SOLD!

I love me a good auction.  Always have.  In fact, I still remember my very first auction.  I was six and my dad took me.  It was in somebody's back yard.  I remember looking around in awe.  So.  Much.  Stuff.  And the day was a success in my book.  By the time we left, I had suckered Dad into buying me a pink kickball for one dollar.  One dollar.  Yeah, I had the exact same pink ball at home already, but we paid two dollars for that one at the Medicine Chest.  I knew that a backup ball was a smart idea. 

To this very day, I still walk around in wide-eyed wonderment when I attend an auction.  There's just something about other people's junk that sets my heart racing.  I no longer buy for my own wants because I am still on my get-organized kick. Less is more.  It is.  So I now purchase for the sole purpose of turning a profit.  (Because less is NOT more when we're talking money).  And I love to do it.  I could make a living out of it if I only had more time.  And a trailer.  But over the past few years of becoming and avid auction-goer, I have learned a thing or two.  I will share them with you now, in list form.

1.  DO YOUR RESEARCH.  Learn what you're buying.  Learn what people want to buy.  If you spend twenty dollars on an "antique" bottle and there's a guy in the corner laughing at you, it's because you were bid up on purpose and you just put down a twenty on something that will sit on your windowsill for the next forever because nobody wants to buy it.

2.  It's always a good idea to bring a calculator along to keep track of your spendings.  Or a trustworthy, math-savvy child.  Nothing like getting to the "pay here" table, pulling out the fifty dollars you spent and finding out that your total is $120.36.

3.  Children are also good for hauling your purchases to your vehicle for you, but be prepared to pay them in stuffed animals and don't get mad when you see how horribly they have packed your vehicle. 

4.  Keep close track of your bidding number.  If you don't, your child might be bidding on a llama without your knowledge.  (Yes, this truly happened to me.  And yes, it was Mae).

5.  Be realistic.  Sure, you might have the space in your pickup truck for the two-hundred pound fountain that you could get for a killer price, but if you're there alone, don't buy it.  Those auctioneers sure are nice folks when they want you to buy something, but when the sale's over and they see you struggling with the loading of your purchases, they are silently laughing.  And later on, when they're at the bar, they're probably laughing much less silently.

6.  If at all possible, work it out so that your husband shows up right as the auction ends.  This way, he will not be at the other end of the auction spending money without your consent, and he's just in time to help you load.  This may take some trickery, but it's well worth the amount of money you will save.

7.  If you are bringing children with you, limit them to a specific amount.  And make it a small amount, like two or three dollars.  They will be much more careful about what they bid on.  You also might want to limit what types of things they can bid on, as Mae got the llama for one dollar and was quite upset because, "You SAID I could spend two dollars on ANYTHING I wanted and I didn't even spend that much!"  (They were nice enough to not make us take it.  And if they had made us take it, I most certainly would have posted a blog titled 'How To Fit A Llama Into A Minivan').

8.  About that person that's trying to outbid you:  look them square in the eye.  I'm not sure if I have an intimidating look that I am unaware of or what, but people tend to shut their mouths if they catch me looking directly at them when I bid.

And that there's my best auction advice.  For now.  And now that I've written this, I don't want to hear anything about, "Waaait a minute...you bought that for a dolla' and charged me twenty?!"...because it is not that simple.  I researched, I planned, I drove, I bid, I paid, I hauled, I cleaned, I photographed, I uploaded, I described...you're really on the better end of this deal in the long run.  And anything that I don't sell gets taken to Goodwill.  Well, not Goodwill specifically but one of those types of places.  So me going to an auction = me giving to charity.  Kind of. 

And if you so decide you would like to be an avid auction-goer like me, please let me know and take me with you.  I do so love some good company.  The "regulars" don't talk to me.  I am not accepted because I do not own an antique shop.  And the not-so-regulars are so in awe that they don't notice me, but I understand that because I do the same thing.  Or maybe I'm better off on my own because in the rare instances that people do talk to me at these events, I mostly find myself not wanting to acknowledge their existence because I might miss the deal of a lifetime.  Yeah, actually, don't take me with.  Bad idea.

