Halloween 2011

Wow yesterday was fun packed full day!  The kids had to dress up as a book character and later in the day did a neighborhood parade. 

My Thing 1 and Harry Potter:

Then they turned into Zombie things for the nighttime Trick N Treat.



I'm just HAPPY it's over.  We stayed busy all weekend- going to parties, festivals, and events.  So after all that running around and doing this and that can you believe they gave me such a hard time when I asked for some candy.  Geez can I get a piece of candy for all the hard work I put in.  Guess I asked for too much. 

Bullied into going to the Pumpkin Patch

When I got home from working HARD on my feet for 8 hrs dealing with cafe customers on a Sunday the last thing I wanted to do is go anywhere.  But Lil Mama had other plans!

I came home and started to take off my shoes but Lil Mama says "Umm what are you doing?" I responded back " going to relax" she informed me "No you are not- we are going to the Pumpkin Patch- NO EXCUSES" and looked at me like I was the child and she was the mom.  I felt like I needed to give her the puppy dog look she always gives me and I got back from her "NOT GOING TO WORK"  wow did this little 7 yr old just used my words/actions against me?  She bullied us into going I swear!

Now this Pumpkin Patch is SAD:  where are all the pumpkins???












Also cost me $10 for 15 minutes of FUN for the kids to go on the slide.  Plus $10 for a small a** pumpkin.  They had pony rides ($7 per kid), face painting ($7 per kid), Jumper ($5 for 10 minutes) but who can afford all that??? 

But in the long run Lil Mama had a blast and that's what it is all about.  Next time though I'm finding a REAL pumpkin patch and it will be FUN for everyone. 

Kid's Homework Is HARD!

Yes, it's been about 30 odd years since I've been in elementary school but dang the MATH homework is hard (for me).  I read the problem over and over and still can't get it.  Of course I have lil man looking at me like "WTF you don't know this MOM?"  I stare back and shrug my shoulders and than we both roll our eyes.  If I'm having this issue now just imagine what I'm going to go through in the years to come.  I need to go back to elementary school I guess.  My kids do math different too...I learned last year they don't CARRY anymore but TRANSFER. 

My son's class is doing their math homework online this year and the program is wonderful.  I had a get a couple problems wrong so I could have the site walk me through the process and my son got mad at me because I was ruining his quota...whatever dude!  I needed to know how to do it so I could help if needed.  Geez! 

My daughter is a whiz at math but younger than my son so when she tries to get in the middle of his homework I ask her to back up and do something else.  I can see my son getting upset that his little sister is telling him how to do his homework.  Someday he might want her help! 

What I do like about homework is we get to sit around the kitchen table and I cook all at the same time- wonderful family time!

What is like in your house with homework???  Or am I the only one who doesn't remember what I learned in 4th grade...LOL!

Our Earthquake Aftermath

Okay so last week the Bay Area had an earthquake around 4.2 and several aftershocks. I've lived in Cali for almost 15 yrs and every time a earthquake has hit I've been in a car or just didn't feel it. I felt this one and I'm still kind of shook up about it! It was the oddest feeling to have everything under you MOVE. My hubby and I were at home so we jumped up and ran outside along with the rest of our neighbors who were home at 2:30pm. The kids were at school and they were evacuated to their safe place.

  Later that night after 8pm another one hit and WOW those kids ran to our room so fast and the rest of the night was HARD. The kids wanted to sleep with us and that wasn't going to happen. We talked lil mama onto the couch (right outside our room) and lil man well he ended up all curled up in our chair in our room. I don't think we slept well that night because the next day we were all grumpy.

Now the next night I guess there were a couple small aftershocks that happened but we didn't feel them except for my son. He came in the room about 12:30 am waking us up talking about another earthquake. I snapped at him to go back to bed because there was no earthquake and he needed to go to BED! Wow, did I feel like a bad mom the next day when the news informed us YES there were a couple small shakes last night. Ugh! Gave him big hugs apologized for my behavior and told him I will believe him next time.

