The Adventures of Kelly and Malia

Weekend Projects

2011-10-24T08:44:00.005-06:00

I'm not going to bother with a lot of chit chat today. I had a couple of projects to get sewed this weekend and I'm going to show off the pictures.

First up, we have a changing table pad cover for my sister Kami who is expecting her third child (first boy!) in December. I just want to say that the minkee material that she wanted was a pain in the behind to hem, but through much gnashing of teeth and not a few curse words, I got it to work.

Picture one is the finished product before she picked it up.

Picture two is the finished product placed on the change table pad.

The next project was a little more difficult. Why, you ask? Because I had no patterns. That's right, I had to wing it. My niece (from my other sister) wants to be Jasmine for Halloween and my nephew is going to be a penguin. You'll note that I didn't say he wanted to be a penguin. He's two, he doesn't really care all that much. But he does a FANTASTIC impression of a penguin walking around so it'll be good. I didn't take pictures of the little feet and beak that I made, but take my word for it, they are great.

Anyway, for the Jasmine costume, I used a pair of Haylee's pants and a shirt I bought in her size to trace to get a feel for the size. I would like to apologize to my mom, but I used a bit of wrapping paper for this because I couldn't find any other paper that would fit. It worked, but those "patterns" had to be tossed afterwards. I made a vest and a pair of harem pants. It's hard to see in the pics but the vest is a lavender corduroy with sparkles in it, and the pants are a rayon blend so they are kind of silky. First picture, just the vest with it's beautifully crafted detailing around the edges.

Second pictures, the vest and the harem pants.

Not pictured, the purple long sleeved t-shirt I found for her to wear under the vest, the veil/crown thing my sister is going to make, and the black wig that she's going to borrow from her mother-in-law.

So, that was my weekend, in between wrestling niece, nephew and rugrat for brief periods of time. Oh and I snuck in a book or two because it's not a weekend without having read a couple of books.

Bedtime Negotiations

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

Last night Malia sat me down because she had something really important to discuss with me. I had a hard time keeping a straight face because she was so serious about it. I kinda felt like when I was little and my parents (usually my dad) would sit me down to talk about something bad I'd done. It was a weird feeling to get when hearing "We need to talk about something important" from the rugrat.

The conversation went something like this:

Malia: I've been doing some calculating (Yes, she said it) and I want to talk to you about my bedtime.
Me: Oh yeah? What have you been calculating?
Malia: I figured out that with my current bedtime (8:30) I get XX amount of time with you each weekday if I add in the time we spend driving to daycare and the time we spend driving home from daycare and XX amount of time with you on the weekends. That's a total of XX time each week.
Me: Really? That much time?
Malia: Yes, but I am thinking that if you move my bedtime to 9:00 I would then get an extra 30 minutes a day and then it would be a total of XX time each week.
Me: When did you figure this out?
Malia: Oh, I did it in my head while I was in the shower. So, what do you think? Do you think I could switch my bedtime?
Me: Well, I think it's a possibility. How about this? Bedtime stays 8:30 during the week until school is out, but we can change it to 9:00 for the weekends. When school is out you can have 9:00 during the week, and I'll let you have 9:30 on the weekends.
Malia: Really? 9:30?
Me: Yes, but all of this is dependent on attitude and behavior. So, if you don't do your chores and you don't listen to me and do what I ask, then we'll change it back.
Malia: Sweet!!

I left out the actual time measurements because I can't for the life of me remember. Also, she doesn't know that the "concessions" I made were what I already had planned except for changing current weekends to 9:00. I just hadn't planned on telling her anything until after school was out. The fact that she spent the time to figure it all out and that she put it in terms of time spent with me impressed me so I gave her the 9:00 weekends. Oh, and yes, she did indeed use words like calculate and totaled not on the daily, but the weekly time differences. She cracks me up!

Mexico - April 2011

2011-05-02T21:02:00.004-06:00

I made it back! Mexico was fantastic. I am pretty sure I ate my weight in guacamole and cheese, but managed to lose 5 pounds because of all the climbing and wandering of ruins. Each of the last 6 posts is just a slide show of a specific Maya ruin site that we visited. I feel they can speak for themselves. It was freaking amazing to see all the pyramids and especially finally getting to Chichen Itza. Just wow!

If you click on the slideshows you can see the photos in Picasa either in a slideshow or individual pictures. Also, for those that have my Facebook, I have them all posted there as well. Enjoy!

Tulum Ruins

2011-05-02T21:02:00.000-06:00

Muyil Ruins

2011-05-02T21:01:00.001-06:00

Coba Ruins

2011-05-02T21:01:00.000-06:00

Chacchoben Ruins

2011-05-02T21:00:00.000-06:00

Oxtankah Ruins

2011-05-02T20:59:00.000-06:00

Chichen Itza Ruins - slideshow

2011-05-02T20:57:00.000-06:00

My family thinks I'm dumb

2011-03-07T10:42:00.003-07:00

I had the following separate conversations with my mom and my sister over the weekend discussing my impending trip to Mexico with Buddha.

Mom: Don't get kidnapped.
Me: It's not really on the agenda, so I'll try not to.
Mom: We won't pay the ransom. We don't have the money.
Me: Well, thanks?
Mom: Well, I'll cry if it happens and we'll miss you, but you'd pretty much be stuck.
Me: I feel the love, thanks.

Krissy: You aren't taking my niece to Mexico are you?
Me: Not this trip, maybe next summer.
Krissy: You aren't funny. I hope you don't get kidnapped.

Really family? Do I strike you as being completely inept? Don't answer that, because apparently the answer is yes. Just for that, no Mexican blankets or maracas for you. =P

Rugrat's school fun

2011-02-23T09:09:00.004-07:00

I'm sure all of you know, because I talk about it all the time, the rugrat is in a special program for school. She's in her second year of Chinese Dual Immersion. Recently KSL came to her school and a couple of others for the French and Spanish and did some filming to do a story on the entire program. I encourage any of you with Kindergartners, or younger to look into this program. It's amazing how well the kids take to it and as you can hear in the program, the kids in the dual immersion programs consistently score higher overall academically so it's certainly not hurting them to learn a second language.

KSL Video

Oh, and look! Here is the rugrat in a screenshot. She's the one in the red sweatshirt on the far right. If you want to see her in the video itself, look for the 1:30 mark and there she'll be. :)

Book Review - Packing for Mars

2011-02-14T10:14:00.000-07:00

Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void by Mary Roach

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I loved this book! The level of detail and research into the subject is really quite amazing. I love how she explains the mechanics of how we deal with space and all it's quirks. It's great insight into the true costs of the space program and I feel as though I understand a bit better why the time lines for the Moon or Mars or anywhere are so long. The amount of research and testing and just plain inventiveness of the people who work for NASA is just amazing. I also loved the little bits and pieces of astronaut trivia and quotes from missions that show that even through the seriousness of their endeavors, they still had a sense of humor. Some more appropriate than others. The less appropriate ones are far funnier, just so you know!

I also loved that the author didn't limit either her research or writing to just the US Space Program. The interviews and information about the Japanese and Russian programs was fantastic. I loved the Japanese astronaut selection process and frankly even if I were totally qualified in EVERY other way, I would fail the crane test. Origami is just not my strong suit. =)

If you have even the remotest interest in the space program I recommend this book. Especially if you think you know what NASA does with the money it receives. You'd be surprised and I salute the men and women around the world for their efforts to get us out there to see what's going on. Like the author says at the end of the book, sometimes you SHOULD do something just because you can and going into space should be one of those things.

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The most important post ever!!!

2011-02-10T09:57:00.003-07:00

That's right, a countdown to my 6 WEEK long sabbatical from work.

Oh yeah, and we're going to DisneyWorld

May the force be with you girls

2010-12-10T08:34:00.005-07:00

As you all know, I am a geek. I feel no shame in admitting, as a girl, that I love Star Wars, Star Trek, and especially Lord of the Rings. Not that long ago the writer of a blog I read posted about a 1st grade girl who'd been teased for taking her Star Wars water bottle to school because Star Wars is for boys, not girls. Well, screw that I say. What's not for girls? Princess Leia kicks just as much, if not more, butt than anyone else thank you very much. Here is a link to the CNN story about Katie, and a link to the Facebook event page:

CNN Story (video/text)

Facebook Event

Anyhow, in honor of the Wear it/Share it, the rugrat wanted to wear her Princess Leia costume to school. That's who she chose to be for Halloween this year. Instead we picked up a Star Wars Lego shirt that she's had her eye on for some time. I figure it's a good reason. Especially because she was so upset on behalf of Katie. I explained what had happened and she felt bad. She knows how it feels because she's been teased before for having a "boy haircut"... by no less than the woman cutting her hair at the time. Yeah, I was not happy and told her so. We no longer go there. She always says that it bothers her, but that she's not going to stop wearing the clothes she likes, watching the shows she likes, and liking the toys she likes. She said it was stupid to say things were for boys and other things were for girls. Anybody should be able to like anything that they want.

I don't know how I managed to impart this sense of self and comfort with being who she is so well, but I like to think it's because I like myself and she has that example. I just hope it lasts when she hits those teen years. I hope she gets enough years in that it becomes habit and she doesn't lose it, but I'm certainly going to continue backing her no matter what.

This morning I took a picture as I was dropping her off at daycare. She told me that with her short hair and the shirt everyone would probably say she looked like a boy, but that was okay because she likes her hair and the shirt and she'd be able to use that to tell people about the girl that got teased and maybe then they could learn something too. Oh man, I love this kid!!!

Book Review - Machine of Death

2010-11-08T10:58:00.004-07:00

Yay, another book review!

Machine of Death: A collection of stories about people who know how they will die by Ryan North

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

First, I have to say that it wasn't what I expected, but it was better than what I expected. For whatever reason I expected more stories dealing with the actual death of people. Instead it was more about the reactions of people to the concept itself or their particular reading.

My two favorites in the book are very very different, yet at the core have the same sort of bias towards the machine. Torn Apart and Devoured by Lions and Miscarriage are those two. Neither of them actually contain the death and one is both completely accurate for the story it titles, yet isn't the way someone dies or is slated to die.

The stories are so varied and there are even several from the point of view of the "creators" of the machine. None of the stories in this collection take away anything from any of the others and they all seem to fit very well together. I went in only being familiar with the work of two of the editors and one of the writers in the collection as they all write webcomics that I love and read whenever there is a new one available. Those three webcomics (Dinosaur Comics, Wondermark, and xkcd) showcase the variety of perceptions, views, and entertainment type you can find on the internet and that really translates into the entire book.

I'm very impressed overall with not only the variety of stories, but the collection as a whole is very well put together.

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Book Review - The House on Durrow Street

2010-10-28T11:07:00.002-06:00

I decided that since the majority of what I spend my time on is reading, I should share some of the books I've read. So I'm introducing a new "feature" of sorts. This is really a Kelly only adventure, but it's my blog, so deal. =)

The House on Durrow Street by Galen M. Beckett

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I really liked this book. I actually liked it a lot more than the first one, but I think that was mainly due to being more familiar with the setup of the world. I still had a hard time getting through the book, but I think that's really more my own issues with Jane Austen style of story-telling. So slow and most of the time I had to go back and re-read because I skipped things in my desire to move along in the story.

Also, I disliked the massive build-up over the course of the book and then everything resolves in like 10 pages. Again, it's the style of writing and not one that I prefer, but I did love the way the differing story-lines came together at the end though. I was curious throughout the book how the two main ones of Ivy and Eldyn would connect, but I knew that they would. That is one thing that I love the most about this series is that the most disparate seeming story-lines end up being so intertwined. I did figure out one of the bad guys early on, but the story still drew me in and made me want to continue to the end.

All in all I like the book and look forward to more stories in the series/world.

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Screw you stomach flu, I wanna take a shower

2010-10-26T19:45:00.005-06:00

Today I saved myself about $150 by manning up and doing some home plumbing. I did not want to do this plumbing which is how I discovered that it would cost me $175 to have someone come and do it. Of the 3 plumbers I asked to get estimates from, $175 was the cheapest, one was over $200 and the 3rd dude didn't even bother showing up for the appointment he made with me.

I've gotten ahead of myself and should give some explanation. Over the past few months, the cold water tap in the shower has become increasingly difficult to turn on and off and the handles been loosening. Awhile ago I thought it was done for, but I managed to finagle it and didn't have to fix it back then. Unfortunately my luck ran out last Thursday. Not only did it stop working, but it loosened to the point that I couldn't get it to tighten and shut the water off all the way and the screw head broke off in the stem. That was the end of showers. Because I knew I wasn't going to want to spend the money for an emergency fix and the water was only leaking a little bit, I just put in the plug and let the cold water build up over night, then added hot water the next day to have a bath and the rugrat and I were washing our hair in the kitchen sink. Yeah, I know, I'm ghetto, but at least I didn't just let it drip and waste all that water.

So, after waking up Monday morning feeling as though I'd been hit by a truck, I got a hold of 3 different plumbers to come take a look and give me an estimate because I didn't want to deal wit it anymore. After they all left I sat down to decide what I was going to do. I looked into how much the parts would be and it was about $25. I just needed to let go of my fear of dealing with plumbing and replace the stem and other sundry parts. So I went and got the new parts with the plan to fix it tonight after getting home from work.

Those plans were thwarted when I spent the rest of Monday night and early this morning in the bathroom as it became apparent that I would not be going to work. The "hit by a truck" feeling was apparently a prelude to a 24 hour stomach flu bug thingamajig and I wanted to die by about 5 this morning. I got the rugrat to daycare and came home to spend some more time in the bathroom. It occurred to me that I since I was going to be spending the day in the bathroom anyway, I should go ahead and fix the tub tap while I was in there.

Now, I must take a small break here to remind you all about my tendency to mix brilliance with complete idiocy. I believe I have covered this in depth on this blog. I wish that I could blame today's instance of this on drugs, but since I'm pretty sure that Pepto and Advil don't cause stupidity, that's not really an option.

Anyway, it wasn't until about 5 minutes after I shut off the water and I was wrestling with the stem to loosen and remove it that I realized that the reason I was in the bathroom in the first place was my frequent need of the facilities available in the bathroom. Luckily, and I'm still not sure exactly why I did it, I had filled a bucket of water prior to turning off the water so I could refill the tank on the toilet. Yes, I'm an idiot. Luckily it wasn't a very difficult thing to fix so it only took me about 20 minutes total to take out the old and put in the new. I think if I'd not been sick it would have only taken about half that.

I then used up all the hot water in the house taking a shower. =)

That's not the best part about the whole thing though. The best part is that this is the first home repair/project I've completed without injuring myself. I don't know how I managed it but it appears that I'm less apt to injure myself when I'm half out of it because I'm ill. Eh, whatever the reason, I have no injuries and I'm fine with that.

I've angered the rugrat

2010-08-19T10:00:00.003-06:00

We're having this contest at work relating to purchasing items online. Well, I decided it was a good opportunity to help my team win by starting on my Christmas shopping. It's really only about a month early for me. I usually start in September and am completely done by Halloween at the latest. What? I hate people. I especially hate crowds shopping. I have significantly decreased my personal interaction by taking most of my present shopping online, but that little bit I need to do in person has to be done before everyone else is there. Frankly I'd rather pay $2 more for a stupid toy than have to wait in line for 3 hours to buy it later. Sometimes my patience (or lack thereof) trumps my cheapness. Which is impressive because not much trumps my cheapness.

I digress, as usual.

So, I found a sweet deal on some Science and Animal reference books in a lot. I bid on them and won. They arrived earlier this week and when Malia saw the package she asked what it was. I told her it was one of her Christmas presents because I started my shopping already. She got down and was looking at the box reading the side panels. The person obviously recycled the box because it was labeled "Rope of Sausage". She got all sorts of excited because she thought I bought her an entire box of sausage. When I explained that it wasn't really a big box of sausage the look of disappointment on her face was priceless. She looked so dejected for about an hour before she got distracted. I know she'll love the books I got her and the other items I have planned, but apparently I should get her sausage of some sort for her stocking.

My mom was eaten by a shark

2010-08-05T18:13:00.003-06:00

So, Malia and I are sitting around watching Shark Week. It is the most wonderful time of the year and I'm very glad that she enjoys the shows as much as I do. And no, I don't let my almost 7 yr. old watch the shows with the reenactments of attacks and whatnot. She likes the scientific research ones like Ultimate Air Jaws. She's also quite happy that she's got another loose tooth and like the first two, it's being pushed slowly out as the adult tooth comes in. I'm really starting to wonder now if all her teeth will do this. She loves it because she has "shark teeth" in that she's got two rows of teeth temporarily. I believe I have discussed this before so sorry, I tend to repeat. Especially things that I find super entertaining.

Anyway, we're watching some show with cage diving and we have the following conversation...

RR: When are you going to go cage diving with sharks?
Me: I promised your Grandma that I wouldn't go until you were 18 so she didn't have to raise you.
RR: HEY!
Me: (laughed so hard I snorted)
RR: Fine, go, then if something happens and you die, could it please be because you were eaten by a shark?
Me: What?
RR: How cool would it be if people asked me why I didn't have a mom and my Grandma was raising me and I could say "She was eaten by a shark"? That would be pretty sweet.
Me: Thanks, good to know my being eaten by a shark would be a conversation piece for you.
RR: Well, you have to die sometime, I'm just saying being eaten by a shark isn't something that you hear every day. I'll be really sad when you die, but at least this way it would also be a little funny and I wouldn't be as sad.
Me: Point taken. Let's not discuss my imminent death by shark though please. Just watch the show.

Is it any wonder I love this child? Good times at our house.

More fun with water

2010-07-01T12:16:00.003-06:00

Well, it's been awhile since I last had to do a home improvement project involving plumbing. You may recall the Great Toilet Repair of 2008 where I got to replace the entire innards of my toilet and only got one injury. Well, I'm going to be doing another one after this long weekend. Why not now? Well, because I'm going to the parents tonight to stay through the weekend, so it'll be a project for when I get home.

The fun begins when the rugrat and I got up this morning to get ready. Got all our stuff together and I went in to get the shower started. I turned the hot water on first (as is my habit) and then went to turn on the cold water to blend them nicely for a fantastic way to start off the morning. Much to my chagrin, the cold side knob just kept turning and turning and never turned on water. It seems as though the inner portion teeth have worn to the point that the knob grabby things (technical term - I'm a professional) are no longer grabbing anything. I will need to replace this faucet, which means I might as well replace both of them. I do like matching some things.

