Ketchup Day & A Brain Declutter all wrapped up in one...

*The inventor of these new dip or pour Heinz Ketchup thingies at fast food places should win the Noble Prize.  It is pure genius.

*I feel like I just haven't posted enough pictures of one of my favorite faces lately so this picture does double duty. 

*Notice the crocked glasses.  They are super glued together...We are anxiously waiting for the eye doc's to call us to say Jake's new glasses are in...

*So for the Ketchup/catch up part of this post I have some pictures of the fun we had hanging out in the Detroit airport on our trip back from NH.  We drove up with Nee and Papa G and flew back.  Long story slightly shorter:  The plane had problems in Burlington, VT (where we were flying out of) and after they thought they were going to have to have us all get off the plane and book new flights they fixed the problem!...but not in time catch our connecting flight in Detroit to Charlotte.  Did you know Detroit is the 3rd largest (or is it busiest...I don't remember but it was both) airport in the US?  Did you know that it costs $4 to rent one of those luggage carriers and I count in among the best $'s I have ever spent.  We had Wendy's for lunch (that is where the ketchup pictures came from) and had fun going back in forth through the cool tunnel that lights up and plays funky music. 

We even got to ride on the...train thingy.  I am typing this late Monday night early Tuessday morning so I may say thingy a lot....Here we (I am obviously taking the pictures) waiting for it....

...and here we are on it.  :)

*On the plane I got the window seat on this leg.  It was 3 seats across and I didn't want to have to share chair space with the person on the other side.  You have to think about these things when you are fat fluffy (fat is not a nice word I guess.  Jake gets mad if I say I am fat.  I know I am though so it doesn't offend me like he thinks it should.)

*I am slightly obsessed with clouds lately.

*Jake has a new bike.  Daddy and Papa Harmon came home from Walmart with it one Friday night.  It was dark out and I had no prior knowledge I needed to be ready to take these pictures so I had to act fast.  This isn't actually the bike he ended up with.  It broke the very next day when he really road it for the first time. But they went and got another one and after the tube in the tire of that one had to be replaced the second time Jake road it, it is working just fine.

 Moral of the story:  There is a reason why bikes from Walmart don't cost very much.

*Which brings me to another thing I need to declutter from my brain.  I have come to realize that on some occasions we are way too hard on Jake.  But than on other occasions we are not hard enough...Example:  Aaron got a little perturbed with Jake when he wasn't comfortable riding his new bike in the dark.  He was a little hard on him...Sorry but it is true Aaron.  Jake hasn't had a bike (that worked, or was the right size) for years and he isn't exactly a dare devil...but Daddy is pretty athletic and wishes Jake was a little tougher.  I on the other hand tend to maybe, just a little bit, every now and then  baby him.  There I said it.  I am having a hard time with the fact that my child is almost 11 and even though he will always be my baby he really isn't a baby any more....So, there is is.  The

 dilemma. And there are other examples of when I am way to hard on him and Aaron isn't hard enough!..Maybe it is balancing out because he is really pretty amazing (he has his moments...some days more than others...like today when EVERYTHING I said was followed by: "do we have too?" or  "what if we do (fill in the blank here depending on which conversation it was during...) instead of (the thing we need to do)? or  "it's my hair and I don't want to cut it" or...never mind I think you get the picture....) in spite of our inconsistencies...

*It is one of my favorite times of year right now.  I love it when stores look like everybody on the planet needs crayons, glue, and notebook paper.  I LOVE.Love.love school supplies and I am trying very hard not to buy any (besides what we really need) because when we moved and I packed up all the composition notebooks and colored pencils, (and folders, and pencils....etc.)  I realized we could have our own school supply sale....I was thrilled (as you can imagine) when I found a mega pack of my favorite pens (the cheap  Bic crystal pens) in a new variety

 of colors.  It had the old stand by black, red, and blue.  But it also had pink, two shades of green, another shade of blue, and lavender. I  was pretty much thrilled.  We also got Jake some cool new erasable pens (better than the old ones) that he is pretty psyched about too.  We got our shipment from Classical Conversations in (I ordered it on a Wed. afternoon and it came Fri. morning!!!)!!!  I am so excited and would put a picture up (you are not surprised I took pictures are you?  Aaron was making fun of me but I am used to it) but it is on the camera that is in the room Jake is asleep in right now.  I will put them up another time and tell you all about how amazing homeschooling is going to be this year because of it.  I keep singing "it's the most wonderful time of the year!"  because I love school supplies so much. :)

