7 Questions #3

Time for the FUN!! Time for the Gentri Lee 7 questions blog link up. The best thing about this link up is the questions are different and entertaining every week. You never know what others are going to say. You get to see all kinds of different pictures and people. If you would like to join visit the link below.

I do not own very many funny pictures of my self because I am usually the one behind the camera or forgetting the camera when it is needed. So my pics will mostly always be of my family or hilarious ones I find online.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This picture is of my twins and my little sister acting crazy at the farmer’s market. This is what you get when you ask 3 preteens to pose for a picture.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And this one I had to include because I love it!!! I about to die laughing when I found this pic.

1. Do you ever have reoccurring dreams?

I don’t have recurring dreams but I have dreams that have recurring factors. Like the weird dreams I had this week. I the first dream the government was taking over everyone’s lives and was using this big machine to destroy everyone’s cars!!!! Then in the next dream the very next night the government was making women carry babies and then taking them away by c-section at full term. In the dream they made me carry a baby (even though my tubes are tied) and when it was full term they put me to sleep and took the baby. I was in freak out mode in my dream. This recurring government take over thing has got me baffled because I honestly do not believe in an eventual government take over and I have not had any conversations that would have led up to dreaming like that. And it has been a solid week since I watched Hunger Games. So I am not sure where all of this craziness came from.

2. It’s the first day of Fall (or Spring for you southern hemispherers) in a few days, what are you looking forward to most?
Snuggling with nice big sweatshirts, hot chocolate, hay rides, and strange enough I kind of look forward to it getting dark earlier so the kids have to come in right after dinner we have the best family times when it is dark outside and dinner is done we seem to do more as a family inside.

3. Because a lack of coordination, would you rather not be able to tie your shoes or cut your own food?
Absolutely tie my own shoes because there is ways to make sure that isn’t an inconvenience but not being able to cut your own food would always be an inconvenience in more ways than one.

4. Would you rather live in a house made entirely of glass or a house with no windows?
Oh this one is really hard because the first thing I do when I wake up in the morning is open my blinds and curtains to see the world. I love letting the light in and facing a new day. But if I lived in a house made of glass I would have to repair it all of the time I am a clumsy person 😦 I don’t know I think I will have to go with a house made entirely of glass because I would get way to stuffy and claustrophobic in a house with no windows.

5. Would you rather walk on you toes or heels forever?
Probably my toes I think walking on my heels that long would cause back pain (speaking from experience in the back pain area)

6. What’s your favorite sense? (you have 5 btw)

Hearing because I don’t think I could live without hearing my sweet children tell me they love me or their laughter or the sounds they make when they are sound asleep.
7. What’s your favorite movie quote of all time?
“Just keep swimming, just keep swimming, just keep swimming” I love Dori!!

If you would like to link up for this fun and cool blog hop click on the image below.

The Good Dinner

It is time for one of my favorite blog hops. I enjoy this particular blog hop because I get a lot of great recipes and meet a lot of new bloggers. If you like to try new recipes and meet new bloggers click the pic below and join in.

The Good Dinner
There is a little back story behind this recipe. I always buy a few London Broils when my local grocery store has them on sale. Which is about once a month they have them at an insanely good price, but my children were getting tired of the way I was fixing them so we decided to surf the world wide web for a new recipe. After about 30 minutes of surfing we came across this recipe and all the kids agreed that it would be the one I would try. I have to tell you that all of my children cleaned their plates and asked for seconds!! This is very rare in my house. I was so excited. From that point on this particular recipe has been appropriately named “The Good DInner.” To visit the webpage where I found this recipe click on the image at the bottom of this post.

