Christmas

Well today was definitely different. For as long as I can remember my family has always celebrated Christmas on Christmas eve. So we all got together last night. Only one word comes to mind: weird. It just wasn't the same without mama there. My baby broke my heart yesterday afternoon. I was explaining to her that she would have 3 gifts, one from her aunt, uncle and grandparents. It took her no time to pipe up and say with tears about to break "But I won't get anything from maw maw". I told her maw maw did her shopping before she died and yes she would have something. Of course her tears weren't because she was afraid she wouldn't get a present, but because maw maw wasn't here. We had our get together last night and all headed home. We got up this morning and did our Christmas exchange. We didn't have anywhere to go really. We used to go to D's parents, but his mom died last year and long story short, we don't do that anymore. My sister and brother both have in laws houses to visit on Christmas so we don't have any family dinner for Christmas. Pretty much we just stayed home and lounged all day. I have a head cold and spent most of the day just watching TV and playing with our presents. I guess I need to go find us something to eat for supper. We had a nontraditional homemade pizza for our lunch today. It was good but I don't think I'll be putting that on the menu again for Christmas dinner lol. I hope that next year it will be easier at Christmas than it was this year.

Death In Family

My mom passed away Friday night. Needless to say I probably won't be on here much in the next few days. Please keep our family in your prayers.

Snowman doughnut

Krispy Kreme has snowman doughnuts for Christmas/Winter. So of course we had to go by there and get E one. We wound up with a dozen variety. Plus got gift tags that are actually coupons for a free doughnut, which of course you get 12 if you buy a dozen doughnuts. I've only had one so far but I think I hear one calling my name!

December already?!?!?

Man is it December already? Time has flown by! Why is it when we were kids, time seemed to stop after Thanksgiving? Now that I'm an adult, it goes by at warp speed! I guess it's because there are even more things to do than the rest of the year. This past week and this coming week have been/will be especially busy for us. Last week we had 3 doctors appointments 3 days in a row(1 for each member of the family). One of which last 1hour and 45 mins, 20 mins of which we actually saw the doctor. That could be another post entirely. This weekend we decorated the house. This coming week I have to finish getting presents for school so I can get them ready for next week. I also have to find time to bake cookies with E since I've been promising we will. Plus I have been invited to a cookie exchange Friday for which I have to bake and take 4 dozen cookies. The hard part will be keeping them from getting eaten. Last of all my biggest chore is to get food and cook enough to feed roughly 40-50 people. During the month of December, we have groups of people in our dept at work who pick a day and provide lunch for those working that day. The rule is if you contribute to a meal, you get to eat the rest of the days. Out of the 30 days we do this I think we will eat at least 10 or 15 times. My group is doing spaghetti. It winds up being about $15 or $20pp in each group depending on what they bring. Sam's will be providing our ingredients and we even got a couple doctors to contribute so for $15 (there are 6 or 7 ppl in our group) we will be feeding everyone working Friday spaghetti with meat sauce, bread sticks, salad (w/tomatoes, bacon bits, croutons, cheese and ranch dressing) plus drinks. It's so cool. I really missed doing that when I left from there. I'll let you know how it turns out!

Frustration

That pretty much sums up how I feel right now. Do you ever find yourself in a situation where the harder you work at moving forward the quicker you go backwards? No matter what you do to try to fix things, it just doesn't work. Right now I think there is a brick wall somewhere with my name on it saying "hit head here". None of you have ever felt that way right? I didn't think so.

Pumpkin anyone?

I love this time of year. It's the time when everything pumpkin comes out. I had a coupon for the coffee mate creamer and it was on sale so I bought the pumpkin spice creamer. I fixed a cup of coffee and used some. Man is it good! If I close my eyes it's just like eating a piece of pumpkin pie! I suggest you try it if you like pumpkin pie and coffee!

Procrastinate

should have been my middle name I sometimes think. I don't procrastinate at everything. In fact with the majority of things I do it and get it done early. Unfortunately I don't do that with filing papers. Now my file cabinet is organized and my desk has different slots for different things. Usually I just toss papers to be filed in my "file" box on my desk and file them when it starts getting full. It passed being full about 2 months ago lol. In fact now it's about to spill out of the desk. This is the worst its ever been. The problem all started 2 years ago this month to be exact. We sold our house moved in with my parents. My filing slacked off greatly due to not having many bills to pay. Plus I wasn't using my normal filing cabinet, but instead the file drawer on my desk and most of what I filed wound up going to the tax lady back in Jan/Feb. My poor 2 drawer file cabinet sat neglected for over a year. With 2 previous years stuff in it. You know where this is going don't you? So we buy our new house and literally moved in in 2 days. Of course everything from the desk gets thrown in a box and sat in a room to wait for me to get to it. All while life goes on and the desk is collecting the current papers to be filed, I have a box of last years filings to be filed in the cabinet, and the neglected cabinets with 05 and 06's years worth of filing. My sister was over last week and commented on my filing system on my desk. Normally I can find what I need if I need it, but not this time. Alas, it was finally time to bite the bullet and sort through the file cabinet and weed out old stuff and box it up. I did try this a few months ago and didn't seem to get anywhere. Other than dividing stuff into 3 boxes.
Today was going to be the day. I woke up around 8am and headed in. I finally stopped about 1230. I totally cleaned out the file cabinet and further organized it into his, hers and ours lol. (I had stuff in there from the year we got married 7 years ago and almost every month's bill stubs from our previous house we lived in for 5 years!!!) Then I sorted through the boxes I had previously divided. Everything got filed in the cabinet for access, in the shred box, the trash box or the put in the attic box. I felt so accomplished after that. I can actually see the floor around my file cabinet! I didn't however tackle the desk. That will be for another day. But at least there is a light at the end of the tunnel. And maybe I'll find the credit card the company says they sent and the owners manuals for the things in the house! The ironic part is while I'm cleaning up my filing mess, I'm fussing at my daughter who doesn't want to clean her mess on the other end of the room. I don't know where she gets it from?!?!? It's gotta be from her daddy!

