Summer's Last Hurrah

The kids have been back at school for two weeks now, but with Labor Day upon us, summer seems as if it is finally coming to a close.  I know that technically we still have until near the end of September, but this past weekend we tried to live it up and have a great time together before the changing of the seasons.

My friend Stacey's parents have a pool at their house and she invited us to come over for a swim on Saturday before her parents close up the pool for the season.  My only plans for the day involved dishes and laundry so I ditched those fairly quickly and told her we would meet her later on after her errands.

I did two loads of dishes and the kids mostly cleaned their room before lunch and then we got packed up and started to head out.  Because of my lame texting abilities, Stacey and I had a miscommunication about when to meet. Since the kids were already in the car, I figured I'd just keep driving until I heard from her and then we'd turn around.

We actually ended up taking a very nice drive through the mountains and made it all the way to West Virginia!  We got out and took a few pictures and then I decided that we'd head back even though I hadn't heard from Stacey. Of course, the real problem was that being up in the mountains meant I was out of cell service and as soon as I got back in communication with a tower, my phone blew up with a bunch of messages!

After finally arriving at Stacey's parents house, the kids all jumped in the pool.  Even Benjamin surprised me by putting on his life jacket and getting in all by himself.  We spent about 5 hours at the pool and I never got in!  (I don't actually like swimming.)  But the kids had a blast!  Henry even went off the slide with no life jacket.  Granted he panicked and started to flail around in the water, but he made it to the edge and grabbed on right as I got to him. He was scared, but otherwise fine.  He did the same thing last time we were there.  I assume that eventually he'll either learn to swim or learn to stop going off the slide with no life jacket!

We ordered pizza for a late night dinner and then said goodbye to our friends.  Life is always hectic and schedules are always crazy, but I love it when we are able to get together.  And the kids love it too!

JMU Puppy Pound

Last year I signed the kids up for the JMU Puppy Pound. JMU's mascot is the Duke Dog (a royally-attired bulldog). Area kids can join the "Puppy Pound" which allows kids free passes to lots of JMU sporting events. They had their opening event on Saturday before JMU's first home football game of the season. Stacey and I met at CVS and headed over to campus together. The kids all got free t-shirts and Chick-Fil-A sandwiches. They had a bounce house set up as well as a football throwing booth and a basketball shooting booth.  They got to meet the Duke Dog and get their pictures taken with him.

Benjamin says, "I no like da dupe dog!"

The rest of us like him, though!!

After we had hung around for a while, we walked across campus to check some other things out. Both Stacey and I went to JMU, but a lot has changed since then and I wanted her to see the new fountain and the Quad.
We had fun playing around the fountain in front of Burruss.  They kids were experimenting to see which things would sink and which ones would float.  They also tried every which way imaginable to get wet because we had told them not to.

Then Ryan threw his football in the middle tier of the fountain and it got stuck. Stacey had to put Lydia up her shoulders to rescue it.  There's a picture, but I promised not to post it!! :)
The kids all got thirsty, so we left and went to the Golden Arches to get free water and then headed home. I'm glad we got to spend the day tailgating!

St. Patrick's Day 2012

Frances' school had the PTA Carnival on St. Patrick's Day this year. I had volunteered to bake a cake, and then in a moment of insanity I also signed up to bring food for their International Food Sale.  I baked a rainbow cake on Friday night. It was a ton of fun and a lot easier than I had expected.  I used two boxes of cake mix, divided it into six bowls and tinted each one a color of the rainbow.  (Sorry about the crappy iPad photo.) 

Then I slowly added each color to the middle of the baking dish.  You don't have to mix or anything. You just pour one color straight into the middle of the pan.  Each successive color pushes the next one outwards until your baking dish looks like this:

Bake as directed in your recipe and then decorate.  I just used white frosting and the used Skittles to make a rainbow on the top of the cake. I wanted somebody to be surprised when they cut into their cake! 

I also made a batch of black bean and corn quesadillas with a recipe I got from Budget Bytes. Easy, peasy, DELICIOUS!
Mix together:
1 can of black beans (drain off the clear liquid)
1 cup of frozen corn
1 package of taco seasoning mix (or less depending on your intended consumers)
2 cups of cheese
And add to tortillas and cook on both sides. Frances and I LOVED these. I think they were a bit too spicy for the boys, so when I try them again I will use less taco seasoning.

After preparing all that madness, I decided to make us some St. Patrick's Day shirts.  (Frances made the glasses at her after-school program on Friday.

