Theme Thursday: Kids (Mine, Yours, Theirs…)

Theme Thursday is a weekly happening where bloggers come together and link up their takes on a theme chosen by Jenn at Something Clever 2.0.  This week’s theme is Other People’s Kids. 

I readily admit that I had a lot of trouble doing this week’s theme post.  It wasn’t necessarily the topic.  After all, I work with kids.  I went to school to work with kids.  I like kids a lot!  After playing around with a lot of different things, I finally just started writing what came out of my head easiest.  I don’t think this post is really about other people’s kids anymore.  Oh well, I’m ADD, remember?  And my throat is really sore.  And my own kid won’t poop.  I’m a little distracted.

Sometimes I can’t help but shake my head at some of the stuff I’ve seen.  Don’t worry, my kids are the cause of some of the head shaking.

This one has raised an eyebrow or two.

My kids certainly aren’t perfect.  I’m sure that people that don’t know me have passed judgement on my kids and/or me on a number of occasions.  I feel like I’m not qualified to judge on other kids and how that kid is acting at that particular time.  I don’t know what their situation is, or if their children have special needs, or if maybe the kid just needs a nap really badly.

I never miss an opportunity to use this picture!!!!

I’m sure that people wonder what the hell is going on when my kids are throwing a tantrum in Target.  The truth is I probably told them no and they aren’t getting their way.  Imagine that!  Sometimes though, there is stuff I see that just screams to be made fun of.  Like this:

The sad thing is that I’ve seen this in real life. More than once.

After all, we do live in an era where shows like “Toddlers and Tiaras” has viewership.  All I can think when I see references to it is “What are you people smoking???” Never seen the show, never will.  My daughter is referred to in this blog as Princess Whatever-We-Are Calling-Her-That-Day.  We strive to make sure she believes that she is NOT a princess.

There is no royalty in our house, though she thinks she is the queen.

Today Princess It’s-All-About-Me announced to me that she no longer likes princesses.  She likes kitties.  That is fine with me, other than the fact that I have now had to sit through Aristocats four times in the last month.

My daughter. She thinks she is all that… I may call her Princess here, but we don’t let her think she’s one!

We really try to make our kids NOT be spoiled brats.  Sometimes they can be very trying.  We have to have a sense of humor about this stuff.

I can’t imagine where they get it from… Evil Genius in the fort he made.

But really, when you think about it, there are some pretty historically bad parents.  These parents make some of today’s parents pale in comparison.  Like Joan Crawford.  Or Darth Vader…  Think about how their kids turned out.

The truth is, no matter how good of a parent you are, no matter what you are doing, there is going to be someone who is going to disagree and tell you that your are totally raising your kids wrong.  I was born in the seventies.  We grew knowing the Bill Cosby style of parenting.  Now that’s probably considered wrong!  You can’t yell “Let the beatings commence!” or say “Let me describe the brain damage.”anymore without getting some seriously judgemental looks.

I’m not judging.

So in summary… unless it’s something totally, utterly wrong, I’m not going to be openly judging you, or your kids.  I’m nice like that.

Be sure to check out all of the posts at the Theme Thursday link up.

It’s Gonna Be EPIC

People just keep giving me awards.  In the blogging world, receiving an award is rarely something that you just take the trophy and go home.  There’s often quite a bit of work involved.  Thinking of (interesting) random facts about oneself, questions to ask, and answers to questions that one has been asked as well as figuring out who to tag or nominate for the award.  For example, recently I received two awards as well as a blog challenge on the same day..  Historically I’m not very good at getting these done right away. It’s been a little while now and am just now getting this done.  This is due to several reasons:
1)  I’m working.
2)  I can’t find enough interesting stuff about me to share.
3)  I have a hard time choosing bloggers to nominate because I a) don’t want to annoy anyone who doesn’t like these awards b)  It seems that many of my blogging buddies have already received these awards c)  I follow a ton of people and hate to play favorites.
4)  I am historically bad about doing this
Basically I am having an anxiety attack over the whole thing, and this is not supposed to be something that is stressful, right?

