My Relationship with Coffee

As a kid...I didn't like coffee. I tried to like it on and off for years, but it just never "took".

I have always enjoyed the smell of coffee; and on the occasions I would try it, I was always disappointed. The aroma of coffee is a wonderful one and it makes you (well me) feel like when you get it into your mouth it should be full and rich. But it was always just scented, hot water as far as I was concerned.

So I ate coffee flavored ice cream instead. Now that is what coffee was supposed to taste like: rich and creamy with that most heavenly smell.

As I started getting older I began drinking coffee as dessert after dinners at restaurants. With lots of cream (or some Bailey's). These moments were very few and far between as they only happened in restaurants.

Fast forward through college, through marriage, to 2004-ish. This is about the time I've had both of my children and they are both in pre-school. It's also about the time I was afforded the opportunity to meet other girlfriends (with children who had also gone to pre-school) for morning coffee every now and then. I will admit that at first I would get everything but coffee. Then I discovered Starbucks and its wonderful frappuccinos. Coffee just the way I like it - cool, rich and creamy!

Eventually I started realizing that this was ridiculous money spent. Especially when the Starbucks showed up inside my grocery store and became easy access. I also started realizing the ridiculous amount of calories I was adding to my day with these creamy delights. So I started going smaller (is that Tall or Venti - I can't remember) and I started to choose Latte's instead of Frappuccinnos. I still added mocha syrup, but I was trying to wean myself from my former days of all the mocha and caramel and whipped cream. I even started realizing that some of the local coffee shops were way better than Starbucks.

Then, almost two years ago, my sweet husband got me a Keurig coffee maker for Christmas. For those of you not familiar, this is a coffee maker that brews one cup at a time (cause I don't warrant a whole pot yet). You buy these cute little "K cups" (which you can now get at Costco, Target and Walmart, not just online), available in every flavor you can think of, and enjoy at the touch of a button. Instantly.

This machine came with a plethora of samples. I enjoyed the flavors and the different blends, I enjoyed the fun of ordering different flavors, and then I realized I was gravitating to "Newman's Own Special Blend" and was always disappointed when I ran out. This "Blend" was just yummy, basic coffee.

So today, I have a few flavored coffees (that I mostly save for use as after-dinner desserts), I am currently embracing regular 'ol coffee. Sometimes I still choose a diet coke on mornings when I am hot and sweaty (cold caffeine is better than hot caffeine on those mornings), but I am finally enjoying coffee that I tried for so long to like.

And did I mention that I still add lots of cream? Lots. I use Fat Free 1/2 and 1/2 because of this. (And it's only fat free because they've found a way to add more sugar).

Well right as I have started to really enjoy my coffee I have noticed that it's starting to taste kind of funny. Maybe I don't like it as much as I thought I did. Hmmm. Such a shame.

Then the brewer tells me I need to descale it. This means I spent yesterday brewing lots of white vinegar to clean it of the mineral deposits from our hard water. Yesterday was the third time I've had to do this since I've owned it. Descaling seemed much easier to do this time luckily. And it was worth it because man - the coffee is heavenly again this morning.

Coffee and I are safe for now.

That's One Wrong Step for Annekind

What am I doing, you ask?
Nothing. Everything. Getting back into routine.
School started yesterday and today is the first full day. The children have been very excited and have rushed out of bed each morning (we'll see how long that lasts - it's only day 2).

I am in charge of the school's store. Part of what we do is coordinate the purchase and delivery of school supply kits for the children whose parents have ordered them. Not a hard thing, but the week before last I was at school overseeing their delivery to the school and then I labeled and got them to the classrooms. Lucky for me there are not quite 200 people in the school and not everyone ordered.

After that we went to stay at the renovated Holiday Inn on Folly Beach for two nights. We had a ball! Bryan does some work for them out there and a lot of them knew him. They were always asking if they could get us anything. We felt pretty special. We enjoyed adjoining rooms, great food, good weather, fun and fruity drinks, the pool, the beach, and the kids enjoyed the fitness room and a room service meal while we went downstairs to dinner by ourselves on the second night (the children insisted - it was great). We played cards in the very relaxing lobby area that looks right out onto the beach, and overall enjoyed just sitting still for a while.

This past Sunday we attended the end of the year awards party for the swim team the children were on. Julia was awarded the "Coach's Award" for the female swimmer. And yes, I fought back very proud tears. The things they said about her were very rewarding as a parent.

I have spent the last few days (and will finish out this week) putting the finishing touches on the school store and its volunteer schedule and making sure any glitches with school supplies were ironed out. I also culled out 4 bags of clothes from the children's closets (that didn't fit them anymore) and have already dropped them off at Goodwill.

I've been busy. I'm tired. And I"m also sore. But the "sore" is because I took a good tumble next door on Sunday night. The same next door where the dog pulled me down and forced my hand at buying new jeans last year. This time I was out looking for the cat due to the fact that there was some serious "cat screaming" going on outside. It was about 9:00pm.

As I got outside I realized that it was very dark. The neighbors had all of their lights on so I head up their tall flight of very pretty, brick stairs to ask them if they would mind turning on their back light to see if we could round up Felix (the Trouble cat). We live on a cul-de-sac so their yard is quite a distance from mine and is also where the awful screaming was coming from.

As I near the top of the stairs (did I mention it is REALLY dark?) I could tell that a planter was right in the middle of the last step before you reach the landing. So I adjust my path, move to the right, grab the hand rail and continue to the landing(aka the front porch). As I do this, my left foot steps on something metal that feels like a grate (yes, I was barefooted - it's summertime. I'm in the south. I'm always barefooted. Even when it's not summertime) and I instantly started taking a quick ride sideways and backwards down the stairs, on one foot, while on top of this grate.

