Renee's Ramblings

No more hiding! Out with the old, in with the new!

2012-01-07T19:52:00.003-06:00

I have good news and bad news...

The bad news is...I'm STILL fat.

I was hoping after getting my teeth all yanked out I'd have lost some weight...no such luck. There is a good chance I'll always be fat...but I still hope to work on it and be a little less fat sometime in this lifetime.

The good news is...there will be no more pictures like this:

Or like these:

And thank God, no more like THIS! (gross picture warning)

Because....

On Jan. 3rd, I had a dentist appointment...to pick up my new smile!!

No more hiding! Gotta work on my smile a bit, I haven't used it much in a long time, I need to practice...

Cheese!

I'm still fat...still pretty ugly...but by golly I now have pretty teeth! Now...if only I can figure out how to eat with them!

Talking with them was hard at first, but I'm getting the hang of it...the eating is another story. I was told to eat only soft foods for a while, make everything small, and to put food in both sides so I can chew evenly not one sided. I've been doing that, but for some reason the food tends to go down between the bottom dentures and my cheeks and I feel like a chipmunk LOL. I've been eating about 5 bites per meal with the teeth in, then I give up and take them out to finish. Practice practice practice I guess. Someday I'll get the hang of it...I hope!

Toodles!

Goodbye 2011

2012-01-07T19:37:00.002-06:00

2011 wasn't the best of years.

It seems it was the year of breakdowns & repairs.

I think the basement flooded twice.

We had sump pump breakage.

Leaky pipe.

Leaky sinks.

Clogged drain in basement causing big mess down there (and left me unable to use the kitchen sink for several days).

It was also a year of toilet overflows, have I mentioned we have a carpeted bathroom? Yeah..big mess.

In July I think it was, our less than 5 yr old fancy refrigerator broke down. Fix it guy had a fix for it, but said its iffy, might last 3 days, 3 months, 3 years or 30...just never know. We gave it a try...it lasted about 5 months. A few days before Christmas it died. It was unfixable. We had to move the spare smaller frig from the basement upstairs, and the old one went out the door.

We also had dryer issues this past year. Even now it has its good days and bad...

Our portable dishwasher also took a dump. It started leaking & wasn't getting stuff very clean, I got sick of mopping up the mess and now I use it to store stuff in and on LOL, and I wash dishes by hand.

Bill's truck also needed some expensive repairs, not only once, but twice...

All that (plus some I think I forgot), and also some dental issues & health issues that caused major expense.

It hasn't been the greatest year.

I'm hoping 2012 will be a GOOD year. Good health, and no repairs or replacing of household items! A winning lottery ticket would kick off the year right...I guess I need to play to win though LOL.

Happy 2012! (I know I'm late, sorry)

Toodles!

Christmas Past

2012-01-07T19:16:00.002-06:00

I know, its Jan., and I haven't blogged about Christmas... Better late than never right?

Christmas Eve the girls got to open their traditional present, new PJ's to wear to bed. This is something I've been doing for the kids since they were babies. Even though they know what the present is, they still get excited. Unfortunately Jilly's excitement was short-lived this year, when she put her PJ's on and found out they were to small. The pants fit, but the shirt was up above her belly button, she was NOT a happy camper.

It was after 11 when the little girls finally fell asleep. Santa was pretty tired by then, but he did manage to stop by and leave a few things. Surprisingly he didn't leave coal, since the girls probably deserved quite a bit... They ended up making out pretty good.

Kelsey got a nice new watch & camera. Jilly got some games, and from her dad she got an iPad. Bree got a dollhouse and other things.

The bottom corner pic of Bill is him opening the one small gift I got him...a 5 lb box of Atomic Fireball jawbreakers! He loves those things! We have a hard time finding them in stores, so I ordered some from Amazon. He thought it was pretty funny that I got him such a big thing of them.

One of the things Bree got was a cardboard playhouse that you can color. Santa didn't realize how darn big that sucker was going to be! We set it up and it took up most of the living room! I had to take the tree down the day after Christmas so I could make some room.

As you can see, its nearly as tall as Bill! Bree has really enjoyed this house. Once we moved it to its place, we put her new dollhouse inside it, and a few other toys and she'll hang out in there playing for hours at a time.

Christmas was pretty good for us (except for a broken frig). I hope yours was pleasant as well!

Toodles!

Hair Highlights from...?

2011-12-17T10:47:00.002-06:00

Chalk! Did you know you can put pretty colorful highlights in your childs hair with chalk? I didn't, until I heard about it from this great hair site! That site has a ton of awesome hairstyles I look at that site all the time and wish I could do some of those styles on my girls. I try...but they never look that good! Practice I guess...

I did it on Bree's hair right away after seeing it on that website. I had some crayola chalk sitting in the house so I figured why not give it a try! Bree loved it! Jilly loved it too and later did her hair by herself. I have pics of Bree's but I didn't get a pic of Jilly's darn it. I'll have to be sure to get one next time.

Cute huh?

I'm tempted to put a pink streak or two in my hair :)

Toodles!

Snow!

2011-12-17T10:37:00.002-06:00

I've been anxious for snow...yet Mother Nature has been mean and not provided me with much. There was one day we had a few flakes fall, I ran out to see them, then ran back in to get shoes on, by the time I did it had stopped. Then, a few days before my birthday we got a tiny dusting, not even enough to cover the grass, and barely enough for a snowball. I was excited we got some, but majorly disappointed in the lack of it. Every day, I wish for snow. It is December after all, and nearly Christmas, the ground & trees should be white and pretty, not ugly drab colors of dead grass and trees... I check the forecast online often and I get a :( face because there isn't any snow in the forecast day after day...even yesterday when I looked at the 10 day there wasn't any other then next week a rain/snow mix. Imagine my surprise when I went out to the kitchen this morning and glanced out my window and saw this SNOW! I was so excited! I called for Bree to come look out the window, she too shared my excitement. We grabbed our shoes, coats, and her mittens, and grabbed the dog and headed out to play in the snow while Moo (the dog) did her business. It was awesome. I'm in snow heaven. I want more...I'm greedy that way, sorry.

I know, most of you are snow haters...I'm sorry. Please don't rain on my parade :P

Toodles!

Bree's 4th Birthday Party

2011-12-17T10:20:00.002-06:00

Bree turns 4 on December 19th, but we had her party early so Kelsey could be here for it, she'll be out of town this weekend. So on Dec. 11th we had a few people over, my mom, and my brother and his family. Invited a few others but they didn't come. It was a small but sweet party, Bree had fun, and thats the important thing!

Bree is in love with Lalaloopsy toys. Lalaloosy dolls "were once rag dolls that magically came to life when their last stitch was sewn. Each doll has their own personality that comes from the fabrics used to sew them." says their website. They are kind of cute, but the one thing I don't like about them is they are so top heavy they won't sit or anything, they just fall over... They may make a good weapon too with that hard head. Anyways, Bree loves them. She got her first last year at her birthday, she got the larger sized Princess Jewel Sparkle...and it has snowballed from there. Now she has about 10 mini lalaloopsy dolls, a bus, a treehouse, lalaloopsy pj's, and a ds game! She's in Lalaheaven.

She wanted her birthday cake to be Lalaloopsy of course. I made a drawing of how I hoped it would be, but of course plans changed and it didn't look as good as my drawing. I did a big pic of Princess Jewel Sparkle (Bree's favorite) on the top, and a bunch of others faces on the sides.

We got Bree a pink crown to wear, like Princess Jewel Sparkle, and we curled her hair all pretty for the day too, but the curls didn't last very long.

Here are some pictures from party day Enjoy.

Toodles!

What the girls do when they are bored

2011-12-17T10:13:00.002-06:00

A few weeks ago the girls were bored.

Kels was letting Bree torture her. Bree decided she wanted to give Kels a make-over. First she started with a crayon...which worked surprisingly well by the way, later we switched over to real make-up.

Isn't she pretty?

After that Bree decided she wanted to give herself a make-over...

She had a blast playing with make-up. I'm glad I was busy, or she might have tried to do mine!

Toodles!

I know, I've been MIA.

2011-12-17T10:00:00.003-06:00

December has been busy, and stressful.

We've had appointments. Dentist for me, still waiting for my pretty new teeth, should be soon though. Doctors appointments for Kelsey (she is suffering from depression and we are trying to get meds and dosages right etc.).

I've been mom taxi carting the kids back and forth to school, dances, and bowling practices & games.

Bree's had a cold, which she shared with me, and we've both been feeling tired and icky.

I turned another year older. I'm now 43, I think. See, so old I don't even know for sure...

I've been doing extra cleaning, because we had a little birthday party for Bree on Dec. 11 th.

I spent my birthday baking and decorating Bree's party cake.

I've just been tired. I've been cranky. I figured I'd stay away so I wouldn't scare people away LOL.

I'm going to try to get a few posts done today...providing my computer cooperates, its been having some scary issues the last few days... say a prayer for it!

Toodles!

Giveaway WINNER!

2011-12-01T13:35:00.002-06:00

Thank you to those that entered to win the MyMemories Digital Scrapbooking Software giveaway! I wish you could all be winners, but I am only able to have one. I went to Random.org and had them pick the winner.

Hmm crap that came out small LOL. Hopefully you can read that, if not it says the winner was picked from the numbers 1-9, and that winner is #5! So comment #5 wins, that would be JOANNA!

Congratulations Joanna! I'll be getting in touch with you soon with the information you need to get your prize. Enjoy it and create some beautiful stuff!

To those of you that didn't win, I'm so sorry. If you would like to purchase My Memories Digital Scrapbooking Software please use my code (see below). It will get you a $10 discount on the purchase of My Memories Scrapbooking software AND a $10 coupon to use in the My Memories store! Good deal right? Great for you and for a gift for someone...Christmas is only 25 days away ya know...and it would be so easy to shop from your computer getting this software..think about it :)

*** CODE: STMMMS10284 ***

Thanks for visiting my blog. Don't forget to check out My Memories website & Facebook page.

Thank you My Memories for giving me the opportunity to host this giveaway and for supplying the software to me to review and give to the winner.

Toodles!

P.S. Can someone PLEASE send snow my way? It's December, I need snow on the ground...just not on the roads :) Thanks.

Giveaway Time! (Closed - Winner announced!)

2011-11-20T06:00:00.003-06:00

****GIVEAWAY CLOSED - Winner announced !****

Sorry for the lack of posting lately. I've had some stuff going on around here that has had my mind elsewhere.

I'm excited to report that I have a GIVEAWAY for you! I was contacted by My Memories, the award winning digital software company, with an offer to host a giveaway for my blog readers! I was very nervous, I always get that way with giveaways because I worry I'll do it wrong and mess everything up, but I was also very EXCITED too!

I was given My Memories Suite digital scrapbook software to try out and review. They claim it is easy to use, I was leary though because I really am terrible at using things like this... But guess what? I DID IT! I made some things! It actually is fairly easy! If I can do it anyone can, really. Would you like to see the things I made? Let me show you..

I've been thinking about making a new blog header, I had an idea in my mind, just didn't know how to go about it. I got to thinking hmmm maybe this new My Memories Suite could help me make it, and I went about trying it. This is the very first thing I made:

Not to bad for a first timer with NO CLUE what I was doing. Right?

Then I went about trying some other things...As you will see, I'm very much a lover of snow, and wishing we had some NOW, so my things have a winter/snow theme to them...

The red one, was a template they had, I just added my picture and my words. The blue one I totally did on my own. I've got some more learning to do, but this just shows you anyone can do it. I did these all one evening, just using a few hours of my time.

How about it? Would you like to give this a try? Would you love to win My Memories Suite digital scrapbook software? You could make your own scrapbook layouts, cards, calenders, photo books, videos and more!

There are 3 ways you can enter to win, pick one, two, or do all three:

1. Visit the My Memories website, and take a look at their digital scrapbooking kits, then come comment here telling me which one appeals to you. This counts as ONE entry. Be sure to leave me an email address in your comment so I can contact you if you win.

2. Like and/or Follow My Memories on Facebook or Twitter then come back here and leave a comment to let me know you have (please be honest). This counts as ONE entry (even if you like AND follow). Be sure to leave me an email address in the comment so I can contact you if you win.

3. Follow my blog, if you haven't already. If you do, let me know you already do. Once you follow my blog, come back here and leave a comment letting me know that you have done so and that will count as ONE entry. Be sure to leave me an email address to contact you if you win.

I'll be taking entries from now, Nov. 20, through Nov. 30, 2011. After that I will randomly pick a winner and announce it here (and via email) on (or near) Dec. 1, 2011.

As a special to my readers, My Memories has supplied me with a code for you all- good for a $10 discount off the purchase of My Memories Suite scrapbook software and a $10 coupon for the MyMemories.com store! So even if you don't win the free software you can still score something good :) The code is: STMMMS10284 If you'd like to make a purchase for yourself or as a gift for someone please use that code (highlight it, control/c to copy, then control v to paste it in your order). This would make a great Christmas gift, why not get it now, you can order it without leaving the house, so easy! Please spread the word and share the code!

Good luck!

Toodles!

(As stated above, I was given a free copy of the My Memories Suite to try and review. The opinions given above are my own)

I Spy 11-3-11

2011-11-03T11:25:00.003-05:00

Before I join Dear Dazee in her weekly I Spy, I need to take a quick second for a special announcement...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY to my MOM! I hope you have a wonderful day!

Ok, back to the regular scheduled programming...

This weeks prompt is TREES, and bloggers choice. My favorite trees are my moms trees in the fall. This picture was taken last year while I was bored at our garage sale that no one was coming to LOL.

I love the colors, aren't they pretty?

For my bloggers choice picture hmmm let me bring up another oldie...
How about another of Jilly, she was a little troublemaker as a youngster. I found her this way one day, I asked her if she was in my make up, she told me NO...I didn't believe her, do you?

What a stinker...

Next weeks I Spy is: MAP(S) and Bloggers Choice.

Have a great day!

Toodles!

P.S. Damn I haven't redone my blog since Spring, maybe I should get on the ball and change things up a bit soon... should I do fallish or go right to wintery looks? :)

Look at me! Again and again and again...

2011-10-28T20:53:00.003-05:00

I have a few internet pet peeves. Most of you that know me know one of them is people that use a million !!!!!!!!!'s or ????????'s in posts of any kind whether it is on FB, Twitter, wherever. One or two !'s or ?'s is plenty folks.

Another pet peeve of mine (sorry if this offends any of you), is people that post a crap ton of pictures of THEMSELVES on facebook. Really, how conceited & vain are we?? (see, 2 ??'s made my point very well). It really annoys me. Oh, don't get me started on the pucker face, duck face, whatever you wanna call it... why do they do it? I don't understand, do they think it makes them look cute? I have news for them..it does NOT.

For fun (although it wasn't) I took a crap ton of pics of me (in my ugly toothless glory), just to prove a point.

See. OVERKILL. One pic of me would have been way more then enough. But by golly I wanted to make sure you saw me in my funny faces.

Do you know someone on FB that takes a ton of pics of themselves? I do. Really... GET. OVER. YOURSELF. Sorry. You may be pretty, or you may not.. do we really need to see you over and over and over and OVER in the same poses with the same goofy faces?

Whew. I feel better getting that off my chest.

Toodles.

I Spy 10-28-11 (yes I'm late again)

2011-10-28T19:56:00.002-05:00

This week has been messed up. It's been busy, crazy, stressful, and painful to name a few ways to describe it. Bill's been home off and on all week. Monday I had that dental procedure, I was all nervous about it but it went ok. I was sore that evening but things are healing up. Tuesday Kelsey had a dental appt, and it seemed to take forever. I don't remember what all I did Wednesday, but whatever it was it kept me busy lol. Yesterday was busy too, and in the evening Kels went balistic about some stuff so I never got around to posting this... Then today brought another busy day, cleaning in the morning, ER visit in the afternoon. My crazy Bree keeps climbing onto the countertop in the bathroom. I sent her in there to go potty before we picked the girls up at school today. We heard her in there smacking the mirror which means she was on the countertop... we went in there and told her to get down and to not do it again for she'll get hurt. She climbed down and as she was at the floor she stumbled and fell hitting her nose really hard (you could hear it hit) on a metal step stool. Ouch. She screamed bloody murder for a good 35-40 minutes, her nose swelled, and it bleed a bit. 2+ hrs and xrays later we find her nose has a slight crack in it, but it won't affect the appearance of her nose so its ok, and she has a cut inside her nose. She is to ice it, take pain meds if needed, and take antibiotics to prevent any infection that could come from bacteria getting into the cut in her nose. So yeah, fun times...NOT.

Dazee's I Spy was actually yesterday but I'm still participating. Theme this time is JUST LIKE HALLOWEEN.

Jilly the pumpkin girl and Bree as strawberry shortcake. They dressed up to go to CVS to get goodies. When we got home they carved pumpkins. Bree wasn't to keen on putting her hand in hers. I took about 10 pics of her with her pumpkin, this is the closest I could get to her actually looking towards the camera...and it isn't a very good one. Drives me nuts when she looks everywhere but at the camera!

Bloggers choice pic will be....

This picture always makes me laugh. This is Jilly when she was younger, with pretzels up her nose. Do not try this at home, leave it to the professionals.

Next weeks theme is: TREE(S), and bloggers choice.

Toodles!

A Vlog For You

2011-10-13T10:31:00.002-05:00

I came up with an interesting way to do a Vlog. You know I'm not a fan of my picture taken (yet anyways). Last time I vlogged I think I had a paper bag over my head! This time is a bit different...

Its funny how you can have a lot to say, then the camera is in your face and everything you planned to say disappears! I just rambled on about this & that, not sure how much sense it makes...hopefully it doesn't bore the crap out of you LOL.

Keep in mind I did this alone, so the aim isn't so good with the camera...

Toodles!

I Spy 10-13-11

2011-10-13T09:12:00.002-05:00

It's that time again! Time for me to join up with my pal Dazee and do the weekly I Spy.

This weeks prompt was ABANDONED and Bloggers choice. I pass a few abandoned places here in town frequently, so yesterday when I picked up Kelsey at school (she had to stay late to take a test) we swung by these places to take pics really quick.

The first one is located near Jilly's school. Upon taking a closer look at it yesterday I think it had a fire in it, hence why it is now empty. It looked like there was black smoke stuff on the side of the house (not seen in the picture).

I wish I had taken my camera with me yesterday morning when I took Kels to school, it was still a bit dark then and the full moon was above that house and it looked creepy & cool. To bad I missed that shot.

The next one I'm going to show you is located on Rt. 34, this house has been this way ever since I've been living in this town, not sure when it got abandoned. This house interests me, I wonder the story behind it, why it was left...is it haunted? I'd like to go through it, but I'm sure its probably dangerous inside since its so old and falling apart.

To bad houses can't talk, I bet this one would have a lot to say. This house also has a barn...well, whats left of a barn...

Poor old barn.

Now, for Bloggers choice...This is a hard one. Over the weekend I took the girls to Sannauk Forest Preserve for photos. I have several I like and I can't pick just one, so I'm not going to limit myself :) Here are the pictureS I have picked:

It was so nice out over the weekend, temps in the 80's. We enjoyed it while we could :). I'm anxious for cold weather and SNOW to come, but I hope it stays away until Nov. 1, gotta have it nice for Halloween :)

Thats it for this weeks I Spy. Next weeks theme is PLAYGROUNDS and bloggers choice. Be there or be square.

Toodles!

