Listerine Oral Care Challenge Blog Tour

A few weeks ago I was selected to take part in the Listerine Oral Care Challenge. As part of that I was sent a box of Listerine and Reach oral care products.

Darly & I were pretty excited as we have tried some of the products before and liked them already. I was even asked to do a product review on the Listerine Total Care Anticavity Mouthwash before! Here's what we were asked to try this time:

Listerine Total Care anticavity mouthwash. We received some in Icy Mint and in Cinnamint flavor. I really liked being able to try the new flavors, they both taste good and leave your mouth feeling really clean.


Darly was asked to try Listerine Agent Cool Blue tinting Rinse. This product tints the teeth blue so the kids can tell how well they are brushing. Basically they dye their teeth and then brush it all off...still blue? better brush some more! ;o) Darly really likes this as it has a nice bubble gum flavor and it's fun to use.

Also included was the Listerine Smart Rinse anticavity fluoride rinse for kids. This product didn't get as big of a thumbs up from Darly as the Cool Blue, but for one simple reason... the product makes Darly thirsty and to set the product you shouldn't drink for 30 minutes after using it. I suggested that Darly get a drink before brushing her teeth and I haven't heard anything about it since. I guess all is well.

Next up was the Reach Access Flosser with extra disposable heads. And Reach Total Care dental floss. The Access Flosser is GREAT! I loved them so much I had already gone out and bought one for everyone in the family (well, not the dog!) I really like how the flosser holds the floss for you and helps you to reach your teeth so well. The Total Care floss is nice too, it has micro-grooves technology to help clean between your teeth better...that's always helpful for those pesky popcorn bits!

We also received some toothbrushes that we really couldn't use as they're for toddlers and a BatMan toothbrush. I think I'll see if my nephews can use those.

Darly was given a chart with stickers to keep track of her brushing. Well at age 11 that was a bit too childish for her...she used the stickers for about a day or two. However, she was fine with using all the rinse and floss products.

I'm pretty sure our dentist is going to be happy with our nice clean teeth!


If you would like to take the Listerine Oral Care Challenge, just click Listerine or Listerine Kids. Once you get there, take the time to check out the websites! They are terrific. The Listerine Kids web site is full of excellent information and tips for keeping your kids' mouths healthy and clean at any age. Oh, by the way, if you need more incentive - The links I posted above had coupons for the products!


"I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour campaign by Mom Central on behalf of Listerine and Reach and received Listerine and Reach products for the Oral Care Challenge and a gift certificate to thank me for taking the time to participate."

Flu Prevention Steps

Obama declares swine flu national emergency

the following is just my personal opinion (shared by many others) but feel free to ignore it. I think this entire thing is just a bunch of hype! I think that the pharmaceutical companies have lobbied to get the Prez to declare this "emergency" to help boost their sales. Why? Because I know several people who have already had the H1N1 flu and it wasn't any worse than a regular case of the flu. In fact their doctors are telling them to stay home!

As part of the hype I was recently asked to share with you the following Flu Prevention Steps.

People should take simple steps to help prevent the spread of the seasonal and H1N1 flu viruses in their homes:

· Wash Hands Frequently: Wash hands with warm water and soap for at least 20 seconds (the time it takes to sing the “Happy Birthday” song twice).
· Disinfect Germ Hot Spots: Disinfect the surfaces kids touch most frequently – like doorknobs, faucets or plastic toys.
· Do the Elbow Cough: Cough and sneeze into your elbow instead of your hands to help prevent the spread of germs from touch.
· Follow Good Health Guidelines: Eat right, exercise and get plenty of sleep to help boost your body’s ability to fight the effects of colds and the flu.

I'm happy to share this part with you...there is a part that I edited out because I don't feel like posting it. I know you can find what I edited out on the web. :D

I sincerely hope that you don't get the flu. and if you do get the flu that you recover from it quickly and don't share your germs with anyone else. Take care!

Letters! an idea ...

I've swiped from my friends.

I've seen this idea on a few of my friend's blogs and I've always wanted to try it...well now I'm going for it!

Dear Owner of the gymnastics gym that Darly goes to,

HOW DARE YOU?!?!? How dare you break my little girl's heart like that?!?!? We told you that we could not attend a class on Wednesday, yet YOU told us to sign up for the try-outs anyway. YOU said you would work something out because Darly wasn't the only girl who couldn't do Wednesday nights.

Yet last night after Darly did a stellar job earning her a position on the Team you had your minion come out to let us know that yes she got a spot, but she couldn't have it unless she could be there on Wednesday nights!!!

Did you really expect us to choose gymnastics over GOD??? Do you really think you're more important? I THINK NOT!!!

Lucky for you that Darly's tuition is already paid for the next 4 months! We know that Darly has the skills to be on the USAG Team, Eagles or Cara... and while my little girl's heart is breaking over not being able to do this, she won't give up God for you. I'm so proud of her! and so MAD at you!

Sincerely,
a very ticked off mom!


Dear Roofing Companies that won't return my calls,

Yes, I realize that you are super busy right now. Busier than you've ever been...but if you want to continue to be busy, you should have someone answering the phones! I won't be giving my business to someone who doesn't have the courtesy to return my phone calls...if you can't be bothered to call me back now, how can I believe that you'll call me back when I give you my business. pshaw! You won't! Which is why I WON'T be calling you back or giving you my business. oops! There goes $11K for you!

a not that stupid homeowner!


Dear House,

Would you PLEASE stop piling up with junk all over yourself? You're really letting yourself go and it isn't attractive! Stop it now!

Your owner

Dear Postal Carrier,

Would you please STOP filling my mailbox with junk mail that I don't bother reading? You're continued stuffing of my mailbox is leading to my House's problem with the piles of junk (see letter above)!!! I have to rip my name and address off each piece and then recycle all this paper and I have NO IDEA where the recycling center got moved to!

thanks!
resident, occupant, and homeowner


Dear Dishwasher,

You had better stop leaving a film all over my dishes or I'll have to call someone to come and take a good chunk of my money (money that would otherwise go to supplying you with the nice dishwashing packets) to come and rip you all the pieces!!!

