On the Cusp of Sharing

There is BIG news that I have been keeping for about four months now. No, I'm not pregnant. That's what a LOT of people love to think of first. In just a few short days I'll be able to completely fill in all my bloggity friends, but I'll have to keep you in suspense a couple days longer. Just know that this is HUGE.

As for the rest of this post, a list, that's what I have today friends~a list:

1. I have lost 13 pounds since January 1st. Ecstatic!

2. Daniel was discharged from a second therapy (Speech) today. Two done, one to go. The boy speaks in full sentences now, he does not need speech therapy. God is so good!!

3. I am still cleaning out toys, closets and stuff! Ugh! I want to get it done, but sickness, school and playing Wii seem to get in the way. Don't judge, 'kay?

4. In my Haiti post last week I told you about A and R, well R landed in Florida yesterday and is traveling to his new home in the Midwest to part of a beautiful family stateside!! I fully believe God is working on taking care of the littlest victims of the Haiti earthquake.

5. My laundry is piled high again. I want to know who is using all these clothes??!??

6. God is so good to me and I can't wait to share all the mini miracles that are happening to us!!

Well, this concludes my terrific Tuesday post. I hope you all are having a blessed day!

Toss, Toss, Keep

I've hit spring cleaning two months early. He he he Because I have mentioned before that I feel like I am domestically challenged I figure if I clean out a bunch of stuff then there is less stuff to clean up, wash, fold or put away so, I am mid-winter cleaning.

I am cleaning out closets and toys and I have more donations than I am keeping. YAY!! I am doing some serious weeding on our toy collection. I am too sentimental about toys and I always think, "oh they might play with that" or "ahhh, but that was. . . " and so every time I weed out, I always leave back more than I should. Not this week. Reality is, they aren't going to play with them. Period. End of discussion. Toys, clothes, old puzzles, games and books~~nothing is safe!

I'm cleaning out my clothes too. Another area in which I am overly sentimental. "Oh but if I lose 15 pounds that would be really cute" or "I just can't throw that out", come on woman, let it go!!! This is what I told myself, if I throw everything that I can't wear or won't wear E.V.E.R. again then I get to buy new stuff. ~~Smile~~See I haven't really blogged about it, but I am still endeavoring to drop a significant amount of weight and so therefore I will need new clothes. The light bulb finally came on; I don't want to lose weight and wear old clothes. When I lose weight I want new clothes. {Can I get an AMEN} I have actually added to the budget a very small Valerie-just-lost-all-this-weight-NOW-SHOP category. Hubs is in total agreement, actually it was his idea from a long time ago.

I am also weeding out our kitchen "stuff". For some reason we have a LOT of kitchen random thingys that never actually gets used, so it's going out the door too. Space in the kitchen is an issue, I DON"T HAVE ENOUGH, so if its not being used or I don't even know what its used for, it has to go. Like the coffee pot that I am not sure even works and is sitting in the bottom of the pantry collecting dust because we don't drink coffee. And other random items that just seem to be hanging around. Oh and the storage area on our patio is getting a good cleaning out and re-organizing as soon I am done with the stuff inside. Like I said before, nothing is safe.

Makiah is sick, again. Strep throat, pray saints, pray that NO ONE ELSE gets it. {I am serious about the praying, I may even call a fast} The whole house smells like disinfectant wipes and bleach, but I left no door knob uncleaned. I thought about wiping her down with one, but then decided against it.

Other than a major clean out, school resuming, trying to advance to the next level in Mario Bros Wii and Makiah being sick, it's been a pretty calm start to the New Year. How about you?

How Big Is This Closet Again???

As I told everyone is another post, we are moving again. I won't whine about that today (well too much anyway), I will just tell of my time with the downstairs storage/coat/throw-it-all-in-there closet.

Our lovely huge closet has been a thorn in my flesh for the last several months. Oh it's spacious and has places to hang things as well as store things--that became the problem. Storing things, everything, there. It started out well organized and completely useful. Then things went down hill from there. People realized that they could just put something in there instead of taking it upstairs. Makiah would change into her pj's and put her clothes in there. They would put toys in there to keep from having to take them upstairs. Then other things that we didn't know what to do with it would get placed in there and before I realized it, I had a HUGE problem.

So last Tuesday, I got the wonderful idea to pull all of that out and start going through it. I made two mistakes: (1) I assumed I could get it all done in about 6 hours HAHAHAHAHAHA and (2) I did it while all three children were here (where else would they be??).

I started the great dig into the closet. I cannot tell of the things I found in that closet. Toys that had been long thought lost. Clothing items that I was sure the dryer had eaten. Shoes that couldn't be found. More toys. More clothes. More shoes. Yarn. Yes, yarn.

I pulled everything out. Everything. I had a mountain of mess. And a mountain of laundry. See I had been bagging up and storing in there all of Daniel's clothes that he had outgrown. The boy had quite a wardrobe! Needless to say between all of the stored clothes (which were stored clean), all the clothes I found, the normal laundry for the 5 of us and the tote of clothes I went through for discarding--I did 16, say it with me 16 loads of laundry last week (yes I washed the stored clothes again)!!! I have already done 3 this week and I took a laundry break on Monday. I have more laundry amassed and ready to go into the machine. I am beginning to think that someone else brought their laundry over and added it to mine! Where are all these clothes when I can't find matching shorts for Sam?? I know, hiding in the closet!!

No more my friends, my closet is beautiful! Perfectly organized. Shoes all lined up and ready for feet. Any clothes in there are hung up and I will hang the next person that throws something in there up by their thumbs (they have been warned). No toys in there, except the hula hoop and riding toy for outside. It's great. What a lovely closet.

I got it functional just in time to move.