Homecoming 2011

2011-10-07T10:37:00.003-05:00

Last weekend was Mendota's Homecoming. Friday was Spirit Day for the students to dress up in school colors and look goofy. I was a nice mom and bought Kelsey a shirt & shorts to wear, and did her hair.

That is supposed to be an M, for Mendota. We sprayed her hair purple & gold...although they don't look it much because of Kelsey's regular hair color underneath.

After school Kelsey had to come home and shower, then she had a job interview for Pizza Hut. After that she went to dinner with her dad and they went to the homecoming game together. I'm happy to report Mendota WON the football game. It was also their first homecoming game on their new field/stadium!

Saturday Kelsey's friend Autumn came over to go to the dance with Kelsey (Autumn graduated from Mendota last year). They spent a ton of time getting ready and taking pics of themselves and facebooking them. The dance started at 8, and the girls were finally ready to leave for it at 8:20. I didn't get much for pictures because they were in a hurry, and it was dark out, not good for pics. Here is one decent one I got. (Kels is in the black/teal dress, Autumn in green)

I like the dress...just wish it was a few inches longer. :) I bought her the dress, and paid for her tickets for her & Autumn for the dance...No thanks from Kels for any of my homecoming purchases is for her...just complaints that I didn't pay for her to get her nails done nor her hair done. :( It frustrates me.

When the girls returned from the dance they hung out in Kelsey's room making all kinds of noise, not much sleep that night.

The following day she slept most of the day, even though I begged her for a little help around the house & with her little sister since I was still recovering from my teeth yanking and I didn't have much energy. I got none.

I think she needs to start saving now for Prom...because with her attitude and lack of thanks I'm not feeling in the generous mood... :P

The girls did look nice and pretty though for homecoming. I'm glad its over.

Toodles!

I Spy 10-7-11

2011-10-07T10:14:00.002-05:00

TGIF! Yep its FRIDAY. 4 day weekend for the kids here, I'm glad I don't ahve to drive them back and forth to school for a few days, I just hope they can be on good behaviour while home and not make me drive them there anyways LOL.

I'm a day late for the I Spy, but I'm still joining in. Yesterday my old neighbor (who works for Dell) came over and did some major much needed clean up to my computer so I wasn't able to get this post done on time.

This weeks prompt was SIGNS. Here is a stop sign a few blocks from my home. I did not do this to the sign, someone else did, shame on them... but kinda cool too.

Show love people, not HATE.

Now for Bloggers choice...I took this picture yesterday.

Pretty huh? I love the little lake here in town. I love fall colors too.

Next weeks prompt is ABANDONED and bloggers choice.

Toodles!

I Spy (Bench)

2011-09-29T20:09:00.003-05:00

Happy Thursday!

I'm joining in with my friend Dazee and her I Spy meme again.

This weeks theme/prompt is BENCH (S). I happened to find some for pictures last week, so here they are:

Notice the bend in the middle of this one? Probably from me sitting my fat butt on it! LOL not really I didn't sit on this one. These are both located at the lake here in town.

Now for a photo of my choice....hmmm I don't know that I have any good current ones...Let me find an older one...

:)

Toodles!

I Survived!

2011-09-27T13:23:00.002-05:00

I'm happy to say I survived my dentist visit and all my teeth extracted yesterday. I was super nervous! I took my valium at 8 like I was supposed to, my mom drove me. Soon as we got there I used the bathroom and then they were ready to take me back! I guess thats better then sitting around waiting nervously.

I sat in the chair and they got me ready. Let me say one thing, THANK GOD FOR THE GAS! That stuff made it much more tolerable. The gas was started first, then the novacaine...ick. My mouth was so huge (or felt that way at least) that half the time I wasn't sure if I had it open or not lol. The whole thing seemed to go pretty fast (even though it was nearly 3 hrs). If I felt anything I was given more novacaine...except at the very end. They had pretty much maxed me out on it and since my blood pressure was so high (160/100) they didn't want to risk giving any more, at the very end I felt a few stitches being put in. It hurt a tad but not awful since I did have some numbing (just not enough). According to the dentist all went well in the removal.

I had to sit a bit after to make sure all was well and I was given care instructions. At this point I had tears in my eyes , from relief of being done, then all the sudden I got the giggles! I kept laughing and nothing was even funny! My mom was back there with me at this point, she was laughing at me/with me. LOL. I was so glad to get out of there! Mom drove me back home. I talked a lot I think but I doubt she understood a word I said because I had so much gauze in my mouth.

Once we got home mom went and picked up my meds (Thanks Mom!), and I got settled on the couch, where I remained almost all night....like until 3 a.m. The evening was hard while I had gauze in, because I kept having to write notes to everyone because no one understood me. Bree didn't like that I couldn't talk to her. Late evening I took the gauze out and thankfully the drooling stopped, for I had gone through a ton of gauze & paper towels trying to catch all the slobber LOL. I spent the evening chilling out, and watching DWTS, while my family made a mess...which I had to clean up today. Kels did make Bree dinner, and take Moo out for me. Jilly felt bad later that night and folded a basket of laundry for me.

I stayed on the couch most of last night trying to sleep, I was trying to stay upright as much as possible. I was awake far more then I was sleeping unfortunately. At 3 a.m. ish I said screw this I'm going into bed... I still had sleeping issues after that. Today I'm sore, swollen a bit and exhausted, and a tiny bit hungry. I got in 2 bites of yogurt this morning, and about 3 for lunch...enough to get food into my stomach to take my pills. I'm crossing my fingers that once my husband gets home tonight I'll be able to take a little nap!

I told you I'd take a before pic, and I did. I'm going to post it, so if you don't want to see turn away now. Its just what my smile looks like, I couldn't get into my mouth to show you all the other broken yucky teeth, but I'm sure by looking at the front you'll get the idea.

Now you know why you rarely see pics of me, and if you do I'm not smiling. Soon I'll try to get some full body pics too for a before pic, I'm hoping I'll shed some pounds and by the time I get my teeth I'll look a lot better!

Toodles!
Time for me to ice ice baby...trying to get swelling down.

D-Day

2011-09-26T08:56:00.000-05:00

Today is the day. When this blog post shows up I'll probably be sitting in the dentist chair. Hopefully I'll be so drugged up I'll be at ease... Please keep me in your thoughts and/or prayers, I NEED THEM. I was going to post a before pic, but at the time I'm typing this I have a major headache and I'm not in the mood LOL. I will try to post one as soon as I'm able though.

If I don't survive...please know I appreciate you readers. It's been fun. Make sure my husband cremates me, and I want my ashes kept with my kids...the last of my children to die (hopefully many many MANY years from now) needs to take my ashes to their grave. There, I've covered that base..

I hope for the best, prepare for the worst... thats the worry wart in me.

If ya follow me on Facebook I'll try to get a text sent to FB to let ya all know how it went, if you are interested.

From now on you can call me GUMBY haha :)

Toodles!

SOOC Saturday (9-24-11)

2011-09-24T15:30:00.002-05:00

Happy Fall!

Today I'm going to join up and do Marvelous Mommy's SOOC Saturday meme again. Its just posting a photo that you took, straight out of the camera no edits done to it. I like this because I suck at editing lol so I don't have to worry about this one. I don't have any good edit programs, I just use picnik when I edit. Someday if I ever get lessons on how to use a program like photoshop or lightroom (of course I'd have to save to buy them first...those suckers are expensive), maybe I'll dally more into edits, but for now I just do basic things when I do them.

Here is my SOOC picture, I took it last week over at Lake Mendota:

Not to bad for SOOC eh?

If I do a little vibrance & boost to it, it turns out looking like this:

Happy Saturday!

Toodles!

Anxiety

2011-09-22T12:46:00.002-05:00

As you know, Monday is a big day for me. A scary day. A exciting day. A painful day. A new beginning day. It will be the day the journey to a pretty smile begins. On Monday I am going to the dentist and getting all my teeth taken out. To say I'm stressing about this would be an understatement. I'm a tad freaked out LOL. Well more than a tad a LOT freaked out.

I lay in bed trying to fall asleep and I think about the dentist. I have dental phobia. Even calling a dentist freaks me out, I get the craps, cramps, feeling icky. Knowing I'm going on Monday has already started that ball rolling and I've been visiting the bathroom lots already. Anyways, as I was saying, I lay in bed trying to fall asleep and I think about the dentist, and whats gonna happen, about the sounds & smells of the dentist etc. it keeps me awake. When I finally do fall asleep I have dreams about the dentist. I told you about the one I think, where he told me I owed him money and how he claimed I use my boobs to try to get a discount...I told ya right? That was about a week or so ago. The other night I had one that I was at the dentist, strapped to the chair, and he was threatening to put novacaine injections into my FEET to prevent me from leaving! Eek.

I worry about everything. What if I choke on a piece of gauze? What if I have a reaction to the valium I'm going to be taking? What if he overdoses me on novacaine? What if I feel the pain as he pulls my teeth? The shots...EEEEK I hate those things. What if I bleed to death in the dentist chair? What if what if what if. I think because I've wanted this to happen for years and dreamed of dentures and a pretty smile, thinking it would never happen due to costs, now that it IS happening I fear the worst because I'm getting something I want. Sorta like that'll teach me for wanting something so costly and for appearance sake (although its for health reasons too).

Keep me in your prayers, I need help with this anxiety and constant fear, and of course I'll need them for Monday.

I am looking forward to no more toothaches, no more pain from cold winter air hitting my teeth, no more teeth breaking when I chew my food...

Another huge thanks to my Mom for making this dream a reality for me. I love you mom, and if I survive Monday I'll be sure to give you a big hug after my appointment. Maybe I'll give you one before too, just in case I don't!

Toodles!

I Spy (lamps)

2011-09-22T12:32:00.003-05:00

Happy Thursday!

I'm going to join in with my friend Dazee again with her I Spy meme. This weeks prompt was LAMPS. Lamps...? Seriously?!? I think its a crazy one, not one I'd have picked, and one I have struggled with LOL. I don't really have any lamps in my home, ours broke and never got replaced since we have ceiling lights why bother ya know? I didn't want to lug my big camera into a store to sneak pics either, because I was afraid I'd look like a loon (more than usual). So I was a wiseguy, and took this pic:

I drew it in chalk, on my driveway.

The FedEx guy that came today probably wonders why there is a lamp drawn on my driveway...oh well let him wonder :)

For my bloggers choice pic I think I'll go with this one:

I took this one out by the lake this morning.

Next weeks I Spy prompt is BENCH (S). I've got that one covered already yay me!

Toodles

Imagination

2011-09-19T18:35:00.003-05:00

My 3.5 yr old daughter has quite the imagination. I love listening to her play sometimes.

Today she made me laugh a lot.

I have an alarm set on my phone, when it goes off that means its time for her to go use the potty and then we head out to pick the girls up at school. So Bree is in the bathroom doing her thing, and taking a while...I go look in to check on her and was shocked by what I saw. She is in there with her pants around her ankles. She has a big wad of TP stuck in her butt crack, and she is hopping around. When she saw me, she said, "Look Mom, I'm a bunny!!" I cracked up, and did what any computer loving mom would do, I facebooked about it LOL.

Earlier today she was in the bathtub playing. She pretended she was a mermaid deep in the ocean (her words, that is what she told me), and she had a job, selling ice cream deep in the ocean in an ice cream truck. She lives in the ice cream truck too she said. When I asked her what the ocean smelled like she said to me, "Umm like seaweed, DUH!" what a hoot. I asked her what kind of pillow she used in the ocean, she told me she sleeps on a pillow of ice cream.

Bree sure comes up with some wacky stuff. I love her imagination.

Toodles!

SOOC Saturday

2011-09-17T19:12:00.002-05:00

Busy day today. The girls & I went to Honey Hill Apple Orchard in Waterman, we go there every year. We got some YUMMY cider & donuts, and some apples that I'm going to make applesauce with later. Then we stopped by my moms for a bit to visit.

Today is SOOC (straight out of the camera) Saturday, which is a meme by Marvelous Mommy. I like to join in on this when I can, because its simple :)

Here is my SOOC picture, of a goat at the orchard today, I had the camera right by his (or maybe it was a her...) face.

Isn't it cute? Don'tcha just wanna give it a big ole smooch? Yeah... me either. LOL.

I hope you all had a great Saturday...

Off to eat a donut ;) Toodles!

I Spy (on time :) )

2011-09-15T04:00:00.000-05:00

As I mentioned in another post, my friend Dazee started a new meme thing called I Spy. I'm joining in this week ON TIME :) Yay me!

This weeks prompt is BUGS EYE VIEW, crazy isn't it?! LOL

Here is my idea of a BUGS EYE VIEW, 2 photos:

And, then I get to put a BLOGGERS CHOICE picture up, I pick this one:

These are the flowers from the bugs eye view pic, before I made them look like bug vision LOL.

Toodles!

Stuff 3

2011-09-12T19:48:00.002-05:00

A few months ago I did the 'Stuff ' post, where I put stuff that I'm doing now to words that were given. I figure I should do one now, just for the heck of it.

Listening: MadTV is on...stupid show

Eating: NOTHING, could really go for a caramel apple parfait from McD's though.

Drinking: NOTHING, but could go for an ice cold coke from McD's, or a mug of hot tea.

Wearing: PJ's...which consist of a tank top and shorts

Feeling: Yucky. I'm tired and I've had a stupid scratchy throat all day...if I'm going to be sick it needs to get it over with already, I have big plans in a few weeks and I can't really be sick at that time.

Weather: Clear, hopefully cooling off by now, I believe it was in the mid-80's today. I'm turning the a/c back off tonight (turned it on yesterday) and hopefully it STAYS off until next summer.

Need: To win the lottery! (LOL I think I answered this question the same each time)

Thinking: That I'm so ready for bed!

Wondering: Why are goldfish called goldfish when they are ORANGE not gold? Why does the lid on the tuna can never come all the way undone with the hand held can opener? I always gotta twist it to get the last tiny bit undone.

Internet find: Hmm not sure I found anything today really...

Toodles!

I Spy (better late then never)

2011-09-12T18:45:00.003-05:00

My dear buddy Dazee has started a new meme thingy, and last week was the first one...and because I suck as a blogger I missed it! So, because I missed it, I'm unable to link up to the others, but I figure I can still blog about it :)

It's called I Spy. Dazee gives us a prompt for a photo, and then we take one or use one that goes along with the prompt as we see it. Then, we can put a photo of our choice no matter what the theme. Tomorrow (correction, THURSDAY) is a new one, hopefully that one I can get on time lol, but for now, here is my version of last weeks...the prompt was WEATHERED

Here is my WEATHERED photo(s):

I took this pic this morning after dropping the girls off at school. This water tower has seen better days...I wonder how old it is. It definately is weathered...

And MY CHOICE photo:

This was on the drive home Thursday night. Along lonely road, normally a boring drive with nothing but corn & bean fields to look at, but the sky made the trip home nice.

The next I Spy's(tomorrow) prompt is: BUGS EYE VIEW and Bloggers choice... hopefully I can get it done on time.

Hopefully if I get my rear in gear I'll also get my SOOC post done Saturday too, I missed last weeks and I think the week before :(.

Toodles

Still Alive

2011-09-10T15:16:00.003-05:00

Yep, I'm still around...sorta. :)

I've just been lazy when it comes to blogging! :( I suck. I've been trying to keep up with swagbucks, irazoo, superpoints etc., and trying to read the bazillion blogs I subscribe to, and I've neglected my very own blog. Sorry. I'm pretty boring anyways, not like you are missing anything really exciting...

I did go to my dental appointment. It was tough. I had the craps days in advance I was so stressed over it. As soon as I walked in the door and sat down in the waiting room I lost it. I got all teary, I'm such a BIG BABY! I don't know why my fear is so bad, but it is. I got lots of x-rays taken that day, and talked to the dentist about the dentures. Just for the record, I do NOT have a BIG MOUTH. :) The ladies that took the x-rays said they had to use the smallest thingy for my mouth because it was so tiny. I told them that was the first time I ever heard that one! LOL. Most tell me I have a big mouth. Anyways.. I'm going to get all my teeth taken out at once, and I hope and pray the valium, and the gas calm me down enough to get through it. I'm not looking forward to the oodles of shots of novicaine, and the sights/sounds/smells of the dental visit that day. I would really love to be knocked out for the process, but that costs a lot more. I'm sure I'll have some pain for a few days at least. I just pray everything goes smoothly. I will be without teeth for a while, not looking forward to that, I think I'll become a hermit for awhile so no one sees me toothless. I'm thinking of taking a "Hello my name is...GUMBY" sticker with me the day I get my teeth yanked, then as soon as they are all out I'll slap that on me LOL. I have an appointment for Sept. 26th for the teeth removal...please say prayers for me that morning and keep me in your thoughts! I'm going to try to take some before pics not only of my crappy teeth, but of my fat body too... and hopefully when I get my pretty new teeth I'll have a less fat body to go with them, and we can compare before & after pics...

I'm already super nervous about that appointment on the 26th. I'm even dreaming about the dentist, and not really in a good way LOL. Last night I dreamt that I took Jilly for her appt., the dentist yelled at me because her teeth were so bad, then yelled at me that I owed him $150. Then he told me that I was trying to use my big boobs to get a discount! I was so mad in the dream that he said that, because I wasn't using them. Sure I had boobs, but they are attached to me, its not like I can leave them at home, and in my dream I was not flaunting them in any way to where he'd have thought that. It really upset me. I was waiting in my van for the receptionist to come out so I could talk to her (she is a friend of my moms) and the dentist came out and I wanted to run him over! Nice dream eh?

August 23rd was Jilly's 11th birthday, and also her first day of 6th grade. It was a half day of school, so after she had a few friends over for cake. Three 11 yr old girls...oh my, they acted so goofy and drove me up the wall lol.

Jilly had a nice day, despite having to go to school that day.

The weekend after Jilly's birthday, we took the girls to a place in Yorkville called Hoppers. Its an indoor place that has a bunch of bouncehouse things, and a velcro wall. They had a blast. We were there for several hours.

We look forward to returning. Even parents could go on the stuff, it was fun. Bill took some pics of me, but I look like a big fat pig with a broken tooth and it was disgusting, so I'll be posting no pics of me there!

Last weekend we went to the fair down the street from our house. Our town puts on a pretty pathetic fair.. Its rather sad. I wish they'd take lessons from the Sandwich Fair. I did take a few pics of our fair, but nothing really special, so I won't bore you with those. This week was the Sandwich Fair, and again we went for wristband day. We got there around 10:30 a.m. and left at about 7:20 p.m.! The girls & Bill got wristbands so they could ride as many rides as they wanted. I didn't get one because I get sick on nearly everything! I was the watcher of the stroller and the picture taker for the day. Last year Bree LOVED the giant slide and merry-go-round. This year she only went on the slide about 5 times. She did try a few other rides but didn't like them. First it was the bee ride, Kels rode with her. She was ok when it started out, but then the bee went up in the air, and Bree did NOT like that at all. Later she tried the teacup ride...which is a smaller version of the teapots at Disney sorta. She was excited but nervous to try it. Once the ride started I guess the cup kinda tilts a bit and it freaked her out, Jilly ended up hugging and consoling her the rest of the ride. Bree did still enjoy the merry-go-round (which she calls the miracleround lol) and she rode it with Bill and the girls several times, she does not like riding on the horses on it though, she must ride on the bench or she freaks out. Kels rode a few rides with Bree & Jilly then went off on her own for the rest of the day. Jilly rode a few rides, her favorite was the hang-glider one. My favorite thing of the day was a turtle funnelcake.. which is funnel cake, powdered sugar, a ton of whipped cream and caramel & fudge drizzled over the top.

