Wednesday, March 31, 2010

A little spring cleaning.

Once again, I’ve changed the look of this blog.  :)  I can’t help it, I get restless and want to change it all the time.  My tabs that were on top are now on the side under “menu.” 

Hope you all enjoy the new look!  I’ll tweak it a bit, but it should be just fine.

Sunday, March 28, 2010

The Hair Sisters & Earth Hour

Yesterday both of the girls decided they wanted their hair down for the day.  “Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair.”

 

This was Hannah’s hair shortly after she got out of the shower.  Oh my goodness, my little girl is growing up at lightning speed, isn’t she?  Damn, she’s gorgeous.

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Kali was telling me about all the dirt she had on her hand.  :)  That pink dress is about 2 years old and she wears it all the time.  She was very happy to finally wash the dirt off of her hand after she was done helping Daddy outside.

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Last night was Earth Hour.  At 8:30 we shut off all the lights, computers, and TV and hung out for a quiet hour.  Well, Alex was desperately trying to find the basketball game on his phone, which was quite amusing.  Kali read to us by candlelight.  I was thrilled that she read to us!  Normally she won’t read to anyone else but me, and only when we do our school work.

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I would show you pictures of our Earth Hour, but it was too dark! 

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While I enjoyed hanging out in the dark with everyone, I was slightly glad when 9:30 rolled around and I could see again!  It was either that, or I was going to fall asleep on the couch because my brain thought it was bedtime after I sat in the dark for an hour! 

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Mindless fluff

On a parenting message board that I belong to, there’s a “list ten things about yourself” post. 

Ten is not enough.  Not that I’m some fantastic human being, but because I have too many quirks.

I will list my million here, and y’all will be kind and leave a comment with your 10 or more. 

 

1. I'm 5'10" - short compared to my 6'8" dh!

2. I never thought I'd have more than 1 child.

3. I really want to travel - a lot.

4. I have not had a working vehicle since the middle of December.

5. I thought homeschooling was only for crazy people! Hmmm...I might be crazy then!

6. I cannot stand fake people or liars. No room in my life for that.

7. I cannot keep plants alive. I try, oh how I try, and I keep killing them.

8. My youngest has some undiagnosed "issues." However, if I could clone her and have 10 more, I would. I tell her if everyone in the world had her heart, there would be no more war.
9. I love to cook. I'm making dinner for a bunch of friends Friday night.

10. If Disney would let me, I'd live there and work for them for free. Come on, Mickey, give a girl a chance!

11.  I hate making phone calls.

12.  Bent paper makes me twitch.  And I have to have more than one piece to write on – like it needs to be stacked neatly, not bent, and have at least 2 or more pieces.  :) 

13.  I love to run.  In the dark.  Alone.  With my iPod.  :)

14.  I am a total homebody.

15.  I am a glass half full/eternal optimist kind of girl.  Better to look on the bright side than be constantly complaining, right?!

16.  Streak-free windows are not something I can manage to do. 

Oh there’s more, but this could take all day!  Your turn!

Friday, March 19, 2010

New tab

At the top of my handy-dandy blog here are two little tabs.  One is for my favorite place in the world, and the other one is a brand-spankin’ new tab.  Click on it, then tell me what you think.  Pretty please?  With sugar on top?  I’d appreciate it.

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

One day you’re in, the next day….you’re out.

 

I’m talking about calories here.  Why, oh why, do they have to be the reason I gain weight?!  ;)  Maybe I should stop shoving food in my mouth, huh?

1 pound = 3,500 calories.  Can’t the calorie fairy make it, oh, more than that?

I’m back to tracking my calories on SparkPeople.  I really need to drop another 20 pounds, and I need to figure out where my calories are going.  Can we say…..coffee, milk, and sugar?!  So by calculations I should be eating around 1,800 calories a day and burning a total of 500 calories a day more than I’m eating which will give a 1 pound a week loss.  That’s doable, right?

Thankfully, running kills off about 100 calories per mile.  I ran 4 miles this morning.  :)  I figure the more I run, the more I’ll lose.  The more I lose, the more I’ll run!  What a concept, right?!  I am just tired of attempting to run with all this extra weight floppin’ around on me.  Do they make a sports bra for your butt?!  No, really, I’m serious.

