Friday Fill-Ins #16

1. I'm funky, I'm fresh, I can blog just like the best!

2. Why do I have a Scion and not a family car?! (I ask myself this every time I have to HOIST that little girl up into her seat while the front seat slides dangerously back into my legs and butt, almost taking me out. It's not a lot of fun. But I know the answer... Because I chose it, and now I'm stuck with it! At least for a while... *sigh* At least it's a reliable car, and cute, to boot.)

3. How does this silly document protection crapola work, anyway? (I ask myself as I try and complete some more training for work...)

4. Every morning, I put perfume on my body... Clothes were such the obvious answer, I had to think of something else.

5. I consider myself lucky because after eight and a half years, my husband is still my best friend, we are still in love, and we are blessed with an amazingly intelligent and beautiful little girl, who completes our life.

6. One day we’ll see Europe on a dream getaway together.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to maybe stopping by a friend's house to say hi and then going home to chill, tomorrow my plans include working out, cleaning, dancing with my girl and starting to pack and Sunday, I want to do more of the same!

You can find other Friday Fill-In participants HERE.

Wordless Wednesdays #18- Around The Park Plaza Hotel...

You can find other Wordless Wednesday participants HERE.

Random Tuesday Thoughts

...You know, because I'm not random enough as it is. Ha. Ha.

...oooh man, I crack myself up.

*Illy is going through a phase right now of discovering her emotions. She has been doing a lot of the fake whiny-whiny lately. The kind where she sits in the backseat (or next to you on the couch, or hanging off your leg) and goes "ehh.... weeeeehhhh.... meeeehhhhh...." until you look at her and ask, oh so nicely, "Honey, what's wrong?" And then she has nothing to say. Or tells you something like "The train stopped." ...Uh... Really? No way.

*She hit her elbow the other day and hurt it, so I called her over and said, "Come here and let Mommy kiss it and make it all better"... So she came over, I kissed it, we agreed it was all better... Then she ran over to her Dora trike and slammed her elbow down on it again. "Ouch Momma, ouch, make it better" and came back for more magic kisses... and again... and again.... and... yeah... you get the point.

...Not that I am complaining about any of this. It's pretty cute to see her figuring these things out. Although, the fake whiny whiny? I'm not a big fan.

*I am baffled at her verbal prowess. Yes, you read that right. She has prowess. Of the verbal sort. She blows my mind all the time, coming out with words I didn't even know she knew yet, making whole sentences. The other day she said to me in the morning as I was busily packing lunches- "What you doing, Momma? You makin' the foods this morning?" Did I mention she's not even 22 months old yet?!?! Is it too early to declare my child a genius?

She also came home from day care the other day singing Mary Had a Little Lamb, which we didn't teach her. Of course, she did learn "Boom, boom, aint it great to be- CRAZY!" From me. Cuz that's how I roll.


*I need new undies ass covers and bras tit slingers. Thanks for reminding me, Kia....

*We went to give our new landlord our deposit for the duplex. They are soo nice and they really like Illy. I have a really good feeling about this place... I hope for this to be the last time we move until we buy our own house :) That would be so nice. Moving ever year (or more) is really no fun. Seriously.

*Our new TV came. Boo-yah. And I actually don't feel guilty for treating ourselves to this right now, even though it's not the best time... Because we just spent thousands paying back debts we've owed for years to improve our credit scores. So I think we deserved it.

*My husband does feel guilty. They just laid off two more people at work. The same day our TV came. He said he felt like a shmuck, even though he knows he shouldn't, because it's not his fault... and we did need a new TV and deserve one. It's just hard to enjoy something special like that when (a) you're worried how much longer before it's your job being let go and (b) you know there are TONS of people out there right now just worried about making ends meet.

*I have a banana today, but I forgot my peanut butter. I don't think I'm going to eat it. Plain bananas are not nearly as exciting as PB ones.

*My little tweet-bird (yes, another nick name for her, I know) didn't want to let me go this morning. She was clinging to my legs and hugging me with all her might... she didn't even want to get down and play with her best friend or go to her Dada. It made my heart break into a bunch of little heart-shards. :(

That's all I got right now. If you liked this, or have some random thoughts of your own to share, visit The Un-Mom to grab the button and play along!

I Heart Faces Week 7- B&W

I have seen this group all around the blogosphere, and a few of my friends are playing along... Let me just start by saying:

I LOVE it.

