Sunday, January 27, 2008

Finally, FREE TIME!

It is amazing how much extra time gets eaten up by shoveling, working out, and jobs. I can't believe a whole week went by already. Geez.
Early on in the week we had a bunch of snowfall. It apparently wasn't enough for them to call off school or a 2 hr delay, which would have been nice since I would have liked the extra help clearing the driveway. My neighbor and I began clearing our driveway's about the same time. It was really lite fluffy snow, so it wasn't too heavy, it just flew around easy. Making it extra work for you. In the time it took him and his snowblower to do his ENTIRE driveway, I managed almost a THIRD of mine. He felt sorry for me, so he came over and did the rest of mine for me. So NICE of him! Since I had extra time I made him some Merry Berry Cheese Bars with Zebbies help. Zeb didn't want to share too many of them, since they are his favorite, so I waited until Zeb was at school and ran a plateful over to them.
That was the day I stepped back into the swimming pool for the first time since July. Yikes! That kicked my butt! Duner asked me the other day if I ever get winded anymore. He didn't see me try to get 20 minutes of lap swimming in. I can run at a 6.5 mph pace on the treadmill for 10 minutes and no be as winded as I do swimming. So when the neighbor was able to help me out on the driveway, my arms were very grateful.
The rest of the week FLEW by... between working, eating, working out, I really didn't have much time this week. Thursday was quality night with the kids we took them out to eat. We hadn't really taken the ENTIRE fam out for a long time. It was a good lesson in manners. I found myself saying things like...
'Don't touch your brother.'
'Chew with you mouth closed.'
'Don't play hog! Only one thing on your plate at a time!"
'Get your FEET off the bench!'
'Sit up please'
When we are at home, and they chew like horses, is one thing. But they need some courses on how to act in a public place. I think I will check out the courses they offer at the Y while I am there.
Friday was a half day. We need this really cold weather to LEAVE!! The kids are getting sick of being house bound all the time. I picked up some movies on my lunch hour and ran into two other neighbors at Family Video. They must have the same problem. I rented the boys 3 movies. That was supposed to keep them entertained until I got out of work. I still got a phone call from Reece. Brock was acting like a snot nosed brat instead of a babysitter, so I had to set him straight.
Saturday Duner took the boys and snowblower up to the cabin for the night! Yeah!! I was alone with the dogs. Which I gleefully volunteered to take care of, in order to stay here. So I was alone with NO kids for a whole 24 hrs. I spent the time shopping. I first went to an outlet mall in Oshkosh, to Vanity Fair store. They have some good deals on Lee and Jansport clothes, then I went Gap Outlet Store, got a coat for 18 bucks and two long sleeve t's, Then on the Mall in Appleton.
There is a store in Appleton called Steve and Barrys. It has a huge sale going on right now, EVERYTHING is 9 bucks. So I bought 4 pants, 3 shirts, and a jacket. Yep, 9 bucks each.
I spent 4 hours shopping Saturday, without anyone asking if we can leave now... or asking to use the bathroom,... or screaming how HUNGRY they are! (Which I heard from another girl while I was in Target, and I just smiled)
I came home, tried on some of my purchases and decided which ones I will keep (some I didn't try on) and figure out which will be going back. Scrubbed the boys toilet, (it really needed it) Watched a movie and went to bed!
Ahhhhh...pure bliss!

Monday, January 21, 2008

Weekend Events

Friday I had the luxury of being Alone... Ah, to be by myself. To do what I want, when I want it. So what did I do?
Shovel in frigged temps for an hour and a half. What fun. Not really but it was nice to not have "Mom!" Shouted in my direction for an evening. I really wanted to make it to the gym.
(Ok, deep down I did)
I was SO COLD by the time I was done, that I just sat in my living room with my fireplace going and under a nice blanket and my laptop for warmth. I didn't warm up fully until the next day.
I didn't quiet make it to the gym that night, but I did get my entire driveway snow free.

