Oh lordy, it so sooo addictive!   Just in case you have not heard of it, Pinterest is straight from their site, (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. To get started, request an invite.)

My board is full of photography ideas, crafty how to’s, helpful hints, and gorgeous decorating ideas.   I wish I had the time and money to do even a fraction of them.   Anyway, I love it.   Get to pinning, and let me know your ID so I can follow your board!

(just in case you did not know, Pintrest has no idea who I am.  They did not pay me or anything!)

Thank you ladies and gentleman of our military, and thanks to your families–dogs included–for sharing so nicely.

Go here for even more jumping, tail wagging, camo wearing awesomeness.

Thanks @lookydaddy for the link.

Whatever.  (sidenote:  The Son totally looked at me today and said “Whatever, you can just do what you want.”  Who taught him that?!)

Oh, and on the way home we stopped at the navy museum.  I did not even bother taking in my camera that time.

Here we have lovely picture of a jet thing.  It was cool according to The Hubs.

This is where we spent the bulk of our time.  Cock pit training thing.

Some of us were very excited.

Some of us are still talking about it.

How did he know what to do here?  I am quite certain that the Wiggles have never covered air warfare.

He told me this button “made the fire that goes POW!”  Great.  So much for him not knowing about guns.

I wonder if this lever would have ejected me back to the beach?

Back outside to look at the helicopters.  Mama gets left behind.

At least I have my camera to keep me company.  Why does this say Army if we are at an Airforce museum?   Still do not know the answer.

Look!  A flower to take pictures of!  There are approximately 49 pictures of this hibiscus in my camera–and two of the helicopter.  I can’t help it.  I am a stereotypical girl–and proud of it.    Next time I get dropped off at the condo.

We have been spending vast amounts of time in our jammies here at Huckablog world headquarters.  We have been catching up on our reading, and cartoons, (pronounced by The Son as shar-toons), cooking, feels like spring cleaning, and surfing our favorite corners of the web.  I have not really written a post for you or anything, but it has been brought to my attention that many of you are suffering from Son withdrawal.   So here ya go.  See? In his jammies.   Right now?  12:28 p.m. on a Tuesday( turns out today is MONDAY)?  In his jammies.   And you know what?  I am totally cool with that.

Since we are being a wee bit lazy, I have decided to share some linky love.   Here are some of my favorite blog posts I have read recently.

The first one is PhD in Parenting.  I LOVE this blog, and this post on Breastfeeding in Children’s programing has some awesome clips.  The Son and I watched them all several times.  The whole blog is great, and her ideas and philosophies on parenting mirror my own (not so much on politics or religion, but diversity makes the world go round, right!).  I am proud to be her fellow student of parenting.

Next we have the Nie-Nie dialouges.  I have pored through this blog in the last week or so.  It is by a mom who loves being a mom, she is so HAPPY and CREATIVE…and she and her husband were very nearly killed in a airplane crash in August.   She had 83% of her body covered in burns….and still she is HAPPY.  LOVE this one, go check it out.

This is 7daytrial, and a good post on the choices you must make as a parent.   Darling, this is so just the beginning–and no worries, I was in L&D eight times before The Son was finally forcefully removed from me.  The best time was when I thought I was leaking amniotic fluid.  Turns out I just wet myself a little.

Mamapop, oh how I love thee.  I am seriously considering giving up “pop culture” for Lent because I really do not want to know who is on the cast of The Hills when I do not have cable TV, but this is a great post about a more serious problem, one I feel passionately about.

That should keep you busy for awhile.  I will be back soon.  Promise.

Well the print version anyway, this is from Similac’s website.

You probably already know how I feel about formula in general; but really, could someone please tell me what Ty Pennington has to do with baby formula?  Nothing.  He just is greedy and takes any endorsement deal he can get. I am adding this to the official, “Why I can’t stand Gary Tygert Pennington” list.  I can just tell that you are dying  to know the rest of the list.  No?  Well sorry, this is all I have for you today.

