Summer Birthday
June 30, 2008
Sissy’s birthday party was yesterday and it turned out sorta okay. She had invited about 12-15 kids but only 2 girls showed up. In a way it had its ups and downs. She got to spend a lot of time with just those two friends and she really did have a fun time. On the other hand she was dissapointed that more of her friends didn’t come over. There was another friend of hers that was having a birthday party too yesterday and alot of the kids she invited went to his party instead. The two girls that came to hers were also invited to his but chose to come see her instead. She was really happy about that. she got a bunch of girly stuff like a necklace, some bracelets, perfume, lip gloss and some Hannah Montana stuff as well. 
We also had the neighbors come over and their two younger ones as well so her younger brothers had someone to play with as well. All the kids enjoyed the slip and slide and I bought a kids volleyball game for the to play as well. 
One of the positives about so few kids coming was all the extra cupcakes! The kids loved being able to come back for seconds and thirds. LOL 
I’m thinking about plans for her party next year and considering having a last day of school party. Since their last day is just a half-day I think it would be cool to invite the kids to all come over after school and let their parents pick them up around 5. I think she’d have a lot more kids come and it would be a lot of fun for everyone. My mom said she could come and help out with the party as well so I’m not overwhelmed.
For now, we’re done with birthdays until August then we have two fo them back to back. we can start planning for them and maybe we’ll have a bit of a better turn-out
On the Injured List
June 26, 2008
That’s where I am right now — on the injured list. I picked up a bag of canned goods out of the Jeep, turned, took a step, and then ouch. My right hip area just plain hurts right now; I’m pretty much okay sitting here working but walking is very painful. I feel like Hop a Long Cassidy!
My kids know I’m not doing too well (we’ve been through this before). When they saw mommy hobbling they knew I’d “done it again”. (I think I need more exercise to strengthen things up a bit but…shhhh)
My daughter was the first to say something to the two younger boys who were misbehaving. “Guys, mom doesn’t feel good, okay? Knock it off, NOW! so then the boys come running “Mommy, you okay?” Of course I tell them that I’ll be just fine especially if they behave really well for me.
Buddy is in the kitchen and I can hear water running, dishes banging, and footsteps going back and forth. I’d love to go in there and see how clean the kitchen is but well I don’t want to spoil his surprise and I really am hurting too much at the moment to get up. I can also smell the delicious aroma of what I think is going to be brownies! Whoo Hoo; the injured list isn’t a bad place to be!
We all have chiropractor appointments tomorrow and once he adjusts me I’ll be just fine again; I’ll have to go in a couple of times next week to make sure my hip sets right again. For now, I’m just enjoying the pampering and am not going to bother to tell them that the chiro will be able to make mommy feel all better tomorrow! 
Hot Summer Days
June 26, 2008
It’s finally here; hot summer days have arrived! Yesterday it was 85 here in Wisconsin. Okay, I know that some of you are in states that get much hotter than that but without any a/c in the house it was just miserable. I’ll have to admit that the house did stay cool for much of the day and that I wasn’t aware of just how hot it really was until I realized that all the kids and their friends were in the house vegging out in front of the television. When I stepped outside the reason was quite obvious.
The main beverage my kids drink is water; they probably drink more water than most kids their age because I don’t give them soda, juice, or any type of flavored drink. With the arrival of summer I like to keep a couple of pitchers of water in the fridge to make them more likely to get a drink. I don’t know why, but to them it’s better because it came out of the fridge! One of the first things that I do when it starts to get hot every summer is to print a list of the symptoms of dehydration and put it on the fridge. I like to keep it along with treatment tips where I can see it just in case any of the kids start showing any of the symptoms. WebMd has a great article called Symptoms of Dehydration and Heat Illness.
I have to admit that while quite vigilant in making sure the kids stay well hydrated I am usually pretty lax in that area for myself. My friends all gang up on me and are always asking me if I’ve had my water and how much. I’ve started drinking Propel with Splenda and that seems to help make it more palatable and less likely to go scrounging for sweets all the time.
Now that it is hot outside I will be switching our daily schedules around to keep the children from getting overheated. Right after breakfast they can go outside and play until lunch time; after lunch they do their summer homeschool books and chores. Once those things are finished they can watch TV for a bit or play one of our many board games or some of the toys tucked away for rainy days.
I don’t know what’s worse – being closed up in the house with 4 kids during the long cold winter months or being closed up in the house with 4 kids when it’s scorching hot outside! Neither one sounds very pleasant as I know they both can result in cranky kids. I guess I can just keep them as busy and comfortable as possible to keep us all from being miserable.
