Daniel’s Pre-K Graduation

It’s been a big week of milestones for our family.  Today, Daniel had his Pre-K graduation ceremony at school.  It was beyond cute.  First, all the kids performed some summer songs on the big stage.  The songs included the very popular “Florida Alphabet” and “If All of the Raindrops” – my personal favorite.  Daniel even wore a cap (no gown) for the graduation part.  He walked across the stage to greet his teacher, Ms. Michelle.  She gave him a bible and a graduation certificate.  He was so proud. We had to wade through the sea of parent paparazzi to get our video and photos.

We gave Daniel some new Richard Scarry books as a congratulations.  He was so excited.  My boy loves books.  And he loves Richard Scarry books.

We all went out for a family lunch at Chili’s.  It was Daniel’s pick.  Because they have the crazy blue blast drink there, of course.

Congrats to my super silly, super smart, super awesome little man.  I love you oh so much.

Easter ’11: Part One

This was Daniel LAST Easter.  (Please note the enormous blue and purple Easter egg bump on his forehead.)

And this was Daniel THIS Easter.

 

Please note the ginormous laceration across his cute forehead.  It’s the annual Daniel Easter curse.  This was the THIRD Easter we took Daniel to the ER.  The first time was when he was 7 months old and we were visiting my parents in Maryland.  It was Easter morning and we were all getting ready for church service.  I was changing Daniel’s diaper on the bed.  I turned around to grab his Easter outfit from the dresser and in that one, two, three seconds, BAM, he rolled off the bed and fell on the floor.  Luckily it was a short twin bed and there was a carpet, but I was a first time Mama. I panicked and so did Hubbie.  I had images of scrambled egg brain in my head.   I told my husband if Daniel ended up with a learning disability I would never forgive myself. That was an extreme reaction, yes, but I could not believe this was happening to ME.  I mean, I was not that Mama who let her kid just roll off a bed onto the floor.  And here I was.

We took Daniel to the ER.  I think one of the scariest moments was when the doctor separated us to get the story of how Daniel hit his head.  It was to rule out child abuse and I found out later that it’s standard procedure.  I was crying pretty hard so Hubbie handled most of the questions and the examination.  They felt Daniel’s head and checked his eyes and all the other vitals.  He was fine.  He was just a tired little baby that wanted to take a nap.  We felt justified taking him to the ER because we had to board a plane back to Florida that afternoon and what if he passed out while were were miles in the air?  I held him in my arms the entire flight.  He slept with a smile on his face.  I fought back tears the entire 2 and 1/2 hours.  It traumatized me for about a month.

I guess we were in the clear in 2008 and 2009.  Then it happened again in 2010.  Daniel was running around and fell on our hard kitchen tile.  I don’t think he put his hands out because there was just a slip and a fall and a cry and it was so fast.  When we ran to him I just saw the giant blue bump form before my eyes.  I had never seen something like that in my life.  We grabbed ice and asked him a million questions to ensure he knew who he was and where he was.  Hubbie took him right to the ER. The doctors checked him out and said he was fine and he came home in time for Easter dinner.  But then I had to stare at that yucky bump for over a week.

Last Friday was Good Friday and Daniel had off from school.  He was invited to a play date at a friend’s house.  I dropped Annabel off at her GG’s so I could have some girl chat with the ladies. We took a quick tour of the beautiful home and then the three boys went to play.  The moms camped out with drinks in the living room.  The boys moved from the living room to the bedroom playing with all the cool toys.  There were stairs.  Daniel refused to take off his Crocs.  I always insist “no shoes in the house” but the nice Mom said it was OKAY.  LET HIM BE.  HE’S HAVING FUN.  LET HIM BE.  Sometimes I don’t trust my gut.

I don’t know if the Crocs were to blame, but on the way down the stairs for the third time that morning Daniel missed the last step.  I didn’t see this, but that is what he told me.  I heard someone fall on the hard tile and then I heard Daniel’s cry.  I felt like I was moving in slow motion and then I saw it. Blood.  All over his face.  His hands.  Down the front of his shirt.  My heart fell to my stomach.  We thought he broke his nose.  But after wiping him down with wet paper towels and baby wipes we found out it was a big cut on his forehead.  We took him to the ER.  AGAIN.  I know this wasn’t exactly EASTER, but close enough for me.  I could not believe it was happening AGAIN.

