Temporary Road Block.

Posted by Ethne~

Hey dudes.

You may have missed me around these parts.  It's possible you didn't notice since Lori's been doing awesome projects.

Anyway, I thought I should let you know what's up.

We've been having some trouble with K & E.  They're not sick (thank goodness), but we have been dealing with what's up full-time (for their privacy, I'm not going to get into it ad nauseum).  This hasn't left me a lot of time for blogging and projects.  And by the time they go to bed at night, I just about pass out.  Parenting is hard.  Good thing I love them so $%& much.

Consequently, I also haven't been my sassy self.  I keep trying to think up a good post about nothing for us to all laugh at, and I haven't really had it.  I did swear a whole bunch at Bode Miller's competition (the a$$holes) the other night, though, so it's deep down in there, promise.

I will keep up wom-ing.  I love and am really proud of this blog.  I have a post about making almond milk all photographed except the first part, which I keep forgetting to snap before I do it.  Grr.  I have lots of other posts running around in my head.  Plus, we're still doing a gluten-free diet, so there's loads to talk about with that.  Mostly the meals are going well.  {Mostly.}

Until next time, I sure do love Lori - and y'all.

xo, Ethne

Blogs Bring Tears to My Eyes

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Posted by Ethne~

Friends, this is a week to be thankful, and let me tell you, I’m thankful for a lot.  Lor and I both are.  I’ll give you a little insight into that later this week.

But today, I’m thankful for some fun stuff, and it involves blogs.  I’ve discovered a few more blogs this year, and have had even more fun with one of our most favorite, younghouselove.  Even though we don’t really know John & Sherry from that blog, I have little mini vignettes of conversations with Sherry in the comments on their blog.  I smile and chuckle.  Here’s a sample from her post today where she wrote a really sweet post about how much she loves her husband, John, in honor of his birthday.  It’s totally worth a read, here.

And then I clicked over to one of my new favorites, the Pintester.  This lady, Sonja, tests the crazy and stupid things people have been pinning onto Pinterest.  It often involves her own substitutions and alcohol, which means she sets herself up for failings, and at a minimum great sarcasm and swearing.  I made a comment the other day to her Diet Coke cupcake post the other day and today she singled me out as the Pinteste of the week, here.  Let me tell you, GENIUS!

I couldn't do the full screen shot, but my full quote is at the top.  "Lives" is cut off.

It’s like I’m famous except no one even knows it because we’ve not gotten any extra traffic on the blog from it.  Oh well.  You guys are the ones who count!!

I hope you’ve gotten a chuckle, too, Friends.  If I elicit anymore feedback, I’ll be sure to let you know.  In the meantime, enjoy today’s offerings from yet another of my most recent blog discoveries, Pinterest You Are Drunk.  Admit it, you know you were thinking the same thing.

Sweet, right?  Here's the caption they gave it:  

MUR-MAN ALMOST SNEEZED ALL OVER YOUNGHOUSELOVE!

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Posted by Ethne & Lori~

Lori and I are back to my house in big city suburb, MN, after our AMAZING adventure to meet our favorite bloggers, John and Sherry Petersik of younghouselove blog!!!  O.M.G. it was even better than expected!  We didn’t know what it would be like to meet the famous authors that we see each and every day (just not in person).  Now that we’ve had a minute to chat with them, we know that we’d totally riot together.

Going back 18 hours, Lori’s Amtrak train ride from biggish city, ND, to big city, MN, was a NIGHTMARE.  There were drunk people talking to Mur-Man, the train was 3 hours late, and they were stuck with no way to sleep anywhere – but Lori was on a mission.  She was getting here to see yhl no matter what!

Going on *three hours of sleep*, mission accomplished.  Lori and Mur-Man rolled into my house and waited for me to get home from work then we hauled down to West Elm store where their signing was held.  FORTUNATELY, our friend Roxanne (RM in yesterday’s post) was holding a spot for us in the immense book-signing line!!!  And she made arrangements with the super nice gals around her so we could meet up in line with her.  You rule, Roxanne!

