Thing 1, Thing 2 and Pippi Longstocking

Have I really not blogged since Monday? We've had a busy week. Next will be even busier, as my hubby is coming home and we have a ton of stuff planned. Plus we have THREE family birthdays! My hubby's is March 6th, the baby's is March 7th as is my sister's.

Today the three older kids celebrated the end of reading month at school by having character day, they got to dress up. Since I have twins, I sent them as Thing 1 and Thing 2 from Dr Seuss' "Cat In The Hat".

It was really easy actually...

I purchased stick on felt letters and two sheets of white felt at JoAnn's. Total cost: $3.50. Then I went to Old Navy and purchased two plain red t-shirts for $5 each. Next came Party City, where I purchased blue wigs for $2.99 each. The total cost for both costume was only $20. I wanted to do all red, but do you know how hard it is to find red sweatpants when all the spring stuff is in stores? I figured tops were just as good.

Please excuse the white-out faces. My husband and I do not like to post pictures of our children online.


I traced a plate onto the felt, and cut out the circle, then adhered the stickers as shown. I actually sewed the felt onto the shirts, but only used 4 small stitches. This way, they can re-use the tops and they are easily taken apart. I was hoping to find wigs that stood up more, but these will do just fine.

Notice the height difference between them? Our son "M" is almost 5 ft tall! His twin sister is much shorter than him, lol. She obviously did not inherit the tall gene from my hubby and I, though she could surprise us later on. There is almost 1 ft difference in height between them.

Our middle daughter wanted to be Pippi Longstocking. This was actually very easy as well. All I had to purchase was orange hair spray and an old dress from goodwill. Total cost of her costume: $9 (dress at goodwill was $6!! expensive. ugh.). I measured where her knees were and cut it just above that. The blue shirt is her brother's, we already had the tights, socks and boots. Her freckles are my eye liner. And the wire for her hair I already had from making beaded Christmas ornaments.

For the patches, I took out a few things from our own goodwill donation bag and cut them up. I sewed each patch on with 4 small stitches as well. I think she wants to wear the dress again, so the patches are easily removed.

Her hair wasn't that hard at all actually. I bent a long piece of wire to the shape of her head, and slipped the ends through her pig tails. Essentially I had 3 pieces of wire in each pony tail so each group of hair that I braided was nice and stiff, each pig tail got one of those bent in half pieces. I cut off the longer ends with with nail clippers. The extra wire helps keep the braids really stiff.

Please excuse the crude model, lol. You can see the middle piece of wire, that is the end of the piece that was shaped to her head. I took a longer piece, bent it in half and twisted it around the center wire. Then I slipped the extra pieces in the pony tail. The elastic around the hair helped to anchor the twisted wire so it wouldn't fall through the pony tail.





Next came the hairspray...self explanatory!



I loved all the costumes! I had a lot of fun making them, and I love being crafty, so that made this even more fun.

It Was "TuTu" Easy

I got the crafting bug today!

I have been wanting to make my youngest daughter a tutu, but never got around to it. Well today at wal mart, I decided a good way to spend a rainy afternoon was to make it! And it was so easy too! It took me maybe 1.5 hours.

If you want to make your own, you will need:

Approx 2.5 yards of satiny ribbon
5 yards of tulle
Large coffee can, the big giant ones


When you purchase tulle by the yard, it is folded in half. Cut at the seam, so you have 10 pieces of 39x27" tulle and lay the rectangles on top of each other.

Roll up like a toilet paper roll, and get out your measuring tape. Cut at 5" increments till you reach the end of the rolled up tulle. If you have extra end pieces, just put that aside. Also, no matter how much you try, there will still be un-even ends and sides, but that doesn't matter here.

Now you're going to take your ribbon and measure around your daughter's waist and tie a knot at each end of the measurement you made. Usually it works that you have a 20" tail, then a 20" waist and then another 20" tail, with two knots in between.

Tie your ribbon around the coffee can. You may have to double up the ribbon, this is ok!

Take one strip of tulle at a time (after you have un-rolled it) and fold it in half, like a "U". Push the folded end under the ribbon and put the loose ends through the folded end. Like this (except I did mine the opposite way):




Pull the tulle nice and tight against the ribbon and continue doing this with each piece of tulle till you reach each knot. I like doing a pattern, but you can do whatever you like. If the above method is too hard, you could also just tie the tulle around the ribbon.

