TMI

Is there such a thing as TMI (too much information) among friends?  Strangers?  Does it depend on the content or if you have the possibility of a similar event?  I wonder....

I am a pretty open book which can be good and not so good.  I feel that with my inner circle I can pretty much share everything and do but I think there are times when we should NOT share everything.... I am pretty willing to hear whatever as well.  

The way I look at it is I am older and have seen and heard a lot already. I have three children, a husband and a dog that are all male so I subjected to gross and funny things daily.  Not much gets to me these days.  

I was thinking about this because I have wanted to post a sign in my bathroom for awhile.... it would say:

When you go number two, you know what to do

Pick up the brush and scrub away your poo

Because I don't want to look at it when I come back through!

But two out of three of my kids don't read so I feel like my wit is wasted so I posted it on facebook and I thought hmm.... should I have... then I thought why not... then I thought I know that will come back to haunt me... then I thought oh well.

I was not telling a poop story per say.... although I have to my friends with kids.  But it just got me to thinking... what is TMI to you?

Ringing in the New Year with Hodge Podge

Welcome to the first Hodge Podge of 2013.  It does not seem possible that today is the second of January yet here we are.  On to the questions provided by the fabulous Joyce who blogs at 

From This Side of the Pond.  If you have not checked out her blog yet, go do it!

1.  How did you ring in the new year?

We rang in the New Year by playing laser tag, mini golf and having lunch with friends.  Later on we went over to their house and met up with some other friends where we ate, played board games and laughed and laughed while all the kids played.  It was fun and nice to not be in giant crowds.

2.  What is one thing you are looking forward to in 2013?

I look forward to many things in this next year but one of the things I am anticipating most is all the visits from friends & family planned for this spring/summer.


3.  Steven Spielberg is quoted as saying, 'All of us every single year, we're a different person. I don't think we're the same person all our lives.' What say you?

I would say he is right... atleast partially.  I think essentially we are the same but we do change and grow.  I am much more mellow then I was 10 years ago, more confident and more patient.  

4.  The Pantone color of the year for 2013 is emerald green. Like or dislike?  Do you already own something this color?  Will you add something in this shade to your home or wardrobe in 2013?

I have always been a fan of emerald green and I do have a few shirts and sweaters in that color.  I had just tried to purchase a new coat from Old Navy in that color but they were sold out in my size :(

5.  Speaking of emerald...what's your favorite gemstone?

I am a fan of every gemstone but my heart belongs to diamonds.

6.  Share a favorite book or movie from 2012.

I am not great at narrowing down a favorite but the two that popped into my head when I read this was Pitch Perfect and Dark Shadows.  I love the cheesy off beat humor of Dark Shadows and Pitch Perfect is just fun & has some great lines.  Rebel Wilson I think is the name of the girl who plays Fat Amy and she is hilarious!


7.  What is something you want to tell yourself at the start of this brand new year?

To relax and not be so hard on myself.... it will all be fine.

8.  Insert your own random thought here. 

May 2013 bring you loads of joy and laughter.  May you find peace no matter the circumstances you find yourself in... may you grow closer to your family, your friends and God.   May you be healthy & strive to be healthy so you can enjoy time to the fullest.

Holly Jolly Hodge Podge Happenings

Well it is time for the Hodge Podge and I am glad to be actually participating this time.  The last two I have saved and started and then never finished or published.  Life is busy but I enjoy this so I made sure to get done today :)  Thanks Joyce for taking the time and effort to put this together - it is greatly appreciated!!

If you have not already joined in after reading my answers head over to Joyce's great blog, 

From This Side of the Pond and join in.  She is a much more reliable blogger as well :)

1.  Share your traditions surrounding the Christmas stocking. 

Hmm... we don't really have big traditions about our Stocking... we open them when we first wake up and that is about it.  I am interested to hear all of yours.

2.  How many hours of sleep do you average at night?  Is it enough?

Well I don't do sleep great.  I have a hard time shutting off my mind and I am a night person so that works against me.  I get anywhere from 4 to 7 hours.  I have kids that still get up at night sometimes so if I go to bed late and then they are up I am really struggling the next morning.   No it is not enough and I have been working on improving that because it is so important.

3.  If you had to give up one thing for the remainder of this year what would it be?

Cleaning the bathrooms?  No that is just what I want to give up...lol.  I think I would give up tv.

4.  The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge (or Wills and Kate as I like to call them) have announced they're expecting a baby. Do you follow news of the Royals? 

