End of Summer Wrap-Up #2

But there's more....August wasn't just concussions and college -  lots of other exciting things happened in August... for instance...

#1 - I cleaned out my Linen Closet... this was a bonus added onto the Summer To Do List so I got an extra crossed off item.  Not only did I clean out my linen closet, but now I have AN EMPTY SHELF in my linen closet!  Did you hear that people??? AN EMPTY SHELF in my linen closet.  Sometimes I like to just  open the door and look at it.  But that also brings me to my biggest pet peeve of the summer.  Why can't sheet manufacturers put the freaking SIZE of the sheets ON the sheets.  Because unless you live in a house where everyone sleeps in the same bed or in the same size bed, when you try to sort the sheets, there is no way to tell WHAT SIZE they are!  In our house we have every size of bed from twin to king.  Now obviously I can tell the difference between a twin and a king, but doubles, queens and kings are all very similar and it pisses me off!  Because when you haven't cleaned your linen closet out in....years... there are all sorts of unidentifiable sheets in there...stuffed in the back under Aunt Hilda's hand crocheted "heirloom" afghans.  Sheets I don't ever remember buying, let alone using... so when in doubt... throw it out!!!!  Then you get an empty shelf.  I bet it's those damn sheet manufacturers plan, no sizes means I throw my sheets out, which means eventually I'll have to buy new sheets.  Damn those sheet people!

But wait more excitement ahead....
#2 - I've given up caffeine and I'm working on soda.  I tried this once before and gave up after about 3 days, but so far I'm going on 2 weeks and its all good.  Our coffee maker broke about 3 weeks ago and it took me 3 days to get it replaced.  That meant 3 days of no coffee and once I gave that up it seemed I should just keep going.  I haven't had any caffeine in 2 weeks and I'm down to one soda per day.  I'm pretty proud of myself, but I am NOT ENJOYING it.  I have 6 bottles of Diet Mountain Dew (my own personal crack) sitting in the garage taunting me.  I can't stand to throw them in the garbage, but I'm not letting myself drink them, so I need to find a new home for them, before  I succumb to their siren song!
I also got a juicer - since I guess I'm getting all healthy now.  Sadly it's been in the box for the last week. I guess it's much better for you if you actually open the juicer and use it! :o)

Summer excitement is almost overwhelming me, it's time for school to start!

End of Summer Wrap-Up

August has been an incredibly busy month and I've totally neglected my poor little blog.  I've been catching up reading all my friends blogs and seems we've all been in the same boat, so I'm just jumping in with both feet.

#1 - This is the main thing that kept us busy the end of August.  John and Brenna took a Father/Daughter trip to New York City.  It all started out with flowers and rainbows.  They road the MegaBus up to NYC on Friday afternoon and explored Times Square and ate dinner at cool places.

Like I said, rainbows and unicorns.  Saturday they decided to rent bikes and ride in Central Park and that's when it all fell apart.

BEFORE

There was bike riding and ice cream eating, but then there was crashing and ambulances and ER visits and chaos.
Apparently Brenna and a bike racer lady crashed headfirst into each other.  John didn't see it happen since Brenna was behind him.  But he heard it happen.  So they spent the day in the ER with X-rays and CAT scans and blood tests and all sorts of scary tests.  John calls me on Sat night and opens the conversations with... "Don't worry, everything's okay, but..."  Let me just go on record...NEVER start a conversation with "Everythings okay...but..."

AFTER

                  Turns out everything is okay, but our girl spent the night in the hospital with a concussion, a small cheek fracture and a hell of a black eye.  They couldn't ride the bus back so I drove up Sun morning to get them and bring them home Sunday night.  Let me just say for the record.... I will never drive on the New Jersey Turnpike again, unless my family is being held hostage by Bigfoot.

 She's doing fine now, but it was scary for a little bit.  Concussions are nothing to mess around with.  Apparently for the first couple of hours she had no idea who she was, where she was or why they were in NYC.  In the end she lost about 6 hours time.  She has no memory of the accident or the 30-45 minutes before the accident up to about 5 hours after the accident.  Foggy and Groggy for quite some time afterwards.  Got the girl home and babied her completely.  She had a brief scary relapse about 4 days after the accident and it almost derailed her college start.  But she really took it easy and slowed down and we got the green light from the doctor and off to Radford she went.

It's All Over But the Crying!

We moved our girl down to Radford this weekend.  I don't know how it can be true that my sweet baby girl is in college now.  I must admit it was a little bit harder for me than I thought it would be.  I'm so excited and happy for her, but at the same time I can't believe she's not going to be here everyday.   It would be so much easier if they could go to college when they are freshman or sophomores in high school.  No one likes them at that age and it would so much easier to let them go.  Instead, life waits until they turn into real people, fun people that you want to hang around with and then they leave for college.  We got her all moved in with no problem.  Their room is actually much bigger than we expected and they had plenty of room to fit everything in.

