a mothers touch

This morning was parents day at Tony's school.

Last night, while we were discussing what happens on parents day, Tony said to me "please don't embarrass me Mom."

I really have no idea what he's talking about.

I mean what could be embarrassing about being a 14 year old, eighth grade boy at a brand new school and have your mom hanging with you at school for the day?

Really.

I think the administrators do this to these kids just for chuckles.

On the way into school, I asked Tony what would be the most embarrassing thing that I could do to him (just to be sure that I didn't accidentally do something that I didn't know would be mortifying to him).

His answer surprised me. He said "please don't touch me while we are in there".

Wow! That's all it would take?

Through out the day I had plenty of opportunities to cause him blushes that didn't involve touching him....but I was a good girl.

Now he lays here cuddled up next to me while I write this. He likes me to rub his back. I like to play with his wavy hair.

He doesn't seem to mind me touching him now. And I am cherishing these moments because I know they will be gone all too soon.

cruisin The Villages in style

I thought I'd share with you some of the cool golf carts we saw at The Villages this past week.

There were a lot of amazing carts I didn't get pics of but here's a few.

Here's Gigi's parents' cart.....very pretty

There are the futuristic looking golf carts

and hot rod golf carts....

The yesteryear golf carts.....



Golf carts that look like they could survive extreme weather of all kinds.

Golf carts designed for college fans....
(GO BLUE!)

Golf carts that look like the car they drive when they aren't driving their golf cart.

Golf carts that are just cool.

Golf carts for the car they wish they could be driving....

Or maybe the dream car they could never afford in real life...

Gigi and I stalked this guy till he pulled over.

I have a feeling he gets this a lot.

And finally, my favorite. A 57' Chevy.

have a great day!

My "vacation" at The Villages

Wow! I have missed blogging and all my bloggie friends!

I just got home from a vacation in Florida with my friend Gigi (formally known as Lori, but since I've changed everyone else's name on this blog so I decided to change hers too. The name comes from the book I read on my vacay about a child's imaginary land with it's own language and gigi means sister--she is like a sister to me).

Anyhoo, Gigi and I planned this trip way back in May before my move. She got round trip tickets from Detroit to Tampa for $75. Too good to pass up. Poor Hubby said "yes" before he realized that we would be in "puppy purgatory". Needless to say, it was a long week for him (and the rest of the fam).

But not for me! The week was wonderful! We stayed with Gigi's parents, who have a place in The Villages.

When Gigi said we could stay with her parents for free at The Villages, I thought, "great! sounds relaxing!". I've seen tons of commercials for the place (every time I watch a golf tournament). I figured lots of old people, lots of naps, lots of shuffle board, ect. ect.

Boy was I wrong about that place!

First of all, it's a lot bigger than I thought. When Jim and Rosemary (Gigi's parents) drove us around and told us about the place, I was constantly lost. Jim was telling us all kinds of statistics....and you know how I am with numbers.....they are all a jumble in my brain (and when I look at their website to "refresh" my memory, I can't find them).....so lets just say it's HUGE!

24 executive golf courses. 9 championship courses. 2 downtown areas, a bunch of country clubs, club houses (pools), rec centers, a hospital, schools....I could go on and on and still not do it justice. It's the kinda place you have to see to believe.

Not only that, you kinda have to stay a while to experience it. It's hard to describe, but there is a vibe at The Villages. Rosemary mentioned a few times "the spirit of the villages" and I guess that's a way of putting it....

Here's a few examples of things we saw that changed my view of this "retirement community"

~the nightly gathering in the community squares with music, dancing, golf cart cruising, and people just hanging out!

~the 83 year old who bikes 30 miles a day (and 80 miles to celebrate his 80th birthday--in that Florida heat no less!)

~the daily list of activities that is an "insert" in the newspaper....it is bigger than my weekly community news insert at home.

~the thousands of older folks that we saw on the golf courses everyday....some looking like they could barely walk up to hit the ball. But they were out there.

~the group of senior giggling and doing jello shots at dance we went to.

~the beautiful sports complexes they have for everything from archery to Polo. Softball to tennis. Always bustling with people.

~all the groups and organizations and classes. Everywhere you looked, there were active people who were laughing and talking. Constantly going, going, going.

