I just got the girls pierced.

Yay.

I've been wanting to get my nipples pierced forever and since my nipples are all mine now, I got it done.

And guess what? It didn't hurt. At all. Weird.

I fixed it! (and some other notes from my life)

First and foremost - I freaking FIXED the problem I've been having with my google reader. It's been driving me freaking bonkers - it would load the first blog I clicked on but would just hang on loading the next. I have been trying to read blogs for the past few weeks and I just couldn't get through the loading exceptions. I tried everything. I disabled all add ons, even launching in safe mode. I reinstalled the browser. I cleaned up any and all issues with the OS. Everything. And I just ran across a fix - just bring up reader in secure mode instead of http. AH-HA! So now I can finally get back to commenting to my peeps. It's been driving me absolutely fucking insane. And now it's fixed. Yay!

Secondly and thirdly... Here's some randomness I gathered from reading the latest issue of parenting magazine.

~ birth control ads piss me off. Especially the IUD ones where they talk about taking it out to get pregnant "when you want". Fuck off.

~ There is an ad for a book with the description "It's a tale of [a couple] succeeding despite the odds: a passionate marriage, sisters who love each other and the bravery in the face of evil". Succeeding despite a passionate marriage? A great sisterhood? Bravery? Why is that a "despite"?

~ I have a few more comments but since they are more child related, I'll continue this list on my other blog.

Other than that, I just am trying to get caught up in my blog reading.

How is everyone out there? Anything new to report???

I love it.

The carrier, that is.

It came on Wednesday, moments before we left to go out of town for the big turkey day. After the kids went to sleep, I got it out and played with it. It's got quite an instruction book!

So far, I've carried Karl and:
~ made thanksgiving dinner with him on my back
~ went for a walk with him on my hip
~ cleaned up after breakfast with him on my back

It's a great carrier. So thanks to everyone who responded to my carrier question. You girls rule!

My blankets.

I make the typical fringed fleece blankets with some upgrades ...

~ I only use the very softest non-pill fleece. It's way more expensive, but it allows the blanket to hold up to time.

~ I do not tie the fringes. I personally don't like the knots; I don't want to be laying on lumps.

~ I "quilt" the two layers together using a decorative stitch. I go all the way around the circumference first, then horizontally and vertically, making square patterns through the blanket itself. This keeps the two pieces of material together so it doesn't slip.

I know it's nothing fancy, but it's my only crafty talent. And I'm on a blanket kick right now. In the past few weeks, I've made:
~ 2 baby blankets for two people at my husband's work
~ 1 large blanket for mommybird (it was my "first person to comment gets something handmade from me" post)
~ 1 large blanket for my husband's birthday
~ 1 large blanket for ME (the first one I made myself)
~ 1 baby blanket for Karl.

Here is a picture of the ones I made my family. From left to right is: brown/blue one for me (same exact one I made mommybird); Crazy green and yellow one my husband picked out for himself; blue and orange tonka truck one for Karl...



I have 2 more in queue to be made for Christmas too. I think I'm close to being blanketed out!

Who is on your "list"?

Jenn and I talked about the "list" we both have. You know - the one from Friends. The list of 5 people who you would be allowed to get involved with and have a pass with your husband.

Mine are:
~ Michael Pitt
~ Edward Norton
~ Ewan McGregor
~ Brandon Boyd
~ Heather Graham

Who are on your list?

Welcome to the world K.

My BFF delivered her daughter yesterday. And while she doesn't blog nor would want me blogging about her, blogging is such a big part of my life - I feel weird not mentioning it.

So welcome to the world baby K. You are already so loved. Love, "aunt" nancy.

I bought a carrier (children mentioned again)

Wow! Thanks for all the recommendations!

After all your comments and researching different models, I ended up purchasing an Ergo carrier. As K77 pointed out, I do have back issues and having a double shouldered one was definately smart. I liked the style and the functions, so I bought it. I'll let you know how happy I am with it when I get it.

Thanks again :)

I need a sling (children mentioned)

Do any of you mommies have a recommendation for a sling for an older baby? I adored my baby bjorn, but karl is too heavy for me to use it anymore. I need a sling I can use to attach him to my hip so I can cook/clean/etc with him. One that will allow me to have at least one arm free.