Fall giveaway

Check out the fall giveaway. You never know you might win!

Carnival

One of our local churches has a carnival on Halloween. We've never been to it before. Last night we decided to take E. Everything was free. They had corn dogs, cotton candy, popcorn and drinks. You could get as much as you wanted by getting back in line. They had rides for big kids and little kids. They also had games for the kids to play. They played Christian music the whole night too. It was cool. It was cold! We rode the Ferris wheel, which had to be adjusted while we were on it. We were the second group to get on on the second load. The guy said the weather affects the adjustments. It sounded logical. I was praying the whole time to make it off. Hubby was shaking cause it was colder since the seats were metal and little E wouldn't be still and every time she moved the seat would swing. It didn't bother me but hubby doesn't ride rides so it was a miracle he even got on it. Then it had to have adjustments lol. It was fun once the ride started. Of course we had to use the portapotty too! What fun would it be if we didn't? We played some games, ate cotton candy and popcorn and E rode some more rides. Then we ran into one of E's best friends from school. 2 hours later we were going to head on out. E wanted food but the food lines were too long to wait. So we grabbed a drink and told her we'd stop by McDonald's. We did and got double cheeseburgers for her and me and fries for dad. Poor thing, she was so tired she was asleep before we got out of the drive thru. We tried to wake her up to eat when we got home but to no avail. Into the bed she went. Dad ate the cheeseburger. You know whats coming next don't you? Dad had to work today so he left early this morning. My 0830 wake up call from E was "where's my cheeseburger? I was gonna eat it for breakfast!" said in a half surprise/half about to cry voice! Bless her heart. Guess daddy has some explaining to do when he gets home!

Fridge is fixed!

Thursday was the day. Turns out the compressor went out on the fridge. They brought a new one Thursday and now it's working beautifully. No funny sounds or anything lol! It's amazing how much we take things for granted. We had to use 2 coolers to keep everything iced down. Every other day, if not everyday we were buying a bag of ice to replenish. It did get cool enough after the second day that we could have just put everything outside and not bought ice. The 2 drawbacks to that is I didn't want any animals inviting themselves to our food and I didn't want to go outside in the cold in my pj's to get a drink in the middle of the night! Remarkably, none of our food spoiled. Not even the milk, as I was able to pour what we had into a quart jar and keep it in the cooler. The only loss was of the labels on some of the bottles. And luckily those were from obvious things like juices. All in all it was 6 days we were without the fridge. I am so grateful I was born after refrigeration was invented. I definitely don't want to go through that again. Now that I know I have the warranty, next time it starts making any sound I'll call right away.

Funny sound

Our fridge started making a funny sound a few weeks ago. Nothing major, just annoying. It was working fine and we didn't see anything obviously wrong with it. SO like normal people we ignored it. Yesterday it decided not to be ignored anymore. I bought a 2l drink at the store on my way home. When I got home I got some ice from the dispenser for my drink. I noticed the ice was coming out a little slow and seemed to be a little soft. But I was so focused on my Diet Sundrop I didn't pay it any mind. Fast forward to later. My baby helped me make our super of homemade personal pizzas (which were sooooooooo good!). After we ate I went to get more ice for my beloved Diet Sundrop. The ice was even slower to come and more melted. I opened the freezer to see water dripping from the ice maker and everything beginning to thaw. Thank God our parents had given us their old freezer. Hubby put up a fight about getting it because it was old and we would have to move it. I won out on that with the argument it would save money on food since I could buy in bulk and freeze it. So all 3 of us are hauling stuff out to the freezer in hopes of saving it. I checked the fridge but it still seemed all right. Not quite as cold but we thought it was just from having the door open. I got up after my wake up call from E saying she wet the bed. After taking care of that I head downstairs. Hoping and praying the fridge wasn't broke. I open it up and its stuffy and cool, definitely not cold. I wait till the appliance store is open (so I thought) and call only to hear an answering machine. I leave no message. By this time I've called my family asking various questions. They all ask "do you have warranty on it?" to which I answer no since its 3 years old, but make a mental note to check my receipts. I sent hubby out to buy ice to put the food in the cooler to avoid spoilage. I give the appliance store one more call and they still aren't open. So i go to my file cabinet. I found my receipt and it says something about a warranty that doesn't end until 2010. I don't remember buying it but I call anyway. Well thank the Lord we have a warranty and it will be fixed or replaced in full! I love it when God works like that. With all our other expenses this year the last thing we needed was to buy a new refrigerator. So it will be Tuesday before they come out. We just have to live out of a cooler until then.

