This Won't Hurt A Bit... I Promise

A little while back I went to the dentist for my normal 6 month cleaning. She took x-rays and told me I needed a root canal on one of my back molars. Huh? Nothing even hurt, but I figured she knew more than me seeing as she is the one with her hands in my mouth and I am the one in the chair grunting my responses to her questions about my children and how long we have lived in the area.

I was referred to a endo-something-or-other and went in for my root canal on Thursday. Now, if you remember, my tooth did not hurt at all... today I have a swollen face and throbbing pain in my jaw. I even paid them over $300 to put me in such pain! I apparently have the word "stupid" tattoo'd on my forehead.

I would have to say that there is nothing worse than tooth pain. If someone said to me, "I am either going to pull out your fingernails or give you a root canal" well I would take the fingernail extractions over throbbing intense pain in my face. Bring it on...

I don't look very attractive right now either. My face is swollen. I look like Mary Jo Buttafuco. I have decided to stay in the house until it goes away.

The best part of all of this is the medication that my endo-whatever prescribed to me. It has the side effects of belly pain, nausea or vomiting, and diarrhea. Yippee!

I keep thinking about Tom Hanks in the movie "Cast Away" when he was on a deserted island and had a toothache so bad that he was driven to knocking it out of his head with a rock! The next thing you know I will be carrying around a volleyball and calling it "Wilson."

I have read the medication pamphlet over and over and no where does it say to avoid alcohol.

Thank God for small miracles.

Hi, My Name Is...

The other day I was invited to a meet and greet type of a party. It was one of those get togethers that come about purely because your children have common interests and since our lives are dictated by the activities that our children do, many people look for their own friends within the parental circles that their children run in. It does not matter if your kids don't like each other, if my Billy and your Tommy are both on the same baseball team well then let's be friends!

I loathe this type of friendship corralling.

Anyway, so I am at this "will you be my new friend" get together and I notice that the mother/woman who was hosting this party was one of those completely put together type of moms. They kind that has perfect hair, perfect nails, the perfect size 6 pants, the perfect husband, the perfect kids, the perfect dog... but you and I both know that when she is not putting on her perfect display she picks her nose and screams at her children. No one is perfect... and we all know there is no such thing as a perfect husband. They all fart and leave the seat up-I promise.

The perfect woman who would make the perfect friend decided to play the perfect game. We all sat in a circle around her perfect living room and ate little perfect quiches off of little perfect plates that all matched each other. She said this, "Some things taste better in combination. Strawberries and rhubarb, oatmeal and brown sugar, pineapples and coconut. Let's all go around the room and tell everyone something about ourselves and what your favorite flavor combination is!"

I sat and listened to woman after woman tell us about their 2.5 children and their hobby of scrapbooking and baking. The combinations were things like strawberries and chocolate, cake and icing, and cookies and milk.

I sat thinking "Yeah... RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGHT."

I realized that I was the last person in the circle. I would be the last to tell something about myself. I decided right then and there that I would be the first one to speak the truth!

I sat straight up and said, "My name is Marilyn Monroe, I have 4 kids so far who are rapidly depleting my retirement fund, I write a blog everyday and flip off people who jog for exercise as I drive past them on the street. I am a devout Catholic who does not want to talk to you about evolution or sex scandals. Oh, and my favorite flavor combination is a tie between pretzels and beer and vodka and raspberry tea."

I think it is safe to say that I will not be invited back. Thank God!

Call Me On My Cell Phone... I Usually Have It Turned Off.

My husband has very poor telephone skills. He has these poor skills with only me though.

When he is at work he will call me several times a day causing me to stop what I am doing. The phone rings and I have to leap over piles of laundry, dodge little people asking for a snack, trip over the dog who is too lazy to move and grab at the phone in hopes that I will reach it before my allotted 4 rings is up.

When I answer I usually hear a disguised voice, which I know is my husband but I play along with his game and pretend that maybe, just maybe, the person on the other end of the phone is Raphael the pool boy who is hot for my body and wants to rub lotion all over me. Yes Raphael, oh, ah, you make me so horny.

