November 20, 2008 – 4:03 pm
to sick to worry about caps and punctuation here. i feel horrible. that would be in all caps if i had the energy to hit the shift key. if there was a week in the year where it would be the worst week to be sick, this week would be pretty high on that list at work. so i’m here today in body, but not completely in mind. it seems my illness this weekend was a bit longer lived then i thought and it came back with a vengeance tuesday night and throughout weds morning. still recovering from what i believe is the flu. m seems fine right now but i sure hope she doesn’t get it. can’t believe we leave for memphis tomorrow. dad, you’re driving.
not the easiest way to lose weight, but it has helped me get over a threshold that i was struggling with. only 7lbs to go to meet my final goal. i got some pants in the mail yesterday that were a size 10. i haven’t been a 10 in, well…. ten years, so i tried them on and they fit perfectly. so happy about that.
tuesday (before the recurrence of illness) i downloaded blurb and so far am really really happy about it. makes me happy i saved entries from prior blogs. what a neat keepsake this will be for each of us, i look forward to cleaning it up and finishing it. it will take a lot of work to get it the way i want it since i’m exchanging low quality web photos with the high quality ones from my hard drive. but it will be great in the end and a nice christmas present for us
speaking of presents. can’t say anything about the girls presents on here. hi m. no, mommy’s not giving those little hints away, so stop reading here and looking for them. but one that i can say is that a big big big one will come tomorrow morning. mom’s new leather sofa for the family room. we’ve been wanting this for awhile. first we need leather because have i mentioned… we have a dog. the dog likes to be on the sofa, my sofa now is white. you can imagine how well the dog mixes with a white sofa. second main reason is because it seems my kids like to sit on chairs, but since we only have one sofa in the room (and I lay down), then they have to sit on bean bag chairs on the floor and they don’t like that so much, so our new sofa is actually a large sectional. as my mom pointed out - there’s even a seat for daisy.
November 18, 2008 – 6:24 pm
I’m SO excited about my next home decorating project! I found this on Tara Whitney’s blog eons ago and knew immediately I wanted to do it, but but but… well, I actually have no idea why I haven’t done it yet. I need the frames, which are from IK*EA, and hope to get those on my next sojourn to Atlanta, but for now I’m getting the photos ready and will have those printed. The frames come in several sizes and I think Tara used the 19″ squares, but I might go slightly smaller and with two rows instead of three, since I need to fill a wall over my sofa in the playroom.
The hard part of all this is actually choosing the pictures. I’ve played with ideas to do a photo of the girls together each year, but nixed that. Then just random pics of each girl throughout the years, but nixed that too. I decided since it was a PLAYroom, that I should have pics of the girls playing with friends and in that department I’ve got plenty to choose from! I just want some that you look at and they immediately make you smile. Work is kind of a bear right now, so I really need a “smile” room.
Here is just an example of one that has made it into the final cut so far, I wanted to get some more done but M booted me off the computer last night. Similar to Tara’s wall, I’m giong to do a mixture of b&w and color; I’ll be sure to update here when the wall is done. 
November 18, 2008 – 12:22 am
Check out the family jewels…
Stinker. This dog doesn’t know how lucky she is. Both of my parents were going to go to the tournament this weekend, leaving Daisy with no one to hang with, so she was going to have to visit the worst place in the world (as far as she’s concerned)… the VET. Yep, she had a reservation at the kennel for a couple of days. Considering that she refuses to pee the entire time she’s there, she should have been nice and clogged up by the time we got home next Sunday. But, thanks to her Grammie who decided to stay home, she’ll be cozy, clog-free and blissfully unaware of the could-have-beens…
On a note completely unrelated to Daisy, I’ve been experimenting the last month with two things: 1) shooting RAW, and 2) shooting fully Manual. More to come on these, but so far I’m loving both, however let me tell you how difficult it is to meter with a moving target (aka Daisy). And, in case I haven’t mentioned this link yet, go check out Bark. Seriously - she takes it to a whole new level! *Almost* makes me want to get a Great Dane. When my parents lived in New Orleans, their next door neighbors had two Great Danes and 3 small girls, all under the age of 7 or 8. The dogs were SO GOOD with the kids, they were just the coolest dogs. They lived on a golf course, and my mom loves the story of the golfer gone in search of his errant ball in their yard when one of the dogs comes out of his hiding place with an innocent bark or two. Yep… they collected a lot of abandoned golf balls. 
