Flat

You know how in cartoons when the characters get run over by steamrollers they are as flat as paper? Well, that happens to real, live frogs as well.

N and I were heading out for the morning yesterday. I had just put her into her car seat and was walking behind the car heading to the driver's side. I glanced down at the garage floor and thought, "Hm. That leaf is shaped like a frog! Oh, wait. No. That IS a frog. Oops."

How sad! We have a creek behind our house where there are lots of frogs ribbeting at night, and I commented the other day that I wanted to see the froggies. Seeing one on our garage floor squished flat by my car tire was SO not what I meant! At least it happened on the day AFTER Earth Day!

Were you an April Fool?

I almost was, for about 15 seconds after reading my friend Heidi's email about them relocating to France in 30 days. Then it dawned on me what day it was.

I was going to email a photo of a digital pregnancy test that said pregnant to some friends, but yesterday was so busy that I never got this:



But I did pull a fast one over on B! I called him and some semblance of the following conversation took place between us:

J: Guess who called me to offer me my old job back.
B: Your old boss!
J: I know, can you believe it! So crazy. Anyway, I think I'm going to accept her offer. The money would be nice, and I'm getting bored with staying home all day. Bored and burned out - I need a change of pace.
B: But what about N?
J: What about N? We'll just put her in daycare. She'll be fine. She'll adjust, kids are adaptable.
B: Are you serious?!

Now if you could have seen me, you'd have known I was lying through my teeth. I was trying so hard not to laugh. I LOVE staying home with N, we do a LOT and are NEVER bored. The only thing I'm burned out on is not getting a good night's sleep thanks to TEETHING. I couldn't go on any more with the charade, so I asked B if he'd looked at his calendar. He just laughed and laughed after realizing what day it was.

Poor guy, that wasn't his first April Fool's, either. He'd had his medical exam for his private pilot license and after it was over, the doctor said, "I'm sorry, but I'm not going to be able to pass you today." B stuttered and stammered for a few seconds before the doctor said, "April Fools!" POOR B!!! :-) He's a good sport.

Hang Up and DRIVE!

N loves the Little Tikes Cozy Coupe. I have been trying to find a used one for a decent price from Craigslist to no avail. So then I started searching the regular retailers. Target doesn't have the classic car that's red and yellow, but they do have a Princess car that comes with a pink ! cell phone! And that's not all...no, the product photo has a little girl DRIVING THE CAR WHILE ON THE PHONE!

http://www.littletikes.com/toys/princess-cozy-coupe.aspx?Ne=1&N=26+140

Gardening

My friend and neighbor down the street has some beautiful hydrangeas planted in pots outside her home.



I have a horrible time remembering what the name of them are, and usually go through delphinium and hyacinth before hydrangea finally hits me. I had to use Wikipedia to remind me.



At the bottom of the Wiki entry for hydrangea was a warning on their poisonous nature.



"Hydrangeas are moderately toxic if eaten, with all parts of the plant containing cyanogenic glycosides. However, poisoning is rare, as the plant does not look like an enticing food source."



Whomever wrote that has obviously never had a toddler.

Fun with Flair

I'm too old to be messing around on Facebook, but it's a nice, mindless time-waster.

I had fun looking through the virtual buttons on the Flair application.

My favorites:
some are hard to read! The top middle says, "I sing for the one who gave me my song." The black one next to it says, "I can't...I have rehearsal." Seems like I'm always missing moms' night out because of worship team rehearsals on Thursdays...but that's ok! :-)
The blue one below "I scrapbook" says, "they don't know that we know they know we know."
The music note one says, "What have I done?" The one next to that says, "If my daughter is the Princess, that makes me the QUEEN!" Below "Save the tatas" is "You're a great friend but if the zombies chase us I'm tripping you." The green one says, "Well, that's not a good sign." The blue one with an angry face says "I judge you when you use poor grammar." The one with the ducks says, "I had plastic surgery done."

Wii have a fever

For well over a year now, I have not understood all of the hype surrounding the Wii gaming system.

Until last night.

A month or so ago, we invited a couple of our friends over for dinner last night. My parents just so happened to be driving back home from their spring break trip to Oklahoma and wanted to stop and spend the night with us to visit. So we had a house full of guests. We had fajitas, chips, and salsa from Chili's, and beans and rice from a local Mexican restaurant down the street from where we live, and homemade guacamole. Oh, and slushy bucket margaritas made using the On The Border bucket margarita mix with Jose Cuervo Gold tequila (see my previous post about Mommy of the Year!). And after dinner, my parents offered to bring in their brand new Wii that they picked up at a WalMart in a small town near where they were staying. There were fourteen in stock; B and I keep joking about driving up there to pick one up. Anyway, the six of us had a BLAST just creating our Miis - lots of laughter ensued. And then we played the bowling game right in the comfort of our own living room! It was a LOT of fun and now we want one to entertain ourselves!

