Charlottesville

This year for Presidents Day we took the kids on a field trip to Monticello, in Virginia, because we always do something historically educational for national holidays.  I realized as we were driving up the mountain to Jefferson's home that I had never been before, despite living in VA for 2/3 of my life and despite a childhood surrounded by so much Virginia history.  So, this was a field trip for me, too.  We loved it!  No photography allowed inside the house, which was a shame since A) I don't use flash, and B) the decor was not at all what I was expecting given my experience with Colonial Williamsburg decor, and C) Geof wants to copy TJ's dining room.  So many interesting things to see that revealed Jefferson's passions for learning, culture, exploration, gadgetry, etc.  Not to mention the controversial-to-a-modern-6-year-old hot pink bed spread on Jefferson's bed.

So, since I could not photograph the house during the tour, you will just have to scroll through pictures of my kids.  Like you are so surprised. :)  I'll make it informative by sprinkling in some Thomas Jefferson quotations.

It is strangely absurd to suppose that a million of human beings, collected together, are not under the same moral laws which bind each of them separately.

But friendship is precious, not only in the shade, but in the sunshine of life, and thanks to a benevolent arrangement the greater part of life is sunshine.

Walking is the best possible exercise. Habituate yourself to walk very far.

Determine never to be idle...It is wonderful how much may be done if we are always doing.

Do not bite at the bait of pleasure, till you know there is no hook beneath it.

In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock.

Peace and friendship with all mankind is our wisest policy, and I wish we may be permitted to pursue it.

I do not take a single newspaper, nor read one a month, and I feel myself infinitely the happier for it.

He who knows best knows how little he knows.

Never fear the want of business. A man who qualifies himself well for his calling, never fails of employment.

Leave all the afternoon for exercise and recreation, which are as necessary as reading. I will rather say more necessary because health is worth more than learning.

My theory has always been, that if we are to dream, the flatteries of hope are as cheap, and pleasanter, than the gloom of despair.

Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today.

When angry count to ten before you speak. If very angry, count to one hundred.

Power is not alluring to pure minds.

Taste cannot be controlled by law.

Never trouble another for what you can do for yourself.

The moment a person forms a theory, his imagination sees in every object only the traits which favor that theory.

When you reach the end of your rope, tie a knot in it and hang on.

Whenever you do a thing, act as if all the world were watching.

Delay is preferable to error. 

Do you want to know who you are? Don't ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you.

Always take hold of things by the smooth handle.

A Story With No Title

I was sifting through the kids' school papers and came across a fun little story that Hi-Hat wrote.  I decided it really should be in print.

Meet Bob.  Bob is a penguin.  He had some big spikey hair, a big mustache, and a beard.  He lived in a big Igloo in Penguinhood.  One day he decided to start a band!

He put an ad in the newspaper for people to join his band,  but no one replied! He could not find anybody to join his band! He was very frustrated.

He decided to go on a waddle around the city.  Suddenly he stopped!  There was a sign on the music igloo!  It said that the clerk's friends wanted to be in a band!

"Ahh," Bob said.  "Just what I have been looking for!" He went inside and all of the clerks friends were at the desk!


"Hello," Bob said.  "I need you to join my band!"

"Sure," they said.  "What should we call the band?" they asked.

"Bob's Band," Bob said.

They bought themselves a studio and practiced and practiced.  Then finally their first album came out!  Everyone liked it so much.  They bought all their albums, and Bob's band became rich and very famous!

THE END

New Year's Resolution Kept!

A little while back a certain someone asked what our resolutions were this year, and we had a little exchange about cupcakes.  This was a result of me making these spaghetti and meatballs cupcakes for Hi-Hat's 8th birthday this year:

Well, I am happy to report that I followed through with my resolution to deliver quirky cupcakes to a friend on February 15.

First, I made a batch of birthday pie cupcakes - cherry and blueberry.

Here they are all boxed up and ready for delivery.

