Yikes Bikes..

I'm not very good at updating this. Mostly it's because I don't have much down time. The rest is because I don't really have anything interesting to write about.

Well, I was thinking about my marriage and decided I should write about that! I don't feel married. I don't know that anyone actually feels "married." I've never asked anyone. I guess it's because we've been together for over 5 years and we've lived together for a lot of that time. Nothing new came with being married other than taking his name and the comfort of knowing we'll be together "until death parts us." (Assuming all goes well haha)

We have an interesting relationship. He works all day 5 days a week and I'm home with Peyton. I cook and clean and take care of everyone and Steven brings home the bacon. He leaves for work 45 minutes after he gets up. That's about an hour after Peyton and I get up in the morning. He gets home from work about an hour before dinner and two hours before Peyton goes to bed. Once she's asleep, he's on the computer and I'm on my phone playing games and the tv is on. We don't talk much. I don't really have much to talk about. My day consists of Mickey Mouse, exercising, cleaning, diapers, Baby Einsteins, silly songs and pretend picnics. He doesn't have much to talk about other than what goes on at work.

We try to make small talk about the goings on in the world, (read- what pops up on Yahoo! News or Facebook) but those conversations don't last long. Part of my problem is that I don't have an interest in much of what goes on in the world. Politics are SO not my thing. I don't pay enough attention to the news. Most of the things I see are related to pop culture. Even that doesn't interest me much. I'm more interested in articles about healthy foods or baby stuff. I like looking up recipes and crafts. That's what I spend most of my free time doing. When Steven's online, he's reading posts on Reddit or watching two basketball games or playing a computer game or a combination of all three. We usually watch a show or two together on the couch every night.

As boring and sad as this all sounds, it kind of works for us! Or at least it has been. I'm feeling ready to turn off the technology for a little bit. We watch so many shows we can hardly keep up. There are shows on our DVR, shows on NetFlix, shows on his computer and random shows that we watch when we aren't watching shows together. It's a little much. After Peyton goes to bed is OUR time, but we're not spending quality time together.

Having time for intimacy when you have a child is hard enough, but if neither of us is making a real effort it's happening maybe twice a month. I'm proposing (when he gets home) we turn off the tv and the computer for at least 2 hours after Pey's in bed. We can read together or Heaven forbid we actually talk to each other haha! And we both need to try much harder. Most people would probably suggest a night without Peyton. I'll go ahead and stop you right there. It's impossible. I've spoiled her (and I don't regret it!) to the point where I am the only one who can put her to bed and get her back to sleep. Not only that, we would miss her and worry about her too much. We're a happy little tricycle :)

So there's a post! And it's weird and contradictory I'm sure. But ya know? My mom and sister are the only people who read this. So :-P

Thanks!

Every time I see someone posting what they're thankful for I wanna jump on that gravy train! (Get it? Gravy? Thankful? Thanksgiving? *nudge nudge*)

SO here are 9 things since I'm 9 days in to November and have yet to run through the barrier to platform 11/24 (That's Thanksgiving this year, in case you didn't know).

Day 1: Being alive! Woo! If I wasn't alive I wouldn't be here and wouldn't have so many many things to be thankful for!

Day 2: My husband. Without whom I would be living a completely different life.

Day 3: My baby! She is so fabulous. She's adorable, funny, smart and just wonderful. I cannot imagine my life without her. When I do, I cry.

Day 4: Our dog. Maddie is the most amazing dog ever. She is quiet, small and so gentle. She lets Peyton play with her and plays tug-of-war with her too! She has never bitten anyone and when she gets annoyed she just licks.

Day 5: Cold weather. This summer (up here) was by no means unbearable, but I love wearing sweaters, hoodies, socks and boots! And I ADORE dressing Peyton up in her hot pink pea coat :)

Day 6: Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. I wouldn't be able to make dinner without something to distract Peyton. So thank you, Disney Jr! (and DVR so there's always an episode ready!)

Day 7: The internet. I wouldn't have as many good recipes, cleaning tips, exercise routines or creative craft ideas without you!

Day 8: Steven's job. If he didn't have such a good job we wouldn't have medical insurance, dental insurance or enough of a paycheck for me to stay home! If I had to work it would probably only pay for day care and then our apartment would always be messy because I would have zero time to clean.