And since I totally flaked on that one word challenge I promised myself I wouldn't flake on... *ahem* I know... I know... I suck. I always flake. meh. I figured I would try and join up on this.

Since it's awesome.

So you should go, right now, GO and check out I Heart Faces because there really are some amazing photos there. And it makes you look at your own face- and those of everyone around you- in a whole new way...

So now, on to the entries.

This week's theme is black and white. How I love black and white photos! I was already considering joining this group/ meme because I love to look at the entries... But then I saw this week's theme and figured it was meant.

This, of course, is Ilyana. I just love how she's laughing and has that sparkle in her eye! I was so glad it translated well into B&W.

My little brother Mitch. Isn't he handsome?

PS: I have no idea why that text at the top turned small on me. I can't get it to go back, I've tried about ten times. So... I'm sorry it's tiny, but you'll have to deal with it. I'm not up to fighting with finicky blogger this afternoon.

We Got It!!

We GOT THE DUPLEX!!

Just found out about an hour ago and I couldn't be happier right now. WOO HOO!!!

Earl said it first, people:

"Alex: Earl, karma is a very complex Buddhist principle. It’s the totality of a person’s actions which determines the fate of the next stage of their existence.

Earl: Do good things and good things happen. Do bad things and bad things happen.

Alex: (smiling) Yeah I actually like your definition better."


PS: If you don't watch My Name Is Earl, go. Get it. Watch it. Giggle. Thank Me. It is an awesome show.

Friday Fill-Ins #15

You can find the other Friday Fill-Ins participants HERE.

1. Give me some awesome new recipes and I'll make you dinner AND cinnamon rolls.

2. Whenever I think about Weezer, I think "If you want to destroy my SWEATERRRR..." Yes, that was a very random thought.

3. I wish we could buy a house now... but since we can't, I am wishing we will at least get this much nicer apartment. It's a step in the right direction.

4. A creme de fleur from Au Bon Pain was the last thing I ate that was utterly delicious. (Yes, I treated myself this morning... and am now regretting the ridiculous amount of calories ingested before lunchtime. But it was good.)

5. To live in this world is a gift.

6. Other than this one, Good Enough Mum is the last blog I commented on. She makes me giggle. She talks about genitals. hee.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to dinner and maybe Wii and some cleaning, tomorrow my plans include not sure yet, think I might be visiting my Dad and Sunday, I want to finish the cleaning, prep for the week, grocery shop, and hang with my fam!

Instant Karma?

We got our tax money last week.

Rather than plan a vacation (even though I would LOVE to take Bendy to Disney), buy too many things we don't need, or toss it all into savings where it will slowly be depleted over the next few months, we decided to take most of that money and pay back a number of old debts that we had on our credit reports.

See, when I turned 18, I didn't quite understand yet the ---danger--- that IS credit cards. In my frolicky little world of sunshine and flowers, I thought, yeah, I will sign up for this credit card, and buy the things I want... And pay the minimum until the day comes that I can pay them back! *smiles* *tosses hair* *pops bubblegum loudly*

But everyone in the *ahem* real world knows that that day never comes. Instead, you just get pummeled with fees and interest and blah blah blahs until one day, you owe a company $1000 for that $100 DVD player you decided to buy to watch your favorite movie on. And then (at least if you are me) you realize you won't overcome it anytime soon, and you give up. You let it go onto your credit report and ruin any chances you have of getting any type of loan on your own for the next however many years. So that's what I did, and that's how I ended up in this mess.

Will's was actually not nearly as bad as mine, to be honest. He had a bill from a hospital and one credit card, but that's nothing to my ridiculous amounts of book clubs, credit cards, past due bills, etc. I am turning red as I write this, because really, I'm not proud of it. I should have known better.

But, I didn't. It is what it is, I guess.

And NOW... Now that I am older, now that we have a daughter, now that we are getting more serious about what we want to do with our lives and doing things like making budgets and five year plans and thinking of just how to get to that point where we can buy our own house... NOW... We are fixing it.

