Ten Things Tuesday

Ten things I'm thankful for today...

1. sleep
2. sunshine
3. school
4. homemade bread
5. blogs
6. snuggly mouser
7. clean bedrooms (well, 2 out of 4 ain't bad)
8. leftovers
9. dancing dresses
   
10. matchbox cars

If you'd like to join in on this thankful blog carnival go here to check out other's thankfulness today!

simple sunday

We were busy all week and into the weekend. So after church, was lunch (nachos) nap, and play time. Playdoh, trains, bingo, cars, turtle rides on daddy. Mommy got a bunch of knitting done, I usually get about 3 rows, then move on, I'm working on a shawl. While Ady was playing with play doh, I was playing trains with caiden...I heard, "I've got worms!!" she was really excited. Of course she meant play doh worms out of the squisher thingy, but quite a funny thing to hear my little girl exclaim from the other room! If you look closely at the track here, Caiden very much wants the track to balance in mid air for the train to go on. He didn't seem too upset that it didn't ever seem to hold the train.

A few of me.

• There are 54,948 people in the U.S. with the first name Kari.
• Statistically the 748th most popular first name.

HowManyOfMe.com

There are 104 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

Dancing butterflies

Pictures of Ady's dance class. I spent two weeks rounding up the appropiate clothing that also fit. (dear sweet Ady has wide feet...does not make finding dance shoes easy.) The class is once a week for one hour. half hour of ballet and half hour of tap. I love it when the teacher asks them to raise their right arm, or kick their left leg...because only 1/2 get it right and I'm fairly certain that it is mostly by chance. They got great big white scarves and practiced little steps by being butterflies. simply darling. Pictures are blurry...little girl butterflies....move A LOT!! The picture that is so very cute from the back is Ady's friend Madison..doesn't she spread her wings well? I love how the three little girls are comparing their "wings" they are such little girls! enjoy!

To do

This seems to be a theme this week. Thought I'd share how my lists are going.

What I thought about doing today:
clean bathroom, finish yesterday's laundry, blog about dance class, go for bike ride, work on processing apples. Make nice dinner.

What I did:
made 4 apple coffee cakes, batch of applesauce, 2 batches of dehydrated apples, folded some of the clothes from yesterday...still sitting on the floor. took nap.
played trains with kiddos, bathed kiddos, did homework with kiddos. Dug out the rest of my childhood records...I have a record that teaches how to do ventriloquism, and an Englebert Humperdink. And Burl Ives singing Goober Peas. (that should jog some memories around here.) Cooked frozen pizza for dinner. Talked with best friend tonight on phone!!! yipppeeee!!!!

Old stereo/record player...free from sister-in-law years ago.
Records to play...pretty pennies from parents years ago.
chipmunks singing goober peas at speed of 45 rpm's....priceless.

All in all some interesting trades. I especially liked nap time, and listening to old 33 records at 45 speed. Caiden's favorite thing is to play all the big records at 45 and he thoroughly enjoys the chipmunk impersonators...remember the howling dog song on Lady and the Tramp? That is hysterical in regular speed, chipmunk...crazy hysterical..especially for the 3 an 5 year old. The jungle book songs at 45? totally funny...the kids go crazy jumping on the trampoline trying to match the rhythm. Now, if I could just go to sleep at a decent hour and not feel so stinkin' tired tomorrow. This tired momma is goin' to bed.

feedblitz

apparently the email subscriptions have not been working. I have reinstalled it....try it and let me know if it works now.

A-Ha! and other photo fun stuff

At this very moment I am uploading over a hundred pictures to snapfish. Have you tried this delightful place? I love their prices and I love the ease of sharing photos and allowing others to order their own copies of the pictures that they actually like!

However, I had an interesting moment a few days ago as I realized that I am three months behind....summer pictures ring a bell...do you even KNOW how many pictures I took of my adorable kids this summer???

A year ago I was avidly using snapfish to "back-up" my photos...three at a time using dial-up...late at night. Then we got broadband and vista and a CD burner. One might think that I would save snapfish for just the adorable ones that others might enjoy. However, I have still been downloading quarterly pretty much all my photos...WHY??? you may be asking....because I completely forgot that the new wonderful computer could burn a CD of photos!!!! ugh!!!(me, pounding my forehead with open palm.)

