Charisa Darling

For all that don't know, Vance loves phones. He has no tolerance for toy phones. He's no fool. He must have the real thing. He's super sneaky when it comes to getting the phone. My Motherly Eyes In The Back Of My Head have not come in yet, so he always has the phone. He's called many wrong numbers and a handful of family members. (Sorry!)

Yesterday I heard the "Please hang up and try again" lady coming from the phone, so I grabbed it from him and noticed he had dialed 711. This would be a TOTALLY different post if his little fingers had drifted 2 buttons to the right. Hmmm...Must try harder to keep phone away.


When we first found out that Daisy needed two teeth pulled, I went ahead and had them clean all her teeth while she was under. Upon further inspection while she was out, the Doc decided it was not necessary to pull the teeth. Justin is convinced that this is a conspiracy.


Vance is officially a Beast at The Little Gym. I signed him up today. When I told him about it he didn't even look up from his Lillian Vernon catalogue. Maybe we're a little overdue.

Did anyone else see the segment on the Today Show last week about "Cocktail Playdates"? If not, click here! or here! to read about it. So what do we think, ladies (and gents for that matter)? Acceptable or not?

(Side note: It's 9 and feels like -5 here. No one call me and tell me it's cold where you are. I've got all you effers beat.)

12 degrees and with wind chill, feels like -2 here.

Darling, I need a few more boat drinks.

Here's the Friday Freebies!

Having a Bad Day

• Battled Vance at the grocery store
• Battled Daisy and Vance while trying to bring in the groceries
• Doorknob fell off the door leading to the garage
• Tracked in muddy water
• Vance emptied out the grapes on the floor while trying to help me unpack.
• While trying to clean up mud and grapes, Vance threw a glass bottle of salad dressing
• It broke. Salad dressing all over the floor and 2 very nice dings in floor.
• While cleaning that up noticed hole in drywall, where trim was pried off
• That makes 2 holes now
• Called Builder and vented about the drywall and the fact that the trim guy did not putty his nail holes (was totally going to putty them myself, until all this happened)
• I hope it's the same trim guy that installed it the first time. Did he think I wouldn't notice? I find it hard to believe that if putting up trim is your job how can you forget to cover your effing holes. It's such a piddly thing - I'm sure it will take 10 minutes, same way with the drywall - but it's just the point of it all. Do your job and do it well! If you make a mistake and put an accidental hole in the wall, call the drywallers yourself and get it taken care of! Again, did he think I wouldn't notice 2 holes in my walls? F F F

The floors are done. Appliances are installed. Trim has been put up. We're back baby!
Even got a Pottery Barn gift card from the builders because we were so understanding throughout the project!

Vance and I are taking a celebratory trip to the grocery store today. We haven't been out of the house since Monday and are feeling a little Hugh Hefnerish lately. (Wearing jammies all day)

I finally cashed in my Mother's Day gift from last year and scheduled my facial, mani, and pedi for Saturday morning. I'm pretty excited about it.

We got 6'' of snow on Sunday. The boys had fun sledding and playing with their Deere's.

Don't forget to check out the Friday Freebies!

In honor of Top Chef, I picked up some fideos today.

In honor of the Lantz/Little families, I also picked up a Palermo frozen pizza.

The maillady brought me a new CD today. I'm loving it.

Yesterday was the first time I left the house since Saturday. As I mentioned earlier, it's freezing here. I needed to make a Target run, so Vance and I bundled up and braved the cold weather.

Every now and then, while driving, I pass the same older man jogging with his 2 dogs. A Golden Retriever and a German Shepard. The Shepard always has a white V-neck t-shirt on. Not a cutesy, dog t-shirt, an old Hanes or something like that. Actually, since mid-summer he has not been running with the Shepard, only the Retriever. Don't know what happened to the Shepard, but sending good thoughts his way...

When I say, "older man", I'm guessing 70's. I passed him yesterday morning jogging. JOGGING. Outside in the frigid weather. Is that even safe? And he's actually moving pretty well, not that "move my arms so it looks like I'm jogging but I'm really walking". My issue is not that a 70 something year old man is jogging, I don't think 70 is ancient. But should anyone be outside with exposed skin and not to mention all the snow on the ground in these temperatures? I don't know where he lives, must be close by, but he looks happy and waves at every car that passes.

In other boring and non-exciting news, our Target is under construction. It was already a bigger store, with food, but I guess we're getting the full fledged Super Target. Starbucks inside of a Target? Can it get any better than that?

