Kitchen Makeover

I apologize for keeping you all in suspense! I am finally going to show you my kitchen transformation!!! Drum roll please.........

BEFORE

The inspiration - my purple sofas

It's alright, you can say it - BORING!

There's those cool purple sofas again.

Depending upon the light, they "change" colors throughout the day - just as the paint does.

AFTER

The decor above the cabinets is a work in progress - I'm still shopping!

I LOVE IT!!!

TICK WARNING!!!

I hate it when people forward bogus warnings, and I have even done it myself a couple times unintentionally......but this one is real, and it's important. So please send this warning to everyone on your e- mail list.

If someone comes to your front door saying they are checking for ticks due to the warm weather and asks you to take your clothes off and dance around with your arms up, DO NOT DO IT!! THIS IS A SCAM!!

They only want to see you naked.

I wish I'd gotten this yesterday. I feel so stupid.

That's A Lot Of......

75 degrees - hot & sunny on Saturday (perfect)

62 degrees - cold, gloomy & windy on Sunday (freezing)

60 degrees - cool, sunny & windy on Monday (miserable)

18 dollars for admission

13 hours at the softball diamonds

12 dollar souvenir t-shirt for the player

12 girls on the softball team

7 games

5 beverages

4 losses

4 hot dogs

3 wins

3 days of softball

3 family members coated in sunscreen

3 candy bars

2 bags of sunflower seeds

2 hot chocolates (Monday)

2 days wrapped in blankets

2 days on bleachers (bleacher butt)

1 day on comfy lawn chairs

1 freezie

1 super nacho

1 slice of pizza

1 family member not coated in sunscreen (sunburn)

......Softball!

Things I Learned This Weekend - Updated!

- Just because eight people RSVP on Thursday for your Friday Pampered Ch*f Party does not mean that eight will attend on Friday - something will inevitably come up that requires half of them to cancel on Friday morning.

- If for some reason I were to lose my day job, I could get a job as a bartender. I make EXCELLENT chocolate martinis!

- Even though guests are aware that the Pampered Ch*f Party is a Chocolate Bliss theme party, guests will still expect something more substantial (supper-like) being the party begins at 5:25. (Evidently Nutty Caramel Brownies, Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cheesecake, Oreos, Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookie Sticks, M&Ms, Chocolate Milk, Strawberry Chocolate Shooters, and Chocolate Martinis are not considered a "good" supper.)

- No matter how well you coat your daughter in sunscreen does not mean she will return the favor. (But hopefully she will learn her lesson as she will now be coating her mom's back in lotion twice a day for the foreseeable future.)

- If you head to the pool to take advantage of the sunny, cloudless skies, that does not mean the skies will remain that way. (In only 45 short minutes, the skies will turn a deep, dark grey with the threat of rain - oh, and the wind will pick up tremendously!)

- If you run out of white milk for breakfast, chocolate milk will work great with chocolate flavored cereals and chocolate malt-o-meal.

- If you are knowingly going on a 3 mile walk, flip flops should not be the shoe of choice.

- Two parents walking cannot keep up with two kids on scooters.

- If you go golfing and are wishing for a partly cloudly sky along with a gentle breeze, it will not come. (It will be completely sunny with very little breeze - a great day for the pool.)

- Even after three coatings of bug spray, if the mosquitos are determined enough, they will still bite you.

- When you get excited and finally decide to add a line for the kids to your cell phone plan and instead of allowing the kids to pick their new phone, you pick a new "cool" one and give them your old one, you will quickly become disappointed when you find out the new phone is crap! (Supposedly batteries on phones these days only last 8 to 12 hours?!?!?! And I can't make or receive calls because the signal keeps disappearing!!! Are you kidding me??????? I want my old phone back!!!)

- When I play (and I use this term loosely) tennis, I look like a ballerina - according to my daughter. I take this as a compliment - I'm a very graceful tennis player! So if you're looking to combine tennis and ballet into one - I'm your girl!

- Backhand swings in tennis are very tricky! (This is usually when I look most like a ballerina.)

So How Did You Spend Mother's Day?

Saturday we decided to head to SF for Mother's Day Eve. We spent the day shopping, of course. However, I was not shopping for myself nor did I buy a single thing for myself. I know, poor me! My hubby said I made up for it the past few months, though! :) Instead we were on a mission for Hayley. She has a rather difficult body shape. It's VERY had to find bottoms to fit her!! Poor girl. Old N*vy jeans are/were the only jeans that would fit her right. But we're in kind of a predicament. She's at that stage where she's basically outgrown kids' sizes but she's just a bit too small for juniors' sizes!! AARRGGHH!!

