Best Halloween Costume on Kids EVER...

So this morning, immediately after putting Grace on the bus, I had to shower and drive 30 miles to Hannah's daycare to watch a 10-minute "Costume Parade" of the kids in the daycare parading around the playground all dressed up. It's very cute, but totally not worth the 30 minute drive. However, I did it all the years for Grace, so I'd feel bad if I didn't show up.

Anyway, there was one of set of girl twins there, I'm guessing around 2-years-old. Oh... my... god... Best costumes EVER! They were supposed to be Oompa Loompas from Willy Wonka. I don't know the last time I laughed so hard. The mom happened to be standing next to me and said that she had originally planned on putting orange paint on their faces too, but once she realized she couldn't even wash the makeup off her hand, putting on the girls' faces probably wasn't the smartest thing to do.

Anyway, I snapped a few pictures, but since I don't know the mom from Eve, I figured I should block out the twins faces a bit. But seriously... isn't this HILARIOUS?!?! LOL!

The mom even had some blue and green hairspray on top of their heads. Totally made me laugh out loud.

Anyway, I'm now heading to my second "Costume Parade" of the day, around the corner at Grace's school. Then I'm coming home, soon to followed by the girls and Steve, and we'll eat and head back to the school for the Halloween dance they're having tonight for families. I am TOTALLY not looking forward to it for many reasons, but the girls are excited, so I've decided to fake it. LOL! I'll post pictures of my own kids sometime soon. :)

Zzzz...

I am soooo tired right now, and really need to get the hell to bed. But I wanted to say hi and post some pictures from today. The town had their Halloween parade tonight, so I took the girls. We had a blast, the girls got a shitload of candy, and a good time was had by all.

 

Today...

We're pirates. Don't ask why. Don't ask how. Just play along. Trust me on this one.

(PS: I didn't edit these photos at all, so forgive their ugliness. LOL! And she's still wearing that damn skirt. [sigh])

I Am Woman...

Hear me roar.

Some Photos...

I have no time to blog for real right now because it's already almost lunchtime and I've done NOTHING productive, including shower. [sigh] But here are some photos from the pumpkin patches we've been to in the past few days. (One as Hannah's field trip and two yesterday with my parents.)

These first 5 are from Hannah's field trip on Friday...

 

These next two are from the corn maze I took the girls through yesterday...

This last one is from yesterday too. I realize that Grace isn't looking at the camera, but it's sooooo rare that I'm actually in a picture with my kids, that I can't help but like it. LOL!

Layout

Just wanted to post a layout I put together yesterday highlighting Hannah's crazy mood swings. I swear sometimes I think the child is bipolar. LOL!

The Divorce...

Not mine. My sister's. Mary commented in my last post asking who's getting the dogs. Those two horse-sized beasts that, for the most part, are very sweet dogs. But since I'm not a big fan of four-legged creatures, they're certainly not near and dear to my heart. Sorry animal lovers. And I think that my sister's love obsession with them is freakin' bizarre. She dresses them up on Halloween and Christmas, she has birthday parties for them, etc. She says they're her "kids," but I find the whole thing rather disturbing and unhealthy.

Anyway, back to the divorce. She's leaving him. We all like him for the most part, but she says she's not in love with him anymore. That she loves him, but she's not in love with him. He isn't always nice to her when he drinks. Never anything physically abusive, but he's been known to make rude remarks to her, tell her she's getting fat, etc. I guess over the years, it's worn her down. As much as I like Mike and I'll miss him, I'm proud of her for making the decision to move on in her life and search for happiness again.

Anyway, she told him they were done about a month and a half ago. He was devastated. However, over the past few weeks he's already dated several women (his way of "getting over Kristin") and has found a house to rent and is in the process of moving out. He still swings by here for beers and to hang out (with her blessing) and sometimes the two of them even come over together, as they're trying to remain as "civil" as possible through this whole thing.

I feel horrible for both of them because they're both upset about it in their own ways, etc. But here's where the dogs come in. My sister absolutely, positively will NOT part with those dogs. Here's the thing though. Now that Mike is moving out, he's not going to pay the mortgage on their house anymore and I don't blame him, frankly. This was her idea, not his and he can't afford to pay rent AND the mortgage. However, my sister only makes $1100 a month. The mortgage is $1000 a month. She obviously can't stay there and pay for it on her own. Here's where it gets tricky. She won't get rid of the dogs. None of us will let her move into our homes with those two beasts (as well as 3 cats... let's not forget the felines). But she can't pay for the house. Hmmm...

