Ice Cream Maker Giveaway

I follow a great blogger who blogs about the joys she finds in her kitchen.  This month, she is giving away two Cuisinart Ice Cream Makers from CNS Stores.  Please click HERE in order to participate in this wonderful giveaway.  Good Luck to all!!!

Myspace vs. Facebook

So, here I am again, at work...bored stiff...randomly searching the world wide web for anything to peak my interest.  Unfortunately, every hit of the "Go" button brought no more interesting items to the computer screen.  Therefore, I decided to dig into my own past.  You see, since becoming a member of Facebook, as well as many of my friends and family...yes, even my mother has an account...I have completely abandoned my orignal link to the web, Myspace.  I think I check it about every two months...but it's really for nothing since there is no activity on it.

Anyway, today I decided to check it again only this time, I wasn't looking for updates or messages.  I was looking at my profile to remember what I had written about myself and to see the qualities of that page.  I was entering the site with the full intention of deleting it but found that I couldn't do so until I transfered a lot of the items to another outlet.  Basically, I found that I love the pictures and slide shows that I have installed on that page...as well as the baby tickers telling me exactly how old my runts are...decorations of favorite quotes, and a list of my other favorites, i.e. books, movies & tv shows.  Nothing that really can't be told on another site, but it is just an odd connection.  You know, this was my first networking site...and it's a little hard to let go.  Don't worry, I'm really not that freakishly obsessed...I will delete it...but only after I transfer the information :)

So, with that in mind, I would like to share some of the items I have listed on that page for those of you who have never seen them firsthand...

My Favorite Quote

"Anyone can love the mountains but it takes a soul to love the prairie."

(I have no idea where I found this quote but it completely described me and so, I stole it)

My "Deep Thinking" Quote

"It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for what you are not."

My General Interests

Spending time with my family and friends

Scrapbooking & card making

Baking & decorating cakes

Softball & Volleyball

Yard Sales & Photography

My Music Interests

Mostly country but also christian

Moderate amounts of rock and R&B

Minimal amounts of rap

My Favorite Movies

Mr. & Mrs. Smith

The Count of Monte Cristo

Pirates of the Caribbean (all)

Sweet Home Alabama

My Favorite TV Series

LOST

Grey's Anatomy

Desperate Housewives

CSI: Miami

My Favorite Books

Lovely Bones

The Notebook

The Cottage

Northern Lights

P.S. I Love You

My Heros

Any and all individuals who risk their lives on a daily basis to protect the lives of those around them and the freedoms of this country.  All of our ancestors because let's face it America, if the children of the modern world had to go back in time and survive, we'd fail miserably. Please take the time to thank the elderly...it's because of them that you're here with your modern conveniences.

Stay tuned for more on this subject, including...my "About Me" section, favorite pictures of my 3 favorite people & how my life has changed since making these lists & filling out these sections :)

Has it really been that long?

Holy smokes!!  How fast time flies when you're busy :)  I can't believe I haven't posted since February...a big "I'm Sorry" to those of you who like to read this blog.  I'll give a quick update of our lives and if I have the time later, I'll add some pictures.

We wrapped up February with Jeylin's 6th birthday party.  I honestly can't believe he is 6 already.  I know every parent says that but it really just flies by.  We celebrated with a party at 360 Gymnastics in Clarkston.  It was a great time and very affordable...plus, I don't have to think of things to entertain the kids.  The staff there is great and we will definitely be using them more in the future.  He had wanted a football themed party for as long as I could remember but this year, in keeping with the Superbowl tradition, he chose a Colts party.  Yes, I am well aware they didn't win...curse you Hank Baskett...but, I am a Colts fan and so he is too.  We had the partyware leftover from our Superbowl party and some sent to us from Brad's cousin, Linda so that helped.  Then I found a cake design I wanted to duplicate and it turned out awesome.  For this, I will definitely post pictures later.

March was pretty uneventful until later on in the month.  Both kids started soccer and seeing as no one ever wants to coach the Kindergarten age groups, Brad and I are once again coaching Jeylin's team.  Practices work well because I chose the same time and place as Jordyn's practices but game days (Saturday) are a different story.  Jeylin plays in Lewiston and Jordyn plays in Clarkston...and usually close to the same time.  If Brad's off work, we each go in different directions.  On the days that Brad has to work, I find myself bumming rides for my daughter.  Fortunately, my great friend Anne's son is on the same team so she usually becomes my taxi service.

