Kids and Critters

We have way too many stray animals around our house....mostly cats. That is where our incredibly selfish kitty mittens came from

my kids relentlessly chased him as a poor scared WILD kitten until they caught him and kept him captive in Sissy's bedroom for who knows how long until we had discovered him living quite comfortably there. Well, my husband is a softy and told the kids they could have him, but no more hiding stray cats in our house. Well now that spring is in full swing around here, all of the stray cats that hang out in our shed, sneak in our garage and consume our dog food and walk all over my car and leave little paw prints in the night, are in mating season and my back yard seems to be the 'special' place.Yesterday, I looked in the back yard and there were 4 cats that didn't belong to us that were just hanging out. Two of them are seen on top of the little hill there ( on my husbands target range) and there is 2 more that ran behind the hill when I tried taking a picture.

So my kids being my kids decided to try and lure the cats to them so they can 'make friends'

In the photo above is Bean hiding behind a cardboard box. In front of the box was a bowl of food and water. Unfortunately for her, she did not catch herself a kitty but it sure kept her busy for quite some time.I took these from the bedroom window in our house as to not disturb the catch in progress. No animals were harmed in the making of this story, and thankfully we do not have any more cats yet!

Growing Up

My little bitty is the baby of our family. Her little blue eyes and sweet little voice pretty much gets her what ever she wants. With 2 older sisters and 2 older brothers it is a pretty good thing for her. They are always there for her every little wish and want. I guess I still look at her as the baby too, which is hard when you realize that she is growing up way too fast. She is closing in quickly on being a big six year old.

She was so excited to FINALLY lose her first tooth. She knows that losing the first tooth now puts her in the big kid club! It is so hard to believe that she is old enough to lose her first tooth. She immediately had to call her big sister who was not home at the time to share the exciting news and declare her big kid status.

Last night was a music program for the Sissy and Bean. It was the annual school program and this one was themed around saving the earth and was called Easy Being Green. It was so much fun to watch them stand up and proudly sing their song(sissy my 5Th Grader) and Bean laugh and giggle because everyone was watching her(she is a first grader). I could not get a real good picture. They looked horrible, flash on they were too dark and flash off they were too bright and fuzzy. I need to learn more about the camera I guess. But regardless, It was absolutely a pleasure to be there. They are definitely growing up so fast. This is Sissy's last month of school before Middle school...WOW! Now I feel old! I look at the baby pictures on the wall and just wonder how it went so fast. No Destini, I do not want another one!!! Actually at the program last night there was a woman with a real young baby who pretty much screamed for the whole program. I felt so sorry for her, She wanted to watch her daughter's program but her little one was just not cooperating and I just sighed a big sigh of relief, I am so done with that. I am sad my babies are not babies anymore, But I sure don't want to go back there either. I love being able to take the kids places and do the big kid things with them. I am so proud of the kids they have turned out to be and just sometimes wish I could freeze time for a while.

Spring has sprung!!

I absolutely LOVE this time of year.

For the first time I finally have spring flowers that came up, No dogs tearing them up, no ground moles munching them, no kids riding bikes through them!! YEAH!!

It has been perfect weather to take your dogs for a walk...or let your puppy do it for you...

Who's idea was it to keep the dirty white dog anyway? Must have been the kids.....
As you can see Brutus likes to play outside too!I guess I should have kept the black puppy!

My favorites.....

Here are some of my favorite things, things that I love.

I love blue, it is my favorite color

Even American dolls need their hair done!

I love fishing.. That is always something we can do as a family...

One of my very most favorite things in life is music, it soothes me and keeps me sane,With out my radio cranked and singing, my house would never be cleaned!

I love, really love, sleeping babies

Although, Ellie is not real impressed, she does not know where to sleep!


I love Darth Vader....our version.....


I also love clean babies....They are so sweet and smell good!
okay well she is still my baby!And...probably my most favorite is a big strapping manly man that is so sweet he can take time out to play a little Disney princes dress up with his princess
I love to laugh... and laugh with my kids!
I love sunsets.....
Last but not least....I love smiles that light up my world.


Show me your"This is what I love posts!!"

Kids, Kids,Kids

Well,

We survived another week of spring break. The kids were home all of last week and returned to their classrooms yesterday. Unfortunately the weather was not as we had hoped. And today is going to be a beautiful day....go figure.

We did have an opportunity to make it to the movies once and the park

It was really nice to not have to get the kids up in the morning to catch the bus and not have to do homework every night!

Boo was working on a project for school. He had to do a report on a famous artist. It was supposed to be his work with me just helping him to read to him and help him to understand the directions. The artist he was given was Amadeo Modigliano. There was a series of questions that he had to answer on his report, and one was to give his personal feelings on the artwork. His answer was "My personal feelings about is art are that I like the colors but definitely not his art." " I would have liked his art more if he would draw deer or monster trucks" Can't wait to see what his grade is on that one! I try really hard not to correct his answers because it is so fun anymore just seeing his own answers and I hope that the teachers will appreciate them as he didn't participate in class previously. It won't be long and we will be back on Summer vacation and we can really work on his reading.And maybe work on artist appreciation!!

We still have our white puppy! We have named him Brutus. He is such a sweet little guy with a serious chewing problem. He also keeps us very busy. I just don't understand why no body took him....tee hee! I sure tried real hard to find him a great home, okay so I didn't put ALL my effort into it, but I was going to....for a short minute!