After my husband is satisfied in his role playing, he goes on to give me directions for the rest of my day. He reminds me who has baseball practice, who has piano, who has ballet, who has karate, who has to have a diaper change after each feeding, who has to be wiped after they go poo in the toilet... and then he will make little suggestions like "do you think you can do a load of darks today?" or "The blue bathroom could really use a good scrubbing."

I tell you... I just don't know what I would do with my day if I did not have my husband reminding me of how to be a wife/mother/maid/taxi driver. By golly, I may just forget to put on clean underwear each morning if it were not for him.

His next question on the phone is always, "What's for Chow?" Now, it could be 8 in the morning and this man will still want to know what is for dinner. It is as if the success of his entire day depends on knowing if we are having an actual sit-down homemade supper... or just sandwiches. I usually do not know what I am going to make for supper until 45 minutes before supper time, heck, I am not even sure if I will be drinking by 3 p.m. yet! The day is early... give me a few hours.

Then something will happen in the background and he has to get off of the phone ASAP. He does this by simply saying "Gotta Go!" and hanging up. I can be in the middle of a sentence like "so the Dr. said that it has to be..." and he will say "gotta go!" and hang up. It is so frustrating that I vow to give my husband the silent treatment, but this does not work because I have to let him know I am giving him the silent treatment and when I do he will let me know that I am not being so silent by telling him that I am being silent. It is all very infuriating.

The funny thing about all of this is the days that my darling husband is too busy to call me, I get all pissy because he has ignored me. I start to think things like "Sheesh! I think about him all through my day and he can't even have the decency to give me a 2 second phone call to check in with me and these children of which he impregnated me with!" But then I will get that 2 second phone call and I will think "UGH! Why is he calling me and making me stop watching Dr. Phil?! What does he want!"

He can't win... seriously. But don't feel too bad for him, he does not know that he can't win. I have tried to explain all of this to him but he just says "Gotta Go!" and hangs up.

Thank God I have Raphael.

For The Love of GOD...

PUT GRIESE IN!

A Message From Our Sponsors...

On Wednesday I drove from DC to Hotlanta. The kids survived and there no little to no bloodshed. Success!

Yesterday I drove from Hotlanta to Montgomery AlaBAMA with just my youngest two and Steffie, our crazy senior citizen friend. The 3 hour trip took over 5 hours because of all of the stops for potty and snacks...

It is hell traveling with a person over the age of 60!

Flashback to 1982

It is official... my husband and I have become my parents.

When I was a kid, I would get into trouble a lot. I don't really remember why I was getting in trouble, but I do remember my punishments. I was basically grounded from the age of 10 until I went away to college, and even then my father tried to ground me but I just laughed and went to a fraternity party and got drunk. Obviously I learned valuable lessons from all of my punishments.

Well let me tell you my dear friends... payback is a bitch!

My son has started this walk into the darkness of which I like to call "acting like an idiot." Today he did something that was so bad I could have dropped him off at the hospital and asked just how long the statute of limitations is for a person to want to give their child back.

When his father got home from work he was called down to the kitchen table where he sat with tears in his eyes while I kept asking him just what is going through his brain. As we started to lay down the law and hand out the punishment that was the exact moment when I realized that my son is the carbon copy of me... gulp!

I have always said that my son is just like his father. They look like Doctor Evil and Mini-Me so I always assumed that their behaviors would be the same. No such luck! My husband was always a "good boy" when he was younger, or maybe even a "mama's boy" but I am not going to get into that pool of dysfunction right now. ANYWAY, it became crystal clear that as my son sat looking at me with venom in his eyes and his jaw clenched tight , that he was me through and through, and that we would meet many more times at this kitchen table in the coming 8 years of his life.

How can this be? It seems like only yesterday that I was getting punished from my parents for offenses that I thought were minor but they obviously thought would be the end of the world as we all knew it. They punished me as if I were a hardened criminal man... they never cut me any slack. Sheesh!

The sad part in all of this is that I look at the behavior that my son displayed today and the mom in me thinks "He has to learn a lesson here! He has to be punished! Take away the computer, the television, the gameboy, the nintendo, the radio... food!" But the juvenile delinquent in me thinks "Cut him some slack! At least he wasn't out slashing tires and smoking behind Wal Mart."

