Today I turn thirty-FORE!

If you are familiar with golf, then you understand the pun. If you don't understand:  after you put a wicked hit on the ball and it decides to sail towards unsuspecting people, to warn them you yell out, "FORE!"

My husband took me to an narrow par 3 golf course to celebrate my birthday. He also wanted to get me back in the swing of things. (I could go all day with puns, but I'll try to stop.) I haven't golfed in a little over two years and we decided to skip practice on the driving range, so it was a little stressful for me.

For some reason I have a pretty good knack at driving the crap out of the ball. For a girl, I hit pretty darn far. I am not a putter, I just cannot get a handle on soft swings. In my limited experience on golf courses, I usually have to whack the heck out of the ball to get it remotely close to the putting area. Keeping this in mind, we step up to the first hole and my husband tells me to use a 7 iron, I said, "Say what?!"

He started blathering about yardage and it only being par 3; I phased him out because I'm not great with my irons. I love my woods, so I glanced at them longingly and grab my 7. I am strictly a whack it, then attempt at putting the ball into the hole in less than 10 strokes. Yes, I said 10. For today's game I limited myself to 3 tries...nope, still didn't make it.

I walk up, drop my nice bright pink ball down (it's honestly because I can't see the white balls and my husband stole all my fluorescent orange balls). I get ready to swing, take my mandatory deep breathe and whack it. Thankfully there was this 30 foot high net that prevented my horrible shank from sailing into a car window on the busy street next to us.

Well that sucked! I won't even include my putting attempts in this post, because honestly, it's just plain embarrassing. So onto hole 2.

Hubby takes out his 5 wood and walks toward the tee. I got so excited about being able to use my wood, this day was turning around! I pick my 3 wood, give it a quick kiss and skip towards the tee. This is 1 of 2 holes on the entire course that are par 4. Yay! I get a chance to whack the ball, I'm so happy.

Hubby takes his shot and it sails beautifully straight toward that checkered flag, yards down the green. I step up, pink ball in hand, and line up to take my shot. I whacked it...right towards the people putting on hole 1.


I yell, "FORE!" for the first time in my life. Then in slow motion, I see a man and a woman falling to the ground to avoid my badly aimed ball. The woman is screaming and crying as it nearly took off her head, I am horrified.


According to my husband it missed the couple by about 30 feet, and in reality, they only just looked over at me as the ball went flying past them, but I was still horrified. I actually cried, I was so embarrassed. 

We move onto hole 3, I have snot running down my face and no tissues to clean up the mess. My husband is horrified because I'm so upset about it, "Honey, I do it all the time, calm down!"

Holes 3 through 8, I manage to find my swing and do rather well. Putting....I just give up on at this point, I'm so bad. Oh! On hole 8, I almost hit some ducks...pretty much right after saying to my husband, "if I hit a damn duck, I quit!" Fortunately, my shank saved their lives. Why on earth would you live on or near a golf course?

On hole 9, we are waiting for the group ahead of us to finish putting, so I am pretending to eye up my shot. I hear this "CRACK" and a ball manages to drop behind me about 9 feet. Um...where did that come from? As it turns out the dude I almost shot the ball at near the 2nd hole is trying to make it even, karma, who knew?!


We watch as the couple behind us takes about 4 shots to get near the green for their hole. I'm pretty sure you get one try, but hey, they have the range to knock out a few of my teeth, so I'm not going to argue.

FINALLY, the people ahead of us move along and I line up my shot. It was downhill and curved to the right, so even with my shanking ability, I relaxed a little. Bad idea. I managed to get enough distance and curve on the stupid thing to send it sailing right towards....you guessed it, the couple behind us. Well crap, now I'm one up on the karmic screw you meter. The hubby lines up his shot, it looked and sounded great until it suddenly curved towards the right. Evidently he decided that his karmic scale needed adjusting too.

Shoulders slumped, we get into our golf cart and drive towards the balls. We exchange a laugh and some pleasantries with the couple as we pass on the path. Upon finding our balls, we discover my ball landed about 3 feet from the lady taking her shot, and hubby's ball tried to take out their golf cart. By this point I am pretty rattled at my near misses with killing people and ducks.

Next couple of holes have houses directly on the course...on the right hand side. I told hubby that I wasn't going to be responsible for breaking some person's window, karma was not on my side today. For the next couple of holes, I pretended to be his chauffeur, until I convinced him that I was starving and would live no longer.

So golfing is not really my thing, when accuracy is required in order to not kill people or destroy property. I'll stick to golfing on military bases, nothing but open space there!