Well I have always been interested but especially living in England you follow it.  I am very excited for them and I hope that she feels better soon and they are given space to enjoy this experience.

5.  For me,  the sound of childhood is__________________.

Jets flying.

6.  Fruit cake-yay or boo? What's your favorite dessert made with fruit?

Boo.  Fruit pizza is probably my favorite dessert made with fruit.


7. What is one thing you want to accomplish before 2012 comes to an end?

I would like to get my Christmas cards out this year as compared to last year.  Lofty goal I know.

8.  Insert your own random thought here.

I hope that the magic of the Season gets everyone excited and that Christmas can be enjoyed with peace and joy for each of you.   That you don't get stuck in the hustle and bustle and chaos that it can contain.
Oh and if you have an extra 30 seconds my last post has two humorous pictures brought to you by my wacky kids.

Mom vs Dinosaur

Has it really been over a months since I posted?  Wow.... I wish I had a great story or excuse as to why that it.  I don't.  We have been busy & life has been quiet in a sense.  Much going on yet not a lot to talk about.  I am working on that - we need to liven things up around here :)

Some things we have been up to:

We had Halloween and I think I took zero pictures... way to go mom.  We had a Halloween Bash with a few friends over to eat a rushed dinner & then we went out to the chaos of trick or treating.  It was freezing so we made record time.... I was sorely disappointed in the lack of chocolate items in G's Halloween bag.  Sadly for him he cannot eat chocolate so I am usually extremely blessed with his spare treats.  Not this year.  We gave out over 500 pieces of candy.
For dinner I made a new chili recipe that had sweet potatoes... it was unusual but good.  I made a second pot of vegan chili... it was suppose to be the same minus the meat... for some reason it was not... it was terrible.  Apologies again Kelly and family.  Luckily they had brought something they could eat since I failed.
We also had great friends over who stayed here and handed out candy so we could go out as a family to trick or treat.  Thank you to Becky and Eric (not their real names but the names Mr. B likes to call them)

November is a blur.  We had Thanksgiving.  I ended up cooking a tiny 8lb turkey because it was all that would fit in our oven... there was barely enough meat to feed us 5.  Sorely disappointed and made my long for a giant American oven.  Maybe next year we will invest in a fryer.  Luckily for us the base had several other Thanksgiving potlucks, etc so we were able to have about three turkey meals prior to our sad one.

In other news my son drew this picture:

Here is the conversation that followed that:  (between my 6yr old who drew it and my three year old)

B:  Is that mom?
D: No it is a dinosaur...
B:  Well it sure looks like mom

My husband could barely contain himself long enough to get out of the room before he collapsed in laughter. Punks every single last one of them.


We put up our tree and then remembered we had accidentally stored 90% of our ornaments prior to moving. So we have two gallon bags full of bulbs that we put up, a set of 6 star wars ornaments and 6 mickey mouse ones... no topper.  It is a little sad but okay.  I have big plans as soon as all the stuff goes on sale.  Also the kids keep rearranging the ornaments although they are not allowed so we end up with this:

We frequent the library here a lot.  We kids always find the best books that I am so proud to check out.  Like this:

Yes those are buttons on the right so you can have sound effects as well as the amazing text.

Dying in testosterone land here so I often check out story books about Princess's and make the boys read those also.  Yep.

Just in case it is another month before I blog I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and may you find joy and peace in the season... not chaos and crazy :)

Hodge Podge Happenings

So life has been nuts and if I don't have time to at least get my Hodge Podge post up then I have to much going on in my life :)  So here is to simpler times and doing less and maybe if I say it enough times it will happen - judging by my entire family not likely.

1.  So, do you like beer? 

No.  Once upon a time long long ago I did but I no longer drink.

2.  What's your least favorite repetitive task? 

Cleaning bathrooms.  If you are new to reading my blog no worries I am sure I will rant about it soon - in my defense I have three boys to clean up after... I think that entitles me to a few rants every now and then.

3.  When was the last time you rode a bus?  Where was it headed? 

The last time I rode a bus was to swimming lessons with my son's class at school.

4.  What song from your childhood or from your own children's childhood could make a parent's nerves stand on end? 

I think there is one something about a song that never ends which is annoying but what really irritates me these days are my kids running around screaming Braundo commercials that they saw on you tube...

5.  The US Presidential election cycle is drawing to a close (can I get an AMEN??), and the third and final debate was held last night...what was the last thing you 'debated about'?