So Saturday I woke up and braved the cold to head to the gym. 30 minutes on a treadmill and headed out to get the kiddies. They had spent the night with Grandma Z. Brock loved it, Reece not so much. Zebbie had seen them a lot this last week so he was ready to go when I got there.

Earlier this week on Monday, Duner was getting into the Camry when the door handle broke off. Hmmm. Must not like cold temps either. Duner was sick of putting so much gas into his hunting truck (aka- the Durango) So he was itching to get a new truck. I wanted to get rid of the Camry. Due to the $500+ it will take to fix the muffler, the broken window washer, broken CD player, broken center console, broken and leaky tail light... you get the picture.
I love the car, I love how cheap it was, but now it is beginning to nickel and dime us.
So, Duner says to me "Lets go check out cars tomorrow" (that was on Friday). Gee. He wants to do that on the coldest day of the year!? Why not.
After doing some research it was decided we are probably going to be looking for a Saturn VUE. The gas mileage for them is the same as our Camry, yet the ground clearance is better. We were looking for a 4x4, but as long as we have the Durango, we should be ok with only one 4x4. The most important thing is the gas savings.
We did find a few prospects but we don't really want to jump into anything right away.

Sunday we were invited to a neighbors house for the Packer Game. They had just finished their basement and the kids were really excited at the possibility of playing on the Wii game system they had gotten for Christmas. Duner had to work till 5pm and rushed home to quickly change, and leave to make it to their house in time for kick-off. They have done a great Job on the basement. Nothing that I can afford to copy any lifetime soon, but it was a fun place for the kids. I was doing great until about half-time when I suddenly came down with a MEGA sinus headache. I have never had migraines but I think it was close. I have heard of people 'tossing their cookies' due to them and that is what happened to me. Thankfully I was able to sneak away and go home. I was afraid to take anything for the pain, so I just came in, and crawled in bed with the heated blanket on waiting for it to go away. I was able to lay there for about an hour before I had to go back and pick up the kids and husband, but it sounds like they had fun. I just hope the lecture I gave them about manners paid off.

Now for some strange reason, It is 12:50 am and I can not sleep. But I was able to take some Advil liqui-gels and my sinus headache is gone and no more cookies in sight. Yay!

Thursday, January 17, 2008

Souper Stress

We have a patient at work that insists on bringing us the recipes every month from a local radio station. It is very sweet of her but we usually don't want them, since she wants us to make copies and give them to everyone... on company time, with company paper and machines... not high on our priority list. We like to stay employed.
Well, this week was Super Soups. There were two that caught my eye, so I made myself a copy. (only ONE!)

Stuffed Pepper soup and Reuben Soup.

I made Stuffed pepper soup on Tuesday. 1 lb ground turkey. 6 cans tomato soup. 2 cans tomato sauce, some green peppers, rice and onions... and wahla! It was magical. It worked! The kids liked it, the husband liked it... AND it only made it 2 days.

Ok, next up... Reuben soup...
It sounded good, all ingredients I like.

Red and Green peppers, onions, half and half, swiss cheese, sauerkraut, and butter. Sounded good to me!
So I had all the ingredients and began to throw it together. Everything was text book, saute' this, blend that, combine a, b and c. It looked GREAT! I left it sit for a few minutes to finish 'cookin'.

That is when I began to look at my darn Scrabble game on Facebook.

by the time I finished making my move... it was BURNT. ARRRRRGGGHHH!! Cream soups hate me I swear.
Maybe it is a hint. I didn't need those calories anyway. Grrrrr. All of the cheese turned chunky, and it looked more like broth soup than a cream soup. *sigh* Oh the time I spent cooking that!!! All Wasted... all for nothing! Whaaaaaaa Wha! snif... snif.

Ok Change of menu, Hot Dogs and tortilla chips...

Sunday, January 13, 2008

Never Ending Snowfun!



It has been snowing daily here lately...



Shoveling snow seems to be a daily chore around here...



So we turned it into fun..




Managed to get the dogs out and about too!

Monday, January 07, 2008

I'll Take a workout, oil change with a side of Pink Stuff,Please!

