The Sixth Sense

We, as human beings, have 5 senses.  Most human beings however have a sixth sense..common sense.  I stress the word most because you would be amazed at those people who seem to have no common sense at all. 

I was sitting at the table eating my breakfast and I was sifting through all the stuff on my table when I happened upon an empty marker package.  The warning labels on that package made me laugh...only because I feel that I have a lot of sense when it comes to the common type.  Do people really not know that a plastic bag can sufficate a child?  Do people really not know that ink of a marker can stain your carpet and clothing?  Do people really not know that the small parts of a marker can make a small child choke?  All of these warnings are on this one little package.

I have had the conversation with different people about the fact that people seem to lack this sixth sense and some people think it comes down to education, more than just what facts should be obvious to us.  It amazes me that some people don't realize that if you give a child a real gun to play with, they just might hurt someone...common sense...that if you drink alcohol when pregnant, your child might suffer the consequences later in life...common sense...that if you don't put your seatbelt on while driving, you might get hurt if you are in an accident...common sense...that if you put a baby down to sleep in a water bed, they might not wake up...common sense...that if touch a hot stove, you will get burned...common sense. 

I do believe there is a certain age at which we start learning what common sense is - we aren't born with it of course - but that age is young enough so that when we are put into situations that require us to use that sense of ours, we have it!  If it is just a lack of education more so than our own ability to use that extra sense we have, then I urge everyone in this world to pick up a magazine, look up at the billboards, read the labels, watch the news, ask someone else, read a book....the education that is needed to replace the common sense is everywhere if we just look.

SJ

Happy, Happy Birthday!

Today, March 26, 2011 is one of my favourite days of the year!  Steven Tyler, lead singer for the band Aerosmith (as if I needed to add that bit though), turns 63 years old today!  I have been in love with him and the rest of the band for almost 23 years now!!! 

It was the summer of 1988, we lived on Oak Drive in Wetaskiwin and my step-sister, Kristina, owned a big gehto blaster and a pink bedspread.  She was out on the front lawn - with her gehto blaster and pink bedspread - and she changed my life forever that day; she gave me a tape, the name of it: "Permanent Vacation", by Aerosmith.  The big hits on that tape included "Dude (Looks Like a Lady)", "Rag Doll" and "Walk This Way", that album brought them back to the top of the music world after falling off due to drugs and drinking.  They were going strong and still haven't stopped!

After seeing Steven and the rest of the band 6 times in concert and many, many, many times on t.v. and video, I get to watch him twice a week as a judge on American Idol, where the rest of the world gets to find out just what made me fall in love so many years ago!

Happy Birthday Steven!

SJ

Eating chocolate and still melting!!

Remember the famous line from The Wizard of Oz - "I'm melting" (you have to say it in the slow, drawn out way the Wicked Witch of the West does), anyway that is my new mantra...I'm melting!!  Hooray for me - 7 pounds down!  I know a little while ago I said I would never pay anyone to help me lose weight, but guess what...I lied!!  I joined Weight Watchers again - because I know it works - and look at me go!  I have never been so happy to see the three numbers that showed up on my scale today...though I remember the last time I saw those same three numbers and it almost made me cry...today it made me jump for joy (picture that, me, buck naked, flapping boobs, flapping stomach, flapping thighs, flapping all over the bathroom knowing that I am on my way to having non-flapping body parts)!! 

I am amazed at how many "points" the food I was eating is worth...and I am not talking about the junk food, just the regular food that I was always eating; my homemade banana choclate chip muffins are worth 6 points EACH!!!  Who would have ever thought that a homemade muffin could be that expensive in the world of points?  My iced tea, which I was completely and totally addicted to, had a pretty hefty price tag to it as well, so I went cold turkey and started drinking only water (with the odd diet rootbeer thrown in when a major craving occurs).  I have tried my darndest to change my eating habits - though you will not see me eating salmon or asparagus anytime soon - but I have adopted a new way of eating and realizing just what is worth putting in my mouth.  