She outgrew all her jeans that I bought at the beginning of the school year so I recently bought two more pairs but that's all I'm buying because spring/summer is supposed to be here! It's been hectic trying to make sure she has clean jeans to wear every day!

She actually jumped two sizes since September - lately she's been wearing jeans that are two sizes too small!! We can't believe she didn't say anything. At this age, we expect her to tell us if things don't fit and also we never noticed because with the flowy, loose shirts over the jeans you just don't see it!! Poor girl must have felt like a sardine!

(On a side note, since last April, Hayley has grown 2 inches and Tanner has grown 4 inches!!)

Anyways, we were in SF trying to buy her shorts because I am determined that summer will eventually be coming. Store after store after store after store.........disappointment after disappointment after disappointment after disappointment............when all of a sudden, we finally we hit the jackpot! At Yo*nkers we found a skort and pair of shorts that FIT!!! I actually started singing "Hallelujah, Hallelujah" in the dressing room!! Seriously!! :) I was so excited I never even checked the prices of them. Just took them straight to the register and just about died when the total for those TWO items came to over $63!!!!! For an 11 year old. They're shorts for cyring out loud - hardly any material!!! (Yes, I still bought them.) Hayley later says, wow, they were overpriced!

Our last stop was JC P*nney and we found two more pairs of shorts there - B*ngo brand!! And they even came with free flip flops! WOOHOO!!!

Brands we've tried that just do not fit her right are: T*rget's Circo, JC P*nney's Arizona.

Brands we've loved over the years: Old N*vy, Ch*ldren's Place, and some L*vis.

OK - enough about that!

We had lunch at R*by Tu*sdays. Yum-o!! And supper at J*ohnny C*rinos! YUM-O!!!

Sunday, Mother's Day, I didn't do anything fun or relaxing really. Dean & the kids cooked me breakfast. Had to go through rummage sale stuff as my sale is Friday, had laundry to do, went to my mother-in-laws for a bit, and then Dean & the kids took me out for a hot fudge sundae at D*Q.

So how did you spend your Mother's Day Eve & Mother's Day?

Snow Day On APRIL 25th

And mind I remind you, we had a SNOW DAY only two weeks earlier on APRIL 11th!

ARE YOU KIDDING ME???

I think we got about 10 inches on the 11th - which was bad enough.

WE RECEIVED 19 INCHES THIS PAST FRIDAY!!!!!! IN APRIL!!!!!!!! THE END OF APRIL!!!!!!!!!

I am NOT laughing at these jokes that Mother Nature has been playing on me!!!

For my sanity, I hope Spring is right around the corner.........

What Color Lip Gloss Should You Wear?

You Should Wear Cherry Red Lip Gloss

Wild, fresh, and totally alluring.

What Color Lip Gloss Should You Wear?

Who knew? ME?! Wild, fresh & totally alluring?!?!?!

Dance Competition

A few weeks ago, Hayley had a Dance Competition. She participates in Jazz Dance and Pom Dance. Here are the hair pics!

The Night Before - Frontal View

The Night Before - Back View

The Night Before - Side View

(Please Note: She is smiling at this point.)

The Next Morning: Frontal View

The Next Morning: Back View

The Next Morning: Side View

AKA Grandma Hayley & Little Orphan Annie!

(Please Note: She is NOT happy!)

(FYI: Her hair is well past her shoulders when straight!)

(Note to Self: Next time - Do NOT roll hair all the way to the scalp.)

(Better yet, NEVER try this again!)

I was laughing SO HARD that I was crying. Hayley was NOT impressed! I told her not to worry. I would never let her leave the house with a bad hairdo! Which, if you truly know me, I should have been freaking out!

Being Hayley was in two competitions, she need two hair styles! And to top that off, Hayley's hair does not curl well at all! (Unless you wet her hair, use tiny granny rollers, and sleep in them.) One required low piggy tails and the other required a high, curled pony tail. (A co-worker suggested I use the rollers because she uses them for her daughter so I thought I'd give them a shot. Something she forgot to tell me and something I vaguely thought about when I was DONE rolling her hair - maybe I shouldn't have gone all the way to her scalp?!)

We had to be to the dance competition by 10 am. My plan was to leave the house at 8:45 am even though it was only a 45 minute drive so we had time to get through town and find the location.

