Show Me the Money

When we started our family, we wanted to put some things into place to help our kids learn about money. This is kind of a hard thing because you have to choose what you expect your kids to pay for, and what the family economy will be like. There are a lot of opinions about things like whether kids should have jobs in high school and whether they should be given allowance. 

When I was in school for my Marriage and Family Relations degree, this was a topic that came up in a few different courses. The research varies, so suffice it to say, there are a lot of different ways to handle money in a family, and various methods have good outcomes. I know a family that didn't allow their kids to have jobs while they were in school, and now those kids are all successful adults whose incomes have far surpassed their parents'. I know families whose kids were expected to work and pay their way for everything, and they, too, are very successful, affluent adults. So when it comes to kids and money, there's no perfect way, but there are many ways that work out. The most important thing, in my opinion, is to model living below your means, and be grateful for what you have. 

A few things we have implemented with our kids in regards to money are:

1. Starting a savings for them early on

From the time our kids were babies, they've received some gifts in the form of money. We put that money in the bank - even if it was just $20 a year. As they got older, they started being more aware of their birthday and Christmas money, so occasionally, it doesn’t make it into the bank, but about 75% of the money they've received as gifts has gone into the bank. This hasn't amounted to tons of money, but it's something. 

2. We give unconditional allowance

That makes them sound spoiled, but it's $5 every two weeks when they are little (to match our pay day, they also get pay day), and then when they get older, it's $10. So it's seriously next to nothing. The purpose is to give them the opportunity to practice having money. They need the chance to make stupid decisions. They need to learn to save or wait for things, and anticipating a few dollars every two weeks helps them do that. 

I am also always willing to come up with a plan for them to earn some money if they want to. 

3. We pay for what they need as long as they are being responsible

We cover the expenses of their extracurricular activities and things like gas and insurance as long as they are doing well in school, behaving at home, driving safely, meeting curfew, and helping out when asked.

4. We do a "savings match"

We opened a savings account for each kid with two simple rules:

1. We will match any money they put in that savings account up to $1,200 a year. 

2. They don't get the money until they turn 25. 

We did this so they will have a little bit of savings in young adulthood, but we didn't want to hand it over at age 18 or 21, so we decided to go with 25. We wanted them to have the experience of doing something now that will benefit them later. So far, Nicky and Daisy have caught on really well, and they have chosen to save as much money as they can. Zoe is starting to understand more. Eva, on the other hand, has put $8 in that account for a whopping total of $16. 

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We definitely don't know yet if we've made the best choices, but we've had some positive results. All of our kids have gone through a phase where money burns a hole in their pockets, but as they've become older teens, they've shown a lot of responsibility. Nicky and Daisy have become savvy shoppers, and they both love buying things second-hand. Zoe spends a little more, but she always knows exactly what she wants. Eva... well... let's just say we're still going to be working with that one for a while. 

One thing I need to work on with my kids is showing them more of the cost of living expenses we have so they can get familiar with the services we pay for and how much things cost. As our income has become a little more flexible, our kids have gotten accustomed to things like streaming services and family outings. They don't remember that we went without internet for three years because we couldn't afford it or that we used to mow my grandma's lawn for $20 a week, and that's all the money we had for groceries. 

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I wanted to share this in case other parents are looking for options for how to work with kids and money. I got the idea for the savings match from someone else and modified it to work for our family. Where past generations have not thought it appropriate to talk about money, I think it's very important to have conversations about it. Some aspects of finances are definitely no one's business, but I think it's important to teach our children how to handle money. 

On THAT Note (part II)

Since I posted about the notes on my phone last week, I’ve needed to expound on a couple of my lists. A few days ago, I wrote about my list on my phone about the kind of person I want to be. Today I’m going to give more details about another topic: Little People sets I want to buy.

As a kid, I had a lot of Little People sets - the farm, the car garage, the zoo, and more. In fact, I think I might have had all of them that existed. Or maybe between my family and my extended family, I played with all of them. When I look back at photos of the sets, they are all familiar and I remember playing with each of them. If I owned all of them, I was truly a spoiled child! I wish we still had them! I didn't know what a treasure they were! I think all that remains - and it's at my mom's house - is the Little People airplane. 

Sidenote: I had no idea they were called "Little People" when I was a kid.

As you probably know, Little People have been completely revamped for the modern-day child. Nothing will ever compare to the originals, but I like the current Little People as well. When Nicky was little, we had Noah's ark, the farm, and the nativity. Then when we had Daisy, I couldn't resist the Disney princess sets. We still have the nativity and the princesses (though I donated some of their castles to the Church nursery). 

In recent years, they have come out with a lot of fun collectors Little People sets, and I confess, I've been a sucker for them. I've seen them online and felt a great desire to start my own Little People collection (I've had the same urge for Polly Pockets). For years I've thought, "Should I start a collection?" but I never did because 1) I didn't want to find somewhere to put them and 2) I didn't want to spend the money.

But that all changed when the Lost set dropped. 

My heart longed for Little People, and my friend Christie ended up giving me the Lost set for my birthday this year. Then my friend Lynsie gave me the Golden Girls set for my birthday, and that secured my fate - I was going to start collecting my own Little People!

With some birthday money and leftover funds from selling pumpkin rolls last fall, I started investing in my collection. I didn't go hog wild - I just started watching the prices on a few sets I liked, and I bought some when I saw good deals. My collection now consists of:

Up

The Notebook

Back to the Future

E.T. 

Nightmare Before Christmas

Golden Girls

Lost

and as of this week, Beetlejuice.

And then there are the princesses as well that we have from Daisy, which are currently in storage. She doesn't know this, but they will not be going with her when she leaves this house. They will stay in my possession for future grandkids. 

As my Little People sets started rolling in, I found myself in a predicament. Part of the fun of the collection is the boxes that they come in, but I don't want them to just sit in boxes looking pretty because the other part of the fun of the collection is to unbox them and play with them. This made me more understanding of my friend's husband who has a massive toy collection and has made a habit of purchasing two of everything - one to keep in the box and one to play with (I originally thought he was a little extreme. I get it now). 

