Thankful Tuesday

1. We are half way through our two weeks of only having one car. Some days it hasn't caused any inconvenience. On Sunday Paul didn't go to church with us because we only had one car, and last Wednesday I couldn't go to choir rehearsal. Today Nadia is missing her first art class at the Children's Museum because we only have one car. We will be ever so grateful when we have two cars again next week! I will be able to go to choir tomorrow night because there isn't any AWANA tomorrow night due to the church having a business meeting.

2. Last week I ended up receiving several free shipping codes for Shutterfly (from Gymboree, Kellogg's, AYSO, etc.). I am going to be receiving a lot of orange packages in the next two months! I am trying to use Shutterfly to save money on Christmas gifts.

3. We had a great time together as a family of five on Friday going to see Curious George and Steamtown National Historic Site.

4. The kids enjoyed building a jet (in honor of Veteran's Day) at Home Depot on Saturday morning. They love that Home Depot projects involve paint. Paul prefers the ones at Lowe's because they don't involve paint, ha ha.

5. We had a great time celebrating Paul's mom's birthday at their house on Saturday. Oliver made up his own birthday song and kept singing it while playing a guitar. What a hoot! We are so thankful that Paul's mom has been MUCH healthier over the past year than she had been the previous two years. We are also thankful she is done with chemo and radiation. She really liked the present we gave her, which put a smile on my face.

6. The kids really enjoyed the field trip at Papa John's yesterday. Paul was wishing he could have joined us for that tour. The highlight for the kids was that they each got to make their own 10 inch pizza. I wish I had a video of Oliver tossing the dough in the air. The kids could have put ANY topping on their pizza, but they just made three cheese pizzas. We then enjoyed the pizza, drinks, and a little taste of their chocolate chip cookies. The whole thing was free!

7. The piano was tuned this morning for the first time in at least three years.

8. Nadia and Ian are going to be evaluated tonight for Upward basketball (every child is evaluated in their attempts to have the teams be somewhat balanced). I am grateful they can both be in this program this year.

9. Ian is doing SO well with reading. He is now reading our Bible story to us before bed time. At some point we'll go back to the reading curriculum, but for now he's into Little Bear books.

10. Last Monday they finally harvested the corn field near our house. I always prefer when they plant soybeans in that field because once the corn gets to a certain height, it blocks our visibility to see if cars are coming where we need to make a turn. I was so happy when I saw they had finally harvested
that crop. Whew.

11. I mailed the checks this week to pay off one of our retirement loans (the smaller one). That was a good feeling! It is going to take longer to pay off the other one, but I am still hoping to do so before we sell this house.

12. Although at first I was not sold on the idea of Paul being a professor, the idea had definitely grown on me because I knew from experience what the salary and benefits could be, and I knew that the two semesters last about 30 weeks of the year, and that professors usually teach three days a week which makes one's schedule on the other days rather flexible. It has been hard to let go of that plan after investing seven years in graduate school toward that end, especially considering running a manufacturing plant is a 6-7 day a week job all year long. I contacted Bloomsburg to see if they were doing any tenure track searches, but they aren't even hiring adjuncts due to decreased enrollment. I have wished that could go back in time and not resign from my position, but I do love homeschooling my kids.
Today part of our schoolwork including reading picture books about Ireland, watched a video of a Riverdance, listened to Irish music (thanks to the library), and we're having beef stew for dinner. For handwriting Nadia wrote a thank you note to Papa John's. I do love being their mom and teacher!

13. On Sunday evening I realized I had started to come down with something. Paul stopped on his way home last night to get me some antihistamines, which I really appreciated. That and putting some ointment on my raw nose has helped. I'm hoping no one (particularly Oliver) catches it from me.

14. Although selling the house and moving are not tasks I look forward to going through, there are some benefits along the way. One is having the house really decluttered (many toys moved to the basement for example) for the photos the realtor took yesterday and also to be more easily prepared for showings in the future. Paul cleaned the fence and did a few other small projects around the house. He also went through a large stack of papers I had been wanting him to go through for three years. Well he didn't totally go through it. Some of it just was hidden under the bed, but he did start the project anyhow. We have taken car loads to the donation center (before I started trying to sell things) and sold other things. This means less stuff to pack and move and in the case of selling things has resulted in some money to put toward the retirement loans.