L is for "Links"

As in some of my favorite links!! :) You may laugh, some of them can be kind of cheesy....some of them lame, and some of them just for fun. Anyway....here goes nothing...

1) Eonline
I guess I am starting of with cheesy!! I love the "Watch with Kristen"
section....t.v. gossip and it's so much fun!

2) Spoiler Fix
Speaking of t.v., admittedly I am a wimp and I enjoy being spoiled!
This is also a good site that I use to keep up on shows I enjoy but don't
always get to watch.

3) Lelo In NoPo
I just recently discovered this blog and am enjoying it immensely!

4) Greg Oden's Blog
With the upcoming Portland Trailblazer season about to start this has been
a fun read. I do enjoy watching the Blazer's and am looking forward to
hopefully go to a few games. We used to have partial season tickets
before we had children but once kids came along....babysitting costs!!!

5) Swapatorium
Another blog I recently found....all kinds of treasures to be found and
some "vintage" recipes that she tries out too!

6) Creating Keepsakes
I get this magazine and enjoy the website too for scrapbooking ideas

7) Ali Edwards
She writes for Creating Keepsakes but this is her blog. She creates amazing
pages and has a son with Autism and talks a lot about that as well.
Inspiring.

8) Perez Hilton
Yes I read this! Sadly, nothing but candy for the brain! What can I
say....when I am tired and my brains need something rather mindless...
this does it for me! ;)

K is for "Keith Urban" of course.... ;)

Oh so I do like me some Keith Urban....and the time is coming soon when I get a girl's weekend and that weekend includes 2 (yes, you read that correctly) concerts to see him. Actually, what originally happened, is we went ahead and booked the Seattle date first and at that time there wasn't a Portland date set... so we figured a weekend in Seattle would be fun. Well then a Portland show was added to the tour list and my girls and I decided we couldn't pass up that opportunity, so on Friday September 14th we will see him in Portland. Then we get to get up on Saturday the 15th and go to Seattle and see him in concert that night as well! We are staying the night in Seattle and then playing all day on Sunday before coming home.........I can't wait!

I am sooo needing a break right now. Andy has been working a ton and he is working all weekend too so I haven't exactly been overly jolly. I have just been tired of what feels like doing everything and him not being around that much. And I know he is tired too and we actually (I think) have some opportunities to schedule some time together soon but I also have a need to just get away. I am counting down the days and I have some money set aside....my little getaway also means I get a day off from work too! Yay!! Not that I work a ton (only one day a week) but still....sometimes I just need to recharge. I need to have a little space to remember why I like working my one day and why I like hanging out with my kids! Little vacation for me and all will be right with the world.

And the photo's below? Well in 2005 I actually (with the girls) saw Keith Urban at 3 different concerts, one in Portland (at this point he wasn't quite as famous yet so he still came through the audience playing his guitar), one in Vegas (totally rocked!), and one in the Gorge Amphitheatre in Washington. For that particular concert we actually took our husbands and not our children and had a blast! We camped over night (because you can and because it's a long ass drive from Portland leaving at midnight!) and obviously drank lots of alcohol because we could. My lovely friend Crystal made us t-shirts that said "My other husband is an Australian singer-songwriter" since we were spending the weekend with our husbands too. My other lovely friend Anne took the pictures so my sincerest thank you to her.... boy did we have fun and now here comes another trip. I can't wait.... :)

There were actually many more pics taken but I do believe that this is enough embarrassment for me and Andy for one night, don't you think?

J is for "Happy Birthday Jarren"!!

So here again....another letter I was having a hard time with and lo and behold, today is Jarren's birthday! I don't have too many photographs of just Jarren by himself, lately when I've been around he has not been one to pose for me! :) Other than that, this has got to be one of the sweetest, most easy going kids I know. Quite opposite of Matthew, who I feel is or can be more uptight about new situations. Of course some of that is probably the Aspergers in him but still....I didn't take any pictures of Jarren and his birthday cake tonight so a few of my random pics will have to do!

Happy 6th Birthday Jarren!!

I is for "Iced Coffee"!

