My Best Friend, Kirby

On January 2, of this year, I was introduced to the Kirby Sentria. There was a knock on the door and the girl standing there told me that she had a gift for me if I would let her give me a demo of her product. Of course I wasn't really interested, I had been wearing the same pajamas for two days, and the house was a disaster. And of course I said yes.

Well.. The demo took three, maybe four hours. It surpassed ridiculous and was borderline annoying. This vacuum though, it was amazing. It did everything! You can literally paint your walls or change a lightbulb with a Kirby. My current vacuum was losing suction and I was in the market for a new one anyway, so I kept listening. And then we got to the price. I was ready to drop several hundreds of dollars, but I wasn't at all expecting the insane price that I was quoted.

$2400.... What?! No. I told the guy to leave. Being that this was a vacuum sales man, he had all sorts of "deals". If I gave him my old vac, that'd be several hundred off. If I donated a certain number of cans, that'd be a couple hundred off. If donated to Toys for Tots (even though it was well after Christmas), more money off. The price ended up getting down to $1400, which I still was comfortable paying without talking to my husband first. Lucky for me, there was no direct line to Afghanistan, so buddy had to leave.

Fast forward to September. As I glanced out of my front window, I noticed shady people knocking on my neighbors doors. Please, please, please come to my house..! Sure enough they did!! The moment I had been waiting NINE months for. The salesman started on some shpeel about they had a new office in the area and wanted to demo their equipment. "Save it. I know what you want. I want your vacuum." I straight up told the guy that I didn't want a demo, I didn't want my time wasted, and I wasn't going to pay more than $1200. Easy peasy. He did stick around for a tiny bit just to show me some features and help me learn to use it.

I've done some research and apparently the Kirby salespeople always tell you not to mention to your neighbors "how good of a deal you got". Well friends and neighbors, I think I got a pretty good deal. I paid a lot less than some of the other wives that I know. If you have a Kirby, how much did you pay? It's a fantastic appliance, but definitely not worth getting screwed for.

Anyway, I recently found a recipe online to make your own dry foam for the Kirby shampooer. You can make it for a fraction of the price of the actual shampoo, and considering that one bottle of shampoos doesn't go very far, this is a great deal! I'll be sharing that tomorrow as well as my own version of the recipe. Being at my parents' house got me out of the blogging routine, so hopefully sharing my love for Kirby will help get me back.

Wordless Wednesday

Some photos from the past week

This Blogger App Sucks Too

I don't know why, but this updated blogger app keeps posting my stuff with the wrong date and time. The last post that I made was actually from last night, but I updated it and reposted this morning. This post is kind of a test to see if this posts correctly.

People Suck

One of our credit cards was hacked and I'm pissed. I'm almost positive that I know how it happened. Thankfully, USAA is a fabulous company to do business with and they're taking care of us.

Last week as I was driving to Miami for Thanksgiving I had to make a stop for gas. It's always a regular stop that we make to fill up the tank, grab some food or drinks, and switch from I-95 to the Turnpike. While at the gas station I was approached by a girl asking if I had perfume. Umm... No. Sorry.. It was strange, but I just figured that her and her friends across the parking lot were smoking weed.

Fast forward to last night. I logged on to my USAA account since its the end of the month to check how much cash we had. It might be kinda strange, but I like to challenge myself at the end of the month to see how much cash I can transfer to the savings account. I figured that I'd be doing great this month since I've been at my parents' house and haven't spent anything. Wrong-o!! Holy crap. The amount was close to $1000 lower than it should have been. At first I panicked, and then I called USAA. Luckily Hubs was online just at that moment so I could ask if he had been shopping.

I have a feeling that the chick at the gas station was some how able to magnetically steal my account details. Now I'm kicking myself because usually I don't take the whole wallet out of the car but this time I did.

The two people that helped me I the phone were great. I cried and one of the guys was so sympathetic and understanding.

So now I have to wait for the fraud department to investigate and get us our money back. The great thing about USAA is that you're not responsible for fraudulent purchases made with your account.

I hope everyone else has had a much lovelier start to their week. Mother Nature isn't agreeing with me either and I've been in crippling pain.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving my blog friends! I have several things to be thankful for this year.

For one, I have a marvelous little family. My baby celebrated her first Thanksgiving today, and other than a nasty diaper rash is completely healthy. Hubs had Thanksgiving dinner flown in to his FOB and he said it was delicious.

I was able to successfully make the drive to my parents' house without a co-pilot. Thank goodness for my awesome preparation.

Today was spent with both of my parents, all three siblings, and my (brand new Marine) brother-in-law.

Hopefully this will be the last holiday that I celebrate without the Hubster.

It is now socially acceptable for me to go absolutely crazy with my Christmas decor.

Black Friday online sales.

What are you thankful for this year?