At 8:20 I was FINALLY done unrolling her hair and determined there was NO way I could work with this. (I actually tried but it was a lost cause!) There's only one thing to do - WASH IT OUT!!! I grabbed her, bent her over the tub and said, "Hayley, we don't have time to be nice - it's going to hurt!" (FYI - Hayley has a sensitive head.) We washed it, blow-dried it, put it in two low piggy tails, and started curling away. I figured it probably wouldn't look very good once we had to put her in a high pony tail but we had no choice. We were out the door at 9:05 and still made it on time! (It actually looked cuter when we changed it to a high pony but neither of the styles had much curl!) Oh, well!

Does anyone want me to do their hair??!! :)

Here are some pics from her dance competition!

(Hayley is in back row, second from right)

(Hayley is in back row, second from right)

(Hayley is fourth from left)

(Hayley is on the right, standing)

In the jazz dance (baseball), we were the only ones in that category so we took 1st place. In the pom dance, there were two entries and we won 1st place!

What Did You Eat for St Paddy's Day?

Our family ate green mashed potatoes topped with mock beef stroganoff. And for dessert, a green jello poke cake topped with cool whip and green sprinkles!

Tanner & I prepared the meal while Hayley was at dance. When she came home and sat down at the table, I told her we were having green pistachio salad with beef gravy. In addition, I had already dished up two plates so she was looking at the plates and seeing green pistachio salad topped with a hamburger gravy. She looked very confused and did not look pleased that this is what we were having for supper. Then Tanner and I let her in on the joke, it wasn't pistachio salad it was green mashed potatoes! :) She looked SO relieved! Then we all happily gobbled up the yummy supper!

As we were eating, it was hard to believe it was mashed potatoes because it did NOT look like mashed potatoes! They were SO green! Gotta have fun when you can!

Monday Was A Big Day!

I did it!!! I actually did it!!! I got my lower braces on and received my bite plate on Monday! In 3 to 4 months, I will get rid of the bite plate and get my uppers braced. My teeth have been slightly tender but nothing too major. Mainly my teeth are tender only when I'm chewing. Only one bracket has been bothering me so I've been keeping wax on that one. My big discomfort is coming from the bare wire that goes across my extraction sites. The wire has put two nice grooves in my cheeks!! YIKES!!! It is actually quite painful and you can't put wax on a big bare wire; it just doesn't stay! Trust me - I've tried!!! Here's to my cheeks toughening up so I am pain free!

After my extractions, I lost 8 pounds within two weeks. Prior to being braced, I decided to do some celebrating so I ate out at my favorite restaurants for 9 days in a row!!! Yes, you heard me correctly, 9 days of eating out!! Some of the foods were difficult and even painful or uncomfortable to eat but I dug my heels in and ate, ate, ate! For heaven's sake, I had been on boring soft foods for almost 3 weeks!!! But there was a consequence! I gained 3 pounds in those 9 days!! But since I've been braced, I've lost those 3 pounds in just 4 days! YIPPEE!!! Here's hoping to shedding more!

Being it's such a pain to clean my braces and you really have to brush every time you eat, unless you like carrying around a convenience store in your mouth, I've cut out all snacks. It's just not worth it! That's mainly why I'm losing weight. Plus, it takes longer to eat now (since my extractions & being braced) so I get full faster, thereby reducing my portion sizes! Most times I'm eating only half the portion sizes I used to eat! CRAZY!!!

Being you don't hardly see my bottom braces when I talk or smile, I decided to choose a colored lig (rubber band) - light pink. HOW COOL! I'm thinking purple next time! Might as well have fun with it and enjoy it; however, I won't be picking too wild of colors. They had told me I could pick up to three colors to create a pattern if I wanted! No, thanks! One color is plenty for me! However, on my top front teeth I will have clear (ceramic) braces and will not put colored ligs on them as that defeats the purpose of getting clear braces!

This is what my bite plate looks like. Very similar to a retainer except it's thicker behind my front teeth to stop me from biting off my bottom brackets. (If you look closely, you can barely see the bite plate between my top front teeth.) I have to wear this 24/7 - even eat with it!! My back molars do not touch! It definitely makes for a creative eating experience! Hence, the reason why I visited all my favorite restaurants the nine days prior to being braced! :)

Oh, boy! I lisp something fierce!! As soon as the ortho put in the bite plate, I tried to talk! I was shocked! It was NOT GOOD! I looked at my ortho and asked if I would ever talk normal again! He lauged and said yes, but it is going to take some time! :( I have to retrain myself! The first day was absolutely TERRIBLE!!! Not only was I lisping like crazy, but I was spraying spit EVERYWHERE! I went straight back to work after being braced so I had no time to practice! It's getting better but as my boss so graciously pointed out, "It sounds like you have a wad of gum in my mouth!" (It's a good thing I like my boss!) :)