One year ago I was doing a bunch of this on the beaches of Turks and Caicos:
I’m not going to lie to you. I wish I was back there right now…
Bits and Pieces
June 10, 2010 by
Yesterday was the big day. Landon got his cast removed. I’ve never had a cast before, but I imagine that had my arm been wrapped in plastic for almost a month I would want to bend and straighten my elbow over and over and rub my hand up and down my arm like he did. It was really adorable. He seemed quite thrilled with his ability to once again move his arm. He now has a removeable splint that he’s supposed to wear while he’s playing (so essentially all day long) for the next month.
Right. Good luck with that. He’s already figured out how to take it off.
I had to take all three kids with me to have his cast removed. I was worried. But they did great. They didn’t freak out when the saw was turned on and niether one of them asked if they could have a cast put on.
I cleaned out the bins of old clothes in the basement yesterday. I filled four oversized garbage bags to be dropped off at Goodwill and a fifth garbage bag filled with clothes that had apparently been home to our mouse family last year. Do you know what it does to someone like me to have to stick her hand in a bin that has obviously harbored small furry creatures? I’m surprised I didn’t go into cardiac arrest. I kept expecting little zombie mice to start crawling out of the box and up my arms. I didn’t even try to see if any of the clothes were salvagable. I just dumped them in the trash bag.
*shudder*
Lee and I are still attempting to keep up with P90X. The workouts themselves, while hard, are not that bad. Finding the time to do them, however, if proving to be a bit of a challenge. I can only get up at 5:00 AM so many days before I turn into crazy-psycho-needs-some-sleep mommy. I figure I’m of better use to my kids awake and alert but slightly flabby than super fit and walking in my sleep.
And finally, to cap off this most random of posts, I will let you know that it appears someone got a hold of my new camera yesterday and took several pictures. I’m not going to name any names, but the evidence is compelling.
To read my latest post for STL Family Life, click the tab on the right or right here.
As luck would have it
June 4, 2010 by
Part of my Craig’s List money went toward a minor room redecoration. I never liked the bedding I bought for our king size bed a couple of years ago and last year when we recevied our new furniture it just accented the ugliness of our bedding. So I bought new bedding.
Here’s the thing – I don’t have a decorator’s bone in my body. Which makes the fact that I recently started freelancing for a decorator’s blog slightly humorous, wouldn’t you say? The fact is, I just don’t know how to put together a room. I don’t know what looks good where, how to hang photos, what pieces to use for accents – it’s just not my strong suit. So given that knowledge, I’m pretty proud of the minor changes I made to our bedroom.
Obviously, finding the right bedding was my first goal. As soon as I saw this bedding online, I fell in love with it. I ordered it two months ago and it just arrived yesterday due to back order issues. Just in time for my birthday. Yes, I am 29 AGAIN today. Lee seems to luck out on birthday gifts wouldn’t you say? Last year our furniture happened to arrive the day before my birthday as well.
So here we are, one year later, and my bed is finally outfitted properly.
I also bought new side table lamps since our old ones didn’t match and were not even remotely cute. Behold, the glory of a cute side table lamp:
Many thanks to HomeGoods for being the perfect place for non-decorators like me to shop. And naturally we needed a few accents in the room to pull it all together. Naturally.
Lee’s not overly crazy about the urn. “It’s weird,” he keeps saying. “What’s the purpose?” And I’m all, “Dude, you obviously know nothing about decorating a room…”
Weird urn aside, I like how things are coming together in there. I still need to figure out what to do in one naked corner and I need to re-hang a few pictures that don’t look right and, eventually, I’d like to repaint the walls. But what color? Those are the types of decisions that stress me out.
For now, however, I’m going to rest my head on some cute pillows and let out a sigh of accomplishment because I conquered my fear of redecorating a room!
Now if I could only get my husband to take the suitcases down to the basement as they are totally messing with my Feng Shui.
I feel like I’m living in an episode of Everybody Loves Raymond.
