11.30.2010

Crazy, Beautiful Days

As you may have noticed, I have been making some design changes around here lately, and I have been thinking about the title of my blog and how much it applies to life right now. 

When I titled this blog, shortly before my girls were born, I guess I had some idea that life was going to change.  I mean, I am certain that I must have realized it, but I can safely say that I did not at all realize the extent to which it would change. 

I knew there would be some crazy times, though explaining the exact chaos of adding two tiny infants into a formerly childless household is difficult to do.  It's something you have to experience to truly understand, and in retrospect, it is probably a good thing we didn't have a better grasp on what to expect for the first few weeks!

Lights!


The level of crazy has fluctuated as the months have gone by, with some stages bringing a little more crazy than others.  I still say that nothing, nothing, can be as crazy or as out-of-control as those first few weeks, but there are still some moments when I sit back and can't believe this is my life. 

As the level of crazy has changed, the beautiful moments have only increased.  At first, yes, those tiny babies were beautiful and becoming a mother was an amazing thing, but I didn't understand the depth of my love for them yet.  As my attachment to and my relationship with my girls has deepened, the sweet times have just become that much sweeter.

Wyatt & Mackenzie


Along with our best friends Kelly and Justin, we went on our first outing as a group of eight (four adults and four children under 2, including a tiny newborn!) last weekend.  We ate dinner and went to the botanical gardens walking tour of light displays.  The night was just amazing, if only for its simplicity.  As I watched our three one-year-olds run around the (blessedly) empty room at the restaurant, I realized I was looking at just one of the many crazy, beautiful moments that make our up our life.  Adults talking over whining children, digging crayon bits out of tiny mouths, finishing almost every meal with one child or another sitting in my lap and digging around on my plate, and watching our children begin what will hopefully be their own lifelong friendships...sometimes I am just overwhelmed with the simple sweetness of it all.  How did I wind up here?  How did I get so lucky?

Sometimes the crazy outweighs the beautiful, but often it's the other way around.  Put it all together and it becomes a life.  This life we are building...it's a lovely blend of a lot of crazy and even more beautiful, and I wouldn't trade a minute of it.

Bundled up

11.26.2010

Family & Football

Well, we survived the Thanksgiving holiday, and I can still fit into my jeans.  That's always a plus, right?  Our church served over 800 people this year, and as always, it was a huge blessing to be involved in serving our community that way.  It was a long day for most of us, but fun getting to spend time with family and friends. 

We were able to get a rare family photo with at least two of us looking at the camera.  (Of course, it was the two adults in the picture...but hey, we take what we get!)

Happy Thanksgiving

The girls and I were tired and still feeling a little run down after being sick over the last week, so we ended up skipping Thanksgiving with Jeremy's family.  (Did I mention that both girls have been sick again?  Mackenzie officially had an ear infection and probably Addison too.  I had the stomach virus.  Misery!!)  He was at work and I would have had to drive back with two very ill kids by myself, and I just couldn't face it.

Instead, we spent the evening hanging out with my family, watching the CNN Heroes special (we're nerds) and being entertained by two silly, slightly over-stimulated girls.

L & D

Mackenzie

DSC01547

I was a bit surprised that Addison and Mackenzie went to bed without too much of a fight, since everyone was still here and their routine was pretty off.  The bigger surprise came this morning, though, when Mackenzie slept until 8:40 and Addison slept until 9:15!!  That's the latest they have EVER slept...and it was heavenly.

I am not nearly hard-core enough to face the Black Friday crowds, so getting out to shop this morning was never a possibility for me.  I did see a tv at Wal Mart that Jeremy and I wanted for our bedroom.  It was a really good price, so I decided to see if I could get it online.  I set my alarm for 2:15 a.m., when I got up and logged on to check.  A little surprisingly, I completed a very simple and easy transaction and my bargain tv should be on my doorstep sometime this week!  I was back in bed by 2:45...mission completed.

Today was a big day for this 'house divided'.... the Alabama vs. Auburn game was this afternoon.  Unfortunately, the results were not so good for my side of the household (in other words, Alabama lost), but at least the Auburn fan is at work tonight!  : )  And Roll Tide anyway!! 

