Free to Good Home

Free to Good Home: All the silly bands you'd ever want and the arm to go with them!

Is it just my kids or do Silly Bands bring out the worst in your kids too?!?

Are you even familiar with Silly Bands? Or is this a "only in Alabama" kind of thing?!?

Silly Bands are shaped rubber bands that elementary school children are buying, trading, and selling. It's the new craze. They're cute. They're cheap. They're fun.

But...I'm serious...they are bringing out the worst in my children!!

We are probably the last family in our town to own Silly Bands. But while we were in Birmingham this past weekend, my little sister gave us the keys to her toy store and told us to pick out whatever Silly Bands we wanted. She had packs that I'd never seen before. But the pack that I was so drawn to was the pack of religious shapes. There was a cross, a Bible, a Christian fish, and Noah's Ark. I thought to myself, "Oh how perfect for my precious little angels." Precious angels, my foot!!

This is all I've overheard the past few days,

" You stole my red cross!!"

"I'm gonna hide my silly bands under my sleeves so my friends can't see them and they'll give me more." (Guess who.)

"I'll trade you, but I want ALL of your very favorite baseball cards."

"That's MY blue fish!!!!"



Enough with the Silly Bands already! One child has already been told that he can no longer wear silly bands because it creates too much chaos in our family. He accuses his sisters of stealing his bands, he steals his sister's bands when they aren't around (then the sisters come whining to mommy), He was instructed to return the silly bands to his sister. His sister was instructed to return his favorite baseball cards. They were all warned that if I have to intervene ONE MORE TIME there will be no more silly bands.

But I have to know...is it just MY family???

If you STILL want some silly bands, particularly the religious ones, click HERE to visit my sister's store. And good luck to ya!

Crazy Father Puts Dye In Son's Mouth

This is my son.

My poor, poor son.

You see...his dad is the youngest of six children. He never had a younger brother he could tease.
He is so thankful that he has a son that he can wrestle to the ground and pour food coloring in his mouth.

My poor, poor son is a good , good sport!!

Lucy's First!

Sweet Little Lucy celebrated her first birthday this past weekend. Time sure flies!! The "theme" (you know we have to have a theme!) was "Our little cupcake is turning one!", so there were lots of pink sweet treats.

Mary Michael wrapped these little water bottles in polka dot grosgrain ribbon, then attached a little round "thingy" (it's late and it's Monday) to the front of them.

And...she made these really cute hanging pom-poms.

Papa was there! (and so was Mimi!)

Little Lauren was there!

Pf course her daddy was there!

Uncle Bo was there!

Cake time!

Lucy and her fan club...

(Kit Kat, in the red dress, is standing beside Lucy. She kept looking at me and saying, "I'm hungry for cake and Lucy is gonna ruin the cake!")

Durham was there!

Mary Ashton was there (in Sara Evan's shirt ;))

And we were all wiped out on the way home! That's the sign of a good party!

Happy Birthday, Lulu! We love you!

Turkey Moon Pies

Click here if you're interested in learning to make these Turkey Moon Pies.

It's time to wake up now.

The last time I posted a lengthy post, it was about how my life has finally slowed down enough for me to take a deep breath and get my life and my house organized. I have been successful, I think, in those areas. I have a long way to go, but I have definitely come a loooooong way in just a few short weeks. But the funny thing is, I have really enjoyed this "break" from other projects and I can't seem to get re-motivated to "get my craft on." The two youngest girls have decided that they no longer want to share a bedroom, so I have been a little busy re-arranging rooms. But other than that, I've been lazy! The kids were out of school yesterday. AAA and L'il Man were away with friends. I told KitKat and Sunshine to play quietly. I plugged in the box fan to drown out their playful noise, shut the door to my bedroom, pulled the shades down, and napped for TWO HOURS! It was awesome!

Happy Thursday to ya!

No More Monkeys Jumping on the Bed!

My little monkey!!

Is this the cutest pair of pj's you've ever seen?! Monkey pj's with a monkey sleeping mask! They're on sale for $11.00 at K-Mart. They had an Owl Set that was even cuter, but they didn't have this monkey's size.

Birds and the Bees

I had THE TALK with my nine year old! Yes, that talk!

It was worse for me than it was for her.

I knew I had my work cut out for me when I said something about the "egg from the female" and she said, "WHAT?! You have to EAT an EGG??!!"

Someone once told me that it was good to have this conversation in the car so that the child can look out the window if he/she feels uncomfortable. I highly recommend the car. At night. That way, he/she can't see you when YOU blush!!

