Thursday, May 24, 2012

The Great Rhinoceros Hunt

The Great Rhinoceros Hunt
While hubby sleeps by day from working nights, my challenge is to keep 4 rambunctious kiddos quiet.  So when the sun shines, I’m thinking of places we can go do inexpensive fun things and leave Steve to sleep in peace and quiet.
Hence….The Great Rhinoceros Hunt.
We headed off to a Kansas Town that boasted some 60+ Rhinos around town. The kids “hunted” these concrete creatures, some decoratively attired to match their place of business or not.  The kiddos got in place, planted their smiles and ran on to the next one.  After 42 Rhinos found, with the Kansas sky erupting with thunder, we headed home – happy, tired and adding another memory for the books.
So I bring you our fave Rhinos:








Wednesday, May 23, 2012

School is OUT!

School Year 2011 – 2012 Ends today!
Yahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
I don’t know who is happier, the kids or the parents!
I will love it when school approaches again I will be excited and eager for the routine it will bring back. Just as I love it when it lets out, like now. God creates seasons in nature and we as humans need those seasons too…..
So, to summer – let the swimming, T-ball, reading, camping, family time, playing, life begin!
Yahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

Thursday, May 10, 2012

I Love You Ritual

I need more patience….or tolerance...
 
 Every day if the timing is just so, I get to stop for a school bus on a regular route.  This doesn’t bother me EXCEPT…..the one stop is a couple of girls and it looks like this:

Mom and Dad drive both their vehicles up the SHORT driveway and sit there with the girls in the vehicles, waiting for the bus to arrive.  They don’t get out until the bus is actually at their drive way stopped.  Then each girl gets out as the parents get out of their vehicles, and respectively they go through this ritual of hugging each parent before they slowly walk across the road to get on the bus, we wait for them to be seated as the bus will then move on.  The cars line up behind watching and waiting for this ritual on a daily basis.
A couple of things that burn my hide are, if the parents KNOW the bus is coming, why don’t they start their ritual sooner so we all don’t have to painfully watch this while waiting.  Or, do it BEFORE they get in the vehicles at the house…..one gal is in 6th grade, soon to be 7th….okay….old enough to walk up the drive, wait for the bus and just get on it when it arrives!  Seriously. Don’t the parents see us all watching and waiting to continue on our daily commutes?  No respect for that – I think they love the audience….”see how much we love our children!”  Yikes.  Drives me nuts as you can tell. 
I’m not opposed to “I Love You” rituals at all, but at the expense of others who are waiting on you every day I find this one annoying and over the top.  TIME magazine just featured a model breast feeding her 3 yr old who stands on a chair.  Yikes....disturbing photo of a ritual gone too long.  
We all have rituals we do with our children, they are healthy for children to have.  There comes a time we release some of those as our children outgrow them.  It is the journey of letting go of the apron strings…..it is hard, but we do it.  We move from blankies and bottles to cups and good night tucks. I'm talking to myself here too as Sophia still crawls into bed with me too often and it is a hard habit to break.  We all have habits.....a reminder to myself to review more of them.
I think God is working to teach me a lesson in patience that I clearly am rebelling against….because for many years now I’ve witnessed this same bus loading ritual over and over and it burns me every time.  I’m human and so are these parents who are driving me nuts.

Saturday, May 5, 2012

Millers Oh Millers!

I’ve said it before, I’ll whine again…I strongly dislike (yes HATE, a word I don’t let my kids use) moths. Right now for a good two weeks the millers are migrating through Kansas – they are basically the adult stage of the army cutworm heading to the Rockies.  Kansas birds love them and in Colorado they are bear food.  Their fancy shmancy name is:  Euxoa auxiliaris.       Shooo, go away soon!

·        They flit.
·        They are too random.
·        They have this dusty stuff on them that gets on walls, fingers, etc.
·        They are ugly in my eyes.   Yes, I know I need therapy on this issue!


Sophia on the other hand, LOVES them.  Basically she loves bugs too.  We are so opposite on this issue like one end of the spectrum way different!  So, despite my dislike, I’m actually pleased and kind of proud she isn’t following my paranoid obsession with disliking insects, especially moths and spiders. To support her in her healthy curiosity I purchased a new net to catch them in  - because I wouldn’t want to touch them.  She finds her hands and little fingers work easier as she just snatches them up.  
Then a new “cage” – mesh to allow them to live and flit away from me.  A new bug inspector gadget.  She is set to play with her rollie pollies (no, not Polly Pockets!) and moth friends.

I’ve got to go now….heading to the big “W” to buy a gallon of hand washing disinfecting soap for her bathroom as we’re gonna use it all up this summer!
PS:  To all my "Miller" friends this post is NOT about you...sorry you share a moth name though! :-)

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