Tracking calories is a tedious, PITA thing to do.  But it’s a necessary evil.  Also, it makes me realize that I need to up my protein intake.  That, in turn, will improve my running, too.  It also makes me realize that I consume wayyyyy too many carbs.  Damn.  I love my carbs.  I refuse to give them up, but I will cut down on them.

I had a really nice 4 mile run this morning.  Well, the first mile was hell.  Why is the first mile always my worst?  My legs are usually begging me to turn around and go back home.  And then there’s the whole “I need a sports bra for my butt” thing.  Mile 2 was better.  Mile 3 was even better.  On mile 4 I decided to put it into high gear; running fast can’t kill me, right?!  I took about 2 minutes off my mile pace time, and at one point in that mile, had taken it down 4 minutes.  By the end of that last mile, I was 2 minutes ahead of my pace, totally out of breath, and thrilled.  I love that feeling. 

Remind me of that when my alarm goes off in the morning, okay?

Monday, March 15, 2010

What a weekend!

I got a call Friday morning around 8:00 from a mom of one of Mary’s friends.  They have a time-share for that weekend that they couldn’t use and wanted to know if we wanted it.  In Orlando.  Right by Epcot.  OMG. 

I had to turn her down.  We have no car, funds are skinnier than Alex, etc., etc.  I hung up with her and Alex looked at me and said “call her back.”  So I did. 

I woke up the kids and told them we were headed out for the weekend!  They were beyond thrilled.  I found a reasonable rental, packed up our stuff, got a bunch of food together, picked up the rental with Alex, and headed out the door.

This was going to be a girls’ weekend; poor Alex had to stay here and work.  :( 

First we stopped off at the post office to mail out our boxes of pillowcases for the Disney Give a Day, Get a Day program.  Then we stopped at Super Target to pick up some food we needed that I didn’t have…..something for breakfast, hotdog buns, bread (yes, I was out and had not made any Thursday night), and cheese (that I had and forgot to bring.)

Then we made it to where her timeshare is.  Um.  OMG.  We were staying at the Bonnet Creek resort in a 2 bedroom condo.  That place is gorgeous.

We checked in, had our bags brought over to where our room was, and got to our room. 

I looked out the window and saw…….Epcot!  I nearly fainted.  Y’all need to know what a Disney freak I am and then you’ll know why I was so giddy!  The girls couldn’t believe they could see Epcot – and Downtown Disney!

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It was raining and already 5:30, so we unpacked and I started dinner.  Hotdogs.  Hey, that’s as exciting as my cooking was going to get; after all, I was on vacation!

 

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The girls wanted to move in.  Hannah thought that their juice should be in wine glasses.  I agreed.  :) 

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Yes, there are two bottles of mustard on the table.  The smaller bottle actually had ketchup in it.  :) 

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I had to go check the view….yep, still there!  

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It was still pouring after dinner, so I figured I’d give Kali a bath and send Hannah into the shower.  They both ended up in my bathroom – Hannah for the big shower, and Kali for the jacuzzi tub.  Smart kids.

 

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I got done doing their hair, they got jammies on, and we went and sat on the balcony so we could watch Epcot’s fireworks.

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After the girls went to bed, I got in that jacuzzi tub.  :)  Too bad I couldn’t bring that home!

I woke up early the next morning and did something I never, ever do.  I had coffee *before* I took my shower.  Gasp!  Seriously.  It was really nice to hang out in my jammies, have some coffee, and stare at the great view.  I think I need to start doing that once a week.

The girls got up, we had some breakfast, and decided to go check out the resort.

I was chasing them and trying to get some pictures.  They hid behind the bathroom door.  Boogers.

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How did she get so dang cute?!?!?

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While Hannah was getting dressed, I told Kali to show me how much fun she was having so far.  

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The pool by our building was really cool!  Well, warm since it was heated.  :)

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But it was still chilly outside; we all had our jackets on.

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There was a lazy river around the pool, too.

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Hannah picked up Kali so she could see something.

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Then we went for a walk to the activity center. 

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Free mini-golf!! 

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There was massive cheating and bad sportsmanship going on.  :)  It was great!

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And what a view, too!

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We went back to the room, had lunch, and decided to go swimming. 

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Love how you can just walk in to this pool.

