Friday, February 1, 2013

Quick Takes VIII

Linking up with Jen.  But you knew that.

1. The Sheenazing winners have been announced!!!  And while I absolutely LOVE all the blogs nominated, I am super excited in particular that Kelly won.  Her overzealous enthusiasm about the awards was hilarious to me, especially in contrast to the very pious and humble response of so many other bloggers who were nominated :)


Bonnie was awesome enough to give the nominees some blog flare.  Every time I look at this graphic I am now narrating in my head "Simmer down everyone, just simmer down."

A HUGE thank you to everyone who voted for me - and also an apology to the friends I blackmailed into voting for me.  :)

2. Yesterday I decided to be a cool mom and put up the "indoor swing".  It's been a while since we've had it out, and I was very happy to see that Clare is now able to handle the challenge all by herself:


Then I took it up a notch and decided to add an under-table hammock to the mix.
Nosepicking photobomb!

Who knew there were so many uses for a baby wrap??

3. This bit of fun was followed by what will forever be remembered in history as "The great screamfest of 2013"  Because hammocks are really hard to share when you're 2-3 years old.  And babies just cry for no reason sometimes.  I had a horrible headache before this commenced, it was late afternoon and the girls had failed to nap that day, and so I switched into survival mode and did the only thing I could think of to do.

Which was to set them on the couch with their pillow and blanket, turn on the first Amazon Prime movie that popped up, and hand them each a bag of BBQ potato chips.


All crying ceased almost immediately, I think out of pure shock that I wasn't even addressing their clearly out of line behavior, and a few minutes later Ava turned to me and said "that really calmed me down, mom!"

Noted, my dear.

4. As much as I LOVE our apartment (thank you all again for the lovely comments on my Theme Thursday pic!!) it's just not the ideal place for a growing family.  (What I mean is, every time all of the kids are crying and screaming at once, which is at least once a day, I am on edge for a few hours thinking one of our neighbors must have called the police by now.)  We're starting to look around at houses to rent, and honestly I think my #1 criteria right now is NO CARPET. No no no no no.  I'm so over this scene played out 3 times a day:

Gravy soaked french fries and ketchup on carpet.

And Crayola washable products??  Fuggedaboutit.

(Somewhere in the depths of my computer I have a brilliant photo to illustrate this point.  Can't find it right now.  You'll just have to trust me.)

Anyone have a lead on a house to rent in the Baltimore area that is wall-art friendly??

5. Soooo as we sat down to dinner tonight, Stephen paused the music I had playing in the background so that we could say grace.  As he started it back up he mentioned that the Mumford and Sons album I was currently playing had a song with off-color language and that I should make sure to skip that one around the girls.  I assured him that I had in fact had this album on repeat all day for several days now and I hadn't heard anything and there must be some mistake.  You didn't hear the F-Bomb?? he asks...ummm f-bomb??

Yeah, f-bomb.  More than one, in fact.

Way to go Jame, way to go.

6. Did everyone see the study about praying the rosary being as good as yoga for heart health???  This makes me very happy, because I've had some interesting yoga pictures showing up in my Pinterest feed lately which scare me a little.

7.  Did I actually just get through all these quick takes on a Thursday night???  Might I actually have a spot in the top 100 for the first time EVER?!  I'm going to go reward myself with a (literally) midnight Little Debbie or something.

****** I WOULD LIKE TO AMMEND THIS TO SAY WHAT IN THE WORLD?!?!?!  DO YOU PEOPLE WAKE UP AT 6AM TO LINK YOUR QUICK TAKES?!?!  ITS 7:19am AND I'M NOT GOING TO CRACK THE TOP 50?!?!?!
*******

End rant. sorry.

Happy weekend!!  And go see Jen for more!!

17 comments:

  1. Love it all, Jamie...seriously... And perfect solution to a screamfest...movies, blankets and chips! Way to go, Mom! : )

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    1. THANK YOU Billie Jo - I'm not kidding, the fact that someone reading this does not think I'm a terrible mother means a lot to me :) Sometimes ya gotta do what ya gotta do...
      (And HAPPY GROUNDHOG DAY!!!!)

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  2. Kelly's blog is SO funny. for real. I'm glad these awards happened because otherwise I mught not have discovered that blog!

    Carpet is THE WORST. For every potential concussion ours has saved us, we've probably spent as much money on Resolve as we would have on hospital copays...

