there are more things to life than winning a Christmas Giveaway OR a dancing girl and her 9 year old brothers sense of humor

I told you she loves to dance. She is always dancing.

Nash loves to be involved somehow as well. Introducing - Farticus. Seriously? I know.

This is taking a while to upload...

Didn't this month fly by? Maddie turns 12 on Monday and Christmas is on Thursday! This is the last weekend before Santa comes. Excitement and anticipation!

Brian agreed to let me call someone to come finish the trim work in the basement. Yipee. They said they'd have it done by Christmas. I haven't heard from them all week. I hope they call soon.

hmmm...the video is still loading.

Let's see...Oh, Brian is going to run the Pell city 5K on Saturday. I am opting out. I'm gonna take the kiddos and do the 1 mile fun run. Fun Run. fun run. Does that even make sense?

Still processing. Maybe you don't get to see the video after all. I'm going to go get me a snack and I'll be back to see if we're ready to post.

Here we go. (and please ignore the old lady huff when I change to a sitting position.)

Giveaways galore! Not FROM me. But hopefully FOR me!!!

There are so many Christmas Giveaways out there. Talented people and/or people who know how to find cool stuff are sharing their SKILLZ with, well...hopefully ME.

This one is to die for.

Mermag.

If you haven't ALWAYS wanted a self portrait done of yourself...

Self. Self. Self. SelfLESS Merrilee.

My sister totally really knows her too.

AND I have a book that she illustrated called Elvis and Olive that was fun to read.

Also if you go and link to her blog on your blog you get entered for an extra special prize that is TO DIE FOR EVEN MORE!

AND:

Design Mom

She's going Christmas Crazy with a

12 Days of Christmas giveaway grand enough to be called an EVENT!

Totally. I know.

12 different thingys. Go see.

And enter to WIN.

Check out Miss Cally's blog for some Fantabulous crafty goodies.

She has got an eye for fabric.

And you can win it ALL with just one comment. Generosity is her middle name.

So Jump on the Chuckwagon and enter NOW so you don't get left with the raw end of the stick.

Good Luck and Merry Christmas to all!

Oh, Happy day!

are you too busy?

I lurve living in Alabama.

Where ever you go...where ever you are...you can always find reminders of what is really important.

And apparently it's not grammar.

Which is why Brian had to take this picture.

So much so that he backtracked a few steps to take this picture during our

morning of CRAZINESS in which you NEVER want to go BACKWARD when you have sooooo far to go forward! I kept going forward. He had to catch up. Which wasn't hard. 'Cause I was walking.

"What makes walking crazy?" you ask?

When you wake up early on a Saturday in 30 degree weather to walk 13.1 miles!!!!

Yes indeedee! I finished a half-marathon.

My runner friend Alisha enjoys (?) to do this kind of thing so she talked me into trying one out. I wasn't about to run. So she sent me a walking training schedule and I followed it...mostly.

My other two friends I talked into being my walking buddies had VERY good reasons to not be able to do the actual race so Mr Brian stepped up and became my buddy.

Brian kept me going at the pace I needed to go. He started us off running (I know! ugh) for the first mile so we wouldn't be too far behind everyone else. We still ended up pretty far behind everyone else. Pretty quickly,too. But this was not about them! It was about us! I wasn't trying to beat anyone, just trying to get it done. In less than 5 hours. And we did.

In 3 hours 2 minutes and thirty-something seconds.

I look happy, huh? I wasn't. I was grumpy. And I was SORE! But I knew this picture may make it to the blogging land of happiness so I mustered up a smile.
And weird! Look at my fingers. For some reason the whole 'race' (I use that term loosly - it wasn't so much for us.) I kept pushing my freebe gloves down between my fingers with my thumb. I noticed it a couple times about half way through and now that I see these pictures it looks like I was doing it the whole time! Weirdo.

We ran 3 miles - not all together. After that first mile we ran a half mile every 2 miles walked, or so. So we ran 3 miles and walked 10. But we walked FAST! Like speedy quick. And we "sprinted" (not really) the last little bit to the finish line .

Brian ran backwards taking pictures of me.

Wanna know what was in my kangaroo pouch? I had a crunchy granola bar for two and two boxes of Craisins. Alisha gave me a little bag of Energy Beans which were great!
You should have seen us pick up the pace after those babies! Yum.



You also may be wondering about my choice of running gear. I learned on
What Not to Wear that the colors don't have to match to "go" together.



So - It was an experience I was glad to have...uh...experienced.