All photos were taken with my new point and shoot, courtesy of my parents. I love my Pentax and the quality of pictures it takes, but the thing is a mammoth and, to be honest, I wasn’t crazy about hauling it around the Zoo with me. It made me nervous. So I’m excited to have a smaller camera that I can stick in my pocket. Thanks Mom and Dad.
Hey Becke’. It’s Your Birfday!
June 2, 2010 by
Happy Birthday to my amazing, funny, wickedly talented, godly, beautiful sister-in-law, Becke’. I didn’t have a sister growing up. It would have been fun to have one, but God has blessed me with a great sister-in-law who shares many of the same passions and loves that I do. The need for a sister has been fulfilled in Becke and I am grateful.
Some things you should know about Becke’:
– She is an amazing singer. Seriously, the girl can hit some crazy notes.
– She is a gifted writer. And photographer.
– She’s very crafty, although I don’t think she would say that she is. But compared to me, she’s a flippin’ Picasso.
– She is really good at applying make up. Way better than me. I’m always amazed at how put together her face is.
– She is equally gifted at using a curling iron. I, on the other hand, tend to look like Simba if I try to curl my hair.
– She is a master wasp killer. She needs nothing more than a Steno Pad and me yelping on the sidelines.
– She will sometimes answer to the name Coco Mama. Try calling it out in a crowded room – I bet she turns around…
– She has a wicked sense of humor.
– She has the most tender heart and really loves the Lord with all her soul.
– She is a great mom.
– She’s very patient and level headed. Unless someone drops a salt shaker and breaks it. But she recouperates quickly.
– I really can’t think of anything that Becke’ can’t do. She’s like Mary Poppins…practically perfect in every way.
We love you Becke’! Hope today is great.
On LOST and Dostoevsky
May 24, 2010 by
I’ve read The Brothers’ Karamatzov three times.
I’ve made it to the end once.
I got to The Grand Inquisitor twice and my mind almost exploded and both times I put it down for several months before trying again. The third time I read it, I quit trying to figure it out and just enjoyed the story. There was a nagging feeling in the back of my mind that I was missing some pretty important elements and symbols, but I knew if I tried to figure them out, I’d get stuck again, so I ignored the feeling and got lost in the plot.
For much of the last two seasons, I’ve felt the same feeling while watching LOST. It is the Dostoevsky of television. There was so much symbolism, so much to get out of the show from a spiritual and worldview standpoint, but if I thought about it too long, I felt like my head would explode, so I got “lost” in the story instead.
And it was a great story. Probably the greatest TV plotline in history. It was original and weird and dramatic and funny. It made you think and laugh and cry and shout. It was a really, really great show.
I’m not a TV person. I don’t love to sit and watch TV. The constant movement and noise makes me crazy. Aside from FRIENDS, I’ve never before been so addicted to a show that I would put aside life for a short bit of time each week to watch.
But LOST was different. For six years, LOST has been a date night for Lee and I. Every week for 18 weeks, we’ve put the kids to bed early, piled up on the couch and enjoyed unravelling the mysteries of the island. We’ve talked through theories and the significance of what the characters were experiencing. We’ve grumbled when the plotlines didn’t make sense and clapped our hands with glee when they were so good we felt like we could jump out of our skins.
It’s kind of embarrassing to admit that I’m going to miss a TV show, but I am going to miss LOST. It’s amazing how attached you can become to characters. I know they aren’t real, but for six years I’ve invested in the stories of these finctional people. It was like a long novel that I never wanted to end. I’m going to miss watching the show with my husband each week. I can’t imagine another show ever taking it’s place. I actually told Lee that we should maybe just go ahead and cancel cable.
He thought that might be a little rash.
Warning – Spoiler Alerts Ahead!
Last night’s series finale left me feeling a little confused. When it ended I almost felt let down a bit. The nature of LOST is to leave you with questions, so I fully expected to be a little baffled. But, like Dostoevsky, I felt like the last few minutes were so deep and metaphorical that I missed the whole meaning. And there was a fear that maybe the writer’s had pulled the wool over my eyes for so long.
