Birthday Party Fun!

Cousin Claire's 7th birthday party was last weekend. I had decided that Meg and I would go shopping together to get her gift and pick out a new outfit for her to wear. Boy did I get myself into something with that?!?! We walked into the Limited Too (thanks to Mamaw just mentioning that they carry size 6's which Meg has recently started wearing) and immediately the girl asked us what we were looking for. Meg, being her bold little self, prould announced she needed a new outfit for her cousin's birthday party. The girl then asked if she like girly or sporty. Not really understanding what this meant, Meg looks up at me and without a doubt I said, "Point us in the direction of girly!" We looked around for a little while and she found a skirt she just had to have. I didn't see a shirt that seemed to really match it so I told Meg to go find her friend for some help. She did and the girl took us all over the store picking out shirts that would match. Then Meg got to try them all on and decided which she liked best. We even found a pair of silver ballet flats too. She definitely enjoyed this shopping experience, although, I'm certain my wallet will not handly many trips to the Limited Too. I'm thinking about setting up a clothing fund in Meghan's name at the bank, if you'd like details on how to make a donation, just email me!! **wink, wink** :)

She had an absolute blast at the party. It was definitely a girly-girl party and right up Meg's alley. They got to dress up, wear make-up and do hair. She was in heaven for the day. The only non-girly part of the day for her was all the food she managed to inhale. She ate a couple of little tea sandwiches, all the munchie stuff and then later when I asked her which color mini cupcake she ate, she told me she ate one of each color! I think there were probably about 5 different colors. That's my girl....never make a decision on dessert, just eat a little of everything! We learned that well from Grandpa. All in all it was a great day!

All fixed up for the party!

The cousins, looking their best!



Decorating a craft



What a sense of style, huh?

ll

Oh the innocence...

Meg was attempting to get out of the car tonight and her seat belt got wrapped around the armrest on her booster seat. She yelled out to me, "Mommy, help! I'm stuck!" We'd been singing our names in the Banana-Fanana Style right before we got home, so she quickly starts in...Stuck, stuck, bo-buck, banana-fanana-fo.....you can finish the rest. I decided not to respond or react because in her sweet little innocence she had no idea that she had just dropped an **F-Bomb** in front of her mommy. I did quickly change the topic though to divert her attention!

Swim Lesson Update

Swim lessons are a success! Meghan absolutely loves them! Last night, the very first thing they had them do was jump off the side and go under, no problem for my little water bug. Tonight they were actually jumping and touching the bottom and learning how to jump up to the top. I'm sure that seems like a long time under water for her so she now proudly proclaims, "I can stay under water for one whole minute!" HA! They also got out the kick boards so she went a pretty good ways with that. She also was able to swim all by herself for a good little distance. Not bad for day two. I am a proud mommy. :) She looks forward to going and eats like a little pig when we get home. Last night, she ate an entire plate of lasagna, a roll, green beans, and a helping of what Grandpa and I were having for dinner, and then she had her Dunkin Donut for dessert! Tonight, she polished off her portion of the pasta she was sharing with her cousins, a couple of Red Lobster rolls, some of my shrimp, some of Papaw's shrimp and his fish too. I'd better go grocery shopping and stock up!

I will say she ended my evening with the sweetest comment. She was being all sweet about my birthday and telling me she hoped I had a happy day and that what makes her happiest is spending it with me. Now what more could I want, right?

First one in!

Cool kick boards!

Swimming to "that swim teaching girl"

I don't lie...see that smile???? She loves it!

Swim pics coming soon...and a funny!