As a result of this, and because both the rugrat and I needed to not be fragrant for the day, I had to fill the tub with hot water, then add cold water from the sink faucet until it was bearable. I had to do this twice, because frankly, I'm not using the rugrat's dirty water. I swear that child turned the water gray. Anyway, NOT a fun morning and it took twice as long as usual to get going. Which means I didn't get packed as I'd planned, so I have to do it after work. Which means I'll be heading up to the parents even later and probably won't get there until they've gone to bed. At least I have a key. =)

So, stay tuned for the fun as I'll be fixing the faucets upon my return next week. Should be a good time, and I plan on showering at the parents right before I head home so that I have a little leeway.

Man, I love the rugrat sometimes.

2010-06-13T18:58:00.001-06:00

Conversation I just had with Malia:

Me: We'll watch Life and then there is a show about Hawaii and how it was made.
Malia: I don't need to watch that. I already know.
Me: Oh yeah?
Malia: By volcanoes Mom, duh! I can't believe you didn't know.
Me: I did know. I did not know that you did.
Malia: Sure you did. I love you, you don't have to pretend to know stuff to impress me.

That's right, my 6 1/2 yr old patronizes me. I'd be angry if it weren't so funny.

I learned something new today.

2010-06-12T12:58:00.007-06:00

Malia and I headed to the store this morning to pick up some knitting supplies. She's learning at her daycare, so she wanted some stuff so that she can work on her own projects rather that sit around and watch a movie in the afternoon. She's been hard at work since we got home, but I can't show you anything because she's crafting with specific people in mind and I promised not to give anything away. I'll make sure and keep track of her progress and show it off after she's presented her gifts. Keep in mind that some of them are months away so I apologize in advance if I forget some.

Anyhow, after leaving Walmart, we headed to Denny's for some breakfast. Yeah, sue me, I eat at Denny's. Their coffee doesn't suck as bad as it used to, and the rugrat likes that she can get grapes with whatever she eats. Anyway, we're eating and I had finished and was just relaxing and we had the following conversation:

Rugrat: Well, this chicken has finished laying her eggs.
Me: (confused look)
RR: That means I'm done eating mom.
Me: Oh, okay then. (still slightly confused)
RR: It's a figure of speech mom, I don't really lay eggs. I'm a mammal.
Me: That's unfortunate because we could save a lot of money if you could lay eggs.
RR: Gross mom, I wouldn't eat an egg that I laid.

As you are no doubt aware, this is a pretty good example of most conversations we have. Educational and absurd. =) Well, when she's not arguing with me like she's a teenager. An example of that really entertained my cousin Jess and her husband at my Grandpa's 80th birthday party last weekend where this occurred:

Rugrat: Mom? (asked something, but I don't remember what)
Me: No, you can't
RR: Moo-oom, when are you going to treat me like a young adult?
Me: When you are one.
RR: I am.
Me: No, you aren't, you're not even 7 yet
RR: You never let me do anything. (said under her breath as she stomped away.

Jesse (husband of Jess - yes, it's fun) was cracking up and I don't blame him. It is funny, even though it worries me to think about what her teenage years will be like.

Anyway, back to today. After we left Denny's, Malia pointed out that the clouds looked really low and I told her that we could drive through them if she liked. She told me that wasn't possible, so I set out to show her that we could. We headed south and up Little Cottonwood Canyon. Not too far up the canyon, we hit clouds and drove on through. She was pretty quiet and eventually asked if we could just turn around and go back down. So, I turned around at Snowbird and we headed back down. I snapped this picture just before we headed back into the clouds on the way back down.
When we got almost to the bottom she let me know that she'd rather not do that again. Apparently, driving up in the rain and being on the side that looked down the alternately steep tree-lined cliff, or abrupt drop into the fast moving creek made her "nervous" and she didn't like it. So, while I am sad that she was upset and wish she'd said something sooner, we did learn that she's not a fan of heights. Not something we knew before today. She did think driving through the cloud was cool because it "rained" even though it wasn't raining.

So ends today's adventure, if only because my new door isn't here yet. They are scheduled to be here at 2. WOOO!!!! My fingers are almost healed from the fiasco of a week ago.

EDIT: Before anyone yells at me, I did come to a stop to take this picture. There were no cars behind me.

I promise, I had a plan...

2010-06-07T18:05:00.008-06:00

About a year ago, my sister Kami and her husband replaced their front door. When they did this, they gifted me with their old screen door. I have enjoyed having this door, and have been planning since receiving it to fix it up and replace the hard golden plastic inserts with screening to allow for air flow. Especially when one side of them broke a lot and the lack of symmetry has pestered me. So, Saturday morning, bright and early, I started my attack. First things first, I had to remove the aforementioned hard plastic. Here is the pre-starting picture of the door and you can see on the right where the plastic is missing.

I learned the hard way that the plastic in there is very sharp when it's broken. It took me only about 30 minutes to pull it all out, but oh did it end up being a painful half an hour. Here is a picture of some of the larger chunks. If you really want to look closely, you can see some blood drops from the second of the injuries I sustained. Just as an FYI that's as gory as this post gets. I didn't take pictures of the actual injuries because I was to busy bleeding and cursing.

After all the fun of tearing the door apart and waiting an hour for my injuries to stop bleeding through bandaids, I began to attempt to screen the inserts. Holy crap was this frustrating. After 2 1/2 hours of trying every way I could think of, I threw in the towel. The rugrat and I jumped on in the car and headed to Lowe's. I have a guy coming to measure this week and I should have the new door installed and the old one hauled away by mid next week. In the interim, this is the view from inside. The upside is that it gives me fantastic air flow, but the cotton and blossoms blowing in mean I have to vacuum more often.

I also learned something after injuring myself. I managed to cut the pads of my left thumb and pointer finger. The pointer finger is the one that dropped blood all over as it was more of a deep stab than a cut. Anyway, what I learned is that I don't open anything right-handed. I do most things with both hands, but there are a few things that I do with one specific hand. Apparently opening anything in a wrapper or a jar or a bottle, I only do with my left hand. Unfortunately I would forget this every time, so whenever I opened something, I ended up having to change the bandaids because I'd start bleeding all over again. My poor fingers!

So, I learned three things.

1. I should never try to screen anything ever again. I do not have the patience to do it. Nor do I have the ability to do much of anything without injuring myself.

2. I learned that I open things solely with my left hand. Because of this, I should be more careful when I decide to try something that I don't have patience for.

3. I also learned that if I try really hard, I can just curse in my head instead of out loud. Yay for the rugrat because I'm pretty sure her ears would have burned right off.

Thus ends my adventure in screening. I hope to remember to post pictures of my new door when it's in.

Odd bits

2010-03-18T09:23:00.003-06:00

Two things:

1. The damn hamsters got out last night. I'm pretty sure that it's because I apparently didn't completely secure the cage after I cleaned it out last night and they were high on the feeling of freedom they had had while I was cleaning. I let them roll around in those little balls around the kitchen and down the hallway. Dodgers managed to escape the ball, but instead of running and hiding, she decided to climb on my foot and nibble on my toes so she was easily recovered and placed back in the ball... which I then taped shut. Apparently that was not appreciated because they later jimmied up the side of the cage and pushed the door open and got out.

Again, Dodgers lives up to her namesake in that she's not very bright. Where does she head? My bedroom. I was awakened at around 5:15 to sounds of her starting to chew on one of my books. Nothing else is going to wake me from a dead sleep without touching me than my books being messed with. Unfortunately, she got away and after 20 minutes or so I just decided to get ready. About the time we were getting ready to leave, I went in my closet to get my shoes. There was Dodgers who, when I put my hand down on the floor, climbed on in and let me take and put her back in the cage. Finding The Cadet is on my to do list for when we get home. Preferably before she starves and starts stinking up the place. Or eats my books. Oh hell, she better not eat my books. Now I'm going to be worrying about that all day long. I now have a horrible picture in my head that I'll get home and she's created a nest out of my favorite smut novels (with pirates of course) and is all settled in. Aaaaaarrrrrrrgggghhhhhhh!

2. While stopped at a red light this morning, I had this conversation with the rugrat and it almost made me cry.
RR: Hey, that store over there sells notebooks and backpacks.
Me: What store, and I don't see any sign.
RR: The Chinese one over there. Those characters mean notebooks and backpacks for sale.
Me: Oh... Okay, we'll check it out on the way home.

This is the first time it's really hit me that she's learning CHINESE and is accessing that knowledge almost subconsciously. It's like when I see a sign in Spanish, I just read it, but Chinese, I just pass over it because I don't know it. She sees the Chinese and stops to read it. I am assuming it will be the highlight of my day because really, does it get better?

3. So, I'm sneaking in a third one. I had to share that the rugrat had green macaroni and cheese for dinner last night and then we watched "Darby O'Gill and the Little People". Happy St. Patrick's Day to us!

Chinese New Year

2010-02-16T17:23:00.002-07:00

Rugrat's first grade class doing a ribbon dance. Rugrat is in the back left corner with the yellow headband and pink ribbon.

The re-naming of the rugrat

2010-02-05T11:47:00.004-07:00

Apparently the rugrat renamed herself when moving to the new daycare and invented the most hilarious reason how she came to be called "Maria" but her name is spelled "Malia". The only people at her daycare that know her name is actually pronounced "Malia" are those with whom I have regular contact.

Apparently a couple of conversations I had with her last summer inspired her when she got to start at a fresh daycare where no one knew her ahead of time. In one, we were discussing names and I mentioned that Malia was the Hawaiian version of Mary and that Maria was the Spanish version of Mary. Apparently she decided that since she looks like Dora the Explorer she should be using the Spanish version. So, she introduced herself to all the kids and teachers as Maria. Until a couple weeks ago, not many noticed, they just thought they'd misread or misheard depending on where they fit into things. I had spoken with a couple teachers and so I knew she was calling herself that, and they knew she wasn't really Maria.

I went in a couple weeks ago to pay for February and got chatting with the girl manning the front desk. It was the first time I'd encountered her there and she looked all sorts of confused when I told her I was there to pay for Malia. She asked if I meant Maria and kind of had a pitying look when she pronounced the name. I told her no, I meant Malia and that apparently she was one of those who Malia had confused. It was then that she told me the story that rugrat came up with.

Apparently she told several people that the couple of years of Japanese I took in college had confused me on my Ls and Rs and I had spelled it Malia, but pronounced it Maria because of this. My reaction to this was, of course, to laugh. I laughed for quite some time because frankly that's just about the funniest damn explanation ever. I'm not sure what entertains me the most. The fact that rugrat came up with it, or the fact that people at the daycare totally BOUGHT it as valid. That explains the pitying looks that I receive from some of the teachers whenever I asked for Malia by name, or when I jokingly called her Maria.

In case you hadn't guessed, the other conversation we had last summer was about how there is no L in Japanese so in my class, my tutor called me Kerry most of the time because he had a REALLY hard time with Ls. Once again, I'm amazed at what she picks up and remembers from our conversations. Just like with the shark teeth.

Bits and pieces

2010-01-06T08:18:00.003-07:00

I have a lot of little things going on so this probably won't be a very cohesive post, but you all know cohesive isn't really how my mind rolls anyway.

Christmas
The holidays were great and it was fantastic (for me) to spend nearly the entire 2 weeks I took off at the parents. Rugrat was beyond excited to spend that much time up there, I think because she didn't have to worry about me harassing her to clean her bedroom every night. There was food, there was fun, and we even all got to chat with my brother JC and his family over Skype Christmas Eve. My family, after several years of me touting it, finally started giving it a try and they are all believers. I also think it's hilarious that my nephew Zenock now thinks that we all live in the computer. It was so fun to see how excited he was to see us all even through while I was trying to get some settings, he kept hollering that he didn't want to talk to Kelly and to put Grandpa back. Then as soon as I did that he wanted to talk to me. Cracked me up. It was fun to also see how excited Malia and her cousins were to talk to Zen. I totally rocked at picking Christmas gifts for the rugrat this year, but now I have to play all the games she got. Battleship isn't too bad, but I'm more looking forward to some 2 person Lego Star Wars on the Wii. Given her love of the Indiana Jones Lego game for the DS, I figured the Star Wars would go over well. Despite not noticing that it was rated for 10+, the rugrat is a holy terror at that game. She'll probably beat me at that just like she does at Mario Kart.

Home Improvement
I've really only started on step one here. I finally got the storage bay and we begin moving crap into it this evening. I am moving stuff that just sits in bins and boxes because I don't have room for it in my condo. That way, it's easier to start on the improvements I plan to complete before selling the condo. Yes, it's mostly books, so when I buy a new house, I need 3 bedrooms, just so I have one for all my books to go on bookshelves. I plan on doing flooring in the living room and halls first, then I'll do each of the bedrooms, and eventually the bathroom and kitchen. I'm going to be re-doing the bathroom and kitchen, so I'll do those floors as I'm doing those rooms. I even already picked out all the stuff for each of the areas and I suckered some friends into agreeing to help me, so as I have the funds, we do each project. I'm really excited to get started because it means I get to paint again. Don't worry Grandma, I'm painting over my crazy color scheme with something more neutral so maybe you can come visit. :) I am not, however, painting any walls white. I'm sorry, but I just can't do it.

School
I'm getting a meeting set up next week to figure out the specifics of heading back to school. I know, you've all heard that before, but this time I will finish if it kills me. I believe that I can finish in a year and a half. Once I find out the specifics, then I get to hunt for a sitter because it'll be evening school, so the daycare is closed. Man, coordinating this crap is hard.

There you have it. That pretty much sums up what's happening right now. I know, it's exciting. Hey, at least for the first time in more than 6 months I actually care enough to do something instead of just thinking about planning to do something.

Bad Habits

2009-12-17T11:56:00.003-07:00

It's official, I've passed on some bad habits to the rugrat. Well, they aren't REALLY bad, but probably inappropriate in a social setting and I think I need to stress situational appropriateness. The habits I'm talking about relate to bathroom humor, so if you don't like it, just stop reading now because I promise it'll be too much for you if you don't find fart jokes funny.

Last night we hit up Zoo Lights at the Hogle Zoo with my best friend Allee and her husband Matt. This would be the infamous Aunt Allee to those of you Malia has shared with. Anyway, it was pretty cold, but apparently rugrat's butt stayed nice and toasty all night long given the amount of gas happening. I do not exaggerate, she spent nearly the whole time farting it up. Each fart was followed up by a giggle and an "excuse me". So, at least she's polite about it. She also dropped a few while we were at Olive Garden and I'm glad that when she was doing it, there weren't people sitting way close to us. I'm sure I should have at least pretended to be embarrassed by it, but she's 6! It's not like she's any good at holding it in at this point in time. At least she owns up to it to. Frankly there isn't much worse than a farter who won't own up to it.

The fun is not limited to farting, but also to the bathroom. Oh, I'm not going into the details of what happens between her and the toilet because that's too much even for me, but more her attitude towards it. How many 6 year old girls do you know who have reading material for the bathroom? Well, technically, it's mine, but she's partial to reading through cooking magazines so she regularly steals my Taste of Home from the kitchen to peruse while using the restroom. She also likes to mark her place so she can continue. I swear that girl is in the bathroom for like 15 minute stretches because she forgets what she's in there for and just starts reading. Yeah, she's her mother's AND grandfather's kid.

The last piece I attribute to her Uncle JC because even though she probably picked it up from me, he's more infamous in the family for doing it. Nearly every time she poops, she announces as she comes back into the living room: "Do No-ot go in there" a la Jim Carrey as Ace Ventura. Yes, I find it to be hilarious and I crack up every time she does it.

So, either I'm the best mom ever for being able to find such humor, or the worst role model ever for allowing, nay, encouraging some of this behavior.

Oh, and this is the type of posting you get when I make a personal vow to post more because people keep harassing me about wanting more entertainment. So, you asked for it.

Trio of fun

2009-12-15T09:49:00.006-07:00

I've been looking through some pictures that I have handy and thought I'd share with you. The first is my current favorite picture of the rugrat and it's also my desktop picture at work. Every time I see it I just chuckle because it's so very her. That's her "Moe face".

This was my father's Halloween costume last year and I know I've shared it before, but man it makes me laugh. She really enjoys the Three Stooges cartoon that is on Boomerang and the plan is to introduce her to the real thing courtesy of my fathers DVDs when we're up visiting over the holidays.

Speaking of my father, I must share my current favorite picture I have of him. It's going to be next on the desktop rotation when I get sick of Molia. Haha, get it? Moe/Malia. Yeah, I'm easily entertained. I thought the following picture was taken at a friends wedding reception. The one where my two worlds collided due to my sister Krissy's best friend from when they were kids marrying one of my best friends. Technically they are both my friends, but it was just weird to attend a wedding of a friend of mine where my family was also invited. Anyway, upon reviewing it a touch closer, I don't know if it was at the wedding or another get together involving BBQ of some sort. Regardless, it's fantastic imagery.

This picture rocks because my dad should be moonlighting as the Colonel. I'm pretty sure he could make some money if he just bought a nice white suit and got the beard a touch more pointy. I'd like to point out that he made that bolo tie and I wish that I liked them as a fashion statement for myself because he's made some beautiful ones. The man loves a good rock!

The third picture is of my niece Hannah. My sister Kami recently had my other sister Krissy take some family photos. Yes, my parents named us Kelly, Kristen, Kami, and yes, my dad never gets our names right when more than one of us is present. =) This picture is my favorite of the bunch because it just captures, to me, the "essence" of my niece. Big old grin, but the attitude is apparent in the hands on the hips.

Just call her shark girl

2009-12-10T08:12:00.007-07:00

As many of you know, I am obsessed with sharks. Shark Week on Discovery Channel is just about my favorite time of the year. I'm still undecided if I like Christmas-time or Shark Week better. Christmas has family and friends and spending time with them, but Shark Week has SHARKS!!! I mean, come on, SHARKS! As a result of this, ye olde rugrat also has a love of sharks and we watch many a show on them. She's decided to be a Veterinarian and a Marine Biologist so she can study and help all animals. I realize she's only six, but this isn't something new. It's pretty much been the theme her whole life, with only minor references to wishing she could be a princess when she grew up, but only if she still got to play with boy toys like Legos.

Now that you have some background, I present to you shark girl:

Yep, those are her grownup teeth coming on in behind her baby teeth. The middle two are very loose and the side two are starting to loosen up. In fact the middle one on the right of the picture is only hanging in her mouth by a thread because the bottom of the tooth sticks out of her gums at a weird angle. We're giving it until after Christmas, then if at least one hasn't come out we're going to have to visit the dentist and get those baby teeth yanked.

