House Hunting part something

The house drama continues, but I will have something other that house stuff to post tonight (I've been doing the crafty things for Tristan's birthday party). So I'll be back with some craft how-to's, pictures and plans for a Retro Sci-fi 1st Birthday Party that will be out of this world (sorry, couldn't resist).

James filed for an extension yesterday because the bank still has not done their paperwork and has not turned on the water--which means the inspections are not 100% done either. The appraiser is going to be really cool about updating most of the paperwork, but we think he wants the roof repair done before closing. It does need done, but I would feel better spending the cash on that if we actually owned the house. I think the extension would put us at closing by the 3rd of December.
James was over at the house the other day and noticed that the people who own the giant truck that is always parked in front of the house were packing their things into boxes and had collected their extra appliances from their back porch. Perhaps we won't have to figure out how to get the monster truck to move.

As far as temporarily living with my Mom goes, I do get along with my Mom and sister just fine, but I would not be looking forward to spending my staying at home with Tristan time in a house with 5 dogs and 3 cats and then having to share a small room that only has a twin bed with James and Tristan. Mina could likely share the King size bed in my Mom's room.
I don't think going from a 3 bedroom, 2 1/2 bath townhouse to one bedroom in a 4 bedroom (well one of the bedrooms is used for storage) 1 bath house is an ideal situation. I guess it would give me the chance to locate my Christmas decorations and the old rocking horse that I want to give to Tristan that Mom stored somewhere in the attic.
Did I mention that my Mom holds on to a LOT of stuff?
It's going to take a while.

House Hunting Part ....*head deask*

I had a very good day today, up until James came home from work a bit early.

So let's star with the good part...I got to spend a relaxing half hour at the dentist office and the Novocaine actually worked on me today. Awesome, I didn't feel the drilling today.
I picked up Tristan at my grandparents' house and my grandmother and I went to Target to get him some socks. She ended up buying him some pants and long-sleeved shirts and a hoodie because she said that he needed more clothing. She wanted me to help figure out what she should buy the kids for their birthdays and Christmas, so we picked out their gifts.
We got lunch at Scrambler Marie's, which was good, but my Novocaine hadn't quite wore off yet, so half of my tongue wasn't able to taste everything just yet and I may have been drinking coffee that was slightly too hot, but I survived. Tristan ate some biscuit, eggs, bacon and fruit. He also was quite pleased with himself when I let him drink out of my water glass.
We headed over to a local shoe store where my friend works and where we traditionally purchase all of the kids' first shoes in my family. Tristan got his first pair of little white shoes. He refused to walk around at first, but he eventually tried them out.

So after a good morning and afternoon my grandmother picked up Mina from school to play at her house (we have no backyard really and the weather was rather good today). Tristan and I played at home.
James came home early and informed me of the house drama that I was not aware of. I'll do this in list form:
1. The appraiser came by BEFORE the gas leak was repaired and before the utilities were turned on, and before we had painted the deck and put all the correct outlet covers on....so of course that wasn't acceptable for our loan. James got the additional complaints list and went over and made a couple more minor repairs.
2. That appraiser screw-up was our bank's mistake...so they're going to have to fix that.
3. The bank we're buying the house from hasn't done their end of the paperwork.
4. Which means that we might be able to get an extension without being penalized.
5. The people involved with the down payment grant were probably out of their office due to Veteran's Day...so they haven't done anything with our paint inspection (which happened Monday) and likely haven't been able to even start the request for funding.
6. We already put in our move-out notice at this apartment and James doesn't want to pay rent here for the whole month of December since we most likely won't need to be here the whole month. So the game plan is that we'll put everything in storage...and move into one room of my mother's house (which was my bed room up until the age of twelve) if we're not closed by our move-out date....*eye twitch*

Let's just hope it doesn't come to that.

Tasty Tuesday: Fun with Barley Pudding

This is my contribution to Arizona Mamma's Tasty Tuesday.
I just cooked this recipe tonight. I found two barley recipes, one for a dessert and one for a crock pot barley breakfast cereal. I wanted to combine these recipes to make a not overly sweet desert with fruit and nuts, but once I started cooking the barley I realized that my remaining fresh fruits were starting to feel rotten, so I had to go without.