Your owner


Dear Snow,

Just go away!!! It is only October for pete's sake! Now we don't get to go to the Pumpkin Patch for our yearly trip. I really wanted to see the bunnies this year. Sigh!

me


Dear brother,

Would you take a few seconds out of your life to call and check on your sister? I haven't heard from you at all since my hubby went out of town. Your wife my have told you that I bought a new car, but you probably don't even know that. And sorry I had to HIDE you on my FaceBook account, but all you ever post are cryptic Computer Geek updates for your potential clients.
I don't even know if you intend to be in town for the holidays, and I don't want to invite myself over.

Oh and can you let our other two brothers know that they should be checking in on me too? I know that oldest brother is intending to come out for the annual Ski week.

Your favorite Sister



Okay, I think I'm done now! Whew! That was kinda fun!

another busy week

Monday I was asked to come in to cover the phones so the staff could have a meeting. Darly went shopping with her friend. So I go, but I forgot to ask how to use the phones...luckily there were only 3 calls...but it turned out that the meeting ran long thanks to a HUGE issue within the church. Hopefully we can get it all worked out soon.

Tuesday Darly & I went to this place called Jump Street. It is an indoor trampoline "park" where they have these HUGE trampolines all over the floor. It looked really cool. Darly thought so because it was her idea to go there. However, the place was soon packed with kids who had been bussed there. WHAT? Why are children who should be in school at a park that should be being used for kids who are home from school during the day??? I don't know. sigh Well Darly was not happy that she couldn't get a few feet of trampoline to herself, but I wouldn't leave until our time there was up...in case she changed her mind at all...also I was chatting with my friends. hee hee

Tuesday night - gymnastics. I'm so glad that Darly didn't injure herself at Jump Street and was able to go to the gym. Cuz she did a near perfect bar routine! YAY

Wednesday we met up with friends for lunch before going to CYT Denver's production of Beauty and the Beast. Turns out we had met Belle at Church a while back...she was awesome as were the rest of the cast. I was a tiny bit disappointed with Beast but the rest of the kids were awesome and cast so well.

Wednesday night Darly's friend had dinner with us and loved my Pizzania and then the girls went to confirmation...where they went to buy goodies to ship to the soldiers.

Thursday was a day off, but Darly & I went to Kohls and bought her a new wardrobe cuz she's outgrown everything!

Today was Girl Scouts where the kids studied different cultures and we had some foods from different cultures. I brought cream puffs from france...yeah right, they were from the grocery store's freezer. :D but we had a lot of yummies.

Tomorrow I hope to drag Darly to Stemapalooza. Last year she didn't have a good time, but this time SHOULD be better.

Sprinklers

Dh left me a list of stuff to do and how to do it. Now that the weather has gotten colder it was time for me to shut off and drain the sprinklers. Unfortunately Colorado got hit with a very sudden cold snap sending us into freezing temperatures very quickly. By the time I realized the sprinkler lines needed to be drained I didn't have the time to do them they way Dh told me to.

Here's his list...

Shut down: At first freeze
1. Shut sprinkler water line off in basement.
2. Open cap on line in basement. Cover to drain into bucket
3. Open valve at on backflow outside with a flathead screwdriver. Let water drain into bucket in basement.
4. Run sprinklers though full cycle. A minute or two on each zone.
5. Close outside valve at backflow, and cap nipple on the line in the basement. Empty bucket.
6. Make sure Mom’s was done too.

and here's what I did...
1. shut off sprinkler water line in basement. check!
2. open cap on line in basement. Cover to drain into bucket.

and here is where the plan changes. Step 3 takes place outside and it was already dark out. So I decided to leave it for later and hope for the best.

That night temperatures dropped to the 20s! But I had left the line open in the basement and it was still dripping all night.

The following moring it was still bitter cold out, but I tried to complete the list. However, there was no difference and I noticed ice crystals in the valve. oops!

Today was much warmer.

When Darly & I returned from Church this morning I noticed copious amounts of water flowing down our street...on the other side from our house. As I pulled into our garage I look and see that the water is shooting like OLD FAITHFUL from my neighbor's backflow valve! I knew that she couldn't be home or she would have heard that much water running.
So I ran next door to see if our neighbor could come and help get the valve shut off. He wasn't home but his oldest kid offered to call him...meanwhile I head over.
Luckily the person who installed her sprinkler system (probably the first owner who was extreemly smart!) also installed a shut off valve right under the backflow. Although I got drenched on my right side, I was able to shut off the water quite easily.
I then talked to the neighbor across the street and learned that they had noticed the problem and had tried knocking on her door. They promised to get the owner's phone number in case anything like that happened again. I also told my nextdoor neighbor's son that I got the line shut off.

After that fun, I went to my own backflow valve to check it. Everything seemed fine...water was still dripping in the basement (I had rigged it so the water was dripping straight into our sump pump...no mess). So since it was warmer, I decided to complete my check list.

I was now able to open the valve and I heard noise of air rushing in it! And sure enough when I checked the basement, the water had splashed on my splash guard. woo hoo! I then tried blowing air in the valve like DH does, more splashing. YAY! However I couldn't get the sprinklers to do anything when I turned on the system. Normally they spit and sputter.

So I left the valves open all day dripping and closed the outside valves this evening. The line is still dripping inside, so I figured I would let it drip until either it dries up or I can hire someone to blow out the lines.

Wish me luck!

how I feel

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

the update... or I'm such a sloth!

Okay, I haven't posted anything since Sept 24th... and this is so terrible... I'm looking at my calendar to try to figure out what all I've been up to since then and when that didn't ring any bells I looked at my Facebook.

On Sept 27th Darly had to Acolyte at Church service. This was her first time ever serving communion and she did an awesome job. Her dad (after hearing my report) and I are so proud of her. She also managed to actually do her Sermon notes. So I'm pretty happy about that.

After Church and lunch we went over to our local cemetery for a Cemetery Walk. This is where folks dress up as some of the people that are burried there to tell us their stories. I have to say that after living here for almost 8 years this was our first time to ever do this...and it will be our last. While it was neat to finally see this, I was pretty disappointed that everything that we heard was info you can get from the town's historical society in print. The one fella's script was so bad I had to bite my lip to keep from laughing. It was nice that one town resident's granddaughter played her...but perhaps it's time for her great-granddaughter to take over.

