My Real Life

October 17, 2011

How it’s Going

Filed under: Uncategorized — Amy @ 5:44 pm
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So, I think a great example for how it’s been going around here lately would be the fact that, this morning, as I dropped Tiny Monkey off at his babysitter’s house, I realized that I forgot to put on my shoes before leaving the house and was still wearing my slippers.

I was already running late because it was a Monday, and thus, I taught all day long in my slippers.

You see where I’m going with this?

I can barely keep a coherent thought in my head, lately, so putting together a blog post that is meaningful or entertaining is a bit beyond my purview.

However, I feel like I’m missing something when I’m not updating the blog, so although I don’t like to use the blog to complain, here’s the way it’s been going around here the past week or so.

I got hit with the stomach bug last week.

I got hit hard.

I actually had to leave work early on Wednesday and then was out sick on Thursday.

I muddled through on Friday, but I didn’t actually start to feel better until Friday night.

Saturday morning, Real Man and Monkey Girl woke up not feeling well.  By Sunday, the two of them sounded like they had been hit by a truck.  I checked out both of their throats with a flashlight and my unprofessional opinion was possibly strep.

Without a professional diagnosis, however, and based on the fact that they both felt well enough to go to school and work today, they did.

In the midst of this, on Thursday, Monkey Girl got braces, and while she is absolutely adorable with those things, the bill caused my heart to skip more than a beat or two.

Man oh man…have you seen how expensive those things are???

Tiny Monkey started coughing and sneezing on Friday.

The coughing is adorable, and at first I thought he was imitating everyone else, but turns out, he wasn’t.

The cough is all his own.

When he sneezes?

All the colors of the rainbow emerge from that tiny nose.

And, by Sunday morning, my throat was hurting again, as well.

So, we all did a lot of resting this weekend and laying low and watching ridiculous things on television.

(I watched the Justin Bieber movie and cried a little.)

We also waited for our new dishwasher to be delivered on Saturday.

Didn’t come.

Called them up, turns out they had to change the delivery date, but didn’t bother to tell us.

Baby Monkey and Monkey in the Middle seemed to be untouched by all of this and went about their merry way, “raking” the leaves in the yard, playing football inside and outside the house, basketball on the deck, doing puzzles, board games, etc.

Tonight, Monkey Girl, Tiny Monkey and I all are headed to the doctor to get checked out.  At this point, it’s probably moot, but I think it’s important we get checked anyway.

So, it’s not been great around here, lately, and I haven’t felt like blogging about the blah.

But, you know me…there’s gotta be a bright side, so here it is.

I hit the church bazaar on Saturday and got 29 books, 4 jigsaw puzzles, 1 board game, 1 electronic game, 3 coloring books, 10 comic books all for $13.00.  Played with a bunch right away and have some saved for Christmas.  Excellent deals.

My blood sugar numbers have been really good lately.  Now, that could be because I haven’t really eaten much of anything for five days, but I choose to believe that my diabetes is finally getting under some type of control.

Monkey Girl is being super-responsible with her braces.  She brushes and flosses and does everything she is supposed to without anyone having to remind her.  That’s good to see.

We hit the library on Saturday, also, and brought home a truckload of Halloween books that the boys have been having me read over and over as we all snuggled up this weekend.  We also found our own Berenstain Bears collection that got stashed when we moved them up from the basement and we recently uncovered.  So, we’ve been wading our way through all of those, as well and loving every minute of it.

I downloaded the new Rick Riordan book “The Son of Neptune” to the Nook for Monkey Girl and she read it in a day and I’m in the middle of it now and absolutely love it.  This guy is a freaking genius, I tell you.  Makes me embarrassed to say that I’ve written a novel, because my mind and my writing is nowhere near what this guy has in his brain.  So creative and interesting.  Talk about character development and back story and…well, needless to say, I’m enjoying it immensely.

So, forgive the doom and gloom and I promise to get back to the usual lovefest sometime soon.

In the mean time, cover yourself if you see us coming and we’ll try our best not to infect you.

May 2, 2010

Some Things I Love About Kids

Filed under: Uncategorized — Amy @ 9:38 pm
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The way their feet don’t touch the floor when they are sitting on just about any chair.

The way they will hold a toy all day long, no matter what they happening to be doing.

Eating, bathing, playing with another toy…doesn’t matter. 

 They will keep that death grip on the toy that is the favorite of the day, even as they fall asleep.

…and the way that they can completely become entranced in a task that to an adult may seem fruitless and a time waster, but that fills them with such satisfaction, that when they are done, their smiles can light up the world.

