AHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!

I came over to shut the computer off for the day and it dawned on me...I DIDN"T BLOG!

I made it....29 days and to blow it on the last day! YIKES!!!

So obviously I didn't have the most stellar end of challeng post planned.

November might not be the best month for this. Perhaps January or March...when things are moving somewhat slower and thoughts have a chance to catch up with themselves.

Regardless I did it. I rambled on every day for a month.

Mission accomplished.

Did I mention I was a bit competitive?

Sick

Seriously.

I am 10 days past surgery and honestly really just starting to have periods of time where I actually feel pretty good.

Then SLAM!

Stomach flu.


I have it as does my 2 year old and my 4 year old. My 8 year old has flown the coup to a friends...perhaps she should move in.

NOW the Christmas season starts

Did you eat enough yesterday???

IMO it is now officially time to pack up those turkeys, pumpkins, fall leaves and bring on the fla la la la! In honor of that I borrowed this from Amy's blog...who borrowed from somewhere else.....so I guess.....if you want to borrow....go ahead!


1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? I like gift bags if there are multiple parts of the gift and wrapping paper for the one item type. Not that I'm picky. ;)
2. Real tree or Artificial? I would prefer real, but I don't want to clean up after it or water it every day, so artificial with evergreen candle it is!
3. When do you put up the tree? Usually the weekend after Thanksgiving
4. Do you like eggnog? EWWWW
5. Favorite gift received as a child? a bike!
6. Hardest person to buy for? DH's Mom & Dad
7. Easiest person to buy for? my older kids
8. Do you have a nativity scene? YES
9. Mail or email Christmas cards? I usally mail, I do NOT like email type. Lame.
10. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? wool sweater when living in a climate where you simply didn't not need to wear wool...ever.
11. Favorite Christmas Movie? Oh man where do you start????
11. When do you start shopping for Christmas? after Thanksgiving
12. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? no
13. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? pretty much everything....there in lies the problem
14. Lights on the tree? well yeah!
15. Favorite Christmas song? Oh Holy Night
16. Travel at Christmas or stay at home? travel but not far
17. Can you name all of Santa’s reindeer? Yuppers!
18. Angel on the tree top or a star? Angel
19. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? Morning..
20. Most annoying thing about this time of the year? Long Lines and Grid Iron Parking.
21. What theme or color are you using? None in particular
22. Favorite for Christmas dinner? crown roast or steak
23. What do you want for Christmas this year? a massage chair, wheely chair or a cruise. :)

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!!!!!!

Last Day

Day 7 of the healing. The doc said 7-10 days of healing before slooowwwly returning to work. Guess he wasn't kidding. I have done my best to just sit and heal as much as possible these last 7 days....because tommorow we go pick up the little girls!!! I can hardly wait! It also means that full time resting and healing comes to a bit of an end. Still planning to take it very slow, no worries.

Can't wait to see those little girls! I need a little armed hug like you can't believe.

So, what is your favorite Thanksgiving dish? That one thing you HAVE to have.

For me its non gibblet stuffing. I just don't make stuffing any other time of the year for whatever reason, so I have to have it. Oh, and apparently mashed potato's too. One year my sister and mom thought cheezy potato would me a fun change.





It wasn't.

Boot straps

Pulling mine up.

I have friends bringing me lunch today! That is very happy!!

My husband has been a champ during all this. (ignoring the vacume in living room that I'm not suppose to move...he DID use it so dwelling on that...eventually it will be put away)

My Mom and Dad too for taking care of my little ones all this time.

Oh....I found this on anothers blog....its interesting

HowManyOfMe.com

There are 3 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

Boring

My blog is boring. I'm boring. Healing is boring.

Apparently I'm not 25 anymore....and these things will take time.


I miss my little girls.


My printer was drug to the floor and won't work now.


I'm tired and I didn't do anything much today.

Blah.

There....met challege for today

Getting out

I got to go to the store for half an hour.

It was good to go!

I'm getting a bit restless....while being tired at the same time.

Healing away though.

Hanging out....

Ho hum.

Kind of a slow day healing here. Watched a few lame Christmas movies on the family channel. Talked with the little girls on the phone. S told me thank you very much Mommy for letting me stay at Gma's house. I'm glad she is OK and G apparently is too although I miss them hugely. I'm not going to dwell on it.

You would think I'd have an exciting blog post with all this extra time...

Not so much.

