Random ramblings

Well, the kids are both in an "eat constantly" stage of a growth spurt.  I have seen my daughter much on Goldfish crackers all morning, then demand chicken (2 nuggets) corn and green beans for lunch, munch on more Goldfish before her nap, ask for chocolate milk and chocolate animal crackers after her nap, then eat a whole serving of Easy Mac for supper.  The imp is about the same, but in slightly greater amounts.  

Soon, their food intake will taper off, and they'll sleep more--mostly in the form of longer naps.  Maybe an earlier bedtime.

I can't wait for that part.

Right now, though, the pixie is eating.  She had a sausage link and four mini-pancakes for breakfast--after having munched on Goldfish for who knows how long before she woke me up--and is currently eating Club Crackers.  She's on her eighth one, so far.  Yes, I know they're empty calories, but she also ate a couple of Gummy Vites* with her breakfast.

Tomorrow's going to be a busy day.  It's going to be the last day Odysseus and I can work on getting the hall bathroom cleaned up and sanitized before the craziness of semester starts.  We're still not sure if we're going to try to salvage part of the carpet for when we turn the back half of the bathroom into a walk-in closet. 

So, I guess today's going to be busy, too--first on my list is laundry, and second is dishes.  The kids will be helping me in their rooms, the hall, and the living room so that I can vacuum,** sometime this afternoon.  Before that, though, Odysseus will be going to meet his parents halfway between here and their house to pick up the imp, who'd spent a couple of nights with his grandparents.  Y'know, catch up before we tear into the bathroom tomorrow.  Monday will involve deep cleaning that bathroom, so I can't really do it then.

Cricket just caught a mouse.  She mauled it to the point where it was stunned and still, even when she backed off, before I ever saw it.  Pretty thing--all sleek and brownish-gray.  If they'd stay outside, I'd have absolutely no issue with them.  As it is, I'm glad these cats of ours aren't useless.  They're both awesome mousers.  Often, the only evidence I find is a partially digested one inside a turd in the litter box, or a bloody stump of a tail on the floor, on the top of the freezer, or in the litter box.  Both Cricket and Shadow are flat murder on mice.

Honestly, I kinda wish they'd leave them alone for a while--mice eat roaches, which we're still having minor problems with.  They die off, and then reappear a couple of weeks later.  Smaller waves, but still.  I can tell the boric acid/powdered sugar mixture is working, but slowly. 

And we lost a whole batch of peanut butter cookies, because I didn't notice that the ZipLock bag they were in had a small split up near the zip.  And the roaches got into them. 

I'm ready for those nasty things to be gone entirely.

I've been scrambling to get my classes ready.  One is done, and the other is just data entry to make sure they've got what they need to go on with.  However, that did include writing a new chapter for the textbook...then going back and re-doing all of the screen capture illustrations. 

So, between holidays, house problems, sick kids, and getting class stuff ready to go, I have had zero time or energy to work on Pendragon Resurgent, much less that story for the little girl.  However, where that's concerned, I will again have a long block of office hours (four hours on Thursday, since that is literally the only time I can) where I'm not watching the kids every week, which happens to be perfect for writing.  Especially since I won't have papers coming in until the end of January. 

*Gummy Vites are the only children's vitamins I've found for a reasonable price that don't have artificial color in them--something the imp seems to be very sensitive to.  As in, if he has it, specifically red food coloring, he gets meaner than a little snake, and tends to have accidents in his pants.

**Our vacuum died just before Christmas.  We've just gotten a new (cheap) one--another Bissell, because our old one did so well before it got clogged and its motor died.  I can't justify a more expensive one when I can't guarantee that it wouldn't go the same route with a toy or sock in its guts.