Where am I .... Ecuador?

There is coliform in my water. COLIFORM. Thank you, Mississippi rural water association. Who took a DUMP in the well THIS time?!?!

These are not your average jelly beans, folks.

The boil alert apparently was posted last Friday - but living here you tend to hear about these things 3 days too late, and from your neighbor, who heard from another neighbor, who heard from a friend. Turned out, the rumor was true, but being 4 months pregnant, this did make this hormonal mama HAPPY.

After a wild goose chase, I was finally able to speak to someone at the MS Health Dept Water Division. Our water association servicing my area does not have the funding to send out a "message" to their users about BOIL ALERTS, so word-of-mouth is apparently common around here.

Where I come from, you either got a call, and email, or a little flier tucked into your door so that you'd know immediately. This happened for us last Friday. So we're pretty much SCREWED. Look out - hepatitis, giardiasis, and dysentery.

No brushing teeth, no ice (i can do without anyway, but Joe...not a chance), no water in J's oatmeal (now that he's had 3 bowls since Friday, so that doesn't matter), no rinsing fruit and veges (oops...) and no bathing with open sores (we're ok too....). Oh yeah, and wash your dishes with BLEACH (that'll taste good.)

Wish us luck.....

How can you resist??

He's my little rock star.

EHhhhhhhh I dunno about this....

I grew up with cats. I like them. At times, I've loved them. Some. But.....at my new place, even if they are outdoor - I now have a screened in porch that I want to keep as my sanctuary, but these little cute - ahem - terrors will tear it, and any other tangible screen, to shreds.

Joe found them yesterday at the warehouse and its been his dream lately to have cats around to deal with our living-out-in-the-country mouse and snake problem. But Joe does not believe me that cats are capable of tearing your screen world apart. He's asked everyone else's opinion, NOT listening to mine. HELLO, JOE, honey - you don't have to go any further than ME. I know the relationship. I've never not had cats. Take it from me......

Plus, these little girls are driving Happy and Rudy (the pups) to a whole new level of crazy. Rudy is foaming at the mouth to eat them, and Happy - well, Happy just wants whatever Rudy wants. Truth be told, he'd probably just kiss all over them and cuddle with them if he just had the chance. But not Rudy.... his history concludes that he was bred to catch cats.

If I have anything to do with this (which, you know what happens if Mama's not happy....) they will be chasing mice elsewhere. But they ARE so cute........

I've been away for a while......

I can't take it..... I'm simply in love. This little boy steals my heart every moment of every day. I kept waking up with horrible dreams of him getting hurt, and every dream had something to do with him getting something stuck in his eye. HORRRRRRIBLE dreams.

I don't sleep well these days, but I think its because we're PREGO!!!!! We are going to have another baby in April, and we are pumped. I wish I could sleep better, but that comes with the territory. I havent' slept well since I was pregnant with Joey, and I think that's just part of being a mom. You spend your wakened nights praying for protection over your children and your whole family, as at 2am, you simply have no control over the uncontrollable, or the unpredictable.

Anyway, I'm so sorry that I haven't updated the blog in a while. As many of you know, we bought a house back in June, and its really kept us pretty busy. Plus, I've been working really hard on my website building business. In addition to my mom's site (www.pencilworksbyjoyce.com), I recently built another site for a friend of mine who has put together an AMAZING cause for women who live and deal with breast assymetry. That site is called "Its Okay To Stuff Your Bra." I'm excited for her cause, and I was honored to be apart of the process. I really think it will reach a lot of women, young and old, who have spent their lives hating their breasts and in turn, loathing their bodies and struggling to feel like women.

I have several other clients lined up that I'm working with right now. I'm still learning my skills, but I build to the best of my abilities. I will keep you all updated as I build my sites.

Joe's been doing great as his business. He's turning the place upside down. I'm so proud of him.

We have a trip planned to go see my folks this weekend. They haven't seen Joey in a long time, and they are pining for him. Who wouldn't?!?! :)

Wally

We had a pool visitor last week named Wally. Joey LOVED him, but we had to turn him loose.
Thank God. He was cute, but I'm not in to keeping reptiles in my house...yet. I'm sure in a few years I'm going to have to get over this - especially since we've already pulled Wally out of the pool, and just yesterday, we had 8 frogs in the pool. Joey is going to be bringing them inside, begging for an aquarium. I'm going to have to be ready......

