Speedy Claxton

T & H brought a teeny tiny turtle home from their Nana's house the other day. It was the most beautiful color green I have ever seen. It was most likely a brand new baby turtle because it couldn't have been more than 2 inches long. It was a red eared slider - thank you google images. But, when I looked up how to take care of a turtle it said that most baby turtles carry Salmonella-yuck! I immediately made the boys wash, no wait, scrub their hands to rid them of the evil death virus!

We decided that we would let Speedy Claxton roam free in the backyard and hoped that Allie wouldn't eat him. It was a monumentous occasion to let him go. We carefully placed him on a tuft of green grass and he immediately tried to burrow down into the green jungle of bermuda.

We took pictures of Speedy Clax, Clax, Claxton as we said our Goodbyes.

The crazy little fact about this is that 4 days later T & H were playing around a new house about 4 houses down and they found him......we actually made it about 300 feet in 4 days....all right Speedy!

Our evening walk with the dogs

This pic shows Mr. H and the love of his life......and it's not me. I don't mind....I like to share!




T & H enjoying the walk with Allie. She's trying not to get run over
I adore this house - all 3 stories of it.

We go on a walk almost every night so our poor dogs can get some exercise. One of the many reasons I love living in our little town is the Trail right behind our neighborhood. It's 17 miles long and has the neatest sites along the way. The house pictured above is our new one. Just kidding - it's an old Indian mansion that probably dates back to the early 1900's when the Indians built huge brick mansions in Osage County. That house looks alot like the mansion that Maria Tallchief, the celebrated Native American ballerina from the 30's and 40's, built in a town in Oklahoma called Hominy. Those mansions are all over Oklahoma. I guess when the Indians struck it rich with oil on their land, they built these massive homes. They are incredibly beautiful. If I had the money or the nerve, I would buy one and renovate it. But, there isn't a Bob Vila gene in my body so no chance of that. I like new houses. I don't even really care to live in anyone else's used house. How rude is that!



The trail also runs by a farm with alfalfa growing- in the spring it is so green and lush. I love it. It's those times and when I look at ThePioneerWoman.com that I wish I lived on a farm or ranch. Then I snap out of it.



You can see T & H don't like to walk with us. They would rather use the more modern forms of travel like a Razor or bike. Sometimes, even a skateboard.



We had tornado warnings this morning but the day turned out great. A slight breeze but a cool 70 degrees. Perfect for our nightly walk.

This is my guilty pleasure

Looks great I know.........it's Corn Beef Hash and Eggs. I have to admit, this is a family problem. My Dad loved Hash and Eggs and passed the guilty pleasure onto me. This is probably my greatest comfort food. Not chocolate, a glass of wine, nope, for me it's this dish. By the way, I know it looks disgusting in the picture but you just have to trust me. I love this stuff.

So, I fixed it after preparing pancakes for the boys and Mr. H. I was gonna eat it all by myself and not subject anyone else in the family to it but Mr. H saw it and wanted a bite. Low and behold......he loved it and ate half of it. See...that saved me a lot of calories! I guess it was just fattening enough for Mr. H to love it too! He is a dude after all. Dudes love fat and processed.

Oh - and the hash has to come out of a can. No homemade for me. Out of a nasty can. Probably the cheapest dinner you can made.......and the best!

Corned Beef and Cabbage - Kiss Me, I'm Irish

I made a corned beef and cabbage dish today for St. Patrick's Day. Being that my family is from County Cork, Ireland, I figured that's the dish for us on this day o'green beer.

I have no clue how to eat-diets confuse me

My office has been having a biggest loser contest and we weigh in every week. Well, it's now become a contest on who can harass the other better in regards to what they are eating or if they've worked out enough. Office dynamics are so strange that way-someone thinks because they work with you that they can tell you things that they normally wouldn't. I quit the contest because it's no one's damn business actually.

So I started the Atkins low-carb diet 2 days ago. All I've eaten is either salads, cheese, eggs or meat. The part I can't kick is the Diet Coke - it kills me to not have a Diet Coke. I mean, it's not even a real Coke - so it should be ok, right? Well, with Atkins, they want you to not drink caffeine either. No way, not this girl! I'm a momma with a ton of stuff on my plate - give me the Diet Coke.

I started Atkins because on Weight Watchers I always feel like I'm eating only carbohydrates and artificial sweetener. That can't be good. I think I've surmised that I'm a carbaholic. I love bread, biscuits, pancakes, crackers, rice, bagels. All of the carb filled crap. And...some of that fiber stuff will kill your stomach. Take it from me. Do not eat more than one Fiber One bar. Seriously........I learned that the hard way with a day off sick from work due to the fact that my stomach was doing somersaults from fiber overload.

So, how do you figure out what to eat. Is it low carb or the other extreme-the carb filled life of Weight Watchers? I have the hardest time deciding!
OK- Today I ate:
B
1 cup coffee with 2 tbsp ff half and half and 3 packets Sweet-n-Low
2 eggs, fried with butter
3 small sausage links
L
lettuce wedge with blue cheese dressing, eggs and bacon
Diet Coke
D
Chili cheeseburger with no bun
Only ate 1/4 of it though
Diet Coke

My weigh in on Tuesday was 195 - yuck! That feels bad.
handful of peanuts - 5g carb for 39 pieces

Here's my Westminster Kennel Club Winner

I haven't had a dog since I was 12 years old. Her name was Princess and my parents gave her to a farm when we moved to Tulsa and had to live in a condo until we could find a house. I loved Princess and never really wanted a dog after losing her.