To make up for my near involuntary manslaughter charges, hubby took me and the family out to dinner and most importantly...wine tasting at San Pasqual Winery! I am a firm believer in drowning my embarrassment in a glass of wine or three. Important note here: I HATE being sang to in restaurants, absolutely loathe it. 

As I tried to enjoy my salted caramel chocolate cake with a glass of port, hubby gets Little Dude and Princess to sing "Happy Birthday" to me. It was sweet...until the other 20-30 people joined in that were also wine tasting.

The laughable part came when the others didn't know who they were wishing Happy Birthday to, so there was a pause. The kiddos sang, "to Mommy!" then the 20-30 other people joined in, "to Mommy!" and continued on. My face turned beet red and I actually enjoyed myself!

All-in-all, it was a pretty good 34th birthday! Thank you to my immediate family and to the "kids" I now have at the San Pasqual Winery.

Story Time

My husband loves to tell stories to the kids, whether they are from books or his strange imagination. Either way, the kids are sitting around him with this amazing attention you don't see in an average 6 or 3 year-old.

If he reads from a book, the entertainment value is amazing! Imagine a guy from North Dakota reading about princesses or animals with a Southern gentleman drawl or some guy with a Bayou accent. (Imagine the firefly from "Princess and the Frog", reading a Dr. Suess book.) The kids don't realize the comedic value in this, they just sit in absolute awe as he becomes these characters.

Right now Military Dad is on the couch telling them this awful story about he beat up SpiderMan, yes, SpiderMan. The kids are sitting on the floor in front of the couch, staring at him while he spins this story (pun intended). During the narrative, they ask him questions. Normally he hates to be interrupted, but on this occasion he welcomes the questions in order to add to his creation. Some of the questions the kiddos ask, would trip up a normal person, but no, he just includes it in his story as though it always fit.

Tonight's story time began with a few Mo Willems books read in Military Dad's idea of a Southern accent. When the books were done, Little Dude asks Military Dad to tell him a story about SpiderMan. MD smiles and sits back down on the couch. Little Dude and Princess break into a fight over who gets the best seat in front of him on the carpet to hear the story. Once the blood is cleaned up, MD begins his story.

Long story short:  MD was walking along the street when Spiderman asked him if he would like to take his place, as he was retiring from superhero work. Spiderman had him go through surgery to insert web throwers into his wrists. (Yes, he included valium and his recovery period in his tale.)

Spiderman wanted to make sure he was strong enough, so MD suggested an arm wrestling tournament. MD beat him and won a semi. (Huh where did that come from? Oh yeah, worst movie ever!)

Spiderman wanted to make sure he was fast enough so he wagered a contest: travel from San Diego to Kansas City, eat a burnt-end sandwich, then return to San Diego.

Princess: did you win Daddy?
MD: Yes, I won! I made it back in 27 seconds, Spiderman took 3 days!
Princess: Wow. (Notice the lack of exclamation point, she may be starting to recognize BS when she hears it, I'm so proud!)
MD: I know, right?!

Then MD, continues the story by berating Spiderman on how long it took him to make it back to San Diego. Then MD decides to be a bad guy and throw him off the top of a 12 story building.

Princess: What happened to Spiderman?
MD: Um, well since the surgery he couldn't throw webs anymore, so he fell 12 stories and was crushed like a real spider.
Princess:  Oh. Can I tell my story now?

While Princess doesn't quite have the experience that MD has with BS, her creativity and imagination knows no bounds. In a few years, she may give him a run for his money.

I'm not sure I'm excited about this, though. My story-telling is non-existent in comparison and I can't read books with a Bayou accent.

Guess I'll just be the analytical parent who can put Legos and puzzles together, while the story-teller struggles with the simple instructions.

Food - I love you, why don't you love me?

I have a love/hate relationship with food. I love it, but it hates me.

"Hi, my name is ME and I am a stress eater."

For some psycho-babble reason, it seems to make things feel better for that split second. I realize therapists all over the world are crying out, "Replace that feeling with something that actually makes you feel good. Activities that make you laugh, blah, blah."

I manage to think long and hard before I stress eat, so I'm making progress. I try my best to drink a large glass of water or leave the room completely; however, sometimes that spoonful of peanut butter mixed with another spoonful of dark chocolate chips just TASTES awesome!

Since I don't enjoy exercising (on purpose), I have to monitor what I eat closer than non-stress eaters do. Plus I have low blood sugar issues and my families genetics SUCK! Due to genetics I now have, and will continue to have, cholesterol problems. Yes, I do realize that a small amount (30 min everyday) of exercise would cure most of my problems, but it's the motivation I lack. Once I'm exercising, I'm fine, I even enjoy it!

