My house is like the golden gate bridge

I heard that the Golden Gate Bridge is painted all year long.  By the time they completely repair and paint the entire length, it’s time to start over again.   That would be a frustrating job for me. 

But in some ways, that’s how I feel about my house.   Always something that’s undergoing repair or paint.  I looked around my house today and this is what I found:

Library book shelves- I’m trying to make my laminated Target bookshelves look like built-ins. They look horrible right now.

The Green screen- Brian has been making videos in living room for his new tech blog.   Not how I intend to decorate the living rood, although I LOVE that green color!

Yellow paint samples- all over because I need to paint the computer room and hallway.

Playhouse Brian is slowly building for the kids.

Desk Thing-  I started covering the drawer fronts, but decided mixed patterns is going to bug me. Now I have to get those papers off before I start over.

Living room accent wall- I spent a lot of time on this stupid wall, but turns out I’d rather have the whole thing navy so the couch doesn’t look so washed out.  Brian doesn’t have the right tool to cut the molding for the wall, so that’s been sitting in the basement for 3 months.

Kinda scary to see the state my house is in!  LOL. Not to mention the crazy mess near my sewing machine.  Most of these projects are just for fun and not something that needed to be done.  Just like the Golden Gate Bridge, my house is always going to be undergoing improvements. (At least I’m not using red paint everyday.)  This is who I am;  I need variety and frequent changes. Thank God Brian doesn’t mind the multiple projects I undertake and the chaos they bring. 

Sandra's Baby

Have you been keeping up with Sandra Bullock lately? She's one of my favorite actress ever. I like the roles she takes, and she gives really great interviews. "People" magazine is basically my only source of information, thanks to a co-worker (Lindsey, maybe?) who brings them into work.

Glimpsing the headlines over the past 6 months, I've been disgusted with the guy she married. Seriously, who would cheat on her? She's gorgeous, successful and wonderful. What a selfish, inconsiderate man... but then that describes a lot of men, doesn't it?

source photo


This week, someone brought in May's "Special Double Issue" of People. I'm three months behind, apparently.

Once again, Sandra is on the front, but this time she is beaming with a beautiful infant boy in her arms. I picked the issue up on my break and quickly scanned till I reached the article. Soon I had tears running down my face as I read about the most amazing secret that she's been keeping while dealing with her husbands infidelity.


In the interview, she talks about the end of one love, the start of a new life and the "little man" who changed everything. "He is just perfect."

I can not fathom the pain of going through a divorce, but I have felt the amazing and overwhelming love for a baby. And I wonder at her experiencing both extremes at the same time.

Here are some quotes from the lengthy interview that I really liked. Even though she's worth millions and owns like 5 mansions, I connected to her through this article...we're both mothers.

"Even though life now is not what I expected or dreamed of, I have experienced things this past month that I never knew existed."

"I have been surprised by the fact that I really only need three hours of sleep."

"It's astounding to watch a human being grow right before your eyes"

"My dreams for Louis are that he sees life's sorrows doesn't eliminate the great joys."

Mommy Necklace

One of my most recent purchases was from Mommy Necklaces.

Normally I can look at something and say, "No way! I'm not going to buy this. I'll make one myself!" But, I'm not really patient enough to make jewelry, and I wanted this. I needed this necklace. Gracie needed it.

This is what got me to click "purchase":

*$.99 shipping. I love me some cheap shipping!

*"A nursing necklace aids in reducing pinching, pulling and distractability while nursing" oh yeah! I'm tired of rescuing my glasses from Gracie's strong grip.

*They are super cute.

*3 year warranty not to break

*Tested for safety

*It matches half of my wardrobe

*And lastly, supporting another mommy entrepreneur, since I am trying to do the same thing!

Pardon my "mommy ponytail"; I had no idea it was really that bad until I saw this photo.

P.S. I did not receive any thing from mommy necklaces; just sharing something super cool.

