Do these teeball shorts make my butt look big?

I woke up at 3:45 a.m. My back hurt. I cleaned a little, had some grits, drank some water, read yesterday's paper and now I'm heading back to bed.

First, though, I'll let you know that I can't believe that Miles heads back to school in 2 weeks. I am anxious to know who her teacher will be but we can't find out until August 3rd this year. Miles makes me so proud to be her mother. She reads so well and her art? Yeah, it's off the hook for 6 3/4 years old. She is also an entrepreneur. She is producing drawings every day to sell in my booth at the Greenway Art Show for $1 each. Bless her heart. She is taking on the role of big sister and role model very well on most days. Sure, sometimes she shows her baby sister how to drag a bar stool to the front door and undo the chain lock, and sure, sometimes she encourages Lola to draw on the bathroom floor with toothpaste, but she sure is pretty and smart and talented.

Little Lo is growing up like crazy. Her newest fascination is taking care of her baby dolls. Now she's always liked them, but this is different. She is a precious Momma to her babies. All seven of them. They get their babas one after the other, they get their diapers changed and they get shushed back to sleep. Sometimes one might get a whack on the head for crying or 'not settling down', but I swear, I would never hit my kid on the head! I don't know where she picked that up. We've been working on that one! She's really into tattoos on people right now. Yeah.

In other news, Lola teeball team is kicking booty and taking names. The Blue Jays have done me proud. The kids all love me. (It is only fair to acknowledge that I give them treats after practice. LOL.) Lola loves her teeball shorts and asks to wear them at other times, which just cracks us up. They are short little sold black athletic shorts (the kind with the tiny holes all over the polyester-ish fabric?) from Kmart with a heart shaped pocket on the butt. Nice. She looks like a kid in the 70's. She isn't afraid to pimp her teeball hat, either, which just kills me.

Phillip was recognized at work for his outstanding performance at the company. He was the one employee named NBJ AllStar for the quarter. He also stepped right up and agreed to assume some extra responsibilities when help was needed. He's going places, I tell you. Straight to the top, I tell you.

In random news, I am working hard on PR for Junior League and absolutely loving it. I also have a few shows lined up for the fall, so I need to get my booty in gear on merchandise to sell. Life is good. We miss Mandy and Neil because we've all been so busy that we haven't had as much time to hang out this summer, but that will get better soon. We took the house off the market, though it is still for sale if anyone is interested. We don't know what to do. If we stay here, we should refinance; if we can sell it, we should grab one of the great deals available. Just taking it day by day. It hasn't been off the market for even a month yet, so we are just taking some time to think. My parents harvested a crop of 375 lbs of new potatoes, which is wonderful. My dad seems healthier than he has been in a while.

Who knows what the future holds? I do intend to blog about it, though. I miss blogging. Bear with me!

My besties are 4 and 6...

This summer is shaping up to be the best summer of my life. Man, it is so hard to even think about topping the summers of my childhood! I just can't get over how much happiness I get from spending time laughing with my girls. It feels so good to have Miles at home with me. I think I had missed her more than I realized!

I guess this summer's big leap in improvement is partially because they are older and more able to have fun this year at ages 4 and 6, to be exact. Another helpful factor is our involvement in organized sports. Miles played spring soccer and Lola is playing teeball. (PS I'm Lola's teeball coach.)

We have been able to go to the lake and pool without as much worry and to get out of the house for some exercise through their sports. Miles can read now, so sometimes she snuggles with a book. Lola is more than happy to sit in the floor and play dollhouse, My Little Pony or Polly Pocket for literally hours at a time. They are both easier to please when it comes to healthy foods that I feel good about. They have been precious. And evil. But precious more often than evil. ;)

Here's to hoping for an entire phenomenal summer of sweet memories with my two little best friends. The three of us are pals and I like it.

Hard blogging times in the house of Brown...

So it has become a nuisance to blog, and I hate that. I love blogging. However, With Tumblr and Facebook, I am finding it more and more difficult to actually come over to Blogger and follow through with spending time on my blog. I have always used my blog to truly capture our lives, and for the past few months, I've hardly captured anything. I'm sad.

Reasons to Choose Murfreesboro...

