Good Google: I recently discovered through a friend that there is a feature you can get with your gmail account where you can have multiple inboxes for your gmail account. What you do is assign labels to your different emails and then choose to have those emails have their own inbox. You have to go to Google Labs to get it cuz it is still in beta, but I really love it and hope that I get to keep it.
I get a lot of emails regarding my reviews and using the different inboxes helps me keep everything straight...I can put emails regarding products I'm waiting to get in one box and move them to the post review box once I get the product. It is working very well for me!
BAD Google: I used to love my Google toolbar's AutoFill feature. I could use AutoFill just about everywhere to automatically fill in forms and such. But when they upgraded the toolbar to level 5 they decided to not have AutoFill work for login boxes anymore. :( I don't even know if the AutoFill works for anything else because I use it mostly for log-ins. So I'm not a happy camper. The bad part is that I took toolbar 5 off my computer and put 4 back on, but 5 kept reloading to my computer. I finally got tired of reloading 4 and deleting 5...so now I'm just not happy. And I guess what really upsets me is that one Google guy said that they didn't know what was causing the problem and would fix it. But I read on another page that they did it on purpose to work better with Internet Explorer. It is not making me work better!!!
Friday, February 27, 2009
Thursday, February 26, 2009
the update...
OK Chick has asked for an update...so here it goes.
Today - I need to get some groceries (plan a menu first). I should see if I can get my dog groomed and Darly an eye appointment too. I need to work out and shower. DH would like for me to vacuume the house... we'll see how much of that gets done. And Darly has gymnastics this evening.
Yesterday - I worked out for 40 min and took Darly to go rock climbing at REI. If you click on that link you'll see a picture of the store on the righthand side. That HUGE glass window is where the rock climbing structure is...it faces west and it gets VERY HOT in there! I forgot to bring a camera so I don't have pictures of Darly climbing (our friend let me use her camera but needs to find her USB cord). Darly "owned" the pinnacle (that's what the call the rock climbing structure). At one point one of the girls decided to time how quickly the two fastest kids could climb it...Darly did it in one minute 17 seconds! Thankfully the belayer allowed Darly to climb it a few more times than the rest of the kids. There were 8 kids climbing, 6 girls & 2 boys. The girls were all much better at climbing than the boys. We figured out quickly that the girls were better at using their legs to climb with when the boys insisted on using mostly their arms. Only one of the two boys ever made it to the top and the other one was very embarrassed that the girls were doing so much better than he was. The belayer was very impressed with Darly, he said she had good climbing form and was using her body correctly to get up. I had been calling Darly my little "Spider Woman" but the belayer called her a tree frog and I have to agree that the frog image fits her much better. Darly LOVES to climb! The Pinnacle has multiple routes for the climbers to take to the top and the kids were mostly using the easier route, but I suggested that Darly try the harder one that we had access to...telling her that if it was too difficult she could always go over to the easier route. Darly LOVED the harder one! The harder one had more of the natural looking holds instead of the obivious bolted on holds. If Darly got stuck, she would just run her hand along until she found someplace to hang on to. The belayer offered to let us moms climb too, but I know from my last climbing experience that while climbing up is no problem...I just cannot give up control to the belayer to bring me down. So I declined the climb...but I did sneak up a bit on the other side of the pinnacle with no harness or ropes. Darly of course went up higher than I did. LOL!
Yesterday of course was Ash Wednesday and since there was no Confirmation Class we decided to stay home as we aren't particularly fond of the imposition of ashes part of the service. We'll be there for the entire Holy Week.
Tuesday (24th) was the day we went ice skating. See how that went here. We had lunch with a friend and then got ready for gymnastics class. Darly did very well and had a good time. I don't think that she tried any new skills, but she did get almost vertical on the handstand bar top picture. I need to remember to tell her about the back walkover on the beam that another girl was doing...Darly could so totally do it if she tried.
Monday (23rd) we had nothing scheduled, but we went to pick up Darly's friend to spend the night with us so she could come ice skating with us on Tuesday. I had agreed with friend's mom that I would be over after lunch to get her. Both girls were beside themselves with excitement for this play time. Friend is in Darly's girl scout troop and she lives very close to another girl in our troop. So I asked Friend's mom if it would be okay for the other girl's mom to come and get something she needed from Friend's mom instead of either of us having to drive the entire distance. Here's what happened with that!
The back of her shirt reads I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. and yes for even me the front of the shirt makes me do a double take...and I KNOW her. hee hee
Sunday (22) was the usual. We went to Church and tried to deliver Girl Scout cookies. But when we got there to set up in the Fellowship hall we were suprised to find that the hall had been transformed to get ready for the youth group's fundraiser and that folks weren't going in there except to buy tickets for the event. Well that wasn't going to work for the cookie thing. They had set up fellowship in the narthex and so we had to set up our cookie delivery in the narthex as well. DH & I were both NOT happy with that as we both had visions of Jesus turning over tables in the temple. But what else could we do? We did end up selling about 10 extra boxes and had one nice lady who wanted to buy cookies but wanted the sugar free ones that I chose to NOT have any of because they don't sell and we can't give them back.
Saturday Dh went into work to try and get this project done. He is reviewing proposals for some work on the base. He had 13 proposals to review, but during the week even though he closes his door folks keep inturupting him. It seems to me that closing his door makes them come to bug him more. Perhaps he should just leave it open. hummm We joked that I should make him up a nice sign that reads Colonel is busy. Do not enter unless it is REALLY important or you outrank me. which would be really funny because DH currently outranks his boss (it's a time in the service thing and dh didn't want his boss' job.) He got 4 finished. Part of the problem is that if someone comes in, DH has to make sure that they do not read any of the proposals which he has spread out all over his desk. What a headache!
Friday (20th) we went to our Girl Scout meeting. We had a guest speaker from the Wings over the Rockies museum who came to talk to us about Women in Aviation. It was a facinating presentation and I was so proud of our girls who all listened patiently (even the ones who usually insist that they need to say something RIGHT NOW!) Our speaker said that our girls were the best group he's ever had. That's right we had a man come to talk to us about Women in Aviation. LOL! But it was very educational and interesting to learn that the Russians had less of a problem with women flying than the US did. The Germans were very upset that their fighter pilots were being shot down by Russian women. LOL! GO GIRLS!
Thursday (19th) I worked the cookie cupboard that morning and learned that when the cupboard got the cookie refill order they sent this very old guy to deliver the cookies. He gets there and tells Lynn that he hopes she has about 5 hours cuz that's how long it will take him to unload the 700 cases of cookies she has ordered. Lynn doesn't have the time or the patience to wait on this old guy who was moving like the Tim Conway character who shuffles along. He was only loading his dolly with 5 cases at a time. So she called up a few GS Leaders that she knows and they got the truck unloaded in an hour! The old guy says "Wow! You girls are fast!" One of the gals she called regularly lifts 6 cases of cookies with no dolly.
Darly had gymnastics that evening.
Wednesday (18th) Darly went to a tea party. While she was there I went in search of a Wells Fargo bank to deposit cookie money into. We looked up locations close to the tea party online. One is just a few blocks away so I drive over only to find that it isn't a Wells Fargo...it's a Wacovia! and while Wells HAS bought them out, the transfer won't be done for another year and they can't take my deposit. grrr! She sends me about a mile away to another branch...that turns out to also be a Wacovia!!! WHAT??? so I drive back to the tea party and we look up online and pay better attention to the page...yes it did have that location marked as a Wacovia (Wells must have been excited about the buy out!) but we find a Wells branch that is close, call them to be sure it's a Wells and I get my deposit done.