It is exhausting.

These people have more energy than my puppy. I swear!

And I'm still not doing the place justice....

I'm swine...how are you?

I'm missing blogging but things have been a little crazy at our house.
So just a quick update.

The swine flu has hit. Bud has it pretty bad.

Just in time for my trip to Florida.

So The Hubby is trying to hold down the fort by himself.
Working "umpteen" million hours, driving kids everywhere, taking care of puppy, and worrying about Bud....


did I mention I have a really great husband!

A beautiful fall Saturday

Yesterday was a beautiful day here in the Chicago burbs.

It was sunny, with a few of those fluffy clouds.

You know, the kind that you can spend hours looking at if you've got nothing better to do and see clouds that look like people or things.

Which is a good idea for me because some of my friends are concerned that I'm spending too much time looking a puppy poo.

Anywho, back to yesterday, it was chilly but a nice kind of fall chilly. You know, the kind where you throw on a sweatshirt and you're glad cuz you get to cover up those extra few pounds you've gained since you switched from "summer grilling foods" to "fall comfort foods".

Because of the sunshine, the trees looked glorious! All the colors were bright and stunning. We've got to be close to peaking as far as the fall colors go.

The Hubs seemed to be back on his "I'm not letting Tori touch anything that has to do with decorating" kick again.

I "watched" him paint the kitchen. I offer a million times to help. But he always had an excuse. "Nah, I've got to cut in over here yet...." or "why don't you run to Lowe's and get another roller....".

I'm starting to wonder if I messed up when I helped paint the living room. It was my one and only time I've ever painted. Maybe he's upset because when he showed me how to roll the paint and first make a "W" and mine looked a little more like a "V".

I don't know.

I'm not gonna complain. Painting wasn't that much fun anyways.

So I did some laundry, cleaned a little, gave the pup a bath, and told my Hubby how hot he looks when he paints multiple times.

But I still needed something else to do. So I took Tony and his buddy over to the doughnut farm.

Yeah, you heard me right. The doughnut farm. I'm sure there's one near you. They have them everywhere.

They grow these amazing cinnamon sugar coated apple cider doughnuts.

If you go at the right time, they are all warm from just being picked off the doughnut trees in the warm fall sun.

Being that it was a beautiful sunny day yesterday, Tony and I were pretty sure we'd be able to snag some of these warm ones.

So we drove out past the burbs to this gigantic doughnut farm.

It was packed like I have never seen in Michigan. I don't think there are as many doughnut farms near the burbs so when you find one, it's a busy place.

There were 2 fields full of parked cars (and I was thinking to myself what a waste of some perfectly good land that could be used for more doughnut trees) plus 2 more parking lots near the store where you pay for your doughnuts.

I was quite annoyed by the people milling around. I just wanted to pull up front and get my doughnuts and leave. Of course there were people there for the corn maze. And silly people there buying apples and pumpkins.

"Pumpkins schumpkins" and apples?....you can buy those anywhere! I wanted to roll down my window and scream at these people "Get out of my way!!! We are here for the warm doughnuts!!! Yes, I will run you and your stroller over if you don't move!!"

To save time I dropped Tony and his friend at the door and circled the over crowded parking lot. The whole time I was drooling in anticipation.

And Oh! was it worth it!

Are these not THE most beautiful things you have ever seen?!!

I brewed up a pot of coffee and made my own little pumpkins latte thanks to a wonderful place called Trader Joes





I know your probably laughing at my sugar free creamer (it reminds me of working at an ice cream shop when I was a teen and people would come in and order a huge sundae and then say "No whip cream, I'm on a diet!") but what can I say? With my creamer to coffee ratio, if I use the regular stuff, I not only get a caffeine buzz but a sugar buzz. And those are not fun to come down off of! (btw- 55cal; 1gm fat; 9gm sugar; 11 carbs-not bad compaired to the other ways of getting your pumpkin spiced coffees!)

What a lovely fall day. My only regret?
We only bought one dozen.

But today looks like it's gonna be sunny again!

kitchen project

Today we are going to start working on the kitchen.

We are trying to get rid of the off-white theme that the previous owners carried through the entire house.