So the house is on the market as of last week, but my gut feeling is that will take a little while to sell. When it does sell, neither of them will walk away with much after the mortgage is paid off. A few thousand each at best. And when it does sell, where the hell is she going to go? She is never going to be find a place to rent that will allow her to have 2 HUGE dogs and 3 cats. I mean, what landlord is that stupid? Um, none. I'm actually getting pretty annoyed with her. She's refusing to look ahead. My parents have told her they'll help her out financially as much as they can until the house sells (and I think that is above and beyond what they need to do actually). But once it does sell, she's still screwed. Like I said, she'll never find a place to rent with all those animals. And she can't afford to buy a house. But when you try to talk to her about it, she just says she doesn't want to talk about it. Uh, ok. But what are you going to do, ya know? I'll be pissed if she lives off of my parents' hard-earned money for too long. Sure, they should help her out for awhile. But I'll be annoyed as all hell if she goes the next year or so sucking off my parents who really can't afford to support TWO homes. It's not their job anymore, ya know? She keeps saying "She's not moving anytime soon," and that "she'll stay in that house until they foreclose on it" if she has to. All because of 5 stupid pets. I'm sorry, but sometimes decisions we make as adults are not easy ones and I don't think she's acting very "adult-like" right now.

So I've stopped talking to her about it. I have a hard time holding my tongue around her and my annoyance is often very apparent. And you can't talk to her about anything without her getting completely defensive and pissed off and storming off and being mad at you for a few days. So I don't ask anymore. She's made her bed and now it's her duty to lie in it. The problem is, she wants to lie in it with 5 animals and I don't know how that's going to be possible. So the future should be rather interesting to say the least. [sigh]

I've Learned My Lesson.

I just called to order a pizza for tonight. I ordered ALL pepperoni. And I'm going to get SIX garlic knots and hide three of them, dammit.

 

[EDIT: I just can't win. When I got there, I decided to get the pepperoni knots instead of the garlic knots. I came home... I warmed one up... I took a big bite. They gave me sausage knots instead of pepperoni knots. I hate sausage. [sigh] I give up. LOL!]

[Sigh] She's done it again...

My sister-in-law that is. (We'll call her J. from here on out.) Remember a few months ago when my mother-in-law told Steve that J. had joined a gym and was getting all buff? And how the evil competitive side of me could NOT let her be thinner than me (which is totally unlike me), and so I "joined" a gym for a week. (In actuality, I had a free pass for a week and then never paid to join and never went back. LOL!) And then how about 2 weeks later, Steve & I were visiting my mother-in-law and we came to find out that J. did NOT in fact join a gym?

Well, she's done it again. Steve stopped at my MIL's house last night after his dentist appointment, and when he got home, he said that his mom said that J. had been bugging her to join the gym together. And that a few days later, J. told her that instead of joining, she had cleaned off her enclosed back porch and set up a little mini gym with her treadmill, some other equipment, etc. and was going to work hard to lose weight. Shit. Now you all know what that means for me. It means I have to start working out and losing weight. Ugh.

In a weird coincidence though, last weekend my sister was here and mentioned that she's selling her treadmill now that her and my BIL are getting divorced. I asked how much she wants and she said fifty bucks. I said, "SOLD!" I really do want to do something other than sit here on my fat ass, and for $50, who the hell cares if I never use it, right? LOL! So this was all BEFORE I found out J. was starting to exercise again, but not that I found out she is exercising, I have to too. [sigh] I actually have lost weight recently. Not on purpose, and not by trying, but I'm down to 130-ish, which is the lightest I've been in years. But I am NOT in good shape at all, so I really should try to get some exercise here and there. But shit, now it's a competition. Ick.

(Oh, and remember I used to comment on J.'s painted on comma-shaped eyebrows? I did manage to snag a photo one day, so I'll post it later and we can vote on whether or not they are indeed fake and if she is, in fact, in serious need of an eyebrow-painting tutorial.)

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In other news, I drove all the way to the costume place yesterday and they didn't have the costume Grace wants. [sigh] So since I was already in the "city" I ran into Barnes & Noble and snagged 4 new books from the clearance bins. I LOVE the clearance bins. LOL! So that's cool. Maybe I can read them while I walk on my new treadmill. [rolls eyes and sighs]

OK. Hannah has a daycare field trip to the pumpkin patch today and I'm meeting the class there in a few hours, so I have to go get ready. More later. In the meantime, here's another picture of Grace from the weekend. Dear lord, that child loves her stuffed animals. LOL! (And yes Tink, she did get a haircut. Hannah did too, but it's not as noticeable.)

