June Cleaver in Disguise

The Brain

2011-03-10T16:14:00.000-08:00

What do these words have in common?

special
especially
annual
perennial
cordial
Cordially
character
separate
serious
furious
eruption
destruction
direction
comfortable
apparently
microscopic
allergic
scientific
activity
forgetful

They all words that my 5th grader is having trouble spelling. Give him a math problem and he can do it with his eyes shut. Give him the word algebra and he can't spell it after practicing all week. Why do our brains work that way? I'm just the opposite. I absolutely can't stand math, but I see a word and how to spell it is stuck in my head the rest of my life. His spelling problems are frustrating for both of us. I don't understand why he has such trouble spelling and he practices really hard and still can't spell the words. If you have any suggestions to help those words stick in his brain, I would be grateful.

I've Created a Monster

2010-03-17T05:12:00.000-07:00

I got up yesterday morning to the question of "Trash driving?" That was from my youngest son wanting to know if we were going to drive around part of our neighborhood looking for items that people were throwing away and that we couldn't live without.

Disclaimer:
I have to admit that many times I pick up things that I can't use, but that I can sell in our next garage sale, like baby strollers, which was the case yesterday. It's truly amazing the good "stuff" people throw away that others can use. Even if I didn't have plans to sell it, I would pick it up to at least give to a charity to they could sell it and make a little money.

Okay, back to my Monster. As we were cruising around, with the back of the pickup loaded down with other people's trash, but our treasure, we spotted these:

Now, mind you, if I hadn't had a 10-year-old boy with me, I would have NEVER stopped to pick these up. Most of the time, people are throwing these things away because they don't work and Christmas lights and I just don't get along real well. In fact, my Christmas spirit goes out the window when I'm trying to put lights on our tree, but I digress.

Since I DID have a 10-year-old boy with me, we stopped to pick them up, me thinking the whole time "I'm just going to end up putting them by OUR trash can when we get home, plug them in and see that they don't work". I bet the man who lived there, who, by the way was sitting there watching my son the whole time he was putting them in the back of the truck, thought we were completely nuts or desperate to find things to sell. He is definitely right about us being nuts. I REALLY need to find a different neighborhood to trash drive in besides our own.

We got home, plugged them in, and lo and behold, they actually work Granted, a few of the white lights on the body of the one of the deer don't work, so we might have to replace those (don't be surprised if you hear that particular deer met an untimely death because of my Christmas light "problem"), but the motors that make the heads move up and down WORK. You can just imagine my surprise.

Now the big question is "Where in the world do I store them until Christmas?"

Finally, A Finished Project

2010-03-16T14:27:00.000-07:00

Do you remember the table I found in the trash? If not, here is the picture I originally posted.

Now this is what is looks like:

It doesn't even look like the same table, does it? I was able to sand the top down and didn't have to use any paint stripper (not my favorite stuff to work with). Then I restained it and painted the checkerboard. The top of the upper tier is black to match the checkerboard color because the previous owner had put something on it that has left a black stain that I couldn't sand out.

The really amazing part of the table refurbishing story is the legs. I actually found three spindles that were originally made for an outdoor deck rail. Somebody had thrown them in the trash several months ago and I just happened to pick them up. Can you believe I would do something like that? Anyway, my husband had used them as legs on a work table/storage shelf in the garage. We had purchased some other inexpensive wood at Lowe's to replace the legs on the table, but I just wasn't happy with it. It didn't "feel" right, so a couple of nights ago I was out in the garage and happened to look over and see those legs. They were PERFECT. I told my husband he was going to have to disassemble the garage table because I needed those legs. I was even nice and cut the Lowe's wood into 3 ft. lengths so he could have replacement legs. They are longer than the original legs, but that's okay. It really works better in the gameroom at that height. Now the boys have a "permanent" checkers/chess board to play on if they can find it under all of the "stuff" they are probably going to put on it (video games, cell phones, playing cards, etc.).

All in all I spent about $2.25 for the project and that was for the piece of Lowe's wood that actually ended up being used in the garage. I already had the stain, paint and varnish.

The lamp base in the "before" picture has also been painted black, but I'm trying to find the perfect (by that I mean really cheap or, preferably, free) lampshade to put on it. I'll let you know when that happens.