100_1652

Unfortunately, I guess their expressions make sense...

I don't know if anyone else has this problem, but I can't stand to even get on Facebook on Saturdays (or Fridays, in this case) during college football season.  People get so mean and rude over their teams.  I'm a fan and all, but I try to avoid conflict on Facebook...after all, these people are supposed to be my friends, you know?  Maybe it's a southern thing?  Ah well...in just over a month, it will all be over for another year!

Happy weekend!

11.25.2010

Happy Thanksgiving!

I don't sit down and thank God for all the blessings in my life nearly as often as I should.  There are too many good things to enumerate, but my most amazing family and friends are always near the top of the list.  I am thankful for jobs that allow us to pay our bills, a warm and cozy home, and more than enough food to keep us full (as evidenced by my waistline!).  I am thankful for the opportunity to serve a mighty God, who loves me beyond measure despite my many sins and shortcomings.
Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; His love endures forever.   -Psalm 107:1

I am thankful for a devoted, loving husband who does everything in his power to take care of his family...as well as so many others in our community. 

I am thankful for the two very special little blessings who came into my life nineteen months ago and showed me what unconditional love really looks like.  I am thankful for every hug, every kiss, and every laugh I get to share with them, and I hope for many more years full of all those things and more.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We will be spending our Thanksgiving the same way we have the last several years...serving food at our church.  A few years ago, we began a mission of offering a free Thanksgiving meal to anyone in our community who wanted to receive it.  We serve those who can't have their own meal, for whatever reason, as well as those who might be alone or might not have much family around.  Even those with large families who just don't want to cook...  We welcome anyone who would like to come and eat with us.  It is really a neat offering for our community, and I am proud that our church is the driving force for such an awesome project! 

We will eat a meal at the church with family and friends, then a later one with Jeremy's family.  He will have to work, but should be able to stop by and get nice and full while visiting with family for awhile.  All in all, I think we will have a total of FOUR Thanksgiving meals this year over a two-day period.  Cornbread dressing is probably my favorite part of the Thanksgiving meal.  It's something we don't have very often, pretty much only at Thanksgiving, and it's one of the few foods I like to eat leftover.  I expect to eat many, many servings of dressing over the coming weekend.

How many Thanksgiving meals will you have this year?  What part of the meal do you look forward to most?

Anyone braving the crowds for Black Friday shopping??  (I am planning to look for a couple of things online...but no crowds for me!)

I hope everyone has a wonderful and safe holiday!  Happy Thanksgiving!!

11.19.2010

Decisions, Decisions...

I love stationery.  Greeting cards, invitations, note cards, note pads...even a nice sheet of blank paper can make me happy.  When I worked at an event planning company a few years ago, one of my favorite things to do was look through the cards and personalized stationery.  I spent months deciding on the perfect wedding invitation and designing it just the way I wanted.

It should come as no surprise then, that I am excited to pick out our Christmas cards this year. 

Though I have browsed their website for years, I first ordered from Shutterfly last Christmas when we sent our first family photo card.  I was pretty pleased with the way they turned out, especially considering I took the pictures myself.

It's CRAZY how different my girls look this year!

Naturally, when it was time to pick birthday invitations for the girls' first birthday, I went back to Shutterfly.  There were so many cute cards that would have made wonderful invitations, but I finally settled on this one:



I am not sure exactly what look I want to achieve with this year's card, but I know I have to get it ordered soon!  There is such a variety of designs, from modern and trendy to classic and elegant, and I love them all.  Here are some of the front-runners for this year...maybe y'all can help me decide!


(maybe I just like this family?)


This is a fun way to include more pictures...




Hmmm..I guess it's obvious I have a long way to go on making a decision!  

If you're looking for a meaningful gift for family members, the calendars and photo books are an excellent way to share favorite pictures from the year.  I have not ordered either before, but several friends have created beautiful photo books that will make such fun keepsakes for the future.

If you have not tried Shutterfly before, this may be the time to start...they are doing a promotion for bloggers who do a post about Shutterfly products.  More details can be found here.

Disclaimer:  Although I am participating in a promotion to receive 50 free cards in exchange for posting about Shutterfly, all opinions expressed in this post are my own.  I have actually used Shutterfly for my cards in the past and have always been completely satisfied.

