Monday, April 11, 2011

Versatile Blogger Award

MommaC at http://thebitchinspot.blogspot.com/ just awarded me with my very first award for blogging!
Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!

I've been told there's rules that come with this honor...

Thank the person who gave you the award and link back to them in your post.
Tell us seven things about yourself.
Award fifteen recently discovered new bloggers.

Contact these bloggers and let them know they received this award

7 things I haven't already told you about me.

1) I lived in Tucson, Arizona as a kid
2) Many days I think I'm losing my mind (or maybe the straight jacket post gave that one away. lol)
3) My favorite colors are baby blue and hunter green
4) I can tell what time of day it is by the level of my kids' crankiness
5) We have a giant rabbit named Zoe, but I always say she's our puppy
6) I just caught myself arguing with my 3 year old!
7) I can't wait for the day that I never have to buy or change another diaper!!!

As for the 15 other recently discovered bloggers, I only know one other right now. And she's going to kill me for doing this to her! lol I will try to find other new bloggers also.

Saturday, April 9, 2011

A giant bunny or a man in a costume?

While we were at the park the other day a little boy who couldn't have been much older than my 7 year old daughter, over heard us talking about our plans to see the Easter Bunny this weekend. The boy then told my daughter that the Easter Bunny was really just a man in a costume. I quickly jumped in with a "No, he's wrong" but in that split second she looked truly heartbroken. This seems to be an epidemic among elementary school children. My friend's 6 year old came home one day very upset because another kindergardner had told her the same thing.

I asked people on Facebook about this and the general opinion seems to be that by the time kids reach about 7 or 8 years old, they no longer believe, that they're pretty much just humoring us. Can that really be true? And if so, how did it happen? Is our society so bad that our children can no longer believe in the magic of the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, or Santa Clause? How can we fix this? Is it even possible? Have we as parents gotten lazy? Are we so busy and self-involved that we don't take the time to make holidays special and memorable anymore? Have candy and gifts become more important than family and friends?

No matter what life throws at us, we always try to do something special for our kids during the holidays. This year for Easter, we visited the Easter Bunny and had free pictures taken, made Easter drawings to hang in our windows, baked Easter cookies, and the actual holiday isn't even here yet! For St. Patrick's Day we all wore green and my daughter wore green eyeshadow to school. (Which she still talks about!) And at Christmas time we made snowflakes for our windows, and had a cookie decorating party where Santa and Mrs. Clause made a special guest appearance. All these small things make such a difference to our children. It gives them priceless memories to hold onto and cherish when their worlds get turned topsy turvey.

The moral of this story? Don't let your children give up on the magic. Make the effort to do the special things that make the holidays and just being a kid so special.

Feel free to comment and tell me about special holiday memories or traditions that you and your family share. Happy Easter everybody!

P.S.
I found this site last night where you can get personalized letters from the Easter Bunny.
http://www.theholidayspot.com/easter/bunny_letters/
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Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Kids and college

If you've read any of my other posts then you know I have three young children, so it's pretty safe to assume I have a huge case of mommy brain. Add to that a husband who is more of a hinder than a help and what do you get? A frazzled, sleep deprived mess! Am I hearing sleepy murmors of "Yeah, me too"? Well, I added to the maddness. I deceided to become a full time (14 credit hours to be exact) college student. Before somebody yells "Get the straight jacket!" let me tell you this, going back to school was one of the best choices I've made in a long time. It's not easy by any means. I'm even more tired than I was before, I have more to do and less time to do it in, and my favorite time of day (the kids' bedtime) has become my study time. But it's worth it. I love my classes and I love being with other grown ups for a few hours. And I love that not only am I improving myself, but I'm working towards bettering my children's lives. I didn't go back to school for me, I did it for us.
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Monday, April 4, 2011

"Is your Mommy or Daddy here?"

OMG! I was dying my hair the other day, and since only my daughters were home with me, it was easier to do it in the bathroom without clothes on. Somebody knocked on the door and since I could peek around the corner to see the door, I told my 7 year old to answer it. I hear a ladys voice ask "Is your Mommy or Daddy here?" to which my daughter answers "Yeah my Mommy is but she's dying her hair so she's naked!" I was laughing so much I almost forgot to be embarassed...almost!
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Can you blog with a straight jacket on?

My aunt and I were talking earlier about ideas for each of our blogs, we're each other's inspiration and motivation. She had just posted a really good blog that I thought was a great idea to let people get to know her better and get a sense of who she is. I made a comment about wondering what I could write about to accomplish that as well. She told me to write about my life. My response? "I want to get people interested, not try to have me commited!" This led to a discussion about both of us being commited and being roomies. We both thought it would be a great vacation but that with our luck we wouldn't get pretty straight jackets. A vacation would be so nice but it would probably be too hard to blog with a straight jacket on!
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Sunday, April 3, 2011

Bedtime Woes

Bedtime was once my favorite time of day. As much as I love my little monsters...I mean my precious children, come night time I'm more than ready for them to go to bed. This should be an easy, painless process right? If you think so you obviously don't have children.

For my 7 year old it's the repeated chant of put your pajama's on, brush your teeth, clean your room, get your movie ready, (they get 1 hour of tv time in their beds before the Sandman comes), no you don't need another drink, didn't you already go potty? And this gets repeated several times in the process of getting ready for bed.

Then, there's the 3 year old. The chant for him is, let's brush your teeth, come get a diaper on (we're in the process of potty training), what movie do you want to watch tonight, say goodnight to Daddy, get your butt back in bed, no you already said goodnight, no you cannot watch more tv. For some reason this goes on longer than the one for his sister did.

This leaves the 13 month old. In some ways she is easier, but only in a few ways. I change her diaper, get her a bottle of milk, let her say goodnight to her Dad, and lay her in bed. She eaither lays there sweetly with her bottle or plays quietly with the toys in her bed. Then at about 1am she turns into a demon child. She doesn't wake up fussing. She skips straight to an all out scream. The problem? She can't find her bottle. I get up, give her her bottle back and back off to dreamland she goes. Until about 2 hours later when we go through this process again. And yet again every 2 to 3 hours until morning, with at least one diaper change in between.

During this time in the wee hours of the night, the 3 year old comes out to wake me up, after I finally fall back asleep, to say he wants to watch tv. I take him back to his bed while explaining that it's still night night time and he can watch tv when the sun wakes up. If I'm too tired to think rationally, I just tell him to get in bed with me and his Dad, which is most likely what he really wanted in the first place.

So after all the peaceful sleep I get, why is it that come morning I feel like crap? Sometimes I can't wait till they move out....
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Mommy....Mommy....Mommy.......

Mommy....Mommy....Mommy....it seems like I constantly hear this chant. I have a 7 year old, a 3 year old, and a 13 month old, and the funny thing is I hear this endless chant mostly from my 7 year old daughter. I would expect for the 3 year old to drive me crazy with this, but no, in my house, it's the oldest one that drives me batty! I love her to pieces, but she is completly incapable of playing by herself for more than 5 minutes. I'm being nice, it's probably more like 2 minutes! And it's not just a phase either, she's been like this her entire life. She will "play" in the living room with her younger siblings while watching me to see if I'm watching her "play". I've asked her why she does this, she has no answer. She just gives me that blank "what are you talking about?" look. I try pointing out to her that her younger brother and sister can play by themselves, but it doesn't change anything. The really bad part is that I've been told I was the same way when I was little. Thinking back, it's true. But shhh, I can't admit that to my family! And even scarier than that, if she needs this much attention now, what is she going to put me through when she's a teenager?! AHHHH.........
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