A Friend's House by Natalie

Story in quotes and pictures by Natalie, introduction by Mommy, typing and translating by Mommy too.

The house on the right is Natalie's house, the house on the left is Ewan's house. This is a picture of the apartments, with the neighbors downstairs. "Natalie went over to Ewan's house and said that, "I want to go somewhere with my friend, Ewan." "
"Me and Ewan were playing dress up and I was playing my Mom's dress up and Ewan was playing his Dad's dress up. I love Ewan"
"My Mom taked me to the park, and we had a lot of fun, and I climbed on the slide, and then I went on the swings [on the upper left] and had a lot of fun. I love Mom"
"And then there was flowers, that are really pretty, and I made a rose for Mom, because it looks so pretty, and I made a sunflower and a daisy. I love Brady."

A week or so ago Natalie drew me this cute book, and the elaborate story she told was so cute! Of course the story has changed a bit (not as looong), but the same principle and main characters are there. I love scanners!

Ponderings

*Updated Below* with super cute pictures that Sarah snagged on her camera! Thanks Sarah!!


So today was $1.50 cheesecake day at the Cheesecake Factory (anyone else go??), and the kids and I met up with Sarah, Bella, and Ki (a lady from work) after lunch to partake in the cheap goodness. We were meeting up after lunch which is exactly when my kids go down for a nap, so I knew when setting up this activity that my children might be tired during the process (and when I say might I mean would be tired/cranky/whiny/restless for sure). Now if you have been around me and my children in any sort of social setting you may have noticed that I don't handle stress very well (don't know where I got that trait...) and normally kind of start to freak out when the kids start to exhibit any of the aforementioned behaviors. I also think I just want my kids to be extra good around others for some reason, mostly because I am worried about the others getting annoyed with things I am getting pretty good at ignoring. Well, of course both kids were super tired, but I think any major meltdowns were pretty much avoided. Natalie has been working on not breaking down into fits of tears over everything and I was able to keep that mostly in check with a few ear whispered reminders (yay! not screaming or even raising my voice!). Brady on the other hand turns into a completely different, annoying child when we go to a restaurant, Keith and I are completely clueless as to why this is but it drives BOTH of us nuts and mostly makes me want to tear my hair out and stomp my feet! So other than the HUGE cup of ice water he spilled under the table, the fits he threw over not getting to have ALL the silverware, the whining because I wouldn't let him have the cup of ice to play with, the crying because he didn't want his cheesecake, the crying because he DID want his cheesecake, and the crazy, loud obnoxious behavior he was pretty good! (catch my sarcasm there? just checkin.) But, the reason I even wanted to post about this, is because literally as soon as we started walking to the car he turned back into Brady. He wanted me to carry him, he was patting my back and giving me kisses, and once we were in the car he held on tight to his Cowboy's truck and played along with Natalie and I as we hunted for the letters of the alphabet (a sweet game that keeps them AWAKE until we get home, we don't want any cat naps in the car to ruin nap time). It is the strangest thing. So all my friends, and family for that matter, get to see me in all my best when my kids act like total strangers around other people. I just don't get it. And I am hoping it is phase and that is why I wanted to write it down.

Do anyone elses kids do this? Act completely different around others, thereby making YOU look like a totally different Mommy than you are normally? I am thinking it is just me and stress management, but I also suppose that we all have our "things" that we have to constantly work on, and for me this is mine. If only it was as easy as recognizing the problem, and it would never be an issue again, but if it were that easy we would all be perfect!

Changes

Natalie has now on more than one occasion informed both me and Keith that she no longer wants to be a Builder when she grows up. She wants to be a Mommy now. I know that this is normal for a 4 year old girl, they are really in to playing house, and dress up, and princess (her princess name is Caramel right now), but I miss my little girl who so adamantly wanted to be a builder/hammerer/construction worker! It was just so sweet and different, though I am glad she still wants to be a Mommy even though she sees how awful I am sometimes!

True Love

Today after naps Brady and I were snuggling on my bed watching Cars. It was such a sweet and tender little thing. He was just laying there, letting me kiss and tickle all his sweet, soft skin, and he rolled over and looked at me and said, "Mommy, you're my friend." I hope I am always his friend. I will always be his Mommy, but I know there will be times ahead where he doesn't like me very much, and I am sure there will be times when I don't like him! But right now I love that he still loves me even if we had a rough patch just hours before. That is one of the sweetest things about kids, they forgive us all our weaknesses, no questions asked, and they love us unconditionally.

My favorites!

So Missy did a post about So You Think You Can Dance and it got me looking and looking and looking some more and loving all the old routines. Here are my favorites. I love this show, it was SO good this season, I am so nervous about how it is going to end up! All the dancers are great at this point (except Comfort) and I will be sad to see anyone go!

This one got me hooked on the show, and Chelsea and Mark!


and this one! I LOVED these two together!


and this one was CRAZY GOOD! Smokin'!


Jessica and Will had some REALLY good ones too!

I love Tyce's work, all of his are fun, even the Broadway ones!


and of course there are lots more! What do ya'll think of this season? I think it ROCKS!

