Seeing straight is something that I'm longing for.

No, there's nothing wrong with my eyes, it's a figure of speech.  My desk is full of paper work that no matter how many times I try to organize it, it just gets messed up again.

I've encountered every single technical problem out there and don't have the time to sit on the phone with tech support, again, and try to get it fixed.  So I deal with it.

Normally, it wouldn't be so bad, but I'm currently doing the jobs of three people in the busiest time of the year for each position.  I'm barely holding my head above water.

I'm not working at nights or on weekends for my job because, well, I have my own stuff to do, which, again, wouldn't be a bad thing except that it's OUR busiest time of the year as a family.

And there's NOTHING that I can do about that folks.

So I grin and bear it.

Or something like that.

The additional work load will cease on Monday as I'm filling in for someone on vacation and I don't really mind, but I'm slow at what she does because, well…

I'm not her.  I don't do this often.

And my beef with all that I have to do is not so much with the amount of work, but rather the standard that I expect from myself.  It's not being met.

No one cares, really.  My boss is very good about telling me to do what I can and that he understands (I have the best boss in the world by the way) but I'm hard on myself.

So I guess there is something that I can do about all of this and that's to go easy on myself.

But today, I made a mistake.

Was it huge?  No.  It's easily fixable and I'm sure that it was taken care of when it was caught, but I was so shocked about how it was presented to me (one, being not so HUGE that it couldn't be fixed and two, because it wasn't TOTALLY my fault) that I lost it.

I was in the car with the kids on the way to church and when I hung up the phone I yelled into the phone.  I was mad.  At myself and the person who alerted me.

I was frustrated.

And when the kids asked me what was wrong, I told them the truth.

And then I looked at the phone again, picturing someone from my job on the other end, and said, "I'm doing the work of three people.  If you're looking for a miracle, call Jesus… not me."

Until next time…

Remember the Trouble Maker I interviewed not too long ago?  (She's going to pee her pants,… I linked to her voluntarily….)

Well, that was part of the Great Interview Experiment.  She left a comment under mine, so I interviewed her.

I left my comment under Katy, so she got to interview me.  Isn't she lucky?  Yeah, I know she's not.

But here's what Katy wants to know…
1.  Why did you start blogging?

I had a massive crush on my therapist and could no longer return to his office.  No.  Although, he was hot.  He had these eyes that were mysterious and the most gorgeous hair and I saw him out one night and he's a musician, and after that I couldn't look at him like a therapist anymore.  But that's not why I started blogging.  It has nothing to do with my lack of a therapist.

I started blogging for the same reasons that most of you all started blogging.  I wanted to chronicle our lives for those that don't live near me.  I don't have any biological family here and I abhor mass emailing of pictures and letters and never know who cares and who doesn't.  So I put up a blog.

I still don't know who cares and who doesn't.  And I still haven't found a new therapist.
2.  Does anything about blogging cause you stress?

I'm going to lie and say no.

But then confess my sin to my awesome God and say that yes, it really does cause me stress.

But I'm saying no to you all because if I say yes, then you'll tell me that I shouldn't blog and since I've not yet found a therapist, it's blog or take a trip to the padded room… and since we're changing insurance companies and I'm not sure how it's all working yet, I'm not sure that it will be covered, or who would take care of my children and my house isn't clean for them to come and get the kids, so I have to keep blogging.

The stress really comes from wanting to work on my blog, and not the actual blogging.  There are so many things that I want to tweak and don't have time to.  And I never have time to read and comment like I want to.  But I try.  And I'm getting better about letting it go.

I think the thought of NOT blogging causes me more stress than that actual act of blogging.

3.  When you first sit down to read blogs what is the first one you look forward to reading?

How does one answer this without playing favorites?  Although, I have admitted in the past that I do have a "must read" folder in my reader.  The Pioneer Woman is in there because I'm waiting anxiously for the next installment of From High Heels to Tractor Wheels…(hurry up, Ree, would you?) and ChapterBytes because that's a good story too (again, hurry up!)

Typically, the other blogs that are in there are those of close friends or those that I've established a great realationship with over time and through the internet.  Because I know them, I want to keep up with them.