Sept 28th was Darly's book club. We had a HUGE turn out for this month. It appeared that the girls had a very good time talking about the book, but honestly I don't listen to them. I want the book club to be a lot like what I get from book clubs which means not always talking about the book, eating yummies and just having a good time. And that is what they get. We have a great bunch of girls in the club.

Sept 29th I could hardly contain my excitement as we went to the CakeWrecks book signing at a local bookstore. Jen & John were a hoot! We all had a great time. Darly made a "wreckplica" (copy of a wrecked cake) and while she didn't "win" she got a prize anyway. I don't think that anyone (but us) realized that they had a Jr Wreckinator until we came up to get our book signed. If you go to the Cakewrecks site you'll notice that Jen & John are both currently sick in a hospital in Texas...please pray for them as John is in critical condition. Poor guy!

Sept 30th we went to the park, enjoyed yummy PeiWei for lunch and then came home to my dinner disaster! I had tried to make chicken & rice in my crockpot and learned that rice cooked that long turns into GLUE!!! It tasted okay, but it wasn't good eats. Sorry to our dinner guests. I WILL make it up to you next time with food that is acutally edible!!! After that the girls went to Confirmation.

Ahhh finally into this month...

October 1st we went to a coop class on making stop action movies with a digital camera. The kids learned the history and mechanics of making a stop action film and then got to acutally do it. I learned that there is very easy to use software available online to take the pictures and make them into a movie. Too cool! While we were there we enjoyed playing with our friend's new kitten. This little kitten is just a ball of energy and just wanted to play, play, play the entire time...I was expecting her to go take a nap...but she never did. And she pounced my head twice! LOL! But she also gave me hugs.

October 2nd was our Girl Scout meeting. The girls made butterflies for this...
1,500,000 innocent children perished in the Holocaust.

In an effort to remember them, Holocaust Museum Houston is collecting 1.5 million handmade butterflies.

The butterflies will eventually comprise a breath-taking exhibition, currently scheduled for Spring 2012, for all to remember. Here's a slide show of the project... The girls took a coloring sheet of a butterfly and placed it under contact paper to use as a template...then they opened the contact paper sticky side up and placed bits of tissue paper on the contact paper in a butterfly design. Then we stuck the rest of the contact paper over it to sandwich the tissue paper between the layers. The end result made some very pretty suncatchers. We had a visiting grandmother at the meeting who liked the butterflies so much that she wanted her granddaughters to make her one...we had to disappoint her that these were for the project.

Now Saturday Oct 3rd was my truely Slothy day. I never bothered to get dressed! However I didn't sit around doing nothing... I paid bills, balanced the checkbook, tried to figure out my health insurance, and filled out a spending diary for a survey company that I'm a part of. If you follow me on Facebook you'll see that I also took frequent breaks. LOL! Oh and on Friday night I bought some dishcloth yard to make myself some dishcloths. One spool of the yarn is only $7 and so far I have made 3 dishcloths of different sizes. Once I figure out what size I like best, I'll make a bunch more. I think I can get at least a dozen of the large sized ones out of this...probably much more. So I made two dishcloths on Saturday.

Sunday we didn't do much either which is sad cuz I really needed to do my laundry that day. *line removed for TMI content* So hopefully I get some laundry done today...otherwise things won't be very pretty. Oh wait! I did buy a pooper scooper so Darly would complain less about picking up after the dog. Only she gets paid a buck per week to pick up...she hasn't picked up for 3 weeks or so. So I only have to pay her a buck. hummm she needs to figure out the math on this situation. LOL!

Because I've got nothing better to do!!!

I've been running to and from the dealership that I bought my car from and it's driving me a bit nuts.

I suppose I could have saved a few of the trips... If I had bought the car on Friday night instead of taking it home and buying it on Saturday. If I had remembered to get the title for my old car before making the deal that would have saved a trip too.

But the dealer caused my trip in this morning... they misplaced my lender's electronic check. so I had to go over there today to take them a new check for that.

And now the lender has sent me yet another form to take back to the dealer because they needed an adendum for the final amount that we are borrowing. UGH!

If I had known that I would need to take this paperwork tonight, I could have had the bank just fax the dealer the paperwork that I took over there this morning and saved myself a trip. I sure wish they had told me that! UGH!

well instead of coming home while Darly is at the gym tonight, I get to drive yet again to the dealer.

boy I sure sound very whiney... sigh!

Cuz you asked nicely...

I'm here, I'm still here! Rumors of my demise were greatly exaggerated.

Why I've been absent? Well frankly I've been pretty lazy. It's so much easier to post a little blurb on Facebook than it is to update you here. Hummm I wonder what I've been up to over on Facebook? Should we have a look? Sure why not? What else have you got to do?


Renee says it is about time for Church. see you later! 5 hours ago · Comment · Like / Unlike Write a comment...

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RemoveRenee I went, I saw, I test drove, I got to take it home...but it still isn't mine yet. So I'm not gonna post the pictures until DH says it's a go! He better check his email tonight (tomorrow morning for him)! LOL! If not he might end up with a car regardless.Fri at 8:13pm · Comment · Like / Unlike · View Feedback (9)Hide Feedback (9)
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View all 8 commentsRenee I should explain...the link above is to pictures of an expedition...The car currently in my garage (until about 10ish) is an explorer.
Yesterday at 7:58am · DeleteJoan Can't wait to hear whether this is THE car for you so we can finally see pics!
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If you followed any of that, you might have caught that this weekend I went and looked at some cars and you might have even caught that I bought one too!

Here's the story...
I've been car shopping for a while since DH finally agreed that my old car was getting to be too much of clunker. So Thanks to the internet I've been able to do most of my shopping online. whew! Cuz looking at all the dealerships is a pain. Darly & I went to one and I ended up missing my electrician coming by. boo!

So after looking for quite a while I decided that it might help if we had our financing all lined up and I went to my bank's website. Let me say right here and now how AWESOME USAA Bank is! Along with all the other things we have through them I found that they also have a Car buyer's program...where they've worked out discounts on cars! WOO HOO!!! I immediately signed up for it and we saved so much money! :D They hooked me up with some local dealers who had the car I wanted.

I went on Friday and looked at 3 cars, test drove the one and ended up taking it home with me that night! I had a pretty good deal hammered down (after the first round went total bust! Why do they even bother playing that stupid game???) But I ended with telling them that I should really check with DH before making the final purchase. It seems only right...it's a $30K vehicle!

