Category Archives: Alex

Thankful Turkey

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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.

thanksgiving turkey

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?

Todays Creative Blog Tuesday To Do Party

Monster Food & Mummy Wraps

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We had our second annual Halloween party over the weekend and for the second time I forgot to take any pictures. I set up these photos after everyone had gone home and right before I crashed on the couch. In addition to the new food below, I also served the same food from last year.

Marshmallow Pops: Place stick through marshmallow, dip in chocolate, add sprinkles, thank husband for wonderful marshmallow holder he created, place in refrigerator for 20 minutes

Marshmallow Holder : spare wood with holes drilled into it

Food on a stick is always popular and these were no exception.

Chocolate Witch Fingers – Use a paint brush and melted chocolate to paint the fingernails. Allow to cool in the refrigerator for ten minutes. Fill up remaining space in the mold with different colored melted chocolate. Lay pretzel sticks into the chocolate and cover with more chocolate. Place in fridge for 20 minutes.

Chocolate Grave Stone: same idea as the fingers minus the pretzels

Halloween Cookies (known in our house as the Christmas cookies despite the shape of the cookie or the time of the year)

Alex and Andrew named and labeled all of the party food. Dracula’s Skin was banana bread slices while the Monster Teeth were Rice Krispie Treats. They had a lot of fun creating these…let’s just say the Marshmallow Pops above were labeled Frankenstein Poop. Yes, we through classy affairs around here.

Along with our party boards, there were games and crafts to keep the kids busy. A big hit with the 3 to 7 crowd was my Halloween Bingo, I gave plastic spiders to the winners.

The fourth grade crowd primarily ignored my games in favor of a football game but did decide to stop to play the “Mummy Wrap.”

Kids got into groups of two with a roll or two of toilet paper and wrapped each other as mummies.


That WRAPS up (Ha!) another edition of our Halloween party. The left over Rice Krispies have been eaten by me (about 20 in 2 days – NOT A JOKE!) and the games put away until next year. Hope your Halloween is filled with lots of sugar and dressing up.

Halloween Giving

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As a parent, I am always trying to find ways to help instill “giving” and “thinking of others” in my children. My kids are very blessed and I would like them to view themselves that way one day, even now. I think it can be a delicate balance to try and keep kids innocent while at the same time allowing them to be informed people.  I try and choose opportunities which allow them to make some choices and feel ownership in their giving.

I was reading the paper a week ago when I came across this brief news item.

Kids Hospital Seeks Halloween Costumes

I instantly felt this was a project my kids could be involved in. This was the same hospital we had visited only a month earlier. Honestly, I hadn’t thought once about the kids at the hospital in October. I always thought about families celebrating Christmas at the hospital but never Halloween.

The costumes needed to be new and in a bag to limit germ exposure. They were looking for costumes in size 10 and up and 2 and under.

I showed the kids the article and asked them if they wanted to participate. The catch was that I asked them to donate $1 of their money to help cover the costs, I would pay the difference. My six year old immediately said yes while my nine year old was hesitant. After a little pressure from his brother he agreed.

After school one day I took them to the Halloween store and let them choose a costume to donate. They examined the costumes for fifteen minutes, discussing each one in detail.

They finally settled on a Clone Trooper costume from Star Wars. Caroline and I settled on a ladybug costume as our choice.

We paid for the costumes and left.

I was extremely proud of my children. Not once did the boys ask for a costume or an accessory and not once did they complain that their costumes were made from Goodwill clothing.

The kids went with my husband to the hospital to drop off the costumes. They left them at the front desk for the child life specialist to pick up and bring back to some deserving child.

Hopefully two ill children or their siblings will enjoy dressing up and being a kid in those costumes. More importantly, I hope this is a giving tradition our family will continue for many years.

 


Halloween Party Boards

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Today I am sharing with you Party Boards I made for our Halloween party. These boards make great photo ops and the kids just love them, especially when the adults participate.


Here are the supplies you will need: wooden board, paint, tracer (although you could free hand it), chunky blocks, and a photo of the image you want to create on your board.

Place the image under your tracer and use as much of the space as possible.

I used a red sharpie here to trace my lines but a black one would be even better. You will cover up your lines with paint in the next step.

Paint the sections of the image with your desired colors. For this Super Girl board I used paints I already had in my stash.

Once the entire piece is colored you will question whether the end product will turn out well. Do not worry. Forge ahead with your black paint pen or thick Sharpie. This tool will make all the difference in the world.

Cut two large blocks for legs and cut slits into their middles.

The large board then slides into the ground blocks in order for the structure to stand.

Cut out a hole for the face and you are ready to party!

Here are some other party boards we have made for parties.

Have fun creating your own party boards!

Remember to enter the GIVEAWAY for a free personalized Christmas card design – ends Friday

Becolorful Remodelaholic

A Star

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Saw this decal on a car today while I was walking to Alex’s lacrosse game.

