Hurricane Elska

History is no stranger to tiny tyrants. Folks with a fuse to match their height are scattered throughout time.....Attila the Hun, Napoleon, Stalin, and more. We add to the list the Oncoming Storm of a certain little girl who will stomp her foot and pound on your chest with her tiny little fists if you do not move fast enough to fulfill her every whim. (We're pretty sure that she's yelling "peasants, I want a clean diaper and dinner" on a regular basis, and she even pulled on a whole handful of Daddy's chest hair last night. I couldn't stop laughing - he almost had tears in his eyes she had pulled so hard.) She has started to spread out the time between her diva tantrums though, so there is hope that the balance of power will shift someday.

We have been very thankful for those stretches of quiet the last few days since we have had to spend a bigger chunk of time out and about in public. Last week, the fuel pump went out on the car (the power steering has already been giving us issues for a couple of months now), so we have stepped up the time frame for getting a new to us vehicle. Amazingly enough, we have had zero meltdowns so far while at the dealerships or doing test drives. We are praying that this continues for us through the rest of the purchase process since it makes things a lot quicker and easier for us.

Also to note is that we are getting ready for outdoor gardening. This week I'll be starting seeds indoors for later transplant, and we have a couple of friends who will be joining our fun this summer with either vegetable swapping or help in the garden in exchange for a share of what's produced. Basically, we're planning to go all hippie co-op with the gardening this year. (We're also going to go über-hippie with plans for foraging too. I want to do a few batches of blackberry jam this year if we can find some good patches, and I've got a delicious sounding recipe for dandelion jelly. As much as we want to do wine as well, we are going to wait until the basement is in better shape, so we have enough space.)

Other than that, the only "news" to report is that we are continuing to work on the daily routines that will keep the household from falling apart. Charlie has had clean clothes for work every day, and dinner plans have been figured out with enough time to have stuff thawed in time to eat at a reasonable hour. We're still a long way from where we were six weeks ago, but we're making progress. Maybe if I'm feeling REALLY adventurous, I'll bake some cookies. If anyone would like to help with cleaning, cooking, or baking, feel free to let me know. I am totally not too proud to have y'all take care of some of this....

Peace and God Bless!

Birthday Bash

Birthday Girl!

It is so hard to believe that it's been a month now since a certain little girl made her grand entry into the world. Because this weekend was crazy busy with a road trip to Green Bay and  a wonderful time visiting with family and friends, today's birthday celebration is rather subdued. Ok, so we've spent the day recovering....unpacking, laundry, and napping have taken up the majority of the day. We're going to have a nice dinner of chicken (Mamaw/Gigi style) and smashed potatoes and read a little of the story about Finsterhall. We'll just suggest that everyone raise a glass and toast the birthday girl. What did y'all expect? A big blowout bash? Not exactly the Sheffer style. It'll probably be 11 months from now before there's even a cake. We don't want to set the bar too high. This way if there are ever siblings, they won't feel jilted.

Intermission Between Meals

So, the grand plans of weekly updates this year have not exactly happened. I'd normally expect a very public verbal flogging for this, however, it's Good Friday today....God forgives ALL of our sins, so I'm hoping to be forgiven this one by everyone. We aren't where we want to be, but we're better than we were.

We have had a couple of very eventful weeks here at Chez Sheffer. Grandma came from Arizona to visit, and Aunt Katie made the trek into town to meet an adorable little girl - Mama and Daddy have no illusions that they were the reason for either visit. We have lost our status as primary characters in the story of Sheffers' Shenanigans and now have a secondary roles. However, since we have been relegated to roles of waitstaff and servants, we may soon find ourselves as extras in the background.

Since the baby book is somewhere unknown for the time being (sometimes even the first child doesn't have much written....), there were a couple of noteworthy milestones in the last two weeks. April 8, we did tummy time on the floor instead of in the confines of the bassinet, and someone decided that it was boring and rolled over onto her back. When taunted with, "I dare you to do it again," - she did. The other exciting thing was that this morning, April 18, our little girl discovered her happy voice. It was definitely a nice change from the angry voice that we normally hear around here.

