March 11, 2011

  • Photo & Prompt Challenge: Day 9

    Day 9 – Your most treasured item.

    Each assignment just gets harder.  I have been thinking of this one all day.  There are lots of things in my life that I treasure. 

    The Lord’s love and protection
    Time with my children
    Time with my grandchildren
    My husband
    My friends
    My computer
    My home
    and so much more. 

    Which do I choose.  What do I talk about.  Then as I was cleaning today, I came across this piece of paper. 

    I have tons of little pieces of papers, just like this.  Some are from young kids I met over 22 years ago.  The above was written by Jade during her last vacation here at my home.  I take these little notes and try to put them in a folder.  I am a total pack rat!  Sometimes I find them in books that I have not opened in years.  This got me thinking of memories.  I treasure my memories.  These little treasures trigger those memories that are tucked deep within.  Will I still have those memories later in life?  If I didn’t have these little reminders, would I stumble across these memories on my own?  What about the emotions that follow when the memories flood in? 

    Sure we can think of memories and emotions as ‘bad’ things in our life.  I know there are quite a few bad memories and emotions in mine!  I choose to thing of memories and emotions as a wonderful thing!  Where would I be without them.  That is alot to think about. 

March 10, 2011

  • Photo & Prompt Challenge: Day 8


    Day 8 – A Birthday Celebration 

    This is going to be torture!  Just one birthday celebration?  I love planning birthday parties!  Seriously!  For my son I did lots of themes.  Sadly I don’t remember them all and it would take ages to go through the pictures and home videos.  So here are a few. 

    Cars – he loved all those cars on his cake.
    Circus – with a homemade clown pinata too!
    Pirates – we had an awesome treasure hunt with this one.
    Cowboys – even ate hot dogs and beans on the floor.
    Space – had stars and planets hanging from the living room ceiling.

    I don’t remember the rest.  At the age of 10 he decided he wanted a party at a roller skating rink.  I was devastated.  This was the end of planning parties for me. 

    Then Annaleah was born!  A Girl! 

    1st party was just a huge event inviting everyone to see our new home. 
    2nd year we had a Princess Party.  Little girls in dresses and tiaras with huge pixie stix wands (with stars on top) 
    3rd year Dragon Tales!  She just loved Dragon Tales.  This party included a plastic egg hunt with little dinosaurs and toys inside.  It helps that her birthday is in April! 

    4th year Spiderman.  Yep, you heard me right.  My little girl loved spiderman


    5th year Tea Party.  Once again, little girls in pretty dresses all ready for tea.  Fancy style too.  We even had to tiny sandwiches and fancy teacups. 
    6th year Pet party.  This one was a sleepover.  After all the girls were in pj’s we secretly put a bag of stuffed animals all over the front yard.  I told the girls that all the animals had escaped!  They all ran out with flashlights to rescue every pet. 
      
    7th year Spy Party.  All the kids picked out spy names, had pics taken and badges made up.  They had a mystery to solve too.  Someone stole the birthday cake! 
      
    8th year Science Party.  We ordered all kinds of experiments from Science Bob and Steve Spangler.  This was one of my favorite parties. 


    This cake caused me alot of grief as I ended up in tears making it.  LOL.  It was my first time working with Fondant.

     

    9th year Rock Star Party.  All girls in their best Rock outfits.  All kids put on karaoke performances in front of the crowd.. Including Ethan! 

    This year we are looking into a Spa Theme.  My baby girl will be 10 next month.  Thankfully she is not ready to give up on my parties.  She says she will keep having them for as long as she can. I am so happy! 

    Ok, so I shared a bit of all parties.  Just couldn’t help it!

March 9, 2011

  • Photo & Prompt Challenge: Day 7

    Day 7 – Something you use every day.


    1. Magic Bullet

    We seriously use this every single morning for our smoothies.  I am a bit worried that we will kill it soon.  It has held up a long time so far. 


    2. My laptop
    I never, ever go a day without getting on my laptop.  Is that sad or what? 


    3. My cell phone. 

    This is another way for me to connect with the outside world.  I never go anywhere without it.  With my cell I can connect with my son, my parents and one of my closest friends.  I have also been using the task list on here as well as my calendar.  Really nice to have everything in one place. 

