Don't Count Your Chickens

If You Give a Toddler a Cookie. . .

2010-09-30T12:06:00.001-07:00

He will need a place to sit, so you will get him a barstool. Once in a barstool, he will demand some chocolate milk. After he takes a sip he will decide he didn't want it. He will throw it on the ground. Because it had no lid, you will spend the next few minutes mopping up the milk mess on the floor. And counter. And walls. You will leave the ceiling for later. While you're mopping up the milk, he will climb down from the barstool and disappear. So will the cookies. You will go looking for him and find him covered in war paint. You will learn he likes the colors blue and green across his chest and orange on his nose. You will spend the next few minutes scavenging for the marker lids. And probably the rest of the markers too. Better put away the crayons as well just in case. When you place them back in the office desk, you will find his stash of cookies so you will have to wipe out the drawer. Once done you will find the boy playing calmly in his room playing with his cars. Wearing only war paint. He will probably see the diaper in your hand and bolt from the room yelling, "NO! Poopoo Potty!" He will climb on to the closed toilet and sit demanding that you not touch him because he is busy. You will casually walk to toward the sink like you just need to touch up your face. He will call your bluff and bolt from the room. You will have thought ahead and blocked his path. He will have to be wrestled down and have his wrists pinned to the ground with your hands and his feet pinned to the ground with your feet. You will have to put on his diaper with your knees. When he is done getting dressed he will want to watch Mickey Mouse. You will put him in front of the T.V. believing you have 15 seconds to visit the loo. Once you are out of sight, he will decide to take off his shoes. After he has his shoes off, he will need a place to stash them out of sight. He will probably decide to place them up high where Mom can't see them so he will find a barstool. He will push the barstool toward the counter and climb up putting himself directly in front of the microwave. He will think he has struck gold. He will stash his shoes and then realize they need to be warmed up. He will turn it on. You will come in and find him calmly watching cartoons with the microwave on. You will find his shoes and replace the barstool. Now that the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse song is on, he will want you to do the closing dance with him. He will tell you to sit back down because you butchered the goofy dance. He will finish it alone. When Mickey is all done, he will decide he is hungry so he will run to a barstool. You will probably decide on the one with the seatbelt. Once he's in his barstool-seatbelt, it will remind him of his milk.
And chances are, if you give a toddler some milk--

he will probably want a cookie to go with it.

Would You Like a Spoon With That?

2010-08-17T18:18:00.001-07:00

My house is full of smoke.

"oh, is it dinnertime already?"

Yes, thank you for asking. I don't think I'm alone in this, but I may have just ruined our dinner. However, I may be alone in the fact that I ruined 2 dinners at once. That sounds bad. Letme rephrase: I killed two pre-dead animals with one stone. That's a little more cheerful, yes?

I've been doing this program called e-mealz. I signed up for it a few months ago because it took all the meal planning out of my day (or just gave me a meal plan since I can't remember the last time I scratched out a map for my weekly meals). I sign up for the service, they send me a weeks worth of meals, slap it onto a shopping list for me and "Viola!" done. In my case over-done. Hold that thought.

Today I felt like trying my domestic hat on. I do this every once in a while before remembering , "oh yeah. . . nope." I thought before cooking dinner I would quickly cook up some calzones for a weeks worth of lunches. I've made them for dinner several times. Easy shmeasy.

I heated up the oven, which already smelled of smoke since I guess there was some spilled food burning on the bottom of the oven. It was already heated, nothing I can do about it now, so I popped the calzones in, then started dinner. Because I was already smelling smoke, I didn't notice when my calzones switched from golden-delicious to coal-foot until the beeper went off.

Frustrated, I'm opening windows to let all the new smoke out.
I come back to making my meatloaf. I have never in my life made meatloaf because, generally, I'm of the opinion that meat should never be formed into a loaf, but I had my domestic hat on, it was on the list, and was feeling rebellious. It's "Mexican Meatloaf" so I added the salsa. All the salsa. One half too much salsa. The last half was supposed to be added at the end. My meat is not in a loaf. It's in a swamp.

Pete told me before we got married that he was an awesome cook. I thought we were set. Turns out he thought he was a chef because he could make a mean omelet. I don't like omelets.

I'm pretty sure my childrens dinner woes are his fault. Because, clearly, that's false advertising. At least when he married me he knew my main course was toasted o's with a serving of milk, spoon on the side.

Which is what dinner is tonight. I hope he's happy with himself.

The GR8 8 Sickaversary

2010-08-10T08:45:00.001-07:00

It's a good thing we've been married for eight years. On your first few anniversaries there is an expectation to do something extravagant like expensive dinners, carriage rides, or big concerts. When you've been married for eight years, stretching out on separate couches while spending the evening comparing sickisms because one of you has the flu and the other has an ear/sinus infection is perfectly acceptable.
Yep that's right eight years. And such a bummer that we were sick so I didn't even notice that our anniversary was extra special this year because it was 8-9-10 so I didn't have time to convince Pete that he should get me an extra present. I know. He'll just have to make it up to me.
I feel like now that we've made it to 8 we are a "seasoned" couple. Not like those newlyweds. Although the butterflies are still there, after 8 years, you have passed the 7-year-itch and now it's just smooth sailing from here on out. (Right?)
I think it's fun to watch newlyweds though. They are still not quite sure how this marriage thing works, and the giddyness is tangible when you're in the same room. A few days ago my newly-married Bro-in-law was saying how he is such a sucker for his cute wife's puppy dog eyes and is willing to get up to get her a bowl of cereal even if she is the one standing in the kitchen and he is stretched out on the couch. He thought it was a little unfair that he didn't always have that same power over her. Me and Pete just looked at each other and laughed our seasoned marriage smile.
Ah, But they are young yet. Pretty soon, Jared will realize that it's a privilege to be able to wait on your wife hand and foot. Just give him time.

Like maybe 7 more years. Then it should stick.

Happy Campers!

2010-08-09T14:37:00.000-07:00

My Mother may disown me after this post.

We spent Monday and Tuesday "camping" at Cherry Hill. It's probably the tamest variation on the word "camping" but the kids are in love and there are clean showers and bathrooms, so who's complaining here?
We were completely and thoroughly worn out by the end of day 1 since my kids have absolutely zero need to lay down and recharge their batteries, although we tried to trick them into it several times. After a full day of swimming they finally passed out at 10 p.m. and were little angelic creatures in happy camping heaven. But they are young. They will learn that there isn't really such thing.

Andrew and I climbed in the tent and lay down for a long summers slumber on our comfy cushy air mattress. We knew it was perfectly proportioned with air since the air cradled our limbs up high, but the trunk of our bodies sunk cozily into the rock earth. Perfect. We had only gone through two inconsolable toddler night terrors when the rain started.
That could have been soothing if we didn't feel it inside our tent just as if we were outside. Now we have all three kids awake and crying. Andrew jumps up off the air mattress which of course flops me flat on the ground and he flies out of the tent. In just his underwear of course. I'm whisper-shouting at the kids to take cover under their sleeping bags while their Dad is pantless outside yelling to his brother to help get the tarp on the tent.
His helpful older brother walks by and just pulls down Pete's drawers then continues walking. Let's hope there were no witnesses to that. So then I hear Andrew (re-drawered) flailing outside with the tarp shouting a few random "help!'s" out there for anyone else in the family. You might be wondering why I wasn't outside helping. Clearly I would have been, but the baby needed to be covered with a blanket so as not to get wet.
His bro Adam comes to the rescue and they get it secured within a few minutes. Andrew makes it back inside and falls back on the mattress teeter-tottering me slightly airborne. I laugh at my knight-in-shining-underarmor and tell him thanks. As we settle back into our sleeping bags we look up and notice the tarp is covering everything except for directly over our foreheads.
We spent the next few minutes silently enduring the slow drips above our eyebrows. Then we had a breakthrough:
"Andrew"
"Yep"
"I think I hate camping"
"You know what?"
"what?"
"I think I've always hated camping"

Then the mattress squeaked loudly while he tried to adjust to rolling over, sending me to a rock hard landing.

The relief is tangible. The thought of no more air mattresses and even less tents makes my heart happy. Just glad we found this out about ourselves now. Although there is a big stigma about non-campers. That they're wimpy. This is why it's been so hard for me to come to this conclusion for so long.

It's time to embrace my inner wimp. My name is Jodi, and I hate camping!

The End

Eggo Emergency

2010-07-16T08:31:00.000-07:00

I was thinking about getting up this morning, but not really ready to face the already arguing kids in the kitchen when The Boy brought me the phone with dial tone blaring. I turned it off and went back to contemplating the ceiling.
A few minutes later the doorbell rings. I sent the girls to look out the window. Every couple of days my girls have one or another of their friends show up early to play. I assumed this was one of those times. Shea comes back to tell me that it looks like a police man at my door.

I am a little freaked out. Not because I thought it was a cop, but because I assumed she had been mistaken and it was just a man she didn't know. I answered the door and the nice cop asked if everything was okay at our house. ???? They had just received a 911 hang up and wanted to make sure everything was okay.

Ah, the wonderful twos. My happy Boy ran up to the door in just his diaper smiling and jumping. I assured the police man everything was fine and explained the dial tone/toddler incident.

The Boy seemed awfully proud of himself this morning. Lots of laughing and running around after that. There is only two explanations to his behavior. Either he grabbed the phone and completely randomly dialed the three worst numbers to crank call OR the insistence that he have his morning waffles NOW has just become more than an entire family emergency.

I want to believe it's the first, but having seen how crazy/happy he gets about his Eggo's I may be more inclined to think the second.

Either way, I've decided the best course of action is to send him to Grandma's house for a couple of weeks.

You're Welcome Grandma!!

No, He Didn't!

2010-07-12T10:28:00.001-07:00

Oh, yes. Yes he did.

When my sweet little electric muffin said he was heading out to spruce up the garage, I was under the impression he meant tidy up and sweep.

It's great because ever since we moved in I've just been so bugged that we had absolutely no trace of ambiance in our garage. He sure took care of that. Hot spark is always looking out for my needs! : ) Now, whenever I pull in, my garage chandelier reminds me of black ties, sparkling apple cider, and garden toilets full of potted flowers. No better way to come home if you ask me.

Now I'm on the hunt for a matching porch couch, so if you get a whiff of any great deals, give me a call!

Magical Moments

2010-07-02T17:07:00.001-07:00

Truly, if I were a smart woman, I would never take a shower. I will explain.

Picture this:

A two year old, running rampant while Mom takes a quick 5 minute shower. (okay it's 10 minutes, but seriously, a 5 minute shower? who really does that?).He seems so innocent and so quiet while me or any other adult is within sight; however, Mom steps out of the relaxing shower then into the kitchen where she finds a brand new roll of paper towels. They are still stuck together, but unraveled across the floor. Mom's a little peeved. Mom follows the trail around the kitchen island and over to the end which is a large wad of about 15 still attached towels. It's sort of different than what you find at the end of a rainbow. The trail end/wad is damp and soaking up a pool of abandoned clear liquid. A quick sniff test confirms it's just water (thank goodness), but this is more of a large towel (or possibly one small shammy) type of clean up. Mom see's a little brown eyed, possibly pantless, but diapered toddler walking up and smiling. He gives mom a big hug. Mom is about to really put her foot down to let this toddler know she won't put up with this type of behavior and dang it if he doesn't almost qualify for a time out. (almost because he is awfully cute).
Before Mom can get a word out, little toddler get's a big smile as he looks at his artistic towel expression and exclaims,

"Ta-Da!!!!"

Cute, right? I know. The problem is he knows. He knows that I can't do anything at that point. What do I say to that? And where does this end? I am afraid he is going to have plenty of more magical "tada" moments in the future. He can't just claim "tada" and make everything okay can he? Of course not. And that's what I told him.

Or am planning to tell him soon.

Or maybe will tell him next time

Or when he's like 13, or something.

Because he does have dimples. So. . . . . .

Flat Iron Suprise

2010-06-26T08:47:00.000-07:00

I was getting ready for a friends birthday dinner yesterday. I decided to try something new with my hair. I've seen lots of women do really cute curls in their hair with a flat iron--I've even done it on my kids so I thought it would be easy enough to do myself. Things were going well too until I saw the back and decided I did NOT want to be Shirley Temple today. I'm a little old for that.
No worries. I will just fluff them a bit to loosen them up.

I guess Shirley Temple Curls don't fluff. They frizz. Time was getting away. I was getting dangerously closer to the running late mark. I hate that.

No worries. I will just flat iron the frizz so it's flat.

I guess frizzies don't flat iron so they're flat. They just frizz flatter. I had two options. Hope nobody notices my frizz hair or call in some reinforcements.

I called my neighbor Teah. Her hair is always cute so I knew she could help. I hung up twice before getting up the courage to call her for real. Doing your own hair is just something women are supposed to know on their own, so admitting that the only reason your hair looks the same every single day is not because you love it that way, but instead because you don't have a clue what else to do with it takes you one notch down on the "Real Woman" ladder.

Ugh. I hate being one notch down on the real woman ladder. She came over though and fixed it much cuter than I have ever done myself. I was now past the I'm running late mark and I still needed to finish getting dressed. I headed my kids out to the car 20 minutes before I was supposed to suprise someone who was 40 minutes away.

I wasn't a very good suprise. Once in the car I told everyone to stay buckled while I unbuckled again to run inside to find my blasted keys. After 5 minutes of stomping around fruitlessly Madisen stopped listening and unbuckled because she said she could find them. I scolded her for taking up more time than was needed and she didn't listen. She just walked in looked around for about 30 seconds then found them in my closet.

I love when the kids don't listen.

I was late. Big suprise. I had to meet Hot Spark at the restaurant, who by the way, was there on time for the big suprise. I told him I thought it would be a good idea to try something new with my hair. He told me he thinks whenever I get a new idea I need to call him first and ask his opinion. I told him "but you never like my ideas." He just nodded and said "uh-huh" like I was missing something big. I sort of think that if a Man expects his woman to be on time that somehow he is violating the woman code.

And I hate violating the woman code.

Guy Code

2010-06-23T08:41:00.000-07:00

Our ol' trusty van has apparently seen better days. We didn't pass safety inspections yesterday because our sway bar on the passenger side isn't working. Raise of hands of who even knows what a sway bar is?

I hope I'm not the only one. Pete says I violated the guy code. When Jiffy Lube man was listing the repairs we needed to bring our car up to par Pete was nodding his head like he understood everything, and probably even saw this news coming. So I turned to him and asked what the heck a sway bar is.

That's where I violated the code.

He didn't know what the heck a sway bar is either. He looked at me for a few minutes, then back at JiffyLube man before admitting he didn't know. So I asked JiffyLube man what it is. FYI it helps stabilize your car during strong winds. Hmm. Has that ever gone out on anyone elses car? I'm thinking they made that up. Anyway. Turns out you're not supposed to ask a question like that in front of another male. Pete claims I'm supposed to assume my "man" knows what that something is and that ""my Man" can take care of it.
I asked if it would have helped if I would have directed the question to JiffyLube man first so he could have answered it and Pete still could have looked cool (on top of being hot-handsome).
I guess that wouldn't have worked either. The guy code is strict. It was my job to look innocently at "My Man" maybe even with worshipping eyes while he nodded confidently at lowly JiffyLube man so that all the males in the waiting room could see that "My Man" was a M-A-N. (Puff up chest here).

Seems a little tarzan-ish to me. Also, seems a little harsh for the M-A-N who cried with me during "A Walk to Remember". But maybe this guy-code stuff is just way over my head?

Ice Cold Cuppa'

2010-06-23T08:40:00.000-07:00

t all started about 3 weeks ago. Well really if you want to start at the beginning you could call it the day they put out the "boil order". Or maybe even farther back into my childhood. But for this story we will call it 3 weeks.