Oh... this is going to be a long adolescence, I can tell.

Consumer Reports...

Women Beware! These are extremely dangerous cookies... I repeat, EXTREMELY DANGEROUS!

And I don't know who they think they are fooling when the suggested servings per container is 9! 9? You have GOT to be kidding me! 9! What a joke! I ate the entire thing by myself in one sitting. ONE!

Stupid little dough boy...

Sunday Pondering...

WHY ARE HEMORRHOIDS CALLED "HEMORRHOIDS" INSTEAD OF "ASSTEROIDS"?

Things To Do Today

-bring all dirty laundry downstairs

-sort all dirty laundry in piles

-put dirty laundry pile #1 in washing machine

-put clean laundry in dryer

-repeat 7 more times

-fold all clean laundry

-carry all clean laundry upstairs (4 trips)

-put all clean laundry in 6 different people's drawers

Bask in the fame and fortune of being a housewife... refuse to give out autograph.

Tony Tony Turn Around, Something Is Lost And Can't Be Found...

About 2 weeks after I gave birth to my son, I was ready to get out of the house for a bit. When he was just a few days old we had a huge ice storm and our city was basically shut down. My husband was in Diego Garcia with the Air Force (read: he was shark fishing while I was at home with a 2 year old and a newborn... but I am not bitter). When the roads had cleared and the electricity had been restored I was itching to get out of our house which had become our prison for 14 days.

I bathed and dressed Hope up as cute as a button. I did this because I had not bathed her or dressed her since her brother arrived on the scene and I needed to get the caked-on jelly off of her hands and the dried ketchup from the corners of her mouth and chin.

I strapped the kids in the car (HA! We only had a car back then... a 2-door at that! Ahhh, the simplicities in life.) and headed to SuperTarget. While there I needed to buy food because we had eaten through our storm reserves and were in dire need of potato chips and marshmallow fluff. I was standing at the deli counter chatting with the woman who was shaving my turkey for me (no, not shaving an actual BIRD, but shaving the turkey lunch meat very thin.) I turned around and Hope was gone.

I started calling her name and walking through the bins of vegetables. I walked by the carts and the windows still calling her name. Panic started to set in... I started running past the aisles and calling her name with a pleading shrill behind it. I thought my nightmares had come true and someone had snatched my precious 2 year old. I reprimanded myself for dressing her up so cute that morning as fear ripped through my soul.

Suddenly I hear someone say "Here She IS!" and I turn to see my little Hope skipping back to me. I ran to her and scooped her up and started to cry. I had lived in pain for a total of 2 minutes and could not imagine a more debilitating lifetime of that feeling. Hope looked up at me and said " I wuz jus wookin at the wobsters!"

I will never forget that day... or the feeling of dread that I had.

Yesterday I was at Target again (seriously folks, I should just change my mailing address to Target) and I only had baby Mary with me who was strapped to my body in a Baby Bjorn. As I was walking to the checkout I see a mom start to call her daughter's name. "Leah? Leah where are you?" As soon as I heard this I too started to look around for the little girl. The mom ran to the windows and near the carts, I started looking through the aisles because I knew the exact feeling of helpless fear that this mother was experiencing. Finally we hear someone say "Is this her?" and out pops the little girl from the dollar aisle and says "Mama? Can I have dis?"

The mother scooped her up and started to cry.

This post is for all of the parents who have yet to find their children. Who have to live day in and day out with the sadness that I only had to endure for 2 minutes-I could not imagine.

God Bless you and your families. Hold tight to your babies-even when they have dirty fingernails and lunch dried on their faces.

http://www.missingkids.com/

Bill Gates Hates Me...

I think Microsoft is out to get me... and I may have brought this war upon myself. It seems that every time I am doing something of great importance on my computer, like writing my blog or making out my fantasy football roster, Microsoft will freeze up my screen and send me a little note that says "Tell Microsoft about this problem."

Long ago I used to ignore this prompt and not tell Microsoft about this problem. I didn't want to be sending error reports because I didn't want to be a computer narc. I didn't want to be a burden.