We have finalized the dates and times for our new floor that is going to be installed. Project Pain in the Ass, is what I've been refering to it, lovingly. There were issues with our wood floor when we moved into the house and now the builder is replacing them. Sounds easy right? Not at all, my friends.

• The new wood is being delivered tomorrow, so it can acclimate to the temps in our house. This means room must be made for all of this glorious wood.
• They are also coming tomorrow to start ripping up the trim and baseboards.
• Monday morning our appliances must be taken out. Yup, no dishwasher or oven for the next 4 days. The fridge will be moved to another room so it can be kept plugged in.
• Then the removal of the old floor, laying of the new floor, and putting up new trim and base.
• We have to dismantle our hutch in the dining room, get friends to come and help us move it.
• Vance, Daisy, and I will have to live upstairs during these 4 days. Think Vance can nap with all the hammering?
• The dust will get pretty bad, so I've been told to cover the couches and anything else that must remain on the lower level.
• They are sending a cleaning lady through when complete, so that will be nice.

The last time the flooring people were here they clogged my effing toilet. Just a reminder.

So, that's what we're gearing up for this weekend. Hope everyone is doing something more exciting!

Just checked weather.com. It's 4 degrees out, but feels like -8 with the wind chill.

Here's a current Golden Globe Ballot. Sorry about the previous one!

It's Friday! Don't forget to check Freebie Friday!

Daisy has teeth only a mother could love. A crazy woman in Belleville kept her locked in a cage and was also kind enough to malnourish her in her formative years. She's missing many teeth and many of the teeth that she does have are worn down due to chewing on her metal cage when she was kept prisoner.

At her last checkup, the Vet informed me that her two front teeth need to come out. So, at the end of the month, Daisy will go under the knife. Anyone know who does dentures for dogs?

I am sick. And Vance has no mercy for me. The little booger gave me this awful cold, so one would think he would be kind enough to play quietly while Mommy naps. No way, Jose. It's the kind of cold where you think you're getting better, but then a new symptom slaps you in the face when you're not looking. Clogged ears and sore throat made their entrance last night. The night-time medicine that I have been taking for the past two nights has not been working. Must get new stuff before bedtime. I've heard that Oreo's help too, and I'm getting low, so I must run out and pick more up. Starve a fever, feed a cold. Isn't that how it goes?

On a totally unrelated note, The Grandparents have brainwashed Vance. I'm surprised that I haven't mentioned this before. They have forced their love for Polka music on him. He points to the stereo, wanting us to play his favorite song that they so lovingly burned for us. He dances, pumps his fist in the air, and sings, "Hey Hey!" at all the right times. In order to reverse this, we've been watching the "Fergalicious" video over and over today. I'll keep you posted.

For the past two nights I've been sleeping with another man. His name is Vance and he is snotty, feverish, and has an awful cough, which has been limiting his sleep. So, the first sentence is really a lie, we've been doing more tossing and turning than sleeping.

We tried an ibuprofen and night time cough medicine cocktail last night, but that only kept him asleep for an hour and a half. It kept working just until I was ready to turn in for the night. Go figure. So it was another long night last night and looks like it's going to be another long day today. We're keeping an eye on his cough - If it gets too bad to the Doctor's office we'll go.

Vance has never had a ton of toys. He definitely has enough toys, especially since his faves are everyday objects: empty water bottle, spatula, laundry basket, etc. And books. He loves his books. The living room didn't look like a primary-colored mass of plastic and this made me happy.

Enter Christmas.

The amount of toys that Vance has now is scary. Justin squeezed every last one of them in the car for the drive home and still managed to have enough breathing room for Vance and Daisy. And only one toy had to ride on my lap! Nothing could be seen out of the back windows, but we made it home safely!

My living room looks like a giant toy-stuffed pinata was beaten to death. I can hardly see the floor through all of the shrapnel. We haven't even opened all of the new toys yet. We had been away for so long, Vance was excited to see his old toys. Now that some of the new ones are out, he's definitely going through sensory overload. Poor kid doesn't know what to do first. I told myself to let him have a couple days with all of them, then we will divide and conquer. Some of the old ones will be put away. Some of the new small ones will stay downstairs. And big ones will be divided between the basement and his bedroom. Something needs to change next Christmas.

We did have a great holiday and hope you all did too. Part of the Christmas pics are up at Flickr, I'll try to get the rest out later today.