Making Progress

Mondays are my paydays. They are always hard days because I don't get to work as much as my expenses need me to. Most of my checks get poured out on bills leaving us scraping by on a few dollars for a week till the next tiny check comes in. We manage, but the Cosmic Thumb is also successful.

Anyway, today was a little different than normal Mondays. Today, I got paid for an extra day of work last week. This week, Tommy gets paid also. That allowed me to cover minor things for now and take the family to the Arbor Place Mall in Douglasville. It was a hard day (anything with much physical activity these days is a hard day for me), but it was a successful day. We started at Sears and Manti got a pair of dress pants. He also got an appreciation for the cost of clothing. [I hope that means he'll take good care of them!] He also got a good leather belt and a pair of nice leather shoes. He was so proud to be walking around making his own purchases. He went off on his own looking for a few things (which happened more because he wanted to keep shopping and today was a day Tommy had to use a walking cane to get around) but he only shopped while we were together. Some RUDE RUDE RUDE Indian woman (from India, not a Native American) at an Orange Julius kiosk insulted me and my little boys. I wanted to hit her so badly. Instead I paid her $15 for drinks for all of our family (which we ended up throwing away they were so bad) and allowing Tommy to express his distaste for her. I was slightly embarrassed, but ONLY slightly.

We came back to Carrollton and I had to pick up a prescription from Publix, which was the perfect excuse to go over to Target and get a cherry icee. It might be childish, but when I feel bad, there are 2 things that I like to do that help me feel better: 1-buy myself a new shirt, 2-get myself a cherry icee. So today I got a cherry icee AND I got some nachos...I was special for a minute. While in Target, Manti got all the socks he needed and his second leather belt. He looked for pajamas, but did you know that sort of thing is SEASONAL??? Raincoats are too and won't be stocked around here until SEPTEMBER! Craziness! The rainy season in Georgia is NOW...not in the fall...looney people!

Next, we headed over to Walmart to pick up 2 more prescriptions. While there, we got groceries and Manti got a shoe shine kit. I don't know if he picked up anything else while there, but he tends to price things and think for a while before getting stuff, so maybe that's all he actually got...I think it is.

What progress, right? He still has several things to go and some of it we just can't find here. We've discovered there are some things that he'll just have to purchase once he gets to NM.

He's been sorting his things in his room, and he got the word today that Mesa intends to take over his room and VERY THOROUGHLY clean it out when he leaves. So he has motivation to get in there and pack his things securely. I guess next he'll pick up some rubbermaid buckets HAHA!

So there is a progress report! We plan to go out on another excursion Wednesday. Of course, while we're there, I think we're going to go back to the mall. There is the COOLEST store there called EarthBound. They had some of the most awesome cultural items! There were African things, Japanese things, and some stuff was purely "earthly" as in wooden bowls carved from Fir Tree roots and incense and some singing bowls WHICH I WANT!!!!!! It's such an awesome store. I let Morgan get a puzzle... it's actually a house, and if you take it apart, the puzzle pieces are furniture for the house like a table and chairs. It's complicated to put it back together and you literally have to think about each piece to make it work. There were other puzzles like this that I want to get the boys too- an Eiffel Tower, a soccer ball on a pedestal, a beer mug with foaming drink on top... seriously neat toys!

Anyway, more to come, and more progress expected before the end of the week. Till then,...

THANK YOU MOM & DAD!!!