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Laurin and Jenny Talk

So my statuesque, beautiful, glamorous pal Laurin of Laurin and Kelly talk was interviewed by the famous Avitable on her blog the other day. The interview cracked me up and since I love to talk about myself, I left a comment telling Laurin she could interview moi. I did this once before waaay back in the dark ages soon after Em and I started this blog and it was way fun. So, here are Laurin’s questions and my answers.

1. How long have you been addicted to CVS and how did it begin?
Seriously Laurin, have you never read this blog? I said like 4,000 times in November that it was my one-year anniversary of CVSing. GAH! I am so offended. But anyhoo, it began when I found the blog Money Saving Mom and followed her CVSing tips. It quickly escalated when the tips WORKED and I began walking out of CVS paying less than $1 for $30 worth of stuff!

2. Who are you most looking forward to meeting for the first time at Blissdom 09?
Well, since I’ve already met YOU at BlissDom08, I’d have to say Rachel of A Southern Fairytale. I love that girl so much! I want to hug her until she pushes me off for like five minutes straight! (I do want to get a picture with you though, ok? But since you are 8 freaking inches taller than I am, you will need to be seated for said photo. Kthx.)

3. Just wondering how you wish to addressed at Blissdom. Her Royal Stylishness? Madame Editor? You’re a funny girl – come up with an amusing “title” for yourself!
How about Her Serene Dorkishness? Fer real. I am like Queen of the Nerds. I just play fashionable on the interwebz.

4. Even though you’re a fancy schmancy Style Editor, you must have had a bad fashion period in high school or college. Do tell, or better yet, give us the photographic evidence!
College was not a good fashion period for me. I wore jeans & sweatshirts pretty much the whole time. And I owned and wore a pair of black pants with a rainbow stripe down the side. AND I thought they were cool. Sorry, though no pictures! It would take me quite a while to dig one up and I am just too lazy. Not ashamed, just lazy. We all know I have no shame!

5. Tell us the story of the moment you and Emily decided to start the blog together, and how you came up with the great name. For extra credit, where do you see yourself in 5 years? (Hey, it IS an interview.)
I can’t remember the EXACT moment, but I will tell you it was Emily’s idea and she gets full credit. We were really trying to write a book together based on all the hilarious emails we wrote each other when we were first pregnant at the same time. But then, we just realized it would not happen until we were too old to remember what it was like. So Emily came up with the idea of starting a blog. I had blogged on MySpace but hadn’t really read any other blogs. So Em showed me a few, and we started coming up with name ideas. I came up with “Mommin’ It Up” because that’s what I would say when people called and said “What are you doing?” because all I ever did was mom stuff – wipe butts, noses, you know the drill. So instead of “livin’ it up” or “talkin’ it up” I’d say “mommin’ it up!” Em liked the name and so she came over one day and we bought the domain name and hosting. And during that “meeting” we were trying to have, the kids were being crazy, and a newly-potty-trained Joshua pooped his pants, and Emily was like, “We really should be writing this down…”. It was too funny!

Sorry, that answer was so long. Now for the extra credit: In five years both my kids will be in school, so I see myself sitting on the couch watching Regis & Kelly drinking Mountain Dew and eating Twinkies. Umm, seriously…hopefully still blogging, still on staff with Blissfully Domestic, and making enough $$ to afford a cleaning lady once a week! I am AMBITIOUS!!!

This concludes “Laurin and Jenny Talk”. (Kelly, are you like, SO JEALOUS???) If you want to play in this interview game, here’s what to do!

1. Leave me a comment saying, “Interview me.”
2. I will respond by emailing you five questions. I get to pick the questions.
3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.”

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Balance This.

“Finding balance” is quite the catchphrase isn’t it? It sounds so lovely, as though one might just come across balance somewhere, and instantly become serene and peaceful.

Let me just tell you – serene is the exact OPPOSITE of what I feel right now. I absolutely feel like I’m drowning, and I’m not sure what to do about it.

