tiffany's spot

My kids are best friends. They play together all day. Where one goes, the other goes. Usually Jordan is the ring leader and lures him off to do whatever it is she wants to do. He's happy to oblige, he loves being with her. But, as any friends, and especially as siblings - they fight. They'll go from happily sharing toys to each wanting the same toy in about 2 seconds flat. This results in then tugging a toy between them and Jordan yelling and squealing at Tennyson, and him just shrieking and trying to get a cry going to help with sympathy from Mommy. Depending on my mood, my reactions vary. Sometimes I step in and nicely try to redirect their focus and get them playing nicely together. Sometimes I ignore it, at least until they've been at it on and off all day and I'm tired of the shrieking. Sometimes I admittedly yell a little at them to knock it off and play nice. Sometimes I take the toy and toss it up on top of the cupboards and nobody gets to have it. Tonight I w...

I was reading Heather's blog post about her daughter piercing her ears . I was about to respond to her post by telling a couple of my own body piercing stories, and then I thought "heck, that could be it's own blog post!" Piercing Story #1 This one is much like Heather's. I don't know how old I was, but I was old enough to remember. My mom took me down to one of the many local hair dressers in Austin. In small towns hair stylists do everything - hair, piercing, waxing, paving streets, etc. The lovely lady loaded up the gun and aimed it on my ear. I'm not sure what happened, but it only went halfway through and then fell out of my ear and onto the floor. I sat in the chair while the piercer crawled under the vanity to retrieve the stud. She then put it back in the gun (I'm hoping she rinsed it off a bit or something, that part is hazy) and re-pierced the same half-hole. That was so fun. Piercing Story #2 I had just moved to Portage. My roommate/landlor...

...so I don't feel too badly about not having posted a LOT this Christmas! Christmas was hectic this year. We squished 7 events into 4 days. I had full intentions of coming home each night and posting a few pictures, but after running around like crazy all day and then coming home and trying to get three little guys off to bed (way past bedtime) I was more than happy to just go to bed myself. If you would like to see a few of the pictures I took this holiday season, check out my facebook link . You don't have to be a member to see that page. I had intended to take a lot of pictures too, and I didn't. I even had picture ideas in my head as I made my way through the gatherings, but I kind of slacked off on it. Some holiday highlights? Steven gave me piano lessons as a Christmas gift. Three months of Wednesday night lessons to be exact. I'm looking forward to it. Mitchell's first Christmas. I know I should have taken a ton of pictures of him, but I didn't. There a...

I can't believe Christmas is here! Okay, well I believe it, it always comes at roughly the same time every year. The kids were pretty excited this morning and tore through their presents in way less time than it took to wrap them! My mom and Steven's dad and step-mom Doris came to have Christmas lunch with us today, and to lavish our kids with love and presents and of course LOTS of hugs, kisses and a few goodies. We're now off to spend the evening with Steven's mom, sisters and grandparents. Here's hoping that everyone is having a wonderful Christmas day!

I bought a book. It's full of writing exercises and stuff and I'm debating whether to post my writing exercises on the internet. If I post them on the internet I wonder - am I just looking for validation from a group of friends who I know won't say anything mean? Or should I start a completely anonymous blog and put them on there, never to be found by anyone I know? Or should I just leave it off the net entirely? Suggestions?

I once read a criticism about blogging that went something like this - People blog when they're bored and have nothing to do, when they're busy and their lives are interesting they don't feel like it, or don't have time. Isn't that kind of true? I'll put little conversations on here, or a picture of the deck or something about work, but as soon as life picks up a bit we tend to overlook the blogging. That's when we aught to have something to blog about! It's been kind of crazy around here lately - trips to the city, dinners with friends, Christmas shopping, cleaning, cooking in preparation for gatherings, shopping, wrapping presents, shopping, Christmas parties. You name it. It's not even Christmas yet! I actually even put up the Christmas tree. Next year I'm waiting until Christmas eve (roughly). Jordan keeps taking the decorations off to play with or eat. The other day I noticed that it was looking a little extra naked (it's pretty naked to...

