Three Musketeers

Just some recent pictures of the 3
"little" boys........don't they look innocent? Don't let 'em fool ya!

Video of our back yard with down trees

Previous Post came back to bite me.

So, I blog about how ungrateful and spoiled I am with my modern appliances, etc. And, what happens the following day? ICE STORM!! Knocks our power out from 4 am until 8 pm! All the boys home from school for a snow day, no electricity which, out here, equals no water either and of course, no furnace or oven. It was cold! And, I was tired and crabby.

I never should have blogged about those stinkin' pioneers! They came back to bite me in the butt! I was so cranky yesterday thru that whole ordeal, that I was complaining that at least the pioneers had a wood burner and split wood to go ahead and burn! I had NOTHING! After the whole morning of listening to fighting, stir-crazy kids, we went to KFC for lunch to warm up a little. Upon returning, I OK'd the LEGO's in the living room (only room with a BIG window!) and went to bed. I had been up since 1:30 am fighting the storm with the newspapers and was DONE! I figured the boys could handle it for awhile by themselves. And, besides, I was only in the bedroom down the hall. After a good nap, I woke up a little happier, but still cold.

Oh, well, over all, the boys did OK - considering.

I'll write about the day a little more later.

We are spoiled -- or "why I'm glad I live in the 21st century"

I stumbled upon this portion of another woman's blog today while I was feeling sorry for myself about the broken hot water heater:

"I’ve been thinking a lot lately about pioneer women, real pioneer women who, whether through loyalty, optimism, idiocy, or a combination of all of the above, made that covered wagon journey west to parts unknown in search of a new life and new opportunities and to face both foreseen and unforeseen dangers.

....the fact that David the Husband is out of town on business again and the majority of the running of the farm and the caring for the children and house rests on my slumped insecure shoulders. (My mother has been telling me to hold my shoulders up since my first memories.) Just getting teenaged boys ready for school and driving them the three miles to the bus stop, followed by morning farm chores, feeding dogs, all whilst caring for a toddler was a challenge for my inefficient slow-moving self. And I have a whole day of much of the same ahead of me. I can just imagine someone like me trying to do it back in the true pioneer days, without motor vehicles or modern appliances, probably pregnant with my sixth or seventh child (some of which I have most likely buried in the family cemetery) and my husband out clearing land or working cattle for days on end, not knowing whether he was dead or alive or whether bandits or Injuns would arrive on my doorstep at any moment. I honestly don’t know how they did it. Modern laundry makes my whelm runneth over. Envisioning myself by a riverbank scrubbing the prairie dust off the clothing of a whole passel of children against a washboard or even worse a rock, well I just can’t picture it.
Here’s to the women who preceded us, women who worked harder than any of us do today, who probably received only a smattering of gratitude and enjoyed little if any free time. I will endeavor to think of you when I feel put upon or overworked because, if you think about it, my life is cake in comparison. And I like cake. "

All I was doing as I was feeling sorry for myself was heating water up on the stove to wash dishes. On my propane range with it's electric ignitors, by the way. No matches, no open flames, really, no wood to haul in and keep stoked. Heating up water, FROM the FAUCET, on my modern range, made me feel bad! I am truly the most ungrateful person alive.

I could feel sorry for us for the amount of $$ it is going to cost us to replace this appliance in December, but I have learned thru a few lean winters of living with a husband who is an Operating Engineer (aka, no work in winter), not to even start that. It always works out and God has always taken care of us. I think that sometimes, the more I fret about things, the rougher God makes them -- just to try and break me!

We all think we have "rough" lives....with our modern appliances, and even more modern entertainment options. I type this now on a wireless laptop (granted that I "acquired", not bought, but still...) while my rather large TV hangs on the wall spewing a Food Network Show thru the satellite dish on my roof. Yeah, I've got it rough --after all, I had to heat up water on my stove this afternoon to wash my dishes. Again, nice clean water that got pumped out of the ground by an electric pump in my basement and up into my faucet with no effort on my part other than lifting the little handle by the sink. Uh-huh -- ROUGH!

