G Gave Himself a Haircut!!

Today started off as normal.  G wanted to give me a pretend haircut.  The boys love to play haircut.  They take the playdough scissors and pretend to give me, our Firefighter and themselves haircuts.  I always check to see what they are using before they start their haircuts to make sure that they did not take the real scissors.  This morning after G gave me my haircut he wanted to give himself one.  He came back in the living room carrying the water spray bottle and a red pair of plastic scissors.  He likes to use the water spray bottle on his hair because that is what the barber uses when he gives the boys their haircuts.  I looked at the scissors because we have never used the red ones for pretend haircuts.  They were just plastic with no metal for blades in them so I figured that they would be alright.  I had tried to use them on paper awhile back and they pretty much just bent the paper so I figured that it would be fine for a pretend haircut.  Well, I figured wrong!

I needed to run some errands today so while G was giving himself what I thought was a pretend haircut I got dressed and our Firefighter was going to be taking the boys outside to work on the car so everybody was walking back and forth and getting things organized.  When I went to leave I saw that G's hair did not look right but it was wet because he had used the spray bottle to wet it down so I figured that was why it did not look right.  Later, when I came home from my errands, we all had a snack together.  I kept looking at G, who is very fair skinned with very light blonde hair, and something was not right.  His hair still looked like it did when I left except now it was completely dry.  I looked at the top of his head and there it was, the haircut.  I could not believe it.  I just sat there and said "did you cut your hair!?"  He said no, that M had done it.  My Firefighter just looked at me and we both gave each other that "yeah, right" look.

So, at that point what could we do?  Our Firefighter went and got out the hair clippers and fixed it as best as he could.  It was not too bad.  The top front is very short and the part of his hair that is usually on his forhead is now super short.  Fortunately, G's hair and skin color is so light that you do not really notice it and it just sort of looks like it is a super short haircut.

We have now clearly shown and explained to the boys which scissors (the playdough scissors) can be used for their pretend haircuts.  Oh well, his hair will grow back.  The boys were both excited about daddy having to fix G's hair.  We just made an adventure out of it.  Ironically, our Firefighter just took the boys for haircuts last week for preschool that starts this week!

 Here is the part of his hair that he cut.  I asked him if I could take a picture of it and he said yes right away.  He was all excited.  He even put his head down right away when I asked him to so that I could get a better picture.

You can see the chunk in the front that is missing.  I still cannot believe that the blunt plastic scissors actually cut his hair!

He is our Firefighter giving G another haircut to even things out.

G wanted a chance to use the hair clippers but we both told him "No" so he was not too happy about that.  However, when his haircut was done he was very happy with it and both boys were pretty excited.  Good deal that the boys wear their hair short!

Mommy and Daddy are glad that the boys are in bed.  It was a long day!

Kid's Craft: Paper Bag Puppets

When I was a child I remember making paper bag puppets.  They were so simple to make and we made them using items that we found around the house.  I thought that it would be fun for the boys to make these puppets because they enjoy using the glue and playing with my yarn.  With our Firefighter being gone on his shift and the weather being so hot and humid today, I decided that today would be a good day to try out this project with the boys.  These were the supplies that we used:

Brown paper lunch bag (any size and color paper bag would work)
Elmer's glue (poured in plastic cups that we had recycled from mandarin oranges)
Q-tips cut in half to help spread the glue
Yarn (cut into lengths to use for the hair)
Crayons
Markers
Not in the picture, be we also used stickers and construction paper
You can also use buttons, macaroni noodles or anything else that would dress-up the puppet

Once we had all of our supplies together we started our project.  I made up a quick puppet to show the boys what the puppet could look like, although I knew that their puppets would be unique!

This is my puppet.  It was not bad for something that I threw together real quickly as an example, however, wait until you see the boys' finished puppets!

 The boys were very excited to be able to use the glue.  They both grabbed their glue cups and their Q-tips and were ready to go.

They were both working so seriously.  G decided that the strips of construction paper were too long so he cut them shorter.  He likes to use the scissors so this mommy is thinking that he really just wanted to cut up the paper no matter what size it was.

G and M enjoy working on crafts.  M gets in, gets the craft done, seems to have fun doing it and then scoots back into the family room to play with his trucks, farm or fire station.  He enjoys just sitting there and making the figures move around and interact with each other.  He has quite the imagination and loves the imaginative play.  As is typical for M, he sat down, worked on his puppet and then went to play with his trucks.

Now our puppet family has grown to two puppets.

