It's Sort of a Cheat Post Really .... {Wordless Wednesday}

Okay...so I can't keep my mouth shut .... but don't you sometimes wonder what's going through their little two year old heads?

And just for the record .... I stuck my hair in fly paper to get this shot. Two words: 'Ew' and 'Ow'.

That's all.

Stating the Obvious

Just in case y'all hadn't noticed .... I'm taking a little bloggy break. I'm not going away for good, I promise. :)

I've just done quite a few photography related things lately and my evenings that used to filled with blogging are now filled with editing photos. And editing photos is SO MUCH more fun for me now because I finally FIGURED OUT PHOTOSHOP!!

Okay...well... sort of. But I'm a ton better than I used to be!

I've been so tired lately that even my toes hurt. And I even forgot to tell y'all that I got the big ugly boot off last week!! I'm hobbling around slower than ever, just sans the boot!

Anyway, I just wanted y'all to know that I'm still here .... I'm just in neutral for a while! Give me a few days and I'll be back! :)

18

That's how old My Boy is today.

I'm the mother of an 18 year old. It's so hard to believe.

It seems like just yesterday that he was 3 years old and causing me to pray for patience about every other minute. I'm happy to say that his little sister Hope has taken up that cause for the time being.

Funny, isn't it? Eighteen years later I'm still in the middle of Toddler Chaos and yet today I miss that 3 year old little boy that was a force to be reckoned with.

He done growed up on me, y'all.

I'm trying really hard not to cry today. But I'll be honest and admit that I'm losing that battle. And that's okay. They're happy tears about a little boy who has made my life fun, interesting, exciting and at times, extremely stressful. And now My Boy has grown into a beautiful young man who's handsome, funny, sensitive, kind and best of all .... he loves his momma. A lot.

He flashes that crooked little smile and I pretty much melt. ::sigh::

No long, sappy post from me today. I just wanted to talk about My Boy a little.

Happy Birthday, son. You've brought more joy than I could have ever imagined.

I love ya, kid.

In Case You Were Wondering...

...why I didn't post here.

Well that's because I've been a little busy and tired. You can go HERE to find out why.

Be prepared to smile.

Why I Declare Y'all ... It's Good Enough to Eat!

Something I haven't done very much of lately is bake. I love to bake. I also love to eat what I bake. Thus the reason I haven't been baking very much. I tend not to have any self control in the area of sweets sometimes. Or all the time. Like I can wipe out and entire pan of Rice Krispie treats by myself within a 24 hour period. Or less. Just ask my family.



But yesterday morning I had a hankerin' for somethin' special. Actually, I've had this particular hankerin' now for almost a month. Broken ankles are not conducive to hankerin's. But now that I'm more mobile I just couldn't hold off anymore. Nope. I had to bake. And I had to bake yesterday morning.



Do y'all know what Monkey Bread is? Well the recipe I made was Monkey Bread .... on steroids.



It's called Gorilla Bread and the recipe came from Paula Deen.



I bet y'all felt your arteries seize up just now at the mere mention of her name, huh? Yea, me too. Actually when I typed her name I do believe my heart contracted a little. And my cellulite jiggled in celebration.



Anyway.



This stuff is to DIE for (hopefully not literally!) it's so good!!! If you have some sort of brunch or ladies get together to attend and need to bring a dish ~ This. Is. The. One. I'm not kidding. People will luuuuuurrrrve you for it and then you will become epic. People will start saying, ' Ooooo, I hope Michelle brings that Gorilla Bread!'. You will, in fact, become a food icon at the local Baptist church.



I'm not gonna post the recipe. Mostly because I'm a little lazy and don't feel like typing it out. But all you have to do is go HERE to find it. Easy as that! But the other reason I don't want to post the recipe is that I'd rather just feed your eyes.



Pictures of fattening food. It's a whole lot less calories, my friends. But a whole lotta fun to post!

First there's the canned biscuits sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar ...

Oh yes, my friends. That would be a square of CREAM CHEESE in the middle ...

Oh, the marriage of the stick of butter and the cup of brown sugar ... mmmmm....

And we wrap up those little cream cheese surprises because they are a gift, my friends!


Then the layering begins. The recipe calls for walnuts, but I'm allergic, so I used almonds. Love me some almonds! Use whatever nut you feel like. I bet macadamia nuts would be incredible in this! And add an additional 3,ooo calories. But that's neither here nor there.

The first row of our little gifts ...


