Happy Birthday Hubs!

It is Ben's 33rd birthday today and he is lookin better than ever! He gets a fun holiday since it is St. Patrick's Day today and not many of us can say the same. Ben's parent's came to visit over the weekend and we had lots of fun. We started Friday off by grilling a rack of lamb for dinner and we topped it off with a key lime pie, which is Ben's favorite dessert. Don't ask me how much I paid for that pie...it was completely worth it!

Then Saturday afternoon we went around to the Parade of Homes in Elk River....dreaming of homes we can not afford. What we saw were brand new model homes that you could either buy on the spot or build new. The houses we saw were really nice and we could afford them, but we'd be completely house poor. It's a great time to buy right now with prices so low, but with the economic times, it's just not smart.

Later that night Ben and I got ready for a company party at my work and we got all dressed up to mingle with adults. His parents babysat the girls and we had a really fun time! Then on Sunday we went shopping in Maple Grove, had lunch at Famous Dave's, one of my favorite rib joints and eventually made our way back home.

Since we already celebrated his b-day over the weekend, we are pretty lo key tonight. As a matter of fact Ben is going to the YMCA to work out...the triathlon he is training for is coming up in July and he needs to be race ready.

Go Ben!

My Brush With Death!

I have this fear of getting into a major car accident, killing me, and leaving Ben with two little girls to raise. A bit morbid, I know, but I am not immortal and this is a very real fear considering I drive 48 miles round trip daily.

And this jackass of a car driver almost made it come true today. I was merging onto the highway from our neighborhood at the yield sign. I sat there for awhile making sure traffic was all in the far lane before I went. My car started to spin out a little bit and took a few extra seconds to get out there...when all of a sudden out of the corner of my eye a car went whizzing past me IN THE SAME FUCKING lane and missed me by mere inches.

I was a bit shaken up to say the least because this jackass was driving about 65-70 mph and I was going maybe 10 mph. I know the intersection was clear so I can only assume he came out of the far lane to pass a car without seeing me merge on the highway.

I nearly lost my breakfast...no wait...I didn't eat breakfast but still. I was breathless, shaky and sweating all at the same time with visions of my compact car and pieces of my body scattered all over the road.

Because that would not have been pretty.

It took me awhile to calm down and I drove like an old grandma into work. If anything, I will be more cautious at this particular yield sign because this is my second brush with death there. The first being I rear ended some teenage girls last February when my car slid into them....but at least we all came out o.k.

The BIG Lie

As you all know, children sometimes feel the need to fib, or make up stories or elaborate on certain things and tell people about them. Well, do I have a doosy for you all.

Last Friday I was picking the girls up from daycare and I was told by one of the teachers about something Alex was telling everyone, and it created a major scandal! She was telling her teachers about how Ben was moving in with his girlfriend and her kid in an apartment across the street from daycare. They didn’t believe her but because she told it so convincingly, they started to think it was true. So they wanted to have an “intervention” with our family to see if they could “help” with anything. Because they thought we were such a great “Christian” family we needed their support.

OH MY GOD. Imagine my surprise when said teacher approached me with what she had been saying and the look of shock that crossed my face. I was pretty amazed at what a story this was that she concocted and the only thing we can think of is this is happening to a friend of her and she was repeating the story. So I obviously had to convince this teacher it isn’t true, which she was so glad but because people talk, it had gotten around to all of the teachers, the director of the daycare and the front office staff. Lovely.

So needless to say, I had a “talk” with Alex on our way home but I was so pissed. She started bawling and I told her she had to tell her father about what she said because it was a lie about him. She ran into the house, took one look at Ben, started to bawl uncontrollably and hid in her bed. Ben had to coax her down and calm her down, and I finally had to tell him what happened because she was too scared.

By this time, I was starting to see the humor in the situation. But what to do about the actual lie so she understands what she did was wrong? I decided the consequenses for her action was to write an apology letter to her teachers and give it them come Monday morning.

So now everyone is "relieved" that this isn't true. However now the teacher feels she needs to tell me everything Alex is saying just to see if it's true or not because she doesn't trust her stories anymore. Which is fine, but now I feel like I have this lying child when this is so not the case. Alex is pretty mature for her age...but sometimes it's hard to distinguish the truth from her wild imagination......oh well.