After the Storm

So you may recall me posting about the calm before the storm both figuratively and literally. Obviously, I was quite surprised that we got the snow storm quite literally and have also spent quite a bit of time blogging about the historic event. But what about the figurative storm? You know, the one that had Joe out of town and the kids and I insanely busy for the entire week and half prior to Christmas? Well it all worked out quite well actually. We were slowed down only slightly by the cold and snow, which turned out to be a good thing. I have already covered all 3 holiday parties, including our visit with Santa.

Joe arrived home on Friday the 19th and the whole family was awakened quite early (think 4:30am) the following morning as it became apparent that both kids had caught the cold I had been battling all week. Despite this fact, both kids were in rather good spirits when my Mom and her husband George arrived later than day and we had a very nice, relaxing weekend. With Joe at Pendleton at the beginning of the week and the kids feeling better, I decided to take my Mom and George down the hill to civilization where we enjoyed a delicious lunch at Ruby's (one of my favorite restaurants), a tour of the zoo and miniature train at the Living Desert and a quick drive through Candy Cane Lane (an entire neighborhood all decked out in lights and displays) before heading home. Here is a picture of the kids with Grandma Kelly and Grandpa George followed by a shot of them watching the Africa wild dog who hysterically kept running hot laps right in front of the viewing glass.

On Tuesday, Jadyn had her modeling debut as a friend had asked me if she could model the hair bows she is now selling. Unfortunately, Jadyn was not in the most photogenic mood but we did get a couple good shots of her. For those interested you can go to Details Photography and look at the Kiddos section of the gallery. Jadyn's pictures will be toward the bottom of that collection.

Wednesday was Christmas Eve and between Joe's absence and the kids being sick, we still had not decorated and baked sugar cookies so that was the priority of the morning before heading off to the big dinner at Joe's family. The kids really enjoy this tradition, even if it does get a little messy to the say the least. Here are a few pics of the kids enjoying themselves. I can't believe how long Jadyn's hair is getting!



Christmas Eve was a lot of fun but unfortunately with all the chaos that includes 18 adults and 9 children, it was very hard to get pictures. One thing that did become quite clear is that both Jake and Jadyn are quite enamored with their youngest cousin, Lilly who is now 9 months old:



And I had to least try to get a picture with all the grandkids:


Here is Jake and Jadyn opening gifts. Jake was so excited to get the trick tracks for his Hot Wheels that he had been asking for:



I love how non-fat I look in this picture with Jake:


Christmas morning had to be the best as both kids understand that Santa came to visit. They were so excited and quite pleased with all their loot, as was I. Joe surprised me with a double band ring from Nelle and Lizzy with the kids name inscribed on them AND a new LG Env2 phone so I can more easily text and receive email alerts (which will actually help with work a lot because I won't constantly have to worry if I have work being sent to me when I am away from home).

So even though another wonderful holiday season is coming to a close and things are slowing down for us, we have still have New Year's to celebrate as well as my impending blogiversary on December 30th. This means I still have several posts up my sleeve, which I want to crank out before putting this year's blog into print form; something I am very excited about. The storm may be over so to speak, but the fun and memories never end.

Christmas Candids

While we had several activities earlier in the week as well, including a visit from my Mom and George and our big Christmas Eve dinner with all of Joe's family, for now I am going to share just a few photos from Christmas Day:

Here are the kids upon discovering the playhouse Santa had left for them in the garage. It was too cold to be outside!

Jake opening a truck that stores all of his Nascar vehicles. Notice Jadyn's dollhouse in the background:

Jadyn and I being silly. She concentrated so hard when she opened her gifts, she never once looked up for me to take a good photo:

Our family all dressed up and ready to head over to my Aunt's house to celebrate with my side of the family:

And a Christmas edition of a Funny Nose Knows:

Jadyn has not gotten over her aversion to long car trips. When she is not sleeping, she is much harder to keep entertained than Jake was at the same age. Awhile ago when she was being particularly whiny on a car ride I explained to her that she was not tired or hungry. She was just bored. So today, she came up to me while I was finishing up some work on the computer and said, "Mommy, I am a bored!". Apparently, she wanted someone to play with her dollhouse with her. Of course, I obliged.

Jake announced today at dinner that if he ate all of his soup and raviolis that it would make his teeth shiny and white. I am not sure what gave him the idea that eating that kind of food was good for your smile, but it certainly put one on our face. Kids say the darnedest things!

