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Tuesday, August 23, 2011

The Last Day of Summer

Hola! Well, I think this day is the longest day ever. I know I say that all the time, but this time, it REALLY was.

I went to bed last night before 10:30pm, and was SO proud of myself. I looked on Facebook on my phone in the dark until 11pm, then turned it off, and tried to sleep. And tossed. And turned. And contemplated all the things I had to do tomorrow. And thought about what I could do if I got up. Clean the kitchen. Sweep the living room. Do some laundry. But that didn't sound very fun. I could watch the episode of 24 that I didn't pay attention to last night (hehe). And I just laid there until around 1am... Then finally fell asleep.

And woke up at 5:30am when my alarm went off. I climbed out of bed, and got Jake up. He woke up willingly, and we brushed our teeth in my room together. He got ready, and I got ready, and we left the house at 5:45am. 5 minutes later than I wanted to. We each grabbed a soda, and off we went.

I got him to the church at 5:55am, and he went inside to his class. I visited with the bishop outside for a bit, then headed to Walmart. And you now, at 6:10am, there's NO one at Walmart. There were people there buffing the floors, and it was SUPER noisy, but there was no one there. hehe. I grabbed some slim-fast, some excedrine migraine, some nectarines, some make up wipes, some fingernail polish remover, and some deodorant for Jake. Then headed to pay, and back to the church. And it was light when I left Walmart. Kinda strange, going in when it's dark and out when it's light. LOL.

I got back in time to visit with the ladies for a few minutes, then at 6:40am, the broke for the day. Jake and I hopped in the car, and headed back to post. Luckily, Pershing gate is open early, and we were able to come and go through the gate. It cut off a good 5 minutes from the drive. Sa-weet!

We got home, just in time for Tom to have family prayer with us, then he left for the bus. His bus comes at 7:11am. And he has to leave by 7am to get there. All the kids were dressed and ready to go! Jim had on a shirt that was dirty, so I looked to find a clean one for him. The one that we'd laid out last night was actually Joe's. And yeah, a size 6 shirt does NOT fit on the "panda belly", as we loving call it. LOL!

Everyone ate some breakfast, and I got them their lunch money. I made sure that people had what they needed, and then it was time for Jim and Joe and Eme to go to the bus. Jake wanted to walk with us. So off we went.

Eme at the bus stop


Jake at the bus stop
Joe at the bus stop
Jim at the bus stop
We waited around for the bus to come, and it finally did. And off the kids went, happy and excited for their first day. I'd considered driving them, but the school has very limited parking, and I just knew that it was gonna be a madhouse!

Jake and I headed home, and he had about 15 minutes before his bus. So I started cleaning, and he packed his backpack. I started on the kitchen, and got some dishes done, and part of the counter. And the floor swept. Jake left at 7:45am. And then, at 8am, he came back!!! Whaaaat?

He said that another boy in line said they needed their bus passes, and Jake left his at home. So Jake walked back home. Crap. The bus was supposed to come at 8am. He grabbed his bus pas, and headed to the bus stop. And at 8:15am, he came back again. He said the bus never came. Yeah, it came, he just missed it coming back to look for the bus pass. He was adamant that it wasn't his fast. I explained that yes, it was his fault he missed the bus, but he didn't do it on purpose. Of course he didn't wanna miss the bus. He'd left his pass at home, and that's why he missed the bus. I told him that I'd drive him there, and he seemed ok. A little stressed, but ok.

We loaded up in the car, and headed to Austin High School. I dropped him off up front, and told him to stop into the office to get a map. He seemed to think that would be ok, and that he could handle that. Good for you, Jake!
I headed back home, and got a text from Kari when I was about 3 minutes from the house, asking if I still wanted to go on our 4 mile walk. YES! I told her to give me 5 minutes, and hurried and changed clothes and met her at her house.

It was the hardest walk that I've had in a long time. I really shouldn't have let myself go so far out of shape. No exercise, eating whatever crap I wanted. Yeah, SO not good. My legs were hurting and sore, and I was sweating buckets. And my freaking bandaid glasses kept falling off of my face. About 1/2 way through, I just took them off. And was blind as a bat! LOL. Kari kept me from hurting myself. hehe. Thanks, my dear!

I got home, and yeah, there was NO way that I was getting away without a shower. ROFL!
Much better, huh? The only problem was that my face was still BEET red after my shower. So my face make up didn't match my neck/chest. LOL. i know you've all seen THOSE girls, and yeah, I looked like one of them. hehe.

