{internal voices}

7:50 Blinded by the sun shining through the curtainless window bouncing off the full length mirror inside my walk-in closet.
Internal Voice (IV for short): I really should get a curtain or maybe I’ll just tactfully tack a nice dark sheet up there until I can decide what color I want this room.

8:00 Pull the covers over my head.
IV: Wow, it’s hot under here. But it is still Friday, I have no children so I should be able to guiltlessly sleep-in, right?

8:05 FIRE CALL!!!! I lay there and listen to the tones and giggle as George groggily tumbles out of bed and attempts to get dressed.
IV: I really wish he would bring his fire gear home…it sure would be more exciting to see him put those on instead of jeans!

8:25 While still in bed, I learn that the fire call is a false alarm and the Richmond Village Hall isn’t really burning to the ground. Shoot! Poor Georgie, he’ll be disappointed. He loves fires!
IV: Maybe you should surprise him with breakfast…that’ll make him feel better.
IV#2: Buuuuuttt I have no children to be responsible for!

8:35 OK, OK I’ll get up! But reluctantly!
IV: Now go make a nice big breakfast & he’ll be soooooo happy!

I make my way downstairs carefully….don’t want any splinters! I open the fridge and because I have a self-diagnosed case of ADD, I am distracted by the containers of left-overs that have by now undoubtedly gone shopping for new furs. So what do I do? I start cleaning out the fridge.
IV: Hey, this is great! I’ll get the fridge cleaned out and wiped down and it will be all sparkly & clean to put nice new groceries into.

8:57 Since no one is around some of my IV’s are having a conversation!
IV#1: Why did he put the whole pot of soup into the fridge? Why couldn’t he separate it into nice little containers?
IV#2: Wow, it sure is a nice pot though! (It’s my Calphalon Soup Pot that I got for my bday.)
IV#1: You really should take the pot out and separate it into little containers.
IV#2: Yeah, then you can make more soup in the really nice pot!
IV#3: I really don’t think you should hold it with one hand! Grab it with both hands! You’re making me very nervous.
ME out loud: OK, just slide over and I’ll pull you right out………..NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!
IV #3: Told you!

This is what it looks like when you drop almost 5 quarts of Italian Wedding Soup!

9:01 George walks through the door. His voice: Wow!! That’s a big mess. Did the lid break?

IV#4: NO, BUT IT MIGHT WHEN I THROW IT AT YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!

10:32 Finally finished cleaning up the mess. I actually had to use Q-tips to clean the itty, bitty pastina out of the crevices of the fridge. I was really grateful for the dogs as they licked most of the mess right up!

And yes, after all that, I did make breakfast for my Hunka, hunka burning (not so much today) love!!!

{i'm a snob}

As most of you know my affinity for DC goes back to my post pregnancy days with Mikayla. You see, when I got pregnant with Mikayla my life changed. Most lives usually do change when you unexpectedly become pregnant. That, of course, was not a big deal…the being pregnant part I was actually pretty happy. However, the bigger deal was the addiction that came with that pregnancy. Before Mikayla, drinking soda was not part of my drinking fare. I was more of a Perrier/LaCroix drinker (I admit I’m a water snob). However, one day there I was in the teacher’s lounge looking at my gourmet lunch of Lemon LaCroix and a beautifully put together egg salad sandwich when I glanced over at the pop machine. My eyes immediately focused on the “RC” button. I have no idea what power took over my body, but the next thing I know I was happily chugging down an RC!! And so it began…. my love affair with pop! I thought for sure it was a temporary craving that would leave me once I gave birth. But alas, that was not so! Eight years later my drinking has morphed as follows: RC for the next 3 years to regular Coke for about 2 years… I’m also a “diet snob” but finally got over my snobbiness when I switched to Diet Coke.

Why the drinking history you ask?