Take yesterday, for example. I woke up late, rushed to get ready and get the kids to the sitters. Once they were in the sitter’s house, I had to go back outside to pick up the trail of shoes, socks and gloves that we somehow lost in the four steps between the car and the door. I got to work late, had a few minutes to check my email, and then started a marathon meeting at 9:00, from which I had to leave early, so I could make it to my 12:00 graduate class. The bright spot of the day is that the professor didn’t puke on me, which he nearly did the week before, so at least I had that going for me. My class ran 15 minutes over, so I had to grab pretzels, M&Ms, and Diet Coke out of the vending machine and call it lunch, and book it across campus to my 1:30 meeting. That meeting lasted right up until my 3:00 meeting, from which I also had to leave early to make it to my 4:00 class. When I finally arrived home at 7:00, I felt exhausted and absolutely spent.

When I finally fell into bed at 10:00, I couldn’t even stay awake for The Office. And that, people, is not a good sign.

So right now, finding balance seems completely impossible to me. I have a full-time job, a part-time blog, two kids and I’m taking six hours of graduate study. Oh, and I also have a husband. And a house. And food that needs cooked picked up.

I just feel like I’m not doing a good job at any of those things. I’m definitely not being a good friend – I’ve bowed out of more book club meetings and American Idol viewing parties than I care to think about. Andy and I haven’t had a night out in ages. And exercising? Yeah, not so much. (Sorry Shannan and Marcy – I am a sucky running buddy).

I know I’m not alone here, but surely some of you have tips on how to make it all work. How to find balance. Or at least how to keep all the balls in the air. So help me, please!

_____________________________
This post was written for Parent Bloggers Network as part of a sweepstakes sponsored by BOCA. Check out BOCA’s balanced living site to see how you can eat better to live better.

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Dirty Ducks and Foul-Mouthed Fish

My four-year-old son is really into knock-knock jokes, and consequently, so is my two-year-old daughter. She has no idea what she’s saying or what they mean, but she thinks she’s hysterical. So the other night, while I was out running errands, my husband gave the kids fish sticks for dinner and decided to turn the fish sticks into a knock-knock joke.

Knock, knock.
Who’s there?
Fish!
Fish who?
Fish for dinner! Eat your fish sticks!

Hilarious, right? Well, my little Sophie thought it was hilarious, and kept telling it over and over, in her typical loud exuberance. Only when she tells, it, it sounds like this:

Knock, knock.
(who’s there?)
B*TCH!
(fish who?)
ha ha ha ha B*TCH! ha ha ha ha!

Yeah. As hard as we tried to get her to pronounce the “f” and the “sh” sounds, it just keeps coming out “B*TCH!” Sadly, there are few things cuter than a cutie-pie of a two-year-old screaming “B*TCH” and laughing about it. Once again, Bobby and I were in hysterics. We even got it on video. Yes, we are awesome parents! Of course Sophie felt the need to tell her new joke over and over at our house church Sunday night, so Bobby and I had some ‘splaining to do. Soph really raised some eyebrows!

Sophie’s new favorite epithet reminds me of the time Emily and I took Kate and Joshua to the Indy Children’s museum. The whole place is awesome, but as they were 21 and 23 months old at the time, respectively, we spent most of our time in the really amazing toddler area they have there. The kids especially liked the water play area with lots of boats and rubber ducks.

Kate, being the bright, verbal toddler that she was, liked picking the ducks up and saying “QUACK QUACK QUACK!”

Only it didn’t sound like “quack”. It sounded like what quack would sound like if you took out the “a” and put an “f” where the “q” is.

That’s right, Kate was cussing out the ducks! A panicked Emily kept saying, “Kate, can you say QUACK!?” To which Kate would reply, “F***, F***, F***!”

IT. WAS. AWESOME.

Because, as sad as this is, there are few things cuter than a cutie-pie-of-a-21-month old cussing out some rubber duckies.

And it also makes one very popular with the other parents in the water play area!

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