You may ask, why "shark girl". Well, that's how the majority of shark's teeth work. They have multiple lines of teeth and when they lose one another one moves up to take it's place. As seen here:

I would like to point out that she is the one that started telling people that she has shark teeth. She remembers so much from the different documentaries that as soon as she noticed what was going on in her mouth she told me she was excited because she must be part shark. Man, I love this kid!

I'm behind again

2009-11-19T09:10:00.003-07:00

Well, once again I'm totally behind on pretty much everything. For your entertainment though, here is a pic taken of the rugrat and I in full costume while visiting my work. She had wings and a wand with her costume, but left them in the car. Also, she decided to be a Skull Fairy after we went to the doctor for her flu mist and they gave her the sticker that's in the middle of her shirt.

Take note that she's holding my hedgehog and I do have my handy flamingo for any impromptu games of croquet someone would like to play with the queen. If you look closely, you can see the card suites on the material of my dress.And yes, that is the costume I made myself last year, but I don't care because that puppy took me like 15+ hours of sewing. I'm using it until it either no longer fits, or falls apart!

I'm an idiot

2009-10-13T09:21:00.003-06:00

I know how much everyone loves my text only posts, but trust me when I say this one is worth it. Believe me, the title really says it all.

It's no secret that I am pretty smart. I'm not going to even pretend modesty because anyone who knows me knows it would be a load of crap. I do, however, believe this intelligence is balanced by a healthy dose of instances of absolute idiocy. I'm sure many of you have heard stories of this, the most recent, outside of today's story, is the one involving hemorrhoid cream being purchased and used instead of hydrocortisone cream. The packaging looked the same, and frankly, it worked just as well, if not better. I still haven't bought hydrocortisone cream, but I have had bugbites since. Yep, I've been using the hemorrhoid cream and you know what? It works, so there.

Anyway, on to today's instance of absolute idiocy. In attempting to balance my lazy parenting when it comes to meals, I've been trying to at least make breakfast every morning. I figure that will somewhat balance out the fact that 90% of the time we have cold cereal for dinner. This morning I opted to make egg muffins because I had all the ingredients. Another attempt of mine is to try and be a bit more healthy so I recently purchased the olive oil pan spray instead of the regular kind. Yeah, olive oil is still fatty, but it's one of those fats that is also good for you. Anyway, if you are familiar with these cans, they have a little red dot that you are supposed to line up the spray thingie with. Yeah, I'm technically inclined. Thingie is close enough. So, because I've not used this one before, it's not lined up. I make my move to turn the spray thingie and instead of just turning it, I pushed it down a little as I turned it. This resulted in spraying myself from the right to the left right across in my eyes. Brilliant, aren't I?

After I rushed to the bathroom and spent 15 minutes rinsing out my eyes and attempting to clean my contacts off, I managed to finish cooking breakfast even though everything was a touch blurry. Good thing that I have backup glasses. Normally I only wear them in the evenings and weekends at home, but now I get to wear them to work. I will give the olive oil one positive though. It doesn't burn. There isn't any stinging or itching or anything like you would normally have happen if you sprayed something in your eyes. My eyes seem to move more easily as well, so maybe it's a good lubricant. Unfortunately, I am pretty sure I've not gotten it all out and that's why things are a touch blurry. It's getting better as the day progresses and I use more eye drops though, so I'm sure it will be fine in the end.

Well, there you have my idiot story of the day. I hope I've provided you with entertainment to start off your day.

FINALLY!!

2009-08-07T16:29:00.001-06:00

I know it's not super exciting but I have wanted one of these forever. My mom has one and I have coveted. Yeah I know, commandment #whichever says not to covet, but that specifies a wife so I think I might be okay.

The main reason I have wanted one is because of space. Not the final frontier of, the lack of in my condo and especially my kitchen. I now have somewhere that is not a countertop or fridge drawer to put fresh veggies and fruits. Woo!

Oh yeah, pretend you can't tell how badly my window is in need of washing. I'm lazy, sue me. Or not because if I am this excited about getting a hanging basket for my window, I probably don't have anything worth winning in a lawsuit. Except maybe the extensive smut collection and that you will have to pry from my cold dead hands.

Happy Friday or whatever day it is when you read this.

Family visits are fun...

2009-07-25T09:19:00.001-06:00

A few weeks ago my Uncle Lee came for a little visit from the almost Great White North, Port Angeles Washington. We mainly sat around catching up and chatting but we did head on out to Maddox Steakhouse for dinner. Mmmm, turkey steak. Anyway I took this picture, but apparently I'm not that good because you can only see parts of who was there.

It was great to see Lee since it's been almost 5 1/2 years. Here's to hoping I can make it up there for some deep sea fishing next summer!

Summer family addition #1 is here and I'm melting

2009-07-19T17:42:00.004-06:00

Despite her efforts to the contrary, my new niece joined us this past Monday July 13th. I am SO jealous of the birthdate. I wanted to have my kid to someday be able to have a Friday the 13th birthday party, but NO, stupid hospital had to be all booked up on the 13th for inducements, so I had to go in on the 12th. I'll forgive her eventually for hanging out so long they had to remind her to come, but I'm expecting to be rewarded for doing so with her first smile or my name as her first word. I'm cool with either.

All joking aside, I'm way excited for my sister and her husband. They are thrilled to finally have her here and I am too. I'm sure everyone knows my thoughts on kids, but dangit, family is different and I'll be sure to hold her before she's six months old. I can hardly wait until this weekend to see her.

Here is a link to my sisters post with the initial pictures that are just so dang cute. I know, I'm making you all click extra to see pics, but I'm far too hot and lazy to get pictures posted here. Why am I hot in addition to my normal laziness? Well, once again the swamp cooler gods have taken out their wrath upon me. For whatever reason, the fan portion of the cooler will not actually start fanning. It sounds like something is wedged preventing it's movement. It'll be sometime next week before the handyman can come and fix it. I really hope it's not what I fear. There have been some problems with birds nesting in most inconvenient places in the various buildings in my condo complex and I worry that they've done so in my swamp cooler. The odds are slim, but we all know how I like to worry.

Meanwhile, I have improvised my very own swamp cooler. Never let it be said that I cannot produce moments of brilliance, because I'm pretty sure my jimmy-rigged swamper is beyond everyday genius. Luckily I have crappy sinus cavities. Because of this, I always have a mister running to add humidity to the air, except during the summer when I am running the swamp cooler. Well, I've moved that cool mister into the corner of my living room, just in front of an oscillating fan, creating my own version of a swamp cooler. I wish I'd thought of it yesterday afternoon, but it's been fantastic this afternoon. I think it is actually below 80 in my condo right now. That could be that the sun is starting to go down, but I prefer to attribute my genius pseudo swamp cooler.

I leave you with this. Skip to 0:55 for the punchline.

Sometimes they write themselves

2009-07-04T19:38:00.002-06:00

A conversation I just had with the rugrat on the way back to my parents after her cousin Hannah's birthday party:

Me: I don't feel well. I will probably go to bed soon after we get to Grandma and Grandpa's house.
Rugrat: You must be pregnant.
Me: No, I am not pregnant.
RR: Are you sure? Aunt Kami doesn't feel well and she is pregnant.
Me: I know she is, but I am not pregnant.
RR: How do you know? You could be.
Me: Trust me, I know I am not.
RR: Are you really sure? You never know.
Me: I know. Look, you are 5 and I am not explaining how I know until you are older.
RR: When will you tell me? When I am 12?
Me: Sure. I have a book or two I'll let you read.
RR: Oh MAN! You always make me wait so long to tell me ANYTHING.

I dread her teenage years.

Picture is of my niece, Hannah, in her birthday princess crown.

End to an era

2009-07-02T09:39:00.002-06:00

The hospital where the rugrat was born is no more. I knew it was coming but I noticed after my doctor's appointment this morning that the specific labor and delivery wing has been torn down. The rubble in the picture is the remains of where I got my little bundle of joy and insanity. I'm surprisingly sentimental about it.

Farewell Cottonwood Hospital.

Testing 1, 2, 3?

2009-06-30T09:00:00.002-06:00

This is just a test. I am seeing if I can get my email blogging to work. Bonus picture of my burned wrist.

Not a whole lot a shaking going on

2009-04-08T09:39:00.003-06:00

The only truly exciting thing happening right now is that I'm almost done with this semester! Only a couple weeks left and I'm so ready to be done. It's still up in the air when I'm going to go back because I've determined that I'm too old to work full time, go to school, and run after a 5 1/2 year old. I'm worn out and I'm pretty sure no one wants to come to my house until the end of May when I catch up on the last 3 months house cleaning slack.

I also found out that I do not have Diabetes. It's such a relief. I have what's called PCOS and a severe Vitamin D deficiency. I've been prescribed 20 minutes of sunlight a day. No, I'm not joking, and yes, it's HILARIOUS. The PCOS can still lead to Diabetes, but we're trying some new medication and I'm continuing with the diet/exercise plan I've been doing since before Thanksgiving. This alone has made this week the best ever! Even though it took getting an ear/sinus infection to get me back into the doctor. Once she had me, she dragged me through all the tests. I didn't want to do it because I didn't want to know how bad things were. Well, they aren't really bad at all. I will most likely never be able to have more children, but since I'd already decided on that option, I'm totally cool with that.

It's nice that the weather is getting warmer and the rugrat and I starting back in to taking short walks after dinner. It's nice for me because it burns off a bit of that extra energy. It's also zoo season so look for more lovely picture slideshows from the rugrat. We're going to try some bigger hikes this summer as well, so you might even get some entertaining slideshows of the mountains. That's if Malia slows doen long enough to let me catch up and to take some pictures. I look forward to the extra sleep that summer brings. Mainly just due to wearing ourselves out. Yeah, it's going to rain for the next few days, but at least it's staying warmer. We're heading on up to the parents (who won't actually be there) for Easter weekend, so look for sewing project posts. I'm hoping to finally get maternity shirts made for my sisters. You know, before they actually give birth. We may even run up some quickie princess costumes for the girls. I wish I'd taken pictures of Hannah trying on all her new princess clothes. Malia outgrew some that Grandma & Grandpa Brey gave her for Christmas a couple years ago, and since Haylee got the same thing, Hannah got rugrat's set. It was so adorable. She had to go through all of the outfits and try them all on. The best is that she poses and walks around with her shoulders back. Because, you know, that's how princesses roll my friends.

Anyway, look for more fun in the coming months!

I'm leaving the club...

2009-03-16T10:25:00.003-06:00

For those in the know, I've been a member of the Harlequin Book(s) of the month club for a couple years or so. I am going to have to quit though. When I joined up I got to select the type of books I wanted to receive. Unfortunately I couldn't specify Pirates, Vikings, or the Scots, but it did let me select Historical. Over the last few months it has apparently become optional to send me selections from the ONE group I specified I wanted books from. It started with a contemporary romance thrown in now and again. I didn't mind, because they were actually quite good and I enjoyed them, so I let the slip pass as the other 2 or 3 books were historical.

Then I got a book that was about a deformed girl with no face who never knew her family and the aunt who finally found out about her because the girl had been hidden by some crazy government/corporation thing. It was an almost thriller and I kept reading hoping for some sort of smut-related happening. I hoped in vain. Sorry to spoil the end for you, but the aunt ends up as a hostage and when the dude goes to shoot her, forces the gun to her eye so that her face could be given to her niece. Yeah, it was sappy but it was a fairly entertaining book. However, it was NOT smut. I complained and the historical romance started coming again, in fact I believe the next shipment included "The Pirate Bride", so I was satisfied once again.

Then I got a NASCAR themed novel. Are you kidding me? Not only are you sending Contemporary when I requested Historical, but now it's about car racing? I like pirates and vikings and knights and sword fighting and whatnot. What the crap do I want to read about car racing? I read it though. I figured I should at least give it a try. Well, it wasn't good. I mean, the smut parts were really good, but I could have done with the rest of the story and it dragged the whole thing down overall. This was nearly the last straw. However, I decided to give them another chance because once again, it came with historical smut too.

This however has now changed. Mid last week I received the second set in a row with NO historical smut. This is not acceptable. Additionally not only were they not historical, but they could barely be termed romance. Especially in the largest of the three books. The main character is a widow and she has a little widow's group where they make lists of their wishes. 2 of the characters fall in love and all that jazz, but it's very tame and peripheral to the main story. The main character just wants to go to Paris with someone she loves and it's something she never got to do with her husband before he died. Well, of course she doesn't fall in love, she ends up adopting a little girl and they plan to go to Paris because now she has someone she loves to go with her. Puke. Seriously, they should not be allowed to send this crap out labeled with romance because it's not. They should label it something like "Super sappy make you cry oh and there are dudes, but the women aren't focused on them they are focused on their loving friendships and parenting crap".

I will be cancelling my subscription and apparently I'm just going to have to create my own Smut of the Month by hitting up the Barnes & Noble one payday each month.

Now, for those of you left reading after that, I give you the rugrat portion of the post. We hit up the zoo on Saturday with Aunt Allee and had a great time. We were there for almost 4 hours and were able to see Muke. She's the gorilla that has cancer and isn't expected to live much longer. Malia was very happy to be able to see her, and then very sad when we got to the reptile house and the Anaconda that was her favorite animal in the zoo was gone. It passed away in January. She bounced back after we discovered that the crocodile is nesting, so there will most likely be baby ones fairly soon. Well, I don't know how soon. I'm no crocodile expert so I really couldn't tell you when they will be here.

After the zoo Malia got to go back and hang with Allee and her husband Matt while I went to my cousin Jessica's wedding dinner. It was a lovely dinner and the highlight for me was the little girl sitting at the table next to us who kept saying "ew" everytime Jessica and her husband kissed. I also enjoyed the stories the boys told about Jess. I don't envy her growing up with 5 brothers. I much prefer the 3 girls to 1 boy ratio in my own family. HAHA JC!

Anyway, rugrat and I have been discussing getting a cat again for some time. We had to give up the 2 siamese cats we had when we moved because our condo is just too small for two cats. I didn't want to split them up because they were from the same litter and had always been together. Every time we've discussed a cat, I've told her that I wouldn't be getting one until she finished cleaning her room. Well, on Saturday after spending a few hours at Allee's playing with her cats, Malia asked again. I told her that if her room were clean, I'd buy her a cat the next day. I didn't think much of it and we headed home and went to bed after the long day.

I dragged my sorry behind out of bed about 9 Sunday morning. I had been awake since about 7:30, but didn't want to get up so I stayed burrowed into my covers. I got up and while I was trying to get my contacts in Malia kept harassing me to hurry so I could come see her room. I didn't think much of it because she randomly moves stuff around or sticks pictures on the wall to show me. Well, that's not what she did. I don't know what time she got up, but she managed to clean her entire bedroom and put EVERYTHING away. Outside of needing a good vacuum, her room was spotless. She reminded me what I'd promised the day before. So, we got a cat. His name is Butch and he's from the Summit County Friends of Animals. He's 5 and completely black with green-yellow eyes. He's also a ton of fun and likes to cuddle, but not too much cuddling. Anyway, here's a link to the only picture I've managed. The little bugger runs off everytime I break out the camera. Yes, he's really that dark. He doesn't have any white spots or anything, he's pure black.

Now we're back in Adventuring season, I'm hoping to get posting a bit more often. It's hard to post when your adventures consist of cooking spaghetti casserole and reading a smut novel.

I nearly killed a woman in Walmart last week

2009-02-11T10:01:00.004-07:00

Now that I've grabbed your attention, I'm going to caveat that with a "nearly killed her with laughter". Ha!

Today's post comes as a result of my linability to have a solely inner monologue and my inability to refrain from answering my daughter honestly when she asks me questions. Apparently this is delightful for those around me. I related this story to a friend at dinner last week and she mentioned that I provide a lot of entertainment. I'm taking that in a positive way, though I'm sure part of the entertainment comes from watching me slowly descend further into insanity. No complaints though because I'm enjoying the descent as well.

On to the story. Some time ago, someone on Twitter (@sarahbellum) mentioned that her deodorant smelled like cookies. This intrigued me and even more so when I found out that the scent of it was called Vanilla Chai and it's made by Secret. I decided that I needed to look into this because I always wear vanilla scented perfumes and this would not clash with that. In fact, a friend of mine thinks it's me every time she smells vanilla when she's out shopping. I also like to think that anytime she's baking and has to use vanilla that she also thinks of me, but that's just because I like to think I'm more important in the day to day stuff of other people's lives than I really am. Occasionally I borrow someone else's perfume when I am going to her house, so I can sneak up on her and she doesn't know it is me. I know, I'm like a 12 year old.

Okay, really onto the story. The rugrat and I were in Walmart last week and since I needed new deodorant, I decided to check it out and see if I might like it. I picked it up and smelled. It did indeed smell like cookies. I determined that it was a little too much for me and place it back on the shelf. Here is where the crazy starts. Malia asked me why I wasn't going to get it and I replied that I didn't think I could handle my armpits smelling like cookies all the time because it was just too much. Unbeknownst to me, there was a lady standing behind me who started laughing so hard she started choking. After a few minutes she had gotten a hold of herself enough to sniff it for herself. She agreed that it did smell like cookies. She offered the advice that vanilla is an aphrodisiac to which I replied that I didn't think I wanted anyone getting the urge to do THAT sort of thing to my armpits because I was pretty sure it was inappropriate. That set her off again. I'm pretty sure that I was the highlight of her evening. She even told me that I was.

So, that is my tale of almost killing someone in Walmart. I wish I could say that this was an isolated incident, but it's not. I just can't seem to refrain from saying out loud the comments that pop into my head. Like the time when Malia was about 3 and a lady asked me when I was due. I looked at Malia and told her "about 3 years ago". That time the lady didn't laugh, but the cashier had a really hard time ringing me up because she was trying not to laugh at the mortified lady behind me. She was still red as a tomato when I was done checking out. I know, it was kind of jerk thing to say, but it was funny in my head so I'm okay with that.

Side Note, as of this writing, Malia has 7 day's in a row of getting greens. She's informed me that she's trying for 20 days in a row. I'm so proud!

I blame life

2009-02-02T08:39:00.009-07:00

As most of you know, I've recently gone back to school. Because of this Malia and I aren't having as many adventures which explains the lack of posts. I keep thinking about posting about the cluster that has been getting back into school and the one surrounding health issues, but then I always decide that that stuff is just too boring and no one really wants to hear it. I figure I've bored you enough with the school issues. Well, that was a pretty long segue into telling about this weekend fun..

