I swear everywhere I look lately is spiders. Today I went to workout in the garage gym at my office and when I lifted the garage door a 14″ x 16″ web went floating up the door as it opened. Long story short I spent the entire workout looking over my shoulder for a spider. Lately though it seems like everything is a spider. A speck of dust, a piece of dropped food or, the spider who crawled over the back of the couch into my shoulder.
For a long time I had a house cleaner who would come monthly. But that became one of those expenses my husband wouldn’t let me keep. So I’ve been trying to keep up on it for the last 8 or so months. You guys I live in a two story house with all hard wood, two children and the dustiest dog ever. I can no longer keep up. My kitchen table is black so I always see dust and smudges. My floors, always dusty from the dog and because they are hard wood my steps always have dust bunnies in the corners, big big ones. The toilets with three boys are never clean. I don’t have near enough room in my closet or dresser so the couch in my bedroom is always full of shit.
I’m surrounded by one big mess and it seems like I’ve been so busy with work, the gym, and little league that when I have time off I just want to relax or take the kids to the lake or maybe go shopping for new workout clothes. Cleaning is the last thing I want to do. I think my house is just about the dirtiest I’ve ever seen it, (yes my dirty is still cleaner then most people’s clean) but its bugging me. There is clutter and dust and its driving me insane. I’m now taking applications for a house cleaner who will work for free or the cost of a six pack. Tomorrow is my only day with zero plans and it looks like I will be at the gym and then cleaning all stupid day. I hate being grown up.
*if there are no spaces between paragraphs or errors in this post I’m sorry. I’m attempting to blog from my phone. There is no spell check feature on here.

I received an email from my mom last night.  It was some kind of music email and it said she spent money.  I wanted to bonk her.  If she had bought another Rolling Stones ticket I was going to kick her butt. Before I could read the whole email she texted to say, “I kind of spent some money, you need to read your email.”

Holy shit!  She bought me tickets to see Willie Nelson.  I actually couldn’t process what I was seeing.  Willie Nelson was a really close friend of Waylon Jennings.  Seeing Willie before he died has been a life long dream of mine.  He was here recently and I missed him.  I was devastated because I just knew as old as he was I wouldn’t have a chance to see him again.  But, Willie can’t stay off the tour road and he’s coming back.  

She got us the Premium package that comes with all of the stuff listed above. 

I’m beyond excited.  I’m crossing an official item off of my bucket list and I get to be in the same room as a man who was a close friend of Waylon.  Honestly, I still haven’t processed it.  I’m so excited, so so very excited, but I really don’t’ even know how to handle it.  I know I’m most likely going to cry through the whole show.  Willie is a special man, he’s a unique man and I love his values.  His books are hilarious, and he’s had a very interesting life.  

Thank you mom.  I didn’t think I would be crossing anything off of my bucket list for another ten years.

…..

Now I just hope this tan line is gone before the concert.

Because I just cannot look this ridiculous while one of my hero’s is playing!

For quite some time now I've been having an issue with my youngest Codi.  He likes to lie.  Codi will lie about anything.  Codi will pour purple paint on a plate and turn right around and tell you the paint is green.  It's been a huge problem.

One of the biggest things I want is for my kids to never be afraid to talk to me.  For their entire lives I want them to feel like they can come to me with anything.  

ANYTHING.

I want my children to know, no matter how bad they fuck up, what they do wrong, whatever happens that first and foremost their mother loves them.  That I am on their side always.  

When Codi's lying got to be a little bit ridiculous I started a new tactic.  I started telling him that if he tells me the truth there will be no consequences.  But if he lies there will be.  That means that even if he went and smashed the TV to pieces for no good reason, as long as he told me the truth he would not be in trouble.  This made my husband insane.  His thinking was that if the kid smashed the tv (there was no tv smashing) he should be in trouble regardless if he told the truth.  This is one of those times I laid down the parenting law and said we are doing this my way.  

