Bouncin'

When they tell us they hate us someday, we'll remind them we bought them this!!

The Perfect North Nashville Day

Since we weren't going anywhere for Memorial Day weekend, we decided to take a road trip north of Nashville and combine several errands into one trip. On my wish list was strawberry picking in Portland, but given the boys' ages and the heat, it would not have been an ideal situation. So instead, we first visited Old Time Pottery, which does not have any locations close to us but was having a great Memorial Day sale. We bought 2 leather parsons chairs for our dining room because we were needing some extra chairs.

Ok, that last statement is actually kind of funny because I have more chairs than anyone I know- we have 21 extra chairs in our house- and I know this because I routinely set them all up so we can have 30+ people in our living room for the grocery game class. So now we have 23 chairs.

From there we headed to our favorite furniture store, B.F. Myers. We were armed with fabric swatches we collected earlier in the week and planned to spend lots of time chasing little boys and looking for the perfect chair for our living room. We have bought most of the furniture we own from B.F. Myers, because the store is full of things that are our "style", they will match anyone's price, and they have free delivery. It's worth the drive. Dave found the most perfect chair ever- it had only been delivered 2 days earlier and hadn't even been brought to the front of the store yet. We took immediate delivery in the back of our van. We honestly are so spoiled because we buy and haul anything we want most of the time because of our van.

The last stop on our journey was lunch. While we debated about going to the Chef's Market, a local hot spot, we needed something fast so we hit my all time favorite fast food joint while on a road trip (most locations are in KY), Long John Silvers. Yes, laugh if you want but we don't indulge in fried food very often and this is the only location in all of Nashville.

I will also add here that we have been very busy helping the economy the rest of this weekend. Dave also made a big purchase at Costco (also immediately put in our van). It's pretty and shiny.... And today we have been at Home Depot buying wood blinds (goodbye, hideous IKEA curtains) for our living room and a storm glass front door (hello, sunshine).

We're Suing....

Never thought I would be saying those words, but it's happening.

Here's the background: In 2004, we bought a top of the line Honda Odyssey mini-van for which we had saved our money since we had been married. We were particularly interested in the "Touring" model because it had an automatic rear lift gate, which Honda had never offered before. The model also had "PAX" tires, something we had heard of and the concept sounded pretty cool to us. Basically, if the tire went flat, you could keep driving on it for 125 miles, so you could safely reach a service station to get it changed. What was not disclosed: The "PAX" tires cost twice as much as regular tires, wear out in half the time (18-30,000 miles) and most service stations do not stock them or have the proper equipment to change and balance them. It has been a quandry for us, because if we went on a trip and end up with a flat tire in an area that is not near a "PAX" dealer, we are STUCK. When we had to replace 3 tires last year at a cost of $1,200 we were SHOCKED. And now Michelin has announced they will no longer make or support the "PAX" tire. Oh, and the retrofit back to regular tires costs around $2,000 and there isn't a place on our vehicle to store a spare tire. So much for resale value if we want to ditch the van. Which we're not- we're entirely happy with the vehicle's performance, but we feel we were completely misled about these tires, along with 75,000 other consumers.

Yesterday, a class action lawsuit was filed against Honda and Michelin Tire and my name is on it as the class action representative for Tennessee. I have been working with a law firm for several months who has been gathering grievances and complaints similar to mine. When I read the 100+ page document today (I skimmed it for the good parts) I was angered on behalf of what the other plantiffs have experienced and for what we still face in our future dealings with our Honda. It will be several years before this is resolved, and hopefully we will be reimbursed for some of our expenses. If not, lesson learned. I would caution anyone thinking about buying a Honda vehicle- this issue has not been handled well and we are not pleased with their company's integrity. Their vehicles may have great reliability, but for us it has come at a price which we will not soon forget.

Happy Mother's Day!!

I am blessed to have a wonderful mom who loves me so much! I am glad she lives nearby also, so I can see her every once in awhile. Ok, she really wants to see her grandboys, but she likes to visit with me too! She is always asking how she can help me as a mom, for which I am so grateful.

We had an interesting yard sale yesterday. I have never done one before, because for me it's never been about re-couping money, it's about de-cluttering my house and my life. So this was an experiment, one I probably won't repeat for awhile. It's so much more fun to shop at other people's sales than to sit at your own house in the freezing cold collecting $1 bills. I closed up shop early because I got hungry, so we made less than $200. But most of the stuff is gone, and the rest will go to my parents' yard sale in June.

I'll back up to Friday night for a minute- we had a nice date night at church at the community group leader appreciation dinner. Yummy food from Macaroni Grill. Then the morning of the yard sale, Wesley woke up in a funk and progressed to a fever, which has lasted through today. That cancelled church for us and some Mother's Day plans. It's still been a good day, and Dave made me some chocolate chip pancakes for breakfast and let me take a nap.

Now it's time to go make the final decisions on the new Wii games.....

Pressed for Time

I really really shouldn't be taking time to blog, but I have a few milestones to document in the midst of the whirlwind. We are in the middle of Dave traveling for 4 weeks in a row, he has been gone more days than he's been here in May so far. He had to get up at 6am to mow the yard on Tuesday because it was the only time available this week. We also have our babysitter 3 nights this week because there is so much going on. We are looking forward to June!!

Back to the milestones- Wesley has said his first two syllable word- it's "cookie". He uses it for anything he really wants, especially granola bars. He doesn't have that many one syllable words, so this is quite impressive.

The other thing I wanted to blog about is all the free stuff I've been getting at Walgreens and CVS. I usually skip CVS because of time, but lately the deals have been too good to pass up. I've accumulated free pain reliever, free post it notes and flags, free dishwasher soap, wipes, and mr. clean erasers with very little effort. We have the grocery game class here again tonight with 35 more women and I can't wait to teach them how to do this!

Modified Hobbies

How do you know when it's time to give up a hobby? Probably when you haven't touched the stuff in over a year. I love crafty things: I love to sew, crosstitch, quilt, scrapbook, and stamp. I have rotated different "crafty" hobbies over the years until they run their cycle and I need a break from them. I have very few unfinished projects because my personality tends to want to "wrap things up".

But I have been very discouraged with myself over my stamping and scrapbooking lately. I can't make time to do it because I don't have a long blocks of time available anymore. I decided it was time for a fresh start. I am selling 75% of my stamps (watch out ebay!) and just keeping my favorites. My new approach to stamping is to buy beautiful blank cards and stamp them inside with sentiments and decoration. Instead of making cards from scratch, I'm just going to make a blank card prettier. So if you receive one of these cards, know that is still made with love, a product of my modified hobby.

I plan to finish Wesley's baby scrapbook and then go entirely digital. There are so many great websites out there now- shutterfly, lulu press, kodak, my publisher- and tons of coupons and deals. We want to have some of our pictures printed out in books so we can look and talk about them as a family. I've already had some great "remember when?" moments with Daniel looking at his baby book.

Yard sale update: I am almost done with the whole house! A few areas remain- Dave's side of the closet, the office, one last look through all the closets, and pricing everything. We have decided some of our yard sale profit will go to buy Wii games (I thought this might motivate Dave to clean out his closet, but so far no luck).