I’ve MOVED!!

Check out my new blogging location, designed by my good friend, the fabulous DCRmom at DCR Designs!!!

Be sure to update your bloglines, etc since I won’t be posting here at funcrazylife anymore!

Do not leave children unsupervised around guacamole.

Here’s one of the reasons I’ve been MIA all week. There will be an official launch soon, but enjoy the preview!

Beth at I Should Be Folding Laundry has a GREAT POST about how important it is to COMMENT on BLOGS. This means you! Seriously - I get like 400 hits a day and like 10 comments. You know who you are, Lurkers. I know who lots of you are. And you know that I know who you are. So start commenting, dang it.

If you are trying to lose weight - or even maintain your current weight - do not, under ANY circumstances whatsoever, visit this amazing blog I just discovered. Otherwise, go nuts and don’t drool all over your keyboard, since that may cause some technical problems.

And a big shout out and thanks to George W. for the $1800 tax rebate that arrived in our bank account this morning. Woo-HOO!!

Perhaps it is this GIGANTIC baby hanging around my neck?
Except for eating, this is his very favorite thing to do.

This is why dinner can be a stressful time in our house:

Grace: I can’t eat this. Its too big. Can you cut it into small pieces?
Me: Grace, its RICE.

Grace: I only like this flavor on Saturdays. But on… onnn….. What is it?
Me: Thursday.
Grace: Yes. On THURSDAYS I do not like this.

Grace has a new favorite song:

Its on my favorite peppy-song playlist and she’s picked up that catchy tune.  Husband is a bit conflicted about what the girls are listening to.  I don’t think its a big deal. They also sing along with everything from the Beatles to U2 to Coldplay to Ariel to Sheryl Crow to Elmo. (I do always buy the “clean” version on i-tunes so that they don’t hear any REALLY objectionable words.)
Its not like they’re singing gangsta rap with Snoop Dogg about sippin on gin and juice. (”with my mind on my money and my money on my mind…”)  

I don’t know. Is this a big deal? Should I be more concerned about this than I am?

So I called to update our credit card info for our automatic payment of our Verizon internet.

I was transferred SEVEN times. To this person who couldn’t help me, to another person who couldn’t help me, to this person could only help me if I lived in New Jersey… Then they couldn’t find my account number. Then they couldn’t find ME. Despite the fact that I have paid them lots of money EVERY MONTH for the last EIGHT years… They have no record of me existing.  Part of me really  wanted to just let my credit card expire and bounce right back to them. Clearly they won’t miss me, since they don’t seem to know who I am.  But instead, being the responsible citizen that I am, I wasted 45 minutes trying to find the ONE SINGLE employee out of thousands who could actually help me.
FINALLY someone was able to update the info I needed. Which took all of 1 minute.

Then, my heart full of dread, I called the company that makes this Hello Kitty boom box.  Ellie got this for her birthday and it just randomly stopped working, so I called customer service.
An ACTUAL REAL LIVE person answered the phone. She told me to mail it to them and they would fix it for FREE and if they couldn’t fix it, they will MAIL ME A NEW ONE! Amazing!!

Feeling confident, I called the insurance company. Who managed to make Verizon look downright speedy and efficient. The insurance is denying to pay any of our maternity/newborn care. Because it was all filed under Husband’s policy number. (Obviously they would deny maternity care for him seeing as HE IS A MAN.) It is very simple fix - they just needed to change things to MY policy number. I tried to explain this to them, but it was apparently MUCH too complicated a concept for them to understand. Seriously - my head almost exploded after having the same conversation over and over for 30 minutes with an women who kept calling me “Honey” and was INSISTING that there had been no mistake.

And there goes two hours of my life that I will never get back.

So Colin has started projectile vomiting all over the place several times a day. I’m a little concerned. Not for his health - Grace did this too when she was a baby. It was just reflex, no big deal. He’ll be fine. Especially since he is HUGE and is CLEARLY not in danger of losing too much weight.
I’m concerned for our wardrobes. Last night he got me straight on. I had to change my sweatshirt, my t-shirt, my pants, my bra AND my underwear. That is how soaked I was. (Say it with me… EWWWWWWW!!)  What am I going to do when he does this in public? I’m going to have to start carrying a duffel bag with complete changes of clothes for the whole family. And clothes for any unfortunate bystanders. Can you imagine? What if he gets a total stranger in the grocery store? I. Would. DIE.
Maybe we’ll just stay home until he outgrows this.
Don’t YOU want to sit next to us in church this Sunday?

Yesterday, while cleaning out my closet, I made an interesting discovery.
Look at this:

Not a great picture, but let me tell you what this is.
11 black sweaters
3 short sleeved black t-shirts
6 long sleeved black t-shirts
3 black dresses
I didn’t include the pants, skirts or maternity clothes in this picture. Since CLEARLY you can get the idea, since you can no longer see my couch under all the black tops.

This tells me two things:
1. I really need to wear OTHER colors. Not branching out into charcoal grey, but some actual colors. Like pink. Or blue. Or ANYTHING that is not black, white or grey, which is really just both.
2. I am a perfect example of American excess.

I have been justifying this discovery to myself. Saying things like “Some of these shirts and sweaters I have had since college!” and “But all of the sweaters are different! There’s the long-sleeved crewneck, and the long-sleeved v-neck, and the cable knit one and the turtleneck and the turtleneck with short-sleeves…” Because I obviously NEED all ELEVEN black sweaters. Besides what if there was some sort of emergency crisis and I could not do laundry for 20 days and we HAD to wear ONLY black tops??  WHAT on EARTH would I do THEN??? Huh??

And I admit - I love clothes. I love shopping for clothes, trying on clothes, reading up on the latest trends, watching tv shows about fashion, picking out what I’m going to wear (although not lately with the whole 6-weeks-post-baby-body). Except ironing clothes. I hate that.

But, as I’m trying to justify it to myself… I’m realizing I’m ashamed. It is completely ridiculous that I own as many clothes as I do period. Nevermind this many of the same thing in exactly the same color. Is this really the best investment of my resources?  Just yesterday - while cleaning my excessively full closet - I was talking to a woman in my Bible Study who told me she was saving up to pay the registration fee. Of $25. (Can you imagine not being able to scrape together $25 to join a Bible Study? I am so paying for her to go in scholarship.)  I’m remembering the people I saw in India, who owned one or two changes of clothing.  I came home determined to live more simply and to cut down on excess in our lives. And, less than 6 months later, I’ve lost it.

I know I didn’t go buy all these shirts in the last month. (That is years of hard work on that couch!)  But it serves as a symbol to me about my ‘wants’ and ‘needs.’ About how I’m spending money. About perspective. About what is important. And about what isn’t.