Monday, December 28, 2009

Great Video

I found this video and thought it was great. I love the look on the hair dresser's face when he says, "So you want me to work for free." Great video for freelance artists and for those who like a good laugh.

A few changes

You may have noticed a few changes on the blog over the last few weeks. I have hired the very talented TonieLee Designs to create a new blog template for me. It matches the new website that I have set up at www.sirenavanschaik.com. I'm excited to have everything revamped and I am really happy with TonieLee, she did an excellent job on both.

So while they are pretty apparent, I just wanted to mention the changes and also see what everyone else thinks of the changes. For more information on TonieLee, you can visit her website at http://www.tonielee.com.

All the best,

Sirena

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

'Twas The Night Before Christmas

Okay, it may not be the night before Christmas but today, as I was looking through my resource books, I found my copy of "The Night Before Christmas." I was pretty happy with this since I was sure I had lost it and last year we had to read the story from a sheet of paper I downloaded. While it was the story, it just wasn't the same as reading it from the beautifully colored pictures of my book.

Proud of myself, I went in to my husband, who was sitting with my oldest son. He glanced up and said, "Oh, you found it," as my son made a small noise of delight. I looked at him and said, "You can't read this book."

"What? Why not," my son was a little disappointed by the news and he stared at me incredulously.

Just then, my husband interrupted, "Because only the head of the household can read it."

My son thought about it for a split second and then said, "Oh, okay. Mom can you read it to me."

I start laughing and my husband spent the next ten minutes arguing with my son that he was the head of the household and not me. Finally he just gave up and said, "That's a story I like to read on Christmas Eve."

It's funny how kids see things.

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Uncovering the Laundry Thief

For years, I have had the misfortune of being the victim of a laundry thief. I have lost countless shirts, pants and many other items and never could figure out where they went. When my kids arrived, this thief seemed to strike even more and while I blamed all the missing socks on the washing machine, I began to suspect that there was more foul play than I wanted to admit.

Finally, after all these years, I have discovered the identity of the laundry thief. It was heart wrenching to uncover him and I have to believe that it was not done with any thought towards wrongdoing.

of course, the discovery came after several of my shirts went missing. Then a few days later, my oldest son's favorite t-shirt had gone AWOL. It was such a cute shirt, with a sad tree and monkeys on it and the words "Homework Kills Trees. Stop the Madness!"

At first I did what every mother would do. I looked at my 8 year old and said, "Okay, where did you stuff it?"

I was positive that his excuses of putting it in the clothes hamper was just that, excuses, but after searching every nook and cranny in the room, every book shelf, every toy box and even extending the search to his brother's room, closet and dresser, there was no sign of the shirt. I sighed and said, "Did you take it off at school for some unknown reason?"

That last ditch effort to find it only resulted in rolled eyes and a "Yeah, sure mom. Like I'm going to take my shirt off there."

So we left it at that and I figured that the laundry thief had struck again.

And he had!

Just yesterday, as I was putting away laundry into my husband's dresser, I came across a shirt I had lost. "Oh ho," I exclaimed. (Okay, maybe I didn't say Oh Ho, since I'm not a pirate and I didn't really say anything but I did smile in triumph.)

After searching through all of his dresser drawers I uncovered a whole assortment of clothes. Mine, my 5 year old's and my oldest son's "Stop the Madness" shirt. I was perplexed at the find. I mean, my husband will often mix up the kids' clothes and I am constantly switching clothes back and forth between rooms but how could he think that the small sized shirt was his.

For that matter, how could he think the soft pink pajama top belonged to anyone else but me. Still, I sorted my treasures and set them back in their rightful places and then hunted down my laundry thief.

"You are never putting away laundry again," I exclaimed with triumph without even saying anything else.

He looked at me in confusion and asked, "Waht did I do?"

"You know what you did," I pointed an acussatory finger at him, "You keep putting the laundry away in the wrong places. I'm tired of fixing it."

He shakees his head, "Well, at least I put the laundry away. Some husbands don't even do that."

I spear him with my best disapproving look and say, "Yeah, but when you put it away like that, it doesn't help. Just don't touch it anymore."

"Fine, I won't," was the last remark before I walked away, proud of myself for finding the thief. And then it hits me; maybe I had been duped. Maybe all those years of missing laundry had been some nefarious plan and I had walked right into it. It had taken a while to wear me down but in one short afternoon, I had taken all the laundry onto my workload and told him not to touch it ever again.

And now, as I gain a little perspective, my victory doesn't feel as sweet as it did yesterday.

All the best and if you lose some laundry, look into your husband's dresser but don't, and I repeat don't, fall into the same trap I did.

Sirena

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

December is here!!

December is here and the holidays is only a few short weeks away. I am so behind on my shopping. I have 2 presents bought officially and I haven't even started my Christmas cards. On top of that, both of my kids want to make their Christmas presents so I have to go out and buy the supplies for those. There just never seems to be enough hours in the day and I find I count minutes to make it feel like I have a lot to do.

Let's see. This task will take me 15 minutes but that still leaves me with 885 minutes to accomplish all of that. Yep, plenty of time to do everything. So while there may only be 24 more days until Christmas, you still have 34560 minutes, give or take a few, to get all your Christmas shopping done.

See, I like my way better. I'm not behind on getting Christmas shopping done. I'm actually right on schedule and may even have a few thousand minutes to spare.

Anyway, wishing all of you a Happy Holiday Season this December. (Thought I would start early on the well wishing.)

Sirena