Like my Pixie?

So what do you all think about my Weather Pixie? She is on the sidebar. She will tell you all what kind of weather I am having currently. She stays current and updates her outfit according to the weather.

Like her? Want one? Just click on her and she will take you to the site were you can personalize your own Pixie!!

Progress

Today we set out to try to accomplish some cleaning today. So we started with the living room. Now we don't use this room except for holidays and birthdays. It usually ends up a catch all room from time to time and we have to clean it out when we want to use it. It is supposed to be our "formal" room. We have a white couch in there along with white patterned wing chairs and our piano. Today it was easy to clean as there wasn't much in there that wasn't supposed to be there. I began with a quick removal of all things not belonging in the room and then began vacuuming. I then decided that we needed to rearrange the furniture. It took three trys to get it right and I am pleased with the results. I will have to post a picture for you all to see.

We moved the couch from one side to the other and put the wing chairs opposite the couch. The piano is still at the far wall. Now, we only took out one piece of furniture which was a sofa table but the result was a much larger looking room. I think it was from the rearranging not the removal of the table.

I am so pleased with our results I think I will just live in that room only and not bother with the rest of the house. Unfortunately, the computer resides in a messy room. Tomorrow I really hope to tackle another room.

Fall Schedules

This year we signed the kids up for fall soccer. Last year we didn't and had intended to use the free weekends to go camping but we never did that so this year we went ahead and signed them up. All three a playing and that means two nights a week we have soccer practice and then most of the day on Saturday we have the games. It is good that the games are all at the same location so we literally pick up our chairs and move them from field to field on Saturdays.

We also have started back to church from our hyatus. Sunday school has started and the kids really enjoy that. It was good to be back last Sunday. While we were there we also signed up for their "Logos" program for Allie, which is an afterschool program from 4:30-7pm on Wednesdays where they do arts and crafts, activities, lessons, children's choir, and have dinner. It will be nice because the others have soccer that day and Allie gets bored hanging out on the sidelines just waiting around.

At church we also signed up for Kenneth and I to participate in their "supper club" which meets once a month with 3 other couples and we have dinner together centered on a theme. I figured that it was time to meet more people and this was a great way to do it.

Moving on, Monday, Nicholas had cub scouts and they had signups for a camping trip and we got our schedule of cub scout events for the year. Man is our calendar filling up.

Caroline announced that she wants to do Girl Scouts this year and she will be a Daisy. Yeah, we will squeeze it into the schedule...somewhere.

So, I have now done exactly what I didn't want to do and that is fill our week with activities all the time. It really just seems like that and isn't really that. With three kids they each have two things that they do each week. But when it is all together, Kenneth and I are running raged just trying to keep up.

Okay, before you all tell me "just wait until they are teenagers", I know!! I am waiting but hopefully I will be a bit more organized....not.

Lessons Learned

My grandfather passed away last week at the age of 90. There were a few lessons that I have learned from him that I thought I would share.
1. It is better to listen well then to speak well. My Pop-pop always listened to us. He usually didn't give his advice right away but he let us work through situations and learn from our mistakes and our accomplishments. Then he would tell us what he really thought.
2. Always stay active. Up to his death he was an active man. Slower in pace as the years piled on but active still. He played golf through his eighties and even got a hole in one and he played bocce ball and traveled.
3. Set your goals and make them happen. In the 1990's he got cancer and fought through it with surgeries and treatment. He set a goal that he would live to see the year 2000, and became healthy again and accomplished it. Then after my grandmother died in 2004 he set another goal to travel to the Panama Canal. This past March he took a cruise through the canal and loved it.
4. Take time to watch the sunsets. You see them a zillion times but they are beautiful each time and oh so different. His house on the river has a porch where he would sit and watch the sunset each evening. They mark a beautiful life.
5. Err on the side of patience. The good things in life will come if only you are patient.
He was the most patient, kind and considerate man I have ever known. He will be missed greatly in this world.

New Blog to Check Out!

I found this new blog and I think it is great. This guy, Jimbo, hand carves crochet hooks. I love to crochet and I am DEFINITELY going to bid on one!!

He has declared September 12th "International Crochet Day" and I think it is a great idea. Much of our historic handcrafts are falling to the wayside. It is so much easier to go to the store and buy a $5 pair of mittens but it is so much nicer to receive a pair of handmade mittens. We in our fast society are rushing out to the store and just buying what we need and not taking the care, love and time into making exactly what we want! I will always support handcrafts and will always practice them in my home.

So head on over to:http://jimbosfrontporch.blogspot.com/ and check him out. By the way, he is "raffling" off a crochet hook. Scan down to August's blogs and find his entry for the contest. You will see that I entered!!

Back to School

When I was a kid I remember the weeks prior to returning to school. Now, of course we were at the beach for most of the month of August and we would return the Sunday a week before school began. Mom would return to work the very next Monday, as she was a teacher so she started the week before school began. We would spend much of that week out shopping and getting our school supplies and a new outfit or new shoes for school to start. In the weeks prior to this week while we were at the beach I would scour the fashion magazines, teen magazines, and newspapers to figure out what I wanted. I loved new school supplies, the new notebooks, pencils, and markers. We didn't use a book bag or back pack back then but I remember as a kid thinking about what lunch box I wanted. I had a Holly Hobbie lunch box and a Peanuts one. It was such an exciting week.

Nowadays, that week has turned into a month long series of sales. I have been collecting school supplies for my kids for the past several weeks. Nothing goes on sale at the same time and they never are at the same store. Walmart will have crayons on sale, Office Depot will have glue, Staples will have pencils. My kids are barely involved in the process anymore.

While I don't mind having the super sales and getting packs of pencils for a penny, I do miss the excitement that no longer exists. The biggest excitement we have had was back to school day (or really half hour) where the kids get to take their supplies to school and meet their teacher. It is a madhouse at the school for a half hour but the kids really enjoy it.

Does anyone have anything that they do to help get that sense of excitement back like we had?