Here is what ours looked like:



It's just a quick picture, I didn't have time to un-fold some of the ends of the tulle for the picture, oops! I am also going to trim the ends a bit, but other than that, I am ery happy!

A closeup:



If this is too confusing, I will add more instructions later! Just let me know.

Tiny Financial Update....UPDATED

I just wanted to share how happy I am that our two credit cards are PAID OFF!!!!! I did that this morning. And I am headed out after lunch to pay off my youngest daughter's bedroom set.

With all three of these bills paid off, we're going to be able to save around $200 extra per month.

We are now debt free except for our Van payment!!! I don't see us coming up with 10K anytime soon to pay it off, lol, so we'll be keeping that payment for awhile. That's ok though, because the longer you keep your credit open, and paid on time, the better your credit score. I am so proud to say that in one year we have raised our FICO score 124 points!!!! And after the credit card payments post, it will go up even higher.

Hooray!!!

Thank You Tax Refund!!!!

It feels great!

Songs From Your Past

You know how you'll get a whiff of a scent and it brings you right back to a certain time and place in your past? I've had that with a candle I bought once. We had the same scent when we lived in our apartment and Germany, and I happened upon it years later and it instantly brought me back.

The same things goes for songs; tonight after I was done watching Lost (I bought it iTunes), I was perusing songs and somehow found a compilation album for every year of the 90s. I listened to a few clips and some of the memories I had were just silly, some were sad, and some were good.

In no particular order:

"Mr Jones" by Counting Crows: I remember sitting in Mr De Jong's grade 7 Social Studies class discussing this song with several of my classmates. I can't remember who, but I can still remember how we were sitting. It was me, two guys, and another girl.

"Hold My Hand" by Hootie and The Blowfish: My dad and my step mom (at the time) took me to a Hootie and The Blowfish concert in Vancouver. It was awesome! I even got a concert t-shirt. Don't ask me to recall where it is, because I wouldn't be caught dead with it now, lol! I had so much fun going to that and thought I was hot shit because I was at a CONCERT! lol

"California Love" by 2Pac: An old friend of mine, Kristen, and I were having a "party" at my house and before all the kids arrived, her and I were watching Much Music (I'm Canadian, it's our version of MTV...or what used to be MTV) and I remember seeing this video. I can even see us sitting on the floor in my basement watching the video.

"MMM Bop" by Hanson: My friend Jake and I were going out for dinner at Red Robin, and his sister Sam was driving us and I remember us waiting in the car for her. The song came on and he and I were singing along to it.

Almost anything from 1998 pretty much defines the whole year for me. I graduated from high school, started college, had a pretty traumatic breakup that fall, met my husband, spent time with my Best friend from California. Many Many things. It was a real turning point in my life, as was 1999 (which I shall get to in a moment).

One song from 98 that affected my life in 99 was "Don't Want to Miss a Thing" by Aerosmith. The reason behind that song is simple. When my husband and I were "dating" over the Internet, he said that was "our song" (you know how teenagers are, lol, we were 18 and 19!!!). Anyway, he and I broke off our engagement and I had gone on to date other guys etc etc, and I was at a friend's house sometime later and he and I watched Armageddon. I balled like a baby when I heard that song, it was so emotional for me because it had been mine and my "fiance's" song (now husband). Funny thing is, my friend had no idea and thought I was crying because of the movie. Yikes! lol I guess I wasn't really over him yet (this all happened early spring 99).

And of course, we can't forget "My Heart Will Go On" from Titantic! I saw that movie so many times, and I remember the first time I saw it I was in Delta with my friend Melissa, and some of her friends and us girls were all crying afterwards and all the boys hugged us. Awww.

Another emotional song for me is "Love Song" by Sky. This is probably up there with the Aerosmith song. I had another somewhat serious relationship in 1999, and this was a really popular song while "S.P." and I were dating. Ultimately things didn't work out for us, obviously, but this song always makes me think of him (same goes for "Blister In The Sun" by the Violent Femmes).

I think a lot of songs from 98 and 99 bring back the most memories for me because of all the life changes that went on. Like I said earlier, I graduated from high school, had a couple relationships, a couple bad breakups, moved out on my own, got a job and supported myself, got engaged, went to College and University, and ultimately eloped and married my husband of 9 years!

