OH NO!!!

Oh my goodness.....I think I may totally freak out. We had a small problem with our DVR. It was making funny noises so I figured a quick call to DirecTV and we would be up and running in no time. Not so much. It's DEAD!!! Along with ALL. OUR. RECORDINGS!!!! What?!?!?!?! There's no master backup...no collection of everything saved in some secret warehouse somewhere....nothing. I'm so sad...:`( sniff, sniff. What is the use of enjoying modern technology if one day it just goes kablooey. No more movies saved, Smallville is gone, so much for watching "Men of a Certain Age" from the beginning. I can't list all the shows/movies we had saved. Luckily, we had put a few of the the items we knew we would want to always keep(Dan
It doesn't matter that they sent us a new one. At no charge other than shipping & handling. It's an empty shell that cannot replace the close personal relationship we had with our DVR. The many hours of Bones & House. Watching NCIS & NCIS LA with Dan. Snuggling all together to watch Smallville. Now we have to start from scratch.
And so it begins....

Hello, You Are Caller #9

Dontcha just love, love, LOVE radio stations this time of year! They are running contests constantly. Your truly was a lucky winner today! How I managed to be the right caller is a mystery but the right caller I was. I am now the proud (soon to be)owner of a $50 Wal-mart gift card. The only draw back...I have to go to the radio station to pick it up. Why is that a draw back you ask? The radio station I listen to is based out of Baltimore and more than an hour away from us. Oh well, even with gas money I am still coming out ahead. I am certain I can come up with a few errands that need to be run while I am over there anyhow. I can definitely think of which store the rest of our Christmas shopping will be completed in!!! Thanks be to God! He is definitely looking out for us!

Christmas Card Debacle

Ok I am just going to have to stop apologizing for not posting as often as I should. Consider this a blanket apology for a really long time.
So I got online with Walmart to order my Christmas cards. I used to order them from Sears but they are just toooooo expensive. I can get over 60 from Walmart for less than the first set of 20 from Sears. Last year, I purchased the rights to my Sears photos so I was able to take one of those pictures and use it at Walmart for our card. This year it was just not feasible to spend that much. I debated the idea of using one of their pictures anyway. I put a card together and checked it out but decided against it...yk since it was *illegal* and all. Even though I knew they wouldn't check or even care. Instead, I made the kids put on "Christmasy" pj's and pose under the tree (that wasn't quite decorated but I threw some ornaments on the bottom to make it look good). About 20 pictures later, I finally had one I liked and I put a much cuter Christmas card together. I ordered 60 of them, paid and was ready to pick them up the next day. Or so I thought....
When I went to pick them up I found ONE card with the kids in their pajama's...so cute.




















and SIXTY cards that I didn't want.

















Now, I'm not saying that I don't like the red card, I just *REALLY* like the blue one. Oh well, win some, lose some. I think I might just have to print out some copies of the pj picture to send along with the card.