So bear with me here as I humbly try to accept the following awards that have been so graciously bestowed upon me!  When nominating other blogs, I tried to pick the ones that I read often, that aren’t the blogs with 3,287,095 followers (in other words, the littler guys that deserve lots of attention!).  If you have been nominated, you don’t have to do anything unless you want to.  My feelings will not be hurt.  Like I said, it’s a lot of work to follow up on these!

Epically Awesome Award of Epic Awesomeness

Meg at Just A Little Nutty was sweet enough to award me this award with one of the coolest award names I’ve seen!  I thought that was really sweet!  If you haven’t visited her blog yet you should!  .

The rules are simple:
Nominate 10 bloggers that you think deserve this.
Provide 10 random facts about yourself.

Oh boy, are there any facts left to divulge?  I think I’m going to have to cheat on this one, and link to some of my previous fact revelation sessions.  You can read all about it here and here and here.

Here’s some that I love that might just very well be, well, epic. And I didn’t nominate 10 people.  I really can count, I just picked a few of the bestest…

Menopausal Mother–I just can’t help but love this lady!  She is one awesome friend as well as funny as all get out!  She’s also famous-she was in the Circle of Moms Top 25 Funny Mom Blogs.  If we lived closer to each other there would be mischief aplenty.  Plus, I don’t think she has this award yet so I’m sure she’s very excited!
Cloudy, With A Chance of Wine-I can’t get enough of this woman.  She can turn anything into an entertaining story.
Mod Mom Beyond Indiedom  She is talented.  She is cool.  I like her.  She is epic.
Don’t Chew on the Dinner Table  A long time ago I happened upon this blog.  I thought the name was neat!  The blog is neat too.
Baking in a Tornado-She rocks.

The Sunshine Award

Apparently Valerie at Atlanta Mom of Three thinks I am a ray of sunshine.  How sweet she is!  I enjoy her blog a lot-she is a homeschooling mom of three lovely children.  She also lives near one of my best friends, so I hope someday when I go to visit him I’ll get to hang out with her for a day!  If I was allowed to tag her back for this one, I would.

To accept the award I am supposed to answer these 10 questions, and nominate 10 other bloggers for the award.

1. What’s your favorite color? Purple
2. What’s your favorite animal? Cats
3. What’s your favorite number? 2.  I don’t know why.  Maybe because one is the loneliest number and three’s a crowd?
   
4. What’s your favorite non-alchoholic drink? Diet Sunkist Lemonade
   
5. Facebook or Twitter? I do both.  I like Facebook because I am a visual person.  I like Twitter because I seem to be able to reach a broader audience.
   
6. What’s your passion? Writing.
7. What’s your favorite pasttime? Scrapbooking, even though I haven’t done much lately.
8. What’s your favorite day of the week? I really don’t have one, honestly.
   
9. What’s your favorite flower? Irises
10. What’s your favorite season? I like Fall because of the weather-just cool enough to wear sweatshirts but not too cold yet!
    

Who makes me smile?  Who makes me laugh?  WHO is a ray of sunshine in my life?  A few blogs that I have recently started reading:

Big A Little a  Certainly a ray of sunshine, her kids are funny!  I think that we could get our families together and have lots of fun!
Stacy Sews and Schools– She blogs, she sews, she homeschools, what is there that this chica cannot do?  Incredibly cute projects and great homeschooling resources (I want to go to school at her house).
Motherhood is an Art– I do believe Melissa’s blog has the award for getting the most awards from me.  She is indeed a ray of sunshine, as are her children.
Funny is Family-Smiles and laughs aplenty here!
One Funny Motha-She knows big words.  She’s also, well, funny!

I was nominated for the same award by two different bloggers around the same time.  Menopausal Mother and Mom’s World both picked me to receive the Very Inspiring Blogger Award.  This is nice, because I sure have not felt very inspiring these days.

