The Tooth Fairy Cometh

Yesterday was a very exciting day in our house. My little man finally lost his first tooth. And about two hours later (thanks in large part to a BBQ chicken wing) he lost the second one.

We had been playing the waiting game for a while. His two front teeth kept getting wigglier and wigglier... but were still holding on. We even tried a few times to pull them, but no luck. His new teeth had even started coming in. But still the baby teeth clung on.

But when they're ready, they're ready. And yesterday was finally the day.

By this point he was a little too excited to stand still (hence the blurry picture.) But his excitement was understandable. Not only is losing your first tooth (or teeth) a big deal in itself... it also means the first visit from the Tooth Fairy. And since he had lost the first two on the same day, he just knew that she was going to bring him something extra-special.

And he was right. This is what he woke up to this morning.

And of course the Tooth Fairy had to bring him enough to share, after what I overheard last night. He told his sister that, since he had lost two teeth he figured the Tooth Fairy would probably bring him two things, so he was sure he would have enough to share with her. Something that sweet just has to be rewarded. :)

A bit much? Perhaps. But that's just how we roll around here. Milestones are meant to be celebrated. And let's be honest, getting to create these little moments is absolutely one of the best parts of parenthood.

How about you? Have a favorite Tooth Fairy memory? I'd love to hear it!

Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

No big revelations here (mostly because I'm just barely recovering from a horrible 4-day stomach flu ordeal and don't quite have all of my neurons firing again yet.) But I just had to share something adorable.

Yes, that's my little "Thing 1" and "Thing 2" at our local library's celebration of Dr. Seuss's birthday today. The library really did a great job of it this year, with several activity stations, games, crafts, treats, story times, and of course a brilliant photo op.

The kids loved it. We hadn't been there very long when my daughter asked "Can we come back to this again next year?" You betcha! If you know me at all then you know how much I love a holiday that centers around books, so of course seeing my kids happily celebrating that love of reading completely made my day.

Unfortunately (because of the aforementioned stomach flu) I didn't have a chance to plan anything ahead of time for our own personal celebration, so aside from reading some of our favorite Dr. Seuss books as our bedtime story tonight, the library's birthday party was the extent of it for us today. But next year I will definitely be more prepared to make a complete day of it.

And if you missed the celebration today, make a plan now to participate next year! For more information about this annual event, please visit the National Education Association's Read Across America web site here.


Do you have a favorite Dr. Seuss quote? How about a favorite book? Did you do anything special to celebrate his birthday? Please share!

LML Monday - Cub Scouts & BBQ Wings

It's Monday once again, my friends. And as always that means it's time to reflect on the things that made us happy over the past week. And of course now is also the perfect time to set the tone for a great week to come! 

If you missed my take on LML, you can find it here. If you missed the explanation of LML Monday, you can catch up here.

Cub Scouts
This weekend was my son's first Blue & Gold Banquet with Cub Scouts. It was quite the event, and very exciting. He received his Tiger Badge that he has been working toward all year, as well as several other awards. I'm very proud of my little man. But even more, I'm so happy to see him take pride in himself and his accomplishments.

BBQ Wings
As some of you know, my daughter has quite a love for BBQ chicken. And so from time to time we go out to one of our favorite joints for wings. Partly because we all like to eat them. But largely because we get to see this face. And who wouldn't want to do that as often as possible?

Ok. I shared mine - now it's your turn! Please feel free to leave me a comment and share some of your recent LML moments. Focus on the happy thoughts, and have a great week!

Renewed Faith in Today's Youth

Getting nailed in the face with a big rubber ball hurts. A lot. It happened to me yesterday when I was dropping my son off at school. We were walking through the playground when one of the kids playing four-square got a little too exuberant with his bounce and the ball got away from him.

It caught me totally off guard - and did I mention it hurt? - but I'm fine. No permanent harm done. The headache that it gave me only lasted for a few hours, and the mark it left on my face is almost completely gone now. And (thank goodness!) my glasses were only bent and not broken, and my husband was able to easily fix them for me.