March 8, 2011

  • Photo & Prompt Challenge: Day 6

    Day 6 – My favorite memory.

    I am sick today. As I lay here trying to think of my favorite memory, my brain hurts. I may have to give this a moment.

    Thee are really a lot of memories floating around. The day I met my husband. A surprise birthday party. Times spent with family or friends. My children doing funny things. There are just too many.

    One memory I have as a child is my dad bringing me to my mom’s workplace. I remember his big hand holding my small one.

    I remember the steps being so huge and seemed to take forever to climb. When we finally reached the top of the winding stairs, there was a room full of tall ladies and sitting at tables with sewing machines. They were all looking at me with big smiles. Everyone was talking to me and I didn’t want to talk back. The were kinda scary to me. I finally saw my mom among those faces.

    This memory feels like a dream. However when I shared this with my mom she told me when I was 2 years old, my dad got me all dressed and made my hair pretty. He took me to see my mom at her workplace. She was a seamstress. This is my earliest memory.

March 7, 2011

  • Photo & Prompt Challenge: Day 5

    Day 5 – Your Day

    Monday is always a tough day since the weekend gets messy.  I generally focus on cleaning and Annaleah does light school work.  Today will be a little different as we are all heading out to see my Granddaughter Meadow this afternoon.  We are very excited. 

    As usual I start my day at 6am.

    I started my homemade yogurt in the crock pot first.  Then it was time to make smoothies for all. 

    After the usual morning routine (dishes and general pick up) I got to work planning our meal for the trip to Meadow’s tonight.  We decided on Subway.  Since Angel has to go low sodium, I printed out the nutrition guide and highlighted the sodium section to help him make better choices. 

    Between getting Anna to work on her chores, chatting with Angel and such I managed to restock our freezer with bananas for more smoothies during the week. 

    Finally, Anna got started on her school work and took a shower.  I got to work on the spreadsheet for our food journal. 

    For lunch I made an egg casserole.  This helps keep the sodium low for the day.

    I finished up the yogurt and got it in the oven. I was shocked when I realized it was already 12:30 and Ethan was arriving. 

    Anna went back to work on her Grammar Lessons and I went to scrub down the bathroom.    Seriously, I have no idea why since it will look exactly the same by tomorrow morning.. sigh.

    After rushing around, trying to get everything packed and trying to get everyone out the door, we were finally on the road by 3pm. We stopped to pick up Subway Grinders for the trip.  Angel and I got a veggie grinder.  It was quite good.  I have never had a veggie grinder before.  Of course I still craved the buffalo chicken strips grinder that David ordered. 

    Then we headed off to Meadow’s!

    We hung out and played with Meadow.

     
    We did not realize they were going to order pizza.  whoops.  It was good. 

    After about 2 hours, goodbyes were said and we headed off for a one and half hour drive home.  Sadly I did not get a good pic of Annaleah. 

    Once we got home, Angel and I made some mung bean Sprout side-dish to refrigerate for tomorrow. 

    Then we got Annaleah ready for bed.

    I will be up for a bit longer.  I have to wait til 12:45ish to get the yogurt out of the crock and put it in some containers.  I will also put some in mini muffin tins and freeze for tomorrow smoothies. 

    For now I guess I will look for an Asian Drama to watch while I am waiting. 
    I am exhausted! 
    Goodnight All!

March 5, 2011

  • Sickness and Saturdays

    This was meant to be a part of the challenge.. however, if I had read ahead I would have known that weekends were off.  Oh well. 

    My Saturday is nothing like the other days of the week. Usually we rush out the door by 11am to hit the library then drop Annaleah off at Jazz.  During her Jazz class we head on over to a grocery store and get what we need for the week.  We also tend to hit the Asian or Indian market. 

    However, today is not a normal Saturday.  Yesterday, Anna started complaining of a stomach ache, sore throat and headache.  Her temp was about 100.7.  Usually I do not do a thing for a temp unless it is 101 or over.  However, glossy eyes tell me this is serious.  Giver her some meds.. have her rest.  She did manage most of her schoolwork quietly in the chair.  Then we sat and watched some Gilmore Girls together. 

