Randomness throughout February and March

Ever since we moved into our house I have been trying to figure out what to do with our living room. It is really long and skinny, so I decided I wanted a faux fireplace on one of the walls. I saw a cool pallet headboard on someone's blog and I thought it would be perfect for a faux fireplace, so I started collecting pallets. There is a house being built across the street from us and I asked the contractor for pallets. He is amazing! He will just carry them over for me and just knock on the window so I know they are there. I also asked him if he had something that would work as a mantle and he gave me a solid piece of wood that was like 3"x6'x8". Lauren also got a fence panel from him for a project. Then I bought a fireplace from the auction for 3 pounds. So my project was only 3 pounds so far!

So on a rare warm day Lauren and I decided to start our projects. I was having a hard time getting the pallets apart and things just weren't working out the way I had hoped. Lauren was going to use the fence to cut the slats into a circle for a big clock, but the way they were cut they were uneven and wouldn't work for a clock. So she suggested I just turn it sideways and use it instead of the pallets. We cut it to the right size, carried it in and leaned it against the wall and I LOVED it!!! We rearranged the living room (for the 20th time) and I am now happy with my front room. We also got new(used) couches somewhere in there. I don't have my chair done yet, but hopefully it will warm up again and I can recover my chair and put it in the front room. Someday I'll post pictures!

3 pound fireplace(fence in background)

pallets

mantle

Something else that went on was the day after we got home from Liverpool and Wales Blake was outside with Parker and Broden. Parker fell and was crying so he brought him inside. I just thought he was being fussy. Then later that night Parker was standing behind Blake on the couch and Blake leaned back onto him. Parker started SCREAMING! We thought at that point something must be hurting him. As I watched him closer I realized every time he fell and caught himself on his hands he would cry. I felt along his arm and when I touched by his wrist he screamed. I figured it must be broken. So the next morning I took him to the doctor. The doctor seemed to doubt that it was broken. I had given Parker Ibuprofin that morning and it must have worked because he was only a little uncomfortable when the doctor touched his arm. But the doc ordered x-rays anyway and sure enough it was broken. So he got a fun cast that went past his elbow. He was supposed to have it for 6 weeks, which would be getting it off the day we were supposed to leave for Rome. So they scheduled it for the day after we got home.

The day before we were supposed to leave for Rome I was starting to feel really bad for the babysitter(Lauren) that she would have to deal with the cast and the smell. I was hurrying around getting the kids ready for school and before I realized it Parker had climbed into the shower and was playing with a soaking wet towel. Hmmm, his cast was kinda wet. So, I called the doctor to see how wet was too wet. They said bring him in and they would check it. As soon as the tech walked in the room he said, "Oh, I can already smell it." They looked at his record and thought he was close enough to his day to get it off that they could just take it off. So they removed it, we got and xray and he was good to go. YAY!!! No more stinky cast. He slept from 8:00pm until 11:15 the next morning when I finally woke him up. I think it must be uncomfortable to sleep with a huge hard thing on your arm.

The day he got his cast

Done with his cast!

 Something else random that happened. I cleaned the bathrooms, yes I do this occasionally. Then my face started itching. I figured it was from my hair and dry skin. So I just pulled my hair back for a few days and put lots of lotion on. Then a few weeks later I cleaned with the really strong toilet cleaner again(I only use the strong stuff every couple weeks, not in weekly cleaning). The next morning when I woke up I said to Blake that my neck and face was all itchy again. He rolled over and looked at me and said I was having an allergic reaction. Sure enough, my face was swelling and I was itching like crazy. I took some zyrtec and it seemed to help, but I'm a little scared to clean bathrooms now. I'll stick to the general cleaning and let Blake use the strong toilet cleaner. Too bad:)