Things That Make Me Go ARRGGHHHH!

Have you seen this?



The best part of the whole thing is where she walks her child down the aisle of artificially colored, sugar filled drinks and puts her arm around him as to say, someday son, maybe the economy will turn around and we won't have to drink water anymore.

When I was a kid we rarely had "extra" stuff in our fridge and pantry like popular soft drinks and snacks. I can remember going over to other kid's houses and seeing their pantries bursting at the seams with fruit roll ups, Oreos and other goodies. Damn my mom and her desire to only feed us real food! Our idea of a sugary splurge were those little Kool Aid packets you could get 10 for a dollar. Mom would mix them in a gallon pitcher with a cup of sugar and water and then call it juice. She claims now that she didn't know any better, that's just how people fed their kids then. People, we know better.

Our kids are fat. A first grader with a cholesterol problem is child abuse. I don't know if taxing the foods that cause our kids to be fat is the ultimate answer, but if it causes one parent to decide to pass on the crap this week and make do with water or 100% juice (which my kids think is a special treat), then who are we REALLY harming? The hundreds of corporations that are fighting against this tax because making our kids fat is their business, that's who.

Real Women Move Heavy Things

I had to to go the doctor last week for back pain, something that I have never had an issue with in my entire life. Apparently I have been lifting and heaving too many boxes and large pieces of furniture over the past few weeks. Lack of a husband will cause one to do such things when one has barely moved into a new house. So now I have back pain pills which is cool, but the side affects (or effects, whatever the hell is right) cause me to have to drink lots of prune juice which is not so cool. I assured the doctor I would not lift anything else for a few weeks, right after I finish tidying up the garage from when my husband "tidied up the garage" and after I finish decorating the dining room which has a large armoire right in my way.

So, here is my finished dining room (well, it could use a few more accessories and a new rug):

And here is the girls' bathroom, also in need of more hot pink accessories:

I still suck at decorating, but I am pleased with these spaces so far. There is still lots to do in the house, but I am officially on a painting hiatus and hope to stay that way until after the new year.

I fall more in love with this house every day. My parents were here for Avery's birthday and they both seemed to be very proud of this real estate decision. We always liked our house in Sugar Land, but never really loved it. Well, maybe I did love my KitchenAid appliances that I didn't even get to enjoy for a year...you're welcome new, ungrateful homeowners.

But back to this house, the neighbors have all been really great so far and the home is just so open, but cozy. I have been able to stay on top of the cleaning in this house and so far no one has fallen down the one single stair leading into the front door and broken a rib. That in no way guarantees any future avoidance of drunken rib breaking but the downsizing of the number of stairs is bound to work in our favor.

Two Little Fairies

And this year's Halloween costumes are...

Life's Little Surprises

This morning I had my MOPS meeting and at the last minute I decided to go. MOPS is a group of stay at home moms that meet at a church in Houston and basically provide support to each other and a break from the kiddos every other week as childcare is provided by the church free of charge. The speaker today was supposed to be the church's pastor and he was to talk about marriage. I'm not a big fan of listening to preachers talk about marriage because the marriage they usually talk about is not my marriage. And we like our marriage the way it is thank you very much.

Apparently the pastor forgot that he was supposed to be talking to us and instead we got an assistant pastor whose wife is in our group so basically he couldn't say anything that would tick her off...the world submissive didn't come up once. Amen.

He actually talked about the role of the stay at home mom, a role that after two years I'm starting to settle in to. The talk was pretty good, especially given the fact he had all of ten minutes to prepare. He spoke about our role as our husband's helper and assistant. He made the point that it's not the easiest job in the world being the sole breadwinner for an entire family (especially in this economy) and that as the primary shopper in the family we, as the wife/mother, should take care of the family finances in a very frugal manner. This in turn makes our husbands feel more secure in their role as breadwinner...they feel as though they have won enough bread.

On the way home I began to go over in my mind all that I have spent on decorating our new house in an attempt to have a nice place for my breadwinner to come home to. As I started to feel guilty I began to list the items I could still take back rather than hang on the wall. Then it came to me...a sign.

I checked our mail and found a check from the insurance company for overpayment on the house insurance at closing.

What guilt was I talking about?

Would You Like Some Rant With Your Lunch?

I just got back from having lunch with Ryleigh up at her school. It was fun, hanging out with all those little kids. They're all so cute and sweet and....JUST KIDDING!!

God bless our teachers, those kids are crazy! They make you take your kid and go sit over at a table by yourself and what an excellent idea that is. I still could barely hear my kids over all the chatter though. After we were done eating Ryleigh took me over to meet all of her friends. There are some really sweet girls in her class but the boys were just out of control. An all girls school isn't sounding too shabby right about now. After lunch all the kids had to line up against the wall. I was talking to Ryleigh and her friends and then I turn and look over and the boys are holding their lunch boxes up in the air and letting the other boys kick at it. Geeze! They responded well to me telling them to stop but really, I now get what Ryleigh is talking about when she says the boys are always causing trouble. Man, I love my girls.

What killed me though was seeing what some parents send in their child's lunchbox. And would you believe it, the kids with the most fatty and sugary items are the ones that are already overweight at the age of 5. Go figure. I'm not saying that I'm the role model of health consciousness, but really, if you send BBQ potato chips and sugary kool-aid to school with your kid for lunch you can just expect them to grow up and have the habits and the health of someone who ate BBQ potato chips and sugary kool-aid every day for lunch. Word.