Skin Cancer SUCKS!!!!

and hurts like heck too!
Yep, I went to the dermatologist a few weeks ago for a nasty spot that was in the middle of my back. It started out as a really raw spot and then just would not heal(or so I thought). It has been there for a year and we have been watching it close. It never got better and never went away so I broke down and made an appointment.
Too make a long story short it was cancer and I had it removed yesterday and let me just say....OUCHY!
Chris was allowed in the room with me to "watch" and he said "Babe they took a hunk out of your back!" ....geez thanks!
The Dr. took out a piece of MY meat that was as long and thick as my pinkie finger and a little wider!!!
Now I am all stitched up a sore as crap...they put 6 stitches on the inside that will dissolve and did a running stitch on the outside that I will have removed in 10 days.
So now that I have sworn off tanning beds forever I am looking for a good spray tan place...and hopefully I won't come out looking like an Umpa Lumpa!!!

Brain dumpage!

I have several things running around in my brain lately so I thought I would drop a few to make room for more...

School starts back in a week and I so am not ready for all this..... early to bed, pack lunch, picky teachers, fuss, do home work, yell, do projects, check homework, more home work, do you have a ride home, stomp feet, no you can't wear that shirt with a Rebel flag to school, eyes roll, early to rise...and repeat!!!!

Celebrated my 16 year wedding anniversary last week and it seems like I just married him yesterday...and I almost have him trained just how I want him :O)

Hate all the things kids post on face book, the cuss words, girls pictures with those shorty butt showin shorts on, flippin off the camera...geez...and you want your parents to treat you like an adult...ummmm NO!

Sick of people sending me friend request on FB that I don't even know...just cause your a friend of a friends Aunt on her Daddy's side 2nd cousin to Grandma Bertha don't feel the need to friend me cause it's gonna be a BIG FAT ignore!

I still need to find more jeans for Kyle....KILL ME NOW!

So stoked about my new oil rubbed bronze kitchen faucet I won on ebay last week. Although my boys think it doesn't match the kitchen but then again what do they know about style & fashion...NOTHING cause they still ask me if their clothes match on Sunday mornings for church!

I am so ready for Fall I can almost taste it!

Kyle driving is going to cause me to age 100 times faster than I already was.

Bringing to mind my next thought...my hair really needs to be done due to all my gray showing.

Wine always taste better when you are drinking it on your back porch while on the phone with your BFF who is hundreds of miles away and she is drinking hers on her back porch but the conversation is just like you are sitting side by side at the same table.

Kyle let Chevy in the house and he scratched my hardwood all to heck and back again...although he still denies it with every breath he takes...and last I checked Chevy doesn't have thumbs, therefore he didn't open the door and let his self in!


thanks for listening!!!!

I hate Back to School!!!!

I hate back to school shopping...especially with a teenage boy in tow. Not that he is that picky but lets just say...clothes are not cheep!
I took Kyle to Raleigh Saturday to shop for jeans.....I would rather have been horse whipped! The day did not get off to a good start when we had already been in 5 stores and none of them had his size(either every teenage boy in North Carolina wears 29X34 jeans or it is a very abnormal size and no stores carry them.....I am leaning more toward the 2nd choice!) The poor salesman at Belk's tried to help us and asked what size we were looking for(he must have noticed the frustration on my face after digging through shelf after shelf of Red Camel jeans that were on sale for $15.99 a pair) When I told him what size I was looking for he gave me a puzzled look like "lady you can't be looking for that size" then about that time Kyle turned the corner and walked up and the sales guy loudly said "oh my gosh, look at the length of his leg bone!"...my poor Bubba is all leg I tell ya!
After leaving about the 4th store with no jeans in hand Kyle turns and says "Mom, you can just by me Wranglers from Walmart, really I don't mind" Bless his heart, I then told him I already tried that and they didn't have his size either.
It was then that an idea popped in my head to just chop his feet off at the ankles and then he could wear his 30X32's from last year!!!!...and that would save me more money by not having to buy new tennis shoes!
We finally scored big in American Eagle. They had a few pair of jeans in 30X34's (he will just have to wear a belt) a shirt and 2 pair of boxers and cost me $107.00! Then we headed to Hollister and got 2 more shirts for $34.00. For those of you who know me, you know how much I love to say money and shop the clearance racks...well that didn't happen that day but at least he won't have to start school naked.......or without his feet!