The second to last pic is Jilly in an inflatable wheel thing, she was like a hamster lol. The last one is her chowing on a deep fried pickle on a stick... Everythings good on a stick right? She loves pickles and wanted another!

Yesterday Bill & I went and got some much needed haircuts! My hair is short again and it feels great!

I think that is all for now. I'll try to keep up a little better with my blog...so my mom can stop bugging me about it LOL (kidding mom).

Toodles!

SOOC Saturday

2011-08-19T21:01:00.002-05:00

I enjoyed last weeks meme of SOOC (straight out of the camera) Saturday, so I thought I'd join in again. It means I put up a picture I took that is straight out of the camera, no editing done to it.

This meme is put on by Marvelous Mommy. Please visit her site and enjoy her pics, and those that have linked up to this meme.

I couldn't pick which ONE of these bubble pics I took, so I'm posting both. Bubbles are cool.

There ya go, my SOOC pics. Not perfect, but still cool.

While I was looking for these pics I came across some other pics that I like and some old videos that had me laughing. Bree, Kels & I ended up watching a bunch together.

In the same folder as the bubble pics I came across this one of Jilly it too is SOOC I believe, might have cropped it I don't remember, but I didn't change the pic in any other way. Its one of my gazillion favorites...

I like her blue eyes, and her blonde hair, and the freckles on her nose.

Oh, and then there is this one of Bree covered in chocolate, and splashing in our ugly gold bathtub...so cute

She's such a nutbutt.

Ok, going to stop looking at photos now or I'll be posting all my favorites!

Have a great weekend!
Toodles!

Big Changes Coming Soon

2011-08-19T20:37:00.002-05:00

I wasn't sure how to title this post.

I thought about "Dream coming true". Or, "I love my mommy" :) . Or, "Out with the old in with the new" or "I'm full of crap"... and a few other things.

I got a shocking surprise from my mom earlier this week. I had to pick my jaw up off the floor when she told me the news.

My first thought was 'oh my God, for real?' I was very excited, for it was something I've been wanting to get done for years now. My second thought was 'OH SHIT! I have to go to a dentist!'. Since then I've been spending my time doing a happy dance, and sitting on the shitter because I have a nervous stomach and its in knots...(I know, TMI, but its the truth).

You are probably wondering what I'm talking about...

My mom has told me she is going to pay what insurance will not for me to be able to get my teeth pulled and dentures! If you've followed my blog for a while now (or if you know me in real life) you know that I am terrified of the dentist. Between my fear of the dentist, and years of no dental insurance/money, I haven't been to the dentist since I was in high school. Yes, thats a LONG TIME.

I am totally freaked out about going. My appointment to talk to the dentist is Monday morning, and I'll know more after that. I'm so scared my stomach is a mess and my booty is sore LOL. But I'm also excited in a way too.

I'm really embarrassed and ashamed to have to open my mouth to them on Monday, and allow them to see the horrible state of my teeth. I've mentioned before they are in a bad way and I'm not kidding. Most of my teeth are broken, even a front one is broken in half from top to bottom only half of it remains...I look like a hillbilly.

I'm excited that soon I will get rid of these yucky teeth, and get some new ones, ones I can eat easier with, and ones I can SMILE with! I will be able to smile, and maybe even want my picture taken once in a while! You don't know what its like trying not to smile, or letting people see you smile, for fear they'll be freaked out by my appearance.

Another good thing that I'm excited about is I might be able to shed a few pounds during this teeth removal process. I won't be able to eat much for a while probably, that is a GOOD THING. Maybe I'll get thinner, and be smiling more too, and I'll start to feel better about myself, and have more energy.

So as I said, there are some big changes coming soon. Please keep me in your prayers & thoughts for these things:
*That I can get through my appointments without passing out or something.
*That the dentist isn't freaked out and making me feel worse about the way my teeth look and the way I feel about them.
*That I can get this done quickly!
*That the tooth removal goes smoothly, no complications and healing is quick.
*That the dentures feel good and LOOK GOOD.
*That I lose a LOT of weight :)

Please give a big shout out to my Mom. If it wasn't for her generosity I'd not be getting this done! I love you mom, thanks so much, you will get my first pretty smile. :)

Toodles!

Hopscotch

2011-08-19T20:30:00.002-05:00

Bree wanted to play hopscotch today.

I didn't want to go outside to do it because it was hot...and I'm fat...and hot and fat don't mix well LOL.

So we compromised.

We did hopscotch INSIDE.

Masking tape to the rescue!

Even Kelsey got into the fun when she got home from school.

Now seems like every time we go down the hall we do the hopscotch LOL.

It's fun to watch the kids doing it.

Scary watching ME do it...I'm big, and fat, and have old lady saggy boobs....if I keep hopscotching I might knock myself out with my boobs.

Go get your masking tape...and get to hopscotching too!

Toodles!

She's BACK!

2011-08-19T20:19:00.002-05:00

Jilly is HOME from Norway! She was supposed to be home in the middle of the night on Sunday/Monday, but their last flight got cancelled! I wasn't pleased, I wanted my Jilly home. She finally made it home early Monday afternoon. I was super happy to see her, and so was Bree!

I would post a picture of her, but I haven't had a chance to get any! She/we have been busy all week. Jilly's dad is in town until tomorrow, so Jilly's trying to get as much time in with him as possible. She's been gone pretty much from the time she gets up each day until past bedtime. I'd like time with her too, but right now her time with her dad is more important because soon he'll be gone, so I'm letting her have as much as possible. She was home long enough to get her school physical on Tuesday, and her dentist appointment on Wednesday.

Tomorrow is going to be a sad day for Jilly I'm sure when she says good-bye to her daddy again. Please keep her in your thoughts and him too, I know its just as hard on him.

Toodles!

SOOC (Straight out of camera)

2011-08-12T20:47:00.003-05:00

I saw that Dear Dazee my buddy joined in this meme, so I thought I'd jump on the boat too. I like this one, its posting a picture straight out of the camera, no edits. I'm not a professional photographer nor do I edit much so this is up my alley.

The meme is from Marvelous Mommy, please click the buttons below to check her out along with those that linked up to her meme.

Here is my entry. This was taken back in October, on the way home from Somonauk.

Toodles!

Worried about what others think..

2011-08-12T11:42:00.002-05:00

I need a haircut. I haven't gotten one in months. I put it off for a while because money was tight. Then I worried that I'd go to get it cut and there would be a flea in my hair (dog & cats had fleas bad) and it would freak out the hairstylist and embarrass me... My hair is getting pretty unmanageable now, and I'm getting tired of having to put it in barretts or headbands (which hurt my head! I must have a big head...). I'm at a point where I NEED something done to it, I just don't know for sure what.

Yesterday I was surfing the web, in search of hairstyles... I came across something that caught my eye. At first glance, I thought 'I like it, but to risky for me.' I kept looking for other styles, and found a few ok ones, but my mind kept going back to the risky one. The more I looked at it the more I liked it. Maybe the fact that its on a model that isn't a twig helped pull me in. Maybe its the fact that it is a SHORT & EASY style that pulled me in... I like short hair, I like it on me, and I like the easy styling in the morningss... My husband isn't the biggest fan of short hair though.. But, who is going to wear it, him or me? Most of his time is spent working/sleeping/or on his computer, so its not like he'd be seeing much of me either LOL. But I do still worry... about what people would think...

So, my problem is... Do it because I like it, and pray it would look ok on me? Or don't do it, because others might not like it?

HERE is the style. I might (if I get it) have them go a tad shorter by the eye, for I hate stuff in my eyes. It is also making me think about wanting to get my ears repierced...I haven't worn earrings in probably about 10 yrs!

Nervously considering...
Toodles!

Senior Pictures

2011-07-26T21:47:00.002-05:00

Because money always seems to be tight, and because I like to take pictures... Kels & I have decided that I would do her senior pictures. The plan is to take a few each season, and print out the best of them. Yesterday we had photoshoot #1.

Here are a few, let me know what you think!

Toodles!

While I was Away...

2011-07-26T21:09:00.002-05:00

As I mentioned in my last post I believe, I went to visit my brother & his family for a few days. Kels, Bree & I got up early Friday, loaded up the van and headed out.

Our first stop was to the vets in Princeton to drop off Moo who was staying there while we were away. (Normally Bill would deal with her, but he works 2 jobs and she'd have been outside while he'd have been working, it was way to hot for that, and it turned out to be nasty in other ways too.) Upon leaving the vets, we looked at the sky, it looked pretty crazy! A storm seemed to be brewing. We stopped at BK and snagged some breakfast to eat on the road and off we went. Shortly after we got on the interstate, it started to rain. Yuck, I hate driving in rain, and driving in construction in the rain is really sucky. Thankfully the rain didn't last long. We drove, and drove, and drove. Stopped a few times for pee breaks, because we had Bree with she's not super good at holding things sometimes and I didn't want to risk her having to go when it was going to be to hard to get to a potty, so we stopped at easy to get to places as we went.

We arrived in Springfield around lunchtime. We unloaded and visited a bit, then went and got lunch. Once lunch was over it was play play play time for the little girls. Bree & Trinity hit it off well and kept eachother very busy. Kelsey & I took some turns holding baby Jude. He is so cute. Then we had to run to the store for some makings for dinner. I told Robb & Beth that I'd be cooking dinner for them. They always seem to treat us out and stuff while we are there so I wanted to do something for them this time.

Beth, Kels, Bree & I took a quick visit to Meijers for some stuff. When we got back, Robb says to me..."Where exactly in Norway is Jilly?" I told him she's near Oslo... to which he said, "Ummm did you hear a bomb went off in Oslo Norway today? And someone killed a bunch of people at a camp?" My heart dropped. Panic hit. I got my phone and dropped a msg to Jilly's step mom on FB, because that is where I usually find her LOL. I asked her if everyone was ok, and to fill me in on what happened. I was to impatient to wait for her reply, so even though it was late there, I called my ex. (He was staying at their place, his wife was with the kids at their cabin). He answered the phone right away and told me everyone was safe and sound. The bombing wasn't to far from where he works, but he's ok. Jilly & the others were further away at the cabin so they were all safe. I guess the bomb went off right near where my ex's sister works, thankfully she was on vacation at the time. Whew. I could breath easier knowing Jilly was safe. I then went on to the task of cooking dinner. We had sweet and sour chicken, my FAVORITE recipe. It takes forever to make because I make a big batch but its so worth it, YUMMY. We had dinner pretty late Friday night.

After dinner Beth & the baby had to go out for a bit to a goodbye party for a co-worker of hers, so Robb & I and my girls hung out together. We went into the pool for a late evening swim. The weather had been like around 100 for several days, and the pool water was HOT. I've never been in a hot pool before. When I say hot I mean like water I'd take a bath in hot. Wild. There was a deer out in the field by his house grazing as we swam.

Saturday the girls played all day. I made ribs for us for dinner. Beth made a bunch of pasta salads and potato salads during the day, we had them with the ribs for dinner. We basically just hung out relaxing all day and visiting. Jude took a 3 hr nap on me, Bree joined him on my lap for one too. So I had 2 kids sleeping on me for a while. Robb & the girls went out swimming for a bit while I was being a mattress for the baby. It was a nice day.

Sunday morning Bill sent me a text. He said on his way home from work he saw lightning strike a pole that was about 40 feet from his truck. He said it scared the crap out of him. When he got home the power was out. A hell of a storm came through with high winds and lots of lightning. There are tree limbs and some pretty large ones down all throughout the town. Power remained out for 9 hours. I'm glad I wasn't home :) Out in Springfield we got a storm too, but not that bad. We spent the day chilling out and visiting some more until about 5 p.m. when I loaded up and we headed home.

I'm closing with a few pics from our weekend. Enjoy!
Toodles!

This is why I get along great with my SIL Beth...she's a little crazy just like me. :)

I'm a Dreamer

2011-07-22T06:04:00.002-05:00

The night before a trip or special event I always sleep like crap. Last night was no exception to that and I had a night of being awake and tossing and turning. In the few hours I did sleep I had a crazy dream. I mentioned before I have crazy dreams right? Well I do. I'm going to tell you parts I remember, it might be kind of rambly, because I don't remember it all, and because well, its RENEE'S RAMBLINGS so .. :) LOL

I was at a party at Mrs. K's house (She is Jilly's old 1st grade teacher, when we moved to Mendota I didn't know anyone and I became friends with her, she told me things I needed to know, doctors to go to etc, love Mrs. K :) ). I don't recall what the party was for, but there was a lot of people mingling about and a lot of buffet tables with food.

At one point, I let Mrs. K's COW, and CHICKEN out into the front yard to roam about for a bit. LOL yes, a cow and chicken... I told you I had crazy dreams! The cow was normal looking, white with black spots. The chicken was a bit odd...It had a LONG neck, and it had a hairdo that kind of looked like one you'd see on a poodle. Anyways, the cow and chicken were out in the yard, pecking and eating grass and stuff. The chicken started to go over the yard border, so I took it inside to keep it out of trouble. I ended up mingling with someone inside while doing so, so I didn't get back outside right away. When I did return outside the cow was gone! EEK! I yelled to Mrs. K that the cow is lost! Mrs. K started crying and got all frantic and we sent out party members to look for the cow. I went back outside calling, "Here cow cow cow!" and what do you know, it came running down the street. Except, it ran past me, and turned down the road where there was a dog out. (This part is sad :( ) The cow got on top of the dog and was like jumping on it. I called off the cow and carried it into the house (I was strong apparently!) while yelling to Mrs. K, "I got the cow I got the cow! But get outside the dog it attacked needs help!" So Mrs. K ran to the dog who was laying in the street wimpering. She had some nearby friends load the dog up and take it to the vets. (Don't know what came of the dog, I hope it survived!)

Then all went ok, we went back inside to the party. I was a famous blogger, lol I failed to mention that earlier :) Yes, it IS A DREAM lol. Mrs. K surprised me by having one of my fans there. The fan loved me and was so excited to meet me. It was a tall older lady with light blue hair, and she wore glasses and her name was Orange Marmalade! LOL

That is all I remember. I hope you enjoyed my crazy dream. Pray for the dream dog ok? :)

I'm heading out shortly to go visit my brother in Springfield. Its just the girls & I because Bill has to work. We are very excited to go see them and the new baby :) As always, I'll be sure to take lots of pics, and probably bombard you all with them here when I return.

Have a fun and safe weekend everyone. Peace.

Toodles!

Earning for Christmas

2011-07-20T19:02:00.002-05:00

Money is always tight around here, especially at Christmas time. So, to help out with that I've decided to join several things in order to earn amazon gift cards to buy my kids Christmas presents.

I joined Swagbucks first. I'm a fan of swagbucks although recently they've really pissed me off. I have a referral link to give people to join under me. That way they sign up, and what they earn I earn too up until they get 3000 swagbucks I think it is. Well anyways, I gave this link out to people, and 3 of my last referrals didn't show up as my referrals! So I complained to swagbucks, they agreed to link the one up, but will not do the others. In my opinion, I'm being punished unfairly by not having these people linked up and getting credit. It isn't MY FAULT their link doesn't work properly. Anyways...

Even though Swagbucks has upset me, I'm still going to use it, because I can earn amazon cards! So far, I've earned $75 in amazon cards. Once August gets here I hope to have enough bucks to purchase another $25 worth. Thats pretty good for just wasting time on the computer... Since I'm on it a lot of the day why not earn money at it? I have 6 referrals on Swag, would have 8 if the others showed up...so far only 1 of my referrals has actually tried to get swagbucks. I'm hoping the rest start trying soon!

Next I joined iRazoo. Its nearly the same as Swagbucks. On both sites you can do searches, do surveys, watch videos, get codes, and do other things to earn bucks/points. It can be time consuming if you want to earn faster. But if you are on the computer often, might as well do some earning. I think I earn points faster on iRazoo. So far I've earned $40 in amazon gift cards from iRazoo.

Next I joined Superpoints. This one is the easiest of the bunch. Here you can also do surveys, watch videos and stuff, but I mainly do the easy part. I go on every day, and I get 30 spins of the lucky button. (I get more if I get more referrals). Most of the spins I don't win, but every so often I do. It could be one point, or more... The biggest I've won is 50 I think but there are higher ones. You can also win via lucky point emails from them. Basically they send you an email with points, just click it and it goes to your account, easy peasy. I spend a total of maybe 5 minutes on this site a day. I just recently joined and haven't earned a gift card yet, but I'm getting close.

Last night I decided to give zoombucks a try. This is just like swagbucks and iRazoo. I haven't earned a card yet, since I just joined, but I'm trying :)

All this stuff is pretty simple. Some take time, some don't. If you need to earn extra money to spend at amazon (or you can earn other prizes too), this is something to consider doing! I'm going to put my referral links up to all of these, please consider signing up, it will help you, and ME TOO! :) Thanks for listening to my sales pitch lol.

For iRazoo CLICK HERE

For SUPERPOINTS Network, please send me an email if you are intersted, it doesn't give me a link or banner to post... email me at reneesramblingsATgmailDOTcom (obviously replace the AT with @ and the DOT with a . ). Once I hear from you I'll get you a referral sent via email right away.

Toodles!

Holy Heck its HOT

2011-07-20T18:45:00.002-05:00

Not much is going on in these here parts....other than sweating. The temps have been in the upper 90's for several days now with heat index making it over 100. We've been staying inside a lot.

I've been farting around with Bree's hair, trying to figure out some styles to keep her hair up off her neck, and to look cute too. I've found a few awesome hairstyle blogs to learn from. My styling looks nothing like theirs, its going to take me a lot of practice! Here are a few that we've done:

It would be nice if she'd look at the camera for me and smile...she can be so uncooperative...

Its been pretty quiet around here. Kels has been staying places a lot, Jilly's still in Norway (and I miss her), so its been pretty much Bree & I around here most of the time.

Please keep my son in your thoughts. He's made some bad choices in things. Last night his boyfriend dumped him and kicked him out. He's now staying at his dads and his step mom is NOT HAPPY, she can not stand my son. So I hope Zach can get back on his feet with a good job and some money coming in and get his act together. I feel sorry for my ex too...because his current wife is not the most pleasant person and when she's pissed watch out...

Friday the girls & I are going out to visit my Brother & his family. I can't wait to see them all, and the new baby too, it will be our first meeting of little Jude! I will miss home, and my computer lol, but we'll be having a great time visiting & swimming. :)

In case you haven't seen enough pics of Bree, I'm posting a few more, because its my blog and I can. Here is one of her zonked out with her popcorn, and one of her soaking wet after helping me water tomato plants today....and one pic of our cats cuddling, because they are cute...even if they (well one actually) shit on my floor often...

Toodles!

Premature E...

2011-07-11T22:08:00.003-05:00

Premature ENTER hitting...did you think it was going to be something else? Shame on you :)

As I was preparing my previous post about my Relay for Life Reflections, I accidentily hit the enter button (didn't realize my curser was resting on the publish button at the time) before I had the post finished. I hurried and clicked edit and finished the post as soon as I could. So if you happened to see that unfinished post, please go back and review the post and see the rest of it :) Thanks!

Relay Reflections

2011-07-11T20:44:00.003-05:00

Relay For Life.

It's an amazing event.

