To the 2008 edition of getting to know your friends and family. What you are supposed to do is copy (not forward) this entire e-mail and paste it onto a new e-mail that you'll send. Change all the answers so they apply to you, and then send this to your friends & family, including the person whom sent it to you. The theory is that you will learn a LOT of little things about your friends & family that you might not have known.

1. What time did you get up this morning? am I up yet?

2. Diamonds or pearls? honestly- neither

3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema? The Spiderwick Chronicles

4. Favorite TV show? Right now I am anti-TV-nothing interesting enough

5. What do you usually have for breakfast? Honey Nut Cheerios

6. What kind of soap do you use? Lever 2000, Suave

7. What is your middle name? Suzann (possible baby name?)

8. What food do you dislike? Italian sausage(my father once made us eat it as a burger, I can't even stand the smell of it since!)

9. What is your favorite CD? any that I put together myself, otherwise Reba's #1s

10. What kind of car do you drive? Chevy Venture minivan (OK- stop druling!)

11. What characteristics do you despise about people? Selfish, unteachable, self righteous

12. Favorite item of clothing? any comfortable PJS

13. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you go? Alask, Ireland, England now and 150 +/- years ago (Jane Austen's time)

14. What is your biggest regret? getting into debt

15. Where would you retire to? a large ranch

16. What was your most recent memorable birthday? i don't have those

18. Furthest place you are sending this? alaska

19. Who do you least expect to send this back? Katherien-she sent it to me!

20. Person you expect to send it back first? Jackie- she doesn't have one on her blog yet

21. When is your birthday? Ground Hog's day and Farrah Faucet's b-day-you can figure the date
22. What is your favorite scent? fresh cut grass, camp fire, horse feed (horse manure isn't too bad either!)

23. Are you a morning or night person? who said I was a person?

24. What is your shoe size? 7 1/2, sometimes 8

25. Pets? Mo the cat, Ody the dog- (I have discovered that pets are best when they live in another state)

26. Any new and exciting news you'd like to share with us? RD has lost 20 lbs, he also recently pointed out to me (so I could be prepared), that if he keeps loosing weight, and i keep gaining because of the pregnancy, that I will probably weigh more than him! Sometimes he should really keep his mouth shut!

27. What did you want to be when you were little? a teacher, vetrinarian, for a short time a comedian, a mom

28. How are you today? somewhat down, another Jeckyll/Hyde day

29. What is your favorite candy? snickers, dove truffle eggs (only available during Easter)

30. What is your favorite flower? for smell-Lilacs, I don't actually know what they look like

31. What is a day on the calendar you are looking forward to? August 7, 2008 Breaking Dawn comes out

32. What church do you attend? The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, in the same building I attended as a little girl

33. Favorite sandwich? PBJ; Hot ham &Cheese from Lion's Choice

34. What are you listening to right now? Jake keeping himself awake

35. What is the last thing you ate? homemade chicken and dumplins (as RD calls them, chicken and puffs)

36. Do you wish on stars? very rarely

37. What would you consider your perfect day? A sunny 70 degree, slightly breezy day (does anyone ever say cold, drab and rainy?), I've hiked a beautiful trail with my family, had absolutely no obligations, did not fix a single item of food, and laying in an open field watching the big puffy clouds go by.

38. How is the weather right now? cold, miserable

39. Last person you spoke to on the phone? my hubby

40. Do you like the person who sent this to you? of course

41. Favorite soft drink? Pepsi, A&W root beer

42. Favorite restaurant: Mcdonalds- NOT- Iam anti food right now too, so I couldn't say

43. Hair color? dark brown

44. Siblings? 3

45. Favorite time of the year? Spring and Fall, Summer comes in second

46. What was your favorite toy as a child? my barbies because my brother would play them with me-he had his own Ken!

47. Summer or winter? Summer

48. Hugs or kisses? Hugs

49. Chocolate or vanilla? Chocolate

50. Do you want your friends to email you back? nah

51. When was the last time you cried? For what reason: stressed-I'm quite hormonal right now so a few tears escape my eyes each day; sad- don't know;happy-laughing histerically during love making the other night (I will never say why!)

52. What is under your bed? batteries, candles, broken books i plan to fix one day, loads of toys, a flash light, my house shoes, kids clothes, probably some food item (I did clean it out not too long ago)

53. Who is the friend you have had the longest? Sabrina- I don't even remember meeting her for the first time, we played together at the age of 2

54. What did you do last night? played hooky from Scouts, watched a great movie "The Importance of Being Ernest", wrote on my blog, waited for RD to get home from school

55. Favorite room in your house? my living room (that's pretty pathetic!)

56. What are you afraid of? losing one of my kids, not having food storage when I need it

57. Plain, buttered, or salted Popcorn? buttered, buttered, buttered

58. How many keys on your key ring? 7-2 house, 2 car, 3 church

59. How many years at your current job? 9, almost 11 if I get to count marriage!

60. Favorite day of the week? Friday, no homework and it's not the day before Sunday

61. How many towns have you lived in? 3 (that's truely pathetic!!)

63. How many people will you be sending this to? none-it's only on my blog

64. Do you like your job? most of the time, if I were better at it I would love it!

Parenting Tip #1

First off- this is a record, this is the first time I've written 2 posts in one day! Don't get used to it!
I thought I'd share a new form of "motivation" we have discovered for our kids- take them to a movie that scares the piss out of them, then threaten to them back when they misbehave!
We took the kids to see the Spiderwick Chronicles on Monday. We knew AD would be scared, but we took her anyway. I thought the boys would love it-wrong! The first time the house brownie turned to a scary creature, JD jumped out of his seat and shouted "I HAVE TO GO POTTY!" I haven't seen JD this scared in a while. (I never did let him go to the bathroom!) ID was near tears in a few spots. AD just sat with her head buried in FD's side the entire movie. Luckily, we were the only family in the theater, so FD and I had no problem laughing at our kids terror.
Since that day I would say we have threatened them at least 5 times- "If you don't stop that now we will go see Spiderwich again!" It has immediate results! ID has asked if we are serious about taking them back, with fear in his voice.

When is a hot dog too hot?

We are just overcoming the latest winter storms today. The boys were out of school for two days in a row again! We didn't even go out to play in the snow, though it was perfect. I think we are all tired of the cold and ready for the spring to begin! This past weekend did not help our spring fever. Saturday we sat outside in the warm beautiful weather eating our bar-b-que. ID was of course eating hot dogs. For one reason or another his h.d. got cold. I told him to warm it in the microwave for 10 seconds. He left to do this. I had no concerns because he has done this many times. A few minutes later I decided to take somethings inside. To my utter astonishment and horror, ID was still warming his h.d. Smoke was billowing out of the microwave, ID was just standing there waiting patiently. When I saw the time left on the microwave it was at 6 minutes and 40 seconds. He got the 10 right, just not in seconds! The stench was unbearable itself (the smell took me way back to the time my mother had found a mouse burned to death in the insulation between the stove and oven.)! 4 days later my house still reeks of burned dog. It's hard to explain exactly what it looked like. It was quite black, rather large, and completely dried out. Quite inedible! I'm pretty sure we will need to get a new microwave because every time we use it- it emits the horrid smell. ID will be under better supervision for his future microwave uses!
So when is a hot dog too hot?
Maybe when it's beyond recognition and creates it's own air freshener ( maybe air non freshener)!