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After going around the lazy river a million times, I got out and dried off.  The girls decided to go back in, but after Kali felt the blast of air hit her, she decided she was freezing (she was yelling “cold, cold, cold” here) and they got out.

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Hannah thought it was pretty funny.

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We went back, got dressed, and went to Downtown Disney.  By the ESPN store there was a guy showing how baseballs are made. 

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We went to the toy store where the girls were making potato head faces.

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And then off to the candy store.

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Candy is gooooooood.  The girls have to buy their own stuff if they want it.  Keeps them from begging me and makes them appreciate it more when it’s their money they’re spending.

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Coffee is a wonderful thing!

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The resort has a “Flick on the Field” on Saturday nights.  I got roped in to going to the movie and was not looking forward to freezing on the lawn.  Much to my relief, they had moved the movie inside.  Oh yeah!  Monsters vs. Aliens; the girls were happy because they had not seen that one yet.  Free movie and free popcorn.  Score!

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We got back, and it was time for them to go to bed.  I packed up as much as I could and went to bed myself.  I did not want to leave.  Ever. 

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The girls did not want to get up.  It was daylight savings time and we had lost an hour!  Zzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

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I realized that the blanket was nice and heavy.  Kali really like it and it helped her sleep really well.  I’ve often thought about getting her a heavier blanket and now I think I should.  Kids like Kali do well with heavy blankets.  :) 

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We checked out and headed back to Downtown Disney.  The girls insisted.

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They wanted to run around the open field by La Nouba.

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Beautiful balloon, but I still don’t want to go up in it!

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My princesses.

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Hannah kept putting hats on Kali.

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It’s the ‘deer in the headlights’ look!

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Hey Genie! 

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See my girls and their fudge?  See the Candy Cauldron sign in the background?  :)  Kali had just enough money left for fudge.  Hannah still has plenty of money.  :)  I let them eat fudge before lunch.  I’m going to lose my “good food making mom” license.  lol 

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And then it was time to go home. 

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We had an absolutely wonderful weekend.  I am so grateful that we were able to do this and thankful to Sandy for letting us use her timeshare weekend.  The girls have mailed off Thank You notes and pictures to her this morning.  Girls’ weekend was a hit.  I had a great time hanging out with Hannah and Kali.  They said their favorite thing that weekend was………everything.

And to top that off just a bit, right before we left on Friday, I got a call from the St. Pete Times.  Kali and I had dropped off an entry form for a Disney contest they had.  We won 2 tickets to Disney!  I was waiting for Publisher’s Clearing House to show up next!  We should have those tickets just as soon as we fill out some paperwork and send it back. 

Saturday, March 6, 2010

Disney’s Give a Day, Get a Day.

I’ll do anything for Disney.  Anything.  Really, all they’d have to do is call me and ask me to help out, and I’d find a way.  :)  I am a Disney freak.  So when we saw late last year that Disney was going to do a give a (volunteer) day, get a (Disney) day program, I was psyched.

Then the van died.

And it stayed dead.

And I had to cancel our volunteer day since we couldn’t get there!

Then, after talking to a friend and doing some more searching on Disney’s volunteer site, I found something we could still do…….make pillowcases for children with cancer.  Perfect.  I can sew, I knew the kids could help, and I figured if I needed an extra hand, I’d yell for Alex.  ;) 

I signed up with ConKerr Cancer for our volunteering.  We had to make 5 pillowcases per volunteer, and since I signed us all up, we were going to make 25 pillowcases. 

Thankfully, I had the majority of the fabric already, and only needed to get a few spare yards to finish up some. 

Hannah and Kali had a ball learning how to use my sewing machine.  Kali couldn’t reach the pedal, so I had her sit on my lap and I did the pedal for her.  It was so cute.  Hannah really enjoyed it, and by the end was running my machine like a pro.  She was even helping me iron, too.

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After they were done, I washed them and then ironed them. 

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They are now individually bagged and waiting to be boxed up.  I have to get a large flat-rate box since there are too many for the medium ones I have here.  We all had a wonderful time making them and hope that they put some smiles on the children’s faces. 

The girls want pillowcases now, too.  Not sure I have any fabric left!  I’m sure I’ll come up with something for them, right?  Hannah said she wants to keep on sewing.  Maybe I’ll teach her to do more than sew a straight line!