Our 2010 Family Christmas Letter: Mother's Day program

One joy of being a M.O.P. is the annual Mother's Day program. Mason's teacher asked him some questions about me and filled out the questionnaire then they read all of them out loud in a small presentation to the parents. They sang a couple of songs and made us a little keepsake with their hand prints. All in all it was a good day. Plus, Mason didn't totally out me like my friend's four-year-old outed her by saying that she likes to dump water on him.

I Know My Mother Well

by: Mason

1. My mom looks prettiest when "it's happy mother's day".

2. My mom's favorite food is "toast".

3. My mom's eyes are "green".

4. My mom likes to "work at our house".

5. She is happy when "I'm being a good boy".

6. My mom is "29" years old.

7. If my mom could go anywhere she would go "for a walk with me".

8. Her best friend is "Kristi".

9. Her job is "to kiss".

10. I love my mom because "she's wonderful".

Our 2010 Family Christmas Letter: Crafting for Valentines

I came up with a little project to do for Valentine's Day, thinking it would be good if Mason and I did a craft or something together. See, when Claire was first born and I was personally waist-deep in the newborn "eat, poop, cry, sleep" cycle, I was so tired that I wasn't up for much. I'm afraid to admit that a lot of the interaction Mason and I had for a while was playing MarioKart on the Wii during Claire's short, frequent naps.

So by the time that had worn off last winter or so, I started itching for something undigital (is that I word? More importantly, do I care?) to do and stumbled upon this. I decided it would make a great gift for grandmas....probably in 2011 because we actually finished them much later than Valentines Day 2010. Sorry, grandmas.

Gather the following supplies (and a preschooler anxious to paint):

-wooden picture frames in desired size; we did 4"X6" openings. They came in a two pack. Bonus!

-acrylic paint in desired colors (Lilac and Holiday Red for us)

-dirt cheap sponge paintbrushes you can toss when you're done

-lots and lots of conversation hearts

-glue - any kind. I used hot glue.

-resin finishing spray (unless you want to dip all of it in resin. I didn't.)

Cover the world in newspaper. Set the kid loose with the paint.

Separate out the damaged hearts. Snacktime! He ate the reject pile. It saved me from disposing of it.

Draw glue on picture frame, one line at a time, and set hearts as straight and consistently as possible. Keep going until...

Voila! Candy-coated frames. I then took these (and some of the newspaper) outside to the porch and finished them off with the resin spray. It said it would take 24 hours to dry, but outside in the wind it took about an hour. I didn't get anything fancy, like a gloss finish, for the spray so it didn't change the look at all.

I bought some glass (our frames didn't come with it) to put inside and maybe this year I'll get pictures taken of the kids for Valentines Day and pass the whole thing on to the grandmas. Nothing like crafting AND finishing in a timely manner.

Halloween Preview Continued

Introducing the sweetest puppy dog in the world.

Not Dead Yet

And I even remembered the password to get in and post. I've got some catching up to do. First, though, a Halloween preview....

Happy Easter!

The Easter Bunny certainly made the rounds this year. Mason saw him at my work Easter egg hunt (turned Easter party because there was freaking snow on the ground -- in April). But he dropped baskets off and hid eggs at our house on Saturday, stopped in for the work party, then went to both grandparents houses for another egg hiding and more baskets. All in all, I think the holiday was a success. Claire was busy being sickly and slept through most of it, but I think she enjoyed what she was awake for.

We tried to hide eggs in somewhat obvious places. Who wants to find one a few months later?

Mason enjoying his Easter basket spoils. Mom..er, the Easter Bunny, needs to find a more consolidated hiding spot because when I got everything out, I realized that I spoiled the kids way beyond my intentions. Mason's basket included a new outfit (a Tyrannosaurus Rex polo shirt and shorts), a book (The Little Red Caboose), a kid-sized aluminum water bottle (finally found one that I didn't have to take out a loan on. He's obsessed with the one I bought myself a couple of months ago and I'm so sick of cleaning up water puddles!), a sandwich cutter that will cut a sandwich into dinosaur shapes, a toy lawn mower, and a "grabber". I'm sure there will be another post on the grabber toy, because it may or may not disappear on the community cleanup day that's coming to our neighborhood this spring.

