another commercial

(Scene: watching the Burn Notice season finale. Which was AWESOME.)
C: That's right I keep forgetting he was a navy seal. You know, I don' really think about SEALs as spies.
C: Although, they do have all those commercials that are like "How many men are in this scene. Too late, you're already dead. Sucks to be you. NAVY SEALS."
C: I should totally write commercials or the military.
N: Them and the corn industry.

girl talk?

I wrote this in response to a blog on Momformation, and thought it should go here as well. There's girl-talk, and then there is just people-bashing, and I very much feel they are different. I personally work very hard to keep any complaints about my husband very general and minimal, and prefer to vent about the aspect that's making me upset (instead of "Augh, he never does ANYTHING around here!" I go with "Augh, I can't stand this mess!" or "The baby is driving me CRAZY.") I have two reasons for this: 1) so that I am more likely to actually talk to my husband about issues I'm having rather than venting behind his back and 2) Because I remember the exact day my mom went from listening to the other girl scout moms bashing their husbands to actually joining in. Within a year she was miserable, 'trapped', dissatisfied and shrewish, and every week she had new things to complain about to her 'girlfriends'. Oh, and she stopped talking to my dad and starting barking at him instead. The effects on their marriage of her 'harmless venting' has been years of emotional fallout for both my parents and us three children. It shut down communication in the entire family, and they are working hard now to try and open back up to each other after years of nagging, resentment and 'keeping it all in'. I would much rather not wind up in that situation to begin with. Seems to be along the lines of loshon hora?

HFCS is, like, TOTALLY ok.

C: I saw another one of those high-fructose corn syrup commercials today.
N: Oh?
C: Yeah, it was like,
lady: look, popsicles.
dude: but, like, high-fructose corn syrup. uh, durrrrr.
lady: yeah, whatever.
dude: waaaah, I'm fat, why didn't you bring enough for me?
N: ...
C: YES!! *drinks root beer*

daring bakers, ciao

I am no longer a Daring Baker, unfortunately. Too many issues logging in which meant I have not been able to participate for a while, coupled with my desire to go food shopping a maximum of once a month and some really pricey ingredients (occasionally) mean I am going back to just being an observer. I may try some of the challenges after the fact, but I am cutting out the stresses in my life and when cooking becomes stressful it just causes indigestion. So, go bakers! I enjoy seeing your culinary journeys. I hope to be able to join in again someday.

heading into fall...

Classes start in about two weeks, and for the first time I am taking a class that I care nothing about and one that I am terrified about. Of course, if I would sit down and study instead of surfing the net...or sleeping...I wouldn't be so apprehensive. So, if E stays asleep once I hit publish I will go and do that. Or maybe clean the kitchen.
Our month of no spending made it to almost 2 months of no spending, which was pretty amazing for us. E decided yesterday to break C's phone, unfortunately, and I do mean break, so we went to the mall (augh!) and got him a new one. At least he was eligible for upgrade. Unfortunately, we did not get a free-upgrade phone. Nope, my tech-junkie hubby got an iPhone. Which, granted, is a blast to play with and I lurve it, but still. Not necessary. I also decided that when I upgrade (as my phone has been having issues for quite a while, such as turning off randomly, battery not working, battery not charging, sim card not registering, etc.) I will not be getting an iPhone for myself. I saw a cute little phone I would like instead, and if they have a similar one that is *free* I'll get that. I am waiting until my phone really truly dies though. We also returned to Costco and, amazingly, didn't buy much. Still more than we really needed, but about 1/2 of what we used to buy. Baby steps, indeed. That should be it for a while, it helps to stay away from stores though. Oh, right, C needs shoes. Because his are broken (how does his stuff get broken so fast) and then we are done. Oh, wait, we need to repair his bike. I think we are truly done then? I already know what I am making for gifts for the holidays/birthdays, I just need to get on that. Oh, right, and no-shopping does not apply to food, although really we have so much food that I manage to put it off for over a month each time. We are really blessed.
We are entering phase 2: get rid of all this crap! We were in our friend's nice, almost-empty apartment the other day, and when we came back I said "I'm jealous of A&B's place. C agreed; "yeah, what IS all this crap?" So I am going through and getting rid. Baby stuff has to wait until almost the end of the month; Jellibeanz takes trade-in, so I'll be going there and then whatever they don't take I am donating to Sienna House, which is where I donated my maternity clothes and whatever non-kosher food we get in our food bundles. I am also tempted to give the trade-in voucher to A&B for baby K, but we'll see.
The main problem with our place is my stuff. My craft stuff, actually. I just have so much of it, and it is taking up way too much space. A lot of it is going to become gifts and stuff for my etsy shop (once I sell my patterns I am going to turn it into a real shop) but still, way too much. I realised the other day that I actually detest doing papier-mache, so I recycled all the supplies. This may not seem like much, but I was raised by a packrat daughter of a packrat to be a packrat, and it is HARD to undo that many years of training. Seriously, my grandmother has an apartment full of stuff, and half a house full of stuff. My mom is almost as bad. I am going to get there, but it takes some doing. Ok, a lot of doing. My big problem with getting rid of stuff is finding some place to donate it. Craft supplies, for the most part, I can't recycle, and I know if I can't find a taker it will just go in the trash and I cannot STAND knowing that perfectly usable items are going to the dump. Ugh. Oh right, and all those patterns? (I have rescued close to 400 from going into the garbage) I have decided I am DONE storing them. The truly vintage are going on etsy, the rest I am dividing into manageable bundles of kind and giving them away. Hi, Freecycle! You are my friend! There's a burden off my mind. oh, and several boxes out from under the desk.
When we move, I want it to be simple and fast, and I do not want to be burdened with boxes and boxes of "what is this, and why do we have it?" It's not a good feeling to be wallowing in stuff, and I want to get back to how it was when I first moved out on my own, before my previous 23 years of stuff caught up with me.
Well, I'm going to go work on that a bit more. Or perhaps study. We'll see.

out of context

Both from C:

"Quick, go nice some more bacon out of him." (MySims)

"Apparently, all crabs secretly look like fingers." (Fingerpuppet)

An update that makes sense soon,I promise.

happy birthday, little guy!

Wow. One year. That's just amazing. Beyond amazing. and you, E, are a complete nut. You started this life with your eyes wide open, wanting to know, and that hasn't changed for a second.

I can't wait to see what this next year brings us. I love you, baby boy.