The BFF is one.  Soliloquy is another. Redneck Mommy because I saw her boobs and once you see someone's boobs (that aren't as small as she says they are, they automatically get bumped up to the must read list if they weren't there already (Pipe down, Tanis, you were there before I saw your boobs!)

Lisa B. That Chick. and a slew of others. I have 40 on my must read list…

Post Secret is there too because, well, I'm addicted.  I want to send a secret in but I can't think of a really good one and I want mine to be selected for the website.

4.  When bored or looking to relax, what do you do (other than color your hair - LOL)?

I blog.

I read.

I write.

Those are the three things that I love to do.  I never tire of them.  Ever.  Ironic how they all intertwine, eh?

I do like to watch some tv, but even though I work for three tv stations, I don't watch much at all.
5.  What is the best part about being a single mom?

Honestly?  There's no one to blame but me for anything that happens.  In the litigious world we live in, everyone wants to blame everyone else.  And I don't have to worry about blaming anyone.  It holds a certain level of accountability that I need to keep me in line and make sure that I'm doing the right thing.

But you can bet your bottom dollar that there are times that I so badly wish I could blame someone else. 
6.  What is the hardest part about being a single mom?

Not having anyone to blame?

No.  I think the hardest part is when I'm not on top of my game. If I'm healthy, I can take on the world.  However, if I get sick, there's no one to help out and I've still got to do everything that I normally do, but while I feel like crap on a stick.

I hate to get sick.  And one would think that if this was the WORST part about being a single mom, I would take better care of myself.  But I don't.

Start lecture now…
7.  I was reading some entries and I can't quite figure out if your friends or family know of your blog and read.  Do they?

They know.  Whether they read or not, I'm not sure.  If they do, they hardly ever mention it.  I know that my ex mother-in-law reads and my ex husband.  My mother reads occassionally.  I'm an open book.  But because I know that people are reading, like parents at the school (Hi SCA MOM!!!), I'm pretty careful to keep it positive and unhurtful.

There are times that I wish I had an anonymous blog.  But when I think about why I want one?  It would be to speak ill of someone and that's not me.  Not only is it not me, but it's not the person that I want to be.
8.  Do you think you've found the sanity you desperately seek?

Nope.  And I don't think that I ever will.  Which is why it's a good name for a blog… I don't think I'll ever outgrow it.

But I'm not sure that I want to find it.  I think life would be rather dull and unentertaining.

9.  If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would it be?

I love to travel.  My wallet does not.

I would love to go back to San Francisco but I'd also like to visit Australia, Spain, France, Italy, Greece, and Germany.  White sandy beaches are nice, but, I can take them or leave them.  I want to go where there are things to see, history, structures, and culture.

10.  If you could eat anything right now..what would it be?

A scoop of peanut buter cup adn a scoop of peanut butter pie in a cup from Katie's ice cream.  I've been craving it since we went a few weeks ago.  Maybe I should take the kids for ice cream after church…

So there you have it.  All good questions and I've had fun answering them!

Hop over and see Katy and say hi!

Until next time…

A few weeks ago, Heather (remember Heather?  She's the one that made fun of my cooking skills on MY blog…) anyway, she emailed me and said that she'd be in town (and by in town, I mean an hour away) and wanted to proposed a bloggy meet-up.

I went over the top with this one.  First off, you know how I love to meet people from the internet.  I mean, it's one of my favorite things to do.  Except meet men, online.  But I think there's a difference in meeting a man on a dating site and meeting a blogger, in which you've been peeking in their "homes" for quite some time.

Anywho, I love to meet bloggers, but also?

No one, and I mean NO ONE, has ever emailed me and said, "I'm going to be in town, want to meet up?" Because no one really ever comes near here and I'm the one that's always travelling.

So I felt loved and important and was just so freakin' excited that someone wanted to meet me!!!!

At the recommendation of Katherine, (we missed you today!) we went to Flat Rock.  I love twitter which is where I posed the question.

After waiting forever for me to tell her where we were going to meet and give her directions, we settled on where we were going to eat and what time.

Guess what?

She actually showed up!

(That was my other fear, that she would just not show..no, I'm kidding.  She has never appeared to be that way…)

She was there waiting for me as I was frantically trying to access my email on my phone because I thought I gave her the wrong directions and Heather, LadyBug and I had the most delightful lunch.