Basically the only picture I have of grumpy little Claire. The day before we celebrated Easter, we had a puking incident in the car that allowed mom to become proficient at dismantling our carseat. If you ever need help with this kind of task, just call me. The thing looks brand new. Anyway, she was still spiking a fever of about 101 degrees and not in the best mood on Saturday. She got as much enjoyment as possible out of her basket, including these cute little sunglasses. The EB spoiled her with a swimsuit, sun hat, book, a little beach toy set, and a Melissa and Doug picnic basket.

This is an overhead shot of their Easter baskets. Didn't take up the whole table each like I thought, but still proof that I went overboard.

We colored eggs on Friday night. Mason really loves that activity, but there was something messed up with the pink dye this year. Oh well, I guess we have to have at least one issue with dying each year. Last year he mixed two color tablets together. I wasn't going to give him the chance this year, but we found a way around that.

We also had a really yummy dinner and spent some quality family time together. Hey, we have to do that at least two or three times a year, right?

Happy (late) Birthday, Alan!

(with Mason on our recent snowmobiling trip -- blog about that forthcoming)

I tease Alan about his age because it's fun. He's only 5 months older than me, but it's fun to tease him nonetheless.

We had been trying to ensure that Alan's birthday wasn't overshadowed by Mason's birthday this year, for the first time in four years. Well, so far so good on that front. The bad news? We have the unfortunate honor to attend two police officer funerals. Alan attended one on his actual birthday, and we'll most likely be attending one on Saturday -- the day of Mason's birthday party. The world is going crazy, and unfortunately it's a part of our world where they nuts-ery is occuring.



Alan also received a promotion at work (yay for our hard-workin' daddy, we're so proud of him and all the hard work he put in to earn this!), and his schedule has been a little bit up in the air. It all got "officially" ironed out yesterday, so it meant he logged lots of phone time and basically ignored his birthday.



Well, in the end, we get date night to a yummy dinner and I made one of his favorite meals to celebrate last night. We got him a modest gift and will be putting some money towards an equipment upgrade for him. Hopefully those things will remind him how much the kids and I love and appreciate him for his hard work and his strong goal-reaching example. We very obviously couldn't lead the lives we do without him and his work, harrassment, and his presence. Happy Birthday, Old Man, we love you!

Ten for '10

I'm sure I'm original and no other bloggers are a)doing this or b) titling it this way. Here are my New Year's Resolutions/Goals (organized by time frame because I am a geek).

1. Watch my freaking mouth. I've gotten better about not saying "the biggies" in front of the impressionable little copycat. I'd also like to cut the inappropriate "like" misusages from my vocabulary. I'm smarter than verbal crutches and I wish I sounded as smart as I can be. (Acting smartly will be a resolution for another year.)

2. Actually celebrate Alan's birthday for the first time in four years.

3. Organize my entire filing system for bills. Before tax time.

4. Actually see "New Moon" with my mom like we've been discussing.

5. Participate in a half-marathon. I've already started preparing and am off to at least a mediocre start.

6. Get back to not being the mom who yells. That would be good.

7. Actually decorate my family room and purchase comfortable furniture. Psh. You mean we're going to live here a while?

8. Be totally selfish and do something for myself. When pondering this, I had wild goals of purchasing a Kitchenaid or something. On reflection, it might be more simple like getting my hair cut more often than once a year.

9. Find a reason and send a thank you card to someone every week.

10. Stick with a project until the bitter end. This list counts, right?

Happy New Year!

Cheers to the New Year!

P.S. These cute little name mugs SUCK. The thing was leaking as the picture was taken, never mind as I was filling it.

Mason and I "cheersed" with our second annual Maple Hot Chocolate. He was skeptical of making it in a pan (seriously, I might be getting lazy as a homemaker if he calls Swiss Miss "real hot chocolate"), but was okay with the process once he got to help.

This year has been so nuts. Thanks for reading and catching up with us. We love you all and wish you the best the coming year has to offer. Here's our recap, good bad and otherwise:

• Alan tested for engineer but didn't get it. We're keeping our fingers crossed and wishing him luck in 2010.



• We all but skipped Alan's birthday to celebrate with Mason. I totally almost ruined his birthday cake, but manage to re-balance it in the box without shoving my hand in the middle, thank you very much.



• Alan played in the Guns 'n Hoses hockey game. The firefighters lost. We'll pretend it was to help the cops overcome their ego problems.



