That one time my camera took me on a little date

These last few weeks have been rough. As in, I-mostly-look-forward-to-bedtime-and-not-much-else rough. I'm sure a lot of it is Molly's ongoing medical drama and not having a car or a piece of furniture or anything to cook with outside of that one cookie sheet we bought at the PX (which, oddly enough, has not baked any cookies yet! The horrors! I will fix that soon.). But I know some of it stems from me not having anything to do outside of watching the kids litter the floors with crumbs (OH THE MILLIONS OF CRUMBS) and wash the unending mounds of laundry. I need schedule, I need things to do, I need to stay busy. So I might be volunteering for a FRG leader position tomorrow. I might also have gone on a walk by myself and pretended like it's totally normal to be taking pictures of random flowers on the side of the road.

The pessimistic side of me is finding more and more things to not like about living here, but the optimistic side is all "It's so beeYOOtifull here! Come on! Let's go exploring!" So I stuck the kids with Steve (they got ice cream since I scalped Sam gave Sam a haircut earlier) and I headed out for my own walk.

*Let's pretend someone has time to edit pictures and they are all perfect and beeyootifull instead of straight outta the camera.

These have been blooming forever now (or wait, maybe only a few weeks actually)...

I dunno what this is, but I would imagine it's thistle, or thistle's first cousin. I know, I should just go ahead and frame my botany degree.

I dunno what these little beauties are, but there is the most beautiful field of rice patties behind them.

'Murica

I dunno what this little stand sells (are you sensing a theme yet? An I-don't-know-anything theme?) but I am loving the way it smells (like garlicky chicken smells). And I think that pioneer-like crank makes fresh-squeezed lemonade. Just call me Inspector Gadget. One day I'll try it all out and report back to you.

Look who I stumbled upon! The ice cream eaters.

It took Sam a solid three minutes before he noticed I was there and taking his picture. He thought he was just watching cars whizz through the intersection.

This is how I feel about walking up hills too.

One more, I couldn't help it.

Time to burn the last bits of ice-cream-energy at the playground.

So today was the "fun" run...

...and look what I did!

Y'all know that I am just more naturally inclined to sell baked goods than I am to run 2+ miles, right? So I stuck with what I knew. Steve did what he does best. (Physically exerting himself while making it look easy and enjoyable)

After the fun run (a couple of spouses looked like puking was imminent after all of that "fun"), everyone socialized and bought goodies (maple butter french toast muffins with BACON on top, holy whoa, our FRG leader can BAKE). I had a great time. Mostly because I wasn't forced to run. And also because there was iced coffee. Not gonna lie about my motives there. But I enjoyed getting to meet the new people that Steve is working with.

This was a big money-maker for the FRG's and people were allowed to make a $5 donation to run in jerseys or other non-PT clothes. Obviously, we took full advantage of the $5 and rocked our Auburn-wear. (First game of the season on Saturday! War Eagle!)

It is painfully obvious that we might never take a successful family photo.

After taking a few pictures, Sam had a legitimate meltdown and Molly somehow managed to sleep on the way home despite his erratic screaming and face-slapping. (Yes, he slaps HIMSELF in the face. Like that will somehow anger me. By all means son, slap away!) Despite it only being 9:45 in the morning, I chucked the little monster in bed and he is still sleeping after two and half hours.

Also? Molly slept til 4:57 this morning and around here, that is sleeping in!!! I was so thrilled with her perfect timing. (Was getting up at 5 anyway.) Now I'm hopped up on coffee and am on Cloud 9 with the simultaneous napping that is going on here right now. I feel like I can do anything; grocery shop at the commissary on payday? Clean the house? Do the laundry? Run 2 miles? Ok let's not get overzealous here. I'll probably start with a little nap..

So now I'll just tell people that I went to Paris over the long weekend like it was no big deal

Despite the general feeling o' death that's been hanging over me lately, I have managed to knock a couple more things off of my 101 in 1,001 list.

I'm sure that in my last post, I came off as all kinds of hating Valentine's Day, but I really don't. I have no problems whatsoever with a day that revolves around LOVE and showing love and remembering why you first fell in love, yadda yadda. But I also don't think that we should focus all of our love efforts toward that one (extremely over-commercialized) day. I try (key word) to do things for Steve every day to let him know that I love him.

But since I didn't really DO anything on Valentine's Day (thanks to feeling like I'd been hit by a truck), I decided that I would surprise him with a special, candlelit dinner. Number 72, consider yourself DONE.
So I hit up the Valentine's Day sale section at Target, got a few decorations and some candles and went about setting up our special dinner. I made spaghetti and a chocolate chip pie and got word around 4:30 that he would be leaving work at 5. Well, 5pm came and went. So did 6. So did 7. I may or may not have gotten my panties in a twist over this stupid delay and called my mama to vent it all out. He finally got home around 8 and we had our dinner then. He was still surprised and loved it, and that was really all that I was going for (although eating dinner before our bedtime still ranks pretty high on my list of daily priorities). I took one whole picture before my camera up and died on me.

