Five Question Friday

Happy Friday people! TGIF! This week was the last one until the end of the year that didn’t really have big plans – though I did still get to hang out with some of my favorite people over coffee, diet coke and goat cheese dip. I feel like I should use the weekend to rest up but I have promised the boys we would decorate the house for Christmas and shock of all shocks, I intend to put up our Christmas tree. Anyone want to place bets on how long it takes for Jack to knock it down or how often George will growl at it (it’s 4 years after we got our curbside recycling bin and he still barks at it every other Friday night when he goes outside to do his business)?

1. What do you give teachers for gifts?
For daycare I make up a BIG tray of Christmas goodies (gifts of food = my love language) and bring it in for everyone to eat and with baggies so they can take stuff home for themselves. For Liam, I contribute to the teacher gift and do a little something extra because I want her to know how truly much we appreciate her!

2. Do you text? One finger texter or total pro?
Do I text? Please let me refer you to this post and this one. So yes, I text, to me texting as a 30-something is like when I used to talk on the phone as a teenager and how I first used FB… a necessary means of communication, much preferred to all others (except with my parents who I love to talk to on the phone). I go back and forth with my texting, if I do it one fingered, it’s using my Swype keyboard (have I mentioned that I LOVE IT!?) and sometimes I type with my pointer finger on my right and the thumb of my left, it’s strange, but it works. If quantity of texts sent are any indicator, I am a total pro. I celebrate when close friends get unlimited texting plans. It’s sad but true.

3. Do you give back during the holidays? If so, in what way/which is your favorite charity?
We give back year-round, not just during the holidays. Sure, it’s so much more in your face at the holidays between the bell-ringers (Simon used to work for the Salvation Army and when I met him, he was in charge of the bell ringers so I had my fair share of it and cannot walk past one without putting something in, even though he doesn’t work there anymore), Angel Tree stuff and year-end pleas for financial support from every non-profit organization but charity is an all-the-time thing and there are all-the-time needs everywhere in the world. I wish more people put in as much effort as they do at Christmas during the rest of the year. I like charities that help with addressing the base reasons for the problems – lack of nutrition leads to being behind educationally which leads to being behind in life – and cover basic needs – like food, water, clothing, shelter. I believe in fixing problems, not putting bandages on gushing wounds.

4. If you would’ve been the sole winner of the 575+ million dollar Powerball jackpot, what would you have done with all that money?
Wouldn’t that be a wonderful problem to have? It is my (not-so-) secret desire to be independently wealthy (talked about here and here). I guess I’d buy all the things in this post, plus a house in Australia and make sure our family was taken care of for the rest of our lives and then I would get to work making the money make more money and fixing the world’s problems. No big deal.

5. Will you please take just a moment to spread the word and pray about Mama M’s friend’s missing family members? There still is no news, and I can’t imagine their pain and worry. Facebook prayer page: Prayers for Trista, Shy and Matt


Linking up with Mama M for Five Question Friday.

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Woah, Nelly, there are a whole lot of pics in this post but I’m playing catch up. Make yourself a little snack and scroll away.

We have had a baby gate around our TV/entertainment center since we got it. For Liam we just had the six sections of the play yard stretched out in front of our TV and fireplace and he never tried to go behind it even though the ends were open. Jack went behind it almost as soon as he started crawling so we created a fence around the important things (the electronics) and this has worked for us for years until a couple weeks ago when I walked into the living room to find Jack as pictured above. In his defense, a piece of food had fallen onto the floor inside the gate and he had figured out a way over so he could retrieve it, not to cause havoc. And I know what you must be thinking, Michelle, your son is nearly 4, isn’t it time to take down the baby gate? And you would think that but one of the last times we were at my parent’s house, we found Jack in the living room feeding DVDs into the VCR. So, no, we are not yet taking down the baby gate and I have moved the chair he used to scale over the baby fence – after I had him reenact how he did it.


