Add to Cart - aka my Poison

  I'm  a huge "window" shopper - and by "window" I mean if its in my visual window, then I'm shopping!  I love things that are easy and user friendly.  There are no dressing rooms with those god-awful lights and what I (not affectionately) call Camera mirrors - because they automatically add 10 lbs .  There are pictures  and TRUE testimonials of how awesome and enriched my life will be when I have these wonderments in my possession.  I got addicted to "Add to Cart" one year when I decided to Christmas shop at 3:00am.  Oh my goodness!  Add to Cart and I became best friends!!  I just clicked and TA-DAH!! presents automatically landed on my front porch.  It was truly a Christmas miracle!  There were no cars that were gonna cause me to go into parking lot rage, there were no parents yelling at their kids to stop crying, there were no sales people bombarding me with "specials", it was just me and Add to Cart.  I fell in love.  And as anyone who has ever been in love knows - its not always a 50-50 split on the give and take.  But with Add to Cart, it always gives me exactly what I want, with one little touch.  Those three little words changed my life forever.

the Boys are back in Town

Last night I went to dinner with my cousin, who is about to become a grandmother for the first time.  When I walked in to Flips, she was sitting at the table holding a tiny baby boy - which was unusual - not because she had a baby that was of no relation to her, but that it was a boy.  My cousin is the mother of two adult daughters and has never experienced all the most wonderful and exciting things that having boys in your life on the daily brings to the table.  Now her oldest daughter is pregnant with twins and a couple of weeks ago, we found out that they are both boys.  Nothing could have shocked her more, and to be completely honest,  disappointed her.  I, of course, being the only person in our family for at least our generation and  the 2 generations before, was the first to have 3 boys and zero girls - so I thought it was the greatest thing ever.  I still do.  I woke up this morning thinking about, first how sweet and precious Baby Eli was that I also held last night, but also how lucky I got to be in a house FULL of boys for 20 plus years.   My boys are just such fun people.....They bring a completely different vibe into the mix with the loudness and the wrestling and the general messiness that just IS boys. - I found out early on to never, EVER use the phrase "Oh my kid would NEVER do that!!".......As soon as those words leave your mouth, you will instantly become a liar.  Believe me on that one!! They are psychic and basically just enjoy messing with your head.
However, there are so many awesome things about boys that I miss more than words can say since mine have now moved on and left me, but I'm going to take a quick trip down memory lane and enjoy how much each one taught me a wonderful lesson on patience, parenting and determining that no matter how old you are, you are never too old to take a lesson (or 2) from your kids.  
But also, the unconditional, never-wavering, ever-present love that they have for their mom.  Any other female that is brought into a male-dominated household learns very quickly she better be able to hold her own.
So, congratulations to my beautiful cousins, Kimma & Zig and to their kids, Brad & Terra and the newest little rockstars, Jett & Jagger.  Your lives will never be the same and for that you can thank J-squared - they will keep you on your toes, make you think it was actually YOUR idea to get that puppy, snake, lizard, ferret, goldfish (hint on that one - just buy them in bulk!), guinea pig, drums, guitar, paintball gun,  every action figure and lego that has EVER been invented and GUM!!!

PS.  I started this in Feb........and finished it in May.     What can I say?? I  got busy...  :)