Meet Me In St. Louie (via Instagram)

I briefly mentioned it before, but my specmazerful husband surprised me with a trip to St. Louis for my 30th birthday. (Insert collective "aww"s here.)

The trip itself wasn't a surprise - I told him that I wanted to leave the city for my birthday, because logically, if I wasn't there, my birthday couldn't find me and I wouldn't ever actually turn 30. (It was my crisis and I dealt with it nobly, obvs.) However, I didn't want to know where we were going. Even though I didn't want to know, that didn't stop me from guessing and deductively reasoning and pestering. Just ask The Hubs. Truthfully, though, I did not figure out exactly where we were going before we were on the road. I had a couple of guesses, and St. Louis was one of them, but I didn't know for certain. (This is a big step for me because I *love* a challenge and am generally VERY hard to surprise).

I left work early that Friday and we set out on the road.

The first directional choice we could make was to either go north toward Columbus or south toward Cincinnati:

South it is!

From there, we went west until we hit:

The sun was so bright at one point, The Hubs decided he needed two pairs of sunglasses:

And I still wasn't exactly sure where we were headed once we hit:

But eventually, I figured it out! (Before we came to this sign, even. Give a girl some credit.)

See the arch?!

We arrived at our hotel pretty late, so we hung out and ordered some of "St. Louis' Best Pizza", which was totally gross. The next morning, I was so excited to see the view from our 17th story window:

Morning, Archie! 

The first thing we did was to walk down to Laclede's Landing on our way to our trolley tour of the city.

The trolley was going to pick us up at Lumiere Place, so once we got there, we looked around the hotel and casino for a bit:

And had one of the absolute best meals I've ever had:

The trolley tour was really great - $20 per person and lasted like an hour and a half. The tour guide took us all over the city and told us all sorts of interesting tidbits about its history.

The Basilica of St. Louis, King of France ("Old Cathedral") .

We toured Forest Park, which is the site of the 1904 World's Fair, and is one of the many absolutely FREE parks and attractions in St. Louis. The (absolutely FREE) St. Louis Zoo is in Forest Park, as well as an art museum, tons of green space, and this statue of Louis XVIIII (and his horse):

After we left Forest Park, we drove down "Millionaire's Row" where St. Louis' most affluent residents live. Part of that drive was along an original portion of Route 66, and stopped somewhere along that road, I saw this cathedral. I don't know the name of it, though. (Sadface). 

After the trolley tour, we walked to the Arch in order to take a ride to the top. Apparently, it sells out, so we weren't able to go up just then. Instead, we sat around, enjoyed the beautiful weather, counted no less than three wedding parties getting photos taken, and took some dizzying pictures of our own:

Then we walked back to our hotel to get ready for the evening's festivities.

Back at Laclede's Landing, we had an incredibly underwhelming dinner at Jake's Steaks, where at least my $30 steak was free after being completely overcooked and us having to wait for a zillion years for service. The best part about Jake's Steaks, however, was this gigantic metal Beyonce signed by Ron Jeremy:

The last surprise The Hubs had up his sleeve for the night was an hour-long carriage ride through downtown St. Louis. We had a wonderful driver (?) and a beautiful horse named Hercules who took us on a freezing, but beautiful, tour of the city.

Hercules dropped us off at our hotel, but at close to midnight, I got a hankering for some Key Lime Cheesecake. If Key Lime Cheesecake is what your wife needs to drown out her sorrow from turning 30, Key Lime Cheesecake, she gets! So we drove to The Cheesecake Factory, got my life affirming nectar of the gods, then went back to the hotel to crash before another full day and a long trip home.

Day two of my amazing 30th birthday adventure later!

Ten Years from Last Friday

Dear Anna,

Today, you turn 40 years old. I am full of so many hopes for you! I’m sure you remember that turning 30 was a difficult thing for you. You mourned for weeks about the passing of so many years of ‘wasted’ time. You hadn’t accomplished all that you thought you would. You were scared about feeling the same way at 40 as you did at 30.