Notice the lovely plastic cups. We are super classy. I may have also possibly been in my pajamas already during our special candlelit dinner (because it was BEDTIME HELLO) and Steve may have possibly eaten dinner in his underwear and half of his uniform (because HURRY UP DINNER'S GETTING COLD).

Overall, it was a nice way to unwind after a long (although technically short- ha) week.

Earlier that morning, I decided to bite the bullet and make some goodies for Soldier Appreciation Day. I mean, I appreciate the soldiers a lot, even if people can't give me more than a day's notice on making goodies for them. I only made brownie bites for the soldiers, but I stuck an extra treat in Steve's bag and put it in his truck since he wasn't at the motorpool when I dropped off the baked goods.

Normally, I would go for some fancier packaging, but when I am sick and only have a day's notice, you get a ziploc bag with some "personalization" on it. Lovely!

Later on in the (same) day, I got Sam another doctor's appointment. Since finishing his antibiotic for his ear infection(s), he had developed a wet, nasty cough as well as a super-disgusting snotty nose. That was in addition to grabbing at his ears. So. We go to the doc's office and see a NP since our usual doc has the day off. She valiantly puts up with his screaming while getting his pulse taken (ON HIS FOOT for the LOVE) and then it takes three people to physically restrain him while the NP tries to check his ears. I had the pleasure of holding his head, most likely because I am the most deserving of eardrum damage since he is my kid and all. She confirms that he has two RAGING ear infections and apparently that last antibiotic didn't do squat. Awesome. After checking out another (!) two rashes on his hiney, we leave the sweltering office with two new prescriptions and a lot of sweaty clothes. Yes, it was then that I decided that checking out the Valentine's clearance at Target would be a grand idea. And it was. No regrets!

That day was also the candlelit dinner day, and I realize now that I basically told the whole day backwards, or at least in a really funky order. Oh well. You get the gist of it right? (The gist of it being: I NEED WINE. LOTS OF WINE.)

Steve has a 4-day weekend this weekend and we wanted to take full advantage of it, not just putter around ol' Clarksville and waste time (although Steve DID mention something about going to Target, and I was thisclose to taking him up on that offer). Instead, we decided that yesterday, we would go and see Paris, Tennessee, with our own eyes.

The drive there was quite interesting. I love driving through little towns and wondering where on earth the people there do their grocery shopping and if that's their only gas station and seeing how cute the little downtowns are. We arrived in Paris and could NOT locate the Eiffel Tower! You would think it would be stuck in the middle of downtown. Instead, this courthouse was. I guess that is probably more useful than an Eiffel Tower replica. But still.

Charming, no?
The entire downtown area was so cute and we stopped in a sweet little store to ask directions to the Eiffel Tower.

After receiving directions that involved no street names whatsoever ("You go down this road here until you get to the Sonic. Then you go left. And then you go right. Don't go too far past the Lowe's.") We eventually found it, even as directionally-challenged as we are.

There was a nice little park and recreation area surrounding this near-life-size replica of the Eiffel Tower, and Sam was content, once again, to walk around its perimeter, surveying the playset and practicing walking on woodchips. I am hoping that one day, possibly in the close-ish future, Sam might gain the courage to actually play on the playground.

While Paris wasn't exactly what I was expecting, I thought it was a very charming town and we enjoyed our Saturday trip to somewhere new.

Between the pressure from society and my sinuses, I think I need a piece of chocolate

You know when you're at the beach and you get knocked down by a really big wave? You come up sputtering and your nose burns from inhaling large amounts of gross-tasting salt water and your face stings from being exfoliated by the sand you just ate, and just when you wipe your eyes and get your footing, ANOTHER big ol' wave comes and smacks you right back under.

Maybe you don't know that feeling if you wear goggles. Or are aware of your surroundings. Or steer clear of the Atlantic Ocean. But I've been to the Jersey shore before (EW), and that happened to me a lot when I was feeling brave enough to venture into the water (TWICE). And that is sort of how I'm feeling this week (metaphorically speaking and all). Sam got hit with his ear infection and snotty, stuffy-nose sickness sometime last week (or two weeks ago, I can't really remember ANYTHING anymore) and then I got it. Felt kinda "meh" for a few days and then one day I turned into the blob that did not want to move from the couch. Finally got my footing though and wiped my eyes, and then yesterday- BLAM. Feeling like death had just mowed me down again. Where in the frickety frick is this crap coming from?? It is not like we even GO anywhere these days. And my house is cleeeeeeaaaaannnnn!!! I promise! Thank goodness Steve got home from work early yesterday (or, well, ON TIME, which is just as unusual as "early") so he took over feeding and bathing and entertaining the small person while I laid on the couch, wrapped in a blanket, and moaned about how demanding my boss is and how much I wish I could call in sick.

Of course yesterday was payday and we ran out of something like six essential foods in our house, so I was dreading the subsequent commissary trip that had to happen today. I don't mind running errands with Sam because he is generally well-behaved when we are out and about, but he has become much more, um, "defiant" lately when it comes to getting in the car. You would think I was strapping him into a chair that was on fire. He screams and cries and I gotta do this wacky move where I use one elbow to hold him down at the crotch so he doesn't arch his back and make it impossible for me to fasten his buckle. I can only imagine what the neighbors think when watching me strap him in.

