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Tag: anna

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Would I Want To Be In Any Club That Would Have Me as a Member?

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I am finding out some interesting facts about the states where I have applications in for nursing school.  I chose the states hoping to find less competition to get into the programs.  After the fact, I decided to look into the public schools.  I do have children that will require education while I myself am pursuing my degree.  These are some of the states I applied to:

Alaska, Hawaii, North Dakota, Mississippi and of course Florida.

Three of the states I applied to are ranked as the Dumbest States in the United States.  I kid you not.  Three of the states where I hope to go to school are, in fact, NOT smarter than a fifth grader.

Fingers crossed that no matter where I go, I find some sort of quality education for my girls.  Or at least a good banjo teacher, so when they are sitting on the river banks, they’ll be able to twang away.  A girlz gotta have wicked mad skilz.

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Let The Memories Begin – My Own Fondest Disney Memory

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Thank you for calling Walt Disney World Reservations!  My name is Caroline.  How may I help you?

Yep, my name was Caroline.  For a short time in the 90’s.  Not my stripper name – get your mind out of the gutter.  This was my telephone name as a reservation sales agent for Walt Disney World.

We moved to Orlando in 1993, right after Brighid turned 2.  It was the first time I had ever moved entirely away from my family (except for the summer I spent in the Outer Banks of NC living with my aunt, but she was family!), and I was feeling a bit lost and overwhelmed by my new surroundings.  Living in Orlando was a bit surreal for me.  This was a vacation destination, after all, and here I was, home all day with my two year old, wondering what I should do with myself.  We had annual passes to Walt Disney World, Universal, and Sea World, but at some point in between all the fun of the theme parks, I had to become a productive member of society.  I lounged around as long as I could, went to school for a while, and then decided to look for a job.

On a whim, I headed to Disney Casting. I walked in, not knowing what to expect, and by the end of a couple of hours, I was a Disney World Cast Member!  It was my dream job for my dream company – I was going to be helping people plan a fabulous Walt Disney World vacation!

The first day of training came, and our initial responsibility was to change our names.  Everyone had to have a unique name, so that if a guest had a compliment or a complaint about you, when they called in and said, “Anna is a wonderful cast member!”, there had to be only one Anna out of the hundreds of us at Central Reservations.  I went down the list of names, and not seeing my own, chose the next normal sounding one on the list.  Caroline.

My time as a cast member flew by, and job transfers for Jim prohibited me from staying very long, but I remember every day that I worked there, and I treasure them!  I loved shopping at Company D and having the opportunity to preview new attractions and resorts.  It was a job, no bones about it, but there was a lot to be said about working for the Happiest Place on Earth, and I’ll never regret having the chance to do so.

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Mom’s guide to the truth behind fashion models

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As a mom to three daughters, I work really hard at teaching them that you need to be healthy without worrying about looking like the unrealistic expectations we put on ourselves.  I try to teach them what I believe – that while you do have some control over your size and weight, they are genetically born into a family of obese people.  I could blame fast food and processed food or an excessive amount of junk food, but truth be told, growing up, we didn’t go to fast food restaurants.  My mom always had snack foods in the house, but they weren’t liberally dispensed throughout the day – you had them as a bedtime or after school snack.  We didn’t eat a lot of fattening foods, and there were always vegetables and fruit in the house.  My grandmother, who produced five children who all ended up obese and diabetic, cooked every meal from scratch, and rarely had anything other than fruit salad or a homemade cake or fruit pie that she portioned out to last at least a few days so she didn’t have to bake again.  Again, I’m not saying we couldn’t have exercised and eaten smaller portions to affect our weight, but there is some genetics in whether or not you are going to be fat.

We know Barbie is an unrealistic skinny bitch, but we’re grown ups.  Our little girls do not see the irony in the fact that you can buy Barbie kitchens, Barbie food, Barbie couches and TVs so you could have a Barbie couch potato, but you can’t buy a Barbie with a mouth that will open up to enjoy one morsel of the fabulous wedding cake you can purchase for her.  Barbie is like the original anorexic.  But we don’t tell our little girls that as we buy Barbie pants that you have to lay her on the bed to button.  And we should.

Here is an example of a bad photoshop job. The model has thighs. Huge, fat, chunky, my size? Probably not, or she wouldn’t be a model in the first place. But to make the picture look better, they trim down her already super thin thighs.  So why do we have to take a photo of what was probably already a far cry from what many of us will ever be able to attain in terms of a thin body and make it appear even thinner and less attainable?  What message are we sending our girls?  Or even our boys?  Do they grow up wanting real women, or do they grow up seeing flaws in every woman who doesn’t need a size 0 taken in at the waist?

Model thighs trimmed down but Photoshop artist forgets to trim the shadows

Rest assured that all of my pictures are not altered in Photoshop Version 7.0.1.1.1.0.0.1.j to make my butt smaller.  My arse is what it is.  And my girls have all seen it wandering the house naked.  They know that I am not now nor will I ever be a Barbie doll.  Or a Heidi Klum.  We just haven’t been blessed with the genetics or the modeling plastic that allows us to be that thin.  And it’s okay to be what we are and be proud of ourselves.