Band Memories

2010-03-09T07:03:00.000-08:00

I went to the high school yesterday to help fit ~~approximately 12, 572~~ about 35 band members for their concert uniforms. Let's just say that teenage boys + trying on formal wear = a very interesting afternoon.

Conversation between us moms and the boys:
What size pants do you wear. "I don't know" was the common reply. What size shirt do you wear? "I don't know." What size sport coat do you wear? "I don't know. I've never worn a sport coat." "Okay, then take this pair of pants, shirt, jacket and vest, put it on and come back out of the bathroom. DO NOT take anything off without us actually seeing it first unless it is way too small to even button. Some did exactly what we said to do. Some did exactly what we said not to do. Some were just completely clueless about any of it. One went into the bathroom with his "gear" and came out a few minutes later with his school uniform on (not the dress uniform, mind you) and said "It all fits, except the pants are waaay too long." We said "Okay, then you are going to have to go back in the bathroom and put the pants back on so we can pin them to be hemmed." Lord, give me strength.

Ya gotta love'em.

It was all worth it in the end, because this is how they look (except for the length. We didn't have time to hem before I took the picture).

The tie and vest are a silver print and look really nice with the black tux.

The girls are wearing solid black, long dresses that are very flattering for every figure.

They have a competition tomorrow, so I'm headed up to the school again today to help finish hemming. Ah, the joys of motherhood.

Freecycling My Way

2010-03-05T04:15:00.000-08:00

It's been a pretty good week for freecyling, curbsaling, embarrassing yourself because people are watching you pick through other people's trash, etc.

My first find was this table.

I was cruising along through our neighborhood (I wonder how many people recognize me now as the "trash lady" and whisper things about me when I drive by?), when I spotted this table sitting by the curb IN THE RAIN. Can you believe someone would just put this beautiful table outside IN THE RAIN? What were they thinking? I opened up the hatch on my minivan and threw it (okay, well, I didn't actually THROW it because it's kind of heavy, but you get my meaning). I headed home and put it in my garage. The middle of the top on one side is a little sunken is which I think can be fixed very easily and it needs a little work on the top there the finish was rubbed off, but it's gorgeous. Those are wrought iron legs. Not sure where I'm going to put it yet, but I couldn't just let it sit there and get ruined.

The next day I was cruising along again, this time on purpose since it was trash day in one part of our neighborhood. Apparently someone had moved out of a rental and the owners had cleaned out whatever the renters left. I love it when that happens. I always get some good stuff that way.

I found these

The table is currently being sanded down to paint and put in our gameroom, along with the lamp. Now if I can find a lampshade I will be in good shape. It also needs a couple of new legs because it looks like some critter chewed on them.

I also found a cute Uncle Sam wooden stand-up "thingie" for my front porch for the 4th of July. He's gonna need a little cleaning and I'm going to put a flag in his hand.

I can't wait to show you how it all turned out. I'm also repainting the furniture in my youngest son's bedroom. He's decided he wants the University of Oklahoma colors in his room, so bring on the crimson and cream.

Airing My Dirty Laundry

2010-02-26T15:39:00.000-08:00

Unfortunately, I do A LOT of laundry at my house. I'm always looking for ways to make it fast, easier and cheaper. I found this recipe for homemade laundry soap on the Duggar's website (you know, the people with 19 kids).

Homemade Liquid Laundry Soap- Front or top load machine- best value

4 Cups - hot tap water
1 Fels-Naptha soap bar
1 Cup - Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda*
½ Cup Borax

- Grate bar of soap and add to saucepan with water. Stir continually over medium-low heat until soap dissolves and is melted.

-Fill a 5 gallon bucket half full of hot tap water. Add melted soap, washing soda and Borax. Stir well until all powder is dissolved. Fill bucket to top with more hot water. Stir, cover and let sit overnight to thicken.

-Stir and fill a used, clean, laundry soap dispenser half full with soap and then fill rest of way with water. Shake before each use. (will gel)

-Optional: You can add 10-15 drops of essential oil per 2 gallons. Add once soap has cooled. Ideas: lavender, rosemary, tea tree oil.

-Yield: Liquid soap recipe makes 10 gallons.

-Top Load Machine- 5/8 Cup per load (Approx. 180 loads)

-Front Load Machines- ¼ Cup per load (Approx. 640 loads)

*Arm & Hammer "Super Washing Soda" - in some stores or may be purchased online here (at Meijer.com). Baking Soda will not work, nor will Arm & Hammer Detergent - It must be sodium carbonate!!