Well, this past week I was attacked by the flu bug promptly followed by the cold bug! I, however being the “bug snob” that I am, refused to attribute my general achiness & major headache to the flu. Instead I was sure it was withdrawal symptoms as I had also decided to just stop drinking Diet Coke (cold turkey). So for the next 3 days, that’s right 3 days, I was again possessed by some unknown force that resulted in family retreating from me every time I walked into a room. That is a bit of an exaggeration, but I think they were really scared!!!! LOL. So, after two days of seeing my family disappear from the room I was in and several really bad phone conversations with my sister, she convinced me to just have one Diet Coke to take the “edge” off. Because she is the medical field (that’s how I rationalized it…she is actually a practice manager for a doctor’s office!! LOL) I trusted her advice. Two DC’s later I still felt just as bad as I did before. It was then that I became more conscious of my symptoms and decided to lay down for a little “nap” on Monday. My nap lasted the rest of the day on Monday and all day Tuesday. I felt like a Diet Coke truck had delivered my supply but run over me in the process! My symptoms were all but gone on Wednesday which fooled me into thinking I was “back to normal”. I went about my normal activities and then as I was driving home from my very cool Script class I started sneezing and sneezing. I looked in the rear view mirror and there it was the COLD BUG!!!

There you have it, a very detailed description of my week. BUT…out of negative always comes positive, at least in my “happy little Gina world”…that’s what George likes to call it. I found a new favorite thing… Puffs tissues with Vicks & lotion right in them! They smell soooooooo good! I’m still sniffing them & I’m not really sick anymore. I swear they are best thing next to Perrier… ok, ok Diet Coke!

Have a great day & be kind to a stranger!

{god's country}

In my last entry I made a reference to "God's Country" which is my mom's pet name for how far I live from the city and more importantly her house. Actually, on a good day, it's only 65 minutes to her house. However, when we hit traffic, it's a completely different story. At the beginning of our relationship, George (a.k.a. My hunka, hunka burning love) and I made that trip quite often as we were desperately infatuated with each other. As our relationship got more serious it became apparent we would have to choose:

A) A house in Melrose Park within a 10 minute radius of both my mom & sister. This option would have satisfied me, the city dwelling, downtown clubbing, manicure every week girl, except for the unfortunate fact that my ex was also located within that radius.

B) A house in the country, actually George already had a house in the country, pretty convenient huh? Of course this option satisfied him being the lemonade drinking, country music listening, tractor loving guy that he is.

OR

C) we find a house in a central location. Knowing I could probably manipulate finding a house in a more urban area outside of that 10 minute radius that encompassed my mom, sister and ex I was very keen on this idea.

The choice was obvious to George as he had an established house and I had given mine up. I have no idea why the choice didn't seem as obvious to me!!! After many, many, many hours of discussion and tears on my part, we decided we would "try" his house. I stress "try" because his country house was actually a country cottage with two lovely bedrooms, a kitchen a bathroom and a living room! Yep, that's it! Not exactly the best set-up for a family of six! But we gave it a whirl and here we are almost seven years later permanent "country" residents. (I'll discuss the trauma that accompanied this transition in another post.) We've gone from the two bedroom country cottage to the remodeled three bedroom country cottage to the ugliest, oldest house in Johnsburg to our final resting place....George's version of my Gone With the Wind dream; built with his own hands here in "God's country".

So this is my traffic....

I know it's a bad picture, but I took it while driving!

The spots are actually from my dirty windshield!

I ran out of wiper fluid.

This is my view....

out of the bedroom window

and my front porch.

These are our pets.

I'm telling you, people who knew me before would never have imagined this is really who I was!!

One of the many organic egg layers!

The pygmy goats--Bentley & MiniCooper. See what happens when you don't have malls nearby!

The bane of my early morning existence!! I've actually named him Chicken Soup!

Juniper Rose & Oliver George

(Another funny story for a later blog.)

Now folks, (see I even use folks in sentences what HAS happened to ME???) the vision of my dream home consisted of porches and swooping willow trees and neighbors. Yes....I think in my vision I had neighbors AND a mall. But as I adjust to my new street lights (the stars) and my new neighbors...oh wait nothing to adjust to there! Simply stated, I love it here and wouldn't want to be anywhere else! Thank goodness for God's Country!

{candle hog}

Traditions. What would a family be without them? We have always been big birthday celebrators in my family; my family being my mom & my sister and our significant others. The celebrations have evolved from the extravagant dinner parties in restaurants to the more intimate setting of our homes. (My preference.) Usually the meeting place is my mom’s or sister’s house because I live way out in “God’s country” as my mom likes to say.