Day 9: Nap time. It used to last longer, but now I do an hour long workout video. By the time I've worked out, showered and gotten dressed I have about 10 minutes before Peyton wakes up. Not so bad though. At least I'm not just sitting on my chubby buttocks watching my stories.

Look at me! 9 things I'm thankful for AND a blog post. Get. That.

Raindrops On Roses and Whiskers On Kittens

These are a few of my favorite things:

5. Peyton's nap is so easy! We change her diaper, brush her teeth, turn on Rockabye Baby! (Coldplay), turn on the fan, turn off the light, lay down and within 3 minutes she's asleep! (for 2 1/2 to 3 hours)

4. She's so happy when she wakes up from that nap. She'll make some noise so I know she's awake, but doesn't cry. As soon as I open the door I see her sitting at the end of the bed with the biggest "cheese" grin on her face and she waves to me.

3. After the dishes are done. The sink is empty. The counters are clean and I have room to do stuff! Or just enjoy the fact that I had time to clean.

2. Watching Peyton pick up her blocks and put them away. She figured this out on her own. She doesn't build with them, and if we build towers she knocks them down. She'll walk around with one in each hand and bang them together. I just love when she puts them away because she picks up one at a time and puts it gently into a bucket. She then looks around for the perfect one to go next. She'll walk all the way across the room to get a different one if the closer one isn't right. When she gets one she sits down in front of the bucket to put it in. She's so smart. :)

and my #1 favorite thing right now...........

1. My life! I cannot imagine being any happier than I am right now. I have an amazing husband who works 50 hour weeks to pay the bills so that I can stay home and raise our incredible daughter. I have the perfect little family. My immediate family is very close and I can visit them all the time (not that I do since I never have the car, and even when I do I can't seem to make plans BUT it's not impossible haha). If I ever need anything I can call/text/facebook one of my siblings and they will help however they can. (And hopefully they know I would do the same)

So there we are. A few favs :)

Now I gotta go put Pey down for that awesome nap!

Mean People

We've all been mean at some point in our lives. But, for most of us, there comes a time when we get off our high horse and stop saying unnecessary and hurtful things. The internet is viewed a place where it's "ok" to be a jerk. Newsflash: It's never OK to be a jerk. If no one is a jerk, no one else needs to be a jerk.

Nice guys finish last because jerks push them out of the way and call them names.

I admit I haven't done any sort of research into cyberbullying (nor did I watch the ABC Family movie *gag*), but who is raising these people to think this is right? It sounds dumb when people talk about it. Kids commenting on their peers' facebook and myspace stuff telling them to go kill themselves. If someone told me to kill myself I would laugh. But these kids are serious!

I'm not a saint by any means, but I would never be so hurtful to someone. (Ok Kate, I know I was a pretty mean big sister, but you were *and still can be* a jerk too!) I just don't understand the need for snarky comments on things people post. Keep it to yourself, dude! Haven't you people seen Bambi? If you don't have something nice to say, don't say anything at all.

People correcting grammar and spelling on Twitter is absurd. This isn't high brow literature. It's not literature at all! Leave Simon Pegg alone for using the wrong "your/you're!" He has more important things to do than proofread his tweets. You don't have to tweet Rainn Wilson that you're not following him any more because he's not funny or he says something offensive. He's an actor. He's not Dwight Schrute. And he is funny, just don't take everything he says seriously. It's obvious when he's kidding.

I read HelloGiggles (you should too) and people are usually very positive and supportive! But sometimes the jerks comment. I hate jerks. I think negative things about the posts sometimes, but I would never EVER comment something hurtful or rude.

All that "mean people suck" stuff aside, we as a culture or also super sensitive to things. People are so easily offended nowadays it's ridiculous. "Don't hate on my president!" "Don't say morbidly obese kids have bad parents!"

I don't know what else to write on this topic. Why can't everybody just knock of the dumb stuff and be happy? It's not hard...

I remembered what else I was going to say! Why are people so judgmental of how people became famous? Like the Kardashians and Paris Hilton. They are making money. Leave them alone! They are famous because we watch them. We watch them go on vacations, we watch them get married and get jobs and buy houses and get divorced and have babies. It's not their fault they don't have some amazing talents. They are pretty people and we like to look at pretty things.