It's Christmas Picture Time

One of the things I like most about getting ready for Christmas is our annual trip to Sears portrait studio. While it may not seem like I enjoy it to my children because I am spending so much time being very cranky about what they are wearing and how their hair looks, the end results are sooooo worth it.
This year's trip was a bit more...frustrating that other years but it was partly my fault. We usually have our pictures taken in late October or early November. This year I was a bit lax in getting an appointment and we just had them taken the day before Thanksgiving. Well as you can expect, the studio was a mad house. They had double booked each slot and we ended up waiting for about 45 minutes before we even got to go into the room and then another 15 minutes before she was actually ready for us. Not the best way to start out but at least I didn't have a fussy baby like some of the other people waiting. I was determined to be in and out as quickly as possible and even with a change of clothing for everyone, we were finished in 20 minutes. I think it might have been a record for us but maybe it helped that I came well prepared with poses from previous years that I liked.
Then the fun part....it will be about an hour before you can look at your pictures...say what?? Not too thrilled at this point but we still needed to take care of a few things in the area so not a huge deal. We don't get to the mall too often since it's 45 minutes away from our house. A trip to Claire's to get some birthday items for a friend of Teresa's (and a few stocking stuffers I managed to get past them :-}) and a stop in the food court and it was back to the portrait studio. But wait...who's that standing over there??? Why it's my awesome husband checking in to see how things were going. He was driving by the mall on his way home from work and realized we were still there. He actually volunteered to take the kids home while I finished up. What a guy!!! We trooped out to the van, gathered their things up, got the DVD out of the player to put into his vehicle and I sent them on their merry way.
Meanwhile, I got to go and sit and look at all the poses in peace. No kids saying "how much longer" & "aren't you finished yet". And because it was so busy, I got all the time I needed to look through the poses and decide how many sheets and all that jazz without the salesperson breathing down my neck. Heaven, I'm in heaven.
Then the best part happened. When I was finished, the woman who was helping me (who happened to be the manager) was busy with someone else so she asked one of the photographers to put my order together. I let him know what I wanted and made sure to mention that because I am a smile saver member I get buy one get one sheets Monday - Thursday (which is why we had to go on a Wednesday). He muddled and fumbled and managed to put the order through(wrong of course). Unfortunately for him, he must have pushed the wrong button somewhere because the printer started up and began printing out my pictures. Now I am not throwing away perfectly good money just to have my pictures printed on the spot. I can totally wait for them to come back in 10 days from the printers, especially since they cost more and I can just look at them online when I get home. So the manager came over and told him to scat. She fixed my order (he hadn't figured out how to add in the free ones) and processed it and went over to the cash register to ring it up. So she said to me "Since you have had to wait so long and have been so patient, I am going to give you all the pictures that printed out. I hate to throw them away, even though that is what we are supposed to do." WooHoo!!! Can you say FREE PICTURES!!! Really good ones too. Apparently there is an advantage to getting them there because they are really durable. You can spill anything on them (except alcohol or Purell) and it will wipe right off. No fingerprints either.
So now I have some of my Christmas pictures already and then still more whenever I get around to the mall again to pick them up. TOO COOL!!!! I don't suppose anyone is actually interested in seeing them...?? Well, since it's my blog, you have to anyhow. ;-P
I still haven't decided which one I like the best but I'm leaning towards the first one. I don't have a very good scanner so they are actually much better in person than they look here.

Blogstyle Iron Chef November

Guess who won the Iron Chef challenge for the month of November?!?!? Me that's who silly!! I am super excited. I practically never win stuff.
I have to send out a thank you to my Aunt Kathy who passed the awesome Cheesy Hash brown recipe on to me. Thanks Kathy!! What a gal!
Look at this...I'm actually posting 3 days in a row. Haven't done that is ages. Well I suppose you shouldn't get used to it since the holidays are upon us and everything is getting ready to be very hectic. Oh well...I'll do my best.
Thanks so much to everyone who voted for my recipe!!

Prayers Needed

We are finding ourselves in need of some big prayers this holiday season. My husband's work is having layoffs (again) next week and there is a good chance he will be up on the chopping block. Please pray that he makes it through this round or (even better) finds a different job (much closer) that he has been actively searching for for months. Although he is not thrilled with his place of work (yk, since it's more than two hours from here) at least it is a job. A job that we desperately need since *I* can still not find anything in this rinkydink town that will fit into the hours I am available. I know there are many out there that have fallen victim to this stinky economy and are much worse off than we are but I am praying very hard that we at least make it through Christmas before the hammer falls. (not sure why that would be better but it certainly couldn't be worse!)

Not Me! Monday!

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

I did not drive to Jaquelyn's school when I was supposed to be driving to Taylor's school to pick her up. It did not take me until I was practically at Jaquelyn's school before I figured it out. I am not that scatterbrained.

I did not let the cashier at Target recharge my card for my purchases after adding adding a pack of gum just to take advantage of the "spend $100 get a $10 gift card" special. I am not really, really, really hoping the credit for the first charge shows up before the rent check clears.

We did not eat our Thanksgiving dinner two hours later than planned because I did not fail to read the directions on the stuffing that said it needed to bake for an hour. And I was not already running behind when I finally figured this out. It is not almost a tradition to eat our meal soooo late because I always do something to mess up the eating schedule.