I can only imagine how much laundry THEY do. Fortunately, they have several washers and dryers in their house. I have one of each and some days wish I had two or three of each. My washer is front loading and I absolutely love it. It doesn't use as much water as a top loader and the clothes seem to be a lot dryer when they come out.

I couldn't find the Super Washing Soda at any of my local stores so I ordered it from Alice.com. Alice.com always has free shipping and they apply coupons when they have them. I have found that they are fairly competitive on prices.

I save about $75 when I make a "batch" of laundry detergent. Since I've got a kid going to college in 3 years that sure helps my budget to be able to save a little more. When he leaves, I might just make him his own "batch" to take with him.

If I Only Had a Brain

2010-02-25T16:08:00.000-08:00

Before I begin, I would like to say that I found a really cute picture of the scarecrow from the Wizard of Oz, but my computer was acting up and my frustration level was just too high to put it on this post. I figured if I got so frustrated that I threw my computer out the window, that would negate any bargains I found today and in the near future.

Do you sometimes feel like the scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz? I definitely had an Oz moment today. I was doing all of my errands today, determined I was going to get EVERY SINGLE ONE done. (I have a tendency to procrastinate, especially when I need to go to the bank.)

I went by Target and got a great deal on some paper towels. I was cruising down the paper products aisle, against the outer wall. Did you know that the end caps closest to the outer wall is where the clearance products are? Anyway, I was standing there looking at some clearance items, hoping I could find something cheap AND that I had a coupon for. I picked up some Suave shampoo (the large bottles in a double-pack for $1.75) when a lady came over, reached down and picked up a 12-pack of large rolls of paper towels. She said they were marked $11.99, but were ringing up $6.79. She had already bought one package and she was grabbing another one. Needless to say I grabbed two packages (averaging about 40 cents per roll, if bought regular rolls). Whoo hoo!! What a deal!! There was a man standing there and he grabbed the last two packages. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time. Next time you are at Target, make sure you go by the clearance items. You never know what you might happen upon.

Next I went to Kroger. I got a few sale items, but nothing much worth mentioning, except a free bottle of Frank's hot sauce (50 cent coupon doubled and the bottle was originally $1).

I went by to deliver an Avon order to a customer that is absolutely my best customer. I start to get worried when I don't hear from her every campaign. She orders A LOT of Avon and is a really sweet person to boot.

I went by and paid for my van tag. I don't want to see a policeman in my rearview mirror with his lights flashing because I didn't get my new sticker that costs over $54. It's probably cheaper than a ticket, though.

I went by Jack-in-the-Box for lunch. While I was there, I looked through my coupon book because I had a CVS extra-care buck I needed to use no later than Saturday. As luck would have it, there was a deal for Colgate toothpaste, on sale for $2.99 and you get a $2 ECB. Perfect. I could use my $1 ECB plus my $1 coupon and actually make money on the deal. I also bought two Snicker's bars because I had a coupon for 50 cents off 2 and they were on sale for 2/$1. That's when my Oz moment happened. I guess I got too excited about the Snickers. I paid for my purchase, walked away from the counter and realized I hadn't used my ECB. That was the WHOLE PURPOSE of going to CVS to begin with. I guess now I have to go back and use my ECB. Ughhhhh!! Oh, well, at least we always need toothpaste.

So Proud

2010-02-23T14:13:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to the North Forney High School percussion ensembles that went to competition in Conroe, TX. They got superior ratings for their performances and came in 1st and 2nd out of 9 groups.

They came home with three trophies and 1 plaque. They also won a concert band bass drum stand. I'm so glad we made the 3 1/2 hour drive to see them. It was really worth it.

I'm one of those moms who LOVES to go to my children's events, not so much because the music is wonderful (except, of course the music my child plays) or the parties are a blast, but because I want to support my children. Both of them want me to be there and my oldest is always telling me how much he appreciates me and his dad being so supportive.

I also got to see my sweet niece's competition cheer team take first place over 9 other teams in a national competition Sunday. We were so fortunate that it was held here in Dallas and we could go. I wouldn't have missed it for the world.

My children are only going to be children for such a short length of time. I'm trying so hard to really enjoy them.