Well do you?

Do you own a house? Did you graduate from WGU and go on to become a teacher? Do you and Jack both have steady, sturdy jobs that you can build the rest of your life on? Do you have money in a savings account and not live paycheck to paycheck? Did you have another child? What child(ren) you do have, have they lived happy, fun-filled, active lives up to this point? Did you finally figure out what it would take to make you lose weight and stick with it?

Anna, even if the answer to any of those questions is “no”, I want you to remember that that is okay. At 30, you beat yourself up over the loss of time. How silly is that? What were you hoping to do with it, lasso it up and keep it in a jar in the cupboard? It doesn’t work that way, kiddo. (And yes, even at 40, you’re still a kiddo). What ever you HAVE accomplished is exactly good enough.

At 30, you had a really hard time believing in and accepting that last sentence. Instead, sentences that began with, “I should have…”, “I didn’t…”, “I was supposed to…” consumed your thoughts on those long weeks leading up to the big day. (Which you spent in St. Louis because you have an amazing husband, remember? Have you told him thank you for that lately?) You thought of all the things you didn’t do, and all the time you had “wasted.”

You had a hard time reminding yourself that, by 30, you did have several accomplishments under your belt. You were able to say that you had not been without an income since you were 14 years old. You had met and married a wonderful man, and had worked very hard at a happy, mutually respectful relationship with him. You carried, gave birth to, and nurtured a beautiful baby boy, who was (and probably still is) the light of many peoples’ lives. You maintained friendships with people whom you cared about and who cared about you.

I’m sure at 40, you have even more great accomplishments that are the markers of time well spent. My hope is that you did accomplish some of those things on that list above – mostly that you completed your degree and had another child. But if you didn’t, I don’t love you any less.

The whole point of your 30 Meltdown was to help you to remember that no time is truly wasted. The life you lead is the life you live, and the cliché is true: you only live once. So DO NOT spend another minute lamenting the shouldas, couldas, and wouldas of the past 10 years. Hopefully, you learned the lesson way back when you were writing this next sentence…

Every minute of every day, you choose to live a certain life. Acknowledging the life you chose in the past is the only way for you to purposefully choose a different life in the future. The power is in the realization that it is ALWAYS a choice, and the choice is YOURS.

Choose wisely.

Unconditional Love Always,

Anna

Crushed

I know I don't post often, but I had to give y'all a little update.

Last Sunday, we went to spend the afternoon with my dad and step-mom. They have a ranch-style house with a full basement that you access through an open stairwell. (AKA, there's no door to the basement or anything). Most of the night was spent making sure Bubbers didn't fall down the stairs.

I was sitting in a chair about 6-8 feet away from the stairs, and Logan came scarily close to tumbling. I went to get out of the chair to run after him, and I almost couldn't get up. I am so fat that I can't even get my ass up and moving in an emergency! Luckily, the kid got "shiny object"-ed and headed the other way, but the damage (to me) was done.

As we left that night, I told The Hubs that I couldn't wait anymore and that we needed to move forward with band surgery. I can't bare the thought of something happening to Bubs because I'm too fat to save him from danger. Because my husband is awesome, he agreed, and told me to call the doctor's office the next day to get the process rolling.

Monday, I called to find out what my options were for paying for the surgery. 1) Insurance. A no-can-do, as my miserly insurance plan barely covers doctor's appointments. Medical weight loss programs or surgeries are very clearly an exception to my plan. Even when the patient has weight-related medical issues, like I do.

Option 2) Self-pay. We have about $17 in our savings account and our credit cards are almost maxed out, since that's generally what we were living on when The Hubs was out of work. Cash, checks or credit cards would get us laughed out of the office.