Someone challenged me to create a top ten list for moving to Murfreesboro. I ended up with a baker's dozen.

1.) Well-rounded community, not overtly just one genre of people
2.) Close to Nashville (35 mins.) but small town feel
3.) The schools are good and the teachers are usually vested in the community since they often went to MTSU.... See More
4.) MTSU football. Lots of tailgating and fun if you like that kind of thing!
5.) Plenty of choices for kids' sports leagues, plus adults can play softball, on dodgeball teams, cycling teams, etc. The city also has two sports facilities, Sports Com and Patterson Park, that have pools, workout equipment, classes and walking tracks.
6.) Greenway system is lovely and free to use. We have two large parks, Barfield and Seigel.
7.) Close proximity (30 to 60 mins) to lakes for boating, skiing, etc.
8.) We have a great library system and some local theatre groups.
9.) The mall, The Avenue and local shops mean you never have to drive out of town to do your shopping unless you are just adament about a specific store that we happen not to have, but we have plenty of all the big name choices and lots of locally owned shoppes.
10.) Cost of housing is very fair and much lower than Nashville or Franklin.
11.) Great local music scene. MTSU is a leading school internationally for recording industry, which means lots of buddin muscians around the 'boro.
12.) This community cares! We have a lot of philanthropic opportunities, like the Junior League of Murfreesboro.
13.) Less than an hour and a half to Chattanooga, which is a fabulous town for day trips.

A Rite of Passage for a young lady

Someone got her very first pair of heels today, and it makes her Momma want to cry. We are almost done with kindergarten, and the more time passes, the more I understand why moms' have empty nest syndrome when their kids leave the house for college. Maybe it isn't the fact that they leave; maybe it's the fact that you can't deny that they are grown.

A big shout out!

A huge shoutout to Coen Brock for getting into the Discovery School! Congrats, Coen! You're growing up so much and you will love kindergarten. We are so very happy for you and your mom and dad are so proud of you!

One of my besties, Shea, and her son, Coen, Discover School student

Terrible blogger

I have been a terrible blogger since the fall. I just don't have as much time to blog! I am going to get back into writing on my blog very soon!

Recent developments worth blogging about, though I haven't done it yet:

• Miles can read books all by herself!
• Lola is very into her jeans and refuses to wear much else.
• Miles got a big girl bike for Christmas and I need to post pics.
• Coen totally 5-year-old kissed Miles last night at Mellow Mushroom and she blushed and then said she wanted to kiss him again and again and again. Ahhhhhhhhhh!
• We got a real snow today! It took us an hour and a half to get home from Shea's! That's about 8 times the normal amount of time.
• Miles has gotten a 5/5 on her last three AR test! Woot woot!
• My jewelry will be featured in the February/March issue of Murfreesboro Magazine and on their site!
• I am going to ODI (Organizational Development Institute) for Junior League in March and I can't wait!

Christmas Eve 2009

Christmas on the Square 2009

Goggelers, and other essential items for the lake

Lola has gotten me tickled so much lately. Why, just now, she randomly told me that if you go to the lake with your 'goggelers' on, you can't see anything. And that if you go into a lake with alligators in it, alligators will eat! you! up!

She has been growing up so incredibly fast. She is smart as a whip and loves to giggle uncontrollably. She prefers to sleep in one of my tshirts instead of pj's or a perfect sized gown. Santa brought her a Tinkerbelle scooter and you should have seen her face. Boy, oh boy. That scooter was just perfect.

Vacation's all I ever wanted...

Christmas vacation is going very well here for the Brown family! My children are enjoying themselves thoroughly and Phillip and I are taking it easy. Each day, we come up with some craft or food to make and a way to get out of the house. So far, so good. Previously, Miles has cried when school was out, but this time she is giggling and happy. I think she understands that everyone is out of school, not just her. (At fall break, she seemed to think that the rest of her class was still at school having fun and that we were just keeping her home. We could not convince her otherwise, and she cried like a mopey, depressed thirty-something.)

To think that tomorrow is Christmas Eve is astounding. The weather is so nice and mild. The sun is shining! So much for a white Christmas, huh? That's ok. My childhood memories always seem to include beautiful sunny Christmas days in Louisiana, so I'll talk a nice mild Tennessee Christmas.