Hubbie met us there and I did the hand off.  He’s better than me with this stuff.  He’s calmer.  I really was proud of myself though. I was pretty calm.  I was urgent, but I was calm too.  The ER doctor put Daniel’s forehead back together with skin glue.  It’s pretty amazing stuff.  Daniel was ready to leave the moment we got there.  He kept saying, “I’m FINE.”  He’s a brave kid.  And he has a very high tolerance for pain. He just wanted to go home.  He said it didn’t hurt.  Well, I sure felt a little broken inside.

Easter Sunday was actually really nice and drama free.  I’ll post photos and notes tomorrow.  Unfortunately, yesterday, Daniel had an allergic reaction to that glue adhesive.  The cut became puffy and red so last night at 8 PM we went back to the ER.  The same doctor took off the glue and replaced it with four steri strips across his forehead.   The doctor said he was healing well.  Now we just have to watch for the scar.

SO, Easter 2012?  I’m considering a three day movie fest.  On the couch.  All day long.  No one moves.  No one gets hurt.  I’m breaking this curse, darn it.

It’s Friday, Friday

Happy Friday!  Yahoo!!

And do you know WHY I’m so happy?? Well….

1.  Grey’s Anatomy ROCKED LAST NIGHT.  (I may be in the minority here, but I thought it was just awesome.)

2. I survived Spring Break week with both kiddies at home!  We had some great adventures:  bike rides, park fun, lunch at Panera, a bookstore visit, library craft day, and a perfect rainy afternoon watching Tangled on DVD. We ended the week at the MOSH in downtown Jacksonville.  Here they are goofing around in the indoor tree house.

3. I’m going out to Happy Hour with the hubbie tonight!  I don’t know the last time I went out for Happy Hour.  It was definitely pre-kiddies.

Finally, I leave you with the biggest viral video of the week.  It now has over 72 million views on YouTube! It’s Rebecca Black singing “Friday.”  Very appropriate.   She’s only 13 years old and I think she’s pretty darn awesome too.

Soccer

Daniel’s soccer season starts this week.  His very first team practice is tomorrow evening.  We are all very excited.

Daniel was excited to buy the cleats and shin guards.

Facing My Fears: Sugar Cookies

I’m not a good cook.  My hubbie is the cook in our family, or, rather, he is the CHEF.  He’s amazing and I’m not motivated to go head to head with his skills.  It’s fine by me.  I like to bake. Sometimes.

Now that Bean is in preschool he is anointed with the “star of the week” title about 3 times during the school year.  As part of the fun, he has to bring in a toy and a book to share each day.  He loves it.  He gets to show off his collection of trucks and cars and books that he loves to read.  On Friday, he has to bring in a special snack to share with the class.  When I think “snack”, I think apple slices or peanut butter crackers or popcorn.  But I quickly learned that when the kids think “snack” it means cupcakes, cookies or brownies.  SUGAR, basically.  In the fall we made cupcakes with leaf sprinkles.  They were a hit!  Yahoo! This time Bean wanted to make sugar cookies.

I loved the idea because the letter they were studying last week was “S.”  So we decided to make SUGAR cookies in the SHAPE of STARS with SPRINKLES!

Easy, right?  Well, not for me, the amateur baker mom.  I know I need to amp up my baking skills since I soon will have TWO kiddies in school.  I didn’t go all homemade but I did buy the sugar cookie package instead of the “bake and break” variety.

The tough part turned out to be the star shapes.  The dough was a bit sticky so pushing the cookie cutters on the dough and then trying to lift up each individual star shape was not working.  Bean and I used our creative skills and made each one directly on the cookie sheet.  It took longer, but it worked!

I found this recipe for the sugar cookie icing.  I give it two thumbs up.  The icing was smooth and shiny.  We used paint brushes to spread on the icing.  That was super fun for Bean.  I personally love, love, love the almond taste and it did not overpower the sugar icing too much either.  Then we quickly tossed on the sprinkles before the icing dried and Voila!  All done!

Since I always anticipate a hiccup when I’m cooking or baking, I decided to use crafty packaging in order to make the cookies SEEM more delicious.   I bought the cellophane bags from Hobby Lobby (my new favorite place) and tied them with ribbon. Each kid would get one star cookie and then we bundled extra cookies together for the teachers.  Then put everything in a fancy basket and there is no way they could be bad.

