Coming Back

I want to keep on blogging. I really do! It's been way too long since I've blogged. I had to update stuff on my blog such as the New Moon countdown widget I had. Now it's an Eclipse widget!! June 30th baby!! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!


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Life has been keeping me busy. Even more so my Avon business. I LOVE AVON! Not only the products but I'm making money and helping others achieve the success I am achieving. It's awesome! (Check out my website!)

Joe and I have been house hunting. It's fun most the time till we find a house I love and he hates or vice versa.

Sara's out of school after this week and she's on social restriction for June. It's going to be a loooonnggg month.

Well I'm going to try to get back on track with this. Don't hate me if I slack.

Mother's Day Weekend

Happy Mother's Day!

My mother's day weekend started off great! Joe took me to dinner. Just me and him since Sara went to a friend's house for the night. Then Saturday I spent the day with my mom--just me and her, which doesn't happen enough. We went to the Blueberry Festival. We picked blueberries fresh off the bush for an hour and half. Between us both we had over 9 lbs of berries! We also participated in the wine tasting. I'm not big on wine but I'm always willing to try. They were actually pretty good! My favorites were the strawberry and tangerine. We also tasted key lime, blueberry, wild berry and raspberry. There were many vendor tents set up and a live band! We got hamburgers from the fire dept that were there and sat and ate enjoying the live band. It was great!!

Once my afternoon was over with my mommy, I had to pick Sara up from her friend's house and we had to go dress shopping. Yes, I will repeat, DRESS shopping. For Sara. The girl who is anti-pink and anti-dress. Her 8th grade banquet is Monday and it is semi-formal wear. She's been shopping the past few weekends with her friend but has yet to find anything. Now, any type of clothes shopping with Sara is usually hell. I usually make Joe come to keep us behaved. But he didn't want to go and just wished me luck and told me to behave. Well, 2 and half hours, $55 spent and NO arguring, Sara got a dress, shoes and a sweater to go over the dress since it reveals her back. I can't believe my baby is wearing a dress! Look how gorgous she is:

Of course she'll probably kill me I posted this but isn't part of being a parent about embarressing, I mean, bragging about your child?!

This morning I woke up to breakfast: cheese omlet and blueberry pancakes! YUM! YUM! I foresee lots of blueberries in my food this week. hehe. I've had a lazy day so far but I think I will suggest going to the park with the dogs later for a walk. Oh yeah, the card Sara made for me was very heartfelt. I balled my eyes out. Literally. I cannot remember sobbing so much from something so sweet no less from my one and only child. I can't even put this into words. But if you are a mother, I'm sure you understand.

Until next time, enjoy your day! Especially if you're a mother!

I'm back!

I'm back from my Europe trip which was absolutely awesome! I also became an auntie again! Things are a little crazy at work since I have a week's worth of stuff to catch up on. So I will have to give you the fun details of my trip later but you can read about my new niece here.

Being Mommy

Sara has been sick since Friday. She's had fevers, cough, sore throat and tiredness. We've made her stay in bed all weekend. Today I allowed her to stay home from school to hopefully kick it out because tomorrow she has FCATs at school. Don't want to miss those. So Saturday while Joe went to play golf I went grocery shopping (a task I really don't care to do). We didn't go the previous week so we had nothing to eat. Really there was nothing. Along with buying the foods we normally keep in the house and stuff for our planned dinners for the week I threw in a bag of donuts, 2 packages of oreos (because they were 2/$5) and 2 packages of Klondike bars (they were BOGO). I usually don't buy this stuff but I figure the donuts were a quick breakfast for Sara, the oreos were for her lunch (it was either that or more GS cookies but Joe said to go with the oreos since more cookies come in the package than GS cookie. He happened to call while I was staring at the oreos.) The Klondike bars were because coldness felt good to Sara's throat with it being sore and who can pass up a BOGO deal? Well Joe informed me Sunday that Sara told him I bought too much junk food. Yes me, Ms. Healthy bought too much junk food. Coming from my 13yo daughter. So last night I mentioned it to Sara and she laughed and said she didn't mean it mean but that normally I would not buy that stuff. Well Joe helped me realize what I did. The nurturing mother came out of me and I wanted to make my sick baby happy.

For those of you who follow my health blog, this so goes against what I blogged about today there. lol. I really did buy the "junk" food for Sara. Now if I get an urge to taste the "junk" food I will do so in moderation then get some activity in to burn it off.

Happy Monday!

Ppffffftt...Excuse Me!