Giveaway

Check out this give away. It's a really cool tea pot to make hot tea. So if you like hot tea go on over and check it out!

Nursery Rhyme Day

Today was nursery rhyme day at school. The kids were supposed to dress up as a character from a Mother Goose nursery rhyme. My child wanted to be Humpty Dumpty. Luckily I had all the stuff to whip her up a costume. It's not my best work and the photograpghy is lacking too. Not to mention the pic was taken at 630 am on our way out the door to school. I wanted to fix a hat to complete the egg. I did make one but I messed it up so we went without it. Anyways here's the final result. Maybe I'll take better pics later!

Chuck E Cheese

Well we went to CEC. I must admit, it was pretty fun. I had coupons I had been harbouring. We actually got a great deal. We had a large pizza, 4 drinks(4 cups since that's what the coupon was for), 70 tokens and even splurged for a cup upgrade for birthday girl and spent $21. Not too bad for a place that can cost an arm and a leg. Most of the coupons were from Hi-C I bought over the summer. One was for the food and 2 were for 10 free tokens when you purchase food. You could use up to 3 per person so we got 20 free tokens. Plus since E is signed up on the birthday club she got her Internet coupon for 20 free tokens. We ate almost the whole pizza, drank our drinks and played for about 1 1/2 hours. Oh yeah we did splurge for ice cream ($2). The cups we had were tiny but you got free refills. We tossed the ones we used with supper and kept the other 2 and filled up on the way out. All in all we had a good time. Even walked away with a pair of disguise glasses and a notebook for her. Maybe I'll take a pic tomorrow and post it. I think she had a good birthday! Now for the party tomorrow.................

Happy Birthday

Today is my baby's birthday. She turned 5 at exactly 1:50 pm today. She is so excited! I on the other hand cannot believe that it's been 5 years since I had her. Where has the time gone? How has she made it this long? How have I managed to stay sane this long? lol So far the presents she has gotten (from us and mawmaw and pawpaw) have hit the mark with her. As soon as daddy finishes putting her Dora scooter together and she rides it a few minutes, we are off on a shopping trip and maybe Chuck E Cheese. I must admit I'm not looking forward to the last part. Especially on a Friday night. Of course from the conversation going on downstairs between her and her dad over staying off the furniture, she may not make it anywhere!

furniture

My furniture is supposed to be on its way. I can't wait! This is the first living room furniture I have ever bought. I have part of supper in the oven cooking so when they deliver the furniture we can chow down and then head out the door for E's soccer game. I think we will be cutting it close. I'll try to take a picture after we get it an post it. Hope everyone has a great day!

Free groceries?

Wouldn't that be nice? Especially with inflation the way it is. Yesterday evening a family got that. Well I should say I assume they got them free because I don't want to accuse anyone of anything. Being the lazy mother that I tend to be when I'm busy, I had no plans for supper last night. We decided on a frozen pizza(only b/c it was late and I didn't have the stuff to make our own), so we head off to the store. We get our pizza and a few other unplanned items. You know how that goes right? We pay and walk out the door $25 poorer and 4 or 5 items. We get in the car to go and I happened to look over at the store to see a man run out of the store to a car off the side of the store. I didn't think much of it until I saw him push the hand basket of groceries in the car. My child said something and I turned around to see what she wanted. Then I saw the car drive by. Really not even speeding. It took a few minutes for my mind to process what had happened. I looked at my husband and told him " I think they just stole groceries". It saddened me really. From outward appearances, it appeared that it was a poor family who didn't have the money to feed the child in the backseat. But whats even more sad is nowadays you can't assume that's the case.
I guess there's really no point to this post. Just to make me more thankful for what I have. And I'm thankful that I have family and friends I know I could always go to if I needed money to buy food for my child.

You know you're a redneck.........

when you wait at the bus stop for your child on a 4 wheeler. On the first full day of Autumn with no inclement weather. And you're on a paved public road. Hmmmm go figure!

Ice cream truck

Ahh the awaited sound of summer. You know the tune that gets stuck in your head once you hear it 50,000 times as the truck is driving around the neighborhood? (do your ears hang low can you toss them to and fro? can you tie them in a knot, can you tie them in a bow? can you toss them over your shoulder like a continental soldier? do your ears hang low?) Well my child has waited all summer for the anticipated truck to drive down our road. We could hear it in different parts of the neighborhood but it never showed up. Finally we heard it about a little while ago. We got up and looked out the window to see it drive by. So we got outside and see it parked at the end of the road. What do we do? We get out flip-flops and start walking. $2 and a snow cone later we are walking back up the street, but not before the driver calls up back and asks us how to get out of the neighborhood. Shouldn't the directions been at least worth a dollar off? Oh well, at least my child is happy she finally got ice cream from the ice cream truck!

