I'm just another working mom seeking a few moments of Zen and zinfandel between soccer practice and supper. My former beach bartender husband founded MouseCalls Computer Services here in Nashville. I believe laughter is the best medicine, especially when regularly administered with a good glass of wine, or three. Email me at blondemomblog@gmail.com
So far so good on my New Year’s resolution to eat dinner at home EVERY night this month! I feel like I’m running in an organized mom marathon and WINNING (for a change). Yes! I may pass out at the end of the month, gripping my crockpot, but I’m in the home stretch now.
One of our favorite cold weather meals is soup. January is National Soup Month and since I’m working with Vicks this winter I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to share with you a recipe I found on in a video on their new Nature Fusion YouTube channel which features Denene Millner from My Brown Baby. This “one pot wonder” chowder recipe from chef Curtis Stone sounds perfect for an easy (sign me up now, please) and hearty family dinner this winter!
Be sure to stop back by next week for another Vicks post. I’m giving away one of our winter must haves, a Vicks humidifier! We have gas heat in our home, which is really drying, and have been running our humidifier in our bedroom since before Christmas.
Do you have any good soup recipes to share? Please link up in the comments or paste them there if you’re not a blogger!This Tex/Mex chili recipe is a favorite of mine and one we usually enjoy while watching football.
Disclosure: I am being compensated for my work with Vicks this winter as a member of the Vicks Blogger Brigade but, as always, the words and stories I share with you are all my own.
I sat in the car pickup line skimming my email with my index finger as usual when I saw one from my older daughter’s teacher that caught my eye.
The topic caught me off guard – 4th Grade Graduation.
I may or may not have sucked in my breath.
I clicked it open and read…
We will soon be sending our children to middle school. Each year, we recognize our fourth graders with a special awards ceremony in May.
There’s no way that this girl is going to middle school in August. She’s just a baby, right?
She just started kindergarten, marching proudly into her classroom wearing her new Hello Kitty sneakers and bright pink princess backpack. She’s still working her way up to chapter books and coloring worksheets and taking naps after lunch, right?
Only she’s not. She’s doing long division and writing reports and telling me about boys who have crushes on her.
She’s still our very first baby girl, there’s no way she’s ready to take on the halls of middle school. But of course I know she is. She’s so excited about it already and today as we drove by the school building she pointed it out, “There’s my school mom!”
Middle school.
(Sob.)
I didn’t cry at her preschool graduation and I didn’t cry on her first day of kindergarten (but I did cry on her first day of first grade, go figure), but I have a sinking feeling I’m going to cry at 4th grade graduation because I may or may not have cried simply reading her teacher’s email today.
I may be a tad neurotic when it comes to severe weather, especially if tornado warnings are involved.
Unfortunately my neuroses brings out the inner Jim Cantore in my girls. When hubby dropped off Miss C at indoor soccer practice last night she apparently ran into the gym like a town crier, excitedly shouting, “There’s A TORNADO WARNING FOR TONIGHT!”
Any way, all was calm at bedtime so it was business as usual. Shortly after midnight, however, an ominous thunder clap woke me up. Did I also mention I’m a light sleeper?
Remembering the predicted bad weather I sat up in bed and then trudged to the den with Jack the dog on my heels. I fumbled for the remote and turned on our local weather to see a massive weather front headed our way:
OK so this is really from Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, but you get the picture (Blog credit, Misterdavid.typepad.com)
Cue EPIC STORM OF DEATH. The weather forecaster was dropping terms like favorable conditions, touchdowns and safe place.
Crap…how could I sleep now?
I settled down on to my safe place, the couch, and waited for the pitter patter of small feet on hardwood floors but no one else in the house seemed to be waking up. Minutes passed. I may or may not have started to become bitter about everyone else in the house and their PEACEFUL SLUMBER. It was just me, the dog, and the local weather radar of eminent doom and all its colorful glory. I decided to monitor the situation since there was no way in hell I could sleep.
About a half hour later the tornado siren at the nearby fire station went off and I went back and forth between watching the local weather radar coverage and reading local updates on Twitter and Facebook where people were hunkered down and in wait and see mode, like me. The wind and rain picked up for about 10 minutes and then it was eerily silent. And then, according to our local weather coverage, our part of town was in the clear. Unfortunately I was now WIDE AWAKE at half past freak out o’clock.
It’s gonna be a long evening.
p.s. Current earworm – Sexy And I Know It (although I’m sleepy and I know it as in, “hey look at that sofa, hey look at that sofa, hey look at that sofa…I conk out.”)
I'm just another working mom seeking a few moments of Zen and zinfandel between soccer practice and supper. My former beach bartender husband founded 
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