As I land (or you could say "as I fall") - it was a full-on splat on the entire left side of my body - I landed partly on the stairs, partly on the porch. My forearms caught my upper body and I found myself wondering what in the world my neighbors were thinking - cleaning their grill grate on the front porch!? My head couldn't get around that they had done this. Their grill is usually on their back deck, but this sure felt like grill grease I spatted in.

I picked myself up, still frightened for my cat, and headed to the door to let them know I was the loud "thump" they had just heard in the night. I was going to explain about the screams and the cat and ask them if they could turn on their back lights so we could see what was tangling with the neighborhood cats. On the way to the door my left and then my right foot did a "squish and slide" as I took my steps. It dawned on me that this "grill grease" I thought I landed in was probably not "grill grease" at all. Instead, I think it's PAINT. And I had just immediately prior to these steps landed fully in it from the hip up. Yay, me!

So I freeze (so as not to get paint on any part of their white and brick house - it's on the market I might add - or any more of me). So there I was frozen in mid stride with the left leg in the air. I stopped. I thought. And then I knocked on the door with the back of my hand.

After they opened and I apologized for it being so late and explained why I was coming over at 9:00 pm, I reminded them that their porch was wet and that I had been successful in splatting myself right in the middle of it. I found out that the paint was in fact stain and sealer, not paint. Yay me, again! This was not as bad as I thought it was. And though I felt like I had done the equivalent of a snow angel in it, it didn't seem to look horrible or be as all over me as I thought initially. (My clothes ended up being fine...I'm still waiting on a return phone call to see what the mess looked like Monday morning.)

Back to the story...we went to the back deck and looked for the cat. Julia then let us know the cat had come home and my neighbor lovingly led me with a flashlight through the dark to home (I'm sure he was hoping I wouldn't fall again). Once inside, I told Bryan what I had done, and as I looked down I realized that I had "knocked the bark" off of my ankle, knee and hip. And the ankle was bleeding a bit. And everything was a bit swollen. And I was feeling it all pretty good at this point. I wiped off and laid down and Bryan brought me some Advil. I awoke Monday morning and didn't hurt as bad as I thought I might and began picking all the flaking skin from each of the areas. (I told you the bark got knocked off...more like scraped up and I chose to pick it to get it to come all the way off).

Today - well, today my ankle still stings a bit and the hip still has an egg sized lump. Not the goose egg that it was, more along the lines of chicken egg today. I can see the beginning of a bruise on my hip, but most of the other swelling in the ankle and all of the swelling in my knee is gone. Bryan and I decided we need to demand some free dental work (or teeth whitening paraphernalia) since this is the second time I have come home with skinned up legs from their house. Did I mention the neighbor is a dentist? But we aren't really the suing kind. And I like these particular neighbors a lot. So instead, we'll just laugh about it.

Seriously though, I did call yesterday to see how badly I messed up the porch and I still have not heard from them yet.

So....in a nutshell, that's what I've been up to lately - what about you?

Birthday Surprises

As I get further and further away from my last post, it gets harder and harder to want to write. Too much catching up to do if you know what I mean.

I have pictures off the camera and on to the external hard drive, but Picasa is giving me fits. Mostly because I'm learning as I go and I don't have the time to devote to it right now.

Legare turned 9 on Monday. He danced a jig for a few days before and continued through yesterday. I'm sure as we wake he'll continue. Bryan and I both commented on how we had never seen anyone quite so excited about a birthday. And it wasn't even a big one. No double digits or anything...just good old 9 is all.

He got everything he wanted for presents. And all of them were Lego Star Wars things. You would have thought they were all bars of gold. And equal excitement was given to all of them - huge and small alike.

The one that we gave him is called a Republic Attack Gunship (you've seriously got to check out the picture of the thing). He watched a cute video clip of it on Legos.com for days, maybe weeks, leading up to his birthday. And I see why...I have not seen so many moving doors and hatches on one piece in a while - it is truly a neat "ship". It took about 2 days to build with over 1000 pieces. He was very proud, I was very impressed. He even asked me to join him on the building of it - truly sharing his pleasure. I was honored and enjoyed every minute of it.

Then, disaster struck. We finished the ship around 5:00 and worked together to put together another of his gifts (I really did enjoy doing this with him - sissy was at a b-day party so it was just us). He couldn't wait for his dad to get home to show off his new creation. He flew it around and played until bedtime. I should mention that this thing probably weighs 12 pounds.

Not long after we tucked him in he was back in the den with what we thought would be the "I can't sleep" song. Instead, he let out the saddest cry ever to come from a 9 year old boy. His ship had broken. And it was devastating.

We reassured him that it could be fixed, it just had come apart. The Legos we were sure hadn't broken. And my thought was that this things was so big and beefy it was probably 5-7 big pieces that could easily be put back together. WRONG. Imagine our surprise when we got to his room and it looked as if the ship had taken part in a gun battle. I bet there were 500 individual pieces of Lego or Lego chunks in one pile on the floor. My heart sank with him and we all kind of started laughing out loud at the ridiculous pile. It couldn't have looked much worse had you just opened the box and dumped out all of the pieces.

I bet it will take 30 minutes at a minimum to get the thing back together. And he did not start it today - he decided to enjoy the others for a while. I'm betting that's on our Friday to do list. I have told him that I do not have super glue!