At least it was this year anyways :)

Last year we did our first one, it was in Yorkville. The weather for that one was bad, a wicked storm came through as people had set up, and it blew down a bunch of stuff. The event was moved into a small gym and another small room for everyone to 'camp'. It seemed very uncoordinated, and like they had no plan for rain problems so no one knew what to do, they just crammed us into that area. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't horrible, the even still had meaning, and was interesting, it just seemed not well planned.

I wanted to do the event again.

So I did.

This year 2 different ones!

The first was again the Yorkville one. But we did it differently, as I explained in a post after the event. Our money got turned in, but we didn't stay, in fear of being crowded into the small area again. We came to Dan & Cindy's and had our own little relay at their place. It was nice this way, we raised money for the ACS, and walked, and honored those special to us that passed away from cancer and for those we know still suffering. We enjoyed time together as a team, and shared memories.

The second Relay for me this year was here in Mendota, where we live. When we heard there was going to be one out here Kelsey and I decided we wanted to do it, and set up a team for her grandfather who has lung cancer. We signed up months ago at the meeting. We got a few members for our team and came up with a cool team name "Grandpa's Groupies". Since it was for Kelsey's grandpa, she was the team captain and I assisted her.

We came up with some good fundraising ideas, but unfortunately most didn't come to fruition because we couldn't get plans made right, volunteers, or money to do them...but that didn't stop us from participating. Kels and I talked about the Relay often. We made team t-shirts last week, which was time consuming, but worth it to have some unique shirts. We put letters on the shirts to spell out what we wanted, then sprayed bleach over them to make it look cool. Then after they were washed, on the sleeves we wrote on one "In Support of" and listed those we know that are currently battling cancer, and on the other sleeve we wrote "In Memory Of" for those we know that have passed away from it already. Unfortunately for us, our In Memory Of side had a longer list of people :( Pretty sad isn't it? That we know more that have died from cancer then we know living with it? UGH. This is the reason we do the walk, to help raise money and hopefully find a CURE.

Kelsey & I were anxious for this walk, we just knew it was going to be a good time. We arrived at the location at about 3 to set up our tent. WOW it was HOT out, and our site had NO shade. The sweating started, I sweated in places I didn't know could sweat LOL. We put our tent up to the back of the site, hoping our other team members would set theirs up closer to the front to fill up the space. Only one team member ended up setting up a tent, so we had lots of extra room. This is what our site looked like, there were a few trees, but along the very back so they didn't do any good for shade, and there was a tiny one that was more like a bush.

Our team arrived, some later than others, but at least they made it! Kelsey's grandfather was able to make it thankfully. He was driven up to our campsite on a Gator, and had a wheel chair for use too. We all put on our Grandpa's Groupies shirts, and headed down to the track for opening ceremonies.

Here is some of our team. Terry, Kelsey's grandpa is the guy in the wheelchair, in the purple survivor shirt. The others in the picture are Ed (Kelsey's uncle), Lindsey in the red hat (Kelsey's dad), Kathy (Kelsey's aunt), Kelsey, and Chlovena (Kelsey's grandma).

We listened to a cancer survivor give a speech, and had some other opening ceremony stuff, and then the survivor lap began. For those of you that have never been to one of these, this is a very touching scene. The survivors have on their purple shirts, and they line up and take a lap around the track and everyone claps and cheers them on, celebrating their life and their fight and courage for battling cancer. I always get teary watching this.

That is Terry on his survivor lap with Chlovena by his side, and Lindsey (his son) pushing him around the track it was to hard for Chlovena to push the wheelchair on the grass.

Here are Kelsey, and her aunt and uncle watching the survivor lap.

After the survivor lap was the caregiver lap to honor those that help those with cancer daily. They deserve special recognition too for all they do.

The track then opened up for all the teams to start walking! There was a great turn out! Here are a few of the walkers.

These pictures touch me of some of our team...
Son & Daughter taking care of their dad:

Brother & Sister sharing a moment together on the track:

A grandmother/granddaughter moment:

The Relay was held near the Civic Center in town, where they have a lot of wedding receptions. There was a bride and groom that decided to take a break from their reception, and bring their bridal party along with and take a lap around the track too! The brides grandmother is battling cancer. It was very cool.

There were many events going on during the evening. Bands playing, contests, fun stuff.

Another highlight of the evening is the luminairia (sp?) bags. There were SO MANY! They lined the track and lit the way. There were speeches during this time, and names showing on the screen of those dealing with cancer one way or another.

Even Bill & Bree walked the track that night...

Before I go any further, I need to give a shout out to Kelsey. I'm so very proud of her. She tried to walk the whole event from start to finish! She did really good. She started once the teams were allowed to walk I think it was around 6:40ish, and walked until 4 a.m. with only a potty break and a quick break to go get a water from the campsite. She was in so much pain, her feet hurt, and her hips hurt but she kept walking. Finally at 4 she couldn't take the pain anymore and came to the campsite to rest for about an hour or so, then went to finish up. She did awesome!

I stayed up the whole night too, and did a lot of walking, but not as much as Kelsey. The whole night was great, and there were a lot of events going on to keep people busy and awake. When morning arrived they had everyone line up in the letters spelling out HOPE, and raise their hands, then they had a plane fly over and take pictures. I can't wait to see that.

The closing ceremony consisted of awards for teams and money raised etc. Kels & our team got a award for amazing youth leadership.

The amazing ending was when they announced the totals of the money raised. First let me tell you that last year, they raised 15,000 I believe she said, with 10 teams. They set a goal for this year of 35,000. This year they had 40 teams, and they exceeded their goal by a LOT! The total raised was $154,000!! Isn't that awesome?!

We all had a great time and will do it again next year! I'm sure I left out some details, but thats because I'm STILL tired and I can't think straight LOL. I have a ton more of pics, you can see them here on my FLICKR album.

I think the city of Mendota hosted a great Relay For Life. The participants did awesome too. But, it couldn't be done without the hard work of the ACS crew, and I think most of all a guy named Mitch Landgraf. He was great! He helped put it all together and made the event go smoothly I think. Well done Mitch! (He happens to be Kelsey's counselor at school).

The only changes I can think of to make it even better would be to have it so the parking is blocked off from the campsite area. We had a ton of people just drive through our camp! We were laying on a blanket on the ground snacking and nearly got run over. That was not cool.

I also think maybe a tent set up with things for little kids, like craft things, story time (the story time there was was hard to find lol we found it when it was nearly done), and maybe a bouncehouse or something for the little kids.

I'm glad I decided to do a second Relay this year, and I was proud being a part of it. Well done Mendota.

Two out of Three

2011-07-11T20:39:00.002-05:00

Two of my three girls are GONE.

Jilly left on the 8th for Norway. She was very excited to go, and I'm sure she's having an awesome time. Friday was a hard day for me though. I'm an emotional mother. I was all teary thinking about her leaving, for someplace SO FAR AWAY, and for such a LONG time... I was also worried about her flight safety, because I am a worrier. She did make it ok, I talked to her Saturday morning. I miss her! Bree misses her too. I'm looking forward to Jilly's next call home, and more forward to August 14th when she returns home! :)

Today Kelsey left for about a week. She is going to stay at our friends Dan & Cindy's house. Kels & Cindy get along great and enjoy time together.

So its mostly just me & Bree around here, since Bill's usually working. Its going to be quiet, well, as quiet as it can get with a 3 yr old yakky girl around...

Toodles!

Happy Birthday My Friend

2011-07-07T00:58:00.000-05:00

Today is my friend Dazee's birthday!!

Lets all take a minute to sing...
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to yoooooouuuuu
Happy birthday dear Dazee you crazy $*^#@ :)
Happy birthday to youuuuuu!

Dazee rocks. She keeps me company daily over on skype, or on the phone via text. We have a lot in common. She's a great friend.

Dear Dazee, I hope you have a marvelous birthday full of fun, presents, and of course yummy cake. If I was closer I'd totally make you one, but I don't think shipping one to UT would work well :(. I love ya! Now bed over, let me send some long distance birthday spankings ;)

Toodles!

Vet Visits

2011-07-06T22:31:00.002-05:00

Tuesday we finally took Moo to the vet. I was happy to hear that my diagnosis was correct. Well, not happy Moo has issues, but happy to know that my research lead me to the right problem. Moo is allergic to fleas. One flea bite can basically make her whole body itchy. We've been battling fleas for a while now off and on, those little things are hard to get rid of! The cats have had them, but we didn't really see them on Moo, but apparently they got her, even if its not many of them the few that did made her skin flare up into an itchy mess. She was chewing herself raw in spots.

I learned that dogs could be allergic to fleas from watching a video on Swagbucks! It got me thinking that is probably what Moo's problem was. After learning this, I went to Petsmart and got some spray for her to relieve itching and I was giving her benedryl, and I got a cone thing for her so she couldn't chew herself up. We also put some flea killer stuff on her. Things were starting to improve but we still took her to the vets for the check up.

We got Moo tested for heartworms, she is good doesn't have them. We got her meds to keep her good for that. We also got a pill that kills fleas on her, dang that was expensive....each pill is over $13. Moo is all set now and we are working to help her with her itchiness.

Now, we have more fun planned, tomorrow I get to take both cats for their check up! Eek, that could be interesting... lol. Wish me luck :) I'm hoping to get to the bottom (lol pun intended) of Sissy's poop issues. That cat needs help...cats shouldn't fart loudly and spray paint poop all over...

Toodles!

Reunited!

2011-07-06T22:07:00.002-05:00

On the 4th of July, Jilly's dad came back to IL to see her! They are spending the days together here until the 8th, then she'll go back to Norway with him until August 14th.

Here is Jilly patiently (not really) waiting for her dad:

Finally he got there! The first few pics I have are bad, because I had the wrong setting on the camera...oops. Anyways, after 1 and a half years, they finally see eachother and share a hug, and tears of happiness..

They have spent the last few days shopping, eating out, having fun. Tomorrow evening Jilly will stay with her dad at the hotel, and on Friday morning they leave for Norway. :( I'm going to miss Jilly! I know she'll have a great time and will be in excellent hands over in Norway... but I'll be anxious for her return. Please say a prayer that they have a smooth safe flight both there and back, and that she has a great time catching up with her dad, step mom, siblings and other relatives over there!

Toodles!

July 4th, 2011

2011-07-06T21:57:00.003-05:00

We had another fun 4th of July at our friends Dan & Cindy's house. Thanks for having us C & D! Bill got to come this year, that never happens.
Here are a few pictures of our day!

I made cake :) My inspiration was from Amanda over at i am baker, she rocks. I'm glad my cake turned out. Decorations were not as good as I wanted to do, but with the frig fiasco I was to tired to put much into decorating...

Cool eh? :)

I hope you all had a fun & safe 4th too!

Toodles!

Enough is Enough

2011-07-06T21:40:00.002-05:00

Saturday evening, I noticed a slight ice haze on stuff in our freezer on our side by side. I thought hmmm maybe one of the kids didn't shut the door tightly, I'll shut it tight and all will be well.

Boy, did I think wrong.

Sunday, Bill brought home a few groceries, I needed to put some stuff in the freezer. I opened it up to find things thawed out, water dripping from the ice maker...oh goody. He said he thought the door was ajar. I told him I made sure it was shut tight when I went to bed so I don't think that is the case. He said keep it closed a bit and we'll see what happens later.

Nothing good happened. It got warmer. Stuff got ruined.

He said, "seems weird that just the freezer side is broke" that got me thinking, uh oh, come to think of it when I got some pop out earlier it wasn't super cold.

Great.

So, the frig side and the freezer side were broke. It was a holiday weekend. Not good. Bill & I spent the day moving all the stuff that we could to our spare frig in the basement, thank god we have that! Other stuff went into coolers. Meats got cooked up. It was a busy day, plus I was trying to get a cake baked. I felt like I was in the kitchen and on my feet all day, I was tired.

So Tuesday comes, holiday is over, we call the repair people and are told they'll come out on FRIDAY! I was not a happy camper to hear that! Thankfully they called this morning and said they could squeeze us in.

So the guy comes and looks at it, needs something for it and goes to get it and returns. Then he tells me the bad news. There is no gas as he said, aka freon (sp?), and there is a compression issue of some kind or something something about vacuum hose and a hole. He said the proper way to fix it would be a new compresser thingy, and freon stuff cleaning out the old thing etc, which runs $500-600. He must have seen my jaw hit the floor lol because he told me there was another option...he could put some leak seal stuff and freon stuff, it sometimes fixes it, but its iffy, could last a day, or years, you just don't know till you do it. Oy. Bill was at work, and I was afraid to make a decision so I called him for his input. He said to go with the cheaper option! So the guy goes back to his workplace for the stuff, and comes back to tell me they were out of it. They had to send someone out to Rockford to get it and he'd be back later today to fix it.

Thankfully, he called a few hours later and was able to come back and get the job done. As of now, my frig and freezer are COLD :) Cross your fingers it stays that way for many years!!

I asked him if this was a common problem, he said no, not in something this new. Our side by side is only 4 yrs old. I'm a little disappointed in Maytag right now. :(

I hope this is the last of our breakages. Seems like everything in the house has died recently. We have had enough!

Toodles!

Super Moo to the Rescue!

2011-06-30T20:27:00.002-05:00

This is Moo

This dog drives me crazy in more ways then you know... But, tonight she actually impressed me.

Jilly & Bree were playing in the little kiddie pool in the back yard. Moo & I were sitting on the swing watching them.

Jilly started to splash like a crazy girl and started screaming.

I think Moo thought she was in danger.

Super Moo to the rescue!

Moo darted off the swing and went to the side of the pool, putting her front feet on the side. She barked loudly like she was trying to get my attention (even though I was already watching).

When I didn't get up (no need to, Jilly was playing and not in danger), Moo took it upon herself to jump into the pool and go to Jilly like she was rescuing her!

It was very cool.

Maybe we should rename her Lassie :)

Jilly thought it was so cool, that she kept trying over and over. Each time Moo would be sitting quietly till Jilly started splashing and flailing around...then the barking started and she'd jump in.

Moo has a special bond with Jilly...Jilly is Moo's humping toy LOL, she doesn't want anything to happen to her. Gross eh? Moo is very attracted to Jilly's leg. Moo is a girl by the way...and she's fixed...not sure why she's so in love with Jilly's leg...

Toodles!

Ninny

2011-06-29T07:58:00.000-05:00

When Bree was little she couldn't say Jillian, or Jilly. For some reason she called Jilly "NINNY". Jilly didn't seem to mind it much. To this day, Bree still calls her Ninny 99% of the time, sometimes she even shortens it to "Nin". Bree can say Jillian now, but she still likes to say Ninny instead.

The other day, Jilly asked me, "What exactly is a Ninny anyways?" so, we looked it up.

Ninny is:
Short for nincompoop. A stupid idiotic person. A fool. A dull-witted person.

Jilly said, "HEY! That's mean!" now she isn't thrilled at being called Ninny. LOL. Not sure she can make Bree change her ways...good luck Jilly :)

Toodles!

Stuff 2

2011-06-28T21:16:00.002-05:00

Doing this again, going to try to do it regularly...

Listening: To Disney shows, Bree's yakking, Jilly's TV blairing in her bedroom, and the ceiling fan.

Eating: Nothing! Shocker right? LOL. Last thing I had was dinner, grilled chicken with chicken rice and corn.

Drinking: Mtn. Dew. Probably not the best thing to have at all, but especially after 9 p.m.!

Wearing: Wow, I still have my day clothing on! Thats not normal. Why am I still wearing a bra after 9 p.m.?! Have I lost my sanity?! LOL yes I have, long ago. I'm still wearing shorts and a tank top, along with a bra & panties of course. I think its way past time, I should have gotten my pj's on ages ago.

Feeling: Warm, tired, anxious for bed!

Weather: Warm & clear.

Need: To win the lottery!

Thinking: That I wish I'd win the lottery...and I wish Bree would go to bed. :)

Wondering: What the hell the person/people were thinking when they came up with Yo Gabba Gabba. I mean seriously, whats up with Muno? He looks like a giant sex toy with one eye. That is messed up.

Internet find: Oh golly... I see tons of stuff... I'll go with this link, to a very cute dress, makes me wish I could sew! Check it out :)

Toodles!

Dear...6-28-11

2011-06-28T21:05:00.002-05:00

It's been a while since I've done these. Sorry for slacking. Dear letters are letters for good or bad, just to vent or praise, get the word out etc. It's all my dear friend Dazee's idea :)

Dear Jilly...Please take better care of your teeth so we don't have to get anymore pulled, and so your's don't end up like mine.

Dear earwigs...you dear bugs are DISGUSTING. Go away. I hate you, you gross me out, get outta my home.

Dear basement... you stink. I'm assuming its from being flooded last month, or was it this month? I don't remember anymore... I did clean you, but you still are smelly, and I think my house is smelly because of you.

Dear Moo (our dog)...I wish I knew why you itch so much.

Dear Kindle...I LOVE YOU.

Dear Janet Evanovich...Thanks for making great Stephanie Plum books. They make me laugh out loud quite often and they are fun and easy to read. I can't wait till the next one comes out.

Dear Bree...You are keeping the bandaid companies in business. Do you think bandaids are a fashion statement? Why must you have them everywhere? Oh, and just so you know, they don't take away the pain of owies, they just cover them up. They aren't really needed unless there is blood. I think we are going through a box a week lol.

I think thats it for now...if I come up with more I'll try to add them :) I'm kinda slow in the head today.

Toodles.

What I've Been Up To

2011-06-28T20:36:00.002-05:00

Most of this post will be in pictures...

Jilly got a tooth pulled last week. I didn't take pics. She was quite nervous, but she survived and did well.

Friday we did the Relay For Life...well a new version of it anyways. The Relay for Life got their money still, and that is the important thing. Instead of going to the one in Yorkville, where a lot of the stuff was going to be done in the hot gym, we opted for a little different view. Dan & Cindy had us come to their place, and we set up camp there, and walked the street by their house. We slept (or for the most part didn't sleep) in our tents in their yard, had a campfire, shared memories and good conversation, and had lots of fun.

That is Dan, Jilly, and a neighbors grand daughter in the picture. There was probably 20 or so of us once everyone arrived.

Bree got a new bike...she's still learning the pedal thing,she tends to push her feet backwards, which stops the bike instead of making it go...but practice will make perfect, someday...

We've had what seems to be lots of rain, the other night we even had a double rainbow.

The girls have been enjoying summer. They had a silly string fight. Here is Kels on the losing side of the fight LOL...

Bree has been enjoying her pool...even Jilly & Kels join her sometimes.

I won a plant on Facebook, all I had to do was 'like' a status of the radio station I listen to, and they picked a few winners. I was one of the lucky ones. :) Thanks to Jilly's old 1st grade teacher (and my friend) Becky for picking it up for me! Isn't it pretty?

It's a good size plant, I need to find a place to plant it.

Does anyone know what kind of tree this is:

It is in my front yard. Its a fragrant tree and I've always wondered what kind it was...trying to find out but not having much luck. It has like 2 different color leaves, the dark green, and ones that are more a yellow/green, and it has yellowish flowers. I don't think it blooms every year...if I remember right last year it didn't and I was disappointed. Another thing I've noticed is the lightning bugs seem to love to hang out in it during the day! LOTS of them. Speaking of lightning bugs...the girls are outside now trying to catch some :)

I've been spending a lot of time doing this:

and some of this:
iRazoo its pretty much the same as swagbucks just a few differences.

Between the 2 of these I've earned over $70 so far.

