sickness

Julie stayed home sick today, but really all three of us were sick. I went to the doctor because apparently I have a canker sore on my tongue. It was so big and it hurt so much I didn't know what it was. The doctor told me to get more sleep. Should have seen that coming.

Today was Grace's first day of her new gymnastics class. Wow are these kids advanced! Grace did really well though and she even made it through the whole two hours with no problem. Julie ended up coming for a little while just to watch because she really never gets to see her do any of this stuff. So she drug herself out of bed and drove on up to Antioch. And then she went right back home and back to bed I think. Grace and I went to get gas up in Wisconsin; her gymnastics place is only 1.2 miles from the state line and over the line it's only $2.99. So that's a no brainer! Then we went to get her some flip-flops or crocs; it was up to her. And all she's been talking about is flip-flops, but the only flip-flops they had at the place we went was croc flip-flops, and she didn't like them so she ended up with crocs which is what I would have rather she bought anyway.

Then we came home too and we all had lunch and soon after that is when I went to the doctor. Then after dinner a financial adviser came over to go over our current investment portfolio and he told us that basically we are on track to retire a little early and he says we should be able to buy a vacation/second/retirement home in about 10 years. We'll see! It sounds a little scary to us!

Then since we were all tired and sickly we were all getting ready for bed. But Grace had gone to play at "A"'s house so Julie went to go get her, but then I came out too and was talking to her dad. He was telling us about an accident he had at work. He basically got electrocuted, but it wasn't your standard 110 or even 220, it was more than that. He's alright, but apparently he's going to take a few days off as his work wants him too I think. So we will get some much needed rest tonight and hopefully be better tomorrow.

Stage Rehearsal

Today was stage rehearsal and we were there a little longer than I thought we would be because we stayed to watch all the dances. Plus we picked up Julie's Mom on the way there and she came with us. Then we dropped her off on the way home. Stage rehearsal itself went pretty good I think. There were a few glitches like when the curtains broke and they couldn't close them. That's bad when you get to the end of the show and you can't close the curtains, but overall things went well. So I think everyone is ready for tomorrow.

As I'm writing this however Grace is still not asleep. She's pulling out every card she's got for a reason why she can't go to sleep. It might be partly because she took a nap in the car on the way home, but who knows. She didn't eat much of her dinner and that usually means she doesn't feel well. So hopefully she isn't getting sick.

Sadly, my whole family won't be able to come and see Grace dance this year. My Dad and my Aunt are both going out to Uncle Chuck's wake and funeral. And my Sister is going to our cousins graduation party. So I've got four extra tickets if anyone wants them. :-)

I tried to get a few things done around the house today to make it more presentable, but we just really didn't have any time at home. I was helping my Aunt (different from the last paragraph) with a computer problem on the phone in the morning after I paid a few bills. Talked to my Sister for a few minutes too. My niece had her recital today and so we couldn't go to that since we were at stage rehearsal all day. I was amazed at how she was describing how they do their recitals. For our recitals they have two shows and they generally go for about two hours each. For their recital, they have between 6 and 7 shows and each one is about an hour and a half. I was amazed. That's a lot of dancing! Now that would take all day!

I did get a few minutes to work in the garden a little. I finally got my netting put down and my strawberries are mostly protected now. I also put the new post caps on all the garden posts so they all look nicer. Now I just need to finish weeding and till the soil so I can maybe plant a few things. I need to think of someplace to transplant the strawberries to next year because they take up a lot of room in the garden. They are probably taking up 1/3 of the garden and thats too much in my opinion.

I'm so ready to get our new car. This car is nice, but it's not perfect for us and I'm just tired of driving it. I feel like a yuppy in it. Although we did see two "older" ladies driving one tonight on the way home from Wisconsin. Speaking of Wisconsin, we couldn't believe the gas prices up there. We're definitely filling up before we come home tomorrow. I think I mentioned the other day that the cheapest I've seen around here is $3.33/gallon. Up in Kenosha it's only $2.99/gallon. WOW! 34¢ a gallon can add up quick!

That's all I can remember, so I'll add more if I think of it tomorrow.

