Sherwin Williams paint goes on sale today (40% off) so when you read this I am probably standing in line at Sherwin Williams buying a gallon (or two) of paint.
My husband is sooooooo excited that about this.
And that’s just because he thinks we’re painting the walls.
Wait till he finds out I have plans to paint the dining room ceiling.
Have a great weekend.
I know we will, my dear. 🙂
Each year I make a paper bag turkey and feathers for our family’s annual Thankful Turkey.
He usually gets called Tom the Turkey or Ted the Turkey and we add thankful feathers onto him each day.
Here’s a photo of our 2009 Tom:
This year I decided to upgrade us to brown wrapping paper.
I know, we are the last of the big spenders.
I found a turkey picture I liked, printed it out, and drew freehand the turkey onto the brown paper.
My children have informed me that it looks like Ted is holding his private parts.
Children.
You just have to love them.
Or tell them, “Do not say Ted the turkey is holding his private parts ONE MORE TIME!”
After dinner, everyone takes a feather (scrap paper I have) and writes down one thing they are thankful for that day.
After I had written my feather on the first day I asked my preschooler what she was thankful for.
She said God.
I decided to take that moment to add a bit to my feather.
Here are some more things we are thankful for…
But don’t worry the next holiday is never far from our minds.
And just to cover our bases…
🙂
Everyday, immediately after preschool drop off, where the teacher comes to the car and helps my daughter out, I vow that today will be the day I go home and clean out my car.
And yet, I don’t.
I’m just banking on the fact that my car is not the only toy filled, clothing filled, school work filled, and goldfish filled car they’ve seen that day.
I have shared some of our family’s favorite Christmas books (along with our Christmas Eve tradition) before so I thought it would be good to share some of our favorite Thanksgiving books.
I keep all of our holiday books together and only take out the ones that pertain to that month at the beginning of the month. I’m pretty sure that’s the former teacher in me coming out.
Nothing fancy for storing them – just some old milk crates in our storage closet. (Christmas – bottom shelf; Halloween – left of top shelf; February – right of top shelf)
It’s exciting to see all of our favorite books come out and sit and enjoy them. Please tell me about any favorites your family might have.
Ten Fat Turkeys by Tony Johnston
-Cute rhyming & counting book with each turkey falling off the fence after some mishap-
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I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie by Alison Jackson
*My friend Betty gave this book to my children years ago & it’s always a favorite – the illustrations show grandma eating the entire Thanksgiving dinner, even the pot it was cooked in!
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Arthur’s Thanksgiving by Marc Brown
Arthur is in charge of the school Thanksgiving play and he can’t find anyone willing to be the turkey –
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Thanksgiving Mice! By Bethany Roberts
-Adorable board book about mice putting on a Thanksgiving play, one of our favorites-
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Franklin’s Thanksgiving by Paulette Bourgeois
Franklin is sad because his grandparents can’t come for Thanksgiving. He decides to invite some friends to dinner without telling his parents.
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Olivia Talks Turkey by Farrah McDoogle
Olivia is up to her usual antics this time learning how to “call” turkeys with the help of her teacher Mrs. Higenmuller
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We Gather Together…Now Please Get Lost! by Diane DeGroat
We added this book to our Thanksgiving pile last year – Gilbert is not happy with his partner on the school field trip to Pilgrim Town so he ditches him once they arrive. Unfortunately it was not a good move for Gilbert.
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The First Thanksgiving by Garnet Jackson
– Simple reader that shares the Thanksgiving story –
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We’re Gong on a Bear Hunt by Michael Rosen
Not necessarily a Thanksgiving book but the illustrations indicate it’s cold and windy so I put it in our pile.
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A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving DVD
Not a book but one of my kids favorite holiday DVD’s – always fun to pull this out in November
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And here’s our new Thanksgiving book this year (book fairs sucker me in everytime)…my 8 year old LOVED this book and read the whole thing in one day, constantly spouting out facts he found interesting.
What Was the First Thanksgiving? by Joan Holub
This 100 page book is filled with illustrations, maps, pictures, and information about both the Indians and the Pilgrims.
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I’m already thinking about adding these books to our collection next year…
The Berenstain Bears Thanksgiving Blessings by Mike Berenstain
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The Night Before Thanksgiving by Natasha Wing
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Balloons Over Broadway: The True Story of The Puppeteer of the Macy’s Parade by Melissa Sweet
Obviously, I have a love for children’s books.
Happy Thanksgiving Reading everyone!
I have successfully eaten every Almond Joy and Heath bar within a 6 square mile radius of my house.
It might have something to do with the fact that I told my children those candy bars don’t taste good.
Or maybe it’s that I keep stealing them out of their Halloween buckets.
Either way, I was in line at the grocery store tonight and actually thought about buying an Almond Joy.
Now that’s a real sickness.
Just popping in today to share costumes from last night.
My 4 year old was a cheetah for most events this Halloween but chose to be Belle for trick or treating.
