Growing up and getting over her fears

Mary Kate took another big step in growing up...She got over her fears and sang today in church.  A solo, acapella...in front of about 400 people!  I am so proud of her.  She sang Amazing Grace after the pastor performed two baptisms.  It was so beautiful.  Enjoy the video!

Circus Act...

Did you ever go to the circus and see those people that balance all sorts of teetery things on their forehead or nose?  They get them stacked up like 10 feet high.  Its all great, but if they so much as move a millimeter one way that they shouldn't have, it ALL comes CRASHING down...That is how my life feels right now...not in a bad way, but kinda in a stressful way.  I have a huge event that I have been coordinating this year and it is on Saturday.  I love event planning and I really do thrive off of the energy and busyness...But right now, less than 48 hours out, I feel like one wrong move and everything will come .....well, you get the picture!  It is good to know that there are people out there praying for me! 

School is Cool...I think...I don't remember...

So today is the end of day three of Kindergarten.  All in all, it is going quite well.  Mary Kate loves her teacher and the playground and the computer lab where she gets to play alphabet games.  Today she got to use a computer with headphones and so she got to hear the sounds of the game as well.  She also got to play on the swing today which she didn't get to play on yesterday because they were wet from rain and she didn't get to play on Monday because everyone else was taking all the recess time on the swings.  Her teacher calls her Mary Kate, but her art teacher still calls her Mary.  I told her she would have to politely ask her art teacher to call her Mary Kate.  I am doing well all things considering.  It is so much quieter in the house during the day.  Dropping her off is hard because she is still learning her way around the school.  Parents are only allowed to walk them to the lobby and after that only kids and staff get past all the locked doors.  I LOVE this about the school, but It is hard.  I am having to trust the staff of the school to make sure my baby doesn't wander around aimlessly, and I am having to let her go and grow up and learn how to ask for help and learn her way around.  It is hard...she looks so lost and little when I drop her off.  She told me this afternoon when I asked her if she found the auditorium that she didn't, but a teacher helped her.  So someone did see that she needed help and asked her what grade she was in and led her there.  I find I am praying for her so much more than I ever did.  Isn't it funny how much more we pray when we are forced to have Faith.  The situations where I have no control are the ones I know I have to pray through.  Overall, we are all good.  It was weird to have just Brianna on Monday and it is still weird with just Bria and Chey.  Like I said, quieter, especially during nap time.  Tomorrow I start back to work with a training day.  Should be fun...it will be nice to get back to the swing of things in our normal schedule. 

Kindergarten

Mary Kate starts Kindergarten on Monday.  I am so not ready.  Tonight we have meet the teacher night which should be exciting.  It also hit me the other night that tonight is signups for the PTA and such...I am about to become a PTA mom.  YIKES!  When did I grow up?  When did my girls grow up?  The PTA is for...my mom, not me!  Don't they give away free minivans and mom jeans with your PTA membership?  Wow...I feel like an old lady...really though, it is one thing to have kids, It is entirely something else to have school age kids.  Well...ready or not...here we come, jumping into the world of school!  Feet first!  With a box of kleenex!  Pray for us!

A little redemption!

If you know my husband, it is no secret how he feels about mothers day, fathers day and valentine's day. They are hallmark holidays that are commercialized and he doesn't need no hallmark holiday to tell me or his mom or anyone how he feels about them. He can do special things for us all year round. Good thought in theory, but when life happens, the all year round appreciation and spoiling doesn't actually work out in practice. Needless to say, Mother's Day hasn't always been a pleasant day in our household. I would hope that he would do something, he would do nothing, and then I would be disappointed and have to watch EVERYONE at church and everywhere gush over how thoughtful their kids and husbands are! Well....this year he bought himself some redemption! It helps that MK is almost 5 and very excited about it! They got me the best present ever. They got me plants, dirt, seeds, and planter boxes! Not only is it something that I really wanted, but I got to spend some great quality time with Mike and both girls planting my new plants yesterday afternoon! It was great. He did some research and knew I wanted tomatoes and some herbs. He found two tomato plants that supposedly will do well planted in high heat on the porch in planters. He also remembered my herb garden attempts from a couple years ago and how hard it is to grow rosemary from seeds. My seeds never actually sprouted then. So he bought me a rosemary plant to keep going. Also he bought me basil, zuccini and summer squash seeds, carrot seeds, and moonflower seeds. I am so excited! Mary Kate is old enough now to help with it as well and excited to watch it all grow! Now to figure out how to keep all the neighborhood kids and the bunnies out of them!

