It's time again for my unfamous count down!

This week I'm going to pay tribute to my twin toddlers, as they are my favorite people less then 4 feet tall, LOL

Every day they do things or say things that may either make my day or make me sad, but they are still a blessing and I would NEVER trade them for anything!

So, here's my latest funniest/worst experiences, in no particular order, with my toddlers recently..

1. Every night I will kiss the kids goodnight and will be goofy with it. I'll tell them to kiss my nose and forehead or cheek.. well.... Now, it's gotten to a point where I don't have to ask, they just go and kiss me on my entire face, which is so dang cute... Until one day... I had already gotten kissed on my nose, my cheeks, my ear, my nose, and then Emilee gave me a big squeeze hug and said "kissa yur back", and she made the kissing puckered lip noise, emmmm muaw, and kissed my back. I was like "thanks Emilee", then she said "kissa yur bum" and started to make the ever so famous kissing noise, I almost died! I was like "NO, don't kiss my bum", she thought it was funny so she kept trying to climb down my back to kiss me on my bum... She obviously wasn't allowed to, but it was still hysterical.. Until I asked her where she wanted kisses... she said her nose, her cheeks, her head, her hair, and then she said it... "my boobies", I was like "WHAT?", I had to explain that no one should kiss any one's boobies.. OMG, they're so silly!

2. Ivan is still holding his poop all day then pooping in his pull ups while you're not looking, or after we get him in bed for the night, so we still have poopy pants most of the time.. He knows it's yucky, but is too stubborn to adapt to the pooping on the potty... Well, he'll be going to be trying to go pee on the potty when we'll pull down his pull ups and he'll have a a "skid Mark" on them and be like "EW, POOPY"... well, yeah.. he'll say it in public bathrooms, and you can hear women chuckling in the near by stalls.. He's a ham!

3. I love going in their rooms to wake them up... Emilee will be all knock out and she'll either cover herself up, like you can't find me to wake me up, or she'll be motionless and pretend like she's still sleeping... Ivan will mostly be awake and will say HI MAMA! as soon as I open the door and will be happy and excited to see us... He's so charming!

4. These guys think everything said with an upward tone, is something to be excited about... We can say with a cheerful tone.... "Wanna go eat dead bugs" and they'll be like YEAH! LET'S!

5. They get overly excited when I pee or poop... They applaud me and want to look and it just makes my day in an embarrassing, but mommy-ish way.. I will always think to myself, as I poop, YAY FOR ME!! (while clapping and jumping up and down in my head)

Yup, they're beautiful happy kids, most of the time, and I love them beyond words!

May there be someone(s) in your life, or something, that make it worth waking up every day!

Enjoy your weekend!

Lesley

My new dream livingroom ..... but not my livingroom yet

I have discovered potential bliss in a can... The link above is an amazing livingroom by Kenneth Brown, an HGTV designer..

The use of the gold-ish walls and bronzy brown curtains... oooh... ahhh... say it with me!!

A lovely lady from my ESM mom's group has taken my project on, which is awesome... So far she has only suggested I move the furniture back to where it was, except the tv got pushed forward next to the fireplace.. She has, though, approved of my used tables purchase, and of my rugs, which made me feel better.

I'm going to going to Sherwin Williams to get some color swatches, as a goldish color I saw on their "Color Visualizer" made me sweaty with glee.. It's called Mannered Gold, and is lovely on the internet, I just need to make sure it stays lovely on our walls, especially with our crappy lighting..

I am also thinking of painting the diningroom and the stair hallway a brownish color "Jackson Tan" or a reddish color "Cavern Cay", both from Sherwin Williams, called "Jackson Tan", but that's a whole 'nother beast!

I got the Artesia Persia Curtains in Duke Red, and boy do they look stunning up.. It'a amazing how we lived life in our living room without them for so long.. Now, I can see how this all WILL come together.. Look out RATE MY SPACE on HGTV, here we come!

I just need some accent pillows, a throw blanket to cover my recliner/rocker, and some decor, and I'll be stylin'!

