Violated

So I had planned on having some kind of normal post by now, Easter weekend recap maybe. And then yesterday happened. My yahoo & myspace were hacked into. Long story short I learned a VERY important lesson the hard & frustrating way. So take note & learn from my mistakes:

• Follow the password prompts that warn you your password is low security.
• Don't use a password that someone could figure out in short conversation.
• Change your password periodically so you don't feel too 'safe' with it.
• Even 'casual' conversation can reveal a lot of details.
  
• Don't be so trusting of people you don't really know.
• People LIE!

So the last couple of days I've been trying to sort this out, warn anyone on my friends lists that some person is out there posing as me trying to get their information and frantically switching all of my online accounts to my alternate e-mail address. It's been frustrating & tedious. So far it doesn't seem there is any serious damage done & I'm SO thankful it wasn't worse. I made a new myspace but made it private and will not add anyone to my friends list - messenger or myspace unless I know them. I have been thinking about my blog and if I should make it private. So that's something I'm still thinking about. I hope that by this weekend I'll have more of a clear mind to do a more regular post. For now I've got my thoughts & plenty around the house keeping me busy. Oh & I have I mentioned how much 'tude a 3 year old can have? :sigh:

Spring is Here!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend with your family & friends. The weather is beautiful in these parts {at least for today} and I'm looking forward to fun activities with the kids. We'll go to church tomorrow and celebrate the resurrection of our Lord & Savior Jesus Christ and then have a video conference with hubby. Today I have last minute errands to run like getting Lydia a basket that's not as big as her & hoping to find Michael a 'Sunday Best' outfit. Did I just find out it was Easter weekend? No, I'm just a good procrastinator like that. ;) I'll do a little egg hunt with the kids and just have fun with outside as long as the weather is nice. I've got a yummy pot roast left from Thursday but since the kids didn't enjoy it nearly as much as I did I'll have to make a little something special for them. Next week I should be somewhat back to my normal bloggy self. Thanks for visiting!

P.S. Did spring & Easter sneak up quickly on anyone else? It's not often that Easter is in the same week as St. Patrick's Day. I found out it has something to do with the equinox & full moon - or something like that. Anyways, next year Easter should be back in April where it belongs. ;)

Edited to add: Today isn't the first day of spring in case I confused anyone. As far as I know the first day of spring was Thursday - I just hadn't posted since it's been official.

I'm Still Here

I'm still around just been busy with things around the house, working my business and being introspective. Thank you for your previous comments and I apologize if anyone was worried I went off the deep end. I haven't - not yet at least ;) Seriously though, I did struggle some yesterday morning feeling overwhelmed with various things and had trouble staying focused. But I'm working on it. I need to get some things figured out & get a new routine around here so that doesn't happen so often or get more intense. I may not be around the blogosphere for a bit of time but I'm not gone forever.

Also, for those who have asked or have told me they are thinking of or praying for my husband, thank you. I have been able to talk to him over the computer a few times and once over the phone in this last week. He is doing well, sometimes working on little sleep but doing well. He is really excelling & standing out as a leader. I am SO incredibly proud of him.

Combat Boots & Flip Flops

One of Those Days

Several of you have left me sweet comments saying that you have thought about me at various times, usually after hearing news about the goings on in Iraq and several have also given me encouraging comments about how well I'm doing and how strong I am and you don't know how I do it. When people tell me they don't know how they do it, being a married single mom, I usually reply that I take things one day at a time and I just do it because, well I have to. There really isn't an option not to do 'it' unless I wanted us to starve and end up with no clothing in a dirty house and no social life. Obviously that's not really a choice. So I do it. But I don't always do it well or as well as I could.

Today was one of those days. It started out fine meeting up with some other wives for coffee, playing with the kids in the park and then running a couple of quick errands. And then I'm not sure what happened. Michael didn't take his nap {usually only does max of three days out of the week}, Lydia woke up early with an exploded diaper while I was chatting with the hubs online, three doorbell interruptions in the middle of all that, kids getting into things making more of a mess than there was and being behind on housework - all of it just seemed to pile on. I also realized in the middle of that that our registration on the vehicle I'm driving {other is on non op since I don't need two cars right now} has expired and I haven't received anything in the mail about it.

I was frustrated, overwhelmed, kicking myself for getting behind on various things and cramping - which never helps anything. Michael argued with me on everything he could, at least twice which upset me and 'bad mommy' guilt followed. Most of today was a day that I just try to get through each hour looking forward to the kids' bedtime and dreading it all at the same time because it means the house will be quiet & I would be 'alone'. It's a good time to get caught up around the house but also my time to relax and unwind. So for now that's what I'm doing, unwinding. The other stuff can wait.

Thanks for visiting. And I truly thank you all for your supportive & encouraging comments you often leave. Tomorrow will be a new day with a fresh start and I look forward to that.

