New Car

For those of you who asked, yes, I gave up the gas guzzling SUV. I got tired of paying $75 - $80 per week to drive the thing. It only got 15 - 17 miles to the gallon, which was no big deal when it only cost $30 to fill it up but a lot more painful now.

The car I got is a 2007 Chrysler Seibring. My payments are similar and we didn't have to extend my loan out that far (I still owed on the jeep) so we went for it. I didn't take pictures of it so I pulled the ones off of the dealer website to show you.

Our weekend review

On Thursday I got a call from daycare that Zack was sick so I had to leave early to get him. Consequently, I also had to stay home all day Friday with him because of the 24 hour rule. As it turns out this wasn't quite such a bad thing because he didn't really feel 100% again until Saturday afternoon.

It was, however, a bad thing for me in respect to the fact that I had an additional day tacked on to my weekend and took advantage of it to get some things that we needed for our house.

One of these, in Zack size.....

Which he promptly used to chase around and wack at the cat. It was taken away by Saturday, perhaps he will be able to play nicely with it later this week.

One of these....

Which you have to go into the girls section to find even though my SON loves it and it is in a perfectly respectable blue, yellow and red color. What boys don't grocery shop??

And of course some of this...

Because really... how can you appropriately shop without food?? (He has proceeded to attempt to eat 90 % of the plastic food as well as chew the paper wrappers off of several things!! :-)

Moving on to Saturday... (He He He)

One of these....

We had one neon tetra alive who had been alone for about a year. It was either give up or clean the tank and get new fish. So we went with the later, emptied the water into a bucket and were in the process of cleaning the tank when we heard a crack.

At this point it was do or die. We had one fish swimming in a 5 gallon bucket in our living room and no aquarium. So we bit the bullet since I couldn't flush the fish.... and decided to get another aquarium and some new fishies to put in it.

Four of these...

Two of these...

(except ours are red)

Two of these...

And two of these.... And finally....

For good measure....

We topped off our weekend with one of these....

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Yeah, I think I'm done purchasing ANYTHING for awhile!!

18 Months

On the 12th Zackary turned 18 months old. There are so many things that I want to write about this but I can't seem to find the words.

He is the most AMAZING child I have ever met. He says more words than I can even count including knowing how to tell me no like a big boy. Something that I thought I had at least a few more months before I had to worry about.

He is loving and sweet and LOVES his animals but at the same time will not hesitate to tell you when something is not right in his world.

He has in own thoughts and opinions on how things should go and if you do not do it his way the punishment can be severe!! :-)

He is absolutely in LOVE with his daddy and makes sure he finds him EVERY day as soon as we get home.

He is now in full blown copy cat mode and will copy not only your actions but pretty much EVERYTHING you say including words, phrases and some things you wish he would miss.
He loves swimming in his pool, playing in his sandbox and has a two stuffed animal minimum in his crib at all times.

Every day he turns into more of a big boy and less of my baby.

I am constantly amazed by all of the new things he is doing and seeing him makes my heart hurt because I love him SOO much.

I love you to the moon and back Mr. Zacky Zack. Don't grow up too quickly!!

Dr Appointment Today:

31 lbs. 9 oz.

32 3/4 Inches Tall

Head size is off the charts. (He got his mama's brains!! :-)

Gone, but Not Forgotten... I hope...

Although since I haven't posted in a week and no one has seemed to notice perhaps I am forgotten!! :-(

Either way, I'm just checking in to let you know things are crazy. My work got nuts and so I am working , working, working and when I get home I'm just playing with Zack and then vedging on the couch. I had 110 feeds on my bloglines so I have LOTS of catching up to do.

Things in the alcoholic side of my life have also been crazy. Jake has not relapsed but the farther we get into this recovery the more times old garbage will make it's way to the surface. This has happened recently and we are dealing with it and I'm working on my program, which I have not been so good at doing.

Hopefully, things at work will get better and things at home will calm down and then I will be back, full time. Until then there will be a slight lack of pictures too because all we have at home is dial up and well, I think that speaks for its self.

See you on the flip side!! :-)

One Year

{{This picture has been moved to Zack's personal site}}

July 2007


{{This picture has been moved to Zack's personal site}}

July 2008

Trouble

Notice the look on his face... the look of I know I'm not supposed to but it's SOO much fun?
{{This picture has been moved to Zack's personal site}}

See the dad in the background jumping from his seat
Notice how even though he's SUPPOSED to be in trouble he looks more like he thinks this is a game...
Yeah, WE ARE in trouble!!

New Curtians

God said "let there be light" and there was light

And the small child saw that the light was good and promptly woke up at 6:15 am every morning and refused to go to bed until 8:45.

And so the parents, with their still half open eyes on Friday morning the 4th of July said that this just will not do!!