That evening Darly had her Confirmation Youth Mentor kick off meeting. They did an ice breaker and went over what is expected of the youth and the mentors, afterward was a service that Darly & I decided to skip...so we went home to have cookies.
and that brings us to the 17th...the date of my last update. LOL! I hope I didn't bore you too much with all of this. :D
Today - I need to get some groceries (plan a menu first). I should see if I can get my dog groomed and Darly an eye appointment too. I need to work out and shower. DH would like for me to vacuume the house... we'll see how much of that gets done. And Darly has gymnastics this evening.
Yesterday - I worked out for 40 min and took Darly to go rock climbing at REI. If you click on that link you'll see a picture of the store on the righthand side. That HUGE glass window is where the rock climbing structure is...it faces west and it gets VERY HOT in there! I forgot to bring a camera so I don't have pictures of Darly climbing (our friend let me use her camera but needs to find her USB cord). Darly "owned" the pinnacle (that's what the call the rock climbing structure). At one point one of the girls decided to time how quickly the two fastest kids could climb it...Darly did it in one minute 17 seconds! Thankfully the belayer allowed Darly to climb it a few more times than the rest of the kids. There were 8 kids climbing, 6 girls & 2 boys. The girls were all much better at climbing than the boys. We figured out quickly that the girls were better at using their legs to climb with when the boys insisted on using mostly their arms. Only one of the two boys ever made it to the top and the other one was very embarrassed that the girls were doing so much better than he was. The belayer was very impressed with Darly, he said she had good climbing form and was using her body correctly to get up. I had been calling Darly my little "Spider Woman" but the belayer called her a tree frog and I have to agree that the frog image fits her much better. Darly LOVES to climb! The Pinnacle has multiple routes for the climbers to take to the top and the kids were mostly using the easier route, but I suggested that Darly try the harder one that we had access to...telling her that if it was too difficult she could always go over to the easier route. Darly LOVED the harder one! The harder one had more of the natural looking holds instead of the obivious bolted on holds. If Darly got stuck, she would just run her hand along until she found someplace to hang on to. The belayer offered to let us moms climb too, but I know from my last climbing experience that while climbing up is no problem...I just cannot give up control to the belayer to bring me down. So I declined the climb...but I did sneak up a bit on the other side of the pinnacle with no harness or ropes. Darly of course went up higher than I did. LOL!
Yesterday of course was Ash Wednesday and since there was no Confirmation Class we decided to stay home as we aren't particularly fond of the imposition of ashes part of the service. We'll be there for the entire Holy Week.
Tuesday (24th) was the day we went ice skating. See how that went here. We had lunch with a friend and then got ready for gymnastics class. Darly did very well and had a good time. I don't think that she tried any new skills, but she did get almost vertical on the handstand bar top picture. I need to remember to tell her about the back walkover on the beam that another girl was doing...Darly could so totally do it if she tried.
Monday (23rd) we had nothing scheduled, but we went to pick up Darly's friend to spend the night with us so she could come ice skating with us on Tuesday. I had agreed with friend's mom that I would be over after lunch to get her. Both girls were beside themselves with excitement for this play time. Friend is in Darly's girl scout troop and she lives very close to another girl in our troop. So I asked Friend's mom if it would be okay for the other girl's mom to come and get something she needed from Friend's mom instead of either of us having to drive the entire distance. Here's what happened with that!
The back of her shirt reads I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. and yes for even me the front of the shirt makes me do a double take...and I KNOW her. hee hee
Sunday (22) was the usual. We went to Church and tried to deliver Girl Scout cookies. But when we got there to set up in the Fellowship hall we were suprised to find that the hall had been transformed to get ready for the youth group's fundraiser and that folks weren't going in there except to buy tickets for the event. Well that wasn't going to work for the cookie thing. They had set up fellowship in the narthex and so we had to set up our cookie delivery in the narthex as well. DH & I were both NOT happy with that as we both had visions of Jesus turning over tables in the temple. But what else could we do? We did end up selling about 10 extra boxes and had one nice lady who wanted to buy cookies but wanted the sugar free ones that I chose to NOT have any of because they don't sell and we can't give them back.
Saturday Dh went into work to try and get this project done. He is reviewing proposals for some work on the base. He had 13 proposals to review, but during the week even though he closes his door folks keep inturupting him. It seems to me that closing his door makes them come to bug him more. Perhaps he should just leave it open. hummm We joked that I should make him up a nice sign that reads Colonel is busy. Do not enter unless it is REALLY important or you outrank me. which would be really funny because DH currently outranks his boss (it's a time in the service thing and dh didn't want his boss' job.) He got 4 finished. Part of the problem is that if someone comes in, DH has to make sure that they do not read any of the proposals which he has spread out all over his desk. What a headache!
Friday (20th) we went to our Girl Scout meeting. We had a guest speaker from the Wings over the Rockies museum who came to talk to us about Women in Aviation. It was a facinating presentation and I was so proud of our girls who all listened patiently (even the ones who usually insist that they need to say something RIGHT NOW!) Our speaker said that our girls were the best group he's ever had. That's right we had a man come to talk to us about Women in Aviation. LOL! But it was very educational and interesting to learn that the Russians had less of a problem with women flying than the US did. The Germans were very upset that their fighter pilots were being shot down by Russian women. LOL! GO GIRLS!
Thursday (19th) I worked the cookie cupboard that morning and learned that when the cupboard got the cookie refill order they sent this very old guy to deliver the cookies. He gets there and tells Lynn that he hopes she has about 5 hours cuz that's how long it will take him to unload the 700 cases of cookies she has ordered. Lynn doesn't have the time or the patience to wait on this old guy who was moving like the Tim Conway character who shuffles along. He was only loading his dolly with 5 cases at a time. So she called up a few GS Leaders that she knows and they got the truck unloaded in an hour! The old guy says "Wow! You girls are fast!" One of the gals she called regularly lifts 6 cases of cookies with no dolly.
Darly had gymnastics that evening.
Wednesday (18th) Darly went to a tea party. While she was there I went in search of a Wells Fargo bank to deposit cookie money into. We looked up locations close to the tea party online. One is just a few blocks away so I drive over only to find that it isn't a Wells Fargo...it's a Wacovia! and while Wells HAS bought them out, the transfer won't be done for another year and they can't take my deposit. grrr! She sends me about a mile away to another branch...that turns out to also be a Wacovia!!! WHAT??? so I drive back to the tea party and we look up online and pay better attention to the page...yes it did have that location marked as a Wacovia (Wells must have been excited about the buy out!) but we find a Wells branch that is close, call them to be sure it's a Wells and I get my deposit done.
That evening Darly had her Confirmation Youth Mentor kick off meeting. They did an ice breaker and went over what is expected of the youth and the mentors, afterward was a service that Darly & I decided to skip...so we went home to have cookies.
and that brings us to the 17th...the date of my last update. LOL! I hope I didn't bore you too much with all of this. :D
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
All's Well that Ends Well...
It is just nerve wracking getting to the end point!!!
Back in mid-January I had arranged for a group of us homeschoolers to go Ice Skating at our local college's ice rink. I had called up and spoke to a woman about getting a date for this because they don't normally post their schedules that far in advance. Because we were planning to come on a Public Skate day the gal didn't take my contact info.
