A Group Of Stahrs

Ten On Tuesday

1.  Halloween:  Jamie and Jacob had parties at school.  Mazie was able to wear a costume to school if she paid $1 which went to a teacher who lost a loved one over Fall break.  Otherwise it was uneventful.  We had our annual Guts and Bones dinner (spaghetti squash and bread sticks).  But the kids had fun and enjoyed a piece of their candy from Boo at the Zoo.

2.  We had a Ninja…and a purple fairy…and a Shake It Up dancer…3.  I voted about a month ago by way of absentee ballot.  I hate that I had to base my vote on someone who was going to damage the country less.  But I voted, nonetheless, did you?

4.  Speaking of voting, I have never actually gone to a poll center to vote.  I feel I’m missing out on the American process.

5.  I will be happy when the election is over and the ads are off the radio and tv…and facebook.

6.  With the help of Timmy Tripod and Rowena Remote, I took our family Christmas photos a couple of weeks ago.  They are even edited.  Putting together the cards may take a while…

7.  I received a box of ordered gifts today that will sit in the basement until I have time to wrap and resend them.  I am hoping to get this done by the first week in December…

8.  My birthday is a month away.  Just putting it out there…

9.  I am so excited that Thanksgiving is around the corner…My brother, sister, and niece are coming and I can’t wait!  Neither can the kids.  Jacob has told me that I am to have lots of cranberry sauce so he and Chloe can eat it all!  It’s funny what he remembers from last year.  Mazie and Jamie are just excited to have another girl around.

10.  I am also excited to do my Friday Thankfuls starting this week.  Check back to see what I’m thankful for this year!

Ten On Tuesday

1.  Jacob told us all about Christopher Robins and how he sailed the ocean blue in 1972.  He was very accurate about the ships (Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria) and that he sailed the ocean.  He was just a little mixed up on the name and date.  We’ll work on his memory.

2.  Tomorrow Jeremiah is the Watch DOG at school.  Jamie and Jacob are so excited that he will be there all day to help out around the school.  They get a bit of fame for the day!

3.  I get to go to my very first day of middle school tomorrow!  I’m so excited.  I volunteered to be a judge for the Science EXPO.  I will be going to school with Mazie.  I think she’s happy about it.  I’ll be sure to not embarrass her.  Maybe for tomorrow I can be the cool mom.  A girl can hope ;-).

4.  Mazie’s science fair project is a leaf collection.  She had to collect 15 specimens and identify them correctly.  Her portfolio and board look pretty cool.  I will not be judging collections.

5.  Today Jeremiah and I baked.  I made 4 different kinds of cupcakes, 2 dozen each.  Jeremiah made 5 dozen pumpkin chip muffins.  The muffins and half of the cupcakes are going with me to the middle school and the other cupcakes are going to school with Jeremiah.  I am not going to be baking the rest of this week!

6.  The kids got their first quarter report cards and we had parent/teacher conferences this week.  The kids all got great marks.  Jamie’s teacher couldn’t say enough good things about how great of a student she is.  She is quite the leader apparently.  Her shell must be breaking apart!  Jacob’s teacher thinks he is a great little man.  He is in the top reading group and top writing group.  He just seems to keep forgetting his punctuation.  He is also a little chatty.  We will work on that.

7.  Mazie’s a little nervous about her presentation of her project tomorrow.  She just came out of her room for the second time tonight to remind me of when she needs to have her things in place.

8.  Jeremiah is playing Bad Piggies as I type this.  He is addicted.

9.  Fall is my favorite season.  It’s just so pretty around here.  Our tree has completely lost all of its leaves.  We are hoping to get a little jumping in this weekend.  But the colors this year are so bright.  It’s simply beautiful.

10.  October marks a sort of milestone for my handsome husband and me.  As of October 20, we will have been together for half of our lives.  Jeremiah figured out that, based on his birthday, his day is October 4 and based on my birthday my day is October 20.  A little bit of fun trivia on this Tuesday!

