So much has been happening over the past week that I’m going to just have to give an overview instead of going into details. Here goes…
Last Thursday night was spent packing so I could take the girls to Maryland Friday. Friday morning I attended MOPS, then I fed the girls lunch at the church and we drove down to my parents’ house. I stayed for dinner then drove home. On my way home, Joel called to say that there was a problem. He wouldn’t be home when I got there after all because his radiator had sprung a leak. He was hoping at the time that it was a hose, but we found out later there was actually a small hole in the front of the radiator. In order to get the car home, he had to drive very slowly for a little bit, then pull over to let the engine cool down again. He had run out of water to put in the radiator, but even if he had had some, it just went right out the bottom without cooling the engine any time you poured it in. When I found out where he was I was able to alter my course slightly and come up behind him, and we caravanned home the rest of the way. At least we could kind-of keep each other company that way.
Joel and I had Friday night, Saturday, and Saturday night all to ourselves, so what did we do? We spent most of Saturday making costumes for ourselves and went to a really fun costume party Saturday night. 🙂 Of course, we ended up staying at the party singing karaoke so late that the little bit that we slept in Saturday morning was pretty much wasted. 😛 Oh well. We had fun. If we got any decent pictures of us in costume I’ll post them another time. I still have to get my film developed.
Sunday we attended Sunday school and then went to pick up the girls. They had done pretty well though Alexis had apparently been close to tears a couple of times when I was mentioned. They were able to distract her pretty easily, so it wasn’t a problem. Branwen hadn’t been any trouble as far as missing us, but when we showed up she didn’t want me out of her sight for a little while.
We drove back home Sunday afternoon during nap time. Sunday evening Joel and I played rock-paper-scissors to determine who would get to go to vote on the new Minister of Education at church and I won. 🙂 (In all fairness to Joel, he told me I could go before we played, but I didn’t want to feel the guilt of knowing that he wanted to go and decided to send me instead… so we made it more arbitrary.) It was a long meeting because the man they were recommending is local and there were a lot of people who had things to say about him, both negative and positive. After we voted (we did vote him in), they closed in prayer but then provided an opportunity for people to stay and hear about the 2005 suggested budget. I knew Joel would like me to get that info since there’ll be a vote on the budget in November, so I stayed until that was over. I didn’t end up leaving until about 9 PM. I got home just in time to say goodnight to the girls.
Monday Joel took my van to work since his car was out of comission. He called the mechanic that evening and they said they could fit his car in the next day, so we inched our way to the mechanic’s Monday evening. I needed my van on Tuesday so I could teach at the church in the morning, so Joel worked from home for the day. When I got home from the church, we had a typical lunch hour after the girls have been away all morning. Branwen was surgically attached to my legs, screaming, while Alexis was fussing about various things and having to use the potty fairly often. I don’t know how long it took to get lunch together, but it was some ridiculous amount of time. Joel offered to help a couple of times, but I didn’t want him to take time away from work to help me do the normal house stuff. I did make sure to point out that the way it was going was absolutely normal so that he would appreciate my job even more. 😉
Tuesday evening was Bible study and I had to make dessert for which I didn’t have the ingredients, so the afternoon for me was spent completing a grocery list, gathering coupons, and dragging a tired Alexis to the store so Joel could keep working. (Side note: Isn’t it great fun when your three year old announces loudly in the canned fruit aisle that she needs to poop?) The trip did not go terribly well and I came home frustrated and a little late. Joel helped me make the dessert or it never would have been done in time. We went to Bible study and had a nice restful time there, at least. The girls actually did incredibly well for the babysitters downstairs considering how tired they were by that point. We couldn’t go straight home from there, either, because we had to go pick up Joel’s car at the mechanics. We changed the girls into their pajamas there and let them fall asleep in the van.
Yesterday Joel had a dentist appointment in the afternoon and we had prayer meeting in the evening (where I had also agreed to coordinate the nursery since the normal worker couldn’t make it). The morning was spent mainly dealing with a back-up of email and phone calls plus two somewhat fussy girls whose schedules have been thrown off for several days running now. At least with Joel having a dentist appointment in the afternoon he actually got home in time for us to eat a relatively casual dinner before we had to leave for the church. Nursery was hectic, but went well, and I was able to find someone to take me home so Joel could take the girls home before I was finished at 9:20.
The last crazy thing for the past week actually began yesterday evening during nursery duty, but it really deserves its own post which I may just go ahead and write now. On a positive note, we did get a letter from our HOA yesterday saying that our ridge vent was approved. 🙂 Yay! Maybe we’ll actually stop being rained on in our master bath now.