We had planned to go to Liberty tonight to Mandy and Neil's house, but it looks like we are going stay in town. They have three more puppies to give away and need to meet some potential adoptive families for these three, so it would be hard to get together. They came over Friday night and I was able to give her the Little Wayne painting I commissioned from Jeff Bertrand. She loved it. We gave Neil some leather work gloves, some bungee cords and a copy of Capote. I guess you just have to know Neil to understand that gift combo. :)

I am very ready for Friday morning. Santa is bringing so many wonderful things this year! In fact, I may have gone a little overboard. Possibly. Slightly. But not really. We have lots of gifts under the tree and will all be getting many things that we wanted...but every penny spent was cash money, so that isn't too bad, right? No lingering debt after the holidays means it is ok, right? But I digress.

2009 has been a strange year. We've sent a child to kindergarten and we've passed along how good it feels to keep on volunteering in this community. We buried Papaw Joe but we've celebrated birthdays with lots of little friends just learning to be themselves. I went back blonde. Lola became a true LSU fan. (She's watching tv, wrapped in an LSU thrown right now. Don't prod her or she will ask you, "How 'bout them tigers?") The entire world said goodbye to MJ. We congratulated Britt on her engagement.

Merry Christmas to each and every family, with warm wishes for 2010!

Snowglobes

We made homemade snowglobes and it was really cool! This is an easy activity as long as you have adult supervision and the kids absolutely loved it!

You will need:

1. One tight sealing glass jar for each snowglobe, we bought two jars of pears at Dollar Tree and used those jars. Phillip got the labels off with a razor and acetone while the kids ate some pears. ;) This was cheaper than buying empty jars.


2. Water


3. Glitter, we should have used the larger kind instead of the fine kind I had


4. Glycerin, found in the soap making aisle of Hobby Lobby, $3.47 for a big bottle


5. A figurine, toy, etc., that will fit inside the jar and has a base that can be glued down; we let each girl pick a little figurine from Dollar Tree.


6. Hot glue gun and glue sticks


7. An ornate button to glue on top of the finished product; I have a huge collection of vintage buttons, so we used gold-tone honeycomb buttons.

Thoroughly dry your jar lid. Place a large dollop of hot glue right in the center and glue your figurine or small toy down, making sure to center it. In the jar itself, fill it most of the way with water. Add a nice splash of glycerin. Sprinkle in some glitter. Add a hint of blue food coloring if you'd like. You may need to add or dump a little water to get it basically full when the top is replaced with the figurine inside. Replace the lid very tightly. Turn the jar over and hot glue a pretty button to the top. Shake and enjoy!

My own version of people at Walmart

Friday, we really saw a big, fat redneck woman in too-small sweatpants and her man, who was a fat redneck (white, duh) guy wearing a black button up shirt, unbuttoned with wife beater, of course. On the back of the shirt was...a grey line drawing of Notorious B.I.G. with rhinestone accents on a crown on his head. At Walmart. Of course.

'Tis the season!

Because I want to be careful

Yesterday, I had my second mammogram ever. The first was in 2006 before my surgery. This time, I went on the recommendation of my fabulous OB/GYN, Yolanda McGriff. Dr. McGriff had mentioned to me before that my family history indicated that I should consider the testing for the breast cancer gene. The testing is very elaborate, and in order for insurance to cover it, I basically had to have a mammogram and meet with a surgeon to discuss my family history. This information will be documented as a true need for the testing, thus my insurance will cover the testing. Everything looked great on my scans, fyi. I have to go back in another day and have my blood drawn for the testing. Once I get the results, I can decide on my future actions.

More then likely, if I have the gene, the surgeon will recommend a bilateral mastectomy and replacement to drastically reduce my chances of developing breast cancer in the future. (Just to clarify, if I do not have the gene, I can still get cancer.) However, with the gene, I have a much greater likelihood of having breast cancer at some point in my life. The odds are like 55% to 77% or something. Dr. Baskin, the surgeon, said that based on my family history (three of my mother's sisters had breast cancer), I should already be doing yearly mammograms and if I have the gene, I also need an annual breast ultrasound. Wow! Isn't it crazy how far technology has come? So many lives could be saved if more people took these precautions like I am! Just something to think about...