Happy Tuesday!

Ten On Tuesday

1.  Can you believe it’s October?  Most of my September, at least in pictures, went down with another hard drive.  I apparently had a string of bad luck with computers over the last year+ but I’m feeling lucky this time with this new computer!  Things you won’t see…the balloon festival pictures, the kids writing their Christmas lists, and some every day things that I wanted to put here on the blog.

2.  I’m going to start with Landsharks.  The kids did the Fall XC series.  There was a 1/2 mile division (Jacob), 1 mile division (Jamie), and a 1 1/2 mile division (Mazie).  They ran their hearts out each week and had a blast but Jacob has already said he likes the short sprint series in the Spring better.  I’m guessing he’s not going to be much of a distance runner!  But here they are, proud as can  be with their medals.  Even the dogs joined in the fun…

3.  Jacob is going on his very first field trip tomorrow.   They are going to the Colorado Pumpkin Patch.  To say he is excited is a bit of an understatement.  He told me tonight when I was tucking him in to bed that he just wanted to jump out his window so he could get there now.  I suggested that he get a good night sleep.  So far I have not heard any jumping out of any second story windows!

4.  Mazie has FACS this semester.  It stands for family and consumer services or better known as home ec.  She will correct you every time you say home ec, however.  She made a pillow and was so proud that she let her teacher display it for the whole school to see.  That was after she was able to bring it home to show it off…

She is also cooking.  She’s made cinnamon knots and french toast.  I hear there is going to be some tasty grilled cheese tomorrow.  She’s enjoying it!

5.  I had to take Jamie to the doctor today because of stomach pain.  Since she was running a low-grade fever and had pain at her belly button, I was worried that it was appendicitis.  Jamie had her blood drawn (for the first time), gave a urine sample (“Ewe gross, I peed on my hand”), and had an x-ray of her abdomen (“Oh cool, there is a laser on my belly”).  All to find it is something viral.  While I am thrilled to have my mine put at ease and that it isn’t serious, I really could use those 3 hours we were at the academy back.  Jamie had a blast with all the tests but I’m pretty sure she would be good to not have to do any of it again.

6.  Mazie was bullied at school last week.  It was totally random and completely caught her off guard.  She was in Western Hemisphere (social studies) and there was a substitute teacher.  She asked the girl (who has sat beside her since the beginning of the year) for help on one of their problems about the bill of rights.  The girl looked at Mazie and said that she was going to beat her up after school.  Mazie went to her next class and told that teacher (who she trusts) and she took Mazie to the office to get it all straightened out.

7.  Do you want to know when Mom found out about all of this?  If you said after school, you guessed correctly.  Western Hemisphere was 3rd period (way before lunch) and I had to hear about it from Mazie.  Not the principal.  I was a little upset at that part.  So I called the principal immediately after school last Monday when I found out about the situation to find out what was being done with the whole thing.  I didn’t get a call back until Tuesday afternoon (and two more calls later) to find out that actions were taken.  I couldn’t have the specifics because of legal reasons according to the principal.  Mazie was a little nervous about going to school on Tuesday and I couldn’t put her at ease.  Thankfully her teacher (the one she went to in the first place) was looking out for her and emailing me throughout the day to let me know she was ok.

8.  Mazie said that by Thursday the other girl involved apologized to her.  I am happy that it wasn’t anything more than a verbal threat but a little upset by the events that followed.  The good thing out of all of this is that Mazie now knows how to handle that sort of situation.  We’ve learned to diffusion bullying in taekwondo but that is usually if someone comes up to you and calls you a name.  This totally threw her off guard but she did the right thing and is confident again in her abilities to diffusion any bullying situation.

9.  I have taught my last cake decorating class.  I have classes scheduled for October but not enough interest for the classes to run.  I’m a little sad about not teaching.  I enjoyed it and I think I was pretty good at teaching the skills to other people.  But I want to enjoy the kids’ functions and not worry about whether or not they conflict with a class for the rest of the school year.  It just seems like too much to do with a move coming next June.