Like my blog? Have a Kindle?

Sometime between yesterday and now, my blog went 'live' on Amazon Kindle.  I am excited, to say the least.  I found that if I go to amazon.com and type in 'my family my funny blog', mine is the tenth one down.  You will know it when you see it because it has a screen shot of which you should be very familiar right now.  For only 99 cents per month, you can get updated blog posts on your kindle (and that's after a 14 day FREE trial period). 

And now, I must ask a favor.  If you don't have a kindle but you DO have an amazon account, will you please, please, pretty please go on and "rate" my blog?  I mean, unless you think it sucks, in which case, QUIT READING!  And if you don't have a kindle OR an amazon account, it takes about one minute to sign up for one.  Thanks to everybody who reads and especially to those who continuously motivate me by complimenting my writin' skills.  You guys are awesome.  :)

Update:  So, yeah, I've discovered that it's WAY easier to just go to amazon.com and type in my name (Amanda Bigley).  Then I'm the very first (and only) one on there. 

Morning Madness.

Both kids put extra effort into being extremely difficult this morning.  After dragging them out of bed fifteen minutes late, they both sat around the island in the kitchen with their eyes half opened and their bed head in full force.  I asked what they would like for breakfast and received the following responses:

Mae:  "Spiders."
Kyler:  "Buffalo."

And they thought they were so funny.  What they were unaware of is that I finally got an adequate amount of sleep last night and I was prepared to deal with their shenanigans in the calmest way I know how, which happens to be 'walking away from the situation'.  So I informed them that we were fresh out of spiders and buffalo and it looks like they would be in charge of making their own breakfast...then I walked away.  They were not laughing anymore.  But what I didn't know is that I was silently posing a challenge for them and they were more than up for it.  Their morning goal was now to find my breaking point before the school bus arrived.

Mae decided that since I was on breakfast-making strike, she would make her own breakfast as advised, but she would not touch the floor while doing so.  She created quite the ear-splitting racket as she danced along the counter tops and balanced her way across swivel chairs.  I remained steady and calm, while silently fearing that we would be making an early-morning trip to the ER.

Next up: getting dressed.  Just the two simple words, "Get dressed," have been known to throw Mae into an instantaneous clothing meltdown, complete with yelling, tears and sometimes violence (all her, none me).  She once ripped her shirt completely in half while angrily taking it off.  She's like the Hulk, but miniature and less green.  Nearly every morning, I hear, "Nothing fits, nothing matches and everything is STUPID."  But today she has new pants to wear so she decided to skip the clothing meltdown and trade it instead for...

Shoes.  Cowgirl boots don't match jogging pants.  But she wanted to wear her boots so bad.  But she wanted to wear her new pants so bad.  But...the boots.  The pants.  Boots.  Pants.  She looked from one to the other, back and forth for quite a while.  She finally decided on sandals.  But not just any sandals would do...they had to be Kyler's sandals.  Except Kyler already had said sandals in his hands and was ready to put them on, so Mae just ripped them right out of his hands and transferred them onto her feet, thus causing war.  I decided I should intervene as we had exactly three minutes to be out the door, so I bravely stepped right into the middle of the battlefield and explained to Mae that tennis shoes go good with jogging pants and, "Look!  Your shoes even match your pants!"  The house immediately calmed until I looked toward Kyler and saw something very, very painful.  While looking me directly in the eye and with a smile on his face, he slipped his sandals on his already socked feet.  And he wasn't wearing just any socks...they were camouflaged socks.  I am eight-hundred percent certain that he did this just to see if he could break me.  But I was not going down with less than three minutes left.  I turned away from him and with a quiver in my voice, said, "Go give your Dad a hug and kiss." 

As we headed out the door, Mae looked at me and said, "Library books."  Apparently, since I am the one who brought the books into the house and put them away, I was expected to know where I put them.  What nonsense.  I ran back into the house and searched frantically for the books.  One was on top of the piano bench, one was on Mae's desk and one was in her toy box.  That is NOT where I had put them.