1. Look at him:

This guy is 44 years old.  He has a not quite soul patch, not quite chinapillar.   He has said he goes to a spray tanning booth when he is not shooting, his hair…well, just look at it!  He is 44! I do like this jacket though, for me not The Husband.

2.  I met him once and he was a total egomaniac.  He was going from desk to desk signing autographs at our office.  I just shook his hand, and he seemed surprised I did not want him to sign my cell phone.   I was surprised because he was much shorter than he looked on TV, and his girlfriend just followed him around handing him sharpies, not talking and had an identical haircut.

3.  Speaking of his girlfriend, he cheated on Drea Bock, his girlfriend/manager of 11 years, with a stripper.  Ew.  I guess next he will be endorsing herpes medication.

4.  Even though he is more than capable of hiring a cab, he was arrested and convicted of DUI.  He apologized and Disney (who owns ABC, Extreme Home Makeover, and Ty) glossed over the whole affair.

5.  He is an endorsement whore.  Besides being Similac’s spokesperson (even though he has no kids! Nor any medical background to compare formula to breastmilk! Or a uterus!),he has also endorsed the ADHD medication Adderal (which he also takes ((which, by the way,  should not be mixed with alcohol)), the now defunct Furniture Unlimited, cell phones, Bayer aspirin, and of course Sears.  There may be more, but these are the only ones I could find.

6.  As we saw many times on Trading Spaces, and now on Extreme Home Makeover, his taste is marginal at best.  Look at his bedding line if you doubt me.  Do you know what he calls his “style” ( I am using that term loosely obviously)? Creativi-TY and sTYle.  Gag.

7.  He gets published when there are so many awesome writers who have to try for years to be read by a publisher.   He has written three books and now has a quarterly magazine.  How can you write that much about platform beds and mdf?

8. He is tacky.  He was asked to tone down all of the double entendres in a caulking chapter, and every book has a picture of him nude in the shower.

9.  Lastly, and this is more a negative of ABC than Ty, but he should know better, an Extreme Home Makeover makeover will add thousands of dollars in new taxes to the new homes they build—which, in all likelihood, the owners can’t afford.  They capitalize on an easy tear jerker, without considering the social consequences of erecting a Mcmansion that often towers over every other house on the block.   Extreme Home Makeover and Ty Pennington offer the shallow American dream,  leather sectionals, stainless appliances, whirlpools and half a dozen flat-screen TVs—all thoughtfully provided by the show’s sponsors.  They think this will bring happiness, no matter the affliction.

In other words, I would pick  Nate Berkus any day of the week  (even if he is Oprah’s lapdog).  For those of you who need more heterosexual and rugged eye candy than Nate can provide, might I suggest Mike Rowe?  (disclaimer:  I, myself,  like the more geeky, intelligent, cuddly sort, think The Husband) Mike is hard working, well read, and, when clean, down right yummy.

I deleted the post from the folder today. Just in case you were wondering, none of the predictions were right (Hillary Clinton is not the president elect for example.)

I am sorry I have not bothered to write a real post in weeks. I have had a nice vacation and have been spending time traveling and with family and friends I rarely get to see, and while I am sad to see how low my hits dropped this month, I think I needed a little blog break.

I got to see CAT long enough to hug her and talk about The Office, I had a cheese pizza with Ang long enough for The Son to insure she may choose to never have children, and Shoeshe came to stay for a few days. While Shoeshe was here we took my teenage cousin and The Son to the best, cheesiest amusement park on earth where The Son rode a roller coaster which my BiL will not even ride, and I got nauseous on the teacups we had to ride twice (pictures to follow). She also stymied my panic attack in a laundromat at two AM as we washed bathmats and kitchen rugs that my OMFG why will you not just pee outside you whacked out little mutt new dog seems to have confused as her own personal lavatory. Shoeshe never even complained. Not even when I told her she could wash her feather pillow. Ooops.