Amanda came to pick me up, and we went to pick up Kari. And we headed off to Sears vision. The dude who used to work at the PX vision place moved to Sams club, then moved to Sears. He's my favorite. hehe. We got there, and Maggie was having her eyes tested. We watched Hannah for her, then it was our turns. It was funny, because Maggie found this little charm by her seat, and gave it to Amanda, and said "I found Jesus!" It was too funny. hehe. I put him in this plant vase thingy, so someone else could "find Jesus" too!
The girls and I decided that I should go next. Because the bandaid glasses (frankenglasses) needed to go. Hmpf! I think they're sexy... Anyway, I went back, and the eye doctor said that he was gonna wave the $50 contact lens prescription fee if I referred other people there. Sa-weet! I'd TOTALLY do that.

He had to take a call real fast, so I took the opportunity to take some photos with the machines and such. hehe. You know me....

Did you know that I can't even see the biggest of the letters with my glasses off? I think that's worse than 20/400..... Dang!





I know, I know, I should at least TRY to be normal...


The doctor came back in, and proceeded with the eye exam. I don't think that my prescription had changed. Or if it did, it wasn't that much. He wrote me a new prescription for both glasses and contacts, then gave me a trial pair of contacts. The left eye was not the correct prescription, but was super close. But the wrote the prescription for right, so when I order them, it'll be good.

And then it was Amanda's turn, and then Kari's turn. Amanda and I both snapped a photo of the dude's business card, and put it on Facebook. Here's sending some business your way, eye dr dude! You' ROCK! And he takes the army insurance :)
We finished up at the eye doctors, and then loaded up and headed out. Maggie headed back on post to see her hubby for lunch, and Amanda and Kari and I headed to Office Depot (or Max, never can remember which one it is...) We needed the flyer for that store.

We grabbed a few of their penny items, and found out that some more spiral notebooks come in tomorrow. So we'll be back bright and early! hehe. Because you never can have TOO many spiral notebooks, you know.

We headed to Walmart to price match a little bit, and checked out the vision center there. It was SUPER busy, but we looked around and found a few pairs of glasses that we liked. They had NO frames in the womens cheap section that I liked. These fit my head, but were like the ones that I had in 4th grade. Um, yeah, NOT going back there...
The really expensive ones in the womens section were passable, but still squeezy on my face. Cause, you know, I have a HUGE head. I know, I know, proportionally to my body, it looks normal. But it really is large.

So I went to the mens section, and found a $25 frame, and LOVED them. What do you think? Do they look overly man-ish? Can I pull it off? Wait, this, coming from bandaid girl... OK, I think it's an improvement!
Because it was SUCH a long wait, we decided to just come back another day. And we went around the store looking for price matching items. And yeah, because it had been tax free weekend last weekend, and EPISD schools were going back to school today, Walmart was WIPED clean of school supplies. We found a few things, and some clearance swim shorts, but that was it.

We headed to the cash register, and got a checker that really didn't care what prices we gave him . Yes, we gave him the right ones. But we could have told him anything. hehe. He didn't even look at the ads :)

And after we paid, we headed out, but the vision center wasn't busy at all. So I stopped in there, ordered 2 boxes of each eye for contacts, and a pair of those man glasses! Total was $248. Expensive, but not bad for what I got. The kids' glasses are on sale for $38 a pair. I'm coming back soon for them!

Kari ordered a pair of glasses too (her's were SUPER cute! But then, she has a small head and can pick from the womens section.... Lucky!)

And we were starving! Well, Amanda and I were. Ha! So we headed out to lunch. We had about an hour and a half before we had to pick up the kids from the bus. We headed to Olive Garden, thinking that we'd missed the lunch rush. It was 2, after all... Yeah, we should have gone somewhere else...

We were seated right away, but that was the only good part about the process...
Even though there weren't many people there, the waiter/server seemed to be overwhelmed. He forgot to refill Kari's water after being asked three times, tried to give me a regular coke 3 times, forgot our salads completely, gave Kari my food, my soup was cold, and on and on. Yeah, NOT the best Olive Garden experience ever...
Empty soda does not make for a good tip...
We eventually were done with lunch, and headed back to post. We made it in time to get to the bus. Amanda parked, and the three of us went to wait with the other moms. At around 3:40pm, the bus showed up. With only 1/2 the kids. Unfortunately, mine were all on it (ha! Just kidding). Amandas and Kari's and all our other friends' kids weren't, though!