So I go home take some pictures and zip an email off to DH right away...and wait! and wait and wait! When it was almost noon and I still hadn't heard from DH I prayed about it and went to go buy the car. It is now ours.

Of course when I got back home, DH finally emailed me back to ask me more questions about it. LOL! In the end DH is okay with my purchase, but I'll owe him when he gets home.




Okay... The color of my car is called Black Pearl. This immediately brought up images of Pirates of the Caribbean and so it seemed that a name for the car from the movie would be in order. I'm thinking Turner or Swan for Will Turner or Elizabeth Swan. I'm leaning heavily towards Turner cuz well Orlando is CUTE! But Turner is the name of the camp where DH stayed so he's against that. Darly likes Ella for the car's name cuz she's reading Ella Enchanted right now. I could also be talked into Sparrow I suppose. But I'm not a huge Jack Sparrow fan (or Johny Depp either!) and honestly I didn't like that Elizabeth decided that after years of loving Will that she would rather have Jack. I need to see movie #3 still.

So any ideas or help?

Zhu Zhu Pets – Product Review & Contest!

Parents everywhere: Has your child been begging you for one of those cute Hamsters they see in the pet stores? Your first thought was “How much work is one of these buggers?” If you’ve ever had hamsters before you then already know about all the feeding and cleaning that is involved with real hamsters and UGH who wants to do that again? Right?

A while back we were asked if we would be willing to host a Zhu Zhu Pets party for our friends to try out a new toy. We checked out the website http://www.zhuzhupets.com/main.html and were excited for this opportunity. Like every other child Darly had been bugging me for a real live hamster because they’re so cute! And now I had this opportunity! YAY!

The day the box arrived Darly’s friend K was visiting. The girls are both 11 so I allowed them to open it up and check out the party kit. The girls immediately were able to set everything up and start having fun with their hamsters. I also allowed the girls to plan the party. We decided to not invite as many kids as the party kit had hamsters for because we wanted to give all the girls a chance to play and so that we could give a few away on our blog…more on that later. This is a shot of the girls playing with the hamster city

Besides the obvious perks of these toys (all the fun of a live hamster without the mess!) there are many other great qualities to these pets!

1) They’re so cute!
2) They make cute noises as they zoom along.
3) The habit trails have something that the hamsters read so the hamsters know what part of the trail they are in and they respond accordingly.
4) Did I mention the cuteness?
5) Your child will be happy with just the hamster toy as they run on any solid surface (they kind hop on carpet which of course leads to more cuteness!)
6) The habit trails are easy to assemble in a variety of ways…unlike a real hamster’s habit trail where once you decide how you’re going to put it together, you better leave it alone or your hamster could escape!
7) When you’re done playing with your hamster, you just turn it off!

We had our party and it was a HUGE success! The girls all loved the hamsters and had fun picking their very own from the four different hamsters (5 more coming soon!) Everyone had a blast putting their hamsters through all its paces. Here is a video of the girls playing…

I think another thing that I loved was finding out how reasonably priced Zhu Zhu Pets are. They'll be available at Walmart, ToysRUs, & Amazon.com soon!

and now... for what you've all been waiting for... the Contest! We have 3 Zhu Zhu Pets to give away. So go earn your chance to win one you'll have to first visit http://www.zhuzhupets.com/toys.html, leave a comment on my blog here with what part of the Zhu Zhu hamster city you like the best and then visit Darly's Blog and leave her a comment too. Only folks who comment on both my blog and Darly's will be entered in the drawing.

The small print I received the Zhu Zhu Pets products you see here for free from BSM Media/MomSelect in exchange for me telling you about them. It was my idea to give away the extra hamsters on my blog.

Chatting with mom

Sunday morning (yes...I'm just NOW getting to blogging about it! If you read my Facebook you already know about some of this.) as I was leaving my bedroom to come downstairs I heard the unmistakable chirp of my cell phone going off for just 3 or for notes of it's song. Enough to know that it wasn't someone on my call list...see each number stored in my call contact list has it's own ringtone assigned to it. Some of the tones are really humerous (to me anyway) and fit the caller well. I like being able to know who is on the other end of the call before answering.

okay I digress...so the phone rang for just a bit and it wasn't someone on my call list. So when I got downstairs I looked at the phone to see who had called and was shocked to see it was my mom's phone number. (yes, I know I'm a bad kid for not having my mom's phone number on my cell phone. but I should tell you that every time I call my mom it's at least a 90 min call and I AM NOT USING MY MINUTES ON THAT!!!)

I'm going to digress again... see I have a cell phone but I have it under protest. I never wanted a cell phone. I don't like them. If you need to reach me via phone, call my land line. If I'm home, I'll answer (usually!) and if I'm not home there's this really neat invention called an answering machine that will record your message for me...if you're really desparate for an answer, perhaps you should email me. Anyway if you're lucky enough to know my cell phone number you've been given directions for it's use...Call the land line first!!!

Okay back to our story...so I see it's mom and I'm in a panic mode. Why is she calling my cell phone?!?!? So from my land line I call her back and my step dad answers. Still in panic mode! why are they calling? Is mom sick again?

Step dad immediately appologizes. See he was setting up the voice mail on mom's phone and accidentally hit the send button...he tried to end the call quickly but not quick enough. But since I called back...why don't I have a chat with mom.

and so we did!

We ended up having a really good chat focused mostly on me this time. See having a deployed hubby and a hail storm and needing a new car...helped me keep the conversation on me. hee hee

So the talking about the hubby part went really fast. He's there and he's hot.

I did get some good info about the hail bit. When I was a kid we had a hail storm and they filed a claim. She said that back then they never saw the insurance check at all. it went directly to the mortgage company who dealt with the contractor after they hired him. So I guess I'll go ahead and send the check to the mortage company for them to deal with it. sigh!

We talked about how I need a new car. She tried very hard to talk me into buying in Lincoln Navigator instead of the Ford Explorer Eddie Bauer. Saying how much nicer it is and well insulated and it comes with roadside assistance & free maintence. Ummm yeah, it also comes with a price tag that is about $15K more!!! After being car payment free for about 10 years now, seeing payments that are upwards of $700 per month is quite shocking enough...I don't need one that rivals my mortgage!!!! So sorry Mom, but NO! I won't be buying a Navigator! I don't need a vehicle that is that big anyway!

