I hate painting.

One more coat on two walls, and I'll be done (well, except for the "oops" touch-ups on the ceiling--heh).  And actually, I must admit I'm "enjoying" the painting this time much more than the painting of my children's bedrooms.  Frankly, John and I just didn't really know HOW to paint back then.  And the results showed it.  The paint is PEELING in Mary and Izzy's room.  And Keith's room is WAY too dark--and still not technically done as both John and me just sort of gave up after a while.  John is talking about re-painting the ceiling in Keith's room.  Well, he's more than welcome to it.  I don't want anything to do with that room for a LONG time!

Anyway, the creamy-tan-yellowy color is looking pretty nice in the living room/dining room.  Too bad we have to put up with horrible pink carpet and college kid-worthy/crappy furniture for a while.  Ah well.  Bits and pieces--we'll do what we can do when we can do it.

A school mom called today to chat for a minute and reminded me that I'm leaving for vacation soon...and here I am spending all this time painting instead of fretting over what I need to pack for this family of five--and do we even have enough luggage for that?  I don't think we've taken a full week's vacation somewhere since there were five of us--what all is this going to entail?  Are we going to have enough room in the back of the mini-van?  (John is seriously considering getting one of those luggage cap thingys). 

Oh!  Forgot to mention in my catch-up post yesterday:  Keith has had a pretty memorable summer.  He has FINALLY learned how to ride a two-wheeler, WITHOUT the training wheels.  I feel kinda guilty that he learned so late.  I mean, shouldn't he have mastered this years ago?  (Come to think of it, shouldn't this be something I should be teaching his little sister now???)  I don't know.  There are no sidewalks on our side of the road.  And when I was working, I never had the desire to take him out on the weekends.  And...just plain bad, lazy parenting, no?  Well, I was determined he would learn this summer.  But most of the days have been horribly hot or rainy, and...next thing I know, we've only got a few weeks until school starts!  So!  I finally pumped up his tires, took off the training wheels, and got out there with him.  I tried him on the grass first, in case he fell a lot, and held the back of the bike up for him.  Then we moved on to the driveway.  Then I think it started raining....  Then I took him out a few days later and drove him to a park down the road that has a really nice-sized, usually-empty parking lot.  It didn't take long at all.  Maybe 20 minutes to get it down?  Oh!  Such exuberance!  ...And then the chain kept falling off the bike.  No worries.  Mom carries a Swiss Army knife in the glove box--one of these gadgets should help  (I'm SO awesome)....  Still, that's kind of a pain.   Anyway, we've been out one more time--where he ended up having to share the big pink bike with Mary since the chain on his STILL kept popping off.  (I think it's time to just buy a new bike, no?)  Anyway, John is so excited, he's thinking of bringing the bikes on vacation.  Wait--a luggage cap thingy AND a bike rack?  I guess I should go out and buy those little family people sticker thingys, too.  LOL