A Real Page Turner

I just finished reading "Is Everyone Hanging Out with Me?" by Mindy Kaling.  Loved it. Made me laugh out loud.  Made me wish I could write a memoir of hilarity.  Why not?  I may not have book writing skills but hey, I can spell memoir! And it would be crazy popular..after all I do have 5 whole followers of this here blog, never mind that I'm one of them.

Anyway, when I was done, I looked at my bookcase and scanned the books that we have. 

I do not organize books by author, or alphabetically.  I organize them by type and height.  Some hate when books are not alphabetized, I cannot stand seeing a short book in the middle of two tall ones..tall, tall, short, tall, sticks too far out from the book it's next to...insanity!

This is what sits on the shelves and why I keep them:

 Travel books.
  Why keep these? If we were to go back to any of those places we'd need to get the updated books.  I guess so I can look at them fondly knowing I was lucky enough to do some cool traveling.  And it looks pretty.

Self Help/ Here's How to Raise Your Kid:
            I buy these
with every intention of helping myself and learning how to feed and teach my kids the right things.  I pretty much get through the first 5 pages of each book and never touch them again except when dusting.
I keep these to look smart and I might need to reference them in case the kids go wild or I finally have my mid-life crisis.

How-To Books:
        I love "how -to" books!  So many neat things to make and build.  I dive in with such enthusiasm, look at the cool pictures, read the instructions and say to myself, "This sounds complicated, I'm just gonna wing it."  Sometimes that works, and other times I throw down my tools and swear never to make anything again.
I keep these books so that I can repeat that cycle.

Series Books:
            Charlaine Harris' "Sookie Stackhouse" books,  Janet Evanovich and her "Stephanie Plum" series, Harry Potter...they each get their own shelves.  This is the only time I will arrange books the way they're "supposed" to be.  Although maybe I should go wild and set them out of order...how long before it drives me nuts?
I will never get rid of these books.

Sci-Fi:
These belong to my husband. He's allowed a shelf .

General Fiction:
I guess it's not really general..it's either murder, mystery, murder-mystery, romantic comedy or so funny I laugh out loud in public in places that are good to have a book to read but no one has a reason to laugh hysterically.   Examples are: dmv, quiet hipster coffee shop where people are too cool to laugh, any kind of waiting room, and the parking lot of your kid's school. 

Mixed into the bunch are a few gut wrenchers, heart-felt, makes you think about life, blah blahs.
I keep those to show that my brain is not just full of hilarious vampire murder romantic wizard books.
 It's funny that most of my gut wrenching, life thinking  books are from when I was young.  "The Bridge to Terabithia",  "The Outsiders",  "Where the Red Fern Grows" ....Stay gold Pony Boy!
I can be deep.

I once belonged to a book club.  The books were intriguing, deep, so full of emotion....and at the end of each one I was drained and wanted to jump off of a bridge. 
They also bore what I now think of as my "mark of death" for books , the Oprah's Book Club seal.
I never understood why we couldn't mix it up a little.  Joanna Fluke's books make you wonder who dunnit and has tasty recipes.  That suggestion got me stares and cricket silence. 

I should start a book club where we all read the same book, get together, say if we liked it/didn't like it, then discuss random things totally unrelated to the book while laughing and drinking wine. Who's in?

Yes, my name is Phyllis and I am a book hoarder.  Love them. I still have books from when I was a kid. I want my kids to read them with the same excitement and fervor that I had, and still have. 

I don't even get rid of the truly horrible ones. This explains why I still have the "Twilight" books, and since I have only two of them, I feel the need to get the others just so I have a complete set. 
Someone help me!!!

What are your faves?  What's your favorite genre?  Are you an Oprah's Book Club president for your area?

Road Tripping with Kids...Are You Sure About That?

We drive a lot.  Living where we do, we are a days drive to a bunch o' lovely places so when we get the chance, we load up the kids and head out.
Wait, drive? Kids? Whole day in car?
The "Are we there yet?", "I  have to pee!", "My toy/book/food fell and I can't reach it.", etc, etc. What, am I insane?!?!   Maybe a little, but that has nothing to do with any of this. :)

I like to think that with as much as we drive , I've come up with handy ways to survive. So today my friends, I share these ways with you.

