Turning 4!

My baby is turning 4 tomorrow! It doesn't seem like he should be 4 already! We celebrated his birthday this past Saturday, and he loved everything he got. He had asked for a combine cake. So I did my best to make the cake look like a field, with a John Deere combine and tractor on it. It wasn't great, but B LOVED it. The tractor and combine on the cake were actually presents from Pawpaw. Although he liked all his presents, Pawpaw is the only one that got kisses. One of the things that I got him was a shirt with a 4-wheeler on it. But he will tell you Pawpaw got it for him. Pawpaw gets credit for everything, lol.

I guess I need to stop calling him my baby now. He gets mad at me when I do, and tells me, "I not a baby, I a big boy."

So Sweet

The other night, I was looking through some old pictures when I came across this one. I just love this picture...back before Ray and Chey were fighting all of the time. This was taken at the end of March of 2007, so Chey was 2-1/2 years old and Ray was almost 7. It was only 3 short years ago, but it seems like longer.

Stupid Adults & Rude Children

As I mentioned in my previous post, Ray was diagnosed with strep throat on Sunday night. We were supposed to have company (a friend and her kids) on Monday morning. I let her know that Ray had strep throat since most parents would not bring their children (aged 9, 7, and 4 months) around a sick child. Not only did she still come over, the original time she was supposed to come was 10 am and didn't come until 1 pm (um, things to do here).

While here, her 9 year old tried to tell me Brian wasn't allowed in Ray's room, that my dog was too big to me inside, that Brian wasn't allowed to be near the baby, that Brian was annoying, that Ray needed to be allowed to play outside since he was feeling better, etc. When Brian decided to play on the computer, the 7 year old ran and jumped into the computer chair trying to keep Brian from playing.

The whole time the mother just sat there, not saying a word to her kids. I said stuff of course, and so did my mother. I would never let me kids get by with talking to an adult the way this 9 year old was talking to me, or let my kids act this way. Not only would I correct them, they would be disciplined

Not a Good Winter

This winter has just been the pits. It all started 2 days before Christmas. That is when Chey started to run a fever, and was vomiting. Her fever finally broke Christmas Eve night. Only for me to wake up Christmas morning feeling like I had been run over by a truck and having to blow my nose every 2 minutes. The afternoon brought Brian vomiting. Thankfully, Ray got by without any of it.

Chey and Brian got better, but I didn't. The month of Jan brought Pneumonia for me. Then a couple weeks ago Chey was diagnosed with Pneumonia. Then this past Saturday night, Ray started to complain that his throat hurt. Sunday he was running a fever that didn't want to go down too much, didn't want to eat because his throat hurt him too much, and he started vomiting. Since it was a Sunday on a holiday weekend, I took him to the ER. The poor boy has strep throat. Monday night Chey started running a fever again, but thankfully it was gone by morning and didn't come back.

And for me, it has just been one cold after another this winter. We have never been sick this much before. I wish I knew why this winter is different.

I Don't Want to Go to School

C is only 5.  She is in Pre-K (her b-day falls after the cut-off date for starting K this school year).  Up until Christmas break, she LOVED school.  A lot of mornings she would wake me up.  The mornings I had to wake her up, she jumped out of bed.  Every minute was, "Is it time to leave yet?"  After school was always, "But I wanted to stay at school longer."  And she hated weekends or any other day there was no school.  She would even complain she didn't get homework like R did.  When she did start getting "homework", she was always so excited, telling everyone, "I was so good at school today my teacher gave me homework."

But apparently that all changed during Christmas break.  Since starting back at the beginning of the month, every school day starts the same..."I don't want to go to school today, I want to stay home."  This is every single day from the time she wakes up until she gets to school!  She's even told me, "If you were a good mommy, you would let me stay home."  So apparently I am a bad mommy because I make her go to school, lol.

Kids' Clothing Sizes

I don't know about anyone else, but I think clothing for kids should also come in half sizes.  My kids don't really have anything that fits them just because all 3 seem to be stuck in between sizes.  A size 8 is too small for R, but size 10 is too big on him.  B is too big to wear 3T, but 4T's are too big on him.  With C, 5's are too small, but 6's are too big.

