Just So You Know...

When coloring your own hair, if you should choose a color called "Navajo Bronze", be ready for more Bronze than Navajo.

When trying to cover said color with "Suede", be prepared for not just Suede, but- yes, this color is my own custom color creation- Suanze. That's right, some Suede and some Bronze together.

Although, not an altogether bad color, not really what I was going for either. Glad I wasn't brave enough to go with the permanent color!

Hello?

Yep, I'm still around.

We've had several sets of visitors, yard sale-ing (as previously mentioned), new schedules, and school starting. At this point, I'm just trying to make it through the rest of the week! As we get settled into our new routine, things will move much more smoothly, and I will be able to function a bit better. I have now had to retype about 15 words... apparently something else that has changed is my ability to spell.

More updates after I re-learn how to spell or have the common sense to use the spellcheck function, which I really didn't even think about until just now.

Sailing, Sailing...

OK, it really should be sale-ing, but that isn't a word and even if it were, I think it would be pretty bad in the grammar department.

We're getting ready for a yard sale around here. Next weekend we will be having a "Large, Multi-family Yard Sale"... at least that's what the signs will all say. Some girlfriends and I are going to be having a yard sale together on Saturday. For this week, that means a messy house... or at least a messy garage. Husband pulled bins down from the attic for me to go through and sort and I have been through the kids' closets.

It's amazing how much stuff there is around here! I discovered that most of the items that we had in the bins in the attic are clothing. Lots of kids' clothes. Like, all the clothes except the clothes worn in the first 3 months of Son's life that the kids have ever worn. Eek.

Let me just leave you with this to ponder... what am I supposed to do with the 21 pairs of underwear- all the same size!!- that my son has outgrown? More to the point... why did he even have 21 pairs of underwear to outgrow?

I Really Have Lost My Mind

What was I thinking?

Son's birthday was yesterday. Happy Birthday, 5 year old!! How did we celebrate? First I made a cake for him to take to school with him (he's doing Parent's Day Out over the Summer, and LOVES it!!). Spider Man was the choice for the school cake. Then he needed a different one for his family "home" birthday cake. Batman was the preferred superhero for that cake. Mix in presents, Husband and I spending the morning filming a segment to show at church, building a backyard obstacle course, 200 water balloons, and a trip to fetch pizza for dinner in a crazy storm, and you've got a pretty full day.

Today is Son's birthday party day. We started by being at the pediatrician by 8:00am for his check-up and immunizations. A rude way to start the day, I must say. Follow that with a flurry of quick trips in and out of a couple stores, home to set up the previously mentioned obstacle course, and cleaning-up the backyard and you will approach lunch. I now have just over 2 hours before a dozen 5-ish year old will descend upon my house, rapidly followed by a trip to Montgomery to fetch my parents who will be here for 10 days. I am still needing to fold laundry, dust, clean the bathrooms, steam the floors, and clean the kitchen. Yesterday is sounding pretty good right about now.

Now, I need to go finish the Transformers cake for the party. First I think I'll have a break-down. Excuse me.

It's That Time of Year...

Every year around this time, I feel the overwhelming need for change. And not just wear-a-new-color-of-eyeshadow kind of change. I mean change.
I think it's the Army wife in me. When we move, every 2-3 years, it happens about this time of year. When I have had both of my children, it has been about this time of year. Well... this year we are not moving, and I am not having any children.
Last year when I was in this same situation, I pierced my nose. This year, I have decided that we need to have all the carpet in the house replaced, the back porch screened, and the furniture in the family room rearranged. Guess what?! That's a whole heck of a lot of change to pay for! I decided that moving the furniture is easily done, and free. That was accomplished last week. The porch will be done in the next couple of weeks, so that will be fantastic! We will be able to go out and sit in the back without being attacked by bugs! Yay!! I priced out having the carpet done... I decided that I would go with having it cleaned for a small fraction of the price of replacement. Maybe it will just look like new.
We'll see if this will satisfy my need for change. If not... how do you think my eyebrow would look pierced?

Feelin' Hot, Hot, Hot

It's hot. That's about all I can wrap my head around right now. It's hot. I went to get something out of the bug and I almost melted onto the driveway. It' hot. I now need to go out and get the mail. It's hot.

By the way, did I mention that's it's hot?

Silly Songs

"The donkey on the bus says; 'He, haw. He, haw.'"....
"The man on the bus says; 'What are you doing here? What are you doing here?'"

Brought to you today courtesy of Daughter.

Ugh!

