Broken Oven...

At work, we have what's called "PTO Time", which is personal time off that you use for vacations, holidays, sick days, etc. We earn so many hours per pay period, but once you reach a certain "cap" (in my case, 240 hours) then you need to start using more of it or else you lose some. You can earn any more hours until you have used some up!!! Since I was getting close to this "cap", my boss suggested I take a few days off... just to get me by until I took my vacation time in June!!! Do you think he heard me complaining???? Nope, just the sound of the door slamming as I ran out of the place before he could change his mind!!! HAHAHA!!!

Since I had three days off and the kids were still in school, I decided I would make a list and get all of these "spring cleaning" tasks out of the way. First thing on the list was to spray sealer on the deck, since I have been anxious to get our patio furniture out and use it! Then I wanted to paint the porch area -- the paint has been coming up over the years from scraping it with the shovel in the winter. The list also included such tasks as: plant flowers around the deck steps; patch holes in bathroom wall; clean out Brianna's room and make room for her summer clothes in her dresser; clean out the kitchen; clean the oven... the list was actually quite long!

I got up early the first morning of my three day "hiatus" from work! I wanted to get the deck done before the sun got too far up in the sky and it was too hot! I took the broom out to sweep these seed/pod thingies off the deck -- I also had to use a screwdriver to get them out from the cracks of the floor boards. It took me about 30 minutes to work my way from one end of the deck to the other... and when I turned to look back at my work, what do you think I saw??? More of these seed/pod thingies!!! AAGH!!!! I then realized that the wind was blowing these things out of the neighbor's tree faster than I could keep them off the deck... which meant I wasn't gonna get to seal the deck until these things were done falling from the tree... ( and I was mad, because I had just got done waiting for the other neighbor's "cotton" from his cottonwood to quit snowing all over our yard!!) About this same time, I am realizing that I can't paint the porch either for the same reason, and I can't plant the flowers until the deck has been sealed... seems my list is growing shorter right before my eyes!! Since I couldn't do any outdoor stuff, I went and started on the indoor things. I patched the holes in the bathroom walls -- only took about three layers of spackle!! I also decided to start cleaning the oven to get that out of the way so I could enjoy my other days off!

While I am wiping the oven cleaner from the top and sides of the oven, my rag somehow gets stuck on the top heating element. I am trying to get it off and end up giving it a good yank -- the rag comes off, but I also hear a popping sound and when I look up at the digital display on my oven, it is blank -- not a good thing. Not sure what to do next, I went ahead and unplugged the oven from the wall and finished cleaning it out. Once I was done, I plugged it back in to see if it would start working... nothing... dang it!!! By this time, CJ has come home from work and I have told him about it. We check the breaker box in the basement and see that one of them is off - when we turn it back on, the digital display on the oven starts working!! My stove top also starts working, but the oven still won't work. CJ calls several appliance repair places and they all said that we would probably need to replace some electronic control board located in the back of the oven. They also told us that some boards can cost more than what the oven did when it was purchased 4 years ago... YIKES!! Since we were planning on going on vacation in less than a week, we decided to wait until we got back to deal with the problem. We still had the stove top, a microwave, and a toaster oven to use so we could manage.

About two days later, I went to use the timer on the oven and accidentally hit the BAKE button... and the oven came on!! So I put a roast in and watched it cook the whole two hours it was in the oven -- no problems!! And no problems ever since! Not sure what the problem was or why it started working again on its own, but glad it did before we shelled out the money for something we obviously didn't really need!!!

As for the rest of the things on the list, they didn't get done!! That first day was such a bad one when nothing went right, that I just decided to spend the next two days getting therapy... retail therapy!!! Shopping is way better than cleaning any day!!!

Court of Awards Ceremony

The Court of Awards Ceremony was held on Friday, May 15th. This was Brianna's final ceremony as a Brownie Girl Scout!! On this night, she "bridged over" to Junior Girl Scouts, along with the rest of the girls in her troop!! YEA!!!

