Things That Make Me Say, "Ew"

I'm a mom.

I clean snotty noses, change diaper blowouts, and handle getting puked on with poise. I kill spiders that sneak into my house, remove dried worms that have baked on the driveway, and dispose of flies that have fallen victim to the cunning stalking skills of my Schnoodle. The sight of blood doesn't make me queasy. My stomach stays perfectly fine when I see food dried on the faces of my children. I've scrubbed poop out of underwear and off bedroom walls with no more than a scrunched nose. But ask me to stick my nose in a milk carton after it's turned and you're guaranteed to see me gag.

There aren't a lot of things that truly gross me out, but milk, and some milk products, is definitely one of them. If the gallon in the fridge is approaching its expiration date, I make my husband smell it first. If the kids sippy cups of milk end up sitting on the table for an hour after lunch, I have to dump them out just because the thought of them possibly having gone bad gives me the chills.

I recently discovered one of the kid's milk cups had been left in our (hot-ish) van overnight. I brought it inside and opened it in the sink to clean it. As soon as I saw the warm curdled milk stuck to the edges of the cup I began to gag. I did my best to clean it whilst holding my breath and trying to avoid actually looking at it, but despite my best efforts, I continued to gag as I cleaned it out. Even after washing it by hand AND running it through the dishwasher, I still felt like I could smell the spoiled milk in the cup.

Other milk products that turn my stomach if they go bad or even get too close to their expiration date include sour cream, yogurt, ricotta cheese, and cottage cheese.

Next on my list would have to be eggs. Not all eggs, just ones that aren't cooked properly. If I were to order eggs "over easy" at a restaurant and they were still raw around the yolk, I'd definitely gag. Which causes a dilemma for me every time I order breakfast out. I'd like to order my eggs scrambled when I'm dining out because there is less chance of undercooking them, however, a lot of places make their scrambled eggs from a powdered box mix these days, which I also don't prefer. Hence the dilemma.

Also, two nights ago my husband was making fried eggs for sandwiches and one of the eggs he opened had blood in it. I was semi-freaking out as I asked him to dump it out and start over. Blood in an egg just can't be good, right?

Finally, the last major item on my list is closely related to the egg. In fact it's raw chicken. I love eating cooked chicken. And I cook chicken a lot, but handling it when raw really messes with my head. I get so grossed out at the thought of the possibility of salmonella bacteria infecting my kitchen as I prepare the meat. I wash my hands at LEAST a dozen times during the process and in the winter all it takes is one night of making a chicken dish to completely dry my hands out to the point of cracking. I have lysol or clorox wipes conveniently under my sink and whip them out to wipe down every vertical surface and my sink after the food prep is done. I even change out my kitchen hand towels afterwards too, just in case I hadn't killed all the bacteria when I washed my hands and it got onto the towels when I dried them. Crazy, I know, but it just grosses me out that much!

Years ago, I was having lunch at a restaurant where I had ordered a chicken sandwich. When I bit into the sandwich, the inside of the chicken was STILL RAW. That experience made me so crazy I didn't eat at that restaurant (including any of it's other chain locations) for about 5 years.

So if you ever invite me over for dinner, you can serve me your great grandmother's spinach casserole and I'll be fine, but add a a glass of warm milk or undercooked chicken on the side and be prepared for the repercussions!

S is for Sesame Place

Yesterday we took a little mini family "vacation" to Sesame Place. The fun started the moment we left the house as we picked up breakfast at Chick-fil-a and grooved to music in the car. We were having so much fun on our drive that we failed to grab a ticket as we got on the Turnpike and ended up having to pay the maximum toll amount ($24.50) when we got off not even 30 miles later. But that wasn't about to ruin our mood.

We arrived at the park before it opened and had plenty of time to get covered in sunscreen and stand in line at the gate for a bit. As we waited to enter, Kylie amused us by pointing out the fact that she could see Elmo and "Big Tweet" every 5 seconds. The day was already worth it's weight in gold, just hearing her enthusiasm.

Once in the park we decided to do the "dry" rides and activities first. We hit up the carousel, Big Bird's Balloon Race, and Ernie's Bed Bounce before heading indoors to catch the Elmo's World Live show. The show was exactly like the segment on Sesame Street, complete with Dorothy and Mr. Noodle. The show was fun, but I found myself watching my girls more than the show itself because their faces were priceless as they watched Elmo move about the stage.

