My favorite Christmas to-date

Spider man, Shopkins and Trolls, Oh my!  These were the gifts that filled our living room this Christmas. Wyatt is actually more into Batman, but didn't seem to mind all of the Spiderman things he got. In fact, he was overjoyed with every single gift....except the underwear.

This was definitely my favorite Christmas yet, since being a little kid myself. Both of my children were finally old enough to understand the whole Santa thing and get excited about it. Rylee's imagination as she discussed Santa and the North Pole all month long, was just precious. She made me such a believer, I almost forgot I had a job to do Christmas Eve night.

We spent Christmas Eve day with my family at my aunt's house as we have done since I was a kid. We had a delicious lunch, opened presents, and enjoyed each other's company. My two favorite moments from the day, were my 5 1/2 year old niece's reaction to the "fake" glasses she got from Grandma (she's been asking for them for months!!).  "I CAN SEE!!!", she said when she put them on. My other favorite moment was when myself, my husband, my brother and sister-in-law decided to show our kids that we used to dance to songs like "Bye Bye Bye".  Being goofy was a lot of fun! I'm so glad we got it on video...my brother is a great dancer (wink, wink)!!!  You can see the video on my Facebook page.

Around 4:30 that afternoon, Rylee learned about the Santa radar and saw that he was crossing the ocean to the United States.  She started to excitedly panic that we needed to get home, QUICK! She had her coat and shoes on before the rest of us even knew what she was talking about. Once we finally left about an hour later, she watched the sky intently, looking for the sleigh. I remember doing that exact same thing on the way home from my aunt's house as a kid. Both Rylee and Wyatt fell asleep in the car by 6:00 and stayed asleep once we got home.  I was worried about how early they would wake up in the morning.

After James and I had everything set up and went upstairs to go to bed, I decided we needed to block off the stairway, so the kids couldn't go down without us in the morning.  I knew they would be very excited to see if Santa came and probably wouldn't even come into our room to get us....and their reaction is just something I did not want to miss!

Okay, so they easily could have gone through this, but I figured it would at least be a reminder for them to come get Mom and Dad first. 

Rylee ended up coming to our room around 4:45 am. She was, as I predicted, bouncing off the walls with excitement as she woke us up.  We told her we wanted to wait for Wyatt....that didn't go over well. After making her wait for 30 minutes and still no signs of Wyatt waking, we decided to go ahead and take her downstairs....a little kid shouldn't have to wait to see if Santa came, we thought.

She was delighted to see the presents, the full stockings, the empty cookie plate and milk glass. We played with her gifts from the day before while we waited for Wyatt.  About 20 minutes later I heard him stirring. I went to his room and he sat up and asked, "Did Santa come?!"

By 6:30 we had all of the presents opened. Wyatt's reaction to all of them was priceless. He was very vocal as he opened each gift. Lots of "Wow!" and "I always wanted this!". All day long he told me, "Wasn't it so fun opening presents this morning?!?!?!"

Rylee, having not asked for much, liked all of her gifts too. She had a couple of very enthusiastic moments and remembered to say "Thank you" right after opening each gift (she even thanked Santa for his gifts).

Last year, I can recall that the kids didn't really care about their gifts about 30 minutes after opening them. This year though, the toys were played with all day and are continuing to be played with today. Yay!!  We got 3 new games from Santa, for the family.  They are all active games that require you to get up and move. We've played each one multiple times...that was probably the best gift!  It was nice to have new things to do together as a family. I even laughed so hard, I cried during one game!

Pancake Pile-up is a pretty fun game for young kids (and their parents too)!

I'm already sad that Christmas is over and am making notes for next year. I know these years of magical Christmases will be few, but I'll cherish them for now. So much fun seeing Christmas through a child's view.

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas too!

It's the most wonderful time of the year

I love Christmas. This year, the holiday season has been especially fun as my kids are both old enough to understand it now and are participating so eagerly. I also love the fact that Rylee, who had a super long wish list last year and assigned a toy to everyone who buys her gifts, has decided to just be surprised this year.  My heart melted a bit when she said that. To make sure she didn't change her mind, I threw away the toy catalogs that came in the mail, before they made it into the house. Being surprised is fun, I think. And there are so few surprises in life anymore.

Speaking of surprises, I welcomed mother nature's surprise snow this morning!  Okay, so maybe it wasn't a surprise to anyone else, but James and I had NO IDEA that it was going to snow. In fact, we had planned to take down the trampoline today before the snow comes....oh well.  The snow makes it feel even more Christmasy now.  Though, I really didn't mind the slightly warmer weather we had the day before.

I got a little carried away with my Christmas decorating this year, I think. It's been fun though, and James has been enjoying helping with it too (I think). I've wanted ice cycle lights on my house for as long as I can remember and I finally got them this year!  Thank you, James!!

I couldn't resist decorating multiple trees this year either. We of course have the tree with all of the random ornaments that have been given to us, or made by us. I've always wanted to have a red and gold tree though, as well as a white and silver one.  So, I bought two more. Additionally, I have two smaller trees that I just put lights on and nothing else. I love a dark house being lit by nothing but the glowing Christmas tree lights.

Basement tree.

Dining room tree

Living room tree

Basement fireplace

Living room fire place

We are a little obsessed with black and red checker print this year

Yes, I already have presents wrapped. I'm 98% done with my Christmas shopping.  I didn't start until November (which was late for me), but I got it all done in just a couple of weeks. This was the easiest year I've ever had with Christmas shopping.  I loved it this year. The only problem with being done early is that now of course Wyatt is asking for things that we didn't get him.  Hopefully he'll enjoy them all the same.

We kicked off our holiday season with a trip to the Festival of Trees and Lights and Disney on Ice the day after Thanksgiving. This was our 4th year to attend the ice show and mine and Rylee's 2nd year doing both.  I think this will be our tradition going forward.  It's such a fun way to start the holiday; not to mention the quality family time we get to have together.

This past Friday night, we participated in our town's annual holiday festival, where we watched the tree lighting, listened to carolers, filled a bucket full of cookies in the cookie walk, and saw Santa and Mrs. Claus arrive on a fire truck. Neither of the kids like Santa, so we just watched from afar. It's such a neat event for a small town.