Soapbox Saturday

Sounds pretty catchy. Maybe I'll keep it up weekly, maybe I won't. If I don't I'm sure it won't be for lack of a topic. I have 2 for today.
#1) Birthday parties
It's great to celebrate your child's birthday. But do we have to invite every child in the class? And expect them to attend and bring a gift? Here's the way it usually goes for us. We get an invitation. If we decide to go, we go get a gift. I usually limit it to $10 a gift. I think that's fair and you can get a decent gift for that, cheaper if you find something on sale. We go to the party, my child has fun, but I know no one there usually. It's all fun and games. Then it's time for my child's birthday party. Now I could care less if she gets lots of presents, but in today's society it is expected. But do all the kids whose parties she attended show up? Usually not and that's half the fun, celebrating with your friends. Then to top it off, most of the presents you get in return have no thought put into it. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining about presents. Here's my thing. Times are tight. I pay for a bday party for my child for her to have fun with friends. To me that is the present. I know it's not to her but I am trying to teach her that. Most people nowadays focus on the principle of "more kids, more presents". Not everyone can afford to buy a gift and sometimes don't come to the party or buy something that's "cheap" for that very reason. Most will spend $5 on this "cheap" gift, so why not get a gift card for that? A few $5 add up and it's better than something that breaks the first time they play with it. Why can't we get back to the way things used to be where you had a good ole birthday party at your house with cake and ice cream and played pin the tail on the donkey? And if you didn't have the money to buy a gift you made a card and put a few dollars in it? If you didn't have that, you just brought a card. I know some of you may not understand where I am coming from but oh well, it's my blog! I hope to teach my child to understand it's not all about the party and what you get from it. Hopefully I will succeed in that. So now we are off to a birthday party for a kid in her class. I'm hoping I know at least one parent there. I"ll try to post on soapbox #2 tonight!

New furniture

I"m so excited!! With the economy going down the drain, stores are having great deals on expensive items. Last weekend being Labor Day, the sales got even better. Our furniture is still in good shape, but it's what my hubby had bought years before we were married. In other words, it's not what I would have picked out. It's over 10 years old but doesn't look it. Most of the furniture stores around our areas were having great sales for Labor Day. We decided to go look and if we found something, great! If not it wouldn't be a big deal. We made our way to the Lazy Boy Gallery. Now the only dilemma of course was we disagreed on what to get. We have a reclining couch and rocker now. I don't care too much about the recliners because most of them are poofy on top. I want the more traditional look. Hubby didn't. He wanted recliners. So we went out in search for traditional looking furniture that reclined. I expected a long search. In total we went to 3 stores. We found our compromise at Lazy Boy. We settled on a sectional that is more traditional looking but we have 3 recliners on it. Plus we got a rocker/recliner and 2 new tables. The rocker is leather, but we had the sectional covered in a fabric that looks and feels like leather. It's beautiful!! (as a child, I never thought I would be excited about furniture lol) Now I'm sure most of you are thinking new furniture with a 5 y/o, are you crazy?!?!? Well they had "insurance" in the form of a lifetime guarantee and a stain guard they would put on the fabric(for an extra charge of course). But with a 5 y/o it's worth the money. It was a reasonable cost. It prevents any stains by beading up any liquid that is spilled on it and the lifetime guarantee is for rips and tears. If it ever gets a stain we can't wipe off, or a tear or burn or anything, it will be replaced for FREE for LIFE! Isn't that great. I only have 5-7 more weeks to wait for it!

I'm not lost

I'm still here. I've just been busy spending time with my family and haven't been spending as much time on the computer. I really shouldn't be on here now. I should be cleaning up the house but true to myself I'm procrastinating. 8o)

7___Years

Today is our 7th wedding anniversary. Nothing special to celebrate except going out to eat. Which included taking the 4 year old. She was actually pretty good at the restaurant. And mommy even managed to take her cues and get her to the parking lot to throw up. LOL Guess the food was just so good she couldn't stop eating. For the most part the past 7 years have been great. But there are those days...........lol that's why I left the blank. But considering that we are both still alive I think we are doing pretty good. Now maybe I can talk him out of a back or foot rub?

First Day of Kindergarten

My baby started kindergarten this morning. It's bittersweet. I'm happy but then I'm sad because she is growing up. I swear it was just yesterday that they were telling me they had to deliver my baby 5 weeks early to keep me well and alive. Now here she is 4 years 10 1/2 months later starting kindergarten. Where does the time go?

Things went smoother than I thought. A few weeks ago I got all her supplies and we got a few new outfits. Our friends came in from out of town this weekend so I wanted to have everything ready and not wait till the last minute to get it together. So I had her backpack packed and ready to go this morning. We laid out the first day of school outfit and I cleaned her shoes. She has been wanting me to curl her hair but always waits till its to late to ask. I told her I would put her hair in curlers and roll it for today. After we ate supper last night we got ice cream then came home to roll the hair. Normally, she doesn't sit still for me to fix her hair. She did pretty good last night. I got it all rolled then I put her in the bed. She was excited but settled down easier than I anticipated.