Recently, I went full-on vegetarian (okay, so not full-on, I eat fish and dairy/eggs - so I'm a pesky ovolacto Unitarian or something) so that adds another hitch in my food monitoring. Also, since I don't eat meat I now have low iron levels to worry about. Not usually a problem, however being a woman, evidently you pretty much deplete your iron stores on a monthly basis, yay! But how much iron do I need? What if I eat too much iron? Ugh!

This is how I came to have an appointment with a dietician. Other than the fact that I've been monitoring the wrong things and my genetics suck, it was actually a great appointment. If your insurance will pay for it or you have a YMCA near you (ours has a dietician), I recommend consulting with some sort of nutrition specialist. (**For those of you with spelling OCDs: dietician and dietitian are the same thing, I looked it up because Google said I spelled it wrong.)

After browsing through the multitude of handouts, I am actually doing a decent job eating healthy (aside from the stress thing). Getting rid of meat in my diet is actually 1/3 of my battle with cholesterol; dairy and genetics are the other two-thirds. My real struggle comes from the fact that I evidently monitor and eat the wrong fats.

DISCLAIMER: I'm not and never will be a dietician so go see one for yourself, because you are not me and may have different diet and genetic suckage to deal with.

One of the many handouts explained the whole saturated/unsaturated fat business in a way I understand...it had pictures! Plus, I added the all-important arrows indicating what the different fats did to my cholesterol. My dietician helped explain the LDL and HDL thing.
HDL is good stuff, it helps gets rid of the LDL which is the nasty stuff that sticks in your arteries. I'm still lost on triglycerides, but that is because mine seem to be fine so we didn't touch on that.

Basically your natural oils (olive, peanut butter & nuts) help increase your HDL and decrease your LDL. Fried stuff, we all know is bad, but it's BECAUSE it lowers your HDL and raises your LDL. Ah HA! I'm not very good at, "Don't do that, it's bad for you!" I need explanations and reasons for things I should do.

Avoiding fats altogether is bad too (did not know this) because good fats are needed to raise your HDL. If you don't eat them, no matter how "healthy" your diet, genetics come in and have a SUCK parade all over your healthy food.

Now I get to do what I hate to do, count calories! Ugh! It's more the vitamin, fat and iron levels I am monitoring, but I still hate it. If anyone has any recommendations for free apps for an android phone, I'd love the help!

Also, if anyone has any recommendations for vegetarian, healthy snacks that I can use for my stress eating I would love the help! My go-to snack is peanut butter with dark chocolate chips added, horrible, I know...but oh SO GOOD! Working on my stress eating will be a whole different post, so let's not go there!

I'm not perfect

Wow! That was kind of hard to say! I know I'm not perfect, but you all don't know that! My husband says I'm perfect all the time, but now that I think about it, he may be lying!

Seriously though, there are very few of us who are actually perfect in any way, that's what makes us special and unique. Some people can do things others of us can't.

For example, without being formally taught, I managed to teach myself how to sew on a machine, and I do it rather well. Can't sew a button on to save my life, but I can use a machine quite well. There are other things out there I seem to have this natural ability at doing, which make me seem like a super hero to some members of my family. Mailing is not one of these things.

Mailing anything, not just packages. This is one woman who truly appreciates and knows the value of online bill-pay! If it wasn't for online shopping, I probably wouldn't get any gifts to my friends and family either.

My  husband says I have a process and if I were to send Christmas gifts in the summer months, they would get there on time. You ask, "seriously, it's June, what postal process takes 6 months to get to its destination?"

Mine!

Here is my normal timeline for mailing packages:

I buy the item and it sits on my table, or some random place, until the next step, which is wrapping the item. This first step can take weeks, months even, if I don't have the right wrapping paper! The poor item gets moved around, from place to place, until I manage to force myself to take the 2 minutes to wrap it.

Yay! Now it's wrapped, now I need to put it in a box. If I have the box, just lying around, then this process is quick and painless. If I don't have the box, add another couple of weeks.

You're thinking to yourself, "Now she only has to drive it to the post office and she's done!" Ha! I laugh out of sympathy for your thoughts. This is the step that can actually break me. 

Now the package seems to disappear into this place of limbo, where it somehow manages to become "out of sight, out of mind." The package will sit somewhere in the house, waiting patiently to make it to the car for distribution. If the package was fluorescent, or any other color than white or brown, this process could be shortened dramatically. However, the postal service seems to enjoy white and brown packages, plus I'm too cheap and paranoid to buy the present looking packages. (The paranoia comes from my mother. I'll have to write a post about our family Christmas' another day!)