Brian and I had fun making each other laugh, which wasn't hard because our brains were a little oxygen deprived quite early on. But he's a funny guy, I tell ya.

I may even do it again someday.



What I learned: Anything you can do I can do better.

(Just kidding...that just popped into my head. Have you heard that song? It's funny.)



Sometimes you have to make the time to do something new.



If you go out in the very cold for a good chunk of time you may come down with a cold a few days later.



Everyones bodies are different and some may hurt more and maybe even for longer than others.



Brian owes me a dinner at Classic on the Noble! Woot!



and last but not least...

(This post may be edited when all my anti-cold drugs wear off. I will check back in a few hours and fix what needs fixin'. Now off to find a good song to go with this post and get something warm to drink. Should I do one of those steam tent thingys? Do they work?)

my new hat and a bracelet that is out of stock

I totally won! This is one awesome winter hat.

Warm, cozy and made with love!

Want your chance to win a Heidi origional?

Check out her blog. Leave a comment and you are entered!

New winners every day.

(not the most flattering pictures of yours truly, but it's really all about the hat.

I got feeling a little dorky taking pictures of myself. There were MANY to choose from.

I don't think I'll do that again any time soon.)

Also, check out those pies she made for Thanksgiving. We totally scored when we got the Kesler's to come for Thanksgiving dinner! Even though their company would have been more than enough to make my Thanksgiving fabulous. The pies were to die for. And the rolls...sooooo delish!

I was checking out a coat my sister was coveting at J.Crew and found this bracelet.

It's called the Storybook Charm Bracelet. And it is out of stock.

I love it.

the first thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!

(My sister and her husband are very funny, creative and talented.

This video is from a couple of years ago. Check it out! You wont be disappointed.)

carter wanted a swing

So Brian got the stuff to put up a swing.
He get's excited about projects.
Can you see the beam up there? WAY UP THERE?
I had Erin go stand by the tree
so you could get an idea of how high up the beam has been bolted to the trees.
I'm telling you. When I am upstairs in Erin's room,
I look out her window and the beam is at eye level!
The 2x4 you see nailed to the beam was to help us hold the beam up so he could screw the first bolt in and then we had to use the 2x4 to get the end of the beam to the other tree.
Brian says the higher the more fun.
I still think it's too high.
But, maybe he's right. It'll probably be a blast.
I may have the kids wear helmets when they use it so if they don't swing very straight and they smash into a tree trunk at least their heads will be somewhat protected.
We still have to finish getting the bolts all the way in and then it's flying time!
I'll keep you posted.

picky eaters

I cooked.

Yeppers.

This week I made a meal.

Cream of Potato Soup and French Bread.

The bread is an awesome, easy recipe from Heidi,
my bama friend.
(it didn't look pretty. I need practice on the shaping of the loaf, but I made it myself - from scratch! and it tasted marvelous.)

And the soup was so easy!
That one is from my other friend, Natalie!
Thanks for helping me feed my kids! (kind of)

Try them both. Really. Just do it. You'll be happy.

In a crock pot...

Dump in:

2lb bag of frozen hash browns (cube style)

1 can cream of chicken soup

1 can cream of celery soup

2 cans chicken broth

1 med. onion finely chopped

1 - 8oz. package of cream cheese cut into small cubes

Salt, pepper and garlic to taste.

Mix well. Cook in crockpot on low all day.

I wasn't paying attention when she told me she used a can of cheddar cheese soup instead of the celery soup - so next time I'll use cheddar although the celery one was still yummy, just had chunks of celery in it...did not thrill my kiddos.

Which leads me into my next topic - what the title of this post refers to.

My kids! Love 'em. Really, really do.

And I could totally handle if they didn't like one or two things.

All right. I just deleted my rant. Embarassing. Fine.

So they are picky eaters.

There are worse things.

Suffice it to say, I calmed down,

emptied the laundry basket and put all the food back in the pantry.

Then quietly/lovingly told the kiddos that if they are going to be such picky eaters things may be difficult sometimes. Sometimes meals may work out for them, sometimes they may not.

You decide for yourself :

"Will I still eat the hamburger even though those McD guys put ketchup on it when we specifically said 'plain'?"

What can you do.

One thing that stuck in my head from last weekend in Nashville was

"Teach them correct principles and let them govern themselves."

I'm still trying to figure out the best way to do that. (What is the punishment? She said you re-teach the principle, but how do the consequences work into it?)

And I'm not sure if it really applies to picky eaters, but...

What do you think?

How do you handle (or wish you handled) picky eaters?

(try the soup!)