We got to see all of our grandparents, some for longer than others, The Husband’s cousin from Texas whom we love and who I envy because she can wear boots without looking ridiculous, another cousin with a baby almost as cute as mine. We saw Gabs, my cousin who lives with my Ma (my grandma, her Great-Grandma), who is ENGAGED, which makes me feel really old because I was old enough to be holding her when her umbilical stump fell off (I screamed and handed her back to her mother.) We spent another great weekend at the elder (but not old) Huckablog’s Scenic Compound where I laid in the hammock even though it was 40 degrees outside. I am glad I did it then, because I may never be invited back because my OMFG why will you not just pee outside you whacked out little mutt new dog chose to pee on MMiL’s feather bed. All in all it has been a bad season for feather linens.

So that, in a nutshell, is what we have been up to around here, plus you know, like parenting and stuff. New Years resolution! Not to say like and stuff so much! Hey, how about some New Years’ resolutions? (did you like my segue?)

Here are my 2009 resolutions for TheHuckablog.

1. Add a pictures page. I have tons of pictures I would like to share, but cannot always come up with time to write about them. To relieve the stress, and make relatives happy, I will just post directly to a separate page and people who want to look at twelve pictures of The Son eating spaghettios can, while other’s can ignore them.

2. Add a book club page which other people write. Some of you miss the Read it or Rants, others want to start a book club, I want to read what other people think about books other than Thomas, the Tank Engine. First book for the book club is really a series. Twilight. I know, I know, that is so 2008. CAT told me not to waste my time, MMiL thought it was okay, others think it is the BEST.BOOK.EVAH!

3. Finally get around to doing what it takes to have ads. By someone other than an EVIL CORPORATION THAT I AM PRETTY SURE SLAUGHTERS KITTENS AND PROBABLY HATES THE SIMPSONS.

4. Do the leg work to have some cool give aways. Did you know lots of blogs get cool free stuff to give away? I want to do that!

5. Write a post at least every other day…unless I need a vacation…or want to read instead…or have time for a toddler free shower.

Happy 2009 everyone.

I read a lot of different blogs, and wanted to tell you I appreciate you not cursing, that is rare even among mommy bloggers! This is not really a question,  but you are welcome.  I have never really said the “big two” more than a handful of times, and have tried to curtail any words I do not want my two year old saying.  (we were watching Dirty Jobs while caring for my parents dogs at their house last week, and Mike Rowe said, “So this is Gourd Sex.”  The Son immediately said “Gwod Sex! Gwod Sex!”  I told him the man on TV said gourds are six, but I do not think he believed me.) Sorry I got sidetracked.  What was I talking about?  Cursing, right, so my parents never really cursed, and neither did my close friends, or husband, and truth be told….I think it is a little tacky.  There ya go, I just called most of the blogasphere tacky.  I didn’t mean it! (or I at least did not mean to let you know that is what I thought.) Please still be my friend.

You never told us how you finished weaning off of Lexapro. Um, yeah.  There is a reason for that.  I gave up.  The Husband and I had sorta kinda decided that I would come off of Lexapro by August 31, The Son’s second birthday, and then we would open up discussions about whether we wanted to start thinking about another baby.  Mid-August we talked about it, and both agreed we were just not at all feeling another kid any time soon.  We did not say never, but definitely not in the next year or so.  Since there was no longer a reason to worry about being on an SSRI, while pregnant, it just seemed stupid for me to be having panic attacks or generalized anxiety when there is a perfectly good way to prevent them.  At 2.5 mgs I was having horrible, horrible withdrawal, at 5 mg I was still feeling worried about stupid things, so I am back to my original (yet still very small) dosage of 10mg of Lexapro.  That Lexapro Lexplains it category on this blog is not going anywhere anytime soon.

I am your friend, I think, so why do you not talk about me, or write me a birthday post or something? I do not post pictures or names of people who I am not either related to, or that have told me specifically that they do not mind their images on the blog.  I have tons of friends whom I LOVE, but I just can’t write about every single person who is special to me, and if I wrote a birthday post for everyone then that is all this blog would be.  The Huckablog is supposed to be my therapy, not a greeting card.  But I still love you, really I do.

