My vanishing act

This is the time of year where I usually do my vanishing act.  At least where blogging is concerned.  However, this year I am going to try and stick around.  You are thrilled, I can tell. 

So let's see what's been going on, shall we? (I'm just going to pretend that we are having a real live conversation here.)   Oooh, guess what!!  I've started is an Etsy shop!!  It's called Ladybugs and Fireflies.   I've got a link of the side of my blog. I'm going to make some cute things for the home and sell them there. Or at least I hope to.  My favorite so far, is the Advent Calendar. Probably because I love Christmas. Anyhow, I've only put a few things on there to see what kind of response I get. Hopefully I can sell some things and make enough to help with Christmas. We shall see. My friend, Michelle, has an Etsy shop as well. She is uber talented and has a ton of things listed. Her shop is called 24 Olive Street. If you are in the market for anything made with fabric, I urge you to visit her shop. You won't be sorry!

What else?  Well, school has been in session for 3 weeks already!  How time flies.  The older kids are doing good with school.  Each of them have friends in class from last year.  The younger two, well that's a different story.   Maeve is liking Kindergarten, except for that little brat girl in her class who is telling the other girls not to play with her!  This is not making momma happy and I'm ready to go to the school and have some words with said child.  It's not going to be pretty.  Declan has class with many of his friends this year.  He loves that!  Of course, he also loves talking, which is why his desk has already been moved away from the other kids.  I've also been asked to call his teacher at home last weekend.  Apparently my son thought it would be a good idea to climb up on the urinal (YUCK!!) and check out some kind of bug that was climbing up the wall.  In his mind, it was not a big deal, he just wanted a better look.  The teacher was afraid he might fall in.  (I think I just threw up in my mouth a little bit.)    Also, there has been some playing on the playground which may or may not involve kids who are falling into broken glass and pieces of cement, resulting in lots of blood and stitches.  Not my son, just kids chasing him.  So naturally, it's his fault.  And he might be playing a made up game called "Tap Out" where boys try to knock each other down, then stand over them screaming "Tap Out!".  Again, while this play time involved 4 boys, the only one to get caught was....Declan!  And finally, another child came to school, so shaken he could not breathe, saying he was afraid of using the bathroom in case Declan was in there?!  Personally, if my child was that upset, I wouldn't just drop him off and leave, I would be in the office finding out what was going on.  But, who am I to judge another parent.  At any rate, he never even saw my son in the bathroom at all, so we are not sure where this came from.  And I was in the office for that as well.  *sigh*  It's going to be a long year for him, I'm afraid.

I am also teaching Maeve how to read.   I have this totally awesome book called "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons".  I love it and recommend it to everyone!  I even brought it in Declan's class last year to teach some of the kids in his class.  Anyhow, Maeve is up to lesson 15 and is doing great!

What else?  Oh yes.  Baseball has started up again.  Lord help me!  Fall ball is much more relaxed then when you play in the spring.  At least that's what I was told.  However, we have practices twice a week, which will stop when the games start.  They are also twice, possibly three times a week.  Thankfully it's a short season.  A little side note here:  I would like to shout out a HUGE congratulations to Columbus' Northern Little League.  Their team went all the way to the World Series playoffs!!  They did fantastic and should be very proud of themselves!

I've also gotten a few emails asking me how I plan on getting debt free.  First off, let me just say that it's not happening overnight.  There are little changes that we are making, which will hopefully make a big difference when added up.  One thing we decided to try this month was buying food from Angel Food ministries.  We have never done this before and thought we'd give it a try.   I'm not a name brand snob, so it wasn't going to bother me to try something new.  Some things I do like my name brands though.  Anyhow, we checked it out and found that you don't need to provide anything showing a need.  It's open to everyone!  How awesome is that?  Anyhow, we only bought one package to try.  On pick up day, we were surprised to see how much food was really there for only $29!!

We've already eaten most of the food, and I'm happy to report that it's really good!  I know that sounds like I expected it to be spoiled or something, but as I said, we have never done this and didn't know what to expect.  Next month, we are getting a couple of packages.  On their website is a menu for the following month, so you can decide if it's what you want.  Also, you can order as many packages as you like. 

Have a great night everyone!!  I hope to be back soon!