Week of single-mommying ended with an awesome girl's night!

Yup - I was a single mom yet again last week, thanks to J going down to sunny Florida for a week of training. But it ended up being a good week. And B behaved most of the time or at least whenever mommy started growling at him when he was up to no good. So the next time your child gets unruly, making really freaky animal sounds is guaranteed to get their attention!

But J came back home right in time for me to take off the following evening for a fun-filled girls night with the FunnyGals KAT and SJ along with another one of my and SJ's childhood classmates K. The night started with a nice dinner at J-Tim's - yummy buffalo wings and nachos and calamari that was spiked with fried jalapeno pepper rings... not sure about those, but the calamari was good! Following dinner we determined that it was far too early to arrive at the night's hot spot, so we invaded the boy's poker game going on at KAT's house for a few rounds of Dance, Dance Revolution. KAT was by far the best dancer among the 4 of us, but watching each other hop around like crazy (while getting booed - the nerve of that game!) was just hilarious! But then we got a real dance lesson - KAT very patiently taught the rest of us a few country line dancing moves in preparation for fun to be had at the Caddy Ranch which was our next stop. I can honestly say I felt fairly comfortable with the steps by the time we left her house, but by the time the song came on at the Ranch, I only remembered half of what I had learned! Maybe I should blame the rum and coke I had when we first arrived. Or the free shot of Jameson... Anyway, once we were out there and dancing, the steps came back to me and by the time the song was over, I was wishing it hadn't ended! I had finally gotten a handle on all the moves! And of course the night wouldn't be complete without some crazy stuff going on - like some guy trying to pick me up! All I can say is thank god we left when we did - right at the start of a slow song with that guy walking back in my direction! And honestly, who goes to a country line dancing club wearing sneakers anyway?!?!?

Another month - another post?

So we're now into March...in like a lion and out like a lamb, right? I sure hope so. Lots of stuff has been going on with us lately - I'll have to elaborate more about that in another post. As for my friend with her twin boys - they are both fighting like champs right now. Both of them have been transferred to another hospital which is connected to a children's hospital with surgeons, specialists, etc. So they are both receiving top-notch care right now, which they need desperately! The bigger one had issues with his small intestine that required the removal of at least 80% of it. So they have some challenges ahead of them in the feeding area and making sure that he can digest food. They would like to put him on a transplant list at some point, but they can't do that until he is at least 2 years old. The smaller one is fighting right along and will soon be undergoing surgery to connect his esophagus to his stomach. So there will be a bit of a battle for him to fight soon too. All in all, the parents have remained very optimistic and are leaning heavily on their faith to get them through all this. Last weekend I dropped off some food and her baby shower gifts since I won't be able to attend her shower in person. And next week will be the last week of her 6-week maternity leave, so she'll be returning to work the week after that. That will make visiting the babies very tough I'm sure.

On to home improvements... The dining room wall has been patched and sanded and is ready for painting, but last weekend we re-painted the ceiling in the kitchen and the dining room and going up the stairs. And since the idiots who built our house didn't bother priming the sheetrock on the ceiling prior to spraying the ceiling, we had to use this nasty oil-based paint to seal the existing junk to the ceiling. I forgot how bad oil-based paint stinks! But now we have a nice flat white ceiling that looks really nice and we can move ahead with the wall painting. Actually we won't be doing the walls right away. My plan there is to install a chair rail that will run the length of the wall and turn to follow the wall up the stairs. And there are several funky angles there so we'll definitely need my dad's help to cut the chair rail correctly. Once we know where on the wall the chair rail will be fastened, we'll start painting. Above the chair rail will be a nice dark red and below will be an almond/cream color. Should look nice once it's all done.

In other news - my mom was in the hospital last week for shortness of breath. Thankfully she was only there for a week, but they had to drain quite a bit of fluid from around her lungs so that she could breath easier. The doctors seem to think that a virus could have caused her system to weaken which would explain the fluid levels since her heart is weak enough as it is. She's home now and the oxygen machine is back so hopefully she will get stronger in the next few weeks.