<Sam, screaming like he is being forced to sit in a bed of fire ants>
<Me> "Sit DOWN. Here- milk? juice? book? pacifier? toys? Come on child! SANTA IS WATCHING!!!"

Luckily we just don't GO anywhere anymore. That eliminates a big hunk of the problem. But there are times when we need things (say, groceries for example) or when I have to run an errand or when I just CANNOT take being inside of our house any longer and the carseat fight seems to be worth it. (I usually start doubting whether or not it's "worth it" about halfway through the battle.)

Upon waking up this morning and having a piece of sandpaper replace the usual lining of my throat, I decided that I could not and would not take Sam to the commissary with me. And lo and behold, Steve got back from PT early! I convinced him that I only needed to grab a few things from the commissary and if I could just go now, while he was home between PT and work, it would save me lots of time and quite a bit of sanity as well. Saving these two things only serves to benefit Steve, so he agreed.

It took me an astounding FIFTEEN MINUTES to work my way from the front door of the commissary to exiting the checkout line. I was SO PROUD. And so happy! I would not have to battle the crazies with paychecks fresh in hand at the commissary later in the day, NOR would I have to take Sam with me. Win win win WIN. I got home to realize that I didn't buy the most important thing I had gone in for. And THEN I got a text from the FRG leader alerting me that I needed to make something for the Soldier Appreciation Day for the battalion TOMORROW. OF COURSE. I cannot bring myself to go back to the commissary. I went there this morning during low-tide, 7:30am. Now? If I went back there now? SUICIDE. And being sick does not help my attitude when it comes to wackadoos clogging up the teeny weeny aisles of the commissary on payday, trying to decide whether they should buy these pork feet, or those pork ears. Choices, choices, choices.

The poor soldiers will most likely end up with some gluten-free brownies, as that is the only thing I really have available in my pantry to bake at the moment. Or I could just stuff some Cheetos into ziploc bags and call it a day. I would personally, LOVE to receive bags of Cheetos. So I don't see how that could be a bad idea.

Speaking of receiving, Steve and I did absolutely nothing for Valentine's Day yesterday. Well, we said "Happy Valentine's Day" to each other, but that was about it. I asked him what he would like (alerting him to the fact that I had not gotten him anything yet), and he said something completely inappropriate for the internet, and then he asked me what I wanted and I said nothing. We agreed that cards would be a waste of money (would much prefer him to just write me a sweet note) and I need chocolate like I need a hole in the head (HINT: cannot breathe out of my nose, so chocolate is very much appreciated please and thank you), and I do not want him to go out and buy some crappy, bottom-of-the-barrel, overpriced bouquet of half-dead roses. I did mention, however, that a random bouquet of non-dead flowers on any other day of the year would be very well-received around these parts and (HINT HINT) chocolate will never be rejected.

By the time he finally got home from work, I was feeling particularly pathetic and possibly did not even offer to cook dinner. This could partly be because I didn't thaw anything out. (Oh, the SHAME.) But after watching him play with, feed, and bathe Sam, I started feeling some guilt and dug a skillet meal out of the freezer (Wife Of The Year, here I come). Then (then!) I also dug out some frozen cookie dough and made him some cookies. Well, by "make" I mean that I broke the little blocks apart and stuck them in the oven. Steve got them out of the oven and forced me to eat too many of them. He then told me that I could come upstairs five minutes after him and I could have the sink in the bathroom all to myself. What a lovely gift, as I could now go "put away" the rest of the cookies (snarf, snarf, snarf) and brush my teeth without worrying about random food particles colliding with the back of my head while Steve flosses and I jockey for the sink. (We have the tiniest bathroom in the history of bathrooms.) I finish brushing my teeth and applying my Breathe Right strip (hello hottie!) and find my sweet husband already passed out. I finish off the night by listening to Hypnobabies and almost strangling myself with the cord on my iPod.

Oh and my most favorite Valentine is my mom (sorry Steve). She sent me the SWEETEST package filled with chocolate (she knows how I operate) and this Clinique face lotion that I was hemming and hawing over while she was here visiting recently. I could not justify the cost, and that is why I was to the point of using a magnifying glass to find the last little bits of lotion in my sample tub yesterday morning, but she has saved the day and replenished my supply. THANK YOU MAMA! My face thanks you and Steve thanks you too for not letting me run out of quality chocolate.

Perhaps one day this weekend I will go "all out" and cook Steve a proper dinner and dessert and let him know how much his love means to me. I might even make him a homemade card and write a love letter and set the table and let him choose what we watch on tv for a change. I don't need one designated day each year to show my husband how much I love him. Quit it with the PRESSURE already, Hallmark. Geez.

I smell like brownies and urine, but I totally won today

Whoo y'all. Today was one for the books. I was very happy to put the little stinker to bed, close his door, and do a happy dance. It was, indeed, ONE OF THOSE DAYS.

