Other Fun Things

This post is the catch-all from the past month of fun or interesting things that we've done that I didn't feel fit anywhere else.

I snagged a picture of Juliet, from the team fb page, presenting with her group in Englis class!

Aunt Wanda sent us these cool Jerusalem Roses to enjoy.  We had fun watching them refresh, but they didn't ever get quite as luscious as the pamphlet showed.

William's was a dud, so we replaced his four days in.

Grace is writing for her school newspaper this year.  She was doing an article on space exploration, and Megan, my friend who works for NASA, kindly agreed to an email interview!  Sadly, when the teacher went to print, she pulled Grace's original article, not the cool one, where she interviewed someone with inside information!  I was so disappointed. = (  Her article was still pretty good, but I got to read the real one, which was much richer, of course.

I didn't quite snap the picture of the coupon fast enough, but when I found an empty soda can in the Walmart parking lot, I took it inside, and recycled it, so I got cents off of my purchase, thanks to the refund coupon.  Maybe you had to be there, but I was excited.

Billy's grill cover was looking pretty sad after two years outside, so we replaced it with the exact same cover.  The color difference is pretty telling.

For my birthday, Billy bought me some new luggage, and it was the easiest product registration that I'd ever done!  10/10 would recommend.  Also, I'm super excited about my new luggage.

I took some pictures of my girls at their fall fest, while they were in the Bingo room.

At an estate sale, my mom and I were using some baskets to hold all of our treasures, and when I got home and washed them, I found that I had the matching large one already!  Small excitements!

At the thrift store I was so excited, then so disappointed.  I thought I'd found a Skippy Jon Jones stuffy!  My mom and I have been searching for this stuffed animal since Emily was in first grade, and we've found one, ever.  = (  So, this one would have been number two, and the coloring was right, but once uncovered, I found it was not Skippy Jon Jones.  After some consideration as to what price I would pay to buy a 'fake' Skippy, we checked out and he came in under budget!  Emily made a collar with a name tag, so now Ms. Jones is the proud owner of Skippy Jones Jon..  = )  She and her students were delighted, and we will continue to look for the genuine article.

Kristy took me out for coffee for my Birthday, and while we were out, we hit the table Goodwill in Charlotte!  We spent two and a half hours there, finding lots of good, funny, and odd items.  This pair of long johns reminded me of a M*A*S*H episode, so I sent it to Billy. = )

One early release Wednesday, I promised Emily that I would take her to Plato's closet to sell the clothing that she cleaned out of her closet. In order to beef up her budget, she helped me return some cans and bottles to Kroger before we went, and we got $6.70 back.  This is obviously a big deal. lol. (6-7)

While shopping, we found some interesting things!  I had warned her that she would probably only get a couple of bucks for one or two items, but they offered her over $60 for her items!  Despite trying on many pairs of jeans, she only found a single pair to bring home, and after a discussion about what would be fair, split the rest of the profit.

Grace got the only child treatment one day, because she came with up on a Sam's Club run, and we went to explore the newly renovated fish ladder park.  It was very musically themed!

Billy and I have been watching the Longmire series, and I talked him into a least trying out the audiobooks, because I enjoyed the entire book series.  He listened for a few days, and enjoyed it, but never found a way to permanently incorporate it into his schedule.  It probably didn't help that he was trying to look up a character, and it spoiled the book because that character was the murderer.

Speaking of Longmire, we're watching it on Roku, with ads.  So, we have this game going where we try to guess the next commercial.  It's been pretty entertaining, though with the Christmas season upon us, the ads are way more varied (and harder to guess) than they were.  One of the ads was for Ulta, which Billy had never heard of, so when I saw it advertised at the gas station, I felt compelled to send it his way.

