Traditions

These pictures have nothing to do with Traditions. At least not for me anyway. We went to the Teddy Bear Tea on Saturday. The kick-off of the holiday season. We got all dressed up and went to a traditional tea party. It's annual event put on by our city with the proceeds going to the local hospital. This is the first year that Megan and I went. It was ok, I guess. But I don't think I'll be going again next year. After all the hoopla of getting fancied up only to be rushed through a cup of tea and food from Costco....eh, I'm kind of over it. To tell you the truth, I really just wanted an excuse to put Megan in this super cute dress. Isn't she adorable? Even though she is still refusing to smile or look happy in front of a camera?

Back to the topic of traditions....I was wondering what yours were. So if you're so inclined, and have a moment, I'd love it if you posted in the comments :)
Do you have Thanksgiving at your house, or go away? This year we are going to my moms and I can't wait! I've never done Thanksgiving myself.
What's your favorite thing on the Thanksgiving menu...the one thing you wait all year for? For me it's the turkey that my mom's husband makes. Oh. My. Gosh. The best ever!
When do you put up your Christmas Tree? When I was a kid we never put ours up until maybe two weeks before Christmas. But now I like to do it the weekend after Thanksgiving.
Real tree, or fake tree? I prefer a real one, but I have a nice fake one. It's easier. No stringing the lights!
Do you open presents on Christmas Eve, or wait till the morning? We wait till morning. Actually nothing goes under the tree until the kids go to bed. That way they're super excited to see the loot when they come downstairs in the morning! It's what my mom did for me and it stuck. :)
Santa gifts: wrapped or unwrapped? Unwrapped.
Favorite treat you only make this time of year? Spritz cookies or Mexican Wedding cookies.
And lastly...do you have a traditional Christmas breakfast? Like something you make every year? I'm still working on this one. I haven't found that perfect thing yet. So if you have one, let me know, K?
Oh, one more thing before I sign off....Jake did all kinds of Thanksgiving projects and activities at school the past couple of weeks. He's come home with 4 different turkeys and Indian and pilgrim stuff but the best thing was his recipe for How to Cook a Turkey:
We will go hunting for our turkey. Take off all the feathers. Then it's ready to cook in the oven. It cooks for three minutes at sixty degrees. We will have salad too. The turkey will have spices.
We got a copy of all the kids recipes and I have to say it's another thing that will go into the box to be saved forever! It's so cute. What I thought was cool was that Jake was the only one to say he was going to hunt for his turkey! Doesn't surprise me though!
Have a great Thanksgiving!!

I keep things

I can't help it. I'm a sentimental kind of gal. If something has any significant memory attached to it, I keep it. (Maybe that's why I like scrapbooking so much?) I have a cedar chest full of memories from my childhood and adolescence. I have all 4 of my high school I.D. cards. I saved my tickets to the Prom. I have a T-shirt from the 5th grade that everyone signed on the last day of school. I still have the head gear I had to wear in the 9th grade. Yes, I wore head gear but thank God I didn't have to wear it to school! Could you imagine? *shudder* I still have 2 teddy bears that were given to me as an infant. Oh, and I still have my 'B'. That's what I called my blanket.
I keep things. Pete does not. He's a tosser. We'd been married about 2 years, no children yet, and he was out in the garage cleaning up. I had a box of old dolls and stuff that my mom had saved for me and given to me to keep. He opened the box, saw a bunch of 'useless' dolls and without even asking, just threw them away. About a month later I went out the the garage searching for something and noticed my box was gone. I went in and asked if he'd seen it. "Oh, you mean that one with all those nasty dolls and stuff in it?" Ummmmm yeah, that one. "I threw it away". I just about died. Most of the stuff in there was no big deal. But my very first Cabbage Patch Kid was in there. And a little teddy bear my camp counselor had made for me. I was so upset that it made me cry. And Pete just didn't get it. He obviously understood that I was upset, but he just didn't get it. I still hold this one over his head. He doesn't throw out anything anymore without asking me first. But he still doesn't quite get it.
I also have a box of school work from Kindergarten to about the 3rd grade. Most of it is art projects or reports my mom had saved for me. My very first report card is in there. Stuff like that. Pete has threatened to throw it out on many occasions. Because the box is just sitting there taking up space and doing nothing. That's not the point, I tell him. He asks me if I ever look at it. And mostly I don't. It does just sit there and take up space, I get that. But that's not the point. It's just not the point! Dang it!
A friend of mine gave away her wedding dress the week after she got home from her honeymoon. Her husbands grandmother handmade the dress. Without a pattern! And she sent it to the Good Will. I could not believe it. She said, "Well, I'm never going to wear it again." Yeah, ok....but SO WHAT?!
Yep. I keep things.
So, when Pete got home yesterday and I showed him Jake's very first report card and the nursery rhyme book he made, Pete said:
"So, I guess you're going to keep that for a while, right? I bet I couldn't pry it from your cold, dead hands."
He's learning. :)

