Lost Another Tooth!

Trunk or Treat

I know it has been a week since my last post. Ken has been installing Windows Vista on our computer. Plus, I have a job, two kids, I'm pregnant, and my hubby works 10-12 hours a day and doesn't get home till the boys bedtime. Basically, time is not a luxury I have. My posts will probably be more photos with captions. Sorry, it's all I have in me.

Last Saturday was our ward Trunk or Treat and chili cook-off. We always have fun at this activity. There are games and face painting and the ever important distribution of candy. I don't have many pictures of Kenny because (surprise, surprise) he was not listening very well and kept running off. The boys were both Jedi Masters allowing us to get a second use out of last years costumes.

I didn't win the chili cook-off. I never expect to here in Texas. I have won a chili cook-off in Utah, but this state is serious about their chili. Nevertheless, my pot was almost empty by the end of the night. My INSANE husband ate 4 chili dogs with sour cream and two full bowls of chili. Let me tell you, he slept on the couch for a few nights after that.

Nathan was a little nervous with all the people and strange costumes.

Kenny and one of his best friends, Daniel.

Costume parade

My RandomThoughts Are Wandering

Exhaustion is the name of the game. And I can't get rid of it. It doesn't matter what time I go to bed (I average 8:30) I wake up totally exhausted! By my 10:25 lunch time I am ready for a morning siesta. Unfortunately, it is frowned upon for teachers to sleep on the job. Especially kinder teachers. There is no telling what an unsupervised group of imaginative 5 year olds can come up with.

Which reminds me of a story.

You know you're a kindergarten teacher if you can find a pair of used underwear on a chair in your classroom and it has absolutely no effect on you.

This happened to me. No kidding.

I am in the middle of doing this little song about the sound of the letter T when one of my little ones pipes up, "Um, Teacher, there is undies in the chair."

What?!?

Sure enough, there was a pair of electric blue Spiderman underpants with a red waistband on a chair by the computers.

Without missing a beat I turn around and find myself saying, "Who doesn't have on underwear? Boys and girls, let's not take off our underwear at school. Leave it on. If you have an accident, let me know and the nurse will help you clean up. What's that? Oh good, I'm glad you put on new underwear this morning, but are you wearing it now? Bobby (name changed to protect his not-so-innocence- he is usually my most likely suspect) come here so I can check you. We have to keep our underwear on. No, no Bobby, please don't undo you pants here, go to the bathroom first. Bobby...BOBBY, GO TO THE BATHROOM FIRST!"

It wasn't until later when I sat down and had time to think that I realized I went to collage for this! I worked hard to get my four year degree so I could be a professional underwear detective.

I know anyone who works in childcare or as a teacher understands what I'm saying. Other than being a mom, I love my job. I love teaching little kids. But every once and a while there are moments when I wonder why I didn't become a marketing director with a nice office desk job and adults to talk to during the day.

Well, it is now 9:00 pm and WAY past my bedtime. Nerdy, I know, but I am beyond caring. I have to get up at 5:45 am for another day of underwear sleuthing. Night-night!

Here's The Story...

Please note: Before all this occurred my husband did not know much about plumbing or flooring replacement. Good thing he is smarter than I am and taught himself how to do all this.

Nathan shoved toys down the boy's toilet and our toilet. Luckily, he had enough compassion to leave us with one working commode downstairs. Snaking the toilets did not work to remove anything. Ken pulled up the boy's toilet, ripping out the improperly installed linoleum tile flooring in the process. After getting the toilet removed, he noticed the flange was cracked and leaking.

Off to Home Depot to buy a new flange.

After removing the flange, we found out the sub floor was rotted out because the pipe connecting the toilet to the sewer was cracked and leaking.

Off to Home Depot to buy a new sewer piping and materials for sub floor replacement.

Back and forth a few times to get the proper things to do the job.

Taking out the sewer pipe was a messy, horrible job. Ken said he was so happy we have a wet/dry shop vac. After getting the toy removed, pipe replaced, and building a new sub-floor we went out to the garage to find extra flooring tiles.
There weren't any.
Oh shoot.
The tiles that came up with the toilet were torn beyond patching. We needed a new floor.

Off to Home Depot to buy a new floor.

We researched out flooring options and decided to go with vinyl planks called TrafficMaster Allure. It looks like tiles, but installs in panels that have interlocking glue strips. The floor is actually a floating floor and does not connect to the sub flooring, which meant we could save the cost of needing to install an underlayment before the laminate flooring. (Wow, I know way too much about this.) The flooring is sold in boxes of 8 panels and we needed about 18 panels to cover the floor. That meant we would have enough to re-do our master bathroom floor as well. Yeah! Ripping up the rest of the boys bathroom floor was the next step. This part was relatively easy because (as anyone who has taken a shower in that bathroom without the bath mats down) the self-stick tiles were improperly installed and they stuck to your foot rather than the sub floor. The hard part was scraping the glue residue off the floor and using some special kind of compound to level out the floor.

