Well Dang It

My youngest has a birthday tomorrow.  

I'm a slacker and have nothing planned.  

Well, not "nothing", just not a friend party.  

Here's the deal....my little guy and I talked about his friend party several weeks ago and decided on a movie date to see Cars 2. 

Then back to our house where we would do cake and presents.  

And he could have a few buddies sleep over.  

Perfect!  

Almost...

He must have mentioned it to a "friend" at school because the next day he came home explaining that he didn't like that plan anymore and that Cars 2 is a "baby movie". 

UGH!!!

The last several years we've done pool parties at our house.  

They're great ~ he has fun.  

His buddies have fun.  

But, I thought it would be nice to change things up a bit.  

Well, after the "baby movie" fiasco conversation I sorta, kinda let party planning fall apart.  

Which brings me to the real problem...

I'm a loser Mother who should have her 

mothering license revoked!  

{Lucky for me they let any old boob have a baby so there's no chance of losing my license.}

What kind of mother lets her child go friend-birthday-party-less?!?

Tomorrow we will go to a movie with his older brother.  Have the lunch of his choice and a special dinner with cake and ice cream.  

Hoping this will tide him over 'til I can get that friend birthday party going.

In the mean time, I'll be online searching for boy party inspiration for the tricky "I'm not a baby" but "You're not a teenager either" age.

Wish me luck....

Hugs,

Carrie

Happy Campers

I was gone on an adventure last week.  I was chosen to be a chaperone for my youngest son's outdoor education class {aka CAMP!}.  Being a chaperone is so desired that the teachers have to pull names from a hat to choose parents.  I was lucky enough to have been picked and could not have been happier!

Although, my little guy wasn't nearly as happy about it.  Turns out, I'm can be "a little tooooo...." {his words}.  He said I could go as long as I promised not to bug him too much about sunscreen, dressing warmly, taking a shower, and eating his veggies.  I figured I could manage that for one week so we had a deal and I was in.

The trip is 5 days with 60 kids, 8 chaperones {4 dads, 4 moms} and 2 teachers.  Even though I'm the mother a boy I was assigned to lead 11 girls and manage their cabin {for obvious gender reasons}.  I was fortunate to share my duties with another mother and our group of girls paired up with a dad chaperone and his group of boys {including my own} for all activities, except eating and sleeping.  

The kids completed team challenges.  This one involved wood planks and getting each member of their team from one side of the 'pond' to the other using only the planks.  The 'alligators' {grown ups} would 'eat' {kick out of use} any planks the kids weren't standing on.  There was some trash talk to try and unnerve the little buggers, but they did pretty well...

Except for one casualty...The wood planks left a splinter in this boys finger and it required some simple surgery performed by our patient and kind naturalist.

Of course there was hiking and lots of it!

There was a Barn Dance where we doo si dooed the night away

We stopped to smell the wildflowers.  They were sweet ~

We went to the ocean and hiked the dunes

Headed to a marsh where we learned about plants and animals that live in brackish water

And we ate pickleweed which did in fact taste salty just like a pickle

We all made it to the beach!

The kids played wave tag ~ the grown ups watched closely ready to jump in the icy water and save somebody if needed.  Thank the Lord it wasn't needed.

Faces got sandy and dirty

We saw seals {see his little head poking up}

Two!

And sand crabs

we saved a snake from the middle of the road

And although it was all exciting, and exhausting, and fun, it would have been nothing without this face

This face that warms my heart and fills my soul.  

I love him to bits and feel so thankful to have had that week with him.  

No TV, no phone, no computer.  

I know the memories will last a lifetime for me and I hope they'll last for him too.

Hugs,

Carrie

PS ~ You'll only see the face of my child in these images so as 

to protect those who may not want their kids faces on the internet machine

What a Random and Fabulous Week

Our younger son is on Spring Break this week and that means he doesn't have to get up early with the rest of us so I've found him like this...

...every morning this week.  I want to wake him up, but his little face is too sweet for it.

Two nights ago the cutie above was getting the mail and came running in to tell us he saw an owl.  It went something like ~

"MOM! Come outside and see this! I found an Owl!"  

{Pause}

"MOOOOMMMM!  Hurry!  I said I found AN OWL!!"

Sure enough, there was an owl perched on the tippy top of a tree in our neighbors yard.

It was getting dark, so there isn't much detail, but you can tell...

See him? The tiny spec right in the center

He was noisy, but entertaining to us.  

The hubs would hoot and then the owl would hoot in response.  

I had to come inside, I felt uncomfortable watching my hubs flirt with a bird.

Yesterday was to die for beautiful here in my neck of the woods.  It was sunny, and warm {88} and I had on shorts...even though my legs are ghostly white.

Because we woke up to clear skies {no fog, low clouds or rain...just sun} the hot air balloons were flying.  They're up every clear morning ~ but it's been rainy and cloudy for so long I had almost forgotten what they look like!

These 2 were flying over the vineyard across the street from our house.

This 1 is crossing our street, headed right for our house

Here it is flying over our yard

On to our neighbors house now

I just love the balloons ~ we count them on our way to school in the mornings.  The record number we've seen is 13 and it's been in place for a couple years.  Maybe it will be broken this year.

In other random musings, we've had a bee hive in the trunk of an old walnut tree right next to our house since we've lived here.  

It's always fascinating to watch the bees busily fly in and out of their home working so diligently to pollinate for us.

Well, this morning as I was walking by the tree, after my spontaneous photo shoot with the balloons ~ I noticed something I hadn't seen in our little bee tree before.

The bees are spilling out of the tree

It's a bee beard!!  

I was a little scared as I took these pictures.  Luckily no Carrie was harmed during production. Phew!

Hugs!

Carrie