Thursday, February 26, 2009

Stylish....Who Me?



I have been meaning to show you this...isn't this adorable? This is a normal college-type notebook that has been snazzed-up by my good friend, Eileen. She actually embroidered the "K" onto the material, used pink, velvet ribbon for the 3 stripes and brown, polka-dot ribbon for the bows, which are tied through holes she punched in the notebook cover. I told her she should make these and sell them...I LOVE mine and take notes for my projects in it. Really I just want to walk around holding it because I think it's so damn cute! My girls know I had better not see their hands on this item or it's to church for punishment....I mean to their rooms!

Emotional Daze....

I couldn't even think of what kind of photo to attach to this posting - that's how fried my head is right now. Is there such a thing as chapped brain? ya know, like chapped lips?

Anyway, some of you may know, and some may not, but Mike is a cancer patient. He finished treatment in May of 2005 and you have to continue follow up testing for 5 years before they will cut the apron strings. So we had been coasting along since he finished treatment, loving life, every test came back fine...until last summer. Then they found something on his liver and it was as if our whole world came crashing to a halt. Now they told us it was probably nothing and they really weren't concerned so we shouldn't be concerned....yeah...riiigghhht. Any of you who have had cancer or have someone close to you with it, when they first say the "c" word, it's a terrible feeling. You know you hear all the time about people having it in one place, successfully treating it only to have it come back somewhere else in their body. Mike had a particularly rare type so they really couldn't tell us any stats on it coming back or not, or infiltrating other areas of the body. So understandably we have been walking in egg shells since his last test in the Fall. This week he had another set of tests and this morning we got the good news that it is not cancer and he is fine. Relief washes over me every time I think about it.

As if this wasn't emotional enough, my place of employment, as so many other companies during this economic crisis, had to do layoffs today. I was one of the very fortunate ones who is able to keep their job. I am very thankful for that, but it is sad to know these people we have worked with and joked around with are out of a job. When I saw one of the HR women who had the awful task of delivering the layoff news to employees, she looked like she wanted to cry. That has to be the worst part of being in the HR department.

I have some great websites for job hunting that I will put together for another posting...but not tonight, I need to chill.

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Faithful Reading....



Welcome to the book portion of the program. Please be seated - this will be quite a ride.
Now most of you who read my blog regularly can tell I am not a good, practicing Catholic. I take jibes at the church at times and the people I find at mass. But I have my reasons - ones I don't need to share, and ones that I can share. I will readily admit that I don't believe in many of the things the Catholic church believes in (is it getting hot in here?). I don't see a problem with birth control - and I don't see a problem with divorce (I don't feel divorce should be an easy out, but there are circumstances where divorce is the best option and people shouldn't be persecuted for their mistakes). I do feel you can pray and connect with God without being in the physical church - the church says "wherever 2 or more gather in my name I will be there". Hello? What about people who pray silently to themselves wherever they happen to be? God doesn't listen to them? That doesn't make sense - "Go find a buddy and then we can talk" - I can't picture God saying that. I really don't understand why women can't be priests and why priests can't be married - just doesn't make sense to me. I definitely feel there is a God and I feel comfort when I pray to him/her - kind of like free consolation in a time of need. Anyway, I could go on and on. Recently I was sent this book to read and my first thought was, "Great. A religious story about discovering God." Then I started to read it. Hold on to your seats people because this book is unbelievable. Just the content alone - I know many people don't like to hear about bad things that happen in other countries - it happens over there and doesn't affect us so what are we supposed to do? I guess this book gives a bit of a wake up call to all the regular "Joe's" like me out there not to take everything for granted. What this woman went through during the Rwandan holocaust is just so unreal. The other part of the whole story is how her faith changed and grew during some of the most intense moments in the story - times when I think I, myself, would have packed it in and admitted defeat. Clearly - and if this story is true I have no doubt - that her faith had a direct bearing on miracles that saved her life. More than once. I know, it sounds crazy and I can't even believe the words as they are coming out of my mouth. Since reading this book I have looked at faith, in general, in a different way. I mean, you always hear people say, "I'm praying for your recovery", or "We're praying for them during this difficult time", etc. But what if you could change the outcome of situations by having faith so strong that God would intervene for you? I never really thought that having strong faith could change one's life. I always thought of it more as a fast-pass to heaven, but not really affecting anything while I was still among the living. Read the book. Let me know your thoughts. It has definitely had an affect on me - I haven't quite figured out to what extent.