For many months Codi and I have suffered with the lying.  He would lie an obvious lie and I would ask him if he lied. He would of course say no.  Instead of yelling or punishing him I would just talk to him.  I would explain the reasons I knew he lied, and give him one more chance.  One chance would turn to four or five chances. Sometimes there would be tears and yelling I'M NOT LYING MOM, but eventually he would tell the truth.  I had to stick to my word.  I never punished him.  Most people would say he should have been punished for continuing to lie, but I needed him to understand that the truth was the best answer.

It has slowly gotten better, now he usually only says "No" one time before admitting the truth.

But just now his brother came in and told me that Codi said, "shit."  I called Codi in and I said:

"Codi, before you answer I want you to remember it is always best to tell me the truth right?"

He said yes.  I asked if he said a bad word and he said, "No."

I paused for a second and rephrased, "Codi, did you say shit?"

He looked at me, thought for a second and said, "yes, I did."

I was so proud.  So I explained to him that was a bad word.  That only grown ups should say that, but that it's a bad word and grown ups really shouldn't even say it.  I thanked him for telling me the truth.  I told him he wasn't in trouble for doing it because he told the truth, and then we discussed it.  I told him if he said it again he would be in trouble.  Then I explained to him why I needed him to tell the truth.  He may only be five but he needs to know that his mom is his best friend for life.  That no matter what he needs to always feel like he can talk to me.  He understood.

My goal is to create an environment where my kid never dreads talking to me.  I don't ever want them to do something bad, or get a bad grade, or just…anything bad and have a fear of talking to me. I don't want them to ever have the feeling of dread as they come home knowing they have to talk to their parents.  I want them instead to know, that they can come talk to us and tell us anything and we will talk it out.  If they get bad grades, or skip school or punch each other, or whatever it is, I want them to feel comfortable enough to talk to me.  More then that I want to be a good enough mom to be able to always listen first and then talk.  I have made a huge effort not to yell lately. If you've read me for a while you know yelling is my problem area.  I am working on that. After reading Willie Robertsons book (the guy from Duck Dynasty) I realized there are better ways to parent.  When I talk to them I expect them to look me in the eyes.  If the TV is on and I'm talking, they turn it off.  If I ask them to clean up, they turn off the tv and do it.  When I tell them to do something they need to reply, "yes mom," instead of "uggggg" or "but moooom."  

They are getting better at it.  If they answer with a "but mom" I just look at them and say, "is that the correct answer?"  They always change their answer.  I've gotten better about just talking to them.  If they are fighting I try my hardest not to yell. Instead I try and ask them to work it out.  I find consequences to their fighting.  If they can't stop fighting then they have to stop what they are doing (riding scooters, playing a game, etc) and go to separate rooms in the quiet until they can decide to like each other again.  

I am really trying hard to parent differently.  I still mess up, I still yell, I still get totally overwhelmed and call my husband for back up, but I am trying.  When I first had Brandon I had so many illusions about what parenting would be like.  I would be the worlds best mom. I would never yell and my kids would never fight and everyone would envy my family. Somewhere along the lines I forgot to hold up my end of the deal.  I am a work in progress.  Today though, today was a perfect way of letting me know I am getting better.  Codi told the truth.  He told the truth and we discussed it and it was all over with in under two minutes.

Does this mean he can break the TV in the future and not get in trouble? NO.  What this means, is that I hope to also parent in such a way that my kids don't even cause the kind of trouble that would make them afraid to talk to me.  I am also aware that kids will be kids and they will cause trouble.  I'd rather have them do something wrong and get away with it while earning their trust, then have them do something wrong and react in a way that makes them afraid to ever talk to me again.  I'm hoping that at this young age I can make them realize they can trust me with anything.  If someone makes them uncomfortable, if they have a broken heart, if they are being bullied, if they are having trouble in school, even if they don't like how I'm parenting. I want them to feel like they can talk to me. 

My husband is working on it too.  The other day Codi lied to him, pretty good and instead of getting really mad he calmly talked to him, and was super patient with him and he got the truth out of him.  Even though he was furious at what Codi had done he handled it well and he earned Codi's trust by reacting calmly and evenly.  