some thoughts...

ok, a couple of random thoughts I was thinking today since I haven't blogged in forever, and don't feel like playing catch-up with life right now and pictures:

1. Swiffer wet jets-good idea in theory, great if you don't mind getting down on the floor and scrubbing with a clorox wipe first, best used in between moppings for floors not so dirty, not your best bet as primary mop.
   
2. Aldi-LOVE LOVE LOVE!!!! Finally have gotten the chance to go here a couple times and look at products and prices and such. I love the feeling of joyful surprise and shock when I get through the check out and it is about 20-30 dollars cheaper than I expected to pay. It is totally worth it to do as much shopping as you can here! This week I went and got 4 gallons of milk, a 3 pound bag of frozen tilapia filets, ground turkey, summer squash, apples, a half gallon of chocolate milk, two cans of soup, 6 pounds of bananas, two boxes (name brand) pop tarts, 3 avocados, two 4pks of applesauce, two bags of salad mix, two bags of shell pasta, two boxes of fiber granola bars, roma tomatoes, cottage cheese, kiwi, and eggs. I expected to pay over 50 and probably over 60. The final price: $40.31. Love it!
3. Mom's get the short end of the stick when they get sick. I am currently recovering from strep throat and have not been able to get any extra rest. No matter what happens to me, unless I am hospitalized, I still have to take care of the kids and the house. Boo...as a result, the dishes are piled up and the laundry is starting to pile up a bit. I was staying caught up on it. So now I play catch up, finish my antibiotics and pray that my inability to get any extra rest to aid my body in recovery will not cause me further harm.

I think that is it for now.

Groceries by the numbers...

So now that we don't qualify for WIC anymore I have really been focusing on getting the best prices on groceries, clipping coupons and shopping at places where I get the best prices and where they double and triple them, and focusing on what we buy and what we use so as not to waste money on groceries we won't use. I have made a couple of observations which I find interesting to say the least:

1. We go through roughly 10 gallons of milk per month. 10 gallons mostly just with MK and Bria drinking it. Mike has some (maybe 16 or so ounces a day), but mostly the girls. I haven't been drinking much milk since I started counting calories as I have a hard time justifying using 90 calories on a drink. Anyways, 10 gallons...WOW!
2. We go through seven 4-packs of yogurt...Per WEEK!!! We all have a yogurt cup every day. 7 time 4...there you go. Currently in my refrigerator we have dannonino, dannon crush cups, oikos greek yogurt, activia (both a 4 pack of yogurt and a 4 pack of drinkable yogurt), stonyfield farm fat free individual serving yogurts, and a 32 ounce dannon all natural yogurt. It sounds like a lot, but next friday I guarantee you I will be buying more. All I have to say is THANK GOD FOR GREAT YOGURT COUPONS!
3. We go through 5 1/2...yes 5 1/2 pounds of Bananas EVERY WEEK! Every week I get 2 1/2 -3 bunches of bananas and swear there is no way I will eat them all before they go bad and that I will be making banana bread. And without fail every week we eat every single one of them. I bought 5 1/2 pounds of bananas last Saturday. And as I sit here on Thursday night there is currently 1 banana, not one pound of bananas, but 1 singular banana left.
4. Between Mine and Mike's lunches for work we go through 16 cans of tuna and 12-15 cans of soup per month.
   

On the plus side, we are eating a lot less bread. We go through a loaf in about a week and a half to two weeks. I don't eat much of it and Mike doesn't eat much of it, and I can't send peanut butter and jelly to the school with the kids and they won't eat lunch meat...so bread lasts. Ok, those are my grocery insights for the night...anything your family goes through? Or tips or tricks for saving money? I have heard that Aldi has GREAT prices on milk and produce among other things. I will have to check them out sometime soon.