Year in Review...Or Fast Forward...One of the Two...

Today is the last day of 2013. This year has really gone by fast. All of the codependents have grown and changed. We have had a good year.

I still have not looked at a single picture from Christmas. Maybe I will do that one day this week. Or next year.

I am very depressed about having to work this week. Not because I mind the work, mind you. It's because I have a really good and really long book that is in the back of my mind. I still have a couple hundred pages to go, and I would rather be on my sofa reading A Prayer for Owen Meany than getting up and going to work. I didn't realize that it was 617 pages when I ordered it. So me. BUT, a dear friend recommended it, and I couldn't resist. It's not a new publication, and I probably should have read it long ago. I'm not even finished with it, and I am recommending it to you. Whoever you are.


Fact. Life is messy. Spiritually, emotionally, physically. I kind of like it though. Not the actual messes that have to be cleaned up. The messes that exist inside me. If my soul weren't so cluttered and full of broken bits, I wouldn't be the same. I wouldn't see the beauty in simplicity the same way I do now. I wouldn't see the beauty in surviving or the joy of learning something new. I have grown to love many of my disheveled parts. That gives the messy a sense of peace. During this last year I have definitely found more peace with myself. I am slowly but surely letting go of the things that caused the messes inside me. Maybe 2014 will be the year I fully embrace the mess.

 

Enjoy the day. Enjoy tonight. Happy New Year!

Anonymous...

I openly admit that I am not much of a writer. This blog is a hobby and doesn't get much traffic. Comments? A few a week at the most. However HOWEVER, I get scads of junk comments from spammers, trolls, whatever you want to call it. Here is a sampling of some recent anonymous comments that made me laugh out loud.

Really? You tell me your website is about Penis Advantage and think I'm actually going to follow it up? Come on.

Well established website???? What kind of crack was this anon smoking?

Wait, you think I need to look at Yahoo for how to create headlines and then squeak in the information that your website is about buying viagra....No, just no. Spam bots need to be more clever. Also, it was nice of them to use ain't in the comment to seem kindred to this southerner. 

The odds of me clicking on that link are not good. Neither is the use of the word capital.

 Say what? There wasn't even a query. There wasn't an argument either. Did Chuck Smith even read the post? Come to think of it, I probably didn't read it either before clicking publish. The fact that I don't read my own blog posts tells you that I shouldn't be doing this. Bwhahahahahaa.

Because I Have Reached a New Level of Lazy...

So...what does a blogger do when extreme blogger's block sets in? You get on twitter and ask people far more funny than yourself to do a guest post. 

Jan and I don't know each other in real life, but we are twitter pals. She is hilarious and agreed to write a guest post for me. Without further ado...

Jan of Tough Bananas

Let me just preface this post by stating that indeed, I love our boys, I would not trade them for anything and I cannot imagine life without them. But parenting is hard, guys, and gross.  This list could be seven pages, but I’ve kept it to four things (for now).

1. I never thought I’d be so gleeful when bedtime rolls around.

Before we had children I could get up when I wanted, take a nap when I wanted, eat what I wanted wherever I wanted. I wish I could go back in time and tell 9 years ago me to appreciate naps. And free time. And naps. I never thought I would love 7:30pm as much as I do.  With only one son napping now, bedtime has become “Me Time”. That’s when I get caught up TV shows, social media, and shopping by myself. Those few hours every night have become the reward for making it through the day with everyone still standing.

It’s not unusual for the boys to witness a little song and dance as we announce it’s time to get their jammies on. Hurry up, gentlemen, Mommy has a glass of wine, some M&Ms, and a date with the couch. Chop, chop!

Occasionally, my fantastic Bearded Husband will say, “Jan, just go to bed, you’re exhausted.” To which I reply, “No, it’s only 9:30 and this is my time. MY TIME I TELL YOU. I WILL NOT SQUANDER IT BY GOING TO SLEEP.” Priorities, guys.

Go to bed, I have some important social media updates to check. 