What ever happened to the Read it or Rant posts? Short answer? It started to feel like homework so I quit.  Long answer, they were making me feel stressedwhen they were late, and no one seemed to be reading them anyway so I quit.  There has been some interest in starting an online book club, and I will totally provide that for people on a separate page here, I just do not want to be the only one participating.  If I can get a volunteer to recommend a book  and then write a review, I will post it and moderate the comments.

I do enjoy your blog, but you have offended me with some of your God/prayer/Christian type posts.  Can you lay off for those atheists like me out there? Can I lay off being a Christian?  No, I can definitely not lay off of that for you.  I am sorry if you felt offended, but as egocentric as it may sound this blog is about me, the real me.  You will never hear me mocking other faiths, and I even have a lot of respect for different beliefs, but they are not what I know to be true.  My faith is an enormous part of who I am, and while I do not expect everyone to agree with me, I do hope that you can understand why I will not censor any relgious posts I may write, I just could not live with myself if I “hid my light under a bushel.”

I went about my afternoon, sort of thinking about that sales call. I ate dinner, visited some dinosaurs, met Elvis….still thinking about that call. I figured it out: 90 minutes, 120 dollars. That is what, 80 dollars an hour? That is pretty good. Hum. If I had 120 dollars I could pay for my little er, indiscretion. Everyone could go ride the train and I could sit and smile for an hour and a half and then meet them in time for lunch. I did not really want to ride the train anyway, and it would be ninety minutes free of toddler wrangling. I called Candy back, and she was THRILLED to talk to me. She asked how old I was, if we were above a certain income bracket (barely Candy, but you do not need to know that.) and what The Husband and I did for a living. She informed me that she had a spot for us to be “orientated” on Saturday morning, but my husband would have to come with me because of my age and since he is the “main bread winner” (and old.) Great, now I had to convince The Husband that listening to a sales pitch would be better than riding a scenic railway. It did take some time, but finally I talked him into it, on the one condition that I would do all of the talking and the saying no. (Remind me to tell you sometime about our crazy expensive cookware.)

Saturday morning we got up early so we had time to pack, check out, and get The Son settled with MMiL and FFiL. We walked in to this lounge type thing and saw dozens of couples sitting on cheap furniture. Half of them looked like rich, old retirees and the other half looked like middle class working people. We applied our sticky name tags with our names spelled wrong, and watched as various salespeople poured through the doors. A woman named Susannah came smiling to us, and lead us up into a hot, crowded room filled with lots of tiny tables. She spent a good five minutes pumping us for information, or getting to know us—you decide. What do we do, where did we meet, where did we go on our honeymoon, how often do we vacation, where did you go to school, where are you from? “Oh, I grew up twenty minutes away!” (I chose to ignore the fact her name tag said she was from Fairbanks AK). “Oh, I went to school at insert Alma Mater” (Really? You have a degree? Does selling timeshares really pay that well? ((then again, I have several degrees and I spend my days wiping applesauce off chins and singing songs about spiders. Never mind.))

After several minutes this little, overly tan guy walked in. His name rhymed with Fake-o. You could see the gray roots of his dyed black hair. He looked like he was either wearing heavy foundation or tanned daily. He went into this whole spiel about the links between health, vacations and living longer and working too much and blah blah blah. Every other sentence he would insert a….dramatic pause. He had so many…..dramatic pauses that I briefly wondered if he was having a series of small strokes. When he was done talking and pausing he showed us a video of lovely suites filled with average Americans singing the praises of Whinedam resorts. (none of the suites looked remotely like the ones that we stayed in that week), it was full of phony sounding statistics, and I could read the fine print from my spot. The organization responsible for these “facts”? The World Vacation Institute. Oooh, that sounds official. Then Fake-o told us how he had a heart attack “a year ago this month” and just fourteen days after quadruple bypass surgery he was on a beach in California, with his small son, at a Whinedam resort. He showed us a framed photo of the silhouette of a small boy holding hands with some guy running down the beach. He quickly waved it in front of our faces and then put it back on a shelf. Since we were at the front table, I could see the picture fairly well. I am pretty darn sure it was not Fake-o in the picture. It really, really looked like the picture that came in the frame. Also? FFiL had a quadruple bypass this time last year and spent some of his recovery time at our house. He sure as hell was not in any shape to be gallivanting on a beach fourteen days later. I call BS on Fake-o.

