Back in Black

(I'm going to post pictures in segments so they will all be out of order and what not, here is your first lot of pictures)


Here I am sitting at the air port getting ready to go see Jen. We got on the plane and flew over. Upon looking out my window in Oregon I discovered IT'S GREEN! I took pictures but they don't do justice to the green ness I saw! I got off the plane walked the 5 miles to baggage claim and suddenly saw Jen running towards me. I can sense a hug from a mile a way and this girl was going to hug me. I announced quickly, "it's okay you can hug me," and then we giggled because I had just said that. We headed out to the parking garage and rode the elevator to the wrong floor. I made some kind of joke about I was going to blog about this, how we were only together a few seconds and already having troubles (little did I know). We get to her car and I grab the car seat out of the bag and pull it out of the base. Umm I said, PULL IT OUT OF THE BASE!!! Note to car seat, thats your cue to come out of the base.

(Insert Shannon and Jen scratching our heads here)

So we look at each other, look at the car seat and do the only logical thing, we pull harder. Nope. Doesn't budge. Okay well how about if I hold it this way and you pull. Nothing. This is the point where I eloquently say, "Jen i'm going to start cussing now, and I know you don't cuss," this is the same time Jen was like, "Duh, yeah I do cuss loser gosh, I just pretend not to cuss on my blog."

Right about now I'm getting mad. I look at Jen and inform her that I'm going to throw this fucking bitch on the pavement. So I do. I threw it, we dropped it, we jiggled it and wiggled it and yelled at it, telling it what a dirty little whore it was being. Then we packed back up walked inside and begged Southwest to help us. Southwest guy who will hereunto be called Wussy boy acted like an idiot who had no clue what to do and said, hmm gee maybe uh, umm, I'm a moron and I can't help you.

So we walked out by baggage claim and I started throwing it around more. Some really nice guy came over and said he had the same car seat so he would help. He tinkered with it, pulled and tugged and then he broke it even worse.

Finally we had to call Jens sister, have her bring us Jens car seat, leaving Jens baby with her husband. We loaded Codi in Coles car seat drove the Jens and ate. Then we had to fucking drive to Babies R Us and buy a goddamn fucking car seat. While we were doing that her husband was taking a crow bar to the car seat. IT STILL DIDN'T BUDGE.

Observe the bitch whore car seat. I will be calling Graco today to complain.
After the car seat situation I was able to make my first observance of Oregon.

Lots of hippies smells like Pachoulli.

I later revised it to lots of hippies, smells like pachoilli, and smells like tasty flowers. Everywhere I looked there were gorgeous flowers.

The boys got along great! Codi spent a lot of time being a bully and poking Cole in the eye.

Jen and her husband took me to Bread and Ink Cafe for breakfast on Saturday. I got VEGETARIAN biscuits and gravy with a scone. I took a bite of each and at that exact moment I knew I wanted to move to Oregon and live inside of this restaurant! I do not lie when I say this was the best food I've ever tasted in my life.

Biscuits & Gravy – Fresh black pepper biscuit smothered with herb gravy (choice of Sausage Gravy or Vegetarian), topped with Italian sausage and cheddar cheese. Served very hot with two eggs any style.

We also ate at Hedge House, and Pix. Pix sold nothing but desert and coffee. I got the following two deserts.
The Pixie Pistachios, almond paste, and raspberry jam are the main ingredients making up this layered concoction people can’t seem to get enough of. One woman replied after her first taste, “Oh! This makes me wanna dance!” Enough said. (This was only two bites big not as huge as it appears)

Queen of Sheba Truffle Cake

Moist chocolate almond cake with bittersweet chocolate center. Warm slightly for molten chocolate center.

Saturday morning we went to the farmers market and bought a shit ton of fresh veggies, potatoes, asparagus, shallots, lettuce, bread, cheese, strawberries, and sugar snap peas. We also went to buy some green onions but were informed they were some fancy version of garlic. This was a real farmers market. It had everything there. I now hate Reno's wannabe version.

That night Jens husband took all of our findings and created a dinner for us. Roasted potatoes with shallots, asparagus in balsamic. Then he laid out the lettuce, and all the individual components of it to as a snack/salad bar, with bread, olive oil and vinegar. I didn't feel fat or anything after that. To finish off we had cupcakes which I will post about later.

