Lots of craziness

Things change...

2010-11-25T22:05:00.000-08:00

You change.
I change.
Things change.

I am on a journey. It's strange, I keep searching externally for what I am finding is completely internal already. And with that, there is peace.
I am focusing on controlling my mind and even just with the smallest changes, there is such a difference in my life.
Surrender.
I feel myself fighting the moment in I am in sometimes and I mentally step back and just smile at the ridiculousness of that very idea. Fighting the moment I am in. Fighting myself. Fighting my life. I am no longer interested in fighting my life. So I smile and I surrender and I am at such peace.
I had no idea that the tools I spent so long looking for were here all along.
I feel like I am on the cusp of becoming another person.
I feel like a caterpillar.

last night

2010-10-29T05:55:00.000-07:00

Me: Trin, tomorrow is Friday! Aren't you excited? The weekend is coming up!

Trin: No. I wish there wasn't school on Friday... or Monday. We should only have school Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.

Me: I completely agree. We shouldn't have to work on Friday and Monday either. No school and no work!

Trin: And no dumb stupid math.

The Red Princess Detective

2010-10-28T07:00:00.000-07:00

There is a little imaginative girl who lives in my house. Every day when I come home from work and peek into her room, she is off on an adventure. Sometimes it is with her nose buried into a book that she is reading outloud to her dog who is curled up at her feet, sometimes it is in a very involved game including every barbie doll she owns, and sometimes it is in one of the many journals she draws in. She will blip back into my reality long enough to smile and say hi before reentering her own little mind space and blocking out everything not imperative to what she is doing. I softly close her door and go into the kitchen to start dinner. I'm always a little envious that she gets to stay behind.

Song of the day - Cover Me

2010-10-26T06:45:00.000-07:00

~Candlebox

And Cover me yeah, And I walk alone
And Cover me yeah, And my stance it stumbles home
And Cover me yeah, And trip on through the sands of time
And cover me, 'Cause I've been branded
I've lost my mind yeah, Lost my mind yeah
But you'll cover me yeah won't you give me shelter from the storm

And Over me yeah, You fade into the night
And Over me yeah, You melt into the light
And Over me yeah, You will fear the things I need
And Over me, You will feel the hate I breed
You're under me, And you will question my authority
You're under me, And you will lose almost everything
You know, You're under me, You will feel the pain I wanna bring you
You're under me, You never change, Never change not a fucking thing
Not a, a fucking thing
But you - you'll cover me, Yeah, give me shelter from the storm

Cover me, Cover me
Won't you, Cover me
Cover me, Don't you
Cover me, Cover me
Give me shelter from the storm

Oh yeah, No no no
People push and shove on time, I give it to you
What I have is what is mine I feel it for you
You've got to cover me
You've got to cover me
People take & people steal, I have it for you
What I have is what I fear, I fear it for you
You've got to cover me, 'Cause I've been branded
A broken man, A Broken man
But you'll cover me, yeah
Won't you give me
Shelter from the storm
Cover me, Cover me
Won't you, Cover me
Cover me, Don't you
Cover me, Cover me
Give me shelter from the storm

slacker.

2010-10-26T05:47:00.000-07:00

I'm not listing excuses this time. Ya'll already know all the reasons I sometimes vanish from here.
Some bullets...

**I am working on some interesting bread recipes. Mostly stuffed with cool things like pesto or cinnamon, sugar and raisins. I am trying to do a double recipe of the french bread dough I like the most right now and experiment with it. Recipes will be here as soon as I get them just the way I like and take some photos. Stay tuned.

**In that vein, I started watching How To Cook Your Life last night amidst groans and "Maaa-oooom, this is SOOOO boring" from the girls. Now I want The Tasajara Bread Book... really any of these books. I only got to watch about twenty minutes because it was bedtime but the atmosphere was so interesting.

**I am listening to Eckhart Tolle's The Journey Into Yourself on my ipod right now. I read A New Earth last year and learned a lot but didn't really internalize as much of it as I thought I had and in listening to Journey, I am being reminded of a lot of things I had let fall by the wayside.

**Please do not be surprised if fifteen years from now I am living with Buddhist monks in India.

**I still have a whopping secret I am keeping from most of you that I can't wait to write about. Soon my pretties, soon.

**Halloween party is this weekend. If you are local, I better see your ass there :-) The girls and I are going as a coven of witches. I am so totally taking a family photo of us in our costumes. I may just use it as our Christmas card.

**I have another book idea. Ok, admitedly, I have a really great beginning and end to a book. The middle hasn't come to me yet. It's really from a dream I had a long time ago.

**I woke up with Candlebox's Cover Me in my head three times last night.

**My sister is having a little boy in February. It is so strange to see her pregnant. There is something about seeing your siblings have children that makes them become grownups in your eyes. I went by her new house yesterday, they will be moving in in the next few weeks. If trying not to control you sister's life is this hard, I can't even imagine how hard it will be with my own chidren.

**The weather is beautiful. Highs in the eighties and lows in the sixties. We've had about a month of it and I am just in heaven.

**Amanda wants a bass guitar for her birthday.

Enchiladas and Spanish rice for my sister

2010-10-07T16:52:00.000-07:00

Cast of characters... half of an onion, jalapeno, salsa, white rice, oil, shredded cheddar cheese, corn tortillas, tomato bouillon, chicken bouillon (not pictured), enchilada sauce, a tomato and cilantro (optional and not pictured)...

Dice up the onion... you can use a whole medium onion if you like a lot of onions... If you have access to fresh jalapenos, just buy one or two (unless you want more spice, I never use more than one) and clean them and dice them up as well.

Next you will want to put two table spoons of oil into a deep skillet or a pot over medium heat. I use a skillet that is two inches deep, probably ten inches wide. Heat oil slightly, not to where it wants to explode when you throw something in there, just enough to where it moves around in the pan easily. Add one and a half cups of rice and stir occasionally to keep it from burning. Making Spanish rice is an art, I swear. Half the time I make it, it's fabulous and sometimes it flops, it's like the first pancake, except you don't get to make two :-) See how the rice is starting to turn white, that's what we want.

Now we are going to add the onions and jalapenos. You can add a diced fresh tomato here as well if you like, but we are going to add salsa later so you don't have to. You'll want to stir almost constantly because the onions and tomato will want to stick and you don't want to. Also, at this point, everything's gotten pretty hot so you want to keep it from burning. Your rice should start to brown a little, but not too much. Maybe two or three minutes of stirring before we add the bouillon.

You want one cube of chicken bouillon and one cube of tomato bouillon. Mush them up with your stirring spoon as quickly as possible and get them mixed in. As soon as you do, you may notice everything is wanting to stick at this point, add three cups of water, stir it all up and lower the heat to medium low.

Now I have a theory that you should only have the rice covered up about three fourths of the time that you are cooking it so that it doesn't end up mushy. I want it cooked all the way but not too much. So I usually uncover mine several times through out the process and check on it. When I think it's time, I leave the lid off so the rest of the liquid can escape, like I said, it's an art. In the bottom left photo, you can see what the consistency of the rice was when I uncovered it. I added 1/3 to 1/2 cup of salsa to it and stirred it up and lowered the heat to low to cook the remaining liquid out of it.

Now, while you were letting the rice cook, you needed to be starting the enchiladas. For this, you will want a 9x13 glass pan. It doesn't have to be glass, but it's better this way. Trust me. Poor a third of the can of enchilada sauce into the pan and make sure it is coating the bottom.
Wrap about fifteen tortillas into a few paper towels and microwave them for about two minutes. You want them to be hot enough to be pliable but not so hot that you make them hard. If you roll it, it shouldn't break. In each tortilla, put about two tablespoons of cheese and roll it up and set it in the pan. You can do two layers of enchiladas for a total of thirty. Drizzle remaining sauce over enchiladas and then sprinkle with cheese.

Bake in the oven at 350 for about twenty minutes or until the cheese on top is melted and you are confident that they are hot and then EAT! SOOOO good :-)

Kale, leeks and pesto over pumpkin ginger rice noodles...

2010-09-30T17:47:00.000-07:00

(for two servings)
1 tbl olive oil
1 leek, roughly chopped
1/3 red bell pepper, diced
1 head of kale
2 tbl basil pesto
2 tbl almond milk, unsweetened
1 package soba rice noodles

Heat olive oil over medium heat and saute leeks and bell peppers for about five minutes. Lower heat to medium/low and add kale, stirring occasionally until tender. I added some white pepper, herbs de Provence, celery salt and a little garlic powder here, you can spice as you'd like.
Add two tablespoons of basil pesto (I make mine with basil, pumpkin seeds, garlic and olive oil) and a few table spoons of unsweetened almond milk, more if you want it more sauce like.
Serve over rice noodles.

bedding and barstools and dinnerware, OH MY!

2010-09-29T05:36:00.000-07:00

Other than the pure clensing effect of blogging and the numerous friendships I've made out here in the blogosphere over the years, I occasionally run into opportunities that have only come up because I blog. This week, I was lucky enough to receive an email from CSN Stores to asking me if I'd be interested in reviewing one of their products. It was an easy YES once I saw how many fabulous products there are out there to review! CSN Stores has over 200 online stores where you can find anything you need whether it be a snuggly new bedding, a chic bar stool or even gorgeous dinnerware!
*sigh*
I love kitchen stuff.
And there are scads and scads of kitchen stuff available.
So I am gonna go browsing :-) I'll let you know what I pick!

(vegan) white wheat biscuits

2010-09-26T18:17:00.000-07:00

2 cups unbleached white wheat flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
6 tablespoons vegan margarine, chilled
1 cup unsweetened almond milk
rosemary, optional

Using a food processor, combine sliced margarine with flour, baking powder and salt until crumbly. Add almond milk until just combined... with biscuits, the less you mix, the better. Spray a twelve count muffin tin with non-stick spray, divide the batter evenly. I like really big biscuits so I will use a larger six count tin. Sprinkle the tops with rosemary.

Bake at 450 for ten to fifteen minutes, until golden brown on top.

on being vegan

2010-09-21T08:10:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I don't think you can say "being" when you are entering your second week BUT I have to say that I could seriously see this as a lifestyle change for me permanently. It wasn't hard like I thought it would be.
Whenever one considers a diet change, you always see yourself with the little food journal and a calorie calculator and you know it will be work.
But not so much for this one... I had to change what I buy at the store and the fact that Amanda and Trin are not on board blows because I have to make more than one dinner but as far as will power? Cake. Well, cake with no eggs anyway.
There are a gazillion awesome websites out there where I can find recipe ideas but with the exception of baking, it isn't rocket science. Substitute soy, almond, coconut or rice milk for just about everything calling for milk... and so far, there hasn't been anything I can't use ground flax in to cover for a lack of eggs in baking.
No meat? No problem. I don't even really miss it. The other day I was baking some chicken strips for Trin and Amanda and I didn't want to pop one in my mouth at all ;-)
Last night, I reheated a frozen brisket that The Cake Lady's husband made the last time we bbqed and as I was cutting it up for Amanda, it didn't bother me at all. Although I did stick my finger in the bbq sauce that he made to go with it because that shit is gooooooooood.
I can't do a freaking thing with tofu yet... how did something like tofu become intimidating?
The coolest thing? I can eat pretty much whatever I want and kind of feel guilt free about it. Second helping of salad? Yeah, well, it's SALAD. lol
Oh and I love cous-cous and quinoa a bunch!
Since I am only going into week two, I am not feeling secure enough to host my girl's night dinner with a vegan menu that will knock anyones socks off so we will be taking a break this weekend so I can make Chicken Spaghetti and a Mandarin Orange cake, both recipes from Mow's bag of old recipes that I finally finagled away from my Aunts who were keeping them hidden away.
I will be posting both recipes here with photos and reviews.

Song of the day - Edge of Desire

2010-09-17T10:15:00.000-07:00

~John Mayer

Young and full of running,
tell me where is that taking me?
Just a great figure eight
of a tiny infinity.

Love is really nothing
but a dream that keeps waking me.
For all of my trying
we still end up dying,
how can it be?

Don't say a word
just come over, and lie here with me.
Cause I'm just about to set fire to everything I see.

I want you so bad
I'll go back on the things I believe.
There I just said it,
I'm scared you'll forget about me.

So young and full of running,
all the way to the edge of desire.
Steady my breathing,
silently screaming I have to have you now.

Wired and I'm tired,
think I'll sleep in my clothes on the floor.
Maybe this mattress will spin on its axis
and find me on yours.

Don't say a word
just come over and lie here with me.
Cause I'm just about to set fire to everything I see.

I want you so bad I'll go back on the things I believe.
There I just said it,
I'm scared you'll forget about me

BRIDGE

Don't say a word
just come over and lie here with me.
Cause I'm just about to set fire to everything I see.

I want you so bad I'll go back on the things I believe.
There I just said it
I'm scared you'll forget about me.

yesterday I cried

2010-09-17T10:10:00.000-07:00

It's been a long time since I've just cried.
There have been reasons enough for months. In fact, I remember thinking the other day that it was strange that I hadn't cried in awhile.
I was listening to John Mayer's Edge of Desire while driving home and it just hit me, punched me square in the gut and suddenly I was spinning.
I felt overwhelmed and desperate and scared.
And then it passed.
And I took a deep breath and wiped my face and life resumed, as it does.
You just have to feel things when they come and then let them go when you are done.
It was a long day and I felt a lot.
And today, it's done.

heavy

2010-09-15T06:53:00.000-07:00

Being a mother means making hard choices.
It means that even after you've learned hard lessons, you have to watch your children learn them again, for themselves.
There is a saying that I always think of when being a mom is hard...
“Making the decision to have a child - It's momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.”- Elizabeth Stone

Let me tell you a little secret about raising a teenager... even when she is an awesome kid who makes great grades and who doesn't have sex and who is cheerful about 85% of the time and who keeps her room relatively clean and who helps with dinner and knows how to dust the right way... even then, it's hard to raise her. It's hard to help her make the right choices. It's hard to let her make the wrong ones. And sometimes, like right now, it's hard to know which is which.

Last year, she was in seventh grade and a boy who rides her bus was in ninth grade. She and this boy became friends. He was and still is this geeky looking kid whose feet are too big for his body, he wears glasses and draws pictures. He doesn't look like the kind of boy you need to be too wary of. I'm beginning to think that they all are anyway.
So last year, they become friends. In fact, there was a whole group of kids she was friends with on the bus... her little bus posse.
And then the trouble started.
This boy started dating a girl in high school. A ~~bad~~ misguided girl. The kind of girl who is in trouble all the time, who spends her afternoons in detention, who gets suspended. I don't know this girl so I am hesitant to cast judgement but suffice it to say, she was spending her days in in-school suspension and her afternoons running around town. And for whatever reason, she set her sights on this boy and he started spending time with her.
It only lasted a few weeks and Amanda came home and griped about this girl and how she was trying to get this boy to get into trouble all the time. I reminded her, as I do whenever the opportunity arises, that he is responsible for his choices, not this other girl.
In a flurry of activity, many things happened quite suddenly.
The boy and the girl slept together.
The boy and the girl broke up.
The girl claimed rape.
The girl admitted no rape, but confirmed pregnancy.
The girl also admitted multiple partners.
The boy was shipped away to relatives.
I took advantage of all this drama to have several BIG conversations with my daughter about choices and behavior and responsibility.

Now, having been down the teenaged pregnancy road before, I sympathize with these kids, truly I do. That being said, I do not ever want to have to sympathize with any of my own children in that sense. I'd like to get all of my girls well into adulthood without any of them having babies.
So, the boy moved away and Amanda and he stayed friends online and via text but the updates on the girl and the boy were few and far between.
Admittedly, I was relieved.
Not long afterwards, Cody moved back. And in with us. And away.
Another big sigh of relief but not without the recognition that while I don't want these boys thinking about my daughter naked, I also feel for them. I cared about Cody. I wanted to help him.
Sometimes I feel like there is something inside of me that tries to reach out and latch onto people and pull them in closer. Even when I don't want to, it still happens.
The thing that Cody had in common with this boy? Both sets of parents blow.
So the boy moved back at the end of the summer (practically coinciding with Cody leaving) and he and Amanda became fast friends again. And then with the beginning of the school year, just a mere three weeks ago, they started "going out". And when I say "going out" PLEASE NOTICE THE QUOTATION MARKS because my daughter isn't going to movies or out to dinner or even for a damn walk with this kid, they just ride the bus and have the social status of going out and they might hold hands or have long texting conversations but they aren't dating. Because my daughters aren't allowed to date until they are sixteen.
But at the same time, I realize that "going out" with boys, which they've been doing in school since the second grade, happens. I don't like it but in order to maintain some kind of control and facilitate honesty in my household, there it is. And more times than not, when it happens, it is over just as quickly.
So when Amanda came to me to let me know that he and this boy were going out, I inwardly cringed but outwardly kept my cool. And have held onto that cool for the last few weeks as this girl has gotten closer to delivery.
Now, there is some possibility that this isn't the boy's baby but his parents, who blow, are practically excited about the baby being born and have agreed to start paying child support without a paternity test. There are so many things about this boys parents that I don't understand but I really cannot fathom not getting a paternity test when this girl has admitted she was with other guys at the same time.
As a parent, I am struggling with all of this.
A lot.
On the one hand, I feel like I am limiting what Amanda can get away with but simultaneously, I am having a bunch of chats with her about all of this. She has been crystal clear in letting me know just how much she understands right now that one time is all it takes. She has told me that she doesn't want to get pregnant, doesn't want to have sex yet and man oh man does she ever have the shining example of how easily those things could happen now. We've talked about how many girls at school have already been pregnant or had babies... Teenaged pregnancy is no longer a ship your daugter off to her Aunt's house for the summer thing. It's in your face, it's happening a lot.
At the same time, I've told her that as soon as she even thinks she might want to have sex, she needs to let me know because we will get her ass to a gynecologist immediately and she can choose the form of birth control she wants to be on first. And we can learn the names of all the stds ever.
On the other hand, I want to forbid it. All of it. Sex. Boys. "Going Out". Growing Up. But I can't. Forbidding it all closes the communication doors and I'd rather help guide her through her choices than try and make them for her or worse, have her make them behind my back.