2. I never thought I would lie so much.

I’m not a liar, really. But once your first child starts asking questions, you start to develop a bit of a “gray area” that you did not see coming.

Sorry, that was the last cookie.

That colouring is beautiful – you could sell that picture.

This isn’t the piece of pizza that fell on the floor.

What am I eating? Carrots. They do smell a lot like jelly beans, don’t they?

Santa doesn’t bring toys to whiners.

Yes, please give me a full recap of the movie we just watched together.

What should I do with all this free time? Coffee? Wine? Definitely chocolate.

3. I never, ever thought I would touch snot or a booger.

I learned early on that I cannot be a mother to “that kid”. You know the one: always has something crusty somewhere on his face? So if I spot a booger as I am strapping you into your car seat, I will twist my pinkie finger in ways you cannot imagine to extract that little gem, then deftly flick it to the curb. I may or may not have pinned a son down to remove such nasal nastiness, it’s a gift.

I’m not proud of this, but on more than one occasion we’ve been caught without a tissue and I’ve resorted to scooping some snot off a crying toddler with my bare hand, then wiping it in the grass. Desperate times.

4. I never thought I’d eat someone else’s food.

Ha! Sometimes the scraps on their plates are all I have for lunch.  Calculate that, MyFitnessPal.

Your turn – what have you done as parent that makes you shudder?

 Hide all you like, it's still bedtime.

Shine on Me...

Good day! Hopefully, you are all having a good day and week. My week has been great. Sorry if that seemed braggy. I have just had an amazing week. I have worked from home and enjoyed Christmas to the fullest. I love working from home. Being able to get things accomplished while in my pajamas and with the kids running around the house is awesome.

There is a boson butt in th3e crock pot right now. It smells yummy. Every time I say Boston butt, I giggle. It's like I turn into an 8 year old girl. lol. It's the same way with farts. I don't care how classy you are; if I hear you fart, I will laugh every time. Sometimes, I laugh when I fart.

 

I am typing this post on my tablet. I hope I don't have too many spelling mistakes. I have this nifty keyboard for my tablet, but I am not good with it yet. Of course, J picked it up and typed like a professional. It takes me a while to get used to things like this.

I have watched enough Law and Order SVU for all of us. I can't help it. USA will do a marathon, and I will let it play while I iron clothes or work. It's like that with any show for me. Give me a marathon and a pile of clothes, and I will watch all day. I have also overdosed on NCIS.

Boston Butt. You know you laughed too.

Bradford is offering a free ride home during the upcoming holiday for anyone who is too intoxicated to drive home. While I do think this is a great idea, I can't help but wonder if the staff will also be trolling for new residents. Take you home, leave a pamphlet on your door. This is a better business plan than the monkeys buying lottery tickets.

All three of my children were blessed with a cowbell for Christmas. It was intended to be payback for them hiding my cowbell. It has backfired. No, I don't want to talk about it.

I have yet to look at a single picture from Christmas day. I have no doubt that the early morning ones are blurry. I was definitely not quite awake when the youngest of my brood alerted me to Santa's gifts.

I am really looking forward to the new year. I am ready for a fresh start. Ha. I am toying with the idea of actually making some resolutions this year. Normally,  I don't make resolutions. I make a to do list. This year though I am toying with making resolutions. Any suggestions?



  

Peace Out...

Yay for a short week due to holiday time off!!! I hope you all enjoy your week as much as I am planning to enjoy mine. :)

Check out this old picture of Ella. She is so strange.

 

J is totally over the draft posts I have been publishing. I guess I'll stop for a while because I don't want to hear about it later. Whomp, whomp. The draft section will remain delightfully full for a while longer. I apologize for annoying you all with my many draft posts. Specifically, I apologize to J for annoying him with my draft posts. I will pay for it later.

Oh Happy Day...

Merry Christmas to all!!!! I hope you all have a wonderful day and get to spend time with your families. Much love!

What Would You Do?...