Sometimes it really stinks to do the right thing.
Especially when it backfires on you!

Shhhhhhh...

It's Thursday morning and all is quiet in my house.

Son and Daughter are at school, Husband is at work, and I am home alone. There are only the dog and her snoring to keep me company.

This hasn't happened in quite a while. I love it. I think I might take a little nap.

I Really Ought To Be, But I Don't Want To...

I am procrastinating right now. I really don't want to dust, vacuum, or clean the bathrooms. Instead, I'll share a short little story with you.

We were at the gas station yesterday and pulled up behind a convertible VW bug from the early '60s. Son told us that we should get a car like that. Husband told him that we already have a car like that.
Son's response? "No. One without a lid."

And now... I will dust.

I Did It...

I now am on Facebook.

Maybe I'll be better at that than I am about posting here! Don't bet on it though...

Food On A Stick Friday

Each Friday we have some sort of a family night. Previously it has mostly consisted of pizza and a movie, but the circumference of my waist was beginning to object we decided that it was time for a change. No pizza tonight, and probably not for many Friday nights to come. We have decided that it will be food on/ with a stick Fridays around here. Meaning, of course, that the whole meal will consist of food that is either served on a stick (see tonight's menu) or eaten with sticks (usually of the chop- variety). Our menu for tonight...
*Corn dogs
*Apple squares on a stick
*Cheese kabobs (cheese hunks on a toothpick, but cheese kabobs sound so much classier as if classiness were a factor at a meal whose main dish is a molded meat-product shoved on a stick, dipped in mushed-up dried corn, and then fried...)

I have to say, I think it was the most popular meal that I've made in quite a while. Long live Food on a stick Fridays!!

Wow! That's Wonderful Wednesday!

Today's Wow! That's Wonderful Wednesday...

Check this out... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY

I know that it's a bit long, but be sure that you watch all the way to the end. It really is wonderful!

Good Friday

I was walking into the house a while ago after putting the hose on the trees and thought, "Ugh. It is nasty humid, windy, cloudy, and just plain icky. It's too humid for me to be comfortable."

Then it hit me. I was suddenly so overwhelmed that it literally brought me to tears.

Here I am griping that I am uncomfortable because it's humid and I had to go out to water the trees so that they won't die. Today, thousands of years ago a perfect man was unfairly arrested, unjustly tried, brutally beaten and hung on a cross to die- I'm sure being more than just a bit uncomfortable- so that I will never have to die.

So really, who cares about the humidity. It is indeed, Good Friday!

Not Inherent?

Whoever said that the only differences between boys and girls are what we have taught them has never spent any time in my house.

At dinner this evening, Daughter graced us with a rendition of "Mary Had a Little Lamp". Shortly after she was finished, Son piped up with "So, let's talk about dinosaurs and blood".

And it's all what I've taught them?

Rain, Rain, and More Rain

The current weather prediction for our area is that by the end of the night tonight, there will have been 10+ inches of rain that has fallen over the last 5 days, 6 of which are supposed to fall this afternoon.

It has turned my children into wild monkeys.

Wow! That's Wonderful Wednesday

Welcome back, Wow! That's Wonderful Wednesday!
This week's wonderfulness...

Chocolate. In any form.

Enough said.

Updates and $22.48

Surgery went well for Husband. He is quite the trooper and is recovering very well. Surgery was on Friday, and Sunday morning he was sitting in church. Yay! He now has 30 days off for recovery. It's too bad (for me) that he is one-armed right now, because I can think of a million things that he could help me with if he had 2 functioning arms over the next month. Oh well. I will just enjoy his company while I do the stuff myself.

My mom is coming in from CA tomorrow and will spend 10 days with us. Her timing could not have been more perfect! Husband will still be recuperating and the kiddos will be on Spring break the whole time she is here. I however, have school, so it will be nice from Hubby to have a second set of hands to help out.

I went to Target this morning to grab some eye-cream (I am currently fixated on finding one that works well and doesn't cost so much that I will have to dip into the kids' college funds [but hey, at least they wouldn't have a wrinkly old hag of a mom!!] just the right one) and I wandered back to the garden department. I was looking at a wood bench for our back patio and I found one that I liked... priced for $22.48. It is made of ash, looks frighteningly like my dining room chairs, and was crazy cheap. After making sure that the numbers on the tag actually matched the numbers on the bench, I called a guy over to ask if that was really the right price suspecting that it wasn't. He said that if it was marked that way then that was the price I should get, and even wrote the price and his name on the tag. Of course when we got to the register it rang-up as $99.99, but they still gave me the $22.48 price!! I am so excited about what a good deal it was! I almost asked them to check the back for any more, but I thought that might be pushing my luck. Whatever, though! A $100 bench for $22.48! Awesome!! What makes it super awesome is the fact that it is just right for the back porch. Yay!!

