Brandon's Puppy

I have no concept of distance for things outside of Florida. You see, my cousin invited me to go up to South Carolina and spend some time with her and her family. In my head, I’ll not only be able to visit them, but also visit my other cousin who lives in Durham, NC. Never mind that these two places are almost 200 miles from each other, that is but an inconsquential detail in my world.

While recently thinking about this possible upcoming trip, my imagination got the best of me, and I decided that maybe we should all just rent one of the Outer Banks vacation homes I’ve heard so much about. For just under $100 a day, my extended family and I can spread out throughout this lovely 3-story, five-bedroom rental.

I know hubby will favor the indoor pool (table, that is), while my cousin and I lounge by the outdoor pool with the kiddos.

It would be so wonderful to take a week off and just spend some quality time with my family. When we were children, my cousin, our siblings and I would spend two weeks together in Miami Beach. Those are some of my fondest childhood memories. Wouldn’t it be a beautiful thing to start new traditions and build new memories for the next generation to remember?

Posted by Amanda at 9:30 PM In Family, Travel
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The Second Grader

Observations:
"Mommy, there are more boys than girls in my class. There are 9 boys and only 4 girls."
"I like my teacher, but I can't say her name."
"I like my art teacher too, she's nice."

I asked him, "what did you do today?"
He answered: "I did Art, a worksheet, a back to school apple" (see below)

Back to School Apple (fill in the blank):

I'm glad I'm back to school because I want to learn more math.
The most fun I had this summer was when I went to Bosh Garden.
This year I want to learn mor math becuase I want to learn x. ("times" = mulitiplication)
I am happy when I spen time with my famaliy.
I am very good at math because ti's my farait.

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The Pre-Schooler

I asked him, "did you have a good day?"
"Yes"

"Do you like your teachers, Miss ____ and Miss ____?"
"Yes"

"What did you do today?"
"I draw the letter M, and I did art. It's in my room, come and see!"

Posted by Amanda at 9:15 PM In School, The Boys
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Brandon lost tooth No. 5 a week and a half ago ( on Monday 8/2) and tooth No. 6 yesterday. Though it's still a-ways away, the upper left lateral incisor is a bit loose as well. Between the recent tooth fairy visits and "prizes" (also known as bribes....ahem) for cleaning up the playroom, B has collected $9, and he's saving his money to buy this cute little guy, which he fell in love with and begged for last time we went to Ikea. I told him that if he had most of the money next time we went, I'd put in the difference and he could get it, but he had to earn it. I didn't realize he would earn it so quickly!

Posted by Amanda at 8:30 PM In Happenings, Moolah, Shopping, The Boys
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Last Thursday, I finally got my much-coveted iPhone. Hubby gave me permission to purchase it as my anniversary present, and I in turn allowed him to think that I needed his permission as his present from me. We're quirky like that.

For those that care about these kinds of things, I got the 3GS with 8GB of memory. As cool as it looks, I was apprehensive about purchasing the 4 since it's still got kinks. The 3GS suits me just fine.

I've already browsed through the app categories and downloaded a few free ones: a handful of games for the boys, a money management app, the FB app (of course), the Target app (Duh!), Twitter and Shazam. I even got that barcode scanner one that tells you where to purchase something for a lower price, and keeps a running list of things you've run out of. I've yet to try that one out, but that's only because I just installed it today.

Hubby and I no longer fight over our one desktop when we both need the computer because I can now use my phone if I want to check my email or look something up on the web. I feel so....connected. I love my new phone!

Posted by Amanda at 4:56 PM In Cool Stuff, Techie Stuff
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We've made a few changes to the boys' playroom over the last few weeks. Besides sorting through their toys and putting stuff aside for the upcoming community yard sale, we made part of it our home team hall of fame.

Our friends bought the autographed poster on the left at a garage sale for us, and we had the other two posters.

Hubby's old jerseys are either stained or don't fit him anymore, so we reused them as decor. We may put them in those collectors frames sometime in the future. The shelf contains sports paraphenalia we've collected through the years.

The latest touch is the navy blue basket on the floor containing all the boys' stuffed animals (to the left of the TV stand). I saw it at Michael's today, it reminded me of the Sabrina Baskets from Pottery Barn Kids, but at a much more affordable price. It was only $14.99, so of course I had to have it. I may go by another tomorrow for their sports stuff (to the right of the TV stand).

Tell me, what do you think?

Posted by Amanda at 10:35 PM In Home Sweet Home, Sports
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Monday: Work from 8:30am until 6:45pm, then a visit to my grandmother’s house. Got home at 9:45, went to bed at 11pm.