***I am officially the queen of unfinished blog posts. Bow down to me.***


I make a lot of jokes about what I should do to the codependents...Like changing the wi-fi password everyday and not giving it out unless rooms are clean and chores are complete. I blog about what I do with them. I want to take them to parks and  movies. I want them to experience being a part of team sports. Friends. Fun. I have blogged plenty of times about the things that I have done with them and the things I want them to do.

I'm not sure that I have ever really blogged about what I would like to do for the codependents. (Well, besides that whole pesky task of making sure that each one makes it to adulthood.) There are so many things that I would like for Hadley, Ella, and Layton to witness, so that each would truly appreciate how precious life is and how fortunate our family has always been.

The brutal truth is that they live in a carefully crafted bubble. I crafted that bubble. It's because of me that my children have a distorted sense of reality - sort of. My choices have dictated where they live; what they eat; with whom they play; friends they have; what they see on TV; and every other aspect of their lives. If I were to tell Layton that there are people without homes, he wouldn't fully understand. If I were to tell Ella that there are people with no food, she would think I was talking about some far away land. Hadley is old enough that she is beginning to understand there is a real world out there, and that it's not always pretty. I believe in my heart that there is no reason for young children to know about the hurt, loss, and deprivation of the real world. As they grow older though, they will need knowledge of the world in order to have compassion for the world.


 If I could do anything for my children as they grow up...


I would show them that suffering is not "life without an ipad."

I would take them to broken colonias in Mexico.

We would build houses for Habitat for Humanity.

We'd spend our holidays volunteering in soup kitchens to help feed those without blessings and lives like ours.

I'd take them to Africa to hold orphaned babies. My children would see and understand the reality of HIV in places where medical care is scarce.

Water. We would carry water to those in need and help make it possible for water to always be
available.

We would deliver food to shut ins and spend hours visiting with nursing home residents.

Children would be fed and have story time for dessert.


If I could do anything for my children, I would show them the world without a censor and how so many are still joyous even in the worst situations.

Little Ball?...

***I probably started this post last July. Did I finish? Obviously not.***


This past Summer was a good one. We did a lot of different activities. I played ball with this one....



The ball is as big as she.

This is my favorite way to play ball...sitting spread eagle on the concrete...rolling it back and forth...

 

I am starting to miss the warmer weather. I like it cool but not cold. 

Forward and Backward...

 

***I am sure there was a story to go with this picture. I just don't know what it was. 

Up My Meds...

Yahoo!!! It's the weekend!!! I am ready for some rest and relaxation. I am also ready to finish the last little bit of my Christmas shopping. I have some stocking stuffers to pick up and one chair to buy for Layton. I was going to make that purchase at Target, but I am second guessing that decision in light of the security breach. This is what I would do in the event my card was compromised at Target....

Layton's MineCraft name is Butt Sackington. He saw it on an online video and copied it. This does not give me a proud mommy moment. I have no more words - except Butt Sackington? The heck?


Hadley skyped with a boy who lives in Auburn. The skype (is that a verb or a noun or both? Heck, I'm using it as three parts of speech here.) lasted four hours. They are just good friends and have been since preschool. His family moved away, but they have stayed in touch. They were talking about video games. J seemed stressed about it. He said, "your boyfriend is 400 miles away. Keep him that way." I don't think he's actually 400 miles away. I don't think he's her boyfriend either. I do think J might have been a little protective. I wasn't concerned until I noticed he was polishing his shot gun on the front porch. That part was joke. Bwhahahaha.

Ella recently started a sentence with, "When daddy does something stupid that he is going to regret." Poor child. She doesn't even know how bad she just stepped in it.

Enjoy your weekend!!! I will be enjoying mine!!!

Throw Some Shade...

***I don't even know why I took this picture or thought it was blog worthy. Clearly, I was drunk at the time. I need to stop joking about being drunk all the time. People are going to think that I have a problem. Wait, do I? More humiliating draft posts later.***

 

Dirty Woods...

