Falling behind again...

So we can all agree I'm not very good at keeping up with my blogging.  But what can I say I work almost 24/7 and have a house and family to look after.  But excuses aside here I am.

I can't wait for this weekend to officially start.  Fun things are on the calendar and cupcakes are in the oven!  Yes I said cupcakes are in the oven.  We have a geocaching meet and greet tomorrow night.  Although we neither voted in the hidey awards or reached any milestones this year we plan to go and have some fun!  I'm in the middle of baking cupcakes to bring and will make cornbread tomorrow.  I can't however come up with any good ideas on how to decorate the cupcakes.  I want something with a geocaching them.  I thought about doing little travel bugs on them but that might take a really long time!  I also thought of incorporating a the logo in somehow.  I'll come up with something, I always do.

We've been doing a lot of shopkicking lately.  Shopkick is an app for your smart phone that has you scan items in stores while you are out shopping.  Each time you scan an item you receive a predetermined amount of kick pints.  You can also receive kick points by simply walking into a store.  They also give instant rewards that require you to do nothing at all.  Once you have collected kick points you can redeem them for gift cards.  We just redeemed some points for 25 dollars from restaurants.com.  I can't wait to use it!  If you are like me and love a good deal or free things give shopkick a try!   I have also heard that swagbucks is another great way to earn points to cash in for prizes and things.  I might just sign up!

Trip to nc!

So we took a spontaneous trip to North Carolina this weekend.  My husband's parents decided to bring his sister and her family their Christmas gifts.  They asked us if we would like to go along.  That was Thursday, we left on Saturday and we were back this afternoon.  Although it was a short trip we had fun as always. 

They took us to their aquarium, the North Carolina Aquarium Fort Fisher.  It was a very nice little aquarium!  Much better than the one we go to near us in Va Beach.  And the price was great!  Eight dollars!  Here we pay 21!  I always thought it was high and now think so even more!  If they can have low prices why can't ours?  I'll admit maybe ours does have a few bigger exhibits like the otters and the seals outside but I still don't think they need to charge that much.  If it were cheaper I would go more than once every few years.  And usually when I do go it is because I was given a free pass or I was with some one with a membership.  I'm not saying it is a bad aquarium I just don't feel as though I've gotten my moneys worth when I leave.  I do think it is well worth the drive to go to the one in NC! 

Liam loves to look at fish!  I'm so glad they decided to take us!  It's so cute to watch him try and catch a fish as it swims by!  It's also adorable how he gets startled when one sneaks up on him. 

Oh!  Liam said dada and momma tonight!  We were at dinner at my parents.  My mom was feeding him too slow he thought and decided to let her know it and said dadadada.  My mom asked if we heard it.  I heard him say something but it didn't register what.  We all looked at him as he proceeded to say dada again then momma!  I guess he decided to go ahead and get them both out on the same day!  After that he decided he liked dada the best and continued to babble that for the rest of dinner!  I'm so excited for talking.  Let's hope this isn't like his blowing raspberries.  He blew raspberries for a day and then stopped.  We shall see!

Here are some pictures from our trip!  Hope you enjoy!

Pictures!

I thought I'd make tonights post pictures of the baby!  Enjoy!

Geocaching adventure!

We went out on a numbers run today.  A numbers run is when you go out and grab as many caches as you can to bring you total finds up.  Though we didn't end up meeting our goal of ten it was fun.  It was a small goal I know but we were trying to grab some quick park and grabs while the little cacher napped in his carseat.  He napped for about an hour which gave us time to grab a few.  We did a few more after he woke up and had a bottle of course.  He enjoyed a walk around a small pond behind an office building.  I enjoy finding caches in nice little hidden spots like that one.  He liked the fountain and most of all the wind blowing his hair.  He loves the wind!  Although we didn't make our quota we did find 8.  Not too shabby but not great either.  We had three dnf's or did not finds.  I never like leaving with without a find especially if I know where it is and can't get it because of a muggle.  We had two of these today and one true dnf.  If that one was camouflaged it was very well done.  All in all a good day.  We will venture out again tomorrow in hopes to make a few more finds.  We are hoping to hit 200 finds by February 4th for the milestone meet and greet and hidey awards.  We need 58 more!  Wish us luck!

I won't break my streak!

I do not really have anything thought out to say tonight.  Liam was cranky most of the afternoon until I went to work and because of that I never put any thought into what I was going to write tonight.  I have five minutes to publish this or it will become tomorrows post and I will have lost my own challenge of writing every day!  Now four...and the baby just woke up!  Here is hoping he puts himself back to sleep, I'm tired.  Good night!