And lastly, two more songs from 2000: "Kryptonite" by 3 Doors Down, and "I Try" by Macy Gray. Nothing spectacular that's for sure, but that was when my hubby and I were first married and we lived in Germany. These were really hot songs at the time, and I can still see us driving in our Suzuki JLX driving from housing to the Air base, and hearing these songs on AFN (Army radio station).

Now that you've hopefully enjoyed the little window into my memories, what are some songs that define your life? What brings back memories?


*there are some I did not share, like all the Smashing Pumpkins stuff, which makes me remember practically all of grade 9. Or a song by The Police, which reminds me of my friend Jake, who I mentioned already, etc etc. I though my post was long enough ;o)*

Just Shoot Me, I blew It

All my well laid plans to not shop so much have gone right out the window! And I should say that 4 kids cost a lot to clothe! I normally don't spend that much each month, but with ON's sale, I couldn't pass it up.

Old Navy has a really good 40% off, and having gone through my kids' summer clothes and realizing how little they had, I was given the OK from my hubby to go buy some stuff. I purchased our middle daughter two pairs of shorts, and one pair of bermuda shorts. The oldest got 3 tops, and the boy got 3 tops. My total came to $75 and I got FREE shipping! It's all for the summer. My daughter's shirts were only 3.90 each, my son's shirts $6 and the shorts were the most expensive, they were $12 each. I also went to Value Village, and was able to find my son 3 pairs of shorts for only $12!!!

I'm just lucky we have the funds to do so. I am insistent on having the kids well dressed, so I was quite happy with my purchases for what I paid for them. Especially since one of the pairs of shorts I bought my son was ABERCROMBIE, for only $4.99.

Go ahead and laugh if you want, because I know some people think I'm crazy for buying when and what I do, lol. I don't care though. I pride myself on finding good deals and I am happy with what I bought. Plus, I used cash and all the bills were paid for the month as of the 15th. Yaay!!! I love finding a good bargain!

Better Late, Than Never

A big big thank you to 11th Heaven's Homemaking Haven for including my post Homemade Amish Bread in this weeks edition of the Make It From Scratch Carnival!!!

Ebates!!

Hello dear readers!

Today I finally signed up for Ebates, which is an online service that gives you cash back for online purchases.

Ebates is a shopping site that gives you up to 26% Cash Back every time you shop online. You can shop at over 1000 stores including Barnes & Noble.com, Gap, Target, Buy.com and Expedia. Plus you get additional savings with exclusive coupons, free shipping offers, and limited-time sales!
I do a lot of online shopping, so I really wish I had signed up with them before. And we have a few online purchases coming up too with our tax refund, so that is even better! You get your cash back every few months as well!

If you sign up, you get $5 and I get $5 when you make your first purchase!!

*no this is not a hoax and NOT a PPP opp* lol I really did sign up! Please sign up so we can both earn and save money!!!

EBATES REFERRAL LINK

From The Depths Of My Freezer

I don't know what to do with it all! I found all this stuff and didn't even know I had half of it, or I have conveniently forgotten about it because I am too lazy to do something with it. So I need ideas on what to do with it all!!

*I have found 12 ears of mini corn-on-the-cob, which I will cook with dinner tomorrow night.

*A HUGE 10lb bag of chicken quarters that I forgot to separate and are now frozen in one large chunk. I think we might wait till it is warmer and then BBQ them all. *BBQ it will be*

*A half gallon of strawberry ice cream, never opened. *We'll eat this*

*1 frozen Capri Sun, WITHOUT a straw *had a hole, so threw it away*

*2 gallon bags, filled with strawberries that I hulled and chopped up last summer. They were frozen flat. Also found a small freezer bag with frozen strawberries as well. Maybe make some more jam? we just ran out today. I'm not feeling it right now though. *Keeping these for smoothies. I love my smoothie maker and don't use it enough*

*Two packages of hash brown patties...one pkg had 3, one had 2. (Threw these out b/c of freezer burn and they looked nasty)

*Frozen french fries from long ago... I remember buying them last summer!!! *probably make these this friday with hot dogs or something*

*Various full bags of vegetables like broccoli, cauliflower and brussel sprouts etc. *This will help keep my grocery budget down b/c I now have enough veggies for a week*