Yesterday the girl had her baby. The boy wasn't at school because his parents took him to the delivery. And when Amanda got home, she was upset because everyone had been talking about it all day long.
There are no books on how to handle this. How to handle that the boy your daughter likes already has a baby (if it's his) or that everyone keeps gossiping about it or that she's not even fourteen for another ten weeks.

And all the while, I'm starting to look at Emilee and wonder.

Emilee and I are doing a 3 week vegan diet

2010-09-13T10:30:00.001-07:00

I'm excited about this. I've been wanting to try it for a long time and never found the "right" time. We discussed it a week or so ago and started to get all the stuff we'd need and cut down on the meat and dairy in our lives over the last week.
I think we can do it.
So today for breakfast, I had a slice of toast with soy "butter" (which doesn't taste bad like I thought it would) and some malt-o-meal with maple syrup. And for lunch I had pita chips (my new fav) and a veggie burger on whole wheat with spinach and avacado. The avacado really helps with the whole no mayo thing.
Not sure what we are having for dinner yet but I am pretty sure it will be one of the soups I made over the weekend.
With the exception of cheese, I don't mind so much.
Almond milk is a killer substitute for regular milk and we use rice or soy milk for cooking.

I also cut out coffee when the girls went back to school.. not completely mind, just stopped drinking it daily. I find I still like a nice hot glass of it on Sundays when I am reading blogs in my pjs :-)

2010-09-12T08:42:00.000-07:00

Last night, at the end of Mamma Mia! Trin looked at me and said, "Mamma, you should get married soon."
I laughed and asked her, "to who?"
She said, "someone who you like and who is nice."
I told her as soon as she found that person to let me know.
She thought about this for a few minutes and then said, "you know Mom, pretty soon there will be a better chance of you being in a bank robbery then there will of you getting married."

Hello fellow bloggers and blog readers.

2010-09-03T17:19:00.000-07:00

How are things? It's Friday.
Oh baby, when did Friday start to look so sexy? I remember when Friday was just kinda hot.... or back in school when Friday was just a cute dude I checked out from across the classroom but was kind of indifferent to. No, my friends, Friday has blossomed into a hunky, ripped, stud-muffin with a good job and spontaneous tendencies to be romantic. I luff him.
I'm entering a calm. A place in my life where things are slowed down and calm. It's like when the wave comes in on a beach and water runs all over your feet for a few seconds before heading back out to sea. I can already see the calm receding. But I chose to walk on the sand and not follow the water back into the tide. I've chosen to turn completely away from the sea and walk into the dunes for a bit.
I should be scared shitless right?
Well maybe it is the fact that it hasn't happened yet and so I still have time to follow the sea or maybe it's just because I am so damn confident that I believe it's something I can accomplish. I feel confident. Things feel attainable. I feel like this ride has slowed down enough that I can look out and enjoy the views and enjoy the thrill of the ride for a little while and I can see the giant dip ahead... the one that is going to make feel like throwing my head back and screaming in utter terror. And today, I feel like the ride will catch and smooth out and I will be able to sit up and smile and say, "fuck, that was scary but a little fun and now that we've crossed through the dunes to this new ocean, I want to stay in the water for awhile."

When sisters stand shoulder to shoulder, who stands a chance against us? ~Pam Brown

2010-08-29T15:11:00.000-07:00

When my first daughter was born, I could watch a movie where the women in it had this Bond. They raised their kids together, they grew up and old together, the experienced each other's lives and here I was, this sixteen year old girl, completely secluded from the world... just me and this baby and no idea about anything. No clue what would happen the next year or when I was going to find myself, I didn't even know I needed to find myself.
That was fourteen years ago and now, when I take stock of what's important, I count these women. These women who I've known for varying lengths of time, these women who have been there as I've cried on shoulders or made the right choices, these women who've nodded in compassionate understanding as we went from diapers to backtalk to teenagers.
Last night, I sat at my dining room table surrounded by almost all of the women who make up My Village. These are the people who have witnessed my life and whose lives I have witnessed in return and we've hit this new middle place. We aren't new at this any more. We aren't these twenty something girls balancing our first babies on our hips and trying to understand how mortgages work or when we won't have to buy diapers anymore. We are in the place where we've discovered mostly who we are or at least we are trying to because we now know it's part of The Path. We've passed by that place where we made impulsive silly choices because we've learned from them. We know now whether we want more children or whether we want to just get the ones we've almost finished raising out, we know whether we want to be in school or whether we're on the career path we want to be on already, we know that we don't know all there is to know anymore and we are ok with it. We can sit down together as grown women. We've become our own versions of our mothers... or at least the quintessential mother.
Doesn't just about everyone have a memory of their own mother sitting around with her women, those women you had known your entire life, those women who could tell you they'd changed your diaper when you were a baby and who you could go to when you didn't want to talk to your own mother about birth control? Those aunts who weren't really your aunts.
I have found those women. These beautiful sisters that I've been blessed enough to acquire over my thirty years. Last night, I reminisced as far back as the few years of being a teenager before I became a parent straight through the birth of the most recent baby in this circle. I listened to them talk about school and husbands and kids and laugh hysterically about That Stuff We Did When We Were Younger. We drank endless bottles of wine and I just enjoyed the fact that we could all be in the same room together for a few stolen hours before our lives took us back.
It was precious time, priceless time.

it goes...

2010-08-27T05:54:00.000-07:00

Ok so schedule is in play and working.
Did I just type that?
I have to admit, when I took our new schedule home and posted it up around the house, I met with a fair amount of yeah right, Mom and that’s not going to happen.
Am I the only one who occasionally feels ganged up on by their kids?
I found that the most resistance was coming from the evening side of things.
The girls didn’t like that the schedule didn’t allow for TV/computer time. So they negotiated. We decided that as long as everything on the schedule was accomplished before bedtime that they could watch tv or use the computer or read until bedtime.
Our revised schedule is going more like this:

4:45 -- MOMMY UP , SHOWER AND GET READY FOR WORK
5:15 -- GET TRIN READY FOR SCHOOL
5:30 -- WAKE AMANDA AND EMILEE UP, NO BATTLES
5:30 – 6:00 HAVE BREAKFAST TOGETHER
6:00 -- EMILEE SHOWER, AMANDA AND EMILEE GET READY FOR SCHOOL – NO TV OR COMPUTER UNTIL
COMPLETELY READY FOR SCHOOL, MOMMY LOADS DISHWASHER
6:15 -- MOMMY LEAVES FOR WORK
6:50 – GIRLS LEAVE FOR BUS, EVERYONE SHOULD BE READY
3:30 – 4:00 LEAVE WORK
4:00 – 4:30 GET HOME, START A LOAD OF LAUNDRY AND MAKE DINNER, PACK TRIN’S LUNCH
4:45 – 5:15 SERVE DINNER, EAT TOGETHER
6:00 – 6:30 LAUNDRY INTO DRYER, MOM AND EMILEE CLEAN UP KITCHEN, START DISHWASHER
6:30 – GO FOR WALK OR DO HOME WORK IF YOU’VE GOT IT
7:00 – TRIN SHOWER, EMILEE UNLOAD DISHWASHER, AMANDA HANG UP LAUNDRY FROM DRYER
7:15 – AMANDA SHOWER
7:15 – 7:45 TRIN READING TIME IN BED, LIGHTS OUT 8:00 FOR TRIN
7:15 – AMANDA GATHER LAUNDRY, PUT IN WASHER FOR MOMMY TO START IN THE MORNING
7:30 – 8:00 FREE TIME AMANDA AND EM, COMPUTER, READ, HOMEWORK, TV (IN YOUR ROOMS)
8:00 – PHONE AND ELECTRONICS OFF, PHONES CHARGE ON HALL TABLE
8:00 – 8:45 READING TIME
8:45 LIGHTS OUT

There are times during the day where I am standing there wondering what I should be doing and I will just go and look at the schedule and be like oh yeah, laundry. We haven’t “walked” yet since it’s a blistering 100+ degrees out just about every day, but we’ve been doing cardio pilates a few days a week which I am hoping to make at least three times a week. I found it is easier to do something at home since Trin has been getting in the bath after dinner and staying in there until it’s time to read.

Here is what I have discovered this week:
*having the girls get up and sit at the table for breakfast is causing (so far) no morning arguments. I’m not sure if this is because the girls aren’t rushing so they don’t fight over the bathroom or if it is just because they shake off their cranky morning moods at the table. I don’t care what it is, my house is downright pleasant in the mornings and I love it. Yesterday Amanda didn’t eat anything, she just sat with us for about fifteen minutes while she woke up all the way. This morning she had watermelon and a bagel… Emilee has been having a granola bar every morning and Trin has had everything from biscuits to bagels to toast with juice.

*I stopped drinking coffee Wednesday. I didn’t mean to and I certainly don’t know if it will be permanent but I haven’t had any for three days and I feel fine. Some minor headaches the last two mornings but no energy loss. I’ve also been eating something light in the mornings, some mini-wheats or toast with juice and I have a lot more energy. I’ve also lost ten pounds.

*We planned out our “menu” over the weekend and we’ve eaten really well this week. Lots of veggies and grilled chicken. Last night we had salads and corn on the cob, Amanda and Emilee didn’t even clean their plates and both were full. We are always done eating by 6:00.

*Trin has been taking hour plus long baths this week and when she gets out, she puts on her pjs and gets right into bed with her book. She is reading the Spiderwick books right now. She has me set a timer for twenty minutes and as soon as it goes off, she rolls over and goes to bed.

*I’ve been in bed by nine every night this week and with the exception of this morning, I’ve not had any problems getting up before 5:00. I love going to bed early.

*We’ve been SUPER on top of the laundry this week. I will be going into the weekend with one or two loads total. WHAT WILL I DO WITH ALL THAT FREE TIME?

*I feel very good. I feel like a good mom. I feel organized. I feel energized. I feel like I will be able to start other projects now. I am going to thank the girls for being so great this week.

Jude, born August 12th, 2010

2010-08-18T11:12:00.000-07:00

So let it out and let it in, hey Jude, begin...

too much

2010-08-17T11:02:00.000-07:00

It's too much right now for me to write in here.
I'm focused on making some major life changing decisions that I can't talk about publicly yet.
Fairy had her baby, Jude and I want to spend every spare second smelling his head.
School starts next week and I've got menus to plan and sleeping schedules to reset.
I'm busy.
I'm crazy.
I miss ya'll.

Love you,
~KHE

2010 - 2011 School Year Schedule

2010-08-04T11:17:00.000-07:00

If you are like me, you are already starting to dread the school year that is looming around the corner in a few weeks. I love Summer. I love the flow of it, the fact that I don't have to communicate with another human being until 7:00am when I walk into work. No worrying about forgotten homework, lunch money, PE clothes, umbrellas, etc.
I like Summer.
It's easier.
I like easy.

But, knowing that the school year is impending, I thought I'd better start getting our schedule together. Four females in a house can get pretty chaotic and sometimes I'd rather just point to the schedule hanging up and declare, "IT'S NOT ON THE SCHEDULE."
Because I amd Mommy and I can.
Just kidding.
Kind of.
It's more of the written goal frame of mind. Brian Tracy has a quote that I love in regards to goals, "Only three percent of adults have written goals, and everyone else works for them."
I believe in writing your goals down and reflecting on them as often as possible. I think if you look at your intentions daily, you're way more likely to accomplish them.
And believe me when I say that a schedule for our household IS a goal.

So here it is, our Monday through Friday 10-11 School Year Schedule... wish me luck!
4:45 -- MOMMY UP , SHOWER AND GET READY FOR WORK
5:15 -- BREAKFAST FOR GIRLS, START LOAD OF LAUNDRY IN WASH
5:30 -- GET TRIN READY FOR SCHOOL
5:45 -- WAKE AMANDA AND EMILEE UP, NO BATTLES
5:45 – 6:00 HAVE BREAKFAST TOGETHER
6:00 -- AMANDA AND EMILEE GET READY FOR SCHOOL – NO TV OR COMPUTER UNTIL
COMPLETELY READY FOR SCHOOL, MOMMY LOADS DISHWASHER
6:15 -- MOMMY LEAVES FOR WORK
6:50 – GIRLS LEAVE FOR BUS, EVERYONE SHOULD BE READY
3:30 – 4:00 LEAVE WORK
4:00 – 4:30 GET HOME, GET LAUNDRY INTO DRYER AND MAKE DINNER
4:45 – 5:15 SERVE DINNER
6:00 – 6:30 MOM AND EMILEE CLEAN UP KITCHEN, START DISHWASHER
AMANDA HANG UP LAUNDRY FROM DRYER
TRINITI HOME WORK
6:30 – GO FOR WALK
7:00 – TRIN SHOWER, EMILEE UNLOAD DISHWASHER
7:15 – EMILEE SHOWER
7:15 – 7:45 TRIN READING TIME IN BED, LIGHTS OUT 7:45 FOR TRIN
7:15 – AMANDA GATHER LAUNDRY, PUT IN WASHER FOR MOMMY TO START IN THE MORNING
7:30 – 8:00 FREE TIME AMANDA AND EM, COMPUTER, READ, HOMEWORK, TV (IN YOUR ROOMS)
8:00 – PHONE AND ELECTRONICS OFF, PHONES CHARGE ON HALL TABLE
8:00 – 8:45 READING TIME
8:45 LIGHTS OUT

The Meehoo with an Exactlywatt by Shel Silverstein

2010-08-04T06:19:00.000-07:00

Knock knock!
Who's there?
Me!
Me who?

That's right!
What's right?
Meehoo!
That's what I want to know!

What's what you want to know?
Me, WHO?
Yes, exactly!
Exactly what?
Yes, I have an Exactlywatt on a chain!

Exactly what on a chain?
Yes!
Yes what?
No, Exactlywatt!

That's what I want to know!
I told you - Exactlywatt!
Exactly WHAT?
Yes!
Yes what?

Yes, it's with me!
What's with you?
Exactlywatt - that's what's with me.
Me who?
Yes!

GO AWAY!

Knock knock...

existing

2010-08-03T18:10:00.000-07:00

You know those humane mouse traps? The glue ones? Are those considered humane? I don't know now that I think about it... anyway, I feel like I'm stuck to one. Like my life is a giant glue mouse trap and I'm just stuck to it. And some days I get this burst of energy or optimistic enthusiasm and try and pull off of it but I don't make enough progress and end up laying back down on it. Stuck.
I hate that.
I don't want to feel that way about my life. I mean, fuck, it's MY LIFE. It's not like there is a guarantee of another one. I want to feel inspired. Loved. Excited. Breathless. Certain. I want to look around and see wonder. I want to marvel at it all.
Am I spoiled?
Insatiable?
Bored?
I don't know. But I want more. I'm not satisfied with it all.
I used to feel bad saying that, like I wasn't grateful for what I do have. Like it wasn't this amazing thing that I went from being this high school drop out mom to where I am now.
I am grateful. But I am no longer afraid or abashed to say I want more.
I want more.

growth

2010-08-02T09:52:00.000-07:00

Emilee wants to be taller than Amanda and I SO VERY BADLY.
There isn’t a week that goes by that she doesn’t measure all three of us to see who’s grown and more excitingly, who hasn’t... as long as it isn’t her.
Amanda is five foot four, I am five foot six and Emilee is five foot three. Amanda has been five foot four now for a year or so and really I don’t know if she is going to get any taller… maybe a late teenaged growth spurt or maybe she is just growing REALLY. SLOWLY.
Emilee has grown an inch or so in the last six months, I can practically see her catching up. She loves to stand really close to me or Amanda so she can mentally measure herself against us.
One of the most surreal things about being their mother is them being able to stand in front of me and look me in the eye. For so many years, I’ve looked down at them and them up at me. And now, they are almost my height. It’s freaking weird.
But, on the flip side, it is one of my favorite things right now. Watching Emilee measure herself every day with the tape measure. It’s something I am always going to remember. I am silently rooting for her. I hope she grows to be five foot eight and towers over her sisters and I because man oh man, she wants it badly.

