ROBINS !!!

It’s almost Spring, it’s almost Spring! We saw the first robins last Sunday! Woohoo! Now I see them everywhere & am perfectly happy about that! I don’t think I saw any juncos out under the feeder today, so maybe they’re gone!

The only crocus out there so far!  It's not even as big as a dime, but it's there! 

So last weekend we had our 2nd annual “Girls’ Night Out – St. Patrick’s Edition”. Yes – we actually celebrated ~before~ the day this year! Last year we looked like a bunch of retards going into the Village Grille the weekend after, all in our St. Pats gear. We decided that this place now sucks badly & won’t be going there anymore. The rather surly waitress came out & gave us menus, then proceeded to tell us what all they DON’T have anymore. Hello? And gave us a dirty hand-written pizza menu. Real classy. Then when we tried to order, they didn’t have feta cheese for the Greek salad, didn’t have rye bread for the Rueben, etc, etc, etc. So for our next gathering, we shall take our decorations & go elsewhere.

Socks.

OMG, it was so fun! The snow was starting to melt, but there were still a couple inches at Laurie’s house, so she hitched Princess up to a sled & pulled us around. It was a riot! We had a few green beers & when we got home from dinner, we sat around & watched Wedding Crashers. That was the extent of our party weekend. And a couple Chinese fire drills, too.  Woooo.

Angel was getting style points. 

I was more cautious.

That was it for my St. Pat’s celebration. I got home from work Monday & had to stop myself from taking decorations down. Then when the 17th rolled around, I had to force myself to dress up. I have a reputation to uphold at work, so I couldn’t not show my Irish. I borrowed one of Angel’s turquoise hair extensions & she put it in for me.

Green beer!

So now everything is down, along with the “winter” stuff and I realized I don’t have much by way of Spring decorations. Ooops. Easter, yes. Spring, no. Shopping trip!!!

I gained some points on my “Cool Mom” status. The Thursday before we went to Laurie’s I bleached streaks into Angel’s hair & Friday as soon as I got home from work, I dyed those blonde streaks turquoise. We went to a beauty supply store & got the stuff and advice on how to do it. The girl at Sally’s told me that her hair was still too dark & needed to be bleached before the color would show. Alrighty! Good news is….she loves it! Granted the turquoise is already fading & it’s a lovely shade of light green on the ends, but she’s happy. And it should be washed out before her competition next month! If not, I’ll just get some of that color remover that is available. And if that doesn’t work….we’ll have to get drastic and color all her hair. But those are Plans B & C.

Blonder streaks

The finshed product.

From the back.

So yes, I went back to Weight Watchers on the 3rd. Why the hell did I start the week before Lent? It was so hard avoiding paczkis!! I did have one Sunday so I could stay away from them on Fat Tuesday. I lost 2.6 lbs the first week, but gained .6 back the second. GNO was a bad thing for me. That & my TOM arriving all conspired against me. I’m sticking pretty good since, tho. I had to go to the meeting location by work since my place didn’t have the new calculators & neglected to tell me that they didn’t know when they’d be getting any more in. I got one of the last 2 & this lady told me that their supplier is overseas, so that’s why they’re scarce now! So I will treasure this damn thing!

We had real, legit drama here yesterday!! Angel & Amanda had gone down to the corner store. Apparently on the way back to Amanda’s, they got into an altercation with 3 10th grade boys. The boys were calling them uncalled-for names & threw lit cigarettes at them! One even has a mooning problem. Knocked over the girls' bikes & generally scared the crap out of them. I hurried up & went over to Amanda’s & followed them back to our house, since they were afraid the boys would steal their bikes. If they would have been outside, I would have turned them into speed bumps! But they were down at another kid’s house, apparently watching the girls. Luckily Randy got home soon after & he got the whole story from them. One of the boys lives across the street from us!! He was there, but he didn’t do anything to them. Lucky!!  So Randy & the girls went over and had a chat with Corey’s dad. A few minutes later, he came over & apologized for his friends. His mom was almost in tears!! After that, I bet he went & beat up his friends for getting him in trouble!  I'm so glad that Randy has skills to talk to people.

