grisaleen's Xanga

Thursday, January 22, 2009

Thu, 22 Jan 2009 14:25:53 GMT

Pouty little girl out in the snow. She was sad because the neighbor girl got in her mom's car and they left (and Mino wanted to play with her).

But then we went out back and made snow angels and things were good again.

I have the greatest kid ever, I swear. Last night in the middle of the night I sneezed and from down the hall she yelled "Bless you mom!" I was totally cracking up because I didn't know she was awake. "Thank you hon" "You're welcome." :) And that was it, at least for a little while.

And last night I took her to the store and I let her wear a skirt that was really a dishtowel and a clothespin, a headband made from cutting a sleeve off an old t-shirt, and a magic wand made out of a spiral straw and a christmas star ornament. So fun. She's been wearing that headband for nearly two days now.

I've been in a non-blogging and non-picture-taking slump lately. The weather has just been so flippin' cold. Yesterday was a nice reasonable 18 degrees and today looks about the same, so we can start spending more time outside, but for a while it was either too windy or, like last week, just too cold.

Ryan and I start classes on Monday. We'll both be going 3/4 time and Ryan's mom will be watching Mino a lot since our classes overlap. It's good though - this winter break was very nice, but when you have things going on, you really do get up and moving and you feel better, even if frazzled.

Monday, January 19, 2009

Mon, 19 Jan 2009 21:58:59 GMT

Ouch.

What Kind of Reader Are You? Your Result: Book Snob You like to think you're one of the literati, but actually you're just a snob who can read. You read mostly for the social credit you can get out of it.
Literate Good Citizen
Obsessive-Compulsive Bookworm
Dedicated Reader
Fad Reader
Non-Reader
What Kind of Reader Are You? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Wed, 24 Dec 2008 16:41:08 GMT

I know this doesn't matter one little bit, but I added a picture of Ryan clearing out the end of the driveway for some size reference. The pile is gone (after MUCH shoveling, over the past three days), and this picture helps to show how high the snow is here.

Sunday, December 21, 2008

Sun, 21 Dec 2008 18:55:54 GMT

Why yes, I AM a nerd.

So last night, Ryan and I went out to finish clearing off yesterday's snow in preparation for the big storm we got last night/this morning. We fixed the snowblower so it works SO much better now (yay!) and widened the opening to the drive way (let's just say it's a good thing everyone who uses the driveway owns small cars). Last night dumped a bunch of snow and now the wind is crazy today. The worst part is that it's -6 (-29 with wind chill) so we have NO desire to go clear off what the snowplows did to the end of our driveway. So we are staying inside today, all day.

My driveway.

Here's where the nerd part comes in. I wanted to better illustrate how blocked in we are. Yellow is our driveway, blue is the pile at the end of the driveway.

Look, it's almost as tall as the mailboxes! Btw, that car is actually three lanes away, but the perspective is weird, so it looks like it's closer.

So yeah. That stuff they plow is always really slushy and heavy, too. No thanks.

Monday, December 15, 2008

Mon, 15 Dec 2008 22:49:58 GMT

Mino just had her worst day ever. Full-on tantrums, every few minutes, over the smallest of offenses. I've NEVER seen her like this.

Sunday, November 23, 2008

Sun, 23 Nov 2008 18:54:28 GMT

A few months ago I went to visit my mom. I told you about that part, but I haven't told very many people about this next part.

For a while now, my mom has been talking about giving me a house she owns. For a variety of reasons, she was holding on to it until I was ready for it. So when I went out to visit her this fall, we talked and she decided that it was time for me to have it. I knew this was coming eventually, so it wasn't a big shock to me, but I was pretty happy about it. :)

I wasn't able to get to the house right away to clean it, and I've been waiting to show pictures until the place was cleaned up and I got the roof repaired. The roof was really bad. But I've spent some time on it and now I'm excited to show the pictures. This place holds a lot of memories for me and I'm thrilled that I'll get to share those memories with my daughter.

The place came furnished, but I haven't tried to clean the sofa or chairs yet. I was just working on the walls, ceiling, floor. The garage (it has a garage! Yay!) has a big stain on the floor that is permanent, but for the most part I was able to clean up the inside. Oh, and the bedroom is pretty dirty still, so just ignore that part, okay? The house sat unoccupied for a number of years and that's why it was so dirty - mostly just years of dust, you know? The actual structure is totally fine.

Click here for pictures

Friday, November 21, 2008

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 16:34:56 GMT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVqqj1v-ZBU

Friday, October 31, 2008

Fri, 31 Oct 2008 19:38:52 GMT

I've got a riddle for you.

A woman called in to one of those morning radio talk shows, complaining that no one ever pronounces her daughter's name correctly. They have her spell it out for them, and then can't say it correctly either. The woman seems seriously annoyed and can't figured out why no one can pronounce this name when it's spelled just like it sounds. I'm going to give you a while to think about it before I give the answer. The name?

Le-a

Don't google it, that's cheating.

Saturday, October 25, 2008

Sat, 25 Oct 2008 14:15:32 GMT

Tell me about some subcultures that you think might be interesting to research a little bit. I'm not talking about races or ethinicities. Some of the examples were Harley riders, cutters, Moose Lodge, the goth culture.

And there's a prize! The winner gets their topic written about in a 5-6 page, double-spaced essay written by a bonafied college student! Yay!

Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Wed, 22 Oct 2008 17:43:33 GMT

Yesterday I stayed over at my friend's house because she had to leave really early in the morning with her son for an appointment and needed someone to watch her daughter. So Elka and I just stayed the night instead of waking the kiddo up at 4 in the morning, just to go back to sleep over there.

Anyway, the girls had fun playing, for the most part. I did get some comical moments, and this has to be my favorite:

Looks innocent enough, right? Oh no. The minute Mercy turned her head the other way:

I CANNOT stop laughing at this. Omg, it's so funny. If you must know, she was actually just freaking out about the marker on her hands, but it totally looks like she's trying to send Mercy some Death Rays. Seriously, I'm just dying here, it's so hilarious.

Then we've got Mercy:

There are a million possible captions for this, but I'm not going to write any, because it's funnier to just look at it and imagine them for yourself.