Baked Barley Pudding

1 3/4 cup barley
4 cups water
3/4 cup milk
3 eggs
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar
1/4 cup chopped walnuts
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
a pinch of salt

1. Boil barley, salt and water for about 40 minutes.
2. Beat eggs a little, then combine with milk, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla and chopped nuts.
3. Add milk and egg mixture into barley and stir.
4. Pour barley mixture into a baking dish, I used a round glass casserole dish.
5. Place the baking dish in a pan with about 1 1/2 inches of water in the bottom.
6. Bake at 375 degrees for about 40 minutes.

Additional info-- you could add other chopped nuts, chopped fresh or dried fruit, or other spices if you desire.

The Three Hikers and the Big Bad Ahmadinejad

A quick mention before my post--Apparently there was good news for baby Stellan earlier today (well on Monday) and it sounds like his surgery was successful. I'm very excited for their family.

So elsewhere in the world today...
I was going to title this "The Three Hikers and the Big Bad Ayatollah," but since the summer uprisings I'm not entirely convinced that the Ayatollahs are running the show in Iran. I think I believe the CIA guy who was on CNN stating that the nature of things have changed in Iran and President Ahmadinejad is leading the Ayatollahs....isn't that a little bit of extra scary if it is true. The CIA guy was citing the quick response of the various militia groups to protesters and how they seemed to be acting on Ahmadinejad's orders. Since Ahmadinejad was quite involved with the very foundation of these militias during the Revolution it really doesn't surprise me that he has some buddies there.
Anyway the Iran dance starts over again. Three hikers apparently wandered across Iran's border at the end of July and were detained. The Iranian government is charging them with "espionage" which translates as "yeah, these people weren't really doing anything, but we want to claim that the West was threatening us again in an attempt to make Iranians think the West is still meddling." Being part of "The West" and a student of Iranian History admittedly the West has done some meddling over there in the past. Also in the past the whole Western nations meddling in Iranian affairs was a more believable claim... since current President Obama is usually seen as wanting to reach out to other countries I think the "meddling West" claims are not as believable as they were under the Bush administration...you know with the whole "Axis of Evil" declarations.
Iran appears to have a limited reach over here in the USA, so they have to take what they can get and usually that would be a wandering American. I'm assuming that a brief and mysterious, or maybe public (since it seems like the Iranian people get the mysterious trials), show trial will follow. The people will be imprisoned for a several months or so...then someone will want to talk about nukes and the Americans will be released as part of some deal. It's really unfortunate for the hikers and their families.
You can sign the petition or learn more about the hikers here.

I better be getting some sleep
at some point in time

Praying for Stellan. Mina's Medication update

Still praying for Stellan. He has had a really rough time in the hospital with his SVT, low blood pressure and now a fever.

We had a doctor visit this morning for Mina. Adjusted her medication again. Hopefully a higher dose will last longer so that she can make it through a school day without tapping, humming, clicking, rocking, rolling on the floor or taking her shoes off in the afternoons. I want her to stay in the typical class as long as possible, but it's not fair to the teacher, the other kids or to Mina if that his going to be her behavior pattern. If this medication change doesn't work out, then we'll probably give her a different medication in the afternoon to help her get through the day. I really hope that that some day we'll find the magic medication or diet change or whatever it takes to get her to calm down. Her doctor usually sees her in the evenings, after the medication wears off, so she seems happy with how Mina and I were able have a conversation now whereas in the evening appointments Mina is meowing, yelling or doing her scripted lines that she made up.

I'm trying to get Tristan to take a nap so I can get some housework done.

Yes, I'm still here and I have Chili Dog Pizza

We'll start this off with a prayer request for baby Stellan who will be having a risky ablation surgery either tonight or tomorrow morning. Another prayer request for little Matthew who is currently hospitalized, but will hopefully be well enough to get his kidney transplant very soon.

I've been pretty out of it, off and on, for the past couple weeks. I'm pretty sure Tristan and I had the flu and then I did battle with something ovary-related (I have cysts sometimes). I'm down about half a bottle of pain meds, but I think all these issues have resolved themselves, so I should be back to regular posting. Oh, and I actually do have a lot of stuff coming up, since both of my kids have birthdays before the end of the year and there's the holidays and moving from the apartment to the house. It will be busy.
Tristan's First birthday is going to be Outer Space themed and Mina is having a Pinkalicious birthday. I'm also working on my NaNoWriMo project.

