Confessions of a Pathetic Shopaholic

how much would you pay for the above dress? $25? $10? $6.50 plus your integrity?...

august 29th i wrote a post about our moving from a lifestyle that could have been tagged 'seriously excessive' to a lifestyle that would be tagged 'only what's necessary'. i mentioned going on a shopping freeze that would include buying any kind of clothes or accessories for either myself or the kids, cause we all had more than enough stuff to cover our bodies for the next couple of months, if not years (more for myself, since i am no longer growing, and i still wear shirts that i bought 8 years ago.)

this post may have meant nothing to any of you. lots of you probably didn't even read that post. but i have to admit it has helped to keep me 'clean' for the last few months, for fear of having to share that i failed and bought something that i didn't necessarily need. there was a period of time when lily had a lot of mismatched pjs, due to our many moves (we have since recovered all the right tops and bottoms!), and almost everytime i went to either target or walmart, there would be a pair of pjs for lily in my shopping cart until i would get to the checkout and realize that though i loved lily in matching pjs, she did not NEED to have matching tops and bottoms to go to bed. this honestly happened about five or six times. and i refrained from giving in to my obsessive need to have new stuff cause i knew i would have to 1.write about it. and 2. tell chris.

now don't get me wrong. chris is no tyrant. he did not put me on this shopping freeze. i did it to myself. he is just severely supportive cause 1.it's saving us money and 2. he is a man of his word, and he expects others to be as well.

so i was really great for two months. and then i broke down last week. it started with our family picture. chris and james have matching gray polo t-shirts, so we decided they would wear those, the kids would wear colorful polos, and the girls would wear something complementary to all that. well, i couldn't really find anything 'special' for lily to wear. so i went shopping. yes. i was already prepared to break my word for the sake of an awesome family picture! but then the unexpected happened- i found two cute gray polo shirts for topher and sungu to wear that would match their dads! so i bought those instead of a dress for lily. cause truth be told- she had a dress she could have worn all along in the picture. i did however also buy her some ribbon for her hair though. i am a shopping monster!!!!!!!!!!

AND THEN... i went back to target the next night with my sister so we could stroll about with no kids. so wonderful. jeehon was actually looking for some shirts. i was just 'helping her out'. until i came across the above pictured dress. i am all about long dresses. i had wanted one all summer, and was so happy that they were such a huge fashion trend this last year. but i just could not bring myself to buy one for full price. this dress was $24.99. then it went down to $17.48. then it went down to $12.48. then it went down to $6.24. and then... i bought it.

c'mon reader! does your heart not skip a beat when you see a price tag with not only one, but THREE sale stickers piled haphazardly on top of one another? judge me if you will. but all i can say is i tried. i failed. and i am moving on. with my awesome new dress in tow.

Thursday's Thing- COFFEE!

here is a post about another mom-essential: coffee. well, it's a momming-essential for me. a lot of my beautiful friends here in arizona actually don't drink coffee. it's the strangest thing. when we go to starbucks i am the only one who ever gets an actual drink that isn't water. but for those of you in the east valley who appreciate a good (and cheap!) cup o' joe, read on.

the hidden gem in the cheap coffee world is Krispy Kreme. there aren't a ton of locations in arizona, but one of the three that i know of is a 3 minute drive, or a twenty minute walk (i know cause i have done it)from our apartment. their regular, everyday price for a 10 oz cup of coffee is $0.25. yes. i said it. twenty-five cents. hello? is this 1978, or some other crazy time before i was born???
this coffee is always a touch bolder than i would like, so i actually ask for 1 cream and 3 sugars. (i generally like to just drink my coffee with 3 sugars, no cream.)

another great deal is- believe it or not- a regular coffee at Starbucks. a tall (12oz) is $1.50. this is pretty great considering Dunkin Donuts sells their coffee for about the same price. but the best thing about Starbucks right now is that if you buy a bag of Starbucks coffee at the grocery store (usually for about $6 -$9), and you bring the empty bag into a Starbucks, they will take the bag and give you a free hot cup of coffee. so basically you paid about $4.50 to have a butt-load of home-made Starbucks coffee, only to be rewarded with someone who will take your garbage and give you a free coffee at Starbucks. the bag says you can redeem the bag for a tall coffee, but chris has brought in a bag before and gotten a venti. you might need to show a little leg, something chris is always willing to do for something free.

Great Pic- Part I

I just got a disc of amazing pictures that Barb, my wonderful jack-of-all-trades mother-in-law took. This one is hilarious and I am posting it first because it is from Halloween. Apparently he stayed in character the whole time he was out trick or treating with his Nana, not saying a word. One person giving out candy even correctly identified who he was trying to be. That means his costume was a success!
Tomorrow, or some other time in the not too distant future, I shall post more pics.
Enjoy!


