School daze

Today, our highly independent sweetheart, Bella, started Pre-K. The excitement in our home this morning was palpable. I woke several times throughout the night, fearing I would miss my alarm. Dropping your kids off in car-pool line in pajamas and glasses is all kinds of cool, just not on the first day of school.  The excitement even played throughout our girls subconsciousness throughout the night. They were restless in their dreams, eager for morning to come.

Everyone was SO EXCITED for Bella to start school!

It is a rare thing when the ebb and flow of a household getting ready in the morning is completely uninterrupted. Today was one of those rare gifts of a morning. Bella, so eager, got ready in the blink of an eye. And Jade, ever the helpful one, made her own lunch before I even had time to gather the peanut butter and jelly. Our sweet Jojo, completely unfazed by the excitement, slept right through everything.

Precious Bella, just when exactly did you grow up enough to be so ready for Pre-k?

In a near miraculous turn of events, we left the house with a few minutes to spare!

Just enough time for Mommy to snap a few more pics than I normally would have, which is good. And thanks to ios7, I now snap about 5 million pictures each time I open my camera app!

Notice my "Junior Mommy" in the background filling the class Sponsor/teacher in on all things Bella in the background?

Our school district has this pretty amazing program for upper-classmen. Students interested in pursuing a teaching degree, or a career path into early childhood education, are given the opportunity to run a pre-k, with the supervision and guidance of an actual Teacher. The high school students are in the class for 2 periods of their day, and then another set of students are in the class for an additional 2 periods. It's a great environment for Bella to learn in and the student to "teacher" ratio is almost 2 to 1. We are so excited for our girl to interact with a few peers just a few hours a day for a couple of days out of the week! And I'm excited to build relationships with her teachers, classmates and the other parents.

And this little guy is excited to have Mommy all to himself for a few hours! He's also pretty excited to not have to share any toys and to not be bossed around by a couple of over-bearing, while always good-natured, sisters! What fun he and I will have getting to spend just a bit of time each week hanging out!

Favorites

I love finding things that make life a little easier and a little simpler.

I remember learning the whole "smashing a clove of garlic" to peel it easier trick. But I think I may have just fallen a little in love with Martha Stewart over this trick!

The kitchen has kind of been my place. I like to wind down from our hectic day and have some "me-time" while cooking. Here lately, I've wanted to start incorporating our kids in the dinner-time process. I think this will be a perfect starting point for that! Thanks, Martha!

What do you let your kids in the kitchen? I'm always looking for ways to make "chores" fun for my kids!

Brinner

After a full day of mothering, laundering (clothes, that is. Not money.), housekeeping, refereeing, tutoring and chauffeuring, there is just something so blissful about brinner.

That moment, at 5:00pm... 30 L O N G minutes before the cavalry is set to arrive, when you feel like you could just close your eyes now and sleep 'till next summer. There is the hope that brinner brings.

Brinner, a perfect excuse to brew yourself a cup of joe and to soak in every bit of that delicious bacon smell that will surely permeate through every crevice in your home. (Seriously. Why is it that bacon can smell so dadgum good during cooking? Then, four hours later you wish that bacon had never been invented because then your house would definitely STILL not smell like it.)

Brinner, the perfect camouflage to your mommy-tired hands clinging to that cup of coffee like its your life-source.

Last night, 5:00 o'clock hit. I was willing my eyes open with every ounce of strength I had left in me. Brinner beckoned me with it's promises of warm coffee, bacon and an easy clean-up. I didn't even try to play hard to get. I ran straight into it's warm and welcoming embrace.

I let the smell and sounds of the sizzling bacon take me away. Who needs Calgon when there's bacon?

And then, there's Brinner.. in all of it's glory! Filling, satisfying and so easy to make: Brinner.

What's that you say? Taking pictures of your food and posting them on every social network known to mankind is so 5 years ago? Please be sure to refer to point 7. 

Stop and smell those roses while you're at it, too. Journeying through that perfect meal can be a beautiful thing, but soak in all your surroundings. Be grateful for all those little things that got you so dang tired through the day. Sure, you'll sleep good because of them tonight.

(Bella performing one of her newest tricks: crossing her eyes.)

But, if you don't stop and smell those roses, you'll miss all the hilarity that can ensue during mealtime with those little creatures. Who knew that I'd get a free ticket to the best dinner entertainment in town each and every night? Never a dull moment around our dinner table!

Funny little thing

Laughter is a big part of our family. My awesome husband has probably one of the best senses of humor. He laughs easily, quickly and heartily.

Our eldest has inherited this same sense of humor. While furniture shopping one afternoon, she saw a guy snuggled up on a bed. Upon pointing the snuggled up man out to her father, they shared a chuckle over the not-so-randomness of the scene.

She has also turned into quite the little prankster. I only wish I had such a great imagination as hers!

Yesterday afternoon, we were rushing to get out the door. In the corner of my eye, I saw her messing with my bed. Next came the sounds of rushing feet across our upstairs, followed by a fit of giggles between her and the little sister.

Choosing my battles wisely, I put the incident out of my mind. The house was in one piece, the kids were happy, and I was rushing to get out the door. A minor incident involving my bed and a mischievous first grader were not on the forefront of my mind.

We finally made it out the door and into the sweltering Texas heat to "watch" my nephew's 2nd football game of the season. (I pretend to watch, but really I'm a bit more pre-occupied with 3 little blonde people.)

Then, we enjoyed some yummy Chinese food with Grandma at this great little Chinese restaurant. We came home and let the kids enjoy the slightly cooler-than-before weather outside on their bikes. Before I knew it, it was the kid's bath-time... followed by our nightly story time... followed by bed-time.


My work for the day wasn't quite over though. I tended to some chores before catching up on some of my reading and shows with the handsome Mr.  And the very minor incident from earlier in the day was completely forgotten about.

Until 10:30 p.m. The entire house, yes even the Mr., had been asleep for several hours. Exhausted from a day of parenting and fun, I couldn't wait to crawl into bed.

I pulled off the decorative pillows on my side of the bed, and was greeted by this:

Dearest Reader, let me not even try to explain to you the restraint it took for me not to scream bloody murder and wake an entire house full of sleeping little (and 1 not-so-little) sleeping people! But I will tell you, that I will gladly mark the adrenaline rush I had at 10:30 pm last night as 2 days worth of work-outs!

Now, someone PLEASE give me some tips on how I can get this little rascal back!

What's a fun, harmless prank you've pulled on some young'uns?

Mu-sack!

We're a musical family. Some of us are more talented than others at being musical. (Insert praise for my husband's giftedness here.) But we're musical in the sense that we LOVE LOVE LOVE music in our home! And in the car. And in the grocery store. And walking down the street. And just about everywhere.

We've already discussed how a good song makes me react, over here. I would be lying if I didn't tell you that my children have the same reactions, too. Sweet Bella girl was really getting her groove on in a clothing store the other day. And Jade's little melodies always seem to be filling the quiet spaces of our home. Even our munchkin Jo-Jo can be heard spouting off a word or two to his favorite tunes!

And we love all kinds of music 'round these here parts. There's a little jazz, some folk, (lots of) pop, a little rock 'n roll, and a good amount of worship. But my absolute favorite music to listen to are songs chalked full of Scriptures. You put simple truths to a good tune.. and it STICKS! (Just the other day I put my daughter's teachers name into a cartoon jingle that we are both familiar with. And, voila! She had her teacher's name down packed!) I want to be intentional in what's filling our little one's ears. I want them to store up the Word in their hearts. And well, when you put great, BIG truths to a good tune.. it STICKS!

We've had this CD for about a year now. And we have not tired of it yet! The tunes are catchy, and are packed with the Truth that I want my kids to know. (And hey, it even serves as a good reminder for me too! There have been a few times I've found myself cleaning or folding laundry whilst these peppy little songs pass the time!) I love playing this on the way to drop our oldest little Brantner off to school. It gets all of us so excited and ready for the day!

I love playing it when we are acting a fool in our living room with a "pick-me-up" afternoon dance party!

I love playing it .. well just a lot.. I just love paying it!

I highly recommend it! You can check it out here: Mighty Spirit Kids, iTunes, or Amazon