One day soon, I will dig into my stack of burnable CD's and make my very own...maybe in January when I can do the whole year at once....hopefully no viruses will attack before then...oh well...I always have Snapfish! Perhaps I will finish editing my family movies as well that are sitting on the computer...not being burned onto anything. (Have I even taken ANY video this year...after hubby bought me a way better digital camera? hmmmm)

And now, dear Marcy informs me that I can turn my blog into a book...go ahead google that idea, you'll be wanting to publish your daily thoughts as well....would anyone even want to read this blog again? Isn't the point, that blogs don't get dusty? Would I really want to spend the time and energy (and money) to turn my random thoughts into a book that collects dust....I think dusty books are kind of sacred, I'm not so sure this counts. What are your thoughts?

resource fair

Friday we skipped school to go to a children's resource fair. The time frame was 9:30-12:00. I had a fingerprinting appointment at 10 (my last piece for my substitute license) so we went over right after. The kids got to do three things and then the agencies started cleaning up. This was at 11:00 when they started cleaning up. I guess the bus loads of children were done and the few of us, not attached to a large group, were not worth sticking around for. Needless to say, after driving an hour and a half to get there, I was not pleased. I will be making at least one phone call Monday morning.

The kids didn't understand why the fire trucks left before they could shoot the water and why Smokey the Bear was nowhere to be found and why everytime we turned around another station was gone. hmmm... They did get to play on the bouncy slide, eat a snack, make a foam art project and a christmas ornament ball.

We did spend the day with our very good friends, even got a nap in! So, the day most certainly was not a waste.

Steadfast

Psalm 26:3
For thy steadfast love is before my eyes and I walk in faithfulness to thee.

This is the verse the kids and I are learning this week in the car. All week I have been wanting to teach them in a hands on way what steadfast means. I have an idea or two floating around that may involve daddy.

I just got my own hands on lesson about the meaning of steadfast. I went for a bike ride. the same loop that I took the other day. However today on the last 20 minutes the wind was blowing against me. It slowed me down by about 2 miles per hour and I was already tired. The wind just kept coming and coming. I felt like I could have walked just as fast. I started practicing our verse. Thinking more about steadfast. I realized that the wind was blowing against me but was not moving me. When I got home my time was actually better than the other day, despite my slower speed.
God's love is steadfast and cannot be moved or shaken and is not dependent on us. It just is.

I like numbers

I went for a bike ride this morning. After a weekend of grumpiness and being a bit sedentary. It feels good.
Here's few numbers that help it be worth while and is a bit faster to satisfy than the creeping downward numbers on the scale!
A side note...I bought a cheap bike computer this weekend, just for this type of inspiration!(I even installed it myself!)

My total distance: 8.26 miles.
max speed: 12 miles/hour
average speed 9.4 miles/hour
time: 52:45 minutes
heart rate afterward: 150 bpm
Calories burned: 214 according to fit day
I'm so excited! YAY for my side!!!!

a little paper work

A plan for this week. Only time will tell how well it goes.

Chore charts for Caiden and Ady printed out. We will put stickers on them each day. Then on Saturday or Sunday each kiddo can check off chores on website and have play time with their handipoints kitty.

Handwriting: Letter B for Ady. No and Yes for Caiden. Handwriting worksheets from here. (completely customizable.)

Spelling: word search using our current site words. Testing, practice and playing at this site. again..completely customizable for our own lists. I printed a word search for each kiddo.

ABC order: I printed a dot to dot here for Ady.
Reading: Caiden brings a reader home from school each day.

Another goal I have is to do better with bible verse memorization. The kiddos are in the car for 30 minutes each day as we travel to and from school. This would be an opportune time to work on verses. I found some printable kid friendly bible verse cards here. I printed the boy version, girl version, plus two more copies for mom and dad to carry around. Maybe a verse each week??? I plan to cover each in contact paper. we shall see...

well said

I love reading blogs...especially when I find one that mirrors my own sentiments.
check out complete thought today and find an interesting and positive tidbit regarding Sarah Palin.

introductions

I have ALWAYS wanted a big friendly orange tabby cat. Mom planted the seed a couple days ago. Kevin said if I found the "right" one we could do another cat. It has been a year since Harley died. I was running a bunch of errands with the kids yesterday and decided to go the humane society. It is in the boonies and I had to turn around several times before heading the right direction.

I intended for this to be a first visit, totally not expecting to find "Mr. Right" the first time. I figured we would make several trips in and have to subdue kiddos a few times. However, we walked into the cat room and looked in the cages and there he was. waiting patiently. We got him out and after stretching his legs a bit and sniffing around, he let each of us pet him and tolerated the kids putting toys in and on his face.

