The Hurricane, the SEQUEL?!?!?

After witnessing an exchange between my little Hurricane and our cable guy last night while he was dropping off a new remote (at 7:30 no less! Yay for Suddenlink!.... and by exchange I mean that the Hurricane kept jumping in between our cable guy and Prince Charming while they were discussing remote controls and yelling "hey, SIR! I a pincess! I Awiel! Tister is Seeping Booty. I Cinnerella! Tister Tow Wite! I pwetty! Watch me dance like-a-rella! I a Cheetah Girl! I Aqua. Tister Dowinda and Mommy is Chanel!". :::::sighs::::: At least she said "sir", right?) and realizing how many people say that she acts JUST like me (Okay, okay, it was mainly my mom, and mainly when the Hurricane was in Category 3 or higher mode), the thought occurs to me that I should send my mother flowers fairly often. Okay, really I thought I should send her Vodka and Xanax, but I don't think I can really do the Xanax bit, and the vodka alone would just be sad, right?

On a brighter note, this kid is so freaking smart! She knows all of her colors, has sung her ABCs for over a year now, has been able to spell her name for about that long, too, can count to like 16, knows 0,1,2, and 5 by sight (I still can't figure out how she learned that one), can count to 10 in Spanish, is peepee potty trained (we're working on the other bit), and has a memory like an elephant (they're the ones with good memories, right?). She's also one of the MOST flipping adorable children I have ever seen, has joy radiating from her pores (most of the time :X) and has has the sweetest little voice. I could listen to her talk all day long. Most days. Who am I kidding, that IS what I do most days, lol!!

Well, if you're a semi-regular reader, (or have read more than once or twice) you know that you can never trust me if I say I'm going to blog "tomorrow". Here in JuliLand, "tomorrow" means sometime after I've slept. I never say how many TIMES I will have slept, lol! To be honest, I COULD have blogged, but I'm known as something of a procrastination queen, and I instead chose to make a nap mat cover for someone at the girls' preschool, do some embroidery, make my very first brisquet ever, blow up the bouncy house and let the girls have some friends over to jump, buy some Halloween fabric, plan some FABULOUS H'ween skirts and dresses for the girls and a few kids I sew for, and be online searching for a new dining room table and chairs that will eventually be my breakfast nook, and trying to figure out something to blog about. No wonder I'm tired!

DWTS, I won't do a HUGE recap, but let me just say that it looks like a fun season! The girls are excited about "Jake Ryan" from Hannah Montana being on there, and HRH thinks that Misty May-Treanor looks "kinda like my teacher!" LOL! DH thinks Misty May-Treanor is pretty, and I think MAKS is pretty, so we're all pretty thrilled around here. Although, I will say that I'm a little irked that they're allowing curse words on it. I'm no saint, and I'm no prude, but it was nice to have a show we could watch together without having to worry about crap like that. Eh, well, I guess we'll just have to say "you can't say that" when we hear bad words, but it still irks me.

Exercising, for anyone following my saga, lol. Prince Charming got me back to the Y this week. I reminded him that LTG wants me to just do the treadmill or elliptical, yet he managed to sweet talk me into some weight machines. Damn those gorgeous eyes of his @@. So ever my biggest cheerleader, he conned me into doing WAY more than I should have done and NOW I'm sore. I'm not sure what muscles are sore, they're in between my collarbone and my armpit. NOT a fun muscle to have sore. (I thought I had heartburn or something, I didn't know WHAT the heck was going on. Stop laughing, Lara.). Then the NEXT day, he had the nerve to get me BACK to the weight machines again. (I know, I know, it's technically MY fault, but I don't really do technicallys) After one too many "work THROUGH the pain"s, I convinced him I was done (and I'm sure it had NOTHING to do with the mathematical equation I was forming aloud that correlated the length of time I had to do those cotton-picking exercises to the length of time until he would see his wife naked again, right?) and we stopped and all was right with the world again, lol.

I'm in a blogging funk. What should I talk about?

p.s.- I realize the ridiculousness of me complaining about the language on DWTS right before I'm cussing about my husband's bedroom eyes, but it's MY blog so get over it ;)

Aaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh.................

