Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Trains and Rockets!

For our book project we read "If You Could Go To The Moon". It's a cute book describing all of the things you would need to take, what it would be like, and how grateful you would be to come home! Then we made our very own spaceship! We shook up some white paint in an old juice bottle. Cut and colored some cardboard and foam circles. Then brought out the handy hot glue gun. Love it!


"T" is for Trains! Okay, this one's not the cutest one ever but Cooper loved trains so I tried to improvise.


Friday, September 18, 2009

Recommendations

I've got 3 passions in my life right now. I want to give some recommendations:

1. Cooking
I love, love, love it! My sisters, mom, and I have just started a cooking blog. Check it out!

2. Exercise
Two great workout series, both from Beachbody.com. First, Chalene Extreme. This is probably my favorite. Her philosophy is to lift heavy with few reps. It has really worked for me and I love it because I get a fabulous workout in minimum time. Second, P90X. I know a lot of you have heard of it. It is extreme, but pretty good.

3. Crafting
On the right side of my blog there are about 20 AMAZING blogs that I look at every day. They are under "My Favorite Links". There are crafting and cooking blogs. Check them out-you might find one you love. They inspire everything I do with my kids and cooking.

** No, I have not been paid for any of this advertising:)

Getting Bigger and Hanging Out

We have been up to a lot lately, it seems. Or maybe it just seems that way because I do EVERYTHING now that Jake is a traveling man. I go to bed so tired!! Actually, so tired that I have a hard time falling asleep. It's one of those cruel injustices I have to deal with in my lovely life! Every now and then we get to just chill at home. Here are some memories captured on camera of my adorable 3 boys.
I love this face. I don't know what he was doing. Can anyone tell me what color his eyes are? I cannot figure it out.
Isn't this fancy? I love his booty wiggle and speed!
"Playing house" this morning. I thought it was cute to boot!
Notice I called my boys adorable? I really do mean it this time. I feel like I've had a transformation of sorts this week. Some of my boys give me some EXTREME challenges (mostly because we're both head strong and want to be right). I have been doing a lot of pondering, studying, crying, depressing (I know that's not good vocab), and plain introspection. I've discovered that this problem I was dealing with had seeped into all areas of my life and was changing me in ways that I hated. I started really not liking who I had become.

I finally decided to let go and just LOVE!! Okay, I know this sounds so cheesy but it really has worked. I've been listening to these talks by John Lund. He talked about having challenging kids and how parents who seek to perfect their kids only succeed in driving them further away by them constantly not meeting expectations (me to a "T"). I expect a LOT out of my kids and when they don't mold just perfectly--watch out! Anyhow, Brother Lund encouraged parents to "Just love them and do what you can do". Basically, always show conditional love and the rest will take care of itself.

I was so caught up in perfecting this child that I was having a hard time loving him. I've changed and life has been so, so much better. I'm just determined to love this child first and foremost and to pick my battles. I guess I don't always have to win. Danget! ALSO, I am reading a great book called "Positive Discipline" that I would totally recommend to any parent. I didn't mean for this to be a confessional. Just thought I'd share my experiences.

S is for Star!

So, I no longer have the excuse of summer and visiting family. I've decided I need to get started again with teaching my children. We continued our journey through the alphabet. "S" was fun because there are so many applicable things! Plus, Coop's new obsession is space ships so he was even more interested!

The next day we read Eric Carle's "Draw Me a Star". (Disclaimer: There is a nakey pic of man and woman...Cooper just thought it was me and Jake-that's weird, huh?) He made a glittery star and then we cut it out and pasted it on black paper. He has been attempting to draw stars all day now. It's cute!

Friday, September 11, 2009

Rude, Crude, and Unusual

I had the WORST day yesterday. I've been all alone this week at my parent's creepy house. For some reason the nighttime is really scary here so I don't sleep well. Thus, I am cranky and overworked and lonely because there's no one to talk to. I just wanted to prelude my experience with that. So yesterday I scrambled to get out the door by 8:45 to pick up co-op/deliver/sort it. Then we ran to the library and enjoyed reading time (This sounds much more pleasant than it was--let's just say I put Luke in time out 4 times inbetween getting out of the car and actually entering the library). While I was checking out books Cooper and Luke started running circles around the DVD's. The check-out man proceeded to read all 17 of the items I had checked out and when they were due. It took forever! Mid-list I ran to gather my kids and as I was walking back a very, very upset middle-aged man came storming through and yelled at the top of the lungs "Lady, either get your stupid kids to shut up or get out of here. This is a library for ____ sake!". I angrily turned to him and said "I'm doing my best, thank you!". I was mortified, stressed, and felt like crap. Everyone around me was overly kind and apologetic. I even had one lady chase me out to the parking lot to assure me I was doing a good job and she thought the man must beat his wife. I thought I was over it but then I entered a dark abyss for the rest of the day of motherhood crapiness. Then I let it all out to Jake on the phone who already feels bad that I have to do it all on my own lately. Man, sometimes life is just really hard. Today was a little better. A little.

Those Crazy Sedgwick's!

We (actually my mom) had the HONOR of watching the Sedgwick kids for 3 weeks while their mom and dad went to Africa. In order to make the kids feel like they weren't missing out, we pulled out all the stops!! They were entertained every day with stuff ranging from the zoo, crafts, the beach, a jump warehouse, homemade forts, and space shuttles!! Lucky us, we got to tag along to join in all of the fun!
The Zoo





The Fort

The Jump Warehouse


The Craft



The Beach




Space Shuttles!


The Kennedy Space Center down in Florida was awesome! Cooper has declared that his 3rd birthday will be all about spaceships! Good, I can't mess up white frosting!