Family.

Adam and Joanie came home for Christmas and lived with us for at least three weeks as they waited for their visas to come through for their move to England.  It was a full house with two four-year-olds and a baby, but I miss them and can't wait to visit.

The Beach.

Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, 31 October - 5 November 2010.
10 hours in the car with a four-year old and a one-year old.
Awesome.

 

My camera also broke at the beach, so I'm really glad I got a few decent pictures out of a mostly blurry experience. 

Birthday girl.

Growing up.

She's taking on water!

It's been a while since I've had to think about mathematical equations and such, but I very recently discovered a formula to brighten your day:  hole-y roof + torrential downpour = working on day off.  You like?  Me, not so much.  But squeegee-ing is kind of fun, especially in Shoes.  Fabrics and crafts.  The photo lab. The backroom.  Ugh. The backroom.  What a mess.  We pulled at least six shopping carts of sopping wet shoes from the salesfloor.  There were probably four carts from infants.  Thousands of dollars were lost in damaged large-screen TVs.  All but maybe one of our photo-processing machines, including two brand new ones, are swimming and they're not water-anything.  Awesome.  The hopefully-legal immigrants who've been repairing/replacing the roof the past several days and since o'dark thirty this morning?  Apparently, they didn't anticipate this afternoon's thunderstorm.  Poor guys.  They worked so hard and I'm pretty sure they're still there cleaning up.  We haven't had rain all summer.  Go figure.

Bath time.

I know you don't necessarily know Paris as well as I do, but she actually let me wash and brush her hair.  It's a miracle, man!  Her hair looked amazing.  Here's hoping it's somewhat manageable in the morning...

Adventure? Dilemma.

So.  This really isn't an adventure per se, but the new position I alluded to several posts ago has turned out to be quite...sweaty.  What I know how to do so far isn't all that difficult but the salesfloor is so darn hot.  I miss the comforts of Personnel's air conditioning.  Oh, and since the Powers That Be have terminated three assistant managers in the past few weeks, another assistant is in a potentially confidential location for military training, and the store manager is on vacation this week, we are exceptionally short-staffed when it comes to leaders in my store, meaning Zone Supervisors (me) are being asked to step up and assist in a more managerial way.  I'm not exactly uber-thrilled about that one.  I only know how to do a handful of stuff and I still spend some of my time answering (the same) questions (over and over) for the new me in Personnel.  I really miss knowing what I'm doing, but I really enjoy spending money, so if my Personnel position opens up again (it may be soon), I'm not so sure I'd apply to go back.  Except I really do miss my Sundays off... that's probably worth $2.40/hour right there. 

Also, Paris' new favorite phrase is "rippling pectorals".  She finally told me that she got it from Hercules.  Do you have any idea how hilarious it is to hear a 4-year-old say "rippling pectorals"?  Most definitely the highlight of my day.