5 weird things about me.

This is Sheila's challange. You get to know 5 very wierd things about me, that you could probably do without knowing. HAHAH

1. I read in the bathroom
2. I always check my favorite chic website before I even think of getting my email and it is the last thing I do before going to bed. That goes well, with the at least 20 times a day I visit. Can we say addicted. I knew you could.
3. My dogs have ME trained. Kira barks and I get her a cookie.
4. I actually LIKE snakes. My littlest boy and I BOTH want a corn snake.
5. I am incredibly moody and I am aware of it. Stange.

New Year's Resolutions challange

I challanged the Ladies to write about New Years Resolutions.

I make em every year. I break em every year. I think that is HALF the fun. Does anyone take their resolutions seriously? I guess we do, half-heartedly. That must be why we make them. The whole clean slate thing, turning over a new leaf bit.. you think?
Well, here are my half-arsed ideas for change in the NEW YEAR.

1) Stay away from Walmart. Go back to the old way of shopping... as in going to different stores for what I need. Instead of this one stop shopping bit. There are other stores out there besides Walmart. I might pay a little more, I might not. But, even if I do.. it is worth it to avoid the aggravation of that place.

2) Continue to work on losing that weight. As in GO TO CURVES.. you pay for it every month. Don't piss your husband's hard earned money away.

3) Work hard on purging and packing the house down to the bare minimum. The motto for this New Year is..... LESS IS MORE.

4) Work hard on the landscaping of the house so it will SELL. I gotta get rid of this house.

5) Make our financial goals the top priority over everything. If it doesn't help the goal, then it doesn't get done.

6) Make a schedule and get on it and stick with it. Must learn to be organized and neat so I can teach it to the child who is taking after me. LEAD BY EXAMPLE for the love of Pete.

7) Do way more scrapbooking and crafting. Make my lifestyle accomadate that goal, by downsizing my belongings and streamlining my reposibilities, so that I have the freedom to do the things I love that make me feel good.

That should be enough for now.

The POWER of Parenting challange

I Challenged the girls to comment on the power of being a parent.
Think about it. There is tremendous power in being a parent. You are the everything to that child. You could make or break that little human being. Everything thing you do, everything you say shapes and molds that life and how he or she percieves it and moves within it.
If we are darn lucky, we get it mostly right and we don't screw them up to much, and some therapy can usually can fix that.
Our children look to us for their self-esteem and their confidence. They reach for us to learn love and compassion. They watch us model what they need to learn and they will immitate us. God help us if we don't do it right.
When you are out in public, just listen to the parents around you. Watch them interact with their kids and listen to how they talk to them. Imagine how you would feel if it was you on the recieving end of it. Then realize that other people are doing the same thing to you. When you can listen to yourself, interact with your own kids.. then you can be a good judge of how you are doing.
Most of the time, we don't pay attention to how we are parenting.
I know I don't think on it much. But, when I do...like in the example of public watching.. I feel my interactions change for the positive... I try harder to be better.. instead of slipping.
Perhaps.. .we could think of it as GOD is watching us parent and because he is watching and judging how we are wielding the power... we might be more carefull with how we swing that mighty sword.

My latest addiction

Guess what my latest addiction is... besides rum? LOL Thought I would put that in there, in case Mom found my blog. Pistachios. HMMMM MMMM Good. Can't just eat one. Oh no, the whole 4$ bag is gone in a few days. Someone told me they were heart healthy or something. Hope so, cause in the past week and a half.. I have knocked several pounds of these puppies.
Goes very nicely with the rum.. ROFLMAO

Florida in the winter

Well, Florida in winter is a real trip. Right now it is 48 degrees at 11:45 p.m. We got the heat running. As a matter of fact, we have had the heat on at night for about a week now. Gonna love that bill. So, we will wake up in the morning and layer on the clothes, looking ridiculous, and by noon we will be stripped down to shorts and a t-shirt because it will be 75.
Floridians have only one wardrobe, ya know. Only summer clothes and maybe a light jacket. We don't have thin blood.. we just don't have any clothing.
I went up to Michigan one February. DAMN cold. Hadn't been out of the state of Florida in like 22 years. We got to Flint, at around midnight and the guy on the radio announced that it is zero. I ask my Mom " What does zero feel like? " She told me to get out of the car and find out. It hurts, people!!! So, the next day it is warmer, but I am freezing. I refuse to leave my brothers house and I stayed in front of the fire. But, by the day after that... I acclimated or it got warmer, because I went out to play in the snow... sniggle... in jeans and sweat pants over my jeans and two pairs of socks and 2 shirts and a sweatshirt and a jacket. I ditched the jacket after a while though. I had a ball. :) It was 32 degrees. Heat wave for Michigan in February. LOL.
Oh, I look forward to Georgia. I look forward to sweating my ass off in the summer and then freezing it off in the winter. At least it will be different than here.

