Top Ten

Shamelessly stolen from a friend's blog.... here are the top ten things I love about my daughter:

1. She loves to sing
2. She loves to listen to ME sing (and that's saying alot!)
3. She calls me Momma
4. She's smart and not afraid to voice her opinion
5. She's a tomboy who loves pink
6. She loves animals and wants to be a vet
7. She's interested in computers
8. She has a huge heart for an almost 5 year old
9. She loves sports and cars and books equally
10. She loves to help me cook

Timely

A good friend sent this to me today, of all days....

"The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on my life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than successes, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness, or skill. It will make or break a company, ... a church, ... a home. The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past... we cannot change the fact that people will react in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is our attitude. .... I am convinced that life is 10% of what happens to me and 90% how I react to it. And so it is with you... We are in charge of our attitudes." --Charles Swindle

My Elite Eight

Thanks Carla!!


8 Favorite TV shows...in no particular order
1. House
2. Prison Break
3. 24 (can't wait for Jack to come back!)
4. Entourage
5. ER
6. Amazing Rase
7. Greys Anatomy
8. The West Wing

8 Favorite Restaurants...
1. Bellini's
2. Bertucci's
3. Higashi
4. Margaritas
5. Ming Dynasty
6. Panera
7. Puerta Vallerta
8. Shady Glen

8 things that happened yesterday...
1. Went to gymanstics
2. Went grocery shopping
3. Baked homemade cinnamon rolls
4. Baked 2 loaves of pumpkin bread - froze one
5. Played a kazillion rounds of scramble
6. Had two glasses of wine
7. Watched Grey's, finally
8. Fell asleep before SNL

8 things to look forward to...
1. Our Disney trip - 9 more days!
2. Carving a pumpkin
3. Sleeping in
4. Making Christmas cookies
5. Christmas morning
6. Girls' night on the 22nd
7. Trick or Treating with Spiderman!
8. Election Day!

8 things I love about Fall...
1. Pumpkins and leaves and mums
2. Thanksgiving
3. Baking
4. Fires in the wood stove
5. not shaving my legs so often! (had to keep this one Carla!)
6. Our anniversary
7. Long walks
8. Trick or Treating

8 things on my wish list...
1. An ipod of my own
2. New black boots
3. Another "Girls Trip"
4. Hiking on Mt. Washington next summer
5. A massage
6. A dress for my friend's wedding in November
7. Peace for certain family members
8. More time to read

If you are reading this, consider yourself tagged now too. Let us see your 8!

Straight from the horse's mouth:

"He's a decent family man (and) citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues and that's what this campaign's all about," McCain said at the town-hall meeting in Lakeville, Minnesota.

(AFP - October 11, 2008)
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20081011/ts_afp/usvote_081011195349

When I grow up

I wanna be her.......

Hil-arious!

Probably the closest they will come to together.... <= click this ;)

I wish I had a tape recorder.....

Four and a half year old
Sitting on the toilet
Singing (repeating over and over)

Every little thi-ing's gonna be alright.... yeah!
Every little thi-ing's gonna be alright.... yeah!
Every little thi-ing's gonna be alright.... yeah!

Yeah, she's my child, alright! :)

Fresh Air, Phhbbbbt!!

Melting

Conversation after school:

A: Mom, I love our home.

I'm thinking ugh, the one we want to sell cuz it's falling apart (not literally but we've had our share of issues), the driveway is steep, there is virtually no yard, no A/C and every ceiling needs painting....

Me: Really, why honey?

A: Because you're here.

*sigh*


If that's not enough to melt your heart I don't know what is!

Shoooooooooot!

"I know it's not a nice word, Mommy, but can you tell me how to spell it?"

Untitled

Sorry I have been neglecting this blog the last month.... there is just so much going on here (or not going on, depending how you look at it) I'm not feeling very creative..... This too shall pass. Sooner the better!

An easy one....

This came from Tammy
Answer these questions with one word only: no word can be used twice.

