Mistakes in Motherhood

I forgot to update about my afternoon with UPS yesterday.

So I call UPS with the same song and dance that Bobby had used the night before. They tell me to go ahead and go to our customer service office that is open from 11 am to 6 pm. I get down there with the receipt from us mailing the Xbox to TX, my mortgage statement with mine & Bobby’s name on it and our address, and the “we missed you” slip with tracking # and of course the two little ones in tow. I explain that the person who took down my hubby’s info spoke broken English, and that he did not verify the spelling of our last name (it was not even misspelled honestly, a it was a whole new word!).

Well the UPS woman said she could not release it because the name was wrong, but that the story is just too crazy NOT to be true. That and he freaking got our name, phone number AND address wrong! Our street starts with J, he spelled it with a G… my street name is super easy, so think “Gar Lids” instead of “Jar Lids”…..??

So she called her manager or maybe another co-worker over, they both looked at the receipt, the tracking #, the package, my ID, the mortgage statement, made some jokes, had some laughs and fawned over my kids. I told her we joke that my baby’s daddy is the UPS man (since we don’t have a milk man) and she said “I will have to tell James I met his daughter, her coloring is a little light though”… LOL

The error his Xbox was apparently a time consuming, impossible, or difficult fix, because the Xbox we got yesterday is brand spankin’ new (or refurbished), this *almost* makes up for their clueless phone reps, thank goodness UPS is on the ball!

No Comments | In: A lot about nothing | tags: Bobby, Technology, Updates. | #

Wow, what a week so far and it is only Tuesday.

Everything is breaking in our house… Bobby’s XBox 360, the drum kit to Rock Band, thankfully both are still under warranty. I also need to get off my tail and replace two other things under warranty as well, my kitchenaid pan and the broken toy bar I need to return for Sophie’s swing.

Bobby is also starting school again this week, to get his Bachelors. Unofficially he will only need about 3/4th of the classes as his credits transfer very well, and his entire associate’s transfers in full.

Last week I took Sophie to the ped to see the cause of her horrible rash (below)

Turns out my poor honey has sensitive skin and a very bad case of baby acne. It is clearing up a little bit, this is what is looks like today:

Hopefully it clears up soon, poor little girl.

I also got the CUTEST diapers last night, they are embroidered on the bum! They are called Green Acre Designs, or GADs and I adore how cute, and well made they are. We won’t know how they fit until she gets a little bigger though. Aren’t these darling???

Brown w/ pink snaps & fleece with a monkey.

Pink paisley butterfly with purple snaps & fleece.

Yellow celestial image with blue snaps and fleece.

So so cute!!

1 Comment | In: A lot about nothing, This is how I roll | tags: A lot about nothing, Bobby, Cloth Diapers, Photography, Ramblings, Sophia, Technology. | #

My darling husband has a talent for stating something, and then having it happen.

Back in 1997 I discovered this when I was watching a movie about Saint Theresa, and how when she died the house she died in filled with roses. He was not paying attention and said “What? Mother Theresa died?” That was September 4th, 1997…. on September 5th, 1997 this world lost a great woman when Mother Theresa died.

He also put a ton of Chinese restaurants out of business when he told me that by us ordering from another place, and this “cheating” on our regular place we were going to put them under. One by one, he put three Chinese restaurants out of business.

There are countless other examples… but the most recent happened on Saturday. I got Bobby a new laptop at Best Buy to replace his four year old one that was dying. On Sunday he comments that we probably need to replace our modem, as it was a couple years old and probably far behind the times and a new one would give us more speed…. so who do you think I wanted to throttle this morning when I woke up and I had no internet?? A 30 minute call to tech-support revealed that my area was fine, Qwest was fine, I just could not connect to my ISP. Since Best Buy carries the Qwest DSL products we need and has a return policy, so I met Bobby at the store and we got a new modem.

We get it home, and the fun continues… we hook it up and encounter one silly problem after another, and when the Internet light fails to light up, I call tech support back. This time I am on the phone for an hour and nothing works. He tells me he has no choice but to send tech support out on Wednesday, but in a last desperate attempt tells me to unplug the modem and plug it in again. He is just about to put me on hold to get the appointment time, when the light comes on and ta-dah, we have internet!

While I was on the phone, our friends brought their 18 month old by. Matthew had a lot of fun playing with his new friend as he called her. At one point, they ran up to each other to hug and it was like the movie cliche of a couple running up to each other to hug, except for his little friend ran harder and knocked him onto his ass and landed right on top of him… where is the video camera when you need one? It was a total AFV moment.