I decided that I am going to keep the Little People sets in their boxes, but only temporarily. I am going to build my collection for a while, and then, when I become a grandma, I will open my Little People sets. That is going to be my "grandma prize" when my first grandchild is born. There is no timeline for this yet - I could be a grandma two years from now, twenty years from now, or never. (If the answer is never, then I'm going to have to do my opening for my 60th birthday party or something). 

And that is why one of the notes on my phone is titled "Little People" - because I am keeping a running list of the sets I want to buy so I can watch for sales and build my stash. 

It's finally happening, folks. 

The Bear Necessity

My friend Lynsie and I sometimes buy each other beautiful offerings from the thrift store and leave them on one another’s porches. In 2014, I found a ceramic bear on my porch holding a bag of lemon bars from Schmidt’s Pastries. 

Zoe was just under two years old, and she fell in love with that bear. 

She carried it around like a stuffed animal, and that thing got dragged all over the house for a few years. At some point, the bear broke, but we don’t remember how it happened. We just know it was devastating.

Last year, I was in my neighbor’s basement, and I saw this:

It was the same bear!

I took a picture and sent it to Lynsie, telling her I found a replacement bear, and I was gonna steal it!

(I’m a big talker. I didn’t steal the bear).

Sadly, my neighbor and long-time friend is now moving. On Saturday, she was having a yard sale, and at 7:00 that morning, I suddenly remembered the bear in her basement. I texted her the photo of her bear and asked if she was selling it. I don’t know if it was included in her original yard sale plans, but she said she would sell it to me! I promised to explain to her why I wanted to buy her bear and why I had a photo of it (creepy). 

Later that morning, we walked over to the yard sale to get the bear. Not only did she save the bear for me, she saved his friend! So I bought two coordinating, ceramic bears and brought them home along with a wagon, a beach tent, and a set of dominoes that I snagged before Papa G across the street could. 

My girls were so excited about the bears. Zoe remembered her love for “Beary,” our former bear of note, and she recognized the likeness of new guy right away. Eva named the other bear Harry, so now we have Beary and Harry, and they live in a cardboard apartment.

This probably wasn’t what my friend envisioned when I asked to buy her bear, but I’m glad she went along with it! I promise they will be loved and cherished for a long time!

How My Oven Made Its Exit

Every time Scotty travels, we have some sort of catastrophe while he’s gone. Luckily they’ve been mostly manageable - like kids throwing up or the van battery dying (neither are ideal, but I can at least figure out how to solve those problems).

When Scotty left for Asia, we joked about what would happen while he was gone. We didn’t want to tempt fate or anything, but realistically, if your spouse is gone for two weeks, something is bound to happen. I’ve been worried for months that one of our cars would break down while he was gone, and that’s partially why we got a new van when we did.

We had just about made it to the one week mark when the catastrophe hit.

I was laying on my bed doing something important on my phone (I’m sure of it) when I heard Daisy and Zoe yelling up to me, “Mom! The glass on the oven broke!”

I was like, “What? Huh? What do you mean?”

And they were like, “The glass!”

I walked downstairs and saw the oven like this:

Frankly, I was stunned. I froze up for a few minutes and just stared at it, like wha?!? 

I could hear the glass continuing to crack, and little bits and pieces kept crumbling and falling on the floor so that, within minutes, the hole in the oven was doubled in size.

I figured I should probably get as much of the glass off the oven door as possible so it would stop crumbling and falling on the floor, so I spent a good chunk of time trying to carefully remove pieces and get them safely disposed of.

Inside the drawer

I vacuumed a lot over the next several days. No matter how much I cleaned up, I kept finding more and more glass. It was messing with my mind because I felt like I had glass particles in between my toes and in my eyeballs and up my nose. I didn’t, fortunately, but it was kind of like seeing a spider and then not being able to stop feeling like there’s something crawling on you. 

I ended up buying a new oven, but it wouldn’t be delivered for a week and a half, so the damaged oven stayed put and continued dropping glass. 

The day after Scotty came home, the new oven arrived, and I paid for them to haul the old one away (there was a trail of glass from the kitchen through the living room and out the front door as the oven went away). 

Scotty got the new oven installed, and I couldn’t wait to try it out. I got a double oven - something I’ve wanted for many years. It was a little more expensive than other options but was something I was planning to buy eventually and was trying to save up for. It’s crappy that I had to buy it during the most expensive time of the year, but let’s just consider it an early 40th birthday present.

Scotty kindly took Zoe and Holland to the park so I could try out the new oven without any little supervisors bossing me around. I wanted to make cookies for the theatre kids (I signed up to provide dinner for them for a late rehearsal on Monday of this week), so once the girls were gone, I got to work. 

Things started going wrong immediately. You may recall that I’m a bit of a sloppy baker , and I usually make some sort of significant mistake when I bake. My first go round with my new oven was just par for the course.

First of all, I started mixing the dough and realized I was out of baking powder (note that baking powder was on my grocery list a few days prior, and somehow I managed to skip it at the store). So I sent Nicky to get me some baking powder. Luckily, I realized I was also out of brown sugar before he came home so I was able to text him to get some brown sugar, too. Phew (wipes brow. Then washes hand… because cookies…)

When Nicky got home I finished mixing the dough, but I lost count while scooping the flour, and I couldn’t figure out if I had done 4 scoops or 5. I do this all the time, so I’m always telling myself I need to measure the flour into a separate bowl and not put it directly in the dough, but I always believe that *this time* I’ll be fine. 

I am never fine. I always get distracted.

I decided to bake a single test cookie to determine the flour status. Turned out, I needed to add more flour. 

When the cookie dough was ready to go with the proper amount of flour, I started scooping. I filled a baking sheet and put it in the top oven. Then I filled two more baking sheets to put in the lower oven. I put the first sheet in without incident, but when I put the second sheet in, I tipped it too far (I think this was because I’m not used to putting things in such a low oven), and some of the dough started rolling out of position. I tried to adjust the pan to keep them from rolling off, and somehow I burned myself. I was grateful my kids weren’t home so I could yell my favorite swear word without censorship.

I wasn’t able to save the cookie dough, and about five balls of dough fell into the bottom of the oven. 

I removed both cookie sheets from the lower oven and pulled out the racks as fast as I could so I could get to those dough balls before the smoke alarm went off. I threw the two hot racks on the kitchen floor, praying they wouldn’t burn it, grabbed some tongs, and picked out the dough balls.

