Year End Recap -- Change was in the Air

2016 is already a memory.  I can hardly believe it.  This blog has evolved from a chronicle of life in a house with kids at home to a blog designed to keep family and friends up to date as our family has grown and spread its wings!  2016 seemed to personify this evolution in a way I could never have anticipated at the beginning of the year. 


The complexity of a maintaining a family blog when everyone in the family is now an adult is a delicate dance between sharing news and progress and protecting the privacy of the family members...fewer pictures, fewer funny anecdotes which might embarrass, but still trying to sharing important events.


Last things first.  Christmas came off without a hitch and everyone had a terrific time.  Santa did a terrific job of picking gifts for the kids and  I managed to meet my goal of making hand made gifts for friends and family (on time - which means packages got mailed early, not at the 11th hour).  Christmas cards were mailed in middle December (!), all of the presents were wrapped by the 23rd, and I managed to pull off Christmas breakfast for the kids and some friends and Christmas dinner (for 11!).  I was actually pretty impressed with myself.


Superman went from working locally in the beginning of the year to working overseas by mid-summer...this time, however, he's not a contractor, he's an employee of a multinational corporation.  For us, that simply means that his doesn't find a new job every year and, as long as he likes this company, he can move within the company.  His current assignment runs through August 2018, so we know where he'll be until then.  Superman loves his job and this is old hat to the rest of the family, so while it is not your typical set up, it works for us.


Charming has been running, and running, and running...and when he's not running, he's plotting and planning a move to the west side of the state for sometime this spring.  After being at the same company for five years, he's looking to make a change both professionally and geographically.  Truthfully, I can't decide what to hope for:  Should I hope he finds a fantastic job here in town or should I hope he finds a fabulous job on the west side?  So, I just hope he finds something he likes and have faith it will be the right next step for him.


In December, Valiant moved out and into a place with his girlfriend, taking over the reigns of his life.  It is so exciting watching him make his way out of the family home.  He's bought a truck and sold the same truck (all in 2016) and he bought himself a project car which is his 2017 project.  (That car, he left behind our fence...not exactly room for a project car in apartment parking!)   Valiant's life has moved beyond the family home...now it is consumed by his relationship, his job, his apartment, and his project car.  His girlfriend and her family are lovely...they joined us for Christmas dinner and it was a blast.  We figure any girl who can just roll with the weirdness that is the Nagle5 is a good girl to have around.


Buttercup is halfway through her senior year in high school...and is also well into her second year at the local junior college through the Running Start program.  She has been throwing javelin for her high school and is looking forward to doing it for one more season.  Her favorite class is ceramics and this spring she's decided to master throwing on the wheel.


And then there is me...with the kids almost all grown up, you'd think I'd have plenty of free time, but with Superman overseas and both boys moved out and Buttercup busy with two schools and a job, the house maintenance and pet maintenance is left for me.  (Pro tip:  don't let your second son move out of the family home until spring, otherwise you're the one left doing the shoveling when it snows...just saying!)  So, when I'm not shoveling, cleaning, worrying about cars, or heading to the gym, I'm sewing or embroidering.  In addition to helping out my friend at Piping and Pleats, this fall I really dug in and learned all about the embroidery side of my sewing machine and it made me love my machine even more.  If you want to follow my sewing adventures, I've started a separate blog:  www.seamsbyerin.com to chronicle my journey.   In addition to sharing many of my fall sewing projects (now that the recipients have opened their gifts), I've committed 2017 to be the year I sew clothes I actually WANT to wear.


So, time keeps marching on and, while the story is ever changing, it continues.  Coming up next:  The Nagle5 (plus 1 - the girlfriend!) will be together again when Superman comes home on leave this spring and we will be heading to California and, before you know it, June will be here and Buttercup will be graduating from high school. 


In the meantime, the frigid temperatures are supposed to give way to snow tomorrow night, so I'll be back manning the shovel!


Happy 2017!

October Recap...Where does the time go???

November?  Already!?  Where did October go?  I know I felt pretty busy in October, but it wasn't until November arrived that I realized just how busy we'd all been.  The weather changed, cars got repairs (heck, a car got stolen and found - Valiant's girlfriend's car, to be specific!), a room got painted, I made it to book club for the first time in months(!), dogs got sick, dogs got better, sprinklers got blown out in anticipation of the freeze, I even covered for a friend at her work so she could get some much needed time off.  Obviously, I didn't take pictures of it all, but I did take some random photos:


I put up a few of my favorite Halloween decorations, but with no little kids at home, I didn't feel like going all out.  I have three of these wrought iron spiders in various sizes and just love them...this is the smallest one:

I also put up our ping pong ball bats...they just make me smile whenever I see them.

