What is it?

So a couple of years ago I suffered from a sudden onset of Vertigo. And it stuck around for a couple of months leaving me with a huge crick in my neck (presumeably from trying to "still" myself from spinning). It's like getting the drunk spins (or so I've heard, I really don't know much about those...)
I went and saw a quack called a Cranio-Sacral Therapist who breathed out my bad energy while only touching me with the tips of his fingers. It worked. No shit. And I had don't every conventional therapy, pill, herb, massage, you name it. And this voodoo crap stopped it.
But it didn't cure it. And last night at about 2:30 I woke up with the spins. Which I don't understand since I was sound asleep. And I didn't even have the beers that would induce such night spins.
All the tests that were performed when this all first happened were inconclusive. I don't have a tumor (It's not a tu-muh!) And the only diagnosis I found for myself online is called Meniere's Disease. Which means you get occasional dizzy spells. Whatever. It sucks. It zaps my energy and I get that pit in your stomach like after you've ridden one too many rides at the fair after eating a funnel cake and a basket of curly fries.
I think it's over, a shower washed it away this morning, I hope it doesn't return tonight. Ugh.
And I got lectured about Vitamin D twice today, I may have to lecture all of you on it shortly. But for now I'm going to bed.

OH! Larry just told me that I get to dog-sit Munch's dogs this weekend! He has the perfect dogs (breed wise anyway) and I can't wait to get my hands on them. Fats is a pug (except he's tall and skinny) and Molly is a bulldog. I really want a bulldog, but the size of their mouth scares me a little now that I've actually played with one. And both dogs snore I believe. So they may come play here during the day, but sleep back at their house. I don't do snoring. I can hear Katie snoring outside during the summer when the windows are open and it drives me nuts. Once, when I was a little girl, I spent the night at my Grandma Iva's house. She snored so loudly (from 2 doors down) and she was so intimidating, that I called my parents in the middle of the night to drive the 20 minutes to rescue me. I don't do well with snoring. I don't snore, I just hold conversations with Lar while I sleep, then we argue the next day because he thinks we actually discussed something. Always the multi-tasker, I am.

Trek to the Tulips

Since this is the last official weekend of the tulip festival, we thought we'd try to brave the traffic and make an appearance (we haven't been since Brady was a baby). We found one patch, and just as we decided to head to another, the rains came. It was a quick trip to Skagit county that day. Oh, well. Natalie did have a grand time picking up petals that had dropped and had quite a collection of muddy, wilted, tulips petals before we left. Then she "planted" them among the flower beds in the garden where we parked. Nice.

Super busy Saturday

Brady showing off his mad skills as a firefighter.


Her Highness couldn't take the sun in her eyes, so she insisted I surrender my shades.















We had such a fun day on Saturday, it was a gorgeous spring day. We headed down the hill to the Safety fair (and ran into about half a dozen friends) where Brady and Natalie practiced their bike safety, and inspected the fire trucks, police car, coast guard jet skis, WTA bus, and the new humane society van. Brady was in heaven. Then we caught the bus downtown and met mom and Tracy (and Brooke and EB) at the market (and ran into a few more friends) and got our first kettle corn of the season. I also scored a couple new plants, but restrained myself on some really pretty jewelery.

Took the bus home and then headed over to Whatcom Falls park just because. We didn't get home until after 5 (and our day started at 10 over at Erin's home!).

Springtime in the Northwest

We saw this more than once today...

Sorry it's blurry, it was a covert shot on the bus.

Zuanich

There was just enough sun yesterday to make a trip to the park. I put on both of my coats so that I wouldn't be the party pooper for my kids by freezing my ass off and making them leave after 15 minutes.
We got there at 3 and ended up staying until 4:30 because the weather kept getting nicer, and we kept finding new activities to do including Natalie running completely around the building searching for her new "friend". It was a lot of fun giving her a time out for that in front of all the parents and children at the playground. But I told her not to go chasing after this little girl and she did anyway. And I don't know if that Level 3 sex offender is still living in the marina, but I don't want to find out the hard way.
And we are off to go to the safety fair at Haggen today, they have everything to make Brady's dreams come true down there today: Fire trucks, police cars, bike safety people, and Splash the Otter (Haggen's mascot) will be there to scare the crap out of Natalie, so that's probably just bonus points for Brady. Natalie doesn't like mascots. AT ALL. But she didn't scream at the Home Depot mascot the other day, she just gave him stink-eye and walked on the other side of me. So we're making progress. We'll get to Disneyland someday.