Mmmm...mmm....and a little of that butter/brown sugar marriage goin' on ...


The second layer that finishes with more of the caramel-like sauce and more almonds ...


Pop it in a 350 degree oven for 30 minutes until it gets golden and bubbly ...


Let it sit for about 5 minutes and then invert it onto a cake plate. Stand back and cry like a baby at the confection you just created.

Can I get an Amen?!


Looks good enuf to eat, dudn't it, ya'll?!?! (That's totally a word. My blog, my say-so.)


I do believe I'll have me a little bite of this. Or half of it. Whatever works.


Are your eyeballs droolin' yet?!?!

Good! Then I've succeeded! Y'all go have a wonderful weekend with your families and make some Gorilla Bread! Let's feed our cellulite together!

It's Just a Season

Yesterday was a challenge. The day before that was a challenge. I pretty much figure today's gonna be a challenge, too. This just seems to be the going trend in my life currently.

There is so much that needs to be done right now. So much so that my Overwhelm 'O' Meter is registering off the charts at the moment. I started to make a list of things that needed to be done so I could seem a little organized and systematically check them off as I did them, but once I hit 50 things To-Do I just wadded up the paper and threw it in the trash. I'd be happy just to get the toilets cleaned.

Oh well. So much for lists, I guess.

Monk always likes to tell me that you can only eat an elephant one bite at a time. Well, what do you do when the room is full of elephants and you have no appetite? Hm? Tell me that.

Well.

You continue to do laundry, cook meals, sweep floors, wash dishes and pray like crazy that the doctor tells you your foot is well enough to be out of the silly boot. You continue to do what you do, even if you feel like you're on autopilot, because it is the only way to keep from drowning in the sea of people you like to call your family.

And somebody has to wash all the underwear.

You block out words like: failure, inadequate, overwhelmed and weak. Those are words to lose by - not to live by. It's what you feel, but you simply can't give in to those destructive words. They will eat you alive. I know this.

These are the things we do in this season of life because it's just that ~ a season. Mine just feels like it's a very looooong winter at the moment. But rest assured this season is only temporary.

How do I know this? Especially when I'm smack dab in the middle of it? Because the Bible assures me that this is only a season and it won't last forever.

Even though it feels like it.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8
For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
2 a time to be born, and a time to die;a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
3 a time to kill, and a time to heal;a time to break down, and a time to build up;
4 a time to weep, and a time to laugh;a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
5 a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
6 a time to seek, and a time to lose;a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
7 a time to tear, and a time to sew;a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
8 a time to love, and a time to hate;a time for war, and a time for peace.


I just wish there was something in there about a time for Sonic's Happy Hour.

Or any Happy Hour for that matter.

A Little of This and a Little of That, But Mostly a Whole Lotta Nothin'

This last week has been a little challenging for me. Not counting the sweat attack to beat all sweat attacks, it's just been a very frustrating week in a lot of different ways.



Charlotte has been sick all week which has really put a damper on some things getting done. Poor baby. I've more than obliged her in the area of attention and one night I slept almost upright in the recliner just so she could breath. Wouldn't you know it was the night after I had gone to the chiropractor. ::sigh:: Needless to say, my house and my sleep are suffering.



...my poor little snotty nosed baby ... you can tell she doesn't feel well ...






And this boot on my leg? Well, I'm pretty sure I'm gonna burn it once the doctor lets me take it off. It is really becoming ANNOYING! I sort of liked lounging about for the first week, but now that it's been a month later I'm fairly certain I might have a hissy if the doctor makes me keep it on any longer! It's driving me cUh-RaZy!!



I've also acquired some extra poundage over the last month. All that lying about and eating highly fattening comfort food and drinking Sonic Happy Hour Cokes has had an impact. And not a positive one. My Mommy Muffin is now officially a Mommy Meatloaf. With mashed potatoes and gravy. So I've put myself on a new eating plan. It's called ... Eat Less and Drink More Water. I'll be doing ELDMW for about a week and then I'm gonna try and Low Carb it again. My carbohydrate, sugar loving genes just cowered in fear and are begging for chocolate to make them feel better. Don't worry, I shut'em up with some salt 'n' vinegar almonds. That'll teach'em.



