DRAIN TROUBLES

Yesterday I was cleaning up the kitchen. I was putting egg shells down the disposal when the water stopped going down and started to come back up. I immediately knew what had caused the problem, potatoes. We have had issues before when too many potato peels have been ran through the disposal. This time it was potato halves so I thought it would be fine. I guess I was wrong.

Jeremy took the p-trap off to see if they was a blockage. The pipes looked pretty clear, so he ran a plumbing snake down the pipe in the wall. He thought he felt something move. He put the drain back together and ran water to see if it was fixed. It ran great until he tried the disposal again. This process happened several times.

At one point I said " I wonder what the basement looks like?" The floor drain in the laundry room has had problems. Jeremy ran down stairs to look. It was not pretty. There wasn't a huge mess but definitely a mess. Luck for us the laundry room is cement and foot square sticky tiles. There was nasty black "stuff" in a big circle ( maybe 4.5 feet across) around the drain. Jeremy grabbed the snake and tried to get it into the drain. It wasn't working because of all the twist and turns. One time he had it in a little way and all of a sudden I see air coming up I was like "That has to be good, right?" Nope! After the air came up so did more water. After more trying with the snake I suggested just trying the plunger. Jeremy did it once and we couldn't tell if it worked or not. So he tried it again and that time it definitely worked. Yeah all the water was gone but boo all the poo was still there. Jeremy kept insisting it wasn't poo but I'm not so sure about that. Alma had an appointment with the bishop so we had to hurry and get cleaned up to go over to the church.

When we got back from the church the clean up began. We put a heater under the kitchen sink to dry it out. Then went downstairs to start on the laundry room. What sludge! It was so thick and nasty. You could see bits and pieces of egg shell and potatoes.  We ripped up some of the sticky tile, more they peeled up, because of all the nasty stuff that got under them. Jeremy moved the washer out so we could clean under it. After getting all the sludge off the floor Jeremy brought down the hose and sprayed the floor. I got out the chemicals and started to sanitize everything.

After the laundry room was done we have to put everything back under the sink. The house was finally back together and I could go take a nice long hot shower.

It was an adventure but could've been a lot worse. I have a clean laundry room, under the sink was organized and due to a gasket breaking and a trip to home depot it only cost us $1.87. Not how I wanted to spend my Sunday but o'well.

FEBRUARY SO FAR

We have had quite a busy month so far. Alma turned eight and had three parties, there was Valentines Day, and several field trips.

Alma's birthday was on a Wednesday. Jeremy took half a day off to surprise Alma. We went out to lunch and then to Toys-R-Us. That night was his first official night of scouts. The next party was on Saturday with his friends. He had six friends come. The theme of the party was tricks/pranks. The last party was on Sunday with the family coming over for cake.

Valentines Day or should I say night was a blast. Jeremy and I actually had money to buy each other presents and to go out. I bought Jere some cologne from Victoria secret and fixed his watch, AGAIN. He got me two necklaces from Kay. One is from the open heart collection, I love that one. For our date we went to Ruby River and had some GREAT steak and to see The Vow.  Jeremy also bought a box of treats from Cakewalk for Alma and I to share.

We have had a lot of field trips this month so far. We had two Valentines exchanges, a couple of performances at The Capital Theater, and an art and poetry festival with Washington Online.

The second half of the month looks just as busy as the first half. Alma has the remainder of his swim lessons, we joined a co-op, and the Safe Kids Fair is coming up.

Missing Ads?

Saturday we went food shopping. I was going to price match some items. I thought I left the ads in the car so I had Jeremy run out to the car. ( We dont park close so it is quite a run.) He got out there and couldn't see them. He looked all over the car and then came back in the store. He asked if I had them. I looked in the cart and there they were. Jeremy nor I saw them there before he went out. Alma said he knew they were there. We asked why he didn't say anything. We had a good laugh and finished shopping.

Trust Nothing

In the past week I have been "poisoned" twice by cereal. The first was Monday. I had been feeling off for a few days. So as I was eating breakfast I thought to check the cereal box for ingredients. To my surprise they changed the chocolate pieces to have milk. Ugh! The same company has come out with a new cereal that has milk chocolate in the center. The "issues" I got with this was nasty "pimples" and IBS pain.

Today for lunch we grabbed a new box of cereal, this was a different company. After about five bites, I knew it had milk in it. I grabbed the box and I was right. It had whey in it. It kicked my butt. The hiccups, the reflux, the feeling of foggyness. Im sure that means more "pimples" and IBS pains as well. We figured I reacted more to the whey cereal because  whey is more concentrated.

Why do they have to put milk in cereal? I guess that is another thing I always have to check. Ugh!

FINALLY OURS

We have lived in our house for six and a half years. It finally feels like ours. We have done a lot of remodeling. I wonder if the previous owners would even recognize the house. Shortly after we moved in we took down a fence around the front yard and tore trees out of the backyard. The roof blow off several years ago. The shingles on at that time were red and we replaced them with black. The outside looks different.

Inside looks different too. We have replaces the tub and shower up stairs. It use to be a three piece surround until it fell on Alma while he was showering. Now it is tile. The bathroom downstairs has been gutted and redone. Where there was only a shower is now a tub and shower. The wood paneling in the basement was ripped out and drywall put up. All the carpet has been ripped out. We either bought area rugs or just left the hardwood showing.  When we bought the house the front room was two rooms that was opened up and connected to each other. A year and a half ago my mom got sick and needed a room upstairs so we put the wall back up.

I'm very pleased with the functionality of our house now. Downstairs  we have a good size family room, a bathroom that doesn't feel like a "basement" bathroom and Alma's toy room and bedroom. Upstairs we have a nice library, and craft room. I finally feel like we are using our house . We have room to breathe and enjoy life.

Swimming Lessons

Last night Alma had his first swimming lesson.  He did really good. His teacher said that he was stiff when it comes to floating but that should get better. He has two other kids in his class, they are identical twins, that are a handful. The teacher had to keep reminding them of the rules.

Alma loved what he learned so much that he wants to go swimming today " so that I can practice the new skills I learned". I'm glad we got the swimming pass for Christmas, looks like it will be used a lot.

BEST NEW YEARS EVE EVER!

This is video of the ball room. It was crazy in there. Friday  night Alma was chasing the big 5 feet balls and got nailed with one. He was knocked over and broke his glasses. Luckily they broke in the same spot as normal so they we able to be super glued. Saturday several people had their glasses break. Mine were knocked off a lot but never broke.

We got right in the middle of all the balls flying. The balls were coming at us from all directions. There were so many on the floor around us that in spots they were waist high.

They projected the count down on the side of the hotel.

Bounce Town

Bounce Town

Drums

Cymbals

Relaxing on form glow in the dark blocks

Creating Art at the Salt Lake Art Center

EVE was so worth the money we paid. We spent $86 on the three days. That includes tickets, dinners all three nights, snack Saturday night and glow toys for Saturday night. We saved about $82 with all the free shows we got to see.  We went to four different shows at the Planetarium and one at Off Broadway.

It was a blast! We most likely will go again next year.