JustJenny

My cousin is here visitng from West Hollywood. She had a few days off and wanted to get away from the oh so wonderful but hectic LA lifestyle. We are headed to San Fransisco while the kids are at school so, today's post is short and sweet!!! Here is my weekend in photos. I made this with my new PhotoFancie app. It was a great weekend. Lunch in Sac with friends on Friday, a walk to our lakeside comunity pool for a swim (you can see Greg a million steps ahead of me), garage sale-ing, lunch with my mom & cousin and last night a walk along the water. Off to SF. Have a wonderful Monday!

I’m not sure if I would really call this the highlight of my weekend but it was definitely cool and unexpected. I drove to Patterson to pick up my son who was spending the night at his best friend’s house. His friend used to live down the street and we all got to spend lots of time with him. His mom remarried and now they live about 45 minutes away. The boys miss each other more than 14-year-old boys would like to admit, so I made a commitment to drive to Patterson once a month so they could hand out. When I went to pick up my son, his Mom took me to her friend’s house. I did not know until we got there that I would be working. The friend is from Africa and once a year she goes to the flea market about 30 minutes away from where they live to purchase one year’s worth of cassava leaves. Apparently, it is a staple in many African dishes. This is only one of the four boxes. And we already took some out before I took this picture. We picked the leaves off and I had to pull ...

It feels like social media has always been a part of my life. I may not manage it well, but I am connected EVERYDAY to EVERYTHING and EVERYONE. Like many others, I was very reluctant at first to join the social media craze. At 29, I felt like I was too old to join MySpace, is it still around? Does anyone even remember MySpace?   Anyways, back to how my social media addiction began. I have a few younger cousins, who were in college at the time that pushed me into joining. I reluctantly complied; it was the only way I could keep in touch with them. I had no choice but to accept that the days of calling your loved ones on the phone or sending thoughtful letters were long gone. I really didn’t want to lose contact with my little cousins who are like sisters to me. After about a year of contemplation, I reluctantly joined. At first, I did not really like it.   It felt weird and kind of silly but I did like being able to find music and I loved all the cute page layouts. ...

I have been home for three full days now and the kitchen is a mess, I still need to vacuum and the cat needs a bath.                                        I really have no excuse because every other Monday I get to stay home due to my 9-8-80 schedule, which I love! I will admit it is rough working 9-hour days especially with a one hour commute each way but the extra days off really help me keep up on the everyday things that a working mom STILL has to do.   Okay, so maybe I am  a little behind but that extra day still has  only 24 hours, so I cannot work any miracles. I would hate to see what my bedroom would look like if I did not have that extra time at all. Yikes!   I really need to keep cleaning but my oldest son Greg says, “Hey Mom, you want to watch a ...

My four year old niece has wanted to go camping for several months now. On a recent visit to her home she said to me, “Aunt Jenny, have you ever been camping? I want to go camping but I don’t think my Dad will take me.” She is probably right since my brother hates camping!!! If I thought this would be like the time she said, “Aunt Jenny, I don’t think I am going to get a Christmas tree. My parents hate trees. They are messy,” I would not have offered to take her camping. She did get the Christmas tree of course, in case you were wondering. I am not sure what I was thinking. I really didn’t have the time to plan a camping trip. I have not yet reached my one year anniversary at my new job and all the vacation time I have accumulated thus far have been used on doctors’ visits, errands, naps and small day/weekend trips with my sons. I also had to take into consideration the fact that my niece can be quite the “scaredy cat” at times, like my sister ‘stick-in-the-mud”. It is very possible...

My days can be very long sometimes. Often by the end of the day my mind is a gooey mess, like melting jello. Green melting jello. At least that's how I envision it. This leads to a lot of misspoken words. The other night I was driving my kids home from a youth event. The car behind me had very bright lights. I think they were those new halogen lights or something. I looked in my rear view mirror and felt like I was staring into the sun. Which lead to this conversation; Me: Those brights are light!!! My son: What? Me(with confidence): Those brights are light, I can't see!!! My son: Did you REALLY get a full scholarship to college? Sometimes I kinda find that hard to believe.   Sometimes that's hard for me to believe too. At one point in my life I was extremely smart, or so I was told. Now, I find that my vocabulary is lacking, my memory is failing and I feel like my brain is on Dial-up. So please forgive me if you pass ...