My hope is that I can look back on my life in twenty years and tell myself I was exactly the kind of mom I dreamt of being when my first baby was still in my belly.  Those two boys are my whole life and I'm going to do every single thing it takes to be their whole life, and to give them the best life possible, even if that means that the person I need to work on the most is myself.  I'm trying.  I'm trying very hard to be the mom these boys were born deserving!

Because these two, they deserve the whole world.

Step one: Go to Whole foods to purchase healthy protein powder, carrot sticks and an apple.

Step two: Decide rather smugly and proud of yourself to purchase a salad from the salad bar.

Step three: Congratulate yourself when you add some roasted veggies into your lunch.

Step four: Remind yourself you are going to the gym so you should add some mashed potatoes for carbs to your lunch.

Step five: Spy the cookie bar at Whole Foods.  Smartly grab one vegan ginger cookie and applaud the fact that you only grabbed one.

Step six: Notice they keep the ingredients to the cookies on the side of the cookie bar. Tell yourself that you are only going to check the nutrition facts to see if they possibly sold any cookies made without eggs.  Discover two new cookies without eggs.  Decide to purchase one of each for future knowledge.

Step seven: Walk away from cookie bar and then decide to just taste half of each cookie to make sure I was making smart purchases.

Step eight: Turn around and go back to cookie bar and purchase 8 more of each cookie because WHAT IF THEY NEVER HAVE THESE EGGLESS COOKIES AGAIN.

Step nine: Eat other half of cookies walking around the store.

Step Ten: Come to work and take two bites of salad, one bite of veggies and then hoover down all of the mashed potatoes.

Step eleven: Reward myself with another cookie.

Step twelve: While stressing about what to make for dinner, snack on chips telling myself I can't go to the gym on an empty stomach.

Step thirteen: On drive to gym notice cookies in the car and eat one more.

Step fourteen: Fuck it, lets just eat one more because I've already fucked it all up.

Step fifteen: Sit in gym parking lot and enjoy one more cookie, while texting your best friend that you cannot believe you are actually eating cookies in the mother fucking gym parking lot.

Step sixteen: Go to the stupid gym with a belly ache.

Step seventeen: Wake up the next morning and avoid the scale like the plague.  Also wonder…should I just finish all of the cookies today so I am never ever ever tempted by them again?

And that my friends is how to lose weight like a goddamn professional.

 

Update**

Obviously my no willpower having ass ended up finishing all of the cookies today.  I need adult supervision. Lots of it!

I've been buying my jeans from the Gap lately.  I love them.  They make a pair of jeans called "curvy" that fit people with a J-Lo ass and a small waist.  Every once in a while I get the idea to try something new though.  About two years ago I purchased a pair of jeans from Tilly's.  If you aren't familiar with it, it's one of those stores that caters to 16 year old teeny boppers, but also has a super fantastic flip flop section.  I bought the pants and wore them exactly one time before I got too fat to fit into them.  

Recently I decided to try them on again and I was sad because they didn't fit.  I pulled them up and then I started doing that thing women do to get our pants on…you know first you grab the waist of the pants and you bend your knees and pull up, then sort of wiggle your legs and ass back and forth while pulling, then you resort to grabbing the belt loops and kind of hopping up and down, while shimmying left and right and tugging up as far as they will go.  So here I am hopping and bending and shaking and wiggling and lifting up one leg and stretching it out while pulling on the belt loops, then bending and lifting the other leg and tugging some more while my husband is just watching me like I'm fucking bonkers.  At this point I'm on the verge of tears because these fucking pants will not pull up.  I decided to just button them and see how bad the muffin top would be.

That's where I got confused.  The pants buttoned perfectly.  But…how is that possible they weren't pulled up. I walked into the bathroom and looked in the mirror and that was the moment I discovered that the pants were pulled up.  They were pulled up as far as they would go because they are those new fangled low rise teeny bopper jeans.  Meaning, I could have tugged for hours and the damn things wouldn't have budged another inch.  I was fuming.  The pants are cute.