Check up

I went in for a dressing change today and the nurse said things look really great. Really very little if any brusing. Plenty of swelling as to be expected...but she seem'd almost excited at the way things looked....which made me feel good as she has been changing the 2 day after surgery dressing for years.

So, I guess its more doing what I've been doing. I've been pretty good about it so far, but I think I could start getting restless soon.

Mind over matter!

It is done!

Wheh!

It is over!!

It all went as well as it all could. I'm working on recovery now, resting and taking pain meds to keep that in check. Using some frozen veggies too as numb works best. My skin stings in places which is uncomfortable and the numbness is preferred to that.

Hubby just went out to get a movie and some lunch....my appetite is 100% back! All good signs.

7 things

While I'm a bit out of it today having and recovering from surgery.....I'll leave this for you all!

Camille was my tagger!

Seven things to do before I die:
1. Go whale watching
2. Go to Prince Eward Island
3. Visit Africa
4. Take a cruise
5. Take my kids to the ocean and Disney World
6. Go to Europe
7. Take a cross country train ride in a sleeper car


Seven things I cannot do:
1. Yodel
2. Operate
3. operate power tools sucessfully
4. engineer things
5. run long distances
6. touch slimey things
7. hunt

Seven things that attracted me to my spouse:
1. Tall
2. Dark
3. Handsome!
4. he listened
5. he took care of me
6 he was romantic
7. he made me think and go outside my box


7 Things I say most often
1. come on ladybugs!
2. the fairies aren't coming to help
3. I love you
4. stop ___________
5. SoHanGa YOU you know who I mean!
6. put the dog out
7. did you do your chores?

Seven books I love:
1. Anne of Green Gables Series
2. Harry Potter
3. Stephanie numbers series
4. Faye Kellerman series
5. I Love you Forever
6. Llama Llama Red Pajama
7. The Shack

Seven movies I could watch over and over again:
1. Sense & Sensibility
2. Pretty Women
3. Cinderella
4. Beaches
5. Steel Magnolias
6. the one with the Christmas train Tom Hanks is the conductors voice
7. any Charlie Brown holiday special

Seven people I'm tagging:
1. Stephanie
2. Min
3. Robin
4. Chris
5. Mandy
6. Christine
7. Anita

No offense AT all if you don't wanna do it!

countdown

Can you say bundle of nerves?

And everyone of those nerves connects to a muscle that is so tight it brought me to tears this afternoon.

I'm past ready for this to be done.

Its on

Surgery is set for Wednesday. They called this AM, I report at 8:15 and will probably be wheeled in about an hour later.

So....lots to do! Cause I can't just leave it. Laundry, cleaning, bills, notes, and a thousand things I keep forgetting and remembering.

I wish it were next week.

Big Bowl

Hubby and I went out to lunch yesterday before picking up the kids. YUMMO!!! Big Bowl was the name and freshly prepared Chinese, Thai and Curry food was the game. Each bite carried layers of flavors and was so yummy you just wanted to sit and savor each bite. Highly recomend it. And take people with you so you can try multiple things. We tried their freshly squeezed raspberry lemonade and pomagrante ginger ale (also made from scratch) We knew we were in for a treat right then. So good.

And I did it!! Day 16...pass the halfway mark of then write every day on your blog for a month challenge.

This next week might prove to be a tricky but we'll see. I'm having a little surgery this week. So if you get a wacky post on Wednesday, and heck maybe even one Thursday...its the drugs talking. \

I'm getting a little to a lot anxious about it all and last night had myself convinced that the surgery center won't call tommorow to give me my time for Wednesday cause I messed it all up some how.

I'm an only recently admitted control freak and this is all doing a number on me. Where by body is concerned I usually tell it what it is allowed to do....(I'm know, I'm wacked) and when it doesn't obey I ignore it. Or mask it with ibuprofen, my drug of choice. WHICH by the way I've been off of now for more then a month and miss a great deal. This I'm afraid isn't something I will be able to control nor will I be able to ignore. I"m going to have to accept help...which I never want to bother anyone with. People are busy.

Making it harder to think about accepting help is that the surgery, while will improve my quality of life HUGELY, is still sort of elective....so the recovery which will take a few weeks.....is sort of self inflicted. OK, take out the sorta's. I will not die if I don't do this. It is self inflicted choice which then furthers my wacked thinking that I should be able to take care of it myself. But I'm not going to be able too.

AAAACCCKKK!

