face first off the side of the planet

the title is exactly how I feel about now.  like I've fallen off the planet.  I had/have so many things I want to do here (home and the blog) but we have a nasty stomach bug making rounds and rounds and rounds and rounds in my house.  it's not fun!  if it doesn't clear up for the man of the house it's ER time for him... so, I will return when I have a healthier house.  don't give up on me yet!

how I made cookies

I made cookies this afternoon!  I am a brave woman.  here's how cookies get made in my house...  at least today how they got made.

step one - clean up the stove top and find a bowl big enough for the dough.  while looking for the bowl, find that four year old who fights sleep like a pro has passed out on the couch in a rather awkward position.  go find camera.  grumble cause the battery is low and first attempt at a pic doesn't work.  try again.  it's blurry.  try one more time.  this pic is also blurry but you have cookies that need making!  put camera away while mentally updating your FB status with the pic.  I don't have a cool phone that takes the pic and will let me post it.  and I would have to drag out the cord and then open my photo program and I'm trying to make cookies here!  back to the kitchen.

step two - find an unopened jar of peanut butter.  my recipe uses a whole jar and I am making a double batch so I need one of the big jars.  once that is found, it's time to look for a measuring cup.  oh good!  it's clean and in the cabinet.  I place that on the stove top with the bowl, spoon and jar of peanut butter.  get sugar down and measure out the amount needed.  then go to fridge and get eggs.  start cracking eggs into the measuring cup, checking them for blood (hey now, it's not uncommon in home-raised birds that are younger).  get those into the sugar.  start mixing.  realize you need a bigger spoon or a better hand.  opt for the first option and head off to find the spoon in question.

step three - save toddler.  toddler has managed to wedge his 40 pound self into an opening roughly 8 inches high by 12 inches wide (under the arm of a chair).  well, only half of him.  the back half.  I try to work him out of there but chunk is stuck!  I consider my options.  option one - leave him there and go wake up my sick hubby.  I realize that since he's sick that it's probably gonna be harder to get toddler out, probably resulting in him wanting a saw to get him out so I toss that option.  option two - attempt to break the chair.  yes, this is a good option!  no, wait, nevermind.. that is my toddler in there!  option three - shove him really hard til he goes thru.  this one fails, I tried it.  I would shove, he shoved back *sigh* so I went with option four - take off his sweat pants and diaper, protect his boy bits and slide him back thru.  SUCCESS!!

step four - go rediaper the toddler.  return to kitchen and wash hands.  finish mixing the cookie dough.  pull out pan to be used and turn on oven.  start spooning dough onto pan and mess up, several times resulting in "two-by" cookies as my children refer to them.  get so distracted by shiny things, small children and FB that you burn at least two of the six batches you make.  wait, did I say six?  oh no!  make that burn at least three of the seven batches you make.  thankfully none of them were burned to the point they couldn't be eaten, just darker than the family prefers and a little less chew to them.

step five - sample the cookies, many times.  have your helper minion sample them many times.  uh-oh!  hubby is up...  wait, he's sampling them too.  at this rate I may not need to make dinner.  oh well, there's the voice of reason.  no more cookies right now children.  off with you!

so, cookies were made and eaten.  a life was saved in the mix as well.  yes, it was life or death!  we thrive on dramatics here.  I do have two little girls after all.

are you ready for a party?

Big News!  Swag Bucks is having a party tomorrow!  they're celebrating being around for four whole years!

in addition to codes galore (rumored at being 130sb worth) there is a team challenge where you can earn bonus bucks!

there should be lots of fun and even more insanity on their Facebook page and on Twitter!

the huge part of it is that FOUR people will win $1000 each!  how awesome would that be?  so, break out the bubbly and let's celebrate!  get there early and plan to stay late.  it's gonna be awesome!!!

not already a member?  well then sign up and join in the fun with me and nearly 1 million other users! 

upgrade for momma!

for quite some time now, this is how I have been computing.

yes, my little computer sitting right next to the big gaming computer used by my beloved (side note - see that massive monitor, the one on the right?  yeah, I payed for it with money earned from SwagBucks).  no storage space or anything.  it was hard!  now, thank to a neighbor moving, I have been upgraded!  this is my new computing home....

