CHOC Walk 2008 Team Registration now open! July 28, 2008

Registration is now open for CHOC Walk 2008! Take a few hours out of your Sunday morning to support this great cause and impact the lives of the precious children treated at this amazing hospital every day! www.chocwalk.org

Not a morning person? Still want to help? Why not make a donation to Team Abbie?

This October our family will again be walking in CHOC Walk at the Disneyland Resort. We support CHOC in appreciation of the awesome care and attention our daughter received at CHOC in July 2005 for her first open heart surgery, and the continuing care she receives and will receive throughout her childhood. Please join us in supporting this wonderful hospital that touches the precious lives of so many children in Orange County! Every little bit helps!

https://www.chocforms.org/chocwalk/2008/sponsor.cfm?DA=sponsorForm&ID=54762

Thanks for your support!

Rubber stamps and peanut butter June 15, 2008

Seriously, I have got to come up with better post titles, but after 9 loads of laundry, 2 bath times, peanut butter in my 3 year old’s hair, a trip to Lakeshore to make a Father’s Day card, and a sleeping baby on my arm, I am lucky I am getting to post at all. Gotta love Lakeshore, by the way, I get to drive a few blocks down the street to a really cool teacher supply store, pick up some neat new preschool activities and potty reward stickers, and my 3 year old gets to make a Father’s Day card with the biggest array of artsy-crafty glue-on type thingys I have seen on one table at one time. And the best part? I don’t have to shop for all the thingys, cover the dining table, find bowls to put them all in, cut out the head shape, clean up the mess, and peel tacky glue off the walls for weeks… someone else does that! Oh, and it’s free. You can’t beat that deal. I get to shop, she makes a fun mess and a card for daddy, and everyone goes home happy. Today I had a great coupon and combined with their savings card I saved about 15% off of my shopping trip, which was good because my 3 year old has decided she loves rubber stamps and must have every stamp she encounters. Lakeshore has these really neat-o huge washable ink pads for stamps and their rubber stamps are mounted on big fat foam shapes so the ink stays on the stamp and not on her hand – mostly. While I was there I also scored a couple of great workbooks that I am determined to start working on with her, and a teacher’s plan book to start documenting what we worked on. I am seriously starting to wonder if I can hack it in the homeschooling world, I used to be such a self-motivated student myself, but now I am an overtired discombobulated mess and half the time either forget to do any instruction for a whole day, or just decide I’d rather go shopping, or to Disneyland. Some great influence I am! I figured if I start keeping a physical record of what we do, the pathetic-ness of how little we get done will motivate me. Not that I am trying to work her to the bone at the ripe age of 3, but rather trying to remember to spend 15 minutes on something resembling education every day. I’m sure by the time Kindergarten rolls around I’ll have this whole thing figured out… or not.

Yay, I’m a Blogger! June 10, 2008

If you have stumbled upon this blog site by chance, I should start by saying I have never written a blog before. I have never written much of anything, aside from speeches for Girl Scout ceremonies and emails, millions of emails! So why start now, you ask? I am pretty much convinced that I am the only person left on the face of the earth that does not have a blog. Ok, so that’s an exaggeration, but whenever I post on community parenting forums and such, all of the other moms always have a blog listed in their profile. So, why not? I’ll give it a whirl, one more thing to do in my already busy day that may, or may not, make the cut. Heck, it’s hard to get even a little work done, let alone something requiring focus and thought like a blog. I’d much rather go to Disneyland than sit at my computer, but one can’t live all day at Disneyland. As with everything I do, I have big plans. The plans of an overachieving Super-Mom that has yet to learn the art of saying No when someone asks for help. I put a lot of thought into exactly what on earth I would write about in this blog. What do I have to share that anyone would care about? And then it occured to me. I own everything. Every stroller, car seat, bouncy thing, diaper pail and baby carrier known to mom. Well, not quite, but I own more than most people ever buy in a lifetime. I have a shopping habit. My friends all know that when they are in the market for anything related to an under 4 year old, I have probably tried it and can vouch for one brand or another. They also know that when they are bored and want to get out of the house, I am the one with the perpetual events calendar and GPS map in my head and can spout off local events and fun attractions like I was reading it from a book. So, this is what I will write about, I will write about what I know! Isn’t that where all good writers start, afterall?