Everywhere that they could have chose a color when they built this house, they chose off-white. Every inch of paint, the tile in the bathrooms, the carpet, and the counter tops. Everywhere.

The kitchen counter tops are a nice material, it's Corian. But it's off-white, of course.

I don't think I would dislike them so much if I wasn't looking at so much off-white constantly.

So Hubby and I picked out a glass tile back splash. I would have loved to do something really colorful and bold, but then what if I hate it a year from now? So I toned down my color aspirations a little.

We found one that we both like (which is a miracle in itself). It has the same sage green as our living room couches (which connects to the kitchen). A touch of brown that is the same color as our cabinets. A touch of silver that looks nice with the stainless steal appliances. And a butter cream yellow.

The yellow is the only color I'm concerned about. The Hubby will be painting the kitchen that color first and then putting up the tile.

I don't mind yellow, I'm just afraid it's too close to all the off-white that is every where.

But here is where I trust the Dear Hubs and his decorating abilities again.

I guess he did okay with the living room....

We also have a new kitchen table and chairs on order. The old one will go into storage for Nae. It won't be much longer and she will be graduated from college and setting up her own place (sigh).

We will paint this weekend and the Hubs will do the tile while I'm in Florida (I know kinda spoiled ehhh?).

So I'll post some pics when it's all done. Have a great weekend!

things like this make me angry....

I was doing a little blog reading this am and Pam over at Pam's Perspective was talking about the crazy news this week.

Now I'm a little riled up.

One of the things she talked about is the story about the weather balloon fiasco yesterday. Click on her site if you live under a rock and have no idea what I'm talking about.

IF this was a hoax, I'd like to ask the parents a couple questions......

IF this was a hoax, did you think about the danger that hundreds of people were put in because of it?

IF this was a hoax, did they think about the pilots of the helicopters who were asked to fly to help rescue the boy? Did you think about what you say to the families of the pilots if one of those helicopters crashed?

IF this was a hoax, did they think about Denver International Airport and the hundreds of people who were on aircraft that day that could have been in danger of running into that balloon? Or did you plan on a nice sunny day just in case? How would you have face thousands of family members if a plane had crashed because of this?

IF this was a hoax, would they have allowed the crazy rescue ideas to be put into action, putting even more people in danger? Or would you have said enough is enough?

But there are even more issues that are of course less important...

~the cost of these rescue operations

~the cost of closing down Denver International (or rerouting traffic)

~the inconvenience of thousands of people who were delayed

I'm sure there are many more issues we know nothing about.

I'm hoping that when they investigate this, they do a thorough job. This guy seems like he is a pretty good actor.

how to embarrass your teens

Yesterdays post was fun for me.

Embarrassing your teens is almost as addicting as blogging.

It made me think of a story of mom embarrassing her teen that I witnessed a few years back.

I was a teachers aide for a while at my kids school. One of my duty's was to supervise the outside lunch area. There were picnic tables where the high school kids would eat lunch.

One fall day, I'm standing next to one of the tables that is filled with 9th grade boys and girls.

They are doing what all 9th grade hormonal teens do, flirting, giggling, picking at their food, when we hear this high pitched call from across the lunch area.

"Yoohoo! Jor...dan...! Jordan! Over here! It's mom! Yooooohooooo!" Every eye turns to look at at a woman dressed in a house coat, slippers, and curlers (this is a mother that I know, she does not dress like this in public). I look over at Jordan and see the color drain from his face, accompanied by a look of horror. Then the color quickly returns and ripens into bright red.

Jordan's mom is frantically waving her hand in the air. "Jor...dan..." she continues in her high pitched whiny voice, "I just wanted to make sure you remembered to put clean underwear on this morning!!!".

Jordan seems to be paralysed by mortification. The whole lunch area is silent. Kids who have mouths full of food have stopped chewing and their jaws hang open in disbelief.

"Jor...dan.... come over here and give your mommie a kiss!!!!"

Jordan isn't moving. I'm not sure Jordan is breathing, he's so red he almost looks purple.

Jordan's mom starts walking over to the table full of teens and squeals "Jordan! I missed you! I just had to come and say HI to you and meet all your friends!" Jordan's inability to move has now disappeared and he jumps up from his seat to intercept his mother before she can reach his lunch table.

They happen to meet just a couple of feet from where I'm standing.