We made it to the bus stop in time to see a big, yellow spot coming down the road toward us.  I turned the Jeep around and headed back down the driveway, but as I looked into my rearview mirror, I once again caught sight of Kyler's socked and sandaled feet.  And that's the image that will stay with me for the remainder of the day.  "Social suicide," I've warned him before.  But he seems to think that comfort is more important than impressing people.  Pffft. 

Cleaning Epiphany.

I finished up the dishes, then headed toward the laundry room.  I am so far behind on every single chore.  For every extra hour I've been putting in working, that's one hour I've been losing on house-cleaning.  I hastily put a  large load of dirty clothes into the dryer, added the detergent, shut the door and turned it on.  You did not read that wrong.  But here's the thing: this is where great ideas come from.  Somebody is too tired or in too much of a hurry or both and they accidentally make a mistake that causes them to wonder something BIG....

Something like...

WHY do we have two machines to do laundry?!  We don't have a dishwasher and a dishdryer.  There must be a way to combine a washing machine and clothes dryer in the same manner.  And it's probably not even very difficult.  Just difficult for me, who has trouble understanding any further direction than 'plug it in'.  And sometimes even then...well, it was a strange-looking outlet, OKAY?!

So, I guess I'm only writing this in hopes that an expert washer-dryer mechanic is reading and willing to go the extra mile to create this wonderful idea.  And please let me know if you do.  I won't try to steal the rights to it; I promise.  I will, however, be your very first customer. 

And in case you're NOT an expert washer-dryer mechanic, you should also take something away from reading this.  My best advice would be to work an eighteen-hour day after only three hours of sleep, pay absolutely no attention to what you're doing and perhaps you, too, will extract a great new invention by accident.  Actually, that's horrible advice.  I don't want to be responsible for tomorrow's car accidents and/or plagues so never mind. 

The actual real thing you can take away from reading this:  We can now dream of a future with washerdryer machines.  This could be as big as TVCR's.  I almost cried when those came out.  Brilliant!  "Switch the laundry" could simply become a phrase of the past.  Our children's children will wonder so many wasteful hours about it...Where exactly were they switching the laundry to?  One integrated machine, doing the job of two and in half the time.  Or maybe it will take the same amount, but probably not because who is actually standing next to the washer as the cycle ends and is ready to be switched?  Sometimes there is a good hour or two between the loads because laundry is the most difficult chore to put any sort of focus into.  To be completely honest (and Kenny will vouch one-hundred percent for this), sometimes whole days pass before I remember I was doing laundry.  So as you lay your head down for restful sleep tonite, please take a moment to hope and wish and pray for future washerdryers.  If not for you...for your children. 

Seriously, guys, I promise to get a good and normal amount of sleep tonite.  I will most likely re-read this in the morning with an expression of horror on my face.  But oh well.  I write this so that when I'm one-hundred and twenty years old, I have something to read to pass the time in the nursing home.  And I fully intend to have a nurse on standby to nudge me each night and say, "You wrote that, you know."  ...and then again, the look of horror.

Our weekend in a nutshell: Zombies and Science.

Every Monday morning, as I silently reminisce about the weekend while sitting in the dark preparing for work, I am reminded of just exactly how lucky I am.  Sure, the dog pooped on the floor for no apparent reason and I'm broke as a joke that's not funny, but I when I woke up on Sunday morning and rolled over to look at my loving husband, I got to say, "Aw, honey, your make-up is smeared all over your face."  And then I got to clean it off for him.  And then he rolled back over to sleep.  I should probably add here that Kenny wasn't exactly wearing make-up...his blackened, smudged face was the result of a zombie-theme'd party we'd taken part in the night before. 