Meg is officially signed up for swim lessons. I'll be posting pics next week! We went last night and registered and boy 'oh boy is she ever excited! She's been waiting all winter to swim again and she finally gets her chance. I hope it's as much fun as she thinks it's gonna be. As we were walking out last night I hear her saying "Friday, Saturday, Sunday, MONDAY!" Only three more days 'til swim lessons, right Momma? That's right Meg! =) We've got bathing suits picked out already and we already have an after swim lesson snack planned since she already knows she'll be staaaaaaarrrrrrrrving. A doughnut from Dunkin Donuts. We've been watching them build this place for months and we saw it opens on Monday, so she is just sure she needs to be there. I can't say that's a bad idea. Now....my decision as a parent is...can that be our dinner or is it just dessert? LOL

And the funny you're still wondering about? Meg has this not-so-new habit of mouthing off to me. It's not something that makes me particularly proud of her and she continues to get the "respect" talk and "respect" lessons from me that are attached with time outs and other various forms of punishments. (No television for the day is the worst!) Anyways, she now has learned to follow up her hateful times with "Mommy, will you forgive me????" (This is in the sweetest voice ever, keep in mind!) She'd been saying this for a few days when just yesterday she asked me, "Mommy, what does 'forgive' mean?" End of story....you get my point, right?????

Warm Weather Fun

Well....I'd planned on posting on here last night with some pics we'd taken and telling about how wonderful the weather was and how much we'd been enjoying the warmth...guess I'm a day late! We did enjoy the warm weather Monday and Tuesday after school, but it's FREEZING today! So not fair! Oh well...surely warm weather will be here to stay before too long, right?

Anyways, Meg got over the stomach bug for the most part on Monday, although she did get to spend the afternoon with Mamaw and Papaw after Mommy stayed home in the morning. **Partly so we could catch up on the rest we'd missed for spending two nights in the bathroom** We spent Monday after school practicing for upcoming spring soccer and throwing a frisbee. Meg did a pretty good job of learning how to catch it! =) Then we ventured off into the woods and the creek. We found a bunch of mussel shells back at the creek then headed up towards what has been our "mountain" path that leads up behind Greg's house. Someone has been back there cutting down a buch of trees and our path is hidden. It made it difficult to navigate and Ms. Boss kept insisting we were lost. Not really since we could see Greg's house and the camper, we just couldn't find the direct way to get out of the woods. In the mean time, we saw four deer run through just a short distance in front of us. Meg also had her brush with a thorn bush. She had a teensy-tiny place where she touched it....for a moment, I thought it was going to be necessary to call in the lifeline helicopter to come rescue us, but I ended up convincing her that she'd be fine. She managed by holding her thumb tightly until we found our way out. **Whew...a close brush with death in the wilderness!** After we got out she jumped on the trampoline for a while and showed me all of her "tricks" which are truly amazing! I had to score each one and I quickly learned that a score of 10 was not near high enough for a princess doing trampoline tricks.

Tuesday we spent time closer to the house as it looked like it could rain at any minute, so our woods trip got cancelled for the day. She played in the sandbox instead, although Servant Mother (me) had to spend 10 minutes with the sifter-thing making sure that every miniscule bug was out of it before Princess Meg would play in it. ;) We even made a yummy dinner out on the grill! Mmmmmm! All in all it was a nice two days of fun outside....however the cold front moved in sometime around midnight last night. How do I know it was midnight? Because that's when a scared little girl literally ran into my room and said, "I hear a scary, scary noise!" Well, that scared the crap out of me, thinking someone was in the house because at midnight I had been sleeping so soundly I had no idea there was a great wind and lots of raining going on outside. Once my head cleared and I realized we were in no danger of being kidnapped, I took her back to her bed, laid down with her for a few minutes and all was well. We bundled up with our winter coats and hats again this morning and headed out for another glorious day!

Carnival fun!

Her prize fish, which survived the night, so she named him Rudolph

Playing Plinko

Beatiful face painting, a rainbow, ladybug nose and initials

Hanging out with cousins for the night (notice Kate's angel??? LOL)

Meg and Kate playing the Stuffed Animal Walk

Last night was the school carnival, which Meg had looked forward to all week. And why wouldn't she...what other night is there when you can eat Chicago's pizza, play games and win trinket toys, suckers, fish, and cans of pop? Meg enjoyed playing games like the Stuffed Animal Walk, Plinko, Ring Toss, Go Fish, a car race game, the sucker pull and corn hole. She won all of the things I already mentioned, which included a fish.....yes, a real live fish. Rudolph, the fish that so tragically died a year ago, had never been replaced, so why not? She took that ping pong ball and from a pretty good distance launched it right into the fish tank to prouldly win her a fish. She was elated! We got home around 8:30 and she was still pretty hyped up, until her bubble got burst. We flipped on the tv to watch the "Bad Kid Show" aka Supernanny like we do every Friday night, but it wasn't on. She was heartbroken.

