UGGGHHH The Stomach BUG

So I was just bragging to my girlfriend the other day that Ella Ray has never really been sick...i mean we had the "mouth,feet,hand" virus but that's all and she was 20 month...nanny nanny boo boo....well God really handed it to me in spades this weekend. First off Friday morning I woke up in a puddle of sweat in my bed...that's right every southerners nightmare had come true...the air conditioning has gone out in the middle of summer!!!!!! So with that, I took at steam bath in my shower only to get out and start sweating all over again. Looked at the thermostat and it read 91 degrees....what????? So thankfully I realized we had the 2-10 Home Warranty that covers all this kind of catastrophe and smiled thinking "by 4:00 Oprah show I'll be cooled down on my comfy couch".....NO SUCH LUCK...I mean you pay $400.00 + dollars for a warranty and they can't get someone out here till MONDAY? Are you kidding me? that's 3 days of scorching heat!!! So Buck gets home around 6:00 and everyone knows he is thermally challenged anyways, I mean the man sweats in 60 degree weather. Well he walks in the door and you would have thought he was Frosty the Snowman melting rapidly!!! So our whole weekend of cooking out on the grill, relaxing at home all went to hell in a hand basket. Buck decides lets just go grab some dinner when I realize Ella Ray isn't looking so hot....she has been warm all day and I threw it up to the NO AIR CONDITIONING in our house....I pass it off and we go to Chili's for dinner....Ella Ray doesn't eat....SIGN # 1 she is sick...I mean my kid EATS....so I think maybe she just is so hot from the NO AIR CONDITIONING that it has zapped her appetite.....NO SUCH LUCK...that night we slept downstairs where it was cooler and she tossed and turned all night and got warmer and warmer. Around 5:00 a.m. she woke up and I yelled at Buck (who conveniently got to sleep all alone on the comfy couch) to come and get her and go get her some milk.....he only got to the top of the stairs before I heard "OH MY GOD SHE JUST PUKED ALL OVER ME"....well I have to admit at first I did laugh to myself saying "haha God got you back for making me sleep with her last night"...I get upstairs and my poor little baby is like a rag doll shaking and so scared. Immediately of course Buck wanted to call 911, the National Guard and the Pope himself as this was a true Emergency to him. I convinced him let's just call the doctor and find out what's wrong...knowing it was probably my cooking that made her sick since I'm such a horrible chef! Anyways, to make a long story short, she had a virus, that lasted ALL WEEKEND!!!! I never knew how many cool contraptions you can buy on infomercials during the hours of 1 a.m. - 4 a.m. I really have to get that total gym that will work me to looking like Cindy Crawford, along with the power juicer to boost my metabolism and if all else fails I'll buy the whoody hoo boob pusher upper band that makes my boobs look fantastic! What a weekend!!!

She's 20 months going on 13....

So Ella Ray has decided to "mock" everything I do lately and that includes some great, funny things as well as things I'm not so proud of. The fact that when she gets mad at me and points her finger and says "bad girl" is not a highlight of my mothering skills but as you will see in the 2 videos, she has inherited my dancing abilities and make-up applying skills...two things that are essential in becoming a DIVA one day like her mom!!!

More Florida time with the Baldwin Family

We spent 10 days with Buck's family down at his parents home in Bonita Springs/Naples Florida where Ella Ray got to see her Aunt Mimi, Uncle Dan and cousin Mason for the first time. They live in New Jersey and with everyone so spread out we haven't had a chance to get everyone together until now. They were SO PRECIOUS together. Just thought I would share some updated pictures of Ella Ray since it's been a while since I posted some.

Beach Bums...

I just got home from spending the last week at the beach with my family, (Gran Kacky, Poppa, Uncle Selby and Aunt Kinsey) as Ella Ray would call them. This trip has been a tradition in my Duncan family for 20 years and it's always so much fun to see all our beach sites every year. Ella Ray loved the ocean this year and I will say it was MUCH easier this year with her. Last year she was 8 months old and it was a CHORE to get her and all her "baby gear" down to the ocean every day, only to have her cry or have a poopy diaper 5 min after we got down to the beach. Now our condo is on the ocean but the beach is like a football field long and trekking through the sand with a baby, her bouncy seat, food, bottles, cooler and all other swim gear SUCKED last year, however, this year it was MUCH MUCH better. Ella Ray can walk and carry her own towel and she no longer requires so much "gear" to function at the beach. It might have taken us 30 min to walk to the ocean but we eventually got there. The beach was full of jelly fish this year so we didn't get much ocean time except for the last 2 days, in which Ella Ray didn't get out of the water more then 5 min. She was a regular mermaid!!! She successfully learned to go underwater and blow bubbles and swim with no floatation devices. Something I have been actively teaching her since May and for a 20 month old that is VERY AWESOME!!! The big news was that Ella Ray got her first boyfriend, an older man, Will, who celebrated his 3rd birthday while we were down there. Her and Will played together everyday in the baby pool and we hated to leave him. All in all it was a fun and eventful trip, as always with the Duncan clan we had drama, my dad got stung by a stingray, my brother stung by a jellyfish, and I got sun blisters all over my chest...but it wouldn't be a vacation without a little drama! The big news was that our family has grown and we adopted 2 new hermit crabs named Ramona and Beazus. As you will see in the picture Ella Ray was very happy to adopt them, now daddy not so much, just more animals to feed and clean haha....oh well Ella Ray loves them that's what counts right? Now it's back to regular life in Franklin. Still trying to sell the house, no offers yet but we are still hopeful!!! Something about the beach is so relaxing and calming you hate to come back to normal life and leave that serenity......