Oh, and the confrence with Jake's teacher went well. He's definitely not that kid. But I already knew that :)

Oh brother,

I knew this would come back to haunt me. I just didn't think it would be so soon. My one moment of weakness in front of a bunch of kids and at least one of their parents.
Jake just came in from playing outside and said Mommy, is the middle finger bad? like when you hold it up like this??
*sigh*
My first thought was oh great, now I've gone and taught the whole neighborhood how to flip the bird. Please don't make it be my kid showing everybody....please let it be some other degenerate child.
Me: Who was doing that?
J: Well...um (gulp)....I was.
great. just great.
Me: Why?
J: Well...........well.......Brady started it!
*Oh thank goodness!*
J: He told us all to do it! And then, and then John said it was bad. And I'm sorry mommy, I didn't know it was bad! (he said, in his very rushed, please I don't want to be in trouble voice.)
*whew*
Me: Well, now ya know. Don't do it again ok?
J: Ok Mommy, I won't!

Being a parent is hard. Especially now when the whole social aspect comes into it. I'm very conscious of what other parents think of my kids. Because what they see in them, is a direct reflection of me. And I don't want to be that parent, you know? The one who lets their kid run wild through the neighborhood with no boundaries or rules. (and flips people off driving down the street) And I really don't want my kid to be that kid either. The kid who no one wants to let play at their house. Or the one who when they look at they think That poor kid with that awful mother.
ha ha! I know I'm being rather dramatic, but this stuff really does go through my head!
Parent/teacher confrence tomorrow. Let's hope Jake is not that kid at school. ;)

A new phase of siblinghood

Sibling hood? Is that even a word? I think I may have made that one up.

Anyways, here is Exhibit A:



Don't they look sweet? Lately, this has become a very rare sight around our house. I think we've ventured in to the new phase of brotherly/sisterly love. The fighting over everything phase. Seems like all I hear lately is:

"Get out of my room!"

" Stop touching me! Megan!"

"Get off!"

"Go away!"

Followed by:

"No! Dat mine, Day-dee!" (that's how Meg says Jakey)

or just a blood curdling scream: "Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!Eeeeeeeeeek!"

And then me:

"Ok! that's enough!"

And then of course Miss Bossy Pants:

"Yeah! Dat nuff Day-dee."

It's just a never ending circle of this stuff. It's uncharted territory for me, an only child. I don't know anything about fighting with a brother or sister. Does it ever stop? (don't answer that.)

Mix in with all that mess, Exhibit B:



Do you see the evil eye? Yeah. This the defiant I'm not loooooking look which I get quite frequently. Especially if I want to take a picture. She just will not look at me. Not only is she bossy and defiant, she's also a complete drama queen. She cries over just about everything. Everything. If she asks me for something and I say, Ok, just a minute....she falls out crying. If she asks to go to Grandma's house and I say Grandma's not home today....she falls out crying. She cries whenever someone leaves our house, or we'll be driving and she'll see a cat out the window and she'll ask if she can pet it and I say No, she cries. It's enough to make a mom crazy. I know I'm making it sound pretty bad I guess. And it's not like she's never sweet or never not crying. But there are a lot of these little crazy moments mixed in with tons of super sweet fun ones every day...you know what I mean? I find myself constantly saying "Megan...look at mommy. Stop crying. This is not something to cry about". I suppose it's all typical two year old stuff. You know, she's just working that little personality of hers. It think it just seems way more dramatized because 1) I'm with her 24/7 and 2) she's a girl.