Option 3) Financing. This was the route that we had already planned to go, knowing that Options 1 and 2 weren't really options at all. The doctor's office that I was planning on using charges $11,900 total for all aspects of the surgery and two years of aftercare. I called Monday, fully expecting to get approved for financing, but jointly, we were only able to get approved for $2,000. Granted, math is not my strong point, but even I can tell you that $2,000 is a far cry from $12,000. I called a couple days later to see if I could get an increase, and I'm pretty sure the lady on the phone tried to stifle a laugh.

A personal loan isn't an option, and I even went so far as to ask my dad if they could get a loan for me. No can do.

The major reason I want to have the surgery now is so that I can lose enough weight to not have a high-risk pregnancy when we try to give Bubs a brother or sister. He's over a year old now, and I'm turning 30 this year. Time is running out, y'all. We don't have time to save up $12,000, and if we did, we should use that money for a down payment on a house.

I may or may not have had a breakdown after getting the phone call from my dad that they couldn't help. Just the day before, surgery was a real, palpable option. I was so excited that it was finally going to happen and I was going to get to start living my life and be there for my son. And now, there are literally NO options. No choices, no chances.

It's gone. And not to sound melodramatic, but I honestly and truthfully feel like hope is gone with it.

Too Good To Be True?

Hi all!

I'm going to breeze right over the fact that it has been, oh, a zillion-and-a-half years since I blogged, and jump right in to the reason for my post...

I just discovered that band surgery is tax deductible. According to IRS Publication 502, you can deduct any medical or dental expenses over and above 7.5% of your Adjusted Gross Income. For us, this would mean that we would be able to "claim" about $8000 of the cost of my surgery.

Did any of you bandsters out there take advantage of this? Is it too good to be true? (Please tell me it's not, because I'm super excited about my new discovery...)

And in other news, Bubbster turned one last Friday, which I totally can't believe and am in denial about. He's still my little bubby baby boy, right? (Say that one three times fast.) We had one small family birthday party for him and his GiGi (great grandma on my step-mom's side), and he'll have his big birthday party on the 7th. It's Mickey Mouse Clubhouse themed, y'all. Oh, Toodles!

He also had seven (yes, onetwothreefourfivesixSEVEN) Christmases, and not by choice or by my doing. I would have been happy with one, but darn it for family and friends! The kid received NO duplicate toys, either, which has to be some sort of Black (Christmas) Magic or something. We're going to put some of the toys in a closet and pull them out throughout the year for him.

I've missed you all and have been a bad blogger. Sorry, y'all. Life's been a royal bitch for the past six months or so, so I've been doing pretty well to not climb in a hole or drive my car off a cliff or something. But I'm here. I'm alive. I'm doing.

So anyway, let me know about the tax deduction thingamajig, because that's so flipping awesome if it's true!

Hugs to you and yours, and Happy New Year, too!

Wordless Wednesday: Hick Edition

Monday morning...

Survival kit.

Hello, lover.

Wherein I go all doom and gloom on your asses...(UPDATE)

I've known that I needed to post a new blog soon, but haven't really had the energy to do it. What I want to blog about is just not pretty or fun, and who wants to waste time writing about things that aren't pretty or fun? More than that, who wants to read about things that aren't pretty or fun?

So here it is.

I am in a dark place right now. I'm having a hard time seeing the light at the end of the tunnel as anything other than an oncoming train. I just haven't had the energy to put any of that elloquently, so when The BFF asked me in an email about what was getting me down and if there was anything she could do to help, this was my reply, and it's now my un-pretty, un-fun, dark places post.

