A Perfect Dinner, In a Perfect World

Everyday at dinner time, I have so many willing hands to help. My wonderful, loving, and ever-so-helpful husband is always a step ahead of me, anticipating the needs of our daughters and myself. The girls are setting the table, while he pours everyone a drink, and I put the final touches on our dinner. We all sit down to the table and give thanks to the Lord for our meal with bowed heads and a perfect little prayer, recited by one of my blue-eyed princesses. Then we all politely take turns fixing our plates, listen to each other as we talk about our day, and, of course, use every manner ever written. Everyone compliments me on the amazingly delicious meal I have prepared.  All of this is done effortlessly, without spilling a crumb of food, or drop of drink.

And then I wake up.

Well, I wasn’t lying when I said that I have blue-eyed princesses! Three, to be precise! Give me some credit there!

I dream of a day when no one complains about what’s for dinner. I would love to not hear someone ask for something else from the refrigerator with a whole meal laid out in front of them. It would be a miracle if we could get through dinner without the echoes of a burp reverberating through the house. Keeping the two-year-old in her seat throughout the entire meal would be a HUGE accomplishment! A simple, ‘please’ or ‘thank you’ would probably make me pass out. Someone offering to help clean up after? HA! Fat chance! I force my poor kids to clean up after dinner. Manual labor builds character. They have to rotate who does which ‘after dinner’ chore, and you would think they were driving railroad spikes into the ground. No, sweeping is NOT the hardest thing you’ve ever had to do, child!

I’m sure this is every parent’s dream! I think I’m going to have to get creative when it comes to teaching table manners. How do you teach your kids to exhibit good table manners?

Caring Mom, or Fallback Plan?

 

   Every  day after school, Big A has the same routine. After we talk about her day for a few minutes, she goes to her room to do her homework and she reads for twenty minutes. She has a homework packet that her teacher hands out at the beginning of the week. Inside this packe, there is a page for each day of the week, Monday through Thursday. They do the work throughout the week and turn it in on Friday. 

   

    Her teacher had them put together binders at the beginning of the school year. Inside, they have an agenda, some notebook paper, a pencil pouch, and various folders labeled for certain things. One of these folders is labeled ‘Homework’. Can you guess what that one is for? RIGHT-O! That’s the folder she’s supposed to keep her homework in throughout the week so she doesn’t lose it before Friday. 

Does her homework ever make it into that folder? 

No. Never.

It gets shoved into her binder, or her backpack, or she lays it on her desk. Never, ever does the child put it in her homework folder. It doesn’t matter how many times I’ve told her to put it there. It.doesn’t.happen.

Now, let’s talk about last Thursday. 

I’m sitting at my desk writing some content for my blog when Big A comes into my bedroom and asks me where her homework is. I have no clue. It’s not my homework, it’s hers. Plus, I told her the night before to put it in her homework folder. Of course, it never made it there.

“I can’t find it anywhere!”

“I told you to put it in your homework folder last night.”

“I know.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“I thought I did.” 

“Obviously you didn’t.”

“If I don’t turn it in tomorrow, Mrs. H will make me sit out at recess and do the whole thing all over again!”

“Then you better get lookin’!”

“I need help!”

“No you don’t. It’s your homework. Not mine. I told you to put it where it belongs last night and you didn’t listen.”

>Insert more whining and complaining about needing help finding it, and me refusing.<

    She finally found it and completed it. After I checked it for errors, I gave it back to her and told her to put it in her homework folder. She said, ‘Ok,’ and took it downstairs to her room. Silly me, for not checking to see whether it made it there or not. Should I have to check?  Or should I just assume that, at 8-years-old, she’s old enough to be responsible for her homework?

    Fast-forward to the next morning. It’s time to walk to the bus stop and she’s about to walk out the door. I have to remind her to get her coat. She makes a trip downstairs, comes back with her coat in one hand, and (did you guess?) her homework in the other.

“Why is your homework not in your homework folder?”

“I set it on my desk.”

“That’s not where I told you to put it.” 

“I know.”

>banging head against wall<

 It was freezing outside, so I insisted she put her coat on. She put it on, grabbed her backpack, and walked down to the bus stop. Since the bus stop is at the bottom of our road (only about 3 houses down from ours), I stand at the end of our driveway and watch her get on the bus. Little A & Middle A are still sleeping at this time every morning, so I don’t want to go too far away from the house. I watch as the bus pulls up, she and the other kids at the stop get on, and they head to school. I walk inside, take off my coat, hang it up, and turn to walk up the stairs. 