I am now the Co-Pi.....

...oh I can't even say the word......I can't even type the word.....
but non the less, I am no longer in the drivers seat.

My Bubba turned 15 on Wednesday and passed his permit test(after the big turd slept til 10:30) and he only got up then because I went and jumped on his bed and sang Happy Birthday to him at the top of my lungs! I mean, who really sleeps til 10:30 on their birthday??????

I must say things went better than I thought they would. I was really terrified on the way to the DMV office that he was not going to pass. He did well in Driver's Ed class (well, all except that for bird & squirrel deal) but I was just afraid he would rush through the test and not take his time and make a careless mistake. But he proved his Mom wrong and only missed 2 questions on the computer test and made 100% on the sign test.....Mr. Smarty Pants!

And just that fast...it was all over and we were walking out the door and Chris was handing over the keys. I really am proud of myself that I didn't cry. Chris on the other hand said he should have taken 2 blood pressure pills that morning instead of one. Kyle hopped in the driver seat. I climbed in the back and Chris had shotgun(nothing like having a Trooper for a Dad on your first day with your permit). But Kyle did well and only made a few mistakes. I kept my head down most of the time and prayed :O)

We had asked Kyle earlier in the week what he wanted to do for his birthday and all he wanted to do was be able to drive to his weekly Wednesday night fire meeting....and so that's what he did.

Yesterday he talked his Nana into coming to pick him up so he could drive her around town to run her errands and then called to say he needed to spent the night with her so he could driver to her hair appt this morning at 8:45 the next morning......that boy is crazy!!!!

So, now we have started a whole new chapter in the Owens household. It gives me an entire new fear. He has gone through so many milestones in the past 15 years but this is the most terrifying one for me and the most exciting one for him!

Knock-knock....are you guys still out there????

WOW! I haven't been on Blogger for over 2 months....holy mother of pearl!
I am sure most of you thought I was dead or put in prison, held captive by Kyle for not adhering to his feeding schedule...or better yet basking on a beach somewhere with a fruity drink in hand....I vote for the last one!
Nope...none of the above....
However, we did go on vacation to the beach for a week and it was absolutely wonderful! I did nothing but lay buy the pool, then the beach, then the pool then....well you get the picture...
Anyhow, Kyle has finished his first year of high school and even though he barely passed Spanish by 1% point they have decided to let him move onto the 10th grade. And get this....they are even placing him in Honors English {{crickets chirp}}
I know, right...It AMAZED me too! Not that I don't think I have the smartest kid in the world like all the other moms, but less face the facts here.
1. He is 27 days shy of being 15 and still uses the word weren't several times a day.
2. If something is Beast or Nasty...that's a "good" thing.
3. He still loses his train of thought 2 words into a sentence if he sees something with dual exhaust or mud tires.
4. And spends 99% of his time looking where he has been instead of where he is going.

Which leads me to the next BIG thing that has been going on around our house......Driver's Ed!!!
He has already completed 30 hours of "class instructional time" and for the past 2 days he has been knocking out the 8 hours of "behind the wheel" training (and I use the word "knocking out" for a reason)
On the first day of driving, he called me during the break only to tell me that he had already run over a squirrel and a bird!!!! No joke, I can't make this crap up! So lets just say he is going to have to drive alot with his Dad before I get in the car with him behind the wheel. I mean, how many kids have actually killed an animal the first day of Driver's Ed....much less two! I'm not sure if he was driving, or hunting!!!!!
But none the less, he got his certificate and so now we just sit and wait for July 27th to roll around so we can head to the DMV to get his permit....and all the while, all I can think about is straining my brain trying to remember back to the last time I held him in my arms as a toddler and put him down where his feet touched the floor not even realizing that it was the last time I would ever hold him.
If I knew then what I know now, I would have had the best photographer in town there at that exact moment to snap a shot so I would have it to look back on for the rest of my life. But instead, I just have it tucked away in my heart and think about it every time I look at him growing up.