They were all dead?! What!
For about fifteen minutes, I felt confused and frustrated. But it didn’t make sense. Surely they hadn’t been dead the whole time. The writer’s wouldn’t do that. So Lee and I rewatched the ending and it seemed to answer the most pressing question.
The survivors were not dead on the island. All that was real. But somewhere along the way, they all eventually died. Some, like Jin and Sun, Sayiid and Shannon and Boone, died on the island. Others, like Claire, Kate and Sawyer got off the island and lived life. We don’t know what happened to them, but they lived and died. Jack, of course, died on the island, in the same place where he began six years ago. Laying in the bamboo field.
Brilliant.
The sideways reality was a sort of purgatory. It was a waiting ground – a place for all of them to be connected again. I still don’t really understand all of that, honestly. There are a lot of unanswered questions and this is the part of the story that I could either go crazy trying to unravel or I could simply enjoy the story and leave it at that. Again, it’s the nature of LOST to leave you feeling completely confused and exhilerated all at once.
Dumb smart people…
But the island happened. And that’s the story that I invested six years of my life into, so I was relieved to know that it was “real.”
I loved the way that they brought all the characters back together in the sideays reality, even if I’m not crazy about how it ended. It felt like there was closure. Kate and Jack were together. Sawyer and Juliet found one another again. Sayiid and Shannon were reunited. It was so good to see all of these storylines intersect once again. It ended with everyone where they should be.
So all in all, I enjoyed the series finale of LOST. I still feel like there is so much I missed. There was deep symbolism leading up to last night’s finale. I got some of it, I probably overanalyzed a little, and I’m sure I missed a lot. But strip all that away and I still fell in love with a great story.
If you didn’t watch the show, well, you missed out. But there’s hope! Never fear. Lee and I, being the deep nerds that we are, have every single season on DVD. You can borrow them anytime you want.
And I am now finished bleeding nerdiness all over my keyboard.
The End.
Let’s have a chat
May 20, 2010 by
This post is going to be a random conglomerate.
Landon got his permanent cast on yesterday. He picked a fiery red cast. They decided to cast him all the way up above his elbow even though the fracture was in his wrist. Otherwise he might be able to pull the cast off. I saw the X-Rays. He broke both the ulna and the radius just above the growth plate. We’re thankful the growth plate wasn’t affected at all!
He’s proud of his cast. And Steve the monkey got a cast too because his arm was hurt. So everyone is healing.
Tia seems to be a little jealous. She told me she wished she had a ‘puwple tast’ for her arm. Here she is pretending she has a cast like her brother. Landon’s trying to figure out how to navigate the world left handed. Watching him eat brings a smile to my face. Half the time he misses his mouth, the other half the time he shoves the fork down his throat.
Lee has found the silver lining in this whole broken wrist ordeal. “He’ll get tons of practice dribbling the ball left handed,” Lee said, his eyes getting all glassy and dreamy. So, you know, he’s got that going for him…
My kids, like all kids, wear me out daily with their constant fighting, whining, tattling and arguing. But it’s moments like this one that we had last night…
…that energize me and give me the strength to get through one more day. I am writing this at 7:48 in the morning and the kids are screaming at each other behind me. I keep looking at the picture to remind myself that there are sweet moments to look forward to.
Speaking of being energized, you can read my latest post over at 5 Minutes for Mom. It’s all about how I’m actually NOT supermom.
Tia had her last day of perschool yesterday. I’m so excited for summer break. I have all sorts of lofty goals and plans for the kids. We’ll see if I can stick with it or if I cave and let them watch TV all day long. Just kidding, I would never do that…
Lee and I started the P90X workout this week. I can’t move anything from my neck to my ankles without gasping in pain and I’m walking like a ninety year old woman with a hunchback. It’s intense but so far we’re enjoying it. Except for the Abs workout, which I’m fairly certain was developed by Lucifer himself. Seriously, if I cough or sneeze I have to hold onto something to offset the pain. Fun…
I had a whole paragraph (or two) written about the Arizona Immigration bill and my horror at the President’s audacity to stand up next to a foreign President and publicly call out another State. I’ll save you my rant, but will say that we are the United States of America. We don’t need a President who’s a man of all Countries. We need him to be the man of the People, which is what we elected him for.
