... No Frills attatched

Don't let the dimples decieve you...





THIS GIRL CAN ROCK!

JoJo our Walking Pup

JoJo had his second visit with the vet on Tuesday and all is looking good!

His Staph infection is clearing up and he's put on some weight!
He's now tipping the scales at 2.2lbs. A porker to be sure! ;)

Puppy Math

After our first visit with the Vet, he confirmed that the new puppy, JoJo, was , as we'd suspected, a Chihuahua mix breed. With the large eyes and the floppy ears, we'd already guessed as much, but the thing that had me curious were the markings on his face. They reminded me of our guard dog, Brutus, who is a Doberman mix as well. But the odds of a doberman and a chihuahua romancing each other seemed unlikely. But then I remembered that there is another dog, very small dog, who shares the same markings... The Miniature Pinscher. So I did some math... let me share:



What do you think? Could I be on to something here??

TuTu Beautiful!

Every Tuesday, sometime just after lunch, Diana will ask me the same thing:

"Is it time to get ready for ballet yet?"

Even though I assure her that class doesn't start for hours,
she'll still retrieve her leotard and tights and lay them across my bed
so that they're ready just as soon as she gets out of the shower.

But despite her enthusiasm, her least favorite part of our
Tuesday routine is always the construction of her bun.
I've been doing her hair the same way for over
a year, but it still poses a challenge for her to sit still long
enough for me to do my thing.

When I announce it's time to go, she slings her ballet
box over her shoulder and marches out the door.

We're fortunate this year that both her tap and ballet classes
fall on Tuesday and are both taught by the same amazing woman, Ms. Heather.
(Whom Diana happens to adore!)

As luck would have it,
we were early to class this week and the studio was empty, so I took a few}
minutes to get some long overdue pictures of Di and her best friend Samantha.

_____

Getting ready to leave the house:

Diana at the bar:

Practicing the splits:
(Diana inherited the anti-bendy-Odom gene, so this is a pretty big deal!)

And my favorite picture: Diana doing her Plie at the bar:

Then Samantha joined Di at the bar:

And of course, what kind of ballerina doesn't know how to goof off??

Cruel and Unusual Cystems.

It's 11:22 and I've just finished cleaning out the gaping hole just under my collar bone. I've also just finished with a pretty good cry. Partly because sticking hydrogen peroxide soaked q-tips deep into the hole really hurts, and partly because I know I have to do it all over again tomorrow, twice.

All of this because I had a cyst. A cyst on my chest which I'd lived with (quite happily in fact) for 6ish years. The cyst which had been about 1/2" wide and about 2" in length started to grow. And Grow. AND GROW. By the time my Dr.'s appointment came around the cyst had taken on the appearance of a giant, grotesque Easter egg. Dark purple on the bottom, red in the middle and flesh on the top. By my best estimations it was about 3" wide and 5" in length, and it really, really hurt.

Truth be known, if the cyst hadn't begun to abscess two weeks ago, I'd have gone another 6 years without having it looked at. It had never given me an ounce of pain or trouble and I had no intention of inflicting undue pain on myself. But that was then, this is now.

The Dr. recognized it immediately as a Sebaceous cyst and began a lengthly explanation of how and why it occurs. While I should have been listening with rapt attention as soon as he mentioned the part about "immediate removal" my eyes glazed over and I started having an internal anxiety attack. Before I knew it, I was lying on my back squeezing Ed's hand, and planning my escape route. There was no such luck.

The next hour and half involved some cutting and copious amounts of pressing, pushing, and packing. What will now be forever remembered in my psyche as the Trifecta of Pain. (There was also a lot of cussing, crying and caterwauling... the other trifecta of wimps worldwide!)

And the needles. So many needles. They would have hurt anyway, but because the skin was so incredibly infected and swollen, each pin-prick was like an injection of liquid lightning. Poor Ed is still nursing the nail marks on his right hand. (Speaking of Ed. He was amazing! He's almost as squeamish as I am, and he did an amazing job of keeping me calm and helping me through the entire ordeal. Huge Kudos to him for a job well done!)

The most horrid moments came toward the end, when the cyst walls broke the surface of the incision. There. are. just. no. words. But if I was forced to describe it, I'd suggest you cut a small circular hole in your skin and then reach in and try to extracate your colon.

When the proceedure was finally at it's conclusion and I'd lost the urge to walk toward the light, the Dr. confided to me that my cyst was the largest and deepest he'd removed in his years of practice.