And the length of things.  Just as adults can be classified as petite, regular, and tall, kids can too.  With R I need tall, and with the other two I need petities. 

Maybe I just need to finally break down and learn to use this sewing machine sitting in the next room .  That way I can make their clothes myself to fit. 

My Little B

My little B can be such a sweetheart at times.  I have been sick since Christmas Day.  I just couldn't seem to shake what I thought was just a cold.  After running a fever for 4 days in a row, I decided this past Monday I needed to go to the doctor.  B had to go with me since I had no one to watch him.  The whole time at the doctor's office, B was patting me, telling me, "It okay, Mommy, the doctor make you better."  Well, the doctor did help to make me feel better, giving me prescriptions for my pneumonia.  It was so sweet of B to help "comfort" me during the doctor's visit though.

Then yesterday B was running around in circles, and gave me a game, telling me to push the "banana" buttons (the yellow ones).  He said it would turn him off.  So I pushed them.  He told me I did a good job turning him off and also told me, "You so brave, Mommy." 

This kid just cracks me up

Christmas Memories

Last year, DH lost his job not too long before Christmas time, so money was really tight.  The kids weren't going to get much for Christmas, but I was determined that it was still going to be a great Christmas for them.  One thing I always have in the house is ingredients for baking.  So I set everything out, then the kids and I got to work.  We made several different kinds of homemade cookies, homemade caramels, homemade hard candy, homemade truffles, etc.  We even got my youngest involoved, and he was 2.5 at the time.  We spent the whole week before Christmas baking.  Sure, it made a mess, but we had some great fun.  And what was even better was seeing the joy on the kids faces when they would pass out their goodies to other family members while telling them about making them.  And you know what?  Here we are a year later, and my kids don't remember a single gift they did get for Christmas last year.  But they sure remember making all those goodies.

So this Christmas, make some memories with your kids.  Get in the kitchen and bake some cookies together.  Or do holiday crafts, go caroling, or whatever.  It doesn't matter what you do, as long as you do it together.  You can even invite other family members over to join in on the fun (we had my brother come help last year).   

Report Card

R got his first report card for the year today. He got 2 A's, 3 B's, and a D. The D was in Spelling, but we are working on that more, and using games to help him learn them. So hopefully that D will be brought up before the next report card.

Another "Boo-boo"

B sure keeps me on my toes...the poor boy. Just as a quick history lesson:

• At a year and a half old, on a Christmas Eve, B busted his head open on the dining room table. Spent forever in the ER on that one
• At 2 years old, he was jumping on the bed, fell off, and had a heck of a black eye from it. Didn't phase him one bit though, he went right back to jumping on the bed 2 seconds later.
• The dog bite (which can I wrote about here and put pics up here) happened when he was 3. Also was the incident a couple weeks ago where he kept hitting his eye on everything at the family reunion, which I wrote about here.

So that brings me to now. The other day he was in his room watching TV, when he started crying. Hubby went to his room to see what was wrong, and came carrying him down. B was bleeding from his chin. I got the bleeding to stop right away. And once I got him cleaned up, it was just a little worse than a scratch. I asked him what happened. He told me, "I was jumping on my bed and fell." Just a couple hours later, I caught him jumping on the bed again!

So I have come to the conclusion that the only way I can keep him from getting hurt is to wrap him in bubble wrap, lol

I've been bad

I admit it, I've been horrible at actually working on my blog. I've wanted to. I really have. It's just that I don't think anything in my life is interesting enough to share. Now that I've said that, here's what's been going on here.

C turned 5 a few weeks ago. Although she thinks she is older. Her b-day was after the cut-off to start Kindergarten this year though, so she is in an all-day Pre-K. She LOVES it. She is doing good in school, loves doing her homework (yes, homework in Pre-K!), and loves all of her new friends. The only things she hates is the fact that there is no school on the weekends, and that she has to wake up early. She never has been an early bird.

R just got his first progress report for the year. He's getting 1 A, 3 B's (one of which the teacher said if it was the actual report card, she would have put an A), a C, and a D+ (which the teacher and I are going to work with him on bringing up). I will have to do a whole other post on what getting him to do his homework is like :x.