Home Sweet Home

HOME SWEET (messy, dirty) HOME

We traveled last week to visit family in Indiana and Wisconsin. (Yes, I'm a blogging dork who scheduled things to post while I was gone.) I hardly touched a computer the whole week, but I did get quite a fill of HGTV at my mother in law's house. Oh boy! I am just itchin to get painting and spray painting and decorating, but I spent my first day home cleaning and unpacking. And draining water out of our pond. You'll hear and see pictures about this grand adventure and massive project soon. Fortunately, I am NOT the designer or main undertaker of this plan; I am only around for moral support and dumping buckets of water.

1,575 Miles traveled
28 hours Time spent in car
25 Average miles per gallon
63 Gallons of gas
11 Number of relatives we saw
15 Number of times I asked, "Are we almost there?"
14 Hours traveled in the car on the last day.
2 Boxes of Teddy Grahams I doled out
5 Signing Time DVD's the kids watched
1 Blanket binding sewed. It took one hour and I wished I had 15 more to pass the time.
9.25 My highest score on the trampoline event of Wii Olympics
1 million Number of corn stalks we saw growing in fields
4 Number of corn on the cob that I ate

Just some light reading...

Can you tell which side of the bed is mine? (hint: I'm a bit of a bookworm)

I count 14 books on my side of the bed and 0 on Brian's side of the bed. I can't imagine having so much space on my nightstand!

Most of the books are garage sale finds, or books passed along to me. When I run out of those, I go to the library and come home with at least 10 books. Occasionally, I find a book that I feel is deserving of space on my shelf (and money out of my pocket). But getting books from the library or second hand works for me; if I don't like the first 30 or so pages, I just skip it.

I recently read "The Secret Life of Bees" by Sue Monk Kidd, and that one's a keeper.

I just read "Blessings" by Anna Quindlen. The story line to this book is really great, but the style of writing wasn't my favorite. I often caught myself re-reading to make sure I understood what was going on.

I also just finished something off of Oprah's book list. I can't even remeber the title....Let me tell you, I've been disappointed over and over by the books with her sticker on them. Obviously, I shouldn't be taking book recommendations from her. What's on your reading list this summer?

My favorite Christmas gift

This is the best present I've gotten in a long time. Last year, my mom heard me complaining about how hard it is to find tools around my house. They never get put back after projects, screwdrivers disappear like chocolate, little pieces of tools are strewn across the work bench, ect.

On Christmas morning last year, this is what I opened up. I was so excited to have a PINK tool box of my own. My mom knows that a girl really needs her own set of stuff. Everything has its own little place to sit and I can tell right away if something is missing. Brian seems to instinctively know that he needs permission to use the pink stuff, which is great. I pull this out of the closet at least 4 times a week and I can always find what I need for the projects I do around the house. (mostly screwing or hammering something into place)

Out with the old, in with the new

Good-bye, my close companion, my little black purse. You tried your best to handle the daily stress of holding my wallet, pacifiers, snacks, and phone. You occasionally even tried to deal with the coupons and store receipts that were thrown your way. I know it was hard. You only had one tiny little pocket and so many demands. Although not beautiful, you are a classic. Black goes with everything! But there's always been that little pet peeve that got under my skin: you slip around on my shoulder.

Hello, you pretty little thing! With a gorgeous green print and embossed velvet flowers, you caught my attention and have gained a place close to my...um...hip. Your 5 pockets can handle more than everything a mommy needs to carry. And you stay in place like a good purse should. Best of all, you were perfectly crafted by a dear friend.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

I'm sure you've heard this slogan. I'm not sure if people in the mid-West have. We are visiting family in Indiana and Wisconsin this week and I just CRINGE to see soda cans, cereal boxes, everything...absolutely everything going in the trash can. We drive past enormous landfill mountains all over the country side out here, and yet people don't recycle! Hello! The land fill is in your back yard! I'll keep my mouth shut...except for one more thing. Why do you people smoke while you are eating in restaurants? To smell that nastiness and try to eat something delicious at the same time is really hard. A few people ruin the air quality for everyone. I am a spoiled New Yorker with great no smoking laws. Ok. I'm done moaning and groaning about the Mid-West.

