Not much new around here...

I hope you all are having a great 2012 so far. I did start my organizing and there's so much more to do:

It's sort of amazing how much you can get done in just a few minutes. I just keep looking at the pantry thinking it's more than I can handle and PLEASE, don't make me look at the cupboard under my bathroom sink! I try so hard to throw stuff away when I clean that one and it just keeps getting worse. :(

We went to visit our friends, Pat & Jan the other week and enjoyed a huge bonfire! The boys and Hermione had a great time.

 Patch had a ball taking some pictures of it. He has quite the eye when he wants to.

We had another fun class with Ranger Jay - that I got lost on the way to it and ran into a scary neighborhood where a woman was sitting in the middle of the street in her scooter. I should have gotten her picture ;-)

This was the most wildlife we got to see that day but I'm about to give up hope on ever seeing anything more in a crowd.

 The trees that look rather ghostly are sycamores, the bark falls off as the tree grows and the bottom of the tree has patchy (or camouflage looking) bark - therefore looking sick (Now I'll always be able to recognize a sycamore tree!)

Once I get my hands on some pinking shears, I plan on trying to make a quilt out of these t-shirts. Wish me luck on that one!

Work is still going really well. Patch keeps improving his speech and both boys still dislike school work ;-)

OH! I almost forgot! Franklin is toying with the idea of starting a foodie type of blog and has come up with the name - Wild Teen Foodie. Todd and I lean towards something like Teenage Mutant Ninja Foodie. Being that he's not all that 'wild' but likes some pretty wild things as a youngster, I think he needs help with an idea so if you have any thoughts, please share them!

Happy New Year!

Can you believe it's 2012 already? The boys decided not to believe that the world was ending on 12.12.12 when I cheered that I wouldn't have to be doing any Christmas shopping next year. ;-) They did get a kick out of this cartoon though:

2011 was an okay year. We kept thinking that things are going to get better just around the corner, next month, we will be all caught up and organized. Then in August, I got notified that I was being restructured and had to start searching for a new job. I took a little bit of time to consider alternatives, garage saling/reselling on ebay, making soaps to sell on etsy, throwing the kids to the wolves in PS and getting an out of the house job but in the meantime, I applied for job after job after job online. I am soooo thankful that a guy I could barely understand (heavy French accent) called and interviewed me. It turned out that I didn't off him my firstborn (Yes, he was that hard to understand) but offered me an excellent job with excellent people!  So, Todd and I are both employed this year and most of the bills have come down for one reason or another (except that stupid, stupid cable company!) and we really should be back on our feet soon - it seems like things keep changing and we're not quite sure what's going on in all corners yet. But, it's looking up!

2012 is the first year in many, many years that I have made some resolutions but they're not fixed goals, just general goals. I resolve to make myself a happier person this year. You should hear me laughing more. And, I'm going to be making lists and keeping myself more organized. That's it, nothing huge but being more organized should make me happier. 

Look how much my vanilla extract has changed in just two weeks. Think a resolution should take a little longer? Me too!

I am getting more training at my new job today and I am so excited to keep getting new hours and learning more about the company!

Christmas

Christmas was great this year! As I'm sitting here reflecting on 2011, it was so much better than last year. I think we are finally recovering from the layoffs that have happened and maybe we can live like real people soon. Todd and I are both in jobs we love and things are looking brighter.

Mom came up for Christmas and redid the boy's bathroom for our Christmas present. I think it's beautiful. I love the disco ball that lights up sitting on the new cabinet which has been needed in there for a while! I might have to take a shower using that as the only light. LOL Thank you Mom!!

We finally discovered the lights at Saluda Shoals this year! If I recall correctly, the were almost as nice as the lights at Lake Lanier in GA but they were less expensive and just beautiful! There was something new to see around every corner :)

And, we got to meet with Todd's mom and the rest of the family at our traditional spot - Sonny's near Greenville. This was our 3rd year. I wonder if I have pics from the previous two years...

Well, here's the 2010 picture...

I think it's time to get Patch a new coat ;-) It would be nice to get the entire family together sometime!

I am planning on making some New Year's Resolutions this year - something I rarely do.

Merry Christmas!

I hope everyone is enjoying the holiday season and gets to spend lots of time with family and loved ones.

We've been as crazy busy as the rest of you but I wanted to take some time to share what we've been doing lately. 

We've been making stuff....

