you be the judge

it's my birthday today.

and i may or may not be totally excited to be 28...

i may or may not still act like a kid when it comes to my age and turning another year older...

i may or may not be [im]patiently waiting for two years to go by so i can be 30...

i may or may not regret this when i'm about to turn 30...

i may or may not have pre-ordered a cd for my birthday present just because it was going to come out on my birthday...

my birthday present from ben may or may not have been off of a pallet that he bought at the auction...

said birthday present may or may not have been pens... lots of them.

that may or may not have been the best present ever...

i may or may not have had ice cream three times today...

i may or may not have totally enjoyed all the birthday wishes from my friends and family...

i may or may not have requested that we don't go out, but stay home and order pizza for my birthday...

and i may or may not have had raspberries blown on my belly from my family instead of getting birthday spankings...

i may or may not have had one of the greatest birthdays today...

you decide!

not me! monday

finally back with a not me! last monday i was NOT way too exhausted to even think about blogging. our about to be 5 year old niece did NOT come over the previous friday because her parents were out of town. she did NOT cry and whine going to bed that night. and then she did NOT wake up the next morning throwing up. i did NOT lysol, clorox wipe, and germex every furniture, surface, and hand constantly. and i did NOT do mounds of bedding and blankets. that night, thankfully, she slept awesome. it was NOT because of the heaven-sent tylenol and benadryl. the next night, however, different story. she did NOT cry and cry again. and then at 3:30, she did NOT get up repeatedly to go to the bathroom, or get a drink, or cry, or tell me about a bad dream, etc. this did NOT go on until 7am when i finally made her go sleep on the couch. she did NOT come and wake me up a little later with blood on her shirt and fingers and nose... it was NOT monday—her last day with us. that night? i did NOT sleep like a baby the whole night through!


one night, after seeing a commercial for feminine products, samantha did NOT start asking a bunch of questions about what they were for and why mommies had to use them. my dear husband, ben, did NOT tell her that they were diapers for me to wear in case i went potty in my panties... umm?! thanks hun.


and speaking of panties, my dearest daughter did NOT grab a pair of my panties, hold them up for my mother-in-law to see, and announce, "nana!! look at mommy's panties!" they were not my mesh, ruffled, hot pink panties...


my sister has NOT come to the conclusion that i am disaster prone after i unintentionally drank bleach one night. you see, the bleach dispenser on my washing machine seemed to be clogged. after the bleach (not just straight bleach, the thicker color safe bleach) finally drained, i poured some water in the dispenser to see if it would drain. it didn't. so i did NOT decide to shove a straw down the hole to see if it was clogged. i tried to blow into the straw to try to loosen up the clog. but that didn't seem to work. so in my state of stupidity, i did NOT then decide to try and unclog it by SUCKING on the straw. annnnndddd.... mouth full of bleach. i did NOT immediately spit it into the washing machine. and then rinse my mouth out. again and again. it was finally ice cream that took that awful taste out of my mouth.


go visit mckmama.com to see if there's anyone else as stupid as me... i know i'm gonna!

the scene of the crime: target

the offense: passing up a ridiculously cute, cheap pair of hot pink converse shoes.

the offender: me

yep... that's right. on monday i went to target. i had my kids with me. and my soon to be 5-year-old niece. i had time to kill before i was supposed to drop her off at my mother-in-law's house, so to target we went. i had to get ryan's medicine refilled, so as we waited for the prescription we wandered around target, each member of our posse hanging on to the cart, and touching nothing. we meandered through electronics, housewares, toys, and finally arrived at the shoes. there, before my eyes, was a whole aisle of clearanced shoes. i carefully looked them over, waiting for a pair to jump into my cart and demand that i buy them.

and then i saw them.

converse. hot pink. 75% off.

i flipped over the price tag. $4.98

$4.98!!!!

i looked at the size. girl's 2.

ugh... i wear anything from a woman's 7.5 to a 9, depending on the shoe, unlike my sister who can fit into both women's and girl's shoes. i searched through the shoes anyway, just hoping there might be a pair that would fit. and then i found them. girl's size 5.5.

i tried them on. they fit! but for some reason i was deliberating if i should buy them, when suddenly samantha piped up and said, "MOOOOOOOOMMMM!!!" (no, not oo as in moon, but a long, drawn out, said-with-an-attitude 'MOM') "WHY are you trying THOSE sneakers on?! you're NOT even a TEENAGER anymore!!!"

i took them off, put them back on the shelf, got ry's prescription, walked out the door, and drove away. (you know, after putting the kids in the car...)

