Lollipop Bouquet.

Sarah saw a DIY tutorial on how to make a lollipop bouquet and knew that's what she wanted to make Peter for his birthday.

She gave me a list of supplies and off I went to the store.  It was actually a very short list (my kind of DIY project).  It required no special tools, it was easy for her to put together, and there was no mess to clean up. 

And look at the adorable lillipop bouquet she made for Peter:

He was thrilled when she presented it to him at breakfast yesterday!

All it took was 2 bags of Blo-Pops, 2 bags of Tootsie Pops and 1 bag of Dum-Dums.  I purchased a foam floral ball and we already had the flower pot. Voila!  Lollipop bouquet! 

And a helpful tip:  the more lollipops - the better!  Don't skimp because you want a nice full bouquet!

Twelve is...

Twelve is....

intelligent

grouchy

humorous

serious

loyal

sensitive

knowledgable

inqisitive

hot-tempered

loving

tenderhearted

Twelve loves to...

play video games

read books about history

pick on his sister

play basketball, swim, and run track

watch You Tube videos

Google anything he wants to learn about

eat Sunday lunch at Grandma's and Grandpa's house

give shoulder hugs to his family

go outside and play with his Airsoft guns

eat BBQ, wings, and pizza

go camping

Twelve has my heart.

Happy Birthday, Peter!

It's always good to get the first one out of the way!

I knew they were nervous.  Sarah, because she told me many times she was nervous.  Peter, because he was silent.  And I have to admit, I was nervous too.

Yesterday they played their very first games as members of their school basketball team.  They decided at the end of last season that they were ready to move up from the local rec/learning league to their school team.

I had been to one of their school's JV basketball games and I knew it was going to be a lot different than they were used to.  It was going to be a much faster paced, more aggressive game than they were used to.

We loaded up the car immediately after the school bell rang.  I drove Peter, Sarah, and two of Peter's teammates to the game - which happened to be almost an hour away.  But the weather was beautiful, the drive was peaceful, and all four kids worked diligently on their homework.  And I have to admit that I enjoyed eavesdropping on the boys as they talked about homework, school, teachers, etc. 

We arrived at Sacred Heart right on time.  It was a beautiful school - clean, bright, large. The gym was nice too.  It was very well lit and I was kicking myself for not bringing my camera.  I might have been able to get some nice shots.  The lighting in most gymnasiums makes it hard to get a decent shot.  (Well, that and the fact that I still don't know how to properly use my camera!)

The girls started their warm ups and the boys team all sat together and formed a little cheering section.

The game began and Sarah did not start.  I think she and I were both a little relieved about that.  The girls have a big team and the coach did a great job and giving everyone a chance to play. 

I could tell Sarah was a little unsure of herself because any time she got the ball, she immediately looked to see who she could pass it off too.  But she did take two shots.  One missed and the other went in!  She also grabbed a couple of rebounds and did a pretty good job throwing the ball in as point guard. 

The girls ended up losing but it was a really good game.  And then the boys were up.  Peter's team is really small compared to Sarah's and since he is one of the taller kids on the team, he got to start. 

The boys game was much faster paced than the girls.  And those boys were aggressive (but not in a bad way).  And Peter was, well, Peter.  He knew what was going on, but I could tell he was unsure of what to do with the ball. Or afraid he was going to mess up.  He passed it off a lot but he did make 6 nice rebounds and the boys won!

The next game is on Saturday but the kids will miss it because we are going to Washington, DC for Peter's birthday.  It's always good to get that first game under your belt. I think we will all breathe a little easier now.

PT Oh No!

So I believe I mentioned in a previous post that I'm serving on the PTO board as Stewardship Coordinator.  It has been a lot of fun so far and not that hard.  (My kind of job!)  However, several weeks ago, our current PTO President told us that her husband had just accepted a job with the University of Texas and they were moving back to Austin.
When I got that email, I immediately pulled out our PTO bylaws to see who was next in line.  We didn't have a vice president so I was curious as to who would fill her role.  The bylaws state that if a vacancy occurs in the office of president, a current PTO Executive Board officer will be selected by the Executive Board.  So that meant that 5 of us could potentially be the new president.

Whew!  That was four other people better qualified than myself to tackle this position.  I breathed a small sigh of relief.

And then I got another email from another board member that stated due to her work schedule, she was going to have to resign.  And then I heard from another member that she might be moving in March because of her husband's job.

And then at the meeting last night, one of the other members stated that she would love to be PTO President in two years when her youngest was in Kindergarten and her husband was hopefully done working 80 hour weeks.  But she would not be able to handle the role of president now.

So that left me and one other woman.  And I think the other woman would be PERFECT for this job.  BUT, she's the current treasurer.  And you can't be treasurer AND president...um conflict of interest anyone??  And we felt like we would have a hard time finding someone to be treasurer so it made sense to leave her there.

And guess who that left?  Yes.  That's right.  Me.

And y'all.  I'm going to be honest and say that I am scared to death about the prospect.  My two biggest fears in life are public speaking and heights.  Please don't ever put me up on a bridge to give a speech because I might just faint dead away.

I told them that I would do it, but that I did not want to run the general board meetings - because all those people are public and I would have to be speaking in front of them and I'm already breaking out into a cold sweat thinking about it.  (When I had to introduce myself at the last general meeting and explain my role, I got flustered and felt like I sounded like a blooming idiot.)

The treasurer and other members said that they would be glad to run the board meetings and with that caveat, I agreed.

On the way home from the meeting, I was in a daze, wondering what I had just done.  The current PTO President is really good.  She's got a lot of great ideas and a strong vision for the PTO and she's just got so much energy and....big shoes to fill.  Big. Shoes.

Luckily for me though, she has the year pretty much planned out so at this point, it's basically execution of the plans. I hope and pray I can do a good job. 

And I think this is going to be me for the rest of the year:

Visual Vocabulary Day

Typically on the same day that the Kindergarteners dress up for All Saints Day at school, the middle school holds it's annual Visual Vocabulary Day.

The day I saw it posted on the school website, I figured Peter and I would spend hours scratching our heads trying to figure out what word to do and how to represent it.  But, that very afternoon, when I he hopped into the car, he exclaimed, "Visual Vocabulary Day is coming up and I've already picked my word and we need to go to the Halloween store so I can get my costume."

Well, all righty then!  So much for scratching our heads for hours.  And, yay!  I didn't have to scratch my head at all.  That's my kind of project!

Parents get to attend Visual Vocabulary so of course I went with camera in hand.

When I arrived at the gym, they had rows of chairs lined up and all of the 7th and 8th graders were seated, dressed as their words.

The 6th graders (Peter's class) was huddled around the entrance, dressed as their words.  They were waiting anxiously for the elementary kids to arrive.  As each grade arrived (they all had their appointed time slots) the 6th graders divided them up into smaller groups and took them around.

Each elementary student had a card with a grid printed on it with 9 squares.  The 6th graders took them to 9 different "words" and at each word, they learned what the word meant, what part of speech it was, etc.  And the 7th or 8th grader gave them a sticker to place on their grid after they learned about their word. 

Pretty neat, huh?  I thought so too!

Here are a few pictures of some of the words:

Peter as Incognito.

Rotund

Ablutophobia (being photo bombed by Incognito

Abecedarian

Nuclear

Ersatz

Buffoon

Notorious

Pavonine

Troglodyte

Sarah!

Incognito taking around some younger kids!

I had lots of fun looking at all the different words and I know Peter had a lot of fun as well! 

Halloween!

I just had to share some pictures from Halloween!

Look at my little darlings....errrr...creatures?

We did a pretty good job with Sarah's make-up, don't you think?

And Peter always chooses his costume based on teh mask that come with it and every year, ends up ditching the mask because he can't see out of it or breath out of it and it's too hot.  So, next year, I'm going to convince him that we need to do make up instead of wasting money on a mask that he ultimately will not wear even though he promises he will wear it.

After he took his mask off, he laughed at himself in the mirror and said, "It's pretty freaky without the mask!"  Freaky, silly.  Whatever.  As long as he's happy.

After the pictures, we headed out to meet our friends to get down to business.  And here's our annual group shot.

And do you see the cool costume in the back?  It's a jellyfish and they made it off Pinterest.  And I would say they nailed it! (And I hope you can see the cool glow from the LED lights!)

And our last stop of the night is at my parent's house.  My mom always makes the best treat bags for our group (and smaller treat bags for others who happen to stop by).

7QT: Selfies and candy and diets. Oh my!

It's Friday!  That must mean I'm going to pound out some Quick Takes.

Here we go.

1.  Sarah had a Girl Scout Halloween party on Monday evening.  She came home with a goody bag filled with candy.  She looked at me and said, "Ha!  Since you're on your diet and can't eat any candy I don't have to hide my Halloween candy from you this year!"  And she was grinning from ear to ear.

What she doesn't realize is that even though she used to hide it, I would always find it!  Ha to you Miss Smarty Pants!

2.  And speaking of my diet, it's been 10 weeks since I started Atkins and I've officially lost 10  pounds.  I'm averaging a pound a week.  That's slower than I would like but slow and steady wins the race.  Also, at a pound a week, I'm likely to keep it off. So, here's to not eating any candy this Halloween.  No worries though.  When I'm back to my goal weight in the spring, it will have all been worth it!

3.  Today the middle school is holding their annual Visual Vocabulary Day.  Each middle-schooler picks a word and dresses up like the word.  They sit in rows in costume holding a sign with their word and all the elementary kids walk around learning new vocabulary words.  Pretty cool, huh?  I'll have pictures next week of Peter and his word.

4. Sarah loves a good selfie.  I was just looking at my phone and saw these which are just a mere drop in the bucket.

5.  Once in a blue moon, I will find a selfie that Peter took.

Clearly, he has a preferred pose when he chooses to selfie.

6.  We will be going trick-or-treating tonight.  Sarah is 10 and Peter is almost 12 and I imagine they aren't going to want to go too many more years.  So, I'll take a lot of pictures and enjoy every minute of walking through the neighborhood while the kids race around from house to house getting candy.

7.  And this year both my kids are creepy things.  I miss the early days when I could pick out whatever I wanted them to be and dress them up.   Sarah and I worked on her zombie make up the other night and Peter is wearing some creepy masks.  I miss my tiny purple witch and my giraffe!

Happy Halloween!  I hope you get more treats than tricks and don't forget to head over to Jen's and see what everyone else is up to!

Carving the pumpkin. A picture review.

I bought our pumpkin three weeks ago and we finally got around to carving it on Sunday afternoon.  Here are a few pictures of us turning a plain old pumpkin into a jack-o-lantern.

He wanted to make the first cut.

But Daddy still does the work.  No bloody fingers for us, please!

Working on the top.

She wanted to remove the top.

The seeds are always so slimy!

Peter and Sarah are the seed removers!  Mommy is always the seed toaster!

The man in charge.

Sarah had the camera at this point.  I'm pretty sure he is yelling, "Stop it, Sarah!"  Just had to include this shot because this is a face I see frequently!  :)

Daddy always goes for a traditional jack-o-lantern face.

Peter took this picture of Sarah and our neighbor's cat.

Sarah took this picture along with about 50 other random shots - mostly of the neighbor's cat.