I previously blogged about how Oldest son got his Driver's License mid-July. Back in February I was shopping for new Homeowners insurance which was with Allstate and I decided to have Allstate quote on our car insurance and I was amazed how much money it saved by switching to them. I preface my post with this to state that for three vehicles in the family I feel we had done our due diligence on car insurance rates earlier this year.
And I've always heard it mentioned how much car rates go up when a teenager is added to the policy.
Go up?
Try DOUBLING THE RATES.
I think my insurance agent was afraid to call me back with this news. When you have a new teen driver, he or she must be "linked" to one car on the policy and he picked, of course, the oldest car. Our other cars are a 5 year old Honda and a 10 year old Suburban. Our son is linked to the least expensive car--the 1994 little Toyota truck. What is we had newer cars? Sheesh! What does insurance look like for families who get their teen a 2002 Toyota Corolla?? What tricks of the trade am I missing??
Our agent told me there is no law stating that I even had to cover him. Our insurance goes with the car so the car is covered no matter who drives it. But the sooner he has a couple years on a policy behind him the better. I think it may be a little better for female drivers.
My only consolation is how much more money it would perhaps--just perhaps as not all girls can be put in the same category--have cost me these years for toiletries and clothes and accessories I have not had to buy.
In January our Middle son will be getting his learner's permit (in some states this has to be added to auto insurance but in mine no need to add till the official driver's license is obtained) and that means in 1.5 years I will have an 18 year old and a 16 year old on our policy (until the 18 year old moves away).
Wow.
Parents of twin sons--look out!
People with kids older than I am probably looked at me a few years ago and thought, "Uh-huh--they will learn soon enough for themselves the realities of car insurance."
So to those of you with kids younger than mine--this is my announcement to you.
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
Saturday, August 25, 2012
Such a Sweet Girl
That is what I say about 50 times a day. We have had our cat for a week. My coworker and her husband brought her to our house last Sunday and her Hubs had gotten pretty attached. As they drove off he said, "They got a good one."
And we did! She does demand attention. And she is vocal. She meows to be petted. She meows when she wakes up. As in when she hears me talking to a client (!!). I am having to lock her upstairs when I have a call that I cannot mute.
So here is my buddy during the day:
She starts her day after all the boys leave, at the window looking at flowers and bumblebees and birds:
(I covered a dining room chair with a towel.....to the left are some catnip herb pieces).
She has a mouse toy that has catnip on the inside and she likes to play with it:
And we did! She does demand attention. And she is vocal. She meows to be petted. She meows when she wakes up. As in when she hears me talking to a client (!!). I am having to lock her upstairs when I have a call that I cannot mute.
So here is my buddy during the day:
She starts her day after all the boys leave, at the window looking at flowers and bumblebees and birds:
She has a mouse toy that has catnip on the inside and she likes to play with it:
She is over 3 years old but playful. And she is a purr machine. She purrs more than she doesn't purr.
All this from a cat that lived at a no-kill shelter for 1.5 years. She is very special. And just what I wanted: over the kitten stage and only scratches her cardboard scratch box.
Hubs is trying to not freak out over cat hair since he is a neat freak so the floors are getting swept and vacuumed often--she is short haired but maybe it is a summer shed thing--she loves to be brushed. Last night I took the photo above--Hubs was rubbing her belly.
She hangs out with each of the boys. They each get home at separate times and she greets them. Here's Youngest:
This sweet girl relaxes me and the boys say the same thing. Having a cat is a big deal. I told Hubs before we got married that I needed him and cats and books in my life to be happy. He said OK. The cats lived for 15 years and it has been about 10 years since I had one. This won't turn into a cat blog but I had to share my sweet girl.
Oh--did I say that her name at the shelter was....Shirley!! She doesn't respond much to it so I made a list of "EEEE" at the end names as I mentioned before and we still don't have an agreed upon name. We like Roxy but Youngest said Harley Quinn (she does have sort of a mask) and we are also thinking of Whisky. She may just be Kiki (Keekee) because that is what I call her mostly.
Friday, August 24, 2012
Work Connections
I am living proof that when you have lived in the same town for so long and have stuck with the same line of business, the adage of "don't burn bridges" rings true. For me it is also important to "keep some bridges".
