Entry Way Organization

I am a little late in posting this. Organizational Junkie has a monthly organizational goal. Now we didn't meet this goal on time. But late is better than never.

In this first picture is when you walk in the front door. We only use the front door for the girls when they get off the bus and for company. The hooks are from Ikea. The girls keep their backpacks and umbrellas here. There sometimes are jackets hanging here, but we do try to keep it to one jacket per girl here. We try to not have our shoes here, but sometimes it happens. I have boots here because I was carrying things in and didn't feel like going back in the basement to put the boots away. Brooke has her slippers there for a reason only she knows.

As a family we enter the house through the garage into the basement. This is the corner of the laundry room area. This area is not finished, but will be as Tommy has time. We also are not sure how we want the whole mudroom/laundryroom. Whether it will be one big room or two rooms or 1 1/2 rooms.

Here are the shoe racks. The spinning rack is from Costco. The top two tiers are for Melodye and and bottom two are for Brooke. We just took all the summer shoes off and the girls' feet just grew so that is the reason for the sparse amount of shoes. The white racks are from Walmart. This has the girls boots, mine, and Tommy's shoes. The blue chair was from Target. There are a few spots for us to sit an put our shoes on.

This is the right side of the closet area. This is where we keep all of our jackets and coats at all times. The rubbermaid containers on the floor are the summer shoes that we packed up recently. The file box on the top shelf with the maroon lid is a "School Stuff" box. Each girl has a box that I keep their school work filed in.

Here you can see that we have 2 "School Stuff" boxes. The shelf has the winter boots on it. The rack to the left is empty. It used to hold our hats, gloves, and scarves, but I wasn't happy with it. I am not sure whether we are going to use it or donate it yet.

This is our Ikea container that I love. The girls can sit on the left side to put their shoes on. The containers are for Hats, Gloves, Scarves, Mel's Soccer Stuff, Brooke's Soccer Stuff, and two empty ones. I, of course, plan on labeling the containers, but I haven't taken the time yet.

Halloween Recap

A good time was had by all on Halloween. We started trick-or-treating, went around a little over one block, and the girls decided that they were done. They weren't tired or anything. They just wanted to be at home passing out candy. A few arguments over who and how the candy was going to be passed out occurred, of course. But it really was enjoyable being at home and passing out the candy. While the girls passed out the candy, I knitted. I was working on a pair of fingerless gloves for Nonnie. I finished one and need to get started on the next one.

I love this photo of Brooke. I definitely want to scrapbook this one. She was showing what a Transformer does.
Another Transformer action shot. I love how cute the costume and mask look with her little ponytails sticking out.

One last action shot. We had to tell Brooke "That's enough" because she was getting a little crazy with her actions.

Here are my little Transformer and Snow Princess.

I told them to look like they love each other and this is what I got.

Brooke excited about some treat while trying to put her mask back on for a picture.

I love this photo of Melodye showing the true joy she was feeling and not just a fake smile which is waht we usually get.

Melodye felt the need to skip the entire time. I think the dress and how it belled out made her want to skip.

And here are this year's pumpkins. Melodye painted the Black Cat. Brooke painted the little Easter Egg as she called her pumpkin. The other pumpkin is a craft pumpkin from last year that we carved.

The girls got so much candy in the short time that they trick-or-treated. Then we didn't even hand out all of the candy that we had. So this means that the girls are in "Candy Heaven."

10-24-08 NKOTB Concert Part 2

This is my first time posting a video clip from my camera, so hopefully it will work. This is a clip from NKOTB performing Summertime. Enjoy! I know I did.

When I told some people from work about the concert, they called me a freak. But you know what. . . . I am proud to be a NKOTB freak. I have always been and always will be and it's not like I have hid this tidbit of information. So I am standing and saying that I am a freak who loves New Kids on the Block and always will.

On a different note, I went to the thyroid doctor today. Super long wait because they are switching their records to electronic records. My TSH levels are finally where he wants them. They were at a .38 as opposed to the 2.05 last time and the 6.50 when this all started. But since I am still tired quite a bit he upped my dosage slightly, but does recommend that I have my primary physician order a sleep study.

