matalina

Originally published at Raising the Herd. Please leave any comments there.

I think I am one of the few people who isn’t overly upset about the change. Yes the change means I fork over more money than I currently have, but as far as entertainment value goes, it is still the cheapest of our diversions.

We were getting 1 DVD at a time (down from 3 DVDs at a time) and Unlimited Streaming. Both of these are things we are currently using well. But with the price jump of 6 dollars, we actually jumped up 10 dollars and change to get 2 DVDs at a time now. It made sense. Now we can possibly get 4 to 5 DVDs a week. Since mostly what we watch are series we didn’t watch over the last season that’s great for us. We are pretty good about putting out the one we watched the next day. We were doing 2 DVDs a week.

We aren’t currently paying for cable, so $23 for the “idiot box” is far cheaper than another $50 plus streaming and DVDs we were going to get anyway.

We get our money’s worth out of it. It’s by far cheaper for us than buying the movies we want to see. If we really like it it goes on our Christmas list for things we want.

If Netflix had all the things we wanted for Streaming we’d easily drop it, but there are still tons of shows we can’t see the newest episodes of. We’ll survive I’m sure lol, but for now Netflix is still far cheaper and worth it’s money than other options.

Originally published at Raising the Herd. Please leave any comments there.

I know I am not the greatest of parents when it comes to the TV. Yes I let my kids watch it without much limitations. No they can’t watch whatever they want. They are regulated to Disney Channel, Nickelodeon, PBS kids and possibly Cartoon Network. But mostly they watch the Disney Channel with a few exceptions. But right now we are with out cable TV, so they just watch what shows we let them that stream on Netflix. Yeah we get into a rut of watching endless Dora and Deigo. But they’ve watched some pretty cool cartoons too – Speed Race:The Next Generation, Dino Squad and currently we are doing The Jackie Chan adventures. Of course that is on top of Dora, Deigo, Backyardigans, Phineas and Ferb and several PBS kids shows.

I know I shouldn’t let them watch as much as they do, but honestly they don’t watch as much of it as you’d think. More often than not they will watch a few minutes and then go off an play something, come back in a few mins and then watch some more. They rarely just zone out for hours on end watching TV. The TV is good background noise.

Phineas and Ferb was one of those shows I was worried about when it first came out. Two boys who are always doing things that they shouldn’t at least according to their sister. When it comes down to it Phineas and Ferb are about making the most of the days you have, having fun while doing it and using your mind to get things done. They never cheat, they never steal, they always have the proper permission, even if it’s not the permission you’d think – building permits etc, but not always mom and dad’s express permission to do exactly what they did lol. It sends a good message. It’s a fun show and it’s a show Shea and I don’t mind watching for hours on end. We like it – we actually stop to watch it if we’ve never seen it before. It’s a good family show.

I recently found out what a show was and was pretty much appalled that some parents let their children watch that show and wouldn’t let them watch Phineas and Ferb. Disney has it’s set of standerds, if it doesn’t fit it doesn’t show on Disney. Disney may be a commercial business but it is pretty family oriented. If it’s one Disney I don’t question whether or not I let my kids watch it. I have yet to find a show that I’m repulsed by or find that sends a bad message to the girls, regardless of the age range for the show.

Nick doesn’t fall into that range. But the main reason we are dedicated Disney Channel household is mostly because I hate all the cereal commercials and the toy commercials that are all over other children stations. My kids don’t need any help with their toy choices and they sure don’t need the latest and greatest toy out there to be happy. Sometimes a cardboard tube make the light in my children’s eyes go on – that’s a lot of the time for Sammi lol.

Each parent has the right to do what they think is best I get that. Hehe, I have one friend who is pretty adamant that she is only going to let her kiddos watch the stuff she grew up on. She has a great DVD collection going to provide that entertainment. I’d love to see her collection but le sigh, she’s too far away hehe. We have the right to raise our kids the way we feel best. Sometimes I just feel like I’m out of the loop on things. Things in the long run make me wonder if I’m a good parent, and then other times I know I’m doing a good job. My girls are loved, cared for and they love us right back. It’s an awesome thing

Originally published at Raising the Herd. Please leave any comments there.

The people who do NaNoWriMo in November are doing one in July AND August. I’m gonna shoot for July and maybe August to write one of the stories stuck in my head. You can see my progress to the right here on my journal. First day I’m above the minimum balance needed to hit the deadline, tomorrow I’ll probably be able to do more since Shea will be doing some sanding.

Sanding you ask? Yes, while we have time we are going to redo the girls bedroom with some help from the in-laws. We are redoing the walls – putting in sheet rock, painting and generally just redecorating the room. I think we’ll be doing a butterfly/flower theme. Mam bought the girls some butterfly clip boards to hang their art work on. The walls will be pink. we haven’t decided what shade yet but pink is what is. We need to try to get some of Sam’s choice in there which right now is blue. It could change tomorrow lol.

Originally published at Raising the Herd. Please leave any comments there.

Kathleen has been having some pretty good nightmares over the past few days/weeks.

She was laying next to me just a few minutes ago on the floor. She yelled Mommy like she was lost or scared or something and woke herself up. It seems she dreamt we’d left Sammi somewhere.

While Shea does tease her about leaving her places I’m pretty confident that this is not why Kathleen has been dreaming about it or even thinking about it while awake. A few weeks ago, I don’t remember exactly when, I went looking for Samantha, and couldn’t find her. We looked everywhere, and I mean everywhere. Shea was at the point of wandering the neighborhood when we found her just standing in our bathroom afraid she was in trouble, so she was hiding and keeping quiet. She scared the living daylights out of all of us. Kathleen was in hysterics. She was crying and really upset that Samantha had gone missing. This isn’t the first time she’s had issues with her sister being “lost”. Sammi and Kathleen have never been separated. I will say that first off and they have never in their lives been lost. But even the thought of Kathleen being with out her sister makes her go into hysterics. She has no problem going with out her, but someone leaving Sammi or doing something with Sammi with out her scares her to death.

