Halloween is coming

On the first Sunday of October for the past...I don't know....maybe 15 years, we make haunted houses.  The tradition continued today.  We talk and have fun and it is a mess.  It is amazing they turn out as good as they do.  Today we went for a more simple look.  I think we were hungry and just wanted to snack on the left over cookies, and candies.

Notice we didn't use lots of m&m's, the're my favorite. Our ghost have red eyes because we didn't want to open mini chocolate chips just for two ghost.   Next we'll cover these in cobwebs and put out dad's collection of witches.

Bainbridge island

We got to go on the ferry to Bainbridge island.  We went there thinking we could eat at a diner that had been featured on food tv's "Diner, dives and drives" or something like that.  When we got there the diner was closed.  We still had a nice walk through the town and the ferry ride was very relaxing.





It was a little windy.

He's just a little dramtic.  We had a great time.

Monday family dinner topic

It's really important to be a gracious winner.

Oh my goodness did we have lots to talk about at dinner with all the news over the weekend.
  The first thing we talked about was Michael Jordan's hall of fame speech.  Was it sour grapes?  Is he a winner who is still unhappy or was he just showing how competetive he is? 
Serena Williams losing her cool and the match.
 Than Kanye West interupting Taylor Swifts big moment.  Thankfully Beyonce gave us an example of a gracious winner that we could talk about.
We were able to talk about things like it's not nice to say "I told you so," and  even if your right your behavior can turn you into a loser.
 Even if you are the "winner" it's nice if you notice and acknowledge others. 

On the menu tonight was a perfect fall meall.  Pot Roast.  I love pot roast.  I put the meat,vegtables and broth into the crockpot in the morning and can smell the deliciousness all through the house all afternoon.

Favorite Meal

To give the kids something to look forward to  after starting school, I let them choose their favorite dinner.  One choose ravoli, the other choose spaghetti and the last one choose steak sandwiches.

For the after school snack I made them pencil brownies. Happy first week of school.
 Baking and planning these treats give me something to do on the first day of school so I don't get so sad about my kids getting older.

Longing for Summer

School Clothes

Buying school clothes for a high schooler is a bit scary. They want to have a certain look and I want him to be comfortable, but I'm on a budget. This year he needed new jeans so we headed to Old Navy. Great news, they were having a sale, 2 pair for $25. Bad news they had no jeans left in his size. We had to go to Target anyway. Little brother had earned some money and was dying to buy some Pokemon cards. We decided to just look. Lucky us not only did they have jeans in his size, they were the style he liked(dark wash, baggy, plain), their price was $10.99 each.
He also found T-shirts with old rock and roll bands on them for $8.99. Another sale.
Yes,he felt set for school and I was so happy we were way within my budget.

First day at school is a success!

Today was the first day of High School and 4th grade. Everyone was excited and nervous. The day went really well for both boys. They came home really happy. A good start to a good school year.

Brainwashing our kids

Last weekend we were vacationing at Crescent Bar. While we were at the pool there was a group of boys playing the classic game, Marco polo with a fast food twist.

The one who was "it" would yell "subway".

The others would say "eat fresh"

"subway"

"eat fresh"

"five dollar"

"foot longs"

"five dollar"

"foot longs"

"McDonald's"

"get fat"

Does McDonald's have a PR problem?

It's as I've always suspected...our kids are brainwashed by fast food chains.

One more week of Summer

We decided to prepare for school we would start getting up and going to bed earlier. Everyone was on board with this until this morning. Morning came a little early. We had some grumpy kids today. I hope will be on a good schedule next week.

Terrific Tuesday

What did you learn today? That was the dinner question.
A new Joke. Once someone starts a telling a silly joke everyone knows one and wants to share. Here are some samples:

knock, knock.
whose there?
hatch,
hatch who,
God bless you

What is the best time to go to the dentist?
2:30 (tooth hurty)

Why didn't the skeleton cross the road?
Because he didn't have the guts.

To start the New Year off right I wanted to go through the house and make it into an environment that supports everyone in the family. This is the place we start our day from and so we want to feel energized. This is where we end our day so we need to be able to relax and unwind here. This is where we are together and we want to have fun together and also be able to entertain ourselves. I want our home to become a great launch pad and resting place.

On the drive to Tacoma the other night we talked about two rooms in particular, the family room and the living room. I asked each family member to come up with three words that would describe the way they would like those rooms to be. Than I asked them what activities they would like to do in each of the rooms.

We decided that we would like the living room to be, warm, comfortable, calm and peaceful. The activities we will do here are F.H.E., read, listen to and play music.

In the family room we wanted to be comfortable, warm, fun and relaxing. We will play games, do puzzles, watch TV and movies here.

Now we are arranging each room to better fulfill its function. The books are being removed from the family room and moved to the living room. The games are being moved downstairs.