Project Life 11/27-12/3

This is the last of the catch-up. Although Christmas is right around the corner so I have a feeling I will have to do more catch-up in the near future.

Tuesday-Ususally I run errands on Monday but because we were in Cincinnati I didn't run them until Tuesday. In a quick dash I was able to complete 85% of my Christmas shopping. I did not, however, buy anything from this display despite it's prettiness. 

Wednesday-This is what you look like after a long day, part of which was a meeting with school administration to discuss why your child isn't progressing in reading. 

Thursday-This is a what a test looks like when his teachers actually implement his accommodations. 

Friday-Allie spends as much time possible on my lap. So this is a typical view for me. And yes, I had laundry to fold as well.

Saturday-we went to a nearby tree farm and cut our Christmas tree. It's smallish, around 6 feet which is the perfect size for us.

Sunday-In years past we would count down to Christmas with loops, every loop having a little activity on it. This year we decided to do Random Acts of Kindness instead. Then we decided instead of doing one a day we would just sit down and plan/do as much as we could in one sitting. So that's what we did. We took turns choosing what to do and ended up with a list of 20 things. Some costing money and some being free. One of Aiden's choices was to donate money to help stock a fishing pond in a third world country. He really wanted to buy a milking goat but settled for the fish. :)

Monday-Dinner. Lasagna with mushrooms and spinach. The boys had ravioli. 

PS-We received word yesterday that Aiden has been accepted at Springer in Cincinnati so now the real fun begins. Job hunting, house selling, house buying, etc.

Project Life 11/20-11/26

Guess what. I'm still catching up :) Here's Thanksgiving week.

Tuesday: Notes for our IEP. Version 3548. Seriously. We wrote and changed and moved things around over and over again. It felt endless but I'm glad we were so prepared. 

Wednesday: Chris with Allie. Because I realized right before I went to bed that I hadn't taken a picture yet :)

On Thursday we drove most of the day, about 9 hours, to visit my parents. That night was early Black Friday deals at Wal-Mart. One of the games Zach wants for Christmas was $25 instead of $60 so we went. 

What you can't really tell from this picture was how many, many people were there staked out around the games. It was crazy. As soon as they dropped the ropes everyone rushed the displays. The sound was like nothing I'd heard before...this whoosh. Chris and I stayed back looking at each other and laughing. 

After a few minutes I was able to sneak in and grab the game. Yay me.

Did I mention it was crazy?

On Friday we actually had our Thanksgiving meal but Chris and I both forgot to take pictures. 

Aiden started celebrating his birthday early by opening a present from my parents. 

Have you seen this game? I hadn't but it's a lot of fun. There are 5 different games you can play, either one player or two. Aiden likes to play on his own but Zach enjoys some competition. 

And the celebration of Aiden continues on Saturday with more present opening. These glasses were from Chris and I, I found them at Michaels. They wind up and the mustache and eyebrows for up and down. Just something silly for fun.

Sunday was officially Aiden's birthday. Here's my 9 (!) year old boy. We headed out to Cincinnati early Sunday morning so we could do a few things there before our meeting at Springer on Monday.

Monday was our meeting at Springer but there aren't any pictures to prove it. Chris and I both had a lot on our minds and we both spaced on a picture.

When we got home there were more birthday presents for Aiden. :)

Project Life 11/13-11/19

Still trying to catch up. Here's a recap of the middle of November.

On Tuesday we had our first snow of the season. It melted pretty quick with the 50 degrees we had soon after that. This kind of snow, the light/pretty/doesn't stick around snow, I can deal with.

On Wednesday Aiden was able to go to the school book fair. He picked out a book about dogs that play baseball. Look, Buster is one of the players :) 

Thursday was the Open House at Aiden's school. Mostly it was a chance to run around the school saying Hi to friends and then going to the cafeteria for ice cream.

I spent gobs of hours this week painting the trim upstairs. 5 coats of paint later this is what it looked like on Friday. All that time painting was so worth it.

I don't know why but on Saturday I decided to bake. While the banana bread was in the oven the pumpkin cake waited patiently for its turn.

On Sunday I attempted Christmas card pictures. I ended up with a lot like these. Sigh. I did get one good one after I told them there wouldn't be any electronic time until I got a picture I could use.

After all that time painting with the doors off all the closets and rooms I realized that the linen closet needed a little reorganization so on Monday I worked on that. Scrubbed the shelves, purged and then put everything back. Much better.

Project life 11/6-11/12

I'm quite a bit behind on my weekly picture posts but I'm determined to catch up so without further ado here is November 6th-November 12th.

Tuesday- More scanning of pictures. This task truly felt never ending but so full of gems I couldn't just stop and not keep going just because it was so overwhelming. This is my dad, at 18 or so. He looks so young!

Again, not being able to rotate. Ugg!!!

Wednesday-This was my last day of scanning. So happy to be able to cross this project off my list. This was Chris at 3, 4 maybe. Love that cheesy smile, I've seen the boys make the same face.

Thursday-The Elementary School had Parent-Teacher conferences Thursday and Friday so Aiden was home with me. We went to the library on Thursday so he could check out some books before we ran a few short errands. I loved spending one on one time with my sweet boy.

On Friday Chris and I had a date night to a movie. All about Dyslexia :) You know you are freaked out when even your date nights revolve around your child's struggles. 

The movie was really good, informative without being dry. The guy who made it was there and they had a panel discussion after the movie. Chris and I made a lot of contacts that night, people who helped/are helping us. 

Saturday-For Aiden's birthday this year he chose to have one friend over for a movie. I don't have her parents permission for her to be on my little blog so I chose the one picture without her in it. They had fun, what's not to love about popcorn, cupcakes, ice cream and watching Lilo and Stitch with a friend?

Sunday-My mom quilts. I sew but don't quilt. It just always seemed like so much work. So precise, and so many of my projects are just a bit wonky. But after awhile I decided to try a very (very) basic quilt for the guest bedroom. On Sunday I ironed all of the squares I had cut out--all 132 of them. That's a lot of squares :)

Monday-Zach is refusing to buy long sleeve shirts. I'm not sure why except he's 11 and picky. So when it finally turned cold he decided that he would just wear a coat to dinner. Sigh. 

PS-See how that coat is just a bit big on Zach but not huge. It's Chris' coat and the other day Chris accidentally wore one of Zach's shirts around for most of the day. How did I end up with an adult sized child in my house?