The rules:
1.  Display award image on your blog page.
2.  Link back to the person who nominated you.
3.  State 7 facts about yourself.
4.  Nominate 15 other bloggers for the award.
5.  Notify the bloggers that they have been nominated and link to their posts

Seven facts, see the here and here and here…

Inspiring People:

Julie Deneen of Life According to Julie and Fabulous Blogging:  She is an incredible inspiration for those coming into the blogging community!  I want to be her friend, don’t you?
Kelli Stapleton of The Status Woe:  A Mom who searches tirelessly for help for her autistic daughter, Issy.  She makes me all verklempt.  Want to help or just know more?  In addition to reading her blog, find Team Issy on Facebook and Twitter and follow along!
Kathy of Kissing the Frog:  She has faced what most parents fear most-she has lost a child to cancer.  She blogs about the funny and the serious-you’ll laugh and cry right along with her.

The Liebster Award

I received the Liebster award from Mama Lola at Bear and Lion Mama.  If I remember correctly, I have received this one four other times.  🙂

The rules for this one are:
1. Each blogger should post 11 random facts about themselves.
2. Answer the questions the tagger has set for you, then create 11 new questions for the bloggers you pass the award to.
3. Choose 11 new bloggers (with less than 200 followers) to pass the award to and link them in your post.
4. Go to their page and tell them about the award.
5. No tag backs.

11 facts, choose an old post that I linked to with the word “here” above.

This one also came with questions, which I will attempt to answer…

1. fave flower:  Violet
2. fave colour: Purple!
3. fave season:  Fall.  I love hoodie weather, and usually in fall you don’t have to deal with all of the mud!
4. if you could have dinner with anyone dead, who would it be:  Oooooo….ummmmm…maybe Mozart? I just want to see what he was like in real life.
5. fave vacation destination:  I haven’t taken a vacation since I was married other than the NASCAR race in Kansas.  I don’t feel like I’m qualified to have an opinion!
6. how many hours do you sleep a night:  Six to seven.  I spend a lot of time waiting for various people in my house to fall asleep, therefore I stay up too late!
7. how many hours do you spend blogging a day:  Before I started this sub job, 2-3 hours a day.  Now maybe an hour whenever I can squeeze it in!
8. fave chore:  Chores?  I don’t do CHORES!  😉
9. which do you prefer to drive, standard or automatic:  Automatic.  I am not coordinated enough to drive a stick.
10. fave book:  The Princess Bride by William Goldman.  It’s the book the movie was based upon.
11. least fave kinda music:  RAP.  Ick.

I am very much bad about finding new blogs these days, so my choices are few.  Up and coming bloggahs, drumroll PLEASE…

Black Sheep Mom-Her blog is so new it’s still shiny.  It has that new blog smell.  And NINE kids.  Yes, I’d like to nominate her for sainthood.
Muffins and Mocha-I am guilty of not making many comments on her blog, but not for lack of interest.  She is a prolific gal-her blog posts are short but full of great stuff.  Show her a little love and go check her out.  🙂

Remember this? The I-Don’t-Remember-What-The-Award-Is Award?

I think there was one more.  Wasn’t there one more?  I’ve gone through all of my comments, Twitter posts,  and my Facebook posts.  If you gave me an award and I didn’t acknowledge it, PLEASE let me know! 😉  And if you’re sad I didn’t mention your blog, or are jealous of all the attention your bloggy friends are getting from me, I don’t like to play favorites.  I would love to acknowledge you in some way-just let me know.  Not like I have a lot of influence, but it’s always nice to be noticed, huh?

And my blogger friends and I have been talking.  Yes, with real words and everything.  We think there need to be some new awards out there, with perhaps a different set of things to do and a different set of rules.  So keep your eyes peeled for that.  Ew, I’ve always used that expression but never really thought about what it meant before…

Wordless Wednesday: Ice Ice Baby

With the weird winter weather this week, snow and ice are on my mind.  This is from a couple of years ago when we had a ton of snow.  The icicle is probably at least as long as my son is tall if not more so!