A good day for B.

Lifetime buddies.


Tell us how you really feel about little sisters...


This morning Larry and I met with a team of specialists at the elementary school (speech, special ed, and psycologist) and we got the news we've been waiting for for 3 years. Brady will receive speech and language therapy as well as some social guidance (he gets easily frustrated, and doesn't respond well to a lot of positive feedback). So someone will be monitoring him in the classroom to make sure that he is on course and stays on course to help ensure that he has a positive educational career. This is all I've ever wanted for him. Just enough help to give him the tools to be his best possible self.

After swim lessons tonight we headed over to Erin and Christians home and had pizza. I just love the look of happiness in Brady's face. He truly loves his good buddy. And I love that I have pictures of them together as infants. It will be scary when I have pictures of them heading to prom (with dates, not with each other!)

Beautiful Bride

So Carly found out today that all of her photos from her wedding (that someone volunteered to take for her) are lost and gone forever. They never burned a disk or sent her any copies of the photos, their computer crashed, and now they're gone. I think she has every right to be furious, and the response she got from the person when she expressed her frustration was "They're gone. Get over it."

So, I am posting the best shot I got of the lovely couple and hope that it offers some solace to her while she "gets over it." I'm sorry Carly.

Wonder Girl

Natalie insists that she is Wonder Girl quite a bit. She has a little figurine of Wonder Woman, but she corrects me if I call her "woman".

Natalie finally got her hands on Bradys elbow and knee pads and strapped them on and was giving me her best "tough girl" poses. She is flexing her muscles for me in this photo.

I don't think the world is ready for Natalie... she is something else!

Did my good deed.

Even though it probably brought me more joy than it did her, I made a double batch of Chicken Enchiladas (from my Cooks Illustrated mag, "light" version, but I always add a little cream cheese, light version of course!) to fellow mom Rowenna, and her wonderful little addition, Alex. She has 2 year old twin boys, so I was happy to bring her a meal to ease her load, if only for an evening. And I got to snuggle him for a few minutes until my children, the baby-haters, had their fill of me sniffing Alex's head and rocking to and fro. They complained about being hungry themselves and started walking towards the door! Little stinkers.

Got to head to the hot tub and wear out the last bit of energy out of the two punks, Larry's trying to get out of coming, but I have other ideas >:)

Gulp.

So as I was on the 2nd to last page of The Great Fuzz Frenzy tonight, Natalie suddenly starts acting frantic and crying. I was shocked by her sudden behavior and she is sobbing about her marble. "Your what?" "My marble is gone! Down my froat!" I panic, but then realize she is talking to me so it's gone, so I work on consoling her, and she finds it interesting that it will come out in her poop. That calms her down, but she is still missing the marble, and she is still upset about the fright of swallowing it in the first place. I hope it comes through in the end (har har). No, really.

So of course, here comes Larry wondering why the hell I let her have a marble in her mouth (don't you love it how we all blame the other parent when something goes wrong?) All I saw that she had was a little floss pick and she was happily flossing her teeth while we read. I never saw the marble the whole evening. Sneaky little girl.

Speaking of sneaky... I found about 800 Hershey kisses wrappers in Bradys's bed tonight. Guess who was watching the kids today when he snuck those down (not me!) So we're even I suppose in failing our children today.

BUNCO!

Once again, Bunco night was last night at Beka's home. My wonderful friend Kate picked me up (so we could kick it old skool) and that also gave me license to drink freely (OK, one Mike's Hard lime and 2 beers. I'm an animal!) But that extra beer helped my game fo' sho'. I rolled 6 Travels (when you roll all of the wrong number you're rolling for) but that wasn't the winning score. But my 3 bunco's did the trick! I cruised home with $60 in my pocket!

Tonight Natalie and I drove up to Lynden (I can feel my skin getting hot as I drive into "God's country"). Roxie and her friends are participating in the Relay for Life on a team called "It's 5 o'clock somewhere". Cute, huh? So she had 10 different catalog sales vendors (like Mary Kay, Pampered Chef, Tupperware, etc.) and they gave their profits to their fundraising efforts. I also won a door prize (they called my name just as Nat was amping up a tantrum over num-a-nums). And I bought a necklace that says "hope, love, faith" on it with orange ribbons engraved on it. Supposedly the orange ribbon represents Leukemia (it really does) but I think these ribbon colors have gotten a little out of hand, don't you? I mean red (AIDS), pink (B. Cancer), purple is something, there is a checkered one or something for Autism. Oh, and the infamous YELLOW ribbon. Ugh. I know everyone is passionate about their cause, and obviously I am too if I bought the damn necklace, but I could have lived without the 1800 different colored ribbons.

