Front yard fun...

Everytime we get near the door, Cameron is ready to go outside. He just LOVEs to be outside. So, this day we just lingered and I let him wander around to his hearts content.


He wanted to climb trees, so we did that. He collected rocks, picked up sticks, dumped out our cats water dish, and l00ked f0r bugs.

It was a good time. He's quite the little outdoorsman. :-)

Appreciation

My kids celebrated Veterans day recently. Austin joined other uniformed cub scouts in a flag ceremony at the school assembly. Brooke wore her patriotic red, white and blue clothes. Cameron and I stayed for the assembly to snap a few pictures and I'm so glad we did.

Veterans day is a holiday that I don't always acknowledge the way I should. I was grateful for the opportunity that the school gave me, to remember and honor the men and women who have sacrificed and those who continue to fight for our country and our freedom.

I thoroughly enjoyed the heartfelt tribute to our nations heroes. The music, the visiting soldiers and veterans, the flag ceremony were all part of a very patriotic morning. I'm thankful that my kids attend a school where their country is honored, freedom is cherished and the veterans were remembered. I know I would not have done them justice if I had tried to convey the importance of this holiday at home.

I'm proud to be an American and so glad my kids are too!

Grounded

Last week, my kids were melting down and got in a big argument with eachother. As a consequence, they were sent to their rooms. When they continued to be mad and cry, etc... I went so far as to "ground them." They had to stay in their rooms the entire afternoon and evening.

The poor children didn't even get to come out of their rooms for dinner.

Aren't I a mean Mommy?

Of course I fed them. I brought it to them in their rooms. Hmmm, punishment for them, or more work for me?

Regardless, I had to follow through with the punishment. So, they ate in their rooms, did homework in their rooms, laid on their beds, messed around, etc.

As seen in the pictures below, they were really sad about the whole thing . . .



Brooke set up a cute little "tea party" for her dinner and it was so much fun that Cameron wanted to join her. What a punishment, to get to break the regular rules of not eating upstairs and have a party with her stuffed bunny and little brother. :-)

Austin had it pretty rough too. He got to eat as he lay around in bed, in his underwear, reading a book and having time to himself. Isn't it supposed to make you unhappy when you get grounded?? They were so mad to be confined to their rooms and then they realized that is was not so bad.

In the end, I think my mission was accomplished though. There were no more arguments in our house that evening. The down time did them some good . . . I hope.

Can you say Pack Rat?

Ummm, I'm actually a little embarrassed to admit this, but found it humorous enough to record for the memory.

I went into my closet this morning and noticed that I really needed to do a little organizing of my things. I decided to start with a couple of purses/bags that are out of rotation. I use a purse for a few months and often get bored and switch it out for a different or new one. When I make the switch, I'm not always great at cleaning the old one out COMPLETELY. I usually take my wallet and a few necessities and leave the rest to be cleaned out later, when I have more time.

Luckily I had the time today. Imagine my surprise when, between 2 purses, I came across...

$180.00 - yes, $180.00 dollars, not including coins, which there were plenty of.

(I had collected most of the money as reimbursement for various school things that I covered last school year and then never deposited!!)

I also found -

4 unused gift certificates for stores and spas. :-) I actually realized that these were missing, so was very happy to recover them.

13 different lip glosses - good lip glosses, several of them my favorites from VS. And I thought my daughter had been swiping them!

5 tubes of chap stick - Why do I continue to buy more? Oh, because they were lost in the black hole of a large unused purse and we couldn't find any when our lips were chapped.

9 lip liners. No wonder I have been down to the same one for quite a while. I thought it rather curious that they had all disappeared.

2 cases of eye shadow, 2 eye brow pencils, and my favorite mascara

2 containers of concealer make-up and a compact of powder. (it's like I went shopping for make up!)

2 pairs of nail clippers and some tweezers - we are always in short supply of these around our house, little did I know they were hiding here all along.

A stash of about 15-20 pens & pencils.

The list goes on and on. There were lots of other useful items such as hair clips, pony tail holders, business cards, granola bars, crayons, receipts, thank you notes, and plenty of trash to get rid of.

I really surprised myself with the amount of valuable stuff that was shoved away in an unorganized closet. It motivated me to:

A: Keep less junk in my purse. Like, seriously, I think one lip gloss can do the trick.

B. Clean out my bags more thoroughly before making the switch to the next one

C. Use smaller purses, because hello! I tend to fill them with stuff that just ends up lost in there.

D. Clean out my closet more often, who knows what valuables lay waiting for me to discover them!


Anyway, now I'm gonna go put on some of my new make up, go shopping with my gift certificates and make an appointment to use my spa gift! It's like my birthday! Hooray for the benefits of cleaning today. :-)

I love this town

I just have to say that I really love where we live. We've been so happy here and it's for lots of great reasons. I particularly love the community feel that we have here. We had a great time going to some local shops that were hosting trick or treating and running into friends and neighbors. It's nice that those sort of activities still exist in communities and we're so lucky to live in one.

Showering my sweet friend

It was both my privilege and my pleasure to help throw a baby shower for my dear friend who is expecting a precious baby boy in a few weeks. We had fun celebrating with her. Babies are wonderful and the end of pregnancy is certainly a reason to celebrate!

We reserved a pavillion at a great new park for the occasion. We had plenty of good food and lots of good friends. What could be better? It was a gorgeous day and everyone seemed to enjoy the great outdoors.


The shower was fun, she's all stocked up on diapers and now we just have to wait a few weeks... can't wait to meet the little man!

Sticky situation...

I have decided that two year olds aren't terrible, they are just really curious. Case in point... Cameron got a hold of a bottle of wood glue this week. (compliments of Dad leaving it out.)

He wasn't trying to be terrible when he took the lid off. He was just curious. He wondered what would happen when he dumped the stuff inside out. He found out that it was really sticky. He promptly called it my attention and asked for some assistance. :0)

I tried hard to get it all washed up as quick as I could, but still found out that glue dries rather crunchy on carpet if you don't get it all out. ( I thought I did get it, but judging by the crunchy carpet, I didn't.)

I learned a couple things that day.

First, Cameron is quite curious, not terrible, but quite a handful at 2 years old. I need to keep him a little more engaged so he doesn't keep finding things to get into. He's still really easy to love though and cute even when he's naughty!

Second, we should really not keep carpenter's glue out within the reach of little ones.

Third... well, I'm going to need to limit my computer time, because all of the mischievous things that Cameron has done lately seem to happen when I'm online checking my email or on Facebook or something of that sort. It's easy for kids to make messes when Mommy is distracted!

And that's my cue to get off the computer...