By far my favorite part of the trip was when I met Lindsey. My first impression of Lindsey is, she is short like me and super fucking skinny. I was excited about the short part because tall people make me nervous and I always thought Lindsey was way tall. However, the reason this was my favorite part, is the following picture. Let me first remind you, LINDSEY IS A TEACHER she is supposed to be good with kids. Which is why, this is so fucking hilarious...This is what happened when we left Lindsey in the room alone with the two kids for about 4 seconds...

Isn't it awesome? The kids were both tired, ready for bed and pissed right off when she even looked at them. However they finally fell asleep and we posed them with Lindsey for vindication so she could show everyone that babies really don't hate her (even if they were sleeping)

One is mine, one is hers.

I had a really great time. I'll write more about it during the week. Ulitmatly when I went there, I suddenly felt like I was home. If I could talk my mom and dad into moving there I would go in an instant, everything about it felt right especially all the hippies, pachoulli and flowers!

I'm leaving on a jet plane

All my bags are packed I'm ready to go

Playing a quick game of hide and seek with Brandon. We were hiding from dad.

And here you go, the post that started it all. The post that Jen read that made her contact me. Here is the post that made us become friends. So, I owe it all to this blog and this post that I am flying to Oregon tomorrow.

On another note, ya'll remember, if anything happens to me, you tell Brandon how much I love him. You make sure he reads his personal blog and you all give him a big kiss for me!

Also, maybe someone could remind my husband, just how much I love him to, if anything happens to me. Also, remind him he can't get married till Brandon is about 9 and old enough to remember me. Also remind him I am going to haunt him, so please, still don't fart in bed!

And then tell my parents that if anything happens, I will haunt them too, and the way they will know, I'll rearrange all my dads tools, and mess with all my moms wizard guys! Oh and remind them I love them also, and I am so thankful for all they do.


Okay must go get beauty rest now, I have 0ad beauty competition with Jen tomorrow, she's hawt ya'll, she even got herself a new hurrcut!

(No clue why I just started talking like the rapper Nelly)

Mamas got a brand new toy

Isn't it beautiful

It's gorgeous isn't it

Do you see it close up?

NOW do you see what it is?

This new Canon Digital Rebel XTi sure does take some great pictures of my pimples huh? Look you can see every one of my eyebrow hairs. If I primped and stuff this would be a clear sign that mama needs a brow wax. I also need a shower, an some chapstick. Gosh. I will not be focusing any more photos this close on me!

A pretty lame attempt at funny

One of my most favorite blogs to read would be Val. She is um, everything I think I would have turned out to be had I not, gotten married and had kids. Oh yeah, and if I was BRAVE! As a little aside to Val, I just recently (read with in the month) realized Val was short for Valley Girl and not just some old lady pseudo name you chose for your self. I'm a quick one, I am!

Anywho she recently wrote this post about people stealing her ideas and what not. I did immediately did what I think every other blogger did and said, "oh no is it me she is mad at?"

But then I stepped back in reality and realized even if I wanted I couldn't pretend to steal even a shred of her glamorous life. However, I could totally rip her off in a less funny, kind of sad way, which is just what I intend to do (I'm gonna tell her ya'll gosh).

My current favorite post of Val's is this one. I giggle like a school girl every time I read it, err, look at it. This explains it a little better. (Val, I'm trying to back link like you do just for this one post and it's driving me fucking bonkers, I now have a new found respect for every goddamn link you post in your blogs)!

So, in honor of Val, I present to you all, my version of THE MECHANICS. Here is how the current three some in my house goes!

Also, I'm not near as fancy as ya'll with your photoshop doohicky, so I drew this in Microsoft Word, then made a screen shot (that Lee reminds me how to do daily), put it in my iphoto and cropped it. Look at me go.

Ahem, Can I please have a moist towelette?

You have a little something right there...just a smidge

Exhausting

I can't count how many times lately that I've said or written or thought, "I'm exhausted". People keep looking for a reason. Even I looked too. It isn't lack of sleep, because I've never slept so my body is used to that. It isn't how I'm eating. It isn't the amount of exercise I'm getting. I couldn't pin point it until this morning. For a while I thought I was stuck in a 5 month black hole. But now I'm beginning to realize it's been a series of holes. In and out in and out in and out.