William had his tooth extraction surgery, which was a far less stressful procedure than when they extracted the bottom tooth with minimal anesthesia in the spring.  Poor guy, it was awful.  We had to get his dentist added to his pre-approval page, and wait until after his thirteenth birthday, which was no problem.  However, two days before his procedure. they called to say his doctor hadn't been added!!!  I was so stressed.  I called my insurance contact at the state, and she was able to pull a blinder, and somehow got the doctor added (they had given me only one of the two NPI numbers that needed to be added in May) in under 24 hours!!!  I couldn't believe it.  I had already called the office (and left a message, because they were shorthanded and didn't have people answering the phones.) So, had to call them back to let them know it was still on.  Luckily, it had never been cancelled.

He had to fast, so his appointment was at 8am.  My mom came over to get the girls on the bus.  While we didn't have snow, it was dark and misty out.  He did great though, and is already back on a regular diet.

I know it's December, but we finally took Grace out for her one-on-one birthday dinner!  Her request was for a place with Boba Tea and Ramen.  Billy used AI to find a place in Frandor that serves both!

She was very pleased!

I also got a boba!

And Billy and I split a teriyaki chicken bento box.  It was quite good!

Last week I took Billy's car in to get his oil changed.  While I was driving along, his tire pressure sensor warning was also cycling through the warnings.  So, while I was in the oil changing bay, I called to see what the wait looked like at discount tire.  He estimated 1-1.5 hours, so once I finished up at the oil change place, I got his car signed in at Discount tire.

I watched him check the sensor on each tire, so I got to learn how the sensors work!  One battery was completely dead, and the other three were on red, so we had all four of them swapped out.  While I waited, it was a pretty enough day, that I went to get a Thanksgiving pedicure!  It looked really good, but I had to leave to go get Alice, and unfortunately not all of the paint had set, so it rubbed in my shoe.  So, a picture against my dirty floorboard is the only one I've got.

Billy found an entertainment center and food court in downtown Lansing.  They have 'inside' shuffle board in an enclosed patio.  They did have heaters going, but it was still pretty cold in there!  Alice didn't want to go, as she wasn't feeling great, so we were just a group of 6, and played on two teams.  We ordered some nachos, sushi, taquitos, and baklava from various shops around the food court to enjoy!

It was really fun, and William was quite good at it!

In addition to cornhole, they also had a Nintendo switch setup, sadly, it hadn't been charged the night before, so the kids didn't' actually get to play.

The twins did get to watch Bluey for a little while, but they were just watching while waiting on their turn for the switch, so when that didn't pan out, it was time to go.

I'd like to go back when the weather isn't as cold, and the patio overlooking the river is a perk not a detriment!  There were a few empty storefronts too, so maybe in the intervening months they will be filled with new culinary delights!

This was a good month full of fun little moments, but you can tell the weather has changed, since all the pictures were indoors!  Here's to even more fun indoor moments!

later days

U of M, Before Tooth Extraction

William was having some teeth removed, so that his orthodontic treatment could begin.  Sadly, this should have been a sedation visit, and the poor guy was wildly uncomfortable, so they only removed half of what they were planning.  He has to wait until he's 13 (so November) before they will perform surgery on him, which gives us time to get all of our paperwork in order!

We arrived quite early, and so we spent some time walking around the campus.

Why are there doors here?

It was sunny, but still chilly, but that didn't stop the college kids from going outside to catch some sun!

We saw this cool building, but ended up taking the long way around to get to the front.

They weren't open for tours yet, and really, we wouldn't have had that much time, but it is a cool historical site!

A warning seal we spotted on our walk back to the dental clinic.

I'm glad we did the fun things before, because he was very unhappy when we left.  And, as if that weren't bad enough, he wasn't able to play his instrument or participate in track for two weeks, because his roots were so close to his sinuses. = (

Next time should be a less traumatic experience for my poor little boy, and hopefully he won't miss out on any concerts or track meets!

later days

edit5-13-25: backdated for continuity.

Other Pieces of Our Lives Worth Mentioning

My big birthday gift was a plant starter.  So that I didn't have to wait until Spring to use it, Billy and Grace set up some lettuce and basil to grow this winter.  New little plants are always so exciting!

