A Favorite Author

One of my all-time favorite YA authors is Janette Rallison. Her books are kind of like a teen romantic comedy. I always say, "I would have LOVE this book when I was a teen," but the fact is, I love them as a 30-something year old as well. They are clean, FUNNY, and just plain cute.

Anyhoo--she is hosting a giveaway on her blog everyday for the next few weeks in preparation for the release of her newest book, "My Unfair Godmother." If you'd like a chance to win a cute book, stop by her site and enter. :)

http://janette-rallison.blogspot.com/2011/03/book-day-give-away-ex-boyfriend-twitter.html

Flashback Friday

Jarren was two in this picture. We found this book at the library called "Huggly Gets Dressed" by Tedd Arnold. It's about this monster (Huggly) who lives under a boy's bed. He's curious about all the things on the floor and what to do with them, so he starts to put them on. Pants on his arms, a shirt on his legs, socks on his hands, and underwear on his head. The boy's mom comes in, so Huggly has to hurriedly throw the clothes off to dive under the bed and they somehow end up on the boy in the same way that Huggly was wearing them. My kids thought this book was hilarious, especially the underwear on the head. Here's Jarren, dressing up like Huggly, with a pair of Kristen's princess underwear. S, hince he wasn't potty trained yet, he had none of his own. :)

Flashback Friday

Kristen was about 3 in this picture. She has always loved dancing and to dress up in dance clothes. She would always make up the silliest dances--usually involving a lot of jumps and spins. She loved to wear slips, especially if they were really twirly. My mom made her a couple to play in and she loved to wear my little sister's old tutu on top of them. We got this fun ribbon stick from somewhere and she loved to flip that around in her dances. She is still quite the dancer. :)

Update on Us

I was going to do a Monday Musing post, but got a little busy yesterday and it didn't happen. So...I'll just do an update on us.

Kendall--he is almost halfway done with his last semester of 7th grade! All year, his biggest challenge in school was Pre-Algebra. But this semester?? It's science. He's thinking of becoming a marine biologist or oceanographer when he grows up, but...he HATES science. They're studying chemistry stuff right now, so hopefully he'll enjoy the biology part of it. His teacher is very, very tough. He had all the work done, but turned his folder in one day late and she wouldn't accept it. She only accepts them once a week and if you miss out, too bad. You get a big, fat "F"--half credit. So he's not doing too well in there right now....

Kristen--she decided about 3 weeks ago to become a vegetarian and she has stuck to it so far!! She joked about becoming vegan, but I didn't think it was funny. The difference? Vegan's won't eat ANYTHING that comes from an animal--eggs, milk, etc. She's an animal lover and said that every time we have meat, she thinks about the poor little animal and it makes her sick to eat it. So she won't. It's tricky, trying to cook to everyone's desires. No meat for Kristen, no cheese for Jarren, etc.

Jarren--this cute boy goes through major obsessions. He was totally into Star Wars, then Indiana (Jiniana) Jones, then Mario. Now? The Titanic. We got a bunch of books and documentaries for him and he's very, very obsessed with it. He was watching a documentary last weekend and had to keep running up to his room to build a Lego Titanic.

Jenna--she hasn't been going to bed very well. She sits up reading in her bed for a long time. Not just looking at the pictures, but reading. I guess she's my daughter. :) I could read the night away too. She like preschool, but she often cries about not wanting to go because she wants to go to "real" school.

Jon--he's been keeping very busy with work and 11 year old scouts. He and Kendall have also gone on outings almost every weekend--long hikes, bird watching, etc.

Me--I FINALLY got released from Ward Activities Chair and was put in as Visiting Teaching Coordinator. I think it will be a fun "job."

Toby--he FINALLY got a haircut--5 1/2 months worth of fur. I can't decide if he likes being long and shaggy or not. He definitely follows me around even more than usual, trying to soak up my body heat. He just turned "8" last week. Or 56 in dog years. :)

Flashback Friday

I've decided that I'm going to try and blog more. So....I'll start with a picture from the past and do a flashback Friday.
This is a picture of Kendall from when he was 4. He was fascinated with firemen and policemen. My neighbor bought him this cute fireman outfit for Halloween at Costco and he got a lot of use out of it. He would wear the coat with his Winnie the Pooh moon boots and his fire hat. He always had to have his flashlight handy and would wear Jon's old ski goggles and use a medicine measuring cup (or a bottle lid) for his air mask mouthpiece.

This picture reminds me of the time that he dressed up in this getup and refused to take it off when we went to the grocery store. So...this is how he went. He got a lot of looks--some looked at him like he was weird and most would comment about how their kids would do something similar. He would do some really heavy breathing in and out of that medicine cup and I would worry that he'd hyperventilate, but he never did. What a kid!!

Kitchen Floor

I think the floors look sooooooo good now!! It's hard to get a good picture to show how good they look, but after dealing with the pealing (aka ugly) look for so many years, these are a dream!
The kitchen floors have FINALLY been refinished! I was trying really hard not to be grumpy about it (yes, it was hard for me to keep positive about this), but we made it through. We have real hardwood floors and I guess at one point (before we moved in), they had the floors done and didn't allow enough time between staining and sealing (or something like that) and it caused the stain to peel back. Our floors looked really worn and gross. So...we had it done. What I had a hard time with was they were supposed to come last Thursday to sand and stain and then Friday to finish it up and when Jon called to confirm on Wednesday night, he was informed that they couldn't come until Friday. We thought maybe it would only take one day, but then found out that it would still take the two days. At first, we were told the guy could come on Saturday to finish the job, but when he was leaving, he said he'd come first thing on Monday morning. What that meant for me was keeping ALL shoes and ALL water, liquid, snow drippings, etc OFF the floor for a whole entire weekend. Any of that would leave big stains. With 4 kids (and their friends) and a dog, that was not an easy task. He finished up yesterday afternoon and we had to go easy on it--no shoes still--but today we're good to go. I'm also really happy because my stove/oven was delivered yesterday and my microwave was delivered today. We'll be back to normal soon!!!

Flash Back Toys

Jon and I were talking a few weeks ago about toys that we had when we were kids. When asked, I always answer that my favorite childhood toys were Cabbage Patch Kids and Barbie dolls. But...I remember a few other toys that I really liked too. Does anyone else remember these?

These are Dolly Pops. My sister and I got some of these for Christmas one year and I remember how much I loved them and how fascinated I was with them. I believe I was about 7.
How about these? These are Glamour Gals, a very mini Barbie-doll type doll. Most had removable clothes, although not all. They had hair you could comb and painted on shoes. I liked these when I was maybe 9 or 10. I had the cowgirl (Jana), a rock star (Roxie), a beauty queen (Erin), and another girl (Vanessa). Gee--I even remember their names!! I think I also had a bride (Jessie), but that actually may have been my sister's. They had a cruise ship that you could buy for these gals and I really wanted that. I wanted a lot of these dolls actually, but I guess I eventually lost interest.
My sister had a "pet" monkey that I was a little envious of. I used to wish for a real pet monkey, so that I could change it's diaper, dress it up, feed it. Basically, a baby. We have no idea what happened to that monkey, but it was pretty cool.