I will blog tomorrow, I've started exercising again, with my drill sergeant, oh, I mean Prince Charming. But for tonight, I'm going to sit here on my couch with a nice glass of Merlot and some M&Ms and wallow dreamily in the return of Maks and Alec on DWTS. :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::sighs::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Reasons that GaGa's house is better than ours

According to HRH:

~ "Ducks. And geese. And we get to feed them with corn out of a milk jug. But not the swans, they're mean and I don't like to feed them"

~ Dixie Doodlebug is here (My mom and stepdad's little princess of a dachshund)

~ Tea parties and ironing (my mom has her ironing board toy from when SHE was a little girl with a toy iron and the girls adore playing with it.... wondering how old they have to be before I can let them actually iron REAL clothes :X)

~ Because of how close we are to Aunt TeTe (Keri) and SaSa (Sara) and their families and dogs and cats.

~ Because we made an apple pie all by ourselves here

~ Because we go to Texarkana and Shreveport

~ Pop is here and he will have tea parties with us and feed the ducks with us.

~ Walking down the driveway to get the mail (we have a mail slot at home).

~ Doing homework (with school being out, HRH wanted to do school, so we bought some workbooks and she is BLOWING through them. This kid drinks in new things so fast!

~ Falling asleep with Piper (our dog) in the rocking chair every night

~ Sleeping all in the same room at night

~ Going to visit Grandmere at her "villa" (My 98 year old grandmother who lives in a nursing home right down the road from GaGa's house)

And I have to say, I pretty much agree that these are all wonderful things, but Lord almighty, I am DEFINITELY ready to get back to my own house and my own bed!!!

Ike, the update

So Prince Charming went to check on our house on Sunday. We're still living here in GaGaLand, the girls are in heaven. We did manage to draw Ike this way, and lived with no power HERE and no telephones for a day or so. But all is back to work now and we're all happy. Prince Charming was TRULY a Prince for going home, cleaning up, and most especially cleaning out the fridges and freezers for me! We were very lucky, in that we had only VERY minor damage to our house. There is a small hole in our roof, looks like a branch speared it in one small spot. It is already patched, though, and can hold a few months until the people with more major repairs get theirs taken care of. We lost two big trees :*( But all in all, we are SO happy. We should be without power there for a while, though. They're telling us 3-4 weeks, so we're just taking it day by day. I am NOT going back there with two small children and a nervous and hyper dog with no power while Prince Charming jets off to Honolulu every week. I know this much, lol!

What have we learned this week?

* If we evacuate and bring about 5 days worth of summer clothes, we can pretty much guarantee a cold snap, temps in the lower to mid 50s in the morning, where the girls say "Mommy, we're brrrrrrrrzy" over and over again. This calls for a trip to Texarkana to Target and Old Navy.

* Lucky Charms make EVERYONE happy, no matter if you're 2 or 62.

* Who needs power when you have a little ceramic picnic set and mini sterling silver tea service?

* Swans will hiss at you if you get too close to try to have them eat out of your hands, but Canadian Geese and some ducks WILL get close enough to eat out of even a 4 year old's hands. (HRH's contribution)

* Having no cell service at a place you're staying when you are a cell phone junkie is HARD. I make the 100 yard walk down GaGa's driveway several times a day to check my messages and check for texts.

* My girls, in their never ending quest for total domination of the toy world, have discovered that when I am suffering from a lack of sleep, I am more likely to buy them things rather than risk having to deal with a mini-meltdown at the store. I never SAW their little pow-wow, but they teamed up and now the Hurricane is staying awake until 11:00 or so, while HRH is waking around 6, which leaves Mommy with ZERO alone and down-time during the day.

* It is NOT a good thing to have a fall-on-the-floor-and-bang-your-forehead tantrum on a tile floor (Hurricane's contribution)

* The lovebugs can see a Redbox from approximately 2.1 miles away on the open road.

* When choosing to evacuate our house, it was quickly discovered that the only irreplaceable things to me in our house were HRH, the Hurricane, and Prince Charming. Everything else is just frosting on my life's cake.