When Fake-o was finished with his brief work of fiction, Susannah took us on a tour of the compound, and it was lovely. I would definitely enjoy staying there as I vacationed. As we were walking she casually said, “I will be up front with you, it costs sixty-two nine.” That is exactly how she said it, sixty-two nine. I guess I was confused by what it was exactly that she wanted us to buy (it is a deed ((um, huh?)) for the rights to use Whinedam condos for a certain amount of “points” a year. Confused yet?), because I kept trying to figure out what dollar amount sixty-two nine was (that would be $62,900). I heard The Husband choke behind me. We should have just left right then and asked for our $120 while admitting that we were never going to spend that much money on a condo we could only use three weeks a year. Instead we continued the tour. I asked intelligent questions, oohed and aahed at the appropriate times, and then saw a clock. Our 90 minute “orientation” had been going on for over two hours. I told Susannah we needed to hurry this along, we had to meet our family, she rushed us into a VERY LOUD room, crammed with people. (When I brought up this detail to The Husband later on he said he noticed the same thing, and thinks they do that on purpose to overload people’s senses. They get nervous and hot and are more likely to rush and say “Yes” without giving it the thought 63 grand deserves.)

I told her we were interested but not ready to commit today. (I was trying to be nice Susannah!) She had to go get her manager to talk to us before we left. This anorexic looking girl, a few years older than me, came up with her eyes all bulging out. The first words out of her mouth were, “So how much can you put down today?” Er. I might have been playing along a little to well. The Husband looked panicked. (He told me when we got in the car I was lying so well he even believed me, that is amazing because usually I am a HORRIBLE liar.) I said we were not prepared to make a commitment right away. (Please let me leave scary lady, I just came to pay for my ticket!) She said, “Well you have to make a commitment today or you lose this good deal.” “Well, I am sorry, with the economy the way it is, it would be foolhardy of me to agree to spend this much on a non-necessity.” “You are looking at it the wrong way, instead of thinking about saving to spend for your vacations, you have to spend to save.” I could not suppress the giggles escaping my lips on that one. I think it ticked her off, because next she said, “You know, financially savvy people never have to think about it. They just say yes right away,”. Great. First you make me late, then you scare me with your eyes, and now you are insulting me? Does that really work on anybody? I chose to negate telling her about all of those financial tests that I studied for (and mostly passed), and just gave her a firm. “No, thank you. We are not interested.” She flipped over her piece of paper and then proceeded to give us a BETTER DEAL on something called the “VIP” package. Oh, so this is like buying a used car? You thought I was just trying to negotiate? I just want to leave, and never speed through a certain county again! “No, Thank You. We cannot commit to that much money. Especially not with your seventeen percent (!!!) interest rate.” “But, you can get financing on your own with a lower interest rate.” “How can we do that if you want us to agree right now?” “You just pay the $6,000 down and figure out the payments later.” “No, thank you. We cannot commit that much money.” (Dear God, let me out of here!) Scary eye lady huffed off without even saying “Bye”.

I looked over at Susannah, she had tears welling up in her eyes. Was she faking? Maybe, probably even, but I believe she was really upset. She saw her big fat commission fly away. I patted her on the shoulder and told her that she did a good job, that scary eye lady ruined it for her by pressuring us so hard. She gave me her personal email and cell number in case we changed our mind. She then had to bring over some old guy with a bulbous nose, blood shot eyes, and smelling vaguely of stale Bud Light to “check us out.” As soon as Susannah left, he sat down and said, “I understand why you said no. Here let me tell you a better deal.” He brought out more papers and gave us yet another price discount. I was amazed at the sheer tenacity of these people. I no longer had the patience for tact at this point. Our ninety minute “orientation” had turned into a three hour interrogation session. “No. We have to go now, can I keep these papers to think about it (and by think about I mean broadcast it all over the internet)?” “Oh, No, we can’t let you take the inventory.” Whatever dude. “Fine, we really need to leave.” He sighed, led us to the front desk. A weary looking lady counted out $120 in twenties into my hand, I turned on my heel and marched out, relieved to finally be free.

