Not So SAHM

…and there was blood…

We had a very physical weekend. I mean, if blood is involved how could it not be?

It all started Thursday night when we stopped at O’Charley’s for dinner. The service was painfully slow. They brought us their fresh-baked rolls with delicious, creamy butter but that only increased our appetite and made some of us a little bit more savage than others. At one point Ashlyn grabbed a steak knife from the table. We thought we had kid-proofed everything as soon as we sat down. She has her ways. We’re still not sure how she got it. However, as soon as she had the knife in her hand she was wielding it at Daddy mumbling something about dinnuh and bwing and stawving. I have polished my lightning fast reflexes and diffused the situation by securing the knife from her chubby little hand and replacing it with a crayon. Go ahead and color on him. Release your frustrations.

Then, on Friday we dropped Reagan off at church for a cultural event and headed out for a nice date night…with Ashlyn in tow. We shopped for a little bit and Ashlyn did very well. It was at dinner again where she exacted revenge for keeping her out past her bedtime. We chose a Thai restaurant that we had never visited before. It was in a strip mall so how swank could it be? We walked in to linen table cloths on the tables (with that white butcher paper covering them so they could make quick cleans between customers) and very few tables in the whole restaurant. There were patrons there though so immediately my stress level went up a few notches. Have I told you the A-equation? The nicer the restaurant = the poorer the attitude. It’s called the Inverse Proportionality of Atmosphere to Attitude. Based on history I knew we were in for an interesting if not embarrassing dinner.

We were dining nicely actually (except for a few highchair cantations) when Ashlyn picks up her spoon (heavy, since we’re in a nice restaurant) and raps Du on the knuckles. Out of nowhere. Du and I were talking when all of the sudden he’s yelping in pain. Ok. She’s lost interest in the spoon. I look through my purse and find something else for her to play with. A kid-sized hair brush. A little not acceptable at a nice dinner table, but whatever. A peaceful toddler is better than worrying about brushing hair at the table. Du hands Ashlyn the brush and bends over because Ashlyn is indicating that she wants to brush his hair. He’s looking at me to continue our conversation, expecting to feel brushing when all of the sudden Ashlyn just knocks him on the head with the brush. So he’s got a knot on his head to match the one on his knuckles.

Saturday brings two birthday parties. One at an ice skating rink and one at a bouncy castle playroom. Guess which one brings the blood. Ice skating was a lot of fun. I haven’t been on skates in years. Reagan started to get the hang of it pretty quickly as well. We felt it safe for everyone involved if we left Ashlyn off the skates this time. Once Reagan gets more comfortable on the ice and doesn’t need me as support I’ll get Ashlyn strapped up. No blood there.

At the bouncy castle party there were three different huge bouncy thingies. Another mom and I actually went down the slide a couple of times. Talk about getting my silly back. The party went pretty well but those bouncy thingies get kids pretty riled up. There ended up being a bloody nose and a bloody mouth. Fortunately neither were on my kid. Both resolved themselves nicely with one kid yearning for a visit from the tooth fairy that night.

After recounting all of this I’m realizing the blood part was actually one of the more tame parts of the weekend. But with our kids around nothing is ever ordinary…

Desperation

I’m desperate. I’ve got at least ten floppy disks that have a lot of our photos from Europe on them. We’re talking pictures from 1997 and 1998. OLD. Do you remember what floppy disks are? Back in the day I had the pictures developed at York Photo labs and they sent me these floppies with the images on them, saved as .pic files.

Well, my computer doesn’t recognize .pic files. I contacted York and the suggested that I use file conversion software. So I tried that tonight. It seems that my files may be corrupted for some reason.

My next step, I’m guessing, is to use something like Bad Copy Pro to try to restore the possibly corrupted files. BUT, I don’t know if this will work for image files…and it’s about late:30 right now so I don’t have time to try. Has anyone every used software to save corrupted files? Is it a pipe dream?