OMG, we literally have to exorcise (and ban) all Monsters from our house! Not the kind that live under beds, but the kind that comes in a can! Angel was so hyped up on that crap last night that we were glad to ship her off to Amanda’s house for the night. Sheesh! She was so hyper & absolutely could not control her volume. OK, use your inside voice!!

Sheesh, my heart goes out to all those people in Japan! Crazy!  There are no words.  The only tragedy left to happen to them is for Godzilla to appear!  Then tonight I saw where our fine US & British navies are shooting Tomahawk missiles into Libya!!  Wow.  Moammar Qaddafi needs to watch out.  If he keeps taking Aretha Franklin's hats, she's going to kick his ass!

Alrighty. Time to go watch some Jeff Foxworthy with my man! Later!

LOOK!  A bed that a body can actually sleep in!!

A FLOOOR!!!! 

Tomorrow is The Day !!

Tomorrow is the big day! I’m going back to Weight Watchers! I’ve noticed some of my pants getting snug again & I hate that little witch on the Wii that says “oof” when you step on the balance board & announces during the body test “ooh that’s obese” GRRRRRR!! It’s going to be like going for the first time since they changed to the PointsPlus program. I don’t know much about it, but I know it’s a lot different than the regular Points program was. Alrighty! Bring on that 20 year reunion !!!!!


Not much going on tonight. Randy is at the Oakland County ARPSC meeting (that I should be at, too!) and the Tweedles (Angel & Amanda) are in playing Wii loudly. I’ll be making a trip to take Amanda home soon.

So we’re about 90% done with Angel’s room. 6 bags of trash out in the can already & another partial still in her room. Surprisingly not a whole lot in the donate box. Legos & shoes, mainly. Randy hung the stuffed animal hammock last night, so that got those off the floor & bed. I got her an underbed storage box for her extra blankets and the 2 small ones we already had have writing utensils & yarn in them. There’s still some random stuff out on the floor & she needs to go thru her clothes & weed some out. I think I’ll post pics once it’s fully done. They’re SCARY !!!

Isn’t it funny how you can be on the Interwebs looking at something & then, as you’re clicking randomly, you find really interesting things? I was reading the comments to a post on the FlyLady FB page and someone posted a link to their blog. First of all, the post was about how this lady used the FlyLady system to get her house ready for Passover. That apparently is when Jewish people get rid of all the leavened food items in their house (thank you www.chabad.org! – yes, I had to look it up because I didn’t know!) and also some say the basis behind spring cleaning. Anyway, so I’m looking at this other lady’s blog & she talks about being inspired by Titus 2 and Proverbs 31. I know the gist of Proverbs 31 is about how a woman/wife should behave, but I don’t know Titus 2. So I guess I need to look it up. I don’t know why her blog really spoke to me. What caught my attention originally was her post about baking potatoes in the crockpot & then I kept reading afterward. There’s a certain wholesomeness & almost innocence in her writing. Or maybe I’m just a dork?

So not much else is going on. Last Wednesday Randy came home from work complaining about stuff again. He was saying the guy who is the team leader now got taken off beeper rotation – which sucks for everyone else, but was given a Blackberry – so he has to be available 24/7. Poor Kevin wasn’t too happy about that! So wandering slightly off topic, I asked Randy if ~I~ could go to Oakland U and get the copy of his transcript so he could send in with his application that he sent to Oakland County. He said he thought he was able to do it online, so after dinner, he sat down & creatively filled out the paperwork (our printer doesn’t work half the time, so he scanned his signature & layered it onto the request) & emailed it in. But on Saturday, his copy of the transcript arrived in the mail!! I know he hasn’t been looking for any other openings, so I really hope this comes thru for him. I know he’d really love working for the county! Goodness knows he volunteers enough for them!

Speaking of which…this Saturday is the first siren test of 2011 !!! But the NWS says “Saturday: Rain, snow, and freezing rain likely. Cloudy, with a high near 36. Chance of precipitation is 70%. New snow accumulation of 1 to 3 inches possible.”  Neat. Here I thought Larry, the Net Control of last week’s net was trying to be funny when he said we’d be out with snow chains. Now that I think of it – we haven’t gotten our usual emails about siren assignments yet…..Hmmm, wonder if they’re talking about it tonight.

