I'm in the minority?

I find it interesting that I'm in the minority. The minority? Yes. Being married. Turns out that us married couples are in the minority according to the 2005 American Community Survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau.

It turns out that more couples are living together.

I think that's a major shift. It's more acceptable in 2006 to live together than ever before.

I came from a very traditional family and so did my husband. More than ten years ago when my husband and I got serious, we did not live together. I had a condo. He had an apartment. Granted, I'd be at his place or he'd come to my place each night but we didn't cohabitate officially in one location. We kept up the illusion that we were living alone. I think it was more for our family traditions than what we wanted really. But then again, I think I wanted to live alone as long as possible. Have my own place. A place that I could call my own. Mine. Mine. MINE! That I was taking care of myself. That I could take care of my own vehicle. My own home.

Now are you cohabitating with your significant other? Or did you cohabitate before you were married? Tell. Tell me!

Halloween around the corner

My kidlings have their costumes. I've had them for about 3 weeks already.

My son? He has no idea I've got his Halloween costume. Hmmm.... I don't know if he remembers what Halloween is. Does your 3 year old remember going out last year? I haven't discussed it with my little guy but I HOPE he remembers. And WHAT is he going to be this year? Superman! He already has a cape (that I got about a year ago at Tar-jhay) that makes sounds based upon his movements. Either "whooshing' sounds like he's flying or "smack-whack" sounds like he's punching something.

My daughter? She is going to be Wonder Woman. Kind of along the theme of her birthday party. She has found and has worn her outfit already. This week while she's been off from school. She's been wearing it while her brother has been at daycare. So....my litle guy has no idea that he or his sister has a costume.

We've got our little Halloween lights out in front. We've got a string of 4 pumpkins that are stuck along the walkway to our front door. And we've got another pumpkin hanging on the little window beside our front door. Basic. Simple. Nothing elaborate. Nothing scary. My neighbor across the street? He's got 2 lighted jack-o-lanterns, 2 orange cactus shaped jack-o-lanterns, 3 tombstones in the yard, a skeleton hanging beside his garage, orange lights around his two front windows, AND orange spider lights with a black spider hanging above his front door. Yeah. He's got the most elaborate display in the neighborhood. All I can say is that he'd better have some dang good candy to hand out as well! Ha!

As for Halloween hand-outs, what do YOU give? I like to give the mini candybars. Snickers. Crunches. Reeses. 100 Grands. Maybe some Skittles in there too. I've never liked those twist wrap candies or Candy Corn. [blech] I guess that stems from when I was young and that's all my folks could afford. Oh yeah. And black licorice. Can't eat those either. I can eat red licorice but not black.

I can't wait for Halloween this year. The neighborhood is now finished so we can do a safe little loop around. No need to venture far like we had to last year. No construction to worry about. It's going to be great!

Come on...what's on your Halloween candy list? And what are your kidlings going to be wearing?

A little health scare

Remember how I couldn't pick up my sister and BIL when they flew into town for the Princess' birthday weekend? I went to my OB/GYN "Doc E" that morning. My annual. Which I hadn't had in like 3 years. Yes. I'm bad. But moving here I just never scheduled it.

Anyway, Doc E called me today with my Pap results. Dysplasia. Abnormal cells. The level is moderate/severe.

[deep breath]

This means I have to go in and have a colposcopy. Doc E said he'll do the procedure in the office. He'll go in like a Pap but will do a little more. They put solution onto the area to determine which are abnormal cells. Then they take some sort of scope and check out the cells. To see how "far" things have gone. I do believe they also take a sample out for further testing. To determine if the cells are pre-cancerous or not. Then after all that gets straightened out they determine a treatment. Laser. LEEP. I think there are a handful of things they can do.

So I'm a bit nervous about it all. About the entire situation. I'm healthy overall. Have always been. So this is my first real health scare (other than my emergency c-section with the Princess).

Have any of you ladies had a Pap which resulted in abnormal cells?
Have you had a colposcopy?
What was the result?
Anyone ever have a laser or LEEP treatment?

Feedback would be great. Just to get me over this bit of nervous energy inside me. Thanks in advance all...

Ya gonna listen next time?

This weekend was nice. It RAINED around 10am!

What was nice was that we were able to open up the windows in the house. AH....fresh air. And it was cool air too. It had been a cold storm that blew through so the temperature dropped significantly after that morning shower.

Once the rain stopped, the Hubs started to open up all the windows in the house.

Me: Honey? You're opening ALL the windows?
Hubs: YUP!
Me: I normally only open up the windows under the patio there in case it rains again.
Hubs: It'll be fine.

It started raining again around 1pm. I walked upstairs to find my daughter's window (which faces south) screen had water droplets on it. I walked to the window. WET CARPET. I shut the window and sauntered downstairs.