Maybe, as I think more about my ungratefulness, I should have put this in the title here, too:

"Glad I live in the USA (or the "west") in the 21st century. Many, many people, even in these modern times, do not have any of the luxuries that we take for granted. African women carrying water on their heads to their homes miles away. South American farmers living like our pioneers did 100+ years ago. People as close as Mexico collecting rainwater in a cistern on their roofs to have a gravity fed (cold) shower in their mud brick or cinder block homes. I have a picture of the "toilet" built for us as the visitors in a village in Mexico when I went with a group from ICHS in 1989. It had walls of cut cactus, a large pit in the ground and a OLD, recycled wooden toilet seat on the little box built above the pit. They built that for us, knowing we could never handle just going out behind a cactus.

OK, time for me to go into my modern kitchen and flip the handle to get some cold water heating up again. I am also going to turn another handle and watch as my stove and oven heat up to cook the supper I am preparing for my family. It snowed pretty good last night. I'm glad I don't have to put my boots on, get water from an outside well and firewood from a pile outside.

Like that blog I quoted earlier said, "My life is cake in comparison. And, I like cake."

HAPPY 7th BIRTHDAY!!

Well, 7 years ago -- right about this time in the morning-- I woke Joe up to tell him that I think we needed to go to the doctor. I was pregnant with Curtis and had gotten Chris off to school, parked Clayton at the table with play dough, and had taken a shower. As I was drying off, I noticed that my legs were not "staying dry" -- I was leaking amniotic fluid. We had an appointment for an ultrasound right after lunch, so I wasn't too panicked. Joe was laid off from work and still in bed. Besides not being ready to have a baby and it being WAY too early, I was NOT ready for Chris and Clayton to be gone away from home yet. I think Chris had put on his last pair of clean socks and possibly last pair of underwear. Washing whites was on the "list" for the morning. So, I threw those white clothes in the washer and started packing other clothes in bags for the 2 other boys. Whites were done being washed and in the dryer when I finally got Joe moving. We called the Dr. and told him what was going on. The nurse said to forget the ultrasound app't and get to the hospital before any contractions started. We packed Clayton up along with the, now clean, clothes for both boys and called Great-gramma VdWall. Nana was still working at the Library and was at work that morning. Gr.Gramma was more than happy to take Clayton for a little while. We dropped him in Lansing and proceeded to the hospital in Dyer. They put me in a bed, on a monitor, and soon decided that I had lost too much fluid and whether we were all ready or not, THIS WAS THE DAY!


Curtis was not actually due until the end of January. So this added another level to the delivery. They put him at about 34 weeks -- a little early, but not detrimentally so. Early enough that they had a NICU transport team on call. There was no NICU in Dyer, so the options there was to transport any babies in need of that to the Hammond Campus of St. Margaret's.


I labored most of the day on Pitocin. Once they decided that "this was the day" they got me on pitocin right away, since no real contractions were happening on their own. That pitocin is nasty stuff. The nurse also kept "checking" me. She said she could not get a good "feel" on the babies head. Finally late in the afternoon, after she had taken a sandwich that Nana had sneaked in for me away, she had another nurse come in and "feel". They determined that the baby was breech -- he was not head down as he would have been in a few more weeks. I can't remember if I had an ultrasound to confirm that or not, we would have to ask Joe. Regardless, breech baby + 6 weeks early = C-section. That was a scary proposition, but necessary at that point. I remember Joe calling Nana pretty frantically and she showed up to sit with him for awhile (maybe thru the surgery?)


Anyway, at 7:31 pm, Dec. 17th, 2001, Curtis Wayne Propst made his way into the world. He was doing pretty well considering how early he was. I remember waiting desperately for him to cry and he did wail fairly quickly to let us know he was OK there and could breathe.


They did transport him within that hour to Hammond, so I was 36 hours in a different hospital than my baby. My "manic-ness" helped with the quick discharge and the fact that we were going to be spending time in the NICU helped, too, I'm sure.


Curtis spent the longest 10 days of my life, so far, in the NICU in Hammond. He was never on a respirator or anything. He was just small and kept forgetting to breathe whenever he got a little excited. (Crying apnea). We had to survive Christmas w/o him, but he came home the morning of December 27th. That was a long week for Chris and Clayton and Nana & Papa, too, I'm sure as the boys spent most of those 10 days at Nana's.


