The birthday boy yet again...

The birthday boy gets ready to blow out the candles

Another week has come and gone and here I am writing about it.

Monday was Eden's day at daycare. This week, Al took her on his way to work around 8:00 & picked her up at 5:00. I ran a hundred errands and crossed off at least a dozen things on my 'to do' list. One of which was calling Bissell. In broken English and with not one, but two crying children in the background, I was talked through a trouble shooting program to try and fix the problem on my new carpet cleaner. After following her directions according to her computer, the cleaning fluid was still not coming out. She said, "push on the gasket and turn the bottle upside down. Does the fluid come out?" "Why, indeed it does", says I, as I watch it dump all over the kitchen floor. "Good", she says, "now turn the machine on." I turn on the machine. It is loud. The lady on the other end of the line continues to talk. I cannot hear her, so I turn off the machine. She says to me, "you need to turn the machine on to complete the following directions." I turn the machine back on. It is still loud. The lady on the other end of the line contines to talk. I cannot her hear, so I turn off the machine. She says to me, "you need to turn the machine on to complete the following directions." (Are you starting to see a pattern here?) I turn the machine back on and start laughing. This lady can't really be this stupid, but yes, we continue like this two more cycles, until I tell her to read the directions to me with the vacuum turned off and I will write it down. This is ok with her. It's still not working right. Then, for a finale, she says to me, "can you smell the cleaning fluid when you sweep back and forth?" "Yes, I can. Because YOU TOLD ME TO DUMP IT ON THE FLOOR!". The conversation deteriorated from here and ended with me having to find a big box to ship it back to Michigan in. Supposedly, they will send me a new one in 7-10 days.... I'm still looking for a box.

Tuesday was Al's 33rd birthday. We celebrated with chocolate cake and ice cream. I reminded him that Jesus died at 33yrs after preaching for only 3, so to make the most of it. While the ice cream was thawing on the counter, Eden disappeared and was very quiet. When we found her, she had stolen the top to the ice cream and was licking it clean. Very camera-worthy.

Wednesday was a typical busy Wednesday for both of us. The Maytag washer repair person was here first thing in the morning, replaced the electronics board on the washer and left me with a weeks worth of dirty laundry. Ninety minutes later, the washer refused to give me my first batch of clothes and I had to call the store, pleading for him to come back. Naturally, he'd already left town and wouldn't be back until next Wednesday. In the meantime, I had to call Sears back and re-schedule the repair person to come out. This took an hour on hold and talking to the computer at Sears, trying to convince a machine that, yes, the repair person was there that morning and, yes, I needed repair service. I’m not joking about the time at all and by the end, it was not a friendly exchange in words. I'm pretty sure Eden saw steam coming from my ears. I still couldn't retrieve the clothes (4 of which were Al’s clericals) and since they had partially drained, I was afraid mold would set in. After a valiant duel with the door (and discontinuing the power source), I got it open, wrung my clothes out by hand and dried them for 2 hours in the dryer. I'm still waiting for next Wednesday...

Thursday was a follow up appointment for Lars at the doctor in Scottsbluff, so I braved the New World and took 2 kids Wal-Mart shopping by myself afterwards. Five minutes into the trip, I thought this was going to be Ok. Ten minutes into the trip, somewhere in the health and beauty section, I looked down to see Eden’s eyes as big as moons and her mouth wide open. She was choking on a plastic top to a vending machine toy. In one fell swoop, I proceeded to rip her out of the front carriage toddler seats and turn her around to do abdominal thrusts. The sheer force of me ripping her out of the seat, however, was enough for her to throw up all over the store’s floor, plastic top and all. The crowd gathered, and I grabbed a bottle of hand sanitizer from the shelf and decided to buy it after using half right then and there. I calmly walked away from the crowd, as if I do this every day with my child. Two aisles over, in dog food, I was shaking like a leaf. Overhead, I heard, “Clean up near pharmacy…”

Would you believe that Friday was uneventful? We had the day off. We slept in, made brunch, read a dozen books, took a nap, had a snack, played outside, ate supper, then went to church for scrap booking night. Eden played with her friends, Lars was man handled by all the adults, and I got two pages done by 8:00!

Saturday, Eden had a play date with the Douthit girls, and I took my laundry. We were there all day.

Sunday was Sunday.

Eden went to a Pumpkin Patch last Saturday with the Douthit's while Lars was in the hospital

Stay tuned until next week, when I tell you all about the entrapping garage door that almost prevented Eden from going to daycare this morning….