Yea! I got another Jeep! This is my 3rd Jeep (1 Wrangler and 2 Cherokees). It’s a 1994 Jeep Cherokee Country. It is in really good shape for being 14 years old. Here is a picture of it:
1994 White Jeep Cherokee Country
TWOsday!
He’s TWO on TUESDAY!!! Happy Birthday to #3!!! He woke up this morning to balloons covering the living room floor and an Elmo balloon on his kitchen chair. AND, Mano and Warry bought him his very first car! As I type this he’s running around like crazy chasing balloons with his big brothers. We have a fun day planned for him that includes a trip to our local museum, a small birthday party tonight and, of course, VOTING! Don’t forget to VOTE!
Costumes and Crafts
They boys were given the opportunity to dress as their favorite saints for Faith Formation (aka CCD) last weekend. I jumped on the chance to do a little sewing which for those of you who have known me for a while is a HUGE stretch on my former self. I think they turned out REALLY well considering I’ve never made a piece of clothing and certainly never thought I would. Number 1 went as Padre Pio (google it) and #2 went as St. Patrick. Here are their costumes:
Busy October!
GOSH! It’s been ages since we’ve posted. Sorry about that. Life happens, ya know. I’ll start at the beginning and let you know what all has been going on.
First of all, #2 had his first school project due in early October. He was to create an “All About Me” poster with pictures of his favorites (thing to do, food to eat, color, his house, his pets…) . Here is a picture of him and his favorite food. No surprise on this one, he comes by it naturally.
Next we went camping with #1’s Cub Scout Pack–the one that I’m Cub Master of–and we had a great time. It was a tad chilly at night but we made due. They have a tradition of taking the Cub Master’s boxers and running them up the flag pole while he/she is away doing other things. They boys had a great time ‘fooling’ me and stealing my pajama bottoms. They were so sneaky!
A couple weekends ago we went up to the mountains to see the fall colors. WOW! It was so beautiful and colorful! Mano (aka The Matriarch) is visiting for FIVE WEEKS this month so we’ve had a great time hanging out with her and having her help us out with the kids and around the house. Here are a couple pictures of our day trip.
Next was a birthday party for a friend of #’3’s at the local farm/petting zoo/pumpkin patch. It was the best 3 year old birthday party we’ve ever been to and the boys had a great time! You can see why by looking at what all they got to do!
The sky was so blue and their sweaters were so red it was a great day to take pictures!
Ok, that just gets us up to the last week in October! I’ll post the rest of the month’s activities later!
Hugs to all!
Mom
Vote
Folks,
I don’t usually go on a political rant on our web site but, this particular issue is near and dear to my heart. It could affect my company, my job and ultimately my family. Until I started working at Lowe’s I never really cared much about the unions. I felt they had their place at one time in our country and they used to do some good things. Well, now I am starting to see the “true colors” of the unions.
I am sure most of you don’t know this (I didn’t until working at Lowe’s) that the unions are trying to pass legislation called the Employee Free Choice Act or commonly known as the “card check“. The name of it sounds like it would be a good thing for employees. I believe in making the life of employees much better which is why I love Lowe’s so much, they really do care about thier employees. But, there is no “free choice” in the Free Choice Act. Let me tell you about this bill.
Currently for a company to become unionized they (the union) have authorization cards that they have the employees sign as to whether they want to vote to be unionized. If they get 50% plus 1 employee to sign the cards then it goes to a government-supervised vote. The vote is done with a secret ballot (much like our elections). Seems pretty fair the way it is now right?
Well, if they pass this bill then the secret ballot vote part comes out. That means that all the unions need to do is convience 50% plus 1 employee to sign the authorization card and then the company becomes unionized. Holy cow Batman! Are they crazy?!
That means that the unions will go to the employees and “convince” them that it is a good idea to sign the authorization card then instantly the place is unionized.
What happens when a company is unionized? Profits go down, competitiveness goes down, companies starting off-shoring their work to other countries, and the list goes on and goes. I feel that if this bill is passed it will impact Lowe’s and ultimately my ability to support my 3 boys and lovely wife. It will crush our American economy even more than it is now and push the U.S. into a socialistic country and taking away our rights as citizens.
It is up to you to vote against this bill. Now, I am sure you are asking how you can vote against this bill? The easiest thing you can do is NOT vote for Obama. Obama has stated that if he is president he will pass this bill. Click here if you want proof. If you still want to vote for Obama then you have some work to do. You need to write to your congressman(woman) and senator and tell then not to pass the bill. But, you will have a hard time with this because the congress is controlled by the democrats (most which support this bill). I will not be voting for Obama for this fact alone (although there are many other reasons not to vote for him).
