Monday, February 18, 2008
Saturday, February 16, 2008
I'm moving
It was Lisa at Take 90 West that finally inspired me (have you seen her new blog yet?), but I'm making the move to wordpress.
Come visit me there.
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
My kids are anal
They get it from their father.
Because God knows, I'm far from anal. Things don't have to be perfect in my book. I don't mind a little clutter, my clothes are never perfectly ironed, and my bed is rarely made. Ok, so it is only made when the cleaning ladies come because they do it, details, details. But yes, I live in a little clutter. I certainly wouldn't be friends with Bree. Well, I would because I've love to go to her house, rub myself all over her impeccably organized house and hope some of it would come off on me, but I'm afraid that she wouldn't want to come to mine.
But LushMan is just plain anal. "Everything in its place and a place for everything" is something he says often around here. Good thing I don't take him seriously. We only need one uptight adult in this house.
My poor innocent babies though. They've been infected. TheOldest and TheMiddleChild have gotten the anal gene. The first sign was when they lined up all their Little People train pieces at almost 28 months and 14 months. Notice all the people and animals are facing the same direction.
This brings me to Wednesday. It was the first day of TheMiddleChild's speech therapy. The therapist said that part of her problem is that she's a perfectionist. If she can't say something the right way, she gets frustrated and doesn't try. She does not like to make mistakes.
It's all LushMan's fault.
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Works For Me Wednesday: Mastercook
I stumbled upon a cookbook software a few years ago and I have to say that not a few days go by that I don't use it.
Mastercook has become a life saver for me. It comes with its own recipes (over 8000 actually!), but what I like it best for is to create my own cookbooks. I have one cookbook for crock pot cooking, one for Christmas cookies, and now I'm starting one for dairy free meals.
It manages shopping lists too. In fact, I made a dairy free recipe today. Instead of writing out my shopping list, with one click, I added the ingredients necessary to create my meal. I was able to delete the ones I had at home too. The coolest thing about the shopping list is that it automatically sorts the items by location in the store. No more wandering aimlessly in the grocery store.
Meal planning is something that seems like it would be a good idea, but I just can't get my act together to do it. But when I do, the software also does that.
All that and more for only 20 bucks.
I was tagged
How fun! This is my first blog tag game. I was tagged by Boys Rule My Life. I'm sure the majority of the 5 I'm tagging have no idea who I am as I'm kind of a quiet reader. I know, I know, if I want people to comment here, I should comment THERE. Tit for tat and all that stuff.
Let me just say to the 5 I'm tagging, that I do enjoy their blogs.
*Start Copying Here*
I have randomly selected 5 of you below to be tagged and I hope that you will similarly publish this post in your blog. You will have to tag 5 other bloggers and just keep adding on to the list. (Do not replace, just keep on adding! Yes we hope it will be a long list!)
It's real easy!
Tag others and see your Technorati Authority increase exponentially!
The benefits of Viral Linking:
2.Increase your Google PageRank fast
3.Attract large volume of new traffic to your site
4.Build your community
5.Make new friends!
A Room of Mama's Own
Exploring Autumn
Immoral Matriarch: Catechizer
Real Life
Boogiemum
Peace is Every Step
Life According to Lizzy
Following Forward
Boys Rule My Life
A Quest for Relevance
Not Trying for a Boy
The Gaspards
Orryally's journal
My Life with Boys
CityMama
Seven Clown Circus
Take 90 West
Big Mama
Chased By Children
The last five blogs are ones I added.
*Stop Copying Here*
The Money Pit's updates
As you know, I hate love my house. When we first acquired it in the fall of 2006, it needed so much work that we couldn't move in for 6 weeks after closing. The previous owners really liked having blue carpet in the kitchen and throughout the house and wallpaper in every room. I didn't like it as much.
The before pictures only give a hint to how bad it was. We're still working on it (it is a never ending project, isn't it), but here are some after pictures.
We haven't done much to the kitchen because eventually we'd like to redo it all. We did get new appliances, but that was mostly out of fear of what might have been living on or in them. Kind of like that blue carpet.
I think what makes me happiest about the house though is that our garage door opener will finally be replaced on Thursday. And I can't wait. Nothing like a few days of 0 degree weather and snow on top of snow to make you appreciate your home even with all of its faults.
Monday, February 11, 2008
Snow cones
It was 2 degrees this morning while driving the girls to school. Normally, it wouldn't have bothered me that much as I could go from my warm house into my running, heated car in my not so warm garage. Today I wasn't so lucky. Our garage door broke last week following the footsteps of almost everything else in my lovely house.
Because I had to go out the front door and down the walkway to our driveway, I passed by many of the 40 or so rose bushes we inherited with this house. They are so beautiful:
Oh wait, that's how they looked last summer. This is what I saw today. And it made me cry. Sobbed really. Well, maybe not. I would have cried but I was afraid of my tears freezing to my skin. That would have hurt and made me cry more. Plus, I wanted to get my butt inside the car as quickly as possible.
If you look closely, you can see a rose hiding under a rose cone. Or maybe you can't. The rose cones are being held down with a brick and are almost hidden in the snow. Mmm, snow cones.
See this next little guy? I ran out of cones and being the procrastinator that I am, the stores also ran out of cones. I'm sure he's very mad at me right now and cold. Very cold. We'll see if he survives.
And look at this tree. It should be standing up straight and tall, but the snow weighed it down and just robbed it of all its dignity.
It will be a couple of months still before the cones come off and I see which rose made it through the winter.