Guess what’s sitting there on the stairs? 

HER HOMEWORK! 

The very same homework she was freaking out over the day before. 

 

The very same homework she was so worried about having to re-do during recess. 

She sat it on the step as she put her coat and backpack on, and neither of us realized she had left it behind. 

    So now I have this inner quarrel going on: 

Should I take it to her? 

or

Should I let her learn her lesson?

If I take it to her, I would be ‘the best Mom ever’ for saving her little butt. Right? But then, what if she makes a habit of it? She obviously isn’t being responsible with her homework in the first place. I don’t want her to think that she can just use me as a fall-back plan whenever she’s irresponsible, or when she makes wrong choices. On the other hand, I want her to know that I’m there for her when she needs me. Is this a ‘she needs me’ moment? 

Ahhhh crap! 

Parenting is hard. 

Is there a right or wrong answer? 

Who knows?

    In the end, I chose not to take it to her. I know from our conversation on Thursday that she knew what the consequences were if she didn’t have her homework on Friday. If she was so concerned with having it, she would have put it in her homework folder, right? Then it would have been in her backpack and ready to take to school.  Instead, she laid it on her desk and grabbed it on her way out the door the next morning. 

Let’s hear from some other moms! 

Do you agree with my choice? 

Disagree? 

Why? 

 

Toddlers and the Concept of Time

     Last night, while riding in the car on the way home from Grammy & Papa’s house, Middle A asked us if Christmas was tomorrow. Would Santa be coming to our house? D and I explained to her that the Christmas holiday is over for now, but we’ll do it again next year.  Middle A is almost 3. The girl has no concept of time. She uses the words yesterday, last week, tomorrow, and next week interchangeably. She was confused, but at least understood that Christmas wasn’t happening again for a while.
     She was upset by this news, so I tried to put a fun twist on it. I told her we still had lots of birthdays and Valentine’s Day, and Easter, and summertime....at which point she interrupted with a one-word question: “Summertime?”
     Of course, I explained to her that that’s when it’s hot outside and we get to do fun things like going to the lake, and to the beach, and the water park. Then she got excited. I was under the impression that she was satisfied with this explanation, but I was wrong. She had discovered something new to look forward to.....the beach.
     Fast-forward to today. Middle A has asked me no less than 372 times when we’re going to the beach. I explained to her that we had to wait until it’s hot outside. Her reply? “Mommy, the sun is shining!” So I told her we had to wait until there are lots of green leaves on the trees. Her reply? (While looking at the pine trees outside the window), “There are lots of green leaves over there!”  I tried to tell her how cold she would be outside in her swimsuit. She told me she could wear a coat. The problem is, she isn’t 100% wrong about any of these, but we simply cannot go to the beach in January.

     She’s walking around the house dressed like this:

Yes, that is a swimsuit. Yes, it is cold here. 

She doesn’t seem to mind. 

     She is still asking me when we get to go to the beach. I keep telling her we can go in the summer when it’s hot. She just isn’t getting it. I decided as a consolation I would at least give the poor girl a pedicure since she’s walking around the house in flip flops. 

At least her toes are cute. Right? 

So parents, how did you get your 2 & 3 year-olds to understand the concept of time? Do you do fun time-telling activities? Do you have posters or charts to teach them days/months/seasons, etc..? I taught 2 year-olds in daycare before I became a mom, so I always did a circle-time to teach these things to my class. Is it ridiculous to do that at home, too? What do you think?

P.S. Now Middle A wants to go to the park. It’s a step closer to home, and a drier one at that....but NO THANKS! 

Weekend Wrap-Up

We had quite an eventful weekend!
It was packed full of fun Halloween activities.

We started with carving pumpkins. Big A did a great job, but she had a hard time getting the carving knife all the way through the pumpkin. I had to help her shape things up a little bit in the end, but the end result was not bad for an 8-year-old.

D carved the top pumpkin.
Big A carved the bottom pumpkin. 

Of course, you can’t carve pumpkins without roasting the seeds afterward!

We visited our church for the annual Trunk or Treat. My brother-in-law, his wife, and the kiddos joined us there for some fun!

Big A, Middle A & Little A with their cousins. 

Last year, our neighborhood held Trick or Treating on the Saturday before Halloween. We didn’t participate because we had other activities going on. Evidently it was decided that the turnout for weekend trick or treating was better than on Halloween, so they held it on the weekend again this year. We took the kids  around the neighborhood to score some more candy.

Middle A, Big A, and her bestie warmed up with hot chocolate! 

