Old People...j/k...Happy Day mom

Happy Birthday Mom! We have a quote framed in our kitchen by Abraham Lincoln that says, "All that I am or hope to be I owe to my mother." How true that statement really is. We just wanted to wish you the best birthday yet, and that we hope you have many more wonderful birthdays to come. Now on a more serious note, here are some things that make my mom unique:

-the spatula jig, when she gets a spatula in her hand she'll always end up doing a dance where she acts like she is going to hit you with it...while shifting side to side like a crab.

-the corpse, when you try to pick her up or tickle her, she stiffens her body so that you can't move her around as easy.

-the megaphone, that would be mom's mouth when she chews, spaghetti would even sound crunchy the way she eats. When she eats grape nuts you can hear her from upstairs.

-bony elbows, she uses to her advantage by any means necessary

-the crier, she has gotten out of some of the worst scenarios by crying (speeding tickets for example) and certain commercials do the trick, as well as any narrative with classical music.

-carbonated burps, need I say more?

One of my all time favorite mom memories:

My mom always leaves an open can of Diet Coke in the fridge. One day, I decided to pour tabasco sauce, mustard, ketchup, pickle juice and a few other yummy things in her can. She had just come in the door from a long day's work and I could tell that all she wanted was a big swig of her pop. I was sitting at the bar just watching and waiting innocently. Sure enough, she heads straight for the fridge...and takes one of the biggest gulps I have ever seen someone take, the gulp was so loud I could hear it as clear as day. By then my face was red and sweaty as I was trying to contain my burst of laughter a little bit longer. Then she looked at me with a look I will never forget and said in an almost eerie and calm tone, "That was NOT funny". She cruised over to the sink to get a drink of water, which of course I rigged as well (the old rubber band around the sprayer). The funniest thing about the next part was that when the water hit her shirt, she didn't jump out of the way, she just stood there as the water bounced off of her onto the floor. By then I was laughing so hard I began to choke, halfway realizing I needed to run away soon. She never did get me back even though she threatened me a few times...but then again, maybe she did and I just didn't know it. Happy Birthday Bly, you southern belle!

Good times, Bad times

I wish I could make this picture bigger so the facial expressions could do the pic more justice. This is in my all time, top 5 favorite photos as of this week. Joni's cousin Shon, who is now on a mission in Detroit, is holding a saw in his hand when they went "Clark Griswald" on a forest to cut down thier Christmas tree. Shon has a devilish look on his face and Andrea is completely unaware of the whole kodak moment to be. I laughed for at least 5 minutes straight and even peed a little bit...not in my pants. It is now a screen saver on our computer. My eyes are so tired right now I don't even know why I am blogging right now, but for some reason I just feel like it. I played guitar a little bit tonight for the first time in a LONG time, and my fingers are hurting now. You have to build up callusses on your fingers in order to play, and I definately don't have any of those right now, so it kinda hurts. Tonight a woman started screaming outside of our apartment, the kind of blood curdling scream that makes you know something is wrong. I went outside after some investigation from the window, and there were a ton of people outside who obviously heard the same thing. Turns out a woman was attacked right when she got out of her car and a man ran away with her purse. She was smart enough to start screaming right away, but the guy got away. We live in a gated community with security but there is a railroad track right by our house and I think someone hopped a fence. Not to sound negative or anything, but with my job getting more and more not fun, and Joni's internship getting longer by the day, along with the crime all around us, we want to leave Dallas as soon as time allows. I don't feel scared for myself but I constantly worry about Joni. We have a pretty good system between us to make sure she is safe, and she is a smart girl. It is important to be aware of surroundings no matter where you are. We only carry what we need in our wallets now.
Sunday was a day that I think was meant for us at church, so I am glad we were there to hear the messages. The talks were on teaching and raising special needs children. Despite the hardships, we have come to love all the kids in our class. Hannah, the little girl in the wheel chair, adores Joni. Every time we see her she gives us a big hug and gets all jumpy and excited. One of the kids parents came to us to thank us for being her son's teachers and that he always talked about what we did in class, which felt really good because we always wondered if we were getting anywhere with them. I had fun with Isaac too, the other autistic child, I find that sitting with him on the ground and giving him one on one attention keeps him more settled down. I taped his two pinky's together as a joke and he thought it was the funniest thing ever. Isn't it funny sometimes how things can seem so depressing and messed up, then when you find whatever it is that makes you happy it changes everything. I think everyone needs a place to "get away" in thier mind. Mine invloves being with kids, reading the latest sports updates, playing guitar, going to the movies, church, working out, milkshakes, laughing, and playing games. Some music and 80 degree days make me feel pretty good too. I think I would be embarassed if someone listened to some of the music that pumps me up, Rocky never fails man.

Cold feet lead to interesting work days

I just want everyone to know that I have officially "lost it". Either that or I really need this internship to be over A.S.A.P.

You are probably thinking I'm just exaggerating, but I will let you read what I did today and then you can tell me if I've got a few screws loose.