#1: "Are We There Yet? ...How 'Bout Now?
           When I was a kid, we looked out the window and listened to the radio...  Apparently nowadays that's too boring.  
            We pack their electronics, and movies ( dvd player = life saver...just sayin').  For long trips, I sometimes pick up a movie the kids have been wanting to see.   Since it's Halloween time, I got them the "Monster High" dvd for our trip and they were excited and quiet for at least that hour and a half.  Plus they watched it once more later in the drive. 
          Free printable coloring pages are always good, it's different from coloring books they have and it's free!  Two sets of each color of crayon, of course because heaven forbid they share. 
          Drawing pad. They draw and make all kinds of stuff with plain paper.  On the way back from our trip they had made pretend money and a menu and were playing "restaurant".
          All of this stuff goes in a reusable tote that hangs on the armrests between their seats so both can get to it.  If they are sitting in the bench seat in the back of the van, I'll store all the little stuff in one of those hanging toiletry bags, and hang it off of the middle headrest that's between them. 
Oh and clipboards make all the difference!

#2: "I Dropped Everything That Was In My Lap"

                "I dropped my toy and I can't reach it!"
                 "Sucks to be you"...is what you want to say, but you can't so instead the parent not driving has to do contortionist moves to try and find, reach, and return item to kid. 
If it's just one parent in car, then you resort to feeling around while listening to kids yell, "It's over there! No, over there!"  Because you know where "over there" is.  And voila! you actually managed to find it and two seconds after you hand it to a kid, "I dropped it again."

           Solution:  grabber toy.     I don't think of this as a toy though, I think of it as a sanity saving device.   I have two, one for each kid, and on the chance that the grabber gets dropped, we have a backup.   It also lets them reach for snacks themselves.  Love it!

#3:  "I Have to go to the Bathroom"

           Oh joy, public restrooms...especially gas station ones...
If it's possible we try to get gas near a Target or Wal-Mart, the restrooms there are generally cleaner than the gas station, and we can stretch out by doing a walk around the store.  We almost always remember stuff we forgot to pack while we do this so it's a handy bonus .
   Two things I always travel with, flushable wipes and Potty Toppers ( and if I remember, a travel size lysol can).
      You never know when you'll get stuck in that stall that has run out of toilet paper. A pack of wipes is much easier than carrying your own roll.
Potty Toppers...not just for toddlers.   You buy them in packs of 10, they are thick and cover the entire toilet seat ,and they have two stickies on the back so it doesn't slip off the seat before you make contact.   A little bit of tushy heaven for you and your child in an otherwise icky situation.

#4: "When Was the Last Time We Ate Fries?"
        
              So fun to clean out the van after a trip and find rock hard french fries, trail mix, tiny partially melted m&m's...
This time though,  after a 10 hr trip there and a 10 hr trip back, all I found was a stray chip and one piece of shredded cheese.  Not too shabby in my book! 
How is that possible with kids eating...in a car!?!   
I found some handy trays, nothing fancy, the kinds you use to organize kitchen and bathroom drawers. The inside has a rubberized bottom so things don't slide around and it was just big enough for their meal/snack to fit into...everything stayed in the tray and it was fabulous! 

#5:  "The Trash Bag is Leaking...."

           In the past, we've always kept grocery bags in the car to use as trash bags.  They inevitably get knocked over or that hole you didn't notice before suddenly appears.  YAY!
Last year I found a little pop up hamper that I put the bag in, clipping the edges of the bag to it with chip clips.  This method works decently but sometimes it didn't want to stay popped up so that was iffy. 
           Recently though, a friend of mine and I were in search of disposable garbage "cans" to use for our school's carnival.  Yes, they have these, and they are...awesome!!
They pop up and they stay up.   I thought , those would work great for a car trip, and you know what?  They work great for a car trip!!   I couldn't find the standard trash one at the store but I did find the recycle one.  Same thing, this one just says "recycle" on the side.   Comes in a pack of 3.  And if you have nothing too icky, you could just empty it out at the gas station and reuse the same one for the same trip.
It stayed popped up, held all of our trash.  The thicker than a grocery bag plastic did not leak.  Loved it!   I think the recycle ones work better in a car..they are a little smaller than the trash ones.
"Flings", get some!     http://flingsbins.com/

All in all it was one of our more organized trips and that made travel life so much easier. 