In non-baby related news, the contractor has finished work on our house in Green Bay, and word is that it looks great. We're just working on finalizing all the paperwork and inspections before we can move to part of the process where we sell it.

Well, it's about the time where a couple of girls relax and listen to Frankie, Louis, Duke, and Ella on Pandora.

God Bless!

The Fresh Prince(ss)

In the west of Wisconsin we lived our days
With our family and friends we worked and lazed...

Without trying to come up with more horrible rhymes, we'll just say that our lives have totally been flipped turned upside down.

Only a few weeks ago, our lives were slightly under control. We had our routines; homemade meals were the normal; bread was freshly baked a couple of times a week; progress was being made to keep the house clean and organized; and we hadn't been awoken at 3am by screaming since it got too cold to leave the windows open at night and hear the neighbors get into it on their lawn after bar close.

On March 14, we headed up to Osseo for our third annual Pi(e) Day trip to the Norske Nook. It was a gorgeous day for a drive, and the pie was amazing as always. A few day later on the 17th, we had our traditional viewing of The Quiet Man to celebrate St Patrick's Day. Then late Wednesday night/early Thursday morning arrived, and it was the beginning of the end of everything that we knew or even thought that we knew as the stork delivery service made final preparations for arrival.

At first, Sarah was pretty sure that this was just another false alarm - like had been happening for weeks. Attempts (unsuccessful ones) were made at sleeping, and Charlie nervously left for work reassured that if anything actually happened, one of our volunteer drivers would pick him up from the store. This was totally a case of wishful thinking though. After a late dinner, it seemed like it was time to head to the hospital to meet our little bundle. However, labor hadn't progressed enough to be admitted since we live close to the hospital. Home for a night with even less sleep than the previous (ok, none this time), we waited until late Friday morning when we called for our ride to head back to the hospital. This time, we were far enough along to stay. Our future diva wanted to ensure a build up to a grand entrance though, so she decided to wait until Saturday morning to make her debut into the world.

Being born is exhausting!

At 6:45am on Saturday March 22, 2014, this little girl changed our lives forever. Now, we are probably a little biased as excited new parents, but we think that she is absolutely beautiful. If you think otherwise, just keep it to yourself. We are choosing to remain completely oblivious to any contradictory opinions.
Who could have imagined that at 6lbs 11oz and 20 1/4in long she would make as big of a splash as the big guy at the pool doing a cannon ball off the high dive? Somehow, she did.

Ready to head home for the first time.

We took our time getting to know this little wonder before the three of us were able to pick what her name would be. We had gone to the hospital with a short list of both girls' and boys' names, but none of them seemed to be quite right. It took until Sunday night for us to finally feel comfortable her name is supposed to be Elska Rose Teresa Sheffer. Now it seems strange that it took two days to figure it out since it just seems so perfect.

Daddy carrying Elska into the house.

The ladies at the Franciscan/Skemp/MCHS hospital birth center were absolutely wonderful for our entire time there. To say that we got a little spoiled would be the understatement of a lifetime. Lois, Tammy, Jamie, and the rest took fantastic care of us and didn't bat an eyelid at all the times that we hit the call button not having a clue what to do with this little person we're supposed to take care of. We are eternally grateful for all of their advice and suggestions that made for a much smoother transition to parenthood. Also, knowing that they're still available to help is comforting. (Side note about the birth center itself: the whirlpool hot tub is awesome. There aren't a lot of tubs long enough where someone 5'11" can actually relax in the water.)

Cheers for making a stinky diaper!