Here is the recipe:

1 1/2 lbs flank steaks (london broil beef, top round, thick) 1 tbsp worcestershire sauce 1/2 tsp garlic powder 1/2 tsp onion powder salt pepper

2 tbsps butter (margarine) 1 shallot (finely chopped) 2 tbsps all-purpose flour 2 cups beef broth 1/4 cup steak sauce (favorite)

1	Turn broiler on. Brush meat with Worcestershire and season with onion and garlic powder and salt and pepper. I like to massage this all into the meat and let it rest while the broiler preheats.
2	Cook London broil on top rack for 6 minutes on each side, for rare to medium rare, longer for medium.
3	Remove meat from broiler and let it rest 5 minutes. IMPORTANT- do NOT skip this step. The juices will redistribute throughout the meat during this rest time and continue to cook. This will give you a very juicy steak.
4	Place a small skillet over medium heat. Melt 2 tablespoons butter, add finely chopped shallot, cook 2 minutes, then whisk in flour and cook 1 minute.
5	Add 2 cups beef broth to the pan and bring to a bubble. Cook for 2 minutes to allow the broth to reduce a little. Add 1/4 cup steak sauce and black pepper, to taste.
6	Very thinly slice the meat on an angle against the grain (the lines in the meat). The degree to which you can slice thinly slice the meat will determine how TENDER it is to cut and chew, so make sure the carving knife is sharp – the thinner the better!
7	Transfer the slices to a platter keeping them lined up as you sliced them, forming a whole steak, just sliced. Pour gravy down the center and serve any remaining gravy on the side.
8	We like this with egg noodles or a baked potato, a green salad and some crusty bread. Oh and of course a nice glass of wine!

I normally serve with egg noodles and for the kids I cut the london broil up into little pieces and put over noodles, then I put gravy over the meat and noodles. This is a must try recipe trust me you will not be disappointed.

Momma Said There Would be Days Like This

I have to be honest I am feeling a little bummed today. For the past several months I have been struggling with some serious back pain. I have been to the. Dr. a few times and finally after some x-rays I was told I have a Scoliosis Curvature!! I was a bit shocked, isn’t scoliosis found on preteen and teen girls in middle school?? I mean shouldn’t this have been found when I was younger not at the ripe age of 29!! Needless to say I am a bit confused. And to add to the confusion my regular Doctor left his practice to volunteer somewhere (which I look up to him for) but they have not found a replacement for him yet. There has been different Dr.’s in and out. Therefore, I feel like I am getting so many different opinions. One says to go to the gym and lose weight and another says no gym its to strenuous and yet another says you need water aerobics!! Which I don’t mind doing any of that if it helps I just wish I could have a solid plan. I am one who likes to know what I am doing. I want to know my actions are going to make a difference. I get so tired of having days like today where I feel like I can’t do anything. I am laid up on my couch with my laptop looking at all the things that need done around my house that are not getting done. My husband says I suffer from OCD because I like everything to be neat and clean. I can’t stand dust or my floor needing vacuumed. He of course being a man thinks the house looks just fine. And the kids could care less. So that leaves crazy Mom having a melt down inside because she wants the house vacuumed and dusted. I do wish though that I could relax about it because that would probably make days like this a lot easier to handle. It is kind of crazy as Mom’s we are always looking for a break, time to rest, however when I am ordered by the Dr. to do so I feel like my head is going to pop off. My Grandma would probably say it is my inability to handle authority, that according to her I have always had. I know, I know it is such a negative quality but it’s true. I am a leader not a follower!! And of course I think EVERYONE should follow my lead LOL. I mean seriously who does this Dr. think she is telling a woman with four children to REST!! What does that word mean?? I need a dictionary!! HAHA Now I sound like a stubborn person with a cleaning complex. I wonder how Mom’s who struggle with physical limitations do this on a daily basis. I mean I have been very sick before and had several surgeries back in 2008 but it wasn’t hard like this back then. Maybe because I was so sick I couldn’t think. But right now I am not sick I am just in pain. I really do wonder how others do it.

Are you a Mother with physical limitations? Is so please share with me how you do it? 

Disclaimer: I really do not have OCD even though my hubby thinks I do. 

My First Nomination YAY!!

I am so excited a fellow blogger friend at Love, The Skinnys nominated my blog for the Versatile Blogger Award. This is great especially since I am so new to the blogging universe. It really did make my day. Thank you Deidre very much.

THE RULES
1. Nominate up to 15 fellow bloggers who are relatively new to blogging.
2. Let the nominated bloggers know that they have been nominated for this award.
3. Share 7 random facts about yourself.
4. Thank the blogger who has nominated you.
5. Add the Versatile Blogger Award picture to your post.