Saturday we got up bright and early, hit the Starbucks for some lovely hot chocolate and went and got taxes done, then had breakfast, then did shopping for a bridal shower gift, then went to the library, then got gas, and arrived only 15 minutes late to my cousin's bridal shower. Yeah, the morning felt like that sentence. Just kept going and going and I thought I would never get to the end. Anyway, the bridal shower was my kind of bridal shower. Food, chit-chat, open presents, dessert, then go home. No crazy games or any of that business. For this I salute Aunt Jamie. Also, what says a bunch of chicks getting together more than having a salad bar and then decadent cream filled desserts afterwards? Malia and Haylee were big fans of that part and here they are enjoying their treats. I'm pretty sure these were their third or fourth, but they were happy, so it's all good.

After the shower, my sisters and I dragged my mom and the girls along to the fabric store so we could get material for some shirts I'm making for them. I even got Kami to agree to let me make her a muu-muu. After which she will no longer be eligible to mock me for my love of them. I forgot to take pictures of the material, but here are the shirts I'm making first. First we have the muumuu, then Kami's shirt, then Krissy's shirt.

After the fun, Malia and I hit up the grocery store for snacky supplies and then got to the parents. I got up first thing Sunday morning and threw together the BBQ. It was a very simple recipe and it was beef and pork. I went with pork chops instead of pork butt. I'm sad because it would have entertained me to tell the family they were eating pork butt. Alas, Kent's grocery let me down and there was no pork butt to be had. I forgot to take a picture of everyone enjoying the sandwiches yesterday, but I'm having some of the leftovers for breakfast, so here is a picture of the yumminess. Oh yeah, there was football game too, but I don't care who won, it's just a good excuse to have yummy food and hang with the family.

Christmas Fun - yeah I'm late.

2009-01-21T10:08:00.011-07:00

I'm a little behind with posting the Christmas stories, but in my defense, it's been a rather busy month. Malia and I headed up to the parents on December 22nd and stayed through January 2nd. It was really nice to get to spend a lot of time with the family. I even got to do quite a bit of shopping and just hanging with my baby sister which I haven't done in a long time. Yes Kami, you are still my baby sister, even though you are married with 1 1/4 kids. haha The best part for me over the holidays was learning that both my sisters are having babies! I get to be an aunt twice this year. They were also thoughtful in including my brother and I in some fashion. Kami is due on JC's birthday and Krissy is due the day before my birthday. I hope they both enjoy their crappy miserable pregnant summers. =) Love you guys.

I've digressed as usual. So, the days preceding Christmas were mostly spent wrestling children and baking. I made caramels which kinda went wonky, but ended up tasting all right. I also made some oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and some sugar/butter cookies. I am pretty sure my mother nearly keeled over with delight after having some of the sugar/butter cookies because they tasted just like Lorna Doone shortbread cookies which are her favorite in the whole world. She even asked me for the recipe which tells you how much she liked them seeing as it's an understatement to say she does not care for baking/cooking. It's a necessary evil to her I think.

So, armed with much snackery, we had our family party Christmas Eve. We do all the family presents with all of us kids and our kids and significant others if applicable. Unfortunately JC, Carin and Zenock weren't able to come for Christmas because he just had to use his money/time to come back in August for some crazy dude's wedding. Oh yeah, that crazy dude just happens to be JCs best friend and who his son is named after. I guess that is okay. Just don't let it happen again. You're lucky it happened to be the same time as Malia's birthday so she settled for that. Anyway, we opened all the presents and to my delight Malia went crazy for her computer. She declared it the best Christmas ever and once I downloaded some games spent most of the rest of the holiday playing on her computer. Viva la eBay for finding stuff like this! The picture to the left pretty much sums up about 50% of her Christmas vacation.

The other 50% was split between playing with her cousins and playing with the presents that Santa brought her. Santa brought her some more magnetix and a cupcake baking set. Not one of those where you have to buy all sorts of pre-made packages of stuff, a real set with measuring cups, mixing bowls, silicone baking sheet and a recipe book. We made cupcakes Christmas Day. She was beyond excited to make cupcakes. I helped a little with the mixing and putting the batter in the muffin baking silicone, but she did most of it all by herself.

She also spent some of that time building stuff with her magnetix. She built a turtle and a hot air balloon for a mini-barbie that Haylee brought over.

All in all it was an excellent Holiday vacation even though Malia wouldn't try my mom's WONDERFUL shrimp cocktail that she makes every year for New Year's.

Malia causes a ruckus

2009-01-12T09:42:00.002-07:00

I apparently missed a good time at church yesterday. Firstly Malia (age 5 1/2) voluntarily shared half of her orange with her cousin Haylee (age 3 1/2) because her mom Krissy forgot snacks. That alone should be considered a sign of the apocalype I say. Her good behavior at school is starting to spill over into real life and I find I quite enjoy that.

Apparently Haylee was not happy about being in Sacrament meeting, so she threw a tantrum which resulted in her being taken out by her mom. As she's being carried out, she's kicking her feet. She's wearing slip ons that apparently don't stay on her feet very well so she kicks one off. My daughter, in an attempt to be helpful runs after them picking up the shoe hollering at Krissy that she dropped Haylee's shoe and chasing after them.

Even a day later, picturing this scene makes me giggle. Who knew Malia's newfound desire to be helpful could result in such entertainment.

Color Count from school last week: 2 green days, 2 yellow days and 1 yellow and green day (yeah, the teacher smokes something, I don't know)

Yet another quickie

2009-01-06T11:29:00.003-07:00

Rugrat has kicked off the new year on a good foot at Kindergarten. Yesterday, she brought home Green with four smilies! She ended the year well too with 2 greens in a row that last week of school, with 3 total that week. She hasn't gotten a red now in over two weeks of actual school. I'm really hoping that things finally clicked for her. That or my somewhat snotty note to her teacher asking for her to actually give me details on what the problems were so I could follow up with Malia made her realize that maybe she wasn't carding appropriately. I don't really know, but regardless, I'm happy about it.

I do think part of it is the newest deal we have going. I told Malia that if she got mostly green in January that when I got my tax return I would get her a Nintendo DS. Every time we go to Ryan's, he lets her play on his and she loves it. Also a ton of the girls at her daycare have them. I also agreed to buy her one of the Littlest Pet Shop games so she'd have at least one game. Also, each month she gets mostly green, she can get another game and $5 put in the spending money (for our vacation to DC in June to visit my brother and his wife and kid). I figure ~$25 a month isn't too bad to get her to behave herself. Mainly because eventually she'll get in the habit of behaving and the bribery will no longer be as necessary. The deal ends after school is done, so I'll probably have to come up with something fun for her to earn over the summer. At least I have a few months to think of something.

I made it home

2009-01-04T06:06:00.002-07:00

Yes, we made it home. After two weeks of basically not being online, I have returned. However, I am too tired to post anything. I also realized that I managed to take not one single picture the entire two week holiday visit to the parents. Yes, I am that horrible. Malia did take some, but they are on her computer so I'll have to pull them off so I can post them for you all. I am not even going to pretend that's happening anytime soon. It may be Valentine's Day before I get around to it. Anyway, a grand time was had by all and I'll give the whole story when it's not 6 in the morning and I've already been awake for two hours. Crazy dude upstairs apparently is arguing with himself. I am not sure but there may have been fisticuffs. I know there was at least some hammering which is what woke me in the first place. This dude is starting to drive me bonkers. I wish he could keep his crazy for when I'm not home.

There are times I don't love my job

2008-12-18T23:37:00.003-07:00

Like when something breaks and I'm the only member of my team in the country and so I get to head into the office with rugrat in tow at 9:00 at night. It's now 11:40 and I still don't know what time we'll be heading home. Luckily for me Malia will fall asleep anywhere. Here's a lovely shot of her sleeping under the cubicle right behind me at work. She's been out and snoring for about an hour and a half.

she shoots, she scores!

2008-12-17T11:11:00.003-07:00

Rugrat went GREEN yesterday! She was so excited. I rewarded her by letting her take a toy out of the "give to the daycare because you keep getting red or orange" bin and she got to pick dinner. I know I'm not really supposed to reward her with food, but I caved and bought her Arctic Circle. I made the mistake of trying their "new" ham and cheese. Well, if it had just been ham and fake cheese it probably would have been fine, but there was some sort of bizarro sauce on there that was like a cross between honey mustard and hot dog relish. It was not a good cross.

Back to the fugrat...

I'm hoping that my new strategy is what prompted her to behave. Aside from the whole teacher having it in for her feeling, she really does need to be better about following the classroom rules and the main reason she keeps getting to orange is because she gets told to pull a yellow card and then cries about it and throws a fit which results in her getting an orange card for the tantrum. New rules at home are

Red = two toys in the bin mentioned above
Orange = one toy in the bin
Yellow = neutral, nothing happens with toys
Green = Remove one toy from the bin

I told her we wouldn't do anything with the bin of toys until it's full so at the very least I'm sure she'll get enough greens and yellows to keep the level of toys down in the bin. We'll see how that works. I am getting more information from the teacher about her behavior and what exactly she's getting in trouble for so things are getting better. I will be continuing to keep an eye on things though.

Edit: I just noticed I referred to Malia as the fugrat. Makes me giggle so I'm not changing it.

More fun with the rugrat

2008-12-16T14:09:00.002-07:00

I don't have anything particularly exciting going on right now except that I've finished up all my shopping completely. However I apologize in advance to JC/Carin/Zenock in case your package doesn't come before Christmas.

I realized last night that the recent stresses are taking a toll. After just about the crappiest last 5 days of work ever because of course everything breaks when I'm the only team member available, I needed a good baking to de-stress. I made chocolate chip cookies. Malia and my co-workers are quite happy about this. It was afterwards when Malia informed me that I wasn't any fun anymore and that I should take a hot bath and just relax and everything would be great. It just made me realize how in tune she is with my being in stress. I apparently need to deal with stress better and especially at home. I thought I'd share because really how many 5 year olds tell their mom to just take a nice hot bath and relax and everything will be just fine. She cracks me up and is such a delight even when she's a contributor to the stress sometimes.

Morning Drives like this one make it all worth while

2008-12-12T08:56:00.004-07:00

Sometimes even the crappiest run of luck can have some outstandingly great times. Yes, I'm pretty sure I just made up a word, but it's my job so it's okay. This morning compared against yesterday was pretty fantastic. Not anything too spectacular, but just a good morning. Malia seems certain that she will get green today. She told me that every time she takes her Aurora doll as her toy for the day she gets green. So that is the toy she took this morning. The thought of this seemed to put her in a receptive mode because I only had to ask her one extra time to get dressed. I think the extra bedtime story is working to help her get to sleep. That and she enjoys it when I occasionally get tongue-tied reading her Dr. Seuss. We read two of the each night and her new favorite is Fox in Socks. That's the only one that really gets me because it's so easy to accidentally speed up when reading it out loud. She also really likes Green Eggs and Ham and has starting at least trying foods that I make instead of dismissing them outright as something she doesn't like. Who loves Dr. Seuss? I love Dr. Seuss.

As we jumped in the car to take her to daycare we were listening to a little Amy Winehouse. Again I must thank my friend for making me actually listen to her. I'd been reading about her in the tabloids for months but had never actually listened to her. I'm glad I did. Anyway, the following conversation took place:

Me: This is kinda dancing music, don't you think?
Malia: Yep, my bum cheeks are dancing!
Me: Oh yeah? Good music for it then.
Malia: My right one is doing the cha-cha and my left one is doing the ants in my pants dance.
Me:...
Malia: Oh wait, now they are both doing the Dave Mustaine rocks dance.

That's right, my five year old daughter referenced Dave Mustaine of Megadeth. She's also asked if I could get her some of his music because he rocks. This is due to an episode of Duck Dodgers where they defrost Dave Mustaine from being cryogenically frozen to come back and defeat the Martians easy listening Saxophone. I may have to hit up my Uncle Rick for some of his Megadeth collection since they are his favorite band.

She also popped out another gem as she was taking her jacket off at daycare. She told me, "My life was really great when I was three. I kind of miss those days." I wish I knew where she came up with some of this stuff, but that one had me and Dializ (daycare owner) nearly in tears laughing. My daughter is weird and I absolutely love it!

Here is the Dave Mustaine Duck Dodgers for your viewing pleasure:

I feel I must share - wall of text ahead

2008-12-11T08:30:00.004-07:00

I apologize in advance. It's been a rather tough month or so and I haven't posted much happy stuff. This is not a happy post either so I'm giving you a heads up now. Please stop reading if you're looking for something happy. If you just want something entertaining, then I'm pretty sure this will hit the spot for you.

I've already had one of those mornings where I wish I'd never gotten out of bed and it's not even 9 am. Mainly because my morning started at 3:30. That's right. I said 3:30. And I didn't get to bed until 12:30. The guy who lives above me has absolutely no concept of what is an appropriate time to be hammering. What is he hammering you may well ask. I honestly don't give a rat's behind of caring about what he is hammering. I'd really love for him to not do it in the MIDDLE of the NIGHT! I wish he would do it during the day. You know, when no one else is home and he's spending it sleeping. He doesn't work, he's home all the time. Apparently from what I've gathered he really only leaves to do grocery shopping and that's in the middle of the night. I don't really care what he does for the most part, but the music and television at full volume all the time even into the night was bad enough and now the hammering has started over the last couple of months. He gets a talking to and I'm pretty sure he's being fined as well for it. Every night I know that I will have to ask him at least 3 times to turn down the radio/tv. He turns it down, but then it goes up again within an hour. I've lived here for over a year now and it's not really any better than when I moved in. Unfortunately I think that the HOA may have to bring in the police over it because he's disturbing the peace constantly during the night and I'm not the only one affected. From what I understand it's been like that for at least 5 years.

It took me nearly an hour to fall back asleep only to be awakened by a huge crash of dishes in the kitchen. I admit I freaked a bit because I wasn't sure if someone had broken in or what. I grabbed a shoe and headed out there after verifying that the rugrat was in her room sound asleep. I know, a shoe is kind of dumb but I didn't have anything else and at least it has a pointy heel. To my relief there was no one there, but I did have a shattered bowl on my kitchen floor. It appears that one of the holder things for the shelf failed and dumped the contents. It was of course the top shelf in the cabinet because that's just how my luck goes. The bowl that broke is the middle size of a set of three I got at Costco. I'm sad because these were my favorite mixing bowls. Luckily I didn't use the middle size very often, so I'm not too sad. Along with the bowl on the floor there was a ton of silverware and my strainer. I'm a little behind on dishes and I got tired of doing them last night so I put all the silverware in the strainer on the counter. Yeah, they got caught by the falling mixing bowl. Is it bad that I just cleaned up the bowl and not the rest? I was too tired. Oh yeah and bleeding all over. Yep, you were probably waiting for that part weren't you? At least if you know me at all you were. I would have left the whole thing up except sometimes Malia gets up at night to get a drink and I didn't want her cutting herself. So I picked up the first piece and managed to slice open my left thumb. It doesn't look that bad, but that's because it's a pretty clean cut, just a bit deep. Not enough to warrant stitches thank heavens because I don't think I could have handled that this morning.

You may be wondering why on earth I wasn't asleep until 12:30. Well it was a not good day for Malia at school and the information I was given about her behavior. I talked about the color card system before. Well yesterday she was on orange. So I asked what she did and she told me she'd been patting one of the other girls on the head. I asked if she'd done it more than once because orange is the second card that you pull and she said that she hadn't. I admit that I didn't believe her and now I feel badly about that. She brings home a contract every day that is supposed to have her misbehaviors listed out on it. Starting the end of last week and the first part of this week it didn't say anything on it, just frowny faces and a comment that she was whatever color card she was. I wrote a note asking for the appropriate information because I can't back up their behavior program if I don't know what they feel she did wrong. Yes I phrased that correctly. I really think that the teacher has it in for Malia and has her pull cards for things that the other kids don't have to. Part of this is due to the mostly inane reasons given for pulling cards and the fact that the number of things she did wrong is not counting up to the number of cards she's pulling. She gets in trouble for things that all kids do. Like arguing over who gets to go first down the slide. She got a card pulled one day for climbing up the slide backwards. Seriously? That's worth a card? The other part is the way that Malia talks about it. She talks like she has to be careful about everything she does because she doesn't know if she's going to have to pull a card or not. I know she's not perfect and I know she misbehaves, but she's told me that she has to be extra careful in class to not get in trouble. She loves the school work but I can tell that she is noticing a lack of consistency on the teachers' part. I took a look at the contract for yesterday and sure enough it states she was on orange. It also says that the only thing she did wrong was pat a girl on the head. Nothing else. Am I just not getting their carding system? She's been on yellow before when she sat on a kid's feet. Is head touching considered way worse? I'm at a loss. I don't want to discount the whole thing to her because then she won't try to be good. I feel like I'm backing up a program that is inconsistent and frankly unfair as far as I can see. Anyway, I was up so late because I was trying to figure out if I'm incorrect in my perception and if there is something else I can try doing to get Malia to do what she's supposed to do. That is, if she doesn't start getting in trouble for looking at the other kids wrong. At this point in time I'm just kind of waiting for that. I added a note to her contract asking what else she did wrong yesterday because I didn't think that the information on her behavior was comprehensive as it didn't add up to Orange based on past contracts. Hopefully it wasn't too snarky, but it wouldn't surprise me if it wasn't.

Here is a picture of the remains of my bowl:

I was bored...

2008-12-10T11:27:00.001-07:00

76 words

Speedtest

An adventure in shopping

2008-12-07T13:28:00.003-07:00

This isn't really an adventure, but I'm irritated by others after spending yesterday afternoon finishing up Christmas shopping. I have determined that next year for sure I am not entering any store other than for essentials after halloween. People are idiots when it comes to sales. Sales associates are also idiots and I must share the one encounter yesterday that really made me angry.

I carried my purchases at the old Mervyn's going out of business sale (which was rather nice, but I'm not going back in there) to the checkout where the following conversation took place:

Cashier: (looking at one of the items) I hope you aren't going to be putting liquor in those.
Me: Certainly not! Those are beer glasses, not brandy snifters.
Cashier: Same difference
Me: Well no, it's not. If you'd said alcohol then you could say same difference.
Cashier: Whatever, I really hope you aren't putting anything alcholic in them.
Me: Well, they aren't for me so I won't be putting anything in them, but the person they are for does not drink, but will really enjoy them regardless. Outside of that, it's really none of your business and rather inappropriate for you to even be giving me such crap.
Cashier: Drinking is bad for you.

He then refused to speak to me while he finished ringing me up except to tell me my total. The lady running the register next to him apologized to me and he gave her a dirty look.