I realized there have been a few days where I would say, "I feel like I am coming out of it," only what was really happing is I had come out of it, for about two days and then I would fall back in. I now understand this constant up and down is what is exhausting me.

My mind is in a mental cage match, I feel like I'm being mentally body slammed every ten minutes. I go in and out so fast I know longer know the difference between the two. Just when I feel my self coming out BAMN. I feel like I've been tossed into a well. When I look down at my fingers I expect to see them bloodied because I feel like I'm constantly trying to climb out, and just when I reach the edge I fall back in, and right now I feel like I'm drowning.

It is that right there that is exhausting my mind and body. Talking abut it is exhausting. Knowing people think nothing is wrong is exhausting. Trying to hold it together and not sit crying for hours is exhausting. Attempting to complete every day mundane tasks is exhausting. Trying to draw the line between having control of this, and become a bad mom, wife, friend is exhausting. Trying to keep it to myself so that I don't bring anyone else down is the most exhausting part of all.

Fighting with myself to write this was hard. I don't want to write this and then hear the questions, and see the looks, or hear the voices in other peoples heads when they feel like there is nothing really wrong. But I can't not write it because wrestling with this all alone is impossible. These thoughts are engulfing me and swallowing me like a tidal wave.

I hate being the blog that depresses people, but at times I feel it isn't fair for me to carry this alone. Then I think when I'm not being funny I'm letting down those like me who read blogs searching for comic relief in their lives.

I'm loaded with things I should be doing and then when I don't do them I feel like I'm failing. I've been trying to choose things simply for me and I'm left feeling selfish, and as if I have let the world down because I can't do it all, or remember it all.

My kids are my saving grace. Their innocence and carefree attitude gives me hope. I would love to some day feel a glimmer of the happiness they feel. That is why I feel as if I'm letting down the universe when I lose my temper with Brandon. Because in essence my children are my universe. My husband is a simple man, so it takes a lot to let him down, but these kids, they don't know any thing besides 100%. Kids don't understand, "hang on mommy just needs to relax." Kids don't understand that saying mom mom mom mom mom mom mom mom mom mom every fucking second of the day is actually enough to drive a person insane. It is because of this I feel like I can't even get mad at him.

This weekend there was a point (when he flushed his jammies down the toilet to be exact) where I just had to walk in my room and scream. The sad part though is I wasn't screaming because I was mad. Because in reality I thought it was pretty funny and I wanted to take a picture. I was screaming because knowing that I had to clean it, and stop him, and handle one more fucking situation suddenly became so overwhelming I felt it was either I scream in my room or I flush him down the toilet too.

I've been trying so hard to be better to Brandon. Trying to talk to him rather then yell. Trying to rationalize with him. Trying to understand, he's only two, he's going to get in trouble a lot. He doesn't understand anger. He doesn't understand long explanations. He doesn't understand people need to work, or cook, or do things. All he knows is that he wants something and he wants it now. He isn't old enough to know anything different, and I really try and understand that.

The mental and physical exhaustion is killing me. It's making it so hard to function, and yet the insomnia keeps me up at night making sleep impossible. My mind never sleeps, and I never sleep.

I don't know where to go from here. I want to sit in a closet and cry and cry and cry. Huge convulsing ugly tears. But I can't. I have to be a mom, and a wife, and a friend, and a daughter, and doing that sort of thing just makes it harder on those around me. So I put on a happy face in order to protect them.

Only, now I'm wondering, when am I supposed to protect me?

CRAWLING

NOW THAT HE IS CRAWLING, HE HAS DECIDED TO START CRAWLING OUT OF SQUISHY SOFT CODI BABY SIDE OF MY OFFICE AND CRAWL OVER TO YUCKY METAL DESK SIDE..AND THEN OF COURSE, LICK MY METAL DESK. UHH GUESS IT'S TIME TO START CHILD PROOFING THE OFFICE AGAIN EH?

This weekend should have caused me to have a mental overload

Things my child did this weekend

• He put a handful of soap in his hair, spiked it up and declared it washed, then..
  

• He cut his own hair!
  

• With scissors

• Then he cut holes in my favorite shirt of his

• Again, WITH SCISSORS

• He spent the rest of the weekend declaring he got a haircut
  

• In an attempt to throw his cupcake outside he instead threw it so it landed half on my wall and half outside

• While I was cleaning cupcake bits off the floor and wall he was busy eating said cupcake off the dirty sandy patio out back

• When I asked him to get off the toilet and get dressed he informed me, "no, I just have more poop in my butt, I not done."

