Family Matters

Ummm, so I believe the unthinkable has just happened. You know the phrase, "You can choose your friends but not your family"? Well, I think that my family has chosen to "unchoose" me. I'm not entirely sure why, because I really do like them, but something is amiss. Now, let's not get ahead of ourselves. This is not my immediate family we are talking about...it is my extended family. Let's examine exhibit A....a christmas card. We received this holiday greeting in the mail the other day. (I can't believe they broke up with us in a letter!!!) Pay attention to how it is addressed. The original document said "Dear Family and Friends." However, OUR document read slightly differently. See the picture below....


Apparently, we are no longer family (or they just would have crossed out "friends.") We are also not considered friends, because that is crossed out. So the greeting actually reads Dear Family and Kevin Maria"....hmmmm. Ok, so I can deal with that. Maybe it's a mistake, maybe it's a subtle hint. Whatever the reason, I kept reading...because let's be honest, I still care about them and want to know what's going on in their lives. So I read on....and on...until I come to the end of this festive, yet somehow suspicious, Christmas letter. May I now present exhibit B...the closing. Keep in mind that the people writing this are my aunt and uncle. My REAL aunt and uncle, my father's brother and his wife, so...my blood relatives. Note the signatures. Now note the quotations.
I have never laid claim to be a grammer expert ( I leave that Gramma Jean), but something about the placement of those quotation marks does not give me warm fuzzies. Since when did they become my "Quote-Aunt-and-Uncle?" Do they know something I don't? Is there a family secret hidden deep within the depths of this correspondence? I shudder at the possibility.

The only saving grace is held within the first paragraph where they state they will provide a recap of 2008. Recap is in quotes. I can only hope that the misuse and abuse of quotation marks is an overlooked mistake and not something more.........or is it?????????????

Brace Yourself

Oops, I did it again. I forgot to tell work that I had an orthodontist appointment this morning. So I find myself, once again, calling in at 7:30am to tell them I will be in a little late. "It should only take about 15 minutes" I told them. "it's a routine appt."...

I arrive 15 minutes early with hopes of being called before the other 8:30 appointment folks. Hooray, they take me right away! The woman who will be working on me has a high frequency of making me bleed and causing a little pain, so I brace myself. She removes my top wire with little to no problem and I am thanking God all the way. She is, however, having much trouble getting the new, thicker, stronger, wire to go into the slots in the back. It begins to hurt...she tells me to shift my head. (for anyone who was not fortunate enough to be blessed with a metallic smile, let me let you in on a small pet peeve I have. Every time you go for an appointment, the technician will inevitably lodge your head in their torso to brace you, thus ruining any type of hairstyle you had when you entered the building and ultimately giving you the Derelique look as you exit) I digress. Anyway, the doctor comes over and tries his hand at the wire...no luck. As he is trying to shove it in place, I see a small white fleck jump out of my mouth. I look at him and see his reaction. He just puts his head down and sighs deeply. Uh oh, I think. This is not a good reaction. I inquire. He responds that he just broke a piece off one of my ceramic braces....drats. Now, I''l be like 15 more minutes. The technician comes over ready to remove the remaining pieces and says "ummmm, doctor D? You actually chipped the brace on her front tooth too. Are you kidding me? 2 braces? broken? This will be a 1/2 hour for sure.

I have never had ceramic braces before, so I was unaware of how they are removed. Metal braces are pryed off and come off all at once. Ceramic braces break (obviously) and therefore come off in pieces. They will, however, try to pry off if they can. So he tried. He tried so hard, that I raised my knees and flailed my arms (scaring all of the 10 year olds in the place) begging him to stop. I was convinced he actually ripped out my front tooth. I was holding back the tears.

Fine, so that was unsuccessful. He then says he will "dremmel" off the rest with an electric tool. OK, that shouldn't be so bad. I am wearing the safety glasses I was given and again...brace myself. 3 minutes into this escapade, I feel a hot shard fly UNDER my safety glasses and go into my eye. I yell. "Stop!Stop! It's in my eye!" They stop and proceed to fish out the piece. At this point I don't see how it can get any worse. They finish that, shove the wire through (part way and cut the rest off) and now all the tech needs to do is re-tie the rubber bands. The end is sight and I can feel it! She is attaching the bands and I feel her poke me with the very sharp hook-like tool. I bleed. She tries again to get it over my gum. She misses and pokes. I bleed again. This goes on twice more before she gets the doctor. By the time he comes over, my gum is so swollen, nothing is getting around it. He actually has the nerve to say to me that I need to brush more b/c my gum is swollen and red. I tell him he would be swollen and red too if I poked him with a sharp stick in his stomach repeatedly. He agrees. I leave. Fresh air at last. It is now 9:20. I get to the car and notice that my cheek is stuck on a brace. "What the?" They had forgotten to trim up one side of the wire and it was like a quarter inch long. So I go back and they fix it. I am done with this!!!! I ask the doc how much longer till I can have these things removed for good. He says 6 more months. What??? You see, I was originally told 12-18 months. Once his "6 month" timeline is up, it will have been 30 months. (not what I had signed up for) Grrr to braces and Grrrr to them.

