It is wonderful during the day when the big kids go to school, baby naps, and James and I have time alone together. Today we were making lunch together and I said "Mommy needs to go to the store." James looked a little confused and said "Whose mommy needs to go to the store? Are you talking about yourself, Candice?" I suppose I have become a little too used to refering to myself in the third person.

Another odd mommy habit - I am never alone and always have someone to talk to. So the other day when I went to CVS alone, I found myself saying aloud "Where is the curling ribbon? Is it by the greeting cards? Here it is! Did I bring my gift card? Oh good, I found it!" At least I wasn't looking for condoms or laxitives, so I guess it could have been worse.

The basement is again habitable. Jared's spraying for bugs really worked, in spite of my dousing the bug spray with Lysol. Also, the dreaded Virginia humidity has subsided, so now it smells reasonalbe down here, instead of like basement. I am working on getting the basement organized. My problem down here is twofold: first, we have way too much stuff. Second, in order to arrange it, I need to buy organizers. I know it could be pretty and everything could have a home, but I don't want to spend money on organizing. However, I do love when I have a problem spot in my home and find the perfect solution. It just makes my day. My most recent find fixed the dirty laundy in the living room. With our tiny bedrooms full of bunk beds, there is no place to change a baby. Therefore, I have resorted to dressing children in the living room. Then comes the problem: where to put the dirty clothes???? I didn't want to haul dirty clothes upstairs, only to have to bring it down to the basement, so I started throwing clothes down the stairs. Only then I ended up with the stair landing full of dirty clothes, and no one could get through. The solution? A corner hamper on the landing of the basement stairs!!! Then I throw clothes at the corner, they slide nicely into a small basket, and my house is no longer overtaken by dirty clothes!!!

I used the beautiful hamper solution as a justification yesterday when I bought an art supply lazy susan. I got tired of the kids art projects, glue, markers, pencils and take being in HUGE pile in the kitchen. Seriously, it was like Staples overtook my art little counter. So this lazy susan tucks everything away nicely and even looks cute. So now I am in my basement thinking that with just a little bit of $$$, I can organize my house. Hence a solution to my next problem - too much stuff. This problem stems from another problem - only one little girl. I have felt the need to buy her EVERYTHING that I would ever want to buy a daughter. I bought her SO MUCH STUFF that I never even gave some of it to her. Hence, I have a bag full of toys that are still unopened. Imagine my surprise when I looked on ebay and realized I had $400 worth of dolls (not that I paid that much - dolls I paid $17 for are now selling for $150. What can I say, I have fabulous taste!) I am going to have a big sale, and use the proceeds to pay for all the clothes/toys/girl stuff that I still feel the need to buy. Maybe it would be different if I had been blessed with more than one girl, but my little mind rationalizes everything - if you don't buy it for Claire, you'll never get to buy it for anyone...

I am amazed at how many of my weird quirks are coming out on this blog. Someday maybe my grandchildren will read this and say "Wow, she was seriously hung up." Maybe it will explain things for them....