Another Tuesday

Well it's Tuesday which means we've got gymnastics. This was the last week of gymnastics before the summer session starts and they called last week and asked us to come in at 10:00am instead of Noon. So we got there almost right at 10:00 and Miss Deb wasn't there. We got inside to find out that she wasn't going to be there because she was doing something for school with her son and that Grace was just going to have open gym instead of class. All of us parents said that if we'd known that, we wouldn't have come. So anyway, we all stayed and the girls all played around but I think they were bored. Grace's friend from class invited us to their end of school party at Centennial Park just down the street from gymnastics which was really nice.

So we went there after gymnastics and Grace had a wonderful time. She got to play with her friends and made some new friends. Unfortunately it was a little cold today, I think the high was only 61 and we didn't bring clothes for Grace to change into, but at least we had jackets and sweatshirts. She never said she was cold and of course she was running around a lot. I was kind of cold, but my sweatshirt was enough to keep me warm.

After that I got gas at the cheapest place I know of around here in Antioch which was $3.33/gal which was cheaper than their sign said $3.39. So that made me a little happy. Then we went to Menards to get a new toilet flushing mechanism as ours broke in the downstairs bathroom. Actually this is kind of cool (I know; how can a toilet flush mechanism be interesting right?) Well, it's called something like silent or quiet flush and they aren't using false advertising. That toilet is really quiet now when you flush it. Alright maybe it's not so exciting, but it's interesting. I never gave much thought to the volume of my toilet when it flushes, have you?

Alright, enough of that subject. We also got Grace a new kite. I had bought her one last year at like Jewel or somewhere and it was completely useless. We couldn't keep it in the air longer than 10-15 seconds. Apparently you get what you pay for so I saw these kites at Menards for like $10 or maybe a little less and found one that looked kind of cool - nothing really for girls - and got it for her. This was the new Menards up in Antioch by the way and I just have to say WOW that place is cool. They have a very large selection including things you wouldn't expect like food (just packaged food) and the lumber yard is not just indoors like at most Menards, but it's inside the store - heated, cooled, etc. I heard they had a good selection of plants, but we never made it over there. I also got a rain gauge so I know when to water the lawn. Until this week, we hadn't really gotten much rain so my yard was looking horrible.

They didn't have my grass trimmer attachment either, so I guess I'll have to call around and check the internet etc. because the areas that you would normally trim are looking really bad. And since we pay someone to come and fertilize the yard, it's the least I could do to keep things looking good. Speaking of which, I REALLY need to mow the back yard now. It's looking like a field and I'm not sure when it will be dry enough to cut. I'm pretty sure it won't be dry enough tomorrow since we also have a chance for rain again tomorrow afternoon. Then it's supposed to be like 92 on Thursday so maybe Friday is a possibility. We'll see. Thank goodness I mowed the front yard when I did or the neighbors would disown us.

So after the short shopping trip, Grace and I came home. She had already had lunch at the park so I needed to eat something. Then she went to play with her friend next door. Today was the day to pick up Market Day at our church while Grace was still at her friends house. So I stopped over to ask if it was alright if she stay there while I ran to church (not literally.) They said it was no problem so I ran and got that. Just before I got home Julie called and wondered where I was. I thought I'd be back home before she got there but I was off by about a minute I think.

So we all kind of hung out for a while and I made dinner for Grace - I ate my lunch really late and wasn't hungry and I don't think Julie was very hungry either because she couldn't decide what she wanted. I offered to cook something for her but that didn't seem to help her decide either. Then while Grace was eating her friend from across the street came over and said they were riding their bikes to the library and wondered if we wanted to come with. I definitely did because I needed the exercise, but Julie couldn't decide because she was still trying to decide what to eat. But she decided to come along and just eat something later which is usually ice cream :->

So we all rode to the library and it's like 55 degrees outside in June - just crazy! We were all bundled up, the girls with their gloves on and everyone with a jacket and/or sweatshirt. The girls were having a blast and we made it there in like record time. Boy was I tired; I think we averaged about 10.6 mph on the way there, and it seemed faster. Maybe the jeans I was wearing didn't help - they made my legs feel like I was wearing a wool blanket on them. But the next time I ride with shorts my legs will feel really light! So the average speed for the whole trip which was just under 5 miles was 9.8 mph. So we slowed down about 2 mph overall I think on the way back but we made it and now my legs feel like rubber. I should try to ride tomorrow to get my legs moving. We'll see as I'm pretty sure we're going to Great America with another of Grace's friends. He's so cute and the two of them just seem to really like each other. This will be their first "play date" and I think she's excited - and I haven't even told her where we're going yet.

