Coping with the Phenomenon of Male Sickness

There is a mystery I'm dying to solve.

It ranks right up there with government conspiracy theories.

Male Sickness.

You know what I'm talking about.

A guy gets sick and all of the sudden the world stops, 

they need help with everything,

and these rough and tough men become big babies.

Sound familiar?

Now if women get sick, we all keep going (with the rare exception)

We still have houses to take care of, kids to raise, jobs to do, etc.

It takes a very very bad sickness to get me out of the game.

Now I would love to solve this mystery.

Do women have a higher pain tolerance?

Are men used to being babied by their mothers when they were sick?

If that's the case, does that mean all girls were not babied?

I will get to the bottom of this phenomenon.

In the mean time, here is a list for my fellow ladies.

4 ways to deal with male sickness without killing your partner.  

1.  Send them to bed

When they are sick they lose all fun privileges.

This is not a get to sit around and play video games kind of day.  

After all their body needs to rest and you need to encourage them to feel better so they WANT to come out of hiding.

2.  Keep checking on them.

After all they need to know you care.

It is okay if you must wake them every hour to check their temperature.

That is the responsible thing to do.

3.  Make them sick food

Stick to the basics, soup, juice, water, toast, etc.

No fancy cooking here, they need the bland basics to help them get better.

4. Love them

Now if you do all of the above things and they still aren't getting better than that means they are really feeling very under the weather.  They might really be suffering of something beyond Male Sickness.

At this point, continue taking great care of them.

Maybe limit the trips in to wake them up and check on them.

But help them get better and if they get to whiney.  Shut the bedroom door.  That is why we put them up there in the first place.

A Tale of a Dress... a Dang Tutu Dress!

I made this dress...

And I don't make these kinds of dresses.

We're talking a froo-froo tutu like dress for the kiddo.

You see my sister is getting married and she really wanted a tutu dress for Blake's flower girl dress.

And of course, being the world's greatest sister that I am, I decided to embark on this adventure called tutu making.

It didn't seem so hard... tie strips of tulle onto an elastic band and you have yourself a dress.

So I sent the following picture to my sister.....

She informed me that the dress wasn't going to work on a paper towel roll.

Dang it!  

So much easier to pose a paper towel roll than an 18 month old.

So the next morning I sent her this....

(Forgive me for not taking off her PJ's first.)

So I thought I'd try again..

I told Little Miss how gorgeous she looked and she was a princess and I got this....

Even worse of a reaction followed by trying to rip the dang tutu off her purple PJ clad body.

Needless to say, Sister, went a different route for a flower girl dress.

And I am now stuck with a tutu hoping that one day she'll decide it's a fun Halloween costume.

If not, I'll give it to Sister and Sister's fiance for their future children.

In case anyone really does want to make a dress for dress up.   Here is the cheap and easy link I used to make this one.

ENJOY!!!

Going Green!

Happy St. Patty's Day!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful, green filled day!

In honor of the day I thought I'd introduce to you to some of my new favorite "Green" things.

Enjoy!

First off, anyone who struggles to get their kiddo to eat veggies... this is the stuff for you!

Introducing......... DYNAMIC GREENS!

This stuff just rocks.  Get the strawberry kiwi one and mix it with water, it tastes just like Kool Aid but it has all of the veggies and fruit.  

Not into Kool Aid- no problem?  Go with the chocolate one and add it to some milk.

Voila you have healthy chocolate milk!

And the best part, this stuff is all organic and super good for you.  I even drink it.

The other way I have found to sneak the fruits and veggies into Little Miss are these wonderful treats.

I found them at Target, thought I'd give them a whirl and these things are a huge hit!

Seriously, you hand her one of these and you would have thought you handed her the moon.

They have all different pouches and all of them have veggies mixed in with fruits 

But be careful, they taste GOOD and they suck these guys down!  :)

And last but not least....  BLUE AVOCADO

No, it's not the green avocado but bare with me here...

These things are the cutest reusable baggies and lunch totes I've ever seen.

Seriously, I love them.

Go get ya some.

Not only do they have the color green but they also help make it fun to "go green"

How was that?  Did I tie it in ok?

All right, so while you are drinking your green beers and eating your green eggs, make sure and check out these green things.  You'll thank me!

My proudest moment... in a sandbox.

Growing up I was a tom boy....  

Yes complete with a teenage mutant ninga turtles t-shirt, that was the stylin color of neon orange.  

I was cool... real cool.... ok, fine, not really.

My mom predicted I would have daughters and they would be GIRLY.

And after my mother's predictions were 99.9% accurate I was really worried, especially when lying on the ultra sound table (desperately needing to pee) I discovered, we were pregnant with a girl.