I got a craving for some ice. Seems semi normal right? It's been hot and when it's hot, ice is nice, right? I had Lovetricity stop at the gas station to get me a cuppa'. A cuppa' the little crunchy ice. You know the kind. Like sonic has. The tiny little pellets. Mmm it was good too.

Then I had him do it the next day.
And the next.

Pretty soon, I was leaving the house with all 3 kids to stop at the "Top Stop" for the dang ice. I was even making others stop there with me. Because I felt silly to stop regularly for just ice, I started buying the 44oz size cups filling it full of ice, then pouring in about a quarter full of Diet Coke. That way I could pay for a drink, but really, who needs Diet Coke when you have the cold crunch of frozen water pellets?

?????

I know. It had surpassed my addiction for diet coke. That was my first clue there was a problem. The final straw happened soon after. I stopped after my girls swimming lesson to pick up my usual. I filled my first 44oz with ice then a touch of DC. It wasn't enough for me. I thought about the long night ahead, and how many hours I would be without my precious ice, and I did it.

I double iced it.

A SECOND CUP!! OF ICE!! WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME?????

I've always loved crunching ice, but never needed it. At least not like this. I've been trying to figure out my problem. Maybe I am a little dehydrated? Since the stupid water boil order happened down here I have seriously cut down on my water drinking. Not because it isn't safe to drink still (because it was lifted several weeks ago) but just because I'm afraid it has permanently grossed me out. So maybe that is all it is? I need to come up with a solid reason for this because Andrew doesn't think I'm dehydrated-- just crazy.

What say you?

No Ticket Please

2010-06-23T08:38:00.000-07:00

A day in the life! Whoa, and it's been a doozy! You know those dreams where you're in a big fat hurry to get somewhere important, (in my dreams usually to do something fantastically noble like save 100 children from enormous crocodiles, of course) but your feet move slowly and every time you think you can get out the door some new obstacle comes your way and you have to take care of that before leaving?

That was today. Only not in dream life. For reals.

I would never dream of blabbering on for an hour about something (maybe) so I won't bore you with everything, but of all the obstacles to face on your way out the door gum in your daughters long hair has to be one of the worst. I know. But thank you miracle Goo Gone for being you and transforming a sticky scissory situation into a mere gooey hurdle. And thank you Misty for blogging about it a year ago or I never would have known it existed.

So I'm on my way to my destination approx 2hrs after when I should be there. I was just cresting the home stretch when I get pulled over by a dang cop.

Dang Cop: Did you know your reg. is overdue?
Me: ah. Yep.
Dang Cop: Also, you were probably going a little to fast.
Me. sigh* Yes.
Dang Cop: Were you in a hurry?
Me: Nope. I just came from further south where the speed limit was higher, and I was in a rhythm.
Dang Cop: Okay, just give me a sec

He walks back to the car to do cop like things. When he comes back:

Dang Cop: Do you know how to get out of a ticket?
Me: *eyes bright* uh. . . no?
Suddenly Dashing with Mysterious Handsome Eyes Cop: Don't lie--At least with me that always works. Most people try to tell me they didn't know their car wasn't registered, or they were speeding. I'm going to let you off with a warning this time. .
Me: Oh, thank you!!!

I Heart Cops : )

Boy was I happy the wardrobe gods planned for me to wear my cute pink shirt today!! I am too old to believe my looks in any way swayed his decision, but seriously the cute shirt coincidence is there, so think what you will. Everything was looking up Jodi!

I made it to said destination just 2 hrs and 15 minutes after appointed time! At least I made it. In superhero crocodile dreams I never end up making it. I just flop over and I end up awake on my lumpy bed sans hero medal. Nothing's more disappointing than swapping a medal for a drooly pillow.

I'm Rubber

2010-06-17T12:11:00.001-07:00

So we've started a budget. Dave Ramsey says it will make us rich. I now understand why so many people say budget is a four letter word.

1. F
2. U
3. N
4. !

Budgeting is super cool really rad stuff. Mostly I love seeing where all of my money goes. And goes. And goes. It's a slippery little paper. It's hard to hang on to when I see really cool stuff that I need. It's kinda like I'm rubber and cool stuff is glue, and the money bounces right off of me and sticks to the cool stuff. I can't help it. I like things. Being on a budget is kinda like when you go to the dentist and your mouth is numb, so you have to suck your dinner up through a straw. Nothin' get's through.
Not even the cute panels I need for my window. Not even my new couch. Not even Hawaii. Hawaii doesn't fit through a straw.
You know what Hot Spark thinks we should do with our money?

BANK IT!!

I know!! Ludicrous!!

But I didn't marry him for his brains people, just his cute butt. We've been on a "fun!" now for like 5 weeks. I figure we should be at our half-way point for richness. If I'm not rich in the next 5 weeks it may get crazy over here.

To speed up the process I'm starting a Get Me Rich Quick Fund. If you would like to donate just contact me and I will come by to pick up my check. If you donate, you get to be in a raffle for who gets to choose the location of my first of many vacation homes. I will even autograph a post card from said location once we're there.

Don't say I never gave you anything!

Does YOUR Car Have a Power Box?

2010-06-10T13:52:00.000-07:00

Sometimes my keys get away from me. It's very frustrating. They're like a pet that I have to take care of and watch constantly or they will wander away. Like I need anything more to take care of. I do have 3 kids, a hubs, a stinky dog, and my ego to take care of after all.
This morning I was in a rush to get Shea to her dance class. She has a concert coming up so it's crucial she is there on time. Guess what? I was ready to leave on time!! Point for me! You should see the delicious early morning scramble I have perfected and we're not even talking eggs here. I can actually brush my teeth, blow dry my hair, and get the boy dressed at the same time--true story. So we are all headed out to the car and I have my arms full of things for our after dance play date I've set up with several other Mom's. A few minutes later, we were still standing around the car, peering in at my cute little purse, holding my sly little keys, behind the silly little locked door.
"But, I was on time!" ( I may or may not have dropped the playdate things and stomped my foot like a 3 year old, but it's mighty depressing when you make such a herculean effort only to be thwarted by your devious keys).
Being thwarted makes me grumpy. My kids watched my face turn to a bright red while I held my breath so I wouldn't say bad words. They sort of backed away hoping to slink out of sight before mom went off. I was good. I only sad bad words under my breath.
I went door to door asking my neighbors if they happened to have the stick thingy that people use to break into car doors. It's good that it's daylight, and I wear Mom jeans or that could have seemed really suspicious coming from the new lady in town. My cute neighbor Brenda suggested calling the police because they have nothing else to do out here, and apparently her keys run away too so she's had to call them before herself. The convo went something like this
"Dispatch"
"Yes, I was hoping to have someone come and help me unlock my car doors, my keys are locked inside"
"Does your van have a power box?"
"Uh, no, I don't think so, I don't know what that is. . . so no"
"Do you have a button to push that unlocks the whole car?"
"Oh, like my keyless thingy?"
"Um. . . no. Okay, when you open your door, is there like a little button you push that unlocks every door in the van, or do you have to manually unlock each door separately?"
oh, the lady said "power locks." not power box. I just made the poor dispatch girl explain what power locks are to the idiot woman who locked her keys in the car.
"oh, yep. I have that : )"
And she sent an officer on his way to my house. While he was on his way I remembered I had gone to the park the day before and "oh wait? did I put my keys in the stroller?" sure did, so they were right there in the stroller, in the garage, outside the silly locked car. I quick called dispatch back, but I couldn't admit I found my keys outside the car so I just said "we were able to get the door open, so no need for him to come out." We meaning, me and my keyless thingy activated the power box.
After re-corraling the kids I was able to make it to Shea's dance only 45 minutes late to her hour long class. So much for getting ready on time!

Joe Schmoe Stalker Mosquito

2010-06-05T12:36:00.000-07:00

So, I am all happy about summer arriving and all that, but ever since the sun started shining on my house we have been stalked by an overgrown mosquito. Don't get me wrong, I like bugs just as much as the next woman, but this guy is enormous. Kinda like the size of my head, and then maybe even a little larger. I don't like him by my back door, I've told him this, but that's just the way stalker bugs are. They truly don't care about my feelings.
Every time I open my back door at night giant stalker mosquito does his best to flap his eagle wings and get right in my face. Last week, he ended up in the house. What he didn't realize is that I have a secret weapon. . . Madisen is excellent at "shooing" bugs the door. He's getting trickier though. Today it's afternoon time. That's like 7 hours before we even turn on his favorite porch light. That's why I didn't see it coming. I stepped outside without a thought and BAM! Right on my ear. He had me. I could hear him buzzing his "ha-ha's" into my ear canal. It didn't last long though. I couldn't squish this guy, not unless I wanted his gooey bug juice globbering down my face. Thankfully I have been blessed with girly reflexes and my jerky-squeal-wiggle was enough to get him to buzz off--onto my pants. This time it took a little more of the jerk, a little less wiggle, and a mad dash to the house before I lost him. I don't know what to do about this guy. It's obvious one of us has to go, and we haven't even lived in our house a year yet so I think we would lose money if we sold. So that means it has got to be him. If you've ever seen Monty Python, you would say, "obviously Jodi, a machete is the best tool for the job". But this isn't your average Joe-shmoe-mosquito.

The problem is, I haven't been able to find a bazooka on clearance.

The Pan Calling the Hot Pad Black

2010-05-26T10:32:00.000-07:00

If you were standing in your kitchen facing your oven, approximately how long would it take you to figure out that it's on fire? One second? Two and a half seconds? False. I figured this out yesterday. According to my calculations, if standing in your kitchen, facing your oven, and witnessing smoke billowing from the cooktop it would take 31.4 full seconds to comprehend "uh-oh" and then 2 more seconds before "For crying out loud WOMAN! Take burning pot off the stove before you burn the house down!!" actually registers. Maybe I should back up a bit and really get into the story:
So THERE I WAS: boiling a pot of pasta. When it was done I took it off of the burner and placed it on the burner next to me. I pulled the glass pan of chicken out of the oven and placed the pan on top of a hot pad directly on top of the hot burner. I know, I know. In my defense, it IS a glasstop so there were no obvious visual reminders and I am a reminder kind of personality.
I close the oven and stir the pasta one more time before emptying the water. A smoky smell reaches my cute little nostrils and I realize I've burned the dang chicken. Grr. Wait, the chicken is smoking. . . man, I really burned the chicken! Hmmm, why is the smoke getting worse, I guess I should pull off the aluminum foil and see how bad it's burnt. That's strange. It's not burnt. Then where is all this smoke coming fro-. . . . . . . . . . . . . ."uh-oh". . . . . . . . . . . . "For crying out loud WOMAN! Get the burnin' pot off the stove before you burn the house down!!"
The pot was not on fire, thankfully so I pushed it to the side onto a cool burner. The hot pad (poor thing) was completely black and smoking chimney's. I hate smoke smell in my house so I quick decide to toss it out in the fresh air on the deck. Turns out our sad little pad was, in fact, on fire. Oopsie! What, am I in the market for a new kitchen AND a new deck? So I have to pick it back up, run back inside, and drop it in the sink with some water. My neighbors must have love that: the crazy new lady next door tossing a smoking pad out onto the deck-pausing- then squealing and picking it back up to run back inside with it. Nice.
Madisen walks in, "Mom, are you roasting marshmallows for dinner?" Nope sweetie, just toasting my kitchen fabrics a bit.
Guess what? The pad was not the only casualty. My pan didn't make it either. But on the bright side the chicken DID make it so we were able to have it for dinner. It's unfortunate though, that after all that the dinner was just barely edible. It seems if I'm going to accidentally burn down my kitchen and then rescue it with superhuman zip-speed & precision I should at least be rewarded with a great tasting hunger satisfying meal.

I'll remember that for next time.
Sad little pad now awaiting a final burning in a more appropriate setting

Dead dish.^

Sick for Chocolate

2010-05-24T20:04:00.000-07:00

Boys don't do sick well. Okay not that any of us do, but I must say my little guy is awfully pathetic when he is taken over with a fever. But I tell him to buck-up since he IS almost 30 and all : )
No, really, I'm talking about poor little Jack-boy. One little fever and he's in constant need of cuddles. Not that I mind since I am a cuddle kind of woman, but for a little one that is supposed to grow up into a big strong man, well . . . .
The sad thing is, is that when they are this little and sick they can't tell you what is wrong so you don't know how to fix it. It's much better when they are old like maybe 27 and you know that the reason they are feeling so irritable, irrational, dizzy, snappy, fevered, angry, and a little bit nauseated is because they need some chocolate gosh dang it, so you should probably get them some NOW! Thankfully, my husband never has to bring me chocolate because I am rarely irritable and always even tempered. Even when I am texting him the exact isle he needs to walk down to find the cocoa-meds if he wants to even think about crossing the threshold to our serenly peaceful abode. During times like these I usually have to give him directions to find me:
Come through the door, ignore the chorus of "Moms!", jump over the unidentified sticky spot, duck under the monkey in the kitchen, wade through the laundry/lego/barbie trail, hang a right at the stinky-pants munchkin, and you will find me inside the closet, curled up behind the clothing rack in a very, very calm state.

This, my friends, is why chocolate exists. Oh, and the reason Husbands are so wonderful too. Not only because they bring you chocolate, but because they keep your hiding place secret while they battle the pint-size hoodlums solo, leaving you to partake of your melty-sweet life saving sugar rush in peace.

Now, if we could just find a remedy for the after-chocolate guilt. . . is there such a thing?

I Want One !!

2010-05-24T09:06:00.000-07:00

When you were a kid didn't you ever wish that you were a hamster?
I know, huh?
But your Mom would never buy you a giant ball that you could roll around the yard in. That's the problem with Mom's--they never think about how they are traumatizing us when they make the decisions to not buy us necessary ~~toys~~ youth experiences.
Thankfully, my kids will get to fulfill my lifelong dream of rodent rolling/running. Because I found this:

Okay, I guess first I need to decide if $60 is too expensive for an inflatable toy. . . but I now know how to buy my kids off if ever needed :)

Dear Nose,

2010-05-10T15:53:00.000-07:00

I'm sorry I take you for granted. I do appreciate the gooey reminder I've received. It's hard to ignore you when it suddenly feels like you have grown to take over my entire face. However with the scattering of gunk filled toilet paper tissue wads blanketing every flat surface of our home it's been impossibly hard to find the original source of the roll. Paper towels just don't have the pillowed softness of Charmin.
The gallon of O.J. I drank this morning was a relief thankfully, but I would ask that we can resolve this issue quickly so my Gourmet Mother's day cupcakes will stop tasting like foot when they look so gosh darn pretty. Again, please accept my apologies. I promise to pamper you with exfoliating masks, and never again say, "I would be a lot thinner if I didn't have taste buds".
(I thought you understood it was just a woman's bull-corn way to ensure she didn't enjoy sugared fatty snacks to the fullest).

Faithfully, Wishfully, and Worshiply Yours,

Jodi

P.S. Please be on the lookout for the rest of my head. It swam away yesterday and I have yet to find it.

Mother's Day the Right Way

2010-05-10T08:28:00.000-07:00

There's no better way to spend the weekend of Mother's day than by having my mom help me teach my girl's how to do girl's day out the right way--

By fourwheeling and Geocaching of course!

That miniature object in Madisen's hand was one of the cache's we found! I have an amazing eye for this, I tell you what! She found the ginormous gaudy ring on her finger in another cache.

My girls are darn precious. I like to use them to offset my helmet hair and squinty-into-the-sun eyes. They are great camouflage.

These views are why I moved down here ^^

I'm so glad they are getting older and loving hiking. . . it's going to be an awesome summer!

