I should start this post by saying I love my mother-in-law. I truly do. However if she doesn’t start paying attention the rules I am sending her to the worse nursing home I can find.

Do you remember this?

Well she outdid herself this time. Allie has wanted a Baby Alive for (and I quote) her whole entire life. Mean mother that I am, I have banned Baby Alive from the house. After all I have two children, a dog and husband that I already have to feed, bathe and clean up after. Why on Earth would I import another one?

One that cries, eats and pees. Because just like the fish (now deceased), dog and baby sister Allie just had to have, I know who will end up having to take care of a Baby Alive.

Did I mention the child has 268 30 dolls in her room? Why can’t she just play with the ones she has I will never know. Plus Allie is 9. Exactly when do girls stop playing with baby dolls? I know the answer actually. She stopped playing with dolls a couple years ago. She just hasn’t stopped collecting them!

Back to my mother-in-law, whom I do adore. The other day she babysat Allie and when I went to pick her up guess what was in her arms?



Photo credit

Now my mother-in-law loves a sale, a yard sale. She especially loves anything that is free. Apparently one of her friends bought 2 Baby Alives and got one free. As the doll was not in a box but in a gift bag without any accessories I have a feeling that this may not be the whole truth. Close to the truth, but not the whole truth.

What I do know is that “Lilly” is now residing in Allie’s room and began crying in the middle of the night.

Guess who slept through her baby’s cries? If you guessed everyone but me you get a gold star.

For now my mother-in-law is safe, in her own home. Soon however she may need respite care. If she doesn’t start following the rules it might be more spite than respite.

Allie: This is why I like it when Grammie babysits. She says I can stay up until 8:30 then she falls asleep and I get to stay up until 10 or 9 central time.

It’s that time of the week. To take a moment and think of just 10 things I am thankful happened this week. In no particular order, although I wish I was in a Particular Harbor….

10. There are only 10 days left before the girls go back to school. They just may make it.

9. Going off the grid for a week.

8. Campfires and the friends that sit by them. Until 2am.

7. Boo fell in love with the movie Grease. Her IPAD being the only technology allowed while camping.

6. That Boo doesn’t understand the storyline, lyrics or innuendos in Grease.

5. Floating down the river with Boo, Allie, David and David’s sister. I just really wish Boo hadn’t sent my Margarita into the river. Next year she floats with Sherry.

4. That there are no photos of me falling into the river when Boo and I got stuck on the rocks.

3. That we noticed one of the floats had a hole in it before we started down the river.
 
2. That Allie had the time of her life going from Campsite #1 to #18 playing with her friends.

1. That there are only 12 more months before we once again go off the grid with 30+ of our closest friends.

We took a week away from the world. A week where we hung with friends, floated in the river, drank margaritas at noon and wine at dinner. A week where Allie ran from campsite to campsite visiting all her friends. A week where Boo broke into a newly engaged couple’s tent and made their air mattress and tent into her personal bounce house.

A week without TV, Internet, Cell Service. (Saving grace, we had power and running water)

I really wasn’t myself when I came home. See I enjoy all the comforts of home. I am addicted to reading my friends blogs and writing my own. I check my e-mail and texts constantly. I am constantly thinking of things I should be doing at work and at home.

But last week I wasn’t myself. I was away from all that worry and hurry. I was a mom hanging with her kids during the day and a wife hanging with her husband by the campfire at night. I laughed with friends, slept past 6AM and sat down for more than a minute.

I was the me I wish I could be more often.

Then we came back. The first thing I did while driving back into the real world was turn on my phone and review all the e-mails that procreated like bunnies while the phone was off.

We pulled into the driveway and I immediately started cleaning, organizing, doing laundry and getting ready for work the next day. At work I realized that I am not irreplaceable but that I still had 200+ e-mails to return.

It took just 20 minutes to undo the relaxation of being away from technology for a week. To start prioritizing things over my girls. These things are important, too. After all the mortgage kind of depends on them. Boo needs her therapies. Allie needs the routine.

I am the planner, the budgeter, the organizer, the over thinker. Once in a while, though, I wish I wasn’t myself.

“Wait, if you are going to take my picture at least let me get my wand!”

Joy, my friend, has gifted me with the Versatile Blogger award. And of course there are rules to taking the award. Kind of like the thank you note your mom used to make you write your grandmother.

Rule #1. Thank and link the blogger. 
Rule #2. Tell seven facts about yourself
Rule #3. Pass it on to seven bloggers
Rule #4. Link to specific posts on their blogs so they’ll be notified by pingback

So here we go!

Rule #2 Here are 7 facts about me you probably would rather not know:

1. I am addicted to M&M’s
2. I paint my toenails but not my fingernails
3. I am wearing the ugliest t-shirt right now. Allie made it for Mother’s day. So you know, I am taking one for the mom team
4. I have never watched Mad Men, Downtown Abbey
5. I don’t understand why people go on reality TV then are surprised when they get arrested for not paying taxes.
6. I think mismatched socks trend was invented by a mom who decided to forget looking for that lost sock and convinced her daughter she was cool.
7. I have never been arrested. Yet.

Rule #3 pass this award to seven bloggers.

1. Julie at Julie’s Boyz
2. Kerry at Transcending CP
3. Tatum at Ain’t no Roller Coaster
4. Sylvia at Faithful Mom
5. Liz at Four Sea Stars
6. Misty at Meet the Cottons
7. Stacey at We are the Brothers B

I’m not too sure about the whole pingback thing. So dudettes you’ve been tagged 🙂

Oh and Joy, thanks for letting me blog-sit last week. I hope I didn’t leave too much of a mess.