We even ordered the same thing.

We talked and talked and talked some more and then we had to leave.  I wanted to take her to the Star because you can't come to Roanoke without going to the Star, but it was cloudy and raining.

Fortunately, she's coming back in January so we can try again… in the cold and snow.  It will happen!!!

But before we left, we took pictures of ourselves, so we could you know, blog about it.

Her picture on her camera is so much better and I was secretly hoping that by the time I got around to posting that she would've posted already so that I could steal hers, but I promise when it's up, I'll show it to you.  Because in hers?

All three of us are actually looking good, smiling and looking at the camera.

And LadyBug…

I just want to steal her.  And I said that outloud.

I'm pretty sure you don't want to say that outloud to someone that you just met on the internet.  I might now be labeled the scary woman… maybe that's why Heather hasn't posted yet….

But still, isn't she the CUTEST….

Really makes me want to have MORE (I know, I'm crazy, and yes, I've read the posts over the past few weeks about how my older children were driving me crazy.)

So there you have it.. go see Heather… and tell her to put up the pictures already!

Until next time…

I managed to fill my 6 hours of quiet.  I worried.  I waited.  I wondered.  Just like I said I was going to do.

I sent their first day of school pictures to everyone I knew and mentioned to a few people that it was harder for me to put Matthew on the bus today than it was the first day of kindergarten.

Perhaps they'll let me have my nurturer card back after today.

Samara arrived home first.  As ususal, she didn't come straight home… tried to hide out at the neighbors.

When I finally spotted her and called her home, the first words out of her mouth were, "Can you believe I have stupid homework on the first day of school?"

Actually, her first words were "I brought you a cupcake home but I ate all the icing off of it."

Then she complained about the homework.

I sat her right down at my desk to start on her homework.

And then the fighting began.  I can see that this homework thing is not going to get any better.  What should've taken 30 minutes took two hours.

TWO HOURS.

Welcome back, Mom.

Matthew arrived home an hour or so after Sam and I took a break from the homework drama to ask him how his day was.

His answer?

"I don't ever want to go back there."

However, there were no tears so I wasn't worried.  When I finally got out of him what had happened, and told him that it happened to lots of kids, he seemed to settle down.

When he got to his game, I told him to take his frustrations out on the kid on the field across from him.  By the end of the night, when he was asked about his day, his response?

"It was okay."

I feel confident that he will not beg me to homeschool him which is good because I can't do that.

Ever.

Not enough money in the world.  But I admire those of you who do.

It's not for us.

But the good news is, despite the long day at school and the lack of sleep the night before, the Titans beat the Cavaliers 30-6.  (And I used to be a Cavalier…)

So we're undefeated so far, but the season is still young.  And I think carrying that around makes up for the fact that you didn't know what period you were in during the day.

Until next time…

Do you hear that?

Silence.

Complete and utter silence.

And it's bittersweet that silence that I'm experiencing.

It's amazing how I can be so excited for weeks to get them out the door and then the moment that they leave, I want to scoop them back up and keep them with me.

Samara was dressed to the nines with her new dress and her Hannah Montanna sneakers, complete with 36 cupcakes to take to school and her splinted finger.

And I was not allowed to help her with the cupcakes to get to the bus stop.  I was instructed to stay at the top of the hill while she walked the younger kids to the bus stop.

Forty-five minutes later, it was time to get Matthew out the door.  That, my dear friends, was much harder.

I know that I've struggled with him growing up and going to middle school.  After orientation last week, I was no longer fearful for him and figured that all I would have to worry about was me.

However, when it was time to go to the bus, he realized that the highschoolers were there waiting.  All of a sudden, he didn't want to go to the bus.  Fear set in and I could see it on his face.

I allowed him to sit with me on the porch for just a little longer before I told him that he could wait no longer.  The fear of getting on that bus, the right bus, was raging with in his mind.

As I watched him walk down the street, I could see him wiping his tears.  My heart was so heavy and I hurt so much.  I wanted to call out to him and offer to take him to school, but I knew that it would only prolong the inevitable.  I feel confident in the decision that I made, although, had he asked me to take him, I can't be confident that I would've been so strong.