We went ahead and went to sleep. I was hoping to sleep late this morning as I've ben really tired this week, but no such luck. She woke up at 3am and began puking. She's got a nasty, nasty stomach bug and has been puking and poo-ing all day long and running a fever. Poor thing. I feel just awful for her! I guess she ended up with an extra not-so-goodie from the carnival maddness. :(

The only bright side of this...I was extremely motivated at about 6am this morning and got laundry done, bed sheets change and beds made, kitchen cleaned and trash taken out. I felt like I needed to get all of my "ducks in a row" because I figure I'll be having the same symptoms before too long.

At the request of one of my blog followers...

PICTURES! I still claim that there isn't anything going on in our lives right now that warrant pictures, but I took a few before bedtime tonight. And photographer Meg took a pic too, I decided to post it too, because who doesn't love seeing my bright, shining face on here too! :)

If you'll notice in the pics, she has on short sleeve and short jammies tonight. It was about 60 degrees after school, so we got to play outside. We began reviewing soccer skills since that will be starting before too long. She was then convinced that it's now "hot" outside and she needed to wear those jammies tonight or else she'd be hot. Whatever makes you happy. She'll be plenty warm with the 5 different layers of covers she uses.

She's desperate for warm weather so she can swim again. She keeps telling me the seasons over and over, Winter, Spring, SUMMER!, and Fall. Summer is always accentuated more than the others. I must agree that it is a wonderful season, partly because of the weather, but also because we don't have to get up and go to school! I look forward to having all of our extra time to hang out.

Alright....that's it for tonight. Enjoy the pics Marcia! :)

For Papaw

And the truth comes out!

Last night, Greg, Meg and the boys were all waiting in the truck for me while I had run inside my house for a few minutes to grab some stuff. When I came back out they were all giggling and Meg had the "uh-oh I shouldn't have done that/said that" look on her face. Immediately I was asked the question by one of them, "Do you know what Meghan does at school?" Of course I do, I'm Super Mom, right?!? I read her report sheet at least twice every day, most days, she wants me to read it aloud to her, so yeah, I know what she does! Somehow though, that question, combined with the look on her face, made me realize this wasn't about her story time, circle time, show and tell, and all the other schooly kind of stuff. I hesistated and said, "I think so, why?" Then they told me that they were having a discussion about holes we have on our bodies (don't even ask why that conversation was going on....it was a farm thing for the night and quite a learning experience for all!) anyways, Meg busts out with...I know...we have ear holes!!!! Then she proceeds to tell them all that during her time at school she digs in her ear holes and gets the wax out and wipes it on the table. Ewwwwwwwww...gross! Guess I didn't know she was doing that at school. :/ Maybe I should send in some disinfectant wipes tomorrow with a little note that just says~May be a good idea to wash the tables off!~ HA! Gotta love this kid and her total innocence and honesty about everything!

Ready or not....

Kindergarten here she comes. Preschool finished a kindergarten readiness checklist recently. Meg passed everything with flying colors except knowing her home phone number and tieing her shoes. She calls her dad and knows that number, but I rarely use the home phone for anything. The only real purpose is for the internet, so it never entered my mind that she should know it too. I thought learning her address was much more important! HOWEVER....being the teacher I am, if you ask it to her now, she'll proudly tell you what it is! :)

As for the shoe tieing...I bought a book (because, once again, I am a teacher and there is a book for EVERYTHING!) and thought we'd start practicing that and hoped to have it mastered by August. Not a problem! She's a very determined little girl. She sat with the book the first night I gave it to her and insisted she get it. It was about 45 minutes of her yelling at me to help her "find the hole for the bunny to go in!" but she got it! (Thanks to Greg for the tip of the bunny going around the bush, into the hole....that really helped!) I will say it's probably a little backwards and messed up since we're both lefties and she's a righty though. I attempted to teach her the way I thought a right handed person would do it, but I'm still not sure that's exactly it. Doesn't really matter though....she can now tie her own shoe!