We did not spend more than 2 hours at Sears dealing with the Portrait studio on Wednesday. It did not actually pay off a small bit to be so patient with them and the result was not 6 sheets of our portraits printed right there in the studio due to a mistake by one of the employees. The manager did not decide to let me have them for free rather than throw them away since I had been so understanding through all the waiting. I was not totally psyched! I cannot wait to scan the pics in and show them to everyone!

I did not take Taylor and Teresa to our local Good Will on Saturday and spend over $50. It was not their monthly 50% off all clothing sale on the last Saturday of the month. I am not totally excited to wear the new holiday fleece I found there! I am not going to make the kids model their clothes so I can take pictures and put a longer post together soon.

My 4 year old is certainly not wearing clothes that my 10 year old wore at 6 & 7. Rebecca is not that tall....or is it that Jaquelyn wasn't that short? Either way they are not vastly different in height at this age.

Black Friday

Hello! Hello...Hello? Anyone still out there? Probably not but I will put a quick post together anyhow. I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving yesterday. We had a fun, lazy kinda day that we all thoroughly enjoyed.
Today is known far and wide as "Black Friday". I rarely venture out on this scary shopping day, although I did when I was young and careless. This year, I actually found a few things that would be great for Christmas in the Target circular. so I dragged myself out of bed and showered at O Dark Thirty this morning. I DID NOT wait in line like the other morons die hard shoppers but instead walked in at 5:15am with no line and carts sitting around waiting for the *smart* shoppers. I actually found everything but 1 item on my list and that was only a "maybe" anyhow. It was not a mob house and when I was finished and ready to wait in line, there was one person in front of me. I stopped off at the grocery store, bought bagels for the Coffee Shop and was back in bed and asleep less than 3 hours after I woke up. All in all, definitely worth it.
Target was running a special this morning if you spent $100 you received a $10 gift card. I was pleasantly surprised to find my total just over and mentioned it to the clerk. After I had swiped my credit card, she informed me that I only went over because of the tax...my before tax total was $99.18 and therefore it didn't count. Are you KIDDING me!!!! Don't you think you could have mentioned that before I paid...I could have added a pack of gum or something. So she said she could ring it up again but my credit card would be charged twice and the credit would show up later. I wasn't thrilled but decided it was worth the extra ten bucks. Of course if I had remembered the motor oil for my van it wouldn't even have been an issue.

Na Na Na Na - Na Na- Na Na It's Shower Time! (Sung to the tune of Hammer Time)

You just know it's going to be a not-so-good day when this happens...
You're enjoying a nice leisurely shower. Your hair is full on conditioner and you reach for your pouf and get nice and sudsy. As you turn to start rinsing off, your shower head decides that it has had enough and the next thing you know it looks like this....


































Which makes the whole rinsing off process extremely difficult. So an unplanned trip to Wal-Mart is in order before a shower is needed again. Is it possible to find a decent one on the first try??? Of course not. Why can't the name of the company be ON the shower thingy so that I can figure out exactly which one broke and buy the same one again...yk since we already know we like that one and the water doesn't trickle through a drip at a time and it lasted so many years I can't even remember when I bought it. Anyhow, so that one is taken down...dried off thoroughly and returned for attempt number two. Finally one that doesn't suck is found and we are now able to not stink any more. Yea!!
Now it looks like this again.

Not Me! Monday!

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

I have not totally forgotten to write Not Me! tidbits down. Almost my whole list today is not from the week of Halloween. Oops!

I did not finish Jaquelyn's costume on Halloween day. I am not that much of a procrastinator. I was not sewing maroon stripes on a gold tie (that was luckily found at Good Will that very day) at 3:30pm. I make sure my kids costumes are put together well before Halloween.

We did not forget about carving pumpkins resulting in Jaquelyn carving hers at 4:30pm Halloween day. It was not a relief that Rebecca's didn't need carving since she only has to push the "Mrs. Potato Head" pieces into the pumpkin. This is not probably the last Halloween I will get away with not letting her try to carve something.

