Boo!

Just posting pictures of costumey goodness tonight. Although we bought Harrison’s Spiderman costume and Laura’s Wonder Woman onesie, I made her wig/tiara and boots/tights. I’ll be posting info on how I did that tomorrow—right now, I’m just pooped and wanted to share the ridiculous cuteness of my super hero kids.

Trying out their respective head gear before candy time:

  

Hamming it up for the camera while Brother and Daddy trick-r-treated one end of the street.

  

 

A convergence of the Marvel and DC Universe. I’m probably more protected now than at any other point in my life. :)

“You want a piece of me, Wolverine? Don’t make me use my webs!”

 

Hope everyone had a good Halloween! We sure did!

I’m just a girl who cain’t say ‘no’

We’ve got a lot planned this weekend. Well, had. Still have a good bit, but we skipped the Halloween party we were supposed to be going to because of a bad report from school. As much as I missed seeing our friends and letting the kids play and have fun, and as loath as I am to get word that the boy has misbehaved again, I’m kind of glad that we got to rest and relax a little bit because, quite frankly, I was dreading this weekend. Between the aforementioned party, trick-or-treating tomorrow night (still have to get Laura’s costume finished, but I don’t think it will take too long…) and the karate tournament on Sunday, I was figuring we’d be run ragged. Never mind that every night this week, we’ve had something to do, from a jewelry party at a friend’s house (got some really cute earrings!) to two nights of karate class to meetings. Suffice it to say, I’m tired. Going to hit publish here in just a second, go to the bedroom, put on jammies and fall into bed.

Hopefully, the boy will be well behaved tomorrow so that he gets to go beg for candy. If not, I guess the girl will be on her own.

Got to hit the fabric store first thin in the morning…

Sick Sucks

Terrible migraine and sore spot in my back. God, I feel like poo on a stick. Going to bed so I can sleep this off and hopefully feel better in the morning.

Bleh.

Oh, yeah—bright spot: the gratitude stones? Yeah, my kid rocks. (No pun intended…) When asked what he was grateful for tonight, instead of mentioning the kick-booty karate practice he had tonight where he won all of his matches, he said he was glad that Mommy had cooked such a delicious meal for dinner.

Totally the best kid. Ever. :)

Grateful, Part 2

“Ok, Mommy, it’s your turn.”

We’re telling our stones at the dinner table. Robert has already added his two to the pile—his desk if finally on its way here after being in Delivery Purgatory for about a month and we got our super-cheap copy of Dan Brown’s newest book in the mail today (thank you, half.com!).

“Um, ok. I’m grateful for…I’m grateful that my kids are finally done painting their color wheels. As much as I love the project and as happy and cheery as the colors make me, I’m tired of cleaning paint off the tables and out of the sinks and I’m ready for that particular mess to be done with.”

I drop my stone in the bowl.

Harrison looks at me and holds his stones up. He has two happy thoughts tonight. “I’m glad that you’re my friend, Mommy.” Stone drops in the bowl.

“And daddy’s your friend, too, huh?”

“Yep, you and daddy are my friends.” Big grin.

“And Laura, too?”

A little exasperated, but still happy. “Uh huh, you and daddy and Laura are all my best friends.”

He holds up his second stone.

“And I’m glad I hit Grayson hard tonight and knocked him down and got the point.”

Karate tourney coming up, yo.

Making a Future

Meeting for LongviewWOW was productive tonight. Looks like we’re going to be in the Christmas parade this year—that should be fun! Also looks like we’ll be doing some pretty neat stuff in the upcoming future. I’m hoping to help organize a science day for kids (totally stealing the idea from Katy Did, a blog I ran across over the summer). Other things for consideration are planning out some GeoCaches for kids, perhaps with a St. Patrick’s Day theme, and some sort of historical reenactment. Not that I didn’t enjoy helping work on the Lego robotics stuff, but I’m kind of glad to see that we’re going to be doing some other stuff that branches out into different areas of interest. I think that they kids of Longview are really going to enjoy the stuff we’ve got planned for them. I know that when we first started working with this group and told Harrison what our plans were, he was super excited about it all. His first question about it was, “Will I be able to touch the stuff, Mommy?” How can I not make that happen for him?

Off, now, to bed and rest before more activity for tomorrow. Thursday night is the only night I don’t have something planned, so I’m kind of running out of energy.

Sigh.

Grateful

So we’ve started a new thing at mealtime now.

One of my favorite things at church is the candle lighting and/or stone placing. Everyone is given the chance to come up to the front and light a candle or place a stone that represents something he might want to celebrate, commemorate or just make note of. It can be positive or negative—it’s mostly just a chance for the congregation to know what’s going on in your life. Kind of a prayer request, I suppose.

I’ve wanted to introduce the concept to Harrison for some time now for a multitude of reasons. The most obvious, of course, is that I want to cultivate a sense of gratitude for the things in our lives that make us happy. I want him to learn to stop and reflect on what makes him happy and why.

I also want him to know that Robert and I are happy. I think sometimes that he gets kind of a raw deal because he only sees us at the end of the day when we’re tired and worn out and don’t seem as happy as we could be. I feel like this can help to show him that even though we’re tired, we still have things that made us happy at some point during the day .

Finally, I like the idea of our sharing these things because it gives us a point of conversation and allows us to be happy for each other’s joys throughout the day. I know that I like hearing about the good things the boys do during the day and I can only hope they find my little shard of sunshine appealing as well.

So the ritual is simply this: I have a big bowl I made in ceramics in college that is our collection point. Any vessel could be used—this is just what I had on hand. I bought a bag of stones at Michael’s the other day, but I think down the road I’m going to want to incorporate (and later replace with) stones I find out and about in my day to day living. The stones are in a cup on the counter and each person gets at least one stone at mealtime. We then take turns telling about the bright spots during our day. It might be something we are looking forward to (tonight, Harrison was grateful that Halloween is in five more days, for example) or it might be something that happened during the day (I was glad last night that Harrison and I had finally gotten around to sorting his toys) or it could just be a happy thought in general (Robert was glad one night that none of the kid were sick).

Whatever the appreciated thing is, the stone goes into the big bowl and each day more are added. I think it’s pretty cool to look in and see all that our family is happy about. Some nights, one or more of us might have more than one stone—those are my favorites because it tells me that the day was especially good.

I suppose at some point the bowl will be full and I’ll have to empty it out and start over. I think I’m just going to watch and wait for that, though, and see what happens. I bet whatever does happen, it’s going to feel pretty good.

Regarding the Upcoming Nuptials of Friends

“Uh, Mommy?” Everything begins with ‘Uh, Mommy?’ these days. Definitely need to work on his pause breaks.

“Hmmm?” We’re at the mall, shopping for a suit for him and some pants for me. We’ve just selected his outfit—how unfair is it that a five-year-old can pick something off the rack and it looks awesome with nary a problem? I hate shopping.

“Uh, Mommy? Me ‘n’ Daddy have special jobs.”

“Oh really?”

“Yeah, we’re in Mr. Cody’s wedding.”

I just helped select his suit for this wedding, so I’m privy to the fact, but I feign surprise.

“You have jobs, huh?”

“Uh huh. My job is to walk up the aisle and hold the ring for Mr. Cody to give to Miss Amy.” He beams with pride.

I haven’t told him that the ring he carries will likely be fake since no one in their right mind would entrust an integral piece of the wedding ceremony to a flaky five-year-old who is just as more likely to strike a metal rocker pose during the proceedings as stand still.

“Well, that sounds like a very important job. What’s daddy going to do?”

“Daddy’s job is to walk with Mr. Cody and stand with him and make sure he doesn’t get lost or run away.”