Helping feet.

I know I've told you all about my little helpers.  Their little hands always trying to help out.

But have I told you they have the cutest matching little helper feet ever?

We have another reader!

Drew is showing strong signs of being a reader just like his momma and brother - and also like his father would be were it not for all the textbooks!

His newest cute antic is running to grab a book, struggling to climb into a big chair or rocker with the book under his arm, sitting down, and opening the book up (usually upside down) to "read".

It's precious to me.  I love reading (I have another book review coming, I promise!) and love the thought of reading together as a family.  I have fond memories of my mother reading to my brother and I as we were growing up.  Single novels or books from a series, it didn't matter what, we just loved it when she read to us.  As I grew older, I enjoyed getting lost in other worlds by myself.  I hope that our boys find the same love of reading!

Anyway.  Getting back on topic here.  This particular night, Drew got up and started reading and I ran for the camera.  When Drew hopped down with a grin on his face sweetly asking me "see? see?" Evan hopped up into the chair and showed me how you really read a story.

And so he proceeded to tell us all about what was happening in the pictures.  It was quite the story - lemme tell ya!

And while we're on the topic of stories and book, look what I found on Amazon the other day!

Calendarbears by Kathleen Hauge!  She is the author (and her husband, Michael, the illustrator) for my favorite childhood book, Alphabears!  I found the Mother Goose Rhymes at a thrift store for 25 cents once, and the Numbears I got off Amazon before we even had children!  I love this magical duo and how they create wonderfully warm and soft pictures and bears.  If I had a book for a home, these would be the books I chose for my walls.

Farmpark

Evan has been into cows recently.

Where does the milk come?  How does it get to the carton?  What part of the cow does it come from?  Mom - can we talk about the cows and the teets and the milk?

So when I was given the wonderful tip that Lake Farmpark was having a tractor show and Fall festival this past weekend (along with all their other typical activities), I knew exactly where we would spend our Saturday morning!

We watched a cow be milked, saw some of the largest hogs I've ever seen, tasted freshly churned ice cream,  heard a great little bluegrass band, tasted newly milled apple cider and apple butter (and got to help a little with both), did not get lost in the three acre corn maze, had some very hot "harvest soup" from vegetable right there on the farm, saw a lot of cool antique tractors, rode in a horse pulled wagon, and had an absolute blast.

We're doing it again next year.

 Scot was able to join us and we were all so happy!

 Jamie and her boys went, too!

 Evan was quite excited.

 Both boys were able to sit atop an antique tractor.  

 The John Deere owner wasn't around, but this was just as fun.

 After some potato stamping and harvest soup, we took a little break before going to the corn maze.

 There was a little swing set/playground by the corn maze and we ran off just a little more energy.

More photos here!

Fro Yo!

This past weekend Jamie and I got some much needed time together.  With summer activities, school schedules, and work schedules, it had literally been months since we just sat and chatted without kids running around us.

We've been trying to plan something to do for weeks now, but nothing ever panned out.

Until Saturday morning that is! I popped over to her house with my poor-teething-baby Drew and let Jack take the other 3 boys to the library.  We got to talk for almost a solid hour and is was pure bliss.

It was also way. too. short.

So on the way back to my house for lunch (I just love living 4 doors down) I mentioned that we needed to go that new Fro Yo place sometime.  We tossed up different dates and then I suggested during naptime that afternoon and without a seconds hesitation we were on!

So we went to Menchies - this new Fro Yo place and what a blast!  We got our cups full of cool creamy goodness and, since it was gorgeous out, we went for a walk and ended up by this fountain, on a wooden bench, talking and catching up and having honest-to-goodness not-interrupted girl-time!

SO GOOD!!!

Oh Magic Scouring Sponge - how I LOVE YOU!

So you know how I got into a cleaning frenzy the other day?  Well, it continues.

Not with the same ferocious energy that it was, but it continues.  With the knowledge of this new metal scouring sponge from ScotchBrite - my world has been changed and made so. much. easier.

Today, I decided to see what the Magic Scouring Sponge would do to our very old and dingy linoleum in the front 16 square foot entry way.  I clean it regularly - with an almost toxic solution and a heavy duty scrubbing brush - but I can never seem to get the dirt that's ground into the seemingly microscopic pores! 

Until now!

After years and years of neglect and never being fully cleaned, the entry way to our house -- all 16 square feet of it -- is down-to-the-pores clean.