I've already had one holiday party. A work party with a gift exchange that was a lot of fun. Despite my gifts getting stolen from me a dozen times or more, I still went home with a movie theater gift card I'm excited to use! I even won $15 on my scratch-off lottery ticket that our director handed out.

This week will be busy with holiday events. My good friend and I will be baking Christmas goodies for our 2nd annual bake day and then we are hosting James' family over the weekend. On Sunday, James is taking his little princess on a formal date to see The Nutcracker ballet for the first time. I'm not sure which of the two of them is more excited!

I'm hopeful that this month will go slower than November did and we will have plenty of time to take in the holiday. I'm trying to be mindful of each day and enjoy the season's many blessings. After all, it is the most wonderful time of the year.

I hope your holiday is off to a great start and you are able to enjoy all of the blessings the season brings as well.

Merry Christmas! 

Thankful to be a lunch lady

As I've been reflecting the past few days on things I'm thankful for, I of course think of my family, friends, home, etc.  However, one new thing in my life has been at the top of my mind.

I know I wrote about being a lunch lady a few posts ago, but I really am incredibly thankful for my job. A few weeks ago, I took on a new role in the kitchen.  I'm now the clerk, depositing lunch money into accounts, contacting parents when accounts are low, scanning lunch cards as the kids come in to eat, etc. As I was asked begged to take this position, I just didn't think I could possibly take the job, because it would mean going from the 12 hours a week I was working, to 30 hours. I loved my very part-time hours!  In fact, in my first month, one of my supervisors said, "Don't worry, you won't always have to work the 12 hour/week shift."  To which I replied, "But I love it; I don't want to work more than that."

As the time to decide came to an end (there were several interested parties scheduled for interviews the following week), I made a last-minute decision to take the job. Today, I'm so thankful for the way things just work out!  I've been in my new role just a few weeks, and while it's still new and exciting, I don't think I'll ever regret taking it.  Sure, the 2.5 times more hours I'm working have been exhausting, but I know I will build up stamina and it won't seem like a big deal at some point (I hope).  As luck would have it, I also started an early morning (5:40 am) fitness class the same week I started these new hours, which isn't helping.

My new shift starts at 7 am. I'm usually the 2nd car in the parking lot in the morning. But what I love about this, is being one of the first faces students and staff see every morning as they start to trickle in.  I get to greet them all with a cheerful "good morning".  It's a small thing, but that means a lot to me.

One morning, a 4th grade boy came up to me at 7:30 and said, "Do you want to know what my goal is?"  I said, "Sure, Connor, I'd love to hear your goal." He proceeds to tell me that his goal is to have a smile on his face every single day for the rest of the year.  Of course I smiled and told him what an amazing goal that was and what a great gift he would be giving to others as he looked at them with his giant smile.

A couple of days later, Facebook was a sad state of negativity (right after Trump was elected president).  I drove to school that morning feeling so sad for everyone who was being so negative (and extremely glad that I don't care an ounce about politics). And guess who came to my thoughts as I sent positive vibes to all of the negative people??  Connor.  So, when I saw Connor that morning, I told him, "Connor, I thought of you this morning on my way to work."  He gave me an inquisitive look.... "You did?!?!" he asked.  I told him that I wished everyone could have a goal to smile daily just like he did.

Already, the kids are touching my heart. I get several hugs daily. Yesterday, one sweet little girl brought me a chocolate Hershey kiss.....now, THAT made my day!!  Normally I would eat chocolate the second it's handed to me.  Not this time.  This time, I looked at the candy and knew that it was meant to be a reminder of how lucky I am to have such a special job.  I put the candy on my desk in my office to serve as a daily reminder.

I have learned so many of the kids' names in the short few weeks I've been in this role. Being able to call them by their name, or have them call me by mine, makes my relationship with the kiddos feel so much more special.  And while I was so hesitant about working more hours, being in the building for most of the school day allows me the opportunity to see some of the kids (including my daughter) multiple times a day. I feel like a part of the community within the building now. It's a great feeling.  I never dread going to work. Working in an elementary school has so many more ups than downs and it feels like all of the adults in the building are all there for the same reason......and it isn't the pay.

James and I have had many conversations in the past few years about how much more important it is to love your job than to make a lot of money.  This job is a true testament to that for me.  I made 2.5 times more money at my last job before I became a stay-at-home mom than I'm making now.  But, I don't do this job for the money and I wouldn't take a corporate job for more money again.

Today, as I was out and about with my husband and kids while so many others were working, I thought about what a great job I have in terms of days off.  I only had 2-3 weeks off a year with my corporate jobs.  Working in a school, I have summers, Thanksgiving break, Christmas break, spring break, snow days and all of the in-service days off.  I also get some paid time off as well (surprisingly, quite a bit). It's really a perfect job for a parent who wants to be home at the same time as their kids. I get done at 1:15 every day, so I still have a couple of hours to myself before the kids are done too. It couldn't be more perfect for me. I'm so thankful for this new role coming into my life.

I'm also still writing for the magazine, though I had to cut back on the number of articles I was writing each month. I've had a really great fall, meeting some wonderful people with this job and getting to do some really fun shoots.

I got to go for a ride in this car!

This was a remake of a photo taken years ago...I enjoyed this one a lot!

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!!  I hope your holiday is spent with those you care about and you have many things to feel thankful for.

Google Drive

I've been meaning to write a post about our love for Google Drive. Today a friend asked for recommendations on a place to keep track of family stuff, and I decided now was a good time to write this post.

James and I started using Google Drive several months ago and it has changed our life!  It started out as a way for James to remember events on our calendar better...something he has always struggled with (I think it's a guy thing). He asked me to start using it with him so that we could both view it, add to it, etc. I did NOT want to at first!!  I LOVE my paper calendar!  I like to write (like with a pen -- the old fashion way), and I also like that I can view my whole month with a paper calendar.  Additionally, I copy from my paper calendar for the next year, to see what happened each month and remind myself of things that may come up the following year. So, I was super hesitant about switching to an electronic calendar.

