A Trip To The Zoo

Several months back I mentioned that the girls sold enough Girl Scout cookies to be a part of the 500 club. Saturday was the 500 club outing at a zoo up in Delaware. The girls and I got up bright and early and started the almost 2 hour drive to get there. It went by fairly quickly since we had the portable DVD player along and were watching episodes of Gilmore Girls. (We are up to season 6)
It was a fairly small zoo so it didn't take too long to check out all the animals. There were mostly small animals like monkeys and birds and such.

Here is a Capybara. To me it looks like a big gerbil and the sign says they are the largest rodent in the world. EW Makes finding a mouse in your house not seem so bad.















Here is a pretty good picture of the tiger. Most of the time it was just laying around in the sun but we happened to walk past when it was walking around.

This is the sloth when it was actually moving around and looked up.













Here are a few pictures of the llamas.















The girls got to pet the goats. Rebecca especially thought this was pretty cool.















They all seemed to like the iguana the best. Not really sure why but they all stayed at that cage the most. Teresa in particular seemed to adore it. And how does she show her adoration? By antagonizing it. Yep you read that correctly.















See this sign? My daughter spent ages nodding her head at the iguana before it finally nodded back at her. Of course being the responsible adult, I recorded the whole thing made her stop.




We finally decided it was time to head home and called it a day.
It then took me two days to actually sit down and write out this post. We have been way too busy!

Back To School Shopping

Ok, Ok, Ok. I know it's still the current school year and it's not quite time for back to school. But today was the used uniform sale at Jaquelyn's school for next year. There is only one store that sells the uniforms for her school....for any school within about an hour of Baltimore actually. So they are of course quite expensive since they have no competition.
Lucky for us, our school holds a used uniform sale towards the end of the year. So this year, Jaquelyn changes uniforms. From K-4 through 4th grade they wear either the jumper or the matching shorts, as seen here. These can be worn with the white or green polo shirt, short or long sleeves, white or green turtleneck or peter pan blouse.




















Next year, when she moves up to 5th grade she gets to upgrade to the kilt and oxford blouse, white or blue, again short or long sleeved. She also has to start wearing a gym uniform next year consisting of shorts, shirt and sweatsuit.
As I am looking at the order form for Arhtur's (the uniform shop) I am realizing that shopping for back to school is going to be extremely pricey next year. Then I hear about the uniform sale. Just my thing...saving money! So here's what it all boils down to. I priced all the items she needed and added it up...close to $200!!! YIKES!

I am happy to say we only spent 1/4th of that today. Can you give me a WOO HOO!!! I bought one complete gym uniform, a pullover sweater, a white long sleeve oxford, a blue short sleeve oxford, her kilt and a new matching headband all for a mere $49. Now all I will need to do in the fall is get her some new socks & shoes and she will be ready to roll. Here is what she will be sporting this fall for school. I can't believe my little girl is growing up so fast. Sniff, sniff.

I'm A Friday Freebie Winner!

Updated: I should probably mention to comment on her vlogemo post from today. In case anyone was wondering. Probably not.


My favorite blogger Heidi has a weekly contest called the Friday Freebie.


A few weeks ago I was lucky enough to be a winner. Then on top of that, she was nice enough to host a second contest for anyone who left a comment on my blog. I was so excited to get all those comments. She is such a great gal and I really love reading her blog. She is a terrific writer.

So I told her that I would blog about the stuff she sent me. She claims that is was a lame prize but I love all the different things she sent. It was such a cool box with a little something for everyone.
















The box contained the following:

a magnetic froggy notepad
a book called Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled
a Magic 8 ball
some tattoos
a pack with shampoo, conditioner and gel
some bandaids
some Triaminic cold strips
a bottle of Tylenol
a box of Twilight candy
some various other candies...sour patch kids, swedish fish, chocolate coins, etc
a microwave apple dipper....can't wait to try that out
2 CD-ROMs for the kids
and last but not least...a roll of toilet paper.

Is that a cool box of stuff or what?!! In return for her wonderful generosity I would like to host a contest in her honor. I want everyone to go and read her blog and give her some bloggy love in the form of lots of comments. I have a prize in mind but I may add some things to it when I actually send it out. I will announce the end of the contest eventually but until then it's fair game...comment as often as you like. Have fun!!

Here's a little sneak peek at the main prize.

