We found Ben's Hat?!

I am not even sure how to start this post?

This is one of those things where you say, "you just had to be there!"

But, I am going to try and explain exactly why my 13 year old son and I wet our pants in Taco Bell a few weeks ago.

As you know my son plays baseball spring and fall. Part of the baseball ritual is the hat. You get your hat, then the team Mom spends the next week trying to get in some place to get each child's name embroidered on the back. Because, boys are slobs and forgetful and can't manage to not get their hat mixed up with the other 12 in the dug out that look EXACTLY alike.

Go figure.

My husband coaches and likes to give the boys nicknames. A few seasons ago he started calling one of the boys ( real name Ben ) HOSS. He had a college buddy who they called Hoss, really nice guy and this kid just fit the same mold. I am sure you remember the T.V. show Bonanza? Hey, I just saw the re-runs!

Anyway, Ben always has Hoss put on the back of his hat. This last spring we were the Marlins, and at the beginning of the season a few of the families met at Rico's for dinner one night after practice. Ben walked out of the restaurant and left his hat. His Mother was furious, they went back and kept checking but no one ever found it. Ben spent all season with no matching hat.

Fast forward 6 MONTHS! We were sitting in Taco Bell one night last week, when Tucker grabs my arm and furiously whispers,

"Mom! Thats Ben's hat!"

I looked around and was confused for a minute, as I also have a brother named Ben.

Then I saw it....

A man standing at the register ordering food was wearing Ben's Marlines hat with his name on the back!!

Tucker and I just busted into laughter. My husband turned to see what we were laughing at and actually gasped. He a little too loud, says, " no freaking way!!"

The three of us have tears running down our cheeks, we are laughing so hard. Then my husband says, "we have to show Ben."

Tucker and I are a little more reserved than my husband, we think he is going to take the hat back. We start freaking out and begging him to not ask for the hat back, he shakes us off and walks right up behind the man at the counter and TAKES A PICTURE!

The kids and I are dying, we are hiding behind and under the table's at Taco Bell! All the while still laughing at how hilarious the situation was! Plus, just incredulous that Paul would just walk up and take a picture standing right behind the guy!

Paul, not being shy, much to Tucker's horror, then asked the man if he could take his picture so he could have a picture of the front of the hat. The man was completely happy to pose!

This is about the point that neither Tucker or I could take it anymore, and both raced to the bathroom as I think we both were going to pee our pants!

We must have laughed for 3 days straight, every time I event think about it now I giggle. We sent the pictures to Ben's Mom and called her, when she opened the email I could hear her scream with laughter a few feet away over Paul's phone.

What we are really wondering is what is the degree of separation between a pretty nice Mexican Restaurant, Rico's, and Taco Bell?

We want to leave something else there and see where it turns up months later!

Do babies have "milk bellies"?

Yesterday, I left Andie's 6 older siblings in charge of her while I folded my clothing in my bedroom. At least that is what I told the kids, I really just wanted a few minutes to myself to catch up on the latest People magazine that I had bought last week spontaneously and never had a chance to read.

Who isn't interested in Elin Woods and 100 million dollars? :)

Anyway, I began to get worried when ALL 6 kids were hysterically laughing together. This is only a good thing sometimes...

See, if only a few are laughing that means they are laughing at another child, who will soon be tattling and crying.

Now if they are all laughing, either my husband is harassing the dog or they have done something to the house. I figured I had better check it out.

This is what I found...

They had propped the baby up in her pillow, then the older kids thinking that she looked like she had a "beer belly" proceeded to stage her with a soda, remote and bag of "chips".

Then they took pictures. They kill themselves.

What I really want to know is how do they know what a "beer belly" is... AND is the baby going to be emotionally scarred?

Made the Paper!! They even spelled my name right :)

Yea! Anna and Jeff made the paper! Go HERE to see the article! SHHHHHH! No one tell them! Jeff will be embarrassed!

Jenan was also featured, she does the coupons for the troop. It was well written. Thanks Kim for a great article!

We were also featured HERE this past week, Jenan is doing great work with the coupons for the troops!

School Lunch Ideas

I am sure that many of you have a better system and better ideas for what to make, I would love to hear them!

I always make sandwiches, we rotate between peanut butter and jelly, peanut butter and honey and ham or turkey. This is how I do the ham or turkey, I use dinner rolls in the 6 pack style.

I slice them once through the middle and flip the top off, then I add the mayo and mustard.

Next, comes the ham and cheese.

Then I flip it over and cut 6 sandwiches.

