Friday, July 6, 2012

Big news!

The latest news on the new blog, check it out!
http://thespeckledkat.weebly.com/1/post/2012/07/guess-what.html

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Finally some new posts on the new blog!
Camping
CO Visit

Monday, April 30, 2012

Good-bye Blogspot Hello...

That's right! I've decided to give another blog host a try. Check it out...

thespeckledkat.weebly.com

Saturday, April 28, 2012

You'd be reading a post about our camping trip last weekend by now, except 3 pictures in and I have officially run out of upload room for free blogspot. So now the question is: Do I pay $5 and upgrade my account? Or do I try a different blog domain? Decisions decisions. If you have any domains to refer, please do so, I'm not fully aware of my choices.

Thursday, April 26, 2012

Grindstone, VA Camping

This past Thursday, we loaded up the car and headed on a 3 hour journey northwest to a place in Virginia called Grindstone Campground. We arrived later than planned and raced the sun to put up camp. The first group of friends made it a few hours before us, so they had a nice fire blazing and kindly offered us assistance.

Threats of cold weather and rain were weighing heavily on our minds, but that didn't stop us...

"I'm singin' in the rain"

"I'm singin' in the rain"...well not exactly, more like "planting in the rain".

This morning a friend called and asked if I would join her while she beautified a friend's deck. "Sure!" I said. I was planning on spending some time outdoors as the day was quite lovely and I had been wanting to visit said friend for a while now.

KennaKat and I met Lavender Girl and Biscuit around 11:30 at TriciaJane's house and started unloading the mass supply of beautiful plants that Lavender Girl picked up.

As we began adding soil to the first pot, it started...drip, drip. "No big deal! Just a little sprinkle, let's keep working. " A few minutes later, Drip, Drip, Drip. About 30 minutes in we were in the middle of a torrential downpour, with a few splashes of thunder and lightening for the added touch of "oh my we're crazy". Oh well. We just kept on working, we were already wet and dirty anyway.

Crazy disasters like that are what I live for. I get the biggest kick out of unplanned changes, the messier the better. Weeell I got what I asked for, we got totally messy, and soaked to the bone, but in the end, the deck looked lovely and I thoroughly enjoyed myself =)

To add to the "of course" pile, it stopped raining just as we were finishing up. We ran out of pots so we had a delivery from MW with more pots, soil, and hangers for the wind chime and bird feeder. It had stopped raining by the time he showed up, so I'm sure he got a kick out of our appearance.

You know you want to see pictures of us two crazy ladies, and you know how much I like to share...

Yes, that's mud splatter on my chin...
We are in drying out phase here

For more fun pictures, venture on over to Belma's Pearls, she caught pics of us working in the rain :)

I didn't get shots of all of the pots that we planted, but this gives you an idea.
Here MW is posing with the 2 things that he helped hang.
Do you see the dragonfly wind-chime and the shroons? I love!

You might be wondering, Where were KennaKat and Biscuit during all of this? Well, they happily "entertained" TriciaJane inside. They played really well together and only bonked heads {literally} once or twice. Neither wanted to leave in the end, which is always a good sign.

I love Biscuit's crazy eyes =)

It turned out to be quite the crazy fun day. I knew it was going to be a good day since I actually made it out of my pj's, went grocery shopping, cleaned my house and had an adventure.

Dear Friend, we hope that your new garden filled deck will be a place of beauty and relaxation during your healing. Please feel better soon, and every time you sit and breathe out there, remember that we love you so much!

Sunday, April 22, 2012

spent

I started this blog post to share pictures of our weekend, but I just realized I'm completely exhausted! Good night! Pictures will come in the next day or two, after I'm done with laundry and putting away all the random camping gear that is flooding my floors and counters...

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Friends

'I get by with a little help from my Friends'

Not that this post is really about that song but I thought you'd like to know the current song playing in my head. I'm not sure if it's just me or everybody has this issue, but I constantly, CONSTANTLY have songs playing in my head. Often times they relate to what I'm thinking about or doing at the time. It's like I have theme songs playing at all times. I wonder why? Is it because we live in a society that's full of music or have people always had music playing in the background of their minds? Like when classical music was popular, were people constantly thinking and acting on Beethoven's 5th symphony? Dah dah dah duuuuh! Often times my music in my head puts me in a certain mood...what kind of mood were people in back then if they had that playing in their head constantly? Rise and falls, rushes, assertive, racing...it's kind of crazy, I'll have to ask someone in the paradise to find out.

Ok back on track of what I was planning on sharing today...

The past 2 weeks, KennaKat and I have had a few special outings with our friends and I wanted to share. But I only captured two of them on camera, so I hope you enjoy those!

Fist up: Swimming

Our friends invited us to join them swimming and we gladly accepted. Then later I remembered that I had made play date plans a month prior for the same day. Well, the day ended up being really cold, so we all decided to go swimming at the 'plex and the girls had a lot of fun.

I brought the water camera, but forgot it in the locker room and there was NO WAY that I was going back into that freezing room if I didn't have to. After swimming for 3 hours, we went for lunch at Andys.

Here is the only picture I got of all 3 girls. I told Kenna to smile, completely unaware that she was in the middle of swallowing a mouthful of milk, so here is her milk spewing out of her mouth...at least she's obedient!

2nd: Tuesday we ventured to story time and afterwards we enjoyed park time with our friends. I forgot to grab my camera out of the car at the park so the only pictures I have to share are of the girls enjoying the contents of KennaKat's purse more than the stories read by the Story Man.

Make-up application

I'm really annoyed that I was too lazy to walk back to the car to grab my camera for the park. It was a beautiful day for taking pictures. And there were some bare bottoms that were too cute to NOT capture on camera and I totally missed it. Ah well, there's always next time!