West Elm served hot cocoa and cookies.  Mur-Man was about at wit’s end having had no sleep, but we were good mom and auntie and fed him Oreos too.  Then he and I looked around for Stanley, his Elf on the Shelf, till we made it up to John and Sherry in line.

 

 

Can we even say how odd it was to see them right in front of us?  And they were so friendly!  We each had a book for them to sign, OF COURSE, but then we brought Pinterest Challenge paint spun ornaments from last year for them to sign and we gave them gifts – one of the teeny little owls I made out of acorns, a buffalo stuffed animal for Clara, and Roxanne gave them a postcard with a cool artsy view of the big city skyline.

So as we were talking, Sherry said, “Ethne, I know you!  Aren’t you the co-author of the blog with “mom” in it?”  Holy cow!  She totally recognized me from my comments on their many posts – because Lor and I have been followers (and commenters) for years.  Finally, having a wacky name like Ethne pays off – it’s recognizable in a crowd!!!  Thanks Sherry, that was the coolest ever.

Signing our paint spun Christmas ornament!

As we posed for a picture with John & Sherry, Mur-Man sneezed (I was holding him) and shot a huge booger on me.  I nabbed it off my shirt with my finger and held it away from us all.  But, because it’s me, as we walked away, I couldn’t help but show John & Sherry the giant booger on my finger (they’re parents to a toddler, right?).  They probably were totally grossed out; Lori just rolled her eyes and we took a pic of the boog to commemorate.

What do you have for auntie, Mur-Man?

Full disclosure, Friends - but it doesn't need to be a large photo

Friends, it was awesome.  Lor, Roxanne and I are still just walking on air.  I haven’t even had a chance to read the book yet, except for the page where they signed it to me!!  We’re both exhausted, but I just don’t know how we’re going to get to sleep.  We’ll have to count the pillows Sherry has collected in their playroom, that oughta do it.

Lefse-making-marathon tomorrow night, so you won’t wanna miss that – we’ll see you soon. 

PS:  We should have known the people standing around Roxanne would be cool, since they were fellow bloggers: our new friends, Ellen and Becky from Ramblings from the Burbs.

TUESDAYS AT NOON: Lori's Coming to Town!

Posted by Ethne~

O.M.G. Friends, I have awesome news: Lori and Mur-Man are hopping Amtrak in biggish city, ND, at 2:00 a.m. tonight/a$$-crack-of-dawn tomorrow morning to head here and stay with Shaun, the monsters and me for a couple of days.

New mom Grizz on the right is also Norwegian (that makes sense in a minute)

Why, you ask?  Well, I’ll gladly tell you.  One of our very fave blog authors in the WHOLE WIDE WORLD, younghouselove, are coming to big city, MN, to sign their brand new book tomorrow evening.  Just about one second after they posted notice of this, Lor and I RSVP’d for the event.  One of Steve’s best friend’s wives, RM (he only has one wife, but I think that’s proper grammar – WTF English language, and I was an English major in college, so I oughta be right on this, though I could re-word it to make it sound better but I’m not gonna cuz now I think this run-on diatribe is funny, sorry RM) is coming too!

We plan to bring a little gift for them, and something for them to autograph, in addition to their books.  I could about wet my pants with excitement.  Luckily I delivered my kids by c-section, so my urinary tract didn’t get all stretched out and stuff, meaning I don’t leak when I laugh or get excited.  No offense; and I really don’t think that’s TMI, since it doesn’t happen to me.  It would only be nasty if it actually occurred.

ANYWAY, the next day, Lori and I have decided we are making LEFSE!  For any of you who didn’t grow up in the Northern Midwest, lefse is kinda like a tortilla except it’s made with potatoes and flour instead of cornmeal or flour only, and it’s pretty much on par with deviled eggs for awesomeness in my extremely important opinion.  You usually eat it at the holidays, spread with butter or butter & sugar.  I prefer butter-only most of the time.  Mainly because I eat it alongside Christmas cookies and deviled eggs so I have the balance of savory and sweet and awesome, which is the holy trinity (not capitalized so as not to be sacrilegious) of eating anything inmyextremelyimportantopinion. 