I checked yesterday and it seems that the local dealer with the used 2009 Eddie Bauers has sold them. :( They had a few fleet cars that had less than 10K miles on them. sigh so now it's back to the drawing board for my new car. I can buy either an older car with more miles on it...or I can buy a new one. pout pout pout! I really wanted that blue Explorer...or the red one! But alas they are gone. They don't even have any of the Eddie Bauers left.

I cannot believe that it is already September. Where did summer go? I guess I should start bugging the kid about doing school work again. Which means that along with all the house/car and yard stuff I need to get crackin on school stuff too. sigh

Miss Communication

well as evidenced by my lack of posting here, that definately isn't my name. LOL!

As you know my house was pelted by hail a few times this summer. And I had the pleasure of calling my insurance company to file the claim. The adjuster came out and did everything so I could get a check for the damages.

However since we have a mortgage the check is payable to the mortgage company TOO! Bad enough that DH's name is on there, but their name is too. The insurance company said to call the mortgage company (although they are supposed to be the same company) to find out about getting it endorsed.

I called the mortgage company. The friendly gal there tells me right off that since my name isn't on the mortgage she can only help me this time...after that I will need authorization.

Let's back up a bit here. When DH & I got the mortgage on the house we were shocked to find out that they had not put my name on it. The title company said they could fix that for us and had us file the paperwork + give them a fee. ummm my name still isn't on the paperwork!!! sigh

So mortgage gal says no problem...just send the check to them and add a copy of the insurance adjuster's worksheet. She will go ahead and send me a Claim packet that I'll need for getting the part of money the insurance holds until the work gets done.

So I get the copies and I'm ready to mail in the check when I get the claim packet. But WAIT A MINUTE! The claim packet tells me that I & DH have to sign the insurance check and the mortgage company will hold the check in escrow until the roof is fixed and they will have the roof inspected and issue the payment checks.

HOLD THE PHONE! I can't call the mortgage company to ask about this again because I'm not DH and don't have authorization (forgot to ask what kind of authorization they wanted). So which do I do?

Now I totally get them wanting to protect their investment. totally! But ummm why didn't mortgage gal tell me this to begin with? Well I'm gonna follow mortgage gal's info and send in just that part and see what happens. LOL! This oughta be fun.

Good thing I'm in no hurry to get the roof done!

vacation

Updated with photos!

Darly & I went on a vacation road trip with our friends Marsi & K (K is Marsi's dd who is a month older than Darly...they are very good friends.)  We left a few days early for our trip to South Dakota.  We arrived on Saturday and spent what was left of the day just relaxing.  Here's some pictures of the dogs:

On Sunday we went to Church with Marsi's parents - Renae & Dan (doesn't Marsi's mom have a great name?) :D  After Church we watched a movie on DVD and then went to the Mammoth Site in Hot Springs, SD.  Oh yeah, we are staying with Marsi's parents.  On the way to the Mammoth Site we were able to see a bunch of wild life in the Black Hills National Forest...we saw Buffalo, Pronghorns & Deer.  We decided that we really didn't need to go through Custer State Park to do the Wildlife loop.

On Monday we went to Mt Rushmore and then to Crazy Horse monument to see the laser light show.

On Tuesday we went to Bear Country, Jewel Cave and back to Crazy Horse (thank goodness Marsi's parents can get us in for free) to see to museum that we missed on Monday.

On Wednesday we went to Bear Mountain Fire Lookout and to a local mine to look for rocks.  Dan thought the property was on Forestry property but we learned when the owners showed up that it was privately owned.  The owners were very nice and allowed us to keep the rocks we picked up (just quartz & mica) but told us the property would soon be posted to prevent liability issues.  I felt so bad for the owners that they have to face liability if someone gets hurt trespassing on their property.

We also drove through Custer State Park

We'll be driving back home on Thursday.  I'll be updating this post with links and pictures after we return.

camping trip

Darly & I went camping and got back yesterday.

of course Lilly came with us!  She had lots of good camp food to eat while we were there.  I am pretty sure she ate a lot of non-food stuff too.  ugh!

When we got there and set up the tent we had a small problem...the tent pole to the front "porch" of my tent broke!!!  (that's the lite blue flap you see hanging in the middle of the tall arch)  So we weren't able to use the front door of the tent and had no porch. :(  I looked up my lovely warrantee on this tent and I'm betting that broken poles falls under normal wear and tear...although I would like to argue that this is faulty design.  That particular pole takes the most pressure of the entire tent.  I could also argue that the company is lucky that I didn't get injured, the break happened right at my face level.  ugh!  Luckily my friend's husband took the pole home and fixed it for me.  Unfortunately, they still have the pole.

This trip I brought with us a screen shelter.  I put it over the table and it gave us a good place to keep the coolers out of the sun so our ice lasted much longer.  The cars got way too hot.another improvement I made for this camping trip was the purchase of the plastic tote bins you can see in the far right corner of the picture (magenta & purple) I think that once I put in my organizing dividers that they'll be just perfect!  as it was for this trip they kept everything watertight and also provided extra work surface when needed.

After the kids went to the beach on Tuesday I was pondering a good way for their swim suits to hang dry.  We aren't allowed to tie anything to the trees in the campground.  However they can't stop us from using our own cars.the old beat up clunker in the rear is mine.  The other car is Marsi's car.  This clothes line was so popular that we ended up with even our friends' stuff.  Luv my luggage rack!

We had good weather and the kids had a blast playing for almost the entire time.  I keep meaning to teach Darly how to cook camping food while we're there.  But I get so caught up in the fun that I don't want to let her do it.  I'm so mean.

Table Manners - by Mia King a book review

There's nothing like reading a good book in the summer. So I was very excited to get the chance to review Table Manners by Mia King.

I had originally planned to read this book while working out on my poor neglected eliptical trainer...or even take it with me on my camping trip...but alas when I picked up this book it was too good to put down and I polished it off in just two days without even taking it near the eliptical trainer. ooops!