Everything started out fine- he slept in (sort of), but that was because I kept him up til EIGHT PEE-EM last night. If you're new in town, that is ridiculously late for us. Sam is usually passed out by 6:30 and Steve and I follow suit around 8:30-9. So since there was an ill-timed nap yesterday afternoon (stupid mama never saw a nap she didn't love), he was practically flying around his room last night, rediscovering every single toy that he could possibly launch at my head. I, of course, was lying on the floor and being the best obstacle course and roadway for my son that I could. (Have GOT to remember to purchase some sort of giant pillow for future floor-lying. My giant hips. OUCH.)

Back to today though- Today was the day our lovely FRG was having a bake sale at the PX. I know there are question marks just EXPLODING out of your brains right now. A bake sale? On a Sunday? At the PX? Why? Isn't that a bit of a JV idea? Who wants to buy your homemade crap? Especially when we all know that you bought the pre-made cookie dough at the commissary late last night?

This is not poop on a wire rack.

Well! I will have you know that I had the extreme foresight to purchase boxes of brownie mix a whole TWO DAYS in advance and some mini muffin pans, because I was signed up to bring brownie bites. I even got cute little Valentine's Day bags to put them in. Heh! I'm so on top of things! Except time-management apparently, because the bake sale started at 10am and I was still standing in my kitchen at 9:57. Luckily for me, nothing was ready when I got there, so I didn't appear late at all. I was just someone to vent to about the un-readiness of everything! Whew! I can handle that!

I dropped off my brownie bites and watched our FRG leader arrange them on the table with the other baked goods. It was a lesson in self-control as I held back from placing them the way that I thought looked best.
You can't just scatter them all over the table! Line them up! Arrange them neatly! They are already too close to resembling Cupid's turdlets, there is no need to sacrifice presentation when we're already running late!
But alas, I kept my mouth shut and left. SOMEONE was whining (go figure!) and rubbing his eyes and yawning. Ahh, sounds like the signs of a morning nap to me! Jackpot!

We head home, I change his diaper and put Sam down for a nap. Usually there is resistance to the morning nap. It almost ALWAYS dies down quickly and he passes out, realizing that his screams are worthless. But not today. Today he had the fight in him. Today he battled with me for TWO AND A HALF HOURS STRAIGHT. One of the times I went up there to make sure he hadn't hung himself from his mobile, I walked in and he was lying down with his eyes almost completely closed, but was still yelling. Of course I had gone in there all storm-trooper-style ready to give him the stern "it's NAPTIME, young man" talk, but once I saw that he was lying down, I tried to stop and slowly back my way towards the door. But it was too late. I had been spotted (am very easy to spot these days) and was deemed an appropriate audience to scream for once again. DAMMIT I CAN'T WIN.

Do you have any idea how many of those chocolates I had to eat before I got to this message??

I figured that was probably his last stand since he was already horizontal that time, so it would only be a few more minutes of crying. Except that it wasn't. I finally just went and got him out of bed. First time I have EVER done that. I don't want to send mixed signals to him. Like, Oh if you cry long enough and hard enough, I'll come rescue you from that awful crib. But it was pretty obvious that his crying was not going to cease anytime soon. I fed him lunch and he just chatted away while he ate his cheese, oblivious to the fact that I was SO PISSED at him for not napping. And listening to his crying only made my blood pressure rise, so "naptime" was not even enjoyable or productive! Gah! But it was hard to stay angry at him for long. He is pretty cute.

My plan was to keep him up for the rest of the day. I know, classic rookie mistake, but I figured I could at least get an early bedtime out of him if he didn't nap. We waited until the afternoon to run errands. The mixture of driving on the interstate, having the heat on in the car, and Chris Daughtry playing softly in the background (I KNOW you guys, I finally ponied up and slipped in a new CD! We are saved! For now.), was the recipe for sleep apparently.

We get to Target and NOTHING is waking him up. Rats. He had probably been asleep for all of fifteen minutes. I fiddled around for a minute with different things in the car and then started getting ready to go inside. All I had to do was return one stinkin' item! What an awful day to not have a copilot/babysitter.

So I was a mean mom and woke him up. He was kinda pissed about it, not gonna lie. But once we started walking, he was fine. I tried to make up for waking him up by not browsing at all. We literally went straight to returns and walked back out. That, for me, is unheard of. It was hard too, and I think he was oblivious to my sacrifice. I was under the impression that groggy Sam would get buckled back into his carseat and fall asleep on our drive home. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Sometimes I even crack myself up.

Went to Kroger, got my prenatals filled (I guess, technically, they are just "natals" at this point in the game. We are so far past "pre" that it's not even funny.), and filled up with gas on post.

By the time we got back home, we still had a LOT of time to kill. So we went walking to the playground. Sam doesn't ever want to PLAY on the playground, he just likes walking around the perimeter of it, admiring it from afar if you will, and screeching random obscenities at the dogs we pass in the backyards along the way. It didn't take long for us to turn into popsicles and we headed back inside. Play, play, more play, ignore a tantrum or seven, and realize that it's dinnertime! Yay! After dinner is BED! Mama's most favorite time of the day is now within sight!!! YEEEEEEEHAW!

