when it rains it pours... we must be caught in a typhoon

every year I make a plan for what the tax returns will be spent on. I would like to get to a place, financially, where we can just save up those returns for several years so we can buy a better house.

we aren't quite there because we had one person need to have a lot of dental work done. we needed to get new tires for the van and we were going to pay off any bills that were left at the clinic from last year, I would also love to paint this eyesore of a house.
so we paid the clinic, we got that person's dental work all done - with one small exception...
then we were going to get new tires, but the van broke down. it will cost more money than anticipated. but it's a good thing that I didn't get the van taken in anywhere yet because now instead of fixing our van and painting our house we get to have Ronan go to the hospital and have even more expensive dental work done.

I can come to no other conclusion than God hates me. we can never ever ever catch a break and we are going to be stuck in this hell hole of a house until it falls on us and kills us.

Erica is going to be gone this summer. we won't get to see her for a couple months because our stupid van will still be broken and we will have no way to go get her for family fun.

Can life get any more crap? yes, I'm sure it can. Every year we have some kind of @$#@% to have to deal with that we can't afford to deal with.
give it a little time, I'll probably end up with cancer or something equally wonderful... I do have a bit of a heart issue already anyway. But I won't die, I can't be so lucky... I have to suffer for a good long time.



my self pity party for the week

Customs. An Issue?

I really never thought that I would ever have to worry about customs, but this weekend I find myself learning about customs and international shipments. I never though that I would ever have to concern myself about anything like this, but I find myself in a situation that I thought of too late and may change the way I do business...
you see, I have found myself in an interesting position (not at all unique, but new to me) I have gotten three international requests for orders and two confirmed, just this week. the most international anything I've ever had before was to email a pattern to Canada.
after finishing and listing one of these confirmed orders I realized that customs might become an issue. I'm just not getting the answers I need from the USPS website and I will therefore stress out about it until morning.

One order will be going to Great Britain, the other to Australia. mainly I took the order for Australia just so I could be all 'I made something and now it lives in Australia'
from what I am seeing so far, I think I might not have to worry about it at all because of the size of the package but until I am certain I find myself stuck freaking out a little


however, if customs does not become an issue, since most of what I can ship I can fit in a little bubble wrap mailer and that might be okay... I might just change all my orders to include shipping internationally.

well, maybe....

on one of their walks

the other day Tim and Ronan went for a walk. ever since our kids were tiny babies, Tim will take them (usually Ronan) for a bit of a wander across the way, over by the lake, or around the yard. when they were wandering the yard the other day they found something, quite sad, but it was fascinating to Ronan to be close enough to see it. he came running in the house shouting for me and wanted me to see. a baby rabbit was dead in the yard.

we went out there and Tim was looking at it, not wanting to touch it so he had a piece of cardboard and he was moving it with that. I'm not sure how it died. I'm kind of guessing it might have had something to do with not having been fully cared for when the mama was there... I'll explain my theory in a moment
knowing that there must be a nest near by I looked. it was right in front of our faces! look at this. I had mowed the lawn the other day and the babies were still so well hidden we almost didn't see it right in front of our faces.

if not for the little tufts of fur peeking out of the grass clippings I may not have found it at all.

so I reached down just to nudge the cover enough to peek inside and I was a bit startled when it jumped to meet my hand! oh, yay, live babies!
now that very morning I had been expressing my annoyance over those darned rabbits that eat my flowers, but when it's tiny babies, all I can say is "awwwwwwww"

knowing enough about wild rabbits and their nesting habbits (we've had many many many rabbit nests in the yard... much more than we even were aware of) we decided to cover them up and give them a little bit more shelter and test if the mother would be back. we made a ring around the nest with grass clippings and we evacuated the area. mother rabbits will not come to the nest in the day time so all we could do was wait and check them the next day.

I went out yesterday afternoon and looked for the nest spot. looking for the ring of grass, I found no ring of grass, but there was a bigger mound of grass on the nest. that made us so happy to know that she had been back and took good care of them.

now in about two more weeks I'll be so annoyed at those baby bunnies eating my flowers... but for now, look at those beautiful little ears! they've got me cooing and squealing in a high enough pitch that only dogs can hear me.



you're wondering why I think the one baby died from "neglect" well, this is why. a mother rabbit will only feed her babies twice a day / or I suppose I should say night. she comes to feed them and help them (tmi) urinate once right after dusk and once right before dawn. this is enough to get them through the day while she is gone so as not to draw attention to the nest.

we do have evidence that she's been back to care for them. that's good. now consider, these babies are getting bigger and do a better job crowding each other. I think the one that died was just crowded out too many times and though she may have been fed she may not have been aided in evacuation and that is fatal for baby rabbits :(

the other day when the nest was discovered Tim and Ronan peeked in to see how many they could see and they figured there were 3 more maybe 4. this morning, I count 6 heads and there might have been more underneath them!

yesterday, uffdah

with the van being broken we've missed a lot of church. I know people are going to say that I should just ask for a ride or help to fix the van, but I hate the feeling I get when I ask for help. it makes me feel icky.

anyway, I was finishing up another little pair of those delightful booties and looked up to see the horrible mess in the entryway and it made me feel all stabby and angry, so if I was going to clean up all the kids' mess they were going to do something to.
Yesterday ended up being the busiest day of my year so far.

I cleaned up the coats and got the winter things packed away, I got rid of two hugely packed bags of clothes that were destined for goodwill. I borrowed the riding mower from my aunt and mowed my lawn. I demanded that the kids clean their rooms to a point that I didn't have hurtful thoughts when I looked in them.
the TV remained off until the kids went to bed.

so when the kids were done with their rooms and other odds and ends jobs that Tim could find for them they played outside - something that my kids can't do unless I am outside first or if I throw them out.

Emma is a very creative and art minded person. she went outside and started picking dandelions and clovers and some weeds :) etc and instead of just putting them in a jelly jar of water she found a new purpose for them.





after the art projects and lawn and door way etc Emma and I made cupcakes... and at the same time I started supper. I was getting kind of frantic at that point, trying not to burn the tuna patties and the cupcakes that were baking at the same time.
I didn't do anything physically strenuous, but at the end of the day I just felt ripped to shreds.


but that picture is fantastic

these are so good gracious adorable.

I saw a picture of some cute 'Converse' baby booties and I just had to make some. I looked around and the closest thing I could find in a pattern that was close to the ones I liked was written in Portuguese. even then I had to adjust what I could decipher.

for the last couple of days I've been working on figuring out how big and where to change stitches and how many stitches to skip, etc.... and every time I got closer to what I wanted to complete the more and more giddy I became. even now I have a hard time containing my glee at how totally beautiful these super cute shoes are.

I am making them for a friend who is having a baby in a couple of months. she is having a boy. so I really wanted to make her baby something special, something that wasn't a blanket (which I am sure she will be getting a million of from everyone else, believe me, after having 5 children I now have more baby blankets than I can count and I didn't spend a penny on any of them)



now that I have the technique down I am making another pair so that I can take detailed notes and write a pattern so that I can make a bunch for my grandchildren when ever they come to our family. their beautiful little feet will never get cold. :)