Paint, Paint Every Where, Even In My Hair

This is what I was busy doing all day yesterday (Well, after having my regular pack of amazingly energetic boys over for preK/K class, that is.):

The lighthouse was the last one and I just barely finished it at 11:45pm. Notice my quick finish with the yellow paper? (and before any of you say I'm amazing or any such wonderful niceness, I should say that my house is completely trashed right now. It is 12:16am and I'm doing laundry so I will have something to wear tomorrow. And my kids have been pretty much ignored all day.) I painted these wall murals on strips of butcher paper taped together for an activity we are having at church today. In our church there is a program for girls (and boys too, but separately) ages 8-12 called The Faith In God Award. And there is a group called Activity Days where the girls get together and work on their Faith In God Award requirements together as a group. Cookie has been in this group for almost 2 years now and has loved every minute of it. Last night and all day today they are having Activity Days Girl camp, where groups from all over the area are coming together to participate in workshops and activities to pass off even more goals. This year the primary presidency (3 people who run the children's program at our church), of which I am the secretary, has been asked to teach one of the workshops. The camp's theme is something about boats and our workshop is called "Staying Afloat" and focuses on teaching the girls how to overcome emergency or tough situations that will tempt them even after they have decided to choose the right. So, I painted a lighthouse that shows our desired destination (to return to our Father in Heaven), a life saver (we are going to talk about setting up support lines that can help get us out of tricky situations), and a tempting Peer Pressure Island (It looks fun but it is a small island and will get you nowhere. Better to stay on the boat and continue on your journey.). The other things that will be in our room are oars (the goals and actions we make to propel us forward), life jackets (our testimony which can save us if we fall off the boat ), and a picture of Christ (our captain).

I'm excited to see how this all turns out. Luckily all I had to do was paint, and that was fun. It is up to the other gals in the presidency to get the point across.

Hope you are all enjoying a warm, sunny, fun weekend. See you back here on Monday.

Gross!

I am totally going to Lowe's Hardware store today and getting myself a funnel. This should keep me from peeing all over my hand every time I go to see the doctor (like today) and have to give a urine sample. Why they think I can aim into that little cup when I can barely reach down there, let alone see what I'm doing... I don't know why I didn't think of this sooner.

On the brighter side of things, if any of you are big pregnant, have little ones at home, and are in serious need of a little rest, I highly recommend getting a non-stress test done. I mentioned to my doctor that I haven't felt the baby kicking lately. She scheduled me for an immediate non-stress test. Now, just like when your kid is on the verge of death and so you finally take him in to see the doctor and he is bouncing off the walls and just fine, until you get home again, this little baby started kicking like crazy as I was going up the elevator. I told the head nurse and she said we should still do the test. It was lovely. For a whole, uninterrupted hour I sat in a comfy, reclining bed, sipping cold cranberry juice, and read an entire National Geographic article without and disturbances. It was heaven. I think I need to go in for a non-stress test at least once a day! =)

Oh, and the baby is perfectly healthy and fine. The doc says he feels around 5-6 pounds which means hopefully 7-8 pounds on delivery. Whoo Hooo. I've been worried about a 10 pounder because of the way I've been eating. And my doctor was totally cool about the fact that I plan to take caster oil on my due date (June 26th). So, besides the pee thing, it has been a good day.

I'm Not Ready

I'm not ready! I'm just not. One should never get a taste of something good until they can have it all the time. Like parmesan cheese. Once you taste the good stuff you can never go back to the powdered Kraft stuff, ever. Well, I have been getting a taste of life with older kids and I gotta say, "It's niiiiiiice."

I've never gone this long without having a new baby in the house. Usually by the time the youngest turns two I am bringing home a new one. Now that Sweet Terror is almost 4 I'm experiencing things I never thought I would again.

Like a movie in the theater. On Monday Mr. Hotness took us all to see Prince Caspian at the theater. And we all got to see it, the whole way through. No one had to leave with a screaming baby, or to catch a runaway toddler.

Like playing at the beach. I'm usually stuck on a towel nursing a baby or not trusting anyone else to care for it long enough for me to have fun too. And if I do get near the water I am usually too paranoid about drowning children to have any fun at all. We just got back from visiting 2 different beaches and we all had a blast. Everyone is now old enough to play and to not go too deep. LOVED IT!

Like going to church and actually hearing the speakers. For so many years I've only gone to church because I knew it was the right thing to do. Now I go and everyone sits still and I actually get spiritually fed. It is amazing. And I no longer feel the evil glares of the old people as they try to kill me and my screaming children with their laser eyes.

Like talking to my husband. There is no one that is too young and needy to be ignored while we actually finish our sentences. It is amazing.

I only have 4 more weeks to enjoy this new found freedom and then, once again, my body will exist for the sole purpose of keeping a human being fed, clean, and alive. I'm so excited to meet this new little guy, I'm so excited to not be pregnant anymore, I'm so grateful for this amazing blessing in my life... but...

BUT... I'M NOT READY!!!

