Feeling fall

On Wednesday, the weather was really gorgeous. We spent most of the day out on our new patio - Betsy amused herself with the pile of sand that was left over from its construction. I gave her one of our brooms to play with, because hey, it's never too early to learn right? The temperature dropped thirty degrees overnight, so I guess summer is really over and it's fall now. Time to get out the long sleeved shirts and the sweaters and the extra blankets for all the beds.

I'm having some women from church over tonight, which means I have a long fun day of cleaning ahead of me. (Especially with all the sand that's been tracked into my kitchen.) Last night, I made - or tried to make, anyway - a Pumpkin Cake Roll but the cake sorta collapsed, so I ended up having to glue it back together with cream cheese frosting and hope no one will judge me. ;-)

Porter's arm seems to be doing fine, thank goodness.

Super Mom strikes again!

When we were eating dinner last night, Matt and I noticed that Porter wasn't really using his right arm, which is unusual for him. Also, he's been crabby since Thursday, when he was pushed off the couch by a certain 3-year-old sister of his. Plus, his right elbow was all bruised and funny looking... So, Porter and I got to make a field trip to the Urgent Care place last night.

Poor guy, he dislocated his elbow. He still managed to charm the entire staff, though.

At least I wasn't wearing my 'Super Mom' shirt this time, like I was when Betsy was nine months old and had to get stitches in her FACE. Although, Porter was wearing 'I Do All My Own Stunts' when he fell down on Thursday. I'm not convinced that that's when he hurt his elbow, because he was using his arm fine until Friday afternoon, but since he's a 1-year-old boy and his father's son, we may never know.

So, they took X-rays (his bones are cute) to rule out a fracture, and hooked Porter up with the World's Tiniest Sling, which is still a little big for him.He didn't want to use his arm last night, I guess because it still hurt, but he's actually doing a lot better today. We'll take him to his regular pediatrician on Monday or Tuesday to be sure, but I think he's going to be fine.

And you thought the $4 suede boots were a good deal.

Matt's parents went back to Utah today (sad face) so in the afternoon, I did a little shopping (happy face). I had seen Hobby Lobby's sale ad which said that ALL of their stickers, papers, and rub-ons for scrapbooking are 50% off this week. Hobby Lobby's prices are quite reasonable to begin with, so I definitely wanted to stock up.

They had some new patterned papers in from We R Memories Urban Window collection - I got some of the Diner papers - Hello gorgeous, where have you been all my life?! I've never used We R before - they seem to be big into the boho look, which I'm not huge on but like in small doses - but I really, really loved the bright colors on a white background. I also liked some of the Restoration prints, in soft muted greens and grays... will work nicely for a potential Hall of Fame layout... hmmm...

Anyway, all that patterned paper, plus a bunch of cardstock (I know, I know, I have a lot of cardstock already, but at twelve and a half cents a sheet, you woulda bought some too) and some of those 7Gypsies stickers... came to like 5 bucks. Have I mentioned that I love Hobby Lobby?

Then we headed around the corner to Old Navy, because I had some returns. I decided to kill some time by checking out the clearance sections... and HOLY COW did I hit the motherlode! They had just marked down a bunch of stuff to 97 cents each. Most of it was mini-skirts and tank tops, which I can't wear, but I found some good stuff. I found some capri pants - they are literally the cutest capri pants in the entire universe - so I bought 5 pairs, in 3 different colors and 2 different sizes. Because they were NINETY-SEVEN CENTS EACH.

I also got a couple of cute T-shirts; then I headed over to the register with my loot. Lo and behold, the girl at the register was in the process of marking down MORE stuff that she was about to put out, so I got a maternity (NO I AM NOT PREGNANT I AM JUST PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE) blouse and jacket for, you guessed it, 97 cents each. And saved the cashier from having to walk over to the rack to hang them up again. All in all, I bought 9 things, and spent a whopping total of $9.25 (yes, that includes the tax). When I got home, I added up all the tags and found out it was, like, $200 or something.

Am I a dork, to be so excited over a good sale? Probably. But I'm a well-dressed dork.

I'm also excited because there's a new episode of NCIS on tonight. Woo hoo!

Just playing catch-up...

It's been a really busy (but fun) week. My cardstock class went really well. I only had 2 out of the 3 ladies actually show up, but I really had fun teaching them. Both of the ladies were beginner scrapbookers, so I was able to share a lot of my 6 years' experience with them. (6 years??!! Holy cow, has it been that long?) I did get to watch the NCIS premiere on tape, and all I can say is, yay for Tony being in charge, and boo, hiss! to Gibbs' new pirate look.

Matt's parents flew in on Wednesday night, and boy, are their arms tired! Har. Matt and Wally spent the weekend working on the patio for our new house, and I spent the weekend cooking. I've made Moroccan chicken stew, risotto, pecan pie with real whipped cream (none of that Cool Wip nonsense), black bean soup, zucchini soup, biscuits, a cake, and an endless stream of zucchini bread. They brought several arm-sized zucchini from their garden, so I've been making and freezing little mini-loaves to feed the kids for breakfasts. I think I have somewhere between 10 and 15 in there now.

Our neighbor kindly let Matt and Wally borrow his tamper and his tile saw to work on the patio. We gave him some zucchini bread as thanks.

On Saturday, Connie and I hit up Half Price Goodwill Day. I got some sweet stuff, including an awesome pair of suede boots for four bucks. I was pretty happy about that. Saturday night, we went to the Relief Society broadcast (because next week is General Conference - man, it always sneaks up on ya, doesn't it?!) I love hearing the Prohpet speak to us and tell us how great we women are. It's a fun contrast to Priesthood session, where it seems like the men always get chastised. I like to tease Matt about that one.

I taught the Relief Society lessonon Sunday - my first time teaching in the new ward. Have I mentioned how much I hate it when I ask questions and people don't respond? I'm sure that they are just too shy, but I always end up feeling kind of silly. It always makes me think, I should do a better job of responding when someone else is teaching. Even if I don't have any super profound insight, it does beat the sound of crickets chirping, don't ya think?!

Yarr.

Apparently, today is Talk Like A Pirate Day.
http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/living/columnists/dave_barry/4018055.htm
Who knew?!

Today is also the season premiere of NCIS.
http://www.cbs.com/innertube/player.php?vid=107918&cat=107484
Apparently it's the "Season of Secrets" or something. Ooh, dramatic. It's a good thing that CBS isn't at all known for creating misleading promos for this show.

And it's also ALSO the day that I am teaching a class at Scrapbook Corner. 'Crazy for Cardstock' this time: I'm trying to show how you can create awesome layouts using only cardstock and some adhesive and tools. Kind of fits in with my whole greater philosophy of use-it-or-lose-it, thrifty scrapping. I have THREE people signed up to take this class, which means that it will actually be worth my while to teach it. I'm pretty excited, and the VCR is all set up to tape NCIS.