The Easy Lunchbox System-one word. Yum.

So, now that Energizer has outed me, I can move on to the good stuff.

One of the things having an insulin pump that looks like this

does is makes you really consious of how many carbs you’re putting into your body. What you have to do is carb count and then adjust the pump accordingly. Sounds like a pain, right? Not more than taking a ton of shots a day!

I try and eat as low carb as I possibly can, and it’s hard! Especially when you’re working at a school where there’s no time to really breathe. Like my old schedule. You want to grab anything that comes your way, and it’s not healthy!
When the kids come around with cupcakes and cookies for birthdays, you willingly grab, because when you really haven’t eaten, you are sooooooooo inclined to grab bad stuff.

So, I decided something HAD to be done. Hardcore.

I did some exploring and found that the bento box system I always wanted to try was one of the best things out there for low carb eating. Portion controlled, contained, and CUTE!

I’m all for cute.

That’s when I found Easy Lunchboxes and saw their awesome stuff.

These systems meet my Bento box style criteria, plus add easy to clean and easy to keep cool! No small feat in the sauna that Upstate NY becomes in the summer!

So, I began my quest to try them and see what they were really about.

The system starts with a cooler bag

What you can’t see from this picture is the grommit on the side for identification tags! It’s so easy to make the lunch bag your own by attaching identification to that little built in hole! No more broken zippers from using your ID as a pull!

and then adds reusable, dishwasher and microwave safe compartmentalized, lidded containers!

which hold a ton of stuff. The day I took this photo, my lunch consisted of:
Salad
garlic dill cheese curds (oh, my. SOOOOO yummy!)
Grilled chicken for my salad
mandarin oranges
and Mandarin orange sparking water
as well as my salad dressing and an ice pack to keep it all cool.

see?

and yes, this all fit in that awesome cooler bag!

Wow. I was impressed that it all fit! I had my doubts…but oh, was it joyful that it all fit!

wanna see the inside of the containers?

Ok!

So, can I now tell y’all how in love with this I am?

Here’s the coolest part of this entire thing-
Kelly over at Easy Lunch Boxes has agreed to give one of my gawkers a full on Easy Lunch Box System!
You get:
A cooler bag in your choice of color-as you can see, I’ve got the red…
and a 4 container set to go inside of the cooler bag.

So, here’s the rules…
To enter to win this great set, you must (and this is mandatory)….
Go and visit easylunchboxes.com and leave what color you’d pick for your cooler bag.

Optional stuff for extra entries
* follow me (kileigh7) on twitter and then tweet about the giveaway
* leave a comment with the best bento box lunch you’ve seen out there. It doesn’t have to be for just kids!
*leave a comment describing how you’d customize a tag to attach to your cooler bag so no one steals your awesomely cool lunch!

*follow easy lunch boxes on twitter! She’s got some cool things there too!

And now, for the nitty gritty details

• The giveaway is limited to the United States and Canada only. Sorry, international friends!
• The giveaway ends on July 9th at 9 PM Eastern.
• The optional stuff is just that-optional.

disclosure: I received the easy lunch box system for my personal use and review as well as one to give away. There was no compensation received. The opinions on this blog are expressly mine and mine alone.

The end of Kindergarten and the closing of the lab

This past week and a half has been quite the time. We’ve gone through a ton of changes here at Chez E. Nowhere.
Let’s do some detailing, shall we?

First, Doug got a new job (!) at a local drug and alcohol rehab center. He’s ecstatic. This means, as he puts it, No more G-tubes and crushing everything that’s possible to crush.

Okie dokie. Sounds like fun to me…

Isaac survived Kindergarten. So did I.
And had an awesome moving up ceremony.

and we had cake to celebrate,courtesy of my friend at Caitlin’s Creations (this is her facebook page-if you’re in the area, give her a shout! She does AMAZING work!)

Now, I can’t believe we’re moving on to FIRST GRADE! Holy cow!

the good news in all of this is that we’ve got one of the two teachers we wanted. The bad news is that he’s not with two of the people I requested he stay with. But then again, that’s the way it rolls when you break one class of kids between three teachers.

The other good news in all of this hot mess is that there are (not kidding) 17 kids in Isaac’s first grade class. Yes, you read that right. 17.

I am thrilled.

AND all of his therapists stay the same.

