Monday Evening Question(s) of the Day

How often do you weigh yourself?

When you know you have gained a few pounds, do you avoid the scale?

Does the number on the scale affect your day?

If so, how?

A Wake Up Call

I rarely watch Oprah (way too new-ageish for me most of the time) but watched an episode the other day and am so thankful I did. I truly can not get it out of my mind.

The show was titled "Overwhelmed Moms" and her guest was Brenda Slaby. Brenda was a wife, mother of two beautiful girls, and an assistant principal at a middle school. She was busy busy busy and always on the go. She tried hard to be "Supermom", had perfectionist tendencies, and spent most of her time and energy taking care of and seeing to the needs of others.


One day in August of 2007 she left home early on morning with lots on of her mind because it was the first day back for teachers at her school. Her husband had a dentist appointment and asked her to take their youngest daughter, 2 year old Cecilia, to daycare to save him some time. She loaded sleeping Cecilia into the backseat and headed to daycare. As she pulled up- she realized it was too early to drop her daughter off, so she decided to take care of another errand first- and stopped at a donut shop to pick up donuts for her teachers.


Once she picked up the donuts, with her mind racing ahead to all of the millions of things she needed to accomplish that day, she headed to work- forgetting about her sleeping daughter in the backseat. She proceeded to arrive at school, unload her things, and went to work. Eight hours later someone discovered the toddler in the parking lot and teachers frantically called 911 before attempting CPR. But it was too late for Cecilia.


After watching this story- I went to Oprah's website and read some of the many comments people had left after it aired. I think people have one of two very strong reactions to hearing this story. They are either outraged and think "What a horrible woman! How could a mother forget her child?" or they are sympathetic and think "Oh my goodness, bless her heart. What a horrible accident!". I fall into the second group.


As I watched Brenda tell her story I cried. I cried because I could see how heartbroken she was. I cried for the pain and stigma she will live with for the rest of her life. I cried for her sweet baby who died a horrid and awful death. I cried for her and for her husband who feel such guilt. I cried because I realized how easily our life's distractions can cause us to make a tragic error. I cried because sadly I could see how this happened.

Watching her story made me think of all of the times that I have walked through my daily life, without really being present in the moment but more engaged in what was on my schedule next. It made me think of how often I am doing one thing- but am completely and totally focused on another. It made me think of all the times that I've been trying to do several things at once and ruined one of those things. It made me think of all of the times that I've been somewhere, doing something, but got finished and didn't even really remember anything about it- because I was so focused on thinking of the next thing I had to do.

Norman Fischer (some sort of Zen expert- which is random and not something I believe in at all- but he did say a few really good things) was on the show and he talked about how overwhelmed moms today are and how we try do so many things-often running around like a chicken with our head cut off- all without asking for help. He said something that really made me think.

Though our society stresses the importance of being able to handle multiple tasks at one time, there is no such thing as multitasking. Instead, we switch from one task to another. This switching prevents us from being able to do one task with any intensity or commitment. Whatever you are doing. Do it. Do it completely. Bring your whole attention to it, Be present in everything that you do."

Ouch.

His words stung.

They stung because his description is ME.

And that? It makes me sad. Sad for God, sad for my family, sad for my friends, sad for me.

I'm not a believer of consequences. I believe that God places things in our path for a reason and I am thankful he gave me a wake up call through this woman's tragic story.

And now it's my job to work hard at slowing down- at enjoying the moments of my life, instead of just working to cross another thing off of my to do list. To be fully present and give my full attention to whatever I am doing. It won't be easy for me but I know the rewards will be great.

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Dessert

I made this new dessert last week when my sweet friend Dory and her family were here for a visit. I found it on the Betty Crocker website as one of the 2009 recipe winners. It was super easy to put together and super yummy if you are a fan of chocolate chip cookie dough. (And other than my child who hates chocolate, who isn't a fan of chocolate chip cookie dough?)




