havocandmayhem.com

Had a blast at Great Wolf Lodge for the most part.  Mayhem had some seriously whiny & sulky moments that were a bit much. He didn't want to do anything, go anywhere, just sit in the room. Then he'd ask how long we were staying & pitch a fit that we were leaving the next day because he wanted to stay longer. Sorry, kid but you can sulk around a bedroom at home for free. Other than those moments though, we had a lot of fun. I have 208 photos taken at a good distance, with low lighting, to prove it! Havoc completed 3 MagiQuest adventures and went several times on the boggie board. Mayhem collected the final runes he needed to start doing MagiQuest adventures and spent a lot of time running around the tree fort.  I went up a great many stairs, a great many times, lugging a single or double innertube each time. My friend Mel and I were on an exercise mission - THIGHS OF STEEL!  DH did a lot of boogie boarding and chasing Mayhem around the treehouse So now I am home, ...

This tree is up the road a little from our house. Havoc finds swinging has gotten a bit stale so he goes looking for a new challenge New Legos. I can now pretend Harrison Ford is in my house *sigh* Looks like the bracheasuar missed breakfast We made fall sugar cookies. Dinos are not much good at that so we had to keep them away. They were not happy. They are guarding the cooling the cookies 'so nothing happens to them'. Would you trust them? I crocheted this guy one night this week for a friend as a charm to keep the bad energy away For more weekly winners please visit Lotus at Sarcastic Mom

This is my dad when he was about 6-8 months old. Today is his 70th birthday.

We're going on a 3 day vacation this weekend.  We're headed to Great Wolf Lodge which is an indoor water park & theme hotel.  They also have a great game called MagicQuest to suck up your time when you want a break from swimming.  This will be our third visit in a year. Havoc wanted to go there last year for his birthday, so we did. Then we went in March because they offered us a great deal and this time we are again going for Havoc's birthday (even though it is 10 days away, this was the cheaper of the weekends available). Having done this a couple of times now I am far better at knowing what to bring. 2 suits each, because nothing is worse than putting on a cold clammy suit you took off 2 hours ago when you came back to the room for lunch or a break. Clothespins. They have a line in the bathroom but no pins. Several pairs of sweats or other comfy pants to lounge around the room in because inevitably someone will drop a wet suit on them rendering them unwear...

Kat at Mother Fonker tagged me with a meme. 6 quirky things about me 1.I over explain things to the kids when it is a subject I know a lot about. They asked why cave people & Native Americans wore animal skins and not T-shirts and I explained that they lacked the knowledge of the fiber art technology necessary to spin and weave plant products in sufficient quantities to warmly clothe themselves completely. Using those exact words, to my 4 and 5 year old. DH said "They only had animals available to make clothes from". yeah. what he said 2. I use lots of quotes from 80's Britcoms in my everyday speech. Fortunately the vast majority of my friends have seen the shows. 3. If I am not quoting Britcoms, I am quoting Douglas Adams 4. I have 4 tattoos. Got my first one when I was 33. 5. I can't relax in my living room if things aren't all put away. At least stuffed in bins out of sight. 6. I can read a book and crochet at the same time. Tara at Tara...

Yesterday was the Equinox, called Mabon amongst the Wiccan & some pagans. It is a day of balance, the second of the three harvest festivals & often called the Witches Thanksgiving. The leaves dropping their leaves & going into their long winter sleep is a sign to start drawing inward ourselves, to change our focus from the wide world to the world of our home or to our own inner world. Now would be a good time to start that study course you have been putting off. As the light begins diminishing until Yule, now is the time to work on diminishing the things in your life that are not working for you. I'm working on diminishing my hair trigger annoyance & my shouting. I am also working on lessening my spending. Once I have those under control, I will work on increasing my patience & my income come Imbolc (Feb 2) Little boys don't really get the personal working part of the holiday just yet. We instead just focus on nature. It's been warm here & the tre...

That'd be sarcasm, BTW I finished the amigurumi octopus for Havoc. He chose the rainbow colored yarn for it. I've been experimenting with how to create different shape effects with amigurumi and I created a bunch of mushrooms while doing it. Then I decided to focus on making something for a friend to keep the bad energy away and I made this traffic cone Then I got my hands on some googly eyes and the mushrooms gained some personality. The traffic cone became an angry traffic cone I think he is just the cutest thing ever. The traffic cone came about as a result of 2 things. First I was going to make a witches hat for a little crochet person I had made recently (There is no photo of said person because it seems to have vanished & I am pretty annoyed about that because I never wrote the pattern down & now have to start over) The problem is I really didn't want to do all those close stitches in black (3sc in a circle, then 4sc, then 5 sc, et...