At what point did I blink?

Well, the time is almost here...in less that 2 weeks my Bubba will start Drivers Ed (some stupid driving class the school system requires here in NC). You have a certain number of hours in class and then road driving time as well. Which for Kyle is a waist of time because Chris has already told him once the class is over to forget everything he was told because he was going to teach him the "right" way (boy the advantages of having your father be a Sargent of the Highway Patrol!).....POOR Kyle! I hate driving with him in the car and I've been married to him for almost 16 years! It's always laws, and speed, and blind spots and safe following distance and blah...blah ....blah.......
So, as Kyle begins this phase of his life, I can't help but let my mind wonder back and try to piece everything back together and see exactly when it was that I blinked and missed my baby boy growing up. When did my 7lb 15oz, 19 inch long, dark headed perfect baby boy become a 5 foot 9 inch, lean blond headed mouthy teenager? Who in no way shape of form should be half way old enough and ready to get behing the wheel of a car.....REALLY!!!! Oh, Lord I can't breathe..........
These are the times in life where you have to find the humor in it all so you don't break down into that blubbering idiot Mom phase, complete with runny snot and all!
Some of my close friends are just having babies and some have young toddlers and I feel as though I am at a total different phase in life trying to survive the ever feared teenage years. I hope someday I will have words of wisdom for them as they reach this time whith their own children....but the truth is, non of have any wisdom when it comes to raising children. No matter what anyone tells you or warns you about, it simply something you learn on your own through trial and error...and yes there will be plaenty of times when you will fail and then say to your self "well that sure as heck didn't work out like I thought but it didn't kill him either"...and let me just say I have more than a few of those conversations with myself!
I could stomp my foot and grab him around the neck, dig my heels in and hold on tight but the truth is....it wouldn't help.....he would still start to drive......and ....he would still grow up.
So, as our house begins this adventure please keep us in your prayers cause I am a firm believer that God has a sense of humor and that is something that I am really gonna need to get through it all!

I took a day off.....

I took the day off work yesterday to get a few things done around the house(actually it was more like a long chore list of outside jobs that needed to be done with Chris's help) and since his days off are through the week, it was my only chance to get them done. We started at 8am with pulling weeds out of all the flower beds I have in the front yard. Then while Chris was gone to get a truck load of mulch(yes, we need so much we have to by it by the truck load) I put a fresh coat of black paint on the plant urns I have by the garage. Then I notices the water deverter thingy's needed a fresh coat of black paint too. So I snagged them up and did them to. Next I headed back around front and scrubbed down all four chairs on the front porch and topped them off with a fresh coat of white paint. Chris came back home and he shoveled an entire truckload of mulch while I was on the ground directing and spreading. Next he pressure washed the entire front of the house while I planted flowers in my bird bath and pots.(No my bird bath is not for birds...it is much prettier filled with waving petunias!) Somewhere in between all the chores I think we may have taken a much needed break for lunch...and by the time Kyle arrived home from school I was beat....but there was more to be done. There were still tons of seeds that needed to be planted in the garden. So off we went and spent the next 2 hours making rows and planting seeds. This my friends is were I became a tad OCD.....I planted all the veggies in my garden in ABC order....I mean, who does this crap! Sometimes I think I am going crazy! But over all I think later when the things start growing it make it easier for me to remember what is what. We planted alot this year. Asparagus, beans, broccoli, cucumber, okra, squash, green pepper, 2 kinds of pumpkins, 2 kinds of watermelon, red potatoes and zucchini. And now it's all done. I just have get ferns for my front porch and I will be able to relax and enjoy the view....and take another day off work just to rest!

