Random fall stuff

I love the blog http://jamieivey.com and especially her weekly podcasts. I always feel like I have just sat down with my own friends for happy hour after listen to her! From her website, she inspired me to make these goody bags for the kids teachers the Friday of their first week of school- 

I also copied one of her ideas and sent in a teacher favorites questionnaire (I've gotta know what they like and don't like for future gift giving, right?) along with this letter to each of the kids teachers- 

Dear Mrs. Dreesbach,

We are so excited that Tate has you as his teacher this year!  He is super excited about art, music, social studies and science. We just moved to the area, from California, this summer; so Tate is a brand new student to Old Bridge Elementary.  We want you to know that we are here to support you and help you this year. 

I would love to volunteer in your classroom or whatever else you need, just let me know.  We would be happy to help you with projects or field trips as well.  We want to support you in your efforts this year as you teach Tate each day!

We want you to know that we will be praying for you as you give yourself to our child, and all their classmates, each day of the school year.  We are thankful for all you do and know that teaching is not an easy job.

We also want to be a blessing to you in any way that we can.  Should you find that you need any craft items from our house, such as old magazines, fabric scraps, toilet paper rolls, buttons, please just let me know. I am happy to come into the classroom at least one morning or afternoon each week to assist you however you need help. My contact info is below.

We are looking forward to a wonderful school year ahead for Tate!

 My friend Allyson inspired me to try to make my own pizza dough- 

Will it rise?? (Crazy that I'm 37, a homemaker by trade these days and I've never messed with yeast!)

It worked!

That's the kids pizza above, and here is our pizza-

They were amazing!

Macy has started dance- ballet and tap

I saw this sticker on a car in our neighborhood recently and immediately wanted to slash their tires-

Not sure if I've ever shared here that I make the kids play dough... I hate the smell of the store bought kind and since Tate was about 18 months, I've just made it instead.

I like to make a double batch, dye it with food coloring, add some extracts for different scents (peppermint, orange, etc) and you could of course add glitter if you wanted even. Not me. Too messy.

And since this blog is as much for me as it is you (is anyone even out there reading this??) here is the recipe. Because I find myself referring back to this blog so often looking for a recipe or what we did two years ago on Memorial Day... So someday when I lose my play dough recipe, it will be here from now on:

1 cup flour
1/2 cup salt
2 teaspoons cream of tartar
1 cup water
1 tablespoon oil

mix dry ingreiendts in a saucepan. Add wet ingredients while stirring over low heat. Continue cooking and stirring until it thickens and pulls away from the side of the pan. Knead, add in color/scent and store in ziplock bags for 6+ months

It's the best stuff... It is so easy and cheap. I got the recipe 7+ years ago from a mommy and me playgroup Tate and I went to in Monterey, and we have never been without homemade play dough in the cabinet since...

Tate is playing flag football this year and boy was I psyched when he got placed on the Patriots team! He wasn't so excited, since he has been brainwashed by his daddy. But Macy and I know what to wear to games every Saturday morning- 

Tate has also started lacrosse. It is a 4 week clinic, which concludes with a 1 day tournament. The practices are on Sundays from 12-3pm. A few of the weeks it has still been terribly hot! While I don't think he loves it, he has never once complained about going. His buddy Joel also plays, so I do think that helps. Here he is in full gear-

A couple weeks ago I had the pleasure of having breakfast with a former coworker of mine who was visiting friends just about 20 minutes away. When I was a social worker in Weymouth, MA and dating Brian, I met Mary Ellen Flynn, who was a secretary in our office, and former Marine spouse. She and her husband traveled the world in his 20+ year career as a Marine. She was incredibly supportive and encouraging to me, as I knew NOTHING about what a military life would entail. The area we lived in was not heavily saturated in military folks either, so having her around those few months was so wonderful. When Brian and I eloped, she drove to the nearest Air Force base and bought me a copy of the Air Force Wive's Guide! Published in the 50's, I haven't referred to it much, but I do still have it. Mary Ellen gave me a brilliant piece of advise back in 2003, that I still share with others to this day-

"Never buy curtains." -Mary Ellen Flynn

She explained that you'd never have the right amount or right length of curtains the next time you move. And curtains are expensive! So just don't do it. And I never have...

