Category Archives: Random

• Sitting down on an ice cold toilet seat (work bathroom, I’m looking at you).
• Hitting every red light on your way somewhere.
• Grapes with seeds.
• Having the kind of hair that curls fall right out of, but that frizzes up with the least bit of humidity and curls when you’ve flat-ironed it – you can’t have it both ways, hair, pick straight or curly and stick with it.
• Grabbing a piece of fruit or vegetable and poking your finger into a soft/squishy spot.
• Stepping on any poop, pee or vomit from any person or animal (negative points added if you are barefoot).
• Catching the last chords of a favorite song when you switch radio stations, especially if you wasted your time listening to a “lesser” song on another station.
• Pushing yourself to do over 5 miles on the elliptical, eating healthy and then gaining weight that day… blah, blah, blah… muscles weighs more (it should also burn more).
• Going to hug one of your kids only to have them accidentally headbutt you in the nose/mouth/eye.
• Inadvertently making someone feel bad or guilty (it is, alternatively, pretty great when you can make your kids feel guilty on purpose for something they did wrong).
• Sports programming pushing back show run times so the last five minutes of your DVR-ed show gets cut off. How will I ever know if Alicia takes the partnership? (Oh wait, there is this thing called the Internet that I can look such things up on you say? I’m familiar with it, it’s also the place where I complain about stupid things in life – the Internet and I are BFFs.)
• Chipping a freshly painted fingernail.
• Fresh parsley.
• Airline leg room (except Qantas, premium economy and higher, that legroom is awesome).
• Realizing you forgot something at home when you have left for a trip.
• When your kids fall asleep in the car as you a pulling onto your street.
• Forgetting your cell phone at home.
• Kanye West procreating.
• Running out of deodorant after applying it to only one side.

• I meant to pull something together for yesterday, but meaning to and actually doing are two different things.
• Jack had his 4-year check up this morning. Even though he is such a shrimp, his height actually went up on the chart from 25th to above the 50th percentile – perhaps he’ll outgrow his 3T pants soon (funny, considering we just packed up the 2T stuff and yes, he is FOUR, as in what would normally be a 4T). His weight remains steady in the 50th percentile. All looks good, everything is normal, though I think he would argue that it was not his favorite visit since he had to have wax cleaned out of his ear (he has one very waxy ear – nothing you can do about that) and got three shots. Thankfully both Simon and I were there because we both had to physically restrain him – he’s small but mighty. Sadly Dr. Mark can’t do anything for the nightly visits Jack makes to try and join us in bed – last night he brought a armload of lovies and couldn’t understand why we didn’t want him to join us with his DreamLite shining in our eyes.
• We saw Maroon 5 last night, I have a bunch of things to say about that:
  • Owl City and Neon Trees were both great opening bands – Neon Trees is outstanding and I wish they would have gotten longer to perform. I leaned over to Simon while they were performing and said, the lead singer was born in 1983, so as to make us feel old. But in thinking about that now, that means he is turning 30 this year and that’s not as young as it used to be and I’m only turning 35 so really, not that big of a deal [bigger deal is the fact that Adele is only 2-freaking-4, for real].
  • We did indeed feel old because we were actually there for the music and not to consume countless vats of beer as most of the people around us seemed to be intent on doing. I would much rather enjoy (and remember) the concert than drink through it…
  • Adam Levine had laryngitis, which you couldn’t really tell until he spoke (rather than sang) but because of that, they cut the concert short which lets be honest, rather sucks. But I am glad they didn’t simply cancel it (unless it would have been a reschedule with a full concert) but I would much rather have listened to him sing and sometimes miss a note, than have to go home after only an hour of their performance. But some is better than none… at least that’s what I would tell my children so I suppose I should suck it up.
  • Also, Adam Levine is pretty, um, sexy. I think even Simon could agree with that one, though I’m sure he would not admit it.