We went to Fun Day and had...fun!! The kids got to play a bunch of canival type games and win cheesy prizes.  They got to watch a magic show too. Frances helped the magician turn a blue scarf and a white scarf into two polka dotted scarves.

After participating in the cake walk (and thankfully not winning a cake) we ate some lunch.

The kids chose facepaint over temporary tattoos and Henry got a cute frog for his cheek.

We went home for some well-earned naps and then, because I am a glutton for punishment) we went out to the park with the Washingtons and ended up having dinner with them too. We got home about 9:15 that night and were still able to get up for church in the morning.

A Saturday in the Park

One of the sad things about switching jobs, is that I don't get to see my friend, Stacey as often. We have both left the preschool and our kids don't go to school together, so we have to be more intentional about getting together.  The hardest part of that for me is that I am such a homebody. I would much rather stay home than go out and do stuff.  However, every time I get myself up and out of the house I have a good time. I really need to do that more often!!
Stacey wants to get more experience with taking pictures and the kids hadn't gotten together for a while, so she invited us out to the park to hang out.  The kids run off together, like it hasn't been forever, and that warms my heart.  Even Benjamin found his courage and took off on the play structure.  (I actually lost him at one point because he was standing in the bend between one of the bridges and the slide platform.  Slight panic attack!!)
They played on the structure and Stacey and I talked (and talked and talked...)  Then we headed over to the bridge for some pictures.

 

The kids weren't feeling our artistic vision, so we didn't spend long there.  Next we went over by the pond and found some leaves to play in, a table to sit at, and pond to fall in look at, and a tree to climb.  We spent a while there playing with the kids, trying out cameras, and talking (and talking and talking...)

We also found a cool seat carved out of an old tree stump that made for some great photos, but at this point we were all getting tired, hungry, cold and cranky.  We topped off our evening with a trip to McDonald's and then said good night.

 

We miss you guys! Let's do this more often!!

Frances turns 7!

Well, I did it again! I blinked and the time flew by and now I have a 7 year old!!  Frances was very excited about her birthday this year. Possibly because she was going to have her first "friend party" at our house, or maybe just because she is getting older and mentally capable of anticipating something fun. Who knows!
Anyway, she practically jumped out of bed on her birthday and hurried to get dressed.  She was excited because I had told her that Mommy, Daddy, Henry and Benjamin would all come eat lunch with her at school.  That was fun-especially for Henry!  I made her some cupcakes (from scratch, but only because I had neglected to buy a mix) and sent those to school. She says she has a great day at school and came home to do her homework before we went out to Wood Grill-her favorite restaurant.
We had a nice dinner there and she got the coveted smiley face cookie-although not as nice as the one she had last year.
She was still excited in the days after her birthday because Grandma was coming to visit and she still had two parties to look forward to.  I had, in a moment of temporary insanity, invited 10 little girls over to our house for a Princess Tea Party.  In the end we had 6 girls who came in their fancy dresses to partake of tea and tea sandwiches.
I made sugar cookies and decorated two fir each girl-one with her initial and a heart or butterfly that they could choose. Frances and I had decided ahead of time not to have a cake because cake didn't "fit" into the tea party.

 We had a "Pin the Crown on the Princess" game to play. It also made a great backdrop for the girls to get their pictures taken with.

 Frances' youngest guest was our good friend, Julie's, daughter, Laura who is 18 months old.  She got a Minnie Mouse dress that worked for the party as well as for Halloween later.

 The Queen Mum, AKA Grandma, got all dolled up for the occasion as well.  Actually, I did too, but it's my blog and I don't have to post those kind of pictures if I don't want too!

Ok, I will!

And here's the birthday Princess in all her finery!

 Frances wanted "pickle flowers" which are the little green and white sandwiches you see.  They are so easy to make and so good!  I also made raspberry tea sandwiches, which were delectable.  A simple veggie tray rounded out the menu...except for the tea...and the sugar cubes, but sugar cubes aren't really a food item, are they?? Well they were at this party! I wish you could have seen the amount of sugary syrup left in the bottom of those tea cups!  The girls went through a whole sugar bowl of cubes!! Also, on a funny note-I had forgotten to make some ice before the party (We generally don't have ice on hand.) and so when they tea was too hot to drink, we had to resort to using frozen strawberries in our Wild Berry Zinger tea. Of course the girls loved it!