Work has been a roller coaster for the past 25 years. But what I wanted to write to join Gretchen's Spin Cycle about is how important it has always been for me to bond with some people at work. I have kept friends with one person at least from my many past jobs. It is a very strong connection when together you weather much change in an organization and wackadoodle bosses, I feel, it is similar to how women connect with others when they share a pregnancy group or a new moms group.
There was a time back in 2004 that Hubs and I considered moving away to another state after I had to leave a certain crazy job. We didn't though. My coworkers sent me flowers and a card that I still have that said, "This is your opportunity to touch others the way you have touched us. The Team."
Now that I am in my current job (for almost one year!) I have re-connected with some of those people I knew back then, which has been wonderful.
At my prior job which ended in May 2011 (thank God), it was a small office and I did not bond with anyone--which is not good for me. What I did do to cope is tell my family at the dinner table some stories of things that drove me CRAZY so that we could all laugh about it. One story the boys still bring up--particularly if they are eating a yogurt and we laugh our heads off....which feels great.
In the office next door to me was a much, much older man, a nice man. He brought his lunch every day, and ate in his office and I could hear everything. When he finished crunching away on his very loud crunching, chomp, chomp carrots, he then got out his yogurt. He ate his yogurt every day with a plastic spoon and when he got to the bottom, he scraped. He scraped the bottom of that small yogurt cup over and over and over. I can understand two scrapes but it was about 8 scrapes and then a pause and then about 10 more scrapes. I wanted to take the four steps to his doorway and yell, "I think it's all gone!"
So--it has been a year and 3 months since that time and sometimes the boys scrape their yogurt just for me and we have a good laugh and probably always will over it, which is a different kind of connection...it is a connection to my family for knowing me, just like some authentic coworkers from my past know me and vice versa.
Work has been a roller coaster for the past 25 years. But what I wanted to write to join Gretchen's Spin Cycle about is how important it has always been for me to bond with some people at work. I have kept friends with one person at least from my many past jobs. It is a very strong connection when together you weather much change in an organization and wackadoodle bosses, I feel, it is similar to how women connect with others when they share a pregnancy group or a new moms group.
There was a time back in 2004 that Hubs and I considered moving away to another state after I had to leave a certain crazy job. We didn't though. My coworkers sent me flowers and a card that I still have that said, "This is your opportunity to touch others the way you have touched us. The Team."
Now that I am in my current job (for almost one year!) I have re-connected with some of those people I knew back then, which has been wonderful.
At my prior job which ended in May 2011 (thank God), it was a small office and I did not bond with anyone--which is not good for me. What I did do to cope is tell my family at the dinner table some stories of things that drove me CRAZY so that we could all laugh about it. One story the boys still bring up--particularly if they are eating a yogurt and we laugh our heads off....which feels great.
In the office next door to me was a much, much older man, a nice man. He brought his lunch every day, and ate in his office and I could hear everything. When he finished crunching away on his very loud crunching, chomp, chomp carrots, he then got out his yogurt. He ate his yogurt every day with a plastic spoon and when he got to the bottom, he scraped. He scraped the bottom of that small yogurt cup over and over and over. I can understand two scrapes but it was about 8 scrapes and then a pause and then about 10 more scrapes. I wanted to take the four steps to his doorway and yell, "I think it's all gone!"
So--it has been a year and 3 months since that time and sometimes the boys scrape their yogurt just for me and we have a good laugh and probably always will over it, which is a different kind of connection...it is a connection to my family for knowing me, just like some authentic coworkers from my past know me and vice versa.
Thursday, August 23, 2012
Here's How We Cook Bacon Now
This past June I visited one of my sister-in-laws/brother-in-law in Highlands/Cashiers, NC for a weekend. They had rented a house for a week and so I took Youngest with me and after we went horseback riding through a river (photos of that soon) we stopped by a couple of shops.
There is a potter in NC (Greenhill Pottery but I can't find a website) who makes pottery I had never seen before. My SIL purchased a dish used for rinsing and keeping berries and another on which you place a chicken, neck side up, on top of a small, built-in well area in center of the "pie plate" -- same idea as the "beer butt chicken" where you place a chicken on top of an opened can of beer on the grill.
Anyway, I picked out a bacon-cooker pottery piece since I make bacon almost every Sunday -- by placing the strips on paper towels, on top of folded newspaper, on a plate in the microwave.
