I don't wish to actually revisit those days... mainly because diapers still existed around here and I am SO beyond the diaper stage now.

Can I get an AMEN?

Plus, committing to do something every Friday right now isn't realistic. I'm going to steal something I heard in a meeting last night: I don't currently have the bandwidth for that.

It has been a crazy, busy week. So I mean it right now when I say Thank God it's Friday!

I am also thankful that...

1) ... my little business is BUSY. I have been heard complaining recently that I'm overwhelmed at times. It is a truth and an issue I need to deal with, BUT I am infinitely thankful that I have created a way for me to work from home (when not on a shoot or trip) and be here for the kids after school and when they need to take a sick day. I love most parts of my job. It's fun and interesting and challenging. I have met fabulous people that surround me in support and love.

Couldn't ask for more - except maybe an intern...and free accountant. Any offers?

2) ... everyone has been extremely wonderful at the new high school where I am now in charge of the softball program. I have been busy with pre-season planning. It's not just the high school. I've met with the middle school coach, the girls youth league in town and our Boosters. I am very excited for the season to begin next month and hope they continue to be nice and supportive... even after selection and cuts take place... even if we lose a game or two;-) This school used to be my rival... the enemy... yet it's starting to feel like home. The amount of time I'll be spending there this spring, it really needs to feel that way, lol.

3) ... my husband ROCKS. He really does. Not only did he accept long ago his role as a softball widow, but he has been working well with me to ensure the kids' needs are covered. Note, I said with me. The burden hasn't been on me doing everything and asking for him to show up at certain times to relieve me while I attend a meeting or work. He's been proactive. And helpful. And has been showing up on time. Loving the spirit of partnership in our marriage right now. I couldn't do all that I do without his support.

4) ... social networks exist. This amazing technology grants us the ability to reach out and stay in touch. In times of crisis, it can be a lifeline. Case in point: remember last summer when I hosted a Ragu party for the summer softball team that sucked me in? One of our players was in a really bad car accident this week and is undergoing surgery today for a lacerated liver. I don't know the full details of the accident or the extend of her injuries - but it's pretty serious. Not only does social media allow everyone to stay updated on her condition, but it allows us to send support to her family and ask for support within our communities. For instance, I asked for prayers and positive thoughts to be sent her way... and I'm confident that many of you will take pause and do just that. It's gotta help on some level, right? She's an amazing kid. Always smiling. Friendly. Respectful - even when she's burping louder than a 300lb man. Really. This girl's burps are EPIC. I really like her and am frustrated and angry that bad things happen to good people. But I am thankful to have technology that allows us to rally around her.

So, TGIF! What are you thankful for this Friday?

Enjoy! ~ Kim

----

Ever find yourself creating new places to store your underwear or lingerie so that you can avoid opening that overcrowded, unorganized mess that has become your underwear drawer? If so, do not worry: you are not alone! That particular drawer is notorious for getting out of hand and winding up in as a messy pile you have to push down in order to close the drawer.  

Use these tips to help tame the clutter:

1) I shot a promo video for Tina Gleisner of Association of Women Homeowners.  She edited this one - but there will be others which I will edit and polish along the way.

2) Last week, I produced a cool, live video chat with George Duran in TheMotherhood.  He shared a recipe for a game day slow cooker meal... not mentioning which game here, ehem, because I'm still licking my wounds.

3) I shot and edited a video of my sick little guy and reviewed Maty's All Natural Cough Syrup for SheStreams TV.

4) Today at 1pm (est) Amanda Formaro will be returning to TheMotherhood to talk about Valentine's Day crafts.  She's a crafting guru.  Putting on my production hat for that one.

5) Tomorrow at noon I will be producing and co-hosting another episode of Sister Soup with Desiree Miller.  Fun, fun, fun.

6) Tomorrow at 1pm (EST) my best friend and partner-in-crime, Melanie Feehan will be premiering her monthly cooking class in TheMotherhood.  It's called The Coupon Goddess Cooks.  She's totally going to ROCK it.  And if I mess up on any of the camera or b-roll shots, I'm apologizing in advance.  I think it's harder to produce a friend, lol.