• We all but skipped Valentines Day because we were working. And sick. But still working.



• One of my favorite aunts died rather suddenly. We still miss her, especially because she was the glue that brought us all together for the holidays. Those are definitely not the same without her wry chuckling.



• We poured concrete. Mason was in boy heaven.



• We potty trained Mason. It's been a process, I'm not gonna lie. We're doing okay.



• Baby Claire landed firmly in the middle of our family. She's cute.



• We paid off the commuter car, bought a trailer, and squeezed in a few camping trips.



• We all but skipped mom's birthday to work and take care of the kids.



• Mom and Claire spent the summer indoors and trying to get some sleep. We're both still alive, so it must've worked out at some point.



• Mason spent the summer in a swimming pool. This worked out pretty well for him.



• It was our sixth official anniversary. We went out to dinner (date night was pretty awesome at that point!), reminisced/complained, and felt old.



• Mason started preschool. After a rough start and trouble with authority (given the personalities of his parents, we're thinking this will be a lifelong struggle), he is doing very well and can write his name almost legibly.



• Dad worked a lot. A LOT. And loved it most of the time.



• We had lots of playdates, lunch dates, dinner dates, and spent as much time as we could with friends and family that we love.



• We got lots of good news and have many things to look forward to in the coming year.

Happy New Year, Everyone!

Letters to Santa

Dear Santa,

Merry Christmas! I love your reindeer. They are my favorite.

Will you please bring a train table for my room? I want two tables to play lots and lots of trains. Also, some trains to chug on the train table.

I would love a red scooter to play outside with my friends.

Please take lots of toys to the sick kids sleeping at the hospital, too.

Happy Holidays! I promise to be a good boy.

Love, Mason

******

I might have done the penmanship, but Mason told me what to put in the letter and then he "traced letters". He's currently in his room writing a letter to his dad. I think we may have hit on something here.

He is currently very fixated on a charity his preschool is sponsoring this year. It provides a new toy to kids with cancer. We let him pick a toy himself to put in the box for kids who are very sick; ever since then, he keeps asking for reassurance that when he is sick and in the hospital, mom and dad will come with him and bring him a new toy. I love the empathy he's showing there, but need to find a way to instill the idea that not every kid gets sick and he may not (God willing) be one that ends up in the hospital in the same way. This is all a pretty heavy conversation for a (nearly) four year old.

This is one of those things...

... that we'll look back on and laugh a bit, right? I suggested a trip to see the lights at the zoo last night. Saying it didn't come together smoothly is an understatement. We were running very late (getting there just before they stopped selling tickets), I was in a very poor mood as a result of the running very late, I forgot Claire's hat, and it was arctic-style, freeze-your-nose-off cold. Last but not least, my camera battery died fairly early on. So here's a picture of bundled up little Claire. The blanket was a good hat substitute, and she was warm and smiley all night. Anyway, that's about the only quality picture I got from the evening.

Mason, however, had a great time running around with Grandma. The lights were spectacular, as they were last year, and we finally got to see the tiger cubs moving around. Alan harrassed one until it (sorry, didn't check the gender) was growling and considering chewing through chain link to get to him. We also had some fun with the more nocturnal cats inside the reptile/desert building, but is it just me or does that building always smell like there is a crowd in there? There were not that many people inside but it still had it's usual aroma -- let's call it "earthy" to keep this on the more upbeat side, mmmkay?

We were also disappointed to learn that our zoo membership doesn't admit us to Zoo Lights like it does to the zoo. We still had to pay nearly full price. The concession-folk were very nice about explaining that it's because an outside company does all the displays, but I still thought it was kind of a rip-off.

In the end, the evening was a success for Mason and that's the most important part. I'm hoping in time that's the only part we'll bring up when we remember this particular outing.

What happens when....

...the almost-four-year-old is in charge of hanging ornaments.

The Halloween Index

A is for Alternatives. As an alternative to candy, Mason got some interesting stuff. One of our neighbors handed out coupons for a free Arby's roast beef sandwich. We're guessing they are the owner. He also got a purple straw with pumpkins on it. He loves this thing and must have it with every beverage.



B is for Boo'ed--we got Boo'ed twice (if only I was on top of things and had gotten the first sign out!) and felt like our neighbors love us. We were grateful to be included, even if the treats I put together didn't quite come out as planned.