Frances, Emily, and Lydia enjoyed their tea and goodies.

The Princess and all her royal friends had a wonderful time. And I survived my first "friend party."

Carter's Mountain Apple Orchard

On Saturday, I took avoiding housework to the extremes and headed out to the Carter's Mountain Orchard with the Washington family. We had never been before, but they had and I was quite glad to have someone to follow on the way there. We took a beautiful route on some back roads through Grottoes, Crimora, Waynesboro and more. It was a great Fall day for a drive!! When we got to the orchard we had to drive up a road that was about a 90 degree incline and VERY dusty. At one point Frances asked me, "Mommy, can you see where you're going?" and I had to admit that no, I really couldn't!

We walked out to the orchard and headed down the lines of trees. First, all you see is bare trees. then you start seeing some trees with apples WAY up at the top. Then after walking for about 6 hours (give or take), you get to the trees with branches low enough for the kids to reach.

Henry could even reach some while he was sitting down!

Obviously, we ate some apples up on the mountain! Henry took tiny bites and spit out the peel. Twice he had his apple almost completely peeled so he could finally eat it and he fell. Poor boy!

When he got tired of picking and eating apples, Henry looked at me and said, "I run!" I just smiled and watched as he took off running down the row of trees. He looked back once and I thought he was going to stop, but he was on a roll! Frances and Emily took off after him to rescue him and bring him back!

When we had filled our bags as heavy as we could with Golden delicious and JonaGold apples, we headed back up the mountain.

Of course, the kids needed a break halfway up. Thank goodness Frances found this "couch" to sit on!

We paid for our apples, shared some delicious doughnuts and then headed over to listen to some live music and watch the kids dance.

Random Picture Challenge

This Saturday's random picture challenge is from the

16th picture folder,

28th picture.

Click the picture above to join in the fun!

This picture is from last year's Gus Bus birthday Bash. Stacey and I took all five kids out to the JMU Convocation Center Parking lot. I blogged about it then, but this is a picture I didn't choose to use. We had a great time and are saddened to hear that the economy has had a negative effect on the Gus Bus program. They might not be able to continue their mission of reading to children in at-risk populations. If you live locally and hear of one of their fundraisers, please do what you can to help out. This is an AWESOME program that needs to stay on the road!

Random Picture Challenge

APRIL 2008

or13th folder

42nd picture

or 4th

if you don't have that many

Last April, CHick-Fil-A had a "Princess Night." Tons of little girls dressed up in their best princess gear and headed out for free kids' meals and lots of fun. Miss Virginia was there to sign autographs and talk with the girls. I met my friend Stacey there, and snapped this picture of her twins Lydia (on the left) and Emily. I actually blogged about it when it happened, way back when.

Checkout 4 Little Men and Girly Twins for more random pictures.

Frances-isms

We went out to Golden Corral last night with Stacey and her crew. Ryan's school has a fundraiser night there about once a month. As we were paying the teenage boy for our food, Frances loudly whispers, "Momma, that boy is so handsome!" Um...ok, but be a little bit more discreet Frances!! Frances and Ryan ended up sitting next to each other and as Stacey went to get food for the girls, Frances announced that "Ryan is my boyfriend!" Well she has said this before and when I ask her, she says he is her friend and he's a boy...Very logical to me!
So later, Stacey and I are talking and Frances keeps trying to interrupt. I was ignoring her well enough that finally she turned to Ryan and said, "Ryan, do you want to have a kid conversation?" HA HA Poor girl. As I continue to talk, I notice that Ryan has not actually answered Frances-despite the fact that she keeps asking him and calling his name. So now they have moved on in their relationship. I mean, they must be married now if he is ignoring her so completely while she yaks at him. Then they shared an apple at dinner. How cute!
To be comepltely honest, I took a few pictures at dinner, but I am too lazy to get up and post them now. Maybe I will come back later and update.