Here is a picture of Brianna "bridging over":

Washington School Field Day

Every year, Washington Elementary has what they call "Field Day". Most elementary schools in Sioux City don't have access to a track without transporting kids by bus, etc. so they make up their own version of a track and field day! I had the day off, so I was able to go up and watch and enjoy the events! They started off with "volleyball". The classes were split into two teams and given blankets. Instead of a volleyball, they were given water balloons! The object was for one team to place the water balloon in the blanket then "flip" it over the net and the other team needed to catch it -- if not, then they were getting wet!! Next was "hockey" -- with a potato! The kids had to hit a potato across the playground, around a cone, and back to the starting line. There was not much left of the potato after this round! Then came soccer -- each child got one kick to try to score the soccer ball in the goal... way harder than it sounded! After this was the "torch relay races" where each team was given a toilet plunger and a small ball. They had to put the ball in the plunger and carry it like a torch while racing against three other teams! The first team to get all their players through the race was the winner! If your ball fell out of your torch, you had to go back to the line and start over!! They also tossed water balloons back and forth to each other, raced through an obstacle course with and egg on a spoon, and then finished off with races and tug-of-war!! Pictures of some of these events are posted below:

The Water Race:

The Water Race (again!):

The Egg on a Spoon Race:

The Water Balloon Toss:

The 3rd Grade girls racing:

3rd Grade girls Tug-of-War (they won, too!!):

Track and Field 2009

Zach decided to join the track team for the first time this year! He mostly did field events (shotput) and towards the end of the season, they had him doing shotput, discus, and even running races once in a while! He's not very good at the discus thing, but his best shotput throw is 39'7"... most of the other freshman are throwing under 30', so Zach is doing quite well. East High had a track invite two days before the Drake Relays in Des Moines. To let their runners "rest up" before going there, the coaches decided to let the other kids run these races! Zach and three other boys from the shotput team got to run the 4X100 relay -- and they came in third!! Not bad for four boys with no training! I posted a couple pics of Zach from a track meet:

One More Cat...

Came to work on Monday and there was a note from the ServiceMaster cleaning people. Apparently there was a baby kitten running around the place when they got there to clean!! One of the cleaning people took the kitten home with them, so we didn't get any more details than that! That brings the kitten total to four!! (and Mommy makes five!)

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to all mothers everywhere! Hope your day was a grand one!!

For Mother's Day, I got to wake up at 6:00am and be on the road to Ames by 7:00am! Mom, Jenny, and I didn't have any "definite" plans for this day, so Derek wanted us to come to Ames and eat at his restaurant. I was up for this idea since I have never eaten there before -- drank there before, but have not eaten there! The name of the restaurant is Aunt Maude's and it is located on Main Street. Derek has worked there for almost as long as he has been living in Ames. Aunt Maude's usually isn't open on Sundays, but they do have a brunch menu for some holidays. The Mother's Day Brunch menu did not disappoint... omelettes, french toast, pancakes, biscuits and gravy, steak burgers... I had the Denver omelette with hashbrowns and it was out of this world! I couldn't even eat it all!! After eating, the nine of us piled into two cars and went to check out the mall -- pretty much has a lot of the same stores that Sioux City has in their mall. The rest of the afternoon was spent relaxing at Derek's just watching TV, visiting, and playing cards. Since most of us had a 3+ hour drive home, we decided to leave just before 5:00pm to get home at a decent time since it was a "school night". Oh, I almost forgot... Mom drove herself to Ames today!!! This was her first time driving on an interstate in 70 mph traffic! She did just fine! We are very proud of her!!! Mom followed us home and we stopped in Webster City at McDonald's for supper. Brianna was riding in Mom's car with her so she could have some company on the drive, so Mom had to stop again in Rockwell City so Brianna could get back in our car, since Mom was turning north and we were going to continue heading west. We got home about 8:30pm -- Brianna and I went straight to bed! The long drive there and back in one day must have worn us out!! All in all, it was a great Mother's Day!

Outside Yard Work

Finally... a free weekend with no games and some sunshine and warm air! No better way to get in the mood to do a little yard cleaning! CJ mowed and cut down weeds and planted some grass seed on some bare spots in the yard. Brianna and I sprayed the deck down with some deck wash and rinsed it off with water -- looks brand new!! After this, CJ and Brianna decided to wash the car, then Zach and Brianna ended up filling water balloons and chasing each other with them! Fun times!! We still need to spray a sealer on the deck, but are waiting for a day when we have time and there is no rain in the forecast. So far, that hasn't happened yet!!