He was very cooperative eating dinner tonight and I even gave him a special Goldfish treat for correctly pointing to my nose when asked. (It's only a matter of time before I am nominated for some "Mom Of The Year" award, I know.) After eating something like half a box of Chex cereal (in addition to a normal amount of regular food containing some actual nutritional value), I call it quits on his dinnertime and haul him upstairs to change him. Nice timing too as his entire bottom is soaked in urine! Fabulous! I wrestle to get his clothes off of him (since sitting in urine is a HOOT apparently) and he proceeds to pee all over me. Breathe, breathe, breathe, just gotta lotion this kid up and brush his teeth. It won't be long now. He happily gets into bed and I shut the door without so much as a whine from the crib. I. WIN. YES.

Now it's time to have my requisite bowl of Cheerios and text Steve warning him about this extreme winter weather we're having and remind him to stay warm. (Like he isn't already completely aware of the weather situation since he is currently LIVING out in it. But it makes me feel helpful. Sort of.)

Here's to hoping that tomorrow is easier nap-wise and hopefully we won't get any snow. Probably the first time in the history of EVER that I'm wishing against snow, but geez, my honey is going to freeze his hiney off out there. It would be like rootin' for the Russians.

I am officially the world's worst POC. Also, the most non-committal FRG volunteer.

For starters, POC stands for Point Of Contact and it is my job to call my little list of people in Steve's company every month and make sure we have their correct phone number, remind them about the next meeting, see if there's any way on God's green earth that they might actually help with something we're doing, and just bug them in general. This POC job doesn't really hold much significance until the guys deploy and spouses actually WANT some sort of information from me. Right now I get a lot of "I thought I told you people that I didn't want ANYTHING to do with the FRG. Did my husband not make that clear??" And I'm all, "Oh! He probably did! But we have to make sure that your info is correct in case of emergencies and blah blah blah!" in my most chipper/cheerful voice. When, in reality, I'm in total shock that someone would talk to another person in such a way when CLEARLY I'm just trying to help YOU out. We'll see how sweet I am when they actually want to talk to ME come deployment time. Heh.

But anyways, back to how I'm the worst. We were going to have a meeting on Tuesday, but then we found out at our little luncheon last week that it was canceled and we needed to call our people over the weekend and let them know about that (in case they didn't get the 40 bajillion emails already sent out about it). But then the guys came back from training and it was a long weekend and we put up Christmas lights and I completely forgot about it. I remembered yesterday. Wednesday. Oops. (Like anyone on my call list would actually ATTEND a meeting! AHAHAHAHA laughable!) We have a fundraiser today so I thought that it might still be worth calling my people to remind them about that. And then I realized that I never saved my list of phone numbers. (!!!!) So I had to call the FRG leader and explain that I didn't do my calls when I was SUPPOSED to and could she send my numbers to me again please?
Looking at the upside of this situation, half of the folks on my list would probably prefer I drop dead before calling them about FRG stuff, so at least they didn't miss me.

While we are talking about things that my pregnancy brain is erasing from my memory, I also forgot that I was supposed to make ONE HUNDRED COOKIES for our fundraiser today. This resulted in a panic run to the commissary where I bought four giant tubes of cookie dough and then got up at 5 the next morning to make them all. Also? Even stupid cookies out of a tube are easy for me to screw up since I have zero baking abilities. They are finished now, and a trip to the Dollar Tree yesterday provided me with cute little baggies to put them in. I originally signed up to make Christmas-y cookies, but screw it. This is what the commissary had in stock- this is what you get from me. Hopefully the napping schedule stars will align so that I can actually go and help with the fundraising part of the day, but HAHAHA there are a heckuva lotta stars that gotta line up to make that happen.

News About Something Probably More Boring Than My FRG Duties: I got my Christmas present from Steve early. It is a Shark Vac-then-Steam and it is amazing. LIFE-CHANGING even. Y'all, I wanted to eat dinner OFF of my floors last night they were so beautiful. They were super clean after the vacuuming part since all the itty bitty dog hairs were suctioned up into the tube, and then they were SANITIZED by the steam. The entire downstairs of my house, from start to finish, took twenty minutes. TWENTY MINUTES.
And before you go thinking that my husband is some misogynistic pig for giving me a glorified mop for Christmas, let me explain that I bought my own Christmas present. Yep, AND I opened it before Christmas. But if you could see the stuff I got off of the floors yesterday... spots that I thought were just part of the design of the floor... omg no. That was GRIME. We were living in some kind of nasty, third-world FILTH and I wasn't even fully aware of it. (Note: I was aware of the filth, just not to the extent that I found yesterday.)

The gift of easily cleaned floors is the gift that keeps on giving... all year long, Clark. I love a useful gift, and this is probably the most useful gift I can think of. I LOVE YOU STEVE and thank you for the mop. It has made me one happy SAHM.