Traveling With Toddlers: Roadtrip

Tomorrow is going to be quite the day for my girls and I. We'll be on the road for a total of about 10 hours. Usually I have some one drive with me when we drive long distances, so it'll be the first time that it's just the three of us. Normally I count on my co-pilot to pick up dropped sippy cups and switch the DVDs in the player, but this time all of that falls on me. I'm excited and nervous to make the trip alone.

In the morning we'll be waking up a little earlier than usual to head to Parris Island for my brother-in-law's graduation (BTW, I'm so proud of him! He's the honor grad from his Company). It's about an hour and 15 minutes north of us so it shouldn't be too bad. After the graduation we'll be driving back down south, picking up the dog and then continuing the seven and a half hours south to Miami.

I've made lists galore to make sure that I don't forget anything, but chances are that I will. Thankfully I'll be stopping by the house before I get on the road for the long haul in case I do forget something. Snacks and lunch for the girls will be portioned in to baggies so that handing it back is simple. I haven't decided how I'm going to work the formula situation for Baby A, so we'll see about that. I have Capri Suns in the freezer to act as ice packs and keep other items cold. The one good thing about not having someone in the passengers seat, is that I'll have everything readily accessible.

I'm considering taking my Cricut and sewing machine down to Miami also, just in case I get bored during the day. Whether or not I take them though depends on how much space I have.

Although a little reluctant, I'm excited to try and do this with the girls. I hope I don't lose my mind. If I learn anything, I'll be sure to share!

Commi High

It is pretty rare for me to venture out to the commissary being that we live about half an hour from post. It's even rarer for me to go shopping anywhere on or just after payday. Now combine the two. You're more likely to see a mermaid riding a unicorn than to see me at the commissary on payday. Not this week though. I seriously felt a high after my shopping trip this week. Now I understand why those crazy extreme couponers do what they do!

I got everything in the picture below for $28. Now I know I'm not on the same level as an extreme couponer, but it sure felt like it. Between the Commissary sidewalk sale and a couple of random coupons that were at the store, I think I did well.

Each of the cereal boxes was $.50. They were on sale for $1.25 each, but when you purchased them in groups of three, you could use a coupon for $3.00 off. Since I bought two Rice Krispies, I got the marshmallows free. The macaroni and cheeses were $.44 each, and the jello mold, $.99. I also got four bottles of Spray and Wash that are still in my car for $.25 each. With a coupon, a 20-count box of Lipton teas was $1.00

I can't exactly remember what the rest of the prices were and my recipe has gone missing, but I'm super happy with the purchase. I seriously can not wait until the next sale, they always have great deals!

Hmm..

For some reason, the awesome updated Blogger app that I tweeted about yesterday ate my Wordless Wednesday post. Its showing up on the app but not on my dash on the computer. Very strange.

Lately, I've also had an issue with a ton of comment spam. Is anyone else having this issue? My page views have gone up drastically, but I'm pretty sure they aren't legit views.. ): I know it's annoying, but I'm considering adding the image verification thing back so that I don't have to deal with the spam at all.

I'm currently working on a pretty cool painting that I saw in a magazine. It's paint splashed onto two canvases. I started out with black and I'm going to top it with silver and red to kind of match the bench that I'm working on. The black layer is drying. It shouldn't be too much longer until V and I can do the two other colors.

While the paint is drying, we're watching Noodle & Doodle on OnDemand. I seriously love this show! There are a ton of fun craft and recipe ideas to do with kids.

Wordless Wednesday

Life Is Good

Up until lately, it seems like I've been super busy with life. And by life, I mean Pinterest projects and FRG. Tomorrow night will be my second to last FRG meeting as the leader for this Company. It has been a very long three years as FRG leader and I am so ready to be done with it. Don't get me wrong, I love the FRG, but with this deployment and all of the drama that came with it, I'm happy to be giving it a break.

Last night, a friend and I went to the Rear D commander's house to hang out and drink with him and his wife and discuss what has happened. We had a fun, kid-free night that was spent talking s#!t. It's sad that the actions one person was enough to make me re-think my time as an FRG volunteer. I'm thankful that both commanders fully have my back and didn't let me create a huge issue in my crazy mind.

Since that BS has been dealt with, I think I've been able to relax a little more and just let go of the FRG tension that I've been holding on to. I am beyond happy that this year is almost over, and I'm almost able to relax. For the past couple of days I've been communicating with the parents of Single Soldiers, who have just been phenomenal! No matter how many crazy wives I have to deal with, the awesome parents always make it worth while.

Today the girls and I went to watch the Matthew Freeman 5K Run For Peace at a park near our house. A bunch of our Army friends were running and we wanted to support. Last year, Hubs' company did it as a Company just before the deployment.; many of the Soldiers placed. One of the Soldiers that placed first in his age group was SGT Joshua Born. He was KIA earlier this year. There was a moment to honor him and the group of Soldiers was presented with a flag.

