Happy Halloween!

It's T minus two hours before we start the process of becoming Captain Rex, Commander Cody and an Ewok.



The boys are acting as though two hours might as well be two YEARS.



They are DESPERATE to go ahead and get dressed.



But I convinced them that sitting on the couch for two-plus hours in long-sleeved, multi-layer costumes would be a form of self-imposed torture.



So instead we went outside and took some pictures of them looking precious in their Halloween T-shirts and khakis that we wore to the mall to grab lunch on this rainy day.



It was raining on us while we were out there, but since all of our Saturdays to visit the pumpkin patch this month were rained out, this was my only chance to get pictures of them in their shirts on the same day.



They were pretty cooperative. They like their ghost shirts.



And how could I have denied you the chance to see The Baby in yoga pants?



I couldn't have. He's just too cute. Look at that drawstring.



We didn't stay out in the drizzle too long, and it's supposed to clear up for trick-or-treating. So have a great evening, and we'll catch you on the other side.


Happy Halloween!

Brothers

I love how much our boys love each other. I love how WELL they love each other.



I love that Nathaniel and Nick let Jake do things like bang on their heads with his chubby hands.



I love that they let him shove his fingers in their mouths (it's sweet even though it's risky in this season of germs, I know).



I love that after he's done "abusing" them, they give him high-fives.



And I love that they can't get enough of each other. Hugs are the order of the day around here, every day. The bigger boys BEG Jake for hugs.


And why wouldn't they? Baby Hugs are just the most satisfying hugs in all the world.

Mommy fail

Jake is both very independent AND a food lover. It's not at all unusual for him to avail himself of whatever is in the fridge at a given moment ... his favorite things to grab are his milk and yogurt. Witness:




I may have mentioned at some point that Jake only uses a few words consistently (just like Nathaniel at that age), and he is, shall we say, CHOOSY about the times he's willing to use them. Coincidentally, the times he's willing to use them are generally THE TIMES THAT AREN'T AS CRITICAL IN ASSESSING HIS NEEDS.

For instance, he is perfectly willing to say "All done" when he's already taken off his bib and his tray has been licked clean -- when I can tell with my own eyes that he is, in fact, All Done. But when he still has half a tray of food left and has been in his chair all of three minutes but decides that he needs to Get Down, NOW, Please, he would rather wail and bang his dimpled fists on the tray than use his words. NOT AT ALL FRUSTRATING, SWEETIE.

So the other night I fixed a quick supper for the boys, settled Jake into his high chair, then left them with Grayson while I took my shower. When I came back down, Jake was fussing to get down from his chair. He wasn't quite done with his supper (in my opinion), but he was completely finished (in his opinion.)

My child, he is totally strong-willed, that one, and even though I tried to get him to sign or say "All done" that night, I had no luck. But when I got him down from his high chair, THIS was the point he made (quite well, without words, I might add):




Yes, I had prepared his supper and left him to endure his meal WITH NO MILK. (I actually shot this video the following night as a reenactment for you, so it is missing The Look of Reproach that accompanied the original action.)

But this illustrates why he feels no need to speak. He absolutely feels that he can do anything all by himself, he really only needs us around to lift him in and out of his crib every night and morning, and JUST GET HIM HIS MILK ALREADY. Other than that, we are completely extraneous humans who insist on limiting him to 20 ounces of yogurt a day when clearly he would thrive on four times that amount.

Minus 22 and holding

Briefly, I didn't lose any weight over the last week. I suspect it's because I treated myself to a serving of lasagna and green salad with Ranch dressing last Thursday and a cheeseburger and French fries on Saturday. That, coupled with the fact that I went from Friday through Monday without exercising, made for a decidedly stagnant combination when it came to stepping on the scales.

Neither of those things was planned ... the "treating" or the jogging sabbatical. It's just the way the last week went.

I am going to stay positive (I'm already back on track ... did Level 2 of The Shred after work yesterday), because I have been successful at using ALL of my willpower to deny myself ANY Halloween candy. Not one piece has passed these lips. And we have two extra-large bags of The Good Stuff right there in our pantry, waiting on the trick-or-treaters.

My friends at work have Very Tempting Bowls of it on their desks. Just TODAY, at lunch, I was tempted by the Reese's Pumpkins that have -- in years past -- proven far too great a match for my willpower. So far, I have not caved.

But oooooohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, my. There are so many incredibly yummy candies out there right now. I love all the small round ones. M&Ms. Peanut M&Ms. Reese's Pieces. Skittles. Sugar Babies. HELP ME RHONDA.

Apparently I'm getting stranger by the very minute

I was talking to a friend at work last week, and she asked me if I blew my bangs out to the side with a hairdryer, or if I used a curling iron to sweep them to the side.

I answered that I don't even HAVE a hairdryer (although I think we have one in the boys' bathroom for guests to use), because we have four boys/men in the house and don't need one. Internet friends, SHE LOOKED AT ME LIKE I HAD LOST MY MIND.

Then she said, "That is so weird, I think you should blog about it."

That statement rattled me. It made me feel like I needed to go back and add a postscript on one of my Irrationalities posts, to admit that Hello, my name is Katherine and not only do I not break the bindings of any of my paperback books, BUT I ALSO DON'T DRY MY HAIR WITH A HAIRDRYER.

I don't know. Is it that weird? I haven't used a hairdryer in probably 15 years. I shower at night after I jog, and I go to bed with my hair wet. I wake up, and it's dry. And if my co-workers are lucky, I try to tame it into some semblance of order before I go to work, but someone (ahem, MELANIE) will probably pipe up in the Comments and tell you that I don't try hard enough many days of the week.

So, Internet:

I have to count the small victories

Jake loves to unload. He loves to unload the dishwasher (while I'm LOADING it, unfortunately), remove all of the Wii games from the Wii game drawer, empty the DVD cabinet of all DVDs, take items out of the laundry hamper and recycling bin ... the list goes on and on.



Our other boys did some of those things, just not ALL of them, and certainly not all on the same day, every blessed day of the week. But Jake seems to think that this is his mission in life: UNLOADING.

Last week I decided I needed to curb at least a LITTLE of the unloading, so I did this to the DVD cabinet, after moving all the Wii games from the media console into it:

I am fairly sure that I can't convey to you in words how disappointing this decision was with the 18-month-old. And OH HOW I WISH I could have captured the look on his face when he opened the Wii game drawer to find no Wii games. He did a classic double-take, and then his bottom lip started to quiver.

On the plus side, though, I've gained 10 minutes of my life back every evening. So I'm going to call it a win-win.

My Saturday

I spent yesterday in Marietta, Ga., photographing this one-week-old ...




... and this two-year-old:



They belong to two of my friends from The Olden Days -- also known as the '80s -- and we get together every chance we get.

In celebration of Halloween (AND as an "incentive" for cooperative picture-taking), I took these:


And in honor of the Alabama-Tennessee game yesterday afternoon (which my entire state outside of my household was watching), I took these:


And a good time was had by all.

Featured at ...

Today we are featured over at The DIY Showoff for the wood floors and painted cabinetry we helped our friends John and Leslie with over in Atlanta earlier this year. Head on over to The DIY Showoff and check out all the other featured projects, too.

It's guaranteed to inspire you!

Is reading worth the anxiety?

So it's time for another edition of "She So Crazy." This time it revolves around some of the madness related to reading.

- If I drop a book or magazine on the floor while I'm reading it, I suffer from a really disproportionate adrenaline rush and then a crushing sense of defeat. How long would it take to find my place again ... 30 seconds? What's the big deal?

- I always take a book or my Kindle to the doctor's office so I can read during the inevitable waiting period. When the nurse comes to the door and hollers, "Katherine!", for some reason I start freaking out internally. "Wait a second, let me grab my jacket and my purse. Oh, let me put my Kindle in my purse. I'm right here; don't leave without me. OH CRAP, I DROPPED MY KINDLE." I mean, she sees me; she realizes I'm coming. I have no idea why the freakout. Every. single. time.

- I also always have a book with me while I'm waiting to board a plane. Even though the PA system is incredibly loud (and I NEVER seem to miss the boarding calls for the six flights at NEIGHBORING gates), I am always worried that I'm going to get really engrossed in my book and miss my flight, EVEN THOUGH I'M SITTING RIGHT THERE. Paranoid? You might think. But it almost happened to me once. I didn't "snap to" until they announced the final boarding call and threatened to give my seat away to a standby passenger.