10.  I am so excited to see the leaves changing colors.  It’s simply gorgeous around here.  I am not, however, ready for the temperatures coming Thursday through Saturday.  The highs are to be in the low 50s.  Yikes!  We went from Summer to Winter in a week.  Gotta love Colorado weather.  If you don’t like it, wait 5 minutes!

Happy Tuesday!

Ten on Tuesday

1.  School starts for the kids on Thursday!  They are so excited.  Jacob can’t wait to be at school all day.  Jamie can’t wait to be the big kid at school.  Mazie can’t wait for middle school.

2.  I’m a little worried about middle school.  It’s scares me.  I’m not sure if it’s because I didn’t have a middle school to go to or if Mazie’s just so small or if I’m just being a mom.  Does anyone wanna help me out?

3.  I’m a little worried about Jacob going all day long.  I’m mean, I’m sure he’s ready.  I’m just afraid for him at lunch.  The girls didn’t have all day kindergarten.  I’m also a little worried about what I’m supposed to do all day long.  (Again, with the help?)

4.  I have to say I’m a little worried about Jamie being out in the modular buildings and not in the school.  The district didn’t build the school big enough for all the students.  Third grade gets to be out in the modulars (and I think one 4th grad class).  She’s just so small.  But Mazie was fine being out there in third grade so I guess Jamie will be too, right?  (OK that one I’m just being a mom)

5.  We’ve had a lovely two months of summer.  It’s been crazy hot but we’ve done a few family outings here and there.  I’ll post July events soon.  Quite a few of our outings I just didn’t take the camera.  I just enjoyed them instead of stressing about getting pictures.  And this year, I’m ok with that.

6.  Did I mention that I have the best husband?  Well, I do.  You remember my computer woes back in May.  It took until the end of June for Best Buy’s Geek Squad to do a data recovery and find pictures that I was so afraid that I had lost.  Pictures from my date with Jacob, Jamie’s birthday party, most of May things.  I was devastated that those pictures might not be there.  We received the external drive back and I just couldn’t bring myself to open the recovered files.  Jeremiah decided to look for himself and found everything I was worried about!  I could have cried when he said the pictures were all there.  I’m no photographer but my pictures are still very important to me.

7.  Which makes me rethink some of our adventures this summer that I didn’t take the camera…

8.  The girls and I went for our annual back-to-school pedicures today.  I love watching the girls get pampered.  They are fun to watch.

9.  Tomorrow is their back-to-school dental check up.  They are all so excited about having polished teeth for school.

10.  It’s funny how I started and ended with back to school things.  I didn’t try that.  More to come of our summer adventures.

Happy Tuesday!

Ten On Tuesday

1.  Today Jacob was reading his Brain Box cards on animals (each card give information about different animals such as how they live, what they eat, etc).  He came across the Southern Elephant Seal which told him they live in a harem.  When I vaguely explained what a harem was he said, “Oh they kind of live like we do when Daddy is at work.  You know, there are two girl dogs and three women and I’m the man.”  After catching my breath, I said that it wasn’t quite like that and said that “the man” was kind of the husband to all the ladies.  He said that he couldn’t wait to get a harem of his own then.

2.  Yep, that’s the stuff that I’m dealing with when it comes to my five-year old boy.

3.  Mazie and Jamie are, for the most part, enjoying playing so far this summer.  We are on our fifth week of summer break.  I’d say that’s a new record for them not being completely sick of each other!

4.  The basic arrive at the Air Force Academy on Thursday.  Yep, that means, Jeremiah’s not really going to be around much for the rest of the summer.

5.  Like Friday, he goes in to work around 6 in the evening and won’t be home until close to midnight on Saturday!

6.  So I’m hoping that Mazie and Jamie can keep playing nicely so my world doesn’t completely crumble because no one can get along and there is nothing to do.