If Mother's Were Boats

2010-05-08T09:09:00.000-07:00

If mother's were boats:

They would fill up quickly with weighty obligations like, feeding, cleaning, wiping, laughing, growling, chauffeuring, homeworking, calm down count-to-ten-ing, shopping, kissing, searching, sighing, running, playing, and loving. At the end of the day the boat would be tipping and a silly innocent observation like "You've been sporting a mini butter handprint on your butt all night" could puncture a hole and the whole darn ship would go down.

That's why Mother's are not boats.

If mother's were airplanes, we would never survive. After all everyone knows that airplanes need two arms to function and no mother of young children I know has ever seen her two arms working together to accomplish one task since the birth of her first child. So alas, the one wing holding up the plane (or child), would be deserted by the other wing that is busy cleaning, wiping, calling, or weeding. The whole plane would quickly tip off balance and spiral down into a wicked crash.

That's why Mother's aren't airplanes

Mother's aren't doilies because doilies don't function right with a snag.
Mother's aren't sandpaper because they need to be soft.
Mother's aren't flower's because flowers are fairweather friends.

Mother's are capable of being split in two accomplishing several things at once and never skipping a beat. They can get their hands dirty sifting through the junk and still have a smile for their children. They are masters of wiggling any situation to ensure the end result can turn out right for their little ones. If it's muddy, wet, cold, or slimy, we've been there supporting our children's new found interests.

That's why Mother's are Worms.

At the end of the day, all that dirt doesn't really matter when we are sought out and wrapped up in the hands of little children.

Have a Wiggly Mother's Day!

Rag Rug Road

2010-05-03T08:58:00.000-07:00

I may have been working a little too much. When I got up to take a break from writing I realized my entire house had changed. I felt a little like Dorothy as I stood up and realized I needed to follow the Rag Rug Road out of the kitchen

Into the living room

and skipping down the hallway
and around the corner

and found this waiting for me at the end

"It's a rug party Mom! And you're invited!"

Because I honestly can't remember the last time I was invited to a rug party I was ecstatic to receive the invite to this exclusive event. For those of you who haven't had the opportunity to attend a rug party, let me give you a little tip.

You do not jump across the rugs like a road as I embarrassingly thought. The key to a rug party is the approach you take to sitting on the rug. The member only code for this sitting position is "criss-cross-applesauce". You gotta be quick otherwise once you have perfected this position the party is over and you are left alone on your rug, abandoned for a group of barbies who are in sudden need of a new hair style.

Don't make the same foolish mistakes I did.

Six A Stupid-M.

2010-04-27T13:47:00.000-07:00

My brain feels really squishy, kinda like mush mud pie and my eyes are filled with a globbery goo.

6:00 a.m. is a fine time, really-- if you're an owl maybe or an insomniac

for me though, before the clock hits seven oh oh, I sorta just wanna shoot the owl and throw a mud pie at the insomniac. Or maybe Pete.

Good thing he was gone when I got up this morning.

Bountiful Baskets

2010-04-24T10:01:00.000-07:00

Have you heard of Bountiful Baskets? It's a food co-op run by volunteers so you have to order a few days in advance, but you can get rock bottom prices on produce. I'm talking about .50 cents a pound! The catch is, you don't know exactly what you're getting until you get there. That wasn't a problem today!

I received apples, bananas, blackberries, a pineapple, tomatoes, red potatoes, spinach, celery, baby carrots, swiss chard, and a cantelope. Not a single thing our family wouldn't eat and it's about 30 lbs of fruit and veggies for $15 bucks! Not too bad I'd say! They also have add on's such as mexi veggies, tortillas, and whole grain breads and Peanut butter. I purchased 5 loaves of their 9 grain bread for $10. Not a huge savings if you're looking for cheap bread, but if you love the healthy expensive stuff like this then I saved between $5-8 dollars. Now all I need is a few days worth of meat to barbecue and my groceries are set. I love easy food!

Bountifulbaskets.org

"Oh, Hail"

2010-04-21T20:04:00.000-07:00

Just when you start settling in for a good rain storm watching, all hail breaks loose.

3 minutes this storm a'brewed, and this is what it left me:

I love watching rainstorms. But I really, really hate hail. Mostly I just hate when my kids cry because its so stinkin' loud, they can't nap, and especially when it leaves creepy clown smiles on my window. I hate that.

Does this not say creepy clown smile to you? ^^^^^^^
It must be intentional because although it isn't a good shot, if you'll notice the window pane next to this one is completely free and clear of any ice, but this one is ice covered except for this mad-happy contortion.

April Creepy Fools everyone! Mwahahaha

Nope. Not In the Loop

2010-04-17T11:56:00.000-07:00

When I was younger my dad absolutely REFUSED to do any sort of errands that weren't "in the loop"
That meant he would plan out a route to do our Saturday or Christmas shopping by driving in a counter or clockwise motion until we had stopped everywhere we needed to. If something was outside of this "loop" it would not be done. If we realized we had forgotten something at a store we had stopped at before, it would not be shopped for. That was it. No second chances.

I grew up very anti "loop". It's very limiting. No woman decides she wants to buy something without checking out at least two other stores first. It's flat out against the woman code. There was nothing more frustrating than knowing that although a store was less than two minutes away, because it was a little too much to the left, I would have to get him to drive me to that store on another day.

Sometimes you are given things you don't want. Such as underwear on Christmas morning. Or a box of used knives for your wedding, or maybe shots at the doctor. Or crazy genes from your Pop.

Confession:

Now that I drive, I HATE left turns. Hate them. When living in Salt Lake, I would do just about anything to get out of a left turn. Even, yes. . . . loop. I know, ridiculous ain't it? But drivers of cars are crazy, and there's lots of them, cars I mean, and they are going both directions, and who really wants to be bothered with looking both left and right before cautiously creeping onto a street? No one, that's who. Especially when it is just as effective, albeit slightly more time consuming, to drive around the block and avoid the left hand turn.

Where I live now is nice. Left hand turns are less crazy. Mostly you just need to watch out for skunks and antelope. They hang around the left and the right sides so, I'm warming a bit to the the thought of going left. It's not like I'm prejudiced about turning left, it's more of an affection for all things right.

I can't help who I am. Genes are genes, loop or not. Grass is greener on the right side of the fence. Just look at my neighbor's house.

Okay I'm babbling now, but I suppose what I'm looking for is a little "I despise left hand turns too Jodi, you're not crazy. . . it's completely normal." Or even, "I don't do loops, but every fourteenth step, I have an urge to hop" or something like that.

Some little words like those would be very welcome.

Jocabulary

2010-04-15T13:22:00.000-07:00

I'm writing a book. It's called Jocabulary. I feel it's necessary since I just came up with another brilliant quote, and I feel if this is going to be happening regularly, I better get my copywrites into a book early so no one can steal my stuff.
I was talking to Andrew last night and we were reminiscing and throwing out a lot of "coulda, woulda, shoulda's" . (I think that one is already taken). I finally got fed up with it and demanded:

"You know what?! All of that could have happened and it didn't. Sometimes you just gotta eat what's in front of ya."

It just came out. I didn't even pre-think it or anything.

"You know Andrew, It could have been a cheesecake, but it's just green beans. You have to eat it anyway."

Dead. On.

Sometimes you just gotta eat what's in front of ya
--Jodi Burnett

It Isn't Easy Growing Up Green

2010-04-14T09:47:00.000-07:00

Me: Shea you are growing up so big!

Shea: Nooo! I don't want to get big!!

Me: Why not?

Shea: Because I don't want to turn green!!

Slightly offended, I started to explain to her that although when I growed up I did lose a lot of my olive complexion and start to turn more of a pasty white/blotchy lavendar color, I was certainly not green. And there's nothing wrong with purple blotches, she likes polka dots doesn't she? There's nothing to be afraid of because I turned out alright didn't I?

She cocked her head to the side, not seeming fully convinced.

Shea: Because when I grow up, a meteorite hits and then turns me green and then I grow up really really tall

Ah, yes. Monsters vs. Aliens. Such a classic. Susan gets hit by a meteorite on her wedding day, turns green, then grows into a not so scary giant. If you don't allow your children the privilege of wasting away in front of the tube and it seems to you that this is obviously a case of too much t.v. for my child, think of this:

Does your four-year old know the word meteorite?

I didn't think so. But more importantly:

Does your four-year old know that when they are hit with a meteorite, they turn green, then grow up into not so scary giants?

That's what I thought.

Blueberry Swamp

2010-04-10T08:21:00.000-07:00

Shea is terrified of Shrek. She is afraid of his "green body" so when she sees him on the T.V. she covers her ears and closes her eyes, and gives off this high pitched siren/raptor squeal-scream. It pierces the ear, but is extremely effective since Shrek is swiftly removed whenever the blood curdling banshee sound is released.

Imagine my suprise when the scream normally reserved for Shrek was heard this morning after her seeing the special saturday homemade breakfast I made for her.

(Clearly these are blueberry muffins)

Wooowee kids! We are havin' ourselves a breakfast this mornin'!! Bring out yur spoons, and dig in!!

I think the scream was a bit of an overreaction. The extra burnt sunken in tops just add a fun swamp like twist to breakfast, and they only sort of tasted like fish. Nothing like Shrek. So I told her, if she acts so unappreciative, Mommy's not going make these nice homemade breakfasts from scratch anymore, and then she'll just have to stick to cold cereal.

That will teach her.

Life is Like the Spinny Thingy

2010-04-07T11:07:00.000-07:00

I was vacuuming out my car today. Productive, I know. I had the little hand tool attachment out and was on my way to a clean car when I came across some jelly beans on a seat. What's this? My kids know better than to eat candy in the car! They would never ever do that!! Okay, maybe they did. The point is, there was a jelly bean. When using the vacuum hand tool, with the little swivel spinny thingy, everyone knows you shouldn't vacuum up anything larger than a crumb because it will either get stuck and slow down the spin or just fly right back out.

Today I was ~~lazy~~ working very quickly and didn't want to shut off the vacuum, and disengage the hand tool, just to vacuum up the few jelly beans. I also found the garbage can to be too far away to adequately throw them away without completely screwing up my awesome cleaning groove. If you saw my awesome swiping motion with vacuum, you would completely agree with me: not a crumb left.

Anyway, you're leading me away from my point. I decided to seize the moment and vacuum up those suckers knowing full well the risks involved could cause me more time later (I'm such a rebel). You know what?! The spinny thingy got stuck. Made a horrid noise too.

With the vacuum still on full power, I flipped the spinny tool around so I could assess the situation, and make sure nothing was broken. Since the spinner was completely stopped, I carefully lifted it closer to my eyes to peek in. Wouldn't you know it?

The spinny thingy suddenly came full speed ahead and the pesky jelly bean flew straight out and whacked me right in the eye.

That's when it hit me. Both the jellybean and the life changing metaphor:

Life is like the Spinny Thingy.

It goes crazy fast and if you don't take time to slow down and take care of the little things, they may just come back and try to poke out your eye.

Now if I can just copywrite my brilliance so that whenever I see the quote splashed around the internet it can read:

Life is like the Spinny Thingy.

It goes crazy fast and if you don't take time to slow down and take care of the little things, they may just come back and try to poke out your eye.
--Jodi Burnett

I think a byline makes me look so sophisticated. Yes?

A Lecture, a Lesson, and a Tulip

2010-04-05T20:43:00.000-07:00

When cooking dinner, I get a lot of "ew, I don't like that Mom!" or "I don't want that!" and sometimes just plain "NOoooo's!" from my kids. Young picky eater's combined with my complete cluelessness with a spatula means I probably hear it more often than most. Today though, I HAD HAD IT! My girl's had been playing with friends for almost three hours, close to one hour longer than was allowed. I finally call over to my neighbor's house and am told they are on their way. I try not to be too hard on them when they are late, after all, they can't even tell time, but they are supposed to at least remember to ask their friends' mom's if they will tell them when it's time to go home. Madisen told me she forgot (convenient aye?), and I give a quick not-quite-lecture about the importance of coming home on time. When they follow me into the kitchen and see I'm cooking dinner, automatically the "I don't want's" and "ew's" come out in full swing.

"Out of My Kitchen!!" I demand. Sometimes it just gets that way right? A mother hen should feel appreciated by her little chicks every once in a while gosh darn it and today they better get ready to appreciate!!

Madisen start's out with a "but Mom, I "
"Nope, out"
"Mom, but I just"
"Nope, you were late, I just spent an hour cooking for you so you wouldn't be hungry, and I am not going to hear it tonight!"
the whine starts---> "No, but, Mom, just, I"
"No, I'm tired of this, you should learn to just say thank you for dinner, and eat it and I'm not going to put up with it tonight, so GET IN YOUR ROOM NOW!!"
tears rolling---> "but Mom (sob) I made this for you (sob) so you would be happy!!"

Do you ever get that feeling like you've been punched in the gut? I look at her hands holding out a little Popsicle stick with a blue construction paper flower and some random thread taped around it with "Mom" written in crayon. Ouch.

She was already running crying to her room when I recovered from the mom-shame. My daughter is forgiving. Thankfully. After a more gentle lecture than originally intended both Madisen and Shea came out to dinner a few minutes later officially humbled.

But not more than me.

Ah, that little one. This must be why the Lord sent me such a loving forgiving child. He knew I would need it when my temper and quick words get the best of me. I taped her flower to the computer monitor in a feeble attempt to make her see I appreciate it. After all, it is pretty darn sweet even if it did come with a hard lesson. Aren't little kid gifts the best?

Quirky Food Fights

2010-04-01T20:19:00.000-07:00

My kids are quirky. It's quite possibly Andrew's fault. They have issues with what they will allow themselves to eat. Pete still does not allow his foods to touch each other on his plate. Maybe he's afraid they will fight. Either way I've decided my next two examples are obviously directly descended from Andrew's blood pool.

I served the boy pizza tonight for dinner. He kept picking up his piece and then dropping it and crying. It almost looked like he didn't like the thought of his hands getting messy in the sauce. He was so frustrated I decided I would help him out by lifting the pizza to his mouth for him. Still he would cry and push it away. Dumfounded, I turn to Pete for help and he looks at me as if I'm missing something big here. He takes the pizza, flips it upside down so the sauce is out of view, and the boy picks it up and happily munches away. "He always eats it upside down, you didn't know that?"

Nope. I'm the idiot.

This next example happened last week in the car, and thankfully you all know I'm not one to pick on Pete or I might tell you, that again , this directly reflects Father parenting. I would never tell you that.

Madisen to Shea:

Q:Why are you're toenails all short and gone away?

A: Oh, because I eated them.

Don't you find it odd that one of my children will happily munch on something he found stuck to the bottom of his shoe and not bat an eye, but cannot stand to place pizza in his mouth unless placed precisely in the right way?