Off to bed I go... have to get to work early, then go get my feet casted for orthotic molds. G-L-A-M-O-R-OUS, she's Glamorous (flouncy, flouncy).

The Wheels on the Bus...

This morning we went for a bus ride downtown. It's an easy, inexpensive way to kill a couple of hours. The bus stops very near our house so there is hardly any effort involved.

We hit Hohl's and looked at all the Guinea pigs (love them!!!) and baby rats. Got the dogs a treat as well as some millet for Grandpa's bird, Sunshine. Oh, and some tuna treats for the cats.

Then over to the fish store and got some new fish for each kids tanks (2 Dalmatian and 1 Cremecicle Molly's for Brady and 5 Albino Cherry Barbs for Natalie) and they each picked out a snail. My kids have learned to deal with the death of a pet very easily by having fish. We are constantly at the toilet bowl saying goodbye, or finding one all dried up behind the tank when it tried to make a great escape. Every night we feed their fish before bed and watch them for a few minutes, that also includes a quick scan for floaters or carcases stuck to the filter in-take. The problem is that Brady is constantly talking about "When Katie dies... can we get that dog?" Or "When Daisy is dead, can we get a kitten?" Larry and I really went overboard with pets before our children were born. (5 cats and 3 dogs at one point...'nuf said. We're down to 2 and 2, phew!)

Then it was my turn. I drug the kids across the street to Avellino to get my most delicious double-tall-non-fat-no-whip-mocha. Oh, baby. And each kid got a chocolate chip cookie and got about half-way through them before realizing there were pecans in them, then they both promptly abandoned the cookies. I also noticed that Everyday Music has several signs saying "We pay cash", but I don't know what that all entails yet. I have to thank "Tink" who found my blog and commented about an Everyday Music in Portland. I guess when Cellophane Square went through the change, it may have become a chain? So I will look there for my album sales.

Back on the bus... and home at last. Nice afternoon with the 2 kids. Esp. on a grey day. Ugh, I have no energy in this weather!

The foot saga

So... I went to the podiatrist today and had some x-rays done (and got scolded for not putting down that I'm allergic to Sulfa drugs. 1. I forgot to put it down since the list of antibiotics that I'm allergic to is a mile long. 2. Is it really that important for my foot doctor to know that I can't take a certain drug for a cold?)

I have heel spurs (worse on my left foot) and so I got a nice injection of Cortisone into my heel (I'll let you think it was much more painful than it really was... but after having 2 children, nothing really "hurts" anymore in the grand scheme of things) and am wearing a sling around my ankle/heel, and Friday I go back to have molds made for orthotics. I love being in my 30's. What is next decade going to bring me? My heels look like the top picture, like a bone fishing hook.

A heel spur is a bony overgrowth on the bottom of your heel bone. The heel spur is usually a result of an inflamed ligament (plantar fascia) on the bottom of the foot that attaches to the heel bone. Constant abnormal pulling of this ligament irritates the heel bone and the body lays down a bone spur as a protective mechanism. Therefore, most of the pain is cause d by the inflamed ligament and not by the spur itself.


Now don't ask me how this heel spur repairs itself. I don't know, I mean I see how bone grows, but how does it go away? Without me depleting my body of nutrients? I'll find out Friday when I pummel the doc with questions. And I've found that my current orthotics work great in my Croc Mary Janes, and I am going to try them in my Keen's tomorrow. I'm bound and determined not to live my live in conventional shoes!!! (I don't want to hear from any of you about how me not wearing shoes contributed to my current problem. Just like your fat friend doesn't want to hear about not eating that bag of Cheetos while she complains of being overweight.)

I would also like to take the time to thank Jen for her "kind" offering of support hose to go with my orthotics, but I think I'll pass as I no longer work on concrete floors and my legs are alredady covered in spider veins, thankyouverymuch. Now, I've got to get to my walker and shuffle over to my Little Rascal to go for a cruise around the neighborhood. I've got an appointment next week to have my hair dyed blue and put up in a "do". I'm going to dye my miniature poodle the same color as my hair too. My lifetime subscription to Reader's Digest is in the mail. And I've got to get back to crocheting my margarine-tub cozy to hold my pennies for bingo night at the senior center. Oh and my late night snack is my Metamucil fiber wafer, tonights flavor is apple-cinnamon! I'll wash it down with a tall glass of Milk of Magnesia while I relax to the fine entertainment of Lawrence Welk on PBS, just before the TV turns on it's "off the air" call signal and plays the Star Spangled Banner.