Please don't be too disgusted - here is the before:

And here - is what 15 seconds did to that same little patch:

Silly songs

Recently, Evan has been getting into singing silly songs (as well as "real" ones) and it's fairly entertaining.  While out driving the other day, Evan requested I sing him the "bright eyes song" - a song I made up when he was a baby and have just kept singing to him.  It goes like this:

The " Bright Eyes Song" (to the tune of Head and Shoulders, Knees and Toes)

I don't like it when you're sad (when you're sad)

I don't like it when you're sad (when you're sad)

When the tears fall down 

And your smile is a frown

I don't like it when you're sad (when you're sad)

I love it when you're happy (when you're happy)

I love it when you're happy (when you're happy)

When you're eyes are bright

And your smile is a light

I love it when you're happy (oh so happy)

So I  guess he comes by his song-making-up habits honestly

A few cute things

Sorry for nothing huge to post today.  But here are a few cute things:

Evan's newest phrases:

Hey mom?  Shall we go now?   -- seriously?  shall?

Oh, that's just splendid!

Oh my goodness gracious me!

I don't feel very well, mom.  (I'm just proud that he's using proper english with the use of "well" and not "good".

And Drew is now saying:

Es Peas
Uh Oh!
Owie!
Bruver (brother)
Up/down, on/off
A-EN! (amen)
Shhhh... (with finger to his lips)
And trying to sing.

And together, they are:

Wrestling
Giving eachother hugs
Fighting over prized cars/trucks
Sharing cheerios



As a family, we are:

Busy.
Loving the gorgeous weather right now and the changing fall colors.
Getting ready for my folks to come in a little over a week.

Our little prayer warriror

Evan has always shown a sensitive spirit.  He doesn't cry easily, but he is very tender-hearted and others-centered (unless it comes to Drew) and that is expressing itself right now in seemingly constant little prayers that go something like this:

(We'll pass by a fire truck and this is what happens)

E:Oh look mom!  A firetruck!  That was a such a gift from Jesus!  Let's praise Him!
Me: Ok.
E: Dear God.  Thank you for the firetruck and the surprise.  Please help the fireman help the people and please help the people and...please help us get  home. In Jesus' name...oh...and thank you for sending Jesus and dying on the cross for us and for Drew and his sins and for daddy to come home and eat with us in Jesus' name...oh...please pray for naps that we sleep and for mommy and this pretty day and praise God and the Father and the Holy Ghost and Son in Jesus name....AMEN!

Whenever we pass a school bus (praise) or a money truck (praise) or pull into a parking spot - good or not - (praise) and whenever we hear sirens (pray) we do a little prayer of some sort.  It's so wonderful to see his tenderness coming out like this.

PJs only

Earlier this week is was gray and cold and we (amazingly) didn't have one single thing on our calendar.

So I made the decision to have a PJ day and it was such a great idea.  We popped popcorn, popped in Monster, inc (our new favorite movie) and spent the morning hanging out gooning and playing puzzles.  The afternoon was filled with reading books and helping cook dinner.

I managed to pull my camera out and get these 2 shots:

When the movie started...

...when the movie ended.

Frugal Fun: Spice It Up

In cooking, I love to use spices.  Mostly your basics, but I have a few favorites that are harder to come by in the regular market or just plain expensive due to their availability in only the most expensive glass jars.

In comes Whole Foods or any other market that sells spices in bulk.

You heard me correctly.  You can buy spices in bulk.  And I do.

When a spice is running low, I just write it down on my shopping list and know to go to the bulk section of the store and not the baking isle! You will save so. much. money. this way.  I promise.

I just bought sweet basil for under a buck and it didn't all fit in my container at home!

Don't have a container for a spice?  Not a big deal, keep it in the baggie or use an old container or a cleaned-out baby-food jar! Slap a label on it and you're good to go!

We went Gnome hunting

Fall in Ohio is gorgeous.  It is the only season that blows Colorado out of the water.  Seriously.  And I love a good hill with changing Aspens, don't get me wrong -- but the colors here are a show of God's artistic side!

Today we went on a grand adventure with friends to the Holden Arboretum to hunt Gnomes!  Twenty Gnomes were painted by local artists and scattered around a 1.5 mile loop that took us through forested areas, around lakes, over bridges, and back to a cluster of picnic tables where we ate lunch.  It's a beautiful day today and it was just so refreshing to be with friends outside with all our children running off steam, laughing, and have a ball trying to spot the "next Gnome"!