do you see all those shelves?  the door?  the file drawers?  okay, those are pretty much hidden behind my chair.  but they are there.  it's a lot messy right now and, no, I don't plan on keeping my bread up there.  it was a quick move for me.  I had to relocate the piece of furniture that previously held my bread so until I am done organizing it, there's bread on it.  I am dedicating the door to homeschooling.  much better than the diaper box I was using.  yes, I kept all currently being used books and things in a diaper box that I carried around and stuck in odd places cause I had nowhere else to put it.  now, thanks to uber awesome neighbor (who moved away now), I have a place for it all!  my children were quite excited to be able to see the current books we are using and asked for an extra reading from one of them since they could now see it.  now blogging, GPT sites and everything else will be so much more relaxing for me.  I have a real computer home.

where's the computer for hubby you may be wondering...  well, it's still on that table.  he's happy there.  he's just a gamer afterall lol

making crayons

so, my children tend to break crayons, a lot.  I'd always heard you could melt them down and make your own so I decided to give it a whirl!  I took this mini muffin pan I have and sorted out the broken crayons into the different cups.  I tried to keep similar colors together...

I also let my daughter do some.  those would be the totally randomly colored ones.  we had a lot of fun doing it.  even better is I have crayons for Shem to use without buying those expensive toddler crayons.  this is a total win/win.

basics on how to do it.  peel all paper from crayons, sort crayons into metal nonstick pan.  put in the oven at lowest setting til they are melted.  pull out and let cool then pop them out and enjoy!  this works best with the big name brand of crayon but other brands will work too.

and then I laughed

there we were...  in one corner - toddler!  in the other corner - mom (that'd be me).  let's set the stage...

toddler is standing in a chair at the table.  mom is standing in the walkway to the kitchen which is on the other side of the table.

round 1 - mom tells toddler to sit.  toddler responds in baby gibberish while still standing and bouncing a little.

round 2 - mom repeats that toddler needs to sit in the chair.  toddler responds in baby gibberish and grabs a nearby coloring book for effect.

round 3 - getting exasperated, mom repeats the order again.  toddler, obviously unphased by the exchange, responds in more baby gibberish but emphasizes it with some finger tapping to the coloring book while reaching for the crayon box.

mom gears up for round 4.  she knows that this will be the final round.  either toddler will comply on his own or mom will move in and use her uber mom trick (pick up and tickle). 

round 4 - attempting to sound stern mom once again tells toddler to sit.  toddler barely looks up while coloring in the book, taps it a few times while once again gibbering. 

then it happened.  the battle was won and lost.  this round goes to toddler...  because mom laughed.  it was unavoidable.  how does one not laugh at a 16 month old who is that grown up and serious?  at least he was in the chair and not on the table....

I must prepare better for the next battle with this one...  he's a tough one to beat!

how crumby!

this has been a really crumby day.  not crummy, I really mean crumbs.  they are everywhere!  maybe they're not all crumbs but seriously, little tiny things you cannot see are all over the carpets, the wood floors, the linoleum too!  I vacuumed just yesterday, or was it the day before?  oh bother, whichever it was, I did it rather recently.  I know I swept the kitchen last night while making dinner - gotta get the food I always seem to drop on the floor up somehow and bending over to pick it up is entirely too much work.  to save myself the work of bending over to get it, I walk outside, get the broom and then sweep my little kitchen.  I sweep the stuff right out the door and onto the porch where I continue to sweep it out off the edge, the far edge because there's too much stuff and/or sides on the porch for me to do it right by the door.  no, I go all the way to the far side and sweep it off into the yard.  I have a dog.  I have a cat.  I have three chickens and a turkey.  therefore, this is a public service to sweep the junk outside, right?  you can't argue with that logic so don't even try!

the amount of crumbage (it's a word, I don't know why it's underlined in red!) in my house today is baffling.  yeah, I have four children and children by nature are crumb magnets or catchers or whatever but they only eat at the table or in the highchair when it comes to the toddler.  no, I'm serious!  we eat at the table!  only the table...  well, except the morning cookie from the hubby.  on his way out the door he gives each child a lemon sandwich cookie.  but there is no way that four little cookies can cause this amount of crumblies!  