B is used to having C home all day long, so he isn't liking when she is at school all day. A week ago, at a family reunion, he was playing on a merry-go-round. He decided to let go while it was moving, and hit his eye on one of the metal bars. Then he decided to start pushing a solid wooden swing. It swung back and hit him right in the same eye. Poor little man. He had a little bit of a black eye for a few days, but it really wasn't all that bad.

Too Young

There is a little boy at church that is about a year or so older than C, and he has a crush on her. C doesn't like this very much though. She says the boy isn't allowed to like her and that he isn't going to be her boyfriend, lol. She had 3 reasons:

1. He's just a kid
2. He's not big enough to take her on a date
3. He has to be as tall as Pawpaw to be her boyfriend

So there ya have it. My 4 year old will not have a kid for a boyfriend. He has to be an adult that can take her on dates. Guess she's stuck with Pawpaw and their "dates" every Wednesday to Dairy Queen for a while.

Wonderful Friday...NOT

My day started at 8 am, which was nice. But as soon as I woke up, R started talking. At the moment is it 6:55 pm, and he hasn't shut up yet! He has stopped talking for the time being, but the talking has been replaced by noise making. I don't know if he is just trying to drive me nuts, or if he is going to the world record of not shutting up.



While we were all outside playing today, B grabbed ahold of a hanging plant holder and pulled it down. The plant pot in it of course fell down, and konked C on the head. B thought this was the funniest thing. C, on the other hand, insisted that we get rid of B by sending him to jail. She said after we got rid of him, we could go get her a baby sister instead.

So now B is dancing around the house, using a tennis racket as a guitar, singing at the top of his lungs. I am ready for bed!!!

If I Were A Pizza

So I was going across all the various papers R brought home from cleaning out his locker and desk at school. One paper is made to look like a slice of pizza, and had written on there "If I were a piece of pizza..." So here is how R's paper reads:

"If I were a piece of pizza...I would be a poisonous pizza so people would not eat me If people eat me they are going to die."

Only a child of mine would write something like that.

Nothing Exciting

Nothing too exciting happened over the weekend. The kids did some fishing, and R helped Pawpaw and me do some mowing. R & C got to go to the park with my cousin Saturday, and he took them out for ice cream afterwards.

Anyway, I finally got more pictures of B's "boo-boos" on the computer. These are from 2 days after he got the stitches out. I still need to take pictures of how it looks now, but it is looking good. As you can see from these pictures, even 2 days after the stitches were taken out, it looked better than the day they were taken out. They only things I have been doing with his wounds is cleaning them with plain ole soap and water, then gently rubbing in a little pure aloe (not that stuff you get at the drugstore) and Vitamin E.

His head


His face just 2 days after the stitches were taken out.

And check out my other blog, Crystal's 3 C's, and see the newest baby blanket I have finished for a friend.

Kids in the Kitchen

Since I don't really have anything "cute" to write about tonight, I thought I would talk about kids in the kitchen. My kids seem to like to help out in the kitchen. Some good reasons for letting your kids help you out in the kitchen are:

• They get a sense of accomplishment
• Learning to cook is a very valuable skill...after all, everyone needs to eat
• Picky eaters (like my 9 year old) are more likely to eat something they help make

There is usually always something you can find for your kid(s) to help out with, no matter what their age is.

My 3 year old helps out with mixing things. He also helps pour things in after they are measured out.

My 4 year old also helps mix things. She also helps measure things out, which is a good head start in math. She also does thing like putting the toast in the toaster or the microwave.

Along with mixing, my 9 year old helps out with cutting things that can be cut with a butter knife. He is also just starting to be allowed to help stir things that are on the stove.

All 3 kids help out with washing fruits/vegetables, along with putting butter/jelly/peanut butter on bread/toast. When we make homemade pizza, all 3 kids LOVE to help put the pizzas together.