* Mommys should always keep in their purse : hand sanitizer, an extra pair of panties for each child, peanut butter crackers, Tic Tacs, and a small container of the mini M&Ms.

Feeding the geese:
Our tree (taken with a cell in the rain, so not the best pic, but so sad to lose such a beautiful old tree :*( )

*************************ADDENDUM***************************
One more item to the list occurred to me at WalMart just now

* Even when evacuating from a natural disaster, you can trust me to find and buy fabric. Sunday, I found some zebra cotton, which is SO hard to find, I think I bought a whole bolt, and today I scored some Disney Princess print for $2/yard and some Hannah Montana satin for $3/yard on the clearance rack. The girls can have new nightgowns when I get access to my sewing machine again :)

Oh! And!

FYI, in case you're following my exercise regimen, you can rest assured that I, in my never ending quest to slack off and avoid exercising if I think I can get away with it at ALL, did NOT go to the Y on Thursday and exercise. Instead, I moved all of the mobile things in my backyard into my garage (gas grill, charcoal grill, big plastic slide, Cozy Coupe, Little Tikes picnic table, plastic Adirondack chairs, etc.) and then wrestled my patio furniture to the HUGE pine trees in the backyard (that are probably going to fall on my house tonight or tomorrow) and tied them up. In case LTG is reading this.... OMG I am SO caught up. I could skip exercising for two weeks (and I might :X) and I would STILL be caught up! My legs, back, shoulders, and arms hurt! It sucks! I guess that'll teach me to slack off, huh?

Safe and Sound

After MUCH discussion (and eyerolling and childish sighing and stomping feet on my part, I eventually just said "I don't CARE if a tree falls on my house, but I don't want us and the girls to be there when it happens" and that worked.) we have safely evacuated to my mother's house. The girls are in heaven because we're at GaGa's. :) They've already fed the ducks, and to their delight, Pop has one so tame that it will come and eat right out of their hands! I will definitely be getting pictures of that as soon as the rain lets up.

We didn't have the horrible traffic that we expected, mainly because we took back roads. The highlight of the trip HAD to be when Prince Charming and I, struggling not to laugh our butts off or even dare to look at each other, because we would have totally lost it had we looked at each other, discovered that we had downloaded the NON-radio version of "Hollaback Girl" a little too late and were trying to convince HRH and The Hurricane that Gwen Stefani was saying "Oooooh, that's my ship that's my ship" you know, like she has a cool boat! And then that "this ship has bananas.... B-A-N-A-N-A-S", because she's so nice that she uses her ship to take bananas to monkeys at zoos all over the world. I'm 85% sure that they bought it. We'll see what they say in front of GaGa. Because you KNOW if they figured out that was a bad word, they'll be using the heck out of it while we're here. They're diabolical like that.

Prayers for all of our friends and family who are riding the storm out in the Houston area.

Eek!! Ack!! IKE!!!!!!!!!!!

So judging from the increasingly frantic phone calls by my sister (not Lara, another non-blogging one), and a few "concerned" calls from my mom, it seems that Hurricane Ike might be heading our way. If I was able to watch anything on the television besides Noggin or Disney, I might know this. and if I spent my online time reading news rather than emailing and checking blogs and Perez Hilton (I know, I know, but I can't help it), I might also know it. I really haven't been THAT worried about it. However, Houston ISD is canceling things right and left starting Friday morning, and Brazoria county seems to be evacuating now, so maybe I should start thinking about things.

Prince Charming volunteered to reposition airplanes if they need him to, and if he does that, the girls and I will hitch a ride. But if he doesn't, we're staying here I guess. So, tomorrow, I guess I'm off to the store for necessities. Should be fun (NOT). I sat in line this evening to fill my gas tank. Ugh. So far, I'm planning on grabbing stuff like water, beef jerky, peanut butter, snacks for the princesses, baby wipes, paper plates, matches, can soup/pasta, etc. Any ideas?

Holy crap I just googled:


*****addendum*****
The thought occurs to me that maybe this would classify as a good excuse to not exercise tomorrow? I wonder what LTG would think.