September 15, 2009

Rainy Day vs. Sunny Day

Filed under: Uncategorized — Amy @ 6:27 am
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In my house, as in every house, the activities are dependent upon the weather.

On sunny days, I know the monkeys will be riding bikes, at the park, in the stream, on the deck, doing whatever.

On a rainy day, I never know what they’ll come up with.

Sunny day.

sunnyday 

Rainy day.

rainyday 

Hard to know which one to hope for. Both are awesome.

September 5, 2009

Real Proud

I am always proud of my monkeys, but today, I’m extra proud of the big monkeys. 

Back in the spring, Monkey Girl informed me that she wanted a Nintendo DS.  I said, “I don’t think so.  We have a Wii and a an xBox 360 and a Game Boy.  I’m not spending $129.99 on a Nintendo DS.”

Still, she persisted.  So, I told her that if this was something she really wanted, then she should save for it.  I’m a big believer in kids working for things.  My feeling is that parents who buy their kids everything aren’t helping them prepare for the real world.  You want something as an adult?  You need to work for it.  Obviously we take care of the kids with food, clothing, a roof over their heads, and we are good Santas and birthday fairies.  But, this didn’t fall into the “need” category and there were no holidays or birthdays in sight.

So, she started saving.  She already had some money socked away.  Monkey Girl has a chore chart.  Each chore is worth $0.25.  If she does all the chores in a week, she has the opportunity to earn $8.75 a week.  There are some chores that she does regularly and gets those stickers, like emptying the dishwasher.  If she doesn’t do that, I can’t refill it, so that’s a non-negotiable, but it’s on the chart.  Making her bed?  It’s on the chart, but it’s not a non-negotiable with me.  It’s her bed, it’s upstairs and no one goes there except for us.  On days she has a friend coming over, I expect it to be made.  The good news?  She likes to make her bed, so it gets made every day and she gets the sticker anyway. 🙂  However, you can see that even though the potential is there for $8.75 a week, she may not make that much in a week, depending on the chores she does or does not complete.  Again, you only earn what you work for.  What a novel idea.

When she does get her allowance, she divides it into three, unequal parts.  $1 goes to church on Sunday.  The rest is divided in half.  One half of it goes to her bank account savings and the other goes to her spending box. 

Anyway, she kicked it into high gear last spring.  She started doing every chore on that chart and asking if there were any big projects she could do to earn some more money.  So, I gave her a sock sorting project and a picking up all the sticks in the yard project.  She also started making greeting cards and selling them.  They are really nice and she charged $0.75 – $1.00 for them.

Mid-summer, Monkey in the Middle went to Barnes and Noble with his grandpa.  While he was there, he saw this Thomas the Tank Engine add-on for his train set.  It has lights and bells.  It’s actually pretty cool.  It was $30.  He came home and asked for it and Monkey Girl immediately said “Why don’t you save for it, like I’m doing with my Nintendo?”  Wanting to do anything that she does, he said “Yeah!!!” and started saving.

So, now he has a chore chart that he also can earn $8.75 with.  He’s not really even getting close to that, but he’s working hard.

So, today, the big Monkeys pulled out their money containers and started counting.  Monkey in the Middle had $32 and Monkey Girl had $65. (We told MonkeyGirl that if she saved half, we’d pitch in the other half…we aren’t complete monsters.)  So, off we went.

First we hit Best Buy.

buying 003

Monkey Girl chose a blue Nintendo DS Lite.  Real Man and I decided to buy her a game to go with it, because really, how cruel would that have been to have said, “Okay, you’ve got your Nintendo!  Now you can sit and look at it until you can save up for a game!”  She chose a Wizards of Waverly Place game.

She brought it up to the counter and was bursting with pride as she paid.

Then, we hit Barnes and Noble.

buying 001

buying 002

Another very proud kid as he explained to the cashier that this was his money he was paying with.

Now we’re home and each is busy with their new purchase.  I’ve overheard both explaining to Baby Monkey that they need to be careful with the new items because they were very expensive.  I honestly believe that it gives them a better understanding of how hard you have to work in order to earn a certain amount of money.  It has also helped them to realize that when you work hard for something, you need to take care of it.  Many kids today live in a disposable society.  They are given so much that they don’t care for any of it.  I’m so glad that we are working toward not allowing our kids to have that mindset.

I’m just really proud of the big monkeys today.  They worked hard and are enjoying the fruits of their labor.

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