My Kids a StarA star in preschool?

Does their preschooler feel pity towards the other kids who are furiously scribbling on their paper and shamefully coloring outside the lines?

While eating does their preschooler watch in horror as the other children continue to carry on a conversation with a piece of peanut butter on their face?

Does their preschooler shoot scornful looks as their classmates dare to dress up in mismatched clothing?

Next week I’m going to park my car next to the “star car.”

I’ve designed a decal for my car I’d like them to see.

Might conflict with the “Be kind to others” and “Everyone is important” messages we’ve been trying to foster in our children but I’m ready to chance it.

Spooky Tree…A New Tradition

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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?

A Look Back at Our Halloween Costumes

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As we are narrowing down our costume choices for this year, I thought it would be fun to take a trip down memory lane at our past Halloween costumes.

Through the years the kids have come to expect me to make their costumes and believe I can make just about any character. While that may not be true and some of the costumes may be simple, I love making these and seeing their faces as they put them on.

2003
Kermit the Frog
 (green pants, green shirt, felt details, fabirc covered hat with half ping pong balls)
 
 
 
2004
Fireman
(pants, rain boots, raincoat, fire hat)
 
 
 2005
Winnie the Pooh & Roo
 
(Pooh: While shopping in Babies R Us one morning with the boys, Alex decided he wanted to try on the Winnie the Pooh costume. I put the one piece on him, zipped him up, and let him look in the mirror. When I went to get him out of the costume, the zipper stuck. I mean, would. not. budge! I tried and tried to get him out of the costume. I ended up getting scissors from a clerk and cutting him out. I now had to buy the costume and was now the proud of two pieces of a costume with a broken zipper. When I took the costume into Hancock Fabrics to ask if there was anyone I could pay to fix the costume, an employee took pity on me and fixed the costume for free. So that’s how Alex ended up being Winnie the Pooh for Halloween).
(Roo: Since we already had a Pooh I decided we needed a Roo. Andrew’s costume is actually a monkey costume with a blue shirt I wrote on over the costume).
 
 
 
2006
A Pirate and a Parrot
 
(Parrot: green overalls with Kermit the frog shirt from 2003, red hat, felt feathers in front and back connected by pins and elastic at the wrists)
(Pirate: shirt with iron on transfer, hat was bought, the rest of the costume (belt, hook, & pants were inherited from my sister’s college days – the pants were originally a skirt I altered from the original costume)
 
 
2007
A Saints football player & Curious George and the Man with the Yellow Hat
 
(Saints player: costume was given to Alex)
(Curious George: brown track suit, hat covered in brown felt with fabric ears I made, candy bucket was brown fabric covering the bucket with felt bananas attached)
(Man with Yellow Hat: yellow shirt from Goodwill, felt tie, felt covering a hat with rulers underneath to keep it standing up)

2008

Costume Party

Pirate & Captain Rex from Star Wars
(pirate costume with beard, store bought costume for Captain Rex – it killed me to buy this costume but I did it because he wanted it desperately)
 
 
 
Halloween Night
Captain Rex and Peter Pan
 
(Peter Pan was a store bought costume too – I caved in Party City)
 
 
 
 
2009
Night at the Museum Costumes
 
 (Sacagawea: brown material with added fringe & turquoise beads I sewed on)
(Larry Daley: regular clothes with name tag that read “Larry”)
(Fighter Pilot: not technically in the movie – consignment store costume)
(Teddy Roosevelt: brown pants, brown shirt, glasses, and belt from Goodwill, cowboy hat bought)
 
 
 
 
2010
Burger King, Dairy Queen, a Werewolf, Little Red Riding Hood, and a Ninja
 
(King & Queen: bathrobes from Goodwill with added fur trim, hat made from cardboard and silver tape, signs were made from sticky felt)
(Werewolf: regular clothes torn up with fur sewed into the clothes)
(Little Red Riding Hood: red skirt, white shirt, tights, consignment shoes, gingham fabric with red trim)
(Ninja: black pants & shirt, top shirt was fabric with hole cut out over head and tied with black fabric, black fabric wrapped around his head)

2011

??????????

What are some of your favorite Halloween costumes you remember?

Making Todays Creative Blog Weekend Bloggy Reading Tuesday To Do Party

Driver

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Dear Young Female Driver,

I would like to express my sincerest appreciation to you for teaching my children about white trash behavior today. It is with the utmost most respect that I retell this story so that others will bask in your glory.

I was leisurely driving my kids to piano lessons when I noticed the navy Honda Accord I was following gradually slow to a virtual stop in the middle lane. I slowed and waited until the Honda started moving again. I remember thinking at the time how odd it was to stop in the middle of the road. But silly me, you were just preparing for your lesson.

About one minute later, the slowing down occurred again. I was confused since there was not a light in sight. I see now that this was just your introduction.

