Het Gaat Lijk Lukken Bakken

Good news - I got the little Book done for Anneliese. She should enjoy it. :-) And I even remembered to save it for later in case the current copy gets ruined. Plus, lots more good research information to troll through. When I get time.

Bad news - it won't be tonight. Stupid lady finally showed up with the Black lab she wouldn't let me X-ray yesterday because she didn't want to spend the money. Sooooo..... I get to do my late-night trademark foreign body surgery. As Cheryl won't do it tomorrow anyway. Quick poll - will it be a piece of the ham bone they fed him or a rock from the campground?

Behr's new Ultra premium paint+primer=Faboo. Truly one coat coverage, except for putting dk. purple over gloss white. NOT low VOC however. Be warned. But there is a main color in Anneliese's room.

We have a dance aide! Linsey is adorable. And passionate about dancing. And Anneliese though highly enough of her to bestow several hugs unprompted. So, Yeah! Linsey!! Nice Dutch girl from GR, dyed in the wool CRC'er. Should work out great.

Barley batch 1 nearly dry - to be threshed this weekend. Batch two to be cut this weekend.

Landrace wheats arrived from the USDA SGR:
White Straw Tusan
Ble Blanc de la Reole - France
Ble Rouge de Bourdeaux - France (Gironde)
Touzelle Rouge de Provence - France
Orange Devon
Limburgse Kleine Rode - Limburg, Netherlands
Zeeuwse - Zeeland, Netherlands
Rode Ris - Netherlands

Now, to go make a chart of our Disney vacation and try to figure out where we're eating and what we're doing on which days. ;-)

I was stymied by both husband and baby as far as painting. Husband wanted to shop (?!?!) and baby wanted to nap. There is no painting upstairs while baby is napping in the next room. Too much noise!

BUT we did manage to get out for our Dinner Date. It was largely John's send off to his brother, who died a few years ago. But, since the Grandparents had my oldest, and Kayleigh was blissfully free to watch the youngest - we had our window of opportunity.

We had dinner at Louis Betton steakhouse in Grand Rapids. Excellent service, nice ambience, but a little more attention to the proprieties would have been nice, considering the expense involved. Food was OK, though not stellar. The raspberry martini was good, and the peanut butter pie excellent.

I think, however, that the food at the Amway is better, for a comparable price. And Louis, the Matire'D at the 1913 room would have descended in a heartbeat on the yutz behind us whose cell was going off incessantly. Still, it was nice to have a Date Night. Or 6 or 8 years of Date Night rolled into one. ;-)

Tomorrow, it's off to the Holland Farmer's Market (with cooler) as we will proceed directly to the Michigan Fiber Festival. John is coming along, so he and Paul will likely peruse vintage tractors, the Old Towne of Allegan, and gaze at sheep while us girlz shop for yarn, wool, and other esoteric feminine delights.

Sunday means meeting the Grandparents in Lansing at the Great Lakes Feis. We shall retrieve our oldest daughter, and buy her Irish Dance shoes and poodle socks. Maybe a dance bag and/or T-shirt as well.

Plans are on for the Disney Vacation (TM). Rebooked, but still at the Beach Club. Now to work on ADRs, tickets to the Very Merry Christmas Party, and a reservation at the Bibiddi Bobiddi Boutique. I will be hard pressed not to overdo that, since they are likely to have their "holiday" princess dresses available. With fur-trimmed capes. Tres cute!!

Got a few errands done - card out to Shawna, whose useless boyfriend was caught cheating and summarily dismissed. And a card to Felix and Madeleina's boy in MC Boot Camp - dispatched following all of John's rules on how to send support to a recruit that will BE supportive AND not draw the Unnecessary Attention of the Drill Instructor. ;-)

All in all, so contented for this brief time, it feels like Life on Mars. It won't last, I'm sure. But it is causing me to hope, as I've hardly dared hope before, that we will eventually toe ourselves out of this ditch and toward the things we want out of life. Here's hoping to be able to throw a rope to friends who've been struggling along with us and pull them out as well.

So, the clutch died on the little trucklet on Saturday on my way home from work. I'm likin' AAA. But now we await the Verdict from our mechanic. Gut instinct tells me it will either be an easy fix, or he'll say "Look guys, it's got 250K miles on it. There is not enough bailing wire in all of Michigan to keep this little thing on the road." So we may be car shopping again. *sigh*

John is still waiting to hear on the job he's been campaigning so hard for. Weird thing - two other subsidiaries of the same parent company have called to ask him if he's contract or a regular employee. To which he has answered "Neither, but I wouldn't turn down either!" I have no idea what THAT ought to mean.