Coupons

I attempted to print coupons today.  I always get excited when I read about how someone spent fifty dollars on two hundred dollars worth of groceries.  I jump on the computer and start searching.  About fifteen minutes in I start to get discouraged.  I never seem to find any coupons for the things we buy!  It seems there is only ever coupons for frozen pizzas or shampoo I don't use.  I have come to think that maybe people who coupon don't use the same products all the time.  I like my body wash and get sad when walmart is out of my conditioner.  I'm not sure how I would do changing up my things just because I found a good coupon.  But then again I guess that's all part of the game.  But maybe they are just lucky and they use the products that commonly have coupons out there.  I'm not going to let this discourage me though I will keep trying.  I did enter a contest to win a year of diapers.  That would be nice.  I also signed up for free samples of parents choice formula.  But everytime I hit the send me my free sample button it just sent me to a find your walmart page so I'm not sure I will see those.  If I do it will be a pleasant surprise!  I'll try again another day.  Until then I hope you have better luck than I did!

Headache...

Nothing long tonight.  Terrible headache!  I will leave you with this advice, don't sit in a dance studio waiting area for two hours with a headache.  Especially one that teaches tap!  Good night.....

Day two of resolutions...

It's getting off to a slow start.  With the heat still out we stayed the night at my parents last night.  We tried to run a portable heater in our room and Liam's room at the same time.  Who knew they were on the same breaker.  We do now!  It didn't trip it it blew it!  So my husband and his dad replaced it tonight.  I missed my bed.  I may be short but I'm too tall to sleep on a love seat!  Needless to say I didn't get logged into wii fit last night and I doubt I'll get to it tonight.  I did however remember my reusable shopping bags and resisted the urge to take the easy way out and buy bottled water.  We didn't eat super great today.  I feel I'm going down quick here with these resolutions.  I'm going to try my best though!  At least I got the chance to write this.  Little Liam is napping here on the couch next to me.  It's still too cold in his room for napping.  But hopefully by bedtime it will be fine.  It's also incredibly too cold for a walk tonight.  It's snowing!  Flurries, but I would love to go walk in it!  Unfortunately it's too windy for the little guy.  Maybe tomorrow night!

New year's resolutions...

I've never been big into making new year's resolutions but this year I'm going to give it a try!  They won't be unreachable goals but things that I always say I will do and never get around to.

Starting today I will blog everyday!  Whether it be a short paragraph about the day or a topic I'd like to share or discuss.  I know I've said this before but this time it will stick!  My tablet is being shipped back to the manufacture due to technical issues.  Until then I will be using the desktop and my new MyTouch Q my husband got me for Christmas!  Which I love by the way.  Don't get me started on the mess I went through with my old one.  That might be for another day.

Be more earth friendly.  I will remember to bring my reusable shopping bags with me to the grocery store.  I was pretty good last year but I can do better.  Use my reusuable cups instead of buying or using bottled water.  This means find a way to bring water for Liam's bottle instead of using bottled water.  Start making sure we always bring a garbage bag with us when geocaching so that we can clean up the areas around the caches! 

Get organized!  We need to make our office usuable instead of our catch all room.  We have a great desk that is burried under random things.  Mostly my husbands tools.  I want that done by the end of the month.  I want to keep it organized all year, always!

Lose this baby weight!  I want to log into wii fit everyday, even if it is just for a few minutes or a weight check.  Take a walk everyday, long or short it doesn't matter.

Eat better!  This will help in getting rid of the extra flab.  Cut our eating out to once a week.  On the weekedns maybe.  I'd love to knock it back to every other week, but let's take baby steps first.  Drink more water and cut out soda.  If I do have a soda one per day and no refils if we are out!  I'll keep up better with the fresh fruits and veggies and not let them go bad before we use them.  And make lunches the night before and seperate snacks and veggies into easy grab bags for snaking or lunch packing.

Manage our money better.  Start shopping with coupons and make sure I remember to use the rewards programs we have signed up for. 

These aren't hard tasks to accomplish.  I'm sure I can keep up with them, right?  Wish me luck!

Vlogging update and weekend

I posted days 2, 3, and 4 tonight.  They aren't the full videos.  I still haven't found a good editing app for my tablet.  That being said day 2 has two videos uploaded seperately.  I inadvertently uploaded part two without a title.  It's title is December 2 instead.  I have yet to figure out how to change it!    I also realized I posted my username wrong.  Sorry about that.  It is Rascalflattfan24. 