We decided that he would come home with us. Sometimes things are too easy! After making a "donation" for the cat and getting his microchip inserted we were off to buy new kitty toys and supplies.

He has done marvelously, he is 3 years old, is box trained and is already eating and drinking...happy days! He is a head butter and drools a little. He likes to be brushed which is good because he's a bit behind in the shedding department. Good thing I own a dyson! There was NO whining last night.

We do have to intercept for awhile as Anslow the dog with big teeth gets used to sharing space. Hopefully they will adapt soon enough. I'm not too worried about the cat, I think he's big enough to scare Anslow, but I'm hoping for apeaceful friendship.

Name? so far...Mouser. We have considered Morris, John George, Harley, Cap'n Stubing, Mater, Pete, Girly, Pretty...

a few activities

Yesterday I finally figured how to put our sight words up. For some reason I just have not had adequate brilliance to figure how to do this without using many dollars worth of velcro. After looking at Caiden's kindergarten room..his teacher is a wonderful veteran teacher...I noticed paperclips in her calendar chart...I thought I could make that work.
Here's pics of Ady and I making our sight word chart. Now they can be up and used whenever anyone notices, not just when mommy decides to play teacher.

Today, I decided that they were big enough to learn about records. Fortunately I was a packrat child..(no comment, parents) I still have a good collection of Disney stories and other miscellaneous records. I first had to drag out the old stereo (thanks Kim) from the pump house, and dust a few years worth of dirt off. I was hoping that it would indeed still have a needle and adequate sound. This stereo did live in my jr. high classroom before I married dear Kevin and I honestly could not remember if it still worked. Guess what??? It does indeed work. Just as I was plugging in wires and after I had climbed into the recesses of the under the stair closet to find said childhood records. (had to dust those too.) the kids woke from their non-nap(that's another post altogether) and we sat down to enjoy a new story. I chose Pete's dragon because I thought it would capture Caiden's interest and I always thought that it had the best sound effects out of them all. The kids were completely enthralled, and totally didn't understand why I had to turn it over to finish the story. We listened again at bedtime and enjoyed the songs at the end where Elliot "talks" with Pete.

After the record excitement it was time to go to the library for some new stories. First stop, go to daddy on the swather and take him Popsicles. He thought we were brilliant because he needed a ride home to change the pivot. However, before we could do that, our neighbors had a good size fire going and it looked awfully close to the hay barn. We drove over and Kevin spent the next hour fighting a haystack fire with a garden hose, until the firefighters got there. I think it took 40 minutes for the firecrews to come. Thankfully the guys were able to move the burning stacks away from the shed so only 2 or 3 stacks are lost, as long as no embers blow into the shed tonight. Caiden and Ady did enjoy seeing the firetrucks and visiting with the neighbor kids. Oddly enough this is the family I have been trying to get a play date with for over a year...God answers in unusual ways sometimes!
dinner tonight: tenderloin steaks slow cooked in cream of mushroom. crock pot potatoes, corn on the cob (fresh from garden) and peasant bread.
Both of these new recipes come from my reading of this blog and her menu plan. She does a great job using easy ingredients to make wholesome family meals.

preposterous! parents don't know best!!

boys and germs

Kevin says this is the cost of going to a carnival. That every snot nosed kids touches the same stuff and sticks their fingers in their mouths and gives germs to every other kid. A little history...My dear hubby is germphobic. My son sucks his thumb.
carnival Saturday...3 days...102 degree fever, chills, vomiting. Enough said.

patience

Thanks to enjoying the paradise blog. I'm inspired to play with the appearance of mine. Which has led me to downloading and trying to use a picture software program. Currently, I have not figured out how to change between the "layers". Therefore, my first attempt is at the top of this page, sorry there is no background color...feeling a little frustrated. Have patience as I try to learn this.
enjoy!
Now onto my second attempt. I guess I need to figure out what pixel size? oy vey!

I think this is about the 10th background and 10th header...I'm still learning!
We did go to the county fair and pictures will be posted soon!!

Let me know what you think so far! (and maybe what you saw)

county fair

The fair was much fun this year. I took tons of pictures. Far too many for this blog. The kids petted animals, rode rides, ate goodies and got VERY tired.