UPDATE: I painted a test area on the wall near the new curtains and it's FABU! I'm so anxious to have the room all painted!!

YAY LIVINGROOM!!

Weekly Countdown... Worst games ever

So, I was recently playing Hi Ho Cherrio with my kiddos and my DH, when I realized just how many different games there are... So, here's, in my opinion, the worst 5...

5 - Monopoly - Could this game possibly take any longer? I mean clear about 5 hours because you're gonna be tied up for a bit... As soon as someone buys a property, they're fingers get twitching and then they buy apartments... who can actually buy an apartment building for as little as $500..?? PLUS, it doesn't make for keeping spouse-wife relationships thriving, because it may end up the one spouse made the other, bankrupt, then it gets ugly... Only play this game if you're playing with people who don't understand the game.. trust me!

4 - Clue - The real reason people play this game is because it has a tiny revolver as a game piece.. It's awesome for Barbie though, if Ken's giving her shit about going out with her girlfriends... it almost fit in her purse, she could put a cap in his ass!

3 - Mouse Trap - just as soon as you set the thing up,it's time for dinner... WTF... or better yet, someone sneezes and it sets the little trap spirling down, you go to fix it then all the other peices, the bot, the tub, all gets disconnected somehow.. yeah... plus in real life mouse traps KILL, let's have our kids think that the cute little mousy just gets "contained" for a while, or at least until dinner time, instead of it being smashed by a spring loaded death trap..

2 - Perfection - Ok, for those who know me.. this game whomps big time... You have to put the tiny pieces in their respective slots of the board while a timer is ticking and people are watching, then BOOM the whole damn board pops up and your pieces fly all over the table.. can we say McGruber?? For me it's impossible to get them in with enough time, and like the puff of air blown into your eyeball at your optomitrists office, even though you know it's coming, it still scares the piss out of you...

1 - Life - So you get yourself a car, and a tiny stick figure to stick in it, to represent yourself, blue or pink, depending on gender (what if you're gay and on the outside you're a man, but on the inside you know you were meant to be a woman?)... You spin and move in order to get a spouse... Then you spin some more, pay some bills, loose your house, then all of a suddon you've got 14 stick kids and you're sending them to collage... all this responsibility and you're only 8 years old... Way to go Milton Bradley! Let's scare our kids!

So, I guess if you're board one day, get it board, not bored.. lol Anyways, go out and buy a different game then the ones mentioned above, you'll thank me for it... (Try Scrabble and allow cuss words..)

My UNlivable livingroom

This is the layout of my living room.. Yes, it's got character, but Bart Simpson is a character, so that doesn't mean crap.

This afternoon Rob, the kids, and I, went to a woman's house to look at, and bought, a set of living room tables. They're gorgeous! The pieces are quite huge, but workable, into a couple possible layouts. They're a cherry color, with both light and dark tones, so it goes well with the bamboo roman shades and existing tv corner stand. We definitely need an area rug to tie the dark oak colored floors together with the cherry furniture..

An fellow ESM mom has suggested a couple color pallets for us. Both are similar, one is just a shade darker version of the other. The suggestion is very calming!

I've been fooling around on http://valspaatlowes.com which has an online paint function which allows you to see a room, then change the paint and sometimes the fabric/furniture colors... It's awesome!!

So, I'm still working on it... It will be livable soon!!

I want to be the next person to have HGTV come to my house.

Seriously, how does one get that honor? My house isn't horrible, it just needs some finishing, and a new roof, new garage, landscaping, color scheme, my hardwoods redone, storage, which isn't much, right? LOL



So, I pitched the idea to Bridge Street (WSYR in Syracuse, a local tv station), to do a mini version of an HGTV show.. Get together some local interior designers, a local contractor, and some grunt workers to help make a room or two super special while making the home owners help with the work... Yeah... still haven't gotten a response... I don't expect one either, but it was a nice try..



It's really hard trying to come up with a room scheme that both matches the character of the house and stays within a limited budget... I think I may look for some used living room tables, but will need to go with NEW area rugs.. The new rugs need a design because we have two cats and twin toddlers, so 4 times the messes... no joke.. really messy people/pets live in my house..