Hey gang...

I don't have too much to update on. Yesterday, I spent several hours cleaning up Hannah's pigsty of a room and rearranging the furniture in there. It looks really nice and clean, but I'm not naive enough to think it'll last long. [sigh]

I'm getting ready to drive 30 miles (one way) to pick up Grace's Halloween costume before they sell out of her size. Then I'm coming home and starting on Grace's pigsty of a room. Oink. Blech.

Here are a bunch of photos from the weekend and two layouts I've done in the past few days.

Tink, you were correct the other day. Hannah was indeed wearing a bowling shirt. LOL! My mom cleaned out her attic and found my older brother, Kyle's, bowling shirt from when he was a kid. It's Hannah's latest obsession in terms of clothing. And note that she's still wearing that damn brown skirt that's Grace's. [sigh]

 

Here's one of the girls carving these two tiny pumpkins they picked up at a pumpkin patch last week.

 

Grace with the finished jack o' lanterns.

 

And one of Grace that I really like.

 

And finally, my two layouts.

Weekly Word Challenge Photos

I don't have much time to blog right now since I have a buttload of stuff I want to get done today. But I wanted to get my WWC photos posted. The words this week were Posed and Natural. Here are my takes on them.

POSED

 

NATURAL

Let's Talk About Steve...

Steve, my dear husband. I don't talk that much about Steve on here. Not for any particular reason. Just because there's not many interesting things to say.

But last night, after everyone else was in bed, I was pissed at him. We had decided to get a pizza for dinner last night, and when I went to pick it up, I saw some garlic knots sitting there and bought four of them. They're wonderful little knots of dough with oil and minced garlic on them. Delicious.

So we get home and I eat one piece of pizza and one garlic knot. I was full then and decided to save one of my garlic knots as a snack later that night. I even said to Steve that one was going to be my "midnight snack." Great.

So it's 10:30 and everyone else is sleeping. I'm hungry. I can taste the garlic knot already and head to the kitchen to warm it up. But where is it? I look on the counter. I look in the fridge. I look everywhere. And then I spy it. The little bag that had contained the garlic knots was wadded up and thrown in the garbage, indicating that its contents were gone. GONE people. Son of a bitch, the bastard ate them. He ate ALL of them.

Then, just to add a little fuel to the fire, I open the pizza box to put the leftovers into the fridge for the night. Now when I called to order the pizza I specifically asked Steve what he wanted on his. He said nothing. I wanted pepperoni and said that. He said, "Get half pepperoni, half plain." Great. So I go to wrap up the leftover pizza, and what's left? Four pieces of pizza. All plain. The fucker had eaten all pieces of pepperoni. MY half.

Now I briefly considered walking upstairs, waking him up, and yelling at him. But I realized that that sort of behavior bordered on psychotic chick type stuff, so I inwardly steamed. I couldn't wait to ream him out today.

But he was gone long before I even woke up, picked up by my dad at 6:30 this morning to head to a golf tournament for the whole day. He did, however, just call me on his cell phone to say that he talked to his mom and that his uncle's colonoscopy had gone well yesterday and that nothing serious was found, much to our relief. I should have yelled at him for the garlic knot and pizza incident. But I couldn't. I laughed instead, and told him how pissed I was last night. He laughed. I told him I had every intention of waking him up last night to rip him a new one and we laughed about that together. I just can't stay mad at the bastard, no matter how hard I try. It's a weakness.

He's damn lucky he's so hot. Because otherwise, I think I would've kicked him to the curb a long time ago. ;)

I'm Only Half Back

Dear lord, this cold is kicking my ass. I will say that today is the first day that I can actually BLOW the snot out. Up until now, it was just thick ol' gunk that stayed up in my head no matter what I did to try to loosen it and get it out. So although I'm coughing more today and blowing my nose a hell of a lot, it's better than the past four days, so I'll take it.