These are Triple Chip Blondies – do yourself a favor and make them, or find someone to make them for you and don’t look at the recipe so you will never know how much butter and brown sugar is in them.


Afghan from my childhood, now in my home. This makes me happy. And warm.


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Jack has amped up his affection-showing lately, always wanting to hug everyone in our immediate family, including poor George (ironically, his increased affection for us has not translated to affection for others and when you ask him to smile for or hug others, he staunchly refuses, typically with a look of disgust on his face – a real charmer, that one). George in general tries to steer clear of close proximity to the children but on this occasion, Jack was eating some food and George was hoping to get some so he got too close to Jack and was rewarded with a tight squeeze.


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Me and my littlest boy-o. I just love this picture.


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I made a ball out of paper – gotta love the ideas you find on the Internet.


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Cake batter muddy buddies are delicious – I’ll be honest and say I quickly get sick of the traditional muddy buddies but this cake batter version is addictive!


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Simon and I at the fun. concert… not pictured the three girls who sat in front of us wearing coordinating outfits (everything was red, black and white) who were way done up for a concert in a field house and wearing 4-inch heels that made it comical to watch them walk up and down the bleachers.


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Liam has been branching out more with his Lego creations, including the “people” he is putting together – this is one of my favorite combinations.


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Liam’s also gotten into drawing comics – this is his redo of Captain Underpants. By Liam Bennett and Illustrated By Liam Bennett.


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A collections of pics from my GWA (Girl’s Weekend Away)… clockwise from top, left: we made infinity scarves, painted our nails, ate yummy snacks and played Ticket to Ride (so fun!).


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The view from our weekend house: Lake Pentwater (or is it Pentwater Lake?)


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Liam likes to hang out with me and read. I love it.


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The boys decided it was time for a new sticker chart so they created their own, all categories have to do with being good, either in general or to specific people in our family. Apparently that is it.


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The boys are not wallflowers.


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All sunset shots from the same night.


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Thanksgiving Day, post-dinner, pre-pukefest. I love that Chris looks like he’s about to take flight. It’s a running joke as to how Chris is going to accidentally damage Liam when we get together – this time Jacob took over for his dad and unintentionally clotheslined Liam. Happy memories.


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Jack from Thanksgiving Day – full of life over at Grandma and Grandpas house and then passed out on the hardwood floor in the entryway at Uncle Mike and Aunt Joan’s house.


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But in less than 24 hours, Jack was back to his normal self, building towers bigger than a preschooler and glaring at the camera. This is the face I got when I asked for a smile.


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You’d think they were facing an execution squad, but no, we were about to take them to get a slushie from the gas station – which was apparently the highlight of Liam’s trip to my parents’ house this summer, getting a 44-ounce slushie every day. When I asked him who he was the most thankful for, he said, “Grandpa, because he buys me slushies from Speedway.”


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Friday night I got to cuddle my sweet godson, Ethan, what a little nugget. I’ve still got the magic mom arms to put the babies to sleep. Love him.


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The boys wanted to play with Ethan, Ethan could not be bothered.


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Liam sweetly told me that he wrote me a note, then passed me this piece of paper. Le sigh.


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Left: photos from 2011. Right: photos from 2012. One of these things is not like the other. I’ve got a bit of catching up to do.


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Call me crazy, but I love black licorice flavored anything but taffy is especially my favorite. Thank you, Horrocks for having this back in stock. I also love that Jack knows when he comes to my office, he can check the second drawer of my pedestal for candy.


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Jack and I played cars. And by played, I mean, I sat there while he circled the cars up and told me not to touch anything.


What’s the what

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Someone is clearly not participating in NaBloPoMo (that’s national blog posting month where you post a new something EVERY DAY)… sorry, I know you were just dying for a little daily insight from me. Here, let me help you out: each day you can consider one of the following things and I’m sure one of them will have crossed my mind that day and we can both pretend I’m right there with you:

  1. Adam Levine/Bradley Cooper/Ian Somerhalder are pretty foxy (and none are Australian so I am being true to my husband when I admit that to y’all)
  2. Diet Coke/smoothies/liberally salted tortilla chips are perfect foods.
  3. What has gotten into my children? Red dye? Sugar? Caffeine? Meth?
  4. That person driving in front of you, totally the worst driver ever with the dumbest personalized license plate ever.
  5. Christmas shopping is best done from the comfort of my office chair/couch. Amazon Lightning Deals, you rock!