So, as I've never had any sort of surgery, I can not predict what will happen this week....but I will try hard to "report" as I'm also slightly competitive. And determined to meet this challenge of blogging for 30 days. Because, as I've already said, I'm a bit wacked.

Weekend fun

Getting out of you on Friday was nuts! But worth it 100%. It was so fantastic to just relax and enjoy something for an extended time with out anyone wanting anything from me.

It was also fantastic to have entire conversations with my husband. Multiple conversations. Crazy I know!!

We picked the kids up a little after 1pm today....My SIL rocks....they had a wonderful time with her and her family. Then we took the kids to Madagascar 2. G does OK with movies in theaters if there is music involved. A trip to Kohls resulting in pants for DH and Christmas dress for H and it was time to head home!

We all had fun for sure. It has been great getting out now a few times and doing fun things together just the 6 of us. I think we forgot recently that we can have fun with just us AND still have loads of fun with fantastic friends we are blessed with.

We are very blessed indeed

Friday

Did you sign the petition? Hope so, we just can't go down such a path as a country. Its already bad, lets not make it worse.

I'm having one of those days today. Ever notice that when you try to plan something for yourself that is just key then for things to go nuts. Children tag teaming in the night..conspiring to keep Mom from sleeping. Babies getting into goo. Movies that are scratched. Preschoolers with colds. Phone that will not stop ringing. I need to just ignore that one for the rest of the day. Mess upon mess.

I'm suppose to be "out to dinner theater ready" by 3pm today. Its nearly 1:30 and I'm still trying to get toddler to sleep.

Making that deadline isn't all that positive right now.

Go to sleep little one!!

PLEASE!!!!!!!!

Obama said....

He promised that when elected he would sign the Freedom of Choice Act.

If you haven't already signed the petition telling him that NO you do NOT want this signed please go check out this website and do so. Or just go check out this website if you don't know what the Freedom of Choice Act is all about.

http://www.fightfoca.com/

15 years

The conference I attended was called "Hearts at Home". The organization is 15 years old. The founder, Jill Savage, gave a short talk on Friday night about 15 years and using 15 years as a litmus test of sorts. I found this helpful parenting wise.

For example: My sons hair. IMO the boy DESPARATELY needs a haircut. His Dad disagree (ever so gently...he's like that). J does NOT want his hair cut. DOES NOT. He loves it. So, this weekend I applied the 15 year test. Will the current length of J's hair matter in 15 years? I'm afraid not....and so I need to just let it go.

Another example. When I ask my near 2 year old to pick up the blocks she dumped and she screams NO! While flinging the block. I'm tempted to just leave the block and clean it up later myself. It would sure be a whole lot easier. Jill actually used this example in her talk and it caught me a bit as my answer to her 15 year question was, nah....the blocks won't matter. Thats where I got my jolt out of my rut!! Because oh YES INDEED it matters. My little girl needs to learn respect for authority and how to care for her things....or at 17 she is going to be mighty hard to live with and sure won't be on any path that leads her to God. She needs to be corrected and she needs to clean up those darn blocks no matter how long it takes. (yes there are many many sighs attached to that one)

So there you go. 15 years as your parenting litmus test.

And then, if you get a handle on that....pull yourself out of your rut and imagine you own self in 15 years....just where do YOU want to be????

Oh Yeah!!

The conference! Thank you Camille. Thats what I was going to write about this week. The last few days have been such a overwhelming amount of just stuff going in and out and all around that my brain is just mushy. I told H today that if she saw my brain laying around I'd be greatful if she would give it back to me. I got a weird look.


Anyway....the conference...its processing back in my brain somewhere yet. Hopefully not to jumbled up with all the other stuff. And I just deleted a long rambly sentence about the condition of my brain again. See? I'm a mess!

The conference...oh yeah...the conference!


Contentment. Thats what I wanted to talk about. Contentment. I went to an awesome speaker, Micca Campbell. She said that contenment is something you must learn. I thought that compelling. I think we spend a great deal of time thinking, or at least I do, that if I just do this, or if I just have this, or just get through this...then I will be content. And that feeling just never comes.


She said that discontent comes from comparison. I can agree with that too. I think our society teaches us to compare. The old "keeping up with the Jones'" adage. Its rampant in our commercialized society. Have you ever watched the show "The Duggers" They seem pretty content IMO. They also stay pretty far removed from the commericialism in our society. Definately a connection there.