And that’s all I have to say about that.
Now I’m going to hobble my way to the bathroom to start getting ready for the day. I will attempt to brush my hair, but given that it hurts to raise my hands above my shoulders I may have to lay a hat down on the bed and shove my head into it…
Repost: My Minivan is Cooler Than Your Lexus!
May 12, 2010 by
Originally posted on October 20th of last year, this post still makes me laugh. Mostly because I still remember how NOT cool I felt watching my minivan get a scrubbing in between all them fancy cars.
Due to several car trips in the last few months, our minivan has taken a bit of a beating. Covered in dead bugs, splattered with mud and sporting the drop marks accrued during our deluge of rain last week, her sleek black exterior has lost a little bit of it’s luster.
It’s not often that one reads the words “sleek” and “luster” in the context of a minivan, I know.
So yesterday afternoon, I took my rockin’ hot minivan through a specialty car wash. You know, one of those car washes where actual humans scrub your car?
After pulling her loveliness into line, I got out and shopped around the convenience store for a few minutes before heading out to watch them remove the layers of dirt that had been holding her back all these weeks. And what did I find when I came out?
I found my minivan sandwiched between two Lexus’s (is the plural Lexi?) who were also being scrubbed to shiney perfection. Then a third Lexus pulled up, followed by a BMW and a fourth Lexus.
And finally, the Créme de la Créme – a gorgeous (and I’m not a car person) sports car pulled up and parked nose to nose with my van. I have no idea what brand it was, but it was somthin’ fancy, let me tell ya!
And guys, I kid you not, my van blushed and giggled when that thing parked in front of her.
And so, there I stood, the girl who brought her hoopty van to a class act party. I was the like the stray dog at a country club. The sore thumb. The minivan surrounded by Lexi!
I tried to play it all cool like this was only my day car, but you should see what I drive at night. But my mom garb didn’t help the situation – that being my unwashed hair, jeans, tennis shoes and puffer vest.
Oh, then there was the fact that I forgot to bring cash to tip the boys washing my car and had to scrounge for enough change to make it worth their while. I, my friends, am nothing if not classy.
The best part of the whole process, though, was watching the boys attempt to work my tricked out van. What she lacks in style she makes up in sheer awesomeness! I mean, hello! She has an automatic back hatch and one automatic side door, which I have child proofed, so the poor guys kept getting stuck inside the car when vacuuming because they couldn’t figure out how to open the door and got confused as to which was automatic and which was manual.
Good times.
And then, of course, there are the multiple – and I mean mul.ti.ple – scratches on the car from the kids running their bikes down the sides. Yep – that’s how I roll.
So when the guys finally finished her up and handed me the keys, I climbed inside my now sleek and lusterous minivan and started her up. Next to the purring sports car, she sounded like some sort mammoth as she roared to life.
And with that I held my head high, looked down upon the lowly sports car and I pulled out of Lexusland, driving her hotness off into the horizen. I hope everyone watching wasn’t too jealous…
Favorites Week
May 10, 2010 by
I’m spending the week in Arkansas and I have limited access to the internet, so posting will be sparse. This is a good thing. I’m enjoying some time away from the computer and plan on reading a lot, sleeping a lot and not having a schedule.
Did you hear what I just said?! Not having a schedule…I thrive on schedules, actually. I hate not having a plan to my day. But the last few weeks have been so crazy and so over-scheduled that I’ve experienced a bit of a burn-out.
And when I say a bit of a burn-out, I mean I’ve been almost in full blown panic mode and have felt the need to carry a brown paper bag with me at all times.
Lee and his dad and brothers left while it was still dark this morning for a week of golfing and boy time, in which I’m sure they will eat, drink and be merry in abundance. And I will spend the time relaxing with my mother-in-law and my kids. Not having a schedule. Not having anywhere I have to be. Not having anything I have to do.