I got up this morning and got ready then got her up. Getting her out of bed is like pulling teeth. I don't know where she gets it from ;o) I fed her breakfast then we headed up to get ready. I got her dressed then tackled the hair. She was posing all in the mirror like she was a model. Finally got her hair fixed and headed downstairs to get her book bag and head off to school.

We drive to school, find a parking space and get out. I wanted to get a picture of her getting out of the car but she wouldn't let me. We passed a few friends and their parents. We made it to the entrance of the school building and her true colors started showing. I knew they would come. It just shocked me that they waited this long to surface. The whining started about not wanting to go. She didn't want me to take a picture. She finally agreed to a picture and I tried my best to get her to smile. Then I decided she didn't have to smile in all of them. In fact if she didn't, it would be proof later that she wasn't always pleasant. Well there was a little smile, but she wasn't happy.

Then came the last leg. We walked to the classroom. We went in and after some coaxing got the book bag hung up in her cubby and I walked her to her seat. Then she really poured on the "please don't go'", "hold me mommy" etc. I picked her up and gave her a big hug and kiss and told her to enjoy her day that she was going to have so much fun. Her teacher put a name tag sticker on her. I tried to get her to sit down so I could take a picture of her at her table with her friends but she would have none of that. Finally, I told her bye and started to walk away. She started to cry and run after me but her teacher came over, took her hand and walked her over to see the snake.
I walked out and snapped this picture. No tears or crying or anything after that. Just my baby standing there looking so little yet so big at the same time. I hope she has a wonderful day. If not mommy will make it better with ice cream when I pick her up!

Ripley's Believe It or Not!

Would you believe me if I told you this is one watermelon plant? Would you believe me if I told you I , nor did anyone in my family plant that in my flowerbed?

Well it's true. We built the retaining wall for the flowerbed and a few weeks later this plant popped up. I didn't pull it up because I wanted to see what it would be. When the 3rd leaf appeared and I saw it was a watermelon, I left it. I figured we might get a good juicy watermelon out of it. The root is at the center of the walkway close to the steps and its right at the edge. I have done nothing special to the plant either. No miracle grow, heck I don't even water it. We did fill the bed with compost after we made it but had no clue the seed was there. I figure it was planted last summer/fall by someone who dropped a seed from their watermelon at lunch. As you can see it has almost completely filled the flowerbed. It actually has 5 watermelons on it. I'm not sure if they will ripen since it's so late in the season. I hope they do though! I guess God just didn't want my flowerbed to be empty and He knew we didn't have the funds to build it and fill it with flowers this year. Isn't that amazing?!?!

True friendship is....

....when you're best friend packs up her hubby and 2 of their 3 kids to drive 6 hours to spend a day and a half with you for no special reason. I love my friend! She is the best. I know I don't tell her that often enough. We met 13 1/2 years ago at college. Life has never been the same since lol! We spent about 2 years in college together then she moved back to her hometown. I transferred to nursing school back in my hometown, which at the time was about 8 hours away. (I'm so thankful that they have built new roads to shorten the drive). I think our friendship developed and strengthened more being away from each other than when we were together. Regardless, we have been there in some way shape or form for all major life events. I can't say that about some of my "best" high school buddies. Usually me and my hubby and daughter go visit her family once or twice a year. Their place is so much more exciting than here so we are always willing to go visit them. It's been a few years since they have been able to come here. We were talking the other week when I called for help trying to find a geocache. I told her they could come down the following weekend and we could go caching together. Well the planets and stars aligned and they head over Friday night. I rushed home from work and DH and DD and I spent hours cleaning the house and getting their beds ready (a futon and an air mattress). We finished as they pulled in the driveway around 10pm. It just brightens my heart to see them since we don't get to see each other often. We stayed up till about midnight watching the Olympics then we headed to bed. I was so excited they were here, I barely slept any that night lol!

We made the most of Saturday. We cooked a big breakfast then headed out to the local park and did some geocaching. We had lots of fun and provided a free lunch for lots of mosquitoes. The rest of the day we just hung out and enjoyed our time together. All of the kids enjoyed themselves. They left yesterday afternoon to head back home. That always makes me sad because I wish they could stay longer. Even though it was just for a short weekend, I enjoyed the time we got to spend together.