Look how cute they are:

But they felt wrong.  I spent the entire day constantly trying to pull my pants up.  If I went pee I would instantly forget they were low rise and sit in the bathroom at work hopping around and jumping, and thrusting my leg out trying to pull the asshole pants up until it would dawn on me again, that these pants were built for 15 year old girls who think it's fun to walk around showing their asscrack.  

I have worn the pants one other time because dammit I paid money for them and they fit, but I can tell you for sure I will never ever ever ever buy another pair of pants from a teenager store again.  The Gap and I are going to be life long friends.  Because seriously, I need my jeans to cover my ass crack…and then some.

And that explains the moment I realized…I'M OLD.  My thirty one years is starting to show friends.  I haz a sad over it!

I got my second ipsy  bag and y’all this one is confusing.  I don’t know what to do with any of this stuff.  I mean…I know how to wear blush but in order to wear blush don’t you need to wear a whole face full of make up?  I also know what to do with lip liner, see:

The liner is by Starlooks and it’s in the color Bare.  What I am enjoying about ipsy is that I get to learn all about makeup without paying tons and tons of money for something I’m awful at. 

Here is what I got this month.

The cost of the bag is $10.00 and this month it contained $63.00 worth of stuff, and they were full size samples.  That is amaze balls.  I would never spend $22.00 on a blush, but for $10.00 and all of this stuff I can learn the right way to use it all.

Last month I also got the Zoya nail polish in Gie Gie.  I have to say…I don’t love it.  I put it on to try it and it was way pale. far more pale then I expected.  I really thought it would be a bright summer color but look…it’s kinda just meh.

The website says it should look like this

Which I guess it does in exactly the right light.  Even in that light I hate it.  However, I wore the polish, two coats with no top coat to the beach, did some gardening, dishes, and other stuff and four days in, not a single chip.

I got so annoyed with the color I switched to black and added a matte coat to it.  What do you think?

Updated to add: I tried it on with cuter shoes and in better light today and I don’t hate it.  It’s actually pretty cute with the little summer dress I am wearing today.  What do you think?

Oh hey while we are talking about me and beauty lets look at what happened when I wore a non full one piece this weekend. 

This is my super cute bathing suit.

Super cute right?  Yeah, it’s super cute until you get home and see these tan lines.  Fuck me.

My husband and best friend cannot stop laughing at me.  It looks even more ridiculous in person.  Oh hey, my  nails show a better picture of the Zoya polish.  You guys I don’t know what to do with this tan line.  The only way to fix it would be to buy a bikini and I’m sorry I’m way too fat with way too many stretch marks to wear a bikini.  I have no idea what to do.  The sun in my yard is no where near as strong as the sun up at Tahoe, so even if I laid out in a strapless bra it would take hours to fix.  Ugh. These bathing suits should come with freaking warnings about the damn tan line.

*ipsy does not pay me for this, I pay for this on my own, and review it just because it’s fun to play with make up 

I received my first Ipsy bag this week.  I am thrilled with it.  If you haven’t heard of Ipsy yet you must be living under a rock.  It’s an awesome subscription website.  You pay $10.00 a month and eat month you receive a cute makeup bag with 4-5 samples in it.  Most of the samples are full size. My first bag contained 4 full size samples and 1 small sample.

Here is what I received:

The Zoya nail polish I got was in the color Gie Gie which is a soft pink.  I haven’t had a chance to remove my current toenail polish so I cannot show a swatch of this color yet.  I got the concealer in Yaby color and the brow gel in clear.  I haven’t used these products yet.  

Here are the first two I’m reviewing.

The Pacifica roller perfume came in the Gardenia scent.  It’s a super mild scent but it lasts for a long time.  I put the scent on at about 11:30 am, just on my wrists.  I went to the gym at 5:45 and was there for an hour.  The scent lasted through the whole day and managed to last through my entire workout.  It was subtle but strong enough for people to smell.  I received a lot of comments on the scent.  I think the easiest way to describe it is…beachy.  I put it in my purse because it is the perfect size to fit into a big purse or a clutch, and it doesn’t take much to achieve the desired results.  I will definitely purchase more in other scents.

