No, the Sky has not fallen... yet.

The world turns each day, and sometimes - uh - many times, I lose track of exactly how many times since I last meant to do something. Brandon is off to Cub Scouts once again, I have cooked Thanksgiving Dinner, attended Thanksgiving at my MIL's home, discovered that my husbands brother and his wife bought their first house (I'm jealous, can you tell?) I have watched Brandon perform his first speaking role in a class play, and baked numerous pumpkin pies, made fudge, and had a buffet breakfast with friends. We had parent teacher conferences in which N1 son is threatened with being held back because he has bad handwriting, and told the N2 son, despite his constant and boundless energy, as well as a knack for finding trouble, is doing wonderfully well in Kindergarten. My husband is beginning to wear thin (I say that loosely... I think that he's actually about to break personally) after a month and a half of preparing to shut down the printing company he has worked at for the last 10 years, to eventually leave behind the first boss he has ever truly respected, and begin life with the group of Investors who bought his company in an effort to make more money. Javier has run a Trail race. Brandon and Liam have finished up their soccer season, complete with pictures and trophies ... much squealing and joy ensued - by everyone. Somewhere in there my mother turned 65, and we celebrated at Disneyland.... which might be becoming a family tradition. All of this is happening, I took many pictures. I just have not found the time to blog about it. I can hardly believe that I am doing this now... even sans pictures. Really I should be doing dishes. Oh.. and I was supposed to be doing the nanowrimo. I have a good story planned. And to get it written, I may have to do my own month of writing ... just later. I haven't even managed one word on a page yet. Sigh.

But I am here. I am well. My family is well, and in good spirits. I am more thankful than ever for the things I have, and the people who love me. I have good friends. A wonderful family. Beautiful, smart, and energetic children. A husband whom I not only love, but whom I admire, and cannot express in any meaningful way how grateful I am for everything he does for us. Every. Single. Day. This year, far more than most, I am Thankful.

Happy (Belated) Thanksgiving to everyone.

Knitting Cure for "Nerves"

Another week has come and gone. Javier is mostly back on nights as of this week. I say mostly, because they are still calling him in in the morning. Sigh. I am trying desperately to help my husband sleep in the few hours a day that he has. It's not easy though, when the kids go jumping on the bed to talk with/wrestle with daddy because they miss him. But over all, I feel like things might be starting to settle down. Halloween is behind us, Thanksgiving ahead, and Xmas looming over my pocket book. I am going to try to have all of my shopping for Xmas done by the start of December, so all I have to do is enjoy the season. It's finally getting cold out here in Sunny Southern California. Even stranger is the fog that has been hanging out in the mountains around us. It makes for some lovely misty mornings. I can imagine all kinds of lovely shawls gracing my shoulders... but alas, I am knitting for others pretty much exclusively right now. And I am not a fast enough knitter to get everything done that I want to, when I want to (is anyone? Could you teach me how?) But I am truly enjoying the stolen moments with my needles right now. The wool blend I am working with right now is so beautifully soft... I love knitting with it. I only hope the recipient loves it as much! Right now all I really want to do is light a fire in my fire place, cuddle up with my yarn and needles, and carefully sip hot chocolate. Sigh. Maybe in about 5 years.

In the mean time, I came across this wonderful title... "Knitting Cure for Nerves" in which women at the turn of the century were prescribed *BY THEIR DOCTOR* to sit, covered up in their beds, and knit for 4-6 hours a day. Sigh. Only in my dreams I'm afraid. Go take a look, it is wonderful fun.

Holy Hopping Horrors, Batman!

Just thought I would let all of you know that I'm alive and well. Adjusting to a short term stint with hubby on days. This is odd, if you consider that I have been with my husband now for 16 years, and in all that time, he has been working nights or swing shift. Most people think that I would really like this little taste of normalcy, but I'm not finding it all it's cracked up to be. My husband is no longer home for dinner reliably. I don't have help in the afternoon with kids while I'm trying to help Brandon with his homework. I don't have help with the kids while I'm making dinner. And that fabled "evening time" is a complete loss. We're both so exhausted at the end of the day that by the time I've read to the boys (note I did not say that they were actually asleep) and I have escaped the boys bedroom, we don't watch TV, or even stop to talk. We crawl into bed (with our wide awake toddler) and try desperately to get some sleep before the alarm goes off, and it all starts again.

The good points? Javier is getting slightly more sleep than when he worked nights. And I have a little more time to TRY to clean our house by the end of the day. But with everything else going on with the kids, I feel like I'm barely making it. I hope it gets easier. We don't really know when he'll be back on nights, and we'll be going back to our normal schedule. They may decide to keep him on days, in which case, I guess we'll just adjust. Maybe there will come a time when we will actually be able to sit together, with ALL the children in bed, and you know, maybe watch an hour of TV, or talk for a little while. Sigh. So far we're about 4 weeks behind in Heroes. Kind of sad that we don't even manage 1 hour of TV a week. Some people do twice that in a day. I'm dying to see what happens with Peter. DON'T SPOIL IT!!!!

We did manage to have a happy Halloween last night. The boys were Eragon and Brom from the Movie Eragon. And Maia was a cute little ladybug. I'll post pictures as soon as I have a few more moments that I can sqeeze into my day!