"You can’t do anything. Life is just going through a super sucky period right now, and it sucks. It’s my job, his (lack of a) job, his mom, his mom keeping Bubbers at her house, his mom not coming to our house to help out, us spending too much time at their house, it’s The Hubs and I not having any time or ability to ‘reconnect’, it’s my mom being sick, it’s my dad being sick, it’s my sister being a derelict, it’s my nieces being who knows where, it’s me worrying about Bubbers, it’s me travelling too much, it’s me wanting out of our apartment, it’s me wanting to stay home with Bubbers, it’s me wanting The Hubs to try harder, it’s me worrying about our 3rd anniversary coming up and knowing that there are a million things on my mind rather than thinking about celebrating it, it’s me wishing he were more romantic, more able to show sympathy, a harder worker, smarter, more determined. It’s me feeling absolutely horrible for wishing he were all those things and not focusing on the good things that he is/does. It’s me wishing I had more time to devote to helping you with your wedding and wishing that we didn’t live so far apart, it’s me worrying that your wedding won’t be everything you hoped for but not knowing how to make it so. It’s me wishing certain people would jump off a cliff sometimes, and then feeling horrible about that.

It’s just everything right now. And it’s all bundled up into a nice big fat boulder sitting on my chest with a pretty red bow and a tag saying “To: Anna, Love: The Universe”. And I can’t make it go away."

Sometimes life isn't pretty. This is one of those times.  I'm breathing, and that's all I can really promise you right now, but I know that The Eternal Optimist is still in there somewhere, buried under all the rubble, and that someday she'll find her way out and into the light. And when that happens, I know it won't be the oncoming train.

*UPDATE*

You know, it's funny how much better I feel after just throwing up all of that horribleness into the vastness of the interwebs and into the arms of the loveliest blog readers a girl could ask for. This is what I assume praying feels like to believers - to just give everything up to God. Thank you all for your kind responses and love. You are my light.

Ugh

Judge for yourself, but I say this woman is awesome.

American Apparel's Creative Director, Iris Alonzo is quoted as saying: "If every brand that tried to do this was met with such negative press, we may have to wait another decade for the mainstream to embrace something so simple."

How dare American Apparel use this as a means to justify discrimination.
 
I'm disgusted.

Just another typical work email conversation...

Today, the lovely MFN (My Friend Natalie for those of you not in the know) sent me an email, and if you can ignore our complete overuse of the term "LOL", I think it proves a pretty good point as to why we're friends.

MFN: Umm I just read a yahoo article on feminine products – have you heard of vajazzling!? And hair dye for the nether regions!?

Me: LOL, yeah, it’s all a bit strange to me. I’ll just let mine be what it wants to be and if it leaves me alone, I’ll leave it alone. LOL

MFN: LOL. I’m slightly tempted to get the hair dye as Christmas gifts for my girlfriends – it’s just so ridiculous I think it would be hysterical to see everyone’s reaction. “This is…what!?” Just be prepared.

Me: Lol, you’ve ruined it for yourself. Now I’ll totally be EXPECTING vajayjay dye, so I’ll be all, “oh, yeah, that.”

How I honored 9/11

I'm sitting at the Dayton airport waiting for the first of my two flights to get me to Dallas. I'm having a hard time travelling today - not because I'm afraid something will happen, but because it's hard enough to give up control and fly on an airplane on a normal day. And today, my brain is overwhelmed with thoughts and images of what happened on four planes ten years ago. As much as I want to escape from remembering what happened, I can't.

A little over an hour ago, I was sitting in the Max & Erma's after going through security. I sat down and ate breakfast, and as I did, the TV, trained on CNN went through the list of names of each person who was killed. Talk about loosing your appetite. At any rate, I remembered hearing something about 9/11 being considered a National Day of Service, and a thought popped into my head.

There were four other tables of people eating breakfast around me, two tables with older couples, a table with a family of four, and another table with an older couple who were OBVIOUSLY well-to-do. I decided that I would help spread love today and pay for one of the tables' breakfasts. I sat there for about 5 minutes, trying to figure out which table I would pay for. (That was the hardest part of the whole occasion - I wanted to pay for everybody!)

In the end, I decided to pay for the breakfast of the older well-to-do couple, rationalizing that they were probably the best able to pay it forward to someone else.