I actually had some books that I was mailing back to my mother and I managed to get everything done in a day, since it didn't require wrapping. I felt that the winds of change were upon me and I was going to get past this awful affliction. Nope.

I set it in the car so I could take it to the post office next time I was out and about. Due to some interesting driving we have in California, the box managed to fall off the seat and slip under the driver's seat. There the package sat for 2 months, until my mother-in-law accidentally found it then mailed it for me. Somewhere in my mind, I had already mailed my mother that package,so imagine my surprise!

Fortunately I have a supportive husband who realizes my weakness and tries his best to mail it for me, once I get it to the package stage. If it hadn't been for my mother-in-law, those books would still be underneath the seat!

Here is a big THANK YOU to my friends and family for putting up with my inability to mail things. Even the not-so-gentle reminders are helpful. To my newer friends, you better hope I can shop on-line for you, otherwise you better have some patience!

Optimism and how it doesn't always work

I try to consider myself an optimist, some of the time. For the most part, I am truly a pessimist. I have a hard time putting positive spins on difficult situations. Since I seem to get myself into difficult situations, pretty regularly, I tend to be a little negative.

The only time I can honestly be 100% positive about something, is when it involves me doing less work, or making my job easier. I believe in the "work smarter, not harder" philosophy or as I put it "the being more efficient with my laziness" idea.

My family and I are avid animal lovers. We have two dogs and a cat who are part of our family. I've already discussed the dogs being trained and what a disaster that is. Now we get to discuss the cat.

If any of you have cats, you realize straight away that cats are not really trainable. Cats are cats and they seem to be happy with it, therefore you should be too. They do their own thing, whether you like it or not. About all you can train them to do is come running when they hear a can opener a mile away or use the cat box.

We have had our cat, Chu, for almost 8 years. She is a wonderful cat, we even believe she has some sort of magical healing ability. However, her wake up calls for food at 5 AM would be more wonderful if they had a snooze button. She does not appreciate being pushed away in the morning when she is hungry. Alarm clocks don't complain, they just shut up. Chu gets upset and becomes obsessed with waking your dead butt up.

The one complaint we have is the same as any other cat owner:  cleaning the litter pan. Seriously, it's just gross. Plus, she decides that right after I am done scooping her daily deposits, she HAS to use it immediately after. Plus you know that if you have a dog, they like to help out, which is beyond disgusting.

This is where my optimism hit hard. I saw an add somewhere showing a cat using the toilet to go to the bathroom. (The picture was absolutely awful, may have scarred me for life, however the idea was brilliant! I wouldn't mind flushing a few deposits every once in awhile.  Heck, I already do it for my 3 year old son, why not add a cat?!

I do my normal Google research and find a few products that guarantee results and what not. After discussing this with my husband, I decide to buy the product anyway. (By the way, my husband was not as thrilled with this idea as I was).

The product comes in the mail and I'm excited! Yay, no more scooping cat poo! Then I open the package and read the instructions...4 weeks of preparation, then 8 weeks until possible results!!! Optimism fading...

Preparation involves moving the already established litter box into the bathroom, right next to the toilet. Then over the next few weeks you change the litter to a flushable variety. Moving the litter box into the bathroom, did slow down and eventually prevent the dogs from helping out, which if nothing else, was worth it. However, the cat litter that gets flung outside the box is now being stepped on at 3 AM in the morning. Not to mention the strange experience of being on the toilet while the cat comes in and poos beside you. I begin to think if this is really worth it?

Now that Chu is switched over to flushable litter and is comfortable using the litter box in our bathroom, we get to move on to the actual toilet training. Yay!
First step involves raising the litter box slowly to the level of the toilet, so they get used to going to the bathroom at that height. 3 weeks later, she is now going to the bathroom at the same height as the people in the house.
Second step is to install the fake toilet insert onto the toilet. This step involves putting a plastic toilet bowl shaped litter box onto the toilet. This pretty much stops you from using this particular toilet for a few weeks. As the cat gets used to using the littler box on top of the toilet, you cut out rings in the plastic insert. Eventually they don't miss the litter being there and go in the toilet.

We didn't get past the litter box height. Our cat is rather set in her litter box ways. She in a few ways told me that she was refusing to use the people toilet and wasn't even going to consider life without her box. My optimism is now back at my normal level of non-existence.