March was also the month we said good-bye to Brad's Grandma Opal.  In taking word's from my sister-in-law's blog, "I don't feel like "mourned" is the right word. She had led a long, good life and has now moved on to a better place where she's been reunited with loved ones and is no longer in pain."  The weekend was a nice break, even if it was spent dealing with a funeral.  I met many family members I had never met before (and I've been part of the Nielson family now since 1999) and also had a "sort-of" Nielson reunion with all of Brad's brothers.  Only 6 members of our immediate family were not there but they were missed greatly.  You might think 6 is a lot but when you consider there are altogether 19 of us...soon to be 20, it is a small number.  I will have to "borrow" some of the pictures from my sister-in-law's site as well...since I really didn't take too many.

Other than that, it's pretty much day-to-day activities.  Wake up, go to work, leave work, pick up kids, chores, head to soccer practice, dinner, sleep...and then repeat for the next day.  I did however start adding into that mix, the data entry for our annual Holy Family auction.  It's set for May 8th so we are in full force auction mode.  That takes several hours each week but it is rewarding knowing that I am helping out the school that I love.  By the way, if you or anyone you know has a special talent or skill that they might like to donate, please let me know.  I will be accepting donations up until May 7th.  Cash donations are also accepted for anyone who wants to know.  As well, the auction is open for all people and has free admission so please come and check us out.  We have a silent auction and a live auction full of wonderful items!!

That's enough for the catch-up.  I will post later about Easter and the first half of April.  Have a great day!

Too Cute For Words

A friend emailed this to me and so I thought I would share...it is stinking cute and actually quite impressive!  Make sure you pause my music player and then click the link and have your volumn turned up.  Hope you enjoy because we sure did.

TOO CUTE FOR WORDS

It's Official!!!

Kierra's potty trained!!!  Woohoo!  Actually, she has been for the past couple days but I've been too afraid to commit to writing the post and jinxing all the efforts...but, she's been so great lately, I couldn't stand it!

She is the first kid we have trained before the age of 3 and we are sooo happy!!!  She still wears pull-ups for naptimes and bedtime because she's still in a crib and the bathroom is upstairs but that soon will change.  In the near future, we plan on converting her crib to a full-size bed, giving that to Jordyn and transferring Kierra to Jordyn's twin sized bed.  Then all we have to do at nighttime or naptimes is bring the potty chair into her room and assuming she wakes up, she'll be done.

She even graduated herself to the regular toilet...at least part of the time.  I think she switches back and forth throughout the day.  She's even so good that she does both "duties" and does it on her own without telling us.  Great except she hasn't quite mastered the art of wiping so we try to notice when she's sneaking to the bathroom.

We are so excited to finally be without diapers.  I can live with pull-ups for a while...but no more diapers, halleluja!!!  We have been changing diapers since August 2001!!!  That's a long, stinky time!  What are we going to do with the extra $40 a month AND the empty drawer in our hall storage?  Ohhh, the possibilities are endless.  Okay, not quite...really, how much can we really do with an addition $40 lying around?

Well, I'm being summoned to the bathroom by the sound of pitter patter and rustling potty chair noises.  Everyone have a charming day!!!!

The Lovely Bones

For those of you who are aware of the newest movies to hit the theatres, I'm sure you're no stranger to these words.

When this book first came out, I bought it thinking it sounded interesting.  I'm not much of a reader unless something really catches my eye and peaks my interest.  For me, to just grab a book and start reading just doesn't happen.  Anyway, I remember LOVING this book the first time I read it that I was extremely happy when I heard about the movie...although, I'm still deciding if I should watch it.

For those of you who are not familiar with this book or film, it is a very good book centered around the rape and murder of a 14 year old girl in 1973.  Not a true story so it makes it a little easier to swallow but a heavy topic nonetheless.  The first time I read this book, it took me a while to convince myself to finish reading it.  I was compelled because the victim narrates the story from Heaven.  The author, Alice Sebold, jumps straight into the heaviness and details the plot of the book within the first chapter.  I must say, it's hard to even think about continuing to read this when it hits you that hard within the first 5 or so pages....but, I persevered and am glad that I did.

This book was fantastic!  Since it had been quite a long time since I had read it and with all the publicity of the movie's release, I decided to read it again.  I hadn't forgotten the complete plot but was still surprised by a lot of things I had forgotten about the book.  This time, I read it in one day...technically two if you consider I started Saturday evening but, I finished it yesterday.  I have never read a book twice before but think I will start making this a trend as it was interesting to have some idea of what was going on but to still be surprised by the little forgotten pieces.

