Rule #1: Cardio.

With the upcoming presidential elections looming ever closer, we as a nation have been taking a lot of time scrutinizing the issues at hand; the economy, foreign policies, immigration, the middle east, gay marriage, and for some reason Sesame Street is now an important factor in determining who to vote for....
     Facebook has become a veritable battle ground for would-be political debaters. I personally find that keeping my opinion off of facebook helps me to maintain my ever-dwindling sanity (not to mention many of my friends).  However, I have noticed in the past few months that a very important issue has been blatantly, if not purposely, ignored. I for one find myself VERY concerned with this particular topic and would repeal my personal rule to keep political opinions off of facebook in order to discuss the ever growing threat to ALL political parties. If we are to be a nation OF the people, well then we all need to be concerned with raising awareness for......

ZOMBIES.

Yes, the growing zombie threat is one that our country's leaders are ignoring to our GREAT detriment. I believe that the zombie apocalypse is closer at hand than any of us would like to think about and the time has come to draw awareness to this issue and prepare ourselves accordingly!

Lets look at the facts:

1.) Zombies are dead, and gross, and scary.

2.) A Zombie's only desire is to kill you and eat your brain and/or infect you (though, on second thought they probably don't really have 'desires' being zombies and all)

3.) Zombies probably smell really bad (you know, because of the whole 'dead' thing).

4.) According to a handful of zombie movies (or as I like to call them, 'Important study materials') zombies might be able to run, which quite frankly, is scary as %$*#.

And finally,

5.)  This article.

There are many important measures that ought to be taken into consideration by ALL citizens of the United States who do not wish to become zombies, or zombie food. I will support any candidate who can appropriately present a platform that will help this country prepare for the impending zombie apocalypse. 

I feel that this is TRULY an important issue and I want to see it addressed ASAP!

Also I am pretty sure the majority of Congress are already zombies.

Working Girl.

 It is now October  and I haven't updated since the end of May. I think that may be a manifestation of my deep and abiding hatred of Summer.
Okay, I don't hate ALL of it, just most of it, like 98% of it. The time between June and October seems unnecessary to me . Sure it's broken up by a couple of sporadically 'fun' days; Independence day is alright with the barbecue and fireworks, Andrew's birthday on July 23rd (He is FOUR now!!), and I like swimming before the pools start feeling like bathtubs but that's really it. Because 'summer' really starts in late April/early May in southeast Texas and summer in southeast Texas means constant heat and humidity, and I am over it by June.
Anyways, My summer so far:
                    1.)  Apparently I am addicted. To running. All the time. I find myself unbalanced and off if I don't. I never had this issue before, indeed I used to HATE running and now, well now I need it. It doesn't make any sense whatsoever, because I DO hate the summer, and the heat but somehow I still find myself running in it for five miles every day and do in fact feel really good afterwords. I guess there are worse things to be addicted to.
                   2.) My kids are awesome.

Do I really need to elaborate further?

                     3.) I acquired employment. Yep, I got a job. My 'official' title is "foodserver" at Chili's. All I really do though, is ask people which kind of baby-back ribs they want, or which kind of Chicken crispers they want.

Admit it though; despite the generic "bathroom-pic"
quality, you'd still want me to take your order ;)

That's pretty much it for my summer.

No really, it was THAT boring. Sorry I don't have more to tell but between learning the difference between a 'presidente margarita' and a 'PLATINUM presidente margarita' (one is more expensive)  and trying to avoid eating all the tostada chips I didn't do much. Now that it's officially autumn though (YAY!!!) I should have more motivation to blog stuff!

 If not, there are always about 350 pictures of my kids on my iPhone!

        

Are you not ENTERTAINED???

Corinne: Hey baby, come look at this!

Rob: What is it?

Corinne: Look at the rug! Do you see the spider?

Rob: Yeah, you want me to kill it?

Corinne: Not yet, look! It's stalking that fly!

(There is a fly just sitting on the rug a fair distance away from the spider)

Rob: Oh cool!

Corinne: There is no way it will get it though, its like two feet away and the fly can like, fly you know? holy cow, its still going! It's closing the gap! DUDE! That fly is just SITTING there!

Rob: Oh man!

Corinne: I KNOW! 

(Spider jumps on fly and a struggle ensues)

Corinne: HOLY CRAP, he got it! Did you see that? He totally just pounced on it!