27 pounds of love

Ok, So I'm a little behind on the blog..This entry is from an event on November 4th. Kevin and I were invited to a dear friend's 30th birthday party. Granted their home is about an hour from our place, but it sounded like fun and gave Kevin and I a chance to hang out with some friends. Ok, so what do you get someone for a 30th birthday? Clothes seem weird, gift cards seem thoughtless, and home decor like candles seemed way too generic. I began to think what I would like and appreciate for my 30th birthday (which is right around the corner) and it dawned on me that I would much rather someone make something for me rather than buy something. Our home is full of paintings, sculptures, blankets and even a tapestry that friends and family have made for us. I love them all and treasure them more than anything. But I have only one problem in regards to my friend turning 30.....I have absolutely no artistic talents whatsoever. Our good God has blessed me with the ability to use my brain, not brushstrokes. There is one thing however. I have been taking cake baking/decorating classes for about 2 months before the party. So, I volunteer to bring the birthday cake as my gift. No big deal right? Well, there are about 40 people coming to this shin-dig, so it had be slightly bigger than my typical class cakes. The pressure was on (it was good pressure, mind you, but it was on!) To make matters more complicated (in my own head), there was going to be a professional cake decorator AT the party! Can you believe that? How many cake decorators does my friend know?? Now I really had to prove myself.

To bake a cake for 40-50 people, I needed 15 cups of batter, or 3 boxes of cake mix. (Note to self: do not overfill KitchenAid mixer with batter...it's not pretty) Anyways, I had numerous designs in mind, but decided to go the "less-is-more" route, as not to seem like an overzealous cake decorator.

The cake was baked on Thursday and decorated Friday night. I was working with fondant, so naturally it took a ton more time. I had only worked with this doughy icing once in class, so to say it was an adventure would be an understatement. 4-5 hours later, my masterpiece was finished and I was exhausted. Off to bed I went.

The birthday girl likes the fall season so I made edible leaves that looked as if they were blowing on the cake. I was quite proud of myself.

The party was fun. Cake friend #2 didn't end up coming, but secretly I wish she had, so I could "talk shop" with her. People complimented me and that felt great! I definitely want to continue with the cake thing, but don't call me CakeLady....it makes me feel old.

This is my friend's dog Bailey. I wish I could say she is licking up scrumptious crumbles of my cake, but she is actually licking homemade barbecue pork drippings off the front of the stove. Oh, how she reminds me of our little monsters at home.

Driving Miss Maria

Driving in Los Angeles is an experience all in it's own. (yes, again we back track to my trip to LA) For anyone who has not yet been privileged enough to "cruise" down the 405, let me give you a small piece of advice....Save yourself. Screw Nike- Just Don't Do it!! This roadway of sheer insanity is home to endless hours of traffic (there's no such thing as rush hour- it's busy ALL the time!), pretty people driving expensive cars, and it ultimately leaves you feeling ugly, poor, fat, and of course....late.

I myself try to be timely. So when the first day of my conference arrived, I had planned on being early so that I could orient myself to the hotel (and the Starbucks inside) register, and socialize. Events began at 8am, so I planned on arriving around 7:45. According to my bro who lives in LA, the 18mile trip should take approximately 40minutes...without traffic. Naive me, I have plans to leave at 7. Surely traffic couldn't be THAT bad. Oh, but wait...I forgot to account for one small thing....you know we are in California, so why wouldn't there be...ohhh say a....wildfire? Yes, that's right. There was a giant, blazing, traffic-causing, detour-making, 405-closing wildfire. Of Course. Now I know I'm going to be late. I panic and start demanding Kevin do something. (sometimes I wonder how he can stay married to me) All I can see is all of the money I have spent getting to this conference and now I will spend it sitting on Sepulveda Blvd. Good God save me now! So thankfully we had Nuvi (our faithful GPS) who helped us to take back roads (with the 30,000 other people) all the way to the Hyatt. How long did this joyous excursion take? 2 and 1/2 hours my friends....and poor poor Kevin had to turn around and drive back to Jay's after dropping me off. He is such a wonderful husband and I love him so much (despite the fact that he's friends with his ex-girlfriend on Facebook...grrrr).