One Cool Chick.....

So as most of you know I do acting/singing as a "hobby" that I wish would pay the bills, but as of right now it's more of an extra thing.....Anyways, Monday night I shot the new Gretchen Wilson video and promo for "Save Your Grace" on CMT. It was her "Work Hard, Play Harder" video. First off it was in the middle of NOWHERE TN in a big field with a barn the age of the state of Tenn. However what I thought initially would be a "cattle call" kind of shoot (i.e. where there are tons of people and you might be seen in the video and you might not) I was surprisingly wrong. There were only about 20 of us and we had very ample camera time. It was a lot of fun from 6:00pm-1:30am and I will have to say out of all the "celebrities" I have meet through doing my acting, Gretchen Wilson is by far one of the coolest, down to earth, REAL, chicks I have met. She was friendly, responsive to us and rocked out during the video. Her band and crew were super cool and I really felt like I was having fun while working. The highlight had to be when we were about to wrap she passed a bottle of Jack Daniels around and everyone took a shot!! MY KIND OF WOMAN haha....anyways, most of my jobs are just that jobs, but this was actually a lot of fun and I'm so glad there are still celebs out there who don't forget where they come from and and damn proud of it!

My new leaf....

So I have come to the conclusion that it's time for a new chapter in the "Kristin Saga of Life" Biography. I didn't have a awakening revelation or moment of pure epiphany but it's been an ongoing 3 month revelation that my life just isn't where I wanted it to be at 29 years old. Most of my determination has been from reading a fabulous book called "Eat, Pray, Love", which I highly recommend to anyone wanting a little self finding. I only wish I had the money to take off for a year and self discover over 3 different countries and come home with a sense of self peace and happiness only known by Mother Theresa or Gandhi or something but realistically I'm stuck in Franklin, TN right now and the closest I'll get to visiting other countries is heading to the sushi place for dinner, the nail salon where all the ladies speak some form of Asian language and I swear they are all talking about how funky my feet are, or walmart where I could get my fill of Spanish/Mexican influence. The whole idea of where you are in life is mind boggling to me, and without getting way to deep for my own good, and I can only speak as a woman, since that's what I am, that every woman needs time to reflect on where she is in life and where she is going. I think today it's so hard to balance having a functional family life with the big house, white pickett fence, 2-3 children and maybe a dog or cat and also having a career to which you feel self sufficient and satisfied as an individual. Don't get me wrong there are millions of woman working/mothering all at the same time and I truly take my hat off for you, I honestly don't know where you get the energy!!! However I chose the stay at home route and for the purpose of shorting things (stay at home mothers) will now be referred to SAM's in my blogs as an abbreviation....so that is the path I chose and there are many days where I wonder why? I know there are mothers who would love to be in my position if possible but trust me I think everyone should spend a day in someone else's shoes and then really reflect on whether they made the right "life" decision...better yet, spend a month, you could get my daughter on a good day and you REALLY need to experience the 12 hour whine/cry/through tantrum days to get a overall SAM experience! With that said, I think I have decided to find a job outside the home. I love my daughter, she is the most perfect thing in the world, however I am beginning to think I would be a better mom if I was a working mother and had the adult interaction, the freedom of completing and reward of bringing home a paycheck. Now I know there is going to be tons of Sam's in the world that think I'm crazy and that the reward of staying at home with your children is priceless but I miss all the things I gave up when I chose to be a SAM. Ok anyways, it's a damn good thing I'm a fast typer because in the time I have written this entry, Ella Ray has been asleep and I just realized I haven't peed today, eaten anything but left over poptart, haven't thought about thawing anything out for dinner, the dog hasn't been out all day, Dorothy my fish hasn't been fed in God knows how long and I just realized my mortgage was due on the first....crap and she has just decided to wake up......oh the joys of being a SAM

A New blog format

So I usually use this blog site as a means to share with the cyber world my activies as a stay at home mother with my daughter Ella Ray.....as you see there isn't much diversity in staying at home, it's usually the same routine of activites mixed up week to week. So with that said I have decided to take my friend, Cathiee's approach and use my blog as a therapy session to the outside reader. Maybe some of my blogs will make you laugh, some bore you death, and maybe some will just make you feel like your life is FABULOUS or CRAPPY compared to mine haha!!! Either way, my blog won't be here to offend anyone I'm just going to start telling it like it is, at least like it is in my mind :-)

Ready for an offer

So our house has now been on the market for a month....please see www.3112millbanklane.com to see our website, however having a 19 month old a 65 lb dog and an active lifestyle is NOT the greatest combo to keep a house "show ready". I honestly have never had such a clean house in all my life, even when we had a housekeeper she didn't keep it this clean. Anyways, Buck of course loves it, but I am ready to check out and stay in a hotel just so my daughter can play with her toys without me freaking out if she makes too much of a mess!!! Anyways, selling a house sucks and I just had to vent. Hope all is well and everyone is enjoying their summer time. We have found ourselves either in the pool or in the lake...either way the water is where it's at!!!