November 17, 2008 – 5:19 pm
I miss her and she’s not even gone yet. L will be leaving tomorrow morning for a school trip that will take her and a group of 120+ 6th grade students on an almost full weeks adventure. It’s a school sponsored event called “PAL” for short. What they do is take 3 groups of students (L is in the 3rd and final group) to a camp where they will spend all day developing their own government and creating the American way of life through a democratic process. I’ve probably not explained it well, but it’s very interesting and the kids have a ton of fun while learning all about the difficulties of setting up and maintaining a government and free market society. I can’t wait to hear all about it, but unfortunately I’ll have to wait until Friday when she gets home. I drop her off tomorrow at 7am and don’t pick her up until Friday at 1pm, which is when we will almost immediately hit the road for the tournament this weekend. She’ll miss both practices this week before the tourney this weekend, but I’m not too worried about her performance, she’s had some really strong practices lately.
So it will be just M and I this week. I don’t think parenting two children is all that difficult until I get only one of them alone, and then it is just SO easy! Even M becomes like the easiest kid ever when there’s just one. I think she and I will go out and eat some Mexican food this week. M is the pickiest eater in the world, and it slays me that she actually likes fried beans, which I think are nasty! L who loves almost all food is not a fan of most Mexican food, so we’ll take this opportunity to go to M’s favorite place - Moe’s!
Again - no pics from this weekend; my camera’s getting dusty. I was sick from Friday night to Sunday morning - kind of ruined the weekend. Still feeling a bit queezy at times, but mostly better. Just a bug passing through my system, but I sure felt yucky enough to get absolutely no sleep Friday night, which made for a pretty pitiful Saturday. The girls take on this whole new level of sweetness when Mom isn’t feeling up to snuff, they get really independent about getting and doing things for themselves and then taking care of my needs too.
Not much else going on, just an incredibly busy/stressful time at work, but it’s like that at this time every year. Be nice to your Human Resources department, for you know not what they do.
November 14, 2008 – 6:32 pm
Been quiet around here but that’s because there’s just not much going on that’s post-worthy. Lots of work, went out of town twice this week, girls hate that, I don’t like it so much either. I like travel, but this wasn’t fun travel, it was busy, long days, work travel. Blech.
Still soccer practice, still school, no new pics in fact I haven’t touched the camera in almost two weeks. We’ve got LOTS of leaves on the ground though so perhaps they’ll be some this weekend if I can convince the girls to help me rake. Also planned is a thorough grooming for my poodle schnauzer, and a thorough carpet cleaning for the two rugs she decided to use as indoor bathrooms…. don’t EVEN get me started. Next weekend… furgetaboutit… it’s soccer soccer and more soccer. Our girls are going in to the tournament ranked #1 in the state, so their first two games are against teams ranked #3 and #1 in their states respectively. Should be fun… or not.
How ’bout you M, anything else going on?
Hmmm…
Nope. If even M can’t think of anything to say, then we are REALLY not doing anything around here.
November 9, 2008 – 1:37 am
I SO love this picture! I’ve linked this website up in my photography favorites and visit at least once a week to see what’s new. I found this recent entry and was just in complete awe of these photos, but it was this one that made me really happy.
November 7, 2008 – 8:00 am
Daisy.
She is absolutely everything you would want a dog to be.
- She barks at strangers
- She stays (mostly) in our yard when we’re out in the front
- She’s incredibly loving and patient with the girls, specially the youngest one that likes to just about squeeze the life out of her
- She’s gentle and predictable
- She LOVES her people. Loves love loves loves her people
- And, she will “stay” on command.
