The Pantry

Well as promised I ended up cleaning out my pantry. It really needed it. I actually ended up doing it last night because I was on a roll and thought I ought to just get it done. What's crazy is it only took me 15 minutes to do! Why did I let it get so bad in the first place. 15 minutes is nothing. I went ahead and took pictures of the nightmare pantry to show you. I am embarrassed that I let it get like this but maybe the embarrassment of showing it to the world will prevent me from doing it again. So here are the pics.... Ridiculous!



Notice the bulging doors. Yes you should be frightened. That is never a good sign!!!




It's dangerous to open. You never know what will fall out. Luckily the box of Cheerios isn't that heavy. I could have ended up with a broken toe if the canned items had fallen out. Hazardous I say!




And here is the pretty pantry after I got done. How nice and neat. Amazing what you find when you clean it out. I have four cans of Bush's Chili Magic so I guess I'm making Chili this week. I also have a bunch of tuna. Good stuff. Several boxes of cereal and a total of 30 boxes of jello. Yes 30! What's crazy is the stuff I threw away. A can of Enchilada sauce that expired in 1997 and a jar of pizza sauce that expired in 2002. Let's not forget the huge jar of cherries that was 2 years old. SCARY!!!

Jessie

The Great Purge

Since it snowed like crazy today and I didn't have anything else productive to do I decided to purge the house. I try to do this every year before Christmas. I figure that more stuff will come in due to excess gifting so I better get rid of things to make room for it. So this year I went crazy and really did some serious purging.

I ended up taking out 5 garbage bags of clothes, 2 bags of books and magazines, 2 garbage bag of random what the heck is this and why do I have it stuff and a bag of shoes, flip flops, purses, and hair stuff. Wahoo! There is room in my closets, my coffee table is clear and nothing falls out of the bathroom cabinet when I open it now! That's success!

Tommorow I'm going to purge the pantry and kitchen cabinets. Then I'm going to give the whole house a good cleaning. A little above and beyond the regular cleaning I do. I think there are some dust bunnies living on fans and behind furniture. So I need to evict them and freshen the place up a bit.

Good times!
Jessie

Crazy Cleaning

I got home late from work tonight and have been cleaning house and doing laundry for the past two hours. A social worker from a new adoption agency is coming to meet with me tomorrow. They want to start showing my profile to expectant families but want to meet with me first. I'm excited to meet with the new gal but I want the house to be perfect.

It's so ridiculous. A spotless house won't make me a better parent. Heck I go do walk throughs of clients homes and I don't care if a place is spotless but still. I just want her to have a good impression of me. So clean like a crazy woman is what I do.

Jessie

Pool Party.... Or Not

It's so hot here I just want to lay in the pool and do nothing all day. But my pool is not my friend right now. When we went to Louisiana I had someone taking care of everything but the pool... How I forgot that I don't know but I did. So when we came home it looked like a pond. Now we are close to being back on track but not close enough. The chemicals are right but there is still a yucky cloudy look to the water. So tomorrow I'm heading back to the pool place with another water sample to see if they can help me yet again....

I just want to swim. That's it. I don't want much just to swim in clear water. Not cloudy water, not yucky water. But crisp blue clear lovely water... It's 105 here shouldn't that be possible?

Other than the heat things are good here. I'm feeling so much better than I was over the weekend! And today is the first day I haven't even missed my Diet Dr. Pepper so I survived after all. And tomorrow is Friday so things are getting better all the time.

Jessie

What Am I Thinking!

I woke up this morning and I really wanted to just stay in bed. I'm so sore from moving so much stuff the past two day. But no I got up. I thought I ought to do laundry but that didn't sound like fun. And laying on the couch all day isn't really an option.

So since I hurt already I decided I would go work in the yard. I had a dump truck full of dirt delivered Saturday. It's a huge pile of dirt. I need to fill in some flower beds, fill some gaps around the new fence, and level the yard so I can reseed grass. So I thought I would conquer the flower beds today so I could finish up my planting... Easier said than done!!!

First who knew dirt is so damn heavy? Shovels are heavy too but what sucks is they don't hold much. So it takes forever to fill the wheelbarrow and then it's way heavy to move. I've done 10 wheelbarrel fulls already and the first flower bed isn't filled yet! UGH!!!