Totally Enjoying Life

This is what happens when getting Sweet Terror ready for a trip is a combined family effort. =)

Aaaaahhhh, life has been so good lately. It is pretty much a fact that anytime we take a vacation it will rain on us the whole time, no matter what the weather woman says, no matter what time of year we go, and no matter how far we drive. These last few days have been a lovely exception and we have had a blast. We drove over to Port Angeles:

Mr. Hotness had a job interview over there (We have no clue what is going to happen. Basically, they found him and asked him to interview. It is a much higher position, slightly higher pay, but we aren't sure we want to move.) It is a cute city, we had lots of fun playing at the park while Mr. Hot was at the interview. Then everyone but the pregnant lady who refused to buy a swimsuit, that would only be used maybe twice before never needing it again, played and had a blast in the pool. (I dared Mr. Hotness to wear his wet suit in the pool. He almost always takes my dares... unless I dare him to eat the whole baby squid at the all you can eat Chinese buffet.)

The kids thought that watching *gasp* TV was the best thing ever and gorged themselves on SpongeBob and PBS till bedtime. The next morning we decided to drive around the rest of the peninsula and stop at the beach. On our way out we stopped for bagels at the Olympic Bagel Company. Ok, folks, now I'm really really wishing I had taken photos of these bagels. I cannot believe they don't have photos on their web site. These bagels were DA BOMB!!!!! I don't remember the last time I ate so many bagels. And every single calorie that I forced into my body was totally worth it. The family favorite was a bagel called Apple Crunch. It was a slightly sweet bread bagel that was covered in an apple juice glaze, topped with large sugar crystals, with a carmelized apple ring baked right on top. Oh, my heavens, it was heavenly. They had a pesto bagel that had a huge wedge of artichoke heart, half of a sundried tomato, topped with a slice of provolone cheese baked right on top. There were so many different flavors and all were so very good. I bought an extra 1/2 dozen for the ride home and almost ate them all myself. If we ever do move to Port Angeles I may just have to rename this blog My Bagel Diary. Droooooooooool. After that, our first stop was Crescent lake. We just stopped long enough to throw in a million rocks, take photos of each other, and take some for a Korean family, eat another bagel, or two, and head back out.

After the bagel feast we had to work off some of those calories by playing at the beach. The first beach we stopped at was rocky and beautiful. The kids had so much fun exploring and climbing.

That last one there is a self portrait, because I'm too ridiculously vain to post a pregnant photo of myself. I know, so silly.

After the rocky beach we drove only about a mile or two south and found a lovely sandy beach (where yesterday's photo was taken) and we all had a blast chasing the waves and getting sand in ever crevice of our bodies.

Yeah, we had a total blast!

A Photo

More about this later....

These Shoes Were Made For Walking

And that's just what they'll do. One of these days these shoes will make me walk away from you.

I'm walking away from blogland for a week, or until Monday, which ever comes first. =) I will feel bad for not coming around and commenting on your blogs, and I'll miss the ego boost I get from your lovely comments everyday. But I'll be back. You know I will. Until then, I recommend that you read these lovely posts from Scribbit's Writeaway contest. These were the ones that I had such a hard time picking from (Besides the winner and the runner ups. If you haven't read the runner ups, please do, they are great).

The Shoes That Brought Me Here (The circle of life in shoes)

Sole Defining (A moment that is just too perfect)

The Line (Insightful, educational, and my favorite line is: "living above the shoe line")

Allergic To Weddings (Funny)

Daddy's Girl (I can't help but love this one because of my own memories of my father)

Until Monday...

'Tiss The Season

Last night, after putting the kids to bed, I ran out the door to return some movies and to redeem my Baskin Robbins free birthday scoop coupon. I was so excited to see that they had Baseball Nut in their cases. Baseball Nut: "A summer favorite since 1961, this homerun combines Vanilla ice cream, loaded with cashews and a black raspberry ribbon."

Several months ago I ran to BR for this very flavor in an intense pregnancy craving moment (Remember how I couldn't eat ice cream for awhile there? This was the first day that baby was going to let me eat it again) only to learn that it is a seasonal flavor. This ticked me off. It isn't as if people's tongues change with the seasons. If I like Baseball nut in June, I like it just as much in January. But who am I to fight against the machine? So I waited. And the waiting paid off. Not only did they have the flavor but they had just opened a fresh new tub of it (and there wasn't a pile of nasty old ice cream from the tub before sitting on the top waiting to go in my cone).

I threw my coupon on the counter, grabbed my cone with a hurried, "Thank you!" and ran to the car. And I did something I don't think I've really ever done. I sat in my parked car and ate while listening to the radio... all by myself. I didn't care if people saw me eating, or wondered why I was just sitting there with a goofy smile as I licked my coldness. I just sat and enjoyed a small moment of quite, tasty bliss. Ahhhhhh, it was good. =)

Happy Baseball Nut season, everyone.

Oh, and the winner has been picked for Scribbit's monthly Writeaway contest (for which I was the judge this month). If you need some fun reading, go check out the great stories all written on the theme of "shoes."

Prepare To Be Jealous

How do you totally surprise someone for their birthday? Act like you are going to totally surprise them for 4-6 years before you actually do. =)

WARNING: Despite years of my mother telling me it isn't nice to brag I'm about to brag my brains out here. If you don't like braggy people, please do not read this post and try to continue thinking of me as a humble person. Thank you.

