HOUSE SITTING DISASTER

Guest post from: Natalie Walter

My friend asked me to housesit for her a few weeks ago and I thought it would be a piece of cake. She wanted me to go over to her place once a day and feed her bird and make sure everything was O.K. I happily agreed to help out while she was out of town for two weeks. Little did I know that I wouldn’t be able to figure out her ADT Security keypads. The alarm went off almost every time I went over there and it was driving me crazy. I couldn’t get in touch with her because she was traveling Africa, which made it even worse. One time the police even came over after the alarm went off. Her neighbors started to really hate me, and I was just dying for the two weeks to end. On top of the alarm problem, the bird hated me. Every time I would open the cage to fill up his water bottle and refill his food tray he would try and peck my hand. It was like the never-ending nightmare of house sitting. I am usually happy to help out a friend but after this experience I am really weary. I’m not sure that I’ll ever offer to house sit for a friend again.

STIFF NECK

My day is not turning out like I wanted to. Went to bed last night nursing a throbbing headache. Thought a good night's sleep and rest was going to help. It did help but I woke up with a different ache, this time it hurt like a son of a gun. With me as my husbands personal alarm clock, i have to wake up twice in the morning. One before 5 am and the second is before 6 for my daughter. I always go back to sleep after waking my husband and making sure he is up for work. An hour after going back to sleep I woke up feeling something wrong. The whole right side of my neck and arm hurt so bad. I could barely move from the pain. This was the worse stiff neck I have ever had. I was about to cry my eyes out from the intense pain on my neck and shoulders. Luckily, I have stocked up on pain patch and gels. It really helped. My neck still hurts specially when I move suddenly but its no longer was bad as it was this morning. What a way to start my day!!!

WONDERFUL WALGREENS

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Walgreens for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

Since October I have been hooked and addicted to something. No, its not drugs, liquor or smoking. I am most definitely hooked and addicted to couponing. The number one place in my heart and in my cousin's heart is Walgreens.

For many years I have discounted Walgreens as merely a drugstore/convenient store. I was wrong! I saw the errors of my way last year.. Walgreens has been our Pharmacy for more close to 5 years now. At first it was because it was just a walking distance from our house. Now, its because I found out that Walgreens has an amazing customer service and we are always left satisfied with our prescriptions. I just got to my attention about Walgreens and Express Script and how Walgreens is helping out the community by lowering rates for prescription. Our insurance is not part of the Express Script so my family and I are not realy affected by it. However, my MIL is retired and depends on social security. I have yet to ask if she has been affected. If her insurance is part of the Express Script it could cripple her and leave her helpless. People who depend on low cost prescription will suffer greatly and it will mean their health. Cost have gone up so much and if the prescription cost be it generic or name brands goes up, a lot of people will be affected. That means, people won't be able to afford their prescription and that means the decline of health.

I am so glad to know that Walgreens is behind the people and is trying its best to help lowering the cost. I love my Walgreens before but I am now fiercely loyal to them for what they are doing for the community. I will look into it, how that works and how we can benefit more from it. But mostly, I would want my MIL to get that. She has RA and has a lot of prescription medication handled by Walgreens. The Walgreens Prescription Savings Club will really help cut her cost but not the quality. Since we are in a world run by technology and social media its important that we follow something we actually want to hear from. Walgreens on Twitter and they can also be found on FB. I am proud to say that I a fan of Walgreens on Facebook a place were you can stay connected and find out amazing weekly deals, great customer service and low cost prescription. I am a follower And I will continue to do so. I am proud to say that I am Walgreens loyal customer!!!!

JOLIE LIKE LIPS

Do you see that? That was my lips the morning of December 21, 2011. I just woke feeling that something was wrong. It took me a couple of minutes to figure out that my lips got so swollen and I had difficulty talking. It took me a while to figure out what I did to get a fat lip. I didn't hit myself while I slept, I didn't really eat anything out of the ordinary. I must have eaten something, the question is what?