- I'm pretty sure I've NEVER broken the binding on a paperback book. When I read, I am careful never to bend the covers back at an angle that would cause a crease on the exterior binding. I've always loved for my books to look brand-new on my shelf, even after I've read them. Otherwise, the titles are really hard to read. Right? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller? This particular quirk came in REALLY handy two years ago when I decided to part with all of my books and sell them on Amazon Marketplace. I was able to sell them all in "new" condition ... I sold several hundred books and made almost $2,000. BOO-YAH.

You guys just let me know when I've disclosed enough of my crazy that you decide you can't come back here. Or, alternatively, leave a Comment telling me that I'm not alone! Crazy LOVES company.

There's more where THIS came from

Now, I'll give you that the contributors over at Ruminations usually start off with a gross generalization such as "The worst feeling in the world is ..." or "Every single time I ...," but they follow it up with such funny stuff that I feel absolutely COMPELLED to share some of them every now and then. Because the absolute worst thing in the world, ever!, would be not to share the funny. Carry on.

- I'm 100% convinced that whenever I'm behind one of those trucks transporting about 18 cars, they're all going to fall on me and I'm going to die. Realistically I doubt this would ever happen, but you can bet your a** I'm switching lanes right now.

- I wish I could copy and paste things onto paper with my eyeballs.

- Yes, I'm pretty sure I turned the oven off before we left, but now that you ask, I'm pretty sure our apartment is definitely burning to the ground right now.

- I really can't wait until the day when I can hum a song into my computer and Google will tell me the name and artist.

- “This person was dumber than we initially thought" should be a valid and legal reason to fire anybody.

- There is no worse feeling than a failed nap.

- Nothing is more excited than turning the radio on and hearing the chorus of your favorite song. And nothing is more disappointing than realizing it's the end of the song.

- The worst feeling in the world is when you are in the middle of a good story and realize no one is listening to you.

- I hate scrolling down through all the U's just to find the United States ... No, I am not from Uganda.

- Can we please just stop the "I can't believe it's the end of the month" conversation already? I don't think I can go another 60 some odd years listening to people constantly getting surprised by time moving forward.

- I can never gauge accurately how much dressing to put on a salad or how much sauce to put on spaghetti. It's kind of ridiculous, actually.

- A multivitamin a day keeps the vegetables away.

- Who decided that every home needs a fake drawer directly below the kitchen sink?

- No, Microsoft Word, my name is not spelled wrong.

- Why is the universal "Save" button logo still a floppy disk? I'm pretty sure they became obsolete about a decade ago.

- What is it about turning a picture black and white that makes people feel artistic?

- Does anyone actually sing in the shower? I’ve tried it. I was alone, yet still mortified by the result. But in the car with the stereo cranked up so I can’t hear myself? I'm hitting every note, and sometimes better than the artist. I just know it.

- I love it when an impatient person tries to pass me, only to find out they totally misjudged the other lane and have to get right back behind me. I wish a sign would pop up on my back window and say, "Hi, you look awfully familiar..."

Minus 22

Minus 22 in the hizzle, and here's the drizzle: *

1. I can fit two fingers between my watch band and my wrist. So when I'm feeling sorry for myself because I still can't get in a smaller size of pants, I can say to myself, "Self, you have lost at least an eighth of an inch off of your wrists. So shut up."

2. I had forgotten that one of the nicest things about Fall is that jogging is so. freaking. much. easier. in the chilly air. I am not ENJOYING it, but I am finding that there are stretches of at least two seconds apiece during which I can actually forget that I am jogging. That NEVER happens in the Summer.

3. I am SO tired of the Jenny food and am thinking of going it on my own once my contract is up at Thanksgiving. I'm not finding it that hard to diet or exercise daily anymore, so I'm not worried that I might throw in the towel altogether. I'm just thinking of counting the calories and going back to Lean Cuisines. Cost is a MAJOR factor in that line of thinking. Jenny is great, but Jenny is ONE EXPENSIVE BROAD.

I was prepared to not lose any weight this week because of the approximately two cups of candy corn party mix, eight green apple slices with caramel-Heath Bar dip, nine Ritz crackers with chicken salad and one chocolate chip cookie that I may or may not have eaten at Bunko last Thursday night. I had prepared to eat or not eat that amount of delicious food by eating only a quarter cup of cashews and drinking four Diet Cokes for the entire day before I went. It was the only way I could think of to enjoy my evening without feeling as though I were going to gain five pounds in two hours. But it was a definite risk.

