Allow Me To Humor You

August is almost over, and as I sat and reflected today about how well our first month back to school has gone, I had to chuckle at a few moments that come to mind that were good ideas gone bad. As I look at the titles of my August posts....there is a bigger untold picture.

Salt & Corn Meal Pies: They are fun, and they do keep the kids busy. But leave the kids for too long unsupervised with the stuff and they can be dangerous. This month Jack and Grace decided to DUMP their cornmeal pies down the heating vent. Luckily our vent does not go straight down, but has an elbow in it, so I tried my best to vacuum most of it up. However, there is now a constant film of cornmeal dust on every flat surface in the playroom since the remaining cornmeal residue floats up out of the air vent every time the air conditioning turns on.

Embossing: While we did have trays underneath all of our embossing projects, at one point, Grace must have moved her paper off the tray, heating off the lovely finish on our Pottery Barn kids table. There is now, and forever will be, a melted patch of finish on the top of the table.

The 10 Gallon Bug Tank: Remember our last additions? The grasshopper and the cockroach. I'm not sure anyone noticed, but I never mentioned the release of the cockroach. That is because I didn't. The thought of locating and trying to catch the two inch giant, just didn't go over well with me at the time of the release date for all of the bugs. So...yep...the poor ugly giant cockroach is still somewhere in that tank, probably dead. I still can't make myself look for it.

I Am The Ultimate Dork Mom

My children have the ultimate Dork Mom. I can prove it to you.

For my birthday (I'll be 32), I asked for a microscope. How dorky is that??? What's even dorkier, is that I think this could be the best birthday gift ever! My birthday isn't until September, but since this was going to be a major science apparatus for our Fish & Crustacean study, I got to open it last night.

This microscope is a techno-geek dream. If there are any other techno-geek moms, first I'd love to hear from you, and second, if you don't already have this, you've got to get it. I'm referring to the DM-52 Digital Microscope. This is the answer to the age old problem of young children and microscope viewing. Plug this puppy into your laptop or computer and you've got an instant big screen look at whatever is on the slide - perfect clarity.

Not only that, but you can capture the image and save it as a .jpg on your computer for printing later. You can even create video.

Ken and I sat for the better part of almost two hours looking through slides last night. (I'm not the only techno-geek)

This was well worth the investment, and I can't say enough about the freebies the vendor throws in! Visit http://www.microscopeworld.com

The Night Before Kindergarten...

It is safe to say that there is heavy anticipation for Monday morning in the house. And I am pleased that we were able to successfully achieve it - thanks to a little idea from Dad.

Throughout the county, children will be hopping on school buses and heading for their first day to school. For kindergarten, this is an especially important and excitedly nervous moment. I really wanted Grace to be able to share some of that excitement with her own school aged friends, which is why we decided to take a two week break from school and begin the new term when school started in the county.

What helped to achieve the excitement though, was while Grace and Jack could see what new purchases Mommy was pulling out of packages and boxes for the new term, they could not handle or play with them. And in the mornings, when Mom and Dad were still asleep, the playroom has been locked, to prevent any temptation to take a closer look. This has become the equivalent of putting a bunch of slowly unwrapped Christmas presents under the tree and not allowing the children to touch or play with them. Just look, drool and dream.

Grace's last words tonight in bed were, "I can't wait until I can play with all of the new school stuff tomorrow." I can't wait either.