I can't believe that it's nearly time for her to start school. Wow...has the time flown by?!?! One minute I'm not-so-anxiously awaiting her arrival and the next school is starting. Truly amazing, but exciting at the same time!

One off topic funny comment for tonight:

She was having chicken noodle soup for dinner tonight. As I was putting the noodles in her bowl, she demanded that she also wanted more of that "soup juice" stuff too! What a clever name for broth, huh?

Sugar Buzz!

What a day it's been! I picked up a very perky Meg at the sitter's today. She said she'd been like that most of the day and even the teacher commented on what a good day she had. I'm quite relieved that she's feeling all better now! :) She brought home a paper sack full of Valentine's from her classmates today that she was ever so proud of. She carefully opened and examined each one calling out who it was from with so much excitement I thought she might burst! Some even had candy attached that immediately had to be opened and sampled (beginning of the sugar buzz.)

She was also a-buzz with her first official classmate birthday party invitation. It's a party with a clown, magic show and face painting. (WOW! Guess the little girl's parents aren't struggling financially like the rest of us in America....that or maybe they've already got their share of Obama's economic recovery plan ahead of everyone else??? HA!) I feel like such a prudish, over-protective mother, but I kept scanning the invitation over and over to see if it mentioned anything about parents being welcome to stay. I didn't see it. How can I just drop my child off at some stranger's house and be ok with that? This is why she MUST attend elementary school where I teach. I will either know the scoop or being able to find it out very quickly. I suppose I'll call the mom, speak with her, get fingerprints, background checks, then sit on their front doorstep for the entire hour and half the party goes on just to make sure my baby is safe. OK...maybe that's going a little too far.....We'll see! :)

Back to the sugar buzz...tonight was Grammy's (Greg's mom) birthday. We took the entire gang to Ponderosa for a couple of reasons. 1) It's afforable when you are feeding a gaggle of people. 2) The kids can eat whatever the heck they want and will be happy about it. 3) Ice cream machine...need I say more? My grandpa joined us along with Greg's brother, fiance and their two children. In all the chaos of getting everything and everyone organized and situated, Meg ended up convincing Greg to get her a Pepsi, a la caffeine. She also ended up with 3 bowls of ice cream, which she licked (and yes, I do mean LICKED!) totally clean.

By the time we got home she was literally hopping like a rabbit and her mouth was blabbering about 3,000 miles per second. She got in the shower and was acting bizarre noticing every little detail. "Mommy, did you get a new leg shaver?" followed right after by "What's on the other side of this wall?" When I told her it was the pantry, she started yelling hello very loudly to all the food in the pantry. She suddenly stopped that and was suddenly asking when she was going to get to go visit her goat. We read our books like usual, and I even picked out a longer one, hoping the buzz would wear off and she'd crash. No such luck. She's already been up once, and has climbed up and jumped over the back of the couch. With the threat of no television or computer tomorrow she's back in bed and will hopefully stay there. She's relatively quiet though, although I'm hearing a constant whisper. Lord only knows what she's talking about now. Me? I drank water and limited myself to one small bowl of ice cream, so I don't have near the sugar buzz she does, so I'm off to bed after finishing up just a little bit of my homework. All in all.....a fun day! I'd take a day with a wacky, sugar buzzing kid anytime over the sick, puny one I had last week.

Timing of questions

Meg's been sick. We were at the doctor's office again yesterday (trip #2 in just a few days) right about nap time. That combined with not feeling well equated to a Meg that was a little ornery acting. She was kind of kicking at me, then she'd hop off the table and hug me. She kept going back and forth between being catankerous and loving every few seconds. At one point while the doc was examining her she looked over at me and said in her sweet voice (remember Meghan #1????) and said, "Moooomy, I love yooooooouuuuuu." Awwwwww....how sweet right? Sure.