Now I send them those friggen' error reports several times a day. I am starting to think that the more error reports I send, the more errors I will have on my computer. It is a conspiracy I tell you.

I keep picturing a computer nerd, we'll call him Dwight, sitting at his big Microsoft computer at the Microsoft headquarters that are buried deep within the earth's core. Every time I send an error report he snorts, "Look! That June Cleaver woman who thinks she is so witty is sending me another error report! I'll show her!" and then Dwight sends me a vast array of errors to my computer so that he can picture me sitting at my little computer pulling my hair out. Dwight is evil!

Last night I had my revenge on old Dwight. My computer had to shut down my blog surfing enjoyment because I what? Was trying to click onto too many blogs about Britney Spears? Puleez! I clicked on the "X" button at the top right of my screen a good 100 times... so then I had to click on the "end program" button 100 times, which in return asked me if I wanted to send an error report to Microsoft (aka Dwight) 100 times. I clicked YES 100 times and sat feeling confident in the fact that if Dwight thought he was going to get home in time for dinner (and rest assured, Dwight's home is still with his mother and she was making his favorite meatloaf and jell-o) he was sorely mistaken. Dwight would be sitting at the earth's core for several more hours.

Today when I clicked my computer on it hummed happily and has done everything I have asked it to do. I have won this round with Microsoft, but I know that Dwight is out there waiting for me to get good and comfortable and start something very important like a chapter of my book where I will forget to save it every 30 seconds and Dwight will send me that error that causes all things that are not saved to be lost making me throw my computer across the room and then call my husband with a few choice words about how unfair life is and how it is somehow his fault!

Curse you Bill Gates! (shaking my fists in rage!) Curse you!

Seriously Folks... Leave Poor Britney Alone.

It is like a bad car accident isn't it? The life and times of Britney Spears is one that most would find in the bargain basket at a used book store. We have watched now for a few years as this young woman jumps out of the airplane and her parachute has a big ol' hole in it.

I usually don't pay any attention to what the media says about movie stars and pop stars because the information is false and if it is true, well then God help them all.

Yesterday though I felt sorry for Britney. Everyone was having a field day about her performance on the VMA's (that is the Video Music Awards for all of you folks out there who spend your days on your knees in prayer except of course when you take a break to read my blog)

Last night I watched in horror as the entertainment media made comments over and over about how overweight Britney was. Crazypersonsayswhat? Listen up, if Britney is overweight, well then I am a friggen walrus people.

I was enraged for Britney. I mean, the girl has had two babies back to back, is going through a divorce from a gold digger, has been to rehab, has been to rehab, and has been to rehab, she shaved her head, she almost dropped one of her kids while she was walking down the street, she drove with a baby on her lap, she has shown her love box to the world... again and again, and she no longer talks to her mother. Cut the girl some slack on the weight OK! If I were her I would be dining on ice cream and potato chips all day.

You know why I really feel sorry for Britney? Because she has had to go through some crap-sure much of is was self induced but still, it was crap... and she does it in front of cameras. If paparazzi followed me around, they would see me picking my nose, drinking at lunch time and cutting my own hair (mine came out better than Spear's buzz). They would catch me yelling at my kids, yelling at my husband and yelling at my neighbor's dogs. I would be splashed across the front page flipping off another driver, arguing with a cashier at WalMart and watching Californication on my television (oh that is such a bad bad show... I have to wash my eyes out with soap each time I watch it!)

Basically, those who live in glass houses should not throw rocks, and I know this because I come from a long line of rock throwers. If I had all of the mistakes in my life put on display for all to view, well then I would probably shave my head as well.

So lets all hold hands and say a prayer for Brit. A prayer that one day her sons will grow to be big and strong and take care of their mother... something their father could never do.

Oh Thank GOD!

I just heard tonight that The Office premiere is on September 27!

Who wants to party? Ain’t no party like a Scranton party cause a Scranton party don’t stop!

Oprah's People Called... She'll Be Here For Dinner.

