The Gym

So I have been telling myself for months that I was going to start going to the gym. I had it all planned out I would go workout for an hour and Griffen would go to the daycare and just play and have fun and then we would go home and have a healthy lunch and he would take a nap while I did housework . The result of course would be I would get fit, Griffen would be rested, and the house would be clean. As in all my blog post reality decided to bite me in the butt, and this time it was hard.
Tuesday, I finally made the 5 minute journey to the gym. I was feeling good. My sneakers, that I have worn 3 times, were bright, shiny and cushy. Griffen was sweet and happy. He had been asking me for a ride in the car. He sings it " Ride in the car" it is cute. As soon as we got to the gym parking lot he started to cry. He has been to the gym with his dad. He usually cries a little at drop off but then quickly calms down when he sees the other kids. This time as soon as we got out of the car he started crying " Ride in the car" then he got more frantic and screamed "ride car fast" by the time we made it to the check in counter between his sobs he would moan "car". I could tell it just wasn't going to happen this time but I was meeting a friend so I started the check in process. Well actually all I did is pull out my wallet and then Griffen threw up all over me, then the diaper bag and then the floor. The lady working the daycare rolled her eyes and handed me a roll of paper towels. Service with an attitude that's a rule at the gym. Griffen at this point is hysterical and is using the death grip to climb my back as I try to clean up his morning cottage cheese with a roll of cheap paper towel. Just then my friend showed up to help. The both of us were on our knees trying to clean up when a cute young fit mother (no venom in my tone at all)decided to give me advice about how to get my child used to coming to daycare. She told me to bring him for five minutes and then ten and then twenty and that way he would get used to it. I don't see how that works when he threw up at the entrance. What do I let him puke and leave him in it for five minutes? I was confused. I don't believe that the best parenting advice is given when the person you are giving advice to is covered in puke. Finally, another employee came and said she would take care of the rest of the mess. Let me tell you a roll of cheap paper towels is not the most effective cleaning tool for vomit on carpet. So I took Griffen home. As soon as we got in the car he was fine. When we got home and cleaned up he at a healthy lunch and then took a nap. I on the other hand couldn't eat because I couldn't get the vomit smell out of my head. I didn't get the house cleaned because I was busy emptying my diaper bag and wallet and cleaning all of the contents. The next morning I woke up with a cold. So I didn't exactly reach my goals for this week. In fact I think I have found someone who hates the gym more then me and he has come up with a very effective way of communicating that . So I didn't get fit. My house is a disaster because I have been sick all week and as far as a healthy meals I have been taking shots of dayquil with OJ chasers. Griffen has napped well this week, otherwise I would probably be blogging from the insane asylum. At least I think I lost a couple of pounds from the different organs I have coughed up. And I think my abs have gotten a pretty good work out from hacking up the afore mentioned innards.

Tagged

My friend tagged me with this 7 things list and I thought it was fun so here we go.

7 Things I can Do Well
1- Brainstorm. I can come up with lots of different ideas. Implementation is another story.
2-Problem solve.
3-Talk. ( I am stealing this one from Jamie) I too can talk as y'all can tell by my lengthy posts.
4-Retain useless knowledge i.e. Did you know if you ate a Polar Bear's liver you would die. And that Worcestershire Sauce is made of anchovies and named after the town that produces the most anchovies
5-Remember what actor played which character and lines from movies.
6-I excel at making up voices for children's books
7-Waste time/ daydream.
7 Things I Can't Do
1- Stay caught up on housework.
2- Run.
3- Exercise .
4- Eat enough fruits and veggies
5- Control my whining.
6- Spell
7- Manage my time effectively
7 Things that attracted me to my husband
1- His kindness. He is one of the gentlest souls on the planet
2- He is usually an amazing listener (as long as there aren't any sporting events on)
3- He truly enjoys people and their eccentricities.
4- He is one of the smartest people I know.
5- He is non judgemental
6- He is quirky.
7- There is nothing more beautiful then his big blue eyes
7 Things I always say
1- Son of a monkey's uncle
2- Whatever. (Stealing two of Jamie's but I really do say them all the time)
3- Unacceptable!
4- Yepppp
5-Can I steal that ? ( My mom hates it when I say that)
6- I don't know
7- I love you guys
7 Things I love to eat
1-Cinnamon rolls
2-Oreo ice cream
3-cookies
4-Bread
5-Hamburgers
6-Chicken Gyro
7-High fructose corn syrup in the form of cereal
(And I wonder why I have a weight problem)
7 People I tag
I don't think there are 7 people who read this blog. So whoever.

