2008 August

100th post

August 29, 2008 By Heather 10 Comments

Wow, this blogging thing has sucked me in and I love it. At first I was unsure as to what I should write about, who would read, what would people think…..then I started not to care. I read something, somewhere that you have to decide why you are blogging. Who are you really doing it for? Are you in for free stuff and sponsorship? Or are you in it to keep your sanity and make some friends along the way. Letting the “real” you hang out, ugly or not.

I had many thoughts on my 100th post. Had I really been thinking I would have saved my 100 things about me post for today, but alas I was not thinking and that got the 80something post. Maybe I could have a contest, but no….I don’t want to do that either. Today on my 100th post I will just give myself some sanity from my ever quarreling girls. And maybe try to figure out how to get myself in to the meeting where they decide the schedule so that we don’t have this wonderous 4 day weekend, instead of a 3 day. I mean I am just getting accustomed to the silence them blam-o they are fighting their Friday away. And when people call I have to explain to them why my girls have off, when every other school in the district has school today because they waited to start on Tuesday instead of on Monday.

I have enjoyed the friendships I have formed and I have enjoyed getting to know others while ~~stalking them endlessly~~ reading their blogs. I think over these last 100 posts I have gotten to know myself a bit better. Learned what I like and don’t like and what moves me and what doesn’t . While all the things I have learned about myself I may have not liked as much, I have gotten to know myself better and I am happy about that.

And in the midst of all this writing I have been having to deal with my older daughter thinking she is ugly. Trying to convince her that she is beautiful amidst all the flaws she points out to me. I just want to grab her and shake her and tell her to stop being stupid and look in the mirror. The fact that you don’t think you’re some hottie makes you even more beautiful in my book. But apparently my book doesn’t count. I am supposed to think she is beautiful, I am her mother.

Also today I would like to tell you that I am going to be hosting an anonymous writer here on my blog. I am going to host this person so that they can get something or many things off of her chest. Things that she can’t say in her own world. It is a shame that people can’t let us speak our minds in a space that is ultimately ours, but I understand and I am happy to help a gal out. But more details when she posts here over the weekend.

Well, I need to run, to get a script for my bladder infection and then to celebrate a friend’s birthday with a trip to the local steak house. I hope this day finds you knowing who you really are, or at least in the process of finding out. And thank you for letting me be who I am and reading here despite it.

Filed Under: 100th post, friendships, Giggles

Energy Drinks+Alcohol=wahh?!!?

August 28, 2008 By Heather 7 Comments

Remember the other day when I told you about how I let Giggles drink an energy drink with alcohol. I just barely touched on it, but go on and look here, I will wait for you.

Back?

Good.

To start off the story a bit of background.

My husband’s family has a cottage at Put in Bay. You can click here if you want more info. on the island. Because if you aren’t from around here you probably didn’t even realize it existed.

The cottage has been in the family for 5 generations. It is gorgeous and lovely and we are right on the lake. I enjoy going there. So do a lot of other people. So from time to time friends and family go out there for a day or two or twelve. The point is they go out there.

When these said visitors are visiting they bring stuff to eat and drink because we have kitchen in our cottage. (Maybe there are some cottages out there that don’t have kitchens so I am just clearing things up) When they come out with their food and beverages and don’t use them all they leave the stuff behind for us, kind of like a thank you. At the end of the season when we close down for the winter my hubby and father in law clean out the pantry and most of the stuff makes its way to our house.

Now I go through everything and check exp. dates and everything. What I didn’t check in the Sparks Energy drink was its alcohol content. I just popped it in the pantry and let it sit there.

A bit of time rolls by and I decide that Giggles may enjoy this said drink so while she is in school I pop it in the fridge for her. She gets home and asks me if we can go up the corner store and get her an energy drink. I tell her she is in luck, I had one in the fridge for her.

She goes and gets it out, looks at it and asks where it came from. I told her it came from the island and someone left it. She asks if I am sure that she can drink it. I tell her its fine. It is hours from bedtime and so its really okay.

She starts to drink it. She tells me it tastes awful. I asked her if she shook it up. She said no. So I go in the kitchen, cup my hand over the open can and give it a shake or two. I hand it back to Giggles.

“Mom it is still awful. It feels like it is burning my throat, can’t we just go and buy a real energy drink?”

