peelosophy

Almost all through highschool and most of college I was the regular Saturday night babysitter for my Uncle Tom and Aunt Susan’s 3 girls. Let me reiterate,  Tom and Susan would go out either by themselves or with a couple of friends every Saturday night.  They had a designated time set aside to be together every week.  Back then, it that didn’t seem like a a big deal – just great money for me.  Now, with my own family, I think they were geniuses and I’m jealous.

John and I have always tried to do an intentional date night on the 14th of every month.  We would get a sitter and go do something that usually involved dinner and a movie.  This worked – but there were some drawbacks. First, it got expensive, especially when we had to pay a sitter.  Second, our planning was lacking and we almost always went to dinner and a movie – which I love to do, but it wasn’t a good fit for really connecting.  Third, once a month was not frequent enough.

We switched to doing weekly date nights about 6 months ago inspired by Simply Modern Mom and her Project 52 Date nights series.  You can check out her parameters here. Ours go something like this:

• Friday Nights from 8:30-10:00…although we are usually never really done before 11pm.  But with the intention of an hour and a half blocked time, makes it seem more doable.
• We usually do something at home unless we have a party or something, then we make sure to grab dinner together beforehand.
• Right now, I do most of the planning, John is still apprehensive to the planning part or we would be alternating the planning. He is warming up to the idea of planning, but I have fun with it so I really don’t mind.
• Like SMM, we try and keep it simple .
• Movies are not an option.

So, what do we DO right?!?!  Here some of our past dates…

• We’ve dusted off several games (not the Hi Ho Cherry-O variety) that usually only get played once a year.  One of favorites is Phase 10 – we are addicted!  Another night we played Skip Bo Deluxe, which we have never played, it was still in it’s wrapper – but it was really fun.
• A couple of weeks ago, we got slurpees and played Wii Sports.
• One night I surprised John with a Spa Night all for him and let it be known he LOVED it.  Complete with a pedicure, facial and massage.  BTW, I’m the best wife ever.  FYI, Walgreens has single use face masks for $1, so I didn’t have to spend $8 on something I would never use again.
• Last Friday, we made root beer floats and I got a bunch of travel guides from the library about Nova Scotia.  A little nerdy, but we’d love to plan a trip there for our 10 year and I just thought it would be fun – and it was.

In summary, Friday nights have become such a sweet intentional time for John and I.  It solved the drawbacks about how we used to do date nights and it’s been really fun getting creative about what we are going to do.

For more ideas, check out Project:52 Date Nights at Simply Modern Mom and be sure to check out the post comments too.

I’m still being treated for strep from last weekend, but now I have a secondary respiratory infection with the cough, runny nose, etc.  Lovely.

I constantly have a cup of hot tea with honey in my hand and today I realized I had all the ingredients for chicken noodle soup – score.

I got this recipe from Penzeys years and years ago.  I think they actually called it Turkey Noodle Soup because it was in the issue after Thanksgiving.  So use chicken or turkey, regardless, it’s my favorite on a cold day or on a super hot day in the middle of the summer when you have a cold.

The boys love it too.  It’s funny because JJ likes just the broth and Henry likes no broth but all the noodles and veges.  Kinda like Jack Sprat, they end up “licking the platter clean”.

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We would have had a fun weekend planned with parties to go to and birthdays to celebrate – all missed.   It was the sick ward here this weekend – AGAIN with Henry and I being the patients.  I’ve said it before, I don’t do sick well.  I am just needy and mean.  Thanks to antibiotics, LOTS of hot tea with honey and some moments of rest I am on the mend.

Emma had the most fun though, she got to go to a Ladybug Luncheon with Grandma at her friend Kathryn’s house.  Grandma bought all the granddaughters sweet little ladybug dresses just for the event.  So fun! Here are a couple pics…

Sitting on Grandmas lap….is that not the cutest ladybug you’ve ever seen??!?!

The only thing cuter is Emma with her BFF, her cousin Rosie…don’t you want to know what they are thinking???

