Works For Me Wednesday: Backwards Edition

I have naturally wavy hair. It doesn't do the awesome ringlets that my younger sister's does, but there is some curl to it-though sadly it's not uniform, just here and there. For the past fifteen years, I've dealt with that either by getting perms (which my hair holds forever) or by straightening it daily with a hair dryer, but now I'm thinking...I kinda like it natural and I LOVE skipping the morning blow-drying. Does anyone know of any hair car products that will help me perk up my wavy hair after showering each morning?

Do you need some beauty/household/parenting tips of your own? Post your question and link to this week's Backwards Edition of Works for Me Wednesday hosted by the lovely Shannon at Rocks In My Dryer.

Works For Me Wednesday

Since I started working part-time, the chaos of my home life has multiplied proportionally. Between a very busy field trip season at work (and we LIKE those), a big PTA fundraiser, and the day-to-day business of being a mother of four children; I often find myself spread pretty thin. I've never been the world's best cook, and yet I hate to let Mazzio's, Sonic, or McDonald's become the family chef either. While I've known about the place since it opened, I finally broke down last month and ordered two weeks of thaw-and-assemble meals from Dishing It Up. All I can say is that I wish I had done this 6 months ago! While I admit that I could pre-cook, slice, and freeze everything in the same way that they do, the fact is that I would rather spend my weekends with my kids. Because we do eat at my grandmother's every Friday as well as go out at least twice a month (not to mention try and use up our leftovers), twelve meals from there stretch for a month here allowing me both to utlize their meals and still cook on my own without the stress of fixing something every night. Not to mention, the ladies at Dishing It Up are much better cooks than I am. Works for me!

Would-Work-For-Me-Wednesday

Since I have no clever household hints to share with anyone on this Works-For-Me Wednesday, I'm going to make a list of what would work for me if wishes were horses and all of that (and I will spare the sweet readers of Rocks In My Dryer the results of my whining, I'm only sorry my loyal readers can't say the same).

1. A housekeeper who loved to clean the hard water soap scum off of our toilets and showers. The only thing that works is a pumice stone, and Wal-Mart doesn't sell the kind with long handles for immersing in the toilet which means...eww! This same housekeeper should also enjoy running that intermediate load of dishes that never seems to happen during the day but would help me stay on top of things in the kitchen. He or she should also want to fold and put away my laundry, Dave's laundry, and Elisa's laundry; but not Natalie, Tristan or Caroline's-how else will they learn?
And finally, she will have to be much more ruthless than I am about throwing out toys and extra papers-or less of a procrastinator when it comes to shredding the important stuff. Yeah, that would pretty much work for me.

2. A car that never needed oil changes (because I never remember) and seated about two more kids comfortably. (I don't want any more kids, but I like being the carpool mom and I can think of two more kids that would benefit if I could fit them and their booster seats into my car.) Oh, and throw in a self-refilling gas tank too.

3. Kids that didn't cry/whine/fight while Mom is trying to blog. (Like they are doing RIGHT NOW! Stop it!)

4. Kids that pick up after themselves (though that would eliminate the first thing on my list).

5. A potty-training tutor for Elisa since I'm not home during the day to work with her and Daddy is terrified to tackle it himself. (And I don't mean that in a bad way, I was terrified to train Natalie when he was overseas so I feel his pain.)

6. Two "free" hours that don't "count" in real-world time for reading, writing, or other enjoyable activities. (I think they could manage that on Star Trek somehow-maybe I should just ask for a holideck. I'm sure I spelled that wrong, but you get the idea.)

7. A cat door that I could trust not to let the possums and raccoons inside the house too. (I'm worried my cats would tear off those special collars-or that the other animals would beat my cats up and steal them off their broken little bodies.)

8. A way to scare those aformentioned possums and raccoons OFF my driveway besides chasing them with my car. (Honking, shouting, stomping, and running at them only make them laugh.)

9. A free pass for Southwest Airlines-they fly everywhere I like to travel.

10. Enough money to finance travel and accomodations for get-togethers with all my friends who live far away or for all the online groups I belong to finally meet each other.

11. I'd settle for a day off with no other committments? Please?

12. A partridge in a pear tree. (Actually, that wouldn't work for me at all, I just couldn't resist adding it once I realized this was going to be a list of 12.)