Talkin on Tuesday

It's Tuesday and I'm talkin'! Wait - don't go, I promise I won't talk about snow anymore. Not like I did here, here, here or over here. Trust me, I never thought I'd be talking about or taking so many pictures of snow here in Kennessee. Also, I've never lived somewhere that snow was in my backyard, so I had a child like enthusiasm about it.

Today I'm going to talk about something much more interesting - packaging tape. I know! Intriguing isn't it? No really, there's a lot more to packaging tape than securing boxes, I promise. You still with me? Great, thanks. :sigh of relief: With my husband overseas I take advantage of a military mailing kit. You call this number, press option #1 a couple times and then a nice person tells you about when to expect your package. It's really a great thing. The kit comes with 6 priority mail boxes {two different sizes}, labels & customs forms {yes, you still need customs forms when sending items to an APO/FPO address even though shipping rates are the same as domestic} and a roll of priority mail packaging tape.

I don't think even the most extreme taper of packages could use a whole roll on 6 boxes so I've found some other handy uses for the tape. Some of those things I've taken pictures of to share with you. I've also used it to seal a box when it was opened on the wrong end but didn't think to take a picture of it - or I didn't have my new camera yet, not sure which. Either way, this isn't about sealing boxes it's about other uses so here you go.

Another thing that happens when you are military {and live on post} is your whole house {minus the kitchen and bathroom} has grocery store flooring. I'm sure I've mentioned the ugly floors before. Anyways, a whole house of hard surface is challenging to keep clean with two little ones tracking crumbs and whatnot from outside. Pushing around a mop & bucket then drying the floors with a towel {because I'm nothing if not professional} gets really old when the floors don't even look great afterwards. So I got this sw*ffer mop gadget and the battery pack kept falling off so rather than breaking the thing in three pieces and throwing it out {like I was tempted to} I reached for the packaging tape. Voila! Problem solved.

Here's something we can all relate to. The battery clip being dropped one thousand too many times finally causing a small injury that results in the clip falling off constantly. What was once an annoyance is now just slightly less attractive. And holds better than scotch tape, in my opinion.

Michael loves bread and sometimes tries to help himself to some when {he thinks} I'm not looking. On such an occasion the bag suffered an injury & the bread would have been left to awful demise. Thanks to the packaging tape the bread stayed fresh & my son learned a lesson about asking mom first.

Here you can't see the tape but it's behind those paint samples that I am {was} considering painting the kitchen. I still think about painting but then I really think of all that would entail and I start thinking about something else. So we'll see if that ever actually happens. But I do know that my samples are secure on my wall {until I'm secure in my decision} thanks to the packaging tape.

I also think the tape will be good to me in helping fix my loose cord issues so I'll try it out tomorrow. Okay, so maybe talking about snow is more interesting than talking about packaging tape. I think these are things I'll look back on and laugh at when thinking about my life as a military wife. Not that military families are the only families with packaging tape on hand but with these mailing kits I'd say we've got the corner market on it and plenty to find good uses for.

Thanks for visiting! Maybe if you come back I'll have something more intriguing to talk about another day - or not, not making any promises on that one. ;) If you want to see more interesting things other people are talking about or share something of your own click on the button above.

If you haven't seen enough snow...

I've got more for you! Averaging eight inches more if you were curious. So Friday night I was up late watching the snow fall and trying to be artsy with my camera. Yesterday I took the kids out a few times between running clothes through the dryer. No, I wasn't catching up on laundry {like I should have been} but rather drying the same clothing so we could go play again. Michael LOVED it, as I knew he would, but Lydia didn't have as much fun this time. Considering the snow was about 1/3 her height I don't blame her. It was higher in some places from snow drifts & lower in other places like under the tree. It was such a beautiful sight to wake up to, the field out back & yard/street out front covered by a clean sheet of white powdery snow. Our backyard doesn't look so smooth & clean as other yards but we had a lot of fun. Lydia did walk around some and played with some of the sand toys we have - works great for snow too! Michael built snow castles, made angels in the snow, tasted some clean bits & tromped around as much as he could. So here's a little pictorial of our day starting out with opening the back door, looking at the front yard & snow covered street, and playing with the kids. Yes, I made a snow angel too. Michael shared an Eskimo kiss with me.

I tried to post this Saturday but blogger was giving me error issues - first with getting to the site and then with uploading pictures. Thanks for visiting!

and why am i STILL up???