24 Hour Pictorial of the Blizzard of 2010

2010-02-12T08:21:00.000-08:00

Going to school, it was just perfect. It was sticking to the grass and was just beautiful, but not sticking to the roads. That's my kind of snow.

This picture was of a tree in front of the school. It had red berries on it and was so pretty.

I passed these on the way to work at Mother's Day Out at our church yesterday morning. Somebody had already been very busy.

Then it started to be "not nice" snow!! It started sticking to the streets. This was about 8 hours after I dropped my son off at school. I took it while I was waiting to pick him up. He opened the door, looked at me and said "Why are you here?" I said "I thought you might want a ride." He said "I want to walk." I said "Okay.", so I cruised back home. I could have saved some valuable time and gas if I had just been thinking like a 10-year-old boy yesterday.

This is my across the street neighbor's yard this morning. The snow was extremely "wet" and stuck to EVERYTHING, especially shoes and clothes that were worn into the house after many hours of playing, building igloos and snowball fights.

This is a 10-year-old boy that is very happy it snowed 10 inches in Texas.

Do We Live In a Haunted House?

2010-02-10T12:30:00.000-08:00

Disclaimer: This is not my house, although I would LOVE to live in a house like this. Okay, maybe not quite so run down, but the older the better.

When I got back from grocery shopping (which is scary in itself), I was putting the groceries away and I suddenly heard a beeping noise. I ignored it for awhile and then had to go check to see what is was. Beeping sounds are pretty common around here what with all of the video games, watches, cell phone, etc. we have around here, but this was coming from the laundry room. I went in there and my Kenmore washing machine was trying to turn itself on. I turned it off and went back to putting up the groceries. It kept beeping. Finally I just gave up turning it off. Right now it's in there beeping away, trying to turn itself on.

I guess there's a glitch somewhere that's making it beep and all of the lights come on, but in a way I wish it was a ghost who could do laundry. Wouldn't that be cool? It didn't bother anybody or anything, just did laundry. It would be better than having a maid (well, almost better), because you wouldn't have to pay it and all of your laundry would be nice and clean and put away.

On another note, I saved around $10 with coupons while I was shopping today. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on the way you look at it) there was a coupon hanging on the Oreos shelf that was buy a package of Oreos get a package of Oreo cakesters free. That was just too good to pass up.

Maybe that's why we have a ghost. It's interested in the Oreo. It better hurry and eat some, because they sure don't last long around this house.

Will Energy Drinks Help Me Keep Up?

2010-02-09T13:09:00.000-08:00

If energy drinks will help me keep up with one through five year olds at our church's mother's day out, I will keep them in business by ordering CASES of the stuff. They have soooo much energy. Don't you wish they had USB ports and you could download some of that energy and use it on yourself.? I sure do. It's only 3:00 pm and I'm already thinking about bedtime. Mercy I'm gettin' old.

I remember when I used to could sit on the floor for HOURS and then I just hopped up and went about my merry way. Now I have to push myself up after about 5 minutes on the floor and then it takes another 5 minutes for my legs to quit hurting and start moving like they're supposed to.

My mom and her sisters used to sit around and watch us kids running around and they would always say "I sure wish I had some of that energy." I used to think they were crazy. I thought "I'm always going to have this much energy." That's what I get for thinking.

Swimming used to be THE activity. We couldn't wait to go to the lake or the swimming pool. Any old place would do as long as there was water deep enough to swim in and it didn't matter how cold it was either (water or weather). We would just jump in and have us a good old time. Now my kids want to go swimming when it's 85 degrees out and I'm like "Have you lost your mind? That water's going to be freezing." Give me a nice big hot tub any day.

There are a lot of good things about getting older, but if we had that energy to go with age, there would be no stopping us. Maybe that's why RedBull is so popular.

See!! Even their cans are stronger and have more energy.

Brand New Year, Same Old Problems

2010-02-08T08:17:00.000-08:00

There's nothing like dealing with health insurance companies to make your blood pressure rise to very unhealthy levels. It's like this EVERY YEAR. The first time one of us goes to the doctor, I end up coming home and calling the insurance company because the doctor's office either says we don't have coverage or the coverage isn't what we think it is. This year there were two issues: they didn't have information on whether my children had additional health coverage (they don't and probably never will because my husband is the one whose company has insurance) and we hadn't filled out our online health assessment, so we didn't have the $500 in our account that we were expecting.

