Valentine’s Day Preparations.

Having kids puts a whole new aspect to what Valentine’s Day means. Don’t get me wrong, I still wholeheartedly believe what I posted regarding Valentine’s Day last year but with it being so close I wanted to show you how we do things up around here.

We started our day by running errands and getting some necessary birthday party items, completely forgetting Valentine’s Day is just around the corner and we’ve done nothing in regards to getting the boys prepared for their parties and whatnot at school. Well, we got the birthday items and headed home to get our swimming gear – yes swimming in February with two feet of snow on the ground! After an hour of swimming we headed back into town to pick up Valentine’s Day items.

We found some cute Valentine’s cards for the boys to pass out to their classmates as well as a few gifts for their teachers. Once we finally left Target we grabbed some lunch and headed home. Everything got strewn out on my bed so we could start putting the pieces together.

 

This is after some of the fun has already been completed. ZigZag’s class is learning about how the post office works. When his teacher sent home his class list she sent “address labels” for each child that has a make-believe address on it. Those are the envelopes with the yellow squares. Each child will get to deliver their mail to the post office and get to see how it all works.

ZigZag was very good at using the glue stick to glue the labels onto the envelopes and sticking the stickers on the back to seal them.

While ZigZag was working on his gluing and sticker-ing, E-man was busy writing his name on all of his Valentine’s so we could add his classmates names and stickers to them. I did notice one thing though, while going through E-man’s class list – his teacher has our last name spelled incorrectly still. I corrected her on it several times towards the beginning of the year. Looks like I get to do that again.

While the boys were working ever so diligently on their tasks, I was putting their teacher gifts together. Well, not much assembly required, they just had to be put into bags. We opted to do Valentine’s gifts for their teachers this year because frankly, things are just to hectic around Christmas to even thing about teacher gifts then. Here’s a few pictures of what their teachers (2 teachers, 1 assistant) are getting this year.

I honestly think their teachers will be pleasantly surprised with the gifts. Now, just a few more snack type things to buy for their parties and our Valentine’s Day preparations is complete.

Oh, the Cars bags are how they get to carry their Valentine’s cards to school.

Updates.

School.

School is going great and is the main cause of slacking when it comes to blogging. SO MUCH HOMEWORK! No, really though, it’s not horrible. Anatomy & Physiology is keeping me pretty busy. Micro Computer Applications utilizes Microsoft Office 2010 – a software I’ve been using for months. Sociology I haven’t formed an opinion on yet as we only meet once a week and have only had one class so far. Orientation – I should have taken as a Freshman – I do like the instructor though so maybe I’ll actually get something out of it.

Work.

Work … is going. I do still like my job but with me going back to school the decision was made that I should probably resign. My last day to work at the ACE NET offices will be March 11, 2011. A bittersweet moment I should think. I do know that going back to school was the right thing to do and that’s truly where the peace is but I will miss my friends (co-workers) as well.

Boys.

Boys are HUGE!! Seriously. I can’t remember if I’ve stated this before or not but E-man can eat an entire 8 pieces of pizza all by himself  in ONE sitting! I can’t remember if that’s a large or a medium but you get the point. ZigZag has decided he doesn’t like food. Or rather, that he wants a teeny bit of everything – not even enough to equal one bite most times. I’ve decided I don’t like it when their food tastes change, especially because they tend to change just as I’ve gotten used to what they have been. Aside from food, both boys are doing great in school. And they’re wearing me out talking about which sports or musical adventures they want to challenge next! Soccer. Baseball. Cub Scouts. Karate. Swimming. Drums. Bass. Guitar. It’s enough to make me dizzy!!

Photography/Writing.

My passions. The things I do when I have nothing else to do – which is rare these days. Photography is on hold through the rest of January but I’m hoping to open February with a couple of contests that will be posted here so keep an eye out for those. Writing – what I would be doing. I’m feeling the need to write again so maybe I’ll start the outline for the book that’s been in my mind for ages.

Life in General.

Life is good. Very good. A few things I’m looking forward to: Winter Bible Seminar, Spring Break, Summer Just to name a few. Oh, and snow!! Supposedly we’re getting snow tonight – we’ll have to wait and see how right the weather people are this time. All in all, 2011 is looking to be a GREAT year!

I think that’s it for the moment. I know, it’s not as deep as some of the more recent posts I’ve done but life isn’t all about how deep it is. It’s all about how you handle what’s thrown at you – do you handle it with grace or do you crumble?

Ten Day Challenge. Day 5.

So, way over on my facebook page a friend challenged me to a 10 day challenge. Normally I won’t do these things but this one piqued my interest. It’s a quite a bit different than your normal “challenges”. At least what’s considered normal for Facebook these day! 

Here’s the rules:

Day One: Ten things you want to say to ten different people right now.

Day Two: Nine things about yourself.

Day Three: Eight ways to win your heart.

Day Four: Seven things that cross your mind a lot.

Day Five: Six things you wish you’d never done.

Day Six: Five people who mean a lot (in no order whatsoever)

Day Seven: Four turn offs.