Curt is a healthy, happy (sometimes!) 7 year-old today. He is a smart, energetic first grader who fights with his brothers constantly. Curtis is definitely ALL BOY. He is our only child with blue eyes and has the curliest hair of any of the boys. As frustrating as his goofy attitude can be some days, this child is a real blessing and gift from God. It will be fun to see where God takes each of the boys in their lives, won't it?

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, my little one..... even though you'd cringe right now for me calling you precious ... I will call you precious. You were the one who needed me the most at first and now most days pretends you don't need me at all. I do notice, though, that you are the one who gives me the best hugs at bedtime and whether you like it or not, I notice that some days you need some extra attention as the middle child.

I love you, short one..... :)

I survived the basement, now to make it thru a snow day!

I made it thru the basement purge the other day. Was able to take 4 garbage bags to Goodwill on Saturday, pack up 2 tubs for the barn and sort thru both closets down there. I feel pretty good about it. It looks pretty good, compared to how it was!

Now, today is a "snow" day -- there is really no snow, but ICE! It was treacherous this morning doing the newspapers. But, I made it! I was supposed to be the lunch helper at school today, so that's off. Cole was supposed to play at Evan's while I was at school, so that's off too and there was only a short meltdown about it. I stupidly called JoEllen back after she called last night. She needed someone to watch the boys for a while this afternoon, & I had told her no b/c I had to do the lunch thing @ school. Well, nice person that I am, I called her back and the boys are coming over here around lunch time today. I hope she's no going to be too long......... people forget that I get up at 1:30 am everyday and cannot survive without at least a little nap. My naps are not necessarily a luxury, but more of a necessity. If I don't lie down for a little while in the afternoons (like 30-40 minutes, at least), I am quite crabby by supper and barely make it to the kids' bedtime at 8.

Anyway, I just made the boys turn off the PlayStation for a while. We'll leave it off until Blake and Mitchell get here. I have a floor to mop and then I guess it can be another baking day. It might as well be, as we are not going anywhere. I need to get to Walmart, at least in Rensselaer, this evening or in the morning. Curtis' birthday is Wednesday and I need to get presents ready to send with Joe for Chris. Joe will be home tomorrow, for at least part of the day, as he needs to go to Traffic Court in Crown Point at some point. I'm quitting this post, because the more I type about my week, the busier and less normal it seems. Let's just get thru today trying to stay warm and not getting too cranky with each other.

I call it never-neverland

I am heading into the basement to purge our lives today. I got done with the newspapers just in time to take the kids to school this morning, Cole has to go to preK at noon and then they all need to be picked up at 3 pm, so there is no sense in trying to get any running (like groceries, which we desperately need!) today. The day is just too chopped up to do that without turning it into a frenzy.

So, off to the basement. We've got a back room down there underneath the stairs and off the laundry room that we call the "pump room" -- b/c the pump for the well is in there. It is the official dumping ground for things that otherwise have no home. One corner is the cold pantry -- canned goods and stock-up items that don't fit up here. The other corner has a big storage thing that I stick misc. Cub Scout stuff and other odds and ends, plus a shelf for the rest of the crafty items that I used to have time for. There is a sump pump hole along one wall and of course the pump for the well takes up a good chunk of space -- and the rest of the floor is just, like I said, "Dumping Ground". It honestly, haunts me, but most days seems like such an overwhelming job, that I avoid it. And, it's easy to avoid since that area is not a thoroughfare area of the house, but more of a destination. It is off underneath and behind the stairs, so you can almost pretend that that whole little corner is not really a part of the house.

I need to move the table that I have in the laundry room into said pump room. This table is where I used to do some scrapbooking and is still stacked with paper, stickers, tools, etc. It needs to leave the laundry room so we can get a deep freezer we acquired into the laundry room & out of the garage. Especially now that I have venison in the little freezer and would like to fill the rest with some beef here, soon. My other thoughts behind moving the scrapbooking, is that if I get it all moved into it's own area and organized again, then maybe I will actually work on some scrapbooks. I started them in 1998 and stayed current thru the years until Cole came along in 2004. Now, that poor boy has only a couple of 2 page spreads in a book and the rest of the pictures from '04 and on are either in a shoe box or stored on the computer! Cole thinks that he is the baby in the book labeled 2002. Which kinda works since all the boys look alike as babies! :)