I have not found any good deals lately on pudding or jello so I have been making my own for almost nothing. I have a bunch of the small ziplock containers, I make either jello or pudding the night before and toss them in their lunches the next day.

The trick is getting them to remember to bring back the container, or not leaving it in their backpacks!

This day we had grapes, juice, turkey and cheese sandwiches and rice krispie treats or a 100 calorie bar.

Today they had Capri Suns, clementines, ham and cheese and pudding.

Tuesday the had Juicy Juice, apples, granola bars, peanut butter and honey and a couple kids grabbed rice krispy treats.

I try and stay under $4-5 dollars a day for all lunches. So about $20 - $25 a week on lunches. I buy bread and rolls on sale and freeze them. I bought 13 packages of string cheese for under $.75 a bag, then I freeze them and pull some out every few days. I also freeze lunch meat and load up when I get it on sale. The snacks are always very cheap at Kroger mega events. We go through an enormous amount of fruit, I always try and price match it at Wal-Mart. The kids eat fruit for breakfast, lunch, snack and after dinner... I actually have to hide any kind of berries and the little clementines. They can eat 5 lbs of clementines in one sitting.

I would love to hear what you make for lunches!

One Heluva Party!

Now, I am not going to admit one way or another, that I HAVE or HAVE NOT seen "The Hangover"! But if I HAD seen it, it would have made the following story VERY funny!

My son for his 13th birthday wanted to have some of his friends over to spend the night and go to the Astro's game. Sure, sounds like fun.

My husband took the boys to the game, while the girls and I went to "meet the teacher night" and made the boy's cookies for when they got home. While in Wal-Mart getting butter we thought it would be nice to grab the boys a bunch of junk food. First Mistake. I am not a rookie when it comes to cleaning up kids messes :), so what I was thinking when I bought a bunch of candy that was all INDIVIDUALLY wrapped we will never know!

The girls had one of Tucker's friends little sister also spend the night so we had 13 kids here ready to party at 11:00pm!

Now if you are a Mother to any of the kids who spent the night... stop reading now! I really want you to allow your children over again! Just warning you!

11:00pm ~ Boy's get home from game and want to swim. First, they put the dog on the trampoline and try to bounce him off. Saved the dog, send the boys to the pool.

11:30pm ~ Remind my son that we have 2 older widows that live in either side of us, and they need to keep it down. I put a soaking wet dog in the garage to save his life.

12:00am ~ Send the "little" kids to bed. They cry and beg to stay up.

12:20am ~ Get the baby to bed. Break out the junk food for the boys. They are soaking wet and jumping on the trampoline. I beg them to be careful and not break anything as football starts next week.

12:30am ~ I ban them from the trampoline. They decide to come inside. They are having a blast. I go to bed.

2:30am ~ Baby wakes up, I feed her in the living room and listen to the boys hysterically laughing at Bryan Regan (comedian) they are making me laugh listening to them! I get the baby to bed an tell them to go to sleep. The playroom is amazingly trashed! They have drank an ENTIRE bottle (5 gallons) of water from the cooler. They are having a great time!

3:30am ~ I think I hear them in the pool again. Or I was dreaming...

5:30am ~ Baby wakes up again, yes she is trying to kill me. Boys are still AWAKE! I am sorry MOM's! They are now playing video games, the playroom looks like a bomb has gone off. There are 1000's of candy wrappers, chips and something that looks like popcorn all over, including on top of the ceiling fan? They are laughing so hard my son threatens to pee his pants. There is an empty bottle of Pepto Bismol on the kitchen counter. I get the baby to bed. Turn off the T.V. and demand they go to sleep. I almost kill myself trying to get out of the playroom alive.

7:00am ~ Little kids wake up and go to the play room. Big boy's get mad that they got woke up and go to little kids room to sleep. Wish I had pictures of 5 teenage boys in the 2 sets of bunk beds in the girls room. Little kids attempt to push piles of trash, clothes, towels and toys out of the way to make room to watch T.V. My house now looks like something off the T.V. show "Hoarders"!!

11:30am ish... ~ Most kid have gone home, my girls go to Grandma's to learn to sew and Tucker begs to take a nap.

Paul and I decide to be nice parents and not just set the playroom on fire and re-build later, but grab a garbage bag and start cleaning up. Don't worry, we were leaving some for them to do, but at that point I think it was a health hazard.

I was in the kitchen when my husband came running out holding this...

"Who lost a tooth!?" He yells!