While I do agree that there are some pretty ridiculous "famous" people *see the entire "cast" of Jersey Shore*, people watch it. So, leave it be. You're not going to change anything by being a jerk. You're just jealous.

The sound of...

Baby!

Every little noise warms my heart. (Or breaks it if it's relentless crying because she's teething in the middle of the night)



One of my favorites is the papery swish of her diaper as she toddles around the apartment. Her little diapered bum is the cutest thing ever! She runs around the apartment all day just finding things to do. I love to watch her when she's on a mission. She remembers where she left the book she wants and takes off, head tilted down and leading with her chin.



I also love hearing her little foot steps coming down the hall. The slap slap slap of tiny baby feet could melt a stone cold heart. When I hear her coming I can't wait to see how many articles of clothing she's carrying. She loves to walk around with her clothes. That or two big stuffed animals.

Right now most things are "buh!" When she's eating and wants to feed the dog she says, "Buh! Buh!" and looks around for Maddie. When she wants another bite she says, "Baaaa! Mmmm!" When we get up in the morning, as soon as I open the door she says, "Da!" because she knows Daddy is up. When she watches Baby Einsteins and recognizes the hippo she says, "guh!" because I called it her guy. And when I'm trying to make something to eat and she's hungry or wants to be held it's "Maaammmmmmmmaaaa" into my legs.



She has a great sense of humor and laughs a lot. She has a nasally cackle and I absolutely love it. It makes me laugh every time! The other day she thought my crunching into an apple was hilarious. I could hardly chew I was laughing so much.




So... Basically I love my child. A whole whole whole lot.

ANTS

I hate 'em.

For serious.

I'd post a picture or something for a visual impact, but I don't want to google "ants." I'd vomit.

We are in a ground floor apartment by the pool so apparently we're prime housing for the nasty little buggers. Luckily it's only the tiny sugar ants. They don't bite or strike the fear chord like big fatty or fire ants do. They're still driving me bonkers. I had seen a few here and there a few weeks ago and then one day I went to do the laundry and they had COMPLETELY infested the dirty clothes pile. Laundry, who knew? So I shook out all the clothes and vacuumed all the ones I saw into my dust buster, after following the trail of course. I sprayed any stragglers with Fantastik and sprayed the wall where they were coming in as well.

I saw another trail of them coming out of our coat closet. No exterior walls, but it backs up to the bathroom so we assumed they were coming in for the water. I went to the apartment office and told them and they brought me some spray for inside. We sprayed those areas and around the living room and thought. Hoorah!

No hoorah. I kept finding them in the bathroom and then by the fireplace. Bleh.. I sprinkled baby powder in several locations because they don't like the smell. But it doesn't kill them so they just scatter and find a new entrance. The exterminator guy comes like, every second Tuesday or Thursday or something ridiculous like that so they haven't sprayed outside.

Tuesday is taco night and I was gearing up to make some tortillas. I opened the baking cabinet to grab the flour, baking powder and shortening and low and behold: ANTS IN MY FRIGGIN' CABINET!!! They wanted mah sugah. So I cleaned out the cabinet and put my marshmallows and brown sugar in a ziploc baggie. I was putting things back into the cabinet when I kept finding the bastards on the counter around the honey. Ya, in the cap. That went in the trash...

They were in the stove too. I have to thoroughly clean the stove every time I use it. How fun is that? YAY? No Yay. I mean, don't get me wrong, having a clean house isn't a bad thing! But I don't have a messy house! They are going looking for things. I don't leave my sugar out all over the place, they went into the cabinet to the closed bag. Jerks.

Steven thought I was crazy for freaking out about it until last night. I went to change into my pajamas when I noticed a mound of moving black on my panties in the dirty clothes. Seriously? I don't know whether to be flattered or disgusted that the ants were attracted to my dirty underwear. (I don't have disgusting dirty underwear, just normal every day underwear)

It was so gross.... And it was late so I couldn't vacuum them up! We sprayed them with Fantastik, Steven squished them and I followed the trail and dumped some vinegar into the entrance... I hate ants.