I absolutely did not allow my 17 year old to skip school so that she could work at Dan's coffee shop. Who does that? Not me! My kids always go to school just like they are supposed to and never miss it unnecessarily.

I did not run my dryer several times to re-fluff the clothes that were sitting in it. I did not find out after doing that 2 times that there actually wasn't anything in it!!! I was not incredibly irritated with myself for wasting all that electricity.

I did not spend a small fortune yesterday taking the two younger kids to the movies. When did it start taking needing a loan to be able to afford a simple movie? OK...my bad, it wasn't a simple movie since it was the 3-D version of A Christmas Carol...but still, it cost close to $50 and we shared our drink and popcorn!! Get real! We would not not have even gone if it hadn't been a Girl Scout thing. I am not a total Grinch when it comes to the movie theaters and always tell the kids to wait til it comes out on video DVD. That last sentence did not make me feel old because most people never say video anymore.

I am not going to be spending a fortune in gas these days with all the different places the kids have to be picked up and dropped off from everyday. This is not what a typical day looks like...
8:15am drop Jaquelyn off at school
8:50am drop Rebecca off at school
11:30am pick Rebecca up from school
12:10pm pick Taylor up from school and take her to the coffee shop to work
3:00pm pick Taylor up from coffee shop and drop off back at school for track practice
4:00pm pick Teresa up from Color Guard practice (3 days per week)
4:30pm pick Taylor up from track...2 days/week take her to the YMCA for volunteering
5:15pm pick Jaquelyn up from school/basketball practice
Ah the joys of parenthood.

I did not totally forget to go back to the coffee shop after dropping Taylor off at track practice today and finish closing the shop up. Oops...gotta run!

Christmas Cards Galore

Five year-old Noah Biorkman is in hospice and we need your help to make this the best Christmas ever by sending him Christmas cards! His family will be celebrating Christmas this weekend.

Noah was diagnosed with Stage IV Neuroblastoma in February 2007. He went into remission in August 2007. In September 2008, Noah relapsed with lesions in his right arm and right leg. After going through six different trials, the cancer continues to spread. Noah is an angel and we are blessed to have him in our lives.

Please help the fulfill the Biorkman family's wish to make this the best Christmas ever for Noah. You can send your Christmas cards to:

Noah Biorkman
c/o Scott Biorkman
3480 Petoskey Way
Milford, MI 48380

I found this information in several different places on the internet, including Snopes so I know it's not an "urban legend". Let's see if we can make a difference in this little boys life and show him a great Christmas before he has to say goodbye to his family. This would have been a great project for Jaquelyn's girl scout troop if I had just found it last week instead of today. Let's everyone try to spread the word and get as many people involved as we can!

Wordless Wednesday - Sleepy Girl

Iron Chef November

Well I have been meaning to put this post together and now the deadline is upon me so I suppose it's now or never. I have gotten sooo lazy about blogging lately.

Anyhow, Heidi over at Sacred and Profane is hosting another Iron Chef challenge so I thought I would give it a whirl and see how things turned out. This month's topic is holiday recipes. While I don't have an actual "holiday" recipe, I do have one that I take to potlucks and such...whether it's around the holidays or not. Since we spend the Christmas holidays at the in-laws, I don't do a lot of holiday cooking per se. I have actually submitted this recipe for a previous Iron Chef competition but since it wasn't one of the chosen three, I decided I could submit it again. If Heidi decides otherwise, well...so be it.
So without further ado.....

Cheesy Hash Browns

1 sm carton of Sour Cream
1 can of Cream soup (your choice...we use whatever is on hand, usually chicken)
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp salt
1/4 c chopped onions
8 oz. shredded cheddar cheese

Mix these together then add
1 bag of shredded hash browns

Put into a large pan (I use 9x13 and I prefer glass)

Topping:
3/4 stick melted butter
1 cup of Crumbs...cornflake, rice krispies, whatever you prefer really
Mix together and put over the top.

Bake at 375 for 50-60 minutes and then Yummy!!