*A large assortment of frozen popsicles, fudgesicles and creamsicles. *desert for kids each night*

*1/3 gallon Orange sherbet. Notice a trend? we're not big ice cream eaters here. (also purposely melted this b/c it had freezer burn)

*A few bags of various chicken cuts...tenders, and drumsticks that I thought I had used up. I have a few left in each bag. (I actually threw away the drumsticks b/c they had freezer burn). So now I have 3 large boneless skinless chicken tenders. *I will use these when I make "un-fried" chicken sometime in the next couple weeks*

*A half gallon of pulled bbq pork. *keep this for lunch one day when my hubby comes home again*

*3 hamburger patties *These were really gross, I didn't like them, but my hubby did, so he can eat them for lunch when he is home again*

*1 bag of semi sweet chocolate chips *maybe I'll make a batch of cookies this week*

*1/2 bag of butterscotch chips *bought for fudge, gross. Probably throw them away*

*Coffee, 2 small sample bags *sealed, so I will keep them. We rarely drink coffee though*

*Walnuts and almond slivers *These are expensive, so I will keep them for future baking endeavours*

*2lbs of ground beef *will be making my lasagna rolls with this*



I have a few other things in there, but I just put them in recently, like the ham I cut up today, and some ham bones, orange juice concentrate, some ice cream we will eat, as well as some spaghetti sauce my husband made while he was home.

What should I do with it all? I'm trying to clear out freezer space because I have do do a LARGE shopping trip on Tuesday, and need room for all the food.

Look At My Sidebar

My experiment of "little to no shopping" is failing, horribly! LOL

I was doing so good until I went to the Gymboree outlet yesterday and found a bunch of stuff on sale!!! I got 5 tops for $26 plus tax...only $5 a piece, which is better than WM prices!! I guess my total so far isn't too bad, $60 so far for the month.

Anyway, I'm back on the wagon, so let's see if I can actually keep it to a bare minimum for the rest of the month. I'll try!!

Amish Bread, Day Two

Yesterday I made Homemade Amish Bread, but didn't have the greatest results. It was good, but very heavy and dense.

Today I tried again. I haven't had the opportunity to taste it, as it is going out with my husband. I might make the kids and I a loaf tomorrow.

What I did differently today was to first use 1/2 cup less flour, and 1/8 tsp more yeast. So I did 1 1/4 teaspoons of yeast instead of 1 1/8th. I also made sure the water was a lot hotter when I was disolving the yeast. And lastly, I made sure that the bread was in an even warmer spot than yesterday. Luckily I was baking cookies today (another post to come about that later), so the oven was on and the bread rose nicely. Twice.

Here is a picture of the bread right before I put it in the oven:



And here is one of it after baking. I also brushed butter on the top to soften it.



Please pardon the fuzziness, my camera battery is dying.

I'm guessing the final verdict will be tomorrow when my husband tells me if it was good or not!

****

2/15 I forgot to update. He said the bread was much much better! Still a little dense, but not nearly as bad as last time, LOL. As you can see the bread turned out beatifully as well, but I guess it "kneads" a bit more "kneading", lol.

Homemade Amish Bread

Since my last post about making bread, Not To Toot My Own Horn, I have been much too scared to even try making my own bread again. My confidence from last time completely vanished. I haven't found anyone to fix my bread machine, so the general consensus in our home is to just toss it. I'm sad though, because it has been a faithful friend in my kitchen for the last two years. Ok, not really sad, but you know what I mean, right? Now I get the pleasure of spending $100 on a new one next weekend once our tax return comes. I'd still rather keep my old one if it were working.

My dear husband has been patient with store bought french bread from Safeway, but today he asked me to try make some from scratch again. I did try everything to get out of it, even offer to go to Safeway and pick some up, but he wouldn't have it.

So out came the Amish cookbook that I have, and I found a recipe for Homemade Bread, as follows. However, I will make a few suggestions; if you halve the recipe like I did, only add 3.5 cups of flour, not 4. With 4 you are going to have to add more water as you knead it because it gets too try to do anything with. The original recipe yields TWO two lb loaves of bread.

Homemade Bread

1 (1/4 ounce) package active dry yeast (for one loaf of bread I used 1 1/8th tsp)
1/2 cup plus 2 cups warm water or milk
1 heaping tablespoon lard or shortening
1 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon salt
7-8 cups all purpose flour (I used Gold Medal "Better For Bread Flour)

In a small bowl, dissolve the yeast in the 1/2 cup warm water.