We Can’t Just Shop Like Normal People

It seems that these days we can’t do anything like normal people-everything we do turns into a story.  Take this weekend when we went shopping.  This was because Evil Genius needed pants.  More specifically, he needed jeans that weren’t torn and stained.  Since we had our income tax return and a little time yet before we had to part with the majority of it, we decided we’d take the plunge and go get this taken care of.  I must clarify that he does not wear just any jeans.  Levis 550s are the only ones that he really likes and that actually hold up for a long time.  They are very hard to find in the right size-apparently there must be lots and lots of guys running around in the same size that he wears.  He’s so darn specific-because of this we decided to go straight to the big malls in Des Moines instead of hitting the little one in Ames.  Included in our adventure was child stealing and the possibility that my husband may become a Werecat.

In addition to shopping for jeans, we also went shopping for dresses and leggings for Princess Tantrum too.  This is because she is still trying to squeeze into a couple of 4Ts that are obviously way too small for her.  So did we buy any dresses? No.  Princess Tantrum walked into JCPenney, walked right up to a t-shirt with a big sparkly strawberry on it and said “I want this one.”  Never mind the fact that she has five t-shirts coming from Old Navy.  But this one was sparkly!

And there was other stuff…

I am still disappointed that the people that work at “The Gold Guys” are not actually gold people.  You know, like C-3PO.

The Professor was mesmerized by a slice of pepperoni pizza the size of his head that a little girl was eating.  He almost walked right into it.

Princess Tantrum thinks the “Justice” store is the most beautiful thing on Earth.  Everything is sparkly and there are so many lights.  She was disappointed to find out that she’s not actually big enough to wear the clothes just yet.  She’s planning on eating extra so she can start shopping there very soon.  I’ll take it-her other favorite store is Victoria’s Secret, because of all the sparklies on the bras.  I am very concerned about this child.

Do they actually sell guys shirts at Hollister?  I’m just wondering since all of their guys in the giant pictures are not wearing shirts.  I dared Evil Genius to strip his shirt off and go in there.  He declined.

I think I was stealth perfumed at Younkers.  How do they do that?

Evil Genius was disappointed that he went ahead and shaved when we saw a place that specialized in shaving.  One of the guys working in there had a handlebar moustache.  I think there was a bit of facial hair envy going on right then and there.

Princess Tantrum proved that she cannot walk through walls when she walked into a sign.  This was after she almost walked into about 15 other things.  Malls are apparently very interesting places.

I accidentally tried to steal someone’s child.  I grabbed who I thought was Princess Tantrum as we were walking through Scheels and told her to please move out of people’s way.  Only it wasn’t my daughter-it was another little girl about the same size as her, with about the same color of hair, who was also wearing a pink shirt.  Her mother acted horrified.  I’m not sure why because I gave her right back.

And the Werecat?  Evil Genius was attacked by a cat at the Animal Rescue League.  We stopped in just to look, and the last cat we visited with apparently was a wee bit overstimulated.  He set the cat on my lap and when Princess Tantrum reached down to pet him he went berserk.  There was screaming and hollering-then the ARL ladies whisked the kitty away.  As it turned out, the cat scratched him all over on his one hand.  Luckily, Princess Tantrum got nary a scratch on her, thank goodness.  Evil Genius swears he’s ok.  I pointed out that if he suddenly grew a lot of hair and started howling at the moon that would be when I’d start to worry.  He had another theory.  He figured symptoms would most likely include hissing at people, licking himself a lot, and falling asleep on fleece blankets.

We did find him jeans.  In fact we found him four pairs.  That never happens!

Can you say better late than never?  I signed up for this website MONTHS ago.  I had good intentions-I started to add this to my blog and then got distracted.  Gee, imagine that?  I am now trying harder to get myself out there, so take just a few seconds and click on the Top Mommy Blogs badge in my sidebar to vote for me on Top Mommy Blogs.  The more, the merrier!   You can vote for me once a day.  Just click and you’re done.  Visit, click, done.  How easy is that?

(I wanted to put a banner at the bottom of each post, but naturally I can’t figure out how to do it.  Advice, anyone?)