That's about it - at least with things I can show you.  I am busy with pre-season softball planning.  Shot video for a chiropractor's office that hasn't been edited or published yet.  Wrote a travel piece for Traveling Moms that I will share with you once it is published.  Further slipped into my Words With Friends and Pinterest addictions.

Whew.

I wrote on Facebook yesterday "I need a personal assistant... or a cloning machine."  I was only kind of kidding.  It's taking all 3 of my computers this week to process, edit and upload video all while writing supplemental info.  I put so much into each of the videos I am shooting, producing and/or editing, my favorite words to say?

It's a wrap!

Regular readers have probably noticed by now that my blog posting these days has been a bit, well, not-so-regular.

Also, my weekly webshow Mommycosm Reviews just kind of quietly went away.

Not gonna lie.  I burnt myself out by the end of 2011.

I'm on a mission to feed my soul before I allow myself to get back into regular blogging.

I am busy, busy with both LIVE video production work and editing for clients - which I love.

But I miss being in front of the camera sometimes.  I miss the cathartic brain dump of writing daily without thinking about SEO or hits.

I miss the interaction with YOU.

With that said, I cannot take on the burden of a weekly show by myself anymore.  It's a LOT of work - even if I made it look easy;-)

If you don't already know Desiree Miller @StressFreeBaby, you must get to know her.  We met at BlogHer 2011 in San Diego and have been toying with a joint project ever since.

You know when you meet someone and instantly feel as if you were friends forever?  Yeah.  That's what happened with me and Des.  It's like our souls were meant to be connected.  I love it when that happens.  You think you have enough friends and then your heart grows to accept another.

So, we got to talking about this whole concept of Sisterhood and it not just being a blood bond.  It was inspired because I was carrying around a picture of my best friend. Melanie.  Remember?  She was hit by a car this summer and could not attend BlogHer, so I brought her with me via her pic on a stick.

Anyhow, this quote resonates with us

"A true sister is a friend who listens with her heart" - author unknown

We built a weekly web show around this concept.  The goal is to have a place where sisters - by blood and soul connections - can come hang out with us at lunchtime while we explore this whole sisterhood thing.

We quietly streamed our first episode yesterday.  We still have a few things to work out.  I was heavily involved in the production and she in the content.  It's obvious here - but we'll get better at the conversational piece as we go forward, lol.

Check it out:

The challenge: Create a special weeknight meal courtesy of Bertolli.

When I first took on this challenge, I had visions of tablecloths, our best dishes and candles.  Fancy equals special, right?

Yeah.  Well, then reality set in. 

I don't know about you, but week nights are busy, busy in our house.  Between drama club, guitar lessons and parents both attempting to juggle their work, we are lucky if we all get to sit down for dinner together most nights.  In fact, often, the kids eat dinner at the kitchen island and I'll wait to eat something later with my husband.  Convenient because our dining room table often looks like this.

Actually, that looks better than it looks most days, lol.  My husband works from home a few days a week and his paperwork tends to pile up.  IF there is any free surface left on the table, it becomes a drop spot for mail and the kids' papers on our way in to the house.

So, a special meal for our family is... eating all together in the dining room.

I was excited to try Bertolli's Frozen Meal Soups.  They come in 4 varieties: Chicken Minestrone, Roasted Chicken & Rotini Pasta, Tomato Florentine & Tortellini with Chicken, and Tuscan-Style Beef with Vegetables.  I received coupons to purchase 2, which is good because that is all my local grocery store had in stock.

We made the Tomato Florentine & Tortellini with Chicken. Prep was as simple as dumping the frozen soup into a saucepan and adding a cup of water.

That's my kind of meal.  Easy, peasy.

I sprinkled some cheese into packaged crescent rolls and popped them into the oven.  Everything came out at the same time and we had a complete meal within 15 minutes.

Looks pretty yummy, huh?

It was.  My kids like tomato soup and I often make it for them with pasta inside.  They were a little concerned about spinach floating around in it this time - Oh.My.God!  Green!  - and they totally didn't get my references to Popeye.  Seriously?!  If Smurfs and stoopid Power Rangers are back in, how is it that they don't know Popeye?!