Since I received a new prescription, I was able to use my coupon for CVS to receive a $25 gift card for a new or transferred prescription. Woohoo! And in a month when I need a refill, I will be using my Walgreens coupon for a transferred prescription to receive a $25 gift card. In this day and age you have to do whatever you can to save money.

Oh My Oh My Oh My!!!

I have the BEST husband in the world. Friday he told me that he had considered buying me tickets to see New Kids On The Block and take me that night, but decided not to. Well I was at Melodye's soccer practice at about 6:00. I couldn't stop thinking about the fact that he was going to go with me, which is really unbelievable. I called and told him to see if my parents would watch the girls and get some tickets.

THANK YOU Dad and Karen for watching the girls. He was able to get tickets. I picked Tommy, Brooke and their things up. We left, dropped the girls off, and started for Allstate Arena at about 7:00 with the concert starting at 8:00 and it was pouring rain. The wonderful driver my hisband is, plus we had the IZoom, we got there during the opening acts. When we go in, the security tells me I have to ckeck my zoom lens. OK no problem. We then go to the souvenior stand and I was able to get my jacket. It's navy blue instead of black, and one size too big, but I don't care especially since it was the last one. Then we go to find our seats.

We knew the seats were for the side of the stage. Not only were they directly to the side of the stage, but they were FREAKING four rows from the stage. It was unbelievable. I have never been that close and we only paid $75 each. There were seats still around us that were never filled. People really lost out on an awesome concert.

There were some crazy girls in of us. They were jumping around during the opening acts nearly knocking people in over rows over. I kept waiting for security to say something, but he didn't. Then when the New Kids were on they danced with each other and didn't even watch the concert. About 1/4 of the way through they left and didn't come back. Now mind you it was more enjoyable after they left, but they really did waste a lot of money.

So I was taking pictures with my Canon Digital Rebel XTI and the regular lens. The pictures were ok. After about 70 pictures a security guy came over and said I had to go check my camera in. My husband went to check it in so I wouldn't miss anything. The security guy apologized and said that he didn't have a problem but his supervisor did. So Tommy went all the way to the other side of the building to check it in with our other lens and bag. The security people there were complaing that they wished people would make up their minds. First there was no photography, then it was no professional equiptment, and then I couldn't use my regular lens that doesn't zoom in anywhere near the pocket digital cameras do. But when I gave Tommy the camera bag I took out our pocket digital camera and got much closer pictures. So thank you Security Supervisor you enabled me to get much better pictures even though you didn't think I would be able to without my big camera. And my dear dear husband even took the card out of the camera when he checked it to make sure that no one tried to erase the pictures.

Now onto the pictures. I do apologize that they are out of order, but I didn't feel like redoing them.

This first picture is from the end of the concert. This was Jordan's reaction to being flashed by a girl in front of us. I don't know if I would call it flashing; it was more like posing since she had it all out there for quite awhile. Jordan said "It's about time this happened."

Here are the backs of their jerseys. I love that I can read their names on the back. This was all the way on the other side of the stage so the quality isn't that great.

Here is a picture of the crowd as Hangin' Tough was ending.

I don't know how I got this shot, but I did and I love seeing the different symbols.

This was supposed to be the first picture. But here we are. I can't hold back my excitement and Tommy is just glad I am happy. At one point Joe read a man's shirt that said "Happy Wife = Happy Life." Tommy said that was completely true.

Here we have Danny on the platform on the side by us. The lighting wasn't the best there.

Here we have Jon pointing at the crowd to give us a chance to sing along.

Here is Donnie. I never could get good close up pictures of him because his hat was always in the way causing even more shadows than were there already.

Here is Jordan. I know it is not set up the best, but you can actually see his face without the problems with shadows.

Here is Donnie at the begining of the concert getting us hyped up. Not that it took very much.

I am so glad that I had this opportunity. It was a completely different experience than the concert on the fourth of this month. Just having these seats changed the excitement. But I am glad I went earlier and sat where I did way in the back because I was able to see all of the choreography and stunts from the front. They were hard to see from the side. But being able to see them that close was unbelievable. Oh, the sound of the concert was different also. It's hard to explain, but there was a difference. And yes of course I would go again in a heartbeat, if I had the chance.