After several months, I have been converted and I really do like it.  I love that we can share the calendar and both view it, add to it, etc. We put EVERYTHING on it!!  Appointments, days off, library book due dates, birthdays, reminders for anything and everything, etc. I also have the option to place things on there that he can't see, which is nice because sometimes my reminders don't affect him and it would just be one more thing to pop up for him that he doesn't need to be made aware of.

One really cool thing about Google calendar is that my "super smart" phone will ask me if I want to put this on my calendar any time it sees words like "meet", "get together", "appointment", etc.....this could be in email, facebook, etc. Anytime I get an evite, it asks if I want to place it on my calendar and I can do that with one click.

I also like that you can set reminders for however early you would like to be reminded. I believe you can also snooze your reminder if you need it to keep reminding you. And unlike a paper calendar, I can place events on it for a year or two into the future.

In addition to the calendar, we also use Drive for lists, such as groceries. This comes in handy when one of us runs into the store and can check to see if the other person added anything to the list.

The other thing we use Drive for on a regular basis is our budget and spending tracker.  We created a budget/spending tracker on a spreadsheet in Drive and we add our spending to it instantly. So, as soon as I get into my jeep after making a purchase, I immediately place it on the sheet.  I don't have to worry about remembering to do it later, or keep my receipt.

Within Google Drive, you can share documents and folders as well as keep some private, if no one else needs to be able to view it. It's really a great digital "keep all" place.  James and I definitely feel much more organized since we started using it. If you are looking for a new method to keep organized, we highly recommend Google Drive.

Grocery Budget

James and I finally got on track again with using a budget to manage our finances.  We are on our 5th month now. We expected our mortgage to be the biggest expense each month, but we never would have guessed food would be the second biggest sucker of our money. We rarely eat out, we both get free lunch at work, the kids aren't home for lunch.....what gives?!?!?!

Neither of us are "foodies" and both understand that food is just fuel for our bodies, so we eat pretty light.  We rarely make meals for supper, and when we do, it's usually just one main item and then we hunt in the fridge for something to have with it. Also, James brings home leftover food from work quite often, and sometimes we eat on that for multiple days.  Yet, we still think our food expense is ridiculous every month!  We have found that we actually spend less than a lot of families do, but it still just seems outrageous.  Sure, food is a necessity, just like shelter, which we have no problems paying for...but ugh, we just hate spending money on food.

This past summer we started shopping at Aldi. It's possibly our favorite grocery store now.  Actually, no, I still like Hy-Vee best....but the amount of items I get at Aldi for the same amount of money at Hy-vee is almost double.

I'll admit, I totally judged Aldi.  My whole life, I thought Aldi was a dirty store for poor people (because poor people must be dirty??). You weren't going to catch me in that store, no way!  But then I slowly started hearing people talk about Aldi more and more over the past 3 years. When James' co-worker talked to him about Aldi and gave James some of his food to try, he came home and told me we needed to check it out. I still wasn't so sure.  So, naturally, I sent James in first......

James was doing some cost comparison of Fareway, Hy-Vee, Walmart and Target anyway, so he was more than happy to add another store to his rounds. After his visit, it appeared that all the gossip was true....Aldi IS CHEAP!!  So, I decided to go check it out for myself.  I went inside with no plans to buy anything, just wanted to take a look.  I was very surprised at how nice the store was and I found a lot of their labels to be even "prettier" than the other stores. Okay, I'll give it a shot!

So, we tried just a few things the first couple of times we shopped at Aldi. We loved everything we bought, some even more than the other stores (chicken nuggets!!).  Their $5 take and bake pizza is one of our favs...it's bigger than other stores and so good!  To save a dollar, we buy the cheese pizza (because the rest are $6), and use whatever we have at home for toppings.  Yes, we are THAT ridiculous!

Anyway, we are now fans of Aldi and cannot wait for the new store in Ames to be finished!!  If you haven't been or are still a skeptic....try it out!!  Just don't forget to bring your own sacks and a quarter to use a cart (you will get your quarter back - these are ways the company saves money so they can sell items for less).

One thing we do not do to save money is use coupons. Pretty much the sole reason for this is that most of the items we buy never have a coupon.  We tend to stick to produce, meat, dairy and a few freezer items (you know, all the expense stuff in the store), non of which seem to have coupons. We also usually favor the most expensive item of a kind, like yogurt...the one with the most protein and least amount of sugar is always the most expensive!

The past 5 months since tracking our expenses, we have spent approximately $575 each month on groceries. We budget for less than that and always go over (so what good is our budget, right?!?!). We are hoping that this was just a summer time thing and we won't spend as much during the winter.

To track our spending, we have been using Google Drive. One nice thing about this, is that we can enter our expenditures as they happen. We both have the app on our phone and just enter any money we spend immediately after spending it.

Tell me, what do you do to save money on food???  Specifically, how do you save on snacks for the kids?  I feel like half of my grocery bill is kids' snacks.....which we could really limit if we tried harder. I also tend to splurge on some things.....like pumpkin pie ice cream for $5 (when all the other flavors are $2)...but hey, it's seasonal and it won't be there the next time I go! I do try to go to the store just once a week, but when something unexpected comes up, or we feel like having something that wasn't on the menu for the week, I will occasionally go multiple times in a week. Plus, if I shopped at Aldi, I still have to go to another store to get the items they didn't have. I try to stick to my list (and I always write my list in order of the aisles so I don't have to go back and forth), but almost every time I buy something that was not on the list.  I think grocery shopping is just always going to be a necessary evil.

Loess Hills getaway

This past weekend James and I traveled over to the western part of Iowa, an area we aren't terribly familiar with. I follow an Iowa photography page on Facebook and have seen some beautiful photos of the Loess Hills over the years.  Back in August, James and I decided to go check these hills out and hoped October would be a pretty time to go.

We dropped the kids off at Grandma's on Friday after school and headed west.  We arrived at our destination, a Bed & Breakfast I had reserved back in August, around 7:30; it was dark out. We chose a B&B because we had such a great experience at the first one we stayed at 5 years ago.  Also, I couldn't find much for hotels in the area, and this particular B&B kept popping up on my internet search.  I never did see any photos of the place, but read some of the reviews, which were all good.

So, as I mentioned, it was dark when we arrived and this is what we pulled up to.

EEEEEKK!!  I was like "Oh my! What is this place?!?!?" There was also a lovely run down old gas station next door.  Beautiful.