Summer Breeze... makes me feel fine

Rollin' through the jasmine in my mind!



Since we missed the sunshine on Saturday (at home anyway), today was the first official Popsicle on the curb day.

This is the 3rd year that I've gotten the kids pic's on the curb with their first "summer treat". Meaning it's finally warm enough that I can kick them outside to eat. This year, our next door neighbor, Riley, joined in the festivities.

While I was being compassionate...

Me and my little bro.



Natalie "missed me ever!"



Do you think they love each other?



Brady and Gabby (the best little dog ever!)




I think my brother may have worn her out.





Just like this photo that Susan snapped of B.




My brother spent the day with Brady and Natalie. They went to a park and to the beach, and watched movies and played video games. The kids were buzzing when I returned to take them home.

Susan also rode down with us, so it was nice to have her there to get some pic's of me and my brother together (we haven't been photographed together in almost 10 years...)

Seeds of Compassion

Pre-game Show.



After the Procession of Cultures, all the tribes from the area gathered around welcomed us to their land.


His Holiness the 14th (not the 4th like Gov. Gregoire introduced him as) Dalai Lama.


Tracy scored a couple extra tickets to the celebration today at Qwest field. The message was about compassion, and how we can bring it in our own lives and put it into action. He also spoke of ending nuclear weapons (if we've all agreed not to use them, why do we still have them?) and how men can be troublemakers when put into power, and women seem to keep peace. Also, he believes that all of the world leaders should take family vacations together. BBQ hot dogs, let their children build sand castles together, etc. So when it comes time to talk about difficult matters, they will have a better connection to the man they are having conflict with. I'm not near as articulate as His Holiness, but I hope I got the just of his message. I am so grateful that Tracy thought of me to invite along and be a part of a glorious day (by far the most beautiful day of the year).

Ungrateful friends

I checked out Craigslist tonight just for fun, and found the perfect gift for Carly and Jim and their expecting bundle of joy.
Imagine my surprise when they laughed at my idea of this as the perfect gift to welcome their beautiful baby! I mean, this is custom made stuff! One of a kind maybe too! I told them I already bought it and that I didn't expect any grand gestures of gratitude. Apparently they don't appreciate my idea of a peaceful, cozy, sanctuary for their baby. Ingrates.







THIS IS THE POST DESCRIPTION FROM THE AD (i love that she doesn't capitalize her i's or use an apostrophe when she uses contractions):
When i found out i was pregnant i didnt want the typical crib bedding, so i had this made for me by a company out of California. Never used as i ended up co-sleeping with my daughter. Has been in storage since i got it. Its really pretty on a crib. Unfortunately i dont have any pictures of it on the one i had bought, as i ended up selling the crib. Includes bumpers, ruffle and purple fitted sheet. Originally cost me 130$ plus shipping. From a non smoking home. CASH ONLY 647-8789.

OH, HER PHONE NUMBER IS SCARY SIMILAR TO MINE! YIKES!

Latest Craft

Finally! When I went with Larry's mom to "cowgirl weekend" a year and a half ago. We stopped at a winery called the Blackjack (it was in the movie Sideways) and I bought a couple bags of corks and they have sat in my garage since then. So last night I finally bought a couple band clamps and this morning I made my cork trivet.

Brady's chore

He loves to go get the mail for me... and he's into making different faces just to see himself in the photo.

Swamp Feet

I just took my shoes off for the evening. Good Gawd. This is why I have made a personal vow to wear sandals when at all possible. I mean besides my fantasy to live a laid back lifestyle (a la Jimmy Buffet), but because I have stinky feet too, which I wasn't aware of until I started wearing my tennies all day. I've been wearing them because they are the only shoe that I can put my SuperFeet orthotics in that provide a small amount of relief.

My foot (now my feet because I've been compensating) is killing me. It' been killing me for months now. I've tried all sorts of things to releive it on my own. But it just hurts now more than ever. My doc said I have almost flat feet, my mother in law says I have a bone spur or plantar facitis, I think I broke the damn thing it hurts so bad, except there is no swelling or bruising so I think I'm wrong.

ANYWAY... yesterday I stepped on a shard of one of my new plates (that chipped! I knew I was not responsible enough for porcelian plates) and it cut the hell out of the ball of my foot. So now it hurts in both the front and back of my foot, so I have no where to shift my weight onto to releive the pain!

