Free weekend

We unexpectedly had a weekend free of tball and soccer games, and it was fantastic!  We had pancakes, colored, played games, cleaned the house and Scott worked outside.  I love watching the boys enjoy play t-ball or soccer with their friends, but it's still nice to have a weekend free of responsibilities.

Kindergarten mass

Throughout the year, each class is responsible for mass.  The students in that class do the readings and participate in every aspect of mass.  The school year starts with the older classes being responsible and ends the year with the younger kids.  Today, Karsten's class was responsible for mass. His classmates did a great job on the readings and petitions, you could tell everyone had been practicing a lot.  Karsten's job was to take the gifts to the front.  We arrived early to score a seat on the aisle for optimal photo opps (would you expect anything less of me?) 

I could tell he was nervous and I thought he was intentionally not looking at us, but he told me later that he never saw where we were sitting.  He was very focused on his job!  He looked so grown up and so little all at the same time.  I still can't believe his first year of kindergarten is almost over!

After mass, his class stayed in the church and all of the parents were mingling and chatting.  We noticed that the teacher started to move the kids towards the alter, then all of the parents (ok, just the moms) flocked to the front of the church.

It's been a great year getting to know the families at his school.  We'v felt so welcomed, and everyone has been so helpful as we figure everything out.  This was definetely the right choice for our family.  We can't wait to get more involved in this great community!

Oil class

Yesterday was my first essential oil class at our house. It was great that so many friends were able to come out and learn more about essential oils.  I hope essential oils will help others like they're helping our family.  Recently, I attended a class to learn how to support allergies with essential oils, and have started taking capsules with Lavendar.  So far it's helping, but I still haven't completely kicked the goopy allergy eyes!  

Since I always take a photo of my tables when I entertain, this is no exception.  I kept telling myself to keep it simple, so I made blueberry lemon muffins with lemon glaze, fruit and mimosas.  I'm always looking for an excuse to break out the champagne glasses - they don't get enough use!  

I had no idea what kind of champagne to get for the mimosas, so I read the labels on the shelves at the liquor store and chose one with a high rating.  This one had a rating of 89 so I decided to give it a try - it was pretty good!  Karsten saw the empty bottle on the counter and said the stuff inside the bottle was good for your feet!  I was so confused about what he meant until I looked at the bottle and saw the footprint.  LOL.

Homework

Karsten's teacher assigned a project for the kids to create.  They had to read two books by the same author and tell what they liked in the books and why.  Then they had to make that into some sort of a media presentation, it could be as simple as putting clip art on a word or PowerPoint slide.  

Since Karsten is lucky to have a dad that loves using technology in education, he had the perfect idea for Karsten to create his project.  Karsten drew two pictures to describe what he liked best about each book, then they added some photos and ended up with this cool project.

Once Karsten was all done, he added his books to his reading log and rated them.  

Matching cuteness

My mom decorated these polos for the boys, and Karsten asked if they could wear them to church today.  I'm biased, but I think they're pretty cute!

Although the boys have their share of disagreements, Liam completely looks up to Karsten and wants to be just like him.

Zoodles

I ate at Houlihan's recently and had their Thai Peanut zoodles - they were fantastic! After that, I spent WAY too long reading delicious posts on the Inspiralized blog, and I flipped several recipes to our Flipboard recipe book.  

The first time we tried one of the recipes, Liam wrinkled his nose and said 'what is THAT?' with a tone of disgust.  I said they were zuchinni noodles which didn't make him any more excited.  Then Karsten said 'I thought they were zoodles', and suddently Liam thought they sounded good and was willing to try them.  

Karsten took several bites and kept saying 'these are good, right Liam?' and they both ate all the zoodles on their plate.  

It was an important reminder - it's all in the branding.  Zoodles sounds way more fun and delicious than zucchini noodles.  For the longest time Liam would not eat grape tomatoes but LOVED red grapes.  Same idea, different food!  

Wordless Wednesday - snail friend

Sportsman of the week!

Each week at t-ball, there is a featured character building word.  The team player that best demonstrates the character of the week gets a medal and a sign to take home for the week. The medal was Liam's favorite part.  The coach hadn't even put the medal on his neck before Liam told him 'now I have two medals!!'.  

We have so much fun watching him play, and are proud of him for demonstrating respect this week!  

 Pretty smart marketing on the part of i9, right?  We proudly show our neighbors that our child won an award, and advertise for them at the same time!  

Sweet moment

On Sunday afternoon, the boys were playing outside, and when I saw this cute moment of them sitting next to each other in the garden, I grabbed my camera to get some good shots.  