At this point I am pretty ticked. She really doesn’t like “hand outs” So I figure she is giving me a hard time because she wants a drink that she picked out, not something someone left behind”

“Listen girlie, ” I start in, “you are going to drink that drink and you are going to like it. If this is how you react to all energy drinks then I don’t think you will ever be getting another one again.”

“No, Mom, this is seriously awful. Taste it”

Now I hate energy drinks, they make me feel a bit light headed, but I was tired of listening to her complain. I took one sip and tasted something off, yet familiar. I decide to read the label.

Sparks Energy Plus. Plus what I wonder. What?!?? 4% alcohol!!?!?

I am feeling like the world’s greatest mother, I made my kid drink alcohol all in an effort to save a bit of money and not have to leave the house when it was snowing out. Please hand me my reward.

But, upon doing a search about this said energy drinks with extra added (by the way isn’t an energy drink with alcohol added kind of counter productive) I found this

Which makes me feel a lot better. Because the brand that isn’t supposed to be there, yea that’s the one I forced my kid to drink.

And if you are here representing some child welfare agency or other such thing…..I am a fiction writer. Couldn’t get a publisher so I am going on the cheap with my blog. Yea, that’s it.

Filed Under: bad mother moments, Giggles

Wordless Wednesday

August 27, 2008 By Heather 6 Comments

What a sunset.

For more Wordless Wednesday posts click here.

edited to add: this photo has not been digitally altered in any way.

Filed Under: sunset, Wordless Wednesday

Things I love and then some…..

August 26, 2008 By Heather 10 Comments

I guess I should start off with something that I don’t love. Please don’t waste your money on this

It didn’t clean my shower as it stated it would. There was about three warnings on the package that the contents were highly toxic, but I’ve used the scrubbing bubbles before, no worries. Big mistake. I got an instant headache. I used THREE of the pads and my shower was still not clean.

So this came to the rescue

I can’t same enough good things about Clorox Greenworks. It seems to work on everything, it is dilutable and it isn’t toxic. Plus it smells fantastic. And No Clorox isn’t paying me to say that. (Side note: If someone from Clorox is reading I would love for you to pay me so I can say wonderful things about your Greenworks products. I can work it into conversations, blog posts, heck I would tell all about it when I get the floor at the PTA meetings…seriously, call me) I highly recommend Greenworks if you are looking for an all purpose cleaner. It really cleaned up my tile shower wonderfully.

I also can’t say enough good things about this
It has brought the coffee back to my mornings. I am in love. If I could marry this I would and make sweet little vanilla babies with it. But I can’t. I think hubby would be jealous. A little splash of this, some milk and my coffee and I am good to go all morning with any of the stuff the girls try to put past me before they head out the door.

But last night, I don’t know if it was the stress of the first day of school, rude 7th graders at the volleyball game, PMS or what, but I really loved this
And I don’t drink. Really, I can’t think of the last time I drank anything. Now I have forced my child to drink an energy drink that may or may not have had alcohol in it, (Who would put alcohol in an energy drink?!!?) that was left at the cottage last year by some people who stayed there. But that is for another post. I don’t see a trend, I am not jonesing for one now….but if I drink a few ~~or twelve~~ wine coolers now and again I don’t see the harm.

But you are probably here to see these

Chicken walking to her final year of elementary school. Giggles getting ready to leave for her last year of Middle School. I am sure you are wondering where the Giggles photos are of her walking away. Well I am a ~~sucker~~ good mom and I drove her so she wouldn’t be late. Make-up application and hair straightening is not something you can rush people.

Well I would like to say that I got a lot accomplished today but after getting fumed out of my upstairs and this blasted headache I did not. There is always tomorrow I guess. At least there was peaceful silence all day long. Well that is until I started yelling at the dog because he left me a present upstairs in the hallway. UGH!

If you have kiddos that started school how did your first day go?

Filed Under: 1st day of school, Chicken, Giggles, things I hate, things I love

Do you like Crocs?

August 25, 2008 By Heather 2 Comments

I know, I know….some of you are going *blech!*right about now. Well OHMommy has found stylish crocs and I want a pair!! They are cute and I have heard they are super comfy. So go there and leave her a comment and possibly you could win the crocs. (but I really want them and I am having a horrible day and shoes make any horrible day better so could I possibly have yours if you win…LOL) If you are too impatient to see if you win, you could always go here and get some yourself.

That is all.