Unfortunately, I did not have my camera on me at the time, but I did manage to take a few pics of the fire remnants from the car on the way home. BAsically, all of the trees that have no leaves were the ones on fire.

The Return of the Box of Happiness

All right folks....You've asked for it and so back by popular demand is the Box of Happiness. For those who don't follow this blog regularly, here are 2 things you will need to know in order to understand the video. 1) This is a second round of the original post The Box of Happiness 2) Shame on you for not regularly following this blog!!! j/k To watch this video and appreciate it in it's entirety, you will need sound, so turn up your speakers and enjoy....





I laugh every time I watch this...no fail!

Flight of the Navigator

They say men have an "innate" ability for a sense of direction. I must tell you that I have witnessed this theory fail several times over, but for a second, let's just pretend it's true. This story is a bit of a backtrack to our trip to L.A.

After perhaps the longest conference day of all, Kev and I went back to Jay's house and chilled out for a while. It was about 8pm (11pm on our East coast body clocks) and we were discussing what to do. (By "we", I am referring to Kevin and Jason) I am feeling very tired at this point and pretty much eyeing every soft surface that one could use as a bed. Kevin mentions that he would like to go to a corn maze....tonight. I hem and haw and hem and haw some more but my passive aggressive responses are being ignored and it is off to the corn fields we go. Jason, Kevin, and me. The rest of the roomies declined....gee I wonder why. Don't get me wrong, I love a good corn maze, but tonight I was tired. I was tired, and grumpy, and wearing the worst possible corn mazing shoes ever...teeny tiny thong sandals.

The maze was only down the street (but as usual, this was L.A. so it took super long to get there) and apparently this was the ONLY corn maze in the entire city. From the street it looked pretty fancy. There were spotlights going into the sky, a petting zoo, a haunted house, and a bunch of places to get carnival food like funnel cakes and gyros. Since Jay came along, we thought we would be gracious and pay for his ticket in....I mean how much could a corn maze cost? In VA, they're like 5$, so I figured they would be 8 or 9 in LA. Looking at the sign upon arrival, it appears that admission is 10$, oh but wait, that was the price before 7:30pm. Our special evening corn maze was gonna cost us 12$ a piece, 15 if we wanted to go through the "Halloween corn maze". Thanks, but no thanks, I'll save my 6 extra bucks and spare myself from strangers touching me in the night. Whatever. So we are now officially off to the maze. Upon entering, we are given a small map from which we must navigate to different places and answer questions about voting. (this maze was carved in a political theme given the upcoming election)

Front of tiny map thingy showing an aerial view of the corn maze

Back of tiny map thingy

Being the brainiacs that we were, none of us thought to bring a flashlight of any kind. Lucky for us, we live in the age of cell phones, so we could use the light from those (except for me, who thought "I'm going to leave my cell phone in the car, because why would I need it in a corn maze?" So we are down to 2 phones and Kevin's is losing battery power rapidly. However, he said it wouldn't be long before we were out of the maze because he told us that he would read the map and navigate us to through the maze of politics. OK Kevin, you can direct us.

Kevin...navigating by the light of his phone

Are you sure that's the way?????

After a while Jason tries to help.



We each have own roles at this point. Kevin is the "navigator" (and I use that term loosely). I am the documenter, and Jason is the comic relief. Jay spent his time running around the maze hiding from us, pulling up corn and touching Kevin's head with it, as well as "making his own paths." So, I guess he really had 2 roles, comic relief and trailblazer.


Terror in the corn maze



We did have some success. We manged to find all of the sign posts except for one, which we spent WAY too much time looking for before we came to the conclusion that some teenagers stole it. I was impressed too, because these were large and heavy signs, but I guess you shouldn't underestimate the power of teenagers in a corn maze..at night...around Halloween..in LA. The attendant that we saw after we exited the maze didn't seem at all surprised that the sign vanished. All he said was "damn teenagers!"


Where's the sign? It should be here!!!!