After the show we went to the "Nets and Climbs" area where Jim braved the mazes of climbing nets with both Kyra and Kylie. We should've known Kyra would be right at home here, but in the moment we underestimated Kyra's climbing skills and temporarily lost her as she got ahead of Jim (who was moving at "Kylie pace"). Fortunately, just before I reached the "panic because my daughter has been missing for 5 minutes" stage, she came out of nowhere and met up with Jim and Kylie. We decided at that moment that it was time to move on to something else. Jim suffered some cuts and pulled muscles as he tried to maneuver out of the netting with Kylie sitting on his lap, but he took it like a man.

Jim took the girls to the Peek-a-Bug ride as I held a spot in the long line for Elmo's Flying Fish ride. After they finished their bug ride, Kylie began to let us know it was getting close to lunch time by melting down as we waited in line for the next ride. We managed to survive the long line and revived our smiles as we "flew" in fun Elmo fish.

We headed to Elmo's Eatery and were lucky enough to find a table at which to scarf down some chicken fingers and pizza on super cute reusable Elmo plates. After lunch we changed into our swimwear and headed out into the heat to enjoy some of the water attractions. We started out at Ernie's Waterworks, but Kylie made it clear that she needed some water to splash around in, not to run through, so we headed for the Count's Splash Castle. It had a bunch of fun slides and water spraying EVERY which way, but for Kylie the best part was the fact that the whole thing was a giant wading pool about 6 inches deep. Kyra and daddy did one of the water slides and then mommy took a turn with Kyra.

As we waited in line for the slide, I thought about just making sure Kyra got on okay and then walking back down the stairs to the bottom. When we made it to the top, it was so crowded that I realized going on the slide myself would be the faster, easier route down. I sent Kyra down and then it was my turn. In the few seconds I sat at the top I felt awkward. I hadn't been on any water slides or roller coasters or rides that go upside down (or even faster than 5 mph) in around 4 years. Not because I don't like rides, but just because being pregnant or toting babies around hadn't really afforded me the chance to do any of that stuff in a while. Halfway down the slide I suddenly remembered just how much I enjoyed rides like this one. And it occurred to me that I had missed them. I was so elated to be going down a water slide at that moment!

After we'd had all the chlorine we could handle, we dried off and Jim and I were discussing whether or not it was time to head home. Suddenly, Kyra blurted out, "But I didn't see Big Bird yet!" So with that, we headed to Main Street and made it just in time to catch the parade and see ALL the Sesame Street gang. With the girls perched on each of our shoulders, we came within arms reach of most of our favorite muppets. Again, it was fun to watch the girls as they sat mesmerized by everything.

Finally, the parade ended, we grabbed a few frozen treats, and headed for home. It had been a very eventful day and we were all exhausted, but it was a good exhaustion. The kind that only comes from having fun and making memories with your family.

Pet Peeves

We all have them. Things that bother us. Things that may bother no one else but us. Especially when it comes to a family member, or more precisely, your spouse.

I am no different. I have my short list of pet peeves on my husband. Listening to AM radio stations when they're nothing but static, for example. However, this post is not about that.

I'm actually about to tell on myself here. There is one thing (well, more than one, but let's not go crazy here) that I do that really drives Jim NUTS. You ready for this?

I very seldom finish a can of soda.

This fact has my husband climbing up the walls of our house. It frustrates him. He just doesn't understand it. And every time he asks me about it, there is really no logical explanation for it.

Not only do I not finish drinking the can, I also tend to leave it sitting on the kitchen counter for hours, maybe days sometimes. I'll go to throw it out, but at the last minute decide to leave it sitting there JUST IN CASE I want to finish it later. And then I never do. So a lot of the time Jim is the one who ends up dumping a half can of warm soda down the sink.

This has been an ongoing issue since we got married almost 8 years ago. Jim has questioned it, challenged it, tried to figure it out, but above all he has kindly tolerated it for all that time. A couple of weeks ago, however, Jim actually did something to try to fix the "problem".

He and Kyra made a quick run into the grocery store to pick up a few things for Memorial Day. When they came back, Jim had Kyra proudly display the special soda they had bought for Mommy. It was an 8 pack of 7.5 oz cans of Coke Zero. According to Jim's calculations, these were the perfect "Kesh size" cans. It sort of felt like a practical joke, only it really was practical.

Jim warned me that he better not find any of these miniature cans half full sitting around or he would go crazy. I was VERY tempted over the next several days to leave one out just to see what would transpire. At one point I even thought about drinking the entire can and then filling it with water to just give the appearance of the wasted soda, however, I resisted both of these temptations.