1. Where is your cell phone? purse
2. Your significant other? pensive
3. Your hair? colored
4. Your mother? mom
5. Your father? daddy
6. Your favorite time of day? morning
7. Your dream last night? nonexistent
8. Your favorite drink? Water
9. Your dream goal? success
10. The room you’re in? computer
11. Your ex? unknown
12. Your fear? death
13. Where do you want to be in 6 years? here
14. What you are not? hyper
15. Your favorite meal? lunch
16. One of your wish list items? Italy
17. The last thing you did? Ate
18. Where you grew up? wethersfield
19. What are you wearing? shorts
20. Your TV is? On
21. Your pets? sleeping
22. Your computer? busy
23. Your life? fun
24. Your mood? tired
25. Missing someone? papa
26. Your car? practical
27. Something you’re not wearing? shoes
28. Favorite store? big y
29. Your summer? relaxing
30. Your favorite color? green
31. When is the last time you laughed? earlier
32. When is the last time you cried? yesterday
33. Your health? fine
34. Your children? precious
35. Your future? happy
36. Your beliefs? free
37. Young or old? both
38. Your image? changing
39. Your appearance? casual
40. Would you live your life over again knowing what you know? Absolutely

Now, how about you?

Life Plan - by my four year old after she won Let's Go F!sh!ng....

"Losers do all the work and Winners get to pick (the next game)."

Pretty much sums it up, eh?

Not sure I agree with everything but here you have it....

....shamelessly stolen from my friend Lori

Your Ice Cream Personality:

You are not a particularly modest person. You're proud of who you are, and you don't care who knows it. You are incredibly cautious. You rather miss out on something than make a mistake. No one would ever call you wild... but they would call you responsible. You are a very open minded, liberal, and flexible person. You love many things. You tend to have tastes that range from down home to cosmopolitan. You tend to have a one track mind. You prefer not to multitask. You are fun loving and sweet. You tend to enjoy joking around and teasing people.

The Ice Cream Personality Test

Freedom: The Final Chapter

We let them go!!
In just a few short weeks, they went from this:

to this:

to this:


Let's just say that two had a little trouble flying and leave it at that.
All 5 DID eventually fly away. Far away.

What I'm Loving This Week

I'm usually not a big product endorser (hence the astericks, lol) but here are a few things that I'm loving this week:

Ethnic Go*urmet Organic (Vegan) Channa Masala ~ awesome "Indian fix" lunch!

Homemade (by me) Honey Mustard dip ~ made with just honey and spicey mustard ~ yum!

Newm*n's Own Organic Lemonade ~ same price as the original so why anyone would buy it with HFCS is beyond me!

Fresh Strawberries ~ nekkid

Dogf!sh Head 90 Minute Imperial IPA ~ Voted America's best microbrew (by Esqu!re magazine). Did I mention it's 9% alcohol?

Endanger*d Species 70% Dark Chocolate ~ who am I kidding, I love any dark chocolate, but this stuff rocks! (and it's for a good cause)

Food Should T@ste Good All Natural Jalepeno Chips ~ a nice little zip to them and a local (Boston) company to boot!

F!sh Eye Pinot Grigio in a box ~ even if you're not a "box wine" person, you gotta try it! They say it stays fresh for up to six weeks; not sure it will last that long!

So, whatcha lovin' this week?

Thankful.

Yes, I am thankful. One would think that after the week I had with falling down the stairs and the bad mammogram (more on that later) I'd be in a foul mood. It started out that way, believe me.

But now, as the week draws to an end I am thinking about how bad things *could have* been vs. how wonderful they are, really, and I am thankful.

Yeah, I took quite a fall. And while I am still sore here on day 5, nothing was broken or permanently damaged. For that I am thankful.

The morning after the fall, on the way to school, another car ran the notorious stop sign by the rail road crossing. But I saw him and stopped only a few feet into the intersection. He stopped too, screeching and apologetic. Very close call, but again I am thankful for those few seconds.

