Where can a month go?

Since I left you all hanging last time...

We had our annual hunger awareness/famine weekend for youth group the last weekend of February. Fishing Guy and I spent our anniversary weekend at the church not eating and sleeping outside one night in 15* weather in a box. Really. I'm not kidding. I got extremely clausterphobic about 2:30 am and moved to sleep inside on the preschool hallway floor. It was a one-Guy box, see:



Then, I had almost a week of normal before I got sick with the flu. I felt crummy on Thursday night, powered through Friday, spent several hours dealing with Girl Scout Cookies on Saturday, didn't go to church on Sunday because I had a low-grade fever (but still took in goodies since it was my day) and by 3:30 pm Sunday, I was in bed in tears because I hurt everywhere.

Fast forward through a fever of 102.something, body aches and chills which left me in bed for two days and with a full week of feeling crappy. Fishing Guy had two days off, took an actual sick day to take care of me and the kids and when he went back to work the 4th day, I was still iffy.

Dealing with cookies the Alaska way, right off the barge, out of the container on pallets, hand sorted by troop and atacked onto the pallet:



And into my garage:



Somewhere in there it kept snowing until we had about 4' in the yard. Again, I'm totally serious. Fishing Guy got to put his snowblower to good use and I have been taking a bunch of pictures. The kids have had several snow days and we are all glad to see the rain this week.



And the Iditarod started and was checking updates as often as I could. From the start I knew it would be a hard race when 4 of my "veteran picks" scratched in the first couple of days with pretty serious reasons, like broken bones and smashed sleds. The "Red Lantern" (last place) just finished a couple of days ago after 16 days on the trail.

Then there was a huge fundraiser dinner, talent show and dessert auction the PTO was doing for The Princess' school on the 16th. That meant extra PTO meetings, days of prep and cooking, ticket sales, decorating and such. The menu was Baked Ziti, Meatballs in red sauce, garlic bread and salad.

Meatballs and salad:





That took up most of my extra time from right when I was feeling better to the night of the event. At least, when I wasn't subbing at the school or trying to catch up on all of the stuff that piled up when I checked out for a week.

Then, leaving right after the dessert auction was over, I was gone overnight for a Women's Retreat. Once I arrived, it was a grand time and I found it very relaxing. Unfortunately, it also involved bad snowy roads late at night (well, 9 pm is late for me to be out driving around) and then a hairy trip backwards down a remote road in the Suburban. That really deserves a post of it's own, but since I'll probably never get back to it, I'll give you the short version.

I drove up the hill, to the turn for the cabin in 4High. When I realized I was never going to make the turn, I stopped and put it in 4Low, thinking I could creep around the corner. I never went forward again. I half slid, half steered backward down the very dark hill, bouncing from snowberm to snowberm on either side of the road. Everytime I got stuck, I'd pull forward or back up or just spin my tires until I started sliding again. I finally got down to the bottom, where there is a wide spot, got turned around and parked in the lower lot I had driven by on the way up. Then I hiked myself and my gear up the hill to the cabin, just in time to interrupt the beginning of the evening prayer time.

Fantastic time I tell you. When the adrenalin kicked in, I was literally shaking. The kind women of our church know me so well they offered me coffee to calm me down and I accepted. Of course, I also didn't go to bed until after 1:30 am.

The Turn, on the right, just under the dark rock:


The Hill, note the Suburban is parked about the center of the photo:


The View from the Cabin:


The View back at the cabin from The View from the cabin:


Sunday was my last great effort to get the girl scout cookies out of my house. I also went to see Premonition with a group of girlfriends Sunday night.

Anyway, that was all before or during last weekend.

This week, I've had a girl scout troop meeting, taught a bible study class, taught at Wed. youth group, interviewed for the teaching position for next year at the church school, arranged and held playdates, forgot The Prince's snack day at school, taught in The Princess' class for reading group time and pulled two cards and cleaned a path back into my craft area.

Things will be better next week if only because it's Spring Break and I don't have to take the kids back and forth to school. Then again I have 3x the amount of events to attend for the Youth. I guess it's all relative.

I've got to run and switch laundry before The Princess is dropped off from school and The Prince leaves for his playdate. We are having a sibling-switch playdate this afternoon and I get the girls.

Hope you all have a great weekend.