What is influencing my kids?

Up until the day before Early Bird was born, I worked full-time outside the home. And my kids were in daycare 45+ hours a week. They spent the bulk of their "awake" time with other people. I got about 2 hours each evening and an hour in the morning, and weekends. That's not a lot of time. It was hard on me, everyday talking them into "going to school". And my mother heartstrings were pulled taut and tight often. I worried about all other kids and adults influencing/impressing my little "blank slate" kids. Now I'm a stay at home mom. I get to be with my kids all day, every day. Bug, of course, goes to kindergarten now and Mealyworm has preschool for 2.5 hrs every day. But I get so much more time with my kids. Now I worry about how I am influencing/impressing them. I am so not a great role model for my kids. The theory out there is that being home with your kids is such a great thing for them...well, I'm not convinced. Their old daycare center seemed way more on top of teaching everyday life skills.

One Week Boutique

I just found out, in case you've been wondering...The Fall One Week Boutique will be happening...here's the scoop: Public shopping dates will be November 13-15 (Fri-Sun). The sale will be held in Mahomet at 201 N. Prairieview Road (just off Rt. 150 & I-74). It was the former D&D grocery store. Along with a new email system is a new barcode tagging system. This system is going to make for much speedier checkout lines at the sale -Yeah!

If you wish to consign:

You need to go to the Registration page at www.oneweekboutique.com and click on "Register to be a Consignor". Everyone is getting a new number in the new system. Even if you have consigned in the past, you must register to get a new number (your old number will not work).

Super Lucky or Super Cool

Recently, I had the unexpected, but much appreciated honor of attending a CU Parent Bloggers gathering at B. Lime. B. Lime, A Green Store, is a great store that I'd love to buy presents for everybody I know at. I was super lucky and got to meet a bunch of super cool bloggers. Check out these CU blogs:
Multi-minding Mom
Little Blog on the Prairie
Midwest Moms
Mommy, Queen of Everything
Sulking in Illinois
Midwest Neurotica
Chicken and Cheese
Larkin's Place
Rayne of Terror
Looseyfur's Midwest Adventures
2 Kids, 3 Cats and a blog
The Fabulous Follies of a Freaky Family

And we got to nibble on great treats from Cakes on Walnut and Boltini's....mmmmm.

And when all was said and done for the evening...we went home with our hands full of goodies. Thank you, thank you to the generous givers of stuff including, but not limited to:
Johnson & Johnson
LaundryTree
BlogCatalog
OfficeMax
1800flowers

Hall Pass

I asked my husband the other day, "Honey, do you think its weird that your wife is completely tuckered out at 9 pm and goes to bed?" His response, "Yes, I think its weird." So I laughed and in my head decided I should try to make an effort to stay up later...So last night, after Biggest Loser, when T-Dad said, "Let's watch W. , we just got it from Netflix." I said, "Sure, sounds good."
Flash forward to this morning...
Early Bird wakes up early for a feeding. T-Dad's alarm goes off at some ungodly, still dark outside hour, baby starts crying. Finally baby is back to sleep in my bed, how can such a little baby take up sooooo much space in a queen size bed. I manage to nod off for another half an hour, hitting snooze twice and then completely turning the alarm off. Only to wake 10 minutes before I need to get all three kids out the door to get everyone to school on time! Aaargh!
Bug was late to school for the first time today. He had to go in to the office and get a pass and everything. Poor kid.

Moral of the story: Staying up late when you're tired, gets tomorrow off to a bad start.

OR

Mommy gets to go to bed whenever she wants to.

Am I Blogger or a woman with thoughts that need to be dumped somewhere?

When I was in 6th grade, I subscribed to Thrasher magazine and bought a used Powell & Peralta skateboard. I lived in the country. Surrounded by farmhouses and fields of corn/beans/cows/horses. I rode my skull & sword skateboard with my blue "cons" on, up and down that country road...but was I really a skater? I mean, come on, you can say it...I was a poser. I didn't beg my mom to drive me into the city skateparks so I could learn new tricks or meet up with some other sk8 dudes. I just rolled back & forth on my board in front of my gravel driveway.

So the question I'm pondering now is if I blog on the Internet am I a blogger? Blogs can be so many different things...daily journals, homework lists, recipe reviews, weather analysis, etc. All those blogs have a clear purpose. Some postings may be short and sweet, others rambling and drawn out. But they all tie into a specific theme. But what about me...I'm a "fair/sour weather friend" blogger...when I've got something in my life I want to pour into words or cute pictures of my kids, I blog. But many a day go by without a blog post because I'm too busy, not feeling literary, too mad, too sad, too happy, plain old lazy. Am I a poser blogger? Is there a "true blogger" community? If there is, are the criteria things like: write in complete sentences, spell correctly, write in complete thoughts, have a clear point to your writing, include world events and philosophy, clearly state opinions and observations, etc. Boy, by that definition, I'm so not a true blogger. I can barely get the words on the screen, let alone have them mean something half the time. But hey, a book is still a book even if the author just scribbles on the pages and no one ever reads it right...

Maybe instead of just rolling past my gravel driveway on my skateboard I had actually spoken with some other skaters, I could have learned a thing or two about skateboarding and become an actually skateboarder...Maybe I should get out there and mingle with some other bloggers...hmmm.

Mealyworm at Ballet

Doing her own thing...but loving every minute of it.

Early Bird Milestones

Early Bird just passed the 7 month mark. Crazy, I know. We had her 6 month checkup (a month late) this week and she's doing great. She's 26 inches tall and 18.5 lbs. She's got 2 little teeth on the bottom. She's rolling front to back and then back to front. Any human being that comes within 5 ft of her receives a big open-mouthed grin, saying "Hey, look at me!". She can even sit up for about 15 seconds before rolling to the side and on her back (or face, oops.) She's eating rice cereal and oatmeal & bananas cereal like a champ. As far as other foods, so far she's had and liked for the most part...peas, squash, bananas, pears, and carrots. And didn't really enjoy avacado, which is weird I think. Maybe I didn't get it smooth enough. It is really cute to see her interacting with Bug and Mealy Worm. They love to talk in her "language" of random low & high pitched sounds. Car rides are a symphonic experience these days. It is really fun having a little one again. It is really hard and tiring, but totally worth it. I mean really, just one of those open-mouthed grins and all the tough stuff just melts away.