Last Friday's mammogram needed a re-take due to some dense tissue and lumpiness that runs in my family.... That had me worried nonetheless. All of the What Ifs that start running through your mind. Breast Cancer with a four year old is not something I can even fathom. The fact that they let me go a full week between appointments reassured me a little that they weren't expecting The Worst. But still, anyone who has been through the wait knows it sucks. Yesterday, I got the "all clear" til next year! Phew!

Please please please get a mammogram ladies, this is not something to put off! Thanking my lucky stars on this one!

Last night, my dear little daughter was fooling around in the living room, jumping and dancing as usual when I hear a bang and a cry. Oh, man, I run in and she's lying on the ground next to the coffee table. "I hit my forehead Mommy!!!!!!!!! It hurts!!" I don't see anything right away because I'm looking at her actual forehead. Well, the bridge of her nose was already swelling and was bruised so we spent the rest of the night with an ice pack. No bleeding, and thankfully, no ER visit for this child yet.

Often I think of all the children out there who are going through "things" involving hospitals and medicine and lots of doctors visits; some of them just take it all in stride because that's all they know. Then I look at my child and feel so so blessed, so lucky that she is a healthy and happy girl. The healthy and happy girl who won't even take a grape-flavored ibuprofen "I don't like pills, Momma". I am blessed and thankful for my daughter's health, and for that I couldn't be happier.

What are you thankful for?

Painted Ladies: Part Three

They're Here!!

Three of them have hatched today!!

Gotta get some pictures posted of this amazing transformation... although I had no clue there would be a blood-like substance (meconium) coming out of such beautiful creatures.

Today A and I sat for quite a while hoping to catch one "in the act" of releasing itself from its chrysalis.

So far we've "fed them" sugar water sprinkled on violets and a few slices of fresh orange which they seem to like as they are always resting on one.

Oh, and we've only opened the habitat and took one out. Once. Grrrr. It's now safety pinned shut for their safety, LOL.

Another kind of flight

One that I would rather not take.

Being that all is quiet on the Painted Lady front, I thought I'd post about my Late Sunday (Mother's Day of all days)/Early Monday morning flight. And it was indeed a flight. A full flight of stairs I fell down at 3am.

The.Scariest.Thing.Ever.

My daughter called me in the middle of the night as she often does. "Mommy.... I need you." I ignored the first call. On the second call, I got up out of bed. It was pitch black as our night light has been out. I was half (if not more) asleep. I made my way out of the bedroom and into the hallway. Thought I was reaching behind the bathroom door to grab my .... robe .... there's ... not .... a step .... down .... ~ am I dreaming? ~ Oh, MY GOD!!! down down down HARD I went. On my butt mostly. Down the full 13 stairs.

Screaming and flailing in the dark.

My husband screamed for me and came running down. Whimpering and shaking, I was already trying to move; hoping that everything still worked. It did. I made my way to the downstairs bath. My face was WHITE. I was shaking and in pain. My husband brought A down to see me as she had heard me crying. (Luckily, she didn't remember much the next morning. She knows Mommy "hurt her leg" and that's all she needs to know.) I stayed up for a bit and then tried to get some sleep. I showered and drove A to school and went to work for a few hours. I realized I needed to be seen by a Dr. as my left foot was swollen and black and blue. My regular Dr. was booked all day and my ortho guy only does knees so I headed to the clinic by my office and met with a Dr. there. (Sadly, she asked me if it was domestic violence, ie, was I pushed. Scary world we live in, but that's a post for another day. I assured her it was of my own doing and hubby had come to my rescue.) They did an xray of my foot, checked my head, did a general 'once over' and sent me on my way. I was good to go.

Truth is, in addition to my foot, I have a deep bruise the size of Rhode Island on my ass. It hurts so bad, it is hard to sit, especially in my car for some reason. Must be the shape of the seats. I've resorted to sitting with my rolled up gym socks under my left thigh ~ much better. There are also bruises popping up on my thigh, left shoulder, elbow, a scrape on my left temple and ear.

This happened Monday morning and I have relived it in my head every day at least 3 or 4 times and I get all scared and panicky all over again thinking of what COULD have happened. And thanking GOD it was not my daughter. Her room is gated "to keep the dog out" so there's no worry of her falling down the stairs. Oh, and I bought a new night light (it was the switch, not just a bulb).