In dreams

2010-07-31T08:16:00.000-07:00

I had a dream about him last night. Is it because I am writing him and so he stuck far back in the recesses of my mind all the time? I don't know... but I dream of him occasionally.
Last night, I dreamed he was sad. The girls and I were going somewhere, a party or something I think. I thought he was coming too. But he made a comment that he wouldn't be. I was and truthfully, I think I always am, naively optimistic in regards to him... maybe in regards to everything.
I was of the frame of mind that he was out of jail, near his daughters and would want to go where ever all of us were going, to be part of our little family unit. He made a comment that what he really wanted was to go out and score some drugs. I stormed away, crying, slamming the door as I left. I was so angry with him. But half way down the hall, I decided to confront this, to see if I could argue it out of him... much like I am in the letters I send him. I"m constantly trying to convince him that he can leave his old life behind.
I went in and sat down on the bed that he was on and asked him to turn the tv off. In fact, I grabbed the remote to turn it off myself, he didn't fight me on that, just handed it over indifferently. I remember struggling with it, trying to figure out how to turn it all off. The remote was foreign to me. I finally leaned forward and turned the tv off manually.
We talked. I was mad but patient. Trying to be there for him as an alternative to the drugs even though in the back of my mind I was thinking the cause was lost already. If he wanted them, if he was verbal about wanting them, it was probably only a matter of time. I was crying.
He leaned forward and hugged me. And then kissed my neck. For a brief second, I didn't have any thoughts about that other than that it felt good, it awoke all of those feelings that a good kiss will. But then he moved to another part of my neck and my brain snapped back and warned me. But I didn't stop him, I knew I would but not yet. Twice more he moved and finally, with a tear running down my cheek, I pulled away. I buried my face in my hands, torn between too many emotions. I apologized for not being able to accept that from him. He said nothing, didn't move.
It was like he didn't expect anything.
I left him there and went to the party with the girls.

The braces are off!

2010-07-08T10:34:00.000-07:00

I know, I started slacking on the monthly photos... fact is, I stopped taking Manders when stuff at work got weird and wasn't there for the appointments which then led to my forgetting the pics. BUT I took her today and look at the before and after pics!

This is the day she got them on and the day she got them off, one year later.

This the day she got them on and off without the braces so you can just see her teeth. It's amazing!

additionally

2010-07-03T08:48:00.000-07:00

I am friends with Lucia St. Clair Robson on facebook.
I can't even explain the way that this makes me feel. It's like there is this club and the club is all about the thing that you love the most. You want to be in this club so badly but you have to actually accomplish the thing that you love first.
I feel like by being friends with her on facebook and being able to carry on little conversations with her or watch them unfold on both her personal page and her author page, that I am being let into this club a little bit.
She is friends with spades of writers. But even if she weren't, she is brilliant. Freaking brilliant. I aspire to be able to move someone with something I've written the same way she has moved me with her books. And if I could only be friends, even cyber friends, with one writer, it would be her.
I am reading her newest book, The Last Train From Cuernavaca right now. And it feels different than having read all of her previous books. It feels more connected and for me, more special.
I've not been a good writer lately. With the Cody drama, and the trip planning and the newfound dislike of my job... but every day when I see her on facebook, I remember that I want to be a part of that club. I want to be an author more than anything in this world.

ramblings, no discoveries

2010-07-03T08:27:00.000-07:00

When I woke up this morning, I found myself thinking about a guy. And since I've been such a piss poor blogger, I can't remember if I've even written about him here. And since I'm still waiting on the coffee, I can't be bothered to look.
The guy is a previous customer of ours, someone I don't even have a clear picture in my head of. He's older than I am, but has a good job and as far as I know, no children. He's been wanting to take me out for almost a year. I've not went because I wanted to double date with another couple who has surprisingly let me down.
So this guy called me a week or so ago and left me a message and I never returned his call. I had already just decided not to go out with him in a decision that came along mostly because of my flaky friends and not so much on account of him. But in the process, I realized that I wasn't really as interested in dating at all.
Snow told me once that the longer you are single, the more likely you are to stay that way. I've not had a true relationship since before Trin was born. She's eight now. And the only pseudo relationship I've had since then was the Mr.I debacle. I stay permanently torn between thinking that there is plenty of time to find Mr. Right and wondering if I have wasted eight years that he and I could have been together?
Does that mean I think this guy is Mr. Right? No... but truthfully there isn't any way for me to know since I don't want to go out with anyone?
So as I sit here this morning drinking my coffee, stretching and relishing the twelve hours of sleep I got last night, contemplating apple pie for breakfast; I wonder... I wonder about that life with another person. I wonder about waking up not next to a sleepy, tangled-haired eight year old but next to the man I want to be with. I wonder about drinking coffee with him as we plan out our day. I wonder about being able to talk to him about my job, my daughters, my life... our lives.
I wonder if he is out there right now or if it will be years before I meet him.
And then I snap back and wonder if I am just more wistfully romantic in the mornings and if in a couple of hours I will be back to normal.
I feel bad for this guy. I feel guilty. I ~~would hate~~ have hated being the girl who is trying to get the guy's attention to no avail. I feel badly that I haven't returned his calls. And I justify it by convincing myself that if he were the one I would know it already.

wherein cheeseballs get inappropriate

2010-06-28T06:43:00.000-07:00

At my last Halloween Party (you know, the party that confirms I've lost my mind every year?), Jiffinner brought a cheeseball shaped like a pumpkin.
It was super cute.
And, unlike all the other cheeseballs I've had in my life, this one was GOOOOOOOOD.
So on Friday when she and I went on the Mad Shopping Spree for Fairy's baby shower, we decided at the last minute to make one for the party. We got all of the stuff and then Saturday night, when Jiffinner came over to help with the food, we decided we couldn't have it be shaped like a pumpkin... we wanted it to be baby themed.
A bottle of sangria later, I was all BABY HEAD! BABY HEAD! Alas, Amanda and Jiffinner said heck no, that would be weird... instead, Jiffinner tried to sculpt a rattle out of cheese ball.

I'm all, "uuuhhh, shouldn't the rattle part be bigger and the ~~shaft~~ handle be skinnier?"

I practically had to leave the room.
Jiffinner says, "let's add the handle part and maybe it will look better..."
Jiffiner mentions a piercing and I did have to leave the room.

A much more rated G cheeseball.

Recipe:
16oz sharp cheddar cheese (buy the big block and shred yourself)
8oz cream cheese
8oz container chive & onion cream cheese
1tbsp paprika
1/4tsp ground red pepper

Mush ingredients together w/hands.

daughters

2010-06-22T12:22:00.000-07:00

The Emilee pic is the only one I have right now because she's been staying with my mom for the last two weeks while in drama camp... I promise she isn't always that angry :-)

The Conclusion to Cody

2010-06-20T07:54:00.000-07:00

I emailed back and forth with the lady who taught my adoption/foster classes when I was going through everything with Cody. It took me over a week to be able to write the letter below. I needed time to reflect on how I felt about the Cody situation and how it had ended and truthfully, I needed a little time to grieve what I felt as a loss.

Good morning [caseworker],
Well it took me a little time to be able to send this email... Cody is back with his father.
It was a tremendously heartbreaking experience to go through. I can't believe how many different emotions you feel when you have a child staying with you, even temporarily. It makes me respect those parents who can do foster care about a million times more than I already did.
It also makes me certain of the choice I made to go straight for adoption and not do foster care.
I was so ready to make a place for Cody in my home, in my family and in my life. It was a hard choice to make but once I'd thought through as much of it as I could at one time, I had made the choice to choose him and for me, that started the really hard part of letting him then choose us and then talking to his parents. It was hard because I once I decided I wanted him with us, I didn't want anyone else to come along and tell me no. Additionally, I started to realize the enormity of that choice. That my parenting, my family, my household - it was all going to get harder because I would be fitting a new child, a male child, into it. And I knew it would be a long time before I could relax again about it all.
Anyway, his mother couldn't have cared less. But when I called his dad, it turned out he cared quite a bit. He said he had no idea the situation that Cody was in, not having a place to live and with his mother not caring one way or another. He said he would be down that weekend to pick him up. Just like that, all the thinking and preparation I had done both alone and in conversations with my girls, was done.
I talked to his dad several times on the phone about Cody, and Cody's life, and Cody's future. His dad is scared, overwhelmed, at the prospect of raising this teenaged boy. But he is scared and overwhelmed because he wants to do a good job. He wants to be a dad.
As this all was happening, I reflected back on your class. I kept telling myself that it is best for a child to be with their parents. That reuniting them is the goal. And I believe it too.
I will make myself available to Cody's dad as much as I can be. Even if he just needs someone to talk to when things aren't easy. But in the long run, I have to believe that this is what is best for everyone.
I feel like I learned so much from such a short experience... things I will take into my own adoption process as valuable lessons. It made me all the more certain that our family is ready for that little girl to be here. I hope that we find her soon.
Thank you so very much for being someone I could talk to about this while it was all going on and all overwhelming me. You've truly been a friend.
~KHE

radio silence

2010-06-16T05:07:00.000-07:00

I'm sorry for the "radio silence" lately... Every time I think about writing anything here, I am just overwhelmed by all of the stuff I want to write and the enormity of some of it and I end up out in my yard pulling weeds and planning out where I think I should plant my zucchini next season.
What?
Who wrote that?
Gardening?
What is today? June 16th right? Let's pop back five years in the past and see what THAT Heather was doing...
--insert dreamy back in time music here--
*~*~*~*~*~*I was telling the girls about the possibility of my meeting Matthew McConaughey on the way home. The VERY 'G' version, of course. Nothing about me wanting to do interesting and nasty things to his body....*~*~*~*~*~*
Yeah, that's more like it. What happened to the girl who used to blog about Matthew McConaughey's body? Now it's all gardening and how I don't ever get laid anymore.
Why do you guys come here again?

Anyway, some reality. The Cody thing hit me harder than I thought it would. I wasn't ready to write about it because it made me sad. I wanted to help him. And while I think that he is much better off with his dad than he was with his mother, I still know it wouldn't be as good as being with me because I do shit right.
Additionally, I realize that I can't fix everything and everyone and that he isn't mine to fix.
So I am repeating that to myself daily and the more I do it, the less I feel angry and defeated.
I do feel like it was a little bit of a dry run for the actual adoption stuff that is eventually coming. I had no idea about the barrier that would be there between the child and I and I got a good taste of that with Cody. The whole acting like your parent but not actually being your parent thing. I don't know, maybe it will be a little different when I get my little girl... because she'll be younger, because she'll know she is being adopted...
I guess only time will tell.

I'm also going through some work stuff that I am not ready to blog about. Soon, my pretties, soon.

I am not going through any guy stuff. The last almost guy stuff fizzled out and died. Which was totally my fault because I've apparently decided I'm... I don't even know. Not ready? Too controlling? Interested in the accumulation of both spinster dresses and cats?
I sent an email to a friend the other day about dating...

We are used to being in relationships, we want to have someone there to
help, to be the co-parent, the partner... Being alone is
scary.
Let me tell you a secret. When your girls are little like yours are
now, you really feel more alone because you are just the caretaker, at that
point, you need your friends and your family more than anything. You need
to have someone to call who gives a shit about the random ass thing your five
year old just said. Your support system. If you don't have that,
find it asap. And please know, I would love to be a part of that support
system.
But here's the secret part, in a few years, your girls are going to start
becoming these people. They are going to be people that you want to spend
a lot of time with. They morph from someone you take care of into someone
who can help out, who has amazing things to say, who makes you laugh, who is
super fun to watch a movie with or take a walk with.
And then, at some point, you are going to look back and think to yourself
that you are so ridiculously lucky to have had all of those years where it was
just you and them. The bond is going to be this amazing thing, suddenly
you are going to realize that you'd rather finish the journey with your
daughters before you embark upon a relationship journey.
I wasted a lot of time trying to find the right guy. Going through
all of the excitement that comes with a new relationship, all of the
infatuation, the phone calls, the slipping away for a weekend. And in the
end, I found that I'd rather hang with my girls. My oldest leaves in five
years. Five years. It was like yesterday that she was only five
years old. I have no idea how it happened. I guess what I am saying
is once you find balance in yourself in the life you have now with your girls,
you will find that you don't really want more right now.

I think that sums up, pretty well, why I just can't seem to get excited about dating right now. I mean, if Matthew McConaughey comes a-knockin', I'm not sending him away or anything :-) Or for that matter, if I met someone who really seemed like a good and patient match, I'd probably give it a shot... but I'm not looking.

Ok, that's all I have time for this morning, gotta get to work. I promise to try and get more stuff up here. I miss you guys.

Writing...

2010-06-04T05:42:00.000-07:00

4,100/60,000
6.9%

I’m going to scream.

2010-06-03T08:38:00.000-07:00

Just as I had finally started to accept the reality of Cody being in my house and all of the anxiety and responsibility that comes with a co-ed household of non-related teenagers, it all blows up in my face.
Cody’s mom decided she was just fed up with having to deal with him.
No. Really.
That’s what she told me today, that she couldn’t deal with him anymore.
When was she dealing with him at all?
She is coming to pick him up today to take him to a friend of his dad’s house until his dad can pick him up on Saturday and take him back to Other Town Three Hours Away. She even went and withdrew him from school yesterday without even telling me. So I stuck him on the bus this morning and because she told him to leave yesterday to meet her and then sent him back to ride the bus, the school suspended him anyway so he couldn’t even go to school today and was instead stuck in town until he got a ride back to my house.
What the fuck is wrong with people?
I spoke to his dad twice. Once yesterday and once today and whether he is a good dad or not remains to be seen but he did seem to be equal parts not surprised and disgusted with Cody’s mom. After talking to her today, I am not surprised.
I feel like I lost.
I feel like I tried to fight for him and lost.
Even the most simple thing, keeping him in school for two weeks, I lost.
I feel defeated.
And angry.
And sad.

The next step: asking for help. Lots and lots of help.

2010-05-31T07:33:00.000-07:00

So last week I spoke with Cody about the possibility of living here. I talked to Amanda about sharing a bedroom with Triniti. I talked to everyone I know about summer options. And I talked to my doctor about upping my anxiety meds. Ok, not really. But maybe I should? :-)
I still can't take a deep breath.
Yesterday, Cody's brother brought him back here. God, I almost typed home. You can see where I stand on this already. I am ready for this to be his home. I'm done with the whole teeter-tottering. When I decide to take something on, I don't want to stand at the starting line for three freaking months, I want to go. Accomplish.
Anyway, I don't think his brother would have even driven him to my house if it weren't for the fact that Cody had left his brother's cell phone here and his brother wanted it back. So Cody got here and ran into Amanda's room to search her closet. I was still shamefully in pajamas at noon yesterday and when I saw that his brother was waiting outside my fence for him, I threw on clothes so fast it would make your head spin and went outside to talk to him.
He is eighteen. He came from a shitty family. You can tell just by looking at him. He was super defensive and standoffish with me initially. I could barely get him to answer me. I think he was expecting me to ask him why the hell he was bringing Cody back. Once he understood that I WANT Cody here, he loosened up a bit. I told him that I was making plans for Cody for the summer and that I just wanted to know if there was any period of time over the summer where he was looking to have Cody come and spend some time with him.
I swear you could visibly see the relief wash over this poor kid.
I gave him my cell number and asked him to call me next week and let me know.
When he left here, I knew that the next step is talking to his mom. So I have contacted my teacher from CPS to ask for help. I need some kind of free or very inexpensive resources. I need a pro-bono lawyer. I need for there to be an organization that will be on this kid's side.
I am waiting to hear back from her tomorrow and then I am going to either follow whatever direction she can give me or start cold calling lawyers straight out of the damn phone book until I find someone who will help us. When I go to talk to Cody's mom, I want to be prepared. I want to be able to sit down with her and tell her what the best option for him is and why. And people, if the best option for him is for me to adopt him, then that is what I am going to do.
I am pretty sure I will have to have both his mother and his father sign off on everything but I don't care. I'll do it.
He needs lots and lots of stuff. He has three pairs of clothes in a backpack to his name. He needs PJs, summer clothes, bedroom items, hygiene products, a bed... Lots of things. But I want to make sure I can offer him the thing he needs most first: a family.
Advice would be greatly appreciated on this one ya'll...

For the one person who is still reading this blog...

2010-05-26T11:49:00.000-07:00

So, life got in the way of blogging.
And then, last night, when I was watching How I Met Your Mother (I'm not linking to it because YOU SHOULD ALREADY KNOW) and they were ragging on Barney because he has a blog and they were all "blogs were cool like eight years ago" and I scoffed. Loudly.
Because I [heart] my blog.
All five plus years of it.
And then I felt bad because I hardly blog. I mean, I turned thirty, Em turned twelve, Trin's turning eight and has started "hand-flapping" which accompanies her teeth grinding and makes me wonder if I should be looking into more therapy and the cat had kittens and my mom and brother are renting a new place and Amanda had a band concert and I have pics and stories and I haven't blogged ANYTHING.