~Wordless Wendnesday~

Is your dog missing????????????????

Cause if it is...it's a pretty safe bet that it was hanging out behind our house with every other dog in the world last night! All of you are very aware of how Redneck Kyle is...right??? Right! Anyway, Kyle has a second favorite past time besides riding his 4 wheeler in the mud...(since his 4 wheeler is up on blocks with a tire off waiting for a few broken parts to come in the mail) he had to resort to this 2nd favorite past time. What is this past time you ask??? Setting out trapping cages to trap animals....now,before all you PETA loving animal fanatics go all postal and hatin on my blog let me finish. We live on a river that is over taken by beavers and when I saw beavers, I mean an entire family....like 100 generations or something (too hear Chris tell it anway) No, seriously...there are alot of them and they build dams that back up the river which makes the river rise up in our back yard. Plus it keeps the water from running and it become stagnate....and you know what loves stagnate standing water????? Mosquito's!!!!! Chris and Kyle bust up the beaver dams at least 3 times a week! No kidding...those little furry boogers can haul log I tell ya. And they will put anything they can in the dams....buckets, toy ships, John Deere toys left outside....ANYTHING! Anyway, back to the cages. Kyle loves to set and bait them food(which most of the time Chevy goes back and steals) to see what kinda critters he can catch. Which he always just takes a picture of his catch and then turns them free....thank you very much! Well, we were awakened last night to dogs barking way out in the wood behind our house. At first we thought they were barking at all the beavers that were busy at working building another master piece. But then they just kept on barking. Chris decided to go check things out and see what all this fuss was about. So he grabs the spot light beside the bed(see I told ya we are redneck, we have a spot light plugged in beside our bed that is bright enough to land a commercial plane with!) A few minuets later he comes back and said the dogs we all around the cage barking at a possum that had fell for Kyle's trap.....and they wouldn't go away! They all just all layed down around it like they were gonna keep watch over it all night! No joke! Crap like this only happens around my house, right! Chris gets the shotgun and heads back outside. I didn't know what he was gonna do...shoot the possum or shoot around the dogs to scare them off our what! He was gone for what seemed like hours and when he finally came back in he said they dogs we finally all gone but he left the possum in the cage cause he was WAY too pissed off to be let loose right now and would probably turn on him when he opened the cage. He then made some smart tail comment under his breath about how he should go in and wake Kyle up and make him get the possum out of the gage, and how Kyle always sleeps so soundly through all these things....... Oh, and guess where Chevy was through all this ruckus????? Dead asleep on his warm bed in the garage!!!!!!! He is just as bad as Kyle!!!!!

"Sooooo....how ya been?"

Hey girls!!!! I bet you thought I had fallen in the deep dark black hole and would never be heard of again.......no such luck....that's like seeing a camel using a pay phone...it aint ever gonna happen!

soooo.....how ya been???

Things here have been good, just relaxing and waiting for that warm
spring weather to come and stay.

I bet you guys are wondering if Kyle passed Spanish...well, yes he did!!!! With a D non the less but he passed. He actually stayed after the final exam was over and asked the teacher to grade it while he waited :O) And you'll never guess what he has in Enlish so far this semester.....how bout a 97%.......at least there is hope for one lanaguage folks!

I have been working on redoing Kyles room little by little. Time for a "Bog Boy Bed" hahaha. Nothing like trying to fit a 5'10, 14 year old, long legged teen age boy in a twin bed.....kinda looks like a freak of nature ya know? So I was given an old headboard from a friend which I painted. Another friend gave me an almost new matterss set and I bought him a dresser from a yard sale yesterday which I painted to match his headboard. He picked out a really nice Columbia brand comforter that already matched his wall color(thank GOD) so there was no painting needed there. I would post some pictures but alas, they are still being held hostage with Nicholas Sparks in my camera....some day I am gonna get around to getting a new USB cord I guess.