G is a different story.  He enjoys imaginative play but he loves hands-on activities like crafts.  He is the one who always wants to help me in the kitchen, with the cleaning or anything else that I am working on.  He also likes to help our Firefighter with the lawn.  M likes it too, however, he helps for a little while and then goes right back to his imaginative play.  It is amazing to me how two brothers can be so focused on what they like to do but yet those interests are so different from brother to brother.

Anyhow, I digress so back to the puppets...since G likes the hands-on activities he continued working on his puppets after M went back to his trucks.  The most fun I think that he had was cutting the yarn and gluing everything onto his puppet.  M liked the glue too and was even gluing his stickers on his puppet.

G cut alot of yarn.  We will have plenty of yarn hair for many, many puppets in the future!

Our family of puppets has now grown to three!

In the meantime, M came back into the kitchen and he decided to make another puppet.

G was more than happy to help M with his second puppet!

G decided to make a second puppet too.  He would cut the yarn and have me glue it onto his puppet for him so that he could keep cutting more yarn.  There was yarn all over the next puppet and the puppet after that too.

Our paper bag puppet family ended up growing to six members by the time the craft supplies were put away!  The boys really enjoyed using their imaginations and being creative with this project.  It was a nice project that was a short and easy set-up and clean-up.  Now when our Firefighter returns home from his shift he will be greeted not only by myself and the boys but our six paper bag puppets will be sitting on the table waiting for him too!

My New Wardrobe...Fire Department Clothing

I remember the wardrobe that I used to have before I met my husband.  I wore dress clothes to work and at home I either wore jeans, shorts or sweats.  Everything was basically color coordinated and stylish.  Somehow that seemed to change when I met my husband.  Slowly but surely I began to notice a lot of clothes in my wardrobe that had the maltese cross on them as well as the fire department patch.  I began to wear one of my Firefighter's extra fire department summer jackets, then I had some of his old uniform t-shirts that I would wear around the house for doing housework or yardwork.  I would also wear some of his fire department t-shirts when I was pregnant because they were so comfortable.  One year for Christmas one of the gifts that he gave me was a brand new sweatshirt and sweatpants with the maltese cross on them.  I loved the sweatshirt and sweatpants because they were warm and cozy and had the maltese cross on them.  They are pretty old now but I still have them and wear them occassionally on cold winter nights.  My parents each have the same set too.

When my brother began to work at his local fire department the wardrobe continued to expand.  Not only did I have clothing items from my Firefighter's department but now my brother was providing us with fire department clothing as well.

My parents have even gotten into the swing of things.  They just got back from their vacation last week and they brought my Firefighter back two fire department t-shirts from two different fire departments that they visited while on their vacation!

Now that my Firefighter and I have two kids the fire clothes that we have in our house is even greater!  Both of my boys were brought home from the hospital in a Little Fire Chief one piece outfit.

 This is M in his Little Chief fire outfit.  I liked the outfit so much when I was pregnant with G that I bought it in the newborn size and the 0-3 months size.  Both boys wore it a lot.

 We also had a lot of bibs.  This is a bib that I found before G was born.  It was still new in this picture.  By the time M was born this bib had seen better days!

This bib came with  a rescue pup one piece outfit.  It was so cute on G and then on M.  It was amazing to me how many fire department themed clothes I could find for a baby!

This is the Little Chief bib that I bought at JCPenny's.  When I was pregnant with G, JCPenny's happened to come out with these Little Chief outfits.  We had a one piece outfit, overalls, onesie, bib and shorts all with the Little Chief design on it and both boys got a lot of use out of them.  Those outfits were so cute!!

Grandparents, relatives and friends also helped us to keep a continuing supply of fire department themed clothes in our boys' closets.  It seemed that we received fire department themed clothing for every birthday and Christmas.  We still get excited when we find fire truck clothes in the stores.

Here is my Firefighter and G raking up the yard.  They are both sporting fire department wear.  Firefighter in his maltese cross sweatshirt and G in his fire department jacket.

This is a little better view of the jacket.  Both boys were able to wear this jacket too.

Now that the boys are getting a bit older I do not have as many fire themed clothes for them.  They seem to be harder to find in the toddler sizes.  However, I just found at JCPenny's the other day a t-shirt made by Okie Dokie and it looks just like a firefighter's jacket and it is a long-sleeved t-shirt.  I cannot wait for them to wear them to preschool.

