I know you’re sick by now of visiting this here blog only to find that I’ve written another review. Go ahead. Admit it. Isn’t there enough advertisements in the world, now Stepherz has turned herself into a walking billboard?

But I thought I’d share a bit of the experience with you, in case you were wondering.

I’ve nearly made enough money for my blog makeover from only a handful of posts. The more reviews I write, the more money I make off of subsequent ones. It’s like getting into a “clique”. I’ve never been big on cliques, but then again, no clique has ever offered me money. It doesn’t take me long to write the review at all and I figured out that, so far, I’m making an Engineer’s wages per hour. And just when I want to gloat about making the big bucks, I remember that most engineers don’t only earn one hours worth of wages a week. Dork.

There are ins-and-outs that I’m learning. For instance, it’s all about timing when you are a review writer. If you don’t accept a job fast enough, someone else is going to. I’ve missed out on better paying reviews because I didn’t check my e-mail often enough. I’ve also broadened my interest area to allow for more offers. Instead of just making myself available for home & family type products, I’ve offered myself to write for Travel and Electronics too. Travel companies pay better than Real Estate companies, the electronic genre doesn’t pay great but offers the most jobs, and the gambling companies are chincy all together.

It sounds more interesting than it actually is though. I think in your first few months of writing reviews, you could only probably make a few hundred dollars per month. You could make more, of course, but you risk losing the interest of your blog readers. They don’t come to read about this kind of stuff. I guess you have to weigh what’s important. I don’t really need the money, it’s more of an experiment and it’s certainly not worth losing you over.

I don’t expect that you would be entirely honest with me, in order to save me from hurt feelings, but I was wondering how obnoxious these 4 reviews have been to you? Did you even notice? Have you thought about breaking up with me yet? Because in a perfect world, I would be able to keep you and write 3-4 reviews a week.

I’ve noticed some regular readers becoming less regular over the past month, even before the review writing. I’ve noticed some new readers in their place. I even have a new reader that started out looking for my mom through Google, and now visits nearly daily. I guess this is changing the subject, but sometimes I get bummed over the turn-over. I’m super excited about the new folks, but I wonder what I did to make the old friends leave. I’ve broken up with a couple of blogs too, and I’d never say who they were or why it happened. But they didn’t seem to miss me anyways, so I guess it was for the better. But you? I miss you when you’re gone. So don’t break up with me, K? You can always fuss at me for being a kiss-ass-butt-smooching-advertising-dork. I’d deserve that, for writing such lame reviews. But don’t leave…

Your patience with me is already paying off. You just about bought me a new blog look. So maybe you would like to help me out with a theme/catch phrase idea? I wanted something fun, maybe Southern, and obviously incorporating my favorite role– Mommy. I wanted to be my own mascot this time, but my camera isn’t working and I’m not sure when I’ll get my new one. Soon! If you are good at the theme thing, and want to make suggestions for my new “catch”, drop some ideas in the comments! I’ll send you some happy mail if I end up using your idea!

Saturday was a special day, and so I thought I’d try to capture some of it with the camera phone. It was a unique day in that I had most of the day all to myself. Jeremy went to see his momma with the kiddos!

I drank an entire cup of coffee quietly while I read up on some blogs.

I conquered some homework in Psychology. Speaking of that, what is the psychology behind a fly’s need to be an exhibitionist? I am sitting at my computer, reading about neurotransmitter pathways when a couple of flies land on my keyboard and start humping each other like I’m not even there. How rude.

No, I’m not going to show a picture of the flies humping. This is a family blog. Pervs. Actually I guess I’m the perv for even trying to take a picture of it.

I decided to start getting moving because I had a lunch date at noon with my buddy Kim. Here’s me with that morning glow. Ok, maybe it’s not a morning glow. It’s the stoopid camera flash. Whatever.

Here’s me with a bit of work. I clean up alright sometimes.

I headed to lunch with Kim, who happens to be one of the coolest momma friends I have. We went to a super nice restaurant and I took a picture of my meal but it didn’t save for some reason. We went window shopping downtown and browsed around an antique mall (one of my favorite things to do on a Saturday). Then we headed back to her house and I jumped in my car for some afternoon errand running.

I went to Alltel to buy Austin a new cell phone, because I’m cool like that. I bought him a fancy camera phone with unlimited texting. While I waited in line, I noticed an old boss of mine buying his wife a new cell phone. I took a picture of him so that I could share with you a quick story about this doofus. I was the Recreation Director at his Nursing Home facility about 4 years ago. I often tied my hair in a bun because I had to play cricket with the residents outside and I was so miserable with my hair down in that heat. He came to me one day and told me that I needed to fix my hair nicely because my “sloppiness” was a reflection on him. I can tell you that I rarely look “sloppy” and certainly not at work, so I was so insulted that I quit my job right then and there. I wish I would have put more thought into it because I would have loved to have closure with all of the fantastic people I worked with. But. You know, it’s a pride thing. And it didn’t pay well, so it was easy to replace. Anyways, this Jackass and his wife were with the Rep right next to my Rep’s desk and they were whispering to one another about me with me RIGHT THERE! What’s the psychology there? 