My thoughts are all over the place today.  I have more than the usual amount of free time today which always makes my head spin.  Here is a sampling of things going through my head throughout the day…

- Why did we sign JJ up for soccer camp in the middle of July from 5-6:30pm?

- Is it just a coincidence that Aunt Ann sent us a “really good” deal on a house in West County and I have been reading through Jonah?

- My house has been unusually clean for more than 24 hours – what am I doing or not doing?

- I love JJ but I really don’t want to sit in the heat tonight.

- For a second, considered parallels between West County and Nineveh.

- Thinking my clean house is a result of JJ helping out more and us being out of the house more lately.

- Considering for a minute that a NachoMama’s Drive-Thru margarita can be on the way to soccer tonight.

- Realizing and admitting to myself that I am a huge zip code snob.

- Summing up…..I’m praising God for a clean house today, vowing NOT to sign up the kids for any evening camps in the heat of summer next year and letting God in on the fact that it’s going to take a whale for us to consider West County.

One of our new favorite time killers family activities lately has been obstacle courses.  Especially in the 4 o’clock hour, my least favorite time of day – it’s usually melt down city around here, but lately we’ve been doing some fun stuff.   JJ loves putting the courses together and then I time the boys to see of they can beat their last times.  Here’s our latest one…

Go under the chairs…

Across the “moat” via cushions…

Across the tightrope…

Slide down the little slide and shovel 3 scoops of rocks into a truck and push it to the other side…

Hop over the bricks to the clubhouse…

Run through the clubhouse and down the turbo slide…TIME!

Now another dozen times until dinner.  I love my backyard.

The best afternoons here are when the boys all collaborate, with minimal fighting, on some sort of project that takes hours to reach completion.

Yes, I said hours.  I promise you, it doesn’t happen very often. But when it does it usually happens outside.  And lately, it involves the construction of some sort of “habitat”.  Whether squirrel, roly-poly or a Claire habitat, they have taken the philosophy of “Build it and they will come“.

This day it was a daddy long-legs habitat and the poor daddy long-legs was already inhabited inside during construction.

“DO NOT TOUCH DO NOT GO IN THIS AREA PAST THE STICKS BEWARE”

My kitchen island has become a bit of a freak show.  This is the an Albino African Clawed Frog that somehow managed to become a part of our lives temporarily.

We named her Petunia…we were trying to think of the most beautiful name for the ironic appeal.  Basically the story goes, the owners were going to dump her because she killed her mate, and we were the suckers saved her from her deadly fate.

Have you seen the naked mole rats at the zoo?  If you are like me, I just can’t stop staring at them because they look so weird – she’s kind of like that.

She looks like a plucked chicken…that swims.  She has no eyelids so you don’t ever know if she is sleeping.  There are times I walk by her and get goosebumps because she just freaks me out.

Intrigued?  Come on by, bring the kids…hopefully she won’t be here that long.

My sister Lara in town a couple of weeks ago and we so miss her now that she is gone!  She LOVES her nieces and nephews (here and in Colorado) and they ADORE her! She is so thoughtful with the kids and is always sending them little packages and postcards from her travels.

She got to spend some time with us this trip on days that I was watching other kids.  And, of course, they were all put under her spell.  They all called her “Aunt Lara” and asked if she would send them postcards too.  And, I know she will because she is just thoughtful like that.

This picture is of her and Emma when she stopped by on her way out of town and it so happened they were both wearing their “kerchiefs” in their hair so I had to snap a picture.  I can only imagine, Emma asking in 15 years when she can go stay with Aunt Lara in LA…..

In junior high I transferred from a private all-girl school to a public co-ed school. That is a heck of a transition for a junior high girl!

By God’ grace, I became instant friends with a group of girls, of which most of them also had transferred from all girl schools. We were called The 6-Pack because their were 6 of us and we were inseparable. I don’t know if this name was given to us or if self-proclaimed, but it was junior high – if you had a place or a name where you fit in – it was half the battle.

I’ve been thinking of my junior high 6-pack lately, especially when I stop and realize that we are now a family of 6. Even writing that,  it is crazy to me. Don’t get me wrong, we wanted a big family and I’m from a family of 6 — this should not be that crazy to me!

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