I couldn’t even keep my oven clean for the first two hours of its life in my house!

After a whole lot of chaos, I finally got the oven put back together and baked six pans of chocolate chip cookies - three sheets at a time, which is just a beautiful thing!

But did the fun stop there? On, no, it did not.

I was making spaghetti for dinner, and I wanted breadsticks! So I mixed up some dough, and while it rested in the mixer for ten minutes, I saw the salt on the counter and couldn’t remember scooping any into the dough. Salt is essential in bread making. It’s more than just flavor - it helps the yeast work properly, so you can’t just skip the salt, so I had to figure out what to do. I took a little piece of dough and licked it to see if I could taste any salt. I couldn’t. I wasn’t sure if it would work, but I decided to mix the salt in the already formed dough and see what would happen. 

By some miracle, it worked! The breadsticks turned out… except I burned them. But they were still edible. Just a lot more browned than normal (they started smoking when I opened the oven… or was that the residual cookie dough particles in the bottom? Who knows!)

So I didn’t get off to a good start with my new, beloved appliance. I hope we have better days ahead! But yesterday I burned a grilled cheese sandwich on the stove top, so for now…please send pizza.

(Quick aside for informational purposes: I often double this recipe and get 80-90 cookies depending on how much dough my family eats before it hits the oven. I have no idea what size my cookie scoop is. I made two double batches so I would have about 140 cookies for theatre (plus some for my family to eat)).

Joyful Noise

It's fall break (no school Thursday-Monday), and I'm sitting across the table from Zoe while she plays Roblox on Nicky's laptop and sings loudly about America. One thing about Zoe - she makes noise with every emotion. If she's happy, she's loud. If she's sad, she's loud.

I can deal with the loud right now because she's happy. She has had quite the emotional few days. 

Zoe has a strange attachment to our household items. A few years ago we got a new couch in our living room, and Zoe went ballistic over us getting rid of our old one. She laid on the cushions and cried for hours, begging us to keep it. She kept saying, "But it's a part of our family!" I thought this was a one-time, attention-seeking episode, but then she did the same thing when we got a new dishwasher. All of a sudden, our old, piece of crap dishwasher had a name and was the most important thing our family had ever owned. I had to hold her back while Scotty dragged the old dishwasher out of the house. 

Well, the time has come for us to buy a new vehicle. Our van is on the fritz and has been for a while. Our truck is also on the fritz, but one thing at a time. We did a few thousand dollars of repairs on the van a few years ago in hopes that we could get it to last another 2-3 years, and luckily, it did. But now we either need to throw a few thousand dollars more into it or replace it, and after thinking about it and looking at a few options, we are going to buy a new (to us) one. 

We bought our current van in 2016. It has lived a good life. It has taken us to California nine times, Saint George five times, and various other destinations like Phoenix, New Mexico, Idaho, and a slew of National and State Parks. It's had a good run, and we've beat the crap out of it. The DVD player is broken, the seams of the seats have come apart and it's shedding bits of foam all over the interior, pieces have fallen off the inside and the outside, the carpet is worn down to the netting, and - let's be honest - it's absolutely disgusting after everything my kids have put it through. It has melted candy in the cup holders, crayon vandalism that no one will own up to, permanent sand in every crevice, and it smells pretty bad, too (shortly after we bought the van, a gallon of milk leaked in the trunk, and we had to pull out the carpet multiple times trying to get it clean, and it's never been the same). 

None of that stuff really matters to me, though. As long as the van is drivable and the fast food window works, I'm happy to keep driving it. But it's been leaking oil off and on for a few years now (we've had some things fixed, but the mechanic said it would likely start leaking again over time, and he was right), it has a strange vibration when we accelerate, and it makes a popping sound in the axels whenever we turn or reverse or make any quick movements. We've done repairs here and there, but it's to the point where we've done all of the affordable fixes and the more expensive ones aren't guaranteed to resolve the issues. 

(Here is when I change tense because it took me so long to write this post that what was present tense when I started is now past tense, and I just have to throw this little aside in here for my own peace of mind).

We found the van we wanted to buy, and when Zoe heard that we were planning on getting a new one, she went nuts (we weren’t going to tell her, but we forgot to let my mom know, and she mentioned it to Zoe without knowing what was going to happen). We got in contact with the seller, and over a few days as we tried to work out a time to go test drive and purchase the van, Zoe was an emotional wreck.

The night she found out about the van, she cried (loudly) for a couple of hours. When we put her to bed, she wailed from her room until she fell asleep. The next morning, she started crying as soon as she woke up. Then she cried on the way to school and refused to get out of the van until I promised her that we wouldn’t get rid of it while she was at school. 

After school, she did this for a while:

This whole deal started Tuesday night and continued through Friday. The odds were good that we would be making the final purchase Friday evening. Knowing this, Zoe requested to have some time alone with “Muffin,” which is what she suddenly started referring to our van as, based on the Bluey character. 

Zoe went out into the garage, instructing us to not come out no matter what we heard. She took the Echo out there and played music by AJR (which she claims is “sad” music), and she wailed for a while (and occasionally checked to make sure the garage door wasn’t completely closed so we could hear her). She told us she was doing a “goodbye ritual.” She also made me provide her with a lantern. 

It was intense.

We did end up getting the new van that night, and as we left the dealership - having traded in “Muffin” - we had to pry Zoe off.

None of the child development, parenting, or psychology classes I took for my degree prepared me for whatever this is.

As we left the dealership, pulling Zoe away from the old van, we tried the Marie Kondo approach and told Zoe to thank the van for serving its purpose and release it. 

As we drove home in the new van, she started feeling better and turned her energy toward fighting with Eva. There was a lot less crying but a lot more yelling. It made the new van instantly feel like “ours.” Ah, the sound of sibling rivalry echoing from the walls of a vehicle driving 65 down Mountain View.

So I’m okay with Zoe’s current noises of happiness because it sure beats the weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth she’s been dishing out for the past several day.

Signs I'm Almost 40

The other day I caught a glimpse of a reel on Facebook with a girl defending herself for doing her hair and make-up to go to the gym. She was like, “I deserve to feel good about myself!”

