Party Weekend

We had a great weekend- Brent's parents were in town for Gray's birthday party. They got in town on Friday night. Luckily they left Indy early so they could miss most of the snow that hit the midwest. I read that some parts of Indiana and Ohio got 13-20 inches. Glad they made it:)We had the party on Saturday afternoon. It was kind of crazy (as always). We had about 14 adults and about 12 kids under the age of 4. That is always chaotic. The good part was that the kids were from playgroup so they are used to being together and having it be loud and crazy. They have learned to tolerate each other pretty well. We had a frog theme party. I made some frog cupcakes that were adorable (if I do say so) and had a frog cake and frog lollipops.

Here is a closeup of the cupcakes. The kids also made their own sundaes. As usual I overestimated the amount of food we would need for the party. So we had a ton of ice cream, sundae toppings, sprinkles, whip cream, and a huge container of cherries left over. We will be eating sundaes for the next few years. I think that is a challenge we will happily take on.

On Sunday we took the kids to the Children's Museum. It was fun to see Gray appreciate it more. He loved the dinosaur slide and playing in the model of the James River. It was a fun way to spend the afternoon with the kids. Later in the day Linda and I went to a few open houses in the area. They were both pretty big homes in beautiful neighborhoods. But both would need work in different ways. One had wallpaper in almost every room, but it had a great price because it was a foreclosure. The other one needed some updating- lots of pink subway tile in the bathrooms. We are not ready to move anytime soon but it is fun to see what it out there. Especially since it is supposed to be buyer's market.

Here Kitty Kitty

So the latest dilemma involves Emme, the cat that lives under our porch. She basically "conveyed" with our house, and according to the neighbors, has lived under the porch for several years across a few families. When we closed on our house, the realtor told us about her and we agreed to feed her. We think she is feral, but she is DEFINITELY an outside cat. Regardless a few days ago her food did not seem like it was eaten as quickly and she wasn't waiting on our front porch in the morning. I got a little worried about her and saw her limping a bit. Yesterday morning she did not touch her food or water. So I went on a hunt and found her curled up in a little ball on the side of our house. She had a dime-sized open wound on her paw and seemed to not be feeling well. The thing that worried me most was that there were flies (yuck) all over her. So after much consultation (Meghan- thank you, SPCA, etc) I called Animal Control to come get her. Hoping that they would try to treat her with antibiotics and maybe put her up for adoption. Well I took the boys to church last night, and Animal Control must have come while we were gone. We had a notice on our door saying that they could not catch this cat. I was kind of surprised by this info, but figured that they must not have tried very hard. Last night at 9, our neighbor came over asking about the cat and the AC visit. The guy said that he watched the AC person chase the cat for about 45 minutes before giving up. He gave us the name and number of an agency called CARE that helps rescue cats. So I called them this morning and they have agreed to get her checked out, vaccinated, and give her antibiotics for her paw. Then I guess we can see if she is truly feral or may be adoptable. If she is feral then I guess she comes back to living under our porch. If she is adoptable, then she may have a nice home coming her way. Great resolution, huh? The ONLY CATCH is that I have to catch her and get her to their vet by 9:30 AM on Monday. So this should be interesting. I do have an old crate that we had used with Elvis so I guess I will put some blankets in it and some tuna and see what happens. It should be entertaining. Picture it...Monday morning with me, a 3 year old, and a 1 year old trying to capture a feral cat in a crate and drive it to the vet. Not sure it is going to happen but I will try. Who says the life of a stay-at-home Mom is boring?

Teenager in the works

Nothing much to post today. Griffin has come up with a few more interesting comments lately. The first is saying, "Whatever", with just the right amount of sass. The second is calling his trains "stupid" when they fall off the table. He said that a kid in his class was calling people "stupid" today. So I had to launch into a lesson about not using that word to talk about other people.

Other than that, not much is happening. Brent's parents are coming in town this weekend to celebrate Gray's birthday. We are having a small party with the kids from playgroup so I hope it is fun. We are doing cake and ice cream sundaes so it should be a great sugar high for them all.

Birthday Boy

It is hard to believe that Gray turned ONE yesterday. Last year he fit on Brent's hand, and now, that aint happening!
We had a fun day yesterday. We went to Kitchen 64 for lunch and the food was great. Then we just hung out all afternoon. The weather was nice so we were outside for a little bit. Then at Griffin's insistence, we came inside to open the presents. This "sharing" concept is a bit hard for him. Gray got a Tonka ride-on toy, a cool ball, some jammies, and a water table for outside.

I made a little Oreo cake for dessert after dinner. He loved it!

This morning this is how I found him playing with his new toy.

My Little Weirdos

My little weirdos:

Griffin decided to do his best impersonation of Tom Cruise (in Risky Business) yesterday. You probably can't tell but he has his school backpack and his Colts hat on too. That adds a little something to the whole ensemble. Then there is Gray- why does this kid prefer to eat paper towels to any nutritious food I offer him? He can find a stray piece of paper anywhere and just start munching away.

Then this is mostly for the grandparents, but it is a quick video of Gray's latest trick. He is waving "hi" all the time. Tonight he was headed up the steps (yet again) and would go up about one step, stop and wave "hi", then do a few more steps, then stop and wave "hi" again. Kind of cute.

Snacking

I may have been talking a bit too much about what is healthy for Griffin to eat. Today we were walking out of his preschool and he said, "Mommy, I was good today so I get a chocolate donut". So I said that he could have a donut after he ate his lunch. Griffin said, "Good idea. I need some turkey rollups so I can get my protein". Pretty funny. I also cut some veggies (celery, carrots, peppers) and put it in Tupperware in the fridge. As of now Griffin thinks his "healthy snack box" is fun, but I am sure this will wear off soon.

The other funny thing he is doing recently is asking me to call him a specific name. So today it was "Mommy, call me Griffin Running Boy" or "call me Griffin Jumping Skipping Goat". It is sort of weird but I am not sure what to think.

Also just 3 days until Gray turns ONE. I can hardly believe how fast this year has gone by. I need to think of something fun to do for his big day.

What to eat, what to eat

So today at Mom's Group we had a nutrition/wellness/fitness expert as our guest speaker. She was very good, but man, did she make me think about what kinds of food we eat at our house. I think I may be trying to justify things to myself, but I feel like we are somewhere in the middle. We don't eat horribly, but we could do much better. One of the speaker's biggest suggestions was to monitor the amount of sugar you consume. She talked about statistics that were pretty crazy- like how a kid on average eats 5 lbs of sugar in one week. It is hard for me to think about a 5 lb bag of sugar in the grocery store and how that could possibly fit in my kids. She said that first that monitoring sugar was the best way to lose weight but also talked a lot about how it affected your pancreas, etc. Kind of wild. She was very ANTI artificial sweeteners and seemed to focus on eating foods in their most natural state. So we should be eating raw fruits and veggies, brown grains, and use unprocessed sugar and salt in foods. That is easy with Griffin, but doing this with Gray should be a challenge. He is my "all carb" kid who loves to eat anything that is white or yellow. He kind of just spits out anything that looks healthy for you.

On a very random side note, anyone seen the Orbit gum commercial where the two ladies are fighting over the guy in his office? I love it. "Who you calling cootie queen? You lint licker". Followed by "Pickle me, you kumquat". Not sure why I find it funny, but I do.