I hopped out of the jeep and a lady wearing sweats, her disheveled hair down, hollered out to me in a smoker's voice, "Are you Emily?"  I wasn't sure I wanted to answer.

We stepped inside and she showed us to our room at the top of the stairs. The room was very......old???  The furniture was antique. I knew from my reading about the place on the car ride there that this was an old hotel. I didn't imagine that the furniture from the old hotel would still be inside of it!  Okay, that's a little harsh...it's not the original furniture, but it felt like it could be.  Anyway, aside from the bed being really hard, the rest of the room and bathroom were just fine for the two nights we would be staying.  Although, we found out shortly after arriving that there was a smoking room below us and unfortunately the smell rose up to our room.  There were air fresheners in the room attempting to mask the smell, but that almost made it worse at times.  I wasn't sure I was going to be able to sleep...but I did, and the next night I barely noticed the smell.

In the morning we went down to breakfast.  The hostess had asked us when she showed us our room what time we wanted breakfast in the morning and what we'd like to eat.  We were surprised to have these options as the first B&B we stayed at told us what time to be at breakfast and just served us the meal they prepared. The hostess looked much more "put together" in the morning, with her hair braided nicely. She served us a wonderful breakfast of fruit, eggs, ham, bacon and french toast with homemade jams. We enjoyed our breakfast with another couple who was staying at the B&B. They gave us pointers on places to go that day, which we were grateful for as we had ZERO plans!

Yes, me, the planner, I had ZERO plans for this trip!  We both agreed on the way there and again on the way home that "plan-less" was so much more fun. We just showed up and allowed the trip to take us where it would.  We may have missed some popular sight seeing things, but we felt that the things we did were just perfect for us. All I had on my agenda was "see the hills".

The first thing we did was drive to Hitchcock Nature Center. It is a beautiful park in the Loess Hills with lots of hiking trails.  We played around in the lodge, learning a little about the hills and the animals who inhabit them. James made this sweet note in one of those things you push pins through:

Then we climbed the look-out tower where we could see out for miles above the hills.  There were a couple of volunteers up there with binoculars, monitoring the avian activity. That was interesting to watch.

After that we hiked out to the end of one of the ridge tops and back.  It was an "easy" hike. We only saw a couple other hikers on the trail.

While both of us could have stayed at this park all day, we left and headed to our next stop. On the way there, we decided to grab a bite to eat, as it was lunch time and we'd been burning our breakfast off hiking. We used the navigation system in the jeep to help us find some restaurants.  We decided on a local bar and grill, and grabbed a couple of barstools in front of this guy:

We shared a light lunch and then headed to the lavender field I wanted to see.  Unfortunately, most of the lavender plants were no longer in bloom :(  We walked around the cute little gift shop and then sat on a bench under a pergola outside for a little while. When we were ready for more exercise we headed to the last stop of our day, Preparation Canyon. We hiked one short trail down to a creek and then hiked back up to the top. My knees were starting to complain, but I wasn't ready to be done.

We drove through the park some more and came across the place I've seen in pictures many times, that I was hoping to visit in person (although I didn't do any research ahead of time to find out where it was).  It's a scenic look-out spot on top of a ridge. The neat part is that you can walk out onto the ridge quite a ways and see out across the land the entire time.  It was so beautiful and we were there at the perfect time!  It was late afternoon, so the sun was moving to the west and was just the perfect color of gold.

I could have spent the entire rest of the day on this ridge top.  I told James I wished we would have brought a picnic supper.  We didn't encounter anyone else on the trail with us. In fact, we were shocked at how few people we saw all weekend. I was so glad we found that spot (and so randomly too). This was my favorite part of the weekend.

My second favorite part came after that.  We were driving the back roads, headed out of the park, when we came across some birch trees.  I have been wanting some birch branches (for decor) for months, and, as they are just not plentiful in our area, we have not been able to find any.  I even asked in a garden store where I could find some and was told they are so rare around here. So....I told James that whatever he had to do, we were leaving with some branches off those trees. As we turned the corner, to our amazement, we saw a pile of recently cut birch branches!!  The problem was, they were all too long for the jeep.  BUMMER!!!!  BUT..... we were only about 5 miles away from the B&B and we happened to know that the owners were wood workers..... So, yes, we went and asked them if we could borrow some saws :)  Long story short, I have birch branches now :) Thanks again, James!

As it was nearing supper time and neither of us wanted to go sit in the stinky B&B room, we decided to check out the local (and only) restaurant/bar in town...with the longest name ever. This town was so tiny, there wasn't even a gas station in it. I was surprised at how nice and big the restaurant/bar was!  Not only that, but tiny town means cheap food!  I got a cheeseburger and a side for under $4! We sat on the bar side of the place and enjoyed watching the locals come in and out.  It was fun to see everyone visit/heckle with each other, given that they all know everyone in town.  We didn't even find it odd that there was a small boy (maybe 4?) sitting up at the bar....seemed normal for that place (I mean that in a good way).

Night #2 was just fine and we had another amazing breakfast Sunday morning. This time it was just the two of us. We told the hostess to surprise us.....she made waffles with apple pie filling and whip cream on top, eggs, bacon and fruit. We talked to the hostess for an hour and learned much more about the old hotel, the town (which used to be a big rodeo town until the railroad stopped going through it) and things she's learned about running a B&B.

All in all, we had a great weekend and are very glad we went.  We wouldn't change a thing about it. Even the sketchy B&B turned out to be a great story! We made some fun memories, enjoyed each other's company and got some exercise amongst beautiful scenery!

Freezer meal prep

I've loved the idea of freezer meal prep groups ever since I first heard of them.  I had several opportunities to join some groups in the past, but every time I decided I could make my meals cheaper and I didn't join. Last month, a friend attended a meal prep event at Hy-Vee and raved about it.  My mom asked if I wanted to sign up for the next one.  I thought about it, but still felt that I could make the meals cheaper. After discussing it with James, I decided to at least try it once.

Last night was the event I signed up for. It was way better than I thought it would be and I already can't wait to do it again! In just one hour and $77 spent, we had 7 meals to take home. I normally spend $65-$85 a week on groceries, so this really wasn't terribly expensive. Plus, my kids won't eat anything I brought home, so James and I will get more like 14 meals out of it, as each one serves at least 4.