The physical stuff will get better in time. I just want to ~feel~ better. I'm exhausted and sore. I have that lovely post-car accident stiffness and achiness going on now and I just want it to go away. Any time now would be nice.

Thank you

Thank you to my daughter for a wonderful Mother's Day. I am blessed to have been able to spend it with such a special girl. I loved planting flowers with you. I am amazed how "un-afraid" of bugs and worms you are! (I know aside from butterflies you don't like flying bugs, only crawling bugs because they tickle you as they crawl on your hand ~ ick!) You love the dirt and the mud. You love to run around. You were such a big, brave girl on your scooter, too. I am proud of you every moment of every day. I love you.

Painted Ladies: Part Two

It's only day SIX and all five (!) of the painted lady caterpillars are hanging upsidedown in their habitat; their chrysalises formed.

It truly is amazing to watch this process.

While A was occupied (LOL) this afternoon, I carefully removed the paper disc they are attached to and put it into the butterfly house.

No more caterpillar poop.

Now, we wait.

Holy Caterpillar Poop!

Geez, these things are getting more gross every day. Yes, they are growing. Longer. Fatter. Did I mention Gross?

Here we are on day 5. Webs. Poop. Fat, Nasty Caterpillars.

She still thinks they are 'cute little fellas'.

Eyes on the prize. Eyes on the prize.

Painted Ladies: Part One

We are now the proud owners of five painted lady caterpillars... and if we play our cards right (read: don't kill them) in about three weeks we will have five painted lady butterflies of our very own!

One particular four year old girl was VERY excited (read: screeching over the phone when I called to say I had them with me)! So excited indeed, she even ate dinner staring at them!

Some of the commentary tonight:

Momma, these are the best pets EVER!
Look at his cute little nose! (nose?)
I think that one likes me!
They're all moving! They're all moving!
Let's name them, Momma!
He's looking at me! I think he likes me!
Cute little fellas aren't they, Momma!
That one's not moving so much, maybe we should name him Dead. (scarey)
Are they gonna grow ten times? On TV it says ten times!


It's going to be a fun (and long) three weeks I think.
It does say on the box that they will Grow Bigger Every Day!

Until tomorrow.....

Country time...

I absolutely love it that the only Friday afternoon rush hour traffic my daughter and I experience is a wild turkey wandering the two lane "highway" a few miles from our house. I had "that feeling" when cars started slowing down that there was an accident ahead and wondered just how long it would take to get home as we were literally 5 minutes from the house. The poor guy was just wandering on the yellow line and cars were stopping and looking (and occasionally honking) at him.

Yesterday on the way to swimming lessons we saw several geese, two separate groups of horses, tons of cows, a hen and her 8-10 babies, all within 20 minutes!

That kind of traffic I can certainly deal with!

Words to Live By

"One should not run unless you are being chased."

That's my philosophy and I'm sticking with it.
Still.

Where?

Wow, where did this month go?

For starters, we celebrated both my and my daughter's Birthday. I was early in the month. We went out to dinner as a family one night. Had my mother over another night for pizza and cake (my sister and niece and nephew had some sort stomach bug so they stayed home) and I went out for sushi with 'the girls' another night....

For my daughter, we had my husband's family over one night (I shopped and cleaned and cooked and made a cake for about 15 people) and then we had her friend party the next day. We had it at a bowling alley with about 10 kiddos. That was a trip! Holy Running Four Year Olds with Bowling Balls!!

Oh, and then Easter was the next day... Yes, we are a partying family but we had a pretty low key Easter, just the three of us collecting eggs, cooking, eating chocolate, watching movies, eating more chocolate. I gained back 2 of the 3 pounds I lost last month. Ugh. It's all good fun though, still down 4 from January 2nd! :)

This week I had a pretty major job interview.... a job that I've been wanting for a while. I don't want to curse myself so I'll just leave it at that. I'll know something in a week or two.

