Spooked out

We had a really nice weekend even though it rained/snowed all day on Saturday. When it rains that means it is inside project time. We had a lot going on this weekend.


Friday night was the dance put on by the PTA.  It was a fun night.  I was very glad to be done with this event.

Saturday night we had a Halloween party to attend.  They have a 4 year old son who is Tee's best friend.  They also have a 8 year old son who the boys enjoy playing with.  The parents planned the party as a surprise for their kids.  The kids were gone with grandparents all day while the parents prepared the haunted house. 

It was another fun evening. 

Tee was determined to get an apple!



And he did!



Yes, I know that putting your mouth in a big pot of water filled with apples after several other people have tried to put their mouth on an apple is totally disgusting.  In fact, my older boys wanted nothing to do with trying to bob for apples.  Everyone needs to try it at least once.

Tee and his best bud.  These two have an unbelievable connection!

Although  the older boys did not have any costume parties at school, Tee did.  I was one of the parents who signed up to help with the party.  The kids had a parade and then back to the classroom for games.  Tee loved that I was able to help out.

No masks allowed at school.

This evening we went to a neighbor's house for dinner.  It was a last minute invitation.  The boys were so excited for Halloween.

Jay as the cool ghoul, Tee as venom and E as the dementor!

We ended up splitting up a little tonight.  The husband took the two older boys with some of their friends.  I took Tee with one of his neighborhood buddies.  I made it back to hand out just a little bit of candy. 

It seems as though there was not so many people out this evening.  My neighbors said they had a lot of candy left over. 

I would love for Halloween to be the last Saturday of the month.  It would be nice to not have to rush through dinner to get them out and back in to get ready for bed.

It is fun.....but I am glad to be done with costumes.

Oh boyz.....

It seems as though there are big issues in 4th grade in regards to the boy's bathroom.  The problem seems to follow them year after year.

The bathrooms are located at the entrance to the 4th grade pod.  The pod has 3 closed classrooms and two open.  It appears that someone likes to clog the toilet on a daily basis.  The kids have lost out on recess time due to the bathroom issues. 

My boys think they know who is responsible for the over abundance of toilet paper in the toilet.  Yes, this child does have a behavior problem.  It would not surprise me but they don't have any proof. 

I was really shocked when the boys came home and told me that someone pooped on the bathroom floor.  How incredibly gross.  How does that happen?  Was it an accident or on purpose?  I guess if it was an accident, I could see a 4th grader being very embarrassed. 

A few days later, I was really grossed out.  Not only did someone poop on the floor again, they covered it with a piece of toilet paper and the janitor slipped and fell.  YUCK!

So now the boys have to go to the bathroom in pairs.  One goes in to use it while the other waits.  When the first one is done the second one goes in and check the bathroom. 

I am totally grossed out by the entire thing. 

This is concerning to me.  E does not like to use public restrooms.  He will hold it ALL day rather than subject himself to such filth.  I had to threaten him to use the bathroom during the day or I will email his teacher.  He does not want me to do that so I think that he has been ok.  I can tell he has not used the bathroom when he runs home from the bus and goes straight to the bathroom.  I watch out for this daily.

****************************************************************************

Tee and I were in the car the other day having a conversation.  He started talking about being able to walk dogs in order to earn money.  He really wants to make some money.  I thought wow, that is so cute.  My response was that he was too young to walk dogs to earn money.  He came back very quickly and said no, you walk the dogs and earn the money and give it to me.  Where does he come up with this stuff?  He cracks me up.

Day off from school = forced family fun

When we were driving today, Tee tells me I am the best Mommy in the world.  Sound nice?  He should have stopped there, but said when you are mean you are the worst Mommy.  I told him that hurt my feelings and that I loved him very much and had to take care of him.  I guess he felt bad and he said ok Mom, you are the best Mommy in the world even if when you are mean.  I left it at that!

Friday was a day off from school, although Tee had school I let him take the day off.  In the morning, I told him we would go to the zoo and he was so excited.  He said Mommy, I have never been to the zoo.  Yes, I feel like the Mom of the year.  He is 4 and has NEVER been to the zoo. 

I purchased a groupon a few months back for a family membership.  The membership expires in December.  It was a bit of a chilly morning but that didn't stop us.  I had never been to the zoo here but had heard that the area on the way is not a great section of town.  I put the address into my GPS and away we went.  Yes, I got a bit lost but was able to find it after a few minutes.

We could have taken the tram to the animals but the boys wanted to walk.

We tried to get as many pictures as possible.