This is a pic of the signs we were trying to find. You can't see Kevin's face, but he is smiling because he found this one. I guess he wasn't half-bad as a navigator, contrary to popular belief.

An Army of One

I feel fat right now. No, I am not just being hormonal or acting like a silly weight obsessed female. I went to Food Lion the other day (aka Chow Kitty) to do some grocery shopping upon our return home from Los Angeles. I had cut out all of my coupons, cross referenced it with sales, and prepared to do a "big shop" which would last us about 3 weeks. I didn't think this was such an abnormal thing to do....however, when I arrived at the register (manned by a 40 something woman with frizzy frazzled hair and apparently very few social skills) I discovered that I was wrong. She kept scanning my items and looking in the cart to see how much I had left to put on the counter. My first thought was that she was close to the end of her shift and I was standing between her and a date with a much needed cigarette. Next, she finished ringing me up and looked at me and said (with her ever lovely southern twang) "Geez Lady, what army are you feedin?" "Excuse me?" I replied. "All this food! How many people are you trying to feed?? You must have LOTS of kids, huh?" I admit, this caught me way off guard. I had purchased ~180$ worth of food for 75$. "Uhhh, no army. Just me and my husband." She then looked at me out of the side of her eye, as if I was harboring illegal immigrants in my basement, and said "oh, Okayyyyyy. Have a good evenin." I will not go on a rant about grocery profiling, but beware....it's out there people!!!!!!

Does this look like I'm feeding an army to you?

Meals On Wheels

FYI. The following was made possible by the State of California...I recently witnessed something that I never thought I would see. I actually saw my parents up on roller skates last Saturday, and they were terrible!!! This unusual sight was made even more unique because we were all wearing 70's themed clothing. And what exactly warrants a 70's themed roller disco party? Why someone's 30th birthday of course. Yes, it was a friend of Jay's who was turning 30 and her husband planned this shin-dig. I honestly had no attire that would have been appropriate for such an occasion, so naturally, a trip to some of LA's finest thrift stores was required. We had much success on our first trip out and even managed to get Kevin an entire leisure suit for only 3$ at Salvation Army! During a trip to our very first store, I spotted my outfit. It was on a mannequin in the front window. Staring at me in the parking lot was an Elvis inspired, all black, sequin unisuit with a great big gold belt! I had to have it!!!! I asked the salesman how much the entire ensemble was and he had the nerve to tell me that it was not for sale. I was broken hearted but not going to give up.

To make a very long story short, I think there were some very unfortunate fashion mishaps during the era in question. I found many dresses that more resembled lampshades than clothing. What were people thinking???? So everyone got their garb and off to the roller rink we went!!

Deep in thought were Harold, Maria, Kevin, and Jay

Why is Dad posing with Farrah Faucet? Oh wait.....that's my mom :0

Can't you just picture the cheezy 70's music on in the background?

I am obviously less than thrilled, but don't worry, once I get a few drinks in me, I become, well, more "party-riffic." Just don't ask to see the Maria dance....






My bro Jay....don't panic, the mustache is fake.






Some more party go-ers, Kelly, Charles, Darryn, and Mah.


OK, so back to how funny it was to see the rents on skates....Poor dad bit it...twice, and mom wasn't doing anything that even remotely resembled skating. It was more like watching an elderly person shuffling towards the cafeteria for mid-morning snack time. Skating was however, a great workout. I forgot how hard you must work in order to propel (or stop) yourself. We were all sore the next few days, mostly in the shins, but for those of us who fell (not me) it varied from palms to wrists to thighs to bums. It was one of the best nights I have had in a long while. I never laughed so much :)

Wii, Mii, and the Familii

Ever get the urge to punch one of your relatives in the face? Ever feel the need to hula hoop without the hula or the hoop? How about walking a tightrope from 1 and half inches off the ground? If you said yes to any of these, then you, my friend, need a Nintendo Wii. My brother, Jay, has this contraption at his place in LA, so while the fam got together, we decided to have a little bonding time with the Wii and each other. It began innocently with baseball and ended in sore shoulders for some of us. And what goes better with a belly full of dinner than a round of boxing with your dad!!

Nice hit dad....a shot to the body!!

I should mention that you do not get extra points for overreaching

I'm doing it! I'm doing it!

VICTORY AT LAST!!!!!!