A few years ago I was watching Oprah... yes, it has been a few years. I used to watch her all of the time, but that was back when I would lay on the couch all day eating Bonn Bons while getting a pedicure and watching my maid Alice do the laundry and scrub the toilets. Ahhh, memories.

Anyway, I remember this one show where Oprah surprised people at dinner time to see what they were cooking. She was in a wayyyy upper middle class neighborhood and every house she went to was clean and organized. There were no kids running around and there were clean counters and empty sinks. People were actually cooking large meals-from scratch. Oprah ohh'd and ahh'd over what "America was making for dinner."

Oprah needs to visit my house at dinner time and see what "REAL AMERICA" is making for dinner... or as I like to call it, "What the hell am I going to feed these people!"

Take yesterday for example. I prefer to wait until late afternoon to get the bulk of my chores done. I do this because I hate housework and I do not want to spend my days cleaning... I would rather spend the last hour of my day screaming like a lunatic and sweating like a sumo wrestler while I run through the house picking up toys, doing laundry, wiping cemented toothpaste from the bathroom sink, and wondering why there is a chainsaw in my son's bedroom.

I do all of these things with a baby attached to my hip and a 4 year old following behind me asking me for a drink because she is so thirsty that her head may just blow right off of her body any second now and she just can't take it!

As I am loading the washing machine, folding clean laundry, doing the breakfast dishes (yes, I realize I am making dinner and doing the breakfast dishes at the same time-don't judge me), chopping onions, browning ground beef, and balancing the checkbook, one of my older children comes into the house with all of the neighborhood kids following behind her because she has fallen off of her scooter and is now bleeding profusely from her knees-the neighborhood kids are apparently there for moral support. So now I am washing a bleeding knee with the dish towel that I was just using to dry the breakfast dishes and I am putting a few dashes of Tabasco in my casserole-which I kept forgetting how many dashes I had put in because of all of the neighborhood kids telling me the horrific yet heroic story of my daughter falling off of her scooter and the blood that came squirting out-oh well.

By this time the baby is screaming because she is not being paid attention to since I am vacuuming and dusting and the 4 year old has spilled the entire pitcher of lemonade on the kitchen floor because I did not bow down to her request of a drink fast enough for her standards.

I yell for my son to come help and he walks in with tar all over his hands and he smells of goose poo. I direct him to the shower and simply say "You wait until your Father gets home!" and I don't ask questions-I did not have time to reprimand him... I'll leave that task to his dad.

While I am mopping up the lemonade the baby is still crying and the 4 year old keeps saying "I love you Mommy." She obviously can tell by the pulsing vein on my forehead that she needs to butter me up a bit.

I finish folding the laundry and put it in a laundry basket-I'll put it in drawers tomorrow. The house is vacuumed and dusted and the bathrooms smell of Lysol and Windex. The dishwasher is emptied and the breakfast dishes are put away. Dinner is bubbling on the stove and I instruct the kids to set the table and fill the milk glasses.

I put the overly spicy casserole on the table just as my husband is walking through the door from work and he says, "The house looks nice!"

Yeah, Oprah needs to ring my doorbell at 4:30 in the afternoon to see how real life happens. My guess is she would call Dr. Phil immediately.

You Too Can Be A Supermodel!

Do you want to lose weight?

Do you want to be thin and beautiful?

Well all you have to do is take a simple miracle pill...

And work out 2 hours a day...

And run 6 miles a day...

And live on only 600 calories a day...

Aren't those miracle diet pills amazing!?!

"In general my children refuse to eat anything that hasn't danced in television." -Erma Bombeck

My 4 year old has decided she no longer likes to eat... or rather, she no longer likes to eat anything I cook.

She has basically been living on cereal, oatmeal, french fries, ice cream, and ranch dressing. That is about it. This has started to worry me so her evil plan is working and I am bending over backwards to make her something different from the rest of us just so I can be sure she has food in her stomach

When I was a kid, if you didn't like what my mom was cooking for dinner... tough crapola. And my mom was not a "kid-friendly" type of cook either. She made things like pea soup and bean soup and liver and chicken 5 nights a week. We were only allowed the chicken legs as well-the breast was reserved for my dad. Today I cannot bring myself to eat a chicken leg, or any kind of chicken on the bone. I get flashbacks and end up curled up in the fetal position sucking my thumb on the kitchen floor.

