Our family is growing by four feet....

No, I'm not pregnant with twins.  THANK HEAVENS!  Not that I'm against twins... my mom had twins (love you R&R), my grandma had twins, my great grandma had twins... and I really wanted twins when I was in my child-bearing years, but now that I am old and the factory is closed, no twins for me, please!

But I digress.... Our new addition is of the kitten variety.  I am not a pet person and neither is my husband.  He was raised with dogs and cats and chickens and horses and cows and I'm sure even a pig or two, but he is not a pet person.  I had a hamster when I was about three and we had a dog named Jim Morrison when I was 16 or so.  Aside from a few tries with fish, those are all the pets my family had.  We just aren't pet people.  Our kids, however, are pet people... or at least they want to be.  They have been begging for a dog or a cat since they could talk.  I have always said that we would get a pet when all of the kids could feed themselves and were potty trained and we live on a piece of property where the pet could roam (we are DEFINITELY not indoor pet people).  Well, we are almost to that point (depending on the day with the potty training) and we live on a farm, and I haven't come up with another good enough reason to postpone the pet adopting...

Having said that, we know we need a cat.  We have known we needed a cat since we moved into this house eight months ago.  We had four-legged "homesteaders" almost immediately.  We haven't had any in the house, thank goodness, but they are outside for sure and love the window well outside my daughter's basement bedroom window.

Last night while I was at Quilt Club, my sacred time away from spouse and children, I received a very excited phone call from a very excited 11-almost 12- year old girl.  "We found a kitten," she says.  "Can we keep it?" she asks.  "Ummmm...  I'm leaving now.  I'll be home in a bit and then we'll talk about it," I answer and hang up the phone.  I immediately received another call, this one from the 14-almost 15- year old son, JJ, needing a ride home from the volleyball game.  As soon as I hung up with him, the phone rang again (So much for the quiet, child/spouse-free time away for Mom.  Lucky for them the meeting had just ended.)  It was my husband this time, wanting to know how we acquired a kitten in the three days he had been out of town.  I claimed innocence on this one and immediately sent texts to our two neighbors (and by neighbors I mean the people who live closest to us - but each are a mile away, at least).  Between them they have about 20 cats/kittens and have been asking us, for months, if we needed cats (plural) at our house.

One of the neighbors texted right back and said it was her kitten and we could keep it if we want.  She thinks two kittens hopped a ride on her husbands pickup yesterday morning and disembarked when he was passing by our house.  (The other kitten is still missing.)

When I arrived home, I found my husband sitting on the porch swing, with a kitten on his lap, surrounded by three bouncing children.  John had gone out to the porch to enjoy some quiet and the cat came up and sat on his lap.  The kids all quickly followed him outside.  Earlier, Kelly, 11-almost 12, had found the cat under the jeep on our driveway and coaxed him out so she could play with him.  Kelly has always been our animal lover.  As we all sat on the porch, she begged and pleaded and pleaded and begged until it was time to go in the house and get ready for bed.  We left it at "we'll talk about it in the morning".

This morning, when we woke up at 5:00 to get the first kid off to school, the kitten meowed and meowed through the open window until John and JJ went out and played with him.  When they left the kitten meowed and meowed through the open window until the other two finished getting ready for school and ran out to play with him.  The way I see it, we have two choices... either give this one back, thereby inciting a kid riot, or give in and get a friend for this kitten, thereby giving me two more things that I'm responsible for keeping alive - UGH...there's a reason why I have silk plants in my house and why my kids learn to make their own sandwiches by age 3.



We'll probably go with the second option...  I live in the real world and know when I'm outnumbered.

(By the way, my other neighbor texted this morning and said, "you can hardly say no if it was a prayer answered."  Gee, thanks, Stephanie!)

Boredom Bottles

Back in my craft show days (a whole seven years ago - haha!), one of my best sellers was "The Boredom Bottle". (The picture above is off the internet of a journal in a jar that looks like what I used because I don't have a picture of mine - they are pretty similar, though.) I bought a jar at the dollar store or WalMart (it doesn't have to be very big - a pint or smaller will work). I copied the activities on different colors of paper and cut them apart. I folded them up and put them in the jar. Wah-lah! A Boredom Bottle. (I also had a cute little label on the front of mine, but that's not necessary - just an advertising thing I did for the craft shows.)

