Recovering Chairs

Seatless chairs
Randy, a.k.a Mr. Perfectionist, hard at work.

The beautiful finished product!

A priceless family photo!

Okay, so maybe this should have been done 3 months or more ago...no maybe about it. Our dining room chairs, inherited from Randy's Grandma Ruth, were in DIRE need of new seat covers...try the seat covers were approximately 40 years old. Now, don't get me wrong, the age wasn't the problem...it was the fact that one was ripped up. And, maybe...just maybe, had been ripped up for months and months.

So, anyhoo...we finally "bit the bullet" and decided to CARPE DIEM! Therefore, after only, 2 trips to the fabric store, 1 trip to Lowe's, 1 trip to ACE hardware, and 1 minor flesh wound (mine) the chairs are DONE. And, if I may say so, they look mighty fine.

May they last another 40 years!

P.S. You HAVE to click on the family picture to enlarge the image! You don't want to miss the full effect of Reed's disgust with this photo session. Can you tell he is ROLLING HIS EYES?! The twit! Oh, by the by, this was one attempt to get a decent family picture for Christmas cards. So I'm giving you fair warning: Don't set your expectations too high!

Student of the Month

Reed's picture on the bulletin board in the Multipurpose Room.
Reed and the Principal, Mr. Flynn. The Boy's Choir performed following the
awards presentations...that is who is in the background.

On stage with his certificate.

Reed, Mommy and Grandma Jane

Reed and Daddy...don't they look great?!

Reed and a classmate were chosen as "Students of the Month" for their class. The ceremony was today. He was very happy that his Dad and his Grandma Jane could be there to see him get his certificate. We are quite proud of Reed. His teacher wrote some very nice things about him that the principal read before giving Reed his certificate. What a good kid!

Gender Roles

Reed came in my room to show off his weapons,

so I asked him to stop for a picture. This is what I got.
Cassidy had a friend over on Friday. The girls spent 4 hours playing
dress up and babies. They were SO cute!

If you watch my kids role play for very long, it is obvious there is no gender confusion going on in my house. Now, don't get me wrong, Cassidy is one tough little girl...but she is going to look good stompin' in the pond or wrestling her brother to the ground.

Aren't they cute?!?

Final Count: 17 Bluegills and 1 Giant Carp

Happy Reed...unhappy bluegill.

On Tuesday, Reed and Cassidy spent about 2 hours at Paul and Lori's house while Randy and I made a quick exploratory trip to Toys-r-Us. While we were gone, Paul took Reed fishing at the pond in the center of their subdivision.

There we were, perusing the baby doll aisle, when Randy's phone rings. On the other end is an excited Paul telling us that Reed caught a 20 pound carp on Paul's ultra-lite pole all by himself. Reed explained later that his arms really hurt by the end, but that it was totally worth it.

When I went back over there to pick up the kids...(yes, Reed was crying because he had to quit fishing - how is it I got stuck with that stinky job?!?)...the guys filled me in on the final tally...17 bluegills and 1 giant carp.

Needless to say, Reed was on cloud 9! They didn't get a picture of the carp, but we have some shots of some HUGE bluegills!

Hillsborough River State Park

The launch

A beautiful November day on a beautiful river

The hawk. I thought I had some better close up pictures, but they were all blurry.

A little blue heron and a turtle sharing a log.

Randy carried each of the kids over to inspect a

little tree frog warming up on a leaf in the sun.

The little tree frog warming up.

We spent another enjoyable weekend at Hillsborough River State Park. I must say though, it was pretty cold each night. The days were gorgeous and warm, but about 4 AM was pretty coldy! Needless to say, I slept well in my own bed last night.

I've already got the first load of laundry in the machine this morning...there is a mountain of laundry. Everything we took smells strongly of campfire, so even the blankets and such need to be washed. Yeah for me.

The only pictures I took were on our canoe trip on Saturday. We enjoyed a beautiful lazy trip up and then down a stretch of the slow moving Hillsborough River. We saw a number of interesting things, but I think our favorite was the hawk eating a snake. (If we were Aztec or Mayan, that might mean we were destined for royalty or at least royal enough for some hot cocoa.) Reed, the lover of reptiles, was quite upset that the hawk was eating a snake. In his mind, snakes are much higher on the "cool list" than hawks and, therefore, should not be prey.

I'm glad we went and glad to be home...the mark of a success camping trip. I considered, briefly, letting some of the air out of the air mattress or dripping water on Randy's pillow to make his tent experience REALLY awful in an effort to boost my campaign for a pop-up camper. But it would have upset my night sleep too so, obviously, I couldn't do it. The cold nights and restless kids did help my cause some. We'll see.

Fall Party

Working on a gift for the widows at church.
Egg relay races

Paper airplane contest

Decorating cookies

Yes, Cassidy is wearing her Halloween costume again.

Yes, I let her.

Soaking wet Reed with his prize.

The face of success!

Reed gearing up to get his apple

Randy is "showing them how to do it."

He went first...definitely the least icky place.

Randy and I hosted a Fall party for the kids from church today at our house. We invited all of the kids from Middle School and below. Before you award us too many stars for our crowns though, that really only amounts to 18 kids total. We had 4 families plus ours attend for a total of 8 kids and 9 adults. And we had a lot of fun. Bobbing for apples was the #1 hit...go figure!

Halloween: From the Beautiful to the Spooky!

Ballerina Cassidy

Isn't she just gorgeous?!?
Yes, I'm her Mom!

So cute...I had to post another picture.

Her grandmas will thank me.

The making of a mummy.

Wrapping his head.

Reed's costume was slightly labor intensive.

He was very patient as we "mummified" him.

Trick or treating at our neighbor's house.

The annual Halloween picture.

To get the full effect, you should click on the picture to enlarge it.

Halloween was so fun this year! The kids have been excited all week and were so happy to put on their costumes and go Trick or Treating! I got them all "duded up", watched them go next door and then sent them on their way...with their DADDY! Yep, I stayed home and passed out candy to other people's children. And I liked it!

It has come to my attention from past year's experiences that I have a major Trick or Treat character flaw. I'm not sure if it comes from some highly competitive gene or that I am too tightly wound(say it isn't so?!) or some combo of both, but I have to FIGHT the urge to constantly hurry the kids along so we can hit all the houses BEFORE all the other kids do!

Now, that is truly pitiful.

I don't want the candy. I don't want the kids eating the candy. But I sure don't want someone getting all of the unwanted candy before my kids can!

I told you...CHARACTER FLAW!

So, I decided it would be way more fun for all involved if "Crazy Mom" stayed home to pass out the candy and "Nice, calm, normal Dad" took the 2 cuties on their way! And I was right. I had fun...I love seeing all the costumes. The kids had BIG FUN! And Dad had fun (or was, at least, enough resigned to his fate to not complain).