* * *

back at home i tweeted my offense. i knew ashley would yell at me, but i didn't think everyone would! i guess it was evident that i WAS out of my mind.

it didn't take much to convince me that i needed to go back and buy the shoes, so the next morning we ventured out to target again. i grabbed a cart and headed straight for the shoes. after a minute of thinking they were gone, i saw them. i snatched them up and stuck them in my cart. and all wrongs were made right...

yes, ryan is kissing my shoes. i may or may not have thought of doing the same thing...

moral of the story? and i have the bestest friends! even when i mess up, they're right there to set me straight. that is, after they threaten to not be my friend, and don't want to look at me for 3 months!

oh, and don't pass up a cute five dollar pair of shoes!

wordless wednesday — target style

wordless wednesday — silly style

oh sweet memory...!

not me! monday

oh boy. where do i begin? there are just too many things that have NOT happened since my last not me! monday post. but today, i'll keep it short and sweet. er, uhhh, well just read...

last week, after the kids were in bed asleep and ben and i were about to get our nightly netflix fix (say that 5 times fast), i did NOT go to the freezer to get my nightly serving and a half of ice cream. i did NOT easily open the freezer door to a winter wonderland of snow and frost covering everthing in my packed freezer. yes... that's right—the night before when i put the ice cream away? i didn't shut the door all the way...

upon realizing this i did NOT slam the door shut, thinking that it would somehow reverse the problem, i guess. but then i decided to deal with it then and there. i started loading garbage bags with thawing frozen food and salvaging what i could. ben did NOT take over 6 bags of freezer food to the trash. and i was NOT sulking—not because we were throwing hundreds of dollars of food away, but because the ice cream was soupy and now i wouldn't be able to have any.

i started cleaning some of the ice out of the freezer (it really needed to be defrosted, too, so i guess this wasn't all bad), thinking that ben was out at the dumpster for a very long time... when finally he came back inside holding one of our [nine] quarts of soupy ice cream. he did NOT say, "hey, i was digging through the trash and this one isn't too bad. you could have some of it..." i was NOT thinking eww, gross, disgusting, but felt it anyway and it was frozen solid! i was still repelled by the thought of eating it though, thinking it had already been in the trash, when ben told me he did NOT go to the grocery store really quick to buy it for me! awwwww...... ♥

then my moment of you're so sweet got inturrupted. i looked at him, my eyes grew wide, and i did NOT say, "YOU DID NOT JUST GO TO THE STORE IN YOUR JAMMIE PANTS!!!" oh goodness. i'm sure that someday we will NOT end up on peopleofwalmart.com.

ahem.

so that was that. we enjoyed our cookie dough ice cream, netflix, went to bed, and all was well. until i woke up the next morning. the bag of frozen bread dough that i had set on the counter had NOT risen all night, exploded through the bag, and made a huge doughy mess. well thank goodness i threw it in the garbage before i went to bed—the mess was contained in the trash can! but it was quite funny to see a huge glob of dough bursting through its bag. i did NOT punch it down about 3 times before ben came home and took out that trash bag...!

and now fast forward to today. i was able to save a roast. so i decided it needed to be cooked today. i got it in the oven, left the styrofoam tray on the STOVE, and started making the kids' lunch.

yeah yeah... you're probably thinking the same thing my sister thought, ERIN! you did NOT turn the burner on did you?! no, people i am NOT that stupid (really, i am...). but my lovely daughter, smart as she is, did NOT think the bloody meat juice in the bottom of the tray was "vanilla that we use in cakes," and did NOT decide to dip her finger in for a lick. well, at least she has a little smarts—she told me she wiped her finger on the towel "because the vanilla was cold," and then licked it.

see? this is why i should NOT be entirely banned from the kitchen!

visit mckmama for more not me fun! me? i'm off to eat some roast!

it's all in the day of a mom

today, i was...

a wedding coordinator—and helped samantha get barbie ready for her big day.

an architect—and made a blanket house for ryan.

a mechanic—and fixed ry's car.

a talent scout—and listened to a never ending concert performed by samantha montantha.

a short order cook—and made an assortment of foods for lunch.