But I waited on the porch until I needed to come in for my conference call and when I went out to take the trash out, he was no longer there.

The school hasn't called to let me know that he hasn't arrived, so I gather he took my advice to ask the bus driver of whatever bus stopped if he was heading to the middle school.

Right now he's in math class.  He's already had pre-AP science.  I hope that he got his locker opened right away and was able to find his classes.  I hope that he's made a new friend and reconnected with old ones.  I hope that he's enjoying his first day of this new chapter in his life and that the tears shed on the street this morning have been replaced with laughter and smiles.

The Lord and I spent some time together after Matthew vanished behind the trees to the bus stop.  I hope Matthew feels the Lord's presense with him today and I hope that Matthew took my advice that if he got overwhelmed, that all he needed to do was shoot up a prayer and know that God was going to middle school today too.

And so here I will sit for the next six hours… waiting… wondering… worrying…

Because as anxious as I was for some peace and quiet, I now want to speed up the clock so that I can see how their first days of 4th and 6th grade were.

But for now, I'll get some work done… in the quiet… and enjoy it, knowing that my children are out there, learning to be their own person, discovering new things about themselves, others and the world.

Those are things that I can't teach them here.

Until next time…

When I was a child, my birthday was in January and my brother's birthday was in August.  Well, that hasn't changed now that I'm an adult.  I guess I should've worded that a little differently.

When I was a child, I was jealous that my brother's birthday was in August.  There seemed to be so much to do in August for a birthday and blizzards were never a threat to cancelling a party.

It seemed that something always hindered my birthday celebrations… weather, Sadaam Hussein, etc.  (And yes, I say Sadaam because I lived on the Navy Base and when there was a threat like there was with Desert Storm, they close the base for civilians, meaning that people can't come to spend the night unless their parents are military and they carry a dependant ID.

Sucks, I know.

Anyway, I've explained to Matthew (whose birthday is also in January) that Samara will probably always appear to have better things to do.  And for the most part, that's been the case.  We've had pool parties for Samara's birthday and one year we were at Disney, not to celebrate her birthday, it just so happened we were there for it.

I always felt bad for him because I've been there.

But in the last three years that's changed and I now feel for Sam.

We've had the hardest time scheduling a birthday for her.

Here's why…

Tomorrow is her birthday, but Matthew has a game.  And even if he didn't, he'd have practice.  The rest of the week is filled with practice or church.  We go camping next weekend, come home, and then we have pratice/games/church every night.  The following weekend they are with their dad.  They come home and we have practice/church/games every night.

Essentially, we have three weeks at least before I could do something for her for her birthday.

Sucks, right?

So tonight is the ONLY night that we could do anything and since we had free tickets to the last Avalance home game, I invited everyone we knew, and then some to come to the game with us.  I allowed Samara to invite four friends and then there were a bunch of people from church, Matthew and I.

Fourteen people.

I brought her friends home with me from soccer practice, that ran long, I might add.  I arranged for Matthew to ride with Pastor Man (in his new car) and one of the other boys.

I knew that when I got there, I was in need of four more tickets.

Someone gave the boys two tickets while they were waiting for me and the girls.  And so I was down to needing two and some man had tickets that he was selling 2 for $5.

I bought them.

I paid $5 to take 14 of us to the ball game.

Oh, but it gets so much better.

I stopped at the bank to get cash so that I could feed the kids.  I can't take them to the ball game and not get them a hotdog… that's un-American.

But, when we walk in the door, they hand all the kids a vocher for a free hotdog, chips and soda.

I fed 7 children and took 14 people to the ball game for $5.

FIVE DOLLARS.

And they had a blast to celebrate not only Samara's birthday but the last day of summer vacation.

And for those of you who wanted to see how my hair turned out?  There it is… right next to all that cheese…

I like it.  It's not dramatic, a little more red, but alot LESS gray.  Which is what I was going for.  It could be purple for all I care, as long as it's not GRAY.  I'm too young for grey.

And so…

After the game, I deposited all the kids and went to purchase the cupcakes and a splint.  Because I've decided that I know more than the doctor when it comes to my daughter's finger and after she fell on it twice, the tape just wasn't working for me.

But it does look better…

See?