We had a great weekend!  The craft show went well.  We had more customers this year than last.  Things are turning around.  The last few years had not been so well due to the economy.  But things are looking up!  I sold lots of my small pine cone baskets!  Though I only sold a few of my scrabble tile jewlery.  It's a shame because I really enjoy making those.

As always the fireworks were wonderful!  Though I wish the wouldn't allow people to stand on their soap boxes.  I'm all for free speach but it ruins everyones good time.  I realize it was somethi g that was done in colonial williamsburg but not with speakers!  It was fun when the crowd began singing carols to drown him out.  Which of course gave hom something to feed on, "you won't be singing jingle bells in hell."  Good grief.  But the carols added some extra cheer and once the fireworks started you forgot they were there.  Liam loved the fireworks!  It was his first ti e seeing any and he didn't cry.  He even trjed so hard to finish watching them even though he could barely keep his eyes open!  I can't post pictures yet as I haven't unloaded the camera but I will soon.

All in all it was a good weekend, a good start to the holidays!

Vlogging!

One of the ladies on the June mommy's group I belong to on facebook decided to do a vlog everyday from now until Christmas.  I thought this might be an interesting challenge for me.  I recorded my first one tonight.  Search Rascalfan24 on youtube.  Although I didn't get to take all of my clips and put them together.  I recorded it on my tablet and tried using a free video editing app to do my editing.  I was very excited because the app did everything windows movie maker does. Unfortunatley after I rendered the video it wouldn't play!  So therefore I could only upload the first part which actually started out to be the only one I was going to do because my son was being cranky.  I need to find a better set up for my video recording.  Liam and I were sitting on my bed, only because Country Christmas was on tv and we were recording during comercials!  But the tablet was being propped up by the blankets and Liam's toys.  I also looked terrible by the way.  I never did get a chance to do my hair today.  Oh well.  Just one of joys of being a mom!  I'm going to call it a night jn case the little booger decides to wake up every hour!

Thanksgiving!

We had a wonderful thanksgiving!  We took Liam to his first trip to his aunt's house in Wlimington, nc.  I do believe we came home with a spoiled child!  He was held just about every minute of the day.  We almost didn't go, poor little guy has an ear infection.  We had no idea.  He was a little congested so to be on the safe side I took him in to see the doctor and low and behold she found the ear infection.  Knowing he would be cranky we didn't want to impose with a crying baby we gave his aunt the option of us staying home.  She said it would be fine she was use to babies with ear infections.  Her son had tons of them whe  he was little.  So Wednesday morning we packed up the car and made the 5 hour drive down.  Liam did suprisingly well and sleep most of the way.  When he did wake we stopped to kill time until he was ready for another nap.  Needless to say our 5 hour drive took more along the lines of 7, but we had a happy sleeping baby. 

Thursday, Thanksgiving.  More family came and we had a wonderful meal cooked by my sister in laws husband.  Liam even had a taste of the sweet potatos.  :(  I brought some sweet potatoes and pumpkin I had pureed for him.  He is really liking the whole solids thing!

Friday we introduced the family to geocaching.  We went to a local park to find some caches.  Liam even got his first swag, a rubber ducky!  My sister in law is hooked.  She spent mich of that evening looking at a map of geocaches.  I think we may have created a monster!

Saturday we went to play disc golf at a beautiful park by the beach.  I've never played in the sand before, it gave the game an interesting chalange.  I forgot my camera in the car.  I was disapointed I did not get a chance to take pictures of the beautiful course.  All the more reason to go back!  After disc golf we headed downtown to eat lunch and do a little more geocaching.  We found some pretty interesting ones and I can't wait to go back and find others.  We only found ten all total for the weekend.

Sunday we packed up and went home.  I think Liam missed everyone. He wasn't too happy just seeing me all day yesterday and today!  I had to escape the house to my moms this afternoon just to make him happy.  Oh the things we do for our kids!

Mingo, WV

Each year my family takes a trip to the mountains.  This year we went to Mingo, WV which is just a few miles outside of Snowshoe.  My husband and I went skiing at Snowshoe a few years back.  It looks so much different in the snow!  Fall is my favorite time of year.  I love the way the mountains look with all the colors.

This was Liam's first trip to the mountains.  It definitely won't be his last!

Oh my!  I started this post last week!  I just happened to come in the office and realize I never finished it.  I'll share a few of the pictures from our trip and call it a day on this one.

It's been a while...