Wordless Wednesday - August 2007

Worst Blogger

I probably deserve the "worst blogger" award for not posting in four whole days but you will all just have to get over it. Not trying to be mean, we just had a relaxing, fun, chill out kind of weekend. There really wasn't anything worth blogging about. I will fill you in on the few things we did do.
We hit the thrift shop on Saturday. Spent Sunday and Monday cleaning the garage out. Whoopie. I will eventually post pictures of the before and after garage mess but we haven't actually made it to after yet so those will have to wait until we actually get to after. It does look tons better though. We even have enough room to put up our ping pong table in the middle if I don't pull my van inside. That should keep the kids slightly busy this summer.
I am always looking for new things to keep them busy during the long summer months. The younger two especially along with the three neighbor kids who are usually hanging with them. We have a swing set, volleyball/badmitton net, lots of chalk, roller blades/skates, tons of jump ropes....that's all I can think of off the top of my head. We have bikes too but since my practically ten year old still can't ride hers that doesn't help. We picked up a small bike with training wheels last week at a yard sale for $3 and I am hoping being able to use a smaller bike might help with the learning process.
Now that I am pretty much just rambling on, I will say adieu to you and you and you.

Jaquelyn's Latest Trip To The Orthodontist

My sweet 9 year old is a tongue thruster. What is that you ask? That is when the child thrusts their tongue between their teeth every time they swallow. The resulting mouth is very similar to a thumb sucker. Her top and bottom teeth do not touch in the front....not by a long shot. Back in December, the orthodontist put something called a "tongue crib" into her mouth to discourage her from the thrusting of the tongue. Tuesday was her appointment to see how she is progressing. Not so well. It is helping mildly and the gap between top and bottom teeth has lessened slightly but not like the dr. would like. What is the next step you ask? I'm going to tell you even if you didn't ask...since it's my blog and all. The tongue crib was just some metal loops behind her front teeth to try to "corral" her tongue behind it.
Exhibit A:



















To try to really keep her tongue back there, the orthodontist clipped each loop and pointed them back towards her tongue. So that each time her tongue touches it, it gets poked. I can see how this would help since it must hurt quite a bit....or maybe I just think that because my daughter hasn't stopped whining about it since Tuesday. To the point that Tuesday night she said she wasn't going to eat until it came off. (Yeah, I was believing that...her next appointment isn't until September)
She has since gotten over that and is back to eating anything and everything we put in front of her. I am hoping this does the trick because the next step is a full metal mouth of braces and some sort of head/neck gear and/or rubber bands to pull her teeth towards each other. Not that I don't see her in braces eventually anyhow but that's besides the point.

It's The Last Day Of Preschool

Today was Rebecca's last day of preschool. She has really enjoyed her time there and I am sure she will love it next year too. Her teachers were terrific and she looked forward to each day there and even wanted to go on non-school days.
This month her teachers put some chrysalises in a cage for the kids to observe. Luckily, they all turned into butterflies this week. As part of their closing ceremony, they went outside and released all the butterflies. It was a great ending to a great year.

Prom Pictures

The Weather Stinks & It's Prom Time

The weather in our area is just plain stinky!!! Once again, my day of fun was canceled due to the rotten, lousy, no good weather. The worst part is each evening it has been gorgeous but it's too late then. So I guess you will all have to put your ideas on the back burner until I am able to reschedule sometime way in the future. Sorry.
On to bigger and better things. Tonight is....PROM! Yes I know I don't mention the older kids as often since they are, yk "way too old for blogging stuff", as they love to say, but I do have a daughter old enough for prom. It was very hard for us to break down and allow to her to get to this age but no matter how we tried, we could not manage to freeze the girls so they could not ever get older.
She and her boyfriend Paul left about an hour ago to go out to eat with some friends at a local diner. From there, they are getting a limo with two other couples to drive around for an hour or so and then head to the Prom Spot. I took a ton of pictures of the two of them outside our house and even at the diner when we dropped them off. I think I may even drive over to the diner when the limo is supposed to get there and take a few pics then.
I will put a post up later with lots of pictures of before and after and other such nonsense.

I Am Sooo Bummed

Ok...sniff, sniff...Bad News! The weather postponed our little outing...(there's a very small hint...it's dependent on the weather) so now we'll try again tomorrow. Hopefully we can fit it in between t-ball/softball and prom.
Updated: They called me and it is scheduled for noon tomorrow. I am very frustrated that it had to be put off but at least we were able to fit it in before Marghee left.
Sorry to drag it out but now you have more time to come up with some wild guesses.

What's Happening Today?

