Christmas has come and is coming more...

Last Saturday, we had our Christmas here with the boys since my family was coming in during this week to spend the holiday here. We thought we'd get our gifts out of the way...and have them opened and able to be used when everyone was here! :) The kids had a great time opening and using their gifts...most of which were either Wii products or movies. There were other things, but we really like family movie nights here...and so movies were a big part of it. If we're not watching movies, we're playing the Wii. Anyway, as soon as we got things opened up, we started the day of playing, movie watching, playing, movie watching, etc... so much fun and relaxation. ;) I have a couple of videos to post and a ton of pics to post, but will have to do that at a later time....there just isn't time to sit and wait for them to upload right now! LOL I need to go play the Wii....

Then we found out that it would work out best for all concerned with my family for us to postpone our Christmas to the following week (the week of New Years) to ensure that the kids will get the most time together. Well, and us adults too, but the focus is the kids. :) Which is actually really nice, cuz I wasn't quite ready to have 10 people in my house! LOL I could have been ready, but why push it, huh?

So we are leaving in the next couple of days to go to Salem a bit early instead of just Friday and Saturday. So exciting...we'll get to spend time with a new baby that has joined the family and see all the cousins and nieces and nephews that we never get to see! The kids are looking forward to having 3 more Christmases in the next week too! LOL

I wish everyone who reads this and checks in with us a very Merry Christmas! I probably won't be back to update again until after the New Year, so Happy New Year too!

Job update

Things are certainly getting interesting with the economy and how it's effecting us in the job area! Even though Terry is working for Toyoda (a Toyota company, Japanese based) they make parts for both Ford and GM owned companies. So since those companies are having problems, it is creating problems for TG. There has been talk since Thanksgiving that things were going to change for them over Christmas (they normally get about a week off for "shut down" over Christmas and New Years), but they weren't sure yet how much. Well, about two weeks ago, we found ot that they would be off definitely the 22nd and 23rd of this month. Okay, not bad. But then the next day, they added the 18th and 19th to that. Then the next day they said they would also not be working the first full week of January (5th-9th) and would be coming back on the 12th.

Really, that isn't so bad, but they are making people use their own vacation time in order to get paid for these days off. That's 9 days of vacation!!! And for those who didn't have the time, they had to take it without pay. I feel so sorry for those people...thankfully, we have the time for it. (I'm just not sure what I will do having Terry home for 3 weeks straight!)

But things are possibly getting worse. There is rumor that there will be more days in January that they will have to not work and another rumor (which is 99% confirmed by a member of management) that they will be going to a 4-day work week. Now, that's not 4-10's. That would be 4-8's. So they would only work 32 hours a week instead of 40. We're not sure as of yet when that's gonna happen or how the pay issue would work out since Terry is salaried. Legally, there can be some issues there.

For the time being, I'm trying to keep Terry from worrying about things...but that's hard to do with him being the head of the household and feeling so strongly about filling that role so well. He feel responsible and is worried that things are going to get so much worse in the coming months. But we're healthy, have a roof over our heads, have food on our table, and have presents under our tree. We are BLESSED and we are trying to focus on counting those blessings.

Family is coming to spend some time at our house in ONE WEEK! :) The kids are getting so excited and I have to admit, so am I! LOL

Mid-December update

We are getting healthy again! LOL It's been a while since I have posted, but mostly that has been due to either illness, craziness (not mine!), and exhaustion!

Right before Thanksgiving we decided to rearrange our living room to better accommodate our upcoming Christmas festivities and cuz we've been wanting it rearranged for quite some time, and this seemed like a perfect time! But I told Terry that I wanted to paint if we were gonna rearrange...it's been 8 years we've been in this house and I've never gotten to paint the living room/kitchen. So I picked out paint and had it mixed and I painted one wall (the one where the entertainment center would go when it was moved) the day before Thanksgiving. We got home from Thanksgiving and (as you have already read) I got sick. We had already moved the entertainment center on Monday night, so the living room looked like a tornado had thrown up in there! But then I was sick for 3 days so we weren't able to work on it at all.

