In case you're wondering, Mackenzie isn't wearing her glasses in any of these recent pictures because they broke and we were waiting for the new ones to come in.

Wild Wild West Part 3

The hunters: (back row) Curly, Tucker, Cooper, Chad, Mackenzie, Randy, Brian, Mike (front row) Nick and Rylan

Mackenzie didn't actually go along on any of the hunts, but she couldn't be left out of any photos! I didn't hunt this year, but I enjoy pheasant hunting as long as it's nice weather because I love the exercise, the beauty of nature, and sharing Nick's favorite hobby, but I really like to watch Ace doing what he loves best. He is such a good bird dog! Rylan went with on a few of the walks and he loves being out there with Nick. I look forward to doing this as a family when the kids get bigger.

One afternoon, we brought snacks out to the guys in the field and discovered the keys had been accidentally locked in one of the trucks. They tried real hard to get it open, but ended up having to go back to the house for the extra set of keys. During that time, the kids had a blast shucking corn off the cobs we found in the field.

Safety first!

Helping Grandpa get the bonfire ready

A beautiful sunset in beautiful country.

Wild Wild West Part 2

As always, lots of animals to entertain us.

Grandma and Mackenzie checking out some horses.

The "babies" (about 6 months old) - Ricochet and Shooter

Violet the cow and her new baby boy. He was born while we were there and I think his name is going to be Burger. (a predictive name you could say). I dared to jump the fence while Violet's back was turned to pet him. She was on to me though and with a little warning, I jumped that fence again pretty quickly.

Sue and her new pal Sundance.

Mackenzie with one of the eggs she gathered.

We ate like royalty, as always, but Mackenzie liked the chocolate cake best, can you tell?

My favorite part was riding horses one evening. We had a great time even though I had one of the spunky horses. I prefer the mellow ones, but Bailey and I got along just fine.

Wild Wild West

We headed to the Ranch for a long weekend and had another great time. We had perfect fall weather and there was lots to do. Friends came to do some pheasant hunting and they all did great. They didn't quite get their limit each day, but it was fun none-the-less. Here are the pictures!

The first day Rylan, Mackenzie and I hiked down to the river to throw rocks and sticks in the water and I got some good photos of them at sundown.

Sweet baby "Lella" got lots of attention and love! She is such a honey!

Hiking, hunting and playing with new friends.

Me, Mackenzie, Amos, and Rylan

Bruno, Amos, and Rylan

Running on the hay bales

Amos, Rylan, Mackenzie, and Christy

Cook-A-Doodle-Doo

My kids LOVE books, and we love that. Even on nights when it's getting late, we always try to read at least one book, because we don't want to sacrifice that time spent with them. We hope they will always have a love for books!

Mackenzie gets to bring a book home from her classroom library every day and she often brings a favorite book to school for show and tell every week. She definitely loves the repetition, because she will want to read the same book every night for a week or so then pick a new one. She is the one always asking questions, wanting to talk about everything on every page. Any way to get her talking is good, but sometimes I just have to tell her to be quiet until I finish reading the page. She has a great sense of humor and loves silly books we can laugh about.

Rylan has library day every Tuesday at his school and he has brought home some awesome books so far. I'm pretty sure he chooses his books very carefully. Next week, his class is also starting the backpack reading program so he will get to bring a classroom book home every night. He is really excited about this! We have a ton of books in our house, but you can never have enough. He could sit for hours and listen to someone read books. We often have to tell him how many long books and how many short books he can pick for the night, otherwise we would read all night long. He has such a great attention span for books. I can't wait to read him longer books like Harry Potter when he gets older, hopefully he will still want me to read to him then.

The latest book he checked out from the school library was "Cook-A-Doodle-Doo" by Susan Stevens Crummel and Janet Stevens. It's an adorable story about a rooster and his friends baking a strawberry shortcake. I had the honor of attending a session at a teaching conference by Susan Stevens Crummel a few years back. And while it was aimed at elementary teachers, she was a great speaker who was hilarious and personable. I was going to buy some of her children's books at the conference for my kids, but of course they up the prices a bit at those things and I wasn't going to pay that much. So I was thrilled that Rylan found this book at the library!

At the end of the book is the recipe for strawberry shortcake and of course Rylan asked if we could make it. I think I surprised him when I said yes. So on Friday afternoon, that's just what we did, just he and I, baking strawberry shortcake! It was an easy recipe and we had a great time. However, I had never had true shortcake and I didn't realize it's more of a biscuit than a cake. It was good, but I don't think I will make it again, or at least I will add more sugar. Rylan said he liked it, but he hasn't asked for a second piece yet. Nick preferred just the strawberries with whipped cream. Kenzie wouldn't try any of it! However, I think I get points for presentation, it looked good!