perhaps some of it has come from our pants...  don't laugh!  I don't mean it like that.  I roll my jeans up.  a lot of the time hubby rolls his jeans up.  our oldest has been wearing jeans with like mega cuffs at the bottom.  when you walk around in the yard stuff flies up in there and hangs out!  it does too!  try it...  but for it to work right you may need to come to florida where there's more sand than dirt and lots of crunchy dead grass bits and come to my yard too where I have lots of leaves or needles or whatever they are from my bald cypress.  yeah, all that junk gets in the cuffs and then it falls out in the house!  technically not crumbs but still stuff under-foot.  

so, what would a rational person do?  a rational person would get out the broom and vacuum.  not me...  I came here and rambled a witty, okay, probably not so witty, blog about it.  I lost my rationality a long time ago!  probably around the birth of baby number two.  perhaps even before that.  so anyways now that I have whined about it here I am going to go tell my children to pick up everything off the floor for the umpteenth time today so I can vacuum it.  but what will happen is they will start, I will get distracted and the house will remain crumby.  they can sense my weakness....

I'm on Facebook now!

you can find me on Facebook now!  I will post my blog posts there as well as random deals I find and things like that.  check it out and give me a like...  I need likes <3

when you see a larger than average family...

as a mom of more than the socially acceptable 1.3 (or whatever percentage of a child we are allowed now) I have some thoughts and suggestions to others who see us out.

it should go without saying that our hands are full.  yes, I mean it should go without saying.  we've heard it before and sadly will hear it again.  really though, you should see how full our hearts are!

my reproductive life is really not your concern.  yes, we know what causes it and apparently some of us are better at it than average...

if each child has the same father is also not your concern.

now some suggestions.

if you see a larger family out and the children are not screaming at the top of their lungs and running all over the place, compliment the parents.  you may not see the children doing those things but I guarantee you that it feels like they are to the parents.  parents get outnumbered and it's draining trying to keep reigns on them all.  let us know we're not failing and that you noticed, it will do wonders for those parents.

if you are a friend or relative of a family with more than a couple children.  invite them over.  really, they get left out of a lot.  no, you don't have room, invite anyways.  or even offer to watch the children once in a while.  once a year is fine.   really, it's rare for parents of many to get time out together sans children.

don't assume that they need all your hand-me-down clothing but do feel free to ask as much of the time it is very appreciated.

most of all remember that they are a family.  they are real people and not freaks to be gawked at and commented on.  maybe you should try admiring them because we get told all the time that you couldn't do it ^.~

mail call!!

I love getting free things in the mail!  I just checked my mail and I have 12, yes, that's one dozen, coupons for a FREE 12 pack of coke!  they had an epic sale at my coke rewards back in december where you could get them for like 30 points.  I got as many as it would let me.  12 came today.  now to decide what to do with them.  use them?  gift them?  hmmm....

January wrap-up

so I'm going to round-up my earnings/winnings for the month of January.

SwagBucks - cashed out $100 in amazon gift cards.  5 x $5, 1 x $50 and 1 x $25 while it was on sale.

iRazoo - cashed out $20 in amazon gift cards.

instagc - cashed out $44 in amazon gift cards.

Calyp - $120ish loaded to a card (still waiting on it to load but the money was removed from Calyp this morning so I should have it in a few days *happy dance*

I did use a few other sites this past month but none enough to cash out.  January is generally an off month for me so I am more than pleased with my earnings and interested to see what I can pull off for this month.  there have been some changes to SwagBucks going on that will certainly make earning more difficult but I am hopeful that I can maintain at least $50 a month, meaning I would cash out $25 each month in $5 amazon gift cards and then either wait a month and get a $50 amazon gift card or I would get a $25 to $50 paypal.  if things change enough I will just have to put more energy into the other sites I use.  SwagBucks is my first love but I will break up with them if they do too much craziness.  okay, maybe not break up with them but they would get the silent treatment and take a back seat to the others...

so, there's my month.  I'm ready to get into this month now!  already cashed out for 2 x $5 amazon gift cards with SB.