Our visit was a rather long one so towards the end of it, while the doctor was in the room finishing up getting her prescription sent off, she started asking me any random question she could think of. Then finally she asked me who my mommy and daddy were. We've had this conversation many times, so I once again told her Mamaw and Papaw, I figured this was just the only thing left for her to think of to talk about. But no....just wait....here comes the best part!!!!!!! Then she proceeds to ask, "How did you get a mommy and a daddy?" (That was a new one!) Uhhhhhh....I looked up at the dr. at the same time he looked up at me. Me, being the quick thinker I am, said, "it's a good thing we're here with the dr., he can tell you all about that!" and just laughed. He told me that sounded like a good conversation for a the car ride home, then he handed us our paper so we could leave. And he never did really laugh. :/ Thanks Meg for helping us make a very quick exit!

Oh...and in case you haven't heard my confession of what a horrible parent I was this week, I sent her to school on Tuesday because I really did think she was better. Obviously, she wasn't, which is why we were back at the dr.'s office. She was diagnosed with pneumonia. So yes, I'll confess, I sent my child to school with pneumonia! Me, the person who complains about all the horrible parents in the world that send their sniffling, snot-nosed kids to my own classroom, sent my child to school when she had pneumonia. Another life lesson learned......

Mama, Mommy, Mom and now...

Mother. Over the past four years what Meg has called me has evolved. I was thrilled when she first started saying Mama as a baby. For a long time, I was Mommy, then for the past for months I've been Mom some too (which made me cringe some thinking about how she's growing up too fast!) but now I've become Mother. Ugh! I can't say I like this name. I mean, she's only four and it's so formal and I so NOT a formal person! She'll say things like "Yes, mother" and "No, thank you mother." It's freaking me out! She even said to me last night, "Why are you looking at me like that Mother?" She even called out while she and Greg were playing last night, "Mother, come play with us!" Gee whiz...that sounds like fun, Daughter. :/ I keep thinking this title has come from a television show or movie she's seen recently and it will pass, or at least that's what I'm hoping for. Otherwise, I may just start referring to her as Daughter and see how she responds! :)

Hussy Fussy

So Meghan at least recognizes some of her moods. We are currently hanging out waiting on the "bad kid show" (Supernanny) to come on television. She's enthralled with a new princess dress up sticker book I got her yesterday while I was a conference, but had a bit of a problem because one pair of the sticker shoes didn't fit on the princess like they were supposed to. **gasp!** She started to get very upset about this and throw a fit and give me her gritting teeth mean face, but I told her I would help, she just needed to ask nicely. She did and I fixed the problem easily and quickly. Afterwards, she told me, "See Mommy, there was no need for me to get all hussy fussy about it!" HA! She's now back going through the pages very meticulously applying all the shirts and skirts to every doll picture in the book. And I even a get a hug every few minutes telling me that I'm the best mom ever and that she loves me. Now that's worth $8.99! :)

Update Time!

After my spur of the moment three day vacation from school last week I shouldn't have gotten behind updating on here, but I did, so here's my update from the past several days. A research class just started for my Master's and it literally feels like it's sucking all the life out of me!

Thursday night we spent a little time at Grandpa's being pulled around on the sled by the new Gator. That was lots of fun! We definitely feel blessed to have an 81 year old Grandpa who can still go out and play in the snow with us! He rocks!

Anyways, we ended last week kinda rough. Meg and I both were suffering from cabing fever, so we invited Claire and Kate over on Friday afternoon as I thought it would help. We played a little bit of this and a little of that, but Meg was pretty bossy and even said sh*t again during a heated game of Old Maid. **embarrassed mom face** Kate was in awe of Meg getting soap in her mouth, but I just refuse to allow her to have a potty mouth! The afternoon did calm down with a little craft time before the cousins had had enough of Miss Bossy Bessie and left to go back home.