We can not fill the discontent in our lives with stuff and expect to feel content. Or at least not lasting content. We will always want the next thing that comes along. I know that this is a struggle for me. I like stuff! I like to go shopping. And perhaps because I do, I do know that that stuff really doesn't bring content or true happiness. The only thing that will fill that hole is God. We all have a God sized hole in us and when we put God in it...true contentment will come.


I know that not all believe this. That God just can't be the answer to it all. That he doesn't work for them. He does though. He really does. I promise. And I'm just not articulate enough, or scholarly enough to prove it. Check out Psalm 139. "Even in painful situations....God is there"

She also pushed my faith asking that in times I felt discontent why I didn't lean on my faith and and be happy with all that God has provided me with. Romans 8 tells us that God promises he will meet our needs to his glorious purpose. Isn't that enough? Should be.

When I read stuff like that I think about people living in conditions that are so far below what standards I have. And observe how they live so faithfully to God. How greatful they are for all they have. While I'm going, but you have so little! And then I see how far I have to go yet. Who is it exactly that has so little?

So often the road God shows us does not look like anything we would even want to consider traveling down. His roads are hard. Lots of twists and turns. Lots of of detours we just do not understand. Why in the world would we want to travel on that willingly?

The speaker shared a story with us that I think helped illustrate why we should anyway.



A little girl was shopping with her Mother and saw a string of fake pearls she just had to have. Her mother said she could do some chores at home to earn money for them. The girl did this and her mother went and purchased them for her. The girl was in love with these pearls. She wore them everywhere and kept them right by her bed at night. One night when her father was kissing her good night he asked her if she loved him. She said of course I do Dad! More then ice cream he asked? YES says the girl (and on this went for several items) Then he said, do you love me more then your pearls? Yes she said. Do you love me enough to give me your pearls? And sadly the little girl shook her head no.


At this point I was a little squirmy. It didn't seem very fair of the Father to put this little one on the spot like that. But the story went on and the Dad this nightly for about a week! Which made me squirm even more. How could you let your child go to bed with such a heavy heart night after night??


One night as you might have guessed...the burden of the heavy heart became to much for the little girl. And when she was asked that last question....she tearfully handed over the pearls to her Father. And her Father actually took them!! Yeah...he totally took this prized object from his daughter. Yup.


Then he said, thank you dear. And reached into his pocket and pulled out a green velvet bag out of which he pulled out a beautiful strand of real pearls which he gave to his little girl!



THATS what God asks of us.



Its that hard....and often times much harder.


So, that is one of the idea "contentment" that I've been mulling around. Since Saturday. Its a weighty subject and I just shared a few highlights. And gone on and on as it is. And I've deleted tons. Cause my brain is still connecting dots.


So, thats probably good for now!

Another Day

Day 10.

How sad am I.

I have thoughts for fabulous blog posts. But when I get here....nothing.

I had to wear a winter coat today.

Its Monday.

Its cold.

Better luck tommorow.

Conference

The conference I went to was good. I enjoy going and it always makes me feel encouraged and validated in my choosen profession. This Mom job.....well....its just hard work.

If you have ever been to a conference, the experience can leave you so full of new information......you just feel fuzzy! I'm hoping in the coming days some of it will start to come back together and I can come up with a few blog posts that are at least an attempt at being more interesting then the last few.

The conference starts out with a "Moms night out" Lots of music, humorous speakers and just a general rah rah go Mom atmosphere. Its fun, low stress.

This year they had a usually acapella group that sings songs for kids that won't drive their parents bonkers Sounded good before they even started singing! :D Then I heard them sing and loved it! Bought serveral CD's

Here is the website: http://www.singers.com/gospel/gofish.html

You can listen to bits of albums there and get an idea of the type of music they sing.

Go check it out!

And I'm back

It was good.....and I'm exhausted!

zzzzzzzzzz

night all!

I'm off!

I am off for a day trip to the Hearts at home conference today!

Interested? Google it....I'll report back late!

30 day challenge

Have you heard of it?

The challenge is to blog every day for 30 days.

I'm not sure I can do it....I'm so not sure that here it is day 6 before I admit thats what I'm trying to do. I failed miserably last year.

But I'm giving it another shot.

Hopefully there won't be to many posts that are like this one.

Its raining here today. A lot.

Freaky day

My garage door randomly shuts when I close the door to the house.