About 20 families were missing kids. And you know how parents are when their kids are missing. I sent mine home, but had to stick around to see how it all played out. hehe. Joe wanted to stay with me, so he and I waited to see if another bus load of kids would show up.

Apparently what happened was that the bus that picked up the Ross Middle school kids 15 minutes earlier than the elementary school was delayed. Their principal wouldn't let the bus leave until ALL of the kids were accounted for. So the bus didn't arrive to drop off that load of students until late. And then it had to come back to school and pick up the elementary school kids. So those kids were waiting around for about 30 minutes in the hot sun, not knowing if their bus was gonna come. And the poor Kindergartners were crying and SO upset. Yeah, there were some MAD parents.

A few of the moms hopped in their cars and drove to the school to yell at the school. Amanda called them on the phone, and when she was told that the kids were gone... yeah, that didn't go over well. hehe. Once the kids finally showed up, she headed on up to the school to let it be known that the situation was NOT handled properly. And I agree. It wasn't.

Anyway, we didn't get home until around 4:05pm. Jake got off the bus at 4:10pm. And Tom was freaking out when we got home. He was all dressed up in camo, ready for paintball. He said that it started at 4pm, and that he was LATE! The other kids and I were going to the pool, so I had everyone change and get ready.

And yeah, we didn't get to the youth center until around 4:40pm. He was pretty upset. I had him run in to see if the guys were at the paintball field, and I was gonna run him over there. He came out with a big grin on his face saying that it started at 5pm. He was early! LOL. He was excited. I said bye, and told him that I'd pick him up at 8pm.

And we headed to the pool.
Jake (his hair held it's shape all day at school!)
Eme
Jake got bored after about an hour in the pool, and decided to walk home. It's really not that far. The rest of the kids played and had a GREAT time. Maggie and family and Amanda and Austin and Kari and her kids were there. We had fun playing and chatting.

The moms got in long enough to cool off, and chatted the rest of the time. Here's Kari.


And me, making a "I'm mad at the school" face. hehe.
Amanda's mad face. LOL!
The pool closed at 6:50pm, so we loaded up, and headed home. Jake forgot his glasses, so Joe was in charge of them for the ride home. hehe.
We got home, and started in on chores. The house was still messy. But after about 30 minutes of cleaning, it was SO much better. The kids set out their papers that needed signed and filled out on the counter for me, and we cleaned some more.

At 7:55pm, I headed out to pick up Tom from paintball. He was REALLY excited because his team won. He got a trophy and everything. He said that one of the boys on his team was REALLY good, and that he should have got everyones trophy. hehe. I told him that even if he didn't do much, he still should be proud of the team win. hehe.

We headed back home, and it took another 30 minutes to get everyone to bed. I think that once the house is cleaned, that the evenings/mornings will go SO much smoother. Right now, it's kinda messy. Tomorrow should be better!

I showered (twice in one day!!!), and sat down to blog, and watched the episode of 24 that I didn't pay attention to yesterday. hehe. I'm now ready to watch season 7 episode 3. But it's bedtime for me! It's 10:23pm, and I have to get up at 5:30am. And start another crazy busy day!

The girls and I are getting the kids on the bus at 7:30am, then going back to Office Depot/Max for those spiral bound notebooks. Then back home. My visiting teacher is coming to see me at 9am. That is, if she doesn't go into labor first. ha! She's due on Wednesday!

Then, at 11:45am, we're going to Yoga. And the kids get off of the bus at 3, 3:30, and 4. Then I'm taking all 5 of them to the Sears vision place for eye exams. And bringing portable DVD players and computers so they're not bored. hehe. Then off to Walmart vision center to get new glasses and contacts for Jake. Should be a busy day! But then, aren't they always???

Click on the link below to go to my account to download the PNG file, and leave some love if you like my work. Thanks!


Simply gorgeous! Love this one, Sharon! The WordArt looks FABULOUS on it!



2 comments:

Danesa said...

Thank you for the great summer wa. I have to tell you, I need a nap after reading about your day! It wears me out. tehehe Love your blogging!!

Elaine M said...

Enjoy your blog so much - makes my life look calm in comparison! Thanks so much for the fantastic word art.