Other things going on this week were my mom coming down on Tuesday for a visit.



That was nice. We took the kids to the park, which is were we got all these pictures. Jake is just looking like such a big kid these days. I was just looking at a pic of him from his birthday in August, and he already looks so much bigger and more mature to me. Maybe it's kindergarten.



We also went on another field trip with his class on Friday. This time was to the grocery store. I didn't take any pictures this time. I've been to the store a million and one times and that surely won't be my last trip! It was fun for the kids though. They got to go in the back and see them decorate cakes and cut meat and all that stuff. Our tour guide was kind of nutty though. She was just I dunno...a little too enthusiastic?? She showed the kids the box bailer in the back room...it's the big machine they use to smash all the boxes down to send to they recycle center. Anyway she proceeds to tell all the 5 year olds how "there was this one time.... a kid fell into the machine and got crushed". yeah. She actually said that. You should have seen us parents...we were all like are you kidding me? You're really telling this to a bunch of kindergartners?
Tuesday is our first Parent/Teacher conference. Even though I work in the class at least once a week and talk with his teacher frequently, I'm really looking forward to getting down to the goods and seeing how well he is learning. About a month ago Mrs. C pulled me aside and let me know that he had tested very low on the alphabet/letter sounds. This didn't surprise me at all. Remember back before school started how I was nervous about him not knowing the alphabet all the way etc...?? So yeah, her telling me he tested low was not a surprise at all. I asked her what I could do at home and she offered to send Jake to the reading specialist twice a week to kind of get him caught up. Well I've seen a VAST improvement since then. I think the reading specialist, plus the teachers more close attention, and my help at home has helped him a lot. I borrowed these books from a friend and I'm just amazed at how quickly Jake has picked it up and is able to read the books all the way through with little help.
Anyway, I guess that's about it for now. This is getting rather long (and boring), isn't it? I guess that's what happens when I don't blog for over a week. I'll update again soon....I've actually been scrapbooking lately and making miniBooks! Hello. That is like so rare for me! ha ha! I've made 2 completed ones and my December daily album.
Wow, just over a week till Thanksgiving! Are you ready?

So, my first thought was...

"So Pete, we're moving to Canada, right?"
If not Canada, how about Alaska? :)

I am filled with mixed emotions today. Who knew I could care so much about an election? I never thought I would. Obviously not every one will share my feelings on the outcome of this election. But lets just agree to disagree, ok?
I'm still cringing when I listen to the radio and hear the replaying of "The 44th President of the United States of America.....Barack Obama!" and then the crowd cheers. It brings tears to my eyes and fills me with anxiety. And honestly, I'm not exactly sure where that anxiety is coming from. But for some reason it's there. I think it amazes me that so many people can overlook inexperience, the fact that's he's BFF's with known terrorists, that's he's totally ok with late term abortion, that he won't put his hand over his heart during the National Anthem, that his wife has never been proud of her country (until now of course)....I suppose I could go on and on. But it's over, and there's no sense in harping on it now.
Barack Obamas' campaign was one of "Hope" and "Change" for many Americans. I think change is inevitable. And whether it's for the better or for the worse, only time will tell. All we can do now is pray for him. Pray that he can lead this country to better times. And hope, well there is always hope.
One thing I can say for President Obama: Through this campaign he brought passion back into Americans. Whether you were for or against him, he caused people to look around and stand up for what they wanted and believed in. I'd never seen so many people really excited to vote. This was the first time Pete has ever voted. He also has a friend he works with who is 50 years old and voted for the very first time yesterday. Not only did this election cause me to be eager to elect a president, but it lead me to look more intently on many State and local elections and propositions. I never cared about any of it before. Mostly because I just didn't understand, or take the time to understand. This year I took the time to understand and when I cast my vote, I was proud of the decisions I made.