Awesome.

Then, I had to suffer through class night for the outgoing 8th graders at my school. And when I say suffer, I mean suffer.

This is the most drawn out horrific night on the face of the planet. There’s dinner, yes, but oh, my lord. The presentations…

First, ONE BY ONE,the kids are called up to get their yearbooks.
THEN, ONE BY ONE,the kids are called up to get their memory books and caps and gowns.
THEN, ONE BY ONE, they’re called up to get their gifts. (and this is after speeches by the 8th grade homeroom teacher, the principal and the parish priest.)
AND THEN, there’s the class poem where they go through each of the kids ONE BY ONE

and finally, there’s the class video.

and that didn’t start until after a 10 minute diatribe by the 8th grade homeroom teacher.

I went home at that point. I had just been through Kindy Graduation. I wasn’t in any mood to be there.

Sitting through class night is an ordeal. It could be streamlined in so many ways. Seriously. BUT, it’s not mine to run…so I keep my mouth shut.

Then, I spent the last few days of school (not on my scheduled days) cleaning out the lab for the last time.

I was notified about a month ago (late in terms of everything) that my job was being eliminated. The principal got funding, and changed the position that I had was turned into not only the computer position, but RTE (I can do that with my eyes shut-it’s basically Special Ed stuff for Reggies), Professional development for the staff as well as marketing of the school.

Is it me, or does that seem to be 2 full time jobs rolled into one? Yeah. It is in my opinion.

I didn’t take the opportunity to reapply.

Why?

For years, I walked into war zones thinking that it wasn’t as bad as it seemed. It was always as bad or worse. When I took this job two years ago, I promised myself that I would only take it and stay if it wasn’t a war zone. I had to protect myself and my family from another school year of being stressed, sick and treated like trash because of things out of my control. I had a bad feeling about this job, and I had to listen to my gut. It’s all about self preservation.

So, as I closed the lab for the last time, signed things that I had to sign and finished off the stupid technology report cards (that the 7th grade teacher THREW OUT-yeah. Not redoing those) I had mixed emotions. I was happy and ticked for all of the work I put in. I was happy and sad to be leaving and not coming back. I was totally sad for the kids. I’m going to miss my wackjob kids and their bad answers.

But what’s done is done.

and when one door closes, there’s either a window or another door open. Don’t know where that is yet…and I’m not stressing as hard as I could be, because I want to enjoy a hard earned break, and I’ve got things to do with Isaac all summer-swim lessons, park camp, ice skating lessons…LOTS to do!!

So, this is the end in a lot of ways, but we’re all ok with this. And we’re ready for the summer to start!

Energizer -what? Is the bunny on summer vacation or something?!

So, this wasn’t the intended post for my first day of summer break. Really, it wasn’t.

But after last night, well, the tale just had to be told.

For a few months now, I’ve been crafting a whole post about things that have been going on here that I’ve kept off the blog, and I’ve got a giveaway to go with it…and it’s coming, I swear…

But, this totally pre-empted anything cute and nice and tactful.

Here goes why I hate Energizer Batteries right now.

Last night, I was sitting at the computer clicking away on some work stuff (reviews, cool stuff, ect..) when my insulin pump (yep-I wear one…more on that later..) started buzzing and chirping.

I pulled it out, peeked at the screen, and it said “Low battery.” Ok, fine. I zipped downstairs and got one of the spare batteries and tossed it in the pump.

The pump went through its start up routine, and then there it was “Battery test failed.”

What?

This is a freakin’ new battery! What gives!?

So, then, I pull out a SECOND battery-SAME STORY.

Then a third. SAME STORY.

Now, pleased realize that any sane human being would at this point abandon the entire pack and move on to a different pack of batteries even if it wasn’t the energizer brand.

I can’t do that.

you see, I’d void the warranty on my pump if I use anything but energizer batteries.

Yeah, I’m not kidding.

So, I sat there debating for about 2 seconds on what to do.

I woke up Doug-demanded a AAA battery out of his stash and swore that I would hold him harmless for anything that went wrong, because I was just that desperate.

We placed a battery in the pump and whammo-it started working!

I then went to bed for a good nights’ sleep.

This morning, I woke up, still fuming about the Energizer debacle. So, I did what any well connected blogger would do.