Amber's Challenge. 8 things about Christmas

HMMM I am to list 8 things about Christmas... is it what I like? or dislike? Oh, well..

1) A man was short 15$ in Walmart and I paid the bill. That felt so good.
2) I am NOT ready for Christmas. Nothing is wrapped and I am not done with my crafts. At some point, I will have to step back and let it be enough.
3) Christmas stresses me out.
4) My tree always comes down the day after Christmas. I put it up so early, that by the time Christmas is over.. I am over. :)
5) This is the best Christmas we have had in years.
6) It is NOT cold enough for me, here in Florida. I equate Christmas with winter and winter with cold and we aren't getting that here, so therefore.. it doesn't feel like Christmas. Bad logic.
7) I really, really, really wish that my Chrismas holiday wasn't filled with running from one house to the next house to the next. I really wish I could have ALL of Christmas in my own home.
8)BUT, I sure am glad that Jesus was born. Happy Birthday my Lord.

Sheilas Challenge... If I was a kid again, what would be on my Christmas list.

There is a tough assignment. Lets see.. I am a kid again and it is Christmas... what do I want?

a bike
a puppy
a pony
clothing
art set
anything from THE DOG line
a remote controlled Hummer
a lap top computer..... I am a big kid
an IPOD... I am a really big kid

That was hard. I can't think of any of the toys out now that I would want. As a matter of fact... I had a hard time shopping for my son's because the toys aren't all that great this year and the really good ones cost a fortune.

12 days of Christmas

On the 12th day of Christmas my true love gave to me...

12 new purses
11 hugs and kisses
10 loads of laundry
9 maids a washing
8 more hugs and kisses
7 Sunflower bushes
6 new blankies
5 golden rings
4 sheets of music
3 Piano lessons
2 new pillows
a roll in the hay... HAHAHAH

35 things about me... challange

1. I am a bigot ( but I won't tell ya to what race )
2. I am 35 and that sounds terrible to my ears.
3. I can't wait to pack up everything I own and empty out this house.
4. I collect idea and lose them
5. I am such a magpie!!
6. I really hate to cook.
7. I would rather dig in the dirt
8. Mud pie isn't on the approved dietary guidlines, though
9. Michele made me cry and it was a good thing.
10. My friends are incredibly important to me.
11. I am gonna be lost without them
12. I hate cleaning too.
13. But, I don't mind cleaning someone else's place. Go figure
14. I love my thirties. They just seem to be slipping away.
15. I love, love, scrapbooking and crafting
16. I love snowman and penguins and snowflakes
17. I love flowers and butterflies too.
18. I want to color my life
19. I adore animals, expecially dogs.
20. I wish I could live on a farm for a while
21. I can't sing for shit.
22. I like to read in the bathroom
23. I love to read
24. Someday, I will build on my Spanish.. not because I have to.. but because I want to.
25. I am going to move away from Florida and my safety net of friends and family.
26. I have lost my mind
27. If it doesn't work out... I can always come back and I wont' view it as a failure. It is an adventure. But... IT WILL WORK OUT.
28. I love chocolate
29. I am addicted to Mountain Dew
30. My Christmas tree decorations are on crooked... I don't care.
31. I didn't put everything out and I am not gonna.
32. I hate painting and I have to do it in January. BLECH
33. I discovered.. going back to work wasn't so bad after all. Don't tell anyone though.
34. My Holiday cards aren't done. A company should make Happy New Year cards in bulk.
35. This was hard.

There it is. The great state of Georgia. Our future home. We are looking over in region 4. We are going up in late March early April to check it out. Todd wants to line up interviews while we are there. I am excited and nervous and worried. But, mostly excited. I am so wanting a change of scenery. I am looking forward to the seasons and all its extremes. I am opptomistic about it. I am full of childlike wonder about it. And I am sick of my Mother telling me to grow up and realize that shoveling snow is no fun and ice is no fun and I won't be wanting to drive in it. I don't care. I know not all of it is fun and games. Florida extreme heat and hurricanes aren't fun and games either. Just what is wrong with wanting a change and looking forward to it... good or bad. GRRRRR Oh well.

Sheila's Challange

What is my favorite Christmas movie and why?

Hmmmmmmm I guess the only one I have is The Muppets Christmas Carol. My husband has made a tradition of watching that movie with the kids for the last, I don't know, 5 years. This was the first year Nathan would sit through it. I love the Muppets and they are so funny.

Why did I marry my man?

That is my husband and that is my friends daughter, Jessica.

The question of the day is...why did I marry this man? Why did I walk away from an engagement to someone else, to marry a man who made a pass at me while we were at work?

I married Todd because he made me laugh and he kept lots of people around him. I married him because he made me better than who I was. I married him because he inspired me to want and ask for more out of life. I married him because he is so headstrong and so hardworking. I married him because I saw the potential of a great, strong, capable adult, in the young man who drove me crazy.

