Disapointing

I was looking forward to the campout near the National Mall in D.C to get my White House Easter Egg Roll tickets this year. In previous years you camp out with friends, pop up a tent in line with the other thousands of tents in line, stay up all night talking and at around 4:30am the tickets get distrubuted.

I just read online that this year there will be no tickets passed out that way, they will be done electronically through the internet, and they were all GONE for 2009! The tickets were passed out last Thursday! Apperently the process was just as grueling, with parents sitting at their computers literally 24 hours that day hitting refresh every minute or so to get tickets. That doesn't sound fun at all!

I hope this isn't how they continue in years to come to dole the tickets out. Camping out in D.C is a tradition that started YEARS ago!!

Oh well, I guess we'll have to find local Easter egg hunts this year. Although the White House was the one I found to be the most fun! A bit crowded though, but that doesn't bother me.

Just because

Just because I have nothing noteworthy to post about at this particular moment, I thought I'd do some then and now photos!
ME BEFORE THE PLATINUM HAIR:

ME AFTER THE PLATINUM HAIR:


KIDS THEN:


KIDS NOW:


A MAN AND HIS DOG!:

A MAN AND HIS BIGGER DOG:

Happy Saint Patricks Day

The kids woke up to a yummy breakfast of green shamrock shaped pancakes, with green fried eggs and ham. I also made them green milkshakes. We listened to Irish music and danced Irish dances, and later we will be making Irish Soda bread to eat with our Corned beef dinner. I'm such a good mom!!!!
Oh wait, that was a day in the life of my parallel universe self. Oh yeah, that's right, for breakfast I poured my children bowls of cereal with milk I dyed green (looked nasty, but the kids liked it). And we have a normal day planned today, if we are lucky and have time I printed off a few St. Patrick's Day worksheets to do for fun.
I WISH we were having corned beef for dinner, I love that stuff. But alas, hubby is out of town, so we will most likely have mac and cheese (although I could dye that green... yuck, maybe not!)
Anyway, St. Patricks Day! Hopefully most of you are having a more fun day then we are, LOL! Hey, at least the kids dressed themselves in green today...

Free Range Kids

Okay, I'm an instant fan. I like to think I parent like this to an extent anyway, but now with a name/label to it, I can find more information about it! Do you remember last year all the media frenzy about the New York mother who let her 9 year old ride the subway by himself? She was deemed the worst mother in America. Well, her parenting philosophy is one I wholeheartedly agree with. She's now writing a book about it, appropriately named Free Range Kids. She has a blog about it as well.Just copy and paste, it's worth it!
http://freerangekids.wordpress.com/2009/03/14/intro-to-free-range-kids-available-for-your-reading-pleasure/

Anyway, you can read the introduction to her book on there, and it's really good! It's one I'll probably read several times. Leave comments... I'm curious what other parents think of the concept. As it is now, I think I'm the only parent I know who lets their 7 and 3 year old wander the neighborhood. I like the idea of having a 'free range kid', HA!

Projects...

If there's one thing we do alot of in this house it's PROJECTS! Here are our latest ones... birdhouses, which the kids did for co-op the other day. Pinky has hers hanging off the tree in our front yard.


We also made Ice Cream In A Bag. It was very cool! Each kid can make and eat there own! I don't have a good pic of that, but you give each kid a ziplock bag (normal size) and fill it with 1/2 c. of half and half, 1 TBSP. sugar, and 1 tsp. vanilla. Then SEAL the bag! In a gallon size ziplock bag put enough ice to fill about 3/4ths, then add 6 TBSP of rock salt. Put the smaller bag inside the bigger and, then roll around on the counter for 5 minutes! Take smaller bag out of salt and rinse thoroughly in water then eat.
All the kids loved this one!

I also attempted something I've never tried before, we made homemade crayons. Just peel all your old crayons, color code them, and bake at 200 degrees until melted. it took about 15 minutes. Then pop in the fridge for like 10 more to cool them.



Try these at home, they were fun!

Snow Day

So, this is a bit late, seeing as how we've had 70 degree days since this... but here is the snow we got last week. It was perfect powdery snow! The dog loved it and the kids attempted to make a snowman with hubby, but the snow was too soft for that still. But it was cool anyway!

What is going on with the weather!!

On Monday it snowed 9 inches, on Tuesday it was icy. Yet, today (Thursday) it is nearly 70 degrees out!! Hey, I'm not complaining... but it sure it wierd!