decisions, decisions

to eat ice cream, or to not eat ice cream—that, my friends, is not the question.

but rather, which kind to choose?!

tell me, which would you choose?

french silk, mint cookie crunch, mint chocolate chip, samoas, strawberry, strawberry cheesecake, vanilla, butter pecan, fudge tracks, cookie cough, peanut butter cup, southern blackberry cobbler, cherry vanilla, fried ice cream, cookies n cream, snickers, reeses, strawberry swirl, or chocolate swirl?

and of course, if you would prefer non-traditional bowl of ice cream, there's always sedona ice cream sandwiches, mini drumsticks, chocolate caramel brownie ice cream sandwiches, neopolitan ice cream sandwiches, popsicles, and ice pops.

what is your favorite kind of ice cream?

when the cat's away...

...the mice will play.

and give themselves a pudding bath.

and then when the cat comes back? the mouse will be

busted.

cat will learn to never leave mouse alone with pudding again!

moving on...

we* have moved on


*ryan

from a love of ketchup


to a love


of


barbecue sauce!

not to worry, though. ketchup has not totally left the picture. ryan can still be found dipping his apple slices into ketchup...

what are your eat-out-of-the-container, can't-live-without, must-have favorite condiments?

not me! monday

last monday i did NOT spend the whole day cleaning for family that was going to come for a visit, only to take a break to go to the grocery store. i did NOT end up coming home with 23 bags of groceries!! and in the 3.5 days that my family visited, we only ate here twice. uh huh... i do NOT have a lot of food in my house!

this past week i did NOT have a blast with my parents and my three nieces (9, 7, & 4 years old) who came for a visit. we had only a couple mishaps while they were here... it was very warm the second night they were here, so i did NOT decide to prop the front door open to cool off the house. we got the girls to bed, dealt with some homesickness, and then got the girls settled in bed again. we were sitting around chatting when i did NOT hear screaming from their room. i bolted upstairs and as i was running down the hall a black cat did NOT come running out of their room and out the front door!!! nope, a stray cat did NOT come in our open front door, go up to the kid's room, and scare the panties off 3 almost asleep overly tired little girls. needless to say, the door stayed closed from then on...

while my family was here ryan slept in our room with us. so he would NOT wake up when ben got up for work. since then his sleep habits have been way off. instead of getting up at 9-9:30, this morning he did NOT wake up before 8am. i am NOT dreading the time change this saturday and having him wake up before 7AM!!! (here is your friendly reminder... daylight savings time ends on sunday, november 1st. don't forget to set your clocks back one our this coming saturday night!)

i have NOT forgotten to give ryan his medicine about 4 nights this week. ugh. i will NOT have to start writing notes as a reminder. and speaking of ry, his neurologist did NOT fail to call me this past week, or the week before with the results from his EEG. and because i don't enjoy calling them and leaving a message for them to call me back, i did NOT decide that i'm just going to wait until his appointment this week to find out the results. besides, dr. h has an accent and i'm NOT afraid that i won't understand her over the phone! so for those of you who have been waiting for results, i will NOT get them at his neuro appointment on friday!

on saturday night we (yes. the whole family. ben included.) did NOT go to joann fabrics to get a couple things. (we were NOT there until closing time!) after we finally left the store, walked to our car, and unloaded our purchases i did NOT decide that i would give the cart a shove toward the store and let it roll there so i didn't have to push it back. well maybe it was the slight breeze, or maybe it was the downward slope of the parking lot, but the cart started going straight towards the store and then did NOT veer way to the left (right in the picture) and was headed right for one of the 5 cars in the parking lot. ben did NOT see what was happening and did NOT sprint over to the cart just to grab it right before it plowed into the side of the lady's car. the lady that was NOT just walking out of the store... i was NOT laughing my head off at what happened, and i'm sure the people that were sitting in their idling car did NOT get a good laugh either! and no, i did NOT draw a picture again just to better explain it...!

happy monday y'all. go visit mckmama for some more not me! monday fun!

musings from the pantry

i don't know how this happens or if i'm the only victim, but somehow my pantry has a way of devouring my groceries and hiding them in every crook and cranny until it's bursting at the seams and demands my attention.

so i cleaned it out the other day. and had this lovely conversation with myself while organizing...

* * *

why in the world do i have five jars of peanut butter in here? and why are three of them opened?! man, sara would be proud of me.


eww... best by april of 2006?! *trash*


chick peas. why the heck did i buy a can of chick peas?!


oh yipee—the mouse hole is still successfully patched up! gee, i hope we don't get another mouse this winter. *knock on wood*


jello anyone? you'd think i was my mom or something! i don't ever make jello so why do i have 31 boxes of jello?!


oh my goodness!!!! i almost bought three packages of jello the other day because i had a coupon...


blech! cheez its. (go ahead and judge my disliking of those cheese flavored crackers...)


oooohh! ketchup! we're almost out of ketchup!.... and jelly? why are they right next to each other? then again, why not?!


mmmmm.... ramen noodles. i bet those don't ever expire.... oh! they do expire! man, you can learn something new every day!


man, that was a great sale special k, fiber one, and pop tart sale at target. which reminds me, i still need to blog about couponing.


wow i have a lot of random thoughts. i should grab a pen and paper and write them down so that i can blog them.


note to self: don't buy special k or fiber one bars for about 3 years. or pop tarts.


i wonder how long the orderliness of this pantry is gonna last?


oh! iced animal crackers!