And I also made a batch of these adorable egg cakes.  

 May have cracked a few.

Carton of birthday eggs - these eggs are worth taking home from the grocery store, cracks and all!

Hope you had a sweet birthday, KR!

*Want to make your own quirky cupcakes?  Check out Hello Cupcake and the follow-up book, What's New Cupcake.  Their designs really are pretty easy - they just happen to be very creative!  You didn't think I came up with this stuff on my own, did ya?

It's a Belated Birthday, Charlie Brown!

In 2010, we promised each of our kids that they could have a big birthday party - we're kind of doing an every-other-year kind of thing.  With Hi-Hat's birthday falling at the end of the year, that meant his party would be pushed int0 2011.  We went back and forth with ideas - lazer tag at Frankie's, movie and sleepover, and my personal favorite - the carnival midway experience in our basement.  I was so excited about this idea. I was envisioning popcorn and cotton candy machines, carnival games, gigantic inflatable animal prizes strung up by the ceiling, Midway mania on the Wii, a funnel cake birthday cake, hot dogs, face painting. . . yeah - I had put a little thought into that.  When Hi-Hat got wind of this idea, he kind of rolled his eyes and said that was a baby party.  Not cool, Mom.  I guess we've reached that point with an 8-year-old.  So, the whole party idea in general got put on the back burner through Christmas and New Year's, and Geof and I kind of wondered if maybe he wouldn't remember that he had not had a birthday party.  Maybe we could get away with an "oh, did we not do that this year?" and then plan another big party for next year.  Not so much.  He remembered a few weeks ago.  So when Fancy came home with an invitation to a sleepover at a friend's house, we thought that night would be a good night to have a house full of 8-year-old boys (in retrospect, I'm not sure that is ever a good idea.  Kidding! Kidding!).  It was a very last minute affair, with home-made invitations going out on email on Monday for a party on Friday, so I was thinking that if just 2 or 3 could come, that would be perfect.  As it turned out, every boy we invited was able to attend.  Hi-Hat was thrilled and could not wait for Friday night!

So I'm thinking 6 boys, 4 hours . . . I needed some structure.  Hi-Hat's plan for the evening was for everyone to bring their Nerf guns and just have a Nerf gun/Wii/Charlie Brown viewing event.  He wasn't too interested in games or prizes or structured activity.  Again, he's 8.  He just wanted to hang out with the guys and be wild.  Now, I KNOW from experience just how wild things can get here at my house when groups of children get together.  Ahem, date night.  I'm just sayin'... :) So I needed a little structure for my own sanity.  I planned the event as follows: play time outside, scavenger hunt for goodie bags, pizza dinner, opening gifts (because NObody does this at parties with their guests anymore and my kids always complain.  I complain too!  It's fun!), cupcakes and ice cream sundaes (butched up by letting the boys add marshmallows to their sundaes using the marshmallow shooters from across the kitchen), balloon popping game, Nerf dart game, Peanuts cartoon viewing, and Nerf battle.  Sounds like plenty!  Um - that lasted about 2.5 hours.  But no worries! Turns out that a bunch of boys with Nerf guns and two flights of stairs can happily entertain themselves for hours!  Hi-Hat was loving every minute of it, and I'll admit that although it was loud and fast and busy, it was fun to see my usually quiet and mellow boy being rambunctious and, well, boyish.  I'm sure most moms of boys live with this every day. :)

On to the pictures.

 Table decorations - had to do it myself since nobody carries Charlie Brown-themed party supplies around here.

The pinata had to stay upside down to dry completely, and then I had to carve a hole in the bottom to stuff it with all the goodies.  Then I covered the hole with a paper plate and disguised that with a yellow paper shirt collar.

Our Peanuts cupcakes - with a Linus cupcake for Hi-Hat and an extra football cake since Lucy always dupes Chuck into trying to kick off the ball.  The pinata was a bit of a project, but well worth it in the end.  Thanks for the idea SB!