So we met at my sister’s house this weekend for our February & March birthday celebrations…. Mom, Jason (my sister’s beau), Niko (nephew) & myself. After dinner came time for the traditional blowing of the candles. This year it could actually be compared to the traditional running of the bulls! Here we are merrily singing "Happy Birthday".

And then literally, in the blink of an eye....THE CANDLES ARE ALL OUT! My mom AKA "The Candle Hog" blew out all the candles before the song was even over! Did she give thought to the other three people celebrating? NO! Did she think hmmm... Let's do this all together? NO!!! Did she inhale as deep as she could and blow with all her might? YES, why YES she did!! Don't you love my shocked expression?

So I did the only thing I could, I blew out pretend candles! I felt so much better! Mom, next year your candles will be isolated on a chocolate island of their own!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY EVERYONE!!!

{introducing the gossip girls}

They're only 2 days old and already they are gossiping girls/chicks! Isn't this the cutest picture ever?

These are the three Black Sex Link chickens (really that is their true name) who will be laying speckled brown eggs for us in about six months. We love going out to the coop and collecting our morning eggs. We especially love sharing them! Put your requests in now! Mikayla named hers Miranda.
George picked the fluffiest one he could find!
This month we'll be getting the rest of our new chickens so stay tuned to see them. I'll be posting pictures soon of what they'll look like grown up...you're going to love these! We ordered some rare birds this time around. Until then stay "tweet"! (Oh, I kill me!)

{homemade fun}

Simplicity...I love it! I truly appreciate homemade birthdays and "37" was no exception. George & kids did a fabulous job throwing me a rockin' party complete with Bozo Buckets, the limbo and a pinata!

We ate my favorite (at least for the moment) homemade Pizza Margherita with a delicious wheat crust!

Mikayla is the family's master balloon blower upper! Seriously, I have no idea how she can blow up so many balloons! I can barely get one done in the time it takes her to do three!

The party really got going after dinner with a little game of "Bozo Buckets"! I never could win at this game, but since it was my birthday I got extra shots! Bucket #5 was always my demise!

George was having his own fun with the "LIMBO"! He did comment on quad muscle strains being the reason he couldn't limbo quite so low. Courtney's teeth were really sore from having her braces tightened the day before. I think this is the only picture I got with her actually smiling & using her head!! She makes me so proud!

The favorite of the night had to be the Princess Pinata! Leave it to George to find a tiara for a pinata! The boys both had good luck because they were using their SOX & CUBS mini bats! Gavin is the die hard SOX fan & Jake is ever loyal to the CUBS even though he has been threatened with sleeping in the chicken coop if he doesn't cross over to the SOX side! Jake actually broke the pinata in this picture but he was nice enough to let Gavin have the last shot.

Look at Gavin's face! The tiara didn't have a chance. If you look closely you'll notice Jake is already gathering candy! I thought he was being nice letting his brother have the last shot....but ALAS he had a master plan!

Devious little feller!

What a great memorable birthday! I can't think of anything I would have rather done!

{rescuing rainbow}

Have you ever been on the receiving end of a scream of terror from your child? Let's set the scene. I'm in the kitchen finishing up some camp paperwork for my meeting. One child is spinning around in circles trying to make me sick to my stomach...it kind of worked, while the other two are doing their homework. (I'll let you figure out who is who.) Suddenly, the horrifying scream from the fourth child who mysteriously disappeared upstairs. As I start to run for the stairs (tripping over the children who are also now running for the stairs; including the dizzy one!) I can hear the water in the bathroom sink on at full force. I'm envisioning major flooding or perhaps a giant spider the size of my hand. It's amazing what can run through your head in a matter of seconds. As I breathlessly get to the bathroom, (maybe I should start working out again) I see RAINBOW; actually I see RAINBOW'S head as the rest of his body is already partially down the drain under the pressure of the rocketing water! I reach in and grab him and SAVE HIS LIFE!! What a mom! As it turns out, Mikayla was trying to clean the tank with two spoons and a plastic cup!! We are glad to say RAINBOW survived the trauma! Just another day!

{THE BLOG IS BACK}

I'm baaack!!! I realize I have neglected all of my adoring fans... I do apologize.
Here is a pictorial teaser of what has kept me away for so long.

Of course there will be more to come.




Need I say more? Until tomorrow!