It's Nice to Be Back

Ahhh!  It's nice to be back in modern times.  We have been without internet access at our house since last Thursday and I feel like I have been living in the stone ages.  It has actually made me a little worried that I am too dependent on the internet.  I mean ...

• I get almost all of my news, both real news and fun, people.com news, from the internet.  My one "real" news watching comes in the morning when I check the morning shows for the day's weather.
• I do all of my banking via the internet. 
• I use email and facebook more than once a day just to check in and see what is going on with my "friends."
• I write my blog and catch up on those that I follow.
• I check Pinterest (my husband's most hated website ever because it gives me so many "project" ideas both for me and for him)
• I "research" things, medical, religious, political, random off the wall interesting facts.  Husband is the king of useless trivia and we are always looking up random tidbits of information just out of curiosity.
• And I will admit I play random games on the internet...like bejeweled or hidden objects games...in the quiet moments when everyone is napping and I'm not cooking, cleaning, or working on a project.

Being without internet for those few days was rough.  Not so rough in the news and facebook/pinterest world, but what I found most irritating was not being able to look up the random things when husband and I were talking over the weekend.  Thankfully, we are back up and running with a new, hopefully more reliable provider that treats their customers better.  

In talking to a friend on Sunday and telling her how we had been without internet for a few days and were switching providers, she laughed and told me I needed to blog about my recent experience with the customer service reps so here goes.

We have had our internet through a major, non-cable, provider for the past couple of years.  We really haven't had any trouble with them until recently.  I mean, every once in a while we would have to reset the modem because for some reason or another the internet wasn't connecting, but those instances were few and far between and resetting everything always fixed the problem.  But ever since the Christmas snowstorm the internet has been going out constantly.  I was resetting it 5 or 6 times a day basically every day.  After I reset things it would work for an hour or so and then go out again.  It was extremely frustrating.  Since other people I know around town who also use this provider were also experiencing issues with their internet I just figured there had been some damage with the storm and it would take a little while to get it all fixed.  

The morning of Ava's birthday party I got up to finish a few last minute items including printing the tags for the party favors.  Since I needed to download the owl picture I used for the bags wouldn't you know it that the internet wasn't working and resetting it didn't seem to make a difference either.  I kept getting a DSL Fail message when I tried to connect.  Finally I called technical support and spent over an hour on the phone with their representative.  We went round and round with the tech support person about what was wrong and what lights were lit up on the modem.  She had me unplug the wireless airport we use and plug the DSL line directly into the computer.  That fixed nothing.  Then she has me turn everything off, unplug it, plug it back in, they resend the signal, etc., etc., etc. over and over again.  Nothing worked  During this long drawn-out process she tells me I must have a virus on my computer.  I tell her I highly doubt that is the problem for two reasons 1.  We have a mac desktop and there are not too many viruses targeted to mac computers and 2.  We had just, within the past week, had a computer scrubbed and updated by the geniuses at the apple store.  I was 99.99% sure we didn't have a virus.  That's when I got some weird error message while trying one of her fixes that said it couldn't process my request because malicious content had been detected.   That was when things got good.  When I read her the error message, she told me that wasn't an error message that could be generated by the Motorola modem and I must have been going to suspicious websites.  She then point blank asked me if I had been going to porn sites because that was a suspicious and malicious website and that was likely my problem.  I was so shocked she was accusing me of looking at porn that I didn't get offended right away.  I explained to her that I was the mom of four small children and didn't have time for porn.  I don't think she believed me.  She was adamant that nothing was wrong with the DSL line or the modem.  After that, I gave up on getting the internet working with her help and hung up.  I ended up going to my parents to download the owl tags for the party.  