Todd always has a joke, or some obscure news story on the tip of his tounge. He has sound effects for objects and voices for the dogs. He likes to do stuff and go places and investigate new things. He is obsessed with music and loves to keep me filled with new songs everyday. He inspired me to go to college for awhile and prove that I wasn't dumb and that I could get excellent grades and maybe even get a degree. He makes me want to be a better person and better mother, because he is such a good man.. I don't want to flaw him. Todd loves our friends and so do I. Our friends are a big part of our life and I love that he understands and supports the value in maintaining strong bonds.
I have 15 years of memories of fun and laughter with our friends and these are the strings that knit our life. Todd was always a hard worker and always looking for up. No one thought he would do what he does today, but I did. I saw it in him. He just needed the confindence and the reason to depend on himself and his hands. He provides for us and I can depend on that, even if he lost his job today... he would have another by the end of the week. There is value in that type of man. Strong and capable and sweet and pleasing and so tolerant of me and my shinanagins.

Now, I would marry him again because he is so wonderful and open. He loves the kids and is such a loving father. He hugs and kisses and plays. He doesn't tolerate alot of crap and he expects obediance the first time, which he doesn't always get, but he still shows unconditional love after every incident. The kids have never doubted that Daddy loves them. Todd is so full of love, that he has stepped up to be Jessica's Dad when she needs him. He has chaperoned dates and played chauffer. He has some of the harder conversations about boys and he always has her best interest in mind. He provides the hugs and praise she desperatly needs and the guidance that she should have from a father. She trusts him and tells him things that she wouldn't tell me or her mother. So, he got the girl he always wanted. I would marry him now, because I still have fun with him and still laugh with him and he still makes me smile and I feel safe with him, despite all that we have been through. People don't know what we have done to each other, but the comment I get the most is how comfortable we seem and how close we seem and how you can feel the love between us. We married our best friend basically and that is why we have made it 15 years in February 2006.

It is my Birthday

I turn 35 today. My dog turns 12 today. I am starting to feel old. I decided that this is it. I want to stay in my thirties always.
Time marches on to quickly and my memory stinks. If it wasn't for my scrapbooks and photo albums, I would be able to remember the memories in my life. I can't close my eyes and feel the memory of when my children were small. It is gone. All I have is the NOW and the NOW is dissapearing so fast. Todd is maturing into a pre-teen who is currently cooking me an omlette. Which by the way is out of this world. He is old enough to COOK. When the hell did that happen? He babysits his brother now. He can stay home alone. I feel like I just started training him for that, but when I think on it... We have been working on that, little by little, for 2 years now. Nathan is getting taller and taller and better able to care for his own needs. Soon, he won't be a little boy anymore. He turns 7 soon. I can't remember him as a baby at all. That makes me sad. I don't remember him growing up. His childhood is gone in my mind.
Where did my young life go? Where did the fun go? I am 35 and just now getting it together. But, I feel like life is passing me by so quickly and I can't grab it to make it stay.

Organized choas

And people wonder why we can't eat a the kitchen table. I REALLY need a craft room

Cookies and milk

Yummy, I got cookies and milk. Warm, fresh out of the oven chocolate chip cookies. Comforting. I have beautifull classical Christmas music. Trans-Siberian Orchastra. Gorgeous. I am trying to unpack all the Christmas house decorations and I don't feel like it. I don't know what is wrong with me. But, I don't feel like putting it all out. That is not like me at all. Hmmmm. Maybe it is because I have so much to do and so many other crafts to do and housework that is screaming for me.... I am overwhelmed. I will go to work and get away from it all. LOLOLOL I am actually looking forward to marching off to work tonight. Comforting. You know what else is comforting? To know that is cold as hell in Georgia and I will get to experience that next year. YEA~ I keep watching for snow. Sick, I know. Here, I raise my glass of milk to a toast. " To snow and sleds and shovels and snowman and red noses and warm cozy homes. "

Random

I got a job and resented it. Physically it is killing my old fat worn out body. Job is mundane and retail sucks and it always has. BUT, I am greatfull for the extra money and I was able to buy presents this week and I will be able to buy some more next week. After that, don't know. They can't seem to keep my availability straight and if I have to correct them every week, I will go work somewhere else. Working is not so bad, if it isn't so much.
Christmas is coming and I am happy about that. I am not happy that my house is bombed and my garage is a disaster and is storing house siding and I can't get to my decorations. I feel out of control and behind. I had lots of time off this week. I took one day to myself and then spent two days with a migraine and then one day taking Nana shopping. I got nothing done. Disgusted. I have not followed my schedule in months and I need to get back on it. It was SOOOOOO working for me.
This is turning into a whine fest. I think I should go to bed now.