1 pouch (1 lb 1.5 oz) Betty Crocker® chocolate chip cookie mix
1/2 cup margarine, softened
1 egg
1 bottle Magic Shell chocolate topping
1 half gallon container chocolate chip-cookie dough ice cream, softened




Heat oven to 375 degrees. Spray bottom and sides of 13x9-inch pan with cooking spray. In large bowl, stir cookie mix, butter and egg until soft dough forms. On ungreased cookie sheet, make 5 cookies by dropping dough by tablespoonfuls. Bake 9 to 11 minutes or until edges are golden brown. Cool 2 minutes; remove from cookie sheet to cooling rack. Meanwhile, press remaining dough in pan, using moistened fingers (dough will be sticky). Bake 8 to 10 minutes or until set. Cool completely, about 30 minutes. Spread 1/2 of bottle of chocolate topping over baked crust. Freeze 10 to 15 minutes or until chocolate is set. Meanwhile, remove ice cream from freezer to soften. Spread softened ice cream evenly over chocolate-topped crust. Crumble 5 baked cookies; sprinkle over ice cream layer. Drizzle remaining chocolate topping over cookie crumbs. Cover; freeze 2 hours. To serve, let stand at room temperature 5 minutes before cutting. (do not try to cut out this step- or the dessert will be frozen as hard as a rock!)

You GO Girl

Just when you thought you have seen everything,

you see something that makes you shake your head in amazement.

Something like this.

So you can go.

Go girl.

Anywhere.

Anytime.

Monday Morning Question of the Day

So I was sitting at church with my hubby, waiting for the service to start Sunday morning and texting my sweet friend Dory who was on the very long drive home after a visit to Texas.

Of course as I am in the middle of writing a text, our pastor walks up and starts talking to us. Although he said nothing, I felt like a little kid who had just been busted by her dad. I stopped texting to talk to him, and then after he walked away I finished my text to Dory saying "I just got busted for texting. By the pastor."

She replied "You got busted but you still replied? LOL LOL LOL".

So today's question of the day is actually three questions:

1. Do you text?
2. How often do you text?
3. Have you ever been busted for texting when you should not have?

Happy Father's Day

I am so very blessed with an amazing Daddy

father-in-law

and husband.

Happy Father's Day to three of the best fathers EVER!!!

I love you all so very much!

A Final Wish

Warning: Grab a Kleenex before reading the linked story.

This is a precious story about a girl's dying wish to see the movie "UP"

and Pixar and Disney's granting of that wish.

If you have seen the movie-you know that it's a precious and moving story that reminds the viewer that we should treasure every moment and

seize the adventure that comes our way each and every day.

If you haven't- you truly should. It's one of the sweetest movies I've seen in a long time.

What a wonderful reminder that even in big corporate America-

compassion and kindness still exist.

Sweet Dory

It's been a wonderful week of

sweet friends

lots of laughter

(even some snorting)


shopping


manicures and pedicures

eating

(maybe a little too much eating)

playing


driving
(thank goodness for GPS systems)

swimming

traveling and packing

talking

picture taking

(this is my favorite pic of me)

and

FUN


with my sweet friend Dory and her family.

Because she lives a MILLION miles away- our time together is precious.

I am so thrilled that she and her girls were able to come to Texas with her sweet hubby who had a conference to attend here. I know it's a super long drive and I am so thankful they came.

I'm praying for their safe travels tomorrow and can't wait to see them again, very soon!

I love you my sweet friend!!!!

Links I Love

It's been a busy week of

project finishing

farewell dinnering

(yes, I know that is not a word)

workshop attending

getting losting
(again, not a word)

workshop presenting

birthday celebrating

birthday party giving

and

house cleaning!

My poor little blog has been neglected lately and with sweet Dory and her family coming to visit on Sat. for the next week (woo stinkin' hoo!) I know I will be too busy playing to blog other than a tiny bit. But I do promise to come back soon with some new stories, pics of their visit, more randomness, and some new yummy recipes.

Until then, here a few fun links I've come across lately:

The "Blog" of Unnecessary Quotation Marks is a an absolute HOOT! It is full of signs that have unnecessary quotation marks. Too funny!

Pick The Perp is a ridiculous site where they post mug shots and your job is to decide who was booked for the listed crime. So ridiculous but so fun! (Thanks to Jennifer M. for this one!)

This tutorial on Instructables.com for making a recycle bag out of on an old t-shirt! What a brilliant idea!

Don't Quit is one of my favorite poems of all time. Here's a fabulous video of the poem!

This Cookie Dough Pie Recipe on Big Red Kitchen. com can be summed up in one word :YUM.

Have a wonderful weekend sweet friends!

Happy Birthday Sweet Girl

I can not believe that my sweet girl is 13 today.

Seriously.........13?

It seems just yesterday that she was born and somehow

magically overnight she has grown into this

beautiful

amazing

kind

funny

talented

silly

compassionate

intelligent

goofy

sweet

loving

young lady.

It just doesn't seem possible that 13 years have gone by.

I know that I never did anything to deserve such a precious daughter-

but I am so thankful God has blessed me with her.