Weekend Highlights

This was another busy weekend, aren't they all. LOL Brooke had a soccer game Saturday at 9:00. Then we went home for her to change. The girls and I went to the Fun Fair at Karlee's school. Brooke has been dying to go because her buddies Sponge Bob and Patrick were going to be there.

For two week Brooke had been begging to go, but we had to remind her that Sponge Bob and Patrick had to come from Bikini Bottom which takes awhile.
Then Tommy met us at the FunFair because his class got out early. Then Tommy and I took Melodye to a Pet Party for Girl Scouts. An older girl held this Pet Party as part of her requirements for her Gold Award. The Pet Party was held to collect donations for the local Humane Society. Then Tommy and I went back to the Fun Fair and hung out there a bit. I ended up seeing a little girl from my class last year there. She was visiting with her cousin. Then found out our neighbor was now working at Karlee's school. Such a small world.
Tommy took Brooke home after the Fun Fair to clean house. I went to pick Melodye up from the Fun Fair and ended up bringing one of her friends, Tabby home. That girl can visit anytime she wants. Tabby wanted to play with Brooke and Melodye instead of trying to exclude Brooke. Melodye even said that her and Brooke played better together with Tabby around. Then we took Tabby home and ran errands until 8:30.
Sunday we thought Melodye's game was at 2:30. Ends up we were wrong. It was at 12:00. She was very upset about missing her game. We made it up to her by paying the $3 difference plus tax that she needed for a Build A Bear. Now she got the Hannah Montana one, but doesn't like Hannah Montana. Explain that one to me. Then we ran more errands. After that I spent the rest of the night doing bills and report cards. Good new is that I only have to put the attendance and comments on the report cards. What a relief to have those done.

Thursday and Friday I am going to be working in my classroom. I am going to try to remember to take some pictures of my room. I just relaized that I have never shown what it looks like. And since the kids won't be there Thursday and Friday that is the perfect time to do it.

Oh, I also got a great deal at Walgreens on Pert Plus. I bought two bottles, used the Walgreens Easy Saver coupon of $2.50 off of each. and then used the $1.oo coupons from the internet. They cam out to being free plus 2 cents off of my fillers. I used Blow Pops as my fillers. They are supposed to ring up as $1.49 but they are ringing up as 79 cents.

AAAARRRGGGHHH

I am so mad at myself. I left the book I was reading at school today. It was getting really good and I can't read it again until Monday. . . . really frustrating on my part. I really hate when I do something like that.

I have read about some NKOTB concerts offering tickets as low as $24. Now why can't I find tickets for Melodye and I to go on Friday. I really don't want to spend $55 for both of us. Also, frustrating because I would really like to go again and this is the only other opportunity. Maybe something will happen in the next few days. Anyone know of any secrets to getting cheap tickets to NKOTB?

Walgreens Deal

I had a super deal at Walgreens this week. I was so excited I wanted to tell everyone I saw, but I did not. Although the cashier and lady behind me did comment on how wonderful I did.

I bought:

• 6 Glade gel warmers
• 2 Glade gel refills
• 16 Halloween pencils
• 2 Glad car refills
• 2 Scrubbing Bubbles Bathroom Wipes
• Visine

The order came to $37 and some odd change. I then used 3 Glade buy one get one free coupons for the warmers, 2 $1.00 off glade gel refills, coupon for the Halloween pencils, 2 $1.00 off coupons for Scrubbing Bubbles, $2.00 off Visine from Walgreens, and $2.00 off Visine from manufacturer. After that I used $15.00 Register Rewards.

I tried to use another $5.00 Register Reward, but it would not work. Later I found out it was because the subtotal was $4.41, so I could have used my $4.00 Register Reward. I then used a gift card for $5.00 that I received for a Register Reward that did not print. At this point my total was $1.68. I then used my gift card from my rebates last month.

So at this point I paid nothing out of pocket and I will be receiving $12 in a rebate plaus 10% for having it put on my giftcard.

Wasn't that just a wonderful shopping trip?