The AC is out.  With that being said it is very warm in the office!  I haven't had the motivation to sit in a hot room and mess around on the computer.  It cooled down a bit tonight so I thought I would write a few words.

I love yard sales, thrift stores and flea markets!  My mom and I went to a few church sales today.  Liam may not have been born into a family with lots of money but he sure won't be missing out on anything.  We found some great things today including a swing for the tree in the front yard.  Our greatest find for the day by far had to be the two rear and forward facing car seats for fifteen dollars a piece.  They were in great condition!  I can't wait to use them.  I'll give him a few more weeks in his infant seats then I think I will graduate him up to a big boy seat.  I just can't carry those seats anymore.  It's killing my back to drag it in and out of the car.  He seems to do well in the one my mom has.  I honestly think he enjoys it better being as he insists on being sat up all the time now.  No more laying down for him.  Now if only he would roll over.

Pictures, pictures and more pictures

I finally uploaded our pictures from the weekend.  Liam had his first ride in a big baby swing.  At first it seemed he wasn't too sure he liked it, but after I started making funny faces and noises he changed his mind.  He also dipped his toes in the lake for the first time.  He was indifferent.  Next summer he will get to go swimming!

Super baby!

Not impressed.

Sleeping with grandpa

Getting ready for bed.  He sure looks tired doesn't he?

I finally finished the train rug for the Wednesday Bible study class.  It took much longer than I had anticipated.  Liam did not like me painting it and would promptly cry every time I picked up the brush.  I also had issues with the paint.  I really need to buy a new paint supple one day.  Most of it worked great then I would get on a role and halfway through outlining a train the paint would get clogged.  I think I spent more time unclogging paint than I did painting!  But thankfully it is done!

The weekend

I am aware there are tons of errors.  I typed this on the tablet so I have to hen peck.  I unfortunately found it much easier to type this rather than try and fix the errors using the tablet.

It's been a few days since I have written.  I've already broken my intentions on writing a little something everyday.  Though in my defense there is no reception at the lake.  But there is no excuse for yesterday, just laziness I guess.

Liam got to meet some of the extended family this weekend.  But sadly it was because we had to attend a funeral in NC.  I am glad however that they got to meet my precious little boy.  On the way home we decided to spend the rest of the weekend with Terry's parents at their house at Lake Gaston.  Liam took his first ride in a swing and dipped his toes in the lake.  I woukd have taken him swimming but the little guy slept right through swim time.  I'll post picturee tomorrow as I haven't taken the pictures off of the camera yet.

We took a long walk after dinner today, about 2 miles or so.  We were going to find a geocache that has been eluding us.  We unfortunatelybhad to turn back before we arrived in fear we wouldn't make it home before dark.  i worked on the train rug for a little while i'm still not finished with it yet.  for some reason liam thinks that every time i pick up the paint brush that is his cue to cry whether he needs anything or not!  i hope to have it finished tomorrow afternoon.  i also still need to finish water proofing the placemats.

thats all for now.

First day of school

Today was the first day back at Bible study and Liam's first trip to the nursery.  Although his aunt and our good friend work in that room.  So other than new surroundings he still has familiar faces!  My mom and our friend work together in the 3,4 and 5 year old room.  We always start our day with free play.  This gives the kids an opportunity to get to know one another and socialize with friends they haven't seen in a while.  This also gives us time to individually work with a child on a special project if we have one planned.  Today we made our place mats for snack time. A few kids at a time sat at the table and colored and dot painted on a piece of construction paper.  I'll print their picture and add it and then cover it with clear shelf liner to make it water proof.

The kids love eating off of their place mats and it helps them recognize their names in the process.  It's a win win!  The parent's meetings ran short today so we had to cut our day a bit short.  Usually after free play the children sit on the carpet for story time and then we do a craft.  Today's lesson was "God made the world"  God said "Let there be light."  I folded a piece of paper in half and they glued bits of black paper to make dark.  On the inside I wrote God said "Let there be light." on the left side and the kids glued yellow bits of paper to make light.  I forgot to take a picture.  After craft the children ate a snack while I set up a light hunting game.  I wish I had taken a picture of this too.  I'll get better at remembering these things.  I made a large tent and put cut out stars and suns all around.  We turned out the lights and passed out flashlights.  The kids loved searching for the stars and suns in the dark!  I only wish we had had more time!

Wednesdays are going to be long days.  I will work at church in the morning then baby-sit from 3-7.  Little Liam will stay with grandma and Terry will pick him up after work.