Did I tell you all I got a Kindle? I think I did... I LOVE IT. I've gotten a lot of free books to read. I did buy a few for $.99, and I splurged on the new Janet Evanovich book, Smokin' Seventeen...I used my Amazon gift cards that I won through Swagbucks & iRazoo to get it :) The book was GREAT! I love Janet Evanovich books, I can't wait till the next one comes out in November, and in Jan. there is a MOVIE! Woohoo! :)

Today Kels & I made different kinds of flipflops. I'll try to get some pics of them soon and share about them.

Toodles!

Stuff

2011-06-23T18:51:00.002-05:00

I saw this on a blog I came across when searching stuff for iRazoo (like swagbucks) and I thought it was a nice thing, so I'm doing it here.

Listening: To Bree singing, and the sounds coming from the TV, Jilly is watching Wizards of Waverly Place.

Eating: Just had a snack of a apple pie (hand held thingy), something bad for me..

Drinking: Sweet tea, made at home

Wearing: pjs! shorts & t-shirt

Feeling: TIRED, and happy because my brother & SIL had a baby today, his name is Jude Scott.

Weather: Chilly, cloudy, rain off and on today.

Need: A good nights sleep!

Thinking: About all the stuff I need to accomplish tomorrow, about how I hope the weather cooperates for the Relay for Life, about how I'm so behind on my weekly Dear...letters, and about how I can't wait to start reading the new Janet Evanovich book on my kindle later!

Enjoying: Listening to Bree singing and playing. Enjoying my kindle too.

Wondering: Will I ever get caught up on my Dear...letter posts? LOL

Internet find: Hmm I don't think I found anything overly interesting today...maybe I'll change my mind after I get caught up on my google reader...

Toodles!

Happy Father's Day!

2011-06-19T00:01:00.000-05:00

I'd like to wish my dad a very Happy Father's Day! I don't think I have any pics of him from lately to post. He doesn't go anywhere near a computer, so chances are very high he won't even see this post lol. But...I still wanted to wish him a Happy Father's Day.

To the fathers of my children (Yes, fatherS...I'm on my third/FINAL marriage, if you didn't already know that, and I've had children in each of those marriages)...Happy Father's Day! The girls & I have made a little something for the Dads.

I hope all the Dads out there have a great Father's Day! Special hugs to those dads missing their children who are far away or in heaven.

Toodles!

Summer Time Blog Slacking

2011-06-18T21:55:00.002-05:00

I suck.

It's summer time, and I've been slacking at blogging. Sometimes I've been lazy. A lot of the times I've been busy. Sometimes I've got nothing to say. Other times I've got nothing NICE to say LOL.

So far this summer I've been driving Kels back and forth to speech class, and helping her with speeches, thankfully class ended last Wednesday. We've had a few days at a friends pool (Thanks Cindy & Dan). The girls & I went strawberry picking for the first time. My husband had several days off so I didn't blog then. We spent a day outside tiding up the yard some and trimming our overgrown bushes. We had a trip to the zoo last week too. Just been too busy and tired to write much around here. I'm sorry. I'd like to make a promise that I'll do better...but I can't. I know things are going to be busy so I might not be posting much...

Tuesday Jilly has a tooth to get pulled. Please say a prayer that she can remain calm, and that its not to terribly upsetting and painful for her.

Soon Jilly will be going to VISIT her dad in Norway. She is excited. Her passport finally arrived a few days ago. I'm anxious for her to get time with her dad, I know she misses him. I'm also worried about her being gone.

I've got 2 Relay For Life events coming up, so I'll be busy with those. I hope the weather cooperates this year!

Sunday I was supposed to do a photo shoot, but it got cancelled, I'm hoping it gets rescheduled soon. I'm excited about taking someones pictures other than my own family!

I got a kindle :) So I'm going to get in some summer time reading. I did some work for it, and I'm so excited to have it!

I'm going to close this post with some pics of things we've been up to lately...Enjoy!

Toodles!

Dear...5-31-11

2011-05-31T21:24:00.003-05:00

I'm soooo behind on blogging. Things have been hectic, and at times I've been lazy, other times I just didn't know what to talk about...so I ignored my blog. But by golly today I am going to break my slacking streak and get a post done.

It's time for my Dear... letters, my dear friend Dazee's creation, letters good or bad, to whomever, getting things out. Dazee's link (Crazy Daze & Nite Dreams) is over there on the side, check her out. She's goofy, like me.

Dear Optical migraine...you come NOW when I'm trying to blog? How dare you. Leave me alone. It's hard to read what I'm typing when my vision is all distorted.

Dear self...Ease up on the sleep drool will ya? Geeze. Nothing like waking up in a puddle of spit. Must be from all those hot dreams I've been having lately ;) LOL. Seriously though, I drool a LOT when I sleep, thats gross. I want to invent a pillow case that is made out of something like ummm a womens feminine product (pad), its soft, yet it absorbs everything so you can't feel wetness on your skin...maybe it would hold my gallons of slobber at night.

Dear Kelsey...Next time you plan to walk around all day in sunny 90 degree weather, please remember to use your sunscreen. Kels stayed over at a friends and went to Somonauks Memorial Day events...and returned home a lobster. Don't believe me? See for yourself:

She's been in some pain, obviously. This picture was taken yesterday night. Today she is blistering, and she has a nice big ugly blister right in the middle of her chest. Thats HOT. NOT.

Dear laundry...my oh my how I dispise you. Do you somehow reproduce while in the baskets? There is always so much of you. This picture below shows some of the mountain of laundry I had to fold...

Dear Moo...I really don't like you much...but Bree does...

Dear Bill....we really need to get a new weed wacker...as you can see from the picture above we have some serious wacking to do...

Dear Tigger...You are such a good kitty, putting up with Bree trying to dress you, and constantly pestering you. She loves you bunches. She's so nice covering you up, and putting something under your head for a pillow...

Dear picnik...I've just discovered some new things on you tonight, now I'm spending way to much time playing around with pictures...

Soooo cool eh?

Dear Sylvia T.... I'm guessing you read my blog? Thank you for signing up on swagbucks as my referral! Now, search, and earn some swagbucks, we can both benefit :) I can teach you if you'd like...drop me an email (info on my contact page)

Dear Swagbucks & iRazoo (something similar to swagbucks)...I've decided to be a good mom. Instead of spending my amazon cards that I get through you on myself (like the camera I want, and a kindle), I've decided I shouldn't be selfish, I should use the cards to buy Christmas presents for the kids... So fork our some more codes, let me win some megabucks and stuff...please?

Dear rain...You can take some time off, a week at least...We've had to much of you lately. The other day we had like monsoon rain. We got over 3 inches in just a few hours...I'll post a quick look of some of our rain on a video towards the end of this post for the hell of it.

Dear old sump pump...the night we got 3+ inches of rain was NOT the right time to die. Waking up at 2:00 a.m. to discover 3 inches of water in our basement was NOT COOL. Thanks for ruining a bunch of our stuff...

Dear flooded basement...YOU SUCK. Stinky, messy, wet (duh). You made a ton of work for me. In fact one day I spent 8+ hours working to clean you up. Not fun, at all.

Dear tornados...stay away! You've done so much damage all over the U.S. Please go and never return. My heart breaks for all those suffering loss of family/friends, and their homes. We had warnings and scary weather here recently and I was so scared, especially after seeing how bad damage can be from those places hit.

There ya go. I finally got a post done. I hope to get another done soon. But don't hold your breath LOL.

Toodles
Rain video below

Stop Correcting Me

2011-05-19T13:19:00.002-05:00

Since joining Swagbucks I have been doing some extra searching on the internet, to try to earn some swagbucks. Sometimes things just come to me, and I want to search them, because they feel lucky LOL. I quickly type what I'm thinking, usually when I'm tired and in a hurry, and heck, its a search, I don't care about my spelling or grammar. Apparently I should.

I get so annoyed seeing, "Did you mean_______?" Stop correcting me! Drives me crazy.

For instance:
My son is gay, and that is OK. Did you mean: My son is gay, and that's OK? Seriously, what is wrong with the way I typed it? Is it that bad? I think its ok, and that's how I wanted it, so leave me alone.

The other night, I was tired, and I was hoping to win a few more swagbucks before going to bed, so as a last ditch effort, I typed into the search zzzzzzz...they say, did you mean: zzzzz? NO I didn't, I meant zzzzzzz! Geeze.

I don't know why it bothers me so much, but it does LOL. I guess I'm just weird. Ok, yes, I KNOW I am just weird, you don't have to agree :P

I don't really want any grammar and spelling lectures either. It's my blog and if I wanna spell bad I can. :P I'm not that bad (or maybe I am...), I've seen some really bad ones out there.

Anyways, I just wanted to vent. I'm done now. Thanks.

Toodles!

Dear...5-17-11

2011-05-17T21:01:00.002-05:00

It's time for weekly Dear... letters! Letters for good or bad, letting off steam or singing praise, whatever :) Please join along! I think I missed last weeks, sorry Dazee.

Dear Bree...You are a goofball.

Dear full moon last night...You looked pretty cool.

Dear Watermelon Lemonade... You are so good. Yummy.

Dear tree in my yard...you are so very pretty in the spring when your flowers have bloomed...to bad with the wind and rain they only lasted 2 days.

Dear baby spiders...stay off of my chair! I went to sit in my chair outside a few days ago and noticed something, a bazillion baby spiders, EEK!

Dear Moo...I hope you stop feeling itchy soon, or whatever it is thats causing you to be constantly going at your butt goes away. I really don't want to try to drain your butt....Gross.

Dear Dancing with the Stars...Good season, I've enjoyed it all. I'm glad Chelsea is in the finals, she is my favorite, my next favorite is Hines. I like Kirstie too, and I liked Ralph... I will be glad when it is over next week though, I hate that you take over 2 of my evenings.

Dear Amanda (of i am baker/i am mommy)...Thanks for sending the gift card that I won from your blog. I used it to buy some k-cups so I can enjoy quick and easy coffee in the mornings.

Dear Swagbucks referrals...I have 3 of you, none of you have tried to get any swagbucks yet :( I can help you if you'd like. If you score I score, lets work together. I've got a wishlist of things I want to buy with my swagbucks :) I'd really like a new camera, or a kindle...

Dear readers...anyone wanna join Swagbucks? If yes, please click here and sign up as my referral!

Dear hot cop neighbor...Please don't move. You mentioned the other day you have an offer in on a house in the country. The girls and I will be sad to see our eye candy leave.

I think that is it. I'm to tired and my finger hurts (sliced it while cleaning the other day), so I think I'm going to go to bed.

Toodles.

Watermelon Lemonade

2011-05-17T10:25:00.002-05:00

I am not a food blogger. I WISH I was, but I am not. I do not take pretty food pictures, make awesome recipes that make could someone drool, or anything like that, although I wish I did. I wish I could be like The Pioneer Woman, or Amanda over at i am baker, but I'm not them, they are my idols :) (well they are a few, I have many!)

Today I'm going to pretend to be a food blogger...but with crappy pictures :)

Last year, I went to Ihop. Ihop had on the menu some watermelon lemonade. Normally I'm not a huge lemonade fan, but the picture made it look so very good. I decided to give it a try...and I ended up having like 4 refills! I was full, and so was my bladder! It was so very good.

I went to Ihop again, not long after that, on a quest for more of that watermelon lemonade, but as luck (or lack of) would have it, they no longer had it. I was very bummed. I decided to make it my mission to try to come up with something that was close to what they had, something that would make my tastebuds dance, and want more.

I thought of snowcone syrup, watermelon, to add to lemonade, but of course, no stores had any. Once again I was bummed and frustrated, I was really craving that stupid watermelon lemonade!

Finally, I came across a blog that might have held my answer...It was over on Skip to my Lou. She had posted about making your own snowcone syrup. BINGO. This was just what I needed. I decided to try this, and I'm so very happy I did. My tastebuds are now doing the salsa, tango, and the waltz too! I'm going to share with you now, my recipe for my Watermelon Lemonade...please try this, its not only tart but sweet too, and oh so very good. Take my word for it, would I steer you wrong? Nope, I would not.

Here is what you need:

Food coloring is optional, I use it just because the Kool-Aid is clear, the coloring helps me see how much is in the glass, and adds a pretty color :). You could actually use just about any kind of Kool-Aid (or generic brand), experiment! I couldn't find plain watermelon, so I have watermelon kiwi.

In a saucepan combine:
2 cups of sugar
1 cup of water
1 pk of Kool-Aid watermelon kiwi (or whatever other flavor you'd like to try)

Bring this combination to a boil. Once it boils, remove from heat. Now, if you'd like color, please add a drop of coloring unless your Kool-Aid is already colored. You have made a simple syrup.

Let this simple syrup cool, then pour it into a container to keep in the fridge.

Make up a batch of Lemonade. I buy the Great Value kind, because I'm cheap, but you could use whatever kind you want.

Once your Lemonade & watermelon simple syrup are cold, get them out and get ready to enjoy some tastebud tango.

Get yourself a glass of ice. Pour a bit of the watermelon simple syrup into your glass, maybe about umm lets say less than a inch worth...You can adjust this depending on how much watermelon sweetness you want to your lemonade I personally like more, because I'm more into sweet than tart :) Next add your lemonade.

Are you with me so far? Lookin' good eh?

Now, stir it up.

Drink it! You know you want to. Let your tastebuds do the cha-cha. It is so good, and very easy to make. I made my first batch of simple syrup (of the season) a few days ago and I've already had to make another, this time I did a double. The girls & I all love it.

I made up a poem for this recipe...because I'm weird...

It's sour and its sweet.
Take a sip and your taste buds will dance like your feet.

:)

LOL yep, I'm weird right?

Go make some watermelon lemonade NOW! Just don't drink to much, it makes ya have to pee a lot...I'm off to the potty now :)

Toodles!

We Survived Prom 2011!

2011-05-09T10:24:00.003-05:00

Happy Monday!

Prom is over, thank God! :)

Saturday was BUSY. Saturday was STRESSFUL. Saturday was FUN. Saturday was TIRING!

My niece Emily came over at about 1:00, and it was time for me & Kels to get moving. First Kels put on her nail stuff, I was going to do it, buy my eyes suck with these new glasses and I couldn't see well enough to line up the nail sticker things. Yeah I suck. LOL, but she got it done ok. Then she did her make up. Next came the hair...I did the waterfall braid thing then started the curling marathon. Kelsey has really thick stubborn hair. We used a ton of hairspray, and I did ringlet curls in small pieces of hair all over, the smaller the sections I curled the better the curl turned out. I finally got it all curled, it took over an hour. By the time I finished, the first sections I did were already starting to lose some curl! OY. Oh well, not much we could do at that point, we were already late, we were supposed to be at her friends at 3 for pictures, and we just finished curling at about 3, she still had to get her dress on. In our rush to get ready, we forgot her earrings and necklace, so the first set of pics she's not wearing them. We remembered at her friends house, and when we came back to pick up the other girls we made sure to put on the earrings & necklace then.

After taking pics at the friends house, we came back home to wait for Grandma. Kels went with her friend to the Lake in town where I was going to take more pics of them. Grandma finally arrived and we booked it over to the lake for a fast photo session. It was 4:30 by then and Kels had to be at the school by 5 to line up for Prom Walk. Here are some pics of our time so far, friends house, lake, and then prom walk.

I took a ton of pics even though I was pressed for time LOL, sorry for the overload.

Did I mention that Kelsey's friend she went with is also named Kellsie? Cool huh? Did I also mention that Kelsey's friend Kellsie is BALD? Well she is...and I think she is beautiful. She wore a wig to the dance, but later took it off, and came to post prom without it (you will see in a minute). Kellsie has some kind of immune disorder that attacks her hair follicles, she has lost all of her hair.

I don't have any pictures of the actual prom, as it was for the students not the parents, but I have pics of Post Prom. Here, after prom, the kids go to the Elks Club a few miles from the school. Its a big to do I guess, this was our first time experiencing it. They have all the kids leaving the dance line their cars up, then they are escorted to the Elks (roads closed for them and everything). Once the line arrives, the first car of promers get out, and they walk up a ramp and are announced and talked to by the announcer (Mr. Holzman), as their car gets parked by a valet. Each car stops, the kids get out, go up the ramp etc...Thankfully Kels & Kells were not to far into the line so I wasn't there all night lol. There were a lot of people there! I was a bit chilled so I was glad to see the K's arrive so I could leave soon :) I watched a few more after them and then hit the road. Here are some pics of the Post Prom.

Kels beat me home, she & Kellsie left right away. They were tired. Kels & Emily ended up visiting until 3 a.m. or so, then they went to sleep. Bree was up till 12:30, I went to bed not long after her. It was a tiring day for all.

Bree did get a tiny nap at prom walk...Emily held her for me so I could be taking pics. Thanks for your help Emily!

This is Emily, Bree, and my mom. Thanks mom for coming out to the prom walk too!

I hope you all enjoyed the pics.

Toodles!

I've been busy!

2011-05-04T22:46:00.002-05:00

I've been busy! Sorry for neglecting you all. I feel like I've really gotten behind on things. I will be glad when prom is over, so I can relax a bit!

Since money is tight, and I like to be crafty, we are trying to do a lot of the things (flowers, hair, manicure) ourselves, instead of paying an arm and a leg somewhere for things. Even doing this, its still costing quite a bit.

Kels got her dress for free from her Aunt. It is not really what Kelsey would have picked on her own, but it works for this year. I told her she needs to get a job to start saving for next years dress (which royally ticked her off LOL. Hey, I paid for my prom dress back in 1987, and it was over $400! A lot over actually, if I can do it she can do it). We had to pay to get the dress altered, because I'm not a seamstress!

We tried what seems like a million different hairstyles. We did hair several nights the last week. I'm not a hairstylist either, but I tried. I think we have found a winner, and I hope like hell it turns out on Saturday.

I made Kelsey's wrist corsage, and a flower ring to go with it. I love working with flowers. Back in my younger days I helped out a bit at a friends flower shop, I picked up a few things. I saw the rings online and thought hey I could do that too...so I did. Now I have to make another for one of Kelsey's friends.

I got to thinking yesterday, hmmm Kelsey doesn't have anything to carry her phone in, or her id while at prom. She needs a clutch, but dang, I don't want to pay a lot for something she's only going to use for a few hours....I wonder if I could make something out of ummm DUCT TAPE :) Guess what? I could! (Pics will follow at the end of the post) I made it today while she was out with a friend, and suprised her with it tonight. She said "hey, this kind of rocks" so I guess its a hit.

Seems like I've been running around here and there and totally busy with prom stuff for the last week or so. I'm pooped.

Prom is Saturday. I'll be playing photographer too and taking pics of Kels and her friends over by the lake in town before the grand march. Kels has to be at school at 5, they do the grand march at 5:30, then off to the dinner/dance. After that they go to the local Elks club, and are again announced and do a walk in I guess...then a post prom thing. Going to be a busy day. My niece Emily is going to come babysit Bree so I can concentrate on doing Kelsey's hair, pics and all the other stuff that day.

Here are some pictures of all the things I've talked about...Enjoy!

Whatcha think?

After all the work I've put into this, and all the money spent, my daughter is still complaining and mad at me...because I won't pay for her to get fake nails at a manicure place, and I won't pay for a spray tan. Sorry, my money tree never bloomed, she'll have to get over it.

Toodles!

Dear...(4-27-11)

2011-04-27T09:29:00.002-05:00

Welcome!