Let’s talk about that last one. “Stay” is the only trick Daisy knows. She will sit for a very limited time if you have a treat in your hand, but otherwise, she has no use for that one. She will not pee in the house 99% of the time (at my parents house, it’s more like 50/50). She doesn’t speak on command, roll over, fetch, drop, walk well on a leash without eventually choking herself, or basically do anything else. I’m sure this is all human error vs dog error, but it is what it is.
Back to “stay”. Unfortunately the only time we use this command is when we’re leaving and she has to stay behind and we’re trying to get her to not escape out the door in front of us. So, anytime we do say this, she gets this really pitiful look on her face. Therefore trying to capture a photo of happy Daisy is pretty difficult because I’m trying to get her sit in one place long enough for me to aim, compose and fire. And that’s when I capture sad Daisy. And Daisy isn’t sad. She’s a very very happy dog. Except when she’s told to stay, then she looks like this… I swear, if she had a bottom lip, it’d be all stuck out there right now.
November 6, 2008 – 12:52 pm
November 4, 2008 – 2:03 pm
After my tirade earlier this morning, I decided to post this:
At times I struggle with this blog being a place where I can share photos and stories of the kids with family and friends, but on the flip side, I want it to be a document for the girls later so they understand my thought process for making a decision. I’ve said before, this is not a political blog, I respect everyone’s political decision, as long as they’ve looked at all sides of the debate and then based on their own review of that, they come to an intelligent, well thought out choice.
So with that in mind, these are my own thoughts that helped form my decision being written for the sole purpose in documenting this so my girls will one day understand what went into it.
By every account, today’s election will be historic. We will either have the first black man as President, or the first woman as Vice President, and I truly think this is a time for all American’s to be proud of these two choices. Last semester L was studying about the women who risked their families and lives to make a stand for women’s right to vote. Later she read about similar issues when black American’s were fighting for their right to vote. How incredible is it that we have come this far!
Beyond the political rhetoric, debates, and negative campaigning, it comes down to two very different men who I believe both want the best for this country. I was a solid John McCain fan from the earliest days of the campaign. However for the past eighteen months I’ve watched both parties present their candidates, and today I can say very firmly and with conviction that I believe Barack Obama will be the best leader for the times we live in today. Does that mean I agree with everything he says? No, I don’t. But here’s what I do believe:
- Being the President is a 24/7 job. Obama has age and health on his side to handle the physical and mental trials that this job brings.
- They say that Obama doesn’t have experience, but he’s shown that he has the experience and intelligence necessary to surround himself with people who are experts in their fields. A good President will do that.
- Obama’s choice for a vice president was a smart one. While I would have appreciated seeing Hillary on the ticket, I think he is saving an appointment for her on his cabinet in an area that she is passionate about.
- I don’t agree that there is an easy issue to taxes, but on this one McCain was talking out both sides of his mouth. He was saying that “everyone is going to get a tax break”, but then saying that “Obama is going to spend more money that I am and put the U.S. farther in debt”. Huh? The experts have run the calculations and McCain’s plan uses 1 billion dollars more of tax payer money then Obama’s plan. And I don’t necessarily agree that giving it to the super-wealthy and letting it “filter down” works. Wall Street should be a pretty good example of this. While people are losing there jobs left and right, the captains of those sinking ships are sailing off with their golden parachutes.
- Obama is a good man, with a strong, steady hand. He’s passionate without being reactionary. I believe he will be able to bring our troops home as victors and he will be the best Ambassador for our country. I trust him.
- And lastly – he’s smart. I mean really really smart. And we need someone with that quality running our country. If people will let him, he will inspire a nation.
November 4, 2008 – 12:14 pm
M has an ear infection and while I gave her some medicine last night, it wore off and she woke up crying about 3am. So I gave her another dose, she went back to sleep, and I laid awake the rest of the night thinking about the election. Well, not specifically, I was actually thinking about the comments my daughters have received from ill-informed classmates in the past week. These quotes are real:
- “O*ama is a baby killer”
- “O*ama is the brother of the bad guy who brought down the twin towers”
- “O*ama’s middle name is Hussein and he’s related to the guy from Iraq”
That first one was aimed at my 8 year old. So apparently we’ve got 3rd graders, who I can only imagine picked up that little gem from their parents, who are FRIGGIN’ IDIOTS to think that saying that to a kid and having them understand the complexity of abortion rights is what they’re going to come away with. Why would ANYONE say that to a child?! This is not a statement a child comes up with on their own. This idiocy is passed down from the adults around them. Do we want our children to think we put “baby killers” in the White House? Seriously? What are these people thinking.