11.17.2010

Whatcha Reading? Wednesday

It's been awhile since I have talked about books, so here is a quick rundown of some of my recent reads...


It's been a few months since I read it, but Cutting for Stone is absolutely one of the best books (if not THE best) I have ever read.  I loved, loved, loved it...and I just don't know how to say it any better than that.  This is one of those books that transported me completely to a different time and place, and it was a place I didn't want to leave.  The main characters are identical twin boys, which I guess is what drew me to the book in the beginning, and their story spans several decades and settings (Ethiopia, India, and the U.S.).  The author, Abraham Verghese is actually a doctor, and his knowledge of medicine is a distinct component to the story, but not in a distracting, difficult-to-understand way.

If you are a fan of literary fiction, I highly recommend Cutting for Stone.  If you have read it, go read this article, which I saw just weeks after finishing this book...it will break your heart.


I read The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo back in Febraury, but in more recent months, I finally read the other two books in the series:  The Girl Who Played with Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest.  Although I enjoyed the Dragon Tattoo, the other two were much easier to read and ultimately, more enjoyable.  The first book in the trilogy focuses on the story of Mikael Blomkvist, and is full of technical and financial terms that make absolutely no sense to most of us.  Add to that the fact that the novels are set in Sweden, and the book becomes hard to muddle through at first.  After a few chapters, the heart of the story begins, and the story gets much better, if still complicated and confusing.  There are some violent, twisted parts of this story that are a little hard to read, but I just tried not to focus on them and made it through just fine.

The second and third books in the series are really Lisbeth Salander's story.  She is introduced in the first book, but without much insight into her mind or life.  The two latter books are much less confusing and move a lot faster than the first, and I enjoyed them much more.  The second book, The Girl Who Played with Fire was my favorite.  If you make it through the first one, keep going with the other two!


One of the more recent books I have read is The Hunger Games. This one is actually in the young-adult category, a genre I haven't picked up in awhile (well, except for the Twilight series, but that hardly counts, right?).  I had heard a lot about this book from other adult readers, but I kept deciding against it, thinking it was too science-fiction and futuristic for me.  In a way, it was just that.  The premise of the novel takes some suspended belief, for sure, and it's very, very depressing if you stop to think about it.  Once I started reading, I realized that I couldn't dwell on the emotional aspects of what was happening in the book...it would just be too disturbing.  (Anyone remember the short story "The Lottery"?  It's a similar setup here...and that story disturbed me for years--no kidding.)

I ended up liking Hunger Games more than I thought I would at first.  I didn't read in the "disturbing parallels" to our current society that some others did...I just didn't go that deep with the fictional society where the story takes place.  I got this one from the library, as it's definitely not a story I want to revisit in the future.  I plan to read the other two books in the series, but I am waiting until they are available at the library as well.


One Day is one of the most recent books I have finished.  I read the description several times on the Kindle bestsellers list before finally deciding to go for it, based on another blogger's review.  The premise of this novel is cute--it visits the two central characters on the same day (July 15) over a span of several years.  It's a setup that should have worked very well, and I did actually like the way it was written.  The problem?  I found I never actually liked the characters all that much...any of them.  At points, you are not supposed to like them, I get that.  But by the time I got to the point where I was supposed to like them, I just didn't care anymore.  I wasn't that invested.  They grew on me a little in the final chapters, but not enough to salvage my opinion of the book as a whole. 

Still, good writing and an interesting concept make it worth the effort if you're looking for something decent to pass the time.

There's a list of a few of my recent ventures...I am trying to keep a running list of this year's reads on my Read in 2010 page, though it's in need of an update right now.  What have you read lately?  Check out Rebecca's post to see what others are reading.  Better yet, write your own post and link up!

11.16.2010

Let the Countdown Begin

Growing up, we were never one of those families that decorated for Christmas the weekend after Thanksgiving.  My mom always said it was too early to start, so we waited until about the second week in December to get a tree.  We had a live Christmas tree, so I get that we couldn't get it too early or it would dry up.  Of course, it didn't really feel like Christmas until we had that tree up and decorated. 

