my first born

On my mommy board I go to they had a thread about posting a pic of you and your first born. All of our baby books are still packed up but I had this one in a frame on the wall so I took a pic of it.

This was taken about 11 years ago. Anthony was 10 months old and I was 20, so that puts it at 1997. I can't believe that my baby is already going to be 12 next month! It hit me yesterday that he is only 2 years away from being in high school. High school! 2 years! He's all grown up.

my Canon printer

Just over a month ago Aaron went and bought a new computer and a new printer for me. The printer is a Canon MP970 (pictured above). It is one big ol printer!

It's actually pretty cool because it is an all-in-one so it can copy (both color and b&w), print and scan. Plus it has a pretty neat feature of being able to print pictures from negatives. It is actually meant to be a photo printer but I need it for copying school stuff more than anything.

So anyways, one day it decided to break. It kept showing an error that there was a paper jam and to clear it. There was no paper in the printer at all. But somehow or another I managed to clear it and got it working again. Then a week later it broke again. Same error message.

Now my first thought was to take it back. For one, I love Hewlett Packard products so I wasn't too happy when Aaron brought a Canon home to me. Plus he paid $300 for it. Who pays that much for a printer?! But since it's been more than 30 days, I couldn't take it back and so I sat here pouting that Aaron wasted $300 on a Canon when he should have gotten a Hewlett Packard to begin with.

Wow, this story is way longer than I thought it would be. Anyways, I called Canon today to see if they could help me fix it. They couldn't. So they gave me two options. Take it to a service center to be fixed or they could send me a new printer. What?!?!?! I will take the new printer, thanks. There is a 1 year manufacturers warranty on the printer. That rocks.

That is how Hewlett Packard is too but they never offered to send me a replacement printer! They always want to send you the parts for you to fix it and keep trying that way until they would finally give in and agree to replace.

So all in all, I am pretty happy with how Canon is handling this. The printer is cool (when it works) and so I thought I would share my experience. That's all. I know, boring.

Big Brother 9 *UPDATE*

****Well Adam won! It was a vote of 6 to 1 in favor of him. I guess Ryan didn't play the game as well as he thought he did. Actually he did play it well, but he isn't as nice of a guy as Adam. Plus he needs to dump Jen...she called him a racist and then totally lied to his face. Craziness!****

I seriously love this show! Even though it is ending tomorrow I signed up for the live feed yesterday. It's a 14 day free trial, then $14.99 a month...but I had nothing to lose since the show is about over.

It's down to just Ryan and Adam. I have a mini crush on Ryan. He reminds me of Aaron. Aaron doesn't appreciate the comparison. lol

I hope Adam wins though. I think it's because I think that he is a nice guy. Plus he's funny.

There is something so dang addicting about watching people live on video....such a voyeur. Oh well, there are worse things in life.

bird feeders

Got some new bird feeders up. This patriotic feeder I have had for awhile and found it while I was unpacking.
I got the idea for this from a Mary Englebreit craft book. It's actually supposed to be for a candle holder but I decided to use it as a bird feeder. It's just a terra cotta pot base.

I really should have painted this one red and then added white stripes but oh well. I really don't think the birds are going to care. I have more feeders to paint, but they are a lot smaller than these.

product review

I have been struggling for a few months now with keeping tangles out of the girl's hair. They get tangles like crazy, and not just little ones. We are talking big, matted, takes forever to brush out tangles. And they happen overnight!!!

I have tried all kinds of products. No More Tangles spray, Aussie leave-in conditioner, Bed Head conditioner (which works pretty good actually). But none of them compare to the new Johnson's No More Tangles leave-in conditioner. Seriously, this stuff works!!

It's in a bright green tube for about $3. Johnson's has a matching spray, but I don't know if it's a new formula or the old spray in new packaging. Before using this I would have to use kid's shampoo (which is a 2-in-1) plus another conditioner, then a spray. Now I just use the kid's shampoo and then rub this through their hair and brush through no problem. Plus their hair looks healthier and better than ever.

So there is my product review...would definitely recommend this to anyone who has to fight tangles. Plus it smells good.

sun tea

This is my new drink of choice. Sun tea. It's perfect for spring/summer. The kid's are so into drinking sun tea that I think I need to switch to decaffenated. This is their crack! lol

Every morning Sara helps me make a jug so we can drink it throughout the day. We will seriously drink an entire jug every single day! And on the rare occasion I forget to set it out, Anthony about has a heart attack!