Today was my first unscheduled day and I found myself a little nervous. I didn’t really know what to do with myself. So I took a nap. Then I read a book while watching my kids play outside. Then I went to see a movie with my mother and sister-in-law. Now I’m squeezing in a bit of computer time before I go read some more.
And tomorrow will be more of the same. I’m nervous and excited. More excited than nervous, though…
So I will be reposting some of my favorite posts from the past couple of years this week, while sprinkling in new posts when I have the chance – just so I can have something up here. Enjoy your week, all! 🙂
Girl and Boy and a Cricket Makes Three
May 4, 2010 by
As Lee and I lead up to our 10th Anniversary, I am chronicling some of the favorite memories of our years together. You can read our love story here.
By the fall of 1999, Lee and I were an official “item.” Although neither one of us could ever really call each other “boyfriend and girlfriend.” It sounded silly and trivial and we’d giggle every time we said it. We also felt very strange and junior high when we would walk and hold hands. Because we knew that marriage was imminent, it almost felt like hand holding and labeling trivialized our relationship.
When we returned for what would be my senior year at Baylor, Lee decided to go to the K-Life Board of Directors and tell them about our relationship and his intentions for it. Because he was on staff and I was a volunteer leader, technically we weren’t supposed to date. I was willing to step down as a volunteer if I needed to in order to officially date Lee, but I did not have to do that. The Board was not only supportive of Lee and I, they were excited for us. And for that entire school year, they really poured into us as a couple. What a blessing that was.
So we were free to move forward as an official couple, and move forward we did. Every available moment we had, we spent together. Because I was in my final year and it was kicking my tail academically, Lee and I spent a lot of time at Barnes and Noble – me studying, him staring dreamily at me…
Okay, not really – I think he usually prepared his K-Life talks or Bible studies, but I like to think that he was so distracted by my beauty that he got nothing done at all during that time.
For those of you who have been in Waco in the autumn, you will know that what I am about to write is no exaggeration. Every fall, Waco experienced what can only be described as the Plague of Crickets. Thousands upon thousands (maybe millions) of crickets would swarm the town, covering buildings, falling from the sky and altogether making my life a living hell.
I’ve told you about my unnatural fear of crickets here. This fear stems from my years as a Baylor student. And the fall of 1999 was the worst cricket infestation of all my years there. You couldn’t go anywhere without seeing one or 10,000 crickets. They were in restaurants, churches, libraries, classrooms – every-freakin’-where.
One evening, as Lee and I sat in a quiet corner of B & N studying and talking, I kept a wary eye on the crickets that were crawling on the wall next to us. It was at a particularly intense moment of conversation that I felt a tickle on my calf. I gasped and slapped at my leg, shaking my pants around a little. Lee laughed and called me paranoid and we moved on.
A moment later, I felt another tickle on the back of my knee. I yelped and shook my leg under the table. When no cricket came tumbling out, I decided that maybe I was being a little crazy. Until…
I felt something crawling on my thigh!
At this point I leapt to my feet in the silent but crowded book store where several people were studying and began hopping and dancing about as I stuck my hands down my pants and dug for the voyeristic little cricket. I finally felt my hands close around it and I snatched it out of my pants and threw it across the room with a scream.
I looked around to see all eyes on me and Lee doubled over in laughter. I gave a little smile and wave, then slowly sat back down all shaky and hot. Lee was still laughing. I glared at him and leaned forward.
“Lee,” I hissed. “Did you see that?”
He snorted.
“Lee!” I was desperate for him to understand the seriousness of the situation. I had just been viciously attacked, for crying out loud.
“That cricket was in my pants,” I stage whispered in horror.
Lee sat up and wiped his eyes, then looked straight at me. “Well,” he said with a grin. “Lucky cricket.”
My mouth dropped open and my face got hotter still. Then we both started cracking up.
And then we left…And I have had a severe Crickiphobia ever since.
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