Let me tell you about my most recent love...addiction...treat....favourite thing....DARK CHOCOLATE!  All I can say is YUM!  My mom was the one who got me here, even though she probably has no idea about this fact.  This past Christmas, she gave me a bag full of little individual chocolates - dark chocolates - which I was not really sure about since I had never tried it before and had always heard it was quite bitter.  I stuck it up in the cupboard and one day I took one out to try.  I still wasn't too sure about this new treat I had stashed away, but I tried a second one, then a third one, well the rest is history now!  The thing that I really love about dark chocolate is that it is so satisfying...just a few little squares and you have had your fix for the day!  I am in love with "Nestle Noir" bars, but the best chocolate I have ever tasted was in Fernie, B.C. in a little shop called The Beanpod, a chocolate shop where the couple who own/run it make the chocolate right there in front of you, they make trips to Ecuador to bring the cocoa beans back themselves and the she is one of only 85 certified chocolatiers in the world, so as you can only imagine it was incredible chocolate!

 ***If you are planning a trip to Fernie now, just to try the chocolate, be sure to stop in at the store called "Board Stiff"...tell the owner his sister-in-law sent you!***

I have been riding my bike in my living room too...I try to get on it everyday...and I have big plans to pump up the tires of my real bike and ride, ride, ride all summer long!  I am so determined to lose these 40 pounds and every time I step on that scale and see the numbers going down, it just motivates me that much more!  My hope is to have lost at least 15 pounds by the time we take our trip to San Francisco at the end of April.  I just want to get back into the jeans I bought at the Gap in Las Vegas just a little over a year ago now; if I can fit back into those next month, I will be the happiest person on this planet!! 

You know what the greatest thing about planning a trip to San Francisco?  That is where they make Ghirardelli Chocolate!!!

SJ

Hello, my name is Sara

I am an addict.  I am addicted to home parties. 

See, this is why I have so much crap in my house!  My mother pointed out to me today that after I posted my last blog post, I then accepted an invitation on Facebook to a home party for jewelry & candles!  I am also planning on having a Tupperware party myself...so, if you need any Tupperware, just let me know!  I am my own worst enemy.  I am sick.  I need a home party intervention!!

I just wanted to let that be known before anyone sees my Tupperware party on Facebook, or any other home party that I will be hosting, attending or selling.

SJ

Too Much Stuff

I have too much stuff!!!

STUFF (hiding underneath is my dining room table)

As I am doing my usual Monday morning routine...let me re-phrase that...as I am doing my usual Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday routine of cleaning my kitchen, sweeping my floor, picking up laundry, toys, papers, books, kids, sippy cups, soothers, etc., etc., I think to myself..."I have too much stuff!!!".  The Berenstain Bears have a book with the title "Too Much Stuff" and I have read it to my kids many times, hoping that the moral of the story will sink into their spongy little brains and keep them from being hoarders when they grow up.  Perhaps that book wasn't published when I was a kid, could that be the reason I have so much crap in my house??  Perhaps it is because even though we live in a computer using, tree hugging world, I still get stacks upon stacks of paper sent home from every school and activity our children go to.  Perhaps it's because I get emails daily from Toys R' Us tempting me from the comfort of my own home.  Perhaps it's because I have four of my own kids plus a day home.  Perhaps it's because I keep buying organizational paraphernalia in the hopes of one day getting organized.  Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps. 

Perhaps one day I will live in a house that is always neat and tidy, where I don't have toys on the floor, dishes in the sink, laundry piled up, beds un-made, floors to sweep, etc., etc.  Perhaps.

my kitchen sink in it's usual state

In the meantime though, I will keep my chin up and my shoes on - just so I don't get anything sticky stuck to the bottom of my bare feet - and I will go about my days cleaning, organizing and going crazy!!

I really have decided that I need to get rid of some of what I have and to stop buying things just because.  Just becuase they are a good deal.  Just because my kid wants it.  Just because I am bored.  Just because it is cute.  Just because.  I am hoping that by not bringing in more, using up what I have and getting rid of what I don't need, I just might become organized!! 

Years ago, when I had just started dating my husband, my Grandma said to me: "Does Greg know that you are a terrible housekeeper and bad with money?"...thanks Grandma!!  He very quickly became aware of those two things...and he still married me!  9 years of marriage and two things have not changed on bit:

1. I am still a terrible housekeeper

2. I am still bad with money

Lucky for me, I married Greg - someone who is so competely opposite of me - and he has accepted these two little quirks of mine, plus the multitude of other quirks I have! 

