Party time

Please forgive me for the IM-speak ... it shortens things like "in-law" and I've used initials for privacy of my husband's family also. :)

Yesterday we had a birthday party for Chase. It was supposed to be a joint birthday party with our niece (SIL's daughter), E, but her mom and dad aren't together and dad had her because he made plans and didn't tell her mom. Anyway, SIL did bring the ice cream cake she had promised anyway (how sweet!).

I haven't thrown a party since Blake turned one. Yes, that's how much fun it was, lol. Not that it wasn't NICE ... it was just very expensive and honestly, not worth it. We had a lot more people over for Blake's first birthday. I'm glad we didn't do that again. On Chase's birthday, we went to Cassandra's volleyball game at SIL's invitation. While we were talking, the idea of a get-together for the kids' birthday came up, and I suggested doing it here because SIL hasn't gotten her own place yet since coming back from Basic Training and AIT (don't ask me what that is - I don't know). She offered to bring an ice cream cake for it, and I said ok.

So anyway, we had my MIL and FIL over, our nieces H and B, and my SIL. My Mom was at a conference, and my Dad didn't want to come over all by himself with a house-full of IL's, I bet, hee hee, and I seriously wouldn't have known what to do with more people! (Sorry Grandma and Aunt MJ!)

We had tacos and chips, and I think it was pretty yummy! Then the kids played for a while, and we had ice cream cake and sang to Chase. Have I ever mentioned how much Chase HATES being sung to by a crowd?!


(this one doesn't show his true pout even!)


He did please the crowd, though, when he named the colors of the candles correctly (which didn't surprise me or Tyler, but I bet Grandma and Papa might have been surprised. :) )

We almost forgot to have Chase open his gifts before everyone left. Gifts are hard! My parents gave me money to purchase something for Chase, and I tell you ... I couldn't pick anything out!!! It was awful! Everything either made noise, or had a zillion parts, or he was too young, or he was too old. What do you get a 3 year old?! I wanted to get him a simple toy guitar, but Kmart's selection SUCKED -- it was either Hannah Montana, Barbie or an actual training guitar, which he is definitely not ready for. I ended up buying a Princess doll for E's gift, and got Chase a totally lame gift from us ... a hard-cover book of Curious George stories, and a travel-size Magnadoodle, which is just for him (which I think is nice because his brother and sister trashed the one that was supposed to be for all 3 of them.)

The present from my IL's was much better received -- a Wow-Wow Wubbzy kickety-kick ball, and an electronic drum set type toy. WOW, that thing is loud! But, he immediately loved it.

Everyone was gone by 7pm, and I was in bed by 9pm, lol. I was, and still am, so tired!

We missed having our birthday duo, but it was still a nice day. Happy celebrated birthday, buddy!! :)

Soccer star?

This is the second week in a row where Blake has had compliments piled on him by his coaches following the game. He must really be good! I know nothing about soccer, so I am not a good judge. :) One of the other boys on the team is surely either a natural, or has been doing this a while. He plays offense, though, and he has really good control of the ball.

Blake usually (remember, non-soccer expert talking) is put on defense. From my perspective, he does seem to get in there when the ball heads down his way, but I can't usually see how successful he is at getting the ball away. The coach that came to praise him afterward today said that Blake always seems to be in the right place at the right time, that he thinks Blake is a natural, and that he wished he had Blake's long legs! I thought that was a pretty nice compliment! I don't know how right he is, and he admitted he's no soccer expert either, but it was nice to say either way. So, way to go Blake! :)

Last night, Connie Prince held a speed scrap at Gotta Pixel. She's had one the last couple of Friday nights, and I love evening scraps - no matter what kind they are. :) But, I like Connie's speed scraps especially, so even if you don't consider yourself a speedy scrapper ... stop in next time. She'll make it worth it -- she always does! ;)

Here is what I came up with:

Using directions from the Speed Scrap, and JUBILANT by Connie Prince ... the colors were perfect! :)

I also created this page recently ... to remember Blake's final T-ball game of the season which was on July 25th:

which is my second page with Lena and Tabatha's MAYHEM, available at Gotta Pixel. It is a rockin' boy kit!!! Gotta love them boy kits! :) Check out the rest of my gallery by clicking on the image to the right ... you know you want to see more, and you can learn more about how to MAKE these pages by jumping into the forums at Gotta Pixel too! Did you know that Gotta Pixel was my first digital scrapbooking home? Yep! Make it yours too! :)

And poof ... my baby is 3 ...