So the mom went to T*rget to procure curtains. And the curtains were hung.

And then mom and dad pulled the curtains and separated the light into darkness

And the small child saw that the darkness was good and he napped and slept late and all was right with the world again.

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Curtains for Zack's room: $200

Trips to Target: 3

Time out of my day: 2 hours

Cutting the crying and talking at nap time from 50 minutes to 5 minutes: Priceless

One day

I miss one day, one little rotten day to stay home with my son, who has pink eye for the second time this year, (Something more to add to my list) and when I get back today there are 72 items in my bloglines account.

Really? Seventy-two?? Could you guys give a girl a break and NOT post for a day... just one little day so I can get caught up? It would be much appreciated... at this rate I might be caught up by the second Tuesday of next week!!

Crossing Over

About two months ago I made a change in this site. Did you notice? For the first 15 months of Zack's life I didn't really talk about him on here much. I wrote a post about it in honor of his 15 month birthday. If you would like to read it you can go here....

Anyway, when I wrote that post and when I sort of changed directions I was unsure if I would loose my faithful readers or not. As of right now the answer seems to be not. I'm grateful that all of you decided to stay with me and I'm glad that so many of you are enjoying the pictures and the stories. I love writing about my kid and sharing him with all of you.

However, after today... I'm not sure how many of you will continue to come back. Today I'm am truly crossing over to the mommy blogger dark side...

After all, who else but a mommy blogger could come here and tell you that on Saturday my son will be 18 months old and this morning.

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He woke up DRY!!

And then...

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He went potty on the big boy potty!!!

Oh yes, I did just write that on my website, and I did just put three exclamation points behind it!!

I..

can't...

help...

myself...

It's official, I'm now a mommy blogger. May God help us all!! :-)

(Wait, before I go may I get one more WOOO HOOO for my big boy!!)

Ok, I'm really going this time...

Childlike Confusion

On Thursday we took Zack to the park. At the park there was a drinking fountain. So we taught him how to drink out of the drinking fountain.

On Friday he used his new found skills to attempt to drink from the spout of the kitty fountain.

In his defense it is sort of a drinking fountain.....

Sick to my Stomach

I have been cleaning my office the last couple of weeks. Every night I do a little bit. Last night I was looking through some old paperwork deciding what to shred and I came upon a gas receipt. In 2003 it cost me $28.00 to fill up my vehicle!!

$28.00!!!

Just the other day I filled up and it cost me close to $75.00. That is more than double the price in just 5 years!! Let me just give you a little history lesson here...

1986 - $1.00 per gallon
1993 - $1.30 per gallon
2003 - $1.50 per gallon
2008 - $3.90 per gallon

So we've got a 30% jump in 8 years, a 15 % jump in 10 years and then a 260% jump in the last 5 years??

260%!!

You have got to be F#$king KIDDING ME!! Someone PLEASE, PLEASE drag George Bush and his oil friends (who have been making record profits by the way) out of power so perhaps we can get back to spending our money on things we need like groceries and utilities instead of GAS for our cars!!

Seriously??

Re: HOBBY LOBBY-MC-30-CKS

IMPORTANT NOTICE

Please contact us to resolve this issue.

We have reason to believe the above referenced check(s) have been stolen or forged. (No SH*T Sherlock could that be because I told you this... a YEAR AND A HALF AGO!!) However, we are requesting more information. (What more could you want? I sent you a police report, and a letter from the bank showing I canceled the account as soon as I knew the checks were stolen. Did I mention that I did this a YEAR AND A HALF AGO!! Ok... just checking) If this item is related to a forgery, theft or identity theft (I think we've established this), we must have copies of your completed forgery affidavit and/or police report to clear this matter from our system. (Um yeah... got that. Faxed them to you... YEAR AND A HALF AGO!!)

Sincerely,

MasterCheck

All I can say is it's a good DAMN thing I keep things, and also that I am in the process of cleaning my office. So I find the information and call the company.

Helpful Associate (HA): Oh, I see here that there were two checks written to Hobby Lobby.

H: Yes, and I talked to someone regarding both checks and faxed you a copy of the police report back in 2006.

HA: Yes, it shows here that we have a police report on file and we have cleared one of the checks.

H: So do I need to fax you another copy to clear the other check. (Come on idiot... get with the program....)

HA: No, I will go ahead and clear the second check now.

H: Thank you. (Did I really just have to waste 15 minutes of my day having that conversation?)

The odd part of this whole thing is that this letter arrived on Friday June 20th. The same day that this happened.

Uninspired

I have been sitting here most of the day trying to come up with something to write... ANYTHING really and I've got NOTHING. A big fat Zero.