I’m desperate and will pay you my yearly salary* if you can help me get to these images!!!!!!!!! See how many exclamation points I used!!!!!!!!! I’m serious!!!!!!!! We’re talking memories of Germany, France, Austria, Italy, who knows where all.

Please, please, please tell me you can help me or that you know this guy who used to hack into burnt disks destroyed by Soviet spies trying to cover their tracks as a hobby and is now looking for a little extra work. I’m desperate.

*Oh, I’m a SAHM so I don’t make much. Not anything really. But you’ll have my undying gratitude and I may just name my next kid after you. Oh wait, we’re not having any more kids. How about our next pet…

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On a lighter note. It’s Friday! Get your awesome post submitted to me so I can put it on the best list going on the weekend: The Best Posts of the Week list!

The will of the people

Actually, it is the will of God. You all know that I am beyond disappointed right now. In fact, I’m speechless. My fingers still work though, so here we go.

God knows what He is doing. His Will will always be accomplished whether we realize it or not; whether we care about Him or not. He’s got a plan. I can’t even pretend to know what it is, but I do have an inkling.

I saw a sign on tv that said, “help is on the way”. This person is expecting one man to give him hope as if he’s never had hope before. What I ask of you is to not put your hope in man: not a man, not a government, not in government programs. When you put your hope in man you will always be disappointed. I have a feeling there will be many people experiencing this disappointment throughout the next four years (as they have throughout the years expecting the government to be their savior). Man cannot fulfill our hope. Government cannot fulfill our hope. God can. I ask you to put your hope in God. Don’t expect the federal government to make everything peachy keen with peace and prosperity for everyone where everyone is equal and no one has more or less than any other. Not gonna happen. God is the only One who can give true peace. God is the only one who has already made everyone equal no matter how much we have or do not have. Government cannot make people equal.

Now, I have a personal request. We must be proactive at making sure our military is NOT decreased. Yes, we want peace, but peace comes with a price (bodily and monetarily) and can only be achieved if we still walk with a big stick. We don’t necessarily need to use the big stick, but we better be ready and willing to use it. Barney Frank has already been pushing to decrease funding for the military by 25%. What the….? Clinton already slashed way beyond what we could stand. The military is struggling to maintain status quo with not nearly enough manning (thank you, Clinton). You will never convince me that we don’t need a strong military. People, please don’t let this happen. We’re going to need a strong military now more than ever, Biden has even predicted it. The only silver lining in this election is that my husband may actually not be deployed again. But even if he is, he will do it willingly, ready to fight and die for people who don’t give a crap about him or our troops because they want to cut our funding. They pretend that they care about troops. I can tell you first hand, if they cut any funding they don’t care about troops. Because troops are troops whether they’re in Baghdad, Kabul or Fort Hood, Texas. Troops are troops whether they’re defending our freedom overseas or whether they’re pushing all the red-tape paper at the Pentagon. Troops are troops whether they’re full-time troops or weekend warriors. Cutting funding for the military is cutting funding for the troops’ families.

Lastly, I would like to extend a personal big hug to George W. Bush. He is hated and it’s sickening to see how people talk about him and treat him. Are you really proud of yourselves? These are the same people that call for tolerance. Mr. President, you brought us together after 9/11. You have helped to prevent this country from being attacked again. For that I will ever be grateful. Everything else pales in comparison if there is no America left to defend.

We are called to respect authority (see Romans 13 below) and so I will respect the Office of the President and therefore President-Elect Obama. My hope will never rest in him nor his government though. I will never expect him or his government to meet my needs. I will not even expect him to respect my rights and freedoms. But, then again, this is the will of God. Certain things must and will happen.

ROMANS 13 (Submission to the Authorities)
Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God . . . Give everyone what you owe him: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor.

Now, I don’t believe that this election was good for our nation. But my ways aren’t God’s ways and only time will tell what He has in store for us. My prayer is that we, as a nation, will turn back to God and put our hope in Him, not in a government.

