A Shiny Day, Mama!

Today was a gorgeous day! The leaves are really starting to change; the sky is ultra blue; and the temperature is getting brisk.

The kids and I were heading out the door in a major rush for church this morning. I am barking orders and just overall frustrated with how UN-smoothly the day had started out.

Little Man stopped in the driveway and was looking up at the sky. He started turning around and around and said "Mama! It is a shiny day! A shiny day!" and gave me the biggest grin.

That made the morning a lot better!

Webkinz? A Chi-la-la? or a drug?

Goosey Lou received her first grade card in first grade on Friday. Ms. Lou received straight 4's in every subject and kept her race car on the track EVERY.SINGLE.DAY! We are so proud of her. Her teacher told me that she is the top student in the class and is always polite and very mature. She said that she has never had a student as smart as Goosey! (Proud mama beaming!)

As a reward (I know that you aren't suppose to reward for good grades) I told Goosey that she could purchase a Webkinz of her choice. After weeks of thinking about it and perusing the stores, a cute little chihuahua named Co-Co was adopted and brought home.

If you are not familiar with Webkinz, it is a stuffed animal that has a code attached to the tag. You log into www.webkinz.com and enter your code so that your animal has a virtual existence online. There are games to play and jobs to do and faux chat rooms and tournaments where you earn webkinz money to buy food, furniture, toys, etc. for your online animal.

Let me tell you...this thing is addictive! Goosey has given me permission to log in and earn her some spending points playing games (there are some that can only be played once a day and I cannot do those). Games similar to tetris, bejeweled, and others are there for the playing! Lots of fun!

Little Man likes it too. He is not allowed to play on the computer yet. He just can't be nice to the very expensive piece of machinery. However, he loves to watch his big sister hold Co-Co the "chi-la-la" and play on the computer. Bless him he is so sweet.

This morning, the kidlets had to have their flu shots. Poor Goosey was distressed the minute I put the numbing cream on her arm. She was whimpering and whining and protesting the entire morning. Little Man was excited to have a boo-boo bandaid on his arm. I was shocked at how smoothly this went down. Little Man went in and I handed him a sucker. He was so busy that he had no idea what hit him. He looked around and saw a new bandaid and a Superman sticker and he was ready to go. Not one cry or whimper.

Goosey, on the other hand, came in from the hall and started fighting the moment she hit the door. The nurse told her to blow really hard and the next thing you know, it was over. She looked surprised when the nurse told her to hop down. Was it worth it all....all the protest, the crying, the whimpering? Well, only if she can go home and play with her Webkinz.

A monster I have created.........

Fire Engine! Fire Engine!

Last week at preschool, Little Man's class was able to visit a fire truck and meet some firemen as part of Fire Safety Week. He LOVES fire trucks! When we see them out on the road or parked outside of a restaurant or wherever, Little Man becomes so excited that he starts pointing and jumping and saying "fire engine, fire engine" repeatedly until someone acknowledges that yes, indeed, a fire engine is within our line of sight.

So today heading back to the house, a fire truck was heading toward us with their sirens on high and lights flashing and heading to some sort of an emergency. Little Man starts hollering "fire engine, fire engine, mama!" Here was our conversation:

Me: Yes, it looks like they are going to an emergency to help someone.
LM: Hep some 'un?
Me: Help someone. I bet there is a fire or someone is sick. Maybe we should say a little prayer for them.
LM: Otay.
Me: Dear God, Please be with the people the firemen are going to help. Keep the firemen safe too. In Jesus' name, Amen.
LM: ....Long Pause.....
LM: Mama, where de fire engine go?
Me: Remember, it was going to help someone who needs help.
LM: Otay. Fire engine hep Jesus.

Little Man thought that the fire engine was on its way to help Jesus! So cute!

Flying Solo & Scary Monster Spiders

Goosey Lou decided that she wanted to try out for a solo part in the children's choir. Evidently, she is the only female first grader that even wanted to try out. So we practiced and practiced and practiced the part that she wanted to sing. We have been playing the CD alot in the car. Little Man sings along too! It is so sweet.

She tried out for the part a few days ago and we still have not heard if she made it or not. I explained to her that God has given her a gift (can carry a tune) and that all He asks is that she is willing to use it for Him (trying out). If she doesn't get the solo, then she can try out next time. She looked at me so seriously and said, "Mom, I know I am going to get it. I sang really well that night." We'll see......

On the Little Man front, we ventured back to the local museum. The same one with the same program we had to leave after being there only a few minutes last month due to a horrendous meltdown. I am happy to say that he did great this time. He half-listened to the stories, but was VERY excited about the crafts. He was able to make a spider from pipe cleaners and egg cartons. He named it "Scary Monster Spider". He loved making "Ghost" out of kleenex and even colored a picture of a pumpkin. So maybe we have arrived at a new era in our social life....we can participate in one!