Don't you also find it odd that another one of my children refuses to eat ice cream, but has found a way to become self sufficient by eating parts of her body? I would never point fingers, but for the record, I am decidedly weird-food-quirk free, where Pete is afraid of a battle against lasagna and a cucumber. Just sayin'

Plunger Promenade

2010-03-10T12:19:00.000-08:00

There are some purchases that just shouldn't be made on their own. Sometimes it's necessary to pull random things off the isle and onto the cashier belt in order to cushion your embarrassment. Last night, I didn't feel like cushioning anything. I had no shame. The day was awful, one of those Jodi and the Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Day days. I kicked it off bright and early breaking my dishwasher disposal by bombarding it with leftover stinky potato peels. Turns out disposals don't like spud peels anymore than I do. I call my husband and he asks me to stop at the store to grab a cheap plunger to suck the peels out of the sink. Because I’m miserable with allergies today my eyes were bloodshot and swollen and my nose was full of mucus (stupid pollen), I decided to swallow my pride and buy the darn plunger sans any random item cushion. Let the cashier think what she will. I scoured the store for any sign of a plunger. I didn't dare ask for help; wandering the isles alone with a clearly-sick face and asking for a plunger wasn't really my cup o’ tea. Strangely enough I found them next to the kitchen cleaners in the far back corner of the store. Hmm. With plunger in hand, I wonder how I'm going to make it to the checkout this way without running into someone I know because this is one of the worst possible and therefore most likely times I would. I avoid the isles and skirt through the baby diaper and swimsuit section; head low, object behind back. I appear to examine a tankini while the last person in line finishes up. When I rush forward and place the plunger on the belt, I find I don't know what to do with my hands. I can imagine what she's thinking, so how do I act casual? How do I stop my face from turning so red and for crying out loud, how do I get her to hurry the heck up?! After she rings me up for the $3 vexation, she has the audacity to ask me if I need a bag! Of course! I'm not trudging the rest of the way out to my car exposed like this! I hastily grab the sack and turn to leave. I pass the next check-out over, and see someone who curiously resembles me, awkward stance and all. I pass slowly and peek over at her single item purchase: Pregnancy test-no other items. Our eyes meet after she spots my plunger handle. I give her the courtesy look-away, and keep moving-- cowardly deciding to never again go the brave single purchase route- no cushion.

CSI: Jodi Robs Walmart Checker

2010-03-08T12:30:00.000-08:00

It's good that we are all such close friends around here. This way I feel like I can spill my deep dark secrets. Like the fact that by day I participate in thievery. Hold that thought.

It's no wonder I despise grocery shopping. I never make it all the way through without incident. Today was a relatively short shopping trip, I had a list and everything. At about the half hour mark, the poor boy had fallen asleep in the cart seat. We had no jackets with us to cushion his poor little head (darn this warm weather), so in order to lessen the times his forehead clonked on the cart handle, we decided to skeedadle to the checkout.
Now, recently Andrew and I have come across Dave Ramsey and his book "Total Money Makeover". We've been following his wickedly simple advice, which in part involves using envelopes for expenditures like groceries. So on my way out today, I grabbed the little "grocery envelope". In order to head off a tantrum storm, I allowed my kids to talk me into an extra box of plain pasta (apparently the thought of anything but elbow macaroni was just unbearable to Shea). Plain pasta can't hurt, right? It's a dollar a box, Jack's ready to clunk his noggin again, let's avoid the whine/mom explanation/fit fest, grab another box and just get the heck out of here.
So at the check out, get this: I'm $0.73 cents short. Are you kidding me? I do a quick inner debate to decide whether I should use the debit card, or just put something back. Trying to stick to the budget, I grab the macaroni, and ask her to take it off.
The young checker smiles sweetly and refuses, stating she'll just give me a dollar. I try to quickly explain (the line is piling up behind me) that, no in that case I'll just use my card, after all, I have the money, I just didn't want to bother with the debit card when I was so close. To my horror, she pulls one straight from her own pocket, takes my cash, and rings it up.
Here was my dilemma: She looked so happy to be helping me out, that I just didn't have the heart to argue with her. However, I had the money and didn't like the idea that she pulled one from her own pocket when I really didn't need the tantrum avoiding pasta. And the part I'm most unhappy to admit, is that my pride was hurt more than anything. I was so embarrassed knowing everyone in line thought I couldn't pay for my food.
The whole drive home I felt horrible. What if she needed that dollar for her lunch break? Did the fact that I have no backbone mean I just robbed the poor checkout girl?

I've learned a few things from this experience:

If I'm using cash at the store, bring a calculator for crying out loud

There are wonderfully kind people in this world

Always carry coats for the boy to crash on if necessary, and

Pasta is evil.

So, did I just commit robbery? What would you have done?

There Once Was a Daddy Who Lived In a Shoe

2010-03-02T06:56:00.000-08:00

One time, when I was five years old, I was getting ready for school. I was trying to put on my shoe, but it wasn't fitting. It felt like a sock or something was shoved against the toe. I got my dad to help me, and he couldn't get it on either, which was weird since the matching shoe fit fine. He pulled my foot out and out crawled a ginormous daddy-long-leg.

Creepy eh? Daddy long-legs are huge anyway, but to a five year old ack! He was big enough that I did not squish him when shoving my foot against his body. The creepy bugger held his own.

Yesterday I was putting on one of my shoes and I felt something suspicious when I put my foot in. I jerked it back out and threw the shoe on the ground. Upon close (hesitant) inspection, I found the shoe to be free of any creepies.

I still couldn't put it on for an hour.

Soggy Scone Bandit

2010-03-01T10:08:00.000-08:00

The Setup:
A young, vibrant, intelligent, brunette, multi-tasking (yay, mom plug!) mother was readying herself for the shower when the phone rang. Leaving the water running, she steps out of the room to answer it.

The Crime:
Mother notices the pre-made scones for the family's weekly go cheap and easy navajo taco dinner have gone mysteriously missing.

The Evidence:
A chair left carelessly near the scene of the crime, and pulled against the counter indicates the bandit is disadvantaged by an unfortunate lack of height.

The Capture:
Ah, brilliant strategy used by the bandit: ducking into the running shower to throw us off of his scent so he can consume his soggy goods.

Unfortunately for this duck, his number is up.

The Punishment:

Mom's Motto: Go tough or go home. He'll never think of attempting this again.

This one is for Julie!!

2010-02-28T20:39:00.000-08:00

Andrew was really hungry this evening so he decided to grab some pepperoni from the fridge

He started to eat it, but:

Thankfully I was there to stop him.

I almost made this mistake yesterday, but fortunately caught sight of a crucial message printed on the back:

Crucial message ^^^

Whew! That could have been uncomfortable! So thankful for safety messages! So is Pete:

2010-02-23T13:43:00.000-08:00

Hey! Check out my new writing gig! strollerreviews.net

Wicked Sugared Conversations

2010-02-16T09:06:00.000-08:00

A few of you know about my battles against yummy sugary food. I have a strong opinion that it's of the devil. You may remember my posts here and here, supporting my argument. I know there's some of you who still think I'm some crazy lady who thinks food speaks to her. To prove my point, let's just remember the most evil of them all: Valentine's conversation hearts. Despite their slight chalkiness making most people question whether it's candy or an antacid, I believe them to have come straight from H-E-double-hockey-L's. I've lived almost 28 years, and still have not ever grilled up a plain chicken breast, only to see it embossed with "Kiss Me" across it's flesh. Never has my unassuming green salad spelled out "I love you" in carrots, nor has my rice cake flat out demanded "be mine". However, I have had some squishy green spinach try to come close to "I Do" only to shlop onto my plate, plainly stating to me: "Please Don't".

I'll let you draw your own conclusions.

Happy Sappy

2010-02-15T13:00:00.000-08:00

Get ready to read a pretty sappy post. Remember you were warned.

I saw a friend of mine I hadn't seen since we moved this past friday night. I actually saw quite a few friends I hadn't seen in a while which was super-duper awesome, because they know how to party (can you say Leatherby's?) Anyway, she gave me an awesome compliment, saying how when she's having a bummer day, she comes over to read my blog. I was seriously so flattered, and humbled. When I first started writing, I had no idea anyone besides my mom would even be interested in my stories. (After all, they're usually about me embarrassing myself in some way). I now have several awesome friends who come over to read regularly, some who I haven't even seen in ages. There are even some who I've never met, who read regularly, which, to me is incredible. I'm not bringing this up to brag or toot my own horn, I am just trying to thank every one of you who leaves comments of encouragement, or those who just stop by to quickly read. Your comments have given me the confidence to accept the Newspaper job which was offered to me, and also apply for other writing jobs (one I was hired for so far! ). I would not have any kind of confidence to do the thing I love most if it weren't for your caring words. So please feel comfortable leaving comments, I love to hear from you. To sum up my thanks I just want to say:

Thanks for giving a hoot!! You guys are the best!!

Wonder Where She Got That From?

2010-02-12T16:05:00.000-08:00

This past week Madisen has been driving me crazy with the question: "Really?" It seems after every thing I say to her, a "really?" follows whether necessary or not.
"Madisen, I need you to clean up your room before going to a friends"
"Really?" yes really.
"Yes, you will be 11 when your sister turns 9."
"Really?" yes. really
"We're leaving to the store, hop in the car"
"Really?" For crying out loud! Really!!!!
Yesterday I was putting laundry away and she came in and told a whopper of a story, that lasted several minutes about what sort of valentines she was going to make, and who she would pass them out to at school. I listened for a while, but had my mind on other things, and just sort of tuned out. When she was done, she seemed to expect a response. Guess what genius return I heard myself come back with? That's right folks.
"Oh, really?"

Yes, Mom. Really.

Losing it on the Cute Coat

2010-02-02T14:33:00.000-08:00

The day started out well. I had plans to go to my daughters school for Parent Teacher Conferences. An outing! A blessed, blessed outing. A reason to don more than a sweatshirt for the entire day (or week as this has been a very "inside" kind of week). To celebrate my coming out of hermitism, I pulled out the cute coat. The only coat that has any shape to it for on this day, my friends, I am driving farther than the bus stop. And who knows, I might see someone! Hurrah! So I hop in the car with my little boy, feeling good, and ignoring the fact I forgot to change my housecleaning, light colored, almost-holey-but-not-in-a-fashion-kind-of-way-jeans(after all I am in my cute-coat and I think they counterbalance to produce some sort of mid-grade hotness right?) and we're on our way. I pull up to the school and debate whether I should park close to the office where I have to check in, or the classroom where I will be leaving from. Office won out, although, close is relative: the only spot open was as far from the office that close could be. The Boy had a mild fever this morning as a result, I believe, of teething. For those of you who don't know him, let me just explain that The Boy is not a small child. He's a thick and tall little eighteen month old. So I'm carrying my chunky, but cuddly, fevery little boy and we tromp across the asphalt to the office. The boy is starting to get heavy, but he's so cute, and besides, genetics from my father's side has equipped me with appropriate Mamma hips. We finally pop in the office only to be told that it was unnecessary and they send us on our way to the classroom. We get to wait outside because Previous Mom obviously has no regard for other people's failing arms. I can't put the boy down because he has now taken a turn for the worse and is obviously feeling pretty crummy. So we stand outside in the frigid weather, me clutching the 30 squishy pounds to my body in hopes I won't drop his hot weight on the frozen concrete. Previous Mom really likes to talk. Ugh. Oh yay! 15 heavy minutes later, Mrs. E open's the door and P.Mom walks out. THEN IT HAPPENED!! The Boy (I'm sorry there's no nice way to say this) lost his breakfast. All over himself, his poor stuffed puppy, and yes cute-coat. Sad.
"Um, I think I'll reschedule. . . " I manage, and Teach laughs and says, " Okay, well, at least you weren't inside! Ha ha!" Hmmph. Cute little joke. She hands us a couple paper towels and takes the next Mom in line. Off comes the boy's coat and into the dumpster it goes. Fortunately cute-coat is not a casualty, so it gets crumpled up into a ball. Now I no longer have a 30 lbs toddler clinging to me, I have a 100 lbs (at least he feels that way now) ticking time bomb, turned outward just in case, and leaning slightly over cute-coat which has now turned pathetically into barf catcher. We get to trek across the never ending lot this way. What do you know? I did see someone today! Lot's of someone's loitering in the massive parking lot who were fortunate enough to see my my ample derriere sticking back at a funny angle so I can lean over ToddlerTime Bomb, who needs to lean over cute-barf-catcher. Thankfully we made it home without another episode. Once we get home, I stick the boy in the bath while I stretch out my gumby arms. When he's dressed, I lay him on the couch for a snuggle with his squishy 30 lbs, and droopy eyes. I decide tonight is a cereal for dinner night, and we both drift to sleep. Him dreaming of Mom of course *wink* and me: dreaming (of course) of a new Cute-coat.

Thankful For Thrones

2010-01-28T07:01:00.000-08:00

Shea leaving the bathroom this morning:

"Thank you, TOILET!!"

I've never thought to thank him before. Now I'm feeling so ungrateful.

It's Name is Freddy

2010-01-26T08:36:00.000-08:00

Madisen was completely upset with me when we moved and I had to pull her out of her school. She still talks about her friends at her old school sometimes, although, those times are getting fewer and farther between. Last night we realized why. Madisen was sitting on her Daddy's lap, telling him about her day at school, and her best buddy Freddy. She pulls his ear to her lips and says, "Daddy, me and Freddy are in love!"
I know what you're thinking, but despite all odds, Pete's eyeballs did not fall out when pushed to their maximum capacity.
He picked up his heart, put it back in his chest, and tried his best to just listen to her without demanding Freddy's last name, and phone number. I got to listen to Pete gripe about what a stupid name Freddy is and hear him randomly scoff "Freddy" throughout the rest of the night. I have parent teacher conferences next week, and because Pete isn't able to attend, he's demanding I address this to the Teacher. Short of homeschooling, he doesn't see any way to proceed from here. I am a little less irked by this. Mostly because I was a little girl once and know this is more about the game of "Wedding" than anything else. However, this Friday I am going in to her school. I am only going to volunteer, and observe of course, but if Freddy gets too close, I can't promise I won't accidentally trip him.

yes I did change the name of the little boy. I figure a few years from now, if she reads this blog, she will be happy I didn't post the name of her first love all over the place :)

Do Mom's Sweat?

2010-01-19T08:16:00.000-08:00

I can't stand parenting magazines. They claim to be supportive of stay at home Mom's and yet I've never seen an article about the stay at home Mom who doesn't work from home. Or the Mom, that rejoices if they vacuumed in the morning and it still looks vacuumed in the evening. Or the Mom who figured out how to one up her child over the dishwasher battle. The battle where Mom puts the dirty dishes in the dishwasher, but toddler feels each dish looks best dirty, under the kitchen table. I must say I know a lot of stay at home Mom's, but not a single one who could name what was taking place on any given soap opera. I truly don't know a single Mom who even turns on the T.V. during the day for herself. And while I don't know a single stay at home Mom who wears sweats all day every day, I don't think it's all that impractical of a uniform when part of the job is to be a target for flying snot. I do hate the cliche idea of the Mom who sits on the couch all day eating bon bon's. However, after a particularly snotty-cold week, I've made an appointment with myself, 3 years in the future. In September of 2013, I have made a date with my couch. After I send my youngest off to Kindergarten, I boldy plan to spend that day in my sweats, bon-bon's in hand, and Soap Opera on the T.V. Don't Mess.

UNUBWG's

2010-01-13T17:32:00.000-08:00

I've always been an UberNerdUltra BookWorm Geek. It's cool, I don't mind the title. My husband, rather than try to help me away from my addiction of all things literature, has chosen to feed it. He could do no worse than buy me the heavenly Ultide gift of the golden trophy, nay, the holy grail of all UNUBWG's. The Kindle. INSTANT BOOKS. Have you not heard of the coveted Kindle? I'm your friend, I won't judge. The kindle allows me to download books, wherever I am whenever I want, and have them within 30 seconds. Since recieving the Kindle, I believe I haven't seen my blessed, blessed husband, because my nose has never left the screen. It's my new little buddy, that I simply CANNOT do without. While blowdrying my hair, I'm reading. Walking, pulling laundry out of the dryer- one handed, because I'm reading. Waiting for Madisen's bus: reading. Making dinner: reading. Oooops.
Did I just pull a plastic plate of dinner rolls, out of the oven just in time for the plate to NOT melt onto the rack?
Yes I did.

It was Jane Austen *shrug* you understand. . .