• Especially when he’s all squinty, or singing anything at all.
• Happy birthday, again, to my friend Steph, who we got to celebrate with over dinner before the concert! You don’t look a day over 23. 🙂
• The Oscars were on Sunday and I have things to say about that as well:
  • First, Ben Affleck, I knew I was right about you from the very beginning. You are good people and deserving of everything you get. Thank goodness you realized you were better at making movies that choosing scripts for acting for yourself. And thank you for saying that marriage is work, albeit the best kind of work.
  • This is not at all a political commentary, but what does the first lady have to do with movies and why did she announce the Best Picture Winner?
  • Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper should be in all of the movies, along with being great actors, she gives the best speeches and Bradley Cooper is pretty nice to look at (and he brought is mom!).
  • Argo was awesome but I kind of wanted Zero Dark Thirty to win; but it made me happy either way.
  • Anyone else surprised that Daniel Day-Lewis can be funny? I always assumed he took himself way too seriously.
  • Why are we supposed to hate Anne Hathaway? I mean, I do get it, but she’s not the worst person in Hollywood by far, cut the nerd girl gone glam some slack. I will say she should have reconsidered her dress choice… unless 90s “retro” and dart-created dress nipples are a trend I’m unaware of, which is totally possible, I’m not known for my trendiness, after all.
  • Seth McFarlane wasn’t as terrible as I thought he would be, which is not to be confused with praise for his performance. I firmly believe that Tina Fey and Amy Poehler should host all of the awards shows. Also, Seth has an album of standards, for real.
  • Not sure how Ang Lee won best director for a movie that was greatly CGI and Ben Affleck didn’t even get nominated for his Best Picture-winning film for directing actual people and doing an exquisite job of telling a story people already know the outcome to with great suspense.
• My stylist friend, Michelle, confirmed that my hair is not quite long enough to cut for Locks of Love yet so I get to keep my hair until summerish – happy day! Sorry, Simon.
• My nephew, Mitch, has a radio show that we finally were able to catch this past weekend. It was so fun to hear him on the radio with his co-host (who mentioned she watched The O.C. when she was in 4th grade and I felt Old since I was post-college when that show was on). I texted him to tell him that Liam liked one of the songs they played and Mitch gave Liam a shout out on the air which thrilled Liam beyond belief. It was awesome, multiple times that say he said, “I can’t believe they talked about me on the radio!” Sweet. Then my boys decided to draw him some pictures…
  Jack’s “cousin Mitch petting a dinosaur” and Liam’s love for Mitch with a guitar because “he plays instruments”:

• Liam also has TWO loose teeth and he’s pretty excited about that as well… his top middle teeth, which means that soon some big ‘ol buck teeth are going to be showing up in his mouth because Simon and I both bring that trait to the table.
• Our weekend trip to Chicago two weekends ago was so much fun. It was great to catch up with my college friend, Heidi, and her family – the adorable Sydney just recently turned one – and have some fun family memories made at Legoland Discovery. The only downside was that the shorter car trip and the boys’ related behavior does not bode well for the longer trip to Texas we have planned. Laughably, 30 minutes in to our drive, the boys were asking if we were almost there… Um, no. Start praying now. Cute quote from the weekend, despite our telling the boys that Sydney is a baby, when we got in the car to leave their house the first time, Jack sadly said, “I thought Cindy [his pronunciation of Sydney] would be older and bigger.” Bummer, dude.
• We packed meals last weekend for an organization called Feed My Starving Children and it was a great experience – the church, over the course of two days, packed over 166,000 meals that are now on their way to Haiti. Of course my children were immediately whining about being starving themselves once we left the building because it was 5 minutes after noon. Sigh.
• All this talk of getting older is making me realize that my birthday and turning 35 is right around the corner which means I need to get working on my 35 before 35 list… yipes. Anyone want to watch my kids while Simon and I take a weekend trip?
• We had a speaker at MOPS talk about the Love and Logic approach to parenting, one of the things she said was to have a signature phrase you use to signal to the kids that they have done something wrong and are going to face a consequence, something along the lines of “Oh how sad” or “That’s a bummer” and I realized that I already do this (win for me) but probably with way more sarcasm than is advised for actual Love and Logic parenting.
• I’m still putting in the time and miles on the bike and elliptical but all this celebrating and travel eating is not helping me out, I only lose a half a pound at a time in a week and it is frustrating me to no end – but on the upside, I’m not gaining and I’ve enjoyed some really good eating so if I wasn’t working out all the time, it would be very bad for me.
• On a related note, I’m super proud of my husband who has also jumped on the workout, better eating band wagon and reports that he is down to his lowest weight in years [and in the interest of full disclosure, I also hate him a little because he was so easy for him and easy is definitely not a word I would use myself and also not doing to my lowest weight in years – that came in the month after I had Jack when I lost 30 pounds in two weeks from pre- to post-delivery]. I might also hate him because he drinks Diet Coke in front of me and I haven’t had a soda of any kind in 6 weeks.
• And just to be proud of myself for one little minute: I have logged 268.3 miles so far this year on the elliptical/bike/walking (that’s an average of 38.33 miles per week). Go me!
• Also, we discovered there is or was or has been a squirrel living in our attic. I believe I have mentioned my unreasonable fear or hatred of squirrels before so I don’t have to tell you how much I hate having typed that sentence. Shudder. The problem is in the process of being taken care of… with traps and pest control. Double shudder.

Two weeks in a row!