Me: Your daughter's carpet is wet.
Hubs: Huh?
Me: Yes. The rain? Remember?
Hubs: Yeah.
Me: When you open the windows on a semi-cloudy day like today, you need to monitor the direction the rain is coming down.
Hubs: Uh. Okay.

Around 7pm (before getting the kids ready for bed), the Hubs went and closed the remaining windows that were open. Luckily, he did because during the middle of bathtime, the rain started up again.

After storytime and the tucking in ritual, I walk downstairs ready to take my own leisurely shower.

[splash-spash-splash]

I heard raindrops. CLEAR as day. Like I was outside. Dang-and -tarnation! There must be a window still open! I ran to where I heard the water.

The OFFICE. Window. Wide open. My work laptop. A foot away from the window. The only saving grace is that we have shutters and the shutters were not completely open. If they had been? Someone would have received bodily injury.

My laptop? Didn't have a drop of water on it.

The shutters had water drops all on the inside. The window ledge had water on it. The wall below the window had a couple tiny streams going down. Onto the Hubs precious cherry floors.

Do you think the Hubs will listen to me the next time I warn him about something? Probably not. But I won't stop his (I hate to say this) s-t-u-p-i-d-i-t-y. I'll just make sure none of my stuff is ruined in the process.

ARGH!

It's good to be the king

Who knows what movie THAT phrase is from? I only ask because my husband used to say this to me and I'd look at him like "Huh?" He finally was able to show me the movie that the phrase is from and I knew why I'd never heard it before. It was one of THOSE adolescent weird movies (in my own opinion).

Anyway, who is the king? The PRINCESS is!

"HUH?"

In her class, they play a game every Thursday called "King of the Mountain". It's basically a review for their Friday spelling test. You know the basic format. Each child spells a word. If the child spells the word correctly, the child remains standing. If the child misses the word, then the child sits down. My daughter? She LOVES this game. She is KING this week. That's right folks. She won yesterday's game.

ACTUALLY....she's won 7 out of the 8 times they've played this game. Yes. She's a good speller. This is the reason the Hubs and I can no longer spell words when we don't want the kids to know what we're talking about. We now have to have these discussions when the kids are in bed.

She's won 7 times. The one time she didn't win? Was because she had a doctor's appointment. And did I also mention that she is the youngest in her class? Yup. She was actually born after the normal cut-off for the public schools. And since they don't take exceptions we enrolled her into the charter school she's in. And now? She's the king.

We're so proud of how intelligent she is. We just have to keep on feeding her need to learn. It's good to be the king!

A week off? Oh no!

Next week, my daughter is off from school. The ENTIRE week!

I wouldn't have even realized this until I read a notification in my daughter's reading folder. So I am going to have to figure out how I'm going to fill her days here at home while I'm working.

Homework from her mathbooks. Because she "loves math!"

Reading assignments. With a question/answer session to develop reading comprehension. I bought her an 8-book series so that she could get to really know some characters. It's the "Magic House" series. Anyone know it?

A new Leapster game. About animals. To keep her busy with a new educational toy.

DVDs. We have a bunch of them. But I'll rent her one for the week to break up her day.

Break out her paint-by-numbers kit. She's got a couple horse ones to paint.

But I am going to take ONE day off. So that she and I can spend one-on-one quality time together. I'm contemplating a trip to the zoo. I'm sure it'll be nice out too.

What do you do to occupy your kids when they have a week off from school?

The REUNION!

Tonight is the Project Runway Reunion. ARGH!

Everyone is getting together to "dish" about what happened. Drama! Conflict! It's going to be fabulous. I can't wait! Let's see what Keith has to say about the cheating controversy. And Malan? Oh...that VOICE! It'll be a fun show.

Of course, I've already seen what the 4 designers created for Fashion Week. How could I NOT see it on E?

But it'll be great to see the finale...when is it? Next week? Whenver. It'll be fun to see the designers at home. How they are developing their show pieces. Fun, fun, fun!

And there he found us...

I mentioned that my husband has been out-of-town this week. He came home last night around midnight. He slept in the guest room so as not to wake me. Or the Bear.

He came in to our bedroom this morning and found me and the Bear still sleeping.

I had one of our king-size pillows situated up-down in the middle of the bed. It's a king-size bed. The pillow was to be the "barrier" to keep the kid on the one side of the bed.

This morning? The Hubs found the Bear right next to the king-size pillow. The pillow was to his left. And I was on his right.

Did you catch that? He was on MY side of the barrier. So our king-size bed was not fully being utilized. The kid was on my side. His head on my pillow. His body pressed up right next to mine.

Tonight? I don't know what's going to happen. I think the Hubs is going to take a hard stance and ban the Bear from our bed. It's NOT going to be a pretty sight. But at least the kid got some sleep after being sick. And I did too.