I digress.  They humored me, admitted the spinach really had no flavor... and both ended up really liking it.

See? 

At a suggested retail price of about $5.99 - $7.99, we had a complete meal for a family of 4 for under $10.

Note: The package says it contains only 2 servings, but along with some warm rolls, this fed the four of us.  It was very filling.

Want to find out more about Bertolli's Frozen Meal Soups?  Check them out online:
Facebook: facebook.com/Bertolli
Twitter: twitter.com/Bertolli
Website: villabertolli.com

Here are my three tips on how to make a special weeknight meal:

1) Special doesn't have to be elaborate.  Sometimes simple can be special, too.

2) Put away the gadgets.

3) Mix it up and make something a little outside of your norm - like we did with Bertolli's Frozen Meal Soups;-)

Disclosure:

I was compensated by Bertolli to participate in the Weeknight Meal Special Challenge.  Thoughts are clearly my own.

"I chose this. It's what is best for the family," she tries to assure him... and herself.

She takes a deep breath and hopes the tone of resentment within her inner voice doesn't escape aloud.

She did choose this, after all.

Every once in a while, when I can't take any more of the sky and land blending into one greyish hue, I apply sunscreen instead of my normal moisturizer.  It warms my soul to smell like beach all day and reminds me that there is (sun) light at the end of that dark tunnel also known as a NH winter.

My daughter is an Aruba baby and has a really hard time with winter.  Like mother like daughter, right?  She's a fourth grader.  Read: way too cool to play in the snow at school.  No snow pants for her - well, until I can get Katy Perry to design a sparkly pair that she is willing to pimp, thereby proving that cool girls can indeed be warm.

Bygones.

Totally lost the snow pant battle this year, but I still make her wear snow boots to and from school.  It's been far less of a struggle now that she has a pink pair of Crocs.

No, not the summer sandals.

Snow boots.

Looky here.

These are Crocs Chameleons™ Crocband™ Gust Boot.

Aren't they cool?

First of all, they are pink.  And girlie.

But even better?  The band changes color when the temp goes below 50 degrees.

Funny, she doesn't complain when I make her wear these.  Says they are super comfy.  Her words.

Crocs offers a variety of winter snow boots to suit your kids' style needs.  My son wants to try the glow in the dark ones.  Although I'm not sure I get the whole glow in the dark thing with snow boots.  Who wants to be outside in the winter when it's dark anyway?

 You can purchase Crocs winter boots via their website OR by using their handy, dandy store locator to find a store near you.  Prices range from $19.99 - $49.99 ish.

Disclosure:

I was offered free product in exchange for sharing information with my readers.  Thoughts are my own.

Yeah.  Take a number.  I am as well.

I woke up to not one, but TWO kids with a golden Stay Home from School Sick Ticket yesterday.  Now, I know I work from home so that I can handle these unexpected times more easily than if I worked for someone else.  It's supposedly a perk of me having an in-home office.

heh

But it's getting to the point where I cannot drop everything work related just because I have sick kids at home.  Reality set in really, really quickly after I made the sick call to the school and looked down at my planner.  My schedule was packed and a lot of juggling would need to occur for me to pull it all off.

It's never a good thing to start off a day with that dreadful feeling of complete overwhelmedness.

Is too a word.

So, I fed the kids breakfast and found this in the sink.

Gross, right?

Something you need to know: It's a pet peeve of mine to leave gross, rotting food in the dish drain - especially letting it sit there overnight.

gag

My husband of almost 11 years knows this.  He was up and out of the house hours earlier that morning and totally saw it before leaving.  I mean, he had to have seen it, right?  He was the one who left it.

I gritted my teeth, grabbed a paper towel and dumped the damn drain.

Breakfast was served by an irritated server with a side of coughing kids and lots of snot.  Yum.

Went upstairs to get on my computer and saw this on the futon in my office.

I know how this is going to sound when I say this, but leaving clean laundry in piles around the house?  One of my only other pet peeves.  No, really.  I'm not a hugely anal person, but seeing this set me off. 