I am going to publish this post and head down there with some 55 gallon trash bags.......... one for garbage and the others for Goodwill. Our house is just too small to store all the junk down there. It's nasty, overwhelming, stressful and just plain silly. My plan is to try and implement my laundry plan from a previous post. I may not jump into that plan as drastically as I blogged about there, but something has to be done about the mountains in the laundry room. Anything that looks like it has any value can go into some tubs to be toted to the barn for resurrection at a spring garage sale. The rest if OUTTA HERE!! The toys, mostly Rescue Heroes, may be given to a few friends/relatives (beware!!) or stashed for the garage sale. I know there is also a $17 Christmas Tree down there -- only used once, many suitcases, some coats that fit no one, etc., etc., etc.......... I wish I had done this before it got so cold and I could do a real "Clean Sweep". You know, haul it all outside and only bring in what I was keeping. Oh, well. I think Goodwill is open in the evening, so I can still get rid of this stuff before it migrates back in here. And, the dumpster at the church next door is always open, right?! :)

Wish me luck -- I'll post good news if I make more than a dent in all that clutter today! :)

There is no other title for this one than "Life with Boys".

So, I got the Christmas Tree up yesterday. I don't know what took me so long this year. Usually I am right on it the week after Thanksgiving. Maybe just a busy week this year or exhaustion due to the busyness leading to an apathetic attitude toward the work that goes into decorating for the Christmas. We got a new artificial tree last year after Christmas, so I should have been excited about putting up a tree that was not only pre-lit, but also not leaning in one direction or the other. Our last tree was beautiful, but the "stem" and stand had both seen better days. It was quite tilt-y -- and as soon as you thought you had it all straightened with little blocks of wood, duct tape, and some twist ties, someone would breathe on it wrong (actually the the kids touching it or the cat climbing it were more of the problems) and it would tilt the other way.

I must say, though, that in all the years we had that tree, I can only remember it being actually knocked over to the point of lying on the floor twice. And, once was actually my fault. We had it kind of wedged into a spot between a couch and the piano bench and I got up from the piano bench and knocked the whole thing over with my butt.

Now, getting to the "Life with Boys" part of this post ......... I got the tree up yesterday, but not decorated. The tubs of decorations are still in the barn, and I was lazy yesterday with no desire to drive back there and dig them out. Maybe today. :) So, Cole is pretty excited that the tree is up, but he is leaving it alone. He is actually more concerned and fascinated with the HUGE sheets of bubble wrap that were around the pieces of the new tree. The other boys came home from school and were excited that the tree was finally up, too. Clayton went to start his homework and Curtis, Cole, and I began to pick up the stuff that needed to come out of the living room since the Christmas tree took over -- Lego's are banned until after Christmas, books needed to be picked up and a few other things moved around. We got that done and I went to start the sloppy joes for supper. I hear much giggling and "rough" noises from the front room. This is not out of the norm here, but with the new Christmas tree up, I felt compelled to check on the level of wrestling that was going on in there. I walked around the corner into the living room and there were 2 little boys lying on their backs UNDER the tree! Like they were fixing a car or something -- WEIRD! I reacted similarly to the cartoon from my post yesterday -- "What are you doing?!" I must've frightened them just enough to cause them to SIT UP under the tree!! I couldn't get to the top of the tree fast enough to catch it and return it to the upright position, but I did make it! WHEW! It only tipped a little but and we put it back quickly. I "very calmly" reprimanded them with a "Stay out from underneath the tree!" and went back to the beef browning on the stove. More crazed giggling from the living room requires that mom return and reinforce the fact that children should not be under the Christmas tree. While they are gifts from God, they do no belong under the tree. Dad got involved at this point and put a piece of tape diagonally on the carpet in front of the tree (which is in a corner -- can you picture the whole scene?). No one may cross the tape and get close to the tree at all now. It's a very nice look for the living room, let me tell you!

Here's my "life with boys" thoughts/questions about this whole thing: Why, WHY are they under there? Neither of these boys is that young -- one is 4 and the other with be 7 in a few days! They have seen Christmas trees for years!! I used to put a baby gate/play yard thing up around the tree when the boys were really little -- but that was when we had toddlers around here. Maybe they are fascinated with the pre-lit part of this new tree? Are they checking out all the cords? Or are they lying under there with their eyes crossed making all the lights kinda blurry and psychedelic? Is it because there are no ornaments, ribbons, or garland on the tree yet and they can almost look all the way up the center of the tree to the top by lying under it? WHO KNOWS??

