Kisses For The Mailman

I think I need to do more selfless giving while my children are watching. You see, when we moved into this house we realized we didn't have a mailbox. Apparently the man who lived here before had always used a PO box. So..we have to install one. Our neighborhood is in a driving route, and to install a mailbox post, well it would be a bit of trouble with the frozen ground. So my husband talked to our mailman and he said he would just put our mail between our storm door and front door until we can get a box put in. Very nice of him!

Anyway, back to the selfless giving. So I was finishing some last minute Christmas cards and I made up a little goodie bag assortment of Hershey Kisses as a holiday "thank you" to our mailman. Well my kids were totally confused by this.

"What are you doing?"
"Is the mailman going to eat those?"
"Why does he get some of our candy?"
"I'm going to watch him out the window while he eats them!"
"Will he eat them on our porch?"
"What if he's not hungry?"

And it went on and on! Apparently, I am not doing a good enough job of teaching my children that it is the NICE thing to do to give people who are nice to us a little treat.

Hopefully today taught them a little something!

Although, right now they just seems confused and a little pissed that I've given away some of their candy!

Greetings From Our New Home

Here I am? Were you wondering what happened?

We are all moved into our new home. We moved on the 6th. In the snow. It was hell. But so worth it!

We're getting unpacked and our house is coming together very nicely. We're decorated for Christmas. Major plus there! We just weren't "feeling it" until the tree went up. Now that we are we're freaked out because we have no gifts for the kids! I finally did sit down on Monday and order the items that either aren't available in the stores or were just too dang expensive. Amazon is my friend! That's for sure!

My 3 year old has been saying she wants a "pee in the potty doll" for weeks now. Unfortunately, the one she so desperately wants is $50 (at least) in the stores. It's the Little Mommy Gotta Go Doll. We just can not imagine spending $50 on something like that this year. But I found it on Amazon for $24.99 with free shipping and I snagged that real quick! Good thing because today it's up to $39.99! Strangely, it came in a box, without the actual packaging. Something about "frustration-free packaging" or whatever was enclosed. Made me a little mad, because I want that "WOW! LOOK WHAT I GOT!!" response when she opens it, instead of..."What? A cardboard box with a doll shoved in?" So now I have to decide if I want to set it up beside the tree unwrapped or set it up and cover it with some scrap wrapping paper. I just refuse to wrap her most wanted Christmas request up in a cardboard box...that's no fun!!

My 5 year old wants a Spiderman Web Blaster. I finally found the one I wanted and it actually was on sale! And I had a coupon code for 25% off! So cool! But I ended up paying OVER full price to get it here by Christmas because shipping was over $15. Oh well..it'll be worth it right?

I figure, we only have a few precious years where our kids have a FULL belief in the jolly red elf. If we can afford to grant their most wanted requests, it's kind of our duty. Besides, Christmas morning is so magical, and it's so much more magical to see their eyes light up when the find the treasured toy they've asked for hidden under the tree wrapped up beautifully and awaiting their greedy little hands to play with them for 5 minutes and totally forget they ever got it before the clock strikes 12 on New Years Eve!

The Christmas Box

I had decided that this year we would be skipping having the kids' Christmas pictures taken. With our move coming up, we really did not have the time to get into the photo studio in time to have the pictures back for putting in Christmas cards. Also, the cost always seems to be outrageous and we just can not afford it this year. But last night...I had a brainstorm!

The kids were playing in one of the empty moving boxes and it hit me! I would take a regular digital picture of them, in their Christmas clothes, and have 4x6's printed off from Walmart and THOSE would be our Christmas pictures. Plus it would double as a way to inform everyone of our change of address and save me postage having to send out another mailing! GENIUS!

So what follows is our picture taking adventures this morning:

Trying to get them to stop goofing off!

Trying to keep Hayden from touching Tara so she would stop getting majorly pissed off!

Stepford Children.

DISASTER!!! (Maybe this isn't worth the trouble??)