Good Trainer/Bad Trainer

So I met with my little trainer gal (LTG) today. She's darling. She's perky. She's like 12. She calls me ma'am. And I'll bet my eating a big bowl of lima beans that she doesn't have an ounce of cellulite anywhere on her body. I freaking HATE lima beans. I'd rather eat just about anything in the world. Except maybe hot dogs. Don't ask. I can't explain it. It's just one of those things.

So anyway, I meet up with LTG at 10 this morning. (It takes me an hour to drop the Hurricane off at school and convince her that she wants to stay and play. For some reason, she's always sure that she doesn't. Never mind that on Wednesdays, when HRH goes to Pre-K and Hurricane is with me, she gripes at me all day about "why come tister go to school and me not get to?" She's nuts. Comes by it honest, though) My friend J was meeting her trainer (let's call her Lucifer) at the same time. OMG I am thanking my lucky stars that I got LTG rather than Lucifer! She's a freaking monster! J works her rear off. She's so much more dedicated than me. I'd stop going and start screening phone calls. LTG is a doll, she has me fill out paperwork about why I'm there.

* Reason for starting an exercise regimen : to shut my husband up.

* What was your reason for stopping previous exercise regimen : apathy and I never liked my shoes.

* What would you like to accomplish with this exercise regimen : world peace, my children sleeping, $2/gallon gas and fewer dimples on my ass.

* Do you have any physical conditions that would keep you from exercising? : unfortunately, no

* Has a doctor ever warned you against physical activity? : No, but in elementary school Mrs. Carlton told my mother "why bother" when it was time to sign up for dance classes. And I imagine there are countless yoga instructors who will want to throw me out of their nice, peaceful classes b/c I can't keep my trap shut.

And so on and so forth. LTG seemed to be amused, but all answers were the truth! She set a goal for me to work out 3-4 times a week for 20 minutes. WHOA there Nelly! Prince Charming has been busting my butt for 40 minutes on the elliptical this week! I've been hoodwinked!!! I SO cannot wait for him to get home from this latest trip so I can tell him I have it on authority I shouldn't go more than 20 minutes now. :) :) :) She then proceeds to show me around the cardio room. (listen to me all throwing out the lingo like I'm all that! Are you impressed?) I heard "this is the treadmill, you push this big green button to get going". Seriously? Do I look that dumb? Did I fall down walking down the hall to meet you? What's up with that? So I say "Oh! You mean the one that says 'start'?" Just to make her aware that I can read. Then I met my old buddy the elliptical. I told LTG that we were friends. I'm not sure Elliptical is doing anything for my glutes even though I'm doing glute workouts, though, b/c I'm not sore at ALL. Maybe I'm doing it wrong, which might justify LTG treating me a little like an idiot.

She leaves me to exercise. I decide a trip to the car to grab my headphones is a good idea, so I can watch The Price is Right and moan at the bad guesses with the septuagenarian on the reclining bicycle next to me. As I'm walking out, I have the thought that my friend J is working out right in front of the windows with Lucifer. I'm sure she sees me skipping down the stairs while she's lifting 80000 pound weights while hopping on one leg and reciting the Declaration of Independence and thinking "THE HELL she's leaving!!!" I was SO tempted to turn around and stick my fingers in my ears and waggle them and stick out my tongue at her, but then I remembered that I'm 33. I grab my headphones, head back inside, work on the elliptical, record my time (I only padded it 5 minutes) in my little record sheet in LTG's binder and then head home! No harm, no foul! This isn't hard! Next up? YOGA!!!!! I have to find out when they're doing classes.

p.s.--> Can you believe that the spell checker doesn't recognize lima beans?!?!??! I guess I could capitalize it, but that would make it Lima beans, and I'm not sure they're from Peru, you know?

p.s.2--> Upon further reading, I'm not sure it's apparent in the title that the "good trainer" is LTG and the "bad trainer" is Lucifer. I suck at blog titles. But now you know, so it's all good I guess.