So, in the years that I have been with my Firefighter, and since my brother has become a firefighter, the wardrobe for my entire family has changed.  It is not uncommon to go to my parent's house on a cold winter day and find pretty much all of us wearing some type of fire department sweatshirt, hat or sweatpants.  What can I say...we are a fire family!!

Crayon/Activity Bag

I found that as my boys grew from infants to toddlers to preschoolers that it was becoming increasingly harder to keep them occupied in places like Church, doctor's offices and restaurants.  It was not that they misbehaved at all of these places but with being active little boys they just seemed to have a hard time sitting still for longer periods of time.  I would try to remember to bring crayons and coloring books with me and I would just carry them in the diaper bag.  However, there were a lot of times that I did not need the diaper bag and I did not want to have to carry it around just for coloring books and crayons.  Well, one day when my Firefighter was home from the station, I took advantage of that time and I went to Joann Fabrics while he stayed home with the boys.

While I was at the fabric store I was looking through the pattern books and came across Simplicity pattern #2295 for a wonderful crayon/activity bag.

Fortunately, the Simplicity patterns were on sale that week and I was able to buy it for only a couple of dollars.  I bought the materials that I needed and headed home to start my project.  The materials list consisted of the following:

3/4 yd. of 45" fabric
1/2 yd. of 45" polyester batting
1 1/8 yd. of 1" wide webbing
one package of medium rick-rack
Thread to match

Fortunately, this is not a very expensive project, especially when you are able to use coupons to buy the fabric and the pattern is on sale.  Of course I had to buy everything in duplicate because I knew that both boys would want one.

I was able to cut out my pattern and fabric during the day.  The boys like to play by me while I am working on a sewing project.  They bring in their trucks and toys to play with but sometimes they ask for my scrap fabric so that they can pretend that they are sewing.  When I actually am able to start to sew G really likes to sit on the chair with me and push the reverse button on the sewing machine...when I tell him too.  Sometimes I just wait until they go to bed if it is a pattern that I really need to concentrate on.

I was very happy to find out as I was sewing that this was a very simple bag to make.  You start out by applying the batting to the front and back sections and then sewing the crayon pocket onto the front of the bag.  Then you stitch the bag front and back together at one side, add the rick-rack and then stitch up the other side and bottom of the bag.  The webbing for the handles are then basted onto the bag.  The bag front and back facing sections are stitched together (except for a small section for turning) and then attached to the outside of the bag.  Once all of the layers are stitched together you would just turn the bag right side out.  The bag facing will need to have the open edge slip-stitched and then the facing put back into the bag.  A top-stitch along the top edge of the bag finishes the project.

Looking back on this project, I wish that I would have taken a picture of each step to show you how it looked as I worked my way through this project.  I will make sure to do that for future projects.

 These are the bags when they are finished and filled with crayons and coloring books.

These are all of the items that I had in the bag in the previous picture.  As you can see, the bag really does hold a lot of items.  The bag was not stuffed so there was room for more items.  However, you just need to be careful so that the bag does not become to heavy for the child because then you end up carrying it...not that you do not end up carrying it anyhow sometimes!

This is a close-up picture of the crayon pocket on the front of the bag.

This is the inside of the bag.

This is a picture of the back of the bag.

In the end, we were all very happy with the way these bags turned out.  We use them every week for Church.  I keep the coloring books and crayons in the bag and hang them each on a plastic hook in the closet.  That way when we need the bags they are packed and ready to go.  Sometimes I will put a sealed snack bag in there, like Scooby Doo graham crackers, so we can just grab the bags and go.  It saves time if we are running late.  There is also room to fit a juice box or a sippy cup in the bag if you wanted to put that in there too.  Once again, just be careful of the weight of all of the items so that the child can comfortably carry  it.

The bags are also good in restaurants and doctor's offices.  It keeps the boys occupied when there is nothing in the waiting room to do but wait or while we are in a restaurant waiting for our food.  More often than not the bags do the trick and the boys are happy and content.  Sometimes I'll switch the coloring book or add stickers or something like that to change things up a bit.

Overall, this is a little bag that I would highly recommend.  It has worked out great for us!

Back to Bellydance

A number of years ago I was talking to a friend of mine about things that we would like to do someday.  She told me that she had always thought about taking a bellydance class.  We talked about it a bit but neither one of us ever did anything about it.  Over the years I would give it a thought or two but it always just remained in the back of my mind until last year.  I have been very unhappy with my body shape since I gave birth to my boys.  A lot of my problem is that I do not always make healthy choices and do not exercise.  At this point last year I was not exercising at all so it was no wonder that I was not losing any weight.  I thought about bellydancing again and decided that it was time to learn a bit more about it and give it a try.