The Where Did My Week Go Roundup

I think I need one of these in my house.

I’m not being sarcastic about the weekend.  What a week!  And where did it go?  It seems like it was just last weekend.  That’s not necessarily a bad thing.  Three weeks in and four or five to go on the sub job.  Meanwhile, I did some writing this week:

Monday  Not So Deep Thoughts By Me  I could not form complete blog posts, therefore I shared random thoughts.  And signs.  Funny signs.

Tuesday  A Man, A Plan, And A Stache  He insists there was no plan, but there was definitely a stache.

Wednesday  Wordless Wednesday: Is Spring Here Yet?  Is it?  REALLY, is it???

Thursday  Theme Thursday-Things I Love So Much I Want To Marry Them  I rehash and update an oldie but a goodie for Theme Thursday.

Friday The Snowmaggedon That Wasn’t, And Other Unfortunate Events   We were supposed to have a monster snowstorm, but instead we got more of a muppet storm.

Favorite Posts This Week
I loved them all. You are all my favorites.

Best search engine terms this week
Molly Ringwald hates Winona Ryder  FIGHT!  FIGHT!

Did Ward Cleaver dye?  I don’t know, does he like bold colors?

poo drink Ew.

Turkish Grandpa Toilet  ?????

Regressive python song  When have I ever referred to a python in my blog?  And how is a python regressive?  Now I’m curious what song is out there about regressive pythons.

I pee my pants  There’s a song in that somehow…

I got spammed
I’m used to getting some spam comments every day, but lately they have been almost hurtful.  Telling me my blog used to be interesting but now its not in totally imperfect grammar. That’s just what I need-robot critics.  Oh, and I also got a come on to go buy some Cialis.  Let me just grab my wallet.

Next week
Before I publish this and sit down to watch the one and only NASCAR race I’ll probably get to see this year due to my no satellite situation in my house, I suppose I’ll give you a preview of what is coming up this next week.  I’d like to say that you will see genius writing flow from my laptop like you’ve never seen before.  HA HA HA-no.  I really really really cross my heart hope to die stick a needle in my eye promise to finish my award post sometime next week.  I also will tell the tale of how I almost stole someone’s child and why my husband may become a WereCat.  I’m writing a post about butts-seriously. Theme Thursday deals with O.P.K.  You’ll just have to stay tuned to find out what the heck I’m talking about, now won’t you?  Meanwhile, you enjoy the rest of your weekend and the beginning of your week, however long or short it may be.

Can you say better late than never?  I signed up for this website MONTHS ago.  I had good intentions-I started to add this to my blog and then got distracted.  Gee, imagine that?  I am now trying harder to get myself out there, so take just a few seconds and click on the Top Mommy Blogs badge in my sidebar to vote for me on Top Mommy Blogs.  The more, the merrier!   You can vote for me once a day.  Just click and you’re done.  Visit, click, done.  How easy is that?

(I wanted to put a banner at the bottom of each post, but naturally I can’t figure out how to do it.  Advice, anyone?)

The Snowmaggedon That Wasn’t, and Other Unfortunate Events

They told us to expect feet of snow…

They called it “Snowmaggedon”.  They told us to batten down the hatches.  We were going to get feet of snow.  Travel would be impossible.  We were all going to die.  For someone like me who only appreciates the first snow of the year and the potential to reenact Calvin and Hobbes “Snowman House of Horrors” when we have large amount of snow, I wasn’t looking forward to it.  Not only was I not gleefully anticipating the snow, I was fretting about the fact that this was the first year that I’ve had to drive to make it to work in snow AND figure out childcare arrangements for a kid in a long time.

But let’s back up a minute to what happened BEFORE the storm.  A storm of a different kind.  We had a series of unfortunate events that made me look like a total blithering idiot.

