headed to the beach

OK, so this photo is not at all related to anything I want to say. I swear I never saw this one before. That is my Tanner. Wholy cow! Where did the time go? He turned eighteen months old the other day. OMG, I am getting teary. Can't think about it.

Anyway, I made it. We are 90% packed for vacation tomorrow. I have the house almost all clean. I cannot believe it. We'll be on the beach tomorrow! Yahoo! When I was little my mom went to Florida with her girl friends and she told me it was "the land of sunshine and beaches." While she was gone I told everyone she was in "the land of sunshine and b*tches," OOPS! We still call it that, is that wrong?! I am so excited. I luuuuuuv the beach, the sand, the heat, the flip flops, the pina coladas, the salt water, the birds, and everything about it, obviously. It always makes me want to move there forever, maybe someday.

See you all in a week or so...

seriously?!

beach babe

sandy baby

prefers the pool boy

OK, so these pictures are from last year but you get the idea...

In a day and a half I am supposed to be at the beach. I am so not ready. I have really procrastinated this year, I am hardly packed, hardly organized, hardly mentally ready. I think it is because we are flying this year and I really prefer driving. I like knowing I can cram as much as I want in my van and hit the road. Having to scale things down into a few suitcases is too much for me to comprehend. Actually, it is my family. Seriously. It is. They do not get it. In the past few days, I have been making a list of what we "need" and it is so big I want to tear it up and say "screw it, I am not going." What my family thinks they "need" for a vacation is ridiculous. I keep telling them we are going to the beach!!! We don't need that!!! You will live for nine days without ____!!! They are driving me crazy. Can I just go by myself? Well, I would miss them so much but this whole packing thing is super annoying, way more annoying than I remember it being in the past.

I am so excited to go.

I hope there is no oil in our part of Florida. I hope we have sunny days and we get to see the 4th of July fireworks over the ocean. I hope I get to see some pretty birds. I hope I get to take some good family photos. I hope I get to read a magazine. I hope I get to eat some good sea food. I hope no one gets sunburned. I hope we don't spend all our money too soon. I hope we get to relax. I hope I can get all our stuff crammed into our suitcases (oops, I went there again). I hope the plane rides are uneventful. I hope there are no no-see-um bugs, I really don't like those guys. I hope it is just wonderful.

from trash to fab

I think I am addicted...

Here is another altered gift idea. Sorry if you are bored of these.

This one is a Weight Watchers cheese container, duh, you can see that right? I promise I am not trying to be insulting, I just get excited to share my crafty-ness. (I think the Laughing Cow kind are the same) I made this one because I was on my way to put it in the recycling bin (it is made of cardboard) and I got a phone call. Somewhere between answering the phone and the garage, I got a wild hair to try this.
I think I saw some really crafty girls do this before, maybe on a blog or something, so I cannot take total credit, nor can I site the original artist. I used some leftover paper from a recent scrapbooking class I took with my buddy, Kristin (shout out KP!), basically because it was on my desk, not put away yet. ;) I cut some circles, one for the top and bottom, one for the inside, added a flower and brad and a word sticker and voila! Impressive huh? I also added teeny strips of patterned paper to the edges but you can't see those. I plan to use it for a gift card, with small candy inside. For now it is getting filed away until I need to use it.

watchin' my weight Wednesday

All the information I have been reading lately, books, magazines, on-line, even tv shows like "Losing It with Jillian" and "Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution" have all said that the key to healthy eating is fresh food. Real food. Whole food. That makes total sense when I read it and thinking about it makes even more sense.

I truly think I was raised on packaged food. Fake food. "Edible foodlike substances" as Michael Pollan (sorry if I spelled his name wrong) says. This is not a bad thing, I think it was my generation. We liked our Kraft Mac and Cheese (it's the cheesey-est) and our Velveeta cheese. Chips, Oreos, Fruit Loops. And those microwave meals, I lived on those as a single girl teaching for a couple years I think. So it is no wonder that we have to teach ourselves how to eat all over again. It's hard not to think there are no snacks in the house if you are out of Pringles or granola bars. Snack on an apple? Whodathunkit? Seriously, I think this is a learned thing. You live what you have learned. I learned that a snack came from a box. Of course I know so much more now.

I have always loved vegetables and I am trying to help my family to love them too. (That is Zoe peeling a potato.) We have pretty much eliminated packaged food from our snack selection. I do have some fruit snacks which are pretty much like candy, I know. I am letting them have these as we wean them off. We are still buying a small treat bag of chips at the swimming pool every now and then, I don't want to make these foods totally taboo and therefore very alluring, you know what I mean. The kids know they have these choices for snacks: yogurt, string cheese, fruit, carrots, smoothies (made by me), popcorn (again, made by me), goldfish crackers (it's not right to not have "fishies" for the kids- at least they have whole grain ones now!), or a homemade cookie. They haven't complained a lot, just a little sometimes, but like I said, we allow little occasional treats (at the pool) because I don't want them to feel like they are totally deprived. I don't feel too guilty about it, I made the kids watch Jaime Oliver, they go to Weight Watcher meetings with me, they know I am trying to do what is best for them. I know I am doing what is best.