Regardless of feelings about alcohol and it's goodness or badness, this kid was not joking and I was really annoyed by his insistence that I must not put alcohol into BEER glasses. I kind of wonder what he says to the people that buy wineglasses. I have wineglasses, but the only thing that goes into them is martinellis.

Sorry, but this just made me angry.

On the upside I am now finished with my Christmas shopping except for my brother because I apparently managed to completely forget purchasing him something. Hope I remember JC, or you're sharing Carin's present. ;)

I have been busy - UPDATED

2008-12-02T10:39:00.005-07:00

I haven't posted anything in awhile because I haven't care to. Also because I've been doing a lot of reading and enjoying not worrying about the internet. I spent a lovely Thanksgiving holiday at the parents. I also managed to remain completely off the internet until returning home Sunday evening. This may be a record for me. Malia also managed to only go to Orange at school yesterday so that's a good thing. Anything is a step up from Red all the time. It's nice to open up her backpack to get out her schoolwork and not have a big red paper in there informing me she was exteremely naughty and misbehaved. EDIT: She got green yesterday! Viva la bribery! I'm pretty sure the idea that if she gets 10 green days she gets to pick a new Ponyville or a Littlest Pet Shop toy is the reason.

She and I got up our decorations Sunday afternoon. Not like it's super exciting or anything because we don't have a lot of room. I got a lovely 3 foot pre-strung tree at ShopKo and we got some snowmen and Rudolph cartoon ornaments. We haven't hung the Rudolph ones because I keep forgetting to pick up some hooks so we can. Hopefully I'll remember today on my way home after the baby shower. Is it wrong that I truly hate baby showers. I love my family and I love that they are having kids, but I hate baby showers and I'm not overly fond of babies until they are about 6 months old. I realize I'm a mom, but that doesn't mean I have to like kids. Outside of my family and friends anyway.

I haven't taken a pic of our tree yet, so in order for you to not feel bad, I've included a crappy camera shot I took yesterday of one at work... where they didn't measure and there are a good 6 or so inches of the tree squished across the ceiling.

A note on behavior and the sometime suckiness of single parentdom

2008-11-17T15:51:00.006-07:00

I realized that I mostly only blog about the fun stuff that happens leading a lot of people to believe that the rugrat and I lead a charmed life of rainbows and unicorns that poop marshmallows. This is not, in fact, reality.

Case in point the ongoing saga with Malia's school which I've finally become calm enough to comment on. She's got some bad behavior issues especially tantrums when she doesn't get what she wants, she never stops talking, and she's got the biggest smartmouth around. Yes, she gets the mouth from me, but I do try to keep it somewhat under control. She hasn't learned that lesson yet. I had hoped that starting Kindergarten would help with this and for the first month and a half it appeared that it had. She was behaving much better at daycare and even at home. Unfortunately it was not the case at school. She was apparently saving up all her naughty for Kindergarten. Why did they wait a month and a half to FIRST make mention of this you may ask. I would not be able to answer that question. I had not gotten any indication that there were any problems at all at Kindergarten. No notes from the teacher asking for backup on her behavior or anything like that. That's one thing I have gotten from day one at her daycare. I get an update every day on her behavior and what steps were taken if she got into big trouble.

So after the phone call I received from her K teacher I was understandably pissed off and sad at the same time. I was pissed that this was the first that I had heard of it and I was saddened that I did not notice anything and that apparently I was not doing my job to encourage good behavior... or something like that. Not that I'm an expert by any means, but I probably should have known my daughter well enough to know she's going to push the limits in a new situation. I'm paying for this now because I'm pretty sure that bar a few exceptions I'm now the mean mom who makes her sad all the time. We did not go to my parents house this week because I told her that unless she managed at least 2 days on green or yellow we wouldn't. She managed 3 days on red, 1 on orange, and 1 on yellow.

I should probably explain the color system. The same time I got the phone call they instituted a new behavior system at the school. All the kids start on a green card for the day. The first misbehavior they go to yellow which is just a warning. Orange is for the second infraction and it results in the loss of half of recess and some center time (computer center, toy center, book center). Red is for the third and results in lost recess and lost center time and a note home. However, because of her continued issues, she brings home a note every day with whatever she's done and she has to meet with a Behavior Counselor something or other as well. I will give her credit in that she's not violating the same things every day, but she's not got a very good record. I now almost dread picking her up from daycare at the end of the day because odds are very high that she'll have gone red (Edit: Today she got Green!). Of the 15 school days, not including today since they instituted the new rules, she's managed the following:

Green: 1
Yellow: 1
Orange: 2
Red: 11

Does anyone else see a problem with this? Her daycare is backing this up for all the kids by making them do some extra practice school work based on what color they are. Even if they get yellow they have to do some extra work. Additionally if they get red, they have to do the extra work during the entire afternoon inside play hour. Guess Malia should be pretty good at finding words. Who knows, due to the extra work she may be reading by Thanksgiving instead of Christmas Dad! When she gets red it also means that she gets no TV at home which I'm starting to believe is more of a punishment for me than for her because she won't leave me alone for five minutes even if it's cooking dinner for her.

This would be a whole lot easier to deal with if I had someone else to help shoulder the blame, but being a single parent I can't do that. Nor can I say "hey, significant other, this behavior is your fault, fix it" because I am the only one doing the parenting. Additionally she threw a lovely "My dad wouldn't get so mad about this and he'd let me do what I want" at me the other night. I really wanted to reply with a "Yeah, the dad who apparently decided that he no longer cares to be your dad? In fact, he doesn't even want to be a dad to his biological children. You mean that one?" Thankfully I managed to refrain because I'm pretty sure that would only make things worse and then I'd have more reasons to feel guilty about my sucky parenting skills.

Anyway, that is the joy that is going on right now. On a lighter note, she's discovered the joy of showers. Feeling a bit bad about no TV time I've let her take long showers. Mainly because it gets her out of my hair for a bit and I can get stuff done. She's really loud in the shower (singing the theme song to Duck Dodgers mostly) so I'm not worried about her injuring herself. I did however discover that my water heater allows for about 1 1/2 hours of warm enough for showering water. I learned this yesterday when I lost track of time and she hollered to let me know that her shower was cold. Plus I remembered that I had this which makes it perfect for her:

Halloween - Fun or bust!

2008-11-10T19:25:00.007-07:00

So, I thought about splitting this up into multiple posts about the different activities. Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on your view, I have decided against that idea. I've just created individual slideshows for the activities. I'll intersperse with my usual commentary.

First up for fun we had the Boo at the Zoo. Now, I love a good time at the zoo and I love that lots of people go because that means they make money and can stay in business. However, unless my life absolutely depends on it or Malia begs for months, I'll not be attending again. It was held the Saturday before Halloween. In theory it sounded great. Tables set up for trick or treating in a pretty safe zone sounded fantastic. Unfortunately every one and their dog also thought it sounded great. After the 4th 15 minute wait to get a sucker or a mini-candybar Malia and I gave up and just checked out the animals and then went home. I think the best part of the day was hitting up the Mexican restaurant not far from me with Krissy and Haylee and then having Malia drive off to Brigham with them for a sleepover with Haylee. Unfortunately for the parents, and fortunately for Krissy, Malia opted for sleeping at the parents instead. Boy was she glad to see me Sunday afternoon, and I was glad to see her. It's nice to have a break now and again, but I miss her terribly. I know, uncharateristic mush from me. I'll try to cut down. Here is the slideshow of fun. Note the terribly excited look on her face.

Next up we had the fun of having Ryan and Mel come over to carve pumpkins. Well, we actually went out to dinner to the New Ho Ho Gourmet and we bribed Malia into behaving with the promise that they would come over if she behaved. Following closely on the heels of the behavior stuff at school, it was handy. That whole cluster is an entirely different post that I'm waiting until I'm less pissed at her school to post. Anyway, it was a good time with Ryan assisting Malia with the actual cutting of her pumpkin. She drew the picture and he wielded the knife. This was probably best for all involved. I did my pumpkin all by myself because I'm too particular to allow help. Mel had the best idea though and refrained from actually touching the pumpkins. If I wasn't the parent, I would have opted to go this route. I swear my hands smelled like pumpkin for days. Here are the few pictures taken. I apologize that they are so dark. I only have the ones that were taken with Malia's camera and it appears that no flashing happened. Also, yes, she is hugging her pumpkin. We had to go out at bedtime so she could give it a hug and kiss goodnight. Added pictures that Ryan just sent me to the slideshow. HAHA Mel, got some of you too. Oh, and yes I just realized that Malia is indeed kissing her pumpkin in one picture and yes, her pumpkin has hands.

Halloween Day I was the favorite parent ever at Malia's school. I was in charge of donuts. Since in my quest to find glazed donuts I failed, I ended up getting maple and chocolate bars. Not only that, but they either had candy corn or bat/ghost/pumpkin shaped sprinkles on them. I feel rather bad for the parents that got their kids home after that gorging of donut. I'm pretty sure those bars count as two donuts, plus adding in the sugary toppings? Oh, that's pure insanity. I got much love from the class. Here are the pics. No Slideshow because there are only three. Also, note the lovely green down the front of her costume. That should teach me to allow watermelon yogurt for breakfast.

Finally we have the joy of actual Trick or Treating in the parents neighborhood. Needless to say it was difficult getting out the door. It seemed like Malia and Haylee had been hitting the crazy juice because holy crap were they wired. Hannah wasn't so much but she's young and hasn't been completely infected by her cousins yet. It's not for lack of effort on their part though, trust me. I think it's just a matter of her getting better at keeping up with them. I foresee a madhouse at the parents for Christmas and I can hardly wait! I just wish JC, Carin and Zenock would be there too. Anyway, after a couple of houses Hannah was done so Krissy, Rob and I went on with the two riff-raff. We only did approximately 3 blocks worth of homes, but man did they get a lot of candy. I hope Haylee got some of hers... Rob, I'm looking at you! Malia and I have hardly made a dent in hers and it's not like we aren't snacking on way too many each evening. By the end, the girls were dragging and Malia made me carry her bag because it was just too heavy. In keeping with her drama queen crown, Haylee gave me her "worn out" look. I think she looks drugged, not tired, but she's young and has plenty of time to fine tune before she gets to Broadway. Here is the slideshow of fun.

All in all it was a good holiday, but now I'm worn out and am taking a small break from doing anything. Gotta rest up for the fun of sewing the girls' Christmas dresses. So excited!

I know I'm behind on stuff

2008-11-06T15:48:00.005-07:00

But it's not my fault! My harddrive went out on my laptop so it was in the shop from last Friday until Tuesday. Then I spent Tuesday and Wednesday nights feverishly getting my music and pictures back on my laptop from my ipod because I'm too cheap to pay several hundred dollars for someone to pull apart my old harddrive and pull the information directly off the whatever they are called. Which isn't as easy as it should be. Apple.

I still haven't gotten them reorganized because don't think I can find a program that would keep the same organization, but at least I didn't lose anything. I think except for this one sweet background that I'll have to search the tubes for again. Also, I've lost my CD with my Leopard upgrade so things don't look the same and I'm floundering a bit. Grr!

Anyway, I hope to be back blogging and putting up all the fun pumpkin carving and Halloween adventures by this weekend at least.

Also, and sorry to get all political again, but I'm way excited. Yay for President-elect Barack Obama! Regardless of your thoughts about him, please take a look at the website he's put up for his transition. It appears to be set up for regular updating. I think I'm a bit more excited about this aspect of his presidency than just about anything else. The internet is becoming more and more a part of everyone's lives and I like his apparent desire to keep transparency with what he's doing and continuing his message that it's about all of us doing something. He's asking for our input and I think we should give it to him. I'll step down from my mini soapbox now, and sorry, but this is the first time in a long time that I've had a lot of hope in what the government can do for Americans.

It's becoming a habit...

2008-10-28T09:45:00.004-06:00

At some point in the near future I may need an intervention. I leave it to all of you to determine when that needs to happen. After the fun I had sewing up Halloween costumes for the rugrat and I, it became necessary for me to branch out just to see if I could do it. So, I got patterns for the rugrat and myself that contain all the pieces necessary to make full outfits. Obviously I was smart enough to go with the easier patterns because even I am not willing to make the jump to insanely difficult right from the get go. At least with sewing. :) Sewing has seemed to replace baking as my stress reliever too. Which is weird because it's 100 times more frustrating than baking a cake, but the results last longer so maybe that's why it's working for me.

Last night I decided to break out the jumper pattern for Malia and give her a go. I needed to see how long it was going to take because the sisters and I have decided to make matching jumpers for our girls to do Christmas pictures. I need to know how long it's going to take me to sew them so I know how quickly I need to get going. Well, after two hours last night, I'm just about finished. I did not start until around 8 so I had to stop at 10 so as to not annoy the neighbors with my loud sewing machine. I don't know if it can be heard outside my condo, but I'd rather not take the chance given how much I complain about the crazy dude living above me and his tendency toward loud. I just have to finish up the hem on the bottom and finish hemming up the armholes as well. I'm sure there is a technical sewing word for the armhole finishing thingie, but I don't know what it is. I did learn that I will not be using flannel for these though. Holy crap that was a pain. Maybe it was just the type I got, but it stuck to itself and other parts and I think added in at least an extra 20 minutes to the whole process. I think I may move to fleece for winter wear because it would be nice and cozy.

Here are pics of the jumper. Yes, it's really long, but I still need to hem it and I figured longer was better what with winter coming up next on the season agenda.

Not a Halloween post - haha =P

2008-10-27T12:43:00.003-06:00

I am shamelessly stealing this from another blog that I read. Here’s what you are supposed to do:

* Look at the list and bold those you have read.
* Italicize those you intend to read.
* Star the books you LOVE.**

Also, please note that I am irritated by some inconsistencies in here. Why is The complete works of Shakespeare in here and also Hamlet? Also, the same is the case for Chronicles of Narnia and "Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe? It makes me wonder how many people pick the full collection, but miss the individual selections. I really think that if you are going to put an individual one in, you should not also make selection of the entirety available. I'm kind of a jerk about stuff like this though.

1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2. **The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien**
3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5. **To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee**
6. The Bible
7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8. Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12. Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14. Complete Works of Shakespeare
15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16. **The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien**
17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18. Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19. The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20. Middlemarch - George Eliot
21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24. **War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy**
25. **The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams**
26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34. **Emma - Jane Austen**
35. Persuasion - Jane Austen
36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38. Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40. Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41. Animal Farm - George Orwell
42. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46. **Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery**
47. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48. The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
49. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50. Atonement - Ian McEwan
51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52. **Dune - Frank Herbert**
53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58. **Brave New World - Aldous Huxley**
59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66. On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68. Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding
69. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70. **Moby Dick - Herman Melville**
71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72. Dracula - Bram Stoker
73. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75. Ulysses - James Joyce
76. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78. Germinal - Emile Zola
79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80. Possession - AS Byatt
81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87. Charlotte's Web - EB White
88. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91. **Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad**
92. The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94. Watership Down - Richard Adams
95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99. **Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl**
100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

Quickie - Malia ties her first bow!

2008-10-23T22:28:00.004-06:00

Earlier this evening Malia asked me if I could help her by showing her again how to tie a bow. She's got little ties on the front of her pants and just decided she wanted to do it. She's tried before in the past but got frustrated and decided to wait until she got older. Apparently she was old enough tonight. I showed her the easy two bunny ears method and after about ten minutes she managed a half tie, but couldn't get both sides of the bow quite right.

Well after a couple hours of practicing she just came in to show me her very first bow that she ever tied by herself. I, being the dork that I am, took a picture:

She then untied it and retied it and I took another picture:

Yay, how's that for perseverance?

I finished one and have half of another done

2008-10-20T20:34:00.011-06:00

I finished up Malia's costume last week, and she decided to parade it for everyone. I also got started on my own costume and with the exception of the sleeves I have the upper half of the dress finished. Luckily all the skirts entail are gathering the waist and sewing one of them to the top half and then hemming both of them because I think the sleeves may be the death of me. I already had to add in extra material in the bodice because I'm an idiot and forgot to adjust the pattern to account for the girls. I thought I accounted for fat arms, but I forgot to account for being able to move them as well. If I want to walk around the entire time I'm wearing the costume I can leave them as is. I don't like this option so I'm working on some ideas about doing something to them so they fit better. I've yet to find exactly the right layout, but I do have some pretty cute little stuffed hearts that I may use to widen the sleeves. I may just give up all together and wear my black sweater underneath. It's really thin and would probably help in the making sure the girls are covered as the neckline is a touch low. Here are a couple pictures of mine. It's kind of hard to tell what it looks like, but use your imagination.

Eh, here's the joy of Malia. Second picture is her "leopard face" a la batface from last year. It's not quite as good.

Ryan and Mel came over for enchiladas and entertainment by Malia (c). Malia also took pictures during the mini-party. Before they got here, she started taking rather random pictures. I was finishing up the velcro on the front of Malia's costume and had to pause because apparently her stuffed snow tiger was feeling under the weather and we had to heat up her rice bag and then she tucked the tiger into it. The first bunch of pictures are of that snow tiger and then of course she had to take a bunch of pictures of the birdcage. I say birdcage because I'm not sure you can see the bird. I don't remember where in the mix the picture is, but my favorite from the evening is when she let TC take a picture of her and Ryan. She got him to help her make a scary Halloween face. It was a lovely evening and there was only a minor break down when I turned off her Hello Kitty so I could check out the new show Crusoe. That didn't last long but not because of her tantrum. You'd think that you couldn't screw up a show based on a classic like Robinson Crusoe and involving pirates, but I had to force ten minutes of viewing before even I could no longer ignore the lack of goodness.

Here are the pictures from Malia's camera and Enchilada night.

Two unrelated topics

2008-10-16T18:11:00.005-06:00

Saturday Malia and I decided to head up Emigration Canyon this last Saturday. We hadn't been up and she wanted to take pictures of the leaves. I know, we're a little late, but it was still fun. We got about 2/3 up the canyon before the rain turned to snow. We went up until the turn off for Pine something or other and decided to head back down since it was starting to really come down. I thought the snow would stop sooner as we came down the canyon, but it was still snowing as we passed the zoo. I think it was still snowing until we got to around 2000 E. I've added a link to Malia's gallery of pictures. Per usual, she decided to start taking pictures before we even left the house. Also, as an aside I noticed a ton of houses up for sale. I really wish I were in a position to purchase a home up there because I really like it. I love all the trees and being near the creek.

