Good weekend!

Saturday was a beeyootiful day! Andrew had to work, so we didn't go anywhere, but man, oh, man! Did we spend the day outside! I took advantage of it and cleaned out the stinky, smelly, dusty, dirty, stinky, did I say smelly? sunroom! We keep the litter box in there and after a time, things get dusty. Add to that the constant build-up of dirt and chicken poo that comes in from our shoes. Add in also the muddy days we've had. And don't forget the pile of winter coats, boots, snow pants, gloves, hats, scarves, drying rack, and scattered clothes pins to hold clothes to drying rack. And the shoes! Good Lord the shoes! They're fornicating in there! I swear, shoes multiply in that sunroom! It smelled like cat pee in there, too. Phew.. what with the litter box and Percy the cat peeing in places he isn't supposed to be.

Needless to say, the sunroom needed a BIG clean up/out. While the kids played outside, I cleaned. Cleaned and cleaned and cleaned! High chair? Out! Box of too-small shoes Percy peed on? Trash! Empty plastic bags? Gathered together and recycled! One by one, things got sorted, cleaned, put away, trashed, lost and found or moved to the pole barn. It no longer smells in there now. One can walk in there without tripping over something. And best of all? I finished in the nick of time-- the kids were starting to come in and out, in and out, looking for excuses to come in and plop somewhere, tired from all the outdoor play.

Before and after pictures? Are you crazy? I'm too embarrassed to show any before pictures of the sunroom (yet I can tell you how filthy it was!?!) and after pictures are nothing to toot my horn over. It's not a pretty room-- gray fake-wood paneling, faded tan linoleum floors cracked and ripped and worn through in some spots, drop ceiling panels and florescent lights, and black fake-wood plastic trim. I have plans for that room! Oh! Can you just imagine ripping out the drop ceiling and finding exposed beams, staining the wood in warm rich color and adding lights and replacing the cheap-o windows with new triple-paned windows, adding real bead-board wood to the walls and wood, maybe tile flooring. Losing a couple of windows and putting in cabinetry in it's place for better storage and turning it into a fancy-schmancy mud-room slash laundry room. ~sigh~

Who knows what that drop-ceiling is hiding, probably lots of spider webs and nothing but nails poking through the roof. I bet we'll find the walls are not insulated and we might find termite damage in the framing. There's even an old 80's speaker-phone speaker on one wall. We've already ripped out the main radio/speaker-phone thingy and other speakers from the rest of the house and patched the holes in the drywall. The sunroom is the only one left because of the fake-wood paneling and hanging a picture over the resulting hole just won't do, it's too close to the door frame. Ah well... one can dream. At least the sunroom is clean now.

I don't know about you, but this time change thing really knocks me for a loop! I wish I could be like Archie the cat up there and just flop on top of the truck and go to sleep. Ok, maybe not on the roof of the truck, but flopping on the bed sounds good to me.

I'm already tired and sore from all that cleaning from Saturday and it sure doesn't help that at 8 am this morning, my Aunt and Uncle came over to visit. That's early! It's really 7 am if it wasn't for that time change! Why?! Who gets up at 7 am?? Oh well, I slap a smile on my face, hug the relatives, nosh on the doughnut holes they brought and enjoy the company.

And we did have a good day, too. I took my Aunt with me to the stores for my Sunday morning shopping. She's a coupon queen, too, and we've never coupon-shopped together before. I told her to bring her coupons and we could go together while most people are in church and we can have the stores all to ourselves. She comes from the city where everything on sale gets sold out the first day and she couldn't believe it when we pulled into the empty parking lot and nobody else was there but us.

It's so funny to watch her after we got in the car from making our purchases and see her scan the receipt and cackle at her success and her lucky day when the cashier gave her a better price on the coupon and she made a little bit of a profit when I gave her a higher-value coupon to use instead. I could tell she was watching me shop, too, and my mom told me later that she was impressed with my shopping skills and that I knew what I was doing. I'm not looking for validation, but it does make me feel good to hear that.

The kids have so much fun when my Aunt and Uncle are here.. Great-Aunt and Great-Uncle to them. Aunt brought over a tube with 10 different colors of nail polish in it. Do you know what nail polish does to little girls?? It makes them squeal with delight and beg to get their fingers and toes painted! It's even more fun when Auntie has her digits painted in different colors, too!

I get to pick Uncle's brain about farming and gardening and chickens and he takes the kids outside and pushes them on the swings and walks in the woods with them. It's good fun and the kids are sad to see them go at the end of the day. On the bright side of their early arrival, the kids are tired and hardly any protest at going to bed.

Speaking of bed... I'm headed there right now. ~snore, snore~

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