Last weekend

Friday we Skyped with Lara and kids, packed up, and headed to Merideth's house.  It took about 3 hours to get there, which is what I thought it would take.  Visiting with Merideth and her family was wonderful.  We have been friends for so long now that they are like family.  It was a fun time - lots of laughs, very relaxing.  Saturday Merideth and I just did a puzzle.  Isn't that divine?!  Then we left at 6pm so we could be home by bedtime.

Sunday, we went to the same church we went to last week and were able to see people we recognized and sign up for small groups.  Michael and I are going to do one together, and I want to do a women's one too.  Kara was looking forward to Sunday morning, which is a great sign.

Then we stopped by Arby's on the way home and I unpacked my desk in the office and worked on lesson plans.

Before:

Middle:

After:

That spare desk next to mine makes a nice L-shaped
desktop for me!  And the file cabinet next to it works
so well.

I still need to fill those shelves, but I will get there.
Meanwhile, I love having the printer and shredder.

Then I unpacked my master bathroom and did two loads of laundry.

I am used to having a lot more storage space
in my bathroom, so I put these shelves
right outside the bathroom door.  I have
all kinds of things on there!  lol.

Around 5:30, we logged on to play bridge online.  I LOVE that we are able to keep up this tradition.  And it really does feel like we are there!

Today is Monday and my back hurts quite a lot.  Not like I really used it, but like I better be careful or it will get REALLY mad.  So, we did school on the couch this morning.

Look how she slants her paper during
cursive!  Oh well, at least she's doing it.

Then I went to Walmart for walkie talkies (Kara upstairs and me downstairs means a lot of yelling - no one likes that) and Lowes for heat reducing window films for the office.  The office is always boiling (85 degrees and up) and that just isn't acceptable.  Since we'll be here a short time and are sure to only have about 2 more months of this heat, I wanted something inexpensive and temporary.  I can peel these films off as soon as it's November and the heat is positive it's gone.  You should have seen me putting those things up.  Let's just say there is a steep learning curve.

Since it is a rainy, dreary Monday, I made chicken spaghetti for lunch (which is quite a bit of effort for lunch if you ask me), and marinated chicken for dinner.  I was pretty proud of all of that and thought it was amazingly delicious.  I may have been alone in that thought though.  :-)

Let's see, what else.  How about we look at all the unpacking I still need to do??

I'm going to use some plastic shelves I brought with us
to stack on top of this shelf.  Beach towels, batteries,
etc will go on there.  Don't worry, I won't load it too heavy.

I have barely put a dent on the garage.  Those empty boxes
in the front there got wet - not sure if they are good to
use over again or if they aren't strong enough.

This is the top of the stairs.  Oh my.  This makes my
head hurt.  It's probably for the best that it's so dark.
This is Christmas decorations and homeschool books.

More furniture in the upstairs hallway.  You can see into
Kara's room.

Hi Kara!  You think I stacked enough furniture in there?
2 couches, 7 dining room chairs, bench under the window.

I still need to do the entryway too.  I need to put shelves in and create a pseudo-mud room - shoes, mittens, bug spray, sunscreen, stamps, envelopes, etc.  Well, that's the stuff I keep in my mud room anyway.

 I'm getting there, slowly but surely.  My bedroom and bathroom are done.  Kara's bedroom and bathroom are done.  Office/spare bedroom is done (except my books).  Kitchen is done.  Living room is done.