I snuck up on them, totally expecting this cute moment to pass and whatever they were looking at to scamper or slither away.

I was shocked when I was getting close and they hadn't noticed me yet.  I thought they must have caught something really cool.

How sweet are they with Karsten's arm around Liam and Liam leaning into Karsten.

They're going to be sad when they can't dig for bugs in the garden in just a few short weeks.

Imagine my suprise when I discover they were enthralled with a movie on Scott's phone.  He was working in the backyard and left his phone unattended.

It was still a pretty sweet moment of them, and Scott and I had a good laugh about what they were actually doing. These silly boys keep us on our toes!

Wordless Wednesday - BeadOs

My monkeys

We enjoy having dinner together as a family most evenings.  I'm not looking forward to the days where activities and other events change this tradition, so for now we try to savor every minute.  We learn all sorts of interesting things.  Tonight, Liam told us that his friend goes to a 'peach school' and asked if we thought he got to eat lots of peaches there.  It took us a minute, but we figured out that his friend was really going to 'speech school'. 

Getting Karsten to talk about his day is tricky, he often 'doesn't remember' anything.  We ask a lot of questions and can usually piece together some information; however, I always wonder what we're missing!  Last week, I went to a mom's night out with some of the kindergarten moms, and the mom of one of his friends told me the boys have a game where they pretended to take their friend's name.  So, the next morning when I woke Karsten up for school, I said 'good morning, Lane!' He's usually tough to wake up (like me), but when I said that his eyes flew open and I got a big smile!  He asked how I knew to call him Lane and I reminded him that Mommy always finds out about things.  Thank goodness for the great community at his school, this has been true so far!  

 After dinner tonight, both boys wanted to sit on Scott's lap and they started being silly, so I snapped a few photos.  

I love that everyone is smiling in this one!  Success!  

Since they had a 'good' picture, they wanted a silly picture as well.  Scott said 'touch your nose' and he meant 'touch your nose with your tongue', but Liam didn't know that.  Liam was like, this isn't silly!  LOL hilarious!

Karsten was working on an art project for school (more to come when it's done), and Liam decided he was going to draw a picture of daddy and mommy kissing.  Interesting choice, but okay.  I'm the red person below, I apparently have green hair and grey eyebrows and am leaning away from Scott, the yellow guy.  Liam is the green and orange guy standing next to us in the house.  We have quite the budding artist!

Just a simple Tuesday night at our house!  

Essential Oils

For several years we've been working hard to cut out processed food and chemicals in our home. We're trying to reduce our exposure to all of the unnecessary junk that food companies are able to add to food which could have impacts to our health. We've found that we find whole food so much more flavorful than the overly processed food we used to eat.  

Despite our best attempts to stay healthy, last fall, we caught every bug that passed us by.  Liam, Karsten and I all had strep throat (Karsten had it twice!), as well as a host of other bugs. Several of the food and wellness blogs I follow talk about use of essential oils to support your immune system.  I had done a bunch of research, and when a friend from high school reached out to share information about essential oils, it seemed like the right time to learn more.

After meeting with her, I jumped in and ordered a starter kit with 11 oils and a diffuser.  It arrived at the right time because Karsten had just gotten a stomach bug and we were hoping to keep it isolated to him.  We diffused oils and applied them topically to help support wellness for Scott, Liam and I.  I'm happy to report that we made it through that round of sickness without anyone else getting sick.

Since then, we all apply oil to our feet on a nightly basis to help support our immune system.  We regularly diffuse oils which help keep our home smelling great without the health risks associated with scented candles.  I even use a few essential oils daily as a perfume.

I'm totally sold on the benefits of essential oils.  I could ramble on and on about the ways we're using them to support our family's overall wellness, but I don't want to bore you.  When I started using essential oils in December, I had no intention of sharing this info with my friends and family.  I thought you all would think I'd finally lost it and gone too far with the healthy stuff.  But now that I've seen the benefits we've experienced, I want to share essential oils to help you too.

I'm having an Essential Oils class at our house on April 24th.  If you're in the area and interested in learning more, let me know, I would love to have you!  We'll have mimosas and snacks, so it's sure to be a fun afternoon.  If you're not local and want to learn more, message me and we can chat.  I can send you a sample or two to try out.

Mother Son Dance

Karsten's school had it's first annual Mother/Son dance this year and it was a big hit!  I asked Karsten if he wanted to go to the dance and he quickly said NO!  I asked a few other moms if they were going to the dance, and when I reported back to Karsten that all of his friends would be there, he was in!