Sophie’s little sheepy came in too, she loved her “soft”… this is a name my niece gave my parents sheep skin that they brought back from New Zealand; all the other grandbabies loved it so much, I wanted one for Sophie. Pictures and more plugs to come in the morning!!

No Comments | In: Geek Speak | tags: Bobby, Humor, Lame-o, Matthew, Me, Ranting, Silliness, Sophia, Technology. | #

Miss Sophie got to wear the onsie that was passed from Christopher to Matthew to her. This was the very first baby gift I received and [start geekyness] it was given to me by the Sysop of the BBS I had been a member of for 3? 4? maybe even 5? years of my life at that time. [/end geekyness]

Sophie was called a boy at Best Buy today… I told myself after 3 boys, if I ever had a daughter she would never leave doubt in anyone’s mind as to her gender. Oops!

This morning, Sabin was a furry door mat, this is how I found him when I opened my bedroom door:

When I got up, my house was 78 degrees! Why? Because Matthew decided to turn the thermostat up and then move the button over to heat! HOLY HECK it was hot! I think he was trying to prepare my friend Julia for 100 degree heat for her trip back home to Vegas. We were very sad to see her go.

No Comments | In: People, Places & Things | tags: A lot about nothing, Christopher, Fur Babies/Pets, House Stuff, Insanity, Lame-o, Matthew, Me, Memories, Photography, Sons, Sophia, Technology. | #

I finally got a new phone!! Bye bye Razr, HELLO enV2!! I love this phone! It does not have TV like Bobby’s, but I don’t need no stinkin’ TV

I just wanted a full QWERTY keyboard and good reception, so this is what I got: Lookie lookie! Mine is in Maroon though, it’s purty.

1 Comment | In: Geek Speak | tags: Me, Technology. | #

1. I learned that I have WAY too many songs with hidden tracks, silence or just crazy long on my iTunes, easily remedied by clicking Get Info>Options>Skip when Shuffling, OR in a large batch edit Get Info>Skip When Shuffling>Yes. I know, my anal retentiveness qualities are showing, but I hate having to Fast Forward through songs when listening to my iPod.

2. Dogs are the most annoying creatures EVER, just ask the one who lays in front of me and won’t let me move, or the one who is obsessively licking a bone and will not stop bringing it in the house no matter how many times I toss it out the door. The bone is supposed to keep her from chewing my deck, not enable her to annoy me in the house.

3. Friends are friends are friends. Be them online friends, or real life friends, it does not matter, they are there to pick you up when you are down and it works. After some encouraging emails and phone calls, I feel so much better about my day. I am not at 100% yet, but I think that won’t come until a good night’s sleep.

4. YouTube is EVIL! I watched this today and turned into a bawling puddle of tears… any of the videos they show about Soldiers or Iraq hit so close to home I just have a mini emotional breakdown. I have mentioned how much I LOVE what the Patriot Guard Riders are doing, but this tribute from an Aunt of a fallen soldier touched me even more than the news stories I have seen. I also love the Welcome Home Soldier program too. THANK YOU to our men and women serving our country, and THANK YOU to the men and women who serve those who serve or served! You are just as important as the soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen!

Enjoy your cry, I know I did.

—————-
Now playing: John Mayer Trio – I Got A Woman
via FoxyTunes

No Comments | In: A lot about nothing, Geek Speak | tags: Friends, Fur Babies/Pets, Newsworthy, Technology, Updates, Videos. | #

Today on the Science Channel I watched the coolest show called Eco-Tech, which is all about reducing our strain on the environment. This episode was about building homes that reduce your carbon footprint and save the planet. Since I tuned into the show a little late I have only been able to tour three different homes/concepts. The first was a wooden home with a house within a house that allowed the sun to heat the main wall and release the heat through the day to keep it hot in the winter, and in the summer it causes the heat to circulate through the attic and pull up the cool basement air. The homebuilder brags an 80% reduction in utility costs.

Even cooler were these biotectures called Earthships. These unique homes are made of earth and tires and bottles to make fully self sufficient homes that use about $100 a year in utility costs. These homes are completely independent and use no city utilities. It makes it’s own power, recycles rainwater, takes care of sewage and heats/cools itself.

The next thing they showed was paint that could last for 1,000 years, resists graffiti, mold, and breaks down carbon monoxide emitted from cars. They also showed windows that could control how much sunlight would be allowed through them and green rooftops on skyscrapers (rooftop gardens) which would reduce wastewater put into the sewage system, as well as lower the temperature on the roof and make the air conditioner work more efficient, as well as reducing pollutants in the air.