     

    Her temp rose to 102.3 before bedtime.  We put her to bed with us tonight.  I do not do well with a sick child in another room at night. 

    So right now it is 9am and she is still sleeping.  I have showered, dressed, made smoothies and updated our food journal.  Ethan has arrived and is a busy boy already. 

    Annaleah just woke up.  Looking and feeling better.  her temp is 99.6. 

     

    Afternoon update:

    Got really busy.  Left Anna and Ethan with David (my son) and headed off to Job Lot, the Asian Market, and then Walmart.  Came back and did tons of dishes with hubby, then made lunch.  Played some games and such with Ethan and Annaleah. 

    I found this thing called Enviro Blox.  It is basically the packing peanuts that dissolve in water.  We had a bit of fun with that.  

    After playing with the EnviroBlox we teased Popotan with a laser light.. that was fun.

    After Ethan left, I worked on editing a vlog and played a game with Annaleah.  Then hubby made us Thai Curry,

     

    (similar to the pic above)

    which we ate while watching Stranger than Fiction. 

     

    We cried. 

    That was pretty much my day.  Anna’s fever seemed to have been down all day. 

    We are still going to take it easy tomorrow, just to make sure.

    I think it may be time to cuddle up with Anna and watch some Gilmore Girls. 

    Have a great night. 

March 4, 2011

  • Photo & Prompt Challenge: Day 4

    Day 4 -An experience that made me who I am today. 

    This is a really difficult question.  There are a lot of things that make me the person I am today. 


    I was born into a family that did not have alot of money or material things.  My parents had their issues.  I will not share them here.  They did the best they knew how with us.  We were never starving or seriously injured.  They kept us safe the best they knew how.  When I was 7 years old I lost 60% of my hearing.  This changed me in so many ways I can’t explain.  Kids in school are mean, that’s for sure.  However, I still loved school.  I loved learning.  I however, avoided most kids and only had 1 or 2 friends in school. 


    In my teen years, my parents were very overprotective.  I didn’t go anywhere, except school.  That was just how it was.  I was extremely shy and insecure.  At 19 I met a guy.  I was trying to escape my parents.  I was a good girl.  Did well in school.  Never did anything to get anyone upset with me.  Or tried not to.  However, now I wanted out.  I thought I was in love.  Someone actually loved me back.  However I did the one thing I had promised God and myself I would never do.  I was so afraid of losing the ‘guy’ in my life.  I would have done anything to make sure I stayed with him.  Looking back, that kinda scares me now. 

    This was the first thing to completely change my life.  At this point I realized that I did not want to ever put my child in any danger.  I wanted a stable home, a stable life.  My whole being started to revolve around this precious, precious being that had come from me.  I wanted to do it all ‘right’.  However, I still didn’t know what the right way was.  I was determined to find out.  I was never going to put anything ahead of this little guy.  That included men.  The one guy I thought I loved was now far away.  I had moved to RI with my parents before I even knew I was pregnant.  My parents were a huge blessing to me during this time. 

    Sure I was interested in other men.  Thought they were cute.  But that was the extent.  I was not getting involved ever.  I started a family day care so I could home school my son.  I had heard horrible stories of a teacher in our area that called kids names in the classrooms.  This one young shy boy was called “stupid” along with other names.  There was no way I was taking a chance with my son.  No one was going to hurt him in any way.  (In that area I guess I became overprotective) 

    Then I met Angel who changed my world once again.  Here was a guy who loved me for who I was.  He was pushy for sure.  He did not stop trying to win me over.  He changed my life in so many ways.  He wanted to adopt David but was very understanding when David did not want to change his last name.  After 6 years of dating and only seeing each other on weekends.  We were married. 

    This was a huge change.  We moved to Connecticut.  I no longer did home daycare or home schooled.  David wanted to go to public school and Angel agreed.  At this point I didn’t know what to do with myself.  I got involved in the school’s PTO.  This shy girl eventually took over as co-president of the PTO (although I still did the background work while my other co-president dealt with the stuff I avoided..lol)  along with leading the Grinder Lunch Program and even the Fundraiser. 