So I didn’t have to take Amanda home! Her mom came to get her. Angel is bummed that I won’t let her skip dance tomorrow to go hang out with Amanda on her birthday. I do believe she’s going to get her belly button pierced with a crazy aunt. Sorry – it’s getting too close to the first competition! So she’s is in the living room, showered & snuggled in to watch a chick flick until bed. They were watching part of Saw IV earlier. Odd. I think that was all Amanda, tho. Angel prefers scary over excessively gory. LOL, one of the guys at work, his son was just turning 13 and he was telling me how concerned he was over raising a teenager & all the crap that goes on for them now, etc. I just laughed. I just have to worry about possible nightmares from horror movies (none so far!!) He thought that was pretty funny. She is interested in boys, but luckily she’s not obsessed like niece Lisa is. Whew! She thinks I’m kidding when I tell her that I’ve researched military schools for girls. Heehee. Nope!


So anyway, guess I should go straighten up the kitchen & start the dishwasher or something useful like that before bed. Pppft.

I don't know why they were all hanging out in the bathroom this morning.

Snopocalypse Part 2

This is going to be a crazy weekend!


First of all, we got “Snopalopagus II” (that’s how Angel & Amanda pronounce “Snopocalypse – LOL) Sunday night – we got a good 8 inches this time, so we all stayed home. It was no problem for the girl – she didn’t have school and the plan was for her to go to the Boys & Girls Club anyway. It took Randy & I 4 hours to clear the driveway & dig out the cars! She still had dance, tho. And we both forgot! It was supposed to start at 3:30 and at 4 Terina called & she had to hustle to get ready. Luckily it was technique that she was late for and not her actual classes. Ooops!

Must.Go.Sniff !!!

SNIFF !!!!!

Car-sno-hawk

So Tuesday we went to the Club & she flat out refused to stay. She wanted to go to work with me instead!!! Oh come on!! So I tried calling Mom – no answer at 0730. So I took her into work with me for a while. Then I finally was able to get hold of Mom, but by then I had work I had to finish, so she got to hang out with me until about 10. Glad my bowl of paperclips kept her busy!

I was supposed to take her over to Mom’s anyway after work because she was staying there Wednesday. So she just went early. But I still had to make a trip home to get her stuff, because I’d forgotten to pack until as I was walking out the door. Crap. So Randy & Jack took a field trip with me over to Mom’s Tuesday night.

I picked her up from the roller rink yesterday when open skate was over. It seemed silly for Mom to bring her home when I was close & really didn’t have to wait too long.

I had taken today & tomorrow off work. I had to take Maggie to get her blood pressure checked, to make sure her meds are doing what they’re supposed to. All was good with her – whew! We stopped at BK for some breakfast, then came home for a bit. Pnut had a consultation with the orthodontist at noon. As if I needed someone else to tell me how jacked up her teeth are. Guess her skull is too small for her teeth, so they’re crowded and her front teeth have pushed the lower teeth back & her eye teeth are tipped way in. She goes back on April 1 for x-rays & to get molds made, etc, etc, etc. The Randy & I will go back 2 weeks later to find out what they can do with her & also what the damage ($$$) will be. Joy.

Then we went to the credit union & filled up their coin machine with pennies. We had to wait until they emptied it so we could finish! She had over $30 in pennies. That was a nice little deposit in her account.

Then we stopped at Target since it was killing her to use the gift card she got for her birthday. She was looking for a jean skirt, but they didn’t have any. She got 2 books instead. Then we went to the Salvation Army & she struck gold! We narrowed it down to 2 for her & 2 for me. Plus I found another creepy doll to zombify. This one was glass eyes, so I won’t have to paint them! And I will use spray paint this time instead of the acrylic enamel. Darn those brush strokes!

Those EYES !!!!!

