rough day

It has been a rough day.
Chris has been gone a lot lately (volleyball Thursday night, volleyball all day/night Saturday, golf tonight, golf tomorrow night, volleyball again on Thursday). It is one of those things where we talked about each one of these events and thought they were a good idea, signed him up and then realized that they were all back to back. It is good for him to get out, be active, have hobbies and be social but it is hard for me to be home with none of that for myself. I don't think this all would have been such a big deal if at the same time I wasn't trying to catch up on laudry, yard work, cleaning and grocery shopping (not to mention my jobs!) since we were gone for five days. Plus, Sam is going through a tough time of teething and growing out of two naps.
We are struggling right now.

But two funny things happened today that made me smile.

I saw a pig statue today at a mechanic shop that had a sign on it that said "I am swine flu free!" I thought that was pretty funny. I like a mechanic with a good sense of humor!

The neighbors across the channel must be working on putting in a new dock or something because there were two men examining the shoreline across from our backyard. One of the guys walked back up the hill and one stayed behind. The one that stayed behind stopped for a moment right on the shore, looked around (apparently NOT seeing me in my yard right across the water) and then proceeded to open his fly and PEE!! Oh yes he did!! HE PEED. I laughed and looked away quickly. Not sure how he didn't see me.

So that was pretty much my day. I am now sitting here watching the WORST "game show" I have ever seen...not even sure of the name but Spencer and Heidi from the Hills are on it; YUCK. Nothing else on tv and because I am a tv addict I just can't turn it off.

How was your day?

a whole lot of pictures

We had such a great time in St. Louis and I did my best to have the camera out to capture the fun times. So here are a whole lot of pictures from the weekend...better ones will be posted on Jodie's blog but here are my favorites.


One of Sam's lovely faces!I love the face that Sam is giving to Bailey in this photo..."hey off the water!"

sprinkler time gone terribly wrong!

Sprinkler time in my parents front yard started out very cute and peaceful. Sam was timidly putting her fingers in the water and freaking out if someone accidentally splashed her in the face.


And then an adult water fight began...which ended in disaster (or a really funny prank!)

We made it!

We arrived safely to my parents house about 10:30 last night. Sam was such a trooper. I was terrified pretty much all week that she was going to be a crabby, screaming mess the whole time but she wasn't, she did great. Which had very little to do with the portable DVD player that I broke down and bought yesterday thinking that it would be the perfect distraction for her in the car. It works great for my sister and her girls when they travel so I was just convinced that it would be the perfect fix. Now don't get me wrong it probably did help, she watched a little and was certainly distracted by it at times. But I thought she would just stare at it and be quiet the WHOLE time, which was not the case. She isn't much of a TV watcher normally so I am not sure why I thought she would suddenly be interested, but I did.
I have been convinced for years as we drove past vans filled with the glow of colorful tvs that MY children would not travel like that. They would travel the way that I did; looking out the window, playing stupid license plate games, reading, coloring, and of course fighting and whining with siblings. I don't know why but I have just had an aversion to using the TV as a distraction mode in the car; they miss all the scenery if they are staring at a screen. But my fear of eight hours of screaming Sam took over and forced me to forget my convinctions (clearly it was not that strong of a convinction!). So I went and bought a DVD player, it is even PINK! HA!
The funniest part of the whole thing is that I LOVED having it in the car!! I watched the baby Eisnstein movies and Robots and it was great. Totally made the time go faster. So, my conclusion from the whole thing is 1) don't have convictions about silly things that don't matter, and 2) for anyone out there that has long trips in their future with kids in the car BUY A DVD PLAYER...doesn't even have to be for them, just make your spouse drive, sit back and enjoy a movie!

I hate the F word

No I am not talking about the one that rhymes with duck, although I really do hate that word too.
I hate the word FINE!
It serves no purpose but to allow people to hide their true feelings, wants, needs or reactions. Whenever I use the word FINE it is not actually what I want to say.
Someone asks you how they look in some outfit, you say FINE. But what you really want to say is Sorry, sweety but you are not in college anymore and CANNOT pull that off OR oh my gosh I am so jealous that you look that good, I could never pull that off.
Someone asks if they can miss a meeting, blow off a phone call or somehow otherwise inconvenience you at work, you say FINE. But what you really want to say is No, my time is valuable too and if I have to be there/do it/whatever so should you.
Your husband/wife asks if they can take a whole Saturday and go (oh I don't know play golf! HA!) somewhere to do something and you say FINE. What you really want to say is there is laundry to do, a house to clean, a yard to tend to and a family that needs you, no you can't go OR no, you stay here and let ME leave for the whole day.
But no one ever says what they are really thinking, they say FINE. And then that anger, frustration, resentment just sits inside of them stewing and growing. It is ridiculous.
Yes I understand that if everyone stopped saying FINE and started actually saying what they truly felt there would be hurt feelings, damaged relationships and probably a lot of people no longer speaking to each other. But in the end wouldn't we all be happier, healthier, less stressed out people? I mean the people in our lives that truly love us are not going to cut us out just because we are honest with them (right?). I truly think the word FINE should be removed from the dictionary and all of our vocabularies because it just doesn't do anyone any good.

So, maybe this is just me and maybe you think I am nuts for going on such a rant about a small, virtually meaningless word but for whatever reason today I am not FINE with the word FINE!

puddle, pine cone and a bucket

It doesn't take much to entertain my daughter. A while ago we went to have dinner at our friends Nick and Stephanie's house. It was getting late and Sam was reaching her breaking point but Chris and I were not ready to leave. I handed her a deck of cards and I think she could have sat there sorting, holding, dropping and picking up the cards for an hour. It was hilarious!
The other afternoon we went outside after a small rain shower and she had SO much fun playing in a puddle. She found some pine cones and I gave her a bucket and she was good to go.
She loved the feeling of the water, loved throwing the pine cones into the water and watching the splash, and would collect all the pine cones in the bucket and then dump them out in the water. It was really fun watching her play in the puddle as if she had never experienced water before.




I love watching her discover new things outside and I can't wait for her to be little older so I can really start doing outdoor activities with her. But for now I really think we may have to buck up and buy this kid a water table!!

a challenged failed

My sister challenged moms (anyone really) to be in the pictures with their kids more often. She took some very cute pictures of her with the kids; you know the kinds where you hold the camera out with one arm and take a picture of two people squeezed into the frame. So, I decided to give it a try. If she can take cute photos like that, why can't I!


Okay, this one did not turn out so good. Second try...clearly flash was not a good idea! But without it didn't seem to work very well either...
This is the best one and good grief is it out of focus and not centered!
Sorry, I don't think I will be trying to get myself in the photos anymore. I failed this challenge. I think I will stick with taking pictures of Sam, those can sometimes turn out pretty cute!