I remember one night my mom made bean soup. It was disgusting. I refused to eat it, so I got to spend the remainder of the evening sitting in my chair at the table in front of my now cold bowl of brown colored bean soup. All of the dishes had been cleared away and they even turned out the lights when they left the room to leave me sitting in the dark with a bowl of muck that was gar-on-tee'd to make me gag. It was horrible and it has taken years of therapy to give me peace with bean soup. My parents still owe me for that bill.

I try to make meals that my family will enjoy. I go out of my way to make it healthy and appealing to the masses. My kids don't like big stewed tomatoes in their sauces, so I will usually blend them up in the blender. They don't like big onion bits, so I chop and chop until the onion is so small they don't even notice it. They don't like vegetables so I find new and yummy ways to cook those carrots and peas. Basically, I am the kitchen bitch around here. I look at myself and wonder, "What happened to me?"

Well, this short-order cook is taking off the apron (which by the way, I would love to have one of The Kitchen Madonna's aprons!) and tonight I am making liver with a bean soup chaser. I am taking back the oven! I am going to be a crusader against kid-friendly cooking. I am going to enjoy a big ol' juicy tomato in my spaghetti (well, maybe not that because I think cooked tomatoes are gross... but for effect sake I will eat one!) And if they don't like it... well then they can sit at the table for hours until they pass out and what they don't finish in the evening they can finish for breakfast!

But before I wage this war with my children I think I am going to bake those cinnamon rolls I have sitting in the fridge. My 4 year old will eat a cinnamon roll...

Theology 101

My son was talking to me about Purgatory this afternoon and after some time of me doing my best to explain it he finally said:

"So basically, it is like you are really really hungry and you can see the sandwich but you can't reach it to eat it."

I could not have said it better myself.

"A" For Effort...

I have been getting quite a few emails lately asking me about my homeschooling so I thought I would do a post on just that... homeschooling, or as I like to sometimes call it, sticking a hot poker in my eye on a daily basis.

Oh, Just kidding... don't get yourselves in such a tizzy.

I use a mish-mosh of curriculum. Some years I favor Mother Of Divine Grace, others I veer toward Seton, and sometimes I throw in the towel completely and go for the hard stuff... The Jack Daniels curriculum.

This year I have fallen back in love with Mother of Divine Grace. There is a lot of reading, which means my children are forced to be quiet and not bother me so much. We use Saxon Math which I love because not only am I teaching my children math, but I am re-teaching myself all of the things I didn't learn when I was in school because I was too busy writing notes and gazing lovingly at Ryan Grigson.

I am a big fan of English curriculum. My kids study the classics, and the not so classics like the Sunday comics. I have to pay close attention to their spelling as they are both horrible at spelling... but one day they will be allowed to type on a computer and just click that handy button at the top for spellcheck. Oh how we have grown lazy in our spelling. If I didn't use spell check, my posts would look something like this: I shat lsjdk slihgheien sltis heisl vodka!

We enjoy history in our house and this year is exciting with 7th Grade Greek and Roman History and 4th Grade US History. My son could probably write his own history curriculum, but I like to torture him so I make him follow mine--which in his mind is substandard to say the least.

Science is always fun-I obviously teach Christian science so there are no pictures of monkeys turning into Mr. Whipple around this place.

As for Art, Drama, and Music, I hire other people to teach them those subjects. Sarcasm is a daily teaching tool I use and humor is apparent when I try and speak Latin to them.

Basically I offer my children many opportunities for education. Whether it comes from a book or from climbing a tree in the backyard, they are growing in their knowledge of who they themselves are and who they want to become in life.

I can only hope and pray that I am doing all I can for my children. It keeps me awake for hours some nights wondering if I have offered them all that is needed to succeed in this world... but in the end, if I have taught my children virtues and the way to Heaven, well then I can feel pretty confident in the job I am doing.

I Wanna Be A Biker Babe...

My daughter came in from playing with her friends yesterday and announced that our neighbor was selling his fishing boat and buying a motorcycle.