Here are the pictures of the train rug process I promised.  It's not finished yet but it is on my schedule for Monday!  Enjoy!

The first rug

Changed rugs the first one was too short

Measured out space for ten trains.  It will be a bit tight but it will have to do.  I didn't have any other rugs!

Mommies sleepy little helper.  The best he was all day!

I drew and cut out a template for an engine, a box car and a caboose

Outlined the templates

The beginning of filling in

Baby, trains and crazy things

So my goal is to write a little something everyday even if it is just a couple of sentences.  I am aware that with work and a 2 month old it may be a challenge, but I'm up for it!

I didn't work today so Liam and I stayed home.  Did I mention Liam isn't a fan of staying home all day?  Well he isn't.  I needed to get a few things done for the start of the Bible study tomorrow.  We always have the kids line up to go to the gym, playground or bathroom.  In the past I have traced their feet on construction paper and lined those up on the floor.  But since this room is also used on Sunday for Sunday school I can't leave them there so I end up taping them.  Well the tape doesn't stay well and by the end of the session most of the feet are ripped.  This year I thought why not use a rug runner.  I am painting train cars on a rug and will unroll and roll it up every class.  Liam decided that he would let me get the cars traced but not colored in.  So there for I do not have it finished for tomorrow's class.  Next week it is then.  I have pictures of the progress but quiet frankly I'm too tired to take them off the camera.  Tomorrow I promise!

We went to dinner at Terry's parents tonight, something we have started doing once a week.  I remember looking forward to going to my grandparents for dinner each week and want Liam to have the kinds of traditions I enjoyed as a child.  His grandma rocked him to sleep which she loves.  Ordinarily I would object but after his cranky afternoon I said what the heck have at it!

We noticed last night the dishwasher stopped working.  Terry decided to take a look at it tonight.  Unplugged and pluggd it back, nothing.  After pulling it out from under the counter and lots of water on the floor it worked!  Why?  Have no clue.  He pushes it back in, no more lights.  He is still in there figdgeting with it now.  Hopefully he can figure it out.

I put little Liam to bed at 10 tonight here is hoping for a good night sleep to make up for last night!

Labor day fun

You'll have to bare with me, my writting isn't that great but I've always wanted to start a blog.  So here it goes!  I'll share little tid bits of our daily lives and what new things our little boy is up to.  I teach a Bible class to a group of 3 and 4 year olds as well as Sunday school to 2 and 3 year olds.  I'll share with you what we do in class from the games we play to the art projects we make.   I'm hoping that this will help others who teach preschoolers.  There are lots of great sites out there that give information on lessons and crafts. But sometimes I wonder if they have ever taught to preschoolers.  Some of the activities and crafts are way to complicated for this age.  I'll share how I did things and whether or not they worked.

So here goes nothing...

Our little Liam had a great  night sleep last night!  Eight hours!  Our little boy is growing so fast!  But mommy and daddy love the idea of getting a full nights sleep again.

We decided to do a little geocaching today so we loaded the gps with stroller friendly caches, packed a few extra bottles for the baby and headed out.  But before we could even think about hiking we needed to grab lunch.  Firehouse subs sent us a coupon for a free medium sub for Labor day.  I love their steamers!  It turns out all of the caches loaded in the gps were park and grabs.  We decided to take a chance and headed out to stumpy lake.  The paths were littered with debri from the recent hurricane. It made for hiking in flip flops a bit challenging.  Because we chose stroller accesable caches to begin with we didn't bring any tennis shoes.  Needless to say we decided not to push the stroller.  I used the mobby wrap.  I love it!  I have a bjorn carrier but it hurts my back.  I did a little research and came across the moby wrap.  I'm still getting use to putting it on but practice makes perfect right?

We didn't have any luck on the trail, we will have to go back when we have the propper footwear.  We decided to grab one near the road before heading out.  It was a pretty easy matchstick container by the lake.  Beware of the poison ivy!  My husband insists he has it, he says his ankles itch already.  We marked that one off our list and headed to walmart.  I know, not very smart on Labor day but it really wasn't as busy as I expected it to be.  Grabbed broccoli, cheese and a spark plug for the lawn mower and headed home.  While I  made broccoli salad my husband attempted to mow the knee high grass.  He got about two thrids of it done before the lawn mower died.  We had dinner at my husbands sister's for her husbands birthday.
It was bath night for the little booger!  I was so proud of him he didn;t cry once while in the bath, he usually does not like his hair washed.  He did however cry when he got out.  Here is hoping for another eight hours tonight!