Phone Follies

Last Sunday I had a fairly substantial, even dare I say, monumental, blonde moment. 

After playing a little mind game with myself last Sunday afternoon, wherein I promised myself that if I undecorated the house in 2 hours, I'd have enough time to go shopping before church.   Yes, I bribed myself.  Listen, every time I have to take down all the Christmas decorations I feel anything but merry and bright and mumble and grumble about how next year we'll have a tree and stockings and that's it.  My family typically just roll their eyes at me and my empty threats because they know that next year when it's time to decorate I won't be able to resist putting out "just a few snowmen" or getting out "just a few more totes of Christmas decorations".  Anyway, the mind game kinda worked because I made good time undecorating the house, so it was only right that I got to go shopping.  I picked Blade up at his friend's house where he'd been for a birthday party and we headed into town.  We went to the mall and had a great time shopping.  He's one cool kid and I love hanging out with just him, especially since he still holds my hand and tells me which pink sunglasses I should buy.  As we were leaving the mall I pulled my phone out of my pocket because I had a missed call.  And then I put it back or so I thought....duh duh DUH......(the suspense builds)
We drove the 18 minutes home and I went to put my phone on the charger because the battery was running low.  Except that when I went to do that I couldn't find it.  I dumped out my purse, looked through the PMobile, checked pockets, the whole  bit...and NADA.  Then I had GI Joe repeat still nothing.  I called it but then quickly hung up because I thought that I had accidentally called GI Joe's phone.  But before I hung up I was sure I heard someone pick up on my cell phone, but I hung up before this registered with my brain.  We called and sent 911 texts to it hoping the perp would answer it again but alas he/she did not.  At least it was a smart criminal that stole my phone.  But since I couldn't 100% confirm that someone did have it I decided to drive back to the mall to see if by chance it was still laying in the parking lot. 
The whole drive back to the mall I was kinda freaking out just because I had just gone through the hassle of getting a new phone and also because I would lose all of my contacts.  And how on earth would I ever replace the phone numbers of all the rich and famous people I had in there?  Not to mention, what if they hacked into my facebook and posted an inappropriate status update?!?  Oh the horror.  You can imagine my distress. 
I got back to the mall parking lot and drove slowly past the spots I passed on the way to my parking spot earlier and then parked near my previous spot.  I didn't see my phone during my driveby so I got out to do a foot search.  I was nearly in tears as I got back in the PMobile after the foot search was unsuccessful.  I reached into the front pocket off my purse to get lip gloss of all things, (hey the cold air made my lips dry!) and lo and behold, there was my phone.  It was a miracle!  I really have no idea how it got there because I had literally turned my purse upside down at home and it wasn't there.  It had to be divine intervention.  I was missing church to search for my phone after all. 
I immediately sent GI Joe a text that said "YAY!  FOUND MY PHONE!  P.S. THIS IS YOUR WIFE AND NOT A HARDENED CRIMINAL WHO STOLE HER PHONE"
Obviously, he was relieved and especially glad that I clarified that it was his wife and not a criminal. 
You know those clips they had for mittens to clip them to the sleeves of kids' coats?  I need those for my cell phone.  First person who jerryrigs one of those up for me wins a prize.  Seriously, this is becoming a reoccurring problem. 
How does that saying go?  Blondes just want to have more fun?  You know what else this blonde wants to do?  Hang on to her phone.  It's good to have goals. 

A World Record & Photo Friday

This week I've accomplished two things I've never done before.  1) Gotten up early, REALLY early 5 DAYS in a row to do weight loss yoga with my on again off again now on again boyfriend Bob and 2) blogged 5 days in a row! 
What is happening?  Clearly, you should stock up on non perishables and generators because the apocolypse is upon us. 
Today, because I'm exhausted and barely able to lift my arms or walk without hobbling and groaning and moaning, I give you photo Friday. 

Bubba hopes you had a very Merry Christmas

Ryder wants to know what you think of his new 'do.  He's growing it out. 

Frosted trees and pretty snow.  It's all melted now and everything is a not so lovely shade of brown. This picture reminds me of better days.

So does this...

Happy Friday wherever you are or wish you were!

Keepin' It Classy

In case you haven't noticed, this makes the 4th day of posting IN A ROW!  This from the blogger who could at times go 10 days between posts!  4 posts in 4 days?!?  I don't even know who I am anymore.  Don't get used to it, you know about my will and resolve.  (ex:  New Year's Resolutions 2010=Fail.)

The title feels very familiar and I may or may have not used it before but what can I say it's a way of life around here. 
The other day we had a pretty good snowfall and the temperatures were in the DOUBLE digits.  In Iowa in the winter, double digits are huge.  Well, not literally, but 35 degrees sure feels like a heat wave when the next day it may or may not be 12 degrees BELOW zero.  So with the heat wave of 35 and fresh fallen snow on the ground, I donned my bathing suit NON-PINK Carhartts (Carhartt will be hearing from me very soon, I am not one to be ignored as they will soon find out) and went outside to play in the snow with the kids.  To kick off our winter wonderland festivities, I took them hillbilly sledding.  It looks a little something like this...

A rescue toboggan long enough to hold 3 kids and a pug pulled by the 4 wheeler.  This is lots of fun as long as the driver of the 4 wheeler (in this case me) is a responsible and good driver.  I think you know where this is going.  I didn't think I was going that fast, until I happened to glance behind me and noticed that the sled was upside down and was empty.  Then I stopped and looked back further and found 3 kids in various spots along the route face first in the snow some crying, some wailing, but all saying things like, "MOMMY didn't you hear us tell you to SLOW DOWN?!?  You flipped us and now I have frostbite on my nose, face, etc"  Oh oops.  In my defense, I think the sled went over a cowpie or a mound of horse droppings which dislodged the kids from the sled, so really it wasn't my driving.  The rest of the sledding was done cautiously and was more of leisurely sleigh ride than adrenaline pumping fast paced sledding.  I guess we'll get back to that when GI Joe takes over as driver.  Lightweights. 

And this is when I let Blade drive.  Not.

After our sledding adventures, we headed to the meadow aka our front yard where we can build a snowman and pretend that he is Parson Brown (p.s. WHO is Parson Brown?) Within 5 minutes, the oldest and the youngest wimped out and headed for the warmth of the house making accusations of frostbite from the sled upheaval they'd been thru, leaving Blade and I to construct snowmen (and women, we're equal opportunity) masterpieces.  It was dangerous work as rolling snow into a ball in a yard that 4 dogs use for their outdoor activities is kind of a crapshoot...pun intended.  But our snowman turned out adorable..once we got all the brown spots concealed. 

Nothing says Frosty like psychedelic eyes made of Candy Cane Tootsie Pop Drops or broken Christmas ornaments or a Starburst smile, am I right?  Speaking of Candy Cane Tootsie Pops, have you tried them?!?  Hurry and stock up on them while they're 75% off, sweet mercy are they ever delightful. 

We were pleased with our work and moved our workspace to the front ditch to get a bigger audience of viewers.  We decided the one in the ditch that everyone driving by should be bigger and better than the one hidden from the road by bushes in the front yard. And I do mean better....

Such a beauty huh?  Notice the cranberry belly button.  I have to admit that once I whipped out the bikini and pink hair Blade washed his hands of this snowwoman.  So yes, I spent a good 30 minutes outside by myself dressing our snowwoman.  I think my extra effort was well worth the time investment.  The bikini was just happy to see the light of day after laying dormant in my drawer since OUR HONEYMOON...13 + years ago.  She wore it well. 

As you can imagine traffic by our house slowed considerably the rest of the day.  Usually, when people slow down it's to gawk at the emus or the gay llamas in pornographic positions but today it was all about the snowwoman.  As usual we're just keepin' it classy!

You Might Be a Redneck If....

this is parked in your driveway............

GI Joe proudly decks his truck out with these bad boys during deer hunting season.  I'm so proud. 

I'm also so proud of this....

No really, I am.  She's rockin' that orange right? 

She also tells me all about gutting the deer her Daddy shot and how she nearly caught a field mouse with her bare hands.  The maternity test is still pending.  We may have to get Maury Povich involved.

But she definitely belongs to him, no doubt about that.

Christmas Corniness

Ahh Christmas, how I love thee. The shopping, the music, the decorations, and the traditions. As you can probably imagine, I’m all about traditions, both creating them and maintaining them. Christmas is basically my Traditions Superbowl. I’m all about making events out of ordinary things and more importantly, making memories that our kids will look back on fondly years from now. Let’s be honest, they’ll probably laugh and roll their eyes about how crazy their mother and sometimes their father is/was. And that my friends, is the goal. 




Some of the traditions are things that GI Joe and I each brought from our respective upbringings but most of them are things we read about, heard about, or saw on TV, and started within our family.



Here are just a few of our family Christmas traditions.  Warning:  Will likely cause eye rolls and shaking of heads.

*The annual Koons Christmas Light Extravaganza.  My family mocks me when I say this because truthfully we've only done it the past 3 years so they don't consider it quite annual yet.  Never mind that I had that big fancy name for it the very first time we went.  Like I said people, everything's an event with me.  The Christmas Light Extravaganza is held on either the 2nd or 3rd Friday night of December.  It consists of eating at Texas Roadhouse, a stop for cappuccino and hot cocoa, and then driving thru Jolly Holiday Lights while singing along to the Christmas music station.  It's quite delightful and slightly Griswold-ish.  See?

*A pickle in the tree. Yes, it gets a little smelly by the end of the season but it’s a tradition. JUST KIDDING. The pickle is a glass ornament and as we decorate the tree every year it gets hidden in the branches and whoever finds it first gets to load the dishwasher is guaranteed good luck. Or so the legend goes. And by legend I mean the story I made up and tell the kids every year. Pretty sure I read about the pickle tradition on the internet so I’m sure it’s legit.


*Christmas PJ’s-Every Christmas Eve, we each get to open one present. That present is our Christmas PJ’s. A little corny, yes. A lot corny is that we all 5 match or coordinate. For example, one year we all had blue snowmen PJ’s, different shades of blue but all snowmen and all in the blue section of the color wheel. This year the color scheme was black, red, and gray. The kids’ PJ’s all matched, Justin’s coordinated, and mine were snow leopard (obviously) and are just all around awesome but also coordinated with everyone else’s in their own special way. 

This is one of my favorite traditions and one that I plan to continue on until I die, even if that means when the kids are all married and have kids of their own that I end up buying 17 pairs of matching/coordinating PJ’s. It’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make and photograph. And now within a span of 2 days I've not only posted llama porn pictures on my blog but now us in our PJ's, have I no bounds?  Apparently not. 

*After we put on our Christmas PJ’s, we cuddle up on the couch. in front of the fireplace and read ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas followed by the more biblical Christmas story out of Luke. Then we put out cookies and eggnog for Santa (FYI, that’s not in the Bible). Except this year all the cookies disappeared before Christmas Eve so we left out a plate of deer jerky instead.  Santa left a note saying he rather enjoyed the deer jerky but that his sleigh staff didn't find it amusing.  ;)  It’s all very quaint and Norman Rockwell like. And I try to take lots of pictures because how do you think Norm painted all those pictures? He had a picture to look at obviously!

Santa. I know there are many opinions, stances, blah blah blah about the whole Santa debate. Our position on the Santa debate? WE EMBRACE SANTA and guess what?  I don't think we're going to hell for it!  Yay!  We have so much fun with Santa. Listen, there are some out there who say that Santa is NOT real…gasp! And to those people I say, then explain the sleigh bells that jingle above our children’s heads as they sleep or the soot bootprints leading out of the fireplace all the way to the tree, or the reindeer tracks (REAL reinDEER tracks) in the yard, or the presents in 3 (one for each kid) separate types of wrapping paper never seen before in our house under the tree that say From Mr. S? You’ve got nothing. Is it weird that Dakota at age 11 tells her friends when they try to tell her that Santa isn't real that she feels sorry for them because Santa must not come to their house anymore?  Maybe but oh well, it certainly makes for a magical Christmas Eve and morning and you can bet we're savoring every single minute of when they "believe", not that we'll change our game up one bit once they don't believe. 

Santa makes such a mess. 

A new tradition we started this year is called "Elf on the Shelf". I'd read about this on several different blogs and thought it sounded adorable, especially since we're a house that still believes.  Which means I could get a lot of mileage out of the old "the elf is watching how you behave so he can report to Santa each night."  There is no scare tactic quite like the Santa Tactic.  We named our elf "Oogy" and it was so fun each morning as the kids tried to find where he had set up camp for the day.  I'm debating whether Oogy should be a year long tradition.  Surely Santa needs updates more often than just the month of December right?

A few years ago we decided that we would stay home on Christmas Day and not go anywhere.  It's worked out really well because we celebrate Christmas with GI Joe's family on Christmas Eve and with my family post Christmas so we get to stay home and play with all of our gifts on actual Christmas.  Every Christmas I go all out and prepare a Christmas feast.  ONE year, a few years ago, I decided we need to have Christmas Goose because it sounded "proper."  It was good although we preferred turkey, ham, or even prime rib that we've had the past 2 years.  Anyway, this year prior to Christmas I asked the family what we should have for our Christmas feast this year and their reply?  "We have to have Christmas GOOSE!  It's our TRADITION!"  Uh oh I've created monsters with this tradition stuff.  I was really hoping to do prime rib again or even a ham but the troops rallied and made the following ultimatum, "We want Christmas Goose or LEG OF LAMB!"   Who's kids are these that would make such sophisticated demands?  Darn foodies.  After much discussion, we decided on leg of lamb which GI Joe smoked in his smoker along with a venison roast and both turned out amazing.  I think we've found our new Christmas tradition.  It felt all fancy and stuff too, having leg of lamb for Christmas dinner while sipping our sparkling cider from goblets...while wearing our PJ's.  That's right none of us changed out of our PJ's ALL DAY LONG.  It was glorious. 