Well. After jogging my little heart out to try to work it off by yesterday morning, I still lost one-and-a-half pounds for the week. But let me tell you, Internet, even if I hadn't, IT WOULD HAVE BEEN TOTALLY WORTH IT.


* Can't WAIT to hear what my sister has to say about THAT.

Before & after: The den

This is an older post, but I wanted to link up to Rene's party, even though I'll be redecorating this room again within the next year.



So here we go!

Thanks to a little unexpected prize money I won for coming up with an innovative idea at work, we found ourselves able to invest in a new sofa this month. YEA! We'd been shopping for a sofa when I got pregnant with Jake in 2007, and we decided to hold off until he was past formula-feeding age. No point in getting a new sofa that would see lots of spit up within a few months, right?

And of COURSE if we were getting a new sofa, I had to come up with a new space plan for the den, which has seen no fewer than five furniture configurations in the 10 years we've lived in this house ... none of which have worked all that well. So my friend Jackie from church -- an interior design wizard -- came over with her measuring tape and common sense and worked her magic on a new space plan. Thanks, Jackie!

Helpful hint for people who are as stubborn as I am: If you buy a house and there is no cable outlet on the wall on which you'd most like to house your TV, bite the bullet before you move in and FOR THE LOVE OF GOD INSTALL A CABLE OUTLET ON THAT WALL. Do not, under any circumstances, decide that you can "live with it" on the wall the previous owners used, nor on the opposite wall, just because there happens to be an outlet there, as well. I DID BOTH OF THOSE THINGS IN THIS HOUSE, and I have regretted it. Until this month. I've finally wised up ... and it only took 10 years. (And I just typed "wized up," so clearly God's not done with me yet.)

SO, onto the pictures. (Sorry it took so long to get here, but I really wanted to share my cautionary tale for the betterment of the Internet.)

BEFORE (TV WALL)



AFTER (NOW, COUCH WALL)



BEFORE (COUCH WALL)



AFTER (NOW, TV WALL)


(I realize that my After shots are a lot wider than my Befores, but I was trying to give you a better sense of the room as a whole. I'm not sure it's working out that way. Now that I look at them, it's a little confusing. Apologies.)

BEFORE (VIEW TOWARD THE BACK OF THE ROOM)



AFTER (VIEW TOWARD THE BACK OF THE ROOM)



BEFORE (VIEW FROM THE KITCHEN INTO THE DEN)



AFTER (VIEW FROM THE KITCHEN INTO THE DEN)



BEFORE (THE CORNER WITH THE DESK AND THE CORNER WITH THE TOY BINS)




AFTER (NOW, THE CORNERS WITH THE TOY BINS AND DESK -- you can see that we just flip-flopped their positions)


And, if anyone is wondering, we used Glidden's "Pokerface" paint color in Benjamin Moore's actual paint ... sort of a taupe-y brown. It might sort of look like a cave to you in these pictures, or you may be thinking, "MY LANDS WOMAN. WHAT'S WITH ALL THE LAMPS?" I'm still trying to figure out the task lighting in here, because the lighting really worked better with the other space plan. HOWEVER, every single other thing about the room is an improvement, to me. I am SO happy with it, including the color. I think it minimizes the mauve tone of the carpet ... which we aren't replacing while we still have a cat. (Love you, Scoutie!)

In closing, YEA for finally getting up off my tush and doing what I should have done 10 years ago!

Putting things in perspective

Friday morning before we left for school, I asked Nathaniel to look at the school lunch menu on the fridge and tell me if he wanted to eat there or to take lunch from home.

He stood at the fridge for a minute, finger on that day's date, mumbling to himself.

Me: "What'll it be, buddy? Lunch from home, or do you want what they're serving at school?"

Nathaniel: "Well, I DEFINITELY want to eat at school, but it's going to be a Really. Tough. Decision."

Me: "What is?"

Nathaniel: "We have two choices today. I can either choose pizza or corn dogs. OH, THIS IS SO HAAAAAARD."

Me: "Well, you love pizza."

Nathaniel: "But we haven't had corn dogs since the beginning of the YEAR. If I had to choose RIGHT NOW, I'd choose a corn dog."

