I Marched for Babies.

Every year I join forces with the March of Dimes and thousands of others to March for Babies.

The March of Dimes is one of my very favorite charities. Many people have the idea that they only help babies who are preterm but the goal of the organization is that "One Day All Babies Will Be Born Healthy". This means that not only NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit) babies be helped but also those with other problems including genetic defects which in many cases may not be born alive.

This is of specific interest to me and a friend, Kathryn, who is the mother of a Trisomy 18 baby who lived for only 6 hours after birth. We and several of our momslikeme.com friends (and some dads) walked to show support for this amazing cause.

It was so inspiring to see an ocean of people all parading down Bayshore Blvd with the same goal. I was brought to tears multiple times just from being so overwhelmed with emotion. I wept for those babies who did not make it and for those who survived and were there walking too. It was amazing and I can't wait until next year.


Our Team.

3 miles and worth every step.

To see this many people all walking for the same cause is amazing.

We walked with our own children to help all children.

When Kathryn's daughter M got too tired to walk she hitched a ride with D.


Kathryn did an interview for Channel 10 discussing how The March of Dimes helps all babies.

If I would stop letting jerks get to me my days would go a lot smoother.

I have to get this out because I am ticked off!

I am not a "salesman" so I do not "buy" email addresses from any kind of source. So suffice it to say if I have your email it is only because at some point in time you yourself emailed me. THAT IS THE ONLY WAY I WOULD GET YOUR EMAIL!

Now on rare occasions I may send out an email that I want as many people to receive as possible. This happens usually once a year for the March for Babies Walk. I walk and of course have to ask for donations. I send this email out once when I register for the walk and again the week of the walk (about 2 months apart least).

Now I will admit that recently with my baby in a contest needing votes I did send out an email asking for votes for her 3 times. This is the first year in which I have sent out a mass email to my contacts relating to anything other then the March of Dimes.

When I sent out these emails I went into my contacts and selected "All Contacts" because in my naivety I assumed that getting this amazing charity as much exposure as possible would be a good thing. I knew some addresses weren't even any good but rather then filter through them all I just let it rip. I also assumed that most people would be fine with getting an email for this and worse case scenario they would delete it if they had absolutely no interest in helping. No biggie right?

Wrong! Myriam (a women who has emailed me asking me for items for her own baby that my child has outgrown) and Jean (a teacher at my child's school) couldn't do that.
The first told me not to email her. Fine Myriam, when your baby needs something don't you dare ask me to "donate" or "sell low cost" anything to you. Anything I have (regardless of what you can use) will be donated to Hope Children's Home which is a wonderful charity that is very deserving and grateful.

The second said unless it is for school purposes don't contact her. Well since you are one of those parents that refuse to participate in class events and ignore correspondence or requests I won't even email you for those.

I am not saying everyone has to care about a charity because I do (even though this is one of the most amazing groups around in my opinion) but do you have to bean ass over it? Just delete the email and get on with your lives. Don't send snotty responses because even though I may not email you anymore, every known porn site may just get your email instead. (I am joking... for now.)

Camping... What a Trip!

Well, we are back from out camping trip and what an adventure!


We decided to go camping for 3 days because we really wanted a vacation but didn't have tons of money to spend. Funny thing is,... camping is not so cheap. After buying food, supplies and paying the camping fee we could have stayed overnight at an Orlando hotel and gone to a theme park. But wait there's more!

We get to the camp site and it is a parking lot!!! It was for RVs. There was no shaded areas and the area we had was about 4 feet from the next camper. Well we can't let the kids hang out in a RV parking lot especially with no shelter from the sun (darn Irish husband) so we tried to find a more rustic site. Well they had some called "primitive" sites but they were a mile hike to get to. With a truck filled to the brim and 3 kids that wasn't happening. They did however have cabins available but they were pricey. So at this point we decided to go home would be an even bigger waste so we shelled out the extra dough and got the cabin which was beautiful! We decided to make the most of this trip no matter what and were doing a decent job. The kids played and D tried to run into the campfire and even though the baby was a handful things went ok until my son got sick Friday night (about 6 hours after we got there). He vomited for 24 hours straight! When he finally started feeling better it was time to go home. If nothing else we got a lot of memories (both good and bad). Funny thing is though had we not gotten the cabin we would have had to leave anyway with a sick kid and were it not for the cabin I don't know what we would have done with the baby. (Aren't kids and animals supposed to have a natural fear of fire?) So good and bad things worked out as good as they could.

Pictures:
Why did we pack so much stuff? If only we had known we would have been in a cabin!


Roughing it? Only if you call a full kitchen, living room, 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, wraparound porch with 2 entries overlooking a lake rough with full electric and ac rough.





Fun around the fire:





My men and the grill:





Getting dirty and getting clean and having fun:





What a very sick boy looks like when on vacation:



Not too bad a time:

Gator Freds - Spring Break

Happy Thursday. Today I took Great Grandma M  and the kids to Gator Freds.

It was supposed to be a momslikeme.com playdate but as is often the case when dealing with moms, they were a no show. I was the only one there and I didn't even set the playdate up. Whatever. Kids had a good time anyway.

They played in the kiddie fitness center.

And took turns pushing my lazy baby around in the fire truck.


D also pranced around on a poney.