My family enjoys the outdoors. We like the woods. We like to hike and camp. We don't mind getting dirty.

***The is yet another unfinished post. No, I have no idea what I was planning to write for this picture. Clearly, I thought I had an idea, or I would not have saved this picture and titled it and started the post. Months later...I have no idea where it was going and didn't bother spell checking it. Boom.

Over the Years...

***Yet another unfinished, unloved post from the draft section. I really am cleaning these suckers out this week!***


These feet have walked many miles over the years. These feet like to run. These feet like converse tennis shoes more than any other brand.


 

I have an obsession with my children's feet. All of them.
I suspect it is because I have a foot situation of my own. I like for feet to be clean and kept away from me. I do not want to be touched by feet. I do not want to touch other feet. I'm just not a foot person, so I have long been obsessed with making sure my children have adequate foot care and supplies.

Feet are actually kind of amazing. All the places that our feet take us...it's impressive. Just keep them covered up when you're around me. HA!

Stranger Danger...

***Unfinished post. It's so pathetic to see the things I have yet to finish.


We do not know this woman. I refrained from posting a picture of her face. Hey now, I do try to be somewhat polite from time to time. When Layton had kite day at school, he was having issues with his kite. This nice woman was the kite whisperer. Not only did she help him get the kite in the air, she helped him fly it. And then, she let him fly her kite...which was kind of like the Maybach of kites.

 

I have no idea who she was. She said her grandchild had kite day later in the day. She didn't offer him ice cream or beg for help finding a lost puppy dog, so I'm pretty sure her story was legit. 

Embrace Your Inner Pharisee...

***Disclaimer - This is another lovely unfinished post from the draft section of my blog. Did I bother to finish it? No. Will I? Maybe some day. For now it is just a thought...


Jesus.

Admittedly, I don't know a whole lot about Jesus, but from everything I have read about him, he sounds lovely.

Please don't think poorly of me. Yes, I was born and raised in one of the most conservative states in our  nation. I grew up attending church and studying the Bible; however, I don't think that I ever absorbed the message as intended. Or maybe, just maybe, I had selective hearing and only took to heart the messages that I subconsciously wanted to remember. I might have even slept through a sermon or two after Saturday night dates in high school. Scratch that. I barely dated in high school; I just slept through a few sermons. I never bothered to memorize any scripture, and if I am brutally honest, I will admit that I have only ever read short passages of the Bible. I have never read an entire book from the Old or New Testament. Come on, now. Some of those Biblical names don't even have any consonants in them. How am I supposed to pronounce those?

I did, however, have a Sunday school teacher in my formative years that made an undeniable impression on me. Buzz. That was his nickname, and he had a way of reading a passage and making it come alive. He would talk about the things happening in the world around the same time as the events of that particular day's lesson. Buzz also had a way of making it seem okay that I was never prepared for a lesson and couldn't spell the word pharisee. I learned two things in his class that have hung around inside my head for decades. These two things are the starting point whenever I have a decision to make. Except for lunch. I start with how much money I have in my pocket for that.

1. Love is the best of these. I know this is part of a Bible verse, and if I were a good Christian, I could tell you which verse. Ahem, instead I will paraphrase that when left with nothing but love, faith, and hope, love is the best.

2. The pharisees were obsessed with the letter of the law and being pure. Jesus was the spirit of the law and didn't think too kindly of authority.


The two thoughts above are my spiritual foundation. Love is best, and following the letter of the law isn't always the right thing to do. Sometimes, you have to find the spirit of the law and learn to love it.