Only minutes later, I was getting the coffee ready when I heard extreme laughter coming from our bedroom.  Mae yelled, "Mom!  QUICK!!  You've GOTTA see this!!!"  I ran to the bedroom just in time to see Kenny's upper half on the floor while his bottom half was still in bed, as if he had seemingly dived right onto the floor and just decided to stay there.  He was asleep.  And as my niece fumbled with her camera in a hasty and comical manner, Kenny woke up just in time to avoid the picture I would have posted here:

And then, THEN, we got to see Bill Nye.  The kids were very much against this as they had never heard of him before.  When we showed up, they got to go for a nature walk with Kenny so they weren't entirely miserable.  Then, the pre-show guys just so happened to be, "MY SCIENCE GUYS!!!" (said both kids at the exact same time).  Derek and Dave are the "science guys" that visit them at school.  And to top it off, they even gave boring old Bill Nye a two-thumbs-up review.  They were quite surprised at his wit and intelligence.  They had assumed he was some old-fashioned, black-and-white speaker that would bore them into a comatose state.  But he wasn't and he didn't.  So the day turned out much better than  planned.  Before ever going anywhere, I put all of the bad things that might happen into my head, assume they are going to actually happen, and then leave the house with little expectation.  This may sound unpleasant, I know, but my days mostly always exceed my hopes.  I suppose this could be summed up better as "Expect the worst, hope for the best."  Except I mostly just expect the worst.  Getting your hopes up is unnecessary. 

And this concludes yet another weekend update.  May your heads all be non-throbby and weekdays run smoothly.

Dare me; I dare you.

Kyler and Mae were sitting in the kitchen, working diligently on their homework.  I walked in quietly and stood behind them unsuspectingly, only to witness the following conversation:

Mae:  "Hey, Kyler, do you dare me to eat this pencil lead?"

Kyler:  "No."

Mae:  "C'mon, just dare me.  I'll do it."

Kyler:  "NO, Mae."

Mae:  "I'm seriously not gonna leave you alone until you dare me to eat at least one stick of pencil lead.  Just one tiny stick.  And I'll really do it."

Kyler:  "Fine, Mae.  Eat the lead.  I don't care."

Mae (yelling):  "MOoOoOMMM!!  KYLER'S TRYING TO MAKE ME EAT PENCIL LEAD!!!!"

She was quite startled when I said, "Oh, really?" and my voice came from one foot behind her, rather than  a different room.  But she's so quick that she just put on that oh-so-sweet smile of hers and said, "Juuuust kidding.  I knew you were there."  Then, she told me I should quit bugging her while she's trying to get her homework done.

My shoes are loud, your face is mean.

Today, I have the loudest shoes.  I have owned these shoes for fourteen years and they have been used specifically for funerals and they have never given me even a hint of trouble.  But I thought I'd switch it up today and wear them to parent-teacher conferences.  It's not really fair for my shoes to only see sadness.  But I knew right when I entered the school building that something wasn't right.  I'd made a very big mistake. 

There's something about my funeral shoes...when the bottoms of them touched the hallway floor, they made a very, VERY LOUD noise.  Noise isn't even the right word...perhaps a ruckus; an insistent ruckus.  I instantly stopped and looked around.  The kids paid no attention to me and took off in a mad rush to the library for the book fair.  I took a couple more steps and had to stop again and look around.  I don't know what I was looking for except another human to nod in my direction, letting me know that my shoes were, in fact, as loud as I was hearing them.  It sounded as if I was walking in shallow water while wearing foot fins.  Nobody was around so I walked as quickly as I could.  Unfortunately, I had a lobby, a very long hallway and a flight of stairs to get through.  The first couple that I passed did not give me a happy nod like I expected, nor did they clap for me or laugh hysterically.  They simply looked at my feet as if they were obnoxious and I knew exactly what they were thinking:  Why did you bring those silly feet to a serious place like this? 

I made it up the stairs and to my relief, Mae's teacher wasn't there.  I had only passed the one judgemental couple so far.  I decided this might turn out okay.  Except I sat there for a whole two minutes or so before Mae's teacher showed up and I started really worrying about my loud shoes.  When she startled me out of my thoughts and asked, "Have you been waiting long?"  all I could muster up was, "I have LOUD shoes.  I'm sorry."  She smiled politely.  When I stood up and walked into the classroom, she laughed a little and I know why, but no further words needed to be passed about my shoe choice.

Next up was Kyler's teacher, which just so happened to be right across the hallway.  I tiptoe-ran to the door and took a seat.  I was summoned into the room just seconds later and Kyler's teacher was very talky so we were able to awkwardly ignore the thunderous noises coming from my feet.