Last year, Jim and I were too late for a movie so we went to the pet store next door. In I walked and saw the dog that would permanently move into my heart. She was 8 weeks old and the cutest white boxer I had ever seen. I was desperately in love from the beginning. A week after we got her home and the warranty had run out on her, she got sick and was in the intensive care unit at the vet for 8 days. She was very near death. So sick that Jim held her on his lap for months after she came home and spoiled her to death. She's a 70 pound lapdog now.

She sleeps on our bed hugging Jim's leg all night long and doesn't move. She thinks she's human and in all honesty, I think she is too.

I don't know what I ever did without this dog in my life.

Why do I do it?

Why do I let some people run all over me? I took my son to physical therapy to this lady named Suzette (bitch is more like it). Anyway, it turned out horribly. She was the rudest, nastiest medical professional I have ever come into contact with. Really pissed me off! Why do I let people treat me rudely and not stand up for myself? I am really that weak? I wanted to deck her but didn't want to make a scene in front of my son and my mom. After that I vowed that I'm going to let people do that to me-I will speak up and I will tell them how I feel about their behavior. I'm going to start not caring if I look like a bitch. I'm sick of trying to always make people like me. Why do women feel that need to always be liked?

On another subject, I saw a picture of myself from last New Year's Eve - God - I looked so fat - I really am going to keep with the Weight Watchers. I haven't made it to a meeting in 2 weeks but the water drinking is making me feel better. I have more energy and feel so less weighed down when I really watch what I eat. Yep-I sticking to WW - but I'll think more about it after I finish icing the cake that just came out of the oven.....toodles!

Weight Watchers

I'm going to try this weight watchers thing once again-I drink the 40 gallons of water a day and then about die trying to drive the 30 minutes home. How do people drink that much water? Is it normal to go to the bathroom every 15 minutes?? The idea of functioning in any kind of work environment baffles me - I can't even let anyone come sit in my office or I have to leave them to go pee! ARRGHHHHH!

So I'm going to try to prepare snacks before the week starts and just bring them to the office.

By the way - I tried the Southwest Grilled Chicken salad at Sonic - pretty decent!

Mom Guilt

Why do moms carry around so much guilt? Is it innate in us to feel guilty about working to provide your children with a better life when you see a stay-at-home mommy at school and you are just dropping your kids off while on your way to work? I see the moms who are casually walking their children into school and I'm hurrying mine out of the car....and it kills me! Those are the moments that I want to be a stay-at-home mom. To do the simple things, like attend every school party, not just the ones that work with my schedule.
I watched Tim Gunn's Guide to Style last night. He took a teacher who was also a mom and taught her the right way to dress but also to learn that its ok to pamper yourself. Of course, when they started talking about doing things for yourself and not just your children, she started crying and I started crying watching it. Why do we let ourselves go as moms?????? Do we think that being a nice looking, sharp dressed mom makes us seem self-indulgent - I don't think so. I always try to look my best - now somedays I don't feel my best - but hey, I try.

Proud mom!

I was glancing through my son's backpack last night and noticed a form that needed to be signed. It was the form for testing to get into the gifted and talented program for my 8 year old. I asked him about it and he said he didn't want to be in the gifted program because it would be a ton of extra work. I think he misunderstood that it was an honor to be asked to participate in the program. Not something that he should dread.

So....being the mom I am, I called to talk to the teacher about it and let her know that I really think he needs to be in it whether his test scores were high enough or not. To my surprise, she told me that he was going to qualify whether he tests high or not. She said he was one of the brightest kids in the class, but what was so special about him was that he was really well-rounded. I guess most kids who are smart really lack in social skills. Not my guy - with a mom that hasn't met a stranger, it would be extremely difficult for him to lack in any social skill whatsoever. That made me so proud of him. You see, he was injured at birth and paralyzed from the right shoulder down. This is a child that isn't even supposed to be able to move his arm, much less write with it. My son has turned out to be a go getter. He doesn't let the fact that his right arm doesn't straighten all the way get him down in the dumps. He embraces it. We call it his special arm or his lucky fin (Finding Nemo). We also live in a small town and all of these kids know him and play sports with him. They don't know him any other way.....and they really like him. But, the fact that he doesn't act shy and hide the fact that he's just a little different than anyone else makes me so full of pride. He's a great kid and I'm so proud to be his mom!

Hotdogs and the American family

Soccer season has started and so has the guilt feeling I get everytime I feed my little darlings hotdogs for dinner. When you have soccer practice two times a week and can't get home until 7pm, it's either feed them hotdogs or we all stay up until 10:30. There is no time for fixing dinner. So my question is this......is it really horrible to make almost no effort whatsoever on dinner when you have been running around like crazy? Or should I be one of those hyper-organized moms that has every element of the dinner planned out to the minute.

I'm getting a seal a meal - that's the answer! I'll be posting seal a meal recipes before long!