I Still Believe

Last year, Jake became interested in the movie "The Polar Express". With the combination of a train, Christmas and Santa that are all central to the story, this should come as no surprise. While Jadyn and I were at the library for story time a couple weeks back, I decided to check out the book so I could read it to the kids along with their other holiday-themed books.

To my surprise when I got to the last line of the book, I found myself crying. I found this odd. It isn't a particularly sad book but as the weeks progressed I found this not to be an isolated incident. It turns out I simply cannot make it through the Polar Express without getting weepy and I really had to think about the reason why. This is the conclusion I came up with:

The Polar Express is about the magic of Christmas. It revolves around the innocence of children and the way that innocence allows their imagination to soar, to dream up far away places and magical creatures and beings. The movie expands on that theme to include the true spirit of Christmas as they show children's innate goodness; their willingness to share and help each other even without their parents hovering over them demanding they do the right thing. No, they do it on their own out of the goodness of their own heart.

One of the many great advantages to having children comes during the holidays when you get to relive the magic of Christmas and the conclusion I came to, the reason for the crying is that I want to hold onto that innocence for as long as possible, not only for my kids but for myself as their mom. Preparing for Santa's visit carries so many fun traditions. And so if someone rang that bell for me, I think I would be able to hear it. I don't want it to ever fade. Because in my own way I have found that I still truly believe. I believe in the magic of Christmas.

And so in addition to our new tradition of watching the Polar Express on the day before Christmas Eve I also wanted to share another tradition for those that wish to keep tabs on Santa as he makes his worldwide visit to all the good little boys and girls all over the world. You and your kids can track Santa's progress and watch video clips of him visiting far away places on the NORAD website at http://www.noradsanta.org/en/home.html. Jake got a real kick out of this last year and he is eagerly awaiting to the do the same today.

And for all my friends and family near and far, I want to wish you a very Merry Christmas! Safe travels and may you too find that you can still hear the sweet sound of the bell and join in the magic of the Christmas season.

In the Middle of the Storm

On Wednesday when the snow came, Jake's school was not only canceled, but Santa's visit to our play group had to be rescheduled as well. I had already had to cancel and reschedule the kids dentist appointment on Tuesday because the weather had closed down our main escape route to civilization. What was supposed to be a very hectic week was also becoming rather complicated. Luckily, everything worked out.

We were still able to make it to the first holiday gathering of the week for Jadyn's Kindermusik class. We stayed home on Wednesday and played in the snow, which here in 29 Palms had all but melted by the following afternoon. Thursday we ventured out to see Santa. Then on Friday as I drove Jake to school in the neighboring town, we were surprised to find several inches of snow still blanketing everything, including the parking lot, which means I had to drive in snow for the VERY first time. LOL! After Jake's class party,we went to have lunch at my friend Danielle's house where she not only still had snow, but the perfect slope in her backyard to enjoy some sledding. It was so much nicer than the week prior when the kids had to wait in line to sled. If only I knew we would have all this snow at our disposal not even a week later. I don't think I would want to live somewhere where it snowed the majority of the winter but after this week, I sure wouldn't mind if it came out this way a little more often.

Pictures of us before and during the Kindermusik party:

With Santa on Thursday - Jake asked for Hot Wheels Trick Tracks and Jadyn would not go near him without me there as well. She finally admitted to wanting a castle with little people and tables:


Jake's somewhat smaller than normal class singing jingle bells at the conclusion of their holiday party:

And afterwards sledding with their friends Adan and Adalia. Oh yeah, and I wasn't going to miss out on the fun either:

Let It Snow

I was really going to attempt to make this a Wordless Wednesday, but atlas I could not contain myself from commenting. We got snow! And lots of it. Jake's school was canceled - our first ever snow day. I took the kids outside immediately after realizing that the steady rain had turned into huge flakes of snow and then again after lunch when we had a decent coating on the ground. The only problem was every time I turned around, Jadyn was eating the snow off any available surface. I also realized I have no knowledge of the proper mechanics for building a snowman but Jake and I did our best. You can see we had to scrape all the snow off the dirt around the entire radius of where our lil guy ended up. Oh, and the dogs loved it too. They stayed out there with us the whole time. It was so much fun. The only thing missing was Joe. He always seems to be gone when cool stuff like this happens. What can you do?

Our winter wonderland:




Here is Jake trying to catch a snowflake on his tongue. The idea came courtsey a Charlie Brown Christmas:




Jadyn's reaction to the snow:

Snowy Utah:

Snowy Nago:

Jadyn eating the snow:

And again:

And again:

And Again:

Ice skating in the driveway:



Getting ready to throw some snowballs:

Taking a pic of me in the snow via self-timer:


Making footprints in the snow:

Jake with our snowman:

Christmas Memory Lane

As inspired by my fellow bloggers.