Last Fall I went to the local library and checked out a number of bellydance instructional DVDs.  I really enjoyed the DVDs and ended up buying a few to help me practice.  My favorites were by Neena and Veena Bidasha.  I used Bellydance Fitness For Beginners - Arms, Abs, Hips, Buns & Thighs and Bellydance Fitness For Beginners - Basic Moves & Fat Burning for exercising.  As for instructional use I used Discover Bellydance which consists of the three DVDs Basic Dance, Beyond Basic Dance and Mystic Dance.  While I enjoyed the DVDs very much I felt that I wanted to learn more and felt that a class would be better than just using the DVDs.  I did an online search and found Alanna Schultz.  She taught in the area and also on the college level.  I quickly enrolled in one of her classes and have been taking them ever since.

Bellydance has proven to be a fantastic outlet for me.  I got to class for one or two hours once a week and I am able to just focus on myself.  I know that sounds selfish but as a full-time mother I have neglected my body and my health and have chosen to just focus on the needs of my kids and my husband.  I have since learned that unless I take some time for myself I am not able to be the wife and mother that I want to be.  Bellydance has been the first thing that I have done for myself that takes me out of the house since G was born.  It is one to two hours a week of time just for mommy.  Of course, with my Firefighter's shift schedule he works at least every third week when I have class so I then arrange for either the babysitter or my parents to watch the boys.  When I come home from my bellydance class I feel re-engergized and rejuvinated.  I feel better about myself as a wife and a mother.  Bellydance has helped me to build my self-confidence back up and to appreciate the mom body shape that I now have.  It is also encouraging me to improve my body and to get back in shape.

Over the summer I signed up for Alanna's performance class.  I went to class once a week for eight weeks and learned an entire routine which the class will be peforming at an art festival.  Once the eight weeks were over I continued to practice the dance with some friends that I had made in class.  We practiced twice a week over the remainder of the summer.  One of the ladies who practiced with us had kids so everyone met at my house and all of the kids played together and the moms practiced our dancing.

Tonight our regular bellydance classes started up again.  This time I registered for the intermediate class and it is kicking my butt!  Alanna is teaching us how to layer our basic bellydance moves and we will be learning how to dance using a veil.  I am determined to continue practicing my dance routine and the new layering techniques that we are now learning in class.  By the time I left class tonight my abs, glutes and calves were burning they were so tired but it was a good tired.  I am looking forward to continuing to take the classes and practicing at home.  The boys like to help me practice.  G likes to turn the CD player on for me and M likes to run around us while we are practicing.  Sometimes I listen to my CD of the bellydance music in the car while we are driving.  Even the boys will ask to listen to it.  So, in the end, bellydance seems to be good for the entire family!!

Weekend at the Lake

This past weekend we were all able to spend some time up at the lake.  My parents have a small place on the lake and we love to go up there in the summer.  Our Firefighter nicknamed it "The Villa".  We decided to take the boys up there for a long weekend since school is starting this week.  Our Firefighter was going to be on duty at the fire station so I took the boys down a day early and he was able to join us for a couple of days inbetween his shifts.  We had a nice long weekend and enjoyed some great family time.

We took the boys for ice-cream at one of our favorite ice-cream places, The Patio, and the boys actually both stood for this picture for me.

I try to take their picture here each year but it does not always happen.  Last year G would stand there for me with my nieces but M would not.  This year both boys stood there for me!  The Patio also makes fantastic donuts so we had to buy a couple of those to share too.

M really likes the donuts and I have to admit that mommy really likes them too!  It is a little hard to see but M is holding a piece of donut in this picture.

After we finished with our ice-cream snack the boys wanted to go and play shuffleboard.  Now, while they do enjoy shuffleboard, we do not actually play it and follow the rules.  I have no idea how to play the game.  When my Mother is there with us we try to play a game with the boys because she knows how to keep score.  However, since she was not there at that moment we just checked out the equipment, went to our assigned court and practiced.  I have to admit that the boys are getting pretty good at this game.  G is able to push the puck all the way to the other side and keep it on the court.  I was helping M and by the time that we were done he was even doing real well too.

When we were done playing shuffleboard we headed to the park.  We still had a little bit of time before our Firefighter was going to be able to join us.

M was enjoying these new rockers that had just been added to the park.  G made a friend and really enjoyed playing on the jungle gym.  When we were done we headed back to The Villa to meet up with our Firefighter.