I did manage to finish every one of the 8 mini cans only to return to the normal 12 oz size and once again fail at finishing them. I have no rhyme or reason why this happens. The best I can figure is that I don't have time to chug a 12 oz can in one sitting and by the time I return to it it's warm and no longer refreshing, so I leave it. Why I can't seem to dump it down the sink, knowing that I won't finish it later, is an even bigger mystery.

So there you have it. My little tattle-tale on myself. It's quirky, I know. But it's the quirky things that make life interesting, right?

Providence

Our pastor is always talking about how he doesn't like the question, "Where do you go to church?", because church isn't a place. WE, as followers of Christ, are the church. However, we do have a place, a building, we go to to worship and fellowship with others who are also part of the church. This post is about that place.

For the past 4ish years, our weekly gatherings were in a building that belonged to someone else. We shared the space peacefully during that time, but God apparently had somewhere else He wanted us to be. In 2008 the executive team at Providence (our "church") made a list of things they wanted in a building if we were going to move to a new location. In the borough of West Chester (where God called our pastors to reach out to the community) only one building met every requirement. The asking price: $3 million. This wasn't an amount we could afford. So, our leadership team trusted God and waited.

The price went down to $2.7 million. Still, it was out of budget. Over the next 18 months the price continued to drop. $2.4 million. Then $1.8 million. Next down to $1.4 million. We ended up closing on the building for one million dollars, one-third of the original asking price. The owner said he would not have sold it to anyone else for such a low price. He wanted us to have this building. More importantly, God wanted us to have this building.

The top level of the building had been used for banquets and weddings and was absolutely gorgeous. It would need some electrical work done, a sound booth, a stage and a few other things to convert it into a "sanctuary", but it was definitely doable. The second floor, however, had been home to the Italian Social Club and had a bar larger than my family room smack in the middle of the great room. This was where our Children's Ministry was destined to be located.

It became a running joke, the huge bar in our church. We'd joke about putting the babies behind the bar to play or serving drinks to the kids for snack time. But in reality, those of us responsible for the Children's Ministry had to figure out a way to make it feel less like a dingy bar (without removing the actual bar) and more like an exciting place to learn about Jesus.

We did walk-thrus and talk-thrus. We made and changed plans. Finally we came to a decision and had our tasks laid out before us to begin the transformation.

Part one: cleaning, repairing, replacing, altering, building, painting, carpeting. We had a work day planned. We planned on having only 6 of us there to do all the massive amounts of work on our list. But God's plans are bigger and better. We had so many people show up with willing attitudes and happy hearts. And things got done!

Part two: decorating, packing, moving, supplying, unpacking. It was in this stage we realized how little toys/games/materials we actually had of our own. Rooms looked empty. Walls looked bare. Thankfully God gives everyone different talents and we are blessed to have organizers along with creative minds involved in our Children's Ministry. Rooms and walls did not stay empty for long.

Part three: just add kids. Tonight, we had our first meeting in our new building. It was awesome. Seeing the faces of the parents and children as they looked around and discovered all the fun, new things. Their new classrooms. In OUR new building. That God provided. Having the kids there tonight in their respective classrooms for the first service, a special celebration service, was the final touch.

We are where God has destined us to be. We are in His Providence.

Memorial Day

I love this country. The United States of America. It's a name that's associated with words like "freedom", "justice", "opportunity", "equality". But those titles come at a price.

Growing up, our church would do a special patriotic service over 4th of July weekend every year. I always loved that program. The songs, the fireworks, all the red, white, and blue. But as I got older, I started to become overwhelmed with emotion each year as the service men and women would come parading onto the stage in their uniforms. I had an eerie sense of awareness of the price so many have paid to build our great nation.

I have seen photographs from wars past and present. The faces of those who fight and have fought to defend our freedom. And I think what gets me so choked up is that they're people, Americans, just like me or my neighbor, or my best friend. They don't have a special genetic code that predetermines they'll be the one to fight for this country. They're not part of a robot army built in an underground bunker. They have families, dreams, goals, problems, feelings, love... just like all of us do. Only they've chosen to put themselves aside for something that is so much bigger than any one of us. And in doing so, many have made the ultimate sacrifice.