The waitress came over with my check, and I told her I wanted their check as well. When she came back with it, she asked me if I knew them. I said "No, but today is a day to spread love", and she said "Yes, every day is."

So I paid for our breakfasts, and on the receipt I left on the table, I wrote:

"Today, and every day, spread love. :)"

BYOC

Since Draz said exactly what I wanted to say, I'll just go ahead and let her say it:

It’s FRIDAY – thank the ever-loving heavens above. I mean why is it that short weeks (after a holiday) end up being thee longest weeks on Earth? Oy.

Let’s do BYOC – Bring Your Own Crazy. We answer 5 questions in an effort to get to know each other better and to give our blog brains a break. Copy to your own blog and ENJOY!

1. Do you drink coffee? Decaf or regular? Cold or hot? If not – what’s your go-to morning drink?

No. I love the way coffee smells, but hate the way it tastes. My go-to caffeine fix is either Diet Coke or Mountain Dew, depending on whether the restaurant I drive-thru that morning is a Coke or Pepsi restaurant.

2. What are your top six characteristics in a partner if you could hand pick them. And just for kicks – if you’re in a relationship – after you make the list of six – does the person you are with possess all five?

Honesty
Integrity
Sense of humor
Adventurous spirit
Musicality
Chub n' scruff

The Hubs is all of the above, except, he can't sing or dance, or play an instrument. And I should add that "chub n' scruff" is the physical appearance of men that I am attracted to. A little overweight with some sort of facial hair. I'm forcing The Hubs to keep a beard for me since he's currently out of work and doesn't have to impress anybody. I luuuuuuuuuuurve it. He hates it. But still, he humors me. :)

3. I’m going to pick a person – not knowing if this person even exists in your life – and you try to describe this person in 5 short words or sentences:

Paternal grandfather

• Lloyd
• Kind of mean
• Glasses
• Lived in VERY rural Tennessee
• I vividly remember him in his casket at his funeral

4. What’s your signature item? Color? Piece of clothing or jewelry? Accessory? You know – that one thing people know you will ALWAYS have on?

Sunglasses on the top of my head. Even when it's raining. Several years ago, I spent a ridiculous amount of money on a pair of Prada sunglasses, and since I spent so much, I wouldn't go anywhere without them. Now, I've traded them in for a $16 pair of Tarjay sunglasses, but haven't shaken the habit. They are ALWAYS there. Business meeting? Funeral? Shopping? Snowstorm? Yep, they're holding my hair back.

5. Repeat question: Summarize your week in real life and in blog life.

Longest short week EVER. I haven't slept well all week and work has been nutso. I'm leaving on Sunday to go to Dallas (via Chicago) until I return on Wednesday night. Yep, I'm getting on two airplanes on the 10th anniversary of 9/11. I'm not really concerned about safety, but more about obscenely long waits and security feeling up my hooha for explosives.

Blogland has been kinda slow, except for the fact that I'm Donna Reed, bitch! So, not too much to report there.

Love, my lovelies!

It's too bad...

...the Donna Reed show theme song didn't have lyrics. They would have made a great title for this blog post.

I'm Donna Reed, bitch!

First, I perfect meaty balls o' goodness, and now I make homemade chicken and dumplings?! Watch out now! Next thing you know, I'll be wearing pearls and high heels and bringing The Hubs his pipe while he reads the newspaper. (Sidenote: the mental image I just had of the confused look on The Hubs' face that says "What the hell am I supposed to do with that?!" just made me giggle out loud at McDonalds. Oopsie.)

At any rate, I did, indeed, make homemade chicken and dumplings. And it was, indeed, the bomb dot com.

Here is the recipe, and the changes I made (or will be making next time) in red. As far as "healthy" goes, I'm sure it's not the best thing out there, but I'd bet my pearls it's healthier than frozen pizza and mozzarella cheese sticks.