It's My Blog...And I'm Bragging


Yes, I know I brag about my kids, but what parent doesn't, right? I'm sure there are plenty of people out there who listen to me go on and on about how smart my kids are and always get A's and A+'s and blah, blah, blah. They probably think I embellish their accomplishments and roll their eyes behind my back (ok, maybe that was a bit on the paranoid side...story for another time!)...well I'm here to tell ya, people, I have proof! Jamie came home two weeks ago with this official-looking envelope and a few official-looking letters inside. She has been recognized by the United States Achievement (she definitely doesn't take after me, I just had to look up how to spell that!) Academy as a National Honor Student! Ok, now, settle down...enough of the "Ooooh's" and "Aahhhh's"....once you've had a chance to think about it, what that hell does that mean? Obviously it's quite an honor to be recognized for academics...but I had never heard of this "United States Achievement Academy"...so I googled it. It seems to be an organization whose sole purpose is to recognize smart kids and offer them a chance for grants and scholarships. And it says it will look good on their college application...I'll take it! We get a nice hardcover yearbook with Jamie's photo and stats in it. I promise I'll take a pretty picture when we get it so you can all drool over it...

Monday, February 23, 2009

Click For A Cause.....




Please click on the link below and you will see a purple button on the screen that says "Click Here to Give - It's Free" and it helps pay for the care of rescue animals.

http://www.theanimalrescuesite.com/clickToGive/home.faces?siteId=3

We Are Not Nanny-Worthy...


So it wasn't until this past weekend that I found out which house near me has had the SuperNanny there for the past few weeks. Why can't it ever be a normal family that gets her help? Oh Nooooooo. It has to be a huge colonial on the lake...not that I'm judging or anything, but very rarely do you see regular Joe's family on shows like that. Now I can't wait to see the episode on TV...when the kids are all screaming at the Mom and each other I can laugh and say, "That's what you get for having a nice big house on the lake and being able to stay home with your kids!" What?

Winter Sunsets....


There's nothing like winter sunsets. I actually took this photo with my trusty cell phone camera - not bad, eh? I was recently reading about how to photo shop photos to be these great works of art and there is definitely something to be said for it, but I felt like this whole time I have been admiring these two bloggers photos b/c they are so amazing...and in reality they are photo shop amazing. I'm sure if I had photo shop mine would be just as amazing...and I'm going to keep telling myself that!

Saturday, February 21, 2009

My Secret Life As A Greaser....





Tonight on TV...I forgot what channel it was on...was the original movie, Grease. Now, I don't know if other kids grew up like me and my friends, all wishing we were Sandy and reciting all the songs from that movie, but every time I watch the movie, it brings back great memories. When I was in middle school, my friends and I put on the play and I played the character Rizzo. Now I'll be honest, I had not seen the movie before I did the play so I didn't realize what an unsavory character she was until months later when I actually saw the movie. The best part was learning all the songs and dancing. So, or course, when I see the movie on TV I join in with all the singing, much to my daughters dismay. The actually forbid me to sing so I resort to lip synching. It's such a fun movie but my daughters view it through different eyes...maybe it's a generation gap...maybe my 8 year old is just too old for all of her 8 years. As you may know the movie ends with a great, pump you up type of song and Sandy has been transformed into a sexy hot mama in skin tight black and Danny is also in all black...all the characters are singing and dancing and it makes you feel good. What is Bethany's only comment? "Doesn't black attract the sun?" I gave her a look which was met with a serious, "What?"....sometimes she makes me feel like she's the Mom....

Monday, February 16, 2009

If It's Free, It's For Me....

