I hate it when people post just to post.....

[losingjusme 12]

No job is worth your health.

yeah ... that was the absolute deciding factor...

btw - a coworker did have some of those fancy schmancy M&Ms (the $4 box) in almond. i did have a couple and they were pretty good... not worth $4 a box, but pretty good.

[Guest Leslie2Lose]

We have an M&M Mars Factory here...hmmmmm....free samples maybe?

[Daisalana 33]

What M&M's are you talking about?? What makes em fancy?

[Guest Leslie2Lose]

They are a fancy "new" gourmet M&M. They are $4.00 a bag. For M&M's...insane.

http://www.m-ms.com/us/premiums/

I couldn't get a "picture" to print so here's the link to their site.

Edited August 27, 2008 by Leslie2Lose

[Daisalana 33]

Oh bah.. that didn't do anything for me. I like my chocolate cheapy!

[luluc 6]

nope, i've tried it... doesnt work.

that's why i'm giving my 2 weeks notice next week...

something to be said for a quality of life & work taking it's toll on oneself.

i gave up the corp gig up 2+ yrs ago, and though i struggle days not mentally stimulated - it sure beats not knowing what time zone i was in or going to be in next & having a family life.

i wish you well!!

[losingjusme 12]

something to be said for a quality of life & work taking it's toll on oneself.

i gave up the corp gig up 2+ yrs ago, and though i struggle days not mentally stimulated - it sure beats not knowing what time zone i was in or going to be in next & having a family life.

i wish you well!!

thanks... it will definitely be a challenge as i'll be home... alone ... with my almost 5 year old daughter... there are days where she'll drive ya to drink ... and unfortunately that's not an option right now... :cursing:

i think we're going to get a Ft. Worth zoo membership and i have a friend who has horses... go there a few times a month... and there's always the public library... i just have no creative ideas on WHAT to do...

[Guest Leslie2Lose]

Oh bah.. that didn't do anything for me. I like my chocolate cheapy!

I love dark chocolate. When M&M's came out with the dark ones - I was in heaven. Now they are a curse. Did you know they slide right on down? I think they are engineered for that purpose alone - that's why they are so tiny and melt.

Losingjusme - I commend you on giving your notice (or plan to). Life is too short to be stuck doing something you hate. You don't need the stress - take care of yourself and your little one. That's what is important now.

[Daisalana 33]

losing- I read a famous mommy blog, and have for a while-- she is hilarious.. but I notice she has gone to the zoo A LOT lately. So that must be the thing to do to occupy kids. She has 6 kids. She also takes them to museums.

I'm not really into m&m's, so was curious what fancy meant.. I don't like any of those kind of flavors (mint, raspberry, coffee, etc.).

I look good old fashioned hershey's chocolate.. no coatings. My will power is not as good.. well, it's BAD.. so I just keep no candy in the house. When I am bad, I keep a bag of Dove's chocolate around and eat 3 pieces a day (that's the serving size!).

[losingjusme 12]

losing- I read a famous mommy blog, and have for a while-- she is hilarious.. but I notice she has gone to the zoo A LOT lately. So that must be the thing to do to occupy kids. She has 6 kids. She also takes them to museums.

ummm.. blog address please ...

im sitting here at work nearly bored to tears refreshing LBT every 25 seconds...

[Guest Leslie2Lose]

I love the plain chocolate bar myself. I used to get that before I found the dark choc. M&M's....I haven't had any in a while. I can't buy them either. I have a little "gumball machine" at my desk at work I used to keep stocked. It has been empty since April (my surgery). I guess I need to give it to someone else...it is no longer needed.

I hate that Halloween is coming up - all that temptation. My kids go into hyperdrive - and we don't buy it! Halloween night - no point in dinner - just my living room covered in candy. My kids have belly aches for three days afterwards. It's only once a year and a treat for them - so I let them. I'm a bad mommy.

Actually come to think of it "food season is coming up"...Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas then all that drinking at the first of the year....oh I love to see it come but love to see it go too.

[Daisalana 33]

losing - haha I just pulled it up to show you the link, she apparently just went to the zoo AGAIN. She has been in news, has a book coming out, etc. Wish I could find the original thing that introduced me to her.. she had an ebay listing for a pokemon card pack.. the listing was a long story about how one of her kids stole it, so she is selling it on ebay to teach him a lesson. It made me cry from laughing.. here it is:

BECAUSE I SAID SO

[Daisalana 33]

My band keeps me in check for turkey day and christmas. I remember last Thanksgiving, was my first one since banded, and everyone in my family stacks a plate at least 8inches high with a ton of food.