Here are some of my favorite pictures from the day, to see all of them, go to my facebook album.

An attempted group shot sans

 

All 20 Gnomes we found!

My sweeties.

Evan walking around in my flips.

My silly Drew-boy

These boys are the highlight of my days.  They give me grief sometimes, yes, but most of the time I just love being around them.  I love the "whys" and the clingy days.  I love the smiles (and smirks), the curiosity (even if it means I'm cleaning something up becasue Drew was curious what sound it would make as it hit the floor), the teachable moments (even if it means we're late getting out the door), the sleepy/snugly times, the "lets run around until we're dizzy" games, reading books, drawing/scribbling pictures.

I love it all.

And yes I mean all.  I even love getting smeared with half-chewed sandwich and smelling like peanut butter for the better half of the day becasue it means that they came to me for something (or that I had to go get them from something).

This is my dream job, peanut butter kisses and all.

And I love pictures.  I love capturing a moment and being able to recall what exactly was going on when the shutter snapped.  I love it when I capture a little smile or moment of love between the boys.  And I love that Evan loves a particular picture of the two of us -- taken when he was about 15 months old.  It's black and white and sits in a little black frame.  It used to sit on my dresser until about 4 months ago when he found it, proclaimed it was his favorite picture, and took with him.  It traveled with him for a few days (inside the house), and still does occasionally.  But mostly he just likes looking at it.  he'll set it by his bed at night to "watch him" sleep.  I think it's so endearing.

Which is why last week I went on the hunt for a picture of Drew and me (without a paci in his mouth), made it black and white, sent it to Walgreens, found an identical little black frame (thank you, Target!), and now have a picture for Drew to one day love and cherish the way Evan does his.  And the picture just happens to be from Drew's 14th month!

And so I give you pictures of a momma loving on her boys.

GIGO

Quite a few years ago, as in, before I was even engaged, I was visiting a very good friend and we got to talking about music.  She had recently made the switch to listening to mostly Christian music and I was curious about the change.

GIGO, she said.

Come again?

Garbage In, Garbage Out.

What you are taking in and filling your brain with is what is going to be the most ready to come out of your mouth or pop into your mind first.

This got me to thinking about what I do put into my head.  Since I'm not a fan of "pop" Christian music, I did not make the switch to programing the Christian station on my radio.  I did buy some good Christian CDs and put them on my iPod so that I was at least not listening to all secular music.  And I have never listened to "dirty" music, but seeing as how much I love music, I found it very hard to cut secular music out completly.


Until now.

Evan is an auditory learner.  We've known this for a while now.  When I think that a random smattering of artists singing on my iPod is just background music, I have questions firing at me. 

What does that mean, mom?


Haha!  He just said "at 'em!"

He's talking about a horse, mom -- what's he doing? 

The scariest part was when he started singing along to some of the songs.


And so just like that, I'm listening to my music through the ears of my three year old and I'm hearing phrases and words I never heard before.  Music I would have (a month ago) labeled as "clean" is now only on occasionally.  And music that I knew was "iffy" is now not listened to at all if there are little ears around.

But I have to have music on, and since Evan is obviously taking in what I perceive to be just background tunes, what better to have on than Scripture memory verses?  So I bought the second volume of the Steve Green Hide 'Em In Your Hearts CD and Evan loves them.  The other benefit, I'm now singing these little songs to myself, too, which has turned out to be a nice reminder of how I'm supposed to be acting, too.

Music we're listening to now: Indelible Grace, Mercy Me, Owl City, Sovereign Grace, Lifehouse, Jars of Clay and some others.  Most of Norah Jones and AKUS is still ok.  So is a lot of Rascall Flats.  But not everything and it's taken time to figure out what is ok and what is not.

GIGO, my friends!  What are you listening to? 



WIWO is the new motto: Wholesome In, Wholesome Out!

(I don't want to mislead anyone.  The boys go to nap -- or if I'm in the car alone -- and the iPod goes strait to my favorite play lists!)

The bug.

My nice clean stove/oven/pot/tea pot

I know some people out there are huge proponents of Spring/Fall cleaning. Taking an entire day or two to really deep clean the house.

I have two little guys running around and have no idea where I would get two. full. days. to just clean.  Therefore, I do not do the "Spring/Fall Cleaning" thing.  Not really.

At this point, let me say that I'm a fairly clean person.  Tidy but not a neat-freak.  Our house looks lived in but not unkempt. I would not recommend eating off the floors, but you could. 