Howdy folks and welcome to the next installment of "helpful Hints and websites"! Today's websites are all about saving money, and who out there in this economy can't use some ideas on saving money?
OK, so the first website www.swapathome.com looks rather interesting. I like the idea of posting items for free and receiving items for free (ok, really you pay with virtual coupons, but they're not real, so really things are free), you just have to pay the shipping. While the website is set up nicely and I did look through some items, I think I prefer www.freecycle.org because on this site you join your local group and everything is pick up locally - no postage involved. Two other swap-type sites, www.swapace.com and www.swaptree.com were listed in the same article, but I didn't find either of these sites very enticing - I saw an apartment in Sydney, Australia listed for $670,000.00AU on one of these sites. No bargain there!
Lastly for today's installment I read about some interesting ideas on saving money on www.thriftyfun.com. It was one of those things where I clicked on the headline "Cut cable with Hulu.com" which led to another article about saving money on www.tiphero.com which led to other articles, and so on, and so on. Definitely some money saving tips on thriftyfun.com although you may have to search around for what you are looking for...in the end it might just be worth it!


Happy belated Valentine's Day! I had quite an enjoyable day on the 14th. We normally take the girls out for Valentine dinner every year. This year, however, our oldest daughter had a birthday slumber party to go to...who has a birthday party on Valentine's Day? Better yet, what parents want to encourage a houseful of children on Valentine's Day? turns out, the girls birthday is Valentine's Day so I guess it was appropriate. Anyway, Jamie had to leave in the afternoon so Valentine dinner had to be moved to Valentine lunch. We have been trying to eat at one of the new Red Robin restaurants since they came around our area about a year ago, but every time we attempt it, the amount of people waiting to get in rivals the lines at WalMart on Black Friday...so we just drive on by. This time we had a plan...or at least Mike had a plan. We would get there when it opened at 11am...in like Flynn. We didn't eat breakfast so we'd all be nice and hungry for our first Red Robin gourmet burger experience. The closest Red Robin to us is at the new Patriot Place at Gillette Stadium so we headed out and literally walked up to the front doors of the place just as they were unlocking them. Cringe. I felt kind of funny...but within 1/2 hour the place was packed. Really good burger...I had one called the Royal something or other. Regardless, it had enough calories to keep my body going until mid-week! Did you know they offer bottomless fries? We all had a great meal...we got home with just enough time for me to have a nice little nap before taking Jamie to her party. It was like Thanksgiving! I stuffed myself and then had a nap! We don't really exchange gifts, Mike and I. We usually get the girls the current Valentine webkinz and just cards for each other. I got him one shaped like a heart - only because it played the song "I swear" when you opened it. Unfortunately Mike didn't remember that was the last song we danced to at our wedding. Oh well, my parents came over for dinner and we ended up playing Wii bowling with them. Lots of laughs and overall a really great day. Hope yours was as well : )

Friday, February 13, 2009

Free Fun Sites.....

Ok, I found two websites that could help you pass time aimlessly and unproductively and one that could actually provide entertainment, depending on who is involved. Should you crave to sit at your computer and play free game online, check out www.shockwave.com and www.popcap.com to play game for free. I have played "Insaniquarium" on the Popcap website before...pretty entertaining actually...
I also have a website here that says you can sing along karaoke style with songs you choose off their website. I did not register on the site, but it says you can do this for free at www.karaokeparty.com and who doesn't want to sing along like Elvis? What? I know I'm not the only one....

So until the next installment....sing a tune, enjoy a cookie and invigorate with a coffee bar!

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Interesting Websites.....



I didn't want to call it helpful hints again because I guess a lot of what I'm finding are cool websites....now don't these cookies impress? They are decorated with such detail! I'm not sure I would ever be able to eat them! Stop laughing.....ok, you're right....but I would look at them for a long time before I ate them! You can buy them at www.sunflowerbaking.com. Find these cookies under the "custom work" section.

Helpful Hints Part Two....



OK, so it didn't work out so well that I go through a few of these helpful hints a day...sometimes life just happens all around me and it's better for me to be curled up on the couch with my girls rather than at the computer. Sorry, not saying you all aren't important to me because obviously without you, I would have less of a purpose, but sometimes you have to wait.