We adore this and everywhere I take it it's gone in a flash.

Praying For Stellan In Boston

Updated:
Stellan's surgery went phantasmagorically awesome!!! He is still not out of the woods due to a few other problems but it looks like he might be SVT free for good!! You can read all the details at MckMama's blog and get the low down there.


I hope everyone who reads MckMama's blog is keeping them all in their prayers today. Stellan is undergoing surgery today to try to control his SVT. Let's all hope and pray that everything turns out well.

Girl's Night Out

A few weeks ago it was homecoming weekend in these here parts. The plan had been for Taylor and possibly Teresa to attend the dance they were having on Saturday. Their friend Micayla was also going to join them. Unfortunately, those plans fell through due to all the stupid (but I'm sure necessary) rules about id and such for out of school friends. So then many things were discussed and ideas were tossed about and the final decision was a girls night out for dinner. Some place fairly dressy so that the homecoming dresses could be worn. Since Marghee was here she joined us and we drove over to Annapolis and hit PF Changs.
We all had a good time in spite of the pouring rain and by the time we were finished, the rain had stopped. Silly me forgot my camera in the car so there aren't any restaurant pictures but I did run out and get it as we were leaving and snapped a few by the fountain in front of the restaurant. The first pic is me, Marghee and Pam. The second is Teresa, Micayla, Sophia and Taylor.

Finally A Halloween Post

I am getting lazy again with the whole blogging thing. There are a ton of things I keep thinking about blogging about but just can't seem to get around to actually doing it. So I finally decided to download my Halloween pictures and put a quick post together before I started my computer work.

Halloween is a fun time around here. I enjoy decorating and am always on the look out for cute decorations the week following Halloween. Through the years I have collected quite a few and love putting them up in different places and trying new things with them.
My dad comes to visit us each year at Halloween and we look forward to the a lot too.
Since I am a totally mean and cruel mother, my kids are not allowed to trick or treat when they hit the teen years so it's just Rebecca and Jaquelyn that actually get candy. Teresa and Taylor stay home and get to give out the candy...and eat a fair amount of it I'm sure.
This is the first year we have tried going around our own neighborhood and it seemed to go pretty well. We live in a fairly new neighborhood so in the past there really weren't enough houses that were occupied to bother with staying around here but they pulled in a good amount of candy just walking around here.


Here are Hermione (from Harry Potter in case anyone didn't know) and my little angel.

Wordless Wednesday - More Pictures From My Flight Lesson

That's My Girl

I have mentioned in the past that Teresa is involved with the Color Guard at her school. They have not been very active this year because they do not have a coach. However, several of the kids from last year decided to get together and put a routine together for the homecoming parade. The result...my Teresa on the front page of the Sunday paper. You Go Girl!!

Praying For Stellan

Poor little Stellan is in the hospital again. He is in pretty bad shape. This bout with SVT is happening very fast and he is not doing well with it. Please keep Stellan and his family and most importantly his doctors in your prayers as they decide what is best for him.
Since it is also his birthday. You can send birthday wishes too. What a crappy 1st birthday.
Here is a link to MckMama's blog.

Look At What I Got To Do!!!

For Christmas last year, my sweet, wonderful, awesome husband surprised me with quite the unusual gift. An introductory flight lesson! My husband...the one who not only *loathes* flying but doesn't like it when the girls and I fly either. Who'da thunk it?
My sister-in-law came down from Massachusetts to go up with me and she is the awesome photographer.
I never realized how close some of the towns in our area are "as the crow flies". It takes about 45 minutes to get from where the airport is to a little town near us called St. Michaels. Up in the air...they are about 5 minutes across the water from each other. I flew the plane over to our town and checked out the sites. I found our house, the coffee shop, and lots of other places. I circled around our house twice so that Dan and the girls could come out and see us flying past. Wicked cool!!


Here Marghee and I are in front of the plane.


