My thoughts were, “I’m so glad I don’t care!” Because when I go to the gym, sure… it would be great to look fabulous in some cute clothes with my hair and make-up just so, but here’s the fact: I’m gonna walk out of there smelling like the small animal building at Hogle Zoo and soaked in boob sweat. I’m not there to be pretty. I’m there to be gross. I don’t want to waste time and money on hair and make-up for the gym! 

My clothing of choice is stretchy pants and gigantic t-shirts. I used to buy cute workout clothes (and maybe someday I will again), but right now my only criteria is that the clothes keep my butt crack and my belly covered, and that my bottoms have a pocket. Fortunately, most of the people at the gym I go to are of the same mentality. They are there just trying to do some good for their bodies. We are united in our grossness, save for a few anomalies. 

Now that I'm going to the gym regularly again (a lifestyle I used to live until I went back to school and had Eva), there are a couple of things I needed to invest in. 

First, a sports bra. 

I have a few oldies in my drawer, but I don't want to deal with them because A) they have removable padding, which has no practical purpose in my mind. Removable padding just means the pads fall out all the time, and I have to put them back in, and then they get all shifty and give me Lumpy Boob and B) I hate putting bras on over my head, so I keep wearing my regular bra, which is not ideal for certain movements. 

Clearly, I'm lazy, and I need a sports bra for lazy girls. So I went and found one that has built-in padding and that zips in the front. 

Second, some big, ole granny panties. 

I wear religious underclothing (read more about that HERE), every day with very few exceptions. I've been wearing my religious underclothing (which we usually refer to as "garments") to the gym - this is something that the wearer can make a personal choice about. I can't claim I wear them based on any degree of righteousness, though. I'm not of the mentality that we should wear them when we work out (like I said - it's a personal choice), I'm simply too lazy to take them off and put them back on after I work out. So once again, my motive is laziness. BUT... since my grand return to the gym, I have destroyed three pairs of garments from thigh rubbing. Thus my need for some new Underwear of the World. 

So I went to Costco, and I bought the biggest, most covering underwear they had. We're talking full butt cheek embracing, belly button high underwear. 

And friends?

I put those things on for the first time, and I saw myself in the mirror, and I thought, "Wow! These are surprisingly sexy!"

And that is the ultimate evidence that I am almost 40. 

All the Ways My Life Has Changed This Week

This has been a big week (technically week and a half) in the Brittish household. 

First of all, as you know from this post, we bought a Jeep for Nicky to drive. Investing in a third vehicle is a big deal to me. Not only do we need to figure out insurance, gas, and maintenance expenses, we’ve also had to reconfigure all of our parking routines at the house. 

In addition to that, Nicky ended up snagging an appointment for his driver's test a few days ago, and it's official! He got his license! He told his sisters that on the day he got his driver's license, he would take them to McDonald's, so we sent them off on their own to binge Happy Meals and McFlurries. 

On Wednesday, Nicky drove himself to school, and it was wonderful! This morning he dropped Daisy off for early morning dance rehearsal, and I stayed home and stared blankly at the wall because I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do! That just bought me 40 extra minutes in my morning!

A few days after we bought the Jeep, we bought a new dishwasher. I saved all the money I made from selling pumpkin rolls in the fall plus the money I got for Christmas and my birthday, and I went marching into Lowe’s like I owned the places and declared, “I want that one!”

You guys! My dishes are CLEAN and DRY. I've heard that life could be like this, but I never experienced it until now. Our previous dishwasher couldn't even get butter off a plate! (Shouldn't it just melt off? I feel like the darn thing defied science!) The new dishwasher tackled a Pyrex bowl coated in dried up mashed potato residue like it was nothing. 

Over the weekend, someone offered us a gently used mattress. We've needed a new mattress for years but A) there's never any money for a mattress (we accidentally spend it on vacations instead), and B) I have mattress buying phobia (seriously, how do you commit to a mattress? How???) For nearly twenty years, Scotty and I have been sleeping on a mattress we bought from a Marriott hotel for $20 when we first got married. I've seen better mattresses on the side of the road than the one we've been sleeping on. So we took that free mattress, gave it a good shampoo, and put it on our bed. Now our bed is 8" higher, and everything about life is totally different. I can no longer simply sit down on my bed. I have to hop up onto it since it's above butt level. My feet can no longer touch the ground which means, as I discovered on Sunday, I need to come up with a new way to put my tights on.

Another big change to our house from this past weekend is the installation of a new toilet handle. For the past two months, we've had to hold the toilet handle down for 8 seconds to flush the toilet (I counted). Now we get to flush like normal people, and I have at least 12 more minutes available each day!

And if that isn’t enough change for one week, here’s more!

Yesterday I got rid of all our little kid hangers. I swapped out the last of Zoe and Eva’s itty bitty hangers for regular sized ones. We have big kids now with big head holes in their clothes. If moms wore scout shirts and gained patches for various milestones in parenthood, I feel like there would be a patch for this. No more baby hangers. It’s bitter sweet. 

Last but not least, Nicky got a job. Or at least a job offer. He needs to pass his drug test before it’s officially official, which brings us to some more milestones: first job interview, first job, first drug test, and first time peeing in a cup! I hope there’s no backsplash. I found that I didn’t have time to coach him about interviewing for a job, but I spent about five minutes last night before bed talking to him about peeing in a cup.

It’s a special brand of mothering I do.

A lot of big things have happened all at once, and while it’s very exciting and good, I’m not sure this is the pace I prefer! But if it means I get to have clean pots and pans and spend less time being an unpaid Uber, I’ll make it work!

Beauty Tips From Back in My Day

September Writing Challenge - Prompt #33:

Product

I think we can all agree that I'm not a person that anyone should come to for beauty or fashion tips. I'm at peace with that. I peaked in 2006, and I'm pretty much stuck there. But there's one thing I can offer you from 2006 that I still think holds solid, and it has to do with a product... A Monistat product.

Now, I know what comes to mind when you think of Monistat. Calm down, calm down. I'm not going there, but I'm still going to ask you to be open-minded as you read this post. 

The product is Monistat Chafing Relief Powder Gel, and I use it on my face. 

True story!

