Amber | Life Elevated Mom

The issue with school lunches

November 18, 2010 by Amber

If my daughter had her way, she would eat “hot lunch” from the school’s cafeteria every day.

Unfortunately for her, she has a money-saving mom who only allows that indulgence once per week and it’s usually on a day they’re serving something healthy.

Sucks to be her.

Last week, it was a particularly chilly day and she queried if this was the day she could get her hot lunch. Responsible parent I am, I extolled the many virtues of saving your money as I packed her lunch. I grabbed her lunch bag, threw it in her backpack and sent her on her merry way to school.

And then looked at the kitchen counter to where I had left her unpacked food.

Filed Under: Hadley, Humor

Why some days, I feel like Betty White

November 17, 2010 by Amber

A couple of weeks ago, I read a feature on Betty White in the newspaper.

One particular part of that interview has had me chuckling ever since:

Every weekday, White gets up at 6, feeds her dog, showers, works on a book, heads to the set (whether TV, movie, or commercial) for a day of shooting, comes home, plays with her dog, does a crossword puzzle, writes some more, and goes to bed at 1:30 a.m.

How does she stay in shape?

“I have a two-story house and a bad memory, so I’m up and down those stairs all the time,” she says. “That’s my exercise.”

Filed Under: Humor

Let It Snow!

November 14, 2010 by Amber

We woke up last week to a momentous occasion: the first snowfall of the season. Both kids tried to use it to their advantage.

Haddie begged me to drive her to school. I told her she’d be standing at the bus stop in far worse conditions than that this winter.

Tough-love is my version of a pep talk.

Bode tried to declare it a “Snow Day” and stay home from preschool. Yeah, that .000005-inch of snow will wreak havoc every time.

Well, maybe if you’re woosies and live in Texas where the entire state is halted at the sign of a snowflake.

I should know. We got stuck in Dallas on our way back from our Costa Rica honeymoon for that very reason.

I love love love love the snow. I hate hate hate the heat. So I have to admit even though I’m so excited for our cruise aboard the Norwegian Epic, the timing could not be worse because I am finally getting weather I love in Denver.

But I’m willing to make the sacrifice and go anyway.

The third member of our family, Remy a.k.a. “Fat Kitty” had a rather extreme reaction. The bane to his existence is playing in the backyard with the kids. All day long, he “Meows” incessantly until one of us relents and goes outside with him.

Once granted his freedom, Fat Kitty follows the same pattern: He walks through the sliding door, does a big, long stretch and then sharpens his claws on the outdoor mat.

I don’t have the heart to tell him he’s been declawed.

He then roams around the yard in his own private utopia eating grass, lazing out in the sunlight or hiding in the shade. One time, Fat Kitty shocked us all and caught a mouse in the pumpkin patch.

It was a true revelation that he was, indeed a real cat and not just a big, lazy ball of fur.

On our snow day, I tried to lure him outside but our fair-weather cat was having nothin’ to do with it.

He reminded me of my snow-despising mother.

The woman who has lived in the Great, White North her entire life.

Filed Under: Bode, Colorado, Hadley, Humor

Tangled in a Ponzi Scheme and My Fun Win!

November 11, 2010 by Amber

What do Disney’s new flick Tangled and a Ponzi scheme have in common?

Nothing. I just chose to include them in the same post.

I have oodles going on before my mother-in-law flies in to take care of the kiddos while Jamie and I go on our cruise aboard the Norwegian Epic.

In the midst of the chaos, the kids and I attended a prescreening of Tangled, which hits theaters next week. Read what we thought of it and why I have more in common with Rapunzel than I care to admit (and it ain’t a good thing).

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Almost two years ago, Denver was caught up in a scandal when it was revealed Bishop Shawn Merriman was involved in a $20 million Ponzi scheme. There were many victims but no one was more blindsided by his betrayal than his own wife and four children.

The press obsessively followed the trial and conviction but his poor family stayed in the shadows. I recently found out that his resilient now-ex-wife Andrea started a blog and is an amazing, powerful and inspiring writer.

I asked her to guest-post at Mile High Mamas this week and guaranteed, you’ll be as mesmerized by her worst nightmare as I am. In our three-part series, Andrea shares how she learned the horrible truth, the day the Feds came to confiscate everything and where she is today.