For years now, Mr. Hotness has wanted to throw me a party or do something really cool for my birthday, but every year something got in his way: he forgot to plan ahead, we didn't have the money, or he just didn't know how to do it. So, I've had simple birthdays. Last year I opted to just stay home, watch SpongeBob, and eat cheesecake and pizza because having happy kids meant having a happy mommy. This year I turned 30 and Mr. Hotness kept telling me we had to do something big to celebrate (but he said the same thing when I was turning 29). I am so pregnant, my hair is so out of control, and my feet are so fat, that I really didn't feel like doing anything at all. I kept telling him I just wanted to see a movie, eat my favorite birthday dinner, and that was it (and I wasn't even expecting those to happen because we've had a tough time getting our babysitter now that she works). He kept telling me not to schedule anything on my birthday (just like he has for the past 6 years), but wouldn't tell me anything else.

My birthday comes and Mr. Hotness doesn't get up for work, so I figure he has taken the day off. I get up to make breakfast, school lunches, and to get the kids ready for school and the babysitter, while Mr. Hotness enjoys sleeping a little longer. I am serving the kids their french toast when Mr. Hotness comes out and says, "You haven't eaten breakfast, have you?!?!"


"No, not yet, why?"

"I'm not telling you why, just don't eat breakfast."

"Ooookay."

"What do you have planned for today?"

"Well, I'm taking the kids to school, then I have to drop the other kids off at the babysitter while I go to a doctor's appointment. Around 3 I will pick the kids up from school, and then I'm just going to enjoy my birthday."

"Why did you schedule a doctor appointment??? I told you not to schedule anything."

"Well, I didn't know you weren't going to work so I thought you meant not to schedule anything for the time that you are usually home."

"It's ok, this will still work."

"What will still work?"

"Nothing."

"Ooookaaaay."

Turns out he is taking me to breakfast. I think, "Aw, how sweet. This is my surprise." My friend was willing to watch the kids earlier so that we could eat before my appointment. I normally don't like going out for breakfast because breakfast is easy to make at home, but the place we went to actually served a fantastic breakfast. I had Swedish pancakes with loganberry butter and compote.

Then we picked up the kids and Mr. Hotness says, "Ok, now you get to choose between seeing Iron Man or going to McCormick and Schmicks for stuffed salmon."

"What about the kids?"

"I have that all taken care of." I started to panic because I am very very paranoid about who I let watch my kids. But Mr. Hotness did great and picked one of my very trusted, and best friends to watch them. It was a tough choice between the two but I settled on the salmon because it won't be coming out on DVD later. This salmon is my usual birthday treat. A big hunk of fresh salmon, stuffed with crab, shrimp, and brie cheese. Absolutely decadent! Even the mashed potatoes and veggies were cooked and seasoned perfectly. The weather was gorgeous! The restaurant overlooks lake Union and so we sat and watched water planes taking off and landing while I licked my plate clean. Mmmmm. They even gave me a free slice of scrumptious key lime cheese cake, but we took it to go because I was stuffed. I was so happy driving back to get the kids, telling my hubby how happy he had made me on my birthday, and thanks for arranging the babysitter and for all the yummy treats. I figured this was the surprise.

We get to my friend's house to get the kids and Mr. Hotness tells me I'm staying there. "What?" My friend, Jamie, pulls me into her house and says, "I'm babysitting you." Hmmmm, what is going on here? I'm worried that he might actually be planning a surprise party for me because I left the house with wet hair which was now all over the place, my breath was nasty after 2 meals, and my clothes were also a bit dirty after two meals (I can't eat without spilling when pregnant). I asked her for a curling iron and she said, "No." What kind of friend would deny a girl a curl? We sit and talk till her babysitter shows up and then she says, "Time to go." I was really worried now that I was going to have to face people looking so scrudgy (which happened to me the only other time I've had a surprise party thrown for me). But Jamie didn't take me home. She took me to the Gene Juarez Beauty salon. I start crying, just a bit and then stop before my face puffs up. Mr. Hotness has arranged for me to get my hair done, my face done, and my nails done. I've been so badly in need of a haircut but am way too cheap to get one. This place was amazing. They have you remove your shirt and put on a robe, they ask you what you want to drink, and then you sit by the fireplace till it is time for your appointment. This was one of the very very few times I've liked, no... loved, going to a beauty salon. The guy who did my hair actually listened to me and gave me a perfect cut. I have funky hair so a perfect cut is very hard for me to get. Then I went to the makeup counter and asked the lady if she could somehow hide all my embarrassing acne scars and pregnant blochyness. She did!!! And without making me look like a Glamour Shots photo. I looked in the mirror and actually had normal skin looking back at me. YAY! I asked her how much the "camouflage" paste and powder cost. It was too much. But then I cancelled the manicure (my nails are so short and I don't like the way my fingers look when wearing nail polish anyway) so I figured I would break even with buying the makeup. Now I'm excited to go out again, or to even get a family photo taken after the baby is born because I can hide my blemishes rather than photo shop them out (which I do). I came out happy. THIS was the big surprise!

