Nerds With Birds

I see these lists everywhere it seems. Being I’m a list maker I felt the need to have one to ;)

Talkin’ bout the things…They woulda-coulda-shoulda done…
But those Woulda-Coulda-Shouldas…All ran away and hid…From one little did.”
~ Shel Silverstein ~

The Goal:
To complete 101 tasks/goals within a period of 1001 days. This list of tasks/goals will begin on July 28th 2007 (7-28-07) , I figured today was as good as any. Hopefully the list will be completed by April 25rd 2010 (4-25-10) Roughly 2 years from now. I’ll be keeping this post up to date from now until the end date (hopefully)

Progress So Far:
7 currently completed

Here’s the list:

1. Move to a farm with some land
2. Quit drinking soda (it really is bad for you)
3. Buy a flock of babydoll sheep (only if I have the land)
4. Visit Niagra Falls
5. Ride in a helicopter
6. Get all my dental work completed
7. Get 1/2 the classes required for an animal science degree
8. Complete the kids scrapbooks up to school
9. Buy a kiln
10. Buy a pottery wheel
11. Learn to speak spanish
12. Start a retirement fund
13. Get a fire proof gun safe - to store guns but also valuables and important things
14. Restore an old airstream travel trailer (well get it started anyway)
15. Keep to my budget for three months
16. Go one week without spending any money at all (not including direct debits for bills)
17. Travel to 10 new states
18. Get through at least 1 novel/book without skipping to the end (Baby Laughs By Jenny McCarthy)
19. Stock at least 2 weeks worth in case of emergency-food,water(done),heat(done)
20. Get a Tattoo
21. Get passport’s for Me, Jay and the kids
22. Paint a picture on canvas
23. Go see Bodies or Body Worlds exhibit (Woohoo! I went to the Branson Exhibit - thanks Lauri & Fish)
24. Buy a large bigscreen t.v. (Thanks to the TV gift giver)
25. Send a message in a bottle
26. Contact/Find old school friends
27. Reduce all debt (except the house) down to zero and stay that way for 6 months
28. Go on vacation to somewhere that I’ve never been before for a week
29. Write three letters of thanks/praise about a good service/product
30. Learn how to spin wool
31. Get my CHL
32. Get some type of solar energy started
33. Rain barrels under the gutter drains
34. Start my vermiculture under the rabbit’s
35. Kinda goes with above but buy my favorite handgun
36. Start a farming business
37. Meet everyone on my Dad’s side of the family
38. Win some cash in Vegas
39. Sleep in - all weekend!
40. Read from a book everyday for 1 month (a textbook is a book right?!*L*)
41. Write a letter forgiving the person who hurt me most
42. Celebrate my 30th birthday out somewhere
43. Learn to play guitar (not electric) (I play guitar hero now *L*)
44. Learn how to belly dance
45. Learn to use sign language (in progress)
46. Spend a day riding roller coasters
47. Enter something at the fair
48. Have at least $2,000 in my savings account by the time I complete this list.
49. Go without fast food for an entire month
50. Submit a post secret @ postsecret.com
51. Put all my cd’s on my ipod
52. Read the entire bible
53. Do 10 RAOK (random acts of kindness)
54. Acquire a WWII food ratio coupon book with coupons
55. Create a shadowbox in honor of my grandfather
56. Learn how to drive a standard without giving me whiplash *L*
57. Become an expert on something historical
58. Sew a complete outfit - that I would wear in public
59. Scan all my photo’s into the computer
60. Can up something from my garden
61. Learn to scuba dive
62. Eat at 10 restaurants I’ve never eaten at before
63. Crochet Cody a Mario Bros. blanket
64. Teach Anubis to not jump on you
65. Send a care package to a soldier
66. Volunteer in Habitat for Humanity
67. Complete my brain Age everyday for a month on my Nintendo DS.
68. Watch all seasons of Lost
69. Go gambling with Becky
70. Get a professional Massage
71. Blog at least once every week for a year (So far so good!)
72. Get better at knitting and actually complete a knit project
73. Learn 10 new crochet stitches
74. Meet up (in person) with a childhood friend
75. Get involved with PTA - maybe on the board
76. Enroll Cody in either 4-H or Boy Scouts
77. Enroll Emily in Girl Scouts
78. Actually clean out the attic and fix the floor up there
79. Get my Dad’s side of the family tree completed
80. Keep this URL and create a book from my blog
81. Learn to grill a steak
82. Start getting all veggie’s @ the farmers market
83. Create a kitchen rag rug
84. Have MawMaw teach me to quilt
85. Goes with above but make a quilt *L*
86. Buy an actual nice bedroom set
87. Take the kids to Disneyworld
88. Take the family to get locked down in Alcatraz
89. Potty Train Emily
90. Build A Snowman
91. Teach Cody and Emily to Swim
92. Go play bingo with Holly at a bingo hall
93. Go geocaching
94. Spend New Years Eve in New York watching the ball drop in person
95. Visit the Diamond Mines in Arkansas
96. List/Buy/Get something off craigslist (PB Piggy, Martha Mags)
97. Buy an outfit that isn’t on sale or clearance
98. Visit the titanic museum in Branson
99. Make 5 recipes from my gramma and 5 from my mom
100. Reach Pro status in all the Wii Sports games
101. Complete all the tasks on this list then create a new one!