I'm not very happy about it, quite honestly. I know he's growing up, and he's smart and cute and all, but gosh darn it he IS my baby after all. I'm not normally one of those moms who shares their child's every milestone. After all ... Chase is #3, and so it's all been done before by his siblings, lol. ;) And normally I don't post a whole lot about birthdays. Actually, birthdays have been pretty low-key around here the past 6 years. It seems like we never have money to spend on a birthday party around birthday time. And, truth be told ... that's where we're at right now too. I sure wish we'd waited to buy Tyler a vehicle until October ... even just ONE month later would have saved us $311 to spend elsewhere. *sigh*

Anyway, the fact is, today my baby is three years old. He is no longer reliant on mom for milk (um, yeah ... he nursed way longer than the other two -- though just at night for quite a while). He is almost potty trained -- went almost all day in the same pair of underwear on Sunday! He is starting to not sleep in mom and dad's bed at all at night, though occasionally he get's mom's soft spot who misses her baby and lets him fall asleep with her .... . He is verbal. He is independent. He is a daredevil (see previous post). He is adorable, and he is my baby.

'Nuff said ... I need to get to bed and quit rambling!! :)

Happy 3rd birthday to my littlest man,
Love,
Mom

NOW it's Sunday ...

I didn't get to sleep in quite as late as I'd hoped, but it has been a nice day. The kids played outside quite a bit today. I took advantage of this "quiet time" to clean house. I am now satisfied with my dining room, bathroom, and living room. I am happy with my kitchen floor, but the rest needs work (DH says he'll be doing dishes tomorrow ... scratch that, I bet the concrete work he'll be doing with my Dad will take over instead). I even organized/ chucked stuff from under the sink in the bathroom -- it suddenly occurred to me to use Ziploc baggies to organize. I now have all the following in baggies: ointments, bandaids, plastic covers for the thermometer, 3 rolls of ribbon for using in Julia's hair, and a baggy full of hair things for Julia. It should make finding things a lot easier. I also used a "snack size" baggie to store the coupons that I want to keep handy in my purse.

Chase has been wearing the same pair of underwear since he woke up this morning. I will try to get a picture of him in them soon. :) He has been doing great at going to the bathroom -- he has no issues with going, except sometimes in public places. But, lately he's been able to go in public places too. He really has done fine unless he's been wearing a pull-up or underwear. Well, I decided to keep him underwear the last couple of days. Yesterday he didn't make it at first ... had an accident once ... but today he's been doing great! It is pretty exciting to think that he might be out of diapers/pull-ups very soon! :)

In the digi-world I got to play with Mayhem by Bella Gypsy -- one of the newest designers at Gotta Pixel. I started out with a template this week, by Brenda Miller. I knew I needed several pictures, so I went into search mode. I found the perfect series of photos to play with this kit. "Daredevil" and the perfect colors?! A match made in heaven! LOL




This was, I'm sure, one of many heart-stopping moments that Chase has in store for me. :) Not that Julia and Blake aren't full of their own moments, but their motor skills are a little more advanced, lol.

Now, on to Monday we go ... it is sure to be a busy week. Leslie's daughter turns 3 tomorrow, and Blake has soccer practice. Chase turns 3 on Tuesday. Wednesday I have a meeting at work. Before we know it, Saturday will be here and we'll have more soccer. Oh yeah! I should add pictures from yesterday's game for Blake ... (forgot my memory card for Julia's practice/game *sigh*)! Lots to do. :)

Have a great week,
Melinda

Is it Saturday, er, Sunday yet?

I am so tired! I know, I know ... so why am I writing this post and not in bed? I think my body might go into shock if I was in bed before 11 pm. LOL. Seriously, I will be trying to get to bed soon after I write this, but I'll have to let Lexi out one last time for the night, and then I need to straighten up ... so yeah, gonna be a bit. :)

Tuesdays tend to be an exhausting day for me. I suppose my body is protesting after getting to sleep in on Sunday. But, I managed to wake up on time today regardless. (Yes, it did involve a 30 minute snooze-fest with my alarm clock, but 6:45 is still on time. ;) )

I woke up to a stink in my house ... unfortunately, Lexi got a few nibbles on some grapes that the kids dropped on the floor. I didn't know it, but grapes can be toxic to dogs, and since Lexi isn't big, I'm glad she spit out the one that I'm aware she nibbled on. At any rate, it gave her some loose stools, and she wasn't able to hold them in and went in her crate during the night. So, I spent the first 15 minutes of my morning (when I should have been waking up the munchkins so that they had their "wake-up" time) cleaning out the crate after shoving the stinky dog outside (who was given a bath later this afternoon, thank you DH!!!).

Then, I got the kids up at 7 am and they proceeded to be too tired to get dressed for another 15 minutes or so ... and why do I have to brush my teeth? I don't WANT to wear that shirt, mommy! and I don't want to wear those shoes! ... sigh. I quick dropped the kids off at the corner by the school (instead of in the parking lot as usual), and dashed to work where I was 2 minutes late. I just had to get stuck behind a school bus and then one of those (good, but frustrating) people who actually goes the speed limit as it is posted. There has to be an easier way to do this waking up stuff ... what is it? Please share.