They followed the directions, and we were met with quite the success in each pod!  Sadly, success meant that we were to cull some of the plants.  I don't like that part at all and would rather have none than to kill off the late bloomers, so I transplanted any 'bonus' plants that grew.  I'm happy to report that all of my transplants took, and now we have growth in each pod! = )

Erin Elise sent me a double Birthday gift, a reusable bag (yay!)

And beautiful heavy weight sewing scissors!  The little ones are all animal shaped.  I keep saying I should hang them on my wall so that I can look at them while not using them, they are so pretty!

And my last birthday gift that I'll mention here is the sticker assortment that my sister sent me!  I donated the rest to the robotics team to sell as a fundraiser, but I think the sponsor is still waiting for approval from administration to sell them.

I don't know what William was doing, but I have 4 pictures of him in fighting stances from the set and this was the most in focus. = )

I went out one Sunday afternoon to a yard sale, just to inquire after this electric fireplace that I saw in the listing.  It's huge, and heavy, and was only $15, because it didn't have a remote!  Every the optimist, I bought it, and cleaned it.  Emily played with it a bit, and got it to come on!  The only function for which you need the remote is to change the temperature.  Which is the feature I won't even be using it for at my party next summer!  

In the meantime, it fit perfectly beneath my Grandmother's picture, but we will not be keeping it past the party.  I keep reiterating that, and yet it currently has Billy and my stockings hanging on it from the stocking hangers we bought for Alice's first Christmas.  Her Christmas tree one had been squished and deformed and was easy to part with a few years ago. 

But I was in an emotional state this year when I cleaned them out.  These were the final two of the seven we had, since we used to have one for everyone, and I'd slowly cleared them out as I accepted that we would not be moving any time soon.  And this year, after years of not using them, but dragging them upstairs with the rest of the Christmas decor,  Emily helped me rescue them from the donation pile, and we displayed them in front of the fire.  But we will not keep the fireplace. Probably.

We drove all the way to Grand Rapids for a 30 minute appointment, that covered William, Grace and Juliet, so the kids were creative while we waited for the doctor.  Juliet made a poncho.  We took a picture before it ripped, and was thrown away.  She was proud of it. = )

On our way home, the pallet of the landscape looked so much like West Texas that I had to take a picture.  Obviously, the trees are too tall, and there are too many hills, but the colors reminded me of home!

I saw a pretty, young, blue bird on our porch, digging in the siding termination for seeds? bugs? decorations?  It hung out on the porch for a while, but I didn't get the picture I'd hoped for, showing off it's blue plumage. Surprisingly, it didn't even go near the pumpkins!

Emily and Grace spread some carrot seeds in the spring, but when I pulled up the plants under which I thought there'd be a carrot, it was obviously a tubular plant, but no carrot.  After all the pumpkin vines were pulled from the garden at the end of the season, I saw a rather large carrot leaf plant sticking up.  Emily went out dig it up, and it was a carrot!!!!  

After cleaning it and slicing it, everyone agreed that it was a very flavorful and tasty carrot, much better than store bought! = )

Here's Emily, working on her daily Duolingo practice, while checking her grades or an assignment for school, after showering following a late night of dance class!  She's rocking 7th grade, her lowest average is a 98!  We sure are proud of her!

When we set up our Christmas decorations this year, we found that both of our white light strands had not survived the summer. = (  Emily and I went out to a thrift store, that has an adjacent Christmas only building.  This decoration guides shoppers to the Christmas store! = )  We lucked out and got one of our missing strands for $1!

Emily got a robe, and one night she fancied that it looked like an elephant.

Grace wanted in on being an elephant too!

At trunk or treat we gave out leaves with faces, so when I saw these ceramic ones at a thrift shop, I had to snap a picture to show to the kids!

I haven't a clue what the occasion was, but Grace had some very crazy hair!

I bought a shirt to sew into a jacket to go with my Sherlock Holmes costume, but then decided to request the one I actually wanted as a Christmas gift.  So, I washed the shirt, and liked it well enough to repair the small separation of the seam along the bottom right side, and add it to my wardrobe!

Cynthia, Chelsea's mom, sent us this adorable Alice in Wonderland-esque hat!  The kids had a great time trying it on.