I was very impressed with the set up. There were 7 tables (one for each meal). Each table had all of the ingredients needed to make 14 meals (there were 14 people there). 2 people worked together at a table to bag the 14 meals.  My mom and I had a pretty easy one.  We measured and poured 6 ingredients into a bag. Some people had to stir things together or patty up burgers, which took longer, but we were all still done in an hour.  All of the veggies (onions, peppers) were already diced for us when we got there.

After all of the meals had been made, the staff subtracted any ingredients we didn't open from our grocery total and divided the total by the number of people there.  We just paid for the groceries used (nearly all of them were hy-vee brand), plus $10 just for attending the event.  To have that many meals prepared in just an hour and not have to do any meal planning, grocery shopping or dicing veggies, was worth the $10 for sure!!!  One lady we talked to said she has been going to these every month and she and her husband eat the meals for several weeks, cutting her need to meal plan and grocery shop.  The time savings alone is very valuable to some of us!

I'm excited to try the meals now.  The dietician leads the event, so the meals are mostly healthy. She also gives suggestions of healthier sides to serve with the meals. There are some ingredients in the meals that I have never tried before, but so I'm eager to see what I think of them.

Glamping

I know camping isn't for everyone.  Maybe it's the bugs or the park bathrooms, I'm not sure. For me though, camping is a relaxing escape from the real world. I almost enjoy it as much as a beach vacation....almost. There isn't any housework to do, no projects to work on, no running around town from one place to the next. Just relaxing outdoors, enjoying the calmness that nature brings to my soul.

I love sitting by the fire, morning and evening both.  We tend to keep our fire going the whole weekend, as we prefer to make all of our meals over the fire. The cackle sound, the campfire smell...it's all so calming. Sure, my hair and clothes smell like it too, but that's a trade off I don't mind for just a couple of days.

I also enjoy the food we eat.  At home we eat a lot of leftovers or random meals, but when we camp, the meals are all planned out and are generally things we might not eat at home.  Plus, everything just tastes better over the fire.

One of my favorite things about camping, is all of the friendly neighbors, or should I say, happy campers in the campground. Most people keep to themselves, but everyone at least says "hello" as they walk past your campsite. If you'd like to strike up a conversation with someone, there is a good chance they won't mind.

I love being outdoors, but when I'm at home, I tend to spend a majority of my time inside the house. Camping forces me to stay outside. I'm not one to sit inside my camper (I really don't understand the campers who do this). Going to campgrounds with walking/hiking trails and other things to do is my preference. It makes us stay active and gets us away from the campsite, without leaving the park.

I've tent camped many times, but I knew I wanted to have a camper someday.  I did not want to have a "glamper" though...I mean, it's not camping if you have all of the amenities from home inside your camper, right?!?! Well, we just purchased our first camper, and although James disagrees, I think we are now "glamping".  We got a used travel trailer, but it does have a microwave, oven, tub/shower, and indoor/outdoor radio, among other things. We also brought our Keurig with us this past weekend. Totally glamping.

We rented a pop-up camper earlier this year, and while it met our few needs just fine, we didn't like that we could hear the noisy neighbors late at night, nor the time it took to set it up and take it down. After our first time out with the travel trailer this past weekend, we are very happy with our decision

I'm looking forward to spending many more weekends outside in nature with my family. The kids love all the outdoor time and we will make lots of fun memories. In fact, I don't think I ever heard, "I'm bored" either of the times we camped this year!

Playing at the Jester Park playscape area

Jester Park offered a lot to do while we were camping

What I learned from the classroom

Two days ago I received a call from the elementary school I work at, asking if I could sub for an associate this week.  I was hesitant to say "yes" as I was fearful of being with a badly behaved child. When I called back to inquire about the student, I was told it would be an easy kid to be with.  I decided I better give it a shot, so I said "sure" (although I only accepted one of the two days they were requesting me for). I was pretty nervous about today, but it actually went very well.  The kid I was with was pretty easy. He was a cutie, actually. I just had to remind him to stay on task a few times was all.

What I hadn't thought about ahead of time, was that I was going to be sitting in a classroom for most of the day...meaning, I would get to see what class is like these days.  I was pretty surprised.  Extremely surprised, really.

Teaching appears to be a glorified baby-sitting job right now.  I could not believe how much time the teacher spent just asking the kids to be quiet and waiting for them to pay attention.  WOW!!   I felt really bad for the teachers (I sat in 2 classrooms). They had their own ways of getting the class to pay attention and be quiet, but the kids just didn't ever seem to want to obey for longer than 3 minutes. These were 3rd and 4th graders. I did enjoy watching the kids try to get each other to be quiet so they could "surprise" their teacher when she came into the room....of course there was the one kid who thought he was hilarious by being loud...his classmates were not impressed.

Something our school does is combine grades. So, first and second graders are in a classroom together and then third and fourth graders are in a room together.  This is optional, as we also have traditional single grade classrooms.  The multi-age thing is fairly popular though.  We have heard a lot of good things about this program, so I was glad I got to check it out today. I just couldn't imagine what it would be like to have 2 grades together.  It was interesting.  Just by my observations today (and I could easily be way off from the way the program is actually ran), it appears that the students are taught more "real world" applications, rather than traditional reading/writing/math/science, etc.  I watched them share their feelings and then discuss how to help their friends that were feeling down.  I watched them discuss things they did well at yesterday and things they felt they could improve on today.  I watched them sit quietly and read independently (each at their own level of book), and then discuss how to be better readers (read the text and then think about what you read and predict what may happen). I also attended their math class.  Ummmm.............

So, I've been hearing about this "new math" for a few years now.  I finally got to experience it for myself.  W.T.F?!?!?!?  Seriously. The first problem was 44+57. It took 10 minutes to tell a ridiculous story about how to get the answer.  There's no stacking the numbers on top of each other and adding each column.  Now, we count in 10's and then add or subtract the appropriate number from there.  I was SO LOST!!  I wanted to ask, "could you please pause for a second while I got get my phone to record this???  Because no one is going to believe me when I tell this math story...."  But instead I sat quietly and tried to figure it out.  I mean, I took every single math class my school offered and did very well in them; I enjoyed math!  But this new math is just a foreign language.  I will admit that once I figured it out, it did make sense, but still.....I feel like it takes so much longer to do it this way.

