Drop by drop, or person by person, the house fills up again

On boxing day, I drove out to Lansing to pick up Alex for her Christmas visit. We had to meet much earlier than normal because I had to work at 3 that afternoon. Alex lives with her grandparents on the other side of the state so we meet roughly halfway. Alex will be 15 in a few months and is growing into a fine human being. Bill has watched her grow from age 4, I've only known her since she was almost 8 but I have to say we love her and the only way she could be more ours would be to go through court procedures (not going to happen she's in a good stable home and happy now). She's smart, funny, cute, musical, athletic, polite and helpful among other good traits. It's always nice to have her here.
Alex loves Acer and is a really good older sister or JieJie (pronounced like the first half of the name Jeff). She's so patient, loving and doesn't mind playing toys or singing with him when he asks. She and Brandon get along well too. Tomorrow we'll be picking Brandon up to stay with us until Sunday. They have a good cousinly relationship and look forward to seeing each other here whenever possible. They also have a longstanding partnership in returning our soda bottles. We stock pile them until both the kids are here and then make a mega trip. They split the work, money and goodies. Brandon is now 16 but this partnership has been 5 years in the making so I think it will endure.

We have a big house rearranging plan in progress, so the house is all dis-arrayed. I think Brandon will end up on a blow up bed in the computer room, soon to be the sitting room (with all my antiques and breakables. Alex is in the lowest level, in the sitting room bedroom we used to sleep in which will be the spare bedroom, entertainment center and computer room (with room to play DDR again!) Acer's room will be turned more fully over to him as we pull the entertaiment center out of there, it's not been used since we've been home anyway. We're in what used to be Alex's or the spare bedroom, it will also be altered as we move out a Queen Anne chair, an oriental rug, a bookshelf, Alex's box of stuff and some of my craft stuff, and move Bill's dresser in. With all this going on you can believe we're going to use the younglings to help. I guess it's also a good thing that I took seasonal layoff this year, not only will I be able to rest and get rid of my sinus infection, I might just be able to accomplish this plus some painting I want to do before April rolls around and I go back to work.



Here we see both my wonderful brother and my nephew Brandon doing an activity I thought I'd never see again. Brandon is swinging and James is watching to make sure he doesn't get hurt. Yes, Acer's swing can go up to 175 pounds, and yes, Brandon did manage to sing his backside into the wall & (slightly) hurt himself, so James really was needed.

Unfortunately, with my stoopid sinus infection, we moved nada and now the younglings are back in their respective homes. Dern.