Bloggity Bloggity Boo

As you may be able to deduce from the title of this blog, I'll be discussing Halloween and a few key events that happened on that day. First of all, Halloween is one of my favorite holidays celebrated. I have dressed up just about every year since I was a little "ghoul." This year, I had many great ideas and narrowed it down to one that was inventive, clever, family friendly, and most important- work appropriate! I decided to dress myself in all black and put numbers all over me, which were made of medical tape. Can you guess what I was?? OK, so it's not extremely obvious, but anyone who knows me knows that I LOVE puns....so my costume was "someone you could count on!!!!!!" Corny? Totally. Original? Most definitely! I think the best part of wearing my costume in public was the variety of guesses people had as to what I really was. Here are a few of my favorites.....a thug (hmmm), a dice (wouldn't I need dots?), Dr. Who (I don't even know what that is), the stock market (the person who guessed that said it was because I was wearing numbers that appeared to be getting smaller towards my bottom half, and that the stock market went down....I'm not gonna touch that one....), and my personal favorite.....the number 7 (are you kidding me? I was covered in all sorts of numbers and you pick out a 7?) In honor of Halloween, I have included pictures from previous years so you can see how much fun it has been.

This was a few years ago, some co-workers and I dressed up as "Gang Green." Dorky, I know.

This was taken at an 80's themed Halloween party while I was grad school. It was awesome! We even had our own theme song (Whip It) that played as we made our grand entrance!

Ahh, not really Halloween, but I liked the picture. This was taken at Pleasure Island in Florida before we got married.

Going WAY back.....these were costumes that our mother made for us. They look cute, but the inside is actually filled with crinkled up newspapers...and you can gather from the way I am standing that it was most itchy!!!

Murder on Highpaige Way

What do you think would be the worst thing you could come home to? Cheating spouse? Fire? Grizzly Bear? (Hey, it happens) My answer, until recently would have most definitely been fire. It's scary, practically irreversible, damaging, and expensive. That changed Friday night. After a long day at work, Kev and I went to dinner in the West End. We stopped at Michael's to get a cake pan for a friend, and then stopped back at my work to try to print off some things for Kevin's class (which was unsuccessful). As Kev drove off to school, I drove home, eager to see the pups, who have been home alone a little longer than usual. I am not prepared for what awaits me.


I open the door and immediately try to shuffle everybody outside so there are no accidents in the house. As I do this, my eyes shift towards our ivory microfiber couch....which is spattered with blood. I look at the wall- also spattered. Oh No! Who is bleeding??? And how does that splatter pattern occur?? A ruptured artery? I go out and see that Nala has blood on her face, paws, and body, but doesn't seem to be wounded. My attention is now on Neo who is also covered in blood. Head, paws, and body. I run my hands all over him and still come up empty. Neo is now crying so I know it's him...I just can't find the problem. Lastly, I touch on the very tip of his tail and now I'm covered in blood. Ah Ha, so it's his tail. I put pressure and paper towels on it, but it seeps right through. I try again and the blood seems to be coming out even stronger. "Oh God" I think. I am going to have to take him to the emergency vet...over a 1/2 hour away. Suddenly, the sound of cash registers dance in my head. It'll be at least $100 just to step foot in that place. Oh well. Nothing is working, so I pack up Neo (in my tan interiored car) and off we go. To make matters worse, it is pouring outside and what do dogs do when they get wet? Yes, that's right...they shake....their tails. So now there is blood in my car.

At the ER, I am a nervous mother. Demanding that they take us first and pacing the halls until the doc finally examines him. She suspects a condition called "happy tail." This is when a happy dog wags his tail into something like the wall or a corner, repeatedly. I'm not buying it...I am a disheveled mess, with blood on my shoes, shirt, and jeans. They shave his tail, dermabond the wound, discover it is a puncture wound from my other dog, and charge me 150$. As Neo comes back to me, he slips on the floor and opens his tail again. "Forget it." I say. I just want to go home b/c it's almost 10pm.

Arriving home, Kev is already there and I notice the couch is still spattered with blood. I inquire why he hadn't started cleaning yet, and he responds "Started? I haven't stopped since I got home!" I didn't realize this at the time, but there were blood splatters on the hardwood floors, the tile, the walls, the windows, the kitchen cabinets, the fridge, the furniture, and anything else that was downstairs. It took lots of cleaning, but eventually we got it all out. However, when Kev and I arrived home Saturday after running AN errand, we found a very familiar mess. I am convinced the absolute, worst place a dog can be injured, is their tail....because they will wag that thing no matter what!!