I have not been watching a lot of tv. I haven’t been blogging either, makes you wonder what I have been doing, doesn’t it?

Well, since you asked, I’ve had family in town. I have five brothers and sisters. One lives in Fort Leavenworth (in Kansas), one in South Carolina, one in Michigan, one in Louisville and one in South Bend, about an hour from me. We are nicely sprinkled around the US. So, when one comes to visit, it’s a treat and it completely disrupts our lives as we know it, but we like it and that’s okay. Some of the family from South Carolina came by from Thursday until today. We had a wonderful weekend of visiting. My parents live about 20 minutes from us and that’s where my sister-in-law and her three kids stayed. Since last Sunday (the 9th) we have driven to my mom’s 12 times. And in the midst of that, we hosted another garage sale!! We had such a good time visiting with family, we are all SO tired, I woke the kids up from their naps at almost 6:00 PM tonight, that’s after trying earlier to wake them–sweet little things became so wore out just playing, what a life! I tried adding pictures, but it would only let me add 12 when I wanted to add 23, so I got frustrated. I’ll try again tomorrow.

On Saturday night I finally turned on the television at about 10 pm and started watching a show on The Food Network. It was an ice cream challenge by Haagan Daz. Who could come up with their newest flavor. It was such a good show. It was two hours long, I was too tired to finish it so I “tivo’d” it and finished it last night. If you get the chance, you should watch it, it was really good, it’s called “Scoop!.” I was most interested in Sticky Toffee Pudding, one of the flavors, I can’t stop thinking about it. I want it. Now. sticky. toffee. pudding.

Today was one of those days where you just clean and do laundry and it really doesn’t hurt to do it, you don’t mind doing it, infact, you secretly enjoy it. Must be the full moon, I almost checked myself into the hospital and God, if you could give me more days like that, I promise to be a better citizen. Although I did all of that work, I still have ALOT more to do, but don’t we always? Life seems to be a big circle of works and things to accomplish. Like cleaning the bathrooms, I finally clean the bathroom, then I clean another, and God Bless America if they don’t get dirty again. Like the next day.

I did all of that work and I had a Pampered Chef show to prepare for. It was what I thought was my last show, but no such luck. I now have 3 more. I can’t turn down the money, so I’ll just do it.

On my way to the show, I had a nice visit from a police officer pulling me over. I was a little confused because I was pretty sure I wasn’t speeding, but I was on the phone, but as far as I knew, that is still legal, so I was confused. Well, Sergeant Hotterthanhot approached my vehicle, I forgot how to speak and looked at him blankly while blinking on occasion. He told me I had a brake light out. I asked him if he would take his shirt off…oh wait, nope, I didn’t, but I wanted to. I stupidly told him I knew, in fact, even stupider, I SHOWED him the replacement bulbs sitting, collecting car dust in my coin tray. He was a little flirty, asking me about my age and pointing out that I was about to hit the big 3-0. (not appreciated, by the way) and he immediately told me that it wasn’t a big deal, he wasn’t going to give me a ticket or a warning, he just had to take my driver’s license and registration and document him pulling me over. I wish I had my camera, I would have taken his picture and said the same thing “for blogging purposes I need to document what has happened tonight, you need to take your shirt off and and I need to take your picture, you understand, right?” It was a great experience. Sergeant Hotterthanhot, thank you for pulling me over. You made my night.

(whoa…two posts in one day.)
So what if my Independence Day post is one week late…better late than never! I’m sharing our Fourth of July pictures. we took the kids to a parade. Once we finally started watching it,Racecar was not happy and he was ready to leave. Ariel, on the other hand, loved the parade. We accidentally sat at the end of the parade route, so where the parade was supposed to start at 11am, it started at 11:45am and by then all of the performers were tired and well…didn’t perform. But, luckily we got to hear 30 minutes of sirens. that was great. (Anna calls sirens “aliens.”)

Our fourth was VERY quiet. We went to the parade, had lunch at my Mom’s house and then we went home and stayed there all night. We cleaned the garage, mowed the lawn, I mulched, we ate pasta, gave baths and then it was bedtime. Racecar, who is turning into his mother, has an incredible fear of fireworks. Terrible…don’t even say the word because the kid will go into frenzy running all over the place until he lands in your arms. It’s crazy because we were so close to some in June, and he was fine at first and then suddenly he realized he could be scared, so he was….very strange. As a child, I was absolutely terrified when it came to fireworks. TERRIFIED. I would go hysterical when my family would light them off outside. I thought for sure someone would die, I feared them so much. I have one memory in particular, where my Dad was outside lighting fireworks for my five other siblings while I was inside screaming, clinging to my Mom. The funny part is that it was daylight outside and I was still that stinkin’ scared.
This year, on the 4th, when it got dark,Ariel and I shared a chair and a blanket in our front yard and we watched the fireworks going off in the neighborhood, whileRacecar slept peacefully. Daddy came out and stood by us. Ariel said “Daddy, will you hold my hand,” and he did. It was very nice.

Happy to be at the parade!

Happy to be holding an umbrella…not so happy to be at a parade.

Happy with her umbrella, too! (my Mom!)

A woman came by and gaveAriel a head piece with ribbons attached to it! She loves it! She still wears it almost every day!

My McDreamies

gotta love parade toys.

My favorite part of the parade.

Anna’s favorite part.

Brian made pancakes this morning. They were made after I (finally) had an amazing night’s sleep and they were made on a morning where my weight was incredibly low. My Mcdreamy.

Our garage sale went SO well. It went so well, we are doing it again next Saturday. We raised just over $800, we raised a ton of awareness and we recruited an affliliate team. Someone who lives in my little city has a son with lymphoma. They walked last year at the same location as we did, they even remembered us being there, this September we will be walking side by side. I am so excited about this. We all agreed that we were absolutely meant to meet yesterday.

I was so tired yesterday, I took a coma-like nap for about 45 minutes after 4pm. I then showered and we went to my cousin’s daughter’s graduation party. We have seen this extension of family maybe 2 times in the past five years. It’s quite sad, but you know how life can run away from you. This girl is a special girl, I used to babysit her when she was a baby. She has grown up to be beautiful and smart and so kind. She was voted homecoming queen this year, she’s just a great girl.
We arrived the same time as my parents and it was a very emotional reunion with this family. We were all so happy to be there. They just built a brand new, massive, beautiful home and had just finished their huge in-ground pool. My cousin’s husband works for a liquor distributor, so liquor was in abundance. The coolest thing was that they had a slushy machine (and Olive Garden!). I thought the kids would LOVE slushies! But even better, it was a margarita machine. Oh my heaven, it was beautiful. I am typically not a fan of margaritas, I don’t order them when I go to restaurants, but this margarita was divine. (I talked to my cousin and she said it’s new from Jose Cuervo…she said her husband had “the guys” over one night, they were playing cards and drinking beer, well someone broke out the margaritas and the group of men tossed their beers aside and shamelessly drank their margaritas. They’re THAT good.) I had two and drank them fast. They were strong and so tasty and oh so cold. I had to ask about them, because while drinking them I thought I had to have a margarita now everyday for the rest of my life. If today weren’t Sunday, I’d perhaps go buy some, but the law prohibits me from doing so. I guess I’ll start my drinking tomorrow.

Between my lack of sleep over the past week and the two margaritas, I was literally in pass out mode all night. I tried to fight it, but I was losing my battle. I brushed my teeth and was in bed by 10pm. A record for me. I watched TV for an hour, rolled over and slept for 10 blissful hours.