Anyone?

This is the day and life of a pin.

Many of you are asking about the pin, so I thought I'd go ahead and update you. The pin. Yeah. No idea. I haven't had an xray since last week Wednesday. But here are some awesome WAY TMI updates about it. (seriously, click away now. it's way too much.)

~ Last week I knew it was still in because I tried to have, um, "relations" and I had to stop because it felt like I was being stabbed. Literally. Last night, it didn't hurt anymore.

~ Two days ago I went to the bathroom and it was all bright red blood. So much I thought I started my cycle. But, yeah, I didn't. But the next time I went there was no blood.

So. I don't know. Those things could of happened due to where the pin was and what position it was in ~or~ it was on it's way out and it scratched me? I don't know. BUT, I did have an MRI on monday for my lower back and they didn't find any crazy bleed (yes, they knew about the pin, said it wasn't a big deal. Let me keep all my metal piercings in too - said the MRI isn't actually that bad with metal, I'd feel a pull/vibration, but it wouldn't pull out of my body or anything), but then again, it was on my spine so I don't know if they'd look at anything else. If I have any other symptoms, I'll do back to doctor. If not, I'm assuming all is good and the pin is in my past. I have three more blankets to make and the large ones take me 6 or so hours each, so I promise not to eat popcorn at the same time as pin removal. :) (Thanks to everyone who asked about my condition!)


A few updates ...

~ I double dated on Monday night and we went to see the Pixies in denver. Great fucking show. They played the ENTIRE doolittle album, as it was the "doolittle tour" because it's the anniversary of the album or something like that. They played the entire album in order. Wow. And then for their ~third~ encore, they played "where is my mind" which isn't on the album. It was fucking amazing.

~ I have a fashion show this sunday of my burlesque friends' clothes making company. I went to a fitting session last night and got to try on super fun clothes. If I had to explain the type of clothes they are, I'd say they are rockabilly. Awesome. I get to wear a halter top and then a little halter jumper. Super cute.

~ Monday comes my 2nd spine injection with the new doctor. They put me under a bit of anesthesia and then do the injections so I'm not worried at all. I hope it brings me some relief.

~ Pumpkin ice cream fucking rocks.

~ I'm starting to wear liquid eye liner and holy cow, it's hard to put on. I look stupid half the time but I figure I need to keep practicing if I want it to eventually look good. Kudos to you out there who can do this and look good. I want to have fake eyelashes too, but I'd need Laurel to put them on me everyday (she put some on my for halloween and it looked amazing!)

~ Kristin sent me some super cool halloween knee socks. Thanks Kristin!!!

Alrighty. I think that's it. Happy Wednesday!

The~Real~LifeOfNancy in pictures. (and a funny ending!)

Jenn has discovered the ~real~ life of me on her visit. The aspect where I'm really not exciting and fun!

We had a wonderful time hanging out, but we spent most of the time just in the house, not doing much. But come on, we had ~4~ kids with us who had to nap and sleep early and whatnot. When I picked up Jenn at the airport, it was one of the first questions I asked her, "Do you want to plan to do a bunch of stuff or let babies rule?" "Let babies rule" was her answer, so we did.

Thursday - She had a long day of traveling, so we stopped and got food on the way home from the airport then hung out together without my kids, whom were all in school. We realized we felt like old friends immediately and there was no awkwardness! She even brought me tons of gives. The magnets, shot glasses and over the knee socks (which I already spoke of in the last message). We went to get Ella and then went to the grocery store to get stuff for the menu we made up for the 5 days she'd be here (with 6 people to feed, you gotta be planned out!) and we just did exactly what we said we'd do - we let the babies rule.

Karl trying on Jenn's handmade sweater and hat ...




Here are Caiden and Karl hanging out at one of the toys ...




Karl was enthralled with miss Caiden ...




Jenn actually got a picture of "the grin" of Karl's, the one I've been trying to get on camera for awhile ...




Friday - I got up to get Ella off to school and Jenn and Caiden slept in. I was happy they were able to recharge their batteries after such a long trip the day before. Once awake, we all got ready and everyone, minus Tom and Ella, got packed into the car for the drive to Northwest Denver. We were meeting Lavender Luz (Lori) from the fantastic blog, "Weebles Wobblog ... and we don't fall down".