The FINAL product!! SO FLIPPIN' CUTE!!! (And only $7.19 for 45 prints! Cha-Ching!)

Blog Carnival For The Holidays!

You may have noticed the new button in my sidebar! Its for Tiff's Christmas Carnival! I am so excited for this. I had a blast with her Thanksgiving one! Everyone head on over and check it out!! Just click on the button in my sidebar!

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It's A Big Day!

Let me start this post by sharing you a few words from the song that I woke up to singing in my head...

"We don't give a damn for the whole state of Michigan, the whole state of Michigan, the whole state of Michigan! We don't give a damn for the whole state of Michigan, we're from OHIO!"

Oh yes, today is THE day! It's Ohio State vs. Michigan day. The BIGGEST day of the year for every Buckeye fan!



In about 2 hours, it'll be time for us to put the "BEST DAMN BAND IN THE LAND" in our stereo for our own personal "skull session" and cheer as "Hang on Sloopy" fills every corner of this house! Oh it's a mighty big day indeed!!

At noon..it's KICK OFF, BABY!!!





GO BUCKS!!

Don't Let Me Depress You

It's pretty obvious from some of my posts over the last week that I do not have to tell you that I am very pleased with the political headlines this morning! But...I AM, I AM, I AM!!! :) On that note, this is the extent of my political blogging. Back to the regularly scheduled mommy-blogging for me!

Now that Halloween and the Election are officially over, it's time to start thinking about the Holiday Season. This really has my head spinning. I am NOT ready for any of that. It could be that it's been over 70 degrees here for the last couple of weeks, but it could also be the fact that money is TIGHT and I get bad anxiety in normal circumstances...add in trying to buy all the fixin's for a Thanksgiving feast, Christmas presents for all 3 of my children, my 3 stepchildren and my 1 step-grandson, not counting all the extended family we buy for, plus things for myself and my husband! It makes my head spin!

I have been trying to put money back for all of this...but it never fails, something else always pops up. You know, things like rent and groceries!! Thank goodness gas prices are now cut in half! Right there is a major relief!

Wow, I'm even depressing myself with this post. I can't help it. It's stressful times in this country, I think everyone feels it. I just certainly hope our new President really will bring CHANGE! And maybe by the time the holidays roll around next year, things will be better. One can only hope!

Halloween Recap

So Halloween has come and gone. Thank goodness! I was tired of listening to "When do we get to go get candy!" Now its a fight over when they are allowed to eat the candy. They've been begging since 7:30am today. I'm ready to throw it all away already!



While we were out it was pretty uneventful. It was the typical, "Trick-or-Treat", "Thank You!" You know the drill! But we made it to one house in particular and their grass was very high. For the most part everyone's lawns around here are very meticulous looking because we've had frost so everyone has done their final mowing and there has been little growth. Well Hayden and Tara walked up through the yard to get the candy and then came running back through the yard to Will and me waiting on the sidewalk.

Hayden took that opportunity to YELL "Why is their grass so HIGH!? Don't they know they should MOW IT!"

We just smiled and grabbed their little hands and headed on to the next house as fast as we could trying not to crack up laughing.

Yeah, not very exciting, but it was funny and I thought it was worth sharing! If you live in the neighborhood we trick-or-treat in...one word for you! MOW!


And on another note..if you live in the United States of America...I have just one word for you as well! VOTE!!

Don't forget, if you haven't taken advantage of the early voting, tomorrow is ELECTION DAY! Let your voice be heard!!!

Halloween Zoo Trip!

Still following Tiff's "orders" for this post. Today's topic is "Halloween Present" Remember, click on this post's title to head over and take part. I am SOOO hoping to win today's prize! I NEED SOME PAMPERING!!! :) Now on to the post!

Trick-or-Treat is not until this coming Friday, but we've already dressed the kids all up and taken them to the Zoo. There was candy stations, animal's smashing pumpkins, and BATMAN!