Malia's pictures

I slept funny a couple of nights ago and my neck has been sore ever since. I started getting the mother of all headaches earlier today and decided to leave work a touch early. After picking up Malia from school we headed home and I decided to finish up a project that I started well over a year ago. Possibly even two years ago. My mother gave me some great hand towels in an Elephant motif that match my bedroom decor. These were to make rice filled heating bags. They are simple but brilliant. They move around and mold way better than a heating pad and they don't get so hot, plus you can use them as a cold pack to if you freeze them. Anyway, I finally sewed mine up and have been wearing it for the last hour and a half and it's still plenty warm from the 2 minutes in the microwave. My neck feels a hundred times better.

Bonus gallery from my last visit to my parents. My niece Hannah is such a cheese for the camera.

8 Things - blame Carin

2008-10-15T09:16:00.001-06:00

8 TV shows I love to watch:
-Bones
-House
-Fringe
-Dirty Jobs
-Deadliest Catch
-No Reservations
-Bizarre Foods
-The Office - only if I remember it's on.

8 things that happened yesterday
-Went to work and wished I'd stayed in bed - getting a cold
-Looked at Malia's Halloween costume and opted to watch TV instead of finishing it
-Looked at my costume pattern and opted to just not think about how long it was going to take
-Got lazy and fed Malia and myself frozen TV dinners
-Ate 3 grapefruit (NOT the best plan, I'm paying today)
-Opened a new account at the Credit Union that is lending me money for school
-Watched Fringe and laughed maniacally several times. John Noble's character is fantastic
-Woke up at 3 am to the crazy dude upstairs hammering something (technically this was today, but I'm counting it)

8 things I'm looking forward to:
-Finishing both Halloween costumes
-Boo at the Zoo trick or treating with Malia and whatever family can come down
-Halloween party with some friends/co-workers
-Finally getting my dining room table and chairs uncovered so we can sit down for dinner
-School starting in January - I'm more looking forward to the finish of that though
-Halloween party with Malia's Kindergarten class
-Crazy dude upstairs moving out (not currently planned as far as I know, but I can hope)
-The first big snowstorm and making snowmen with Malia (hate the snow, but love how excited she gets)

8 people who I'm tagging:
-None, I will force this on no one. =)

Christmas teaser

2008-10-14T14:12:00.005-06:00

I can get away with this post because my daughter is only 5 and she doesn't read this blog (or much of anything just yet). I purchased her Christmas present today. She's been pestering me for awhile to play on the computer and for the first time last night she got really angry that I wouldn't let her play around on my Macbook. I've been meaning to get something that I can hook up to the internet to let her play around because every kids DVD anymore includes online games and stuff like that. I figure it'll help her with figuring stuff out and reading as well if she can play around. Also I don't want her on my laptop. Too many possibilities for it ending badly.

EDIT: This is not to replace the sweet kids laptop my parents got her for Christmas last year. She loves that thing and it's great, but it can't go online. :(

Long story short, I found the perfect computer for her today. It's not super fast and it isn't super fancy, but it should be a fun first computer for her.

This would be an iMac old school:

Specifications :
* Serial # : RN0115T2J89
* 400 MHz Processor
* 320 MB Memory
* 10 GB Hard Drive
* CD-RW Drive

Includes :
* Apple iMac Blueberry Computer
* Apple Power Cord
* Apple iMac Blueberry Keyboard
* Apple iMac Blueberry Mouse

The problem now will be me having to wait 2 1/2 months to give it to her.

Another Halloween teaser and fun with sewing

2008-10-13T12:05:00.005-06:00

I broke out ye olde sewinge machine yesterday morning. After approximately 1 1/2 hours wrestling with it, I sewed the first stitch on Malia's Halloween costume. I'm apparently an idiot because it took me that long to troubleshoot and discover that not only had I not put the bobbin in correctly, but I'd strung it incorrectly. It's been about 6 years since I last sat down and sewed something so apparently in those years, I'd forgotten the basics of running my machine. I took the thing apart trying to figure out what was jamming things up before I noticed that it wasn't the bobbin jamming that was the problem.

After about ten minutes of sewing I realized that the 3rd step in the process was to sew the tail and stuff it with poly fill. I apparently forgot to purchase that fill in one of my many trips to the fabric stores over the last couple of weeks. So, up we went in the snow to JoAnn's to pick up some poly fill. While I was there I grabbed a scissor sharpener too because I've been meaning to. Mom, I'm bringing it with me next time I come up and sharpening yours.

I sat back down and 5 1/2 hours later I'm about 90% done with her costume. I still have to finish up the ears and attach them, put on the velcro for the front closure and finish up sewing the elastic into the mitten and boot parts. I also apparently have to do some quick fixing and tack on a few inches to the bottom hem because I'm somehow off by like 2 inches. I don't know how. I measured it three times and even measured it while Malia was wearing it. Yay, for extra material. Hopefully it's not too noticeable.

I did realize however that this was the easy of the two costumes and it's going to end up being around 9 hours total with cutting out and sewing. I'm probably looking at 15 or so for my costume. Luckily I'm not working on Friday so maybe I'll get up a teaser on it for the weekend. I also realized that while I love my counter height kitchen table with it's stool chairs, I'm too short to comfortably sit and sew and still reach the pedal. I had to sit on the edge of the seat to reach the floor to work the pedal. I may have to invest in a card table if I decide to continue sewing things. I probably will because the cutting out part aside, I rather enjoyed putting the costume together. I may do some real clothes for her now. It was surprisingly relaxing.

Enjoy the pic I took last night. Sorry it's so blurry.

Family Fun Walk

2008-10-09T20:00:00.005-06:00

Good times were had this evening. Malia and I attended our first official party thing at her school. Yay! I ran the ticket booth. I was scheduled for an hour, but ended up there for like 2 1/2 hours because Malia was having such fun running around I couldn't bring myself to make her leave. As it was she was unhappy to be leaving because there were still people there... the PTA cleanup crew.

Anyway it was fun. I chatted with a mother of one of the afternoon kindergarten kids. I am a horrible person and can't remember her name, but should she happen upon this, you rock! I chit chatted and Malia ran around the playground. The GOOD playground. She was excited to play on the big kids playground because when she is at school she only gets to play on the little kid playground. Maybe I am blind, but the only difference I noticed was color. I think they just have to play on the one that is closer to their classroom, but when you are five (or 32) it's all about the grass being greener.

Grand tally for the evening:
4 hotdogs
1 Pepsi
1 bottle of water
2 face paintings
3 balloon "animals"
1 colored hairspray

Pictures here

Fun fact to share with you all. I apologize that this picture is not more clear, but it's still pretty good. On the bench in the picture there is a woman with a gold belt. That gold belt is on a denim jumpsuit. That's right. I didn't think that they still made them. While I think it's a fashion don't for multiple reasons (jumpsuit, denim need I say more) it did not look bad and I think was actually pretty flattering on this lady. However, they really should stop making these.

Bonus video from the last time we went to the zoo. Wrestling bears!

It's a better day than I thought it would be

2008-10-07T11:03:00.009-06:00

I kind of figured that today would not be a good day. It has however turned out to be a pretty good one. I think it's because I'm very happy with my new pants and my birthday shoes. This is the first time I've worn my birthday shoes to work and it's great. I scored the new pants at the DI.

Malia and I had to go get her a new jacket since she managed to lose her last one that fit somewhere between daycare and school but not on the bus. Yeah, I don't know what she did. She decided on a lovely jean jacket with embroidered flowers on it. It fits perfectly which means it may or may not last until it's time for winter coats.

Here's to keeping my fingers crossed and to my cute shoes.

Oh, and I got Malia's costume all cut out I just need to begin the fun of sewing it together. I am now reminded why I sew so rarely. I HATE pinning and cutting out the pattern. I think I need to look into paying someone else to do that part.

Malia fun and a Halloween teaser

2008-10-03T08:26:00.004-06:00

Malia decided to tell me a story from school this morning while we were getting ready. Apparently her "boyfriend" at daycare told her that she didn't look pretty because her socks were never matched. She told him that it didn't matter what he thought because she thinks that she looks pretty with them. She elaborated that she doesn't care if someone else doesn't think she's pretty because she thinks she's pretty and that is what is important. I teared up a little bit to hear that she's so comfortable with herself. I realize she's only 5, but how many kids that age do you know who would make the statement? I'm so proud of her!

Night before last as I was delivering HOA fee to the HOA president Jeannie, her son Andy decides to challenge Malia to Mario Kart. He bets her a dollar that he can beat her. Andy is 17 almost 18 and likes to tease Malia. Well, she took him up on it and they shook hands. Andy brought his little brother over (I can't remember his name exactly, I think it may be Arlen) and they get to playing. Malia wiped the floor with him. He was so surprised that she beat him so handily. I tried to warn him that she uses at least 45 of her 90 minutes of tv/game time each night to play Mario Kart, but he didn't listen. Malia, of course, will probably tease him for quite some time. Or at least until she gets her dollar from him.

They came by again last night. This time we managed to talk Malia into letting him use the steering wheel with some fancy BS from me. I let her use my controller which has a green stretchy cover on it and told her it was my lucky one so she would be just fine to use it without the steering wheel. Well apparently it is lucky in that she still managed to beat Andy even with him using the steering wheel. She wasn't quite as good, but she realized that she needs to practice with the regular one so that she can beat anybody at any time. I did realize however that she's a very poor winner so we'll be working on that a bit.

And finally, the Halloween teaser you've all been waiting for. I purchased patterns for costumes about a month ago, but just haven't have time/money at once to get the material. Well, I went and picked up the material last night for Malia's costume. I'm going to hold off getting mine until I'm done with hers so I don't get confused/distracted. Malia decided last year that she wanted to be a cat for Halloween. Over the year she's been going back and forth on what kind. Well, about 3 months ago she finally decided on the Cheshire cat from Alice in Wonderland. She then informed me that I needed to be a character from the show too so we could match. Well, I'm just not young enough to pull off Alice, so I'm going to be the Queen of Hearts. Should be a good time. Back to material. Do you know how difficult it is to find pink and purple striped material? I looked all over the place and no one had any. I'm all for effort, but frankly I'm not going to cut up material and sew it piece by piece to make my own stripes. Luckily I was able to find a animal print in purple and pink flannel at Hancock Fabrics. They are usually way more expensive than anywhere else, but they are having a sale so I got it for 40% off... or the regular price I would pay elsewhere. They also had no solid flannels so the part for the tummy and the inside of the ears has little pink hearts on it. Malia informed me that I'm to try and get the hearts to be over where her real heart is because that would be cool. So anyway, it appears that instead of being the Cheshire Cat, she's going to be the Cheshire Jaguar or Leopard or whatever animal the print is supposed to be. I don't know these things, I just know stripy types like tigers and zebras. Those are easy to figure out. Eh, at least we found purple and pink in one fabric and we're both okay with that. Here is a picture of the material:

Fun with food and school

2008-10-02T14:15:00.005-06:00

Due to many requests, here is a link to the recipe for the peach cobbler. Instead of the pineapple and cherries use peaches. I generally try to use enough to cover the bottom of a 13x9 pan. It's like 6-8 good size peaches. Hale peaches work the best.

http://www.tasteofhome.com/Recipes/Spiced-Pineapple-Upside-Down-Cake

I also add 1/4 tsp of cloves to the cake batter and I grind a little pepper over the top of the peaches before I put the cake batter on. I don't even bother to try to turn it over. Peaches are way juicier than pineapple so it isn't as sturdy as it would be with pineapple.

I also just found out this afternoon that my student loan went through for school. I get tuition reimbursement from work, but still have to pay out of pocket up front so I was kind of stressing things what with the economy tanking and all that fun stuff. Yay me!

Unrelated, this picture just completely cracks me up. Thanks to a co-worker for sending it my way! The eyes!

Random entertainment

2008-10-01T15:50:00.004-06:00

Can you say you have ever passed the Great Leslie on the way home? Well I did yesterday and he was driving a red Dodge Neon. I didn't have a chance to take a picture because he turned too quickly for me to grab my camera but here is a visual for you all to appreciate my fun drive home. He's the one in the middle for those of you who haven't seen the movie. Also, his gloves weren't white, they were a dark brown.

Easter post - yeah it's a few months old

2008-09-30T09:21:00.003-06:00

Since I was on a photo kick, I also organized some other pictures that Malia has taken on her camera. She took pictures over Easter when she got her bike. I'm not sure why there are half a dozen pictures of her Candyland game. It may be part of a plot to guilt my mom into playing with her again. Malia stacks the deck when she plays the game. I don't know exactly how she does it and it just may be dumb luck after all, but she always wins. She manages to get the right special cards to jump way ahead on the board, and always manages to get my mom to have the card that sends her way back near the beginning when she's close to the end and winning. Yep, my daughter is a Candyland shark and has now been banned from play for several months now. Maybe around Christmas time we'll play with her again. If she can refrain from cheating.

As a bonus to these pictures there are quite a few (blurry - sorry!) pictures of Hannah crawling around. She looks so adorable. Well, as adorable as you can look when you are blurry.

Enjoy!

Pre and Post Adventure to the Zoo

2008-09-30T08:55:00.007-06:00

It appears that I am an idiot because I'm having difficulty figuring out this new gallery that I'm setting up. So you'll just have to click a link to actually see the pictures until I can figure it out. Also, I can't get her actual pictures from the zoo to load up so you get to see the pre-zoo and post-zoo ones.

On with the fun. Prior to going to the Zoo on Sunday, I replace the batteries in Malia's camera. She wandered around the house taking pictures while I was getting things ready to head to the zoo. I think my favorite is the picture she took of the light switch. Apparently she liked the way it looked against the green. You can't tell it's green because the flash on her camera went a little bright. I haven't figured out how to turn it on or off yet.

Enjoy!

After we left the zoo and jumped in the car to head home apparently Malia decided to take some pictures. I had no idea that she even took these until I was unloading pictures from her camera. I wondered why she was giggling the entire ride home. Now that I think about it, I should have noticed a flash. It appears that the flash on her camera is auto-adjust to light. That makes it even cooler than I previously believed.

Enjoy!

I promise to continue trying to get the actual zoo pictures up as soon as possible.

Hogle Zoo visit

2008-09-26T19:59:00.003-06:00

I'm messing around with my MobileMe account and I'm not sure how to connect everything up yet. Go here for the Zoo post until I can figure stuff out.

Unless I figure out something really cool, I'm not going to continue with that blogging attempt. I am now too tired and irritated to post the stuff here so I'll do it tomorrow.

I've got some good adventures coming up

2008-09-26T09:42:00.004-06:00

I really enjoy teasing people with the future of posts of mine. Rugrat and I hit up the zoo yesterday with Aunt Allee. After a slight delay in start, we had a grand old time. I actually took pictures so I'll put together a slide slow post about it tonight while I'm getting angry at the Presidential debates. I know I shouldn't watch because it's just going to make me pissy, but I can't stop myself. After the fun of the zoo we hit up the DI and got some sweet items. That's a whole other post of fun. And, the piece de resistance will be happening tomorrow. We'll be attending the Gem Faire. That's right, it'll be a grand old time.

Just thought I'd give you all a teaser so you knew I was thinking of you.

Brigham City Municipal Airport Appreciation Day

2008-09-21T13:59:00.002-06:00

Not all the time when we head up to visit the parents do we just sit around all weekend and just hang out. Occasionally random fun things come up for us to do. Krissy called and invited Malia and I to head on out to the Airport Appreciation Day. They just recently finished up adding a new runway. Now, I know most of you are thinking what, Brigham City doesn't have an airport. Au Contraire my friends, it's just really small. Think Airport 2 small in the SLC Valley except I think that one may be slightly larger than the Brigham one. Anyway, apparently with this new runway they can now land up to a 737 size airplane. Pretty sweet eh? Yeah, I don't really know, it just sounds cool.

We were lured out by the promise of free hotdogs and soda. Unfortunately either they didn't plan for many people or they just forgot to say when they would be available because we go there before one and they were packing up the grill already. That tells me they'd stopped cooking hotdogs awhile ago because you sort of have to wait for it to cool down before breaking it down. They did still have some desserts left which you will see in the pictures. I have encountered the elusive candy bar on a stick. This one didn't have the candy coating stuff on it, but they were still delicious.

I didn't have my real camera with me so the pics aren't super good. Plus it was really windy and so it was hard to get shots that didn't have hair in the way. Haylee and Malia got to get in ambulances, University Hospital Life Flight helicopter and some crazy contraption some guy in Layton is still building which appears to be a one-person helicopter. Or as Rob called it "death trap". Enjoy!

Political Rant - may contain cursing

2008-09-18T08:26:00.004-06:00

I have to admit a real disappointment in my gender. Recently all I hear and see are references to women throwing their hat in with McCain now that he has picked Palin as his running mate and Clinton is no longer in the race. This pick completely banks on Hillary supporters only being supporters because she is a woman, not because of her stance on issues. The posts I've read and comments I've overheard even outright admit that it's because she's a woman (I'll have to look them up, I'm too tired and irritated to do it right now). I have a real problem with this. I am not even remotely opposed to women being high up in government and I would have gladly voted Clinton come Election Day were she to be an option. NOT because she is a woman though. Her stances on most issues most closely reflect mine out of all the candidates over the last year and a half of campaigning. That is what my choice was based on, not that she is a woman.

These women who have determined they now support McCain when six months ago he was considered the devil to them because he was in opposition to their chosen female candidate should lose the vote. Frankly too many women over the years fought too hard to have a say in what happens in government for some to throw that away in my opinion. You should vote for the person you think would do the best job and who has beliefs and stances on subjects that are how you feel. You don't switch based on gender of the candidate. Palin and Clinton are nearly direct opposites when it comes to stance and policy. They don't believe in the same things nor would they fight for the same things. For women to make a switch because "She's a woman, she'll do stuff for me even though we don't agree on any issues and I really just want a woman up there because it's about damn time a woman was in the big time" is stupid and bullshit. Yes, I just called them all stupid and I just don't care anymore. To be fair, it's certainly possible that those who have now determined they are voting for Palin carried the same beliefs all along and were only backing Clinton because she was a woman, but my comment stands.

You shouldn't base your decision on who should be President and Vice President of the United States based on the gender of the person or even the race of the person. These are not what makes the person qualified or not qualified for the position. Also, why the big hubbub over experience in general? I don't get it. NONE of the candidates who have been part of the race have ANY experience being President of the United States. NONE!!

I honestly don't care who people vote for come Election Day if they are voting for who they truly believe will be the best person for the job. That's how I will make the choice. You look at the candidates and what they say and more importantly what they do to back up what they say and you make a decision on who you think should be elected. It's not difficult. It won't kill you to be informed. Don't vote for someone because that's how everyone else you know votes, or that's how your parents or your third cousin's uncle's sister votes. Inform yourself and make an INFORMED decision.