Other the D falling out of one of the bounce houses and scratching her face up and getting a knot on her head we had another great day. I am still amazed though that Marcie somehow eluded me and my camera. I will get a picture of her one day I swear it!

Mosi - Spring Break

It's day 3 of spring break and our second day of fun. Today I took the kids and Abuella to MOSI. They loved it. (Those passes were such a great idea!)

They ran around looking at all the exhibits for the 100th time before getting lunch in the cafe. Then on to "Kids in Charge" which is such a cute area. Everything is geared toward kids and fun. They love it. Plus they recently built a playground just outside so while the older two were doing the astronaut experience D ran around the playground and threw mulch. I just wish that MOSI would take a hint from every other attraction type place and add a water area. They could use it to explain water pressure and power. But they haven't gotten a clue yet but other then that the place totally rocks.

Abuella and the kids tried to set up a domino rally while D was hellbent on knocking it over before they started.

And of course D threw one of her tantrums (what day would be complete without one?).

YMCA Pool - Spring Break

Today we all went to the YMCA water park. While there I got hit on by the teenage lifeguard. Now I realize I am not the thin hottie I used to be so I don't have this happen too often anymore but seriously?!?

I am at the pool with my 3 kids, wedding rings on, looking as unavailable as possible. The lifeguard, after starring and circling for a while (to the point where even my son mentions him staring at me) comes up and says he wants to ask me a question. I know I looked irritated and I was because my toddler was leaning into the kiddie pool area which is only a foot deep but still water so she needs an eye on her. So after he stutters and stumblers he finally asks "Where did you get that diaper bag?". Ok, so I have not been on the dating seen for a while so maybe this is the way you attract a "cougar" but I found it creepy. I looked at him and said "Try Target" and as I glanced back at my baby she was face down in the water trying to roll over.

I jump in (the freezing water) grab her and she is sputtering and spitting everywhere. As I hold her and dry her off the lifeguard is still hovering around me practically violating my territorial bubble. Finally after his next attempts at conversation and his hovering were ignored he moved on. He didn't talk to me again but he kept staring. It was weird.

D was fine but much more cautious of the water after that. I got tons of pictures of her, the other two not so much since they would barely hold still but everyone had a good time... near death experiences aside.


(I swear they had more fun than this picture lets on.)

If only kids knew how easy they have it.

I stogged (my word for steal for my blog) this off an email. If you are 30, or older, you might think this is hilarious!

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were. When they were growing up; what with walking twenty-five miles to school every morning.... Uphill... Barefoot...BOTH ways… yadda, yadda, yadda



And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way in hell I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on my kids about how hard I had it and how easy they've got it!

But now that I'm over the ripe old age of thirty, I can't help but look around and notice the youth of today. You've got it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a damn Utopia!
And I hate to say it, but you kids today, you don't know how good you've got it!

I mean, when I was a kid we didn't have the Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the damn library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalog!!

There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter - with a pen! Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox, and it would take like a week to get there! Stamps were 10 cents!

Child Protective Services didn't care if our parents beat us. As a matter of fact, the parents of all my friends also had permission to kick our ass! Nowhere was safe!

There were no MP3's or Napsters or iTunes! If you wanted to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the record store and shoplift it yourself!

Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio, and the DJ would usually talk over the beginning and @#*% it all up! There were no CD players! We had tape decks in our car. We'd play our favorite tape and "eject" it when finished, and then the tape would come undone rendering it useless. Cause, hey, that's how we rolled, Baby! Dig?

We didn't have fancy crap like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called, they got a busy signal, that's it!

There weren't any freakin' cell phones either. If you left the house, you just didn't make a damn call or receive one. You actually had to be out of touch with your "friends". OH MY GOD !!! Think of the horror... not being in touch with someone 24/7!!! And then there's TEXTING. Yeah, right. Please! You kids have no idea how annoying you are.

And we didn't have fancy Caller ID either! When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your parents, your boss, your bookie, your drug dealer, the collection agent... you just didn't know!!! You had to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

We didn't have any fancy PlayStation or Xbox video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With games like 'Space Invaders' and 'Asteroids'. Your screen guy was a little square! You actually had to use your imagination!!! And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen... Forever! And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like LIFE!

You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on! You were screwed when it came to channel surfing! You had to get off your ass and walk over to the TV to change the channel!!! NO REMOTES!!! Oh, no, what's the world coming to?!?!

There was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons on Saturday Morning. Do you hear what I'm saying? We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you spoiled little rat-finks!

And we didn't have microwaves. If we wanted to heat something up, we had to use the stove! Imagine that!

And our parents told us to stay outside and play... all day long. Oh, no, no electronics to soothe and comfort. And if you came back inside... you were doing chores!
And car seats - oh, please! Mom threw you in the back seat and you hung on. If you were lucky, you got the "safety arm" across the chest at the last moment if she had to stop suddenly, and if your head hit the dashboard, well that was your fault for calling "shot gun" in the first place!
See! That's exactly what I'm talking about! You kids today have got it too easy. You're spoiled rotten! You guys wouldn't have lasted five minutes back in 1980 or any time before!

Regards,
The Over 30 Crowd




(And though I remember all these things and I find humor in it I want to clarify that I AM NOT YET 30!!!)