"I have no idea" thinking that was very strange we didn't know, as my kids are so thrilled to have lost a tooth because it means M.O.N.E.Y we usually know immediately that someone has lucked out.

Then I start to get VERY worried and pray that it is not one of the kids that stayed over.

"Tucker!" Paul screams. He runs down the hall and wakes him up. "Who's tooth is this?" he demands.

"It's mine." Tucker says. I breath a sigh of relief!

"They dared me to pull it out, so I did." he laughs.

Paul and I stare at each other in disbelief shaking our heads.

"That was one hell of a party!" Paul says to me under his breath!

I agree, and am still expecting to find a tiger in the bathroom!

Thank You!

This is way overdue, but I wanted to take a minute to say a personal thank you to all my readers. I may not have 1,000's of followers and readers like other blogs, but they can't even come close to having the kind of people reading that I do!

There is something that happens every week that I am so touched by from you. It might be a nice email or comment, or letting me know of a way that you have helped someone else. It can be meeting someone in the store who recognizes us and says the nicest things, or reading your blog's and telling my husband a funny story from your family.

It is a joke around here when I start telling my husband about an email or story about a reader. He always says to me, "you know that you have never met them sweetheart, right?!" But it doesn't feel that way to me! I feel like I have made so many friends that I have actually never met personally. It is kinda a weird thing!

This week was extra busy getting ready for my school to start and for the kids to go back. I want to personally thank 2 readers that made a big difference in my attitude this week!

First, Joann, who I have met personally but through my blog. We had to exchange some SR stuff and she came by the house. When she did she brought 2 HUGE meals with her and coupons! Not only did she bring coupons, but she took the time to print off the baby coupons and get this... she even CUT THEM OUT FOR ME! Thank you so much!

Second, Lelee! Look how cool this is ( picture above!) I posted last week about the Chipotle deal, buy anything on Tue or Wed. bring your receipt BACK on tax free weekend (this weekend) and you get the same items FREE again. The catch is that it was only good at Texas stores.

So Lelee went out to eat on Tue. and MAILED me her receipt from Virginia!! What a surprise when I opened the envelope. I kept laughing and trying to explain how crazy cool this lady is to my husband! Who would have thought of such a sweet thing! My son was even impressed, and at 13 that is hard to do. So we all went out to eat on Friday night!

That is him below eating his free burrito curiosity of Lelee!

So my point is that I wanted to say think you for all that you bring into our lives and for all the nice things that you say and do for our family. I wish I could have a chance to meet everyone personally and thank you for taking time out of your day to stop by here and see a little of our lives!

Thank you, to you 2 ladies for whatever prompted you this week to think of us! Sometimes, I have a little feeling that there is something that I need to do for someone, even if it is as small as a phone call or email and I don't do it. I usually find out later that friend needed a little help or had been sick and I could have made a difference for them. So I am trying to be better about paying attention and following through with those little feelings!

O.K. enough of that, and I will get back to why you are here and the deals! Thank you again!

Today I officially Get Old! I have a teenager!

** I wrote this last year for Tucker on his birthday. I am reposting it because, well, I didn't have time to write another one because I was helping him do his laundry :)

As if turning 35 this year wasn't enough to make me feel old (it really didn't) the fact that I now have a teenager is what is going to put me over the edge!

Twelve (Thirteen now!) years ago tonight I was starting my 21 st hour of hard labor. At 5 am in the morning I had woken up to what I thought was a dream that I had peed in the bed. I kept apologizing to my husband and tried to get to the bathroom, but I just kept peeing everywhere! Now 6 kids later I would have known right away that my water had broke, but I was unexperienced and young. It finally occurred to me almost 45 minutes later that maybe my water had broke, and by this time the contractions were coming hard and fast.

I waited as long as I could before I wobbled out to the car and to the hospital. I labored in the tub and listened to Cat Stevens, I walked the halls during the afternoon, I laid on my side and talked to myself. Every now and then my midwife would poke her head in and check on me, she had already been up at the hospital for 2 days and was trying to get a little sleep in another room.

At 12:40 am after much pushing my sweet, sweet baby was born. It was nice and quiet, just Paul, my Mom, the midwife, a cranky old nurse and my little sister peeking from the doorway to welcome Tucker. I was so tired and almost in a little shock that when they immediately laid him on my chest I was scared that I wouldn't love him.

I have never been so wrong.

Tucker has been something so special from the beginning. Even as my first baby I could recognize it. He has such a special spirit about him, he instinctively has that thing inside him that tells him when reverence is needed. He has always been cautious, no matter how we tried to teach him otherwise he is naturally a careful person.