Jordan's mother grabs her son in a big bear hug and the smile she has been wearing instantly vanishes. As she is patting her sons back I hear her hiss into his ear "Don't you EVER walk away from me when I'm talking to you again!".

She pulls Jordan back from the big hug by the shoulders and there's that sweet smile again on her face. She gives Jordan a big kiss on the check and leaves the lunch area.

Man, I was in awe of that woman that day!

I'm pretty sure Jordan didn't ignore his mother ever again.

So I was thinking it might be interesting to come up with a list of ways to humiliate your kids. This list could be useful for times when you need to come up with a creative way to make your kid obey you (like Jordan's mom demonstrated).

Or it could just be for fun.

Like a hobby.

I would love some help with this list.

Any ideas you have would be great or past experiences of when your parents embarrassed you.

Think of this as a public service, you know, to help us parents reach our fullest embarrassing potential.

Here's the ones I've come up with:

1. Just go about life normally....you will embarrass you're kids no matter what you do.

2. when driving their friends somewhere, tune in an 80's station and sing really loud. Dancing in your seat, hand gestures and exaggerated facial expressions are an added bonus.

3. show up to pick your teen up in an outfit that closely resembles what they are wearing. Point out in front of their friends how "special it is that you match".

4. tell their friends stories of when you were their age. include things like "I was so cool..." and "I can remember what it was like to be your age..."

5. put together a small album of naked baby pictures. Keep it handy if dating curfews are not strictly met.

6. in front of your teen ask cute cashiers or wait staff if they have a boyfriend/ girlfriend (my mother would do this to me).

Well, that's all I can come up with right now (I'm exhausted today from puppy). I would love to hear your input!

I'm officially disowned

My kids told me if I dared blog about this they would disown me.

Do you realize how tempting that is?!

I was actually kidding when I said I was gonna write about this but now I HAVE to.

So remember that when you're judging me for writing this.....I HAD to do it.....

The other day our puppy, Ace, seemed to be turning the corner as far as house breaking goes.

He had gone all day with no "accidents" in the house and had even gone to the door and whined to go out multiple times.

So I got all smug and posted on my facebook that I had a brilliant puppy.

Then 2 seconds later he peed on the carpet as soon as we walked in the door from just finishing peeing outside.

I reposted on facebook that I take it all back and that I had a dumb dog.

And it was down hill from there after that.

Ace had about 10 more accidents in the house in the next 3 hours.

It was like he was getting revenge on me for dis'ing him on facebook.

The worst part was waking up at midnight to take him outside and being half asleep and sticking my foot into my shoe and finding that he poo'd in it.

That's the kinda thing I take personally.

I was not real happy.
And I let Ace know.

He seemed all sorry the whole next day. Giving me these sad little guilty faces, like this one.

Then late that same afternoon, he does this....

I was kidding with the kids.

I told them that it looked like he poo'd a heart.....just for me.

Like he was saying "I love you and I'm sorry for poo'ing in your shoe"

I was trying to make a joke out it for the kids.

They just thought I was being embarrassing.

They sooo underestimate my abilities to embarrass them....

My diet....going down in flames!

Dear guy who invented South Beach Diet,

I hate you.

I'm hating you so much right now that I'm not even willing to google you to figure out your real name.

That's all I want to say.

Thank you.

Tori the carb addict.

This is my third time using The South Beach Diet plan.

I'm so good at it now that I don't need to look at the book anymore (hence me not remembering the guys name).

As I've said before, I am an accomplished yo-yo dieter.

South Beach is my favorite yo-yoing trick. It's easier than walking the dog.

Except this past week. See, it was my birthday. Well, not really. It was the day I finally got to celebrate my birthday with my dad and Ann. My dad is a fisherman extraordinaire and Ann does a mean fish fry. So if there is one meal I want for my birthday it's the fish my dad caught.

Unfortunately, fried fish doesn't really fit in the South Beach phase one plan. And I was on like day 9 of phase one (which means I was almost done and could move on to the "good carbs"). And when you cheat, you basically have to start over again--it's pure torture!!!

So I blew it.

And when I blow it, my mind starts thinking "well, if I'm gonna blow it, I should just blow it big!".

