Thinking Outloud

Yesterday I was telling you all about the search and rescue mission I needed to go on to try to find my son’s sneakers and how when I did finally find them, they really weren’t much good to him.  So yesterday after work my husband stopped at the store and purchased him a new pair of sneakers, my daughter a new pair and both of them a new spring jacket.  Needless to say after all this spending, he came out of the store a little poorer than when he first walked in.  But it was things that the kids really did need, so the money had to be spent.

They both looked so cute and proud when they headed off to school today in their new spring gear.  So the spent money was totally worth it.

Last night I started routing through every closet in the house to try to find my son’s sneakers. They were put away for the winter and now with all the snow gone, it’s time for him to stop wearing the winter boots. I spent a lot of time looking for his sneakers and when I finally did find them, I was highly disappointed in the shape they were in. He did go to school today with them on, but over the weekend we are going to have to get him a new pair of sneakers to wear back and forth to school.

I’m really thinking that what this child needs is a pair of Dansko so that they will last more than three months of wear and tear. My son is extremely hard on his footwear and I have to the realization that he really needs a good sturdy set of footwear for his everyday use.

I feel so bad for  my little guy.  Every time you turn around he is getting sick.  Most of the time it’s just a simple cold that he needs to work through but lately these colds have been turning into so much more.  In December he started out with a cold that turned into an ear infection, then in March he had a cold that ended up being phenomena.  Well here it is the first of April and he has another cold.  Because his colds usually end up becoming a more serious problem, I have made him a doctor’s appointment for later this afternoon.  Better to be safe than sorry.  Hopefully he can get some medicine and be on the road to recovery soon.

My  daughter  is really starting to enjoy her violin lessons.  They have now begun working on the fun stuff like playing songs so she is really starting to get into it.  Getting her to practice at home is still requiring a lot of patience on my part, but things are starting to  improve.

In the month of April, she has three different violin events coming up and she has one more performance event in June.  She has her fiddle-a-thon, a competition and the spring extravaganza in April and then has a retirement party for a teacher to prepare for in June.  With all these concerts and events coming up in the near future it gives her a purpose to practice hard.   And now that she it totally caught up with her class (she missed a lot of time before Christmas due to a serious illness) and can play everything they can, she is having the time of her life.  So much in fact that she has decided to stick with it for many more years to come.

I can’t be more proud of her than I am right now and I am really looking forward to seeing all her performances.

I don’t know what I was thinking a few months back.  I decided that I would finally use up all my scrap pieces of yarn and make my daughter a homemade knitting afghan.  It was a great idea at the time.  But, I never realized what type of work would go into one of these and I honestly have to wonder if I’m ever going to get it done.

I usually knit in the evenings while I’m watching TV.  The particular pattern I chose was to make 70 individual blocks of six and a half inch squares.  One square (if I knit constantly) takes me a day.  Then I have to sew all the pieces together and then crochete a border.  I think when it’s finally completed it’s going to be a very funky and interesting piece.  My daughter loves it already.  But, I am still wondering if I’m ever going to see a completed product.  Then my son wants one for his bed (all boy colors) as well.  So even when I see the end of this project.  It’s really not the end.  But I have been making some progress and here are some pics so you can all see how far I have gotten.

Although the kids are just getting over a long weekend, my youngest son was looking forward to another long weekend next weekend.  This coming Friday the kids were supposed to be home from school due to parent teacher conferences.  But, because they have missed so much school time over the last few months due to bad weather, the schools have decided to cancel all parent teacher conferences for Friday and have a regular class day instead. 

This information has been on the radio all day and I just received a talk mail confirming it.  Needless to say my youngest son was not impressed and still has a sour look on his face when I remind him that he has to go to school on Friday.  This information did not bother my daughter, but it sure did bother him.

The kids have been invited to a birthday party afternoon.  We are going, but this really isn’t a party I am looking forward to.  The party is for a one year old that obviously the kids don’t play with (they are 7 and 9).  But, they are our neighbors so that is why I’m taking the kids over. 

The one thing I don’t understand is why do some parents insist on inviting every child in the neighborhood even if the kids aren’t friends or don’t play together.  I have to wonder if this mother expects that when it’s my kids birthdays that I will invite her kids to their parties.  I don’t really think that is going to happen.  But, the kids did hear her invatation and they do want to go, but I think this will be the last one of these kinds of birthday parties that they will be attending.

Happy long weekend to you all.  Today is Good Friday, but there really isn’t much going on in our household today.  My husband, who was supposed to be off, was called out to work this morning.  And, as he had to travel quite a distance to the job site, he will proablybe gone most of the day.  So that leaves me and the two kids home alone all day.  So I think we will have a quite day today doing crafts and playing around on the computer.  Although this may sound quite boring, sometimes having days like today can be an excellent day to just unwind and recharge the batteries.  We do have quite a busy weekend ahead of us, so having a quiet day sounds like a great idea to me.

Having two young kids at home, it’s starting to get pretty expensive for all the birthday parties that they get invited to. One of the kids is in grade 4 and the other is in grade 2 and both get invited to a lot of birthday parties in the run of a year. Then you have to account for neighbors parties and family birthdays as well. This can begin to get quite expensive as you need to purchase a gift, a gift bag or wrapping paper and a card. So I have been looking at possible sites where I could purchase some personalized birthday cards for these numerous parties.

One area where I can save some money but still give out acceptable birthday cards is by ordering personalized Birthday Cards from cardsdirect.com. While visiting their site, I discovered that they have a lot of ready made cards available, but they also give you the option of having your cards personalized as well. Their prices are extremely competitive to other sites that sell similar products and their site is extremely user friendly. If you find yourself purchasing a lot of birthday cards in the run of year and would like to check out a site where you can purchase fairly inexpensive personalized birthday cards, then I highly suggest that you check out this site. Just check out the following picture of a card that you can order from their site.

My youngest son got off the school bus this afternoon extremely excited. One of the programs that he’s involved with ended today and they had a pizza party. I really wish that I had of known that the teacher was going to do this. I wouldn’t have sent a lunch today had I known. But, he seemed to enjoy his party. He had three pieces of pizza, two cookies, three pieces of licorice and five glasses of pop. I guess you now know why he got off the bus bouncing. lol

This is one of the reasons why I love this school so much. It’s because of all these little surprises that they are always bestowing upon the kids for a job will done. And, as an added bonus, I didn’t have to make him any supper tonight, he ate his school lunch.