Got my costumer's ATC's coming along. My original plan got scrapped, as the technique did not work in acrylic the way it does in oils. And I somehow bought Glitter Mod Podge. Ooops.

At Home Depot, Anneliese was shopping for paint cards. ;-) I tried to get her to pick a scheme for her room, as I'd like to paint it while she does her overnight at Grandma's. She picked out the Hannah Montana and Pirate's of the Carribean cards. I'm thinking not. Probably either the Tinkerbell or an Under the Sea theme. Crazy girl-child.

Yesterday we lost our power in the AM. Must have been another squirrel in the transformer or some such. So we piled in the car and went to Lansing. We traipsed through the 4H children's garden and then the larger gardens. It was more than a little warm, so we also stopped by the Dairy Store. They apparently also have a Student Union location now, so it wasn't as crowded as I remember it being. Of course, they just buy their stuff from Country Fresh these days, rather than making their own, for the most part. It was good. But I miss the old $0.75 ice cream cone that you could hardly finish.

Anneliese starts the summer program today, which is a good thing. She needs something to do. Though, on the upside, she's begun being more tractable about eating things that aren't toast. Now all I have to do is get Mom to NOT pull a Captain Hook on her and ruin it.

Back to the ol' grind. Hopefully I can take the time tomorrow to grab my book from the library. It's a facsimile of a Dutch embroidery model book from the 16th century. ;-)

Wow. Busy, busy weekend.

First, it was off to Chicago. Missing one toll plaza for being in the wrong lane has instituted a discussion on whether an I-Pass might be worthwhile. What I'm wondering about is what the "refundable" deposit is all about. Especially on recharges. WTF? Deposit for what?

We started at the Field Museum, which may have been a tactical error. Anneliese enjoyed it, but it was pretty much over her head, and really not hands-on enough. She did like Sue, but wasn't fascinated for all that long. That place is such a maze, that in the herding of the Anneliese, we never even got to see the Maneaters of Tsavos, which John was looking for. Though, in truth, knowing that the current mounts are quite a little smaller than the original animals - given the repeated trimmings and time spent as rugs - it was likely to be anticlimatic. John wants to do it sometime, just him and I. A reasonable thought.

It was such a nice day, we wandered down the way to the Adler Planetarium. This is a place that holds many fond memories for the Hubs, as his mother drove him down for weekly astronomy classes when he was a kid. Apparently it has changed drastically. ;-) Though it didn't shift his paradigm as badly as watching Chicago cabbies waiting (reasonably) politely for pedestrians to cross streets. He speculates that they must in some way fear a visit from The Outfit otherwise. *sporfle*

Anneliese preferred the Adler, certainly. Heck, so did I. The sheer selection of honest-to-goodness medieval astronomy instruments was super keen. I sense an ivory sundial in my future as an A&S project. John took Anneliese to a Big Bird and Elmo sky show, which she adored. Perhaps a bit too much. After Elmo said "Bye bye, friends!" - she sobbed. I sat on the bench outside the theater with her for 10 minutes - sobs. We went upstairs so John could check out the other exhibits - sobs. Walked back to the parking garage at Soldier Field - sobs. Maybe an hour? Until she was finally distracted by the great Pokemon seek-and-find book. Aiieeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It was then 4 PM, and John and I were faced with spending hours in a hotel room until the girls were tired enough for bed. Or find something else to do. God Bless GPS. And I mean that in a literal, non-blasphemous, genuine way. Up to Woodfield we went. Ah, another place to visit when unencumbered by children. It's the weirdest mall. Lots of half-levels, ramps, and mezzanines. I could SEE the Janie and Jack store, just couldn't figure out how to get AT it. And was unwilling to drag the whole fam around anyway. As it was, we stopped at Caribou Coffee for hot water for Rori's bottle just in time to avoid a meltdown on that front. The Disney Store was big and well stocked. And the Disney Doorway to Dreams was really a lot of fun. They put on movies and dragged out toys for the girls while John and I toured the models and talked turkey with the salesman. I suspect he will call tomorrow. John was briefly tempted by Bay Lake Tower, just because of the view. Until I pointed out how few of the units HAVE a Magic Kingdom view. He still likes the location, and we're less affronted by the decor, having seen it in person. But I'd still rather have Boardwalk. Especially since the salesman was emphatically sure that an extension would be in the works, soon. Though I doubt I'd get that in writing. I think we'll wait. Mostly cause we can't afford it anyway at the moment. Even with some pretty damned good incentives.

We window-drooled at Texas de Brazil. But again, had the girls along. And $42.50 a head was a little steep, with kids. Then off to the hotel in Portage, IN for the night.