Today is going to be soooooo fun. I cannot wait!!! I am going to do something that I have never, ever done before. It is pretty exciting. My sister in law Marghee is here for the weekend to hang because it's prom tomorrow and she is going to join me. My neighbor is watching Rebecca and we will be back this afternoon. I will post tons of pictures and you won't believe your eyes.
Any guesses?

Contest Winner!

Updated: I am such a DUNCE!! I was in such a hurry today that I just assumed that I was spelling Heidi Ashworth's name correctly. I humbly apologize to her and beg for forgiveness. You can forgive a fellow Heidi...right? Please?


Sooooo, Heidi totally did not forget about the contest she mentioned last week. Those of you wonderful people who commented on my blog (thank you so much by the way) probably were wondering when she was going to announce the winner. Well...silly me, she asked me to do it and I forgot. I am really bad at the whole remembering thing...you can just ask my husband, he'll totally back me up on this.
Anyhow, I did that random.org thing and came up with....drum roll please.....your favorite Heidi author and mine....Heidi Ashcroft. So Heidi, all you have to do is go to Heidi's blog, get her email address and shoot her a quickie to exchange your stats. There are just a plethora of Heidi's in this here post. We are really everywhere. As you can see by the 2nd blog roll on my sidebar, we also love to blog.

It's Iron Chef Time Again!!

Heidi is having her monthly Iron Chef Blog contest and I am once again participating. Hopefully it won't be as awful as last time. Cooking is not a gift of mine by any means but I do have a potato recipe that my aunt gave me that we all adore. I would assume most people have either tried it or heard of it...but you never know so here it goes.

Cheesy Hash Browns

1 sm carton of Sour Cream
1 can of Cream soup (your choice...we use whatever happens to be on hand)
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp salt
1/4 c chopped onions
8 oz. shredded cheddar cheese

Mix these together then add
1 bag of shredded hash browns

Put into a large pan (I use 9x13 and I prefer glass)

Topping:
3/4 stick melted butter
1 cup of Crumbs...cornflake, rice krispies, whatever you prefer really
Mix together and put over the top.

Bake at 375 for 50-60 minutes and then Yummy!!

Not Me! Monday

Hello, Hello, Hello. We are once again back to the weekly fun of Not Me! Mondays. Can I hear a Yeehaw. YEEHAW!! Gotta love free therapy. This little bit of fun was created by MckMama and you can head over to her blog and check out what everyone else didn't do this week.

We did not make our 9 year old play softball on Saturday, only to find out Sunday she had broken her toe on Friday. We definitely wouldn't do something like that. Softball is not that important. We are also not trying to decide just how long she has to wait to start playing again...maybe a week? I am really not crossing my fingers that today's game is rained out so she won't even have to miss this one.

I have not gone super crazy on eBay during the past month and bought tons of stuff. And blogged about all of it. Not Me!

I did not completely forget about a load of laundry in the washer for more than 2 days. It was not totally stinky and had to be rewashed. I don't do stuff like that since I am really on top of things.

It wasn't me who forgot to order my husbands medicines last week and just finally ordered them yesterday. He will not probably run out before they come in the mail. My memory is not that bad.

It wasn't me who left the freezer (the big one out in the garage) door open just a crack...for about 6 hours...causing everything to start defrosting. It was also not me who had to take half the stuff out the next day and chip out the ice that was blocking the entire bottom causing the freezer to not work properly. This did not happen the day after I finally broke down and had the Schwan's man come to my house and deliver a gallon and a half bucket of my favorite ice cream in the world. It was not turned into ice cream soup. I did not feel like crying thinking of the money I wasted.

It is not me that has to get back into the habit of writing these things down so I will actually remember what has happened in the past week. So what did you not do this week?

Happy Mother's Day!!

Hello all! I hope you mothers out there are having a great day!

I am totally excited to have won Heidi's Friday Freebie. Yippee!!! I just looooove winning things...don't you? I don't even care that I don't know what it is....that just makes it more fun. And she is soooo sweet to bribe you all to come over and visit me. I am not above accepting any help to boost my comment totals.

Let me just tell you how my Mother's day has gone so far. It's a long story so I'll start at the beginning....
On Friday, Jaquelyn came home from school limping slightly. Being the concerned and caring mom, I asked eventually noticed right away and asked what was wrong. Long story short she was jumping and playing with no shoes on and one time when she came down her toes were curled under and they kind of...crunched. Her baby toe on her right foot was very slightly swollen and tender to the touch. No biggie right? We'll throw some ice on it and elevate it, you'll be fine in the morning.
The next morning, the toe is a bit more swollen and bruised. Dan and I discussed it and decided it was fine and off we went to softball. She had a bit of trouble walking in her cleats but actually made it on base two out of three at bats. The coach was nice enough to let her have a pinch runner once she was on first.
Fast forward to today. We discuss it again and decide that maybe it should be looked at since it is still very swollen and the bruising is spreading about 2 inches away from the injured toe. Jaquelyn and I hop in the car and drive 45 minutes to the Nighttime Pediatrics that is in Annapolis. We get there around 12:30. They can get her into x-ray at 6pm. Are you kidding me?!? You expect me to wait here for 5 1/2 hours to take a picture of a baby toe?!!?
So we head home and I decide to try the little urgent care place we pass on the way home that is right off the highway. There is no one in the waiting room. We are in and out in less than 15 minutes and headed down the road to the x-ray spot. The doctor does not think it is broken since Jaquelyn didn't make a peep the whole time he was poking and prodding at her toe area. He said if it was broken, most people would be screaming while he was doing that.
So we are at the x-ray place...again no one is there ahead of us. This is just too good to be true. I think Nighttime Pediatrics just got kicked to the curb! Plus these places are both less than 1/2 hour away. Another plus! They take a bunch of pictures and send us on our way. The doctor calls about 15 minutes later to say we have a pretty tough kid on our hands because it is broken! I won't bother to go and tell him I told you so. I'll just keep that to myself. I knew it was when it was just getting worse each day.
There is not a lot they can do but he did give us some instructions. Tape it together with another toe and wear a stiff soled shoe. Simple enough. We have Jaquelyn's cast boot from when she broke her leg in 3rd grade so that should work well (she has a bit of a klutzy side). I suppose she shouldn't be playing softball anymore but since the doctor didn't mention it...we'll see. I mean, she played on Saturday and it seemed o.k. and this time her toes would be taped together so it would be much better...right?? I would feel so bad if softball season was over for her already. Just like when she broke her leg and had to stop her ballet classes. Or when she sliced her foot open and had to have stitches right before leaving for our two week vacation in Wisconsin....where we spend the whole time playing in the water on the Mississippi River. It's just so unfair....she has rotten timing. Although I suppose there isn't a good time to do these things.
Anyhow....that's where things stand here. We are getting ready to eat a yummy dinner that Dan and Taylor prepared. And I didn't have to do anything to make it!













I hope everyone else's day is going TERRIFIC!!!

Race 4 Education

Today Jaquelyn's school had their annual "Race 4 Education". It is pretty much a walk/jog-a-thon that they have each May for a big fundraiser to end the year. Rebecca and I headed over there around 10am to help out after we were finished running errands for the coffee shop. There were three groups (Jaquelyn's was second at 10:15) of kids set up at different times throughout the morning. Each group ran for an hour around a 1/4 mile track set up around the school. The kids were each given an index card to have punched each time they made a lap. Some kids ran, some walked. It was pretty much an at-your-own-pace kind of thing. At some point, Jaquelyn decided Rebecca should go with her and then it began. By the time every group was finished and it was time to clean up, Rebecca had walked/ran over 3 miles. I was quite astonished. She did quite a bit of running but a lot walking too.











And now this is what Rebecca is up to. Out like a light!

More eBay Deals

Ok....eBay and I have been having quite the time lately. It's like a sickness. Every time I think I'm finished, I come up with some thing else we need. I have bought more in the past 30 days on eBay that I have during the years I have been using eBay.
I have my new(to me), purple, working, Dyson. (very exciting) It came yesterday and I tried it out right away. It is soooo cool.






















Jaquelyn's birthday is next month so for once I decided to be prepared and started shopping early. I picked up an American Girl Samantha doll, along with a carrying case and a ton of clothes. She is going to be super excited. She has been wanting a Samantha doll for a really long time. I got a great deal on both the doll and the clothes/case.










































I also bought some DirecTV remotes to replace the ones my wonderful children have broken. Seriously, these have got to be so cheap. I still have working remotes from more than 10 years ago from various tv's and vcr's and in less than 2 years, two of our four remotes from them are broken already. So when I checked online to see replacement costs....$15-20 per remote, plus shipping. Um...no way. I picked up 3 exact matches to our remote, unopened, for a mere $19.99, with free shipping. Way cool! I really adore eBay.


















On a side note, today is the first day I am trying out my new iPod. I just finished putting the 7th Harry Potter book on it. Wow...It takes up a LOT of memory! Hopefully it makes working out actually enjoyable...or at least tolerable.

Wordless Wednesday - My Sleepy Guy