Sorry about the rant, but lately it's been driving me batty. Maybe I'm wrong though and it's all about which oppressed group's turn it is to have someone in a position of authority.

I do agree with Palin on one thing though. I too have no clue what the hell the Vice President does.

edit: I found out what the VP does. Wikipedia is helpful.

Two unrelated pictures

2008-09-16T14:01:00.004-06:00

Yesterday a friend and I did some recon at the nearby Harmon's grocery store for additions to our Zombie Apocalypse Preparation kits and encountered the following:

I think they meant spigots. At least I hope that's what they meant, because that's what was in the basket.

Today I've decided that my boss may finally be dropping over the edge into true insanity. I glanced over to ask him a question and he told me to talk to the apple. This is the apple:

I'm not entirely sure what to make of this outside of insanity. That or he's in a good mood because he's on vacation for the entirety of next week.

Another conversation with Malia

2008-09-15T09:15:00.003-06:00

Malia and I went to the Hogle Zoo yesterday. I'll wait while you recover from the shock. I know it's a surprising thing. Because it's nearing the end of the visit of the white aligator, and she managed to behave all week without a big tantrum or snotty mouth, I bought her one of the stuffed white aligators. Okay, mostly because they were half off the regular price and I still got my 20% as a member after the 50% off. I like to think that I'd have bought it otherwise, but I probably wouldn't because I'm too cheap. Malia decided while we were at the zoo (on the carousel in fact) that her alligator's name would be George. Yeah, I don't know either. I thought it was settled until I had the following conversation in the parking lot of her daycare this morning;

: Grab George and let's get inside.
: Mother, I told you that's not my alligator's name.
: Um, you didn't, but okay, what is your alligator's name now?
: white alligator
: That's not really a name, that's just describing what it is.
: Well, then what is the name of the white alligator at the zoo.
: Well, there wasn't a name on the sign so I guess it doesn't have one.
: Then if the one at the zoo doesn't have to have a name, mine doesn't either.

After delivering that last line, she walked off to the door. I really couldn't argue with her logic. Sometimes I feel like the kid, not the parent. Welcome to the loony bin, white alligator. Also, I am not a chocolate caramel and candy coated pretzel, but it just looked so yummy I decided to use it to represent me in the conversation.

Another post a long time in the works (AKA I'm lazy)

2008-09-12T22:15:00.005-06:00

It's finally my turn to toss up pictures for others to steal. I have another lovely post that I've been meaning to toss up for awhile. Kami brought Hannah down a couple of months ago for her first visit to Hogle Zoo. She loved it! The day we were there happened to be opening day for the Conservation Carousel so there were people dressed up and they handed out cotton candy. Nothing like free sugar to start the day off right. There are pics from when we went to breakfast beforehand. I'm way too lazy to post each picture individually. This shouldn't come as a surprise since I'm just now getting around to uploading the pictures and creating a couple of slideshows. Photobucket only allows for 50 pics per slideshow so I had to split all the pics into two slideshows.

Maybe I'll add videos later, but they aren't really exciting. If you have an overwhelming desire to see videos of a pacing cheetah, weirdly calm meerkats, and I think there is one of me trying to get Hannah to pay attention to me, please let me know and I'll get around to posting them sometime this year.

Quickie

2008-09-12T14:25:00.001-06:00

I'm sure all of you know my feelings on the subject of the 3 Star Wars movies and the 3 Star Wars ripoff attempts for more money. I just found this quote on Great White Snark and had to share because I completely agree:

"One day, I’d like to see “Star Wars enthusiast” become synonymous with “American” and anyone who enjoys the prequels be labeled “pinko commies.” That’s the world I want to live in."

This is what procrastination on my part gets you...

2008-09-12T10:19:00.004-06:00

It's a blog of all blogs today. Seeing as I've been behind on updating with many fun adventures. Also, these are not in any order other than the one I've inadvertantly created by uploading the pictures associated.

Malia and I went to the Willow Park Zoo in Logan a few months ago. We happened to be there on a day of fun where they had a Curious George theme going. We spent the majority of the time there avoiding the dude dressed as the Man in the Yellow Hat and the one dressed as a clown. Malia wasn't too bothered by the clown guy, but he bore WAY too much resemblance to Pennywise for my comfort level. That aside it was nice to wander through and check out all the birds. They don't have many animals, but it's a peaceful little zoo. Malia loves the playground there because there are swings and slides and apparently it gets no better in life than that. This picture was taken at the tail end of the trip which you can see in the what the crap are you making me do mother? look on Malia's face:

A couple weeks ago on the one weekend in August we didn't head up to Brigham, Malia and I hit up the Hogle Zoo. Do you sense a theme here? If not, wake up. We wandered around as usual and she harassed me into taking a picture of her sitting on the brass Tiger statues in the Asian Highlands. The Asian Highlands is the newer area they built over the original cat house. Yes dad, I said it, the cat house! Is it bad that I'm 32 years old, but I still have the sense of humor of a 12 year old boy?

Another fun day was the day eBay had our summer employee party at Lagoon. This was Malia's first trip to Lagoon and she absolutely loved it. Her favorite parts of the day were riding on the Puff the Fire Dragon kids coaster and the Log Flume Ride where my butt got all wet. She barely got wet at all, but was more than a little excited that I ended up with water soaking both sides and the butt of my pants. I am pretty sure it took at least an hour to all dry. Malia was excited that they had hot dogs at the BBQ so all was good in the world even though she said the train ride was not as fun as the one at Hogle Zoo. Here is the lone picture I managed during the whole day:

Well over a year ago my sister Kami had a party celebrating Hannah's blessing. There was much fun and I just found this picture I snapped of my cousin's boy Cayden wearing Malia's princess crown. No real story there, just thought it was funny. You can also see in the picture that this is pre-hair chopping off for Malia.

Another phone picture I discovered. This is one of Malia's favorite outfits to wear:

My most recent adventure was not one really involving Malia except that it was for her class at school. Her teacher asked if I could help out with some things at home since my work schedule doesn't really allow for me to come help in the classroom during the day. Of course I said I would do what I could. I received a stack of 12 of these:

Which I then was tasked with tearing out all the pages and grouping them together by page number. Do you know how much fingers hurt after spending 3 1/2 hours tearing about reading workbooks? I still don't understand why they can't give the kids the actual books instead of just the individual papers at a time. Did I mention there are 151 pages in this thing? ARGH! Anyway, here is what I ended up with:

I also made the apparently inappropriate choice of working on these while sitting on my bed and sort of watching TV. Have any of you seen that Hole in the Wall show on Fox? It's painfully addictive and even though it hurt to watch, I couldn't bring myself to change the channel. Especially the larger people who it doesn't matter how you bend, there is no way your fat butt is fitting through that hole. Anyway, since after tearing out the first book one page at a time I came up with the brilliant plan to just use a razor blade to slice through the pages instead. I say brilliant because I managed to not cut myself one single time. Anyone who knows me knows how impressive this is. Unfortunately the razor cuts didn't always match so I ended up creating a little bit of confetti... which I now get to sleep with each night until I change my sheets because I can't get it all off.

Maybe I'll keep up to date better so you all don't get marathon posts like this to slog your way through.

Fun conversation with Malia

2008-09-11T09:28:00.002-06:00

Sometimes I have the most odd, yet entertaining conversations with Malia. The way her mind works cracks me up and creeps me out sometimes. We were chatting on the drive up to Peach Days last weekend when the following conversation occurred just after we passed Smith & Edwards.

: Mother, I've decided what I want to be when I grow up.
: Oh yeah?
: I've decided I want to be a cowboy when I grow up, only I'll be a girl, not a boy.
: I thought you were going to be a Marine Biologist. What changed your mind?
: There are scary things under the ocean and I decided I don't want to swim with them.
: Okay, then what are you going to do when you are a cowgirl.
: I think I'll ride horses and wrestle some cows. I might even wrestle some bulls too if I get big enough.
: ...

There you have it. My daughter wants to grow up to ride horses and wrestle cows and bulls. I don't really know how I feel about this, but it's entertaining. I love her definition of what it means to be a cowgirl.

Before anyone asks, she does indeed call me mother. Either when she has something she considers really important to talk about or when she's angry with me. It's rather entertaining.

Peach Days 2008

2008-09-08T13:00:00.004-06:00

Peach Days is just about the best time of year. It's not that it's much different than your run of the mill festival or carnival, it's just that it's "ours". I've never missed a Peach Days and I've only missed the parade once (Paul's Patch employee Number One!). I apologize in advance for there not being many pictures, but I rarely take my camera with me because then I'd have one less hand for carrying yummy food!

Friday evening Malia and I got to my parents about 7:00. This was about an hour later than I'd planned, but I blame traffic. Stupid people taking my sneaky backroads and making them all backed up. I think I spent an hour between Bountiful and Farmington. My brother with his impeccable timing decided to call just as we were getting ready to walk down and get some dinner so we didn't head down until after 7:30. I decided to hold off on the Scuba Burger and have one with Mel and Ryan, so after we got our peach cobbler (yummy!), I headed to the pulled pork line while the parents took Malia to get a hot dog and get themselves Scubas. I love the pulled pork sandwich place because it's not just the sandwich. They give you baked beans which are wonderful and they make these peach fritter things that I'm going to attempt making if I can find decent peaches. After some massive Malia wrestling on the part of all three of us, random distractions of Dad by every person we walked past, and not giving in to my desire to duct tape my daughters mouth shut permanently, we got back to the house and had dinner.

Bright and early Saturday morning Kami arrived with Hannah and the race to get ready to go to the parade began. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to get a 5 year old ready who is both excited beyond belief and not wanting to do anything you ask? Trust me when I say it's no party. Eventually we got going with the parents and met up with Krissy and Haylee and Rob. We got to our prime spot in front of Zions Bank (thank you Krissy's work) and sat down to wait. Here are a couple of pictures that I've shamelessly stolen from my sisters blog of us waiting for the parade to begin.

It was near impossible to get us all looking at the camera so Kami just finally gave up and went with this one.

We made it through the parade, took all our stuff back and then headed down to find some lunch. We bypassed the stuff by the Scuba burgers and headed down past the carnival and rides with Malia hollering the entire time about how she NEEDED to ride a ride right then. We were able to distract her, but only with the promise that she'd get to ride something later in the day. We ended up hitting the booth put on by the La Familia restaurant in Logan. Holy huge burrito. I'm pretty sure it was almost as big as my head, and I have a pretty big head. They also had some pretty good tamales. Malia had water and spent most of the time the parents and I were eating complaining about how she just wanted a hot dog. We finished up eating and then wandered through a few booths. Malia got some lovely butterfly fairy wings. I got a sweet paperweight that I've just realized I left on my parents mantleplace of a dragon. I talked my dad into buying one that was a southwest scene with wolves for mom. It's pretty sweet. Hopefully I will remember to get mine when I visit next time. Grr, I can't believe I forgot it. Soon after finding the wings, we found a book booth and mom got some new peek-a-boo books that Hannah loves to replace the ones that are falling apart having been used through multiple grandkids by now. Mom also got a really cool book on Africa that has pieces so you can put together a diorama of animals. I think she and Malia are going to put it together next time we're up there and maybe I'll remember to do pics. We grabbed Malia a hotdog because that's the only thing she'd eat and headed back for lunch and naptime.

Well, naptime didn't actually start for Malia until approximately 10 minutes before everyone started showing up for the late afternoon fun. Mel and Ryan got there and after a brief (okay maybe half an hour) delay including a tour of the parents house, we headed down for the fun. All Malia wanted was to ride some rides, so she got to do some of the inflatable slides and obstacle course. Then we wanted through some booths and bought some frogs. Here's to hoping she doesn't kill them off like she did the fish. After we were done wandering and gave up the quest to find a deep fried twinkie we went back to the inflatables and Malia had some more fun. Oh, and I wasn't looking for the twinkie for me, I was just hoping to find where they were so I could direct dad the right way. We ran into Krissy and Haylee so the riff raff got to do some sliding and bouncing together and then we ran into Natalie with Ava and Dylan. So, I ended up being the adult supervision to take Malia, Haylee, and Dylan on the Carousel. I wouldn't have gone on it except they had no seatbelts and I didn't trust Haylee to be able to retain her seat on the horse if she got too excited. Here is a lovely slideshow of pictures of Malia on various slides courtesy of Ryan's iPhone (man, I want one).

After this fun, we again headed for food and got our Scuba burgers (mmmm, finally had my Scuba burger. It's the best burger and pretty close to the only one I have all year long) and headed back to my house where Mel and Ryan were again subjected to crazy Kelly family entertainment. Ryan and Mel can now vouch for the fact that I can be out-talked though so that's possibly a good thing. Hope you guys had fun at your first Peach Days and that my family didn't scare you too much. =)

I did manage to miss out on the book sale this year, but I'm holding up okay with the loss. Malia passed out on snuggling with me at around 9:00 Saturday night and didn't wake up when I took her into bed so I call the day a complete success.

School Fundraiser

2008-09-05T08:19:00.003-06:00

I only spammed a few people with this information since I'm such a kind person. However, I figured I might as well toss this up and see if anyone that reads this that I didn't spam is interested. Malia's school is doing a fundraiser and they are selling chocolates and wrapping paper and I think there might be little gifts or candles. I don't know, I didn't look at everything. Anyway, if you are interested, you can go directly to the website and anything you buy will be credited to Malia. The school gets 50% of the price.

If you can't get that other link to work, go here and just use Malia's seller number (284821) at checkout or by clicking the Give Credit button on the top right just under the search box and she'll get credit as well.

If you don't want to buy anything, that's cool, I don't mind either way. What little I looked at though is pretty cool. Oh, and if you don't want to order online I have a paper order form and booklet that you can look through. I have it at work with me so swing by my desk. The last day for orders is September 18, 2008 so take a look now if you might be interested.

The first day of Kindergarten (aka Mommy breakdown)

2008-09-03T12:46:00.003-06:00

So, I managed to not actually cry for Malia's first day of Kindergarten, but it was a near miss. I did tear up and got the catchy breath thing, but no falling tears so YAY me!!! I think the main reason I even did that was because we were running behind and I happened to drop her off at daycare as all the kids were getting ready to get in line for the bus. Dializ (daycare owner) has an alarm and when it goes off all the grade school kids know to grab their backpacks and get in line to go outside and meet the bus. She practically knocked me over in her excitement.

In fact the first thing out of her mouth that morning was "It's my first day of kindergarten, mom. I get to go on the bus." I'm still unsure if she was more excited about school itself or getting to ride the bus there and back from daycare. That's the best part to me... that I don't have to worry about her getting lost. Dializ takes them out to meet the bus which picks up right in front of the school. At school they get off right outside their classroom and then get picked up in the same spot. Dializ also made them name tags with all their daycare information and stuff so that they get directed to the correct bus after school. She then meets them after they are done.

Since I had taken the day off, I ran back home and finally got her room organized. Mind you, it's not clean yet, but I got all the different bins and shelves and drawers in place so that we have somewhere to put all her toys. It's so cute and I'll have to put up a picture when we get everything put away. I got them to match the color scheme of her bedroom so we've continued the lavender, lime green and pastel blue and pink. Yes, I hate the pink, but what can I do?

I picked her up just as she was finishing up lunch back at daycare. I meant to pick her up before so we could have lunch for her first day, but I sidetracked myself with the organizing. I hate cleaning and stuff, but once I get going I have a hard time finding a stopping place. So, instead of lunch we ran to the library and then went home. Once we unloaded the joy from the library we walked over to the little Korean BBQ place in the strip mall near our home. They have a pretty good selection of ice cream so Malia got her bubble gum ice cream while I had a lovely lunch of egg rolls. I forgot how much I like their egg rolls so hopefully in the future I remember.

Malia then told me about her day. They learned the rules about the playground, the classroom, had a snack and then they learned about the letter B. I'm assuming there was more to it than just discussing big B and little b, but she got sidetracked talking about the playground and I could not get her back on track. Apparently the Kindergarten plays on the blue playground, but Malia got a look at the red playground and has decided that she can hardly wait until she gets to play on it. The red one is apparently far superior to the blue one and I think it's because the red one has swings. On a side note, we had to practice swinging for about half an hour when we went on our picnic in the park so she could be ready for school. She was disappointed that she didn't get to use her newly acquired swinging skills because the blue playground doesn't have any. She did delight in telling me that she did not get in trouble a single time all day long.

So after the ice cream we walked back home and started to put some stuff away in her room but decided we'd rather just have fun so we played some Wii, watched a little Hello Kitty (not my choice, I read a smut novel instead), and that was her first day of Kindergarten. Well, she did tell Grandma and Grandpa all about the riding the bus. Maybe after awhile the novelty will wear off, but I'm pretty sure it's going to remain her favorite part for now.

Oh, this is what she tried to get me to let her wear for her first day: Tried, but did not succeed.

I hate other drivers, but I love Schadenfreude!

2008-08-24T15:04:00.007-06:00

I'm beginning to believe that no one but me should drive at least when I am driving. Also, I am probably a horrible person, but I laughed at the misfortune of others today while driving. There was a bit of justification though. At least I think so, and that's really what matters... to me.

I was driving out of Brigham today heading back home with the rugrat. She spent the night at Grandma and Grandpa's after a day of fun at Lagoon so that I could have a birthday party for myself with my friends without having to wrestle her down. Main street in Brigham has 5 lanes. The Right hand lanes are right up near the curb, so there is not a lot of wiggle room there. I'm in the right lane heading down main street attempting to get past a truck pulling a boat trailer. I was going slowly because the guy driving wasn't so good at the keeping in his own lane and so I was also hugging the right side of the lane as much as possible. Just as my front end comes up even with his passenger window he started coming over. I immediately hit my brakes and my horn at the same time. Apparently his reflexes suck because had I not come to a dead stop in my lane about 1/2 inch from running my car up over the curb, he'd have taken off my front bumper. His passenger then hangs his arm out the window and flips me off and was yelling something. I'm pretty sure it was non-complimentary because you know, it was totally my fault for being in the lane where they wanted to be. Jerks. I was so shaken that when I pulled into 7-11 two blocks later I had to sit in the car for a few minutes and get my heartrate down before heading in to get some beverages for the ride home. Too dang hot for the end of August I say.

