I have no qualms with admitting I’m a copycat.  But I’d like to think that this copycatting is for a good reason.

I’m copying this, sort of.

Because I need blog topics.

I want fourteen of them, because if I do fourteen more posts, I’ll get to 200.

If I get to my 200th post, I’m planning a giveaway.  It should be a pretty good one too.

Care to help?  I’ll just take the first fourteen comments.  I won’t promise the posts will be deep or lengthy or genius.  As a matter of fact, I don’t promise that for any posts.  But especially these. 

While you’re thinking about it, can I just tell you that I think the YSL Parisienne Fragrance commercial should have a parental advisory before it?!  And the new Kay Jewelers ad, for Christmas I think, with the couple in a cabin during a storm?  I keep thinking the guy is going to strangle the girl.  He gives me the creepies!

Go.  (Please?)

• You do not sleep well when The Husband is not at home.
• Look on the bright side, at least CMT was airing “Top Gun” one night.
• Find a way to say “Son, your ego is writing checks that your body can’t cash” sometime soon.
• If you’re ever watching it again, remember to mute the movie whenever Val Kilmer is on, because he smacks his gum, and mouth noises are really yucky.
• When you haven’t gotten much sleep over a four-night period, you are going to be TIRED.
• So, knowing that, if The Husband goes out of town for work again, and there is an opportunity to volunteer at Big Sister’s school, you might want to take an afternoon shift.
• Volunteering from the time you drop her off until the time you pick her up makes for a long day.
• Even longer when you’re outside for all of it.
• And even longer when much of the day your station was closest to the stereo that was playing a Radio Disney CD.
• You liked it a little too much when the music changed and you were singing along to “I’m Walking on Sunshine”.
• You almost started dancing.
• Thankfully, you hid it well by hula hooping.
• Buy a hula hoop.  No one has to know that it’s not for your daughters. 
• Or you could get a Wii Fit and do the hula hoop thing on that.
• An actual hula hoop is probably a lot cheaper.
• And you can go outside to use it.
• And your neighbors can marvel at your mad hula hooping skillz.
• As will The Husband.
• And then you will probably not get much sleep over a four-night period.

Have a great weekend!

I’ve never seen the movie, I just like the way that sounds.

I think November is my favorite month.  Even though my birthday and Valentine’s Day are both in February and I am a very greedy person who loves getting presents, I prefer the celebrations that take place in the eleventh month.

First, Thanksgiving.  I have always loved Thanksgiving, and it has always been my most favoritest holiday.  For as long as I can remember, my mom’s side of the family has gotten together for Thanksgiving.  My aunt controls the kitchen, my uncle controls the newspaper so he can read the comics aloud to us, football controls the television, and tryptophan controls nap time after the meal.  And I hope that I’m not jinxing the gathering by saying this, but Thanksgiving is typically drama-free.  I think it’s because even when many of us lived in the same area, we didn’t see each other on a very regular basis.  We weren’t around each other enough for the polite shine to wear off.  That, or I have an incredibly awesome family.  Or both.  And, my family is fun.  And funny.  And good to each other. 

Another thing I have enjoyed is how the in-laws have all just fit in so stinking well.  I’ll be honest, I was kind of worried about The Husband at first.  Until he and my cousin started picking at one another, and then I knew he’d be just fine. 

Yes, I’m ready for Thanksgiving NOW.

Also in November: Our Anniversary.  This year will be our seventh.  We’ve had a lot happen in seven years.   One dog, two kids, three moves, four surgeries, five if you count my wisdom teeth.  I love celebrating our anniversary.  And I’ll tell you, every year I ask that we watch our wedding video, and every year it gets put on the back burner and we don’t watch it.  Well, I think one year we started to, but we stopped mid-viewing because we were laughing too hard — The Husband had pulled a Raymond.  He had accidentally recorded a football game through a portion of our wedding video.  (For the record, I did NOT react like Debra — but mine was just a portion of the video, and we had another copy.  Also for the record, The Husband immediately popped the tab out of that video and the other copy we had, so that couldn’t happen again.)

Our Anniversary is something I want to celebrate every year, but I want to make a big ol’ stinking deal out of it once in a while.  This year, because we have a house now and I just like the number seven a lot.  (Plus, after this guest post was written, I had a really strong desire to go away for the weekend…)  In three more years, when I would love something sparkly.  Then after that, maybe we can slow down to making it a huge deal every five years.  But I like it to be acknowledged every year.  Just a little, “Hey, remember when we said ’til death do us part?  I’m still on board.”