Off to Home Depot to buy leveling compund.

The result before new flooring.

He got the flooring installed and it looks great. Unfortunately, the quarter rounds on the base boards didn't come off the wall well and would need to be replaced. This was the time I was sent to the store on my own.
Now that's trust.

Off to Home Depot to buy new toe strips.

I was almost out of the parking lot when Ken called and asked me to get a certain type of caulking.

Off to Home Depot to buy caulk.

Time to put the toilet back on. Ken spent a good amount to time scraping the old wax ring off the bottom of the toilet.

Off to Home Depot to buy two new No Seep beeswax rings.

After getting things squared away in that bathroom, he moved onto the master bathroom (without the pipe or flange replacement). Luckily, since the new flooring is floating, we were able to simply place it over the existing floor.

Our bathroom floor during the toy removal process.

It finally looked like everything was fixed with only trim installation left. That's when little Kenny used his bathroom to do the "big job" and we found out the toilet was still clogged. We're pretty certain that this toy was put in at the same time as the others, but it was stealthy and didn't interfere with the flow of things until there was poop in the toilet. Surprise! Ken tried snaking the toilet again, to no avail. Once again, Ken had to remove the toilet. He then spent a couple of hours tooling, heaving, cursing, praying, and pondering child sacrifice to get the toilet gods' assistance in getting this @#%!$ toy out. No luck. At one point, with the toilet upside down in the bathtub, the auger got stuck during yet another hopeless attempt, but this time there was a faint ray of light at the end of the tunnel. (Actually it was a faint glimpse of blue plastic just beyond reach in the opening of the toilet drain.) The auger was wedged in tight behind this little plastic menace. After breaking one auger and sending a stream of toilet-sediment up his pants, shirt, the wall, and part of the ceiling, Ken was a little reluctant to pull with all his might to break the auger loose this time. With this faint glimpse of hope (blue plastic) Ken's creative juices started flowing. First he tried "flushing" it out with the shower. No luck. Next he tried "pushing" it out by snaking the broken auger through the other end of the toilet. No luck. Time for some serious outside-the-box brainstorming! Out came the Dremel, with its 3 foot flex hose attachment and universal drill bit. 10,000 rpms of fury crammed up the backend of a porcelin throne. (Yeah, THIS was a good idea!!!) It made scratches on both the toilet and YES!!! the plastic toy!!! Now we're getting somewhere! Prodded on by this tiny bit of success, Ken was anxious to win, and came up with the Atomic Bomb of ideas. Fire. He headed to the garage to go get some gasoline. He was going to torch the the toy out! Whenever Ken gets "in the zone" it is my job to sit back and watch him as he busily goes about his work. While it can be entertaining watching Ken in a frenzy like this, the real reason I watch him is to make sure his ideas don't get past a certain point of stupid. Fire in the toilet is that certain point of stupid. I stepped in and tried to reason with Ken about fire in the toilet. It didn't work. I at least got him to trade the gas can for a bottle of hairspray. With the kids downstairs in a secure place, a fire extinguisher in one hand, and a phone with 911 on speed dial in the other, I let Ken go upstairs, alone, with his pyrotechnics in tow. I don't want to know the details of what transpired after that point, but a little while later, with a funny smell in the air, Ken started hooping and hollering with victory. He had melted the toy loose and got it out! While Ken finished cleaning the remnants of the previously-freshly-installed wax ring off the toilet, I checked the bathroom for scorch marks. Again, I don't want to know the details, but het got it out, and didn't burn anything, except for the blue plastic traingle puzzle piece that was now a smoldering heap in the tub. Wow!

Off to Home Depot to buy a new No Seep beeswax ring. The people at the store now know Ken quite well. We are expecting Christmas cards.

Toilet back in place and working quite nicely (we tested it with a big wad of toilet paper to make certain) we finally come to the trim replacement. True to form, Ken got creative when he came across a problem. We have two little "lips" of ceramic tile that we needed the trim to go around. Ken used a utility knife to hand carve the vinyl trim to make an exact fit. I told him not to cut his fingers off. He said it would be fine if he went slowly. apparantly, raazor blades don't cut if you go slow.

My bedroom during the put-it-back-together phase. I have loved having half the garage in my bedroom for a week.

Ta-Da!

P.S. I am taking bets on how long it takes Ken to get all the garage stuff out of our bedroom and back into the garage. The winner gets... something that I will think of later!