Fire up Twitter.

So, I went and posted this message:

@energizer Hey guys-thanks for the entire pack of dead aaa batteries! My insulin pump loves flashing the “failed battery test” icon..

and sat back and waited.

about an hour and a half later I get the following :

@kileigh7 Hi Laura – sorry to hear that! We’d like to help out. Please send us a direct message.

Okie dokie. I can do that-so I send them a message and they respond back not even 5 minutes later with an offer for a FREE PACK OF BATTERIES!!

Woohooooooo!!!

Behold! The power of Twitter!

So, now, my pump and I are happily chugging along in anticipation of the new batteries that are flying my way.

Thanks Energizer! Now, the bunny can go to the beach in peace.

I know, I know! It’s quiet here!

It’s the end of the school year. I’m procrastinating getting grades and tech cards (computer report cards) done.

There are some cool things up around here, and you’ll just need to hang on until next week for the first of those cool things…Trust me.

So, sorry about the silence…

It’s just the sound of me procrastinating and having to rush to get it all done!

I’ll be back on Friday…

Cautiously optimistic

As the end of the hockey season here in E. Nowhere wound down, we didn’t know if we’d have a team next year. Our affiliate was moving out of state, and it was all sorts of “hrm.” The area had a deal go bad with one team-they used us as a bargaining tool to get a better deal in THEIR arena (which wasn’t cool..) and then rumors swirled about teams that were looking to move their affiliates.

I didn’t know what to think. How was I going to tell Isaac that the sport I had spent years explaining to him was the “proper sport” and now he’s PLAYING because of the dang team here….wasn’t going to be here anymore.

Great. yeah. thanks. Let’s just chalk another one up there in parenting hell.

Then, late in the week came the announcement that the area had been expecting…we’re officially getting a new team. You’d think we’d all be dancing in the aisles. Hockey back here, no wondering what to do as we suffer the horrid thing known as winter here on the East coast.

Nope.

Why?

Here’s the rub-It’s the team that the area severed ties with years ago, due to poor promos, poor attendance and poor loading of the team. We supported this team for an eon, but soon, this team didn’t support us. No promos, no decent players, no community outreach. These are the cornerstones of a good minor league franchise. Yeah..thee was none of that.

The parent organization claims that since they own the team now, things will be different. I don’t know. We’ve been spoiled over the past few years, and especially this past season with nice players, GOOD talent and a great office staff. This team has BIG shoes to fill.

But on the flip side, they got long needed improvements to the arena done, so it can’t be all bad, can it?

So, I’m optimistic with reservations. The team knows what they did to the area before, and has the means and the knowledge NOT to repeat it.

I’ll be there, as I am every hockey season, Opening night…in my favorite seats, taking photos, with Isaac in tow.

Maybe someone will do something disgustingly memorable-like trip over the red carpet and then try to play it off. Yes, that did actually happen. The guy NEVER lived it down for the rest of the time he was here.

So, I’m cautiously optimistic. We’ve got 5 seasons with this team. Hopefully, they’ll prove themselves to be worthy of coming back into the fold of E. Nowhere.

Just one word of advice to this team-

Do it right.

Muppets on Sunday

Ok, so usually it’s Muppets on Friday. I couldn’t wait. It’s Muppets on Sunday!

So, here’s another Sam the Eagle classic. Who doesn’t love the overly patriotic eagle freaking out?

One more thing to make me miss the left coast.

No secret here, I’m a Disney Geek..and NOT Florida. Anaheim. Yep. Anaheim.

No secret as well-I’m a former Cast Member, as is Doug.

One little known fact-I used to get paid to do crowd control for the Disneyland fireworks (Question-Anyone want to extend into Fireworks? Answer-MEEEE!!!) and I can sing the music to the “Believe” show.

So, it’s no shock that when I heard the new lagoon show at DCA was coming, that I was looking for previews and things online forever. WELL, Disney got smart and Live streamed the entire thing the other night and posted the video to Youtube! WOOHOO!!

So, this morning, Isaac and I watched the entire 27 minute show…and sang along and laughed and got chills.

Now, I miss my left coast even more.

So, for your enjoyment-here’s the video. The World of Color.
Wonder if you can guess my favorite part?

Miss Ruthie, the annex and Sabrina-or how we got a cat that is just too perfect.