Anyway, the next few pages I pulled from one of my folders has all kinds of beauty tips type of tidbits. So I'm picking a few to share with you. Now, I may not have mentioned this before, but I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the smell of ground coffee. I need to get one of those tiny little Tupperware key chain containers they used to give out at their parties and carry some ground coffee around with me. I genuinely think I would be a happier person all day long. Can you see it now? At my desk sneaking whiffs from my Tupperware when no one was looking? So any products that incorporate coffee is worth taking a look at in my book. The photo above is "Brazilian Espresso Luxury Scrub Bar with Cocoa Butter and Essential Oils"....I want to make this bar my friend. It sounds so indulgent...and only $7.50! Wait, it's a bar of soap...for $7.50? Yikers...that is indulgent! But it would make a great gift for someone....kind of late for Valentine's Day...but Mother's Day is right around the corner! You can get it at www.naturalhandcraftedsoap.com and make sure to tell them I sent you....maybe I'll get a freebie! Another site that has luxurious coffee products is www.bodycoffee.com. Their coffee bar is $8.00, but I found something on their site that made coffee beans sound quite decadent: "Our invigorating Body Polish captures their magic (magic beans!) with a unique blend of Dead Sea Salt, ground coffee arabica, essential oils and herbal extracts". It almost sounds sinful! And all for the low price of $38.00! Not joking...again, would make a good gift, but I would probably never spend that on myself!

Monday, February 9, 2009

Choked By Helpful Hints....

I may have mentioned previously how I love to read magazines and often find helpful tips or websites in them. I don't want to keep the whole magazine, so I've been tearing out the pages with interesting bits on them and keeping them in a folder so "some day" when I have time I can go through them all and see what might be really useful. Well, I have several folders now and if I don't start weeding through them Mike will throw them out and well, that will just give me a heart attack because just maybe there was one little website or hint that would have changed my life or told me how to magically organize my kitchen....ok maybe not, but I am going to start going through them and posting anything useful I come across....I figure if I can go through a few a day, I'll have them gone in no time...so be prepared! Fair warning!

OK, first one, not so bad http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/gallery/ great ideas if you are creative. I'm not big into scrap booking, but I like websites that let you get creative ideas when you need them.

OK, next one, not so bad either. http://en.childrenslibrary.org/ You can actually go on this website, choose a children's book and read it right there, online. Nice if you can't get to your local library, but limited selection...the great part is they have books from all over the world...you can actually click on a country on a globe and it will show you books from that country! Interesting concept.

Next one is great. http://familyfun.go.com/ Family Fun magazine is always filled with great ideas and recipes and their website is no different. Check it out for all kinds of great stuff!

Here's a free contest you can enter (although you have to give your name, email and a phone# so if you start getting emails as a result, don't blame me!): http://zipinstallation.com/v/wwm/ enter for a chance to win a 42" LCD flat screen HDTV and installation.

OK, wow, there's about 30minutes I'll never get back. I just went to www.hes.lbl.gov and you enter all this information about your home - really, it took me about 30minutes, maybe more - and I didn't even know some of the answers - I could care less how many inches of insulation are in my basement or what the insulation is rated - after you enter all your information, it calculates how you could save money with particular upgrades to your home or appliances. It said it could save me a whopping $180 a year....that's about 50 cents a day.

Stay tuned for more interesting tips or websites! (or not so interesting...but you can suffer along with me!)

Stalking Super Nanny....



Have you seen her? Supernanny? Because I haven't! I have been up and down the street they (meaning our local newspaper) say the show is filming on this week and next and I haven't seen even one microscopic bit of evidence there are TV cameras within a 50 mile radius! Maybe they see my car coming and they hide....maybe I should stop yelling out the car window, "Supernanny! Where are you?"

Friday, February 6, 2009

Super Nanny In The 'Hood....