We didn't know Batman was going to be there and once we did find out we didn't tell Hayden (who chose a Batman costume this year) because the chances of actually seeing him were pretty slim.

Well we were really surprised and excited when Batman's parade came through one of the areas where we were walking. And this Batman, was THE REAL Batman! OR at least he could have been if Batman was real. We told Hayden he was though! Not that there was any doubt in that kids mind...his jaw was about to hit the cement!

So imagine our HUGE surprise when Batman got OFF OF HIS FLOAT to come shake Hayden's hand!!! I thought my husband, mom, aunt and myself were all going to pass out! It was soo cool!

Hayden is still talking about it. But he's being very "cool" about it. It's really cute! What a lucky boy!


The Kids Before Heading To The Zoo:




BATMAN:



Batman Shaking Hayden's Hand: (bad pic, but I was too close to get them both in the screen very well)

Fall Extravaganza Craft

Well I missed my blog entry yesterday, I was at my mom's most of the day and by the time I got home yesterday afternoon...well I was just too tired!

Today we're posting our fall crafts. I have two grapevine wreathes, 1 on the front porch and 1 on the deck that I decorate every season. I just get some inexpensive ribbon and whatever else I want to add and see what I can come up with once I'm home.

Theses are our wreaths. Everything on it was purchased 50% off from Hobby Lobby. I spent a whoppin' $16 to decorate both wreaths! I don't think that's a bad deal at all! And at the end of the season, I'll just pack it all away with my fall decor and re-use it next year!






Now head on over to Tiff's blog by clicking on this post's title and enter yourself in her contest! It's so fun!!

Halloween Past

The Fall Extravaganza is still in full swing and today we're supposed to post about "Halloween Pasts". I looked through all of my pics stored on this computer, and of course pics of my most favorite Halloween costume when it comes to my kids is not stored on this computer. Grr! But let me tell you about it anyway!

When Hayden was 8 months old we dressed him as a mechanic. It was the cutest costume ever! He had a pair of denim coveralls and I took black Halloween face paint and put smudges on his knees tushy, and little smears elsewhere like he had been working in a lot of grease and kept wiping his hands. I also put a few little marks on his face as well. It was DARLING!!

We put a hat on him backwards and my husband made a little "Our Last Name's Garage" label for his "uniform" and I made a name tag! It was toooooo cute!! Man! How I wish I had access to that pic to share!!

Click on this post's title to head on over to Tiff's blog to take part in this contest!

He Wants To Be A What?

Tonight my husband and I are taking the kids to look at Halloween costumes. I of course want to be the "perfect" mommy and make their costumes, but depending on what they want to be, it may just be easier to buy them.

Kayley, our 1 year old, is easy enough. A friend of mine gave me an elephant costume...so that's what she's going to be. No sense in buying something when I have a perfectly good costume in a closet...somewhere in my house. I just have to find it first...

Tara, our 3 year old, is unable to make up her mind. One day she says she's going to be a princess. The next, a witch. The next, a cat. She needs some guidance. And if looking at all of the costumes doesn't help her to make up that pretty little mind. Mommy gets to choose!! (I'm voting for cat! It's easy, and I can put it together myself with the help of a bought tail and ears. So I get credit for actually making it!)

Hayden, our 4 1/2 year old son....Well he's the main reason for this post. He's been planning his Halloween costume since Spring. He's wanted to be a Ninja Turtle, Spiderman, a pirate, a dragon....all very good ideas. Now that Halloween is approaching and it's time to get the costume. He's made up his mind and he's NOT budging. He wants to be a black ghost. No it's not some cartoon character. He wants me to throw a black sheet over his head and call it a day. I just can't do it! So he is the real reason why we've planned this Halloween costume browsing trip. I'm crossing all of my fingers and toes that he'll see a "super cool" store-bought costume, fall in love and then I wont have to purchase a black sheet.

Halloween '07: