The Trials of a Busy Mom

Month: August 2005 (Page 2 of 2)

John loves cars!

John and Cars
Isn’t it funny how kids are born prewired with likes and dislikes? For example, Cole was reading at an early age and really loves to read. He’s said that he would like to be a librarian when he grows up (we said, “maybe an editor?). Megan loves to draw, and every paper that comes home from school has little drawings of animals on the back. Natalie likes all things girly and barbie-ish. In fact, she ordered a free DVD from myscene.com without letting us know, as I recall (pretty computer savy for a 6 year old). Jenna also loves dolls and animals and has from the beginning. But John…John loves cars. I think he dreams about cars. He looks at books and points out the cars before the animals, and makes the “beep beep, vroom vroom” noises for them. He drives his cars around the coffee table and parks them on the couch. He really really LOVES cars! He’ll probably grow up to be a mechanic. Or maybe he could be a cool car collector. We’ll just have to see. At least I know what to get him for his birthday, right?

the Summer of Robin


Well, it’s been a fun and exciting 8 weeks, but the summer of Robin has come to an end. We really enjoyed having Robin and her kids here. She’s a great houseguest and she helped me out a lot. Yes, she babysat, made dinners occasionally, and brought friends for my kids to play with. I think the kids are now going to expect live in friends to come every summer–just to entertain them! She passed her classes, too! We had fun going to Yellowstone, Lagoon, Thanksgiving Point, many parks, and many neighborhood and family parties. I wish her well with her endeavors once she gets home–the pile of mail that never arrived here that’s hopefully waiting for her there, her kids starting school immediately, a stove that doesn’t work, and a whole bunch of stuff to sell on ebay are just a few of the things she said she wasn’t so excited to deal with once she retuns.



I now need to get Cole moved back into his room (he’s been generous to give up his room and sleep in the basement for 2 months), clean the basement that he’s taken over, and generally get things back in order. I’ll also have to do my own grocery shopping and errand pick up because I won’t have someone going to Provo twice a week who does those things for me. But we’ll have far less phone calls from people we don’t know asking for Robin.

Sandwich, anyone?

I went to my first PTA meeting of the school year yesterday, and got the most fun object lesson. I’m going to share it here because it could be used for other things, not jut PTA. First she passed around a platter from Subway with those half sandwiches on it (food is always appreciated, right?), and then handed out the following:

A PTA Sandwich

Do you ever get the feeling that it is too hard to SANDWICH in PTA between everything else? And most of the time it turns out to be a JAM sandwich? Let’s make a sandwich together and see what it takes to turn a sandwich into a real picnic!

Bread (2 slices)–First you need a strong foundation. What is expected of you?
Butter–Spread yourself around. Get to know others, be receptive to learning more.
Mustard–Be Prepared. Muster up the courage to ask questions or make comments.
Miracle Whip–When you praise others for their effors, it acts like a miracle.
Meat–Help get to the meat of responsibilities, share the load, finish on time.
Cheese–We all need to feel like the big cheese once in a while. Let’s remember to cheer each other on.
Lettuce–Lettuce make sure we delegate or we may feel overwhelmed.
Tomato–Don’t sling tomatoes at others’ efforts. Always use tact and good judgement.

And you can’t have a picnic without a few extras…
Chips–Everyone needs to chip in and help our PTA be the best we can be.
Drink–Don’t forget to add some sparkle!!
Ants–Don’t be bugged by criticism or things that don’t go as planned. Try to be patient, learn from your experiences.
*******

Cute, isn’t it? After my meeting I went and did some “back to school shopping”. I spent about 80 dollars on clothes for the kids, and about that much —okay, maybe a little bit more–on clothes for me. Whoops? Well, nobody said the clothes were only for the kids who were going back to school, did they?

Sometimes life is hard

“Sometimes life is hard. I mean sometimes you have to get to someone to tell them something important and the phone is busy and you have to keep calling and calling and calling. That is hard.” said the 9 year old who is still in her pajamas at 9:05 am, who hasn’t done any of her jobs yet and hasn’t practiced the piano. After she does those things, the hardest part of her day will be finding a friend to play with. Wouldn’t you like to be 9?

Uh, Oh.

You know those 5 pounds? I think I gained them back again last night. We went out to the Mayan for dinner with Robin and her date last night and had a great time. I ordered the Marguerita Chicken Salad or something like that and it was great. But all that salty food, and I didn’t save half to bring home and eat the next day like I should have. Whoops.

My, what cute toes you have!

My toes look awfully cute. If I were real techno savy I’d take a picture and post it here, but I’m sure you know what cute freshly manicured toes look like. You see, Robin and I set a goal, and promised that as soon as we’d lost our first 5 pounds, we’d go and get a pedicure. We thought that should take us about 2 weeks on Weight Watchers. Little did we realize the influx of parties, neighborhood gatherings, holidays, camping trips, and good intentioned neighbors and visiting teachers who would bring sweets that were awaiting us. It only took us 6-7 weeks to lose those “first 5 pounds”, but we indeed lost them, and got our lovely pedicures. So, now, I can look down at my darn cute toes and be reminded that yes, I have lost 5 pounds, and yes, I can lose the next 5, and the 5 after that.

So, I will plug on. I may not be the most succesful at the weight loss thing, and I may not be the most dedicated point counter or exerciser, but at least I’m trying, and I’m proud of Robin and me for at least attempting weight loss, and succeeding in a little way.

p.s.

By the way, I didn’t win the car. But really, can you see me driving around in the “General Lee”?

But still, it was a chance to win a free car, who could pass that up? It would have been fun to win, ride around for a few days, and then sell it for some cold hard cash! Just you wait, one of these days I really AM going to win a car…and a trip to Disneyland.

Art show

Wow, my kids entered a bunch of stuff in the Highland City art show, and they were quite pleased at the awards show last night.

Cole ended up with a first place for his origami ball, and third place in mixed media for a drawing.
Megan won a first place for her watercolor of Sudance, first for her drawing of two horses (quite good for a 9 year old, I must say), and 3rd in photography.
Natalie won a second place in sculpture.
Jenna won two third places in watercolor and drawing.

So, they were all pleased with their work, and I’m glad we’re done with art shows for a while.

In an unrelated thought, I am very thankful for my body. I’ll be the first to admit, I wish on an almost daily basis that it were someone else’s body, or even my body, only skinnier and tanner, but isn’t a body an amazing thing? I’m thankful that my body is for the most part healthy, and I wish for health for those who are suffering. I look at my kids and their perfect bodies and am doubly thankful that they can run and jump and draw and do all the things they want. Their mouths work a little too well, but that’s another topic.

Nothing much, how about you?

I can’t think of anything to say today. Nothing much is going on except the usual stuff. Kids playing with friends, trying to keep the house clean amid kids playing with friends, John taking every single card in the organized “Who wants to be a millionare game” out and throwing them on the floor. Stuff like that.

Right now I have three casseroles in the oven. One for us and two for people who could use a dinner without cooking, and I just made some carrot orange cookies to go with them (ate WAY too much cookie dough, of course).

As soon as my dear husband gets home I’m going to dash off to the city building to enter my kids’ artwork in the city art contest. There are 4 kids old enough to draw, and each one wants to enter 3 items….you do the math. I just hope I don’t drop a sculpture or something.

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