Change of photographer.

Tee is working on his skills.

The Raven!



My animals!

We spent the first part of the morning in the children's section.  Lots of animals and we didn't miss one.  After lunch, we took a train ride.  It would be nice if they had a ride that took you around some animals but it just goes out and back. 

We then hit the African animals.  There are the bigger animals: lions, elephants, giraffes, chimpanzees etc.  The last stop were the polar bears.  We did a lot of walking and decided that we would ride the tram back to the front entrance. 

I love it when the older kids have such a good time doing something that Tee enjoys.  We had such a good time.

Unbelievable

Early on I decided I would volunteer my time in the school.  I got involved in the PTA when my boys were in first grade.  We moved here soon after they started Kindergarten and I needed a little time to settle in. 

I have held a role on the PTA since then in many capacities.  I have done special events, fundraising, membership and currently holding the role of secretary. Sometimes I have done 2 roles at once.  As is typical, it is difficult to find volunteers and it is usually the same people every year. 

The president is was serving a 3rd year because no one wanted to take on the role.  The President just happens to be my neighbor and good friend.

What many people don't understand is that you should join the PTA every year and that does not mean that you have to volunteer your time.  Our school seems to have minimal members.  Why?  I haven't figured it out.  The PTA does so many nice things for our kids and teachers, from assemblies (4 a year) to special events to  teacher appreciation events to so many other.  It sounds like a great thing, right?

Well, what has transpired the last couple of weeks has made me re-think my role in this organization.  I will never be able to explain in detail, that would take too much time but hopefully enough to understand.

The principal of our school has decided to no longer have a Halloween parade at school.  The parade consisted of kids having to change into costume in order to parade outside where parents are waiting and watching.  Then they have to go back inside to get out of their costume. Typically each class has a celebration with a sweet treat and games.  The only item getting axed is the parade.  There are many who do not celebrate Halloween and a teacher must be responsible for them while others are parading around. It is time.  The communication was done in the weekly newsletter that only gets posted on-line.

A local on-line news source got wind of the demise of the parade and posted a story.  As you can imagine the comments that were left were not very nice.  One comment was encouraging people to get to the PTA meeting so that this could be discussed.  On the advice given by the county PTA, our president posted that the parade was not on the agenda, however, the principal would stay after to discuss with those interested.  The PTA meeting was adjourned and no word was brought up about the parade.  The Principal and VP stayed around and no one said a thing.

Well, the next day comments went crazy blaming the PTA president for everything.  The personal attacks on both the President and Principal were unbelievable.  It said that the President did not have the best interest of the kids and that the principal was lazy. And no one liked either one.

In response to the cancellation of the parade, the PTA changed from a Hawaiian party to a dance and come in costume party.

Another article was printed about other schools in the area and how they were going to continue their tradition of parading.  And once again people started commenting.   Each and every comment really just made me get angrier.  The PTA does so much for the children in the school and the president has dedicated so much of her time for everyone else's kids. 

During this time, the president decided she needed to resign.  She was done with the personal attacks.  At a certain point everything you do will be scrutinized and who can live with that.

And if that was not enough, a third article was posted yesterday.  It was a letter that was written from the president of the PTA council, over a week ago.  The letter was not posted in its entirety.  Once again, the comments started to trickle in. 

I have to say, I just don't understand why everyone has their panties in a wod over a silly parade.  If you want to fight for something, fight for a way to better the education of our kids, fight for a better spelling program.  If you want your child to parade do something at home for them.

I think about how incredibly silly this issue has been and how much of my time I have spent discussing it.  I have spent time reading comments and listening to the PTA president.  I have started to think maybe it is time to do something else with my time.  This bothers me because the PTA does so much  for the children and that is the only reason I have stayed on at this point.  But maybe it is time to do something else that will be appreciated. 

Apples.....Apples

I am a bit behind.  A week ago Saturday, it was a beautiful day, we had no plans and we thought it was a good day to go to the farm.  We visit the farm a few times a year and the boys love it.

We headed around lunch in order to stop on the way there.  We stopped for sandwiches.  On the way, E made some comment about not wanting to go.  This was our first outing in a long time as a family and I was not going to let him ruin it.  My response was we were having a family day and we were ALL going to have fun.

We made our way to the apple orchard.  We were able to pick 4 different kids of apples.  It was spread out a bit so we got a lot of walking in.  We got lots and lots of apples.

The boys standing in front of the apple trees!

My piggies!