Rob: (moving to hover over the carnage) The fly is still struggling! 

Corinne: Get your phone out and take some pictures!

Rob: Oh yeah! (pulls out iPhone and takes LOTS of pictures and video)

Corinne: I feel like Caesar watching the gladiators in the ring! "Are we not entertained???"

Rob: Oh man, I can see the where the mandibles punctured it! This camera is awesome! The fly is still struggling!

Corinne: You know we are still killing the spider. I just think we should let him finish eating first though. Ya know, let him enjoy his last meal.

Maternal Musings.

Mothers day. It's approaching. Stores have the big cardboard displays of quaint mothers day cards, and plastic wrapped bouquets of brightly colored daisies. Mothers day is one of those days that means a lot to many people, causes sadness and regret for others, and to some, is just another sunday. The fact of the matter is; we are all the result of a mother. Love her, or hate her, you are all here today because you have a mother. I am pretty lucky, because my mother is awesome, like, 'Store bought cheese is for squares. I am making my own cheese!' awesome. I'm pretty sure she gets the awesome from my grandmother, who is pretty much the best person I know.  I myself have earned to title of 'mom' and, if you know me, you know that I love it. (and if you didn't know before, now you do)
      I have always been fascinated with being a mom, but not just the basics of being a mom, though that is where it began. The stereotypical, feeding, washing, and rocking babies that I was so obsessed with as a small child.

And this. This is not my doll, but is essentially identical to the
one I owned. Her name was Mary Nicole and you could not convince me
that she WASN'T my baby...

As I got older, I became aware of 'the mechanics' so to speak, of being a mother. I remember being about five or six years old and hearing some neighbor lady spell out the word 'Sex' in hushed tones, which I thought strange, because a) I knew how to read, and b)  she could have said it aloud and the word itself would have meant nothing to me. I finally asked my parents and got the quintessential "talk" that satisfied me for the moment. It turned out to be the first in a series of "talks" that educated me based on my level of understanding at whatever age I was at the time. Being the strange child that I was, I found it all incredibly fascinating. I was the kid who took out books in the library that detailed all the internal anatomy and other things involving "puberty"(Is it just me or does the word itself sound weird and gross to anyone else? Say it out loud and think about it...). And while I knew the biological reasons behind them, some things ('nocturnal emissions' anyone?) still kinda freaked me out. 
           I could take time here to detail the 'emotional' aspect of my growth as an adolescent, and the contributions it had to my ultimately becoming a mother, but it includes a first kiss story that involves a fifteen year old me, in the bedroom of a seventeen year old, who had star wars sheets on his bed, and nobody really wants to hear about that...
     When I was married, and pregnant with my first child, I was working at a bookstore/coffee shop, and spent a good deal of my down time in the health section of the book department, reading about pregnancy, and specifically, what can go wrong. I don't recommend this as it can be  terrifying. Seriously, I dare you to google 'Molar Pregnancy' and not be at least a little bit freaked out.
 When it came time to evict my husband's and my little genetic mash up, I went in confident that I knew what to expect, and was pleasantly surprised that I was right: It hurt like a &#*@!&@%$*!$ and I came out of it with a cute little baby!
   Nearly four years later I have two of 'em, and eventually, would like more. And, as mothers day rolls around again, I am forced to reflect not only on all the 'mothers' in my life, (my own, and all the people I know who are mothers) but my role as 'mother' to my own offspring. I really do hope I am doing at the very least an 'adequate' job. I mean....my kids seem happy enough......

I am gonna go wash the peanut butter out of my daughter's hair now.

Happy Mothers day Everyone!

"And, Aubrey was her name"

 Having a daughter has been a very different experience than having a son. Perhaps it has something to do with the differences between boys and girls, but I am inclined to believe that her personality is just that different from her brother's. As a result, my little girl is constantly teaching me things,  such as:

how important it is for me to be holding her at least 75% of every day:

(The other 25% of the time, Daddy suffices)

She has taught me how determined she is to get her hands on my phone EVEN when I have 'hidden it' under the couch cushion:

She has taught me how important the cats are to her (and what fantastic pillow pets they make):

She has taught me that I can't trust her to be hesitant of the swimming pool like her older brother is. She WILL just climb into the water and give me a mini heart attack:

She has taught me that very few children can pull off pigtails that have absolutely NO curl to them whatsoever, and stick straight out, but she can do it and still look amazing and adorable:

She has taught me the importance of PUSHING those gender boundaries!