Because it is summer and our kids are out of school, here is the list of activities in the Boredom Bottle. I tried to make the activities the kind that you could do without having to make a trip to the store. Low cost and high fun! You know my motto - Quick, Easy and CHEAP!!!  I'm sure that with the advent of pinterest there are TONS more ideas out there, but these should get you started.

**Thumb wrestle
**Play charades
**Blow bubbles
**Juggle tennis balls
**Read a story
**Play hopscotch
**Make a paper bag puppet
**Bowling with a tennis ball and plastic bottles
**Write a letter to someone special
**Build a tower with toothpicks and marshmallows
**Sing along with your favorite songs
**Play “penny basketball” using your hands for the hoop
**Make a foil family
**Play dress up
**Make a vest out of a large paper bag
**Have a scavenger hunt (indoors or out)
**Finger paint with instant pudding
**Bake cookies
**Play “I Spy...”
**Play “Twenty Questions”
**Make a mural with sidewalk chalk.
**Make a dot-to-dot picture for someone to do.
**Play charades
**Take a walk.
**Play catch.
**Have a picnic (indoors or out).
**Have relay races.
**Have a water balloon fight.
**Put on a play.
**Make paper plate masks.
**Watercolor
**Bake cookies.
**Dance to your favorite music.
**Play “Hide and Seek”.
**Play “Red Light, Green Light”.
**Play Double Dutch with two jump ropes.
**Play hide the beanbag
**Play balloon volleyball.
**Try drawing a picture while blindfolded.
**Play Simon Says
**Make jewelry out of paper clips.
**Have a “bike wash” – it’s like a carwash but with bikes.
**Learn some magic tricks and put on a show.
**Make designs on a piece of paper using a hole punch.
**Make a Hacky-Sack-type ball and play the game – Use a funnel to fill a 7" balloon with dried beans or rice. When it’s nearly full, remove the funnel, tie the end and trim the excess. Stretch a second balloon over the first, tie the ends, making sure the knots are at opposite ends.
**Play “Froot Loop” Air Hockey – Draw a playing field (or big square) on a sheet of paper and place a Froot Loop (or any O-shaped cereal) in the center. Each child gets a drinking straw and tries to blow the cereal into the other’s goal box to score a point. The winner is the first to get five points!
**Make scratch-and-sniff water color paints – Just add 1 tablespoon water to one small envelope of unsweetened Kool-Aid and you’re ready to paint!
**Make homemade musical instruments with a comb and waxed paper or out of toilet paper rolls.
**Shine pennies – Fill a small container with vinegar. Place some unshiny pennies in the container so they are submerged. Pour some salt in and swish the pennies around. Wait about five minutes then take the pennies out. Rinse them with water and let them dry.
**Make pet rocks – Decorate a rock with paint, markers, and “googly” eyes.
**Make Ball Catchers – Using a clean, dry milk carton or laundry detergent bottle, cut the bottom off the container. Then cut a “U” shape under the handle (make sure you don’t cut into the handle). It will look like a scoop. Decorate with tape or paint markers.
**Make a mobile – Use shells, pine cones, buttons, chili peppers, whatever. Use string to make two dowels or sticks into an “X” shape. Tie the objects onto several different lengths of string. Tie the string with the objects to the dowels at all four corners and at different places along the dowels. You can also use a clothes hanger.
**Make flying saucers – Tape two paper plates together. Glue a paper bowl to the top to make a cabin for the crew. Decorate.
**Make “Glurch” – Mix ½ cup white glue and ¼ cup liquid starch in a disposable cup. Stir with a popsicle stick. Remove the Glurch from the cup and knead it until smooth. If it sticks to your hands, mix in 1 teaspoon starch. If it’s stringy, mix in ½ teaspoon glue. Store Glurch in a self-sealing plastic bag.
**Make mud bricks – Mix water in soil until it has a dough-like texture. (If soil is sandy, add one part flour to four parts soil.) Shape into rectangles and let set. Use a wet table knife to cut various size bricks. When stacking bricks, spread a fresh batch of “mortar” between the layers. Build walls, houses, cities.
**Make a piñata – Tape boxes together to make an animal. Decorate with crepe paper, feathers, leaves and tissue paper.
**Make an obstacle course (indoors or outdoors) – Crawl under chairs, through tunnels made out of boxes, walk along a curvy hose or dodge a sprinkler. Get creative!
**Make an underwater viewer – Cut the top and bottom off of a clean half-gallon milk carton. Stretch plastic wrap over the bottom and secure with a rubber band.
**Make an ocean in a bottle – Get a clean plastic soda or water bottle. Fill it halfway with water and add a few drops of food coloring. Add confetti or glitter, shells, small toys, etc. Using a funnel, fill the bottle the rest of the way with vegetable oil. Put a dab of glue around the threads on the bottle top and screw on the cap tightly.