Thanks, Jesus, for the gift of a good surgeon, my mom's pending visit at just the right time, and an awesome bench that we so didn't need but is just what we wanted! :)

Slice Em and Dice Em

Just to be very honest with you right up front, Husband does not like the title of this post. Just because I am ornery tonight, I am going to leave it.

Tomorrow will be a LONG day at our house. Husband has shoulder surgery number 3 in the morning. We have to be there at 6:15am. Ick.

When we were taking about the plan for tomorrow with the kiddos at dinner, we discussed that when the kids got in the car in the morning to go to our friends' house they would still be in their jammies. Son asked me if I would still be in my jammies too, and the most proper response that I could come up with was "I will wish that I was".

Anyway, I have to be up at pre-o'dark thirty 4:30am tomorrow, so I'm headed to bed. If you happen to be up at 7:15am (CST), please pray that surgery goes well and that they don't find any surprises once they get in there!

Really? In the Family Room?

Can someone please tell me exactly how toothpaste got on the inside of the recliner arm?

The bathroom toothbrushing room is completely across the house!

The "Grass" is Always Greener...

I was looking out my kitchen window at lunch today and I noticed that things are looking decidedly greener than they were a couple of days ago. Marvelous! As I was washing dishes I told Husband how excited I was that Spring was finally "in the air".

His response? "You do realize that those are weeds, right?"

Yes, Ma'm

I had a first today.

I went to the jeweler to have my pearls restrung.

Aren't I a good Southern girl?

Cleanse and Purge...

I have 3 things I need to confess.

1- I am blogging right now because I do not want to face the disaster that is my house.
There is not a single kid book on the book shelf, there are dishes to be done, and clutter to be de-cluttered. I don't want to do any of it right now, so I am doing this instead.

2- I was doing fairly well with "Wow! That's Wonderful Wednesdays", but now I'm not.
I wasn't very (not that I am now) consistent with blogging for a while there and I fell off the WTWW bandwagon. I am considering getting back on. What do you think?

3- I am in a funk.
My biology class is beating me down. I am pretty far above the class average, but I think the class average is WAY too low to be considered. I am only taking the class one night a week, for a 5-hour stretch (who thought that was a good idea??!) and I am finding that it is difficult to keep up with the amount of info that the instructor bombards us with on Tuesday nights. I leave feeling like my brain has become isotonic with it's biological surroundings and that for every piece of new information that goes in, an old one goes out. A nice method for your underwear drawer, not so much for your education. Oh well, this too shall pass. The true question is will I?

OK- Now that I have shared my funk, I am off to shovel out the house, scrub my face, get in my jammies, and settle in to see who makes it to the next round of American Idol (while having a glass of wine and some Girl Scout cookies). That should make for a nice end to a very long day!

Oops!!

I just logged into MySpace....
For the first time since the end of September!

Hope you haven't been looking for me there! ;)

Why?

I have been asked exactly why Husband was trying to look like a Jonas Brother (not one specific one, any of them would do). The answer is quite simple.

For church, of course!

He helps to lead worship in our middle-school environment and the opener last week was a song by the Jonas Brothers. What can I say? If you want to engage a bunch of tweenagers, you have to go where they go. And Husband did.

I have to say, he rocked the JB!!

On another completely separate note...

Congratulations to Anna on learning the fantasticness that is the strike through. May you use it often and proudly!

So Nice!

Things I love (possibly to be expounded upon later)...

*Fuzzy flip-flop slippers
*Wii Fit
*Silky blankets
*Front-load washer and dryer sets
*Automatically opening/ closing doors on an automobile
*Drive-up windows at the pharmacy
*Watching my 31 year-old Husband trying to figure out how to look like one of the Jonas Brothers

Who May I Say Is Calling, Please?

We got a funny phone call this morning.

Husband answered it without looking at the caller ID and found that there wasn't anyone on the other end of the line. After he hung-up, he checked the caller ID. This is what it said:

Phone Number:
305-474-9429
Name:
Scam Artist

What a funny way to start the week! :)

Hello, Honda!

We now own a mini-van.

