When I was a teenager creativity flowed freely.  I wrote constantly.  I found a bunch of that stuff when we moved and it is BAD. HORRIBLE. EMBARRASSING.  I didn’t get rid of it…but it will never see the light of day.

WHY was I so angsty?  I was a middle class white girl in the suburbs.  I had nothing to be sad about.  But I wrote these dark, discontented poems.  Did I mention they were HORRIBLE?  And I would spend hours on them.  I would hand write and edit them…and then type them out in different fonts on the computer.  Sometimes I would add clip art pictures.  CLIP ART PICTURES!  Then I would print them out.  What the freaking crap? Oh it’s just soooo embarrassing!

I would NOT go back to being a teenager if you paid me a million bucks.  No thank you on the clusterfook of emotions and feelings and drama.

Regardless of how bad my writing was I never had a lack of inspiration.  I guess my hormonal teenage mind was a pool of ideas.  I don’t know when I stopped writing but I did…for a long time.

And then when Alivia was a baby I started again. And after I started my blog  it was like a couldn’t stop the ideas from coming.  I dreamed in blog posts…I kept a notebook by my side so I could jot down ideas as I had them.   I wrote almost every day.  I would get up from bed at night to write.  I would stay up into the wee morning hours to write.

And now?

…yeah obviously I haven’t been writing.  I am not really sure how to rationalize the lack of creativity I have been feeling.  I am definitely busy with life but that never stopped me before.  A rut maybe? I can’t really pinpoint the problem.  I still love the release I get when I write.  I still get inspired and think “wow I should really write that down”.

And you know what?  My lack of writing is not for lack of material.    I would love to write about SO many things.  However the things I would benefit most from writing about and the things that would probably be the most fun to read about are a bit too private for the internet.  Even for me.  Come to think about it the only way I would ever even write about those things on paper would be if I could author an anonymous book.   And even then I am sure people would find out.  (Maybe I should buy a diary with a lock on it like I had when I was 15.)

So basically all of the deep dark juiciest material is just stuck in my brain with no hope of ever coming out.

Maybe that is what the problem is.  Maybe I am too bogged down with all of that stuff and it’s blocking everything else?  Who knows…but I am still here and maybe I will get my creativity back soon.

WELCOME Blog Hop People!!!   I am THE one and only Mrs.007.  Well other than my mother in law and my husband’s Grandma Bond.  I guess that means I am NOT the one and only…whatever I am SO the coolest one.

ANYWAY…My name is Ashley and I am a 28 yr old wife and  stay at home mother of 2 girls.

This blog is my hobby.  I have always wanted to be a writer and I am just too lazy BUSY to make it happen.

I keep it real here at Mrs.007.com.  I am just a girl who got thrown into marriage and motherhood early (  BTW not necessarily in that order).

I write about lots of  extremely important things like how I sometimes suck at being a mom, how my daughter once stuck lip gloss in our dogs butt or the time she let one RIP right in the middle of a wedding.

I hope you don’t pass judgment too easily!

Leave me a comment and I will be your best friend…but totally NOT in an creepy online stalker kind of way.  *ahem*

Bloggers.

There are a lot of us out there.

Sometimes we go to conferences so we can become better bloggers.  I attended  BlissDom09 last weekend and my brain is still reeling.

I was totally nervous to go even though I attended  BlissDom08. ( My Bliss-tini was seriously the only picture I took last year)

If you know me in real life you know that I am not shy at all, but it was  hard to step out of my safe little bubble and into a room FULL of virtual friends.  However, I only live 30 minutes from where the conference was held so it would have been even harder for me to stay home.  So I stuffed my giant purse with necessities, grabbed my bloggy business cards and got into my minivan.

When I arrived at the hip and unique Hotel Preston in Nashville my hands were super sweaty but I was excited to get inside.

Last year’s BlissDom was sort of a test run, so it was smaller and more intimate.  I think there were about 75 people there and the whole conference was held in the Pink Slip bar inside the hotel.  But this time was a different story.  I am not sure how many people were there this year, but I think it was somewhere between 250 and 300.

Luckily my friend Rachel was checking people in and I recognized her right away.   They had her in the right place because she was an awesome welcoming committee!

She handed me a Crocs lanyard with my name badge and an adorable Lands End bag full of really great swag.

In case you were wondering they were just a couple of the companies that made BlissDom possible. Just want to say a BIG thank you to Alli, Barbara, all the speakers, and the sponsors for an amazing conference.

And another one was Little Debbie….seriously ya’ll I ate quite a few snacks from them….but it’s ok because they are only 100 calories each!  I guess that doesn’t matter if you eat 6 at a time.  And I wonder why I have 2 chins in all of my pictures.

My brain is totally fried from all of the bloggy info I absorbed.  So bullet points seem like a good direction to go

While I was at the conference I :

-took many many notes

-talked some people’s ears off ( sorry if that was you)

-met some new friends

-ate too many Little Debbie snacks

-sat at a table with Jen Lancaster…plus I got to hear her speak and she is hilarious!