I have increasingly become more aware of the amount of "stuff" that I bring into my home, and the amount of "stuff" I take out of my home in the form of trash. Two babies in diapers makes up a large portion of it, but potty training starts in earnest when we are home from our trip to visit family!

I wouldn't say that I am a recycling fanatic, although I do put all paper materials, glass and plastics in the green recycle bin every Sunday night to be picked up. Where it goes from there, I'm not really sure. Some people say that the amount of energy used in the recycling process voids out the benefits of keeping all that stuff out of landfills. I really have no idea and have no control over the recycling process that is in place right now in my state. All I can control is putting it in the designated box.

What I can control in my life is the REDUCE and REUSE aspect of that logo. I've been doing my best to stop intaking plastic bags with every purchase I make. The last time I went to the grocery store, I used 2 of my own totes, and only 2 of their plastic bags. That's a vast improvement for me! I really want one of these totes. They cost $12, but they are cute and can fit into my purse. I am also looking at the packaging of items that I purchase on a regular basis to see where I can cut back. For example, instead of buying individual sized yogurt or applesauce (which are so convenient) I buy the large size and portion it out into smaller bowls as we consume it.

Obviously, I'm totally into reusing things. That's the cheapo part of me...I mean the environmentalist in me. When people throw something out that is still functional and usable to another person, I get mad. My dad throws out anything that he doesn't have a use for. I wish he'd call me first so I can grab it up or pass it along to someone who needs a certain item. I've managed to rescue quite a few things over the years from his trash pile. I can remember when I was 16, he put an antique dresser out on the side of the road because one drawer didn't slide well. I ran out and rescued it at the same time some people were about to put it into their car! Whew! That was a close call. I used that dresser all through high school and my mom still uses it now.

I'm considering doing a compost pile so that my watermelon rinds, eggs, coffee grinds, ect are not going to the garbage pile. Instead, they will be broken down into a rich compost that my flowers and shrubs will love. I've read about doing a worm compost, where the worms eat their way through that type of garbage and their excrement is fabulous for gardening. (Like I want to deal with more excrement than I already do on a daily basis) Does anyone have experience with composting?

What are your thoughts on "REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE"? I set up the poll to get a general idea of where people are at, but comments would be fun to read too.

Totally brilliant leggings

Lisa's gorgeous baby was wearing little leggings this week. I wanted some for my baby too!

Yesterday, Kaylee was crawling around on the deck, on the grass, on everything. BARE LEGGED. I wouldn't want to do that, but she doesn't complain. In a flash of brilliance, I remembered that I had cut off Joshua's pajama legs and that they are shaped like leggings. Sorta. I had saved them for some unknown future use.

Now if only Joshua had some cute pink pj's that I could cut up to expand her legging accessories.

Fun in the Bathroom

There's just no good way to re-roll toilet paper.

Loads of Flowers

I love daisys. They were the main flowers used at my wedding. They are sosimple and pure. They also grow like a weed, which is possibly the reason I likethem so much. I planted 5 little clumps of daisys at my old house and within 3years, there were thousands of daisys in the front of my house.

Every year Brian would say, "Are yougoing to do something about those daisys? Something needs to be done." And Iwould say, "NOPE! I love them! For 3 weeks out of the year, I had daisys inevery room of my house. I miss those daisys, and wish I dug up a few hundred totake to my new flower-less house.

I'm starting small with these yellowblack eyed Susans and Irish Susans (with yellow centers), but hope to somedayhave overflowing flower beds. I want them to get so out of control that Brianwill say, "Are you going to do something about those flowers?"

A new way to waste time at work

I signed up for Face Book yesterday. Anyone else have that? Look me up and be my friend! In under 24 hours I had 60 "friends" under my account. Yippeety.....wow...huh? It's a mix of really random people who are probably going to say "Amy Jo....hmm. I do remember her. What's she look like again? Cool, she's got 2 kids!" And then I won't hear from them for 5 years. I'm ok with that. But I really love my blog. I like to talk about my ironing board cover and dirty floors. I get the feeling that face book might not really be about that type of stuff.

So, Face Book is my latest attempt to entertain myself at work while I'm on hold with Social Security or Howard Johnson Hotels. Seriously, 12 minutes on hold for that hotel today! Not that I really care because I was catching up on 60 people's face book accounts.... :)

Nothing beats some clean sheets

I washed all our bedding yesterday as well as 5 other loads of laundry, in case you are interested. At 11:30pm we were ready to crawl into bed, but had to pause 93 seconds to make up the bed. Brian gave a big sigh and said, "I would be happy if you washed the sheets only once a year." Apparently 93 seconds of work isn't worth the smell and feel of clean sheets to a man. But for me, slipping into a clean bed is one of my favorite things!

How often do you wash your bedding? Check out my poll over on the right hand side!

live simply....

I'm a simple type of gal. Years ago I painted a wooden sign that said SIMPLIFY and hung it up in my old house. Maybe I should dig that out again...

Here are some things I've done lately to make my life more simple. They make me happy....

1. Clean the kitchen floor and dining table FIRST, before everything else. Those two things bother me the most. I have a tendency to start with the sink and dirty dishes and then get distracted or interrupted, but I'm not happy until those crumbs have been swept away. I must have been brain washed by the Fly Lady to start with a shiny sink. But it works better for me to keep the floor and table looking nice.

2. Put a second ironing board next to my sewing machine. I read this somewhere on Angry Chicken's blog. DUH! Trekking up 2 flights of stairs every time I need to iron a seam is not very efficient; too many distractions!

3. Move my measuring cups into the cupboard with all my baking ingredients. This is such a simple change, but it saves me a few seconds.

4. When Kaylee takes books off the shelf, move them to another shelf. I realize this means that eventually the 8 lower shelves in my library will be completely bare, and the 12 higher shelves will be overflowing with books. I can accept this.

5. Keep a basket of cleaning supplies in each bathroom. Toilet brush, Windex and paper towels.

What tips do you have that make life easier?

Here's something that I'd like to be #6... maybe you can help me add it to the list! Everyday I use washcloths and cloth bibs in the kitchen. They need to dry before I throw them into the laundry bag. (otherwise they STINK!) Right now they lay across my sink and get wet again when I do dishes. I hate seeing them there... There are usually 3 or 4 of them hanging around, sometimes even more. What do you do with wet wash clothes?

Hey! This week my mom and my friend started their own blogs! If you have a minute, go say hi. I'm waiting to see the stories and pictures and whatever else they decide to share with the Internet. Although I've met some funny, creative, amazing women through blogs, I'll likely never meet them in person. However, I love keeping track of friends and family, people that are a regular part of my life, even more.

I know some of you read my blog and might be interested in setting up one of your own. I'll be happy to get you started....let me know if I can help!

Casablanca

Brian and I watched Casablanca this week. It took us 2 evenings because he fell asleep the first time around. We got this movie for free through some deal he found, and it is in High Definition. Although it was made in 1942, because it was on film they were able to clean it up and put it in HD.


I know this is a CLASSIC movie, and I'm surprised I've waited this long to see it!
I've heard the famous name Humphrey Bogart, and now I can finally put a face to it.

And now I know where some famous quotes come from like:

"Here's looking at you, kid."

"We'll always have Paris."

"I think this is the begining of a beautiful friendship."

Have you seen this movie?

She's a model

This is my friend. She's a model...for real. She left these pictures on a computer at work (naughty girl) so I copied them over to add some glamour to my blog. Don't worry, I asked permission first. She tried out for "Next Top Model" and started out her interview portion just signing. That got their attention! Then she started over saying, "My name is S....and I'm a sign language interpreter..."

She got engaged and passed her National Certification test this week. Now that's what I call a good week! I bet "Next Top Model" will ask her to join the show, just to top the week off.

this and that....