So that’s why I like November.  I like it a lot, and I tend to forget that Christmas is just around the corner because I get so excited about Thanksgiving and Our Anniversary.  But I kind of feel sorry for November and Thanksgiving, and I feel like maybe I’m doing my part to keep the month and the holiday relevant.  After all, with Christmas trees up in stores in OCTOBER, it’s like Thanksgiving gets glossed over.  (Unless you live where there’s a Publix and they have that cute commercial with the little pilgrim salt and pepper shakers.  Or all the green bean casserole commercials.  Can I just tell you that I do NOT like green bean casserole?  I know that doesn’t matter, but I never got what the big deal was.  Am I the only person that doesn’t like green bean casserole?  Am I still talking inside the parentheses?)

So I am embracing the beginning of November with open arms, looking forward to all that it has in store!  I know Christmas is coming, but take some time this month to slow down and think about what you do have to be thankful for.  It could possibly make you more appreciative of what you have, and then you’ll end up being in better spirits for December!  Oooh, that could work!

• You were touched by Miley by extension when you tried on that skirt.
• You must purge all things Miley from your head.
• Listen to some Celtic Thunder, STAT!
• That’s right, Steal Away. 
• *sigh*
• You’re feeling much better now.
• Life can return to normal.
• Well, as normal as things can be when you’re gearing up to get in costume later for a party.
• Great.  Now you’re thinking about a party in your tummy.
• So yummy! So yummy!
• Quick, MORE CELTIC THUNDER!
• They will take you 500 miles from that party in your tummy.
• You’re feeling much better now.

Happy Friday!  Happy Weekend!

For the most part, I have been spared from being taken over by Miley Mania.  My older daughter heard a couple of songs from Hannah Montana (the show? the movie?  I don’t know) when she was at dance camp this summer, but for the most part she is still blissfully unaware of the tween scene.  If we’re watching a Disney movie on television and commercials for Hannah Montana or The Jonas Brothers come on, she asks that I change the channel.  I’m okay with this. 

It’s not that I have anything against them — that would be ever so hypocritical considering my NKOTB-loving past — I’m just not interested in them.  The Jonas Brothers’ videos make me giggle probably the very same way my mom giggled when Joey Joe belted out Please Don’t Go Girl, clutching the air with expressions of angst and heartache.

For the record, I was completely and totally upset with my mom when she would smirk at that video.  She was ruining my who-o-ole wor-orld.

Somehow, though, some of my friends (who shall remain linkless) have started to randomly quote Miley lyrics.  They’ve got their hands up.  They’re noddin’ their heads.  Like yeah.

I hope they’re gonna be okay.

Anyway, the other day I was shopping at Walmart.  (Which, by the way, is more difficult than it used to be because I’m afraid of somehow showing up here.)  I had a list, and I was focused.  Then a skirt in the clothing section caught my eye because it looked perfect for the costume I was trying to put together.  PERFECT!  I picked out a couple in different sizes and quickly headed to the dressing room.  I tried them on and one did fit well, but it just didn’t look right.  Mostly because I looked in the mirror and thought of something I heard quoted from the TV show, Modern Family: 

People know you’re a girl.  You don’t need to prove it to them.

So I took the skirts back, and it was then that I noticed the sign above the clothing that had caught my eye.

I have been touched by Miley.  Well, and the Max guy too.  But unknowingly, I put on something made by Miley. 

Ever since then, my tummy’s been turning. 

But I feel alright.  I’m gonna be okay.

Unless I start movin’ my hips.

Running.  The final frontier.  This is the voyage of the earthship Vanessa.  Her five-month mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out sweat and new muscles, to go boldly where this Vanessa has never gone before.

I blame Facebook, really.  If not for Facebook, I probably would have been happy with walking three times a week, trying to increase the distance and decrease my time.  But no.  I had to look at my friends on Facebook and wonder what was so appealing about running?  Why were they paying good money to get up super early on a Saturday morning to run?  Was it the t-shirt?  The goodie bag?  The chance to carb up prior to running?

I shall soon find out.  Because soon, I will be one of them.  Maybe only a couple of times, but I’m going to do it.  Yes, just do it.  (But I don’t wear Nikes.)  I’m going to start off slow with a 2-mile run.  Then there are two 5K runs that I have my eye on, one of which I have already signed up and paid for — and it’s non-refundable.  That means it’s on like Donkey Kong.

I have tried to run a little during my outings.  Yeah, it’s not happening.  Nope, not until I get one very important item.

A sports bra.

Now, I’m not afraid of a little bra shopping.  I understand the importance of proper support.  But when I saw what I had to shop for, suddenly there was a tightness in my chest as I feared… Well, a tightness on my chest.

I won’t lie.  I’m skeered.

