Spring has finally sprung!

The warmer weather has finally reached us. It couldn’t have come quick enough for the boys and well Mom and Dad too, we were getting cabin fever being cooped up in the house for so long.  We’ve started working on the yard.  I cannot wait to get out there and plant flowers.  The kids love getting involved with planting and designing our flower beds.  It’s such a wonderful time of year I love hearing the birds and the kids like helping to fill the bird feeders, we watch and see all of the different kinds of birds that come to visit.    It's truly is magical to watch everything wake up and come back to life.  And not to mention a wonderful opportunity to teach kids about the environment as well as other important life lessons.  Such as patience, it’s fun to watch day after day how much the trees have budded or the flowers have grown. I love exploring our flower beds with the kids and seeing their excitement when a new flower buds or the plants grow taller.  They learn the importance of nurturing the flowers and plants and enjoy watering and weeding, and I enjoy working together without any bickering and sitting back relaxing and watching the flowers grow!  This year I am excited to do some family craft projects for the garden, I really want to make some garden stones with the kids hand prints and I have a lot of ideas using terra cotta pots that I think the kids will really enjoy.  Wind chimes, planters, and if we are ambitious enough I found this really cool looking bird bath on Pinterest that I would love to make.   Check back for photos and instructions, I will post frequently to my projects and crafts page as we complete our projects!  

Crazylegs Classic

Yesterday the baby and I participated in the Crazylegs Classic.  A 2 mile walk to support UW Badger Athletics. I have never been one for exercise, I think because I grew up with my Mom and Aunt always dieting and I associated exercise with weight loss rather than health.  So needless to say I was a little intimidated when a coworker mentioned doing the walk, but I wanted to try something different and thought it sounded like a fun morning!  I was right, I have to say it felt great and the weather was perfect.  The 2 miles wasn't much at all, I think I walk further than that trick or treating with the boys each year.  There were a few hills now and then but we pushed through and made it! Now that I have seen the event and what it's about I plan to make this a yearly activity and next year bring the whole family.  It's a great way to spend some time together while having fun and getting a bit of good old exercise! I'm sure the boys will love seeing Bucky and the UW Marching Band. I can't wait to share this with them and make this an annual tradition!

Make the Holiday's even more special!

I love coming up with creative fun ways to make the holidays and birthdays more exciting to the kids. I remember holiday time especially Christmas being so magical when I was little all of the lights and decorations, and smells. I want them to feel the same and maybe even one day do the same for their children.

This year at Easter I was a bit overwhelmed. Home with a newborn there just never seemed to be enough time to get anything done, I hadn't fallen into a new routine yet and well frankly I was just exhausted. I was planning on putting the kid’s baskets together but honestly that was all, I was just going to leave them in the living room to find when they woke up on Easter morning. That is until my step son was talking to his Grandma about how excited he was for Easter and that last year it was so cool because the Easter Bunny left clues for them to follow and made it really fun to find their baskets. How could I let him down? After all there are not many years left before the boys catch on.

So I stayed up a little later and created the Easter Bunny's Scavenger hunt. I always start with a letter that I leave usually in the living room, the rest of the clues get folded and placed in plastic Easter eggs with a couple pieces of candy and hidden in the spots indicated in the clues. You can of course do as many as you would like and alter them to places in your household. Have fun and be creative, I have to say I am glad I did it. And no matter how tired or busy I am in years to come I will always make the time to do this. Hopefully they will be good boys and not ruin the fun for their little sister when they stop believing.

Visit the Birthday's, Holiday's and other Funday's page for this and other fun ideas to share with your family!

This thing called Love

So this thing called LOVE… 

Here I go philosophizing again or more accurately still...  I have been giving a ton of thought to love, not just romantic love, just love.  I hear a lot of people speak about love in a negative way; love hurts, love complicates things, it’s not worth the trouble, love sucks, etc. Not being one to throw out bible quotes often but I honestly think Corinthians13:4-8 really defines “love” best.   Maybe this kind of love only exists between a parent and their child.  I myself am certain I have never experienced it.  I know I have definitely counted the wrongs in my past relationships as have the people I have been in the relationship with.  In fact in reading the bible passage again I think I have gone against most of the entire passage.  I think I have often approached relationships in sort of a stubborn eye for an eye approach, unintentionally.  Of course it doesn’t start out that way.  Maybe there are many other things that need to be factored in; respect for one another, maturity, compassion, commonalities, patience, communication, priorities.  I suppose they all go hand in hand.  Or maybe I just simply haven’t wanted it that badly.  When the going gets tough, I have got to go.  Sure I have hung in there and tried when it really matters but after so long I usually come to the realization that what matters is ME, and why would I want struggle and unhappiness day after day? Some conflict is good, but constant conflict is not…  I do not believe real love; true love has room for conflict.  I am not such a dreamer that I believe that couples in love never argue, or have struggles to overcome I am not completely unrealistic.  I just simply believe that in real loving relationship you are a team and together you can get through anything.  Key word being together, that’s where the trust comes in you have to allow yourself to be open to completely trusting in the fact that your other half is on your team, you are out to achieve the same goal if you are not then why are you together?  You are not in war or against one another.  There is always a compromise to be found somewhere. 