"Boy, You Were L.U.C.K.Y.!!!!"

Yesterday was super busy for me. There are only two mornings a week that I have to accomplish some errands sans kids. Yesterday happened to be one of them. I was fortunate enough to be able to visit a dear little baby, Ava, that was born on Monday. Her parents are very dear friends of mine and because both of the kids were in school, I was able to visit her in the hospital.

Then I had to run an errand in town and then back to preschool to pick Little Man up in the nick of time! We went home and had a quick lunch. After an hour of playtime and TV watching, it was time to get back into the car and head over to pick Goosey up from first grade.

As I was corralling Little Man out the door, I heard the faint sound of beeping coming from upstairs. Since we had recently moved our answering machine upstairs, I realized that I had at least one message. There was NO time to check it at the house, so I called the phone and decided to check it on the way to pick up line.

New message 1, Wednesday, 7:58 AM: "Mrs. Mac, this is Goosey's school. We just wanted to let you know that Goosey tripped on her way to the classroom and skinned her nose pretty badly. She insisted that we not call you and said that she felt fine. We applied neosporin and a bandaid over her nose. Just wanted to let you know so that you did not freak out when you pick her up this afternoon."

OK. So now it is almost 7.5 hours later and I just get this message. So I am telling myself that Goosey must be OK since they did not contact me on my cell phone, which is ALWAYS on my presence....well, not ALWAYS, but I usually have it with me wherever I go.

As Mrs. First Grade teacher is putting Goosey in the car, she inquires if I did not get the message. I explained that I had just gotten the message on my home phone and since I was on my way over at the end of the day, I did not want to disrupt her class. She told me that Goosey was a tough cookie and probably needed a special treat for being so brave.

Holy cow! Talk about a tough cookie! When we got home, I took the bandage off of her nose and it looked terrible! One side of her nose had been scratched to pieces, her lip had been scraped, the bridge of her nose was raw and her gum had been cut! She looked like someone had punched her in the face. Evidently, she tripped some how and fell smack dab on her nose. There were some minor scrapes on her wrist, but none on her knees or hands. Bless her heart.

She is so upset about it. She cried when I told her that she had to go to church last night (we both teach classes) and whined we she realized she had to go to school today. She was crying saying that she was hideous and that everyone would stare at her. It made me want to cry....it does look pretty bad.

I took her by the doctor to make sure that there wasn't anything more I could do other than to clean it and keep antibiotics on it. The doctor said, "Boy, you were so lucky!" She was surprised that there was no bruising or swelling; that all of her teeth were intact; that she did not split her nose down the middle and require stitches; that she did not lose consciousness. That is really good news. The bad news is that it will get worse before it gets better. It will be a few weeks before it heals, so she will have a bandaid across her nose for a while.

I wish that I could keep her from getting hurt...physically and emotionally. It is like having my little heart running outside of my body.

Eclectic Days

The past few weeks have so busy that I have not had time to post. A couple of weekends ago, I went away for my annual church retreat to the beach and Daddy Mac was left in charge. I think that they had fun. They were alive, fed, and semi-clean!

Last weekend we traveled to Tennessee to celebrate our toddler cousinent's first birthday. That definitely was a lot of fun. It is hard to believe that a year has passed since her birth. She has an adorable scooting crawl and a faulty walk. She is talking and laughing and just a sweet as pie. She really seemed to enjoy Goosey! She would laugh and holler for her by name.

Little Man seemed to show more interest in toddler girl cousinent. He would smile and play peek-a-boo. Yesterday, a whole week after we had seen her, he started pacing the hallway to the main door. He was babbling like crazy and finally came in next to me and said: Go to Ko-eee's house! Go to Ko-eee's house! Otay?

I am afraid that Little Man is getting sick again. The weather had started to change and the temperatures have finally dropped into the upper 40s/low 50s. His nose has started running and he is coughing a bit. Good grief! But despite this, he is speaking very clearly with more and more words. This weekend he can clearly say the following: rocket shiP, blasT ofF, drinK of wateR. It is as if he is hearing the end of sentences.

Goosey has started to have graded work in her class that has nothing to do with doing it at home. She has had her first science test (100%); first social studies test (100%); reading comprehension based on in class reading (100%). She is doing fabulous! The end of the first nine weeks is coming to an end very soon. She is going to get a Webkinz (a dog) for her great effort. She has kept her name on green since the first day of school too! That is so huge for a six year old!

Life is a hodge podge of everyday, eclectic experiences. It is going by so fast...