There were LOTS of laughs.

I started off by telling her that babies are a gift from God. I then explained that s-e-x is also a gift from God, and it's also called, "making love." She died laughing, "Naked love?! That's hilarious!!" She didn't hear me correctly, so I had to say it again. It was painful!

She kept laughing and saying, "This is so odd. it's so odd."

I said, "It's a gift from God and He wants you to save it for your husband because He wants the baby to have a mommy and a daddy who are married. When you are married, you love each other and you kiss each other and you really can't be any closer physically then when you are trying to make a baby." She laughed and said, "You can say that again!"

When we came home, she disappeared upstairs. I called her down for dinner, but I teased her and said, "Daddy wants to talk to you about our conversation." She started backing up the stairs, "Mommy, I can't take anymore."

M and I started laughing, and she did too.

M said, "We'll get you a book that'll help explain this a little better."

She said, "I DO NOT want to read about this." And she laughed again.

Deep breath.

Breathe it. Breathe out.

I am SO glad that the hard part is over!!

Paw Paw's 96th Birthday!

This weekend we celebrated my Paw Paw's 96th birthday down in Fairhope. It was exactly what he wanted - all of his children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren gathered in the same room to celebrate his life! And we celebrated in true "Steadman Style" ....... Gumbo galore!! Here he is with all of his children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren who were present: And here's Miss Congeniality (aka "Lucy") with her Uncle Everett:

And here are all of the great grandchildren singing Happy Birthday to their PawPaw:

Great - grandchildren:

Grand children and great-grandchildren:

Children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren:

I think he got his wish...to be surrounded by LOVE!

Happy Birthday Paw Paw!!

We love you!!

Trick or Treat

Last night we trick-or treated in our old neighborhood. You'll see why. The neighborhood goes a little crazy for Halloween. Neighbors decorate their yards with some sort of "kid theme." WE saw Scooby Doo, Jurassic PArk, Sponge Bob, 101 Dalmations, Charlie Brown, Nemo, The Lion King, and The Wizard of Oz.

The kids had a blast and M and I had a good time seeing old friends and familiar faces.

My L'il Punkin!

My baby is back and we're busy baking!

Trick-or-Treat is TONIGHT in our town. I have no idea why it's tonight...but I'm good with it.

I e-mailed L'il Man's teacher today to ask her a question about something we're doing next week. She replied and mentioned that L'il Man said he was going to be a "hobo" tonight. Really?! That was the first I had heard of it. Last I heard, he was going to be a football player.

I also have a cute little witch, a precious Hannah Montana, and an adorable cave girl. Will post pics later.

Happy Trick-or-Treating!!

Silhouette Name Cards at La*T*da

Click here if you want to see how to make these.

KitKat's class has been learning about Australia for the last ten weeks so today they "flew" there!

Here she is with her suitcase (pizza box!) all ready to go!

Each students had a "job" to do to help them fly to Australia. Kit Kat was the Metal Detector Security Worker.

Preparing to go the airport: (Isn't she the cuteest Metal Detecotr Security Worker you've ever seen?!)

The inside of the plane:

A view of the front of the plane:



Preparing to checki-in her luggage:

Ticket counter:

Buying their tickets:

Checking their carry-on bags:

Preparing for take-off:

You can see the control tower in the distance.

The cockpit crew:

When in doubt, BLOG

I actually typed the previous post one day before I actually posted it, but I didn't have time to spell-check it, so I just now posted it. I don't know why I felt like I needed to tell you that.

As I re-read the previous post, it occurred to me that it sounds like I'm complaining. I hate it when I complain about my life. I am so blessed. That was part of the point of starting this whole blog in the first place. I want to count my blessings every day, not complain about them!!

But the truth of the matter is, I have felt overwhelmed lately. And by lately I mean the past 9 weeks. I clearly remember thinking, "AS soon as school starts, I can get this house and myself more organized so I won't feel like everything is spinning out of control." Last week, the kids brought home their report cards and I realized right then that nothing has changed since way before school started!

I don't like it when my life feels like this. Way too busy. No time to just enjoy "being" . No time to unwind. No time to lie in bed with the kids and have "pillow talk." No time to talk about God's beautiful world. No time to thank Him for it.

Shameful.

Life has been busy and I've been fully aware that it's too busy but I haven't really known what to do about it. This is the first week in well over 9 weeks that I've been able to sit down and catch my breath.

I am so thankful for this week.

It has given me an oppportunity to reflect on my life my role as mother, wife, cook, cleaner, chauffeur, friend, sister, child of God, mediator, daughter, boo-boo kisser, blogger, crafter, seamstress. And I've realized that I am failing in each area. And it makes me sad.

So...time for change! Time for focus. Time to re-prioritize. I'm excited!!!

First things first. I made a chore chart. For any mommies out there, come back next week and I'll tell you what I'm doing. I have researched some "tried and true" methods out there and came up with what I think will be best for our family. We put it into practice today and I was so amazed at how smoothly it went! I see a light at the end of this tunnel!

I'm ashamed and embarrassed to admit this, but maybe someone else out there needs to know they aren't alone. So...here goes. I gave up my quiet time/prayer time/devotional time in the mornings so that I could do laundry. I am a morning person by nature. I'm up at 5 , or 5:30 at the latest, and I hit the ground running. When school started, I realized that I get more done during the hour before the kids wake up then I do the rest of the day. So that has become my ritual. I wake up and head to the laundry room. Then to the kitchen. I seriously spend over half an hour in the laundry room every single morning and I am never caught up!! I always have clothes in the washer, clothes in the dryer, clothes ON the dryer, clothes in the hamper, and clothes waiting to be folded in the laundry basket on the floor. And a basket of mis-matched socks somewhere in there.

After polling my sister and some of my Type A friends, I have come up with a solution for the laundry that will allow me to have my 30 minutes of quiet time AWAY from the laundry room. I need this. y'all. I need to start my day off with some type of devotional, prayer, and/or Bible time. It sets my tone/mood for the day. And this "break" from God that I seem to have taken has been noticeable! I have truly felt "spiritually dry" and although I have been aware of it, I have been stuck in this cycle and I have been unable to break it. Til now. So when I tell you I'm excited, I mean it!!

I seriously considered giving up the blog! It would be one less thing to do. But I love looking back at this past year on my blog! I want to remember these days! And I want my children to remember these days. And one thing that this blog has "forced" me to do is to carry my camera with me and record the everyday memories.

When I first started this blog, my intention was to be mindful of our everyday blessings - to thank God for our lives and for each other. Somehow during the last 9 weeks (and maybe even longer), I've "lost" that.

Are you still reading this?? If so, I'm sorry for this never-ending post. I'm getting there, I promise.

So with all this being said, I apologize to you if this blog has "lost it's focus." Don't worry...".I'm baaaa-aaack."

Thanking God for giving me this week to take a deep breath, reflect, and re-prioritize. I feel good things happening!

To those few who continue to check my blog only to find that I haven't updated yet again, I apologize. It's not that I've lacked motivation, but I have lacked time. And to be quite honest, it is becoming an issue. To be even more honest...it has been an issue for quite a while now.



I can't seem to get behind the eight ball (is that the correct use of this phrase)? In other words, I'm drowning!! I stay behind and I've been behind since well before school started. I kept telling myself, "When school starts, I'll get organized and things will run smoother." But school started and so did after school activities, and life became even crazier.



So...the laundry is ridiculous, the kid's winter and summer clothes need to be changed out (2 down, 2 to go), I still need to finish the window treatments for my bedroom, the pile under my bed needs to be addressed, I wanted to sew some clothes for Sunshine while she'll still let me, and I haven't even begun to list what needs to be started (and finished!) for La*T*Da. I don't feel like I've neglected the children. Scratch that. I don't feel like I've neglected spending time with the children, but I've definitely neglected the family. Dinners have been fast food or spur of the moment. No planning has gone into a meal around here since school started. How sad is that?! The laundry room is impossible. I've just been "winging it" and going from day to day.



And I've had it!! Enough already!



I'm ready to be organized, put some thought and time into the meals that I prepare for the family, be "caught up" on the laundry (oh, I know you're never really caught up on the laundry. I just want to be able to see the laundry room floor. And my bedroom floor, for that matter.), to have a house that I can walk into and feel a sense of peace and order (rather than mess and chaos).



This is the first week that I feel like life has begun to move at a slower pace. It's time for me to whip this house into shape and re-prioritize. I also need to learn to say "no!" . I'm doing much better, but there's always room for improvement.



So wish me luck. I'll be visiting some other blogs for help in organizing your home, life, etc. I'll link you up if it's worth your time.



Stay tuned...



And have a happy weekend. Hopefully I'll be back on Monday, ready to roll.

When the cat's away...

If you're interested, check out http://www.latdah.blogspot.com/ to see one of the projects I completed while the fam was away.