The cookies actually DID taste good, despite a nightmare I had which involved all the kids throwing their cookies back at Daniel and demanding a cupcake instead.  That didn’t happen at all.  In fact, Daniel said some of the kids asked for seconds!  Awesome! Always leave them wanting more.  I now have 8 weeks to figure out my next sugary creation.

Daniel the Daredevil

My son Daniel loves to be a daredevil. He already had two staples in his head from slamming into the wooden foot part of our sofa. My hubbie was home watching the kids and said Bean was dancing on the couch and just fell. Great. I love that he has no fear, but my heart pounds every time I watch him run up to that jungle gym in our park. Or take off on his Spider-man bike. Or even cruise around the corners in our house.

Luckily, he has a safe, padded outlet to go crazy in for 90 minutes each week. Here’s Bean at the My Gym.

Laugh for, I mean, see for yourself.

Bo

Fair

We went to the Jacksonville Fair last week and it was the perfect adventure to display my kiddies’ unique personalities.  Daniel is the daredevil who wanted to go on every single ride, including the super big Ferris wheel.   He was in awe the entire time.  He loves to figure out how things work.   My husband loved the view of the football stadium. (Go Jags!)

Annabel screamed with glee when she saw all the crazy fair food.   She hung onto that popcorn bag the entire time.  And her favorite part of the fair was dancing to all the hip hop music that was blasting from the speakers of that Himalaya ride. (Okay, I liked it too.)

On a side note, and somewhat related to all the fair food consumption, I am now on a diet.  I HATE to say diet, so I will change that to: I am now choosing better foods to eat and I will also exercise more.   My last hurrah was that yummy funnel cake at the fair.  Hopefully now that I’ve put this down in writing, I will actually stick to it.  My goal is to be down a pants size by my February birthday.  And, yes, I know the holidays are coming.  This is gonna be hard. (Oh how I heart you, pumpkin pie.)

Sushi

Daniel’s very first piece of sushi.  A California Roll from the grocery store.  Yummy avocado, crab stick, and cucumber covered with brown rice.

Baby steps for my little foodie.

Giraffes and Ice Cream Cones

For our Friday night date night, the hubbie and I went to the zoo for their annual “Brew at the Zoo” charity event.  The highlight was (surprisingly) not all the free beer and food samples.  The highlight for me was some alone time with these tall guys and gals.

I love giraffes.  I love them because they are tall like me.  I think their skin color is breathtaking.  I was able to feed a giraffe but darn my camera phone.  The photo came out really blurry.  I need a new phone, but that’s a story for another day and a wish for Christmas.  But I did get this cool shot.  Check out her huge tongue!

On Saturday night we all went out for a family dinner at The Cheesecake Factory.  I was craving some avocado egg rolls.  And a glass of pinot.   The kids love the bread basket and they split the pasta dish from the kids menu.  (That was a tip from our waiter and he was right. It was an enormous portion.)  We walked over to the ice cream parlor for dessert. We ate our drippy cones outside on a bench while the sun was setting. 

Annabel was done first and opted to do a little light reading while she waited.

You gotta love Florida.   We’ll still be hanging outside in our T-shirts and shorts (and Hello Kitty skirt sets) for at least another month.  Happy October.

Fall TV: Lone Star

My husband works in radio so he gets some really cool promotional items sent to his office.

We had a lot of fun with this Glee cardboard locker last year.

Last week he brought home this:

It’s a cardboard suitcase from the new Fox TV show Lone Star.  I don’t know why the promotional item is a suitcase.  I didn’t get a chance to watch Lone Star yet.

And now I won’t be able to watch it….because it’s been CANCELED.  After only TWO EPISODES!

My TIVO has been on fire lately with all the new Fall TV shows I have recorded.  I was going to record Lone Star because of all the positive early reviews. 

But then I forgot.

And now it’s too late.  I guess a part of me is glad because I just don’t think I can fit one more new TV show to my “must watch” list. 

(BTW, check out THIS list of the top 25 TV shows that ended too soon - according to Entertainment Weekly.)

Bean is now using the Lone Star cardboard suitcase as a bed for his trusty pal Blue Dog.

RIP Lone Star.

I wonder what’s next??

Quick Poll: What do you predict is the next show to get canceled? Leave a comment below.

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