7.  I still have to post about our little trip to Pennsylvania at the beginning of the month.  I’m hoping to do that later this week.  I still have a few pictures to edit.

8.  I would really love to go to the beach with the family, just to have fun in the sand.  Not a big trip anywhere and not for anything special.  Just some fun in the sun.  That’s funny since I’m not really a beach person.  I do love my mountains.

9.  Speaking of my mountains, they are burning.  It’s in the Waldo Canyon area.  Manitou Springs was evacuated on Sunday and then were allowed to go back.  There were many other areas evacuated and some more put on “get ready” status.  More than 3500 acres are already burned and the fire is only 5% contained.  Officials are expecting about that many more acres are to burn before they can get it under control.  You know it’s bad when we can see the plume of smoke constantly and smell the smoke when playing outside.  We are praying for the firefighters and the families.

10.  The Little Gym is taking donations for snacks for the firefighters and such who are working so hard to get the fire under control.  If you are in the are, you can drop of snack items at The Little Gym off Tutt Blvd anytime this week.  They will make sure it gets to Care and Share!

Ten On Tuesday

1.  On May 10, my computer decided to not turn on for me.  Turns out my hard drive didn’t want to cooperate with my less-than-one-year-old-computer.  So after getting my computer back with a new hard drive, I am now waiting for my old hard drive to be recovered which may take another few weeks.  Yay me!

2.  Does anyone know of a computer (or hard drive) that actually lasts?

3.  So you’ll have to be patient with me.  I do plan to catch up from all the May things that happened.  It was an incredibly busy month for us here in the Stahr house.

4.  I’m going to start here with a few things.  First, Pop Pop came to visit (for most of the month of May) and we (especially this busy mama) were so happy!5.  Mother’s Day was in there.  If you are friends with Jeremiah on facebook, you may have seen the gorgeous roses the kids got for me.  They were red for Mazie’s birthstone, white for Jamie’s, and blue for Jacob’s.  They were lovely…and I never took a picture.  I also got a gift card for a spa day with the girls.  We are going to do that on Monday!  I also got a lot of handmade things from the kids.  I love handmade things.  Oh and this was after a solo run so no comments on the sweat, please. 😉

6.  Both of the girls were in choir again this semester.  They worked very hard and the program was amazing.  There were some mad moves, too.

7.  Jeremiah and I went to Ring Dance.  After 14 years of going the first time as his fiance, I went this time as the AOC’s wife!  We had fun.

8.  I also joined Jeremiah for the commissioning ceremony for his firsties.  It was set up so much better than when Jeremiah got his 2nd lieutenant boards.   It was a pretty cool night!  This was the picture one of his cadets took of us.  Jeremiah’s two AMTs and wife along with the two of us.  Blurry but you can still see who is who. 9.  We also went to the USAFA graduation.  First, we sponsored a cadet who graduated (we are so proud of you Erin!).  Second, the kids knew most of the cadets who were graduating out of dad’s squadron.  Third, President Obama was speaking and the girls were particularly excited about this one.  It was an interesting day!

10.  That’s all I have for now.  More to come and I promise to not let the cobwebs back in here!

Ten On Tuesday

1.  St. Patrick’s Day was on Saturday.  And, while we aren’t Irish or drink green beer, it’s a fun day for the kids who like to wear green.

I mean, Jacob does love green and the girls get a kick out of four-leaf clovers and such.  So this is what we had for lunch.  Shamrock sandwiches (with or without tomato) and Granny Smith apple slices (not pictured)…

2.  I also made some mint chocolate chip cupcakes with vanilla mint buttercream.  They liked those too. 3.  Jeremiah was gone for most of Thursday, Friday, and Saturday due to recognition (remember that USAFA grads?).  So the Baby Bulls of Squadron 6 became Big Bulls.  He’s so proud.  It was not as rough as I was thinking it would be (being alone with the kids for that length of time) but I’m not really looking forward to the next time.