P.S. If you’re thinking about leaving a comment only to spit vitriol, or just a nanny-nanny-boo-boo, spare yourself. You will neither change my opinion nor make me any more impressed with you.

P.S.S. Marana tha!

What if he wins?… (not really an election post)

I know! I feel the same way! It’s a little scary to think about.

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You may be wondering: “What up with the hair, Vicki?” (haha, pun intended)
I’ll tell you. This post was originally headed towards a shout out to the 80s, but this darn election…

After I got my hair cut I had to actually go out and buy some hair spray. I had a bottle that’s been in my drawers for literally three or four years. It didn’t even spray anymore. I told you I don’t normally do much with my hair. So…I bought a couple of bottles. And one happens to be Hi Hold + Hi Shine from Aussie. The first time I used this I realized what maximum hold meant. I could barely brush through my hair. Wait. I couldn’t brush through my hair. It was like marshmallow gunk had been sprayed into my hair and allowed to dry.

My mind immediately flashed back to one great scene the 80s classic, Girls Just Want To Have Fun

Fast forward to 1:00. Now, I neither had the time nor patience to produce the full effect. I guess if I would have actually used the whole can I could have come closer.

My hair did stand up on its own. Want proof?

Talk about an action shot…and I’m not even moving! Oh, I love this. They say laughing ads years to your life. People, after looking at the pictures on the camera I gained about five to ten years.

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Now back to my political rant. Please choose carefully today. You don’t want me to end up looking like this forever do you? No, really, you don’t. Tonight we will be hosting another political party. This time we have had everyone guess which states will go red and which will go blue. I’ve borrowed Cindy McCain’s dress and Sarah Palin’s shoes and will be rooting hard. All my football teams won on Saturday…may my luck continue!

Tis the season

I balk at Christmas decorations in stores before Thanksgiving. It’s ridiculous and proves how the holiday season is really nothing more than a commercial holiday. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for capitalism, but it just seemed wrong to me when I saw garland hanging from the ceiling of one of my local stores before Halloween. Just wrong.

Imagine my surprise and shock at my very. own. self. when I became a partaker on Saturday night. It started out innocently enough. We went to Home Depot so my mom could look at ceiling fans. What, then, drew us to the grossly huge display of fake Christmas trees? For one, there were little battery-powered snow globes that the girls had found. Grandma was over there helping them each pick out one. Then, my eyes wandered over to the cutest holiday plants I’ve ever seen. Maybe not the cutest, but these looked like I could actually take care of them. And they had glitter on them. I was in love. These hip-high evergreens had red foil wrapped around their containers, glitter sprayed on their branches, and some of them even had ornaments already perched on their boughs. They were begging me to take them home.

And surprise of all surprises, Du actually said yes. If Du says yes, I do not say no. So here they are, my admittedly horrendously early attempt at Christmas spirit. I’ll be decorating them with cute little baubles once we get Thanksgiving out of the way (it’s only the grocery stores that decorate and promote Thanksgiving). Now, I guess I’ll bring my fall pumpkins in so they don’t have to compete.

That is not our cat by the way. It’s the official neighborhood Welcoming Committee.

Clocks…

I think there’s a Coldplay song by that title that I like.

I’m getting ready to set my clocks back an hour. This silly little ritual always manages to mess with people, whether we’re supposed to jump ahead an hour or fall behind an hour. I know there will be people showing up to church an hour early tomorrow. . .

Kind of like how we showed up an hour late one year. I’ve posted about that before, but you probably weren’t reading me back then. I’m including the link below in case you want to read about this pretty funny story (if you ask me) and get a little bit of Vintage Vicki (I like that title!).

Spring Forward Or Else…

Hope you enjoyed your extra hour of sleep! If you have children still dependent on you for breakfast making, or even just to get them out of their beds, then you will not have enjoyed that extra hour. I know I’ll be feeling your pain.