Check this book out and others by this wonderful author!
www.susanstevenscrummel.com

Lunch Time

When Rylan started Kindergarten, one thing we were encouraged to do every morning was talk about the lunch options for the day. In our school district, there are usually 2 different hot lunch options every day, along with a variety of fresh fruits and vegetables to choose from. Also an option every day is a sunbutter sandwich, which is a PB substitute made from sunflower seeds. (Our district doesn't serve peanut butter anymore due to allergies.) Anyhow, so at the beginning of the year, we would go over the lunch choices every morning and explain what some of the items were. Rylan was never very excited about this discussion. Every day after school I would ask him what he picked that day, and it started to be sunbutter sandwiches every single day. So I made a rule that he had to pick something else 1 time a week. I figured if he just started trying things, he would like them, but he was hesitant to pick something new. Then he told me that he never picked any vegetables and he only sometimes picked a fruit. No wonder he was hungry at the end of the day! I was starting to get concerned about his nutrition when I came across a blog one day. It's called "This Lunch Rox" and I have it linked on my blog to the right. It's written by a mom who packs her kids' lunch every day and takes pictures of it and blogs about it. Sounds boring, but she does some pretty cool themed lunches a couple times a week and not only are they healthy, but they are adorable! While I never thought that I would pack Rylan's lunch every day (because I always ate at school and I really never even thought about it as an option) I found myself getting more and more excited to do that very thing. I asked Rylan what he thought and he was even more excited than me about bringing his own lunch to school. So, we looked through the above mentioned lunch blog together and talked about some things he would like to try in his lunch.
The first week, I used a variety of rubbermaid and ziploc containers to hold his food, but soon found it wasn't the best idea. He had trouble getting them open and it was a pain for him to keep track of it all. We needed something better. One of the posts on the lunch blogger's site was about all the "stuff" she uses; lunch boxes, thermoses, ice packs, cookie cutters, etc. From all her reviews, I decided to try the Go Green lunch box from gogreenlunchbox.com. So far, we LOVE it! It's easy to open, everything stays fresh in the individually sealed compartments, there is room for the water bottle right in there, and it can hold more than enough food for Rylan. Here are some pictures of a few of the lunches I've packed for Rylan.


This first lunch has crackers, cheese and pepperoni, fresh strawberries, celery with peanut butter and raisins, honey cinnamon almonds, and milk.

The next one has a PB and J sandwich on honey wheat sandwich thin bread, strawberries and blueberries, a cheese stick, red and yellow bell pepper strips with ranch dressing, and milk.

The last one is half a sandwich thin, pizza sauce, mozzarella cheese, and pepperoni, celery with PB and raisins, grapes and milk.

And here is the insulated bag the lunch box goes in. There are a wide variety of colors and prints to choose from for the bags on the website.

While I'm not as creative as the author of This Lunch Rox, I'm thrilled to be providing my son with a lunch that has a variety of healthy foods every day. I don't know if I will continue to take pictures of Rylan's lunches, but we'll see. Oh, and you may be wondering about me putting peanut butter in Rylan's lunches. His school isn't a peanut restricted campus, so kids can still bring peanut butter in their lunches, they just don't serve it in the cafeteria.

My Little Hobby

A couple years ago I decided I wanted to learn to sew. I had never done any sewing other than in Home Ec. class in middle school. So Nick got me a sewing machine for my birthday and it sat on a shelf for a couple months before I got the courage to try something new. I know, dumb that I asked for it but then took so long to get started. Anyway, I've really enjoyed learning and trying new projects. Sewing was one thing I looked forward to doing more while being a stay-at-home Mom, and I've been on a little sewing frenzy lately. Here are the little projects I've done.

I hemmed a pair of pants for Rylan.

I patched the knees of another pair of Rylan's pants.

I fixed a ripped seam in Mackenzie's sweatshirt.

And then I went a little crazy making baby tag blankets. I love giving these as gifts, but I usually don't make one until a baby is born. I buy fabric and it just sits in the cupboard. So I tried to use up little pieces I had left to make a bunch of these to keep as inventory. They are all about 18x20" in size and all have flannel on one side and super soft minky dot fabric on the other. One of the first tag blankets I ever made was for Mackenzie and she still sleeps with it every night. Here are the blankets I've been working on.

The last two look the same, but they aren't. The left one is patches of the elephant fabric and light blue stripes(which looks sold white). That one has a solid blue minky back. The one on the right is patches of green and blue minky with the light blue striped flannel on the back. I love how the patched ones look, but they are more work so I only do those to use up remnants that I have.

My next project is a poodle skirt for Mackenzie for Halloween, then I'd like to try using a pattern to make a dress or something. I've never used a pattern so we will see how it goes. I watch a lot of YouTube videos for learning techniques and tips, but I'll probably need a pattern for a more difficult project. Stay tuned!