Gratuitous photo of the kid

If you bought us a wedding present, then yes, I am finally using it

The FRG luncheon was a success and everything was SO PRETTY. I finally had a reason to bust out all of my Christmas-y china and serving pieces from our wedding and use them. That in itself felt good. Except the part where I had to scrub the dust off of everything. That was kind of a hassle. But actually USING those dishes felt wonderful. I had everything ready a little before everyone arrived, and as I was going to grab my camera and take pictures of the glorious setup, one of the girls rang the doorbell. Got there early to help! GAH. So I didn't take pictures of any of it. But you'll HAVE to take my word for it when I say that I could have invited Martha Freaking Stewart to this luncheon and I would not have batted an eye. It looked that good.

That morning I proceeded to dip everything in chocolate.

Before:

After:

True, I did not get to dip too many pretzels or ANY potato chips, but that's because I ran out of chocolate. I bought out our measly Kroger last week and thought that would be enough. So I set out what I had and I will dip the pretzels and chips later this week for Steve.
Dipping all of that probably took a total of 20 minutes. And that includes melting the chocolate. I was hemming and hawing for some time about actually DOING it, because I really hate to be interrupted during something that requires my full attention like this. If you take too long dipping, the chocolate starts to harden back up, and then you gotta re-melt everything and stir and dip and the chocolate is never as nice as when you melt it the first time. So I got up super-early that morning and did it before Sam woke up.

Tip: When dipping the butterfinger bites, it is WAY easier to just throw 4 in the bowl at once and then use a FORK to turn them over and fish them out with rather than using tongs. I don't know why this idea never occurred to me before, but I would like to save someone else the trouble. (Mama)

One thing that caught me off guard about the luncheon was the mass chaos that toddlers bring to the table. I have my house secured so that Sam can't get to the things that I know he wants to get into, but I guess I never really considered what OTHER kids might want to get into... For instance... my nativity set.. every ornament hanging on my tree... candy canes...

We have a giant bucket o' toys in the living room that we use to house all of Sam's toys. He doesn't play with the majority of them, but I am not exaggerating when I say that every single toy was pulled out and strewn across my living room like a Cat 5 hurricane had just blown through. Candy cane was ground into my one poor patch of carpet downstairs. Ornaments were broken (I tried to put breakable ornaments higher up on the tree and soft ornaments on the bottom, but somehow a child managed to reach pretty high.). And they all fought over this tiny little stuffed pug.

Before everyone got here I was all, "HAHAHA look at me! My house is so clean and beautiful! I won't have to clean anything all weekend! I'm so brilliant!" And afterwards, as I was sitting in what was left of my living room, wondering what that mystery stain on the couch was, I realized that maybe cleaning was not the brightest thing to do before little people came over to play.

I finally got all the toys sorted today and the Christmas china is put back in its place. We are still eating leftover chicken salad, but it's pretty durn tasty so I can't complain there. Plus, there is no shortage of chocolate-covered things to snack on. So obviously, LIFE IS GOOD.

While having our little FRG pow-wow, we decided on making tori ornaments for our Christmas fundraiser. (The Japanese tori symbol is used to represent the Rakkasans.) I found a tori cookie cutter at the museum gift shop the other day and decided to try it out on some sugar cookies before using it for the dough ornaments we plan on making this week.

Normally, I am very anti-sugar cookie. And not just because the cookie itself contains no chocolate. No, I really hate the hassle of a sugar cookie because they are so time-consuming and I never figured out a way to make cookie-cutting EASY. Well. I read the simple instructions that came attached to my new cookie cutter and felt like the biggest IDIOT ever. "Chill cookie dough for 3-4 hours before rolling out and cutting." Wow. That would have made some previous attempts a HELLUVA lot easier. HOW DID I NEVER KNOW THAT???

I always rolled out the dough as soon as I was done mixing and proceeded to curse at the flimsy shapes that never seemed to come out right. I followed the instructions yesterday and made BEAUTIFUL cookies.

Still not the prettiest... I've got work on transferring them from cutting board to cookie sheet..

All sprinkled up..

Looks like Second Baby wanted in on this picture..

While they are so cute and would make GREAT fundraising items (can you picture them wrapped up in cellophane with something like "We think you Rakk!" printed on a tag?), they are very time-consuming and I am not willing to put that kind of effort into something that people may or may not buy. Our FRG is kind of notorious for having next to no spousal support, so I want to save myself from calories that do not include chocolate (because I know I will end up having to take all these cookies home with me. Gah.).
I currently plan on giving most of them to my neighbors.

I'm just so happy that I now know the secrets to sugar cookies! Only took me 25 years to learn!

I need your deep freezer advice

I thought maybe I had missed God's message about building an ark yesterday. Because the rain? It would not stop. It was coming down HARD and continuously.

That mini-ocean back there? When I went to bed on Sunday night, it was just a plain old field. It quickly morphed into a lake that made me want to put floaties on the dogs before I sent them out back to do their business.

