An interesting "First" for mom today...

Levi was upset about something today and turns out it was something a friend had said to him. He started to talk and all my therapy "skillz" kicked in...well, as well as they could while cooking dinner and dealing with Sam and Seth crying! I started asking questions and trying to tell him what I understood he was saying. It took me FOREVER just to get the story straight, but finally figured out that Levi didn't want to play a game and his friend said "you need to play the game or I won't play with you anymore". Levi adores this boy and the friend is a good boy, so I was talking to Levi about how he could talk to the boy, make his feelings known and not hurt the boy's feelings.

Anyway, I was calm and loving on the outside. On the inside, I wanted to throttle the friend and confront the parents for causing my baby to be sad. I have not dealt with this before! Is this how this goes? Do other moms feel like this or do I have some *serious* control issues? Levi is a sweet boy and a follower. He is not the one to lead or to come up with the ideas of things to do. He is a people-pleaser!

Another point is that I am SO GLAD that Levi felt like he could talk to me. That is one of the things that I really want with my kids. Open-ness and acceptance. After it was all said and done, about 10 minutes later, Levi came up, put his arms around my waist, and said, "Thanks for the good advice, mom." What a sweetie!

Quick Post

It was a good weigh in today....5 pounds down from last Monday. Kind of quick, but as long as I can keep it of, it works for me. I am glad it kind of kick-started...much more motivating that way! I "budgeted" candy intake this weekend and did very well, I think. I finally feel in control of eating/food instead of it controlling me! It's a VERY good thing!

Today for school, we worked with Halloween candy. We sorted it, counted it, grouped it, graphed it, wrote about it, and of course we had a taste test! We also read a book called Flat Stanley. We are going to send our our own Flat Stanley so if you might be willing to help us out, let me know. You just have to send us a picture with you and Stanley (a paper doll we will send to you) in your area or a postcard of your area. Then write a little something that is unique to your area and mail it back to us. We will follow Stanley's travels on our map. Fun!

I need to post pics of Halloween. What a fun weekend! It was really nice to have George as I believe I have taken 3 kids out by myself the last two years because of sickness. We got to go trick or treating with our very fun neighbors as well, so the kids had a blast! Good times!

Hi baby!

I have given up on keeping our kids names straight and so I just call everyone, "baby". As evidenced yesterday:

Seth walks into the TV room. He sees Sam on the green loveseat. "Hi baby" he says. Nonchalantly, Sam replies, "Hi baby."

And for some reason, I thought this was hilarious! Guess you had to be there.

More weight loss

WW is having a free trial week, so I am officially online with WW! It seems good so far, except that yesterday was only day 2 and I got pretty sick. This resulted in some super-fast weight loss (method not recommended:). Today, I haven't felt like eating too much, so that kept my points down and I had plenty left to eat my lite ice cream tonight. Yummo!

I love the "recipe builder" on the site, which lets you plug in your recipe and it tells you the points for each serving. So cool!

I am happy to have such good friends that are supportive and helpful and inspiring. Anyone that wants to join me, please do! Sara, I can't wait to hear about your efforts!

Weight Loss

I believe the wasps are coming in from attic through the ducts. Thanks, Candi! Now I am calling the Terminix guy again and having him go up there. Ugh.

Changing the subject, I think I want to join Weight Watchers. Too many unwanted pounds. I went clothes shopping on Saturday and didn't like how anything fit. I realized that I didn't like my body. I have felt very out of control with eating these days and it will only get worse as Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas get closer!

Some of my friends are losing lots of weight with WW and I think being accountable to someone else is really good for me. I have done this before, but always got pregnant and gained it all back and then some. As we are taking a break from pregnancies:), I think it's time to reclaim my body. I understand it will be slow going, but I think I can do it. I am ready to commit! The overall goal is losing 21 pounds and staying there.

Wasps

About this time in the year, most people don't have to worry about wasps, right? Well, some of us do. They are IN our house!!!! I keep finding them on our sliding glass doors in our family room. They are totally lethargic, which is good but we have found SO MANY! And we cannot figure out where they are coming from. Has anyone had this problem? The Terminix guy was no help. I hope we can figure this out. It's fairly creepy!

Polaris Press: Pickle Day and some Family Randomness

Today we went on a tour of our local Pickle Factory. The kids enjoyed seeing the workers fish pickles out of tubs with a big net but they didn't like the smell. They did like the treats they got to pick out at the end:) They picked candy, I picked a jar of Cinnamon Apple Pickle Chunks. Yummo!!

The weather is so beautiful and I am hoping it sticks around tomorrow. I just remembered a hiking trail that Grandpa was telling us about and thought this would be the perfect time of year to enjoy it. So tomorrow, that will be part of our school day.

Linda is giving the kids piano lessons and I LOVE it! I LOVE that Levi is excited to play the piano and that he can now play duets with me and George. It is so much fun!

I am thankful that I am homeschooling. Today is was BEAUTIFUL outside and I just let kids play all afternoon. We finished our schooling in the morning and enjoyed the outdoors. Yay for homeschool!