Easy Chicken and Dumplings

2 Tbsp. olive oil
12 oz. pkg. frozen mixed veggies (I'll probably double this next time)
12 oz. pkg. frozen peas (I'll omit this next time - TOO MANY PEAS!)
32 oz. chicken broth
1 can (10.5 oz) cream of chicken soup (condensed)
2 lb. boneless, skinless chicken breast cubed in bite-sized pieces (uncooked)
2 C Bisquick
2/3 C milk
salt & pepper to taste

Heat olive oil in a large pot over medium-high heat. Add vegetables and saute until tender. (About 3 minutes). Add chicken broth, salt & pepper, cream of chicken soup, and chicken. Allow the mixture to come to a boil. (The original recipe called for cooked chicken, but I added my cubes in raw and made sure they were fully cooked at the end. I think it would have overcooked the chicken if they were added in already cooked, but you do what you want. I won't tell.)

Combine Bisquick and milk in medium bowl. Drop by spoonfulls into boiling mixture. Reduce heat to low and simmer uncovered for 10 minutes. Stir occasionally, breaking up dumplings into bite sized pieces if needed. Cover with lid and simmer an additional 10 minutes.

Et voila, you can be Donna Reed too!

Food photographer, I am not.

I served this with mashed potatoes (But don't tell Donna that they were the Bob Evans microwaveable kind). I don't know why the original recipe calls for mixed veggies AND a bag of peas - it was way to pea-y. So next time, I'll omit the bag of peas and either double the mixed veggies or just do one bag of mixed veggies.

It was super good even if it was all pea-ed out. Try it!

Somewhat Wordless Wednesday

For realz.

Victory tastes delicious!

I'm not Suzie Homemaker by any means. Just ask my husband. He'll tell you how he does the majority of the 'cooking' in our house, and that most of the time we cook things that are pre-packaged and microwaveable or frozen and heated up in the oven. There aren't many "made from scratch" dishes in our repetoire.

Well, yesterday, we took Bubber Man to his 8 month check-up. (He's healthy by the way, 29.5 inches tall and 20 pounds 6 ounces, finally double his birth weight.) At any rate, the doctor told us that she wants him to be on nothing but table foods and formula by his 10 month visit. And by "table foods", I'm pretty sure she doesn't mean frozen pizza and mozzarella cheese sticks.

She was rattling off a list of all the things we could "easily" cook that he could eat - lentil soup, hummus, anything with beans, indian food, sweet potatoes, etc. Somewhere in the middle of her list of things that The Hubs and I don't even eat, she mentioned homemade meatballs. At the mention of meat, both The Hubs' and my ears perked up.

There's only one problem - I don't cook. For one, I give up easily at the mention of anything that requires chopping, sauteing(sp?), or lots of herbs. For two, our kitchen is a postage stamp. It's what we call a "One Butt Kitchen", so anything you try to cook makes a complete disaster of the two square feet of counter space we have. It has to really be worth the effort if I have to cook AND clean up the mess!

But, knowing that Bubs needs to start eating something more substantive than pureed and liquified fruits and veggies, I got home and started looking for recipes. I came upon this recipe surprisingly quickly. A recipe with four normal ingredients and three steps?! Even I can do that!

After reading the reviews, I ended up adding in some salt, pepper and grated parmesan, and they turned out A-MAZING!!!

Meaty balls o' goodness.

We had my homemade meatballs with spaghetti, garlic bread, and the world's best sauce.

I am so impressed with myself! (She said ever so humbly...) Next time, I think I'll add some Italian seasoning because they turned out a tiny bit bland, but over all, I kicked turkey meatballs ass!

We're getting ready to let Logan try some, and hopefully he'll be a fan too. If not, The Hubs and I will have to eat them all, which is just such a shame. :)

Be proud of me, Bloglandians! I made meaty balls from scratch!

BYOC

It's Friday! I guess you know what that means...

BYOC – Bring Your Own Crazy….5 little questions we ask to get to know each other better and to give our blogging brains a break. Copy and paste to your own blog and enjoy!