Here's the rub. I think I might be a pharisee (metaphorically). At least, if Jesus were walking the ground today, I'm pretty certain that I would fall into the pharisee box. Oh, how that pains me to admit. If Jesus were hanging out in the good ole USofA today, would he hang out with me/you at First (insert denomination) Church? Or would he walk to the darkest, dirtiest, neediest, most corrupt place he could find? From what I've read, Jesus hung out with lepers, beggars, thieves, and whores the first time around. Seriously, I have read that much of the Bible. I'm not assuming the whole beggars, thieves, and whores thing. Stands to reason that he would seek out those who need him just as much if he were walking the ground today. Right? Where does that leave the rest of us? Sitting on our pews arguing about how to follow the Bible and what is Biblically correct? Drenched in the letter of the law and failing to ever feel the spirit? Maybe we can all do a little better. Maybe we can all embrace our inner pharisee and try to smother it.


***I'm really not sure where this post was headed or why my thought process was at the time. I just know that I was tired of looking at it in the draft section.***

Kiss This...

-Sometimes, you just have to rock out. With your tongue out.


 

-Sometimes you have to mentally prepare yourself for a task.

-Sometimes you just have to spend three hours watching bad TV.

-And sometimes you ignore your blog for two weeks. My bad.

I will be publishing several of my unfinished posts from the draft section of my bog this week. There are two reasons for this. 1. I am too lazy to finish these posts. 2. I claimed I was going to do this earlier in the year but never got around to it.
This should be humiliating.

Somewhere behind Me...

 

I am trying to get caught up. :)

The Sexperiment...

***Disclaimer*** This post is meant to be humorous. If my self deprecating humor bothers you J, please don't continue any further. If you happen to enjoy it when I refer to myself as a spaz, keep going.

***Extra Disclaimer*** This post has been sitting in the draft section of my blog for over a year. I decided that since I was already humiliating myself on Grass Stains, I should go ahead and humiliate myself here too.


I'm not the kind of woman who gets a man's attention. Construction workers do not whistle at me. I have never been seated at a bar and received a drink from a dashing man in a pinstripe suit. The last time a man asked for my phone number was circa 1995. Wait, he didn't even ask for it; he stole it from my Barnes and Noble order form. Duh, that's how I obtained books that were not in stock before I figured out the whole Internet thing. I'm more of a Plain Jane type. There is nothing fancy about the way I dress. I have no clue how to accessorize. My clothes are full coverage year round because I am more sturdy than sexy. My hair is a mess, and I'm about as talented with a makeup brush as I am with a hairbrush. In another 10 years, I will be a makeup-less, stringy-haired, elastic waistband wearing, overweight, menopausal nightmare. Internet, sometimes you just have to admit the truth and be okay with it.

When one of my girlfriends told a crazy story about getting hit on at Village Pizza, I told her my story of the guy hanging out at the Texaco who only had one tooth and offered to pump my gas. I suppose it is possible that he was hoping I would pay him to pump gas for me. He was hanging out at a gas station without a vehicle of his own. Hmmm, and here I was thinking that I had been hit on! I seem to only be attractive to a certain caliber of men. The homeless, toothless, drunk, at a gas station for fun caliber. I am simply not the kind of woman who gets a man's attention. All of the gals on the porch at the time all of this story telling occurred tried to convince me that I am being hit on all the time...and that I am just oblivious to it.

I mulled it over. Is it possible that my friends are right? I actually do attract more than skeezy, meth addicts? And so, I told J I was going to run a completely inappropriate experiment. It would take weeks. So began "The Sexperiment."

The goal is simple. Determine if people are attempting to seduce me. The rules. Coworkers are exempt. Relatives are not to be believed when they call me attractive because they have eaten my sauteed mushrooms and realized why J married me. (Seriously, he was torn between me and a really hot chick, but then he sampled my steak topping mushrooms. It's the only weapon in my arsenal.) Notice I used the word people? That's because I am not exempting other women. Maybe there are women who want to get busy with me. I said maybe. I will catalog my interactions with other people and attempt to rationally determine my sex factor. See what I did there? Sex Factor should totally be Simon Cowell's next show.

Week 1:

I stopped at a gas station to buy a little something to wet my whistle. The clerk pointed to an older gent leaving the store and said, "He looked at you. More than once."

Scary looking man at Publix made eye contact with me. I cannot be certain he was checking me out. He might have been staring at the dental floss I forgot I had hanging out of my teeth.