Shea

2010-01-07T10:02:00.000-08:00

Shea: Mom, I have frogs
Me: In your throat?
Shea: Yeah in my mouth
Me: Oh, no! you do sound froggy. are you going to lose your voice?
Shea: Yes. Ursula is going to take it

Shea: When can I be a Mommy?
Me: uh, when you're 27.
Shea: or 28?
Me: even better.
Me: Why do you want to be a Mommy?
Shea: So I can cook dinner.

at first I was flattered that she looked up to me and thought watching me cook looked like fun; but now I'm kinda wondering if she doesn't feel someone needs to take over. . .

MY TREADMILL!!!!!

2010-01-04T18:46:00.000-08:00

DEAD like my microwave

DEAD like my garage door

DEAD like my car

DEAD like the ants.

But I had pizza for lunch!!!?!

Muddled Hot Husband

2010-01-02T08:06:00.000-08:00

Once upon a time there lived a woman. We won't get into specifics, but she was 5'3" with shoulder length brown hair, and 3 children. 2 girls and 1 boy. This woman had just come in from the frigid outdoors with rosy red cheeks after a full day of sledding with the children. Because it is the weekend the New years resolution of always keeping her home spic and span will be put off until Monday in favor of devouring a delicious new book. Time passes. It is now 6:00 p.m. and her middle child (though no less loved for it) came to ask about dinner. Although this child has just turned four years old, it is possible that she managed to come and ask what was for dinner while sporting applesauce throughout her hair on the top of her head. Okay maybe that happened the applesauce --------------------->
next morning at breakfast, the details are hard to say. Anyway, back to the evening and it's late, and this woman decides that her poor, young, starving children should not have to have pb&j for dinner, nor wait an hour for a full dinner to be cooked. She eye's her hot husband sleeping on the couch. The couch where he had been sleeping for just over two hours (after the long hard day on the sled hill). Enter bright, animated light bulb; flashed just above and to the right of the woman's forehead. Woman walks over to wake her hot husband nicely of course by poking him in the ribs. Husband sits up in a flash, looking from the left to right through his squinted left eye, and confused, ultimately grabs the remote and starts flipping through the channels. "No, no" this woman says, "I did not wake you up to watch T.V. I woke you up because you told me you were going to go get us dinner"
"Huh?" his reply
"you said you were going to get us dinner. I will go get your shoes"
"Bring the white one's" he says, and woman pats herself on the back for now it was obvious that her wicked plan worked and in his waking stupor he was unable to recall or not recall stating he was going to pick up dinner. She comes back in the room and he starts asking questions about where he was supposed to be going. This woman puts his coat around his shoulder's and says,"are you serious, you told ME you were going to go get something. I thought You knew where you were going." The eldest daughter say's she wants to come along and the woman replies she can hurry and grab her shoes and go along. He eyes the daughter wondering whether he had also said he would take her along. The man allows the woman to zip up his coat. Unfortunately, at this point the woman was unable to control her laughter after seeing his completely innocent, and muddled face. It made it unbearable how he was still standing up and ready to head out the door. Now further awake, He turns back and asks if the woman is lying to him. She's forced (through laughter) to confess she is. Ah, well, it was a good joke anyway, she says.
The moral of the story: It still holds true that it's best to make the man believe something is his idea. Even better if you wake him up and tell him his idea.
How did this story end? Seeing himself already dressed and ready to go, this man proceeds to go pick up dinner for the family. And they ate happily ever after.
I love happy endings, don't you?
Don't miss the sequil: The Next Morning At Breakfast

Lovetricity

2009-12-30T15:22:00.000-08:00

I realized the other day that I have just about NO pictures of HotSpark on my blog. I don't want him to feel unloved. So I stole this from my friend Kristen's blog. Doesn't he look sharp in a tie??

My One Year Blogoversary!!!

2009-12-22T11:03:00.000-08:00

One year ago today, I made my first post. *tear* It's been a short blog year, but full of awesome stuff. Like the time Jenny taught me about blogstalking. I couldn't have killed more free time without her knowledge. Like the day Misty and several others took me wiggle biking. Like the time/s I got to publicly embarrass my husband (which of course I am so, so sorry about). I would like you to celebrate my blogoversary, by having some of my blog friends BLOG FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!!! Sheesh. It's been several weeks for most of you, and months for a lot of you. It's hard feeling all alone around here.

My rant is done, so Merry Christmas!! only 3 more sleeps!!

this of course is not meant for those of you who have updated. To you I would just like to say: well done. :-)

Slurp

2009-12-14T20:43:00.000-08:00

MMMMMmmmmmmmmmmm. . . . . . yogurt.

"I'm not supersticious, but I'm a little sticious"

2009-12-12T09:21:00.001-08:00

I ordered some ants from a company in Utah for my daughters Birthday present ant farm. They arrived dead. Nobody gave them the "Arrive Alive" memo. Dead like my microwave. Dead like my garage door. Dead like my car.

I'm starting to get supersticious

I Am A Pioneeress

2009-12-10T12:48:00.000-08:00

Someone is trying to tell me something. The beginning of the week started out strong with me happily microwaving my daughters lunch, when suddenly: said microwave died. I thought it was just a little tantrum, but after several tries, and a few gentle fist pounds, it turns out it's dead. So the rest of the week I have been learning new ways to cook. I feel grateful for this experience, because now I can empathize with the pioneers. Cooking from scratch is hard, but worth it! Cold cut sandwiches are surprisingly good when you have enough condiments. Step one of me being a Pioneeress. Step two happened yesterday morning when I was opening my garage to take my daughter to the bus stop. It opened halfway, then stopped. Wouldn't go up, wouldn't go down. It was a cute little trick for early in the morning. I was so close, because I could walk out side and feel the caressing bite of -3 degree temps, but unfortunately we were unable to get the full experience via our warm van because it wouldn't fit out of the garage. The power in the whole house went out just long enough for Madisen to miss the bus. So I was able to empathize with those who lived way back when; those who had to walk to school up hill both ways in the snow. Madisen's school is 3 whole miles away, and there's a small hill at the end. It was snowing and took me a good half an hour to drive before I was all the way back home. Well, maybe 15 minutes. Step 3 cheerily came this afternoon when my car died. I was picking up Skye at the bus, turned off the car for a few minutes, tried turning it back on and it was dead. Dead like the microwave, and dead like the garage door. So we put on our trek faces, and trudged through the snow and 10 degree weather all the way home. Madisen complained it was far, so I told her to sing. Singing is very pioneer like. The bus stop is at least .20 miles, so I used it as an opportunity to teach my children. I feel now I have learned my humbling lesson, and earned a Mom bonnet in the process. This week of being a pioneer was hard, but I think, after how I've grown as a person, I can honestly say: It was worth it.

EHOW

2009-12-07T19:21:00.000-08:00

How To Decorate Christmas Tree

Step One: Kick self in bottom for promising children a fun night of decorating Christmas tree on same night husband is sick on couch.

Step Two: Plaster smiles and start anyway with cheery Christmas tunes in background
Step Three: Set up fake Christmas tree

Step Four: Take down fake Christmas tree, so you can set it back up correctly.
Step Five: Instruct children to help fluff tree so that although, you know, I know, and the neighbors know it's a fake tree, we can all pretend we're fooling someone.

Step Six: Keep fluffing
Step Seven: Keep Fluffing

Step Eight: Ignore complaints from children of too much fluffing. Check Plastered Smile.
Step Nine: Fluff again.

Step Ten: Decide the fake look isn't all that bad and quit fluffing before you reach the back.
Step Eleven: Carefully open delicate ornaments so children can thoughtfully adorn tree.

Step Twelve: Turn around to happily help place an ornament on tree.
Step Thirteen: Disguise bad word you were going to say as something else after you see that during the 30 seconds you were turned around your living room turned into a dangerous mine of colorful glass orbs, and sharp loose hooks. (must have been the one year old)

Step Fourteen: Realize you've lost one year old. Realize bare feet were not the best idea. Grab shoes, Grab one year old from inside of tree.
Step Fifteen: Rearrange face so it barely passes as a smile.

Step Sixteen: Ooh, and Aah, over how beautiful the large cluster of ornaments looks on the otherwise tall and bare tree.
Step Seventeen: Grab one year old from inside of tree. Clean up broken glass orb he used as a baseball. Hope frustrated curled lip is observed as a smile. Spend a few minutes helping children spread out ornaments so they are evenly spaced top to bottom.

Step Eighteen: Place Star on top of Christmas tree. Stand back so star doesn't bend back down and whack you in the forehead like it did a few moments previous. Grab one year old
Step Nineteen: Wake up husband for the initial lighting.

Step Twenty: Ooh, and Aah over finished product. Ignore the bottom half of the tree that is now naked due to the one year old.

Step Twenty One: Place one year old in bed. Grab Pepsi. Smile.

Flu Crew

2009-12-03T07:56:00.000-08:00

The part I love most about no sunshine and frigidly cold weather is how often our family gets the flu. I'm not counting or anything, but we are going on day 9 of being holed up in the sick house. 3 kids down zero to go. Me and Pete have a bet as to which one of us will go down first. Madisen has been flat on her back for so long, this morning she said she doesn't feel like bending. I don't know what that means. Why is it that you feel so much more maternal when you're kids are down for the count? Is it their sweet, innocent, vulnerability? How pathetically cute they look in their tight footie pajama's? Maybe that they are rendered incapable of the expert toddler trickery that usually turns a normal, well balanced, clean home into a messy mayhem where Mom is standing dumbstruck in the middle of it all, but the children are long gone laughing all the way? Hard to say. The upside of sick kids is you have an excuse to not make dinner that will probably just turn out as glop anyway. You can reward yourself with a night off from being StoveSlave. Blessed Pizza Night. Er, nope. Sometimes you accidently move outside of Pizza Man Delivery Parameters. Oops. Then what to do? We're not THAT rural. We have all the standards of a civilized society: Walmart is just around the corner, and McDonalds just a few streets away, so. . . . . . . what gives? I thought about contacting the city council and DEMANDING they explain this huge oversight, but the pony express doesn't make it's way out here for about a week. My fury might be gone by then. Instead I'll just work on my hermit techniques until this little Piggie Flu decides to take flight. Wish me luck!

Bleak Black Friday

2009-11-25T09:31:00.000-08:00

There is something masochistic about shopping the day after Thanksgiving. It’s definitely one for the adrenaline junkies. The black Friday shoppers can be classified into two groups. The first are the Planners. The Planners are wearing track suits, ear muffs, and gloves with hand warmers. You can generally find them toward the outside of the hungry, impatient pack. They see themselves slipping in the sides, while the mid crowd shoves ineffectually to get through the tiny door space. Their over-caffeinated bodies are bouncing slightly while they pour over the store leaflet, and then close their eyes to visualize where each item is located. No, the planners are not talking to you, they are mumbling to themselves about where each item is located, since they have already staked out the store’s layout the day before. They are aware of the route they will take to swiftly and efficiently acquire their haul, and have prepared back up routes if one way is too crowded. The Planners know ahead of time, which checkouts are 20 items or less or self checkout. They have planned not only this strike, but attacks on several other stores throughout the day at precisely planned intervals. They have their drive looped out since there is no time for backtracking, and know exactly how far and how long it will take to get to each destination. Their assaults will be quick and precise. No plans for lunch. There is no time. The Planners are shopping right on through to get the best deals. Then there are the Procrastinators. The Procrastinators plan little, and jump out of bed at 3 a.m. Their disordered manes are swiftly pulled into ponytails. No time for a brush. Procrastinators move in packs, and view all other shopper groups as the enemy. A Procrastinator is distinguished from a Planner by their offensive stance, and crazed eyes. Procrastinators spend the time before the store opening to size up possible opponents. The lucky first Procrastinators in line gloat about their first place spot believing this will grant them immunity from empty shelves. Procrastinators take a few different strategies. Some of them attach themselves early to a Planner, hoping to snatch whatever deals the Planner is moving toward. Others swiped a sale leaflet off the kitchen counter on their way out, and now have a few items in mind. They plan to use their energized shoulders and quick elbows, to help them find those items. When the doors are opened, the Procrastinators have no strategy against the whoosh of body inertia, but keep their eyes on the door knowing that if they can keep standing, this will soon be over. Once inside, the Procrastinator’s inner animal comes out. Their heads are low; their hands fast, grabbing at anything that looks like others might want; whether on a shelf or in someone’s cart. Procrastinators unfortunate lack of planning means, they are last in line at the checkout. Little hair is left in the ponytail, many are unsure of their friend’s fates. Procrastinators usually seem satisfied with their day’s tallies, although many will decide to forgo the mayhem next year. When Procrastinators leave this store, they go to lunch.

Thankful for Bald Bus Drivers

2009-11-24T21:54:00.000-08:00

Ooops- It's November. Not just November, but the week of Thanksgiving. Where did that come from? I'm supposed to bring a dessert to my family's Thanksgiving feast bonanza. It's like they don't even know me at all. If my darn camera wasn't broken, I would give you the wonderful picture of my Dessert Pre Thanksgiving Trial Run. I've never seen cookies so unhappy with themselves. It's not that they tasted bad, but I have enough self pride to not serve goo with chocolate chips to my family. Pete was nice. He kindly ate several glop's before letting me toss them-well, It, in the trash can. But it's the week of Thanksgiving. No gripes allowed. I'm supposed to give my list of things I am thankful for today. I am thankful for store bakery's. Post Its. My family. Cell Phones. Spare keys. Spare Spare Keys. Old Friends. New Friends. Books. And Old Bus Driver's. Not necessarily in that order. Although the last one especially stands out this week. We have a new Kindergarten, and new kindergarten routine. In many ways it's been great. My daughter rides the bus to school, instead of me driving 20 minutes to drop her off like before. When Kindergarten is only 3 hours long, that translates into about an hour and a half of more time between when Madisen goes to school and I have to pick her up. She loves the bus. She always sits by her friend Henry because he brings treats. He also gossips. Apparently Boston (a girl) and Frank are in love. "Yes Mom, Henry told me. He said it looked like they were kissing." Besides, the exposure other kids are giving my young innocent daughter, most days I love the bus too. Except for last early day. I was soaking up my post treadmill run shower, and lazily doing my hair when I realized: "Ohmygosh! It's early day!We have to go NOW!" It was 5 minutes past the time the bus was supposed to be there (around the corner a little ways) and here I was blissfully unaware that my daughter could be wandering alone and lost looking for Mom. I screamed to Shea to grab her shoes, and yanked the Boy out from under his nap (only in a diaper of course. perfect. ) and buckled them quickly into the cold car. I sped around the corner and spotted the bus. Phew. They were late. I was fine. NOPE. They had been driving around looking for my house, and gave up and just waited for me. Yikes, how late was I?? And how many other Mom's are waiting for their kids, because he wasted so much time at our stop? I felt like world's worst mother, but so grateful that he let her get back on the bus when I wasn't there. So I am grateful for him this week.
What are you thankful for?

Saturday Report

2009-11-17T18:01:00.000-08:00

Madisen burst open the door early Saturday morning to give us the report:

"The Boy's being Japan! The Boy is being Japan!"

What?

"Like this" She proceeds to jump up on the cedar chest, bend over halfway and leave her arms swaying back and forth as she says (in a deep growl) "ooh-ooh ahh-ahh! ooh-ooh ahh-ahh!"
Wow. The Japanese are strange. What sort of ritual is this ?And pat myself on the back if my son is so brilliant to be in the know at only 16months! As my brain slowly wakes up, I realize:
"Oh, chimpanzee! The Boy is being a chimpanzee."

"Yup."

She leaves the room. Comes back in to give us a new report.

"Now he's being Daddy!"

Pete puffs up his chest with pride. That's right!

She jumps up on the cedar chest again, lays flat on her back with her arms folded behind her head. Relaxed.

"Just like you Daddy!"