Thank you for listening to my rant 
New Table
I was talking to Becca the other day–who is expecting number 3 in January–and she tells me that she and her hubby have gotten a new kitchen table. She told me that their table only seats four and with the fifth member of the family coming they thought they should have a table they could all fit at. I’m so impressed with her pre-planning. At this point in the conversation I did take pause and realize that we have smashed all five of us around the table that my dad gave us when we moved in February. Number 3 has been sitting on a card table chair fitted with is booster seat. In case you don’t remember from the bumper pool table post, here is that table:
Well, we decided it was high time that we all fit nicely around a table together. So we hit several furniture stores and finally found what we were looking for at a consignment shop and got a great deal! You may notice that there are only four chairs still…but there is room for at least two more and then four more with the leaf in. We’re going to get some more stools–so what if they don’t match!
Thanks to Becca for making me feel bad enough to finally get a new table! (not her intention, of course!)
Mom
Good Idea or Bad Idea
I found #3 playing this little game the other day on the stairs. He thought it was the most hilarous thing.
Step 1: Bakset is in position
Step 2: Slowly step in–one foot at a time.
Step 3: Ready Position
Step 4: “Whhooooaaaaaa!”
Step 5: Lay here and laugh hysterically and then DO IT AGAIN!
Gas Shortage
It’s crazy. For the first time in our lives we are seeing gas stations completely out of gas. This station is one that we drive past several times a day. This morning the price was $3.79 and there was a line to fill up. This afternoon, the place was dry.
Reading
Number 1 was doing his reading homework yesterday when number 3 decided to come join him. It was too cute not to capture.
Mom
Popcorn…Popcorn…Popcorn
I’m sorry we haven’t posted anything recently. My life has revolved around Cub Scouts lately. I was elected to be the Cub Master for our Pack and I’ve been working really hard to build up the Pack. When we got here in February there were only 5 boys and now we have over 20! Last night was our Popcorn Kickoff which was crazy fun and I hope we were able to motivate the boys to sell tons of popcorn. We have set a huge goal for our pack to be the top seller in the District, which is 11 counties. If any of you would like to buy some from us, let me know. I’ll be shipping an order up to Indy and my mom has volunteered to distribute.
Here is a picture I took this morning of #3 with the balloons from last night.
Hugs all around,
Mom
What the heck is a skink anyway?
So a week or so ago we found this crazy critter running around our garage. It had a tail that was irridescent blue and looked mostly like one of those crazy little lizards you see in Florida. I saw it and called to the boys in the house to come check it out and we managed to catch it in a bucket. The fact that we had it surrounded on three sides with walls was a definate Frank Advantage. I googled it and found out that it is called a Southeaster Five Lined Skink. A skink?!? I don’t think I’d ever even HEARD the word let alone been able to tell you what it was. You can read more about it here.
I was all for keeping it until I found out that I would have to buy live crickets to feed to it. So, we told the boys that it had to go and we set it free. The crazy thing was that as soon as she was out of the bucket and into the grass she completely disappeared. It’s weird to think of these things running around our yard and we don’t even know it.
Security
You know, I’ve been thinking lately about security and it seems to me that although I love this website, it’s not very safe. So, some things are going to change around here. You will see all the archives being deleted and we will try to keep only a month or so of blogs up. I will also not be referring to the kids by the names but rather their numbers: 1, 2 and 3. I could make up names but I actually DO call them by their numbers from time to time. And just so you know who is doing the typing, we will sign our blogs “Mom” or “Dad” since our email addresses are such. It’s sort of cheesy since none of you call us that, but deal with it. Let’s chalk it up to keeping all of us in the tribe a little safer.
Love you all,
Mom (heaven help me, I’ve officially lost my identity here. ugh)
First Day of Kindergarten
Today was No. 2’s first day of Kindergarten…and mine, too for that matter. No. 1 didn’t go to traditional school for Kindergarten–he was homeschooled–so this is very new to us. No. 2 was so ready for it today that neither one of us cried! You can see how excited he was this morning on our way out the door.
No. 3 had to be part of the fun, too, and insisted that I take his picture since I had the camera in my hand. I think he really enjoyed his alone time with Mommy today.
First Day of Second Grade
Here is a picture of No. 1 as he headed off to Second grade this morning. He’s a little bummed that summer is over but very excited.