Anyway, got beverages and stripy chips for Malia and we headed out. For some bizarre reason I decided to take the freeway. Yes, I took the freeway. I found out later that it must have been pre-destined. About a mile and a half before the Smith & Edwards exit I noticed a truck pulling a boat off to the side of the freeway. As I got closer I realized that it was the one that nearly broke my car. Being a big old jerk, I honked and waved at them as I passed by. I then chuckled a little bit here and there for the next 15 minutes or so. It was fantastic. Looking back now from a couple hours onward I feel a bit bad about finding so much joy in their misfortune, but at the same time I can't help but continue to feel a bit repaid. I don't know if they actually saw me or recognized my car even though I was going significantly lower than the 75 MPH speed limit because apparently Sunday early afternoon is mass migration of semis and I got stuck in the middle. I do like to think that they recognized me and felt a bit bad.

I'm going to post at a later date about Lagoon because being the horribly unprepared parent I am on many occasions, I did not take a camera so I have to wait to get some pictures from other people. Just add this to the post of fun from the Dinosaur Park because I'm waiting on pictures from that one too.

Quickie for a friend

2008-08-19T09:21:00.004-06:00

This post is just to tide folks over until I have time to put up the big one about the Weekend of Birthday Fun. haha, I'm such a dork and you all love it.

Saturday, the day after the day of Dinosaur fun, my sister Kami and I decided to go "rummaging". Brief backstory on rummaging is that is what our Grandma Bonnie and her friend Kay called going to garage sales back in the day. So, after dropping of some stuff at Krissy's garage sale, we jumped in the Tahoe and were off... and then not off, because we realized that we didn't really want to aimlessly drive around town or we'd never get to everything. So back to the parents we went and got the paper so we could plan our attack. I had no cash, and Kami had $15. Normally that is more than enough for a day of rummaging, but we hit the jackpot eventually. The first couple were just kind of run of the mill stuff, but I was able to score a sweet Rick Astley CD for $1.50. They were having a 50% off everything so I got quite the deal. Kam picked up some scrapbooky stuff for 50 cents, which is apparently really good pricing. Yeah, I don't know, some letters or something. I'm not really up to speed on the lingo o' scrapbooking.

So, down to $13 we wandered aimlessly through a couple more run of the mill sales. Eventually we ended up at the best one. We encountered this bastion of all that is doll related goodness (to a little girl anyway):

That is a "ginormous" dollhouse. That's Malia's word by the way and it comes up almost to my waist. The lady wanted $15 for it, but we only had $13. Unfortunately some other person had expressed interest and had gone to get $15 so the lady wouldn't budge on price. Kami then went through her ashtray of change and came up with 2 more dollars and we walked away with the prize. We then hit up the bank so we could continue the fun. We found some great cookie/candy jars for Kami, a little rocky chair for Hannah, and I got some sweet suitcases at a little old lady's sale. That pretty much sums up the day of rummaging, but we're planning on doing on down here in SLC because I'm pretty sure we can find more. It only took us about 2 hours to hit up all there was available in Brigham City.

Malia's Birthday Adventure... with just me

2008-08-13T11:42:00.005-06:00

Due to the overwhelming requests I've received (one - hahaha), I am posting about the day Malia and I had yesterday to celebrate her birthday. The day started a bit late as I had to head into work for a couple of hours for some meetings that I couldn't reschedule. Stupid work sometimes.

First up for the day we headed to Nordstrom Rack to get her the shoes she has been coveting for months. She has wanted Skechers since before Christmas, but I told her that I was not buying her any until she started real school instead of preschool. Since she starts school in just a few weeks I thought what better time to purchase them than on her birthday. I know, sneaky me because now she thinks of them as a birthday present instead of just for school. Also, we hit up the Rack because the price was about 1/2 of anywhere else. Here are her Lights Skechers:

Seeing as we were there and I like shoes I decided to splurge and purchase a new pair for myself as well. I'm using the excuse that my birthday is in less than two weeks as my reason. Here are my new shoes:

Next we headed down to Gateway. I've been meaning to get us a membership to the Clarke Planetarium for some time, but just had not gotten around to doing it. Well, we set it up yesterday so for the next year we have unlimited free shows. We had planned on seeing the show on the Human Body, but it's not there anymore so we went with Deep Sea 3D:

It was her first 3D show ever and she loved it. She, along with every other child in the theatre, was trying to catch the Jellyfish and various other fish. She wasn't so much a fan of one point where a grouper snapped as though it were coming to eat us. Even I jumped for that one. Outside of that she loved it and kept informing those around us what kind of sharks were swimming by. The guy on my left commented that it was a little disturbing that my 5 yr old knew more about sharks than him. I let him know about the joy of Shark Week and how much she likes watching it with me. Who doesn't know about Shark Week? Seriously, it's not like they don't advertise the hell out of it. Oh well, they'll have another viewer next year if this guy remembers.

Since the show started 30 minutes late due to some projector issues, we didn't end up going to the Fly Me to the Moon 3D show as I'd planned. Instead we headed over to the Children's museum. I wasn't all that impressed with the stuff they had, but maybe I was just too tired. They had a lot of hands on stuff, but it wasn't really geared towards single children to play with. I bet it's a great place to take a group of kids, but not so much to take just one. Especially when it is full of groups of kids who don't really want an extra one thrown in that they don't know. Malia liked it though and that's what really matters.

After the joy of the museum we were both hungry so we wandered around a bit and ended up at the food court near the north end of Gateway. Because Malia has no taste whatsoever and is really picky about food we ended up eating at S'barro instead of some place that had real food. She had cheese pizza (pretend there is no pepperoni visible):

I had whatever this is called:

After eating, we headed home. I ended up taking the long way because she fell asleep before we had left the parking garage. We were parked approximately 15 feet from the exit of the parking garage to give you an idea of how quickly she was out. It was not a super long way, but I managed to take 45 minutes to get home so that she was not super cranky due to short nap. We got home and got all swimsuited up and headed for the pool. After some small freakouts due to drowning wasps we got to the swimming and it was good.

I don't really remember the rest of the evening other than the lady across from me got Malia a birthday card and I finally got a hold of the handyman to get my cooler fixed. It appears that the cooler was indeed possessed the other day because it did not work Monday or Tuesday, only Sunday. I may or may not have fed Malia dinner, it's kind of a haze of exhaustion. I fully expect that Friday will do the same after my entire family heads to the Dinosaur Park for Malia's big birthday party.

Take your pick - possession or spontaneous self-fixing

2008-08-11T10:18:00.004-06:00

To be specific I think that my swamp cooler is possessed. It started acting up a few weeks ago when we had the joy of almost thunderstorms every evening for a couple of weeks. I thought it was because it was so humid. We all know that humidity trumps the cooling effects of the swamper, so I didn't stress too much. Once the humidity went down it didn't start working any better so I had the resident handy man take a look. The prognosis was not good and looking back also doesn't make sense to me.

He said that the motor was on the fritz and I needed a new one. This does not make sense to me because it was still blowing air. However, I am no expert on the inner workings of the swamp cooler so I let it slide. My HOA covers the maintenance of things, but not the actual parts so I have to pay for a new motor. However, I've managed to just miss the handyman every evening since finding out it was broken so I've not been able to let him know to buy the new motor. Needless to say, It's been a bit toasty.

Yesterday I don't know why I decided to try it out, but I cranked up the old swamp cooler and wonder of wonders it worked! Now, it was not cooling down excessively, but it did not get above 79 all day and I'm impressed with that. It even kept cooling over night. Let me tell you that waking up at 67 degrees after dying of heat for a week or so is a little disconcerting.

I don't know if it's actually going to continue working properly or if it's just possessed. I guess we'll see when I get home tonight and start her up.

I used to love school...

2008-08-08T08:41:00.005-06:00

I've determined that I heavily dislike whatever School District Malia is in. I can't remember what it is and I'm too lazy to look it up. It's been a grand ole time getting her registered for Kindergarten. I will share the timeline with you:

--Beginning of January I submit a request to change schools so that she can go to the Elementary that buses from her daycare. I am told I will be notified mid-February whether or not she will be able to attend.
--Mid-March I finally receive a phone call letting me know that she's been accepted and I can come get the registration materials.
--Beginning of May I attend (with Malia) Kindergarten Round-up and turn in her registration information. Since her annual checkup with the doctor isn't until the middle of August, I have Malia get her final shots because they won't register her or assign her to a class until she's had all of them. I did not want to take the chance that she would not be in the morning class. I am told that final registration and class information will be sent out at the end of June.
--I call the school on August 5th since I've not yet heard anything about her class. I was told that they changed their scheduling and were just sending out the final registration information that day.
--I get a postcard in the mail on Wednesday. I'll try and scan later to show you the insane amount of information in tiny font on this card. This card lets me know the following:

I have to come into the school one night next week to pick up more information that they didn't give out at the original registration and that they'll post the Kindergarten class lists on the door of the classroom.
I must schedule a conference with her teacher for one evening on either August 20th or 21st.
Malia doesn’t in fact start school on August 25. Even though I was told this was the first day of school at the Round-up, Kindergarten doesn’t actually start until the Tuesday after Labor Day.
I have to take her in for a pre-assessment test the week of August 25th.

Now, I don't have a problem with doing everything that needs to be done in order to get her into school. What I object to is the spreading out of everything that needs to happen and not being told everything that needs to happen. Can they not consolidate all of this in some fashion? Would it have been super difficult to hand out the information packets at the Kindergarten Round-up? Failing that, they could have at least mentioned the other items that would be coming up. I asked specifically what other things I needed to do and was told that there wasn't anything else and I'd get everything that I needed in the mail. It just seems like the way they've organized things, and I use 'organized' VERY loosely, isn't very efficient.

Regardless, Malia starts Kindergarten on September 2, 2008. She's beyond excited to start and we've already gotten her backpack and school supplies, which she keeps getting out in her impatience to begin.

Well, she may start school then. Does anyone know how to get crayon and/or colored pencil off a TV screen? I say crayon and/or because she doesn't remember which she used on the TV and which she used on the printer. GAAAHHHH!

I'm a bad daughter

2008-08-01T10:25:00.003-06:00

I completely forgot to call my parents this past Wednesday. It was their 33rd Wedding Anniversary.

Congratulations on tolerating each other that long! =) To borrow from your son, "I kid".

Thank you for being a great example of how a marriage should work. You guys have shown me how much you can still love someone just as much as the day you married them. Even if they are never able to keep the aircraft carrier cleared off for more than a day or two at most or they harass you about never being able to keep it cleared off for more than a day or two at most.

I love you both so much and thank you for always being there for me whenever I needed you! I hope you have many more long cluttered years together.

Memory Tag

2008-07-17T09:07:00.000-06:00

Here's how you play:

1. As a comment on my blog, leave one memory that you and I had together. It doesn't matter if you knew me a little or a lot, anything you remember.
2. Next, re-post these instructions on your blog and see how many people leave a memory of you.

It's actually pretty funny to read the responses. If you leave a memory about me, I'll assume you're playing the game and I'll come to your blog and leave one about you. If you don't want to play on your blog, or if you don't have a blog, I'll leave my memory of you in my comments.

Quickie for you all

2008-07-15T11:37:00.001-06:00

Just a quickie about the Great Weight Loss Plan of 2008...

I have managed to somehow get back to my starting weight despite months of going to the gym. That being said, I have lost 5% body fat. So, even though I've not starting losing weight, I'm building up the lean muscle which burns more calories. I expect that within the next month or so the weight will start coming off. Daily attendance at the gym and swimming with the rugrat is paying off!

Also, congrats to JC on his accomplishments so far and Happy belated Birthday:

2 inches off the waist and 10 lbs lost

I'm going to declare myself the continued winner though because it makes me feel better. =)

I really do mean to update

2008-06-27T10:47:00.005-06:00

I've been a bit remiss in my updating, but in my defense, it's been a bit busy lately. I have some posts partially done that I will try and get to this weekend including Hannah's first trip to the zoo and my trip to Chicago for eBay Live.

It is the Gem Faire this weekend and afterwards the parents, Haylee and Krissy will be joining Malia and I at the pool. I'm pretty sure that there will be arguments over pool floaties combined with Malia attempting to teach Haylee how to swim even though she's not very good at it herself. I'm going to put Dad in charge of my camera as I plan on being in the water. It's supposed to be 96 on Saturday and Sunday. Welcome to summer. I got spoiled in Chicago where I'm sure it didn't get above 70. To come home to over 90? Yeah, that was tough.

Oh, gym update. I am pretty sure I gained back those 4 pounds that I lost while I was in Chicago. That city really is the one to eat in. I'm just going to have to work a little harder to get back on track. Also JC doesn't scare me. Buying exercise equipment is one thing, using it is another. Have Carin update us on how your are doing! =P

Let the entertainment begin!

2008-05-24T09:41:00.010-06:00

Updated: Now with actual videos!

Yes, it's the post you've all been waiting for. The complete Malia Dance Recital experience. We'll start with a couple of teaser pictures from the dances:

I'm not going to caption each of the videos. They are the individual dances that were done. Malia is in the back left corner for each of them. Keep an eye out for the wardrobe malfunctions. She tends to have one in nearly every dance.

Not a post with dance recital videos

2008-05-20T08:37:00.006-06:00

This isn't the post where I put up the pictures of Malia's dance recital. I've still not yet uploaded them from my camera. I've been a bit allergy-y. Yeah, that's not a word, but I don't care. I am posting an update to the Great Weight Loss Plan of 2008. Not to be confused with the Great Toilet Repair of 2008. Very similar though in that I'm working to fix something and get rid of the icky parts. Haha, I crack myself up.

Anyway, the update part:

I finally lost some weight that registered on the scale. Only 4 pounds but it's a start.
My body fat percentage has gone down .5%.
My pants and shirts are getting loose.
I got to go down a row of hooks when putting on my fresh from the wash bra yesterday morning. Boys won't really get why this is good, but the girls know what I mean.
I was less out of breath than usual after wandering about the zoo for several hours on Sunday.

They aren't really big accomplishments by any means, but it's a good start.

For the Malia lovers, more Malia-isms from Sunday evening.

"Mom, I wish I could be macaroni and cheese and then I would eat myself all up because I was so tasty."
"Mom, you are the best mom ever because you took me to the zoo. Even though you pretended that I was a monkey and you were taking me home."

I would like to note that I did not tell her that I was taking her home. I did call her a crazy little monkey and somehow her brain made the above translation.

I am calling you out JC

2008-05-13T12:11:00.004-06:00

JC and I were texting the other day about being fat. According to the BMI index thingie, he is 60 pounds overweight. I am 135 overweight. Obviously, I am way more fat than he is. He challenged me to race him to losing the weight. I'm happy to note that I have taken that challenge and have also taken steps to grind him into the dust. Especially since texting last week he let me know that he gained 5, while I stayed even.

I have not only joined the gym and have been attending each evening for a few weeks, but last night I worked with a personal trainer for the first time. I've decided to get rid of internet at home in order to spend the money on a personal trainer once every other week. Part of that plan gives me a pre-defined workout and diet plan to get going. I figure by going to the gym and doing a workout like I had last night (my butt and thighs really hurt) I won't have the energy to want to surf around on the internet when I get home. I'm just going to want to sit in the swimming pool and let Malia play. She's beyond excited that the pool is opening soon. It'll be open starting Memorial Day weekend and they've just finished up refinishing and re-tiling so it's all fresh and beautiful.

I've digressed a bit. In talking with the trainer, I found out that if I follow the plan, I can be down to my ultimate goal of losing 135 (maybe even more, we'll see how I look) in a year. So JC, you have a year to lose your 65! As I'm totally excited about this, I'll probably be posting updates at least monthly. I'll be doing body measurements that often with the trainer.

Get cracking JC because I'm going to beat you even though I have twice the amount to lose!

And for those of you who only really read this for the rugrat pictures and updates, here you go:

Malia-isms

2008-05-02T22:08:00.003-06:00

Sometimes Malia comes up with the oddest things. Some random thoughts she's shared with me lately.

--Mom, I wish I were a dolphin. They are so beautiful. Even though they are gray and that's not really a beautiful color

--Sometimes I wish I could be a balloon and then float up over the top of everything and look down. Then I get to pop, and I think that would feel really cool.

--Someday I really will ride a unicorn, even if I have to build one myself.

--I wish I were paint. Then someone could make a pretty picture out of me.

Needless to say I am very entertained, yet also a little weirded out that she wants to pop like a balloon. I'm not sure how to interpret that one.

Windows, Windows Everywhere!

2008-04-08T18:42:00.003-06:00

I've decided it's a sign that I'm old when I'm so dang excited about getting new windows for my condo. They were installed on Saturday and I finally hung the new curtains tonight. Well, except for the kitchen window which will have blinds. I've just run out of steam tonight.

Here is a picture of the naked kitchen window. Yes, that yellow is the color of my kitchen and dining room and my cabinets are just like the cabinets we had in the old house on 600 South. In fact, my condo was built in 1978 too so it must have been a good year for whoever came up with this dark walnut look cabinets. They've grown on me and I plan on sanding and refinishing in the same dark. They just need a bit of a refresh.

Next we have the living room with a lovely sage green and a dark tan combo. The walls in here will soon be a dark rusty red, so neutrals will be needed for some sanity.

Next we have Malia's room. She's moved on from the orange and pink that was her Dora the Explorer decor to Tinkerbell in a great purple and limey green. I can't express my joy at the lessened amount of pink going on in her room. Suffice to say, it's a large amount. The wall those are on will be a pastel violet color when I get around to painting the rest of the room.

Finally we have my room. I've gone with chocolate and ruby combo. I've revised my original plan for the bedroom slightly by adding in chocolate to kind of calm things down. The wall these curtains on will be a dark jewel tone purple, two other walls will be the chocolate brown and the final wall will be striped with the purple, ruby red, and a jewel tone orange as well.

Hopefully you have enjoyed your view of proof that I am getting old. I love these windows!!!!!

Art Gallery - the cleanup

2008-04-06T08:48:00.003-06:00

Well, it took me far longer than it should have, but I finally got all the evidence of the art gallery off the wall. All that is possible at least. I am mow missing some wall paint and have the added feature of slightly yellowed and reddened areas where the finger paint was the thickest. The parts that look tannish are the parts that are now missing wall paint.

As show here, the construction paper did not fully remove when pulled off the wall. There were quire a few pieces left that were bound to the finger paint.

The finger paint reacted weird (or maybe as expected; I'm no scientist) with the wall paint in some places and peeled off as I was removing the finger paint. I was correct when I remembered that I bought washable finger paint, but apparently when you combine it with construction paper and wall paint it becomes "almost washable" finger paint.

I am still unhappy about this, but at least she picked a wall that I hadn't already painted. I really might have strangled her then.