The second product I tried was the Mirabella Colour Sheer lipstick in the color Bellarina. The first thing I noticed is that the lipstick is paraben free.  This is a big deal to me.  I don’t like to put crap on my lips.  It also contained mango butter which managed to make my lips feel even softer.  I have not owned a lipstick in over ten years.  I prefer lip glosses.  When I received this I was super sad because I didn’t think I would use it.  But then I opened it and saw the color and I was impressed.  I put it on and was surprised to find that it was a sheer, subtle color that went on similar to a lip gloss.  Ipsy did an excellent job matching the color to my coloring and preferences on their website. 

I should mention that I do not know how to photograph lipstick without making a duck face.  Sorry. I applied the lipstick first at work and was thrilled with the color.  The product was smooth, it didn’t have a taste and it did not leave a lingering after taste later in the day.  It lasted the rest of the day while I was at work.  I reapplied at the gym (photographed above) and was shocked that it lasted through my whole workout.  I immediately put it in my purse to use daily and I want to purchase a second color because I was so excited about the product.  I applied more this morning and got great reviews from my coworkers.  One girl in my office tried it on and she wanted to steal it afterwards.  The color I received is a pretty neutral color.  I think it’s something that would work on almost any skin tone.  I don’t wear a bunch of make up..okay I don’t wear any but I always like to have my lips look pretty. This lipstick worked perfectly on my plain makeup free face and added the perfect amount of shine, color and sparkle without looking out of place considering I had no other makeup on.  

Overall these first two products both rate a 5 out of 5 for me.  I have a feeling Ipsy and I will have a beautiful friendship! I can’t wait to try new products. This is the perfect way for a girl like me, who is clueless about makeup to learn a thing or two!

My dog is obsessed with these chewy things called bully sticks.  One day at a local farmers market I saw some fresh made bully sticks and stopped to buy one.  My asshole friend decided to ask me if I knew what they were.

Asshole friend: Do you even know what those are?

Shannon: Beef skin rolled up?

AF: No, those are cow dicks

Shannon:   **blank look**

AF: Laughter

Shannon: But…but this is a 14" bully stick…are you telling me, 14 inches…like…a bull dick are you sure?

Salesman: You didn't know that? That is why there is different sizes.

Shannon: So I'm sorry but..you killed this cow, made some steak, made some hamburger, then cut off his dick and stuck in in the beef jerky machine and labeled it a dog treat?

Salesman: Yeah pretty much

Shannon: BUT IT'S FOURTEEN INCHES LONG WHAT THE FUCK

Salesman: Yeah cows are lucky

I bought the bully stick and my dog obviously loved it.  I've since found them at Costco and it's hilarious because under ingredients they list, "bull pizzle." I laugh so hard every time I read that.

Anyway said dog is currently chewing on a 12" bull penis and you guys my house smells so bad.  When they start chewing on these things they smell.  My house smells like a mix of rotting bodies, shit, and death.  I keep throwing the stupid bone outside and the asshole dog keeps bringing it back inside.  I just tried to eat a snack and he brought the damn bone back in right below me, y'all I nearly puked when I smelled it. I can't imagine what is going through my dogs head that he is enjoying this thing.  He will not put it down for anything.  He thinks this chewy is the greatest thing ever.  Dogs have a very good sense of smell, are you telling me this fucker thinks chewed up, dried up beef dick smells good?

Dogs….

But wait there is more.  I got my first Ipsy bag today, that came with a roller ball perfume.  I opened it up and went to test it on myself. Only problem is, it was hot, so when I touched it to my skin perfume gushed out and leaked ALL OVER ME.   So I'm now immersed in Gardenia smelling perfume that is so strong it's making me wanna vomit.  Combine that with the rotting dead people smell and I need a shot or two of tequila if I'm going to get through this day.

