Nate's Birthday Weekend Getaway

You may recall that Nate's birthday was on December 22nd and shared all about his birthday activities HERE. This year, both of the boys chose going to a Hotel (with a pool, of course) as their big birthday item instead of having a big family party.  Instead of trying to fit this getaway into a very busy month of December, we decided to push it into January and this past weekend was the first weekend that was open since my husband worked the previous two weekends.  To say my kids were excited about this is an understatment - Josh had been counting "sleeps" since the Sunday prior to us going and every morning he would get up and say, "Nate, just 4 more sleeps until we do your birthday hotel". 

The kids were up early on Saturday morning (like 6:30 AM early .. not when I wanted to get up,that's for sure). We had to convince them that they could only take two special friends (i.e. stuffed animals) and Nate tried to convince us that he had to take 3 HA  We finally convinced them both that their other friends would keep the animals company at home ;-)  We had a late breakfast of Holiday French Toast, Sausage and Bacon before loading up and heading out.  Amazingly, the weather was like springtime so no coats were needed to start our trip.  As we got closer to our first destination, we caught the sounds of pre-puke. Yep, car sickness has reared its ugly head again but at least we managed to give Nate a bucket (we've learned!) and yes, we were extremely excited when he actually used it!!!  ;-)  (Not happy he puked but at least he used the bucket, right?)  Poor little guy :-(  Once he emptied the contents of his stomach, though, we were good to go the rest of the day.

Our first stop was the Grand Rapids Children's Museum.  We haven't been to the museum in 2 years and the boys had a blast.  To make it better, we picked up a pass from our local library which made the museum FREE!!!  (There is a reason we haven't gone in two years . . .it's a little pricey!).  The boys played for over 3 hours; and by boys I mean Darryl too!!  Here are a few of my favorite photos from the fun museum adventure!

After leaving the museum, we headed to dinner (early dinner . .. ) at the Beltline Bar - our favorite Mexican Restureant and, by "our" I mean all of our favorite - even the boys.  The boys can down chips and salsa like nobody's business!!  We ran a few errands after dinner - a stop a Kohl's for a frame to replace one that broke and a new pillow for Josh.  His main pillow had to be thrown away after a puking episode when we were all sick.  He was so proud of his new pillow and carried it through the store and out to the truck :-)  We also stopped at Hobby Lobby because Josh wanted now stickers for his airplane he got for Christmas.  (he think you should take stickers off of it and put new ones on all of the time . .. ).

FINALLY, we got to our hotel.  Can I tell you that Priceline is my best friend?  We picked up a room at one of the nicest hotels in Grand Rapids for $40.00.  The hotel was fabulous and the pool was picture perfect.  The boys had so much fun swimming before we headed back to the room for snacks, chocolate milk and bedtime :-)  Yes, the boys were asleep in about 2 minutes - we wore them out!!

We started Sunday morning with a fun breakfast.  This hotel does not have free breakfast (it's too upscale HA) but there was a Tim Horton's across the street so Darryl drove over and picked us up Coffee, breakfast sandwiches and donuts.  We hung out at the hotel until almost noon before heading to Chuck E Cheese.  The boys have been asking to go there for awhile so we figured this was the perfect time.  We used a coupon to get a good deal on Pizza and tokens :-)  I didn't take my camera in with me so I could just play but we did get these photos ;-)

  What a fun weekend! And, thanks to priceline, I think this is something we can budget for every few months - it is so much fun to get away from home and just hang out together as a family !

Too Cute Not Too Toot

Ok,so this first idea isn't really "cute" but it sure looks good.  It comes from Mommy I'm Hungry and makes me want to eat Tacos right now!

I would love to have one (or two or three) of these little bird houses hanging in our windows so we could see if any birds would nest.  How cool would that be?  Check out the idea from Repeat Crafter me.

Random Thoughts of a Super Mom shares another great idea  for displaying kids art work.  I love the saying on the wall and think this would look great on my fridge (since that is where we hang artwork in this house!)