Anyway, enough about my snot. I don't have much to update you guys on since I didn't do much of anything all week. I HAVE to finish up a document for work today or risk getting my ass reamed out. So I can't stay here long since I need to finish it up, send it off, and then head to the bank (again) for Steve. I took a few pictures last weekend and thought I'd share. Now you may notice there's a little copyright symbol on them. Believe me people, I, in no way, shape or form deem myself a professional photographer worthy of a copyright. But word on the street is that more and more photos are being pulled from Flickr (and other sites) and being posted elsewhere and/or printed without the photographers' permission. Since I upload all of my photos to Flickr in order to post them here, I just quick threw that copyright on there to be safe. You're actually supposed to put it right over the subject's face in order to completely screw up any ideas of copying, but I just couldn't bring myself to do that. LOL!

Anyway, here ya go. Some more eye candy for you. (And the reason I always have way more photos of Hannah than Grace is because 1) Hannah MAKES me take her picture half the time... and 2) Grace doesn't flippin' sit still long enough for me to take a picture of her, so all the ones I have of her are her blurry and in motion. LOL!)

Hannah lost in thought...

 

Hannah being whiny because she wasn't getting her way...

 

Hannah being a goofball... (This photo was taken about 2 minutes after the one above. I swear the child is bipolar. LOL!)

 

And one of Grace. She's not yelling. She's singing...

Ick.

I still feel like crap and I still can't breathe. [sigh]

I'll be back tomorrow morning with a real post and some photos. Have a good night everyone!

Weekly Word Challenge Photos

This week's words were Common and Rare. Here are my contributions...

COMMON

Hannah having a tantrum and acting diva-like over something that doesn't even remotely justify a tantrum or diva-like behavior.

RARE

This cloud. See that big, long "stripe" that looks like a jet's smoke trail? That's a cloud. That thing stretched in a thin straight line like that as far as I could see in both directions. It was so freakin' cool and I've never seen anything like it before. So I decided it's rare. Play along, OK? ;P

Is it over yet?

Sunday was one of those days that I glanced at the clock all day long, anxiously awaiting bedtime for everyone (including myself). But first things first...

My girls' night out Thursday night was fantastic. There were 4 of us there and I didn't end up getting home until 1:30 in the morning and 6 bottles of wine later. (All of us. I didn't drink 6 bottles myself.) We laughed, we cried, we watched "Grey's Anatomy", we gossiped. Fantastic.

So Saturday night, we went to Steve's cousin's wedding reception. It was nice and the food was great. I got a nice buzz going on and left at 10:00 when it was over in a great mood. Steve's other cousin (he has like a billion of them) invited us back to his house to continue the party. Since he lives pretty much right down the street from us, we figured, what the hell.

So a bunch of us show up there. He has an amazing setup in his basement. Full-sized arcade games, dart board, stereo system, fully stocked bar, and a regulation size shuffleboard long board game. Sweet. He made me 2 HUGE (and strong) Long Island Iced Teas, and when we left a little after midnight, I was trashed. [sigh]

I woke up Sunday morning and would've sworn I was still drunk. Ugh. After a long, hot shower and a hot breakfast of bacon and eggs, I felt better. No headache, no upset stomach, etc. But dear god was I tired. I was exhausted all day. That kind of exhausted you feel when you've been up ALL NIGHT LONG with a newborn. You know, it sucks feeling like that when you're responsible for two children. Ick.

So anyway, 4:00 rolls around and it's time for the Steelers game. So we get take-out and everyone digs in. Somewhere around the middle of the second quarter, the girls wander into the living room and Steve starts playing ball with them. Ten minutes into it, I'm telling them all to knock it off because someone's going to get hurt. I'm ignored. Literally about 30 seconds later, I see Hannah's head snap back and she starts screaming. Grace had accidentally headbutted her in the face and her nose was just gushing blood. Everywhere. Shit. It's running down her face and into her open mouth. Grace is crying too because she feels bad about hurting Hannah. I'm biting my tongue not to start yelling, "I told you so!" to Steve.

After cleaning up the blood and calming her down, I decided she was OK. No hideous bumps. No weird swelling. Just blood out of one nostril that stopped pretty quickly. Thank god.

But anyway, it was one of those days. I couldn't wait until it was dark outside, both kids were sleeping, Steve had gone to bed, and I could just sit here in silence, watching TV and probably dozing on and off.

Yesterday, I realized I was actually sick. Not hung over. Killer cold, probably passed on to me by my loving mom. Ugh. I still feel like shit, but I'm making myself function fairly normally. If I lay down for too long, I end up feeling worse, so I keep trucking along, trying to do the stuff I normally do. [sigh]

Anyway, just wanted to update everyone. WWC photos later...