It's Monday. And Monday in the worst kind of way. I was up at 5:00 to pick up the house for the cleaning lady. I didn't get Jake up to help me because his idea of picking up is to put the dirty pans in the oven. Grrr... so I just did it. And then I regretted it because secretly I was a little angry that I did it all myself. So when I asked him to do the litter boxes and he gave me flack I sort of snapped on him, a little...

Oh, and our basement flooded AGAIN this weekend. So there are wet kitty litter footprints all over our house that I didn't have time to wipe up....

And our cat is still missing. She has been gone for a little over a week now and we miss her. When we go out side Zack still yells Eeek Ahhh (Squeeker). It breaks my heart every time. I know he is probably doing it because I have been yelling it for a week not because he knows that she's missing but still...

Oh, on Friday we did have a somewhat humorous incident regarding missing cat. I got a phone call about 1:30 from someone who had gotten my flyer (I sent out 61....) he said he thought he had found my cat and then he proceeded to tell me he thought she was dead on the road. So I say thank you and then I try to continue working. I made it to 2:15.

Then I went home, changed clothes, got an old towel and went to the place on the road where he said I could find my cat. I pulled up and was immediately like that's not her. But then I went and gathered said smooshed cat and upon further investigation I couldn't tell. I looked at the pictures on the flyer and at this cat and I was stumped. All that kept running through my head was I don't want to bury someone else's cat.

So... I call Jake and he is short with me because he's at work and then I begin to cry and leave said cat on the side of the road. I drive home a blubbering mess. He calls me back about 5 minutes later and I tell him I just can't tell. So he says he will leave work at 5:00 and come look for himself. So home I go.

I get out the digital camera and I look through all the pictures I have and find all the ones with her and then I study her markings. After about 45 minutes I'm convinced it's my cat. I cry some more and get back in the car to "bring her home." Only, when I get there, I'm not so sure again. I examine the smooshed cat once again and just can't tell so back home I go.

Finally Jake gets off work and I drive over there for the third time. Now said cat is missing. We don't see it. So we both park and we walk up and down the side of the road. We find it, he says yes, it is definitely her. I go to get the towel and by the time I get back he's not so sure. So in the back of his truck she goes and he is off to the rescue league to have them check said smoosed cat for a microchip.

25 minutes later he calls me. This cat is only 1 - 2 years old and has no microchip. So now I have spent all afternoon being distraught about someone else's smooshed cat. I'm relieved but also still very sad. At least if it was her we would have had closure. Now, we keep looking....

Other than that, we are in the process of trying to renovate our dog pen so we can put our escape artists back in it. They learned to jump the fence so we have to buy a jump guard. More money... fantastic. So while we are at it we are also tilling up the pen and planting grass. It has been mostly weeds since we built it.

Oh and speaking of purchases, we now are looking into new shades for Zack's room too. Now that it's light he has began a sleeping boycott. If it is light he will not sleep. This is all fine and dandy during the week when he is up at 6:15 but not nearly so great on the weekends and not nearly so great at night either. He has cut his sleeping by a good one to two hours and his attitude is showing it.

I went to Men@rds to buy some darker shades yesterday and came home defeated when I realized that anything above a one cell shade would have to be special ordered and those things are EXPENSIVE!! Do you think I could get away with hanging blankets on his windows or is that too getto?? Yeah... I thought so too... Uggg!!

Is it Tuesday yet?

Public Service Announcement

Before I write anything for the day I usually go onto my bloglines and read all of the updates. I do this 1) to see what everyone is up to and 2) to possibly get some ideas of what to write about.

Today, I'm going to take a moment to re-iterate something I saw on Kristi's blog this morning. Yesterday she was in a car accident. A minor accident but it reminded her that her daughter had outgrown her car seat and that she had not yet made time to purchase a new one. Luckily, her daughter was not hurt and they immediately purchased her a new car seat. A seat with a 5 point harness up to 65 lbs.

And that, dear friends, is the message of my public service announcement today. There have been some new studies out that have shown that it is NOT as safe to move smaller children up to booster seats as was once thought. Adult seat belts can hurt children under five and even children over five who are small for their age.

I know a lot of parents who move smaller children up thinking the age restriction is all they need to follow or they move the younger child up sooner because they throw a fit and want to be like their older sibling. Please don't do this. The booster seat we got for Zack allows him to be in a five point harness until he is 65 lbs. I plan to leave him in that seat until he is 65 lbs. (Which at this rate might be next year!! LOL)

I also plan to reposition his seat this weekend to tether him into the car. I have not done this and noticed when I got into a friend's car this weekend she had her seats tethered in. That is one more safety measure that I need to take to protect my son. After watching the video's below I realized that one inconvenience for me is NOT worth risking his life.

If you have the time, watch the videos below (possibly with some Kleenex). Seriously what's a little crying and fit throwing about being in a "baby" seat when you are trying to save your child's life?

This has been the end of your public service announcement. We will return you to your regularly scheduled programing next week.