I honked my horn to make you aware that you were holding up traffic and I was concerned about this potentially dangerous situation. You though were concerned with the lesson. Immediately after I honked, you gave me the finger. A beautiful up sweep of your left arm shooting upwards while pointing your middle finger to the sky. My nine year old was certainly paying attention now.

I took this as a teaching moment when all I really wanted to do was show you how graceful my arm movements can be.

“You see, Alex, this is what we call white trash behavior.”

In his entire nine years I had never broached the subject with him before but I see that you were right and I needed to widen his horizons.

After your initial teaching you swerved into the right lane.  I stayed back a bit but notice the light ahead had turned red. I pulled up beside you.

It is here where my six year old is also included in this life lesson since his view of you was now not obstructed.

You turn, just as I do, and scream “F**k you bitch.”

Such precious words for my children.

Normally I would have told my children you screamed, “Firetruck in the ditch!.” But you made sure there was no mistaking your sentiments with your rolled down window.

I could have continued on with your insightful teachings but I decided that our cup overfloweth with white trash knowledge for now. Best to leave some things for another day.

I took an unnecessary turn and left you to spread your wisdom to others.

What a wonderful teaching moment for my family.

In between being kind to others and telling the truth, I had neglected to share in the teachings of the middle finger and foul language.

Well done, young one.

And they say the youth of America doesn’t appreciate education…from where I’m sitting I’d have to disagree.

Fun with Rolls

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The last week of summer vacation was a little bit of a challenge in our family.

Everyone had been around each other just a little too long.

Arguements errupted for no reason, whining occurred at record amounts, and my patience was shot.

I knew I needed a project for the boys to work on so I scowered my house for ideas.

When I came across these fabric tubes in my guest room I was inspired.

Presenting..the Two Story Challenge

Using these tubes, get your hot wheels cars downstairs without using the steps.

And no, you may not throw your cars down.

After removing the fabric from the rolls, they got right to work.

A simple design was developed and executed using lots of duck tape

3…2…1….Go!

The tubes were taken apart at one point due to the two year stuffing objects at the top

Towels were placed at the bottom of the chute in order to protect the floor

A few hours into the challenge the basket was added

The basket was a necessary component to rest their weary legs

Eventually the picture was removed for fear of car and basket damage

If we ever need to get water from a well my kids are ready

This entertained my kids for three days! Obviously there were interuptions due to meals,  trips to the pool, and sports practices but listen to me when I say THREE DAYS!

There was even talk of adding a loop next time.

Go beg, borrow, or steal some fabric tubes from your local fabric store!

3D

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Most people enjoy 3D movies.

They might describe going to the movies as delightful, desirable, and divine.

After the end of my most recent 3D movie experience, I would not.

I would define my experience as distracted, disruptive, and a deterrent to ever returning.

Let me explain.

Last week my mom and I brought my kids to see Kung Fu Panda 2 at the dollar show.

Besides just being happy about going to the movies, my boys were thrilled it was going to be a 3D experience.

“We get to wear those glasses!”

Once we had settled into our seats and the lights went out I distributed the snacks. I passed out the theater bought ICEES and the smuggled in microwave popcorn (much to the chagrin of my mother).

Discarding her 3D glasses during the opening credits, my daughter was content to watch the movie without them while eating her animal crackers. Once the crackers were gone though she was ready to move.

After attempting to distract her several times and watching her run up and down the aisles, I took her out to explore the lobby.

Thankfully, the movie ended soon afterwards and we were able to scoot back to our seats to collect the rest of the family. As a group we walked to the back of the theater where the glasses recycling container was located.

While holding Caroline, I reached into my bag in order to retrieve our two pairs of 3D glasses. I pulled out 2 pairs of glasses and tossed them into the container.

Within moments I realized my mistake.

I had thrown my sunglasses into the recycle bin.

I ripped off the top of the receptacle and leaned into it but was only able to graze the top layer of glasses with my hand. Due to the dim lighting in the theater I couldn’t determine if any of the pairs I managed to grab were my sunglasses.

However, it was not dark enough to miss the strange stares I was receiving from audience members waiting to turn in their glasses.

Ignoring their stares I decided to drag the container into the hallway.

Once in the hallway, I pushed over the bin causing all the 3D glasses to spill on the floor.

There was a noticeable look of concern from the teenage ushers suddenly walking our way. Avoiding their stares I searched for my sunglasses until my nine year old declared, “I found them.”

I could swear I heard music. It was like the holy grail. Light shone from the heavens onto my son’s extended arm.

Perhaps not. But it sure felt like it.

Much to the delight of the ushers I turned the bin right side up and placed all of the glasses back in. I was going to drag the beast of a container back into the theater but was quickly told, “Thank you Ma’m. We’ve got it from here.”

I’m pretty sure they had already walkie talkied back to the front office about the crazy lady by theater four.

Delightful, desirable, and divine? No.

Difficult, disruptive, and distressing? Yes.