Well, so far we have accomplished getting my entire house into shambles. It's a WRECK around here. It's so exciting!!! You always have to tear up jack before accomplishing something truly grand. If the magnitude of the mess directly connects to the grandness of the finished product then things should be beyond fantastic in the end! ;-)

We went to town a little early on Tuesday so I could go vote before we picked Mom up at the airport. Felt good to get that done. I've done my part. I wasn't so much voting for one person as I was voting AGAINST another! :-) Anyway, we got Mom from the airport and took her out to eat at the Olive Garden. Dad doesn't like Italian food and she never gets to eat at places like that, so it was fun. We came home and spent our first evening just THINKING. Got to get a good game plan going before you jump into remodeling stuff, you know?!

Yesterday, once we finally got through breakfast and devotions and all that, we all piled into the vehicles and headed to town to shop for everything we'd scribbled down on the list the night before. Home Depot and Lowes. I think we were successful. We got home with only about an hour to work. It was good, actually, because there's always so much prep work to be done before you can actually start on a real "project." So I removed vent and outlet covers and started scrubbing walls.

Mom went with me to watch the kids at their riding lessons at 4:00. They're all doing good and seem to have fun, but Sam has told me three weeks in a row now that he doesn't want to go and ride... until we get there--then he changes his mind and rides after all. Anyway, Staci let Katie and Joe trot for the first time yesterday. HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! Ohhhhh, how I wish I would have had my camcorder!!! Joe was HILARIOUS! There's just no way to describe it. I only hope that my mind can forever remember the crazed look on his face and those giant eyeballs of his. You'd never know it to watch him, but he had a blast! He bounced around quite a bit and never really got the hang of a "posting trot" (you're supposed to sort of stand up on every other bounce), but he sure had fun. Still, I don't think he had as much fun as Katie girl did. She LOVED it. Not at first--she wanted to stop right away the first couple of times, but then she got into the groove and did really good. And asked to do it again and again! It was fun to watch them having so much fun! :-)

We came home and got back to work. Mom scrubbed walls while I painted ceilings in the bathroom and the utility room. Then we got the walls painted in the utility room as well. We were really surprised we got so far since we didn't really start until 5:30 or something like that!

Today wasn't quite as rewarding initially. We were busy for hours and hours before you could really see any progress! It was a bunch of those jobs that are necessary to do before you can do the really fun stuff that says WOW, you know? I got the shelves out of the pantry and scrubbed them down while Katie painted the shelf supports still in the pantry. Mom was busy scrubbing on the cabinet in the bathroom. Then she was busy wallpapering and I was busy painting the shelves, then the cabinet in the bathroom. Everything is turning out SO GREAT! ~sigh~ It's just so fun to be able to take something so gross (although it would be more fun to take something nice and clean for a change!) and turn it into someting really adorable. :-)

We stopped and got everybody ready for church and headed to Sister Grimes house for BTI service. We started into our new book tonight: The Will of God. Looks to be a really good one. Pat had pumpkin pecan bread for us afterward and it was really good, as was the fellowship. Pat is a riot!

After we left there we went out to Dion's... AGAIN. (I'm about pizza-ed out, I think--if that's possible!) Then we headed to Wal-Mart in Edgewood to pick up some more paint supplies. Came home and got the kid-o's to bed, then put our work clothes on again and finished up on the wallpaper and moved the stove and fridge out of the kitchen because WADE, THE FLOOR GUY, IS FINALLY COMING TOMORROW!!!!!! Wa-Hoo!!! I will finally have FLOORS! (Thanks for the tip on the cleaners, Kevin--it's a laminate flooring that we're installing.) We'll have to work our projects around wherever he is working, but that's okay. :-) James also has poor Sister Galaviz roped into coming up here in her work clothes tomorrow. Can you imagine?! Crazy woman seems excited to come help, though. Ha! It will be so fun to have her here! I think he initially had me invite her up here for lunch or dinner or something silly like that. In the middle of all this work?! I'm afraid all we'll have to offer her is a sandwich or left-overs! ~sigh~ I should be so ashamed. Somehow, I'm not. She just strikes me as the kind of lady who will be just as happy with it this way!

So now we blog. Mom in the blue chair and me in the red chair, 10 feet away from each other. She lives in Tennessee and I live in New Mexico. We see each other a few times a year. And here we sit, in the same room, not speaking, clicking away on the computers on our laps like we would do if we were a thousand miles away. There are times when I hate technology. I would have hidden the computers and made Mom play a game with me tonight... if only we could get to the table. Right not it's about 2' deep in STUFF. The kids will have to eat on the floor tomorrow. They'd just as soon do that anyway. Oh well. Hopefully we'll have SOME of this mess cleaned up by tomorrow night. Of course, we will have created a whole new mess in another room by then. ;-)

For now, I'm going to go take a bath and wash my hair. I'll sleep sooooo much better, I'm sure!