Summer

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Story Time at the Library

Story time at the library was more than frustrating today.
On the way to the library I find myself going over the way we should act with Lily. No yelling, sit on the rug during the story, don't climb all over the librarian, you know the norm! Lily agrees and repeats it all back to me so I know she understands.
We get to the library to discover it is all about Dinosaurs today. Yeah Lily's favorite so it should be a great day, right. She will sit attentively and listen to the story, right. NOPE! Not two minutes into the story time the librarian has Lily in front of her and says maybe you would rather sit in mommy's lap. (because she was trying to climb all over the librarian.) So I have her come to me and sit in the floor next to me, but she can't see. She promises me she will sit still on the rug during the remainder of the story so I allow her to go back up to the rug with the other kids. A few minutes later I realize she is playing along the walls where they have flowers painted. I think to myself ," at least she is not being disruptive" and in an effort to pick my battles I don't say anything. A few moments after that I realize she is playing with the librarians buttons and name tag while she is trying to read. The librarian doesn't acknowledge her, but Lily does not lose interest she continues now playing with the books and the white board. That was it. I walk up there with Thomas in one hand, who by the way is screaming because his bottle is not warm enough, and try to get Lily to come with me so she is no longer disruptive. But she has another idea, she is not going. She plants it on the floor and shakes her head no with a look on her face "I want to see you make me in front of all these people". I give in because I know I can not make her do anything at this point. We finish the story mostly sitting and listening, but then it is time to leave. Except Lily is not ready to leave. So she stands her ground in the middle of the Children's center at the library (thank goodness we were in the Children's area so I was not so concerned about her yelling). I tell her I am leaving and she says NO! So I turn and go to check out the books, without her. She thinks I am leaving so finally follows screaming "I don't want to go, I don't want to". We get to the car and in our seats and then she asks if we are going to lunch with our friends. We weren't because some of the mom's had other obligations, but she didn't know that. So I decided to use this as a opportunity to show her we only get to do fun things when we behave. So I tell her no we are not because we did not behave during story time. She begins to scream, I am surprised someone did not think I was killing her! I ask her if she understands why we can not go eat and play with our friends and she tells me because she did not sit and listen to the story and she bothered the librarian. SO SHE DOES UNDERSTAND!!! So why does she do this. She continues to scream most of the way home, which is ok because now she is taking a great nap!
I would not be surprised if we were asked not to return to story time!

Thursday, February 19, 2009

Granny Barnett Would Be Proud!

So for those of you who were never lucky enough to meet my Granny Barnett she was a feisty little lady that didn't take sh%$ from anyone. That has little to do with this, but she also lived through the depression which made her a compulsive hoarder!
Some other mom's I work with have gotten me started doing this thing called the grocery game. Basically you cut coupons and this website tells you when to use them to get the best deal. When you get a good deal you stock up on stuff so it holds you over until the next cycle of sales.
So I get home from CVS last night with a bag full of stuff. The shelf value is $45.00, I paid $25 and received $23 in store cash to use next time I got to CVS. So really it cost approx $2! I start putting the new treasures away to realize I have accumulated 10 tubes of toothpaste (we will never have bad breath again!), 10 different shampoos (our hair will smell good too), 5 deodorants (no BO!), 5 toothbrushes and some other misc things. It made me think of Granny Barnett :)

Monday, February 16, 2009

Lily's Green Thumb

Lily definatly did not get her green thumb from me! I am actually very suprised my children are still alive, but they cry when hungry and plants don't.
Our Roma tomatos began to sprout on Saturday night and they actually have leaves today! We are so excited about our garden this year. It reminds me alot of Papa & Granny Barnett. In fact we planted purple hull peas just so we could sit on the back poarch this summer and snap them. I still remember the garden at their house and picking veggies in the summer time. Unfortunatly living in the city (yes Forney qualifies as a city) my children will never experience the real thing, but we will get as close as we can.

Thursday, February 12, 2009

I Can Do This!

I am starting to feel more comfortable being a Stay at Home Mom. It took a few months, but I think we have most of the kinks ironed out.
When I first considered staying at home, I had this idealistic picture of things. Much like June Clever. House cleaned, Dinner on the Table, Clean well dresses kids, Make up and Hair done all in time for hubby to be home from work. Boy was I mistaken. It has taken a few months for me to get comfortable with the fact that things will not be this way and it is ok. I am home to be with my kids not to be the maid. Don't get me wrong, I pick up the house as the day goes, but be real when you have 2 kids that are home most of the day we are doing good just to clean up the messes we make not to mention the ones that already existed. We do have a rule about getting up and getting dressed in the morning, except for Monday's which are our Pajama and Laundry day. Dinner, this has been a hard one for me. I will always think that dinner as a family is extremely important. As a child we all sat down to dinner together and it was our family time. So I still strive to get dinner on the table by the time Frank gets home, but there are days that someone is hungry or sick and our schedule gets out of wack.
Hubby has been wonderful about this, I think he knew from the beginning it was not going to be the "June Clever" house when he got home.
We are however getting to do things we have never done before. We planted our first garden last night. Well we started the seeds last night. Lily is so excited. I am fully expecting the Jalapenos to be growing in the Petunias! It is so hard for little fingers to put those tiny seeds where they belong! We are also trying to be more "Green". I know this is the word of the year right. I do think it is important to leave the Earth better than we found it. I am not going to push my ideas on anyone, but we try as a family to recycle, use reusable bags and such and the newest is using cloth diapers. I know YUCK right, but you would be surprised how much like disposables they are. The only thing you have to do extra is wash them. Anyway, this is exciting to me (thanks Anna for talking me into it!). And they are too cute. We also go to story time every week and we are checking out books from the library. We have a play date once a week with our friends from Mother's Day Out. We also are going to Open Gym twice a month to get all our energy out.
So I am beginning to get more comfortable with my new role. Thanks to a few special friends who have adopted me and made me get out of my house. I don't think things would be the same without them.