We had a snafu with my phone the day before the alleged storm.  Two days in a row, the sitter had tried to contact me and strange things had happened.  The first day I had not plugged the charger into the portal on my phone in all the way, so it shut off.  I discovered this that morning as I was getting ready to leave.  I grabbed it and plugged it into my car and let it charge, figuring I’d turn it on after it had a little juice, because it was deader than a doornail.  When we arrived, she asked me if we had got her message.  I felt so bad.  It was nothing at the time-her son had been sick and she was on alert just in case she had to cancel (like if he spiked a fever or got worse).  I went to work, and turned on the phone with a partial charge to see her message-she had texted me.  I meant to text her back and tell her that it had been an isolated weird thing, that I almost always get texts and that was the best way to reach me.  I must have started the message three times when I was on my break, but kept getting interrupted by phone calls.

The next morning, the day of the supposed superstorm, we arrived at her house and there was no one there.

(To clarify things, this time my phone was on…)

So here we were, 40 minutes before I had to be at work a half hour away, with two confused kids.  The Professor was freaking out-no so much because his routine had changed, but because he didn’t get to eat a second breakfast at the sitter’s house.  Princess Difficult was mad because we were in the car and not going anywhere.  After all, it was her fourth day of being the Shining Star at school and she was missing out on important time where everyone is focused on her!  There was whining and complaining and crying.  I pulled back into my driveway, turned around and told them sternly:  “No one is getting out of the car.  Everyone is going to be quiet while I try to FIGURE THIS OUT!!!!!”

And then there was silence.  Thank you.

I began the work as only an expert in miscommunication can do effectively:  1)  I texted my husband and asked him if she said anything the night before.  No.  2) I scrolled through my missed calls and found out that I was never informed by my phone of this missed call or message.  Stupid phone.  I am still not 100% sure of what happened, but obviously her son was pretty sick.  3)  I called work, explained what happened, and told them I would be in as soon as possible.  4) I emailed the school, and let them know that my son would be coming to and fro on a different bus.  5)  I texted the sitter, telling her I hoped everything was ok with her poor kid, and that texting really is the best way to get a hold of me.  FINALLY, I went in, got both of the kids a waffle, and we got to the school, parked,  and waited until The Professor could be dropped off.

Meanwhile, while I was panicking over this, everyone else was panicking over the giant storm coming to kill us all.

Ohhhhh nooooo… they’re coming for us…

The Professor went to the middle school to wait for his bus at 8 am sharp, the earliest time he could be dropped off.  The Princess and I went to preschool.  We were there a whole 3 and a half hours.  This was because the monster storm scared every school into closing early.  Our school, one that rarely closes early, rarely delays,  and rarely cancels decided to let the kids out at 1:15.  Since I have to take a break anyway and have to be home not long after that, I left at noon.  Besides, I’m scared of driving in snow.  When you drive a car into a ravine when you are young and total it in snowy weather, you tend to be a BIT leery of such weather.  But that’s another future post…

So we rushed home.  Princess Difficult was OBVIOUSLY in need of a nap-she was pretty impossible to deal with. I made her lay down on the couch and she slept for a very long time.  The Professor came home and is even quiet for a change (whispering is not one of his strong suits.)

Meanwhile, I kept looking outside the living room window, waiting for this massive snowfall to start.  It was supposed to come so fast and so suddenly that people would be stranded and not able to go anywhere.  I worried about Evil Genius getting home.  I worried about losing power.  I worried about having enough caffeine to get me through the next few days that we would be stranded.

There was not a flake.  I was getting mad at the weather.

Or something like that…

Evil Genius came home around 4 pm.  Still no snow.  I kept checking.  Finally at almost 6 pm a gentle little snow shower started.  Not too terrible, just some snow.  Really?  You got us all worked up for this?  Surely some schools around the area are feeling REALLY stupid.

I should have listened to the meteorologist.  One of the children in the preschool has a father that works for the National Weather Service.  He had told me earlier in the week that he thought it wasn’t the big deal they were making out of it…  That night on the news, the weather guy seemed almost disappointed.  Crestfallen, he says “We have some light snow falling around the metro area.”

Yet the schools continued to be fooled.  They all delayed the next morning, compounding things for everyone.  Maybe it was a little tricky, but it really wasn’t what the soothsayers had foretold.