However, I saw another do-it-yourself video on YouTube where you make an automatic cat feeder. Yay!

Yay! We get to watch TV, it's not the weekend!

Sorry for no posts lately, we have been BUSY!

We moved into a new house and we are finally on the "other side" of unpacking, painting, etc. Due to the packing, cleaning, moving, unpacking, cleaning frenzy that has been going on over the past month or so, my children have been allowed to watch way more television than normal. Yes, I'm one of those parents who don't allow their kids to watch too much television.

I'm also one of those parents that make their kids watch PBS or educational shows. Little Dude has enough problems trying to whack Princess with his Medieval Times sword, that I don't need him to get new ideas from Tom & Jerry or Looney Tunes. Plus some of these new cartoons...I just don't understand, they aren't funny to me or the kids, and who writes this stuff? Is there even a plot? What about character development?

To add to my TV restrictions, Military Dad and I both sit down to watch the shows with our kids, to ensure we know what they are watching.


I understand the need for a little down time where the kids are entertained for 30 minute sessions where you can check email, do dishes or even post on a blog. However, I have serious issues with leaving the television on all day instead of interacting with my own kids. Little Dude gets bored easily, so 1 or 2 shows is about his attention span, so the electronic babysitter isn't an option. Princess would sit in front of the TV the entire day, if allowed, she has what my parents have labelled, "Guy's Disease."

"Guy's Disease" is when a person (usually a guy, hence the name) can enter any place and situate themselves where they can see any TV. Then they have an inability to look away and carry on normal conversations with the people with them. Yes, I have this horrible trait and I evidently passed it on to Princess.

Anyway, Military Dad and I recently discussed the amount of TV we ALL have been watching recently and decided that since we live in California, there isn't really any reason to be inside that much. During the week, the kids get 2 shows each that they get to watch during the day, while Daddy is at work. Then on the weekends there is absolutely no TV, forcing us to go outside, enjoy the weather and do family stuff.

We started this new idea this weekend; the kids weren't too excited about it, but after spending a few hours at the beach, the kids didn't care so much.

After breakfast and some homemade Play-dough time, the kids decided since it was Tuesday AND a weekday, they would like to watch TV. "Mommy, can we PLEASE watch TV? It IS a weekday!"

After answering yes, I hear my kids singing: "Yay! We can watch TV! We can watch TV! It's not the weekend, we can watch TV!"

I had to laugh at their excitement, is TV really that exciting?  I guess, if you aren't allowed to do something all day, everyday, then it may be worth a song or two.

Well, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse is over, so it's time to end my post for today. Plus I now have the "Hot Dog" song stuck in my head!

Why can't I have a smarter car horn?

Today, while attempting to find a loading zone parking space at IKEA, I had a run-in with a crazy person. Technology could have made this situation completely different. I would have had a legal, primo parking space and could have written about more entertaining subjects in my blog.

If you are familiar with IKEA, then you know they have a loading zone near the entrance or exit of the business. A lady was evidently directing her husband/boyfriend or something into a parking space.This guy was attempting to back the car into the space as fast as possible. This awful backing procedure took place among a parked truck with trailer and several parked and moving cars. After almost hitting a parked car and another car reversing into a space, he came backing towards me. 

Once he reached his required inch away from my bumper he turned into the space. For some reason he decides that he isn't straight enough and plows forward until he reaches that inch space again. At this point, my anxiety level is through the roof and I attempt to give him a honk to say, "Okay, you are close enough to my bumper now, please stop!"

He evidently decides to completely ignore me, however his wife/girlfriend thing gets upset. She glares at me and begins to yell across the parking lot, "Was that necessary?" She repeats this same sentence about four times, then changes to, "Did that make you feel better or change anything?"

At this point, the primo space next to her didn't look so appealing, so I parked illegally to load my crap into my car. 

What is the point of this? The point is, with all this wonderful technology in cars today, why can't I have a multifunctional horn? Obviously leave the big center part for the "Oh Crap!" or "You bleeping moron!" situations, but how about a few more choices on the steering wheel? I have Bluetooth, stereo, cruise and all sorts of other buttons, so I know space isn't the issue. 

I would like to add a very simple, pleasant beep, for those situations where a nice short "toot" will work.  Saying "hi" to the neighbor or "Hey, stop texting, the light turned green!"

If I would have had the nice "toot" maybe crazy lady would've understood that I wasn't yelling at her husband, since that seems to be HER job. I was merely concerned that our bumpers were going to connect in an abrupt fashion, since he didn't seem to be paying attention to any one of the several cars around him.