Great Valentine's Day card option for young kids

Since my surgery was postponed to February 7th, thanks to our little 6-legged visitors, I had to do some serious planning in advance for Valentine's Day.  With 2 kids in school now, neither of them totally able to take on the monumental task of a classroom full of cards by themselves, I had to jump into "super prepared" gear and have them done earlier than a week ahead of time.

I saw a great idea on a favorite blogger's website of mine, Rage Against the Minivan, for easy Valentine's Day cards and decided to try it myself.

What a fabulous idea and easy!

I took pictures of the kids holding a white broom stick handle.

Then added some text and images to spruce them up.

The final product was adorable.  I cut a small slit in the cards, the older 2 stuck their lollipops in and taped the backs and Viola!  We had over 45 Valentine's Day cards done in less than half an hour for less than $15.

 

Wig-wearing shoot-out

We went to Disney the day after our horse-heaven visit and Katherine ended up choosing a Rapunzel wig for her parting gift.  We don't do parting gifts every trip to a theme park/zoo, but this time was a go and much to her mother's dismay she chose the wig.

One stipulation was that she had to wear it walking out of the park.  So she did.  And she got lots of compliments, which is something she tries to avoid, but she took it like a champ and proudly wore it out to the car.

Here she is the next day wearing it in what looks like a shooting match with her brother.

Rapunzel, shooting SpiderMan with a shotgun.  Where else would you find such shenanigans?

Horse sick

SOMEbody in our house has fallen in LOVE with horses.  I'll give you three guesses with one hint...

Ok, so she's totally fallen head over heals, wants one in our back yard to walk around the block, "Mom, I'm horse sick," in love with horses.  (She's heard the term horse fever before, but somewhere/somehow it got jumbled into horse sick.  Very cute.)

I guess most little girls go through a love of horses.  I did, but I was older and got one and took riding lessons and was able to care for it and ride it by myself.  She needs a little bit more time and about 5 more acres to do all that.

In lieu of, we made a trip to go visit Kayla, her beloved cousin that does have a great riding horse and was thrilled to cater to 3 little ones.  On her 13th birthday.  She's really cool.  And beautiful.

In horse heaven.

In heaven also, riding on the farm buggy with CowPapa. He's pointing to an excavator that passed by.

Taking in all the sights.  Contemplating.  Thinking about the meaning of life or which super hero can beat up SpiderMan.

 

Here's Kreo.  Kreo is short for creosote.  Cute name for a black-ish horse and he is a great riding horse.

Here's our birthday girl/horse provider showing Katherine how to saddle up and prep Kreo. 

This little man was very cute trying to make horse sounds over and over again.  He sounded like a slight whinney followed by lips vibrating.

 

Hi Kreo.  You're a good horse.  Thanks for fulfilling my baby's dream that day.

Horses are only interesting for so long.  The youth fair pig was nearby and much bigger and louder than Brandon was expecting.  There was much furrowed brow and looks of confusion when nearing the pig, Barbie-Q.  In the books they always look smaller, quieter and cleaner.  That was really throwing him off.

 

Barrels for practice.  Barrel-riding practice really, not rolling-through-cow-poop practice which is what it turned into.

 

Thank you Kayla.  We had a great day and you were a superb hostess on your birthday.  Katherine is willing to come visit you weekly but I have to be the "mean" mom and tell her no.  Keep up the good work riding and cheering but most importantly, in school.  You Rock!

My little darlings

These boys know how to make their momma's heart melt.

I've never read the book The 5 Love Languages, but I've heard enough about it, I pretend to know what I'm talking about when referring to it.  It outlines five ways to express love that Gary Chapman [author] calls "love languages": gifts, quality time, words of affirmation, acts of service, and physical touch.  The book helps to pinpoint what you're own love language is in addition to, and most importantly, your partner's.

One thing he left out was cleaning, which I guess could be under the "acts of service" category.  My children have picked up on my love language and enjoy "loving" on me.  Couldn't be the reaction they get when I see them reach for a vacuum, or ask to help clean the playroom.  I amp it up real good so they can see how much it means to me.  And they enjoy making me happy.

Sometimes.

:)

Birthday trip to Homosassa

Looking back through these pictures while prepping them made me chuckle.  You see, I married a man that is violently allergic to pictures.  He breaks out in hives when he hears the click of a camera shutter.  He starts wheezing when it gets close to family picture time and he strangely is unable to care for 3 children simultaneously while I'm holding a camera.

So what made this batch of pictures so different?  The sheer number of them.

How did I get so many more pictures this time?  Well, that would be because this trip was on my birthday!

Viola!  That's how you do it.  When you want to take lots of pictures, make it your birthday.

This is actually half of the pictures I started out with.  Funny how that works.

Whoa, didn't realize there was a picture of me in the morning stuck in the middle of all these. :)