I confided in him that I'd wet my pants a little.

Dominick turns Eight!

Dominick is 8. (I know, I know, I know! But I've checked the math and it's true!)

I'll never get used to this. Waking up one morning, staring into the eyes of a child where I'd expect to find a snotty nosed (albeit adorable) toddler. How do they sneak it by us? It's one of Mother nature's cruelest tricks: turning our babies into independent children behind our backs! But I digress. Enough of my Mommy melodrama!

We had a great time celebrating his birthday! The night before, he lost his 2nd front tooth and the tooth fairy left a little extra birthday money as a treat! For dinner we made the famous "As-seen-on-iCarly-Bisghetti Taco's" and then finished it off with an amazing cake and great gifts!

Mimi and Papa Odom and Mimi and Papa Fiore made Dominick the happiest 8yr old on the planet by sending him exactly what he asked for: Birthday money. He was able to shop til he dropped and pick out exactly what he wanted!

(Don't mind the Christmas Wrap!)

Making a Wish:

Looks like it came true!

Another Winner!

This was one happy Birthday Boy!

Brooke's 14th Birthday

On her 10th Birthday, she got a surprise.

On her 11th birthday, we had a girls day out .

On her 12th birthday, she had a party!

On her 13th birthday, we remembered how it all started...

And on her 14th birthday, we recycled an old idea,
and slipped away for a day of shopping: Just the two of us!

Top Gear Contest: My First Car

TopGear is hosting a contest! The winner of which will receive a trip for two to London AND tickets to a TopGear Event! Could this get any better?? My two favorite things mixed into one fantabulous prize!! The contest? To write up to a thousand words about your first car!

(** To clear up any confusion this IS the long version of the story! The story I submitted on the topgear website has been condensed down to the required 1000 characters. **)

I didn’t start driving until I was almost 18. I didn’t start having car accidents until I was almost 18. Coincidence? I think not. “Accidents” may be too strong a word. I liked to call them “Incidents”. My parents liked to call them “Reasons we can’t have you on our insurance policy any more...”

I think back on this year as my “Blue Phase”, as I routinely left samples of my 1990 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera’s powder blue paint job on other cars, lamp posts, garage doors, and the occasional pedestrian. My neighbors think back on this year fondly as “Leslie’s Reign of Terror”. You say tomato, I say WATCH OUT I’M ABOUT TO RUN OVER YOUR MAILBOX!

It didn't help that my poor Cutlass had a blind spot the entire length of the passenger side of the car, since that’s the only side that I ever did damage to. I guess I was a really great judge of distance when turning left, but terribly bad at it when turning right. Hmmm.... I might have done well in NASCAR. Isn’t that really just a organization of guys who turn left really well? I digress.

If I pulled up to a car on my left, they’d look over to their right and see a pretty girl driving a sensible blue car. But, if I pulled up to a car on my right, they’d look over to their left and see a pretty girl driving a chewed up, battle worn, how-is-that-possibly-running, Mad Max inspired vehicle of destruction.

Her Majesty (yes, that’s what I called her) kept me safe for four years. Eventually, as life moved on, I had to leave Her Majesty behind. I’d just gotten engaged, and in the spirit of compromise, I agreed to give her up in favor of a car that featured two undamaged sides.

I'm older now, drive a nicer car and by all accounts have stopped running into things, but there isn’t a day that goes by, (especially when I’m turning to the right), that I don’t still miss her.

I wish I had a better picture than this, but you'll notice it IS taken from the driver side. In fact, I can't actually remember taking ANY pictures of her intentionally. The less evidence the better I thought! (I didn't even take this one...that's me asleep behind the wheel!)

It's A Fact

A list of things I've learned today:

1. Snow makes everything more beautiful.


2. I = Principle x Rate x Time. I know this. Brooke knows this, heck maybe even Dom and Di KNOW THIS. After 2 hours of having this equation shoved down my throat, it has been forever scorched into my soul. Happy to Report though, that Brooke scored an 80% on her first of two quizzes on the subject!

3. Trying to explain communative property to a 7 year old is hard. Saying 12x2=24 is the same as 2x12=24 is much easier. He got a 100% on his quiz!

4. I love snow, hate driving on ice.

5. I suck at building fires.

Awesomeness... by: Brooke

Kudos to Brooke for snapping what might be my most favorite picture of all time!

I'm showcasing this here, before I make it my Facebook profile picture.