It's time for weekly Dear... letters, letters for good or bad, venting/praising, whatever... My good friend Dazee's meme. (BTW, I hate the word meme) Please look over to the side --> there is a button over there that will take you to Dazee's blog, Crazy Daze & Nite Dreams.

Dear Rain...GO AWAY! Soon I feel we'll need to build an ark. Enough already.

Dear May...please bring lots of flowers and a lot less rain.

Dear self...You've been bitten by the creative bug. Feeling the need to do prom flowers big time...I think a trip to Hobby Lobby is coming up real soon.

Dear hot cop neighbor...why is your girlfriend mowing? Come on, I want YOU to mow...and do it in your cop uniform please...don't forget to bend over to pick up sticks while you are at it...I'm sure it would make for a nice view for me :)

Dear McD's...When I purchase apple dippers for my daughter, I do not want to come home and take them out of the bag and find that they have already been OPENED. Gross. It has happened more than once. I guess I should check before leaving drive thru...but by golly I shouldn't have to. Your people should notice an open bag before putting it in with my order. Duh.

Dear Robin...I'm worried about your babies, I wish you had built your nest outside of our fenced in yard. I hope Moo doesn't snack on your offspring when they practice flying.

Dear Sun...I miss you.

Dear glasses...I'm finally getting used to you. Didn't have much choice after my old glasses broke last week. I still don't think you are exactly as you should be, reading isn't as easy as it should be, but things have improved. I can now wear you without getting dizzy & nauseous, and feel like I'm going cross-eyed all the time.

Dear cleaning fairy...you are FIRED. You haven't shown up for work in ages. Shame on you.

Dear carpet...Oh how I dislike you. I wish I had hardwood floors. I cleaned you about 2 wks ago, and already you are a mess again. Thanks to cat puke, cat poop (damn cats), and Bree's chocolate puke the other day. Hardwood would be so much easier to clean up.

Dear swagbucks...addicting you are. I'm still waiting for you to pick me for the hourly drawing of 1000 swagbucks...I keep checking and checking. Hurry up already. Oh yeah, and your surveys suck donkey, just thought you'd want to know.

Dear Blockbuster and/or postal system...What the hell is going on? I see my movies are sent, and an approximate delivery date...yet that date comes and goes and here I still wait for my freakin movie. This has happened several times lately. I've also gotten movies that are cracked...kind of hard to watch cracked movies! I'm getting annoyed and frustrated. I was supposed to get a movie on the 21st...its the 27th and still no movie.. Shape up.

Dear sleep...I miss you.

I guess that is all for now. Have a super day. I hope you all get some sunshine.

Toodles!

Congratulations Kelsey!

2011-04-25T10:38:00.002-05:00

Guess what.

Last week Kelsey stayed at her dads for some quality daddy daughter time. During the week there she went to get her drivers license...and she passed! EEK!! Congrats Kelsey! Drivers beware lol.

Now we just need to get Kels a job, so she can get a car, insurance, pay an arm & a leg for gas... welcome to grown up life...

Kelsey also did a good deed last week. Kelsey donated blood for her second time. Way to go Kelsey! I'm proud that you do this to help others.

Toodles!

Cake Decorators in the Making

2011-04-24T14:28:00.002-05:00

I'm going to attempt to do a post, with pictures...I hope to God it doesn't screw up the spacing again. Cross your fingers!

My dad LOVES cake. Especially cake with a lot of frosting on it. So, every now and then I'll bake up a bunch of little cakes for him, frost them, and cover & bag them, and give them to him for his freezer.

I made 6 of these cakes on Friday. I decided to let Jilly & Bree each decorate one, for fun, kept them busy for a bit. Bree piled on colored sugar, and I mean PILED. She did try her hand with a decorator bag too, and did good for a 3 yr old. She was making leaves. One leaf got really big, so I said, "Wow, that is a big leaf!" She said, "Mom that isn't a leaf, its BROCCOLI!" ahhh ok...

Jilly did pretty good too. She tried her hand at making roses for each corner of the cake, and did pretty well. I think she would have done better if she wasn't watching TV while doing it, God forbid she miss Big Time Rush.

Saturday we delivered the cakes to Grandpa, and I'm sure he's enjoyed one, or two of them already.

Toodles!

O M G!!

2011-04-19T18:24:00.001-05:00

Just posted my Dear... post, and it is showing SPACING! YAY!! I hope its fixed permanently! Woohoo!

Sorry, just had to share my excitement!

Now go read the previous post :)

Toodles!

Dear...(4-19-11)

2011-04-19T17:54:00.002-05:00

Howdy Partners.

I'm still alive. I bet you were wondering, since it's been so long since I posted.

I've just been in a cranky mood, didn't really have a lot to say. Plus Bree's been sick and clingy so I didn't feel like blogging with a child attached to me, it makes it hard to type.

But...what has probably kept me away the most is knowing that whatever I type on here, the spacing will not show up, making it hard for my reader to read. And that pisses me off. Blogger needs to fix this problem, like NOW, or better yet, like YESTERDAY. Damn its been weeks now. I'm so frustrated.

Anyways...on with the Dear... letters (letters good or bad, to vent/praise, whatever). Please go over ----> to the side there and see Dazee's link to visit her blog Crazy Daze & Nite Dreams. She's the wonderful fun gal that started this all and she has become quite my buddy, we talk every day, all day long lol. I <3 Dazee.

Here we go...

Dear Blogger...Fix the damn spacing issues already.

Dear Weather...Where did our nice spring weather go? Its now spring break for the kids and the weather is cold/windy/rainy.

Dear Bree...I'm glad you are finally feeling better! Last week was rough. Puking in the van is gross. Fevers of 104 are not good either. Stay better now please.

Dear Bree...Forgot to mention...enough of the bratty attitude ok? Dang it's almost like you are PMSing. You've been watching your sisters to much.

Dear Repeats...Enough already. Give me new episodes of Greys & Private Practice. Repeats suck.

Dear Jilly...Can you ease up on the dirty dishes? Dang, I swear you dirty enough dishes in one day that a normal family of 5 does.

Dear Corn...I love you, why are you so very mean to me?

Dear Swagbucks...You are taking way to much of my time lol. I want bucks bucks and more bucks...gimme :)

Dear Robin...I hope your babies stay safe. Building your nest in our backyard was a bad bad idea. You see, our dog likes to eat things, like bunnies, and I'm pretty sure birds are on her list of tasty snacks. I fear your babies will fall out of the nest and become Moo's mid-day snack :(

Dear Renee...You've been bad bad BAD!! You totally went off your diet, and probably gained back all you lost. Get your ass back on track.

Dear doofus next door...You are crazy for starting to mow your grass already. Once you do it the first time of the season it starts growing faster. I know you love to mow, you like do it every other day...but we, your neighbors, do not like to hear your mower blaring every other day. Especially when my husband is trying to sleep. Plus, have you seen the outragous gas prices? Why would you want to mow so often and have to get gas for your mower all the time? You must have money to burn...how about sending some my way?

Dear Hot Cop neighbor...You can mow anytime you'd like...would it be to much to ask for you to wear your cop uniform while you do it? mmm mmm good :)

Dear Kelsey...I hope you have a great time at prom on May 7. Dang prom stuff is expensive. Thank God you have a free dress (Thanks Aunt Beth!). There are tickets, dress alterations, hair, flowers...its all coming at a bad time, May is a killer money month. So, you BETTER have a good time darn it LOL.

I guess thats it. I'm not going to spell check, or anything, because I'm feeling lazy...so excuse errors.

Toodles!

Dear...4-6-11

2011-04-06T09:15:00.002-05:00

Good morning. I hope today my post has paragraph spacing. I'm getting totally frustrated at this issue. It makes me not want to post. I've looked into it, and apparently I'm not alone, others have this problem too...yet no one has said there is a fix for it yet. It's time for the weekly Dear... letters. Letters for good or bad, just to vent/praise, whatever. Please join in. If you'd like to blog your own Dear... letters please hop over to Dazee's blog and link up. I'm not going to post the link, or the picture on here, in fear of if I have spacing it will mess up when I add that stuff lol, thats when it all started last week. So please go ----> over there and grab the link to Crazy Daze & Nite Dreams. Dear Special K...I like the flakes in your Chocolate Delight cereal, but those fake chocolate wanna be chunks SUCK. I should have known the name 'Chocolate Delight' was to good to be true. Dear Kels, Jilly, Bree...I like that you are sharing, but I don't want you to share germs and sickness! Seems stuff is going around and around lately... Get better, and keep better, all of you. Oh yeah, and don't give anything to me! Dear Key Lime Cove... You made quite the impression, the girls, especially Bree talk about it all the time. Bree just told me that after we pick the girls up from school today we need to go back to the waterpark. LOL. I wish it were that easy. Dear bathroom carpet...if I have my way, you will be HISTORY. Soon hopefully. Carpet in a bathroom is a BAD idea. The toilet has overflowed one to many times and its disgusting and smelly. I'm trying to talk my husband into letting me get you out. I don't like you. Dear TP companies...You should send me free product. I keep you guys in business. Dear Bree...ease up on the TP, you caused the toilet overflow the other day. Dear Tuesday & Wednesday nights...I don't like you. You are filled with LOUD snoring, crappy sleeping, and restless hours. Dear readers...Have you noticed the new header? Or the new page? Dear rainy days...Boo. The whole week on the forecast last night showed rain rain rain rain. Bah humbug...snow would at least be prettier. :P Oh well, hopefully it will green up the grass, and get some stuff blooming, I'm tired of leafless tress, they are gloomy and boring. Dear gas prices...damn. give us a break already. We may all become hermits, and not by choice. Dear swagbucks...Umm, I'm addicted. LOL. Gimme my bucks. :P I do wanna say though, I hate your damn surveys. I always have to answer a bunch of stuff then you tell me I don't qualify, and I get now swagbucks for it. That is frustrating. I need a nap. Toodles!

Finally Escaped From the Kitchen

2011-04-03T15:35:00.002-05:00

WOOHOO! I'm FREE I'm FREE! At least for now anyways :) Last week I seemed to spend all my time in the kitchen. Today I've spent all my time in the living room (and umm the bathroom, tummy troubles today!) relaxing and catching up on some things I've been needing to do on the computer. If you haven't noticed, I changed my blog header. I used some of the pictures I took last week. I hope you like it. If not...TO BAD :) Hmmm I wonder if this post will have spacing, since the last few posts I've done the paragraphs haven't worked! Cross your fingers. If not...TO BAD LOL. Seriously, if this shows up with no paragraphs I'm not sure what to do...any suggestions? I hope everyone has had a great weekend. Tonight we are supposed to get some sever storms I heard. Yikes. Thunderstorms I don't mind, as long as power stays on. The thought of tornados, and night time tornados freaks me out! Cross your fingers that the bad stuff misses us. Here are a few pics of the things I've been making in the kitchen, enjoy! Toodles!

Yawn Can I go back to bed?

2011-03-30T08:46:00.003-05:00

I'm so very tired this morning. Yesterday I rolled out, cut out, and baked a ton of cookies. I was baking from 11 until about 6, only stopping for about 45 minutes during that time to go get the girls from school and run an errand. After baking I relaxed a bit before tackling cleaning of the kitchen, yuck, I hate clean up. I had to watch Dancing With the Stars too before I could start that job. I was disappointed at the elimination choice, I was hoping it would have been Wendy. Oh well. Hopefully she'll go next week :) Kitchen was finally cleaned at 11 p.m. then I took the dog out for a final pee and I hit the sack exhausted and yearning for a solid nights sleep. LOL what was I thinking? I knew as soon as I laid down I was in trouble. Bill was taking over most of the bed. I only had a tiny area, if I laid on my side I could make it work, I had to suffer with his elbow in my shoulder blade area. The worst part though was his head was near my pillow, and he was facing my side, meaning his snoring was going right to my ear. He snores LOUD. So loud that if I'm in the living room watching TV and he is sleeping in the bedroom I can still here him out here. Ugh. I laid there awake, thinking of smothering him with a pillow. I was mumbling a few things that were not so nice, they might have even included some naughty words... I turned the TV up in the bedroom to try to hear something, I figured I'm awake I might as well watch some TV...not so easy. If I really wanted to hear it I'd have to turn it way way up, and would probably wake everyone else. Teen Mom 2 was on. Some of those girls...oy...I just wanna slap them. So finally a little after 1 a.m. I was able to fall asleep. I woke twice, for peeing and such. Then Bree woke me up at 5:50. Today I'm sleepy. I'm wishing I could take a nap. My day today will be spent in the kitchen again. I have to start decorating some of the 187 cookies I made. :) I actually made more, but some little girls keep sneaking them. I'm probably not going to decorate them all today. I'm going to freeze some for later. I wonder if today's post will have spacing. One can only hope... If not, sorry! Have a super duper day. Toodles!

Dear...(3-29-11)

2011-03-29T10:01:00.002-05:00

**Frustrating Blogging day. I've tried several times to post this morning, but for some reason when I click on preview my spacking is all gone, which makes things hard to read! Trying one more time. If it shows up without spacing I'm sorry, I don't have time to fart around with it anymore, I've got work to be doing!** UGH UGH UGH, just previewed and it shows no spacing AGAIN! I'm going to color each paragraph a different color, and hopefully that will help seperate things for you in reading. Sorry. :( Time for a quicky Dear... post. Please join in! If you blog it, be sure to hop over to Dazee's blog and link up. I'm not putting the picture in today for the Dear... letters because that seems to be screwing me up today. I believe I have a link to her blog on the side ----> I'm afraid to try to link anything else in fear of messing up what I've typed already LOL. Dear Customer...Thanks for your order! I was surprised & shocked to see an email last week for an order of 3 doz. cookies decorated and 2 cakes! I'm glad you enjoyed the cookie platter I sent to the school several months ago, which made you want to order from me. :) Dear cookies & cakes, Please look and taste awesome! Dear Swagbucks...I wanna be the hourly random winner! Pick me pick me! No fair that some peoples names are picked twice in one day! Dear readers...Anyone wanna join Swagbucks? :) If you do, let me know and I will refer you. I would love to get extra swagbucks to earn some cool stuff! Dear Bree...I hope your cold/allergy crap goes away soon. Dear Bree...I know you love to wash your hands, but ease up on the soap! We just got that new bottle of soap on Saturday, and its over half gone already! Dear Kelsey...thanks for FINALLY cleaning the litter boxes...now its time to do it again. Dear Jilly...Please stop dirtying 2 million dishes a day. If you don't, I'll be teaching you the joys of dishwashing... Dear Self...SLACKER. Shame on you. Dear Warm Weather...Get back here! You teased us a few days, then brought in the cold again. Not nice. Dear Money Fairy...Please drop me a load. I want to get a fancy camera, and some photography classes (among a ton of other things). Speaking of photography, Kelsey asked me to take some pictures of her over the weekend so the girls & I did an indoor photo shoot. Most are of Kelsey, Bree wasn't into cooperating, and Jilly got bored with it quickly. I took over 500 pictures. The better of the bunch are on my Flickr account. Please feel free to check them out here: Indoor photo shoot . Let me know what you think! Toodles!

So Mistreated

2011-03-24T19:58:00.002-05:00

My 17 yr old thinks I'm mean, and I mistreat her.

Why do you ask?

Because she has a CHORE!

*gasp* God forbid *gasp*

Its not a list of chores, like we had when we were little. It is just ONE thing, and it needs to be done 2-3 times a week. All she has to do is clean the cats litter boxes (there are 2). Yeah, its a stinky job, but its not a hard job, especially if it is done on time. That's it, one easy, yet stinky job.

For doing this job, she has the privilege of a cell phone, with unlimited text and calling. She agreed she'd do her job, and keep it up for this phone when we got it.

She's become a major slacker, and has barely done the litter boxes even once a week. When I remind her she gets all pissed off, and has a temper tantrum, and usually says some very bad/disrespectful things to me. Then she runs off to her room and slams her door.

Every time, she brings up the fact that her younger sister doesn't have to do any job. This is true. But, her younger sister does not have a phone. If she did, by golly she too would be doing something for it.

Maybe, I should give her younger sister a chore or two. Then give Kelsey a few more as well....she does have a phone to work off.

I'm so mean.

I get so annoyed at her hissy fits. She should feel lucky she doesn't have a list of chores like most of us have had growing up. My brothers & I had dishes to do, vacuuming, dusting, the works! My kids have it easy!

My husband who pays for the phone, wants to shut it off. No chore done, no phone. I've held him off for a while now, but I think maybe its the only way someone will learn.

Toodles

Pancakes

2011-03-23T12:16:00.000-05:00

I like pancakes.

Bree likes pancakes.

We ALL like pancakes :) I've seen some very cool pancake art sites online. I'm totally not an artist, but I like to have fun with pancakes, and Bree and even the older girls enjoy them too.

Here are some I've made lately.

It's fun to do. Takes a while to make them though.

Just thought I'd share :)

Toodles!

Bubbles

2011-03-23T05:05:00.000-05:00

I like bubbles.

Bree likes bubbles.

Moo (our dog) likes bubbles too.

See my bubbles..

Bree behind a bubble...

"Oh mommy, I'm going to pop your bubble..."

"I'm getting closer..."

POP!!

"That was fun! Let's do it again!" LOL she had a great time. BTW, that is not snow in the dead grass. Its stuffing, Moo ripped the heck out of her toy, and there is stuffing all over the back yard. I'm hoping some birds snag it to use in their nest...so I don't have to pick it all up :)

Toodles!

Kicked Booty

2011-03-22T20:43:00.002-05:00

On Monday, in my Dear... letters, I mentioned that I needed to get back on track in the working out area, since I had been slacking.

I did just that.

Monday I did some pilate type exercises upstairs, then I went down on the treadmill and did my most intense workout yet. I did 5 minute walk/5 minute jog intervals, and I did it for over an hour. I did 4 miles!

For those of you that work out often, and are in better shape than I, this is probably no big deal to you. For me, this is major! Normally I do 20 minutes or so tops. Maybe a mile or a little more. Never as much as I did Monday. I was quite proud of myself.

I was tempted to just be done working out after that. Instead, I pushed myself even further. I did a work out on the wii. I was so beat after that. I was sweating like a pig, a stinky one at that. I went upstairs to shower.

Then, I popped 2 Aleve. I needed them, I was already in major pain with my stupid heel, and I knew more pain would come as a result of my hard workout.

The rest of the afternoon I crept around, it hurt to move. I relaxed most of the afternoon.

After dinner it was time for one of my favorite shows, Dancing With the Stars. Instead of just sitting here like a couch potato, I went downstairs to watch it while doing the wii fit plus free step. This is basically just stepping up and down on the wii board. They have 10 minute, 20 minute, and 30 minute ones to pick from. Once you get it started, you can flick over to regular tv and watch tv as you step, the sounds you need from the wii come from the wii-remote. I chose the 30 minute step. I didn't just do it once. I did it 3 times while I watched DWTS! Those 3 times equalled 9020 steps!

My total calories burned from the wii time I did yesterday was the highest ever for me.

Excuse the crappy picture, I took a pic of the tv with my phone, it went all wacky on me...but you get the gist I think.

So, yesterday, I burned a total of 1241 (actually probably a bit more from my pilates stuff, I don't know how many I burned on that) calories. To me, that rocks. Yay me.

Today...well thats a different story LOL. I'm really sore today, and I've been busy, so today I only burned off about 250 calories.

Today was also disappointing....the scale said I gained a pound...after I lost one yesterday. It might be that I weighed in at a different time...who knows. Damn wii weigh in is moody lol.