I did get most of the grocery shopping done this week already and that is a definite plus. Well, besides the 5-10 items I forgot because you know, I didn't make a LIST! Hope went with me to Target and we had a swell time with one another. She belted out 'Jesus Loves Me' 5 of 52 times all through the store. And I let her. We had our own little praise and worship time right there in the midst of the Ethnic Foods aisle. People were looking and I just smiled and started another rousing chorus with her. It was just precious if I do say so myself. And it made me not be so mortified whe she announced to me quite loudly in the Paper Goods aisle that she found a .....

'Boo-guh'.

Monk found out this week that he has to go away on a business trip later this month. He'll be gone for a week. He was a little taken back after he told me and I exclaimed, "LUCK-EEE!". It was quite reminiscent of Jr. High when my friend Nat got her bi-level haircut (read: mullet) and I was jealous because I didn't have one yet. But anyway. He moaned on about how he would be all alone and I just clicked my tongue and shook my head. I reminded him of how he would have a fancy hotel room ALL. TO. HIMSELF. and that he would be able to sleep through the night without a baby in the bed and a toddler next to the bed waking up at all unholy hours. He just looked at me with his sad face. Then I said,

"Dude! (Oh okay, I didn't really say 'Dude', but I wanted to...) Honey, I would give anything to be able to get 4 full nights of sleep!! Think of all the reading you can do! Think of all the non-Barbie movies you can watch! Think of all the food you can eat and not have to share one single morsel"

Sleep, reading, movies and food are obviously things I highly value. Anyway, he's still been moping about. Don't get me wrong, I'm going to miss him, but I'd still kill to get all that uninterrupted sleep. I think I'm going to call him in the middle of the night a few times just so he'll feel at home.


And finally, I went for my sonogram at the Doctor 'O' Gynecology this week ~ you remember, that was one of the 'tests' I had to have done after the Appointment of Sweat. And I was quite pleased to learn from the sonographer that my uterus looked really good. Her words, not mine. I immediately texted Monk and said,

'Sonographer said uterus looked really good. Wanna have another baby?' BUAHAHAHAHA! Oh, I do love messin' with that man's head. Not that he thinks babies are bad because he doesn't, I just like to mess with his head.



And I succeeded.

And we wonder why our children all act so weird...

Oldest and Youngest ~ Wordless Thursday ~ Because I Forgot to Post it Yesterday

Yes, This Really Happened

For all you fellas that might read here (::snort::) ~ this may not be the post for you. Consider yourself warned. Just sayin'.

I had to make a little visit to Ye Olde Female Doctore this past Monday. I've had a few ...um... issues I've been dealing with over the past few months and I finally decided to bite the bullet and make an appointment. So I loaded Charlie into Phil the Burb and off we went to the OB/GYN's office ~ broken ankle and all.

(And no, I'm not pregnant. Now you can rest easy. Especially my sisters and sisters-in-law.)

I was a little nervous about going to the doctor because I haven't been to see Dr. Z. since I was expecting Hope and actually left her services for those of a midwife when I was 4 months along. I didn't know if she would be offended or irritated over the fact that I had birthed two children without her assistance and I didn't even want to think of how she might, you know, get me back.

::Shudder::

Anyway, the nurse gets me (and Charlie ~ stroller and all) into the room and takes my history ... yada ... yada ... "oh by the way, I've had two more children with a midwife" .... yada ... yada ... ::eyebrow raise:: ... yadda ...yadda. Weight check (2lbs lighter than the last time! woo-hoo!) at which I had to take off the blasted boot!! Blood pressure check (118/72). And then those famous words we females all love to hear,

" Here's a sheet, go ahead an undress from the waist down."

Dang. So much for small talk.

I realized rather quickly that undressing was going to prove more difficult than usual. My boot wouldn't fit over my capri pants, so I had to completely remove it before I could even attempt to undress. By the time I removed the boot, undressed and put back on my boot (while naked I might add ~ I apologize if you just threw up in your mouth a little ), hobbled myself up onto the table and applied my napkin sheet, I had worked up a little sweat.

Sweating has been an issue with me lately. I don't sweat. I perspire a little, but rarely do I do a full on hard sweat. Except for lately.

People. I've been sweatin' like a hardened sinner at a Pentecostal tent revival in the middle of July. Buckets, my friends. Buckets. This was one of the reasons I was at the doctor this particular day. I'm afraid that even at 40, I'm still a little too young for, you know, the change 'o life hot flashes!

Anyway.

As I sat there waiting (which in my mind is the absolute worst!), one would think that my glands would get the message. I wasn't doing anything active, just sitting, yet the sweating was getting worse! I had brought a magazine with me and began to fan myself. I figured that would help.