I filled out my health assessment (which, by the way, is a big waste of time for me and money for the company) a few minutes ago. One of the questions was "What is your blood pressure?" Well, when they took it in November for the mandatory health screening is was "108/71". Today it's "through the roof/heartattack waiting to happen". Another very important question was "How many alcoholic drinks do you have on a daily basis?" and they were kind enough to tell me how many ounces qualified as 1 drink. Normally I go for weeks without taking one sip of alcohol, but today I want to have several. They are driving me CRAZY!!!!

On the up side, at least I found out before it was too late to take the online health assessment to get our $500. On the down side, I have a 14 year old home with strep.

One of my friends on Facebook mentioned having hot chocolate and Kahlua. That sounds really good right now. Maybe I'll have some and go take my health assessment again. By then at least one of my answers will have changed.

A Moment on the Lips, Forever on the Hips

2010-02-05T17:33:00.000-08:00

I keep repeating those words to myself, but it doesn't seem to be working. It also doesn't help that I keep making recipes that are really good and really high in calories. I have a high school reunion coming up (I'll just keep how many years my little secret) and I would love to lose about 10 pounds. What with the rain, the cold weather and the good food, I'm not losing weight very fast.

I was thinking about going to play KENO with some ladies from church, but I just didn't get everything together in time to go. We were going to all make a different kind of fudge for everyone to try. I found this Cappucino Fudge recipe on Recipezaar.com. Can you say heaven in every bite? Even better, it's easy to make. It took me about 20 minutes or so and was well worth every minute.

I think I'm going to drag my recumbant bike exerciser thingy into the middle of the living room floor. Maybe if I see it sitting there I'll actually use it. Nah, probably not. Maybe tomorrow.

Yummy Enchilada Recipe

2010-02-04T04:58:00.000-08:00

I made these last night and we were practically licking our plates to get the cheese sauce off (not really, but only because we were trying not to teach our 10-year-old that licking your plate is okay, although it totally crossed my mind once or twenty times).

I got this from The Living Proof Ministries blog. If you haven't visited check it out. It's written by Beth Moore and her daughters and is very uplifting.

Sunni's Cheesy Enchiladas

Ingredients:
(I always half this recipe)
24 flour tortillas
2 lbs. ground beef
2 lbs. Velveeta, cubed
2 cans Rotel tomatoes
4 (8-oz.) cartons sour cream
¼ cup butter
2 med. onions, chopped
1 dash garlic salt
Salt & pepper to taste

Brown meat with one chopped onion. Add garlic salt and salt and pepper. Drain. Coat large sauce pan with non-stick spray. Add sour cream and tomatoes, mix well. Add butter and heat on medium heat. Add Velveeta, stirring constantly. Add the remaining chopped onion. Turn heat to low and simmer for about 5 min. The cheese/butter should be melted by this point. Add a portion of the sauce to meat. Spoon meat mixture into tortillas. Lay in casserole dish, seam down. Pour remaining sauce over enchiladas. Cover and bake for 15 min. at 350 degrees.

We have a family of four (two really big eaters) and this was enough to halve and put one pan in the freezer for another night. You could also make some Spanish rice and serve some chips and salsa to make it go even further.

Hubby and I were planning an entire dinner party around it. Conversation:
"Now how many people can we feed with one recipe?"
" If we add rice and chips and refried beans we could invite another 3 or 4."
"How about margaritas with that?" (Once again, not really, but they would be good since we would be going totally Mexican.)

If you try them let me know what you think. Did you want to lick your plate, too?

Misery Loves Company

2010-01-07T11:42:00.000-08:00

I have two very sweet, loveable OUTSIDE dogs. Do you know what happens when you bring two very sweet, loveable OUTSIDE dogs inside because it's so cold? They cry and moan and try to escape from the area I set up for them. Because, number 1 they want to be in the same area of the house as us and number 2 because they are bored. In turn, my oldest son and I get no sleep because they are crying and moaning and actually escaping from the area I set up for them.

My oldest dog Spot (very original, huh) is very vocal. He is a shepherd mix (in other words, a medium sized mutt) and he "talks" a lot, especially when my husband is around. I don't have any idea what he's trying to tell us, but sometimes I think that's probably for the best. It sounds like a high-pitched whining and can make you cringe like nails on a chalk board.