The next day the lake was pretty flat so our Firefighter took us out for a morning boat ride.

The boys really enjoyed the boat ride.  I enjoyed it because the lake was flat.  I really don't like bumpy boat rides.  Of course, a day at the lake would not be complete without a trip to the ice-cream store!  This time my Firefighter and I went out for an ice-cream date night and my parents stayed with the boys after we put them to bed.

Unfortunately, the next day was a shift day again so we had to bid our Firefighter good-bye while he headed back to the station.  That is always so hard to do because we miss him when he cannot be with us, especially when we are having fun at the lake.

I spent a relaxing day at The Villa with the boys and my parents before we all headed home.  The boys had to get in a little swimming in the pool before we left though.

The alligator float was way too big for the little pool but the boys did not care.  They just pretended to ride it around on the grass.  When it was time to clean up we took buckets and used the pool water to water the flowers.  When the pool was mostly emptied of the water I took one of the water squirters and started squirting the boys.  They got so excited when I did that they went and grabbed their squirters and I let them squirt me too.  Needless to say that we were all soaked by the time we were done.  We topped off the night with some dinner, baths for the boys and a car ride home where the boys promptly fell asleep in their car seats.  Once they were asleep I turned off their Bible School CD and put in one of  my CDs.  The Bible School CD is fun but it is not that long so it repeats a lot during the ride to the lake and they will listen to it for the entire car ride.  I think that I actually dream about those songs at night!  So, when they were asleep this mommy changed the CD to my music.

By the time we got home and got the car unloaded we were exhausted!  We had a great weekend and some great family time together too.  There were a few meltdowns which is to be expected with a 3 and 4 year old but the good times are what we remember!

Capturing the End of Summer

One of my favorite things about summer is the fresh fruit that it offers.  We really enjoy going to different farm markets, especially ones where we can pick our own berries or apples.  We were in a local farm market the other day and the peaches smelled so good I decided to buy some and make peach butter for canning.  The wonderful thing about canning fresh fruit is that you can enjoy that summer goodness all winter long.

When we brought the peaches home I dug out my recipe for peach butter and decided to give it a try.  Of course my little firefighters were right there helping me.  The first thing that we had to do was blanche the peaches.  I was clueless as to how to do this so I looked it up on the internet.  The instructions seemed simple enough.  We needed to put the peaches in boiling water for 5 minutes then move them into ice water and remove the skins and peels.  So we began our journey to make our peach butter.

 These are the fresh peaches that we bought at the farm market.  My little firefighters like to go to this farm market because they sell candy sticks for 10 cents.  We like to sit on the bench in the sitting area at the farm market and eat our snacks before we go home.  We also bought some frozen homemade apple cider but we drank it up as soon as it thawed.  I really had a taste for one of their homemade donuts but they did not have any left.  In the Fall they make a wonderful apple cider donut that I just cannot resist!  Anyhow, back to the peaches...

These are our peaches after we boiled them.  I moved them over into ice water and the skins slipped off very easily.  I was able to remove the skin with my fingers.  I then sliced the peaches, removed the pits and G put the sliced peaches into the crockpot.

When I was done slicing the peaches we had quite a few in the crockpot and the kitchen smelled so good!  I tend to cook my peach butter (and apple butter and applesauce too) in the crockpot.  It cooks it slowly and I do not have to be standing there stirring it all of the time.  This is the part that G does not like because he says that it takes too long.  He wants it to turn into butter right away so he asks me pretty often "is the peach butter done yet mommy?"

Once the peaches had been in the crockpot for a couple of hours I used a potato masher and mashed the peaches a bit.  I did that again about another hour later and by then the peaches had turned to a pulp.  I measured out my pulp and sugar and G mixed them up for me and it all went back into the crockpot for several hours.

 This is what the peaches and sugar looked like after the peaches had turned to pulp and we added the sugar.  After I felt that the peach butter was thick enough I prepared my canning jars and began to fill them.

 This was what the peach butter looked like when it was done cooking in the crockpot and I began the canning process.

Once the jars were filled I placed them in a hot water bath canner.  While the peach butter was being processed I managed to get my kitchen cleaned back up.  By this point my little firefighters were in bed.  I like to do the canning when they are in bed because otherwise they would want to help and I do not want them near all of that hot, boiling water.  It is simpler to do the canning while they are asleep.

Finally, here is our peach butter.  I kept some peach butter in another jar that I did not process because I know that my little firefighters will be asking for it first thing in the morning.  Now we can have a taste of summer all winter long!