Pirate Palooza

What: The Preschooler's 5th birthday
When: Saturday May 29th 11-1
Where: Our house



What to expect: Games: Pirate Ship Pinyata, Pin the Treasure on the Map, Fun in the Pirate Ship, digging for treasures, and a bean bag toss.

Crafts: constructing pirate hats.

Lunch: Hotdogs and gold fish, cupcakes, and cookies.




Tradition: Mom forgetting to serve the ice cream TWO years in a row.

Last Day of Preschool.

Great.big.sigh. Today is the Preschooler's last day of Preschool. Well, until next year. We liked it so much that we're holding him back from kindergarten. He turned FIVE Wednesday, but we took the advice of his teacher, our parents, and our gut feelings and decided to hold him back another year. It had absolutely NOTHING to do with my not wanting to let go...(wink, wink). I am thankful to have another year to let him mature and work on his skills. I think he'll benefit greatly from it.
He brought this rock home from preschool one day and I had to laugh.

It reminded me of my days of painting rocks and trying to sell them to the neighbors. I even conned my friends into selling rocks with me. Solar may have even been suckered into this. :)
His teacher said he worked very hard on it so I put in the flower beds. I love it.

Well, lets face it. Laundry rooms are boring. I tried to put some life into ours by redoing this wall at the beginning of the school year.


I changed the artwork out and it ended up being a fun area...and a dumping ground. This is the back door area so everything collects here. UGH. We'll have these memories of preschool until the fall when they can be replaced with new ones. I thought it might be fun to update their pictures with the art work too. What do you think? Do you update pictures on your walls or leave them the same.

Joker Joan

Dear Joan,
You could very well play the next joker. All you need is the make up.
Just sayin....

Extreme Home Makeover

OK-so it's not really an EXTREME home makeover, but it's a makeover none the less. Remember here when I asked for some bathroom makeover assistance?
Here are the before/after results.


I need to disclose that this is NOT my speciality. I did not stew over and look at endless samples of paint colors. I picked out a few samples, hung it on the wall, and went with it.
It did NOT work out well. The color (windswept sails from Valspar) looked shiny and like something that could glow in the dark. I didn't want to repaint it so I went back to purchase a white glaze and sponged over it. It's subtle and toned it down to the point that I could live with it. WHEW!


I purchased the monkey decal from Leen the Graphics Queen on Etsy. I got the monkey step out rug and appliqued towels at Target. A solid white rug would look better to match the long rug, but I think it's fine for now. It was only $1.00! I still have some pictures to hang above the toilet, but other than that it's done. Thanks for your help!

Road trip.

This is the Commander's busy season which means it's just me and the kids. Grandaddy is playing in a golf tournament near Memphis so we are tagging along to have some fun of our own. My cousin is meeting us tomorrow and we will be zoo bound. Did you know the Memphis zoo is ranked #1 in America. We don't have a good zoo so we're looking forward to it.
I'm typing this while sandwiched between the wild thing and preschooler in the backseat of the car. We've already laughed at the differences between making this trip today vs traveling when I was a preschooler. There were no phones available to use in the car. Our first cell phone came attached to the car. We didn't have service to it, but it was still a cool feature. It was huge and came in a black bag. The preschooler is watching sesame street on his DVD player. There were no DVD players when I was growing up. Our only entertainment in the car was a book or toy. Sometimes I traveled with my speak-n-spell. Remember those? It was cool!! We played games by looking out the window. One of my favorites was the license plate game. Now, here I am blogging in the car. These are new and different times for sure. I have to admit it does make travelling much more enjoyable.