    Then this little girl was born.  However the first 24 hours of her life were shattered when it was discovered she had a cleft palate.  The docs and nurses we dealt with had no understanding of what this truly meant.  After a nurse forcing a bottle of formula down her throat which Anna aspirated into her lungs, Annaleah ended up in NICU, un-necessarily for over 2 weeks.  The first week of docs not knowing what to do with her and me having to constantly remind them that she needed special bottles to prevent in from happening again.  The fights for them to let me pump milk for her.  It was horrible.  They finally sent her to another hospital who spent the week teaching her how to eat so they could remove the tubes.  This whole experience changed me once again.  I discovered I was a lot stronger than I thought.  I learned to fight for her.  To learn what I needed to learn on my own.  I no longer just trusted other’s words. 

    There are so many things that make me who I am.  Being a child/teen and watching how adults treat other kids (I have seen alot there). I have always been very aware of things around me.  They shaped me in so many ways.  Then there are big things.  My grandmother’s passing.  Watching my mom as we almost lost my dad.  I will say my parents have always amazed me.  My dad even with his struggles with alcohol always made sure we had food.  Always made sure we were safe.  My mom has stuck through it all.  Her endurance is amazing to me. 

    Lastly, the recent health issues with my husband.  I am learning not to take this time for granted.  To watch the strong men in my life suddenly fighting for their life has been the hardest experience I have ever had to go through.  I know that each time I am getting stronger. 

    The Lord is showing us so much through each experience in our lives.  He is shaping me to be the person He wants me to become. 

March 3, 2011

  • Photo & Prompt Challenge: Day 3

    Day 3 – Your favorite shows

    We do not watch alot of shows on TV.  There is however, one show that we can not miss. 

    We have watched Bones since the first time it aired. 

    Anna and I enjoy watching a series together during lunch break.  The current one we are getting from the library. 

    The one show we can watch over and over again as a family is..


    We own the dvd’s to Dr. Who.  Unfortunately, we do not have cable so we have not seen the new season yet. 

    Then last but not least.  Our favorite Asian Drama is


    We really enjoy Asian Dramas as a family.  They do not take years to end.  They usually last about 20+ weeks and have an ending.  This drama made us laugh and cry.  We really fell in love with the characters.  My daughter loves that she is now able to read the subtitles with us as well.  I would love to get ahold of the Manga for this story. 

March 2, 2011

  • The 31 Day Photo & Prompt Challenge – Day 2

    Day 2: The person (or people) that make your world go around.

    There is no way I can just chose a person.  So here are a few. 


    My Angel


    My son, David and his son, Ethan.


    My daughter, Annaleah (with Ethan)


    My nieces who spend most of their vacations with us.
    Annaleah, Kaitlyn, and Jade

    I can’t leave out my parents.  I don’t see them much these days but they are always in my heart.

  • The 31 Day Photo & Prompt Challenge

     I decided to participate in The 31 Day Photo and Prompt Challenge at It’s Gravy, Baby!  I have seen this around Facebook, but have not joined in.  My niece started doing it while she was here.  I think it is an awesome idea to do it in a blog.  If you would like to join in, Click the button below.  All the prompts are at the site. 

     

    Day 1:
    A photo of yourself with 10 facts


    • I hate pictures of myself.
    • I am a 42 year old mom of 2 and Meemaw to 2.
    • When I was 10 I changed my name spelling to Lynda because I loved Lynda Carter. (We even share the same birthday)
    • I started teaching Sunday school for preschoolers at 15.
    • I can not imagine never having kids in my life.  It would be boring!
    • My dream as a child was to teach, open a daycare center or become a foster mother.  I did run a family daycare in my home for 5 years.
    • I am extremely shy in person, at social gatherings prefer to hang out with the younger kids.
    • I have a phobia of driving.
    • I was a single mom for almost 11 years.
    • I avoided all guys til I met my persistent hubby 17 years ago.  (married 11 years now).