Easter and the Naked Lady

Easter is not a big holiday(to me), but somehow always turns into one. We had a good day this year, although the husband and I were at odds a little. The weather was beautiful, our children behaved, and my mom cooked a good dinner. Overall what more could I ask for (without being greedy)? I was sick the night before which put a damper on enjoying in any Easter candy, but I could use to lose a few pounds so it was probably for the best. My oldest was a little curious prior to Easter how a big bunny was going to just jump into our house and leave treats, understandably so, but not curious enough to ruin the fun yet. The bear was the first up and HAD to go downstairs and look before the other kids woke up. He was so excited!!! Turtle (which is what the husband calls our little girl for those of you who don't know) was excited too but we had to prompt her to be excited, if you know what I mean. The kids enjoyed their baskets and found their Easter eggs, I cooked pancakes while the husband put some mulch out in our yard. A good day.

At my mom's

Excited over hunting for eggs

Now to the naked lady story....
After our Easter festivities in the morning my oldest asked me if he could watch cartoons? I told him I would look for something for everyone to watch. The intent was to find some sort of Easter program on maybe a local channel, maybe an Easter parade? So I turned to a local channel and within seconds a naked woman is sprawled across my living room TV. The show was about an artist from the 1800's who painted beautiful paintings and one of them just happened to be a woman posing on a red velvet couch with no clothes on. Typical of this time period, very classy, but weird to my 7 year old.

"Why did he paint her naked mommy?"

As quick as I could I channel up on the remote which turned out to be the news reporting about a man who killed six people in his family, which was also confusing to my 7 year old.

"Why did he kill those people mommy?"

Two questions I was not prepared to answer this Easter morning. I was unaware of how un-kid-friendly the news was, even on Easter Sunday. So cartoons it was. Now to the funny part.

Flash forward a day and it is Monday afternoon, the kids are home on spring break, it is a beautiful day!! Several kids from the neighborhood are playing in my yard and I offer them all sidewalk chalk. No big deal right? Unless your child decides to draw a picture of a "naked lady" in your driveway for all the other kids to see. Hard not to laugh right? Even though I just don't think it is that funny, I find myself laughing every time I pull into my driveway anyway.

I hope you all had an enjoyable Easter! Enjoy the pictures!

Dilemmas of the day

What do you do when one of your children takes an interest in the one thing in the whole world you don't want him to?

VIDEO GAMES! Yes, I am one of "those" mom's who believe that video games and TV could be the root of all evil. Maybe that is a little extreme, but for real I'm just not a fan of my kid zoning out for hours at a time punching, kicking, and killing other characters, or getting so involved in a dumb cartoon that he has no idea the house is on fire. Unfortunately we don't get to pick what are children enjoy. How do I tell a little boy who does great in school, and is good (overall) he can't play any video games? He is obsessed with his Gameboy, which we made him wait almost 3 years to get. He asked for one when he was 4, so we bought a Leapster and told him he was not old enough for a Gameboy. This year for Christmas he finally received a Gameboy. I did not want to buy it, but it was what he wanted, what do you do with that? When I told him he might not get a Gameboy for Christmas because he was not 7 yet (which was the magic age we told him he had to be to get a Gameboy), he said "Mom I have to tell you something. When you weren't looking I asked Santa for a Gameboy. What if he brings one?" ???????? What is a mom suppose to do with that?
So here I am loathing the one thing my child loves more than anything else in the world. He takes a Tae Kwon Do class, and does very well in school. He loves to play at the park and will go bike riding if we go with him, BUT all he really wants to do is play the Gameboy, and I hate that! I monitor it, set time limits, and take it away if he does anything wrong, but I can't make him not like it. Which leads me to my next parenting dilemma......
How do I raise two TOTALLY different boys and get the same outcome? The desire outcome would be "a college educated, strong, respectful, happy and productive member of society, who loves his mom."

My middle child (5) is a very active little boy. He would spend all day outside, he thinks Gameboy is "boring", and rarely sits through a whole movie. He is fearless, and rambunctious, constantly has a wise-ass comment for things, and always acts "cool" somewhat like Fonzie from Happy Days.