What a wonderful day

Ya know it is sometimes difficult to judge how your day is going to go. Well pretty much all of the time, there are always uncertainties and life just likes to throw you curve balls and you have to see if you can make lemons into lemonade. Well today I made lemonade.

We have 3 puppies left that I woke up to whining in their crate. We have sold all but 3 of them. They are like the 3 stooges and always in some kind of trouble. So darn adorable though that you can not get upset you just have to giggle at them and when you can no longer take the sight of your shoes running past you with puppies attached to them that are smaller than the shoe, time to put them away for a while and let them rest. This is my broom thief!!My broom is always on the go! Then to wake up to my little bitty who is plainly upset that all the other kids are at school and she has no one to play with, top that off with some snow which has just decided to not stop falling this year, I was prepared for a sour day. Then cool things just started happening. My little one and I decided to brave the elements and ventured out for awhile. That just improves ones mood just getting out of the house for a bit. Just the 2 of us. Then the kids started rolling in from school. Boo had a field trip with his class today to a movie on planets, a restaurant and then a book store. He was so excited about his trip and could not wait to fill me in on all the cool details. He bought some star wars books with his extra money I sent him and he is so incredibly proud of his books. Of course nothing is cooler in his eyes than star wars right now,except his dad, naturally. He is so funny. When he walked in the door and was telling me about his trip I asked him what he had for lunch. They went to a Chinese buffet and I was concerned he may not like that real well. He obviously had something chocolate on his face. He says "Well mom, I had pudding for lunch and I am saving the pudding on my face in case I might get hungry later." I laughed so hard! He was such a funny little guy before his autism starting rearing its head. I am so thankful for the little bits and pieces of him that I get back. He had the funniest little sense of humor and it is amazing that somewhere in his body it has been hiding all this time. I know this may sound weird but his autism diagnosis has really changed our family for the better. Not that it hasn't been really hard and the biggest challenge my family has ever faced but the opportunity to be able to take those little moments and cherish them. To know that somewhere in him, the old boo still exists. The whole experience I believe has made us a stronger family and I know has made my other children so much more compassionate. So anyway, John took us out to dinner tonight just because it was such a feel good kind of day, to a real restaurant with real waiters and no drive through speakers with real food and it all started with this....my lemonade. After all the begging and pleading with mother nature to hurry up already with spring and give me a break from the 5 kids with snow pants and boots and mittens. If I would have gotten my way, sure it would be so much warmer and the kids would be able to go outside and scream their little hearts out and ride bikes, but I would not have gotten this picture of boo getting off the bus in such a great mood that he wanted to catch snowflakes on his tongue.


Now I just need to convince him to button up his coat!!I certainly hope that you can enjoy your lemonade today. Sometimes the things that you worry about are so small when you can sit down with your own glass of lemonade, and know that it is all you really ever needed all along.To just enjoy your family and the curve balls and know that there are always small blessings along the way. I guess I can stop begging mother nature to hurry up with spring and let her take her ol' sweet time because apparently there are still moments to be enjoyed. 110 inches of snow isn't really that much right?

Easter Weekend

Well, this weekend was a busy one . We decided to go to My awesome sisters house for Saturday and join them at their church for the annual Easter egg hunt. Wow..... was there a lot of people there. It was so great to see the kids, we don't get to do that enough. I felt bad having to leave the kids were so disappointed we had to go. But lucky little Bitty won a bike. She was so excited!!!
That was the true test for Boo and the homeopathic medicine we seek for him. Be in a church full of bounce houses and a bazillion people with out slipping into a full blown fit! He did great. He did have to step outside for a minute or two to recoup but over all handled it well. It seems as if Easters have been so special for us, Last Easter was the first time he flew a kite by himself, ran, laughed and had so much fun, even when sponge bob the unruly kite decided to slip his grasp and fly away home, he just waved goodbye! We never would have been able to put him into a situation of that many people before and walked away smiling like we did Saturday. He participate in the egg hunt amongst a whole lot of kids and actually got himself some!! Sure there was a lot of anxiety....for me as well... I was prepared for the worst, finding all the closest exits, and never needed to rush him out of there. I don't know if we will ever lose the Autism Diagnosis but I sure feel so much better about his life now. I do think there will be a day when you can tell someone about his autism and they won't believe us. He has come so far. So many of his little quirks are becoming less and less noticeable. Everything had to be so routine for him and he is allowing himself new opportunities. At 13 he no longer wants a happy meal!!
I don't know how many people read this blog, and even if nobody does, I am going to keep writing it anyway, just in hope that someone, someday who is concerned about their child's health and possibly a diagnosis of autism will read it and know that there are other options. You do not have to medicate you child, you can stand up and take a stand against the norm and treat your child with alternative medicine. God has been great to us, and there was a time when we thought we were getting more than our fair share of hardships. Something good has come from this. I have seen other children and members of my family helped with alternative medicine. I feel that my job now is to spread the word and help others through what can be such a difficult time. After a diagnosis, you mourn. For what you thought your child's life would be like and all the dreams you had for him or her. Then you pick yourself up and do something about it. It doesn't matter what the diagnosis is. Just for the record, I am not anti-vaccine. I do believe that vaccines have saved a lot of lives. I am just for safer vaccines. I don't believe vaccines CAUSED my sons autism, I believe that was the spark. I do believe getting all that junk out of his body will keep bringing him back to us. We have a long way to go and I try not to even look at that anymore. We look at how far we have come and the new things he is always doing and thank God for every new day and every new accomplishment he achieves.