But then Jamie grabs my arm, "We aren't done yet." There is more? She takes me to Motherhood and tells me that Mr. Hotness has instructed her not to let me leave until I find some outfits that makes me feel sexy. With everything I tried on she asked, "Do you feel sexy?" If I said no I wasn't allowed to buy it, no matter how cheap or practical it was. I came away with three new shirts (I wore the one in the picture out of the store), a super cute and comfy pair of cuffed capri jeans, and nursing pajamas with a matching onesie for the baby. "Ok, Liz, do your shoes make you feel sexy?" I tried to convince her that there was no way we were going to find shoes that could pull of such a miracle with my marshmallow feet, but like a good friend she insisted. We went to Payless (I didn't want to waste too much money on a pair of shoes that I hopefully won't be able to wear once my feet go back to normal) and we actually found a roomy, comfy, cute, as-sexy-as marshmallows-can-get, pair of shoes. Then we stopped into another store and I found some sexy, affordable, stretchy camisoles that I can use even after I've had the baby. They are extra long so I can wear them under all the shirts that don't quite cover the panel on my maternity pants. LOVE THEM! And they are lacey so I feel sexy when I wear them. I feel so completely spoiled at this point that I have to try really hard not to return all the clothing in a fit of humble frugality or cry and ruin my perfectly spackled face. This was the best surprise I've ever had. I was so overwhelmed and ready to get back to my Mr. Hotness to thank him for my wonderful day.

Jamie takes me home (she also got a fab new haircut and a cute new shirt) and I see cars all over the place. He didn't. Did he? He did!!! I come through the door and everyone shouts "Surprise!" Everyone but Mr. Hotness who was actually out grabbing some last minute things. I hid and when he came back I jumped out and yelled surprise to him. He seemed to like my new "sexy" look and I couldn't help but cry at this point for all he had done for me. And now I have to brag about what a wonderful job he did putting together this party. He thought of everything. He invited all my friends, old and new. He had it catered with Indian food, one of my absolute favorites! He even thought to have pizza and Cheetos on hand for all the kids. Several people brought food too so we also had Brazilian food and more Indian goodies. Mr. Hotness refused to let me do any work (my usual way of surviving parties) and made me socialize, and it was actually very fun being able to talk with everyone. Meanwhile, Mr. H was busting his cute hiney taking out garbage, fetching more cups and plates, making sure the food table was stocked, getting the cakes ready for me, etc. He even thought to put together a pinata, one of my favorite birthday things, and organized the whole whacking set up. We all took turns hitting it till Mr. J finally knocked it clear off the rope and the kids went diving for their candy. Then Mr. Hot brought out the birthday cakes. He had bought 2 gigantic cheesecakes. When he brought one of the cakes to me, with candles lit, and everyone following him singing to me, I started crying again. Monster Man asked why I was crying, "Because, Sweety, mommy just isn't used to all this attention." Cheesecake.... Mmmmmm, (so much for following the doctor's advice to watch what I eat till the baby is born). Food, friends, and fun. What a wonderful surprise. But it STILL isn't over.

Then came the last gift. I had mentioned last month that I would like to get an iPod for my birthday so I could listen to music while cleaning and running (after baby is born), and because my sister has found that her kids are willing to do hours worth of chores when they get to listen to the iPod while cleaning. All I wanted was one that played music and podcasts. Have you seen the new iPod shuffle? It is the size of a pat of butter, and just clips right onto your clothes, and it is only 30 bucks. Perfect! So did I get the iPod shuffle? Nosiree, bob! Mr. Hotness went a bit further and got me the new iPod Touch. Have you seen this thing? It is amazing. I'm not even tech savvy enough to describe it to you, other than to say that I LOVE it and already can't imagine my life without it. Now, when people give me a date for an event, instead of hoping I will remember, or scrounging for a pen and paper, I just plug it into my iPod. Saturday night we met up with six other adults for dinner at a fancy restaurant. We were the only ones that brought our kids, and after my kids had reached their "perfect manners for an hour" limit I turned on my iPod and they watched several episodes of PBS programs for children (Sesame Street and SuperY) quietly while all the adults continued to talk in peace for an extra 2 1/2 hours. And now I'm learning Spanish while I clean.

Come to find out, Mr. Hot had been planning this whole thing for weeks. I even found his "cheat sheet" later and it was even more touching seeing all the work he did putting it together. He even had the whole day planned down to the half hour.

Thank you, Mr. Hotness. You made me feel pampered, special, and completely loved. Thank you for working hard to afford such a day. Thank you for giving up the time it took to plan and put together such a wonderful day. Thank you for making it a complete surprise. Thank you for treating me like a queen. Thank you for making me cry. I love you!

DSSH, Further Known As....

My DSSH loves to tease me about blogging and his latest favorite tease is about my bloggy alias for him: DSSH. I have told him many times that it stands for Dear Sweet Sexy Hubby but he likes to say it means Dumb Stupid Sloppy Husband. He says that I am smart to use an acronym because then I can change the meaning anytime I want (like when talking to him vs. talking to my friends). He knows this isn't true, and all he has to do it read my blog to see that I'm often bragging about him, he just does this to bug me. And it works. So, like the time he kept telling me he didn't want anything for Christmas that couldn't fit in a stocking:

I am dedicating this post to him and to the reBloggening of his name.