My Mosaic

I have seen these flickr mosaics floating around and Caroline finally did one too that inspired me to do my own. I love how it looks. What you do is type your answers to a set list of questions on Flickr and you create a mosaic that is all about you. (better instructions below) Here is mine:

1. Sunset Over Peninsula Malaysia, 2. Hot Potato II, 3. US Navy F-14D Tomcat, 4. light aqua, 5. milo ventimiglia, 6. wham:a different corner, 7. Capri, 8. Double Chocolate Cheesecake, 9. "Are we not like two volumes of one book?", 10. Raccoon Family, 11. be SENSITIVE, 12. Manly's Fairy Bower Pool


The questions:
1. What is your first name? Shannon
2. What is your favorite food? Potatoes
3. What high school did you go to? Cheney High School
4. What is your favorite color? Aqua (really it's blue AND green, so I mixed the two!)
5. Who is your celebrity crush? Milo Ventimiglia
6. Favorite drink? Water
7. Dream vacation? Capri, Italy
8. Favorite dessert? Cheesecake
9. What you want to be when you grow up? Mommy
10. What do you love most in life? Family
11. One Word to describe you. Sensitive
12. Your flickr name (or your blog name or handle or whatever). ksnbowers, but that didn't work so I did Bowers

To make your own:
a. Type your answer to each of the questions below into Flickr Search.
b. Using only the first page, pick an image.
c. Copy and paste each of the URLs for the images into fd’s mosaic maker.
d. When finished, save to your computer to upload to your post.

The Family Fake-ation

Since we weren't able to have a real vacation this summer (one day...) Keith took 2 days off and we used those to plan some family activities that we just didn't want to cram into one Saturday. The main event was a trip to Hawaiian Falls, at smaller water park not unlike NRH2O or Hurricane Harbor. We were really pleased with it! Our original plan was NRH2O, but Hawaiian Falls was a bit cheaper, I think we saved $20, and since we didn't have very many adults (Only me Keith and Erin) we didn't really need to go to a place with lots of larger water slides. Hawaiian Falls was perfect if you just have your kiddos and want to only do things for them! We played in the wave pool, lazy river, the fountain area (where the water spurts up from the ground), and the large kid structure with the little water slides and the obligatory HUGE bucket of water that dumps down on you every 3 minutes or so. The kids had a blast, Natalie LOVED to go down this little red water slide they had (all by herself, NO help!), and Brady was having the time of his life playing in the fountains. I am sure we will at least TRY to get back there before the end of the season, especially since it is SO close and VERY easy to find! I do suggest this place for anyone with small kids, and no real desire to ride a bunch of huge slides (they do have some, and those were fun!). And the best part is you can bring in your own food!

Since there was no way I was taking my good camera, I only snapped a few pictures during lunch time. The LOVED the Doritos...I mean chips!

First Day of Preschool

Wow, wow, wow! I was looking through pictures and when I saw these I started crying! I can't believe how much Natalie has grown in such a short time! I remember her being SO EXCITED that first day of school, and now so much has changed! She is a little girl now, and she reminds me of that every day! Life needs to slow down! It is going way too fast.

Movie Review: The Dark Knight

Well, I haven't gotten to see Mamma Mia! yet, but last night Erin stayed the night and babysat so Keith and I could go see The Dark Knight. It was good! I really truly enjoyed it! Batman is my favorite of all the super heroes and so I knew already that I would like the movie. I had my little moment when Heath Ledger first came on, but he was SO AWESOME as the Joker that it barely even seemed like the Heath Ledger from all of his other movies I have seen. I could barely keep my eyes from his character when he was on screen. I am a HORRIBLE movie reviewer except to be able to say that it was really good! And I recommend seeing it, you won't be disappointed...I think, LOL!

Money, Money, Money...

...all the things I could do! If I had a little money...

Oh, dear! So, today is the second day of our "fake-ation" and we decided to get a bunch of the chores that we have been putting off, and off, and off done today. First things first Keith took my car to get the oil changed. As a little back story awhile back we took the car in because the "check engine" light kept coming in. They didn't find anything wrong and sent us on our way saying all was OK. Well, Keith calls me from the shop this morning and says "well, there's a hole in the exhaust manifold and it causes the pistons to misfire when we are idling (which was making the check engine light come on and the car chug at red lights), soooo...it's gonna cost $610 to fix it." Wha? Whu whu wha?? Are you stinking kidding me? I don't even have ANY idea what he is talking about, all I heard was $610! Apparently this problem isn't super dangerous, until it becomes dangerous...nice, huh? So we don't NEED to fix it, but why take the chance? Luckily we have been customers at this place since we moved here so they took it down to $525, but STILL? We are so not in the place where we can just toss 500 bucks into my car! Oh, well...at least my car is getting vacuumed out, right? Right.

I am thinking I need to start listening to the radio more so I can win one of those $1000 giveaway thingys that they do in the summer time.

And this is just because I can't WAIT to see this movie, plus I have been singing this song ALL. DAY. LONG. and I want you guys to have it in your heads too! Muahahaha!!