Wave Bye-Bye as It Goes Out the Door

Here's a quickie before I go out the door with a couple of bags of goodies for the food bank.
It's not food per se but toiletries are welcomed at my local food bank.
And thanks to Rite-Aid, I've got all this to give.....

10 bottle of contact solution
23 tubes of toothpaste
3 boxes of hair coloring
1 tube of denture adhesive

Then it's off to do some banking, food shopping and if my back is ok from yesterday, I'm going back into the garage to lift and tote around stuff out there.  Yesterday I gleaned this lot plus 2 more boxes of stuff for the Salvation Army.  I'm hoping to fill Hubs trunk for another full donation to Sallie's this weekend.
Maybe another post later....maybe not.

Sluggy

My Huge Head Diva Self

While I was going through boxes in the living room the other day, as part of Week 3's Decluttering Challenge I came across some old photos and momentoes.

One of them is an old photo of Yours Truly at about 2.5 years old. 
The story behind this photo......My grandmother had paid for a professional photographer to come to our house and take my photo while I posed in front of a white sheet.  My mom had taken one of the pictures that resulted from this photo shoot and shellac-ed it onto a plaster frame that had been painted gold.
Yes, we were high end, rich folks back in the early 1960's......lol

Anyway, as I mentioned in #2 son's Birthday post yesterday, that large, nah HUGE! heads run in my family, I thought I'd give you a looky loo at My Diva Self in about late 1960.

Is it me or does this look like someone took a cute little toddler's body and plopped a Rocky Dennis head down on it? ;-)

 And yes, we both have the "Ginger" think going on too!

Sluggy

More February P*rn of the Decluttering Variety!

You may have seen some of this stuff in one of my Feb. Decluttering Challenge posts.  This post is all about getting that crap and more outta the house.

Round 2 of Decluttering Porn for February........

2 Hoodies
2 Vans Shirts
1 Glass Rose
2 Pillsbury Doughboy Ornaments
3 Winnie the Pooh silver Charms
1 Power Rangers Backpack, Fanny Pack and Wallet

2 Throw Blankets
2 Weirdohs Model Car Kits
1 Star Trek Masterpiece Figure/Book Set
5 Star Trek Action Figures
2 Die-Cast Cars 1:32
4 Star Wars Action Figures
2 Star Wars Candy Dispensers
2 Diabetic Lancing Devices

9 Craft Kits
4 Miniature Disney Figures
4 Kid's Puzzles

1 Thomas the Tank Lunchbox
1 Safari Shuttle Sunoco Truck
5 bottles of Lotion
2 T-shirts
11 Boyd's Bears Pins
2 Sticker Sets
2 Partridge Family Bus die-cast Cars
1 Small Soldiers Model Kit figure

1 Address Book
1 Set of Playing Cards
2 Books
1 Toy Story Night Light
1 Kid's Musical Toothbrush
1 WWE Ceramic Mug
5 tubes of Glitter
1 Castanet

75 more things have left the building!
I'm off to the garage to start in there......

Sluggy

Babbling Wednesday & Birthday Time!

***It is with sadness that I write that Precious' blog, Frugal Makes Cents, is no more.   She posted about a week ago that she was going to end her blog.  I left a comment about her leaving the blog up as a reference tool for frugal seekers, as she had many good ideas included within over the years.

I went yesterday to see what other comments had been left and if someone had taken over her "Money Saving Challenge" for 2012, but I can't access the blog, as it's been privatized and I haven't been invited to view it.
*sigh*

I guess she's going to use it for other things and not leave it up for a frugal reference tool.
If anyone knows if someone is going to Host the Money Saving Challenge, please let me know.
I thank you....

***While Hubs and I completed filling out the FAFSA forms this past weekend, I didn't actually submit them until Tuesday evening.   I also found out I could efile the older 2 kids' federal taxes.  Did 1 and once it was accepted by the IRS, I efiled the 2nd one yesterday.  Beats having to mail them to the kids for signatures and then having them pay to mail them certified/return receipt requested.  Too bad Hubs and I can't efile our federal return or tele-file our state return.  Gots to go OLD SKOOL with the paper returns.....