My husband thought this was deplorable... I thought it was fantastic!


I love motorcycles, and I love tattoos. I love men who ride motorcycles and have tattoos. I can't help it, I am a devout Catholic.

Years ago when we lived in England, our neighbor had a Harley. I never paid much attention to him or the Hog until one day I was stopped at a light and he pulled up in the next lane. I watched as he slowed the bike and placed his feet firmly yet casually on the ground to steady the monstrous machine under him. I thought it was one of the sexiest things I had ever seen and went directly home and started to beg my husband to get a motorcycle.

I have been begging for years now.

I have also been begging him to get a tattoo. Back in the day I went on a trip to Germany with some girlfriends and came home with a tattoo on my lower back. My husband was so angry with me that he refused to even look at it. He has since grown to love my tat, but he won't even entertain the idea of getting one himself.

I don't understand this. I have promised my husband so many wonderful things (like I would mow the lawn for a year, or wash his car for a month... if you were thinking of other kinds of promises well then you need to get your mind out of the gutter. I am a married woman after all... with four children. I am too tired for those kinds of promises) if he would only get a tattoo and buy a motorcycle. It is not like I am asking him to start wearing leather from head to toe and change his name to "Cornholio" I just want him to get in touch with his wild side a little bit. Is that so bad?

I was telling my mom about my desire to have my husband buy a motorcycle and get a tattoo and you know what she said? She said, "Oh, and Carl would look gooooood on a motorcycle!"

I don't think I'll tell him that... I don't know if having a mother-in-law who thinks he'd look hot on a motorcycle would convince him to head right out to the Harley Davidson dealership with only a quick stop at the tattoo parlor.

A girl can dream can't she?

Ahhh, Childhood Memories...

A few years ago my friend Lisa was telling me about a time that she went to the Dermatologist. She was having a mole removed or looked at or something and when the Doc finished he had Lisa (who was just in her unders and bra) twirl for him so he could view the rest of her body moles. I thought this was the funniest thing I had ever heard. The thought of my dear friend in her personals twirling while a Doc sat and watched her just struck me as hilarious. We had many a good laugh on that thought-

Well, today I knew exactly how she felt.

I have a spot on my upper shoulder that was questionable and since I have gone to bat with skin cancer in the past, I quickly called my Doc for an appointment.

I had a dilemma though-what in the world do I do with all of these darn kids I have running around this house? Do I take them with me or do I just toss some raw meat on the kitchen floor and leave them to their own devices for the afternoon? Talk about a rock and a hard place.

I decided to load up the kids and take them with me. If anything, the sight of watching their mother have pieces of skin scraped off of her body may convince them to use sunscreen rather than run away screaming every time I pull it out of the beach bag.

My Doc is nice. I think he could use a few more baths, but he reminds me of Donald Sutherland and he enjoys my kids so I figure he is OK. He put on his big googly glasses and looked at my spot of concern, and then he started looking at my face, my arms, and legs... and then he asked me to twirl. So there I was twirling for a Doc just as poor Lisa was years before, only I was able to keep my clothes on (one of the reasons I brought my kids-no Doc was going to ask me to strip in front of my children-I am no dummy).

He found three more spots that he didn't like. Great.

In the end I had two spots frozen and two scraped off with a miniature ice cream scooper and sent off to the lab. My oldest could not bring herself to watch-she can't even watch someone brush their teeth so she knew she could not handle watching skin be burned to a crisp. My son thought it was fascinating and stood over the Doc's shoulder the entire time. He made a comment that some of the tools looked a lot like they were making me into the Bionic Woman. It is good to know I am a superhero. My 4 year old had a total look of concern on her face and held my hand and patted my knee the entire time. What a sweet child... at least I have one that loves me.

So these are the memories that I am making for my children. My mom, she just did things like take us to McDonald's or to the library... I take my children to the dermatologist! I am so cool.

Can I Just Say...

You all are CRAAAAZAAAAY!

OK, so I gather that this homesteading today stuff is about things like: "What's going on with the price of horses?" and discussions about "the argument for grass fed pastured beef over grain fed feed lot beef." or the fella that "seen a cool tractor at the State Fair" and even a lady who says "What'ch ya canning today?"