Eventually, husband was able to get the internet working again (I think he has the special touch) and I actually thought it was working better, or so it seemed.  I was only having to reset the modem once or twice a day for the past week or so which was such an improvement over what it had been I thought things were finally getting fixed.  No such luck.  When it went out and stayed out last week I put husband on the job.  NOTE: I am much nicer and more patient when dealing with people on the phone like customer service representatives.  Husband however is awesome at getting things done.  He is better able to get through to people and get them to do their jobs than I am.  So when I am getting nowhere in dealing with people, I call him in to do the heavy lifting.  

On Saturday husband called technical support again about our lack of internet and this time the customer support person was even more clueless than last time, if that is possible.  No one accused us of frequenting port sites this time, but the woman just couldn't understand what our problem was or why we were upset.  Husband started off the conversation by telling her that he was ready to switch our internet service to another provider if she couldn't get the issues resolved.  This time, instead of the problem being from our frequenting porn sites, she determined the modem had burned out and was no longer functioning and we would have to buy a new one from her.  She almost wouldn't take no for an answer.  She kept saying, "I'm going to place that order for your new modem now," to which we would respond, "No, I do not want to purchase a new modem."  Eventually, she caught on to our displeasure and the fact that we were looking to switch services and asked if she could call back in 30 minutes to give us time to make a decision.  That was when I got on the phone and told her we needed a few hours to investigate our other options for internet service.  Before hanging up she promised she would call me back in 2-3 hours.  During those 2 hours I called and switched our internet service to our cable provider, and while I am not a huge fan of our cable provider, their customer representative knew his products, available packages and pricing, and was able to answer all the questions both husband and I could think up, all without accusing me of being a closet porn addict.  

So we switched.  It was easy and so far (knock on wood) we haven't had to reset the modem even once and it has been up and running for 16 whole hours.  And just in case you were wondering, that other DSL representative that was supposed to call us back never did.  Shocking I know.  Maybe she was too busy looking at porn.

I don't keep track of how much I blog about one child or the other.  Not really.  I just tend to write about what is going on in our lives.  That means, whoever does the funniest, cutest, most insane thing gets talked about on here.  But sometimes I feel like that leaves little Ava out of the fun.  Since she isn't talking and getting into trouble she doesn't make it on to the blog as often as the others.

So today is all about her.  She is so stinking cute and has such a sweet and cute personality.  She definitely brightens my day.  I thought you out there in blog land might need a little day brightening too.  So here is some cuteness for your Wednesday.

Getting a ride from her main man

Ride 'em cowgirl.  She loves the rocking horse!

Already a star and so "popular" she is recognized at the grocery store means she has to wear her "shades."

Hope she added a little cuteness to your day.  Happy hump day everyone!

Her First Date

Ella has now been on her first, official date....with her Daddy.

The dance studio where Ella takes her ballet classes had a Daddy/Daughter Valentine's Dance the weekend before Valentine's Day.  Ella was so excited about it and begged to go after Ms. Sandy told her about it in dance class.  It was a fundraiser for the studio to raise money for a new floor.  The girls were to dress up in their fancy dresses and bring their daddies (or granddaddies, or uncles, or some male companion other than a boyfriend) for some dancing fun.  Mother's with sons taking dance classes were allowed, but the rest of us moms were asked politely to stay away and let the daughters and their daddies have a special day.

I wanted Ella to really enjoy her date with daddy and feel extra special so I order her a small corsage and a boutonniere for daddy.  She got to wear one of her new "fancy" dresses, her silver cross necklace, her charm bracelet, and even a little make-up.  Don't worry, nothing major, just a little powder and lip gloss.  She did ask the next day when we were getting ready for church if she could wear make-up again.  I told her no that was only for very special occasions and that she didn't need make-up she was already pretty.

Here they are, all dressed up and on their way for their very first date.

An I love you kiss

They had so much fun.  Ella couldn't stop talking about going to the dance with her daddy.  Such a special time for Daddy and daughter.  

Got King Cake

Happy Mardi Gras everyone.

Hope you are enjoying some King Cake today.

