Eat Play Love

Nearing the end of the 550 page, The Book Thief, tears began to stream down my face. Reading such a long novel, not only does one sense the end coming, but rather you can feel it. The lobsided book was precariously placed on my lap, my eyes were racing over the pages as my mind was contemplating how was it going to end. I could hear myself shushing all sounds in the room, sinking into the ending even further after my daughter's went to bed. I was completely absorbed.

My husband entered the room and noticed my tears. He casually asked if I was okay. Although I didn't want to pause in the moment, I answered I'm wonderful.

As soon as I finished, the first thought to enter my mind was, what an incredible story. Then rather oddly I thought, television is such a waste of time. I tried to recall a time when television enriched my life like a piece of well written historical fiction, but I couldn't. To think I spend mindless hours sitting in front of a television, flipping chann…

Oh, Colorado it was one week ago I was merrily welcoming Spring. The sun was shining, the weather was sweet. One week later, most appropriately for Colorado we're buried under 16 inches of fluffy white snow. Yesterday the storm hit, schools were closed, the major highway and side road that my husband can take on his commute were closed. A real whopper. Turns out my town was the epicenter of the storm. 
But I'm not complaining. 
It's been eerily warm around here. We desperately needed the moisture. The thought of drought was always looming in the back of my mind. 
In turn, this storm forced us to cancel a trip we had planned that involved some driving. I didn't want to be stuck in our car for an extra few hours due to weather conditions when the trip in good weather is typically about 7-8 hours. IKEA i'll be waiting for you, don't go anywhere.
Now you can find us outside, playing in the snow. It certainly looks beautiful in my backyard all,  windblown and picturesq…

Back in the late 1990's a designer captured my attention on the Style Network, her name was Rachel Ashwell and her show was called Shabby Chic. Rachel took the movement full swing, with the term Shabby Chic encompassing the white painted chipped furniture look, large comfy slipcovered sofas, and beautiful French Country floral prints. Shabby Chic stores were first opened in Southern California, my favorite on Montana Avenue in Santa Monica. 
I'll never forget the first time I walked into the Montana Avenue shop. I felt like I was at home, the Shabby Chic look is very inviting and the linens are beyond comparison. I was always treated kindly in the shop that offered $8,000 sofas and $500 duvet covers, even though I was not a high end customer. Over the years when visiting Los Angeles, I always popped into the shop to see what was new and how the design of the floor had changed. 
I also have quite the collection from visits over the years. I do recall in 2005 hitting the jackpot d…

You've heard of Twitter by now, right? Well, I was a late comer to the world of Twitter, just joining back in December. Twitter just celebrated it's 3rd birthday this past weekend, so it's been around if you were in the know. It's definitely been a hot trending topic in mainstream media recently. But in all honesty, I was a little reluctant to join the Twitter world, thinking it wasn't for me. Yes, I had the same opinion about Facebook which has also changed dramatically since joining six months ago. At this point, I definitely don't regret my decision to join Twitter, it has been a positive experience for me.


Just for a little background on Twitter, it has been deemed as real time microblogging because your "tweets" as they are called are limited to 140 characters or less. Meaning the thoughts you share with others have to be to the point. But the more time I come to know Twitter, the less I would call it microblogging. Does it really need a succinct…

Last week we noticed some green sprouts forming up from the old maroon mulch out front in my planting bed. This week, little hints of purple are beginning to appear. I am delighted. We've had incredibly mild weather the last month in Colorado. Which is pleasurable for playing with the kids, hanging out, and feeling happy. But on the other hand, the weather scares me, as we in Colorado have a history of wildfires and water rationing come summer. Without the snowpack we are in trouble. I know the mountains have done much better than us in the snow department, thank goodness.

We're off to play, I am sure knowing Colorado weather the way I do, there is a spring storm brewing somewhere that will arrive when I least expect it!

Hope you have a wonderful weekend and the weather is beautifully spring in your corner of the world.

Even though I am very good at complaining about the woes of being a TALL woman, standing at the above average 5'11" there truly are some perks which I don't take for granted. Like gaining 5 pounds with out it making much of an impact on my physical appearance. Which is all well and good until you weigh oh 25 pounds more than you would like. My body can distribute the extra weight fine, but I know it's there. I'm not physically where I would like to be.

I don't own a scale (other than my Wii Fit) so I gauge my weight by how my jeans fit. Lately my friend the muffin top has been visiting. Which means, I'm carrying extra weight. There's nothing worse to me than putting on a pair of jeans that feel snug, a pair of jeans that I once slipped on with ease. So what is a woman to do?