7 RANDOM FACTS
1. I was a teen mother of twins.
2. I do not like anything that is artificially flavored strawberry.
3. I am allergic to Star  Anise.
4. I have an order for how I take a shower meaning wash hair, shave legs, wash face, and wash body. It has to be in that exact order every time I can not deviate from that pattern.
5. I have only been to the beach one time in my life and I did not get to swim in the ocean while I was there 😦
6. I have a habit of starting several books at once and getting the stories confused.
7. My biggest fear in the whole wide world is that any of my three girls will end up a teen mom like I was.

MY 15 NOMINEES

Structure in a Unstructured Life

Mommy’s Juice

Stealing Faith

Upward Not Inward

Make Me Up Mandy

Dimples and Delights

Family Birds Nest

Like a Bird Blog

Ashlee Nikol

Deligted

Singed Wing Angels Pad

In a Valley by the River

Eternally Significant

Second Hand Solace

Day to Day Life

Please take some time to stop by their blogs and show them some love.

LOVE TT

7 Questions #2

It is that time of week again. TIme for the 7 questions blog hop. This is my second time participating and I have to say I have been looking forward to it!!
My Funny Picture I love this picture it makes me laugh every single time I see it no matter how many times I have seen it before.

1. Do you have any weird food combinations that you love?
Actually I have a few. As No Drama Mamma stated I also eat pepper on my Cottage Cheese but that’s not all I like to eat my cottage cheese with apple sauce. My Grandma taught me to do this and I love it. Also I think that cheese and pickles taste spectacular together. Even though my tweens tell me it is ohh so gross. LOL

2. Have you ever written a blog post, published it, then immediately deleted it?
I am pretty new to the blogging game so this hasn’t happened to me yet. I am sure it will though.

3. What is a hair style you wish you could pull off but never would be brave enough to try?
Hmmm I am not very hair trendy but I would have to agree with our host that I would like to be able to pull off the pixie hair cut. Something like this…

4. Would you rather always have to use the sun to tell time or directions by the stars?
My Dad was a truck driver and has been every where he is like a walking atlas I swear it is crazy. However, I absolutely did not get this gene. If it was not for the Garmin that my dad bought me for Christmas (probably cause he was tired of me calling him for directions) I would not be able to make it from point a to point b unless I knew where I was going. So I would have to go with the sun.

5. What is a fall trend that you are excited to try?
I have to be absolutely honest here I have no idea what the fall trends are I am completely fashion stupid 😦 I am a jeans and a tshirt kind of gal, I dress up for church and when I have a home show for my direct sales business. That usually is a black skirt and whatever top I think is cute that is on sale.

6. Who is your style icon?
Oh no I am really going to have to think now. I could tell you in 2 seconds who it is not but that is not the question. I am a fan of simple beauty for the most part. I think I will say Drew Barrymore she is pretty down to earth with her dressing style.

7. What is your favorite outdoor activity?
It would be a huge toss up between softball and fishing my two favorite things to do in the summer. But in the winter I like to go sledding with the kids. In the fall/spring I like to go pick apples or strawberries.

Join us for all the blog hop fun link up here:

Are You Serious Right Now?

When I was in my late teens and twenties I was a fire cracker. I used to explode without a moments notice. And I used to have no problem what so ever telling anyone exactly what was on my mind. I was bluntly honest to a fault (okay sometimes I am still that way). However, since I decided to settle down and raise my family I have calmed down a whole lot. I have tried many ways to calm myself that most of the time work. I do crazy stuff like count to a hundred, because ten is not working. I even talk to myself!! I mean sometimes it is like a full conversation to myself, Something like this:

Self to Self: T.T. you better calm down you know what happens when you get mad!!

Self to Self: I know I know but for real this is getting out of hand if I don’t do something people are going to think they can walk all over me.

Self to Self: You remember what happened last time you lost control…. long story short a teenage girl was picking on one of my twins that was 7 at the time and I asked her politely to stop and I am serious I was polite. She went and told her mother I yelled at her and of course her mother comes out yelling at me. Anyways no time for counting to 100 or self talk. I lost my temper pretty bad that day.

Self to Self: Yea your right don’t want to do that again.