And I stood there thinking, "I am so glad that this is the hardest decision that my child has to make today, that 'pizza' or 'corn dog' is it for the day. He doesn't have worries like, 'Will I get to eat at ALL?' or 'What if there's only enough food for some of the kids, not all of the kids?' "

When I picked him up that evening, I asked him what he chose. He said he chose pizza, because Evan chose pizza and he wanted what Evan had. It was that simple.

There are many, many days on which I forget to be grateful. I forget to give thanks for what we've been given, what we've accomplished, what the Lord has provided for our family. Not today ... today I'm so thankful. And I hope that you have been richly blessed, too.

To quote Rachel Zoe, 'That's BANANAS.'

After reading the Comments on this post, I decided to take your advice and snip our bananas apart when Grayson got home from the grocery store last Sunday night.

Tah-dah! This is immediately following the separation:


Day 2, still looking great:


Day 3, still good.


Then, they were all gone! So I know that it helped a little bit, maybe a whole lot. We usually start out with about nine to 12 bananas, instead of just half a dozen. But I will definitely keep snipping the tops! Thanks for the advice.

Internet must-sees of the month

1. Did you know that Oct. 4 was World Animal Day? I didn't, not until one of my favorite Web sites showed me. Although there are a few sad pictures in the set, overall it is WELL worth it to click over and enjoy them all, the majority of which are as cute as THIS one of a brand-new pygmy hippopotamus:


2. Over at Antique Mommy, she posted The Ten Commandments of Entertaining, which is basically some FABULOUS tips on Ways to be a Gracious Host(ess). And then she followed up with Ways to be a Gracious Guest. I'm not saying I ADHERE to all of them ALL of the time, but I think they're well-thought-out and pretty comprehensive. I think they should be required reading for all of humanity.

3. The Nester is doing a series this month titled 31 Days to a Better Dressed Nest. It's all about doing one thing a day to make your home more "you" or more comfortable, more livable for your family. I'm loving it.

4. Ree is doing a series on Christmas gift ideas, and earlier this week she posted an item about The Cake Pan Lady. I think one of these pans would make a great gift for someone in your life who does a lot of cooking or baking ... ESPECIALLY if they're one of Those People who take casseroles to the infirm or those who recently pushed a baby out of their front bottom. The Cake Pan Lady has holiday designs:


... and non-holiday designs.


5. And lastly, I just want to link over to Melanie at BigMama and Darby at Fly Through Our Window. They write the blogs I am enjoying the most right now (other than Patrice, of course). Melanie posts daily, Darby a little less often, and I've been reading them for a long time. Melanie makes me laugh, no matter what she's writing about. She's raising a daughter who is basically a clone of her husband, complete with a love of hunting and disdain for pretty clothes and accessories. Darby has the most beautiful children I've ever seen. She's a wonderful photographer, a devoted mom and has a BEAUTIFUL blog. I also read her identical twin sister Erika's blog. Erika just had her first baby -- a girl named Sloane -- and she looks more like Darby than any of Darby's kids do! Anyway, I get so much enjoyment out of them that I wanted to share.

It's rubbing off! It's rubbing off!

Our boys are OBSESSED with Bakugans. If you haven't had the pleasure, they're these little spheres that you roll onto magnetic cards, and they pop open into shapes. They come in lots of colors and -- although they all look the same to MY untrained eye -- the boys can tell the difference between them from 20 feet.
Our babysitter recently gave each of them a carrying case -- GLORY, GLORY HALLELUJAH -- and the boys were thrilled to have yet another Bakugan accessory. Nathaniel came to me in the kitchen the other day and said, "MOMMY. LOOK. I have organized my Bakugans by color and type in THIS carrying case ..."


"... and I'm storing my CARDS in the RED case. I am so happy because it is so ORGANIZED and I can easily find any Bakugan I'm looking for."


Internet, MY PRAYERS HAVE BEEN ANSWERED.

Bad things: HGTV edition

1. When you get excited about a new episode of House Hunters and then the hunters' budget is $150,000. In Chicago.
   
2. When you love the HGTV Design Star winner's designs but can't stand his personality. (Hello, Antonio.)
3. When the Design on a Dime crew designs a room that looks worse than a room that comes out of Trading Spaces -- and their budget is twice the size.
4. When the homeowners on Designer's Challenge choose a designer whose design I really DON'T want to see come to fruition, instead of the one I'm DYING to see.
   