**Make pinecone bird feeders – Cover a pinecone with peanut butter and then roll in bird seed.
**Say Tongue Twisters - try “Six slippery sliding snakes”; “Flat-fish fleets”; “This’ll sift the thistle sifter”; “She sells seashells by the seashore”.
**Go on a newspaper (or magazine) scavenger hunt – Look for things in the newspaper or magazine (such as a picture of a car, a picture of someone with brown eyes, a certain word, etc). After you’ve found the item, pass the magazine to someone else to see if they can find the same thing.
**Make Rainbow Crayons – Remove the wrappers from old crayons and put them ½ inch deep in an empty tuna cans (or a muffin tin lined with foil). Bake the crayons in a preheated 300° oven for 5-7 minutes. Watch them closely, because they melt quickly. Melt them just enough to blend the colors, but not so much that they completely liquefy and meld into one color. Carefully remove from oven and cool for about 30 minutes. When they are completely cool, remove crayons. They should pop out easily when you tap the cans with a knife. If you used the muffin tin, remove them from the tin and peel off the foil.
**See how many different shapes you can cut out of one piece of paper.
**Make Slimy Gunk – Mix equal parts cornstarch and water. If desired, add color. Have fun squishing it and watching it “melt”. Store in a sealed container in the refrigerator. This can be messy, so cover your table or floor before you begin. TIP: Dilute greatly before it is flushed or washed down the drain.
**Make Peanut Butter Play Dough – Mix together 1 cup creamy peanut butter, ½ cup light corn syrup and ½ tablespoon vanilla. Gradually add 1 ¼ cup powdered sugar. Store covered at room temperature.
**Rain painting – After sprinkling a few drops of food coloring onto a plate, put on rain gear and go outside for just a minute, holding the plate in the rain. If you want to, you can use a white crayon to draw designs on the plate before you step outside.
**Snow Spray Paint – Make several pitchers of colored water (six drops of food coloring per container). Choose a variety of “applicators” to take outside (anything with a nozzle will do including a turkey baster and a watering can). Now, paint the snow.
**Make play dough – Mix 1 cup flour, ½ cup salt, ½ teaspoon cream of tarter, 1 cup water and 1 teaspoon vegetable oil in a saucepan. Cook over medium heat until it holds together (keep mixing or it will stick to the bottom of the pan). When the clay is cool enough to touch, knead it on a floured surface, divide it into smaller balls, and add a different shade of food coloring to each ball. Store in an airtight container for weeks.
**Place a smooth board against a chair or couch to create a ramp to roll things down.
**Use masking tape on your floor or carpet to create an indoor roadway for small cars.
**Play indoor baseball with a balloon and an empty gift-wrap roll.
**Drown the penny – Place a paper towel over the water-filled glass. Wrap a rubber band around the top of the glass to hold the paper towel in place. Place the penny on the paper towel in the center of the glass. Take turns poking holes in the paper towel with a sharpened pencil. The game ends when someone drowns the penny by poking the hole that finally makes the penny sink to the bottom of the glass.
**Musical Glasses – Fill drinking glasses with different amounts of water. Lightly tap the glasses with a spoon. Try to play a song or make up your own melody.
**Try drawing a picture by holding a crayon with a clothespin instead of in your hand.
**Funny face – Look for pictures of faces in old magazines. Cut out as many eyes, noses, mouths, ears, and heads of hair as you can find. Mix them up and piece together a funny face then glue it onto a piece of paper.
**What’s for dinner? – Cut pictures of your favorite foods from old magazines. Glue them onto a paper plate.
**Make binoculars by taping two toilet paper rolls together (or a paper towel roll cut in half). Decorate them.
**Make a necklace by stringing macaroni noodles on a string. You can dye pasta by mixing ½ cup rubbing alcohol and food coloring in a bowl. Add small amounts of pasta to the liquid and gently mix. The larger the pasta, the longer it will take to absorb the color. Dry on newspapers covered with wax paper.
**Cut out a paper doll chain. Draw and color the clothes on each doll.
**Make homemade face paint. In a bowl, mix together 1 teaspoon corn starch and ½ teaspoon cold cream until well blended. Add ½ teaspoon water and stir. Add food coloring, one drop at a time until you get the desired color. Using a small paintbrush, paint designs on face. Remove with soap and water.
**Living Room Islands – Put pillows on the carpet for pretend islands. Imagine the carpet is the ocean. Jump from island to island without falling in the water.