I spent a while on the phone two days ago with all of these credit companies. **SIDE NOTE: You DO NOT need to hire a credit counseling service to help you if you have debts. You can negotiate with these companies all on your own, and they will offer you deals- on average, most will settle for around 50% of what you owed them in the beginning. IF you DO decide to go with a credit counseling service, whatever the reason, DON'T get one that makes you pay ridiculous amounts of money! Check out CCCS- Consumer Credit Counseling Services- you can even do a lot of it online with them now...** I paid back a big chunk of what we had owed, and I am pretty sure it's going to boost our credit score within the next couple of months. One step closer to being able to buy a house in a few years!

And you know what happened??

The next day, I happened to be browsing Craigslist, and I clicked on housing. I have been keeping my eye out on there for a while, because while we do like our apartment for its size, our location and our landlord are both kind of sucky. If you read about our heat situation, you know what I mean.

So we've been wanting to move for a while, but not forcing the issue. We've been waiting for the right thing to come along. We were *hoping* for a house or a duplex, something a little bigger, with a yard (right now we live on one of the main streets in town and have ABSOLUTELY no yard, which blows with a dog and a one year old!)... and I had only seen one that was good in the past few months, which was snatched up before I could even get ahold of the poster. So I didn't have very high hopes in clicking... But what do I see at the top of the list but THIS AD:

3br - ENFIELD NH 6 ROOM DUPLEX

3 BEDROOM (ONE SMALL MORE FOR NURSERY) 1 BATH. NEWLY REMODELED. APPLIANCES ALREADY THERE.
FRONT PORCH
BIG YARD AND PLENTY OF PARKING.
$800.00 PER MONTH PLUS UTILIES
NEW WINDOWS
NEW FURNACE

We are going to look at it tonight. The woman sounds great, doesn't mind that we have a dog, and it seems like we were the first to get ahold of her about this amazing deal!! If all goes well, we might be putting down a security tonight...

Instant karma??

I think so.

This Valentine Made Me Giggle

SO. Who are you, Peggy or Viola?? Tell the truth... :P

Friday Fill-Ins #14

And...here we go!

1. It seems like just yesterday that I was preggo.

2. Put the toilet paper back when you're done, please?

3. If I thought you would buy me a house I'd do just about anything for you!

4. How you could just make my heart explode with love is what I think of most when I think of you.

5. To me, Valentine's Day means showing the appreciation we have for the people we love, when we might not take that chance on any other regular day.

6. Your hugs and kisses gives me strength.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to our potty training party!, tomorrow my plans include catching up on cleaning and maybe watching a movie and Sunday, I want to prep for the week and snuggle with my buggles!


You can find other Friday Fill-In participants HERE.

Luxury Lounging

As mentioned in my last Friday Fill-Ins post, we got to spend this past weekend in the Presidential Suite at the Park Plaza Hotel. Let me just tell you.... this place was FABULOUS!

Ilyana was, of course, right at home. She ran around and played the piano butt nekkid as if she had been living this way her whole life. She must have been royalty in a past life or something, because I was totally in AWE of this place, and here she was, acting as if she belonged there at one year old.

Friday night, we arrived, parked, and got ready to go out to dinner sans Bendy... We don't get to do that too often, so when Mom offered to take her, we were totally there! We walked to the restaurant, an awesome asian place called Jae's... Got a couple of good pics on the way, but my ass almost froze off so we decided to take the T on the way back. Well, I should say ATTEMPT to take the T. See, we got on the wrong line, and we thought our stop was the first one... turns out it dumped us two blocks over from where we should be and only about half of the distance back to the hotel. So I still froze my ass on the way back, too. Seriously. I thought I was gonna need a butt amputation or something. But I survived... Here are some cool pics from the walk:

A little bit of red, white and blue we spotted on the skyline...

Random street block

Hubby plays with the camera in a sidewalk mirror

My artistic alley find

When we were done with dinner and our freezing walk, we went back and relaxed for the night. We didn't want to try and cram too much into one night and get run down... Plus, how often do you get to relax in a suite that EVERY PRESIDENT since the 1920's has stayed in?!?

Yeah, me neither.

The suite was A-freakin-MAZING!

Here is one of the sitting areas in the living room space. There's Bendy in the middle, just for a little perspective. The bar is right behind her...

Here's a closer view of the bar, with my Stepdad David!

Well, hello again, David. I see you are sitting in the OTHER living area. tee hee.

The grand piano which sat in between the two living room sitting areas.

And here is the dining area.