5. When you get all the way to the end of House Hunters and you hate the way the homeowners decorated their new home.

Minus 20.4

I reached a milestone ... 20 pounds! It was all very exciting yesterday morning when I relayed the news to my Jenny Craig weight counselor. And then I did what any normal girl would do ... I treated myself to a non-Jenny chocolate chip cookie at lunch.

Now, I know what you're thinking ... "She fell off the wagon." Well, let me tell you, I did NOT. I was within 20 feet of Great American Cookies and a whole slew of these:


THAT, my friends, is what We In The Industry call an "M&M Double Doozie." It is the Granddaddy of All Cookies, the cookie equivalent of THIS:



... Krispy Kreme's chocolate iced kreme-filled glazed doughnut. THE PINNACLE OF DOUGHNUTS. And, not surprisingly, MY VERY FAVORITE.

And while I was only 20 feet away from the M&M Double-Doozie, I reined myself in and got a plain old chocolate chip cookie from a deli next door. Meh. It definitely WASN'T double-doozie caliber, but it was OK.

I wanted a small treat, one that would be a nice congratulatory gesture for my tummy, but one that wouldn't add 1,400 calories to my daily intake. (I'm guessing here ... I'm sure you're as SHOCKED as I am that Great American Cookies doesn't disclose its nutritional information [and I use that term lightly] on its Web site.)

After all, although I can't tell a HUGE difference when I look in the mirror or pull on my pants, I CAN:

• Jog at a quicker pace than I could three months ago (but I still wouldn't call it a "RUN," per se.)
• Jog farther up hills in my hilly neighborhood than I've been able to in a long time. (Of course, I still can't run past the fourth mailbox on this one hill that my sister runs up every time she's here. I get winded when I DRIVE up that hill in my CAR.)
• Wear Medium maternity shorts instead of Large. (I WISH I were kidding. I guess I could break down and just buy bigger regular shorts, but I don't want to spend the money. I already have the maternity shorts, and they're khaki. Perfect.)

So, you know, fitting in those Medium maternity shorts 18 months post-baby is what's keeping me going. [grin] (I don't like having to spell out my [grin] on my blog, but I can't think of another way to end this on a high note. Oh, yeah ... 20.4 pounds!)

Our weekend in 10

1. I spent five hours Friday night prepping the GARAGE for what was supposed to be a YARD sale. Unfortunately, the forecast called for about 90 percent rain, so we prepared for the worst.

2. It rained four hours and 52 minutes out of our five-hour garage sale. We made a couple hundred dollars, but the Real Win of the weekend was just that we got rid of ALL THAT STUFF. Not one speck of it came back in our house. A local charity picked up everything we had left over on Saturday afternoon, which made me oh-so-very happy.

3. After Jake's nap on Saturday, we all piled in the minivan and went to My SuperTarget! It was our family's maiden voyage to the mothership. The boys had about $40 between them to spend (allowance, birthday money, etc.), and they bought a bunch of Bakugans. (I have never understood the attraction, and I probably never will.) Better their money than mine. We ran into two friends there with their kids, Heather and Angel. Everyone was all smiles, UNDERSTANDABLY. I mean, it's SUPERTARGET, people.

4. After our successful SuperTarget trip, our babysitter arrived and Grayson and I ate a yummy super at Zoe's and then saw One of My Favorite Actors, Matt Damon, in The Informant! (The exclamation point is part of the film's actual title. Having seen it, I certainly would not use an exclamation point in any reference to it.) Although it was humorous in parts, overall (spoiler alert!) it was a pretty tragic story. There was mental illness involved and it was all just sad to me, in the end.

5. ON A HAPPIER NOTE, on the way home from The Informant Exclamation Point, Grayson and I went back to SuperTarget! (THAT exclamation point is ALL MINE! SuperTarget with no kids in tow!) Please allow me to say that in addition to being Everything that a SuperTarget is Supposed to Be, it ALSO has a full-service Starbucks with seating. So basically we can buy Bakugans, complete our fridge and pantry, have our vision checked, drink cherry Slushies, fill our prescriptions, and get coffee and dessert, AMEN. It is very possible that My SuperTarget may become our sole official date-night destination.