*Sound the trumpets!!! Drum roll, please.

From this day forward, let DSSH (Dear Sweet Sexy Hubby)

be bloggingly known as Mr. Hotness!

Mr. Hotness is a total stud man. Watch as he takes on a whole army of devils:

Be amazed as he moves mountains for his children:

See how hot he is in a wet suit. (I wish I looked that good in a wet suit):

And see what amazing babies he makes with his hotness genes?

I love my Mr. Hotness more than I love artichokes, cheesecake, ice cream, movies, TV, I even love him more than *gasp* blogging. Mr. Hotness, I love you!

Oh, and if you are just dying to know about my awesome birthday adventure you are going to have to wait till Monday. It was so awesome it is going to take more time than I have to blog it today. Let me just say that my awesome Mr. HOTNESS exceeded all possible expectations and I cried several times I was so overwhelmed. He scored 10 years worth of birthday brownie points from me for yesterday.

And thank you to all of you wonderful bloggers who wished me a happy birthday. You guys made me feel extra special. =)

You Do The Math

Cheesecake + Candles x Thirty =???

Yuppers, I'm one year older and wiser (or weirder) today. I'd post something great right now but DSSSH says he is whisking me away on some Birthday adventure, so I hope you won't mind me recycling an old Birthday post. =)

May 15th, 1978

Great Literature Part II and Friday Preschool

I've been wanting to post about how I get my children to love Great Literature for a while now and finally stole some time today to do so. Here is how I am instilling a love of good books (that have nothing to do with SpongeBob, Scooby Doo, Or Captain Underpants) into my son, Monster Man:

Every Friday I open my doors to a group of silly, rambunctious, rowdy, loud, and overly energetic boys, and I happen to be the mother of one of them. After we made the decision to put Pablo into public school I realized that Monster Man was going to need something extra in his life to keep from getting lonely and bored in his homeschooling. In order to help him I decided to invite the sons of several of my friends to join us every Friday for a couple of hours for preschool/kindergarten (we are also part of a co-op that meets on Tuesdays). The curriculum I'm using for these classes comes from Five In A Row. I had always heard great things about this but was too cheap to invest in it. A friend let me borrow her manual and I have to say I LOVE IT! I'm being greedy and holding onto her copy until I get my own, or until she pries it from my cold, dead fingers.

What is Five In A Row? Click here for the web site, but I must say I didn't find their web site to be very user friendly. It is boring to read, has no pictures, and doesn't help an impatient, tightwad, person like me. So, I will give you my best go at a review here. FIAR takes good, classic children's literature/picture books and helps you squeeze every little bit of learning you can from them. With each children's book you cover the subjects of Social Studies, Language Arts, Art, Math, and Science. If you do just one subject a day and read the book each time, you've covered the story five times in a row (see how they get the title?). One of the great things about this technique is that you can apply it to any of your favorite children's books. So what I do is, on Friday, we start the class with Social Studies, then we read the book, we try to do one or two more subjects, and then I send them home with things to finish. Here is what I did for one of my own favorite books that wasn't in the FIAR manual.

Bells of Santa Lucia

(You can read the book description by clicking here)

We started class by using our globe. We found where we live and then we took an imaginary journey by train, then boat, then car, then donkey, into the village of Santa Lucia in Tuscany, Italy. We talked about modes of transportation, and how some villages, even today, require people to enter on foot or by small pack animals. We learned some basic Italian phrases and tried to use them as often as we could through the class time.

Then finished by coloring the Italian flag and circling the location of Tuscany on a map of Italy.

Then we read the story of a young girl who lives in the "city of bells", but because of her sadness she can't stand the sound of bells. Then, in the end, she learns that bells are good things, they help us and help those we love, and she is happy again.

After the story we talked about modern day bells (fire alarms, car horns, alarm clocks, doorbells, etc.) and each child was given a little jingle bell tied to a ribbon to wear on their wrist "So their mommies would know where they are." =)

I explained personification to them and we went back through the book to find examples. Then we drew pictures of the personifications on this worksheet (it was so cute seeing pictures of grapes drinking a sun through a straw, or clouds munching on the sun):

Then I made up this little worksheet for math using a bell theme to teach the idea of subtraction. I try to stick with fact families for math, which is why they begin with 6 bells for each problem.

I've given each child their own folder and I write the title of each book we cover on the front of their folder along with a small circle for every worksheet or assignment they are given. For each completed assignment they get a sticker to fill in a circle. This helps motivate them to finish their work at home through the week.

