She wants to know more about me!

At Mom’s Blogging, I’ve had the opportunity to interview bloggers on a weekly basis, but now the tables are turned…

Both Meg @ Simply Nutmeg and Steph @ Adventures in Babywearing are both interviewing me! I’ve posted my interview questions from Meg over at Mom’s Blogging and here’s what Steph wants to know about me:

1. You seem like such a fun mom, what is your favorite activity to do as a family?

Oh, boy … “fun mom” — could you talk to my kids about this? You might get a different answer.

Actually, I do think that I’m a fun mom. I think, in part, it has to do with the fact that I am a younger mom. While I’m not the youngest out there, I had my kids early on in life (Matthew came just a week after I turned 20). But I’m also a kid at heart.

In the last year, I’ve really tried to get out of my “work-a-holic” mode and be more of a mom. That included joining the PTA board, becoming the assistant cheer leading coach, and then making some changes around this house. The biggest was the implementation of family game night and movies in the bed night.

On Friday night we either find movies on TV (we love the Disney Channel Original Movies) or rent one from Netflix and all pile in my bed to watch them until we fall asleep. Of course, with them both growing like weeds, we’re starting to outgrow my bed!

On Saturday nights, the TV and computers go off, completely off, and we listen to the Saturday Night Disco party and play games. We’re also outgrowing our game shelf with all the games that we have. But our most recent purchases were Pass the Pigs and Hit the Deck, both of which we love. We’re also big fans of any of the Cranium games like Cadoo, Zooreka, and my personal favorite Whonu. But we have the classics like Life I and Monopoly too…and then there are the nights that we sit here and play Rummy to 1,000 or until we’re all so tired that we can’t keep our eyes open.

2. Were you a good student in high school? What was your favorite class?

Loaded question… and it depends on who you ask… Yes, I was a good student when it came to grades. I was in the National Honor Society (although, we had the motto of “we cheat better than you”… of course, I didn’t cheat… I’m one of those people that actually likes school and learning. I would go back to college again, just to go back with no degree goal in mind. I’m a geek like that.

However, I liked to have my fun in highschool again and I figured out how to work the system in regards to attendance, etc. When I lived in Philly, it was not uncommon for me to ditch school and head to New York City or Washington, DC… or the mall. But I always maintained my A average (and sometimes a B) which is why no one knew until the final report card came home. My father had a rule about “typical teenage stuff” in that we would not get punished unless my mother found out. And he held his word on that. After my mother learned that I had missed 20+ days of my sophomore year, he came back to my room and reminded me of his rule. She found out and so I was grounded. I fully believe that my grades are what kept me out of alot of trouble.

But my favorite subject in school was always history and government. I had great teachers every single year including my government teacher who actually worked in the White House during Nixon’s term. He later picked up a class at the local community college and I took his government and econ classes there, that’s how much I loved him.

And let me point out that advanced PE was also another favorite class of mine. At my school, you had to take PE your Freshman and Sophomore years, but after that, it was an elective. I moved to VA in the middle of my junior year and the only class they could put me in was Advanced PE since it was the middle of the semester. At first, I thought it was horrible. Then I learned that I was the only girl in the class full of jocks. After that, everything was AOK and even opted to take that class second semester.

3. If you were to run into a gas station and quickly had to pick one candy to eat, what would you grab?

Anything with Reeses on the label. I am one of the rare ones that thinks chocolate is okay… I’m not a huge fan. I can take it or leave it. I know, I know, I’m weird. However, if you marry chocolate and peanut butter in ANY form, it becomes sinful in my book and I’m all over it. The kids know better than to leave any Reeses products in their candy buckets after Easter or Halloween and more often than not, it’s chocolate and peanut butter that I give up for Lent every year. Then by the time Easter Sunday rolls around, there are so many people that bestow the chocolately, peanut buttery goodness on me, I am like a pig in slop.

It’s sad, I know… but it’s really the only kind of ice cream I like too…

4. If you were to officially write a book to be published today, what would it be about?

Writing is something that I’ve always loved. In fact, somewhere buried in the masses of boxes in this house are the first two novels that I ever wrote…. they just weren’t published. They are still handwritten on notebook paper and nestled within the 3 rings in a trapper keeper (flashback anyone?)

Growing up, I was a romantic at heart and completely boy crazy. I started writing a book about the New Kids on the Block, fictional of course, but very vivid in my mind. My father told me that if I wrote it, he would help me edit it and get it published. I worked day and night on that book, and when I was finally done, I took it too him and said that I was ready to get it done and on the shelves.

That weekend, while at the book store, I discovered that someone else had beat me to the punch and there was already a fictional line out there about NKOTB and so the trapper keeper went into a box never to be looked at again. Then I started my next book about The Party. (Do you remember them? From the Mickey Mouse Club? Damon something or other… but they were on there with Brittany and Justin and all the other Mousketeers from my day….) But by the time I finished that, I had lost interest in getting it out there, so I tucked it in a different Trapper Keeper and walked away from writing.

Over the years, I’ve put together several short stories… all fantasies of mine that I put on paper, changing the names to protect the innocent and me. In almost every single story, I was popular, lived with my father who was widowed, had an older brother, and had a boy nickname… I guess it’s no surprise that when I had a little girl, she was immediately donned Sam. Because I just always wanted a nickname of any kind but the ones that were boyish were so much better.

And of course, none of that answers the question that Steph asked, which was “if you were to write a book today, what would it be about”… I have a few business related eBooks out there and already done. I’m working on the 2nd edition of my marketing books and hope to self publish that when it’s done in February but as far as non-business? I’m in the middle of writing a book recounting all of the things that I’ve done in my life that seemed like really good ideas at the time. It’s entitled Confessions of a Very Intelligent Woman: A Direct Dependant of Murphy. I’ve got a blog started that have a few stories on there already and I work on it as I get inspired and feel funny. Of course, a few stories from this blog will definitely make the book.

I don’t know when it will be done but one day it will be. I have to get the gumption to actually put it out there when it’s all done. My mother will die.

5. You say you are a MySpace addict… what is your favorite thing to do on MySpace?

My MySpace addiction has subsided quite a bit since I included MySpace in my fast in June, however, I still love it 10x better than Facebook or anything else out there.

The biggest thing I love about MySpace is the ability to reconnect with old friends. While I had hoped that perhaps we could rekindle friendships of the past, the reality of it is, there’s a reason we lost touch to begin with and most of us haven’t changed. I don’t use MySpace to network for my business, but I do have it up there to stay connected with my current friends, online and off, and with the kids in my youth group.

I don’t believe in having 5,000 friends and I’m proud to say that I know 90% of my friends, personally.

However, confession time… I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE to play MySpace DJ and go and look up songs from way back in the day and sing along… like NKOTB or Right Said Fred or Milli Vanilli and Vanilla Ice. It’s lots of fun….

So there you have it…all that you ever wanted to know about me but were afraid to ask and are now sorry that you did!

Now it’s your turn. If you want to be interviewed, leave me a comment including the words “Interview me.” I will respond by emailing you five questions. I get to pick the questions. If you don’t have a valid email address on your blog, please provide one. You will update your blog with a post containing your answers to the questions. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

Make sure you check out Meg’s interview with me….

I’m thankful for the blogging community that has allowed me to meet some phenomenal people out there that I would’ve never known otherwise. They have become friends and I hope to meet all of you one day!

Until next time…

Heather