One Year Ago

A year ago today I woke up in our room at post lodging, opened the curtains and took my first daytime look at our first duty station. It seems like forever ago & just yesterday all at the same time. So much has changed since then. This place is starting to feel more like home, even though I still don't totally know my way around - I can now find both scrapbook stores! I think I'm pretty settled into this area as well as Army life - it's more than just my husband's career, it really is a lifestyle. I'm not an expert and still have a lot to learn I'm sure but have gotten used to his inconsistent work schedule, uniforms & pt clothes in the laundry, boots by the door and last minute changes to just about everything. Shopping at the PX & commissary is second nature & even when I'm at Wal*Mart I reach for my ID out of habit. More importantly I have met other wives, made friends and have a few people who I think would be there for me if I needed something. I'm so glad that now I do have a few people I can call to meet up for coffee or take our kids to the park. I remember feeling so lonely in that hotel room all month and feeling like I would never make any friends. While I still get homesick and miss my family & friends back in Cali {along with knowing where pretty much everything is} I don't get sad about it as often anymore. Home is where my husband's boots are and so this is it for us, until we get stationed somewhere else. One thing I'm not quite used to is the unpredictable weather. Do you know that we've had just about all four seasons in the last weekish?? Seriously. It snowed one day, felt like spring the next, we had rain, sun, wind, icy cold temps and it's supposed to snow again tonight & tomorrow {90% chance of 3-5 inches}. We've had everything minus the humidity which I am SO not looking forward to. While it was cold outside I was thinking how great it will be when summer is here, I was thinking California summer - so NOT the same as Kennessee summer. But like everything else I'll adjust to that too.

I still remember thinking that military life was so NOT for me. I had planned to stay in California as long as we could afford to live there, continue going to the church I had gone to since I was 17 and be content in my circle of friends & activities. I never imagined raising my kids far away from family because I had grown up with family close by. Funny how we make all of these plans and just know how things will go and then God says something like "well that's a nice idea but this is what I have in store for you". The good thing is He doesn't just turn our lives upside down and leave us hanging. He really has provided me comfort, support, friendship, a new sense of confidence and a new outlook on my life. So be careful about what you say "you will never do" because you just may find yourself right in that place - and it just may be a good thing.

SMART Habit Saturday on Sunday

I'm a day late but yesterday I was too busy to sit down to post, so it's Sunday but I've still been pretty SMART. The kitchen sink stays pretty clean along with the rest of the kitchen. Folding laundry right out of the drier, not so great but it isn't sitting quite as long as it used to. Yay! for progress! This is a new month so time for a new habit. I really didn't know what I was going to start with this month {another reason for not getting my post up yesterday} until today.

Last night I picked up a desk from a friend who no longer needed it. She was sweet & took it apart into 5 pieces so I could fit it into my trunk. After the kids were in bed I put it together & it looks great. Though I'm sure I was quite the sight during assembly! I had to sit under the desk balancing the desk top with my head to keep it in place while putting the back piece in and then getting both of those pieces into the side piece. One things were in place I tightened the screws and put the keyboard tray in. I love having a keyboard tray because I have space to write in my planner without pushing everything around. After looking at the before & after photos below you'll understand my excitement over this new {to me} piece of furniture. Now my computer tower is in the tall cabinet rather than on my desk space, the printer is up on top instead of down below {chair is blocking printer in photo} causing me to get on my hands & knees to adjust the paper oh & it's an actual desk instead of a sofa table with a missing drawer front & bottom slat.

This afternoon I moved a filing cabinet from our bedroom {formerly serving as a bedside table-more on why it's not later} next to the desk. Now I have more storage & you can't see all of the wires in the corner anymore. I still need to rig something to keep the wires behind the desk out of sight but it's SO much better than it was. Ignore the broken bottom drawer on the filing cabinet, I am until I can figure out how to fix it - it's not so easy as I thought it would be.

In the middle of moving the filing cabinet & the kids wrecking havoc in the living room with their toys I thought it would be a good time to organize the TV unit. : / So not really a good time but I wanted to keep all of the computer games, programs & photo CDs close to the computer and they were mixed in with DVDs and CDs in the TV unit. One thing led to another and I have a slightly more organized TV unit. The bin on the filing cabinet is where the computer CDs are because they wouldn't fit inside the top drawer & the bottom one is broken. I still want to declutter my magazines into binders, find a new home for my scrapbooks and projects but until I get shelving in the laundry room this is what I have. It's better than it was before so once again - yay! progress.

You may be thinking - well that's all good & fine but what does it have to do with your new SMART habit? Since I just know you are on the edge of your seat filled with suspense & you were so kind to read all the way through I'll tell you. My new habit for this month is to spend some time once a week tackling projects just like this. Not these exactly because that would get redundant but the projects that I put off or don't often make time to do. I am going to have a little notepad that I can write out things throughout the week that I want/need to get done and then do them one day. I am not going to set one specific day to do this because my schedule can change depending on the kids, getting together with friends or my Mary Kay activities.

I'm hoping that this will help me to get things more in order around here and also relieve anxiety about unfinished projects. To see other SMARTies or join in on the SMARTness yourself click the button at the top of this post. Thanks for visiting!