Mel's Box of Chocolates

The radio was playing a song which led to this conversation with Dylan... Dylan: "Hey, this song is on my iPhone. I never ordered it, but when I got my phone it was already on there. I like it." Me: "Huh. Who sings it?" Dylan: "Some band I've never heard of...U2. It's just a 'U' with a number '2'. I actually have a few songs of theirs that was on my iPhone. They're not too bad." Me: "Oh U2. They've been around for awhile. Pretty popular" Dylan: "Oh I thought it was a new band or something." Dare I ask about Paul McCartney?

...that is what Zoe told me last night and it brought tears to my eyes. On the way home from gymnastics, out of the blue, Zoe asked if I was the one that moved our elf. I asked, "why" and she said, "just tell me the truth." I evaded the question. She again said, "just tell me the truth." So I did. Through the sobbing, I could hear her saying, "I should have just kept it a wonder. I didn't want to really know the truth." Then came the other questions. What about Santa? Easter Bunny? Tooth Fairy?  So I told her. This past Christmas I read The Truth About Santa and I thought about how when the time came I would totally steal the letter. So I did. When we got home I held her tight while she read the letter and more tears came. I told her how we were all Santa and by helping her believe we were able to share in the Christmas magic. She was surprised to hear that her brother knew the truth, but still shared in the elf antics and Santa st...

While the Olympics have been over and done with, I just stumbled across this draft I had started and I just can't let it go to waste.  It has been an interesting Olympics this year especially when it comes to the swimming and gymnastics.  In previous years we would do the American thing and watch the nightly recaps cheering on the American's and their victories.  We were watching history happen. It was great. But, we were pretty removed from the action. This year though, we were watching from a whole new perspective as we now have our own swimmer and gymnast in the house.  As I watch, I can almost imagine what those athletes parents are feeling. I can hear their thoughts... finally all that money I paid is paying off! I watch the strokes and the routines through new glasses. I sit at the edge of my seat as swimmers dive off the blocks and reach to cut off that last hundredth of a second that separates first and second. I hold my breath as the hands come off t...

Zoe came home today from school saying that she thinks our Elf has gotten lost this year because all her friends at school have been talking about the arrival of their Elf.  It's been a big debate in our house when the Elf usually arrives. Dave and I seem to remember him coming December 1st, but the kiddos seem to think he was supposed to show up the day after Thanksgiving. So help us out... Has the elf arrived at your house? When does he usually make his appearance for the season??

One of my favorite parts of teaching is that you never know what to expect.  You can sit and plan and try to think about everything that could happen, but guaranteed some student will do or say the unexpected. On the first day of school I was reminded of this fact. One of my first conversations of the year went like this... Teacher: "Oh you are N.K.?  Are you related to G.K.?" Student: "Yes" Teacher: "Did you know I taught G.N. in 3rd grade?" Student: "Yes, he told me" Teacher: "Well, how are you two related" Student: "By our last name." He said it so matter-of-factly.  I'm sure he was probably thinking what a dumb teacher he was stuck with considering I even asked that question.  After a few more "ignorant teacher" questions I did finally discover they were brothers. Then a couple hours later as the students were completing a scavenger hunt where they had to find a student who met certain cr...

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.

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...

Zoe has become quite the reader in the past few months.  Being a teacher to older students, I'm in awe of those who teach the littlest people.  I don't know how they do it!  I'm very blessed that both of my kids are proving to be quite the little scholars.  Some would say it's because they are a teacher's kid and while I'd love to take the credit, I have to give credit where credit is due and that is totally to my kiddos teachers.  Watching my children learn to read is one of my most treasured moments so far and hats off to the teachers who gave them the gift of reading! Back to the title of this post. My point to that little sideshow is that Zoe has been practicing her new reading skills by reading the billboards as we are driving here, there, and everywhere.  The other day she was busy reading them all when she became frustrated because she couldn't figure out a word. "Mom" she asked. "What is the word m1y?"   I thought I misheard ...

Last week I had one of those really bad days at school.  It seemed that every time I turned around somebody was being mean and it wasn't just my students.  People talking about other people, complaining about this and that, being straight up rude, and it annoyed the heck out of me. After school, Dylan asked me how my day was. I told him how tired I was of people just being plain mean.  That it made me feel sad. I shared that I hope he sees me and his dad trying to spread kindness in what we say and do.  I expressed my hope for him and his sister to become kind individuals.   He seemed to digest everything I was saying.  Then after a few minutes he finally spoke, "You know mom mean people do stink.  If we didn't have them then we would have world peace, but that isn't ever going to happen." From the mouth of babes.  