Collecting Costumes...

Costumes are currently being collecting for distribution in 2010 to area children in need. Please visit this page for more info. Drop off location is Mills Family Pharmacy thru November 13th or contact me Dusty@DustyBrown.net to make other arrangements. Used costumes are accepted, though you are encouraged to take a gander at the Halloween clearance if you're feeling generous! Our family donated three new costumes for a total cost of $5.22 by taking advantage of Kroger and Walmart's Halloween clearance tonight. Please consider contributing! Children will be selected to receive a costume based on teacher recommendation, Boys and Girls club recommendation or similar requests.

All up in their faces

I was just reading US Weekly. In it, a few "stars" claimed that they had nose jobs just because of medical issues and absolutely NOT due to looks. Now first, I should clarify that I don't give a rat's if someone wants a new nose. I wanted and got new boobs three years ago. Then I promptly gained 40 pounds, but that is a whole different subject. Back to the intended subject, I know one family member and more than one friend that had a deviated septum repaired...and none of them look different at all. Which leads me to the point that if you ONLY had it for medicinal reasons, then why does your nose look dramatically different? Exactly. Just own up to wanting a new nose, people. I would not personally mess with my face. Then again, I think I have good features on my face. I would absolutely mess with my flabby arms or double C-section abs. I'm just sayin'.

Second, I just read where Holly from that Playboy show Girls Next Door eats one fast food/junk food meal a day and nothing else but Raisin Bran. That is a horrible dietary influence on young girls!

I miss the early 80's, when chics were hot and still considered 'skinny' in a size 8 or even size 10 jeans. I mean, really. Next time you are with a friend who wears an 8 or a 10, look at them. They are NOT fat; they are slim. Some fo them might night be totally toned, but they are slim! Crap. I'm 5' 3", and when I wore a 9/10, I had no shortage of interested cute, popular guys. They liked the fact that I didn't look like a seventh grader. According to Hollywood, anything over a 2 or maybe a 4 is a total lard-butt. It is ridiculous.

I'm officially ashamed of my three year subscription to US Weekly.

Announcing a new blog....

Just please go visit this site, please! Homemaker Homegirls Inc. thanks you in advance.

Y'all cain't even fathom how much I want to watch this multiple times in a row.

Yeah, I wrote "cain't". You have a problem with that? Sometimes you just have to write it the way you want someone to read it, and any true southern girl just has to bust out the "cain't" every now and then.

What made me bust out "cain't"?? I'll tell you what did. This did!

This Is It

Thank you Michael for all of the old memories, but I'm so glad I was able to see this side of you.

What can I say about the Michael Jackson film, This Is It? Well, for starters, it was phenomenal. The footage truly makes you feel like you were there, a part of it, like you knew him. He was far more normal in the film than he was projected to be in life. He was far less effeminate, noticeably less strung out, far more normal, more humorous and particularly humble in regards to his dancers, musicians and singers.

I left the film so happy that I was part of history. I saw the film at the earliest possible point in time for anyone that wasn't someone to M.J. himself. I saw it when it premiered to the world. I felt included and a complete resurgence of all of the feelings that were felt when he died. I hope that any Michael Jackson fan gets an opportunity to see the film in theaters. It was heart warming. I was really sad when the credits began. I could have watched another hour of his rehearsal footage. It was that good.

Of course, there were a few drawbacks. Someone sitting behind us clearly had a foot fungus of the corn chip variety and we smelled it frequently throughout the showing. We also got a few funny looks for wearing the sparkling gloves that I made for Jen, Meag, Emma and myself. Those things didn't change my opinion of the experience for the worse. By the way, thank you, Jen, for inviting me! I hope your sparkling glove makes a nice addition to your scrapbook!

If you call yourself a fan, you must see This Is It. Then again, if you call yourself a critic, then you truly must see This Is It. I think you'll reevaluate your opinion.

Holy sweet pralines! Only 3 days...

Three days until my date with Half Pint and her fam! Casey is treating me to Little House on the Prairie at TPAC. I am so excited! Melissa Gilbert is playing Ma, too.

P.S. I still hate Nellie Olsen.

Mashed potatoes! Gravy!