This morning I put two small American flags in my garden. Afterwards, Kyra asked me why I'd done that. I began to explain to her the reason for Memorial Day in "3 year old terms". It's amazing how striping things down to their simplest form for the sake of a child can impact a grown up. My husband and I both fought back tears as I explained the sacrifice many have made so that Kyra can go to church or wear shorts or eat at Chick-fil-a. I know she didn't fully grasp all that I was saying, but I did.

I wish I could personally hug and thank each and every person and all the family members of those who are serving or have served in our military. But since I can't, I'll just do the things I can, like never taking my freedom for granted and celebrating Memorial Day in their honor.

On that note, here are a few pictures from our Memorial Day weekend:

Happy Mother's Day to MEEEEE!

This year all I wanted for Mother's Day was to get my hair done. Okay, that's not entirely true. I wanted flowers and to be allowed to sleep in and to have someone else make my meals all day long. But I MOSTLY wanted to get my hair done.

I have beautiful, thick hair. I get complimented on it all the time. Every hair stylist I've ever had raves about it and some even claim to envy it. But that's before they realize that it takes almost a full 3 hours to foil, wash, cut, and dry it. (he he) Which is one of the reasons I wanted to have my hair done for my "Mother's Day" present. Getting my hair highlighted and cut equals a few hours of me sitting in a chair being pampered. It's oh. so. nice.

My very observant husband had a gift card to a local salon sitting on the tray when he and my girls served me breakfast in bed on Mother's Day and today I got to cash it in. I decided not to do anything too drastic with the cut, just added some long bangs and a few layers, and then I had some subtle highlights put in. As soon as I got home, Jim commented on how refreshed (and totally hot) I looked. And I felt both. I think I might ask to get my hair done again for my Columbus Day present. :)

Before:

After:

Just Another Day

I haven't blogged in months. And as much as I don't want to taint my return to the blogging world with overwhelming amounts of insanity, it just so happens that insanity is the particular phase of life I'm living in right now.

Not following? Don't worry, you'll get it. Just read on....

I spent the last 3 days writing out the various moments of craziness on our trip home from Tulsa only to wake up this morning to maneuver through another round of insanity.

The moment I wake up this morning I realize that for the 14,598th day in a row (ok, I'm slightly exaggerating) my allergies are going berserk. Nose running, countless sneezes, itchy throat, you get the picture. I make my way to the medicine cabinet to find I am down to one. single. Benadryl. With my allergies, that will only get me through breakfast.

N.B.D. (Mom, that means no big deal - I know how you are with abbreviations.)

I'm planning to take the girls to see Jim for lunch today, per our standard Thursday arrangement, so I'll just hop over to Walmart and pick some up while I'm out.

I get the girls fed and dressed before they go play in Kyra's room. I'm bustling about throwing in laundry, yada, yada, when I notice the girls are sitting so cute reading their Beginner's Bible. As I come in the room, Kylie looks up at me with her big blue eyes and chipmunk cheeks. Those cheeks (seen very frequently around here) mean that Kylie has once again put something in her mouth that she shouldn't have. By the looks of the half missing page out of the Bible, I can tell what it is even before I fish hook it out of her mouth. Silly Kylie. I guess we haven't gotten to the scripture that explains the appropriate place to hide God's Word is your heart, not your stomach.

I soon discover that despite the fact that I'm in a sundress, I'm profusely sweating from doing the dishes. Hmmm... that's not normal. I check the thermostat.

It reads 79.5 degrees.
Inside my house.
At 10:00 in the morning.
Not.
Good.

I head down to the basement and check all the "right places" to make sure everything is the way it should be. I see nothing out of the ordinary which means the problem must be something out of the ordinary. Super.

I make a call to the company that we've used in the past for service in hopes that a little annual maintenance will cause things to cool down a bit. They tell me they can come out between noon and five, so I cancel our weekly lunch with daddy and sit around our steamy house to wait.

I can tell the heat is starting to get to us because we're all irritable and whiny (yes, me too). Kylie decides she want's to color and I decide, for some crazy reason, that I'm going to hang some pictures on the wall that have been patiently waiting to be hung since January. I can see Kylie out of the corner of my eye sitting at her table coloring away. I get the first picture up and reach for the second. When I turn back around, Kylie is gone. I have this sneaky feeling she's coloring on something she shouldn't be, so I race to find her. The first thing I see when I spot her? Chipmunk cheeks. With orange drool coming out the corners of her mouth. Ugh.