I mean who wants wants to go down smoldering? I want flames baby!

Big huge chocolate cake and fried fish FLAMES!

But then after I blew it that one day (which was last Wednesday), I looked ahead at my week and well, Sunday was not too far away. And we were having a pot luck on Sunday at our house.

Pot lucks.....who doesn't love a good pot luck. And just to be sure I would have a really good pot luck experience, I made all my favorites. (Flames! I want big ones remember)

This time it was white chicken chili with sweet cheesy corn bread muffins. Oh! and homemade mac and cheese from Mary at Deep South Dish. And I will tell you this, The Hubs loved that mac and cheese so much that he actually said this...."This mac and cheese is so good that it's worth you blogging!"

For all of you who don't know, The Hubs does not like my blogging. That's quite the compliment!

The pot luck was awesome and someone brought a whole chocolate cake from Portillo's. If you've never had chocolate cake from Portillo's you should go and get some right this minute. It's insanely evil, it's so good!

So now, I have a house full of left overs because I made too much food. And I have issues with throwing away perfectly good food (it's another one of those issues from being raised in Holland, MI and being surrounded by cheap Dutch people).

It will take me at least 4 days to finish off all this food (by myself).

And then.....I'm going to Florida next Tuesday with my girl friend. No one should be on a diet when you are on vacay.

And if I'm gonna go down in flames.....

The Monday Morning Mindset

While blog reading this morning I went over to Chicken Nuggets of Wisdom and read DiPaola's post.


She's giving away some of that new Starbucks coffee VIA. (Dang! I wish I could do a product review like that one--they also gave her an awesome coffee mug and you know my "issue" with coffee mugs).


To enter her contest you need to tell her why you hate Mondays. Ughhh! I can't even do that, because I love Mondays!

I have loved Mondays for as long as I can remember. But loving Mondays can be a dangerous thing.

People LOVE to hate their Mondays. And as far as the ratio of "Monday Haters" to "Monday Lovers", well, I'm not sure there has been any official study, but it's gotta be something like 100,000 to 1 (at least!). As a kid, it took me a while to figure this out.

So now, looking back, I can see that because I loved my Mondays I was treated differently.


My earliest feelings of fondness for Mondays was in grade school....there's me skipping to the bus stop enjoying the beautiful Monday morning only to have the bus stop bully throw rocks at me. I used to think it was because I was a dork....now I know it's because I was loving my Mondays too openly.

Then there's me in third grade. It's Monday morning, I'm sitting at my little desk smiling, feeling all warm and fuzzy inside. Looking around I see some kids are sleeping with their foreheads resting on their desk and drool puddling beneath their mouths. Other kids are zoned out like little zombies. Then I notice other kids glaring at me for no apparent reason....

And those awkward middle school years? Trouble getting a boyfriend? That one boy always snapping my training bra strap. Definitely Monday Lovers intolerance!

In high school- how different my life would have been if I could have started a Monday Lovers clique. We could have had our own table in the cafeteria, maybe a secret handshake and t-shirts. Yeah we would have been cool!

Now 20+ years post high school, I find out (on facebook) that Bart Z. would have joined my group. He is so brave, he always posts things about his love for Mondays and always gets razzed for it.

I'm not ready to be that public yet.

NaNoWriMo

This is the view out my back door. I've seen lots of sun rises this past week while taking care of puppy.

Last night I did something crazy.

My friend Pam and I decided to sign up for National Novel Writing Month or NaNoWriMo for short.

It starts November 1st.

If you don't know anything about it, I will try and give you the quick skinny on it.

In 1999, a bunch of guys out in California decide to try writing a novel in a months time.

Why? To pick up chicks.

Or at least that was one of their reasons. They had 21 people participate that first year. The next year there were 140 people, and the year after that it jumped to 5,000. (he blames bloggers for spreading the news--yeah! go bloggers!). Last year they had over 119,000 participants! You can click here if you want to read more.

This thing is huge and there's quite a support group out there. You can sign up for local support. They have forums and get togethers, and it's happening all over the world.

So the challenge is 50,000 words in a 30 days.

Yes, I have no idea what that even looks like or feels like. I expect pain, frustration, the urge to quit on a daily basis.