Here is the instructor. His name was Seth. OMG was he HOT!!! I do not normally check other guys out, yk since I'm married and all but when one is shoved under your nose it's hard to miss. I wish I had a better picture but these two with the plane were taken with my cell phone because my camera ran out of juice during the flight. I figure it's ok to look, right?? And maybe convince Marghee to come back and take her own lesson...with Seth as her teacher.

















Here is our neighborhood.

Not Me! Monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

I did not find a post-it note on a box of animal crackers at Target. There was not an incredibly vulgar picture drawn with the words accompanying it. It was not of a part of the male anatomy. I was not appalled to find it on something that children would be picking up and looking at. Who does things like that? I did take it off and throw it away.

I was not at Target solely to use a coupon I had for $1 off a Target Cafe item. I did not chose their popcorn & soda combo. This was not before 11am and right after cardio tennis. I always eat healthy snacks after working out and save popcorn for movie nights.

I did not look in the mirror on Monday after my shower and decide to chop a few inches off my hair...by myself. I am totally not too cheap to go get it cut. It has not been since February that I have gotten a haircut. It is not a really good thing my hair is very curly so you can't see how uneven it is. Teresa is not the only person to say anything about it.

When I was finished at cardio tennis on Wednesday I went into the Y to shower. When I was finished and getting dressed, I did not find out that my drink had leaked into my bag and my undies were rather damp. I did not consider going commando but decided against it. When forced to pick between sweaty, damp panties and drink dampened panties, the drink ones won hands down.

I do not need to warn everyone to watch themselves if they are driving in our area because my eldest daughter is the proud owner of a drivers permit. Yikes!

Teresa did not have a bit of an accident this week while trying to rush to grab the phone. I am not going to have to make a trip to Lowes to find a perfectly matched cabinet door. I am not hoping the landlord won't notice if it's not the exact same door. I *did* manage not to yell and scream at her when I found out...a big accomplishment for me as I am a yeller (but trying to quit)




























I do not have a post in the works that will shock and amaze you. My sister in law came for a visit this weekend and we went and did *not* do something totally awesome!!! I did not mention it several months ago in this post and this post but it had to be postponed and we did not finally get a chance to do it yesterday. Any guesses?!?!? Except you Heidi!

Have a great Monday!

Pedestrians Beware!!

Well...Maybe it won't be that bad but I feel a moral obligation to warn everyone that my oldest is the proud new owner of her first learner's permit. Dan is taking her out this weekend for her first driving lesson. Better keep an eye out when you're walking down the sidewalks.

Wordless Wednesday - The Joy Of Mastering Hopscotch

Holly Hobbie Dress

Here is another old post to read. This one is from last year around this time.

We didn't do much to post about this weekend so I had to come up with something different. I noticed a dress in Rebecca's closet that she hadn't tried on yet. This dress was made for me by my grandmother when I was about 2. We've always called the dress my "Holly Hobbie" dress. Over the years, each of my girls have worn the dress with pictures taken. I went on a hunt a few days ago and found pictures of Taylor and Teresa but couldn't find Jaquelyn. Then I remembered that I used to used Searsphotos.com to develop all my film. Lo and behold I found her picture on their website. I took pictures of Rebecca wearing the dress and now I can post pictures of each of us wearing the dress. Cool, huh? Unfortunately, the bonnet disappeared along the way.

Here I am wearing it with the bonnet at 2 or 3






















































Here is Taylor at 3 or 4 with my grandparents. This is my grandmother that made the dress for me.













































Here is Teresa wearing the dress. Again at my grandparents house a few years later.





















































Jaquelyn wore it for Easter when she was 3.



































And finally it was Rebecca's turn.

I Love Pictures!

I was at a loss for posting ideas so decided to rerun an old post from back when I didn't actually have any readers.

Here is a really cool idea that I borrowed from my Mom. We all love pictures of our kids, right? Well you can only put up so many with frames. And then you have so many holes in your wall and if you happen to rent like we do it is a major pain when you leave to fix them all. (Although this time I invested in those cool 3M hooks that don't leave any marks on your walls....they work for the most part but aren't perfect every time.) I do still have some framed pictures on the wall...mostly ones from Sears and quite a few on the table in front of the wall as you can see by the pic.