Also, over the weekend I came to the realization that my baby is about to turn a year old in just 2 weeks! She was such a big girl, going right up to people and holding up her bucket. When they would put candy in her hand, she would drop it right into her bucket. It was so cute, but it makes me sad to think that a whole year has passed already. 

ROOOOAAAARRR!!!!

I’m going to feature homemade Halloween costumes on Wednesday, so if you would like for me to include your homemade costumes, please email them to anorris21 [at] gmail [dot] com. I love hearing from my readers, and sharing crafty things they’ve done!

  

Halloween Craft: Felt Magnets & Brooches

A guest post by Sage Adderley.

My family loves Halloween. We spend weeks talking about what costumes we will put together, we carve pumpkins, and love to make things to hang up around the house to set the spooky mood.

This year, we decided to make some easy felt crafts. They were definitely a kid-friendly activity. We actually didn’t have to purchase any of the supplies, everything we used was already in our craft collection!

I found some magnets and pinbacks on clearance at our local craft store and finally put them to good use!

Supplies:

Squares of felt in various colors

Glue gun

Googly eyes in different sizes

Sharpie

Glitter pens

Scissors

Directions

We simply cut Halloween-themed shapes like pumpkins, witch’s hat, a witch on a broomstick, a bat, and spider from the felt squares. We drew the outlines on the felt with a sharpie, but you can use stencils if you’d like.

There are no rules when it comes to this craft! Have fun and let the kids use their imagination. We glued one large eye on the bat to make a Cyclops bat and found a stick outside to use as the broomstick for the witch.

After you decorate the felt image, allow it to dry thoroughly and then flip it over to glue either a magnet or pinback. Let it dry again and you are all done.

TIP: There are many free stencils online that you can download and print. Just search free Halloween stencils and see what you come up with.

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I met Sage six years ago. We have gotten to know each other over the last several years, and I'm lucky to be able to call her one of my best friends. She is a major inspiration to me, creatively and otherwise. She runs Sweet Candy Distro, and has a blog of her own called, 'my name is: Sage'.  She's a freelance writer and has an Etsy shop, which is also called, 'my name is: Sage'.  She recently started Sage’s Blog Tours, a tour of book reviews and promotions among numerous blogs, which I am honored to participate in.

I'm sorry.....or am I?

      I recently came across an article on Yahoo called, "5 Things Parents Shouldn't Say to Their Kids".  I was pretty curious about what those 5 forbidden things were that we evidently shouldn't be telling our kids, so I couldn't resist clicking and reading. I have to admit, this list was not what I expected. A few of these are no-brainers for anyone who has an ounce of common sense. The others actually surprised me. I know I'm not the only parent who has threatened to leave the house without my kids because they weren't cooperating. I'm also not the only person who has told her kid to act her age. If you could see the fits my 7 year-old can pitch, you would tell her to stop acting like a toddler and start acting like a 7 year-old, too! [I hope] we all know not to tell our children, "I don't care." Their little minds just don't understand the flippant use of those three words. Adults can throw that phrase around carelessly since we understand social cues and can differentiate between the many ways it can be used. Saying it to a child can truly hurt his feelings on a deeper level.
   
      What threw me for a loop was the one that said, "Say you're sorry."  I've always believed that you should encourage your children to apologize when they do something wrong or say something hurtful. I do make my kids apologize when they say something hurtful, hit each other, etc... It has always been my opinion that if you teach them to apologize after they do something wrong, they will form the habit of doing so. Although, even as I type this it sounds as if I'm encouraging a habit, like washing their hands, and not teaching them to sincerely apologize.
 
      Just two days ago, my girls were wrestling on the couch. Middle A got excited and bit Big A on the cheek. Middle A immediately got sent to time-out for her standard 2-minutes. For those of you who aren't aware, one minute for each year of your child's age is the recommended length of a time-out.  When Middle A's time-out was finished, we had a talk about why it's not okay to bite and I told her to apologize to Big A. Middle A walked over to her, gave her a hug and a kiss, and said, "Sorry for biting you, Big A."  Yes, I did tell her to apologize, but she understands what an apology is. When you hurt someone, just saying sorry doesn't fly in my house. You have to tell the person why you're sorry when you apologize and give them a hug to help them feel better.

     Middle A has picked up cues on understanding when to apologize as well. I'm a minimal footwear kind of person. I hate winter because I have to wear socks and shoes. I'm a total flip-flop freak. Unfortunately for me, toddler feet tend to weigh about 15 lbs each when they're wearing tennis shoes. Middle A steps on my toes all.the.time. When I say, "Ouch!", Middle A immediately replies with, "Sorry, Mom!" and gives me a hug and kiss. That shows me that she has more or less grasped the meaning, or at least knows when to say sorry.