I was also randomly finding them on the couch. (On an interior wall) So this morning I moved the couch to see where they were coming from behind the couch. The interior wall corners with an exterior wall so they were coming in at the corner. This time they had a lookout, though. A spider. (These ants are finding my weaknesses and using them against me) I squealed repeatedly as the spider began to run around hibbety jibbety when I sprayed him with Fantastik. I had to make my squeals of fear sound like fun so that I wouldn't scare Peyton who was staring at me with that, "Mama? You've got issues" look. Spider finally stopped running so I sprayed the line of ants and then went for the baby powder. Spider was playing possum! He started running like a spider with Fantastik on his eyes so I soaked him in it. And he died. But to be sure I squished him with a mound of Kleenex.

For now I've found a few stragglers here and there. It usually takes a day for them to form a line again which leads me to the following question:

Why are ants so stupid? I mean, if I sent out some scout ants to find food and/or water and they didn't return I wouldn't think, "Hey! ANTdrew didn't come back! Wait... Neither did SamANTtha, BrANTdon, ANTthony or Fred. They must have found something great and want us to come too!" I would think, "Uh, ya. They died. We shouldn't go back in there. Ever."

Exterminator comes Thursday. It better work, or I'm raising hell. I don't want ants. I pay $865 a month for an apartment for me, Steven, Peyton and Maddie. If they wanna live here, I better see some compensation for sharing my quarters.

Finding Nemo

I've been watching at least the first 40 minutes of this movie three times a day for the past 4 months. It's Pey's sleepy time movie. You would think I'd be so sick of it by now, but sometimes I finish watching it when she falls asleep. I still adore it. I don't believe it will ever get old.

I've had some time to think about the goings on in the film and have come to the conclusion that it's all Marlin's fault.

Each major thing that goes wrong can be attributed to Marlin. From the beginning, Marlin chose the anemone at the drop off. He then chased Coral around causing her swim outside and be eaten by the barracuda. Nemo gets stuck in the reef thing because Marlin wouldn't wake up on the first day of school. If Marlin hadn't come chasing after Nemo at school and make a big deal of him being at the drop off he wouldn't have felt the need to swim out to touch the boat.

Moving on to when he meets Dori. Nothing unfortunate there until he wont let the sharks read the mask. Had he done that Dori wouldn't have had a nosebleed and Bruce wouldn't have gone all Jack Nicholson on them. They probably would have told them how to get to the EAC real quick. Had that happened there would be no freaky electric fish chase and no jelly fish jungle. Had that still happened if he had trusted Dori and gone through the trench no jelly fish. Had that still happened if he hadn't distracted Dori by asking if she was hungry they would have made it safely out of the jellies. Marlin would probably still have met Crush and the other sea turtles seeing as they needed to get to the current anyhow. Without all the previous stuff he wouldn't have his heroic story, of course, but he would still be on his way to save Nemo.

On to Nemo in the tank. He gets stuck in the tube. How is that Marlin's fault? Getting stuck is not his fault, but had he allowed Nemo to get out of the reef thing on the first day of school, Nemo would have the courage and knowledge to get out of the fish tank tube easily. Now, Nemo almost getting pureed was Gill's fault, he should have given him a bigger pebble.

Marlin's big problem is trust. If he had trusted Dori and let her guide him with her crazy ways things would have been a lot smoother for the two of them. Once they do finally make it to Sydney and get spit out by the first pelican Marlin only needed to trust Nigel and he would have taken him straight to Nemo. But alas, he flipped out and the seagulls went wild.

All of this would have happened much faster without the Shining Bruce, the freaky electric fish, and the jelly fish jungle. That being said, Darla probably would not have arrived yet and Nigel could have shown up with Marlin and Dori without seeing Nemo "belly up." It would then just be a matter of getting Nemo out of the tank. Those fishies are smart and could have figured it out. Marlin is the one who goes to the fishing grounds out of depression, so it's his fault that Dori gets trapped in the fishing net.

I think that pretty much sums it up!

That being said, I still adore the movie in all its convoluted Disney goodness. I enjoy watching it over and over and finding new things. I notice the little details in the background and what the other characters are doing when the action is focused on one or two characters. And what else is amazing is that nothing every stops moving. The fish are constantly in motion and so is the water. It's beautiful.

I'm hungry. It's time for some breakfast!