And then I tried to justify the fact that I haven't been blogging because it was Birthday Month. And because I am planning a baby shower and the over achiever in me wants it to rock and I only have ONE MONTH left and holy crap, Fairy will be having a baby in August. A little baby nephew whose head I can smell until my body longs for the uterus that no longer resides there. And school is over, finally. Which means I am planning ~~how to turn the kids into slaves~~ activities for the kiddos. And planning my vacation with the girls. And learning French for said vacation. And planning what to buy the girls to eat while they are home for the next three months so that they can stay relatively healthy. And oh yeah, did I mention I am working on my book? LIKE FOR REAL working on it. And I have a garden and monthly dinners and a freaking house to clean. And my job that isn't awesome any more and I HAVEN'T HAD SEX IN TWO YEARS.
Pardon me while I breathe into a paper bag for a few minutes.
And then I have this other thing.
This important thing.
This big thing that makes my stomach muscles (ok, yeah, I don't have stomach muscles - shut. it.)... makes the butterflies that live in my stomach do nose dives into my... well, I guess other parts of my stomach.
I truly feel like barfing.
Remember Cody? Cody has a sad story. A sad story about a family that doesn't care about him. And he hasn't been in home in three weeks and he landed on my couch on Monday. And I knew it was coming. I knew it was a matter of time before he'd be there and I've been wondering how I would handle it. What I would do. If I could do anything. And I emailed my caseworker with CPS and asked for advice and crazy pills.
Then Monday, there he was. This thirteen year old boy who is taller than me and who has no where to go. PEOPLE. He hasn't been home in three weeks and NO ONE CARES. That makes me want to cry and then punch someone in the face. Preferably his mother.
Last night, I had The Talk with him. The talk wherein we discussed his future. The talk that I had been trying to mastermind a plan for for the last six months because I knew this was coming. I've thought out every possible scenario I could think of. I've talked to EVERYone I know who would listen. I've looked up anything I could think to look up. I even spent a few minutes in Total Denial. But the townspeople kicked me out, they knew I was a fake.
When I decided to adopt a few years ago.... when I decided I wanted us to be a family for someone who needed one, I said The Universe will send me who I'm supposed to have. The Universe will choose a child who needs us.
The Universe didn't get my memo about NO TEENAGED BOYS.
And listen, I have so totally tried to fight this. I've tried to ignore it, to find someone else to step in. I've cried. I've pleaded. I ran into wall after wall after wall.
And finally, yesterday, I just accepted it.
It is what it is.
It is harder. Most choices I make in life are.
Hard Choices walk up to the average Joe and say, "Nah, let's go find that Katehopeeden girl. She'll take us." And they are right, I do.
My brother and I have had like four hundred and seventy three phone conversations about this. And every one of them has ended with, "God Kate, you are out of your fucking mind." Don't get me wrong, he's on board because THERE IS NO OTHER CHOICE but he is just verbalizing his concerns the same way I am internalizing them.

I'm taking baby steps here. This isn't a jump in with your clothes on kind of situation.
First step was yesterday: Acceptance
Second step was last night: Talk to Cody, see what he wants to do, let him know that becoming a member of my family is an option.
Third step is finding stuff for him to do this summer since I can't have him and a certain thirteen year old girl just hanging out.
That is what happened today.
Can I tell you something real fast though? I can't believe how many people were willing to jump in and help. How many people that I've talked to who genuinely said, "Let me see what I can do."
That warmed me. And while I was compiling a list yesterday of possible summer activities for Cody, I thought I have good people.
Today, the sun broke through the clouds when a lady from The Boys and Girls Club in the town where I work called me back and listened to my whole story and then said they would make a spot for him. For $70 bucks registration and $25 a week, I can put this kid into a summer program. Where he can be a kid.
Does this make things easy? No. Not by a long shot.
There is this whole reality of me not knowing this kid, of me not trusting this kid, of him not trusting me. There is a whole lot of reality.
And it scared the ever loving shit out of me.
But when that lady called today, I had a flash of hope. And even that tiny flash brought me to tears. The road is long and scary and REAL but I was really grateful today for a little help.

Song of the day: Airplanes

2010-05-17T09:32:00.000-07:00

Katehopeeden: Glasses version

2010-04-30T13:13:00.000-07:00

There is this line.

2010-04-29T08:53:00.000-07:00

It’s a line that I’ve been near before.
A dangerous line.
I’ve never considered crossing it before.
I’ve considered considering it, but never even got close to actually thinking it would be okay to cross it.
Because it isn’t, not for me.
I don’t want to be that girl.
I want to be the girl who makes the right choices.
The girl who finds the things that she deserves the right way.
Not the girl who takes from someone else, who destroys lives.

So, now I see that line.
And I keep turning away from it because I don’t even want to think about the fact that it is there.
That it could be an option.
But there is a whisper of a hint, a subtle little glint of a daily reminder that it is there.
I am ignoring it.
I don’t even play around with that line.
I hope I continue to stay strong enough.

Can I tell you about this amazing thing that is happening in my life right now?

2010-04-26T09:06:00.001-07:00

It’s called my Girl’s Night Dinner... The last Saturday of the month, I am hosting dinner at my house. It was this crazy spark of an idea that I had while I was talking to Jiffinner on the phone late last year. I was undoubtedly complaining about the lack of visiting I get to do with all of my friends when she made the comment that if it weren’t for me pushing all of them all the time, we would probably never see each other.
This is partially because, I realized, I introduced all of them and partially because I am “the glue” as Jiffinner puts it. Can you believe that? It’s MY CRAZY that brings them all together. Woot!
So, I decided at the end of December, in a haze of spiked eggnog, feelings of utter relief that my obligatory family visiting had come to an end and abnormally cold weather that I, your loving blog authoress, would start cooking dinner for all of my girlfriends once a month. And before I snapped back to my senses, I sent out the first invitation with the PROMISE that this would be monthly. Ladies, I will be doing this EVERY MONTH, I PROMISE.
Thus signing my own contract.
And it was a loop-hole-less contract my friends.
I made sure.
Initially, I thought we would mix it up... have a movie night, a board game night, cocktail night, other things that end with ‘night’... but it turned out that dinner, dessert and copious amounts of alcohol and conversation really were the best way to go.
But I am getting ahead of myself.
Our first dinner was the last Saturday of January. I’m not sure who all I invited BUT in attendance, we had Jiffiner, The Cake Lady and Fairy. I almost had a heart attack. Thankfully, Jiffinner came early to help. I was in full freak out mode by the time she arrived and she couldn’t pour wine into me fast enough.
I can’t help it, I am a worrier.
I worry about not having enough time, having too much time, burning the food, undercooking the food, whether people will have anything to talk about, if my house is clean enough, if anyone will show up, if too many people will show up, if it will be boring, if I have enough booze... If it can even cross my mind, I assure you, I have freaked out about it.
That’s why they make anti-anxiety pills and prescribe them to me.
Of course, with all of the freaking out that I was doing about this inaugural dinner event, I had done something else that I do too much of – I had overbooked myself. You see, dear reader, I have this idea in my head that I can accomplish anything. And I think it is correct. Assuming I could figure out a way to make more hours in the day. It is the whole not enough time thing that always kicks my ass.
So, as if FREAKING OUT about the dinner wasn’t enough, I had also divvied my children up to various friend’s houses to get them out of the way and then, I had made plans for after the dinner since, well you know, I wasn’t going to have any kids.
It’s truly amazing I didn’t have a heart attack.
But the short version is that I was pretty disappointed in the way the first dinner turned out. And it was all my fault. I tried to do way too much. I tried to make food that took too long and was too hard and untested, I made it to where I had to do too much running around that day so I was crunched for time and I made stupid boy plans for afterwards that had me super preoccupied and unable to just enjoy myself. And, the girls (at least the older two), didn’t want to leave... they are homebodies and it made me feel guilty that I had sent them away for the night. I decided I wasn’t doing it that way again.
I don’t think I could have handled the stress of doing it that way again.
So, the following month, I scratched boys off of my list and told Amanda and Emilee that they could stay home but had to hang out in their rooms. My girl Mary cooked and I made dessert and it was SO nice. So much more mellow and enjoyable and for the most part the girls stayed out of my hair.
March was the month I went from three guests to four and started inviting a few more friends. It was also the first Horror Movie Night for the girls. Each girl invited a guest and had pizza and brownies and scary movies. March was the month where I felt like I had figured it out. March was the first month where I really thought to myself, this is GREAT.
This past Saturday was the fourth consecutive dinner party at my house. And I can honestly say that this last dinner party was the first one where I was totally calm (or as totally calm as I am capable of being). I didn’t stress (too much) about who was going to show up, I didn’t stress about the food (which DIDN’T turn out right), I didn’t stress about the kids or the conversation. I just had a great time.
I plan on living in Texas for approximately another six years and I can say right now that I fully anticipate having dinner at my house the last Saturday night of every month from now until then because it is truly such a wonderful evening of food and friendship and it reminds me, every month, of exactly how lucky I am to have such amazing people in my life.

Song of the day: Marry Me

2010-04-20T05:58:00.000-07:00

~Train

Forever can never be long enough for me
Feel like I've had long enough with you
Forget the world now we won't let them see
But there's one thing left to do

Now that the weight has lifted
Love has surely shifted my way
Marry Me
Today and every day
Marry Me
If I ever get the nerve to say
Hello in this cafe
Say you will
Mm-hmm
Say you will
Mm-hmm

Together can never be close enough for me
Feel like I am close enough to you
You wear white and I'll wear out the words I love
And you're beautiful
Now that the wait is over
And love and has finally shown her my way
Marry me
Today and every day
Marry me
If I ever get the nerve to say hello in this cafe
Say you will
Mm-hmm
Say you will
Mm-hmm

Promise me
You'll always be
Happy by my side
I promise to
Sing to you
When all the music dies

And marry me
Today and everyday
Marry me
If I ever get the nerve to say hello in this cafe
Say you will
Mm-hmm
Say you will
Marry me

Today I just feel like crying.

2010-04-19T08:14:00.000-07:00

birthday shopping on Etsy

2010-04-13T10:16:00.000-07:00

I'm weird.
Now that we've gotten that out of the way...
Every year, on my birthday, I like to pre-shop for stuff I like so I can help the girls pick something out for me that I will like.
Like I said, I'm weird.
I just figure if I am spending the money, I should get some say ;-)

Oh ETSY, you evil evil website you.

GAH! The purple!!

In case you haven't noticed, I'm kind of on a bird kick.
But this one? This is my favorite.

Why yesterday was THE BEST DAY EVER!

2010-04-09T06:30:00.000-07:00

I read.
I read A LOT.
And my most favorite book IN THE WORLD is Walk In My Soul which is written by one of the best authors I've ever had the pleasure of reading; Lucia St. Clair Robson. I love this book so much that I FOUGHT hard with Amanda's dad to let me name her Tiana. Obviously I didn't win BUT it wasn't for lack of trying.
Book description is here:
This is the story of Tiana Rogers of the Cherokee, the young Sam Houston, and the Trail of Tears.
Tiana grew up learning the magic, spells, and nature religion of the Cherokee. And in a tribe that revered the life force that was female, she became a Beloved Woman—priestess, warrior, healer, teacher.History knows him as the father of Texas, but the young Sam Houston ran away on a lark from his family’s general store in Maryville, Tennessee, to live among the Cherokee. He hunter and played ritual games with the men and was adopted as a headman’s son and known as Raven.

I can't tell you how excited I was to "friend" Lucia St. Clair Robson on Facebook but I can tell you that the excitement didn't even compare to the INSANE EXCITEMENT I felt when I received a message from her!
And even that was paled when I checked my mail yesterday and saw this:

I'll admit, I screamed.

More than once.

It was like freaking Christmas.

Can I tell you that when your DREAM is to be an author, receiving something like this from one of your FAVORITE authors is like meeting Brad Pitt in person.
You're all like BRAD PITT TOUCHED MY HAND!
I'm all like LUCIA ST. CLAIR ROBSON KNOWS MY NAME!
Shut. The. Front. Door.

And now, I have this!

To put in my copy of this! (Which you should read if you haven't already because, holy crap! SUCH A GREAT BOOK!!)

The photo and card are happily tacked to my story board for the book I am currently working on. Where I can look at them. And smile.
Oh the smiles!

gardening is hard work people

2010-04-07T09:33:00.000-07:00

Easter with Manders.

2010-04-06T07:35:00.000-07:00

Suck it Technology

2010-03-31T11:38:00.000-07:00

I hate, loathe, abhor phone menus where they won’t let you push a button for your choice. Usually you have the option of doing either and I always choose the buttons because I don’t want to sound like a retard sitting on the phone going:
“Yes”
“Yes”
“No”
“Account “
“Billing”
“No”
“No”
“Yes”
“Operator”
“Operator”
”Operator.”
”Operator.”
“OPERATOR.”
DAMN IT!
HOW COME I CAN’T JUST TALK TO A FREAKING PERSON?

So today, I had to call and got a machine menu. I tried using the number one for YES but it immediately advised me, “I did not understand your answer. Do you have an account with us? Please say yes or no.”
I got a little thrill when, after a few voice option choices, I was connected to a live person. BUT right before I was transferred, the recorded voice said, “We like to know how our customer’s experiences are. Please take a short survey when you are done talking to the representative. To take the survey, press the star key at the end of your call.”
PRESS THE STAR KEY huh?
When the call ended, I said “SURVEY” and when nothing happened, hung up.

one week old babies

2010-03-31T10:55:00.000-07:00

I have this PROBLEM.
It's called: Spring makes me want to be a gardener.
And that would be ok if it weren't for this other problem I have: Summer makes me want to stay inside and not water plants and then they DIE.

My one week old babies:

(Ladies and) GENTLEMEN - PLACE YOUR BETS!

A salmon recipe...

2010-03-30T06:41:00.000-07:00

The other night I made salmon.
My kids were gone and I had one in the fridge and it had been calling my name. And the brown rice in my cabinet was singing "me toooooo"....
So I threw my brown rice into my rice cooker (one part rice to three parts liquid) and took the salmon out.
I took a baking sheet that The Cake Lady had sent me home with the other day and drizzled olive oil all over it and sprinkled salt and pepper on it.

Then I took my beautiful salmon friend and laid him ever so nicely on the cookie sheet. The one that belongs to The Cake Lady. I didn't realize after I cooked the salmon that there would forever be an imprint of the salmon on her cookie sheet. I am sorry TCL. Please forgive me?

Then I grab the lemons.
I [heart] lemon.
I [heart] lemon a lot.
I zested two lemons and rubbed the zest on both sides of my salmon.

And then I squeezed the juice from one lemon ALL OVER the salmon.

Then, sliced lemons inside.
I also put about a third a stick of butter on the inside.
Butter + Lemon + Salmon = HEAVEN

Then I took the remaining slices of lemon and put them on top and sprinkled with salt and pepper...

Ok, so the real reason I was cooking?
I had to try out my new stove.
My new stove that has electricity and buttons.
*sigh*

My new stove that has a WINDOW.
*double sigh*

I covered the salmon and cooked for about twenty minutes at 325F.
And when it came out it was all pretty...
TCL - did I mention I was sorry about the fish imprint on your cookie sheet?

Yum.

Song of the day: Talk You Down

2010-03-24T05:10:00.000-07:00

~The Script

I can feel the colour running
As it's fading from my face
Try to speak but nothin's coming
Nothing I could say to make you stay
Grab your suitcase call a taxi
It's 3am now where you gonna go?
Gonna stay with friends in London
And that's all I get to know.

Just a cigarette gone
No you couldn't be that far
I'm driving my car to where I hope you are
Maybe I can talk you down
Maybe I can talk you down
We're standing on a tiny ledge
Before this goes over the edge
Gonna use my heart and not my head
And try to open up your eyes
This is reletionship suicide
'Coz if you go, I go...
'Coz if you go, I go...

Taking shortcuts through the alleys
While you're racing through my mind
Cops can chase but they won't catch me
Not before I get to speak my mind
If there's still time, oh

Just a cigarette gone
No you couldn't be that far
I'm driving my car to where I hope you are
Maybe I can talk you down
Maybe I can talk you down
We're standing on a tiny ledge
Before this goes over the edge
Gonna use my heart and not my head
And try to open up your eyes
This is reletionship suicide
'Coz if you go, I go...
'Coz if you go, I go...
'Coz if you go, I go...
'Coz if you go, I go...