Big Mo signed her hand.  He's the stuffed dog at the ball game.

And, I scored major cool points tonight when I gave her one of her gifts before we left the house to head to the ball field…

We jammed to the new Jonas Brothers CD all the way there and Miley Cyrus all the way home.

The girls were in heaven.

So, for the girl that gets slighted on her birthday, she didn't make out half bad… some cash in her pocket, a night at the ball game with her friends, the Jonas Brothers, a new dress, and the Hannah Montanna 3D movie that her brother bought her…

I don't think she's complaining…

Until next time…

I dye my hair.

And it's really because I'm impatient and a procrastinator that I die my hair.  Because there are other things that I should be doing, like you know?  Clean.  But I don't want to do that.

The impatience comes in to play because my friend couldn't do it.  And I wanted it done.

Now.

So I'm doing it myself.

I'll probably look like I'm ready to perform in the circus when it's all done.

And it's not done.  Because I'm blogging while I'm waiting for it to be rinsed.  Except I forgot to set the timer.  I wonder what happens if you leave hair dye in longer than you're supposed to?

Maybe I'll be bald when all is said and done.

Who knows.

And, in case you were wondering, I bought Garnier Nutrisse today.  Know why?

Because the box says, "The non-drip formula spreads easily and smells great while you color."

However, it drips and I guess I need to ask the marketing peeps at Garnier what their definition of "smells great" is.  Because, if they mean smells like wine that's been sitting in the bottle for way to long mixed with harsh chemicals, then yes.  It smells great.

And it drips.

But while I'm waiting, let me tell you a few cool things going on in the land of Heather these days…

I've got some great reviews coming up for you in the next few weeks… and if you're in the Greensboro area, please consider attending BlogHer '08 Reach Out on October 18th.  (If not, there are lots of other cities that they are coming to…)

Not only will I be there, I'll be speaking!

And I've recently been asked to be a contributor at Mommy 4-1-1 on the topic of single parenting, so please take a minute and pop over there and read my inagural post.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to go get this crap out of my hair so that I can see how much damage I've done to my hair.

Perhaps I should've done this on a night that I wasn't planning on going out…

Oh well… live and learn, right?

Until next time…

Do you know how when you're traveling to the beach you get to a certain point where you can smell the beach before you actually arrive?

And do you know how when you're starving and dinner's not quite done, but you can taste it already?

That's how I feel about the fact that school starts on Monday.

MONDAY.

I have never been so freaking excited about a Monday rolling around in my life.

Ever.

The school supplies are purchased and delivered the the respective classrooms and lockers.  Orientations and Back to School nights have been completed.

First day of school outfits have been selected.

And the kids are with their dad for the rest of the weekend.

But with the first day of school comes Samara's 9th birthday.

The big 9… her last year in the single digits and so this weekend I have to bake go to Kroger and buy 24 cupcakes.

I thought about baking them.  I WANT to bake them, but with the last few weeks being like they have, I'm going to go and buy them and not feel guilty even though I know that she's going to have a COW when she realizes that I am not baking them.

Hence the reason I'm doing it while she is at her father's.

I'm smart like that.

This is not the first time that Samara has returned to school on her birthday.  The last time though was so traumatic. It was the first day of kindergarten.  She was so afraid that NO ONE would wish her a happy birthday but as it turns out, they did.

And I made sure to tell her BOY teacher (she's not happy about this) that it was her birthday.

And now that she's arriving on her birthday AND with a broken bone, I'm sure that they will roll out the red carpet… or something like that.

And Matthew?

Well, his orientation was yesterday and I have to say that the nervousness that I had is gone.  They switched classes and afterwards I asked him who his home room teacher was.

He smiled and said, "Well.  I was in two different homerooms before I found mine."

Asking him to explain, he continued… "Well, I went in the hall when they called my name and there were two groups.  I went with the one that I thought that I was supposed to go with.  And then I got lost.  So I asked two cheerleaders who were in the hall and they took me to the room.  And then the teacher goes, 'who's name didn't i call' and when I told him mine, he said i was in the wrong room and pointed me to another room… which wasn't my room, but the next one down was.  So I got there right as they were all going to learn to open their lockers."

And he laughed through all of this.

