I hate my bathroom...

I worked a little on removing wallpaper again tonight. Things went just fine. I'm back to using water and vinegar to remove and it's happening slowly but surely. I had been worried about getting all the paper off from behind the toilet, but I took the lid off the top and was able to reach it all - yay!

...

...

...

But when I cleaned up I dropped the toilet tank lid. It shattered into a billion pieces and left a tear in the linoleum.

Thank you, Audrey

The girls and I follow a pretty predictable schedule. Wednesday starts off with story hour at the library and is almost always followed by a trip to Publix. I pulled into the parking lot of the library and realized that I had committed a major mommy sin.

I left the house without an extra diaper.

We enjoyed our library Easter Egg Hunt and spent some time with friends there. Then, as we were checking out our choices for the week, I smelled it. I wasn't surprised. Audrey's pretty "regular" and changing her diaper while we're at the library happens 3 out of 4 trips. But this time I had no diaper! I could have asked someone else for one - but I was rather embarrassed. Plus, the people there that I know best don't have children in diapers anymore. There is one mom that I wouldn't mind asking that has a child in diapers, but he's a newborn. Audrey wears a size 4. Size 1/newborn would never fit!

So... I shuffled the girls into the bathroom and checked out the situation hoping that I could just flush the stinky stuff. I realized quickly that wasn't an option. After a few minutes of trying a few different things (of which I won't go into detail) I finally pulled out a disposable changing pad out of the diaper bag. Thank goodness it was in there! I folded it in half and positioned it on her diaper area and then pulled her pants up. Since Audrey was in jeans (heavier than most other pants/shorts) everything looked normal!

Most mommies would then hightail it back to the house.

I'm not most mommies.

Most mommies would go ahead to Publix but buy diapers ASAP to change the child.

I'm not most mommies.

I decided to risk it, and we hit up Publix and Walgreens with Audrey not wearing a diaper. Was that a stupid decision? Probably, but I just didn't want to have to drive back into town later, nor did I want to have to pay retail for some Huggies! Fortunately, she stayed dry. Thank you, Audrey!

A new goal

So...
I've been dewallpapering our bathrooms. The girls' bath is finished. Taking the wallpaper off in there was easy and (dare I say) fun. I used a vinegar/water solution that made the room stink but that took the wallpaper off by the yard - no scraper (for the most part) necessary!

But that was then...

...and this is now.

The wallpaper in the master bath is not fun to remove because it has NOT been EASY. Wallpaper removal now feels like work. I started off using the same vinegar/water solution at room temp that I used in the girls' bath. It didn't work well. I decided to make sure the solution was hot/warm and actually WAIT before working. That didn't work well either. Then, I went to just room temp water. This worked.... ok. It was slow going, but it was halfway getting the job done.

We found out that Meme and Pop are coming to visit again next weekend. I told them that my goal was to have the master bath completed by the time they arrived. During the conversation with them, Meme reminded me that we had seen a suggestion online about using a Fabric Softener/water solution to take off wallpaper. Monday night, I decided to try it out. I grabbed some Snuggle and got to work.

Did the Fabric Softener solution make things easier?

NONONONONONONONONONONONONONO

NO

NO WAY

NOT AT ALL

Fabric Softener did not make it easy to remove wallpaper. In fact, it was (BY FAR!!) worse than anything else I have tried. Plus, the smell was bad. Alot of Snuggle squirted in your bathroom DOES NOT smell like Fresh Rain. Instead, it smells like sweet chemicals. Bleh...

Since it's been slow going, I do not think I'm going to be able to have the room completed by the time Meme and Pop get here. My goal now is to have the wallpaper completely off by Thursday night, and to spackle Friday. When Meme and Pop come Saturday - the spackle should be dry and I (we????) can sand and finally paint!

Julia's joke

Julia has a joke now! A funny one!
The 4 of us were sitting around talking to Pop on the phone this weekend when Julia busted out with this:

What goes up when rain comes down?

I don't know - what??

An Umbrella!!!

That's funny! Where did you hear that??

I made it up

(pause)

Plus it was on Dora.