I was enjoying a post from Angela's Utter Chaos about her attempt to get a good holiday photo of her infant daughter, preschooler son and two dogs. I remember prior to having kids, Joe and I used to pose with the dogs for our annual Christmas card. On Jake's first Christmas, I attempted to include the dogs in our photo, but I never did get a decent shot, although looking back now I think one of them may have worked and I was being too picky. We finally got a good family photo with the dogs included for his 2nd Christmas but by the time Jadyn came along, there was just no way I was going to put myself through the stress of taking a good picture of two kids and two dogs. My hats off to Angela! So here are the photos from Christmas card past:

The one that didn't make the cut:

The picture we used on the card in 04:


Family holiday photo 2005:


And in 2006 we went with this one in black and white:

Last year of course I was so opposed to the stress of taking a good family photo that we used the one we had gotten on Thanksgiving, which I have just recently posted on my Thanksgiving Memory Lane.

Then of course there are the two photos from our Sears photo shoot that I didn't reveal with the others. These are two photos that are on the Christmas card for this year:


And this one, my personal favorite, although on the card it is in color:


Now as many of you have already seen, over on Kaycee's Life as a Mom at 22, she had posted a picture of her two sweet girls sleeping on the big bed together. Well it brought back quite the memories as I have a similar picture of my two kiddos doing the same:


And yes, I fit in that spot between them. But as I was telling Kaycee eventually the kids would start to roll over and snuggle with each other, thinking it was me. That was my favorite:


Another trend among fellow bloggers has been to share past and present pictures with Santa but I will save that one for tomorrow, quite possibly a good Wordless Wednesday. I am quite curious how Jadyn will do. The first two years she screamed and unfortunately I do not have a picture to post of her first year because it was a Polaroid. She is saying she wants to see Santa, whom will be visiting our play group tomorrow afternoon but we will just have to wait and see.

And for those who posted support and willingness to read my work, thank you! I will probably wait until after the holiday to send it out via email so if I don't already have your contact info, please send it to me at jenfen23@gmail.com.

The Return of Pretty Peggy

For all 4 of my loyal readers, you may recall that back in June I was challenged to write a post about what I had wanted to be when I grew up. You can refresh your memory by reading that post here but basically to sum up, the post had talked about how I had always loved to write and had at one time aspired to write novels, my first attempt at which was entitled The Pretty Peggy Series.

Well, I found it to be a huge coincidence when only 2 months later, I started reading again, most notably of course the Twilight Series by Stephanie Meyer (and if your rolling your eyes, thinking oh no, not another fanatical post about these books, please try to bear with me). As I scoured the internet for any and all information I could get about the books and the author, I discovered that Stephanie was at the time a 30-something stay-at-mom who had a dream. When she woke, she could not shake the dream so she started writing about it and before she knew it, she had written a book. If only it was that easy for the rest of us, right?

But I have to admit it inspired me. I had always wanted to write a novel, I am the same age and in the same position as she was, why not? I am not saying I could ever come up with something as wildly entertaining and popular as Twilight, but just to have accomplished the feat of writing a complete book would make me quite proud. I briefly toyed with writing a story I had in my head for awhile but it never really came to together. I got busy. The idea kind of got kicked to the curb.

And then, and try not to laugh at me but I had this really vivid dream on Friday night and I am not usually one to remember my dreams. It was like I was watching a scene from a movie play out in my head and when I woke up, I couldn't stop thinking about it so finally I decided to write it out, honestly just to get it out of my head and down on paper.

Later that evening when I was driving to my girlfriend's house, I came up with a complete outline for a story based around the "scene" I had written from my dream. In the last 3 days I have committed almost 13,000 words to a Word document.

So I guess what I am saying is, I am in the process of writing a book. I haven't fooled myself into thinking it's anything good. I will openly admit it is amateurish and immature and rough. It would probably get labeled young adult, after all that is what I have been reading as of late. but that is of little consequence because I would never actually try to get it published. I guess I would describe it as a love story, maybe a character study. There is nothing autobiographical about the story, except for the use of my knowledge of the military and 29 Palms. Don't worry it doesn't have any vampires, werewolves, wizards, aliens or a doomed future of our country.