Today was the day for the skating. I emailed folks last Friday to remind them and begged that if they knew they couldn't come to let me know because we needed 15 folks to get our group discount and we were pretty close...loss of one family could ruin everything!
This morning I check my email and there isn't anything there. But then I see on Facebook that one of the families is sick. YIKES!!! So I start scrambling trying to round up skating bodies. A bit later I get a call and an email from one of the other gals...her friend decided to punish her kids by taking away the skating trip!!!! WHAT???? How could she do this??? Luckily I don't know this lady.
I managed to round up another 4 people and the lady with the friend who bailed out found another friend who would bring another 3 folks...so we were good.
We get to the rink and I go to check in with the desk...and the gal tells me that they don't have public skating today. They've scheduled hockey practice in that rink instead. Excuse me? So the gal at the desk starts calling around for someone to figure this all out...I head to the bathroom.
After I get back and a few minutes, (I sent all the kids outside to play so they wouldn't be terrorizing the place) a lady shows up. The desk gal tells her what I told her which is everything in the first paragraph up there and low and behold...SHE IS THE PERSON I TALKED TO!!! And even better she remembers the conversation we had.
She appologizes for the confusion and calls over to the other rink since we can't use the one being used for hockey (they'll clobber us!) She says that if there isn't any problem with the ice then we can skate there. It ends up taking another 20 min, but YES we can skate on the other rink...we just need to be out of there by 2pm.
No problem!
So I pay the gal, my group gets rental skates and we're good to go!
I'm now getting to know my way around the college's athletic center way to well! LOL! But we got to skate. Woo hoo! And I even made some new friends (kid sized friends. One girl decided to hold my hand and talk my ear off while we skated.)
After skating we went to lunch with a friend...I should have had another cup of soup though...cuz I got home and grabbed a bag of potatoe chips. :P
but it's all good. I'm gonna go work out and take care of that.
Back in mid-January I had arranged for a group of us homeschoolers to go Ice Skating at our local college's ice rink. I had called up and spoke to a woman about getting a date for this because they don't normally post their schedules that far in advance. Because we were planning to come on a Public Skate day the gal didn't take my contact info.
Today was the day for the skating. I emailed folks last Friday to remind them and begged that if they knew they couldn't come to let me know because we needed 15 folks to get our group discount and we were pretty close...loss of one family could ruin everything!
This morning I check my email and there isn't anything there. But then I see on Facebook that one of the families is sick. YIKES!!! So I start scrambling trying to round up skating bodies. A bit later I get a call and an email from one of the other gals...her friend decided to punish her kids by taking away the skating trip!!!! WHAT???? How could she do this??? Luckily I don't know this lady.
I managed to round up another 4 people and the lady with the friend who bailed out found another friend who would bring another 3 folks...so we were good.
We get to the rink and I go to check in with the desk...and the gal tells me that they don't have public skating today. They've scheduled hockey practice in that rink instead. Excuse me? So the gal at the desk starts calling around for someone to figure this all out...I head to the bathroom.
After I get back and a few minutes, (I sent all the kids outside to play so they wouldn't be terrorizing the place) a lady shows up. The desk gal tells her what I told her which is everything in the first paragraph up there and low and behold...SHE IS THE PERSON I TALKED TO!!! And even better she remembers the conversation we had.
She appologizes for the confusion and calls over to the other rink since we can't use the one being used for hockey (they'll clobber us!) She says that if there isn't any problem with the ice then we can skate there. It ends up taking another 20 min, but YES we can skate on the other rink...we just need to be out of there by 2pm.
No problem!
So I pay the gal, my group gets rental skates and we're good to go!
I'm now getting to know my way around the college's athletic center way to well! LOL! But we got to skate. Woo hoo! And I even made some new friends (kid sized friends. One girl decided to hold my hand and talk my ear off while we skated.)
After skating we went to lunch with a friend...I should have had another cup of soup though...cuz I got home and grabbed a bag of potatoe chips. :P
but it's all good. I'm gonna go work out and take care of that.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
My TMJ saga...
Yes Heather, I have TMJ too.
For the rest of you TMJ is Temporomandibular joint disorder
and Wiki does a really good job of explaining it.
Things began for me in about 1984. I noticed that my jaw was clicking and one morning when I was 17 I woke it up with it "frozen" shut. Now it wasn't really frozen permanently, it was just that my jaw was so stiff that morning that it took a good half hour before I could use it normally again. My mom set up an appointment with a orthodontist right away.
There had been some news stories about folks with TMJ on TV...telling about how they had been treated with joint replacement only to have those joints fail and the replacements mess up their jaws & face...a lot! So I was very nervous about what kind of treatment my orthodontist was going to prescribe.
As it turns out an orthodontist while not the correct doctor to treat this, was probably the best option at the time. My ortho decided that my jaw as upset because it was out of alignment and decided to have me wear an alignment plate to push my jaw back together.
Let's go back here... in approximately 1975 I had braces and treatments for my overbite. My overbite was so severe, there was a good centimeter between my upper and lower jaw when closed. So this orthodontist first attempted to push my upper jaw back, but when that didn't seem to be working he decided that we should try pulling my lower jaw forward. To get to this goal he fitted me with a mouth piece that I would wear at night that pulled my lower jaw past my upper jaw.
I'm no doctor, but I would bet good money that this treatment is where my problems with TMJ began!
Okay back to 1984. After this ortho pushes my lower jaw back and my jaw clicking hasn't frozen up my mouth anymore he suggests that we put on full upper and lower braces to pull my lower jaw forward again!!! Even as a 17y/o I could see the flaw in this plan and I declined (good thing as my parents couldn't even begin to afford it!)
I learned to live with my clicking jaw and learned that guys don't appreciate it when you giggle about your popping jaw when they are trying to kiss you. Hey I was 17! Give me a break!
Now flash to 1994, my jaw pain is so severe that I think I have an ear infection. I go to the militaryquack! um...doctor who for once decides that this is over his head and gives me a refferal to an oral surgeon. (I call this guy a quack because of some of the other treatments he subjected me to, this time he got it right.) Unfortunately, it took about 6 months for me to actually be seen by the oral surgeon and I had to pull some strings to do it. Luckily one of my neighbors was the patient advocate at the base hospital.
We were living 4 hours away from the oral surgeon's office. And for part of the drive the road was under construction and that made for a very stressful drive...I would complain to my doctor about it every time I saw him.
My doctor explained a lot about TMJ to me. He taught me that what I had done to myself was to stress out so much that my brain was no longer getting the signals from my jaw that I was clenching it. So there was this vicious cycle... brain under stress - brain tells jaw to clench - jaw clenches - jaw sends signal to brain that it is clenching - brain doesn't get signal that jaw is clenching - brain tells jaw to clench - jaw clenches more - brain still doesn't get the message that the jaw is clenching and sends the signal again! all of this clenching is called Bruxism and it can happen with any of your muscles...just in the jaw it causes TMJ. Doc plan of attack was to train my brain to realize when my jaw was clenching so that I could try to stop it before damage was done.
My doctor gave me some biofeedback exercises to do while I was awake. I had to do them at least 4 times per day. I put my fingers on the muscles of my jaw and clench them on purpose. This would give my brain a dual signal that my jaw was clenching...eventually the brain is supposed to relearn to get the original signal from just the jaw. But at night there wasn't any way I could feel myself clenching and stop it, so we resorted to drugs to knock me out to keep me from clenching at night.