 

Easter S'mores

 I love Peeps.  I've always loved Peeps.  How can you miss with marshmallows covered in sugar?  I love that stores always overbuy Peeps and then have a ton of them marked down to almost nothing the day after Easter.  I always stock up.  I just can't help it.

A couple of years ago I found this idea online somewhere and it spoke to me.....

MARSHMALLOW PEEP S'MORES

(Doesn't that just sound like the most yummy ever?)

We just had to try it.  While our husbands were out of town, my cousin and I got our kids together for a BBQ and we had to try the Marshmallow Peep S'mores.  They were a HUGE hit (of course, since six of the eight kids were boys, anything with fire is a guaranteed win!).

Some of the kids were surprised that we were sacrificing the Peeps to the great and powerful BBQ, but they all warmed up to it after a minute.

They kept coming back for more and more and more!

Man, this kid LOVED them!

NOTE:  We used the E.L. Fudge Stripe cookies instead chocolate bars and graham crackers.  It's just easier for kids to manage.

Can't wait to hear how this yummy twist on an old favorite works for you!

How to Move!

I won’t say I’m an expert, but I have had a lot of practice.  I’m in the middle of my 15^th move in 17 years.  I say the middle because while we are living in the house (and I hope not to move for a very, very long time), the basement isn’t finished so we are still “camping” and have not even nearly unpacked.  Since we have been married, my husband and I have lived in seven different states.  Most of our moves have been cross-country moves.  We have moved just the two of us, with one child, two children, three children and now four.  My in-laws have helped us pull the trailers and we have done it ourselves in multiple trips.  I definitely feel a little experienced when it comes to moving.

Throughout all of the moves I have developed a “system” with little tips and tricks that definitely make moving a lot less stressful for me.  I hope they work for you, too.

NOTE:  I have never had a moving company and I have never had to sell a house so I don’t have any tips for those two moving issues.  I’d love to hear your tips and tricks for those to situations.  Please post a comment.

1.  Get a notebook.  I have a favorite, pictured below.  It is small enough to carry around but big enough to write lots of notes on one page.  I prefer a Five Star notebook by Mead that I can get at Walmart.  It is 9 ½” x 6 ¾” and I usually buy the most obnoxious color they have at the store.  I don’t want it to blend in with other notebooks or stacks of stuff.  I want to know where it is at all times – obnoxious color helps.  There are two sections that are divided by a manila-colored pocket page.  I write all the stuff for “here” in the front (lists of things I need to do, doctor information, school information, lists of things I need to turn off, address changes that need to be made, etc.).  In the back half I write all the stuff for “there” (new school addresses, location of the church, new utility information, etc.).  The notebook is also a good place to write reservation information if you will be staying in hotels along the way.  I keep any papers I need to save in the pocket.  I also keep my favorite pen in the spiral part so I am never with a pen when I need to write something down.  It has gotten to the point that my husband, who often laughs at my crazy OCD-ness, asks me to write something down in my notebook so he won’t forget it during the move.  Seriously, it has saved my brain more than once.

The front of my notebook.  Yes, my two year old colored on it and no, it didn't change the usefulness of the notebook - haha!

 

Just a picture of the page where I listed all the phone numbers of the places I needed to change addresses - banks, cell phones, utility companies, etc.

All the old school information so the new school can request records.

A picture of my notes from my conversation with Dish Network.  I included the name and operator number of the lady who helped me.

2.  Get a colored tote/bin/box/storage container.  Most of our stuff is packed in totes (had too many mice in the trailers and too many flooded basements to trust cardboard boxes anymore).  We always buy the most inexpensive, silver totes that are made by Rubbermaid.  I have one tote that is colored (mine is green) and it is one that I keep by my bed while we are in “getting-ready” mode.  As I pack and come across things that I know we will need as soon as we arrive, I put them in the green tote.  This is where I keep the medical information, birth certificates, social security cards, etc.  I also put things that we will need during the trip in the tote, like books/magazines to read or movies and games I’ve purchased just for the trip.  I also put in all the extra pacifiers that I found when we moved when our children were babies.  It really helps when I can say, “Just put it in the green tote” or “It’s in the green tote”.  Because it is a different color I can also say, “Don’t pack the green tote until the end!  It needs to go in my van or at the back end of the trailer.”  I usually also have another tote that has house stuff we’ll need when we arrive, like sheets, paper plates, cups and disposable silverware, a pot and pan, towels, etc.  It makes it easier if I can just unload that the first night and know that we can live a day or two until we get everything else unloaded.

A picture of my green tote, surrounded by silver totes.

3.  Get two plastic folders.  I get the kind that have the string to wind around two circles to close it.  I use one for school papers that I will need to get from the school here and take to the school there (transcripts, etc).  The other folder has important papers – bills that will need to be paid, birth certificates, immunization records, social security cards, etc.  Sometimes I put the birth certificates/immunization records/ss cards for the kids into the school folder because the school will need them for registration.  I prefer for them to be a little see-through and different colors so I can tell them apart without opening them.  Put these in the green box and fill them as needed.

4.  Get your medical records from your current doctor and tell them that you are moving and they will be receiving a records request from your new doctor in your new town.  This is very important for my family since there are several of us who have health issues that require establishing with a doctor soon after we arrive in our new town.  It often takes weeks or months for medical records to be requested and sent to the new doctor.  By carrying the medical records with us I can establish care and get the medication needed without having to wait for the requested records to be sent.  Because we’ve had testing done to get the correct diagnosis and don’t want to repeat the testing, I always take the records with me to our first appointments so the doctors can see the diagnosis and what we’ve done to get to that diagnosis.  This is especially important when I take my oldest son in because we went through many years of mis-diagnosis before we found out the real problem.  In this case most of our doctors have been amazed at the correct diagnosis because it is unusual.  I have all of the records organized in a binder with dividers for each member of the family.  Most recent records on top.

5.  Get a receipts envelope.  If you are going to be able to claim your move on your taxes or if you are going to be reimbursed for the move by an employer, get an envelope for each car traveling to the new location.  I like a 9x6 manila envelope.  It’s simple and I can write all over it.  I usually keep a pen inside the envelope so I can write on the receipts if I need to.  Remember that some types of receipts fade after time.  You can always write down the amount next to the printed amount if you think it’s going to fade.  When the move is over, close the envelope with the clasp, label it “Move 2012”  and put it with your tax stuff for future filing.

6.  Label all boxes on top and on the side.  Some people do different colored labels/papers/pens for each room in the house.  I usually use a different color pen each time I move and just cross out the previous move information on the box.  It works better for me.  I also write directly on my plastic totes so I don’t have to fuss with tape and 3x5 cards.  Just find what works for you but make sure you label both the top and side of the box and avoid vague labels like “miscellaneous”.  (Funny note:  One move when my inlaws were helping us pack, my mother-in-law labeled the boxes.  She wrote little vignettes that were so fun to read later.  She wrote things like, “The cute stuff that you kept in the kitchen hutch but were such a pain to dust.”

7.  Get some Ziploc bags.  They are my favorite things in the entire world!  I buy them in all sizes from snack size to 2-gallon size.  I love the large ones to keep things together like all the cell phone cords, camera cord, etc.  Then they don’t get lost when I put them in my green tote.

I think that’s about it, but if I come up with some more I’m sure I’ll add it all later.  Please comment with any tips and tricks you find helpful.  I’ve said that we aren’t moving again for a long, long time but I’ve said that before... several times …

A picture of my friend, Jen's, cute daughter and Jen's interpretation of the moving tips.  She's using the accordion file for her important papers and a small receipt envelope for her receipts.  Good luck on your move, Jen!