Go. Read. Comment. And thank your blessings for an honest spouse.

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On Tuesday, I was having a rough day due to some frustrating news I received. As I was moping around, I got a note from my friend and former BlogHer roommate Loralee.

If you’ve never read her blog Loralee’s Looney Tunes, be sure to check it out. The girl is laugh-out-loud irreverent and has had her share of trials such as losing her son Matthew (which she blogs openly about). It has been wonderful to watch her blog grow from near-obscurity to one of the most popular mommy blogs.

Anyhew, Loralee had emailed to let me know I had won her Favorite Things birthday contest.

This was amazing for a few reasons:
1) I rarely enter contests

2) I rarely win contests (well, with the exception of a little one that sent me to the Olympics).

3) I won a treasure-trove of darling products (check them all out here) that included A GUSSY Tote Bag ($68), Saucy Frocks Apron ($35), A ribboned-hemmed skirt by Prairie Mama ($40), “Sweet & Simple Birdie Necklace” by Lisa Leonard Designs ($58.00), Rosette Cuff by Allora Handmade ($16), Petal Pusher Posy from The Pleated Poppy ($15), Filigree Verdigris Brass – Barcelona Earrings, and last but definitely not least, The FIRST edition of Where Women Cook out on Dec.1st!!!! ($16) (This magazine is a project Loralee is actively involved in so you know it’s good).

Best news of all? I was no longer down-in-the-dumps. So, if you ever want to cheer me up?

Materialism works wonders.

Filed Under: Uncategorized

My deepest, darkest secret

November 10, 2010 by Amber

I got the MRI results back for my knee last week. The results did not surprise me. The commentary did. The official report from the lab:

History:
Medial meniscus tear. Medial compartment degenerative change.

Findings:
A small amount of joint fluid is present, within physiologic range. There is heterogeous bone marrow signal in the metaphyseal regions; this is a common finding in menstruating females.

To summarize?

1) In addition to my arthritis, I have a meniscus tear in my knee.

2) I am a menstruating female.

And apparently this is a common finding. WHEW!

I need Arthroscopic surgery to repair the torn meniscus. This is allegedly a pretty standard procedure with a recovery of about 6 weeks(though full recovery will take longer than that.)

Thus begs the much more difficult question: when to do it. I’ve been experiencing pain for well over a year now but have been able to maintain my lifestyle by hiking and biking every day (though running and volleyball are definitely out).

But our schedule is kinda tricky. Jamie and I are heading out on a cruise next week (aboard the Norwegian EPIC!), I need to be in Park City for a conference the beginning of December, then there’s Christmas and we also have numerous ski trips planned including Telluride, Echo Mountain and Crested Butte.

Right now, mid-February is about as soon as I can swing it. Maybe I’ll even do it on the 20th–my birthday.

I’ve already had lice as a birthday present.

Comparatively, a new knee sounds pretty darn swell.

Filed Under: Health, Humor

The new standard of birthday excellence

November 9, 2010 by Amber

At church, I work with the 12- and 13-year-old girls. Though my responsibility is to teach on Sundays, I try to attend their weekly Tuesday night activity at the church when I have a chance.

Since Jamie is in the Bishopric, he has to attend meetings that evening so I always have the kids in tow.

I arrived last week to discover the youth disbanding to various cars to collect food donations for Thanksgiving. Knowing my kids wouldn’t want to be dragged around, we invited ourselves to another ward (congregation’s) activity.

I’m all about letting the best ward win.

Behind our church is a smattering of trees. So lovely is this grove that many people (including my classy sister-in-law Tammy) have their wedding receptions here.

Muchos trees also = muchos leaves.

For a service project, the teen-age boys from my friend’s ward chose to rake the grove, which is no small feat.

We chose to reap the rewards of their labors and spent an hour jumping, racing and burying ourselves in the piles.

Oh yeah, and inviting ourselves to warm ourselves on that dark, chilly night with their hot chocolate.

On Saturday, Bode was invited to a birthday party at his friend Noah’s house. When I arrived, his mom Sam said, unbeknownst to me, that Hadley was invited as well. I returned home to extend the invite but by that time, she was head-deep in pumpkin goop so declined.