I was treated for a little over a year this way and it seemed to help a lot. I had to keep a pain and sleep diary to record how long it took me to go to sleep and if I remembered dreaming (if you don't remember that you dreamed, it means you didn't go into deep enough sleep to dream) which means you were probably clenching too much.
I stopped seeing my doctor in 1996 because he moved to another base and we did too...but he had released me from care and told me to just continue my exercises and be aware of when I was clenching. It was decided that my jaw movement was good enough (I could open my mouth big enough to live & eat) that I did not need joint replacement surgery.
I'm not cured. I will always have this. But for the most part I live with it without it disrupting my life. Occasionally I have a rough day and it gives me a killer headache. But I haven't had my jaw freeze up on me and my jaw has good mobility without clicking too much. so we're calling it good.
For the rest of you TMJ is Temporomandibular joint disorder
and Wiki does a really good job of explaining it.
Things began for me in about 1984. I noticed that my jaw was clicking and one morning when I was 17 I woke it up with it "frozen" shut. Now it wasn't really frozen permanently, it was just that my jaw was so stiff that morning that it took a good half hour before I could use it normally again. My mom set up an appointment with a orthodontist right away.
There had been some news stories about folks with TMJ on TV...telling about how they had been treated with joint replacement only to have those joints fail and the replacements mess up their jaws & face...a lot! So I was very nervous about what kind of treatment my orthodontist was going to prescribe.
As it turns out an orthodontist while not the correct doctor to treat this, was probably the best option at the time. My ortho decided that my jaw as upset because it was out of alignment and decided to have me wear an alignment plate to push my jaw back together.
Let's go back here... in approximately 1975 I had braces and treatments for my overbite. My overbite was so severe, there was a good centimeter between my upper and lower jaw when closed. So this orthodontist first attempted to push my upper jaw back, but when that didn't seem to be working he decided that we should try pulling my lower jaw forward. To get to this goal he fitted me with a mouth piece that I would wear at night that pulled my lower jaw past my upper jaw.
I'm no doctor, but I would bet good money that this treatment is where my problems with TMJ began!
Okay back to 1984. After this ortho pushes my lower jaw back and my jaw clicking hasn't frozen up my mouth anymore he suggests that we put on full upper and lower braces to pull my lower jaw forward again!!! Even as a 17y/o I could see the flaw in this plan and I declined (good thing as my parents couldn't even begin to afford it!)
I learned to live with my clicking jaw and learned that guys don't appreciate it when you giggle about your popping jaw when they are trying to kiss you. Hey I was 17! Give me a break!
Now flash to 1994, my jaw pain is so severe that I think I have an ear infection. I go to the military
We were living 4 hours away from the oral surgeon's office. And for part of the drive the road was under construction and that made for a very stressful drive...I would complain to my doctor about it every time I saw him.
My doctor explained a lot about TMJ to me. He taught me that what I had done to myself was to stress out so much that my brain was no longer getting the signals from my jaw that I was clenching it. So there was this vicious cycle... brain under stress - brain tells jaw to clench - jaw clenches - jaw sends signal to brain that it is clenching - brain doesn't get signal that jaw is clenching - brain tells jaw to clench - jaw clenches more - brain still doesn't get the message that the jaw is clenching and sends the signal again! all of this clenching is called Bruxism and it can happen with any of your muscles...just in the jaw it causes TMJ. Doc plan of attack was to train my brain to realize when my jaw was clenching so that I could try to stop it before damage was done.
My doctor gave me some biofeedback exercises to do while I was awake. I had to do them at least 4 times per day. I put my fingers on the muscles of my jaw and clench them on purpose. This would give my brain a dual signal that my jaw was clenching...eventually the brain is supposed to relearn to get the original signal from just the jaw. But at night there wasn't any way I could feel myself clenching and stop it, so we resorted to drugs to knock me out to keep me from clenching at night.
I was treated for a little over a year this way and it seemed to help a lot. I had to keep a pain and sleep diary to record how long it took me to go to sleep and if I remembered dreaming (if you don't remember that you dreamed, it means you didn't go into deep enough sleep to dream) which means you were probably clenching too much.
I stopped seeing my doctor in 1996 because he moved to another base and we did too...but he had released me from care and told me to just continue my exercises and be aware of when I was clenching. It was decided that my jaw movement was good enough (I could open my mouth big enough to live & eat) that I did not need joint replacement surgery.
I'm not cured. I will always have this. But for the most part I live with it without it disrupting my life. Occasionally I have a rough day and it gives me a killer headache. But I haven't had my jaw freeze up on me and my jaw has good mobility without clicking too much. so we're calling it good.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
you're wondering where I am...right?
well first I had to go and open another window with my blog on it so I could see when I last posted, cuz even I don't know how long it has been.
OK Chick asked about the doggy in the picture of my last post...That's Lilly...she's rubbing her face on my carpet. she knows it's cute.
when last we "spoke" I was in the middle of last Wednesday. I did manage to do all of what I posted. Ohhh what I didn't post was about my Girl Scout leader training. WHAT A COMPLETE WASTE OF TIME! Do you want to know why they had us take this mandatory training??? because they've come out with a new set of books to use. New Leader books, new books for each level for the girls to use to earn...oh wait! They've changed the badge system so now instead of lots of cute badges, they'll only earn 3 or 4. In this lousy economy they want us to switch books and make our girls have get all new books. For a lot of troops this won't hurt so much cuz they make loads of money off cookie sales and can just spend troop funds. But for our troop it would mean each girl buying the books. Well luckily council is smart enough to know that we would all just quit if they forced us to change. So change isn't mandatory, we just have to do it within the next few years. I think I still have time to get Darly through the next level of Girl Scouts on the old system. We'll see.
Thursday we went to learn about Henna tatoos. We got to try to make the cones to apply the henna with. We learned a bit about how the henna is made and why they tatoo themselves. It is neat that the brides get all tatooed and for as long as the tatoos last they don't have to do housework. And finally we got tatooed. They came out really nice even though we didn't leave the henna on nearly long enough. I had intended to leave mine on longer but I put a sticker over mine to keep it from wiping off on my coat...well the sticker took the henna off...bummer. It is still there though, but it is lighter than it used to be.
Friday Darly & I decided to NOT go ice skating cuz that would have been at 10am and we were pooped out from having to be places early every day that week. So we hung out at home that morning. Friday evening I went to Stitch Circle with some friends...Darly came with me cuz DH had to go to bed early and she wanted to come. It turns out that a friend of hers was there, so they chatted at a table near us while we knitted or crochetted. It took me about 5 tries to get my casting on counted right. There was one point where I had the right number on it but I accidentally started knitting with my waste yarn. bummer!
I forget what I did on Saturday.
Sunday we did Church, I still have half of the folks on our list to deliver cookies to. sigh! After Church Darly & I went to IHOP for brunch. And Sunday evening I got to go out! and even though I ate dinner at home all the yummy foods I saw got me hungry. Luckily Heather shared her noodles with me, YUM! and I bought some Key Lime Tart for dessert.
Monday was totally weird cuz DH was finally home. It felt like a Sunday. I made us eggs & baccon for lunch (he didn't want it for breakfast) and I went to the grocery store later. The grocery store was really busy...weird.
Today I went and helped out at the cookie cupboard. That was fun. Mostly we got to chat with eachother and the other cookie folks. One mom got so caught up in the conversation she totally forgot to get her cookies!