I have a lot of my mom's practical tendencies, but now, with A & M getting ready to experience their second Christmas, I find myself ready to get the season started. 

Last year, we were between houses, living in a very temporary rental, and we didn't even put the tree up there.  I did put it up at our old house, before it sold, and it was earlier than ever before because I wanted to get some pictures of the girls for our Christmas cards.  The girls were only eight months old and didn't know the difference anyway, and it all really wasn't as bad as it could have been (not that I want to repeat the process anytime soon EVER), but I am really looking forward to Christmas in our own house this year. 

This year, the girls will know a little more about what is going on, and I am so looking forward to seeing them really experience their second Christmas.  I am planning to get the tree up the weekend after Thanksgiving...which will be in, um, a week and a half.  I have already decorated the mantle, which, by the way, is my first mantle ever.  I am so excited to have somewhere to hang our stockings--the way it's supposed to be done! 




 (Photos from www.hgtv.com)

I am also considering going all out and putting a small tree in the girls' room.  Maybe something with white, pink, and lime green...all those modern, bright colors that are fun, but have no place with my traditional Christmas decorations.  And of course, the fall wreath on my front door will soon be replaced with a holiday one.  No southern home is complete without a wreath on the front door to mark the season and welcome our guests, right?

With Thanksgiving coming up next week and Christmas a little less than six weeks to go, I would say the holiday season is upon us.  I am having fun getting into the holiday spirit and thinking of ways to make it fun for Addison and Mackenzie.

Your turn!  What are you doing to get ready for the holidays?  When is the perfect time to decorate?  Are you an all-out decorator or a just-the-tree type? 

11.15.2010

One Heck of a Week

Is it bad that I am actually glad to be at work today?? 

I guess winter is almost here...the temperature is now (mostly) below 70 degrees, and we had our first round of cold/cough this past week.  It started on Friday a week ago, when Mackenzie was sounding pretty hoarse and had a tight, raspy cough.  By Saturday afternoon, she was pretty miserable.  Saturday night was the first of several nights I spent with a child in my bed over the last week.  Saturday night would also be the first of several nights Jeremy would have to spend on the couch (though he's used to that by now.  Ha ha...just kidding, honey!).

I stayed home from church with Mackenzie Sunday morning, and she spent a large part of the day sleeping on my lap.  It was a bit of a welcome break to let Jeremy take over my Sunday school class and do the lesson for the week, but by the afternoon, I was ready to get out of the house for awhile.  Luckily, my mom stayed with Mackenzie while Jeremy, Addison, and I went to lunch with some family.  Poor Mackenzie was still pretty sick on Monday, Jeremy's day off, so she got to stay with him and get some extra daddy snuggles.  By Tuesday she was better, but still stayed out of school to be sure.  Addison was fine through Mackenzie's sickess, and I was hoping and praying she wouldn't get it.

In a bit of last-minute arranging, the girls ended up spending the night with Jeremy's mom on Wednesday night, since she had already agreed to keep them on Thursday.  I was off for Veteran's Day and wanted to do some browsing for Christmas (I say browsing because I am terrible at actually buying anything this early!).  She reported that Addison had a little bit of a fever during the night, but was okay after some Tylenol.  When I got there to pick them up Thursday afternoon, I knew Addison was starting to feel awful.  She had the same raspy cough, and I began to plan for round two of sick baby weekend.

Jeremy was kicked out of bed for another three nights this weekend, as every time Addison woke up, she would cough and cry, and I just couldn't get up every hour or so and rock her back to sleep.  I was off Friday, so I stayed with Addison all day while Mackenzie got to go play by herself at my mom's.  Saturday, Mackenzie and I went to a birthday party while Addison stayed with her daddy to rest.  I stayed home from church for the second week in a row, with the opposite sick little girl.  Mackenzie probably thinks she could get used to living like an only child and getting all the attention!