Many years ago (around 2006), a blogger posted about this product and said she used it as make-up primer. I decided to give it a go, and I've used it as primer ever since! (Here's a post I wrote about it in 2011). I simply rub a light coat of the gel on my face before applying make-up, and it does everything a make-up primer should do, including helping my foundation go on more smoothly.

It turns out, the chafing gel has the same main ingredient as many quality make-up primers (dimethicone) at a fraction of the cost. At the time I started using it, several friends from my blogging circle (which is long dead) switched over from Smashbox and Bare Escentuals primers. 

So there you have my product recommendation! Rub some Monistat on your face! And heck, you can even put some on your thighs. I’m all about killing two birds with one stone.

Saving the Monies

Right now I'm trying really hard to be budget-conscious. I don't have to tell you that food and gas prices are putting a damper on things. We're all feeling it! I routinely debate whether I should pursue some form of employment in the fall when my kids go back to school, but ultimately, I want to continue to stay home if I can. To do so, I have to be wise and careful with what we have. 

Yesterday that meant having hot dog bun French toast for breakfast. 

One problem I'm having, though, is Prime Day. 

Every year, I know that the best way to save money on Prime Day is to not buy anything. You don't save money by shopping on Prime Day (or Black Friday, or whatever "money saving day" it be). You save money by not shopping at all! Yet every year, I sneak a little peek - just out of curiosity - and I end up buying crap. So this year, I said to myself, "Britt, don't even look! Just stay away completely!" and I set a goal to buy NOTHING on Prime Day. 

This is how Prime Day is going...

Me: I know Prime Day is sometime soon, but I'm going to do myself a favor and not look at the dates. If I don't know when Prime Day is, it won't be a temptation to me.

Internet: It's PRIME DAY! It's PRIME DAY!

Me: I guess it is now Prime Day. This day shall pass, and I shall be strong and unaffected.

Internet: PRIME DAY is two days!

Me: I can make it through two days without looking.

Internet friends: Here are ten links to lists of the best things to buy on PRIME DAY!

Me: I will not look! I will not look!

Also me: Just one little peek won't hurt.

Me: Don't do it! 

Also me: But I'm curious...

Me: What you don't know won't hurt you!

Also me: FOMO! FOMO! FOMO!

Me: Save all the monies! It's not worth it.

Also me: You can just look... you don't have to buy anything! You're so curious!

Me: No! No! No!

Amazon: You made it through day one, but you'll never make it through day two! Admit it! I have you in the palm of my hand!

Me: Stand back, Amazon demon! You will never own me!

Amazon: Prove it!

Me: Just... a few... more... hours... I... can... do... this…

Daisy: Mom! All the Sharpies are dried out!

Me: There might be a deal on Sharpies for PRIME DAY!

Also me: No! Don’t check!

Amazon notifications: PRIME DAY! PRIME DAY! PRIME DAY!

Phone robots: Beep bop! We detect someone is trying to resist PRIME DAY! 

Facebook: PRIME DAY!

Email: PRIME DAY!

Instagram: PRIME DAY!

Pinterest: PRIME DAY!

Me: Must… stay… strong…

Feathery, Little Antidepressants

Last week I met up with my friend Lynsie to have lunch for her birthday. Lynsie lives about 40 minutes away, so we’ve developed a tradition of meeting for lunch in the middle. 

It’s like the old Diamond Rio song…

I start driving your way…

You start driving mine…

We meet in the middle…

‘Neath that Chinese food sign…

On the way home from lunch, I had a little bit of time to burn, and then I needed to check Daisy out of school so she could go to the junior high to tryout for the dance team. I have some suet cage bird feeders in my backyard that I wanted to get some new suet bricks for, so I went to IFA to pick some up. 

Every year, the IFA sign, visible from the freeway, reads “Pick up chicks here.” (You are funny, IFA). As I drove past the sign, I thought, “I could get some chicks while Scotty's in Mexico!” 

You see, Scotty wants to be done with chickens when our current ones pass on. I kind of don’t. A few years ago, I was ready to be done with chickens, but then there was a pandemic, and it was hard to find eggs. We live right by an egg farm, and cars would line up for hours to wait for an egg delivery, and the police would have to come direct traffic. With all of the things that were short on supply as the pandemic rolled in, I was incredibly grateful that I could go out in my backyard and get eggs. It made me never want to live without chickens. 

I wasn't really going to get chicks at IFA, but I circled them again and again. “Just looking,” of course. “For informational purposes.”

I ended up with three in a box on my passenger seat. I dunno what happened! But I do know this: a chicken costs less than a carton of eggs right now (darn you, avian flu)!

One by one my kids came home from their various schools and activities and discovered the chicks, which I had put in our living room. They all fell in love. As did I. 

Chicks are magical! And wonderful! And so very special!

I have loved having baby chickens around the house. And I’m just as bad as the kids. I got out an old dollhouse, and I was all…

“Daisy, put the gray one on the couch!”

“Now put one on the toilet and one in the bathtub!”

“Now put one in the house and pretend the other one is coming to visit!”

I also pushed them around the living room in a Barbie car while singing, “They see me rollin’… they hatin’…”

BEST. THING. EVER!!!

And then we all went out for pizza.

I decided to name the chickens after antidepressants - Celexa, Paxil, and Zoloft - because they lifted my mood so much. Then my kids overruled me and named them Princess, Sophie, and Eva (Zoe picked the name Eva, and she doesn't know that her little sister goes by Eva on this blog. So now I have Eva the chicken and Eva the pseudonym).

Scotty wasn't thrilled about the chicks, but I think he has forgiven me. I can sense loving vibes coming out of him as our children shove the babies in his face. I've even caught him hanging out with them in the backyard.

9:15 on 9/15

September Writing Challenge - Prompt #6:

9:15

With the anticipation of this prompt, I put a reminder in my phone to go off today at 9:15. 

At that time, I was parked at an intersection waiting to turn left and listening to The House at Riverton (or The Shifting Fog) by Kate Morton. 

I could end my post there, and that would be the short version. Those of you who want the short version can move on now, but if you want the long version, here it comes:

Yesterday I checked Daisy out of school to take her to get her first COVID vaccine (Happy 12th Birthday!) I picked her up a little early so we could also go to lunch. She wanted to go to Zupa's, and we ended up having a little extra time before her appointment, so we popped into Burlington. We both picked a few things to try on, and I ended up with a shirt that I couldn't decide whether I should get. On the one hand, it was only $9, and it was cute for fall. On the other hand, I don't need any new clothes, and it would require an undershirt such as I don't already own, so a $9 shirt was quick to become a $20 shirt. 