However, as you can tell from the above story my system is very flawed. I do not have a back up plan for immediate emergency temper control.  I have been tweaking that area with no such luck 😦

I am not going to complain though because I have come a very very long way. I used to not care about the consequences or how I made others feel. Now I care, I actually care a lot. But I can tell you the past couple days my system has been tested and tested and almost failed. Recently I had new neighbors move in above me and WOW!!! I am not sure I even know how to explain this. The apartments we live in are older and the walls seem as thin as paper at times and I try to remind myself of this when getting frustrated. However, the new neighbors upstairs have had a house full of people staying there since they moved in. I am not exaggerating when I say at least 10 adults at one time!!!! They play music all the time; which wouldn’t be so bad except they have the base thumping!! It rattles my pictures on my walls. The problem is I am not one that likes to report people to the office manager but I am scared that if I do try to reason with the neighbors we might meet my flawed part of my system. I truly do not want to have any problems with my neighbors but I do know something has got to give.

My biggest fear with this situation is if nothing is said the neighbors, who seem to lack common courtesy, will think its no big deal and continue to wake my children up on school nights and keeping my husband awake who is works third often. OHHH what is a damsel in distress to do??

Let’s just pray that I can fix the flaw before the situation comes to a boil. What would you do if you had disrespectful neighbors?

Disclaimer: I swear I am not crazy even though I have conversations with myself 🙂

Ughhh Mom I know!!

Does anyone else have a preteen that knows everything???

I know I sure do and actually I have two. Double trouble from the moment they were born!! They are great kids. They do well in school and haven’t got into the wrong crowd yet (which I hope never happens). However, these two think they know everything about everything about everything that there ever was to know in this whole wide world. I can be telling them something simple like “it might rain please take your umbrella to school” and the reply to me is “UGHHH Mom I know.” Okay they must be meteorologists. I might be able to give them that one, maybe they watched the weather or got it on their phone. So maybe they did know.

So here is another scenario: Me to twin #1 “Your brother needs to go to the dr tomorrow he will not be on the bus” twin to me “Ughhhh Mom I know.” Okay they must be my personal secretaries and know my schedule. There is no way possible that she knew that before I said it!! Is she reading minds now? I mean it is in my date book that is in my purse it is not written on a big calendar for everyone to see. So how does she “know” like she claims?

I am finding this age is very fun in all of these crazy kinds of ways like the boys noticing my girls. They look like little puppies following my girls around. And I am thinking in my head where did these fools come from?? But every time I try to talk to my girls about how bad, nasty, and cootified a boy is they say the oh so famous “ughhhh Mom I know.”

So either I have very intelligent super meteorologist, secretary, personal assistant, dating experts or they are trying not to talk to me. Which is a very bad idea and they know it. You see I am not always a traditional type of parent, I like to find ways outside the box to get my kids thinking. Like if you tell me I am embarrassing you when I am not doing anything to embarrass you I will MAKE sure you are embarrassed. My favorite way to embarrass my girls is to follow them around Wal-Mart singing “their” kind of music at the top of  my lungs (which is actually hilarious because I don’t know the words and I make up my own). You should have heard my rendition of “Call Me Maybe.” I think I could have won an award for it personally.

So for my unorthodox way to get the girls to start listening to me instead of always saying “UGHHH Mom I know’ is this: When I tell them something and they reply with the famous words I will sit down with pen and paper. I will them call both to them to the table with me and I will say to them “you guys are so smart and know the future I am taking notes please go on and tell me all the things you know.” They will reply with “MOOOOOMMMMM” and I will rebutle with ” OH please all powerful all knowing ladies I can not go another day without your knowledge of all the world.” HAHAHAHAHA  I made myself laugh.

The funny thing is they know if they don’t get the drift the first time I will continue and make it worse everytime in some way. I do NOT have any shame in following them around while they are outside with their friends with my pen and paper.

Of course I know that I will never totally break them of saying “Ughhh Mom I know” because it is a teen thing but I can guarantee they will think twice about saying it unless they really do know.

What do you do to get your kids attention that may be conisdered a little unorthodox?

What is YOUR Motivation?

Today the hubby and I took the kiddos to church. It was very nice to go as a family, we have not gone together in a long time. We have went separately due to schedules. The subject of the sermon today was motivation? When you do something what is your motivation?