Not bad for a ping pong ball and googly eyes!!

I got some awesome bird feeders to replace the generic plastic ones I've had forever...and, as you can see by the picture I just took, the birds are fans and empty them quickly as they prepare for winter. 

 

So pretty when they're being swarmed by birds...

I even managed to get a new barbecue cover on Superman's barbecue before the three weeks of rain came...the leaves?  They have to wait until tomorrow...I did the front yard today.

Ready for winter!!

I did a lot of sewing.  Some of it was sewing for my friend Cassi at Piping and Pleats...and a c couple of the projects were incredibly large cushions.  Seriously large.  I had my sister in stitches on Skype watching me stuff the cushion below into its slipcover...to say it was stiff would be an understatement.  I was wrestling the sucker into submission!  Check out this before and after:

Just to give you an idea of how large this is:  That cushion is lying across a couch and each of the
 floor tiles visible in the before picture are 13x13" tiles.  The cushion was large!!

I finally pulled the trigger and bought some embroidery software to enable me to do more with the embroidery functions on the Brother SE400 my family bought me four years ago.  I went with Sew What Pro for $65 because I don't even know what I don't know, so I couldn't see a reason to spend more on Embrilliance.  At some point, I might switch over, but for now, I'll see how it goes.

I love binding PDF documents - software instructions, pattern instructions...binding
makes them so easy to use.  They lay flat when they're open for reference during a project.

After quite a bit of trial and error, I decided to go for it and embellished a couple of toddler sized Halloween t-shirts for Aunt S's baby boys...my first time embroidering something other than names on anything and my first time embroidering on clothing.  It wasn't easy, but I was pretty pleased with the results.  (Plus, toddlers aren't perfectionists!!)

Ruined Cash's first shirt, otherwise both would have been grey...live and learn...

In the middle of it all, I had a birthday and Superman and Charming got together to get me these:

Who doesn't love red Vans?

Oh, and my sister requested some Halloween pillowcases made from some of the most fabulous fabric...the pictures she sent me didn't do it justice...as soon as the fabric arrived, I was itching to get the pillowcases made and shipped off to her.  They were such a fun project!  (And it's really awesome when your family likes what you sew enough to ask for more!)

Best fabric ever!!  (It reminds me of the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland.)

And, as October wound down, Buttercup and I helped close down our beloved CrossFit 509.  It has been our gym home for five and a half years and I was heartbroken when the owner had to make the difficult decision to close it down.  Still, when you're lucky enough to have your gym become part of your family, you help with even the sad stuff.  When all the equipment is gone, you're just left with just a sad shell of a building...very sad and weird and all of that...even Honey was bummed...

I had to chuckle at the scuff marks above the blue stripe...wall ball marks!  Bahaha!

We finished off October by going to dinner on Halloween...as the kids got too old for trick or treating, we started a new tradition...this is our 6th year doing it...PF Changs was pretty tasty.


There you go...some of the stuff that went on in the Nagle5 world in October.  Now I'm ready...let November roll on in!!

When the winner of "Who is your favorite human?" leaves the country...

When he wasn't travelling, Superman loved to begin his days at home playing "Who's your favorite human?" as he would dole out treats to the dogs...

Jack is a pretty boy!

Jack, our youngest at only three, has taken the end of the game hard...despite the fact that Superman was, in fact, really just a close second to Jack's true favorite:   Buttercup.  Jack loves Buttercup the most, but the same day Superman left was the day classes started at the college for Buttercup, so she's gone all day this week, too.

Buried in his Minion blanket...Jack is sad.

Even his Minion blanket isn't cheering Jack up...

Poor Jack!

Poor Jack.

 

 

Life in the Nagle5 Household

Superman is suffering from "short-timers" in a bad way.  As he counts down the days and continues with his job search (trying to land a job from 12000 miles away), he is often frustrated and impatient.  (Let's be real...he's not finding the Middle East to be a garden spot in the best of circumstances and these days, we're not seeing the best of circumstances!)  My job right now is to keep him upbeat and positive and distract him from the days oh-so-slowly turning on the calendar.  To that end, I try to share the humor and chaos of life at home.  Everything from the cats bringing live birds into the house (two this month (!), both of which we saved from an unsavory end) to tales of life in high school to my failed attempts at mastering a handstand (grr!) have become the language of life in the Nagle5 household. 



Who knew earbuds were so vital to daily life?

