DragonBlog

Little Ramblings

I have to say that even with my iPhone to help me sift through and delete the crap and spam email while I'm pooping anyway I have a free moment, I still feel like every free moment means sitting down at my computer and sorting through the rest. Right now there are 63 email sitting in my inbox on my main account and over four thousand in a reserved box in outlook that feeds off my "business" account for the jewelry stuff. No, these are not orders. I subscribed to a list where other jewelers share ideas and questions and I'm trying to glean the wisdom of the ages out of it.

Not ALL of it is wisdom, mind you. It's just that there's enough of it in there to make me want to read it.

Grrrr...

In other news, we did NOT suffer any problems from the recent flooding across the Chicagoland area. Thankfully it seemed to cut across just south of any area that might really effect us, although Brian did have to work from home yesterday because the office he goes to was closed. He was able to still do what he needed at home though, which was fortunate. Looking over the images and reading the stories though - I am really caught off guard by the scope of the flooding. It seemed strange to me to see that areas of the airport flooded - there were pictures online of busses at the airport with water coming up steps into the bus, and people being rescued from flooding baggage terminals. In pictures of other areas - further southwest, I saw an image of the football field at my High School totally flooded and while it's next to a tiny lake, it's not really near one of the rivers that closely. In the northwest, I saw a road I frequently travelled when we once lived in Streamwood - closed off and flooded out. Areas of Elgin were hit too, although that was by the river and further away from where we once had an apartment. It all has that "it could have been us" feel to it. My heart goes out to anyone who's having to deal with the aftermath right now - especially in the seven counties that have already been declared disaster areas by the state. My heart also goes out to those dealing with Ike too, however. I can only try to imagine what dealing with these kinds of disaster must be like. Today, I feel blessed that I am safe and dry.

The rain has, however, made everything look green around here again. Driving home from dropping Jareth off at school this morning, I noticed that the fields I pass looked greener today. It feels like the last great hurrah before everything begins to turn to deep yellows, oranges, browns and reds. Already some of the leaves are turning. I love the colors this time of year. It also helps that we're coming up on a point where my allergies begin to slowly subside and give way for me to open windows and air out the house. I find myself more inclined to do fall cleaning than in the spring and already I was vaccuming like mad yesterday - clearing cobwebs and getting dust off the baseboards. Time to tidy up before we are shut in over the winter. The Fall Equinox is coming next Monday and I need to prep. Brian may take the day off so we can go to the arboretum or some other cool tree-laden place with the kids. I might look for apple-picking places too - I know a couple web sites I can peruse for those. Each of our seasonal holidays are slowly becoming more interesting with each year we do them. I've already had a few people intrigued by our Winter Solstice celebrations. Just explaining them to others has been making me look forward to Solstice already. That's a nice change from the yearly dread that I used to feel about Christmas coming.

Rambling onwards - I had a few fun moments of conversation I heard from the children as of late. A few days back, on the way to school, Jareth and Kayla were discussing motorcycles. I believe they had seen one on the road that had prompted them to talk about what "their" motorcycle would look like...

Jareth: My motorcycle would be pink!
Me: Pink? Why pink? If I had a motorcycle it would be dark blue, or black, or gray...
Kayla: My motorcycle would be gray!
Jareth: (obviously contemplating) Well...
Kayla: And daddy would push me!
Me: Daddy would push you on the motorcycle?
Kayla: (with that excited, dreamy sound to her voice) Yeah!
Me: (slightly skeptical, but amused at the imagery)Oooo-kaaay.
Kayla: AND there'd be helmets!
Jareth: Yeah, I'd have a helmet too!

I shall need to remind them of this conversation if either of them ever actually DOES own a motorcycle. That's my kids... helmeted... awesome!

Then, yesterday, when Brian didn't go to the office for work, it meant that his car was still in the garage when we got back from dropping Jareth off for school. As we backed back into the garage, Kayla - Mistress of Astute Observation - pointed out to me:

Kayla: There's daddy's car.
Me:Yep.
Kayla:Is daddy going to walk to work?

Sometimes I just love how the little wheels in their minds turn, taking what information they have to go on and making assumptions with Kid Logic algorithms. Brilliant. And totally entertaining.

I probably have a million more, but they slip away quickly over the course of the day. I'll try to post them more often as Kayla seems to be a wealth of them right now. She brain-growth-spurting, which is totally fun to watch.

I just have to keep remembering not to warp their little minds with my sad, sick sense of humor. *wink*

Anyway, that's all for now. Still considering what I want to do about the photoblog thing and how I want to handle the transition from this one to that one. I haven't decided if I want to try to import all of this one into the new one and continue from there, or just keep this one as an archived, purely html output. I do want to save this one, as it has all manner of great stuff to blackmail the kids with share with the kids one day. We'll see what happens...

Current Mood: amused

Coming Soon!

I'm finally working on getting this blog back in order. I've got a test site in progress, which will move to this spot once I figure all the new software out...

Feel free to check it out:

http://www.rayndragon.com/b2eblog/

Enjoy!

Kindergarten

Oh my gosh. I dropped Jareth off at school this morning. He's officially a kindergartener!!!

Crap. I'm getting older, aren't I? I think I just felt another hair turn gray...

My little guy was totally nonchalant about the whole thing. And he's totally still young enough to still let me smother him with hugs and kisses before leaving. I think I have at least another year before I start hearing "MOM!!" out of him and have to play it cool in front of the other kids. Fortunately, I'll be able to transfer my smotherings to my daughter at the time.

She, on the other hand, is totally loving the whole "I don't have to share SHIT while my brother's off at school! Mwahahaha!" thing I think. The family room floor is littered with toys and she has been content to let me get some work done around the house while she played on her own. More boxes to unpack and stuff to sort through. I think Jareth will likely be moving on to high school before I get everything unpacked. We're trying to find appropriate long-term solutions for the boxes of old photos and documents from my long-gone family members. One day, I'll find time for those projects. One day.

Meanwhile, I just want to get all the books back out. I think we emptied about 20 boxes over the weekend - just in books! There is actually ONE box of books that I have no use or need for anymore, but I am loathe to get rid of books unless they are really, really, REALLY useless in my life. Which means I still have a shelf half-full of British monarchy-related crap that was my mom's. Because... I might have an interest one day. Or, one of the kids might. Or... whatever. They're books, damnit. They're, like, sacred and stuff.

But the big, honking book on pregnancy can go. Been there. Done that. Two kids is enough for us. We've decided.

Besides, the health crap is still lagging on. Apparently blood pressure wasn't annoying enough - now I find that my cholesterol is crap too! I refused to go on the meds for that one yet, as I'm already on something for the blood pressure (at least it seems to be mostly working), so I'm adding three big, juicy pills of fish oil to my daily routine. Mmmm. Yay. These things look like someone pissed in the jello mix and then turned it into suppositories. And then I'm supposed to swallow them instead...

ANYway...

I think I'll just leave you with that lovely visual image. I'm off to get back to some housework before I go pick up my kindergartener from his first day...

Current Mood: accomplished