• I walked in to find him flushing his pajama pants down the toilet, then pulling them out and swinging them over his head like a lasso

• I told him no, came back and found him flushing an entire roll of baby wipes down the toilet

• It was time to eat so I gave him some cream of wheat, which he decided to eat with his fingers

• He also decided to smear cream of wheat HEAD TO TOE down his body, across my table and on my chairs

• I laid out his outfit for the day, a cute pair of brown and orange board shorts with a hibiscus flower and a wife beater, he exclaimed to Rob, "I NOT WEAR THESE SHORTS THEY TO FOWERY"

• Followed by, "Dad, these shorts are fower power"

• I then walked in on him flushing a crayon down the toilet. He went to time out, came out and ...

• Flushed another crayon down the toilet while dying of laughter

• Responded to everything Rob told him with SO SO SO SO SO!
  

• Then he body slammed Codi and made him scream

• Then it was time for another meal. He put a couple bites of food in his mouth, chewed it and then turned his head to the right and spit it about two feet across the floor

• He thought this was hysterical

• I did not

• Finally he looked at me and said, "mama, you a girl, and I'm a guy, I'm a guy and a kid"

• "And mama, you a pincess, mama is a pincess"

I'M EXHAUSTED!

Whats all this talk about a reveal?

A LOT of people have been asking me about my big weight loss reveal. I'm all, uhhh, whu? I'm supposed to do a reveal? Hmmm. So! I'm about five pounds away from my original goal, (I am 156 goal is 150). My next goal is simply 145, however I think I need to get to 143 to fit into those jeans I tried on this weekend. First I want to say, I'm not done, we will call this a mini reveal. I'll do another reveal when I reach my final goal, and you know, I have a tan and style my hair and stuff.

A few mini goals I have reached though. I can cross my legs, rather then just resting my ankle on my knee. Fat people can not cross their legs. I can wear a belt, as shown below. And I don't mean I couldn't before, I mean I can now wear a belt as an accessory and not have my shirt yanked down over it to hide my waist. I can buy jeans in almost any store (fucking Abercrombie and their rule about not going over size 10). I can wear some cute tops with out looking pregnant. I can run for 15 minutes on a treadmill which totals about 1.5 miles. This is a vast improvement from the 1/10th of a mile I used to be able to run. I can also run with out feeling like I smoked 15 packs of cigarettes in 4 minutes. These are some of my small achievements. I have more that I hope to reach. I want to feel good in a bathing suit, and not like, oh she looks good for having two kids, but just, OH SHE LOOKS GOOD. I want to wear the jeans I wore the night I met my husband. I want to be able to buy this one certain pair of Luckys (they stop one size below mine, how odd that Lucky only sells some jeans in 32 and some in 33.) Anyway, here you go.

December 2007 weighing 195 lbs

One hour ago, weighing 156.6

Tell me your best story

So. Back in school I wasn't always the brainiest of the bunch. This meant that there were more then a few times in school I might have gotten some failure notices in the mail. And since I'm 26 now, and have kids, and out of the house I think it's safe to tell this story with out my mom grounding me.

Back around 8th grade I knew I was going to get an academic warning notice. I knew it was going to have a lot of the grade that is the same as the first letter in my favorite 4 letter cuss word (for those of you who are dense thats an F for FUCK). I went to Gingers the weekend I knew it was coming. We some how got to my house and got it out of the mail. We then went to her house to throw it away. Only I was still worried. What if her mom dropped something in the trash, went to retrieve it and saw the failure notice. So we got a better idea. We were going to burn the fucker.

We put it in a coffee tin, lit it on fire and said good bye. Only, I freaked out again. What if her mom saw the ashes in the trash and wondered why we were burning shit. Soooo I came up with the final brilliant plan. We were going to send that bitch down the river behind her house. Down the river it went never to be seen again. But can I tell you how long I worried that somehow my mom would go near that river and see the can and open it up and find the burned paper and magically know it was mine because of some kind of wizard powers? A LONG FUCKING TIME!


So, now it's your turn, tell me your best get out of trouble lie. Or even just one of the best lies you ever told your parents that they still don't know about.