By Gwen

During Thursday night’s elimination, Chelsea T. and Chris had to pack up their dancing shoes and head home. It was the first elimination so far this season in which a couple has been broken up and re-paired with new partners. Chris’ former partner, Comfort, will now dance with Chelsea’s former partner, Thayne. As far as the best solo of the night, it was a toss up between Kourtni and her partner Matt. It was nice to see Matt finally get a decent review from the judges. I was a little surprised to see Chelsea T. go home this early in the season. She seemed like a strong contender for a spot in the final four. But the judges felt her personality had dropped off a bit during recent weeks. Though Chris is certainly a talented dancer, he was bound to drop out before some of the other extremely strong male dancers in the group like Will, Twitch and Joshua.

From Wikepdia — A meme (pronounced /miːm/)[1] consists of any unit of cultural information, such as a practice or idea, that gets transmitted verbally or by repeated action from one mind to another. Examples include thoughts, ideas, theories, practices, habits, songs, dances and moods and terms such as race, culture, and ethnicity. Memes propagate themselves and can move through a “culture” in a manner similar to the behavior of a virus.

Kind of like a chain letter – these are the things you answer on email or read on blogs, to help you “learn” more about your friends. Here are two fun memes to help you know me better.

NWA Mother Lode bloggers – it’s YOUR turn next!

Four Things

Four jobs I have held:
– Florist delivery

– Day care teacher
– Retail sales associate – Eddie Bauer, Casual Corner
– Academic Advisor

Four movies I could watch over and over:
– The American President
- Dirty Dancing
- Breakfast Club
- The Color Purple

Four places I have lived:
- Ozark, AR (super yuck)
- Austin, TX
- Denver, CO (my favorite place)
- Fayetteville, AR

Four TV shows I like:
- Lost
- How I Met Your Mother
- Bones
- Anthony Bourdaine: No Reservations

Four favorite foods:
- Pizza
- anything Mexican

- any kind of fried potatoes – chips, fries, etc.
- big, ripe, juicy, home grown tomatoes with lots of salt!

Four places I would rather be:
- -anywhere with cool nights and low humidity

– Denver, visiting my sister and family
- - at the pool with a drink in hand, not home with a sick kid!
– in San Antonio, meeting our new baby (not yet)

A, B, C, D, E, F …

A - Age: 33.

B - Band listening to right now: no band, I am listening to “Dora the Explorer” in the background – great, huh?

C - Career future: gosh, I wish I knew – lottery winner?

D - Dad’s name: Carl

E - Easiest person to talk to: My sister – I love talking to my husband, but my sister “gets it” more easily than he does

F - Favorite song: The first one that comes to mind is, “Into the Mystic” by Van Morrison

G - Gummy Bears or Gummy Worms: Gummy Bears – the texture is much better

H - Hometown: Ozark, but I don’t like to admit it. I say, Fayetteville.

I - Instruments: piano for 5 years as a child, but no longer, clarinet for one year in middle school, guitar for a few weeks as a child

J - Job: university recruiter

K - Kids: 1 and 1 on the way – our adoption could happen at any time – let’s hope for sooner rather than later – come on, Shlomo!

L - Longest car ride ever: I think the 18 hour drive to Aspen with a toddler in the back seat!

M - Mom’s name: Sharon

N - Number of jobs you’ve had: about 15 since I was a teenager

P - Phobia[s]: tumbling down a flight of stairs and knocking out my teeth – shudder . . .

Q - Quote: You must be the change you wish to see in the world.

—Gandhi

R - Reason to smile: a hot cup of coffee, and an adorable three year old playing by himself while I type this

S - Song you sang last: “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” at bedtime for Isaac last night

T - Time you wake up: sometime between 6:30 and 7:30, unless I can finagle it to sleep late!

U - Unknown fact about me: I was a tiny preemie – I weighed 2 pounds and 3 ounces at birth in 1974

V - Vegetable you hate: cauliflower – yuck!

W - Worst habit: biting my fingernails and picking at my split ends

X - X-rays you’ve had: back, to check for inherited scoliosis

Y - Yummy food: ripe, homegrown tomatoes, COFFEE, anything fattening (boo)

Z - Zodiac sign: Scorpio

OK, so I am hedging on writing about adoption. I don’t have any thing to tell. We don’t have any news. After the big disappointment a couple of weeks ago, I have been anxious, but realistic. These things take time. We have been officially “on the list” for only a month.

I did decide to start getting some things ready for a baby, though. When I thought we were about to jump in the car and drive to San Antonio, I started panicking about getting it all together in time. How do I pack for Michael, Isaac, a baby, and myself for an undetermined amount of time in a hotel room? Yikes! I decided the easiest thing to do is to get a bag ready for the baby. So, after things settled down, I had fun going through all the baby clothes and gear. We will most likely know the sex of the baby before we head to San Antonio, but I decided to pack only the most gender neutral stuff we had. So, I have about a dozen side-snap shirts, a bunch of sleepers and gowns, some hats, a couple of cuter outfits, bottles, diapers, a couple of blankets, the miracle blanket, the car seat, and a few other things ready to go. This way, when we DO get the call, I don’t have to go crazy with the baby stuff. I can just look through it again and work on packing the rest of us!

I never had a “true” newborn at home. Isaac was in the hospital for 99 days before he came home, and even though he was tiny (6 pounds 4 ounces when he came home), and very newborn like, we did not have to deal with the umbilical stump, or some of the other newborn things. Plus, we brought him home at the end of December. I expect (I could be wrong) to bring this baby home sometime in summer or fall. We will be in San Antonio, the first two weeks or so, and it will be warm. What do you dress a summer/fall baby in? Also, why the heck do I need all those side-snap shirts? (we did not use them for Isaac, these are hand-me-downs). Give me a list of your newborn essentials and/or your can’t live without baby item. I’ll go first – my essential baby item is the Miracle Blanket – it is awesome for babies that need to be swaddled – amazing. How about you? Click on the word “comment” below to post your suggestions.