From the Author:  Meet Deidre McIntosh, the ever-resourceful lifestyle maven who has a knack for getting back up when life knocks her down.  At 41, Deidre has created a new life for herself with her own line of branded baked goods and a wonderful relationship with Kevin Johnson, one of Seattle's most eligible and sexy bachelors.  Creative, energetic, and loving, Deidre is the person people go to whenever they need a helping hand.

But when Kevin's ex-fiancée, the sultry and successful magazine publisher Sabine Durant, appears in Seattle, suddenly it's Deidre who needs help.  Already intimidated by Kevin's glamorous, moneyed world--and his sister, Marly Banks, who wants Deidre out of Kevin's life--Deidre knows she's no match for Sabine.  She turns to her friends for advice, but finds they're having crises of their own.  When her business begins to slip from her fingers, Deidre knows she must do something to keep her career and her love life from imploding.

This book is the sequel to Good Things.  I read Good Things a while ago so it was fun to get back into the story and catch up with the characters and see how they are all doing now.  And if Mia needs an idea for her next book I would love to hear what happens with Sarah next. ;) 
I found the story to be funny and intriguing.  I loved the dinner scene where the character Marla thinks that Deidre needs to have better table manners. 

I wrote this review while participating in a blog campaign by Mom Central on behalf of Penguin Group Publishing. Mom Central sent me a gift card and a copy of Table Manners to thank me for taking the time to participate.

ARGH!

Today I started off with a doctor's appointment for Darly on the agenda. I figured after the doctor we could swing by Walmart and pick up some of the 18 gallon plastic tubs they had on sale. Then I kept adding onto my list of errands to run.

When Darly woke up...she wasn't coughing anymore! An hour later and she still isn't coughing! Ummm she has been coughing since July 10th and now isn't anymore! So I called the doctor's office and canceled the appointment.

Then while Darly was cleaning her room she starts coughing again. (JUST SHOOT ME NOW!) But it seemed that it was just the dust because she's been fine since.

So I had a revised list of errans to run...

Petsmart: to get rabbit food
GNC: to buy Papaya tables for me & the rabbits
Home Depot: to buy a new breaker for Darly's bedroom. I also wanted to get some new switches & outlets and also some drop cloths (don't ask! I like shopping there!)
Walmart: to buy the tubs mentioned before.
Bank: deposit checks I've been hanging onto way too long

So we finally get moving...
Petsmart: I find just what I'm looking for with no problems, we visit the very pretty kitties for adoption and leave with just Rabbit food! SCORE!

GNC: Hummm where is GNC?!?!? I thought it was right next to the Ihop. Apparently not EVER! I just looked it up and it's next to the Safeway. UGH! DOWN A POINT!

Home Depot: I find the breaker & switches, but there's an empty spot on the shelf for the outlets. There is a note that says have an associate help me. So I flag one down...literaly! He comes over, then goes to look it up on the computer. They have 88, but they can't sell any until after they do the reset. So the dept manager says I can have the child resistant outlets for the same price! Wow that was a about a dollar & a half savings! But I didn't need child proof...oh well. Then I went for the drop cloth. I was going to get a large one and cut it into two. BUT the smaller one was $10 and the larger one was $29! Hummm I bought two smaller ones.

Walmart: We found our tubs. Then I wanted to look at camping gear and Darly wanted to look at the new G-Force toys. So we split up. I finished in camping gear (picked up two different sleeping pads to try out) and then I went through the Home improvement section and found switches and outlets for much less than Home Depot...so I grabbed those and headed for toys. Well it seems that Darly had finished in toys and went looking for me. Luckily when she didn't find me in camping she came back to toys.

Then we had lunch at Good Times Burgers...YUM!

The first bank went well...except, no lolly pops.

Then the second bank... no lollypops there. I asked about doing online statements and we set that up.

Then I decided to go buy the car dealership to look at new Explorers. They had two. But the sales lady wanted to sell me one from their other showroom. weird! Also I have a car that qualifies for the Cash for Clunkers program...for that they just give me the money and my car goes to the scrap yard since they want it off the road...but the dealership insisted on checking my car out for a possible trade-in. Ummm hello? My car is worth about $1K...maybe if I'm lucky. the clunkers program gives me $4K. I WANT THE $4K!!! Can you say NO BRAINER? ugh

Well the dingdongs at the dealership made me late getting home and I missed meeting up with someone who was coming by...we were off about 10 min. UGH! I feel terrible. I called and emailed my appologies.

Campin!

OKchick asked where I've been all week. LOL! Sorry I didn't post it earlier, but we went camping.

My homeschool group schedules a yearly camping trip and this past week was it. This year we went up to Golden Gate Canyon State Park! We stayed in a cabin this time. It was beautiful up there! And luckily everyone who went loved it too so it looks like we'll be going back for next year. YAY!

I got us a cabin for this trip because Darly was balking at the thought of freezing our tails off in a tent again. And last year we got rained out. This year it looks as if we could have gotten a tent site, but I'm glad we had the cabin too. The link I put up there is of the website describing the cabins. The picture show is of either the cabin we stayed in or the one right next to it...I kinda think it's our cabin because the next shot is the yurt that was next to us.

I invited our friends to come and share the cabin with us and that turned out to be perfect as most of the rest of our group had gone home a day before we did. It also worked out well for us because it gave Darly someone to play with for the entire trip (except for when Darly got mad at her for beating her at Chess...Darly isn't a good looser!)

Before we left for our trip, Darly had ordered her next American Girl doll and unfortunately it was scheduled to be delivered on Monday...the day we were going to go camping. I had looked online and saw the package was listed as "out for delivery" which at my house can mean anytime from 6am to 6pm. So I asked the only neighbor I could find to keep an eye out for the package but I didn't feel too good about him seeing as he doesn't know me very well.

So then I went to fill up the car with gas and was waiting for my friend to meet up with us. While we were waiting at a nearby shopping center we saw the UPS truck heading toward my house... So we decided that since my friend wasn't there yet we would zip home to see if the package had come yet. It hadn't so we went back to the shopping center to meet up with friend...disappointed.

Friend has internet on her phone so we checked the package while we had lunch...it still showed out for delivery, but they don't always update the tracking...so I zipped back home once more before we were going to head to camping. Still no package, but I found another neighbor, ....one I trusted more to ask to keep an eye out for the package. He was happy to do it. So I left for my trip confident that it was taken care of, but Darly was disappointed that she didn't have her doll yet.