At the same time, I am slightly curious how others might react to it. I wonder if it would even make sense to an outsider. At the very least, assuming I complete it, which at this point I am pretty sure I will, I would like to have someone else help me edit and perfect it, just for me to have. Even if no one else enjoys reading it, I find it entertaining. I also wonder if anyone would be able to pinpoint the chapter that was derived from my dream, since I wrote that first but oddly enough the story kind of worked around it so it is neither the first nor last chapter chronologically.

So I am looking for a few volunteers, who would be willing to look at what I have and give me gentle but honest criticism so that I can tweak it. Obviously having churned out that many words in such a short time, I am just going with it right now. I am afraid of losing steam. So I have not stopped to go back and edit it at all but I also don't want to wait until I am done before getting feedback, because it may be helpful in getting it completed.

And now that its out there, that I am telling my 4 loyal readers and various family members that I am writing a book, I feel a little exposed. At the very least, it will keep me motivated to finish it.

The Calm Before the Storm

We have had an extremely mild fall this year, even for the desert of Southern California, with temperatures remaining in the high 60's and low 70's for most of November and thus far even December. However, there is something in the forecast for tonight that does not occur very often here in Twentynine Palms; we might actually get snow. To be fair, even if it does snow I highly doubt it will be much. It definitely won't be cold enough to stick for very long. But in the 5+ years we have lived here, it has only snowed on us twice so if it does indeed snow, it would be a very big deal.

This tidbit of information is not even the real reason behind the title of my post however. You see, this last week has been pretty routine. Jake went to school, Jadyn went to her various activities, we took care to spend extra time wrapping gifts, decorating the house and sending off holiday cards because we knew how hectic things were about to get. Of course, I mean this in the best of ways because we enjoy all the holiday events, it just keeps us very, very busy.

It started on Friday when we went to The Living Desert for their annual Wild Lights display. This is our third year taking the kids and my pictorial of our visit last year was one of my first blog posts ever. You can read more about this unique holiday event in my post from last year here. Again, it is very hard to really capture the beauty of over 350,000 Christmas lights strewn throughout the zoo so you will have to trust me that it is quite a sight to behold.

The kids excited at the entrance:


Trying to capture the magic of the lights on film:

Jake and I being silly. Too bad his coat covered up his huge smirk:

Hanging out in the wagon:

On Saturday morning, we hurriedly bundled up once again, this time to attend the Snow Play Day in the neighboring town of Yucca Valley. Since we do so rarely have snow to play in, the town hauls over 21 tons of snow to its community center so the kids can go sledding and throw a few snowballs. Last year, we had Jake and Jadyn go down the sled together but this year they requested Daddy send them down the slope separately. What Daddy didn't know was that he chosen a lane where they had created a jump, mostly intended to increase the excitement for the older kids. While Jake didn't seem to mind, by the time Jadyn got to the bottom of the hill, she was scared and crying and needless to say, did not go down the slope again that day. I was just thankful she didn't go flying off the sled as she caught air going over the jump. It was pretty funny.

Saturday night Joe was nice enough to let me have a night with the girls so we could eat yummy take-out, exchange Christmas gifts and talk into the wee hours of the night. It was a much needed break from mommy duties given that Joe left for a week long business trip in South Carolina this morning. While he is gone, we have 3 Christmas parties to attend and the kids' first ever dentist appointment. The day after he returns, my Mom and her husband George will be coming for their annual winter visit and before you know it, Christmas will be upon us and that dear folks is what I meant by the calm before the storm. Because even though we are looking forward to all the festivities and visiting with family, we will be going nonstop from now until at least the 26th. I simply cannot wait to be in the middle of the storm.

Winning and Losing

I vaguely remember last spring writing a post about Jake having trouble with the concept of winning and losing - how after I beat him out in a game of Candyland he cried for 20 minutes straight. I am pretty sure at least part of it is developmental and age-related and it is something that we are constantly working on with him but Jake has a quite a competitive streak ingrained in him.

It probably does not help that we learned awhile back that having Jake and Jadyn race against each other was a good way to hurry things along. "Let's see who can get their PJ's on the fastest!" We use the opportunity to teach Jake (and by extension Jadyn to the extent that she understands) how to be both a gracious winner and loser. If he wins, we teach Jake not to taunt Jadyn and to encourage her to finish and tell her what a good job she did anyway. If Jake loses, we use it as an opportunity to explain how we don't always win, not to be a sore loser and to congratulate the victor.

