Levi, Where Do You Want to Eat?

I've learned don’t ask your kids where they want to eat unless you are willing to go there. Luckily I like McDonalds, but it got me to thinking… Maybe I should start slipping toy prizes in at the places I want to eat. We already have a collection of disregarded happy meal toys, some even unopened (the no eat, no toy policy). I know I can pull it off at places where I bring the food to the table, but other restaurants may require too much coordination with the waiter.

Of course if your main motivation for eating is the toy, then McDonalds is the way to go. Arby’s sometimes steps it up and Burger King is no slouch. Chick Fila usually has some lame educational toy. Luckily we figured out that you can trade them in for ice cream. Plus, who needs a little toy when there is an indoor playground staring at you.

Then again the other great motivator is the cookie. Thank you ABC and Lenny’s. I’ve tried to instill at a young age that these children’s meal cookies are meant to be shared with the entire family. I’m not sure how long it will last though…. hopefully at least until they are 18.

Best of: Christmas Day 2008

Best "I'm am way over taking Christmas Pictures": Levi & Kara at my parents house Best "Santa's Helper": Levi Best "We are so going to beat you at Phase 10 Dice, Brian & Kristen": Alison & Garet Best "most frustrating game to play with Levi": "Hoops" (Chutes) & Ladders
Best gift for Levi that meant so much to Mommy: Levi's travel log from Aunt Kristen!

Best gift that Kara wouldn't let go of: her doll

Best gift for Kara that meant so much to Mommy: Kara's travel log from Aunt Kristen!

Best way to relax after two crazy days: in Daddy's new sleeping bag

Best of: Christmas Morning 2008

Best "I look like I just got my wisdom teeth taken out": Alison on Christmas Morning

Best "Why aren't you reading out of a Bible with pictures Mommy?": Levi & Kara Best "Waste of Santa's Money": The Yellow Transformer that DOESN'T Transform!
Best gifts for Levi: Dinaco McQueen & Cars Racetrack
Best wrapping paper: Lightning McQueen

Best gift for Kara: Anything that is furry & talks to her (thanks Aunt Ruth Ann & Uncle Joshua!)

Best way to ignore the chaos of Christmas Morning: Zip yourself up in your new x-long sleeping bag (w/extra long camping mat)

Best gift that should be given in the spring instead of the freezing cold winter: a power wheels

Best way to make your sister mad: Run the power wheels into the fence and not let her drive Best "I can do it myself" gift: Kara's rolling backpack

Best gift that Daddy had to get one too: Light Saber

Best "loudest toy on on our laminate floors": Don't Break the Ice

Best sign of affection: Kara rocking & patting her baby Shamu

Best of: Christmas Eve 2008

Let me start by saying that this post is ridiculously overdue, but better late than never!

Best 1000 calorie decorated cookie: Caleb

Best new tradition: Leaving reindeer food on the lawn

Best Christmas Pageant Ever: The Fields Family's Rendition of The Birth of Jesus

"Best" picture of all 7 grandchildren, Nana & Granddaddy: Take #8
Best "We're trying really hard to get a decent family picture, but can't" picture: The Fields Family on Christmas Eve

Best "I didn't get the memo to wear my red shirt": Garet with his sisters & parents

Best photo book I made this year: A tribute to Don's Parents

Best birthday cake for Jesus' Birthday: Little Hostess Cupcakes

Best cookies & Letter to Santa: Done by Levi & Kara

That's right, I have a blog...

...I've just forgotten about it the last almost two weeks. Garet was out of town for a few days and well, just life in general has slowed me down. I thought January was supposed to be less hectic!

I still haven't posted anything about the holidays, which I hope to soon, sigh.

In the meantime, I'm still here - I haven't forgotten about you!

Oh, and 9 years ago today, Garet asked me to marry him on Auburn's campus. How time flies! Love him even more today.

Our new friend

Please meet our new table companion...she has eaten with us, prayed with us and even colored with Levi this past week - all with that smile and camera in hand.

If you follow me on twitter, you know that I have been researching cameras and this was the lucky winner of my Christmas money. I ordered it from Costco.com and it was even a better deal once I checked out - I heart Costco.