Random Sunday

I got featured on Good Mom/Bad Mom's BS Sunday again! Yay me! Thanks, Jenny and Mindy! You gals rock! :)

I read a LOT of blogs, and see so many neat pictures of people's daily activities. They'll talk about a Saturday evening spent in their backyard watching their children playing, etc., and it will show a view of a picnic table worthy of Martha Stewart. I wonder if people really LIVE like this? People with small children, that is. Here's what MY Saturday night in the yard watching the kids play looks like:
Ahem.... take note, if you will. Extension cord left for children who don't listen when I tell them not to run to learn a valuable life lesson :X, naked baby doll who has been abandoned by her fickle two year old mother, playhut balls all over (not showing the ones in the road that we leave for people driving down our street to dodge, we do this as a public service to amuse them.), the thing that looks like a fuzzy pink spider halfway down the middle of the left side of the picture is actually HRH's hair accessory choice of the day (it's a flip flop clip, she LOVES them), lovely half-painted/half-chipped toenails on yours truly, and what you can't see is my dear daughter who decided to jump "nakey bo" meaning that she didn't feel the need to put her pants back on after going potty 5 minutes before this. She had on panties, though. And a shirt. We're not HEATHENS! Oh, and this is our FRONT yard, not the back. Way to drive up the property value, no? Bet the people on the end of our street who are selling LOVE us :X

I haven't exercised since Friday. Was that Friday when I faced the evil elliptical machine? I think it was. Anyway, I haven't had a chance since then. Come on, people.... who DIDN'T see this one coming?

And as a final note, I just have to say I love my friend Dianne. There aren't many people who would laugh at me saying I'd show up at her house if she died suddenly and tragically with a UHaul to steal fabric before her extended family got there. :X But, hey, I also offered to get rid of anything she needed me to before kids and parents got there! That balances things nicely, right? Right?

Have shoes, will ellipticate?

Or whatever it is that you call what one does on the elliptical machine. I found some shoes. With MUCH help from HRH (who was gunning for some hot pink and black shoes with skulls and crossbones on them, plus rhinestones) and the Hurricane (Lime green wedge espadrilles with ballerina laces up the leg...... girlfriend has STYLE!), I found some nice little Asics. I've been told those are good for people with high arches, and I've also been told I possess a pair of high arches. Before now, the only arches I really concern myself with are the golden ones. Both for their fries and for the newly discovered Redbox. Anyway, I got those, found a couple of cute little workout shirts on the clearance rack at Kohl's (best sales hands down of ANY department store), and headed home for a rest. It's hard work gearing up to exercise!

We get home and Prince Charming is like "Alright! Let's get changed and exercise!!!" I reminded him ever-so-nicely that I had already walked all over Kohl's, but he didn't seem to think that counted. Nevermind the skill that it takes to find and try on a pair of sneakers with a sleeping two year old lovebug and a four year old who demands to know why she can't buy a few pair of shoes "since we're already here".

So, we get changed and head to the YMCA. The girls happily (shock!) prance into the child care area, mesmerizing all around with their beauty and charm (not a shock). We leave them holding court over the rest of the group and head to the room with treadmills and things. Prince Charming says "let's try the elliptical". How hard could THAT be? Really! I'm such a good sport that I jump on and get moving. He watches me for a few minutes, then reaches over and turns my machine on. Oops :X I got my headphones plugged in so I could watch some news and start exercising my little heart out. I feel the burn in my legs. I'm thirsty, I'm sweating, my legs feel like jello. I glance down at my little monitor to see this:

Ye, ladies and gentlemen, I had burned exactly 13.9 calories. What kind of racket is this?!?!?!? I'm busting my butt and I worked off 7 Tic Tacs?!?!?!? Nuts. I stopped ellipticating (I'm going to assume this is a real word) to take a picture and the evil machine beeped at me and said this:

How rude!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anyway, we did that for 35 minutes, Prince Charming kept turning up his volume on his headphones. I think maybe I whine a little :X

We did some random torture machines. I have weak deltoids (I think that's what it was), but very strong shoulders and back and surprisingly strong abs. (note: I did not say FLAT abs @@).