The pee-wee league Jake played soccer in recently did not keep score. That of course, does not stop the parents and even some of the players from keeping a tally of goals in their head. Although I never mentioned it to Jake, their team won all of their games up until his final outing. Unfortunately, Jake seemed to be one of those players who knew too much for his own good. He knew it was there last game and he seemed to realize that the star player of the opposing team was kicking goal after goal. I was happy when Jake managed to score a goal himself, thinking it was a great way to end the season but when the game was over he got very emotional and sobbed in my lap about how he did not want the game to be over and he wanted to score more goals. He was actually sulking. It was quite embarrassing. We had a long discussion about the whole idea of winning and losing but it took quite awhile for him to snap out of it.

More recently, Jake's imagination has come in to play with games and races. From simple childhood games like hide and seek (which I am assuming he learned from the school playground) to more elaborate games Jake makes up and recites the rules for, Jake's nature to compete seems to continual crop up.

The other day, as I was finishing putting Jadyn's PJs on for the night, I asked both kids to put their clothes in the hamper when Jake exclaimed it was a "Hamper Race".

He then explained that the winner of the race would get to lay down with Mommy at bedtime while Jadyn, I mean the loser, would have to lay down with Daddy. While Joe and I were musing just how Daddy had become the consolation prize and how Jake's words had assumed Jadyn would not win, I notice Jadyn get up from my lap with only her PJ top on, grab her dirty clothes for the day and rush down the hall. Apparently, she had been paying attention and the stakes for this game were too high to risk not coming out on top. So she took off for the hamper race. When Jake noticed this, he put his hands on his hips, huffed and looked at us quite perplexed while we tried our best to keep straight faces. When Jadyn returned from putting her clothes in the hamper, Jake declared that she fouled because she did not have her PJ bottoms on yet. Leave it to Jake to find a loophole in the rules of the race. And apparently, we are in trouble, because Jake's competitive nature is starting to rub off.

Hungry For More

Well that was short-lived. I started reading Hunger Games on Tuesday night and finished it Saturday. It was extremely engrossing and left me wanting more. I would recommend it to anyone who liked the Twilight series but be forewarned. This book just came out and is set up to be a trilogy so expect some cliffhangers and be prepared to wait until Fall of next year before the next installment comes out.

Which leaves me in quite a quandry because what do I read now? I have thought about starting the Harry Potter series, since they have many of the same fans as Twilight but I am just not sure. The movies never really interested me. A lot of those who read the Twilight series moved on to other vampire fare, but I don't think I really want to go in that direction.

I am open to suggestions.

And speaking of Twilight, I recall in my review of the movie mentioning my dream of the sequel getting a new director. Well apparently it was not such a outlandish request because it was announced this week that Catherine Harwicke and Summitt could not reach an agreement and she will in fact, NOT be directing the sequel. That was great news until I started reading who they offered the job to, the fact that they STILL have yet to decide to keep Taylor Lautner as Jacob (the one actor from the first film I was most impressed with), that the expected budget is only 50 million and that they want to churn it out for a November 2009 release date. It might take a lot of restraint, but if I don't feel confident they can do a decent job with this, I might just have to refrain froms seeing it. Messing up Twilight is one thing, but New Moon was my favorite of the series. It really is sad that they can take such a wonderful series with a huge built in fan base and completely ruin it because they want to make a few extra bucks. Don't they realize that the franchise is a cash cow regardless and will actually do much better, if they take the time to remain loyal to the book and give us a quality film?

A Funny Nose Knows

#30 How to Decorate the Christmas Tree

Growing up we had a family tree with all the decorations that had been collected and made throughout the years and I loved it. However, once I was married and in charge of my own tree I yearned for a tree with all matching decor, which is what I have done for the last 10 years. Now that the kids are getting a little older, they want to help decorate the tree and have started to accumulate their own collection of ornaments with special meaning. The solution? We bought the kids a 3 foot tree and placed it in Jake's room, where they could take all our family ornaments and decorate it by themselves. Here is the result:


And for the record, we do have a system for decorating the family tree too. Joe puts the hooks on the ornaments and hands them to the kids, who get to deliver them to me to place in their designated spot on the tree. Not much fun, I know. I think in the next couple of years, I will probably give in and go back to the way the family tree was growing up. It just has so much meaning and charm that way. But I will miss my Martha Stewart coordinating decor.

#31 How to put on the thinking cap and use their senses.

None of the preschools or parent/child programs in the area have caught on to the concept of a sensory table. So I decided since we cannot use the water table during the winter, I would convert it to a sensory table. I found a list of great ideas at ChildFun.com.

