Update

"I Hope You Dance" by Lee Ann Womack
I have always wondered who sang this song. When a co-worker's daughter died several years ago, Heather Osmond came and sang it acappella at the funeral.

"And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance
I hope you dance
I hope you dance"

It was so beautiful. The song has always made me cry whenever I hear it.

I am so glad February is over. My mid-terms are over. Hallelujah!

And even better we got our Saturn back. We bit the bullet and decided to spend the money to have a new engine put in. We are hoping for another 100,000 miles. We are having some transmission problems, but I have a call into the mechanic to see what the problem is. More great news—the engine dying wasn't my fault! Instead a leaky radiator hose was the problem. This makes it the mechanic's problem. We have yet to go talk with him about it.

All the drywall is up except for the area around the front door. We still haven't ordered a new front door yet, nor have we made a decision on the flooring. We have decided tile for the front door area and wood for the bedroom and sitting room. Colors and types are still up in the air.

I'll post pics later.

Clearly, I'm an idiot!!

Well, I should never have posted about the three car situation. I blew our Saturn's engine yesterday. I was less than two miles from a gas station where I could fill up and get oil for the engine. Needless to say, I didn't make it! The engine block has a hole in it because I'm an idiot. We just had the Saturn in for service and I meant to call and have them do an oil change, did I remember? NO! Did I not pass numerous gas stations, WalMarts, Targets, etc. to buy oil? But, no, I had to get to 72oo South to fill up and get oil.

I have never felt so stupid in my entire life. I road in a tow-truck—certainly not on my "to-do" list for my life. I had a love/hate relationship with the Saturn. It got good gas mileage, but was soooo loud and small.

So, instead of three cars we are down to two. After the gymnastics meet at the U tomorrow, D and I will stop and clean out the Saturn. It has the rods for my punches in it, as well as, some other things that I would prefer not to lose. And yet another car goes to the Kidney Foundation. I really don't think that Jeff is willing to pay $2500 to $3000 to put a used engine in the car.

When I told one of my classes today, a student (who I see every day) asked if I cried. When I said no, he wanted to know if I swore a lot. I replied in the affirmative. Now I want to cry. But there really is no point. I cried when the station wagon was hauled off. I learned to parallel park in a Colony Park station wagon. I can park anything!

So, we are back to two drivers and two vehicles. Maybe later we will buy another small car for its gas mileage. Over the last two days the Grand Voyager hit 30 mpg! with 1000 lbs of drywall in the back.

Guess what I will be doing this weekend? Hanging drywall! And working the daddy/daughter event for Girl Scouts. Neither my dh nor my dd are attending. Well, D might attend as a PA, but not with her dad. Neither of them thought the event looked interesting. I tried in Service Unit meetings to make it more appealing. But did anyone listen to me? No, of course not.

Well, since it is the wee hours of the morning, and I have to read 150 junior Language Arts exams tomorrow, I had probably post this and head to bed.

I hate hate hate February!!!!

Cars

We have three cars and two drivers. When we bought our Honda Oydessy, we decided to keep our green Plymouth Grand Voyager. This meant we had three cars and two drivers. This semester we are doing the car "musical chair" game. On Mondays and Fridays, Kate drives the Honda and Jeff the Grand Voyager. On Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays Kate drives the Saturn and Jeff drives the Honda. At 15 1/2 years old the Saturn still gets 35 miles to the gallon. It makes more sense for the car that is driving 500+ miles per week to be the one that gets the most gas milage. Jeff drives carpool on Tuesdays and Thursdays and needs the Honda. Kate has class on Wed., and Thurs., and drives the Saturn. The Grand Voyager is full of drywall at the moment, so it has no seats besides the driver and "killer" passenger. Sort of hard to drive carpool with no seats. :) Amazingly enough all three cars are being driven each week!

An update

Yes, that really is a squid on Deirdre's head. All the girls did it during the dissection lab at CIMI.

Life has been really crazy the last few weeks. When we drove up to get Deirdre from the airport we were re-ended by another driver on I-15. Some idiot stopped in the car-pool lane causing all of us behind him/her to slam on our brakes. The woman behind just couldn't get her Suburban to stop fast enough. Our van was in the shop for three weeks and it cost her insurance $4500.

Below are the before and current pictures of Deirdre's old room. We decided to remodel. So far there is no drywall in two of the upstairs bedrooms or flooring. We are down to waverboard in bedrooms and the hall. I'll try to update as we go. Or I really should say as Jeff goes, since he is the one who is doing all the work so far.


There seemed to be so much more to update, so I was putting it off. But now, I can't seem to remember any of it. Clearly a reason for updating more often.