Dear Michigan State:

You had me worried for 38 minutes that I might have picked the wrong team to round out my Elite Eight.

But in the end, you managed to (barely) pull it off. Way to bring it home. Now, if you wouldn't mind stepping it down and losing to Louisville this weekend, I would really appreciate it.

Thank you so much.

Sincerely,
Restless Mom (who is currently in the top 42 on ESPN.com's leaderboard)

Rise and Shout

I'm on Facebook right now and this is the ad that's popping up on the sidebar:

I'm so glad we're done with the potty training thing. Otherwise, I'd actually consider caving to this meticulously placed ad so that D could actually LEARN the first... oh, 20 lines of our alma mater's fight song.

Our kiddo, who knows as much of the fight song (four seconds worth) as his dad.

One question, though. Is it "Loyal, strong and true?" or "Loyal, brave and true?" I never figured that one out. I just mumbled something to get through the line so I wouldn't look like a total idiot:

"Loyal, strave and true... wear the white and blue
As we sing get set to spring.
Come on Cougars, it's up to you!"

Yeah. I still don't know.

The last tag I'll ever do...

The 8 things tag. (Chari, you owe me.)

8 favorite TV shows:
24
House
Beverly Hills, 90210 (the original)
So You Think You Can Dance?
The Amazing Race
What Not to Wear
Designed to Sell
Friends

8 things I did yesterday:
Printed out a ton of cupcake and buttercream frosting recipes
Made cute little binders for my new employees
Played race cars and basketball with C
Spent 2 minutes in between bites talking to my husband
Baked for 3 hours at a commercial kitchen
Spent way too much time on Facebook
Brought home a carrot cupcake with cream cheese frosting for D
Drove by Rod Blagojevich's home in Chicago

8 things I'm looking forward to:
Getting my new glasses
Getting the business website up and running
Having another strategy session with my publicist!
Finding time to read "Your Marketing Sucks."
Going to Leipzig and Prague with D this summer
Having a son who is able to zip up his jacket by himself
Having my husband around more once he finishes school
Summertime in Chicago!

8 favorite restaurants:
Florentine's - Cupertino
Kirala - Berkeley
Joy Yee - Chicagoland
Lou Malnati's - Chicagoland
Haku - NYC
Rodizio - SLC
That Kiosque Flottant on the Seine - Paris
Sparta's Pizza and Spaghetti - Bothell, WA

8 Things on my wish list
I wish we could afford to move to Lincoln Park
and put C in private school
and hire a personal chef
who goes grocery shopping. (That's 4.)
I wish I could lose 5 more pounds
and keep it off
and increase my VO2 so that I can run a 5k
and shrink down just one more size. (That's 4 more.)

Seriously, just pick a team

I saw this minivan driving down LSD by Oak Street beach yesterday and thought it was worth capturing on camera. I highly doubt I'll see anything like it ever again:

White Sox.
Cubs.
Red Sox.
Yankees.
Jesus.

(P.S. - sorry to the cabbie I almost swerved into while attempting to capture the sheer madness.)

Valentine's Day cards

So I used to instruct people in the art of rubber stamping and cardmaking. It was all I did in my past life. Seriously. I was really into it and I still enjoy it a lot. I still have a craft room. I still have 80 reams of coordinating cardstock.

But apparently three months away and I've lost my touch.

This is the best I could come up with for C's preschool Valentine's Day party tomorrow:

What has happened to me?! Not even an embellishment! UGH.

(In my defense, it IS 1 in the morning.)

Rock Out

We rock out a lot in our house.

Tonight: Beyonce.

Oh-oh-oh.

Note Taking

Once in my life, I took notes like this:


And now, this is what note-taking has become in our household:

I think the bold boxes mean "this is important." So do the arrows. I think.

BlahBlahBlahBlahBlah

I recently got an offer for a free subscription to Strategy + Business Magazine. "Sure, why not?" I thought.

So I opened it. Here's what I found for the next 51 (I kid you not) pages:


Finally, on the page 52-53 spread, something I can relate to - a graphic image!!


But then, I turned the page.


Not to knock the magazine, but really, I don't think I'm in their core demographic. I need pictures. Celebrity pictures, even.

Our Celebrity Lookalikes

Several years ago, one of D's old college roommates introduced us to this site that tells you what celebrity you look like based on a picture you upload.

Here's D's celeb profile:

So I guess they pull up anybody with glasses and say they're a match.

Here's C's:

Yao Ming! YES! Maybe C has the potential to be tall.

And mine:

This is interesting, because I did another picture and was told that I look like Garcelle Beauvais-Nilon.

Regardless, mindless fun for a mindless Thursday morning.