I want it to feel warm and cozy, but not lose the kid-friendly aspect, as we do have kids and mess happens.. I'd like neutrals, with a popping color, to add flair.. The problem is our home is definitely unique. It's got plaster textured walls, arched doorways, high ceilings, and it's almost 100 years old, so I'd like to work with that, and not hide it...

I need an interior designer to come to my house, pro-bono, and give me advice, and help me make things from trash, into treasures... lol

So HGTV, please come to my home, donate some funds and some crafty people... Hammer heads, Divine design, over my head, whichever, just visit me!!!

Whetstone Gulf State Park, Ny

What a great mini-vacation! We took our tots and our pop-up to a great NY State campground located just south of Lowville, NY.

We did, though, take a very unique route to get there.. I printed off a Google map advising us to take a few turns off of Route 26, which put us on some "minimum maintenance" roads.. Well, to put it in English, we ended up on 4-wheeler and snow mobile, roads.. It was pretty much the wrong roads to be on with a trailed-popup.. The dirt roads were filled with major pot holes and loose stones and ZERO other people... Even the one stop sign we DID see, had bullet holes in it! EEEK!!

We finally made it to the park, after a couple HELP ME calls to the park office, and the loss of all daylight.. It was a definite adventure! Rob went to fill the water tank and it smelled horrible on the outside of both the Jeep and the popup.. Can we say splattered cow poopy? Yeah, it was pasted to both vehicles... It was such a pleasant aroma, so, I took a picture of it with my cell phone for future scrapbooking-ability.. LOL

The park was awesome! Super tall pine trees gave us the needed shade from the almost 90 degree days, and the country side driving to and from Walmart was so stereotypical "farm land", with exception of the giant white windmills... So, even they were technically green, although they were white.. get it.. Green... lol, I'm a nerd!

The kids loved the nearby farms with the roadside cows and horses... They love cows!

Potty training while camping is always a challenge, as the kids practically live in the bathrooms.. Emilee has to pee/poop constantly, and she doesn't yet realize, even though I tell her every time, that the pottys are not to be touched and manhandled.. Major EW!! Ivan still didn't poop outside of his pull up, so we're still stuck in that rut..

We've gotten him peeing standing up, though, which he thinks is fun.

I wish that Whetstone Gulf wasn't a 2 hour drive, or 3 if you're traveling through the D.E.C. truck trails. lol I would go there more often, because I liked the swimming hole, which we played in on Sunday, and the shade trees are wonderful... Plus, if you forget anything, there's a McDonalds and Walmart right near by! Not to mention the Cheese Store, where they proudly serve 67 flavors of cheese.. Next time we'll stop in for a sample! yumm... Cheese..

Well, back to work for me, it's almost Tuesday!

Enjoy the heat!

Pees on the potty, refuses to poop!

I know I am not alone in the hell called "Potty Training", but it driving me bonkers!

My daughter is pretty much potty trained.. She pretty much wakes up dry every morning, and pees and poops all day long, on the potty.. She hasn't had an accident in quite a long time..

My SON, however... UGH... He wakes up soaked most days, but pees all day in the potty... He will not poop on the potty, though.. He sees his sister poop, gets excited for her, and had pooped litte bits when he would pee, when he first started to use the potty, but even that has ended...

We tell him that if he poops on the potty, we'll give him a piece of chocolate, or a popsicle, but he still doesn't care.. Even when his sister gets her reward, and he doesn't... he gets upset at first, but then doesn't care...

I have looked all over the interweb and they keep saying "it's normal, he'll eventually do it", but damn it, I wan him to do it now!!

Every morning Ivan wakes up with poop in his pants.. He still wears a normal baby diaper, because of that and the fact that he pees a quart every night..

What should we do??

Should we buy a pooping doll?

Is there a poop camp?

HELP ME PLEASE!!!

New Weekly countdown.. Why it's great to be chunky!