The way I have been cleaning house since Evan was born and I started staying home all day (and yet not...) is very simple.  I schedule it like most other things in my life.  Mondays are cleaning days.  And Tuesdays are laundry days (to clean all the rags and towels and sheets from the day before, right?).  And each Monday I deep clean one area of the house.  This gives me the freedom to just "regular clean" in between.

For instance, the bathroom.  Every week the sink gets cleaned, the tub gets scrubbed, the toilet gets a once-over, and the floor is swept.  Obviously, light cleaning goes on through-out the week. I do have 4 little hands that are sometimes muddy reaching and grabbing here and there.  A wipe works wonders, I've found, for a quick clean before someone comes over if needed!

On deep cleaning bathroom days (about once a month) the toothbrushes come out.  And I'm not talking the toothbrushes we use....gross...anyway, the toothbrushes come out and I scrub the baseboards, I clean the soap scum off the tiles in the shower (Blue Dawn is my secret weapon for most things and especially this!), I take things out of the medicine cabinet and wipe shelves down.  You get the idea.

Well, this week's "deep clean" area was the kitchen. 

Now, I clean the kitchen every day.  Before bed I sweep (for the 8th time) and make sure all food is away.  I make sure dishes are done and counters are wiped down.  On regular cleaning days/Mondays I scrub the floor and wipe the cabinets down.  I clean the microwave and toaster oven.  Even with all this -- the big oven is usually dirty and parts of my stove top (you know those lovely burners on old school gas stoves, don't you?) are usually slightly crusted or something with pot-overflow.  My pots always look well-loved (and they are) and there are crumbs hiding in drawers.

I admit: I am not a clean cook.  Soups boil over, sauces splatter out, contents of the mixing bowl very rarely stay in the mixing bowl, and let's not forget my little helpers!  Considering my love for cooking, we're in the kitchen a lot. 

So deep cleaning the kitchen is always a must.  Today, I made it an over-haul.   Probably a typical "Fall Cleaning" for the kitchen.  Usually, the fridge gets wiped, the microwave and toaster oven get pulled out and cleaned behind, the stove "parts" get cleaned.  You know the drill, I'm sure.  Today, though, made a "deep clean" day look like a regular Monday cleaning!

Since we moved in (and the house was not clean when we moved in -- especially the kitchen.) there has been burnt-on food that has just not come off the burner trays.  And believe me, I thought I'd tried everything save a putty knife for this stuff.  So a couple weeks ago, I wrote "steel wool" on the Target list as a last pleasepleasepleasework shot.  And today, I finally bought a steel-wool wanna-be and I'll never go back.

Scotch-Brite has these metal scrubbing pads that are pure magic.  Seriously.  They don't break apart, they don't disintegrate, they don't get their little fibers wedged up in your nail bed.  And when they are paired with my favorite Blue Dawn -- they are simply amazing!

This is to show you all (at my embarrassment) what about 10 minutes and some elbow grease can do to a much-loved pot.

I was just going to clean the burner things, thinking it would take me a while, but then I got carried away.  Before I knew it nap time was over and I had cleaned the burners, the then-exposed stove, a few of my pots, the oven, my teapot, and the sink.  This was after, mind you, I had cleaned the fridge, floor and counters.

Just a tip.  Clean the floor and counters after you make a mess cleaning everything else.

Like I said.  I got carried away.  But Fall is in the air and the cleaning bug bit.  Hard.

I know well enough that when the cleaning bug bites, you just go with it.



How do you work cleaning in your home?  Do you have a schedule?  Any "secret weapons" that you just love?

A Trip to Columbus

One of the nice things about living in OH is how close so many neat things are to us.  So many places are within driving distance -- NYC, Boston, Philly, DC, Charleston...

One of these amazing places is Columbus, OH.  Just two and a half hours away, it houses a fabulous zoo and friends!  So my friend, E, and I drove down in her spiffy mini-van to visit our friend Anne along with making a trip to their zoo, a dip in their pool, and eating some yummy food!  It was a great day. 

Long...but great.

We had a great time looking at baby Moose, watching a Polar Bear have a late morning snack of fish, and the grand finale of viewing the Gorillas and Bonobos - both of which had adorable babies to show off.  We saw all the other "normal" zoo animals, too, as well as getting a little too close to some overly friendly ducks.

To see all the pictures, feel free to browse the facebook album!

Also - don't forget about {the giveaway}!