Crazy Little Dog. . .

I have a chihuahua named Frito, she is an indoor dog. We have had her longer than our children. She was our first child after Cainie of course. She sleeps between Mark and I. She is quite the character. Mark was eating a Popsicle and she was sitting on his hip. She loved Popsicles. She "accidentally" fell face first with her mouth open on to his Popsicle.

She has had her problems; She choked on a meatball one time, she ate a pound of dark chocolate, and she has fallen down the stairs too. She gave herself the Hymlick maneuver after the meatball. We had to pump her full of hydrogen peroxide after the chocolate.

Now to boot she has a heart murmur, chronic pancreatitis, and is completely blind in one eye and has a cataract in the other. She will be thirteen on May 22nd. She plays and carries on as if she were a pup. When we were having our deck torn out and replaced I opened the door to talk with the contractors and she went flying out after them and fell four feet. The deck was already gone.

When we leave the house she goes in the garage. Naturally we have all sorts of things in our garage like shoes, sporting equipment ect. . . Depending on who she thinks is the reason she is out there that's whose stuff gets attacked. She will pee on it or pee and drag a shoe into the pee. I know that is gross but you have to admit for a dog that is pretty calculating. So the other day we come home and she has a can of V8 juice in her bed. Now she only ways 10lbs. and she had to get the V8 off of a shelf and then drag it up into her bed. There again that took some effort and thought. Don't tell me dogs are not smart. She may have a bad heart and can't see real well but she still has her brains.

Sometimes you have to just tell them. . .

OK, so yesterday was a really bad day. Mark and I had a long talk and things are much better. Men are completely clueless sometimes. Mark did not realize he was hurting my feelings or that he was undermining me in front of the kids. We had a nice long talk and aired our feelings and I think we are on the same page now. Sometimes you have to tell men things because they have no clue what they are saying or doing. They don't realize how hurtful they can be with words. Mark is that way.

Most of the time I try not to over react but I think maybe yesterday with everything going on I may have over reacted. I did not say I was wrong, but that I "may" have over reacted. When I told Mark how upset I was he was shocked. He did not know I was upset. He said, "If I had known you were upset I would have called you sooner and we could have talked sooner." What the banging of the pots and pans and slaming of doors and cabinets did not give you a clue? You do have to tell them things they don't get hints at all. At least Mark does not. He will be the first to tell you that too. He needs things in bold print.

Now that we are on the same page we have to join together to battle the kids. If they know there is a weakness in the force field they will play on that. I hope we can show them our force field is strong. I think together we can do anything, even raise our children. I joke about that but you have to stand strong with each other so that your kids know that you back each other up. I guess that is why I was so upset yesterday with Mark. I felt like he was not backing me up.
Together with the good Lord we can do anything.

One of those days. . .

Have you ever had a day when nothing goes right? Well that would be me today. Mark would say I am hormonal. I hate that expression sometimes. He blames everything on my hormones and he does not take responsibility for anything. I do probably get more upset around that time but that does not mean that the reason I am upset should be blown off. I am upset none the less.

Today has been one of those days. I feel like my kids don't respect me and my husband does not respect me so where does that leave me. Today I feel as though I am only a servant in this house. Not a mother, wife, or friend. That hurts.

I know I am whining I am sorry. I have to vent or I am going to explode.

With two boys I feel like I have to assert myself now or when they get older they will just walk all over me. Well, they are starting to walk now. What do you do with head strong 9 year olds? Our fight this morning was over the fact that Mark is not backing me up on discipline. How am I supposed to be able to hold down the fort while he is at work if my kids do not respect me enough to follow my rules?

I am big on respect. Maybe I am expecting too much. I was raised to respect your elders and that meant anyone that was older than you, especially your parents. My parents never spanked, they did not have to. I was so scared they might that, that was enough for me.
I know parenting is hard and so is marriage, but geeze. Today was more than I can take.

Sorry to vent.

Multiple little tidbits. . .

Ok, I have to update you on several things going on. First the garden: It is doing well so far. My little herbs that I planted and have moved inside until warmer weather are doing great. I have some little sprouts in my dill pot. I love fresh dill. I use dill in lots of different things. It is good for dips and is especially good when paired with fish. I eat caned tuna occasionally. The only way I can eat it is; a little mayo, mustard, vinegar, garlic powder and dill weed. Mix this all together with well drained tuna. I eat mine over lettuce or with crackers. I also make a lemon dill sauce for salmon. I mix 1/2 cup sour cream, a little mayo, a tbsp of lemon juice, and some dill weed. Let this chill for a while. I spritz my salmon with olive oil then sprinkle with some dill and lemon juice. I bake it according to it's directions then serve with the lemon dill sauce for dipping. Jack loves it this way. Thomas tolerates it.