In case my day wasn't enough stress as it was, I decided to go shopping (with the kids, of course) after work because we needed a "healthy snack" for Julia's class for tomorrow (I decided on individual cups of cinnamon apple sauce ... yeah, high fructose corn syrup, I know), and I wanted to look for soccer cleats for the kids. We had gotten a pair that were size 2.5 from my MIL who I think picked them up at a thrift sale or from someone she knew, but Blake said they didn't fit, and we had none for Julia. All of the other kids on the team had cleats, so I decided to bite the bullet and buy some. They must serve some real purpose ... I hope. The kids were being exceptionally hyper, and Blake and Julia pulled out those shoe measuring tools and Blake stuck his on there to "play" and I glanced at it and he should need a size 1 to 1.5 for shoes. So, why on earth wouldn't those (too big) cleats fit him? Oh, he says, they do fit! *D'OH!* So, I saved some money and only bought cleats for Julia. Now, she better keep playing, lol.

To de-stress, I sat down to play with Kristmess' Autumn Rain Page Kit. I went in search of a photo that would fit with the elegant droplets that I wanted to play with, and found a picture of my daughter all dressed up in her (then-new) Halloween costume last October. At first I was determined to do an extraction layout and it was going to be fabulous. Then I pulled my extracted Julia onto the purple background and cringed ... the skirt pieces and headband pieces are see-through, and I couldn't get rid of all of the white background bits without spending hours ... so I decided to do an OOB instead (out of bounds). As I played, the layout unfolded itself easily into what you see here:


WOODLAND FAIRY CREDITS

It is amazing to me how much stress I can release in creating one simple page. NOw I am still tired, but I am not as frazzled as I was ... except for that nagging voice telling me to go to bed ...

I guess I better just listen this time, eh?

Good night, and thanks for reading! :)

The Cabin

Tyler was successful in talking me into going with him to the cabin. He has only been trying all summer long, and probably last year too. All I knew was that it was a good drive away, and that from his description there was going to be nothing to entertain the kids, and I just didn't want to be stuck somewhere with 3 very bored children. I'm sure you understand.

We made the not-as-lengthy-as-I-expected drive to the cabin ... which was out in the middle of nowhere for sure, lol. The driveway was almost non-visible. He says that is on purpose. A tree is fallen over the driveway part-way through. I worry that we'll scratch the roof of the truck, but we drive through and as far as I know there is no scratch up there.

The view is nice. The cabin doesn't look like much, and it needs a lot of work. But, there is a nice clearing, and a pretty view of the river. The bank is pretty steep, though. There were some fall colors popping out randomly on the drive up. I was able to see some from the cleared space by the cabin too. It is very quiet there, and I can see the appeal to Tyler, immediately. I just wished for a few things ... a chaise lounge, more for the kids to do, and a easier/faster way to cook the pork chops that he ambitiously brought along. Oh, and no flies/gnats/mosquitos ... but I wish for that no matter where I am.

The kids had a pretty good time, and they even spent a little bit of time down in the river -- well, Blake and Julia did. Chase wasn't allowed to try to climb down the bank, and I started to go down once but Tyler cautioned me there might be bees nests hiding and I went right back up. I am first to admit I am NOT a nature girl. I like the water, so I was willing to go down ... but NOT if there might be bees, lol.

I made a page with this picture I took not all that long before we left. I know that it was later because Julia had been wearing a bright yellow soccer team shirt most of the time. :)



If you like what I made, you can play around with this kit too. It's called "Autumn Rain Page Kit" by Kristmess Designs and is available at Gotta Pixel.



I will be back soon with soccer pictures, and maybe video if I can figure out how to upload it (has been a while!).

Thanks for stopping in!

First day of school - 2009

Blake on the first day of 1st grade:




No lookin' back, Ma ... I'm all grown up.


My little miss confident on her first day of Kindergarten:


Too excited for words. :)


Blake had his first full day today, and Julia had a half-day with me present. Blake jumped back into the school routine nearly without a hitch. Julia, being the little drama girl she is, did decide to be a little clingy with me at school for that half-day, which I found entirely amusing as she never did this when she went to two year's worth of Head Start. :) Julia is taken with her student teacher, and has decided she likes Ms. Lange.

Blake reports that he has Dillan in his class, which is hopefully not going to be a bad thing ... they get along really well, and Dillan is a nice boy, but I worry about them getting too chatty. Same thing with Julia and Devondre in her class, though ... she really likes him! Hee hee.

Well, that's enough about the first day of school ... 178 days to go. :)