First day on the "new" Job

Well I started my "new" old job today. It was great. I didn't realize how much I really missed it till I went back. I liked my previous job too, but the OR is completely different. Someone told me once the first time I went to work there that it would "get in your blood and you'll always want to do it". Honestly I thought they were crazy, since my clinical OR day of nursing school had to have been one of the worst clinical days ever. I swore I would never work in an OR. Over 2 years of med-surg nursing later I was ready to try anything. Even the sworn off OR. I worked in the OR for 3 years before I went to our birthing center to do mother-baby care. I liked it but my mind always went back to the OR. There's just nothing that compares to it. It's one of the few places where as a nurse I only have one patient to worry about at a time. I get to focus all my efforts on that one patient. Any fellow nurses out there will understand how important this is. Not only do I only have one patient, but that patient has only met me for all of 10 minutes before they are drugged and they have put their safety almost entirely in my hands. The down side to it is the patients don't remember it, so there's not much recognition afterwards from patients. But I know day in and day out that I make a difference in my patients lives.
So today was my first day back down there in 3 years. I had to do some paperwork then I got to hang out with my good friend I left. It was fun and I found myself asking, why did I leave. Now for most of you who know me, I'm more of a glass half empty kind of person. Today I wasn't and I am going to pray daily that I don't go back to that. I got lots of "glad you're back" and "good to see you"s but I got a lot of "do you know what you're getting into" or "why'd you come backs" too. It saddened me a little because the latter comments came from people who weren't necessarily happy in the job years ago when I left. I so don't want to turn into that down the road. As with any job, there are always going to be things you don't like about it. You pretty much have 2 choices. One is to quit complaining and focus your energy on work and be thankful to God that you have a job or find another job. If you're not happy in your job maybe you should weigh out your options. I had to do that and decided that the pros of changing jobs well outweighed the cons of staying put. They always say the grass is greener on the other side. That's just because you're too far away to see all the cow patties! They are everywhere, you just have to pray and ask God's guidance to avoid them so you don't stink too!
I might add it was nice to get off at 3pm instead of 730 tongiht. Now I actually have time to go to Sam's, get gas in the car, cook and play with my child. All before bedtime!

Here S/he Is

It's a bird. Not what some of you were thinking I know. my hubby mentioned to the little one about a bird, oh I dunno about 2 months ago. She has not forgotten that we said we would think about getting one. Every time we go out shopping we wind up at the pet store looking at them. Saturday we went to Petsmart and the local small specialty pet store. When we got to the latter, they both kept asking me if we could get one. I felt like my blood sugar was low and just wanted to get home to a snack and my bed before our company came over so I told hubby I didn't care what he did but he was responsible. You know having the equivalent of 2 small kids looking at you and saying please when you don't feel good and just want to get the heck out of dodge can prompt you to make rash decisions. So about 20 mins later, we were leaving like a convoy: Daddy with the bag, child with the cage (as big as she is) and mama with the bird. We are almost out numbered by pets. We don't know if its a boy or girl yet but its name is Daisy for now at least. It's wings were supposed clipped already but she has escaped and flown very high twice, but only when she got scared while the gate was open on the cage. So far it's been good but it's only been 2 days. I"ll keep you updated. Here s/he is:

Family Addition

There's a new addition to our family. I"m tired and my toe hurts so I'll let you ponder about it till tomorrow. Or whenever I get back to the blog ;o) Any guesses as to what it is?

Night with friends

We had some friends over tonight. It was nice. 2 of our kids are the same age and place great together. We had a good time. It was relaxing to sit and fellowship. We had a simple supper of hamburgers which my DH cooked and they were wonderful. Then we sent the kids to the playroom and the adults played cards. They brought a card game we've never played. It was odd at first but the longer we played the better it was. I can't remember the name though. Anyways. I love get together like that. The best thing, no TV was involved! My parents used to play cards with a few other couples when I was growing up. For a long time I knew what we would be doing almost every Fri and Sat night. The women played Rook and the men went out and did something or just talked and the kids played or swam. I always loved doing that. I hope we can continue to have get togethers like this so my child has something to look forward to.

Prayer Request Update

I forgot to mention yesterday an update on my prayer request. I had put in a transfer at work to move to another dept. Currently I work 3-12 hour shifts doing postpartum care. I love what I do but the hours are difficult and our family has no routine since I don't work the same days of the week. I used to work in the operating room where I worked Mon-Fri 8 hours a day. Of course we were off on all holidays and weekends (we had to take call so we had to work a holiday and weekend or 2 but nothing scheduled). I decided that it would benefit me and my family for me to go back to the OR. I put in the transfer 2 weeks ago. My first update of the prayer request was when the transfer was accepted, but then I had to notify my manager and find out when I could leave. I found out yesterday that I will be starting my new job on Aug 10th. I'm excited and can't wait. I'm just thankful that God answered my prayers.

This is what...

...ones' toe looks like after it collides with a kick board in a swimming pool. I don't have audio of the noise I made when it happened, but I'm sure you can all imagine. This morning it was all pretty shades of purple. It hurts and I'm 99% sure its broken although I didn't go to the doctor. I can only recommend that one not sit on nor hold a kick board under their legs underwater while tossing a 4 year old into the water. Trust me, when they decide mid toss it's not fun and kick and scream and hit said kick board, it's turns into a missile. So unless you want your toe to look like this, don't do it. I won't be from here on out either. I hope if you had a bad day today, that I just made it not seem so bad. Did I mention I had to work 12 hours today? On my feet and walking all day? Yeah I cringed too lol! And please pay no attention to the lacking pedicure.

