Pumpkin Fun!

On Sunday my kids tackled their pumpkin carving! Such a fun tradition...

All three decided to go their own way.

Oldest recreated the USA Wrestling Logo --- his pumpkin turned out to be SUPER thick and shading it was really hard!

Muppet Boy, surprise, surprise, went for Kermit on his beloved Boo Pumpkin

The Little Guy picked a weird and wart pumpkin and transformed it into...
Jack the Pumpkin King!

(with some help from Dad)

Happy Halloween!

Just a Little Heart Attack

I just ran across this the other day and need to share it.

HEART DISEASE IN WOMEN:

More fatal than any other disease

• Heart disease is the leading cause of death of American women, killing more than a third of them.[1]
• 35.3% of deaths in American women over the age of 20, or more than 432,000, are caused by cardiovascular disease each year.[1]
• More than 200,000 women die each year from heart attacks- five times as many women as breast cancer.[1]
• More than 159,000 women die each year of congestive heart failure, accounting for 56.3% of all heart failure deaths.[1]

Who is at-risk?

• Cigarette smoking results in a 2-3 times increased risk of dying from heart disease.[1]
• 48% of adult women have a total cholesterol of at least 200mg/dL.[1]
• 50% of Caucasian women, 64% of African-American women, 60% of Hispanic women, and 53% of Asian/Pacific Islander women are sedentary and get no leisure time physical activity.[1]
• 58% of Caucasian women, 80% of African-American women, and 74% Hispanic-American women are overweight or obese.[1]
• Women with diabetes are 2.5 times more likely to have heart attacks.[1]

Affects more women than men

• More women than men die of heart disease each year.[1]
• 23% of women and 18% of men will die within one year of a first recognized heart attack; 22-32% of women and 15-27% of men heart attack survivors will die within five years.[1]
• 12-25% of women and 7-22% of men heart attack survivors will be diagnosed with heart failure within five years.[1]
• Women are less likely than men to receive appropriate treatment after a heart attack.[1]
• Women comprise only 27% of participants in all heart-related research studies.[2]
  Fact sheet from WomenHeart.org

Ladies, love you hearts!

Visit Go Red for Women for more info.

Pumpkin Patch

Friday, the younger boys had no school - a great day to kick off Fall Break.

So, we decided to pack up in the car and head for the Pumpkin Patch - almost an hour away. As we were leaving I realized that the little guy was wearing Sandals... I went home and made him change back into tennis shoes. Good idea, right?

But I should have had him get a coat. And mittens.

As we neared the pumpkin patch, ominous dark clouds loomed overhead. It got darker and colder the closer we got. We had jackets with us. But just lightweight ones.

As we crested the hill that leads to the valley where we pick apples and pumpkins, it began to rain.

And the temperature dropped below 40.

But we had driven an hour! And it had to pass! And they would have hot beverages, surely....

So we went on to the Pumpkin Patch.

Where it continued to rain. And was freezing. And the APPLE ORCHARD was OUT of apple cider! (We did talk the girl into making us some cocoa but then we had to wait around for the water to boil! SLOWLY!)

We decided to brave it, donned ponchos from the car and climbed onto the dripping, muddy haywagon.

We marched into the muddy pumpkin field, carrying warm cocoa cups... and ready to make the best of it.

We found pumpkins and turned around for the trip back up to the shops in record time! (Cold is a good motivator).... we loaded into our car, all of us ditching our muddy shoes into a pile on top of a used poncho) and headed back home....

As soon as we turned back onto the highway, the rain stopped. The sun came out and it warmed up. NOT FAIR!

Oh well, pumpkins acquired!

Back to Christmas

OK I honestly cannot stop scrapping Christmas pages! I have SO many Christmas pics, and yes, I also do Journal Your Christmas... and I have separate Christmas albums. What can I say - I'm a little but Christmas CRAZY!

These photos are from the Little Guy's Preschool Christmas program, why yes, he is currently in second grade. I told you I NEED to scrap Christmas! Some old WRMK Christmas papers, a little stitching, some Mr. Huey and a title from my Silhouette. Simple layout, but I really like it!

Basic Grey: Oxford

I recently came across a good selection of the papers from Basic Grey's Oxford Collection on clearance. Why did I not find this line sooner? It's masculine and fun without being little boy! Love it!

Grabbed it and put together a couple of layouts.

This first layout shows Muppet Boy's Webelo den -- testing the strength of their popsicle stick bridges while working on the Engineer Activity Badges -- there's also a little bit of Origins and some other even older BG school line here. For this one I turned to Pagemaps.  for some sketch inspiration.