After two rounds of bowling, our dinner guests had to go home. After they left, my mom and I started playing the Wii Play games trying to get to the Cow Racing portion. It's the second-to-the-last game on the disc, and you HAVE to play the first seven games in order to get to the Cow Racing game (which by FAR is the best game on the disc). The most annoying and hard-to-learn game was the billiards one. It took Mom and I for-EV-ER to get through that one.

And then when we went to play today, we found ourselves having to go through all of the games AGAIN! GRRRR! The billiards game went a little faster this time, but it was still aggravating.

Mommy of the Year Award

Goes to ME, for hauling my kid into the liquor store yesterday to buy a bottle of tequila.

When we go shopping in other places I am always talking to her about what's on the shelves, you know, "Oh, see the pretty vases? Look, there's a red one, and a yellow one..." etc. There is nothing quite like saying, "Oh, look at the pretty bottles," to your 15-month-old in a liquor store!

Hey, it was better than leaving her in the car!

And apparently they have lots of kids come in there with their parents - enough to warrant a big bowl of Dum Dum suckers behind the counter! The guy asked me, "She's too young for a lollipop, probably."

She's Gone

This is not going to be the most uplifting blog entry I've written. You won't hurt my feelings if you don't read or don't finish.

My friend Dottie lost her battle with breast cancer last Wednesday. I've put off writing about it, partially because I don't have any photos of my own of her on this computer. Dumb, but that's my excuse. I'd known Dottie for a little over or under 10 years. We met on a scrapbooking newsgroup way back in 1998 or 1999. In 2000, I met her in person at a weekend scrapbooking retreat for the aforementioned newsgroup. She was an amazing person, full of life and laughter and fun, and she called a spade a spade with no qualms or apologies. We kept in touch via email over the last 10 years, and I'd been praying fervently for her healing. She got the Ultimate Healing and has no more pain or sorrow, as she is in the presence of the Lord.

On Saturday, just four days before Dottie passed away, my great-aunt Leota went home to the Lord. She had had a stroke several years before, and her health had declined from there. She weighed just 60 pounds when she died. She was a tiny person anyway, but 60 pounds still wasn't healthy for her. Bless her heart! I tried to be good in the last few years about writing her letters and sending her photos, but never sent as many as I would have liked. You know, the shoulda, woulda, coulda guilt complex!

And then I started thinking, you know, I have lost a LOT of family members in my lifetime. I still have some friends who have not yet had to deal with the death of anyone close to them. I'm no stranger to that. This is going to be weird, but I thought I'd catalog all of the family members I've said goodbye, or rather, see you later, to over the years.

My first loss was either my great-grandmother or my great-grandfather; I can't recall which. I think it was MawMaw but I am not sure. Anyway, she died when I was really young, maybe 5? Her husband died shortly thereafter, I think. I was really young so the details are pretty hazy.

These dates may not be the most accurate. I know both of my step-dad's parents passed when I was in either middle school or high school. I can't remember the exact years (sorry!). My dad's mom died when I was a freshman in high school. My dad's dad (well, his step-dad, as his biological father died when my dad was 9) died in 1993 when I was a freshman in college. In 1994, my then-sister-in-law gave birth to a premature baby, Kevin Blake, who died 13 days later. It was the hardest funeral I'd ever attended. Until then, only old people had died in my life, and this just wasn't right!!! Babies aren't supposed to die!!! My mom's best friend died from cancer in February of 1994 in her late 30s. Another difficult death for me - she left behind a great husband and two sweet boys. She herself was a really sweet woman. I attended a funeral in 1997 for my sister's friend, who drowned. That also sucked - he was a senior and had his whole life ahead of him. My aunt (my mom's sister) died in August (?) of 1998. My grandmother (mom's mom) died in September of 1999. In December of 2001, I lost my dad. It sucks a lot to lose a parent, even if you don't have the greatest relationship with them. My great-uncle Doug (my maternal grandfather's brother) died in 2002, I think, then his brother Jimmy (Aunt Leota's husband) died in 2003, as did my cousin TJ - another rough death - he was my age (!!!) and a week or so later, my dad's brother Ray died. Then in February of 2005, my Popa, my mom's dad, died. That was another hard one for me, he was my last living grandparent. In early 2007 Brad's uncle died, and then in late 2007, his grandmother passed away. And that brings me to the two most recent deaths already mentioned at the beginning of this post.