Now I'm tired. Oh and today the President was here...wasting taxpayer dollars to sign the useless Stimulus Package here when it could have been done in his office! I didn't see him. I didn't see Air Force one either. But dh got stuck in his traffic and it totally messed up his lunch. sigh
OK Chick asked about the doggy in the picture of my last post...That's Lilly...she's rubbing her face on my carpet. she knows it's cute.
when last we "spoke" I was in the middle of last Wednesday. I did manage to do all of what I posted. Ohhh what I didn't post was about my Girl Scout leader training. WHAT A COMPLETE WASTE OF TIME! Do you want to know why they had us take this mandatory training??? because they've come out with a new set of books to use. New Leader books, new books for each level for the girls to use to earn...oh wait! They've changed the badge system so now instead of lots of cute badges, they'll only earn 3 or 4. In this lousy economy they want us to switch books and make our girls have get all new books. For a lot of troops this won't hurt so much cuz they make loads of money off cookie sales and can just spend troop funds. But for our troop it would mean each girl buying the books. Well luckily council is smart enough to know that we would all just quit if they forced us to change. So change isn't mandatory, we just have to do it within the next few years. I think I still have time to get Darly through the next level of Girl Scouts on the old system. We'll see.
Thursday we went to learn about Henna tatoos. We got to try to make the cones to apply the henna with. We learned a bit about how the henna is made and why they tatoo themselves. It is neat that the brides get all tatooed and for as long as the tatoos last they don't have to do housework. And finally we got tatooed. They came out really nice even though we didn't leave the henna on nearly long enough. I had intended to leave mine on longer but I put a sticker over mine to keep it from wiping off on my coat...well the sticker took the henna off...bummer. It is still there though, but it is lighter than it used to be.
Friday Darly & I decided to NOT go ice skating cuz that would have been at 10am and we were pooped out from having to be places early every day that week. So we hung out at home that morning. Friday evening I went to Stitch Circle with some friends...Darly came with me cuz DH had to go to bed early and she wanted to come. It turns out that a friend of hers was there, so they chatted at a table near us while we knitted or crochetted. It took me about 5 tries to get my casting on counted right. There was one point where I had the right number on it but I accidentally started knitting with my waste yarn. bummer!
I forget what I did on Saturday.
Sunday we did Church, I still have half of the folks on our list to deliver cookies to. sigh! After Church Darly & I went to IHOP for brunch. And Sunday evening I got to go out! and even though I ate dinner at home all the yummy foods I saw got me hungry. Luckily Heather shared her noodles with me, YUM! and I bought some Key Lime Tart for dessert.
Monday was totally weird cuz DH was finally home. It felt like a Sunday. I made us eggs & baccon for lunch (he didn't want it for breakfast) and I went to the grocery store later. The grocery store was really busy...weird.
Today I went and helped out at the cookie cupboard. That was fun. Mostly we got to chat with eachother and the other cookie folks. One mom got so caught up in the conversation she totally forgot to get her cookies!
Now I'm tired. Oh and today the President was here...wasting taxpayer dollars to sign the useless Stimulus Package here when it could have been done in his office! I didn't see him. I didn't see Air Force one either. But dh got stuck in his traffic and it totally messed up his lunch. sigh
Friday, February 13, 2009
Review & Giveaway- Pledge Fabric Sweeper
LILLY
As all of you know, my house has a dog and two rabbits and to females who shed about as bad as the animals! So I was very excited to try out the new Pledge Fabric Sweeper.
My husband is always complaining about how all of his clothes are covered in hair...not his own as it is so short that he wouldn't notice it! Usually the hair on DH's clothes belongs to me or Darly. :o But we are all really happy with our Pledge Fabric Sweeper. The fabric sweeper fits nicely into your hand and picks up the hair and stores it away so that you don't have to rip off a sheet of tape or clean off the brush during your fuz removal!
Pledge is letting me give one of you the chance to try out a fabric sweeper too.
Leave a comment here and a non-partial judge (maybe Lilly if I can figure out how to get her to pick one) will choose a winner of your very own Pledge Fabric Sweeper!
Thanks to the Family Review Network for the chance to try this out! This post was written for Family Review Network as part of a program by SC Johnson, who also supplied the product for review and giveaway.
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
It's only 1/2 over!!!
my crazay day...
get up, get coffee, check the computer for more crazainess to add to this mess!
find out that my copy of The List arrived! Woo hoo!
workout while reading my new book...love a book that makes the time go fast and it does!
shower!
call up homeschooling co-horts to find out what all I need to bring to the party.
get Darly up
head to Target to pick up last minute items and
get lunch
arrive at party about 10 min late but I wasn't in trouble! hee hee
party until 2pm... okay folks it's time to leave!
deliver three cookie orders
deliver three bottles of lotion
deliver cookies for one gal that I goofed up on
oops! I forgot to gring another gal's cookies. good thing I'll see her tonight!
borrow two books for tonight
give mom form I forgot
drive home and look forward to a bit of peace and type up this post before it all starts again!
at 4:30 head over to cookie cupboard to pick up more cookies to fill extra orders
(hey we are now getting 2 cents more per box for the troop to keep for funding activities! YAY cuz one girl sold over 60 boxes so far. Darly is doing her part too, but her dad doesn't work at a place where everyone needs a sugar fix. LOL!)
depending on how long it takes to get the cookies tonight we'll grab dinner and either eat it there or take it home.
drive Darly to confirmation class tonight...gotta fill out her permission form
drive me to Girl Scout leader training
deliver the cookies that I forgot!
and that's it for tonight...I think! Boy I sure hope that I don't forget anything else.
get up, get coffee, check the computer for more crazainess to add to this mess!
find out that my copy of The List arrived! Woo hoo!
workout while reading my new book...love a book that makes the time go fast and it does!
shower!
call up homeschooling co-horts to find out what all I need to bring to the party.
get Darly up
head to Target to pick up last minute items and
get lunch
arrive at party about 10 min late but I wasn't in trouble! hee hee
party until 2pm... okay folks it's time to leave!
deliver three cookie orders
deliver three bottles of lotion
deliver cookies for one gal that I goofed up on
oops! I forgot to gring another gal's cookies. good thing I'll see her tonight!
borrow two books for tonight
give mom form I forgot
drive home and look forward to a bit of peace and type up this post before it all starts again!
at 4:30 head over to cookie cupboard to pick up more cookies to fill extra orders
(hey we are now getting 2 cents more per box for the troop to keep for funding activities! YAY cuz one girl sold over 60 boxes so far. Darly is doing her part too, but her dad doesn't work at a place where everyone needs a sugar fix. LOL!)
depending on how long it takes to get the cookies tonight we'll grab dinner and either eat it there or take it home.
drive Darly to confirmation class tonight...gotta fill out her permission form
drive me to Girl Scout leader training
deliver the cookies that I forgot!
and that's it for tonight...I think! Boy I sure hope that I don't forget anything else.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
A book review - The Help
I just finished reading the most wonderful book. This book made me laugh out loud, it made me cry and it made me shake my head at the utter stupidity of mankind.
Loads of you already know that I grew up in the south...Louisiana to be exact. I was born in the late 60's after the time frame of this book. While I was either too young or too late to experience a lot of what was going on in the south in the sixties...there was still plenty of it going on for a long time afterward.
The little town that I grew up in was very resentful of integration and many of my neighbors flat out refused to go along with it. A lot of my neighbors sent their kids to a private school half an hour away rather than put them in the same school with "them colored kids." My parents couldn't afford to do that and my mother would have never stood for it...my father on the other hand is the most stupid person I've ever known in my life. My life story could easily be started out with the words "I was born, poor white trash..." Luckily my mom taught me that God made us all the same.
okay enough about me...