So I called my insurance company (dirty bastards as a whole) and they will pay for orthotics! Yippee! So I have an appointment for Monday. Relief is in sight! But now I need some Odor Eaters!

Superfan

I don't geek out (quit laughing) too much about things/music/people but this is one of my absolute favorite movies. It makes me happy to watch it, I love to have a "movie language" with friends and acquaintances (esp. acquaintances, it's so cool to have a instant connection with someone who gets your quirky movie line comment). So I was at Barnes and Noble (when I took myself on a date the other night) and got another piece of flair for my Office Space collection. I have had a red stapler for a couple of years, but now I have my own Initech mug, and a couple other embarrassing items. But I am so excited to drink my morning cuppa in my new mug.

Help?

I have a bunch (not a ton) of old vinyl records. You could even call them vintage. Like Country Joe and the Fish (he's from Whidbey Island, thankyouverymuch); Iron Butterfly (In-a- gadda-da-vida was a drugged pronuciation of "In the garden of Eden"); Blood, Sweat, and Tears; CSNY (I'll give you a prize if you're the first to tell me who that is); The Carpenters; Ramsey Lewis (and the Ramsey Lewis Trio); 5th Dimension (the age of Aquarius); and a few more. I just don't need all this vinyl laying around. I pulled out the ones I really wanted (or didn't have already on disc) like Johnny Cash live at San Quinten, and all my childhood records ( I spent a lot of time alone in my room listening to my record player and reading).

So anyway, to the point. I want to sell them, but have no idea if any of them are actually worth anything. Should I just ask $5 for each on Craigslist? Could one of them be a rare find that could be worth hundreds (and then I'll feel like a fool for selling it for $5 to some schmo.)? If you have any idea on where I could begin (and yes, I looked a little bit online before reaching out) I would really appreciate some direction!

Sick baby

When I got home last night from my wonderful evening, Natalie was sleeping in our bed. Then came the coughing. By midnight, she was barking. So I hauled out the humidifier to try and quell her discomfort.
She woke up this morning bright and cheery. Huh.
Then at 2:00 while we were at my work for a meeting she came to "snuggle". Then she needed my sweater because she was chilly. Uh-oh. Sho' nuf, by the time we left at 2:45, she had a fever and was lethargic. She fell asleep on the way home and slept until 5ish. Dang it!
I did thoroughly enjoy the sweet (and sweaty) snuggles I got to dish out all afternoon, but in the back of my head was all the things I wasn't accomplishing today. Like sweeping/mopping my filthy floors, hauling a bunch of junk to Erin's for another garage sale (shut up), and heading to Trader Joe's to get some various Trader Joe-type things. And maybe a trip to Costco. And I am really bummed because we were supposed to have dinner at Erin's and let the kids run themselves into the ground (translation: easy bed time).
At least Brady had a fun afternoon with the neighborhood kids outside while I holed up with little miss, I hate when one kid has to miss out on stuff when the other isn't feeling well.

WWD

I just got home from WWD (Wine, Whine, and Dine) with some great friends: Brooke, Maggie, Beka, Kate W, Jamie, and her mom Diana. We met up at El Rinconcito, and though I passed on the wine for a Mango Margarita (my MIL just told me not to drink one... it's hard to say no with girlfriends around) and had 1/2 a fajita burrito. Yummy. And I whined quite a bit. About work (my managers style is 'hover and nag'), sleeping arrangements (it seems none of us are night snugglers), being fat (as I sipped my sugar loaded margarita), and much more. It was great.

Then I decided my night out wasn't over (the babysitter had just been releived by Larry, so I needed to milk a little more time out of tonight) so I took myself to Barnes and Noble and got 3 mags, a Office Space coffee mug, and a book called A Beautiful Boy or something like that, sounds like a John Lennon song. I am anxious to get started on it, but I think I'll read all the smut mags I bought first (OK, I only bought People, a pregnancy mag for Carly, and a Cooks Illustrated mag).

And one more whine... I'm pissed I didn't get a photo of our group tonight for my blog and for my "photo a day", next month ladies... I'm gonna gitcha.

My tins arrived!

I did a little happy dance when the mail man arrived at my door today. After dinner at Red Robin with the family, I excitedly started filling and labeling the tins while Larry left to go rock climbing. I really wish he'd wait until our life insurance policy kicked in before doing these thing...