My family is quite open about our natural gases. We have one rule: at dinnertime we do not discuss our natural body wastes (poop) or anything related to it (farts). Any other time it's open discussion. And if the opportunity arises to put your behind up against a loved one and let one rip, do it! (This really pertains to me and Joe. Sara's more secretive.) Well tonight we were sitting at the dinner table eating and all of a sudden out of nowhere I let one go. It was a soft one but of course it happened as soon as we quit talking so it was quiet enough to hear it. I didn't mean to. It just slipped out. Sara and I both had a mouth full of food and we were cracking up laughing. Joe was going on about how I broke the one dinnertime rule and I was laughing too hard with food in my mouth to hear what else he said. We all got tummy aches from laughing so hard. I've been a little gassy tonight so my goal it to give one directly to Joe tonight. heeheehee <---evil laugh.

Daily Life These Days

I finally caught up reading the blogs I follow...all 30 posts! I'm beginning to have blogging withdrawls! I am finally better from being sick for 2 weeks.

This week I had to turn into "mean mom" because of Sara and her lack of making good grades. I had to take away many priviledges and now I must stick to my guns. I think she inherited her bad study habits from her dad...as for me I always made A's and B's and still make mostly A's now. Why oh why couldn't she have gotten MY good study habits?

New subject: So yesterday Sara and I get home after school/work. Joe was already home for an hour and he's in the media room with Polly locked out. As I walk back there I see a big pile of poop in our office. I look at Polly and she knew she was in trouble. Usually the dogs are where ever Joe is so I scold Polly and march into our media room asking Joe why he didn't let Polly out when he got home. His response: "That was there when I got home." Um, ok, and you've been home an hour and why is it still there? Let me just put my maid hat on and clean it up while you sit there playing that stupid &%^$#*@ mock basketball draft online. So I didn't say it like that but that's what I was thinking. MEN!

V-day is over!

Hopefully work will calm down although I know paperwork will be flowing in for me. That's better than my "party" boss running around like a chicken with no head and constantly breaking his SOP (standard operating procedures.)

Joe told me several weeks ago he was going to plan a weekend get away for us for V-day. Well since I am home and it's the weekend we didn't go. He didn't plan it. He blamed it on lack of money. I really think it was procrastination. But whatever. I love him. So we decided we'd go to a nice dinner Friday night. Well I ended up working late and didn't get home until close to 7pm. I'm so wishy-washy when trying to decide where to eat so Joe picked the place. He wouldn't tell me or Sara where but we piled in the car and he drove. We drove for 30 minutes and I was thinking it was going to be a good place we haven't been in a while. As we are fixing to turn onto a main road, Joe jokes about going to Buddy Freddy's. If you aren't familiar with this restuarant, it's a little country-type place that's strictly a buffet with down-home-country-cooking. (But NOWHERE nearly as good as Crackel Barrel.) Well I thought Joe was joking. He wasn't. We pull into the parking lot and I say aloud "We drive 30 minutes to go to Buddy Freddy's for our family V-day dinner?" I tried not to act too disappointed but I was. Sara was happy with the place so I was happy. Plus it was a place we haven't been to in a long time.

Saturday Joe took us to breakfast too to this small place down the street. Sara loves their pancakes so it was mainly for her. Joe played golf all day while Sara and I went to meet my sister for her 4D ultrasound of my niece, who's arrival will be approx. April 3. After that Sara went to her nana's for the rest of the weekend which gave me time to work on schoolwork. Joe finally got home and he decided we go out for dinner just the 2 of us. So I'm thinking maybe now I'll have my "nice" dinner. Although being V-day night everyone was going out so it'd be busy everywhere and I didn't feel like dealing with crowds. So Sonny's it was. Yum, yum.

To turn this somewhat negative post about Joe and V-day around, he did give me a sweet card (brought tears to my eyes) and a small box of SpongeBob chocolates. Oh how I love SpongeBob. He is so cool!

Maybe one year I'll get that professional massage I've been asking for for 4 years...

Valentines Day

I know its not even February yet but the stores are already displaying Valentines day stuff. And at my day job the Valentine day rush has begun. I work for a company that imports flowers from South America. We are near the top of the flower chain. We buy flowers from the farms then sell them to wholesalers who sells them to florists who then sell the general retail. So we are usually a few weeks ahead of the normal retail rush of things. As much as I enjoy this day to spend with my dear loved ones, the past few years I have dread the prior few weeks. Work is hell. Let me repeat, work is hell. Tons of paperwork and tons of stressful hours. Although many florists aren't expecting a too crazy year with the state of the economy and the fact that V-day falls on a Saturday. So I guess we'll see. One of the bosses has taken a leave of absence due to family issues and all the people under him are coming to me with their incompetencies. WTH? I guess I need to take down the sign on my door that reads "Need help? Enter here." I am the accounting department. I do not deal with customer orders or inventory. I do not talk to the farm sales rep to place orders. Just because your direct boss isn't here for a few months and you don't want to deal with the other boss don't come to me! I will just direct you to the other boss anyways.