We're standing on a tiny ledge
Before this goes over the edge
Gonna use my heart and not my head

We're standing on a tiny ledge
Before this goes over the edge
Gonna use my heart and not my head

Just a cigarette gone
No you couldn't be that far
I'm driving my car to where I hope you are
Maybe I can talk you down
Maybe I can talk you down
We're standing on a tiny ledge
Before this goes over the edge
Gonna use my heart and not my head
And try to open up your eyes
This is reletionship suicide
'Coz if you go, I go...
'Coz if you go, I go...
'Coz if you go, I go...
'Coz if you go, I go...

Song Album of the day: Almost Everything I Wish I'd Said The Last Time I Saw You...

2010-03-23T05:27:00.000-07:00

~Wakey! Wakey!

I love Wakey! Wakey!
I want to marry Michael Grubbs.

Check out the other albums:
War Sweater
Silent As A Movie
Live at Bowery Ballroom

make a wish

2010-03-22T10:29:00.000-07:00

I had a wonderful weekend.

2010-03-22T10:11:00.000-07:00

Friday night I had wine and conversation with my neighbor-boy’s mom and her girlfriend. I really like them. It’s been awhile since I’ve started a new friendship but I think I’m handling it ok :-)
One of the best things about them is that they only live one road over! So it’s super convenient for hanging out.
I’ve decided I am going to invite them to dinner sometime in the next few weeks and cook for them. And then I am going to invite them to my next Girl’s Night Dinner…
Friday night Triniti also had her friend Erin coming over which I had thought was happening in Saturday night… this worked out well though because not only did Erin spend the night but so did neighbor-boy’s mom’s girlfriend’s daughter.
Man, I need new names for people.
I think the combination of the wine drinking and company on Friday night made me think that the it was Saturday so it felt like I got an entire extra day out of my weekend.
Of course, three little girls having a sleepover is a pretty crazy amount of energy and those girls stayed up until like two in the morning. And then woke up at like six thirty.
There just wasn’t enough coffee in the world for that.
The girls and I putzed around, cleaning up a little before heading over to The Cake Lady’s house for Jimmy’s Gumbo. SO GOOD.
And so nice to spend some time with The Cake Lady and her family. We’ve hardly seen each other in months and I miss her. She had to work the next morning so we left around ten-ish and went home where I promptly went to sleep and slept straight through until ten o’clock on Sunday.
Did you read that?
Ten. O. Clock.
Fueled by what I can only assume was some hard core guilt over having slept until TEN, I worked my ass off yesterday cleaning and organizing and laundry washing and seed planting until it was bedtime.
It felt great.
All in all, a pretty darn good weekend.
And, I am over the writer’s block. I had some great ideas this weekend.

absence makes the heart grow fonder... right?

2010-03-18T05:15:00.000-07:00

I get writer's block when I can't finish something I start.
That, dear readers (are there still more than one of you?), is why I haven't put anything up here in a few ~~days~~ ~~weeks~~ almost a month.
It's not because I don't love you guys.
And it's certainly not because I've ran off and am having an affair with another set of blog readers who are cuter than ya'll.
Because ya'll are just the cutest bunch of blog readers out there, hands down.
It's because I started a letter to my boss when he left. My boss left.
When I try to put that information into my brain and hit the COMPUTE button, my brain returns the following error message: Does Not Compute
Even now.
His last day was February 26th and on that day I started a letter to him and I haven't been able to work on anything else since.
Not my blog, not my book, not even a decent letter to a friend.
It was just too hard the first few days. I was all DESPAIR and GLOOM! I opened the letter every few days and tried to work on it, but then it became a project and the over achiever in my was fighting with the part of me who tells me I should table a little of the Girly Feelings parts and I just threw my hands up in the air and worked on other stuff because when Over Achiever and Girly Feelings start fighting, I have to step away.
So since then, I've been occupying myself with some other stuff.
In no particular order:
I've been gardening. WHAT? I know right! I betcha if we scrolled back through this website to all the springs I've ever loved before, we'd find that probably every year around this time I get bit by the Plant Stuff Now bug and the end result is a lot of wasted money and dead plants but I CAN'T HELP IT! I DON'T LEARN. This year I am all excited about the prospect of having fresh herbs. I'm not delusional enough to think I can bring fruits and vegetables to maturity yet given my clear black thumb but herbs? I'm just crazy enough to think I can pull of herbs! And oh what fun that would be since I decided to start actually cooking recently. It will be so fun at my dinner parties to be all, "yeah, I grew that rosemary myself. In my GARDEN! AND IT DIDN'T DIE!"
Which brings me to another thing I've been doing, throwing monthly dinner parties! This has turned into one of my most favorite things and if you have a group of people in your life that live fairly close, I seriously recommend it. I'm doing mine the last Saturday of every month. I send out my invited via facebook using the events app. I started it in January as a way to get together with my girlfriends. It just seemed so ridiculous that I never saw any of them and we all live just a few miles away from each other. I don't want to look back and say, "we were all too busy." I want to look back and say, "I made an effort." And really, not that hard to pull off. Thus far, I've been doing pasta dishes and pretty easy desserts and a plethora of booze and it probably runs me about fifty bucks but I'll take it! Fifty bucks to be able to spend a few hours with my bestest local friends? Totally worth it.
And speaking of friends, I think I've made some new ones. You know the little neighbor boy who lives one road over? Well his mom invited me over for coffee with her and her partner and coffee lasted over three hours! We had such a nice time sitting outside chatting away this past Sunday. I really like the both of them and they live super close by which is nice. We are going over tonight to hang out and chat and I think I am going to bake something to take over :-)
What else, what else?
Fairy is having a little boy! She had the ultrasound this past week and as much as she was willing that baby to be a girl, it's going to be a boy after all. I keep telling her I will take him and name him Jude and keep him because I've never had a boy. I don't think she is going to let me though. I'm still in the very early stages of planning that baby shower so any advice would be super appreciated.
Oh and there is a date in my future. My co-worker sold a house to a guy who has been asking him to set us up for like three or four months and finally wore me down :-) So sometime in the next few weeks we are all going to go out to dinner. A date. Holy cow.
Ok, I have to get to work but I love you my pretties and I will update more soon. I'm just going to push right through this writer's block and MAKE it go away.
*mwah*

on dating... no, no... not me..

2010-02-25T13:02:00.000-08:00

Amanda has a boyfriend.
-insert really loud screaming here-
I don’t even know what to say about that. I mean, I knew it was coming. I knew the day would come when my amazing little girl would find out that there is this whole world of boys and dating and butterflies in your stomach.
I knew it was coming.
But honestly, it wasn’t one of those things I was preparing for. I didn’t have a plan.
So I think I've talked about Cody before. He and Amanda met in daycare when they were just wee little things and became friends. My mom knew his parents because they are bar dwellers, as is my mother. One day, Cody’s family moved him away. I think Amanda was in third grade and she was just devastated.
The following year my Mom talked to his Mom (who he wasn’t living with) and got an address. Amanda wrote to him and we mailed it but never heard back. Then out of the blue last year, she gets a call from him. Our home number had been passed down the grapevine. He was living in Eldorado (about three hours from us) and had tracked her down.
It was kind of sweet.
Anyway, she was freaking thrilled. She was so thrilled in fact that when they talked she neither gave him her cell phone number nor got his in the midst of her excitement.
This I was able to tease her endlessly about.
So anyway, this year, he moved back in with his mom who lives right down the road from us. And he started school at Amanda’s school, one grade above her.
And I started hyperventilating.
Here’s the thing (and maybe I am just one hell of a bleeding heart but) he has a crappy family. Like, if he were from normal family, I think I would be so much better at dealing with all of this. BUT he is from crappy, drinking, hang out at the bar with your kids, let your kid sleep in a camper behind your trailer, fight over which parent has to take care of the kid family.
And it breaks my heart.
He is a good kid. He’s smart, he could totally do athletics, he’s nice. But NO one has his back. NO one gives a shit about whether this kid makes it or not. Which splits me in two because on the one hand, I want to believe in him... I want to have his back. I want to be someone that he can talk to who gives a shit. Because really, when you come from jacked up family stuff, sometimes all you need is one person who cares about you. BUT on the other hand, he wants to be Amanda’s boyfriend and what does he have to lose? His family doesn’t care if he has a girlfriend. They don’t care if he is holding hands or sneaking out or all the stuff that comes after hold hands that I am not ready to say out loud yet. If he does any of that stuff, all his parents are going to do is shrug their shoulders and Amanda will hate me for not allowing her to see him.
This part of parenting BLOWS.
So, anyway, when he first moved back, they were “going out” and I let him come over to my house a few times to hang out. In the living room. Supervised. So that they could see each other and I wouldn’t have to worry that she was making out with him in some grungy trailer.
Oh my god.
-insert barfing here-
Well, that lasted a few weeks and then they decided to just be friends (read: they broke up because he was the shiny new toy on the playground and all the girls swooned over him) and they weren’t really hanging out anymore. And I was SO UNBELIEVABLY RELIEVED. BUT I am a realistic. The first dude won’t be the last dude so I really, REALLY, had to start thinking about what I was going to do the next time she liked a boy.
What were the rules going to be?
What kind of boundaries was I going to put in place?
How was I going to handle it all?
Because I don’t want to fly by the seat of my pants when it comes to this.
Well the next boy was 15, his name was Gabe.
He is dead now because I killed him. I’m just kidding ;-)
Anyway, Gabe was kind of a nerdy kid who Amanda rode the bus with. They weren’t in the same school (BECAUSE HE WAS IN FREAKING HIGH SCHOOL) and he didn’t have a cell phone (THANK GOD) so she only saw him on the bus and that was it. And guess who else rides the bus? EMILEE
(Today, the part of Emilee will be played by the nosey younger sister who wants to get her older sister in trouble.)
The Gabe thing went off and on for a few months. But nothing serious. They were never “going out” because Gabe was catching too much flack for liking a seventh grader from the ninth grade girls. This gave me the perfect opportunity to talk to Amanda about how she doesn’t want a boyfriend who is so influenced by ninth grade girls and so worried about what everyone thinks and if she wants to have a boyfriend it should be someone worth having who cares about her and doesn’t care what other people think about it.
In the meantime, she is still in the loop about everything that is going on with Cody and she had told me that he had gotten in some trouble for getting into a fight with some kid who was picking on him. Another conversation we got to have about holding people accountable. Every time she told the story about Cody getting into a fight she wanted to make it sound like it wasn’t his fault, that he had no choice but to get into the fight. And EVERY time she said it, I corrected her.
HE is responsible for his choices, DO NOT give him an out on that.
So anyway, last week, her and Cody started talking on the phone pretty much every day again and it was becoming fairly evident that they were starting to like each other again. Emilee confirmed it a few days later by letting me in on the bus gossip. Which only gave me a limited amount of time to figure out how I was going to handle it all.
So sure enough, Amanda comes into the kitchen over the weekend with her Sweet Daughter Face on which made me immediately know that she was up to something. She starts helping me with whatever I was doing as she broaches the subject of how her and Cody could manage to spend some time together, primarily Sunday (so this must have been this past Saturday). I told her I needed to think about it but that he wasn’t coming over Sunday at all because I hadn’t had enough time to make up my mind about how to handle the Cody Situation.
She and I sat down on Sunday and I laid out the rules.
-Both of them have to have all grades over 80 on their report cards to be “going out” and especially to see one another in person. (This will be grades over 85 on the next report card… Hey, I figure they are both MORE than capable of making those grades, may as well use it.)
-They need to be working on Cody’s science together because he is having a hard time there and Amanda is a Science WHIZ.
-They aren’t allowed to be in her room or ANY room that has a closed door.
-They have to spend at least half of the time he is over hanging out working on college stuff. Looking into colleges, researching what colleges have the best programs for what they want to do career wise and where they are located. This is going to be like freaking homework for them. I am getting a notebook that they can use for notes and pros/cons, etc.
-He has to be held accountable for his actions. So if he gets into another fight or other kind of trouble and his parents don’t give a shit about grounding him, he will be grounded from Amanda. They won’t be allowed to spend time together or talk on the phone for whatever amount of time I deem acceptable.

That’s all I have for now but I think I will be adding to it. I’d love for them to start a language program together or something. He is interested in learning languages so it may help me get Amanda better interested.
He was over last night. They rode the bus home together and he is shy. He doesn’t say much to me. We have a little neighbor boy (Justin) who is friends with Em and who hangs out at the house ALL THE TIME and he is SUPER chatty with me, he talks as much as Emilee does (which is a LOT) . Anyway, Justin was over and hanging out with us last night too and being his normal talkative self so I am hoping Cody will see that he can talk to me. I fed him dinner with the kids and then his mom picked him up around six. Amanda texted me this morning and said he was going to ride the bus with her again and stay until 5:30. So today I am going to make an effort to talk to him. To try and get him to actually start talking to me. All of the girls friends (male and female alike) talk to me. I am The Cool Mom. All the kids like me, the parents like me. So this little dude who wants to spend time with my daughter is going to like me too. And then I am going to try and handle the whole him liking her thing while helping the both of them continue down the path to college.
But so help me, he had better keep his hands to himself.

photo update: thumb injury

2010-02-25T06:33:00.000-08:00

Obviously, I didn't take these pics :-) Emilee did... so they are a little out of focus.

Speaking of Emilee.... did I mention that she injured herself the exact same way a few weeks ago?

Song of the day: Need you now

2010-02-24T05:15:00.000-08:00

~Lady Antebellum

Picture perfect memories scattered all around the floor.
Reaching for the phone 'cuz I can't fight it anymore.
And I wonder if I ever cross your mind?
For me it happens all the time.
It's a quarter after one, I'm all alone and I need you now.
Said I wouldn't call but I lost all control and I need you now.
And I don't know how I can do without.
I just need you now.

Another shot of whiskey, can't stopping looking at the door.
Wishing you'd come sweeping in the way you did before.
And I wonder if I ever cross your mind?
For me it happens all the time.
It's a quarter after one, I'm a little drunk and I need you now.
Said I wouldn't call but I lost all control and I need you now.
And I don't know how I can do without.
I just need you now.

Oh whoa
Yes I'd rather hurt than feel nothing at all.
It's a quarter after one, I'm all alone and I need you now.
And I said I wouldn't call but I'm a little drunk
and I need you now.
Well I don't know how I can do without.
I just need you now
I just need you now.
Oh baby I need you now.

I cut off the end of my thumb. (grody pics)

2010-02-22T06:07:00.000-08:00

The other night, I cut off the top of my thumb.
I did it with a mandolin slicer.

And then I learned, very quickly, how few people know what a mandolin slicer is. I'll admit, I didn't know until about six months ago.

And then I bought the wrong one.
The slicer wasn't what I wanted necessarily.

I really wanted something I could julienne with.
But not my thumb. Vegetables. And maybe occasionally fruits.
But definitely not my thumb.

The other day...

2010-02-20T09:07:00.001-08:00

I had logged onto The Facebook to check out how all my peeps are doing and a little chat box popped up. I heard it since I was in the kitchen and skipped over to see who was trying to grab my attention. It was my sister, Blue's mom. It said simply, "Hi, this is Blue's mom... I was wondering when you might come and visit Blue. She really misses you."
Every heart string I have was severely tugged upon.
I can't begin to tell you how right it made me feel about my choice to move there.
Her mom and I had a short chat where she said that Blue talks about me all the time and is super proud of me and based on all of the things that she has said about me, her mom knows I can do anything I set my mind to including moving there in 2016. I told her about my plans to bring the girls up there for a few weeks over the summer of 2011 so we can poke around and I can check out the place I want to move to.
I have a hard time with patience.
When I know what I want to do, I try to start doing it so having a six year waiting period is rough but at the same time, those six years are all the time I have left where Amanda and Emilee will be home with me. So I need to enjoy them and make sure I experience them and know that my reward at the end of it all will be that I get to be near my sister for as long as I want.

2010-02-15T13:38:00.000-08:00

I've gone to look for myself. If I return before I get back, keep me here.

Perfect Dinner Pairing

2010-02-11T08:12:00.000-08:00

I hate grocery shopping.
It's no secret to those of you who know me... I try and only go every other Friday and occasionally I can stretch it even more if I really try. And I do.
So, I should have gotten groceries this past Friday but shot the grocery store my not so friendly finger as I drove by and decided we would eat cereal all weekend if it meant I didn't have to freaking shop.
This meant I had to get super creative over the weekend because, well, let's face it... your kids aren't going to eat just cereal all weekend no matter how much you try.

I knew I had all of the stuff I needed to make salmon patties so I logged onto Tasty Kitchen to see what the brilliant minds over there had posted and I found this fabulous recipe which I happened to have everything I needed to make.
Score!

And now, I feel like I really need to share this with you.
Why?
Three reasons:
1. Soooooooooooo good.
2. Pretty easy.
3. Inexpensive.