Soooooo the perfect solution?? Put up a collage of pictures of your kids all over a section of wall with blue painters tape. It is really cool and so much fun. I love looking at it and noticing pictures that I haven't looked at for awhile. It is up to you how you do it. I trimmed a lot of my pictures so that I could get just the part of the picture I really wanted to see, but there are some that are still whole so they aren't ruined. Then just start arranging them on your wall, mixing them all up time wise.
It is a big hit when guests come over. Especially if you happen to have a picture of them up somewhere. Challenge them to find it. I will say that Teresa dubbed it the "Wall of Weirdos" but that is to be expected from the teen aged girls who are totally embarrassed when their friends come over and check out baby pictures of them.

Gotta Love Coupon Shopping!

I had a stellar day yesterday at the grocery store. Acme was having a great sale and I didn't even realize it. It's a good thing I read Shosh's and Sara's blogs or I might have missed it completely. I didn't make out quite as good as they did since I didn't have any coupons for cat/dog treats but I did pretty well with the other items on my list. I was dangerously low on oatmeal for the upcoming winter months and Acme decided to have a sale before I completely ran out. So glad am I. I picked up 4 big containers of Quaker Oats for .875 cents each. Gotta love it! These normally run about 4.99 so that was awesome in my opinion. Throw in some Barilla Picollini pasta at .25 cents a box and a ton of yogurt with great coupons and I am sitting pretty. The Quaker granola bars were a mere .50 cents per box and I even had coupons for Crush. I rarely see soda coupons so that was unexpected but welcomed.
All told I spent 43.07 on groceries that would have been 127.43. Definitely a good day at the grocery store. Gotta love coupon shopping!

Wordless Wednesday

So Much For Normal

I guess I spoke too soon. Dan's work sent him home because he is still not functioning where he should be. He goes back to the doctor tomorrow and we'll see where we are going from there.

Back To Normal

Well we are back to normal finally. This is the first day in two weeks that everyone has been at school or work like they should be. Unfortunately I only get two days of normalcy. The public schools have Thursday and Friday off for parent conferences and some in-service day so three of the kids will be home again. I truly can't wait til next week....normal all the way. (providing no one gets sick or their head bumped)
This is really cutting into my tennis playing. :-( And I only have a few more weeks and then the weather cuts it off until spring. There are times it would be nice to live on the west coast or in the south. Tennis all year round! Oh well, maybe I will have to try out the racquetball courts more this winter. I am not looking forward to going back to boring working out on the various machines in the Y. Once you've tried Cardio Tennis, you'll never go back. It is so much fun! The hour goes by like lightning.

Boot To The Head

Well I know I joked about my poor hubby and his bump on the head but it really was quite the bump. He had a cat scan done Sunday evening at the emergency room but everything was normal. The doc said no work til Wednesday but see your regular doc first. We went and saw a doctor at the practice (his regular was sick) and she said no work all week! He was still feeling pretty dizzy when ever he moved around and being in a moving vehicle was particularly bad for him. He was rather slow when answering her questions, yk the ones they ask when trying to test your cognitive skills. Like, what day of the week is it...count backwards from 100 by 7's...who is the president...etc.
We went back today and he did much better ( with only minor cheating such as memorizing the counting backwards thing and checking the calendar for the date & day of the week before she came in). He has been cleared to head back to work on Tuesday (Monday is a holiday for his office). I am hoping he is truly better by then. Driving for himself is still a little iffy but hopefully by Tuesday that will have faded too.
It's times like these that I truly dislike the place he works at. They have NO sick leave. If you don't have any vacation time saved up and you get sick, then you don't get paid. This totally stinks!! He is hoping to be able to claim short term disability so we will get a portion of his check but otherwise, this is a whole week with no pay. Not good in times like these. I have applied to several places in town looking for a part time job to pick up some extra work but nothing has come of it so far. This is a definite disadvantage to living in a small(er) town. There are not nearly enough overnight positions available. Oh well, keep your fingers crossed and hopefully something comes up soon.

Wordless Wednesday - Locks Of Love