June in review

Well, my goal was to finish 2009 pictures by today. That's not going to happen, but I'm plugging on anyway. Here's June.

All About Me #3

My favorites:

TV - House, CSI: New York, Survivor, The Big Bang Theory (hilarious!!)
      And my favorite shows...American Idol and So you think you can dance
     The funniest show ever...Friends (I own all 10 seasons!!)

Movies - Clueless, The Fugitive, Breakfast at Tiffany's, Center Stage, Miracle on 34th Street, Gosford Park
     (I'm sure I'm forgetting some, but those are all great.)

Authors - Francine Rivers, Mindy Starnes Clark, Kristen Heitzmen, Jane Austen

Food - fettuccine alfredo, macaroni and cheese, spaghetti and meatballs, peanut butter, cinnamon anything (rolls, bread, cake, etc.)

Restaurants - The Olive Garden!!!!!, TGI Fridays (although the closest one is 1.5 hr away), Chick-fil-a - aka the world's greatest fast food resaurant

Stores - Target, Old Navy (although I'm mad at them right now), Books-a-million (known as the "train table store" at our house)

Well, that's all about my favorites.  Tell me about yours :).

Help for Haiti - Comment on 2 Wired, 2 Tired

If you haven't heard, my bloggy friend, Tesa, over at 2 Wired, 2 Tired is donating 10 cents for every comment she receives on this post.  Hurry and leave her one.  This is only good until Jan 31.  Thanks!

Turning Point

I think I have reached a turning point in my life.  I might have missed it if I didn't look closely or notice carefully.  What is this great turning point you might ask?  It's just this.

See those bangs?  She has decided she wants to grow them out and at our haircut last Friday, we did not get them cut!!!  I won't say this is because her doll (there in her arms) doesn't have bangs, but it might be.

I almost missed the turning point.  But then I didn't.  For the first time ever she made her own choice about how her hair is cut.  Oh, she has been picky about how I fix it before, but never about how I've gotten it cut.

Sniff, sniff!

My little girl is growing up.

All About Me #2

#2
I met my husband in high school.  We started dating the end of our junior year.  After our senior year, we went to the same school (Go VOLS!!) for undergrad and got married after our 3rd year of college.  We had been dating for 4 years at that point.  I guess we beat the odds and both finished our degrees on schedule.  I know it doesn't work for everyone, but we LOVED being married and in college.  We had a lot of fun together, even went on a mission trip together, and still maintained a great spouse relationship.  I graduated with a bachelor's of science in Industrial Engineering and Tim graduated with a Bachelor's of Science in Electrical Engineering.  Our original plan was for him to start working and for me to go to grad school, but that plan was changed (long story for another post), so we both went to grad school instead.  We packed up and headed to NC State for a year and a half to get our Master's degrees.  When I finished my Master's Degree in Operations Research, I was 3 months pregnant with Julie.  Tim graduated with a Master's in Computer Engineering and he got an excellent job back here in the town where we grew up.  So we moved back and I chose to be a stay-at-home mom to my kids, at least while they are young.  I know that we are very blessed to be able to do this.  Tim and I have been married 10 years, this year, and I love him so much more than the day I married him!

(Gold star to anyone who knows what Operations Research is)

All About Me #1

I thought I would start a new little blog series and tell you things about me that you probably don't know (unless you are my brother and sister, who both read this.  You two probably know all this and can just skip it :)).  These will just be fun, short (hopefully) insights into my life.  I invite you to tell me something new about you in the comments.

#1
I am the youngest of three.  My brother is the oldest and my sister is the middle child.  There are only 3.5 years between all three of us, so my parents had 3 kids in high school together and also had 3 kids in college together (lucky them).  My sister and I are very close and live about 30 minutes from each other.  Our kids are close too.  My brother lives 3.5 hours away - close enough for a weekend trip.  I grew up living 10 hours away from my extended family including aunts, uncles, cousins and grandparents, so I'm very glad that my kids can have relatives close by.

A Day in the Life..

I thought I would let you know what a typical day for me is like.  Of course, no two days are really alike, so "typical" may not be the right word, but I will tell you what today was like, anyway.

6:45 - get up (slept through the alarm going off twice, so thought I should get up then), shower
7 - wake up sleepy kids and get them ready while trying to dry my hair and do makeup that I couldn't get done because I slept through my alarm twice
7:45 - leave to take Julie to school (3.6 mi, 9 minutes)
8:05 - back home to wait til time to take David to school (3.6 mi, 9 minutes)
8:30 - leave to take David to school (7 mi, 10 minutes)
9 - arrive at BSF, my Bible study where I play piano occasionally - today being one of those days.  I only mention that because I have to get there earlier to play and have to take David earlier to preschool as a result.  (6 mi, 8 minutes)
12 - leave BSF after lunch with friends there, go to CVS (1 mi, 2 minutes)
12:05 - leave CVS after I realize I forgot all my coupons and there's no point in being there without coupons, go back home (2 mi, 5 minutes)
1:45 - leave home to go get David (7 mi, 10 minutes)
2 - go to CVS (with coupons this time :)) I saved $17 with coupons and got $12 in extra care bucks on this receipt to use next time!!  (6 mi, 8 minutes)
2:35 - leave CVS, go pick up Julie from school (2.6 mi, 5 minutes)
3:15 - bring both kids (one awake and one asleep) home from school (3.6 mi, 9 minutes)

Total - 42.4 miles, 75 minutes in the car.

