Bad night last night... me, not Jane. I had some sort of stomach ailment that kept me in such pain I didn't get much sleep. I felt better when I woke up, just exhausted. Still I wanted to go to church, so I powered through the morning. I'm so glad I did because an old friend and hockey buddy turned up with his new lady friend. We did lunch with them and some of our other good friends. We were supposed to go to the beach that night, but it was stormy at our house so we ended up skipping it, much to my disappointment.  That disappointment put me in a bad mental state and I really let myself dwell on several other slights and let downs from last week. My thoughts are not in a good place right now. I hope the start of a new week will help me move past it.

Tomorrow is Julian's first day of kindergarten. His uniform is all laid out. His backpack is fully loaded and his lunch bag is full. I can't think of anything else we need to do to prepare. Jason's going into work later so we both get to be part of this big day.

Tomorrow is all about Julian, so here's a Jane picture:

The lighting gives this a mysterious feel!

I love a good thrift store find. They are getting very rare for me though. Mostly because I haven't even gone to a thrift store in months- also because a lot more people are thrifting so the pickings are slim. I didn't plan to stop this morning, but I thought I might find another pair of uniform pants or shorts for Julian. In my calculations, I didn't factor in that he'd need a set of "accident" clothes. I ended up at a store that I don't even like that much. They price everything in anticipation of the one day a month when it's all half off. Anyway, I did find a pair of suitable pants for Juju and then a pair of shoes caught my eye. I have little feet and I can wear kids sizes. These fit perfectly! (I know, I know, thrift store shoes- ick, BUT for the right shoe, you can always throw in insoles and they're fine.) Here's my find:

Love the hand embroidering!

The last photo was artistic, this is a better view! They have hand stitched rag soles too.

That last entry was soooo long, thanks to those who took the time to read it!

So all the holiday festivities are officially over and we're attempting to get back to normal. Really that won't happen until school starts but we can try. The Christmas stuff starts coming down today. I kind of hate that- everything looks boring without the lights and Christmas tchotchkes. I've had a few art pieces waiting in the wings to go up so now would be a good time to get those hung. At least it's something fun and new (to me- it's all vintage so none of it is really "new"). Maybe I'm feeling a touch of the post-holiday blues. Anybody else feel a little lost this time of year?
One of the paintings I'm hanging up:

Tuesday, September 4, 2012~

Still figuring out the camera. It's shooting very dark, but if I turn on the flash, it totally washes everything out. I just need to play with it. Of course, when Juju was at school this morning I had a million and one errands to run.  So later when I'm trying to hang a backdrop and figure out the new camera, he's running around talking non-stop. It was a frustrating afternoon to say the least. I just have to keep in mind that he isn't always going to be here so I need to be more patient and willing to stop what I'm doing and give him a little attention.

Playing cat in the midst of chaos. My just-hung backdrop is in the foreground. His sea creature bedroom stuff is next to him. That has to happen soon!

Friday, July 20th~

   Joy, Daniel and the kids took off early this morning. It's too quiet without them. We're all feeling a little sad because, after this weekend, we'll all be separated again for probably a year. We have all chosen different paths and they do not cross as often as we'd like. For a little distraction and just to get out of the house, we went into Branson and caught another Imax movie and had dinner. Mom wanted to get Julian a little something for school so we went to Target on our way home. It wasn't that hard to talk him out of the sparkly beret and sunglasses when he saw an Adventure Time t-shirt.