Conferences were soon over and I had to make my way back to the main floor library.  The hallways were starting to fill up now and I was pretty terrified.  I just decided to get it over with as quickly as possible and save all regrets for the drive home.  As I speedwalked my way to the library, my shoes decided to sing a new tune:  high-pitched squeaks.  It got the attention of people that were in classrooms.  I know, because I saw random heads popping out of rooms to see what was going on.  For some reason, I thought that talking over my shoes would help, so as I speed-walked with high-pitched squeaks following me, I also began yelling randomly, "MY SHOES ARE LOUD!!  I HAVE LOUD SHOES!!!"  Oddly enough, people seemed to  understand me better when I did this.  Like, Oh, she knows her shoes are loud so I don't have to look at her strangely.  I can just laugh now and it's okay.

I retrieved the kids from the library and as we headed out the door, I asked them, "Hey, can't you guys hear my shoes?  Because you haven't said anything about them."  Mae said, "Yeah, I knew when it was time to put the books away because I could hear you leaving my teacher's room."  And Kyler said, "Why do you think we ran to the library so fast?" 

And as we stepped onto the paved entryway, my shoes turned quiet again and all was fine the rest of the entire day, even through the grocery store and YMCA, which I thought was really odd. 

Ups and d...we'll just do ups.

Today was filled with many ups and downs, but in order to avoid boring you, we'll just talk about the ups.

Up #1:  Both dogs and both cats teamed up to catch what we thought was a mouse.  This was great fun for all of us.  It made me so proud, watching them working together with one common goal.  One cat smacked the rodent across the kitchen, then all four animals tried to pounce on it.  The kitchen floor is linoleum, so instead of going where they desired, they all went sliding, which resulted in a four-animal pile-up.  Next, the high-speed chase moved near my desk.  Dogs were going under my chair and under my desk while cats were jumping over me and on top of me.  And in the end, the rodent was cornered.  This is when the Kenny-dad woke up.  He came out to see what the ruckus was and that's when he pulled out the mouse that was really a mole.  A mole?  Even the dogs looked surprised. 

Up #2:  Mae's over sized teddy bear now wears the same size of clothes as her.  This means she can dress her bear, decide if it looks stylish enough, then transfer the clothes directly onto her own self and happily skip to the school bus.

Up #3:  When we were ready to walk out the door this morning, I muttered to myself, "Where's my jacket..." only to notice Kyler standing in front of the door, holding my jacket up with his right hand.  As I grabbed it from him, I said, "Thanks, now I just need my..." and he held up my purse with his left hand.  Besides being an 'up' for the day, we also call this 'irony' because he never knows where his own jacket, shoes, socks, homework, backpack or glasses are when it's time to leave. 

Up #4:  This picture was uploaded:

This is me and my BFF.  Notice how I (left) am trying to look clever and collected while Adrienne (right) is just being her goofy self.  I can tell just by looking at this that her and the camera man were so obviously making fun of me while I was paying all of my attention to...the television?  Perhaps I was listening to an actual person?  Or I may simply have been spacing off because I do that all the time, especially when wine is involved.  Either way, I love photos like this that are not staged and catch the actual moment.  

And that's that.   A typical Tuesday around here.

Weekend What-we-did's

We are back to  Monday and it is somewhat of a relief after enduring yet another weekend that left me feeling exhausted.  And it doesn't look to be letting up any time soon.  We are a very busy people and I'm not sure how to apply the brakes.  At least this weekend, it wasn't just me.  Yesterday afternoon, we took the kids + friend roller skating.  They were all begging to leave one hour early, citing tiredness as an excuse.  We had to practically drag Kenny off of the rink to leave after he kept saying, "Just one more time around..." about ten times.  He is so funny out there:  the tall "kid" amongst children.  He'd go as fast as he possibly could, swooshing past the poor elementary-aged kids who were just trying to stay upright and scaring the bejesus out of them.  I just love watching him when he gets the chance to "play".  The playground at the park is equally as entertaining.