Switching to eating whole, real foods has been a challenge. It takes a long time to prepare things. Last night I think I worked on dinner for almost an hour. But it was so good, totally homemade, loaded with veggies and everyone ate it up. I guess I have to admit it is worth it. Having that peace of mind is definitely a good thing.

late spring cleaning

Does anyone do real, true spring cleaning anymore? The kind like our grandma's used to do?I think they used to put it off until spring because it is so stinkin' hard! Well, I'm pretty sure I would make my grandma proud most days. My house is relatively clean and tidy for the most part. Nothing can compete with her immaculte home but I do try. I actually like to clean, I know I am weird. I get a good sense of accomplishement from some visible vacuum lines in my carpet. Shiny wood furniture gets me all excited. And a tidied up room makes me feel at peace. I know, I am really weird. I guess I don't necessarily do the "spring cleaning" thing, I just clean year-round, or so it seems.

There are however, some jobs I really do not like to do around the house. I detest cleaning my bird's cage, so much so, I will nag, yes, nag my husband to do it. Cleaning bathrooms is another job I loathe. Yuck. If we ever strike it rich, I am hiring a bathroom cleaning lady right after I buy my Corvette.

And another job that stinks is cleaning blinds. Oh how it makes me grumpy. For the past two weeks I have been cleaning blinds (and therefore windows and curtains/window treatments). I have been doing a room a day. We have gobs of windows. Seriously, when we built our house we added them out the wazoo, what were we thinking? Well, besides the glorious natural light and views, they can be a pain.

I saved the family room until last. It has 5 large windows with blinds and transom windows everywhere. Jeez, it was overwhelming. See...

My method, surely not the best in the world but it works, is to clean and hose off the blinds in our driveway. Then the sun air dries them and I can clean the windows as they dry. This has been working for the past two weeks, no problem. Until yesterday.
Here are my blinds all drying looking good, then the kids and I were headed upstairs to get our bathing suits on for a good couple hours of pool time. Boom! Out of nowhere a freakish storm hit and my pool plans were cancelled and the blinds got extra clean, wink wink. In fact, it rained so much they had to stay outside all night to dry, then, it rained on them again this morning. Ugh, I might never get them back up.

I wanted to call my grandma and tell her this whole spring cleaning is for the birds. But I didn't, thankfully this is my last room of blinds to clean. I still have a few windows to clean but they are easy so it won't be bad. Then I think I will wait until next spring to do anymore heavy duty cleaning!

still for sale

Our home is still for sale

Selling a house stinks so much, it is making me such a grumpy person. I don't think prior to trying to sell our house I would have never been described as grumpy, well maybe not never never, but almost never. Now I am grouchy all the time, well, a lot.

Reasons why I think selling a house is torture:

• all Realtors that we have dealt with are awful (sorry for you or your relatives who are Realtors, our experiences have been complete disasters with these "professional" people)
• people think you are desperate to sell or you are about to be foreclosed on so they offer you ridiculously low bids
• no one wants to put any work into a home, they want it to be completely turn key ready to their decorating standards
• people are mean, they say mean stuff about your personal things, not thinking this is not just a house, but your home
• showing scheduling is never at a good time and they never give enough notice
• keeping your house neat and tidy all the time is not normal, not possible and downright wrong, we still LIVE HERE!
• no one else can sell their home so they can't try to buy your home and so many people are afraid they are going to lose their jobs that they won't take risks in housing
• despite what the media says, the housing market is NOT picking up, I have been doing this for a year and it is as slow as ever
• price sells a home, people want a big box with little regard for the upgrades or updates you may have, so they will, again, offer you a ridiculous amount to purchase
• right now our house is priced $61,000 less than what we paid, we will be losing all our equity if we sell at this price and we will essentially be starting from scratch at our next house, we won't have a big down payment and we wouldn't even count as first time home buyers even though our situation is very similar to that
• did I say, Realtors suck!
• I hate not having pictures of my kids all around, it makes me cry to know I have have all these wonderful pictures of Tanner (and Z & P) but I haven't been able to look at his cute baby chub since he has been born basically, you know how you marvel at their cute 3 month old chubby cheeks as they get older? because my house has to be "depersonalized", whatever!
• no I do not have granite countertops, no I am not going to buy them so don't tell me you won't buy my house because of that!!! screw you
• I get sick of trying to find things to do with the kids for hours at a time while people come through the house, I love doing things with them but I want to do it on my time, when I want and not have my dog with me. No offense Max.
• I don't like feeling like a renter, in my own home, can't do any projects, can't make it personal, don't feel like I am "home" because we are always waiting for that one buyer. I feel very unmotivated to do anything home-y.
• By the way, please don't tell me it only takes one buyer to buy your home, I am not an idiot, I am just sick of this nonsense.
• Because all Realtors stink, we have our house for sale by owner, like I need more work to do!
• I feel bad for my kids, I think they are feeling a little of the same displaced feelings I am. Grr.
• "the government" doesn't seem to be doing a lot to help those of us who did the right thing and invested in a home, paid our bills on time, and are being penalized by those who didn't do the right thing, makes me so mad
• I want to hang up some pictures of my kids!!!
• I hate Realtors.

OK, sorry for that tirade. We have a showing today and honestly I hate it. I really want to not care but I do. I want this to be over. I want to move on literally and figuratively. I am through with this situation. **sigh**

so proud

There's my hubby. Yep, him on the big screen. He just finished his first year as principal of one of the top high schools in the state. I am so proud of him. He worked very hard to get this job and it was a great year for him. He had ups and downs as always but he is so happy in his current place that it was ok, he is thriving and I am so proud.

Just felt like braggin'.