Show your daughters pictures like the one above.  And videos like this one –

We’re not all going to be a super model, and we can’t all have their bodies.  But we can be proud of the bodies we have.

Make sure your daughter knows that.

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Reebok EasyTone – the beautygirlsmom sneaker

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beautygirlsmom is standing in panties and sneakers just like the supermodels – you have been warned

This is NOT beautygirlsmom – I know, you’re shocked

OK, you saw all the supermodel sneaker pictures, now its time for the beautygirlsmom sneaker pictures.

DANGER: Take small children by the hands, and remove all men with unrealistic expectations of woman, well I guess would be all straight men, but anyway, ladies, this is for us.

Seriously, did you think I’d show my butt here?  At least not unless I got the Photo Shop expert that makes the super models look as good as they do.

But anyway – we bought these fabulous sneakers that are not only going to improve my calves, thighs, and butt; but they are going to make my life fabulous.  I will be able to wear super short skirts and short shorts and never once worry that I have camel toe, shop only in stores that place my items in brightly colored shopping bags, and not have to worry about going to the tanning salon for my Snooki special spray tan – I will be naturally a beautiful shade of Not Ghostly White (the above photos have been retouched so you do not have to wear your sunglasses from my blinding white skin while you read my blog).

I’ve not had a lot of opportunity to wear the shoes yet, but so far, they don’t seem to be doing a whole lot.  The shoe sales woman claimed I’d have aches and pains in places I didn’t know existed on my body after my first wear.  My first wear was in Disney World – the Magic Kingdom – and the most I got was a small blister on my baby toe.

Maybe I’m wearing them wrong?  Maybe you have to already be walking to the stores with the fabulously colored shopping bags in order for these sneakers to work?

I’ll keep you posted.

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Macy’s clothes shopping

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Tip number one about going clothes shopping?  Make sure you are wearing the appropriate undergarments so everything doesn’t have panty line.  I went in wearing a baggy, broomstick skirt (you know, the kind I’m trying to ease out of), and you can’t see any panty line under that.  Not so the fitted skirts I tried on.

This was the only one I marginally liked, but honestly, I didn’t see that many “casual” type of skirts in Macy’s today.  Most of them were career oriented, business like skirts for people that have a Jay Oh Bee – which is not me.  I just want to look good when I get dressed in the morning, not look like I’m out to conquer corporate America.

Shopping is way too frustrating for me.  I found very few things I liked.  This blouse I LOVED, but they only had it in a 4 and a 16.  I tried to convince Jim to stop for a banana split on the way out so I could get the size 16, but he wasn’t hearing any of it.

AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH

Then I found a few cute skirts in the Michael Kors section.  Cute, but I’m not in love, and if I’m going to pay Michael Kors prices so the man finally has enough money to buy himself some new duds (is anyone else tired of the black on black look he’s had going for, like, EVER??), I want to get engaged to this skirt.
AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH

Oh wait – a rack of black denim – I can wear black denim!

WHAT?  Black denim for $100 a pop?  Have these people no shame?  I am destined to be a People of WalMart forever.
AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH

So the end result of today’s journey out to the mall is that I came home with some autumn scented soap for the bathrooms and the kitchen.  And a latte.

It wasn’t a total loss.

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When Moms Get Sick

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I’ve been fighting off a cold for about a week.  Honestly, if it were up to me, I’d rather be knocked on my butt sick than catch a cold.  Because a cold is just a cold, and you should be able to function.  Right?

Ugh.

So last night the sinus pain got to the point where I needed to take something.  Because my snuffly nose has kept me up the past few nights, I opted for a NyQuil, knowing that NyQuil for me is not a good thing.  It makes me SOOOOO tired.

On the plus side, I slept until 8:30 this morning.  I NEVER sleep until 8:30 in the morning.  On the negative side, I woke up exhausted.  I got the kids some breakfast, managed to get myself dressed – in clothes that matched, but weren’t winning any beauty pageants.  I was supposed to go shopping with my friend Sandi, and was secretly thrilled when she suggested tomorrow instead 🙂  I went to Starbucks to get my coffee (I said I was sick, not dying), then went to WalMart for one thing (I don’t remember what that one thing was, but I spent over $200 and I’m certain I came home without that one thing).

And when I got home, I crashed.  I put my head down on the sofa for just a minute, and the next thing I knew, it was 4:30 in the afternoon!

And I still feel tired.

I’m getting ready to head up to bed – freshly made by my marvelous husband, who did laundry today while I slept.

Because the daily grind starts again tomorrow.  And it’s only a cold, so I should be able to function.

Right?

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Which is my best picture?

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Please take a moment and reply here to this post and tell me which picture you like best.  I have to have a photo for my bio at the 2009 Walt Disney World Moms Panel website, and apparently, they want to know what I look like!!  Thanks,

Anna