Tonight is a Gumbo Cook-off at church in honor of Shrove Tuesday and what is a Mardi Gras celebration without King Cake.  Two friends and I made these delicious looking and tasting (we might have had a tiny taste test just to be sure they were ok) cakes for the party tonight.

Laissez les bons temps rouler!

Birthday Bash!

Last weekend was little Ava's first birthday bash.  I went all out and had a blast putting it all together.

The theme was owls.  I have never had a theme for a first birthday before and when I started working on this party I didn't have a theme in mind.  As it tends to happen, I found these adorable owl invitations on vistaprint and the theme just grew from there.

My favorite thing about the invitation, other than the absolutely precious little girl in the picture, is that Ava is wearing her owl shoes on an owl invitation.  

Apparently owls are all the rage at the moment so finding owl "stuff" was a breeze.  I actually didn't buy too much, but got inspirations from what I found out there to make my own decorations.

I got my color scheme from the invitation as well as the owl theme and made a personalized "Happy Birthday Ava" pennant banner.  I love how it turned out and thought it was so much fun.  I'm going to be making many more of these.  One for each of the "big kids" definitely, but also some for various holidays like Easter, Christmas, Valentines Day (although given Valentine's Day is this week it will be a next Valentine's Day project).

Here is the banner in process.

And here they are finished.  I did two separate banners.  One that said Happy Birthday and that said Ava.  We hung them in the two doorways into the dining room.

You can't tell from these photos, but in keeping with our owl theme I sewed little silver owl beads on the tip of each pennant.

I also made tissue paper "puffs" in our party colors to hang from the ceiling.   I loved these too.  I will definitely be making them for future parties.

This is a close up of the puffs that hung over the dining table.

And here is the cake table...pre-cake.  I have since moved these puffs to decorate the corner over the glider in Ava's nursery.  They were too cute to just throw away.

Table decorations.

And a close up of the vase

I took the vase pictures after the party was over (I didn't have time before) and things were cleaned up.  For the actual party I filled the bottom of the vases with white navy beans, added water, and then added a few drops of blue food coloring so the water and the beans turned teal.  Inexpensive and easy.  I like that combination.

The owl pinata.  We didn't fill it with candy and have a free for all.  She's only one after all.  We'll leave the pinata smashing for a future birthday.  Our hoot owl guarded the basket of party favors. 

The party favors were another thing I didn't get a chance to grab a photo of before the party and there weren't any left overs.  I'm a fan of party favors that are edible or can be used up, like bubbles,  rather than little plastic  toys and stuff that just seem to clutter up my house.  So...for Ava's favors I made a huge batch of chex mix, bagged it up and added an adorable owl tag that I found on pinterest here and customized to say "Thanks for coming to my party.  It was a HOOT!"

And here is the cake.  

And the smash cake all for Ava

No I did not make these myself.  I wish.  Actually the wife of one of husband's law partners does cakes as a hobby and after seeing pictures of some of the cakes she has done I asked her if she would be willing to do Ava's birthday cake.  I think they came out really cute and were really delicious.  Thanks Kristin.  The cakes were awesome and you rock!  

Unfortunately Ava had come down with a little stomach bug on Friday before her party and she definitely wasn't feeling 100% on her big day.  Because she wasn't feeling well she hadn't been eating much and I wasn't sure how she would do with the party and the cake.  Baby girl is a trooper and was actually pretty perky for the party, considering she was under the weather, and she did enjoy a few bites of cake.

Here is her first taste.  

She was a little unsure, but she soon got into it and enjoyed a few bites of cake before heading back upstairs for another nap.

Here is a shot of her a few days later after she was over her tummy bug enjoying some leftover cake.  You can tell she is really enjoying it.  Nothing says yummy like wearing bits of chocolate cake all over your face.

This past year with Ava has been so much fun.  She brings such love and joy to our family.  I am so blessed to be her mommy.

Happy Birthday again little one.  I love you.

So Ava's first birthday and birthday bash are in the books.  Now it's on to planning the "big kids" birthday bash....if they can ever agree on a theme.