Day Eight: Three turn ons.

Day Nine: Two smileys that describe your life right now.

Day Ten: One confession.

Here’s my Day  5 -

Six things I wish I’d never done:

I’m not a fan of regrets and that’s basically what this list is. I prefer to learn from my mistakes and only make each mistake once because I learned from it so well. So, instead of writing regrets I’m writing things I wish I’d learned differently.

1. I wish I didn’t have to “always” learn things “the hard way” (fortunately this is improving somewhat).

2. I wish I had learned earlier in life that I don’t always have to bite my tongue when things aren’t how I prefer them or think they should be.

3. I wish I’d never said “no” or “not right now” to many things. School. Travel. Missions. Writing. Music.

4. I wish I’d never learned to compromise or settle on things that should be “deal breakers” (fortunately I’ve improved quite a bit here as well).

5. I wish I’d never learned the true art that is procrastination.

6. I wish I hadn’t listened when people told me I wasn’t good enough.

These are beginning to be more draining that I thought they would be. Much harder to write now. You’d think that with the number or items decreasing each day that it would be easier but the opposite is what’s true.

Ten Day Challenge. Day 4.

So, way over on my facebook page a friend challenged me to a 10 day challenge. Normally I won’t do these things but this one piqued my interest. It’s a quite a bit different than your normal “challenges”. At least what’s considered normal for Facebook these day! 

Here’s the rules:

Day One: Ten things you want to say to ten different people right now.

Day Two: Nine things about yourself.

Day Three: Eight ways to win your heart.

Day Four: Seven things that cross your mind a lot.

Day Five: Six things you wish you’d never done.

Day Six: Five people who mean a lot (in no order whatsoever)

Day Seven: Four turn offs.

Day Eight: Three turn ons.

Day Nine: Two smileys that describe your life right now.

Day Ten: One confession.

Here’s my Day  4 -

Seven things that cross my mind:

1. Children. Mine. Other peoples. Orphans. How I can be a better mom and how to instill a love and passion in my own children for the children of the world? For those who don’t have Mommy’s and Daddy’s, Sister’s and Brothers, Aunts and Uncles. Those who don’t have Jesus and don’t have anyone to tell them how much He loves them.

2. Worship music. There is nothing greater than being in complete abandon to the One, our Saviour, who gave His all so we wouldn’t have to. I almost always have worship music playing and if it’s not playing I’m singing.

3. Prayer. I need to be doing more of this – especially in these days. In English and in the Holy Spirit. More for my kids and my family and friends. More for my church and other Christians in the world who are being persecuted. More for the US and our government – especially because I don’t agree with the majority of things happening right now politically. For direction and wisdom. For strength. I also need to keep encouraging my boys in prayer and making sure they know how to pray. I’ve not been great at this lately.

4. Photography. My thoughts run more to how I can improve this exponentially because it is something I so enjoy doing. Even more than that, how can I use this to tell the story of other people’s lives? To bring to attention those who’ve been forgotten, and those who people choose to ignore.

5. Writing. That dream I’ve had for ages and want to do something about. November is NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) and I very much wanted to participate but knowing I couldn’t give it my full attention – not like I would want to anyway – I didn’t write one word. I fully believe that the dreams and desires we have are from God and so it’s hard for me sometimes when I think how God gave me a gift and a desire that I’m not using.

6. Focus. I’m not focused. I’m constantly multi-tasking a million things at once. Things at work. Things at home. Things with the boys. Even now, as I’m typing this I’m also editing pictures and carrying on several conversations. I would love to be able to focus on just one thing at a time so I can make sure it’s done with the quality it deserves. I enjoy getting things done quickly and multi-tasking allows that but there are so many times when I need just a little bit more time to get things done. I’m not a fan of short deadlines.

7. School. This ties into #6 somewhat because the thing I would like to focus most on right now – aside from my boys obviously – is getting back into school and finishing my degree. There are so many factors and variables involved here that at the moment I’m praying for direction and waiting on God’s timing.

ZigZag.

My 4 year old.

Has more energy in his little finger than I do in my entire being (or so it seems most days).

Has a smile that lights up the world.

Has a huge heart and loves to give hugs to everyone. He has, in fact, randomly walked up to people in Wal-Mart to hug them only to walk away and leave them with huge smiles on their faces. He is also the one whose teacher said she had to tell him he can’t just get up and hug her in the middle of class – not because it’s a bad thing but because every other child will do the same thing and all control will be lost.

Does things in his own timing but has an innate sense of the super important things. Including birth. My water broke around 8am, 4 weeks early. He waited until Grandma (my mom) got there, 15 hours later, to arrive. And it’s a good thing. He wasn’t breathing right and my mom, being a NICU nurse, worked with him when the other nurses walked away from him. She kept him from going to NICU and he was able to go home with me 2 days later.

I’m so very proud of him.

They are only little once.

I opted not to get school pictures this year. I don’t see the point since I’m a photographer. So, here’s ZigZag’s first ever school pictures.