Well, since we chunky girls always get the short end of the stick, there are GOOD reasons to be chunky... Here I go!

1. You get more bang for your buck at clothing stores... We'll pay the same for a shirt having MORE material, more sparkles on it, as the smaller version.. Suck it skinny girls!

2. We usually are closet dirty girls... We may dress more conservatively, but trust me.. We're great in bed.. We may pay more attention to our lovers, and want to impress them with our abilities... Turn the lights off and we're simply dirty, dirty girls!!

3. I guess we're more productive at work.. We don't get talked to by all the other people because no one cares what we're doing for the weekend, or compliment our over-sized clothes... We're left alone to work... So, we have more time..

4. More padding, less ouchies! When we fall, we're protected a little more... Those skinny chicks may break their bones, or notice they're sitting on a remote control, but us... Nah.. We're not bothered by the little falls, it didn't even hurt! I can't even count how many times I had been looking for something.. like a remote control, sunglasses., and I discovered I had been sitting on them the entire time...

5. Everything we do, every move we make... Is EXERCISE... a simple set of stairs is like running a marathon... We take a shower and may burn 500+ calories... Bending over... whoa, that's like 1000+ calories.. We could easily burn off a double scoop sundae by getting dressed in skinny jeans, getting ourselves out the door and into the car... All that bending and sweating our arses off in the uber tight jeans... Look out Jenny Craig!!

So, the next time you get depressed about being a chunkier girl, remember there's also a good, lighter side! lol

Enjoy your body, it's the only one you have.. An remember... You're in good shape for the shape you are!

It's getting SO old!

So, I am so sick and tired of seeing, and being part of, the fact that in the workplace the prettiest girls get noticed...

I've been in a company for almost 4.5 years and am now finding that the male owner will go out of his way to ask the prettier co-workers how they are, compliment their earrings, and will give them more verbal praise than the heavier, yet still attractive, co-worker (yeah, me!)

I thought it was a thing of the past and now realize it's never going to stop... I am not ugly, but am a heavier girl. I try to always smell nice, look clean, and try to be fashionable, but do so to have a better self esteem, because if I think I look good, then usually I feel better. The better feeling I have get tossed out the window when a conversation I'm having with the pres. gets interrupted by him paying a compliment to my co-worker... He simply stopped the conversation to talk with her.. Rude Much!

So, now I know where I stand... I know that if there's a layoff that the prettier girls will be at the back of the line out the door, and us UGLY girls will be booted out.. Yup... So, my suggestion to y heavier peers is... Go out and find companies that are run by chubby chasers, otherwise you're doomed!!

Rob and I broke out of our box this past weekend..

We've lived in our house since October 2000, and have had the same living room floor plan since then. We have had different furniture in it, added carpet to it, and a change of pictures, and paint, but the furniture positioning has always been in the same spot, as has our boring 32" non-flat anything, TV..



It's about 12+ feet from my spot on the couch to the TV, at an awkward, neck-cranking, angle and while sitting in a feet-numbing position...



WELL... On Sunday we finally had had it with the carpet. It was stained from our when our cats got pissed because we changed litter types, and from occasional baby puke, spills, and dirty/wet shoes being walked across it... So, while I kept the kids entertained, Rob pulled the carpet out, removed all of the tack strips, and took out the crazy amounts of staples, used to keep the carpet in place.. OMG, that's what our hardwoods looked like......



THEN... We were "Green Light" thinking, Rob grabbed an idea and ran with it.. He even ad libbed by including both the couch and love seat in the new layout, in a whole new spectacular way.. It's almost like we have two rooms in our living room... One centered around the TV, the other more of a book reading lounge .. All we need are two 5x7 area rugs, a small table/bookcase for behind the love seat, and maybe a fake plant or a doily for the sofa table.. lol.. Also a must, we need to take down the giant Arnold Aiger "Palacio" print from the main living room wall, which we be sold as it wont fit on any other wall in our house.... I also need to find some new wall decorations to hang on our newly bare walls, but it's awesome so far!



It really is amazing! He did a fabu job!