I took about a teaspoon of most sides just to be able to taste them and an ounce of turkey. I was an oddity last year. And I wasn't even able to eat all of that! I was pretty proud.

[losingjusme 12]

the 'in' thing to do i guess.

thanks for the link

[Daisalana 33]

Ok here it is, it's long I know.. but it's worth the read (at least I think so). Going to shrink it down so hopefully I don't completely spam this thread....

I’m selling a bunch of Pokemon cards. Why? Because my kids sneaked them into my shopping cart while at the grocery store and I ended up buying them because I didn’t notice they were there until we got home. How could I have possibly not noticed they were in my cart, you ask? Let me explain.

You haven’t lived until you’ve gone grocery shopping with six kids in tow. I would rather swim, covered in bait, through the English Channel, be a contestant on Fear Factor when they’re having pig brains for lunch, or do fourth grade math than to take my six kids to the grocery store. Because I absolutely detest grocery shopping, I tend to put it off as long as possible. There comes a time, however, when you’re peering into your fridge and thinking, ‘Hmmm, what can I make with ketchup, Italian dressing, and half an onion,’ that you decide you cannot avoid going to the grocery store any longer. Before beginning this most treacherous mission, I gather all the kids together and give them “The Lecture“.

“The Lecture“ goes like this…

MOM: “We have to go to the grocery store.”

KIDS: “Whine whine whine whine whine.“

MOM: “Hey, I don’t want to go either, but it’s either that or we’re eating cream of onion-ketchup Soup and drinking Italian dressing for dinner tonight.”

KIDS: “Whine whine whine whine whine.“

MOM: “Now here are the rules: do not ask me for anything, do not poke the packages of meat in the butcher section, do not test the laws of physics and try to take out the bottom can in the pyramid shaped display, do not play baseball with oranges in the produce section, and most importantly, do not try to leave your brother at the store. Again.”

OK, the kids have been briefed. Time to go.

Once at the store, we grab not one, but two shopping carts. I wear the baby in a sling and the two little children sit in the carts while I push one cart and my oldest son pushes the other one. My oldest daughter is not allowed to push a cart. Ever. Why? Because the last time I let her push the cart, she smashed into my ankles so many times, my feet had to be amputated by the end of our shopping trip. This is not a good thing. You try running after a toddler with no feet sometime.

At this point, a woman looks at our two carts and asks me, “Are they all yours?” I answer good naturedly, “Yep!

“Oh my, you have your hands full.”

“Yes, I do, but it‘s fun!” I say smiling. I’ve heard all this before. In fact, I hear it every time I go anywhere with my brood.

We begin in the produce section where all these wonderfully, artistically arranged pyramids of fruit stand. There is something so irresistibly appealing about the apple on the bottom of the pile, that a child cannot help but try to touch it. Much like a bug to a zapper, the child is drawn to this piece of fruit. I turn around to the sounds of apples cascading down the display and onto the floor. Like Indiana Jones, there stands my son holding the all-consuming treasure that he just HAD to get and gazing at me with this dumbfounded look as if to say, “Did you see that??? Wow! I never thought that would happen!”

I give the offending child an exasperated sigh and say, “Didn’t I tell you, before we left, that I didn’t want you taking stuff from the bottom of the pile???”

“No. You said that you didn’t want us to take a can from the bottom of the pile. You didn’t say anything about apples.”

With superhuman effort, I resist the urge to send my child to the moon and instead focus on the positive - my child actually listened to me and remembered what I said!!! I make a mental note to be a little more specific the next time I give the kids The Grocery Store Lecture.

A little old man looks at all of us and says, “Are all of those your kids?”

Thinking about the apple incident, I reply, “Nope. They just started following me. I’ve never seen them before in my life.”

OK, now onto the bakery section where everything smells so good, I’m tempted to fill my cart with Cookies and call it a day. Being on a perpetual diet, I try to hurry past the assortment of pies, cakes, breads, and pastries that have my children drooling. At this point the chorus of “Can we gets” begins.

“Can we get donuts?”

“No.”

“Can we get cupcakes?”

“No.”

“Can we get muffins?”

“No.”

“Can we get pie?”

“No.”

You’d think they’d catch on by this point, but no, they’re just getting started.