That hour and 15 minutes in the car felt much longer.  And from what I've heard from folks with older kids, it will only get worse from here.  Guess I better get used to it :).  Have a great day!

Christmas Crafts

OK, so this post is a little late.  But I thought I would tell you about the homemade crafts/gifts we made this Christmas.  I got to make a lot of them with Julie and really enjoyed the fact that she is now old enough to do some things on her own.

Ornament Wreath

I made two of the popular ornament wreaths.  Once I hot glued everything, it was very easy.  I hung them in my front windows on either side of my tree.  (I had saved the link and was going to link up the directions, but apparently the link doesn't work any more.  Sorry.  If you want the tutorial, tell me in the comments and I'll email it to you.)

Advent Calendar

One of my new additions to the festivities this year.  You can find my directions here.

No Sew Blanket

Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of this before we gave it away.  Every year I struggle to come up with something to give my husband's grandmother.  This year we decided on a fleece no-sew blanket. I let Julie pick out the colors (they included pink, of course).  And she helped cut the fringes and she tied almost all of them together herself!  She was so excited to give her gift and Mamaw Ruby (as we call her) was just as excited to open it.

Creative Crayons

I got this idea here at Living with Lindsay's site.  

We took regular crayons, depapered them (is that even a word??), broke them up and put them in a cookie sheet, then melted them in the oven and made new crayon shapes.  The plan was for the kids to give them away to their friends, but snow happened and we never gave them away.  But, hey, there's always next year.

 

Lowes Kid's Workshops/Crafts

So, I guess technically this may not be a craft,  but maybe.  Anyway, we have discovered the Lowe's children's worshop series and we LOVE them.  They are free entertainment on Saturday morning, give us lots of junk treasures to fill up dresser tops with and teach fine motor skills to little hands.  The kids get free aprons and patches every week for the projects they complete.  And they have little, kid-sized hammers to use.  Over Christmas, we made a wooden gingerbread house and wooden ornaments.  My favorite project was the bank they made this past Saturday.

 

 

 

 

 

We had so much making new stuff this year.  I'm on the lookout for some Valentine's crafts we can try as well.  If you have links to any great, kid-friendly V-day crafts, feel free to tell me about them.  Thanks!

May in Review

Trucking on through. Just finished May last night. It's long, so I won't do any commentating on it. Only 7 more months to go :).

(I know, I know, I said no commentating, but apparently I lied.  Just wanted to point out that those big pictures that are backgrounds are actual pictures taken on our cruise, not just stock photos from somewhere.)

(Notice this is where my blogger picture came from.)

Snow Days go away, Come again some other day

What to do when your child has a snow day...

Or five...

And there's really not enough snow to go play in...

And it's in the teens outside, so you can't just let 'em go outside and play...

5)  Make a mosaic.  We happen to have a magnetic mosaic kit Julie got for Christmas, but you could easily make your own.  Just tear or cut up colored paper into little squares.  Start your picture in the middle and work outward.

4)  Make magic ooze.  Mix 1/8 cup of warm water with 5 tablespoons of cornstarch.  Mix with your (or your child's) fingers.  When you move it around slowly, it is like a liquid.  When you poke at it quickly, it's hard like a rock.  The more you squeeze it, the harder it gets.  Then when you let go, it just drips off.  This was very entertaining for about 30 minutes.  Use a tablecloth, though, because it does get messy.  And don't pour it down your drain when you are done.  It will clog it up.  Just scoop it into the trash.

3)  Go to the library.  Let your kids pick out books, but also pick some books for them that help stimulate their brains.  Because with all this time off, their brains might be turning into mush.

2)  Go visit a friend at work to let your child see what they do.  OK, we haven't done this yet, but we are trying to get together with my friend Erika for this.  So if you can work it out, it would be great.

1)  Take 'em to Grandma's.  We just might be heading your way tomorrow, Mom!

(There's one more I just had to put in there.  My daughter asked if she could unwind the vacuum cord and wind it back up over and over again.  Yes, sweetheart, if you are that bored, just wind away.)

April in Review

Well I'm cranking 'em out as fast as I can.  Here's April 2009 in review:

This page is actually not all the way done yet.  I need to get a picture of his Daddy playing XBOX to put in the picture on the top.  I just put the picture of David up there to hold the spot.

Still have journaling left on this one, but you get the idea.