Back to the tins. Don't they make a beautiful display? I had to stop and take a break since the kids weren't all that impressed by them, they want my attention or something.


Oh, today Brady spread marbles all over the floor. I was helping him pick them up and he told me why he did it. He wanted to see if mae-mae (Daisy, our cat) would slip all over them like in the cartoons. That's science, right? Physics? Logic? Some advanced form of intelligence for sure.

Wild Hair.

So today I had a panic attack about the state of my home. I guess I'm a reluctant housewife since I know all my efforts to keep a clean house will be undermined by all the other inhabitants (myself included). I need peer pressure to maintain a sense of order around here, and apparantly I get no pressure from Larry.

So today I tackled the Laundry room and Larry's shitpile that is in our "entry way". It took me a couple of hours, but I weaned his pile down to 1 1/2 baskets. And in the laundry room I:

-Made 3 large garbage bags of goodwill items.
-removed 11 gallons of paint.
-filled one garbage bag with actual trash.
-hauled up a pile of cardboard to recycle.
-Filled a box up with baby items for Carly.
-Removed 2 boxes of paint supplies and a tub of spackle.

Happy Birthday Tracy!

In all my scrapbooking haze, I managed to create a gift for Tracy... a snapshot book (my new fav. gift) and a canvas of the Dhali Lama (oh, I don't know how to spell it, I'm such a heathen). She gets to go see him next week in Seattle, I'm so happy for her.

Had a wonderful evening with a bunch of women, the kids always have fun with Josh and Salim too. We're so lucky to have them in our lives.

Finished today

Couldn't resist finishing one more project today... Brady helped me paint the canvases... They are:
-A heron at Boulevard Park
-Moonrise over Mt. Shuksan
-Sunset off our deck
-Waves at Semiahmoo spit

Fun Weekend!

First of all, I wanted to thank everyone for their kind words regarding my P-Touch. But our family has decided we still had love to offer, so I brought home my new "scrapbooking" (lame marketing strategy) P-Touch. And the best part about this new labeler... it's pink! I'll never forget big grey P-Touch, but I think we are honoring it's death by loving this new one just as much.

I attended the 20 hour crop this weekend. I scrapped my heart out until 2:30 am, slept until 8 (oops!), and got right back into the trenches. In all I scrapped:
-4 8x8 Canvas photos
-I painted a 12x12 canvas and the little 4x4 that goes with it, but lost momentum.
-4 layouts
-3 mini books

I can't show you all of it yet, but here's what I can show you now:



Oh, and no one was more shocked than myself (I am not one of those "lucky" people. I know better than to try to play the lottery) but I won 2 raffle prizes! Not the much coveted Chrysalis package, but I won a great spa package of yummy bath salts and scrubs, and a cert. for a service at a local salon.
THEN... I won the much coveted TOM girls prize. Each employee is going to take my photos and make a layout for me! Scrapbooking just got easier! And I'll have such a nice variety of styles and techniques (and I'll probably scraplift a few ideas too!) I'm so excited about this, just a little anxious about getting some great photos together for them.



And now, my wonderful children spent most of the afternoon next door playing, so I have been resting, and trying to clean up a little too. I need a housewife.

A sad day in the Allred household

My P-Touch labeler died today... I... I... I'm at a loss. And just before all my new spice tins arrive.

Comcast On Demand kicked my butt

The other day I decided to do one of the Ab workouts on Comcast's exercise TV section. I usually stick to Yoga or Pilates. There's a reason for that. My stomach hurts so bad! Larry dropped out of the program 1/2 way through, but I persevered. I've got to do something about my butt-in-the-front. But for now it hurts to cough or breath deep! Got to push through the pain, right?

Working Title

So I plan on making a totally tasteless scrapbook page of Natalie, but I need help with the title. I've narrowed it down to two: Perpetual Plumbers Butt, or Just Say No (to crack). If you know Natalie at all, you know that she sports the crack all the time, so I have quite a collection of photos of it. It won't be cute much longer, so I figure I need to cash in while I can. I'm hoping her butt crack is a sign that she will be tall and skinny as an adult (no more fatty gene!) and be a professional model/volleyball star. I can't find a pair of pants that don't fall off that girl's hips. And she doesn't want to wear tights anymore, so with the cold weather, dresses are out. However, one of her classmates came to school today in a pink camo mini skirt, a pink leopard faux fur hoodie, and a blue cookie monster fur stretchy shirt. Real classy for a 3 year old. Way to go mom. But she was blaming the little girl! YOU bought the freakin clothes, dumbass!