Lil Mama hasn't slept in her room since and I'm not sure when she will be going back. She has her pillows/blankets/stuffed animal friends all over the couch now! Keeping fingers crossed that we won't feel another earthquake for a LONG LONG TIME because that wasn't cool!

No Cable....Blank Stare

That is what I got and more from my 9 yr old son last night when I explained that the cable is OUT. He looked at me like... WTF am I suppose to do now mom, I felt like I failed PARENT 101! Yep my 9 yr old is addicted to TV/Games. Do I take all the credit for that...nope but we won't get into that rant right now. Our cable is out because remember back when I wrote about switching to Comcast- oh my what a nightmare that was!!!! First, pretty much what they offered was a joke and we got charged anyways. When I brought up the agreement (on paper) what our DEAL was, they were like oh ...but pay the $265 (yes you see that correctly) now and next month we will give you the credit. No MF's...I want my $89 (plus taxes) deal NOW~! Let's just talk about their service...SUCKS! I hated it from day one but thought well for the price I can live with it but as the days/week went by...NO can't live with the old ass menu that is confusing plus just old! Oh yeah, how about only able to record 1 show on DVR while you watch 1 show. Nope..not happening for me on nights I have 2 shows I need to record and then watch something hubby wants to watch. Hubby has had to watch X-factor and Survivor the past couple weeks because I can't record them. I know..I know very selfish of me thinking about how horrible the DVR function is from our cable company when there is bigger issues in the world but hey in my world I'm the DVR QUEEN. So we called Comcast to tell them we no longer want their service and was told we had to pay $50 for them to disconnect the service but can't reinstall our original cable company's equipment. Ok...we will do that and save $50. HAHAHA! Now we have NO CABLE. As much as my hubby says he is techy...he really isn't but its hard to break that news to him. He was on the phone with the cable guy and getting no where! So the cable guy says we will send someone over tomorrow to reinstall our boxes and NO CHARGE. What...see that's why I love AT&T they appreciate their customers- even when we went behind their back and tried a new company. OUR BAD! Now back to last night. 8pm is the magical time we get to turn the TV on for the night. Usually we all go to our separate rooms and watch TV. Last night we were ALL looking at each other and wondering what we should do. Now no cable also means no Internet. We all went to bed early and everyone said they had the best sleep. I feel bad my kids associate so much to TV that we almost had a meltdown but we got it together and enjoyed each other. We are still without Cable (I have laptop connected to my sprint 4g card so I didn't have to go without Facebook and Pinterest) but no one knows that yet! We might have to reevaluate our night time but doubt it!

I Heart My iPad!

If you know anything about me you know I don't always think of myself first! Kids and Hubby always come first...I know i know, I've heard it over and over before. Anyways, back to ME...see I do think of myself, lol! This year with the TAX REFUND I bought a refurbished iPad from the Apple store online. Let me tell you, that was the BEST PURCHASE EVER! Granted when I bought it I used "OUR IPAD" a lot to make sure hubby was OK with me buying something like that. Even though, he just bought a PS3 it wasn't as expensive as the iPad but guess what gets used EVERYDAY...yep the iPad! Over the months "OUR" really turned into "MY" but still anytime he wanted it he can have it. I do all kinds of stuff on the iPad. My favorite APP's are ZITE and FLIPBOARD. I also have Facebook, Twitter, Netflix, Kindle, Hootsuite, and many more that I enjoy daily. The kids have a couple games on there and hubby does too! My son and hubby plays a DJ Mixer Pro app all the time. I really like have Evernote on there because when I come across sites I want to bookmark to read later I bookmark them in Evernote. I have a couple apps I don't use that much but tend to down the road. I stalk FREE Apps all the time. When I first got it, the kids weren't allowed on it for months but these days I have to fight them to even get on at night. Lil Man does homework on there and Lil Mama she has a farm going on Farmville. At night when they are all done with homework they turn on the Pandora App and sing/dance to their favorite artist. They each have their own Pandora account and they get 15 minutes each to do their music thing. I'm very happy we (me) bought the iPad and maybe one day I might upgrade to iPad2 and they can have the old one LOL! What are your favorite Apps and what do you use it for?