I’m not a big fan of winter, but COME ON!  Don’t tease us with tales of killer snow.

Another kind of killer…

Theme Thursday: Things I Love So Much I Want To Marry Them

It’s Theme Thursday!  Each week Jenn at Something Clever 2.0 selects a theme and we faithfully follow by writing a post about it.  This week’s theme is “Things I Love”, which is FABULOUS because I have already written such a post-naturally I figured why not repackage it into a Theme Thursday post!

Theme Thursday:  Kid tested, mother approved, or something like that.

I know what you’re thinking-Oh hell no, not THIS post again.  I just reblogged it not that long ago, but hey, it IS slightly different from the last two and I spelled “zinfandel” right this time!  I’m actually hoping you are a new follower and are reading this for the first time instead of the third as many (ok, a few people.  Really it’s probably only two people). Upon rewriting this post, I was bitterly disappointed that I couldn’t find a video clip of Pee-Wee Herman saying “If you love it, why don’t you marry it?  Heh heh!”  I actually despise Pee-Wee, but I can’t help but think of that whenever I hear that phrase.  There are a few things that I love, besides my husband, kids, and family, of course!  You could say that I love them so much I might marry them, only I am already married and that would be wrong…

Sooooo, you ask, what do I love?  Hang on, I’m going to tell you!

Diet Sunkist Lemonade Mmmmmmm, I keep saying I’m going to quit, but I keep going back.  Some might say I am addicted.  I say I just like lemonade.

Neutrogena Pear and Green Tea Body Wash  It’s like a little spa in my shower.  It smells so good, I look forward to showering so I can smell it.  Is that weird?

Dark chocolate  It’s health food, right?  I like the really dark stuff, but not so dark it’s bitter.  Dove dark chocolate with almonds rocks.  Hershey’s used to make a very dark chocolate that had blueberries, cranberries, and some sort of nut in it.  In a pinch I’ll settle for milk chocolate, but I prefer the dark stuff.

My Ipod I have a 16 gig ipod.  My music is extremely important to me.  I don’t make big purchases very often, but this one was well worth it.  I like the fact that I still have room to put more of my favorite songs on it.  I have some pretty weird taste in music-it’s so nice to be able to listen to what I want when I want it.

Footwear:  Tevas for warm weather, Merrells in cold weather  Or as my husband calls them, weird shoes.  I don’t care!  I’m not a “shoe” person.  I’m all about comfort, and it’s very rare that I wear anything but highly comfortable footwear.  I own Tevas in three different colors, and Merrells in two.

Tie-dye  It’s obvious that I love tie-dye, all you have to do is see the profile pic that I use virtually everywhere!  I don’t know what it is about it, I just love it.  Maybe it’s the uniqueness of each piece, no two are ever exactly alike, kind of like snowflakes.  Note:  I was wearing tie-dye long before it was considered in fashion.

Method products  All natural, non-toxic, and affordable!  I can’t stand to breathe in any kind of fumes when I clean.  I don’t exactly need excuses not to clean.  These smell so good-though my husband claims the green antibacterial cleaner smells like pee (I disagree).  The Lavender is my favorite.

Neutrogena Body Lotion  In addition to the great smelling body wash, we have the great smelling body lotion.  I don’t wear cologne, except once in a great while.  I don’t feel I have to-this stuff smells so good.  I buy the super duper giant bottle and it lasts me a very, very long time.

Sutter Home White Zinfandel  I have been spelling the word “zinfandel” incorrectly for years, which is sad since I love this kind of wine.  It’s my little weekend delight-at the end of every week I get to savor a glass or two of this good stuff.  I must admit it’s not my very favorite, but when I can buy a huge bottle at Target for $11 every few weeks I’ll take it!

I don’t have cheese with my wine OR my whine.

Relax Riesling  When I’m feeling wealthier this stuff is wonderful.  This is my very favorite wine.  Also, the bottle looks really cool on your table.  Win win.