I am an addict!! I swear, in the summertime, I have decided I can just about survive on fresh berries and Iced Mocha's from Starbucks! I honestly am not above having just the iced mocha for dinner if it's really hot out...who needs real food! And this is coming from someone who adores food and adores trying out all sorts of food. Of course lately, the weather hasn't exactly been hot enough to warrant only iced coffee for dinner (or breakfast) but there is hope that we will warm up here soon! I mean yesterday, it was only what...65 out and raining half the day. What is that all about? And in August!!! *Sigh*

H is for "Huh??"

Ok...seriously people....I just couldn't get it together and come up with a good "H" post! It just wasn't working for me so I honestly have no clue what to say that starts with an H that is even remotely interesting in my life. So in the meantime....here are a few pictures from our weekend at Ken and Tonya's (Andy's brother and his wife) place in Central OR. a couple of weeks ago!



Lake Billy Chinook... and Matthew and Natasha!




The boys on the four wheelers...and they are fun!!



Ladder golf anyone???? Also, one of my favorite pics of Mason on the trampoline!
Good times, good times......

G is for "Giuseppe" and "Guilty Pleasures"

So I had to write something about at least one of the cats!! Actually, I know I have some good pictures of Giuseppe but who knows were they are and quite frankly, to sift through a bunch of pictures to even find a couple of cat ones was a little beyond me this morning!! He is a funny cat, very curious but also can be quite shy. Most of the people that even come to the house never see him, kids especially. But he has learned to love our kids and sometimes even seeks out their attention...usually from Matthew and usually only for a short period of time. His favorite person in the whole world is Andy's friend Rich. Everytime Rich is in town and comes over, 'seppe is all over him and can't seem to get enough. Now, Rich used to smoke and this cat loves tobacco, but Rich quit smoking a while back but Giuseppe still can't get enough of Rich when he is around. I swear, if the cat had the opportunity, he would hop a plane and go move in with Rich and leave the rest of us!!!

Now...on to "Guilty Pleasures"! OK...so I have a few (and often are t.v. related), but my favorite lately is "So You Think You Can Dance". Hello...LOVE this show! And yes I voted on some of the dancers and my votes for the finale were for "Lacey" and "Danny"! It doesn't bother me too much that "Sabra" won but for some reason I could never really get into her. Anyway, if you have no idea what I am talking about then I am sure I am boring you to tears about now! Other guilty pleasures: "Charmed" the t.v. show, I own most of the seasons on DVD and still love them, Cheetos or "corn curls" as they are known to Matthew...terribly evil things but they taste so good!, old Kathleen Woodwiss novels....I was sad to hear she passed away recently but boy have I enjoyed those romances, and '80's hair band music, which somehow never totally seems cool that I am listening to it but I still love it anyway! What are your guilty pleasures or is there simply no guilt at all?

F is for "Fireworks"

So I had to have an excuse to post the 4th of July pictures!! :) On that day we had my parents and grandma, Andy's parents and grandparents, and our neighbors Dan and Carolyn and their boys over for a picnicky dinner and then fireworks after. I think the pop-its on the back patio were probably a favorite with the kids but they seemed to enjoy the firework show as well. The noise was a little trying on some of the little ears (and it wasn't just Matthew either!), and Mason took a tumble down the driveway just before the "show", but other than that it was a fun evening of family and friends!!

E is for "Exit Strategy"

So a couple of weeks ago, Matthew's Occupational Therapist and I (and his Doctor) agreed that now is a good time to take a break from OT for awhile. He actually is progressing really well, has come so far in many areas...particularly his writing skills and some of his abilities to handle certain situations. Plus, they want to do an evaluation with a speech therapist to see what/if any attention needs to be put into place. It has kind of been one thing at a time...we were doing some OT and now we will see what's next. Plus school will start in less than a month and he still will get some services through the school.

Almost all of July, Matthew was complaining how he didn't want to go to therapy anymore, it was boring, he would rather play at home etc. etc., really fighting me on even going. However, when the time came to tell him that he only had 2 more weeks of seeing "Jen" he did have a bit of a freak out!! He begged me to sign him back up and really kind of had a hard time dealing with the fact that therapy was going to end for awhile. Jen was great though and really prepared him, and this Wednesday was the first one in months that we haven't gone to therapy in the morning. And he was o.k. with it.