27 boxes of cereal in the pantry.... 27 boxes of cereal.... take one down. throw it away. 26 boxes of cereal in the pantry....


well it's good to know we won't be dying of starvation anytime soon.


note to self: don't buy anymore cereal either. or jello...


wow! i got rid of a lot stuff!! i better throw it all in the dumpster before ben gets home otherwise we'll probably end up keeping half of it!


dang, i wish i would've taken a before picture, cuz this looks WAY better now!

* * *

and now, more cleaning. tune in next week for musings from the bathroom.*

*totally kidding!

because you learned this when you were a toddler...

how to walk.

how to use utensils when you eat.

how to dress yourself.

how to drink out of a cup.

life is not very complicated as a toddler. it is not rocket science, these simple life skills that are learned at an early age. but as evidenced recently, some people need a little refresher course on one particular developmental milestone. and this is probably something that is repeatedly drilled into a toddler/young child's head: wash your hands with soap after you go potty!!!

seriously, you don't see adults crawling around, shoveling food into their face with their hands, and drinking out of a sippy cup. so for the love of mike (or bob. or jim.), please tell me why are there grown people that act like babies when it comes to common bathroom etiquette?!?

*image property of washinghands.net*

yesterday at one of my frequently visited one-stop-shopping-centers, samantha needed to use the restroom so i accompanied her and waited patiently outside the stall. i thoughtlessly sized up the bathroom situation while waiting for samantha: two other stalls were occupied. samantha exited her stall. and even though she would know to do this in her sleep, i reminded her to wash her hands.

a toiled flushed and a woman around 65-70 years old vacated her stall, walked over to the automatic sink, placed her fingertips under the water for half of a second, glanced around for the towels, then proceeded to ask me where they were.

now i have respect for my elders, so naturally i did not say what was going through my head. but come on, what would her mom have said if she was there?! i'm sure she was taught to wash her hands, right? and you'd think older people would wash their hands to avoid getting sick, right? right?!

i will have to admit that thankfully the woman was thoughtful enough to portray that she was actually washing her hands. because i can't tell you how many times i've been in a public restroom and people have flushed the toilet, walked out of the stall, and exited the bathroom without even a glance toward the sink. really people?! i don't care what your bathroom routine is at home, but please have the courtesy and take 10 seconds to wash your hands as if it's an everyday habit.

even if i go into the bathroom stall with samantha and don't actually use the toilet or touch anything, i will still wash my hands upon departure. because in all reality, i don't want to be the guest subject of any bathroom etiquette blog post!

and while we're on the subject, i have another bathroom story from our vacation this summer. our whole family went camping together, and one of the best parts about camping is the little gas station nearby that sells ice cream cones. it's a daily (if not bi-daily) occurrence for us to venture down to the gas station for some ice cream, or tea cream, as it's more commonly known in our family.

this gas station also has a washing machine and dryer, so one day i went there to do a load of stinky, skanky, smoke-ridden clothes. after getting quarters from the lone employee sitting behind the counter, i decided i'd do my hair and make up in the bathroom right down the hall in order to pass the time. just as my beautification process was about done, said employee entered the restroom, went in the stall, quickly emptied her bladder, flushed the toilet, exited the stall, and walked right out the door.

i'm sure shock was written all over my face as i couldn't believe that happened. sure, i know she didn't want to leave the store unattended for a long time, but what could've happened in the 20 seconds it would've taken her to wash her hands?! i just don't get how people can do that with witnesses present... thinking it couldn't get any worse, about 30 minutes later i went to pay for some firewood and there she was, scooping up ice cream for some poor unsuspecting family... i went back to the campsite and told the story to my equally shocked family. we didn't get ice cream from her that day...

so... have you ever experienced this kind of bathroom behavior? do you wash your hands?! do you have an interesting public restroom misconduct story? do tell! although, if you don't wash your hands, please keep that to yourself. otherwise i just might blog about you!

not me! monday

this week...

i did NOT almost put my foot in my mouth at ryan's mri appointment when i almost told one of the doctors that nurses are better than doctors!!

and speaking of his mri, i did NOT forget all about it this weekend and totally forget to call today to find out the results until ben phoned me to see if i heard anything! i am now NOT waiting patiently for dr. h to call me with the results.

we did NOT have a bug scare this weekend and have NOT taken precautionary measures and treated our cars and our house for, ahem, fleas... (that our car picked up somewhere else). my washing machine has NOT been running non-stop and my carpets have NOT ever been vacuumed this many times in one weekend!

