Mel's Box of Chocolates

I don't sew. If you're lucky I may put a button that fell off, back on, but don't hold your breath. The other day must have been lucky though because I dragged out my wanna-be-sewing box.  The one my grandmother gave me when I was probably Zoe's age.The one that holds 3 spools of thread and a pin cushion for a few needles. I pulled out one of the needles and Zoe came over to see what I was doing. "Mom", she said. "You know what I always think about when I see sewing needles" "What's that?" I asked. "I think that a poor little mouse must be really upset that he lost his sword. Don't you think that it looks like a mouse's sword?" "Now that you mention it, yes it surely does," I replied as I finished sewing on those darn buttons with a smile on my face. I just hope that the little mouse doesn't come to our house in search of his lost sword! Love my little girls imagination.

We were just going to get some pool chemicals and grab an ice cream cone, but instead I had the kiddos with me, but everybody was fine.Thankfully. My Tahoe kept everybody safe. While the gas prices have been taking a toll I have to say that in this instance I'm glad I drive a big car.  I, or I should say Dave, was even able to drive the truck home.  He doesn't think there is any major damage, just body damage.  Anyways, it drove...even though it wasn't very pretty. So it's been a rough week as I balanced the bank account and moved around some bill paying to find the cash for the $500 deductible.  Props to Allstate though because they have been fabulous as they got an estimator out right away so we could get the estimate to the body shop.  Then Hertrich's came to the rescue and my car is in the shop as I type.  I'm crossing my fingers that I may be lucky enough to get the truck back next week.  Haven't heard yet.  But I'm  not giving ...

Over spring break, we visited Dave's brother's family in Florida.  The kids had a blast hanging out with their older cousins for a few days.  Nobody wanted to say goodbye when it was time to come home. The kiddos also have little cousins on my side thanks to one my little brothers.  They live in North Carolina and we only get to see them a few times a year.  We always have fun when we get together, but again it's always hard to say goodbye. Growing up I never lived near family, well accept for my mom, dad, and two little brothers of course.  All my grandparents, cousins, aunts, and uncles lived in Michigan so we usually only saw them a couple times a year.  The times we spent together was precious because they were so rare, but I was jealous of my friends whose grandparents and extended family were so close.  Those who had big holiday gatherings, summer adventures, and sleepovers.  I only had letters {can't remember the last time I wrote or re...

Dear Annoying Mom at the Beach, You must learn to RELAX! It was painful to watch your neurotic behavior at the beach today as you screamed at your children when they moved even an inch out of your reach.  I get it.  The beach can be scary.  There are a lot of people. Big waves. Strong water. But sucking all the fun out of your beach trip as you yell, scream, hit, and go off at your children for doing nothing, but being children, was difficult to observe as I was watching my own kids enjoy their beach day. Instead of trying to scare your children to death.  Teach them!  Teach them that when they fall they need to put their hands down and heads up to get out of the water, to watch the waves so they know when they are going to get knocked over.  Show them the black flags on the lifeguard stations that are numbered and remind them that anytime they can't see you to find that big ol' lifeguard chair with that number. Let them get wet. Let them get rolled...

On the side of the console of our boat there is this little door. If you bend over and take a peek inside you will undoubtedly find all the life jackets, our boat bag, and some fishing tackle. or you may also discover this Guess this little nook is also the perfect place to curl up for a nap while enjoying a day on the boat. For more Wordless Wednesday pictures be sure to visit 5minutesformom For more WordFUL Wednesday pictures and stories be sure to visit parenting BY dummies 

This week is my first official week of summer vacation. I've been looking forward to this since I bid summer vacation adios last August. But somehow I think I have misiniterpreted the whole summer vacation thing.  Monday morning came bright and early as I hit the floor running to head off to swim practice for my son.  Then it never stopped till late last night as I... sat in the rain for sons swim practice at 8am took him to get his haircut sat on the phone with insurance companies recording statements of my accident on Saturday cleaned both kids rooms threw away 6 bags of trash started cleaning my room {still in progress} made lunch for hungry kids  added chemicals and cleaned the pool washed, dried, folded, and put away 2 loads of laundry unloaded, loaded, unloaded, and loaded the dishwasher baked 3 dozen cookies for swim meet attended first swim meet with my son {that chaos deserves a whole post of its own - coming soon!} visited with my parents put cr...

Aaaahhhh. Summer vacation. I'm definitely in the minority of moms as I gleefully count down the days till the start of summer vacation. Today I reached the end of my countdown.  As of exactly 1pm today I'm officially on summer break.  Oh yeah!  It's been a challenging school year, but I went, I conquered, and I made it back around to summer vacation! I jammed to loud music on the way to pick up my kids from grandma and grampy's house and couldn't wait to treat them to an ice cream cone on the way home.  No such luck though.  My children greeted me with attitudes and bickering and so the ice cream treat went out the window.  Yep, summer vacation is in full swing. Now we're home and I'm chilling on the couch. Thankfully there is no bickering {I think the kiddos are actually just worn out after being entertained by grandpas and grandmas all week while I finished out the school year} and so far we have enjoyed some books together, Zoe made a craft, and D...

We love our Old Bay steamed crabs and the other day we made our first trek out crabbing.  This is definitely a sure sign of good eats this summer! For more Wordless Wednesday pictures don't forget to visit 5minutesformom

Last week was the week I thought was never going to end. Or I was going to either go crazy or die from exhaustion before it did. First of all it was the students last week at school.  That meant assemblies, band concerts, promotion practice, end of the year celebrations, and all that other fun that fills the last days before summer vacation.  Not only was I trying to make sure my own students were where they needed to be for all the end of the year festivities, I also had to make sure my own children were prepared for where they needed to be and had a family member to celebrate with them. We did it though. Daddy, the grandparents, and I watched Dylan's band concert where we were surprised he played a duet piece, Zoe had grandma at her author's celebration, and grandpa at her kindergarten sing-a-long.  My own students made it to all their commitments as well and the promotion ceremony was wonderful Friday morning. On top of all the school related acti...

That was our "daily thought for the day" yesterday during morning announcements as the 2010-11 school year came to a close {at least for the students, I have another week to go}.  The end of the year is always bittersweet, more so in 5th grade because unlike 3rd grade I won't see them in school next year as they will be in the middle school.  This year was quite a challenging year with a new state testing system, a new leadership position for me, many additional meetings, and just the day to day challenges teachers' face in meeting the diverse needs of 21 children.  But, my students rocked!  I looked forward to coming to school everyday and spending the day with them.  Oh of course we had our good days and bad days, but altogether it was a fantastic year. I do have to confess though that I am not one to cry at the end of the year.  I give each of my students a hug, tell them I love them, and then send them on their way with a smile o...

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One of the best parts of teaching is the conversations I get to have with my students.  I'm still chuckling about this one: For my birthday one of my students gave me the cutest little metal figurine of a bluebird playing a saxophone.  It really is adorable.  I sat it on my desk and said how I couldn't wait to take it home and put it in my garden.  Now my students are aware of my black thumb as they have watched many poinsettias, teacher appreciation plants, and flowers die on my desk this year, so they seemed a little surprised when I said I had a flower garden. Then I had to explain that it wasn't really a flower garden, but more of a weed garden. {Yeah, you can see where this is going can't you??} While most of my class chuckled, one little boy looked at me completely appalled. He said, "Mrs. Tuttle, weed is bad.  The police is going to take you to jail if they know you have weed in your garden.  You shouldn't have weed in your garden Mrs. Tuttl...