Today, the kids and I took the fall leaves we had collected at the park last week along with a few more from our neighbor's tree and a few rocks and I dumped the loot into the empty water table with a set of plastic dinosaurs. Then I gave the kids each a shovel and a cup and told them to find as many dinosaurs as they could. I really did not know what to expect but they had a blast with the activity. Afterward, we counted the dinosaurs and talked about their different colors. I think they had me hide the dinosaurs at least 3 more times and then they started hiding them on their swing set and sandbox too. They really were quite entertained. I foresee us having a lot more fun with the sensory table this winter. I am hoping to get motivated to dye rice for our next adventure.

#32 How to take a trip down memory lane.

Or I could have titled this one "How to please his wife" but I wouldn't want anyone to get the wrong idea. I do have family that read my blog. Anyway, Joe has been at Camp Pendleton for the last 2 days for work and on his way home last night he picked up a White Pizza from Sonny's - a personal favorite dish and place to dine when we lived there so many years ago. And it didn't matter that it had to sit in the car for the 3 hour drive home, it was the most delicious, heavenly pizza I have had in ages. Once again, Joe delivered. And it was nice to have him home again too.

Milestones, Tallies and Entertainment Randomness

With all of the Fall holidays and activities I have been documenting, not to mention illnesses, our family has had some milestones pass as well. While I hope to give each of them some more attention on the blog soon, I thought I better point them out before too much time passes.

1. As of October 23rd, Jake is officially 4 1/2 years old. That means we are less than 6 months away from having a 5 year old getting ready to start kindergarten next Fall. Where did the time go?

2. On November 20th, our rotty Utah celebrated his 10th birthday. Utah was our first baby - our Christmas gift to each other the first year we were married. He has been the most loving and fun dog but there was a time when we never thought we would have the fortune to have him around for so long. In 2002, at only 4 years old Utah blew out his knee and required extensive surgery. The following year, his other knee went out necessitating a second surgery and recovery process. At the time many people could not believe we spent the exorbitant amount of money for him to have these surgeries but seeing what a full life he has lived, I have never second guessed our decision. And anyone who has ever heard him "sing" to Led Zeppelin's Dazed and Confused knows what a unique personality our 100+ pound baby has. Happy birthday Utah!

3. On December 1st (since there is no 31st in November) Jadyn is officially 2 1/2 years old. She has grown so quickly and learns and says something new and funny everyday. I love watching her little personality (even when being a drama queen) emerge and I also love how different she is from Jake at this age. I will definitely be expanding on this at a later date.

4) In the last 4 months I have immersed myself in the Twilight universe (this is obviously not news). The final tally for my reading of the series is as follows: Twilight: 4, New Moon: 3, Eclipse: 3 and Breaking Dawn: 2. When re-reading the series for the third time, the movie came out, necessitating that I go back and read Twilight AGAIN so it was fresh in my mind and I never really intended on giving Breaking Dawn additional reads. While I did enjoy it much more the second time, it is not one I could read over and over. I think the only book I have read 4 times or more is Interview with a Vampire and it certainly was not in the span of 4 months. And no, I do not know what my obsession with vampires could possibly mean about me. However, this series has reminded me how much I love reading and so today we have a milestone as I am starting a book not written by Stephanie Meyer, although it was personally recommended by her: Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins.

5) A little Fall TV update. I have again had the misfortune of having two quality shows that I am invested in be canceled: My Own Worst Enemy with Christan Slater and Lipstick Jungle with Brooke Shields. So far Fringe is holding on but barely. I am very displeased with the recent story lines on Grey's Anatomy and still very intrigued by the new story lines created by the jump in time on Desperate Housewives.

BUT the two shows I have most found myself looking forward to are reality. Dancing with the Stars turned out to be a very entertaining season. Although I truly believe that based on technical skill, Brooke Burke deserved to win (even though her partner Derek annoys me to no end), it was Lance Bass that I was rooting for. I loved how much he improved throughout the season. I loved the unique fresh routines that him and his partner Lacy brought the floor and I loved how confident he became. Winner Winner Chicken Dinner - this was the show to watch for me. The second show I love is the Amazing Race. Last week (warning: spoiler if you are not up to date with your TiVo) when Dallas and Toni got eliminated I was brought to tears. Not because I was disappointed that they did not make it to the final (although I was) but because I was just blown away by the closeness of this grown man and his mother and the amazing amount of respect they had for each other. I saw that and hoped that one day I could have that kind of relationship with Jake when he is a young man. And with as fast as time has seemed to fly by lately, he is going to be that young man before I know it!