Here is a picture of my sweet little Topher


Here is a crazy picture of my disgruntled, crazy-eyebrowed, charlie chaplin look-a-like Topher.

Wonderful Ignorance

This is going to be a quick post, cause it's late and I still have lots of random things I need to do. But it is too funny not to share.

Two nights ago I was giving the kids a bath by myself, cause Chris was working till 9pm. We all sit on the potty right before we go into the bath (I sit on the potty, but I don't go into the bath) but no one is ever able to produce any pee, except for me, cause I am not only a big girl, but I am also a good girl. And I know this cause Lily tells me so every time I make a pee. (This is our superslow, supercasual stroll into potty training for Lils and Topher.)

Then the kids get in the bath, and Topher almost always takes a stance like he is going to pee. I have caught his pee in a cup twice, which he doesn't like, so then he stops peeing, then sits in the bath and ruins everything. Sometimes I drain the water and start all over again, sometimes I don't. Let's be serious, it's gross, but that's life.

So this fateful night, two nights ago, Topher looked like he had to pee at the beginning of the bath, but I didn't catch anything. Then we proceeded with bath time, and as we were getting ready to wrap things up, Lily was sitting facing the faucet, catching the water as it pouring out. Unbeknownst to her, there was something pouring on her back, but she didn't notice cause she was already wet, or maybe she thought I had turned on the warm shower without her noticing, but lucky for Topher that she did not notice that he was peeing on her back, and a little in her long hair. Oh the verbal lashing he would have gotten from his big sister! Lily also did not notice that I was soaping her up again, and rinsing her off again.
Ah, ignorance saves the day once again!

El Paso

I usually put my pictures at the end of my post, but it's really anooying and time consuming, and i always mean to upload my pics and then start writing, but alas my memory sucks. so today the pictures are in reverse order, as is the rest of this long post.



Josh, #96, the kicker for UAB


Pregame walking onto the field. Little junior studmuffin

Chris and me bowling with no kids. That's the look of a woman who has only changed two diapers that day!

Chris and I went to El Paso, Tx this last weekend. Well, Friday morning till Saturday night. Chris' step-bro Josh is the kicker for University of Alabama Birmingham and so this was his closest game that we could afford to go to. Barb and Jerry watched the kids while we were gone, and even took them trick or treating on Saturday night. So great to have great family all around!

We left Friday morning around 11am, after we picked up our car rental (yes, we rented a car even tohugh we have FOUR vehicles!) and dropped off the kids. We took the route through Globe (and Miami, AZ. Didn't know that existed, wish I still didn't. Sad, sad, sad town), while the rest of the traveling pack went through Tucson. We beat them by an hour! I really love road trips with my hubby, they are like very private dates for just him and I to focus on each other and God's wonderful creation (excluding Miami, AZ). So we pretty much had the best 6 hour date there, and six hour date coming back! Kinda dated out! (haha. just joking Chris.)

Friday night, the whole Arizona crew was assembled at the Marriott, where Josh's team was staying (read: and we did NOT.) There were about 20 friends and family that came down for this game- it was pretty awesome! Some of those friends, were people that Chris and I had seen and met a bunch of time at Wes and Kim's house for Suns' games (undefeated season so far! woo hoo!), LOST parties, etc. But going on this road trip with them allowed us to actually get to know one another and hang out! That was a super-bonus to our weekend. After we said bye to Josh we went out for a wonderful Mexican dinner that stripped the lining from my intestines. I was very happy that the kids weren't there eating off of my plate for lots of different reasons, butthe main one being that they might have died. Great food! Little spicy. We went bowling till midnight, and Chris shot a 195 one game, and I shot a 123- beating 3 out of the 4 guys that went with us :) It was a pretty fantastic day.

Then Saturday was even more fantastic than the previous day! We woke up at 9am! Then we went outlet mall shopping! And no, I did NOT break my shopping fast- Chris bought lots of little things for the kids! It was too cute. He was going through some shirts at Old Navy for Lily and was like 'this one is cute.' No Chris Watson, YOU are cute. Then later he realized we bougt 3 shirts for Lily, and only one for Toph, so he had to even the score at The Children's Place. What a great dad.

After a quick yet very fulfilling shopping experience, we headed over to University of Texas El Paso's campus. I LOVE UNIVERSITY CAMPUSES! This last year we have driven through NAU's, UA's and now UTEP's campuses, and I just love seeing students hanging out, reading books, and being in such a fun and important time in their lives. It's a good energy to be around. (whoa. That sounded really new agey of me.)