I have this great friend, Jenn. I can use her real name because she was the second one on this Earth to learn about this blog and therefore knows she could end up on it.

Last weekend we spent the day freeloading off of Jenn’s family and their beach house. Yes, you may have noticed a trend of my freeloading activities. Hint: If you rent a beach house and tell me about it, I may show up. Even if it means a three hour drive.

You have been warned.

Anyway, back to Jenn. When I first had Allie I was a nervous wreck, sure I was going to screw this kid up. Jenn was a fountain of advice. And unfortunately for her, most of Allie’s first few years started with the phrase, “Jenn said….” to justify anything I did.

For the record I was not blaming Jenn, just proving to others that I was following sage advice since both her kids were healthy and not in jail.

After a spending the day in the rain (I swear Boo is paying off the rain Gods so she doesn’t have to go to the beach) hanging at the beach house the girls and I were ready to head home.

Since it was late I asked Jenn if I could have a can of Diet Coke so I could perk up for the ride home. Jenn said “NOOOOOOO!!!” But her mom said “Of course” (her mom might be the better hostess).

I drove home relishing in my first sip of Diet Coke in over four months. It was DELICIOUS. I slurped that baby down faster than an Irish man breaks his Lenten whiskey fast.

Two exits later I had to pee and since the girls were asleep there was not respite. I had to keep the car in motion, lest Boo woke up. Plus have you ever tried to pee in a New Hampshire rest area while holding a child who would rather be sleeping on your lap? Yeah, I crossed my legs and prayed for forgiveness.

Then then headache started. You know, the head that throbs because of the evil in Diet Coke. Yeah, that old friend. And I couldn’t blame the traffic because there was none (thank the Good Lord and all that is Holy).

I finally break all land-speed records (thank you to the Statey’s who didn’t pull me over) and make it home. Put the girls in their respective beds, told Bailey to cross his legs and VICTORY I made it to the powder room. (quick aside, why is it called a powder room? I’ve never had powder)

Put Bailey out, he is relieved and then we try to go to bed. When I mean try, I mean he fell asleep like the dog he is and I had a sleepless night. Tossing and turning, not being able to settle my mind, because of the Diet Coke caffeine.

Of course the next morning the girls were up at 6:30 am. Cause that is how they roll.

And now I am officially back on the Diet Coke abstinence wagon again.

The moral of the story?

The next time Jenn says anything do it.

And hope like hell she doesn’t say stop drinking wine.
 

Over the weekend we visited David’s cousins in Vermont. It was a gorgeous weekend and since I like messing with my husband I signed him up for a 5k without warning him.

I figure if I don’t let him train I have half a chance of beating him. Yeah, right.

We left the girls with the family and headed off to the race. This was the first time we ever raced when we didn’t know the locale. I was thinking bonus points for adventure. David thought idiot points for not being able to find the start of the race.

We finally find the sign-in station and are told the race begins in 5 minutes.  Plenty of time, right? Well as I am tying my sneakers back at the car we hear READY SET GO….

We hurry down to the start, in dead last, with the announcer saying you can catch up. Which we did, until we figured out that there were no signs telling us which way to go. We begin staying in the middle of the pack, moving slowly out of dead last. Except we were not the only ones lost. Even the locals got confused. As we headed into the ghetto neighborhoods we quickly see a woman running back towards us saying, GO THE OTHER WAY!!!!!!

We get through mile one. Not that there was a sign to tell us, thank goodness for Nike+ Run, at my fastest pace yet.

As we start looping back to the center of town and figure out that we know where we are going David begins leaving me in the dust. See we thought we knew where the finish line was. So he slowly began edging to the front of the pack. This was fine, because there were still people for me to follow.

Except we were only at mile 2. At this point I can no longer see David, but there are a couple of people in front of me to show me the way. If only the finish line was where I thought it was. As I turned the corner really thinking this was it, I was done. I hadn’t walked once and my reward was finishing the race not in dead last and not in the wrong part of town.

Then I lost my focal point. She either ducked into a store or was a figment of my imagination all this time. I am at a T in the road. I either have to go right or left. Since the course went in a zig zag pattern I have no freaking idea where to turn. I look behind me and see a nice woman running behind me. I ask, Which way do we go? And she replies:

I think to the right.

You think? Okay, let’s go for it. We do the last mile of the race more or less together with no one else to be found. As we finish the last freaking hill (why are there hills at the end of a race) I round the corner to see David running back towards me.

Oh crap, I think. Now he is lost.

Nope, he was just running back to make sure I figured out which way to go. I finish the race behind David, but with my best time ever. Only to find out that the race not only did not finish where I thought it was going to, it also finished a half-mile away from our starting point. Which is just not fair.

I learned a couple of things with this race:

• David is just humoring me by running at my pace.
• Races should have clear signs telling us where to go
• When you run through a possible ghetto you will run faster, even up a hill
• When you are lost there will be some one nice to say GO RIGHT
• A banana never tasted so go than at the end of a 5k

Hey everyone

My friend Joy at I can Say Mama is vacationing with Maria in beautiful Austria. Okay not really with the Von Trapps, but with real best buddies. While she is visiting with friends and showing her beautiful son, Sunny, off she asked me to make sure now one rummaged threw her house.

So of course I said I would. Who wouldn’t want to pretend they were in Germany keeping the blog fires burning?  As I blog-sit for her I swear the Hills are alive with the Sound of Music. 

Please take a moment and visit me over at Joy’s. She has a great blog, so while she is away you should poke into her older blogs and find out more about her incredible journey as Sunny’s mom.

Now come on and sing it with me…Doe a deer a female deer, ray a drop of golden sun….