Have you ever watched the TV show 'Super Nanny'? She goes to homes to help parents get unruly children to behave? I know, not for everyone...but not only is the show coming to my town, they will be right down the street from us! It was in the local paper that they will be filming next week and the week after on the next street over from mine! The article wouldn't reveal which house or family they would be going to...but I drive down this street every morning as it is a shortcut to get around the lake near my house. So I will be looking for the TV crew trucks, etc. and I'll keep you posted! I know a few families on the street, but I don't know any of them well enough to call and ask if it's them. Only one of the families I know would need Super Nanny...our neighborhood will be on TV! Maybe if I keep driving by my car will get on TV....what a sad life I lead!

Pet Peeve #8...



Why #8? I'm sure I've made at least 7 pet peeves known to you before now, so I'm conservatively guessing this to be #8. This photo is of the actual intersection involved, although I will be covering several driving habits under this one pet peeve. STUPID DRIVERS...we all come in contact with them. The intersection shown above is on a very busy residential street. It used to be one lane each way...then they built a brand spankin' new elementary school down what used to be a dead end street with about 4 houses. So now with such heavy traffic taking a left to get into the street where the school is, they made one lane into 2 lanes; one to turn left and go to the school, and one to continue going straight. I don't believe they made the street any wider, they just made 2 small lanes from one big lane. Unfortunately with all the snow we have had, they do not completely plow the lane to go straight - combine that with STUPID DRIVERS who do not pull completely into the lane to turn left and most of the time we are unable to go straight. Basically the 2 lane idea is not working out and I have to go straight past this intersection every weekday morning to drive my little genius to her smart school. Very frustrating. The other STUPID DRIVERS that aggravate me are the ones that don't know basic road rules. If a person is driving along and comes upon a parked car on their side of the road and a car is coming in the opposite direction, the car on the same side as the parked car has to stop until it is clear to go around the parked car. Basic stuff here, people! So why is it that I am always the one stopping so the idiot swerving around the parked car doesn't hit me? So infuriating! With that being said, way before I get to above intersection, I travel on another road, one lane in each direction. Almost every morning there is a car parked on my side of the street. No big deal b/c I have no problem stopping when I'm supposed to. Problem is, this car is parked on a curve, so most of the time I can't see if there is a car coming in the opposite direction until I am already swerving to go around the parked car...if there is another car coming, I then become the STUPID DRIVER! Ironic, huh?

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

What A Cruel Man Old Man Winter Can Be...


Okay, if you live in New England, or any Northern state that is in a deep freeze right now, and you'll probably see houses here and there with Christmas decorations still in the front yard. I know! What idiots! Don't they know Christmas was over like weeks ago?! If they are still lighting said Christmas decorations you have my permission to cut the wires. I mean I can see a week, maybe even two, after the Holidays, but people, it's February 4th! Alright, Alright...yes, we still have ours in front of our house...they really are frozen to the ground with ice and snow - no way to get them up without breaking them! We haven't seen the front lawn in a month and just when I think there has been some melting and it looks promising, we get another snow storm. That's our angel in the picture, and actually you can see our skiing polar bear in the background; it's way behind the angel, but it looks like it's coming out of the angels head. That was the only year we let the girls pick a new decoration for the front lawn - what is so Christmassy about a skiing polar bear? At the rate this winter is going, we'll be able to hide Easter eggs in them! Actually that's not a bad idea since we run out of new places to hide the eggs each year. I suspect we would get really dirty looks from the neighbors though if it still looked like Christmas in the summer. Summer....mmmmm....warmth.....it seems like a lifetime away right now with the current single digit temps. Think warm thoughts for me!

Monday, February 2, 2009

Dr. Ridiculous!