A year ago?  A huge meltdown would've happened right there in the halls of Hidden Valley Middle School.

I think we're going to have a good year…

and it's so close….

so close…

I can actually hear the peace and quiet from the hours of 8-2.

Until next time…

My daughter is referred to as my "mini-me" alot.  We look alike.  We act alike.  We share many similar behavioral traits in addition to our physical traits.  I can't think of one thing that we are not alike in, including our non-ability to be graceful.

I can trip over nothing.  So can she.  I can walk into things.  So can she.

We're just talented like that.

We make people look at us, shake their heads, make sure we're okay and then laugh their heads off.

Laughter is truly the best medicine and we're medicating people one fall at a time.

There should be a Nobel Peace Prize for that.  We would be the recipients every year.

Last night, I was sitting here editing a video to enter in a contest.  It might have had something to do with a song with a name like "Baby Got Back" but I convinced the kids that we should do this.  Sam had a friend over and we were having a good time.

What?

That's not what you do on a Thursday night at midnight?  I would've never known.

Anywho, after we shot the video, the kids scurried out of the office to remove their bling and other assorted costume items and I sat down in my chair that has been ripped to shreds by our cat to commence the video editing, a task that I have a love/hate relationship with.

No sooner did I finish, and begin to upload the video to YouTube, waiting anxiously so that I could post the link and enter the contest, quite pleased with the end result, I heard a horrible scream come from the middle room.

Samara came out to the office and could barely speak which she stood in front of me with her hand clenched to her chest.

There was no doubt about it, these were real tears.

And real tears?  I can't handle.  Those fake ones?  The oh, I really want attention so I'll sit here and whine and cry and milk it for all it's worth?  I can handle those.  I simply ignore them, tell them that a band-aid is only for hurts that are bleeding and send them on their way.

Mother of the year material, I am.  ::snort::

As I try to calm her down, and look at her hand, she keeps screaming as if someone has cut it off and by the time she finally tells me what happens and shows me her hand, I knew immediately that something wasn't right.

Now, here's where I HATE how my brain works.

When she showed me her hand, my first thought was "Live Long and Prosper" because I'm dead serious when I tell you that her fingers were naturally falling that way.  So, I know that something is wrong.  But even still, I make her show me her good hand so that I can compare.

I'm inspecting, poking, prodding, and in essence causing her way more pain than I probably should have because I needed to rule out a trip to the emergency room.  And please know, it's not because I don't care that my daughter is in severe pain but who wants to go to the ER?  At 12:30 at night?   When you have a houseguest? And when you're supposed to be up for middle school orientation and get three kids around and out the door by 8:30?

Feel my pain?  I thought so.

So I did what any mother who has never had a broken bone in her life does… I called my friend, the nurse, and woke her up.

Friend:  Hello?

Me:  Hey.  I don't mean to wake you up, but um, how do you know if you've broken a finger?

Friend:  What did you do?

Me:  It's not me.  It's Sam.

Friend:  What happened?

Me:  Well, I was sitting here editing a video because entering a contest at midnight is what most people do when their child was entrusted to their care and they just left the office and Sam fell up the stairs and into the wall and now she's screaming and she looks like Spock.

Friend:  Spock?

Me:  Yeah, like her fingers look like Spock, Live Long and Prosper

Friend:  Is it swollen?

Me:  No.

Friend:  Can she move her fingers?

Me: (to Sam) Can you move your fingers?

Sam:  Shakes head no

Me:  Can you really not move them or does it hurt to move it?

Sam:  (trying to move her fingers) It hurts.

Me: (to my friend) She can kinda move them.

Friend:  Well, if it's not swollen and she can move it than it's not broken.  Ice it and look at it in the morning.

Me:  Ok.  Go back to sleep.

So I get off the phone with her and I go to find the ice pack, which at our house is a bag of frozen peas and corn.  However, the peas and corn has been frosted and defrosted one too many times, so I loaded her and her friend up in the car and we headed to Walgreens.

Yes, at one o'clock in the morning.  In their pajamas.

We bought some instant ice packs and coffee creamer and doughnuts, since we were there, and we came home.  I put the kids to bed and iced her hand and gave her motrin.