6. Sunday was pretty laid-back. Grayson, Nathaniel and Nick went on a Cub Scout hike in The Preserve, and they had a great time. Jake and I stayed behind so he could take his nap, and that was ALSO a great time. After Jake woke up, I took him on a run, and as usual, he was the Model of Great Toddler Behavior for the first 30 minutes, and the Toddler Who Makes Onlookers Swear Off Children Forever for the last 30 minutes. Once that child gets bored in the stroller, all bets are off. GEEZ LOUISE.

7. Monday, being a federal holiday, found me at home with the boys. Public schools and our daycare were both closed, and I'd hoped to take a picnic to a park and enjoy a nice, sunny day outside. BUT THEN GOD SMITED ME, and I had to make alternate plans. (The rain, uh muh guh, the RAIN.) We began our morning with a "quick" trip to My SuperTarget to pick up one thing. I was the cuh-RAZY lady with the wet umbrella and three kids who chose to forgo a shopping cart and "just wing it." NEVER AGAIN. We were a spectacle, what with Jake picking up two items from every aisle in his chubby little fists, carrying them all over creation, only to have me run around replacing them as we left. I broke out in a sweat. I AM NOT EVEN LYING TO YOU.

8. After My SuperTarget, we headed out to get haircuts for all three boys, wherein they blew right past cute and came out the other side of adorable. Hopefully the cuts will still be cute in three weeks, when we have our Christmas card pictures taken. That's the dream. Next up was a 20-minute drive downtown to go to the McWane Center, but as we motored down the street, within one block I saw six school buses. We turned the corner that leads to the parking deck, and I saw three more. I was skeptical, but I entered the parking deck. We got up to Level D without finding a single empty space ... I apologized to the boys but told them we had to leave. That we'd never get to play on anything they wanted to play on because of the sheer number of people that must have been in there. There were lots of disappointed-type noises, but when we exited the parking deck and Nathaniel spied SEVEN MORE SCHOOL BUSES, I knew that we had made the right decision.

9. In an effort to soften the blow a little bit, I took them to Chick-fil-A for lunch. And we ALL know how crowded Chick-fil-A is on a rainy school holiday, BUT I AM NOT EVEN GOING TO COMPLAIN ABOUT IT. As far as I'm concerned, we'd dodged a bullet downtown; everything else was gravy. After a very nice lunch at CFA, we went across the street to Lowe's and bought one thing, then headed home for Jake's nap. Busy day. And as I always say after I spend a day (sort of) at home with my boys, I tip my hat to all of the stay-at-home moms out there. You are my heroes.

10. And lest that last sentence make you question whether I love being with my boys, let me just say that there are no people on this Earth I love more than those three. They are the reason I get up every day, the reason I work to help provide for our family, and the reason that my heart feels like it's going to explode with happiness most all the time. Like last night, when I overheard Nicholas excitedly issue to Nathaniel a post-supper invitation: "HEY, NATHANIEL. Let's go to the den and FIGHT TO THE DEATH." What more can a mom really ask for?

Welcome, Fall

I finally decided that it was time to dig up the old Summer flowers and do something for Fall, even though our weather is still being a little unpredictable right now.



I remembered seeing pumpkin topiaries at someone's house last Fall , which I thought were the cutest little things I'd ever seen. I had to have some.

The guy who helps me with my seasonal plantings (I am CLUELESS about flowers and gardening in general) came by and put together a couple for me. One looked great:



And the other one looked a little, well, WOBBLY.



It only made it about 24 hours before the top two pumpkins fell over. Luckily, they weren't bruised or cracked, so I stacked them back up ... but I'm going to ask him to come back and see if he can do something more structural to help them stay upright.

He also created this cute little diddy in my birdbath:



I'm loving it. For the summer we'd done a bunch of flowers and greenery in it, with the base of river rocks, and I love this for Fall.



Inside I just got out my Fall garland (Hobby Lobby a few years ago on clearance) and smacked it up on the mantel.


I read so many design blogs (like, 25 or 30 of them) that it's easy for me to feel inferior for just putting one garland up, adding two mini-pumpkins and calling it a day -- especially with that photograph being so BLUE and all.


However, I have to tell myself that if I spent more time on interior decorating, I'd have less time for my kids, scrapbooking, blogging and Project Runway. And I simply MUST keep my priorities in order.