In the bakery, they’re giving away free samples of coffee cake and of course, my kids all take one. The toddler decides he doesn’t like it and proceeds to spit it out in my hand. (That’s what moms do. We put our hands in front of our children’s mouths so they can spit stuff into them. We’d rather carry around a handful of chewed up coffee cake, than to have the child spit it out onto the floor. I’m not sure why this is, but ask any mom and she’ll tell you the same.) Of course, there’s no garbage can around, so I continue shopping one-handed while searching for someplace to dispose of the regurgitated mess in my hand.

In the meat department, a mother with one small baby asks me, “Wow! Are all six yours?”

I answer her, “Yes, but I’m thinking of selling a couple of them.”

(Still searching for a garbage can at this point.)

Ok, after the meat department, my kids’ attention spans are spent. They’re done shopping at this point, but we aren’t even halfway through the store. This is about the time they like to start having shopping cart races. And who may I thank for teaching them this fun pastime? My seventh “child”, also known as my husband. While I’m picking out loaves of bread, the kids are running down the aisle behind the carts in an effort to get us kicked out of the store. I put to stop to that just as my son is about to crash head on into a giant cardboard cut-out of a Keebler elf stacked with packages of cookies.

Ah! Yes! I find a small trash can by the coffee machine in the Cereal aisle and finally dump out the squishy contents of my hand. After standing in the cereal aisle for an hour and a half while the kids perused the various cereals, comparing the marshmallow and cheap, plastic toy content of each box, I broke down and let them each pick out a box. At any given time, we have twenty open boxes of cereal in my house.

As this is going on, my toddler is playing Houdini and maneuvering his little body out of the seat belt in an attempt to stand up in the cart. I’m amazed the kid made it to his second birthday without suffering a brain damaging head injury. In between trying to flip himself out of the cart, he sucks on the metal bars of the shopping cart. Mmmm, can you say “influenza”?

The shopping trip continues much like this. I break up fights between the kids now and then and stoop down to pick up items that the toddler has flung out of the cart. I desperately try to get everything on my list without adding too many other goodies to the carts.

Somehow I manage to complete my shopping in under four hours and head for the check-outs where my kids start in on a chorus of, “Can we have candy? ” What evil minded person decided it would be a good idea to put a display of candy in the check-out lanes, right at a child’s eye level? Obviously someone who has never been shopping with children.

As I unload the carts, I notice many extra items that my kids have sneaked in the carts unbeknownst to me. I remove a box of Twinkies, a package of cupcakes, a bag of candy, and a can of cat food (we don’t even have a cat!). I somehow missed the box of Pokemon cards however and ended up purchasing them unbeknownst to me. As I pay for my purchases, the clerk looks at me, indicates my kids, and asks, “Are they all yours?”

Frustrated, exhausted from my trip, sick to my stomach from writing out a check for $289.53, dreading unloading all the groceries and putting them away and tired of hearing that question, I look at the clerk and answer her in my most sarcastic voice, “No. They’re not mine. I just go around the neighborhood gathering up kids to take to the grocery store because it’s so much more fun that way.”

So, up for auction is an opened (they ripped open the box on the way home from the store) package of Pokemon cards. There are 44 cards total. They’re in perfect condition, as I took them away from the kiddos as soon as we got home from the store. Many of them say “Energy”. I tried carrying them around with me, but they didn’t work. I definitely didn’t have any more energy than usual. One of them is shiny. There are a few creature-like things on many of them. One is called Pupitar. Hee hee hee Pupitar! (Oh no! My kids’ sense of humor is rubbing off on me!) Anyway, I don’t there’s anything special about any of these cards, but I’m very much not an authority on Pokemon cards. I just know that I’m not letting my kids keep these as a reward for their sneakiness.

Shipping is FREE on this item. Insurance is optional, but once I drop the package at the post office, it is no longer my responsibility. For example, if my son decides to pour a bottle of glue into the envelope, or my daughter spills a glass of juice on the package, that’s my responsibility and I will fully refund your money. If, however, I take the envelope to the post office and a disgruntled mail carrier sets fire to it, a pack of wild dogs rip into it, or a mail sorting machine shreds it, it’s out of my hands, so you may want to add insurance. I will leave feedback for you as soon as I’ve received your payment. I will be happy to combine shipping on multiple items won within three days. This comes from a smoke-free, pet-free, child-filled home. Please ask me any questions before placing your bid. Happy bidding! :cursing: