if food doesn't do it....

......ROCK OUT!

therapy

It hasn't been the best week here in our house. And what does an Italian mother do when she wants to cheer up her kids....feeds them.

Celeste showed up bright and early Friday morning for a day of cooking. She unloaded groceries and all her cooking gadgets that I don't own.

After she got the sauce going, we got to work on the pasta making! I've made pasta with Celeste before but it always amazes me how a little flour, egg, and olive oil turns into a pound of fabulous pasta.

By this time, the house smelled amazing. We have pasta hanging and drying. We have made a cannelinni appetizer. We have dipped some fabulous bread in the sauce (just to make sure it is edible).

Bellissimo!

I don't know how I missed it but ended up without a picture of the HUGE pot of sauce. Here is the bottom of the pot after we took out what was needed for dinner and then packaged 12 bags for the freezer. Nothing like a fun day of cooking and a dinner full of comfort food! Thanks Celeste!

mean green machine

round and round she goes

she's here! she's here!

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{natasha, carly, julie....natasha's homecoming Feb 17}

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Carly has been saving her money for a while. Initially she was saving for a bed for Julie but Santa came to the rescue. Then she decided she wanted a friend for Julie. With the recent addition of some birthday money and some Valentine money and MamMam kicking in the money for shipping, Carly was able to go shopping.

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And here she is....

Natasha.

I don't know where "Natasha" came from. Carly is really excited that she thinks Natasha looks like here. But when I asked where the name Natasha came from, she said "because she looks like a Natasha". Does that mean she thinks she looks like a "Natasha"?

goodwill flowers

A new Goodwill store opened in our town, and being ones to not miss out on some second hand finds (you never know there could be treasures) we went to check it out. Overall it was a bust. We decided that you would just have to be there when the right person decided to clean out their attic.

What Mom did find was a few children's books all .25. One of which was a Hello Kitty art book with projects using pipe cleaners (chenille sticks). Mom declared it full of afternoon fun, and we left Goodwill for the Dollar Tree for a bag of pipe cleaners.

How can you go wrong with $1.25 invested in an afternoon art project?

Mom and Carly got all the supplies gathered and spread all over the counter. Besides pipe cleaners we discovered we could use some pompoms, beads, and glue.

They made butterflies that turned into pencil toppers. They made a dragonfly and a snail. They made jewelry. And, they made lots of flowers.

Here is my "vase" of flowers now at home on the refrigerator.

love bugs, hearts and candy

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I had volunteered to lead the Valentine Party. That is when I realized that it was the same day as the chapel program. Which meant that mom was going to be here. Which meant SHE could lead the art activity! So, MamMam was the star visitor at the Valentine Party. She brought the idea and supplies to make love bugs. They turned out super cute and it was really fun to see all the kids personalities in their art. .

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Of course, there were mail bags full of cards and treats. Carly wanted to "buy" valentines this year. So she took Pixie Stik Valentine cards. I tried to tell her that we could make them that in fact I had made them before but she wanted to "buy" her cards.

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As much as I love good mail, I guess I have to understand how much fun it is to dig in that bag of goodies from their classmates.

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Carly and her friend, Miss C

For God so Loved the World

Friday was Carly's 3rd grade chapel program. The title was "For God So Loved the World" - lessons about loving God and one another.

The skit was about a boy in the 3rd grade who is bullied to be mean to a new girl in his class. He talks to his mom & dad and his preacher about what he should do. There are lots of lessons about how we should treat each other.

There were several examples of love from the Bible. Carly played Naomi demonstrating the love her daughters showed her.

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They did a good job and were all super cute!

Carly is on the back row in the center, third from the right.

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Carly had her own cheering section.

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{romantic} SPT

Lelly's SPT challenge this week was

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"I think it would be romantic to....."

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take a gondola ride in Venice

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now THAT'S romantic!

emily post would be proud

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Carly made a list of birthday thank you notes that she needed to write.

We chose pictures to use (a la Jill) and she wrote her notes all by herself. They were short but heartfelt and sweet.

We dropped all 7 in the mail today.

She loved the card idea and told me we needed a picture for the blog.

So she lined them up and snapped one for us.

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birthday good mail

thank you

Aunt Kacey!

birthday visitors

Nonna and D came to town to take the birthday girl (and her parents) out for lunch. We went back to La Siesta for a little Mexican food. They surprised Carly by bringing her friend Miss M with them.

There was more present opening.

Miss M brought Carly a cupcake shaped bath fizz. D's card for Carly had a little spending money in it. There was also some really cute tennis outfits, a rain jacket, and a gift certificate to Books-a-Million.

what could she possibly need?

nothing. absolutely nothing.

Kenny and I gave her an "in-n-out" movie bucket. For the "in" part, popcorn, candy and the DVD Charlie and Chocolate Factory. For the "out" part, a gift card for the movie theater.

We also gave her a sundress with an IOU for yellow box flip flops to match. Gabby gave her orange converse sneakers for Julie (AG doll).

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Happy 9th Birthday, Sweet Girl!

birthday guest

Miss M was Carly's overnight guest. They were both really excited. I picked them up from school and we went to the house to change clothes. Carly opened her present from Miss M which was a super cute charm bracelet that matched hers. Miss M's mom made them matching scarves. How cute are they (the scarves and the girls)?

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We went to the movie and saw Hotel for Dogs. It was cute, funny, sad, age appropriate with a happy ending. You can't ask for much more. Well, diet coke and popcorn but we had that too.

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After the movie, they chose to go to the bookstore which I thought was great. They had a great time exploring, finding books, and reading.

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After the bookstore, we went to La Siesta. Initially it was for dinner but we had already eaten popcorn and nobody was very hungry. We had chips, salsa and cheese dip.

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Next, was back home for birthday cake and ice cream. I told Miss M's mom that I promised if I was responsible for her daughter again I would feed her a real meal with fruits and veggies.

Carly also had a stack of good mail to open. She got cards from Finn, To-To & Unc, Aunt Kacey, Mam-Mam & Grandaddy (which included the traditional $9 and don't think she had forgotten about that).

She also got a package from Uncle Beege, Aunt Libba and JC. It had a beautiful and sweet little silver star necklace. Carly thought it was very big girl looking.

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We had a great girls' night.