Here is what you need for the whole thing:
2 strips bacon (I used turkey bacon... Melissa d'Arabian is a really wonderful cook... she does a show called Ten Dollar Dinners which I TIVO religiously. I don't always like the idea of some of the stuff that she makes but her salmon patties and her Shrimp Scampi are SUPER good.)
1/4 cup chopped onion
1 egg
1/2 cup mayonnaise
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/2 lemon, zested
1 (14-ounce) can wild salmon, checked for large bones
1 baked or boiled russet potato, peeled, and fluffed with a fork
1/4 cup bread crumbs
2 tablespoons grated Parmesan
Freshly ground black pepper
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 Tablespoon Olive Oil
3 cloves Garlic
7 cups Low-Sodium Vegetable (or Chicken) Broth (I had to use boullion because I was out of broth)
¾ teaspoons Kosher Salt
½ teaspoons Crushed Red Pepper Flakes (I used cayenne pepper because it turns out it is the same thing and I was out of flakes - don't be scared of the spice it is EXACTLY the right amount of spicy-ness)
1 pound Angel Hair Pasta Or Pasta Type Of Your Choice
1 can (15.5 Oz. Can) Chickpeas, Drained And Rinsed
1 cup Flat-leaf Parsley, Chopped
½ cups Grated Parmesan

What I love about this is that I had pretty much all of this on hand and would have just about all of it on hand on any given day. One thing about Melissa d'Arabian's show is that she really gives you some good staples for keeping in your fridge or pantry so that you can make just about anything by adding just a few extra ingredients. Because of her I always have: garlic, lemons, parsley, cilantro, bacon in the freezer, onions, breadcrumbs and parmesan. I can't even begin to tell you the things you can pull off if you always have those on hand. ALSO at Sam's Club you can buy a two pound chunk of parmesan for ten bucks!!!

Here is the recipe for the chick-pea pasta. If you like chick-peas, make this. In fact if you don't know if you do or not, make this. It is really very good.

Here is the recipe for the salmon cakes. First of all, I use light mayo and two potatoes because I think it is too liquidy to hold together right. I also use more than a quarter cup of breadcrumbs. If any of you know a good way to bake these, I'd love to know about it because frying them is messy.

Ok people, there you go. Go and eat and enjoy :-)

Crappy camera phone update.

2010-02-10T09:28:00.001-08:00

(Following up to this and this.)
I used the Brass Free for Blondes yesterday and I can tell you right now, I was FREAKING. OUT. I had essentially bleached my hair twice and now I was tore between doing the Sahara toner or the Brass Free stuff.

I had read in MANY places that the Brass Free had gotten rid of the rest of the orange and I am not ashamed to admit that I begged and pleaded with the box prior to doing the dye and then with the dye itself the entire time it was in my hair.
Please work, oh please oh please oh please work. Universe? Please make this work, please get rid of the orange. Please oh please. - For the entire ten minutes it was in my hair.
Now in my bathroom, I have a shower stall and a garden tub. As SOON as I washed the Brass Free from my hair, I flung the door open to look in the mirror and see if the orange was gone.
And you know what? For the most part, it was. My hair is still a very gold blonde but it is Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better than orange.
My plan is to wait a few weeks (the Brass Free is good for 28 washes) and then do a nice Ash Blonde color... I just want to make sure my hair has enough time to recover from the extensive frying I've done to it this week.

Clairol Born Blonde Original

2010-02-09T10:49:00.000-08:00

When I started:

This is not my natural color... I am naturally a redhead... not a bright redhead but a nice auburn redhead. I like to go darker so I still have red in there but not that bordering on orange red.

Speaking of orange red... This is after the first round of Born Blonde.

Super closeup so you can REALLLLLY see the carrot.

After round two of the Born Blonde as the Clairol Chat Color Expert advised...

I'm going to give the Brass Busters a chance today to fix the remaining orange which isn't what the Clairol Chat Color Expert said... she said to get the Natural Instincts Sahara toner and use that. But I did a LOT of googling and found that just about everyone who was trying to rid their hair of the remaining orange used the Brass Busters and said it worked wonders. If not, no problem, I can apparently JUST. KEEP. DYING. MY. HAIR. Over and over and over and over and over and over...

torment

2010-02-06T11:57:00.000-08:00

I'm all caught up in the craziness that is associated with being in full blown Like with someone.
Please send help immediately.
Or don't.
I can't seem to decide if it is a good or a bad thing.
More to come.

What made my day today...

2010-02-03T09:54:00.000-08:00

going blonde

2010-02-02T19:06:00.000-08:00

I was blond about five years ago and loved it.. had so much fun straying away from my natural auburn locks and the safe browns that I put on from time to time.
But for some reason, the last two nights, I've chickened out... There is a blond katehopeeden in your future as soon as she figures out where she put her cohones.

Which do you like more readers?
The older redheaded version of yours truly?

Or the younger blonder, less fabulous camera version?

Song of the day: Glitter in the Air

2010-02-02T07:08:00.000-08:00

~Pink

Have you ever fed a lover with just your hands
Closed your eyes and trusted
Just trusted

Have you ever thrown a fistfull of glitter in the air
Have you ever looked fear in the face and said, "I just don’t care"

It's only half past the point of no return
The tip of the iceberg
The sun before the burn
The thunder before the lightning
The breath before the phrase
Have you ever felt this way

Have you ever hated yourself for staring at the phone
Your whole life waiting on the ring to prove you're not alone

Have you ever been touched so gently you had to cry
Have you ever invited a stranger to come inside

It's only half past the point of oblivion
The hourglass on the table
The walk before the run
The breath before the kiss and the fear before the flames
Have you ever felt this way

La la la la
La la la la

There you are
Sitting in the garden
Clutching my coffee
Calling me sugar
You called me sugar
Oh
Oh
No
No
No

Have you ever wished for an endless night
Lassoed the moon and the stars
And pulled that rope tight

Have you ever held your breath
And asked yourself, "Will it ever get better than tonight
Tonight"

Reality vs. Fantasy (in writing)

2010-02-02T06:53:00.000-08:00

I've blogged before about how my imagination can and will run away with me. I have a leash on it and I frequently need to rein it in... however, right now I am writing a lot and so when I start to feel my imagination taking over instead of saying, "whoa girl", I am trying to sit down and write it out.
And truthfully, sometimes, doing this makes me lonely and a little sad and occasionally it even makes my outlook on things going on in my life a little skewed.
My imagination glasses are powerful.
Additionally, when I really get into my head, I don't want to come out. I want to write and write and stay in my little imaginary world because I like it there. Because there, things are perfect... or could be anyway.
So Saturday night, there was an incident, one that I will right out very soon... my first inclination every time my stomach clenched up thinking about it was to shut it out. But I am not going to. I am going to write it out and get it out of my system and I am going to use all of the different emotions it gave me in my book.
This is hard for me because I will have to separate out the different feelings I had and explore how each one could have led to totally different outcomes. Essentially, I will have to relive the whole night with different ending and beginning possibilities until my head just explodes.
I am using Life right now. All of her twists and turns, all of the risks that I would probably be a little hesitant to take are research. It's beneficial. I am getting good writing out of it. It makes me want to write. It makes more ideas come out. And, like I said, it makes me a little sad when I let myself feel these things and then when I am done, I have to come back and accept that they aren't real for me, they are only real for my characters.

from postsecret

2010-01-29T07:20:00.001-08:00

Confused girl feelings/thoughts dump...

2010-01-28T16:12:00.000-08:00

What is it about spending time with him that I want? Yeah, ok, the eyes and the ridiculous dimples. But so what? I meet guys all the time who are good looking, I thought I was over that part of my life where looks dictated the way I felt about a person.
How much does his interest in me play a part? I think it has almost double the power because someone like him shouldn't be interested in me. Single mom of three? He was only ten when I had Amanda. He should be interested in hot twenty something's with a gym membership that they actually use and a permanent VIP pass to any hot club you've never heard of.
And I tell myself every day that he is. And that I am just another one of those girls he is trying to conquer before he stops being a young guy and meets the woman who makes him decide to be a man.
Now I feel like very few of us older women are that girl who makes them stop. And I feel like when we are it is because we have a purpose to be. We want to change that guy, we want to be the ones who make them grow.
I don't want another kid. I don't want to mold anyone. I want a finished peice with a few rough edges and maybe a chip or two, but done.
You know what I am scared of? I'm scared that he actually likes me this much and that the longer he likes me this much, the more I want to spend time with him. I like him. We have a good time. He's funny and... I think real. Or he's really good at pretending to be genuine.
See that? That is me not wanting to give him a chance. I think it all the time, that he is just playing me and once I sleep with him, he'll be done. And I've been too careful with my heart this time... waiting and waiting and waiting until I started to feel right about him. And now I am starting to feel that and I keep pushing it away.
Am I pushing it away because I know deep down it's wrong or am I pushing him away because I am scared of falling for him and it is just easier to not take him seriously.
He keeps asking me why I won't take him seriously.
I don't know.
But I think we are going to find out this weekend.

How you can help Haiti...

2010-01-28T08:13:00.000-08:00

Below is a repost from Real Hope For Haiti's need list at this time.
Our local dollar tree sells most of these items for a dollar, does yours?

Donation of goods to Haiti
By haitirescuecenter
We have a friend that is collecting donated good for us at a warehouse. These items are to be shipped to Haiti. If you have items you can ship them to

Debbie Woodward
Main Office
Northrup King Building
1500 Jackson St. NE
Minneapolis, MN 55413

Current needs list
infant formula
powdered milk
ensure milk
oil
other staples
canned meat
canned vegetables
canned beans
canned tomato products
juice mixes

triple antibiotic oint
vitamins
tylenol
ibuprofen
antibiotics
hydrocortizone cream
anti-fungal cream
oral hypoglycemics – metformin, glyburide
seizure meds – pheno
gauze
gloves
kerlex, cling
IV fluids
angiocaths
casting materials
cast saw
surgical blades
sutures – all kinds
syringes

tents
tarps
mattresses
sheets
pillows
hygiene items
laundry soap
disinfectant
copy paper
bug spray
garden seeds – corn, beans (lima, black, etc), watermelon, tomato, eggplant
garden tools – hoe, machete, pick-ax, sickle (digo)
buckets
flashlights
rechargeable lanterns
batteries
dishes
cups
spoons
cooking pots

nails – 3″, 4″, tin
wire
paint
doors
boards – 2×4, 1×4
plywood
shovels
hammers
wheelbarrows

generator
inverter
electric wire
batteries
water pump – 4″
bulldozer
back-hoe
ambulance-like truck

If you would like Debbie’s phone number please email me or if you have any question please let me know. We know some of these needs are big but we want you to know what we are looking for. Thanks so much for all you help.

When you go shopping next, take this list with you and just grab whatever you can grab and get it in a box! Let's do our part :-)

Why I love having a blog....

2010-01-28T08:04:00.001-08:00

They sure didn't find any help here :-)

Five years...

2010-01-26T11:51:00.000-08:00

How is it even possible that five years have passed since we've spoken? Five years of not talking to you on the phone, not discussing boys and their drama, not telling you stories about the girls, not gossiping about our friends... Five years of missed Christmases and missed birthdays and missed anniversaries.
Five years.
Your pictures sit on my dresser and the other day Triniti was asking me about you and it broke my heart that she will not even know you. I pulled up this picture of you to show her that she had known you... That you had been there, held her, bought her clothes, watched her sleep, laughed when she got curly hair and loved her.
You loved her. I wish she could know you. I wish you could see how surprising she is. How she leaves everyone notes everywhere telling them she loves them.

You loved her. I wish you could see the amazing person she is becoming. The way she wants to give everyone everything and the way she laughs and how smart she is.

You loved her. I wish you could see how she is becoming a young woman. The way she is boy crazy and yet grounded, you would love to talk to her and hear how she is living and learning and growing.

You loved her. And she misses you more than words can say.

Margarita's at lunch...

2010-01-25T12:29:00.000-08:00

are making my work day surreal.

Song of the day - Words

2010-01-25T08:57:00.000-08:00

~Train

(I haven't found this to embed yet but the lyrics themselves are wonderful...)

I'd give anything but I won't give up on you
I'd say anything, but not goodbye
I will run with your changes and I'm always on your side
And there's not a word I've ever heard that would make me change my mind

Words they'll try to shake you
Don't let them break you
Or stop your world from turning
When words keep you from feeling good
Use them as I would and let them burn

Like stones in your pocket people try to wear you down
Someone always wants to take the love you've found
So let's runs with these changes and I want you by my side
And there's not a word I've ever heard that would make me change my mind

Words they'll try to shake you
Don't let them break you
Or stop your world from turning
When words keep you from feeling good

Use them as I would and let them burn
Let them burn
Let them burn
Underneath every word somebody's heart been broken
With or without words we try to forget

Words they'll try to shake us
Don't let them break us
Or stop our world from turning
When words keep you from feeling good
Use them as I would and let them burn

Words they'll try to shake you
Don't let them break you
Or stop your world, stop your world from turning
When words keep you from feeling good
Use them as I would and let them burn

Let them burn
Let them burn

Today

2010-01-23T07:19:00.000-08:00

Today I am going to have my coffee, work out, do housework, take a shower, go into Boerne and pick up cards for the two babies I get to see today, take Emilee and Trin to my mom's, maybe stop by work for no particular reason and get the whole seeing the cute boy out of my system, smile, go see brand new baby #1 who was born Thursday, hang out for a little while, go see brand new baby #2 who was born last month, pick up the daughters, go to Home Depot and get dirt and maybe pots for my new berry plants, and come back home and plant them.
I believe I will take pictures while out on this adventure.
Have a great day people.

Dear Amanda,

2010-01-22T12:02:00.001-08:00

I am so glad that I am not thirteen.
It is one of those deceiving ages that you are so excited to reach and then once you are there and all of the drama starts happening, you want to get away from it as quickly as possible.
You, much to my... (what's the word? Surprise? Dismay? Utter terror?) have just broken up with your second boyfriend. I use the word boyfriend loosely here since it doesn't really mean what you want it to mean yet... in fact sister, it may not mean what you want it to mean for a long time. And when it does finally, you may want it to mean something else entirely.
Relationships are tricky.
And they are going to stay that way for awhile.
I have always been a little afraid of the day when you would come to me and then not want my advice since, for the majority of your life, I've been single. And hey, what do I know right? I'm just your old spinster mom...
Oh the things you don't know :-)
And one day we can have a long chat if you feel so inclined but for now, I just feel like I need to remind you that I am here.
When you came home yesterday afternoon and you went straight to your room instead of poking your head into the kitchen to ask me what we are having for dinner because you are STARVING, I knew something was wrong.
I waited a few minutes to see if you would magically emerge but you didn't... even Emilee came in and asked me what was up. I decided to give you some space, after all you'd been surrounded by people all day and maybe you just needed ten minutes of time to yourself. But when I called you for dinner and you said you'd eat later, Emilee and I looked at each other and knew something was up.
Emilee, being a little sleuth, got online and started chatting with ya'll's facebook friends and in two minutes had the news. You and Gabe had broken up.
We got you out of your room but you barely ate and you didn't want to talk about it yet, just said you were sad.
It wasn't until last night when we were getting ready for bed that you told me what had happened and it wasn't until I came in to tuck you in and saw you crying in your room that I really understood the enormity of it all that you were feeling.
It's easy for us, as adults, to roll our eyes and make your one week relationship ending so small in our minds. But the reason it is easy for us is because we've experienced it as being huge. And then we experienced the next huge thing and the next and the next and before we knew it, we could look back at the first handful of boys who hurt our feelings and roll our eyes because in comparison to everything that has happened since, it is little to us. But it became that way because we experienced it and it hurt and then it hurt a little less when the next thing hurt a little more.
So, Amanda, as much as I hate to say it and as much as I hate to see you going through it, it's all necessary. You have to feel this way so that later you will know that you don't want to. And you have to "go out" with these stupid boys because that way you will learn that you don't want these traits in boys.
I hate watching you go through it all. I wish I could hand you a book and say after you read it, you will understand and you can skip all the bullshit, but the fact is - you have to experience things.
But, the promise I am making you right now is that I will be here for you every single time you get your feelings hurt and I promise to always, always remember the enormity of what you are feeling.
I love you.
~Your Mom

2010-01-22T11:09:00.000-08:00

Song of the day - Soul Sister

2010-01-21T17:17:00.000-08:00

~Train

Hey, Hey, Hey,

Your lipstick stains on the front lobe of my left side brains
I knew I wouldn't forget you and so I went and let
You blow my mind
Your sweet moon beam
The smell of you in every single dream I dream
I knew when we collided you're the one I have decided
Who's one of my kind

Hey soul sister ain't that mister mister on the radio stereo
The way you move ain't fair you know
Hey soul sister I don't want to miss a single thing you do
Tonight
Heeey Heeeeey heeeey...