She DARES you to replace
that truck with a doll!

She has taught me how adorable bedtime can be!

....Okay so Andrew has contributed a good deal to the bedtime cuteness.

I kinda love her...a lot.

"a not so very ordinary girl or name..."

Dr. Facebook

There is a lot of complaining going on about what happens on facebook in recent months. Failblog has even dedicated an entire section of its website to facebook fails!
Since I am SUCH a facebook veteran (6 1/2 years kids, 6 1/2 YEARS!) I feel that I can appropriately diagnose and recommend treatment for many of the ailments and diseases that are spreading around facebook like the bloody plague! Just call me Dr. Facebook! (or at the very least, Nurse Practitioner Facebook)

Here are a few of my new contributions to the DSM IV:

Diagnoses: "Severe text-speak syndrome"

• Symptoms: Every status update, or comment posted follows absolutely 0 of the rules of proper grammar nor do they even sound like normal spoken conversation when repeated out loud. Words that everyone who has passed the second grade should know how to spell, are purposefully misspelled. Often when a correction is attempted, it is met with further ignorance.

ex: "OMG y r so many ppl stupid? srsly me n mii bff r liek teh only ppl i no who rnt dum!"

• Treatement: My recommendation is for everyone else to completely ignore these types where all possible. Often it will run its course and the person suffering will grow a few more brain cells, graduate high school, and hopefully, feel intense and severe amounts of shame at EVER writing like that. 

Diagnoses: "Acute Attention Whore-dom" or  AAW!! 

• Symptoms: At least once a day, a status is updated to a vague, often melancholy, and always shamelessly attention seeking update, frequently ending such an update with an ellipsis.  ex: " this is the most terrible thing to have ever happened to me..." When some well meaning person attempts to ask what is wrong, they are usually met with, "I don't want to talk about it..."

• Treatment: My professional recommendation is this: DON'T FREAKING POST IT ON FACEBOOK IF YOU "DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT IT" !!!

Diagnoses: "Obsessive, Compulsive Sharing Syndrome" 

•  Symptoms :  At least every other status update is a 're-share' of some inspirational quote about motherhood/friendship/womanhood/'strong' womanhood/devoted motherhood/having a daughter/having a son/being a strong person/woman/bitch etc. This will often accompany a picture of a cute puppy/kitten/bunny/sunset/rose/beach landscape/blue with pixelated sparkles etc. These people have very little to say of themselves, yet still feel drawn to click "share" whenever they see a picture that somebody else shared recently that they feel applies to them in some way.
• Treatment: In my 'professional' opinion the sufferer should spend some time away from his/her computer, and possibly get outside and see some real life trees to remind themselves that, not every pretty tree has some gag-inducing quote about how 'unique each individual is' plastered over it in monotype corsiva. Perhaps do something that could be used as material for an original status update.

Diagnoses: "Chronic Compulsive Opinion Tourettes"

• Symptoms: Multiple times a week (if not day) this person posts either an original status update, or a link to a blog/article/picture/meme supporting his/her feelings on Atheism/extreme Christianity/Some other severely controversial topic. This person usually accompanies this link to a picture or article with some sarcastic, inflammatory comment towards whichever group they are against. Often they appear to be trying to spark heated arguments, only to eventually explode at everyone.

ex: "F*** all you sheep! You are all f****** idiots!!"

• Treatment: a Rx for Self Restrainex™, with unlimited refills. No generic brand available.

Diagnoses: "Originality Dysfunction Disorder" 

• Symptoms: Multiple times a day, a status is updated with random song lyrics. Occasionally they are put in quotation marks to let people know that they are actually quoting someone. Often however, there is no use of quotations, causing the confused (often older, adults unfamiliar with what is currently playing on the radio)  to ask questions about why you want to "take down dominoes all the time."
• Treatment: If you can't post something original, limit it to once a week, and for gosh sakes use quotation marks!