The Nightmare Before Christmas

So like every good mommy I wanted to provide my son with a Norman Rockwell Christmas. For some reason I thought that since I am a stay at home mom now that I would be able to pull this off. I thought that somehow I would miraculously be transformed into a wonderful housekeeper and patient loving wife and mother. You know like good old June Cleaver. Well part of my plan for the perfect Christmas was to send out perfect Christmas Cards. I decided I needed to get Griff's 18 month pictures done so I might as well get family pictures done that could be turned in to a wonderful Christmas card so that we could share our perfect joy with our friends and family.
We have always gone the JCPenney's to get our pictures done and they have always done a good job. They usually take a lot of time to get the little man comfortable enough to smile and when Eric starts smiling Griffen isn't too far behind. Now that I have become somewhat of a tech geek ( not really in fact you are looking at this weird background because I wanted something different but I was too lazy to really figure it out.) I decided that I would book our portrait experience online, that way I could make sure that no one was scheduled before or after us so they would spend as much time as we needed to get our inner model groove out. Eric scheduled the day off and we were ready to have the perfect day. We were going to get our pictures,go shopping and finish all of our shopping list, go to lunch, after a nap, decorate the tree,then I would make a perfect meal and then follow it off by going to see all the lights around town , then we would all come home have hot cocoa and drift off into blissful slumber.
What really happened is I got the stomach flu on Wednesday and had it till Friday (picture day) Griffen started getting sick on Thursday, followed by Eric Friday morning. I for some brilliant reason believed it would be OK to continue on with our days events as long Eric and I took Imodium AD and Griffen seemed OK. (Onward and upward you know.) We went to JcPenney to start our portrait experience by being greeted by a room full of screaming kids. The room to recreate the true experience of Hell was heated appropriately. Families in perfect red,black and white plaid outfits were squeezed into every inch of the room. They were playing a movie for the kids at a volume level that could deafen the dead. Underneath that was cheery Christmas classic being played on their stereo. Peace on Earth my butt! So after waiting an hour which was spent chasing Griffen away from the breakable Christmas displays that surrounded the store. We finally got our chance to go in the room and make it work. The photographer snapped a couple a pictures after shake Elmo in our faces told us we were done and kicked us to the waiting room to wait another hour to pick our favorites and pay the bill.( I felt a little like the kid in the The Christmas Story when Santa kicked down the big slide before he could tell him he wanted a red rider bee bee gun) Little G and Big E were done so I sent them to a playground in the mall. Which they lasted 5 minutes at before Little G called it quits. Eric took him to the car and drove him around the parking lot for the rest of the time. Meanwhile I sat and listened to other perfect mommies hemming and hawing about what they wanted to get. Finally my turn came. I told the dude listen I don't want any of your enhanced photos( over priced, over designed photoshop pieces of crap) The dude insisted on showing me us in sepia, in black and white, with elves, with bows, with holly with snowflakes and messages of Christmas cheer. ( If he had photoshopped a gun in my hand and a skull and crossbones he would have been closer to a sell) So after looking through all the pictures where my double chin is accentuated and Griffen expression is something along the lines of " Lady if you shake Elmo at me one more time I shoving him where the sun don't shine." I picked what I wanted. The Dude continued to sell me and told me if I would buy this much more I would get this much free stuff and like any prisoner of war I said "whatever". So now we have $100 worth of crappy pictures to remember our "Perfect" day. And I suppose my inner model did find her groove when I came home I ate lunch and threw it up :) That damn June Cleaver I hope she rots in her TV grave. And Norman Rockwell can bite me.

Mormon Superhero

So when I told Eric what I was going to blog about he was like you really are going to tell people that. So I figure I better warn you of the embarassing/scarey visuals I will be painting for you in this blog.