Here is my pretty pottery with a package of bacon placed lovingly all around it:
I chose this piece of pottery out of about 8--had to choose the prettiest one.
Here is another view:
You then place it in the microwave for about 8 - 10 minutes. By the way, our microwave died after I used this a few times and when we shopped for a new one we had to make sure it was roomy enough inside to accommodate the new bacon cooker.
When the bacon is cooked I just pour the grease out into the trash and keep the bacon on the table and it stays warm for a little bit. I am convinced that with a tall bowl set into a pie plate, would work as well.
(Here it is cooked and ready for breakfast or BLT's)
We tried it out right away in North Carolina and my SIL doesn't often buy bacon so at the grocery store I showed her how to look at a bunch of packages, opening the "windows" to find the meatiest bacon of all--everyone does this, right? I can't be the only one to leave the bacon aisle with about 10 packages of bacon with their windows flapped open.
There is a potter in NC (Greenhill Pottery but I can't find a website) who makes pottery I had never seen before. My SIL purchased a dish used for rinsing and keeping berries and another on which you place a chicken, neck side up, on top of a small, built-in well area in center of the "pie plate" -- same idea as the "beer butt chicken" where you place a chicken on top of an opened can of beer on the grill.
Anyway, I picked out a bacon-cooker pottery piece since I make bacon almost every Sunday -- by placing the strips on paper towels, on top of folded newspaper, on a plate in the microwave.
Here is my pretty pottery with a package of bacon placed lovingly all around it:
Here is another view:
When the bacon is cooked I just pour the grease out into the trash and keep the bacon on the table and it stays warm for a little bit. I am convinced that with a tall bowl set into a pie plate, would work as well.
(Here it is cooked and ready for breakfast or BLT's)
We tried it out right away in North Carolina and my SIL doesn't often buy bacon so at the grocery store I showed her how to look at a bunch of packages, opening the "windows" to find the meatiest bacon of all--everyone does this, right? I can't be the only one to leave the bacon aisle with about 10 packages of bacon with their windows flapped open.
Wednesday, August 22, 2012
Goodbye Elementary School
Six years ago I had all three kids in elementary school (same school as where Hubs teaches so my whole family was under the same roof every day) for one year.
For the past two years I had three kids in three separate schools--high, middle and elem.
This year I have two high schoolers and one starting middle.
Here is our 11th grader:
High school starts at 7:15 am or so and their departure time is 6:45 so it was darkish outside still and I was not coherent enough to take their picture in the house before they left (so my routine is back to getting up at 6:30 am so I can see them before they take off).
Here is our 9th grader:
He was hoping as hard as his 11th grade brother that his brother would get his driver's license this summer because that meant that Middle son gets to be driven to school by his brother for the next two years. Middle son needs lot of time in the am so he gets up at 5:30 am.
The wheels:
There they go. This is an old Toyota truck that Hubs used to take to work and used on weekends especially for sneaking back home plants and flowers. It is a stick shift and we told Oldest if he learned to drive it then he could have it for school and weekends. He grumbled a year ago when trying to learn to drive it but there is no grumbling now. We paid the $70 school parking fee and he pays for the gas and he is not complaining now that his other friends tell him how more often they have to fill up their tank with gas. I am proud of him that he can drive a stick shift--i cannot and Hubs is a horrible teacher at that (I know, so ironic) so I told Oldest maybe he can teach me one day.
Here is Youngest:
Middle School does not start until 9:20 am and so I have 30 mins of quiet time until Youngest gets up and chats with me for over an hour until he gets his bus at 8:40. he is the only middle school student in our n'hood--the older brothers had other boys to hang with at bus stop up the street. And so yes, I walk up the street with him and chat and then make myself scarce when we hear the bus arrive.
Youngest is very excited that he has male teachers for the first time--two for social studies and math and another right now for a computer class. That late start time means school lets out about 4:00 and he walks in the door at 5:00 (he is almost last picked up in am and almost last dropped off in pm).
I heard from a dad of Oldest's friend we have known for 7 years that he heard his son talking about how I work from home and so keep a major watch on Eldest. Hubs has always said that when he was a teen all his friends knew his mom (my mother in law) was the strictest on the block and his friends were pretty much scared of her. I guess Hubs married a wife just like his mom. It is not bad at all being perceived as the strictest mom, and one who is home at 2:45 when high schoolers get home.....