So there you go, in case I leave you again for two weeks, you have something to keep you company. And yes, it’s been two weeks since I posted on this here bloggity blog, during that time I have done the following:

  • Gone to another concert on a college campus, still felt old but still very much enjoyed myself. fun. is awesome in concert – I actually prefer them live than any other way. And there was this moment, when they were singing “We Are Young” and we could see the in-sync movement of the crowd down on the main floor that I thought back to one of my first concert experiences (Nirvana) and how I felt in that moment when Kurt Cobain was singing “Come As You Are” and I thought, for them, this is their Nirvana moment and they don’t even realize it at that time. They were/are all young and singing along with perhaps one of their favorite bands and there will not be another moment exactly like that one, it is near perfection.
  • Posted what I am thankful for every day on FB – I have intentions of collecting them all and posting them here at the end of the month – so I can collect all that good thankfulness up in one place.
  • Had a 60-minute massage thanks to a Living Social deal – can now cross that one of my list – it was all in the name of the Life List that I had to take that one for the team.
  • Spent the weekend away with some of my favorite college friends, who are actually some of my favorite people. We stayed up too late, woke up too early (curse you, motherhood). Listened to happy music (yes, I made a mixed CD for the occasion), sewed, painted each others’ nails, ate all the good things and drank other good things, played games and talked, talked, talked. There is not a sentence or blog post that could do justice to the friendships I have with those lovely ladies, we all have those friends who just KNOW us and love us anyway.
  • Got my hairs cut, but not completely off yet – a few more months until I can make my donation to Locks of Love – the boys (Simon and George included) also all got their hairs cut, too. So handsome, the lot of them.
  • Caught vomit in my hand. On Thanksgiving Day (thankfully post-meal) at my brother’s house. It was as awesome as you’d imagine. The stomach flu then made its rounds through the family and took each of us out with no discrimination. Lovely, that. On the slightly positive side – I did sleep on and off for 20 hours straight.

And there you have it – my last two weeks in a nutshell. [The stupid humor part of me is dying to waste time creating an image of nutshell with the words “my last two weeks” inside of it so I can say, “No, this is my last two weeks in a nutshell.” If you get that reference, just pretend I did that and we can laugh together at our collective pop culture-addled senses of humor.]