Addison seems to be on the mend today, though I'm afraid she might be getting an ear infection.  She slept in her crib last night for the first time since Tuesday night, so I'm hoping she is feeling better and maybe won't have to go to the doctor.  We decided this week that Mackenzie is definitely the better patient...she pretty much just wants to be held and rocked.  My Addie-bug, on the other hand, doesn't quite know what she wants when she feels bad, and therefore, no one is happy.  She whines and cries and points and gives you her sad-eyed look..it's just pitiful.  After several hours of trying to comfort her and/or get her to go to sleep on Saturday night, I was just about ready to lose my mind.  It was after TEN P.M. when she FINALLY laid down to sleep...and this is the child who is normally asleep by 7:30 at the latest.  Then, she was up at 11:00, 1:30, 3:00, and so on.

This week was a very cruel reminder of what sleep-deprivation feels like.  I'm hoping not to have another one anytime soon!

Needless to say, the last week or so has been quite rough, and I am not sure when I will feel caught up again.  The house is an absolute wreck, laundry is piled everywhere, and I can't find a spare inch of kitchen counter space.  When my girls are sick, though, everything else just has to wait.  Unfortunately, the laundry will still be there next week. 

Everyone has asked me what I want for Christmas this year, and I really have no good answer.  But I'm thinking maybe they could all chip in and pay for me to have a housekeeper for the next year??  Please? 

How was your weekend?  Hopefully better than mine!

11.09.2010

Family of Four

It has been 19 months now since our family doubled in size from two to four.  You would think the fact that we are now a family of four might have sunk in by now, right?  I realized the other day that maybe it hasn't yet.

The girls' MDO program is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year, and we received a note about t-shirts they are selling to mark the occasion.  I, for one, can never have enough long-sleeved t-shirts, so I knew we would be ordering.  As I filled out that order form, I noticed how quickly the numbers added up:

2 adult long-sleeve shirts @ $13.00 each=$26.00
2 kids' t-shirts @ $10.00 each=$20.00

Total cost of commemorative MDO shirts for this family of four:  a whopping $46.00!

For some reason, spending almost $50 just to outfit our family in t-shirts really brought home the fact that we are really and truly a family of four.

I think we need to be hitting up all the places that give free admission to kids under two...because once we have to start paying four admission fees, we could go broke in a hurry!! 

Shopping the sales
Mackenzie is getting a head start on saving money by shopping the sale papers.  (She was fascinated by the WalMart ad a couple of weeks ago!)

11.05.2010

Chronicles of a Sunday Dinner

Most of the time, I really, really enjoy living in a small town.  I do sometimes miss the things a bigger city has to offer, small-town living does have its benefits.

In the last few months though, I have discovered a quite unexpected downside to living in a small town with twin toddlers... In this small town, finding a restaurant that can accommodate our group for Sunday lunch (or 'dinner', as we say in the South!) has become a major ordeal.

Our usual Sunday group consists of my family (Jeremy, A & M, me, my mom, and my aunt) and BFF Kelly and her family (Kelly, her husband, and Wyatt).  So, a fairly large party, but nothing outrageous.  The important thing to note is that we need three high chairs for our group:  one each for Addison, Mackenzie, and Wyatt.  We start, and therefore, get out of church earlier than a lot of others, so we usually get to 'beat the crowd' to lunch.  So, we shouldn't be too hard to accommodate, right?  Harder than one might think, apparently.

Probably two Sundays out of the month we go to a barbecue restaurant about 15 minutes outside town.  This is an out-of-the-way place that is small and family-owned.  And yet, we have never had a problem getting a table large enough or having enough high chairs to go around.  That's one reason I love going there...the food is good, and we know we can all fit easily and comfortably.

Other Sundays, we rotate where we eat, but we find that many other choices get old quickly and we are running rather short on choices in this town.  There's a place with vegetable plate lunches, but not everyone is crazy about it, and to be honest, it's not the best food either.  There are a couple of Mexican and Chinese places, but we all have to be in the right mood to agree on those meals.  There are chain fast-food restaurants, but really, who wants that for Sunday lunch?  Some of the smaller, more unique places in town are not open on Sundays, further limiting our choices.

There is one chain sit-down restaurant in town (yep, I'll just go ahead and say it:  Ruby Tuesday) that has a good salad bar and should be a good choice for something a little different.  However...they lost our business a few months ago when we discovered they only have 3 highchairs for the entire restaurant.  Yes, THREE.  We would take up every high chair they have just with our partyalone.  And guess what?  The last time we went, there was another family with twins in there, leaving only one highchair for three babies.  How crazy is that?  Jeremy called to complain about it, and was basically told that the restaurant felt that three highchairs met their needs.  We haven't been back since.