That is the most intimidating bra I’ve ever seen in my life.  Is that titanium underneath?!  Maybe it’s the model’s body.  It’s kind of sinewy.  And I think that’s supposed to be complimentary, but it is my goal to not ever be described as sinewy.  Even though I do plan on using some weights (light ones, as my arms resemble pipe cleaners) so I don’t create a breeze when I wave, I don’t want to be sinewy. 

Still.  That bra.  That scary, scary bra.  I may have nightmares.

However, if my other nightmare ever really comes true, and someone jumps out at me from one of those crazy black vans that sit around the block, I think I can forget about gouging out an eye with my key and just swing my chest at them.  Because with a bra like that, they will probably be knocked unconscious. 

Anyway.  I will run.  I will either run like the wind or maybe just a light breeze.  But I’ll do it, and I am positive there will be a sense of accomplishment.  And maybe that is why people pay the money to get up early and run the race. 

That, or the chance to feel like they’re on COPS, chasing down a perp while wearing a bullet proof vest.

• You are being stalked.
• Don’t worry!  It’s only blog-stalking.
• Put down the deadly key-between-fingers weapon.
• Besides, you may have stalked her first.
• But, speaking of stalking, please try to remember that the girl walking past your house every afternoon is simply a student on her way home from school, not a stalker.  Or a Peeping Tom (or Thomasina).
• Try very hard to remember that, because shrieking every time you notice her walking by the window is getting old.
• And, she might refer to you as “The Lady Who Screams.”
• There are many reasons why this is not a great nickname for you around the neighborhood.
• Especially since you have only actually met two neighbors.
• That’s actually not bad considering you lived in the apartment for three years, and you still don’t know The Guy Who Lived Downstairs’ name, and he lived there before you did. 
• Oops.
• Try to remember your current neighbors’ names…
• Try…
• Oops.
• *sigh*
• Mr. Rogers would be disappointed.
• Being known as “The Lady Who Screams” might only be fair then.
• Mention of Mr. Rogers made you think of The Electric Company.
• Shhhh, don’t tell anyone that you will watch that show even if the girls are in the other room.
• You wish you had a pocket full of H’s that you weren’t afraid to use.
• Happy Friday!

It’s 11:15 pm on Wednesday night.  I am not used to being up this late.  The Phillies are on, though, and this should be the game that sends them to the World Series.  There is no point in my going to bed, because whether they’re doing well or doing poorly, The Husband is going to be expressing himself.

And that’s okay.  It’s kind of fun.

But I’m tired.

So I’m online and I’m chatting with a friend, and she tells me about a dollhouse she had when she was younger, and how her little girl is going to get it when she’s a little older.  It’s a dollhouse that is no longer made and it’s worth a bazillion dollars now.

It made me think of the dollhouse I had when I was younger.  It was handcrafted by a relative — it could’ve been my grandfather, or maybe a great-uncle.  Either way, it was nice.

My dollhouse was not home to your typical Mommy, Daddy, Brother and Sister though.  It was home to a family, though.

The Dukes. 

This was Bo.

I was a 5-year-old girl who played with the Dukes of Hazzard in her dollhouse. 

I actually had two General Lees.  One opened at the top so you could fit the Duke boys in easily.  I preferred the one that didn’t open up at the top, though.  I would slide them across the hood and the boys would go in through the windows.  It was a little more difficult to get them in the car, but it was absolutely worth for me to do things the right way.

I also carried a Dukes of Hazzard lunch box with me to school.  In kindergarten.

Yes I did.

I didn’t watch the movie that was made a few years back, because I figured they would destroy my fond memories of Bo and Luke and the rest of the crew — especially Daisy.   So I didn’t watch it.  And I won’t.  You can’t make me.

Now I want to watch the show.  Or sing the theme song.  (Click it.  You know you want to.)

Since I can’t do either at the moment, I will sit here with my fond memories of two good ol’ boys making their way, the only way they knew how.

• Today is Friday.
• Seriously.
• Not Saturday.
• Today is the day you normally do your little Note to Self thingy.
• Yes, today.  Friday.
• Not Saturday.
• Big Sister didn’t have school today, and you “slept in” until 6:30am before you got your tail out of bed to walk.
• Well, you tried to run at first.
• Until you get yourself to a sporting goods store to make a certain purchase, no more running.
• But then, after “sleeping in” and walking, you played all day. 
• Then tried to nap.
• Felt like a Saturday.
• The Husband being gone for three days must have thrown you off.
• Maybe if you hadn’t spent much of those three days simmering because he got to fly first class, you would’ve paid closer attention to what day it was.
• And maybe if you remembered today was Friday, you wouldn’t have already laid out The Girls’ clothes for church. 
• Oh well, at least you’re prepared for Sunday.
• Which is not tomorrow.

