Where The Deer and the WHAT?

Today I took Max for his first professional pictures. The proofs look so cute, and I can't wait to get them back. He gave such big smiles and grins.

On the way home, Mason was singing a song from his Sunday School Songs CD. Here's what he was singing:
"Who built the ark? No one, No one. Who built the ark? Brother no one built the ark."
I asked him if he could tell me who built the ark. He said, "Noah." I asked him if maybe the song lyrics should be Noah instead of no one. He pondered it for a long time, and decided I was probably right...for once!

Here are a few other examples of Mason's mistaken lyrics:

Home, home on the range. Where the deer and the cantaloupe play.

Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now I'm found. Was blond but now I see.

And I was quite proud of him for singing this, completely unexpectedly, at Christmastime this year -
You better watch out. You better not cry. You better not pout. I'm tellin' you why. Santa Claus is coming to town except Santa Claus is just a story.
I quickly had him perform it again, and captured it on video (see below). I love the drumstick microphone and bathrobe!

On days when he is on my last good nerve, it's memories like these song lyrics that save his little neck! :)

Nostalgia and May Baskets

I've been experiencing a wave of nostalgia lately. It always seems to come this time of year. Growing up in the country, my brother and I had so much fun as the weather started warming up. We planted gardens, explored the woods, fished and a did million other "outside" things - all with no concerns of being abducted! I'm certain our mother had no clue where we were most of the time during the summer, but knew we'd show up when we got hungry.

One of my favorite things to do as a child was make May Baskets. On the first of May we would make baskets out of paper, fill them with candy and flowers, then deliver them to our neighbors and friends. This is a tradition I've passed along to my boys and they love it. Even Marcus still gets a kick out of participating. Maybe he just likes to eat the leftover candy - I don't know. Finding wildflowers proved to be difficult this year. Every square inch of rural Andover has been developed, so we "borrowed" some lilacs from a fairly remote area and picked a few other lovelies just one step away from being weeds.

Our neighborhood friends were delighted to receive their May Baskets, and I got my dose of childhood. Here's a picture of one of our baskets:

Tagged

Oooh...I'm so excited - my first tag. My friend Jill tagged me with the following meme:

What was I doing 10 years ago?
I was still single (barely) with no children. Life was painfully simple, but I had no clue. I worked in collections at our old company Baysinger Police Supply, and got to track down the people that owed us money. I was very Magnum P.I.

5 Places I have traveled:
Cancun
Cozumel
Cayman Islands
Cabo San Lucas
Lots of ski trips to Colorado
(I didn't plan for each place to start with "C", but that's really weird!)

5 snacks or treats I enjoy:
Wedding Cake
Wedding Cake
Wedding Cake
Wedding Cake
Chips & Salsa
(I'd be soooo in 7th Heaven at a Mexican wedding!)

What would I do if I were a billionaire?
Lots more philanthropy...especially for kiddos in rough situations.
Big fat donation toward Expedition Hope (our church building campaign)
Colorado ski chateau
Caribbean beach house
Private jet to shuttle all my friends to the chateau & beach house

Places I have lived?
Severy, KS (population 300)
Howard, KS (population 750)
Fall River, KS (population 152)
Wichita, KS (population 350,000)
Blake couldn't understand why I never locked my car doors when I first moved to Wichita. Now it all makes sense.

Jobs I have had:
Mary's Drive-In (small town knock-off of a Dairy Queen - I was so underage and so underpaid...in cash)
Bird Cleaner (don't ask)
Lifeguard
Model
Business owner
Each job seems to have been a nice step up from the previous one - wouldn't you say? Well - lifeguard and model weren't bad - but one was seasonal and one didn't work with my wedding cake obsession.

My Sweet Niece

Last night our family went to El Dorado to watch my niece Josie perform in her school's Spring Music Program. The show was called "Just For the Fun Of It" and the songs they performed were just that - Fun! In fact - Blake kept singing about an aardvark throughout the evening after the program.

Josie is a wonderful niece. I remember when she was very small, there were certain characteristics in her that reminded me of myself. I didn't have my own kids at that time, and it was an instant bond. When she was learning to talk, she had trouble saying my name...what kid doesn't? It came out "Ginger" and I've been Ginger ever since! I love it! She's such a pretty girl, and I know her daddy plans to keep a shotgun nearby as she gets older.

After the concert we went to Freddy's for burgers and ice cream. At some point Mason took Max's Blue's Clues blanket, tied it around his neck as a makeshift cape, and began to "fly" around the restaurant. Since there were only a couple of other people there, I wasn't paying much attention - he was having fun and not causing trouble, and my brother was entertaining us with stories from the past. Apparently (thank you Aunt Donna for filling me in), Mason "flew" past a young, blond girl, stopped and said, "You're Hot"! I wanted to die. When I asked him where he learned to say that, he told me that Marcus used to say it about his girlfriend. True. I guess the girl thought it was quite funny, so that's reassuring. I thought later, she'll probably never forget the little boy with the Blue's Clues blanket turned cape telling her she was hot. I bet her daddy keeps a shotgun nearby, too!

Here are some pics of my favorite niece:This year's school picture. My school pictures NEVER looked this good!

Josie at Freddy's last night

Confessions of a Desperate Housewife

It's been 3 months since I had the baby, and I'm still struggling to get my house in order. Now to be perfectly honest, I don't claim to have EVER had it completely in order. I have a house full of boys for pete's sake, and I'm not particularly a neat freak. But I do like order and I do like a somewhat clean home.

I used to be a FlyLady follower, but she's just a bit on the compulsive side, if you ask me. I remember when she wrote, "I often wake up and there's absolutely nothing for me to do." - referencing her perfectly cleaned and organized home. That's when I flew the coop on Flylady. Then I found a book entitled The House That Cleans Itself. Save your money folks. I sat on the couch through a whole episode of Oprah and nothing happened. My house definitely did not clean itself.

I have two main priorities as I work to get back in the swing of homemaking. Number one - I need to engage my boys. I often find myself picking up after them instead of training them to do it themselves. Number two - time management is key, because with a 3 month old, my hands always seem to be full. Planning ahead is a must. I'll work on that.

And finally - my confession - this morning Marcus claimed to have no clean socks. In truth, he didn't have clean socks that he liked. He wanted a particular kind and none of those were clean. I should have simply made him wear what was available, but instead he witnessed the dumping out of my spare sock sack. This is a little (OK - not so little) bag that I shove all the single socks into when I can't find the mate. Periodically, I dump it out and pair up what I can. It's tidy and hidden. What is the alternative? Unless I only wash matched socks, I can't think of what else to do with the mismatched ones. Any ideas are welcome!