I decided not to get the shirt, and I stashed it on a rack somewhere in the store. 

Shame on me, I know. I'm not proud.

A short time later, I started regretting not buying the shirt, and this morning after I dropped my girls off at school, I figured I would check the Burlington hours, and if they were open, I'd stop in quickly and buy the shirt. They were open! So I went in and went straight to where I'd left the shirt. It wasn't there. So I scoured every place an employee might have returned it if they'd found it on the wrong rack. 

I never found it. And I can't help but wonder if it's bad karma for not putting it back where I got it.  

And that, my friends, is why I found myself at the intersection at 9:15 on September 15, 2021 - driving home in self-defeat.

A-Shopping We Did Go

We don't have any solid "back to school shopping" traditions in our family, but this year and last year, I've tried taking my kids on individual shopping dates. In all honesty, my kids don't really need anything. We went through all their clothes and I wrote down what they actually need, and it came down to one or two back packs, underwear for one kid, and a couple pairs of shorts, and even then, none of those items were dire. Everyone has plenty of everything, and that's usually the case every year, so I always have quite the wrestle with back to school shopping. Yet, we do it. Because it helps them look forward to school... right? And there's a lot of social stuff that goes into it... right? 

I took Zoe and Eva shopping together at The Mall a couple of weeks ago.  

Matching has always been a struggle for my kids. They don't understand it at all, and for many years, I've turned a blind eye and let them wear whatever crazy outfit combinations they want in an effort to choose my battles wisely. Penguin leggings and a floral top? Sure, whatever. I'm just happy you're dressing yourself! But this year I decided to try steering them more toward clothes that actually go together, so I made a rule that whatever they picked needed to be an "outfit." If you want bunny pants, you need to find a shirt to match. If you can't make it an outfit, we're not getting bunny pants. 

It was a struggle. We spent hours pulling everything they loved off a shelf and then laying it out on the ground as ensembles. We put a lot of things back, causing magnificent tragedy in their lives. I tried to teach them the joy of jeans... jeans match everything! Those five shirts you love? You can wear every single one of them with this pair of jeans. Isn't that wonderful? How about we invest in two pairs of jeggings that match every shirt you can find instead of buying those butterfly pants? Oh! And the fact that butterflies like flowers doesn't mean that butterfly pants match every flowery top in H&M. 

Zoe and Eva didn't take in these lessons perfectly, but they definitely learned a thing or two. After we finished shopping, we hung out at a church waiting for Nicky to finish up at a water park with friends, and the girls spread out all of their "outfits" on the lawn and did inventory of their purchases. 

My next shopping trip was with Daisy. She's my biggest struggle because she and I have completely different tastes, and I seriously hate everything she likes. She basically just wants to wear gigantic, tie-dyed everything. She tends to latch on to one clothing item at a time and wear it over and over and over. I have to nag her every day to change her clothes, and last year I had to make a rule that she has to wear two different outfits before she can wear the same one again. Then all school year, she would still put on the same outfit everyday unless I caught her and told her to go change. Then she would stomp her feet and start crying. 

I never wanted to be a mom who nags her kids over how they dress - I remember how important it was for me to have that independence as a child - and yet... here I am... battling my daughter over her clothes almost every day. Clothes and hygiene... hygiene and clothes... day in and day out...

So back to school shopping with Daisy? Not the most pleasant thing I've experienced. I had to make too many rules. No, I won't buy you any hoodies. You can only pick ONE tie-dyed item. If I buy you that, you have to get rid of the old, dirty one you already have. 

I ended up mostly shopping for myself so I could at least buy something I liked.

My last shopping trip was with Nicky, and that had its challenges as well. You may recall that Nicky has preferred a wardrobe of Hawaiian shirts and gym shorts since fifth grade. For the past two years, he's had to wear uniforms for school - basically polos and khaki shorts - so I've been interested to see what his fashion plan is for high school. When I took him shopping, I set him free to look for clothes on his own, but he ended up wandering like a little, lost dog in the middle of Burlington. Eventually he came to me and said, "Mom, I don't know what to look for." So I perused the aisles with him and offered him a shirt or two. I would say, "Do you like this?" and he would say, "I don't know." So we did that through a few stores until he settled on a Nintendo 64 t-shirt, a golf shirt, and a button-down top with cacti on it (to fulfill his Hawaiian shirt dreams). We also found him a pair of shoes, and then I ordered him a "Save Ferris" t-shirt online because that's the only thing he actually wanted. 

Now that we are fast approaching a new school year, I would say that the trends from the Brittish household for the coming year would have to be classified as "not exactly fashion forward." But I guess I'll just be grateful that we are clothed and that we remain consistent over time.

Ninety-Six Thousand

Since watching In the Heights for the first time a few weeks ago (and a couple of times since), our whole family* has had the songs stuck in our heads. 

One of the more common lines we find ourselves singing is, “Check one, two, three, what would you do with 96 G’s?” 

In that song, the characters sing about what they would do if they won the $96,000 lottery. 

The other day, while in the car, I was thinking about what I would do with 96 G’s. As far as lotteries go, it’s not the greatest sum, but it sure beats the $2-3** I hear of my friends and family winning.

Here’s what I would do with 96 G’s:

First action: pay off our house.

Second action: pay off our truck.

Third action: renovate at least one of our bathrooms but I’d hope to stretch my dollars far enough to do both. 

(I decided that in this hypothetical situation, I don’t have to pay taxes).

My kids (some of whom have no concept of money or cost of living), told me the following:

Nicky would put the money in the bank because Scotty and I made a deal with our kids that we will match every dollar they put into savings. So far we’ve been able to keep up on this commitment, but if our kids are going to be throwing around those kind of figures… we’re in trouble!

Daisy said that if she won 96 G’s, she’s give $50,000 to her mom and dad (suddenly I have a favorite child), give some to charity, and buy a chinchilla.

Zoe said she would “probably buy a mansion.” I decided that age 8 isn’t the time to crush her dreams, so we’ll stick with that for now.