The Week Of Pete

2009-11-07T19:00:00.000-08:00

And boy was it! We moved to our new house this week. It's beautiful down here, and people have been awesome. The neighbors were even really friendly and welcoming. In the beginning at least. I thought we could at least go a couple months or so before people found out just exactly who we are but nope. I leave Pete home alone once and he exposes us. The old owners left us a tiny key which he assumed went to our mailbox. There was a big group of women standing outside in a neighbors front yard, and he thought he would be Captain Awesome, and go introduce himself. He shakes hands with all of them and gives his million dollar smile. Then innocently asks if they can direct him to the mailboxes. PAUSE.
"um, in the corner of your yard. . . . " they say. He turns around and sure enough, there it is. And wouldn't you know it: there's boxes in everyone's yard. He backtracked to explain how we had group boxes at our old house and the key looked just like our old mailbox key, but the damage was already done. Now we're out there. There's no hiding it anymore.
We moved in to a house with a field in the back. Nice big open space. And mice. Sometimes those mice like to find their way into a house to get warm food. And sometimes guys named Pete might spot them in their brand new home and try trapping it into a corner with their trusty dog Kona as right hand man. And rumor has it that Pete does a wicked impression of Michael Jackson slash wiggly jello slash screaming little girl when that mouse runs RIGHT UP HIS PANTS!!! Seriously! The inside of his pants! It was headed up to the buttocks before he was able to shake him back out. He's hunting with a vengeance now though. So gross! But also so very, very, funny. I might have laughed really hard for the rest of the night. Even all the way through the bedtime story for our girls, and the evening prayers. Turns out his eyes can really bulge when met with hairy rodent assassins. He got me back though. I asked him if he had seen my wallet because I needed to leave, and he told me he had put it (with all of my other necessities for said trip) in my purse, and in my car so that I wouldn't forget them. Pshaw! Like I would forget something. I stuck my chin out, rolled my eyes and explained harshly how I didn't need a babysitter. I was plenty old enough to get ready without someone holding my hands. I spun quickly to make my dramatic exit and went face first into the wall. I wasn't even kind of close to the hallway where I thought I was. Bad deal. Good week for Pete though. Yay PETE!

Boo for B.O.U. S's

2009-11-03T13:17:00.000-08:00

Boo for Halloween and it's unfairness. My kids eat candy and candy and candy and get crazy energy, which then leads to running around and burning off all of their candy calories. It rots their teeth, and makes them fall out, so what happens? They get a new set of teeth that grow in. What's that teaching them? It's no wonder why I never learned to not eat too much candy as a child. But I'm old now. Candy isn't the same for old people. We eat too much candy, we get sick and lay on the couch which leads to B.O.U.S's: Belly's of unusual size. It's not our fault though. It's the candy that pulls a bait and switch when we grow up. Ever notice how loud chocolate is? I never heard it when I was little. But you better believe it was screaming at me as I ~~snuck some from the girls bag's when they weren't looking~~ respectably purchased a small sample from the grocery isle. There was a dentist advertising last week he would pay kids to bring in their candy. I like that kind of motivation. If every time I wanted to eat chocolate, someone paid me 50 cents, that I could do. I think that would shut the Snicker's right up. "I don't need you, melty, crunchy cornicopia of sweet heaveness: I have a dollar. Take that!" (insert tough guy chest thrust here)

Below I will leave you with pictures of my little candy beggars:
This is Skye. She's laughing at my weak candy calorie burning metabolism.

Closest one of my little Jasmine AKA Sydney. Skye was a witch for her school party and Hedwig for trickortreating.

Jack, trying to escape after being forced into an embarrassing Mickey Mouse costume

We're faster than he is Mwahahaha!
My kids and their cousins. I wish we had better pics, but it's hard to get them to stand still when they know their about to be immersed in candy begging mischief.

Straw-ba-ba-ba-berry Breakdown!

2009-11-02T06:27:00.000-08:00

Unfortunately, having big sister's does have it's drawbacks. Like learning that when Strawberry Shortcake is playing for the umpteenth time, there can only be one thing left to do:

School Pictures

2009-10-28T12:27:00.000-07:00

I cannot believe how expensive school pictures are! It's incredible. The cheapest package Madisen's school was offering was $22 bucks. Guess what it get's ya? A class picture, a sheet of 3X5's, a sheet of 2X3's and that's it. yup. 22 dollars. For the package I would have wanted it was 38 big ones. I'm too much of a cheapskate to pay for that, but I had to get Kindergarten pictures in her uniform. So I was torn. Then in a moment of unexplained brilliance, I decided that I would get her ready for pictures early that day (she has afternoon kindergarten) and take her by walmart to get their $7.00 package which is only one pose (just like school pictures) but you get a gazillion photos. With 8X10's and 5x7's and the whole deal. I paid 7 bucks for a class picture, and $7.00 for all her school pictures. That's a total of a whopping $14.00 dollars. Pat. On. Back. Thank you very much. I love beating the system. Especially after being completely duped in my last post. What do you guys do for pictures? Do you even bother with purchasing them?

Pumpkin Fraud

2009-10-26T14:57:00.000-07:00

Kid's love the pumpkin patch. It seems likely since it's full of dirt and gooey messes. It's so fun to go and pick out the "perfect" pumpkin to bring home. Kind of makes me feel sad for all the other vegetables. When was the last time you heard of someone taking their families out for a special night of plucking the perfect radish? Just not the same. Poor radishes! At least radishes are honest. Pumpkins are living a lie. At least at our Farmers market. From where I sit to pick up my daughter from school, I can see the patch. I don't want to gossip, so I'll just tell you a super big secret that no one else is supposed to know: The pumpkin patch is a fraud! You're not picking pumpkins, you're lifting them from the dirt from where they were tossed after being shipped in on a little blue truck. Shipped in by some disgruntled worker who apparently doesn't even like pumpkins, judging by the way he was chucking them out of the truck bed. I hate to be the patch police, but I call pumpkin b.s. (bull snot of course). I feel so cheated! I HATE getting duped by the pumpkin people. Now it seems no different than going to the store and pulling one out of the box (which by the way is where Shea finally found hers after scouring the whole faux-patch and not finding one she liked).
I'm not going to stand for this kind of mockery next year. No one will make a fool out of this family! Next year we're going out for Halloween Radishes. Care to join us?

You see the little twig thingies they placed along the dirt to make it look like the pumpkin "grew"? FAKE

Don't be fooled by their masks of happiness. Underneath those smiling faces, they are just as upset as I am.

Snotty Boy Chicken

2009-10-22T12:21:00.000-07:00

So, get this: I'm in the shower. (Not NOW! It's a story!!) The Boy comes toddling in covered head to toe in tiny pieces of toilet paper. Kinda like feathers. The roll is stretched out across the bathroom floor. He looks like a tissued chicken. His snotty nose is blubbering down past his chin. This shower didn't last long. sigh. I get out, dry off, wipe his nose, and hurry to get dressed. My interest is piqued. Finding nothing, I conclude that the paper must be attached by some sort of booger-glue. Gross. I wipe the snot n' feathered child down and move on to cleaning the house. The kitchen first, where I scrub something brown and sticky off the floor. (Pepsi?). I finish the bathroom and move on to my mom's carpeted living room. That's where I discover the open syrup bottle . . . .

Big Break

2009-10-13T10:24:00.000-07:00

"Ahem." She said. I turned from the cheesecake I was pondering while waiting for the slowest deli meat cutter in the world to finish. I see a pretty young woman, about my height with make-up overkill, waiting to speak to me. After a quick mental check from me (are small tight black dresses the new standard for walmart? No, probably not) I cover up the child finger print mustard stain at the bottom of my t-shirt anyway, and wait for her to go on. "Your children are beautiful! How old are they?" Okay, now I know something is up. Not that I don't think my children are gorgeous, but do other people really think that when (after shopping for 3 hours and 3 different stores) their hair is skeewompus, their eyes are red and bloodshot because of 30 different crying spells, and their faces are covered in the chocolate m&m's I bribed them with if they would be good for "just one more store"? Do they? Seems suspicious. I tell her their ages and she laughs and says it's cute how they are hugging eachother. I look down. I'd say it was more of a headlock/deathgrip, but I guess she called it how she saw it. She gives me a feather-light handshake and introduces herself as so and so from some casting company. "We've casted for bla bla and High School Musical. Do you think we could set up a time when we could have them come in?" These children? I think. Do you see them with toungues wide open waiting for the sprinklers to spray down on the zuccinni? Hmmm. . . I guess that is kind of cute. "I don't think so" I say. "Really? Oh, okay. Well, take it as a compliment, your children are beautiful. . . " and she walked away. She is right about that I suppose, but I think what she was selling was a bunch of huff, and besides, shuffling kids around to casting calls doesn't seem all that much fun. Too much waiting. Kids wiggle when they wait. It's exhausting. When the sloth of a meat cutter was finally done, we checked out and went home. Fame free and tired. Do you think they'll hate me when they're older for making them miss out on their "big break"?

Jelly Belly

2009-10-08T09:42:00.000-07:00

How old are your children supposed to be when they stop believing you're the smartest person in the world? 13? 15? 5?!!! Five. Madisen's five and I've already lost it. I have no hold over her now, it's very depressing. I thought I could at least hold out until 8 or 9. No worries though, because she still thinks I'm awesome. She told me today I was NOT smarter than Jared (her uncle), but my brain was AWESOME! Does that seem like a sympathy compliment to you? I've been trying to rack my awesome brain to think of a reason for her shift from team Mom to team Jared. Could it be the fact that I spent a whole 20 minutes this morning making goofy sounds and faces to get her to stop playing the "copy-me" game? (she's got a killer copy-cat. ). No, probably not that. Because I sometimes forget things? No, I guess not. Ah, yes, I remember now. . . it must be because of last night when I lost the Jam lid. I made a pb&j for the boy. I went to put the jam back in the fridge and couldn't find the lid anywhere. Not on the counter, not behind me on the oven. Not back in the fridge, not on the floor, not on the counter where I had just barely looked . Oh! There it is: Stuck to my belly. Not the best accessory I must say.
Yup. It must be that.

Kinderdiscrimination

2009-10-07T07:27:00.000-07:00

Sometimes people are just rude. Sometimes those people are about 3.5 feet tall. I'll explain. I've always known that children are cruel. Don't spread this around or anything, but I may have been the target of quite a bit of cruelty in elementary school. I had crooked front teeth and couldn't play kick ball. It's amazing I even survived. Thankfully I had an awesome BFF Lindsay. She was the pretty, popular, funny, amazing at kickball girl. I was her oddball sidekick. We got along beautifully. On the way to school yesterday Madisen was telling me about her 3 pre-school best buddies. I asked her who her best buddy was in Kindergarten. Here's how it went:
Madisen: Well, everyone is in two's.
Me: In two's?
Madisen: Yeah like Kaston is with Cooper, and Jerzie is with Aspen, and Mayu is with Hola, and Brinley used to be my best buddy but now she plays with Sydney. I'm just one.
What?? My daughter is just one? What's wrong with these children? Can't they see that she's so much fun to be around, she's completely sweet, angelic, beautiful? She practically has "I am cool" tattooed on her forehead! I felt like marching into the classroom, to teach those children a thing or two about choosing their friends. They obviously haven't been raised right.
Me: what about Billy? I hear you talk about Billy. . .
Madisen: Um. . . Billy is by himself, he's just one.
Me: Great! Why don't you be best buddies with Billy?
Madisen: (sighing) O-Kaaay Mom, but, he IS the smallest person in our class. . . .

That's right. My daughter the discriminator. Unfortunately we just can't change some people's views about short people.
Upon closer examination of the situation, I've decided that maybe I went about this all wrong. I guess I probably should have said it was wonderful she didn't have a best buddy because it's great to be best friends with everyone. I can't help it though. All those years of tortured torment otherwise known as 5th grade 6th grade and 7th grade. I can't change the past; however, I can teach Madisen how to trick her classmates into gluing their fingers together. . . .

If I had a dollar for. . .

2009-10-05T19:00:00.000-07:00

Every time I needed a dollar, I'd be a rich woman. Also, if I had a dollar for every time someone told me I "never" answer my phone, I'd be rolling in the dough. It's always confusing, I think, "Wait, didn't I just answer my phone?" I pick up the phone every time I hear it ring. The phone rings, I pick it up. Just because the majority of the time my phone is left out in the car, or in my purse out in the car, or left inside my purse not out in the car, but in the dressing room of the store I last exited, does not mean I'm hard to get a hold of. Besides, who doesn't like a challenge? If I was easy to call, people would stop calling me because where's the fun in that? Don't get me wrong, I think cell phones are a beautiful thing. They've saved me from many a predicament. (Sometimes I almost run out of gas) It's just that a strong independent woman like me, who is always on the go, and in the mix of things (today I did laundry AND loaded the dishwasher. how's that for excitement?) can't be tied down by cellular leashes. Problem is, I want to have my cake and eat it too. Or make my calls and have you answer too. So. . . . . when I call tomorrow. . . you're um, gonna answer right?

Homeless Famous Waiter

2009-09-30T13:22:00.000-07:00

Wheeewwwwwwwwwwwwwww! Long time no blog! Where have I been you ask? Homeless. Concerned? Don't be. A nice lady took pity on us, and now we're living the high life mortgage free. It definitely has it's benefits. When was the last time you were able to blow your money on matching family snuggies just because you could? That's what I thought. My Mom's been bombarded with tantrums and snotty noses. Thankfully the children have been angels, or she probably would have kicked my Lovetricity out by now. (he really knows how to throw a fit) Kidding Pete. I want to congratulate all of you for being famous by association. Maybe you haven't heard, but I am about to be a published writer. I have a friend who writes for the Tremonton Leader who showed my blog to his boss, and now I am going to have a column published once a month in their paper! How awesome is that?! So basically all I'm asking is a teensy favor. I don't need anyone to lie, I just want you be honest and gush in the comments about how you can't live a single day without reading my incredible blog, and then buy each member of your family a subscription to the Tremonton Leader. You'd do that for me right? No? Oh. . . . well this is awkward. Well, it's time to pick up Skye from school again. This kindergarten thing is killing me. My days of carefree play-all-day living are over. Now I have to pick up drop off every day and I have to do homework! Now I know what real Mom's do. I've officially become a real Mom. I thought that had already happened when I turned from fun, social, Jodi into giant human napkin. Nope, I was wrong. It's when you turn from giant napkin into Mom of School aged child. Better hurry up and get going so I can wait an hour in the parking lot! Tata!

-Jodi. Mom-of-School-Aged-Child

Friends don't fit in a box. But they sure can jinx.

2009-09-21T12:04:00.000-07:00

I'm on the computer wasting precious packing time. I just can't seem to find any motivation, because it's a little bit illegal to stuff my friends in a box and take them with me. Cops frown on that. Phooey! We still have not come to the realization that we might be moving in two days. The papers are not signed yet and it seems any thought of the home selling will just put a big jinx on it. Speaking of jinx-Do you remember being young and "jinxing" your friends? If you were jinxed that was just it. They might as well duct tape your mouth closed because you were NOT talking. Tapping people on the shoulder, waving at kids you didn't usually talk to, raising your hand in class when you didn't know the answer just so the teacher would say your name. You had to. You'd been jinxed. You were held bound by the Jinx Law. No way around it. My friends took it one step further: "personal Jinx" . With personal Jinx you cannot talk until the person who jinxed you says your name. Then Oooooh Boy, you were in trouble. Might as well write the whole day off as a loss. My kids don't abide by the Jinx law. They're suspicious of Mommy coming up with a game where they're not allowed to talk. They think I made it up. It's not like I don't enjoy the shrilling music of one sibling yelling to the other, I'm just trying to have some quality time with my kids. They don't get it . It's those younger generations. They just don't know how to have fun anymore.*sigh*

Shea just told me the side of her brain hurts. . . do you think I could talk her into a nap to get rid of the pain?