Filed Under: comfy shoes, contests

I’ve had it with Obama

August 25, 2008 By Heather 3 Comments

Okay I took the quiz and went to his site. I was asked for my email address so I could get updates. Not TWO minutes after I sign up I am getting an email “From Barak himself” Yea, right! He was telling me how if I just gave $5 to his campaign it would help to “Make a Change” or whatever his slogan is. Over the course of the next 4 days I got no less than a dozen emails asking me for “Just $5″ I even got an email from his wife, telling me the greatness of a measly five bucks.

Now I know in all fairness if I had decided to get email updates from the McCain campaign I would probably be getting asked for contributions as well. Who knows they could be asking me for seven bucks, making Barack’s five bucks seem like not such a bad deal. But c’mon! It was in EVERY email from them.

But it does get better, we get phone calls from random cell phones from the Barack Campaign. Most of these calls are directed at my husband. I totally understand why they are calling. He is a white, 32 year old man, working and living in the state of Ohio. Since Ohio is undecided they need him. What I don’t understand is why they insist on calling him at 3 o’clock in the afternoon. I mean seriously, do they expect him to be home in essentially the middle of the work day? And when they call, they are surprised to hear that he isn’t home. After I tell them he isn’t there they ask who I am and if I am registered to vote.

I spoke to this “representative” from Barack’s campaign, when they asked if I had any questions for Obama I addressed my $5 complaint. I could tell that, at least with the first person I spoke to, that she didn’t even know they were sending out these emails. (So I am guessing that she is not on the email update list) No one from his campaign that called me could address my concerns about this $5 issue. I mean seriously, if we all gave $5 to cancer research I bet we would be closer to a cure. Want to end world hunger….how about we all give $5!

I don’t really mind the guy ( and by the guy you know I am talking about Barack) And I am still undecided as to who I am going to vote for in November. But if Barack wanted to up his chances in my book could he show up at a debate looking like this
Because I know that I am not the only one that has thought that Barack Obama sounds like Jedi Knight name. Photo Credit to Sebastian Niedlich.

P.S. This is the first day of school for the girls and somehow my rant helped me to not be all weepy this morning. But I will be posting first day pics later today or tomorrow. Probably tomorrow as Hubby has oral surgery again this morning. Then after school Giggles has a volleyball game and we get to finish getting all the supplies that teacher’s don’t put on their lists before school starts. Joy!

Filed Under: first day of school, Obama

Random letters

August 19, 2008 By Heather 11 Comments

Dear Recycling Truck:

Would it kill you to come the same time every week? I know that your route does not alter from week to week. Its bad enough that you switched our days a couple of months back and didn’t come and get our stuff on the “wrong” day even though the city said you would. But now you come at six in the freaking morning. Maybe I don’t want to put out my recycling the night before because those guys who troll the neighborhood trolling for cans make a mess of my recycling on the lawn. So next week can you just come at 8AM, would it be too much?

A Rejected Recycler
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And while we are on the subject of my treelawn.

Lawn Pick up Guys~

Dude, my tree trimmings are decomposing in my tree lawn. Maybe you think because we aren’t sporting a tree out there that we are trying to make up for it by putting all the trimmings out there. Let me clear this up for you…..we aren’t. I call the city and they tell me that you make rounds through out the area to see what needs to get picked up. For the record our stuff has been out there nearly a month. I think you should have seen it by now. You know this reminds me of last fall when you guys drove the leaf vacuum trucks around the neighborhood when all the leaves were still green and on the trees! C’mon guys get it together, I would like to have my lawn back.

The lady who wants her lawn back

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Dear Chicken~

When washing the silverware you must wash the whole piece. Please don’t just scrub the top of it and not include the handle. The handle still gets dirty, especially when you lay it on a syrupy plate. Don’t whine and tell me you did it. I know you didn’t…why…when I grabbed a butter knife out of the drawer this morning my hand stuck to it. Now I know that sometimes I have a tendency to drop things so maybe you thought you were helping Mom out. But trust me, you weren’t. You just grossed me out and peeved me off. I mean I couldn’t even fling the knife in the sink because it stuck to my hand.

And speaking of flinging things….could you do a little more of flinging your laundry down the chute? You know that 2 foot square in the wall in your room? I know that if you put the clothes down the chute you may not remember what you wore yesterday or the day before, but really does it matter? Shoving your clothes under your bed, in your barbie bin or in other small spaces requires much more thought than you need to put into the whole laundry process. That giant hole in your wall is there for a reason. Please use it!