But the inevitable bright side to this story isn't just that I wasn't hurt all that bad. The really cool thing about what happened is that it gave me a little bit of hope that the "kids these days" may not all be the rotten little monsters that people sometimes like to think they are.

When I recovered from the shock enough to realize that the ball had knocked my glasses off, I started to have that moment of near-panic that most bespectacled people have had at least once. You know, that moment when you realize that you have to find your glasses, but you can't see anything without them, so you have no idea how you're going to pull it off.

I was just about to ask my son if he saw where my glasses went, but before I could even get it out of my mouth a little boy who had witnessed what happened ran over and picked them up, and handed them to me with a cheerful "here you go!" I thanked him, and he happily went off to continue playing. He didn't know me, and he wasn't involved in what happened. He just saw someone in need and was able to help, so he did.

As soon as I got my glasses settled back on my nose I looked up to see another boy standing in front of me. When he saw that he had my attention he quickly said "I'm so sorry! Are you ok?" And he really seemed honestly sincere. I assured him that I would be ok (but I did take the opportunity to remind him that there are lots of little ones running around, and that it's really important to be careful.)

He promised to be careful, and headed back to his game. But before he was gone, another boy from the game also came over to make sure that I was ok. Again I said that I would be, so not to worry (and again I used the chance to remind them to be careful.)

I finally recovered from the initial surprise of getting hit and realized the other (more pleasant) surprise of having young kids be so helpful and caring. Way too much of the time all we hear about is the tales of the "bad kids" and how they're being dealt with. It's tempting to get cynical about today's youth. But they obviously aren't all bad, and some of them do care.

I mean, I've always known how awesome my own kids are. But it's nice to see that there are some other good ones out there too. :)

LML Monday - Busy Days and Lazy Days

It's Monday once again, my friends. And as always that means it's time to reflect on the things that made us happy over the past week. And of course now is also the perfect time to set the tone for a great week to come! 

If you missed my take on LML, you can find it here. If you missed the explanation of LML Monday, you can catch up here.


I have to admit, there were times when I thought this past week was going to kill me. It was a good week, really. Just incredibly busy. And it completely wore me out. But since it was so busy mainly because it was a week spent celebrating... I suppose I can't really complain.

My daughter turned 5 last Monday (which, incidentally, is why I missed my post last week. Much too busy celebrating.) We actually started the celebration the Saturday before, because my husband would be working and my son would be in school on Monday, and we wanted to be able to do something as a family.

So we started with lunch (and a ridiculous birthday brownie volcano) at the Rainforest Cafe, and pretty much just kept celebrating all weekend.

Of course the celebration continued on Monday, when we had a girls' day out that included (among other things) breakfast for the two of us, manicures, and lunch with Grandma.

Then finally this past Saturday we got to have her birthday party with all of her friends.

And run ourselves ragged at the park.

In the end we were all exhausted, but the Birthday Princess was happy, so it was all worthwhile.

Of course all of this would have been plenty of excitement for one week... but let's not forget that we also had Valentine's Day thrown in there too. And the Valentine's Day party at school. More planning, and shopping, and organizing. More exhausted Mommy. But also great fun.

With beautiful moments like these, how could I not simply adore my life? 

Of course, the final treat of the week was yesterday, when at last I had no immediately pressing responsibilities and could relax and breathe for a bit. The kids and I had quite the lazy day, filled with Angry Birds, coloring books, and Dr. Who on Netflix. It was brilliant.

Ok. I shared mine - now it's your turn! Please feel free to leave me a comment and share some of your recent LML moments. Focus on the happy thoughts, and have a great week!

LML Monday - Birthdays and Big Drinks

It's Monday once again, my friends. And as always that means it's time to reflect on the things that made us happy over the past week. And of course now is also the perfect time to set the tone for a great week to come! 

If you missed my take on LML, you can find it here. If you missed the explanation of LML Monday, you can catch up here.