A few of days prior to my Jolie lips I noticed that I would have some allergic reaction to pistachio's. The first thing I noticed was my mouth, tongue and throat would get so itchy. I felt like the inside of my mouth was swelling. Seeing that I haven't had any allergic symptoms for a long long time ( I was allergic to almost anything when I was a child) I had thought I outgrew my allergy. After eating pistachio nuts I noticed that I would get bad stomach cramps and it really hurt. I refused to believe I could be allergic to something so good and something I like. I just observed this for two days. On the third day of my observation I finally came to the conclusion that I was having allergic reaction to the pistachio. I went to bed with such a bad stomach cramp. It was so bad that I had to let my husband know to check on me from time to time so see if I was still breathing. It got him so scared. I did take some antihistamine but it took a while for the medicine to work. I finally went to sleep but woke up in the morning with itchy back and neck. When I took of my shirt to look ,I saw two huge round patch of rashes on my back and on my chest and a few on my stomach. My first thought was Shingles. I have heard that many people where getting Shingles and I thought I got it. But thankfully after an hour it went down and disappeared. It happened again the next day and the next time it was my lip.

Without realizing it, I left the pistachio bag in the open and didn't realize that it was really affecting me. After my lip fiasco I took the pistachio and hid them somewhere. After that, I haven't had any swelling or allergic reaction. It was just strange since I am not allergic to peanuts and most of the food that I was allergic to in my childhood I can eat with no problems. At least now I am aware that pistachio is something I had to stay away from. But thanks to pistachio, I got to enjoy Angelina Jolie lips for a few hours, lol.

OUT WITH THE OLD, IN WITH THE NEW

At last a quite house..

My cousin and her two young kids just flew out few days ago. Whew what a long week it has been. I hated to see them go but I also wanted my house back to myself,lol. Don't get me wrong. I enjoyed the time we spent together and the many late night shopping trips we did but i just wanted peace and quite. I finally got my wish. I will be missing them but I know before the end of next month we will be seeing them again.

The house is a disaster! So much laundry to do and I still need to weed out the kids toys to make room for the new toys they got. Its going to be a long week for me. I was planning a slow week but it doesn't look like that. Hopefully after I take down my tree in a couple of days it will be easier to maneuver and clean the playroom since the tree was place right smack in the playroom. I am no looking forward to taking the tree down and everything. At least I still got time for my new hobby,hahaha.. I guess I have skirted way to long about my newest hobby and what has me so busy and distracted from blogging.

Well, I am now a certified couponer. I clip coupons, buy news paper solely for the coupons, and I print out so many coupons. I have amassed quite a few things. Some that I won't normally get and some we really use. My cousin and I are certified Walgreens number 1 fan. We love Walgreens!!!

NEW BEGINNINGS

Happy New Year to all of us!!!!!

New Year was at my relatives house in NJ. They belong to a big Filipino community and they usually have a big bash on New Years. We got invited and I didn't want to pass up the chance to see my grandfathers sister. Thanks to my cousin's husband who drove us to NJ. Ralph had to work but it was fine. We arrived just in the nick of time to attend the mass in their basement. Everyone was Filipino except for the friends of my cousin. It was amazing to have so many Pinoys in one place and people who speak the same dialect! The food was so scrumptious! I totally forgot too take a single photo. You could say all I was thinking about was the food, what to eat first and how much to get, lol. We got to catch up with my with my relatives in NJ. Ralph was working but we kept in touch throughout the night.

Kaitlyn got so tired and was not able to wait for the ball to fall. But it didn't matter, she was in my arms sleeping as we greeted the New Year and I called Ralph as soon at it was 12. We stayed until 3 in the morning and we traveled back. Thankfully out driver got some sleep so he was ok to drive,lol. We got home at past 5 am in the morning. All of us just went up and went inside our respective room and passed out. All in all I enjoyed myself and I am so thankfully that I got to bring home a lot of Filipino Food..

Happy NEW YEAR!!