For the past two years I had three kids in three separate schools--high, middle and elem.
This year I have two high schoolers and one starting middle.
Here is our 11th grader:
He was hoping as hard as his 11th grade brother that his brother would get his driver's license this summer because that meant that Middle son gets to be driven to school by his brother for the next two years. Middle son needs lot of time in the am so he gets up at 5:30 am.
The wheels:
There they go. This is an old Toyota truck that Hubs used to take to work and used on weekends especially for sneaking back home plants and flowers. It is a stick shift and we told Oldest if he learned to drive it then he could have it for school and weekends. He grumbled a year ago when trying to learn to drive it but there is no grumbling now. We paid the $70 school parking fee and he pays for the gas and he is not complaining now that his other friends tell him how more often they have to fill up their tank with gas. I am proud of him that he can drive a stick shift--i cannot and Hubs is a horrible teacher at that (I know, so ironic) so I told Oldest maybe he can teach me one day.
Here is Youngest:
Youngest is very excited that he has male teachers for the first time--two for social studies and math and another right now for a computer class. That late start time means school lets out about 4:00 and he walks in the door at 5:00 (he is almost last picked up in am and almost last dropped off in pm).
I heard from a dad of Oldest's friend we have known for 7 years that he heard his son talking about how I work from home and so keep a major watch on Eldest. Hubs has always said that when he was a teen all his friends knew his mom (my mother in law) was the strictest on the block and his friends were pretty much scared of her. I guess Hubs married a wife just like his mom. It is not bad at all being perceived as the strictest mom, and one who is home at 2:45 when high schoolers get home.....
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
Well......I Was Out of Town
Hmmmm, last summer I was able to blog from my iPhone but I couldn't do it now when I needed to blog from the road. I will have to add more Blue Moon Blogging days into early Sept.
Early in June I made plans to visit a new client in St. Louis in August. I was so excited to go there--we visited as a whole family a few summers ago and it has remained a destination to re-visit. i HIGHLY recommend it for many wonderful (and free) things to do as a family.
I picked a Friday that had a St. Cardinals baseball game. I don't know what I was thinking, but I actually thought I could take the whole family and we would have another great time but get to see a baseball game, tour Anheuser-Busch, take the kids to the wacky but great City Museum and more. Then in July I realized the kids would be back to school.
So I went by myself but I was smarter for this trip and made sure I had some time to not just hop on a plane back back take some time. And it was gorgeous. The residents and workers of the city of St. Louis pay a 1% city tax so that visitors can do so many free activities in beautiful Forest Park--site of the 1904 World's Fair....such as museums and the zoo. Here is just one small part of Forest Park:
After my meeting I drove to Forest park and parked right near that lawn and toured the Art Museum (one of the few structures left from 1904's Fair) and got to gaze at paintings by Monet, Van Gogh, Gaugin and many more. Here is the front:
Then it was just a couple of blocks to the St. Louis zoo. I hadn't been to a zoo in forever and although I am not a fan of places like Sea World or even the Georgia Aquarium, I did enjoy this zoo very much. And it's free! There is a flight cage that was built in 1904 for the World's Fair that remains:
Here is a gorilla who sat down quickly in the "Thinker" pose.
It was gorgeous weather and I got to see everything, and I was really surprised to see swimming hippos. For a minute I thought they were fake--there were three or four of them swimming/walking completely underwater and so gracefully:
Here is the rear view--their "ankles" and toes looked just like a cartoon.
I also drove to St. Charles, MO, where Lewis and Clark began their Journey in 1804 at a certain spot on the Missouri River. I lucked out with 78 degree weather. I will definitely be back and maybe another time will do that beer tour and see a game and more.
Flight Back--
--Of course no trip report would be complete without a mention of my TSA experience. As I've mentioned before, i never have any TSA encounters here at the world's busiest airport because Atlanta has about 16 security lines and only 4 body scanner machines so I pick a line way to the left and about 4 rows from a body scanner. But for my return, once again St. Louis is like other airports where my gate only had two security lines and one had the body scanner so I stood in the other line and got my stuff on the conveyor belt and just as it was my turn the TSA guy put a rope in front of the "regular" metal detector and started to send people to the Body Scanner. So once again in my travels I had to say that I did not want to go thru the body scanner. Fortunately I didn't have to wait too long for a "Female Opt Out" assistance and when the female TSA agent asked if I knew the routine I told her I travel and don't want to get radiation every month and she actually said, "I can't blame you--if I traveled a lot I wouldn't do it either." She was not physically offensive to me as the one time in Tulsa, OK.