Diagnoses: "Extreme Over-Reaction Syndrome"

• Symptoms: These people are often simultaneously suffering from CCOT. They find a status update/shared link, that talks about something they disagree with, and proceed to slam the poster either very harshly, or sarcastically, and sometimes both. These people then continue to wait until the original poster responds to their comments and continuously bash and demean them until the original poster either deletes their comments from their page, or un-friends them, or both.
• Treatment: The Self Restrainex™ often works well for sufferers of these types as well. Often the antagonized will feel that retribution in like manner (trolling comments on his/her profile and status updates) are necessary, however this is a mistake, and can often lead to unwanted "facebook wars" which should be avoided at all cost, as they exacerbate nearly all of the symptoms of every facebook illness.

There are many other serious Facebook maladies out there, but these are currently some of the worst.

On second thought, just prescribe everyone some Self Restrainex™ Heaven knows we could all benefit from it!

What I've been up to.

I have been a very negligent blogger lately. You may be wondering, "Why is that Corinne? What is more important than us, the 4-5  people, (who are more than likely related to you, and therefore, grudgingly obligated) who read your blog?" Well let me tell you...stuff. Very important stuff. Stuff like this:

See that? And with only 2% battery power left! VERY important stuff!

Warriors, come out and PLAY!

The Warrior Dash. Until a little over a year ago, I didn't know what it was either. Robert came to me and told me his brothers were asking him to do it with them. Seeing how I am always in favor doing ridiculous things together as adult siblings (see this post) I was in favor. Being the adventurous type, I decided to pack up my, then two year old and three month old, and tag along to watch. Robert had done a little research on this running series which turned out to be a 5k mud run, which many of the participants dressed up in ridiculous costumes  to trudge through the mud. Because we are who we are, Rob decided he wanted to throw together a costume as well. This is what he spent about a week and a half "throwing together"

Clever, I know, but consider the weather in March in South-
East Texas...It was hot and he STILL wore this!

I watched him as he came around the bend and towards the finish and leapt over rows of fire and then dove into the mud pit with barbed wire strung above it, forcing the participants to crawl through the mud on hands and knees, before crossing the finish line. I thought to myself as I watched all the people doing this, "I could do this, if I was in better shape"

  From that moment I decided that I would get off my lazy behind and stop accepting my post (not just one but TWO) baby body, and make it better.  So I started running. you may remember this post discussing my, then hatred for the activity. As time went on however, call it stockholm syndrome if you like, but I grew to accept it, like it, love it, and eventually, to need it! Thats right, I need to run in order to maintain my sanity these days! Well, throughout all that time, I always had the warrior dash in the back of my mind, and last saturday I finally got to see it through and run my very own warrior dash! I had one of the best times ever! It had been raining almost the entire week before, and got sunny for saturday so the course was EXTRA muddy, which was pretty awesome, except that a lot of the runners didn't know how to hold onto their shoes which got pulled of in the ankle-knee deep mud that covered 2/3rds of the course. For the record, my shoes stayed on the whole time, though I slipped and fell on the  wet mud, a number of times..

Because I can't pass up an opportunity to dress up for something, I made us district 12 tribute t-shirts, because I felt this was an appropriate place to pay homage to the Hunger Games. (These shirts will serve double duty as I will be wearing them to the midnight release of the movie as well, because, thats just how I roll)

The difference I find in myself from last year when Rob ran his first warrior dash and this year, is significant. I have re-gained my 'pre-baby' body and then some! Meaning I weigh less now than I did before I got pregnant with my first baby. Go me! (oh please, stop with all the applause, no no, I am just like any of you, stop chanting my name!)

Fortunately, my genius husband thought to buy a waterproof camera to carry along with us during the race to take pictures of the course that wasn't open to spectators. My family was set up near the end of the course and got a heap of pictures from there as well, so we have a TON of pics from this year.

So here are but a few of the fun things we did on our Dash of warriors!

Phase one: The still clean phase.

The getting ready to go phase.

The, getting used to the slick mud phase

The waist deep...

...ankle deep

And chest deep muddy water phase

the rope climbing phase (complete with hero stance)

The 'I'm not sure whats challenging about walking through
a 12 foot tunnel but I will go ahead and do it' phase

The, tires full of ankle deep mud phase

the, running over floating barrels phase.

the 'we do this TOGETHER' phase!

the, climbing up and over a wall phase.

The, climbing over the 20ft. tall cargo net phase

The jumping over fire phase!

The, doofus jump pose, phase

The, not so doofus-y jump pose phase.