Yes, another scout layout done! Hopefully I will finish Muppet Boy's Cub Scout album sometime before I have to tackle his Eagle Scout albums, unlike Oldest! (See Oldest in these pics? He was the Den Chief for Muppet Boy's Den)

Speaking of Oldest, here's a page featuring his induction to the National Honor Society back in his Sophomore year (now he's a Senior!) Seriously, how can you not love these papers?  and these Thickers, too!

Eagle Courts

All three of our boys are involved in Scouting (I bet you already knew that!)

Oldest is an Eagle Scout. Muppet Boy is a Tenderfoot. The Little Guy is a Wolf-Cub Scout.

A lot of Oldest's friends have earned Eagle Scout, and I try to put most of their Eagle Courts into his Scout album. In general, most Eagle pages in his album are done in Red, White and Blue. Here are three Eagle Court pages, all using WRMK Yankee Doodles papers

For this one, I started with Sketch Savvy #87  The big black square blocks out the recipient's name. And the journal block is blank because I'm hoping Oldest will fill it in himself. The pics are super silly by tradition among this particular group of boys. My favorite is the "Prom pic" at top Right. They're sooooo goofy.

 This one was Sketch Savvy 88  The pics are a little more serious on this one. Different composition of boys from the same troop. I love this CTMH Eagle Stamp from the "Hero" set.

And here's one more using Sketch Savvy #92 - same papers, same stamps... same idea.

Three more Scout album pages, done.

Happy Birthdays to You!

Here's a couple of layouts focused on Birthday-parties gone by. Yes, they're not Christmas but they're still theme-y.

In these photos,  Muppet Boy was turning SEVEN. He is now ELEVEN!!! But back when he was seven, he wanted a "Chinese Dragon" themed birthday party - so we had one complete with Chinese Dragon pinata!! (and yes, I did make that AWESOME cake!) The papers here are Graphic 45 Bird Song which I absolutely ADORE and some Jenni Bowlin Core'dinations.

Was the Muppet Boy really once so little? And does this mean that the Little Guy will soon be eleven, instead of seven? Oh time! Stand still! Slow Down!

While these photos are more recent than 2008, they are still from 2011. The Little Guy's 6th birthday party was a Wild Birthday Rumpus! We ate monster cupcakes, batted at the Monster pinata and had a massive Silly String battle! These papers are from Close To My Heart Hooligans line (which is older but I did buy them with these photos in mind!), and so are the stickers and the little felties (which are so darned cute)! The sewing was done with the help of my Sew Easy from WRMK. And of course the sketch came from Sketch Savvy.

Brotherly Love

I swear I do still scrapbook things other than Christmas!

For example, here's a fun "Brother love" page featuring Muppet Boy and the Little Guy:

See it's all cheerful and yellow, not Christmassy! The pic is of the younger two boys at the Cheesecake Factory (who can be unhappy at the Cheesecake Factory?) A little mist, some hexagons, stitching, mixed alphas... Lots of fun!

What's in YOUR lunchbox?

 

Around this time last year, I posted about my endeavors in school lunch packing.  Pretty much before that point all of my kids had eaten hot lunch at school or been responsible for packing their own... but changes in schedule and the fact that the Little Guy wouldn't EAT most of the school lunches, led to beginning to pack school lunches. At the beginning I was really impressed by all the bento amazingness other folks were packing in their kids' lunchboxes (Still am!) but after a while, I concluded that was a little too ambitious for me! But still - I did decide to go with mostly reusable.

My kids get fruit and vegetables and unexciting stuff like ham sandwiches and peanut butter.... and leftovers, and macaroni and soup in their thermoses and whatever else I think to put in there. At first I found this really difficult but as time has gone by, it's gotten easier and they EAT their lunches!

Things we use for packing lunches regularly include Ziploc, Rubbermaid and Hefty Reusable Containers (available at Target, Walmart and pretty much everywhere else.) The kids have Thermos Food Jars and Snack Jars. We have reusable bags from Re-Pac bags, Munchkin and Disney. And the sporks are ever present and ever-useful! Plus fun stuff like Star Wars sandwich cutters, Japanese Cookies, European Crisps shaped liked ghosts, etc. to make each lunch a little more interesting. 

Another Catch-Up Post!

The later part of September got away from me... Things were very hectic around here. Lots of dental appointments and running hither and thither.

But here's a quick glimpse of things we've been up to!

 Bowling with the Cub Scouts

 Playing Artemis with Friends of all ages!

 Riding the Cripple Creek Narrow Gauge Railroad with my Folks

 Checking out Fall Foliage

Homecoming Dance for the Oldest.

Plus DH surprised me with a trip to Europe next month! So we've been busy, busy planning for that!