Well, I promise not to stay gone for too long this time. I will never catch up on everyones Blogsbut I hope you you are all well......be back soon!!!!!

Sometimes I think I should have had a daughter....

Since we are dealing with snow and ice here in NC now, I thought I would dig out some pictures from this summer to warm me up....and I found these.

Sometimes I think to myself how wonderful it would be if I had a daughter to dress up in cute little matching outfits(Kyle's idea of matching consist of "mud looks great splattered on anything!"

I swear Kyle tries his hardest to see what kind of situations he can get his 4 wheeler into...and out off, with out hekp from us or his dad's 4 wheel driver truck...and let me just add that I have dug his 4 wheeler out of the mud by hand, more times than I can count!
I know some of you mom's are gasping now and think that I need to been turned over to social services or letting my teenager ride this death machine...but he loves it and he really is a pretty safe driver.

Kyle is fearless when it comes to riding. There is no mud or water too deep for him to try and go through...the more mud.....the better....after all, mud is his favorite color!

And on this next one Kyle's Meme screamed and drew blood from my step dad's arm....Not cool Meme!

and just think, a year from now when he gets a truck all his own....what that poor thing is going to put through!!!!!

BIG Fat TEAR!!!

oh how much I love you girls...really I do! I know I will never get the chance to meet most of you in person but you ladies touch my life and my heart everyday. It has really made me tear up reading your comments here and the ones some of you left to me on Facebook...you gals are just too sweet to me.

....NOW...enuff sappy stuff...onto a new year...right!

So what the heck have I been up to the past few weeks????

Well, for one...... Christmas...but who hasn't been busy with that! We had a wonderful time celebrating with family and even though Kyle is 14 and some of the "Magic" is gone, seeing Kyle's eyes still sparkle on Christmas morning melts my heart.

The day after Christmas we woke up to a butt load of snow!!! No kidding...we got 6.5 inches!!! Which for my little crack in the world is ALOT! Not to mention it put a huge damper on my day after Christmas shopping!!!

Kyle is back to school and next week will finish up his 1st semester of High School...MAJOR croc tear here!!! I can't believe his Freshman year is half way over....and the fact that if he doesn't pass Spanish I may be childless!!!

So, I know some of you have missed my Kyle stories so I thought I would close this post with a few of his Facebook post...I really wish you guys knew him cause if you knew his personality they would we much more comical.....

Kyle: Chores done...mud here I come!

Kyle: since when did my hand get too big to fit in the Pringles can????
(this cracked me up at work and I almost spit my tea all over my desk!)

Kyle: here ducky ducky ducky......
(he had got up early to go duck hunting behind the house)

...about a hour later he posted this....

Kyle: stupid ducks, i'm going back to bed..
(guess he didn't see any!)

Thanks for stinking with me....many hugs to you all!!!!!!

Welcome 2011 and welcome back too me!

Hey there bloggie chicks....missed you guys a ton over the holidays!!! I hope each one of you had a very special one with family and friends....I know I did.
I am sorry to say that I still can't find my USB cord thus leaving Nicholas Sparks and all my holiday pictures hostage inside my camera.
I hope I have not lost too many of you as followers during my much needed break. Things have been crazy at work trying to finish up year end and then with me being in charge of directing the children's play at church...and then trying to keep up with Kyle....which by the way we have 3 weeks left to pass Spanish....ugh... I have been pulled in so many directions!
I have also been working hard redoing Kyles room and putting his twin bed up in the attic and getting him a larger one to fit his ever growing teenage boy body. If you remember the scene from Elf where Buddy is trying to sleep in the tiny Elf beds with his legs from the knee down dangling off, well....that's Kyle trying to sleep in a twin bed!!!!
And of course I am still trying to get the rest of my house back to normal, whatever normal is.
Thanks again for being patient with me...I promise I will do better in 2011. Hugs to all of you....