Don't they all look so proud of themselves in this photo? Bunch of idiots! I'm sure you have heard about the CA woman who delivered octuplets - for those who are Math impaired, that's like twins, but 8! Now whenever I hear stories of 6 or more babies, I always think of some loving couple who have been struggling to have a baby so they can share their love blah, blah, blah...you get the idea. Usually afterward you hear about how neighbors and the couples community rallies around them to help with the sudden and overwhelming task of taking care of so many babies at once. I actually like the idea of 6 children...not necessarily all at once...I'll give you my brief summary on the "6 child theory"...when you have 6 children, chances are 2 are going to be schmucks, 2 are going to move away so you will be left with 2 that will take care of you when you are older. Obviously the less children you have, the worse your odds are that you will be looked after when old age creeps in....
Anyway, I have now come to read some articles on this woman in CA. You may already know these facts, but I'll lay them out for you anyway: this woman is 33 years old and already has 6 children, ages 2-7, all through invitro. She is not married and the articles do not mention if there ever was a man in her life, but they quote her mother as saying she is obsessed with having babies and after having the other 6 children she still had some embryos left so why not use them up? Someone else was quoted as saying she wanted to have 12 children! She now has 14 children under the age of 8...and a single mother no less! Another article quotes someone saying she told them she got paid to have all the babies through invitro after they asked how she could afford it...interesting.
So now many people are getting angry with her and I suppose rightly so, however, what about the doctor who really and ultimately had the say in whether or not she was implanted with 8 embryos? I feel this doctor and the hospital team pictured above should be ashamed at themselves for allowing this to take place. They are practically patting each other on the backs in the photo.."We're awesome! Look what we did!"....so when taxpayers are paying to care for this woman and her 14 children and they end up living in a ca...I guess it would have to be some type of econovan....they can look each other in the eyes and say "oops, I guess that wasn't such a good idea"...idiots!

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Nail Biting Good Time....

OK, for real now...I did watch the Super Bowl...I'm not saying I don't look forward to the commercials more than the game, especially since the Patriots were not in it, but WOW was it a good game! I will admit I don't know a lot of the technical terms, etc. but it seemed to me there were so many calls that changed the course of the game! I was cheering for the Steelers, but only because Mike was cheering for the Cardinals. I acknowledged good passes and tackles no matter which team it was - again, this would be totally different if the Patriots were playing. When the Cardinals got their last touchdown, I'm sure mentally many of them had the game won...but the Steelers came back and won it in the last 35 seconds...and by their tippy toes! Yes, you heard me, I said tippy toes because if you saw it that's exactly what it was that won the game! Crazy! And there were some good commercials - you can go to hulu.com to view them all and vote for your favorites....but if you were watching the game, you already knew that!

Woman's View of the Super Bowl....


Super Bowl day has come and gone once again. Although I wasn't really into it since our beloved New England Patriots were not involved, I still watched the entire show. Yes, I say show because really that's what it is. We get all kinds of food and drinks ready like we're going to watch a good movie; the show starts with some good entertainment and some tributes to our country and those who fight to serve and protect it. Then in between the short, funny skits, a bunch of men throw a ball around. At the end of all of it, as usual, the men who think they are bigger and badder get to strut their stuff around and everyone claps and says, "Woohoo, you're the champs!" just so they won't feel bad that we really weren't paying attention to them. We women use the ball tossing time to use the bathroom or get more food so we don't miss the funny shows!

Saturday Night Live....

I grew up during a time when Saturday Night Live ruled...some of the best comedians were on this show or have come from this show. I don't think it has ever regained the popularity it once had, but I like to try to catch it now and then, as I did this past Saturday night. In case you have had your head stuck in the sand for the last 30 years and are not familiar with the show, they always have a musical guest. It has always been a mystery to me how this show can reign in musical guests such as U2 one week, and the next week have a relatively unknown band that spends 4 minutes screaming on stage. This past week, however, I was glad to be watching as I caught Jason Mraz. I'll be honest and say I have never heard of him - he could be a big star for all I know - but I have never heard of him. Then again, I hear most of the music I grew up with on the oldies station now...that hurts! Anyway, have a listen to this song...I think it's kind of long so you might want to run it in the background while you're doing something else. It kind of has a Bob Marley/Caribbean feel to it...it's nice and light - quite enjoyable. Wow...I never thought in my heavy metal/hard rock days that I would ever use "quite enjoyable" to describe anything, nevertheless music, that I would listen to!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYhrYHmUPn0