Blast from the Past - Zman and Carrie 1994

As usual, December was a crazy month around here and I rarely had time for the computer and this poor neglected blog. This year, January seems likely to be even crazier than December was!

Zman has been away on business and returns late Tuesday. He is here for 2 full days and then we are off, next Friday, for a weekend trip to Seattle in celebration of our 13th anniversary. (Lucky 13... I can hardly believe it has been that long!) We return late Sunday evening and are home for 4 full days before I head out to visit my brother and sister-in-law for 2 weeks. Yes, I'm ditching my husband and all the kids to go gallivanting around Germany and Italy. I'm looking forward to going but, without a single weekend in January with both of the adults in the house, I'm worried the kids will run wild and drive everyone to distraction.

We had a lovely Christmas, Cookie had a wonderful 5th Birthday, and I had a very nice Birthday myself. Zman gave me a Sony eBook Reader and I have already finished three books on it. I have 45 ebooks currently in my collection and it can hold many, many more. I LOVE it! I hope they catch on so every book will be released in ebook formate. I have several old favorites that I would love to be able to carry with me everywhere I go. I have shelves and shelves of books that take up so much room and would love to be able to store them all so compactly. If only there were a way to store my kids toys so easily!!

As to that, I am dying to do a purge and get rid of all the excess stuff that seems to be breeding in every corner and closet of my house. When we moved into this house, 7 years ago, we had more storage than we knew what to do with. 2 kids and a home business later, and we are bursting at the seams! I'm itching to scrub every nook and cranny too. Since we brought our rambunctious boy home 18 months ago, all I have had time for is the basic cleaning regiment, and sometimes not even that. Most days it feels like all I do is follow Zboy around, cleaning up one mess after the next, and that makes doing things like cleaning and organizing the kitchen cabinets out of the question.

So, for the new year, I am resolved to conquer my house in-spite of my children and my husband. I have a plan that includes before and after pictures and, my favorite, color coded spreadsheets. Yeah! None of this will start until February though, just surviving this month will be challenge enough for now.

You know you are going to have a bad day when you wake up, turn on your computer, and get a blue screen of death! Yup, complete hard drive failure. Thankfully, everything that was REALLY important was backed up to the network - I did learn that lesson at least. Everything that was lost is replaceable, but the whole thing is highly inconvenient and irritating!

Zman did a recovery on the drive and we were able to rescue somethings but were very lucky to retrieve even the scant amount we did. It's interesting to go through the files that were recovered and see what was saved and what was lost. Things that are lost and gone forever include all my old blog templates but 1/3 of the graphics remain. All of my fertility tracking database was saved but I lost all the re-adoption documents and paperwork... thank heavens I have all the hard copies in the safe. All of my recipes are gone (including my Thanksgiving ones) but all of the music I never deleted after I helped my brother load his Ipod, well, that we still have...unfortunatly.

I spent hours yesterday trying to reconstruct my computer. You forget all the little things you do that make a computer your own until they are all gone. All the small programs I've downloaded, all the personalizations, all the bookmarks... Thankfully I still have time to recreate my Thanksgiving recipe folder and prep time-line (anal much?) before the big day.

All in all, I know that this is a small inconvenience compared to the real tragedies of the world, but I'm starting to get a little paranoid. What's next?

Thanks for the virtual hugs everyone. I knew that YOU would understand what a huge loss this is for me and my son. My uncle, the data recovery specialist, has had the laptop for a week now and we are pretty sure the pictures and video are well and truly gone! (Sob) Jenny, who used the same agency we did, has offered us some of her photos of the orphanage and guest house. I will be nice to at least have those even if it doesn't make up for the loss of the very personal ones! If anyone else has some photos of Ethiopia, Addis, etc. they would be willing to share, please email me! (email address listed on the left)

To help sooth myself, I went hog wild and ordered WAY TOO MANY of Elle's fabulous handmade truffles. I will have to wait a while for them, but just knowing they will be coming and I'll be able to eat myself into a chocolate coma, makes me feel better. If my mom taught me anything, it was that one must drown one's sorrows in chocolate - an adage that I am dutifully passing on to my girls. (Hopefully I won't also pass on the size of my ass. Somehow I think the two just may be related...)

If you haven't tried Elle's Sweet Hope chocolates and caramels, then you are REALLY missing out. Get thine-self over there tute sweet! Not only do you get some amazing goodies, but the proceeds go to help orphans all over the world... a sweet deal all the way around.

by the way - does anyone know how to download a video FROM YouTube? The only video we now have of our momentous first meeting is being held captive there and for some reason I feel the need to have a BACK UP!!

They are ALL gone! Everyone of my photos and videos from our adoption trip to Ethiopia are lost and gone forever! I can't even type that without crying.

I had them all stored on my laptop and was sure that I had backed them up onto our large network hard drive... the one that gets backed up regularly. I remember doing it! Then, I got a new laptop and gave my old one away, after Zman conscientiously wiped the hard drive. Last week I went to pull up some of those pictures from the Ethiopia pictures folder on the big hard drive and they weren't there! It only contained a few pictures that a friend sent me of her daughter from her trip to Ethiopia.

I have turned the household upside down in vain! No pictures on any hard drive in the whole house (and we have lots). The only pictures I have left are the three that I resized and posted to this blog and the very short clip from the video of our first meeting. (Crying again) We have even tried to recover the deleted files from the the old laptop with no success.

Gone are the pictures of our trip to DC. Gone are the photos from the plane ride that changed our lives. Gone are the pictures of us playing with Zboy for the first time, the first time I fed him, the video of his first bath with mom and dad. Gone are the pictures of the orphanage, his crib, the children left behind. Gone are all the photos and video of our travels around the city and country side.

I'm so, so sad. There aren't enough words to say how much.

I had a tough weekend - I think the post title says it all. What? You need more details? OK, ok...

Zman and Princess were both sick with the flu all weekend; technically, Zman is STILL sick though the fever has finally gone down. I've said before that Princess is not a fun person to be around when she's under the weather and she didn't make an exception this time! The whining, the fussing, the complaining... and that was just my hubby.

Wait, that's not the part you wanted to hear about? You people are all about the sensationalism! OK, here's the real story...

Scene:
A frazzled mother is juggling three whining kids, making dinner, and unloading the dishwasher. She turns her back to grab something from the pantry when she hears her oldest daughter cry out.

Princess: “Mom! Zboy is juggling knives!!”

The mom turns in horror to see her 20 month old son holding two very sharp steak knives by the blade, point up. She tries to maintain a calm demeanor because she knows if he thinks she’s going to take something away that he wants to play with that he will RUN… something that could end disastrously in this instance.
Mother: “Zboy, please give mommy the knives”

The toddler hands over one knife willingly.

Mother: “Thank you. Now, please give me the other knife”

The boy refuses to give up the second “treasure” tightening his grip on the blade while his pale mother tries not to panic. He now holds the knife in both hands and is trying to pick his nose with the point.

Mother crouching near the child: “Zboy! That’s not safe!! Please give mommy the knife and we’ll go read Baby Beluga. Zboy NO! Don’t put the knife in your nose!!!”

The boy sees that the book reading offer is really just a cheap bribe to entice him to give up his new toy. He’s not going to give it up that easily.

Mother: “Zboy, GIVE MOMMY THE KNIFE RIGHT NOW!!!”

The boy walks toward his mom seeming to be willing to hand the second knife over but decides at the last moment to give her his free hand instead. This turns out to be a mistake as now that the mom knows the boy can’t run off she seizes the opportunity to grab the knife-wielding hand by the wrist and exert enough pressure to prevent the toddler from tightening his grip on the blade and cutting his hand. Seeing his possession of the knife is at stake, the boy begins to trash about swinging the blade wildly back and forth. The mother is unable to release the boy’s non knife baring hand quickly enough to prevent being stabbed in the back of her hand. The mother drops the boy’s free hand and quickly wrenches the knife from her son’s hand and places it safely next to the other one on the counter-top. She releases the now screaming child and rises shaking to her feet. The stab wound proves to be very shallow and barely bleeding but the mom can’t resist calling out to her husband in the back of the house.

Mother: “Honey! Your son just stabbed me with a knife!!”

Yeah... it was that kind of day. I'm just thankful that no one was badly injured. After 3 kids, you'd think I'd know better than to leave the dishwasher open with knives in it!

I've been taking the bus home from work everyday since June and have found it to be quite an experience sometimes. It's often a wet and cold experience that can try your patience; especially since I catch the bus around the same time the kids get out of high school. (Who knew that sharing IPod headphones was the promise ring of the 2000!)

I find the demographic of the riders on the bus interesting. Maybe it's just the time of day I'm on the bus, but it seems that 80% of the people on the bus are minorities. I find that interesting. There are also a lot of folks who REALLY push the transit systems "be reasonable clean" rule to the max; Good God, the smell! But what I find most interesting about riding the bus is some of the VERY interesting conversations I get to overhear.

Since I spend a lot of time on the bus with the high school set, I hear the low-down on who is dating who and which teacher SUCK. I 've learned where the cool hangouts are and what the current teen fashion is, at least in Alaska. (What is with the knit caps with bills anyway?) I also got quite the education about STD's the other day, complete with how often one should be tested and where the best place to go for that is. I learned all about the current news and events in the local Native community and had met several venerable elders. I've also had the unfortunate opportunity to watch 20 something gansta wanna-bees selling drugs at the bus stop to glassy-eyed high school kids; it's not all fun and games...

The most interested conversation I overheard recently was between 2 boys in their late teens having a loud discussion about the presidential election. I was pleasantly surprised to hear these young men talk intelligibly about the issues, site facts from the debates, and talk about things they learned watching 60 minutes. It was also amusing to hear the criteria these two had for their future president. Apparently McCain lost big points by being stupid enough to crash two planes in his early career as an aviator and they both thought that the appointment of Palin was a bonehead move; Obama was a little too smooth and kinda preachy. By the time they reached their stop, I, and everyone else on the bus, knew that one of them was voting for Obama and the other was undecided but leaning toward Obama too.

Though I didn't always agree with their logic train, it was wonderful to see some of the younger generation so involved with the political process. Maybe there is really hope for a change after all!

I can get away with posting something about Palin every other day because I'm an Alaskan... right? OK, so it's getting tedious for me too but this is my last post about this topic for a while.

I don't usually talk about politics on my blog, though I've been known to post a good video or link now and then, because I tend to be pretty private about my political leanings, religious associations, etc. and because the focus of this blog has always been our adoption, our son, and, well, building our family. Sure, little things creep in now and then that hint at my opinions but I don't tend to wax poetically about them.

When Palin was announced as running mate to McCain I didn't post about my reactions here. THAT was a long day. Many of you know that I work for a public TV and Radio station and we had tons of calls from media stations all over the US. The news took all of us by surprise. I don't like Sarah, I never have. I don't like her stance on most issues and was very unhappy when she was elected Governor. I will be even more disappointed and unhappy if she is elected VP. I think that, even though she will be the first woman elected to serve as VP, it will be a huge blow for womens rights in this country.

I think Palin is highly under qualified for the position of Vice President. Elections in Alaska are more like high school popularity contests then REAL politics. Everyone here knows everyone else. There are only 600,000 people in the whole state! In the 2006 election Palin received 114,697 votes. That means that only 19% of the general population of Alaska voted for her. Yes, that was enough to get her elected, seeing how only 238,307 people bothered to vote at all, but it's not that hard to convince 115K people to vote for you, even if you're a crazy, gun toting, extreamist... *cough*

It's also a bit embarrassing on the national scene for Alaskans right now. Palin under qualified and making an ass out of herself. Stevens is on trial and is definitely possibly a criminal. I mean Stevens is being federally prosecuted and will still be re-elected by the yokels in this state. The bridge to nowhere? It's enough to make you want to claim to be from Canada!

That said, it is hard to listen to her being bashed in the national media. Alaska, as I said, is a very small State. I've met Sarah personally and it's hard to watch someone you know get lambasted on such a huge public scope. It's like watching a family member you dislike getting raked over the coals. You know you shouldn't care but it's FAMILY! I think a lot of Alaskans take the "She may be crazy, but she's mine" view of things. Not that this lingering sentimentality would EVER convince me to vote for the McCain, Palin ticket... not in a million years.

On a related note. I was told by my co-work this week to look at this story in The Huffington Post. Scroll down a take a good look at the first picture of Palin. Notice anything? Funny story. The TV station I work for was broadcasting the GOP Gubernatorial debate and we opened the studio for a public audience. We ended up not having enough people show up, so some of the staff was asked to sit in to fill up the empty chairs.



Yup! That's yours truly in the pink shirt NOT doing a very good job of looking interested instead of bored out of my skull! It's not a very good picture (That haircut! What was I thinking?)and was taken 20 pounds heavier than I am now... But that's me, right in the national spot light, with Sarah Palin! *sigh*

***Edited to add***

AHHHH the damn video is everywhere. It's on the front page of the New York Times today with me in my lovely pink shirt RIGHT THERE! How embarrassing!!! I'm going to go hide under my bed now...

OK, OK. I have finally caved to peer pressure and signed up on facebook... Now I have to ask, "What the hell is this?" What am I supposed to do here? I put up a photo and a link to this blog but have stalled from there. Maybe I've past the "coolness curve" and am finally too old to understand the point of this new fangled technology.

So, if any of you are Facebookers(?), can you give me some tips? Also, I signed up there with my REAL name and now have the conundrum of mixing my facebook stuff with my blog/alias stuff. Anyone deal with that?

Tell me the truth... am I just getting too old for this stuff? I KNOW I'm too old for a my space page!

I hate being sick! I'm mean I really hate it. Some people are good about sucking it up and getting things done, Zman for one, I, on the other hand, am a complete baby. It's a fault, sure, but what can I say... I did give birth 100% naturally - twice - so I can't be a total wimp right?

Last week I had a bit of an ear ache which I figured was from walking home from the bus stop in the wind without my hat; I have sensitive ears and wind blowing in them always makes them hurt for a few days. Since it wasn't a big deal, I just complained a smidge and went on with things. Then, Friday night all eck broke loose. Lets just say that someone jamming an ice pick in my ear would have been less painful! I'll be kind and spare you the yucky details, but it was definitely an ear infection.

Now, I haven't mentioned it before, but I've been having some "issues" with my liver enzymes over the last 8 months which, after the last blood test, made my doctor decide that I could no longer have any alcohol or any meds that effect the liver. Well, I'm not a big drinker, like one or two a year, but, with my semi monthly migraines, living without any and all over the counter pain medication has been rough. I'm guessing you can see where this is going... Extremely painful ear infection + no pain meds = one grumpy, whiny baby, I mean Carrie.

Since my ear decided not to flare up until the weekend, and my co-pays for urgent care/ER visits are cost prohibitive, (like the only-if-a-body-part-is-actually-falling-off kind of expensive) I had to suck it up and wait out the weekend; much to my husbands chagrin, I'm sure. Today my plan was to go see my doctor since I already had appointments for Zboy and Princess for their overdue well-child checks. That would have worked out great except that the receptionist from work call this morning to let me know she had sprained her knee over the weekend and was staying home today. One guess on who has to fill in at the front desk when she's out. Yeah, that would be yours truly.

I had to drag my sorry butt into work an hour earlier than usual and work the full 9 hour day when I usually only work 4. Zman had to rearrange his whole day to take the kids to their appointments and my appointment for those much needed antibiotics got postponed until tomorrow... Yes, there was much self pity happening in the reception area this morning and there is nothing like being stuck answering 100 Sarah Palin media calls to add to an already bad day!

I pretty much figured the whole day was a wash and I should just go to bed and get it over with when Zman came in with the mail and TWO gifts from my secret blog pal. She sent a couple of very sweet and uplifting cards, a HUGE bag of Dove dark chocolate, a bag of sour patch kids (a rare treat around here as we ALL love them), and a gift certificate to Amazon.com! Wow! After a bad weekend and a never-ending Monday, this was just the pick-me-up I needed. Now I can ply the kids with high fructose corn syrup and pizza, and OD on chocolate while perusing my Amazon wish list for just the right book... ah, bliss.

Thanks for saving my Monday Secret Blog Pal. Now if only you had a magic ear infection cure, I would leave Zman instantly and become your devoted follower for life!

I've spent way too much some time lately working on my blog design. I've been looking for a template that would allow me to have 3 columns on the new blogger platform and found some here that work great with a little tinkering. OK, Zman's making me fess up, I spent 6 stright hours at the computer last night while he, wonderful man that he is, made dinner and put the kids to bed. The man knows not to mess with me when I get my teeth into a project!

I've also been looking for just the right header. I have Elle working on something that's a little more personal for the future but I wanted something warm and cozy for the start of fall and with us planning to paint the girls room pink this weekend, I have a feeling I'm going to be really sick of pastels! Since I'm not the creative type, I went searching and found some great free headers here. With a little photoshoping and a new font or two, I was able to pull together something I can live with.

So, for all of you blog reader people, click on over and tell me what you think.

How 'bout those gas prices, huh? I don't know about the rest of you, but here in Alaska, at the cheapest station, we are paying $4.60 a gallon - it hurts just to type that! I remember when Zman and I were newlyweds and we were paying $.99 a gallon. Oh how things change!

Even back then, Zman was an alternative energy nut. Not long after we were married he talked me into purchasing a 1960 something VW Bug that had been converted to electric. Yup, the kind where when you opened the gas cover there was a giant plug. She would go up to 50 MPH and would go for about 30 miles before we had to plug her in again. (Yes, I said HER… her name was Reba – she came with it) At the time, I worked as a bank teller 2 miles from our tiny rental house and Zman worked at the State of Alaska, about 2 miles from our tiny rental house. I drove Reba and he rode his bike. We did have a gas car, a Nissan Sentra that got 30 MPG, that we used for longer trips but 90% of the time we consumed NO gas at all. Ah, good times!

When we moved to Bellevue Washington, our house was on a huge hill that was too much for our little Reba, and she sat in the garage most of the time. Zman’s passion for alternative energy wasn’t abated though. About this time, he heard about a little car Toyota was thinking about marketing in the US called the Prius. What! You’ve heard of it? Go figure. It seemed that Toyota was looking for some families in the Seattle area to try out the car for a month and do some focus groups and such to tell them if the car would be marketable. Of course, Zman applied to participate in the program.

I will never forget the day he called to tell me that we were finalist in this program… it was the first I ever heard of it! He was out of town on business and couldn’t make it to the interview with the Toyota big wigs so I had to go all by myself. Yeah! That was an experience. Picture the swankest hotel in Bellevue and a very lush conference room. Add in 7 people around a table and a video camera pointed at you amd your hubby’s voice coming from a teleconference box on the table. Now, picture yourself as a self conscious 22 year old. Yeah, that was FUN!

They must have seen something they liked though because out of hundreds of applicants, we were chosen as one of the five “Seattle Prius Families.” We were given training on all aspects of the car, how it worked and all of its functions. We were given driving lessons by retired race car drivers. We had our pictures and bios done for press releases. We were given a Prius to drive, for free, for a month… a right hand drive Prius straight from Japan! I’ll never forget the looks on people’s faces as I would drive by on the wrong side of the car. I was always hitting the windshield wipers instead of the turn signals!

The up side of all of this is that we LOVED the car! We wanted to keep the car. I was very sad when they took the car away. The one other bonus of being a “Prius family” was that we had the option to be first on the list for a brand new Prius when there were released if we wanted to buy one. We did!

When we moved to Alaska we sold Reba because she wasn’t a good family car and bought the Prius. When baby number 2 arrived, we bought a minivan too. Those are our current vehicles and while the Prius gets EXCELLENT gas mileage, the minivan sucks gas; I’m lucky if I get 18 MPG. With gas prices so high, it now costs me $75 a week to drive my van to and from work every day, with assorted errands thrown in. OUCH!

So, in an effort to save some money to buy non-essentials like food, Zman and I have parked the van and are now carpooling to work in the morning and I ride the public bus home in the afternoon. While this is not too much of an inconvenience now, except to poor Princess who gets jammed in between the other kids’ car seats in the backseat of the Prius in the mornings, but I’m not looking forward to braving the nasty weather that fall and winter are sure to bring. Oh wait! The weather has sucked so badly here this summer that it won’t be much different, just a little colder.

Here’s a group of people waiting for the bus yesterday…


Looks like fun right? RIGHT? Wish me luck!

We made it. I'm now trying to dig out my house, unpack, and go grocery shopping. It will be a few days before I can surface with an intelligible post but here is a quick synopsis.

We had a great trip and I have around 500 photos to prove it but I've learned that vacationing with 3 kids is almost more work then fun... but still worth it. I'm ready to have some alone time now though.

Some of the highlights of the trip:
- The Portland Ethiopian adoption picnic
- The beach trip - warm and not windy on the Oregon Coast is a once in a lifetime thing...
- The Oregon Museum of Science and Industry
- The County Fair
- The Water Park
- The Grandparents
- The yummy Ethiopian Restaurant in Portland
- The paparazzi session at the park for our family portraits
- Visiting old friends and old haunts (Zman and I both grew up and got married in that area)
- THE SUN BABY!!


Some of the lows:
- The flight down
- The airline destroying Zboy's car seat (I'm pretty sure the styrofoam isn't supposed to fall out in big chunks)
- The endless driving long distances
- Getting bitten by a donkey at the petty zoo
- The girls' never ending bickering
- Zboy learning how to operate all doorknobs
- Cookie tripping every time she turned around and sporting huge bruises from head to toe for the family pictures (no, we don't actually beat the child, she's just clumsy right now... honest!)
- One of my children *cough Zboy cough* flushing something large down my in-laws' toilet.
- Eating out (a lot) with the toddler who is working out his terrible two act at 18 months old

Now for the pictures...

To The Passengers of Alaska Airline Flight ---:

My sincerest apologies for misery that was Sunday's fight. I didn't realize the shear decibel that was achieved in our row until I took a little side trip to the back of the plane to use the facilities and discovered that you could still hear him 20 rows away. (Why yes, I do think he may have a future in the opera.) I wish I had ear plugs to pass out to all of you or at least some Valium for myself.

I could go into the whole adoption and attachment issues which complicate things in this situation but lets just say that I've learned my lesson about lap children.

So sorry,
A frazzled mama.

To The Flight Attendant greeting people as they left the plane:

I love getting parenting advice from complete strangers. I, in fact, did not know that the passengers around me would have been happier if my son wasn't scramming. I thought everyone loved it as much as I do. I also didn't know that I should "train" him to stop that. You know I was just sitting there eating bon-bons and painting my nails but now, thanks to you, I know that I should be trying to do things to get him to stop screaming. Thanks!

Here's a dilemma though... What should I do when he wants to get down and run around the plane during take-off and landing (when you were quiet implicit that we should remain in our seats with seat belts securely fastened) and when I don't allow him to do so, he reacts in a developmentally appropriate way for an 18 month old? What should I do when he wants to put down the tray table and use it as a step to climb on the head of the woman in front of me? Tough huh?

Now, here's a tip for you. When you see a mother who is covered in yogurt. mashed gram crackers, and apple juice who is obviously frazzled and one step away from collapse and still has yet another plane to board, an appropriate response would be to simply wish her a better day and be happy you are not her; nastiness only makes everything harder. Also, just because I was out of earshot doesn't mean that my husband couldn't hear your nasty remarks to the people behind me in line. It's a good thing your airline has a monopoly in the state of Alaska or you would have lost a customer Sunday.

Up your's,
A mom who has been pushed too far.

To the passengers of Horizon Flight ----:

Be thankful, be very thankful. While the 10 minutes of screaming during take off was annoying, it could have been much, much worse; just ask the people from our first flight. I attribute the subsequent singing, laughing, and playing peek-a-boo with everyone to the hard won 30 minute nap I managed to convince him to take during our 3 hour lay-over. I was very nice to see you smiling at his antics as he loudly proclaimed "WOW" over and over and over again during landing.

Thanks for the laughs,
A grateful mom.

To the housekeeping staff at our Portland hotel:

If you think this is bad you should see my house. Enjoy the nice fat tip.

Better you than me,
Mom on vacation

To All the people traveling home with us in 2.5 weeks:

I apologize in advance. I looked into getting the baby his own seat on the way home but feel that the kids would be upset if I spent their college savings on this... that almost didn't deter me though. I am getting over my usual disapproval of such things and plan to purchase some baby Benadryl for your (and not so incidentally, my) benefit.

You're welcome,
A tired mom.

To my blog friends in Oregon:

I'm here!! If you've read through this whole post and STILL want to get together, let me know. We will be spending most of the next few weeks at my in-laws house in Corvallis and are hopefully meeting up with some local adoptive families while we are here.