My other outside dog is a Basset Hound named (and tell me if you don't think this is a perfect name for a Basset Hound)....Tallulah Belle. She is not only vocal, but very smart. When she's not crying or moaning because she's bored, she's trying to escape and run rampant through the house. Last night we caught her actually opening the baby gate. It isn't attached to the wall and she figured out how to use her nose to gradually slide it open. We managed to fix that (thanks to my oldest son's obsession with Duck Tape. "Mom it will fix anything"), but then she managed to push it open a different way, so at 1:30 this morning we were chasing dogs through the house trying to corral them back into their area.

At 12:30 this afternoon, I finally let them go outside to stay for a little while in the backyard. They do have houses with straw and the sun is shining. I will let them in a little later and we'll just pray tonight goes a lot better.

My Brain is on Overload

2010-01-05T11:02:00.000-08:00

Oh My Goodness!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Every time I think about writing a new post for this blog, my brain starts going in a million different directions. I can't post about everything all at once can I? I need to save something for that day when I have writer's block, which I'm afraid will come a lot sooner than I expect.

I guess I will go with what's at the forefront of my brain.

I'm sad/glad Christmas is over. I'm sad because I just love the generosity of people during the holidays. Christmas seems to bring out the best in people. It also makes people think about the "Reason for the Season". They might not think about Jesus much throughout the year, but they do at Christmas. I wish everyone had the Christmas spirit all year long.

I'm glad it's over because I feel overwhelmed by the decorations in my house. I am a minimalist and don't like a lot of clutter. When I put out all of that "stuff" I enjoy is for a few days, but by New Year's I am ready to see it go. It also doesn't help that I just don't really like most of the "stuff" I put out. It's a lot of cutsy, knick knacks and I want ELEGANT (i.e. like Martha Stewart came in and decorates my house). I have a sister-in-law that has the most beautiful decorations. Her tree looks like a designer decorates it and she has beautiful wreaths and greenery and bows and ornaments and (you get the idea). My husband said maybe we should get some ideas from her and I told her we would also have to get some money from her. As much as I would like to, I just can't justify spending a whole lot of money on decorations that will be put out for about a month, so I guess until I get rich (LOL) I will keep using cutsy decorations. At least my family doesn't care, as long as there's a tree up with presents underneath.

I would love to see pictures of your decorations (cutsy or elegant).

I'm Freezing and I Can't Warm Up

2010-01-04T09:24:00.001-08:00

How in the world can it be so cold in North Texas? I was watching the news last night and the weatherman had a graph of last year's temps vs. this year's temps. It was 86 degrees last year on Jan.3. 86 DEGREES What happened? Okay, I really don't want ti to be 86 degrees in January, but I also don't want it to be 44 degrees in January like it was yesterday. I need to become independently wealthy so I can move to a warmer climate, like Jamaica or the Virgin Islands. Do you know what the current temperature is in Jamaica? 81 degrees.

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

82° F | 69° F

80° F | 66° F

80° F | 68° F

80° F | 71° F

86° F | 71° F

Chance of Rain

20% chance of precipitation

Chance of Rain

20% chance of precipitation

Partly Cloudy

Chance of Rain

20% chance of precipitation

Is that perfect or what? Unlike this post because for some reason when I copied the 5-day forecast it messed up something and now I can't figure out how to fix it. Oh, well, at least you get the idea. I think I'll just go hang out in my laundry room where it's nice and warm from drying all of those clothes.

Welcome to 2010

2010-01-02T05:06:00.000-08:00

2010..... Twenty ten....It sounds so space age. How many of you thought we would be zipping around in flying cars? Living on the moon? Having robots clean our houses?

The first two sound okay, but that last one? The one about having robots clean our houses? That sounds AWESOME!! I have to admit, I do have a Roomba vacuum. It is my favorite cleaning apparatus. I had forgotten how much I liked it. Unfortunately it died over a year ago. The battery just went kaflooie (That's one of my new space age words.). For Christmas, as a complete and total surprise to me my husband had the battery refurbished. (How wonderful is he???) Now I can vacuum any room, any time and not even have to be there. Just put it down, push a button and leave.

I vacuumed the master bedroom first. I won't go into gory details. Let's just say it picked up a lot of stuff. The best part is it can go under beds and get all of the dust bunnies and other miscellaneous items. I found two washcloths under the bed before I started Roomba. I have no idea how they got under there. Sometimes it's best to have a don't ask, don't tell policy in my house.