Does any of this help? Do you feel better about strapping in the kiddos and hitting the open road? 
What do you do to make road trips easier for you and yours?  Ear plugs? Separate cars? What works for you?  

Halloween Fun with Labels

I enjoy labeling things..makes stuff easy to find and it looks neat and pretty.  Lately I've been finding printable labels that look pretty nifty, some blank, some already worded..and I thought, how fun for Halloween!
  There are so many free printable labels online now, you could print some up and  go to town on all kinds of stuff.
I thought these apothecary ones would be perfect:

Source: go.tipjunkie.com via Suzy on Pinterest

 

 

And away we go!

1. We're Eating What?!
   Tape over the stuff you have in your fridge for mouthwatering goodness:
     Mayonnaise becomes "Ghost Guts"
     Ketchup... well, blood of course or even better..."Bloodworm Paste"!  Yum.
     Have a jar of pickles in there?  Now they're troll fingers, extra crunchy.
So many options depending on what you have and you don't have to go out and buy anything Halloween specific. 
Now go to your pantry:
stewed tomatoes = fresh  hearts in sauce
olives = goblin eyes, pitted for easy chewing

rice = bag o' maggots. just add water.
have any dried seaweed??   "dehydrated witch's flesh. "





I'd save storage space if I'd just stick to labels!








2. I Hear It's Great for Your Skin, Really...
     This is where you add some fun to your bathroom.
             Hair gel.... "100%  Troll Snot. No harsh chemicals. ".
             Toothpaste.. "Goblin Goo, fortified with snail slime for that extra toothy shine!"
Eyeshadow?  "Rare, finely ground fairy dust"
Green shampoo or body wash can be "ectoplasm" of course!

So, sound like a plan? Sounds good to me! It'll be fun to see the family's faces when they go looking for snacks .  Oh and I'll tell my kids that their hair detangler is really filled with zombie tears.  "Do you know how long it took to hold a crying zombie still to get an entire bottle filled and not be eaten?"

What disgustingly creepy things do you have lurking in your fridge or under the bathroom sink?  The now fuzzy leftovers from two weeks ago do not count :)

    

Random Thought #8675309

Every time football season rolls around I always wind up with the same thoughts. 
I try to watch with the husband but I lack the focus to sit there and watch people run for two seconds, get hit, and repeat...can't do it.  Sometimes I'll think their uniforms are pretty.
Anyhoo..
This is my random football thought...weird that I even have a football thought...

As I piss off Alabama fans.... ( I apologize, but well...)  Anytime someone says, or I see, "Crimson Tide" ... I laugh and think about the entire team being on their period.  "Yeah, it's that time of the month, my crimson tide has come in.."   An entire team of hormonal pissy players ready to beat the crap out of anyone who gets in their way...might be a good thing right?
 Then I envision a giant team tampon running out onto the field during half time to do a special dance. 
And then I laugh..... and even though you may not think it's funny....guess what you will be thinking the next time you see or hear "crimson tide"  .... you're welcome. :) 

To Blog or Not to Blog? That is the Question.

I've been wanting to start a blog for some time now but didn't really know why.  Because all the cool kids blog now, that's why.  No, not really, well maybe a little.... mostly because I'm much better at writing my thoughts than I am verbalizing them.  I can go over each word, each sentence , and decide if that is indeed what I want to say.  Sometimes I just want to show a picture that would easily explain everything.  So here I am, blogging.  In a "What About Bob?" voice, "I'm Bloooggingg!!.."
What will I blog about?
Well,  so many things interest me that I couldn't just focus on one type of anything.  For instance, I love to craft so I thought this could be a craft blog...but what if  I learned a new survival trick from the Discovery channel and wanted to share?  What if I found awesome stuff whilst shopping  or needed to vent because something was driving me nuts?  None of those things belong inside a crafting blog; so random is the way to go.  
My hope is that you will walk away having learned something no matter how useless it may be. I want you to ask yourself, "why do I know that?",  and think of me.  :)