On Saturday, we threw Meghan's bridal shower.  I know, just the term 'bridal shower' makes you yawn, right?  WRONG.  Add about twenty bottles of wine and chocolate moustaches amongst a group of women wearing their Sunday best and you have nonstop laughter that lasts the entire day.  This was great and wonderful and from here on out, every bridal shower that I attend will only be a disappointment.  Though, looking back, it might also have something to do with the company.  What a great bunch of gals! 

Saturday night through Sunday afternoon, Mae and her friend were nearly impossible to keep up with but I tell you what...they are so hilarious!  But you have got to keep an eye on them.  Right away, they said they were going outside to play.  Less then one  minute later, I peeped outside to check on them and Mae was rolling down the hill in our trash barrel!!  I told her that was not safe and she wasn't allowed to do it again and of course I got eye-rolls out of both of them.  About two minutes later, they came inside, grabbed the insert out of the dogs kennel (which is basically a two foot by three foot piece of plastic) and headed back outside.  Again, I checked on them and this time they were "sledding" down the rock hill.  Again, they got in trouble.  But I questioned my own self at that point and I honestly can't tell you if I was watching out for their safety or if I was jealous about the great ideas they kept coming up with. 

Another sign that we're getting old:  Kenny rented a movie last night.  I looked at the title and decided a horror movie was a great idea.  We waited for the kids to go to bed, popped some popcorn and put the movie on.  About one minute in, we realized we'd already seen that movie.  It's the one we'd rented last weekend.  (But I was immediately suspicious that Kenny did it on purpose because as soon as we declared it a re-run, he grabbed the remote, shut off the movie, switched it to ESPN and yelled, "OH  YEAH, FOOTBALL!!!!...hmm...)

Lasterday.

After school yesterday, upon completing his homework, Kyler told me that he was bored.  I jokingly said, "Then now would be the perfect time to work on your Christmas list."  Without another word, he grabbed the laptop and headed into the living room.  About twenty minutes later, he returned and handed me a long list that consisted mostly of ds games, complete with pricing and stores where I can purchase said games.  On the bottom of the list, he wrote: Don't forget 7% sales taxes.  I see that he has much confidence in my shopping abilities.

Today, Kenny asked me if I would pick him up some deodorant at the store, "...because I'm tired of smelling like lilacs and powder..."  I said, "Have you been using my deodorant?"  And he said, "Well, mine's all gone."  He then disappeared back into the bathroom, only to come running out moments later yelling, "I'm losing a lot of blood!!!!"  This was quite alarming so I jumped from my seat and asked, "What happened?!"  He replied, "A double-pimple on my chest!" and then he removed his hands to reveal a tiny spot of blood on his chest.  As he saw my face change from worried to annoyed, he said, "It really hurts a lot more than it looks like!" and then he turned and stormed back into the bathroom.

Kenny has also proven to me that encouraging him to exercise can actually backfire on me.  As I was running on the treadmill, he decided to run in place next to me.  Except he stared at me the entire time and matched my bounces with a really goofy look on his face.  After falling off of the treadmill in a fit of laughter, he proclaimed that I'm not a good exercise partner and I've ruined it for him forever. 

And one last Kenny story.  He's got a habit of mixing up words when he's trying to argue.  He thinks the argument up in his head but it never quite comes out like it's supposed to.  And it always ends in me laughing at him and not being able to argue anymore...which I suppose is good.  These new Kenny-words somehow make their way into  my everyday vocabulary and often confuse people.  I caught myself speaking casually of "overjammies" just the other day.  I forget that not everybody knows my memories.  Anyway, our Kenny-word of the week is "Lasterday".  This one was especially hilarious because when it came out, he stumbled over the next few words and then decided to act like it never happened.  He went on for a while as I stood staring at him with my arms crossed.  When he felt that he had finally made his point and gave me a chance for rebuttal, I simply said, "Lasterday?" to which he threw his arms in the air and said, "I KNEW that's the only word you would hear!!!"  Argument over.

And here's what Mae and I have been working on.  I was going to wait until it was finished to post a picture, but then I decided that it is a never-ending work in progress so I may as well update as we go.  This has quickly become our favorite mommy-daughter hobby.