So again, I say, "WHAT ARE THEY DOING under there?? Seeing that they are boys, I guess I should not analyze it any more and give up on trying to figure out what is going on in their little brains. I probably should be thankful that they did not knock the tree over completely (yet). Yesterday afternoon could have been much more dramatic than it was. If I ever figure these guys out, I'll publish the secret. For now, I guess I blame that Y chromosome, that those of us without one just can't seem to figure out, for all the "weirdness" in my home! :)

Sometimes they look at me like this....(??!???!)

Sometimes the boys look at me like I just TOTALLY don't get it..........like I am an alien because I am both a grown-up and a girl. I will admit that a question like Calvin's mom asks here is one that comes out of my mouth quite often, too. And, really, how do we expect the kids to answer??
That is why most often, caught red-handed, the boys either completely deny what I just caught them doing ("No we WEREN'T!! Really!) or just say ("Huh?? Nuthin.")

Just a little smile for the day here.

LAUNDRY!! ----AUGH!!

No, this is not really me.......... but it could be on any given day. Please take notice of the bowl and spoon. These two things are the nemesis of my dirty dishes. And, the clothes? Who owns a blue robe around here? Huh, I wonder.....

I just found this pic on the web and thought it would be cool to upload with this post!

I have been toying with the idea of getting rid of most of my children's clothing. I think my whole laundry problem is that we have too many clothes. I don't know where they all came from, either. I am not a big shopper -- not clothing anyway. :) I shop at the thrift store for the boys' clothes, for goodness sake.

Anyway, I think I could get rid of most of their clothing and they would never notice. And, then, wouldn't I have fewer loads of laundry to do? I mean, mathematically, that sounds right, doesn't it? Fewer clothes, fewer loads of laundry.

Clayton realistically only need 3 pair of jeans, 4 shirts each of long and short sleeves, 5 underpants, 7 pair of socks and one set of clothing for church, right? Let me think that thru here on the computer............If all the clothes were clean on Sunday morning, he would wear the Sunday clothes, and one pair of jeans and a t-shirt and a sweatshirt plus the underwear and socks, etc. on Sunday. The first thing he will run out of will be the jeans. Wear the Sunday ones again on Monday and then new on Tuesday and new on Wednesday. So -- laundry on Wed night for new jeans on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Wash on Sat. night again and we are good for the week, right? The other boys clothes are small enough to fit in with Clayton's and still only make like two large loads, I think. When they all get bigger, we may have to rethink this whole thing. Or, giving them each one night to do their own laundry sounds kind of good to me!! :)

Now, I need to figure at least 2 loads of whites each week (sox & u-wear + kitchen towels and washcloths) and at least 2 loads of bath towels and a load of sheets each week, too. That is figuring that we use sheets for 2 weeks and I only wash two beds each week. Otherwise, if I want to wash everyone's sheets each week, then I need to make it 2 loads there. (I try to wash sheets more often in the summer. Boys are dirtier, and wear less clothing to bed, hence, dirtier sheets! In the winter with the "zip jammies", etc. I let them go longer on the beds.) Also need to figure in a couple of loads of Joe's clothes, since he's so dirty, his work clothes get washed separately.

So Kids clothes on Sats. and Weds. Joe's on Monday and Thursday. Towels and whites on Mondays and Thursdays, too, lets say. That leaves only sheets, and my clothes, which I add in with the kids most of the time. So, lets add thesheets to Weds., because Saturdays are busy with running and cleaning and baths, too. That really only leaves me with Tuesdays as no laundry days.....so not much different than I do now. However, it sounds like this may alleviate the piles (mountains!) of laundry in my basement laundry room, doesn't it?

I think I will ponder that and work it out into my schedule (like I really have a schedule!) :)
I will post if I actually do it and if it is working out the way I picture it in my head. "They" say it takes 21 days to develop a new habit or to break an old one, so we'll see how this goes.

I would love to come out from beneath the mountain and breathe some fresh air!!