I think there have been some other deaths on my dad's side of the family, but I can't recall who at the moment.

So here's the neat thing...I know they all are in heaven and that I will see them all again some day! That is pretty exciting. And that's what gets me through the rough times.

I need an eye exam

Our new couches arrived on Tuesday. I finally got around to removing the hanging tags from them today. One of the tags is a "WARNING: FLAMMABLE" tag. I really need my eyes examined, because I thought bullet point number 3 said, "Keep children away from machetes and lighters." It says "matches," but machetes is much funnier. I suppose I should return Nyssa's Easter gift back to Machetes R Us!

For some reason, the name "TAMMY" is stamped on the WARNING:FLAMMABLE tag. I'm not sure why. It doesn't say, "Inspected by," or "For a good time, call" or anything.

Junk mail amuses me. Pizza Hut's latest flyer is advertising "The Natural." It has a multi-grain crust, sauce made from organic tomatoes, and (this is the one that gets me) ALL-NATURAL mozzarella cheese. That scares me a little. I mean, what is the mozzarella cheese on their regular, non-all-natural, pizzas made from, if it's not ALL NATURAL??? What does unnatural cheese look like? Actually, I think I know the answer to that one - it's in the form of veggie cheese slices made from tofu. I'm not knocking tofu products masquerading as dairy products, in fact, I am a big fan of the Tofutti products, specifically the Cuties (ice "cream" sandwiches), and the Better than Cream Cheese and Better than Sour Cream dairy substitutes. But veggie cheese still strikes me as unnatural.

Kids' songs? And other ramblings...

One of N's favorite toys is a pull-along ladybug that sings lots and LOTS of songs. Most really are great kids' songs, but it seems to be playing Little Brown Jug from time to time.

I looked up the lyrics and the first page the search engine returned was the following: http://kids.niehs.nih.gov/lyrics/jug.htm.

I was very, very amused by their disclaimer. "Important! This is a fun song to sing, but the message is about a man and his wife who had a lot of hard times because of alcohol addictions. Remember, drinking excessively is not good for your health and could lead to serious problems and addictions. In fact, addictions of all types can be very serious health concerns. " And then it went on to list several kid-related anti-drug/alcohol websites.

On another totally unrelated note, I was going through coupon circulars and ran across an ad for an optical illusion swimsuit. The company claims that it can make you look up to four sizes smaller, and up to 40 lbs. thinner. The concept is pretty easy to buy, since the front and back panels are solid colors in an hourglass shape, and the sides are a zebra pattern. I'm totally convinced I should order at least one
after reviewing the before and after illustration in the lower left-hand corner of the ad:

Falling from Grace

I grew up attending a church of Christ church. I had heard many sermons that seemed to imply that you could lose your salvation. I was horribly conflicted throughout college, and wrote down quite a few scriptures in my prayer journal that convinced me that my salvation could not be lost. But I was never able to fully understand or reconcile in my mind what the Bible meant when it talked about falling from grace.

And then in church last Sunday, our pastor made an amazing analogy that felt like God gently thumped me on the forehead and said, "There ya go! Get it now?" In a kind and loving way, of course! The really amusing thing to me is that B had the same realization at exactly the same moment I did. We just looked at each other and went, "OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH!" As in, we get it now!

So the analogy was this (Forgive me, PG, if I slaughter the story!)...imagine you are riding on a 767 jet airplane. The plane takes off and climbs until it reaches its cruising altitude of 37,000 feet. And at that moment you decide that you can fly the rest of the journey to your destination on your own, so you open the door to the airplane and jump out.

Do you fly safely to your journey? NO! You fall like a sack of rocks straight to the earth.

Falling from grace is when we stop looking to God for everything, and start looking to ourselves for our salvation. If I'm just GOOD enough, I'll get to heaven. We aren't living by the grace of God any longer, we are trying to live by good works. And if you believe that the Bible is the inerrant and infallible word of God, you know that you cannot save yourself just by being a good person. We can't save ourselves, we needed a saviour and that is why Jesus came to the earth. Salvation is a gift that we simply accept. Yes, it is THAT easy! We admit we are sinners in need of a saviour, and we accept the gift of life that Jesus provides through his death on the cross and resurrection three days later. And then we spend the rest of our lives trying (and failing, and trying again and failing again because we are fallen, imperfect beings, hence the need for a saviour in the first place!) to live according to how God wants us to live, because we greatly appreciate the gift of eternal life He has given us and we want to be pleasing to Him.

Church Ramblings

An interesting thing happened today at church.