Yes, having the kids help out in the kitchen does get messy. But it is a good bonding experience, a good learning experience, and can be just plain fun. So try letting your kid(s) help out in the kitchen. You don't have to do it every day, but try it once a week, or a couple times a month. The meal/snack may only last a few minutes, but the memories you make will last a lifetime______________________________________________________________

And for today's Tip of the Day:

Have a stain in your sink, tub, counter, etc? Instead of grabbing the harsh scouring cleaner or bleach, grab your box of baking soda instead! Baking soda scours just like Comet (etc), but isn't as harsh, and leaves no chemical residue behind. For really stubborn stains, spritz some plain vinegar on top of the baking soda and let sit for a couple minutes

Too Cute

I was sitting in the yard this evening, watching B go around and around the circular drive in his Power Wheel Jeep. That's when he saw Pawpaw heading back to the shop to get out the tractor to mow. That boy was almost to the shop before I even got 1/4 of the way, lol. Then he stopped his Jeep right outside the big door and sat there waiting. As soon as the door had raised about halfway up, he floored his Jeep right into the shop and yelled, "Hi Pawpaw!"

Then after bedtime, R kept getting out of bed. The last time I told him he was in trouble if he got out of bed again. His reply was, "But what if there's a snake up here in the room?" Gotta love what kids come up with.

C, on the other hand, decided to try a different kind of "pajamas" for bed tonight. She had to go to bed wearing a purple princess dress, a tiara with purple stones, and white high heels.

I have no clue how I would stay entertained if it wasn't for my children

Tip of the Day #1

Since I don't really have much to blog about, I thought I would give some tips every now and then. So here is today's tip:

If you send your 4 year old to the Wednesday evening church service with her Pawpaw, then there is a good chance that 4 year old will talk said Pawpaw into taking her on a "date" to Dairy Queen. The results could be them coming home with ice cream for you!

So far my results with using this tip has gotten me a Mocha Moolatte last week and a hot fudge sundae this week!

Stitches are out

B got his stitches out on Friday morning. Everything looked worse after he got his stitches out than it did with the stitches in, and that's counting the same day he got the stitches! Here are a couple pictures of what he looked like on Friday, after the stitches came out.

Here is his head. It actually looks worse in the picture here than it did in person, but it still looked bad in person.

And here is his face. It just looks worse than it did with the stitches. Those are steri-strips on his face for those wondering. And for some reason the doc put Betadine on OVER the steri-strips.

B is doing good though. I have a couple pictures that I took yesterday of his face and head that look so much better than he did on Friday. I just need to get those pictures onto the computer. I have been just washing the area with soap and water, and putting PURE aloe (none of that wanna be aloe that you get at Walmart or Walgreens) on his wounds, and they are doing great.

Hope you all had a great Memorial Day. We did here. We went to my grandpa's grave. We also had people over for a cookout, and spent a nice day outside.

R spent a lot of time over the weekend out at the pond with his Pawpaw. Last night Pawpaw stayed up until midnight cutting up fish. And tonight he was cutting up fish until 10 pm.

C did a little fishing over the weekend also. She only caught 3 or 4 fish though. But she claims the ones she caught were about 2 foot long, lol.

Minus 1 Stitch

B is minus one stitch now. He scratched off a small part of his scab, and pulled a stitch out. It looks good though...as good as it can considering it's a dog bite. His doctor's appointment to get the stitches all out is at 9:15 tomorrow morning! I am ready for the stitches to come out so I can stop worrying about him pulling them out. Of course I will still have to worry about him picking at the scabs until they heal. Then again, a mother never stops worrying about her children. I will try to get some pictures up tomorrow night of the wounds after the stitches are out.

The other dogs have been great with B since he got bit. One usually tries to stay away from the kids unless they are eating, and in that case she sits and begs for their food. But she has been going up to B all week and kissing on him. She normally doesn't kiss on anyone. Another has been going in his room all week at bedtime and checking his room out, then laying outside his bedroom door. The other 3 kiss on him and cuddle up to him. B is showing no fear of them, thankfully.

R got a 100 on his spelling test today! He tries to act like it isn't a big deal when he does that, but I always make it a point to tell him how proud I am of him and hang them on the fridge. I think it kind of embarasses him, lol.

C has been having fun telling everyone she runs across all about how B got his boo-boos. Everyone she has seen at the store for the past week, she tells them hi, her name, B's name, how old both of them are, and then tells them, "Tank bit my baby brother, that's why he has stitches."