Zoe is obsessed with her blond hair.  Seriously.  She loves it!  She can't understand why anybody would want brown hair and is often informing me of how jealous I am of her color hair.  The other day at dinner she was once again discussing hair color and cracked me up with her understanding {or lack of} genetics. As we were eating she got quiet for a minute and you could tell she was puzzled about something. Then she said..."You know what I don't get mom?" "What don't you get, Zoe?" "How is that we {her brother and her} are blondies, when you and daddy are brownies?" I found her words to be hilarious. Oh and for the record both daddy and mommy were blond as could be when we were kids.  I don't know what Zoe is going to do when she starts going dark!

Lately, Zoe has been vehement that she is going to live with me for the rest of her life.  According to her, she isn't going to ever have a boyfriend {my dad told me I should record her saying that for blackmail later}, she doesn't want kids, and her latest is that she doesn't want to go to college either because she won't need a job since she is going to live me with forever. She talks about this often. The other day we were out for a girls day with my mom and aunt and she told them her plan of living with me forever.  She said, "I'm going to live with  mommy until I die." So I asked her, "What if I die first?" Her response.  "Then I will go in the ground with you." Bring on the tears!! I think I gave her the biggest hug ever after that one and proceeded to quickly change the subject. SUBSCRIBE to never miss a piece of chocolate Be Sweet, Follow Mel on Twitter

I was cleaning out my drafts and found these kid conversations that I hadn't shared yet.  They took place quite awhile ago, but still made me chuckle so hopefully they will put a smile on your face today, too! Dylan: You don't have to get that much stuff ready.  It's not like we are going to Texas. Daddy: That's where mommy wanted to go on vacation. Dylan: Why?  She doesn't even speak Texas. Me: Umm what language does Texas speak? Dylan:   I don't know.. YeeeeHaaawwww?! Aunt Steph: What is this? {showing a $5 bill} Zoe: A dollar.  Aunt Steph: No, look at the number. Zoe: Oh, it's 5 dollars. Aunt Steph: Good, now what's this {she shows her another $5 bill} Zoe: 5 dollars Aunt Steph: Yes, so now what do you have {she puts the fives togther} Zoe: Two five dollars. or as some may say $10 {which was what Aunt Steph was looking for!} SUBSCRIBE to never miss a piece of chocolate Be Sweet, Follow Mel on Twitter

{ Photo Credit } The other day when Dylan asked when we had to go back to school, I told him the day after Labor day.  The next question was, of course, what's Labor Day? Do you know I couldn't answer him? Some teacher I am.  Now I wasn't totally clueless.  I mean using semantics I knew that it had to do with working.  Plus since it is a holiday then that would mean a day of relaxing and celebrating.  So putting it together, I told him that Labor Day is a day for relaxing and celebrating because you work so hard all the rest of the year.  But, then I started feeling some mommy guilt.  Here I am celebrating a holiday that I don't even really know why I'm celebrating.  So Google and Wikipedia to the rescue. According to Wikipedia : Labor Day is a United States federal holiday observed on the first Monday in September (September 6 in 2010). The first Labor Day in the United States was celebrated on September 5, 1882 in New York City...

The other day my mom and I took the kiddos to see Toy Story 3.  I had heard great things about the movie and well, Toy Story was a Pixar fave of mine {love Mr. Potato Head and the T-Rex} so I was pretty excited to see it myself.  I wasn't disappointed either.  There were some hilarious one-liners and quite a few scenes that made me laugh aloud.  Definitely a fantastic family movie! But, really I'm not here to write a review. Rather I'm writing to share the interesting conversation I had with Dylan and Zoe that was brought about from the movie. First a little background info. Today is cleaning day. I thought why not take a lesson from Andy's mom so I asked the kids if while they were cleaning they wanted to sort their toys into trash, attic, and giveaway piles.  Of course they weren't having any of that.  Dylan's response was, "But mom we're not going to college...not yet anyways."  Now Zoe has been saying for quite awhile how she is alwa...