Roommate Samantha

Zack putting together the incredibly complicated storage shelf

It reminded me a lot of the first day of Kindergarten panic.  You are sending them off, not knowing if they'll have anyone to eat lunch with, if they'll find friends, if people will be mean to them, if they'll get lost or be sad or whatever.  But instead of getting them home safe and sound at the end of the day - it lasts for 3 months! You've said all you can say, you've tried to equip them to stand on their own two feet and be happy and successful and self confident, but you don't know if any of it sticks. You know how wonderful and beautiful and smart and kind and fun and amazing they are and you can only hope that everyone else sees it.  I don't know how my parents did it.  At least we have texting and FaceTime and Brenna doesn't seem to mind my endless "what are you doing now", "what did you eat for lunch" texts!  :o)  I told her she should change my name in her contacts list to something like Too Cool 99 and then all the "kids" wouldn't know she was getting texts from her mother 85,000 times a day!  She said she didn't care if they knew.  Love that girl. 

So, we left her on Sat and drove home.  I must admit I was very weepy for the whole day.  Every time someone was nice to me, I burst into tears. But John my hero stepped right up to the plate and anytime he thought I was getting weepy again he'd reach over and grab my...my... you know my.. Va jay jay.  Which immediately pissed me off and cured the tears!  That's my guy! 

 I think it's very interesting how each of us projects our own fears onto her.  I'm terrified she won't have any friends and will be sad and lonely all the time.  John is only worried about grades and academics.  I guess if you put us together we make a complete worrying person.

I am much less weepy now.  I've talked to her a couple of times and she's doing great.  She had her first day of classes and all went fabulously.  We've decided to have her drop History because she was taking 17 hours, but with Biology and Chemistry - I think that's too many.  For her first semester there's nothing wrong with taking fewer hours and concentrating on the core classes.  She can take history anytime.

She's doing all the right things, taking care of everything that needs to be taken care of.  Staying organized and prepared.  I'm so excited for her to be successful and have a great time.  Not too great a time.... I went to college too.

Too Weepy to Post

Our Baby Girl is settled at Radford University and I am stuffing my sorrows into a box of Dove Miniature Ice Cream bars.  Will write more and include pictures when I get myself under control!

Summer Update #2

I don't know why it's so hard to write.  It's not like my days are jam packed, but everyday I look at the blog and instead I choose to nap, read or do nothing.  This really has been the summer of a whole lot of nothing.  I'm not saying that's bad, it just doesn't give me much food for the blog fodder.
So, summer update #2 -

#1 - We have almost completed our Dorm room shopping.  Personally I believe that they should give out medals for this event and I totally earned a GOLD medal.  We got 90% of everything on her list....in one day... and no one died!!!  Not only that, but no one got cranky, no one cried and no one yelled.  This is even more amazing if you consider the fact that we stood in front of the Target towel display for I KID YOU NOT... for over an hour!  Who knew that the choice of towel color was so CRITICAL to college success.  But I was patient, I was tolerant, I was even helpful. And eventually the choice (hallelujah!) was made and we checked out.  But it didn't end there, no the amazing shopping performance of me continued because we moved on to IKEA and comforters.  I know you know how this story goes... the only difference is that I actually picked out a pillow and lay down on the floor while the great comforter debate raged.  But again, no one cried, no one sulked and no one died and we left with a comforter.  All that's left is the easy stuff, cleaning supplies, school supplies etc...  She got her dorm room assignment and roommate.  Muse Dorm, room 124B and Samantha Wooldridge.  They actually met on Facebook and have been messaging back and forth over the summer.  Hopefully that will give them a leg up over doing just random selection.  3 more weeks and we head down to check her in.

#2 - For the first time in probably 17years, we no longer have a room devoted to toys.  The Toy Room is no longer.  John has a very cool Man Cave/Home office.  He's got the computer, a TV and a lazy boy.  It's a nice little retreat for him.  It's weird not to have a toy room.  Zack has taken over the basement and Brenna is in limbo until she leaves.

#3 - The heat has been atrocious!  Almost too hot to do anything except hide in the house.  We've done plenty of swimming and movies.  Added Xmen First Class (awesome) and the last Harry Potter (sad, but good). Captian America and Cowboys and Aliens on the To Do list.  We (really Brenna) spent a couple of weeks mourning the last Harry Potter.  They were there for the midnight showing - actually about 3 hours early.  Zack and I saw it a bit later.

#4 - Visited Buffalo for a couple days.  It's always a nice trip, but tiring.  We flew Brenna and Melanie there about 4 days early and then we drove up and met them.  It made for a very interesting car ride up with only Zack in the car.  The boy can sleep!  We finished up breakfast at 630am and that boy slept until Erie, PA!  That's about 8 hours in my estimation.  Made for a very quiet trip.  So, we were worried about the ride home with all 3 kids.  Love me some teenagers!  Melanie slept the entire trip and B and Z slept all but 90 minutes of it.  YEAH!!!  Sure beats the days of "she's looking out my window!"  "He's chewing too loud!"  Oh yeah it does!

#5 - Zack is still sleeping like a champ... record so far this summer... 4pm!

Waiting for the heat to clear and starting to get geared up for the new school year.