50 People, 1 Question...

Found this on YouTube....

Where would you want to wake up tomorrow if you had a choice?

Floods vs. Fashion...

Growth spurts, you never know when they are going to hit. Or maybe you do and you choose ignorance over style because you are way too busy or just flat out too lazy to go out and buy some new clothes for the kiddos. And then one morning it is 8:05am and you realize this may be a really bad idea as your daughter is jumping from the bed into a pair of jeans that once buttoned are three inches to short. And although stretching out a cotton t-shirt is a pretty easy feat, stretching the length of a pair of size five jeans to fit a size six body with long legs is almost impossible. You think back, OK the pair she wore on Monday fit well but after a frustrating hunt through the bedroom jungle (it's now 8:15am) you do find them but they are crumbled into a ball, hidden in the back corner under the bed and covered with dried spaghetti sauce.

You take a step back and say aloud, "hey, these jeans are cool, they make great capris." Because your daughter is six going on eleven and is not only picky but she is so over Dora, a borderline fan of Hannah Montana and thinks that the seventeen year old cashier at Wal-Mart is "hot" and going to school looking anything other than "put together" is not an option.

Fast forward to 8:25am and now you are watching your child walk across the schoolyard in her confident, "floods", and into the Kindergarten doors. You realize that she reminds you of that one kid you had in every one of your classes through 5th grade that wore hammy down clothes that were always to small, crooked bangs because they cut them themselves and always had a dried dirt mustache over their top lip.

Time to go shopping...

Out of the mouths of babes...

Highlight on Cheese...

At the kitchen table at breakfast, out of COMPLETE nowhere,

"Mom, if you get fat I will still love you."

Me: Well let's hope honey you never have to make that choice. As I am eating oreo cookie ice cream out of the container.

Still at the table, "Also if I ever get a step mom, I will love you more because you will be my real mom."

Whuck?

And later in the car after school, she was looking outside at the clouds. Admittedly, they were fluffy and perfect for any little person's imagination.

Me: "What do you see Cheese?"

"I see a dinosaur jumping from cloud to cloud, a bunny in a tutu and a turtle waving at me."

Tribute to National Poetry Month...

I dread this morning,
Wheels glide and then stick along the dirty linoleum floor.
Perfectly lined cereal boxes adorn the aisles,
whilst athletes and cartoon charters beckon me to take them home.
The smell of orange and raw meat lingers in the frigid air.
And I cock my head to hear "Jungle Love" over the speakers, I smile and tap my toes.
Looks like this day may get better after all.

I round the corner, enter the seasoning aisle, sneeze fifteen times and pee my pants.

Seriously?

You never know what you will find...

School photos, taken as a way to document your child's growth progress from one year to another, and most recently to document those subtle changes every four months as they are now taken twice a calendar school year. Like I need any more pictures of my kids, I see them ALL THE TIME.

However, if you are like me after you divide up these pictures for your family (in my case unfairly, as someone always gets the shaft and a 5x7 instead of a 8x10, because the people at Lifetouch don't account for divorce) and we grab our two wallets and one for the frig, the rest are shoved into the kitchen drawer with the left over post-it notes that have lost their "post" and the pens that nobody throws away but ran out of ink in 1999.

Maybe it is because I love take so many pics of the girls that I don't put a lot of care or effort in the storage of the remaining 45 wallet photos and one left over 5x7 that no one wants. In fact, I rarely put these photos into frames and they just stay on the refrigerator for the year until they are replaced with the following year's photo.

But if I did place these in frames and five years from now I wanted to donate those picture frames to GoodWill, I think I would have the sense to take the pictures out first. Unlike this family, I found these at the GoodWill the other day and although I felt like an ass taking pictures of the pictures with my phone I had to share the stupidity...this one to me says, "We love you honey, but we just couldn't bother taking out your 5th grade picture before shoving this frame into a box with Dad's old boxing gloves, Mom's cross stiched "Home Sweet Home" Pillow and your brother's old sneakers.

And this one too...

Whuck? I got nothing.

Things Rosetta Stone could not teach me...

Hola amigos, we have returned from our wonderful Mexico vacation and other than the upper G.I. infection, the road rash from falling down in the street after one too many tequila shots and the temporary weight loss (which I see now is very short lived..the weight loss I mean, because the rash still rages along with the unsettled stomach). So I guess for the most part we are unscathed. I will share some stories from our trip in the near future, but for now I thought I would just put together a list of things that I learned while traveling abroad, things that Rosetta Stone forgot to mention.

1. First, the only people who actually say "no" in Mexico are Americans. Mexicans are constantly saying "si". Hey, taxi driver, can we stop here and grab a bottle of tequila for the road? "Si". Hey, tour bus operator, can you stop here so we can get out real quick and buy some cerveza and groceries? "Si". Hey captain, while don't you pull this boat over to that boat over there, it looks like they have beer to share.

We, on the other hand we are constantly saying "no". Senorita, do you want to buy a silver plated bracelet for a dollar, "no". Senorita, do you want your hair braided, "no gracias". Senorita how would you like to buy a grain of rice with your name on it, "no gracias", a bracelet with your name on it, "no gracias", a tattoo with your name on it, "no gracias".

2. I learned in Mexico that they DO in fact, know the difference between "on the rocks" and "frozen", and what a relief that was. Well actually, bittersweet, as that was the primary reason I bought my Spanish/ English key chain dictionary.

3. I realized that the only person that DO NOT benefit from a three bedroom villa is... the maid.

4. I realized that if part of your boob is hanging out of your towel while you are getting a facial at a fancy spa, best thing is to not reach down to fix it.

5. I learned that you can never get tired of re fried beans and tortilla chips.

6. I learned that drivers in Mazatlan must be really safe drivers because they have no seat belts and carry around their children on their laps while in the front seat.

7. I learned that the most dangerous part of a banana boat ride is actually getting on the banana and then getting off.

8. We learned that "you break it you buy it" is as serious as it sounds.

9. And lastly, some Spanish to English translations just are worth printing on your menu. Especially when dealing with snack fish or "Very good littled boys breaded."