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(Family) We have been spending a lot of time with Aunt Holly. I think out of the last week we’ve seen her 4 of the 5 days :)
The kids are loving all the time together with her. We went to Branson (about 30 minutes away) and took a mini vacation this past Wed. We stayed the night at the Grand Country Hotel. It is an indoor water park and has a few outdoor water pools with places to eat, shows and the hotel and water park all on one lot. We had a lot of fun although I don’t think we will ever go back. I just like white water better. Splash country was overloaded with water chemicals - just walking in the building burned your eyes and lungs for the first hour you were there. Then getting out of the water made you itch when you dried off. It’s an indoor and a some-what heated water park so I get the whole germ thing but good grief it was a lot of chemicals and fumes. We had a good time outside the water park to though. We cruised the strip, bought some homemade fudge, took a million pictures and had a lot of good laughs. No one got sun burned this time and everyone had fun - a good mini vacation! Speaking of burned…my sunburn was pretty bad. I got water blisters all over and for a few days it looked a lot like hamburger meat. I took a picture today to show you - this is 9 days after the fact and it still hurts and itches like crazy!

Jay left this morning for Florida *whine* the lucky nerd. It’s actually a business trip so I cant say to much but I do wish I could have went, I have yet to visit Florida. He had a lot of flight delays so it took all day to get there but he arrived safe and that’s all that matters. I took the kids to the Local Fair that happened to start today to cheer them up. They woke up to find daddy gone and were not at all happy. We got to see all the fairs animals and exhibits. The sheep were being sheared, cattle were being shown, the bunnies were on display and the draft horses paraded around like they owned the place. We got to see all the crafty items and homemade delights. It was to hot with no wind to enjoy anything so after a few hours we called it quits and came home. I did take them back around 7ish after it cooled off and so they could see all the rides lit up and basically the fair in all it’s glory. We left at 10pm and by the time we got home both of them were passed out from the excitement of the day.

(Farm) WooHoo we finally have chicken eggs! Well only 1 chicken is laying but 1 is better than none. The rock started laying on 7/24 so the others better be following suit soon. We weighed Zsa Zsa on 7/24 and she weighs 22 pounds. She is getting to be quite the little monster. She looks so cool the way her hair/skin is colored. She is having so much fun in the backyard with her own mud bath and area to root around in. The rabbits are doing good. I’m starting the count down on Sassy in case she is preggo *hope so* I’m calculating at the least (28 days) only 10 more days until K-day. K-day = Kits day *L* kits are baby bunnies you know.