A Year's Worth of Projects

My husband hates this about me, but I am one of those people who has to have AT LEAST one project going at all times.  Usually, I have three or four.  And my list of projects to do never seems to get shorter no matter how many I finish and get crossed off the list.  I am always finding new things I want to make or do that get added as soon, or sometimes before, I get one project finished.

Since my New Year's Resolution was to be more organized and get our house more organized I thought a good way to get a handle on my projects list would be to assign each month one major project.  These aren't my little projects like clean the house, rake the yard...those are chores...not projects.  These are things like make curtains for the living room windows or repaint the master bedroom. 

So here is my list of proposed 2013 projects.

January:  Ava's first birthday party.  Sounds like no big deal but first birthdays are a big deal around here and do almost all of the "work" myself.  I don't want my children to not feel special or celebrated because I chose to have so many children.  My motto is if I would do something if I only had one child, I can do it for all four.  So...big first birthday bash is project one.  Party prep is in full swing since the party is this weekend.  I will post photos of the little "projects" that went into the party next week.

February:  Repurpose a huge, oak armoire have and aren't using into toy storage for the den.  This project goes hand in hand with rearranging the family room furniture and organizing all the toys around here, and with four children, there are a lot of toys.

March:  I have two this month.  The first, make Easter outfits for all four children.  The second, make a Happy Easter pennant banner to decorate the house for the Easter holiday.

April:  Birthday bash for the three 'big kids."  Since John David and the twins' birthdays are only 2 weeks apart, we usually do one, big birthday party for all three of them.  So far they haven't come to a decision about a theme.  They are still narrowing it down.

May:  Make curtains for the living room windows.  The tree that shaded the front of the house and provided some privacy to the living room windows took a major hit in the Christmas snow storm so some curtains for a little privacy are a must have.

June:  Repaint ceilings in the guest bathroom, front and upstairs hallways.

July:  Repaint downstairs half bathroom.  This was the first room we repainted after we moved into our house.  In our plumbing troubles over the last year or so this bathroom has taken a major hit so it's time for a little TLC. 

August:    Paint built-in bookcases and mantle in the family room.

September:  Make curtains for the guest bedroom windows.

October:  Halloween costumes for the children.  We haven't even started thinking about next Halloween yet but I figured I better put it on here to save some time for it.

November:  Catch up month.  I'm going to leave this month open for now because I know I will come up with a million more things I need or want to do between now and then.  I also know that in the chaos of our day to day life it is very possible that some of the other projects won't get completed timely and I will need a month set aside to finish all previously started projects.  

December:  Make Christmas Eve outfits and Christmas pajamas for all the children.

I will post details and pictures as I go.  In fact I have pictures of some of my pre-Christmas projects I need to post as well.  That is for another day I guess.   I hope all of you will hold my feet to the fire so I get these things accomplished.  

Are any of you like me with a projects list a mile long?  I would love to hear what you hope to accomplish this year.

What's Missing

Can you tell what's missing from this picture?

That's right.  He lost his first tooth today at lunch.  I didn't even know it was loose.  He is extremely proud and has been showing off his "gap" to everyone we've seen since it fell out.  I am still in shock.  I can't believe my baby has lost his first tooth.  He is so grown up.  In fact, not 10 minutes before he lost the tooth he corrected me when I called him a "little boy."  He told me he wasn't a "little boy" he was big and a man.  Tugs at my heart strings.  Thankfully my big man isn't too big to cuddle with his mommy yet.

Unfortunately since we didn't know it was loose, we weren't watching for it to fall out and as a result we lost it at lunch.  I think he swallowed it without knowing it.  Sad and gross, but I have it on good authority that the Tooth Fairy accepts notes regarding lost of swallowed teeth.  We will be putting the replacement note under his pillow Friday night (his choice because it gives him time more time to write his letter) to see what the Tooth Fairy brings.