Somewhere in there we had soccer on Saturday mornings, registering for swimming (big pool next session!), planning for Disney in the fall, my nephew's Birthday party brunch and my brother-in-law's (other side) birthday dinner.

Gotta love all of these very cool Pisces and Aries people!


Oh, and in the mindst of all of this I had an itsy bitsy (saying that now) health scare. Something funky came up on a routine test as part of my annual physical. But happy to say after FIVE days of waiting and getting retested and waiting and visualizing my own funeral and WAITING that it's just my own weird body and nothing more.

Phew.

Oh and I'm "so healthy" that I can skip my annual physical next year if I want to.

So, there you have it. That's where March went.

Bunny Story

I should probably save this for when she's famous. My daughter's first story. She made it up (told me what to write) after sticking some bunny stickers on a napkin:

One day there was a little bunny.
He didn't have any friends. Then another bunny hopped by.
They smiled at eachother. Then the went to the pond. Yippee! Yippee!
Then they saw a grouchy dog. So they hid and they hid and they hid.
And then they saw a really mad bunny catcher. So they ran and they ran.
The bunny catcher could not catch up. Then the bunny catcher saw a really big giant and he was blocking the way so the bunny catcher could not run through.
So the bunny catcher ran away. The giant stomped and stomped and he caught the bunnies.


She's so funny. Too bad it doesn't have a happier ending, huh?

I've Taught Her Well

Teacher S: Do you know what holiday is coming up?

My Daughter: Valentine's Day!!!

Teacher S: Do you know what Valentine's Day is?

My Daughter: Valentine's Day is when you get LOTS of chocolate and you give all of your friends chocolate!

Pretty much sums it up, eh?

**Although, I must disclaim, we also exchanged "Love Cards" :)

In Udder News....

Has anyone else's child (almost 4) had the udder, brudder, mudder problem?? (That would be other, brother, mother to you and me)

Is speech therapy on the horizon or is it something she'll out grow?

Hmmmmmmmm.........

Eeek!

We have a very important date with a very important mouse.

September 16, 2008..... Disney, here we come!!

My Girl

Today on the ride home, A said to me, "Momma, when I get bigger, would I be able to take Karate lessons?"
"Huh? Karate? Where would you do that?"
"At the Karate School, Mom....." Oh, duh. My bad.
"Sure honey, you can take Karate. When you're bigger."

Then later she says to me, "My voice is like a boy." (She's said this to me before. I guess her voice is a *little* deeper than some 3-4 year old girls but who's keeping track, really?)
"You have a beautiful voice. I love it."
"It's not beautiful (god forbid); it's like a boy's."
"Who told you that?"
"Nobody. It's just low." (HOW does she KNOW all of this?!?)
"Do you like your voice, honey?"
"Yes." Phew.
"Good. Mommy loves it too."

What else? Oh, she wants a Fireman Sam Birthday Cake. Not sure how I will pull that one off.

She DOES NOT want to be the flower girl in our nephew's wedding. Thank goodness it's not for a year and a half so we have some time to let her warm up to the idea. Hopefully.

At the risk of having this bite me in the butt later on, can I just say right now, I love having a NonGirlie Girl!

All the fun's in knocking them down, Momma!

That pretty much sums up this morning's snowman making attempt.

I never made it past Almost Finished with a Middle before she had kicked and tackled the base.

On a more serious note....

It was a beautiful New Year's morning. A view of freshly falling snow out three sides of our living room (one of the few things I love about my house). A fire in the wood stove (yeah, Tammy, loving it *today*). Sipping my coffee and flipping through a magazine. Reflecting on some of the crappe (Heather's laughing at me I'm sure, but I adore that spelling!) that's transpired in 2007, but more importantly, vowing not to let it get me down in 2008. Fresh starts. A brighter outlook. Standing tall.

Well, all except Frosty. :)

Here's to a bright and glorious year, my friends!

Happy New Year Everyone!

A new day, a new year.

Resolutions Garlore.

Now, what to do with the ziploc of 'forgot about' Christmas Cookies in the freezer?

Hmmmmm.