Product Description
Three ordinary women are about to take one extraordinary step.Twenty-two-year-old Skeeter has just returned home after graduating from Ole Miss. She may have a degree, but it is 1962, Mississippi, and her mother will not be happy till Skeeter has a ring on her finger. Skeeter would normally find solace with her beloved maid Constantine, the woman who raised her, but Constantine has disappeared and no one will tell Skeeter where she has gone.
Aibileen is a black maid, a wise, regal woman raising her seventeenth white child. Something has shifted inside her after the loss of her own son, who died while his bosses looked the other way. She is devoted to the little girl she looks after, though she knows both their hearts may be broken.
Minny, Aibileen’s best friend, is short, fat, and perhaps the sassiest woman in Mississippi. She can cook like nobody’s business, but she can’t mind her tongue, so she’s lost yet another job.
Minny finally finds a position working for someone too new to town to know her reputation. But her new boss has secrets of her own.
Seemingly as different from one another as can be, these women will nonetheless come together for a clandestine project that will put them all at risk. And why? Because they are suffocating within the lines that define their town and their times. And sometimes lines are made to be crossed.
In pitch-perfect voices, Kathryn Stockett creates three extraordinary women whose determination to start a movement of their own forever changes a town, and the way women—mothers, daughters, caregivers, friends—view one another. A deeply moving novel filled with poignancy, humor, and hope, The Help is a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don’t.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I love the way The Help was written. How the author shares the story from the the three different points of view. I found that the different view points gave me a great way of seeing the story. I just can't say enough good things about this book without telling you the entire story.
I feel so blessed that I was able to be able to read this book. The Help will be available today at your favorite bookstore or just click here!
I would like to thank the folks at www.mother-talk.com and www.MomCentral.com for the opportunity to read this book.
Loads of you already know that I grew up in the south...Louisiana to be exact. I was born in the late 60's after the time frame of this book. While I was either too young or too late to experience a lot of what was going on in the south in the sixties...there was still plenty of it going on for a long time afterward.
The little town that I grew up in was very resentful of integration and many of my neighbors flat out refused to go along with it. A lot of my neighbors sent their kids to a private school half an hour away rather than put them in the same school with "them colored kids." My parents couldn't afford to do that and my mother would have never stood for it...my father on the other hand is the most stupid person I've ever known in my life. My life story could easily be started out with the words "I was born, poor white trash..." Luckily my mom taught me that God made us all the same.
okay enough about me...
Product Description
Three ordinary women are about to take one extraordinary step.Twenty-two-year-old Skeeter has just returned home after graduating from Ole Miss. She may have a degree, but it is 1962, Mississippi, and her mother will not be happy till Skeeter has a ring on her finger. Skeeter would normally find solace with her beloved maid Constantine, the woman who raised her, but Constantine has disappeared and no one will tell Skeeter where she has gone.
Aibileen is a black maid, a wise, regal woman raising her seventeenth white child. Something has shifted inside her after the loss of her own son, who died while his bosses looked the other way. She is devoted to the little girl she looks after, though she knows both their hearts may be broken.
Minny, Aibileen’s best friend, is short, fat, and perhaps the sassiest woman in Mississippi. She can cook like nobody’s business, but she can’t mind her tongue, so she’s lost yet another job.
Minny finally finds a position working for someone too new to town to know her reputation. But her new boss has secrets of her own.
Seemingly as different from one another as can be, these women will nonetheless come together for a clandestine project that will put them all at risk. And why? Because they are suffocating within the lines that define their town and their times. And sometimes lines are made to be crossed.
In pitch-perfect voices, Kathryn Stockett creates three extraordinary women whose determination to start a movement of their own forever changes a town, and the way women—mothers, daughters, caregivers, friends—view one another. A deeply moving novel filled with poignancy, humor, and hope, The Help is a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don’t.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I love the way The Help was written. How the author shares the story from the the three different points of view. I found that the different view points gave me a great way of seeing the story. I just can't say enough good things about this book without telling you the entire story.
I feel so blessed that I was able to be able to read this book. The Help will be available today at your favorite bookstore or just click here!
I would like to thank the folks at www.mother-talk.com and www.MomCentral.com for the opportunity to read this book.
Monday, February 09, 2009
Warning: Crazay week ahead!
Today is the calm before the storm...and I might just make it calmer here in a sec.. "Hey Darly, will you please unload the dishwasher?"
Tuesday: a co-op class at 9am, but we have to drive 20 min to get there. That goes until noonish. And I have to deliver cookies to at least one girl, possibly two. Then Darly has gymnastics class that evening, so I have to get her to eat dinner before we go with enough time for it to digest so she doesn't get sick there.
Wednesday: Valentines Day Party to 2pm. I have to pick up more Girl Scout cookies at 4:30 if I can...I may have to wait. fix dinner. Darly to Confirmation at 6:15pm and me to Girl Scout Leader Training at 6:30pm. DH will have to pick up cuz I won't be done until 9:30.
for the Leader Training they are recommending that I print out two books to bring with me. I took a look at the books...one is 61 pages long the other is 70something and both are full of blank pages or pages that are half eaten up by pictures of girl scouts! hummm I don't want to waste my printer ink on that. So I emailed another leader to see 1) how necessary the books were and 2) if I could borrow her copies if I really HAD to bring them. hee hee. Hopefully she tells me that I don't need them or I can get free copies at the meeting. hee hee...now if I could just find my Jr Handbook, I'll be all set.
Thursday: Is DH's Birthday, but he has to work. Another class at 10am and then gym. DH wants brownies for his birthday "cake" yum!
Friday: we might go ice skating and then I have a class at 7pm that night. And I need to do something else too...I sure hope that I remember what that is soon!
I may be out (of my mind) for the rest of the week!
Tuesday: a co-op class at 9am, but we have to drive 20 min to get there. That goes until noonish. And I have to deliver cookies to at least one girl, possibly two. Then Darly has gymnastics class that evening, so I have to get her to eat dinner before we go with enough time for it to digest so she doesn't get sick there.
Wednesday: Valentines Day Party to 2pm. I have to pick up more Girl Scout cookies at 4:30 if I can...I may have to wait. fix dinner. Darly to Confirmation at 6:15pm and me to Girl Scout Leader Training at 6:30pm. DH will have to pick up cuz I won't be done until 9:30.
for the Leader Training they are recommending that I print out two books to bring with me. I took a look at the books...one is 61 pages long the other is 70something and both are full of blank pages or pages that are half eaten up by pictures of girl scouts! hummm I don't want to waste my printer ink on that. So I emailed another leader to see 1) how necessary the books were and 2) if I could borrow her copies if I really HAD to bring them. hee hee. Hopefully she tells me that I don't need them or I can get free copies at the meeting. hee hee...now if I could just find my Jr Handbook, I'll be all set.
Thursday: Is DH's Birthday, but he has to work. Another class at 10am and then gym. DH wants brownies for his birthday "cake" yum!
Friday: we might go ice skating and then I have a class at 7pm that night. And I need to do something else too...I sure hope that I remember what that is soon!
I may be out (of my mind) for the rest of the week!
Saturday, February 07, 2009
Crazy for cookies!!!
Trefoil
Do-Si-Do
Dulce De Leche
Lemon Creme
Samoas
Sugar Free Chocolate Chip
Tagalong
Thin MintThey're here!