We went to dinner at a nearby mexican restaurant before the dance.  Don't our dates look handsome?

I wasn't sure if I would get a photo with Karsten in the dance, so we snapped a selfie in the car.

I loved that the organizer had a photo backdrop as well as a sign with the event!  Such a great idea!

At school, all of the boys wrote why they loved their mom on a 'baseball'.  Karsten's said 'I Love Mom'.  And he willingly posed with his baseball, I was so impressed!  This was my lucky night!

These boys had such a fun night together.  I think I spent a good portion of the night hunting for my date to try and get him to dance with me since the boys were having so much fun running around and playing!  At the end of the night, I took a photo of a friend and her boys, then a few of Karsten's friends were posing on the photo backdrop.  I told them I would take their photos if they went and got the other boys, I wasn't sure if it would work, but sure enough, a bunch of them came back!  Lucky me!

I'm not sure why this photo is rotated, but it's being stubborn and will not change for me.  This is their batter pose.

Here is the catcher pose.

The photos were the perfect end to a fun night, I'm glad we'll have these to help remember how much fun Karsten had at the dance!  I may need it to remind him for next year!

A parade

Scott and I were doing dinner dishes and the boys were having a parade. Karsten had his rolled up paper from children's church and Liam has his superhero sword stuck in his shirt as if it were a holster.  It was a pretty festive parade!  

Wordless Wednesday - Trying on Mommy and Daddy's Glasses

Sunday Errands

After church on Sunday, the boys and I were going to a hardware store to buy stone for a project in our backyard.  The location I had plannd to go to was closed, so we ended up going to a different location further away.  The boys were fantastic and very well behaved.  

After we picked up the stone, it was past lunchtime, so my idea of going back home for lunch was shot.  We ended up eating at a little italian deli in Brookside.  Karsten was saying how good his sandwich was and accidently knocked over his cup of water.  Before I could go find more napkins to clean up, there was a guy at the table helping me mop up the flood.  So nice!  

After lunch, I realized we were super close to a new tea shop I had discovered.  I promised the boys this would be our last stop, and we piled out of the car to get some loose leaf tea.  The store was sampling a berry herbal (aka caffeine free) tea, so Karsten got to try it.  I offered some to Liam, but he still refuses to drink anything except water, so he said no.  Karsten thought we needed some of 'his' tea to enjoy at home, so it looks like we may be adding a new tea fan to our house! 

As a reward, we stopped to get some ice cream on the way home and the boys chose waffle cones.  Little did I know the waffle cones would be giant - the boys were SO excited!  

After showers, Karsten practiced his reading with Liam.  He read a Pete the Cat book and while Liam enjoyed the story, he quickly lost interest since Karsten read more slowly than we do.

We're excited that Scott comes home tomorrow!

When Daddy is away

Scott went to a conference this weekend, so the boys and I were on our own.  We decided to go out for pizza at dinner on Saturday night.  The giant sheet of paper on the table was perfect for the dot game.  The dot game was a favorite of mine when I was little - I remember playing it a lot with Gaga!  The boys have differing interpretations of the rules which made the game a bit contentious.  In the end, we decided to end the game and just draw on the paper.  

During dinner, we got a text from Scott with a picture of a whaleshark at the aquarium where he had gone to an evening event.  This was Karsten's reaction - he wanted to be there and see the whaleshark with Scott!  

Liam had a different reaction - he didn't think it was fair for Scott to see the whaleshark without him!

Baseball for Liam

Liam didn't love playing soccer, so we decided to try t-ball this year.  His friends John and Vivienne are on the same team, and their dad is the coach.  While Liam writes with his right hand, he does a lot of other things with his left hand.  He wanted to wear his glove on his left hand (guess we need a lefty glove!), so I suggested to the coach that he help him try and hit left handed. 

They had a thirty minute practice then a game.

Each kid got five chances to bat and Liam hit it every time he was up to bat!

When Liam's team was up to bat, I was the first base coach to remind the kids to run to first base.  When we saw that some of the kids would skip second base, we sent Karsten to be the second base coach and make sure the kids made it to second base.

It will be fun to watch Liam play this season - hopefully he will enjoy it!

Slithery friends

The neighbor boys found a snake and a salamander and were excited to show the boys. 

They very politely asked if I would like to hold the snake - my response was a quick NO!

Liam was brave and held the snake first.

Karsten refused at first, but when Liam held it, Karsten decided to give it a shot.

My neighbor kindly offered to let us take the snake home with us, but thankfully the boys weren't within earshot when she said this and the snake stayed safely at their house!