Another thing I found interesting is that they do not have desks.  Instead they all sit at tables together. They also do not have their own supplies, as they all just grabbed pencils, scissors, etc from a container on their table.  I guess it really doesn't matter if you have your own things; it's just different from when I went to school. And the kids don't stay in their seats longer than 10 minutes.  The teachers have them moving from chair to carpet and back very frequently.

Additionally, schools are required now to use more technology.  I have heard that they struggle to find enough uses for technology and today I saw them really stretching their ideas to get technology in.  Like, using a blank page on their ipads to practice math problems, instead of paper and pencil. One teacher used the ipad to draw a name at random to come up and help her.

School just doesn't seem the same.  I kept worrying today that these kids are missing out on a lot of textbook items, but probably they are not.  I mean how many things did we learn that we've never needed to know?!?!

I had a very "blonde" moment today that I better share.  I wore flip flops to the school, but because I have to wear close-toed shoes for working in the lunchroom, I brought my tennis shoes to change into.  When it was time for my lunchroom job to start I went to put my socks and tennis shoes on, only to find out I brought my right shoe and Rylee's left shoe!!!  OMG!!!  I could not believe I did that!!!!  Luckily my bosses were cool with it and let me wear my flip flops this one time (sshhh, don't tell).

A few minutes later as I was serving lunch, James came up behind me with flowers :)  I was surprised to see him, as I was expecting him to come eat lunch with Rylee on Friday.  He decided to surprise us both!

All in all, it was a fun day!  I will likely sub again if they call me to.....until I get that one "bad" kid....

Working bus duty after school with my favorite kindergartner! :)

A year at home

As I opened this page up to start a new post, I saw that I have written 218 posts since I started blogging.  I can't believe I've written that many.  I really enjoy writing and sharing my life. Thanks for reading :)

We are coming up on a year since we moved into this house. A year since we've been residents of this town.  It was rocky for awhile last summer, not knowing where we were going to live and which school Rylee would attend that fall. It's hard to feel settled and make friends when you don't know how long you'll be in a place.  I couldn't be happier for the way things turned out for us.  We genuinely love our town, the school, the people we've made friends with, our "neighborhood".  From the first phone call I made to the school last summer, I felt like this town would be our home.  Home is definitely how it feels now.

We are getting to the point of seeing familiar faces around town and having friends invite us to do things with them. I've had a lot more opportunities than James to meet people in town, but everyone has been so friendly and welcoming and we have people we know we can call on.

We hosted a "neighborhood" BBQ this summer and invited all of the people that live within a square mile or so. It was nice to have everyone together and gave us all a chance to get to know each other better.

The kids both have friends here too. It's so adorable when we go somewhere and Wyatt sees one of his little friends.  It's heart melting to see him point out someone he knows by name, or play on the playground with a friend from school. Rylee, being older, gets invited to play at her friends' houses or go to the pool with them.  She even got to go to Adventureland with a friend this summer. James and I love that we have gotten to know her friends' parents well enough to be able to let her do fun things like that.

Being a "lunch lady" has made me feel famous in town amongst the young kiddos. Several times I've heard, "Hey, there's our lunch lady" when I'm somewhere other than the school :)

We also have found a high school baby-sitter we really love. The kids get excited to have her over, so that's a huge plus!  I've always been so nervous about having a high-schooler watch my kids, but we really lucked out with a great one!!  Her mom was Rylee's preschool teacher, so that helped ease my nerves a bit.

Even more than the town, I really love our house and our property. At least once a week I comment that our house is too big, but other than that, I really do love it. I loved the layout from the first time we looked at the house. Sure, there are many things I would have done differently if I designed it, but mostly, I love it.

It's funny. Before we moved in I kept demanding that we get rid of the blue carpet, green countertops and wall paper border immediately.  11 months later, guess what....

blue carpet

green counter tops and wall paper border

I still dislike them all, but there's something about it that makes it feel "homey"....like visiting a Grandma's house.  We did finally decide recently that it's time to start putting our own touches on the house. We started with painting the basement.  With that being where our television is, we wanted to make it feel a little more cozy down there for winter when we are stuck indoors.  The walls had all been white before, but are now my favorite shade of gray. Our next project will be the kitchen I think....remove the wall paper, new counter top and new hardware for the cupboards.

My long front porch and back screened porch are probably my two favorite places of this house. I spend a lot of time on them, usually reading. We eat many meals on the screened porch too. It's nice to feel the fresh air without being outside with the bugs....mosquitos love me!  And the front porch allows me to view our big beautiful yard I love so much!!  James and I have watched a lot of sunsets from the front of our house.

During move-in, I had a fall scented candle on the warmer. When I got that candle back out recently and the wax started to melt, sending the scent into the air, Rylee said, "It smells like when we first moved in here."  :)  I will say, without a doubt, we are finally settled and feeling at home.  We love this place and love our town.

Lunch lady

11 years ago I graduated from college with a business degree.  I never would have imagined that in my early 30's I'd be working in an elementary school lunch room scraping trays....but I am, and so far I LOVE IT!!

A couple years after becoming a stay-at-home mom, people started asking me if I would ever go back to work some day.  My answer was always, "Only if it's a school job, because I want to have the same days off as my kids."  Well, with my oldest starting all day kindergarten this year and our son going to daycare 4 days a week, it seemed like a good time to start thinking about getting into the work world at some level. The first place I started looking was the school website. I saw openings for substitute associates and substitute food service. The food service director happened to have a child on Rylee's soccer team, so we got to talking about the sub job and I decided to apply for it. I figured subbing would be a great job because I can choose when I want to work.  I got hired on for that one, and also for the associate sub job.  Between the two, I figured I'd work a couple days a week -- perfect.

Then a few weeks later, the food service director called and asked if I was interested in a regular part-time job at the elementary school.  The hours would be 10:45-1:15. Hmmm.... That's a nice short shift and I would know when I'm going to be working (vs not knowing if I would be needed as a sub the next day or not). I wasn't sure how I felt about it being right in the middle of the day though and I would have to send Wyatt to daycare a 5th day.  James and I discussed it, and I talked to a friend who works at the school -- she thought I would probably enjoy the food service job.  I decided to take it.  4 days in, I'm glad I made that choice!