I'm hoping tomorrows weigh in shows a loss... cross your fingers.

Toodles!

Imagination

2011-03-22T20:34:00.002-05:00

We have had a few nice days in the last week or so. I've tried getting Bree outside for a bit on each of those nice days. She loves being outside.

The other day, Bill was taking down the Christmas lights (yes finally, he works 2 jobs so he isn't home much to do it, plus we were waiting for decent weather). While he was doing that, I was watching Bree play.

She has quite the imagination. She gathered up some sticks, and arranged them on the front porch. She said it was her stickfire (campfire). Then she got another stick, and put a leaf on it, that was her marshmallow, that she was roasting. Silly girl.

Toodles!

Late...(or Early) Dear...

2011-03-21T08:52:00.003-05:00

I didn't get around to Dear... letters on Tuesday, so I'm late...or I'm early for this weeks, however you want to look at it.

Dear spring weather...Its good to see you! Bree has enjoyed some outside time this last week.

Dear snow...I still love you, but we need to take a break from each other. We need some time apart, to see other people...like spring, summer, and fall... You'll always be in my heart, but please keep your distance...until Nov. 1. xoxo

Dear Kelsey...I'm glad you spent a lot of quality time with Bree yesterday, and that you even gave her a bath. I like that you did my cool thing and colored the bathwater with food coloring for her. BUT...next time can you do a little less coloring please? Bree came out looking sunburned from the red coloring LOL.

Dear self... You've been a bad bad girl. Slacking on the workouts, eating to much crap... You need to get back on track, get your rear in gear.

Dear Cindy...I hope your first birthday without Elliott went better than you thought it would, and that you enjoyed the company and the cake :)

Dear grass...Hurry up and green up, you look mighty ugly right now. I need you green so I can go outside and take some new pictures of the girls.

Dear lottery... I need to play you and win. I want a fancy schmancy camera, a bigger house, bills paid off, new wardrobe, and the ability to go on a vacation more often.

Dear Key Lime Cove... We miss you :) The girls talk about you daily and they want to go back!

Dear Bree... That poop you did this morning totally looked like an ice cream cone! It was very cool...for poop lol.

Dear Dancing With The Stars (DWTS)...I'm looking forward to tonight's show! Thank God you don't have any Palin's on this season.

Dear Readers... I hope I've pleased you all now. I took off the 'hard on the eyes' stuff, and increased the font size.. anything else?

I think that's all for now...

Toodles!

New Look part 2...

2011-03-20T11:55:00.003-05:00

Apparently the former look was "hard on the eyes" according to my old readers :P (lol kidding girls).

Soooo... being the people pleaser that I try to be, I changed it again... I hope this one is easier on your eyes.

Still not what I want, but I have no good pictures at the moment to use to make a collage.

Toodles

New Look...

2011-03-18T21:19:00.002-05:00

Since spring is almost here, in just a matter of days, I thought I'd take off my winter blog header and do something more springy.

I wanted to do a collage, like usual, but I don't have very many good pictures right now of us to put in it. So... I ended up making a 'wordle' then jazzed it up a bit on picnik.

I don't care for the colors to much, but wordle didn't have much options so I picked the best of the crappy choices lol.

Of course I then had to come and change the fonts and stuff here to match...because I like matchy things... That is why it is really bugging me that my community thing and my feedjit thing don't match the rest of the blog...but I'll have to figure out how to change those later to tired now.

I hope you enjoy this new look. I'm thinking its only here for a short time...until I can get some good pictures.

Toodles

We Have a Winner!

2011-03-18T19:05:00.002-05:00

TGIF!

Sorry for the delay in posting a winner for the Yoplait Kids prize package. I was hoping for a better turn out, so I waited an extra day, but apparently people are busy, or something.

Anyways..

I decided to do things the old fashion way, instead of using Random.org. I wrote out the names of the commenters on paper.

Then, I folded them all the same way, and put them in a bowl.

Then I called in my little helper to shake up the bowl some more and pick a paper out of the bowl....Here is my lovely assistant and the winner announcement:

Congratulations Dazee Dreamer! You have won some Yoplait Kids yogurt and a lovely prize package courtesy of Yoplait and MyBlogSpark! Enjoy your winnings!

Have a great weekend!

Toodles!

Giveaway & Review! Yoplait Kids!

2011-03-14T19:10:00.002-05:00

Greetings Dear Readers!

I'm excited to let you know that I've been given the opportunity to do a review AND giveaway through MyBlogSpark and Yoplait!

Are you excited? I am!

I've been planning to do it for a while now, but life got in the way. Aubrey had a tummy bug, then we had our little vacation, and then I kept forgetting to pick up the product! But finally I did and I'm going to tell you about it :)

My girls love yogurt, especially my youngest daughter Aubrey. Yoplait provided me with a coupon to pick up some of their Yoplait Kids yogurt to try. Aubrey & I visited our grocery store on a mission to pick up Yoplait Kids yogurt. We located it in the dairy section and I let Aubrey pick it out. I thought for sure she was going to grab the Dora ones, but she found Disney Princess packs! I had never seen those before, I had only seen the Blues Clues & Dora packs. Aubrey was totally excited to have yogurt with Cinderella on it! She was sold!

I too was sold, when I saw good things on the package, such as 2 Box Tops for Education! There was good news about the yogurt containing live & active cultures , vitamins, calcium, protein, and less sugar!

I love that my kids love yogurt, its good for them, and a much better choice then junk food. I am glad I don't have to 'twist their arm' to get them to eat it, they ask for it!

Are you looking for a wholesome snack for your kids? Look no further, Yoplait Kids is a great snack!

Guess what!

Yoplait, and MyBlogSpark, have provided me with a Yoplait Kids prize package to give to a lucky reader! They also provided me with one, and let me tell you, it is awesome! See for yourself:

This *Yoplait prize package includes a coupon** for any Yoplait Kids product, a "My First Scavenger Hunt" game, a pack of four ice cream spoons, alphabet shaped kiddie bands, a big bounce ball, a magnet frame, and a fold-able cooler for taking your kids packs on the go.

Awesome right? Want to win? It's easy! Just leave me a comment. Be sure to include your email address so I can easily contact you if you are the lucky winner. I will pick a winner on Thursday morning.

Want some Yoplait Kids to hold you over until you win? You can click HERE and get a coupon to save some money on your purchase!

*The coupon**, prize package, giveaway and information are provided by Yoplait through MyBlogSpark..Thank you!

**This coupon offer for a free four pack of Yoplait Kids yogurt is not valid in some states, including California, Idaho, Louisiana, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, North Dakota and Tennessee.

Be sure to "Like" Yoplait on Facebook, and "Follow" Yoplait on Twitter to get the latest Yoplait news!

Whew! I hope I got everything in there that needed to be said :) Enjoy your Yoplait! Oh, one more thing... The little cups that the yogurt comes in can be washed out and used for other things, they make great water cups for when your kids are painting

Toodles!

Dear...(3.8.11)

2011-03-08T14:14:00.002-06:00

Come on in & sit a spell, I've got some letters for you to read. Joining up with my dear friend Dazee and her weekly Dear... letters. Letters to whomever, good or bad, like venting and/or praising, just getting stuff off your chest out of your mind... that kind of thing.

Dear Key Lime Cove...We had a great time at your place over the weekend. I hope we can come back sometime in the future, we miss you already.

Dear slippery floors at Key Lime Cove...get a grip! You are so slick both Bill & Bree fell on you over the weekend. Bree fell twice, once hitting her head.

Dear Build-A-Bear...You have a way of sucking little girls in, and draining their daddy's wallets...

Dear Rainforest Cafe...You are such a cool place but dang you are noisy. We couldn't hear ourselves talk during our lunch the other day without yelling. You are also a money draining place. So is Key Lime Cove lol.

Dear Bree...You talk a LOT! You start as soon as you wake up, and keep talking until you fall asleep. Sometimes you even talk in your sleep.

Dear Bill & Kelsey...at 3:30 a.m. on Monday morning, you were snoring in unison.

Dear Wii Fitness...Please be kind to me on weigh in tomorrow after my diet vacation.

Dear heel on my left foot...I don't like you, enough of the pain already. I'm tired of being in pain with every step. Tired of limping. Tired of popping pain pills. Pretty sad when my 10 yr old tells me I'm taking to many pills lately.

Dear Keurig...I'm pleased with my k-cup order and loving my Keurig machine. I was happy to see one at Key Lime Cove in my room too.

Dear Moo (or dog)...it was great having a vacation away from you.

Dear readers...Be sure to read the other posts from today too :)

I guess that's it for now. I could go on and on, but I would just bore you...

Toodles!

Happy Birthday Old Fart!

2011-03-08T14:06:00.002-06:00

Today is my husbands birthday!

He's old.

He's goofy.

He's a hard worker.

He's often grumpy because he is tired from working so much...I would be too I suppose.

He's a good dad.

He's older than me.

Happy Birthday Old Man.

Yes, he acts goofy like that often...in case you were wondering.

Toodles!

Mini-Vacation

2011-03-08T11:02:00.002-06:00

Our family, Bree, Jilly, Kelsey, Bill & I, went on a mini-vacation over the weekend.

We drove to Gurnee, IL, and first went to the Gurnee Mill's Mall. While there, we had a great (and expensive!) lunch at Rainforest Cafe. We all love that place, so much to look at there. Then it was Build-a-Bear time. Each of the girls wanted something. Kelsey got a Peace Sign Bear, Jilly got a dog, and Bree got a Hello Kitty. The younger girls got dresses for their animals. Bree picked out a Cinderella outfit & shoes for her Hello Kitty, Jilly got her dog a dress. Bill's wallet was a lot lighter when we left that store. After that, we did a bit of window shopping, trying to save some money for the rest of our vacation!

We left the mall and headed to Key Lime Cove! We got checked in, then had dinner in one of their eaterys. Next came time for the waterpark! The girls had a blast. After that it was the arcade time, they loved that too. Most of the weekend we ate, spent money, swam, played games, and ate some more. It was a great weekend.

Our room had 2 queen beds, and a fold out couch. Kels & Jilly shared one bed, Bree & I the other, Bill took the fold out couch. I was happy to see our room had a Keurig coffee maker :) The room also had a mini fridge, which came in handy.

For the rest of this post, I'm putting up a bunch of pictures for you to enjoy. I'll also put up a few videos...if I can get it to cooperate.

Toodles!

Dear...(3-1-11)

2011-03-01T18:49:00.004-06:00

Tuesday is here, which means its time for the weekly Dear... letters. Letters for good or bad to whomever...

Dear Tummy Bug...Leave Bree alone, and stay away from the rest of us too. Poor Bree has had yucky poops for several days now and on Sunday she was puking up a storm. Enough already.

Dear Diet...you suck.

Dear wii weigh in...$%^$ you.

Dear my fitness pal... you blow.

Dear fat...flee the premises.

Dear self...you are a loser, but not the kind of loser you are supposed to be!

Dear pain...You totally suck. I hate you. Go away. I'd like to be able to work out without being in agony with every step. Actually I'd like to be able to even walk without being in agony with every step. You left for a year or so, then you came back after my jogging last week, and you came back with vengeance.

Dear Aleve...I know you can work better & faster... please?

Dear city...Not thrilled with the fact that we have to have city tags for the pets and you are going door to door to verify. Just another way for you to rob us of our money.

Dear Great Clips...I wish I could get a Great Clip at your place...95% of the time I get a crappy clip. Got a bad haircut last night. Oh well, at least I had a coupon so I got my crappy haircut for half price.

Dear Dancing With The Stars...I'm glad to say I don't hate anyone in the new cast...yet. Not sure who to root for.. I'll miss Derek this season!

Dear Bill...I love you, but I hate your damn snoring!!

Dear Kelsey...Stop forgetting stuff! I'm tired of bringing stuff to school for you that you forget. Gas is expensive now ya know, and you are a big girl, capable of remembering your calculator & stuff.

Dear gas prices...geeze..chill out.

Dear weekend...can you get here a little faster?

Dear massage...I wish I could get you when we are at our mini vacation. There is a spa there, Bill was going to let me get one, but I was stupid and said we should spend the money on the kids instead. Now it looks like we'll be spending a butt-load at Rain forest Cafe, and Build a Bear etc... I'm pretty sure there won't be any left for that massage...what was I thinking?

Dear Keylime Cove...I hope you are as fun as you look and you provide the family & I with a wonderful time.

I'm tired.

Toodles.

Kelsey is 17 today!

2011-02-28T10:47:00.003-06:00

Holy cow. Kelsey turned 17 today!

Seems like just yesterday I was on my way to the hospital freaking out about a possible c-section, freaking out about who was going to watch Zach while I was at the hospital, freaking about if her dad would make it in time since we were separated and he was living in WI at the time and all that jazz.

I did end up having a c-section, because Kelsey wanted to come out butt first. Zach was taken care of by my old neighbors until my mother in law arrived. My ex didn't make it in time, but arrived shortly after. My mom was with me and got to carry Kelsey to the nursery after the birth. I'm pretty sure that's something she cherishes, right mom?

Kelsey was a beautiful baby, and has grown up to be a beautiful young woman. She is a big help to me with Bree, and is a great big sister. Kels always helps me when I'm on a cookie making spree, which I appreciate big time. Kelsey does well in school, and I'm very proud.

Here are some pics of Kelsey when she was younger.

Some of those are pictures from the daddy/daughter dances. A picture of her with her new glasses when she first got glasses. One of her displaying our banner for the Light the Night Walk. Kelsey even donated her hair to Locks of Love! :)

Here are some various pictures from this past year:

She's probably going to kill me when she sees I put that picture of her with her make up done by Bree into this collage. :) Isn't she beautiful?

Kelsey requested I make her a blanket for her birthday, she picked out the fleece and I made it. She loves peace signs, and has a purse that has them on it, she found fleece to match! I also made her a peace sign birthday cake. She begged me to use fondant on it, so I did...and hated every second of it! I hate fondant, I am not good with it and I get frustrated. Here are pics of her blanket and cake:

Tonight we'll go out to dinner to celebrate Kelsey's birthday. That is our tradition, birthdays mean food out :) I'm hoping she pics a place where I can have them embarrass her for her birthday. If you know Kelsey, please send her birthday wishes on Facebook, or text her, or call her, or comment here for her :) Even if you don't know her, I'm sure she'd love birthday wishes here in the comments!

Toodles!

Discouraged

2011-02-25T12:52:00.002-06:00

Dieting is a roller coaster ride.

Have I ever mentioned I don't like roller coasters? Nor do I like dieting.

Did you know that if you weigh at different times of day your weight can vary by a few pounds? That is just wrong... I need to try not to get to discouraged when I step on that stupid wii board and see a gain. Especially when I didn't weigh in around my usual time.

Today it said I gained 2 lbs. After I worked out big time yesterday. I was really disappointed and discouraged. Maybe if I weighed in at my usual time it might not say such a gain, but still...hard to not get down after seeing a gain when I worked so hard!

I've been logging my foods on My Fitness Pal. It keeps track of your calorie intake, tells you what your goal should be etc.. You also log in your exercise time. Did you know that if you work off such and such calories you are supposed to eat back those calories? I don't quite understand it all but that is what you are supposed to do. I've logged my food and exercising time, and it tells me how much calories I've earned back by exercising, and I need to keep my calorie intake within my goal plus those calories I worked off. I've been doing that, and I've been under my calories by a bit each day for the most part, but it doesn't seem to be helping me lose. I'm wondering if that eat back your calories stuff is a bunch of BS. I was doing better before I started following that plan.

I'm just frustrated. I want the weight to come off faster. When I worked so hard yesterday and made big progress by JOGGING for more then 30 seconds I was so proud of myself. I had walked 5, jogged 5, walked 5, jogged 8, walked 5, jogged 5... that was major progress for me. Before I'd walk mostly, do intervals of jogging for 30 seconds at a time here and there but that was it. I was so excited yesterday. I had been pissed off by some things so I used that aggression in my work out and I did good. I was sure I'd have seen a loss when I got on the wii today, but I didn't. All I got out of it was a sore body, and a foot that hurts like hell.

After about a year of being mostly pain free in my feet (heel spurs and stuff), yesterday's jogging ruined that and I've been hurting ever since. Icing my heel right now as we speak and praying my Aleve will kick in soon, the others I've taken since yesterday haven't really touched it. Blah.

I know I could do better. I could totally cut out all junk, instead of just cutting back a lot. But I don't want to be totally miserable, for if I am, I'll totally blow all this diet crap. So I am still treating myself to a coke now and then, and a splurge day here and there. I just wish with all the working out and changes I have made I'd see more progress.

I could really go for some comforting chocolate right now... Hmmm where did Bill hide the caramel kisses?

Toodles!

My Mother Taught Me...

2011-02-24T08:34:00.002-06:00

My mother taught me, If you don't have anything nice to say don't say anything!

So, right now, given my mood, I'm going to bite my tongue, and sit on my hands to keep from typing.

I had a crappy nights sleep, and I'm in a very bad mood, and everyone around me is adding to it.

I wish I had a punching bag to work out some aggression on. Off to work out...

Toodles

Dear...(2-22-11)

2011-02-22T06:04:00.000-06:00

It's that wonderful time of the week, time for my Dear... letters, letters good or bad, to whomever I wish. I look forward to doing these letters each week and linking up to my dear friend Dazee who came up with the lovely Dear... letter idea.

Dear tax refund...I love you. I wish you could stick around a bit longer..

Dear cold weather...make up your mind. Are you coming or going? If you are going to stick around, give me some snow. If ya can't produce the snow, get the hell out of here so spring can move on in.

Dear calories...I don't like you nor do I understand you. According to a thing I read, an orange is like 150 calories...for an ORANGE...a piece of FRUIT, which is supposed to be good for you. If I'm going to take in 150 calories (which is a lot if you ask me), I am going to eat something worthy..like 2 oreos. :) 2 oreos are 140 calories.

Dear water...I still don't like you. Why can't you taste a little more special? So bland and boring you are.

Dear mind...when its late at night, the middle of the night, or early in the wee hours of the morning, please, please PLEASE stop working and let me sleep. I'm really sick of being awake during what should be my sleep time because I'm thinking of stupid bake sales and fund raisers. Those seem to be the things keeping me awake the most lately.

Dear Kelsey & Jilly... Please stop fighting. Some day you'll love each other and enjoy each other. I wish that day would come soon...

Dear Bree... You look so cute with your new haircut.

Dear Bill...please don't put your jeans in the laundry with ink pens in your pocket. If I don't notice it, it ends up going through the washer and dryer. Your ink pen ruined 3 of my clothing items, I don't have many things to wear as it is, and now I had to throw away 2 of those 3 things. Your ink also ruined part of Bree's new dress.

Dear chicken taco soup... I love you, you taste so very scrumptious!

Dear self...you need rhythm. You have Zumba for the wii, and you can't seem to get the hang of it...you suck.

Dear creativity... I'm going to need you this weekend to get Kelsey's cake made and looking cool.

Dear Kelsey...Dang, I can't believe you are going to be 17 on Monday! I'm feeling really old.

Dear blog readers...come to my blog. Follow me. I want to feel loved. I know, I'm boring, but come on, pretty please? Dazee has like 191 followers already and she hasn't been blogging as long as I have, she's just much cooler. I have only 35. I love my 35. I just wish I had more to love :)

Dear body...please wake up 95 lbs lighter in the morning. This dieting sucks.

I guess that is all for now, can't think of anything else at the moment.

