What does memorial day mean to you?

Does it mean a day off of work? Does it mean that you are going to get that grill out for the first time begining grilling season? Does it mean summer is here?

Whatever meaning it has for you, please remember the meaning it has to millions of us Americans, our freedom and those precious hereos who fought to preserve it! No matter what your political views or what you think about war, today is a day to celebrate and give thanks to those who fight and have fought for your freedom!

To often we forget what the "Memorial" in Memorial Day stands for. It goes unreconized or ignored by too many of us who are the recipients of our fallen hereos sacrifice. The day comes and goes and we forget to observe the day as it should be, remembering our family members, loved ones, neighbors, friends and those who came before us!

My husband is a former Army soldier and I am so proud that he fought for me, and for YOU! I cannot image life with out my soldier and this weekend, I will remember his fellow soldiers and those soldiers who came before him. Not only was a my husband a solider, but so were both my grandfathers and my step-father. I can image this day is bittersweet for them as they all know too many soldiers who who gave up their lives to protect ours!

Please remember them today!

Now go have to some fun!!! Happy Memorial Day!

SYTYCD

My favorite show(other than its always sunny in philidelphia), so you think you can dance, was on last night! Yeeessss!

I love this show! Dont ask me why because my moves are only sweet when Im drinking and delusionsal. Ive been know to do a little running man and the carlton every once in awhile. I also have some moves made up of my own awesome talent! Those tend to come out when I hear 80's music and kenny rogers, the gambler! YyYeessss!

Anyways, a few of a favs were the 123 party guy, obviously only there to get on tv. I like the big girl dancer, she was inspiring! There was this one dude from russia or something and he got me to thinking, where in the hell do dudes find shirts like that! I mean the ones with tons of sequins and no closures? I was craking up at him! What dude walks into a store and is like "oooh man I HAVE to get this shirt! It will look awesome on me!"

Im gonna get me one of those shirts and just wear it to bed! Awesome!

SWAGGER WAGON

I told you I like to rock!

Its my anniversary!

Soooo I didnt get my coach purse...booooo! BUT I did get a romantic evening with my husband and thats all that I could have asked for! Plus my birthday is next month so he has another chance.

We were trying to find the perfect romantic resturaunt and ended up at this little italian place that was perfect!

We ate toooooo much, stopped for coffee and called it a night. PERFECT! Plus, we got to sleep in!!!

Thanks for all the Happy Anniversarys!! Hope you all had a great weekend! What did you do?

Random Random Randomness

So I cant get my head together for two seconds to write a whole post so I thought Id just do a random randomness post:



-I was really getting sick of the shitty ass blogs that were clogging up my reader so I had to go through them and delete delete delete. I was wondering why I even followed some of them in the first place and was wondering if anyone has ever deleted me? Bitches...



-So daughter #1 had portfolio day at school. She had a cute little stick figure with writing under it that said..."My name is ..... ....... I am 5 years old, and I like to party! Thats awesome! or is it scary?



- Im giving up on doing my designing my blog myself. These wonderful girls are going to whip me up something special! and FINALLY ill have a button! I know all of you are dying to add it to your page!






- My anniversary is tomorrow. I cant think of anything to get my husband. Im hoping he gets me a new coach purse, in honor of my bloggy bff Nikki!



- My Macaroni Kid newsletter is coming along. Id love for you all to become subscribers and help me get my numbers up? Pretty please! You dont have to live by me and I try to have some awesome articles in it!


You can "like" my facebook page here!
Or subscribe through my home page here!

-Please be patient with me, I know I have been neglecting blogs, including my own. So hopefully Ill get some new post ideas soon and Ill be back! Thanks!

Were you wondering?

Im so sorry blogging friends. Ive neglected you. Ive had the same post up for like 5 days. Do you want to know why? Probably not but Im going to tell you ANYWAYS!






Ive decided to become a Macaroni Kid! Thats right! I jumped it and Im loving it!






Guess what else....you can be one too!




What is a macaroni kid you ask? Good question! Macaroni Kid and our big family of publisher moms, (that's me) give you the scoop on all that is cool and awesome, family-friendly, goings on in our communities each week by way of an e-newsletter! Its free to subscribe! I do it so you know its awesome!

First, check out my newsletter......Canonsburg Macaroni Kid Make sure you subscribe while you are there, you dont have to live in pittsburgh, just get it for my amazing articles!




Then, email me if you are interested in starting one in your area...............JessicaBranagan@macaronikid.com






Now I will leave you with a picture of my real life macaroni kid!

Lets get it on!

Awhile back my good bloggy friend Maria bestowed upon me this gem of an award. Hows that for an image first thing this morning!

Anyways, for this award, I must tell you 5 CHARACTERS with whom I would chose to knock boots with, or bump plastics with in this case I guess.

So first, here is my list of men and second my list of whos lists' I would like to see! Got all that?

Here goes:

I have to start with my husband...Hes been the star of a few movies...home movies....

Then there is Vince Vaughn in Old School. Or any movie hes in for that matter. Im choosing this one because hes a family man in it but hilarious!

Next Michael Corleone. Nothing like a cute, shy, little ganster.

And cant forget Noah from the Notebook...ok ok dont gag I know its a total sap movie that I dont normally go for, but Im a sucker for southern gentlemen.

Jason Segal in I love you man. I love this movie! Dont ask me why. I just think hes cute!

Cant forget MrT. from the A-Team. I pity the foo who doenst like gold chains.

And Ron Burgandy. Im a sucker for a male flute player.

Ryan Renolds in...ummm...anything....I guess ill pick Van Wilder...your welcome....

