Black, Cream or Sugar....Any way you like it.

The greatest good you can do for another is not just to share your riches but to reveal to him his own.
-- Benjamin Disraeli

So we have our own little coffee barista at work....and her name is Shannon. Nevermind that she's always being interrupted by a group of coffee junkies during her morning routine. It just seems like this time of year everyone needs that extra little pick me up throughout the morning.
I thought the quote was fitting because of Shannon's unrelenting generosity with the "voffee" every morning. Though the occassional cream is brought in by one of us, or maybe a pack of cups is donated, we generally use all Shannon's supplies and not once has she asked for anything in return. I guess Mr. Disraeli put it best when he said the greatest good we can do for another is not just to share our riches, but to reveal to him his own. So Shannon, I'm revealing to you the great importance your coffee wealth has for the rest of us, we appreciate your giving nature, your therapeutic ear, your quick wit, your understanding and compassion (even when so many people may not deserve it) and your unwavering friendship....these are really the riches you give to us and the reason I come to you every morning...though the coffee is definitely a bonus (and maybe an excuse to use you as my sounding board.)

Make a postcard - it's easy!

Boy, n.: a noise with dirt on it.

In every family there is someone with a funny nickname….mine is Sis, and though it’s very common, that’s what they call me. (My Uncle Donnie used to call me Boo-Boo Kitty but I guess that was just too hard to say every time someone wanted to yell at me.) My dad’s nickname is Skeeter so growing up when someone called and asked for Ernest, you better have told them he wasn’t home.
Anyway, I have a cousin named Jon Christopher. With a nice name like that you’d think we either call him Jon, Chris, J.C., something like that but no, his family calls him Budge, aka Budgie. Now, you have to understand just who Budge is….a rambunctious 5 year old who probably knows too much and definitely doesn’t care to share his thoughts. He’s unique to say the least and his favorite pastime is fussing with my papaw.
His older sister Jenna and brother Clint tend to spoil him like most older siblings do. He gets what he wants, when he wants it and when he doesn’t, watch out. A few months ago he got really ticked at Jenna for some reason I can’t remember. Now, Budge may only be 5 but his vocabulary is better than most adults. However, during this name calling event he got his new vocabulary words confused and ended up calling Jenna a “Vaggit”, we’re assuming that’s a cross between two other words which I’ll leave up to you to figure out…lol. Yes, this is the same child that yelled (at Jenna’s softball game for all the crowd to hear) at Clint to, and I quote, “put me down, you’re hurtin’ my balls!”
So, who wants to be his kindergarten teacher???

Budge holding Drew, who he thinks is his "little broffer".

I teach high school, but a good friend of mine is a kindergarten teacher. One day a little boy tattled on another, telling my friend the other student said the "B" word. Wondering exactly which "B" word, she called the boy over and asked him to repeat what he had said. He did not want to repeat it for the teacher, but after some prodding he finally admitted to saying "Bagina".

Ben, Houston, Texas

“Trust yourself. You know more than you think you do.”
-Benjamin Spock


This always seems to ring true for me. There are just certain situations where had I trusted myself a little more, I would definitely have come away with a better result. Take our current living arrangement….two families, both with babies under 6 months, add in a few dogs and differing lifestyles and values—it’s pretty much a recipe for disaster, don’t you think?

Had I trusted myself, I would probably still be holding on to a shred of sanity by the time I go to bed. Now, don’t get me wrong, it has been more than nice to have my baby be able to stay at home, but sometimes I’m questioning my thoughts on whether it was worth it. I guess I just had that nagging voice in my head telling me to not agree to the arrangement however, I felt like it was what a good person should do and I’m a firm believer in karma…..I definitely did not want that kind of bad karma coming back to bite me in the a$$. I’m sure God would appreciate the way Tim and I were trying to treat our neighbors but dang, neighborly love only goes so far. All I can say is thank goodness for medication. (Actually, THEY should all be giving thanks that I have medication….)
So anyway, that little nagging voice that kept telling me it was a bad idea was chirping in my head in a smug little tone all last weekend. I feel like Tim and I definitely got to test our parenting skills with our houseguests when we had to sit down and have a little talk about what is and isn’t acceptable in our house. I guess it will be different when Drew grows up and becomes a teenager, but that was not a conversation I want to repeat.

Having vented all that, I have to say that though the experience may have started to run its course, and it sometimes gets pretty stressful around the house, I have come to realize that Tim is one of the best husbands –slash dads – slash men I have ever known. I am so glad Drew will have such a good role model as he grows up. Though I had plenty of reasons for not starting to date Tim 10 years ago, I’m glad I trusted myself enough to go ahead and jump right in….I really did know more than I thought I did when I made that decision, and thank goodness I did. :)

Here's your sign...

Yesterday I was driving down the road and came to a stop sign with this sign posted on it. As we all know, nobody stops at a stop sign because they're so far back from where you actually need to stop....so, I had to throw it in reverse, pull my camera out of my purse and hang out the window to take a picture of this sign.

Now, you have to understand I am a teacher and as a teacher, we all tend to catch these things. What I want to know is who has a "gaint" yard sale? I really want to look this house up tomorrow and go to their gaint yard sale just to see how big it is....ah, here's your sign.

*As a side note, luckily no one was behind me when I threw it in reverse and took the picture. Somebody would probably have thought I was insane hanging out the window taking a picture of a stop sign. Thank goodness you all know how crazy I am and can look over my eccentricities....ideas for my blog are becoming a little dangerous as I become more obsessive over finding things to write about. :)

Everyone makes mistakes. The trick is to make mistakes when nobody is looking.

So I guess this blog is started for those wonderful ladies at work who make me laugh everyday. I'm loving the fact that things are winding down at work and I've avoided most of the stress of the year. I'm sure you'll probably be sorry I decided to blog after some of the useless rambling that will be coming your way....and we all know you don't get enough of my sensational sarcasm during the day, right?

Okay, so the heading of this blog is is about making mistakes....there isn't enough room on the world wide web to list all of mine but I think most of the mistakes I've made I've eventually learned something from...if it hasn't been anything better, I've at least learned to try and make those mistakes and not let anyone else find out. Some of the mistakes however have been a little less easy to overcome, like when I choose time and time again to eat the WHOLE pack of cookies and not just one or two like the normal person would. (But we all know calories don't count unless someone actually sees you consume them.) For those of you who think I'm joking about eating the whole package of cookies, just ask my husband....chocolate chip cookies are almost my favorite breakfast in the world. (They edge out a king size Fudge Round by just a hair.) And yes, I am the girl who ate two, count them, TWO hot fudge cakes from Frisch's in one sitting....it's really not that much different than the person who eats dinner then dessert, I just choose to have dessert and dessert.

On a more serious note, I guess no one is immune to making mistakes. I think having a baby has really made me a little more understanding of that in others. I am well aware I'm hard on others, hopefully not judgemental, just a tough love kind of approach. I know a few of you are gonna laugh out loud when you read that part because it's so true. Maybe the real trick is not to actually hide our mistakes from others, but to change ourselves a little bit because of the mistakes and choices we make....Lord knows I'm not even close to perfect.

Uh-oh, we've just had another enlightening moment in the Rosencrans' household that could dedfinitely be classified as a mistake....it's called too many spoonfuls of prunes in Drew's cereal....