Frances' Sleep Over

I was telling this story to my friend Stacey at work today and realized it is the kind of thing that made me start this blog in the first place and I had forgotten to write it down! As you already know, Frances had a friend from school spend the night last Thursday. She is in my class and had told her mom one afternoon that she was going to go home with me. I thought it would be fun so we invited her over a few nights later.
We had dinner together that evening and then decided to go for a walk. We typically walk around the cemetery that is near our house because it is a safe place with no traffic to worry about. One of Ken and Frances' favorite things to do at the cemetery is "bunny chasing." I don't remember exactly how it started, but when Frances was much smaller, Ken would see a bunny and ask her if she wanted to chase it. She would, of course, so then he would pick her up and sneak up on the bunny and then take off running as soon as it hopped away. Because the bunnies dart around so much when escaping, he would do the same. And Frances would squeal with delight the entire way.
Now, as she is older and faster; we look for the bunnies together and she chases them on her own. And last Thursday she took her friend from school. (Poor girl thought we would actually be catching the bunnies and was sorely disappointed to see that we would not!)
After several rounds of bunny chasing, the girls sat down for a rest and some funny faces. Ken could not resist sneaking up behind them and "boo-ing" them. They tried to return the scare, but he ran around the other way and scared them again. They LOVED it!!
We got home and got ready for bed. The girls and I put on our pajamas and then brushed our teeth together. I put toothpaste on their toothbrushes and they started brushing away. Frances' friend finished and spit into the sink. I gave her a cup of water and she rinsed and spit again. Then she took a sip of water and gargled it. I laughed-I thought it was cute. Then she leaned over and spit into the sink again. At this point Frances asks me to check her teeth. (Our dentist told me that a parent should "check/re-brush" a child's teeth until they were about 8 or so.) I did my little brushing and then gave Frances a cup of water as usual. Now I should tell you that Frances still uses fluoride-free toddler toothpaste and has never had to "rinse and spit." She has occasionally used "spitting toothpaste" but not very often or successfully. Well that night when I gave her the cup, instead of just taking a sip of water, she tried, very unsuccessfully, to spit it in the sink. She got her pajamas a little bit wet, but no big deal. BUT WAIT-THERE'S MORE! Since her friend had gargled, Frances decided she must try this new skill also. So she took another sip of water and opened her mouth and made that sound. Oh, wait! I forgot to put in the part where she tilted her head back...oh yeah-because she didn't!! She gargled water straight out of her mouth all over the floor and her nightgown. I tried to tell her to stop, but from a combination of laughing hysterically and having a mouth full of my own FOAMING toothpaste, there wasn't much I could do.
These stories are the reason I started my blog. Hopefully, one day when Frances is much older, her current boyfriend will "google" her and stumble upon this story. He will then decide that she is too kooky to date until she is 30. Then I will feel satisfied.

I love a parade...

Yesterday morning when I got to work I walked in on a conversation about a parade. It turns out that Weyers Cave was having a parade and lawn party and my boss was having a float in the parade to advertise the day care. Well in typical "me" fashion, we all decided to join in on the parade at the last minute. Stacey and her kids joined in too, as well as Kristen and hers, and some other families from the other day care. We all dressed in red, white and blue and waved American flags. Ken drove the truck (even though it was a Ford) and the rest of us sat in the bed or on the trailer. We threw candy, blew bubbles and shot silly string at people. It was quite fun!
After the parade, we went over to the lawn party. Stacey and the kids came with us and we watched rides for a little while and then went on the cars and the airplanes. The kids had a great time!! Of course, none of us wonderful mothers had cameras with us, so I don't have pictures, but if anyone sends me any I will post them later.
Hopefully today I will be going to get Frances' pictures and then I can post for her about the Safari Park trip on Thursday.

Princess Night at Chick-Fil-A

What a fun idea! For very little money, Chick-Fil-A just made themselves a ton of money and had a great time doing it. Tonight was "Princess Night." All kinds of little girls came out in their princess dresses to eat dinner at Chick-Fil-A. Miss Virginia was there as well as some other pageant winners. They had balloons, and princess stickers and princess bracelets. Frances dressed as a forest fairy and we took Henry and met up with a friend from work and her two little girls. They had a blast! My favorite part was over on a table they had wide ribbon set out that was pre-pinned like a pageant sash. I was waiting for Frances to finish playing so we could go over and make one. I looked in the window of the play part and she already had one on. At first I thought she has commandeered someone else's, but when she came out I saw that she had made her own! She wrote her name on it all by herself!!! Then she went over and made one for Emily. She didn't spell it exactly correct, but it started with and E and ended with a Y. To top it all off, she went over and made me one with my name on it. I LOVELOVELOVE that she can spell my name all by herself from memory. (It kinda makes up for the fact that Henry delights in saying "Dada" every time I try to coach him on "Momma.")
All in all it was a great evening. And Henry devoured all the chicken nuggets and French fries that were within his reach. You would have thought I don't feed him.