C is for Chili. It's what's for dinner.


D is for Dad. He had the day off work. On a holiday. It was great!


E is for energy. Mason had it in spades. He was so excited to do everything.


F is for friends. Out trick-or-treating, we found a few to join up with.


G is for Grandma's 'hood. The first trick-or-treating stop we made.


H is for Hamburgler. It was my favorite costume that someone wore to work yesterday.


I is for Irritated. If you haven't taught your kids the rules of trick-or-treating and send them out, shame on you. There is nothing wrong with wishing someone a Happy Halloween or saying thank you for treats. If the porch light isn't on, don't go there. If I don't answer fast enough when you ring my doorbell even though my porch light isn't on, don't knock repeatedly. That is all.





J is for James; Mason was transformed into James and loved his costume.


K is for Kennels. Where the dogs spent their night barking at the doorbell. They don't like Halloween very much!




L is for Ladybug. We had a pretty sweet one at our house.


M is for MarioKart. It's what we did for family fun while we were answering the door to trick-or-treaters.


N is for Neighbors. Neighbors who share their candy with our excited kid and send their kids, in fun costumes, to our house to raid our candy supply.


O is for Outside. It was cold and dark, but I think Mason could've stayed out all night if it weren't for needing to go to the bathroom.






P is for Pumpkins. Alan spent hours carving these. The picture is a little hard to see. I'm still learning how to work the camera in the dark. Our choices are limited to either a little hard to see or impossible to make out.


Q is for Quick. The candy went quick this year!


R is for Rings. These and the...


S is for Stickers....were actually a huge hit with trick-or-treaters. I was fairly shocked. "S" also has to be for Snickers because it was the candy of the year in our neighborhood. Mason probably has the equivalent of a whole bag of them in his candy stash.


T is for Thomas. Mason had a Thomas jack o'lantern, and a Thomas treat bucket. You could say this is following the household theme.



U is for ugly. Some of my neighbors who are really into Halloween built a maze in their driveway. Their costumes were (intentionally) ugly and scary. Mason LOVED them and couldn't stop talking about it after he got home.



V is for Volume. Mason was going for volume with his candy haul. It might take us YEARS to eat as much candy as he got.



W is for Who the hell took our pumpkins? They aren't smashed; they are just gone. Whoever took one that was plainly for a little kid... you suck. I guess we'll have to bring them in next year.


X is for X-ray shirt. I know this isn't related to anything for us, but I thought it was awesome! (All right, I tried to go find the picture and come back to post it, but I can't find it. It was this amazing shirt a local girl made and sent a picture to our newspaper. She was pregnant, and it was like one of those black shirts with a white skeleton, but then she also made a skeleton baby over where her stomach was. It said she had her baby a couple weeks early and passed the shirt on to her sister. For some reason, I LOVED it.)


Y is for young 'ns. The only thing I enjoy about Halloween is watching the little kids (including my own) enjoy it.


Z is for ZZZZZ. What we all did when the sugar high finally wore off.

No tricks, just treats

We're getting ready for Halloween. This means my maiden voyage as a preparer of treats for Mason's preschool class. The stipulations are 13 wrapped, commercially prepared treats. These little bags are what I came up with. I curse this modern, fearful age for robbing me of something I have looked forward to for many years: baking treats for my son to take to school. I guess these days something doesn't count unless you spend money on it. Oh, well. Anyway, each bag includes:

• 6 small Halloween-themed stickers
• 2 plastic rings with different Halloween symbols as the "jewel"
• a Tootsie Pop
• one small candy bar

I got my ideal bag of Tootsie Pops. There was only one grape and one chocolate in the whole bag. The rest was a mixture of raspberry, cherry, orange and mystery. I'll be honest here, I totally saved as many of the cherry ones as I could because they are my personal favorite. I also used Kit Kats and Three Musketeers because I thought those were the least likely to encounter any allergy problems. I spent $8 total (meaning on these items and our candy for trick-or-treaters. I felt okay about that. I plan on cutting up the stickers and putting both the left over plastic rings and the left over stickers in with our Halloween candy (which is, you guessed it, Kit Kats, Three Musketeers, and Snickers. I don't care if the trick or treaters are allergic. Beggars can't be choosers, right?).