In my own home, I feel like I could be doing so much more to reduce my carbon footprints, yes I use CFL bulbs in almost all my light fixtures. We recycle and we have replaced all our old appliances with new energy star appliances. We use a HE washer and dryer to reduce the water I use, and we use cloth diapers on the baby. I am in the process of switching to all natural cleaning products and laundry soap to reduce the amounts of pollutants I put in the sewer. I know I could do SO MUCH MORE. I have all the supplies to build a clothesline, yet I still don’t have one because my backyard is so smelly from the lack of grass and overabundance of dog pee. I also don’t have a garden because again the dogs make the back yard unpleasant. I also could not justify the cost of a new tankless water heater, so we did go for a more efficient one than the old one, however I think the only way we will ever have higher efficient home is to start fresh and build our own home where we can recycle rainwater for landscaping, incorporate solar panels into the design, have a tankless water heater, use CFL, all energy star appliances, and possibly geothermal heating, cooling.

I think with a little more planning we all could take baby steps to reduce our carbon footprint and all live a little greener with tiny little changes that make less of an impact on our day to day living, but a great impact on the amount of strain on the planet.

2 Comments | In: Frugal, not cheap!, Geek Speak, This is how I roll | tags: House Stuff, Public Service Announcements, Ramblings, Something Worth Mentioning, Technology. | #

New Theme, new WordPress 2.2, new way to find me, AND a new merging of old and new. That is what I have been doing for the last two days. I won’t bore you with the details, but I will tell you it has been a tedious, time consuming, mind-sucking project!

My old blog posts are all now available over here and my old free blogger blog will now bring you here, so you don’t have to update your blogrolls until you are ready. I can also be found by going to http://www.mistakesinmotherhood.com.

The old theme, as much as I loved it, did not mesh well with WP2.2 so now I have the new pretty butterfly theme… come on, I need SOME pretty in my life, otherwise I might drown in all this masculinity/testosterone in my home full of men/boys.

I promise I will try to update a little more now that I have a little less off my oh-so-full plate.

1 Comment | In: A lot about nothing, Geek Speak | tags: Announcements, Blog/Blogging, Technology, Updates. | #

iThink iHave an addiction to my iPod.

Today I spent hours uploading all my old music CDs onto my iPod and now have almost 1700 songs on there… as well as videos and Podcasts… almost 8GB total. I can listen to songs for over 5 days without hearing the same song twice.

I have a little bit of everything on there, from Alice Cooper, Disturbed, Tool, The Rolling Stones, Ani DiFranco, Zero Seven, Led Zeppelin, John Mayer, DMX, Nine Inch Nails, The Cure, Talking Heads, The Beatles, Shawn Mullins, ICP, Tori Amos… I think you get the point… my music is a little eclectic.

Anyways… My name is Heather and I have a problem.

2 Comments | In: A lot about nothing, Geek Speak | tags: A lot about nothing, Humor, Technology. | #

There is a new program available from PayPerPost, called PayPerPost Direct which is a really neat addition for anyone interested in paid blogging. First, I will explain PPP and paid blogging; if you are a blogger with interesting material and have a blog older than 90 days old and you update it regularly you can sign up for PayPerPost to review websites, services, products, etc on your blog to receive compensation ranging between $4 and up per post. Unlike other blog advertising companies which tell you what to write about, PPP gives you the freedom to chose what content you want to put in your blog.

Now PayPerPost offers a new program called PayPerPost Direct. Basically, PPP Direct is a program you can install in your blogs to allow advertisers to directly approach you to offer you an opportunity to write about in your blog. This allows Posties and Advertisers to directly hash out a deal and set their own terms without involvement from PayPerPost.

Other pay for blog websites, such as ReviewMe, can charge as much as 50-100% markup, which is CRAZY! Why should I do all the work while someone else makes just as much as I do for being the middle man? With PayPerPost Direct you truly are your own boss! Now I don’t mind the 35% markup from PayPerPost, they do have a staff to pay, they do send me Tax Returns, and they do secure more advertisers than any other paid blogging website I have seen, however, the more money I can keep in my pocket the better… which is where PayPerPost Direct comes into play.

PayPerPost Direct will still offer marketing, they will still offer the security of me not having to put my email address out there and wait for advertisers to connect to me, they still make it super easy for me to get opportunities and for advertisers to find me. It is important that you claim the money you make to the IRS, and PayPerPost does that by sending you the forms you need for tax purposes, however even with PayPerPost Direct they will continue to track your earnings and send them out to you in your end of the year tax statement. Seems like a WIN-WIN situation to me!

2 Comments | In: A lot about nothing | tags: Blog/Blogging, Sponsored, Technology. | #