So back safe and sound....till Houston in one week.
Early in June I made plans to visit a new client in St. Louis in August. I was so excited to go there--we visited as a whole family a few summers ago and it has remained a destination to re-visit. i HIGHLY recommend it for many wonderful (and free) things to do as a family.
I picked a Friday that had a St. Cardinals baseball game. I don't know what I was thinking, but I actually thought I could take the whole family and we would have another great time but get to see a baseball game, tour Anheuser-Busch, take the kids to the wacky but great City Museum and more. Then in July I realized the kids would be back to school.
So I went by myself but I was smarter for this trip and made sure I had some time to not just hop on a plane back back take some time. And it was gorgeous. The residents and workers of the city of St. Louis pay a 1% city tax so that visitors can do so many free activities in beautiful Forest Park--site of the 1904 World's Fair....such as museums and the zoo. Here is just one small part of Forest Park:
After my meeting I drove to Forest park and parked right near that lawn and toured the Art Museum (one of the few structures left from 1904's Fair) and got to gaze at paintings by Monet, Van Gogh, Gaugin and many more. Here is the front:
Then it was just a couple of blocks to the St. Louis zoo. I hadn't been to a zoo in forever and although I am not a fan of places like Sea World or even the Georgia Aquarium, I did enjoy this zoo very much. And it's free! There is a flight cage that was built in 1904 for the World's Fair that remains:
Here is a gorilla who sat down quickly in the "Thinker" pose.
Here is the rear view--their "ankles" and toes looked just like a cartoon.
I also drove to St. Charles, MO, where Lewis and Clark began their Journey in 1804 at a certain spot on the Missouri River. I lucked out with 78 degree weather. I will definitely be back and maybe another time will do that beer tour and see a game and more.
Flight Back--
--Of course no trip report would be complete without a mention of my TSA experience. As I've mentioned before, i never have any TSA encounters here at the world's busiest airport because Atlanta has about 16 security lines and only 4 body scanner machines so I pick a line way to the left and about 4 rows from a body scanner. But for my return, once again St. Louis is like other airports where my gate only had two security lines and one had the body scanner so I stood in the other line and got my stuff on the conveyor belt and just as it was my turn the TSA guy put a rope in front of the "regular" metal detector and started to send people to the Body Scanner. So once again in my travels I had to say that I did not want to go thru the body scanner. Fortunately I didn't have to wait too long for a "Female Opt Out" assistance and when the female TSA agent asked if I knew the routine I told her I travel and don't want to get radiation every month and she actually said, "I can't blame you--if I traveled a lot I wouldn't do it either." She was not physically offensive to me as the one time in Tulsa, OK.
So back safe and sound....till Houston in one week.
Thursday, August 16, 2012
There’s Gonna Be Another Female in the House!
A feline female! This is a big deal……
When I met Hubs 27 years ago I told him that I needed to have books and cats in a home to be happy and he was on board. We got one cat and then another and then a few years later a dog and then another. All four of them lived their full, long into geriatric lives, and we haven’t had any pets for 7.5 years.
So I think it was fate and timing because this cat’s story spoke to me—about how she lived at the shelter for A YEAR and was MISERABLE but the minute she was put in a happier place she changed. So I reached out and this past Sunday Youngest and I visited the kitty and she was so sweet and not scared at all and after an hour was rubbing our legs and letting us pet her belly.
(my coworker has been emailing me a photo a day of her)
So…..she is gonna be mine this Sunday! And the Boys! Right now they are fighting over the name. I made a list of names that end in the “eeee” sound such as Roxy and Harley--those are the top contenders (kitty was named Shirley!!!) so I was thinking new name/similar sound. I am out of town for a couple of days which is why the adoption day is this Sunday. I’m sooooo excited. She will be scared and hoping that a car ride doesn’t mean shelter time again.
Oh, and she likes guys and feet so she should be happy at our house.
Oh, and she likes guys and feet so she should be happy at our house.
So what is the trend for cat food these days? Some canned food at night so the diet is not just dry food (which has a lot of corn)??
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