Despite the heavy subject matter, I would recommend this book to everyone.  It's a nice, easy read and really does break away from the heart-sickening disaster and share the beauties (in the author's mind) of Heaven.  It captures like a love story, the growing and changing lives of many different characters which keep you just wanting to turn the next page.  I really think I might watch the movie now that I fully remember all that the book offered.  Has anyone seen it yet?  If so, what did you think?

Jeylin's 100-Day Project

Yesterday was the kids' 100th day of school for the 2009-10 school year.  This usually falls during Catholic Schools Week and the kids enjoy lots of fun activities and crazy dress-up days at school.

This year, I decided to help the kids make really fun and interesting projects.  I forgot to take a picture of Jordyn's project so this is just Jeylin's post.  Jordyn gave her project to her BFF Maddie so when I get a chance, I'll have her bring it down so I can take a picture of it...she only lives next door :)

All 100-day projects need to be created using 100 of some item.  The most common project I think is fruit loop necklaces, paperclip strings and other stuff.  This year, Jeylin and I decided to use pasta...oh and not just any pasta, but big pieces of rigatoni.  And what would a 100-day project be without coloring added...well, just plain boring.  So, we colored 100 pieces of rigatoni in each of the following four colors (25 per color)...

RED

YELLOW

GREEN

BLUE

Then all of the finished pieces were strung onto an extra long piece of orange rope.  Here are two pictures of the finished project and the wonderfully elated 5 year old who was so proud of his craftiness...

Dressing Herself...Part 2

Couldn't resist posting Kierra's outfit of choice for today....

She is so going to hate me when she gets older!

Water....Water....Water....

Potty time!!!  Potty training has officially started and is in full swing at the Nielson home.  Since I am not working Fridays now due to a slow stint at work, we decided to take this weekend and start potty-training Kierra.

I had this feeling that since Kierra is quite bright and seems to figure things out on her own that this would not be very difficult.  I thought that all it would take would be a coincidental pee-ing in the potty chair and a big celebration and she would have it down.  I was about half right in that assumption.

After dropping Jordyn and Jeylin off at school on Friday, I went to see my friend Dawn's new house.  Brad worked late so he started the morning with Kierra.  Unfortunately, it didn't go so well for him.  When I came home, I jumped right into it.  I immediately took the diaper off and put her in training pants.  Luckily for me, the first accident was on the linoleum in the kitchen.  I took her to the bathroom and made sure she knew what needed to happen.  I changed her into a fresh pair of training pants and set the kitchen timer for 10 minutes before we would "try" to go again.  A whole whopping eight minutes later I hear, "Mommy, uh oh."  That's right folks...eight minutes.  Again, luck was on my side and it happened in the kitchen.  So, we repeated the previous steps only this time, I set the timer for 8 minutes and again, four minutes later...."Mommy, uh oh."  Argh!!  Really????  And then one more time with the clean underwear....I'm already starting to run out of clean underwear....yikes!

Four minutes later, I set her on the potty and we waited.  Not sure how much time had passed but she finally went and the big celebration followed from Mommy.  I'm sure she thought I looked like a fool but oh well.  This is the half of my assumption that was correct!  She now knew that when she had the "urge" she needed to go sit on the potty chair....and she continued to do just that all day long.  The half that I didn't think about nor was it correct, she hasn't quite figured out the concept of taking the undies off to go potty in the chair.

By the end of the day, we were in real big girl underwear because they proved easier for her to remove and put back on.  Her little butt was so cute in those things...I totally should have taken a picture.  There were of course more accidents throughout the day but she did get the idea down of going to the potty every time the "urge" strikes.  Now if we can just continue to work on the undressing part first.

Saturday it was the same and so far today is the same as well.  Hopefully next weekend she might get that half figured out completely.  I must say though that we are lucky to have a wonderful babysitter for Kierra throughout the days that we do work.  She will keep up the work throughout the week so we don't waste valuable time and efforts.

Basically, I just wanted to say "BRAVO Kierra!!!"  Then I wanted to point out that once she is finished with diapers, we will have our own celebration.  We have been changing diapers ever since August 2, 2001 with the exception of about 3 months between Jeylin finishing training and Kierra being born.  We are definitely looking forward to the end of the training!  By the way, if anyone has any ideas of how to teach Kierra to take the undies off before sitting on the potty, do tell because this is a new scenario for us.

Little Fashion-ista

She just loves to dress herself...

...and in true Diva style, shoes are her favs....

However, I think something might be missing from her wardrobe....we'll have to work on that :)