Just in time I´m so glad you have a one track mind like me
You gave my life direction
A game show love connection we can't deny
I´m so obsessed my heart is bound to beat right
Out my untrimmed chest
I believe in you like a virgin your Madonna
And I'm always gonna want to blow your mind

Hey soul sister ain't that mister mister on the radio stereo
The way you move aint fair you know
Hey soul sister I don't want to miss a single thing you do
Tonight

Way you can cut a rug
Watching you's the only drug I need
So gangster I'm so thug
You're the only one I'm dreaming of you see
I can be myself now finally
In fact there's nothing I can't be
I want the world to see you be with me

Hey soul sister ain't that mister mister on the radio stereo
The way you move aint fair you know
Hey soul sister I don't want to miss a single thing you do
Tonight
(Repeat)
Hey, Hey, Hey, Tonight

tangled emotions

2010-01-21T06:37:00.001-08:00

The word of the day is: perspective.
Yesterday, in our quarterly meeting, I was enjoying the constant praise that our location was receiving. I can't help it, I'm human and humans like to hear that they are kicking ass.
Despite the fact that I had a really rough weekend with the girls contracting head lice and the warrant for my arrest that had just been issued for a speeding ticket I got in 2001 (Nine. Years. Ago.), the former of the two having forced me to take a day off that I really needed to work, I was in really good spirits.
I had a really good attitude because I had pushed myself to finish all of the work I needed to get done before the meeting. I'd helped out in areas that I hadn't really needed to help out in because I'd wanted to.
In short, I'd done a good job and I was pretty happy with myself.

At about two o'clock, my boss leaned over and said, "did you hear about what happened in Haiti? They had another earthquake this morning, a 6.1..."
I hadn't heard.
Suddenly, the lady from marketing was fading out and all I could think about was how was Haiti going to survive another earthquake? How many more people were going to die? How many more were going to be brutally injured? Who was going to help them?
My eyes started to well up right there in the middle of the marketing section of our quarterly meeting. I wanted to go the bathroom and just sit down and cry.
I don't understand everything you know? I don't understand how things like this happen. I don't understand the why.
I didn't excuse myself.
I shouldered those tears and tried to focus on the meeting that suddenly felt empty and ridiculous.
By the end of the hour, I'd managed to push Haiti into a corner in my mind and put my participation in the meeting back in the forefront. After marketing, it was time for awards.
Awards.
Plaques.
Checks.
I've been with my company for two and a half years.
In the last two years, I have implemented systems that our entire region is now required to use. I've trained other office managers on them. I've helped out with everything I could possibly think to help with. I've set the standards of office management on many levels.
I really thought that I was going to get an award.
And I didn't.
And it stung.
And it's stupid.
Because people in Haiti are trapped and dying and without water and medical attention.
Because other stores in our company are closing, people are fighting for their jobs.
And I am sitting there pouting. I had the audacity to pout. To be angry.
Lola reminded me yesterday that my feelings are valid. That I'd worked hard and I deserved to be upset that I hadn't been recognized. My feelings were valid.
But without perspective I think.
I am lucky every single day that I have a home, a job, security in both of those things. That my children are healthy and that head lice, no matter how icky and inconvenient, was the worse thing to happen to them this year. They are happy, they have bright futures.
I am lucky.
We are, all of us, lucky.
So today, I am refocusing. I am not focused on the fact that I didn't win an award yesterday. I am not focused on the head lice or the stupid hundrend and twenty bucks I had to pay for a warrant for a freaking ticket from nine years ago. Today I am having perspective. I am grateful for the things I have and I appreciate them.

buying in bulk

2010-01-16T07:37:00.000-08:00

I usually buy my chicken at Sam's Club.
You can get a ten pound bag of boneless-skinless frozen chicken breasts for $22.00.
Yesterday when I went grocery shopping though, I was really hoping I wouldn't have to go to Sam's.... I was really hoping I'd find a good deal on chicken at HEB (our local grocery chain).
And you know what?
I totally did.
First of all, regular boneless skinless chicken breasts were on sale for $1.99 a pound. PERFECT I thought. That is going to save me a trip to Sam's for today.
But then, my little school skipping daughter says, "hey Mom, look at these, they are marked down."

The "this" she was referring to was the all natural chicken breasts that sit next to the processed, additives added chicken I was buying.

Here's the thing, dear reader, I love organic. I love all natural. I buy it whenever I can possibly manage to because I know it's better for us. But most of the time, it is twice the price and I just can't afford all that.
This time it wasn't twice the price, it was less than the regular chicken I had been about to buy. Why? Because it's sell by date was two days away.
I care not for sell by dates because I freeze everything in my trusty stand alone freezer in the laundry room.
When I started loading up, I almost chickened out (pun so totally intended) because I saw that about half of them were bone in, skin on. Now, I can debone a chicken breast pronto, and I will if I need to. But mostly, I am all about convenience. I don't want to have to mess with it all.
I hesitated.
And then I had the shocking realization that by buying these, I would not only save money on the chicken, but I could also cross the organic, four dollars a quart chicken stock I had on my list off. Why? Because I could make my own.

Here is the break down of the cash:
I bought 19.57lbs of chicken for $28.67, roughly $1.50 a pound!
(That is almost twice the amount of chicken I would have got at Sam's for only six bucks more!)
Additionally I was able to make almost a gallon of all natural chicken stock using the bones and all of my veggie scraps. A gallon of all natural chicken stock would have cost me about $16.00 at the store.

So, as you can see - I SAVED.

BUT what did I do with all of it?
Well, first I took it all off the bone and removed the skin. I had three large bowls. One for the skin (which I don't use or keep), one for the bones (for the stock) and one for the chicken.

Once I had it all separated, I threw away the skins and put the bones on to cook in a big pot of water.

Then I had to figure out what to do with the chicken.

In a few quart sized bags, I put about six cloves of minced garlic...

and a half a cup of buttermilk and about eight chicken breasts cut into two inch chunks. This will be for me to fry chicken nuggets with later. Labeled and into the freezer it goes.

I then cut the whole breasts in half, length-wise, creating two smaller but still whole chicken breasts. (I find that the girls and I can very rarely eat a whole chicken breast by ourselves.) Then I grabbed the bottle of Italian dressing I had bought just for this very purpose...

And put about six to eight of them into a labeled bag headed to the freezer....

Then I put the remaining chicken, six to eight breasts at a time, into quart sized bags unseasoned (I don't know what I might want to do with them later)...
By the time I was done, I had EIGHT bags of chicken in the freezer and three breasts left out for the dinner I was making that night.

I went through my veggie drawer and grabbed anything that was about to get bad and chunked it into the pot, I also started cleaning all of the vegetables I had bought, throwing their stems and extra parts into the stock. Additionally, I cleaned up the kale I was using for my two experiment dinner/snack items I was making that night and threw the kale stems in.
This is what it all looked like when I turned it off to cool.

It smelled amazing. The girls kept coming in to tell me as much. I let it cool for about an hour and then strained it and poured it into a gallon pitcher. I wanted it to cool completely before I put it into bags and into the freezer.

In the midst of all of this I cooked two different recipes which I will be posting later and I also prepared beef in a marinade for something I will make later this week and froze it as well as a meatloaf which I also made and froze.
Pictures got scarce about four hours in ;-)

Haiti.

2010-01-14T05:41:00.000-08:00

I can't explain how it happened... Haiti was like a friend I hadn't met yet... Several months ago, I saw a link on Facebook that led me to a blog called Watching the Waters. I love this blog. I read it several times a week. The strength that Corey shows daily just blows my mind.
At some point early on, she linked to another blog called Real Hope For Haiti Rescue Center.
You may remember a few months ago that I posted this... that was from that blog.
It was the children.
The children kept me coming back.
The children deepened that feeling I have inside of me that makes me want to do more to help out in this world, a world where what I have is unfathomable to these people. Where a dollar a day really does save their life.
I'm humbled.

I heard about the earthquake in Haiti the same way you did... and I knew right away that it was going to be catastrophic damage. Life destroying damage. I didn't want to turn on the tv and see the footage, I didn't want to google it and see the photos. I didn't want to find out that the amazingly wonderful people that run RHFH Rescue Center were hurt or worse.
I went there first. Got onto my computer and pulled up the website that shows me every day what it means to really devote your life to making a difference. That shows me every day how they save the children.

"We are okay. The wall are cracked in several places. We have heard town is worse. There are lots of aftersocks and tremors happening right now."

They are posting more now.
Photos of the damage, photos of the injured, photos of the dead lining the streets... but they are also posting photos of the lives they are saving... it is those photos I would encourage you to go and see. Go and see the good that they are doing and when you feel compelled to, and I know you will, click on the little paypal button and donate something, anything. Five dollars if it is all you have because five dollars will go further than you can imagine there.
Make a difference... even if it is a little difference because it is a difference any way.

Olive Garden's Chicken Gnocchi Veronese... kinda...

2010-01-13T00:26:00.000-08:00

This post should be titled: How I didn't follow the rules while attempting to duplicate Olive Garden's Chicken Gnocchi Veronese recipe.
For starters, I didn't EVEN have time for the two hour marinade time the chicken required since I decided to make this yesterday right before I left work. I get off of work at 3:30p. So I ran to the store to get a few things that I didn't have at home that I needed for this. Like gnocchi... because I wasn't even about to attempt to make that from scratch on a Tuesday.
I am not Super Woman people.
I got home at 4:30p.
My girls get home, starving and cranky at 4:45p... Clearly, two hour marinade was not happening.
I threw the chicken in a bowl with the lemon, rosemary (mmmmmmm rosemary) and garlic (which I wanted to add SO MUCH MORE OF... I love garlic) as soon as I walked in the door.
Like before I even unloaded the groceries.

Then I got to work julienning (Is that even a word?) my zucchini...
Now, a month or so ago, Ryan over on This Is Reverb did a post about a breakfast casserole and he used a mandoline slicer.
That is what I retained: MANDOLINE SLICER
I did not retain: JULIENNE ATTACHMENT
So for Christmas, Emilee got me a plain old, no attachments mandoline slicer. I naively thought yesterday that I could use it for this soup.
Oh, the things I learn.

Now here is where I really just threw the directions out the window.
This recipe calls for two things that I did not want to do:
1 small Vidalia onion, chopped
1 red bell pepper, sliced (julienned)
Ok, let's start with the onion. While I was IN Wal-Mart, I called my mom. The conversion went like this:
Me: Hey, what the hell is a vidalia onion?
Mom: It's a sweet onion, like a Georgia onion.
Me: Uhm, ok. Do they have those at Wal-Mart?
Mom: Sure.
Me: [standing in front of the onion selection] Uh... what color are they?
I usually buy one of the three major onion types depending on what I am using it for: Yellow, White, Purple
I didn't know Yellow = Sweet.
Now I do.
Additionally, onions make me cry when I cut them.
A LOT.
So, I usually try and scam a daughter into doing it for me... usually Amanda because she says if she chews gum, her eyes won't water. And guess what! I have gum she can chew. But here was the dilemma: I needed the onions VERY. FINELY. CHOPPED. so that the daughters wouldn't bitch about them being in the soup and I knew Amanda would do a rough chop so I wasn't sure how to proceed.

Then I looked over at the stupid red bell pepper. Here's something you may not know about me - I loathe and abhor bell peppers, any color. I know that when a recipe calls for them, it is important to include them because they bring flavor, but I don't want to bite into them.
Not at all.

So, as it happens, I received a Bullet Express for Christmas. I love my Bullet Express. We use it just about every day. And I had the brilliant albeit not following the recipe idea to throw my onion and red bell pepper into the food processor attachment and chop them up that way. Into teeny tiny pieces.
It didn't go down like that.
It turned them into an onion and bell pepper smoothie.
So, you know, do with that what you will.
I did what any fly by the seat of your pants cook would do and say Oh Well and moved on. I threw the zucchini into my oil and started to saute it. As it was cooking, I slowly added the onion and red bell pepper mix to it. It smelled heavenly.

As it was cooking, I mixed my heavy cream, ricotta cheese and parmesan together into a bowl and checked the directions.

And realized I had a problem.
The problem was two fold. First, I had doubled the recipe. Second, I didn't have a pan large enough to combine all of my ingredients. I had a pot, sure, but the recipe called for a pan.
I also realized I needed to start boiling some water for the gnocchi.
And start my chicken.
I did both simultaneously. Because I rock.
When the little gnocchi started to float, I poured them into my strainer and then took the pot I had cooked them in and put my cream and cheese mixture in it with my sauteed veggies and the gnocchi and turned it onto medium.

The chicken with the rosemary smelled so good.
It didn't brown though because I was cooking it too low.

I stirred the cream and veggie mixture pretty constantly to keep it from sticking or burning or exploding. As the cheese melted, it went through some interesting texture changes.

I added the chicken pieces as they cooked since I had crammed so many of them in there and all...

Then it was done... and so very good. We ate it with HUGE chunks of garlic bread with parmesan melted on it. There is no picture of that though because WE WERE HUNGRY.

I, being such a good follower of recipes and directions and rules, didn't add anything additional of course.

What? I didn't do that! Who put that picture there?
I would never do that... even if it's...

From the Olive Garden recipe website...

Ingredients
¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
1 small Vidalia onion, chopped
1 red bell pepper, sliced (julienned)
½ zucchini, sliced, (julienned)
Salt to taste
4 chicken breasts, sliced in ½” strips
2 small branches rosemary
1 garlic clove, minced
Juice of ½ lemon

Veronese Sauce
1 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
½ cup ricotta cheese
14 fl oz heavy cream

Gnocchi
2 qt water
6 oz all-purpose flour
2 eggs
2 lbs russet potatoes
2 tsp salt
OR (if you are in a hurry and can't cook worth a crap, like me)
1 lb gnocchi (potato dumplings), cooked according to package directions

Procedures
NOTE: You may make your own gnocchi by following the steps below, or you may purchase them already made.

Gnocchi
WASH potatoes and place in water. Cook potatoes until soft (cook time will depend on size of potatoes). Remove potatoes from water and cool in refrigerator.
PEEL cooled potatoes and push them through a fine grater (rice grater) until mashed; do not over-mash potatoes or they will get tough.
COMBINE potatoes, flour and eggs in a mixing bowl. Mix well until dough does not stick to hands (add small amounts of flour at a time if needed).
DIVIDE dough into 4 sections. Roll out each section into a long rope. Cut each rope into ½” pieces. Push fork tines on each piece for the classic gnocchi appearance.
BRING water to a boil in a sauce pot. Drop in gnocchi and cook until they float.

Chicken & Sauce
COMBINE garlic, lemon juice, rosemary and chicken slices in a mixing bowl. Let marinate for at least 2 hours.
COMBINE Parmesan cheese, ricotta cheese and heavy cream in a mixing bowl and set aside.
HEAT sauté pan on medium high. Add extra virgin olive oil, onions, bell peppers, and zucchini. Saute until onions are translucent (do not brown).
ADD marinated chicken slices and cook until slices are brown on all sides and internal temperature is 165°F. Reduce heat and add sauce mixture. Bring to a simmer.
DRAIN cooked gnocchi and add to pan with chicken, vegetables and sauce. Stir to coat gnocchi with sauce.
SERVE gnocchi topped with extra Parmesan cheese.

my dawgs

2010-01-12T05:02:00.000-08:00

On the weekends, when the sun comes up and through my windows, I LOVE being able to take pictures. There is just nothing as lovely as early morning sun. Usually this is when I will take shots of Triniti because, let's face it, she is the only kid I have that wakes up early in the morning. But this past Sunday, when the sunlight was streaming in, I had a livingroom full of doggies :)

You will of course remember my baby girl, Madame Chicita Puppy...

Chica is a sunbathing gal.

My "new" baby is Daisy Dog.

She is still slightly confounded by this whole having her picture taken thing...

But she has learned, as all that reside in my house eventually do, to just give in.

Lemon White Chocolate Chip Cookies

2010-01-09T06:39:00.000-08:00

The Cast -
2.25 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup butter, cool
.75 cup packed light brown sugar
.25 cup white sugar
2 (3.4 ounce) packages instant lemon pudding mix
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs
12 ounces white chips

Rehearsal -
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Combine the flour and baking soda. Set aside.
Mix the butter, brown sugar, white sugar, pudding mix, and vanilla. Beat until creamy. Add the eggs and mix well. Gradually stir in the flour mixture. Stir in the chips.
Acting tip - You want your butter to be slightly softened but not warm. It should be chilled enough to piss your beaters off when you mixing it. When your dough is done, you should be able to form cookie balls with your hands. If it is too sticky, then your butter was too warm. You'll want to refrigerate the dough for twenty or thirty minutes.
I like my cookies big so I usually use about a third to a half a cup of dough and roll it into a ball and then flatten it a little to make it like a thick disc. That will make the cookie about six inches in diameter when done.

Performance time - 350 for ten minutes or so. It really is going to depend on your cookie size. Keep checking them and when they've spread out and poofed up and browned slightly, they are ready.

