Getting the boy to eat his dinner!

 We have always had a hard time with eating dinner around here. Jack will eat for anyone but me. We go through the same routine every night. "I don't like that, I am not going to eat it." all before even taking one bite. It is frustrating and as my last effort before going on strike I came up with an idea.

When I picked Jack up at school I told him we were going to work on a project this week. Since he didn't like the things I chose and made for dinner I would let him plan and help with dinner. We went to a little market full of fruit and vegetables and just the basics available. So there would be no begging for sweets and treats. I asked Jack to pick out what he wanted to eat for dinner.

Jack picked;
Squash
Potatoes
Tomatoes
Cucumbers
Mangoes
Kiwi
Bananas
Corn on the cob
Strawberries

 For the first meal between fish and chicken he picked fish. For the side he wanted the corn. We also decided to use our strawberries up, since they go bad fast, and added some kiwi.


We got started he had to husk the corn. He was so proud as he finished and started to get down from his stool. I told him we still had work to do. He was shocked as I explained that we had to prepare all the items for the meal. We had to keep going till it was all done. After a while he turned to me and said "Mom you are right this is a lot of work." he then apologized for not eating what I make. What?! Yes!

Being Jack he had to dress the part!

We set the table as our fish finished cooking and Jack being really into this project said that since this was a fancy meal he was going to fold the napkins in triangles.

With the dinner done we just had to wait for Dad. 

Jack was pretty excited to show Dad his surprise contrary to what he looks like in the picture below.

It was a good meal and guess what!

That little boy cleaned his plate.

We didn't have to ask him a hundred times to eat! 

I reminded Jack that was only one day down and that he chose enough food for three more meals. We will see how they work out but it was a good experience for both of us last night. As of now my strike has been abandoned.

Repirator fun

Last week I pulled out Jason's old respirator. I needed it to wear while I sanded down some furniture. I need heavy protection for these fragile lungs of mine.

It was laying on the table when Jack came home from school. He ran up stairs to grab his light saber, a jacket and instantly became a star wars character. 

He went outside and starting fighting a battle.

 

Then I looked out the window and Jack was riding around in the car with that thing on. It was quite the sight and had me laughing.

Star Wars Dress Up from whitney Balls on Vimeo.

           Jason came home and Jack was still playing in it, then this happened.

Oh boys!

Family Room Updates

While Cami was here I had so much fun with her bouncing off decorating ideas and getting her great help. I go to stores to pick out stuff by myself and usually end up walking away because I needed another opinion.I had a list of things I needed her help with and it was so fun going to the store and having her agree with my ideas and help make my ideas better. I really appreciated the help. Here is the progression of the family room.

We had just got to painting and hanging the curtains right before all he guests came. I had limited decor and no pictures up.

                                                                 A little Cami magic.
She is so good at putting together a room. I had been on moving and furniture placing overload. She came in there and made me feel so much better, using what I had to fill the room.

The behind the scenes picture of putting together the picture wall.

Finished product.

We painted the coffee table as well. I found this great ottoman that works for the chair, instead of one big coffee table this made the area more open for traffic flow. (don't mind the paint samples on the stairs...that is this weekend's project.)

The view from the front door.

Amazing what a little paint and some curtains can do.

The view from above on the stairs.

The only before picture, this was taken the day after we moved in.

 After. Fun to see the progress.

This was me and Cami one night looking at our work from that day.

The next project(s) for this room

Crown molding, wainscoting and painting of the bookcase. 

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Another little project that we worked on. Our new island is huge and instead of getting five new stools, which would have been really expensive. I used two that we already had and my parents gave us three that they still had from the home on Center. I wanted to paint them two different colors.

At first they were going to be a yellow and gray. I put the yellow on and it was no good. Then we decided to go with coral and gray. The gray I loved but the coral turned out way too pink.

I tried the darkest coral on my paint samples and they turned out to be the perfect color. I would never have known just looking at the color so our little pink chairs did help in the long run. A big shout out to Ranell, Jason and Cami for helping paint those chairs!

 It's all trial and error but it's nice when if finally comes out how you imagined it.

Celebrating Mama

Mom's birthday was on Thursday the 18th. We had a celebration on Friday night to honor her. 

Meredith and I came up with dinner plans at Disney. Mom didn't know where she was going. I just told her to come to our house and get in the car and we would take her to her destination.

We had dinner at the Grand Floridian Cafe. 

Since we have moved to Florida birthday dinners at a Disney restaurant is tradition.

 Having a birthday at Disney is the best, you get treated so well.

I mean look at that haul. A specialized birthday pin, a Mickey cupcake and a picture of the Grand Flordian made entirely out of chocolate

Jack thought that Mom needed some help blowing out the candles.

We had good food and we got the sampler plate for dessert. It was just right to have a little bite of each of the desserts. Jackson ate the majority of the Chocolate Mickey and it was NOT hollow.

We enjoyed the nice weather and walked around the grounds. 

We always like to do this and pretend we are staying there.

This little boy is growing up so fast. He is getting so tall.

I love these two so much.

We then rode the monorail over to Epcot to watch the fireworks. 

Jack was pretty excited we got to ride the Iron Man monorail on the way back.

It was a great celebration, celebrating a wonderful woman. 

She is such a great Mama and very loved Nana by all her children and Grandchildren.

Love you Mom!

Catapus

We had a pet for two days over the weekend. I found a caterpillar in the yard on Saturday and shared it with Jack. He was excited exclaiming "I finally have a pet." We put it in a jar and Jack called it Catapus.

 We had fun watching him crawl up and down his little stick. Sunday night I thought it was best to let Catapus back out into the yard. Jack was heartbroken. There were tears shed. We put him out on a blade of grass and watched him crawl away. Afterwards Jack sat inside with the empty jar and cried. It was heartbreaking. He still brings up Catapus and tells us he misses him. He even spent a while looking for him yesterday. I told him Catapus is probably out there having an adventure. 

Maybe one day Jack will have a pet for longer than a weekend.

 First he has to learn how to clean up after himself and then we will talk!

Grandma and Papa

Grandma and Papa came out to visit us. 

We had some beautiful weather and got to do some fun things.

One day Jack got to miss school and go to the beach with us and his grandparents.

Life has changed for our guests now that we have our own house. We put them to work.

Saturday brought yard work and chores. 

Jason now has his own mower. It is the same one as his dad so they had a fun bonding moment! It was surreal to see Jason mowing his own lawn. He hasn't mowed in years. Now he GETS to!

I was not there for this adventure but Jason took Jack and his parents one day to Gatorland.

 I got these pictures sent to me.

You can tell I wasn't there because that is my baby sitting on a gator! 

It's hard for me to even look at this picture.