Thankful Thursday

1. Last Friday morning we stopped at a yard sale a church was having in their gymnasium on our way to gym class.. Everything was by donation toward their missions fund, and I found a few pairs of sandals for Nadia. Yay! The gym was packed with stuff. I didn't even attempt to look through the clothing.

2. Nadia's softball game was cancelled last night, which means she didn't miss it even though we had said the musical at church took priority.

3. We had an amazing day at Knoebels yesterday! The weather was perfect, and it wasn't crowded.

4. This afternoon I was able to pick up my new engagement ring as well as my other rings that I got resized. My left hand ring finger is still a size 5, but my right hand ring finger knuckle has gotten bigger. It's so nice to be able to take those rings on and off without ice cubes and physical pain! I remember when I was engaged in 2000 that I would often find myself looking down at my left

hand. It was weird to be doing that again today. It's special to me knowing the diamond was my great grandmother's.

5. Today we had a wonderful time at Art Day. Last year a lot of the art stations were outdoors. Everything had to be indoors this year because it was raining all day. Jess opened up her home to almost 100 people today. We were there almost four hours (some were there for shorter or longer amounts of time). I would estimate she had at least 30 different art stations set up in various places on three floors of her new house. She'll be hosting another Art Day tomorrow. We also enjoyed the potluck lunch.

6. Today two frames I recently ordered arrive on our doorstep. I put a piece of artwork into each one, and Paul hung them on the wall this evening in the family room. I am enjoying displaying some more of their artwork this way!

7. Ian's soccer practice was cancelled today due to the rain. Tomorrow the ONLY thing on our schedule is gym class. After two hectic days, I am ready for a day mostly spent at home sweet home!

8. At first we used bedding for the guinea pig cage. That was great at minimizing the smell, and we could wait a week to clean it out, but the bedding got EVERYWHERE. I felt like I needed to vacuum multiple times a day. The felt fabric I bought needed to be changed more often, but it solved the "bedding getting everywhere" problem. The problem we encountered was it wouldn't stay covering the entire space. Sometimes the guinea pigs would move it, an other times it was my kids who accidently moved it while getting a guinea pig out. This meant poop was piling up on the bottom of the cage instead of only on the fabric. I had to clean the cage more frequently, and it was more disgusting to clean it out. The final straw was then the guinea pigs were getting dirty from this and then also spreading that to the kids' clothes. We gave the guinea pigs a bath a couple of times in the sink, and they were not crazy about it. I had the idea of putting down Velcro to attach the fabric more firmly to the bottom of the cage, and thus far it seems to be working. I attached the Velcro yesterday morning. Hope this idea is a "winner" as my mom would say.