So the crazy part will begin tomorrow. Besides probably having to shovel snow again so Randy can go to work, we’re going to take EVERYTHING out of her room, except for bed & dressers. I’ll probably even have her take the drawers out so she can go thru her clothes. Vacuum & dust!  Oh, and I WILL take before and after pictures.  It's scary.  I fully expect to fill up the entire trash container with stuff & have a truckload for the Vietnam Vets!! Then she’s been bugging me to go see that damn Justin Bieber movie. I really don’t want to go see that. The kid annoys me just by the fact he’s EVERYWHERE !!!! At least his music doesn’t irritate me like Taylor Swift. I’d rather listen to the brakes on my car grind than to hear her.

Just found out on Tuesday that one of my Adopt a Platoon guys is heading home sooner than planned! I was supposed to stop “sending support” on April 1. Now it’s March 1 !!! Yay for the HHC 2-327 Infantry!

LOL, a whole bunch of people on the Halloween Forum love my Fatal Attraction skeleton cupid! I got a PM from someone asking the name of the seller so they could see if they had any more. It’s just too cute!

So, I guess I need to go figure out dinner – I told Randy it was a super secret ninja dinner plan – meaning I have no earthly clue what we’re having!

Oh, I almost forgot – furthering the Donor drama – the Monday after I’d had the chat with his girlfriend; I got an email from him! She somehow managed to get him to realize he was an ass & wanted to “apologise” to me & Angel for not being there & wanted to make up for it, blah blah blah. Just HOW does he think he’s going to make up for 11 years of ignoring her?? You can’t. Plus, she doesn’t miss him in the slightest. She’s got Randy there for her. Then wants to call & talk to her. But the number he has is for my old apartment! Funny that I don’t remember him ever calling there, but I know he has called here! I’ve been meaning to ask her if she even ~wants~ to talk to him, but I keep forgetting. Guess I should reply to his email. But there’s no hurry. I’ll reply about as quickly as he’s replied to me in the past – in a month of so. Maybe.

Anyhooooooo. Starting back to Weight Watchers next week!!

Playing in the snow.

Happy Valentine's Day!!

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Didn’t do anything particularly exciting. I tried to talk Michelle into letting me have the day off work, by nature of my name, but that didn’t work. She said she didn’t get Easter off (they’re the Hare family) so I didn’t get Valentine’s off. Darn. Didn’t hurt to try! Randy & I dropped Angel off at dance then went grocery shopping. We decided on not going out to dinner tonight & instead made dinner in that reminded us of summer – turkey cheddar brats, baked beans & potato chips. I got a bunch of flowers there & he grabbed 2 bags of Dove chocolates and 1 Reese’s dark chocolate peanut butter cups. MmMmMmMm!!! Then we played some Wii Crazy Golf.

Then I went to pick Angel up & was invited in to watch the competition jazz dance. It’s pretty neat. It’s going to look awesome in their silver & blue striped sequined dresses. I’m looking forward to next Monday because its winter break & they’re just having certain classes, so I want to go a bit early to watch tap. I haven’t seen her tap since last year’s recital! They always look like they’re having fun.

They’re offering a Dad’s class this year for the first time. I’d love to see Randy on stage, but I also know that he absolutely cannot dance if his life depended on it. Oh well. I saw the sign up sheet – there’s going to be quite a few Dads, so it’ll still be funny. The teacher who’s teaching it said the last time she taught this class; she had them in boxers & wife-beaters & raincoats dancing to “Its Raining Men”. OMG – that had to be hilarious! The Daddy/Daughter dance will be cute, too.

I had an entertaining email conversation this weekend. I got this message on Facebook out of the blue from this lady who had been seeing the Donor. She was really nice & wanted to know my side of the story why he hadn’t been in contact with Angel, etc. We chatted back & forth 5 or 6 times. I got the impression she was on the verge of breaking it off with him anyway, and what I told her sealed it. She said (among other things) she couldn’t respect a person who could ignore his own flesh & blood. Me, neither! I’m glad for her, since I rather liked her. Some of the things she said sounded like me! I sort of wonder how she found me. I looked at her profile & she is friends with both his Mom & a guy from the Lincoln we called Tiny. I wonder if one of them told her who I was. Oh well, I wish her the best in her new ~freedom~!