Happy Haunting! Oh, and here's the question? Did I go overboard on these? Or did I not go overboard enough? You be the judge.

Craftiness is in the air

Last night, we went at the last minute with my friend Kristi, her sons Logan and Colton, and her mom, to a little Halloween night at a local craft store. I'm not gonna lie, it was not nearly as "big" as we thought it would be. But in the end, the boys had fun and that is what counts. Mason is now five times even more excited to wear his James costume (and apparently, to be somewhat snotty as he corrects the people who say "Look, it's Thomas!") to school and on Halloween proper. Plus, we had ice cream for dinner; that's always a bonus and further proof that I'm mother of the year, as I keep telling you. Oh, well. It was good, free entertainment. Thanks for inviting us to tag along!

I'm a dork, I took a picture of the sign.


Mason and a little bit of Logan at the craft table. They had mummies to draw on, jack o' lanterns to draw faces on (the nice lady glued these together so they made a little basket), and pom-pom spiders to attach legs, eyes, and noses to with a hot glue gun. Mason got (actual)glue on his hand and his (figurative) glue melted, so I finished it up for him and thus don't have pictures of that.

The parade

They gave out balloons, and Mason's had a very, very long ribbon. He loved letting it stretch up and telling me to "look how tall my balloon is, mom". Claire liked watching it, too.


Claire watched the whole thing in her understated way. She was asleep when we went in, and I wasn't going to mess with her ladybug costume when she woke up grumpy. Even without a costume, she won a prize that is a bead picture making kit she won't be able to use until the choking hazard doesn't apply.

Is this how we pictured it?

At least, that's what Alan always asks me. Usually as we're sitting in the porch swing while both kids are crying. Our sixth wedding anniversary was last Sunday, so here ya go. I finally got around to it. Thanks to my mom for scanning the pictures, which gave her much difficulty. Thanks to Alan for putting up with me all this time. He must be crazy. It's not what I pictured, but it's what I would have pictured if I had known what to ask for.

Like good wine, marriage gets better with age - once you learn to keep a cork in it.

-Gene Perret

Six years

Two kids

Two dogs

One house

Nine jobs

Eleven states

One college degree

Many years to go

Love you!

A Slidin', Wavin', Sparkin' Good Time

What is there to say about our Fourth of July weekend? Not much. We had a good time keeping it close to home and did some of what we always do. We took in Dad in a parade, played on a few blow-up slides, had a family barbeque (thanks to the hard work of Alan's family who was willing to hang with us), and lit some fireworks off much to Mason's delight.





We did not have the resident veteran with us this holiday because he's in New Jersey, but we did at least pause to reflect on how dedicated these men and women are. We are grateful for his service, their service, and the sacrifices of all those who came before. It is only thanks to them that as a family, we could celebrate so many good things in our life. We are free to raise our family the way we see fit; I hope we can leave our kids the same legacy.

Taking every excuse for a holiday....

... no, we aren't Mexican. But we're celebrating Cinco de Mayo (and trying to clear out mom's sinus infection) anyway!

We're cooking Fire Station Chile Verde. It's a great recipe and may be the last time we do it before warm weather hits, so check it out if you want a good chile verde recipe in your file.

From China to your house, with love

I'm not a good holiday celebrator; I think I've mentioned this. One thing I forgot was that the Easter Bunny hides eggs when he/she brings Easter baskets. My husband was kind enough to tell Mason this was going to take place a few days before it happened. It was good because it kick started my plan to help Mason enjoy the day. We already knew the Easter Bunny was going to be bringing a bike, but it inspired me to help the boys dye eggs and be prepared with extra baskets and treats so Mason could hunt for whatever the Easter Bunny chose to leave behind.

Just a question about the egg-dying process: Am I the only one who's noticed the options around these days? Alan just got the basics, an "original egg dying kit". It had NINE color options. Nine. That's basic? I think when I was a kid (and I'm not trying to complain, it was fun) we had four or six colors for options depending on the kit. If we wanted green, we made it out of yellow and blue. If we wanted orange, we made it. To be fair, Mason did try a chemistry experiment by putting the orange and purple tablets in the same cup. Since we didn't want a black egg, we nixed that cup and went with a seven-color variation that worked well.

Alan showed Mason the white crayon that lets you draw pictures (or names in our case) prior to dying. Mason wanted a fire engine sticker on his and his dad's eggs. My egg ended up being yellow and you couldn't read the "Mom" on it.