 We have been home now for a little over a week now. We do NOT have this parenting thing at all figured out yet. The dining room table is somewhere under a huge pile of clean laundry, baby gifts, and probably bills that need to be paid; we forgot to bring in the mail for two days this week, and it's only Wednesday; nothing more challenging that scrambled eggs or a sandwich have been cooked at our house since coming home; and the garbage didn't get taken to the curb this week. At the same time, we have learned a few things so far:

• Not immediately having a child's name decided causes a lot of people to freak out - and in a bigger way than not knowing in advance if it's a boy or girl. The instant access of the information age has caused a lot of folks to have no patience.
• Cosco greatly exaggerated the weight range on the car seat that we had purchased. There is no way that a 5lb baby could use that thing. This caused Mama and Daddy a lot of stress on a cold wet day. Cosco - we did not need the extra panic thank you very much. We might be able to start using it when Elska gets to be around 8lbs. We had to get and install a second seat in order to leave the hospital. 
• The level of sleep deprivation caused by college has got nothing on the zombie mode that a newborn can create. Also, it is amazing how long it's possible to stay functional under the circumstances. New babies should come with warning labels about driving though....exhaustion is probably more damaging to reaction time than alcohol. Just sayin'.



I totally forgot that now Mama will change my diaper!

• Hiccups during a screaming session are completely hysterical. You just can't keep from laughing at how goofy it sounds.
• Compared to the indignity of childbirth, nursing in public doesn't seem nearly as daunting as it did only a month ago.
• The time that it takes to write a blog post increases from minutes/hours to days when you have a small distraction who insists on being held at ALL TIMES. You can even see it in her eyes...the look says, "Peasants! Bow to my every whim! Move faster!" We have prevailed upon Aunt Katie to refine these diva tendencies. We are hoping to move to the more manageable Barbara Streisand mode from the current full on Diana Ross that we have now.
• It is possible to have a child prefer a wet/stinky diaper to the temporarily bare bottom required to change said diaper. 
• It is possible to fall so deeply into a pair of big blue eyes that you never get out or even want to.
• There is no way that we could ever thank our friends and family enough for the amazing support that they have given us in just the last few days. The prayers, meals, help with errands, and all the rest have made it possible for us to feel like almost competent parents.

 God Bless!

Projects in Progress

Rest in Peace poor little celery plant

There are a lot of ongoing projects at the Sheffer homestead. It is tempting to only report on the ones that are in the "somewhat" to "fabulously" successful range. However, that wouldn't really give an accurate picture of life around here. It's been a mixed bag. We've had failures, struggles, and successes in a pretty even mix.

First off, we start with very sad news. Today, the celery was pronounced dead. For 38 days, it struggled against the odds (since it was being raised by Sarah) but was unfortunately removed from all life support to go to the big Compost Pile in the garden. Through its death, it will bring new life to other plants.

The dreams it had of being a wonderful nourishing plant will continue on long after its death. This poor plant's sacrifice will be an example for all future celery plants. There will be a day when we have conquered the deep questions of the Celery Project, and we will prevail!

(Note: Yes, the picture just looks like dirt. That's really all that there is to see. We held out hope that something.....anything would grow. Once it became apparent that there was nothing left living in the pot, we did have to finally give up hope of this project working out for us.)

Also on the failure list, we have to put just about all cleaning and organizing. We have both been pretty emotionally spent lately and not had the energy to get it all done. The dust bunnies are in danger of reaching alarming size though, and Sarah is really tired of the pictures and paintings being propped up in a corner instead of on the wall. Hopefully this will be able to be moved into the "making progress" category soon.

Sarah has begun work on a couple of new growing projects. Last week, we planted pepper seeds in hopes that they will be able to germinate. They did come from store bought peppers, so we are hoping that it will be possible to get them to grow. There's no picture of that project right now since it's only been a week, and there's not too much interesting about egg cartons full of dirt.

Also in the grow project works is an attempt to grow lettuce from leftovers. The stumpy bottom just went into water today, and we'll have to see how it goes.There's nothing much to report except that despite using a lettuce knife, there's a little brown on the tips of some of the leaves.

Ongoing in a non-growing related area would be the efforts to produce a delicious, 100% whole wheat sandwich bread. So far, the sticking point has been the sandwich part. Sarah has been struggling to get the bread to look like anything other than short stubby loaves. We continue to hold out hope that "this next loaf" will be the one where the magic trick is learned. Since some have followed the saga on Facebook, there will likely be a posting here that explains what actually finally worked (if Sarah ever learns).