Thats him in the back, the little 3 year old who's head you can barley see, I sent him down the Snake River with his Aunts and Uncle, he has never forgiven me.

Tucker is a strong boy, he has always had such a strong sense of right and wrong, and he stands by the right thing.

He takes care of his sisters, and his little brother. He is going through that stage where they annoy him more, but when other people or kids are concerned he stands up for them, I have never had to ask him to do this, he just does.

Tucker has the kindest heart that I have ever seen. If there is bad news or a horrible story on T.V. he never wants any part of it. He can always see the spiritual side of things, and follows his heart.

During our last vacation without any prodding from us he was asking his little cousins and sisters to dance. It was sweet to see him trying to make sure they had a good time and wasn't yet concerned that it might make him look "dorky"!

Tucker is smart, and I am not just saying this because I am his Mother, I have other children that I would not say this about... the boy is brilliant. I have not been able to help him with homework for years now, he almost has a photographic memory. In second grade he read the entire Lord of The Rings series, by himself, in 3 months. He didn't get credit for it at school though, because it wasn't on the list for elementary school students. Tucker has always been able to understand concepts that were complicated for even adults.
I love this boy so much, he is turning into a wonderful man. I am so proud of him and love him for the wonderful spirit that he brings into our home. I have such special feeling for him because he was my first and I had so much time with just him. I feel like we grew up together. I had him when we were in college, it was a really long winter that year. Paul would leave for school at 8am and get home from work at 11pm. I sat with Tucker all day in our little cinder block wall, 600 square foot apartment, just the two of us, all that lonely cold winter, and the next winter as well. I just talked to him all day long, and took pictures of him sleeping. I had nothing else to do and I didn't want to miss a single thing that he did.

So Happy Birthday Tucker! I LOVE you so much!

Love, Mom!

Exactly what you want to hear: You need to loose some weight!

I didn't mention on my blog, but I did on Facebook, that I developed PUPPP's with this last pregnancy.

If you are fortunate enough to have never heard of it or even more fortunate to never have gotten it yourself, try to imagine the WORST itching you could possibly stand without clawing your body to pieces.

Yes it really was that bad! I would not wish it on my WORST enemy! Well, maybe :)

Even more ironic, you normally only get it with the 1st or 2nd pregnancy and 75% of the time you are having a baby BOY. Also, as soon as you deliver it usually goes away. NO not in my case... mine got WORSE!

Basically I was a freak of nature. But hey, once you get it you are not supposed to ever get it again when pregnant, just in case that applied to me!

When Andie was 5 days old I couldn't take it anymore and my husband was sick of listening to me scratch all night and the sheets covered in blood every morning from my legs, arms and belly bleeding, so he drug me and the baby into the doctor.

Now, my doctor is an older Indian man. If you can imagine King Julian (up at the top!) that is exactly what he sounds like! I love listening to him talk. He isn't the most personable guy but I really like him.

The doctor takes a look at the baby and does her little exam. Then he gets to me. I am an emotional blob of mess in his office. I am exhausted, hormonal, have sore boobs from nursing, and am freaking out because I have been scratching for 6 weeks solid! He decides to put me on another massive round of steroids (because nothing else is working) tells me to stop nursing (thanks for the advice) and then does what ONLY a MAN (who apparently forgot that I had a 5 DAY OLD BABY) would do....

He explains that the medication he is giving me will cause me to gain weight.

King Julian then stops, turns around, slowly looks me up and down from my head to my feet, 2 TIMES, and says,

"You need to loose some weight, you had better start working out."

If I had not been holding my 5 day old baby, I really might have hurt him. I smiled, and said I would work on it. Then I swore at him all the way home.

I don't have it so bad!

My Dad keeps a blog for the grandkids because he travels so much. He takes pictures with his cell phone and posts them so they can see where is his in the world. Kinda like "Wheres Waldo" but its "Wheres Grandpa?"

This is one of his latest pictures from yesterday. He is in Guanzhou, China.

Now repeat after me: "I will not complain about taking kids shopping, as long as I don't have to get my bags home this way!"

Who does my baby look like?

Poor 7th child...

She has barley any photos taken of her!

The ones that have been taken are by friends and family. But today, I was able to take a few.

Somehow the only ones that I got are of her making faces like this:

Which made me think she looks a little like Liza Minnelli...

Maybe an older Liza Minnelli?
Actually, who she really looks like, if you got the full view of her hair, would be Terk the little monkey from Tarzan!