Can you believe three of us didn't take a picture? Yeah, we suck! So we eat a nice lunch at Noodles then go across the street and take the kids to, no other place than a liquor store! It was a huge one and we picked up a few bottles of belgium bear, guinness, pear cider and wine. Mmmmm.

We got home in time to get Ella from school at 3:30 and spent the rest of the evening just chillin. We ended up making a big spaghetti dinner and sat around with full bellies...




When they were all together (which was all the time) things were a bit overwhelming! ...




Saturday - The day was spent at home playing around and then we got ready for some bad ass Roller Derby!

Mommy and Karl watching some awesome girls ...




We got a box seat so we could spread out a blanket and have room for the kids to play, which we found to be a great plan. Here are the babies (and Ella) watching derby from their seats ...




Sunday - We woke up to SNOW! (maybe 4-5 inches) so we ended up having a snow day. Our tentative plans for the day were all outside and we didn't want to go to the mall or something like that, so we stayed in and kept warm.

It certainly didn't seem like Karl got the idea of "staying warm" ...




Miss Caiden had never seen snow, so we brought in some to the house. She'd take a big handful and just stuff it in her mouth, just ignoring how cold it must have been. When I took it away from her, she got PISSED, so we let her play with it until it was pretty much all gone ...




Monday - We got Ella off to school at 8am, then Karl and Allison went to school at 9:45a. Miss Caiden went down from a nap since she didn't sleep well (she got her FIRST TOOTH!) so I went out and got some coffees for me and Jenn and we just took our time relaxing and packing Jenn up to go home. She had to be at the airport at noon, so we didn't have much time. I planned on taking them to downtown area to walk around but forgot miss caiden needed that nap. Instead, Bay (Laurel) from the blog Simply Bay's Place, came over to meet Jenn and Caiden. (Laurel was in a car accident last week so stop by and give her some nice healing comments please!). When it was time to go, off we went to the airport.


All in all, it was a GREAT visit. Jenn even left Caiden's blanket for us to keep because it ~perfectly~ matched, like no joking, Karl's room. She made it herself and I thought she accidentally left it so I packed it up in a box to ship back, only to get a message from her that she meant to leave it as a thank you gift. She's fucking awesome. It was just too much of a gift, but she insisted, so we have a new favorite blanket for Karl.

True, we didn't do much, but with 4 kids to content with, we actually did quite a bit! I hope she had as nice as a time as I did.


And now for a "Nancy story" - you know, one of those things that can only happen to me.

I have been coughing this weekend due to a tickle in my throat. I have a runny nose so Jenn suggested it was from that, which I agree with. I just keep coughing and I cough until I gag. And then occasionally, I gag until I throw up.

So. I'm driving home from the airport and I start coughing. Then gagging. I do NOT want to throw up while driving, so I'm telling myself "Don't puke. Don't puke. Don't puke." I roll down my window for air and try to take deep breaths. But it doesn't work.

PUKE.

My mouth was overly full, I couldn't swallow it. Thankfully I have my window open. Unfortunate I have my seatbelt on. So I simply bend over and puke on my lap.

Seriously. What is wrong with me? I don't puke on the floor or OUTSIDE the freaking car. I puke on my lap.

Oh. And I had just finished a starbuck's mocha so it was a chocolate puke. Nice.

(p.s... these were pictures Jenn left for me and there were NO pictures of her on them! But I took lots of pictures and once I download them from my phone, I'll put some more up.)

Jenn is here.

Jenn and her little girl, Caiden are here! They are both ~amazing~. We're getting along just like old friends.

I'm so happy.

Hatred is alive and well.

Sheesh, I take a few days off from the internet and I find anonymous hatred is still alive and well. How sad. When I see comments like that, I think about how sad their lives must be to lash out to someone they probably don't even know. If being mean to me made their lives better, then so be it. I'm happy to allow a little bit of happiness into their lives.

While someone was thrashing me on my blog, I was in the hospital. I'm embarrassed to even admit what happened, but here it goes ...

I was eating popcorn while making blankets. (mommybird, your blanket went out in the mail yesterday! yay!) I was taking out the pins while I went and also taking handfuls of popcorn. Somewhere my hands got confused, I took out a pin and before I knew it, I swallowed it. I just sat there in shock thinking OMG, I just ate a pin! I told my husband and he told me to call the doctor. I did and they sent me to the Emergency Room. Awesome.

I got an xray right away and went back to the waiting room. Within 2 minutes, I was being called back, the nurse telling me a doctor looked at it and didn't want me to wait. I was put in a bed and leaned way back, feet in the air, to help the pin stay in my stomach. The GI staff was called in (a nurse, a tech and the doctor) and I was put out as they scoped my stomach. I woke up halfway through the procedure and started fighting the scope and they put some more in my IV to get me back to sleep. I woke up later, when I was supposed to, and they told me they couldn't get it. After a consult with the surgeon, I was sent home with instructions to see my PCP the next morning.

I've been getting daily xrays now and the pin seems to be making its way through my GI tract. They want me to "look" for it, but hell no, I just can't do it. I'll just wait until the xray shows it's clear. My next one is tomorrow.

Moral of the story? Don't eat popcorn and sew at the same time.

Honking.

I HATE it when people honk outside a house. Seriously, can't people GET OUT OF THEIR CARS anymore? Like is it that hard to park and walk to the door?

I have a great honking story from best friend and fellow blogger Laurel (aka Bay). She actually got up out of bed, early in the morning, and bitched out a woman honking outside her neighbor's house. It's an awesome story, but I don't have time to type it all out right now, but I will soon. Keep an eye out for it.

What do strangers do which bugs the hell out of you?

Tuesday

I had quite a weird day. I was so exhausted, I literally could stop myself from falling in and out of consciousness until about noon. Then I felt lightheaded all day. I really thought I'd pass out. But I finally ate a banana and drank some oj, now I feel better.

Your list of pet peeves was fun. I'm glad most of you said you'd never actually tell the writer it irked you, but instead just list them out here. There's a difference between thinking something vs acting on it. Most of you have good hearts.

I made two baby blankets this weekend and now I have the one I'm making for mommybird all laid out and ready for pinning. I make those classic tassled fleece blankets, but I put in a few extra hours of work by "quilting" it with decorative seems and cross stitching. And I don't knot it. It makes for a much softer and streamlined blanket. Lots of work, but worth it!

Time for bed. Nighty night!

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

What are your grammatical pet peeves?

I was recently commented upon (anonymously) in which it was pointed out I use parenthetical phrases too much. Which is funny since I have pointed it out myself multiple times.

It got me thinking about my own grammatical pet peeves. I would never point out these peeves to a writer, but I do have my own and I'm assuming you have your own too. I know we've discussed these here before, but let's go over them again.

~ The misuse of "loose" vs "lose". It happens so often!

~ "Angel" vs "angle". Its such a huge difference!

~ Spelling errors. I'm not talking about the random typo here and there, but when someone really can't spell a majority of words, use spell check!

~ Using the word "that" superfluously. If the sentence can still be read without the word, it doesn't need to be there. I think this is my biggest pet peeve. The word "that" sticks out when I read like a neon sign.

~ Using nonexistent words "irregardless" and "supposably". The latter makes me cringe!

"That" is my list of everything I can think of off the top of my head. What are your pet peeves?

The "worst" part ...

(continuation of last post) The craziest part wasn't even the time nor cold. But that I was on the side of my house, BEHIND the cars. The entire front of our house was turned off - jack-o-lanterns blows out, orange lights unplugged, big blow up pooh bear deflated, porch light OFF.

So these people skipped the front of the house, came up driveway, went behind the cars to find me 15 feet back from the front of the garage, sitting on a bucket, packing up papers.

I'm still shocked at it.

Oh, and I had the oldest trick-or-treater last night too! It was a mom and a grandma taking their group of children around. We give out good candy, those nice and big candy bars (reese's, hershey's, milk duds, etc...) and I let everyone take 2 each until it gets late and based on my supply (which is always over) I let them take 3-4 each.

Well, the kids go back to the adults and apparently told the grandma what I was giving out because next thing I know, a woman wearing jeans and a sweatshirt came up to me and said "trick or treat" and stuck out her hand. She took 2 out of the bowl and said "happy halloween" and left. People - the woman was well into her late 60s! Or maybe this was just a REALLY good halloween costume and she was really an 8 year old kid.