I took Jack to the Barber shop the other day and they were selling combs for 25 cent. I had some change and I let him get one. Little did I know I had created a monster. He now spends at least 15 minute every morning fixing his hair. He is only 9. Isn't this too soon for primping and such. He is constantly combing his hair and slicking it down. Is this normal for his age? I don't remember boys caring that much about their appearance when I was his age. I am so not ready for puberty.

Calgon take me away. . . .

The Garden. . .

We now have a tiller. Yeah!! Mark tilled up a little piece of the back yard so we can plant our garden. We planned out where everything was going to be planted. Some how, the things that I wanted to plant and eat were getting less and less rows. Mark does not eat much of what comes out of normal gardens. Unless you are growing cows or chickens. We had a slight argument about what and how much was going to be planted.

We decided to plant some spinach, lettuce, and onions. Now we planted 3 rows of onions and I am the only one that eats them. You ask the reason why, Mark bought a bag of onion sets and decided they all needed to be planted. In about 2-3 weeks I will have onions coming out of my ears. Now I love onions but even the biggest onion lover could not possibly eat those 3 rows before they go bad. I did get 2 rows of spinach and 1 row of lettuce. Now those I love and can eat that much easy. Now he has great plans for the little bit of dirt we have left. He wants to do 8 tomato plants, 4 cucumber plants, and 4 zucchini plants. Oh, and he just said last night that he wanted to do a row of corn for Thomas. Thomas loves corn. He only likes it on the cob though, he does not like it cut off. We were eating at Marks' sister house one day for a family get together. She had cut off corn and some other vegetables ect. I asked Thomas if he would like some corn and he asked if it was on the cob and I said no. He said, "can you put it back on the cob for me?" How funny is that. So I am glad to grow some corn for my little baby.

I have some pictures of our progress and I will post them later.

The Total Money Makeover!

I know I have posted before about Dave Ramsey. He is so great. I just checked his book, "The Total Money Makeover" out of the Library. (Sorry Dave but saving money these days)

I just finished it in record time. I love it. I am so jazzed about the saving and getting my debt snowball going. That is a Dave term. If you have not read the book I highly recommend it. If you have to go to the Library and check it out. I have been telling my husband about Dave and he has heard it so much that I do believe he is tired of hearing it. The funny thing is he has a friend that lives in Raleigh and they only talk about 2-3 times per month and he called yesterday. He is taking one of the courses through his Church. He is now bending Marks' ear about Dave. Poor Mark he cannot catch a break.

I have been telling everyone about his book and all the things I have learned. Some of it is common sense and some of it is more than that. My Dad has a lot of the same philosophy. I guess that is why I was not too bad in debt right out of college. I did get my first credit card in college like most kids. I was responsible with it for the first few years then I got a little wild.
One thing in Daves' book that scared me though was that, "19% of those folks that filed bankruptcy in 2006 were college students." That is sad that they are starting their adulthood that way.

This will send shivers down your spine. When Jack was only 6 yrs old he asked, "When do I get my first credit card?" Mark and both in unison said, "Never!!!!" Mark never had a credit card until he went to work with the company he is with now. They said you have to have a credit card to put work expenses on. He hated that. He has been with them now for 17 years. He still only uses a credit card for work. I guess that is why we work so well together. He is the one that keeps us grounded. If we were both like me we would probably have filed bankruptcy long ago. Gotta love him.

Gardening? ? ?

I love to garden. I love growing things I can eat. HA HA , to bad you can't grow chocolate. Ok, I am having a bit of cabin fever today. The kids are home yet again because of the snow. I do love my children but I also love my "me" time too.

Back to my gardening question. I want a compost thingy. My husband and I got into an argument, shock surprise, over if I need one or not. He says, "You don't need a composter. You can take everything you would put in a compsoter and put it directly in your garden and till it under." Ok then where do we keep it until we can do that? So the argument went on. Ladies I need some advice. Do any of you have a compsoter or know what they are and if they would be good or not?

I want one so that I can use it to fertilize my garden naturally. My sister uses horse manure and goat manure on hers. She usually has a really good garden. My mother has always used horse manure on her gardens. Yes, she used to have at least two going. She had one at our house and one at the barn. My sister and my mom both use horse manure because they have an abundance of it. I think my sister does her own compost as well.

Mark has given in to the fact I am going to have a garden this year. We have not had a garden since 2004. The last one we had we grew: zucchini, yellow squash, cucumbers, lots of peppers, tomatoes, green onions (my favorite), and we tried our hand at cantaloupe. During this time I was making a lot of fresh salsa. Since moving in 2005 I have only done little pots with lettuce, spinach, tomatoes, and of course my herbs. This year I want a BIG garden with lots of stuff in it. I think I could do without the peppers this year. But, everything else I want.

I would love to hear from everyone about what their plans are for their gardens. I would also like to hear what you think about the compost thing too.