She is tied to the hip with Sam in a very emotional sense. I think she is her back bone sometimes, the strength she feeds off of. Kathleen is a smart girl, but she’s really shy. She has been for a long time, and I just hope that school this coming fall will go well. Thankfully she’ll have one little girl from daycare at the same school, so maybe that will help out. If they are in the same class even better!

Originally published at Raising the Herd. Please leave any comments there.

The girls have been watching Speed Racer: The Next Generation for the past few days, Shea and I had finished the series a few days ago but the girls have watched it from start to finish again. And that got me thinking about being a kid and the cartoons we watched.

As a kid I only remember two shows that we ever pretended we were those characters, the most easily recognizable one was He-man. Not only did we pretend to be them, we had a billion and one He-man action figures. We got some hand-me-downs and added to our collection. Otherwise we’d probably never have gotten Castle Greyskull at all. But we had it because of family hand-me-downs. yay!

The other one I remember I didn’t remember the name of the show. I’ve thought about it over the years and never really got around to actively looking. Mom had suggested checking Speed Racer out. I didn’t think it was that. I’ve checked out Voltron and various other ones we use to watch but I could never put the names into those shows. I did a 70s 80s cartoon search and came up with a site. And there I started clicking the names of shows I didn’t know or couldn’t place. Lo and behold the first on I clicked “Battle of the Planets” had main characters of Mark and Jason. Bingo! Found it. And now that I think about it I do remember G-Force being part of the pretend play too.

It’s not streaming on netflix or even out on DVD as far as Netflix is concerned so I can’t show it off to the girlies. Tho I’m sure they’d not like it. She-ra and He-man didn’t impress them, hehe, they really didn’t impress me either.

As another note of nostalgia, Dark Age of Camelot turns 10 this October. Holy, wow!

Originally published at Raising the Herd. Please leave any comments there.

My interview yesterday went well despite the power outage. A storm hit as my appointment time drew near and I was sitting in the HR office the power went out. The hiring manager had to hike up 7 flights of stairs to interview me. He apologized for being out of wind. I totally would have been as well.

Hopefully I’ll be hearing back soon on whether or not I got the job. Keep us in your thoughts and prayers, we need all the good luck we can use too. Thanks in advance lol.

Originally published at Raising the Herd. Please leave any comments there.

Good News! Finally! The girls and I went to the park today, and while we were there I got a phone call. It was HR at TeleVox a company in Mobile, that focuses on medical and dental practices. I have interviewed with them before I had kids – over 5 years ago.

It’ll be a big decision but really not in a position to say no if I get the job. Please keep me in your prayers and thoughts and your fingers crossed. My job interview is at 2pm on Thursday.

Originally published at Raising the Herd. Please leave any comments there.

I’m not taking a class and I might if I can get through an hour of it on my on with the DVD. But I am very much liking Zumba. It’s fun, not overly complicated and this is really the first time that I’ve felt good after working out. My knees are my week point they get weak and like jelly, which is good cause that means they are actually working.

I’ve gotten through 4 mixes on the cardio party disc of the set of 3 (disc 2). The girls even ask to dance, which is a very good thing, even tho they really don’t do it long with me. But it gets me going and makes me get up. I try not to tell them later too much, but I do tell them. I have no set time today.

I was feeling a bit out of it and depressed and after my 20 mins today I felt pretty good. My worries didn’t leave me but I wasn’t worrying so much about them. I don’t recall DDR or anything else I’ve done actually do that. So yes I like Zumba, not enough to pay for a class yet, but maybe, one day soon I will.

Originally published at Raising the Herd. Please leave any comments there.

I am doing the whole “diet” thing again. Not so much as dieting, we don’t have a horrid diet, I make nearly everything we have and ground turkey and chicken are our staples more than anything else. Yes it’s not the greatest and it’s not always lean but it’s the best I can do on a budget. Health foods are so friggin expensive and vegetables are not really on the table for the most part – beans and potatoes and corn on the cob are about all Shea will eat. And if he doesn’t eat it chances of it going bad is fairly high.

I am trying the Zumba DVDs this go around. I am shooting for 30 to 40 minutes every weekday, possibly on the weekends we’ll see. I do enjoy it so that’s a plus. Maybe my coordination will get better the more I do, right now I feel horribly awkward. There are a few local Zumba classes, the one in town is $5 a session. That’s not too bad, but right now it’s not gonna work.

I’m tracking calorie intake and burnt so we’ll see how well things go. I’m a bit concerned that I don’t eat enough as it is, but that’s just the way I’ve always been. We’ll see how it all goes, over the course of the next few days.

Originally published at Raising the Herd. Please leave any comments there.

Yes more about my Memorial Day Dinner. I have not cooked chicken in a VERY long time on the grill. Why? Because it takes so long and I’m always worried about underdone chicken. I hate having to microwave it. But today I decided because it was Memorial Day and I was missing the family gatherings back home (as I always do on the big summer holidays) I was going to grill. I was having burgers and dogs so that is what I was going to do, but I have even less luck with burgers than I do with chicken so I thawed out 3 leg quarters that weren’t part of my meal plan this week and made the old standby chicken bbq marinade. I had to look it up cause I didn’t have my mom’s recipe.

Needless to say it brought back memories and I definitely didn’t make enough.

My burgers didn’t stick too badly and they tasted pretty good.

I will be making this as a main dish one day this summer again. Lots of chicken. I’d invite the inlaws down if I thought theyd’ like it. We’ll have to see.