Eva said that she would buy ten pet rabbits and one pet cat.

Scotty said, “If I win the lottery, you’ll never see me again,” which, thankfully, is just another line from In the Heights and not an actual sentiment from him. Smart aleck.

*We let our kids watch In the Heights, but you should definitely do your own research and decide for yourself whether you allow your own children to see it. It has some language, innuendo, and other things that aren’t especially “kid friendly.”

**We do have a relative that won 250 G’s, though.

Managing the Monsters

You may recall that a monster was recently unleashed when Scotty and I built some plate racks to hang over the kitchen table. Shall we call it the "Plate Monster?" It's not a very exciting name, but it fits the situation. Anyway, the newly dubbed Plate Monster surfaced, and I have since wanted to buy every plate I see. 

The Plate Monster walked away from these plates at WinCo a few weeks ago and wondered if she would regret it. I ask you... what is a Plate Monster to do? Today I was able to purchase them at 75% off - $1.22 each! A win for the Plate Monster!

(The Plate Monster bought monster plates!)

I've got to get this Monster under control because there are other monsters surfacing now. Like the Christmas Decor Monster who wants to put out the Christmas decorations and the Shopping Monster who is always operating at full force this time of year. 

Combined, the Christmas Decor Monster and the Shopping Monster are dangerous, but adding a Plate Monster into the mix is a whole new beast. Not to mention the love children of the Christmas Decor Monster and the Shopping Monster: the Holiday Candle Monster and the Puzzle Monster. 

Must... buy... all the candles...

Must... buy... all the puzzles...

The Shopping Monster and the Puzzle Monster went

to Hobby Lobby and came back with this

I need Marie Kondo and Dave Ramsey to stage an intervention. 

"Spark joy!"

"Live like no one else so later you can live like no one else!"

I also need to stay home and cancel the WiFi so the Monsters won't be tempted... right after my scented candle order arrives this afternoon. 

Spiky

September Writing Challenge - Prompt #21:

Balance

It's the last day of September, and let me just say... this month flew by. Time moves a lot faster when we start getting gray hair, doesn't it? I remember how long a school year seemed when I was a kid, and now as a parent, a school year is nothing. In fact, we're already approaching the end of the first quarter. I can't believe it!

With September ending, my writing challenge is also coming to a close. The prompts I didn't use are: quiet, boredom busting, weakness, inspired, animal, perspective, pause, awe, and place. I completed 27 of the 35 prompts. 

Yesterday I posted a list of 21 goals I want to accomplish before 2021. Prior to hitting publish, I was already working on some of those goals, one of which was to try something new. 

Yesterday I also mentioned that I have been participating in an emotional resilience class. A few weeks ago our class facilitator mentioned that she lays on a "bed of nails" to help with stress and pain relief. First I pictured a literal bed of nails, but then she clarified that it's actually a mat with plastic spikes. I envisioned this mat as something quite large, expensive, freaky, and for some reason, elevated on a table. 

Later, I googled it and found that what she's actually using is an acupressure mat or needle stimulation pad, and it's quite small and not very expensive. I decided to order one for my friend Lynsie and one for my friend Shannon - just because it seemed like an adventurous and somewhat funny thing to receive as a surprise from Amazon. 

Lynsie's arrived first, and she tried it out. She said it hurt, but she kind of liked it and she wanted to keep using it. She sent me a picture of her back - red and perforated. She said she had to call for her husband to come help her get off the mat. Then Shannon got hers, tried it, and also said she liked it and wanted to keep using it. 

Not to be left out, I ordered one for myself, and it came the next day. 

Here's what it looks like:

The mat isn't very big - it's about the length of my back and width of my shoulders, and it came with a spiky pillow. 

It's recommended that when you start using the mat, you wear a light layer of clothing and lay on the mat for about five minutes. Over time, as you build up more endurance, you can start using it directly on your skin and for longer lengths of time (10-20 minutes per day is the recommendation). 

Acupressure is supposed to stimulate the body's self-healing mechanisms and restore balance to the body's vital energy. There haven't been a lot of studies on the effectiveness of acupressure mats, but there is some evidence that they are helpful with reducing pain - including fibromyalgia, headaches, and general muscle pain. They may also help with insomnia and stress. 

Personally, I was just curious to see what it was like and whether I could handle it. Normally I'm not in to stuff like this, but for $15, I wanted to try it. Plus, I'd already made my friends do it, and I was starting to have acupressure FOMO. 

My first time using the mat, I was fully clothed, and I couldn't feel the spikes at all, so I stripped down to my garments (my religious underclothing), which created the perfect thin layer of protection. I laid on the floor with my back on the mat for about five minutes, and I found it tolerable. It definitely hurt, and there were moments where I found myself taking shallow breaths, but overall, I was okay. I was even able to get off the mat myself, though after Lynsie's commentary, I made sure I had Scotty on standby. 

After laying on my back, I tried standing on the mat. I haven't had a lot of chronic body pain thus far in life, but I have had plantar fasciitis off and on for several years, so I experience a lot of pain in discomfort in my feet. My first time standing on the mat was great. I only gave it about two minutes because I did it right before I had to leave to go somewhere. I stood on the mat barefoot, and it wasn't overly painful. My feet felt pretty amazing afterward. The following day I stood on the mat again, feeling all sorts of confident because I'd already proven I could handle it, and to my surprise, it HUUUUURT. I made it about one minute before I absolutely couldn't stand it any more. Since then, I've continued standing on the mat each day just for a couple of minutes, and it's interesting to see how the pain varies. Some days I'm fine. Other days it hurts, and I can't make it even a full minute. I tried it with socks on, but I can't feel it through socks. 

With my back, when I first lay down, it feels fine - just a little spiky through my garments. Then as time goes on, it gets a little more painful, but I can handle it. After a few minutes, I start to feel a burning sensation and my heart beat in my back. That's when I wonder if something magical is happening of if it's actually something horrible. I feel like I'm either miraculously healing or about to die. Not long after that sensation starts, I get off the mat... just in case it's the dying and not the healing. 

Last night was the first time I've tried the mat on my bare back, and holy moly, it hurt. I only lasted about a minute before I had to stop. 