The results are in with 15 votes. Cool! 15 different people looked at my site this week? Unless that was my mom trying to inflate the numbers and make me feel good... Don't you think my mom should have a blog? I think I'm going to make one for her and see if she'll do it

The question: I eat outside....
46% said "every chance I get"
13% said "ugh..too much work"
40% said "because I don't have to sweep up the crumbs"

I hate that those numbers don't add up to 100. I guess blogger doesn't do decimals...

Thanks for the lovely comments on my anniversary. We had an uneventful day. Brian at work and then to play golf. I took the kids to a park in Syracuse with my cousin Colleento visit with my mom . It was a wonderful little trip, including the brief torrential rainstorm.

I got home late to find Brian had bought an ice cream cake and bouquet of white roses. He actually remembered our anniversary! I have super low expectations, so this was enough to impress me. I wonder if he actually remembered that my wedding bouquet was white roses, or if that was a lucky grab off the grocer's shelf....

For those of you waiting to see a picture of the wasp killing outfit, I'm sorry to disappoint. Brian's friend offered to spray the deadly poison into the nasty hive. No winter coat or ski mask needed. What a friend! (I think Brian was relieved.)

Fashion Confessions

A post on my friend's blog made me smile, and evaluate the things I have in my wardrobe. I've got some oldies but goodies, some everyday boring clothes, and some stuff that just doesn't belong. Unfortunately, I wore something from the latter category today to church. I'm still wearing it as I type, to be honest. But as soon as it leaves my body it will go into the donation box. After I wash it...you gotta wash things before you donate, right?

THE GOOD:

- It was given to me, so no $ invested and no emotional attachment
- It never needs to be ironed. NEVER! ..and I don't iron
- Button down front for easy nursing

THE BAD:

-Busy pattern on black background
- Way too short and big for me

THE UGLY:

- From a maternity store
- Makes me look like I'm starting "to show"
- Shoulder pads

My only excuse for wearing this dress is my continued state of sleep depreivation. It's causing me to make poor decisions, including fashion choices. I needed something clean and wrinkle free. This poor little dress fit that short list of requirements. For those of you concerned for my well being, I must report that I'm now on night 9 of getting little to no sleep. Last night,

I went to bed at 10
Kaylee at 10:50PM
VRI at 11:30PM
Kaylee at 2:30AM
VRI at 3:30AM
VRI at 4:25AM
VRI at 5:35AM
Joshua climbed into my bed at 7:30AM
Kaylee woke at 8:30AM

VRI is an extra job I do about once a week, where I interpret from home for hospitals when deaf people go to the ER. I gotta get rid of that. ASAP.

And the winner is...

I apologize for the delay in selecting a winner of the Heidi give away. I've been away and feeling sick and severely lacking in sleep. Apparently only 4 people were even interested enough to leave a comment. Poor Heidi. She's such a happy go lucky little girl that she probably wouldn't get hurt feelings. So, the winner, chosen at random is Dana! (although it certainly would have been fun to mail something off to Belgium) My next order to Amazon is going out this week and Heidi will be included. Interestingly, I'm also ordering a set of flower flashcards by the same designer as the bird cards I featured from Dana's baby's room a while back.

I had a rough day at work. The call volume was high, so I could hardly get anything fun done (for myself). Imagine that. Actually working hard at work. Here is an account of the strangest part of my work day.

Deaf caller is signing that he took a driver's permit test back in 2004, but had some delays and blah blah blah ...never got around to taking the actual test. I decided to voice, "I dropped the ball". At the time, I thought it was a fitting interpretation. Well, the person on the phone was bi-lingual and had a strong accent. She says, "WHO DROPPED A BOMB?"

Oh dear Lord...I couldn't decide if I should faint or laugh or roll my eyes. I could just imagine the FBI being called; her office being closed down and a huge search for a "bomb". I quickly corrected her, and decided to speak CLEARLY and SIMPLY for the rest of the conversation. I wish that particular conversation had improved, but incredibly it went downhill fast. Too many bi-lingual, tri-lingual people on one phone conversation and there's bound to be confusion. After 20 minutes of frustration, I asked to be switched out and let my supervisor take over the call. Have I mentioned before that I love where I work? :)