My 11 year old didn’t care about his costume so he went as a soccer player by default.
My 8 year old decided he wanted to be something from Harry Potter. Any guesses?
Yep, he’s Mad Eye Moody.
We took a $7 coat from Goodwill, ripped it up, lightly spray painted it with white (to make it look dusty) and stamped it with a black stamp pad to make it look old.
I bough these face paints and brushes this year and have loved how easy they are to use and how the paint doesn’t smear.
I would love to hear in the comment section what your kids dressed up as this year.
Now on to November!
We had our annual Halloween party this past weekend and it was a lot of fun.
As well as being quite tasty.
But….not too healthy (only some of the butter we used).
We may have cooked ourselves silly making sugar cookies, pumpkin whooopie pies, banana bread, oreo mummies, cupcakes, chocolate faces, pretzel witch fingers, pretzel eyeballs, marshmallow sticks, rice krispie treats, snickerdoodle cookies, and pumpkin muffins.
We also played a game which I think the kids enjoyed – Mystery Boxes
The idea of Mystery Boxes is to reach into the box and try and figure out what food is in there.
For example, I told the kids that I had witches hair. Once they felt it, they needed to decide what food my witches hair really was.
I took 4 boxes (Cheezits, Amazon, shoe boxes) and spray painted them or covered them in fabric with Modge Podge.
I then glued on a piece of cloth to the outside which covered a hole I had cut out in each box.
Each box on the inside was lined with tin foil. One had a cup and another had a bowl which held the food items.
Before starting the game, I handed out a piece of paper to each child and told them what was in the mystery boxes – witches hair, mummy intestines, troll eyes, and Frankenstein eyes. Then I had some parents hold the boxes for me, not letting the kids peek inside the boxes.
This picture of my son reaching into the box is my favorite one from the party.
Here’s a sample of the sheet with their guesses on it.
Here we all are talking about what each of their guesses is for the food items.
And the reveal….
In case you are wondering…
Witch Hair = Ramen Noodles
Frankenstein Eyes – Olives
Mummy Intestines = Lasagna Noodles
Troll Ears = Dried Apricots
___________________
Mystery Boxes = Silly & Slimey Fun 🙂
Man o man.
This thing called life just knocks the wind out of you sometimes.
The first thing out of my middle schoolers mouth when I picked him up from school yesterday was, “Kids told me Mrs. Matheus’ son died. She got a call during 6th period that he died. He’s in the Air Force. We watched her walk out to her car and leave.”
First off. How Awful.
Nothing is worse than your child dying.
Second off. She had to find out that horrible news in front of a bunch of 11 and 12 year olds.
Fast forward two hours, back at our house, with me at the computer checking to see if soccer practice was still on.
I open an email from my boys’ swim coach.
It informs me that one of the summer swim coaches has died.
He was 21.
It was self-inflicted.
First off. Again. How awful.
Just being a parent makes my heart break with this news.
I only knew this kid from afar.
He was always smiling and laughing with the kids and the other coaches.
For three years my kids knew him and loved him.
Second off. How dare you? Why would you do such a thing?
I’m not really mad at him. I’m disappointed and sad for my kids.
And heartbroken for his family and friends.
I know I will never know what led him to that decision and I’m not sure I need to know.
But I do know that I will continue to tell my kids everyday that I will always love them, forever and ever, no matter what.
I chose not to share with my kids the manner in which Coach Jake died. That’s too much information for even an adult to comprehend, never mind an 8 year old. He died. His family is sad. We are sad.
The next day I again picked my son up from middle school and asked him if he had a substitute in Mrs. Matheus’ class.
“No. It was actually her dog that died not her son.”
We had a bit of a laugh, learned never to completely trust the word of middle schoolers sharing information in the hallways, and went on with our day.
And I may have told him thirty times that day, ” I will always love you, forever and ever, no matter what.”
*I never use real names in my blog except those of my children.
I hate cooking.
No, that’s not actually true.
I really really dislike cooking.
It’s not calming for me, it’s not enjoyable, I just don’t like it.
I don’t like menu planning either.
(I have obviously now entered my Archie Bunker phase of life).
But I do both because it’s hard to be a stay at home mom and not be the one in charge of cooking. I have I tried to lobby to hire a cook, but somehow, my husband sees that as my role.
So seeing as this appears to be my gig for awhile, I decided to make a menu planning board.
I used a frame I already had, printed out a free menu planning printable, and used an old expo marker I had from teaching to write out the meals.
We’ve been using this for a few weeks and somehow it just makes the whole process a little more enjoyable.
And yes, we eat out once a week.
I need to keep moving toward that white light at the end of the week or else I’d completely give up and just serve cereal for every meal.
*In case you are interested I found the meal plan printable here.
*And just for the record, my husband is awesome and always helps me cook.
I think I might have some work to do with my daughter in the math department.
She just told me she was half cheetah, half flamingo, half wolf, and half tiger.