Have a spectacular day!

Toodles!

Shop Till We Drop

2011-02-21T18:39:00.002-06:00

Our tax refund came Friday.

Its so nice to have extra money around for a while. I just wished it would last longer!

We paid off my Fashion Bug credit card, yay! It's been forever since I bought anything with it, but I've been paying on it for a few years, the damn interest rates were killing me and I never seemed to make any headway with it. I love that store, but no longer get to shop at it much now that they closed the one closest to us.

We stocked up on groceries with some of our refund money. We have 25 boxes of macaroni and cheese...my husband said since its on sale we need to get it. That is a lot of mac & cheese...

We used some money to buy the girls some new clothing. Bree's out growing all her stuff so she got several dresses, she loves dresses. Kels & Jilly both got new swim suits and a few clothing items so far, they still have a bit left to shop with. I was to get things for me too, but after shopping for several hours with the girls things were going downhill fast. We were all tired & cranky, so I just grabbed 2 t-shirts and a pair of capris to work out in. I wish I had more time to look for me, but oh well.

Some of the money is going to a mini-vacation. It will just be a 2 night stay at Key Lime Cove in Gurnee IL. They have an indoor waterpark and arcade, several eateries, a spa, and shopping things all in a nice hotel. We haven't gone on any vacation in forever, so we are looking forward to it, even if its still in IL, and only for 2 days. That is 2 days I don't have to cook or clean :) The girls are looking forward to the indoor waterpark. Bree keeps asking me if today is the day we are going to the water place.

We'll be using some of the money to board the dog while we are gone. She is also getting caught up on her vaccinations. The cats need to go to the vets for their stuff too, but their appointment hasn't been made yet.

A lot of the refund will be put aside, for stupid real estate taxes. Ugh those taxes are a killer.

I wish our refund was bigger. There are many things that we could use the money for. Like a new TV, the on/off button apparently got pushed one to many times, and it went inside the TV and is no longer usable. We have to use the remote to turn it on and off, if the remote gets lost, we are screwed. There are many repairs around here that need to get done, remodeling that would be nice to do. Of course never ending bills to pay.. But, that is always the case I think, always wishing for more... We'll be sure to enjoy what we have now though.

Toodles!

Dear...(2-15-11)

2011-02-15T18:54:00.003-06:00

It's Tuesday.

Guess what that means?

It's time for me to join in with my buddy ole pal Dazee and do Dear... letters! Letters to whomever I want, for good or bad...

Dear Sickies...So long! Don't let the door hit you on the way out! We are all finally feeling better, and on the road to wellness. Bree still coughs a tad, but is doing a ton better.

Dear mind...when I go to bed to sleep, PLEASE turn off so I can sleep. I don't want to think about bake sales, and other fund raising ideas, nor about anything else... I. JUST. WANT. SLEEP.

Dear hot cop neighbor...Your dogs are totally getting on my nerves lately. Every evening for the last several days they are barking up a storm. You are so lucky they aren't doing this at night, or I'd have to call the cops...which would be umm YOU. LOL. Good thing you're hot, and you look extra hot in your cop get up.

Dear Train...Man, when you derail you sure make a mess! Several coal cars on a train over turned here in town Friday.

Dear self...You weigh 11 lbs less today then you did Jan. 1. Good job.

Dear tax refund....you could hurry up a bit couldn't ya? We've got things to pay...and we wanna take a weekend vacation to an indoor water park.

Speaking of the water park...Dear waterpark...I hope when we finally do come for a weekend you are filled with a blind people convention, so no one can see my fatass in a swimsuit.

Dear fundraising idea...I thought of you, and I really hope you can come together and work. I hope it is easy to do and it makes us a ton of money for the Relay for Life. I'm not used to planning stuff like this, not sure what to do so I hope it all works out...if people pay money to come and see something and it fails I'm going to feel horrible.

Dear Sissy (our cat)...While I'm laying in bed around 5:20 a.m. trying to return to sleep, the last thing I want to hear is you sharting in the bathroom..and the last thing I want to see when I go to investigate is your spray paint crap all over the side of the bathtub and on the carpet.

Dear snow... It is so sad to see you departing :( I love you snow...I just wish it didn't have to be cold to have you.

Dear spring...I'll miss the snow, but I'll welcome you, so hurry and get here so the snow haters can stop whining :) LOL

I guess thats all for now...

Toodles!

What do YOU call it?

2011-02-14T13:00:00.002-06:00

I'm curious. What do you call your evening meal? Supper? Dinner? I wonder if it depends where you live? Hmmm thinking a lot about this, not sure why LOL.

Please do me a favor, let me know in the comments what you call it, and the state you live in (or country if you are not in USA). I'm going to gather info from here, and other places I ask, and try to figure this out...because you know, inquiring minds wanna know! Right? :)

Supper?

Dinner??

Please share the link to this post, the more answers I get the better! Thanks.

Toodles!

Crazy Dreams

2011-02-11T20:26:00.002-06:00

I have always been umm blessed?...or maybe cursed?...with crazy dreams. I think I'm leaning more towards blessed, because most of them are not scary, and are quite humorous and entertaining!

Last night I was able to get enough sleep to actually have a dream. It was odd. I only remember bits and pieces, let me tell you about what I remember. It involved a big old house that was in need of repairs. We moved into this place, and by we, I mean me, and a bunch of people that looked like the Duggar girls. They all had long hair with no style, wore long skirts etc. I don't know if I looked like that because I didn't see my body, I just saw stuff around me. Anyways, this house needed repairs, and there were cracks all over the plaster walls and stuff, some walls had like cracks and had shifted so it was like off kilter even. This house had 2 kitchens, and 2 living rooms, many bedrooms & such. I vaguely remember conversing about rearranging furniture in this house. Before we moved into this house, wild cats took it over because it had been abandoned for a while. These were not just any cats, these cats were like cartoon cats, the kind you see on Halloween things. Cats with arched backs, tails straight up, green eyes. These cats were like cardboard, flat, stiff, no bendable parts. We in the dream, would put rows of rubber bands on our fingers, and then somehow run a finger from our other hand over these rubber bands and it would make them shoot off all over the room. The cats LOVED this and chased the rubber bands. Of course they were like cardboard, so they didn't actually run, they kinda just bounced sorta. That's all I remember. Crazy eh?

I told Bill about this dream this morning. He asked if I was on drugs. I'm not...but maybe it was the combination of the Aleve and the Nyquil cough medicine that caused this craziness. Probably not..I'm just weird.

I've been having a lot of dreams about houses lately! Not long ago I had one that we moved into a big fancy house with 2 business dudes that bought a McDonalds. To get to this house we had to drive through a really bad area, then we turned on a road and it was instant nice with huge houses. We lived on the end of the road in the circle area. This house had a lot of fancy stuff, I loved it. One of the halls had like 4 bathrooms in it. One was for handicapped people and it was like a locker room/bathroom. One bedroom in that hallway had a great room and in the front of that bedroom was a bathroom, shower, sink, toilet, and a half wall separating it from the bedroom part of the room. All my kids wanted that room. Also in that hallway was a strange room...I ventured inside and found an operating table, all kinds of gadgets, a laser thingy, and a bunch of medical stuff. Apparently the previous owner was a brain surgeon, and he did things out of his house. That is all I remember of that dream...so strange.

I've had so many odd dreams I should really write them in a journal, give it to my grand-kids someday, they'd think I should have been in a loony-bin.

One dream I had years ago involved my grandma falling in love with a killer whale at Sea World. She actually stood by the viewing glass and married this whale, and kissed it through the glass.

One dream I had involved Bill going to buy a new car. I was waiting at home. He came down the street in our new car...which was a couch, with wheels under it, and to make it go you used your feet, like Fred Flintstone.

One I had involved my mother posing for a naughty magazine and movie...if you know my mother you'd know this would NEVER EVER EVER HAPPEN. Well anyways, I got a picture on my phone of my mother that was x-rated, I was terrified. LOL.

Gosh I have so many.. I'll stop now though, now that you know how crazy I am.

Toodles!

P.S. I must be somewhat special, I got roses today, not once but twice! My husband brought me some home this morning, and I got a delivery this afternoon from my mom. Thanks Mom & Bill!

Soups On!

2011-02-11T08:49:00.002-06:00

I've been on a soup kick lately.

I've made Chicken Taco Soup....twice.

I've made homemade chicken noodle soup...twice.

I've made hamburger veggie soup.

Soup. Soup. Soup!

Yesterday I made my second batch of chicken noodle soup this month, its pretty good. I had it for lunch yesterday. I had it for dinner yesterday. I'm eating it now for breakfast too! Yes, I know I'm weird...I just wasn't in the mood for breakfast foods. Chances are I'll have it for lunch as well.

Tonight's dinner though is different. Fridays are my splurge nights. After I take Kelsey to her dads, the younger girls & I treat ourselves to McD's on the way home. Yeah, its naughty, and bad for me...but it makes me happy, and once a week isn't going to kill me...might explain why the weight isn't coming off super fast but oh well lol.

Do you have any good, easy soup recipes you can share with me? I could use some more.

Yesterday I also made something else...brownies. They aren't for me, unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it lol.) Jilly's class is having a party today and she signed me up to bring brownies. Being a nice mom, I made some, and jazzed them up a tad.

They look so good. I made this picture my desktop picture.

Last night was the meeting for the Relay For Life. We have our team all signed up. Kelsey picked the name Forever Fighters, but she might be changing it if she can. I personally hate that name, to boring... I like something with more character and coolness. :) I'm having a little bit of trouble setting up my 2 different Relay web pages, they seem to be going together, instead of being separate...gotta figure out how to fix the problem. Once I do, be prepared, I'm gonna mention them in hopes of getting some donations! :P Its for a good cause, something near and dear to me, I've seen to many friends & family suffer from cancer, research needs to be done, a cure needs to be found.

Anyone got any home remedies for coughing? I'm so sick of coughing, sick of the girls coughing too! I'm also sick of puke that comes when a little one coughs to hard. Jilly & I have been using Delsym, but its not doing crap for us. Bree isn't supposed to take over the counter medicines. My other kids did and were fine, but things have changed apparently and they don't want kids under 6 taking them, supposedly all dangerous now. I did get her some natural cough syrup made just for toddlers last night...doesn't seem to do a whole heck of a lot though.

I hope you all have a great Friday & weekend.

QOTD: Do you ever eat odd things for breakfast?

Toodles!

I need YOU. :)

2011-02-10T10:48:00.002-06:00

This summer I am participating in not one, but TWO, yes 2, Relay For Life walks.

The first one is in June I believe, and we are on a team called Elliott's Luek Troop. Elliott is my friend Dan & Cindy's son, who passed away in April, and we will walk to honor him & his memory.

The second one will be in July, right here in my town. My daughter Kelsey has decided that her Grandpa needs a team. He is battling cancer, and doesn't have a whole lot of time left the doctors say. He might prove them wrong...we are hoping. Anyways, his name is Terry Hebert. We are trying to come up with a team name. I suggested Grandpa's Groupies...Kels isn't to sure on that one yet. SO, I'm asking YOU...Can you give us some name suggestions for this team? Something fun & catchy would be great. Terry is a big Mustang car fan, so maybe something to do with that? I kind of need a name by TONIGHT. There is a meeting tonight and we went to get the team registered. So, HELP :) Please. Thank you. Leave your team name suggestions in the comment area.

Toodles!

Dear...(2-8-11)

2011-02-08T09:57:00.002-06:00

Happy Tuesday.

Its time for my weekly Dear... letters. I'm actually going to be on time with them this week...usually I end up doing it few days after Dazee posts hers. I'm really on the ball this week. Actually, its purely luck...I came on here to whine, and what better way to do it than with the Dear... letters which can be good or bad. Feel free to join in on the fun, and go over to Dazee's and link up...She'd love you for it, as would I.

Dear Fast Care at Walmart...You were not fast at all! But...I'm thankful for you, I was able to get Bree checked, and some medicine for her to hopefully make her finally feel better.

Dear Bree's tonsils...shrink up, you mean things, you've caused my little stinker enough pain & suffering already.

Dear Vomit...why oh why must you smell so disgusting and be so hard to clean up?

Dear idiot who put carpet in my bathroom...WTF were you thinking? Did you not realize that toilets over flow, that there is a lot of moisture in bathrooms, and that people vomit in there and might not make it all into the toilet...therefore getting it on the stupid carpet??

Dear Hoover Steamvac...Thank you for being here in my time of need.

Dear Bree...Please, no barfing today. I'm proud of you for running to the bathroom to try to get your barf into the potty. I'm not mad you didn't quite get there, making puke get all over the side of the toilet,the seat, the wall, the trash can, and the carpet. Grossed out that I had to clean it,yes, but mad, no. I hope you start feeling better.

Dear fever...You can go away now and stay away from Bree, its time.

Dear glasses place...I wish you would have called me early yesterday, before I went to Peru and back. But..I'm glad you finally called, took ya long enough.

Dear glasses...I've waited for you for so long...only to find I hate you. LOL. I need to go back and get you readjusted, you slide around to much and drive me nuts. You are going to take a lot of getting used to...damn bifocals. Looking out the top is nice, but I still see everything under and its all like blurry, I had to take you off after a few hours last night because you made me feel dizzy.

Dear Self...I'm very disappointed in you. (Hang on readers, this is going to be a long one) After 37 consecutive days of working you, you took a break. Shame on you. Granted, it was for a good reason, you were gone most of the day, you didn't feel well, and by evening when you were going to do it Bree got sick throwing up and you needed to stay with her. (long sentence, sorry) You were worried she'd throw up while you were downstairs and you'd not hear her when she needed you. You did the good mom thing and stayed by her side, even slept with her so you could hand her the puke bucket if needed. But, still...you missed a day. Now you don't want to return to working out. I know you feel like crap today, weak, achy, tight throat/chest, hacking up a lung or two...and I suppose if you skipped today no one would really hold it against you. You are your worst enemy. You feel disgusted with yourself, you feel like you FAILED, you feel disappointed and discouraged, you feel like giving up. Try not to let those feelings get to you. I know you'd feel much better if you were able to sleep several hours, uninterrupted, you'd probably be raring to go after that. Sleep is good for the sickies and the soul...and for weight loss too I hear...I guess if your sleeping you aren't eating :) I hope you can get better soon, quit hacking up a lung, so you can get back on track with the working out program.

Dear cough...leave me alone.

Dear lungs...I need you IN my body, don't let the cough evict you.

Dear Bree & Jilly and me... Lets kick some sickie ass and get these germs out of here!

Dear readers...I hope some of this actually made sense. I don't know anymore LOL.

Toodles!

Anniversary

2011-02-04T21:03:00.002-06:00

Wednesday was our wedding anniversary! Feb. 2, 2007, Bill & I were married at the courthouse with the kids present with us. My mom was there, my brother and his future wife, and Bill's brother & sister in law, and his mom were there too.

Here is a picture from that day.

We've all grown since that picture LOL.

We couldn't go out to celebrate on our anniversary, due to the blizzard, so we went out last night. Just went to Buffalo Wild Wings for dinner, and did a little shopping at Target, Menards, and Hobby Lobby. It was nice to get out alone for a bit.

Toodles!

Blizzard Feb. 1 & 2, 2011

2011-02-04T20:24:00.003-06:00

We got some awesome snow this past week!

Monday we got a little bit.

Tuesday the big stuff came, it started in the afternoon and went on until Wednesday. Lots of snow, and lots of high winds. We even had THUNDER SNOW. Very cool. I'm going to try to post a video of that at the bottom of this post, I hope it works. I've been trying to post it all night and its giving me issues!

Here are some pictures of the blizzard, and of the girls on their snow ramp they made to sled on in our front yard. Enjoy!

Ok, gonna try one more time to get this damn video up...If it works, just skip to about 1:25 on the video I think it is...the first part is just me waiting and waiting..boring.

Toodles!

Thunder Snow:

Dear...(2-4-11)

2011-02-04T19:43:00.003-06:00

I'm such a slacker! I'm so late with this. I just haven't been in a bloggy mood lately for some reason. Time to get with the program Renee and snap to it! LOL. Its time for the weekly Dear... letters. These are letters to whoever, good or bad...to vent or praise.. Join in if you'd like!

Dear back...please stop hurting.

Dear cough...GO AWAY!

Dear bladder...Toughen up will ya? I'm tired of leaking when I cough.

Dear Jilly & Bree...Feel better!

Dear Kelsey...If you & your friend keep me up all night I'm not going to be happy.

Dear blizzard...You were very cool. I like all the snow!

Dear laundry...enough already. I folded 8 loads today.

Dear Bree...Stop changing your clothes every 10 minutes.

Dear self...No missed days of work outs since starting this on Jan. 1. You worked out even when feeling crappy/sick. Good job.

Dear weight...come off already will ya? Haven't I been suffering enough?

Dear Bill...Thanks for the date night last night.

Dear Mother in law...Thanks for babysitting so we could have a date night. Actually, thank you Kelsey for babysitting Bree, and MIL for supervising so Jilly & Kelsey didn't kill eachother while we were gone.

Dear brownies...stop calling my name.

Dear Monday...Can you hurry and get here? :)

Thats all for now...

QOTD: Do you suffer from back pain?

Toodles!

Wow, I'm behind!

2011-02-03T21:44:00.002-06:00

Just realized I haven't blogged since Sunday...Oops.

To tired to coherently blog now, I will do it tomorrow :) Stay tuned. I'll probably talk about a blizzard, an anniversary, working out, and I need to do my weekly Dear.. letters!

Until tomorrow...

Toodles!

Renee's Ramblings

No more hiding! Out with the old, in with the new!

Goodbye 2011

Christmas Past

Hair Highlights from...?

Snow!

Bree's 4th Birthday Party

What the girls do when they are bored

I know, I've been MIA.

Giveaway WINNER!

Giveaway Time! (Closed - Winner announced!)

I Spy 11-3-11

Look at me! Again and again and again...

I Spy 10-28-11 (yes I'm late again)

A Vlog For You

I Spy 10-13-11

Homecoming 2011

I Spy 10-7-11

I Spy (Bench)

I Survived!

D-Day

SOOC Saturday (9-24-11)

Anxiety

I Spy (lamps)

Imagination

SOOC Saturday

I Spy (on time :) )

Stuff 3

I Spy (better late then never)

Still Alive

SOOC Saturday

Big Changes Coming Soon

Hopscotch

She's BACK!

SOOC (Straight out of camera)

Worried about what others think..

Senior Pictures

While I was Away...

I'm a Dreamer

Earning for Christmas

Holy Heck its HOT

Premature E...

Relay Reflections

Two out of Three

Happy Birthday My Friend

Vet Visits

Reunited!

July 4th, 2011

Enough is Enough

Super Moo to the Rescue!

Ninny

Stuff 2

Dear...6-28-11

What I've Been Up To

Stuff

Happy Father's Day!

Summer Time Blog Slacking

Dear...5-31-11

Stop Correcting Me

Dear...5-17-11

Watermelon Lemonade

We Survived Prom 2011!

I've been busy!

Dear...(4-27-11)

Congratulations Kelsey!

Cake Decorators in the Making

O M G!!

Dear...(4-19-11)

Dear...4-6-11

Finally Escaped From the Kitchen

*Yawn* Can I go back to bed?

Dear...(3-29-11)

So Mistreated

Pancakes

Bubbles

Kicked Booty

Imagination

Late...(or Early) Dear...

New Look part 2...

New Look...

Yawn Can I go back to bed?