I’ve been awake for 3 hours just letting this fester and I probably shouldn’t write this post when I’m so keyed up about it but just look at the last two statements my 11 year old heard on the school bus. Wrong and… wrong. Eleven year olds, if they don’t know the facts, will tend to make up points to fill in the blanks and say things for the “shock value”. So just a question here - if “Jack the ripper” was a maniacal killer, should we not put anyone in the White House named “Jack”. Just sayin’.
We shouldn’t talk about politics at work, but the subject has come up once or twice. We have a VP who said he agrees with everything about Obama. Likes the man, likes his position on things. Won’t vote for him though because of his name. I have nothing to say to that. I’ve tried to come up with an intelligent response to an unintelligent statement, but I can’t. I just have nothing to say to that.
November 2, 2008 – 5:42 pm
I went for a run yesterday morning; from my house to the front of our subdivision and back is exactly three miles. I didn’t quite make it the whole way in the run and walked about a half mile on the return trip ~ I’m not so good up hills yet. Anyway my leg started hurting in the last mile and it actually felt better running then walking so when I needed to walk it was more of a hobble. Once home I hung around on the front lawn for a bit and let Daisy come out and play. There are three brick steps up to the front porch and in just the 5 minutes I sat on the bench out front my leg had completely stiffened up. Those three steps might as well have been Everest with as painful as it was to get up… L had to come out and help me. Anyway, we had a ton of stuff to do yesterday: M’s last soccer game of the season, followed by present shopping, home for about an hour, then out for the rest of the day skipping between birthday parties. The more I walked the better my leg got, but as soon as I stopped for literally less than a minute, it would tighten up again. It’s still really sore today and the same rule applies as far as it stiffening up quickly, but again, too much to do today to let it rest. There was my weekly pilgrimage to Wallyworld, followed by Sunday school this morning, the end of season cheer party for M in two hours, plus a mountain of laundry to get done. I have no idea what I did to my leg but I think it’s a muscle problem not a joint issue (I have arthritis) because when I try to put much pressure on that leg (like trying to walk down the stairs) it will collapse under me, I can feel the muscle just give way. I must have sprained something.
Anyway… that’s what I get for exercising. 
Not to end on such a whiney note, I took a few indoor photos of M in her new dress. I was in Gap last week and could not resist this outfit, it is just SO M, and she rocks it. By the way… I’ve mentioned before that M reads this blog, so the other day she noted that I wrote out L’s whole name a couple of posts ago when I was talking about the old website, and reminded me that I told her I would only put their initials L & M to protect their privacy because we’d been talking about safety on the internet. Hmmm. She got me (again). So I’m off to go change the verbiage I used in that post and alter some of the comments so they don’t read L’s whole name. My bad.
October 31, 2008 – 10:19 pm
Call me crazy, but I don’t think she’s going to scare anyone tonight… ‘cept her mom maybe.
Not to be out-done by her big sister… Meisi says “Mom, what exactly am I?” Um… we’re calling her a Lady in Waiting, but honestly, I just thought it was a pretty dress.
October 31, 2008 – 6:25 pm
October 29, 2008 – 5:23 pm
I’m on a very small yahoo group, I think there’s only 7 or 8 on there, but most of us have known each other since the late 90’s when we were receiving referrals for our oldest daughters. We were talking about all the websites we used to visit religiously during the wait and how blogs have replaced the once adored websites. I mentioned that I would give anything to see L-Land again and wish I had at least made copies of the pages. Well, one of our members gave me links to this site: www.web.archive.org. I keyed in my site names and voila! Well… it wasn’t quite that easy, but I was able to retrieve the contents of about a dozen pages (so far, I’m still looking). I was beyond hokey in my writings and comments about my, then, only daughter, and again, as one of my friends said - I was just completely “blissed out” (LOVE that word) on L and being a new mom. So today at lunch I pulled some of the photos off - I’m not going to share the actual pages because apparently I wasn’t a bit concerned back then with providing private information. ;-) But I did want to share on here just a “few” of the photos that bring back a world of memories.
