First of all, I want to thank you all for your wonderful input and the clever suggestions that came pouring in to try to help me out with the dog door thing. No, really. THANKS A LOT. ~sigh~ Bunch of goons! ;-)

It's 3:30 in the afternoon and I'm sitting down to BLOG! Is that great, or what?! Actually, it would usually be considered terrible but I've been a very good girl today. And I'm tired of being good, so I'm taking a break. That works, right?!

Yesterday we loaded up the fam and headed out to Edgewood to do some grocery and t-shirt shopping. We HAD to find some shirts for the kids. They've been growing like weeds and I was tired of seeing their belly buttons poking out from under their shirts. We were able to find t-shirts anywhere from $1 to $3.50, so that works! Everybody has at least a few decent things to wear now.

After our shopping we headed back to the library to actually return our books from two weeks ago and get new ones. Everybody always picks out 6 or 8 books (or more!) and they burn through them in the first two days. Kate is on chapter 5 of her newest book and Joe has read through 2 new Davy Crockett books since yesterday. They're not kiddy story books either. We made a grave mistake, however. We allowed Joe to get a book from the library about robots. He's been driving us NUTS ever since yesterday afternoon, wanting to build a robot. Not with paper bags and sticks and cups and such--a real, working robot. Our conversations go something like this:

"Mom--I'm going to build a real robot! Can you help me?"

"Nope. We don't have the electronic equipment and wiring--or the know-how--or the time right now to be able to do that."

"But, Mom! Can't we take something apart and use it??? Wouldn't it be cool to have a robot that could do anything you want for you?!"

"Why do you think we had kids?"

"Mo-o-o-o-om!!! Then us kids! We need a robot to do things for US!"

And so on. I told him that perhaps one day we could look into tackling a project such as building a robot, but it would certainly not be before Convention and Camp. He's very hard to discourage once he sets his mind to something though and he really, really wants a robot. We'll see what he comes up with.

I did another really dumb thing at the library yesterday. While we were there something suddenly popped into my mind and I looked it up and *voila* I came home with a book of my own. ~sigh~ I don't have time to be reading a book!!! I read Pride & Prejudice a few years ago and I recently learned that there is a book entiled Mr. Darcy's Diary, kind of chronicling his side of the story. Yeppers, that's what I came home with. It wouldn't be that big of a deal if I possessed that certain virtue known as temperance. I started off well enough. The book is in diary form, of course, so it's split up into tiny (usually) little "entries." I would read one or two, then go do the dishes. Read another, then start a load of laundry and so on. In the evening I sat down and read for about an hour. I let the kids stay up 30 minutes later than usual reading their own books, just to be fair. :-) When I put them to bed I spent an hour or two working on curtains. We need curtains at the living room window and the two kitchen windows, so I started on them last night. I hit a roadblock though and didn't have the perseverance to push through it. So I picked up Darcy again. And finished it. ~sigh~ All 330 pages. I have a list a mile long (okay, not a whole mile--but it does fill up an entire notebook page) of things to do in the next week before Convention and Camp, and I sit down and read a book! Bad, bad, bad!!! Still... it was so great!!! Oh, I thoroughly enjoyed it and only felt a small twinge of guilt over shirking my responsibilities. There's always tomorrow, right?! Ha! I'll be all out of tomorrows real soon. Anyway, I still made it to bed by 1:00am, so that's pretty good.

Got up this morning and hit it hard! Had good devotions with the kid-o's, then dove right back into the curtains. I've gone as far as I can go, however, until James gets home with the curtain rods. I'm scared to do the "pocket" part until I have the rod and can check and make sure I'm sewing in just the right place.

So in the meantime, I whipped out two skirts for Katie! Wa-Hoo!!! Yes, that's right--I whipped them out! You know, just like Mom does!!! Okay, so they're probably not JUST like Mom does 'em, but for me it was phenomenal! It's not the kind of thing I would give to somebody else... or want anybody else to inspect closely... but they will cover my little girl and that's the point, so I'm thrilled! She REALLY, REALLY needed some new skirts. They're not the kind of thing that requires a pattern (although it would've been helpful--especially for the A-line one), but I was amazed that I didn't have to rip out seams over and over again and fight with the machine and all of the things that usually make sewing so miserable for me. I had bought this fabric (stretch denim--the best!--for $2 a yard at Hobby Lobby recently) the same time I bought fabric for some new bloomers for Kate. I'd love to get them done tonight, too, but I fear I'm about sewed out, at least for today. I'm glad I'm finally learning to stop sewing before I get all nutty and mad. It's so much better when I just start fresh the next day. :-) I will, however, finish up the curtains tonight. That'll make my husband happy. I do aim to please. ;-)

Well, I need to go get some of my sewing mess cleaned up and figure out something to make for dinner tonight. I'm finishing up on the laundry and I would LOVE to find the oomph to do the ironing tonight, too. I have my doubts about that one, but you never know! In any case, I'd better get busy. Later!

~Becki~