I hope your Christmas was just as merry.  Those are just a few of our traditions, I can't give away all of our secrets.  Tell me I'm not the only one obsessed with Christmas traditions.  What are some of your family's traditions? 

What I Learned in 2010

The difference between mules and donkeys. I hate to keep beating a dead horse mule donkey but I will probably never live this down…EVER. P.S. Beyonce and Kanye are doing well.




That accidentally microwaving a chicken sandwich for 45 MINUTES instead of 45 SECONDS is not considered “normal wear and tear” and is not covered under the microwave’s warranty. And the only way to get rid of the smoky smell in the microwave is to get a new one.



That clearly my animal “sexing” skills need some work. In my defense, take a look at this picture…can you see the goods?

And those eyelashes?  Fughettaboutit.

See why we lived a lie for over a year? I’m working on this but I gotta be honest googling animal sexing is not exactly G rated. But then neither is the Brokeback Barn and Grill we’ve got going on with our 3 gay llamas or the llama porn I just posted so basically I'm just headed in a downward spiral.   


That even though we have 5 very nice, tame “laying” hens,now that it’s cold I’ve run out of eggs more than once. Back to Costco I go for the walk of shame to buy eggs in bulk.

That even though I buy butter in bulk, 4 pounds at a time, during the holiday baking season I ran out. How did I let that happen? Paula Deen would be so ashamed. Also, Holy didn’t appreciate me trying to milk him to churn my own butter. Hey, desperate times=desperate measures.

*Please note that was a joke, as you cannot milk male cows even if they are considered a “dairy breed”. You may get something but I can assure you it will NOT be milk. I tell you this because I care and because once upon a time when I was a young wannabe farm girl I thought all dairy cattle could be milked.   Again, I'm here to educate and inform you.  Please learn from my mistakes.

That 2010 was one of my least favorite years and I was more than happy to hold the door for it while it found it's way out.  True to form, the last day of 2010 was terrible weather here in Iowa so our rip roaring Baptist New Year's Eve party got cancelled. Instead of dancing on tables  holding hands while singing Kumbayah and throwing down..Uno cards we had a night at home.  I prepared a New Year's Eve feast using all Pioneer Woman's recipes: this for luck, these because they are delicious, and this because it felt like the right thing to do and RIGHT it was.  Good stuff.  We tried to trick the kids into going to bed after they showed the ball dropping in NY at 11 but they didn't fall for it.  I rue the day they learned to tell time.  So we waited it out, poured some sparkling cider in our fancy glasses, and clinked our glasses at midnight when the ball dropped..again.  It was a little bit nerdy but a lot awesome.  Good riddance 2010 and 2011 I expect great things from you. 

Happy New Year!!!

From Our Zoo To You....

In years past this is when I would post our annual Christmas novel letter just in case you weren't on the list of the select 37 that actually received it in the mail.  Not this year.  This year, I started to write the annual Christmas letter and by the end of the first paragraph realized if I sent it out people would need to spike their eggnog with something strong just to read the letter, it was that depressing.  I'm not one to sugar coat things (like you didn't already know that) and the first 2 1/2 months of 2010 were among the worst in our family's history and that just doesn't make for a feel good, warm and fuzzy Christmas letter.  So instead of the Debbie Downer letter I included this shameless plug for this blog. 

Dear Friends and Family,
Seasons Greetings!  You're probably expecting a lengthy, detailed, witty (a girl can dream) recap of our year.  After much deliberation, angst, and even a facebook poll, I've decided not to write the annual Koons Christmas letter. 
Dry your eyes because instead I offer you this...........http://www.hillbillyhilarity.blogspot.com/.  My blog where I, self proclaimed Prairie Princess, record the major and not so major happenings, mishaps, events, that take place here at the Koons Zoo throughout the year.  Like the time I accidentally bought donkeys because I thought they were mules or Blade's first season of tackle football or Ryder's Homecoming Court appearance or Dakota's dabblings into girlhood or the kids' new bovine brother or the National LamKoons Summer Vacation, and many more tales, it's ALL right there and will continue to be.  So really it's the gift that keeps on giving!  You're welcome. 
Now with all the extra time you have from not having to read the novel that typically is our Christmas letter, go have a VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS and a Happy New Year! 

Love,
The Koons Clan

So if you came to this blog because you got that shameless plug in the mail along with our Christmas card, welcome and I hope you'll stick around.  And to those of you faithful, longtime readers, thank you for reading, thank you for laughing with us, and thank you for encouraging me to keep writing.  Being the attention seeker that I am, I probably wouldn't keep doing it if I thought no one was reading it even though I love having this record of our lives.  But you guys make me want to record it all.  So thanks and I'm sure someday when my kids go back and can read about the details of their childhoods, they'll thank you too.  Once they get out of therapy, that is.   :)

From Our Zoo to You...Merry Christmas!