I have a mixed bag this week The view from our driveway Roadside weed flower The killer vine weed. I am highly allergic to it, which is why it has taken over the veggie garden. In honor of Talk Like A Pirate Day there was some digging for buried treasure Look! The loch ness monster! I think the dinos get bored during the day with the boys in school.I find them in the oddest places. "Oh hai! We can haz muffinz plz?" Things don't look good for teddy I finally finished the octopus I have been working on for Havoc. He chose a variegated rainbow yarn. For more weekly winners visit Lotus at Sarcastic Mom .

My layouts this week created with Tell Me a Story by Traci Reed & Heather Roselli at Sweet Shoppe Designs one of my Learn Something New layouts, created with Scary Moon Cat by Lauren Grier at SSD another Learn Something New layout,created with Winter Chic by Shabby Princess at ShabbyPrincess.com

Could you do a size somewhere between the duplo and the regular legos please. Or make Indiana Jones Duplos? And by the way, pressing those little single peg legos together ALWAYS pinches my fingers. k' thx' Stacey Havoc got an Indian Jones Lego set for being 'good' today. (Don't ask me to define good, I have no idea why he has it, unless good means not actually knocking displays over while tearing around the wal mart. I'm tired, my shoulder hurts & I was pretty much numb from the overwhelming volume of noise. I suspect Havoc got the Legos because he was marginally better than Mayhem & that is 'good' enough) Anyway for whatever reason Havoc ended up with the Indiana Jones set of 2 motorcycles from Last Crusade, which is the only IJ Lego set near his age. Most of them are 8-12. I had to put it together but he's been able to put it back together so it's good. They are watching Last Crusade now & playing with the legos.  My ears...

Mayhem comes home with a package from school. In it is a blank construction paper banner and some instructions. How cute! Preschool homework! The note says "Your child should draw or cut from magazines pictures of their favorite things. Please let them use the scissors themselves." "This should be a lot of fun" I say to Mayhem and set about finding scissors and glue. Then I look around and I realize something - there is nothing for Mayhem to cut out. We get 2 magazines in our house. The first is Cook's Illustrated, which is illustrated only with black & white photos of food and cooking implements. Mayhem is the anti-foodie, so CI won't work. The other is NRA Magazine.  Yeah. I look around hoping to find an old issue of Real Simple or Rachel Ray Magazine. I pick them up randomly at the store. But no, apparently I have been decluttering effectively lately. The only thing I find is a year old copy of a sci fi mag with Dr Who on the cover and the kid...

Click to see full sized. I can't figure out how to get that to appear here. Muffins seem to feature highly. Which might explain why my pants are too tight.... No time to blog today. I'm making a photo book for my dad's 70th birthday. It's the 26th so I am already screwed on shipping time but if I can get it completed today I can at least say it will arrive 'any day now' when I call him.

I made cupcakes Saturday and muffins yesterday. The cupcakes were for a pot luck party my bunco group was having. The muffins were for the family. I ate several of both batches. The cupcakes were cheesecake brownie cupcakes. I used the recipe for Mrs Field's Cheesecake Brownie Cups found here at RecipeZaar.com. However, I am not sure what it is with me & measuring, but I ended up with 16 cupcakes instead of 12. They were very well received. I had 2 bananas that needed to be used yesterday so I made muffins. I was going to make peanut butter banana muffins, in the hopes of tempting Mayhem to actually eat a muffin rather than just demand to make them. But he'd gone on a PB&J spree over the weekend & there was insufficient peanut butter remaining. I decided to replace it with Nutella. Chocolate, bananas, hazelnuts...yum! Nutella Banana muffins Preheat oven to 400 and prepare 12-18 muffin cups. (recipe claims 12, I made 18) In a large bowl mix together ...

We live in a rural area. There are a lot of cattle farms and a lot of wooded acres around. Even the subdivisions that exist must, by county law, have no less than 3 acres per plot. Most average over 7 and market themselves as 'estates'. So there is a lot of room for wild animals to roam and roam they do. Unfortunately that roaming involves crossing roads and deer don't seem to get the 'look both ways first' rule of road crossing. They just merrily leap out from the undergrowth and trot right across the road without thought of oncoming cars. This is very unnerving if you are driving the oncoming car. It's even more unnerving if you are driving a 7 year old car that has already had 2 front end collisions that ought to have totaled the car, but mysteriously didn't, and you are fairly sure you will not get away with it a third time. Oh, and you are in no position to take on a car payment right now thankyouverymuch. I spend this time of year driving in fear o...