Ok, when I saw this idea, well, I knew I had to share it. Chicken soup is just one of those things that shows love, right? Well, why not have it REALLY show it with some heart . .. carrots.  Check out this idea from sophisti mom.

Finally, check out this idea from Slow Robot- just what every boys needs!

Happy Crafting!

Preschool Fun - January Week 2

This was our first full week of preschool and we had a great week.  You can read my intro post HERE.  What a difference this time around with school.  Josh actually was counting down the "sleeps" until we started on Monday.  Both of my boys and the little munchkin I babysit come running to the table when I say it is time to start lessons.  They don't even argue that the TV gets turned and and, let me tell you, cartoons are a favorite thing in this house!

Here is a basic overview of what we did this week.  I did not take photos of everything but tried to get them in action on some fun things.

 We began with Bible and had a lesson on the Fruit of the Spirit - Love.  We colored pictures with different fruits on them and talked about using kind words. 

 For all of our basic lessons, I am using information from 1+1+1=1.  Included on the page is a lesson plan page and she gives links to all of the extra stuff like this color by number shown above and the Upper/lower case A activity show below. 

 Looking for upper/lower case letters was something new to us but it was interesting because later in the week I heard Josh playing with one of his V-tech toys and he said, "look, lowercase letters".  He's already catching on to the idea.

I tried to include some type of fun activity each day.  On this day, it was painting with water paints.  The boys received lots of different craft items from Papa and Nana for Christmas (THANK YOU!!!) so those have been so handy this week in throwing in fun activities for the boys.

I re-introduced play dough to the boys and this time it was a huge hit.  The first task was to create an Upper/lower case A/a with the play dough.  Then we got the cookie cutters out and they played for hours.

 Look at that cute face??? The dice were one of the new things I introduced as far as a "game".  We used them to play an Ant game but the boys really just loved throwing them around the house.

The dot-to-dot markers were a huge hit. See how nicely Josh is filling in the dots? I was pretty proud of him.

Another fun activity that we did was practice making "A"'s on the new Aqua Doodles the boys got for Christmas.  Ok, lets be real, I drew a couple of letters and the boys just drew fun stuff.  It was still fun though!


I had hoped to get to some more crafty things or PE activities but we had the privilege of having extra friends over instead.  A friend of mine needed some babysitting help so we had two more kids in the house for a few days this week. We focused on sharing, using soft words, and being kind :-)  Life lessons, right?

We also introduced some new music. Our song of the week was "All in All".  But we also learned "Father Abraham" and "I'm in the Lords Army". Josh's favorite was "Father Abraham" - he loved moving around to that song.

That was week one :-)  I already have week two prepared and ready to go next week.  We'll still have friends visiting us so I'm hoping to get through just the basic lessons.

Int

Saying Good-Bye to one of our Furry Friends

We ended 2012 with, sadly, having to say good-bye to one of our Furry Family Members.  Our cat, Stratocaster, passed away on Saturday, December 29th.  It happened kind of unexpectedly.  She was fine before Christmas and even on Christmas day when I fed her, she was fine.  By Thursday, December 27th, I noticed that something wasn't right.  She was having some trouble walking and finding her way but then as long as she walked right by me, she was fine so I thought maybe her sight was finally gone.  On Friday, I noticed that she was doing worse and by Saturday evening she was gone.

 We adopted "Orchid" on February 25, 2005. She was several years old at that time so we know she was at least 9-10 years old.  We changed her name to Stratocaster since she is the same color combo as my husband's Stratocaster Guitar.  We called her Strat for short :-)

 Strat quickly became a part of our home -  finding all kinds of fun places to sit and sleep.

 I could never get a photo with her eyes open!!!  Strat started out as an indoor cat but eventually chose to move to the garage and live for various reasons. I didn't like her living out there but that was her choice and she actually enjoyed being out there most of the time. She had a warm bed and, in the winter, we would add a heat lamp for her as well. (And if it got really cold, she did come inside)  She never left the yard and, if she happened to get locked out of the garage because we didn't know she was lounging under the deck, she would sit at the patio door and meow until we let her back into her sanctuary.