      I happen to think that teaching your children to apologize when they have done something wrong is the right way to handle things. By ‘right’ I mean it’s right for our family. It’s what works best for us. Here are some things that other parents had to say about making your child apologize:

   I think you should make your child apologize. Also, you should make a big deal out of your own apologies to others. Allow your child to see you mess up and allow them to see you apologize. The example you set is more meaningful, than trying to be perfect on front of them. I try to do that as a teacher. If I mess up, I own it and apologize. It sets the stage for meaningful conversation. --Elizabeth, GA

When I was 5 years old, we visited some friends and I took a very small penknife from their toy box and took it home with me. I was sitting on our couch and it fell out. Both my mom and dad saw it and asked where it came from.... they took me all the way back into town that same night and made me walk up to the door by myself and apologize for taking the knife. Never, ever have I taken anything from anybody 50 years later. Best lesson I ever learned. --Mike, TN

I will apologize for him and teach him what he should've done instead, as well as what he can do to fix the situation. I do not force him to apologize. My son is pretty good at offering up hugs if he sees that he made someone sad. --Joanie,  FL

For the things that he understands, he apologizes. If it's beyond his comprehension, I apologize and turn it into a teaching moment. --Gracie, CA

He's too young to fully grasp apologies for certain things. If he hits his brother or the dog I make him apologize. But to kids at the park that he barrels into without looking or cuts in front of on the slide, I do the apologizing. --Sarah, CO

People’s opinions vary widely on any given topic that falls under the subject of parenting. If you ask 10 moms who do the same task or handle the same situation all in a unique way, they will all tell you that their specific way of doing things is the ‘right’ way. I’m a strong believer in the ‘You handle your family, and I’ll handle mine,” method, so I welcome your input, opinions, and methods! Share with me.

Drawing Pad & Pencil holder

A very special little girl in my life turned three in March. I wanted to make her something special, so I pulled my chair up to the sewing machine and got busy! Using the tutorial from Skip to my Lou, I whipped up this cute drawing pad & colored pencil holder. 

I've seen crayon rolls before, but I didn't want to do that. I wanted her to have something she could take everywhere with her. Here in Georgia, if you leave a crayon roll in the car for longer than 10 mins, your crayons will have melted by the time you get back. I think colored pencils are the way to go. 

With this tutorial, if you're going to turn & topstitch like I did, make sure you lengthen the width of your inner and outer fabrics by 1" to 1.5". I did the tutorial exactly as it said and my pencils were too long for it to close evenly. Evidently her tutorial doesn't account for lost space in the pencil slots if you turn & topstitch. Just a heads up there.

I will be making these for just about every kid I know, I think. I really like these. I like the convenience. I like that I can personalize them, and I like how easy the tutorial is to follow.

Give it a try! 

Culinary Creativity: Getting Your Picky Toddler to Eat.

Guest Post by Sage Adderley

Apparently my 2-½ year old son is now a picky eater. While he has no problem snacking, he has become selective as to what he’ll eat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. I began brainstorming food ideas and thought about making him some bento-style lunches.

I became slightly obsessed with bento a few years ago. Bento is a Japanese box lunch. I was initially interested in bento when I discovered a bento-themed Flickr group with photos of bento food art. Basically people creating characters (Hello Kitty, Mario, etc), animals, and nature objects using various food items.

The bento box lunches range from simple to elaborate. Bento-style lunch boxes also help with portion control and making sure you have an assortment of food.

I decided to order some bento products from All Things For Sale. I picked up the following:

• ·      animal food pick set
• ·      dinosaur-shape cutter
• ·      stainless steel veggie cutters (heart, star & bear shapes)
• ·      small plastic cups for dipping sauces
• ·      bento box
• ·      colorful food separators

I started off small by cutting fruits, such as apples and bananas, with the star and heart shape cutters. I placed an animal pick in the fruit and my son loved it! I’ve never seen him devour food so quickly.

While some people get extremely creative with bento food art, I have kept it fairly simple. Like most other families, we are busy and time is usually not on our side. For me, preparing his fruit and vegetables with the shape cutters takes no more time than slicing it with a knife, so why not make it fun?

The stainless steel cutters are also perfect for cheese slices, sandwich meat, pancakes, and lasagna noodles. The bonus is that the bento accessories have helped him learn colors, animals, and shapes. It has been a win-win situation.

