Money Matters

For a long time I've been debating how to teach my children how to save money. I was never taught to save money and its been a struggle so I want to teach my children.

I raided all their saved money and added in "a little extra" that was sent to them by Memaw and saw that each child had enough money to open juvenile savings accounts at my bank! I was so excited!! So I figured out the tithe for each child and put it in a baggie clearly labeled with each child's name. Then I figured out their savings amount and put it in clearly labeled baggies. Now, while I'm doing this, Elijah and Lydia are standing beside me wanting to know why I'm taking all their money. I try to explain to them that they are going to keep half, the bank is getting some and that we are giving back to God the part that is SUPPOSED to go back to God.

Please forgive my naivete, but nobody was excited about this venture with the exception of MOM! I was so stupid!! I thought they would be sooooo excited to have their own savings accounts!!

Ignoring their pouts and moans of displeasure, I load up the 4 younger children to go pick up Abigail from school. Surely my oldest child will be excited to have her own savings account. Wrong again. All 6 of us trot into the bank with solemn faces, the children because they have to give the bank all their money and mom because she is the only one happy about opening new savings accounts!!!

Lesson learned - there are two things you don't have to teach children - how to lie and how to love money!!!

Hoping they will appreciate my mommy being "mean" when they have a nice nest egg in the bank at age 21 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

An Observance In The Differences Between Boys and Girls

I've heard "researchers" say that the behavior of boys and girls is a learned difference and not an inherent one. I still maintain that these people have obviously never raised children.

The twins were given gifts by a lady in the church. They were these cute little teddy bears that recite the "now I lay me down to sleep . . . " poem when you push their paw. When I hand a bear to one of the babies, they would cuddle it or chew it. When my older girls saw the bears, they started cuddling them and playing house. Here is what my son did with the bears today when he noticed them.

I'm in another room and I hear "now I lay me down to sleep . . . " over and over again and then my son cheering loudly at the completion of each poem. I don't think much of it until he runs down the hallway screaming "they tied"!!!! It then occurs to me that instead of cuddling the bears or playing with them lovingly, he was pushing the buttons at the same time to see which bear could recite the poem the quickest. It was a competition.

Learned behavior my foot!!!!

Home Made Dishwashing Liquid

So, I'm trying my hand at home made dishing washing liquid. I figured it would be nice to have on hand when I run out of Dawn or for the family to use as a hand soap. All you need is 2 cups of left over soap shavings OR 2 bars of grated soap. Bar soap is super cheap at the Dollar Tree. Grate it and get 2-3 cups of hot water and mix together. Allow to sit over night. Then add as much water as you need to add the following morning to achieve the desired consistency. Add 1/2 cup of lemon juice or vinegar to help cut grease. Voila! Home made dishwashing soap for all the time or in a pinch! (Talk about pinching pennies!! LOL)

Not Much To Say - Just Some Pictures

Some time ago, my digital camera died a sad death. It had been a very reliable and trusty camera, purchased for me by my mother approximately 5 years ago. I had publicly mourned the death of my Fuji Finepix and was recently contacted by my "real life" friend, PJAcademy. She had been GIVEN a digital camera that she didn't need and wanted to pass it along to me . . . . . . if I wanted it!! HA HA HA HA !!! Do I EVER?! So I get the camera. Its nicer than the one I had, well, because it was newer! I go buy some new batteries for it. I WORKS. All I needed was the USB cord to be able to download the pictures to my computer. Due to an unexpected refund on Elijah's winter coat (thank you, Mom) I was able to go purchase a card reader today to be able to download some of my pictures from my new, old camera, given to me, ever so graciously, by PJAcademy. Here we go - just cause I wanna brag!

This is Abigail looking pretty just because she can. Age 7.



Here we have Elijah, looking handsome and goofy, as usual. Age 4. He'll be 5 in December.



This is Lydia at bedtime after we realize she had her pajamas on inside out and she was stuck and MAD. (Please excuse her 1980's mullet. She has cut her own hair.) Age 3.



This is Hubby and Sunshine Sofie. (5 months) You might be able to imagine that I love this picture!




This is Miss Sweetness, AKA Phoebe.




And this is Thing 1 and Thing 2 together, holding hands and smiling. LOVE IT!

The First Time Trick-or-Treating

In my circles, trick-or-treating is a pretty controversial issue. But setting that aside, we were able to take the children for the first time ever this year and we had so much fun!! Typically the children all attend the fall harvest party (aka - a Halloween Party) at the church but this year the harvest party was on Friday evening. Daniel didn't get home from work in time. Plus, Lydia had pink eye. So none of us got to go to the church party which was actually a hayride/cookout instead of just a children's party.

So along comes Saturday and low and behold, Elijah is puking Saturday morning. So I'm thinking no party and no trick-or-treating. Abigail, the babies, and I go bus visiting while Daniel stayed home with Lydia and Elijah just so I could get out of the house. Then we ran some errands which included going to Wal~Mart. I felt badly that the children weren't going to get to do anything for Halloween so I bought a few bags of candy and a bag of apples to make up for it. When I get home, Elijah hadn't puked all day so Daniel decides we'll go ahead and go trick-or-treating after all. This summer I had picked up a Batman costume for $1 at a yard sale just so Elijah could play with it. And I had gotten Lydia a lady bug cape to play with, also for $1. So Elijah dressed as Batman and Lydia dressed as a ladybug. Then, we put Abigail in one of her foo foo church dresses that we have stored back for her because its too big and then I pulled out my old wedding veil so she could dress as a bride. Oh, she was sooooo excited. (I also found out I could still wear my wedding dress!!)

Here are my little munchkins.



They were THRILLED. We had such a good time. It was so hilarious watching them literally RUN from house to house and I was very happy that they said "thank you" at each door. It was fun seeing all our neighbors having such a good time with the children. Elijah was running pell-mell screaming "Batman to the rescue!!!!" and Abi was, of course, a proper princess . . . except for the running. She is always so excited to be "beautiful". We saw Mr. Incredible, Captain America, a bull dog dressed as a bumble-bee. We tried to get Lydia's picture (our ladybug with their bumble-bee) but she was being too shy and didn't want to pose for it. That was okay. We also saw a small house dog dressed as a hot dog. Lydia was also very impressed with the giant gorilla she saw but would NOT touch it . . . until it walked away. THEN she wanted to "pet" him. Everybody was so friendly and we had a great time. Lydia got tired (and COLD) and eventually Daniel was walking with her from door to door holding her candy bag for her. It was a long walk for those short little legs!!! The twins and I led the pack in the stroller and a fun time was had by all. And the kids made out like bandits with all the candy they received.

My Latest "Mommy Moment"

Today, Lydia was still recovering from pink eye and I had to leave church early so just Abigail, the twins and myself were in the van. So its was basically just Abi and I. We were chit chatting and I looked up in the sky and it was fairly clear and the moon was so bright! I don't know if it was officially "full" or not but it was awfully close to full. And I commented to Abigail that it looked like God was holding a giant flashlight and shining it down onto us and saying "I see you". She agreed and said that it was like God was reading us a bedtime story. I said "Abi, if God were going to read us a bedtime story, what would he say?" She said "He would tell us that God loves us" and it made me tear up. I'm so glad that when my little girl imagines God reading her a bedtime story, that He is telling her how much He loves her.