I had to squeeze in my workout, quickly before an oil change. While I was getting my oil changed I get a phone call from Z's school. He had a fever. 101 (underarm). He had been coughing for a few weeks now but he didn't have a fever.
Today he wasn't acting abnormal. He woke up with a aching head this morning but said nothing else all morning, so I sent him to school.

I picked him up, he was not happy. He really likes school and did not want to go home... until I told him I was going to take him right to the Doctor's office. I was still in my workout shorts, hair back in a ponytail, even water bottle in hand yet. One of the perks of working at the Doctors office is I can pretty much come down whenever I need to, which is nice.

After registering, we weighed him at 46 lbs (with his shoes on yet). He kept asking to go home. He was on the verge of tears the entire time. I think he was in so much pain from his head. The nurse gave us some samples of Advil Chewables to take for the pain. He loves the grape flavor Advil. The doctor was in quickly and he was diagnosed with an nasty ear infection. We got the yummy pink medicine Z likes.

He was so tired he fell asleep on the way home, We tried to get him to eat a Tuna melt but only a few bites made it in.
We managed to give him at least one dose of pink medicine before he fell asleep again.

Now, per doctor's orders, he will be off school until Thursday.

Saturday, January 05, 2008

My Son, The Plumber...

My oldest has his heart currently set on becoming a plumber.
*Sigh*
He doesn't want to go to a 4 year school after High School. We were viewing some other possible options, like architect or engineering but nope, I couldn't get him to change his mind. It said, either, he had to be good in math and science or had to write reports. He didn't like that.
*sigh*
His favorite part of the job?
The plumbers crack.

I am going to help him out whatever he decides. I can only wish he aims a bit higher. I think computers are more his thing. He is not exactly an active kid. He likes to use my building program on my computer. I hope the Trio program at school knows of something that will help him find a job he will truly enjoy.

Tuesday, January 01, 2008

Happy New Year!!!

So here it is 2008.

Welcome everyone.

Some reflections? It was a pretty good year. Lost some weight. Kids are old enough to stay home alone. YES! Kids are old enough to know what I expect from them.

Brock has in some ways become a young man. He is beginning to realize when to kiss up. He has continued to kick some major butt with his grades!! (All A's and B's for the first Semester!)
He is still painfully shy. He plays more with Reeces' friends than kids his age. I believe it is because he doesn't read cue's real well and can come off as VERY annoying at times. Maybe we can work on this with him.
Reece has discovered food is fuel, not just something to do when you are bored. I continue to try and work on burning energy for him instead of "Here, eat this...", like it seems was the case when I grew up. He did a triathlon. Ran a few miles for me. He has done some push ups. His teacher at school even has a 2 minute drill every day they do 2 minutes worth of exercises. Reece has discovered how well he can do push ups. I think next summer I will add something like that to his chore sheet.
Zeb has grown up so much this year too. He loves school especially the bus ride with his friends. He doesn't want to grow up. He said he would like to stay five forever. He doesn't want any more birthdays. Today he asked for Star Wars Lego 2 video game and I suggested he ask for it for his birthday but he said, 'No, I don't want any more birthdays". Hmmmm. Maybe I will have to work on that with him. Right now I will settle on him learning to tie his shoes. That would be nice.

Last night, for my birthday, we took the kids out to eat at BJ's to eat and to the movies, Enchanted and I am Legend, then went home to play some games of Apples to Apples and Sorry Card Revenge. Reece was be big winner of the evening. As you can tell we partied HARD!

As it came to 11pm (midnight in New York) We opened the sparkling cider and the fancy plastic champange cups and went around talking about our goals for the year.

Brocks was to do better in school and get more friends. And do better at hunting. (that was just for Dad I think)

Reece's was to do 'more' with girls??? He would not elaborate, and get involved more in sports.

Zeb's was to get more lego's and cars. He doesn't quiet understand the concept yet.

Mine is to drop 20 more lbs. Win some money. Kick some triathlon butt. Simple. Just not easy.