I got a booboo at work Friday. I was cold so I grabbed a cup of coffee & proceeded to trip up the stairs. It sure didn’t look like much coffee came out of the cup, but it was all over 2 ½ stairs & a good part of the landing. Damn it. Then I realized I bruised & skinned the hell out of my knee. Luckily it was only stiff Friday. It’s been fine since, even with the big ol’ scab. Glad there were no witnesses!!

Angel went home after the school Valentine dance with Emaly Friday to finish decorating their shirts for today and ended up spending the night. So I stopped at Avenue after work & got me some nice new undergarments, a nice necklace, 2 new tops & some yoga pants that shrunk when I washed them! I know my legs aren’t that long, damn it! But they should be nice to bum around the house in. I have to go off on a tangent about these new underwear. I so have to go get more. They are AMAZING!! They are the most comfortable undies I’ve ever worn & no wedgies!!! And they’re funky colored, too. I saved the bright red ones to wear today.

So since we had the huge “Snopocalypse” 2 weeks ago, we haven’t gotten much more of the white stuff.  An inch here, a couple inches there, etc.  In fact it’s been warming up a bit! Got up to 45 yesterday & 41 today and going up to 53 Thursday!!! WOOHOOO!!!! But I know that’s not the end of winter. I just hope it doesn’t inspire my tulips & crocuses to start sprouting! Jack wanted to play ball so badly today. I had to keep it in the driveway since every time I threw it out in the yard, it would get buried in the snow & he couldn’t find it. But my hand started to freeze about 4 or 5 tosses, so I had to be the fun killer.

So next week is mid-winter break. I’m taking a couple days off to take little Miss Maggie to the vet to get her blood pressure checked and them Miss Angewa to the orthodontist for a consultation. I know she’s going to need braces. But at least that darn little snaggletooth came out! That goofy kid wants them!  I’ve never had them, but I’ve heard that they can be painful until you get used to them. She complains about brushing her teeth now, she’s really going to hate having to brush them a bunch of times a day to keep the crap out of them.

Anyway, I got my skeleton cupid. I love it! It just makes me want to SQUEEEEE! I posted a picture on Halloween Forum & people are jealous! LOL! And they think I should leave it out year round. I just might!

I’m just waiting for my payment to clear for the last of the blowmolds I won on eBay. We had one like the one on the left when I was a kid. ^^^^^^^^ No idea what ever happened to that, but I couldn’t resist when I saw this one. I think I’m done with eBay for a while. However, I do plan on having the Easter bunny bring me this….

So anyway, its time for bed, Sweet dreams ya’ll !

A & A2 doing chocolate mousse mud masques.

I . Am . Tired . Of . Snow

let me say it again......   I.Am.Tired.Of.Snow.


Need I say any more? First we had the “Snowpocalyspe” Tuesday night into Wednesday. We got lucky & only got about 6 inches. Other places got slammed. Another 3 or so today. Just tired of it.

I love when snow starts to peel away from the fence.

What was left after I moved my car!  A snow tire!

So anyway, we had Amanda over Tuesday night & she didn’t go home til right before dinner Wednesday. Our school district is so mean! We got one of their automated calls around 5pm and both girls were jumping up & down screaming, since schools all over the area were closing rapidly. Wrong! It was the principal inviting everyone to an Academic Blitz on Thursday night – they were devastated! LOL! I kept watching Channel 4’s website for school closings, and at one point there were almost 600 schools listed, but not one single public school district in Macomb County. Anyway, we finally got the call around 9:45PM that school was closed. A lot were still closed on Thursday, but ours wasn’t. Neener neener. Neither Randy nor I went to work, either. When they first started talking about this blizzard on Monday, I told them at work that if Utica Schools were closed – don’t expect me in. I love that they forget exactly how old Angel is, that she’s plenty old enough to stay home alone!! But the people in dispatch are also slightly stereotypical, so they had no issues with me or Kim staying home because we have kids. But the guys – most of whom have little little ones at home – were expected to be in; their wives could watch the kids! LOL!!