because of the flea scare, we did NOT decide to royally clean out ben's work car. we did NOT fill over six garbage bags of trash and ben did NOT find something that he got from a job over a year ago!!

yesterday we were minus samantha, so we decided to try out a new to us hole-in-the-wall mexican restaurant. i did NOT have fajitas for the first time ever. (go ahead and judge, people.) they were NOT incredibly YUMM-Y! (why hasn't anyone ever told me how good they are?!) and we did NOT have the cutest little waiter. he did NOT remind me of a latino elmer fudd!

i cleaned out my pantry today (yea me!) and did NOT find a few items that were over 3 years expired. and i also did NOT find a sinful amount of cereal. and jello. any guesses as to how many boxes?!

you can find more not me! fun at mckmama's blog. happy monday!

how sweet it is

to enjoy the fruits of labor!


we (me, my dad, my 2 sisters, and my niece) just spent over an hour picking these luscious raspberries from my dad's garden. and in a few days we'll probably get twice as many!

worth the labor of picking them?! Mmmmm Mmmmm definitely!!

13/52 photo challenge

first of all, let me start by saying that i have slacked for the last 2 weeks on the picture of the week challenge. i will do those someday...

but as for this week, FOOD is the category. i didn't cook at all this week, except for the stouffer's pour contents of bag into the pan and heat for 15 minutes meal that i cooked tonight. ahem. so i didn't really have any foods worth capturing this week. well, except for when i went to margarita's for tacos with my sis-in-law. but i totally didn't think about taking a picture of the best tacos in the world because we were too busy talking about stellan. i digress.

instead i decided to take a picture of one of my our new favorite desserts.

one bowl of mixed frozen fruit...


topped with vanilla flavored yogurt...


and all mixed together!


YUM! it's incredibly delicious, and has also been said to taste better than ice cream! the only thing that could make this cool treat better is a nice hot warm day!

wordless wednesday

thankful thursday

today i'm thankful for:

• a toddler that let me sleep in until 9 this morning and took a good nap this afternoon
• no waiting to get an oil change
• uncovered plants that didn't freeze last night
• an uneventful grocery shopping trip and the now over-abundance of food in my pantry, fridge, and freezer
• conversations with friends
• time that i'll get to spend with my husband during his 3-day weekend
• the early late birthday present from my husband

what are you thankful for today?

thankful thursday

first of all... i don't know if someone else has come up with a thankful thursday scheme so i totally won't take credit for it. but this is something that has been on my mind for a while---that i need to be more thankful. and i should be able to come up with something every week shouldn't i?? (you're invited to do the same!)

the past week i've been trying to teach samantha about being thankful and grateful. the other night we were going to go out for dinner because it was too late to make anything scrumptious and i didn't have anything quickly fixable in the house that ben would like. so as we were getting ready to leave ben told samantha that we were going to go to the dumpster for dinner. i saw this as a great teaching opportunity and asked samantha if she though anyone would ever do that. "eewwwwww! that's so gross! no one would eat from the trash!" she said. so i explained to her that yes, some people do eat from the dumpster because they don't have food and we need to be thankful for the food we eat even when we may not like it the best and on and on.

so lesson taught and off we go. we ended up at dairy queen (which has a rep with my mom for not being very good). ben got 2 cheeseburgers and the kids and i split a chicken strip basket. long story short---the food was gross. everything tasted like it had been sitting for quite a while, the chicken and fries were cold and hard and the hamburger was pink in the middle. so i asked for a refund, got my money, we hopped in the car to go somewhere else, and right away samantha pipes up from the backseat, "mom, i thought we were supposed to be thankful for our food even when we don't like it. didn't we just talk about that tonight?? right??"

oh crap. i hate it when my daughter teaches ME a lesson. (but at least i know she was listening to me earlier...) so i apologized to her about not being thankful for my food and so on and then ben proceeded to tell her that if the food was free we would've eaten it and been thankful for it but we had to pay a lot of money and if we threw away the food we would've been wasting our money and dairy queen needs to know that the food wasn't good so that they don't keep making it that way. whew! (yes i know that was a run-on sentence) he made me feel a little better after saying that, but i still learned a lesson from my 5 year old.


so all that said, here's what i'm thankful for today: food! it's not number 1 on my list, but it goes along with the story! i have a fridge full of food right now. my freezers are plumb full and i have so much stuff in my pantry that there is some stuff i can't even see. i am thankful for food. food that is not dug out of a dumpster or trash can because my family is hungry. food that is fresh and healthy. food that is warm on a chilly day. food that i have chosen. food that is not hazardous to our health. food that satisfies our appetites. even food that is gross from dairy queen! we are so blessed.

my own little cookie monster

i gave ryan a golden oreo today and went in the other room to do something. he's usually good with eating food by himself, but when i came back i found this messy boy!

i think he was laughing at me because i had to do the clean up!