Tuesday: Work at 9:00, Matty’s school called at 10:15 that he threw up three times. MIL picked him up and stayed with him until hubby got out of work at 3pm. Rushed out of the office at 6pm to head home, pick up boys, and head to doctor’s office. Left doctor’s office at 8pm, headed to toy store for a “treat” for Matty for being so good at the doctor. Had early celebratory anniversary dinner at Bahama Breeze, got home at 11:15pm.

Wednesday: Anniversary Day. At work at 8:30am. So busy I missed all calls of well-wishes. Phone dies around 6:30pm. At work until 9pm (Did you notice? It was a 13-hour workday). The good news: overtime, and Pad Thai take-out at work. The bad news: exhaustion.

Thursday: At work at 7:30am, left at 6:30pm. Another long day. Good: Had dinner and did a bit of shopping with Tere. Bad: parking ticket because I forgot to put more change in the meter.

Friday: Workplace becomes Joint Commission accredited…Yay!! The long hours and months of preparation become well worth it. Shorty’s BBQ for lunch, left work at a “decent” hour. Bonus: nice little gift received from boss for all the hard work this week. Some self-care time is in my very near future!

I'm very much looking forward to sleeping in tomorrow. How was your week?

Posted by Amanda at 7:55 PM In Friends, My Crazy Life!, Work
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Claudia and company came over to hang out for a while this afternoon, and little J was a ham as always. His latest trick is signing Justin Bieber's "Baby Baby", it's the cutest thing. I have no doubts that someday I'll see that kid's name in lights. You Tube is not allowing me to log in right now, but I'll definitely post the short video I took of him tomorrow. It's adorable!

Posted by Amanda at 10:52 PM In Friends
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When I was a child, I'd spend most weekends at my grandparents' house. More often than not, I'd find Cuban ice cream sandwiches in the freezer, and eating one would be heavenly. What is a Cuban ice cream sandwich, you ask? It's vanilla, chocolate or strawberry ice cream between two slices of panetela (pound cake). It was having cake and ice cream together, in one perfect little morsel. They came in clear cellophane wrappers, and the product information label was neither pre-printed or a sticker on the package. It was a piece of paper practically baked onto one of the sides of cake, and you had to peel it off before biting into the yummy goodness.

I've been looking for these delicious sandwiches for as long as I can remember. I knew I wouldn't find them in Publix or Winn Dixie, so whenever I'd wander into a Cuban market I'd look for them. Trouble was, I didn't know the brand name, and most people I asked looked at me like I was nuts. Unless you were in Miami in the mid-80's and had heard, seen and tasted what I was talking about, you had no clue this thing even existed.

Fastforward 20-plus years later, and I'm grocery shopping with Brandon last night at Sedano's. I go into the refrigerated section to get some orange juice, and my eye happens to catch a glimpse of this wrapper inside the freezer door just ahead of me. I immediately opened the freezer door and grabbed three sandwiches. Brandon asked why I was so happy, and I explained to him I'd eat those when I was his age and I had been looking for them for a long, long time.

I could hardly wait until dinner was over to have one for dessert. It was almost as good as I remember. The ones I'd have as a child had thicker slices of cake, but the taste is same. Mmm-hmm!

Posted by Amanda at 12:37 PM In Fantastic Food!
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The community yard sale is in just three weeks, and my "sell" pile has taken over half my side of the closet. There are all sorts of things in there: some of the boys' old toys, all kinds of home decor, even some clothes. I had a bit of luck selling the boys' baby books last time, and I've noticed that many of the other residents sell used books, so I've cleared out part of our bookshelf and am hoping that's a successful item for us.

I've also listed a few DVDs and a couple of other things online, because I'd rather the price for these items go up than down. I'm hoping that we make enough between the yard sale and the online auctions to make a significant dent in our cruise fund.

Posted by Amanda at 1:08 PM In Moolah
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My insurance sent an inspector out to the house yesterday for an outdoor inspection since it's time for us to renew. Everything was fine, except he's not sure if our roof is up to code. Some coding changed in late '93, and he's unsure of when our roof was redone. I can't find the permit info online pertaining to the roof. He's submitting his report to the insurance company, and they will probably call us for more information. This same thing happened when we initially got this insurance two years ago. We're hoping the insurance company can find the info in their records from the last time, and that we can avoid "investing" in any work to get it up to code.

Posted by Amanda at 11:02 AM In Home Sweet Home
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