Bus Driver Appreciation Week!

Go ahead and roll your eyes now.  I got the email from the PTO that this week was Bus Driver Appreciation Week.  I love that stuff!!  Unfortunately, they didn't send it to me until Wednesday in the middle of said week, so I didn't have the opportunity to do a little something each day or to at least start Ms. Terry's week off right.  Oh well.  Do what you can, right?  So, I hit my favorite site and found something cute and do-able with the boy.  Found something, but unfortunately, the blog it came from is by invitation only, so I guessed at most of it and decided to blog it myself.  I got a large chocolate bar and wrapped it in a piece of yellow card stock.  Then we decorated it to look like a bus with a special message!  To be delivered tomorrow morning!

A Boy Moment

Haven't posted in a while, because I haven't really had anything to say, but i do have some pics to share...just a little amusing.

So tired.......

Another great use for the Moby Wrap!  This was not in the instruction book for possible configurations, but we discovered it and thought we'd share!  This works similar to the "get along" shirt.  Happy wrapping!

Pumpkin Chicken Stew

So, I was in the mood for something seasonal and on a whim I bought 2 cans of pumpkin puree.  What to do?  What to do?  Oh yeah, consult Pintrest.  Accept, everything i found had ingredients I didn't currently have and I'm sick right now, so I'm not going out.  After a little browsing, i figured, what the heck, I'll put a bunch of stuff in the crock pot and see what happens.  Turned out pretty good.  The hubby, of course, needed some salt, but said it was pretty good.

All amounts are subject to whatever you have in your fridge/freezer, so I'll just say what i put in, but do what you want!

3 ears corn - kernels cut off (canned or frozen would probably be just fine, but i had this frozen from the summer)
4 carrots
1 big squash
half a bag of frozen peas
mushrooms
1 onion
1 can pumpkin
1 can diced tomatoes
salt
garlic powder
oregano
chili powder
half a box of turkey stock
cooked rice
4 boneless skinless chicken breasts

slice, cut, chop up all the veggies.  Put them in the crock pot.  Place the chicken breasts on top.  pour the tomatoes and pumpkin over the top.  add the spices/seasonings.  Pour the stock over everything.  Turn on high for 4-5 hours.  Turn/stir occasionally.  the chicken will start to fall apart by the time you are ready to serve.  Serve over rice.

Angry Birds Birthday!

My Mikey (wants to be called Michael now, but Mommy just can't seem to remember) turned 6 today!  Last year he chose Angry Birds for his theme, so all year we've been saving boxes and planning towards this big day.  I think it went pretty well and was a perfect excuse for some little boys (and some big boys!) to take out some aggression and expend some energy too!  As usual, I'll explain what I did with the pics.

 Started collecting boxes......a year ago.  This is the only pic that came out, so you are only getting to see a very small pile.......we had 23 boxes, in the end, designated for angry birds

...And i started wrapping.  Now, I've had a bit of time on my hands being on maternity leave, however, it still took me a few days.  Very therapeutic actually, turn on Rachel or The View and just start wrapping.  I wanted them to look like the game pieces somewhat, so we wrapped them in brown packing paper.  I'd suggest going to staples instead of the post office for the paper.  About $5 a roll and i used almost 3 rolls.  The post office has it for much more and a lot less on the roll.

The pigs...what to use? what to use?  Well, how about gallon milk jugs since my family goes through 2-3 a week.

Paint them green.  There has been some discussion as to whether this was the appropriate shade of green, however, it's the color I had leftover from the boys' wall murals.....so camo-yucky green it is.


let dry and then draw on faces.  ta-da!


For the birds, we decided 3 red birds was perfectly fine.  No need to go crazy with all the different types.  We found these balls at Five Below.  They are the kind i remember from gym class.  Plain old smelly rubber balls.  I painted the white part and used a black sharpie for the rest of the face.

PLAY TIME!!

We started out with the idea that an adult would build the first set with 6 boxes.  Then Mikey, birthday boy, would take his turn and throw all 3 balls.  Then he would get to choose any 6 boxes and build for the next kid and so on and so forth.....this worked......for a while...

 

 Then the dads got involved and decided it wasn't challenging enough and we needed to try to use all 23 boxes each time...........I have to admit, this at least allowed for much better pics!!

 

Food:  usually I go all out on food.  However, this time, having just had a baby, we kept it simple.  Decided to go with pizza and snacky food.  Mikey actually had a school math project to plan a party on $45.  he had to go through store adds and figure out what he could get.  he did pretty well, but whoever set that assignment definitely intended for an Aldi shopper! (good thing we are).  So, pizza, BBQ cocktail franks, Doritos, cheese puffs, carrots, and root beer and orange ice cream floats.

The cake was done by my fabulous sister!  It was a green pig and super cute!  Apparently, though, a picture of it was not taken with my camera, so i will need to wait for the pics to be uploaded by someone else.  So, to be posted!