Another boring post.

Yesterday, the whole family worked on the landscaping around this house. We are thinking that we might just stay here, but we are going to fix this house up the way we like it and not wait until we are putting it on the market. That was the mistake we made with the Tanglewood house. When we put the Tanglewood house up for sale, we finally did all the updates and improvements that we had put off for the ten plus years we had lived there. The things we wouldn't do for ourselves. We tiled the floors, replaced the gold double ovens with stainless steel double ovens, changed out all the kitchen appliances, replaced the gold kitchen counter-tops with tile, and even put texture and fresh paint over the walls that still had paneling. Wait, there's more! We replaced the shop doors, re-textured the entryway, replaced light fixtures, and even - REPAINTED THE OUTSIDE OF THE HOUSE! Let's just say that I didn't want to leave after that.

The one thing we DID do for ourselves while we were there was gut and update the master bath. It had the fanciest 12 x 12 tiled shower in town! Unfortunately, it had the fanciest tiled LEAKY shower, and we fixed that before we left too. We also let the kids pick out the paint color for their rooms and we had to paint over that. I don't know who would want a house with crazy room colors. One bedroom had two walls painted red and two walls painted blue and another bedroom had two walls painted purple and two walls painted green. That's what you get when kids pick the color: indecision. My room was painted orange - UT orange - and we painted over that, too. I miss my orange room! When my reading lamp was on I felt I was surrounded by soft candlelight.

While hubby and I were doing yard work, we found a doggie septic system in our back yard. Yeah. I didn't know that such a thing existed.

Catching Up

We are going to look at a house we can't afford today. It has some acreage and my mom would like to put some of her horses on it. That means she might help us buy it. We don't need that much land.

The house only has three bedrooms, but Matthan is going off to school next year to major is Psychology/Psychiatry. We could afford to send a kid to Victoria College, but our house hunting turned to downsizing once we understood how much his college would be... Psychiatrist = medical school.

Did I mention I need a job? Yeah. Because I have travel plans! Hubby and I are coming up on our twenty year wedding anniversary and we are dragging the whole family with us on a cruise to Jamaica, Cozumel, and ... somewhere else. We are leaving out of Florida.

After *planning* a trip for five to England and France, the top of the line cruise seems affordable. (Did I mention that *planning* is my favorite part of vacationing, schooling, cooking...) Planning is dreaming. I love dreaming.

I figure if I work part-time and put everything into an account, we can travel more and consider it SCHOOL. I don't want the kids to think that THIS - Victoria, Texas - is it. Recently, my daughter (14) had some jealous-teen drama and I reminded her, "You are about to be on a cruise with rich boys from around the world. Do you really want a boyfriend? Tell the boys that you want to remain single because when you travel, you want to be free..." It's advice I wish I could have been given, but I was stuck in the country in an even smaller town, just trying to get out.

We took the kids to The Oak Room for the first time the other evening. My daughter said, "I will never eat at McDonald's again!" The duck was everyone's favorite. I can't wait to go back!



Trips for FOUR will be more reasonable. Which is why I want to travel more. I was going to write a whole post on WORLD SCHOOLING the other day, but I got too busy. I'm still working on a recipe for itisi.

Land. **BEGIN DREAM** Maybe I can train horses again... Teach horseback riding lessons! Have a FREE SCHOOL in the country that revolves around equine management or training, breeding, and showing horses. **END DREAM**

I would like to substitute-teach because I do not want a full-time job. I already have a part-time job: parenting and housewifen' (yeah, it's really only a part time job if you do it right... or wrong, however you want to look at it). As far as homeschooling, the kids are old enough to read the instructions, work the sample, and complete the work on their own. I only have to plan, motivate, and check.

Hubby tore his calf muscle playing basketball with the homeschool high school boys. This, after declaring that he "didn't feel old," though he had just turned forty. I guess if I ever want to do P90X again I better not skip the Yoga. Now I understand why Yoga is important... S T R E T C H without breaking.

My friend's husband passed away. I spent the night at her house the first night and I've been spending much time with her. I think she's going to be looking for a house soon, too. She also wants to travel. Hopefully, when our girls graduate high school, we can plan a senior trip - for the girls, not us - to Paris. Our girls are the same age. That's what I want to do when Kelsey graduates high school - big trip. It's what Matthan did when he graduated.

I hope she keeps up with her French! I gave up. Information tends to leave my brain, and new information doesn't tend to stay.

The kids' passports are on their way! Then we will all have passports! YEAH! I hope it serves as valid ID for PSAT... I had to get a Texas State ID for Matthan when he took his PSAT.