I think they were separated at birth!

The. Best. Purchase. Ever!

If you have 1 or more children, this includes your husband, boyfriend or pet, YOU NEED TO GET ONE OF THESE!

It has changed my life. Period.

Many years ago I looked into getting a water cooler but never did. We obviously do not have a fridge that has a water dispenser so my children are fascinated by them at friends houses.

I spend a good part of my day getting my children drinks of water, asking the older kids to help the little ones get a drink of water, and telling them that "No, they may not have a juice box, Capri Sun or a Gatorade!"

It might be a bit of an eyesore in a small kitchen like mine, but it has relieved me of permanent water Mom duty.

We purchased our cooler in a completely unlike me fashion, I saw it at a appliance type place and bought it without even having an idea of what they should cost. We paid $100 for it and I am thinking we might have paid a little too much. When I got home I priced them from the water delivery places, they charge a rental fee of anywhere from $3 a month to $6. Plus the water delivery is $5.99 to $7.99 a big bottle. We refill our bottle at the grocery store fro $1.75 and we are doing that 3 times a week.

Water from the delivery place: $83.88 a month (3bottles a week)

Water from grocery store: $21 a month (3 bottles a week)

I figure it will take about 3 months to pay for the cooler and start making it a better deal to have purchased it.

Plus, I am thrilled at how much water my kids are drinking and all the time I am saving by not refilling cups all day. The little kids love how BIG they feel that they can help themselves and not have to ask anyone!

What a simple little thing that makes such a big difference!

Do you have any of these little things that makes your life soooo much easier?!

The Ultimate in Bad Advertising!

Last week I went in for my 2 week check up. My husband came with me and the new baby so that we could also get Andie's PKU done. After 7 children I still can't stand to be in the room when they stick my baby, so my brave husband is the one who holds the baby while the baby and I cry.

My O.B. was running late and my husbands ADD was kicking in, so I teased him and suggested he walk across the hall to the Urologist and pick up some literature. He was glad to get out of the office and took off.

He comes back with a hand full of brochures on non-scalpel techniques for a vasectomy and all the pros and cons of having it done. Well, mostly the pros because apparently there seems to be no cons that are associated, the only one according to my husband is that he is not sure he feels comfortable laying there with his legs in stirrups in front of someone... excuse me?

Did this man really just say that to a woman who has had 7 children? I am going to let that slide or I might have to kill him...

I notice a smirk on his face and he tosses me a rolled up t-shirt.

"Look what they gave me" he laughs.

I unroll it and actually gasp!

"Are you kidding me!" I am laughing so hard I almost pee my pants! "Are they trying to ruin their business?"

We could single handily destroy this poor Urologist's business! Can you imagine if my husband wore this shirt to the mall with all 7 kids tagging behind him!

Wait for it....

Wait for it...

Oh yes! That is really what they are giving out! How funny is that, it is so dumb I am tempted to have him wear it in public with the kids. They should really ask how many kids you have before they want you to be wearing their advertising in public! I think it would scare the cr**p out of people!

And NO, I would never let him actually wear that in public. Actually I don't have to worry about it, he wouldn't be caught dead in it anywhere but in the living room!

Does second hand pot smoke affect children? A trip to see the Bee Gee's!

** This is a repost from last summer on this very day! It seemed last last month! It made me giggle to remember it so I thought I would post it for you!

Houston has an outdoor venue like no other in the country, Miller Outdoor Theatre. It is completely free and hosts all kinds of really nice cultural events. So when we saw that the "Bee Gee's" were coming we had to go! Well, that and it is a central location for my Sister in Law and I to switch kids...

Apparently the Davis/Ivanovsky/Tew families weren't the only ones who decided to take advantage of this free concert, the entire cities population of hippies and homeless people also wanted to hear Saturday Night Fever for free.

We secured our spots on the lawn right behind Mr. Homeless Man, who realllly liked to talk, and a few rows behind Ms. Freespirit, very flexable and I've had 7 glasses of wine. I knew the evening was going to be interesting, not only because of our company, but I wondered if I had brought enough food with me for our big group as we were all suffering the effects of second hand pot smoke.

It started off good, happy kids and all. But as the night went on...

They were dropping like flies...
I tried to interest them in Ms. Freespirit, after-all when do you get to see a 65 year old, heavily pierced, woman who is that flexible?
No go. Not interested.
Too bad for them, that was enough entertainment for me for a while, I'll wake them when something more exciting comes to town, like The Moody Blues.