I have to be honest here, guys. I'm extremely tired today, and not completely feeling the writing vibe. But that probably has something to do with having just spent a long weekend in Las Vegas celebrating my birthday. (Can't say that's for sure why I'm so exhausted... but I'd say it's a pretty safe bet.) But for you, I'll suck it up and write anyway. :)

It's no shock that my focus on this fine LML Monday is my awesome husband, and the mini-vacation that he just treated me to. It was a bit of a milestone of birthdays, and it has been many years since the last birthday I got to celebrate, so it seemed like a good time to do something special. Nothing extravagant, of course (because I'm not the extravagant type.) But four days in Vegas was just about perfect.

We spent the days relaxing and taking in the sights. And yes, indulging a little in good food and good drinks. It was a celebration, after all.

Senior Frogs is always a good time. The staff is fun, the karaoke is usually hilarious, and who doesn't love drinks measured by the yard?

Sadly we weren't there at the right time to see the girls dancing on the bar at Coyote Ugly. But I did get to walk around for the rest of the day with a big plastic cowboy boot filled with alcohol, so at least there's that.

Ok, so a huge plastic Eiffel Tower isn't necessarily the most convenient thing to walk around with all night... but it's cute, and the drink was actually pretty good (and enough to share, which is always cool too.)

No, the week wasn't all about the alcohol. But the occasional "big drink" is fun, and it's a huge part of the Vegas experience. (Trust me. Walk around there some time. You'll see what I mean.)

So while I'm exhausted, and taking a bit of time readjusting to reality, it was all worth it. I have to thank my husband again for the wonderful time. Oh, and a special shout-out to my mom, too. If the kids hadn't been able to stay with you... well, I probably would have still celebrated my birthday, but I imagine it would have been considerably different. ;)


Ok. I shared mine - now it's your turn! Please feel free to leave me a comment and share some of your recent LML moments. Focus on the happy thoughts, and have a great week!

LML Monday - Play Dates & Pine Cars

It's Monday once again, my friends. And as always that means it's time to reflect on the things that made us happy over the past week. And of course now is also the perfect time to set the tone for a great week to come! 

If you missed my take on LML, you can find it here. If you missed the explanation of LML Monday, you can catch up here.

I know the blogging has been a bit patchy lately, but like I mentioned yesterday things seem to be getting a little bit back to normal. And even if they aren't completely there yet (or don't stay there) I've decided that LML Monday needs to be back, and needs to be a constant. Because I feel better when it is. So here we go, back on track...

Play Dates
My kids and I have a tradition, going back to the beginning of last school year when my son started kindergarten. Every time they have a half day at school we take advantage of the free afternoon and go out to lunch (usually at McDonald's, because in a town this size there aren't all that many options.) We always have a good time. And there is usually ice cream involved, which also helps.

At some point our lunch dates began to evolve, as we started to get to know some other families from school and make some friends. Sometimes it's still just the three of us for lunch (which is still fun), but sometimes (like this past week) we're able to meet some friends there and make an actual play date out of it. Spending a couple of hours at McDonald's is even more fun when the kids have friends to play with, and I have other mom friends to talk to.

When you're a mom (especially a stay-at-home mom) your exposure to grownup conversation can sometimes be kind of limited. Don't get me wrong - I treasure every minute with the kids, and wouldn't trade it for anything. But having another mom or two to spend some time with now and then is a great way to relax and recharge, and it always makes me feel better.

Pine Cars
This past weekend was the first Pinewood Derby of my son's Cub Scout career. Sadly, none of our cars did all that well, but we still had a great time. And we got some ideas and learned a lot about what we can do better next year, so it's good that this is an annual event. :)

These cars might not have been the fastest, but they sure did turn out cute, didn't they? Family craft projects are always a hit in my house, so these made for several fun weekends leading up to the race. (And lots of hard work - mostly on Dad's part, but I like to think that the rest of us contributed a little.) My son didn't even care at all that he didn't win - he still loved his Angry Birds car.


Ok. I shared mine - now it's your turn! Please feel free to leave me a comment and share some of your recent LML moments. Focus on the happy thoughts, and have a great week!