Jodiisms

2009-09-18T17:31:00.000-07:00

I have a deep dark secret. I must tell it because ever since it happened this morning, Pete has been itching to spread the rumor. I have to get it out there in my own words before he has peppered it with all of his embellishments. Here goes:

I was putting on my make up this morning, and picked up my foundation. It crashed to the floor and spilled an ugly mess all over the floor. I picked it up and looked at it and decided it was a pretty clean break. I wasn't going with out make-up today so I stuck my finger in what was left of the bottle and dotted it on my face. As I started to rub it in a chunk of glass scraped across my cheek. I said Ow! pretty audible, although, I was too embarrassed to tell Robyn (whom I was on the phone with) what had happened. So now I have glass flecked goop all across my face and I have to figure out how to remove it without scratching up my entire facial epidermis. Trick is, I only have one hand because my other is occupied with the phone. After successfully removing all of the prickly globs, and living to tell about it, I hung up with Robyn and called my husband. Before spilling the beans, I swore him to secrecy and scolded him for leaving me home alone when obviously I need constant supervision. Unfortunately, Pete won't leave a good story untold, so it's halfway around his job site right now. So now you have heard it from me.

Another day, another Jodiism.

Potty Time NOW! or whenever

2009-09-15T18:56:00.000-07:00

I just got done at the burn clinic. Shea insists she needs to go potty. Right now. Can't wait. University Hospital is a happy little maze of skinny hallways, and too small signs. Can't find the bathroom. We finally find a little hole looking bathroom and try to open the door. It's locked. I keep jiggling and shaking the handle until it dawns on me that perhaps it is a one person only bathroom and some unsuspecting person may not feel comfortable about the frustrated door knob turns and 3 year old fist banging. Quickly we walk away like we didn't just freak somebody out. We hit the elevator button and get on with what I think is probably the scariest looking man in the hospital. Not too hard to do since I am usually suspicious of all old men, who are by themselves with scary dirty white beards, and holy flannel shirts. The elevator takes it's sweet time and I'm getting nervous about Shea. She is only 3 after all. When the door opens, Shea runs out as I am adjusting Jumbostroller to turn around and back our way out. I back right into someone in a wheel chair and stumble slightly on his feet-which are in casts. Nice. So I hurry to get out of their way so they can get around me down the hall. Turns out I went about hurrying the wrong way because they were trying to get onto the elevator where I was completely blocking them. So poor cast man gets thrusted forward by wheelchair driver and gets his legs almost stuck between the doors as they close. Thankfully Kindscaryman was there to catch the door and help him inside. What a nice fellow. Not like Thoughtlessmomlady running rampant through the hospital with Jumbostroller and potty dance child. So there we are on the main floor. Shea says she CANNOT wait and we rush to the next bathroom. She takes her time selecting from one of the 150 stalls until she finds the perfect one. Because she had a sucker in her mouth, I take it from her and put the stick end in mine to hold it while I take care of putting toilet paper on the seat for her and other things so her sucker doesn't get dirty. I know gross, but what else would I do with it? I get my hair all over it. I shut the stall door to wait for her to finish. Time goes by. Five whole minutes go by. I finally open the door to see Shea completely dressed and unpottied with one finger stuck in each ear. Apparently she was waiting for the next door neighbor to finish because she doesn't like the loud noise of the flush. Neighbor was taking a while. Shea gave up and we just washed her hands. And mine. And the sucker. There was no helping my sticky hair. Shea gets all excited about the motion sensored paper towel dispenser. So excited in fact that she's skipping out the door. She turns around to make sure I'm following and when she sees that I am, she turns right around and BAM! right into the water fountain. She took a spout to the chin. Bummer. It's time to go. And just when I feel we can't do any more damage, I walk out of the parking lot elevator slowly and unobservantly enough to let the doors close just in time for the lady helping two special needs adults in wheelchairs to not be able to catch it.

And this is why I don't leave the house. The end.

**to add insult to injury, the child didn't really need to go. not for hours.

And The Award Goes To:

2009-09-10T17:25:00.000-07:00

Me! I award myself with the "First Day Of Kindergarten Drop Off Without Any Mom Tears Because Sudden Bursts Of Overly Sad Emotion Throughout The Day Don't Count Award" Or simply known as the FDOKDOWAMTBSBOOSETTDDC award! Yay! It's not that I'm patting myself on the back or anything, it's just that I don't think anyone can ever have too many awards, right? First of all, I'd like to thank Madisen, who without her tears shed over fears of missing Mommy at school, my emotional heart-string-dry-sobs would not have been possible. I'd also like to thank her for leaving me at the classroom door without a backward glance, and for also telling me she didn't miss me at all upon pick-up. I need to thank the parking lot attendants, who wave their proud orange wands high and wide even though it's obvious no one is going anywhere for a long time. I also appreciate Shea, who was a necessary part in delaying the 571 cars behind us when she decided to take off her seat belt right when Madisen was placed in the van, setting off several frantic parking attendants flagging their little hearts out to get us to hurry out of the way. And lastly I would like to thank Madisen's classmates for already teaching her about secrets they shouldn't tell anyone else. (And the Joke's on you J****e because Madisen went ahead and told me that you do not in fact have a twin sister.) Thank you everyone again! I leave you with pictures of the cutest little kindergartner I've ever seen:

just turn your head slightly to the left until I can find someone more computer savvy than myself.

Underground Robbery

2009-09-04T16:07:00.000-07:00

I went to the Discovery Children's Museum today with my friend Crystal and her adorable kids. It's such a fun place. We bought a pass for Christmas so we've been several times since then.
Let me give you a little background info: A few months back Pete and me took the kids there and when we were trying to leave the underground parking we saw a sign: Cash or Checks only. Seriously? What year is this-1980? Who carries cash around? When did you last write out a check? And for a dollar? I don't think so. The Old Cashier Man gave us a good stern talkin' to about reading signs and yada yada. He finally gave up and told us he was taking down our license plate and we were going to owe him that dollar next time. That's right, we were shaking in our booties. Anyway, since then, I've remembered to validate parking inside the museum because it's one dollar instead of three, and I can use my card. Today however we stop to get validated and they tell us:
"well it's a dollar for up to three hours, but if you use a card there is a minimum purchase of five dollars. You can buy something from the store to make up for it. . . . "

WHAT?

ROBBERY!!! They WILL take money from us or they will NOT let us leave! What is this conspiracy? I'm a MEMBER for crying out loud! Haven't I paid my dues already? They know we can't use our cards outside, so they cook up this brilliant scheme.

Now I'm grumpy.

Watch out children's museum. You're gettin' a letter!

Looking Too Much, and Burning Hands

2009-09-02T20:54:00.000-07:00

We had been driving around for a while running errands the other day when Shea told me her head hurt.
"you're head hurts?"
"Yes"
"Why does it hurt?"
"I think I've been looking too much"

I know how you feel Shea. Sometimes I definitely feel I have looked too, too much.
Yesterday was a sad day. I had Shea vacuuming her bedroom when I hear the 'crunch-crunch' of something too big being sucked up. I hear The Boy start to cry. I start running down the hall, and Shea meets me and yells terrified, "Mommy! I vacuumed up The Boy!"
Turns out she did not vacuum up ALL of the Boy, but his hand did take a beating. He has a pretty yucky friction burn. We get to go to the burn clinic tomorrow to have it looked at. The pediatrician threw out some words like "could damage his hand" and "possible skin graph" Yikes! I don't think it will go as far as the graph, but I'll let you know how it goes.
Thank you Jared and Von for coming to the rescue! Doc was pretty impressed with the wrapping skills! What would we do without you?

Patience

2009-08-27T06:27:00.000-07:00

Do you ever feel strongly like the Lord is trying to teach you patience?
Do you ever wish you could hurry up and learn it so that you can move on to the next lesson?

Hanging Up My Chef's Hat

2009-08-25T18:34:00.000-07:00

WARNING! This post is not pretty.

Today I made pancakes. Put batter in a blender because I couldn't find a bowl big enough. Made several pancakes, all the way down to the end of the batter. Realized there was A LOT of batter left. Pretty much ALL the batter was left; stuck to the sides of the blender. We all had watercakes for dinner. Sad. But that's what kids are good for. Gobbling down your cooking mistakes. They like syrup. Lots. And when you add enough syrup and butter to watercakes, they're actually not too shabby.

Lesson Learned: blender+pancake batter= watercaked embarrassing blog confession.
Lesson Learned: syrup+butter= clueless children
Lesson Learned: water+pancake batter= not as easy as it sounds.

It may be time to give up my chef dreams. Hmm.

Blog Clips

2009-08-21T07:08:00.000-07:00

Time for another episode of blog clips:

Madisen and Shea had a very in depth debate the other day. No decision was made so I leave it to you for a vote. Shea asked why Elmo doesn't have teeth. Madisen replied that obviously he does have teeth you just cannot see them. Shea said, "Oh because they're black". Madisen rolled her eyes and tried to explain that, "No, Elmo's teeth are NOT black they are white just like ours. You just can't see them because his mouth is so dark." (duh).

Um, does Elmo have teeth?

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ever can't get to sleep because you have a case of the nose whistles? You try unsuccessfully to fall asleep, but can't because someone in the room won't stop whistling, then you find out the person is you?
No?

Uh, me either.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Does Madisen really have to start Kindergarten?

Poultry Predjudiced

2009-08-15T18:40:00.000-07:00

A rooster is a chicken. It is. The male kind. A hen is a chicken. The female kind. Both chickens; different names. So why is it then, that when Lovetricity asked me the other day:
"A rooster is a chicken, right? So does that mean we sometimes eat Rooster?"
My whole world turned upside down? Flowers are one thing, but I don't think a chicken by any other name will taste as sweet. Chik-fil-A definitely looks different to me now. Just because their cow's never say, "eat more rooster" does Not mean there are no roosters snuck between your buns, right? So many questions follow this discovery!Does the fact that I am repulsed by the idea of eating a male chicken, mean I don't care about the female one's? Are the female chicken's any less important than the males? Are others of you poultry-predjudice as I am?

Rooster Nuggets? Grilled Rooster Breast? Rooster Cordon Bleu? No thank you! I'm a Roostatarian.

My Name is Jodi and. . .

2009-08-04T16:28:00.000-07:00

I am a killer. A straight up, in your face, serial killer. Just ask my yard. The stories it could tell. I've heard of the green thumb. I always thought it was a myth. Never really paid much attention. After looking at my brand-new-just- five-days-ago-flowers however, I've realized not only do I not have any green appendages, but my thumbs ARE awfully brown and crumbly. Crispy like. I was told in ninth grade that all those crinkly lines on my hands just meant I had an old soul. Nope. Markings of a killer.
I may have misplaced my camera, so I've brought in some stand in pictures, so you can feel the pain like I do.
5 short days ago, we dug up a new homey dirt haven to place some happy plants in. I could almost hear them singing. They looked like this:

Sadly, under the care of ME, they now resemble this:

and this:

Although, mine are less "dead is beautiful" and more, "crisp like desert"

It's not as if I set out to do this. It just happened. I know, likely story. But I can't help myself. I feel sad for them. It's almost like they're gazing across the street with longing, thinking about how the soil is probably richer on the other side of the fence/road. Can't say I blame them. Erin's flowers are tauntingly pretty. I have one last weapon however. This time in their favor. "I can overcome this!" I think to myself, so we've layed it on thick with the Miracle Grow!
Ahem.

(This was of course BEFORE we realized, Miracle Grow isn't SUPPOSED to be layed on thick)

sigh.

Wiggle Derby

2009-07-31T07:12:00.000-07:00

Ever since I turned 27, I've really been coming into my own as a mature, responsible woman. I've started to see things in a clearer way, and have realized I need to have a plan in place for the future. Thankfully, I have some awesome friends who have helped me realize which way I need to go. They completely suprised me last night with a trip to Leatherby's. Which is, by golly, THE best ice cream place ever! And like any mature adult, Misty decided our night would best be spent, not by going home, but instead Wiggle Bike Racing! I have now found my niche! I am to be the worlds best wiggle bike racer! Darn it, I guess I'm going to have to practice lots and lots!
Oh, you've never ridden a Wiggle bike?
Baby, you haven't lived!
Our night just got started at 11:00 p.m. when we shoved the teenage make-out couple out of the way to start our races. Sonia "The Madam" Morgan was to start us off down the hill. There was a 90 degree turn halfway through, before we were soaring down the sidewalk at lightning speed. There were only a few crashes, but a gazillion screams. That poor couple, they had no idea what they were in for when they chose that park for "snuggling". We were just finishing up, when the Pops showed up to let us know wiggle time was over. I'm so bummed, because I didn't have my camera, but no worries! Just check out out Misty "Stay-at-home-Mom" Startup's blog(funny farm) And look for our team next year at the second annual Jodi's birthday slash Wiggle Derby!

scroll down (Funny Farm) to the last two pics to see our team:
In the top one left to right: Erin "goin' on green" Lundgreen, "Shakin' it" Sheri Vaughn, Jodi LaLa, "Stay-at-Home-Mom", and "A Penny for Your Jenny" Child's

Bottom Pic: Lia "Lovin' The Lighning" Goldsberry, The Madam, Goin on Green, Lala, and Penny for Your Jenny.

Best. Birthday. Ever.

Thanks so much to everyone who came, and I definately missed those who couldn't come, (ahem, Robyn, Jolene, Megan) it was a blast!

How About That?

2009-07-30T15:51:00.000-07:00

It's my birthday and stuff. I'm livin it up loca style. So far I've gone to the nursery to buy flowers for my front yard, cleaned my house and took a nap. All that and it's only 4:52 p.m. If this is any indicator for how the rest of the day goes, then WOW! Lookout! Hot Spark is taking me out Saturday. Who wants to waste their birthday on a Thursday? I think my day has shown, I know how to party. Thankfully I'm not over the hill for a while. My Mom's generation went over the hill at 30, so they have been on the frowny side for a while. Nowaday's 40 is the new 30 so I still have about 13 whole years before I have to buy doilies. Anyway, I'm sure Andrew has something spectacular planned for this weekend. I'm sure because he has to. My birthday is 2 weeks before our anniversary. The very first birthday I had when we were married I told him:
"Our anniversary is coming up pretty quick, so if you want me to renew our marriage contract for another year, you should probably think really hard about what you are getting me for my birthday."

Still to this day he believes there is such thing as a marriage contract I get to renew based on his behaviour. It's kinda like grown up Santa Claus I suppose. If he does well, he gets to live with me for another year! Seriously, how did he get so lucky?! Yay for birthdays! I'm not like taking names or anything, but if you wanted to wish me an awesome HB there's only like seven hours left.