Hmmm....well I don't know that we 'debated it' but conversations were held about where to hold my son's upcoming birthday party.

6.  Can a person make too much money?  How much is too much?

Is there something like too much money?  It seems like we and the world always need more.  Seriously though yes, I think that a lot of celebrities and athletes make way to much and often have little to show for it.  I know lots of people donate to charity and all which is great but if you have ever watched an episode of Cribs on MTV you know that someone has too much $$ and time on his hands after you see a few of those houses.  How many gold plated sinks do you need?  How about a few normal high end sinks and buy groceries for some peeps?  Just sayin


7.  Pop-soda-coke-something else...what's it called where you live?

Joyce could probably answer this questions better than me as she speaks fluid England Speak :)  Where I grew up though we always said drink or coke....so you might say, "hey want to go get a coke?" but you might get chocolate milk or ice tea.

8.  Insert your own random thought here.

I am full of random thoughts today.  I am slightly overwhelmed at attempting to do this B Day party when I seriously just did a blow out Mario party for my other son about a week ago.  Two B Days in October is sometimes rough.
My niece is in the hospital delivering my new great niece tonight and I cannot wait to see pictures and really wish I could be there in person.
After two years of working on a medical problem of my son's with a variety of Dr.'s I feel like we are finally making some progress.  Prayers are being answered and I am beyond grateful and feel very blessed.
Lastly, it is super foggy again today and I would rather curl up on my couch and read and/or sleep all day but out into it I go.  This is not one of my favorite things about being here.

Hot glue = no more pockets for children in my house!

So, last night as I was moving the 100th load of laundry out of the dryer (well it felt like the 100th but was probably more like the 15th...) there was a sock that did not come tumbling out when I pulled everything else out and it was stuck.  For about 2 seconds I was puzzled over what would make a sock stick in the dryer, until I noticed the bubble gum wrapper sticking up out of the lint filter. Upon further investigation discovered the melted gum in the back of the dryer.  The brand new dryer.
I find stuff allllllll the time in the washer and dryer from the boys.  Legos, rocks, more rocks, more Legos, crayons. It makes me crazy and I constantly request they do not use their pockets and that they empty them prior to taking off their pants and putting them into the dirty laundry.  Still  I do check their pockets but apparently not thoroughly enough.
 So I have decided that little boys pants should not have pockets at all in them.  I will be hot gluing my kids shut today... yes hot glue because they have a lot of pants and i don't have time or ambition to sew all those.
Seriously why should they have pockets?  They do not have wallets to carry... they don't put toys in their pockets they either carry them, throw them in a backpack or most commonly trick their mothers into schlepping them around.  Boys are gross and pick up gross things... I say down with pockets until they are doing their own laundry.

Finally back at Hodge Podge

I am so happy to be back to posting and happy to be participating in Hodge Podge again!  Thank you Joyce for easing me back into blogging again with great questions :)  Check her out over at:

From This Side of The Pond.

1. The Wednesday Hodgepodge this week falls on John Chapman's birth date.  He's more famously known as Johnny Appleseed...what's your favorite variety of apple? 

I really like Grapples. (Apples that taste slightly like grapes)  You can check it out more here

.

2.   When did you last say 'ick'? 

Yesterday when I cleaned my kids bathroom - no dry heaving this time though so I was happy about that.

3.   Do you think there's a generation gap?  Explain. 

This question requires too much thought right now :)  I didn't use to think there was but as I get older and see teenagers I think there must be.

4.  What's on your computer screen saver?  Do you leave it alone or change it often? 

A family picture and I like to change it periodically.  I am to lazy and busy to do it often but I like change.

5.  If you had the attention of the entire world for two minutes, what would you say? 

I would say stop, be grateful and be kind.

6.  Four fashion trends to try this fall are-brocade/jacquard (fancy printed fabrics), peplum, lace, and printed pants...which of these four would you be most likely to wear? 

Well I did purchase a peplum dress which I really like & I think out of the others I would most go for lace.  I just don't know if I can pull of the printed pants.

7.  What can make your bad day better?

A hug from my kids and chocolate.

8.  Insert your own random thought here. 

Well, it has been ages since I posted on my blog, let alone to the Hodge Podge.  August was an insanity filled month and September has been a little nuts also.  I really am hoping that life has slowed down and that we are finally getting back into routine around these parts and yay for finally having internet so I can rejoin you!!!