When I eat mine I just fold it in half so it lasts longer

The problem with lefse is that homemade is a ka-zillion times more delicious than store-bought.  Don’t be mistaken; I buy store-bought here in MN, and I LOVE IT, but it’s not the same by a mile.  And lefse is a Norwegian delicacy, and I’m not Norwegian, I’m Swedish-German-English by ancestry, so we don’t have the lefse-making tradition.  Like, I grew up with it as a holiday tradition, but then my family moved away from Williston, so I have no way to get it homemade now.  Torture.  It’s possible that Thrifty Nana (my mom) has the implements to make lefse, but I don’t think we’ve ever made it but once, two decades ago, so I’m not sure if that counts.

Here’s where having a Norwegian best friend comes in.  Lori has agreed to pack all of her lefse-making-supplies, including the giant lefse griddle in her suitcase and bring it on the train to big city.  Is that the coolest ever?  Yep, the key here is that I will once again make a mess in the kitchen, which Shaun says is my specialty.

And to make sure we pack every possible adventure in, Lori, KS, and I are viewing the 11:30 p.m. showing of Twilight Breaking Dawn, Part 2, following the lefse-making marathon.  This was STEVE’S IDEA, AND LORI’S SUGGESTION, mind you, which shocked the socks off of me.  I told her I would agree to go if she didn’t trash-talk Twilight once.  She told me that just because she hasn’t read the books doesn’t mean she doesn’t think the actors aren’t hot (do all those double-negatives cancel each other out, English major?).  Well, that’s a start.

Then, Friday, Steve is coming to town for a conference and they’ll spend the rest of the weekend at JM & RM’s house (the non-polygamists).

We will for sure be blogging about our adventures, so you will FOR SURE want to check back a whole bunch this week and next week.  I am not sure if we’ll have a super awesome post for Friday since we won’t be getting to bed until breaking dawn (I’m hilarious) and I have to work Friday.

When I advised Shaun of our genius plans he said, and I quote: “Are you really trying to pi$$ me off?”  Success.

YEAR ONE REVIEW (BY LORI)

Posted by Lori~

It seems like yesterday I was in big city, MN kick-starting my dream and Ethne’s dream.  Yes, on January 1, 2011 we launched WOM-MOM.  And it has exceeded our expectations.  We went into this with lots of ideas, topics, and so much more, but had no idea that a year later, over 400 posts later, and 150 followers later we would hit our 1-year anniversary L.O.V.I.N.G. WOM-MOM.

Launch weekend!

Thank you to our followers for joining, following, and sticking with us through this adventure.  Thank you to Ethne for being my WOM-MOM partner.  I have loved every minute of our daily phone calls, emails, WOM-WEEKENDS, and laughs (until there were tears).

And so…Ethne and I thought we would recap for you our top posts (written by yours truly)…and here it goes:

First up, is all things Mur-man.  He brings so much inspiration into what I do and what I WOM about.  Some of my faves include:

1.    SUPER CRAFTY SUPER-CAPE

2.    A YEAR OF MUR-MAN

3.    MUR-MAN’S SUPER ROOM

4.    And…ANGRY BIRD EVERTHING!

Next, I love posts that inspired me to GET THINGS DONE.  Some my favorite motivational posts included:

5.   CRASH MY CUPBOARD

6.   CRASH MY CRAFT ROOM

7.   MISSION:  QUANTUM LEAP (YES…I STILL NEED TO MAKE A MAJOR LEAP!)

And, then there are the posts that still make me laugh:

8.   DOUBLE-CHIN

9.   WASTE OF CAULK

10.               SECRET BUFFALO….and so many more!

11.               I love the CRIME EDITION posts.  Ethne and I are still convinced that we should host a WOMEN ON A MISSION:  CRIME EDITION PROGRAM (look out Casey Anthony…here we come!)

12.               And lastly, the $5.00 BREADMAKER POST (the Admiral).  This was of course our first post…this was the start of it all!

I could keep listing…I could go on and on! 

And a shout-out to our WOM-MOM special guests…thank you to your many contributions!

2012—look out!  HERE COME SOME WOMS!

YEAR 1 SUMMARY - Ethne!

