The loss of a loved one

Its never easy hearing that you have lost someone you love.  But, it somehow harder when you lose someone that is so young and full of life.  We expect that we will lose a parent, grandparent or elderly aunt.  Never is it easy to find that a friend has lost her daughter. 

My dear friend, Kari was informed earlier Sunday morning that her beautiful daughter Amy was thrown from an automobile and killed instantly.  Amy only 18 years old a bright and beautiful girl who graduated as high school valedictorian two weeks before this tragic event.  Amy had plans to attend a close by University in a few months.  She had big plans for herself and within a minute those plans where extinguished. 

There seems to be nothing I can do thousands of miles away but pray and send some money.  Prayer is the healer of all things.  God works wonders in people lives.  He is the only one that can help a mother deal with her tragic loss.  I know this but, yet I feel helpless.  I feel that no matter what I say or do that it is not good enough.  This is not about my feelings,  this is about making sure I do everything I possible can.

This loss hits home so easily, my own daughter is only 21 and then I have 2 preschoolers.  I grieve for Kari's loss, but I also grieve that this tragic event can happen to anyone, anywhere and at any time.  It makes you want to hold on to your kids and hug them with everything you have.  To tuck them in at night and make sure you kiss and hug them.  To always remember that you say I LOVE YOU, everyday!

Tell your loved ones that you love them!!


Love,

Lise

Time to take the oldest to the bus station

My oldest daughter, Chantel now lives with her father in San Diego County.  Chantel like most of us is still trying to find herself and her way through life.  So, this morning after a 2 day visit she is going back to her life in San Diego.  And in a few hours she will be back on a Greyhound bus to her little corner in the world.

Chantel is now 21 and knows what she wants in life, or at least she says she does.  She loves make-up.  This is to me is funny, since I hardly wore makeup my whole life.  She wants to do makeup for a living, either for theatre or professional jobs in the entertainment industry.  She loves working on plays and do backstage work.  All of this is a completely different world to my little mommy world.  But, right now....since makeup school is so expensive, she is a caretaker at a home for physically challenged women.  The pay stinks, the work is hard ( a lot of lifting, cleaning and taking care of the needs of her clients) but, I know that she has a huge talent for this type of work. 

Chantel is a caretaker!!  She might not see it that way now.  But, she has always had a knack for caring for those who can not take care of themselves.  She was a nanny for years.  But, I think taking care of these women will strengthen her being and in the long run make her a stronger person.  Not, just anyone can take good care of people who can not care for themselves.  And Chantel has the compassion and love like no one else.

Love,

Lise

Good Morning My fellow Sugar Bloggers

We ate lovely food

and met wonderful friends

We now get to be introduced to each others

lives through a wonderful thing called

Blogging!

I can not wait to read

into the lives of my new friends!!

These woman and men

who share themselves and their passions

through their eyes and their words!

Cheers,

Lise

Daddy can you buy Broccoli from the store

I think kids say the best things in the world.

I am thankful that I have been feeding my kids organic produce from Tanaka Farms the past few years. Because both Kylie and Peyton LOVE veggies and fruit. But, for the last month and a half I did get my regular boxes of fresh produce since we were out of town and I let it slip my mind last month. And because of this I have not purchased a lot of veggies at the store either. I guess I am a creature of habit, I am used to getting the veggies in my bi-monthly box and when I go to the grocery store I totally walk past the vegetables.

Anyway, just last week Kylie said, Daddy when you go to the store can you buy some broccoli. I guess the craving have started, she hasn't had fresh broccoli in a couple of weeks.

My kids favorite things to eat:
Edamame
Broccoli
Cauliflower
Green beans
Corn
Peyton loves cherry and grape tomatoes, he pops them in his mouth like its candy
Kylie loves cucumbers
raw carrots
bananas
apples
oranges

If you start your kids early with veggies and fruit, they want it. I started both my kids on edamame at 3 months. I chewed it and put it in their mouths, I know it sounds gross, but they love it and want it all the time.

Both Kylie and Peyton love their candy and junk food as well. But, I am happy to know they love veggies!! And Organic is so much better for them!! Thank God for Tanaka Farms!

Love,
Lise

My favorite product!!

Since, I sell Mary Kay I thought I would write about my favorite products that I have tried and LOVE!! I believe that this is going to be a weekly addition to my blog, but it will not my any means be just Mary Kay products. I know too many moms that make great homemade products that I absolutely Love.







My first favorite product is Mary Kay Satin Hands. It comes with 3 things in a cute carry bag. Satin hands comes in peach or non-scented.

This is the Peach Scented

The first of the three products is Satin Hands Smoothie Hands Scrub. I love this product!! You pump a little of the scrub into your hands and can use it on your hands, feet, elbow, heels..or anywhere that needs to be a little softer. It exfoliates your skin, so when you wash it off your skin has a softer feel to it. Its great on your feet and it much like the scrub the spas uses when you have a pedicure.



The second is the Satin Hands Hand Cream. You put this on after you exfoliate with the scrub. It has the same soft smell of the scrub and makes your hands feel even more soft. Massage it in and your hands will have a relaxed feel.



The last is the Mary Kay Extra Emollient Night Cream: Put this on at night on all your rough spots. Perfect for you feet, heels, elbow and rub the rest into your hands to keep them as soft as possible. Put on socks to keep the moisture in and you wake up with silky skin. The threesome runs $30.00 for the scented and $34.00 for non-scented. And it lasts forever!! I think that's one of the most important thing, you spend your money and the products lasts. You dont have to buy another a month later. Satin Hands, a little goes a long way!!

To clean- MY ADHD

I think I have ADHD!! Or maybe its my new excuse... I can not for the life of me clean one whole room at a time. I am trying to clean my daughter, Kylie's room today. She is having a sleep-over in a few hours and they need room to sleep and play. I managed to straighten her shoes up in the closet and vacuum the floor. But, the room still looks like its has NEVER been cleaned.
My cleaning goes as follows:
I start in the living room, I pick up toys and then grab the broom to sweep up the dust, dirt and food that has been left by the kids. Done!! But, as I am putting the broom away I notice dirt in the kitchen and sweep that. Walk back to find a toy in the kitchen, put toy away in Peyton's room, notice his clothes on the floor. So, I fold and put away the clothes. Now, I am in his room cleaning up what is in there. He has a cup in his room so I walk into the kitchen. I notice after I put the cup in the sink that the dishes need to be washed. I fill the sink with water and soap and decide to start a load of laundry. Run into the kids room for dirty clothes, fill washer with clothes, shut off water in sink and I am so exhausted I go sit in the living room for a quick TV show. Dishes sit, the laundry washes and I need a nap!
So, here I am in Kylie's room looking at the computer (it's in her room) and decide to check my email. I manage to read and answer my mail and turn to see her room still in a shambles. Why? Why, can I not finish at least one room a day?

Off again to TRY to clean her room. Please give me an idea of how to do one thing at a time.

Lise

Talents of the Woman I know

I believe all of us have talents. I think I have to focus on the talents of the women I know. Some, are talents I desire and envy those who have them.

I wish I could sew. I have great ideas but putting a thread to a needle is not what I have the patience for. My mother is an excellent seamstress. She has created things ever since I was a little girl. She designs wedding dresses and has even made wedding dresses for a friend or two of mine. Her talent is endless. She has so much patience with fabric. I, on the other hand hate to pin fabric with patterns, so I give up before I even start. I know many other woman that create lovely things with fabric and I envy their passion and creativeness.

One of my friends is a talented cook. She has the ability to make simple pancakes a beautiful taste in your mouth. She had a birthday party for her daughter and the theme was If You Give a Mouse a Party. She made pancakes, muffins and cookies on a stick for party favors. The party was a great success and the food was even better than the theme. Now I desire to be as great a cook as her, but if I was I would also be 200 lbs over weight.

My daughter, Kylie's teacher has the talent of teaching and being patient with children. There is so much a person could learn from her. I see the beautiful light of understand in her eyes. She radiates life into the children that surround her. Kylie missed school for a whole week, because we went on a cruise. She said she didn't miss school, she said she missed Mrs. Roberts. This is the first year Kylie has gone to school and I am blessed to have my daughter in a class with a wonderful, loving woman. I know a lot of women have the talent of patience and teaching because I see posts from other moms about their children's teachers and can not believe how blessed we truly are. These woman are such a strong force in the lives of our children. And that force is past onto us through our children. They should be celebrated everyday with all that they do.



Another friend has the talent of being a great friend. She is a ray of light on a clouded day. She is friendly, fun and a joy to be around. She is patient with her children and has an understanding heart. I think all of us have a friend like this and maybe we are this friend to others. I desire to be that friend to someone, if not everyone I know. I think at times I am this person and other times I know I could do better. Friendship is important to us women. We have our families, our children and even some of us have co-workers. But, we really need each other, someone that knows what we go through, someone who will let us cry when we are need a shoulder to cry on. A friend that helps with our children when we can't for some reason or cook us a meal when we just had baby. Someone that gets us straight through the core of who we are. I am blessed to have made friends with this woman and others that have the same talent and strength.



Thank you,

for all the love, talent and being who you are



Lise

Cruising with 2 (part 2)

I didn't realize that I had so much to say about my first day on the ship. So, I think this will be the last part of Cruising with 2.

As I said before the kids were going to entertained in The FUN ZONE with the other 3-7 year Pelicans . Each age group had their own room to play in with their own counselors (or teacher as the kids called them). When we were at sea Kylie and Peyton could join their friends (up to 45, 3-7 kids were on this cruise) from 9am-12pm, 2pm-5pm and 7pm-10pm. When we were in a port the kids could be in The Fun Zone from 8/9am-5pm and then 7-10pm. They had a lot of time to do several activities, including playing PS II, board games, watch movies, do crafts, face painting. They also had late night babysitting from 10pm-1am at an additional rate of $5/hr per child. I also picked my kids up before 10pm. No need for anymore expenses and the kids were completely worn out anyway.

The second day at sea, the kids were super excited to go play and do whatever they could with new friends. Peyton had me paged 2x the first day. He wanted to be with mommy. But, after that, he never wanted to leave. Kylie one day had a melt down and had me pick her up and Peyton stayed to watch a movie. A lot of the time the kids hung out in with the other little Pelicans. Some of the time they wanted to swim. I took them swimming 4 days out of the 6. One day, it was too windy to swim and one day they were in time-out from the pool.

Princess cruises will not have their staff change a diaper, so I was called a couple times when Peyton had a poopie-doop. Peyton is still in his potty training stage and the poopie is not coming along yet.

The first day we swam together I tried several of the pools. The two main pools were way too deep for me to be with 2 non-swimmers, even with swim vests. I found the kids little pool and the kids were super excited about it. But, of course 1 foot deep did nothing for me and we were in the shade. So, the day that Kylie had her melt down we found a pool that was 3 feet at one end and about 4 feet at the other (although it was a circle pool). We spent the rest of our swimming days in this pool. Although, I loved this pool because it allowed me to sit in the water and let the kids paddle around I also HATED this pool. They had so much chlorine in the pool the ends of my hair turned sea foam green. I figured it was because I have dyed hair. NOPE!! Kylie's hair end also turned green (but, not even close to the color I am still sporting). Everyday after swimming or just hanging out the kids were so exhausted they took a nap.

When Kylie and I were done swimming I had planned on doing an on board scavenger hunt, so I took her with me. There were 10 people altogether (most people were still in Port), so Kylie and I were a team and we ran around the ship and collected items. We were not the first to arrive back, but we did come back second. We found 11 out of the 13 items and won 2nd place with 3 other teams. We walked with a Silver Medal. Kylie was so excited she worn her medal all day long. After our game we went and had Tea. Everyday at 3:30-4:30 they served English Tea. We had our tea, cookies and scones and chatted with other passengers. I continued to go to tea 2 more days. I really enjoyed this and thought it was one of my most favorite things that Princess had to offer.

