Bedtime prayers.

I love our church. Humor in a sermon? Always a good thing.

On occasion they will insert a video clip into the sermon to help make a point. They've used clips from Talledega Nights, from the Family Guy, etc.

Our pastor played this comedy clip at church yesterday. (His sermon was about heaven.)


This is exactly why I changed the line "if I should die..." to "And when I wake, with morning light, I pray the Lord to guide me right."

Much more positive and comforting at bedtime, don'tcha think?

What would Muhammad Ali think...?

Scene: Grant invites Handsome Hubby to join him for a game of Wii Boxing.

Grant: "Do you wanna play?"

HH: "Sure."

Grant: "It's really cool, you get to pick a guy and be a character."

HH: "Sounds good. What's your character's name?"

(Listening in, at this point, I'm thinking along the lines of The Hammer, or The Crusher or something strong and menacing....)

Grant: "Jeff."

Birthday Bacon

I almost never cooked bacon when the kids were younger.

It isn't exactly good for you, it splatters and makes a mess when you cook it, etc. I did not realize how infrequently I cooked it until one day a 5 year old Devin came to me and asked me if he could have some of that "up down food." This request was accompanied by a hand gesture that mimicked waves, undulating up and down. The poor kid had an extensive vocabulary, yet he didn't know the word for bacon.

Fast forward 13 years. My baby just turned 18. Due to several scheduling conflicts, we opted for a morning celebration.

Instead of a birthday cake...? Two pounds of Birthday Bacon.


Contemplating his birthday wish. I can only assume that he wished for more processed meats.


I am so proud of the smart, funny, handsome young man my baby has become.


We love him to pieces.


However, I do agree with the birthday message one of his brothers left for him on the fridge...


I just found this crazy looking recipe on Just Shy of a "Y" for the Baconator. I am sooooo going to try this!

And these Bacon Chocolate Chip Cookies are a hit every time I make them.

Busy Body Book Winner

Congratulations to
#5 Carmen at Life With Sprinkles on Top

Everyone else....? Please, please trust me and go to BusyBodyBook.com and make the upcoming year so much easier for yourself.

Go.

Now.

You can thank me later.

I'll never look at my Pottery Barn catalog the same way...

Again, I'm probably the last to know, but I think this is my new favorite funny blog.

Catalog Living

This woman has created two fictional people and inserted them, in caption form, into the stupid vignettes that catalog companies create.

Hilarious!

Don't forget to enter the giveaway for a BusyBodyBook calendar/organizer. It's open for entries until Thursday at noon, PST. Good luck.

Organization. Here's a chance to win some.

Back To School.

Does it strike fear into your heart or does it bring a sigh of relief? ...Both?

Either way, you had better get organized. A new school year is a clean slate... for all of us. Just like we tell our kids that it is easier to maintain a good grade than it is to try to bring up a bad one... start out organized and just maintain it.

Yes, yes, easier said than done. However, I have a great tool to help me. Last summer I wrote about how much I loved these organizers. I'm about to start on my 5th one.

I have tried Palm Pilots, using my phone, online calendaring with email reminders...
Trust me, I have tried it all. But I have 4 busy boys and a busy husband (which makes me busy by default). NOTHING works better to see what they're all doing at a glance than BusyBodyBooks.

These organizers have a brilliant grid system and give you your week at a glance, plus plenty of space for notes.

This is the image from the BusyBodyBook website.

Here's what mine in real life looks like....

At a glance I can easily remember the little things... like that I promised the PTA I'd donate two 12 packs of soda for the carnival or that Grant needs to wear a blue shirt on Friday, or the big things... like that Handsome Hubby's presentation (that he'd been working on for 3 months) was going down on Tuesday.

I can jot down notes when I'm on the phone. I can go through all of the paperwork that comes home from school and instantly make notes/add info to my calendar. I can then toss recycle all those papers and avoid clutter.

oh! And they're a handy size and easy to take everywhere. oh! And I hang on to my old ones because they are a good archival source for old doctor's appointments, remembering when you last had the tires rotated, etc. (But I'm a freak that way...)

I have been a volunteer spokesperson/cheerleader for the BusyBodyBook since I got my first one back in 2007. The fabulous folks there are kindly sending me a new one AND PROVIDING ONE TO GIVE TO A LUCKY READER! Yay! Love them!

