Real Friends Tell You When They Break Your Toilet

Had dinner with the girls on Friday night - I had been excited all week, and truth be told, so was Cameron.  "You were nice for 2 weeks the last time that you saw JRo," he told me.  I'm fairly sure that I'm nice ALLL the time, but then again, I don't have to live with me. 

Here we are! EM, myself and JRo waiting for a table at the Cheesecake Factory.

In a flashback to college (even without alcohol involved!), I managed to break a major fixture in EM's home.  Some things just never change. 

Friday night, I broke EM's toilet.  Luckily, I don't mean that the level of my intestinal distress was too much for the poor potty.  What I do mean is that the toilet was running... and jiggling the handle wasn't working.  I couldn't very well leave the toilet unflushed and running.  I carefully removed the porcelain top and began to fidget with the pluggy thing in the tank.  Almost immediately, the plastic chain snapped, and I realized that there was no way around this.  I was going to have to confess what I had done. 

Have you ever seen the doormats that say cute things like, "Real friends use the side door"?  I now want one that reads "Real friends tell you when they break your toilet."  I was still feeling guilty today, but then I got a text thanking me for breaking it.  It would seem that she had been begging her husband to replace that toilet for months.  It's time to start a new business venture - Is there something that you want replaced?  Invite me over - I'll ruin it.  Guaranteed.  Destruction, I can handle.

On Saturday, Cameron and I traversed the big city to celebrate Cousin J's 4th birthday.  We saw a lot of family, and the kids jumped themselves silly on all the bouncey houses.  I got a rocking baby fix thanks to Cameron's sister and cousin who were happy to let me get a little baby loving.

 Baby J!

Destyni got a turn.  She's so ready for her baby brother to get here!

Tyler was more interested in the cupcakes.  (Great job, Uncle D!)

Spending just a couple of hours with the kids is always hard.  Poor Des clung to her Daddy when it was time to leave.  She knows that they'll have a long summer visit, though - alls well that ends well.

Looooves her Daddy - but never forgets that GIRLS RULE and BOYS DROOL.  Don't know who told her that.  :)

After making two trips into the city this weekend, on the way to get Mom's trash to take to the dump, my car started shaking.  One of the tires was SHREDDED.  I limped on down the mountain until I came to my mom's road.  That's where I saw this:





Poor Bianca.

I called up a neighbor, who came to my rescue.  Unfortunately, I had parked on a slope, so on the first go-round, the car rolled forward and bent my jack in half.  I couldn't really help, so I did what I could do...



I made him cookies!  (I didn't give him the *ahem*broken one...)  These are just about my favorite cookies to make.  They're quick and easy and moist and chocolatey!  I'll get the recipe up here soon. 

All in all - it was an AWESOME weekend.  I realized that even though I may not like my house, I love my neighbors.  I'd rather have amazing neighbors than an amazing house.  Now to talk EM and JRo into moving this way.  Talk about awesome neighbors!!  

100 days!

100 days to go! (aka 25 weeks)

Baby Bo, according to a mash up of various emails that I receive, is probably between 1.5 and 2 pounds.  He is running a little short on space, which makes his bumps and turns more noticable - and I'm still loving every second.  I feel good, and I accomplished a couple of things this weekend that made me feel slightly more ready.

In not quite unrelated news, if anyone knows anyone at TLC or a similar network, please inform them that my household could probably be the basis for a new program called Air Conditioning Wars.  There is currently a debate going on about the appropriate temperature for life in general.  So far, it's been civil.  The bigger Bo gets in the incubator that is my midsection and the more the temperature rises outside, the less civil it may be.  Check your local listings.

I picked up two excited kiddos on Friday afternoon.  After a quick stop at Daddy's work, we made our way to one of my new favorite weekly affairs, Farm Fridays at Jackson Lowe Vegetable Farm. 

I could have taken photos of their delicious veggies or awesome new facility, but I opted for a shot of these two instead.  You can hardly blame me.

We picked out broccoli and kale and squash.  C cooked the kale tonight - it was a new veggie for me, and I am typically not a huge fan of greens in general, but these went so quickly that I didn't even get a chance to take a photo of them. 

Here's a shot of the squash instead - my sweet mama cooked these up for us.  (I fried the pickles myself... to redeem myself from last week's deviled egg fiasco.)



Speaking of deviled eggs - guess who came to the rescue and had some for me on Friday night when we got there for dinner?  Yeah - my sweet mama.  She's the best.

Moving on from the food...  there was actually more to the weekend.  Saturday, the kiddos spent some one-on-one time with their daddy while I spent some one on one time with my mama.  We worked together on my registry, and I really only hit a couple of snags.

I solicited advice from mommies that I know about complex issues such as bottles and baby monitors.  After considering all the advice, I decided that in our small house with a baby sleeping mostly in our room, a basic audio monitor will work just fine.  I appreciate the need to not be confined inside the house because of a napping baby.  There are other kiddos to think of, plants to be watered, and sunshine that I need.

Sunday was a big day for us. 

Swimming with the boys at Nana and Pop's house after church.

Followed by the devouring of chili dogs.  (Not pictured is the followup trip to Dairy Queen for ice cream or the kiddo bellies that actually might have rivaled mine by the time all was said and done.)

As a special treat, the kiddos each got to stay up a little bit late and watch TV with Daddy.

It was a great Memorial Day weekend.  Thank you to the vets.  You are the reason that we live the life that we do.  May God bless and keep all of our soldiers, vets, and their families.  Amen.

Crazy is as crazy does.

The absolute last thing that I intended to do tonight was cry over deviled eggs - and yet somehow, that's exactly what ended up happening.  I'm not exactly what you might call proficient in the kitchen - I'm not a bad baker - cookies and biscuits and the like are well within my abilities.  Outside of the oven - I'm kind of a wreck.  Luckily, my husband likes to cook - likes it and is good at it.

I've wanted deviled eggs for about 6 weeks now.  Finally, tonight, I was going to make them.  How hard could they really be anyway?  I started cooking while C mowed the grass.  Boiled eggs.  Sounds simple enough.  Inept though I may be, I can boil water with eggs in it.  (I should mention that while all this was going on, I did successfully manage a couple of pans of chocolate cookies - don't judge me.  Or do - I'm beyond caring at this point.)  As I peeled the first egg, it became obvious that it was not actually hard boiled.  So I put them back on the stove and tried again.  After bringing them to a boil the second time, I was convinced that they MUST be hard boiled now.  So I peeled them all... and as I sliced them in half, dreaming of the deviled eggs that I had waited soooo long for, I noticed that they were all STILL soft boiled.  C came into the kitchen and started telling me what he would have done differently - and driving me crazy because he was about one pot of boiling water and 12 peeled eggs too late.  The filling for the eggs was completely liquid.  He blames my soft boiled eggs.  I blame his heavy handed use of pickle juice.  The truth is probably somewhere in the middle. 

He suggested that we make egg salad... EGG SALAD.  I didn't want EGG SALAD.  I wanted a FRAKKING DEVILED EGG.  So I stubbornly poured the yellow egg water into 4 of the white shells.  And I cried egg sized tears as I ate them.  And C made egg salad.

I should just go to bed.