My crazy day started off with me getting up at 7am and getting all my paperwork ready to go & pick up the cookies.
8:29 I arrive at the cookie pick up location. There were supposed to be 4 lines of cookie trailers, but I guess we didn't need that much...so there was only one line. I got to wait behind someone who was picking up for two troops, who didn't have enough room for that many cookies! LOL! No big deal, by the time I got all my cookies it was only 2 minutes after my original pick up time of 8:40am.
8:46 or so I get back home and sweep out my garage to unload the cookies into it for sorting. I get everything ready to go by 9:10am, but I'm worried that moms will start showing up before 9:30.
Darly & I sort all the cookies into orders for each girl.
10am arrives and I still haven't seen or heard from any of the moms. So I dig out phone numbers and start calling. I still haven't heard from one mom, but 3 have decided to have me bring out the cookies when I'm going to be near their house. 3 came to get their cookies today.
It is now 2pm and all is calm. I wonder when that one mom will be looking for her cookies...at the meeting yesterday she thought I would have them there. LOL!
oh and I've already had to start making plans to pick up more cookies... the fun begins!
Friday, February 06, 2009
VEGGIETALES®: ABE AND THE AMAZING PROMISE - Review
”If you like to talk to tomatoes, if a squash can make you smile, if you like to waltz with potatoes, up and down the produce aisle… then have we gotta show for you!”
Yep those veggies are at it again! This time it is a Lesson in Patience…NO! Not patients, but patience…you know waiting. ;0)
It’s the story of Abraham & Sarah waiting for a child that God has promised. Waiting so long they begin to wonder if it ever will really happen.
Product Description
Good things come to those who wait! VeggieTales®: Abe and the Amazing Promise, the exciting new Bible-story-based adventure from Big Idea, Inc., an Entertainment Rights group company, releases on DVD February 7, 2009. The DVD launches amidst a comprehensive multi-product VeggieTales “Values To Grow By” marketing campaign.
Abe and the Amazing Promise is a Veggie-spun Bible classic that tells the story of Abraham and Sarah and their wait for a promised child. Featuring a lesson in patience, the DVD showcases nationally syndicated radio host “Delilah” as the voice of Sarah. Including a new Silly Song with Larry entitled “Sneeze If You Need To!,” the musical “misadventures” of Blunders in Boo-Boo-Ville and lots of family-friendly bonus features, this highly anticipated title is available for $14.99 SRP in Christian stores Saturday, February 7, 2009 and everywhere Tuesday February 10, 2009.
While on set filming, Bob the Tomato decides to respond to a fan's letter about "waiting", meanwhile everyone's patience is tested by spitting camels, a confused nurse, an easily distracted film crew, and a host of other laughable filming disasters! Join the comical chaos and calamity in Abe and the Amazing Promise that reminds kids that God always keeps his promises . . . even if we have to wait a while!
This review opportunity couldn’t have come at a better time for me. Was it God’s intervention? I don’t know for sure, but it was certainly timely as we have been studying Abraham & Sarah in my Sunday School class. So after scrounging up a DVD player & TV my class got to watch it with us.
What I love so much about Veggie Tales is how even my 6th graders enjoyed the show. I think the folks at Big Idea do an awesome job of keeping everyone entertained by the story. Another good thing about this movie was while they didn’t cover how being impatient turned out wrong for Abraham & Sarah they added the Blunders in Boo-Boo-Ville which taught the kids that lesson very well. After we watched I asked the kids if they remembered how Sarah & Abraham were impatient and what happened to them for that.
Waiting is hard for everyone, but with a little patience good things (like cookies!) do come to us. You can pre-order VEGGIETALES®: ABE AND THE AMAZING PROMISE now or wait until Feb 10th for it to be available everywhere.
Thanks so much to Family Review Network & Veggies Tales for the chance to review another Big Idea!
Yep those veggies are at it again! This time it is a Lesson in Patience…NO! Not patients, but patience…you know waiting. ;0)
It’s the story of Abraham & Sarah waiting for a child that God has promised. Waiting so long they begin to wonder if it ever will really happen.
Good things come to those who wait! VeggieTales®: Abe and the Amazing Promise, the exciting new Bible-story-based adventure from Big Idea, Inc., an Entertainment Rights group company, releases on DVD February 7, 2009. The DVD launches amidst a comprehensive multi-product VeggieTales “Values To Grow By” marketing campaign.
Abe and the Amazing Promise is a Veggie-spun Bible classic that tells the story of Abraham and Sarah and their wait for a promised child. Featuring a lesson in patience, the DVD showcases nationally syndicated radio host “Delilah” as the voice of Sarah. Including a new Silly Song with Larry entitled “Sneeze If You Need To!,” the musical “misadventures” of Blunders in Boo-Boo-Ville and lots of family-friendly bonus features, this highly anticipated title is available for $14.99 SRP in Christian stores Saturday, February 7, 2009 and everywhere Tuesday February 10, 2009.
While on set filming, Bob the Tomato decides to respond to a fan's letter about "waiting", meanwhile everyone's patience is tested by spitting camels, a confused nurse, an easily distracted film crew, and a host of other laughable filming disasters! Join the comical chaos and calamity in Abe and the Amazing Promise that reminds kids that God always keeps his promises . . . even if we have to wait a while!
This review opportunity couldn’t have come at a better time for me. Was it God’s intervention? I don’t know for sure, but it was certainly timely as we have been studying Abraham & Sarah in my Sunday School class. So after scrounging up a DVD player & TV my class got to watch it with us.
What I love so much about Veggie Tales is how even my 6th graders enjoyed the show. I think the folks at Big Idea do an awesome job of keeping everyone entertained by the story. Another good thing about this movie was while they didn’t cover how being impatient turned out wrong for Abraham & Sarah they added the Blunders in Boo-Boo-Ville which taught the kids that lesson very well. After we watched I asked the kids if they remembered how Sarah & Abraham were impatient and what happened to them for that.
Waiting is hard for everyone, but with a little patience good things (like cookies!) do come to us. You can pre-order VEGGIETALES®: ABE AND THE AMAZING PROMISE now or wait until Feb 10th for it to be available everywhere.
Thanks so much to Family Review Network & Veggies Tales for the chance to review another Big Idea!
Thursday, February 05, 2009
Review - The School of Essential Ingredients
Foodies - this is the book for you! (if you don't know what a foodie is then you probably aren't one...but you will love this book too!)
I just got the wonderful chance to read The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister. I found myself quickly captivated in each of the character's stories and how the author chose to intertwine them all together.
From Publishers Weekly
In this remarkable debut, Bauermeister creates a captivating world where the pleasures and particulars of sophisticated food come to mean much more than simple epicurean indulgence. Respected chef and restaurateur Lillian has spent much of her 30-something years in the kitchen, looking for meaning and satisfaction in evocative, delicious combinations of ingredients. Endeavoring to instill that love and know-how in others, Lillian holds a season of Monday evening cooking classes in her restaurant. The novel takes up the story of each of her students, navigating readers through the personal dramas, memories and musings stirred up as the characters handle, slice, chop, blend, smell and taste. Each student's affecting story—painful transitions, difficult choices—is rendered in vivid prose and woven together with confidence. Delivering memorable story lines and characters while seducing the senses, Bauermeister's tale of food and hope is certain to satisfy. (Jan.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Product Description
Reminiscent of Chocolat and Like Water for Chocolate, a gorgeously written novel about life, love, and the magic of food.
