But It's Going To Get Better

I keep telling myself, "If I can just get through this week, everything will be great."

It's been about, oh, 32 weeks now, and I can assure you that everything is NOT great. But if I make it through this upcoming week, a few things will be easier. I think.

Quick Ten Things of Thankful:

No severe storms this week for us!

I had a four day work week, thanks to my daughter's law school graduation being on Sunday evening. 

We had beautiful weather most of the week and got lots of much needed outside time at school.

One of my kids brushed a bug off his head during circle time. Something made me look for it, and I'm SOOOO glad I did, because that niggling feeling was right - it was a tick. Ick. I stuck it to a piece of tape so the kids could all see it.

We had a fun talk about checking for ticks after this little incident.

I cleaned my closet and found a set of Erimish bracelets in a bag that I had completely forgotten I had even bought. It was like a mini Christmas, especially since they were Christmas bracelets! I think I ordered them when they were on sale after Christmas. Maybe. Who knows?

Black Cherry Propel water has been my go-to (after my morning Diet Dr Pepper) recently. It feels like summer.

One of my favorite student workers made the best homemade chocolate chip cookies I have  ever eaten and brought them to school as a thank you for being flexible with her schedule (she is incredibly dependable and fantastic in the classroom and I should be making HER chocolate chip cookies) AND she shared the recipe with me!

My husband and I ran out to Silver Dollar City on Saturday to listen to a little bluegrass music. It was a gorgeous day for it!

My dad's Tahoe needed a new battery, so we drove it to O'Reilly Auto Parts, because we had just gotten a new battery for our car there and they install the battery for you on the spot. Well. They don't do it with newer cars that have all the electronics, but I didn't know this until I had already bought the battery and the guy asked me if I wanted him to put it in the back of my car and I said I was hoping he'd put it under the hood. We didn't have time to find a place to install it that weekend, so I made an appointment THIS weekend to get it done. I made the appointment for 8 am on Saturday, because I wanted to get it over with, but when we tried to start it, of course it was dead. I had already missed the appointment to get the battery installed, and they were really nice about it and said I could bring the car in whenever we got it started and they would fit me in. We called AAA to jump the car, and the NICEST man came, and instead of jumping it, HE INSTALLED THE BATTERY FOR US. What a thankful!

I spoke too soon about those severe storms. There are storms in Oklahoma and Kansas, and we may or may not be affected. It's been a rough spring on a lot of folks, and hopefully, we are nearing the end of the worst of tornado season.

There's still a whole hour to join the hop!

I didn't take a picture of the tick. Or the battery.
Or the cookies. But I always take pictures
of my sweet girl Nora Pearl

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Spring Weather Is Not For The Weak

I slept through the deadline for last week's Ten Things of Thankful. I seem to be perpetually worn out and I can't get enough sleep. I'm in an exhausting season of my life. I think it's more mental than physical, but since the only way to give rest to the mental part of me is physical sleep, then that's what I've got to do until someone gives me a better idea (totally open to any and all suggestions, so bring 'em on). Now I've got some making up to do with a couple of weeks' worth of thankfuls:

I finished the A to Z Challenge! I had a lot of fun poring through memorabilia from my childhood for the Challenge. I teared up over some of it, but by and large, it was delightful to revisit my past. 

My husband and I spent the last weekend in April working on my parents' house, continuing to sort through items and box them up for either moving or donating or selling. We've had a ridiculous amount of thunderstorms and rain this spring, and that weekend, it seemed to rain non-stop. Not that it would have really mattered, but I didn't think to check the basement until Sunday afternoon when my dad called to ask if it had leaked. 

You know what's coming next, right? There was an inch and a half of water all over the basement. I know this exact measurement, because I stood on the bottom step and stuck a ruler in the water. And as I stood there, surveying the ruined boxes and other items, I would hear "blurrrrrrPPPP" coming from different places around the perimeter of the basement, followed by rippling water. The water was still entering the basement (I read that this happens when the ground is so very saturated that the pressure of the water in the ground causes it to push into basements and foundations). There was nothing I could do at the time, so we left and hoped for the best. We returned on Thursday, and all the water had receded (yay!) but there's a crap ton of stuff that will need to be thrown away (see introductory paragraph about my current state of exhaustion). It could have been a LOT worse, so there's that.

Now, back up a few hours on Thursday to about 1:30 in the afternoon. All almost all of the children at our school were sound asleep. I, myself, was trying NOT to fall asleep as I waited for my last little hold out to drop off to la la land when a shrill tone came over the intercom system, followed by an announcement that we were under a tornado warning. I jumped up, stuck my head out in the hallway, and yelled, "Is this for REAL?!" Because if it was a malfunction of the system, I was going to be ticked, really ticked.

Not a malfunction. I flipped on the lights, told my kiddos that they were getting their wish to go visit the room in the basement where we keep all the extra toys and equipment and where they have asked to go ever since the last time we had a tornado drill some six months earlier. They all popped up from their cots, got an Exit Buddy, and out the door, down the hall, and into the basement we went, along with all the other children (around 70 in all, ages 1-5 years old). We all made it safely to the basement and our safe place in two minutes (woot! woot!), the kids found it exciting rather than scary, and we sang every. single. song. I could come up with before we got the all clear some 40 minutes later. There was some wind damage, some possible tornado sightings (and definite radar detected rotations in the clouds), but nothing came closer to us than four or five miles. Huge thankful!

The first weekend in May was relatively quiet. We should have enjoyed it more.

As early as the day we had the tornado warnings, meteorologists were predicting big storms for Monday night. How do they know these things, anyway? They were correct, and our favorite meteorologist was amped for the event. We watched as he tracked tornadoes on the ground from Oklahoma on across to southwest Missouri. The storm was nearing us, and my husband decided he needed to pack a small bag to take to the basement (I only had plans for grabbing Finn [the other two cats will follow out of curiosity] and my purse and go to the basement). I asked my husband what he packed in his little bag, and he said, "Four pairs of underpants, an extra tshirt, and a pair of socks." "Why four pairs of underpants?" I queried, and his answer was, "Because if this tornado really happens, I'm going to shit my pants!"

About that time, there was a crash on our roof. I grabbed Finn and Nora and ran to the basement. The sirens were blowing and the wind was terrible. It was fast moving, however, and I didn't have to stay down there more than ten minutes. Our house seemed to be intact (found out the next day a tree branch did break off and hit our roof). A small tornado did skip through town, however, and it touched down on a portion of the path from the devastating and deadly 2011 Joplin tornado, so that was scary. No one got much sleep that night.

Wednesday afternoon. Same scenario as the previous Thursday. Kids asleep. All quiet (or so we thought). Announcement comes over intercom that we were in a tornado warning, and it was same song, second verse. We woke up children all over the building, hustled to the basement, and spent an hour waiting for the all clear. Again, there were small tornados touching down in the area, but we were safe. I think I'm ready for spring to be over.

And this weekend? Oh, nothing much. We're in Kansas City. The weather has been lovely. Oh, yeah, and MY DAUGHTER GRADUATED FROM LAW SCHOOL!!! YEEEEEEHAWWWWW!!!

Dodging tornadoes and graduating attorneys. They both have been wild rides!

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