My Aunt from Nebraska called today. She's coming out in July (which is kind of funny because we're going to see her later in July) and was making sure we'd be around and be able to pick her up from the airport and such. So now we have something to look forward to in the beginning of July. We normally go to the Taste of Chicago before the 4th, but we haven't made any plans yet. Maybe we should start working on making those plans and then we'll have even more to look forward to.

Looks like I am going to the Cubs game next Tuesday, so I'll be missing the Village Board Meeting. I've been going to them since March I think. It's really opened my eyes to the things going on in our Village and the surrounding area. But I can miss just this one right? I called my BIL to see if he could go and it looks like he can. So it looks like the three of us are going, should be fun! I've never been to a night game at Wrigley - at least I don't think so.

Oh when I went to the library I got a book about learning Windows Server 2003. I don't know much about it and this'll help me learn how to start playing around with it since I installed it on the computer I got from my Dad. I'm not sure if it'll really work since it's only licensed for development purposes. But I can certainly play around with it until it tells me to stop or something doesn't work when it really should be working. So I now have 10 books checked out of the library. Most of them are stuff for vacation though, so I'm not reading the entire book for those, just trying to get ideas.

First blog post

I thought it was time I started blogging so that far-away family and friends can keep up with our day-to-day happens/turmoil/etc.

The days of driving the Freestyle are officially over. I only have about 16 miles left before I reach the magical number (24,000 miles) and will have to start paying by the mile since it's a lease. The dealership is only around 10 miles away, so that isn't a problem. Good news is that we're turning it in on Friday (2 days), bad news is I haven't really done anything except take Grace to her activities for the last two weeks. I'm getting a little stir crazy with not being able to go anywhere.

And you'd think that since the weather's been nice and gas prices are so high (lowest by me is $3.57 as of today) that I'd be able to ride my bicycle, but I had a flat on Monday. I built it up all morning with Grace after school and we came home and the front tire was as flat as a pancake. So I thought: no problem, just air it up. Ha-ha-ha - no, didn't help. Gaping hole in the tube. And I can't drive anywhere to get it fixed. No places close enough to walk to, so I'll just wait until I can use another car to get it fixed. Well, my neighbor let me borrow his car today and I thought I'd go and get the tire fixed while Grace was in school (her last day of preschool until the fall.) But the bike shop we go to - M&M Bikes in Mundelein - didn't open until 11:00am which is when Grace gets out of school. So I went to the library while Grace was in school and then her and I went to the bike shop after school and got it fixed. Turns out it was a spoke that put the gaping hole in the tube as the inner protector that covers the spoke holes had shifted and allowed the spoke to touch the tube - bummer!

So anyway, I now have two tires that work and my bike is ready to go. I'm planning on using it tomorrow (Thursday) to go somewhere, just because I have to go somewhere. I can't stay at home all day. But I do have things to do at home. I need to cut the grass as we're hosting our "Somewhat Annual Memorial Day Picnic" on Sunday and I want the yard to look good. Probably should pull some weeds in the flower beds too. Also need to get to cleaning the house and we still haven't planned the food we're going to serve and therefore can't tell anyone what to bring yet. Good news is the RSVP's have been coming in pretty darn strong and no "no's" yet.

I'm trying to learn ASP.net 2.0 and since I only have Windows XP Home on my computer, I don't have and can't install IIS which allows you to run ASP.net files (basically a web server.) So I've been using the Cassini Web Server that Microsoft provides on the asp.net website but it doesn't do everything that IIS does. So I've been playing with Windows Server 2003 on a spare computer and trying to figure everything out so that I can run IIS on there and have access to all of it's features. I'll let you know. Hopefully my brother-in-law can help as he uses Windows Server 2003 all day at work. I was talking to him tonight and maybe he can help me a little at our picnic on Sunday! I'm actually kind of excited - learning can be fun!

Alright, this will have to be enough for my first post as it's late and I need some sleep.