(Garden) I have been steady picking cucumbers and cherry tomatoes. I decided to add a picture of what I have collected just this week and I’ve already eaten 4 or 5 cucumbers out of this weeks batch. My regular tomatoes aren’t doing as good as Id like. They fell over a few days ago so I tied them back up and hoped for the best but I’m having my doubts. I think some of the root systems were damaged when they all fell over. I guess we’ll know in a week or two. The peppers are doing good. Well one of them is the other not so much. The jalepeno has about 10 peppers but the other plant has ONE *LOL* and that one the sorriest looking pepper. The pumpkin plant is trying to take over. It stretches to the end of the garden and is working it’s way up the fence now. What about The strawberry plant you ask? What strawberry plant? It’s pitiful. It has a few leaves, no blooms and has produced no more than 8 strawberries. Just pitiful!

(Website) I uploaded a bunch of pictures. Updated the chicken page - egg counts.

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1. I hate watching or reading the news. It’s always bad news and the media hypes you up to make it out like the world is ending tomorrow but buy a new car today…on credit *LOL*

2. I cannot spell worth a crap without spell check.

3. I cannot paralell park. Actually I can but it’s not going to be pretty. I will park 10 miles away just to avoid paralell parking.

4. I’ve always hated the way I look.

5. I think about all the bad things that could happen - each and every day.

6. I think that I have a really good life even though sometimes it doesn’t seem like it.

7. I think about what people are thinking about and if they are thinking the same thing as me.

8. I’ve tried to learn to speak spanish. It just never stays attached in my brain.

9. I am terrible at direction. As in which way is North vs. South. I don’t think I’ll ever be good at that.

10. I used to wish I was stranded on a deserted island like in “return to blue lagoon”

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White Water - Branson, MO
90 degrees…Not a cloud in site…Surrounded by water = sunburn! *LOL* Well ok so it COULD have been avoided but I was an idiot and forgot the sunscreen. Well not exactly *L* I forgot to put it on me - I slathered the kids in it before we left. They didn’t even get pink (what a good momma right?!) I however am a crispy lobster *ouch* but it was fun. I’m what you would consider a VERY over-protective momma of my kiddo’s (that comes from my mom) Anyways…I usually don’t take them to places like that - they are still babies after all. Well in my mind they are. So I wont even pretend the thought of me with my 2 kids at a giant water park with a bunch of other people made me freak for a minute. In general people are idiots and have no consideration for other people and I have no tolerance for idiots these days so it’s really not a good combo *LOL* but since Aunt Holly got us some free passes it was really hard to pass up. So we loaded up Thursday morning and drove over to Branson. Since Jay had to work it was just me and the kids and aunt holly. I think we got there around 11am and we ended up leaving at 3pm. So we were there for a few hours and let me just say - it was FUN! Cody was learning how to swim (with floaties of course!) and princess peanut was having a blast in her little floating lily pad thing. We stayed for the most part at the “lazy river” its got a slight current and you just kinda float around (maybe 4.5 feet deep) but we did check out the “wave pool” and uh yeah never again *L* I darn near drown *lmao* ok that may be a slight exaggeration but just picture this..Im sitting on my butt with water up to my neck and emily was floating in her lily pad in front of me…were talking at MAX two and a half feet deep. The countdown hits zero and they start ringing bells. I figured ahh cool a few waves - no biggie. Yeah right *LOL* the first one hit us and it was decent - peanut was NOT happy with that but before I could stand up to get her out the 2nd one hit. The next thing I know im standing up with Emily, dodging waves and a swarm of kids that are trying to get out there to the waves. Insane! So needless to say we didn’t go back to that section. So much for a few peaceful waves ;) Aunt Holly tried out their new kalani towers attraction. It’s a 75 foot freefall water slide. Cody doesn’t do heights and it stresses him out if I get on an escalator so I didn’t think he’d enjoy me being up so high so I passed this go round but next time…I’m there! *L*

