Whoa...it was the LOOOOONgest 2 weeks!

I think that I am surfacing....right, that is the word for when you come up out of some viscous layer to a land of breath and movement? Well, I am saying that is what I am doing because what has been going on around here has not been the best... not the worst by any means, but the sun has been shining and only today have I had enough energy and to go out and enjoy it.

We have been sick, sick here at our house. I guess everyone gets sick, but it never seems as bad as when YOU (a.k.a. the Mom) get sick. I felt SO bad, I had to ask my husband to stay home from work for a day and a half... because I couldn't hack it... being a good mommy to my boys that is, not the phlegmy-phlegmy, because I can hack that! (gross!) To be done with the whining quickly, my youngest is recovering from pneumonia quite well and aside from not hearing well and sounding "nasally" I think that I might live. (also, knock on wood, my husband is a trooper and my oldest boy seems to be not letting the yuck-yuck get him to badly.) I did think that I was going to get the husky Kathleen Turner voice again this year...two years ago I got it for like a week and it was so fun to have a low gravelly voice...I sounded VERY MYSTERIOUS! (I don't remember the sickness associated with the voice to be that bad, but maybe it was and I just can't remember.)(Please tell me that you people know who Kathleen Turner is...Romancing the Stone anyone?)

So for the rest of it I will continue in the list format that is easy for me to think and easy for you to read:

1) My most exciting news is that I received my swap quilt...Yes! I got it yesterday and I felt like it was a SUPER special crafty valentine just for me!

Isn't it just the most perfect?? I am truely grateful to a new quilty-crafty friend over at Freshly Picked... I am over the moon about this small quilt swap, (Margaret you are a Rock Star!) I feel like it helped me to be creative in a new way, get my work "out there" in the world, and get connected with great people that spur my creative vision in new directions. I am hoping that when I figure out what I want to be when I grow up (besides a super mom, of course!) my world is going to be that much broader and richer.

2) Does anyone else have childhood flashbacks when they smell their own kid's ammoxicillin? That smell...I don't even know how to describe it...

3)My mother-in-law sent me a great little video....I would love to embed it like some of my friends can, but I am just not that cool today. So you can watch it here. (I realize that this sounds iffy, but it is a video of a mass prank??? Just go watch it.)

4)Valentine's Day cards: I always think that I am going to be ....I don't know what-- "Martha Stewart Mom" and hand craft, with my son, 24 valentines.... and gently instruct him on the merits of signing his name himself...

What really happens is: the night before, in hour #2 of dinner (I don't know what that boy is doing while the rest of us eat...oh yea, making faces at himself in the window.) I am filling out all of the cards myself, as he casually explains that he can't sign his name and that I need to put a heart sticker on each of the "Nemo" cards...because they don't have hearts.....and I do it.

It was a weird moment.

I think that I will treasure and shudder at this memory. It gives me mixed feelings, but at least I can feel really righteous because I did get the cards at Goodwill for $0.49...take that Corporate America! My son came home from preschool with a bag full of candy and one kid even gave out little Shrek bags (!!!) with a Lollipop, two DOVE hearts, AND HUGE sticker!!!! WOW. I think that we need to go to THAT kid's birthday!!! so...I guess I need to sign off...I am going on a little Date with the Husband! I am excited, it has been way too long!

JMB