We played while the eggs dried; Mason was excited to put the stickers all over them, so we let him go nuts as soon as they were ready. (Also, probably the closest this blog will see to a belly shot; I'm not good at posing and I'm usually the one taking the pictures.)

Two nights before, Mason informed us that the Easter Bunny would be by our house that night. Alan told him that Easter was still a couple of days away, and it was going to take a while; the Easter Bunny's mode of transportation after all is hopping, and he was still clear on the other side of the world in China.


Well, as Mason enjoyed some of the candy and small toys, he let me know the Easter Bunny had brought them all the way from China. I think we'll wait a few years to get into the cultural and ecological differences that make that a little hard.

Either way, we had a fun day with our in-house Easter Egg hunt, taking Mason on long walks so he could enjoy his new bike (thanks also to Alan's younger brothers who both went on walks of their own with him!), playing MarioKart and Tiger Woods with Alan's brothers, and seeing Alan's parents after they had a weekend out of town. We also embarked on a round of Cities and Knights of Catan that might just be the longest game ever, but it was mostly fun.

His first question: "Where's the step?" He's now in the hang of getting on and off, even if he needs a little help sometimes. And one of these days, he'll have the pedaling thing completely down, too.

The helmet lecture. Would you expect any different from parents who are a paramedic and a dispatcher? Mason has taken to his helmet so well he likes to wear it around the house. Who are we to discourage this?



Happy Easter from our house to yours!

Dear Mason, today you are three years old...

(Mason's 1st birthday, Jan. 2007)

... and I'm not sure you know exactly what a big milestone this is. To look at you now and compare it with photographs from such a short time ago is to see one of the greatest miracles of life at work. In the past three years, you have become such an individual and such an important part of our family that it is hard to remember what life was like before you came along.

(First night home, Jan. 2006)

From the start, you were such a robust little guy. You were 9 lbs. 8 oz. and born three weeks early. We had a hard time interrupting your sleep to get you to eat often enough; in fact, sometimes it is still difficult to wake you up. You definitely need your 12 hours of sleep or life is not always pretty.

(Oct. 2006)

You regularly throw caution to the wind. I gave up keeping you off the stairs and taught you how to maneuver them when you were around 8 months old. This was before you could walk or crawl, but you were so dedicated to playing on the stairs that teaching you how to do it with something resembling safety was the only option. More recently, you climbed a ladder without looking back so you could be on the roof helping hang Christmas lights. Often times, we are having the heart attack for you as you proceed through everything because your curiosity will not let you stop until you have conquered the task at hand. If you can but keep this drive throughout your life, you will do great things even if your mom is in the background freaking out a little bit.

(Mason's 2nd birthday, Jan. 2008)

You have learned so many things and continue to amaze us with your knowledge and your memory. You can identify nearly all the letters in the alphabet and tell us what phonetic sound they make; the only thing that holds you up here is your desire to do it. As often as not, you are likely to ask us what the letter or the sound is if only in either subtle mocking or desire to be more grown up. You can count to 15 or so, but usually get the numbers out of order on purpose so that we'll laugh with you and you can remind us that you are a "slilly boy". You sing songs and sometimes get the words right. Other times, it's just fun to hear what you come up with.

You are a particular little guy who will ask us tirelessly to make the train track the way you have envisioned or build a tunnel out of the couch cushions that stands up just right so you can crawl through it. All it takes to make a fort you love is a card table and a sheet; all you need to play in the yard is a shovel and some dirt. You can keep yourself busy for hours with a good puddle and a few rocks. More often than not, you would prefer to be outside and your enthusiasm for camping is bound only by your fear of the wind blowing your ears away.

Happy Birthday to you, our sweet and sassy boy. You are three, which means your world is full of frustrations when things don't turn out the way you were expecting; but hopefully this year will be full of surprises and excitement for you. You have a new baby sister coming, which will be a big change. I hope you will smother her with kisses the way you do me and proudly proclaim that you stole them from her, too. I hope you will clearly feel our love and encouragement as you take a big-boy sized bite out the world by going to school for the first time. I wish you could stay sweet and small, but more than that I hope you continue growing up into a smart, happy, and handsome boy.

Love and many stolen kisses,
Mama