I think I now qualify as an "average American Mom"- I live in the 'burbs (albeit the suburb of a small southern Alabama town and not a big city), I have a house with a picket fence, I have a great husband, 2 kids and a dog, and I drive a mini-van.

I have to say, I love my life! :)

A One Track Mind

I discovered something about myself today.

I simply cannot be Mommy and a rock star on Guitar Hero World Tour at the same time. Every time one of the kiddos' names is even said, I miss a note- and forget it if one of them is drumming on the others' head talking to me. Apparently the "Mommy brain" works more efficiently and effectively than the "Rocker Chick brain".

I guess that's a good thing.

Is It Time For Bed Yet?

Children amaze me.

For some reason, Son was up before I was this morning. When I got up at 5:10am, he was lying in his bed playing his Leapster so I can only imagine what time it was that he actually woke-up!

Whatever it was that caused Son to be up early was apparently contagious, because Daughter was up before 6:00am.

Needless to say, by lunch they were both complete disasters. When I put them each down for a nap (an hour earlier than usual!!), neither would actually sleep. Daughter eventually slept for about 45 minutes, but Son stayed awake.

It is now an hour after they are usually in bed and Daughter was just up talking about being "sirsty" while holding her cup in her hand. Son just went to sleep.

Please note that it is now 8:10pm and I am ready for bed. Why were the kids, that supposedly need more sleep than I do, not falling asleep at the dinner table? I'm ready now to fall asleep sitting at the computer!

It must be one of the perks of youth!

30 And Loving It!

So I was listening to the morning radio show this morning that I listen to just about every morning and I did something so out of character that I surprised myself.

There was a woman that called and said something that just made me mad. Before I knew what I was doing, I had picked up my cell phone and was talking to the call screener and telling her what radio station I listen to the show on. 30 seconds later I was on the air. I don't think I made my point very eloquently because I was so ticked that I could have crawled though the phone and rung the neck of the previous caller but I did present a different train of thought on the subject, and I think that's what mattered.

When I hung-up the phone, I was shocked that I actually did it! I rant over discuss the many things that I feel passionate about around the house and to Husband all the time, but I actually took this one out in public, and on a national radio broadcast at that!

I have to say, I think turning 30 has made me bold!

Extra Thick, Double Fudge

I have lots of brownie points coming my way. LOTS!!

My birthday is coming... I'll be 30.

There have been packages arriving by UPS and in the mail. I am the only adult home when these packages arrive. They are addressed to me. I know they are for me and I know they are meant for my birthday. Do I open them? No. I do not.

You see, we have a rule about gifts in our family. It is the rule in my house and it is the rule in the house I grew up in. It is as follows; If you find out what your gift is before the gift-giving event (in this case, my birthday) due to snooping or peeking, you do not get the gift, and it will not be replaced, therefore forfeiting your present. Harsh? Maybe a bit. But I will say this... it has proven to be very effective.

Here is where the brownie points work into the system. I could very easily open the packages and see what they are without anyone knowing. The packages come in the early afternoon- usually just as the kids are going down for quiet time- and Husband usually doesn't get home from work for several hours after they come, thereby giving me plenty of time to open, investigate, rewrap, and reseal the packages. Have I done any of this? No. I'll take my brownie points in the double-fudge flavor, please.

My Dad and I were discussing this on the phone yesterday and he asked me if I was trying to set a good example for my kids. I am not. I tried to convince him that it was my inherent goodness that kept me from peeking, but he just laughed at that.

Really? I think I haven't poked around because I am subconsciously blocking the fact that I will be 30. And do you know what's really rude? I was thinking that I had another week and a half before it was my birthday, but it's on Tuesday.

My how 30 sneaks up on you!

Intervention, Anyone?

I have shirked my duties.

I sit here at 9:22pm on a Wednesday night with a sink full of dishes, a chapter of Biology to read, a photo-essay on the Inauguration to compile, and the previously mentioned not-putting-itself-away-laundry to put away. Why is this? And, if I have these things to do tonight, why in the world am I siting at the computer blogging?? It is because I spent nearly 2 hours tonight playing Guitar Hero. By myself. I now have a personalized rocker. Her name is LuLu. She likes purple, pina-coladas, and getting caught in the rain.

Is there a 12-Step program for Guitar Hero yet? Not that I need one. I can quit anytime I want to. Really. I can.

Did You Know?

It seems that no matter what it contains, how long it sits there, or who it belongs to, four loads a basket of laundry will not fold and put itself away.

Trust me.

A Work In Progress...