My weekly winners this week are all taken from my Project 365-Boys Play that I have been working on this year. We decided to paint the boys' room this week. Word must have gone out about it because while DH & I were moving the furniture around, these guys showed up: Contractorsaurs.  They had their own equipment so we hired them but soon there problems. They seemed to have issues with the spackle   I'm fairly certain some child labor laws were being broken   That doesn't look like painters' tape to me   Watching paint dry. We're not paying them by the hour are we? 5 days later (3 days longer than planned) the room was finished        For more Weekly Winners please visit Lotus at Sarcastic Mom

Some layouts I did this week This was done with Heart of Fall by Traci Reed & Kay Miller at Sweet Shoppe Designs This was made with Mischief & Mayhem by Heather Roselli, also at SSD. This was for the Learn Something New class I am taking This was done with Bestest of Friends- Boys by Eva Kipler at SSD

This is the current stack of books on my nightstand The ones with paper sticking out are the ones I am reading currently. The rest are waiting their turn. I am currently reading The Provincial Lady in London by E M Delafield, which is a humorous semi-fictional journal first published in 1933. This is a reread for me. I've read the entire 5 book series a few times & always enjoy it. For Keeps edited by Victoria Zackheim, which is a collection of essays written by women about growing older, their bodies and learning to accept these things. I've borrowed it from the library and they want it back Monday so I need to focus on it this weekend. Buddhism for Mothers by Sarah Napthali, which is a very good parenting book about remaining calm & being all zen with your kids. I'm rereading it for the 3rd time because I'm having issues with equanimity thing lately. Daughter of York by Anne Easter Smith, which is historic fiction about Princess Margaret of...

This is the first time since 2001 I am not watching towers being knocked down. It was all over the news in 2001 and 2002 . You couldn't avoid it and I didn't try. I had an 11 month old in 2003. His favorite game was have me build towers from our soft blocks so he could knock them down. That is what I spent Sept 11 2003 doing. Sept 11 2004 was spent overseeing a game where Havoc built towers of blocks for Mayhem to knock over. We moved operations to the sand box for 2005 and 2006. They were Legos in 2007. It's not that my kids have some weird affinity for building towers on Sept 11. They were building towers and knocking them over with regularity for months before and after. It just...on that one day...it stood out. I couldn't watch them without thinking about it. Twin towers made of sand ceasing to exist with a deliberate sideswipe of a little hand. It hurt to watch and remember. It hurt that the connection existed to be made. My little toddlers, playing toddler games...

Just a few. All I wanted was to make some breakfast burritos. I needed maybe 6 corn tortillas. Small ones, but knowing how these things go package wise, I accepted I'd probably end up with 12 large ones or 15 small ones & make enchiladas for dinner one night. HA! I was determined to get corn tortillas, not flour. I like corn better, especially for breakfast burritos. I run into Food Lion & scan the 'international food aisle' for tortillas. They only have taco shells and flour tortillas, so I head back to the refrigerated section. There I find corn tortillas. Except....they only come in bags of 100. Yeah 100 tortillas, when I need maybe 6. There are slots for bags of 36 tortillas and bags of 15 large sized tortillas, but the slots are empty. It's 100 tortillas or no tortillas. The boys were very into having breakfast burritos and the boys rarely get excited about food that isn't cheese pizza, so I was feeling pressure about the burritos. I stood there in th...

We decided it was time to paint the boys room this weekend.  We've lived here 11 years now & apart from slapping some moon & stars decals on the walls & hanging a couple dragon posters, we've done nothing to their room. I'm not the sort of person who goes in for creating nurseries.  To me, they have a short life span & then the child who lives in them expresses their negative opinion on Baby Bugs & Company and the whole thing has to be redone. (a friend of mine's 2.5 year old is regularly peeling the Winnie the Pooh decals off the wall because 'they keep looking at me') I'd rather save the money I'd spend on doing up a nursery and then use it decorating the room for the 5-7 year old to his tastes. The boys have each selected a color & we'll be doing 2 walls in a flame red and 2 walls in a blue gray. They haven't said much about decor - no preference for sports or a cars theme yet. They'll be getting bunk beds and new ...

Signs that summer is over. Abandoned toys. Fall chores Back to school Taking down the pool These guys are not quite ready to let go though See more weekly winners at Lotus at Sarcastic Mom