(P.P.S. Keep in mind it took a full year and 6 weeks to get the dining room wall fixed.)

FYI...

Just letting you boys in the fam know your wedding YMCA video on You Tube has been viewed 552 times.

Just in case you missed it before, here is the link.

A Typical Family Dinner

Ken's rather accurate imitation of Nathan.

"Ta Da!"

Our little man's favorite words.

He'll hold his little hand out at whatever he is proud of and say "ta da!" Everytime he pee-pees in the potty we get a "See that, ta da!" This morning I was woken up with him handing me his Geo Track train. He said, "Mama, fix it train." I sort of opened my eyes and told him I couldn't fix it without new batteries. He bent over for a few seconds and came back up, holding a new AAA battery in his hand, and said, "tada!" It was so cute! It told him we needed three batteries. "Ok Mama. You stay here. I be right back." I have no idea how long he dug around in the battery drawer, but he finally found the necessary batteries and I got his train running.

We Still Love You Nathan

Who would have thought a little boat could do this.

And this.

And this.

And this.

After we finish getting this bathroom put back together we get to move onto getting the cup out of the master bathroom toilet, which has rendered it unusable.

Whoever coined the phrase "terrible twos" did so before three!

Our Baby- The Tapeworm

Cartoon from babygaga.com

This is what our new little bundle has reduced me to. I am always hungry. One day this last week, I ate eggs and toast with yogurt for breakfast. For lunch I had a sandwich, a whole tomato, bag of grapes, rice krispy treat, an Almond Joy candy bar, and a granola bar. An hour after lunch, I bought a catered lunch some people where selling in the staff lounge. I ate a chicken leg/thigh, a quarter link of smoked sausage, potato salad, and mexican rice. For my after school snack I ate rasainets. For dinner I had tator tots, a hamburger, and corn. Then I snacked on an apple and some chips after the kids went to bed. The real kicker...I lost half a pound by the next morning! As of this morning, I have gained a whooping 4 pounds. Now, why can't I eat like this and not gain weight when I'm not pregnant and I can't gain weight while I am pregnant? One of life true cruelties.

Rebuilding

I know it has been a week since I blogged last. Been busy and I have felt very unmotivated and a little depressed. Everyone here has a lot weighing on their minds and I have all these crazy hormones to contend with.

Debris removal from our yard is complete. We are now in the rebuilding phase. I have pictures of our new backyard fence, but I can't find the camera-to-computer cord. We still do not have any side yard fencing.

We had church in the parking lot one weekend due to loss of power and only an hour last week because we have some displaced members living in our building. Some of these people have lost everything. We had men in work clothes at church on Sunday for the Primary Program. The men in the ward are spending the weekends in Galveston and I helped make lunches to take to the crews and the families they are working with last Sunday. I also made and took dinner to a dear friend of mine and her family who flooded bad and she has had to gut out her home. It felt good to be doing something to help. It is odd to me that seeing piles of debris, blown out signage, blue roofs, leaning or broken power poles, and smelling mildew in stores are all a normal part of life. Every morning on my way to work I see convoys of power trucks and telecommunication vehicles. My kids drive around with us and point out big damage verses little damage. Even Nathan says, "Mama, look a damage. More damage, more damage, etc." He's only 3! Kenny has struggled with this storm. At least once a day he says he wishes storms never happen. Last Sunday he asked me why Heavenly Father let the storm break the good people's house and not just the bad people's houses? Try explaining that to a 6 year old.

We all went back to school and work on Monday, which was a bit stressful. I have lost two weeks worth of teaching time. It is already October and I have to start testing for the first report card next week. Thank goodness the passing requirements for the 1st kindergarten report card are fairly low and most students can basically pass the testing with what they came to kinder knowing. But I have about 4 who do not have a hope or a prayer of passing. They came to me knowing very little (a few shapes, no letters, could not write names, can only count to about 5, etc.) I have not had the time to get those poor babies enough knowledge to pass the test. My school also went ahead and held Open house last Tuesday. We had been in school 12 days, 1 day since the hurricane, and I had to do Open House. Let me tell you, it was my lamest Open House ever. Luckily (I guess), the parents only had 1 day's notice after the hurricane and I only had 5 parents show up.

So Guess What!! All the stress of evacuating, hurricane clean up, and returning to week has proved to be more than my body could handle. I started having contractions every 5 minutes, along with back pain and nausea yesterday. Things eventually stopped and I was ordered to spend the rest of the weekend on bed rest. Assuming things stay calm, I can again return to my modified bed rest plan on Monday. Maybe I'll get lucky and this will be as severe as my pre-term labor problems get this time around. Who knows?