We had seats 5 rows up from the field (which is actually not ideal for watching a football game and all the action) but it was great cause we got to see Josh up close and even touch him when he came by to say hi to his giant fan base :) UAB was supposed to get rocked by UTEP, but that is not even close to what happened. Josh's team played so well, and Josh made all of his kicks except one. It was an amazing game to be at! I a little bit peed in my pants (what? I have had two kids! The muscles down there don't work the way they are supposed to anymore!)

Chris and I took off for home after we said bye to Josh. We are so proud of our brother! What a good, and talented kid. The drive home was full of phone calls to home. We were pretty sad that we were missing Lily's and Topher's first trick or treating experience. But besides the timing thing, a great time was had by all.

Thursday's Thing- Potties

This is NOT a post about how to potty train your kids. Why? Cause I have no clue how to do that. Today is a post about the potties that I do have though. (I am looking at this picture I just took, and it kinda stinks. At least this isn't a photography website!)

The one on the right is the ever popular Fisher-Price Cheer For Me potty. You can get it for about $30. It was Lily's cousin's, and after much disinfecting, it is Lily's. Cause I do not spend $30 on anything, least of all a potty that can't even train my kid to pee ;) Anyhoo, it's a cute little thing that requires batteries (of course. Do toy companies and battery companies own a lot of stock in each other?) It says fun little things like 'it's potty time!' and it sings and says 'up' and 'down' for when you move the lid up and down. Cute, but all so unnecessary.

The potty on the left is from IKEA. it is $3.99. I very gladly bought this for Topher myself. This cute little potty comes in black, red, baby blue, pink, and this awesome shade of green that I love. Topher picked it out himself, and later when we got home, we decorated it (and Lily's as well) with stickers. According to the books, it's good for the kids to have 'ownership' of their potty, and to look upon it as something that is fun and wonderful, not something that wants to steal their life essence (aka, their pees and poops.)

The best thing that this potty offers, that the $30 potty does not, is a pee-pee shield. There are lots of potties on the market, and lots of them have pee-pee shields, but none of them are $4. And another great thing about this potty is that since it is just one piece, it is very eay to clean. The other potty has a little piece that the kids do their business in, and you can take it off to empty it into the toilet. But there are lots of crevices and other pieces for kids to pee all over. Less to clean is always better. Always.

So run on over to IKEA. Then maybe to Michaels to get some stickers from their $1 bin, then blow the rest of your $10 bill at Starbucks on one drink, and have a great time potty training!... :)


here is Topher's potty up close.


And a side view so you can see the pee-pee shield to the left, and the back rest on the right. So many amazing features for just $4!!!!!

I Love You TOO!

I have been telling my kids I love them for longer than they have been alive. For the most part I feel like I am doing a better job at showing them I love them- with patience and kindness, which is my new motherhood mantra.

My kids have been able to communicate that they love me in their own special ways. Topher's a big hugger, which is so great. He is also a great lover of food, so if he shares even a morsel of what is on his plate- that's amore! Lily is a big flirt so she just looks over her shoulder, flutters her eyelashes, shines those giant dimples, and smiles.

We taught the babies to blow kisses at a young age, which we meant as a sign for 'bye' and 'i love you', but who cares? Those are things that we put on them. Just because they did it didn't mean that they were necessarily trying to say 'bye' or 'i love you'. They always got lots of extra kisses and 'oohs' and 'aahs' when people would get these adorable blown kisses, so maybe they were doing it for the acclaim. Who knows?

And with both of the babes talking, they have both been able to say 'I love you' after we say 'I love you', and repeat 'Sarang heh' which is 'I love you' in Korean. But again- does this mean anything to them? Should this mean anything to me?

Then recently Lily started saying something that made me feel like maybe she understood how I truly felt. Like the love that I have for her is something way deeper than the love I have for chocolate ice cream, which I often say that 'I love!' (I happen to have a great respect for chocolate ice cream, which comes out as 'love', but is in fact just a strong affinity.) She wasn't saying 'Mom, I love you like I love Pablo on the Backyardigans', she was saying 'Mom, I have watched you and studied you for the last two and a half years of my life and I can see that you truly love me and would do anything for me. I am moved by this love, and I LOVE YOU TOO.'

We have moved to the next level here people! The addition of that one simple word has so much meaning to it! Or at least I have now pinned on so much meaning to it! I know that there are things that we make the kids say, like 'thank you', that they don't always mean. Especially when we have to force them to say 'thank you' for something like an extra helping of rice. But when Lily was trick or treating this weekend, every piece of candy that hit her little bag was met with a heartfelt, sincere outburst of thanks.

We taught Lily and Topher how to say 'thank you' and 'I love you', but we can't necessarily teach them to mean it. But one thing I didn't teach Lily, which these days I am thankful for every time I hear it, is how to say 'I love you too', cause I think that just happened as a sincere outburst from her heart to mine.