Pam and I are talking about setting up rewards for small goals met. Most of mine will involve carbs....lots and lots of carbs!

I'm also hoping to meet some new people in my area who are a little crazy just like me.

And the best part, is actually writing something (even if it stinks--it doesn't matter). It's something that I've always wanted to try but have never taken the time to do (hence the blogging).

Speaking of blogging, I expect my blog to suffer some pretty severe neglect in the month of November. That's part of my reason for writing this (begging you to not give up on me). Of course, the other reason is motivation to see this thing through. The more people I tell, the bigger my fear of full blown humiliation if I quit. That maybe what I need during week two (or so I've read).

Is there anyone out there who would like to try this with us? It will be fun.....or at least that's what I've been told.

I'm expecting the sound of crickets.....

on being an ADD blogger...

This blogging thing and ADD, I'm not so sure they go together.

To blog is not only about writing fantastic posts (ummm, or at least attempting to), it's also about reading other bloggie friends posts, showing bloggie love (ie. thoughtful comments), returning e-mails to bloggie friends, and exploring and finding new bloggie friends.

All of this can be very time consuming. For those of us with ADD, it can swallow your whole day (without you even realizing it)!

Here's a little view into how my brain operates while trying to do bloggie related activities yesterday. When I say "Me" what I'm really talking about is my conscious intentions. When I say "My ADD" -well, that is that part of my brain I seem to have very little control of.

Me: I'm gonna check my e-mail and see if I have an comments on my post from yesterday

in the process of logging in the puppy pees on the floor

Me: CRAP!

clean up pee and uselessly take puppy outside (he has already done what he needed to do)

Me: looking at my computer screen Now what was I gonna do?

My ADD: Let's read some blogs!

Me: Oh yeah! That was it.

clicks on blog reading list

Me: let's start from the top shall we?....Oh look! rxBambi has a new post!

My ADD: Ooo!Ooo!Oooo! Look at the pretty pictures of flowers Tootsie posted! Let's skip rxBambi and go back to her later!

clicks on Tootsie's blog

Me: Wow! Look at the stuff she has in her green house. Man, I think I kinda hate her a little... (not really Tootsie)

My ADD: hey!hey!hey! she has a Mister Linky Widget thingie! Let's take a quick peek at a couple of these and see....Whoa! Thoughtfully Blended Hearts....that's sounds like a nice place to visit.

clicks on the link

Me: This is a nice place, pretty flowers.....

My ADD: Ooo!Ooo!Oooo! lookie at that picture! It's kinda sparklely!

2 hours later and after 20 million clicks on links and pictures and brightly colored words....

Me: {{Dazed and Confused}}Where am I? Whose blog am I reading? How did I end up here? What time is it?

My ADD: No! Wait! Look at that! There's Otin on her reading list too! He must be good, it's like the third time I've seen him mentioned today and rxBambi reads him too....

Me: rxBambi! ugghh I forgot rxBambi!

clicks back to my dashboard so I can go to rxBambi's blog

My ADD: Ooo!Ooo!Oooo! We have a new follower! Let's just peek and see who it is....

flaunting flowers-kind of.

I've never participated in blog meme before but I couldn't resist this one over at Tootsie Time.

She has a blog about gardening that is amazing. I'm sure I will be spending many cold, snowy, winter afternoons sipping hot coffee and looking at her pictures. She has a greenhouse too! I'm sooo jealous!

Anyhoo, Tootsie has something called "Fertilizer Fridays!" where you get to flaunt your flowers/gardens.

I'm hoping this qualifies as "flowers/ gardens".

Okay, really I'm just wanting to show off how handy The Hubby is.....and show my beloved pergola. So I promise this will be the last time that I will lament over the flowers and gardens that we left behind, (you already know how I get all sentimental about my gardens and my flowers when we move).

But seriously, I am still in mourning from leaving this pergola behind. I tried to talk the moving guys into packing it for us. He laughed....I wasn't kidding.

Two tons of flag stone and a weekend of back breaking work but it was all worth it.

We had just started building flower beds along the back patio (to the left of the pergola) and were planning on continuing them around the back side of the house. Sorry, I don't have any pictures of those.

I planted a beautiful, sweet smelling honeysuckle next to one of the poles to climb up the pergola, it was really beginning to take off (sniff...sniff...)