That brings us to this week. I had to pick Meg up from Beth's yesterday early because she was apparently sooooooo sick! Ummmm....not so much! After a two hour nap, she perked right up. I think it was just exhaustion from lack of rest over her weekend with her dad. :/ Grandpa came over for dinner. Afterwards she provided plenty of entertainment. Her new thing now is to "teach" Grandpa all about the internet. He's been learning all about starfall.com, pbskids.org and webkinz.com. Very beneficial to him, if he were ever to actual want to use the internet! She also had Greg hide her in a box that I had around the house so she could be mailed to Florida to visit Mamaw and Papaw. I wish it were big enough for the two of us, because I may be tempted to pack both of us up and go with nasty winter weather we've been having here! We got somewhere between 4-6 more inches of snow today. :( She's already doing her "No school tomorrow" chant, but I'm just hoping for a delay. We'll see!

Greg's out plowing again tonight, so it's just the two of us. We're going to have fish, since he won't eat "cockroaches from the sea," and hibernate then the rest of the night.

Oh....and as I sit here, Meg is "text messaging" away on her pretend Cinderella phone....yet another sign of the times. I certainly don't recall that kind of technology as a child!

Snow and then some!

We've got major snow here! There's about 12 inches in the back yard. School was, of course, cancelled for the day. Meg cracks me up now that she's in school as she will chant "No school, no school!" hoping for a delay or cancellation. A delay for her means no school, so that's just as good for her. It means an extra Lazy Day with Beth that she just loves to have. :)

We headed outside this morning around 10am after getting all bundled up. She was full of squeals and delight the minute she stepped outside. Obviously, this is the most snow she's ever seen. She immediately started running up the piles (then sliding down) that Greg's plow had piled up in my driveway. I had some shoveling to do, but my shovel was in Greg's basement. We started the trek to his house together, but the snow was waaaay too deep for her to continue. She ended up stopping to make snow angels while she waited for me.

I did decide that we could venture out to Blockbuster to get a movie, as I wasn't up for playing "Cheetah" and "House" ALL day long. We rented a classic...Annie and she also got a Barbie movie since she wasn't so sure about my choice. On the way home we stopped at Chicago's, or Pizza Place as she calls it and got lunch to take home. We had a nice lunch and watched the movie as we ate. She seemed to like it and was even attempting to sing along by the end. Not a surprise really! After that, she watched her Barbie movie some and help me some while I tackled the playroom/office in the house for a major reorganzation. I've lived in this house two years and I still continue to try to make room for all the toys and get things just the way I want them. I think we finally have the playroom in good shape. Now...if things will just get put back where they belong. Right?!?!

Last goat post...

Billy, our goat, left yesterdat at 2pm. Meg was heartbroken and I felt like a pretty crappy parent for bringing the thing into our home and letting her get attached. He's going to a great farm, where a little 11 year old girl will be raising him to show in 4-H this upcoming summer. I will admit that I even teared up with him leaving. Meg had a huge meltdown right away and a few since then. I swear that these types of things were NEVER mentioned in parenting books! Where the he** was that chapter that read Caution Saving an Animal's Life....Possible Trauma for Your Child!?!?! Oh well...I'm sure she'll be over it soon enough, plus Grandpa came over for dinner tonight and informed us that another set of triplets were born last night. Apparently two aren't doing so well, but don't look at me! I've been there, done that!

Things you may never have known about a goat....

In case you've been wondering, we still have our goat (Billy is his name now). To summarize our past week with him, I thought it might be fun to make a list of the things we have learned from him....things I never really knew about goats and things YOU may not have know either.

1. Goats play hide-and-go-seek. Meg and I take off from Billy and try to hide during our play time with him. Usually he follows as fast as he can, but if we get away without him seeing where we go, we can mimick a goat noise and he'll come find us wherever we're hiding in the basement. Quite entertaining...if you have a strong desire now to have your own goat for playing this game, feel free to email me, I can hook you up with one! :)

2. Goats have a great sense of hearing. Billy is in the basement, but when someone is walking around upstairs, you can hear it. He's a perfectly good "goat angel" all night long and doesn't make a peep, but as soon as I get out of bed in the morning and start moving around, he hears me and is downstairs bleating away to make sure he gets his breakfast ASAP.