-listened to Chris Mann sing…and he made me laugh out loud too

-went to 2 cocktail parties and had more Bliss-tini’s

-considered leaving the 2nd cocktail party early and driving home because I had a moment of insecurity where I didn’t see anyone I knew and I kind of panicked

-ended up staying and going to an after party thing where me and a group of grown women did our best VonTrapp family impression and sang a song we wrote to the tune of doe a deer a female deer. (Yeah we did.)

And that was pretty much it.  I came away with A TON of really great information to use to improve Mrs.007.com.

But for me the best part was getting to hang out live and in person with these women that I read every day.   I didn’t take as many pics as I wanted to.  But I did manage to get a few.  Although I seriously considered pulling a reverse Mrs.Fussypants and pasting Britney Spears’ head on my body because of my double chin.

Oh well…it’s me and even though I am in serious need of a diet I will share them with ya’ll.

Because obviously I am all too willing to humiliate myself for a good blog post.  Your welcome.

Me and the lovely and talented Beth

Beth is the one who designed my beautiful blog and you can go here if you want to have a bloggy makeover too!

Me and Colleen…she is  a buddy from BlissDom08 and I had such fun with her this time…she is so funny

Megan…she is brilliant ya’ll… and so sweet

Moriah is another BlissDom 08 friend…really enjoyed her company

Mrs.CPA and Mrs.007

Mrs.CPA made my business cards and they turned out sooo awesome!

me and Jessica who is just beautiful!

Wow if you stuck with me this long you deserve a prize!  Well guess what?  I have an extra Lands End bag to give away!

Leave me a comment on this post telling me something you would like to see changed or something you would like to read on my blog and you will be entered.

You can earn an extra entry too!

Tweet about the giveaway and leave me a seperate comment telling me you did!

I will announce a winner on Friday and I will email you if you win. Good LUCK and thank you for letting me tell you all about BlissDom09!

Remember when I told you about my fat little Wii Mii?  Yeah shii hasn’t gotten any skinnier.  But I do have some good news!

A few weeks ago I won a contest over here from Stephanie ( Adventures in Babywearing).  I won a Wii PopStar Guitar and I was so excited!  I couldn’t wait to get it so I could be the pop star I never knew I always wanted to be.  As luck would have it I ended up getting two of these exciting Wii games in the mail.  So who gets to benefit from it?

YOU DO!

I have ONE brand new in the box Wii PopStar Guitar to give away.  It retails at 59.99

How to Enter:

Leave a comment on this post = one entry

Twitter it with an @mrs007 = two entries

Subscribe to my blog = triple entries

If you are already subscribed…just leave a comment telling me that and you will get the extra entries.

Please visit the Bloggy Giveaway Carnival for HUNDREDS of other giveaways this week.

US shipping only

I will close comments Friday morning and I will announce the winner that day.

Is it too late to start over?

Today I went back and read some of my older posts.  It was kind of similar to when you are going through some of your old crap and you find the diary you kept when you were 14.  Except that this is the internet and anyone can read how stupid I sound.

And unlike my teenage diary, I have never written a blog post about how my parents just don’t bleeping understand my stupid world-is-coming-to-an-end teenage drama.

One day I will have several bottles glasses of wine and post some of those diary entries or better yet some of the poetry I wrote when I was 16.

OR

You could just go to your kitchen, take out your meat hammer/tenderizer thing and bash yourself in the hand repeatedly.  Because that is what I want to do when I read my old diaries.  The problem I am having is that while my diaries and poems are hidden away at the top of my closet my blog is here on the world wide internet.

Yeah.

Plus I put it here on purpose.  Because I thought it would be fun.

Too bad I didn’t anticipate how I might feel a few months later. I guess I will just leave all of those posts alone and hope to goodness that no one ever goes back that far.  I think that is a pretty safe bet since the only comments I get on the old posts say things like “free penis pump do you want to lose eleventy hundred pounds in 6 days Acai berry extract home insurance quotes”

I know I said I would be back this week.  We are home from Georgia and I have a million things to write about and cute pictures to post,  but it’s just not happening.  I have a nasty cold and the Christmas aftermath is overwhelming enough without adding the pressure of writing some brilliantly hilarious blog post.  Mr.007 had to cook dinner tonight because all I have managed to accomplish today is to unlock some new levels on Wii Mario Kart and to make sure my kids actually ate food.  Barbecue Lays and leftover Christmas cake count as food groups right?  Kidding mom!

Anyway I know it sounds like I am just making excuses for my absence or maybe I am just talking to myself here.   OR maybe I am being presumptuous that anyone has even noticed my lack of posting besides my mom and Adam.   Whatever the case may be….I am exhausted and feeling a lot older than my 28 year old self and even older than my Wii Fit age of 32.

Clearly I must have my priorities wacked since the Wii and the Tivo have had plenty of Mrs.007 to go around and my bloggy friends are being neglected.    So consider this an apology or an explanation or whatever is needed to keep you from tossing my blog away in your reader trashcan.  I don’t think I could take it if you pushed the unsubscribe button simply because of my laziness.

So now if you will excuse me I am going to go try and reconcile with my left nostril because it doesn’t seem to care that I need to breath air to live.