Whitey

I am a dog person...always have been and always will be so when this little cat showed up at our house about two weeks ago I told her to SCAT. She was crying, malnourished, and covered in ear mites. I didn't want the kids around it so I encouraged her to leave. After 2 days of this, I decided she was obviously not getting fed nor did she have any intentions of leaving so I caved and gave her some turkey and milk. She ate it then curled up on the back porch and fell asleep.
I called the city to report a stray cat...I KNOW...I KNOW! BUT..I had no idea where it came from or what diseases it may have so it had to be checked out by someone.
By the time they came out, we had all grown attached to the kitty. She was friendly, calm, and seemed sweet. When the "city animal officer" showed up I told him we wanted to keep it so he said the city would vaccinate it, microchip it, bathe it, treat the ear mites, and spade it for $60, but if I took it to a vet then it would cost much more. He was travelling around with three dogs, a parakeet, a raccoon, and a possum all caged in the back of his truck. I found his collection of animals very entertaining. He took the kitten and told me the city had to hold it for 5 days in case the owner claimed it, but then it would be up for adoption. The 5 days past and they called to tell us know she was available and asked if we were still interested. I had to go down for an interview to adopt this cat!!! Seriously, they wanted to know all kinds of things about our house and family. It was a little intense. Did you know we live in a town with a leash law for cats!? They frowned upon my stating this would be an outdoor cat!! Well, believe it or not we were selected so meet Whitey. The Preschooler named her. Bless his heart. He comes by his pet naming skills honestly. We once had a black lab named "Big Dog".
We're real original when it comes to pet names. :)
Don't tell anyone, but I kind of like her.

Happy Mother's Day.

Happy Mother's Day to all of you wonderful Momma's out there. I hope you all having a great, relaxing day. I just woke up from a long nap and decided to make strawberry bread. My mom gave me the recipe. I put them in muffin pans instead of a loaf pan because it's much easier to walk by and grab one when no one is looking. :) It does make a lot so if it's just for us then I cut the recipe in half.

You can use fresh strawberries---mash and add sugar to taste

3 cups flour
2 cups sugar
1 teaspoon soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 packages 10 oz. frozen strawberries ( reserve 1/2 cup)
1 cup oil
4 eggs beaten

Mix dry ingredients--then make hole in middle and add liquid ingredients.
Pour into 7 1/2" X 4" greased pans. Bake 45 minutes 325 degrees.


Filling

8 oz. cream cheese
1/2 cup reserved strawberries
2 Tablespoons powdered sugar

Blend together


*The muffin pans take about 25min. Watch for them to turn a golden color and check with a toothpick.

Wordless Wednesday

I'll be back. I've been in the yard planting these.



and these.

We're hoping a few of them survive the wrath of the Wild Thing.
I've already replaced a few. I guess that comes with the territory. :)

Really, Really Random, I Mean Really.

I have nothing awe inspiring or even interesting coming to me. I guess you could say I'm experiencing blog block right now so I'll leave you with 10 really random things just to let you know I haven't fallen off the earth.

1. I'm passing mini M&M's down to the smallest Mini so I can have some peace at the computer. Lovely, I know.
2. I took this picture to my wonderful stylist who gave me this very cut. Did I bother looking at how short it was before I committed to this. NOPE!
Now I feel like a big, tall, naked giraffe!
I purchased some vitamins to help expedite my hair growth.

3. Modern Family is my new favorite show. It's hilarious! Tune in on Wednesday nights if you're in need of a good laugh.
4. I worked this weekend. The word BLAH comes to mind, but I'm trying to have an attitude of gratitude for having a job.
5. The Commander and I both have tomorrow off work so that already makes Monday my friend...for this week anyway.
6. I want to go mow the yard. I'll do that as soon as I hit "publish post"
7. You've had great things to say in your blog so why not put them to print? I wish we would have invented this marvelous idea, but www.blog2print.com beat us to it. :) How awful would it be to lose our blogs?
Thank you Katie for showing how cool these books are.
8. Must.go.grocery.shopping! It's bad, folks. We're talking no bread, milk or anything. I was missing one ingredient for everything I tried to fix yesterday. Finally, I found some chopped onions in the freezer which allowed for a chicken casserole and luckily, there was enough stuff for Dodo to fix breakfast this morning, but now it's slim pickins'.
9. The Preschooler planted strawberries a few weeks ago. He picked and ate his first one yesterday.
10. I'm in a food slump. I stare blankly at cook books and then resort to the same ole, same ole that we've all grown tired of eating. Any suggestions?