Here is a shot of the kitchen/ bar area. Yeah... I hope my kitchen looks this chic someday! Notice the fruit plate and petit-fours they left us? They left something new for us to eat every day. Yum, yum! Check out some of our goodies:

Everything they served us was so fancy-shmancy! Will re-arranged some of it to get this pretty lil shot.

Spring water in wine bottles.

Truffles... mmmm....

Almost all of the food they gave us, like these nuts, was in edible containers. This one is made of peanut brittle. You can see from how much of it is gone that is was oh-so-good.

More and more fruit!

The suite had three bedrooms and five bathrooms. I don't know why, but we didn't get any good shots of EITHER (that's right, we had two!) of our bathrooms, and we only got this of our bedroom, which isn't very impressive to look at if you could have seen the WHOLE space:

I do have to say, though, that compared to my bed... This IS impressive. haha.

We made sure to get some shots of each of us sitting at the desk in the private office in our suite.We couldn't go without them, knowing that past Presidents had probably sat there to make some important executive decisions. Who doesn't like to feel big and important?

Bendy sitting at the big, honking, GORGEOUS desk which I am pretty sure had a leather inlay... Niiiccceeeee...

Some very important business...

I just love the face he is making! Like he is trying to decide whether to deploy the troops or not... Or maybe he's just trying to stifle a toot... hmmm...

Fancy offices make one feel very high-class, you know.

Oh, look! I can put on a pretty face when I try!

I had to be a little wacky.

This was our view from the living room, both at daytime and at night. Personally, I prefer the night-time view.


Day:

Night:

And here are just some more cute pics of the Ruggle. I got a few great ones of her looking down into the marble floor... She thought there was a baby trapped in there at first, because she could see her reflection. She found it very amusing...

I see you, baby!

And we, of course, found her amusing... As per usual.

Hamming it up for the Grumps.

Sneaking spicy cocktail mix leftover from the party the night before...

Saturday, we took Ilyana to the aquarium for the first time. It was fun... But it was SO crowded that we didn't even get to look at some of the exhibits. People were pushing past us, and it took about twenty minutes just to get back to our locker. So yeah, note to self- next time, go during the week. I think the girl was a little overwhelmed, because she didn't want to touch the animals in the tide pools and it seemed like she was more excited about getting back on the T (which she loved!!) than seeing the fish... fishes... Yes, they are both words. The aquarium says so.

Ilyana especially loved the jellies! This was one of the least crowded parts of the aquarium, so we got right up close to the glass with them. Some of them are so beautiful...

Funky glowy jellyfish!

We also liked it when Mr. Turtle in the big tank swam right up to our glass!

But not so much Mr. Scary Eel. Although Illy seemed less freaked by him than I did.... What?! He's creepy!

We just thought this *star* fish was cool. Is that what it is?? I don't know... it has a lot more arms than a typical starfish...

Nifty shot Dada took of the tank looking up.

And a little ray, too. I didn't even see him. I guess Dada Rugg has a better eye than I. heh.

I've always loved the penguins! They are so cute. Illy thought it was funny that they were taking a *shower* (they have mist sprayed onto them from nozzles.)


After the aquarium, the girl was due for a nap, and Dada Rugg decided to pass on shopping in Boston with the ladies... hmm... wonder why...
They went back to the suite for a much-needed nap and relax, while Mom and I tromped around Boston for another few hours. I do have to say, though, that our shopping trip was lacking. I couldn't find what I was looking for, and it took us forever to find my Mom's stuff! By the end, we were beat and our feet were saying "ow, ow". So we went back to the room. I couldn't wait to relax around the nice room, and sort of felt bad for my Mom, who still had a long night ahead of her... She had the big awards ceremony for NEPA to attend and afterwards, a cocktail party in our suite. So she had no time to rest! Her and my Stepdad got all gussied up:


Don't they look so nice?

Smiling on the outside, but inside... Her feet are saying OW, OW.


And went off to their big awards ceremony.

Of course, Mom had to come back a while later, after I had gotten the Bend up and bathed and ready, to give her some lovin' and bring her downstairs to show her off at the dinner...



I just love this photo! *Pats self on back*

Oh hello Momma, are you going to let me go to the awards ceremony? Pretty please?

So off went the Ruggle to show herself off and suck up to the peeps. They all loved her, of course.

This weekend was really amazing- more than I could have expected, a once in a lifetime experience to be treasured always.

Thanks again Mom and David! You. Guys. Seriously. ROCK! :) Love yaaaaaa....