Next I ran it in the boys' rooms. The game room is next, but I have to make the boys pick up all of the stuff off the floor first. Since I made them help me clean their rooms, I thought I would wait a few days to torture them again, alhtough my youngest might be game, because he was amazed at how much stuff it picked up in his room. He's a clean freak until it comes time to take a bath. The child would rather rot than take a bath. (My highschool English teacher would have marked up this paragraph with so much red you wouldn't have been able to read it. Not proper writing style at all!!)

Speaking of writing, I'm really going to try to do better about writing on my blog. I have a list of daily computer chores and that it one of the things on the list. "Write on blog". I won't be as witty and charming as Big Mama (I just love her), but I will try to be somewhat entertaining.

Hope you had a wonderful New Year's Day. Although this warning is a little late, whatever you did on New Year's Day is what you will be doing all year long. At least that's what my Mama always says.

Winter in Texas

2009-10-09T01:55:00.000-07:00

I know what you're thinking!! Winter? Already? In Texas? Well, it seems we've skipped fall and moved right into winter. Yesterday it was 85 and realllllly humid. As I sit here writing, the wind is howling, the rain in pounding and the temperature is dropping like a rock. In the next couple of days, we are supposed to have lows in the 30s. On the bright side, at least it will feel like football weather tonight at the highschool football game. Nothing says football like sitting on metal bleachers, freezing and wishing you were home watching Monk and Psyche on a Friday night.

On a brighter note, have you ever visited Woot.com? They have lots of things you didn't know you needed for really great prices and always $5 shipping. Today is a:

Breville 15-Bar Die-Cast Espresso & Cappuccino Maker with Knocchi Knock Box for only $179.99 + $5 shipping.

I'm assuming that is a great deal since I'm not really an espresso/cappuccino kind of gal, but it must be if it's on Woot.com.

When they offer a 2-pack of Snuggies for $9.99 + $ shipping I will be the first to order. I looks like I'm going to need them.

Somebody Stop Me

2009-10-08T05:50:00.000-07:00

Okay. It's official. I am ADDICTED to Farmville on Facebook. I tried to resist. My friends would send me invitations to be their neighbor or make me enticing offers of free gifts or the chance to "adopt" an ugly duckling that they found wandering on their farm.

Being the wonderful mother that I am (ha, ha), when my oldest son asked me to please send him a gift for his "farm" I said okay. That's when the torment began. Now I am constantly going to my "farm" to harvest vegetables, plow land, plant seeds and buy miscellaneous decorative items and animals for my "farm". Yes, there's even an ugly duckling that is eventually going to turn into a beautiful swan.

One of my friends sent me a free gift for my "farm" and I wrote her back and told her how addicted I was. She is on vacation from work this week and, apparently, she's spending a lot of time at her "farm" because she said all she could think about was checking to see if her vegetables were ready to be harvested.

There are a whole lot of other "games" you can play on Facebook. I refuse to be sucked in. I don't care how many requests I get to play Mafia Wars or Farkle. I'm just going to go to my virtual gazebo on my virtual farm and watch my virtual crops grow. Fortunately for my manicure, virtual dirt doesn't get under my real fingernails.

CHEATING THE RECYCLERS

2009-07-29T08:07:00.000-07:00

Today is trash day in our section of our subdivision. Not only is it trash day, it is also recycling day, so everybody (well, almost everybody) puts out their recycling tubs for the recycle truck to pick up. My youngest son and I cheated the recycle truck just a little. We walked around and picked cans out.

He loves to collect cans. We turn them in for money. I love for him to collect cans because it gets him exercising. We're trying to save up money so we will have enough to go to Six Flags. We already have three tickets (1 from a school reading project and two for collecting Coke Rewards), but we need one more ticket and we also need to be able to eat when we're there because 9 and 13-year-old boys and a 45-year-old man can't go all day without quite a bit of food. I don't seem to require as much as they do (if I did I wouldn't be able to get out of the house, I would be so big), so it doesn't cost as much to feed me.

We get some strange looks from people as we are collecting, but we also had a lady ask us today if we came around every week. I said "We try to." and she said she would put them in a separate sack for us. I thought that was really nice. We also saw a man we know, told him what we were doing and he said "Nothing wrong with that." I think most people appreciate the idea of being thrifty and working a little harder in this economy. I appreciate that it's teaching my child the value of money.