The camera came on Monday and I haven't had a chance to break it open yet. You see, this is a problem I have. You may have remembered the Roomba/IPOD saga - it takes me forever to open new items.

To give you an example, I went into my room to count the number of things I have yet to take the tags off of or open: A pair of jeans, A pair of khaki pants, an alarm clock, my favorite soap from Hawaii, and a memory card. Now that is the list of things I plan to keep.

Also unopened are the things I plan to return: A pair of jeans, a booster seat (unless I can convince Garet that this is worth $40), shoes for Levi, 2 bathroom vanity lights, and a shower head.

It's a disease! Opening the item makes it so permanent and I am such a researcher that I have to prove to myself that I have exhausted every option before the purchase can become final in my books by opening the item. Sigh.

Note: That thing on top of the camera is this little bendy tripod (unused), but opened by (you guessed it) Garet. He opens things on the way home from the store. That's why we are perfect together folks.

What does this say about my housekeeping?

Levi's response as to why he threw his pizza on the floor at dinner last night:

"I thought that was the trashcan"

I only wish I was making this stuff up!! I assure you that there was a "time out" involved. :)

Dusting off the sewing machine

This past Christmas, I decided I wanted to try to make more of the gifts I gave instead of buy them. The result was about 25% homemade because I quickly learned that buying something and making something take drastically different amounts of time. There is only so much you can do when you are a procrastinator like me.

After learning to do some basic sewing this past summer, I decided to attempt this Dish Towel Tote Tutorial. It turned out to be fairly easy and I was pleased with the result. The only problem I had is that you need more than the 5/8 yard of fusible interfacing - a yard would probably be best. I had never worked with fusible interfacing before and it was a little bit ornery. I also only used a dish towel on one of the totes I made because there wasn't a large selection of dish towels to choose from. Instead, I used two pieces of 5/8 yard fabric.

Without further ado, the totes:

These were gifts to my sister-in-laws, Kelly & Keri:

I follow the blog, Sew, Mama, Sew, in my reader, and it has so many great ideas and tutorials. All their posts in December about made my brain explode with endless possibilities. I think I want to try this fabric basket next, but we'll see - maybe in 3 months when I dust the sewing machine off again!

Finally, a few more shots from the evening. Garet is so creative and had the kids play this game:

Kara took her turn with the big girls in Ring-Around-The-Rosy. She thought she was the greatest thing ever:

The Christmas Sweater

In case you missed it in the previous post, Levi spelled his name "Evil"...several people told me that they hadn't noticed, but that is why we found it so comical.

Anyway, back to this post. When I was working full time, a staple in my day was listening to the Glenn Beck Program - I loved it. Unfortunately, my life now does now allow me to listen to a 3 hour radio show, but I still have some time to read. Glenn wrote a book called the Christmas Sweater and I picked it up thinking it would be a nice little feel-good holiday book full of Glenn's humor.

**Minor Spoiler Alert**

Not long into the book, I quickly figured out that this book was not exactly a happy one. The story is about a little boy who loses his father to cancer and then his mother to a car wreck. I know that children are supposed to bury their parents, but the boy in the book buries them at 10 and 12. The whole premise of the book is how this boy deals with his new life without parents. I think I started crying on page 10 and never stopped.

What got to me so much was thinking about Levi and Kara growing up without Garet or I. They are so young right now and I know at this point in their lives that they would have very few memories of us. That thought just tore me up!

While I was contemplating all these things, we received word that a close family friend was near death. He has 3 boys with the youngest being twelve (the same age as the kid in the book). Our friend passed away shortly after Christmas and the hardest part of the funeral for me was seeing the boys. All the words from the book just kept flooding back into my mind and I just wanted to scoop them up, hug them, and tell them it would be OK. (I consider them my "babies" anyway - I babysat them for close to 10 years and our families did countless things together over the years. The middle child was our ring bearer and Garet said he officially felt old when he could talk to him at eye level!)

Despite the tears over the holidays, the events did cause me to give a few more hugs, say a few more "I love you's" and spend some more time with the kids. I know that I can't control the future (thankfully God has that one covered so I don't have to worry about it!), but I can choose to be more purposeful in how I spend my time.