There are times in life that you swear that the world is against you, and then there are the times in your life that you swear people were put in your path to let you know the world doesn’t suck as much as you think it does.

Earlier, I blogged about the local rescue debacle, and how that lead us over across the street to the cat shelter annex on two seperate occasions.

Let’s roll back to the night of the evil debacle.
to review:
I wanted to go home. I was upset, cranky and didn’t want to deal with anything. I wanted to go home, and go to bed. Doug didn’t want to hear any of it. The Cat Annex was not on my list of things that I wanted to do right at that moment. Doug tempted me with LOGIC! You know, the “Well, we’re right across the street. We might as well go over there. And since I’m driving…”

Damn logical thought.

I can’t argue with logic, no matter how hard I try. Stupid logic.

So, begrudgingly I went with them. I was in ABSOLUTELY no mood for this. Not in the slightest. I did it because of logic. (see statements above about logic. I still stand by them.)

The three of us wandered in, me debating the brilliance of this move and getting ready to get back on craigslist and find a kitten/cat there. We were greeted by Deb, who was cleaning out an empty crate, getting it ready for a new arrival from the shelter. She asked us if we were just looking around or interested in a specific animal.

Doug already was over at Sabrina (then Dorothy)’s crate, eyeballing the nutjob of a cat. Isaac was peeking at EVERY SINGLE CAT in the entire annex, and me, well, I was trying to stay calm. Again, I was only there because of logic. I was also explaining our situation to Deb…when we met Miss Ruthie. Since Deb had to get finished, she passed us off to Miss Ruthie. Miss Ruthie is a wonderful lady who has done tons and tons of adoptions and knows when a match is right. She’s what I love to call the “cat whisperer.”

She instantly made us feel like we were part of her family, and even brought out Sabrina for us to really get to know. She had us hold her, play with her and even let Isaac mess with her. She also took Isaac by the hand and brought him in the back to meet some kittens.

Doug and I had some quality time with Sabrina and were falling more and more in love with the nut by the second, but Miss Ruthie knew I still had my heart set on a kitten…but she knew better. She saw Isaac interacting with a kitten, and knew that he was just too rough with one, but instead of being nasty and horrible to us (like the last place…) she said the following:

“you know, I wouldn’t reccomend you get a kitten. Isaac is just too excited around them and only wants to play. I know you’d never leave him alone with a kitten, but I know that you’d be heartbroken if during a play session, something happened to the kitten. I know it wouldn’t be on purpose, but he doesn’t even know his own strength. He’d be beyond upset, you’d be beyond upset,and it wouldn’t be good for all involved. So, let’s just keep looking at bigger cats. Not totally old cats, just ones that are a bit bigger who can keep up with a high energy boy.”

Ok. I can get behind that.

So, as we put Sabrina back, Isaac was bouncing around the room and we continued to talk to Miss Ruthie. As we tried to contain our ADHD-tired after a full day and OT boy, Miss Ruthie kept remarking on how good a match we were for this cat, and how she was shocked that someone didn’t snag her sooner.

Doug and I chatted and figured that this nutty little cat would fit in well, as all of her paperwork said that she got along well with other animals as well as kids. So, we told Miss Ruthie that we would love to have her as part of our nutty little family.

Then, Miss Ruthie did something that rocked our world.

She looked at Deb and asked her how much the adoption fee was. Deb replied that it was 75.00. Miss Ruthie then reached into her pocket and pulled out 25.00, and said she was going to sponsor our adoption, because we were the perfect home for this cat!

I cried.

It was one of those moments where the world sucked so badly and then, here was this one person making sure that I knew that it didn’t suck as badly as I thought it would.

Miss Ruthie demanded that we exchange information and addresses, and I had no problem with that. Come on! The woman just handed us a cat! She asked us to keep in touch with her and let her know how Sabrina was doing and to send photos. We knew we could do that easy! Totally easy!

We brought Sabrina home the following Tuesday, because we had to get the house ready and do a few things.

When she came in, Sabrina stomped the house. She just made herself at home, and acts like we’ve had her all of her life. She torments the frogs, bothers Booger and plays with Isaac. I totally couldn’t believe it. We found the perfect cat.

And it was all because of a bad night, the cat annex, and most importantly, Miss Ruthie.