Hope to meet you,
Carrie

After 12 years of marriage, 14 years together, and 8 Mother's Days, my husband has hit the top of his game. This is it. He can't possible get any better! My children where adorable and semi-well behaved, the weather was sunny and warm, and my baby brother arrived home from his tour in Iraq.

Yesterday was the perfect day.

I hope all the Mothers and almost mothers out there had a day just as wonderful!

I grew up watching all the old musicals with my mom; Singing in the Rain, My Fair Lady, 7 Brides for 7 Brothers, The Sound of Music and many, many more. We would sit together and sing along to all our favorite songs and just enjoy spending time together. As I grew older, I became very critic of THOSE kinds of movies; not cool enough for my “Wayne’s World” loving teen self. I mean really! Who just breaks out into song willy-nilly in the middle of the street or in the mist of a passionate moment?

Yeah…who…who could be that un-cool, that dorky, that idiotic?

Ok, ok, I confess! Now that I’m an adult I am prone to break out into song at any given time; and not trendy, modern songs or even songs sung properly, you know, with all the correct words. Oh no, I make up my own verses to popular tunes, sing off key, and repeat endlessly the 1 or 2 lines I can remember of a song. I know, I know, I’m just SO cool!

It funny how these little ditties just pop up throughout the day. When bathing the kids you’ll hear renditions of the ever popular "I’m Going to Wash That Baby Right out of My Hair” or "Splish, Splash, Zboy’s Takin’ a Bath". Then there are the endless versions of:

Wash, wash, wash
Wash, wash, wash
Wash that hair.
Wash that hair

Brush, brush, brush
Brush, brush, brush
Brush those teeth.
Brush those teeth

Dry, dry, dry
Dry, dry, dry
Dry your hair
Dry your hair

etc.

Yes, let the good times role!

Leaving the house requires ‘Hit the Road Jack’ and coming home needs the nursery rhyme “Home again, home again, jiggity jog.” We get into the car with “1, 2, buckle the seat belt. 3, 4, shut the van door…” though this always leads to an argument with Cookie about whether 9, 10 is “a big fat hen” or “do it again”. Even Zboy has started getting in on it by chanting “gig gat gen” although it sounds like he siding with Cookie on the hen thing.

Sometimes my girls will chime in with me as we sing “Mess maker, mess maker, make me a mess” to Zboy as we clean up whatever great new thing he’s discovered to destroy. Yes, my children accept my musical eccentricity with remarkable ease - while my hubby is more likely to give me that fond, bemused at the cute crazy lady look. Cookie is my partner in musical crime and will instigate these strange hybrid songs almost as often as I will. She also has started coming up with her very own little, priceless gems.

You are my mommy
My only mommy
You make me happy
When skys are grey
You’ll never know mommy
How much I love you
Please don’t take my mommy away.

Princess prefers to ignore us for the most part, conveniently forgetting that whole year when she was 2, when we had to sing everything to her… it was like living in an Opera! I’m pretty sure this is where all this singing madness began. There is nothing like 12 months of a tyrannical toddler demanding you sing everything you say to her to improve your ability at improvising a tune.

“Sing the brushing your teeth song mom!” (see above)
“Sing the wiping your nose song mom!” (not pretty but true)
“Sing the getting out of bed and getting dressed but can find any socks song mom!” (???!!!)

Zboy has proven recently that he is definitely MY son by spontaneously breaking out into songs of his own. ‘Fere a Jacka’ is his current favorite and I am very impressed that, although the words are unintelligible, he’s got the tune pitch perfect.

Ah! My legacy will live on!!

I've been trying really hard to eat a very healthy balanced diet lately. I hate saying that because it makes it sound like I was eating tons of junk before...and that is only partially true. I would eat very healthy and organic and then wash it down with a sleeve of Thin M!nts. I could easily justify the cookies with the fact that I had eaten a very healthy meal.

I finally hit the point where I realized that if I really want to be healthy and live a long and productive life, I need to get serious about life style changes. So, I started by logging on to MyFoodDiary.com and began logging in everything I ate. This is a very scary thing to do and NOT for the faint of heart! Wow! Even things I though were healthy are full of calories, fat, and sugar. My favorite breakfast, grape nuts mixed with yogurt, has 420 calories and 32g of sugar! And lets not even talk about portions sizes. I quickly found out that I was eating 2 or 3 times the recommended serving sizes of lots of foods. Even healthy food can be unhealthy in great quantities.