This morning, I got the kids up and the moment she pulled her hand out from under the covers, I wanted to faint.

I mean, faint.

On the floor.

It was blue.

It was HUGE.

That doesn't even do it justice…

So I walked right out to my desk and called the doctor to make an appointment feeling really crappy that I didn't take her to the ER hours before.

In fact, at the doctor's office when my friend saw it, I looked at her and asked, "I should've taken her to the ER last night, shouldn't I have?"

She told me that it wouldn't have made a difference.

Dr. Payne (lovely name for a doctor, don't you think?) examined it and sent us for x-rays.  You know that your child has a GREAT injury when the nurses and doctors and xray techs ask what the problem is and when they see the injury they give this "eew" response.

And what's even better is that every person we talked to asked her what happened and she would respond with "I fell up the stairs and into the wall trying to go to the bathroom" and we would all ROLL.  I mean, tears in our eyes, laughing.

I was embarrassed the first time she told people.  It would've been much cooler to say, "I was skateboarding down the street and fell" or "I was in the middle of a fierce game of soccer and it happened" but have to admit that it was MUCH better than her telling people that I beat her or something, which is ALWAYS my fear.  Especially since Matthew is a walking bruise, Lord knows what those people thought I did to my children.  I just kept throwing words like football and soccer around so they would know that we are a sport family.

But, I love Dr. Payne.  When we were not back in 30 minutes, he called down there looking for us.  We were quickly ushered back to the room and the pictures of the spock hand were taken.

When we went back to Dr. Payne's office, he told us that she had an angular fracture and that because of the way that it was broken, we had to go see an orthopedic doctor.

Great.

Did you know that I'm in the middle of switching insurance companies?  All I can think about is how this is going to slip through the cracks and not about how it shouldn't matter what this costs because if you don't take care of this your child could potentially be Spock's stunt double for the rest of her life.

The orthopedic doctor came in, looked at her hand, told me that because of her age and the way that it was fractured that some tape for four weeks would do the trick, handed me two rolls of tape for my trouble, and was ready to send me on my way.

"Could you show me how to tape it up before we leave?" I had to ask.  I mean seriously?  All this money the guy is making he could at least tape up my kid's bruised and broken fingers.  So he did and then Sam posed the question about soccer.

"Well, are you competitive?" he asked.  "I like to win," she replied.

"Are you the goalie?"

"No, I'm a midfielder." she responded matter-of-factly.

"Then you can play, just tape up three fingers instead of two.  I want that finger to be supported," he told her.

I was floored.  She was ecstatic that she won't have to miss her first EIGHT AM game tomorrow.  I was a little bummed, I'll be honest, because eight am?

I'm not even UP at 8am, let alone, alert and moving at that time.

But she's ready.

And I'm convinced that we'll be back at the ER before four weeks is up…

Until next time…

If you're anything like me, you have TONS of digital pictures but many of them still reside on your harddrive and if you have taken the steps to print them out, they reside in a box on your craft table waiting for you to find the time to do something with them.

I've even given up the hope that I will get them all in a scrapbook and have settled for just getting them in picture albums.

But that hasn't happened yet either.

I'll be honest, I use several different places to print my pictures but sadly the last time I had pictures printed was January when I returned from Set Apart.  I typically look for new places that have a free member offer with sign up or wait until someone has a sale for 9 cent prints.

But one of my favorite places to get my pictures "developed" is Shutterfly.  They have a very easy upload process, have my prints delivered in no time flat and they are always the best quality.

And right now?  They have some pretty great specials that are going on, so I thought that I would pass them along to you.

New member's offer: Get 50 free 4×6 prints and an 11×14 Collage Poster when you join Shutterfly.

Shutterfly: 15% Off Orders of $25+. Use coupon code: AF63-AG08. (Expires 9-9-08)

Shutterfly - $.15 4×6 print sale. Valid 8-21-08 to 09-08-08.

Since I'm already a member, I'll be taking them up on the offer of not only the cheaper prints, but also on the 15% off. My Mom's birthday is coming up and I'd love to send her something customized with the kids' picture on it.

So how about you? What's your favorite online developer? Are you good about getting your pictures actually off your camera and computer and into a scrapbook or photo album?

Until next time…