Dear Rhonda,

What do you think is the absolute best hair dryer? I recently bought the $300 T3 Tourmaline one and was underwhelmed. Are the so-called ionic dryers really better for your hair?

Dear Dryer Dilemma,

This is a great question and one I’m asked practically every day at the salon. We all know there will be a new, latest and greatest gadget that gets a lot of buzz and comes on the market right after you’ve sold the farm to buy today’s “latest and greatest.” Beauty tools can often be SO complicated. Sure, it’s great to have choices but having too many of them can sometimes cause an overwhelming urge to run down the street naked! Know what I mean? AAAAAHHHHH!

Now back to your question. I’m really sorry your new, turbo-powered hair dryer wasn’t all you expected it would be. Here’s my take on it. The not-so-glamorous truth about hair dryers is this: They all blow hot and cold air and have an on/off switch. That being said, some do have features such as a motor that cools itself off as it heats itself up. (These are the kind your stylist uses because he or she is using it all day long and therefore needs this feature. These dryers also tend to be a lot hotter than average because stylists need to get the job done fast so clients can get back to work, kids ,etc.)

As for the ionic dryer, these dryers use positive and negative charges to suck the water from the hair. Sounds crazy, and it’s even harder to explain, but that’s how they work. For home use, I tell my clients to let their personal preferences combined with their pocketbook make this decision. If your hair is very thick and wavy and you need to dry and go fast, an ionic, hotter hair dryer will be best. If, on the other hand, you have fine, thin hair, a dryer that doesn’t get quite as hot would be the safe choice.The wattage, in my opinion, should be at least 1850 and price varies by brand. There’s no way to say one dryer is “the best”. If you find one you like, hang on to it.

As for your $300 dilemma, return that joker and get your money back.

Rhonda Moulder is a Northwest Arkansas stylist and mama to 2 fabulous girls. To send her a question or ask about a consultation, e-mail her at mamas@nwamotherlode.com.

By Shannon, Ladybug’s mom

Play dates for 6-year-olds are all kinds of awesome. And I mean that from my perspective. I just offer the occasional snack (they prefer baked cookies, but could care less whether they’re homemade, so why should I?), the occasional called-from-the-other room instruction, and just now, a bit of Caladryl for a bug bite. Really not too taxing.

Previously, with the under age 6 play date, it was all kinds of taxing. They wanted to paint, they wanted to cry, they wanted to break my house like so many matchsticks. Two and a half hours into this one, I’m hearing their cheerful chatter in Ladybug’s bedroom while I catch up on some blog reading and a little work.Of course, it depends on the child you’ve invited over. Some are more affable than others, of course. And some are more polite. Polite is very important to me. Impoliteness can result in one invitation only. We’re sticklers for the polite (it’s really my husband). (And NO, I’m not saying my daughter is the Queen of Polite. But if we’re in hearing distance, we require it from her).On this day it’s not only a play date, but a full-blown SLEEPOVER. Ladybug’s first (cousins excepted). And the appointed child is very polite. Case in point: I just asked the girls if they’d like frozen pepperoni pizza for dinner (as in, not from a pizza parlor) and the sleepover friend nicely inquired, “Could I have mine warm, please?” I think it helps that she has an English accent and nearly everything she says sounds nice.Everything went swimmingly, until that evening. Ladybug wouldn’t – couldn’t — go to sleep. The play date friend apparently has a 7 p.m. bedtime at home, which I absolutely can’t imagine. My daughter’s internal clock is tuned to eternal night owl. She prefers to stay up late and sleep late the next morning. I thought kindergarten would cure that. Just before she started “big school” last fall, my mom friends with older kids told me in a knowing voice: “She’ll be falling asleep on the way home” and “You won’t have to ask her to go to bed. Mine was asleep by 7 o’clock – kindergarten is tiring!” (Shush with the 7 o’clock, people. It’s disheartening). They were wrong, wrong, wrong. Yes, she went to sleep a little earlier, but she wasn’t dropping off on the way home from school — or even by 7.I know that much of the sleep situation is my fault. I get Ladybug into bed at a decent hour, but she often derails the early bedtime by something as simple as a thought-provoking question. She’s learned I can hardly resist answering those, which is what my savvy 6-year-old is banking on. Take the other night. She tells me she has to ask me one thing. Against my better judgment, I walk to the door of her room. “Yes?” I say. She asks: “Which one: lion or hyena?” (We’ve played this many times. What she means is: in a face-off, which animal would win?) Nothing like talk of slaughter to lull you to sleep.I pick lion. I turn to leave so she quickly calls out “duck or chicken?” A tough one. “I’d have to vote for the chicken. Their beaks are sharper,” I reply. As I reach the living room, she raises her voice and asks one more: “Orca or blue whale?” Knowing I should refuse to be reeled in, I walk back to her door and say, “Hmmm. Orcas are toothed whales, but the blue whale is the biggest whale in the sea. I’ll have to choose the orca.” I call out to my husband for a second opinion: “Orca or blue whale?” He replies without a beat, “Orca. They have teeth and they usually don’t travel alone.”The night of the sleepover, Ladybug’s friend got to answer the never-ending list of questions. She even asked a few of her own. I finally sent Ladybug to sleep on the couch so her friend could close her eyes already.Then they both went to sleep, mercifully. The next morning they asked in unison: “When can we have another sleepover?!” I told them soon. Soon.Frozen pizza: $3.50

Movie rental: $4

Someone else to listen to endless questions before bed: priceless