Incense/candles/scentsy/stuff that makes your house smell awesome  Self explanatory.

Yes I love some pretty incredible things.  What do you love?

Now that you are rolling your eyes at me, go to Something Clever 2.0 under Theme Thursday and check out what other people love.  Heck, maybe you want to be amazing and write a super quick post about the stuff that you love and link up before Thursday is over and done! Really, I’m not going to stop you.

Wordless Wednesday: Is Spring Here Yet?

I was searching through my pictures trying to come up with a photo for Wordless Wednesday when I came across this one.  We have a 100% chance of snow this Thursday.  I remember buying this pinwheel while wanting warm weather to come so we could enjoy it.  She was so ready to go outside to use this!

A Man, A Plan, And A Stache

Not this stache…

Once upon a time in Iowa there was a man and his progressive facial hair.

That’s right, this year Evil Genius decided to grow a beard.  This is not the first beard he has attempted, but it was the most successful beard thus far (as far as beard successes go).  I’m not a huge fan of beards, but even I have to admit I liked it.  It helps that I love the man underneath it, so I’m kind of biased.

As 2013 progressed into February, he volunteered to represent his department at the company booth at the collegiate career fair this year.  Some brilliant person decided that this year it should be a seventies theme.  Therefore since he always gives 150% to his career he decided that his facial hair should go along with the theme.  The result? The 70s pornstache.

Who WOULDN’T want to look like someone from Anchorman?

Now all photos of him in the 70s outfit are, as far as I know, utter top secretness.  I have, however, substituted the above picture of Brian Fantana from Anchorman.  I understand that their booth at the fair was a raging success, but who wouldn’t love a booth with a disco ball?  Yes you saw that right, there was a disco ball.

I did take one picture of him with it, but I was laughing so hard as I attempted to take it that it didn’t turn out as well as he would have liked.  Considering he has threatened to grow a handlebar moustache on several occasions, I was really okay with the pornstache.

The very next day after the career fair he shaved it, and the pornstache that used to be became nothing but a memory… it was quite a shock to see him those next few days without any hair on his face.  I understand that several people that he works with were very sad that he did away with it.

Does your significant other have or has ever tried to grow a beard or moustache?  Were the results delightful or comical?  Please share…

Oh all right, I won’t keep you in suspense.  Here is the only existing photo that I have actual permission to share.  I even told him he was the subject of today’s blog post and he insisted I include the actual picture I took.  He would also like everyone to know that despite the title of this post, there was no actual plan, just a man and a stache…

Yep, he is all mine…

Not So Deep Thoughts By Me

Random, like this post.

I’ve been trying to piece together an actual blog post.  However I’m having some sort of severe anxiety attack tonight so I guess it’s not going to happen.  I’ve been trying to finish an award post and can’t.  Two other posts I would like to finish are sitting with random sentences.  The words are not flowing and the ideas are not forming the way I would like them.  On the other hand, my Fly on the Wall post for next month is already written.  Is that sad?  So instead of a regular post I present you with some random thoughts I have had recently.  And signs, because they’re funny:

I bought Secret deodorant.  Today I noticed that it was an “Invisible Solid”.  If it’s invisible then why can I see it?

Who made the decision that some of the boxes of Valentines should have only 16 cards in them?  How did they arrive at the number 16?  Or 32 for that matter?  I’d like to see the mathematical formula they used to come up with that.

Recently someone called The Opinionated Man started following my blog.  I had to check to make sure it wasn’t my husband.  It wasn’t.

I learned the hard way:  never, ever, ever try to save money by buying the basic Venus razor cartridges instead of the Venus Divine.  My legs feel like someone rubbed sandpaper all over them.

Who gets zits on their neck?  Apparently I do.

Am I really immature for laughing hysterically at Superhero Movie?  What’s worse is that I will never be able to attend a funeral now…

It’s very hard to feel sexy when you’re wearing a Hello Kitty band-aid on your finger.

The check engine light is on in my car.  Ok, there’s nothing funny about that…

Have a great start to your week!  I hope to be writing actual posts again soon…