On Thursday night, I was feeling better, so we talked about how to do the weekend with all the finishing we needed to do...furniture, wiring for the stereo and video equipment, etc. Terry suggested that we could go ahead and paint 2 more walls (which would take the paint into half of the kitchen) with no problems on Friday night. See, I had planned on just painting that 1 wall and stopping till after Christmas. But he had a point, why not get it all done while the furniture is already away from the walls? So Friday night, we had a "date night" of painting the living room walls and one kitchen wall. The kids got to help some, but they entertained themselves having a 'gameshow' of the two contestants having a painting competition. They would get their announcer voices (which sounded oddly British!) and take commercial breaks and interview the "painters" and everything. It was really quite comical and made the evening more fun. But then, we were nearing the end of the night, the end of the painting (for now), when Terry had to open a new gallon. I looked at it and said, "It looks more pink...." He said, "It's probably just cuz it's wet and the stuff up there is already starting to dry." Okay, whatever. :) So he gets back to his part and I finish up the corners and ceiling area I was doing....I get down and something told me to look at what he was doing. I stepped back far away from it and just said, "Honey stop!" He said, "It's not the right color is it??" Yep, the store mixed the color wrong. And we had a 3-foot-wide-floor-to-ceiling patch of it that wasn't right. And it was too late in the night to take it back to them. But then we got to looking at it all and realized that the color we had been putting on the wall was actually the wrong color (which we liked better!) and the one in the cans left was the right color! So the next morning, we took them back and they mixed up some fresh color, matching the wrong color, and didn't even bat an eye! I was shocked; I figured they would make us pay for it....but they didn't!

So we finished painting and started putting things back together. We got the living room put back and all the wiring done by about 7:30 last Saturday night and we just collapsed! On Sunday mom and dad came down so that we could put up the Christmas decorations, and mom stayed an extra day helping me get the school room and the rest of the living room (the tornado throw up from before was still there!) back together again. (I suddenly feel like "all the kinds knights and all the kings horses..." Ha!)

The boys decided they wanted to go home with Grandma, so they went home with them on Tuesday night...and we started our Christmas shopping! All online! LOL It's really fun to be able to ship everything right to your door! We got all the boys' stuff ordered that night and just have to finish up a couple more things for extended family this weekend! YAY!

Work is proving to be an interesting situation for Terry...being in automotive, things are getting tough. TG makes parts for other manufacturers, and those companies are shutting down more and more over the next few weeks...which means that TG isn't working either. So, they have told them that they have to be off work 9 additional days (additional to their holiday time off) and it has to come out of their vacation time...if they don't have vacation time, they take it without pay. Then he came home last night and said that other departments are already talking about working 4 day work-weeks (not 4-10's, but 4-8's....getting them only 32 hours a week instead of 40) and that he suspects his department will be next, cuz they are so closely linked in what they do. *sigh* So, starting when he comes home next Wednesday, the 17th, he will be home and not working until January 12. That's over 3 weeks off. Granted, that will be nice to have him home and we'll get some things done, and we're thankful that he's got the vacation time to use so we won't go without pay, but it's making it hard to figure how to make things okay if work gets worse. And it has great potential to get much worse. :-( We're just praying and, honestly, it's helping our faith more, cuz we know that God will take care of us and make things okay. :)

Well, I am off to do more laundry and get ready for my boys to be home. :)

Well, I'm sick...

Here I sit, on my bed doing Christmas present research for Terry while I'm sick...but he's up and doing the dishes and the laundry and cleaning stuff. :( I have 2 infections in my left ear and one in my right. Ugh. I've had horrible luck with my ears this year. Ho hum. LOL C is asleep by me and B is helping Terry, which is good for them. Guess I'm having a pity party of sorts, huh? :-)

I will update soon about our Thanksgiving...it was truly a blast! We had 4 days in Salem and it was such a blessing.

Till then...