a money launderer—and found some clean coins in the washer!

an interpreter—and figured out that 'wait a minute!' can mean something entirely different to a 2-year-old.

a heartbreaker—and didn't let ry have a cookie before lunch.

an explorer—and won a game of hide and seek.

a seamstress—and altered ryry's jammies with a safety pin.

a supervisor—and oversaw (overseed?) samantha wash the dishes.

a mediator—and stopped a sibling spat seconds before it started.


today, i was... a mom!

it's like getting behind on your bills

that's how i've felt the past three weeks. first you miss one payment, then decide just to wait to pay it with next month's, and something comes up and you need the extra money for new tires or something, then you start hiding the bills so that you won't have to see them, with the hope that they'll go away...

i'm sure all of us have experienced at least something remotely close to that. and no, i'm not behind on our bills right now. but rather my BLOG, and blog reading. (i'll get caught up on everyone's blogs, i promise! i just may not comment on every post!) really i had something half written to post on january 1st, and then that obviously didn't happen, and about 5 different things to post after that. but the more i went without posting something on my blog, the more i wanted to avoid it altogether.

so here's my mass payment ramblings from the last month that have piled up in my head:

Christmas was great! i actually hope to post something on that later. (yeah, we'll just see how that plan turns out...) i learned some things this Christmas though. to name a few...

my 6 year old daughter can still wear size 4T snow pants. albeit they were a tad short, but they worked!

ryan would be satisfied with a train, a car, and an airplane for Christmas.

it's the little things that are special—a spontaneous slow dance to silent night with my husband and children, my 2 year old boy singing sentimental Christmas songs at the top of his lungs, and a homemade, hand-written, heart-shaped note from my daughter that said "i love you SO much mom."

our family does not need 10+ dozen Christmas cookies. case in point—we still have over half of them left.

spaghetti noodles can be mistaken for oral stitches, and vice versa.

i went to MN for 10 days to celebrate Christmas with my family, see my alaska gramma, and met my new grandpa! he had open heart surgery last friday and is still sedated, but getting better. thank you all for your continued prayers for him and my gramma!

my house is a complete and utter disaster. it's like getting behind on blogging—i don't know where to start. hence, i'm blogging today. yeppers, i'm making myself blog right now just so that i can procrastinate on housecleaning. it's a vicious cycle. but hey, at least my suitcase is put away and all the laundry from our trip is done!

i did something really stupid but funny the other night that deserves a post of its own. but just as a teaser, it involves me cooking mounds of food this weekend. let's hope that i don't burn down my house in the process!

samantha got me the perfect brownie pan for Christmas. it was actually very cute, because i knew that's what she was going to get for me. and when the infomercial would come on she would hint around and say, "don't you wish you had one of those, mom?!" and when we were in target one day and i was looking at a bar pan she said sternly, "mom, you don't need to get any pans for brownies or desserts because we have some at home, and maybe you'll get one for Christmas, OKAY?!" all that to say, i love my perfect brownie pan. i hope to write a review with the pros and cons, but you know how i am—in case it doesn't get blogged about, i'll tell you right now that i'd recommend it.

ryan is doing really good. he hasn't had any seizures since the last time i missed giving him his medicine. he is starting to use the right side of his body more, and is getting better at standing up and maneuvering the stairs. and he is definitely developing a mouth like his sister's—loud and never ending!


and now, i feel just a slight bit caught up. see y'all in another 22 days...!

just another day?

so let's get right down to it—it's new years eve. but to me it feels like just another day. we have no plans to do anything tonight and no parties to attend. and ben and i were never into the party/drinking scene, so this holiday probably isn't as important to us as it is to other people.

and earlier this week as i was asked a few times if i was excited for new years, i'd say "no, it's just another day..." and at the risk of sounding exactly like my dad (which isn't a bad thing!) it is just another day. it's no different than yesterday or the day before. there really isn't anything super significant about this day apart from this: (and my dad's birthday—happy birthday daddy!!!)

it's another day that i'm alive!

it's another day that i get to enjoy my husband. my daughter. and my son.

it's another day that i can experience God's love, grace, and mercy.

it's another day closer to a new year, a new beginning, a chance to start fresh.

it's another day closer to Jesus's return!

so while it is, in fact, just another day, today i rejoice—for God has granted me yet one more day.