I’m not fat.  I’m not skinny either but…I’m not fat.  At least not in my head.  In my head I’m overweight.  However, when I go to the gym and use their little body fat machine it tells me that I am “morbidly obese.”  Because of my height (5′ 1″) and my weight (167 at the time of this post) I rate very high on the BMI chart, I rate as morbidly obese. 

The picture up there is of me currently.  Do I look obese, let alone morbidly obese?  This is so frustrating.  Statistics like this, words like this, they really fuck with a persons head.  I was working out at the gym so hard, eating so good and doing all things right so imagine what it did to me when the guy at the gym put in my height, weight and age, then looked up at me and gave me my body fat percentage (33%) and then had to tell me that I am VERY OBESE. Not only was it embarrassing for me, but it was embarrassing for him.  The funny part is, this guy has hit on me since I joined the gym.  I think it did something to his head telling a girl he has been flirting with that she needs to write down that she is obese.

I wonder, If I am morbidly obese then what do they label someone who weighs, 60-80 pounds more then me?  I always thought it was super duper huge people that were considered obese, and morbidly obese.  I am so bothered by this.  I’m working so hard towards a goal of being healthy, but to even be considered non even over weight I have to get all the way down to 118 pounds.  I wouldn’t even want to be that small.  That is way small, and at my age it’s almost unattainable.  So even if I got down to 140 pounds which is a respectable weight, the United States would still consider me OVERWEIGHT.  How is a person supposed to get excited about weight loss when all of their goals and acheivements get smashed down with words like obese and overweight.  Total bummer if you ask me.

WHAT. THE. FUCK.

I call bullshit on the whole thing.  I’m sorry, they need a new chart…because this…is not morbidly obese.  NO.

Some of you may remember my youngest child Codi had food issues for the first four years of his life. By issues I mean, he wouldn't eat anything that was not either a chicken nugget, a donut, chocolate, or a mini pancake.

After months of frustration and worry and agonizing over his weight loss and growing anemia I finally got a little mean and made a threat.  Either he eats real food, or, every day we would have to get blood drawn using a needle to check his anemia and every day he would have to drink the brown, awful, nasty liquid iron medicine.  After much talking he chose to eat. 

Strangely he now pretty much loathes chicken nuggets.  He has decided he loves steak.  Expensive steak like filet and rib-eye.  However the funniest of all is his love of pig products.  Codi's favorite snack is ham.  Ham, cheese, and crackers.  His favorite lunch item is hot dogs (all natural, nitrate free).  His favorite food is bacon. Duh.  This kid loves bacon.  It cracks me up though, he will not eat turkey, only ham.  He will not eat a turkey dog, only an all beef or all pork one.  He will eat bacon in anything. 

Seriously..he ate this whole foot long corn dog at a carnival restaurant with my dad:

 

I have to admit though…aside from his love of pork my child is also in love with vegetables. He loves cauliflower, asparagus, beets, green beans, edamame, and various other veggies.  He still hates salad but that is mostly because he hates salad dressing.

In fact have I mentioned that my children both eat sandwiches, but neither will eat mayo.  They don't like salad dressing (Brandon recently accepted ranch on his pizza).  Codi despises ketchup in any form.  He actually prefers zero condiments.  NONE.

Codi will only eat tube formed yogurt, he does not like yogurt on a spoon.  I am lucky I recently found an organic kids greek yogurt with no food dyes or HFCS.  He thinks potato chips are a food group.  He will not eat eggs.  Toast and bacon are his preferred breakfast.  He has tried soda and liked it (I did not allow this) however his brother has tried it and hates it…the carbination bothers him.

He likes to turn everything into a sandwich, except sandwiches.  Two crackers equal a sammich, two chips equal a sammich, two cookies…you guessed it a cookie sammich.  Two pieces of bread with something in the middle….NOT A FOOD THAT HE WILL EAT.

 

Point is….my kids food habits are almost as weird as mine.