How does your mud hall look?

Mine currently looks like this.

With all the snow we have been getting there is pile of wet, soggy snow gear that never leaves. My brilliant idea of laying down beach towels to keep the floor relatively clean and dry is not working in the least.

The boys sure like it though! They have been happily building an igloo in our backyard and then bringing inside most of the snow they have been using.

This snow better stop coming soon! We are running out of places to pile it!

Keeping Busy

Since the outside is rather unwelcoming for any activity, I have done my best to keep myself occupied inside. I started out the year with great plans to print out my blog, bind it myself and then make a clam shell box that each book/year would fit into. I was so excited to start! However, I have found it quite difficult to find someone online that will let me do some editing on my blog, and then sell me a high resolution pdf copy of it. In other words, they want me to buy their books, not make my own. I have been hitting dead ends, wherever I turn. I haven't given up yet, but I have put it on the back burner at least for now until I can figure something out.

Instead, I decided to do a little sewing. Now don't laugh too hard! Truthfully, I don't sew and it has never really interested me. But I do have a sewing machine. Actually I take that back. Scott has a sewing machine that he bought at Costco several years ago. I will occasionally drag it out to sew on a Scout patch or two. A couple months ago, I even taught myself how to hem my own jeans, but that is about it.

Back to the reason of my decision to sew. Several months ago we had the remainder of our cabinetry installed in our house. This included a lovely bench/cabinet combo in my kitchen. I had the bench made a bit deeper so that I could put throw pillows on it at some point. Recently, I had a lady in my neighborhood sew a cushion for it.

For about a month I put some old pillows on the bench just for kicks. I noticed that other than getting a bit smushed, the boys left them alone. I was quite surprised, because every time I have put throw pillows on my couch, I end up picking them off the floor so many times within a few days, that I give up and put them in the closet. I understand now why they are called "throw" pillows.

So, I decided that now was as good as anytime for pillows, and I was going to sew them. I did what anybody does when they want to learn something new. I read and watched a couple of tutorials online. Instead of sewing an envelope case, I even decided to learn how to put in an invisible zipper. I know...fancy. I then took my measurements and my coupons and went and bought my fabric.

I started with the cheapest fabric and made this one. It took a couple of head scratches, studying the instructions and unpicking half of the zipper, but I figured it out! And you know what? The thing even zipped up when I was done! I must admit, I was kind of surprised. And it didn't turn out that bad.

Then it was pretty easy and I whipped out the kitchen ones pretty fast. They are not perfect by any stretch, and I would hate to have anyone who knows what they are doing inspect them, but I think they turned out pretty well! Now I just need a few stains and grease marks to break them in.

Here is a pix of the whole thing.

And last but not least, the boys settling in.

Now, on to the next project!

Hang in there Girls!

To say it has been cold would be an understatement. Frigid, icy, arctic-like, glacial and finger-numbing would more accurately describe the past month. It is a sad thing indeed when the temperature hits 20 degrees and you think it is warm outside.

Even though my ladies are winter-hardy, (there was tag on them when I bought them that said this.:)) Scott and I have been a bit worried about them outside in their coop when the temperature drops down to single and then negative digits.

First and foremost I have been very glad Scott insulated the coop when we first bought it. However, there is no heat for them other than a 100 watt bulb that turns on for 4 hours in the evening and 2 hours in the morning. They are on their own. Yes, they are wearing their own custom made down coats, but still you start to worry.

However, they seem to be taking the cold in stride. They don't go out into their run much and we haven't let them out to roam the yard in weeks. But, they seem relatively happy pecking around in their coop during the day and then crowding together on their roost at night. And so far we haven't noticed any frostbite on their combs. I'm sure they are getting tired of being cooped up like the rest of us, (I'm so funny aren't I?) but this cold has got to break soon!

The Best Accusation EVER!

Here is Bennett sitting at the counter with his daily fruit & veggie smoothie in front of him. His vitamins will be handed to him shortly. He is in no mood to take either of them. He is grumpy. It is Monday and it is early. Can't blame him there.

He's got the look on his face of one who is discontented and who's life is not fair. Out of his mouth shoots the worst accusation he can think of at the moment, as he is trying to tell me what a terrible life he has.

"Mom," he says "all you care about is my health."

I couldn't stop laughing.

He couldn't figure out why his accusation went so wrong.

All Better

It started the day after Christmas at the Kimball family party. Chase laid down on the couch smack dab in the middle of the festivities and fell asleep. That is never a good sign. When he woke up an hour later he had a fever. He was sick for couple of days and that was it. Nothing to worry about.

Scott followed quickly after with mild cold-like symptoms, but nothing else. The same thing or something totally different? Who knows.

Then they started falling like flies. A few days after Scott, Bennett got sick, but it was much worse. Low grade fever, aches, pains, dizziness, sore throat and sleeping a lot. Not good. Taylor quickly followed with more or less the same symptoms, but not exactly the same. I thought they would follow Chase's pattern and be done in 2 days. Didn't happen. They were miserable for 4 solid days. Long enough that I thought maybe they had strep. I hauled them in to the Dr. just so he could tell me that they had "flu-like" symptoms and to just wait it out.

Owen decided to join the party, but instead of getting all the yucky stuff listed above he just started in with a nasty cough and congestion. Nothing more.

It was a good solid week and a half before everyone was feeling better. Owen however decided to end it with a bang. A few days ago, I was putting all of the boys into the van to take them to the dentist to get cavities filled. Owen was the only one that didn't have any. As I was putting them in the van, Owen breaks down and starts crying and complaining that his ear hurts. Now if you know Owen, you know that he has a very high pain tolerance. He rarely complains about anything, so when he does complain you take action. I scooted off to the dentist and Scott dropped everything and took him to the InstaCare. And sure enough, double ear infections.

Luckily, I managed to stay away from it this time around. Let's hope we are done for the winter.