Strat was really a sweet cat and I enjoyed her.  I will miss seeing her lounge on the deck in the sun - even in the winter. As long as the porch was clear of snow and the sun was shining she could lay there soaking in the warmth. She would sometimes perch on the rail where she could watch everything going on around her.  In the summer time she loved to wander through the flowers and lay in the sun.  When I would be outside, she would always jump up on my lap and wait for a good old fashion petting :-)  She loved to have ears scratched, that is for sure!  I made sure that no matter the weather, I would go out and spend a few minutes with her each day - in the winter I would make 2-3 trips to the garage to make sure she was warm and had fresh water.  Needless to say, now every time I enter the garage it breaks my heart to know she is gone and I won't see that cute cat.  

Farewell my sweet Strat.  You will be missed.

Weekly Menu

Some weeks going really smooth when it comes to meals and that was last week.  Things just fell into place and we had some great meals.  I did make a meal on Monday, Baked Shrimp Scampi, that sounded better then it tasted.  It wasn't awful, just not a "make again" recipe.

Here's the plan for this week:

Tuesday - Tacos, Rice, Beans and Chips and Salsa

Wednesday - My husband has practice so the kids and I will just have some frozen pizza - simple :-)

Thursday - Ham and Cheese Quiche, Potatoes, Fruit

Friday - Chicken and Dumplings and Salad

Saturday - Mongolian Beef, Brown Rice, and Broccoli

Sunday - Ham, Carrots, Potatoes and Cabbage roasted, Fruit Salad after church and then Grilled Cheese and Soup for dinner.

Monday - Lemon Chicken, Stuffing, Corn, Biscuits

Food Friday - Spinkle Cookies

Sprinkle Cookies
adapted from Cookin' Cowgirl

I was looking for a fun, easy cookie recipe and this fit the bill.  My kids love sprinkles so yes, it was an automatic plus with these cookies.  Added to that is that my kids could help makes these due to a short list of ingredients and, they even broke the eggs!  I will admit that these are not my personal favorite flavorful cookies but they were still fun!  I think that next time I might try using a yellow cake mix instead of white - yellow seems to have a better flavor (at least in my opinion!) Also, I ended up having to cook mine for about 12 minutes - the first batch I took out, let cool, and tasted one . .. it was still cookie dough!.  By the way, my kids discovered the joy of eating cookie dough off the beaters :-)


1 box vanilla cake mix, 18.25 oz
1 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
1/2 C vegetable oil
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 C color sprinkles

Preheat oven to 350°. In a large bowl, mix together the cake mix and baking powder. In a small bowl, mix together the eggs, oil and vanilla. Add the egg mixture to the cake mixture and stir to combine. Stir in the sprinkles. Drop by spoonfuls onto a cookie sheet or silpat.

Bake for 10 minutes. Allow to cool for 5 minutes on cookie sheet before transferring to cooling rack. They will be very soft at first. 

Cool and enjoy! 

Topical Study and What I'm Reading

I posted (HERE) about my Topical Study for the year - "Raising Conscientious kids".  I went on a search for books to read to help with my Topical Study.  Really, ultimately, this will make me be a better mom.  As I become a better mom, my kids will also become "better" and grow in ways I want them to grow.  Isn't it funny that when we want others to change we actually have to change ourselves and learn how to become the person who can HELP those we want to help.  This is really a long list of books I want to read this year.  I tend to read these in "paper form" instead of on my Kindle because, honestly, I will always pick the "fun" book I'm reading on my Kindle verses the "educational" book.

This list is in no particular order.

I know what you are thinking - there is no way I will get all of these read this year and guess what?  You are probably right but I wanted to plug all of these into this one post for easy reference.  I promise to share what I read; truths that I learn; how we implement new ideas and what works (and what doesn't!)  

I may come back and add more to this list throughout the year if I find some more new titles I'd like to check out so I will always try to remember to link back to this original post anytime I'm referencing the Topical Study or one of the books.