Happy Fourth Birthday Anna

Anna had a nice birthday yesterday. She opened her presents in the morning and went to big brother's soccer game. She spent the day playing with her siblings and we had a great carpet picnic with her new play food and "big girl doll". She had fun decorating her Dora cake.

Unfortunately our USB cable (which really isn't "Universal" after all) is missing in action, so I can't show you the great photos. I plan to organize my office and hopefully it just got placed where it didn't belong. So today, I included a photo of Anna with her Nativity scene. I am glad I was searching for photos, because I don't think one was printed with the other Christmas pictures! Anna's Godfather gave Anna these pieces as a Christmas present this year. He (my big brother and Godfather) even called her on her birthday! (I only mention that so my dad will tell my mom, who will be so pleased.)

Handy Mandy Update

I believe I gave the wrong impression when I indicated that changing a toilet seat was HARD. Yes, changing the first one, with no direction, was a challenge. Changing the second seat - 5 minutes (including cleaning time). Easiest thing ever. I realized as well, that I didn't give you the secret to toilet seat changing. Hold the bolt part of the "nut/bolt" assembly under the toilet seat while unscrewing the seat. That made the job soooo easy, I simply loosened the seat in our third bathroom to clean it really well and didn't even need to replace it. (master bath gets less little boy action :)

Perhaps having 3 clean toilets at once shouldn't thrill me, but it is the simple pleasures in life people!

Spring has sprung

Spring season has arrived, although it seems like we went from winter to summer pretty quickly. I am not complaining, the weather is the weather - nothing we can do about it!

Anyway, back to the theme of this post:
Spring is showing itself in many ways.

1st THE GARDEN
We planted the garden at the best time (last Friday night). The only thing we could have done better was to do "starts" in the house, but we planted as early as we could, just by chance. My friend's husband planted tomatoes the weekend before and they FROZE. Yesterday (about 10 days after this happened to them) was 97 degrees. Crazy. I don't have a picture, because Ken is out of town and I believe he has the USB cable for the camera. I will post a picture later, because I LOVE to see the changes in the garden.

2nd
The McClearys have new life! Our first baby robin hatched, probably today. The picture isn't of our baby robin (see USB note above), plus our Mother Robin stayed on the nest most of the day. When we first spotted the baby, we ran to get the camera, but Momma was back quickly. The 2nd time that she was off the nest, she was close by and was chirping at us loudly, so although we tried, we were unable to take the time to focus the camera on the little bird. It was an especially hard challenge because I don't have a great camera, and the nest is tucked away in a tree below our deck. The camera took some great pictures of the tree branches!

3rd Spring Cleaning.

I have NEVER changed a toilet seat in my life. Ken has changed many toilet seats, but I have always just let that be his job! Well, Ken is gone all this week and most of next. I had to run to the hardware store for our new doorbell and picked up the new seats that we needed desperately. I decided that while I was with Anna in the bathroom (her in the tub) I would replace the seat - how hard could it be? VERY HARD. First I tried to unscrew the lid with Ken's pocket knife that was upstairs. I broke down and went to get a screwdriver (while Carolyn stayed with Anna), then I broke down and got the power screwdriver (while Joel stayed with Anna). I finally got the silly thing off and scrubbed the entire toilet within an inch of its life. I put the new seat on, only to realize I bought "elongated" instead of "round". I really felt like our seat WAS NOT round, but clearly, I made a wrong judgement. Why I couldn't have figured that out while the seat was still in the box, who knows. I was just sure that our seat WAS NOT round. Oh well. The brand makes a round seat as well, so I can swap out the top and leave the bottom pieces on. I am sure I can find someone who needs a brand new ELONGATED toilet seat.

I see this as a great life lesson. A. for me - I know all the tricks to changing toilet seats now. B. for the kids - who witnessed my perseverance and acceptance of the problems, working toward the solutions to same problems.

Sometimes you just have to focus on the fact that the cup is 1/2 full - rather than swearing at the idea that you bought the wrong stupid toilet seat. To be honest, I think I was so happy to finally get the old toilet seat off, the fact that I have to run to the hardware store tomorrow is really no big deal. I know that the seat will install, since the enongated did just fine :) My goal will be accomplished before Ken gets home, so I am ok with how things played out! I am Handy Mandy!