Happy birthday Maddie May-

you will always always always be my sweet girl

and I love you more than you will ever know!

Crafty

My mom was someone that was so very creative! She sewed beautifully, made stained glass, and painted. She was an amazing artist and could make absolutely anything she saw. Her favorite phrase when we were shopping was..........."Oh we could make that!" to which I always replied "Um.ll..no Mom, YOU could make that!".

Although I am not 1/1,000th as talented as she was-I absolutely do love to make things. I do NOT consider myself crafty at all- more like a very good copier of great ideas that I find.

Typically when I work on projects, I do them at my kitchen table. Now because of my OCD tendencies, it's stressful for me because finished or not- come dinner time I simply must remove all the stuff from my table. So, for a lengthy project it become frustrating to have to keep packing up and moving my supplies.

So I recently started thinking and dreaming about the day when we build our forever house (the one we will live in for forever). In it I plan to have a beautiful HUGE craft room. I already have it totally planned in my mind and can not wait. However, since we won't be building our forever home for many years, I started thinking of something I could do in the meantime.

I already have a great craft closet in our guest room. I have some awesome shelves in it (Tony took a bookcase and cut it in half and then bolted each piece to one of the corners of the closet). It is fabulous and every little thing has it's own labeled space! Although our guest room is very small and already contains a queen sized bed, an armoire and a rocking chair I started thinking that I could fit a small table in it- if I simply moved out the antique chest that was next to the bed. A table that was long and fairly skinny- like a sofa table- would be perfect.

And so the quest began. I started looking for tables- at Goodwill, at the used furniture store, at Hobby Lobby, and our school district Swap Shop (basically a garage sale via email). I found several tables- but none that seemed to be the right one for the right price. That is, until one night a few weeks ago. A sofa table popped up on Swap Shop and it was beautiful. It was a cherry wood table and the price was just right. I quickly called the lady(after a quick email to Dory to see what she thought) and went to pick it up. It was indeed beautiful- with not a scratch on it.

Now my intent had always been have a distressed Shabby Chic type of table to match the antique furniture in the guest room. This table was NOT at all distressed- it was perfect. So although I felt badly, we set out to bang it up a bit.

We used the electric sander and sanded it down. We then took an old sock and filled it with nails, bolts, and other random stuff on Tony's workbench and proceeded to beat the heck out of that pretty table. I couldn't help but thinking that the sweet lady who sold it to me- who was so proud of how perfect it was- would have absolutely CRIED if she had seen me beating her beautiful table.

Once it was sufficiently beaten up, we proceeded to prime it, and paint it. Thankfully because it was spray paint it was done in one evening. A little sanding of the edges and we were done and I was the proud owner of an adorable little craft table!

And here it is with all the fun baskets and tins and jars full of craft supplies. I love love love it!

And if you know the sweet lady who I bought the table from- please don't tell her what I did to it. Let's just keep that our little secret. K?

Crazy or Brilliant?

Paul James, a former model and personal trainer in Melbourne, set out to gain a large amount of weight to see how his overweight clients truly felt- to get inside of their heads. He said it was difficult to relate to his heavy clients- so he decided to see what it was like.

He started eating like crazy, stopped exercising,

and gained over 40kg (roughly 88 pounds) in just 4 months.

He went from this to this:

(Picture from http://english.cri.cn/index.htm)

He's keeping the weight on until July and then plans to work hard and lose it by October.

Read the story here or here and then tell me what you think.

Crazy or Brilliant?

Need VS Want

I Need To:
•Wash all of our windows
•Straighten all closets
•Go to the gym (Do I even remember my login #?)
•Clean out my closet
•Straighten up garage
•Move boxes out of old school
•Get some sun (I might be confused with Casper at this point)
•Sweep and mop


I Want To:
•Refinish my new craft table (Cannot WAIT to do this!)
•Go buy Photoshop and play with it
•Watch Court TV all day long
•Make a fun display board (Seriously, how cute is this? I just need an old cabinet door......anyone have one?)
•Bake and eat something sinful (Maybe these? YUMMY!)
•Go to the movies
•Go to Hobby Lobby to buy stuff for my cute new craft table
•Get a massage
•Get a pedicure (This might border on NEED)

What about you?

What do you NEED to do today

and

what do you WANT to do instead?

Because...........

Because sometimes life is

tough

yucky

difficult

ugly

sad

and

painful

here's something that made me laugh this morning.

Left Brain's Grocery List

Hope it makes you smile too!