Birthday boy is fast asleep...

Since we homeschool, and have no pressing errands or appointments today, I allowed JP to stay up all night last night.  This was in honor of his 13th birthday.  I am writing this at 10am, and he just fell fast asleep on the living room floor.  Of course, I don't want to entirely throw off his sleep schedule for the next few days, so I will wake him up around 2pm or so, and make sure he is back in bed at a reasonable time tonight.  It is tempting to go for a bike ride after waking him, but as you will read below, getting a shower after might not be so easy...

Birthday cake - lemon on lemon with chocolate sprinkles.

While it was wonderful to celebrate JP's bday yesterday, it wasn't exactly the best day for me.  I woke to NO WATER in the kitchen or bathroom!  I knew we might have service disruptions to our gas and electric due to repairs at street level, but there was no mention of the water being shut off!!!  If I had known, I would have gotten up extra early to shower, and pot some water for use over the course of the day.  I would have washed my sink full of dishes the night before. I would have done ALL of the laundry on Monday instead of just half.  Sigh...such is life.  Full of unexpected twists and turns.  Now the HOT water is on, but not the cold.  Not fun, and not sure how long it will last!  Might be asking a friend to use her shower if it lasts beyond today!

How do you cope with such unexpected events?  I wonder how my neighbors coped?  What about people with 9 to 5 jobs that needed to shower, shave, etc to prepare for their workday?  How did people cope before indoor plumbing?  Although I enjoy camping and hiking, and don't care if my campsites have showers, I do enjoy my plumbing at home!

I have two other bits of news:

First, I've added MYSTERY sets of envelopes to our Etsy shop!  Each pack is filled with envelopes from our growing pile of random upcycled, recycled, photographic, and other envelopes.  These are all extras or ones that don't quite fit a good theme for a complete set.  As such, we are just pulling twenty at a time from our pile, and shipping them on to you for a fabulous price!  Check them out HERE...

Envelopes of all styles!

Second, our post on how I manage as a homeschooling, single, grad student mom was featured by the Gifted Homeschooler's Forum on their Facebook page this morning!  Read that post HERE.

MAIL CALL:  So far, nothing today.  The last few days have been very sloooooow for snail mail.  I am expecting a few things for JP (bday cards, maybe a gift or two), and eventually we should (I hope!) get a box of homeschooling materials from Book Samaritan.  If you've not heard of Book Samaritan, they are a wonderful charity organization that helps homeschooling families by supplying FREE materials.  Check them out HERE.

WHAT'S FOR DINNER:  Tonight, dinner will be dependent entirely on the water situation...our hot water is so hot that I can't easily wash dishes or do anything with it unless I fill a bucket or bowl and let it cool.  If the water situation hasn't been remedied by this evening, we may just have cereal for dinner!  If the water situation is fixed, we'll have vegan veggie rolls!  I need to wash and prep the veggies, as well as cleaning a pan to cook them in!  Unfortunately, the wrappers I bought to make the rolls are the kind that really need to be cooked.  They taste awful raw.  Again, had I known about the water situation, I would have bought a different type of wrapper to make raw spring rolls!  Sigh...