Happy Friday!

Just do it.

*swoosh*

I remember very, very clearly waking up one morning with an ache in my chest and a nagging in my heart.  I was in the midst of my divorce and had somehow come to the conclusion that the best way to make myself feel better was to drink and flirt.  Even though I had spent so much time relying on God’s faithful love to get me through the situation, I got tired.  I… grew weary of doing good.  So for a while (not long, but still too long), I took the easy road.  Drinking pretty colored drinks in funny-shaped glasses made me feel better, as did attention from the opposite sex.

But that one morning, I woke up and I could not deny that I was living a life that was a) just not me and, more importantly, b) so out of whack with what God wanted for me that I thought it was going to take forever to figure out how to get back into His good graces.  Well, what do you know, His compassions never fail and they are new every morning.  Including that morning.  So I stopped.

And, of course, I can’t tell you that I skipped merrily on my way down a yellow brick road to a life that was all rainbows and sunshine, but even as I screwed up over and over and over again, His compassions did not fail me.  I disappointed Him, but rejoicing did come. 

Those lightbulb moments have come for smaller, simpler matters too.   It doesn’t necessarily come easy to me, but I have found that for many things, I have to follow Nike’s advice.

JUST DO IT.

Walking: Just do it.  I have wanted to walk for a long time.  Walking has always been a great form of exercise for me.  Simple, yet effective.  I was walking regularly before I got pregnant with our second, and then I stopped.  One reason being an actual injury slowed me down, another reason being I used pregnancy (and then nursing) to get out of many things.  (I don’t know if I’m willing to apologize for that, though.  Pregnancy and new mommyhood are rough!)  Anyway, once the second child was through using me as her milk bar, I could have started walking again.  Could have.  Whenever I would make plans to walk, any little thing could stop me.   It’s too dark.  I didn’t get enough sleep.  I don’t have mace.  I don’t have music.  It’s too dark.

Then we moved, and I did feel safer (except for those crazy black vans), and then I found someone willing to get up at a time I didn’t know actually existed and walk with me.  So we walked.  Then one morning came and she wasn’t able to walk.  I STILL WALKED.  Then her work schedule and commute changed and she couldn’t meet me anymore.  I STILL WALKED.  Sometimes in the dark.  Sometimes without music.  Sometimes with the children.  I just did it.

And even though it’s not like I’m a total fitness freak (no offense to those of you who are, I’m just not there and don’t know if I ever will be — but more power to you, for real), I still know I’m doing more to take care of me.  First and foremost, to take care of the temple.  Secondly, I only have this one body, and I need it to last for many years with The Husband and The Girls, and I want to be able to enjoy that time.

Quiet Time: Just do it.  I have always been kind of all-or-nothing with quiet times.  Then I got to a point where I said, “If I’m just giving him a few minutes here or there, is it really worth it?  Does that really count?” 

Uh, yeah.

So one night, I went to my bookshelf and looked at the myriad of devotionals it held.  I had given myself and God one excuse or another constantly as to why each book didn’t work for me.  Oh. My. Gosh.  LAME, LAME, LAME, LAME, LAME!  So I took one out and decided I was going to just do it.  I wouldn’t just find the time, I would make the time.

Strangest thing happened the very next morning.  I got up, I walked, I got ready, and I had ten whole minutes before I had to wake the girls up.  (If you don’t have kids, please trust me when I tell you that ten whole minutes to yourself is a miracle in and of itself.)  I grabbed the devotion book that I hadn’t even cracked the spine of yet, and I told myself I would do however much I could in the time I had, but I wouldn’t rush.  If I needed to come back to it later, I would. 

Turns out that each daily devotion was only a page or two long, and I’m a pretty fast reader.  So on that first morning, I was able to read the devotion, the accompanying scripture, and then pray.  And I remembered requests that normally I would flip up to God throughout the day:  Oh yeah, so-and-so is having such-and-such going on…  And God has used that time to step on my toes, refresh my heart, and show me something new here or there.

Coincidence?  I think not.  (I don’t believe in coincidence anyway, really, but I like saying that.)

There are more things that I have just been struck with the “just do it” mentality, and maybe that’s just the Holy Spirit giving me a well-placed swift kick. 

But beyond just doing it because I’m supposed to be doing most of these things anyway, I am (too) slowly seeing that I need to be doing these things for God.  (If you leave me a comment that says nothing but “duh”, I will understand.)  How many times must I have read Colossians 3:23?!   Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men.  Not for The Husband.  Not for my daughters.  Not for anyone else, but the Lord.  Improving my well-being and making family life run smoother are simply bonus blessings.

I think my code, my motto (sorry, still watching Horton) should be… Just do it.  For God.  Duh.