Works for me Wednesday

Although I am not Catholic, I've got lots of friends, family, and co-workers who are and I have always been a little awestruck by the traditions and rituals surrounding that faith even though I already know quite a bit about them. After all, I majored in Latin and once lived in Italy. So this year, I'm giving up something for Lent. That would be chocolate. I know it's dark chocolate is good for you in small amounts, but that's not how I eat it. It's more of an addiction for me. So, to help me curb that (and to prove to myself I can do it) I'm giving it up until Easter. I don't mean to disrespect my own faith or mock the beliefs of my Catholic loved ones. I just see this as a way to show solidarity with them while hopefully curing myself of a nasty habit along the way. Works for me!

Works For Me Wednesday

As I've already covered in great detail, I recently returned from a visit to my friend Anne's house. I think I even mentioned that she hosted not only myself and my four children, but also her brother, his wife, and their three children all at the same time. Beyond just the impressive logistics of finding a place for each one of us to sleep, the house was also remarkably clean the entire time we were there. As someone who struggles with staying on top of things, I watched her over the course of the trip to see how she accomplished this and what I discovered was a solution so simple, I probably have no business mentioning it here-but it was a revelation to me, so I will anyway. Her "secret" seems to be simply that she cleans something up as soon as she is finished with it. If there was clean laundry, she folded it and put it away as soon as it was finished-usually while visiting and chatting with us. She emptied the dishwasher before meal times and loaded it as she prepared something. We finished loading it when mealtimes were over and ran it before there was an overflow of dirty dishes in the sink. And we picked up the toys each time the kids were done playing with them. This may seem simple to the non-organizationally challenged among us, but for me it was a whole new concept. I tried it during Caroline's party and for once I didn't say goodbye to the last of her party guests feeling exhausted from the party and overwhlemed by the mess ahead of me because there wasn't one! So, my tip for the week (borrowed from Anne) is to clean things up as soon as you are finished with them. Works For Me! For more (better) tips, check out this week's Works For Me Wednesday at Rocks In My Dryer.

Works For Me Wednesday

I've mentioned before that my time-management skills leave a little something to be desired. Especially when I go online to update my blog. First, I'm checking my email, reading updated blogs, and before you know it; I should have started dinner half an hour ago. So, I've taken to unplugging my laptop before logging on. That way, I can blog from wherever I am in the house, but never for too long because once my battery gets low, I know my time is up! Works for me!

Works For Me Wednesday

I've mentioned here before that I suffer from Type 2 ADD which, in simple terms, means that I've spent most of my life staring out the window daydreaming. According to my research, medication doesn't help this type of ADD nearly as much as some type of organizational training and so, my obsession with Flylady.com was born. Unfortunately, during stressful times, even those famous "15 minutes" seem beyond my reach. Worrying about work and school deadlines, PTA stuff, or even listening to the kids' noise completely sidetracks me from whatever cleaning shore I'm trying to accomplish. After choking down Focus Factor pills, setting timers, and more beating myself up over the mess in my house than any human being should ever do to herself; the solution turned out to be rather simple.


If I want a shiny sink, clean bathroom, or folded laundry; I just pick up my iPod, put on the headphones, and get to work. Getting into the music really helps me shut out my other distractions. Of course, it's never turned up so loud that I would miss something bad/important happening with the kids and I have way too many "informers" among my four children to ever miss out on any serious misbehavior anyway. But, if I want to get any cleaning done around here, my iPod really helps me stay on task. Works for me!

Works for Me Wednesday

Every Wednesday, Shannon at Rocks In My Dryer hosts Works for Me Wednesday which is chock full of good hints and tips of all kinds from other bloggers. I love reading them, ALL of them. Before I started working, this was no big deal, but now that I get home at about 4:00 and spend the rest of my night with all 4 kids by myself; looking through a list of links to more than 100 blogs prevents me from accomplishing other things around here like laundry, dinner, and dishes. (Not to mention the kind of havoc four kids can wreak when left unattended.)
What's a gal in need of clever household hints, recipes, and blogging aids to do?
I wait and read them all over the weekend when I actually have time to devote to them. Works for me! (And thanks to Shannon for hosting.)