I can't say enough good things about this program, and am loving it to death. If anyone would like to try it without buying the book (though the book is worth the money) I have made worksheets and have lesson plans that I would love to share for the following books:

Harold and the Purple Crayon

Make Way for Ducklings

The Little House by Virginia Lee Burton

The Man Who Tried To Save Time

Tikki Tikki Tembo

And here is a photo of my darling boys and the paper dragons we made after reading Tikki Tikki Tembo (you'll see Pablo in the back because he had a day off school that day. Now he is constantly talking about the next time he will get to do FIAR with us so I plan on doing it through the summer, hopefully):

Picture This

WARNING: To all my friends at church, one of the dangers of being friends with me is that you might accidentally end up with your picture on my blog. If you don't want it on here, just let me know and I will take it down. (Better to ask forgiveness than permission, right?)

Here are pictures of some of the things I did this weekend.

BABY SHOWER

Ok, when I was first asked to help with a baby shower I said, "Sure, as long as you only ask me to do the food." You see, I don't really do baby showers. I don't throw them, I don't go to them, I don't want one for me... nothing against them, I'm just not big on them. So, it was agreed that I would just do food. In the end, though, I was in charge of anything but the food. I panicked, I procrastinated, and then I stayed up till 3am and woke up at 6:30am Saturday morning putting all this stuff together. It turned out just fine in the end and I'm so glad it did. But I still don't do baby showers. Here is what we did (In the end I was glad I didn't do the food because the ladies that did did a fantastic job):

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I made a Well Wishes Quilt that all the guests got to sign and write a little message on for the new baby (who is darling, by the way).

As people came into the room I put a sticker on their back that had an item on it having to do with pregnancy or babies. People could only ask yes or no questions to figure out what their sticker said and the winner got a prize. Knowing that we are all experienced mommies, I tried to make them difficult. Here are some of the words:

Baby Puke, Caster Oil, Pediatrician, Pregnancy Test, Breast Pump, Circumcision, Poopy Diaper (Poop was kind of my theme), etc.

The women seemed to have a lot of fun figuring these out, and we had to remind everyone to take the stickers off. Can you imagine going to the store with "Breast Pump" on your back? =)

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This next one is actually the first baby shower "game" I ever played. I think I was 9 years old. I made little felt diapers, painted 3 with brown craft paint in the bottom, and filled with M&Ms or cashews. If you got a "poopie" one you got a prize. People seemed to really like this.

This is an oldie but I gave it my special touch. You are supposed to guess what the "poop" is in the diapers, and the person to get the most right gets a prize. Some people do this with melted candy bars, some do it with baby food, I did it using food combinations from my kitchen, and the results were fantastically real. It was so much fun watching everyone sniffing, handling, and talking about these dirty diapers. In the diapers there were:

1. Chocolate pudding and corn kernels

2. Sweet and sour sauce

3. Whole grain deli mustard

4. Hoisin sauce

5. Peanut butter mixed with canned peas

6. Molasses

7. Canned pumpkin and crayon shavings

Then, while the mom opened her gifts we gave all the women a small plate and some play dough. They sculpted their best baby and which ever baby the mom picked as her favorite won a prize. Mine is #7

COMING HOME

DSSH was a dear and had the kids doing their chores when I got home. But no one knew where Sweet Terror was. Hmmm...

MOTHER'S DAY

This is what DSSH let me wake up to. Mmmmmm. I LOVE LOVE LOVE strawberries smothered in Nutella.

I have to hide it from the kids if I want to get any, though. Sorry, Sweet Terror, but this is MY Mother's Day treat. =)

We did many other things this last weekend but I am much too exhausted to write about them. In fact, I've been providing my husband with lots of entertainment as a Narcoleptic, falling asleep in the oddest situations. But it was a busy, fun, and very enjoyable weekend.

How was your weekend?

Loving Mother's Day

Do you love Mother's Day? The first time I heard that a mom might not be ecstatic about this day was from my mom during an honest moment. Since then I have heard it often and from many women. Just the other night I heard a phenomenal mother tell me, "Aw, I HATE Mother's Day. Always have, always will."

This reminded me of the day that I felt the same way. It was Mother's Day 2003, I think. I remember my husband and kids saying "Happy Mother's Day" to me and that was pretty much it. It was a busy, hectic Sunday just like any other. After a few upsetting Mother's Days this was the worst. I was hurt, and very sad. To be fair, my husband was in grad school, very busy, very stressed out, very poor, and our children were very young. But I hated Mother's Day that day. I figured that if it just didn't exist I wouldn't have any reason to be upset. Honestly, though, I didn't hate the day, I hated the unmet expectation. I hated the lack of fanfare, the absence of feeling special, the void of feeling any different from every other day of the year. I suddenly knew why Moms were saying they hated mother's day.

But I didn't want to hate mother's day. It broke my heart when I heard that my mom didn't like it. I never wanted my kids to feel like I didn't feel special on that day, no matter what they didn't do for me. (By the way, mom, I ABSOLUTELY don't blame you for not liking mother's day in the past, or even to this very day as I am one of the worst people at doing anything for you on this day. I'm sorry!!! I love you and you are a fantastic mother.) Having your kids believe that they make you happy on this day is like letting them believe in Santa for as long as they want. It just makes them happy. Even husbands like believing this. But I didn't want it to be a lie, either, I wanted to really enjoy Mother's Day.

