-ed

i love my husband clean shave-ed.

i love my husband (creepy) beard-ed.

i love my husband weird sideburn-ed.

but i'll tell you what... i'm really loving him right now goatee-ed.

you can't tell me he doesn't look good. you can try...but i won't believe you.

today, for valentines day, he got me some lotions (is he saying i'm ashy and smell bad?) and was so thoughtful to get me ones that weren't too strong (i'm a picky smeller, ya know). then he took me for a drive. (i LOVE drives!) and we ate at cracker barrel. (seriously people, some good ol' comfort food). and i reminded him that just 3 short years ago, he broke up with me right before valentines day, so he didn't have to do anything for me. (he loves when i bring up the past "bad" stuff)

it was a fabulous valentines day with my sweethearts. (i can't forget little j.t. too!)

pay it forward people

diana posted this on her blog, and i was the first to comment. woohoo! so now i'm doing my part.

this is how it goes:
The first 3 people to leave a comment on this (my) post will receive a handmade gift from me during this year—when and what will be a surprise. There’s a small catch. You knew there would be, didn’t you? Post this on your blog and then come back and leave a comment telling me you’re in. Fun, huh? Remember, only the first 3 comments receive the gift.

i'm not really sure if this will be exciting for you or a punishment. i'm not exactly known for my craftiness. but hey...whatev's.

because it's today

on this day, LoW's day of birth anniversary, i feel inspired to talk about the one time she gave advice that everyones lip stick and cell phone should match. she made it clear that if they didn't match, she'd be very disappointed. being the good sister that i am, and knowing what a good advice giver she is, i didn't want to disappoint her. so i looked at my cell phone....
and i took the necessary step....

at which point i realized that it would probably be best for me to get a different phone then going around looking like that. so i bought one just like hers.trust me, my lips and my phone are much cuter now.

that's what big sisters are for. giving advice, and making sure you coordinate and look good. which is why i'm thankful she is my sister.

happy birthday LoW! (again-again)

WIGAC spotlight---it is your birthday.

guess what people...TOMORROW, TOMORROW, TOMORROW is THE LoW's birthday!! so what better time to have a special WIGAC birthday spotlight, with a few other questions that inquiring minds want to know.

so now, i introduce to you (again), the birthday girl herself...

LOWINDA!!

(with lots of pictures for your viewing pleasure)

how old will you be on your birthday TOMORROW?

Sadly.... very very sadly, this will be my last year in my 30's. I am so sad about that. Really really sad. Sad. Sad. ......... Saaaad. Sad.

if you could only get 2,623 presents for your birthday TOMORROW, what would you pick?

Oh my, that's too much. Can I take just two presents? I want new shoes and a video camera. Oh wait, and a good camera. So I'll take three if that's okay.

what is your most memorable birthday ever?

Oh, you know Ma doesn't like it when I bring it up, but my 17th, when my family forgot my birthday. Seriously, that's memorable stuff right there. It was 16 Candles, except it was 17.

do you ever just sit, and think about how lucky you are to have me as a sister, for hours on end?

No. Should I?

what's the sweetest thing gary ever didn't do for you on your birthday?

Surprised me. Not a party, but a surprise at all. But he does write me poems, and that's the sweetest thing he HAS done for me for my birthday.

if you had to guesstimate how many gray hairs you have, what would the count be?

None. Hello.... hair color!

what do you plan to eat for breakfast for your birthday TOMORROW?

I think we are celebrating my birthday today (b/c of short day tomorrow) and so I am skipping breakfast for a big lunch. I can't decide, sushi or Italian (food)? And then on my actual birthday, I am skipping breakfast b/c I don't eat breakfast. :)

because you love me so much, would you give me all of your birthday presents that you get TOMORROW on your birthday?

So far I have a gift card to Sonic... and I know you love the Sonic, but I think I'll pass on passing it over. Sorry. But I still love you so much.

what are the 3 best things about me?

It's my birthday and I have to talk about you you you? You are naughty. Ummmm..... you have a hot husband. You have a cute baby. And you have an awesome big sister. Oh, and your funny too.
(Is Jud blushing? Good.)


if someone gave you 700 billion dollars to bail you out, what would you spend it on?

Golly gee, I am really not a spender.... hmm.... donate it to the country in hopes to save us all from what this real bail out is going to do to us?


if i move close to you, will you babysit my child every weekend for free?

Absolutely!! Bring it!

what are your big plans for your birthday TOMORROW?

It's a short day for the kids in school so I can't go to Savannah (wah!) and I have to teach Young Womens that evening... so just the same ole thing apparently.

will you commit to come visit me this summer?

I can't make any promises. But I can commit to really wanting to and I can promise I'll do my best. :-D

TOMORROW, on your birthday, will you spend the whole day wishing you were celebrating your special day with me?

Part of the day, probably.

what is the best birthday present you ever got last year?