I also planted "stepable plants" between the flagstone called "Mazus Reptans". When it blooms it's covered with tiny purple flowers.

We only had one full summer to enjoy it.

It was a great place to relax and read....sigh....
Okay I'm done now.

Fitting in

Ace is fitting in nicely to our house full of teenagers

wrestling for fun....

"Mom, can you buy some more Taquitoes next time you go to Meijer?"

sneaking food into the living room

tormenting his "sibling"

running back to mama crying when he "gets what he had comin"

constantly taking "self portraits" with my camera

one class of driver's training and he knows it all.

Giving mom the old "how can you be mad at me when I'm this cute?" eyes when he's in trouble

sleeping most of the day away....

yep, he's fitting in nicely.

techy teens a new level of rudeness!

I just wanted to show you this pic I took yesterday in my yard. If you click on the pic it will give you a bigger pic and you can see all the amazing details even better--unless you hate bugs, then it might just gross you out.



I almost stepped on this guy when I was walking the puppy. He sat so still that I thought he was dead at first but he was so beautiful that I ran and grabbed my camera. The way the sun was hitting his wings I could see all these different colors and designs. I guess I've never looked at one that close. So I got real close and snapped some pics and then he flew into my face and I screamed and ran around because he scared the bajeezies out of me. I swear, most of the times I look really stupid in public, is when I have my camera in my face!


Anyhoo, I couldn't believe that the pics turned out so nice with my crappy little camera. I boosted the colors a little on my photoshop thingie (you can tell I soooo know what I'm doing). The original pic was nice but it didn't show the colors that I was seeing in real life. Here's the original...


I was all proud of my bug picture, so I showed Tony. He said "You didn't take that mom! You stole that off the internet." Of course, I erased my photocard in my camera after I downloaded the pictures so I have no evidence that I really took it. There's nothing like talking to one of your teens when you're looking for a compliment. They will deliver a blow to your ego every time!

What I really meant to blog about this morning was my techy teens. I'm not bragging here. It's actually really annoying!

Last night I wanted to get on my computer to get caught up on some of my blog reading and to answer some emails (I'm sooo far behind because of the puppy poo duty). I find Tony, on my computer, facebook chatting with a bunch of people all at once and also on his phone texting.
If two people attempt to chat at me at once, it's like stimulus overload! I try keeping up but it feels like my head might explode.
Mac was "one up-ing" her brother. She was on facebook chatting to multiple people, talking on her phone, and texting all at the same time (when she gets a text she pulls the phone away from her face but continues to talk and reads her text).


After I kicked Tony off my computer, he got onto Bud's. Then, adding to all the ways he was communicating before, he started skyping.


I had a teen parenting "first" the other day.

Mac asked if I could give one of her friends a ride home. So I'm driving along, Mac is in the passenger seat and "the friend" is in the backseat and it is unusually quiet. I'm thinking to myself "this is strange", then I realize that they are texting back and forth!
It's the "new whispering behind the hand" as far as rudeness goes! I was actually really mad. They would throw out a comment here and there or giggle about the text they just sent, only to be even more annoying cryptic.

I started imaging pulling over and tossing both their butts out of my car!

Our parents had to teach us proper communicating etiquette. Such as, look someone in the eye when you talk to them, don't interrupt others when they are talking, don't mumble, ect. ect.
But now in this techy new world, I feel responsible to teach a whole new set of techy communicating etiquette rules that I don't even understand myself!

These are some that I came up with on my limited techy knowledge:
1. Don't text on your phone when you are having a "real" (face to face) conversation with someone else.
2. Don't text people who are with in talking distance from you! Talk like a normal human being! God gave you a voice! Use it! (sorry for all the "!" this really annoys me!!!!)
3. Don't use that "skyping" thingie unless absolutely necessary. It makes your voice sound like a robot and it's creepy.
4. Return texts promptly. If you can't then begin by apologizing why it took so long to get back to someone. No one likes to be ignored.

That's all I can come up with this morning on my two cups of coffee brain. I'd love to hear if anyone has any others to add. Especially my geeky friends out there (you know who you are) or my teen readers (they probably have the most insight) or my geeky teen readers (you know who you are too!) :)
Have a great day!