We returned yesterday and found the doll sitting on my front porch! The UPS guy had left it behind my front porch railing...so it couldn't be seen from the road. In fact the only way to see it would have been to go on the porch and look for it where it was. The box wasn't labled so even if someone had come on the porch they wouldn't have known what was in it. So neither of my neighbors got the package for us, but it was safe and sound. Darly is happily playing with her new doll and all is well.

We drove up to the campground on Monday. It was a lovely drive with only one slow up due to road construction...or more like parking heavy equipment in the road and taking a break! But we were only held up about 10 min or so. We arrived at the campground and paid our fees then headed to the cabin. We got unpacked and had visitors before we were done as some of our friends had gotten there the day before. After getting our site set up we went to visit our friends at another site.

Lilly was her usual pain in the butt because there were other dogs around. I really need to find a way to get my dog better socialized as she is becoming a problem when we camp. Yesterday I was really annoyed when two teenagers brought their dogs to the site next to us...just to visit their friends and one family allowed their very well behaved dog to run around off leash (which isn't allowed in the campground!) I came out of the bathroom with Lilly to be face to face with this dog. Lilly went nuts but the other dog just kept on walking, probably thinking "IDIOT!" about Lilly.

The view from our cabin was amazing and the weather was perfect. Having beds to sleep in was nice and comfy...I've never slept so well on a camping trip. I need to find better mattresses for our next trip...which will be Aug 3rd.

more hail and lady vs tree!

we had another hail storm the other day.  Luckily this one wasn't quite as bad as the first storm, I don't think that the roof is in any worse shape than it was before.  LOL!  However, damage to the garden continues...This bell pepper (I know it looks like an Aniheim, but it's a bell pepper!) got punched!Here's a pile of the hail after about 20 min of rain.  Looks like snow, huh?here's some flatten lettuce.  notice all the leaf litter on the ground.  UGH!  I don't think I'm allowed to have any produce this year.  Hello Farmer's Market!

AND NOW!  The Lady vs the Tree!The tree triesbut in the end the Lady is victorious!!!  YAY!  this will make nice fire wood!  ya!

A pretty normal week

I realized yet again that I've been a bad blogger.  So here's the latest scoop...it's pretty boring...you've been warned. ;)

Monday morning I went over to the Church to help deposit the offering.  Normally they schedule 4 gals to do this.  Two to work on the computer and enter the offerings so that each person gets credit for what they give and two more to do the paperwork and write out the deposit ticket.  Well this Monday one of the gals forgot to show up.  This bothered the other gals and they were torn between calling the missing gal or just trying to do it without her.  We ended up opting without her and did just fine.  I offered to do the data entry part by myself, but the gal in charge didn't want to do it that way because it isn't how they do it.  However, we had plenty of times where I was doing the data entry on my own and did just fine.  Luckily with the holiday it was a very low offering and we got done very fast, even with just the 3 of us.

As I was leaving my car reminded me yet again that I needed to take it back to the Brakes place to see why it was still making noise when I stepped on the brakes.  So I took it over and of course on a Monday they couldn't see me right away...but he gave me an appointment at 3pm.  When I took it back at first the guy couldn't find the noise and when he took me with him to see if I could point it out, it wasn't being noisy.  But finally we did hear the noise and it turned out to NOT be my brakes.  It's the bushings, they're part of the car's suspension.  He took a look at them and said that while they are cracked that I could still get about another 10K miles out of them before they need to be replaced.  I reported this to DH and he finally says I should look into getting a new car.

I'm a bit in shock because I can't believe that I've finally "driven it into the ground" so I ask numerous times for him to clarify his position on this, but no he reassures me that it is finally time to look for a new car.  He even mentions that perhaps this time I can actually get a new car instead of a used car.  However as the week goes on he teases me that perhaps I should only get a used car because I don't keep my current car clean enough...and by the end of the week we are both teasing that I should keep my current car and force it to last another 5 years.  sigh!  He's actually kidding though and I can go look at cars...just no obivious drooling.

On Tuesday Darly got to go back to her gymnastics class.  They've been on summer break for the last two weeks.  I was happy to see that even with hardly any practice she wasn't that out of shape and could still do most everything that she could before.  That's about all we did on Tuesday.

I should mention that during week one of the summer break I looked on google to find a gym for me to go workout while Darly is in her gymnastic's class.  and there is one right near her gym with personal trainers and I could get a free session online.  So I signed up for it and they bugged me about coming in.

Wednesday we went to the park with our homeschooling friends and had a curriculum sale...kinda a yard sale for all our old school related stuff.  I managed to get rid of some of my old stuff!  YAY!  We took home one of Darly's friends for a few hours and that night we got to watch the International Space Station fly over our house...AND we saw a shooting star...this was Darly's first shooting star.  She was so happy.  Before she had been whining that she might never get to see one.  I tried to reassure her, but of course I don't know anything.  So when I saw the star I pointed it out, but she had already seen it.  Her friend either didn't see it at all or was unimpressed.  Hard to tell because this friend isn't impressed by much.  Later we met up with friend's mom at Dairy Queen for ice cream and friend went home.

Thursday we went shopping with some different friends and had fun visiting before Darly had to go to gymnastics.  While she was at the gym I decided I would try to figure out where this gym for me was at because I was having trouble locating it with google...the google stopped in the middle of the road and there are loads of office buildings around there.  So I walked by where the google map stopped.  I couldn't locate the gym!  No sign of it anywhere.  So instead I went for a walk.  It was a nice walk but one of the buildings near there is under construction so that wasn't the most comfortable place to walk past.

Friday morning Darly had an open gymnastics class...she loves these as they allow her to work on anything she wants to.  The "coach" is actually just an older student at a higher level.  And there aren't normally that many kids in the gym...so it can be like a private lesson.  Darly is still having trouble with her hand springs...she doesn't really spring her arms enough yet.  I've seen her do them perfectly before, but for some odd reason she just can't get them now. 

While Darly was at the gym, I went home and worked out on my eliptical trainer for 25 minutes.  While I was doing it I really didn't notice the time and just picked 25 min as a stopping time because I figured I needed the rest of the time I had while Darly was at the gym to get a shower and to get back over there...Darly frequently quits early because a full hour & a half by herself or nearly by herself is too much for her.  So now my plan is to workout while Darly is at the gym each time.  Hopefully I can start loosing the extra weight I've put on.