1. If you have a camera and have the time – take the contents of your purse out – and take a picture of said contents and explain them. If you don’t have time or a camera – please describe the contents of your purse.

I usually keep my purse pretty empty, much to the delight of my MIL. There's little in life that she likes more than to feed her superiority complex when I don't have something completely random in my purse that no normal person could ever foresee needing, and yet, somehow, we need. What ever it is, she's got it. It's like Mary Freakin' Poppins in there. Need a coat rack? I'm pretty sure she'd have it in her purse just incase you need it and her daughter-in-law didn't come prepared for just such an occasion. 

But I digress. 

In my purse currently, there is:

• a pink wallet (with a debit card sticking out)
• my phone (had I not used it to take the picture)
• loose change
• 8 used fake fingernails (don't ask)
• my keys
• a leopard print pair of tweezers in a plastic tube
• 4 hair ties
• 3 earrings (one and a half sets, lol)
• a bobby pin
• a tiny plastic baby from a Mardi Gras King Cake 3 years ago (which I put in my purse when I left my old job and have forgotten to take out)  
• two pens
• miscellaneous receipts
• a bottle of this
• business cards
• a container of Sensa
• a notepad that I got from St. Jude Children's Research Center

Random. And note the complete lack of essentials like tissues, medicines, bandaids, Tide to Go, etc. that my MIL likes to remind me I don't have. What can I say, lady? I like to live on the edge. Neener neener with my tongue stuck out.

2. Repeat question: I’m going to pick a person not knowing if you have a relationship with this person or if the person even exists and you try to describe the person in 5 words or short sentences. Your kindergarten teacher.

Seriously, how do you remember that person?! I have no recolection of kindergarden, except for making way too many art projects out of uncooked macaroni (some of which still get hung on my mama's Christmas tree, thankyouverymuch).

I'm sure my kindergarden teacher was a very nice person.

3. What’s your favorite guilty pleasure / trashy TV show you like to watch?

Much to my chagrin, I do not have cable. However, I do enjoy trashy reality shows. I loved "Love In The Wild", and still love The Amazing Race, even though I wouldn't really consider it trashy. I heart pretty much any reality show you'd find on TLC, plus any of the documentaries on addicts, prisoners, and serial killers.

What does that say about me? Eeek.

4. A lot of you told me about your first day of school experiences when I posted about how my 5 year old going to kindergarten wasn’t causing me too much heartache. So now I’m officially asking – tell me about one of your first day of school experiences that sticks out in your mind the most. Who put you on the bus? Did you ride the bus? Did your parents take pics? Did they walk you into school? Drive you there? Cook you breakfast?

I can't remember any of my personal first days of school and I haven't had the pleasure(?) of sending Bubbers off yet. I'm sure it will be filled with pictures and tears.

5. Repeat question: Summarize your week in real life and in blog land.

In real life, I made the decision to get banded, which I posted in blog life here. I'm also going through a work/life/husband crisis where I just can't be happy with anything in any situation. (It's a fun time over here in BatShitCrazyLand, won't you join me? My husband sure would appreciate it.) I'm looking forward to the 3 day weekend, and to starting it a little early - I'm leaving work at 12:30 to go pick up Bubbers and take him to his 8 month check-up. Yay!

In blog life, we finished the remodel! Yay! Thanks, Tricia! For some reason, the post fonts aren't working on IE9, but I think she's working on that. I've been catching up on banded bloggers' stories, usually starting from the beginning of their blogs or band journeys. It takes a lot of time, but the information is incredibly helpful. I hope that my blog will be a source of information for possible bandsters one day, too. And also, in Blogland, I'm growing insanely jealous of those BOOBs who are going to Chicago. Hopefully I'll be an attendee in 2012, ladies, so save some fun for me!

Guess that's it, lovelies. Have a wonderful 3 day weekend if you get one!