***I can't believe how many things I have crossed off my "To Do" List for February so far.  This coming week is all about cleaning out & organizing the garage.  I need to get Hubs to drop off the Sallie's load in his car so I can load him up again.  The donations are backing up here....

*** I also can't believe the weather we've had this Winter!  Tomorrow is suppose to hit 50 degrees here and Friday 54 degrees....INSANE!!!  Usually by this time, it looks like this around here.....

 OR like this in really bad years.....

Not what it actually looks like today....

***Today is my baby's birthday.  16 years ago today I was in labor and trying to pop his massively large melon head out my HooHa.  The week preceding his arrival, our region was facing massive flooding from a late February Winter snow melt-off combined with days upon days of rainstorms.

My water broke as I rolled over on the sofabed at home at 5:30am.....I had been sleeping there as my regular bed had been too uncomfortable to sleep on since December.  Dropped 2 kids at friend's house and Hubs, my mother(who had flown up from VA for the birth)& I drove to the hospital.

Got hooked up to PIT around Noonish, to get things cranking along.  Around 2 o clock is when the pain got heavy.
I was going to attempt another no epidural/drugs delivery.  By 4 I was pushworthy.  His head was down and engaged in the birth canal but he just coudn't/wouldn't leave.  The nurses had me standing on the bed, hanging onto a bar which they set up over the bed(think gymnastic apparatus!) in a semi-squat position.  This power position and gravity was to help me squeeze him out.
After almost 4 hours of this, interspersed with mind blowing contraction pain, I threw in the towel and BEGGED for a C-section.

And about a half an hour later at 8:26pm, the youngest was pulled from my abdomen and commenced hollering.  Hubs still remarks about how freaky it was to be sitting next to me in the OR while the doctors had my ueturus sitting out on my abdomen, chatting away with him, while they cleaned up large amounts of scar tissue from an emergency appendectomy I had undergone when I was 30, before putting me back together.  Yes, good times!

And they fished #2 Son out not a moment too soon, because by the time they stitched me up and got me cleaned up and back to my room and got the morphine flowing(ah!), it was Thursday and nearly time for ER to come on tv and I never missed that show!lol  That boy would rue the day he interfered with his momma's shows.....

And we found out why there was no way on God's green earth he was coming out the other way.  The doctors(I got 2 for this procedure...I am special!lol)said his head was the largest they had every seen(well, for a non hydrocephalus baby).  The nurse measured it when they take all those vital statistic thingys and his head was literally the size of a toddlers.  He was a big boy anyway at 9lb. 11oz.  So between my 5'1" frame with a normal sized pelvis and his melon head, there was no tunnel egress for him!lol

And both his mother(that would be me)and my oldest brother had exceedingly large heads when we were young so it runs in our family.  My brother had a genius IQ so I like to think that WE both needed those larger than normal heads to hold all those brains WE had......well, that's my story anyway.

Because of the C-Section, #2 Son and I had an extended stay in the Maternity Ward.  Between my surgery/stitches and his high Billirubin count(and his time under the lamps with his cool shades), we became fixtures on the ward.  By the time we came home, my mother was worn out from watching the older 2.   Pres. Clinton came to town while we were lazing around the ward but he didn't stop by the hospital.  I still tell #2 Son that Clinton came to town to celebrate his birth.....so what if the town the hospital was in was declared a federal disaster area that week due to the heavy rains, massive snow melt and unseasonably high temperatures that caused flooding.....the presidential visit was all for HIS birthday!

#2 Son has always been my quiet child.  He is introverted and is not one to yammer on or show off, like his older siblings.  We never thought he'd talk when he was young, as his siblings never shut up long enough to give him a chance to speak!lol  When he was born his sister was 3 and his brother was 4.5 years old.  Yes, I had 3 kids under the age of 5 at once. ;-)
#2 Son is my last hope for producing an artist.  #1 Son had a talent for performing/acting and he studied music for awhile put lost interest in it.  Daughter is the least gifted in the artistic realm but she has continued with playing her guitar.  #2 Son has a gift for visual arts(though he doesn't believe what his teacher and I see there) and he has a passion for music.   He eats, drinks and breaths music.  Though he gets good grades in all his classes, if he didn't have music, he'd probably decide to drop out of school now that he's old enough to do so.(And it's not like I'd allow that anyway!lol)  Being an introvert, he can take or leave the whole social aspect of high school.