Here are ways you can enter:

1) Leave me a comment and tell me what your biggest organization challenge is

2) Go check out busybodybook.com and then leave me a comment telling me which one you like

3) Post about this contest, link back to it and leave me a comment telling me you've done so

4) follow on twitter (@busybodybooks)

5) add Busybodybook Organizers as a friend on Facebook

I will close this contest to entries on Thursday, August 26 at noon PST.

This fabulous organizer can change your life. (I am not even exaggerating!) Good luck!

And they don't even pay me for spreading this kind of love.

Dear Kohl's,
I love you. I'm your biggest fan.
love,
Viv

The Winner of the Insulated Lunch Bag is....

Stacey from Bloggin' It Like It is!

Congratulations!

If you didn't win, you can still go over to Simply Bags and pick up a great bag at a great price. The bag will more than pay for itself with all the money you save by not grabbing fast food.

And your body will thank you too.

Can I ignore this crap forever? Honestly... I think I can.

I have a blog. I write things and post them on it. I read other blogs. I feel guilty when I do either of these things.

Why?

Because chances are there are unfinished projects (or at the very least, laundry) that needs to be taken care of... and I'm screwing around in Blog Land.

But it could be worse. I could have to account for my time on Facebook. {GAH! Updated because the last third of the original video I posted was inexplicably cut off. All better now.}


For the life of me, I don't understand why I can't shoot a video without the opening frame making me look like I've had a frontal lobotomy.

Don't forget to enter to win the cute, personalized, insulated lunch bag.

And so help me... I'll never go hungry again!

I don't go to school anymore.

I don't go to an office everyday.

I don't need to worry about packing myself a lunch. However, I DO get really cranky if I get hungry. And I am not kidding when I tell you that this is my coffee mug.


I keep Scooby Snacks in the car for my kids, but those aren't always something that sounds good for me. I get horribly cranky if I get hungry.

Handsome Hubby has actually said that it is like he has to take care of another kid when I get like that and is often telling me I should plan ahead and keep food with me.

Enter the folks from Simply-Bags.

They make amazing (and CUTE!) personalized insulated lunch bags. They sent one to me to try it out and I love it.

First of all, it's super cute. (Going hungry...? OK. Going ugly? Never!)

It is perfect for me to toss in a yogurt, a little fruit, string cheese and a small drink and to keep it chilled for me while I run around town. In other words, it'll help to stop me from eating a bunch of crap because I got hungry.

It'll be particularly nice when I have to pick up kids from soccer practice and those coaches then proceed to let practice run long! I'm left waiting in my car, hungry, willing to eat ancient french fries that might be lodged under Grant's car seat!

It holds a lot. Seriously a lot. But it isn't big and bulky. And hello... it's personalized with pink letters. No boy is gonna try and take my snacks!
While my photography skills show this as a bit washed out, I promise you that it is a nice crisp black and the embroidered letters are a nice vibrant color.

The best part? You can win one!

The nice folks who run Simply-Bags have offered to send one exactly like this to one for one of my readers. There are 3 ways you can enter:

1) Leave me a comment here. (duh)
2.) Go over and check out Simply-Bags, then come back and tell me which one is your very favorite. (keeping in mind that the giveaway is for the one pictured.)
3) Post about this giveaway on your blog and link back to this post. (Leave another comment telling me that you've done so.)

Easy right?

Go and visit.

Winner will be chosen on Friday.

A wee bit lavender...?

Scene: Our family is walking through a pedestrian tunnel on our way to an amusement park. The tunnel is painted a bright shade of purple.

Mitch: "My friend Geno would love this tunnel. He'd probably move in if he could."

All of us: "Um, why?"

Mitch: "Because purple is his favorite color."

Grant: "But.... Geno is a boy...."

Yep... Gender stereotyping is firmly in place by the age of 6. What's a mom to do? (Other than laugh?)

25 years? Surely you're mistaken, because I'm still 18 in my head.

Handsome Hubby and I attended our 25th High School reunion a few weekends ago. Since we were classmates and have the same friends, we avoid that awkward Spouse As 5th Wheel syndrome.

It appears that reunion companies won't do 25th (or 35th, 45th, etc) reunions without a huge deposit, because they say statistically these are poorly attended. Um, I didn't have a spare $2,000 that I could tie up for a year, so my girlfriends and I had to put on the reunion ourselves.

Hmmm. I guess we beat the statistics. We had a blast!

The reunion was at a country club near our hometown. Gramma & Poppa kept the kids, and HH and I arranged to spend the night in my childhood room instead of driving home. When we got to my parents' house, my mom had placed the following items on the bed to welcome us.