Thursday we went to the Academic Blitz thingy after Pnut got out of dance. It was a bunch of information booths about colleges, tuition savings plans, student loans & other programs that UCS offers for after graduation. I was rather embarrassed that Miss Dork told the lady from Macomb Comm College that she wanted to be a Power Ranger when she grew up. But the MCC lady played along & said the closest she could offer was Law Enforcement. Then we got to chatting about their vet tech program, which is what she really wants to do. Angel got excited about that, which is good, because a 2 year degree from MCC is one hell of a lot cheaper than State! But I don’t want to think about that kid in college yet. Depressing yet scary at the same time.

Grr. I want a bigger house. I’m trying so hard not to act the martyr because no one is helping me out around here, but there’s just no place to put anything!!! Tonight I got out my Sink Reflections book to start reading again. I’m just overwhelmed!! I swear last Sunday I worked on the house for 4 hours & it didn’t look like I did a damn thing. It’s always a huge freakin’ mess. Randy cleaned out from under his deck & consolidated some stuff, but now he has boxes sitting on top of his desk & he can’t use his computer at all without relocating all his crap onto my desk!! So instead of 2 desks/computers & 1 chair, we basically only have one desk/computer. I’m miffed because I missed out on a possible bidding war on eBay for 2 bunny blowmolds & 4 eggs. He was in my way, so I lost it in the last 20 minutes. Silly I know. Guess I didn’t really need them anyway. Don’t get me started on the closet. To fit two desks in here, I can only open one closet door fully and of course all of my stuff is in the back. So I can’t see what I have in there. Towels are in an old dresser in Angel’s closet. The drawers aren’t even on runners; they’re just hanging in there by their fronts. The sheets are in a clothes basket on top of said crappy dresser...which is one of Maggie’s favorite places to sleep. Having the Wii boxes sitting around the living room still aren’t helping, either. Randy is anal when it comes to boxes from electronics. “If we ever move, they can be packed up safely”, etc etc etc. Just like he’s going to go dig out those 20 year old college textbooks out in the garage. Sure like that info isn’t totally out of date! Why would you dig out old books when you have the INTERNET right handy?? I don’t get it. Oh well, he can take the boxes out to the garage tomorrow. I want to have the living room at least useable before the football game tomorrow.

Is it sad that I want the Packers to win just because the Steelers come from the same city as the Penguins??

But we will watch the game – for both the commercials and for the score at the end of each quarter, because we both bought squares from work. I’d rather watch hockey. Granted football players have to be tough enough to withstand a bunch of guys jumping on top of each other, but hockey players are moving non-stop, slamming into the boards, getting into fights, etc. etc. Plus they’re not as arrogant as football players are – well most of them anyway. Last weekend when Randy was gone, we watched the NHL All Star game on Sunday & the Super Skills Comp on Saturday. I do believe Miss Angela is a convert! She really enjoyed watching the Skills & the game with me. During Skills, it was hard to tell who was on which team, since they all were wearing their own jerseys (Woohoo Team Lidstrom!!!) but it was fun. Most of the players ended up with nicknames that we decided upon.

One of the cars racing in the Sno-Drift.

I’ve been listening to my hypnosis CDs, but the hardest part seems to be staying awake! I don’t feel like I’m really hypnotized, but I really don’t feel like moving or opening my eyes like she said would happen. I just wish I could get 20 minutes to myself without a certain little girl bugging me. Helloooo! I don’t go barging into your room every few minutes – stay out of mine! Sheesh! What do you think I’m doing, trying to escape out the window??

So here’s the update on my zombie doll…..dying her dress didn’t work for crap. The brown bib and trim are - as I found out the hard way - not satin, but polyester or nylon or something that doesn’t dye at all. Same with the lace. Neat. So it is a dark gray and brown dress with dirty yellow lace. I didn’t want to use regular acrylic paint on her, so I found acrylic enamel paint for glass & china. But apparently I don’t have a good enough brush because it left brush strokes – exactly what I didn’t want to happen. I think I mixed a nice shade of gray, but she lost her pretty porcelain complexion – damn it. I wonder if I could sand it smooth & use spray paint on it…..don’t know if I’d get the color I want tho. Sigh.

Just bought this guy - the scarf says "fatal attraction"  How cute it he????

Anyway, it’s getting late & although I’m not terribly tired, I’m going to head to bed. Later!

The boys snuggling on my Snuggie!