February Goals Revisited

Posted on February 29, 2012 by Jennifer

So it’s that time again.

Time to review which goals I have officially accomplished in February and which ones I needed about 5 more days to complete.

*Get Yearly Photos Framed – Check! These will be ready to pick up in a week and I will share them with you.

*Pay Library Fine – Check! We haven’t gone to the library in six months because I was convinced I had a large fine to pay. Turns out it was only $10.

*Make Birthday Skirt or Dress for My Daughter – Check! She wore the skirt to school on Monday and I’ll be sharing those pictures soon.

*Play more Music in the House– Check! – I played some music but not as much as I would have liked, though going from no music to some still counts as a check in my book.

*Figure out How to Keep My Car Clean– Check! I think! So far so good in the clean department. I shared with you here how I started the process and next week I’m hoping to share with you some storage holders I made for the car.

*Do the Art Project with Andrew he’s been asking to do– Check! Go here to see the process

*Hang “I Love You” Signs – Check!

*Make Jeopardy Game for etsy – Fail! It’s about 20% complete – will bring this goal over to March

*Paint Bedroom Lamps and Buy New Shades – Check! But not 100% sold on them yet. Will share soon.

*Read a Parenting Book – Check! I read How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen So Kids Will Talk by Adele Farber & Elaine Mazlish. I have to admit, I am not a big nonfiction reader so for me to read this is a big deal. I am so glad I decided to read it. The authors provide tons of scenarios and cartoons that show positive and negative ways parents and children interact. The book is meant to be used as a workbook but I chose to read it front to back since I wanted to make sure I completed it. Now that I’ve read the book through I’m going to go back and read each chapter more thoroughly and use it as a workbook.

One point the authors try and guide parents toward is not making all of the decisions and solving all of their children’s problems. One day Alex had a friend over and this was turning out to be a little difficult for Andrew. He wanted to be involved in all of their games and was feeling left out.

He came downstairs and said, “Alex and *** won’t let me play their game.”

I took my moment and seized it, “How does that make you feel?”

“It makes me angry and frustrated.”

Here was my biog move, “Ummmm.”

“I’m going to tell them I’m frustrated with them.”

AND HE DIDN’T COME BACK DOWNSTAIRS TO COMPLAIN AGAIN!

I’m hoping for more of these moments when I read the book again.

*Host a Mardi Gras Party – Check! Go here for the door wreath and here for the decorations.

*Do not accumulate one single bag while shopping – Check! I will admit I probably stretched out my purse a bit when I forgot my bags. Other times, I simply didn’t have enough bags so I would have the bagger just stick those remaining 8 items into the cart. I found myself saying several times, “I know it’s weird, it’s just a resolution I’m trying to keep. My friend emailed me about a great bag to use when out shopping for clothes so I have gone ahead and ordered one since placing new shirts in the bags that previously held onions is really not a smart choice.

*Scrapbook 10 pages in Andrew’s scrapbook – Check! Barely. 10 pages done.

***As a side note, last month I had the goal to drop $100 from our food budget. I failed miserably since I didn’t keep an ongoing written list of spending. This month I redeemed us by spending $300 less than what we normally spend on groceries… so we are back on track.

Overall, I feel like I accomplished a lot this month so I know the list is helping me. But. And it’s a big but… I feel like the list is constantly looming over me. When I was sick for a week this month I worried about all the wasted time. I may shorten my list for March since there’s birthday parties to plan and a whole week of spring break – and we all know that nothing off the list will get done that week.

Have you accomplished anything this month your excited about?

Art Project with Andrew

Posted on February 27, 2012 by Jennifer

My six year old has been asking for months to create a piece of wall art similar to this one.

source

I have stalled and stalled on it because 1) it would take a good amount of time to complete and 2) I couldn’t quite decide what the best way to make a frame for it would be.

But the since this project was on the list I was forced to make a decision and begin.

We looked around the garage and found this old Halloween decoration which was broken.

My husband add the ears which were previously the mummy arms while old metal coat hangers became the base for the antlers and the nose.

Using a mix of half Elmer’s glue and half water, Andrew and I paper mached strips of newspaper onto the structure.

Over the course of a week we put on four separate layers.

After a trip to the craft store to choose his colors, Andrew painted his gazelle with a combination of orange, coral, black, white, and blue colors.

There was a minor debate about where this piece of art should hang. Andrew suggested my bedroom which I quickly thanked him for but declined. My thought was for it to go in his bedroom room. He quickly declined that offer. We finally settled on an area in our playroom above a doorway.

Andrew’s already talking about making a water buffalo for the living room and an elephant for his sisters’ room.

I’m thinking I’m going to have to introduce him to the idea of small sculptures.

Chance to Win Something!

Posted on December 8, 2011 by Jennifer

I am giving away 3 sets of my bingo games to people over at I Heart Crafty Things.

Go on over there and enter.

You have a pretty good shot since only one person has entered so far 🙂

The Slide

Posted on December 6, 2011 by Jennifer

“This is going to be so exciting kids.”

“Let’s race, Mom.”

“OK, but this is just for fun.”

Here we go….

I’m ahead right now, yes!

Nice tactic Alex but leaning will get you no where when you’re racing me. You might as well pack it in right now suckas’.

Man, I’ve got skills – I might have been a professional luger had we lived in the right climate.

Ha! They are slowing down and my body keeps going – God knew what he was doing when he created this winning machine.

Oh, oh, oh, my legs are clearly across first.

Yes! I AM THE WINNER!

I mean, wasn’t that so much fun kids.

Running for Pie

Posted on December 1, 2011 by Jennifer

If you’ve read my blog anytime in the last 3 months you know I’m training for a half marathon and pretty much hating every step of it.