Here is what I did:

1. I changed my expectations. If you ask moms what they want on Mother's Day most of them say they want one day free of being a mom. That is what I wanted. I wanted one day of no cooking, cleaning, diaper changing, whiny kids, pleasing my husband, or doing anything that wasn't just for me. I also wanted to be celebrated, treated like royalty, to have one perfect day. And with expectations like that how could I NOT be let down?

But Mother's Day isn't about not being a mom anymore. It is a day to celebrate being a mother. So, I erased all the above expectations and decided that on Mother's Day I was going to find joy in my motherhood and nothing else. Anything else would be a pleasant surprise. Now on this day I laugh more with/at my kids, I refuse to yell, I give up all guilt, smile evily at people who are annoyed by my kids, don't worry about how they are dressed, what they eat, or anything else. It is a fantastic day.

2. I started treating myself. Sometimes we need to show people how to treat us by treating ourselves that way first. I now go to the store the day before Mother's Day and buy strawberries, whipped cream, flowers, whatever I want for meals the next day, and maybe even a new piece of jewelry (but I don't spend more than $15). If my husband wants to beat me to the punch on this, he is more than welcome, but otherwise I do it and I am always happy the next day when I can enjoy my treats.

3. I stopped blaming my husband. It is Mother's Day, not Wife's Day. Sure, a man should honor his wife for being the mother of his children, but he can do that all year long and on other days of the year. Once I gave up the idea that he was in charge of Mother's Day I was able to love him and not be angry with him for "failing me".

4. I allowed myself the same freedom regarding Father's Day. I can encourage the kids to celebrate the day. I can help them carry out their plans. But I don't have to feel pressured to do it all, or to even do anything (though I try to). Now I can't feel bitter because I "did more for him than he did for me". It isn't up to us, but to our kids.

Now comes the good part. I made all these decisions the day after that sad Mother's Day in 2003. The following Father's Day the kids and I picked out a candy bar for my husband (the kids' choice of gift) and we all signed a card. This was very little compared to the previous Father's Day fanfares. My husband was a bit hurt and disappointed. When he mentioned it I nicely, without any malice because there was no malice to be had now, said, "But it is more than I got for Mother's Day." He was sure that wasn't true but when I asked him to tell me what they did for me that day he couldn't think of anything.

Ever since that day I have had marvelous Mother's Days. And I have to thank my husband for all the effort he puts into them now. He really goes out of his way to treat me right. But it is my new outlook on this Holiday that really lets me feel joyful. It no longer matters if things don't go just right, it doesn't hurt if something keeps my husband from getting it put together, and it doesn't even bother me if the kids are grumpy and mean to me that day. I just smile, remember how blessed I am to be a mother, and enjoy the look of my new bracelet. =)

I hope all you mothers have a very enjoyable Mother's Day !!!

More Green Beans

I am still too busy to sit and write a thoughtful post today. Tomorrow I am putting on a baby shower for one of my friends from church, and I'm just starting on the quilt that I want to make her (I'm such a procrastinator). If it weren't for my other friend, sariqd, I would have had to give up the idea of a quilt because I'd still be putting off all the things she helped me finish yesterday. I hope to have lots of photos of it to share next week as well as book reviews, movie reviews, jumping back onto Lara's Smart Habit Saturday (or should I even bother with the baby coming?), a post about autism spectrum disorder, a post about Friday preschool, and my promised posts about great literature for children, etc. See? I have high aspirations for this blog. Really I do. But for today you will have to be content watching how Sweet Terror gets her daddy to eat green beans. She used to do this almost every night as a way of avoiding her own food. Apparently daddies have a hard time saying "no" to little girls. (This was taken about a year and a half ago. Oh, and notice Monster Man's reaction to being asked about eating his carrots).

Kill The Green Bean!

Tomorrow, Michelle of In the Life of a Child is going to be hosting her new Picky Eaters Club carnival where you can come and share your tips for getting picky kids to eat. I'm posting mine today because there is no guarantee that I will even be able to sit down tomorrow, I'll be so busy. =)

Today I will tell you how I get my picky kids to eat green beans. I don't know why this only seems to work with green beans but it works like a charm. I must warn you, it is demented, very disturbing, and still makes me wince that my kids like it so much.

We kill our green beans in a tortuous, graphic, and very loud way. We eat them to death. It all starts with the pile of quietly uneaten green beans. I take notice and start my pleading-bribing-threatening routine. "Please? Just eat 5 of them for mommy. It will make me so happy to see you putting those wonderful vitamins in your body. Don't you want to be big and strong with super muscles like daddy? We'll make cookies after dinner if you can eat them all gone. Tell you what, I will pay you a penny for every green bean you eat. Tell you what, I will spank you for every green bean you don't eat!" Once I get to threatening my child over a green bean I realize that I need to think outside the box, and once again I fall back on this fail proof routine:

I salt their green beans, hold one up in front of the child's mouth, make it wiggle a little, and in a very high pitched voice say,

"Oh no, no, please don't eat me! Don't bite my head of off, oh please no!"

The kid promptly gets an evil smile on their face and chomps the poor guy's head off. Now comes a step that can't be left out or all they will eat is the head of every green bean. Now you must have the head scream in their mouth as they chew (don't forget to make it sound muffled as it is coming from inside the mouth).