He lives for music.  And I am thrilled to say that he is making progress in his skills and music loves him back.
Happy 16th Birthday #2 Son!!!

Sluggy

Week 3 Low Spending & Decluttering Challenges Results

Week 3 of Carla's Double February Challenge is done....at least for me it is!

First the Mini-Challenge.....where you are suppose to help someone.  That would be today, when I used my mechanically prowess to help #2 son with his problem.
Yah see, his friend gave him a guitar flanger pedal for his Birthday.  It's a little hunk of metal and plastic that you plug your electric guitar or bass into and it distorts the sound the instrument produces.  #2 son says "this pedal makes your guitar sound like it's on acid."
Okay....
Anyway, it worked for the first few minutes he used it but now it won't work at all.  He's been nagging me to order him a new one on Amazon since Sunday.  No, he can't wait to take it to the music store and see if they can fix it first.  He has to go out and drop $30 on a new one.....and pay for Express shipping to boot!
So "hell no you don't need express shipping" mom goes on Amazon.....and she starts reading the reviews on this item since she knows nothing about guitar flangers, heck, she didn't even know what a flangers was until #2 son told her about them.
And mom reads in a review that there is a battery inside this nifty little device, so mom asks #2 son if he has opened the flanger up and changed the battery inside.  To which he responds no.
You see where I am going with this now, don't you?
So mom opens and changes out the 9Volt battery and Voila!....It's a miracle!!....his Flanger works!
I saved him $30.
Of course after all that I don't get a thanks mom....he just grumbled some more when I told him he owed me $4 for the battery. ;-)


As for the Low Spend part.....
Food shopping.......$73.02
I actually spent money on something other than food though.  #2 son is in need of new footwear as he has holes in every last pair now.  So I went on eBay and bought him 2 pair of Chuck Taylor Converse sneakers.  We usually hit the Converse outlet in Rehobeth Beach to get them for a discount price but he wore the last pair out sooner than expected.  I got them on eBay and with the shipping they were the same price as at the outlet-but without paying for gas for the car to get there.lol
2 pair Converse....$72.98

As for the Decluttering Challenge.  This week was the Productivity Challenge.
I am working on my dining room/living room.
I don't think I was very productive though.

Before I show you my living room, let me explain that it isn't really a living room yet.   I've used it for storage....stored various things over the years.  First we moved here sort of in a hurry so it held lots of moving boxes.  Then after I got that stuff put away we got another load of my mother's things....my mother passed away the week before we moved here. So the next 2 years, as my brother settled her estate, we had to cart my inheritance stuff home from VA and find places for all that stuff. Then my eBay inventory grew so some of it got shoved into the living room.  At one time the room was wall to wall boxes of crap.....very similar to one of those Hoarding shows, except without the trash and animal feces. lol
We also had 4 dogs-one of which was very destructive-at one point and there is a white carpet in that room, so we had to gate off the living/dining room.  The destructo dog is gone but we still have 2 dogs, 1 of which is paper trained but she also considers the dining room her toileting area, so we still have to gate the rooms off.

I have almost gotten the living room emptied at this point.  I am tired of waiting for the last 2 dogs to pass on to fix up my living room, so I am working on getting repairs made and the room painted and furniture bought so we can use it as a living room.
*Deep Breath*

Here are the before shots.....

 That old rug is there from when the Xmas tree was up.  Not quite as bad as leaving your lights on your house all year, but close.lol

 Tubs of eBay merchandise that hasn't sold yet....and that isn't even listed right now.lol

I emptied the ugly plastic shelving unit and got rid of it.
I also got rid of 2 boxes of trash.....

And I gathered all this to donate......

And here are the after shots.....

I cleared the paperwork off the table(for the most part).  The stuff in the chair are my Xmas presents I still haven't opened. lol

I washed and rehung the curtains.

 I gleaned and restacked the eBay merchandise that's left.

 Other than sending some Christmas stuff back upstairs where it belongs and trashing that plastic shelving unit, I still need to work on this part of the room at another time.

The same goes for the table at the bottom of the stairs...though some of this is stuff that is going upstairs.

So that is that.  I am not done but progress was made this week.

Sluggy