The last 2 days the kid's have been jones-ing because we have been out of sugar and can't have tea...lol So I just thought I would share.

p.s. it's been over 7 months since I have had a soda!! May 13th will make it 8 months! And it's been 3 years 2 months since I quit smoking...yay me! If I can do it, anyone can!

Girl Scouts

Well, it's official...Emma is a Brownie Girl Scout! I had wanted her to sign up a few months ago but the troop that contacted us was just too far of a drive.

Now that we have moved and are getting settled into our new area, I decided to try again. And luckily her troop meets about 5 minutes away from our house. Emma had a blast today. There are 9 girl's in her troop and 2 others are homeschooled.

The meetings are almost over for the year but the girl's will meet up over the summer to hang out. Then they will start back up in the fall. Sara is going to have to wait until then to join a troop. Since she will be in Kindergarten she will be a Daisy Scout. I am really excited!!

Sara's photo shoot

After taking the Earth Day pics Sara decided she wanted to change her clothes. She was really excited to put on her new blue jean dress and wanted her pictures taken again. So here they are! (I couldn't find a white bow so I went with cream colored, even though it looks yellow).

The kiss blowing was totally her idea. She is so freakin cute!

Seriously, the child can take a picture!

The sun is too bright!

Earth Day 2008

Happy Earth Day!

I made the kid's get all dressed up to take pictures outside. Anthony said that it felt like I was getting them ready for church. lol

So here are my monkeys....I love these pics, they turned out so good.

This is my favorite one. I'm going to print it up and frame it.

My first set of pictures of the kid's against the tree I had accidentally moved the little dial that lets more light into the lens, so the pictures came out too bright. But they still look kinda cool.

Emma with those bright blue eyes!! I'm tellin ya, this child has the blue-ist eyes ever!! And red lips, naturally! She will never need lipstick, her lips are perfectly rosy on their own.

Gardening

I am so loving spring right now. We have the prettiest backyard, it is so green. There are trees all along our fence line so it's like a little wall of green. With exception of the fence that we share with our neighbor, no green there.

Here is a picture of one of out big trees. You can only really see the hummingbird feeder, but we also have another bird feeder and a bird house in there.
This is the corner of our backyard that is along the street.
Here is the other corner that backs up to 2 other yards.
Our newest bird feeder. $5 at Walmart-you can't beat that!

My mom gave me this birdhouse. I think it's charming. I have more somewhere still packed away. Maybe when my mom is done unpacking her house she will give me some of her collection (and she has quite a collection...hint hint). lol
This feeder is pretty cool. It attaches to the window and on the other side it has a temperature gage so you can see what the temp is from inside the house.
Still have yet to catch a hummingbird using it, but the level keeps going down, so they are out there somewhere!
Ok...now on to the gardening. I decided that I wanted to grow some veggies. I wanted them to be grown in containers, but I think I might have to find a spot in the backyard for them. We will see how it goes.

Here are the girl's helping to put garden soil in the pots.

Emma checking out the plant. Notice how it's already growing. I knew that the only chance of me growing a vegetable was to get one already started!!

Here is Emma yesterday with all of the plants.

Sara was taking notes on the veggie's progress on her clipboard.
From left to right: strawberries, jalapeno's, roma tomatoes, Bonnie Original tomatoes, green bell pepper and strawberries again.
Here is the bell pepper plant. It's actually a pretty cute plant.

Now the kid's freaked out because they could see a bell pepper coming out. Can you? Okay, if you look in the center of what looks like a dying flower, that is the tiny little pepper starting to come out. It is sooooo small! Totally cute. I think I will get some red and yellow pepper plants too.
These are my tomato plants. I don't think I have a big enough container for them and that is why I might have to actually create a garden in the backyard. Which sounds like a lot more work than I wanted this project to be! lol
My jalapeno plant. It's supposed to be "monster" jalapenos, which isn't what I wanted, but they were out of the regular jalapeno plants.
Some strawberries growing. I'm gonna need more than 4 plants if I am gonna have enough strawberries for Emma and Aaron.
I'm also on the lookout for a berry bush like blackberries. Aaron and the girl's love blackberries, and that is my favorite kind of jelly...or jam...or whatever the Smuckers kind is. lol

The Storm

We had a storm tonight. Tarrant County got it really bad and if you are in the DFW area, you know all about it since they didn't play any shows, just broadcast the weather all night. North Richland Hills was getting hit really bad with rain, winds over 60 mph and baseball sized hail. We live a block away from the border of North Richland Hills so it was scary.