My husband knows this irritates me - yet he did it anyway AND left it right in my office.  It's like he was rubbing my nose it in.

So, I did what any reasonable woman would do.  I started plotting the ways I could seek my revenge.  No big statements.  Just a few passive aggressive ways to get back at him.

Like this one time when we were newly dating, he was being a total grouch when I was trying to help him clean his desk.  He was in grad school at the time.  His room resembled ground zero and his desk was where the bomb had detonated.  No idea how he accomplished any work.

Anyhow.

One of my tasks was to sort through the 100ish pens and pencils.  He said something snippy to me.  I bit my tongue, giggled to myself and started putting black pen caps on the blue pens and vica versa.  I knew it would drive him batty... and it felt good.  Really good.

Looking back, I have to ask myself why.  Why did it feel so good to irritate him?  Did it make him any less grumpy?  Hell no.  Totally didn't help the situation.  Although I must tell you, to this day he shakes his head and smiles whever he pulls out one of those pens with the mismatched covers.  It may not have been nice, but it was memorable.

So, yesterday, I sat in my office and took a few deep breaths while attempting to regain perspective.

My husband left the gross mess in the dish drain after he washed the dishes.  I doubt he left it there to purposefully create more work for me, nor to irritate me.  He could have walked away and left the dirty dishes for me to deal with, right?

But he didn't, because he is a good husband.  He just lacks follow through sometimes...ehem.

And the laundry?

He left the laundry in a pile in my office because he switched loads in the middle of the night after discovering our son left a mess in his school backpack.  Instead of leaving it for me to deal with in the morning rush, he dealt with it in the middle of the night.

He did this, not to irritate me, but because he is a good husband.

Crap.  Perspective can suck sometimes.

Even though, for reasons I cannot explain, it would have felt good to plot against him, I knew I had a choice.  I could spend more time and energy fueling passive aggressive ideas on how to get back at him or I could acknowledge what he did do... and let it go.

Which would you choose?

Whether you want to buy green, sell green or participate in an active green community, this site has it all.  I mean, if you think about it, eBay is inherently green to begin with.  They've pretty much mastered Reuse, don't you think? 

OK back to the site.  There's so much coolness, I cannot cover it all in one blog post.  It's like they took green and put it on steroids.  I'm just going to share with you my top 3 favorite features and you're going to have to go explore yourself to find the rest.

My faves:

That day, I signed up for the National Marrow Donor Registry.  The first step was as easy as swiping a cotton swab across my cheeks.  Within weeks, I found out I was a match for a 21 year old stranger with leukemia.  Unfortunately, I didn't start blogging until 2 months after going through the donation process, but I did write about it a few times after the fact. 

My peripheral stem cells were able to extend her life by 9 months.  I struggled with the fact that she didn't survive for quite a while.  Now that I have lost people close to me, I realize just how much of a gift 9 months really is.  Heck, I would take just one more day with any of them.

Unfortunately, the woman whose story inspired me to join the registry was not so fortunate.  A match was never found.  Here's a sad statistic from the NMDP: around 10,000 patients currently are in need of a marrow transplant, yet only half will recieve one.

Heartbreaking, isn't it?

If you are not already on the National Marrow Donor Registry, please consider signing up.  You could be a match for someone in dire need.  I would be more than happy to hold your hand through the process and talk to you about any reservations you may have about the actual donation, if you are ever deemed a match.

If you know of anyone part Asian, part Caucasian who is not already on the registry, please share this story with them.

source:kyleneedsyou.org

Meet Kyle.

This handsome 4 year old has aplastic anemia and needs your help.  It's hard enough to find an exact match for bone marrow, but when you are biracial, it's even more difficult.

Out of the 9 million registered bone marrow donors, not one has been a match.  Yet.  I believe in my heart that his match is out there.  We just need to find him/her before it is too late.

Kyle's family has set up a website called Kyle Needs You.  There you find information about Kyle as well as how to help.  There are links you can share via your social media networks.  If you are reading this blog post, I'm assuming you probably at least have a Facebook profile, right?

Please help spread the word about Kyle.  Even if you don't turn out to be a match for him, you could end up helping someone else.