Okay so here's a little background:

I had to teach 2 1/2 hour diabetes meal planning class this morning. I also had 6 assignments/projects to be handed in today. Anyone who knows me knows I'm a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to things like this (mainly because we are evaluated on EVERY move we make in our rotations). So I stayed up super late on Valentines evening putting finishing touches on homework... I even planned out what I was going to wear to teach my class.

A little more background (I promise this is leading somewhere)

Our house gets really chilly at night. I always get dressed and then wear my oh-so-cute bright pink fuzzy slippers while I do my hair and make up.

I finished getting ready, gathered my stuff and headed out on the 20 minute drive to work ... forgetting one key element ... ... ... ...

I figured out right as people were starting to arrive to my class that something was not quit right... I FORGOT TO TAKE OFF MY OH-SO-CUTE PINK FUZZY SLIPPERS. Pretty professional looking, right?

I didn't have enough time to drive home so all I could do was belly laugh till I was blue in the face. Eventually we dug up a ratty old pair of black walking shoes that I ended up wearing the rest of the day.

The class ended up going just fine - once I contained my giggles.

I think I need a VACATION

Valentines and girls

I remember the good old days in elementary school when valentines day came around, and everyone gave out valentines to each other. I would always sneak in the candy hearts that had secret messages written on them...URAQT or I like you for that one girl...and "you are nice" for that other girl. It was cool because you could pick out the superman valentines cards because you liked them, not because you knew the girl would like it. When I got older and didn't care as much I stopped looking at the messages on the candy hearts and it got me in trouble a couple of times. I remember in the first grade I would eat glue to impress girls, and I was even brave enough to sit three of my crushes down at the same time during play time to tell them that I liked them all, but I liked them in a particular order...each for thier own reasons. I don't know if they liked me back though because I was the kid who wore the same pair of corduroy's for the entire year. It's funny how every grade there is a new crush, and I can remember thier full names and everything, but I couldn't tell you anything about fourth grade and up, it was all a blur. I think it is easy for kids to have so many crushes because almost all kids are cute in thier own way, but then we all hit this ugly stage at sometime in our lives and some of us never recover. I guess I am not talking about Valentines anymore but who ever said blogs had to make sense?
Joni was the cutest little kid EVER, not kidding, she was the curly haired fro blond girl with enough energy to ware any adult down. She claims to have had an ugly stage in junior high, but it served her well because all of the guys in her school that made fun of her in junior high wanted to ask her out in high school, and she promised herself she would never go out with any one of them...and she didn't. That's probably the coolest thing a girl can do when she looks "good" to the world, is deny those who didn't see who she really was. I am constantly reminded of a video I saw when Joni was a little kid and she had a bug in her hand, just curiously inspecting it, when her mom said, "Joni, don't eat that" and Joni replied, "but I want to", and stuffed it in her mouth. She hasn't changed much when it comes to life as an adult.
I am experiencing writers block and I can't write anymore right now...writer's block is wierd. That makes me mad because I was going somewhere with all of this, but the wheels were just spinning too fast. I think I need to learn to type faster so I don't keep doing this in blogs.

White Blur

There isn't any reason I am posting this picture, Joel sent it to me a long time ago and I just found it again. I call it the white blur. We were supposed to be taking pictures of the nieces and nephew jumping and watching thier facial expressions, but I couldn't just sit there and watch. Time seems to be a big white blur lately...I am sad to say I measure time by how often I pay the bills or the rent, and I have been doing that a lot lately so time must be flying by. Joni and I have known each other for over four years already, carter will be 4 soon, I have been home from Chile 6 years, and I have been in Texas of all places for 8 months. Maybe that explains me craving old school video games lately, I can't get the Mario music out of my head and I don't know if it ever will leave my head until I find somewhere to play it.

Last night Joni and I went to Walmart to buy a scale, some rubber gloves, and a gallon of milk...we always try to guess someone's life story by looking at what they buy, or how they act-it's a pretty fun game...I can only imagine how we are "classified" sometimes. Speaking of which, there really are a lot of crazy people here, I know I have said it a lot, but it is true. I was thinking last night how many kids I feel sorry for because if they become anything like thier parents than they are doomed. Seriously, it should be against the law for some people to have kids, and they are the ones who end up having ten kids. At this rate by the time I hit the half century mark I am going to go crazy with the number of insane people there are in the world. Maybe everyone else is normal and I am crazy. You never think of those in your "bubble" being crazy but who knows. All I am thinking is that kids deserve the right to grow up normal, learning to respect others and themselves, eating a proper diet, experiencing discipline etc etc. Then let them be free to choose how they live and hopefully they had a good enough upbringing to get them by. Some kids just don't get a good fair start...which explains all the bad drivers out there. I know it is the easiest thing in the world to be judgmental, especially with other people's kids, but come on. I wonder sometimes what kind of childhood George Bush had. Thanks mom and dad for doing your best, even though I am a bit messed up sometimes, you guys managed to do a pretty good job at the parenting thing. Thus concludes the most random blog I have ever written.