Nope. It only got worse.

About 5 minutes later I realized it was going to take a little more that Southern Living to take care of this particular diaphoretic episode. The back of my thighs and rear were beginning to stick to the white paper on the exam table and I was becoming more and more uncomfortable. I had to take drastic measures.

I grabbed the sheet and began to furiously fan myself, throwing the sheet into the air and abruptly back down, shifting my weight from one side then to the other, desperately trying to get some air into my nether regions. I knew that if the doctor were to walk in while I was fanning myself with one side of my hiney perched into the air, she was going to assume that I had ... uh .... been gastronomically expressing myself or something.

Right about this time Charlotte decided to wake up. I wriggled myself down the table far enough to scoot her stroller a little closer to me. It was at this point ~ while I was attempting to wriggle ~ that I realized the lovely white paper had pretty much glued itself to my backside. I grabbed the magazine and once again began to fan furiously, trying to unstick myself from the paper and the vinyl. It wasn't working.

Then the doctor walked in.

I won't say panic set in because by that time I pretty much knew my fate was sealed. I just decided to ride the wave. Dr. Z. played and chit chatted with Charlie for several minutes and then she noticed me fanning myself. She asked whether I thought it was hot in the office or if it was just me. I let her know that this was one of the reasons I was in to see her ~ my profuse sweating.

Momentarily I thought just maybe I was gonna get out of an exam. But nope. She called for her nurse to come in and pulled out the lovely stirrups. Then she asked me to scoot down the table.
I just sat there. How was I to tell this woman I was physically bonded to her examination table with my own perspiration? She looked at me and I began to stammer.

"Uh. Well. I'm sort of stuck to the table ...hehe...or rather the paper is stuck to me....hehe....I told you I was sweating a lot!"

:: Mortified::

I then leaned over to show her the saturated white paper adhered to my backside. She seemed nonplussed by the whole situation and sort of exclaimed,

"Oh my, you are sweating a lot." ::someone just shoot me now::

Then she tells asks the nurse if they have any chux pads. A CHUX PAD, y'all!! For sweat!

Once they find the chux pad, Dr. Z. asks me if I can lean over so they can just slip it under me. Um, no. Because once I leaned over the stupid white paper tore from the table and came with me! I had to stand up (half naked!) and then PEEL white paper from off of my butt and thighs!!! It wasn't coming off easy, either! Oh, no! It was all rolling up and coming off in bits and pieces! At that moment, I seriously couldn't believe that this was my life.

I was apologizing profusely and the doctor, being the amazing woman that she is, just kept helping me peel the paper from my backside and telling me that I couldn't help it. Once most of the large pieces were stripped away, I quickly sat back down where the doctor proceeded to do the examination.

Quite honestly, I don't remember much after that because my Mortified-'O-Meter had just gone off of the scales and I was absolutely dying of embarrassment. She basically ordered some blood work, another test and in a round about way said my ovaries had HAD it. Or so she thought. She said a few other things I don't remember and then said she'd see me in a few weeks and left the room.

I sat there, every ounce of dignity gone, looking at the shredded paper on the floor, wondering what I had ever done to deserve such a horrifying experience. I stepped down from the exam table so I could get dressed and guess what? I STILL had to peel more paper from the backs of my legs and rear! It was at that moment I had to laugh. And once I started, I couldn't stop.

As a matter of fact, I chuckled all the way home. I went out with some girlfriends that night and when I told them the story we laughed so hard we cried. It was especially funny when I was demonstrating in my storytelling of how I was leaning to the side on the exam table and then realized I was fanning my backside with a menu! I'm fairly certain the other patrons in the Olive Garden were pretty much displeased by this little demonstration.

So what have I learned from this experience? Well.

- I've learned that exam table paper is most definitely not waterproof.

- I've learned that when exam table paper is wet, it adheres to skin quite well.

- I've learned to always ask for TWO sheets ~ one for cover and one to sit on.

- I've learned I could probably make a fortune if I could come up with waterproof exam table paper.

-I've learned that if you lean to one side and fan your backside with a menu at a popular restaurant, you will get funny looks.

-I've learned not to take myself too seriously.

I mean really. If you had been the nurse's assistant in that room that day, would you not have gone home and totally laughed your tale off telling your family about the lady with the sweaty paper stuck to her backside?!?!

I so totally would. And I did.