I bought a new scale yesterday. I don't know what bothered me more - that the new scale said I was fatter than the old scale did, or that the new scale gave a different weight every time I stepped on it. I don't mean each day, I mean four seconds after I last stepped on it. I returned it today, and picked up another scale. I think I may have to return this one too. I'm pretty sure that my actual weight is somewhere around 108 pounds, and this scale is way off. WAY off. I shall continue to wallow in my rice krispie cake and hot chocolate while I ponder what to do about this.

J: All the peoples' heads are stuck on their heads. M: You mean they don't come off? J: No. M: That's good. J: Yeah. If they come off you couldn't see things. M: That wouldn't be good. J: If you don't have a head then you just have feet and arms. Then if you just have feet and arms and you can't see where you're going then you fall down. ***** J: Mommy, Auntie Angela's boys don't eat chicken. M: No? J: No. So I don't want to eat chicken either. ***** T: (after biting his finger while eating dinner) Owie... M: you kiss it, kiss it better! T: No. J: Mommy? M: Yes? J: When little tiny kids get owies, then their big mommies and daddies kiss it better. M: Oh yeah. J: So you have to do that to Tennyson !!

1. meatabot - meatball 2. adieu - i do 3. joof - juice 4. pitapot - pizza pop 5. f*ck - truck (no matter how many times we try and get him to say it right!) 6. moke - milk 7. kot - sock 8. jojo - jordan 9. amma - grandma 10. teef - teeth 11. vink - drink 12. eggo - diego 13. coth - cloth 14. neenee - noodles 15. apo - apple (or orange)

This idea was posted by another interesting blog I read. I'm copying and furthering the challenge . If you are a blogger you now have a mission. As soon as you read this, drop everything, grab your camera and take pictures of where you blog from. NO CLEANING !!! THEN, tag some lucky ducks and spread the love. I'm tagging Ange , Lyla , Candice , Heather and Sonya . I'm hoping that at least one of them has a mess comparable to mine!

Here's a little quiz for ya. Tennyson says many things - yet he's still in the stage where many of his words are understood by only those he lives with. I'm going to list 15 of the "words" he says, and if you wish, you can guess what the English version is! 1. meatabot 2. adieu 3. joof 4. pitapot 5. f*ck 6. moke 7. kot 8. jojo 9. amma 10. teef 11. vink 12. eggo 13. coth 14. neenee 15. apo Good luck!!

Um, I've been checking for comments, and there are none. Has nobody noticed my absolutely fabulous ticker? It dropped 4 points!! FOUR!! I have to say, I was pretty pumped this morning. I'm hoping I don't plateau for a while again. That saddens me. Speaking of plateau - Christmas is coming. I have six gatherings in four days. I think I may hide the scale over the holidays again, try to slip in a couple of work-outs, and eat a little bit of everything in moderation. After all, it's Christmas. And my blessed blessed Grandma Q is making her absolutely, spectacular, to-die-for perogies. The moderation thing may be ignored in the face of perogies. I intend to indulge on many of them. Let's not forget to drown them in strawberries, and then coat the entire mess in the very decadent, very over-the-top, very delicious-in-every-way cream gravy. It's like dessert. Only it's not. Dessert comes after...

Only 23 days until Christmas! Remember when we were kids, and Christmas was all about time off school, lots of treats (chocolate, candy canes, oranges, turtles!), new Christmas dresses for the church concert, lights, music, decorations, noisy and exciting gatherings at Grandma's house, Christmas episodes of our favorite tv shows and of course presents! The list goes on and on. I still find Christmas exciting. Yet, now the season holds more than just the "fun" stuff. Now we have to worry about scheduling in all the different families and parents, buying gifts we can't necessarily afford, making dishes to bring to the different gatherings, hoping that people will understand that we need to share the holidays with many others, and hoping that nobody will be hurt if our time with them is short. I wonder if I'm doing a good job of making the holidays fun and enjoyable for my kids, and if I've bought the right gifts. I worry about what five days in a row of late ni...