In a large mixing bowl, combine the lard, sugar, salt and the remaining 2 cups water. Into the mixing bowl, stir the yeast, and enough of the flour to make a soft, elastic dough that doesn't stick o the sides of the bowl. Knead well with your hands.

Cover the dough with a loose piece of cheesecloth or plastic wrap and let rise till double (about 1 1/4 hours) in a warm, draft-free place, such as a table close to the stove or a sunny windowsill.

Punch the dough down, and divide it into 2 balls. Form 2 loaves with your hands. Put the loaves in greased loaf pans. Cover with a damp cloth and let rise again until double (45 to 60 minutes). Bake in a 325F oven for about 45 minutes. The bread will sound hollow when it's done. After removing the bread from the oven, brush the top with butter. This will make for a softer crust.

I took this recipe from "The Amish Cook", written by Elizabeth Coblentz

Right now my loaf is in the first rising stage. I have the timer set and it should be done in about 45 minutes. I will update later!

******

Well, some people are very impatient. I happened to be away at a Valentine's day performance for my middle daughter, which is why I didn't post earlier.

So, the verdict is in. The bread was very good, but VERY dense. It definitely needed to rise longer, and it definitely needs 3.5 cups flour, not 4 cups. I'm making another loaf tomorrow, so hopefully it will turn out better. Oh, and a pinch more salt is good too. It definitely tasted a bit bland.

Tax Season

Last Thursday I dropped off all of our tax information to our Accountant because we had our appointment today to get our taxes done. I wanted it all handed in earlier because my husband is not home for long, and we needed time to make sure we could get it all signed. Today we went in to sign the papers and found out our refund amount. It is quite large, which we are happy about. Yaay! It will pay off all the credit cards, pay off our daughter's bedroom set, get all of us our passports, get me some new glasses, and finance an expensive trip to Ikea to purchase a new table and chairs, and a few kitchen items we need.

AND....we'll still have just about 2K left to put in savings!!!

Celebrate with me! I'm quite happy about that. Of course, we were hoping for more, doesn't everyone? But this is enough to take care of what we need and put some into savings.

Now comes the waiting part...it should be here February 20th. As soon as I get it, the credit cards and the bedroom set will be paid off. Essentially we'll be debt free except for our van payment!

The amounts we're saving each month by paying off the three big bills will also be put right into the savings account. We pay $50 on each credit card per month, and the bedroom set is 26.79 a week averaged out, and that totals just about 210/month for all three. If we can save the majority of that amount per month, by March of 2010 we should have just over 4500K in savings. I would add a savings ticker to the sidebar of my blog, but I am not quite sure how to do that...maybe eventually I will.

Busy, Busy, Busy

*** HE'S HOME***


Yet again, I procrastinated with timing my household duties and my husband coming home. He will be home in 24 hours and I still have to do the following today, before I go to bed:

Vacuum living room and front room and our bedroom
Catch up on laundry, fold and put away. Don't know if I'll be able to do this.
Dust living room and master bedroom
Sweep for cobwebs
Mop and sweep the kitchen floor
Shave
Paint my nails, lol. I do it for him because he likes it! toes are being left till the morning, fingers done!
Take my son to karate tonight We skipped tonight.
Put away all the winter wear in a less conspicuous place
Put away the Christmas decor stragglers


Now I still have time to do that tomorrow morning, but not a ton. I did get all the grocery shopping and errands done today, except I forgot two important things. Grr!!!

Well, I better get off my butt and do something!

Tomorrow I still have to make a big dinner, a special desert for him that I wanted to make, bake some cookies for the evil neighbors as a peace offering, stuff 12 goody bags, bake two cakes, pick up my husband from the Truck stop. Ugh! maybe I should make him do some of that, lol.


************************

Friday:

As you can see, today on the list is mostly menial stuff. Just little things here and there that I didn't get to do yesterday:


Drive the kids to school (normally they take the bus)
Clean out and tidy my van. It's looking like a bomb exploded in there. I went and vacuumed it out too at the car wash!
Bake the twins' cakes (hubby will decorate)Working On It
Bake the neighbor something or just buy it I made brownies
Put away all the dishes from last night
Paint my toenails
Wash, fold, dry and put away as much laundry as I can
Clean my glass cookie tray and put away

I *think* that's it. I hope that's it!