When I retrieved Bode a couple of hours later, the boys were attacking a pile of leaves. Hadley was not pleased with their choice of activity.

“NOBODY TOLD ME THERE WOULD BE LEAVES INVOLVED AT THAT BOY’S PARTY!”

Leaf-jumping: the new standard of birthday excellence.

Filed Under: Bode, Hadley, Humor

Saturday is a special day

November 8, 2010 by Amber

Saturday marked the end of soccer season (glory, praises Hallelujah).

It’s not that I didn’t enjoy being part of the soccer mom tribe. It’s just the season seemed so dang long and by the end of it, there were a thousand different ways I would have preferred to spend my weekend. It gives me new appreciation for my folks who raised three athletic kids and attended all of our sporting events through high school.

It’s gonna be a long haul.

Bode was a pleasure to watch, attacking the ball and averaging a few goals a game. Hadley, on the other hand, regressed as the season went on. By the last game she acted downright scared of the ball.

This, from the most spirited, aggressive kid I know who throws a colossal fit whenever her brother beats her in Sorry (which is often).

I’m not discouraging her from playing again but am gently encouraging her to explore other options. She’s an ace at skiing and hiking and loves the water so I’m thinking swim team may be in her future.

This, from the mother who hates to get her face wet.

Haul=long. But it’s worth it.

=================

On another [long-haul] note, last weekend marked the end of Pumpkin Season 2010. The Great Pumpkin has been sitting in our driveway for the past month and Jamie took a saw to it on Saturday. The process is tedious and long. After salvaging the seeds (to trade with other growers), he cut it up, put it in a thousand trash bags and plans to compost it in the patch.

Ever wondered what the inside of The Great Pumpkin looks like?

Big enough to eat a small child, for sure.

As Haddie and Jamie gutted it, I went to the store. As I was backing out, I followed my usual path, not realizing The Great Pumpkin was now in my way.

I may-or-may-not have run into it.

And it may-or-may-not have been the highlight of my season.

Filed Under: Humor, pumpkins

Top Picks errr…Pics of the Week

November 3, 2010 by Amber

Check out my darling twin nieces on Halloween.
(Nevermind that wild rabbits are our neighborhood pest and Jamie is constantly threatening to “break their necks” for destroying our yard.)

I finally took a picture of Bode that I love. In case you couldn’t tell, he is going through a rough patch as it pertains to smiling in pictures. As in he can’t do it. Cases in point:

At the Denver Aquarium.

On the first day of school.

In the Outer Banks.

Well, you get the picture.

And that picture ain’t smiling very well.

However, the other day I finally got one that I love. The weather has been glorious here (mid-60s, my ideal temperature). After preschool, we’ve been hitting the playground and going on many outdoor adventures.

Yesterday, we had stick sword fights along Clear Creek, trekked through our favorite secret passageway to collect branches and leaves for fall decorations and threw 100 rocks in the river. After this precious shot of Bode counting the stones, I inadvertently nailed a duck.

That’s gotta count for some bad karma.

On Monday, we biked to a water tower that is perched over our neighborhood. After stashing our bikes in the ditch, we hiked to the top where we played hide-and-go-seek, threw more rocks and counted the clouds. I’m not sure how long we were up there but it felt like hours as we both experienced a high we never wanted to come down.

As he gazed out upon the undulating landscape, I asked him to turn around to me, at which time I captured his very essence in a moment when he least expected it.

Joy.

And it made all those other unphotogenic moments totally worth it.

Filed Under: Bode, Humor

The Great Pumpkin’s Mushroom Kingdom

November 2, 2010 by Amber

Halloween is almost anti-climactic after all the pumpkin patches, parties, weigh-offs and trunk-or-treats.

This year, the kids opted for a Mario Bros. theme. Bode’s hero is Mario and Hadley begged to be Yoshi, his sidekick dinosaur. Bode’s costume was easy: I went to the local thrift store where I found overalls and a red shirt. I bought the actual Mario hat from the Halloween store.

I’ll admit I wasn’t too thrilled about Yoshi so when I couldn’t find a costume in Hadley’s size, I proposed she dress up as Princess Peach, the damsel in distress in Mario’s ficticious Mushroom Kingdom.