The Santa print as an early birthday present for this year. For real.

can i stop asking you questions now?

Please don't stop.

oh, and just so you all know she practices cannibalism. but i didn't want to ask her any questions about that. but i should be the next bawbwa wawers, huh??

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LoW!!

baby got back

yesterday i scheduled an appointment for little j.t. to get some professional pictures done. i figured at 5 months old, it's about time for someone else to take pictures of him besides me. so we all headed to the mall to find a cute little outfit.

but of course, shad and i had to shop for ourselves too. so shad picked out a pair of jeans and headed to the dressing room to try those bad boys on.

yeah babe. lookin' goooood!

he turns.

he starts walking away.wait! what in the world?! get back here!

oh mercy!!

bless his heart

there we were, driving back home from a friends house as i was rockin' out to a john mellencamp tune.

you know the one. sing it with me.

r-o-c-k in the u-s-a. r-o-c-k in the u-s-a.

when all of a sudden shad says..."r-i-c-k?"

i explained to him his error. to which he responds "i was wondering who rick was and why they were singing about him being in the usa."

bless his heart.

WIGAC spotlight--old school

remember back in the day when i used to do weekly spotlights for about a few weeks? well, i'm bringing it back to the old school. except i can't promise it will be every week. i will certainly try, but it would probably be more appropriately named "when i get a chance spotlight". or WIGAC spotlight for short.
and since i'm taking it back to the old school, i thought my first spotlight should be the person i spotlighted first the last time. my dear husband....

shad

i sat down with my dear shad and asked him a few questions so we could all get a little insight into this mans mind. i of course asked the questions you all would want to know. so here we go...

why did you decide to grow a beard again? cause i was bored.

why do you chew your gum so loudly? it's just something i've perfected over the years

why are you watching the super bowl when you don't even follow football? for the commercials

is it gonna be weird when little j.t. grows up and looks like your twin? no

what's the best part about being a father? the sleepless nights

if you had known what a bratty wife i was going to be, would you still have married me? (laughing) yes (more laughing)

why haven't you patched the hole in our ceiling yet? because i'm being a father

do i look fat? (laughing) no

who is your best friend in the whole world? little j.t. or aniC. depends on if aniC is being bratty or not.

if you had to choose between wearing a shirt made of poison ivy or shorts made of nails, which would you choose? shorts made of nails

on a scale of 1 to 10, how much do you love when little j.t. cries? 2.5

why do you love me?

because you like to go on adventures with me. because you birfed little j.t. because we have fun together. because you love me. that's why i love you.

he may not be a man of many words, but he's my man of not many words.

what in the world?!

(i will attempt to share this story with you in as grosslessly a way as possible)

once a mother, always a mother, right? it's a job you don't get a break from. you are a mom 24/7. even, unfortunately, when you are sick!

wednesday night, i was suddenly stricken with a disease that caused my stomach to ache majorly. things came out of me in ways that they shouldn't have. i was ill. this is also the night that my dear little baby j.t. decided to cry like a maniac for 3 hours before deciding to go to sleep. since shad had work in the morning, i had to take the brunt of the baby duties, in between running to the bathroom.

now, to shad's credit, he did come home a few hours early on thrusday to help me out. which i'm ever grateful for. but it's not like my duties as a mother went away. there was a baby that still needed to be feed, and only i could do it. and a baby that still needed to sleep, and usually only allows me to get him to sleepfulness.

motherhood never ends!

WEVER...last night my husband, the father in the home, came home claiming he didn't feel well. yet he was still able to eat some dinner. and he claims he had what i had. with a little bit of an upset stomach. narry a diaper he changed the whole evening. he slept well through out the night. (who was up for an hour at 5 am when she was sick? oh yeah...me!) and today his "back is a little achy" from being sick. (whose whole body throbbed with pain when she was sick? oh yeah...me!) and still, narry a diaper he has changed. he even wants to get out of the house and go shopping!

HOW is it, i ask, that i was for seriously sick and didn't get a break, yet my husband was pretending to be sick and gets a nice daddy va-ca?

(before you go all ww1 on me, remember i'm all about the dramatics. i love my husband, and he's very helpful. even if he did pretend to be sick to get out of some diaper duty. this post is simply for fun so put on a smile.)

10 reasons why you should find a new plumber

#1. he cancels your first appointment because his "nanny got injured."

#2. after he talkes to you the first time, he thinks he called you back and talked to you again, but he didn't.

#3. when he's calling to tell you he's coming over, he asks you to hold on a minute...and you hear him yelling at his kids.

#4. you ask him to take his combat boots off before walking through the house, and he does. and his big toe waves at you all the way up the stairs through the hole in his sock.

#5. he tells your husband stories of past jobs, but never finishes any of the stories.

#6. he doesn't know anything more about the job that needs to be done than your husband does.