I get that-I love ya'll for it.

I have a few books by Ann Coulter... I get her and I love her for it.

But I am trying to figure out just what Tractors and Ann Coulter have in common. What ever it is, I am sure it has to do with drinking games.

Homesteading Today and Ann Coulter?

I have a question... I just checked my site meter and apparently I did or said something that made it onto some Homesteading Today site and the Ann Coulter Chat. I cannot get on either (well, I can get onto the sites, but I am not good enough to be allowed to view anything. Whatever! Site Snobs!) so I am curious as to what they actually are and if my husband went ahead and sold those nude pictures of me that he swore he was going to delete off of the digital camera.

I have had over 100 of you pop into my blog from those sites just today so fill me in on the brilliancy of this blog that is attracting such a flurry of homesteaders and Ann Coulter Chatters.

I feel like people are talking about me and I can't hear what they are saying!! It is driving me nuts... and if I have spinach in my teeth, please tell me.

Homeschooling 101

Today was the first day of school. We survived.

Phew...

Another visit from the Mother-in-Law under my belt. The show is over folks... nothing to see here. Keep moving along with your regularly scheduled lives.

June's Top Ten...

List of Pet Peeves!

10. Finding a black curly hair on the soap when I step into the shower… and it ain’t mine.

9. Sticky counter tops and kitchen tables. I realize that people live in this house; I just don’t want it to look like monkeys do.

8. When someone eats off of my plate of food or drinks out of my glass. It grosses me out and I have to dump the food and drink and start anew.

7. When you are serving ice cream and as you scoop out the ice cream from the carton it gets all over you knuckles. I can’t stand this one-I won’t buy ice cream in the carton for this exact reason. We live off of ice cream bars because this pet peeve haunts me so much.

6. Senior citizens in the grocery store that you just can’t get away from. They are slow and they take up the middle of the aisle and it seems like they are in front of you for the entire shopping excursion.

5. Neighborhood kids who will ring my doorbell 750,000 times a day! I realize my children are fascinating and the only way you will have any fun on this block is if they come out to play, but for the love of Pete lay off of the friggen door bell! I fully admit this is a cranky pet peeve, but I love my kids… your kids, not so much. I seriously see myself becoming that one old lady on the block who yells things like “Get off of my lawn!” or “I’m going to call the police on your punk ass” but I have come to terms with this and just accepted my role on the block.

4. When people, usually of the male persuasion, ask me if I am breastfeeding as they glance at my boobs. I know they are fabulous-but you creep me out. Does it make your day brighter? Are you able to lead a fuller live now knowing whether or not my lovely lady humps are nursing my child? Are you really that concerned with the nutritional value of my child’s eating habits? No… you are just being a pervert and you may just get a drop kick to the groin from me so back off heebie-jeebie person.

3. When people come up to my baby and stick their face in hers and make all kinds of obnoxious sounds which cause her to cry and then they say “Oh, poor baby, is your mommy not feeding you?” Yeah… that is it. It has nothing to do with the fact that you are a stranger and you are sticking your strange face in hers and talking loud and breathing your stinky breath in her face. I am just not feeding her. Idiot.

2. When someone who shall remain nameless (it rhymes with wuther-in-raw) will try and take my baby out of my arms without asking permission first… as if she has some God-given right to take my child from me. Back off before you get a karate chop to the neck. Hi-YA!

And June’s #1 Pet Peeve:
When the man we all know and love on this blog will hide from his own mother by pretending he is busy doing things like picking up sticks out of the yard, getting the fire pit ready for those fall night fires that will happen in October, checking on the fish pond 12 times in an hour, or mowing all of the neighbors lawns. I do not think it is funny to leave me with her. Talk about throwing a person to the lions. Sure I may hide on the side of the house near the trash cans now and then drinking my beer in peace while she is here, but I can do that. I would chew my arm off if I had to… and just so we are clear, you owe me big time husband of mine. BIG TIME! Especially since you have been at the golf course now for the past 4 hours!!!