It seems the artists who draw our favorite comic strips have doubled down and joined the effort to keep Superman smiling.  So many have struck me, that I started cutting them out and adding commentary for Superman.  We get the local paper (comics are a great way to introduce your child to reading the newspaper!) and  I'm linking to the comics directly and sharing these with you here because Superman struggles to get internet that allows surfing websites and he'll get this as an email.  Here is a sampling of what I've cut out:  Our favorites these days are Baby Blues (no babies here anymore, but these guys obviously live what they draw...three kids are exponentially more than two, I tell you!), Zits (I haven't found the hidden camera that keeps capturing Valiant, but I know it is here), and Off the Mark (definitely our weird sense of humor.)

Life with Valiant:

Seriously...where is the hidden camera in my house?

Life with Buttercup:

After raising two boys, I feel qualified to say that girls are
different...no better, no worse, but definitely different!

(And don't you think Charming is relieved to have moved out of the house so I don't compare his life to life in the comic strips?)

My life is nothing if not exciting...

I was minding my own business, getting ready for the gym, when Buttercup fell backwards, broke her fall with her wrists, and promptly broke her left wrist.  Didn't get my workout, but I did get my heart pumping.

For whatever reason, Buttercup's blood pressure dropped quite low in the ten minutes it took to get to the ER (68/30) and she was whisked into a room lickety split and placed on a bed which was tilted way back to put her head below her heart.  The blood pressure situation resolved itself and Valiant was bored.

Four hours laters, the break was set, the splint was on, the sling was in place, and the pain pills had kicked in.  Even better?  She was still rocking her Vibram Five Fingers...those shoes made her the star of the ER.

This afternoon, we head to the orthopaedist for the permanent cast.   Any guesses on the color she'll choose? 

Life At Home - The Argh! Edition

Last month, as I was folding laundry in front of my dryer, water started dripping down on my hand from the ceiling!  There is an exhaust fan above the dryer and above that is my bedroom.  No water!

After I freaked out in my mind a little, I stopped to listen and realized that Valiant was in the shower.  I ran upstairs and made him turn off the water.  The drip stopped.  That was really good.  However, I had no clue what to do about it. 

 I confess I called Superman and woke him up in the middle of the night with this cheerful news.  Honestly, I didn't know what to do...water dripping down from the ceiling onto my dryer is not covered in my Wonder Woman handbook!  We decided to just leave the shower alone until Superman was home on leave and could have a look it at.  I thought that was fine because we're fortunate enough to have three full baths.   A little shuffling and we'd be fine.

A few weeks later, Mr. R., came home on leave from his job in North Dakota and we got to talking about my leak.  He insisted on taking a look so that Superman wouldn't have to worry.

After seeing how bad it was, I'm pretty sure he regretted that decision.  Apparently, the problem had been ongoing for quite some time...I had no idea.  Still, he had some free time, so I was able to hire him to fix it, so Superman wouldn't have to do it now. New subfloor, repaired wall, new toilet and new flooring, he even added tile around the edge to help prevent the problem from returning...it was a big job and I feel so lucky to know someone I trust to do it well.

He did a fabulous job, didn't he?  Now all I have to do is get Superman to help me pick a new paint color for the bathroom...I don't like the yellow with the new floor.  Do you?

Why Some Things are Better Done By Men

Well, as predicted, we awoke to a winter wonderland this morning.  It was a typical winter morning in the Nagle household.Valiant enthusiastically headed outside to shovel the drive and head down to the neighbor's to do her driveway, too.  As I'd planned, I tackled the plastic insulation on the windows.  I started with the Master Bedroom, thinking I'd go from the top down.

And there, my friends, was where the similarity to our typical winter prep ended.

If Superman had been in charge of insulating the windows, he would have picked a day, started applying the insulation to the windows, and been done with the entire house in two hours.

Me?  In two hours, I got exactly one room done.  One!  Why?  Because when I went into the bedroom to do our window, I had to move the bed (I'm not as tall as Superman).  When I moved the bed, I saw the fur from the cats who sleep under the bed, so I had to vacuum.  When I vacuumed under the bed, I saw the fur at the bottom of the curtains (from the same cats) that are normally behind the bed, so I had to clean the curtains that are behind the bed.  Then I noticed that the blinds were dusty and I couldn't seal up the window without dusting them (right?).  I noticed that the wooden cornice was dusty, so, of course, I had to dust it, too.  Finally, the ceiling fan was a little dusty, so I dusted it.  I talked with a neighbor on the telephone (she didn't need to use my mixer after all).  In the end, I did get the plastic up on my window and only my window.

Oh, and while I was doing all of this, I made a loaf of banana bread.  (I'll give you the recipe tomorrow...it is terrific.)

I have nine more windows, minimum, to do.  So, at this rate, and taking into account Thanksgiving, I should have the window insulation up in a little less than two weeks.

Two weeks vs. Superman's two hours.  Some things are better done by men...at least my man.