I honestly don't know if the mat is causing anything fantastic to happen in my body, but I definitely feel amazing afterward. Some describe it as feeling like you just had a massage. I don't feel quite that great, but I do have a bit of a high from doing something that feels incredibly bad ass. 

As far as pain reduction and such, I don't really have anything to measure it with. Since the acupressure mat is still pretty new to me, I haven't had a chance to try it out when I have a headache or some kind of pain. 

I'm not sure if I'll keep using the mat long-term, or if it's just something I'll try for a while and move on from. For now, I find it amusing, and like I said, a bit bad ass.

-----------

If you want to try an acupressure mat, yourself, make sure you do a little research beforehand. There are sources that recommend you not use one if you have certain medical conditions such as diabetes or high blood pressure. This is the mat I bought for myself (looks like it has gone up in price - I paid $14.95), and this is the one I bought for Lynsie and Shannon.

Closet Update - Doors

September Writing Challenge - Prompt #26:

Create

I've been posting a lot about things around my house lately. I'm just going to trust that my three readers don't mind. I'm always up for a sneak peek into someone's house - I'm nosy like that, what can I say? Chances are, you're nosy, too. Don't be ashamed of it.

Anyway, last week I showed you the closet we've been working on, and now, it's finally done!

(Well, kind of. There's always some sort of problem - and in this case, we've hit a few snags. More on that in a minute...) 

The closet is really big, so as we were planning it, we decided to make our own doors. Custom-made doors would have cost us a fortune, and building the closet to fit standardized doors wouldn't allow us to have the dimensions we wanted. Also, we have a second closet in the basement (for the water heater and furnace - nothing exciting) that has a one-foot ceiling drop, and it would have been really hard to buy doors for it. 

We decided to do sliding bypass barn doors for both closets. 

Door #1

I was a little hesitant to do barn doors because of how trendy they are (were?). When something is that level of trendy, it goes out of style hard. So thirty years from now we'll all be talking about our barn doors and our feathered eyebrows while our grandkids make fun of us. 

(Little do those silly grandkids know, they'll be repeating the same trends ten years after that). 

But what it came down to is that barn doors were such a good option for these closets! We knew they would be easy and relatively inexpensive to make in comparison to other doors. 

Last week we went and bought all the wood. Then Scotty built the doors while I tested stain colors on scrap wood. I went through several possibilities:

Rustoleum Barrel Brown

Minwax Ebony

Minwax Dark Walnut

Varathane Hickory

and finally... the grand winner: Minwax Early American.

First door finished

Once Scotty had finished building the doors, I spent two early mornings staining them. After adequate drying time, we got them installed and the angels sang. 

Second door finished

Glory, glory! The doors are kind of done!

Now for the problems. We bought the hardware for the doors during a Black Friday sale last year. Our delivery ended up sitting in a FedEx warehouse for six weeks (I had multiple packages held up by FedEx at the time, resulting in a sincere dislike for FedEx, but I digress...) When the hardware finally arrived, the box was damaged. It was only this week that we realized some of the hardware was missing from the box. Scotty contacted the manufacturer, and they are sending us replacement parts. Since they are the last parts that need to be installed, Scotty went ahead and hung the doors. When the parts arrive tomorrow (so long as they aren't coming via FedEx...) he can finish the doors. 

Me being incredibly helpful while Scotty

dealt with some of the problems

But that's not the only problem... there were some issues with drilling holes and hanging the rail and so on and so forth. That's just kind of how things go around here. We haven't started working on the second set of doors yet. Hopefully we learned enough the first time around to make the second set go smoothly!

The kind of finished product. After this photo was taken, 

we swapped the doors around to get rid of that gap on the left.

Here are a few more photos of the basement just for fun:

We moved the TV console we built last year to the basement:

Scotty suggested that we get a bigger TV, and I kept disagreeing with him because I thought a bigger TV would be too big. He went ahead and bought a bigger TV, and well... I LOVE IT. 

I Got Frills

September Writing Challenge - Prompt #24:

Frill

When I was coming up with the list of words to use as prompts for this month-long writing challenge, the word "frill" came to mind. It seemed like a good option, so I added it to the list. Then I thought, "I better make sure I know what 'frill' means." 

Do you ever do that? Use a word but then look it up just to make sure you know what you're talking about?

So "frill"...

According to Oxford Languages it can mean:

1. a strip of gathered or pleated material sewn by one side onto a garment of larger piece of material as a decorative edging or ornament

2. an unnecessary extra feature or embellishment  

Since my my mom no longer sews my clothes for me, I don't have many gathered pleats of decorative material in my life, but I probably have a few unnecessary extra features. 

Take, for example, one of the newest frills to come into my life: 

THE COUCH!

Scotty and I have had very few pieces of furniture that haven't been hand-me-downs or home-made, so buying a couch for our basement was a big deal. Because of the nature of our stairwells, we had to be really particular about the couch. There weren't very many options that could fit. So finding this couch at Costco was a blessing and a miracle! It fit our space (with very little room to spare), and it came in six pieces, which meant we could actually get it into our basement! AND!!! It wasn't thousands of dollars. Well... I mean... it technically was thousands of dollars, but not as many thousands of dollars as the couches we had been looking at from other stores. 

We bought the couch at the beginning of this year. We weren't ready for it, but since furniture season at Costco comes and goes quickly, we figured we'd be wise to snatch it while they had one in stock. 

The couch in our truck - quite the sight

in the parking lot

We stored it in our garage for six months. It wasn't fun. But at the same time, it felt good to know that we had our couch.

The couch came with three motorized recliners. I've never wanted motorized recliners because I don't have the patience to wait for them to open and close, and I never wanted to worry about plugging the couch in. Luckily, Scotty, in his enthusiasm for all things electrical, wired at least ten plugs in our small family room, allowing us to plug in our couch without drama. 

Now, not only do we have motorized recliners (which I still don't have the patience for, but somehow I manage)... we also have USB ports and outlets in our couch. 

I know we're behind on the times, and this stuff has been around for several years, but dang! What a frill! I can plug stuff into my couch! 

And I don't exactly hate it. 

That's the thing with frills... once you have them, you can't go back!

So here I am living the high life. I currently have my feet propped up on the recliner with my computer on my lap. And of course, that computer is plugged in to the couch because I got frills.