5 Year Old Kyle Miller


3 Year Old Isabelle

Making Dinner

Last night we made dinner and ate as a family. Let me clarify, we made something that didn't come out of a box OR a frozen bag. We cooked people!! I'm gitty all over just thinking about it.

I was reading a blog yesterday and I came upon this GREAT recipe for Parmesan Crusted Pork Tenderloin Chops.

I'll put the recipe here, but I HIGHLY suggest you pop on over there because she has pictures to go with the recipe and everything is easier with pictures.

2 pork tenderloins (they usually come two to a package)
We just used precut pork loins. They were on sale and it made it so we didn't have to do the pounding of the meat because they were already only about 1/2 inch thick
2 large eggs
5 ounces Parmesan cheese (We bought the pre-shredded stuff because I couldn't' find a block of Parmesan at the store)
1/2 cup flour
1 teaspoon Salt
1/2 teaspoon Pepper
2 teaspoons Garlic powder
Olive oil (We used vegetable oil)

Combine the flour, salt, pepper and cheese in one bowl and mix well

Whisk eggs in another bowl

Get out a non-stick frying pan and put the oil in the bottom and then heat it to medium high.

Then bread the pork putting it in the egg and making sure it is coated and then in the cheese mixture and then into a non-stick frying pan.

Heat about 5 -7 minutes on each side until golden brown and the serve. It is VERY nummy... and good... AND.... it DIDN'T come from a box!! Aren't you proud??

Eeek!!

Two weeks ago we de-binkied my son. Things have been going really well. He asks for it once and awhile and we just tell him it is all gone.

However, last night we had our usual babysitter, who hadn't been there in two weeks, and we forgot to tell her about the whole binkie thing. So he asked, and she found the spare one under the changing table and gave it to him.

SO... my question to any of you who have ever been through this, how long will the screaming last this evening?

He asked for it over and over again this morning (we took it away as soon as we got home) and we just told him all gone. He seemed ok with that but I'm not sure he's going to be so ok with it when it comes to bed time tonight.

Should I hunker down for another two hour screaming fest? I'm not sure my ears can handle it. Please tell me one of you had this happen and it was no big deal..... please..... :-)

Counting My Blessings...

This weekend a man that Jake's sister graduated with, a man that Jake used to run around with was murdered. When I saw his picture on the news my heart just sank. That all too easily could have been Jake.

This man had a three year old and no matter what he had done to anyone he did NOT deserve to but gunned down in the street. And gunned down not just by anyone but by someone we know.

That's right. Remember back in October of 2006 when Jon and Jane broke into our safe and stole our checks and then decided to go on a random spending spree??

If you've forgotten you can read Part One, Part Two, Part Three and Part Four to get caught up.... (You might want to take a coffee and a bagel... it's a long read)

So on Sunday morning I got on the Internet to see who was charged with the murder of this man and I felt like I had been hit over the head when I saw Jane's name come up. That's right, the woman who was IN MY HOUSE, is now charged with murder.

All I could think was oh my G*d that could have been us....

No matter where you are in your life and no matter what you think of the situation that fact of the matter is that a young man lost his life this weekend. A family lost a son and a brother and a little boy lost his daddy. It could have been us, and I'm counting my blessings that Jake was able to get his act together when he was but at the same time my heart is hurting for the family who wasn't so lucky.

Is it too quiet??

What do you get when you leave my husband and my son alone too long with some sidewalk chalk??

{{This picture has been moved to Zack's Personal Site}}

War Paint Mom... DUH!!!

I forget... do I have one child or two? :-)

Parting is Such Sweet Sorrow...

(Said as we were leaving the driveway this morning)

Bye Bye daddies....

Bye Bye Puppies...

I ove ooo....

mmmmmmmhhhhhh.... (hand to mouth blowing kiss...)

Things Heard Round Our House This Weekend...

"You are looking at the new co-manager of Random Mobile Home Park."

Yes, Jake got a promotion. A pretty big one actually. He is now the co-manager of the mobile home park which comes with a whole new set of duties and hopefully (cross your fingers) a whole new set of pay too!! :-) YEAH for JAKE!!

"No, No, NO!! DON'T dig in the litter box. That's icky!!"

The basement flooded last week so the litter boxes had to be moved upstairs. I forget how much I HATE having them in our living space until they are back again.

"Can we just fill in the basement with dirt? Really... never venture down there again? I think it would be easier."

After the water receded I had to scrub the floor in the basement. Here is your exercise for the day. Take a bucket and fill it with water. Now dump in some kitty litter and mix until it is a nice pasty consistency. Now spread it on your floor in a nice thick goopy wet paste. Next take a mop and a bucket and try to clean said mess. THAT is what I did yesterday. Happy to get the litter boxes back to the basement. Not so happy to clean it first....