Ben Stone...Seth Rogan in knocked up. Aww he was sweet in this movie.

Peter Klaven..also in I love you man.....

So thats my list!

I would love to see what these ladies come up with so Im passing it on to:

Nikki @ myfantabulouswonderfullife

Mandy@ suburbanstereosype

Rachel @ littlegirlshinyworld

Jamie@ daydreambeliever

Pamela @ 2muchtestosterone

LauraJane @ callmelaurajane

Jane @ mylifeasjane

MommaKisss @mommykiss

Messy Mommy @aliasblogger

Purse Blogger @ purseblogger

Tabatha @ expressingitall

Jen @ thisiswhatmommyhastosay

Daisygirl @ adailyscoupofchaos

Alyssa @ bloggintonoggin

ok i better stop there, you are all too funny and I want to hear who you would pick from ALL of you!

Wah Wah Waaahhhh...

Debbie Downer will be guest posting today....I cant help it. She just took over! Sorry folks, I keep telling her to leave but she refuses and continues to use words like folks. Ha



I LOVE Mother's Day! It is a much needed, guilt free, day off. I call it Mother's Day weekend. I get to sleep in, dont have to cook, could maybe take a little nap if I wanted. PERFECT!



but...on this day, I am reminded that I dont like my mother. Its true! I didnt couldnt even bring myself to call her yesterday. Instead, I sent her a text. Im horrible. I struggle with it alot and it would take me an entire 500 page book to tell you all of the reasons why.



Im trying to be a better Chirstian woman and this includes respecting your mother and I just.cant.do. it! I try to rasie my girls in the exact opposite way she raised me and my sister. From things like she worked, I stay home, she had 2 girls, now I have to work on three, all the way to the words that come out of my mouth!



My husband really gets upset about this thing between me and my mom and he says "What if one day your girls didnt want to talk to you on Mother's day?" or " What if you girls dont answer the phone when you call?"All I can respond with is, " That will never happen because I will hunt them down and stalk them until they talk to me. And its true. I would definitly do that!



My mom, she wouldnt/doesnt. I really dont think she cares. She onlys cares because she wants others to think she is worlds best mom/grandma. Now I know I sound like a whiney bitch but I can tell you that I am ok with this! I have a great relationship with my grandmother and really feel like its my mom who is missing out on all this coolness!



Its just when mothers day rolls around and I am faced with the fact that I AM ok with this, that when the feelings of guilt come. The sound of her voice can put me in a bad mood for days so I just prefer to keep my distance and live my life happy! People tell me that one day I will be sad about it but I just dont think I will be. Ive lived the majority of my life dealing with this issue and have had enough therapy to come to terms with our relationship.



I have issues...but so do you right? Tell me Im right?

Thank heaven for little girls.

Last night at my Apples of Gold meeting, we discussed purity. This was hard for me because I am the mother of two girls. It is a topic that I have struggled with since the day they were born.

You take a look around at some of these young "ladies" out there and think, "Gee, I hope my girls never look/dress like that when they get older." Some sights actually make me throw up a little in my mouth.

Sexualizing young women in this society is a big problem! I want to find some of these parents out there to punch them in the neck and ask them what the hell they are thinking for letting their kid walk out of the house looking the way some of them do!

It makes me ask myself, how do I teach my girls to be respectable young women? How do I get them to realize they need to respect their bodies? To be modest? How do I teach them that boys really arent looking at their hearts but something a little different in that vacinity of the body?

Ive always said that I love having little girls its the teenage ones I dont want! I know how I was and it really is scary to think that they will be like me one day. I mean, dont get me wrong, I did turn out awesome. That is no thanks to my parents. They let me do whatever I wanted!

Am I overreacting? Im just trying hard now to put some good thoughts in their heads and let them know that they are beautiful every chance I get. My grandmother tells me I do it too much and that they will be big-headed but I disagree. In this world, I dont think that there is a such thing as too much love or too many compliments!

Blogging is making me fat

Ive been missing....in case you noticed.....

My computer decided it wanted to take a visit to gangsters paradise and never return. Unfortunately, my husband decided to bring my beloved computer back! Yay!!

Upon the demise of windows, we now have installed vista so we will see how this works! The good news is, I also have sound back! Its the little things folks, the little things.

In my forced day away from the computer I got a lot accomplished.

I did yoga for an hour with my little one. It IS a little hard to be "zen" when you have a 2 years old tell you 6,000 times,"Mommy I have to go poopy." I did a sculpting workout and I went for an hour walk! Oh yeah, and I got a lot of housework done!

Anyways, I realized that I did so much when the computer is down, that blogging is making me fat! I dont do much physical activity when Im sitting here reading blogs and writing! My husband was happy when he came home to a clean house too!

Sooooo Im thinking, maybe I should just throw in the cards and quit the blog? Hmmmm, nah! BUT I do need to better manage my time. Maybe all you bloggers need to start writing crappier stuff so I dont want to read it anymore? Sound good?

Just kidding! I love your blogs!! They do say laughing burns calories right?

Cloudy with a chance of hands in the pants

Last night we went to daughter #1's school for family fun night and they showed the movie, Cloudy with a chance of Meatballs.


My girls did great! They sat and snuggled and watched the movie. Yay! Then....there were some of the other kids....


I swear I wanted to hide in ebarrassment FOR the parents. The kids were running around kicking people, yelling and one little dude stood in front of everyone with his hands down his pants playing with his junk for like ten minutes! and I mean RIGHT in front of everyone. I had to distract my girls!


This begs the question, is it the parents fault when kids act like that? Or is it just the nature of the kid? I think I would have a heart attack if my kids acting like that!