A "non entry" doesn't deserve a title

Here I am trying to dig deep within my psyche, (a scary feat at any given point) so that I can work up a witty and captivating entry (snigger if you must) when I suddenly realize that I have Blogger's Block.

I could write about listening to my husband in the shower singing along in falsetto to Heart's Crazy On You but I'm just not feeling it. I'm not feeling it either when the song changes on the radio and he begins to sing along with the Bee Gees' More Than A Woman ("More than a woman to meeeeee!") but I do smile to myself.

I might ask if any of your kid's are walking around using the word "definitely" as much as Emily is these days. ("Did you have a great day at school, Emily?" "Definitely!" "Do you want another piece of pizza?" "Definitely!" "Emily, is 'definitely' the new popular word in school?" "Definitely!") That's a definite possibility.

Perhaps I should regale you with observations of my first days back in school? Do I start with feeling wholly inadequate while surrounded by a mass of young perfect bodies, ones that have yet to endure stretch marks from two pregnancies or see those first grey hairs that send your self image into a tailspin as you think My God, I'm five years away from forty. It might take weeks to return my self esteem to normal (ok, days--I'm not that depressed about it). My classes this (final!) semester are child psychology, ethics, and political science with an online marketing class thrown in to make it interesting.

Recapping Abigail's recent temper tantrum would surely entertain but I think she might disagree. I am learning (somewhat slowly, I admit) that trying to rationalize with a pissed off six and a half year old is pretty pointless. I'm pretty impressed with myself though because my patience is not wearing thin any sooner (that year on Lexapro is really paying off). Abigail will look back on that and surely appreciate it.

If I wrote that I was worried that every little twinge or "dullness" in my knees was a precursor to completly wasting the surgery I had I might sound whiney so I'll leave that alone. I'm forever reminding myself that I'm still healing and to not overdo it. Paitience, Iago. Patience.

I should tell you that my little detective managed to solve The Case of the Missing Tweezers. Emily's fee for cracking the case? One dollar. The guilty party? I've been advised by someone's lawyer not to reveal that information but I can say that it was in a certain someone's medicine cabinet. Next to his cologne.

Well, I've tried everything I can think of but I just can't seem to get past this Blogger's Block. I guess I'll get back to you when I definitely have something to talk about.

The case of the missing tweezers

Pen and notebook in hand, Emily stood before me and posed her first question. "When did you last see them?" she asked. "I need the exact date."
"The 18th," I fibbed. In truth, I hadn't seem them in forever.
Emily scribbled something in her notebook and walked away. I returned to marveling at Michelle's new pendant that she crafted by hand. (Visit her Esty shop, Shoozles, where I dare you not to drool!)
"I'll need a list of suspects." Emily was now behind me, pen poised.
I turned away from the glass goodies. "Well, there's you," I offered.
Emily made a face.
I thought for a moment. "Daddy."
Emily scribbled.
"And Harley."
Offering the dog up as a suspect earned me a pair of rolled eyes. Emily turned away from me and hunted down her father for questioning.
I hope my daughter is successful in locating the missing tweezers. My bet's on her father, but Lord knows where he's put them. Or worse yet, what he's done with them.
To be continued...

First day back

Today is the girl's first day back to school. I hope the day goes fantastic for them, and I also hope that it will be an indicator of a fantastic school year.

Emily is returning to school this year as a 3rd grader. When did she get so big?


Abigail has moved on from letters to numbers. Here is my 1st grader! (Abby, tone down the cuteness, please.)


Learn lots today, girls! Tomorrow we'll work on setting up the coffee for mommy and daddy. ;)

The best way to come up with a blog idea...

...is to have someone else do it for you. My thanks to Mrs. F.

My "Moi Moi" (I'm on strike against Meme)

A. Attached or single? | Married 11 years (OMG!)
B. Best friend? | Jennipher
C. Cake or pie? | Cake, preferably slathered in chocolate.
D. Day of choice? | Friday
E. Essential item? | My iPod. Loaded.
F. Favorite color? | Used to be pink, lately I'm in Blue Period.
G. Gummy bears or worms? | Gummy Bears
H. Hometown? | Vacaville, CA
I. Indulgence? | Cold Stone Coffee Lovers Only ice cream made with mocha (thanks, Jen!).
J. January or July? | July, definitely. I'm still a California girl at heart.
K. Kids? | 2 girls. Unless you count my husband.
L. Life isn’t complete without? | My bugs.
M. Marriage date? | February 19th.
N. Number of brothers & sisters? | 2 sisters. Both younger.
O. Oranges or apples? | Well, that depends. If you give me a choice between a sweet orange and a sour apple I'm going to go with the orange.
P. Phobias? | To get into a car accident and to have not shaved my legs that morning.
Q. Quotes? | It's a toss up between this and this.
R. Reasons to smile? | When my house is clean early in the day.
S. Season of choice? | Summer!
T. Tag seven peeps! | I tag.... YOU!!
U. Unknown fact about me? | Um. Well... if I wanted you to know THAT I'd tell you, wouldn't I?
V. Vegetable? | I can only pick one? Mushrooms.
W. Worst habits? | According to my husband: Not putting cereal away after I pour it.
X. X-ray or ultrasound? | MRI
Y. Your favorite food? | A wicked hot Vindaloo curry.
Z. Zodiac sign? | Gemini, baby!

I would be remiss if I didn't publicly thank Nora at White Hot Magik for awarding me the Arte Y Pico Award. My only regret is that I don't live close enough to her to celebrate with some kick ass margaritas. *xoxo*

A day full of ups and downs

The day didn't start out promising.