Well, I must go now and try to find my dining room table so I can feed the five pre-schoolers in my house, because apparently my island has been commandeered by little artists and I will now have to scrub the paint off my island, chairs and the floor, I am sure!

And Will's face!

Will...probably my biggest mess maker!

4 out of 5 pre-schoolers making beautiful art!!

SJ

A new chapter in my life.

My life has been changed today in so many ways, by one little event...my teenage daughter got her driver's license!!  I have been waiting, wanting, wishing, for this day to come for so long now (she is over 17, so that means I have been waiting even longer than first planned) and now that the day has finally arrived, I am so scared!!  I never thought that this milestone in my child's life would be cause for so much concern.  I have to say right now that my mother wasn't as crazy as we all thought she was when we were teenagers!  I will apologize here and now for all the times we did not call home as soon as we arrived at our destination!  If this is how I am feeling about my daughter getting her license, how in the world am I going to feel when she moves out on her own??  I don't think I can think about that and this in the same day! 

Natalie is just itching to get out and drive too...only problem is that her car (that she bought for $500 cash) is sitting in a snowbank, needs an inspection (because it's an '84) and needs some insurance and registration (and Greg wants her to take a drivers training course before that all happens), so that means that she will have to drive my vehicle!!  She is stoked about this of course!  I have an 8 passenger Ford Expedition - decked out with 3 carseats and 3 booster seats - as well as an IPod jack, great bass, heated seats, command start, power everything...you get the picture.  Her car on the other hand has a gas tank hidden behind the license plate, nothing power, the old cigarette lighter that actually creates fire, smells like old people (I am quoting Natalie), and no IPod jack!!  Somehow she feels that she shouldn't have to drive the kind of vehicle that she bought, she should for some reason, be able to drive a vehicle like mine!  Where does this sense of entiltlement come from?

I have thought about the entitlement issue a lot lately as I see so many young people acting in ways that scream "I am entitled to everything I want", including my very own daughter.  I was watching Dr. Phil last week and they had on a family with a very troubled teenager.  Dr. Phil said something so profound that I have been thinking about it every day since.  What he said was something like this: We (parents/adults) wonder why the children are acting the way they are, but don't think about the fact that we were the ones who raised them (to be that way).  I am not sure how he said it exactly, but it as along those lines.  Obviously, children are not born knowing their manners, boundries, expectations, etc., so we as their parents have raised them with those things in mind...but somewhere along the way we also gave our children the idea that they are equal to us.  I say this as a parent of a 17 year old girl, not someone who is looking into the window of a world I haven't lived yet.  I too take responsibilty for making the teenagers of this world so incredibly self-centered and narcassistic.  Here is the big question we all need to ask oursleves, especially those parents who are raising younger children right now (myself included): what are we planning on doing about it? 

I have said it before, but I have a very unique perspective on parenting (kind of like Michelle Dugger), I have one child who is graduating and beginning to make plans as an adult while I have three other kids who are just starting their schooling, and even one still in diapers (that issue is a whole other blog post though, and thank goodness he is not one of the ones in school yet!  LOL).  What I didn't know then, or thought I knew, and now know differently, I have the second chance so many parents will never get...and I bet my dollar most of you with grown children are saying "thank God I don't have diapers to change on one kid while I am buying a grad dress for another kid"!  That is my reality though, because while I myself was buying a grad dress I had a child in diapers!!  I am not sure where we, as parents of teenagers and young adults, went wrong with raising our kids, but somewhere along the line something changed.  Was it when they said spanking your child will ruin their lives?  Was it when they decided to give a medal to each kid in the soccer tournament...even if they lost?  Was it when they said we should use positive statements instead of saying "no" or "don't" when disciplining our kids?  Was it when they started to run Treehouse T.V. 24 hours per day?  Was it when we would decided as a society that it was not safe to let our children leave our sights for more than 10 seconds, because a bad guy is always lurking in the bushes?  Was there one event in our world or society that made us go off track?  Are we really off track, or have the kids of this world always been this way but I am just noticing it now?  I know that I was not raised to belive that I was equal to my parents and that if I wanted something, I worked and saved until I had enough to buy it myeslf. 

They say it takes a village to raise a child, I say it only takes a parent.

SJ