And while I hated having my hair frizz all the livelong day (trivial!), I felt REALLY bad for Steve, who was having to sleep and work in it. Sam and I went to the commissary this morning to stock up on food needed to make ALL of his favorite meals this weekend. I know I personally didn't send him out there to do training during these past two weeks of miserable weather, but I still feel BAD and want to somehow make coming home a gazillion times better than usual for him.

I also found out (RIGHT after I got home!) that I will, in fact, be hosting a little FRG lunch get-together here at my house on Thursday. So.... that probably means another trip to the commissary! Wheeee!!

I was already planning on dipping everything in my kitchen in chocolate for Steve (as per my usual Christmas tradition), but I figure that a few women aren't going to put THAT much of a dent in his chocolate stuff (right?!?!), so I will set that out for my desserts. And I was thinking of getting some croissants and making chicken salad? The FRG leader is bringing some fruit. I'm not doing veggies because I know what a waste of human effort that is. Am I missing anything? I should probably have some drinks on hand as they probably won't want to drink milk or that NASTY Shasta cola in the fridge. Hmmm... "I'll think about it tomorrow."

Meanwhile, yesterday.... Allison, Sam, and I went to Nashville where they have been secretly hiding a Trader Joe's all this time! And no one told me! It was small, but filled with awesome stuff. I was surprised at how much I DIDN'T spend, but I got quite a few things that Steve and I will enjoy. (Sorry Sam.) They always seem to have a little spot set up where they are giving away samples of something or other. And yesterday, they were giving out samples of.... LATKES AND APPLESAUCE!!! It does seem a little odd that that sample would excite me to that level of all-caps, but Sam and I have been reading a Christmas-book-a-day, and yesterday we read about

LATKES AND APPLESAUCE. How appropriate. Of course, Sam couldn't actually sample it due to the whole gluten-thing, but I did remember to tell him how yummy it was. HA.

Another fun thing about Trader Joe's is the people watching!! You would not know you were in Tennessee if you went into that store. They were all really crunchy, granola, hippie-dippie-trippie folks that were doing their ACTUAL grocery shopping in there. ($$$$$$) It was entertaining, to say the least. We paid for our purchases and then headed home (in the rain). Sam screamed for the better part of the return trip, and I'm assuming now that Allison has enough birth control to last her into next year.

And that picture there? That is our little baby freezer, packed to the gills. I dare not find anymore milk on sale (it was a whole DOLLAR cheaper per carton that usual!! and there are 5 more cartons in my fridge...), or make anymore bread, or freeze anymore meat, or buy another frozen veggie, because I have rearranged as best I can. There is absolutely no more wiggle room in there. Do any of you own a deep freezer? Can you recommend a brand or model? Maybe you can tell me which brand/model to stay away from? We are clearly in desperate need of one and are trying to hold out for some after-Christmas sales. While I normally advocate buying things like this off of Craigslist, I'm thinking that if we're going to be shoving lots of food in there, I would prefer to know that it is brand spankin' new and not going to randomly shut off and die, thus destroying all of that food (which = $$$).

I am basically recording the events of these crazy days so I can read about it in the future. Feel free to skip this post if daily life bores you.

This week has been BUSY so far. Much busier than I anticipated. While I knew that there were a few things going on before leaving for Thanksgiving, it still has not registered in my wee brain that all of these little things now take for-freakin-ever now that there is a small person whose nap schedule MUST be maintained and who is not particularly happy about going for car rides unless I stock him up with a nice sippy cup full of milk.

So yesterday was my POC training in the morning down the road, and I dropped Sam off with my good friend for a "playdate." After the training, I picked Sam up and headed home for his nap. Steve anticipated on coming home for lunch (I have LEFTOVERS! Yippee!), but then got called to a meeting at the last minute, so he needed me to bring him something (LEFTOVERS, just not heated!). So I had to wait for Sam to wake up, then we rushed in the lunch traffic to take Steve his lunch, dropped that off with him, and headed back to the house to feed Sam lunch. Luckily, Sam was in a very cooperative mood with the eating yesterday (the past few days have been a battle of the wills to say the least) and we finished that up fairly quickly. (Well, thinking back, it wasn't quick at all, but it was quick for US.)

Wiped Sammy down, loaded him back up, rounded up the dogs, harnesses, leashes, and headed off to the vet. Y'all, this vet (OFF POST) was such a different and glorious experience compared to the last vet experience. People there were willing to HELP me, and I also wised up and only brought one dog in at a time, which proved to be totally unnecessary, as the vet clinic people were more than willing to take a dog from me, seeing that I had to fill out paperwork and try to entertain the small person. They were quick and nice and helpful and we were in and out in no time. I don't care if they charge double what they would on post, those people are worth their weight in GOLD.

After leaving the vet, we stopped off at the house to drop off the dogs, because holy heavens those dogs were stinky. Sam and I headed back out to the stables on post to drop off all of the dogs' new paperwork so that they can be boarded over Thanksgiving. (Nothing like waiting til the last minute, huh???) After filling out MORE paperwork there and trying to remember what size scoop we use to feed the dogs their food, we were off again. Back to the house and down for a nap. The afternoon nap has been giving us trouble lately (as in, the small person flat out REFUSES to go down for one at all, and instead, will scream his lungs out for an hour straight, only to come out of his crib in a major funk and fuss and fight for the rest of the day). But thankfully, he went down without a fight and slept almost two hours.