Down | One of my incisions looks infected. (I'll spare you the picture)
Up | A quick call got me into the Dr.’s 3 days early.

Down | I had to drive all the way out to campus to pick up my books.
Up | Amazingly there wasn’t a line!

Down | I woke up at the butt-crack of dawn and couldn’t go back to sleep.
Up | I used my time wisely and got a lot of housework done early--hobbling all the way.

Down | I forgot to eat breakfast.
Up | I was treated to an Indian lunch… and dessert at a cupcake bar! (The Twisted Red Velvet cupcake is to die for... and a must to split with a friend)

Down | I seriously need to clean out my car and vacuum between the cushions of my couch. Guess where all that peeling skin went? *Ewwww*
Up | I'm heading out tomorrow to buy this nifty thingamajig to ease my cleaning woes.

Down | I'm constantly getting my butt whooped playing Mario Kart Wii against my kids.
Up | I can send them to bed for beating me.

In the end, it's good to be the mom.

"I do the peeling here!"

Emily has discovered a new past time and I'm grossed out, completely horrified, and laughing my fanny off all at the same time.

She is making it her mission to peel off my dead skin as I shed my sunburn.

"You are going to look back on this experience and be completely grossed out," I promise my eight year old as she picks and pulls. Emily laughs at me and tells me that she wants to start a collection.

A collection?

"Oooh! There's a big piece!" she says as she peels, her eyes lighting up. She's got this intense look as she goes after my dead skin, much like a scientist looking for a new strain of virus. Or a monkey grooming a friend.



I will be starting a fund for my daughter's anticipated therapy sessions. Feel free to mail me a check with your donations.

Observations of a part time invalid

Ever since I got a glimpse of my stitches I've been fascinated by them. I hope it doesn't hurt when the doc takes them out. I'm a wimp like that.

My legs still look awful. Swollen and bruised over my knees, I'm fairly certain that I won't be leaving the house in shorts any time soon. Anyone know where I can purchase a fashionable mumu?

Bose headphones truly block out a lot of sound, especially if you are trying to avoid listening to your kids play games on the Wii while you're indulging in a Harry Potter marathon. (Check out my set up!)

Reading books and watching movies that take place in the U.K. make me want to start using words like "dodgy" and "skint" all the time. Conversing with my cousin Catherine in Scotland and Tim in Manchester (who is not my cousin but it would be really cool if he was) doesn't help much, either. (Note: that last word is to be pronounce EYE ther and not eee ther.)

I have never been more afraid of tripping over something in my life than right now.

Sleeping in a seated position lost it's novelty at about day 2.

I'm shedding skin like a snake. This would be me peeling after my Girl's Weekend sunburn. So right now I'm a skin-shedding, gimpy-walking, bruised and stitched-knee messed up chicky.

Having a walkie talkie in the house has been quite possibly one of the best things EVER.

I'm measuring my successes by how many times I can get up and down from a seated position unassisted. My successes are unfortunately limited thus far. I think I'm too scared to end up in pain. Moving my legs has become a planned out, carefully calculated event that is to be executed slowly. I don't hear that crunchy sound anymore coming from my knees when I try to move though. Score one for me!

I'm sooo ready for a beer. I won't have one until after I'm off the pain killers, and that looks like it may be soon. I'm going to try to stretch out the time between pills and really see what I'm up against. If you happen to hear a blood curdling shriek sometime in the near future that may be just me getting up to answer the phone. No worries.

TMI

Would you believe that they make you take off every article of clothing prior to any surgery? Good thing I was freshly shaved (My legs, people! My legs!). I'm slightly bummed that I couldn't wear any makeup though (just a little eyeliner and mascara would have been fine!) because I look ghastly!

My knee surgery went swimmingly. I had a great nursing and surgical staff, and as soon as I emerged from a blissful, drug-induced cat nap ("You're going to start feeling drowsy now." "Oh, ok...mmm hm--") I found that I had two rather large marshmallow-like things surrounding either knee, each filled with cold gel packs. Sexy, eh?

Thanks to Darvocet, I'm not in any pain--for the moment. I'm able to walk (to be honest it looks more like wobbling) but I'm not willing to try traipsing up or down stairs yet. I'll have to wear my coldpacks for five days--nice. I'm supposed to sleep with them on, too. That will be interesting!

If you're curious as to why I had knee surgery (beyond any explanation that I've given previously) then this video is for you. If you get the heebie jeebies easily then... maybe not so much.

My thanks for all the well wishes I've received! You are all the Bee's Knees. (Sorry, I couldn't resist!) *Hugs*

What a way to kick off August

I feel rather silly about making such a fuss over Abby and this program. I know that she's going to do fantastic no matter where she's at. Maybe I just had to get all of that frustration off of my chest. So thank you for listening to me gripe.

Speaking of chests, mine happens to be terribly sunburned at the moment. Along with my face, arms, legs and belly. I, uh, sort of fell asleep--face up--on a raft, which happened to be floating on a lake. "Jungle Juice" may or may not have been a contributing factor. This is apparently the risk you run while on a "Girl's Weekend", especially if you mix 20 or so women who are kid-free, husband-free or boyfriend-free for two days. Next year's Girls Weekend is taking place down in Memphis. Graceland should start boarding up the windows now!

I will have one full day to recover from all things "over exposed" and then it's time to get scoped. There is a slight change in plans, however. I'm going to have surgery on both knees instead of just my right one. I'm excited at this because it should bring my recovery to a close sooner rather than later.

I'm off to try to find a home remedy to soothe my baked skin. I was considering basting myself in French's mustard, as recommended by this site, but I swiftly realized that I might be mistaken for an Oscar Mayer wiener. Perhaps I'll stick to Aloe Vera.