I did have success in a Boot Camp Class this summer, but after the session ended, I did not have the discipline to get up at dark and convince myself to work out. I am not much of a …

Does my husband parent or children or babysit them? Is there a difference? Lately I've been chatting it up with friends about this exact issue.Do you think I plan out every minute of when my husband takes the girls and I am doing something on my own? Or do I let him go with the flow?
Find out over at Rocky Mountain Moms Blog, I'd love to hear your opinion on the matter.

Dear Grocery Store Cashier,
When a mom, with two small children enters your store, please assume she is not out on a casual stroll having a fun afternoon, humming la*la*la. Typically she would be in a hurry, probably a bit stressed, consumed with getting out of your place of employment as fast as possible.
Unfortunately my luck always seems to be drawn to the newbie cashiers at this particular grocery store. And today, my luck was abandoned when I entered your line. You robotically scanned my $80 worth of groceries and I watched them piling up at the end of the conveyor belt.
Piles, piles, piles.
Under the piles were my cloth grocery bags that were meant for the groceries to go in them, not on top of them. I stood there in amazement as you tapped your fingers waiting for my credit card receipt to pop out of the machine.
Looking at the piles, piles, piles.
You handed me my receipt and told me to have a nice day. Started to ring up the next customer to my utter amazement. Cue my children…

Being a fan of Charlie and Lola, we have also become Pink Milk fans in our house. Pink Milk is strawberry milk. Now if you were to take the traditional Hershey's Strawberry Syrup route, you'd be serving up some lovely High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS) and a nice little side order of mercury. None the less, when the recent mercury/HFCS link came to light in the media, I ditched our pink milk syrup. We've tried an organic variety, but the girls didn't like it. Sigh. I've made homemade strawberry syrup, but it's not something you can just reach into the cabinet and grab on a pink milk whim.

Then recently I finally had a revelation. A middle ground strawberry syrup with acceptable ingredients (although I could do without the artificial coloring), Torani Syrup doesn't have High Fructose Corn Syrup! I purchased some Vanilla Syrup around Christmas time, to dress up my coffee. Now the large bottles of Vanilla and Strawberry Torani Syrup have become a staple in my hous…

We all know the latest media buzz words: downturn, dropped X points, recession, unemployment, failing economy, foreclosure, predatory lenders, on and on and on, all those negative words leave me feeling blah. Then I start to worry about money and how I have to budget. I feel guilty, like maybe I need to cut corners when buying food or generic brand household items. I know any personal shopping is off the list, unless it's an absolute necessity. I haven't gotten my hair done since September. Has our economic situation changed in the last six years, no not very much. Why have I become so paranoid? Being a conscious spender has been at the top of my to do list for the New Year, so I am embracing the challenges in the economy and seizing a moment to do something different.

In this little blogosphere, sometimes you just find an unexpected ray of sunshine. One of the blogs I regularly read Very Busy Mom With 4 decided to spread some sunshine. I happened to be a part of her Pay It For…

Last Thursday I received an out of the ordinary noon time phone call from my oldest brother. I'm juggling lunch making and the swift movement off to kindergarten. I picked up the phone to see what was up. The first thing out of my brother's mouth was I heard your having a house guest!

House guest?

Our family lives in Upstate New York, so typically I know when I will be receiving house guests. There's a lovely window of time to prepare my house, the guest room, and myself mentally. These days the guest room has turned into the catch all room, clothing cast offs from my growing daughters, winter gear from my hubby's traveling adventures for work, laundry, and diaper boxes of toys that I fill up when things break or it's time to let them go. I have to keep them in the closet for a few months because there is always a random toy that won't leave my oldest daughter's memory and I have to retrieve it from the cast off box. If no questions arise, off to the local …

Just in case we've never met in real life, let me paint a little picture for you. I'm 5'11" tall. Yes, taller than average. Oddly and strangely tall when I was a teenager. I carried myself with horrible posture during those formative years, as if hunching over would make me appear not as tall as most of my male peers, that's saying if my male classmates were as tall as me. Oh and did I mention towering over my girlfriends? Being tall I would say kicked my self esteem in the ass. I've had a good two decades to come into my own, I'm okay with it. I no longer hunt through shoe racks looking for the flatest shoes I could possibly find, cringing at the thought of shoes making me taller. On a good day because I'm wild and crazy sometimes I even wear heels.

Being tall, it is what it is.

Still to this day if I was to get separated from friends and they were looking for me, TALL would be one of the first words out of their mouth. Have you seen our friend Deni…