Campin' Stuff

2009-07-26T19:15:00.000-07:00

We camped all week. It was fabulous!!! I love love love being dirty, grungy, and gross. Okay, the truth is I DO like camping I just don't like bugs. At all. It was very depressing to me to get bitten by a horsefly, and bring home a bazillion mosquito bites. (sad). It started out well though. We went down to Starvation Lake and started the trip off with a bang. The second we arrived we opened the car door and Shea stepped barefoot right into a cactus. Rockin'! I knew this was going to be awesome. The rest of the trip went really smoothly because I have an awesome extended family. Especially my cousin Callie's husband Charlie, who is super darn good looking, and didn't even ask me to write that into my blog. The sad thing is, I didn't take one stinkin' picture the whole trip. So you guys don't get to enjoy his beauty. If I had taken pictures I would put the picture of him here-------->
Also, if I had brought my camera, you would see cousin Travis shooting at bees with his pellet gun here------------>
You would see Lovetricity, hanging out on the rafts with the girls here-------->
My dog Kona diving under water for rocks here---------->
The Boy making a meal of dirt here-------->
And my natural good looks (even during a camping trip) first thing in the morning here------>
Isn't it almost like you were there? I bet you are jealous after these visuals aye? Since we've been home I've learned you can take the kids out of the camp, but not the camp out of the kids. We had an awesome meal at my Mom's house tonight. The Boy wouldn't eat a thing. He refused everything we gave him. After dinner, he stuck his nose up at the brownies we ate, ( uh, I mean Pete ate I would never eat those) but had no qualms about munching on a spoon full of ants. Go figure. It's all that camping. Turning him into a neanderthal. Well, no more news to report here, nope no more news NOBODY is having a birthday this week. No one. Not even me. If somebody WAS having a birthday this week it might be on Thursday. The 30th. That would mean there would only be 4 shopping days left. Hypothetically speaking of course. Peace Out!!

8oz Is For Wimps

2009-07-19T06:55:00.000-07:00

Now that The Boy is one he's been eating a little more.

He's a growing boy, what can I do?

Kissing Cupcakes

2009-07-15T12:02:00.000-07:00

Do you ever go to the grocery store hungry? No, right? Everyone knows that rule. If you go to the store hungry your food bill will go up and your waistline out. Not the best way to grow. I usually make it a rule to shop right after breakfast or lunch. However, since I wanted my children to eat today (I hate hate hate grocery shopping.. . it's been a while) I ended up arriving just before lunchtime. My tummy-growl check came back negative so I thought I could handle it. I was doing pretty good too, until I noticed I was making eyes at the Hostess. MMMMM, preservative chocolate cream cake. A quick self reprimand and I was back on track toward the milk. Only $1.50- Yay! When I hear a catcall, coming from behind me. I turned around determined to show the culprit I was definitely NOT appreciative( while internally noting that I've still got it) when I realized it was just the french bread, assaulting me with it's fresh, hot, scent. Now I'm feeling a bit dizzy and decide to get out before I end up embarrassing myself by proposing to the pastries. (love them) I feel pretty good now. I went in planning on spending about $20 and only spent about $50. That sounds pretty bad until I tell you everything I bought was on the list; I'm just really bad at cost predictions. Well, everything except the take-and-bake pizza that snuck into my cart who knows how? But I can justify that. Really. Just ask my friend Misty ("Funny Farm" blog). I can have pizza for lunch, because I didn't eat breakfast, and I'm going to run tonight. And it was take-n-bake which is probably less greasy and fatty than delivery. And, I mowed my lawn.
See? Learned my lesson.

Mmmm, cake.

Flack Attack

2009-07-13T07:04:00.000-07:00

I've been getting a lot of flack lately. A few people in my family have been flackin' about how I haven't blogged lately. So, because I haven't blogged all summer, You're about to get a whopper about how I've spent my summer vacation. Ready? No? Fine.

So I just took my facebook fortune this morning. "If you want the rainbow, you must put up with the rain."
I don't understand this. Why put up with depressing rain? Rain is not fun. It's soppy. Haven't you heard that famous quote:
"Life is about waiting for the storm to pass, not about dancing in the rain." And famous quotes are usually right. Besides I don't have the time to deal with soppy, I'm a busy person. Yesterday, I went to church, then took a nap, then watched t.v. with Pete, then went to dinner at his parents. Super busy.

So the point of this story is I did a redo. Remember being little, and when you didn't win a game or race, you would pout and shout RE-DO? It still works.
My new fortune:
"You are Talented in many ways".

Much better.
Thank you.

p.s. For those of you who have flacked: Yes I will blog about Jared coming home, and Jack's 1st birthday. He's 1 Hurray!

To Kill A Spider

2009-07-02T07:57:00.000-07:00

Directions for disposal of Arachnid-Hairius-Scarius-Maximus:

Step 1: Spot big scary hairy offender perched creepily on daughters sandal
Step 2: Squeal quietly so as not to alert children Give a full body shake to get rid of eeby-jeeby's
Step 3: Throw shoes mate from across the room in hopes it will land directly on spider sending him to a miserable squishy death.
Step 4: Say bad word.
Step 5: Grab vacuum. Place all attachments onto vacuum hose to make it as long as possible. Stand across room reaching with what you wish were"go-go-gadget" arms.
Step 6: Touch spider with tip and squeal a little as it walks away casually to underside of shoe.
Step 7: Say bad word. Take a deep breather and a little eeby-jeeby shake.Briefly consider asking daughter to come squish spider for you. Put on determined face. Step back in to battle.
Step 8: Holding breath, point inadequately short hose toward spider. Commit to not thinking about 8 disturbing legs. Place hose over offensive spider and watch his legs start to lift upward. Watch spider disappear into dark tunnel of death.
Step 9: Quickly drop hose before the dead spider thud hits. Jeeby shake, jump, and dance. Squeal loudly. Leave vacuum running considerably longer than necessary in case dead spider has any thoughts of haunting sequel.
Step 10: Run out of room to call husband and tell about brave war against arachnid. Embellish a little. Leave vacuum for husband to clean up.

2009-06-30T09:34:00.000-07:00

Thriving On Awkward

2009-06-24T09:21:00.000-07:00

We have people coming to replace carpet in our Master bedroom and basement today. I'm very excited. But I gotta say, I HATE having people come over to work on our house. I always feel so weird about it. I never know if I should hang out with them, or if I should stay away, and leave them alone. I don't want to be rude and ignore them, but I don't want to be crazy and look over their shoulders. Pete says I just over-think it too much. And as I was over-thinking his comment, I had an epiphany. You know how some people thrive on the drama? I think I thrive on the awkward! All this time I thought I was shy, but I think I just get a weird rush with making things awkward. I get butterflies when I go up and talk to Strangeworkerguy, and then stand around in silence because I can't think of what to say. "So, you come here often?" just doesn't seem to fit right. As it was all coming together, I decided that now I need to choose where I go from here. Knowing is only the pre-step. Then there's admitting that I T.O.A thrive on the awkward. Then you have to take action. Overcoming the problem seems like it will take too much work, so I've decided to embrace it. I'm not alone either. Here are examples of other's who T.O.A.

Oh, Rock, you silly guy!

Just because you're two headed, doesn't mean you can't be awkward.

And last but not least. Two washed up bad guys T.O.A.ing

Do you T.O.A?

Happy Birthday Mom!!!

2009-06-20T14:27:00.000-07:00

Today is my mom's birthday. It's super special because this time she's turning a whole year older. Not like a few years ago when we all celebrated her 48th birthday. We had cards, "happy 48th!" cake "happy 48th" and balloons "happy 48th". She went an entire year before realizing ( just before her "49th" birthday) that after doing the math she really was in fact only 47. She got to turn 48 twice. Not a lot of people have that chance. Anyway, today she did decide to turn 50. She marched right on up over that hill like it was nobody's business. I think she's kind of depressed about it. I don't know why. I told her 50 is not nearly as ancient as the 60 that's coming up here pretty quick, but for whatever reason that didn't make her feel better. So I was hoping, that if you read this, whether you know her or not, you could wish my mom, Rita, a happy birthday. Maybe then, she would be happy. And put me back in the will

Happy Birthday Mom! I love you!!!!!

20 Cents Addicted

2009-06-18T11:00:00.000-07:00

Today I did something I thought I would never do. I was on the way home from my girl's dance class and remembered I didn't have any diet coke at home. The thought of walking in to a store with three greedy children didn't sound very tempting, so I decided to go out of my way to stop at Chick-fil-A to get a Coke Zero. For those of you who are unaware they have to-die-for Coke Zero!
Out of my way? That's right. But not the worst part. I pulled up to the speaker and gave my order of a medium Coke Zero.
"Would you like to make it a large for only 20 cents more?" What? Of course not! Have you seen the SIZES of large drinks lately? Bigger than my head. I thought about all that caffeine I would be draining into my veins, and how the carbonation is awful for my running and I was grossed out at even the thought. I would rather not be 20 cents closer to addiction (because I am not addicted, by the way). Then I thought about all the stuff I was going to be busy with for the rest of the day.

"Yes please" I heard myself say.

I am ashamed. I supersized. I supersized myself right into addiction. It's time to face the bubbly-syrupy-aspartame music.

My name is Jodi, and I 20 centsed myself into addiction.

bigger than my HEAD for cryin' out loud! eek!

Right on the Head

2009-06-17T10:10:00.000-07:00

I love how kids see the world. Madisen is trying to describe to me somebody so I can tell her the person's name, but I can't figure out who she is talking about. So all of you people who have:

"had dinner with us a lot of times, but maybe like two times, and have a dog, and look like you have an oval head, but actually have a circle head,"

Will you please contact me so I can ask Madisen if it's you whom she is speaking of?

Thank you.

Learning To Skate

2009-06-13T16:37:00.000-07:00

Roller Skates?:

Check.

Strawberry Shortcake Knee Pads and Dora Elbow pads?:

Check.

Check.

Pretty Dress and Princess Tiara?

Check.
Now She's Ready.

Up the Crick Without T.V.

2009-06-12T18:49:00.000-07:00

From Comcast news today:

Television stations across the U.S. cut their analog signals today, likely stranding more than 1 million unprepared homes without TV service.

Stranded. They are just up the crick without a paddle. How will this turn out? What WILL all those 1 million people do? Can you imagine having NO T.V.? You might end up actually (eek!) talking to some friends. Or reading. It's such a good thing Comcast is keeping us updated. This is quite serious after all. I would love to see how it all turns out. It's like nobody saw it coming. There's nothing like a spontaneous disaster hitting so suddenly, a year and a half after everyone warned you it would. Yikes. Hope someone show's mercy and throws them a life line.

(or maybe a book.)

So we're clear: overuse of the internet is completely validated.

The Cereal Battle

2009-06-08T16:49:00.000-07:00

Does anybody else struggle in the cereal isle? I HATE the cereal isle. It's a battleground for my inner self. Do I buy the good healthy cereal that my children won't eat, but I can pat myself on the back for being such a good parent? Or do I buy the sugar loaded junk that my kids will eat, but makes me feel like I'm world's worst parent? Ugh! Last night I ended up with chocalate mini wheats, and some rice crispies. I justified the Chocoloate Mini Wheats by telling myself at least they were full of fiber. The crispies are lose-lose. No health and no sugar. It seemed a good compromise. Nobody wins. I spent 10 whole minutes looking like an idiot going up and down back and forth the dang isle over this decision the other night. WHY? I have no idea. It's cereal for crying out loud! Tell me I'm not alone please??
What do you guys do?

I Heart Pepsi (and Pete)

2009-06-04T19:59:00.000-07:00

This is why I love my husband:

I was very busy sitting here on the computer as Pete was watching the NBA finals next to me. Suddenly the urge for a diet pepsi was overwhelming, so I turned to him and frantically yelled
"quick! Go get me a pepsi!" He looked intense, this seemed like a challenge. (if you make it seem like a challenge ladies, they are all over it) He jumps up and runs to the fridge, as I'm yelling
Hurry! Hurry up!, Quick!" His socks slid across the kitchen floor,and he gains his footing just in time to grab the fridge handle.
"Quick, I need it!"
He grabs the pepsi, and fly's over the couch arm to land halfway on the cushions, and pass the pepsi off to me before he overcorrects his spin and plunges to the hardwood floor. Don't worry, the pepsi wasn't shaken.
Boys are so simple. Do you remember when your older siblings could get you to do anything if they said "I'll time ya?" No? Uh, me either.
Same concept folks.
Excuse me now, I have a Pepsi to drink.

2009-06-03T20:57:00.000-07:00

I spent 3 hrs today chasing The Boy around a dress rehearsal for the girl's dance. This was after 2 hours at the zoo. What a rough life I have wouldn't you say? I was talking to one of the other Mom's and she asked if my poor husband was at home fending for himself for dinner.
um. . . yes.
Because apparently she had left a note with her husband describing where everything that he needed for his dinner was. You know, the precooked bacon she had made at 2:00 this afternoon, and all the other ingredients for his BLT. She also took the time to lay out everything that her other daughter would need for dinner.

Hmm. . . I probably should have done this.
I thought of my husband coming home to his bagel and Pepsi and felt really bad. What made it worse was that she seemed to think this was a rare occasion for us too. Like the husband being un-dinnered was just a fluke.
"Ah, poor guy, just BLT's tonight" she had said.
"left him a note" she had said.
I cleared my throat a little. She was waiting for me to say something. I could have told her Pete would have been thrilled with BLT's. Or even a homemade sandwich. But, I made a new friend and I think that is MUCH more important than telling the truth.

I feel like "ohmygosh, I know" was an awesome reply and wasn't even a fib, it was an un-lie.

Un-Lie: verb
fibbing by interpretation

By the way, for those of you who want to know the end of this story, He did get dinner when I got home. Pizza is in the food groups. Right between fruit and diet coke.

BLT's and the Un-Lie

2009-06-03T20:17:00.000-07:00

I spent 3 hrs today chasing Jack around a dance dress rehearsal. This was after 2 hours at the zoo. What a rough life I have wouldn't you say? I was talking to one of the other Mom's and she asked if my poor husband was at home fending for himself for dinner.
um. . . yes.
Because apparently she had left a note with her husband describing where everything that he needed for his dinner was. You know, the precooked bacon she had made at 2:00 this afternoon, and all the other ingredients for his BLT. She also took the time to lay out everything that her other daughter would need for dinner.

Hmm. . . I probably should have done this.
I thought of my husband coming home to his bagel and Pepsi and felt really bad. What made it worse was that she seemed to think this was a rare occasion for us too. Like the husband being un-dinnered was just a fluke.
"Ah, poor guy, just BLT's tonight" she had said.
"left him a note" she had said.
I cleared my throat a little. She was waiting for me to say something. I could have told her Andrew would have been thrilled with BLT's. Or even a homemade sandwich. But, I made a new friend and I think that is MUCH more important than telling the truth.

I feel like "ohmygosh, I know" was an awesome reply and wasn't even a fib, it was an un-lie.

Un-Lie: verb
fibbing by interpretation

By the way, for those of you who want to know the end of this story, He did get dinner when I got home. Pizza is in the food groups. Right between fruit and diet coke.

Point for me!

2009-06-01T16:54:00.000-07:00

I know you're not supposed to revel in other people making fool's of themselve's.

But

I was very very much the reveler today when I watched someone else search for their keys when they were in their own hand. I didn't even tell her because I wanted to see how long it would take for her to find them.

Does that make me mean?

Ahhhhh. I felt pretty triumphant because at that moment I knew exactly where my keys were. They were in the diaper bag by my feet.
Or in my back pocket.
Or my purse.

Point for JODI!!

Blips

2009-05-31T11:44:00.000-07:00

I have lots of blog thoughts. . . but not ones that I could drag into a big blog. Here they are in random order:

***********************
The gay rights debate is huge in CA right now. I was watching the news today and really and truly heard this come from an activists mouth: "I just can't believe that in the state of California, the majority can override the minorities rights."
????????
I don't even know how to explain that one to him. Where do you start?
************************
Andrew was complaining today about how he couldn't find MY key's this morning. I suggested he probably barely looked. That he probably only checked the dumb places like the Key hook, and my purse. He said that was true. How am I to train him?? After a huge eye roll from me (boys can be so ridiculous) he did admit that he hadn't yet checked the sugar bowl OR the refrigerator. He would get right on that when we got home.
We found them inside his shoes. (thank you Shea)
***************************
Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to live in The Boy's world. It must be a much more tasty place. I have never, as of yet, walked into church and wanted to give the pews a good lick. FYI, judging by his face, They don't taste very good.

There you have it folks! The end and stuff.