Sick little Julia :(

Last night, around 11:15, Matt heard Julia coughing. He went into her room to check on her, and the next thing I heard was "OH!!!" I jumped up and ran to see what was wrong but was met in the hall by Matt and Julia rushing to the bathroom. She was throwing up. EWWWWW!

After she finished her episode we cleaned up her face, brushed her teeth, and put her hair in a ponytail (just in case!) Matt put a few layers of plastic grocery bags in a bucket and settled Julia and the bucket in our room to watch TV while he and I cleaned up.

When I walked in her room to strip her bed, I was reminded that the child had drunk red Kool-Aid at dinner. We NEVER have Kool-Aid in the house. Why, oh why, did we have to have it that night??? Anyways, there was dark pink throw up everywhere!

Sheets? check
Pillows? check
Comforter? check
Bedskirt? check
Floor? check

I stripped the bed, started a load of laundry, and grabbed the LYSOL! Matt grabbed the Resolve and got to working on the floor.

Julia continued to get sick every 20-25 minutes for the next 3 hours or so. I covered the bed sheets and pillows with towels so that if she got sick there would be less chance for her to mess up my sheets too! This wound up being a smart decision! Eventually, she started feeling a little better and I asked her if she wanted a cracker to eat. She said "yes" and got off the bed to go in the kitchen. I stopped her and told her she needed to eat in the bed. "WHAT??" She thought it was pretty funny that I commanded her to eat crackers (and consequently leave alot of crumbs) in my bed.

During the time in between Julia's episodes, I got to worrying (imagine that!) about Audrey. What if she got sick too?? The poor child would be scared out of her mind! And what if she was sleeping on her back when she got sick????? SO... I dug out a baby monitor and snuck into Audrey's room to set it up. Am I paranoid? yes.

Julia's stomach finally settled down in the 2 o'clock hour and the 3 of us fell asleep around 3. This morning, Julia's been JUST FINE!!! YAY! We did not go to church this morning even though Julia's acting better than ever. We slept in as much as the girls would allow us, enjoyed a lively breakfast as a family, and then gave Julia a much needed bath!

This & That Thursday

* Matt was talking about his latest class. He said, "This class covers the doctrine of God and the doctrine of scripture; it doesn't even touch Jesus." Julia was apparently listening in b/c she quickly responded, "Of course you can't touch Jesus. You can't get into your heart!" Theology from a 4 year old...

* Audrey's latest phrase is "Audra's turn!" She said this over and OVER last weekend in reference to getting to pick which DVD to watch in the car. We found out quickly that she wasn't 100% sure of the meaning. If Julia chose the movie, Audrey would freak out and with teary eyes moan, "Audra's turn!" We would say, "Yes, it's Audrey's turn, " and she'd be perfectly fine... even if the movie was still one that Julia chose. Audrey just wanted it to be said that it was her turn.

* Tuesday, I successfully refilled my ink printer cartridge all by myself. Woo hoo! I'd never tried that before! At least I hope I was successful. As soon as I type that this was a success my printer will probably explode.

* This whole wheat pasta that I've been buying ($.15 per box) is actually pretty good! None of us have minded the switch.

* I've been getting hand-me-downs out of boxes for Audrey's summer wear. She also has a few new items thanks to her grandparents. I wish I were joking when I say that she has NO LESS than 2 dozen choices for her summer Sunday mornings. I think I'll go through everything and give some of those hand-me-downs to Goodwill.

* Tonight is Pajama Party Movie Night - we're watching Emmett Otter's Jugband Christmas.

* After a weeklong reprieve from wallpapering (partially b/c of our trip and partially b/c of laziness) I'm now finished spackling and sanding and am ready to paint the girl's bath! YAY!

* As I type this, Matt and the girls are listening to Michael Jackson and moonwalking around the living room.

Happy Thursday everyone!

Beach pics

Here are some pictures from our weekend. We did have a nice sunny time at the beach Friday morning. It was even warm enough for the girls to wear their swimsuits, but I didn't get any pictures from then. I assumed we'd have another swimsuit day later on. I was wrong. We still had plenty of fun though!




Please do not think that I favor Audrey! I would have loved to have more pictures of Julia, but she wasn't up for that!


Pictures from our beach picnic that I mentioned yesterday...