After her gym class we went to lunch at Panda Express.  I picked a dish that was low fat (mushroom chicken) and Darly had Kung Pau Chicken...she just eats the chicken & nuts out of it, so I had her zuccini.  But almost immediately Darly said she was tired, so we went home.  Later Darly said she had a headache, I figured she was dehydrated and told her to drink some water...she did and took a nap.  She said she was fine.  So we met up with friends to take advantage of a deal at Taco Bell.  Every time our baseball team scores 7 or more runs we can get 4 tacos for a dollar.
When we got there Darly says she isn't hungry.  So I try to see if perhaps she just wants something small like nachos and she says no with her hand over her mouth!  I have to tell her to run for the bathroom (kids!  why can't they figure out when they're gonna puke?!?!?!?)  After I place our order I go to check on her and yes, she did puke but she hadn't gotten there in enough time to aim very well.  :p  So I had to get some towels (no paper towels in this bathroom!) so I go back into the restaurant and get napkins then back to clean up her mess.  I didn't get everything, but if they expect better, they should have papertowles instead of a blower!
After the puking, Darly felt fine and ate her tacos with no problems.  So we think she must have just had some bad Panda Express.  Which reminds me that I need to let them know that!
We watched Wallace & Gromit in Curse of the Were-Rabbit with our friends.

Saturday we had a yard sale to help Darly earn her next American Girl doll.  Darly and her friend sold quite a bit of their old stuff and I got rid of some stuff too.  Not nearly all of the stuff I wanted too...a trip to Goodwill is in order, but enough for Darly to get her doll.  So we will soon have another doll in the house.  I reasoned with Dh that while it may seem like a lot of dolls for her to have (this will make her 4th) that it was better than her spending the same amount of money on a bunch of lesser priced toys and then having a bigger mess!  That seemed to be the most helpful for DH.  Now of course he's worried that he'll have to make more doll beds.  I think that he should. ;)  LOL!
Speaking of DH he called yesterday so I got to talk to him a bit.  While it is wonderful to hear his voice and talk to him, it seems that we have more meaningful conversations via email.  So when he calls there isn't much to say.  Oh well, it is still good to hear from him.

I found out from him that his siblings are planning to take MIL to live in Michigan.  I now feel like I should go talk to her and 1) see if she is having decent conversations yet and really knows what's going on...and 2) see if she really wants to go back to Michigan.  I know that she said she didn't want to ever go back there before, but perhaps because she knows that she needs so much help now she's willing to let her daughters help her now.  I feel really bad for not going to see her since she was first in the hospital, but I've always felt out of place.  DH's siblings don't feel as if I should be involved with this at all.  And Darly doesn't want to go see her (The last time Darly saw her in the hospital she was in pretty bad shape and that was for a surgery!  When I saw MIL after her stroke she looked worse so I can't imagine that Darly would want to see her like that.)  Of course I worry that MIL won't ever be in good enough shape that Darly will be comfortable around her.

Today is now Sunday and I've heard Darly coughing a few times.  I think that it might be best if we don't go to Church this morning so she can sleep more and hopefully get over this cough.  I'll have to go do the offering deposit tomorrow anyway. 
 

 

weekend update

Well what I had planned and what actually happened changed quite a bit, but we had a good time, so all's well that ends well...right?

I thought that we might hike (it's all of a mile) to downtown and check out the city festivities...maybe find a funnel cake & corndogs to much. Come back home, light up my firepit, cook hotdogs & smores over the fire and then watch the city's fireworks from our back porch.

What really happened is: Darly nixed the hiking downtown cuz she hates hiking and she doesn't like funnel cake (she's tried it just once!) So we didn't do that.

Then around 3pm or so it started raining! I grabbed my firepit and put it on the porch under the roof to keep the wood & pit dry. At about 4:30 or so I tried to light my firepit...still under the porch's roof, but pushed out so the wind would blow all the smoke away. The temperature was dropping, Darly & I were still in shorts and were getting cold...I was running low on matches (they're on the shopping list now) and the darned fire wouldn't light!!! It was too windy.

So we ditched the fire! and cooked our dinner inside... POUT! I was so looking forward to a charred hotdog. So I put mine under the broiler to try to crisp it up...no luck there either. pout!

so now...how to do smores? I grabbed one of my soybased candles (the one that smells like cookies) and we roasted our marshmallows over it's flame. I nuked my chocolate & graham crackers in the microwave...so my smore was nice and mushy! I then made another smore and had just a marshmallow too.

It had been raining constantly since 3pm, so I was worried that there wasn't going to be any fireworks... I even started channel surfing for a fireworks show on TV. But luckily the rain did stop at about 8pm, and the fireworks went off at around 9:20pm. We watched from my family room couch (sitting backwards!) in the nice warm dry house! :D

as soon as the show was over I watched TV, even though my neighbors were still shooting off illegal fireworks (you can buy them just over the state line -2 hours away) for a good 2 hours afterward. :p

Darly & I got to watch Turner & Hooch. She liked it, but I totally forgot that Hooch dies in the end...I told her before that he does get shot and almost dies...and then the darned dog dies! What is with all the dead dog movies & books? Can't any of these animals live a nice long life??? bah! Well she didn't even notice that he had died until I appologized for forgetting that he had died. I guess I shouldn't have mentioned it.

Sunday after Church we went to the library, the farmer's market and then home to wait for the insurance adjuster. I got a cuc, a zuc & a tomatoe at the farmer's market. YUM!

The insurance adjuster said that I should be getting a new roof! I hope they don't depreciate the roof too much. I would like to change the color of our shingles to match the house...they're currently grey and the house is brown. :p

I was talking to the neighbor about the roof and he mentioned that they had found a turtle in his front garden... we asked to see it and found out he had a Western Box Turtle...no idea how it got there as they don't roam our streets. LOL! and while checking our yard for spent fireworks I found instead crow feathers & a beak!!! I'm thinking that perhaps a coyote got this bird as cats normally leave more parts behind.

We finished off the day by watching The Next Foodnetwork Star. I'm glad they finally got rid of Katie... It looks like Jamica might be next.



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