And since our lovely swimming pool collapsed the yard is still a little swampy and well I've got mud all over. It's not pretty here folks. Even the dog is crabby! I don't see why I attempt to do this crap. It's ridiculous. But there are only a few alternatives.

1. Don't worry about pretty grass and flower beds and just settle for a yard with patchy grass and not so many flowers... I'm not really feeling that though. I love having a pretty yard. In fact I'm obsessive about it. I want my yard to be the prettiest yard on the block. It's something I like.

2. Hire someone to do all this manual labor crap and just plant and water the flowers after they get done. Well I would do this if I was made of money. Some day if I'm rich I'm hiring a yard boy. I'm not playing. That is the first thing I would do if I won the lottery. Get a yard boy!!! But I can't afford to do that now so it looks like I'm hauling more dirt.

3. Find a husband and make him do it. If finding a husband was that easy I would probably have one by now. And knowing my luck I will end up marrying a great guy some day that knows jack squat about yard work or manly type things and I'll end up doing it anyways.

4. Wait for my dad to come home. Now this is the best solution of all. My Dad rocks. He could have probably had the dirt moved, the pool reset, the flowers planted, mulch down, mowed and washed my car in the time it has taken me to move the little bit of dirt I have. He just rocks like that. But my Dad isn't coming home till the end of June. So I at least have to get the flower beds done by then. Dad if your reading this PLEASE COME HOME TOMORROW!

Okay the pile of dirt is screaming my name and I've cooled off now and had some water so I'm going back at it. If I don't post for awhile it's because I'm laying dead in the yard by the dirt pile.

Jessie

More Money

Well my air conditioner isn't working properly so the repair man is here now. Hopefully it will help and he can fix it. But of course it will cost more money! YUCK!!!! I'm sick of spending money on not fun things. I've never spent so much money on repairs in my life. This house and my old car are killing me. Being a grown up is no fun sometimes.

Jessie

A Shift

Boy how things change in a week. Last weekend I was so stressed out trying to get all my homework done before the end of the semester. This weekend has been so nice and relaxing! I like this way so much more!!!

Yesterday I went and got flowers so I could get them planted. I got hanging baskets done, and the front flower beds done. I got the back flower beds cleaned out and then it started raining. It hasn't stopped yet so I haven't finished up. Maybe next weekend. I also got the items I need to build another flower bed in the backyard. I can't wait to get it all landscaped and pretty. Then I'll post pics to show you all the new fence and flowers. Good times. I'm also having dirt hauled in so I can level out some spots in the yard and reseed. The small ponds throughout the yard make it pretty obvious that I have some low spots.

Today I worked on my bedroom. Mainly my closet and dresser. I ended up with three huge bags of clothes to take to the salvation army tomorrow. I also got all my laundry done which I was way behind on, my shoes (I have too many) organized, and the closet rearranged for summer stuff in the front. Surprisingly that only took me about 1 1/2 hours. Now I wish I hadn't put it off. I kept thinking I didn't have time to do it during school and then it didn't take that long at all.

I have gotten caught up on most the shows I have recorded. I only have 6% taken up in my DVR now instead of 72%. I have gotten caught up on the three most recent People magazines, and I'm reading a book for fun not work or school! What a great weekend!!! I even got all my recycling stuff sorted so I can take it to be dropped off this week.

I had forgotten how nice it is to have just work and home stuff. No school. I feel so much calmer, more organized, less nervous and anxious! I like it a lot. It makes me kinda reconsider my plans to keep going to school full time. I wonder if I ought to cut back to part time. Feeling sane is worth a lot!!!

So I'm off to relax with my enjoyable book now!

Jessie

Home Improvement

Well since my Dad is here to visit it means that home improvements are occurring. He can't sit still for a minute so he is always working on something. Today he installed cabinets in my garage! They are wonderful. I have so much more storage now. What a blessing! He is one crafty guy. Tomorrow I think he is going to help me do some landscaping in my newly fenced backyard.

Heather is coming home tomorrow so that will be great. She and Dad are going car shopping for her. She drives a big truck now that costs her a fortune in gas. She is really wanting something more reasonable. Hopefully they will find her a great little program car. She should have fun looking anyways and at least it will give her a better idea of what she wants.

I'm taking tomorrow off work to just hang out and do what I want. I will have to do some homework but I'm hoping to be able to work in the yard some and relax some. That would be nice.

Jessie