They have a maze for the kids.  Jay and Tee went right in, with Dad of course.  I was afraid that Tee was going to get separated then get lost then get upset.  They went in and had a great time making their way through.  E stood next to me just looking.  After a few times through, I asked E again if he wanted to  go through.  He said yes.  And he had so much fun.  I can't tell you how many times they all made it through the maze.  We started timing them to see how quickly they could make it back. 

In front of the maze!

 We also went for a hay ride.  As you ride through the woods you see many different characters from Winnie the Pooh to Harry Potter.  It was fun for the boys.  They tool pictures of each and every character.  As you can imagine the pictures were not great.

Our hay ride!


We managed to spend our entire afternoon at the farm.  The apples are delicious.  I have only made one dish with the apples so far.  It was a crock pot recipe for Apples.  It was really yummy.  Tomorrow I think I will try another recipe for apple bread. 

The older boys have flag football on Saturday afternoons.  Even though I had to push them into playing they absolutely love playing.  They wished that game would last longer than 1 hour.  I have yet to take my camera with me to a game. 

Our pool was finally closed this past week.  With all of the rain and colder weather we have not been able to swim since August.  We were a little late this year and I am glad it is finally closed.  The pool is covered in the winter.  The cover sits in a storage bin outside.  We have had to wait until that came out in order to put away all of the pool toys.

Yesterday was a really nice day a bit windy but nice.  We ended up starting a fire in the pit to make smores.  We invited some neighbors over to join us.  It was a fun night.

Our Sundays involve Tee's t-ball game and E/Jay have baseball practice for a few hours.  It seems like weekends fly by.

Nature Center trip

 Our Saturdays have been busy.  A couple of Saturdays ago, my two little scouts and I made a trip to a nature center in Delaware.  Yes, I wondered the same thing......aren't there nature centers in my area instead of having to go on a 2 hour drive.  Well, I guess we don't have a nature center like the one we visited.

It was a really long day but the boys earned 2 badges and parts of other badges.  So the 2 hour drive there and the 2 hour drive back was definitely worth it.

Our morning started at 7:30 and we didn't get home until 9pm.  We rode with the our den leader and we had 5 boys in the car.

We were fortunate that our weather was a little chilly to begin (it was mainly cold and rainy in Baltimore) with but the sun did end up coming out for a large part of the day.  As the sun set it did get a little chilly  but we were inside for the last part.

Our leader at the nature center was awesome.  He was with the 20 scouts and parents all day.  We all learned so much.  The boys learned about the various types of trees and their uses.  The common theme was that most plants are not good for you.  There are also many poisinous plants around. 

The boys were also able to net out sand from the stream to find different insects and organisms.  That was a lot of fun and luckily all boys managed to stay dry.

We had breaks for lunch and dinner and a bit of play time in between.  The boys had a blast.  The ride home was really quiet.

I am not sure what E is doing....I think he is pondering something

Jay with his friends

The praying mantis stayed in the leader's hair for a really long time.



This is a fungus on the tree.....just in case you wanted to know.



I was really dreading the trip, driving two hours and not sure what the dinner was going to be like.  But it ended up being a great trip.  I am glad the boys have stuck with scouting at least for now. 

This past Saturday was also really fun......more on that later.

Short Lived

The most stressful part of jury duty is trying to make sure all your kids are taken care of for the day.  You don't know how long you will be gone.  I tried to google what to expect with jury duty, but didn't find much on the subject.  I am a planner and I like to know what to expect.

Tuesday morning was an early morning.  I had to get up, showered, breakfast and lunches made. As I was in the kitchen, Jay asked my about what I was doing.  I had explained to them the day prior what I was doing.  Our conversation went something like this:

Jay:  I am going to ask my teacher to turn on the tv. 
Me: (puzzled)Why would you ask your teacher to turn on the tv? 
Jay: So that they could watch me.
Me: (even more puzzled) How would you watch me on tv. 
Jay:  You going to be on Judge Judy. 
Me: (laughing) No, not judge Judy....Jury Duty.  No offense Judge Judy I would be happy to be on your show anytime as long as I am not the one being sued.  He just had it wrong.
That made my morning.

 I delivered the older boys next door and Tee down the street with my preschool carpooler.  I then made my way to the courthouse.  We are fortunate that the courthouse is not downtown where parking would be an issue.  The courthouse is very close to my house.

I arrived a little prior to my assigned time.  I had to walk through the metal detector, which went off but the officer told me it was as it was the buckle on my shoes.  We were shuffled up the steps around a few corners into a room.  The room was standing room only.  They did bring out a few chairs.  We waited for a while as people continued to show up.  It was so crowded that people were sitting on the steps. 