This past Sunday, we decided to try something a little different.  It would only be my family, since our friends are staying home adjusting to life with their new addition (which, if you're counting, will soon bring our highchair requirements to four!), so we took the opportunity to go somewhere we wouldn't normally go with our "large" group. 

The first place we went was a place inside a large, old, Victorian-style house that has a yummy home-style buffet.  I knew the tables were a little crowded, as there's not a ton of room inside, but I knew they would have plenty of things the girls could eat, which I hoped would keep them occupied while we crammed in a good meal.  We got to the entrance and read the menu for the day's buffet.  It sounded SO good, and our mouths immediately started watering.  We tell the hostess we need a table for four adults and two highchairs, and guess what?  They have ONE highchair remaining, of their TWO TOTAL supply of highchairs.  About that time, another lady walks up to ask for a highchair as well.  I told her she could have it, since we would not be able to deal with one kid having to sit in someone's lap. 

Strike one.  We left and went outside to debate our options. 

We were very near another restaurant that is only open on certain Sundays, and this day happened to be one of them.  I eat lunch there sometimes, and again, I knew it was a tight squeeze inside, but figured we could make it work...if they had enough highchairs.  We walked the two blocks to the restaurant with Jeremy lamenting the wonderful lunch we had missed out on at the first place.  When we got inside restaurant #2, it was crowded and all the tables were full, but we spotted two highchairs stacked in a corner.  Score!  There was also no one else waiting for a table ahead of us, and we saw that a party at one of the large tables was paying their bill and all holding to-go boxes.  Obviously getting ready to leave, right?  Oh, but noooo...not with the luck we were having.

Mom and I stood inside to wait on the table to clear out, while Jeremy and my aunt took the girls out to walk around the sidewalk.  The group finished paying their bill, then settled back in to apparently catch up on all the week's gossip or something.  We waited patiently for five minutes...then ten minutes, while they continued to sit as if they had all the time in the world.  (Which I guess they did...they were all of a quite advanced age, and obviously had nowhere else to be on a Sunday afternoon.)

Eventually, Jeremy came in to check the status of the table, saying that the girls were getting tired and hungry.  With pointed glances in the direction of our coveted table, I told him that we might as well give it up and move on.  The older people at that table turned around to wave and smile at the girls, saying how cuuuute they were, but we just mumbled thanks and hustled them out of the restaurant...thinking, yes, we know they're cute, now get your butts up so they can be FULL and cute.  It was not my finest moment.

So, strike two.  Mom offered to take the girls home while Jeremy and I ate at the original restaurant, but by the time we got back to our cars, the place was packed and the line was out the front door.  We gave up and had a nice little lunch at Wendy's, complete with a frosty for dessert.  (My mom and aunt, on the other hand, drove to a new place in a small nearby town and had a wonderful home-cooked meal that they tried very hard NOT to rub in our faces later!)

Really, who would have thought finding a good place to eat lunch on a Sunday afternoon would be such an ordeal??  Maybe it's a sign I should start cooking at home more?

Nah, we'll just stick to our favorite little barbecue place that never lets us down!!  : )

11.03.2010

Halloween

Confession:  I have never been a big fan of Halloween.  Even as a child, it just wasn't really my thing.  I didn't put a whole lot of thought into costumes...it was usually something we threw together pretty quickly.  The candy was nice, of course, and we always carved a pumpkin when I was little, but we didn't do much trick-or-treating.  I do remember the Halloween carnivals that our middle school used to put on (they're all called "fall festivals" these days, apparently), and I really enjoyed the games, food, and prizes there.  But Halloween itself?  Meh...I can take it or leave it.

It may come as no surprise then, that I don't get carried away on costumes, etc. for the girls either.  Last year, they just wore the Alabama and Auburn cheerleader outfits they already had.  This year, I kept looking at Minnie Mouse costumes (since they watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse most mornings while I get ready for work), but they were over $20 each.  Multiply that times two, and that's over $40...a little much for this not-really-into-Halloween mama!

