day 24...crafting

love finding crafts online that syd and i can do together...

found this one and it turned out so cute!  it's suppose to be a porcupine pin cushion but we didn't have brown felt so it's a pink creature...must come up with a better name than that...

syd did part of the sewing until she got bored and then proceeded to make very annoying noises - who knows why...

                   old pin cushion                                  new pin cushion

purses...

day 16 - so at book club tonight, my friend pam gave me a purse!  is that awesome or what!  a couple months back i made comment about her purse.  well, when she's "done" with her purse (like she goes and buys another one) she gets rid of her old purse - she doesn't keep it - she gets rid of it...so she got rid of it to me!  that's so awesome...so i have a new purse...

being a mom...

day 15 - so it's my 19th year anniversary and i ended up making my own dinner...what's up with that...anyway, i made chicken fried stead with mashed potatoes.  this is one of the families favorite meals and ryan said "i'm so glad i have a mom that makes good meals".  now, even though i made my own dinner on my anniversary (sorry, i said that twice) - that comment from my son made it all worth it.  from not growing up with a mother at home, it makes me feel so good when i can actually do "mother" things for my kids - like making good dinners that they'll remember when they get older, or making pickles for them because they love them and i don't that much...that's what being a mom is all about and it makes it all worth it. 

chocolate dipped strawberries...

day 14 - syd and i melted chocolate and was only going to do strawberries but ended up with strawberries, pretzles and mini marshmellows...yum!  each boy (five of them) got one, gave two to nancy & pat and saved the rest for us. syd wanted to do the first one - she dipped and then immediately ate it...i guess she had the right idea!  my camera was in the car so no pictures...

my house...

day 13 - now over the past couple of years, i've wanted to get rid of my large house - too far out, too much land, too large in general but during robotics season, i really love it.  right now we are "robotics all the time" - as i write, we have various boys on the floor of the living room and ryan's room. randy is in syd's room because syd is in my room. i got up early to hopefully finish reading Genesis but found my living room invaded. love it (I'm going to kill my cat! is it possible to disengage a cat's meow? )  i had to make my coffee in the dark - grind my coffee beans in the train room (farthest room away from everyone) and guess how much water i was pouring in but it tastes just fine.

microwaves...

day 12 - love microwaves: one of the lovely robotic parents brought over two frozen lasagnas, bag of salad and a load of awesome bread.  the best part was that the lasagna's were microwavable.  now to me cooking in the microwave is yuck - the microwave is for popcorn, heating water for tea, defrosting chicken, you don't cook in it.  but that's me and i am feeding boys remember.  so plop them in, cook 10 minutes, look at it, cook another 7 minutes (i was actually suppose to cook 14 minutes on 50% but for some reason my microwave "tells" me "that option is not available now" - what's the deal with that - i've told people that and they look at me like "you just can't figure it out" which makes my nosterils flair because ... well, that's another post... so getting back to my lasagna...cook another 7 minutes (you know it actually takes about 30 minutes in the microwave to "cook" a frozer lasagna - i know that's know really a lot of time but i thought "it's microwavable - should be done in at the most 10 minutes. then you're suppose to let it sit for 5 minutes (wouldn't it be cold by then) - but it was perfect.  a little crisp around the edges but really good.  now this was a mostly cheese lasagna with a little bit of sausage on top so i think that's the key.  so thank you mr. (or ms.) microwave inventor, you came through tonight!

month of love cont...

day 7 - lemon bars...never been a fan before but today at the Super Bowl my friend Marci made the best lemon bars I've ever had...truely awesome!

day 8 - monday...there must be something to love about monday right?

day 9 - basketball practice...Syd is really enjoying her time in Upwards...she actually was excited for her game last Saturday...we struggle most of the time because we are so much a like - hard headed - by being her mom now i flash back to when i was her age and some of the things i put my dad through...wish he was here so i could tell him how much i appreciate him for putting up with this hard headed girl and loving her just as much as i love syd... I also love Dutch Bros - Starbucks is my steady but tonight Syd wanted a Dutch Bros. for her snack after practice.  so here's to Apple Smoothies :*

day 10 - yangs, new haircuts & crafts...had yang's for lunch today - yum!  then after work, syd and i both got new do's.  her's is a bob and looks totally adorable.  mine is an "A" line cut.  DH even said he liked it - i'm sure he was fibbing but at least he said it (he prefer's my hair long long long but I don't don't don't) - we looked pretty hot!  then when we got home, we needed to make 26 valentine cards.  we cut out butterflies and colored little dots on them then slipped a sucker through the two slots we cut and put a piece of tape to hold it in.  they were pretty cute. DH even got in on he action.  syd did an great job doing all the writing "happy valentines day"

day 11 - schezwan chicken - lunch with shannon at china faith...has to be the best chicken ever...

my entry's aren't going how i'd wanted - i don't want them to be laundry list of my days events...i'll keep working on it...

the month of love...

28 days of love (i know it's the 9th...oh well).  i don't want to post those typical answers like - family, God, chocolate - unless they are particularily special that day so that's why i'm skipping days 1 - 9 (unless I can think of something particually special about that day).  let's give it a try...

day 1: unexpected activities - ok, i'm already cheating a bit on this one because it actually happend on jan. 30th.  on the way home from signing Syd up for softball, we saw a group of geese in a field.  she asked if she could stop and see if she could sneek up on them.  at first i said "no, we'll get mud on our shoes" but then i reconsidered and i turned around.  we parked and started walking out into the field.  we didn't get very far when they all took off at the same time.  the sound was awesome and they were all 'talking' to each other.  Syd thought that was the best thing ever.  so did i.

day 5: air beds - enough said...

day 6: chili - i don't actually love chili but i love that i typically always have the stuff to make chili thus the ability to feed 6 extra kids for dinner...robotics

something amazing...

it's strange, i "check" my blog daily because i have link to another blog and i want to know what's happening with her.  "her" is Stephanie Nielsen from the nie nie dialogues.  she had surgery in january to grow skin graphs for what i'm assuming will be used on other parts of her body due to her extensive burns.  i read them because she's so honest ... well, i'm sure she's not completely honest with what she's feeling because really how could you be?  what she's going is absolutely horrible but she asks for prayers and give me insite to her life...voyerism at it's best.  but, i guess i read because in doing so i get to be a part of something great...something absolutely amazing...if i knew Stephanie (i mean really knew her), i would bet she would not think of herself as amazing and that's amazing in itself.  but to say she's an inspiration is clique` and would really cheapen (i know that's not a word...) the experience.  do you ever want to part of something amazing?