Real love can only come once the manipulation stops.  It is the purest of all emotions, and has one simple requirement and that is honesty, honesty with each other, and most of all honesty with yourself.  I cannot say I have always been 100% honest in every relationship I have had.  I know that I haven’t. I have always held back some part of myself.  Not necessarily bad things, but I have sat back and have been accepting of things that I do not agree with.  Not always spoken up when I have felt wronged.  Sat back and let the anger and resentment build inside of me until there is no chance to make things better. 

But now after all of this time I can truly say that today I know what love is.  There is no doubt, there is no question, or what if’s.  The first part of this entry was written over two years ago, when there was a lot of question in my life.  But as I finish this today I can honestly say to myself and to you that I now know real unselfish, unconditional, through thick and thin, in sickness and in health, til death do us part REAL LOVE. When you experience it, it is unlike anything you have ever known, you realize that all the times before when you thought you had all of the answers when you thought you were in love it was nothing more than a 4 letter word used far too freely.  I don’t claim to have all of the answers now; I couldn’t tell you how to get it, where to find it, or how to keep it.  But I can tell you that once you have it you truly will just know!

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 

Dinner time made easy!

Meal time is one of the biggest challenges we face at our house. Every night we hear “I don’t like this” and “can I be done” more times than I care to relive here. We are not strict when it comes to eating, we don’t expect them to eat every last crumb, but we do want the kids to at least try everything on their plate. This has proven to be far more challenging than I ever would have imagined. Night after night it’s a battle to get them to try even just one little tiny bite. Thankfully I have found a solution to this problem. A solution so simple I can’t believe it took so long to figure it out. Involving the kids with meal planning and cooking is something so minor and puts an end to all of those nightly arguments at the dinner table.  

Each week we sit down as a family usually on Sunday and make a daily meal plan, the most important step here is to write it down! We keep a simple template that we print and complete and then hang on the cupboard in the kitchen. This helps in so many ways. Not only does it cut down on and most of the time eliminates the dinner time battles we had previously faced but it also helps Mom and Dad tremendously. We too were sometimes challenged when it came to dinner time. All too often we wouldn’t know what to make or we would have forgotten to take something out of the freezer to thaw. And by the time we would make up our minds it would be too late to cook anything and we’d end up with a nutritious meal of frozen pizza or take out. This way we know exactly what we need and when we need it. I cannot tell you how much time and frustration this simple 15 minute exercise saves and best of all the kids are far more likely to eat the meals knowing they had some input. 

I have also discovered they can be excellent helpers in the kitchen, and seeing new and different foods aren’t so intimidating when you have helped to prepare the meal. It’s a great way to spend some time together on often too hectic and short on time week nights. And they take great pride in presenting the finished meal to the rest of the family. Some of my most favorite childhood memories are cooking in the kitchen with my grandparents, and I hope I am making lasting memories with my children as well. 

One of our family favorites:

Mostaccoili Bake 
1 lb. Italian Sausage (sweet or mild)
1 lb. box Mostaccioli
2 24oz jars Prego Chunky Garden Combo Pasta Sauce (or jarred sauce of your choosing, I like this to get an extra serving of vegetables in the kids!)
1 medium red pepper, diced
1 medium yellow pepper, diced
1 medium yellow onion, diced
½ cup grated parmesan cheese
2 cups Italian 5 cheese blend

Brown sausage and drain fat. In the meantime cook pasta as directed and drain. In a large pan, combine meat, pasta and vegetables. Starting with 1 jar add sauce, continue with 2nd jar until you reach desired “sauciness” (I usually use about 1 and ¾ jars and save the remaining sauce to dunk breadsticks). Stir in parmesan cheese, and transfer pasta mixture to a baking casserole. Top with 2 cups of cheese and bake at 350° until cheese is melted, about 20 minutes. Serve with a salad and garlic bread or breadsticks on the side, Enjoy!!

 

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