3. Goats have a good sense of smell. Billy's belly is never full. When his bottle is finished he always wants more and will try to continue to nurse from my fingers. Meg would love to have him do this to her, but he won't give it a thought. I think he knows my smell as his "mother" and will only do this from me. How nice that a goat loves me like this, huh?

4. A jumping goat is hilarious to watch. I've always known that goats are playful, but to watch him jump up on his back legs and kick up at Meg or hop up and down like a rabbit is funny. On top of that to listen to Meg cackle while watching him is joy for me.

Those are just a few fun things we've learned. The good/bad news is that we may have found Billy a home. Good news because a goat really can't be raised in my basement and the home for him would be a great one. It's a 10 year old girl who wants a goat to show in 4-H. Bad news because we (yes, WE) are attached to him. Everywhere we've gone this week Meg has announced to random strangers, "We have a goat living in our basement!" She already she some major tears when I told her the possibility that he may be leaving tomorrow. We'll find out in the morning if he's leaving for sure and will cross that bridge together if we get there.

The Honest Truth from a 4 year old

Meg was trying to convince me of something, so she started in on her bargaining. Bargaining, I'm use to however, she had a new technique this time. She proceeded to tell me that if I'd give in to her request she'd let me take a nap. This was after school, and it has been a long week, so I'll admit the offer was tempting. I know, though, that there's no way she'd ever let me nap as this would require her to stop talking to me for longer than five minutes. Anyways, I told her that I didn't need a nap, so I wasn't giving in. She told me that I did need a nap and she could tell because I looked tired. I asked her how she knew I was tired and she told me she could tell it because of the way my eyes looked. HA! Think she's ever heard that before? Now...off to check the bags under my eyes and see if they really are that bad!

Stretching a Dollar (or Five)

Mamaw and Papaw are gone for several weeks. They've officially become snow birds with retirement and have "flown the coop," yet they haven't forgotten completely about those precious grandchildren that are freezing here in Indiana. Meghan and the other girls got a "miss you" card in the mail the other day that had a $5 bill in it. Meghan was insistent tonight that this $5 be spent on a toy. I wasn't really up for an outing since we were having company for dinner, so I tried to avoid it. There was no diverting her, (not even her goat friend in our basement could get her mind off of spending her $5 bill!) I told her that the only place I would take TONIGHT was Wal-Green's since it's about 30 seconds from our house. I also explained that they have a very limited $5 toy selection and that if she'd wait, I'd take her to Wal-Mart tomorrow after school where they "Roll Back Prices" and she could get a much better deal with her 5 bucks. Nope! She wasn't having it! She had to spend that money TONIGHT! So...off we went.

Here's how our trip went:

We walked in. Beauty department is first. Meg spies a decorate your own nail kit. "Mommy, how much is that?"

"$20, Meghan, you only have $5."

We move on, finding the very short toy aisle, where she proceeds to ask, "Is this it?" Uh huh! She points out many more things she's just dying to have. A baby in a stroller. $39.99. A Barbie hairstyle head. $10.99 High School Musical something. $15.99. Princess Tea Party Set. $20 (She just got one of these for Christmas I might add!) The list goes on...you get the picture. At this point, she's pretty discouraged. I told her again, that I'd take her to Wal-Mart or she could save her money (gasp...what a thought!?!?) and she could buy something bigger when she has more. Nope...she WILL buy something TONIGHT for $5 at Wal-Green's. Finally, she sees a pair of Snow White Dress up shoes. They're red and match her Gabriella dress up dress she got for Christmas. How much? $3.99. Sold! She very proudly walks up to the counter, plops her shoes and money down and makes her purchase! Whew...that $5 is gone...but the story isn't over just yet.

We get in the car to come home and she says, "Mommy, I can't wait to go to Wal-Mart tomorrow night. I wonder what I'll pick out there!" I had to explain that the money was gone. She told me that I could go to the bank and get some of her money out for her so she could get some more things. We had a nice little talk that the money Mommy puts away in her bank account isn't going to come back out to buy toys on a random night at Wal-Mart. Was she a little disappointed? Yep, but when she got home and put on her new $5 dress up shoes, she forgot all about it! Is this outfit just perfect now or what?