A five bump yellow pepper!  

Grace and Juliet used copious amount of Emily's hair color wax product to turn their hair pink.  It turned out pretty vibrant!  Sadly, they also turned entire areas of the house pink, including the bathroom rug and my brand new white towels! It was like The Cat in the Hat!

Thankfully, it all washed up, but I'm still finding cracks that have a little more pink in them than they should!

My mom and I thought we'd go check out the Freetail store at the Lansing Mall, since we'd both been hearing good things about it.  Never wasting an opportunity to get things out of my house, I had a small donation pile to bring with me. .

When we walked in the door, there was a serpentine line through an empty store, with the tail snaking slightly into the corridor of the mall.  We wondered what it was, and it turns out, it's the line to get into the Freetail store!

Our curiosity was not that great, so we just dropped off the donations and walked the mall instead.  We checked in several stores to see if they happened to have red hots, but no luck.

A story that I must include here, because I cannot believe it.  So, I sent Natalie a picture of this sweatshirt asking if she wanted it.  Since I don't usually push a cart, I didn't want to carry it around, so I left it on the rack while I continued shopping.  Once I got an affirmative from her, I went back to grab it, but it wasn't there!  I checked a few other racks thinking maybe my memory of where I'd seen it was faulty, but to no avail!  I was in disbelief.  I found myself looking in peoples' carts to see if they were the one who grabbed it. lol.  I even checked the 'reject' rack at the changing rooms, in case they decided that they didn't want it.  But I guess it was just not meant to be!  I couldn't believe it, there was an Eaton Rapids shirt that had been there for weeks, and no one had grabbed it, but this particular item was gone in the ten minutes between sending and receiving a message?  I guess I know now to carry around my offers so that I don't have to disappoint people on the receiving end by telling them that it's gone!  (And I'm really glad I took the picture, because I would have thought maybe I just made it up!)

The names of the elves in one of the Scooby Doo Christmas books we read were reminiscent of the Lansing winky, blinky and nod towers.

While I was in recovery from my dental implant surgery, my kids took very good care of me, and of themselves.  Grace made me an "M" for mutti out of her magnetic bookmarks, and then transformed it into and "A" for avia and asked me to sent a picture.

On a particular early bedtime for Mutti night, I made a 'to do' checklist for them, so that the next day would be smooth.  I love that they wrote me back some sweet notes. = )

The twins made some advent candle holders at church at the start of the month, and have enjoyed lighting them each Sunday!

Grace and Juliet really like getting mail from Avia, and had fun coloring Ladybug and Cat Noir!

Another gift from my mom was Arby's happy hour on the last day of school!  Everyone got a milkshake, and then we got dinner to go!

In an attempt to avoid updating my blog (one of my bigger projects) I started doing some smaller projects, one of which was cleaning out some of the homeschool supplies.  I've gotten rid of most of what we had, but it's really hard to let go of such an amazing experience, so I'm still holding on to things almost two years later!

One of the items I pulled was the KNEX building kit from science.  The twins would have been using it with their curriculum next year, had we continued homeschooling, but I felt like it was time to pass it on to their classroom teacher.  Grace wanted to use it before we donated it, and built the car first, which just happened to fit Hello Kitty perfectly!!!

On day 2 she started building using the guide, then started adding her own flair!  

William didn't build anything from the guides, but built a character and called him "Bob."

On one of my shopping trips, I found a cute little wolf hat for Grace's friend Zoey.  After a quick message to her mom, to make sure it wasn't a duplicate of a gift she'd already have, I bought it!

 

Grace wrapped it up and I gave it to Kristy the next time we met up!  It even matches her sweatshirt!

Speaking of Kristy, Grace was delighted to know that she personally knew a veteran, and made a special coloring sheet to send to her on veteran's day!

These posts are always the ones that are the most delightful to me.  They are filled with such small moments that they flee my memory, but are brought back into relief whenever I peruse the old blogs!

I can't wait to rediscover these stories in the future!

later days