Not So Chocolate Cake

2009-07-28T12:40:00.000-07:00

This morning I asked Brett if he wanted to make a cake. Of course, being 9 years old and a junk food junkie, he said "Of course." He wanted to make chocolate cupcakes.

I looked for a recipe in one of my Paula Dean cookbooks and its said "6-Layer Chocolate Cake" and me, being the non-attention payer to detail that I sometimes am, neglected to see that the only part of the cake that was chocolate was the frosting. I don't know. Somehow when you see the words chocolate cake, you automatically think CHOCOLATE CAKE, not vanilla cake with chocolate icing. Fortunately for Paula, it turned out to taste really good or I might have had to sic Brett on her. A 9-year-old boy who LOVES chocolate cake, thinks he's GETTING chocolate cake and doesn't GET chocolate cake can sometimes be a little perturbed. All is well now and apparently the chocolate icing had some kind of sleep aid in it, because he's in there on the sofa right now taking a nap. That rarely happens.

I cleaned out our shed yesterday and threw away an entire large garage sack full of stuff. Now you can actually find what you're looking for when you go in there. What a concept!! The workbench can actually be worked on now without having to shove 10,000 items somewhere else and the tools are where they are supposed to be. I wonder how long it's going to stay that way? I'll let you know.

I Need a Vacation to Recover from Vacation

2009-07-21T04:30:00.000-07:00

We went on vacation. We got back last Friday. I am still tired from vacation. I need another vacation, preferably one like in Kenny Chesney's song where he has "nothin' to do, but breathe all day".

We went to El Paso, TX, San Diego, CA, Los Angeles, CA, Las Vegas, NV, The Grand Canyon and then the next couple of days were a blur. I think we ended up somewhere in New Mexico and then Amarillo, TX before we actually got home. Our minivan kept getting smaller and smaller the closer we got to home. We kept adding "stuff" as we went along, plus we had had about all of the togetherness we could handle. Two weeks, four people, one minivan.... you do the math.

I thought the boys would have come home and holed up their rooms to get away from each other, but nooooooooo. I went in the oldest one's room and they were in there wrestling on the bed, then the youngest came in later that night and hung out on the bed with me and hubby. I guess he hadn't had enough togetherness.

On a more positive note, we have some good friends coming to visit. They are only going to be able to stay one night, but we're thankful for that one night. This was the only time they could come see us, what with our son starting band next week (whatever happened to summer vacation?) and their son having to do weight training for baseball (?????). High school puts a new perspective on life.

It's off to Wal-mart today and then coming home to do some dusting. I guess my vacation from vacation will have to wait a couple of more days.

A New Purse..... Need I Say More?

2009-05-20T14:24:00.000-07:00

I had some time to kill Wednesday, so I thought I would do a little shopping. Of course, I had tons of other stuff I could have been doing, but none of it was as much fun as shopping.

I went bebopping (I don't think that's really a word, at least not in the dictionary, but I like it because it describes what I was doing so well.) over to Garden Ridge. I was just wandering around, looking at all of the fun stuff they have when, lo and behold, there was a whole section of bag, luggage, purses, etc and there was a sign that said (something like) "ALL PURSES 50% OFF). My heart did a little flip-flop. I love purses and I love signs that say "50% OFF" even more. I bought the cutest purse for $9.99. Honestly, I think I could have bought several because they had a bunch of cute ones, but this one really caught my eye.

Normally I am a basic black/navy/brown kinda gal. I don't know why I liked this one so much. They had several different styles of the same colors/design and they were all cute. My oldest son said it looks very country. I don't think he likes it very much, but what does a 14-year-old boy know about fashion?

A Rose By Any Other Name

2009-05-20T14:15:00.000-07:00

I have worked for a small personnel service in Mesquite, TX for about 3 1/2 years. A couple of weeks ago, we got a big contract to hire 75 people to work a 4-day temporary job. Keep in mind, when I say small, that means we have 5 employees. We had 3 days to find 75 people. Well, WE DID IT!! The company that hired us was really pleased with us, so today my boss took us all out to the Dallas Athletic Club for lunch (very swanky), gave us a small bonus and, when we got back from lunch, there were these beautiful roses on our desks. All of us got a different color, but mine was the most unusual. I absolutely love the color blue.

Isnt' is beautiful and isn't my boss sweet?