Breaking news.

Micah lost a tooth yesterday.

Yes, it's breaking news. It had been loose forever. The boy, unlike most kids, was *not* happy about having a loose tooth and refused absolutely to let anyone touch it or to wiggle it himself. (Recall his first loose tooth story, if you will, lol. This is the first tooth he's actually lost and not had pulled.) Yesterday at lunch it was dangling and started bleeding a wee bit. You'd think the boy was going to die. ;)

After a lengthy discussion about how losing his tooth would not hurt (alongside plenty of bribery involving free Slurpees and time at a pool with some friends), we managed to have a fun day...which ended with Micah finally pulling that darn tooth out ALL. BY. HIMSELF. 

History being made, folks. :)

Course, now he's convinced that that tooth was the source of all his powers. Having lost it, he informs me that he's apparently unable to do his spelling for the day. I kid you not. :)

I've decided.

I have a proposal. I've given it some thought, and I firmly believe that all drivers should be required to take the written test both initially and (at least) 7 to 10 years after first getting their license.

Seriously. Think about it...at age 16, people are fully hormonal with puberty and entrenched in the mindset of learning for a test...memorizing and then promptly forgetting. And then we don't require them to prove that they've actually retained any of those driving rules unless they break the rules or until they're so advanced in age that the rules have probably changed anyhow. It's no wonder I get so irritated with all those "other" drivers on the road who don't seem to know the rules, right? ;) 

So. I hereby declare that all drivers should be required to take the written test at least once more after initially being licensed to drive...once puberty has passed and they have some life experience under their belt. As an added bonus, this requirement would even bring in additional revenue for states and would potentially cut down on accidents, thereby saving insurance companies money. See? Everyone wins. 

Whew. Thanks for letting me get that off my chest. ;)

Last Friday...

We had a great time last week with cousins. :) Though we'd have loved more time, we settled for an afternoon...picked up my brother's three kids and went to lunch, to a toy store, to get frozen yogurt, to browse at the Apple store, to play with the giant globe thing and then back to my brother's place for a wee bit.

Fun times! Wish Haylee and Quinn lived closer so we could do that more often!

Lessons learned...

Well. As of about 1:30 in the wee hours of this morning, the painting part is done. ;) Still working on shelving and electrical and cleaning carpets and will then start moving stuff back into the appropriate bedrooms. Whew. ) In the meantime, here are some of my thoughts...

1. Bright yellow walls are difficult to paint over (hence, Micah's room was the most difficult of the three).

2. While I admit that doors go well near the edges of rooms, it would be lovely if the trim around the doors would go right up to the edge of the wall. Painting the inch or so between the trim and the corner is not easy.

3. Trim is annoying. Painting around and up to trim sucks.

4. Removing closet doors to make the room bigger is a good idea. But. It means that you have to paint the closet, too. Which kinda isn't fun...especially when said closets already have shelves in them (hence, again, Micah's room was the most difficult of the three, lol). 

5. Shuffling a gajillion legos from room to room takes awhile.

6. A certain youngest son can be quite the task master when it comes to his new room. ;) (And, obviously, the fact that his room is turning out to be the most complicated isn't helping matters, lol.)

7. The guy who lived here before us liked to experiment with home projects and wasn't a stickler for quality or consistency. It's made for many a delay and has us mentally drafting a letter to include for the new owners when we someday sell the house...informing them that it was *not* us, lol.

8. Remind me, please, not to start any projects of this size when things like Olympic trials or Olympics are in progress. Watching those greatly cuts into the available time to work on the projects, lol. (So, I guess we'd better hurry up and finish these bedrooms before the Olympics start...which will hopefully go faster now that most of the trials are over.)

Okay, off to clean up the paint stuff so we can get back to the electrical stuff when Nathan gets home tonight. Fun times. ;)

Another double-digit-er...

I don't know how it happened but we have a second double-digit-er in the house as of today. My sweet Asher turned TEN today. TEN! Sigh.

Though we're fully engrossed in painting bedrooms and all the mayhem that entails (more posts on that to come and that would be why I've been rather quiet here. lol), I wanted to take this moment to wish my middlest a very happy birthday. It's been a fabulous journey so far...(the first nine years...)

 And here he is today...

We'll be doing more full celebrations for both Asher and Micah in the middle of the month (Micah's birthday's at the end of the month)...so, for now, I'll just stand in amazement at how this awesome kid got to be so big. :)