Dylan had a special mystery night at school at the end of the year and it so happened it was the same night as Zoe's preschool graduation.  It was the first time I had to decide between my two kids and it stunk!! I didn't know how I was going to choose one over the other.   Dylan at first said he didn't need to go to his event {such a fantastic big brother he is}, but when I mentioned this to his teacher she told me she understood, but was disappointed because Dylan was going to receive an award that night.   Great.  Mommyguilt.   Gotta love it!  So my parents came to the rescue and took Dylan to his program while Dave and I attended Zoe's.  My parents recently moved near us so it was their first time visiting Dyl's school for a function so he was pretty excited to show everything off for them.  When we picked him up later this was our conversation. ME:  Dyl, did you get a special award tonight? Dylan: Yeah. M...

Why is it that week days crawl and weekends fly? The weekend just passed me right on by before I could even put my thoughts together to schedule a few posts for this week.   Here's a funny story for you though courtesy of my 5 year old daughter.   This weekend was the FitBloggin conference in Baltimore and since I was staying the weekend, I was leaving straight from my school.  That meant that daddy had daycare pick up duty on Friday.  Now Zoe always does better when she knows the plans ahead of time so we had been telling her all week that I was going to run a race in Baltimore and was staying in a hotel so daddy would be picking her up on Friday.  She was good to go and everything was fine. Then came the drop off on Friday. Me - "Remember Daddy will be picking you up today and I will see you on Sunday." Zoe - "Ok, I remember" Ms. A {Zoe's teacher} - "So Daddy gets to pick you up today.  That's nice." Zoe - "Yes, daddy ...

I'm always curious to hear about Zoe's day when I pick her up from daycare. Some kid always does something shocking like hits another friend, or takes a toy, or says a potty word that Zoe is always eager to share. Oh and there is always the days when she tells me her friend was sick and threw up everywhere in the room...love hearing those stories. But, I was not prepared when she got in the car the other day and right off the bat asks me if I had my belly button pierced. I asked her why she was asking and she told me that one of her friends mom's just got her belly button pierced and she was talking about it at school. Well then. I did answer her question and some of you may be surprised to hear this too, but yes, I told her, I used to have my belly button pierced. I went on to tell her that I took it out when I was pregnant with Dylan, then under my breath finished the sentence saying how now instead of a cute little hoop I have stretch mark decorating my tummy. Zoe ...

One of my favorite things about kids is how they just say things the way they see them. The other day Dylan and I were on our way home from school listening to the news about Haiti. It was a few days after the horrific earthquake and the news was not good at all. After listening to the report Dylan made the comment, "Wow mom, God must really be angry with the people in Haiti." Silence. How do you respond to that? In his eyes, God allowed that earthquake to happen as a consequence for their actions. Pretty deep thinking for a 9 year old. Rather than dwelling on the idea that God was punishing the people I steered the conversation down the path that perhaps He was trying to teach people like us a lesson. Here we are sitting in our solid homes, pretty healthy, wearing comfy clothes, while eating three meals and multiple snacks. Maybe the earthquake was OUR wake-up call to help those more unfortunate than ourselves. Society today is all about gimme, gimme and maybe we neede...

First the sweet... When we were in New York last weekend the doors to St. Patrick's Cathedral were open so we took a minute to step inside. It is an absolutely gorgeous church and you can't help but become mesmerized with the beauty. There were many places where you light candles and Dylan wanted to know why there were so many candles and what they were for. I explained that people light candles to signify sending a prayer for a loved one (I am not Catholic so I hope I got that right). He thoughtfully stood still for a second and then asked if he could light one for Mako since he was thinking about him. He asked it so quietly and with such love that it completely stopped me in my tracks. I was so choked up that my little boy would be so thoughtful that I couldn't really respond. Thankfully, my mom in law was with me and came to my rescue telling him what a nice thought that was. In the end we didn't light the candle, but I'm sure Mako could feel all the love Dylan...

Zoe has been very frustrated with herself because she can't read. She knows the words say something and often she just makes up her own stories which I always tell her is a way of reading, but other times she gets mad because she wants to know what they really say. I have been trying to make some time everyday to work with her on reading and of course we read books together as much as possible. Her favorite thing lately is to cuddle up with Dylan and ask him to read his homework book with her. The other night I snuggled with both of them for their regular reading time. I was so proud of what I heard... D - " Ok Zoe tonight the book is called 'Smokey'. Before we read we have to make some predictions. Look at the cover. What do you think the story is going to be about? Z - "I see a train." D - "Good job, Zoe. You are right it is about a train. Look at where the train is. What do you predict is going to happen to the train." Z - "The tr...