::So far, I have not had verbiage with any men other than my husband, relatives, and coworkers. This will be harder to chart than I originally thought. ::



Week 2:

Received a completely inappropriate compliment regarding my ability to contort my body in an effort to get a photograph of a golf ball. It was the highlight of my week.

A male friend invited me to a campout. I think this was actually fueled by bourbon and boredom and is probably irrelevant to the Sexperiment because he also invited Scooby Doo. Does this make me equally as sexy as Scooby Doo?


Week 3:

A slightly retarded man asked me to marry him. For future reference, this was not my first proposal from a challenged fellow. This was not meant to be rude or condescending. I'm just stating the fact that this individual is actually mentally retarded and finds me worthy of marriage.

A client asked if I was married. This guy is a relatively new client, and he honestly didn't know my status. We're not facebook friends, and because I don't often wear my wedding ring, he would have no reason to know. He was just curious. Nothing more.

Week 4:

The owner of a gas station down the street from my house told me that he loved me. I think he was drunk. That one cherry Coke I was purchasing definitely didn't have any kind of magic potion or anything on it that would have caused him to fall in love with me instantaneously.

::This was a boring week.::

Week 5:

I wore my wedding ring and engagement ring. No one noticed. Not even J. Is it possible that I am invisible?

Week 6:

Did my friend just try to cop a feel? No, he was actually falling down drunk and used me as a stopper. The boobage on the play was unintentional. That's right. If you need someone to drive you home from a bar/restaurant because you drank way to much, I'm your girl.

::That's right. My only interaction with someone outside of work and family this week was a friend who needed a ride home and knew that I would do it.::


Week 7:

Christmas parties. Fun. I think the hubs works with a man who found me attractive. Or, I had salad between my teeth. Either way, he seemed to actually like me. True, he is probably 30 years older than I and works in a lab in a basement and probably hasn't ever had a girlfriend.....Do I even count this one?

How many enablers does it take to get a strong man to help unload the groceries? None - Even when the enabler puts on her most fabulous red lipstick and black wedge heels. The adorable kids at Publix do that for everyone.

Week 8:

I was in a gas station purchasing a Diet Mountain Dew. The man in front of me was definitely interested. He kept turning around to look at me. He even said, "you are a very lovely woman" while we were in line. This would definitely be an instance that could impact the results of the sexperiment. Except for one thing. As he paid for his cigarettes and beer, the clerk asked him how long he had been out. That's right. Dude was fresh out of prison. I guess it had been a while since he had seen a woman. I also think he probably shouldn't have been buying beer. BUT. He was clearly interested.

After my encounter with a fresh from prison man, I decided to call this week a wash. I don't think my ego can take anything else.

Week 9:

I had too much to drink. It was an accident. Or, it was me attempting to force myself to flirt. Trust me. It takes a serious quantity of hooch for me to be anything that remotely resembles flirty. Whether you believe it or not, I am a serious introvert and extremely nervous around groups of people. For about 15 seconds I thought I was going to get hit on. Then, I closed one eye and saw clearly that dude was interested in my friend standing beside me and not me. I was this close to being hit on by a man with more than one tooth. No, not really, (it was just double vision) but let me think it anyway.


So, I ask J. What's the deal? Why is it that everyone I know is constantly getting hit on by men everywhere they go, and I only get the attention of ex-cons and men twice my age? Even though I know he was joking; J's response was perfect. "It's because you love me, and everyone can see it. You're unattainable." He's right. I'm not the slinky, beautiful type of woman who gets free drinks and unlimited, charming glances. I am the type of woman who finds the one charming glance she will ever need and holds onto him forever. It shows on my face.

Months after my sexperiment ended a rather arrogant ladies man told J that he was going to have "your wife in six months." I stood there with my eyes the size of dinner plates. J calmly looked over at him and said, "good luck." I couldn't resist it. I licked J's face right there in downtown Athens.