So, since I've started MFD I've been eating between 1200 and 1300 calories a day. When I exercise I am careful to eat back the calories I spent to maintain the minimum 1200 threshold. This helps encourage me to exercise more so I can eat more. I watch what I eat and even when I cheat I log it in. Valentines day for example was wicked... I ate about 1200 calories in that one meal!

I've found that this system works great for me because I'm a control freak. I like being about to tailor my diet to be sure I'm getting all correct percentages for my body and health goals. I aim for 20% fat, less than 9% sat fat, 50-60% Carbs, and 20% protien... all tracked in the program. I am also careful to stay below the recommended 2400mg of sodium and try to eat at least 25g of fiber a day. This is not an easy balance to maintain and I often fall short but I'm getting much better at it!

I'm striving to loose a healthy 1 to 1.2 pounds a week and I had a total of 49 pounds to loose when I started mid January. My weight loss goals are secondary though to my health goals. I want to lower my cholesterol into the healthy range and stabilize my blood glucose levels which are currently pre-diabetic. I plan to exercise a minimum of 5 days a weeks and include cardio, weights, and stretching in my workouts.

If I don't ever reach my weight goal, I'll be ok with that, as long as I reach my health and fitness goals. I want to be here to see my children grow up. I want to be a fun and playful parent instead of the one with low energy, unable to keep up. I want to feel good in my skin. I want to be healthy and strong!

So, I've been doing this plan for 36 days now. So far, I've lost 7.5 pounds and 1.5 inches from my waist. Only 41.5 more pounds to go. I'll keep you posted.

I found out this weekend that a really good family friend passed away last week. She died quite suddenly of a brain aneurysm and we are still all in shock. Karen was a truly wonderful, caring, giving person, with a heart of gold. During my pregnancy with Cookie I had a very painful condition called Symphysis Pubis Dysfunction. Karen was volunteered to give me Chiropractic adjustments free of charge for as long as I needed them. I saw her 3 times a week for the remaining 6 months of my pregnancy and between 1 and 3 times a week until Cookie was 18 months old and I was finally pain free. Without her help I know that I would have been bedridden during that pregnancy.

She came over to my house to give me adjustments after the birth, after my gall bladder surgery, and when I had a migraine so bad I couldn't stand up. She always insisted that if I needed her over the weekends when her clinic was closed that I call her at home. She was one of my mom's best friends and a good friend to our family and I can't believe she's gone.

Then this morning I found out that Zman's friend, our accountant, passed away this weekend. She apparently fell in the bathroom Saturday, hit her head, and died. Her elderly mom found her and suffered a major heart attack from the shock and is not expected to live.

Needless to say we are all walking on egg shells around here. One sudden, senseless death is difficult; three is unfathomable. Both memorial services are scheduled for Thursday at 2 and 3 pm. Please keep their families in you thoughts and prayers.

When I moved to Alaska, 8 years ago, I had never driven in snow. We moved up here from Oregon in February and got a crash course, literally, in winter driving. I think I was towed out of more snow berms that winter than everyone else in Alaska, combined. I won't even mention Zman's little guard-rail insident...

The weather here can be brutal. It's quite common that it will snow, then rain, then freeze, causing what I like to call the car-skating effect. Here is a little taste of what I mean.

Now I don't think twice about driving in some pretty nasty conditions. I can control a skid easily. I can drive on solid ice at 55 mph with one hand on the wheel. I can driving in blinding snow and 60 mph winds and I can parallel park on a downhill 30 degree slope on the passenger side of the car in 2 feet of snow and ice. (I call that taking Princess to school.)

It's interesting to me to see how much I've changed over the years we've been here. When we moved to Alaska I was pregnant with our first child; now I'm the mother of three, one adopted from Ethiopia. Life has a funny way of taking you by surprise. 8 years ago today we took a huge chance,picked up our whole lives and moved 1000 miles away from all of our family to Alaska... We wanted change and adventure. We wanted independence and autonomy. We jumped into the unknown with both feet... and I wouldn't change a thing!

Yes, that's me driving 40 miles an hour on solid ice while filming it with my camera. (That thud you just heard was my husband hitting the floor) Don't worry honey, no one was harmed in the making of this film.