We had just finished singing "Grace Flows Down," when the center doors at the back of the church opened. Into the sanctuary walked a man who had long hair pulled back into a ponytail, and who was wearing a skirt. The entire congregation turned to look at the man. They continued to stare as he walked up the center aisle. He finally stopped at the very front of the church. He paused for a moment, then ascended the steps onto the stage.

Well, ok, so the skirt was a kilt, and the man was carrying a bagpipe, playing "Amazing Grace," and it wasn't shocking to us since we'd been told since rehearsal last Thursday that there would be a bagpipe player on this Sunday. It was actually very, very cool! Most of the folks in the congregation were surprised, though.

And it's not to say that our church wouldn't be welcoming if some random skirt-wearing, long-hair-having, man (or woman) did walk into the church and straight up the aisle to the front of the sanctuary.

Art Project, Anyone?

Craigslist has some interesting ads, especially if you look under the "Free" section.

Like this one:

Free 1.7cu ft GE Spacemaker microwave - does not heat

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Reply to:
Date: 2008-02-23, 6:21PM CST


This is a white 1.7cu ft GE Spacemaker microwave. It is in great shape - just stopped heating. If anyone has a use for it, please email me.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If anyone has a use for it, please email me as well, because I'd love to know!

My favorite part is that it is in great shape even though it stopped heating.

Days late and dollars short

The marquee outside Hooters is announcing their Mardi Gras party on February 25.

Where do I even start?

"Mardi Gras" is French for Fat Tuesday. Which falls on the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday. Which was February 5 this year.

And February 25?

It's a Monday.

Neon Signs

One of the clever marketing ploys by Krispy Kreme doughnuts is their "Hot doughnuts NOW" neon sign that lights up when they have hot doughnuts rolling off the conveyor belt. I must admit that I am not a fan of a hot doughnut, so their little marketing ploy is totally lost on me.

Apparently Papa John's is trying to capitalize on the same idea. I was walking back to my car from the grocery cart return yesterday when I noticed a neon sign in the Papa John's window saying, "Baking hot pizza NOW!" Well, that's good to know, since I'm sure your customers would prefer their pizzas freshly baked and delivered hot.

It just didn't make sense to me.

Hands and Feet

That is the funniest-looking foot I've seen in a long time.

Rural Route

The other day when I checked the mail, I found this envelope tucked into the middle of the weekly grocery fliers.



What cracks me up is that we're on a rural route. I suppose that's another joy of living in a brand new subdivision! We live less than two miles from the local, very busy, post office. It's not like we have to journey 20+ miles "into town" to buy stamps! Oh, well, the sentiment by our mail carrier was nice.

Julia Child, I Am Not.

Do these look like sugar cookies to you?


I believe I posted previously about my greatest new cookbook, Small Batch Baking. I had made vanilla cupcakes and they were pretty yummy.

I had a craving for sugar cookies, and figured with my sister coming in last weekend that it would be fun to make the dough the night before she arrived, and then make cookies with my million and one cookie cutters the next day. The other sugar cookie recipe I have, which is from my friend Heidi and is so very, very yummy (though dairy-laden), makes entirely too many cookies for my needs so I turned to my small-batch cookbook.

I found this recipe:


And set to work making the batter. Can I just say that it is amazingly annoying and difficult to measure 1 tablespoon plus one teaspoon of egg? Anyway, since we're dairy-free in this household, I substituted Smart Balance light for the unsalted butter.

Well, apparently that is not a proper substitution, as the dough didn't quite cooperate. I knew I was in trouble when the directions said to turn the dough out onto a floured surface and knead it for 30 seconds. I was skeptical when I looked at my runny dough, and definitely knew something was wrong after I stuck my hand in the big pile of GOO. I had quite the time scraping the dough off with a silicone Pampered Chef spatula.

The dough looked and tasted like chocolate chip cookie dough without the chocolate chips, so I just reached into the cabinet, pulled out the Ghirardelli semi-sweet chips (which are dairy-free, of course) and eyeballed the amount.

I baked them according to the recipe time, plus another 7 minutes or so. I'm glad our new oven has a light inside.

The verdict on these cookies? They were ok for a last-minute improvisation, but I won't bother with that recipe again until/unless I can use real butter. They were rather crunchy and not like I like my chocolate chip cookies to taste. They weren't awful, and the entire dozen lasted only a day, but I will stick to my old chocolate chip cookie recipe in the future!

What in the world???