If you are interested in learning more about bento, I highly recommend the website,  Lunch in a Box. 

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I met Sage six years ago. We have gotten to know each other over the last several years, and I'm lucky to be able to call her one of my best friends. She is a major inspiration to me, creatively and otherwise. She runs Sweet Candy Distro, and has a blog of her own called, 'my name is: Sage'.  She's a freelance writer and has an Etsy shop, which is also called, 'my name is: Sage'.  Sage is an awesome mother to three amazingly bright and creative children. If I could choose one person to be most like in the 'mommy department', it would definitely be this woman. 

Help me support one of my besties by visiting her blog, her distro, and her Etsy shop!

More Easter Fun!

Before we get into the pictures of our Saturday, I want to update you on the whole chocolate deal. 

I did it. 

I went 40 days with no chocolate. 

Honestly, it was harder than I thought it would be. 

Unlike my sister-in-law, who gave up Coke and then couldn't finish even half of one on Sunday, I had absolutely no problem indulging. 

I have probably eaten enough chocolate today to last me all week. 

Now I seriously need to jump on the treadmill. 

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Now on to the cuteness that is my 3 A's. 

We went to an Easter egg hunt on Saturday.

It was pretty cool. A few houses in the neighborhood got together and hid eggs in all of their yards so it was one giant egg hunt. 

There were quite a few kids there. 

They even had crafts for the kids to do!

Middle A kept trying to get a head-start. 

She knows what's up when she sees colorful plastic eggs now. 

Big A had a blast finding the eggs.

She likes to see if she can find unique colored ones.

Gold, silver, iridescent....

Middle A understands the concept of hunting eggs.

She just doesn't quite have the speed thing down yet.

They still got quite a bit of eggs! 

I think between the two of them, there were about 80 eggs.

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Later that evening, we colored real eggs.

We colored on them with crayons and used tape to create designs.

Both of the girls love decorating eggs.

Here are a few of our egg-celent friends!

These are a few of our favorites.

That's not the end of our Easter weekend. I still have plenty more to update you on. 

Until then, hop over to our Facebook page. 

Click 'Like' over to the right --->

You can follow along on Facebook and give your opinion on what I should write about next.

Easter Weekend: Part 1

Wow! We had such a busy weekend!

Annie returned from her week-long visit to Tennessee on Friday afternoon.

My parents and I met in the middle for lunch so they could visit with Middle A & Little A for a little while.

Cracker Barrel!

Pops & Little A

After the two-hour drive home, we went to D's parents' house for Easter dinner and an Easter egg hunt. 

The kids had a blast finding the eggs!

Middle A had her own personal basket carrier.

(Thanks, Papa!)

Then there were the Easter baskets. 

I'm pretty sure they liked them.

Thanks, Grammy & Papa!

That was what we did on Good Friday. 

Tomorrow, I'll post more. There are so many pictures I want to share.

It would be ridiculous to put them all in one post.

Until then...

The Chocolate To My S'mores

Happy Birthday to my very wonderful, amazing, patient, intelligent, kind, loving husband. 

D turned 30 today. I need to go buy him a walker now, I guess. Really though, I have six more years of the twenty-somethings so I get a kick out of teasing him about his age. He knows I love him and he's the perfect man for me. He's the milk to my cheerios, the cheese to my macaroni, the peanut butter to my jelly, the syrup to my pancakes. He's my real-life Romeo. 

Yeah, I seriously love the guy. I would honestly be lost without him. He and I literally complete each other. Where one of us lacks in certain areas, the other makes up for. 

He hasn't said much about turning 30. The most I've ever heard him say about it is that he wants to have all of our kids before he turns 30. Well, that didn't happen. We aren't finished having kids yet. I don't know if it's actually realistic to set goals like that. I think life happens too often in between the time you set the goal and the 'ending' time. 

We haven't decided how many kids we'll have, but we know we aren't finished. People always ask if we're going to keep trying until we have a boy. I think that is a ridiculous and utterly absurd question to ask. I think anyone who is having kids until they have the desired gender is having children for the wrong reason. 

My second favorite question is, "What if you have all girls?" Well, uh.....DUH!!!! We'll have all girls. Do you think the last one is gonna come out with a big banner and a party hat, blowing on a vuvuzela in celebration of having all girls??? Come on now!

Stay tuned for tomorrow's update. Maybe you'll get a nice picture of D and myself dressed up to go on a birthday date. Maybe not...who knows? 

I'm thinking a Brazilian restaurant will be fun!