I ended up ordering mouse ears online for under $10 total.  I added the pink bows, paired them with polka dot dresses already in the girls' closets, tied on a ribbon belt ($2.50 for the ribbon)...and behold, we have Minnie Mouse!

Happy Halloween!

Mackenzie was NOT feeling these pictures, but Addison was posing perfectly.  Typical...they can never behave at the same time, right??

100_1611

This was our first Halloween in the new house, as well as the first Halloween the girls would semi-understand.  Our neighborhood is one of the larger established neighborhoods centrally located in town, so it usually gets tons of trick-or-treaters.  We took the girls to my dad's and a couple of friends' houses, then came back to hang out on our front porch and hand out candy.  It worked out well, and Addison and Mackenzie had fun waving at all the kids coming down the street.  They didn't pay much attention to the costumes themselves, but I was relieved they weren't scared by them.

We had a fun night hanging out with family...

100_1633

eating (a little) candy...

Addison

Candy!

balancing on the porch railing...

Pretty in pink

and climbing steps...

100_1618

before finally crashing at the end of a great Halloween night!

Long day

11.01.2010

Monday Musings...

Last week, I caught wind of a blog post published on Marie Claire's website that caused a pretty massive uproar among readers all over the internet.  The title of the article?  "Should 'Fatties' Get a Room? (Even on TV?)"  Yes, seriously, that is the title.  A national women's magazine, one that claims to support women in all aspects of life, published an article containing the word fatties in the title.  What exactly is the purpose of a post like that, if not to embarrass and offend? 

The blogger admits she has never seen Mike and Molly, the show that sparked this discussion of fat people on tv, yet she claims that by watching this show, we must be "implicitly promoting obesity".  OK...obviously obesity is unhealthy and costs millions of dollars per year in healthcare expenses...but most people don't want to be overweight, and none of that, NOTHING, in fact, makes it okay to belittle someone like that author talks about overweight people in her post.  Did she take even a fraction of a second to think about how the actors on that show might feel while reading the cruel things she wrote about them?  Not likely.

This all took place on the website of a NATIONAL MAGAZINE, I feel it bears repeating...if it were on her personal blog, it would still be distasteful (to me), but we all have the right to express our opinions.  The part that I am absolutely outraged over is that the editors at Marie Claire allowed this writer to post this hateful, judgmental, offensive drivel on their site.  That, to me, is unforgivable, and I will ensure that I do not spend my money on their publication anytime soon.

The quote from this poorly-written article that raised my blood pressure the most?  That would be this one: 
So anyway, yes, I think I'd be grossed out if I had to watch two characters with rolls and rolls of fat kissing each other ... because I'd be grossed out if I had to watch them doing anything. To be brutally honest, even in real life, I find it aesthetically displeasing to watch a very, very fat person simply walk across a room — just like I'd find it distressing if I saw a very drunk person stumbling across a bar or a heroine addict slumping in a chair.

Also?  "Heroine"=feminine version of hero.  I am fairly certain she meant to say "heroin", as in the drug. 

Is Mike and Molly classy, intelligent, outstanding tv?  No.  Jeremy and I find it entertaining enough to fill the 8:30 timeslot on Monday nights, and I will forever be a fan of Melissa McCarthy (previously known as Sookie from Gilmore Girls ...where her weight was never made an issue, I might add).  Are we inspired to gain weight until we are obese and driven to join Overeaters Anonymous like the characters on the show?  Hardly.  I guess we didn't quite get the "glorifying obesity" message of the show.
I didn't really mean to write an entire post on this stupid article, but obviously, it got under my skin.  Almost as much as the homophobic Arkansas school board member who posted on his Facebook page that he enjoyed that homosexuals "often give each other AIDS and die."  I won't go into that one here...one post can only handle so much discussion of ignorance and hate.  Thankfully, he resigned, though I fear a LOT of damage was already done.

As for me, I'm heading out to find something to lower my blood pressure!  : )

What do you think about the 'Fatties' article?  Are you shocked and outraged like me, or do you see the other side of the issue?  (Don't be afraid to disagree!)  What has your blood boiling this week?  Let it out...it feels good!