When we were outside, the first words out of The Husband’s mouth were, “How much do you think the timeshare would cost if they stopped giving $120 to people like us?” Good point darling. Oh well, we were $120 richer and had at least gotten some good blog fodder from our morning not riding the train.

What color are TheSon’s eyes? Excellent question. He has two different colored eyes. His right eye is a lovely bluish grey, it looks very much like MMiL’s. His left eye is blue as well, but about a third of it is a hazely-greenish color. It reminds me of JHJ.

What kind of job does TheHusband have that lets you stay at home? He is a computer geek who moonlights as a computer geek. His official titles are umm….hold on. “Honey, what are your official job titles?” “Computer Systems Administrator, and Product Support Engineer.  Why does the Internet need to know that?” “Never mind. Keep reading political blogs and getting mad.”  Yes, The Husband does have two jobs, but he sorta does them simultaneously. He is also in school. (He rarely sleeps, so I try to take an extra nap on his behalf.)

Are you one of those ultra conservative fundamentalist Christians? I am a Christian, and in someways I am very conservative, and in other ways I am pretty liberal. I think that Christianity is all about Grace, and I wince when I hear hate disguised as Christianity.   That is just so, so, so wrong.  I am a Methodist, in fact I am a sixth generation Methodist.  My great something or the other was a circuit rider, and we used his travel sized baptismal font when The Son was baptized.  Being Methodist was a deal breaker for The Husband and I, it was my way or the highway. Luckily, he felt very disenfranchised with his church, and will now quote to you out of the book of discipline to make his point.

I want to be a Stay at Home Mom, do you have any tips on how to afford it? I have been reading this blog lately which is all about a farm family, I was in awe of how she did it all, and then did a little research and it turns out they have oil wells, and are one of the wealthiest families in the Midwest. I felt a little cheated. Y’all, there is no oil well in our back yard. The Husband works very hard, and we are blessed, but we just plain do not spend much money. As for tips…well, I can just tell you what we do. We do not have cable TV, we gave it up for Lent one year and never turned it back on. We just recently turned off our home phone because we never used it, and did not even have our answering machine plugged in. We get our hair cut at the barber college. I get The Husband’s clothes on super sale clearance, and most of The Son’s clothes are from children’s consignment sales. We try to double up errands to save on gas, we never turn down a free meal at someone else’s house, we limit things like Christmas and birthday gifts….that is all I can think of right now, but you get the point. We have everything we need, and some things we want. It could all change tomorrow, but for now we are just having faith.

Are you really still breastfeeding? Yes. Next question.

Why do you never email me or call me back? Because I am a horribly lazy person? I do not have a good excuse, I just do not like talking on the phone, and only have a very limited amount of internet time between naps and snacks. Sorry, but I DO read every singe email and comment, so keep those coming.

What did you want to be when you grew up? In chronological order: The Princess of France, an actress, a veterinarian, a psychologist, a pediatrician, an actress, a speech and theater teacher, a political speech writer, a missionary, an NGO worker, a SAHM/writer.

What is your real name? Welcome new person! See the blue sentence at the top of the screen that says, “It’s my blog and I can dictate if I want to”? You can click on it and see why we use alter egos. I chose Hey You after thinking about it for all of three seconds, and now I kinda hate it, but it is all over my site and I am too lazy to change it.

Did you know that you were the next of kin for a wealthy Nigerian businessman and he left you millions in his will? Really?! Wow, let me email you my bank account information so that you can deposit it for me.

Keep the questions coming guys, I will be back on Sunday.