Picked up the lovebugs, where they were proud to show off the necklaces they made in our absence. They did great :*)

The girl who's going to be my little "trainer" and help me learn what to do called me today. We're meeting Tuesday morning while the lovebugs are in preschool. This should be interesting :)

Confessions of a LAZY person

Those of you who know me well are fully aware of my extreme aversion to exercise (I'd probably rather just not eat). I've gone through phases of my life where I occasionally exercise, and it doesn't KILL me, but I'm just not a fan, let's say. Prince Charming, on the other hand, is a supreme exerciser. He bikes, swims, runs, etc. He says it's so he can eat what I cook and not gain a thousand pounds (I do NOT cook low-fat, lol). He enjoys it, though. He trains to do the BP MS150, a 180+ mile bicycle ride to raise funds for Multiple Sclerosis. (Why they don't call it the BP MS182 is beyond me. It SOUNDS more impressive, no? I certainly wouldn't shave any miles off of it, I'd want credit for every single inch. I should start calling the walk from my room to the kitchen the JB MM80 feet... or however long it is, I'm not a great judge. Wonder if people would pledge money to fund my M&M addiction?)

Anyway, I digress. Prince Charming managed to catch me in a moment of weakness and "what the heck am I going to DO with my time while the girls are in preschool" to convince me to join the YMCA so we can go work out together. While doing the facility tour, I drew some amused looks from the tour-giver when she was all excited about showing me the "cardio room" (or as it looked to me the "torture chamber with brightly colored blow up balls and catchy pop music playing". PC told me those are called exercise balls. I always called them dodgeballs.) and I told her "I'm just here for the yoga". I could do yoga, right? It's stretching and stuff. Looks peaceful. Cute pants. No shoes. Lara says I have good balance, I can do some freaky windy tree pose she showed me and balance for longer than she thought I would be able to. That's an accomplishment when you've got these freakishly long limbs, too!!

After we signed up, they offered us this thing where a personal trainer will go around with you and show you how to use all of the equipment like elliptical trainers, stretchy machines, pushy weight thingies, dodgeballs, etc. Stop laughing, Lara. For 12 weeks, they'll keep in touch with you and "check on your progress". Prince Charming signed me up. I have a feeling I'm going to be my trainer's favorite person EVER (NOT!). I'll keep you posted.

So now he's all "When are we going to work out? Let's go exercise! Come on!! FEEL THE BURN!!!! WORK IT WORK IT WORK IT!!!" (he's a little crazy, but he sure is nice to look at, so I'll overlook it). My exercise project for today? Go buy some shoes to exercise in. Seriously. I don't own a single pair of sneakers. Well, I have some cute blue ones, but they're totally just cute to look at and would be mad at me if I sweat in them.

I will report in tomorrow on the great shoe hunt.

Special Blog Award?

I wonder if someone would like to nominate me. I'm guessing I might be eligible for either "Worst blogger EVER" or "Most inconsistent blogger of the year". Sorry :X We've been busy!

We spent a long weekend at my parents' house for my big sister's birthday. The girls LOVE going to GaGa and Pop's house. They get to see their cousins, who are quite possibly the most adorable boys on the planet (no offense to anyone reading with sons)

The cousins just adore each other, and there are many tears on our side when we have to leave. I've heard no fewer than two or three times a day "When can we go back to GaGa's house?" since we got home. They are trying to convince us to let them have a sleepover at GaGa's "with NO mommy and NO daddy". ACK! We've never done that before. So Prince Charming and I are thinking we might just try it. Maybe a weekend at The Arlington is in order for us. :)

We also started school. HRH is in Pre-K and the Hurricane is in two day Mother's Day Out. They both did GREAT the first day. I told them they looked too stinking cute to be sad and that seemed to work. HRH wouldn't have been sad regardless, she has been ready for this for over a month. She loves it, and she has a fabulous teacher.

I made the skirts kind of from this pattern : http://grandrevivaldesign.typepad.com/photos/ruffled_skirts_tutorial/index.html . I modified it a little, but it made a big difference, IMO. If you're interested in how, just leave a comment and I'll email you.

The Hurricane did much better than I expected her first day. A dear friend is working up there and checks on her a lot (::::::::::::smooches to Neile::::::::::::::::), so I can rest easy knowing she's with people who love her. :)


There are more pics at their other blog, if you're interested (or there will be as soon as I get both class "room mom" letters written and ready to send home today and get their blog updated).