#7. he tells you and your husband a story about his childs birth on april 1st that doesn't make a lick of sense.

#8. he won't stop talking.

#9. he tells you the same thing over and over again.

and the #10 reason why you should to find a new plumber...

he tells you that to cure your acne problem, you need to drink more water, because obviously you aren't drinking any. filtered water would be best.

nuffin' muffin

i have a new addiction. and i mean addiction in the very serious sense of the word.

muffins.

but not just of the stud variety.

i kid you not....i could eat muffins for every single meal. every single day. when shad calls me on his way home from work and asks "do i need to pick anything up?" i always tell him "muffins." he's warned me that he won't continue to be my enabler. but it's ok. he doesn't have to be. i will get them on my own if necessary.

lemon poppy seed. chocolate chip. chocolate-chocolate chip. blueberry. banana nut. pumpkin. carrot raisin nut.

the kind doesn't matter to me. if it's a muffin, i'm going to eat it and enjoy every single bite.

which is why i'm glad my husband joined sam's club. and even more glad that on his way home from work yesterday, he picked up a 12 pack of muffins from there.

now excuse me while i go get some muffin devouring taken care of.

peace in the east (coast)

remember the war i have been waging for 2 months now??

well, i'm putting up my white flag. i surrender. i just want peace (still). i just want love (still). i just want my sister back! i'm willing to do whatever it takes. even if that means LoW getting to post her sonic video and being praised for something she never would have thought of doing if it wasn't for me.

because getting praise isn't important. sisterhood is important. and let me tell you, we are sisters from the hood, and we need to stay connected. not let petty things keep us warring.

so, LoW...do you forgive me? will you be mine again (still)? will you be my partner in crime again (still)?

whadaya say? truce??

oh brother!

i love my husband. i do. but i love him like a husband. obviously. so why is it that sometimes he acts like my big brother? i already have plenty of big brothers. i don't need another one.

very often, we are in the middle of watching a tv show. and it will be at a good part. and out of nowhere, he will just change the channel. just to drive me nuts.

he knows that i hate feet to touch my feet. he's known it from the very beginning. which is why he will rub his feet on mine any chance he gets. just to drive me nuts.

he LOVES rolling his eyes at me when he doesn't like what i'm saying. just to drive me nuts.
he thinks its hilarious to tickle me, even though it doesn't make me laugh but makes me angry. and even though i told him his new years resolution should be "no tickling in 2009". no, he loves doing it. just to drive me nuts.





BUT...



he opens the car door for me still. when he's not carrying the car seat out to the car. just to be nice.

every sunday night and wednesday night, he goes around the house and gets the trash together and takes it out. just to be nice.


if i ever ask him for a neck massage, he does it willingly. just to be nice.

he still plans and takes me out on dates. just to be nice.


he gives me great gifts on special occasions. and sometimes for no particular reason. just to be nice.

he takes little j.t. on saturday and sunday mornings and let's me sleep in. just to be nice.
he often tells me i like "nice" or "pretty" or "hot". just to be nice.

for the last several months, he's been the main dinner maker in the house. just to be nice. (or just because he's hungry)

so...i suppose it's worth it to put up with the "big brother" that's instilled in him to be able to be on the receiving end of all of his niceness.

plus, you just gotta love him.

par-tay hard-y

i love traditions. whether it's having the same meal every year for a birthday celebration, or taking a similar picture with people at a certain time every year, or going to LoW's house for Christmas eve every year for a par-tay. for the past several years, that's what the "blacks" have done. and we of course always make sure to take a picture of the group. just in case anyone is too tipsy on egg nog we want to make sure they remember they were there. my favorite part about the picture is that we take it in the same spot every year.

unfortunately, there is no 2004 picture, or group pictures in LoW's first house where we started the Christmas eve par-tay tradition.

but here's the others.

our first picture in the spot, 2005

here we have 2006

then 2007

and the latest, 2008

*it should be noted that we do not partake in alcoholic beverages, and i was only making a joke with the intention of being humorous.

*it should also be noted that it must be really awkward for LoW that she was wearing the same shirt for the par-tay two years in a row

but seriously

i've gotta give it to corn. they are trying really hard to get people to eat foods with high fructose corn syrup. but let's be honest...how many of us would have had this conversation on a date...with these "facts"?



i wish i could have found the one with the two teenage boys. it's much better.

gotta get away

shad and i have pretty much come to terms with the fact that we won't have many visitors. yes, our parents came after little j.t. was born. and a couple of my sisters came before he was born. but we are well aware of the fact that our days of having visitors are over now that the grandparents and everyone else have seen the little guy.

but people!

check out our cozy guest room.

don't you feel like you are looking at pictures of a room in a cute inn or something? like it's a cute little serene retreat away from the craziness of the world?

it is!

so come visit us!

and be thankful it doesnt look like it did when we bought the place.