4.  Check out the business blog to see the “Green Things” I’ve made recently.  I made my first truffles (which were pretty yummy according to my critics…ie The Kids) and a green velvet cake.

5.  We are going to California on Saturday!  Someone has a pretty big birthday coming up.  He’s pretty happy we are celebrating it at Disneyland.  We are all excited!

6.  Mazie taught Jamie and I our kyroogi poomse (sparring form) for taekwondo this weekend.  We both knew the steps, just out of order.  She was a good teacher.  I am grateful she had the patience to teach me.

7.  Jacob is leader at school on Thursday.  He wants to take rainbow fruit kabobs and cheese sticks for snack.  I’m hoping I have enough time tomorrow to put them together.

8.  Mazie learned to do laundry yesterday.  From start to finish.  She put it into the washer with the detergent, switched it over to the dryer (pictured), and even folded it.  I was very proud.  She also knows that most of the laundry is done during the week…while she is at school…backfire. 

9.  And Jamie has been working on ixl (a math computer program through the school).  Spring break doesn’t mean no work around here! 

10.  Max (the resident pet) got into a little tiff with her neighbor today.  The neighbor’s dog is a male and a few years younger than Max but they’ve always kind of played together.  Today he was actually attacking her and trying to bite her.  I noticed the two of them running in our yard this afternoon but Max wasn’t running with him.  She was trying to get away from him.  So I called her inside but he just kept after her.  It was weird.  She had a spot on her back that was a bit sensitive after.   I’m not sure what happened but she was shaking after I finally got her into the house.

Happy Tuesday!

Ten on Wednesday

1.  Yeah, I know.  I’m a day late and a dollar short.  What’s new?

2.  Friday was Dr. Seuss’s 108th birthday.  Did anyone celebrate?  We did.  I made green eggs and ham for breakfast.The kids were excited about it but only took a few bites each and then went on to a “normal” breakfast.  Jacob and I read Seuss books and watched a couple of short movies in the afternoon.  We also went to see The Lorax on Saturday as a family.  We totally recommend the movie.  It was true to the book with added parts to make it a full movie.  It was great!

3.  I completed my first Pinterest project.  I am so excited about it.  What do you think?Jacob walks through the dining room to go to the bathroom and almost walks into the door because he is looking up!  I can’t wait for the girls to see it after school.

4.  And no rainbow is complete without a pot ‘o gold, right?This sits right under the rainbow on the table.

5.  Jacob scolded me for standing on a bar stool while attaching the rainbow to the wall/ceiling.  He said that I should be using the step-ladder.  I had to explain that I couldn’t reach while standing on the ladder.  He said, “Oh yeah, you are kind of short.”  Then he told me that if I fall it he was going to say, “I told you so” because he did.  I didn’t fall so we are good!

6.  Mazie started TCAP testing yesterday.  It’s the same as CSAP of last year.  The state just changed the name.  She was so nervous about the first test.  I thought this year would be different since her teacher was purposely playing down the test by calling it “TCRAP” and saying it wasn’t a huge deal.  I guess he just talked about it too much.  Oh and said “Do your best” which means extra pressure.

7.  Jamie has her second grade music program tomorrow evening.  She had to take an umbrella to school for it.  I can’t wait to see what that’s all about!  She’s so excited about it.

8.  Many of you know how Jacob feels about buttons on his shirts.  To put it mildly, he hates them.  He says they hurt him.  He doesn’t mind the buttons on his pants, just his shirts.  He picked out a Little Man suit for our big date at the end of the month.  Black dress pants, a light green button down shirt, a black pin striped vest, and a matching tie (and don’t forget the dress socks and shoes).  Seriously, he looks so big and handsome in it.  I can’t wait to have our big birthday date.

9.  Or maybe I can.  That means he will be 5 after all.  I’m not really ready to admit that I have big kids now.

10.  We are so excited about Spring Break in a few weeks!  The girls have two weeks off.  During their last week is Jacob’s and Jeremiah’s Spring Break.  That’s the week we are going to be in California!