The man who was standing outside the room as prospective jurors showed up went up to the front of the room.  He said that many years back jury duty consisted of about 200 people a month.  Back then you had to be available for an entire month.  They now call about 200 jurors a week.  Yes, that means lots of trial juries.  The man also mentioned that sometime cases will be settled as they are walking into court or if there is evidence missing the trial must be postponed.

After his spiel, he had us all sign in and paid us our $15 for showing up.  It took a while to get everyone signed in.  He said his next job was to get things moving in the courts so that he could get us in or out. 

When I got up to sign in, someone ended up taking my chair.  So I then was stuck sitting on a step.  A very uncomfortable step.  I read a magazine and talked a little bit to the lady sitting next to me.  Of course, I people watched also.  Many people were on their phones or were reading.  One lady was knitting.  The lady next to me was working on a crossword puzzle.

They say the jury summons are random but I just don't know if I believe that.  I looked around, there seemed to be the same number of women and men and then a breakout of young, younger and older.  I guess I will put me in the young category.

Then the good news came.  It was announced there would be no jury trials and we could all leave.  We were done for the week and could not be called back for at least 3 years.  I guess I made $15 for sitting 1 1/2 hours.

I know....civic duty

I was originally summoned for Jury duty in August during the time we would be on vacation.  As the directions stated, I immediately sent a letter stating that I would be out of town and need to be reassigned.  What I wasn't expecting is a letter a few weeks later giving me another week.  That week just happens to be this week. 

As I mentioned, I called on Friday and my group number 42 was not called.  Groups 1-19 were to report.  My thought was that Tuesday groups would probably be 20-39.  That would make sense to me.

I called today around 4:30 to listen to the message for today.  The guy on the system started with the group numbers to report.  Group number 20, 21......then he got to 39 but kept going and then 40, 41 and you guessed it 42.  All groups are to report at 8:30.

After my 5 minutes of panic, I had to start thinking about what to do with my kids.  The two older ones are not the problem, it of course, is Tee who has preschool for just 3 1/2 hours.  I ended up getting it all taken care of.  It is times like this when I wished we lived closer to family.

I am fortunate that the courthouse is close by and parking will not be a problem.  I do dread the fact that the majority of what I will be doing is just sitting and waiting.  I have a stack of magazines and some other things to do while I am doing my civic duty.  I am just glad that this civic duty will go away for at least 3 years.  Stayed tuned as I am sure I will have some good stories.

It has been a while.....

I had trouble logging into my account this evening.  Yes, it has been a long time since I have been here.  I think about it many times but wait until it gets too late.  Many things have gone on in our house in the last month, some good and some not so good. 

The boys are growing up (literally also).  We are all back into the routine of school and activities.  Tee cracks us up a lot these days.  I love it when he says something followed by "I trust you Mom".  I keep trying to tell him it is "trust me". 

There are a few things that I have noticed lately that I just don't understand.  I have to say that I am with the majority of people who wish the FB format would remain unchanged.  It now lets you see what your friends comment on even if you are not friends with those people.  The only way to stop it is to ask your friends to create that privacy.  Doesn't that not seem wrong to anyone else?  Well, one of my boys was sitting next to me telling me that his friend has a FB page.  I looked him up and he certainly had one and then I found several other 4th grade students who had a FB page.  Some of the kids had no privacy settings and their walls were open for viewing.  Are you kidding me?  What are these parents thinking?  They need to watch a few episodes of Dr. Phil and the dangers of kids being on-line.

I am a little frustrated with the preschool.  I am almost glad that this will be our last year, but I don't want my baby to grow so quickly.  The preschool hired a new director, they had an interim director (who was awesome by the way) up through the end of the summer.  Oh yes, the director decided to start the week school started.  So she knows absolutely nothing and she has little personality.  I have tried to speak with her a few times and had to hold my tongue.  Everything is difficult with her.  All I tend to hear is I can't.  I am not alone as there are many parents who agree.  I have to say I don't love the teachers Tee has this year.  He seems to like them and has a great time at school, but I had just hoped for a little more. 

I love it when we do clean up around here.  I cleaned out toys a few weekends ago but had to get my husband to help me.  I tend to look at the toys and get really sentimental and end up keeping junk.  I have a few large bags full to donate.  We are also working on the man cave in our basement.  Hoping to have it completed in the next couple of weeks.  I love to get organized.....but for some reason I have a hard time getting into my office. 

I am all over the place tonight.  I hope to get it back together and write more.