Day 54

Finishing on a high note, there have been some project successes. This last week we were able to actually eat some of the green onions that we grew ourselves. We are still hoping that we can get some of the bigger stalks to go to seed, so we have more to work with. In the interim though, it was pretty gratifying (and super convenient) to be able to grab some fresh food that we grew ourselves right on the kitchen counter.

Also in the "W" column goes Sarah's efforts on the car's power steering. Sure, all that it needed was some power steering fluid, but as someone who doesn't know much of anything under the hood, it's a pretty big deal. Hopefully, the car will stay fixed from now until we decide to get something new (to us). Car repairs add up really fast!

Projects currently on hold until warmer weather arrives are the basement, the Man Cave, and the Comet.

God Bless!

Date Night!

Ok. So we're just getting a couple of $5 take out pizzas and watching a movie on Netflix. It's still a date night. Extra special? It was Charlie's idea. That's right. One very sweet husband suggested a night off from cooking dinner (and the extra dishes that come with it). Now we just need to get the vehicle out of the driveway - the warmer weather today has made the snow too slippery to get any traction. Who could have guessed that there would be a drawback to not having below zero temperatures for a change?

Last week we made an epic journey to Home Depot to get gardening supplies....potting soil and a few more lights. According to the recommendations, it's still a little early to start the tomato seeds, but we wanted to get some while the selection was good and we were thinking of it. It's way too easy to forget to start them and wind up not having time for anything but the much more expensive seedlings. Sarah got a tray of pepper seeds planted. The seeds did come from peppers bought in the store, so we aren't sure if they'll grow. If not, we'll have to pony up the buck and a half for some seeds at the store. It wouldn't really be the end of the world.

Charlie succumbed to the pressures of the Pig-tailed Mafia and ordered six boxes of cookies - five of which are now here and the sixth will be delivered shortly. Sarah had often wondered how so many boxes of cookies get sold every year (since she would definitely prefer homemade cookies)....and then she married one of those sweet guys who just can't say no to a cute kid. Apparently some work will need to be done to change this before we have kids old enough to take advantage of this. The teen years could get really rough.....

Sarah finally finished a major crochet project that has been in the works for months now. Yarn for the next project is currently on order. Should she be concerned that the folks at her favorite craft store now know her and ask about how ongoing projects are progressing? They don't know her name yet which she hopes prevents her from needing to be admitted into a 12 step program.

It seems about time to go get those pizzas....

God Bless!

Crazy and Calm All at Once

It is amazing how you can have both tons of stuff going on and nothing at all happening - at the same time. It feels like we have all this stuff happening, but when we actually look at the happenings of the last week or two, it's mostly just normal life...

Charlie started his new and more predictable work schedule a little over a week ago. He is still worn down from all the crazy foolishness of the previous months though, so he hasn't quite gotten to being in the groove yet with it. His work related stress has gone down some already though, and we are hoping that with another week or so he will start to feel more relaxed.

Last weekend, we went to a "Laugh Your Way to a Better Marriage" seminar with a few other couples that we know. For those of you who have never been....if you ever get a chance - GO. It was both very entertaining and has also resulted in a lot of really good conversations from things that we realized about ourselves and one another. Best part - THE GUYS LOVED IT TOO! We did pick up copies of the DVDs too, so we can watch them again when we need to be reminded of things.

So far this week, our big "event" was to pick out some of the seeds that we want to get started indoors for our garden this year. We decided to scale back significantly from what we did last year because we realized that we had taken on too much to start. As much as we really want to have that huge garden that provides us with all sorts of delicious fresh produce and yummy stuff for preserving, we need to build to it. This year we plan to continue with the berries, ramp up our efforts with the tomatoes and some peppers, and try to get some of last year's saved seeds to grow. It's not nearly as exciting as going to pick out all sorts of seedlings and bringing home a huge variety of things, but we decided to go with a boring garden if it means somewhat more predictable results.

The only other exciting news is that Sarah finally got her Shamrock Shake and is very happy about it. Really, it's the little things in life....

God Bless!