How stinkin' cute is my mom?! She calls her guest room (my old room) the B&B (bed and breakfast).

I felt like I was kind of "on duty" as people were arriving. Everyone was all smiles and were so happy to see each other.

My mom and my friend Scott's mom volunteered to work the registration table.


Having just gotten back from camping with my good friend, Chris, I thought the both of us cleaned up pretty well....

That's Chris on my right.

Some of my besties. A big bummer was that my best friend couldn't make it because she went out on a boat earlier in the day and got so seasick that she still had trouble standing the next morning!

Handsome Hubby sure lived up to his name. He looked fantastic.

It is such a great feeling to be looking around a room filled with gorgeous people and the one who catches your eye and makes your heart go pitter-pat is your own spouse! I love, love, love that I still totally have the hots for him.

He made me feel great too. He is a big fan of this red dress. I love this dress. I felt like a million bucks in it. It's made by a company that makes clothing for real women (ya know, with boobs and hips and junk in their trunks.) I think seeing me out of my normal Mom Uniform (jean, Ts and flip-flops) has helped to add a few more peppers to an already spicy relationship.... :)

I've known my friend Scott since the 5th grade. Our moms were nurses in the same hospital and his parents are great family friends. He is the brother that I never had and is Conner's godfather. He is such a great guy! He's a brilliant engineer and based in Denver now... which is still way closer than Saudi Arabia (where he was for 15 years!) so I won't complain. We still don't get to see him as often as I'd like.


We had great food but most important, we had great music. We had both a DJ and an 80s cover band. These guys were great. They even dressed the part.


Let there be dancing!



Lots and lots of dancing....

My friend LaRonda is the Dancing Queen.

There was a wedding and reception at this country club the same night. We were having such a great time, that we started having people from the wedding crashing our reunion. These folks had a bit too much of a good time, and we had to ask them to leave after a while.

It balanced out though... some of our reunion people helped themselves to the leftover wedding favors.

Planning this thing was a giant pain in the ass... but it was so much fun that it was all worth it in the end!

For all the dancing I did, I almost missed dancing with HH. Fortunately the band slowed it down for the final song and I got a nice slow dance with my man.


Just like in High School, there were after parties. We went to one and were so proud of ourselves... we managed to stay there, having fun until 2:30! That is really something for two people who have trouble staying up on New Year's Eve.

The next morning my mom made pecan waffles, bacon and fresh OJ for us, then we took Grant with us to a local park where there was an informal, family friendly picnic. We got more time to visit with people, and Grant had lots of new kids to play with.



I think it's kind of funny that both locations had bubbles.

What a great party! I'm already starting to think about what we're going to do for the 30th!

What's in a name? Or, please forget everything we ever told you about how great it is to be able to read...

As you moms out there probably know, it's back to school shopping time.
As you moms out there also probably know, it's important to encourage a young child when they are a beginning reader.

Grant has become a good reader, with a pretty voracious appetite for new words to read.
Great, right? I always thought so.

I took him shopping to Kohl's over the weekend for new shoes. If you've been to Kohl's, you know that the shoes are displayed on the top of bookcase-like shelves, and the actual boxes of shoes are underneath. Or put another way: Grant can't see the actual shoes... just the labeled boxes on the shelves.

Scene: Kohl's shoe dept.

Grant: "Mom! I want Tony Hawk Blasters!!!"

Me: (looking at the shoe he wants) "No Grant. You pick shoes based on if you like how they look, not based on what the name is. Did you even see the shoes that are here?"

Grant: "I want the Blasters!"

Me: "Stop reading. Don't look at the labels, look at the shoes themselves."
(at this point I pick him up so that he can be at eye level with the shoes on display. I realize he is still not looking at the shoes, but is trying to read the names on the price tags...)
Me: "Grant! Stop reading! I don't want you to read the tags and labels. Don't read anything. Just look at the shoes. Which pair do you like that way it looks."

Grant: (who is still trying to scan the tags and still isn't looking at the shoes) "I like the Blasters...."

Me: "Grant! I don't want you to read the name! Just look at the shoe itself! The Blasters have orange on them. They will not match anything in your closet. Pick the shoe based on How. It. Looks. And stop reading! Do you understand? No. More. Reading."

Grant: "Oh. I like these ones."



Me: "Fine. I like those too and they'll go with everything."

Grant: "But what are they called...?"

ugh.

(And just a side note. The pair he ultimately chose? They're called "Detour." I guess "Irony" didn't test well with consumers....)