Works For Me Wednesday

I have extremely finicky eaters here, three of whom like pancakes and one who will only eat waffles. Last week's menu had breakfast for dinner. Anticipating my son's reaction (I HATE PANCAKES!!), I remembered a little trick I learned in college and thought I would give it a try:


Take out one of these and plug it in



Mix up a package of this with the pancake/waffle recipe on the back of the box.
Add 1/4 cup of batter to each sandwich triangle in the Snackster. Close and cook for four minutes.

The result? Triangle shaped pancake puffs that even my son can't refuse. I would have taken a picture, but they were eaten before I could get my camera. Full tummies, happy kids, and no leftovers?! Works for me! For more great ideas, check out Rocks In My Dryer.

Works for Me

Again, this isn't something I want to link to the super-cool "Works For Me Wednesday" post at Rocks In My Dryer (especially since it's now early Thursday morning), but now that what I wrote last night is out of my system and on paper; I find I don't really want to dwell on it too much more and I want to post about something else. Something good. Today, Redneck Diva blogged about her love for books. I enjoyed the post very much because many of our experiences with reading as children were similar as are our literary tastes. I also got some good suggestions for new books for Natalie-she goes through them so quickly. Anyway, it made me start thinking about the things I'm doing right as a parent. As you can guess from reading older posts here, I'm not sure my life is one I necessarily want my children to model theirs after (especially ages 16-20), but that doesn't mean there aren't some things I think I've gotten right with this whole mothering thing.

First of all, like Redneck Diva, my kids love books. Both Tristan and Natalie read (though Tristan will feign ignorance and have you read to him if he thinks he can fool you) and Caroline is finally starting to show an interest in books even when they aren't covered in glitter and featuring pictures of My Little Ponies and Disney Princesses. Elisa, on the other hand, prefers to read the book to you (not that she actually can) and gets really mad at my insistence on reading to her. She's a bit bossy, I may have mentioned that a couple hundred times here. Anyway, my kids have an incredibly vast book collection stocked with most of the classics I knew and loved and a few they have requested that I hadn't heard of yet. I started buying these books when they were babies and I think Natalie has pretty much read them all at this point. I give Tristan a couple more years-and he'll probably skip the "girly ones" even though neither Dave nor I would ever discourage him from reading them. I think I got the book thing right.

My kids also have toys. Maybe a few too many, but not so many that I can't clean their rooms up nightly. Most of these toys are of the 'encouraging imagination' type like dress-up clothes, playsets, puzzles and dolls rather than all the cr@p toys you see on TV. (Of course there are a few of those, what do you think they do with their birthday money.) Still, they have a lot of the things I would have liked had my mother been better at teaching us how to keep our things neat and organized enough to enjoy them. (In her defense, she didn't know how herself.) I enjoy being in their rooms and watching them all play together. I think I got the toy thing right too. I'm sure I could toss a few more of them without them noticing, but as long as they can pick them up at the end of the day; I think we're good.

Thanks to repeated Family Home Evening nights on Mondays and regular church attendance, my kids also know more about the scriptures at their ages than I did until I was 20. Granted, that's a priority that varies from home-to-home; but it is one of mine and with as much chaos as an activity like FHE produces around here, I'm amazed they are learning anything. And yet, they are. So while I may never quite be heavenly material, I do seem to be teaching my kids the right things. And I'm glad. I know that, like me and their Dad, my kids will ultimately be responsible for choosing their own spiritual path. I'm just glad to give them some kind of foundation. It's certainly more to build on than I ever had as a child.

Finally, my kids are happy. None of them are as pathologically shy and scared of the world as I was at their ages, and I think that's because Dave and I have established our world as a nice place for them to live in even if it is a little messy sometimes and he and I occasionally make a dirty joke or use words that we shouldn't. I was scared of the world and it's unpredictability because I started out scared of my mom and her erratic moods. I may not be perfect at keeping my temper, but I certainly don't function on the same level as my mother did; and that just might be my best achievement of all.

Works For Me Wednesday

I love reading these at Rocks In My Dryer, but mine is too lame to link there this time. While I may be the last person in the world to have discovered this, it has really helped me keep up with my favorite blogs. You can enter the url of any blog with an RSS feed, then let Bloglines tell you when it has been updated. I now spend half the time I used to online clicking to see if my favorite bloggers had written something new. Works for me!