Packing is about 90% done!

We still have some last minute things to assemble the day we leave. I need to pack a few DVD's and books (books are heavy!), some coloring books, maybe paint and playdoh and a few toys... I'm confident everything will fit and I am close to ready to wager Gary will be able to see out the back window too! Last year on the way home we passed a horrible accident that terrified me and gave me nightmares for a week. It's all coming back to me. :(

I'm happy to report that The Bush's and Grandma Sandra have safely arrived. I also believe our food expert and his wife (the Haywood's) have arrived. I got a message from Bride-to-be and she was driving... on her way to OBX I think! I hope to talk to my mom again tonight and get a full report.

Isn't money grand? I consider myself pretty frugal, or at least I have the ability to be. I also can spend money like no body's business, i've just never had the opportunity to do so. :) Today we decided to go out to lunch, just the 5 of us and then Gary got his hair cut. I also bought a tanning package good for a year. In those purchases, we spent more than I spent last week on our grocery bill! (You can either deduce I don't spend much a week on groceries or we overpaid for hair cuts and pizza. Probably both are true.) It was nice to be pampered and served though. Lesson learned today: Unless you make it yourself, pizza is rarely healthy. I've been trying to follow Weight Watchers for several years. I"m not sure if I'm allowed to advertise who got me started, but I get a lot of the info free through this VIP. This allows me to basically follow the principles but not pay the membership fee or attend meetings. I think I'd like the accountability but the idea of spending $ to have someone else weigh me every week seems a bit wasteful... if I can do it myself. My goal after Esther was born was to try to do it on my own, and if I couldn't, join. So far I've not joined yet but that's always an option, we discuss it about once a month. I'm close to my goal so we'll see. So I've been tracking what I eat, counting "points", and weighing myself regularly. I found a website over a year ago that allows you to record your weight. You put in your weight, your goal, and each week you "weigh in" and it tracks it for you. You can also track what you eat and work out and I think you can have friends and chat and all that stuff. It's a dieting social network basically. I just log in and record my weight. My favorite feature is that it emails me once a week reminding me to weigh in. I also use a website that helps me figure out the points values for restaurants. It was here that I found out today that one piece of a large cheese pizza is 9 points. However, if I eat one slice of a large stuffed crust cheese pizza, it's 8! How is that possible!?! Less crust and more cheese?! Cheese is better for you than crust? I wonder what it is if I don't eat the crust at all! :) The other lesson reminded: DO NOT BUY CHILDREN MILK AT A RESTAURANT!!! I almost always take them drinks or have them drink water. We forgot that today and it cost us more than a gallon of milk to get them both one not even full cup.

The other day I was on the phone with my mom and all of a sudden I could not hear her very well, and then silence. The speaker had been making weird noises and sounded odd for a few days so I assumed right away it was the speaker dying. I was right! When Esther pulled a chord that unplugged the Internet and TV and I needed to call Gary, I figured out that speaker phone was my only option. Thankfully we were at the part of our contract that as long as we signed our lives away for 2 more years, I could get a free-after-rebate phone. The sales lady also gave the kids each these model phones. They don't have power or anything but they look exactly like a real cell phone, heavy and everything. They are obsessed with them! I've had to take them away several times and since Friday that's the best punishment there is! They like to play music, call people, leave and listened to voice mails and play video games. How do they even know phones do all that stuff?! :) This has reinforced that they will not have phones for a very long time. And I hope data plans are not standard by that time!

Other updates for today. A piece fell off the mower cutting Gary's chore short, Esther can hold and throw her bottle (and toys), the kids are playing wedding a LOT, and the sun came out today!!