 Pizza dinner - lots of joke telling for most of the meal.  The sundaes served as targets for hungry boys with marshmallow shooters. :)

Boys can eat a lot of pizza!

Cake time!

 Balloon popping game - there were 80 inflated balloons in the basement, each with a slip of paper inside.  I had written point values on the slips of paper, and it was a a relay race to see which team could pop the most balloons and collect the most points.  This was loud and crazy and really fun!  Poor Hi-Hat (the drummer, mind you, who should be ok with loud noise) wore earplugs and cringed every time he had to pop a balloon.

 Can you see the different in approach between Hi-Hat and his friend?  Too funny.

More balloon popping and Nerf gun target practice

Team target practice and medals for the winners

 It only took three hits to crack open Chuck's head.  The picture on the left was after the second whack, and the third sent goodies flying!

Nerf darts, army guys and gum.  What more could a guy ask for?

Poor Chuck.

Then we had some down time with the boys watching a few Peanuts cartoons that Hi-Hat had picked out.

 And then the Nerf battle started.  Boys were running up and down and up and down and up and down. It was literally all a blur.

There IS a kid in the photo on the left.  He was just fast!

And Hi-Hat rounded out the evening with an impromptu drum concert - to calm things down as parents arrived.  He was pleased to drum for his friends, and I think the boys were pretty interested in Hi-Hat being able to perform a few songs.

And with that, the party ended.  Hi-Hat was beaming and thrilled and said it was exactly what he wanted.  This party was exactly why I love me some home birthday parties!

Calling All Creative People!

This photo from our trip down the sidewalk for a quick mini photo session with friends needs a great caption.  It's begging, pleading, screaming for a fantastically witty or comical caption.  But I'm blanking.  So, HELP! Caption this photo for me!  Aaaaaaannnnnnnddddd.......

GO!

Training

Today began as one of those days where I was really down on my littlest girl.  And it didn't help that I was late getting the big kids up for school, that I brewed a cup of coffee straight onto the counter because I forgot to put a mug under the coffee maker, that I burned my bagel and had to throw it out, and that my eyes were stinging from getting soap in them in the shower.  Clearly, I was off to a promising start.  So I got the bigs off to school and proceeded to get myself and Rella for our LAMBS Bible study this morning. It crossed my  mind more than once that at the rate I was going, I just might not make it.  But, having missed the last 4 sessions for various family and health reasons, I really wanted to go.  Sometimes God meets us right where we are, where we need to be met.  Strike that - He meets us there ALL the time if we are willing to seek Him.  Today, He first met me in my closet (where I tend to stress out over getting all put together for LAMBS) and pretty much said, "Girl, if you just pull it together and get yourself ready, you can wear your new boots to LAMBS."  Seriously, it was just enough to get me past all the distractions and mishaps that Satan was throwing into my path this morning to keep me alone at home.  Should I ever be surprised at bumps in the road on Bible Study mornings?  It's the last place Satan wants me to me and he works hard to keep me from it.  But today, God showed me my boots to get me where He wanted me. 

So, I'm dressed and ready, and Rella was dressed and ready (after having already had 2 pull-up changes due to her potty-training and constipation issues), but she was not happy with what I had dressed her in.  She said it was not cozy enough.  She was in a pouty pouty mood, despite me showing her all the fun little things she could keep in the pockets of her polka-dotted dress.  And so, just as we were ready to go, Rella announces that she is in need of new clothes.  She had wet herself with the explanation that she wanted to wear something else.  OH NO SHE DIDN'T!  Well, I say that, but at that point my choices were to change her quickly and keep moving out the door, or punish her and miss LAMBS altogether.  As I said, I didn't want to miss, so I changed her and moved on.  By the time I got to my study room, I was feeling really down about Rella's potty situation.  While today's dealings with her weren't really out of the ordinary as of late, it was all starting to overwhelm me today.  Again, thank you Satan.  During prayer time I felt like it was a "let's-listen-to-Laura-complain-fest" about Rella's situation and how I had reached the end of my rope.  We prayed over the situation, but I went to big group still feeling incredibly frustrated and embarassed and overwhelmed with her.  Potty training is something us moms all do, and the fact that I can't get it done is making me crazy! I feel like I've failed in some way and that I'm incapable of something so basic.  I hate that she has this control over me.  And that's just it, it's a control thing.  This is not my battle, it's hers.  I want her to be trained, but she knows I can't really do anything about it, and so she can control me with it.  She wins.

I settled in for the big group lecture, and I'll admit that I was not encouraged at first.  We studied Revelation Chapter 9 this week, and the opening of the 5th and 6th seals.  God's judgement on those without the seal of the Holy Spirit is not a pretty picture.  It makes me ache for the fallen world.  But it turns out that God didn't use those boots to have me just think about those judgements.  For the last 5 minutes of the lecture, he used Beth Evans to speak directly to me, right where I was this morning, wearing my boots.

I came home from LAMBS, and Rella came into the kitchen wearing her chef's attire and said we should make "ants on a log."  I thought we should spend a little time together.  So I got out my camera and did what I like doing and haven't done enough of recently.  I watched her and chatted with her and took pictures.

And I reflected.

Beth gave a challenge.  With each conversation that I have throughout the day, I should ask myself, "whose interest am I really concerned about serving in this?"

When I have my complaining-fests about potty training, whose interest is in my heart?  Am I interested in defending myself? (yes) Am I interested in straightening out myself? (yes)  Am I building up myself? (yes)

Am I glorifying Christ? No.

Why do I have the attitude that this needs to be something that only I can fix? 

Do I have so little trust in God that He can't take care of it?  That He doesn't have a purpose in this struggle for me? If God has the power to open the 7 seals and pour judgement over all the earth, if God spoke the world into being, and if He is the author of the beginning and the end, then surely He can take care of this.  He may choose not to right now, but my role is not to take over control, but to rest in Him, seek comfort from Him, and glorify Him.

The life Christ intends for me is not about the works of my hands.  I believe Beth said that when we try to do things on our own, things usually won't work out.  That usually "just brings more depression and despair."  I am so there.  Depressed that I can't fix this and despairing that there is no end in sight.

Nothing I do on my own is worth anything.  In Him only do I receive everything worth anything.  Yes, I have talents and skills that God has given me.  Yes, I have responsibility to help this child grow and learn and develop.  But it's not about me.  It's about my heart.  When my heart is in the right place - when my focus is on God and I am absorbed with Him and not with myself, then I can be the person that God wants me to be and I can truly worship Him.  I was created to worship - to worship God, not Pull-ups or potty training or pediatricians' advice or a controlling toddler. 

And I don't know, but isn't it fitting that I should learn all this in the midst of disasterous potty training? I mean, if I'm frustrated with her refusing to go potty, her constant soiled pants, her exerting her own will to my continued frustration, isn't this a picture of how the Lord may feel with each and every one of us? I know what I've been instructed to do. I know what God expects of me. I know what pleasant and fragrant sacrifices God desires of me.  And yet each and every day I essentially offer up a stinking Pull-Up. Um, that's quite a lesson. 

So I'm going to stick with the training - hers and mine.  I'm going to give my desperation and frustration to the Lord.  I'm going to worship my Creator and glorify Him with the works of my hands.  I'm going to die to myself in my conversations. I'm going to keep these boots on today.  I'm sure there will still be stinking offerings, but I'm going to be trained.

And after God spoke to me through Beth this morning, he extended His hand of grace to me here at home.  As soon as we were done with our ants on a log, Rella went on her own into the bathroom and pooped in the potty.  Then she looked up at me with her big blue eyes and said, "Mom? Can you do your happy dance?"  You bet I did, because I was still wearing my boots.  Hallelujah!