Oh and BTW if you have left me a comment in the last few days and I haven’t responded….I promise I will.  I just need to go bathe in some NyQuil for a couple of days and I will be as good as new!

Here is a list of some things people searched for to find my blog.  It makes me want to reevaluate my content.  Nah…I am who I am I guess…saggy boobs and all.

1.  ‘How to make big boobs with pee’

I mean there are no words.  I can NOT think of a single reason that one would search for this.  But alas someone did.  And it landed them here.  Go figure.

2.  ‘Crack Barbie’

This one was on the list twice.  I think it may have something to do with this post.

3.  ‘Poopy adult diaper’

This too was on the list twice.  Once again I am at a loss to figure out why someone would search for this, but hey this is America and not much surprises me these days.

4.  ‘Idiot mom’

Yeah well I have been called worse so it doesn’t really offend that someone searched for this and found me.  Maybe I should change the blog title!

5.  ‘Butt crack’

This one is funny.  I actually have a slight aversion to butt cracks in general.  I don’t want to see it.  Nope not even yours. The only exception is the baby butt crack.  Now that’s just cute.

6.  ‘Sweaty @$$’

Yes I added the symbols to protect innocent eyes.  I don’t recall writing anything about sweaty butts, but something here flagged the internet robots.  This is another thing I am grossed out by.  Butt sweat.  I had a professor in college that had this type of sweating problem.  Ew.

7.  ‘Stupid Monkey’

Bad monkey! You are stupid.  A stupid stupid monkey!

8.  ‘Poop Stains’

well…I have kids, so poop is unavoidable.  Poop stains….yeah sometimes that too. But that is why I am the Samurai Stainfighter.

9.  ‘Whamma lamma ding dongs’

I did have a post with this title, but it was just because I couldn’t think of another one. But someone typed that into a search engine.  Weird.

10.  ‘Pink reebok high tops’

Yeah I wore them.  And I wrote about that and some other fine fashion choices I made in the 80’s. Like stirrup pants.  That was back when I said things like ” Gag me with a credit card and put me on layaway”

11. ‘ Saggy boobs’

I guess it just come with the territory.  I own it.  I am a mommy blogger and I write about breastfeeding, baby poop and saggy boobs.  It is what it is.

Reasons I am so glad I went to BlissDom08:

- It was so freakin’ sweet to get out of the house for the day and not have to cook for anyone, clean up after anyone, wipe anyone’s butt or stick my boob in anyone’s mouth. (although a few more Blisstini’s and I might have done that last thing….oh I joke!)

-I feel so blessed to have been in a room full of such talented and insightful women!  I took home SO MUCH information and I hope to become a better blogger.

-Meghan from the Velveteen Mind is hilarious!  I laughed harder than I had in a long time every time she had the microphone in her hand.

-I got to meet and listen to bloggers I read every day….like totally live and in person.  And guess what?  They are all normal people just like me.  I mean I have always known they are real and not internet droids, but sometimes it’s easy to forget that we are all just women with computers who have some really important things to say.

-The first person I was greeted by was none other than Robin at Pensieve and yes she does in fact rock.  She is not only gawgeous…but also incredibly sweet.  Oh how I wish she lived closer to me!  I would love to have coffee with her once a week.

-I shared a table with 2 beautiful ladies. Lori from Front Porch Legacy and Jamie from Blonde Mom Blog. I hope we can get together with some of the other Nashville area ladies again soon…maybe for a Nashville bloggers dinner or something like that.

-I met another secret agent!  Mishelle from Secret Agent Mama!  Found out she is an AMAZING photographer!

-One of the best things was meeting new bloggy peeps.  Such as Moriah at Please Pass the Salt, Kelly at Mrs.CPA with her beautiful baby Maddie, and Jessica at To Live Beautiful

-Two words….Swag Bags ( which included all sorts of fun goodies!)

-I learned soooo much!

-I can’t possible mention all of the superior bloggers that spoke and attended, but it flippin’ rocked to get to be there.

I want to say a gigantic THANK YOU to Epson, One2One Networkand Blissfully Domestic for a great day at The Hotel Preston in Nashville!  I can NOT wait for BlissDom 2009!

I am fairly new to this bloggy world.  I started mrs007 back in May 2008 so that is not very long.  I have learned so much in that time, but I have a long way to go.  I read sooo many blogs and I have “met” some really amazing people in the blogosphere.  And next weekend I am going to get to meet some of the most talanted writers/bloggers in person.

I am going to my very first blogging conference.  I feel so blessed to be able to attend because if it were happening anywhere else I wouldn’t be able to go.  So yeah….I am going to be able to leave the house and spend the WHOLE day without anyone calling me mom and without changing poopy diapers OR putting my boob in anyone’s mouth.

If you are interested I think there are a few spots still available, but from what I understand there is VERY limited space left.

This post is written by one of my very favorite bloggers ( not to mention we are not really but it would be fun practically neighbors) and it lists the top ten reasons to attend and has a lot of other really good info as well.  So yeah…be excited for me!  I am looking forward to learning new stuff about blogging and meeting some awesome people!  Yay us!