The School of Essential Ingredients follows the lives of eight students who gather in Lillian’s Restaurant every Monday night for cooking class. It soon becomes clear, however, that each one seeks a recipe for something beyond the kitchen. Students include Claire, a young mother struggling with the demands of her family; Antonia, an Italian kitchen designer learning to adapt to life in America; and Tom, a widower mourning the loss of his wife to breast cancer. Chef Lillian, a woman whose connection with food is both soulful and exacting, helps them to create dishes whose flavor and techniques expand beyond the restaurant and into the secret corners of her students’ lives. One by one the students are transformed by the aromas, flavors, and textures of Lillian’s food, including a white-on-white cake that prompts wistful reflections on the sweet fragility of love and a peppery heirloom tomato sauce that seems to spark one romance but end another. Brought together by the power of food and companionship, the lives of the characters mingle and intertwine, united by the revealing nature of what can be created in the kitchen.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The only drawback to this book is that you might find yourself getting very hungry. ;0) It is a great read and I highly recommend it. You can find a copy of The School of Essential Ingredients at Amazon or at your local book store.
Thanks again to mother-talk.com and www.MomCentral.com
Dazed & Confused
Last night Darly & I feel asleep on the couch while watching TV. I woke up some hours later to some infomercial.
I got up and woke Darly for us to go to our beds. Darly stood there for a bit looking for something...
I started going to the stairs and Darly was all upset because I was leaving her and she still couldn't find what she was looking for.
Darly: "Wait! I can't find Mom!"
Me: "I'm right here"
Darly: "No, MY mom"
Me: "then who's mom am I?"
She gave me a dirty look and came anyway. By the time she got to bed she was fine.
I think she was really looking for the skirt she had on earlier but took off before she went to sleep...it's still bundle up on the couch.
She is going to HATE me for posting this. Bwahahaha!
I got up and woke Darly for us to go to our beds. Darly stood there for a bit looking for something...
I started going to the stairs and Darly was all upset because I was leaving her and she still couldn't find what she was looking for.
Darly: "Wait! I can't find Mom!"
Me: "I'm right here"
Darly: "No, MY mom"
Me: "then who's mom am I?"
She gave me a dirty look and came anyway. By the time she got to bed she was fine.
I think she was really looking for the skirt she had on earlier but took off before she went to sleep...it's still bundle up on the couch.
She is going to HATE me for posting this. Bwahahaha!
Monday, February 02, 2009
who lotta nuttin going on
where am I and what have I been doing? I don't know really. I know that TC will spill and tell you that I've been on facebook all this time ignoring you...and she's partially right.
I did start a pretty bad facebook habbit... but I can break it. I know I can!
I had to help Darly with her Girl Scout cookie sale. She's doing pretty well so far. We even managed to sell most of the 25 extra boxes that I ordered so she could get the one prize that she wanted. I don't doubt that we'll have the rest gone quickly...it's amazing how quickly those cookies can go when people see them.
I was also busy with my homeschool group's co-op. Thank goodness my co-leaders agreed to allow me to hand off most of the work back to the folks participating in the co-op. The previous co-op director used to do just about everything and really made it a much harder job than it has to be. Now I just have to approve access to the board. Much more simple! What's uber-cool is how much the folks like my way better. ;0) I think we had something like 60 classes offered this co-op. These folks are amazing and I can't wait for classes to start.
There's been the fun of dealing with MIL. I don't know what all for sure my SIL & BIL have been doing, but it sure making MIL angry.
There was the waterheater fun. We THINK we have that all sorted out now. Actually DH did most of the work. Oh we still have to get the old waterheater up out of the basement and out to the trash by Wednesday. DH assures me that this waterheater weighs much less than the old one. hummm this one still has sludge in it. :p
Saturday night we went to the Observatory in hopes of seeing the Orion Nebula...but our hopes were dashed when we got there to see very thick cloud cover. We were able to see the moon peeking out and one of the guys focused his very powerful binoculars on it. That was pretty cool to be able to see it that well. One of the kids with us didn't want to check it out and it wasn't until I told her that she would be able to see the caters on the moon that she took a look... I hope she was happy that I talked her into it. I have to say that the renovations that they've been doing at the observatory look great! and it was so nice to huddle next to the radiator...I want radiators for my house! toasty!
that's about it. I need to call the dairy and let them know the eggs I requested have two cracked ones in it. sigh
I did start a pretty bad facebook habbit... but I can break it. I know I can!
I had to help Darly with her Girl Scout cookie sale. She's doing pretty well so far. We even managed to sell most of the 25 extra boxes that I ordered so she could get the one prize that she wanted. I don't doubt that we'll have the rest gone quickly...it's amazing how quickly those cookies can go when people see them.
I was also busy with my homeschool group's co-op. Thank goodness my co-leaders agreed to allow me to hand off most of the work back to the folks participating in the co-op. The previous co-op director used to do just about everything and really made it a much harder job than it has to be. Now I just have to approve access to the board. Much more simple! What's uber-cool is how much the folks like my way better. ;0) I think we had something like 60 classes offered this co-op. These folks are amazing and I can't wait for classes to start.
There's been the fun of dealing with MIL. I don't know what all for sure my SIL & BIL have been doing, but it sure making MIL angry.
There was the waterheater fun. We THINK we have that all sorted out now. Actually DH did most of the work. Oh we still have to get the old waterheater up out of the basement and out to the trash by Wednesday. DH assures me that this waterheater weighs much less than the old one. hummm this one still has sludge in it. :p
Saturday night we went to the Observatory in hopes of seeing the Orion Nebula...but our hopes were dashed when we got there to see very thick cloud cover. We were able to see the moon peeking out and one of the guys focused his very powerful binoculars on it. That was pretty cool to be able to see it that well. One of the kids with us didn't want to check it out and it wasn't until I told her that she would be able to see the caters on the moon that she took a look... I hope she was happy that I talked her into it. I have to say that the renovations that they've been doing at the observatory look great! and it was so nice to huddle next to the radiator...I want radiators for my house! toasty!
that's about it. I need to call the dairy and let them know the eggs I requested have two cracked ones in it. sigh
NetSmartz - Review
Teens and tweens today have grown up as digital natives. I know when my tween talks about what she’s up to online, I worry that she’ll be careful. Just because our kids grew up familiar with the Internet does not necessarily mean they have learned safe online usage, which makes it important to find sites that can help.
NetSmartz, a leading online resource of the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, used their expertise to develop NSTeens to educate, engage, and empower kids as Internet users. The website, http://www.nsteens.org/ includes bios, comics, and videos of seven teen characters. Their comic How Much Is Too Much illustrates the consequences of improper Internet use and shows the power of impact teens can have when they use their network to empower people. Videos cover important topics such as social networking, cyberbullying, and offline consequences. Each cartoon video also portrays interviews with teens talking about their Internet use.
Just the other day one of Darly’s blog friends asked where she lives…and Darly was about to tell her…for all the world to see. And while I’m pretty sure that her friend is indeed a child (from all the stuff she has posted on her blog) I still didn’t feel comfortable with Darly telling where we live. I think that no matter how often we tell our kids to be safe they still forget. I frequently have to go in and edit what Darly posts, thank goodness it is mostly typos. I know that using NSTeens can help us all as parents to keep our kiddos safe. Oh and there's also NetSmartz Kids for those of us with younger kiddos!
This review brought to you by MomCentral! 
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