I think the one that perhaps needed some more preparation for this was me!! I hadn't realized how I had relied on Jen to kind of help me out with some of the tough situations that we would come across. They weren't situations that usually would require a call to the doctor, but little things that I could easily bring up on Wednesdays. Sometimes either Jen could give me suggestions on how to handle Matthew or she could bring it up in a story or game with him on how to deal with the problem. It was just nice to have that little bit of extra support when/if I needed it. But for now, Matthew is doing fine and is getting excited for school again, and I will be fine even if Matthew does have a rough time. I keep telling myself, only a couple more weeks till school and then we can all be back on a regular schedule...not only for Matthew's sanity but for my own as well! Change is apparently hard on all of us!! :)

D is for "Mr. Darcy"!!!

So I was flipping through the t.v. channels today and lo and behold look what was on!!! Nevermind that I already own "Pride & Prejudice" on DVD. I love this show, I love the book, and I particularly love this version with Colin Firth as Mr. Darcy!! I haven't had the nerve to watch the more current version with Keira Knightly...somehow I couldn't imagine any version being any better than the BBC version. Maybe I need to go off to the t.v. and load up the DVDs so I can go catch up on the parts I missed today.....

C is for "Critters"

Yes critters....as in "they are NOT my friends" right now!! Actually most four legged creatures are currently on my bad list since the other morning I woke up early to go on my walk and was greeted in the kitchen by a lovely brown "treasure" from one of the cats. Not sure which one either. To accompany this "treasure" was a "streak that started on the carpet and went halfway across my kitchen floor. Safe to say at this point I wasn't having a good morning. I go to get cleaning supplies to start on the mess and look out the back door to discover much of my container garden on my deck is dug up and the carrot and onion seeds that Matthew had planted (and were growing very well) were dug up and strewn all over!! I was fairly positive any outdoor cats didn't cause this mess and upon further inspection, I found raccoon prints on my sliding glass door. Later in the day, I found out that the neighbor has had the same problems and said that a momma and her three babies were living up high in a tree. Argghhhh..... damn raccoons! Then a couple of days later, a house behind us obviously had a new dog and we finally figured out it was escaping their backyard to get into our backyard to use it as his own personal toilet! Now I don't own a dog yet, I actually might consider one in the future, but I am not interested in letting some other dog use my yard for nothing but excrement!!

So anything with four legs right now needs to be on its best behavior...around me at least!! My poor kitties, I have been awfully grouchy with them lately! :)

A is for "Art Infusion" ( and for Ali!)

So I got this plan/idea from Ali and though what a pretty good! Basically, (as I understand it) the idea is to go through the month and blog everyday (ha ha) about me/my life ( I may be making things up as I go along too!) using the alphabet as a bit of a guide. We will see how it goes, hard to tell if I will make it through the whole alphabet and it may take me 2 months but whatever!! I still think it's a cool idea and I figure I should just give it a go, even though it seemed to take me awhile to get started. And a big thanks to Ali for passing the idea on!!

Anyway......Art Infusion is actually a program at Matthew's school that brings visual arts into the classroom and is parent run. I helped out this last year in the classroom when it was time to do art infusion lessons and had a blast! I am certainly not an "artist", crafty is more my game and that can be iffy at best. But I learned a ton from this program, got to socialize plenty with other mom, and got to play and learn the lessons so as to teach the kids and it was so fun. I took a few pictures of Matthew's art infusion projects .......

So the one on the left was from a lesson on abstract art (think Jackson Pollock) and I do remember on that particular lesson the kids were given instructions to for example "draw a blue circle, draw a red line connecting, draw (I forget what else" and how all the kids had the same components but everyone's work looked different. The picture on the right was just before the holidays and it was foam printmaking.

This one was watercolor and also practicing horizon lines, the other one is "still life" and I believe that was the only lesson I wasn't in the classroom for.....

This one is "cave painting" with chalk I believe (can't quite remember at the moment) and the kids had a good time with this lesson!

I do plan on helping out again this year....so much fun and quite frankly, I always feel it's a good excuse to be in the classroom and check out what's going on!

Oh and my "B" post? I figure I may as start a little out of order.....see my previous post on "Bounty and Boys" ! "C" will be next..... ;)