The other night right after I got Griffen to sleep I went downstairs to do some laundry and I threw the clothes I was wearing into the load. I went into our office/gym that totally needs to be redecorated and realized that I have really, really let myself go. I realized this because that room for some weird reason is full of mirrors. One whole wall is mirrors. It has been like that since we bought the house and I find the room too scarey to go into long enough to figure out what to do with it. Sad being that is where I store my eliptical trainer. So Eric was down working in the evil room and I went to say good night to him. I was wearing my garments with a breastfeeding top. I haven't bother to seperate them from the normal tops and when I am grabbing clean clothes out of the basket I just don't care what kind they are. Well on this day Mother Nature had brought be my monthly gift and I had accessorized my Jesus Jammies with a pair a purple panties over the top of the bottoms. For you that don't wear JJ's they often hang low in the croutch area and are not the best support for pads. When I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror I started to laugh because in my off kilter brain I thought I looked like a Mormon Superhero. I wanted to run upstairs and add a oven mitt to the ensemble so that I could finish off my costume. I imagined that my superpower was to save the world one casserole at a time. Then I realized that I don't ever really take casseroles to people. I always think about it when I hear that someone is having a rough time but then I figure I don't want to make the rough time worse by making them eat one of my casseroles. I also thought it was funny because if this Mormon Superhero was to be mass marketed it would have to include an innertube to be worn under the jj's to replicate my belly/butt. It would be just like the six pack abs that come with the real superhero costumes but more realistic for my super mormon charactor. That is when I came back to reality and realized I need to use that eliptical trainer and whip myself into shape. So after I polish off Griffen's halloween candy and watch a few programs I am going to get right on the whole weight loss thing.

Simple Pleasures

Lately I have been thinking about little things that make me happy so I thought I would share some of them with you.
1- An empty sink. I love to see an empty sink in front of me. I especially love it if someone else has done the dishes. Of course I am focusing on real pleasures and not daydreams.
2- Nap time. I love cuddling my little man until he finally goes off to sleepytime.
3- I absolutely love reading friends blogs and seeing what they are up to. It makes me so happy to see how lucky I am to know such wonderful people. And even though I don't get to see them very often I still get to keep up on what they are doing.
4- Itunes!! I adore the "you might like this" feature and the "if you liked this artist you might like this artist". You can find the best music that is never played on the radio.
5- A good program. Mama loves a good program. There is nothing better then a good program and a diet caffiene free coke. Like today Oprah was so good. It was about a nuerosurgeon who had a stroke. It was totally fascinating. And they played with real brains and you could tell Oprah thought it was gross.
6- Finding an unknown/independant/foreign movie that turns out to be awesome. It is like finding treasure.
7- Netflix. I get so excited to see the red envelope in the mail. I know I pay for it but it feels like I just got a present.
8- Non Junkmail/Bills mail. I love snail mail that comes from a friend. It is the best to get a card in the mail. I feel like a little kid when I get one. I dance around and say oh oh oh I got something oh oh oh.
9- Random acts of kindness from strangers. I love to be reassured that the world isn't full of a@#holes. It is so nice to have a stranger smile at you and do something simple like offer to return your grocery cart for you.
10- Slippers! There is nothing better then putting your foot into a little piece of heaven. Its like walking on clouds. I don't like grown up slippers. I like ladybugs, fish, hedgehogs etc. They have to flip flop, otherwise I feel like my feet are suffocating. I really don't like bunny slippers they are just way to cliche.

mamasprograms

What Are They Thinking

I was just thinking how much I was enjoying the Mormon Light Program. I would go to Sacrement and Relief Society twice a month. If there was a ward party that needed food I would cook for it but not attend it. I am a Visiting Teaching supervisor so I call people about their monthly visits but never do any of my own. I don't drink or smoke but I am a democrat and shop on Sundays. The MLP has been the perfect for me. But now I have been called as the Secretary in Young Womens. They obviously don't know me very well or they wouldn't have put me in a position were I could influence/corrupt the youth. Luckily as callings go I think I will only be doing the Mormon Medium program (no I am not becoming psychic). I will have to go to activities on Wednesday but I don't think I have to teach or do anything else. I think I just have to take roll and be a chaufer. And though I am a scary driver I do believe I can make beautiful check marks next to the girls' names. And since they are all teenagers I finally have a group that understands my love of Edward Cullen.