Back to 'Getting by with a little help from my friends'- Friends come in various ranges but I am so thankful for fellow mommy friends. Who else is going to make you feel better about all the crazy things your kids do? Who else would you plan your children's futures with{yes, I do plan mini weddings in my head constantly}? Who else are you going to share ideas with and get great ideas from? Who will make you feel like you're not the only one going through those things? Friends are great. Thanks fellow mommy friends, you make raising children so much fun and less daunting!

Sunday, April 15, 2012

Circuit Assembly Day 2

"Make it a goal to leave every person you come in contact with, feeling better about themselves than before you spoke to them" -Bro Milano

This pretty much sums up how awesome our Assembly was this weekend. FANTASTIC! Everyone I spoke to was filled with love and happiness this weekend. The talks were right on point and so encouraging! We had excellent seats. The kids were P-E-R-F-E-C-T the entire session of both days. {My dream come true} This weekend was just absolutely amazingly great!

Today we sat on the second row directly behind the DO, sub CO, and visiting CO...it was a treat!
The kids fell in love with sister Allen and her seat saving duckling!

We leave this weekend feeling completely exhausted, filled with spiritual treasures, and having renewed determination to fulfill our goals and become better imitators of Christ. I forgot to use my camera a lot today, so sadly I didn't get as many shots of the friends as I would have liked but enjoy what I have:

My guys!

Sibling Love

crazy bangs, again. and crazy Kenna

Watch out ladies!

Overflowing with adorable she could burst

Demonstrating the singer in the back of the old song book :)

They love each other, they really do!

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

We did not successfully capture a good picture this weekend

T&T day 2
{I'm going to steal that necklace}

Oh the hilarity of this picture. Not that he is aware of where he is grabbing, but still, totally inappropriate way to hug girls!

With sister Allen and her duckling

We stayed with K&P this weekend which was Great! We arrived Friday night after dinner and hung out a little before beginning our weekend. Sat they went to a wedding and we went out with friends, so we didn't see them until bedtime, and then Sunday K so kindly cleaned up our ~~junk~~ belongings and made us dinner. We packed up and headed home sooo tired but encouraged and happy. The kids were totally WIRED after the program both days which makes me jealous because after sitting all day, I'm pooped, but the kids are ready to run a marathon it seems. Oh well, let them be crazy, they were perfect during the program and that's what mattered to me this weekend.

We have been having quite the spiritual feast lately with the Memorial, Special Talk, and Circuit Assembly...but we're not done yet, in 2 weeks, we get the CO visit! We can't wait.

Good night everyone!

Saturday, April 14, 2012

Circuit Assembly Day 1

Hey look! I remembered to use my camera!...well, a little at least :)

Here's day 1 of the Assembly.

After quite a stressful event of trying to actually park our car, we made it to the first day of the CA so embarrassingly late. But we made it nonetheless and it was excellent. Can't wait for more Spiritual Goodies tomorrow!

Until then, enjoy some pics...

My sweet cutie!

Crazy Bangs

Crazy Kenna Eyes

Silly E

Silly J

Silly E and J

Sibling Love

I found a friend!

Boy+Boy= 2 Boys
{future brother inlaws??? j/k}

Crazy Grass Stained Boys

Tabby and Tily

Major LM love, a frameable keepsake of LM wanting me over mommy, sorry mommy I know you're going to kill me for posting this pic ...but how could I forsake this LM love?

Double Mint Gum

B and mini B, my boyZ!

Us taken by E with a visit from Kenna's eyes

And another attempt at a pic of us, with hubby saying "that's enough, that's enough"

Good night day one, until tomorrow!

{Maybe I'll remember to take a family picture?}

Friday, April 13, 2012

What we're reading: Kids Magazine

Before I forget, I want to share something that E's teacher was raving about yesterday.

I was discussing my schedule change with her so that I can reg. aux., and move my volunteer day from Monday to Thursday, and she got excited because she wants me to have a reading session with the kids and do activities out of the Cricket magazines. When I asked her what she was talking about, she had to pull them all out for me to see.

Cricket mag has 4 different levels of children's magazines with all kinds of short stories, poems, songs, and activities for them to do. She said they are the best she has ever found. And the awesomest part is that the short stories they use are the exact stories they will find on the EOG's. They pull them straight from these mags, which I think is awesome that you could actually go over these with your kids before they have their EOG's and they may actually be a bit more prepared. Now of course, not every story will be on the test, so you wont know for sure, but still, it's a start.

Now, the only kids magazine that I was even familiar with was Highlights and these Cricket Mags highly surpassed them and there is no advertising in them, which is nice.

So the 4 different levels are:

BABYBUG: for ages 6 mo to 3 years and they are board book magazines

LADYBUG: for ages 3-6

SPIDER: for ages 6-9

CRICKET: for ages 9-14

Each magazine is geared towards a different level of reading, which is great for when you are looking for something level appropriate.

His teacher likes the ladybug and spider mags for first grade. You can find these at cricketmag.com OR they are available to check out at the library for free. {I like that word}. But I think I might at least look into ordering them because how fun would it be for the kids to get their own magazines in the mail?!

I just checked their website and they have even more magazines like age appropriate science mags that his teacher likes to use as well.

Monday, April 9, 2012

Treasury

Made my First Treasury today on Etsy. For those not familiar with Treasuries, you can add up to 16 items that you like on Etsy and feature them in a treasury. It helps to share the love and it's fun to search on Etsy, too much fun really. This is an effort to showcase my new found love for blues and browns and tans and golds and and and...you get the picture!