"Dirt Poor"

"You are the proud owner of a big ole pile of dirt."

These were the words spoken to me by my husband this morning when he woke me up.

"What??"

"The dirt people came today and left us a big pile of dirt on the driveway for the dog pen."

"Oh gooooood....." I said as i rolled over.

"And I'm robbing your purse of $34 to pay the dirt people. Hope you don't mind."

"You have to PAY FOR DIRT?" I thought. What the hell kind of deal is that?! I guess I knew that. Back when we were building our home in the midwest, they hauled away a bunch of black dirt, and when we needed it for filling in our landscaping, they tried to sell it back us. What the heck?

Ah well. At least we now have $34 more worth of fishing worms. Not that I'm going fishing any time soon.....

Blessing with Butterflies

I know this is sounds strange, but this is the second time this happened in my life.

See this butterfly? I know its hard to see the detail and the beauty, but it's hard to find a rare and beautiful butterfly like this. Tuesday, we bought a home and Wednesday night, before we left the home (we're having to do clean-up before moving in), we spotted this butterfly in the garage, fluttering around.

The last time I saw a bizarre butterfly was on my wedding day. It was petite with two solid pink wings and two solid yellow wings. I remember thinking how significant it was to see such a rare creation on such a sacred, special day.

when we spotted this butterfly Wednesday night, I had the same feeling. See, the home we just purchased is nothing less than our dream home. If we stay in this town (er, villiage) we will most likely never, ever move. And just the blessing of this home is a significant moment in our lives, just like our wedding day. Its like the beginning of yet another chapter in this crazy life. And it begins with another beautiful butterfly.

She is not my friend

In all her devilish pregnant glory, here is the black widow I pulverized with spider killer this morning. I found her not 2 feet from my back door, trying to enter my domain.

EEEEEEESH! I LOATHE SPIDERS and this mamacita I loathe on a scale of which I hate Brown Recluses (of which we have too) and the growing-in-popularity-since-Hurricane-Katrina, the BLACK recluse which is apparently when the Black Widow and Brown Recluse got together and... you know.

Why does God allow such demonic creatures to roam the earth? I guess for the same reason as murderers and sex offenders.....

Gratzie, Gratze, Belllllllla!

Mmm! I just heard about the Memphis Italian Fest going on right now thru Saturday.

I've been doing some daydreaming lately - ok, honesty- everyday I daydream. I've been yearning to travel in a BAD way. Not just to Florida or some place in the US. No, I'm talking overseas. I feel Spain and/or Italy calling me. I just need to go to the places I adore. My little village here is just not doing it for me these days.

But ... (sigh) ... travel is probably not in my cards for a while. We are going to buy a house soon, and maybe #2 on the way in the next year (this is not an announcement....I promise!!), and ... well, just lots of other life things. When I was single, as my family knows (and was sitting on nerves about) I was picking up and going to foreign lands on whims. I feel blessed that I was able to do so then - but my appetite for such travel was just beginning to be fulfilled - and then (NOT REGRETFULLY) I decided to get married, and pop out Joey. AGAIN - NO REGRETS!!! But I do long to travel. Hopefully, we'll have a chance to travel as a family in the near future - but for now, its MEMPHIS ITALIAN FEST, watching "The Godfather" a few more times, and taking chances to make my own sangria. I wonder if Memphis offers flamenco lessons??

Pencil Works by Joyce

*Sweat beads rolling down my face*

I've officially completed my first web design. It was finished a few weeks ago, but I hadn't officially spread the word until I had some more kinks worked out, and some blanks filled in. Now that those things are done, I can start passing the link around.

I'M STILL LEARNING.... and have a long way to go ... but I'm truly enjoying this extra-curricular activity, well ... soon-to-be business, or second household income (THANK YOU economy for making it hard to buy food and TP these days!!!!).

Check it out (but don't be too harsh on my inexperienced ass): Pencil Works by Joyce

It is still very amateurish, but that will come with experience. Let me know what you think. No use of templates... just completely built from blank documents - from the ground, up.

By the way, that's my mama's art site. I can only hope that I could do her incredible work justice.