During that time, I cooked the scariest-looking ham EVER (like, I didn't even want to touch it with my hands, and I'm not the type that is leery of raw meat), I learned that I would need to make mashed potatoes for 90+ people the next day (today), and that I would have to figure out how to do that, as well as drop Steve's truck off at the Chevrolet dealer in Hoptown so it can be repaired while we're out of town. Luckily (I guess), my friend needs me to cook a brisket for her today since she has an FRG meeting as well, and that will give me time to make all those mashed potatoes. (The mashed potatoes are for OUR company's FRG Thanksgiving potluck/meeting.) My friend will come pick up her brisket as we're fixing to leave for our meeting, and then she will come back to our house after the meetings are over and sit here while Sam sleeps so that Steve and I can drive up to Hoptown and drop off his truck.

THEN I will try not to stress out about all of the things that I have not packed for our Thanksgiving trip tomorrow. I will try to make a master list today of all the things we need to take down with us, pack it in the morning, drop off the dogs at the stables, remember to take a tub of their food with them, come home and pack up the car so that when Steve gets through with his meeting, we can roll out of this crazy town and head to my parents' house!! Sounds simple enough, right?
Well I'm off to go battle the crazies who are doing their Thanksgiving shopping at the commissary this morning so that I can buy 15lbs of potatoes and 8 buckets of sour cream. Hopefully this tornadic weather will settle down for a minute so that my hair doesn't frizz to oblivion while I'm running in and out of there.

Gratuitous picture (because if you got this far in this post, you deserve it):

Sammy having a grand ol' time at the local Chick-fil-A

First brigade ball

This past Friday night, Steve and I went to our first brigade ball. I started out excited about it (well, after I got over Operation Dress Stress and Deathcon Shoe Search) because we would get to go out! alone! and talk with adults! and wear something besides sweat pants! and perhaps drink alcohol!

Well let's be real here. I drank a LOT of alcohol. After not drinking for 9 months (baby incubation period) and then breastfeeding for 6 months and then Lent for 40 days (which, technically, we are not outta the woods with that yet, but I pretended it was Sunday), one glass of wine did me in. But did I stop there? No, why? We were having a good time! I got a cosmopolitan and Steve and I both got BIG EYES while we watched the bartender fill up half a Solo cup with vodka. Better judgement SHOULD have kicked in and said, "Is this really a good idea? You haven't even been through the receiving line yet, which is UP THE STAIRS, and you are already not so talented at walking around in high heels and floor-length gowns, so you might wanna just STEP AWAY FROM THAT LOADED DRINK WOMAN." But I just flicked that little thought off my shoulder and sipped on my Very Strong Drink.

After becoming thoroughly tipsy, the GUEST OF HONOR and his WIFE approached us (out of at least 200 people standing around ???) and wanted to chat it up. They were familiar with Auburn and had been there many times so we talked about that for a while and I tried very hard to appear sober and respectable and like this wasn't the first time I've had a drink in over a year. Who knows if I succeeded at that or not. But by the time we were finished talking with them, we had to get in line to go through the receiving line. And our drinks were still FULL. Steve knew better than to go against his conscience, so he ditched his drink, but remember that I had already left my conscience way back there with my first glass of wine? So I proceeded to chug the rest of my drink while simultaneously walking up the stairs. That turned out about as well as you'd imagine it would.

I managed to shake everyone's hand in the receiving line and a General's wife fixed my necklace (you know when the clasp works its way around to the charm) and then she gave me a big hug. Maybe drunk is a good thing! People can relate to that! Maybe she wished she didn't have to stand in that stupid receiving line while 2LT's wives were down below getting lit.

Somehow, after the receiving line we ended up in the line for pictures. I'm not sure how that happened. Maybe the staircase down just looked too challenging at that point. Either way, I hope my eyes aren't doing that crazy half-open thing because then I would REALLY appear intoxicated and that wasn't the whole look I was going for for my First Brigade Ball Photo.

We eventually ended up in the ballroom at a table with a bunch of guys and gals that Steve will be joining and working with starting this week. They turned out to be a riot and we had a good time being at their table. Then we met the Colonel and I was introduced as the new FRG leader.
Wait. Whaaa??? I figured they would at least wait until I was sober before I could agree to a decision like that. I guess I will wait around to see if any of them were sober enough to remember naming me that.

And after eating some really awful food and watching people do ridiculously large shots of the Regimental Punch, we had to call it a night. A ball that lasts five hours BEFORE dancing? Kinda lengthy, Army, kinda lengthy. Maybe they should consider starting these affairs at 3 in the afternoon so people who go to bed early (like US) could have a little FUN afterward? We were so tired that we came straight home and passed out. No dancing for us. We did have fun going out alone and not worrying about Sammy since he was in such capable hands while we were gone!