Ok so now that I got that off my chest I also want to let you know that I may go MIA for the next few weeks. Valentines day is the busiest time of year for us so that means I have to actually dedicate all my work hours to work. It sucks that work is getting in the way of fun but I guess I get paid to work not have fun right?

I really hope Joe is planning something special for our Valentines day. I could use a good day of relaxation and adult fun after work's V-day rush. But knowing Joe he probably isn't. I will have to plan. And I don't want to do a special dinner or something all fancied up. It can even be a family thing to include Sara. So any ideas on a inexpensive, fun, relaxing, family-friendly V-day? Or even something inexpensive and relaxing for adults? Based upon the past it will just be another day with a few more kisses and I love yous. At least it's on a Saturday and I will have the whole day off.

XXX & OOO

Kids & Exercise

Happy MLK Day! School is out, government offices are closed, some people have the day off but unfortunately I'm not one of them. So here I sit at my office blogging prior to begin my day.

I have learned my body isn't in the best of shape. Don't get me wrong; I eat good foods and try to stay away from those foods that aren't so good but I don't exercise enough. I lost 50 lbs in 2006 and proud to say I've kept them off. I don't care much for the traditional exercising so my main way of getting out to move is by walking. I walk my neighborhood with my dogs; I park in the back of the parking lot at the store to force myself to walk; I get up from my desk to walk to a co-worker's office to talk instead of using the phone system. Those sort of things because every step counts. They say that the ideal healthy number of steps per day is 10,000 steps. By using a pedometer you can count your steps. It's really tough for me to get 10,000 steps a day! And my office job doesn't help.

Saturday was my nephew's 2nd birthday party. It was at a park which was a lot of fun with kids running around everywhere! But only 5 of them belonged to our group. I swang with my nephew holding on to him in my lap and what fun it was. See:

Before I even got off the swing my muscles in the back of my legs near my behind were sore. Then yesterday my shoulder/arm area muscles were sore too! I guess it's time to throw in some sort of exercise to help strengthen my muscles. I want to be able to run around chasing my nephew without being sore. And my niece is to arrive April 3-ish so when she's mobile I will chase her too!

So this is where dancing will come in play. Santa brought us Dance Revolution so that will be put into action. The game provides me with the foot action and cardio so I will throw in some arm movements. I may look silly but if I'm moving to exercise it's all good!

For some health tips check out my other blog.

January 9

I just want to give a shout out to my one and only sister: Jenn.



HAPPY BIRTHDAY SIS!!

Accomplishments

Only 4 days into the new year and I've gotten so much accomplished around my house. Friday we took down all the Christmas decorations and put them away. Saturday Joe cleared the stuff in our shed to make room for all his a/c crap that had taken over my dining room. Seriously. His a/c crap was half my dining room. Instead of calling it a dining room I called it the a/c / girl scouts stuff/dining room because it was more of a storage room. We couldn't even dine in there because there was so much crap you couldn't pull out 3 chairs from the table. Well not any more! I have a real dinning room once again. I can actually pull out all 6 chairs from the table so I'm ready for dinner guests in this department. Since I was on such a cleaning kick with the dining room I continued it today in my bedroom. I cleared out so much stuff. My trash bin outside is way over flowing. I've learned when cleaning with Joe don't ask him if he wants to keep it, just throw it away. He's a worse pack rat than me. One of these days I will clear out our closet too. He probably wouldn't even notice that half his wardrobe that he doesn't wear would even be missing. He even has a whole shelf in our closet that holds a million golf balls. Well maybe not a million but close to it. I haven't played as much as I should the past year (I've played twice in the past 2 weeks!) but I've been taking those balls from his side of the closet and he hasn't even noticed. That's how many boxes of balls he has. Anyways, back to my accomplishments. I should have taken a 'before' shot of my dining room and an 'after' shot. Then you would so understand what an accomplishment that was. I spent 5 hours clearing it. 5 hours!! The last 2 with Joe at the golf course. Sometimes it's best to clean without him there saying "keep that." I was going to try to help Sara clear her room this afternoon but instead I went to the golf course. My second time playing in the past 2 weeks. I think I've done enough cleaning the past few days I will take a cleaning break. Maybe I should go as far as going on all cleaning strike including washing dishes? haha. That always puts a spark up my family's behind to help out. We'll see what kind of mood I am in tomorrow. =)