*I am going to have to put glue on my hands, let it dry, and then peel it off some time soon.  I love doing that or should I say "loved" since I haven't done it in years and years.  I remember doing it when I was little and it seemed like it took FOREVER to dry....I never have been very good at the whole having patience thing....

*We are spending the night at Nee and Papa's while they are away in NH still.  Aaron had to work until 9 tonight so we decided to bring Sadie over and enjoy an evening of feeling

 like we have a house.  I haven't mentioned lately that we are finding out buying a house in shortsale is not even close to being short...We put in out final offer last week and are still waiting to hear if it has been accepted or not. Yes, I am trying to be patient.  "Trying" being the operative word.  Nana and Papa are saints for letting us stay with them for 3 months now waiting for the house to come through.  I am crossing my fingers for news soon.  I am ready to have our stuff again.  I miss our very old and uncomfortable mattress.  I miss my silverware-I know that sounds weird but it really is funny the things you miss when you don't have them...Soon enough we will be united with our spoons. :)

*I hope you have enjoyed the pictures I have taken of some of my favorite things to buy this time of year.  They are all cheap so it is easy to justify buying them but when you have enough to supply a small school it really doesn't matter how cheap they are.  One of the Walmart employees looked at me like I was crazy and asked if I needed help.  I just laughed and said I was just looking and that I loved school supplies.  She got it after that.  She probably does too.  I bet that is why she works at Walmart.  For the discount I am sure she gets on school supplies....Lucky dog....

*Speaking of dog, Sadie is loving sleeping inside right now.  It is funny because she loves being free to wander outside but she falls right back to being on a leash to pee while we are at my mom and dad's like she is used to it.  I guess that is her way of making sure she gets invited back to our slumber parties at Nee and Papa's little cottage house.  If she acts like a pain in the neck she would get left home in the dog pen (which is huge by the way so it is not like it is torture or something.  She goes in the dog pen voluntarily to sleep in the holes that she and Penny have dug that keep them nice and cool.) and not be able to enjoy her Nylabone's and raw hide bones that she loves.  It will be nice when we have our house so she can be outside and inside as much as she (or we) wants.

*I just watched "The Time Traveler's Wife".  I got it on Black Friday for $2 or something like that and I just got around to watching it.  Besides the naked butts (I am not going to explain that right now because it is just too late.) and the ending, I liked it.  I am a happy ending kind of person and while some would argue it is a happy ending,  I would say not so much.  It was an okay ending, but when I say happy ending I really mean a perfect ending. Think: You've Got Mail or Sweet Home Alabama-those are my kind of endings.   It is a movie.  I want everything to end up working out perfectly.  It is already far fetched and unbelievable so why not end it perfectly for the characters?  If you haven't seen it you would probably like it.  The naked butts may offend some people so keep in mind they (yes they) are briefly in there.

*I did take one good lesson away from the movie:  I need to start living better during the day.  I have been sleeping horribly lately and it has made me pretty groggy during the day.  I am okay once I fall asleep...I just can't seem too!  Restarting exercising doesn't help with that either.  Although I will have loads more energy once I get in shape, the getting there makes me pretty tired at first...Why is it is so hard to fall asleep and so hard to get up in the morning?

*Right now my eyelids are heavy...maybe I just need to declutter my brain every night...I will see if it works...except it is so late I am going to have to drag myself out of bed.  At least I will be really awake when I get up because I will have to walk Sadie on a leash instead of just letting her out of the garage.  A nice walk early in the morning in the heat and humidity will wake me up.  Note to self:  Ask Nana if I can come and continue using her treadmill once we get our house (we will only be 2 doors down) instead of suffering out doors....

*...another note to self:  Keep praying and crossing you fingers that it will still be summer when we get out house....