I scoop her up and take her to the kitchen sink where I swab out an entire orange crayon that has been very thoroughly chewed. The crowns of her teeth all have huge chunks of the crayon stuck in them, so I end up having to use a toothbrush to scrub it all out of her teeth. She's eaten crayons before (wow, I sound like a super observant parent), but this was the worst incident to date. Had my husband seen it, he probably would've thrown up in his mouth a little bit. (He has "issues" with messy kids.)

Kylie is a wreck from the intense teeth brushing session, so I put her down for a nap. About 45 minutes later, the HVAC maintenance man shows up and starts checking everything out. Two HOURS later.... he says to me, "It's not good. You're going to need a new compressor or you might want to just replace the whole unit. Not what you want to hear, I know."

No, Mr. Maintenance Man, it's not at all what I wanted to hear.

He says he did a very temporary fix, but it won't get the house nearly cool enough to be comfortable. The only thing he can do now (besides take my credit card) is schedule a time for one of their sales guys to come out and quote us on the compressor or new unit. I ask him for a ballpark figure, but he says he can't give me one. He does, however, give me a coupon for $500.00 off a new unit. My IQ isn't at genius level, but I'm pretty sure anything that can afford a $500.00 discount isn't cheap. Oh joy.

As soon as he leaves, I gather up the kids and head out the door. If the house isn't going to get much cooler than 82.5 degrees downstairs (upstairs was even warmer), I'm going to at least enjoy the fully functioning A/C in my van as I run around.

We stop at Jim's office so he can say a quick "hello" to the girls and so I can record the store closing message for Memorial Day. We then head to Wal-mart so I can pick up my now seriously needed allergy medicine. I end up buying 2 boxes of popsicles and 2 cartons of ice cream. That's how I temporarily fix a broken A/C.

We stop at my sis-in-loves to pick up some pots and then head back to the house strictly so I can put the frozen treats in the freezer. I don't even get the girls out of the oh-so-heavenly cool van. The way I see it if we can stay out until bedtime it will make the rest of our afternoon much more tolerable.

Our next stop is Becker's, a teacher's store. I realize as soon as we get there that my stroller is sitting in my garage, so I'm going to have to carry Kylie around. Just as I suspected, Kylie does NOT want to be carried. The second we set foot in the store she start's flailing and screaming to be put down. Kyra quickly finds her way to a little play area in the store and I convince myself that Kylie will be fine if I put her down in the play zone.

Not so much.

She SPRINTS around the entire perimeter of the store before going through the employee break room into the private "employee only" bathroom. The two employees behind the counter just stare in silence as I emerge carrying a screaming Kylie. I didn't buy anything. I didn't even look for what I came to look for. I was totally stressed out.

But there was still too much daylight left for us to head home. So I hit up Old Navy (since I KNOW they have shopping carts I could use to restrain my child) and both girls were fairly well behaved while we were there. It gave me a false sense of confidence that we could handle stopping for dinner on the way home.

Normally I'd just swing through the drive thru at Chick-fil-a, but seeing that I didn't want to eat at home (or in the car) and that I would have to go in somewhere to eat, I decided to go to a sit down restaurant. It would take longer than fast food, so according to my calculations, it could be our last stop and we'd make it home just in time for bed. This was a major lapse in logic.

We get seated and meet our server who announces that it's his first night training and to "go easy on him". As he's asking for our drink order, Kylie dives head first over the back of our booth into the vacant one behind us. I hop up to swing her back around to our side and as I sit back down in our booth one of the straps on my sundress breaks. I quickly put my hand over the top of my dress (afterall, I'm not wearing a bra because it was just too darn hot for that) and spit out "bring us 2 chocolate milks and a coke zero". He backs away, embarrassed, and I scoop up both girls and the diaper bag and make a beeline for the restroom. It's only 15 feet away, but it felt like it were 15 miles.

I lock us in the handicapped stall and survey the damage to my strap. I realize it broke in a way that I could tie the two parts back together just so it would keep my dress up while we ate our dinner. Despite Kylie climbing all over me in the booth, I hardly moved for fear the knot I had tied would slip and I'd repeat the embarrassing moment all over again. A little over an hour later, we emerged from the restaurant, knot still in tact.

When we got home the house had cooled down to a lovely 78 degrees, so I bathed the girls (who were super sticky and stinky), put them to bed, and settled in to record this crazy day here on my blog. As I write this, storm clouds have moved in and the temperature outside and inside has dropped dramatically. For the first time today I'm comfortable sitting in my house. So now I'm gonna go ruin it and go for a run. That's insane, you say? Well, like I said, insane is all I know right now. And I'm getting pretty good at it.