This recipe is really not healthy, but my husband was inspired by this pizza ad for the "Bride of Wonderboy" Pizza from Avalanche...since we're still living cheaply we had to DIY our own gross pizza, so here we go. No, I didn't take a picture when I made this.

Chili Dog Pizza

1 frozen pizza crust (or make one fresh if you desire)
4 hot dogs
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
1 can chili dog sauce
shredded cheddar cheese
shredded mozzarella cheese
ketchup
mustard
etc.

Thaw the frozen pizza crust and let it rise a little.
Saute the onion slices with a little oil until golden and translucent.
Put a little oil on your hands and handle the pizza dough. Spread the dough out using whatever method you desire into the pizza pan. Stretch it out an inch or two longer than the edges of your pan.
Cut two of the hot dogs into four long strips--so cut length-wise.
Roll the length-wise sliced hot dogs into the edges of the crust. Remember the "stuffed crust" pizzas that have cheese stuffing? This is just like that, but with hot dogs. You can seal the stuffed hot dog crust by gently pressing the seam with a fork. Poke the crust all over with the fork to prevent air bubbles.
Put some ketchup on the crust and use the chili sauce as your pizza sauce replacement. Slice the remaining two hot dogs into thin slices, so that they look like pepperoni. Place those on the pizza and add the onions. Sprinkle with some of the mozzarella and cheddar cheeses-as much as you usually put on a pizza, but I suggest going a little light on the cheddar because it gets a little oily.
Bake the pizza, I believe we did about 15-20 minutes in a 425 degree oven.
The top of the pizza was really greasy, so we blotted the oil with a couple paper towels and then added a little more cheddar cheese.
Cut the pizza into slices and top with your usual hot dog toppings such as ketchup, mustard, etc.

Parent teacher conferences

Mina is ahead academically, but is having trouble with sitting still and being quiet in the afternoons. I guess we'll be trying to get some sort of additional medication for afternoons. We've tried just about everything. Various degrees of structure at school, removing dyes from her diet and we've probably almost run out of new medication options. She's probably still not "hyper enough" for that one study we had applied to last school year. She has come a long way since we stated on this schooling journey when she was 2 1/2.
Once the regular 1st Grade teacher had gone on to her next meeting I talked with Mina's special needs teacher and inquired as to how long teachers will tolerate Mina's disruptions before she is sent back to the special needs room. She said that kids usually hit a wall around 3rd grade, but it may happen later this year if problems continue. She thinks that Mina will do best in the typical class, but Mina is going to be how Mina is...and we can only do so much.
Mina will have a different special needs teacher in the next couple weeks, they've got a new teacher to add to the program so they had to shuffle things around. I'm worried that the changes at school along with moving are going to really mess with Mina's attitude. I really don't want her to be out of the typical class, but we'll have to find a solution for her humming, tapping and rolling...and taking her shoes off...or else it's really not fair to the learning of the other kids either and obviously she can't be really learning if she's rolling on the floor.

hmm, I'm watching this show about The Shakers...is "Simple Gifts" the only song they can come up with to use in these shows? I feel like I've heard it a dozen times already.

Feeling a bit better

Watching "UHF." Tis a silly movie. I've also watched portions of "Ghandi," "Pageant" (which is about Miss Gay America) and parts of some really obnoxious children's shows. Now going to listen to "The Axis of Evil Comedy Tour."

Tristan and I slept until 2pm. Okay, I was awake to get Mina ready for school, but we needed to get some more rest after that. Tristan has mostly stopped coughing and I don't feel nearly as bad as I had in the past week. Great success.
I'm still going to take some pain meds before I go to sleep to distract me from the sore throat.
We may have a slight snarl in getting the house closed on, but it should be okay. Another person has to do a lead paint test before we can get this home-buyer grant that our city just stated giving out. The loan officer doesn't think it will be a problem. Our Realtor says that we can wait to the last minute before asking for an extension. Taking an extension though would screw things up in a way because we had hoped to have everything cleaned up and painted in time for Tristan's birthday party.
Well, I've got some things to work on before I go to sleep again,