Summertime’s Free Adventures
June 23, 2008
Wow, it’s been 4 days since I had to have that talk with Sissy! It’s been very hectic here and I just can not believe how full our summer has become. I’m so glad that I took time out to plan fun things for me and the kids to do. We are going to the library twice a week for their summer reading program; Monday night’s are free performances and Thursday afternoon’s are crafts, games, and snacks. Just these two days alone are great fun for the kids and best of all they’re free! I was truly amazed at all the free things our town has to offer to keep the kids occupied. If you haven’t checked out the local happening your town you might want to see what they have to offer.
This past weekend was filled with more fun stuff that was free. Our town had their annual Cranberry Blossom festival and I packed in as much as I could with buddy since the other kids were gone. On Thursday night they hosted Cinema Under the Stars; they put up a big screen, closed off the street, and we watched several old Looney Tune cartoons. It felt so nice and had a really cool “small town” atmosphere. The historical society had an old fashioned ice cream social with free ice cream and tours through the mansion on Saturday. Some of the other weekend activities included a bike ride, a kid’s fishing contest, and finally a parade. Everything was a lot of fun and the two of us had a blast with all the stuff we did.
I also managed to squeeze in some time to finally finish editing and updating my Expert Business Results website; stop by and take a look. I love the face lift and I even managed to get it ranked onto the first page of the search engines for my keywords. Just last week it was so far at the bottom that it wasn’t worth looking for; I felt extremely excited to see all my hard work bring such awesome results so quickly.
This week is going to be busy once again; of course it started with our Monday night library program earlier this evening. The theater has started their summer children’s movies again; we can go watch a movie and get popcorn for $2.50. Of course the movies are ones that have already been released but my kids don’t always get to see these movies so for them it’s awesome to go to the theater. The movies are shown on Wednesday and Thursday. Lunch On The River is another event that takes place every Thursday; lunch can be purchased from several different food vendors or you can pack your own. They always have free live entertainment. The kids can’t miss their Thursday Library Activity day after lunch.
With all that activity for the week you’d think that I’d be too exhausted to do anything else but the highlight of the week doesn’t come until Saturday. We were able to get free tickets to Riverview Park and Waterworld in Wisconsin Dells; Saturday is also sissy’s birthday. She’s planning to have a friend sleep over on Friday night and her parent’s are picking her and sissy up on Saturday morning. I recruited several families to go to the “Dells” with us as these tickets were being given away by the radio station to anyone who requested them. So we have at least three families going together! Lastly is sissy’s birthday party on Sunday.
This is going to be a busy week; I will pop in as often as possible and update all the adventurous details of the week. I’m already looking forward to next week when hopefully it will be a bit more relaxing. (maybe!)
I’m Not Ready for Dating
June 19, 2008
I don’t mean for me; I’m talking about my daughter “sissy”. Well I’m not exactly sure if I should call it “dating” but the thing is that her and the next door neighbor boy are kind of spending a lot of time together. I don’t know how to explain it but it’s just one of those things that as plain as day with the way they’re acting. We’ve lived here for 2 years now and last year they were in the same class together.
When we first moved here they barely talked to each other; instead buddy and him played together most of the time. Now sissy and him are inseparable. With summer here he is over here constantly asking if sissy can come out to play. It used to be he was asking for buddy. And he doesn’t stop at coming over once — he has to stop over several times in a day until she is finally finished with her chores and homework.
some of the things that I’ve noticed is them sitting together (way too close for my comfort and standard), she giggles at everything he has to say, when she climbed a tree — he was right there by the tree holding out his arms to make sure he could catch, she hurt her leg over the weekend and he came to me right away to find out what happened and if she was okay. You know…little things like that. Am I overreacting?
Well anyway with all this stuff going on it made me realize that I’ve never really had that “talk” with her about “stuff” (you now?…girl stuff) So I did the first thing I always do when I have an issue I need to take care of; I started looking for a book. I found a couple of good books from Amazon.com and purchased Growing Up: It’s a Girl Thing. For my daughter this book was perfect; it didn’t give too much details about sex but rather described it as an adult activity. I really liked how it discussed first periods and other aspects of puberty.
when I was looking for a book to talk to sissy about this stuff I realized that I’d never really had that talk with buddy and thought I’d better find something to talk to him about puberty. He’s 13 and I really had no clue what he knew and what he didn’t. I wanted to get a book like the one I had found for sissy that discussed sex as something to be saved for adulthood and didn’t go into much detail about it. For him I found American Medical Association Boy’s Guide to Becoming a Teen . This is really a good book for his age. He was of course embarrassed at first but the book was written in a way that helped him to feel comfortable. I also talked to the adult male neighbor that buddy is real close to and asked if he could give me some assistance in discussing this stuff with buddy so he wouldn’t be left in the dark and would have a male to turn to if he had answer.
I’m sure this is a phase that my daughter is going through with the neighbor boy and that it’s all sweet and innocent but I feel it’s never too early to instill in them what’s right and wrong and what my values are about these things. I’m also glad that it opened my eyes to what I needed to discuss with the kids.