As my darling little diva grew, I realized she liked dolls, babies, and then came makeup and jewelry.

I shook my head and thought to myself..  "why is Mama always freakin right?"

Well then a couple of days ago this glorious thing happened.

Jewlery clad- Little Miss discovered our sandbox out in the back yard.

I held my breath and anxiously awaited what would happen next.

Would she think it was to dirty for her little girly self and walk away in disgust?  

Or would she say "Oh whatever, I look great, I'm digging in".  Pretty girls can get dirty.

Well.....

She dove right on end and continued to play there for quite some time.

Shoes covered, outfit covered, hands a mess, but I didn't care.

She was not so girly after all.  

Yes she wore her necklace to play in the dirt, but that's all right.

She's proving you can be pretty and still get your hands messy.

That's my girl!

Well and then I had to cut our little "Pretty Girls Get Dirty Party" short.

She made the ultimate point and ate the sand not once, but twice.

I decided my point had been made and did the only responsible thing. I snapped out of my precious sandbox moment and pulled her out of the sand box for eating sand.

She cried and screamed, but I smiled.

I had visions of a life filled with yes jewelry, make up and shopping, but also, 

snowboarding, hiking, biking, sports, etc.

Because maybe my daughter won't be so prissy after all.

Just maybe......

Kony 2012

I woke up Wednesday morning to find this picture and link all over everything! 

All over Twitter and Facebook and I was immediately curious.

I started the video thinking I wouldn't watch all 30 minutes, but I couldn't stop watching.

If you have not heard about this yet, I highly recommend you check it out HERE !

Following the media tsunami that was caused by this video, there were a fair share of attacks on the organization and their mission.

I'm not going to address these controversies, but instead I wanted to point out the encouragement that I saw after this video went viral.

If anything this video caused people to look "outside the box".

That box, where everything is comfortable, where we don't have to worry.

This does not directly impact us in anyway, but to see millions upon millions of people actually stand up and care for something outside of their comfort zone was, for lack of a better word, encouraging.

I just hope and pray that this helps us to continue to live with our eyes open.

Yes, spread the word about Kony and pray for his capture, but always look at those people we pass every day.  Everyday there are people that need help, that need a smile, that need to know you care.

Put down your phone, live in the moment and see how else you can change your world.

The Cop Life... part 2

Awhile back I wrote this post on what it's like to be married to a cop.

Well it's all still true, but now I feel like I should update this, with what it's like to co parent with a cop while being married to him.

Ok, that changes things... just a little.

Husband is still wonderful at leaving work at work, and overall he's a wonderful hubs and father.

I really couldn't be more blessed.

But.... (you knew there was a but didn't you)

when you make the decision to both work full time, and to not put a kiddo in day care.

Well then life gets a little tricky.

And then our relationship gets a little tricky, and then parenting gets a little tricky.

Currently, we are single parents half of the day 4 days a week. 

4 days a week, our life looks like this.

I wake up early, and head to work.  Get home with 15-30 min before hubs heads out the door to start his shift at work.  He gets home, we sleep in the same bed for 3 hours and then I'm up again to go back to work.  My joke is I see my husband 3.5 hours a day and 3 of those hours are spent sleeping.

Awesome!

Now the other 3 days of the week are great.  One day I spend working part of it, and then the other 2, are spent as my highly anticipated family days.

The other 4 days just plain stink... A lot!

Every year, we adjust to a new schedule and every year, I go through this period of hating Caleb's new shift.  And then we finally get the hang of it, only for it to change all over again.

It's been a hard few weeks of this shift, I'm not going to lie.

I've cried a lot (poor hubby)

I'm exhausted!

And sadly, I've learned to rely on Yo Gabba Gabba, so I can actually get food on the table for me and Little Miss each night.  That show is so obnoxious, but I'll save that for another post.

But in all of this, I am realizing that this is my constant reminder to keep God first.

I love my family, I really really do. 

But sometimes, I need the reminder that I need to love God more.

And this is the perfect reminder,

In the chaos, and the loneliness of nights alone after Blake is in bed....., I'm reminded that it isn't Caleb that can make me eternally happy, and as much as she tries it's not Blake either.

It's the Big Man Upstairs.

As long as I keep this perspective, we will be fine, I will be fine, life will be fine.

After all, Husband and I have big plans for when we're old, retired, and the kids are grown up.

So I'll miss him now, but look forward to the plans of the 2 cool old people traveling across Europe like we're 21.... ahh yes, that is what I have to look forward to.

Cop Life... it's a constant adjustment, but at least I can say every day, I'm proud of my husband and the work he does!  He truly makes a difference in this crazy world we live in.