Being a "lunch lady" could easily be a thankless job.  One of the reasons I decided to take this job was to get to see all of the elementary kiddos every day.  I wasn't exactly sure what it might be like to see them all every day, but I was hopeful that it would bring a smile to my face, just like seeing all of Rylee's preschool classmates did each day last year. Let me tell you, these kids have not disappointed me!!

In fact, I almost teared up on the first day as they started coming through the lunch line saying, "yes please" and "no thank you". These were 1st and 2nd graders, using better manners than most adults!  I kept thinking, "I sure hope Rylee isn't the one kid who forgets her manners when she comes through this line."

I was already emotional on the first day, between sending my first child on the bus to go to kindergarten and starting my first job in 3.5 years. But the kind things I heard from the kids' mouths forced me to hold back tears.

"Thank you for lunch!"
"It was good, thank you!"
"This was really good food!"
"Thank you for lunch!"
"Have a good day!"

These were many of the comments I received from the kids.  I was just shocked!!  Here I thought I was teaching Rylee good manners, but I know she would never say any of these things to the lunch lady wearing a hair net and scraping her tray.  Nearly all of the kids looked me in the eye and said something to me....even if it was just, "I didn't like the peas!"  :)

One girl said to me, "Before you tell me 'thank you', I want to thank YOU!"  :)

Several kids noticed I was new this year and they commented.

"Are you the new lunch lady?"
"You're new, aren't you?"

One little boy and girl came up to me and he asked if I was a new lunch lady.  When I said, "Yes. My name is Emily," the girl hit him in the arm and said, "I told you!!"  That made me chuckle.

The second day a couple of kids said to me, "You came back, huh?!"  They must have been making bets that I wouldn't.....

By far my favorite comment so far came from a 3rd or 4th grade girl on the second day.  She stood in front of me, looked me in the eye, smiled and said, "You're VERY pretty!"  :) :) :)  Okay sister, I'll bring you a cookie tomorrow ;)

Scraping trays and washing tables isn't the most glamorous job in the world, but being in an elementary school, surrounded by young kids who haven't been too tainted by the world yet, is very rewarding. I have a job to do while I'm there, but the lessons I leave with have nothing to do with the tasks I performed.

I've been putting my mindfulness training into practice while I'm there and I come to appreciate so many little things every day.  From watching kindergartners learn how to dump the food from their tray without dropping the tray into the garbage can, to listening to the words the teachers use to talk to the students, to watching the principal wear a hair net and happily spoon food onto the kids' trays....every day I feel more and more blessed to work in that environment.

Seeing Rylee every day in school mode is probably the best benefit of this job for me. So many parents don't get to witness their child in this way. I love that I get to watch her walk in a line, interact with classmates and school staff and follow rules that weren't made by me. Plus, I get to see what she is or isn't eating....she "loves" that ;)  "Seriously, just try the tator tots!!!"

Her friends all enjoy seeing me too. I hear "Hi Rylee's mom!!!" many times.  They're all just so adorable!!

Flourless Pancakes

Have you seen the two ingredient pancake recipe floating around Pinterest??  I bet I saw it at least a dozen times and I finally decided to try it out.  Two ingredient pancakes just can't be that good....right?!?!  When I had some very ripe bananas that needed used up, I tested that thought out for myself.  The result:  A-MA-ZING!! They weren't like a regular cakey pancake, but I liked them better than the original.

Here is the recipe I worked from.

http://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-make-2-ingredient-banana-pancakes-cooking-lessons-from-the-kitchn-218658

She gives several ways to add extras to the pancake batter.  I chose to add vanilla, honey and baking powder....making it more of a five ingredient pancake....however, I use very little of those three additional items. We have had these pancakes three times now and have loved them each time!!

We also found it nice to pair the pancakes with our "usual" side of mixed fruit.  Someone recently asked me what we are doing to eat more healthy, but in an inexpensive way.  Each week we buy fruit that is on sale (at least three different fruits) and cut it all up when we get home and throw it into a large container. This fruit salad becomes our side for every meal until it is gone (usually 4-5 days). We have even pureed some of the fruit salad to use as a topping for a meal (turkey burgers, pancakes, salad dressing, etc).

One time when our fruit salad was all berries, I put oats on top and had that for breakfast.  I don't like oatmeal, but mixing oats in with my fruit was a good way to get the benefits of the oats.

What's your story?

I recently finished reading "A Thousand Miles in a Million Years" by Donald Miller. This book was loaned to me by a friend after I made a comment about feeling discontent.  I really enjoyed reading this and found myself asking a lot of questions and being surprised by my answers.

The author compares his life to writing a story.  He states that we all want our lives to be a story that is enjoyable to read.  No one wants to "write" a boring story. But, he asks, what are we doing to ensure our story isn't boring??  Are we taking the risks necessary to accomplish the things we really want in life?? Additionally, are we writing our own story, or the story that we think others want us to write?  Good questions to ponder....

My husband and I were having a conversation similar to this several months ago.  As I have never been able to answer questions like "What do I want in life?" or "What are my goals?", I decided to ask a different question to help me find the same results. The question is, "what type of person do I admire?" No matter how well you know me, I think my answer will surprise you.....

The type of person I admire.....might sometimes be referred to as a "HIPPIE"  (you weren't going to guess that were you?!?!?!?)

This person
* Lives a very simple, yet enjoyable life.
* Doesn't care what anyone thinks of them
* Never judges others or themselves
* Is nearly always positive and smiling
* Doesn't care about money or status
* Is always kind to others
* Eats real food (vs 90% of the items found in a grocery store claiming to be food)
* Does most of their shopping at garage sales and second hand stores
* Rides their bicycle as their main mode of transportation
* Is carefree and loving life!  Free Spirit!!

I see this type of person regularly in Ames.  Sometimes at the natural foods grocery store, sometimes at the library, the second hand store, main street, yoga class, etc. I always feel drawn to these people and want to sit down and hear their stories.