This blog gets a decent amount of traffic a day - somewhere between 150 - 200 visitors, and if you wouldn’t mind, I would be very curious how many of you were once visitors to my first website so long ago. How many of you remember L-Land?
Dang, this kid was (is) gorgeous! By the way, the girl she’s hugging in the top center photo… her birthday is this Saturday, she’ll be 12. The two cousins with L in the photo to the right of that… they’re both in college now. The photo, second row left, is with Peanut, my red persian kitty. She had to be put down about a year after that. I still miss that cat. The photo with Santa is actually in a Better Homes & Garden Christmas book from 1999. L’s “tea party” is with her grandmother and two friends, one of which is no longer with us, she died of cancer this year. The last photo on the bottom right was L in her Christening dress, which was made by her great-great-great grandmother, approximately 100 years before she ever wore it. And I could go on…
October 25, 2008 – 10:37 pm
I just adore M’s hair. Her bangs are fully grown out, but they always seem to escape from her ponytails, so M always has this Veronica Lake thing going on. She also has naturally wavy hair. It was downright curly as a baby. I remember getting into the elevator just 15 minutes after receiving M, she was still quite upset, but on the video you can clearly hear my travel mates saying “Julia - look at her hair!”
I really need to do SOMETHING in the kids playroom and I never print the stuff I take of them - I know that they would love it! Thanks so much for sharing this idea 
First of all, hope you feel better! I know how that goes about wanting to be home but needing to be in work.
Tess was sick Monday and I had budgets due that day. Luckily she let me work.
I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Blurb! I have done the old blog in two 8X10 books with the padded photo cover. I also have used them for Tess’ scrapbook. I mix digi pages with regular photos that I didn’t scrap and I love it! As much as I would have liked to print them out regularly in an album, I had to think about space. This is my ideal solution. I will do one book for each year of her age so she has a one year book completed and so on. it works out great for us. Plus Blurb has added an option for better paper. Well you know I don’t work for them but it sure sounds like it.
Feel better!
I hope you feel better quickly. Congrats on the weight loss. I’ve checked out Blurb but haven’t gotten around to using it yet.
I hope you feel better soon! Geez… not strong enough to lift your pinkie and hit the shift key? That’s sick!!
I love Blurb.com too. I’ve printed my blog into yearly “family journals” and swapped out the low res blog photos for the higher ones on my computer. It took MONTHS to do this, initially, but now that I’m all caught up, I just transfer my blog text and my pretty pics to the Booksmart software every time I post something new on the blog. I even put stuff in our book that I wouldn’t blog (for privacy reasons). I can hardly wait until 12/31/08 when I can click the button to upload the whole shebang to Blurb! I use the 13 by 11 inch size because I LOVE being able to see my scrapbook collages and other photos in all their humongous full sized glory! And I can easily stick a grid of 6 or 9 photos on a page and still have the photos large enough to actually be appreciated. But I’ve used the 8 by 10 size too and I love that for everything but my yearly Creme De La Creme Family Album because that deserves to be in the larger size.
There’s a little promotion going on right now and you can get free shipping until Midnight December 6th by entering this code: Promotion code: freeshipping
Better take a swig of Nyquil and get busy!!
Donna
Hey girl…sorry you are feeling well! I am sick, too. Sounds like the same thing as you. My head hurt so bad today that I fought back the tears and my poor students were doctoring me…too sweet. I sure hope you feel better soon. I love Blurb and am working on one for Paige. It is time consuming, but I think it will be well worth it. Can’t wait to see pics of your new couch. Sounds divine : )
oops, sorry you AREN’T feeeling well. See, I am out of it, too : )