So I decided to go to Walmart and go shopping. Hey, the sky was getting dark but it wasn't even sprinkling yet and I really needed a Magic Eraser. I left Anthony at home and me and the girl's went. We were almost done getting our stuff when someone came over the intercom and said that there has been a severe weather warning issued and all customers should go to the center of the store. Scary huh?

So I immediately called my neighbor Melissa and told her to go get Anthony and make him go to her house. She said no problem....then I thought, what the heck am I doing at Walmart, I'm outta here! I didn't have much stuff so we quickly went through self checkout and went home.

It was still awhile before it started raining, so we were okay. But, it made me think of the day after Anthony was born. He was born at the Lewisville hospital and the maternity ward (back then) was on the 2nd (top) floor. The nurse came in and said that a tornado was headed our way and that all of the babies had to go back to the nursery and that the mom's were being put into the hallways for safety. I thought "there is a tornado coming and there is no way in hell I am leaving my baby". I was the only mom that went to the nursery with her baby. No tornado came but it was definitely a defining moment for me as a mom.

So anyway, we cleared out Anthony's closet and put blankets and pillows and Sara's mattress up. We even connected Caleb's leash to the clothes bar to make sure if something happened he would stay with us. We never had to get in there (all it did was rain here and not even that hard), but the girl's enjoyed the thrill of it all.

Here is Emma with her scared face.

Oh yeah....and the ever so important shopping trip loot! The reason we just had to go to Walmart! Not pictured is the Magic Eraser and some lemonade. We also got some bubble bath, toothbrushes, kid's bar soap, Febreeze (I love the vanilla and lavendar scent) and a bathroom cup holder. Yep, all items worth risking your life for, wouldn't you say? lol

nothing much

Well there isn't too much stuff to update on here this week. I need to take pics of our little veggie plants. Anthony is finally getting carpet in his room on Friday so I can finish unpacking this house!

I have plans for our summer to be pretty busy. The girl's have 2 different Vacation Bible School's they are going to. Anthony will start basketball in June. Plus he wants to volunteer at the library helping kid's to read. The last 3 weeks of July all 3 kid's will be going to day camp. It's from 7:30-5:30 (I'm not sure they can handle such a long day!). I am going to be so bored without them here.

We have planned on taking the kid's to Scarborough Faire this year. I picked May 3rd since I have a Homeschool Book Fair to go to on the 10th, then Anthony's birthday is the 31st...hopefully he can take the time off.

Oh yeah, he is no longer the GM of the Colleyville Papa John's. He got 103 on his MC test (no clue as to what exactly it is, but 103 is damn good) and so they gave him a better store. He's the GM of the Southlake PJ's now. I'm so proud of him....he deserves it, he works harder than anyone else I know.

So that is pretty much it for now....been trying to fix up the house some and get things taken care of (soon will be scraping the old paint off and re-painting the outside). Going to be putting some flowers into the flowerbeds out front....I plan on spending a lot of time outdoors this year (saving for a pool!!!)....so that's it for now.

chore chart

I got the basic idea for this chore chart off my mommy message boards and tweeked it a little to fit for us. And instead of each kid having their own, all 3 kid's are sharing one.
Here is a close-up of the things we expect the kid's to do everyday. The other side of the circle says Done!

Here is the list of extra chores they can perform to earn money. Most are set at 50 cents, but there are a couple that are $1.

Here are the 10 cent clean up's. If the kid's are playing with something and put it away before moving onto the next thing, they can earn 10 cents. Hopefully this will eliminate leaving one mess to create another.

Game coins are $1.00 for 30 minutes. So in order to get computer or Wii time, they have to pay $1...and to earn that $1 they have to do chores. So it's win win (to me anyways)....I get help around the house and the can earn their game time. And I have a digital counter to make sure they get only 30 minutes at a time.

This is the section where they move the chore tabs to once they have completed them. This way I know who did what and how much to pay. There are also smiley faces here. At least they start off that way. If they get out of line, the face turns over into a frown and they get time-out. Three frowns means you don't get game coins that day, even if you have the money to buy them.

I am going to be making the kid's "time cards" to keep track of their earnings daily (since the chores get reset every day). That way on Sunday I know exactly how much we owe them and what they spent on game coins during the week.