If you are a stay at home Mom and your job is to cook, clean, grocery shop, run errands, and many more things; What is your motivation? Do you do it because if you don’t no one else will? Do you do it so people look highly upon you and think you can handle anything? Do you do it for your kids and husband because you love them?

If you are a hard-working man that works a factory job that seems never-ending and repetitive; what is your motivation? Is it because someone has to bring home the bacon? Is it to make your Dad proud? Is it to one day get to the top? Is it to have a good retirement? Do you do it because you love your wife and children which makes you want to provide for them?

 If you are a firefighter, a dancer, a foreman, a nurse, a teacher, a truck driver, a volunteer, an activist, a brick layer, an architect or whatever may be what you do; what is your motivation?

What if you could be motivated by one thing? What if you could feel good about giving your absolute best with no human recognition? What if you could be happy with exactly what you are doing right now? What if you could feel that every single job you do is for the Lord, even if it is as little as washing dishes or cleaning toilets?

I know it seems impossible to feel that way. And admittedly when my Pastor said that this morning I was thinking “what purpose could there be in washing dishes besides getting them clean.” But the more he spoke the more sense it made that where we are in life and what we are doing is exactly where God wants us to be. You can serve the Lord and Praise Him no matter who is looking, no matter who notices, and no matter your profession.

In Colossians 3:22-25 (NIV) Paul is saying just that.

“Slaves, obey your earthly masters in everything and do it, not only when their eye is on you and to win their favor, but with sincerity of heart, as working for the Lord. Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving. Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for his wrong, and there is no favoritism.”

Even though Paul addresses slaves in these passages he is still talking to us as well. We all have a job to do here on earth and most of us have earthly masters (bosses). God wants us to give every job we do are all. Do the job as if it was for Him and He was right there watching. Because it is in fact for Him and He is in fact watching.

So the question is:

Is God your motivation? Is being pleasing to the Lord your motivation? Can you be motivated to work hard and with purpose even if another human never noticed at all?

7 Questions #1

My daughter pretending to be a superhero with her blanky when she was two 🙂

 

1. I say “Jump” You say ______.
How high?

2. What is your favorite flower?
I am a big fan of Roses in every color I know that is sort of cliché but it’s true 🙂

3. If you had to choose between having plumbing or electricity, which would you choose?
Plumbing for sure my kids would never survive without it.
4. What is your go-to funny youtube video? (keep ’em clean)

No Doubt the Talking Twins is Hilarious!! They are having a serious Convo.

<iframe width=”560″ height=”315″ src=”http://www.youtube.com/embed/_JmA2ClUvUY&#8221; frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen>

 

5. Do you think dreams mean something?
Lord, I hope not because sometimes I have some mega crazy dreams. But I have had a couple of dreams that came true.

6. Do you collect anything?
Yes actually two things I have my Grandma’s Bell Collection that is very important to me and I also collect angels I have 4 shelves of them

7. You’re in a situation that is everything it should be. You’re with the right people, in the right place, doing the right things, but it doesn’t “feel” right… What do you do?
I trust my gut. If it doesn’t feel right then something is wrong. My gut has never stirred me wrong. I like to think my gut feelings come from the Holy Spirit within me.

 

Link Up Here:

Wonderful Food Wednesday Blog Hop

Who could resist a blog hop like this?? I will tell you NOT I. Family, Food, And Travel invited me to take part in this blog hop. And of course on the hills of making one of my favorite meals I had to oblige. I had done some research on clean eating a few months ago after seeing in on MoscatoMom. I came across this recipe and I was so excited to try it but had some reservations on how my kids would react with all of the veggies and green “things” (as they call them).  However, I let them all pitch in on prepping, chopping, and cooking and to my surprise my kids ate like champions!! They ate veggies that day I thought I would have to hide in food to ever get them to taste. The whole time they were eating they were commenting on how YUMMY dinner was. I was AMAZED, to say the least. So therefore, I think Clean Eating Stir Fry is a wonderful food. To get the recipe click here. Trust me you will not regret making this.

Here is a photo from the website

 

Doesn’t it just make your Mouth Water!!

Happy Blog Hopping and Wonderful Eating!!