Chocolate covered candy canes

 Laundry soap

Homemade vanilla extract - will be ready in about six months and I'll have plenty of it! If you want to try it, just let me know! :)

We've been going places....

The downtown lights we saw on our way to Todd's Christmas party for work - sorry, no pics of the cool ice sculptures there this year :(

Sorry, terrible pic of Occupy Columbia we saw on our way to the ballet (But, go Occupy a Job, please!)

Twas the Night Before Christmas ballet at the Koger Center - the boys even liked it! :)

One of our favorite things - a full moon hike through Phinizy swamp in Augusta, GA

We've been getting read for Christmas...

I ordered a present from Ebay - I had no idea it was coming all the way from China but it's got Chinese writing and stamps on it - pretty cool!!

My Secret Santa ornament from one of my co-workers at JustAnswer - I think one of the guys drew my name ;-) and the boys thought I should have mentioned the Gamecocks instead of the Wolverines. 

Finishing up school work for the season - you'd think he'd be happier about it!

Todd thought we should stop there with the tree...

The view from my office these days :)

Merry Christmas everyone! We hope to see you sometime soon!

Hi! Remember me?

I'm the girl that got 'restructured' and then had to hunt down a new job. While I was unemployed from a paying job, I had a full time job looking for work and was sort of surprised to find out, not all jobs are found by word of mouth. I also took advantage of the extra time (HA! Not sure there really was any!) to spend more time with the boys and trying to learn some new cost saving techniques.

Patch has been showing some interest in learning how to cook. He has been promoted from grasshopper to apprentice chef and wants to be my sous chef something fierce! I do appreciate the extra help in the kitchen. He can make eggs on his own and keeps trying to find new things to add to the eggs to make them yummy. He has also helped me make a bunch of dinners, laundry detergent and some chocolate covered candy canes today! Franklin does not seem to care to cook too much but he did help with the candy canes today. He doesn't like mint so we made some choc covered pretzel sticks for him. Franklin does seem to almost like school this year. I think it's dawning on him that he needs to know stuff but he really likes doing 8th grade math as a 7th grader.

Patch making soap

I'm trying to buy whole chickens and cut them up myself to save some money. I've done 4 so far and have 2 more in the fridge to work on - making them boneless and skinless, making stock. Saving the chicken wings to make hot wings is going to take a while - 4 chickens worth of wings will feed one of these guys - maybe... (I can hardly wait to see how they'll eat as teenagers!) And, of course, I'm trying to do some couponing. I think I only saved 20% last trip to the store but, I'm trying! I think the most I've saved is 35% but I'm not a crazy extreme couponer either ;-)

My new job is awesome! It's not community oriented like my last job but it's still very interesting and the people are GREAT! I'm working for JustAnswer.com where people get answers to their questions from verified experts. The answer everything from legal and medical, auto and appliance repairs to tarot and dream interpretation. They'll also help you with your homework - don't let the kids get any ideas though - you have to be 18 years old to be on the site ;-) They did open up an AskSanta site though - Patch asked if he'd get what he wanted for Christmas - Santa was non-committal on that answer ;-)  If your kids want to ask Santa a question, or just read what others have already asked, check this out :) http://www.justanswersanta.com  

Hope everyone is enjoying their holidays this year!!

Where to post, what to say??

So much drama on FaceBook today! Everybody seems to hate the changes and I have to say, I think there's a lot of redundancy between the new lists, what FB thinks is important to me and the running status/comment updates in the right hand column. It feels sort of like iVillage today - everybody complaining, threatening to never come back, blah, blah, blah...

I discovered Google + last night and I'm not sure what to think about that. Does this take you to me? https://plus.google.com/u/0/?gpcaz=e737f855#110652639194611001985/posts There don't seem to be a lot of people there yet so not too much activity going on. I'm also not sure what's better about it than FB.

Or, do I keep posting on iVillage? Just blog here, find a new forum to post on? I imagine I will post on a new forum if I can find a new job soon!

Maybe it would just be better to not be on the computer so often...

When one door closes another door opens...

There is more to this quote...

"When one door closes another door opens; but we so often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door, that we do not see the ones which open for us." - Alexander Graham Bell


The door has closed on my time at iVillage.com but I'm looking for that open door. I've had the feeling for a while now that with the economy so bad, and unemployment so high, the world is in for another change. Like the industrial age and now the computer age, the world is in for a new age. I just want to have an inkling of what it is and get in on the ground floor!