Testing, Testing, 1 2 3

I got a new App for my iPod Touch that lets me write blog posts from my iPod, and publish them too!! I am just testing it tonight.

Off to bed now, I am so tired.

Neighbor Issues!!!

If I could have no neighbors, I would be so happy! my next door neighbor came stomping up my porch and steps this morning and got upset with me for one thing after another. Her and I have very different ways of parenting, and our kids don't play well together at all. Things just came to a head this morning...her son and my middle daughter were having a bit of an argument at the bus stop, and my son stood up for his sister and called her son a name that she didn't like. *asshole*. Hubby and I try to watch our language around the kids as much as we can, and don't let the kids swear, but we don't really censor them either. We personally don't think that "asshole" is all that awful, but to her it is. We don't conform to the norm that's for sure. Anyway, she came stomping up the porch mad as a hornet about the name calling and whatnot and now she is threatening me and saying she'll be an awful neighbor and hate me. And I think what made her the most was that my first reaction to what my son called her son, was to laugh. I just thought it was funny. We teach our kids to stick up for themselves and their siblings!! I know that you can't control knee jerk reactions, and I plan on apologizing to her again for laughing.

I'm just tired of it with them. Over and over and over again. I'm always hearing from my kids how awful the neighbor kids are to them. Their daughter is so awful that the teacher had to seperate her and my daughter in class (when the school year started, the teacher had put them side by side not knowing they were next door neighbors and fought). Their son slammed my son's hand up against the bus window once and caused his hand to be bruised and cut. It just never ends and I am so tired of it!

I don't know what to do anymore. Neither of us has any plans of moving (we're both renters) so we're stuck here for the time being.

Please don't flame me for what I am about to say next. It's just an observation and I don't mean to offend anyone or make any stereotypes. I'm just trying to understand how she is. They are on welfare, food stamps, and section 8 housing and her husband is a bum who sits at home doing nothing all day. she works part time and "pays the bills". And again, i have no problem with that stuff, it's there to help people and I think that's a great system. Anyway, we're not involved with anything like that. We have a nice vehicle, my kids wear all nice clothes and I make sure to take care with their appearances. My husband works hard to provide for us and I am lucky to have these things and be able to stay home. We only rent because we're trying to save up to buy a home (otherwise we would so NOT be here!) Her/Hers...not so much and her kids are either in too small or too big clothes and look unkempt a lot of the time. Is it possible that maybe she is jealous and acting out because of that? I wonder if she is bitter that we have more than she does?

I have tried to explain to her time and time again that the kids just don't get along, but she apparently doesn't get it. Kids bicker and fight, it just happens. Her kids have very different temperaments than mine, She was raised religious...we're not religious.

Can anyone give me advice on how to mend things? I'm planning on going over there this afternoon when she gets off work. I don't care if her and I are not friends, I really don't...I just don't want to have a hate-hate relationship with her.

I think hubby and I just repel neighbors! Maybe we should learn to conform, but maybe not


*** Hmm... I wanted to actually respond to my own post, but I'm not quite sure how. My plan for this afternoon is to talk to the neighbor and just suggest that we have the kids stay apart as much as possible. I know that isn't easy because with kids it just goes in one ear and out the other. Kids are enemies one day and best friends the next. I guess somehow I will have to convey that to my neighbor. I hate confrontation.

Here's The Deal

On a message board I frequent for Gymboree lovers, there is a post floating around about not buying much, if anything at all during the month of February. January was a gluttonous month with Gymbuck Redemption, Red Balloon Sale and the Fire Sale. Granted, I did get good deals, but I spent far more money than I needed to.

My goal for the month of February is to buy little or no clothes at all for the kids, unless it is absolutely needed. Like my daughter suddenly needing new pants overnight- yeah, that actually happened in January. Fun! If it is such an awesome deal that I can't pass it up, like I did last week and got brand new $43 raincoats for only $1.99, then I am free to purchase them as long as we have the extra money.

We will be needing to supplement with some short sleeve options soon, but we have a couple months for that still. And when that happens, I will purchase as needed.

I added a "list" to the sidebar, so check it out each day and make sure I don't go shopping!