"Ow, my head, ow. Oh no! Please don't bite my legs! Owie ow ow not my legs!"

To which the devil child will happily munch away at more of the poor, dying Mr. Green Bean. Keep going till you get all the way down to the toes and in they go.

Sadly you must sit there, hand feeding each and every green bean into their mouth, making horrific dying sounds, and feeling queasy, in order for them to eat all their green beans. The good news is that after they get a bit older you can just say: I know you can eat them so eat them.

And that, my friends, is how I've gotten all my kids to eat green beans. I may need therapy for it later, though.

Intruder

Last night we can home from our Cinco De Mayo feast at a local restaurant with our bellies much much too full of only so-so food. We sleepily drug ourselves through the door and downstairs to help kids brush their teeth. As we passed the back door my husband noticed that it was unlocked. That is very disturbing in these parts and something we try never ever to do. Who wants to find a naked crazy homeless person in their home (like this woman?), or something like that. Nothing looked disturbed downstairs so we continued getting the kids in bed, though I kind of wish someone had come and stolen my dilapidated entertainment center so I could get a new one.

Later it was just DSSH, Cookie, and me upstairs talking in the kitchen. DSSH went to enter the hallway towards the bathroom when I saw him jump back and stand staring into the hallway. I was sure there was a man holding a gun or something just as bad. It was worse. It was a black, crazy, freaky, 3 inch big spider resting just below eye level on our wall. We stood there staring, then laughing, then nervously trying to decide what to do with it. The spider must have been just as freaked out or he was sedately planning on how to eat us, because he wasn't moving either. I finally grabbed a big glass and a piece of paper and trapped it in the cup. I made DSSH slide the paper under because baby was threatening to make me puke up my tortilla chips. *shudder* It started to spaz out in the cup a little bit. Oh, and Cookie was having a grand ol' time just watching her parents act like wimps. Then hubby made the offhand comment that it looked like a hobo spider. I handed him the cup and ran to the computer and darned if he wasn't right. So my concerns of having a crazy hobo in our home were validated. Normally we just release our spiders back outside, but when you see pictures like this (scroll down to the bottom of the page) you just want the thing dead as dead can be. We flushed it, talked extensively about how freaky it was, sent Cookie off to bed to have nightmares, and got ourselves ready for bed as well. I sent Jon to go check on the kids and he came back rather quickly. "You aren't going to believe this..." Apparently the hobo had brought her boyfriend and he was trying to set up home by our shoe basket. Though he only measured in at a measly 2 1/4 inches he was still rather freaky himself. DSSH decided to kill this one his way, by chucking shoes at it while I laughed and shrieked.

As if going pee 5 times a night weren't annoying enough, now each pot stop takes 5 times as long as I carefully search every shadow and corner for a hidden hobo spider. The lesson here, folks, is to always, always keep your doors locked tight against intruders. But DSSH says that the lesson here is not to keep telling your husband the correlating scenes from Arachnophobia as he tries to save you from the killer spider or as he tries to go to sleep later that night.

I Miss My Ankles. A Whiney Post.

Some people's hearts swell with love. Some people are just swell people. Me, I swell with water retention. Here I have been whining about the lack of sunshine, the cold, wet weather, and the sorry excuse for a Spring that we've been having like a big baby. Yesterday we had a gloriously warm, sunshiny day. I was so happy I wanted to dance. I wanted to go on a picnic, drive to the beach, pick flowers and put them in my hair, and get the first sunburn of the year. I ran to the closet to slip my feet into my, until now, sadly underused sandals. But my feet wouldn't go in. I figured they must just be tight from non use, you know, like a pair of freshly dried jeans from the laundry. I tried harder, but it was a no go. In frustration I leaned over my big belly to try to see what was wrong, and then I saw them. My feet! Or were they water balloons? I couldn't tell. And what is with those ankles? Since when did my ankles have the same girth as my thighs? I wanted to grab a pin and pop them like water balloons. I wanted to hide in the closet till the baby is born. I wanted to go out and buy myself many floor length skirts to hide the monstrosities that were now my feet. I wanted to cry. I always swell up during the last months of pregnancy, but it never ceases to catch me off guard. How can a body look like that just all of a sudden? I had normal ankles the day before, and after just three hours of sitting in church each ankle seemed to have gained 20 pounds.

On the bright side I was able to witness the lovely results of patiently training/coaching a husband for the past ten years. I ran into his office and, sticking out my pachydermal protrusions, shrieked, "Just look at these! These aren't feet, they are mutant marshmallows!"

He looked, and without batting an eyelid was able to say, "What? I don't see anything but your lovely feet."

I, of course, had to point out every bulging vein, every discoloration, and the fact that I couldn't wrap two hands around my ankle (that is if I had been able to bend over that far). Still, he stayed strong. He pulled me onto his lap (managing not to grunt) and told me how lovely I am, how this will all go away soon, and how I will pop this baby out and immediately return to my super model body shape, and how I'm the most amazing woman he has ever known.

Yup, it may have taken me 10 years but I think I've finally taught my man exactly how I like to be lied to. =)