Headshot - (note: yes, I know I need new baking sheets...) This is probably an 11x15 holding eight cookies so you can get an idea of how big they are... next time I will take pics of the process and update the post :)

2010-01-06T17:47:00.000-08:00

Hoppin John (my version)

2010-01-05T14:42:00.000-08:00

When I was in Dallas last year for New Year's Eve, my aunt made Hoppin John on New Years Day and I just loved it. She substituted the ham for little smokies which were cut into slices.
This year, my mother was pretty upset with me for not buying any lucky blackeyed peas to eat on New Year and when she was griping at me, I suddenly remembered how much I liked the Hoppin John we'd had at my aunts house.
I haven't had them since so I am seriously hoping that they aren't hangover food.. you know, when you have something to eat after a long day of being hungover and it tastes like the best thing you've ever had.
I googled the recipe and decided immediately not to use ham... I'm just not a ham person. I realize it is usually left over at most people's houses the week after Christmas, but not at mine. Echk.

What you need:
Two cans of blackeyed peas..
One box (12oz) of Zatarains Jumbalaya mix
Two packages of smoked sausage
Celery (optional)

Now traditionally, you would have the pork, celery, blackeyed peas with plain white rice, so if you are feeding more than just a couple of people, you could make two or three cups of white rice and mix it in to fatten up the pot :-)

Bring four cups of water to boil, add Zatarain's jambalaya mix and cut up sausage...

Cook covered and simmering for about twenty minutes.... When all of the liquid is almost gone, turn down to low and you want to add the blackeyed peas.

I just put them on top and cover it up for about five more minutes and then stir it all up. Test your rice and make sure it is cooked all the way, if not add like a half a cup of water and cover again for another five minutes.
Turn off and leave covered for about ten minutes.
If you have additional white rice, add it.
Serve. Enjoy.

Feel good that your family is eating blackeyed peas and that the whole meal only cost:
Blackeyed Peas at .80 each, $1.60
Zatarains - 3.00
Sausage mine was on sale, two for 3.00 but it is usually two for four or five dollars
Celery if you use it, less than a dollar
additional rice if you use it, less than a dollar
That is under ten bucks!!! :)

A new year...

2010-01-04T17:47:00.000-08:00

The year I turn thirty.
What is going to change?
I will be thirty this year... Amanda will turn fourteen, Emilee will turn twelve and Triniti will turn eight.
Today I got to hold my boss and his wife's new little baby boy. They let me keep him while they left for lunch and for a blissful hour I got to smell his little head and watch the faces he made in that state of half awake, half asleep that two week old babies are prone the staying in.
I remember the girl that was pregnant eight years ago. I remember that Christmas when he burned all of the cards and it didn't even matter any more because everything was over anyway. I remember packing and leaving and being this girl who was alone and scared with little girls who were about to start school for the very first time. That girl didn't know the answers.
This girl doesn't know them either. But this girl, this almost thirty year old girl? She's got faith in herself.
Faith that there will be good choices and smiling and enjoying my girls and plans and friendships and sometimes it will be hard but this girl is happy.
And this girl doesn't plan on that changing anytime soon.

Song of the day: Brooklyn

2010-01-04T06:29:00.000-08:00

Had to bump this one up again.

~Wakey! Wakey!

I hope I see you soon,
Because you’re fond of me and I am fond of you.
Most days I guess that’s all it takes,
That and just a few mistakes.
And I have made mistakes.
I have made mistakes today,
Yes I have made mistakes today.

So tonight I’ll be your Brooklyn
So cool and yet so far away!
Just tell me what you want for me to say
And if it brings you home…

I guess its safe to say,
We both could use this fire escape.
Cause I’ve been breathing ashes in,
And I’ve been waiting for something to carry you away.

Cause I have made mistakes today…
And I have made mistakes today…
Yes I have made mistakes.

So tonight I’ll be your Brooklyn
So cool and yet so far away!
Just tell me what you want for me to say
And if it brings you home…

So I hope you travel safe.
I hope you’re cool,
I hope you find your way.
Because it’s sounds like it is safe to say,
We disagree on one too many things.

Cause I have made mistakes today,
Yes I have made mistakes today.
And I have made mistakes…

Happy New Year!

2010-01-01T12:23:00.001-08:00

This is going to be a good year.
Things are changing, I can feel it.
Love you guys!!

Song of the day: Halleluja

2009-12-31T10:58:00.000-08:00

~David Castro

I've heard there was a secret chord
That David played, and it pleased the Lord
But you don't really care for music, do you?
It goes like this
The fourth, the fifth
The minor fall, the major lift
The baffled king composing Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Your faith was strong but you needed proof
You saw her bathing on the roof
Her beauty
in the moonlight
overthrew you
She tied you
To a kitchen chair
She broke your throne,
she cut your hair
And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Maybe I've been here before
I know this room, I've walked this floor
I used to live alone before I knew you
I've seen your flag on the marble arch
love is not a victory march
It's a cold and it's a broken hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

There was a time you'd let me know
What's real and going on below
But now you never show it to me do you?
Remember when I moved in you?
The holy dark was moving too
And every breath we drew was hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Maybe there's a God above
And all I ever learned from love
Was how to shoot at someone who outdrew you
It's not a cry you can hear at night
It's not somebody who's seen the light
It's a cold and it's a broken hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

Do you remember?

2009-12-31T06:13:00.000-08:00

That evening, after the movie? I think it was a movie... It happened before I started this blog which is hard for me to imagine because it feels like I've had this blog all of my life.
We had taken your car and left mine in a parking lot. I don't remember where we went or what we talked about but I remember that nervousness that is so fun in the beginning. The butterflies in my stomach, the anticipation.
I remember riding in your car.
I remember being excited.
When we got back to the parking lot where my car was, we stayed near your car for awhile, we talked, we kissed, we laughed.
You told me I made you nervous.
Do you remember that?
I remembered it this morning when I was drying my hair and getting ready for work. I just had this flash and there I was, kissing you good night and watching you drag your hand through your hair looking almost exasperated, me asking you what was wrong, you admitting that I made you nervous.
At the time, I didn't think it was possible for there to be anything more absurd. You, this big snuggly guy who made my every nerve stand on end being nervous about little old me.

I am a bad blogger.

2009-12-30T12:11:00.000-08:00

As with all things in life, I blame this on my mother.
hehehe
No, seriously, she is at the house... been there since before Christmas.
And I've been sick since LAST Tuesday.
And I am lazy.
And I am desk shopping. That takes a lot of time you know... choosing the desk that I am going to write my novel/screenplay on...
And I haven't had sex in a year and a half.
Oh yeah, and Facebook.
I have started about fifteen posts and they are all rubbish. Which I blame on the Robitussin/NyQuil cocktail I've been on for a week.
I love you.
Hang in there.

Song of the day: Daughter

2009-12-27T17:04:00.000-08:00

~Loudon Wainwright III

Everything she sees
she says she wants.
Everything she wants
I see she gets.

That's my daughter in the water
everything she owns I bought her
Everything she owns.
That's my daughter in the water,
everything she knows I taught her.
Everything she knows.

Everything I say
she takes to heart.
Everything she takes
she takes apart.

That's my daughter in the water
every time she fell I caught her.
Every time she fell.
That's my daughter in the water,
I lost every time I fought her.
I lost every time.

Every time she blinks
she strikes somebody blind.
Everything she thinks
blows her tiny mind.
That's my daughter in the water,
who'd have ever thought her?
Who'd have ever thought?
That's my daughter in the water,
I lost everytime I fought her
Yea, I lost every time

in my head, not in my head

2009-12-23T05:23:00.000-08:00

I have a tendency to make things out to be more in my head. I have a fabulous imagination and it likes to run.
I think it's why I don't like to run. My imagination does enough running for the both of us.
So, recently, I've been trying to be more of fact girl.
Facts are good.
Facts are truth.
Facts are cold and hard.
It's hard to argue with the facts.
And that's a fact.
[Sorry, it's early and I haven't had any coffee yet. In fact, let's just make that a blanket apology for this entire post.]
So, in the past, I've often made things from this place called Reality where everyone likes to hang out just a tad more sparkly in my head. What can I say? I can put some spin on shit in my head.
And sometimes, when I'd be retelling a story about a night out with a pretty boy, I'd have to ask myself if he really said it like that or if afterwards when I was mentally putting it on paper, the wannabe author in me made it that way.
Uhm, wannabe author wins out almost every time.
I can't help it.
Reality is this very un-fairy tale like place. Boys don't always say the right thing at the right time. They hesitate and watch other chics cruise by and quite frankly these boys in Reality don't hold a candle to the guys from my sparkly imagination.
But, I did make myself stop glorifying relationships after Mr.I.
I may have let my imagination run away with me because that is how I am wired. I may have heard things I wanted to hear and not the things that were actually there and said. But now, the Reality KHE knows that to do that only leads to a lot of dissapointment.
A. Lot.
So now, I am all about the facts.
I am all about the cold hard facts.
And so while I want to take that look in someone's eye and give it this fantasy explanation, I feel like the look I see is like 3% and the words coming out of their mouth is 97%.
This is a huge step for me. This Reality thing. This words thing. This not letting my imagination run away with me thing.
It's new and tricky.
And honest.
I still give my imagination free reign to run all it wants right before I go to sleep, but during the waking hours I try and pay a little more attention to the facts.
I'm not sure it's going so well right now.
But I'm trying.

Song of the day: Signs of Life

2009-12-23T05:21:00.000-08:00

~Our Lady Peace

I'm not looking for trouble. I'm taking one on the chin
I don't know where I'm going, or where to begin
Alone in this room, thinking of you, and what could've been
The trouble that I've seen, the trouble got to me

And there's no signs of life in here, at all
The sound of quiet is deafening, I'll wait for you to call
And there's no signs of life in here, at all
All the trouble that I've seen, the trouble
Won't get the best of me

A la la la la la,
A la la la la la,
A la la la la la la

Sending you out a signal, over land, over sea
From the top of the Great Lakes, down the Mississippi
Alone in a room, thinking of you and those possibilities
The trouble that I've seen, this trouble got to me

And there's no signs of life in here, at all
The sound of quiet is deafening, I'll wait for you to call
And there's no signs of life in here, at all
All the trouble that I've seen, the trouble
All the trouble that I've seen, the trouble
Won't get the best of me

And there's no signs of life in here, at all
The sound of quiet is deafening, I'll wait for you to call
And there's no signs of life in here, at all
All the trouble that I've seen, the trouble
All the trouble that I've seen, the trouble
Won't get the best of me

when things don't go the way you thought they would

2009-12-20T06:44:00.001-08:00

The bottom fell out of the evening pretty quickly yesterday. The guy I was supposed to have the date with called my co-worker to get everything set up yesterday morning but my co-worker was super busy and couldn't get back to him until it was too late in the day for my date to be ready and to meet us.
So, no big deal. I'd already decided that if I was going to be dateless, then that would be cool. However, when I got to co-worker's house, they said that the boy from the drama was going to be riding with us. Which was pretty much the exact opposite of how I had wanted things to go. Luckily boy from the drama was busy with his family and couldn't leave until we did so he ended up riding on his own.
When we got to the party, I was flagged by my boss who had a seat saved for me, which was great because nothing sucks worse than being at some random table with people who I don't even know.
Then I won a fucking 32" Sony Flatscreen TV.
Seriously.
How cool is that?
We had dinner and the boy with the drama showed up... after we ate, they were doing casino night which was really cool because we usually just hang out and chat and dance... I love activities :)
Although, I must admit - I am no gambling queen. I don't even know how to play most of the games... I played roulette a few times but mostly just mingled.
It ended up that the boy with drama was by my side for the majority of the evening and we even danced a few times.
Yup, you read that right. Danced.
Oh Wine, what you do to me.
Then I was dancing with the wives. They came and got me from outside when Single Ladies came on. And, an aside, none of us knew how to do the thriller dance. Note to self - Learn Thriller dance.
At the end of the night when the boy with the drama was starting to get a little too friendly, I took him outside to have a chat with him.
I pretty much told him that he isn't serious about dating me so this whole pretending to be bit needs to stop. I told him that if we didn't work together it would be different. If we didn't work together, I would probably hookup with him. BUT we do work together and it is just enough already.
He got uber defensive and acted like I was listening to what other people had to say about him and not giving him a fair chance. But then he had to admit that he knew damn well that we weren't going to start dating seriously which negated the rest.
When I left, he was pretty pissed.
I, on the other hand, got one of the guys to load up the tv I won and cart it outside to the car and I left with a big ol' smile on my face. I had a good time, I looked fantastic, I didn't make ~~an ass~~ too big of an ass out of myself and I, even under the influence of a bottle of wine, did not hook up with anyone.
I'm such a good grown up :)
Oh and the date I didn't get to go with? We are in the process of setting up a New Year's Eve dinner.

morning of

2009-12-19T06:16:00.000-08:00

After a spattering of dreams I struggled to remember every time they woke me up, I got up to let the four legged beasties outside to do their respective things and made myself a cup of coffee using my new french press. Let me tell ya, having a tendency to break all things glass, including coffee carafe.. is it called a carafe? Anyway, it does make it to where I get to try a new coffee maker roughly once a year. And as tempted as I am to buy one of those new fangled coffee makers where in all you do is add a little creamer-from-the-gas-station looking container and water and voi-effing-la you have a dang latte, I have a fear that I will run out of the little container thingies and there won't be a back up place in which I can just put regular coffee grounds and the world as I know it will cease to exist because I can't have any coffee and I live in the country, a million miles away from a Starbucks.
Holy run-on sentence, Batman.
I had good dreams last night which is why every time I woke up, I wanted to get back into them or pick them apart and dissect them for the purposes of either 1. my enjoyment or 2. my novel. However, neither ended up being the case because I shopped for FIVE HOURS yesterday people and my ass was tired.
[An aside - I want to be a bone fide writer so. very. badly. One of the things I am putting into place after Christmas is getting my room rearranged.. ok... OKAY! and CLEANED. And getting a desk in there. I have a bulletin board already in there that I can use for my note cards and whatever else I feel like I need to have physically in front of me. I already have the software I was planning to use to map everything out. And most importantly, MOST. IMPORTANTLY. I have this fabulous idea that I have been chewing on for a couple of months now and I have finally figured out the general beginning to end and now I just need to discover my characters and decide whether their story wants to be a book or a screenplay because it could go either way in my head.] note to self - work on using less run-on sentences.
I woke up this morning at seven forty-five, even though I swore all week I would be sleeping until at least ten on Saturday. But the combination of the doggies needin' to pee and my being a little excited about my new french press had me headed to the kitchen instead of my room once I released the critters.
So, now for why you are all here... I have a date tonight. Most likely.
Co-Worker boy called one of his friends, his name is Tim, and asked him if he wanted to go to our regional company Christmas party with yours truly and Tim, apparently being a gambling man, said sure.
I know very little about him except that he lives about an hour from me (even more in the country than I do), he owns his own construction company, is in his mid to late twenties, is roughly five foot ten and is apparently pretty good looking. My co-worker also said he was kind of a hermit, not a guy who goes out often as he'd rather be home.
The fantasy/conclusion I have drawn from that last little tidbit of information is that the dude is much like me in that regard. In my mind, he works hard and when he isn't working he likes to be able to enjoy what he has worked hard for. I am a hermit in exactly the same way.
If my assumption about him is correct.
Given that he opted to join us for an evening out in San Antonio shows that he isn't a total hermit but again, like me, doesn't often have plans on a Saturday night.
OMG-I am having a flashback to another party where I went with a blind date. Scratch that, where I met a blind date at the party. It was when I worked at Fantasy Disco Ford and it was awful. So awful in fact, that the guy I was supposed to hang with bailed because I kept blowing him and his friend off. Oh Universe, please do not make tonight suck. Thank you.
So, I am a little excited.
I am excited in a reserved way.
I am trying not to get my hopes up because it could be a total flop.
I have already fantasized that he is the perfect man.
I bought the cutest new boots and top.

That is the thing about dating. It's much like gambling. You throw a quarter into the machine and either it spits out more quarters, all the quarters or nothing. And I have been on one hell of a losing streak lately and while I am trying to have a positive outlook about the whole thing, I am also trying to stay grounded so I don't get upset if it is nothing more than a night out with a dude who I can cross of my Potential List.

hot off the presses!

2009-12-18T10:24:00.000-08:00

No, seriously. I haven't even emailed anyone about this yet. YOU are the first to know. Well, besides me... I was technically the first to know. :-)
Soooooooo, I may have a date tomorrow.
The Universe keeps throwing men at me.
Granted, they haven't been quality men, but they've been men so there's that.

This morning, the dude from a couple of posts ago actually asked me if we were going to tomorrow's party together.
As if.
Sorry, I was feeling a little nineties there...
THEN he tried to make it out like I ditched him last weekend. Even said that was why he left early. What. Ever.
So now, I am being set up... which is only a slight bit better. But I know WAHS will be pleased as she is always trying to get me to poke around and get set up through friends.
WAHS, I hold you personally responsible for this.
:-)
We'll see. May not even pan out.. probably will though since the person trying to set me up has TWO people in mind.
A couple of days ago, I was seriously considering not going and instead remaining in my PJs and wrapping presents while watching Love Actually for the nine-hundredth time.

and now for some funnies

2009-12-15T08:23:00.001-08:00