Just pretend they are posing with The Great Mushroom.

If you know Hadley’s aversion to all things princess, you would realize what a risky move this was. Somewhere, at sometime, a princess did her wrong and these royal wenches represent all that is evil in the world.

Fortunately, due to her affection for Mario, she made the exception to be Peach.

Though she did have the pageant girl wave down at her school parade.

On Saturday, we had a busy day with soccer games and a playdate with Aunt Lisa while Jamie and I auditioned at the Marriage Ref. That night was the trunk-or-treat at the church. Knowing they would get loaded up on sugar, I fed them a healthy dinner. Thirty seconds prior, Bode professed to be starving to death and proceeded to eat half his weight in food.

“My tummy is sooooo full,” he moaned.

I thought he was exaggerating until it was time to go to the trunk-or-treat an hour later. He refused, with the same complaint.

“Bode, don’t you realize you’re going to go to a place where they are going to stuff you full of candy?” I queried.

“Don’t care. My tummy is too full.”

I don’t know how a kid like that came out of me.

He bounced back on Halloween and we joined our neighborhood revelries with a fire-truck-led procession, followed by trick-or-treating.

The local Medved dealership sponsored our parade and brought this Camero. It was love at first sight for the Lord of the Gourds.

Please don’t ask me how many times he made me retake this photo in order to best showcase his dream car.

As you can imagine, visiting the house of The Great Pumpkin makes us a VERY popular stop for picture-taking.

Next year, I’m charging a fee.

All these were fun times but my favorite moment came earlier that day when I attempted to clean up the house. As I swept the kitchen floor, the Lord of the Gourds commented:

“You’re the best looking thing with a broom today.”

‘Bout time someone recognized it.

Happy Halloween!

Filed Under: Bode, Hadley, holidays, Humor, Jamie, pumpkins Tagged With: Halloween

Battling it Out at Denver’s Marriage Ref Auditions

November 1, 2010 by Amber

On Saturday, my husband Jamie and I were invited to audition for the Marriage Ref, Jerry Seinfield’s brainchild on NBC.

No, Mom. We’re not on the brink of divorce but we need a comedic mediator for our ongoing dispute:

Jamie’s all-consuming obsession with growing The Great Pumpkin.

The whole thing unfolded almost by accident. When I was driving to my daughter’s Halloween Party on Friday, the hosts of Alice 105.9 were talking about the Marriage Ref’s auditions in Denver that weekend. Casting directors were looking for humorous squabbles that could be resolved by their celebrity panel.

I listened with moderate interest but then something clicked. The inordinate amount of time Jamie spends nurturing The Great Pumpkin is a kooky dispute, on par with past Marriage Ref episodes that included Fonzie the stuffed dog and a stripper pole in a bedroom.

I am not proud of this.

The show had open-call auditions at a few different locations. I did not want to stand in line for hours so tracked down a few different emails of casting agents who were scheduling auditions. Though they assuredly had a flood of emails, I figured I would hear back if it was meant to be.

And I did. Later that day, a casting agent contacted me and then the actual casting director emailed later that night. They scheduled us for Saturday afternoon and instructed us to bring props so we compiled every insane picture and newspaper article we could find.

Turns out we didn’t need them. One picture of The Great Pumpkin testifies to our insanity.

I thought I had this argument in the bag with well-rehearsed talking points and humorous anecdotes but my beloved James had some great rebuttals of his own, resulting in a fun and thought-provoking debate.

The woman doing the interview loved our quirky topic. She said we nailed the audition and made it past the first round. So now we wait. Our main challenges for being chosen:

1) Pumpkin season is over so getting video of the soon-to-be destroyed pumpkin is a challenge. They asked us to film some footage of it on our Flip camera and send it to them.

2) Somebody else is growing The Great Pumpkin and has our same issues with an even greater degree of hilarity.

If chosen to appear on the Marriage Ref, we would receive an all-expenses-paid trip to New York to be on the show and a generous prize package (last season was a second honeymoon/week-long cruise). Four different couples appear in each episode and the couple the audience deems the “most right” wins $25,000.

Fingers are crossed that will be me.

Filed Under: Humor, Marriage, Marriage Ref, pumpkins