Stupid old man and his snobby botoxed wife. I can fix my hair, but there’s nothing that old man can do about his meanness (or that ugly shirt).

The day ended well. My mother-in-law sent me a beautiful plant home with Jeremy and the plant is so grand and amazing that I’m going to have to make a special place for it.

We spent the last part of the day at a BBQ at my friend Randy’s house. My normally disappearing deviled eggs were not a hit. What’s the psychology behind that?

It was a wonderful Saturday and I felt a bit renewed having a few hours to myself. Next weekend, Poppa Bear gets to leave for a few hours for some “guy time.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I thought it might be fun to start sharing something silly and random at the bottom of some of my posts about something fun one of the kids said/did.

We were outside this morning, enjoying the sun. Bella was using the water hose to water the flowers. She started using the hose on her baby brother, who wasn’t amused. Obviously. I told her to stop or I’d take the hose away. She said in her sassy little way, “Mommy! You are always so mean to me. Always.” It made me laugh and sort of sad all at the same time. What am I going to do when this child is 15? Tell me! Huh?

And to think I thought my modeling days were over! Apparently I am Miss September, y’all! I decided to finally enter my round belly for the Belly of the month over at www.pregnancypiercings.com, and I got Miss September! Yahoo!

Dear Hugh Hefner,

I’m so flattered you want to make me Miss December for your magazine, but. I don’t think there’s enough Photoshop expertise in the world to make that a good idea. Tell Holly I said “hi” for me anyways, and I’ll be over this weekend to share some margaritas and steaks. Also, please tell the bunnies to quit leaving kiss marks all over Nooskers. He’s a bit young for that.

~*Stepherz~*

**** Speaking of The Girls Next Door. Does ANYONE out there love that show as much as I do? I mean, the concept is gross– three over-rated Barbie-esque girls and their old, gross lover. I can’t help but really like those girls, even Holly has grown on me.

How about Chelsea Handler? Do you love her? You better not! She’s mine. Mine. Mine. Mine.

Today was one of those really awesome, memorable days…

I started with a nice hot cup of coffee and my new addiction… Twilight by Stephenie Meyer. Go. Get. This. Book!

This is really an interesting little tidbit: You know how authors sometimes use pen names? Well, I created 2 pen names for myself, the first being when I was only 14 years old. I wanted to write a book about my mother’s murder. I wrote letters and sent my first 2 chapters to publishers all over. They wrote back telling me I needed an agent. I was so bummed. Anyways, the pen name I picked at that time was Stephanie Meyer. No joke. Meyer is my grandmother’s German maiden name. When I was 22 or so, I thought I’d go to college, major in English Communications, and write a book with the Meyer name. I mean, I guess more amusing than wanting to use that pen name is that I actually thought I’d write a book. I told you– I’m a dreamer!

Anyhoooo… After 2 sips of coffee and 2 paragraphs of my new book, the babies woke up. After we had breakfast, we headed to the park. There was a really bizarre man at the park, sleeping on a bench when we first got there. He gave me the heebie-jeebies. I’ve never felt that intimidated by a man. Seriously, I felt really beside myself like something just wasn’t right. I felt really uneasy and uncomfortable, but was scared to leave because I didn’t want to turn my back to him. After 15 minutes of feeling uneasy, I told the babies, loud enough for him to hear, “Daddy is coming, look for his car.” I knew it was going to get Bella’s hopes up, and Jeremy wasn’t really coming, but I wanted him to know I was about not to be alone and vulnerable for much longer, in case he was wondering. Sure enough, he got up and left. You know, I can tell when a man is trying to flirt with me and I am not intimidated by that. That’s not at all what this guy was doing, and I find it disturbing that someone this weird and creepy was hanging out in such a sacred and beautiful place. I was glad when he left. After he was gone, I found a mattress and whiskey bottles near “his” bench. It’s unfortunate that there are homeless people out there. I’m really sorry that there are people without homes, hungry, while there are people living it up like Paris Hilton– sucking up oxygen and not helping a single soul along the way. But homeless men shouldn’t go about intimidating women, making them feel uncomfortable, and drinking whiskey in a child’s park. I’m calling the police department about it tomorrow… And I didn’t mean to go into all that because it was a wonderful time and we had such fun playing in the river and on the slides, once he left. Here are some amazing camera phone pics I took…

Then? We went to the Firehouse! We met some other mommies from my mother’s group for a tour of the station. The kids got to use the hose, sit in the drivers seat, and play around in the cab. It was such fun watching the enthusiasm and excitement in their eyes…

After we played at the firehouse, we went for a bite to eat at McDonalds. We love us some Mickey D’s, dontcha know!

We traveled home, with bloated bellies. Noah zonked out in the car, with ketchup smeared all over his little cheeks. Bad mommy. Note to self: Use wipes.

When we got home, Noah slept for 3 hours! Yayy! Whoop-whoop!

Bella didn’t sleep at all. Booo. Hissss.

Wonderful day. It ended with a very grumpy girl, but it was wonderful.

Have I told you how much I love this stay-at-home-mommy stuff? It’s awesome.