Love, Mom

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Dear Giggles,

Honey I love you, but sometimes you are a bit uptight. When you come into my room at 6AM I may or may not be wearing pants. Don’t freak out on me and tell me that I should put some clothes on. Its my room and for heck’s sake I wear Granny Panties….you saw nothing! So calm down and realize that my mom laid it all out there when I was a kid. You should be glad.
And for the record I have never driven you anywhere sans pants so you really have nothing to worry about. I am a huge prude and couldn’t see myself going anywhere without my pants.

Also honey, when we do go out today could you please for the love of God and everything good pick out a bookbag. School starts in less than a week and I am tired of you complaining you don’t have a bookbag. I have taken you out several times and we keep coming home with new shirts and make-up. You don’t need either of those anymore. So focus….bookbag!!

Love, Your fully clothed Mom

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Dear ~~Devil~~ Cat~

You are cute and fluffy and nice but if you keep ripping up the carpet the top of the stairs I am going to be forced to ~~kill~~ sell you. You must have overhead the man and I talking about removing the carpet from the stairs. I know you are just trying to be a ~~pain in my ass~~ good kitty and help out. But STOP! I am not redoing the stairs right now and you are just making it look that much worse.

The giver of Pounce Treats

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Dear Insurance Company~

You suck! You totally rip us off and I have had it. I hate changing insurance but for you I will make an exception. Please don’t have your agent call us and act like he is our friend. He isn’t, you aren’t and we are done. When our car was stolen you acted like we did it. When our car was found after you deemed it lost but not before you sent out the check you promised us…you decided “Our bad, it still is your car” I will never recommend you to my friends or enemies.

An annoyed insured

Filed Under: rants

This Monday sucks

August 18, 2008 By Heather 6 Comments

I wake up every morning between 5 and 6 without fail. Last night as I was dozing off on the couch I figured hubby would kick me to bed.

Well I didn’t wake up, hubby didn’t kick me to bed AND Giggles alarm clock did not go off.

So here I am blogging about how we are late for volleyball while Giggles finishes getting ready. She is freaking out people…..do you have a teen or witnessed a teen freaking? It isn’t pretty. If you don’t hear from me later please send help.

Later after the volleyball nonsense I get to go to the dentist office with the girls for at least an hour. After that the Fair.

Oh Monday how you are really something I don’t want to deal with today. I really loathe you. Why can’t you be cool like Friday or Saturday. They really have it going on.

Filed Under: Giggles, Mondays

Words of encouragement

August 16, 2008 By Heather 11 Comments

A “friend” recently learned that I have a blog. I think it was something Chicken said to her. Upon hearing this she turned to me and said.

“You actually think people want to read about your life?!!?”

Yeah, great morality booster.

So thanks to you for actually wanting to read about my life.

Please go and boost Patty’s moral as well. It is her 2nd Blogversary and she is having a contest. Go, now and tell her I sent ya!

Filed Under: contests, random comments

In honor of Jennifer’s last “official” Haiku Friday

August 15, 2008 By Heather 10 Comments

Should I use their names
Not just the cutesy names from home.
Giggles thinks we should now.

For a while I have been reading Jennifer’s haikus on Friday. It is a bit sad that she won’t be hosting it anymore and I really wish I would have gotten into it sooner, but I always thought…”There’s always next Friday”

Today she announced that it is really hard to have to post every Friday, and for that I truly understand. So why not honor Jennifer’s last haiku Friday post with a haiku of your own. Just post a haiku to your blog and you can even grab a button if you want. (I think you can get the code by clicking on mine but don’t quote me on that.) Then you can go to Jennifer’s page and she will give out the linky love to you! Linky love people!!

As for our Haiku dilemma Giggles is not happy. Why isn’t Giggles happy, isn’t she feeling the Giggles Love this past week. She is, she’s happy, she is just tired of being Giggles. She doesn’t mind being called Giggles around the house, which she is called often,but she hates that you internets have some sort of weird perception of her because of her nickname. I don’t know how I feel about actually calling her “her” name on my site.

All powerful internets help me out, what do you think? for the record Chicken does not have a problem, she is just happy when she is mentioned on the site.

Okay so two tasks I am giving you today.
1) Write a Haiku
2)Help me decide what to do about Giggles that will make her happy for exactly 3 seconds. (because you know how it is with teenagers, I do this and then suddenly I need to appease her in some other way)