Princess also offered true English Pub lunches 2 days, but I never went. There was comedy shows ( I went to 1 out of the 4) and production shows. They had a production called I can Dance. I went to watch it the 2nd night and left within the first 20 mins. The singing was okay and the dancing was okay, but it was a little boring.

The thing I did the most was gamble. I won and lost and won and lost. But, in the end I won...not much but, I won. I borrowed $5 from my dad and played the penny slots and made a mistake and hit the play 350 button and won $27.00. I cashed out, cashed in my cash, paid my dad his $5 and paid part of my tip bill with it. I played $2 in another slot machine and won 15.00. I cashed out, paid more off my tip bill and then went back to the roulette table. This is were I spent most of my time and money. I would lost money and then my dad would let me play his chips and I would win money. I cashed in several time and gave him half of what I won.

I think both kids really enjoyed their experience in The Fun Zone and liked their teachers. I was surprised with all the things they got to do and take home. They got a T-shirt that they colored in themselves, a drinking cup, lots of prizes for games they played, cards they made, key chains they made and lots of coloring pages. The last cruise I took with Carnival (owned by Princess), you had to pay for all the big extras. With that being said, I think Princess really did do a good job with my kids. But, I do compare it to Carnival and their staff and know that Carnival is geared a lot more to my children's ages.

The last thing I have to say: Tips on Princess are $10.50 a day per person, no matter what the age of the child is. So, my tips or what they called HOTEL Charges were $220.50 and this would be taken from your credit card or you could pay cash for it. I was really disappointed that this was there policy. I could have fought it but decided against it since both my kids were in The Fun Zone. I did talk to one dad whose 13 month old also had to pay tips even though she was with her parents the whole time. My experience with Carnival last year (same cruise to Mexico) was children under 2 did not have to pay tips. So, I thought Princess policy was bad.

All in all we had a good time. The kids really enjoyed themselves, my parents had fun and I was sadly disappointed with the serves and the food, but I had a nice time as well. I know the next time I take a cruise with my children I will stick to a more KID FRIENDLY cruise line like Disney or Carnival.

Cruising with TWO

Part 1

One of my favorite things to do is cruising! We took a Cruise to Mexico on The Princess Sapphire. Kylie (4), Peyton (who turned 3 a week before) and I shared a cabin with the view of a life boat and part of the beautiful ocean. My parents were down the hall and all the way on the other side of the ship. They had a really nice view with NO lifeboat. All I every heard was how Princess Cruises were the best in the business. I was going to find out soon enough.

The first night the kids were extremely hyper. And I was the only parent there to settle them down. Of course my parents were there to help, but the kids were in their own world doing their own thing. Princess cruises has on board activities for all kids under 18. My kids were going to be in the Princess Pelican program for kids ages 3-7. But, the first night all we could do was visit the Fun Zone and sign them up. It seems like all Cruise lines do this the first night. Its a time for the Cruise Staff to get organized. So, our first night was walking the ship and spending time in our cabin. This can really be trying on anyone with 2 pre-schoolers.

We did have dinner that night with our assigned waiters and at our assigned table. This probably the WORST experience I have ever had Cruising. Our waiters seemed unhappy, maybe it was the task of have 2 kids at our table. Princess usually caters to adults. I really don't know what it was, but, I do know that I was more than frustrated with the approach they had towards my family. Our head waiter wanted to have the kids served first...I went with it. But, I soon realized that doing this was a BAD idea. Once the kids were finished with their meal, then they wanted to run around/underneath the table. We were lucky that we had a window next to our table and the kids wanted to look out the window a lot. Our table was close to the next table of cruisers and my waiter was helping push my chair in so he could walk by and he spilled water all over my arm. This was really not a big deal, but he went on severing the other table and didn't stop to help or apologize for this mistake. I gave myself one more night with these waiters, if it didn't improve then I was not going back. Luckily, the attitudes of our waiters improved, but they really didn't go out of their way to make things a wonderful dining experience. I judge this mostly of the way they treated their other tables and my other cruising experiences. My other cruising experiences the waiters were happy, friendly and went out of their way for the kids and my family.