It rains while the sun shines

While we were at dance....my curtain rod becomes dislodged from the wall

I STILL got political ads in the mail today.


THIS is what happens the day after Obama is elected?

Sigh

Elephants and things

Did you know that an average African Bull Elephant does indeed weigh about 5 tons? My 10 year announced that to me this evening. He is rather inclinded to spout off numbers that are often not even in the ballpark of being right. And that just seemed an awful lot to me. So I googled it. I love google. He was right. The average ABE weighs between 9k-13k. Thats just a lot! And there is a big difference in weight for females. They weigh around 4500-7k. So even a big female is 2k smaller then a smaller male! Thats a big difference too!

I was quick to give the boy his victory. 10 year olds get great joy out of proving their mothers wrong :D

I got a haircut tonight....I was able to get squeezed in. I am soooo close to style I am trying to grow it out too! I love it!

Vote!!!!!!!!

In case you hadn't heard....today is THE day.

Get out there and do your thing. No excuse is a good one...unless you are stuck in a hospital.

Just go!

Faith

I am borrowing this from the "Salzwedel Family" blog. It is so eloquently written.....I wanted to put it somewhere where I could read it often.





What is Faith?
Faith is BELIEVING the Word of God and acting on it no matter how I feel, believing that God will bring a good result.



Faith is not a belief that everything will turn out to please us; rather it is the confidence that no matter how things turn out, God will somehow use the events in our days for His glory and for our good.



Faith is deliberate confidence in the character of God whose ways you may not understand at the time.



Faith is being willing to trust God - turning your hopes and problems over to Him and trusting in His wisdom - and knowing that somehow everything will turn out for the best. No matter how difficult or dark things become, there is always a light.



Faith is a living, daring confidence in God's grace, so sure and certain that a man could stake his life on it a thousand times.



Faith is a reasoning trust, a trust which reckons thoughtfully and confidently upon the trustworthiness of God.



Faith is not belief without proof, but trust without reservation.



Its why I am not pro choice. This faith business. Its becasue I put my faith in God. No matter how the baby was concieved. Even if the conception would kill me. My faith says to trust God in all things. To let him decide for my life.

If I think killing a baby to protect myself is OK....then why have laws against murder at all? I realize that some might say killing the baby to protect the mother is self defence....but is it? My faith says that God gets to decide if I live or die in that instance. Trust without reservation. Trust when I don't understand at all.

Try this!

I wasn't able to find a picture of the Sierra Mist Free Cranberry Splash......but its out there because I'm drinking it right now and it is delicious! Nearly guilt free stuff! Apparently it has been available before around the Christmas season....I just didn't notice. I did today and tried it for fun....two thumbs up from me!

Did you do it?

Did you set your clocks back last night?

Are you kids' "clocks set back too?


Stupid time change.


Stupid stupid stupid

Reasons not....

I just watched a video on another blog....about Obama. There are many reasons why I can't vote for this man. None of them have to do with his color or parentage. To base a vote on that alone is ridiculous in my opinion. But this reason I just saw makes me sick to my stomach. In the video, they were showing countless times where Mr Obama shows his disrespect for unborn babies. He says that he intends to educate his daughter about morals and ethics....but should they make a "mistake" they shouldn't be "punished" (yes he said punished) with a baby. In that statement alone he admits then that "it" is indeed a baby...one that his daughter could potentially be punished with.

If a person can not respect life at its most vulnerable....then just how much respect does he have for any of us?

His tax plan is ridiculous. He wants to "talk" to Iranias (yeah....that'll work). His bail out plan for SS? Lets just tax those rich guys to death...that'll fix it. Never mind that those rich guys are the ones that support charities and offer jobs. Taking money from the rich and giving to the poor always "sounds" good....but its the government who now has the money....not the poor....and we all have seen how well the government spends. Do we really think this is a good idea???

And if one more person claims McCain is "just like Bush" because he voted with him a bunch....oh please. Just what other choice did he really have??

It is much like this election, sometimes, most of the time in politics these days, neither option is really all that good. But you have to pick. Cause not voting is not an option.....its a cop out. And waaaaaaaaaay to many people have died for me to have this right not too. So, although I don't agree with McCain on several issues...like health care...woah boy. But I gotta pick one.

And I can not vote for someone who can allow a baby to die in a linen basket because it wasn't wanted. Becaues someone made a "mistake" and didn't want to be "punished"

Just can't do it.