Giveaway

Check out my friends blog before Aug 1st. She is giving away a beautiful necklace.
With The Fruit of Her Hands

Prayer Request Update

Here's an update on my prayer request. I can't go into much detail yet but I wanted to ask that you keep praying for me. I have just been praying for peace that I am making the right decision and so far I have that peace. Of course it could just be because it's partly what I want too. I don't think so though. It involves change and I am not someone who goes into change lightly. And especially with a light heart or without a lot of apprehension. This change involves 2 parts. Part of my prayer also was that I would set things in motion and if it were not God's will for my life, that he would stop it or hinder it in a way I would know it was Him doing it. (I'm hard headed and don't always hear him over my desires) So far step one has occurred with a positive result. Now comes step 2. This could very well be where God steps in and shows me it's not his will. Honestly, I won't like it if He does, but I will trust Him if that's the case and follow where He leads me. This is a very big, life changing decision that will not just affect me but my whole family. Tomorrow I will set things in motion with step 2. Please be in much prayer for me about this. And pray that if it's not God's will, I will be able to accept it with a happy heart.

Prayer Request

I've had an issue come up in the past few weeks. I've thought about it and prayed about it too. I thought it was just going to be a speed bump, but is quickly turning into a sink hole. A big one. Of course it means I have to decide which path to take to "solve" the issue. Please help me pray that God will show me the right path to take.

Drive-In Movie

Do they still exist? Well yes they do. Although they are far and few between. We have one not too far from us. (http://belmontdrivein.20megsfree.com/index.html) It's a great experience. Not to mention affordable. We decided to go to the drive in last night. Wall-E was playing. It's Disney/Pixar, so we figured it would be a good family movie and keep our child interested.
At our drive-in it's $8 per car. You drive in, park next to a pole with a speaker and wait till the show begins. You can also tune your radio to their station and listen in your car without the speaker. The gate opens around 7pm. A lot of people will be there when it opens. We decided to go around 8pm. That's not a bad time since you still get a good space and only 1-1.5 hours till the movie starts. So we get there around 8, get settled and it starts "mommy, I gotta go potty" . The bathrooms aren't great and I usually miss 1/4 of the movie for potty breaks. I put her off for another half hour. She just went 1/2 hour before, how can she have to go again? (it's the thrill of the nasty bathroom). Finally around 820pm we go to the potty, (which is 2 stalls not big enough to even turn around in with a shower curtain for the door.) and then get in line for popcorn. About 10 minutes and $5 later, we have a medium popcorn and blue cotton candy. We head back to the car to get settled. My child is antsy and the movie finally starts about 930 or so. She whines the whole time and finally falls asleep after yet another trip to the potty. With it being late in the evening it's cool outside but not so cool in the car, especially with a child laying on you. Did I mention I have had some sinus crud going on since I got back from vacation? I still don't feel well but didn't want to keep everyone else from having a good time. So we are hot, restless and don't feel good trapped in the car. Next time we go in the summer, we will have to take our chairs to sit outside.
As for the movie, it' wasn't great. If I had gone to the theatre and paid $8 per person I would have been upset. That's what makes the drive-in a great deal though. The price is cheap even for only 1 person in a car. But its the same even if you have a 16 passenger van. That'd be $0.50 per person. Isn't that cool? Plus they do 2 movies, so usually you will like one of them. We normally stay to watch the second movie but hubby had to work today so we on;y watched the first. It was 11pm by the time it was over. The snack bar is pretty cheap compared to the regular movies too. Plus they give you a trash bag when you drive in to put your trash in and at the end you leave it beside the speakers and they pick it up. Last night wasn't that great of an adventure, I think primarily because I didn't feel great, but we will definitely go back. They usually stay open until November. So if you live close to a drive-in movie theatre, you should check it out sometime this summer. It's a great(normally) family experience!

Vacation

Last week we went on vacation to the beach. More specifically, the Outer Banks of NC. My best friend lives there and we usually go visit her at least once a year. This year we went later than we usually do. Summer camp was closed for the 4th so we used that as our vacation week. So we loaded up the car and headed off to see the sea. After roughly 6 hours (with only a 20 minute stop, if that long) of being couped up in a car with a 4 year old who still will not sit still and watch a movie start to finish and only took a 30 min nap, we arrived. That is the best feeling in the world. I'm so very glad the roads have improved over the past few years. The trip used to take longer than that. And that was with us doing about 75-80 mph. At least that was my view of the speedometer from the passenger seat. Anyways. We stayed for a week and had a wonderful time. My friend took off work so we were able to go do some stuff together. It was truly a vacation. We had no schedule planned or mapped out that we had to stick to. Pretty much it was a fly by the seat of your pants vacation. I will post more later with some pics but I just have to say before I leave. I love my friend and I miss her desperately when we are apart (which is more than not) but I am oh so very thankful that she lives at the beach and opens her house to me and my family whenever we want to visit.

If You Don't Can Food at Home, You Should Start Now

Strange title you're thinking right? Well I'm here to tell you canning has saved my life. At least the main ingredient, aside from the food, did this morning. Any good canner knows she has to have jars, lids and rings. Lots of them. You should always have empty ones until canning season is over. Boy am I ever glad I had some this morning.