Product information
Key features
A colorful cushion with pockets that can keep a child's feet warm.
Easy to clean; machine wash, warm 104°F (40°C).

http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/80129914

I really, really, really don't get this product. What child wants to wear a pillow on her feet? I know all mothers don't want their children to grow up so quickly, but inhibiting their ability to crawl and to walk is just wrong. What other purpose would this thing serve, seriously?!

What If???

This morning I met a couple of friends at a local hotel to attend an informational meeting on the North Texas Team in Training for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. One friend has set a goal to run a half-marathon today and I had told her I would go with her to the meeting, but that I wasn't making any promises on actually signing up.

Well...I decided to sign up and will be running the North Trails Half Marathon on May 18. I have a personal fundraising goal of $2000. If you'd like to donate, please visit my fundraising website. No amount is too small! I'm excited to be running and raising funds to help eradicate blood cancers. My friend's 18-month-old son has been battling leukemia for 6 months now. He is my main motivation. I'll share more of his story and a photo after I get her permission. :-)

About 45 minutes into the meeting, I got a phone call from Brad. I didn't answer my phone, which is typical for me if I'm tied up in a meeting or something of that sort. In fact, I turned the ringer off and put the phone in my pocket. After the meeting was over, I called him. He answered and I asked him what was up. He choked out, "We were in a car accident," and then I heard him say, "I can't talk to her," and handed the phone to his step-mom. I panicked, of course, and started firing questions at her, "What? Did he just say they were in a car accident? Is he ok? Is Nyssa ok? Where are they? What happened???" Poor woman - I didn't mean to assault her verbally with questions, but I couldn't help it. She said they were fine, that they were at the ER at Plano Presby in room 10 and they were waiting on the doctor to check Brad out. I told her I would be there shortly and jumped on the tollway to get to the hospital.

On my way southbound, I noticed traffic slowing down just after the Spring Creek exit. I didn't want to mess with a traffic jam, so I jumped off and took back roads. I briefly thought that the accident that was being cleared might have been the accident they were in. I glanced in my rearview mirror as I headed west down Spring Creek Parkway and thought that the white car on the tow truck could have been Brad's, but wasn't sure. I was glad I had gotten off the tollway and couldn't see the car up close.

I parked in the emergency room patient parking, figuring since my husband and daughter were in there that it was ok even though I wasn't a patient. Funny, the things we think about in moments like that. I rushed in and asked the person at the front desk, "Where is room 10?" She asked who I was there to see. "Brad and Nyssa S." was my reply. She snapped at me and said, "There can only be two visitors in the room. I snapped back, "I am her MOTHER." They opened the door and I speed-walked to room 10. Brad was on the gurney, in a neck brace and still strapped to the blue board that the paramedics had put him on to transport him. Nyssa was in her car seat (with the base attached) and she had some red glowing light thing taped to her toe. I have no idea what it was.

The doctor came in and examined Brad's and Nyssa's vitals, they were fine. Then a nurse came in a bit later and unstrapped Brad from the board. Then the radiologist came in and wheeled Brad away to get x-rays of his neck. Nothing is broken, thankfully! The doctor offered to get Brad a CT scan, but Brad declined since he hadn't lost consciousness.

The doctor wrote prescriptions for various pain pills and a muscle relaxer for Brad, and then discharged them. We drove home after grabbing lunch and dropping off the prescriptions to be filled.

So by now you are probably wondering how the accident happened. Brad was driving northbound on the tollway, heading home from running errands with Nyssa since I had that meeting this morning. There was a Cadillac stopped in the far left lane of the tollway. Apparently the car had completely run out of fuel. Brad changed lanes to avoid hitting the Caddy, and a car in the middle lane rear-ended him. Brad started to try and pull over on the shoulder of the road, but then got shaky so he just stopped and called 911. They sent DPS and the paramedics, because Brad told them he had hit his head. The 911 operator wouldn't let Brad off the phone after he told him that.

The DPS officer came to the hospital and told Brad that he had ticketed the Cadillac driver for being stopped on the roadway. He said they don't find fault, they just determine the cause of the accident. Would the accident have happened if the Cadillac hadn't been on the side of the road? No. The officer told us that we could get a copy of the accident report in 10 days (I think? I can't recall exactly now).

I hate to even try and ponder the what ifs. I can't seem to help it, though! What if the accident had been much, much worse? This morning before I left, Brad was fiddling with the base to Nyssa's car seat. I asked him what he was doing and he said he was fixing it - apparently when the Audi dealership detailed his car, they moved or removed the base and when they reinstalled it, they didn't put it in correctly. What if he hadn't realized something was wrong and hadn't fixed it?

But thankfully, the what ifs are just that. God protected my wonderful husband and sweet, sweet baby, and our family unit is intact.