Another place I went to recently where I felt very comfortable with the company I was in, was the local rodeo. There were lots of "rednecks" there, as well as many regular small town folks just out for the entertainment on a beautiful summer night. I loved that I didn't see anything that would suggest a status symbol or hear people talking about their corporate jobs, etc. It was just a good down home, small town feel.

I've never been one to admire others' education or careers.  I don't particularly care where a person went to school (or if they went at all), nor that they are climbing a corporate ladder. I'm much more enamored by a person's personality and attitude. The man or woman who displays selflessness and is always positive....that's the person I want to sit next to at dinner....that's the person who's life story I want to hear.

So, as I've started taking notes on the type of people I admire, I'm finding myself being more mindful every day of small things I can do to be more like those people. Unfortunately, I have some characteristics completely opposite of those people and will likely never be just like them (which is good as I am my own person)....but small steps are better than nothing.  Small steps help tell part of my story.

I'm still not sure what sort of story I'm telling, but I'm being mindful of the fact that I am indeed "writing" one and making choices daily to determine the next paragraph of the chapter I'm on. A couple nights ago, after putting the kids to bed, I was planning to read.  However, as I passed by the window and saw the sun setting, I told myself, "you can read anytime, but sunsets only happen briefly".....I decided to go outside to watch the sun go down. I didn't regret that decision at all.

What is your story?  Do you feel good about the path it is taking, or is a plot twist needed?

First time campers!

What a fun weekend we had -- camping!  I grew up camping. Even when we went on vacation to other states, we camped. James grew up camping as well.  We've been saying for years now that we want to get a camper.  Our excuse  problem is that we just don't think we'd get enough use out of it to bother with maintenance and upkeep on it.  Rylee has been asking to go camping since this past winter, so we finally looked into renting a camper (James and I are done with tent camping days).  It turned out to be a great idea!

At first I didn't think I would be able to get past knowing someone else used it (same feeling I get when I walk into a hotel room -- gross), but it was so much nicer and cleaner than I had expected.  We brought our own bedding of course and lots of clorox wipes for cleaning...but honestly it was so spotless and clean I really didn't freak out about cleaning when we first got inside. It didn't smell musty like campers sometimes do either.  I was impressed!

We went to Pine Lake State Park in Eldora.  That's such a beautiful park with so much to do!  We went on lots of walks/bike rides on the many concrete trails and played at the very nice playground multiple times. The playground also happened to be a giant sand box, with nice sand toys courtesy of the park.

There is a beach for swimming, but it didn't seem warm enough to swim, plus Rylee and I were a little grossed out by lake swimming.  I used to swim in lakes just fine, but now I'm pretty leary of getting into lake water. We did see some swimmers though, as well as many fisherman and some kayakers. The lake is surrounded by tall trees - it's quite pretty!

There is also a place for tubing down the river near the park...we watched hundreds of people getting onto buses to be dropped off upstream.  Our camping neighbors were a bunch of college guys -- they did the 4 hour tubing adventure and said it was a must for us next time.

Another fun thing the park offered was movie night at the campground.  Kung Fu Panda played on a large screen after dark.  We stayed up to watch it Saturday night.  The kids loved it!  We just brought our chairs to it, but saw several families bring blankets to sit on and bowls of popcorn to eat while they watched.

We cooked suppers over the fire -- hot dogs one night and chicken/veggie foil packets the next. We also did one breakfast over the fire -- scrambled eggs with veggies and ham - Yum!  James and I both loved all the delicious food smells coming from the camp sites in the mornings. For lunches we just ate lunch meat and fruit. We kept all of our meals super simple so we wouldn't need to pack too much.  Our camper had a small fridge, so we only brought what would fit in the fridge.

Another thing we loved about this trip was visiting the town the campground was located near - Eldora.  On Saturday morning, in need of some coffee (we weren't sure how to bring that), we ventured into town to check out the local coffee shop, appropriately called, Love-a-Latte.  It did NOT disappoint!!!  First of all, the shop was adorable!!  Honestly, the cutest coffee shop I've ever been to.  Second, our drinks were amazing!!  I got a turtle mocha (chocolate and caramel) and James had a Tiger-something or other, which was white chocolate and caramel.  The kids got strawberry smoothies, which were equally as good as our coffee drinks.

After visiting the coffee shop, we went inside a few of the shops on the square.  With no intentions of buying anything (we're on a budget these days, remember), we came out with these 2 lovely items.

We aren't positive yet, what we will do with them....but the ideas are generating.  The best part -- we bargained them down to $15 total for the two.  I should say James did...I wouldn't have even thought to bargain!

When we left the downtown area, headed back to the campground, we saw that the visitor center, which happens to be an old train depot, was having some sort of event with a sign that said "Kids activities".  We decided to stop.  The depot had cookies and lemonade, so it was a great stop!!  We also checked out the old train car.  The people who were hosting were incredibly nice -- they gave us some information on the old depot and train car (and recommended a movie to us while we were there -- Central Intelligence -- she said it's hilarious).  They also suggested we go visit the farm museum on the other side of town.  So of course we did.

This was another great stop!  Lots of history.  The entire second story of the barn (which was beautiful by the way), contained thousands of old farm artifacts.  The kids enjoyed writing on the chalk board while James and I looked around. The hosts of this place were equally as nice and informative as the people at the train depot.  Iowa has lots of nice folks!  

We walked over to see the one room school house after we toured the barn.  I've been inside these old schools before, but this one just felt so real...I could actually picture myself having attended class here for some reason.

We were very glad we stopped into town and checked out some of the local attractions!

Late Saturday afternoon, while I was returning to my camp site from a walk, I saw my parents drive in to the park.  They joined us for supper, a walk and s'mores!  It was great to have company!  We decided our next camping trip will definitely involve more people; it's much more fun that way.

Overall, we were all very happy with our camping trip. The kids are already asking to go again!  When we got home, we had a couple of "birds" hanging out in our rock bed..... I think Grandma and Grandpa might know where they came from...

James would like to share his "healthier s'more" idea he came up with this weekend.  He sliced apples (into thin circles) and put peanut butter on them, then placed the melted marshmallow between 2 slices of peanut buttered apples....it was really good!!  (Sorry we didn't get a photo of them).