Christmas

I had a great long Christmas weekend. Christmas Eve we went to Nana's house, had dinner and opened presents with them. Here is Heather and Nana opening her gift:

Kathryn, her boyfriend and her cat:
Sara, Heather & Nick eating:
Nick with her gift:

Christmas morning I enjoyed with Sara, Joe and the dogs. I was Joey-free as he went to his mama's. (Yippee!) Sara put me on a scavenger hunt to find my present. To find clues I was instructed to go in my closet, go to the air vent in Sara's room, go outside to the secret hose compartment then I finally found my gift behind the couch. The same room we started in. She got me a Precious Moments which I collect. It brought tears to my eyes how much thought she put into the gift and the hunt. hehe so cute! I also go satelite radio for my car, which I had to install myself and I did ALL BY MYSELF! It took me 2 hours but I did get a compliment from Joey saying it looked like a professional install how I hid all the wires. Yay me!


Joe got a GPS so he can stop calling me at work asking me to look up an address and tell him how to get there. He also got a few golf books. Sara got a jacket and beanie hat she's been wanting and wore it ALL day, even with it being 80 degrees outside. See:
She also got some earrings, PJs, PS2 game--OH! Speaking of PS2 games! Santa brought us the Dance Revolution game with the dance pad. I am so excited to hook it up and dance! In fact I think I will when I'm done blogging. Here's a few more pictures:

The dogs enjoyed Christmas too:



After our morning we went to my parents' house and enjoyed Christmas with them, my sister & bro-in-law and my nephew:
Isn't my nephew the cutest?
The boys and Sara played some after Christmas dinner pool:

I saved the best for last (well maybe not the best since it's about someone is always on my poo-poo list): Joe got Joey golf knickers. This outfit fits his personality so perfect and he wore them to play golf Saturday. OMG everyone laughed! It's just so funny looking!!


I hope everyone has a great Christmas. And I wish you the best for the new year! Be safe on New Years Eve!!

I have a brother (in-law)!!

Saturday my sister finally tied the knot with her other half. It's official: I have a brother-in-law! And Sara has an uncle which he is making her call him 'Uncle.' She had a very nice small ceremony/reception at my parents' house that my mom and I planned. Snowflake theme, kinda wintery wonderland although with the 80 degree weather we had it wasn't too wintery. The Christmas music was a nice touch. Why is Christmas music so "catchy?" Like we'll just be sitting there doing nothing but then you hear "Here comes Santa Claus, here comes Santa Clause, right down Santa Claus lane." and you just want to start dancing! Sara caught me and Jenn doing that prior to the festivities. Here is a lovely picture of my sister, her new hubby and my nephew (my niece is still baking!)
Me and Joe:
Sara and Joe:
Jenn & me (I officiated the marriage!!)
Joe & Jayden:
The rings (and I am THRILLED to say that I took this picture. Who know I had photography skills in me?!)
The bride & groom (another picture I took!)

Congratulations to my sister and her new husband! Love you guys!!

Here Comes the Bride

No not me! My sister! The past few weeks my mom and I have been running around pulling our hair out trying to plan a nice affordable wedding for my sister. Well, my hair is back in place and we are no longer running we are walking. ha ha, I know dumb. Sorry. Anyways, this Saturday is the big day and I have the pleasure of marrying her. I am a notary so I can do that. I'm excited although I'm worried I will start crying in the middle of it. My mom says I can't because it will just start a train where she'll start, Jenn will probably start as well as all other women at the wedding. So I'm trying to stay strong.

Good luck to me! I mean, good luck to the bride & groom!

Deck the Halls....fa la la la la

I am happy to say that my Christmas tree was angel-less for only 2 days. (See prior post.) We finally got the house decorations up and my home looks so Christmas-y. See:




And every house is not complete at Christmas time without a nativity scene:

Some more of my snowmen:

And the stockings were hung by the fireplace...er...videos?

Yes we do not have a fireplace and we do not have a mantle so I have to get creative with my stocking location. There is one for Joe, Sara, Joey and me and of course I can't forget the furry kids, JayJay & Polly. They are worse than a 4yo searching for Christmas gifts. I've had to hide their gifts way, way up high off the ground because they are already snooping around.

Merry Christmas!