 

Happy Veterans Day!

Happy Veterans Day to all of the veterans out there! Thank you for your service and sacrifice to our country. I am proud to be an Army wife and stand behind my amazing husband and everything that he does for our country.

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Election Day

GRR! I hate it when I have the most awesome genius post typed out and then I do something and it gets deleted. This time, my phone died.

Anyway, I'm glad that the election is finally almost over! I've had enough of the political ranting shoved in my face. This time, like almost every other Presidential Election, there was controversy back home. There were report of voters waiting over six hours. Thankfully I no longer live in Florida and I got to vote by absentee ballot!

The downside to absentee voting, no "I voted" sticker! I found this cool blog that lets you print out stickers in case your polling place ran out or didn't have any. Cuz you know, if there's no sticker, it didn't happen.

Annnd due to a child puking on the couch. This post will be cut short.

Poopsplosion

I know most of the moms will be able to relate to this. If you're not a mom, this might be TMI.

With V exploding diapers were a regular thing. They'd happen probably once a week. Sometimes more, never less. She was fed jar baby food so the stuff went right through her. Sitting in the Bumbo would cause it to squish up everywhere. Thankfully with Baby A I've done this Baby Led Weaning thing and her poop is pretty solid and we've averted any issues for the past 10 months and 29 (28?) days. Today changed all of that.

I woke up to a poopsplosion. My poor Baby A was the victim. It was seriously everywhere! Thankfully, there was no damage to the walls or carpet. I have no idea what the hell I was thinking giving her prunes, prune juice, and beans yesterday. I'll spare you the graphic images that could have accompanied this post and just leave you with a cute one of the clean up.

I hope this isn't an indication of how my week is going to go. Hahaha!

 

It's a Pinterest project Weekend

I seriously feel as though life has gotten in the way of blogging lately. Jacquie and I have spent the night at each others houses just about everyday for the past three weeks or so. Since we're together just about 24/7, I haven't gotten a chance to blog very much. What's worse is I haven't had much of an opportunity to actually follow the blogs that I follow. I'm sorry you guys out there in blog land! I promise that once Hubs is home I'll be posting a bit more regularly and showing off pictures that are of better quality than the cell phone pics which I usually post.

Today and yesterday were spent shopping for material for various projects that will be worked on in the next couple of days weeks. Jacquie and I bought the materials to make a wooden bench, coasters, bath bombs, and lots of Christmas stuff made out of fabric. Friday was Jo-Ann Fabrics, today was Lowe's, and tomorrow will be Jo-Ann's again (they're having a 25% off sale) and possibly Lowe's for something we forgot today. The only thing that I've actually completed so far is my set of Christmas pillows.

The bench might be done tomorrow. We started Jacquie's today but weren't able to finish because of a missing piece. It was seriously so easy though. This is where we got the inspiration from.I'm so excited to complete the bench! I have absolutely NO idea where it's going to go, but the fact that I made it myself and it only cost about $40, makes me happy.

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Have a great weekend everyone! I'll be catching up very soon!

It's November!

It seriously feels as though this year has flown by! Just over ten months ago, Hubster kissed me goodbye on our front porch and headed off to Afghanistan. I'm excited to say that next month he'll be home for good! I'm expecting him to be home for Christmas which is part of of the reason I'm so excited for the holiday this year.

Although he's missed a year's worth of holidays, he was particularly sad about missing Halloween. It was Baby A's first time trick or treating and the first time that V could actually walk up to houses and say trick or treat on her own.

Last night we went trick or treating with a bunch of the other families from our Company. We all met before hand for some pizza and cupcakes. All of the kids were about the same age, so it worked out perfectly. We went trick or treating on post, which was a tiny bit crazy in my opinion. There were seriously hundreds of kids. It was a little wild. Especially with the older kids trampling over our little guys.

Towards the end, it got a bit chilly so I had the girls in jackets with their jeans underneath their dresses. Since she was just chilling in the stroller, Baby A had a blanket too. It made me wonder though, how do kids trick or treat up north??

All in all, we had a fun night! V got a whole bunch of stuff, most of which has been consumed today. There wasn't really anything worthy of being stolen though. I'd say the candy tax was pretty low this year. I guess since the economy sucks, people weren't willing to spend the big bucks on the good stuff.

Huge Monkeys and Tutus Giveaway!

Hey all! I am participating in Misty's giveaway over on her blog: Monkeys and Tutus. I'm giving away a 200x200 ad space along with a Starbucks gift card. She has a ton of great prizes packages which feature a variety of things from ad space to make-up/nail polish and gift cards. If you're a blogger, this is a great opportunity to win some exposure as well as meet new bloggers.