My New Addiction- Pinterest

O..M..G! I spent some time on there today, making my pin lists and looking at this and that, LOVE THAT LOVE THIS! Someone invited me to this site awhile back but I was totally confused and left in a hurry. Well the other day I came across it again and I was WTH I've been missing a whole new world of WONDERFUL!

Here is a cute idea I found today.

You ask what is PINTEREST? http://pinterest.com/ Pinterest is a Virtual Pinboard. Pinterest lets you organize and share all the beautiful things you find on the web. People use pinboards to plan their weddings, decorate their homes, and organize their favorite recipes. Best of all, you can browse pinboards created by other people. Browsing pinboards is a fun way to discover new things and get inspiration from people who share your interests

How to sign up for Pinterest Pinterest is currently invite-only. You can request an invite from us or you can be invited by someone who is already a part of Pinterest. When you receive an invite, you can register via Facebook Connect or connect through Twitter.

If you want an invite~ email me at pamallen68@gmail.com and I'll send you one! If your on it already~ check out my pins http://pinterest.com/pamallen68/pins/

Do you have Spotify? You need it!

I'm LOVING Spotify! Every morning this week I grab my coffee, get on Facebook, turn on Spotify and ENJOY! I'm having fun making playlists and enjoying a wide range of music. I can let my family/friends know what I'm listening to on Facebook- even saw that my mom LIKED Bruno Mars after I posted it. Got my hubby hooked too, maybe he will stop buying music and just enjoy SPOTIFY, lol!

Here is more info: https://www.spotify.com/us/about/what/

Create a playlist -Click on ‘New playlist’ in the left column, give your playlist a name and then drag and drop the tracks you want included.  You can right-click a track or album and select ‘Save to’ and then ‘New playlist’. A single playlist can store up to 10,000 tracks, if you have the time or inclination

Have fun! 

Now I can listen to whatever I want when I'm cleaning house!!!



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My Lil CowGirl

Look at my lil COWGIRL!  I wasn't able to go to her very 1st Parade but Daddy went and so that's all good.  Lucky for him he took some pics.  Her Brownie Troop/Girl Scouts were in the Black Cowboy Parade that Oakland has every year.  Lil Man didn't want to go at first but when he got there and saw all the cool cars, horses, fun stuff to do his frown turned into a smile (daddy said that).  My babies are growing up and enjoying LIFE~ got to love that!

This reminds me I need to get her a sash. 

Couponing is Cool, Right?

WOW...I watched a program (Extreme Couponing) the other day about a lady who took her whole family into a grocery store and bought $2700 worth of stuff for $189.00.  If  I was in the store while she was doing that I would have been there with my mouth wide open, my eyes hecka big with a big goofy smile and just watching it happen.  They had enough sport drinks to last them for YEARS! 

Where would you store all this stuff?   People have separate bedrooms for all their stuff.  Couple people had store-like aisles set up.  It was amazing.  If I ever got that big into couponing you know my family and friends would be benefiting as well.  I would be bringing bags of crap over to them weekly- or just an invite saying "Wine, Snacks, and Shopping", I'm sure I would get a party started with that.  My family would kill me if I became a HOARDER though so I would have to share the wealth of goodies. 

Is this something I want to do?  I'm thinking HECK YA!  But on such a smaller scope.  I started this Sunday by clipping coupons and filing them away in a coupon binder (I had one handy).  I saw so many products that I use so I'm getting excited to use them soon. 

Do you clip coupons and what are your tips for beginners?

BTW~ while looking for images I came across a very cool site that gives some tips and coupons http://www.couponing101.com/

Spell Check doesn't like: couponing