Weight Loss Success?

This past Easter I made the decision to stop eating refined sugar.  It's hard to believe, but after about three weeks cravings stopped and fruits and veggies began to taste delicious.  I know it's shallow, but as the weight melted off, I felt proud.

Last evening I was playing on the floor with my grandson when he poked me in the stomach like I was the Pillsbury Doughboy.  This angelic look came over him as he said, "Grammy, is there a baby in your tummy?"

"Pride cometh before a fall."

www.StillSwimmingUpstream.com

My Monday Morning List

The FLYLADY (Marla Cilley) has a website dedicated to assisting people like me gain control of their housework monsters.  I love, love, love her system because when I use it, it works.  It's a strict routine using a timer, based upon a book called Sidetracked Home Executives.  I can strongly identify with the "sidetracked" part of the title, with the "executive" part, not so much.

Every Monday morning I get up and make a "to do" list of things I want to get done by noon.  Then I get distracted and end up doing something totally different.  Every Monday.  This is my routine.  I don't need to make a list on Tuesday or on any other day either, because I haven't finished my Monday morning list.  I could just call it my "Things to do this Week" list, but pride prevents me from admitting that it will take me five days to do what ought to be accomplished in four hours and I love the optimism of thinking that someday - someday - I might finish my Monday morning list on the same Monday morning.

Today, Katie noticed my Monday list on the counter, which is a minor miracle in itself because usually by Thursday the scrap piece of paper that I wrote the list on has either mysteriously vanished or gotten wet and is stuck to the counter, an illegible mess. 

"Holy Hannah!" she said.  "How many hours do you have in your day, girl?"  This was right before we both spent forty-five minutes searching for my purse, which we finally found hanging on the knobs of our bookshelf doors, camouflaged in plain sight.

I wonder if FLYLADY has a section on her website for slow learners.

Three kids, three preschool stories.

Three kids, three preschool stories.  Art Linkletter was right.  Kids say (and do) the darndest things.

                                                 
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Josh had just been in pre-school a few days when I received the kind of phone call no parent wants to get.  The gal at the other end of the phone was so frazzled she could barely speak.

     "Mrs. Zimmerman, I am so sorry!"

     "What's wrong?"

     "I'm just so, so sorry!"

     "Is Josh okay?"

     "This happened so fast, I couldn't stop it!"

     By now, I am a total, complete wreck.  "Is my son okay?" I yelled into the phone.

     "Yes, yes.  But when we sat down to have lunch, before I could get him his peanut butter sandwich, he grabbed the hot dog that belonged to the kid sitting next to him AND ATE THE WHOLE THING!"

Yes, I'm a vegetarian.  No, my son isn't - a choice he clearly made in preschool.

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I went inside to drop Jessica off at preschool and she was invited to sit in the circle.  She sat down next to a boy with a horrible runny nose.  Green stuff was pouring down his face.  We've all seen it.  It's gross.

The next day, same exact scenario.

The third day, same.

That evening Jessica said to me, "I don't want to sit next to that germy kid tomorrow."

I lit up!  Clearly my little three-year-old was a genius! I had suspected as much, and now here was the confirmation I needed.  Face it, how many kids talk about germs when they're three?  I bragged that night, oh how I bragged!  Told the husband, called the grannies, casually mentioned it to friends and neighbors.  I was on cloud nine.  My daughter, a future Madame Curie!

Next morning as I drop my smart and lovely daughter off at preschool, the germy kid and his mom are behind us.  Mom kisses her son and says, "Have a great day, Jeremy!"


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Our house had a den off to the side of the dining room and tucked away on the inside wall of that room was a fish tank that contained Goldie, world's greatest goldfish.  You couldn't see the tank from the dining room, you actually had to step into the den to see it.  On this morning, I did just that and discovered my three-year-old Katie in her pink blanket sleepers, teetering on top of a box, placed upon a chair.  Her right hand was plunged up to her armpit in the water.

     "What are you doing?"  I asked.

     "Sshhh....I'm fishing and I almost got one!"  She replied.


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Another Disaster in the Name of Environmentalism

"A thing of beauty is a joy forever..." ~ John Keats

...Or for one week, if you live at our house. 

Jerry had spent two weeks and more than a couple trips to the big box stores assembling his project, a replacement mailbox.  He primed the box and painted it a bright blue.  He put gold numbers on the front, then decided red would look better so he made the switch.  He took a 1976 Michigan bicentennial license plate and affixed it artfully to one side. 

He searched high and low for the perfect post and couldn't find one shaped just right. He explored the option of crafting his own.  Many of his specialty tools are still back at our Ohio home, so eventually he discarded that idea and eventually found a suitable post at the fourth (or fifth) store he tried.  He primed it then coated it three times with cherry red latex.  The color was a perfect match with the red on the license plate.  He put large reflective numbers down the side.  It couldn't have looked better.

Finally, it was time to erect his masterpiece.  He consulted the U.S. Postal website for the exact height they require.  He then dug a deep hole with the post hole digger.  (This was no easy feat in the land of the kiln-ready red clay.)  Jerry mixed and poured concrete and I helped him hold the post "just so".   

The concrete had set nicely by Monday.  Another job completed by my handy husband!  There was even a functional little flag for outgoing mail that our former bashed-up box did not possess. It was the Cadillac of mailboxes, a thing to be admired.  And so it was.

Neighbors noticed and were quite complimentary.  Jerry glowed with the pride that cometh with the knowledge of a job well done.  People immediately started using it as a landmark.  "Go past the Michigan mailbox....."
 
On Wednesday, Jerry decided to add a little hanging sign, indicating where our house is located in case we ever order pizza or, God forbid, need an ambulance.  Now it was perfect!
 
On Friday the recycling truck accidentally grabbed our mailbox instead of the container sitting next to it and snapped it like a toothpick.  I'm told the driver got out of his truck, and "cursed".  

I discovered the mailbox lying on its side on the lawn when I went to get the mail.  At first I was confused.  It briefly crossed my mind that perhaps a rabid Ohio State fan had rammed into it.  Then it dawned on me what had happened.
 
I called the recycling company on the spot to report the murder of our beautiful mailbox.  I feared they would give me a hard time but actually they couldn't have been kinder.  They said they would build and paint an exact copy of our mailbox and nobody would ever know it wasn't the original. 
 
They, of course, are wrong.  I will know and so will Jerry.