• I used the word “patootie” yesterday morning when talking to Liam and he very seriously looked at me, without a hint of impishness or impropriety and asked, “Does that word mean ‘ass’?” To my credit, I did not burst into laughter and from the way he asked, I’m pretty sure he didn’t know he was saying a swear word, but perhaps a word that was too old for him. I just said, “Patootie means bottom and don’t ever say that other word again.” What in the world? [And yes, future Liam, patootie does mean ass, in a way.]
• I also forgot to ever tell you about this gem: Liam was upset to the point of tears shortly after the election and when I inquired as to why he was so upset, he sobbed, “Because I’ll never get to vote for Barack Obama in a real election!” I did not know how to deal with this particular break down.
• And one last Liam story: Today, I walked him up to the school because I had to go in an retrieve his forgotten “Friday Folder” so I would know what homework he should be doing this week [my eldest is a forgetter, it drives me insane]. We didn’t even make it to the steps up to the school before he said, “Bye, mom, I’ll see you this afternoon.” And then proceeded to walk up the steps next to me, all the way to the school, as if we didn’t know each other. Stinker.
• And what can be said for Jack? He’s a newly minted liar (he will lie about all manner of things, including things we know the truth about and when pressed he will point out that he wasn’t lying, but we didn’t ask him specifically enough). For example, I heard a sound that would indicate he had hit Liam so I said, “Jack, why did you hit your brother?” Jack: “I didn’t hit him.” Me: “Yes, you did, I heard it.” Jack: “No, I did not hit him.” Me: “Okay, then how did he get hurt?” Jack: “I pushed him hard.” Semantics. He will also lie about who took the food from the fridge, who drank from the now-empty cup and who got out of bed, turned on the light and/or got out the toys. We apparently have another child named, “Not me.” Not me is a real pain in the patootie.
• Not ones to simply bask in the glory that was a date night last Friday, Simon and I upped the ante this weekend with TWO date nights – Friday AND Saturday! Simon had Friday off again because of an all-day training so we got to go out (Panera and “Silver Linings Playbook”) and then he said, wouldn’t it be fun to go out two nights in a row? Um, yes. So we revisited a new-to-us place with yummy burgers and brought along our friends Sarah and Brian! Fun times. Add to the fun a small group meeting last night and we didn’t have to put our kids to bed for three nights in a row – that is practically a vacation!
• This week we are back to regularly scheduled nothing on Friday nights and no date night for Saturday. Alas. It was fun while it lasted.
• Liam has a four-day weekend this week, mid-winter break in February and then spring break at the end of March. This seems like a little overkill on the days off school.
• “Silver Linings Playbook” was superb. My kind of movie (and we’ll be honest and say that pretty much any movie with Bradley Cooper is my kind of movie) but Simon loved it, too. So well acted. True to life “dramedy.” Plus ballroom dancing. I laughed out loud a number of times and once I even snorted. Yup, I did.
• We were dumb and left the restaurant we were at (post-dinner) in search of something else on Saturday night in downtown. Since we were all neither a) in our 20s or b) drunk, we were not up for waiting any place for a table or paying a cover charge. We ended up standing in the front of a bar to watch the end of the MSU basketball game and all have one more drink [we did not get carded- boo] – we were really just trying to avoid going home too early and having our kids still be awake. I wish downtown had been like this when I was in my 20s – so much fun would have been had! And we still had fun and good company, but now we are just in bed by 10:30. Alas.
• I’ve been doing modified push ups on the kitchen counter (so not at all real push ups) and today my shoulders are killing me. I love the burn of sore muscles.
• The first week of the blogging weight loss competition I had the biggest percentage loss… hopefully it’s not the only time I’m in the lead, but I’ll celebrate while I’m there! Whoot! Go me!
• I cannot “do” Twitter… at least not that and be able to keep up with reading blogs, Facebook, Instagram and, you know, real life like my kids and my job.
• I’ve been having cold flashes (like hot flashes but, you know, freezing instead). Does this mean I have circulatory issues or other problems? My hands are currently freezing to the touch.
• We re-arranged the boys’ room a little this weekend and both boys thanked me profusely and told me how much they liked the new look. They will make good husbands someday.
• Our small group hosts made faux Mexican Ice Cream last night (blocks of ice cream rolled in crushed corn flakes and cinnamon sugar, drizzled with chocolate sauce). That was delicious. So good. Still thinking about it. Thanks, Steph.
• It finally really snowed here so now the heat wave can come back and we can be done with winter, right? Side note: Where Simon’s sister lives, it was about 111° F last week. It was 11° F this morning. Awesome. I believe we’d both happily meet in the middle.
• Two months until our road trip to Texas – cannot wait! Honestly. I love road trips and having grown up driving for every vacation with my parents, I’m excited to give those memories to the boys!
• If you are interested, you should totally join me on MyFitnessPal, I’m ememby there, too! It’s like Facebook for healthy living!