It started off as usual. Get the child up dress and eat breakfast. Take her to summer camp and drop the dog off at the groomers (who proceeds to tell me he's overgrown. Duh that's why I brought him to you). I come home to await the plumber. I'm glad the plumber came when he did, or I could have been overtaken. I show the plumber the bathroom in need of repair. I"m standing there talking to him when movement catches my eye. I move and look down in time to see a bug move right out from under where I was standing and drop onto my stairs. First instinct is to scream, but I had 2 strange men in the house so not an option. I look at it while my mind is thinking "what is that, where did it come from since we had the house sprayed a few weeks ago and finally omg we could have stepped onto that thing during our 1:30am potty break and trip to the kitchen for a drink" I whipped into action thinking when I call the exterminator, he'll want to see it. So of course my first thought was a mason jar! Nothing could get through that! I avoided the bug ran downstairs grabbed what I needed and ran back up to scoop the bug into the jar. I did this all without notice from the plumber, until I put the lid on. Then they noticed. They were impressed too, but didn't know what it was.

Now I know what you are thinking. It's just a bug, whats to be afraid of? Why didn't you just step on it? Well, normally I would have but you see this was not a normal bug. I can handle roaches, spiders, ants etc. Those are small. I don't deal with things that could take a bite out of me. Plus if I didn't kill it with the first step I might just make it madder at me. So I took a picture for you all to see. Please feel free to comment on what you think it might be or how you would have handled it. SO without further adieu:

The pictures aren't great, but keep in mind this is a standard wide mouth pint mason jar. Notice the bug takes up half the space on the bottom. I couldn't get a good close up picture, and I was risking my life taking the lid off for the last shot. I think it might be some kind of water bug maybe but have no idea. It had legs and antennae half the length of its body and it looked like 2 sets of little pinchers maybe. I dunno. I just glad I ran into it during the day instead of last night. So if you don't can go get some jars at least. They may save your life!

Water Bug

We have a bug in our pool. I can't figure out a way to get rid of it either. Every time I think I've gotten it out for good, it slides right back in. It's big, about 38lbs and kinda scary looking. I took a picture for proof because I knew you wouldn't believe me when I said how big it was. Do you see it? It's the one with the big green head. And blue and purple eyes. Oh yeah it has big teeth too!
I got it out once, but it just went down the sliding board and got back in!

Home Grown Veggies

There's nothing like the taste of home grown veggies. We are getting the first of our crop coming in now. I didn't get a chance to plant a garden at my house since we were busy getting moved in and settled. So our garden is at my dad's again this year. We didn't get it planted very early, so everything is taking a little longer to come up. I took Em and my nieces swimming at mom and dad's today. We had a blast. I love being in the pool and the weather was so nice. It's great that it has cooled off some. My mom even came out to the pool, which is a big feat in and of itself. While we were there dad took Em to the garden and they picked some crookneck yellow squash and come cucumbers and spring onions. He had picked corn earlier and we brought home 2 ears of corn, cucumbers and squash. I cooked the corn and fried the squash for supper and man oh man was it good!! Fried wasn't the best way but it sure tasted good. Now I can't wait for the tomatoes to start growing. It's been a long time since I've had fried green tomatoes!

Happy Birthday to Us!!

Today is my birthday. Anybody want to guess how old I am? lol It's not a big one but this year it seems much harder to get the bigger number out. Why is that? Well not only is today my birthday but I have the pleasure of sharing my birthday with my hubby! We are exactly 3 years apart. We were actually only born hours apart from each other. Maybe one day I'll figure out down to the minute how much older he is than me. Everyone thinks it's cool that we share the same birthday and it is in some ways. In others its not. I no longer have "my" day nor he his. We both took the day off work, dropped our baby at her last day of 4k (Maybe i'll write more about that later) then we headed off to the cable place. Romantic right? lol Then we took each other out for a nice lunch where we ate too much and hit the movies for a matinee. By then it was time to pick our baby up from school. It was nice to be on a "date" with my hubby and sharing our special day. So who makes the cake? Do we have one for both or one for each? We didn't plan too much this year so we are going to let the odd girl out pick out our cake for us at the Food Lion. So off we go to pick it out. Maybe I'll take a pic and post it later! Hop eeveryone has enjoyed this beautiful day that God has given us!!

She really does listen, just not always to me

We went on a school field trip to the Lazy 5 Ranch on Wednesday. Take a look at the rhino and remember what color it is. It will be important later. I picked my baby up from school today and we headed to the library. She made a couple new friends in the 5 minutes we were there. My child knows no strangers, unless it's someone I want her to talk to. So we leave the library and head on to the house. So she says to me "Mama do you remember what color the rhino was?". To which I reply it was grey or brown. Then she pipes up "No mama, it was white! Remember the man told us he was white but he looked brown because he liked to roll around in the mud!". So she listens to the man driving the wagon and remembers that 2 days later. So why can't she remember not to put her hands (or crayons) on the TV or bring food in the living room?

I'm now a blogger!

Well, it's official. I'm now a blogger! Many of my friends post blogs and I enjoy reading them. It keeps me connected to them, even if we don't talk daily. This is a great feat for me since I know nearly nothing about computers and all their doings these days. So bear with me as I start this new adventure!