Wednesday Randoms

  • I got a new phone over the weekend – another Droid (an HTC One X if you must know) and I’m a happy girl. The screen resolution is greatly improved, the camera is hugely better, it doesn’t randomly stop working AND it has a SWYPE keyboard which I have missed since I got my last phone (which did not). Strangely, the very first time someone called me, it wouldn’t pick up and just kept ringing and ringing, which was disconcerting but since then it has been 100% perfect. Added bonus: I got to keep my old phone which will still work on a WiFi network and so we have yet another piece of technology with which to distract our children with at restaurants and on car trips.
  • Last night I took the boys to Chili’s for dinner by myself because they had a special where you get two free kids meals for each adult entree purchased. For $9 we all ate what we wanted to (even picky Jack was pleased with fries, chicken fingers and a milk), you can’t beat that. You also can’t beat the fact that Jack ate happily and quietly while watching an episode of the Backyardigans while Liam and I talked about his day (judge away but I had already spent 3 hours with just Jack, hanging out, playing and talking about his day, which went like this [according to him]: I ate bweckfast, I pwayed bad guys, I watched a show while daddy took a shower, I ate snacks, I wead some books and I pwayed some more with my guys).
  • I was listening to Jack play with his guys the other day and had to smile when I heard him create the following conversation between two toys:
    Toy A: Ayudame! [help me in Spanish]
    Toy B: Okay, I’ll help you!
    Toy A: Great… Skadoosh (a word he picked up from Kung Fu Panda commercials on Disney – a channel I wish DID NOT show commercials. Dear Disney – I will forever push Nick Jr. on my kids because of the lack of commercials)
    Toy B: Let’s go… see you later, alligator!
  • Two houses across the street from each other in our neighborhood had their Christmas lights up and turned on last weekend. I was going to post some outrage to this happening and then I remembered that we left our inside Christmas decorations up until mid-February last year. Touché. Carry on early Christmas celebrators, carry on. [Note: We also still have one strand of Christmas lights up on the mantle, because they are pretty (well, because they are pretty and I cannot be bothered to take them down).]
  • We had conferences for Liam on Monday… he is doing as expected. The learning behavior he is having the hardest time with is “Demonstrating stamina in large group settings” (the wording for that cracks me up a bit) but it means he can’t sit still when they are in a big group and after a few minutes will move to sit by someone else are fidget a lot. No shocker there but I am glad to know this is normal behavior and not worrisome to the teacher. We were very excited to learn he is ahead of the curve for reading (I’m going to take credit for that since I encourage him to read song titles on the radio display in our minivan [I am KIDDING, people]) and I’m going to brag for just a minute because I am so proud of him: by the end of the year she would want the kids to be reading level 16 books for the daily take-home reading and he is already on level 14 books. And by January his teacher would like students to know 130-159 sight words and he is already at 163! The best is the look on his face when he reads a word correctly or finishes a book and gets all the words right. I’m so glad he loves reading!
  • And that’s all there is time for today…
  • But wait… this weekend is my GWA – CANNOT WAIT! I love my boys but this mommy needs a little girl time!

Things I Would Buy*

*If I had unlimited funds, was already giving half my money to charity and had my boys’ college education paid for [just so we’re clear, not trying to be frivolous here, just dreaming in a place way outside of reality.]


Starbucks Verismo Machine

Available here
The Starbucks version of a Keurig… so you can have hand-crafted Starbucks drinks at home… in theory this is wonderful. Latte at the touch of a button? Sign me up.


Qantas First Class Suite
Available here
This would be the way to travel to Australia, though I wonder how people with children do this since each seat is it’s own little pod [I believe the answer is that people who fly in the First Class Suite accommodations do not travel with children; it would be great if these suites also came with childcare – for the price you pay, you’d think this could be possible.]


Diet Coke Machine
Available somewhere
I’d give Simon and the kids a couple slots for Coke Zero and Sprite, but the rest would provide me with icy cold Diet Coke at the push of a button. (Obviously I would have a service that kept it stocked for me since I can’t keep my own fridge stocked – last week the kids got Happy Meals for dinner because I wanted a large Diet Coke from McDonald’s since we only have caffeine-free at home – admitting you have a problem is the first step.)


Luxury Mountain Villa in Colorado
Available in my dreams
It doesn’t have to be this particular “house,” any one that would hold our family and a handful of other people would be perfectly fine. And skiing lessons. And perhaps a private jet to get us all there.


Brookstone Massage Chair
Available here
Have always wanted one of these… sure a personal masseuse would perhaps be better, but this chair couldn’t hurt.


Motorcycle [for Simon]
Available at nevergonnahappen.haha
I’ve long told Simon that after we buy absolutely everything we could ever want to buy, then he can get a motorcycle. His dad rebuilt Harleys so it seems appropriate for Simon, but I’d let him get whatever one he wanted, you know, provided EVERY other thing was purchased.


Bose Wave Music System
Available here
Awesome sound quality, small intrusion on space – sounds good to me. We currently listen to music at home via our phones or tablets and while it does the job, actually haven’t it sound good would be nice.



Frye Veronica Slouch Boots
Available here
I have thick calves, tall boots are make for ladies with tiny little calves so these boots for wide calves (as recommended by Amber at My Aim is True) are ones I’d love to get.