life is fleeting. it is a vapor, a breath, a blink of an eye. so not just today, but every day, take a moment to enjoy the gift of another day! that's what i'm celebrating today!

happy new year!

not me! monday

well obviously i have NOT neglected my blog posting and reading to enjoy Christmas with my family, but now i'm back!

when i left you last, i was NOT looking forward to getting two teeth cut out. the oral surgery did NOT go great, with a little pain afterwards that has been easily remedied with advil. on Christmas Eve i did NOT slightly look like john mccain, due to swelling. and for the past three days? i have NOT had a bright yellow bruise on my cheek. but it is NOT so much better than super gluing my tooth!!

so speaking of Christmas... our plans for a lasagna dinner did NOT almost go up in flames. literally. while i was preparing said dinner, i did NOT place the box of lasagna noodles on the stove so that i could get my 9x13 pan out and i did NOT once again turn on the wrong burner, thus burning the cardboard lasagna box. and one noodle inside. i did NOT fess up and tell ben so he could lecture me before he smelled the burnt box and lecture me anyway. he did NOT come up with the brilliant idea to take all burners except one out of the stove. sounds good to me—what a great excuse not to cook!

the highlight of our Christmas with ben's family was NOT a "blush brush" that my 12 year old niece got in her stocking. i will NOT let the pictures tell the rest of the story...

yesterday it was warm enough that samantha got to go out and play in the snow. so i got her snow pants out only to realize that they were NOT a size 4T. surprisingly she fit into them. however, they did NOT come about halfway up her shins. so i did NOT lengthen the shoulder straps with ribbon and safety pins and then pull the legs down so that she could still wear them!

one of samantha's Christmas presents was a girl's day out with only mom which included dinner and getting her ears pierced. so i took her tonight to get it done, and all the way there she was talking about how excited she was, but also how nervous she was at the same time. and then she did NOT say to me in her teenager voice, "mom? i don't want a big audience there when i get my ears pierced, but i just wish dad and ryan could be there because they like just support me sooooo much and i just wish i could have a little more support there with me." i did NOT try so hard to keep from bursting out in laughter. and thankfully i did NOT succeed!

she did NOT do great and i was NOT extremely proud of her bravery. oh, and she did NOT age about 10 years. because on the way home, she was NOT constantly talking about when she'll get her driver's license and how she just wishes she could drive right now. oh boy...

before—could she be any more excited?!

after—my brave girl!

happy monday!

all i want for Christmas is my two teeth pulled

alternately titled get ready for excessive parenthesis and italics!

about a month ago i posted that i broke my tooth and had super glued it back into place.

big mistake. nope, not super gluing my tooth, blogging about it and facing y'all's (pronounced yuh-allziz) lectures about how super glue is toxic and bad for me.

well i totally appreciate your concern, but i went against all advice and kept right on super gluing my tooth! you see, this is something that i HAD to do. (stay with me here, i'll get to my point sooner or later.) almost 3 years ago i had a root canal on my molar. i didn't get a crown at the time, since i didn't have insurance or the $600 to pay for it. about a year after i had this done, a quarter of my tooth chipped off (that's the black part in the picture—yes, i made a visual aid!). and then, four weeks ago, i felt my tooth crack as i was eating. after surveying the damage, the whole side of my tooth cracked all the way down below my gums (the black line in the picture).

the whole cracked part would pull away from my filling, but wouldn't come out. (not that i wanted to pull it out—ouch!) so when i'd eat and bite down, if the cracked part of my tooth was in any way out of place, it would hurt and my gums underneath the tooth would get swollen. so i've been pulling the cracked part out from the rest of the tooth with my handy dentist pic (and with my headlight on, of course), squirt super glue down in the crevice, and temporarily attach my tooth to the filling.

this past monday i was finally going to go get my tooth pulled. but after x-raying my tooth, the dentist said he wouldn't be able to pull it because it was cracked below the gumline. so i get to have it surgically removed. yipee. (sarcasm totally intended.) and guess what? my wisdom tooth* is growing in sideways(totally horizontal), pushing against my back molar. wisdom schmisdom. so i'll have to have that surgically removed also so that it doesn't damage my other molar.