Regardless of this dislike, I am committed and will push on for two more weeks.

One big hurdle in getting to race day is over for one of my sisters and me.

On Thanksgiving we ran 9 miles. Definitely an accomplishment for us.

We ran 4 miles before a 5 mile Turkey Day run.

I use run loosely for myself but Kelly truly rocked it on the run.

7 AM before our run, about fifty degrees outside, apparently Kelly had some dribble issues that morning

Since we were running on Thanksgiving morning I felt I had a built in dangling carrot.

Mile one, I was running for turkey.

Mile two, I was running for stuffing.

Mile three, I was running for gravy.

Mile four, I was running for mashed potatoes.

And mile five, I was running for PIE!

My strategy worked for awhile but around mile four (really mile eight for us) is quite working. Right along with my Ipod. Now, I could hear my huffing and puffing along with everyone who was passing me by. Instead of mashed potatoes and pie I thought about pain and more pain.

Despite my negativity, I finished the race. I might add that I finished immediately ahead of a woman pushing a triple stroller containing two year old triplets. Some would be ashamed of that fact but I’m focusing on the AHEAD OF A WOMAN part.

It took me just under one hour and two minutes to complete the race while Kelly finished right at one hour. What can I say, her entire five miles were devoted to wine.

Car Trip Survival

Posted on November 29, 2011 by Jennifer

Here’s how to successfully complete a 10 hour car ride with your 3 children.

Yes. Let them watch movies. Lots and lots of movies.

In my opinion, Redbox movies and their kiosks are perhaps one of the greatest inventions ever.

Now I am not a person who advocates letting your children watch tv all day but for car trips I make an exception.

Over Thanksgiving I drove my kids to visit my parents for the week. My husband flew in Thanksgiving morning to make a guest appearance.

Typically, people describe a road trip by the weather, the traffic, or the snacks consumed.

Our trip, however, can be summed up by one word – movies.

I present to you the first journey of our trip…

…and because the first trip was so successful, here’s our return trip.

Happiness, contentment, and serenity (there was a moment of screaming from our two year old when my son put in “The History of Space” DVD but I’ve completely erased it from my memory).

All for the low low price of $10.44 round trip.

It may be $10.44 to Redbox but to me it was priceless.

Thankful Turkey

Posted on October 30, 2011 by Jennifer

This was originally posted last November when only 3 people read my blog – I will have our turkey ready for this Nov 1st as the kids have come to expect it now that this will be our third year sharing our thanks this way.

With the upcoming holidays I find my kids increasingly thinking about what they can get – i.e. video games or enormous toys. Therefore they have not set foot in a toy store since August and I hoard all toy catalogs that come to the house. I’ve been trying to really make it a point in the last year or two to help them think of others and be thankful for what they have.

Last year I made “Tom the Turkey” to help remind us that we are indeed lucky in many ways. I made Tom out of brown bags from the grocery store (yes I know cloth bags are important but sometimes you just need to have the brown bags for projects). Then I cut out feathers from construction paper that we had.

After dinner, everyone gets a feather and writes down what they are thankful for that day. Then we use a glue stick to put the feathers up. The boys seem to really enjoy this activity and won’t let us leave the table without filling out our feathers.

I included a picture of Tom from last year since this year’s turkey has tons of feathers covering his face.

A sampling of feathers from this year:

From the 8 year old:

I am thankful for….our car…having enough food on the table…going to Gramma & Grampa’s house for Thanksgiving….the Saints winning the Super Bowl.

From the 5 year old:

I am thankful for….Jesus & God…..the shepherd watching over me….going to Gramma & Grampa’s…..eating turkey (in reality he won’t touch the turkey or mashed potatoes with a 10 foot pole….Wyoming and Montana.

What can I say… the boy loves geography.

What are some of the ways your family shares what they are thankful for?

Spooky Tree…A New Tradition

Posted on October 5, 2011 by Jennifer

Last year as I was toodling around Goodwill I came upon this crazy looking metal tree. I had seen this piece in a magazine at some point and remembered it was an Easter decoration with decorated eggs hanging from it.

While I didn’t want an egg holder, I did want a spooky tree for Halloween. I bought the tree for $2.99 and brought it home. To say my husband was skeptical is an understatement. But as usual he gave me an unsure nod and said nothing. Thanks Derek!

I sprayed the piece black and let the kids decorate it. They spent a fair amount of time one Saturday morning working on it.

The main decorations were foam Halloween stickers – pumpkins, bats, and ghosts. They also included a mummy they printed out along with some homemade tombstones. The tombstones are made of a foam board covered with felt with letter stickers to create the R.I.P. messages.

I cut out a witch silhouette from foam board to add to the very top.

This year we were able to take out our spooky tree and redecorate it – a fun new tradition. It now sits on its new home, our dining room table…at least until Nov 1.

How’s your Halloween decorating going?

Free Museum Day – Saturday September 24

Posted on September 23, 2011 by Jennifer

Two years ago we visited the the Frontiers of Flight Museum in Dallas. Now a plane is a plane is a plane to me. But to the boys (including my husband) this place was wonderful because of its various aircraft and in depth aviation history section. I, on the other hand, only thought it was wonderful since it was free. We went on the national Smithsonian Magazine Museum Day.

Tomorrow it is happening again all over the US.

Each of the 50 states has one or more museums participating. Just in the Dallas area alone there are 10 museums participating.

The one catch to this program is that you have to have a ticket which was printed out from the website. You cannot show up to the museum empty handed hoping to get in for free.

Each ticket you download is good for two people. Make sure you read through the site in order to download your ticket and to receive your confirmation emails. Remember, no ticket, no free entrance.