Caiden liked the livestock the best. We visited the goats again today. This little brown one was his favorite. He sat by him for as long as we'd let him. He very much wants to get one and have a cage and pet the goat everyday. Then we saw piglets with the sow. He totally loved that as well. He watched them for a really long time too.
Notice the Alaskan racing pigs. They were hysterical!

Ady's favorite part was holding Becca's hand. (even if Becca wasn't always thrilled) The picture of Ady in the corn box is at the end of the last day...does she seem a little tired to you? They were completely exhausted but had a great time. Caiden wanted to know when we would do the fair again. I'm thankful that it only comes once a year! This mommy is tired too!

techie blessing

We use Mozilla Firefox for our browsing. We have been doing this for a few years now. I love it. The other day, it was time to upgrade...we all know about upgrading things, usually you lose things you like to trade for stuff that doesn't always make sense. however this time, one of the new great features was an add blocker. I LOVE it! I don't see the "are you single?" type of ads. I wasn't aware of how annoying those were, until now...they are LONG gone!!! the little icon sits in my banner quietly blocking ads. Firefox already did a great job of blocking pop ups. This new little friend blocks the ads within the pages...LOVELY!

Here is a link for ad blockers for non firefox.
Or if you want to try Firefox there's a new link to the right in my sidebar to take you there. If you are using Firefox without the ad blocker, go to your tools menu and click on add ons. It is a beautiful thing! My kids have been known to come look and ask about the pictures on the screen (you know the ones I mean) and I answer very vaguely...now they will see only what I am actually reading about!

On a more fun note...we are heading to the county fair with our friends today. We will tour the animals and other free things this morning, enjoy an hour of rides during the parade, come home for lunch and nap. Then go back to exhaust the rest of the day.

Kevin is quite fond of this plan, because he isn't expected to participate. He did spend time there with me yesterday, we sat at the pro life booth. We do this each year and it is a nice way to visit and support babies and families. Each year I read a couple of the pamphlets we have and am astonished by the bogus and misleading information that planned parenthood presents to our kids. Definitely an organization to NOT trust.

Tomorrow dear hubby will go again for the church service...one nice thing about this area, we have a combined service at the fair which is a nice encouragment. Our churches here are very little and don't always like to "share" ( I know, I know, where's the perfect churches? they don't exist on this earth! Wont heaven be great...no doctrinal issues to separate us??) The local pastors are praying together for unity, and we know God is faithful.

living in the moment

We are enjoying our week. We had a great visit with to mama and papa over the weekend. Caiden got to finally go fishing with grandpa. Tuesday, back to school. both kids are still not very excited about school, I am praying that they will make friends soon. Most of Ady's class is Spanish speaking which makes making friends a bit more difficult, even at 4 years old. Caiden is convinced they are all mean. When I suggest that he needs to make friends, his reply "I don't want to be friends with mean kids!!" My heart goes out to him and I hope that soon this too shall pass.

I made a quick trip to town today during school time. Finally got a loooong over due haircut, maybe I won't look like a drowned rat tomorrow. Speaking of tomorrow...yoga class. I had a great 3 pound weight loss last week, I am hoping to see a bit more this week, perhaps yoga, biking, and LOTS of water really will help...fingers crossed.

I did some baking today. I had several apples that had seen better days. so I made two apple coffee cakes; one for breakfast tomorrow and one to freeze. Also made 2 loaves of awesome apple bread to freeze for another time. I made this same bread before camping and it really was yummy and moist and lovely. I'm happy to have found a use for apples headed out of the refrigerator. I really do feel guilty trying to pass them off on the kids when I won't touch them, even smeared with yogurt/peanut butter and granola.

While the corn was cooking this evening (I haven't described how very much the kids LOVE corn on the cob...thank goodness Kevin grew lots and lots! they each eat 2 whole ears each time!) Caiden got to play a game from this site and Ady got to choose a game to play with mommy. Ady chose the electronic connect four. Very fun...she even won fair and square! Within moments Caiden was "done" playing and told Ady she could play. He chose a deck of cards to play with, with mommy. I decided that today he could learn slap jack. He LOVED it! At first he didn't like that I was testing his J knowledge. But once he figured out that we would get to race and slap, he was all mine!! He did great. Ady joined in on the fun after a bit, although it wasn't as much fun for her. She kept only watching her own stack and cried when only one J turned up. Caiden did really well sharing our stacks so we could keep playing and was very patient with Ady as she tried to understand...never did get there..maybe next month! It was nice to play a game with him that involved taking turns, comparing and not always winning..he did great!