and the older women too!

A third grader walking by that rides Son's Bus saw Son in the yard yesterday and she tried to get him to come over (out of our yard) and talk to her.

She said she had been watching him in his afterschool ultimate sports camp and wanted to chat with him. And was he busy watching her too?  Thank GOODNESS Son is So Not Interested in girls, but it is odd.

i have fainted.

Son has received TWO love letters in his backpack this week from the girls in his class.

One invitation to SPEND THE NIGHT....OMG.  Hubby and I almost dropped dead.

And one letter just professing love.

Good lord people, he is SIX and in Kindergarten!  What on earth is going on?

menu planning works for me!

One of the websites I read says that menu planning will save you lots of $$ because you can goto the store with a list of only what you need to buy to feed your family for that week.

Since our grocery bill (5 people!) has gotten out of control - the rising prices are killing us, especially since I try to buy Organic if it's an option for that product (they make organic chocolate!) - we're looking at EASILY $200 a week (and that doesn't include formula for the baby).

So yesterday I made my menu for the week (which doesn't include fast food or restaurant food for the whole week and went to the store.  Well, pizzas were on sale, so I bought 5.  And I bought baby cereal, ice cream (buy 1 get 1 free!), walnuts (heart healthy!), a jug of gatorade, and a couple of other things that weren't on the list.

The total: $130!  So I got everything we needed, plus a few bonuses and spent way less!  YAY!

Look 10 Years Younger!

Me and the young guy on our team, J, were meeting with our "Problem Manager".  He said something about the young kids these days.  I asked how old he was because I think he looks about 43?  I am 34.  HE SAID 33!  He thought I was the same age as J, who is 23!  Yay me!  I look 11 years younger than I am?  AWESOME!

so, um yeah - SKIING!

We went to Snowmass, CO with Hubby's parents.  What a trip!

For the first time in YEARS, I got to ski!  And not only SKI, but ski EVERY DAY.  FOR TWO HOURS.  With hubby!  Without children!  It was AWESOME! 

I spent Monday - Thursday working on my technique (which was crappy).  I can get down any slope (Jupiter Bowl in Deer Valley?  Where they did the OLYMPICS?  Check!  I can get down it - not ski it well, but I didn't die!).  But I wanted to ski more like all those rich people skiing around who get to ski more often than once every six years!  So I worked and worked and worked on my technique.  And I improved!  Yay me!  I even went down the Campground Run - which is a BLACK!  And a Black on the west coast is WAY HARDER (steeper!  LONGER!  STEEPER!) than a black on the east coast skiing.  I laugh at blacks on the east coast, because EVEN if you find them scary, they only last 1/8 of the time the ones out west do!  But I did it!  And I didn't do too bad!

But then Thursday night, we got snow.  At the base of the mountain, it was like 16 - 19 inches, easily 2 feet at the top.  I've never skied that much fresh powder before, so out we went into the blizzard (it was still snowing like crazy Friday morning).  And the first thing I did was fall down! Into 2 feet of powder.  Which is pretty much like falling into 2 feet of water - you get submerged.  It was neat!  So I went down the green as I was a bit shaken - skiing in 2 feet of powder is nothing like skiing on a well used run!  MISTAKE!  Apparently no one skis green slopes in that much powder because the powder makes you go so slow.  SO I was skiing on totally unskied territory and I was alone.  And terrified I was going to screw up in all that mush and go flying off the mountain.  But they had run a snowmobile around the slope for morons like me so I just went in it's track and finally got to where the run crossed where Hubby was waiting for me.  But by the end of our time, I had improved my powder skillz as well, aren't you proud?

And SON?  He is an awesome skier!  We skied with him a couple of times (he was in ski school all day and loving it) and he blows our minds!  He tried to ski thru the woods!  And tried to get over to the jumps!  Thank goodness he didn't see those things in time to ski over to get to them!

Anyway - more on what we did that wasn't skiing coming up next!

And we're back!

We just returned from our annual ski vacation out west!  MAN did we have fun!

But the time change!  YIKES!  We flew out west March 7, and had a 2 hour time difference.  Then the clocks sprung forward on March 8.  Then we returned home and NO ONE set OUR clocks forward so all day yesterday in addition to being off by 2 hours for the time zone, we were off 1 hour because the clocks were wrong... And man did we manage to screw up everyone's body clock!

going green!

Ok!  We're going green!!!

Here's what we're doing!!

 

** recycling plastic, glass, newspaper

** recycling cardboard, paperboard, magazines & junkmail

** bottling the water that runs while I wait for the faucet to heat up - I use this water to rinse out the recycling

** not drinking bottled water if we can help it

** not ordering straws for the adults at restaurants

** using washclothes to clean the 2 babies after meals (we were doing this anyway at a savings of at least 6 papertowels a day!)

** not letting the shower run on and on while we wait for it to get hot and get distracted away.  I'm waiting by the door for it to get warm.

** taking shorter showers

** turning off faucet when washing face (already doing that for brushing teeth)

** not turning the car on until we're actually ready to drive away.  Even if it only saves 10 seconds of idle time per trip, over time, that is A LOT of gas.  I'm also no longer using the remote starter to start my car (this is sad, I love love love that thing) but my truck is a GAS HOG and to let it sit and idle just to get warm is DUMB and WASTEFUL

** Potty training BabyT.  This will be a huge savings for the environment - all those diapers!

 

It's funny, but all the going green stuff is CHEAPER than doing it the wasteful way.

Oh, except for the green cleaners.  Those are damn expensive. Also the dishwasher soap doesn't seem to work very well - I've tried Seventh Generation liquid and powder and they both suck.  Any suggestions?

The products, well, that part is getting expensive!