Money is in the Mail

There are so many things that I do for money these days:

The main thing I am concentrating on is doing Mary Kay. This can be a hurdle at times. But, luckily I have had friends support. I have several that are going to hold parties for me in the near future. Until, I have this in full swing I rely on a couple other things to keep me a float.

I started doing focus groups a couple of years ago. They normally pay $100.00 for 1-2 hours, but sometimes I make more. They normally ask what you think about a product, service, place, company.... The first one I ever did paid $125.00 for 1 hour and a half. It was for AAA. They showed us several ad layout and had the group choose what ads we liked the best. The best thing about doing focus groups is the pay is so good and its really about what you like as a consumer. My opinion really does matter. It matters so much they pay me for it. I have done a groups for toys, coffee and even Burlington Coat Factory...I wish they were more frequent but, I normally get called every 2-3 months.


Another activity (job) I do is belong to a community of women who give their opinions on a Stress Relief Community. I was given special stress-relief products to try and a website that that has individual tools and programs designed for me. The products consist of bath wash, face wash, spritz, linen spray and lotion. All of them have a soothing scent that helps relieve stress. My favorite products are the bath wash (that make my skin feel extremely soft) and the linen spray ( I use this before bed for a good nice sleep). The website I sign on to to get tools to deal with stress and stress related symptoms. I also have to go on to a community site that the whole groups communicates on. I answer questions about the products, the site and day to day things. One time they asked to try bubble bath. I received a whole bottle of bubble bath and also received a bonus for being a participant. This last month I received 60 dollars in Amazon gift certificates. Mainly, I received so much was because of the bubble bath and completing extra activities on the community board (live chats). But, normally if I do not have any raffle winning or they didn't offer extra activities I receive 10 dollars a month of Amazon GC. They add up and I have been doing this community for almost a year. Let me tell you Christmas presents were bought with the time I spent doing this. Plus, I really enjoy learning about new products and they give really good tools to use when I am stressing out!!!

One other thing I do is surveys on-line. They can be time consuming but I manage to get points for every survey and then I qualify for gift cards with points that I earn. Most of the survey are 10-20 mins long and I get any where from 10 point to 90 points. The longer the survey the more points. Each point seems to be worth about a penny. So, as you can tell they really are not worth much. But, the companies also give bonus points for raffles. I can take these extra points and put them into a raffle to win money and prizes. So, far I think I have about 35 dollars waiting to be cashed in. And I have NOT won a raffle yet.

The other night about a week ago. I was on the computer playing around, doing a survey or playing an on-line game. I receive a phone call and is was a gal wanting to know if I would help her out and answer a couple of questions. She called the right phone number. The questions were about my TV viewing and my radio listen. I think we spent about 10-15 mins on the phone. She asked if she could send me follow-up questionnaires. I of course agreed and for my time she informed me that 10 dollars would be sent in the mail along with the questionnaire. On Saturday before going out, I checked the mail and there was my big questionnaire envelope and inside a 10 dollar bill. The money is in the mail...you just have to look for it and participate.

My new blog

I decided to call my blog The Scrat Pack. I feel like I am a woman that is just like the saber-toothed squirrel that is always chasing after his (or in my case, her) acorn (or in my case everything that has to be done).

I have 3 children, A daughter who is 21 years old, another daughter who turned 4 in December and my Lil boy who will be 3 in less than a week. My husband works full-time as a customer service/supervisor for a bus company and I started my own adventure as a Mary Kay Consultant. I have a lot on my plate with day to day life, but also starting a business to supplement my husbands income is an added pain or pleasure depending on what day it is.

I quit my full-time job almost a year ago as a merchandiser. I drove to numerous stores and supplied them with products. The driving and paperwork was endless and I became too stressed and grouchy. My life needed a re-newel and staying home with the kids was exactly what I needed and wanted. We have managed to keep everything a float, but by skin of our teeth. So, in November of 2009 I started my new adventure as a Mary Kay consultant. I didnt take the idea too seriouly at first. But, now that I am in my 6th month of this adventure I see the complete picture and potential for a great income and life.