Her little secret

My mom is a closet smoker. She has done it for basically my entire life: I can remember her smoking as a child, and then her and my godmother went through this big awakening and "quit". I was a little little girl when this happened, but I remember it clearly because I stole a piece of her nicorette gum and chewed it. Needless to say, that was not a fun taste or experience, forever burning it onto my mind.

Last weekend I went down to U of Idaho to watch the football game with my Dad. My dad is always very open with my brother and I, and I appreciate his ability to not only see us as his children, but as his best friends as well.
My dad is a smoker too, however, he does not try to hide it. The subject came up that I really want my dad to stop slowly killing himself with this awful habit. My dad is having surgery this month on his neck (he has some disks that are crushed and ruining his nerves) and he promised that the surgery will be the time he needs to stop. He also has a back up promise- if he cannot do it on his own he will get help. He knows it is important to me and his family to take care of his body, which made me happy to hear.

Now, back to my mom. My brother and I have always known she was smoking on the sly- she would go outside to "let the dogs out" and come back smelling stinky and smoky. Or we would come out to the garage and she would be frazzled and weird.
Neither my brother nor I have ever actually approached her about it because it is an awkward situation for us both. Well, I learned from my dad that my mom smokes a pack a day. A PACK!! I was figuring like 2 or 3 cigs a day to take the edge off... she's a nurse for crying in the night!

So now I'm worried. I'm worried she will develop lung cancer and my beautiful, kind, warm, loving momma will get sick. I'm so scared and worried about losing her early. I'm also angry at her for being so selfish and secretive. My dad said that she even hides it from her co-workers and best friends. It's a problem.

So, my dilemma is how to approach her. I don't even know how to talk to her about something like this, or how to bring it up. I was thinking of writing her a letter, that way she can see my feelings but not feel embarrassed or ashamed.

I don't want my mom to be ashamed. I don't want her to have a broken heart from my pain.


I just want her to quit.

You better comment, you dirty lurkers

**thanks, marriage 101, for this link!

It's over

Well, I've officially broken off my TV relationship with Desperate Housewives. I wasn't loving the gals last year towards the end of the season, and the first 5 minutes of the season premiere last night did me in. It's just getting outta control and totally unbelievable. It is almost sci-fi drama or something.
So now I'm looking for a new 8:00 Sunday night show... or maybe I should dedicate that time to reading books. I love to read, and I read a ton in the summer, but once school starts and I am back teaching classes and taking my master's classes, I just don't have the desire. Now that I've got an open time slot, why not fill it with something somewhat engaging for my mind? Plus, our town library just moved into a brand new, beautiful building, and it might be a great idea to trot down there and check it out... please give me some suggestions of books you love to inspire my desire!

I want a new layout

HELP smarty pants bloggers! I want to change my layout, but every time I try to put in a layout I find on the web, it wipes out my pictures, blog links, etc. I don't know how to edit it to keep those elements. I'm pretty computer savvy, but this is driving me nuts!

Commit2Fit

So I don't know if I'm losing any weight on my new diet, but I sure feel good! I weighed myself this morning and I weigh exactly the same as I remember weighing last year around Christmas time. Either I was really fat then or I'm exagerating this whole weight loss thing.
I've been walking for at least 45 minutes (not strolling either, like sweating it up speed walk/run) everyday and eating very healthy. It helps so much that KK is on the wagon with me, in fact, as we speak he is downstairs on the elliptical trainer.

I love listening to the iPod while I walk. Love it. Like I look forward to it during the day. I speed up and jog when a really good jam song comes on- like Rascal Flatts , Keith Urban or any bootie shakin song. I even turn it up loud, like I"m a kid again. I accidentally turned it up too loud the other day, and my ears rang all night afterwards! Ooops!
I downloaded LimeWire onto our computer this weekend, and I picked out some new grooves to add to "kelli's music" playlist. I'm waiting right now for KK to finish his workout and give me the iPOD so I can go for my walk and jam to my new tunes! (Don't worry- he doesn't listen to my bootie shakin mix- he has his own called "kk's music", which includes Queen, Van Halen, and other hair bands- yuck)

So fellow blogger buddies- give me the names of your favorite workout songs so I can add them to my list! You will feel good knowing you played a part in my weight loss success, I promise.

Season Premiere Week!

It is pathetic that the most exciting part of my upcoming week is that all the TV shows I watch are premiering. I mean, I'm in a serious dilemma about how to handle having The Office and Grey's Anatomy on the same night, at the same time. We used to have a Tivo but canceled it because of under use, and I'm now regretting that decision.
My carefully-thought-out solution is to watch Grey's on Thursday night, and watch The Office the following day on the Internet. It is the only logical solution that I can see- other than going to Goodwill and buying a VCR to record it the old fashioned way on the TV in the basement.
Wow. I never imagined my critical thinking skills could come in so handy.

In fact, what am I doing still on the Internet? I'm going to look through the TV guide that came in Sunday's paper AHORA MISMO and write down my shows and days/times they premiere. I'm packing it in tight this year, because I'm going to try out some of the shows ABC is launching. I'll let you know how my week goes! I'M SO EXCITED!

Whew! that was fun

So I had a fabulous weekend. Fabulous. It was the most fun I've had in a long time. I went down to Moscow, ID for a 10 year anniversary ofmy sorority (Kappa Delta) colonizing on the U of Idaho campus. I saw a good chunk of girls there that I hadn't seen since college, considering I only keep in touch with about two of them on a regular basis. It was really good to see all of them and to see that we have all evolved from girls who partied a lot and wore sweatpants on a regular basis, to contributing members of the working world and society. It was even good to see the weird ones, and to see that yes, they are still weird, even in the adult world.

The part that sucked about the weekend was seeing that I, along with only TWO OTHER GIRLS, am the chunky ones. That's not a good thing. Everyone else has lost the beer bulge and/or junk food habit and become this cute, fit, 20-something woman. GRRRRRR

I try to rationalize it and say that I have been married longer than most of them, (some aren't marred), so they haven't had time to gain the happy newlywed bulge. I also was happy that I haven't gained any weight, which the other two have, since college.

Of course everyone took a billion pictures, so I have proof staring at me in the face every day.

Notice the fat roll. It's like a pony keg. So it's a good think I'm doing Commit2fit, cause I really need to loose weight to compete with my pretty sorority sisters! I forget (being a teacher) that I'm only 25- and that 25 year olds are still supposed to be cute and in style. Great. I'm so bad at that.