My oldest on the other hand is much calmer. He would like to watch TV or play video games all day, he draws (very well), and reads comic books.

I strive to nurture both of their strengths and weaknesses, but how? I want to scream at them "Stop playing stupid video games they will rot your brain out!" and "Get off that skate board you're gonna break your leg!". How do I act proud of a child that just beat "Darth Vader" in his newest video game? How do I let the other one out the front door when I know he is likely to break or hurt something on the very same body that I gave birth to a few short years ago? When I finally get this supportive but not over-bearing mom thing down I will then have to teach them how to respect eachother's differences. AAAAHHHHHH! They are only 5 and 7, and I have a little girl to deal with after that. Wish me luck!

The never ending birthday bash!

He waited patiently for 364 days for this day to come!!

Seven is an odd age, he is not by any means a little kid anymore, but he is not a big kid either. He has out grown the "Invite everyone in the class" kinda parties. So he decided he wanted to take some friends to the movies this year to celebrate. Saturday night we took a total of eleven kids out for pizza and movies, lucky for us six parents stayed. Ice Age The Meltdown was the movie of choice. He had a great time, and "Savannah" sat next to him in the movies, which I know he enjoyed! Sunday we had our family and some close friends over. That was a good time also. I cooked a 24lb. turkey and some stuffing, Anne Marie brought a few salads also, and we had almost nothing left over at the end of the day! This means it all tasted good! Yeah! Then Monday was the actual big day. We had a special snack at school and I took him shopping after school to spend his birthday money and giftcards. Gameboy games were the popular item with him this year. He chose nachos for dinner and we watched Harry Potter until almost 10 pm. What a busy three days!! Thankfully we are on springbreak now, could we could all use some down time. Again the waiting has begun for our "eighth" birthday to come so we can get all the things we did not receive for our seventh birthday!

How did I lose 7 years?

I just never have as much time as I would like to have. There has been more things then I care to count that I was hoping to blog about but as the days go on the things on my mind change and when I finally sit down I can't think of a damn thing that has happened all week. My oldest and youngest caught a stomach bug Thursday to about Saturday. That was fun, for now no one else seems to have it (cross your fingers). My girlfriend has had it circle through her house for 3 weeks now, I am not up for that!!
My oldest is turning 7 in 8 days. So hard for me to believe. A few nights ago the kids were watching a video my stepfather made with stuff from our wedding and when the kids were born. WOW! They were so tiny, and sweet, and we were so young. I wish I could get those years back (kinda). What a different time that was for us. My husband and I both saw it, they were like different people in the movie. Not bad, but now my little babies are 7 and 5 and 2 1/2. I enjoy them being older too, but I miss the tiny people they used to be. I miss my boyfriend too! It was wierd to watch the husband and I interact with eachother. We were just young and dumb and in love! We had no idea what we were in for. Now we are always working and paying bills, or saving money, talking about tile or mulch colors, trees or pavers, minivan or SUV ect. I'm sure you get the point. My love for him has not faded a bit (on average) :), in fact I love him more now than ever, but I miss the days when our life was not so complicated. "Youth is wasted on the young!" And I am not really old yet.
I have decided I want to do the LIVESTRONG CHALLENGE this year in September. It is a 5k walk or run. There is also a 10k run the same day. My husband said he would do it with me, which is awesome!! Part of me would like to try and do the run, because I would have to train for it and it would be an accomplishment for me, and part of me wants to do the walk and bring the kids along and let them get something out of the experience also. I have been sad about my Aunt Carla, and I thought this would be a productive way to deal with my saddness. I would also like to raise a good amount of money. So many people raise so much money for cancer research, it is frustrating we don't have a cure yet! I could write a whole post on this topic! There are so many foundations and so many people raising money............WHAT THE F***!
Anyway, randomly my neighbor decided she would cut my baby girl's hair 2 weeks ago! Yup, you heard me right! She was watching my kids and decided to cut some bangs in her hair cause her hair was in her face. For the record, we were trying to grow her hair to all one length.


No we did not flip out, what was done was done. But, WHO DOES THAT??
I hope you all enjoyed the beautiful weekend!! I will post about our Birthday celebrations next week!!