    Also, there are rental houses in Virginia... Just saying... But if you have a little saved up, FHA loans only require like, a 2.5% down payment? And then your mortgage payments will likely be lower than rent. But it's hard to save money with kiddos! Just a thought, which you've probably already considered :)

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    1. Also, "pious and humble" is really more like, "Didn't realize I was nominated until like, 9 hours after I posted on facebook telling everyone to vote for my sister" :P

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    2. I absolutely clicked through to come tell you to move to Virginia. Rosie and I frequently discuss how we need to be your friend in real life. I'm just going to show up at your house sometime in March, but Rosie is less mobile than I, for some reason, so maybe you should just move :)

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    3. Oh my gosh Rosie I laughed SO HARD about the Resolve thing...it's SO SO TRUE!!! Not to mention the cost of the steam cleaner!!!
      I have no idea about loans - that is really good to know about the 2.5% down payment, that sounds right up our alley :) Our rent is pretty high and I would definitely guess that a mortgage would be less. BUT the other thing we're considering is possibly moving further south in the next few years so that's also a consideration with renting...but hey, Virginia is further south right!!!

      I definitely talk about you guys like I've known you my whole life...Stephen is used to it now but my mom is like ..."who???" hahahah I can't wait to meet up!!!!!

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    4. Yeah, things may be different in MD, but definitely see if you can talk to an agent - it'll be easier to find a rental house through an agent, and he/she can talk you through the buying process if that turns out to be the way you want to go.

      The nice thing about homeschooling is you don't have to worry about the quality of schools where you live! Obviously you want to be in a good parish & a neighborhood that isn't scary, but that made buying a lot easier for us.

      And there are a LOT of good parishes in VA - the Arlington Diocese pretty much can't be beat!

      Andrew still thinks it's weird when I talk about you & your family. Let's plan something for March!

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  3. Oh, Jamie. You crack me up. Fer serious.
    1. Totally agree about Kelly. That girl be hilarious.
    2. SMART use of a Moby!
    3. Yes to the crying. Oh, the crying. Sometimes TV is ok, especially if you are going insane.
    4. Just say no to carpet. We have marble floors here and I dread moving back to the States.
    5. Oops. :)
    6. Bwahaha! Tha cat. Dear Lord, the cat! Now, to pray more rosaries.
    7. Sorrrrrryyyy.

    My favorite is the rant at the end. I posted my QT waaaaaay early (it's one advantage to living in the future) and waited around today, occasionally clicking on conversion diary to see if it was up. I had to head out to grocery shop and when I got home less than 2 hours later there was already a grip of links. Smacked my head and laughed out loud. What can I do about that?

    Longest. comment. ever.

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    1. hahahaha I love this comment!!! But you are totally exempt from the rant, it's completely ok if you live on a different continent. What's everybody else's excuse?!?!

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  4. "Simmer down everyone, just simmer down." HA! I feel like I should do that more often.
    And #3; yes, I believe apartment carpet is evil. It's some cheap brand that not only holds onto stains despite repeated scrubbings, I'm pretty sure it creates new ones by itself when you sleep. If I told you how nasty our carpet was when we moved out, you're admiration of me would totally come down like, 100 notches.

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  5. That swing! That hammock! Amazing.

    I looove Mumford and Sons. Something about that brogue somehow makes the cursing less noticeable, doesn't it?!

    So glad I found your blog through Quick Takes, Jamie!

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    1. YES- that's exactly what I said!!! It's definitely not blatantly obvious...but still, the girls manage to pick up on eeeevverrrything so I'm just waiting for it to come out in public at the absolute least opportune moment :)
      I'm so glad you visited!!!

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  6. That's it. I'm installing an indoor swing. I don't have kids but...I love swings. Awesome. Needs to happen.

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    1. haahahhaa you totally don't need to have kids!!! There are so many crazy things I've seen on Pinterest...like swinging beds?!?! I want one of those...I'm very in touch with my inner child :)

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  7. hahah I love your amendment! There is certainly something fishy going on! Even when I post my quick takes at 9 am in Sweden, there will be twenty or more who got to it before me!

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    1. I think next week I'm going to stay up all night and go to each page as they pop up and comment "WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING?!?!"

      OR - maybe there is secretly a prize for being the first one to link up that we don't know about??? Hmmm....gonna go msg Jen F. about this now...

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