I look forward to seeing her again. Unfortunately  she and her husband come to the DC area too frequently because they are now at the age where they are attending burials at Arlington National Cemetery of former Marine's that they have known throughout the years.

I love Glennon Melton Doyle. Her book and her blog http://momastery.com are so wonderful for any woman, mother or not, to read. I found this letter that she wrote to her son and was so touched by it. I shared it with Brian and he agreed that we should read it to Tate. So I changed the name in it, although I did make sure to tell Tate that "my friend" wrote it, and not me.... I think I will keep reading it to him year after year-

When I was in third grade, there was a little boy in my class named Adam.

Adam looked a little different and he wore funny clothes and sometimes he even smelled a little bit. Adam didn’t smile. He hung his head low and he never looked at anyone at all. Adam never did his homework. I don’t think his parents reminded him like yours do. The other kids teased Adam a lot. Whenever they did, his head hung lower and lower and lower. I never teased him, but I never told the other kids to stop, either.

And I never talked to Adam, not once. I never invited him to sit next to me at lunch, or to play with me at recess. Instead, he sat and played by himself. He must have been very lonely.

I still think about Adam every day. I wonder if Adam remembers me? Probably not. I bet if I’d asked him to play, just once, he’d still remember me.

I think that God puts people in our lives as gifts to us. The children in your class this year, they are some of God’s gifts to you.

So please treat each one like a gift from God. Every single one.

If you see a child being left out, or hurt, or teased, a little part of your heart will hurt a little. Your daddy and I want you to trust that heartache. Your whole life, we want you to notice and trust your heartache. That heartache is called compassion, and it is God’s signal to you to do something. It is God saying, TATE! Wake up! One of my babies is hurting! Do something to help! 

Whenever you feel compassion – be thrilled! It means God is speaking to you, and that is magic. It means He trusts you and needs you.

Sometimes the magic of compassion will make you step into the middle of a bad situation right away.

Compassion might lead you to tell a teaser to stop it and then ask the teased kid to play. You might invite a left-out kid to sit next to you at lunch. You might choose a kid for your team first who usually gets chosen last. These things will be hard to do, but you can do hard things.

Sometimes you will feel compassion but you won’t step in right away. That’s okay, too. You might choose instead to tell your teacher and then tell us. We are on your team – we are on your whole class’ team. Asking for help for someone who is hurting is not tattling, it is doing the right thing. If someone in your class needs help, please tell me. We will make a plan to help together.

When God speaks to you by making your heart hurt for another, by giving you compassion, just do something. Please do not ignore God whispering to you. I so wish I had not ignored God when He spoke to me about Adam. I remember Him trying, I remember feeling compassion, but I chose fear over compassion. I wish I hadn’t. Adam could have used a friend and I could have, too.

We do not care if you are the smartest or fastest or coolest or funniest. There will be lots of contests at school, and we don’t care if you win a single one of them. We don’t care if you get straight As. We don’t care if the girls think you’re cute or whether you’re picked first or last for kickball at recess. We don’t care if you are your teacher’s favorite or not. We don’t care if you have the best clothes or most Pokemon cards or coolest gadgets. We just don’t care.

We don’t send you to school to become the best at anything at all. We already love you as much as we possibly could. You do not have to earn our love or pride and you can’t lose it. That’s done.

We send you to school to practice being brave and kind.

Kind people are brave people. Because brave is not a feeling that you should wait for. It is a decision. It is a decision that compassion is more important than fear, than fitting in, than following the crowd.

Trust me, sweetie, it is. It is more important. Just be grateful and kind and brave. That’s all you ever need to be.

Take care of those classmates of yours, and your teacher, too. You Belong to Each Other. You are one lucky boy . . . with all of these new gifts to unwrap this year.