The, crawling through mud and gravel, which tore up my
knees, phase.

The, covered in mud, and happy about it, phase.

The, Rob asking anyone if they want a hug, phase

The aftermath phase.

The lovely shades of purple, bruising all over my legs, phase.

We are totally doing it again next year, and dragging my family into it too!

Weddings and Things.

So I haven't written in a while. Don't worry you haven't missed THAT much, and what you have missed I will fill you all in on!
 SO! First off I must go on a bit about my new favorite thing. Robert and I decided that we were REALLY sick of our wireless provider. We were paying more than we wanted to and didn't even have smart phones or even a data plan! We were tired of living in the dark ages of wireless devices and finally bit the proverbial bullet, and switched plans! Before we ever decided to switch we knew what we wanted, and NO we are not brainwashed zombies, or mindless followers. And let me just say that I ALSO appreciate the validity and of 'other' smart phones/devices. Androids, blackberries etc, but, we happen to have really good luck with apple products! My beloved Macbook pro is a full year old. I love how easy it is to use, and I haven't had a SINGLE problem, even with my two small children who, from time to time get their hands on it!
 ....I'm sure you see where this is going, and yes, I GOT AN iPHONE!!! It is my new baby and I love it SO very much! There really IS an app for everything! My current favorite has to be my fitness pal which helps me track my running and workouts, and keeps me from eating too much (which apparently I was doing before) Since Rob is a pilot, we can facetime when he is out and has to be away from home for periods of time, which the kids love! Words with friends, just makes me happy and I feel like I must reach out to my "friends" out there and invite you all to join me in playing some of the most drawn out games of scrabble ever played! (thats right, even those of you who haven't seen me in person since I lived in Memphis twelve years ago... SCRABBLE people!)
Um *cough* anyways... yeah so moving on.
My sister Kristen recently got married.

Adorable right? I have to say that we were all a little worried about Krissy there for a while. She wasn't quite living up to her 'partner potential' with the guys she was seeing. So when she brought Bill home last year, and we got to know him a bit, we all breathed a BIG sigh of relief because he IS a pretty darn awesome guy. (and seriously, just look at that face! A-DOR-A-BLE!!)

SO when the wedding plans became 'official' I was ready! As the eldest sister, and being married myself, it fell upon me to be the 'matron-of-honor'. I had the bridal shower in the bag so I didn't worry about that. (it went off without a hitch of course) Then there was the matter of the "dress" not Krissy's dress oh no. I knew it would be fabulous because she wouldn't have it any other way. I was relieved to hear that she wanted us all to wear black. Black is good. Black is elegant. Black is a flattering color on everyone.  I got a bonus when she said that all the styles would be varied according to our individual styles. SCORE! I was ready for this dress. If you have read this blog for a while, then you know that I have been running away from the disgusting, post-baby fat that was lingering, nastily, on my body and have been relatively successful in my endeavors to escape it. 

So we went out in January and dress-shopped. It was a good day. Both Kristen and I found our dresses on the same shopping trip (her's was more important than mine of course, but still...)

Mad props go out to the other bridesmaid who did my hair (Thank you Ashlee Drake. Your years of doing hair for dance recitals has paid off!)

The wedding itself was lovely of course and went off, pretty much without a hitch. Now my sister is married too, and I have a brother in law who is awesome, and doesn't mind when I make "Bill" jokes!

The most popular comments on this photo
since it has been posted on facebook, is that
we are apparently "twins". Pay no attention
to that seven year age gap behind the curtain people

Here are some highlights from the.....blessed event.... and...okay, who am I kidding. Here are some really adorable pictures, that mostly feature my really adorable kids and me with my hair looking REALLY great!

See! Loved my hair that day!

Aubrey getting ready with the girls!

Me and my needy baby!

This was our official "bridesmaid's" pose
...We nailed it

Nothing but pure, unadulterated vanity here.
I feel attractive and look at the cute baby
that I made!

I sort of adore this handsome kid!

Dancing!

Dancing!! (and hiding a bubble wand
in the pocket)

Something was brought to my attention about this next picture. Supposedly my husband and I have a 'signature' pose. 

This is us at Kristen and Bill's wedding, March 10th 2012

This is us at my friend Savannah's wedding in August 2004

...Yeah, I don't see the similarity either.