Sparing the Spider

Tonight I made sure to get all my kids into bed by about 7:30. All 3 are sleeping in the same room (because Ally doesn't like sleeping by herself), so I always know it will take a little bit of time for them to settle down. I know I want to be watching the Amazing Race premiere at 8, so I aimed early this evening.
So after I thought they were all settled in, I came downstairs and was putting clothes into the dryer. I automatically heard Jacob coming down the stairs. Already, I think to myself. I yell out the door to find out what Jacob is doing. He explains that he has something to show me.
I come out of the laundry room and there stands my oldest son holding a dress up, plastic, yellow helmet. This frustrates me a little.
What is it, I ask. A spider, he replies. My heart jumps into my throat. I am not terribly fond of spiders, but I typically am not hesitant to smash a spider. Yes I murder spiders and do not feel even a little bit guilty. But tonight my oldest son was standing in front of me calmly holding a decent sized spider in this hat. I was frozen; I wasn't sure how to respond. Would it upset Jacob to see me smash this spider?
So, I asked him what I should do. He said, I don't know, what do you do with spiders? I explained to him that I kill them. He said okay, just like that this was not bothering him at all. And here I am in this emotional turmoil over smashing a spider. So then a thought hits me. Do you want to put him outside, Jacob? So he turns and opens the front door and we put him in the yard.
This was such a bizarre sequence of events for me. I have never hesitated to kill a spider, but the fact that my son was so calm about this gross little creature made me question myself.
Okay...gotta go...The Amazing Race is starting.

Nearly Wordless Wednesday

Last Sunday we spent the afternoon at Discovery Village!

My Reminder

Lately I have been frustrated with my oldest son. I love him dearly but we just seem to butt heads over everything. It seems like he would argue with me even if I simply stated that the sky is blue.
But this afternoon Jacob reminded me of how much I love him. I have heard all week about the book fair that is at school. I have told him to wait until I have to go to Open House on Thursday and we will talk about possible purchases.
When I went through Jacob's backpack today I found a brand new board book (pictured above). Jacob explained that his teacher had given him a token to get something at the book fair, so he chose a book for his baby brother. He had to add that Logan should really work on learning his ABCs.
Thank you Jacob for reminding me that we need to think of others, even when there are probablly a million things that we want.

Not Me Monday

Lately I have found myself addicted to a wonderful blog written by MckMama. Her family's story is inspiring and I would recommend everyone go check it out. Well, MckMama has this fun, new idea where we can all share those things that we "did not" do during the previous week. So I decided I want to play along.

I "did not" get excited when Grandmother called and asked if Ally could spend 2 days in Salem to keep her company while Grandpa was out of town. I wouldn't get excited to have 1 less child for a period of time.
I "did not" suggest that since Ally was away, Jacob and I could go shopping for junk food for Friday night. I "did not" then go home, put Logan to bed, turn on a movie for Jacob, eat some junk food and promptly fall asleep on the couch. That would not be a responsible mother.
I "did not" also buy a bottle of wine when we went junk food shopping.
I "did not" spill my first glass of wine into a paper tray which had held the sushi that I ate for dinner. That spill "did not" catapult soy sauce that had been in the tray so that I had soy sauce in my hair and on my feet.
I "did not" find soy sauce on the other side of the kitchen on Saturday morning.
And finally I "did not" spend a great deal of time thinking about what I "did not" do, and then worry about whether I know how to put a link within my blog post. And I "did not" hope that I would impress MckMama because I think she is a great writer.
And I "will not" spend the next week thinking about writing a better Not Me Monday post for next week.

We Missed You Sister!

The One With the Missing Princess...

Ally left us last night to spend 2 nights with Great Grandma. She was pretty excited to go keep Great Grandma company while Great Grandpa is out of town. So after our busy Thursday evening which includes Tae Kwon Do and swimming lessons, Great Grandma came and took Ally to Salem.
I have always enjoyed girly things and having a daughter as girly as Ally is such a delight. But these 2 boys are so special. They can always make me smile.
This morning Logan was the only one with the babysitter, so they headed to the store and stopped by work to visit me. What a way to brighten my day, looking up and seeing Logan's smiley little face just brings joy to my heart.
This evening the boys and I went grocery shopping and we got some junk food, so Jacob and I can stay up, eat junk, watch TV and play computer. Just have a fun lazy night.
I knew Jacob's class had planned to make applesauce today. So I asked him how the applesauce was. He informed me he didn't like the applesauce; he just likes the kind from the factory.
I love my special boys!!

But Shawn Wears Boots...

I picked out a cute little pink outfit with capri pants for Ally this morning. I even got up early enough to fix her hair. Then I told her to find her shoes and she said, I want to wear my boots. My logical side simply replied, no, you do not wear boots with capris. This answer did not satisfy my daughter. She wanted to wear her boots. We went back and forth a couple of times and she explained Shawn always wears his boots to daycare. I went another logical route and explained I wasn't Shawn's mom. Then Ally was about to start crying and I suddenly asked myself, is this argument really worth it? Well you can see what I decided...

Maybe it flew somewhere...

So I am still figuring out dropping off Ally and Logan at daycare and then taking Jacob to school. I have been leaving the car running while I take Ally and Logan into the babysitter's house because I thought Jacob would want to be able to listen to music. I thought that if I told him to stay in his seat, that would be enough. But honestly shouldn't I know better. So this morning when I dropped the younger two off, I peeked back out the door to see my oldest son sitting in the front seat. Lesson learned: he's not quite ready for that.
On to the actual story. As I came out of work at 5:00 today, I could see as I opened my car door that something was wrong. My Explorer has this little "anti-theft device," which has regularly been a pain in my butt. It is a little computer type chip on a plastic hook that slides into a spot right down by my knee under the dashboard. If this little device is removed, my car does not start. I have more than once thought that my car battery was dead, when in fact that "wonderful" little device has been knocked on the floor.
As I opened my car today though, I automatically observed this device was nowhere to be seen. Did someone steal this? What would be the use? Is someone laughing at me, as they have this in their pocket and watch me in my skirt looking all over my car floor and even in the parking lot for this stupid plastic device.
As my discouragement started to approach tears, a picture flashed through my mind. A picture of my oldest son sitting in my front seat earlier that day. I thought it through. The car was on when he was up there and I didn't shut it off until I arrived at work, so this would be the first time I noticed his hijinx from this morning.
I picked up my phone. What if the kid has it in his pocket? What type of money would it cost to replace this little thing because knowing my child this essential device could be anywhere. As soon as the babysitter answered the phone, I asked for Jacob. He got on the phone while I was still looking through my car.

Me: Jacob, did you take out my little thing that lets the car start?

Jacob: No.

Me: Do you know what I'm talking about?

Jacob: Yes.

Me: Where could it be?

Jacob: Maybe it fell.

Me: Where would it fall?

Jacob: (pause) Maybe it flew somewhere.

As I began to ask where it could have flew, I spotted it tucked very nicely into the handle that opens the console in the middle of my front seat (which is conveniently covered by my arm rest). I did have to talk to Jacob about honesty when I picked him up. But how can I not find it funny that his little mind was coming up with a story about this device flying. I am definitely still learning about 6 year olds.

First Day of First Grade

Well Jacob has done it. He finished his first week of first grade. Jacob is in Mrs. Harvey's class and his best friend from last year, Cerri, is in his class. It is so hard to get Jacob to tell me about what happens when I'm not there. But everything he has said has been positive. And though it's hard to get the positives out of him, I am sure I would hear about it if he didn't like it. Here he is headed out the door on the first day...

When Jacob wasn't sure about starting first grade, I took him school shopping to get him excited. This lunch box is his favorite thing that he chose. He really wanted the old style plastic ones like I had when I was a kid. And he was a little against cartoon characters (He must be getting too old). We finally decided on the Speed Racer. I try to convince him to get hot lunch sometimes, but he loves taking his lunch. So we've compromised and he gets hot lunch once or twice a week.
We're still figuring out this schedule. But all seems to have gone pretty smoothly the first week. So here's to a great school year!

California Trip

So I took a bunch of pics on our trip to California to visit my uncle and aunt and their kids (that are about Jacob and Ally's age). However I put my memory card in my computer and accidently deleted a bunch of the pictures :( I was pretty upset and still looking for ways to find them, but here are the couple that I have left.

Here is Ally and her cousin Brooke in princess dresses. Brooke has lots and lots of princess dresses and Ally was in heaven playing in Brooke's room.

Here is Logan in the pool. He loved the waterfalls down in the deep end, so we would take him down there to play. He also got quite good at climbing out on the stairs and jumping back into the pool, so someone always had to be ready for him.

Here's Ally in the pool. She has been working to get more comfortable in the water. She loved this little tube. By the end of our time there, she could kick all over the pool in her little tube, and she was even willing to put her head underwater.

As you can see, nothing left of Jacob, but he was there too. He had an absolute blast in the pool. One time he accidently lost his noodle that he was floating on in the deep end and Grandma had to go save him. But that didn't even get him out of the water. By the end of the weekend, he would go underwater and do a full flip and come back up.
The pool was Jacob's highlight of the time and the princess stuff was Ally's highlight. It was a great time for all of us to get to visit with family who we don't see often. It was a bit of a drive, but definitely well worth it.
We really appreciate that our family welcomed us into their home to visit and made sure we had such a great time. And we were also really glad to have Grandma and Great Grandma along with us. Thank you everyone!!

First Grade

Okay, I haven't quit blogging. I was on vacation and took a vacation from my blog as well. But now I'm back to real life. Our vacation was a blast. We visited family in California and it was hot and we spent a great deal of time in the pool. I have pictures but I accidently deleted some, so I'm messing with my memory card trying to find them, but I will post them soon.
Today was Jacob's first day of first grade. It is hard to believe that he can be in school all day long. It was a very long day for me, thinking about if he was doing okay, making it through. But it appears all went well. Jacob never tells me too much about what happens. But I do know that one of his best friends from last year was there this morning, which I think probablly made the day easier. Well my pictures of Jacob from this morning are on the same memory card, so hopefully I will get them posted tomorrow.
Vacation is fun, but I always enjoy coming home!