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Is so addicting. It sucks you in and you just can’t help yourself. Every time I log in I have to look up someone or someone from back in the day has found me. I end up staying up all night chatting and catching up on old times. Normally it’s fun. I love to think back and remember the good old days. Tonight started out that way but ended quite different. A friend from 1989 sent me a message. I was blown away number 1 that she remember my last name *LOL* and number 2 that she had found me after like 20 years. We sent a few messages back and forth and will no doubt catch up some more at another time. Well that got me wondering about some of my other Arbors Apartments friends from way back when. So I started searching. I couldn’t find who I was looking for so I tried her mom’s name then her sisters name - Bingo! I found her sister…from there I found her. Only to find out that she passed away this past December. My heart just sank when I read that. She was a really good friend of mine back then. I haven’t seen or spoke to her in in over a decade but I still feel so sad that she is gone. She made a big impact on me to make me feel so sad after all this time. I wish things were different and we were catching up on lost time. Miss ya girl :/

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Shutterfly made a cute FREE program. Make your child the star in their own alphabet adventure video. All you do is add in the name and upload 1 photo. It’s short but really cute and the kids love it!

(Make your own)    (Cody’s Movie)    (Emily’s Movie)

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OK this is going to be a rant so you may want to just skip this one. I am ticked. I’m sure you’ve heard that Sunrocket a Voip phone service closed their doors yesterday. That in itself sucks. I really feel for everyone who lost their jobs yesterday. We’ve been there…twice. It sucks but you will make it. You will no doubt get hired on at one of the running call centers and get less money, less tenure but you will have a job. Oh and yes that bitter “I’ve been screwed over” call center after taste never goes away. It sucks but it seems no job or company is safe anymore. I hate that I’ve paid 200 bucks for 2 years worth of phone service that will no longer work. I hate that we’ve lost that number. SBC claims they cannot port it because it’s a canceled account. Cancelled? No screwed over is more like it. I’ve been reading the forums and catching up on all the updated information and I am kicking myself for not knowing 1 thing…Sunrocket was founded by 2 old MCI employee’s. WTF? If I would have known that I would have steered clear *L* It was bad enough when they took over the old MCI building but I thought “It’s just a building”. Oh well…Nothing we can do at this point. We have no home phone service but we do have our cells. We are out money but we aren’t out more than we can handle. I’m just pissed off. A notification would have been nice. A friendly “the cat is on the roof and the roof is on fire” email would have been nice so I could have made other arrangements for phone service. I actually liked Sunocket. This just sucks!

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Hahaha..I couldn’t help myself. Today we saw no less than 10 baby eastern garter snakes in the backyard. We have always found snakes back there. As a matter of fact we keep objects in certain places so they make their homes there. I usually see bigger ones and on occasion what I would consider a baby one. I see them daily in the garden which makes me happy because I don’t like bugs in the garden. So it’s a win - win. They eat and I save money by not buying pesticide (which I wouldn’t want to do anyway) and I don’t have any bugs. You can ALWAYS find them in our shed curled up on top of each other in the gardening buckets/trays. It amazes me how many will pile up and hang out together. I think by now they have figured out that our backyard is a safe yard for them and that we wont hurt them because they don’t even move when I open the shed door, they just watch you. Anyways today we caught 2 of the little guys. One was out by the quail pen, the other one was curled up in our banana trees out front. Oh and FYI quails and chickens LOVE to eat snakes. The birds go nuts trying to get them if they see them. So I was actually saving the little guys ;) They are so cute! Around 4-5 inches long and 1/2 the size around as a pencil. Super cute and feisty little buggers. I put them in a mason jar (with holes of course) and let the kids look at them for awhile and we’ll let them go in the garden tonight for some midnight bug hunting.

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Ok so ginormous isn’t a real word BUT it is when your talking about this quail egg we found in the pen today it is. This sucker is twice as big as the biggest egg we’ve found. When we broke it open it was a double yolk. So that was kinda neat. We have never had a double yolk even counting all the chicken eggs we had last year.

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