*that's right. my wisdom teeth still haven't come in yet. i'll save you all the that's why she's so dumb jokes and say this: yes, that's probably why i'm not smart enough to stop toxifying my body with super glue.

so how does this all play into Christmas? (yes, i'm finally getting to my point.) well, i'm having my oral surgery on wednesday, december 23rd.

yes, you heard me right. two days before Christmas i'm having my teeth cut out! there goes our perfect Christmas... i have memories of my sisters laying on the couch, not being able to eat anything, and basically being zombie-ish after they had their wisdom teeth removed. so now i have visions of me being the same way. ben will probably have to fix peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for Christmas lunch, i'll be on the couch drooling, and in a moment of consciousness, i'll wish my family a meh-ee chis-us.

ok, really i think i'll be fine. i'm (hopefully) gonna have our dinners pre-made and all our other Christmas preparations done ahead of time. so i'm thinking Christmas movies for two days straight! and the one good thing about this? maybe i won't eat as many Christmas cookies and candy this year!

oh who am i kidding? i'll just load up on ice cream instead!

and, in the spirit of still being able to pronounce my R's, Merry (early) Christmas!

not me! monday

it's monday... happy not me!


this week i have NOT abstained from peeking in my Christmas present(s). i do NOT want to peek so badly. and i just might NOT peek before Christmas gets here. but in other news, ben and my MIL were conspiring on the phone and searching the internet for something for me. and when they couldn't find it, i did NOT hear them say that they'd have to wait until next year. ahh! this past week has been hard enough not knowing what my presents were. how could i wait a whole year?! but last night? i figured out what it was!! i was looking for something on ebay and halfway down the page it had pictures of items recently looked at. aha!! when i asked ben about it he did NOT deny it and pretend he didn't know what i was talking about. after much interrogation he finally admitted it. ahh... sweet victory. and now i don't have to be in suspense for a year!

so if you thought the phlegm flying onto my leg was gross last week, stop reading. (don't say i didn't warn you.) as the week progressed, so did my cold. my head was so stuffy and my nose was so plugged, that one morning in the shower i did NOT blow my nose into my bare hands. nope. i definitely did NOT do that. instead i decided that not being able to breathe was better than doing something that nasty. only a man would blow green gobs of mucus into their hands, right?!

i did NOT rinse and repeat the next day. (read: i blew my nose into my hands the next morning too.)

i did NOT finish designing our Christmas cards/pictures online last week, but have yet to order them. the way i'm going, i am NOT thinking that they might end up being new year's cards...

happy monday!!

on the other hand,

this present is totally peekable...

it

all day it's been staring at me.

just me and it—whatever it is...


all alone with a pretty package and no one around.

temptation has taken hold of me.

i want want want want want to open it!!

but there's no peeking, because under a layer of pretty Christmas paper, it is hidden in a padded envelope, or so i've been told.

oh the tease that my husband wrapped it and left it out in plain sight.


argh!

how many more days do i have to wait?!

not me! monday

ben was NOT home wednesday through today due to lack of work. and in our attempt to get some things done around the house, we did NOT get side-tracked by the mess of wires behind our TV. we did NOT spend one afternoon disconnecting, labeling, re-routing, and reconnecting cords and wires. i can NOT honestly say that the back of our TV is the only organized space in the house.

samantha did NOT have the whole week off school last week. this vacation was NOT unplanned and spontaneous. i am NOT counting wii games (she has to read), farmville (science), and shopping (social studies, math) as her school for last week, simply because that's about all she did!!

last week we did NOT get the tree up, 95% of the presents bought, gifts wrapped and placed under the tree. this is NOT the earliest we've ever had this done so we are NOT way ahead of schedule this year. now i will NOT be able to spend all my free non-stressful time cleaning the house....

this morning i did NOT go and soak in the tub after i told ben i was gonna jump in the shower quick. and i did NOT put my head under the water so i would not hear the kids and feel guilty for relaxing. and then i did NOT decide to shave my legs since i'm starting to look a bit manly. i did NOT have to pick globs of hair out of the razor a few times and i did NOT have to use more than one razor to thoroughly complete the job.

and just because i like to give y'all too much information and gross you out, while in the bathtub i did NOT have a coughing fit (remember we're all sick here) and a big glob of phlegm did NOT go flying somewhere out of my mouth. a couple minutes later i did NOT finally find it on my leg...


there ya go! what have you NOT been doing lately? join in on the fun or visit mckmama for some more not me! monday therapy!