Just Runnin' My Mouth

So today we found out that my son's best friend at school lives like one street over. How we never knew that? don't ask me! His mom and I were chatting on the phone and I told her how much I disliked my house and my next door neighbors, and how this was just a temporary home. My neighbors aren't the best people, to be totally honest. Anyway, I felt like I just said too much and I actually called her back to explain better and apologize. I was so embarrassed! I just keep putting my foot in my mouth. She was totally understanding and told me not to worry about it, but still...

Which brings me to my next point. I wish I could just keep my feelings to myself! I know it's only a temporary home, but it just isn't home to me. It's a rental, and that pretty much sums it up. We moved here b/c it is cheap and affordable. Why should I have to apologize for my crappy housing when it's not my fault, right?

I think I'm runnin' my mouth now, maybe I should just shut up? lol

P.s......I also wanted to add how much more I am enjoying this blogging thing now that I don't feel as pressured to do PPP! PPP has been pretty non-existant, and it's really nice not having to worry about blogging for money. I'd do it still if they had good Opps, but those aren't really available anymore. Don't tell on me!

At the risk of being totally embarrassed, I guess I just need to get it all out in the open. I have been struggling with my weight for years, yo-yoing up and down. Right now I am the heaviest I have EVER been and I hate it. Just 5 years ago...man that seems like such a LONG time ago, I had lost a ton of weight and I was perfectly happy with the size I was at. Slowly the weight started creeping up, and a year later I had gained it all back plus more. I got pregnant and almost lost all the pregnancy weight...but I gained it all back.

So now, almost three years after I delivered my last child, I have gained all the pregnancy weight back. I hate it. I hate being fat. I hate seeing what I see in the mirror each day. I hate not feeling sexy. I hate not feeling pretty. I hate feeling embarrassed. I hate ill-fitting clothes and shopping at plus size stores. I hate that I have to constantly feel like I am adjusting my clothes to make sure they're hanging right and not emphasizing that tire around my stomach.

I hate that Old Navy only sells their plus size stuff online, so if I want to buy anything, I have to buy it sight-unseen and hope it fits. Lane Bryant plus size clothes are only "ok", I don't care for a lot of them. I only own a few pairs of jeans that fit well, and two are slightly tight. I wear the same style shirts every day, because I go with what looks even slightly slimming.

Most of all, I hate myself. I hate the fact that I just can't control my diet. I see people losing weight so easily and it just pours off them, and that just makes me more depressed. I can exercise and exercise all i want, but I don't lose weight. Because I can't diet.

Honestly though, it's not my eating that is the problem. My normal diet is fine, though I could use more fruits and veggies. I eat moderately during the day. Usually I start off with a bowl of Quaker oatmeal squares, or a banana/yogurt, a glass of milk etc. Today I had homemade bran muffins with a glass of milk. Two small muffins and one glass of milk and I am satisfied. The problem lies within my addiction to sweets. I can't seem to controll my sweet tooth. I am literally addicted to sugar. I eat normally other than that.

This summer we're going to visit my family, and I don't even want anyone to come to the Lake with us because I don't want anyone I know to see me in a bathing suit. Ever wonder why I didn't make more of an effort to go to my highschool reunion? I was too embarrassed.

Being a food addict is AWFUL. Do you know how hard it is be addicted to sugar? It's like a drug. I can't seem to not have sweets in the house. Yet everytime I'm at Wal Mart, or Safeway or Target, and I find myself picking up a bag or two of m&ms, or some mini 3 musketeers candy bars, I get even more depressed. It's a vicious cycle. Fat -> Depressed -> Buy more candy/junk food -> more depressed -> buy more -> eat more. See what I mean? I wish I could go to Fat camp.

I've given myself 1.5 years to lose all the weight. I want to lose it all by my 30th birthday July 2010. But I just can't seem to get moving. I like how I feel when I go to the gym, I feel empowered and proud of myself. Then I come home and have a brownie. I wish there was a magic pill I could take to help me over this. I've thought about lap-band surgery, but that won't help me. Have that surgery won't stop my sugar addiction, I have to over come it myself.

I just don't know how. Monday turns into tuesday, into wednesday and so on. I just need to suck it up and just DO IT.

But how? how do I get over this addiction? Like I said earlier, I just don't know how.