Posted by Ethne~

Unbelievably a year has passed since Lori and I stopped giving lip-service to our pipe dream of writing a blog together and we actually took the plunge.  It’s been a lot of fun.  I get to talk to her almost every day, and when we don’t talk to each other, we text.  And sometimes we send some old-fashioned emails.

We dream of living in big city, MN, together one day, preferably on a compound where we’d only have to walk next door to each other’s houses.  We wouldn’t work.  We’d blog full-time.  Our days would start with meeting up for coffee (Lori) & tea (me) at one of our houses and planning what craft we’d be doing for  the day.

Not that the blog has been easy.  There have been some days where I just didn’t feel like writing up a post.  Or I didn’t feel like hooking my camera up to the computer to download pictures.  And I know that the blog has been something of an annoyance, on occasion, to Shaun, Steve and our kids.  Then there were the days that I felt we were in a blogging slump because we didn’t have very many visits to the blog that day or we hadn’t gotten any new followers in a while.

But then I’d text Lori and she’d slap down a ‘DECISION DONE’ and we’d plug away again.  Really, it’s a fun way to keep my creative juices flowing when sometimes I feel boxed in with the day-to-day of my work life and the evening-to-evening tasks of being a parent.  [The girls’ pediatrician told me yesterday that sometimes, parenting is about knowing your own limits as a parent.  She said I shouldn’t feel bad about telling the girls to go to their room before I say something I’ll feel sorry about later.]  

CAFFEINE also helps keep me going

The blog keeps me doing things that are fun: activities I can do with or for the girls, our home and as gifts.  And honestly, I really like writing for an audience of my peers, like I did as an English and American Studies double major back in college.  That seems like ages ago, and my grasp of the language in all its glory gets rusty.  But when I’m writing posts, I feel the writer in me bubbling back to the surface.  Sometimes I make myself laugh out loud while I write.  It feels good.  I almost always laugh out loud when I read Lori’s posts.  I couldn’t do this, nor would I really want to, with anyone but Lori.  She’s my girl soulmate.

Do I need to find a little more balance?  Of course.  I can’t forget that each evening spent with Shaun and the girls is a day I won’t get back, ever.  So I can’t bury my face in the computer all night long.  I have to actively remind myself of this.  But looking back at all of the projects, crafts and activities I’ve done with Lori, Shaun, the girls and my family and friends, the blog will be my online scrapbook of it all.  I put up pictures of the girls constantly, so there is that record as I go along, detailing our extraordinary ordinary lives.

Finding balance - like on this Omaha suspension footbridge

I searched through the posts I’ve done (Lori is going to do the same) that have had the most meaning, were the most fun to do/write and which made me laugh the most.  It was actually a fairly long list.  Pared down a bit, these are my very favorite ‘Ethne’ posts:

1)   The Royal Wedding.  I liked all of them: here, here, here, here and here.

2)   Adventures in Sunless Tan, Parts 1 and 2.

3)   Bombshell Bra.  These posts here and here and here got us a lot of feedback.

4)   Whit’s Beauty Tips, particularly Mascara Magic 1 & 2, Beauty Essentials and Smoky Eyes.

5)   Crime Editions and Tuesdays at Noon:  Here, here and here.

6)   Together Again, Hometown Meals here and here.

7)   Riot Girls.  All of them, but especially DECISION DONE.

8)   Pride & Prejudice

9)   On the Subject of Husbands

10)                   Mission Organization: Final Frontier (embarrassing, but good)

11)                   Potstickers

12)                   Dry Shampoo and Update

13)                   Food = Love and Love Note Jar

14)                   Bella Shirt (and Shaun's) & a couple other clothing re-styles here and here) and

15)                   Though it wasn’t my post, I laughed until I was wiping away the tears at Lori’s double chin post.

Friends, I really hope you’ll follow Lori and me into our 2^nd year of blogging – and spread the word to your friends and friends of friends and moms of friends of friends.  We will surely laugh a whole bunch and probably cry a little.  With any luck, we will get baby steps closer to living in the same city and maybe even lose a few pounds.  Hard to say what it all will be, but I’m in.