Sing, Sing a Song Saturday

I started doing what I call Sing, Sing a Song Saturday.  I'm going to post one song on Saturdays that the boys or I like. 

The song may be part of a movie, a kid's video or just a song we like. I'll try and include why we like it and/or the history of the song/singer.

This week I'm covering someone I found by accident. A happy accident. I was covering newly designed things and in my Portfolio class and a designers site had a band on it as well.

I was showing a Scrabble Board Andrew designed. It is one of my favorite games; that I suck at. I think I like it because it's challenging. Not because I'm a good player.

Source

The band Andrew is in is called Parlor Hawk. Here he talks about his band:

Meet Andrew Dyer from Parlor Hawk on Vimeo.

Here is one of Parlor Hawk's videos called Every Bone:

This one is called, Saddest Song:

Where to find Pearl Hawk:

• Here's their website.
• Here's where you can go to help back their new album.
• Facebook
• Twitter
• iTunes

Bird

Mica created this awhile back. I don't have much to say about it except that I love it.

He Called the Police (Sort Of)

Two nights ago I was hanging Isaak's clothes in his closet. I noticed that his night stand had pencil drawn on it.

He's gotten in trouble with drawing on things before. We've cleaned up crayon and Sharpie on the floor. Thank goodness we don't have carpet! Then he's drawn on little spots; like on the walls with pencil.

I said, "What's this Isaak?" pointing at the scribbles of pencil on the night stand. He said all timid like, "I did that." Daddy chimed in and said, "What did you do?" Isaak pointed to his scribble markings.

Daddy said, "Isaak I've had enough of this. You keep doing this! I'm going to call the police."

Isaak started crying like his life was ending and said, "No police!"

Daddy fake called. Then he said, "They told me they are going to let it go this time. They want you to clean it up." Daddy handed Isaak an eraser. He proceeded to erase it off. Then he had Isaak show him any other spots around the house he drew on; to clean up.

Could you imagine if police officers wrote out tickets to kids for writing on the walls with pencils and crayons? Source

I know this is a common thing that some kids do. I still wonder why they do it? Mica didn't draw on anything that I remember, but he did go to preschool one day and just decided to cut a hole in his brand new shirt. We're talking a gigantic hole.

I could see if we didn't have creative outlets for our boys. The truth is, is we do. We have an easel, we have paper and coloring books. We also have different colors of Paly-doh Isaak can play with. Again we have wood floors, so Play-doh getting in the carpet isn't a concern. We've reminded Isaak that pencils, crayons and markers belong on paper I don't know how many times.

I don't know if fake calling the police was the best way to handle this situation. It sure did put the panic in Isaak though. Hopefully he won't do it again.

Daddy got the idea of calling the cops from Grandma Apel. He had a little lying problem when he was a kid. One day Daddy and Aunt Laura mostly Daddy decided it would be a great idea to call and check on Michael Jackson, who got burned in the Pepsi commercial. They did a lot of long distance calls that day to hospitals. When the phone bill came in they both wouldn't fess up. Grandma Apel got them in the car to take them to the police station to take a lie detector test. Daddy panicked and told the truth. I don't know what she would have done if they wouldn't of came forward.

Tragedy

I was checking out fun editorials to give my students for their last illustration assignment. I found a ton of stuff that happened this year that was outlandish, interesting, or fun. They are perfect for college student illustrations: A boy expelled from school for having a mohawk, a real petting zoo, we're talking lions, tigers and bears, a feather growing from a babies face and more. I have a total of 15 articles. I was trying to contain myself from laughing at some of the crazy editorials. In my search I came across the current news. The bombing of Boston. My oldest sister runs marathons, so immediately horrible pictures came to my mind.

I went home from work and Daddy asked why I looked like I just saw a ghost? I asked if he had seen the news? He hadn't, but heard something on the radio. At this point we didn't know how bad it was. I just knew 2 people were killed and 40 were injured.

We decided to go out to dinner at Sam and Louie's Pizza. The meat I had pulled for dinner was still frozen. In my wallet I had 2 free meal passes for the boys.

At the pizza place there were two TVs broadcasting the horror. Daddy looked at me, I looked at him, and then I asked the waitress if she would kindly switch the station.

She did, but she stood there for awhile trying to find something new to put on. I said, "Really you can put on anything. I just don't want my sons seeing the horrible tragedy." She said, "I understand. It's just that I have to have sports or news stations on. On both of those types of stations they are covering what happened." She finally found something. In the mean time, Mica had seen a bomb go off. He laughed thinking it was fake.

It's not like I strive to hide things from my children. It's just that when something is too much for even me to understand, I don't want my children watching it.

Daddy and I hadn't even had a chance to talk about what had happened yet.

With the Sandy Hook tragedy we decided to talk to Mica. We kept it brief, asked where they go in their school for danger drills and asked if he had questions. He didn't ask anything. Then we told him if he did have questions to ask us. We mentioned not to talk about it at school because not all of his friend's parents would choose to talk to their kids. We chose to never talk to Isaak.

Isaak has been freaked out about death, rightly so. I just don't want him terrified about the topic even more.

My thoughts go out to everyone personally effected by the bombing that happened in Boston. 

Do you, or did you talk to your children about tragedies?

WW: Tracks {Linky}

One thing that is really cool about Grandma and Grandpa Apel's house is that they have train tracks walking distance from their house. The boys love trains and tracks!

I know they aren't supposed to play around tracks. We pretty much walked along them. There were 3 adults with these kiddos.

We always walk there. Even when it's freezing out we walk there. Lucky for us, Sunday was pretty warm, yet windy.

This gives you an idea of how small the boys really are. They seem so tall up close.

The track says, "115 RE CC B S Co lackawanna 1956". It's interesting how streets have to be rebuilt all the time, but part of this track was made in 1956.

Isaak wouldn't stand still long enough for me to take his photo. He was too busy looking for junk that he wants to make things with. One man's junk is another man's treasure. 

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Swimming

Isaak turns five on May 19. A lot of people think he's older than he is. It's just because he's tall. Trust me he doesn't act older than he is.

Although he swims better than most of the kids his age.

He can swim backstroke, doggie paddle, freestyle, underwater, and do somersaults in the water.

He still needs to work on speed and breathing. Not too shabby for only being four though.

OraMD Review and Giveaway {3 Winners}

I had the chance to try out OraMD; in replace to my usual toothpaste.

I've been skeptical of toothpaste brands such as Crest and Colgate. Why you might ask? Because they have an FDA warning right on the tube. I'm brushing my teeth with something that tells me it's dangerous to swallow. I don't care how much I rinse, some toothpaste is going to get swallowed. I really worry about toothpaste getting swallowed with my kids.

I have been on the the hunt for a toothpaste that doesn't have an FDA warning on the back of it. Something that is natural. I've tried a few things I like.

OraMD was too strong for Isaak. I think more than one drop went on his toothbrush than I intended. He didn't like it. When I used it, it was strong, but for the first time in a long time my mouth felt really clean. During allergy season I have problems with my mouth being dry. During this time of year I'm such a mouth breather. That clean feeling lasted ALL DAY LONG after using OraMD.

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Disclaimer: The opinions on the post are my personal take on the product. This blog is a personal blog written and edited by me. I am not compensated to provide my opinion except for receiving the products themselves to test out. I did receive a free product to help with this giveaway.

Things to Take to Grandma and Grandpa's House

There are a some things I was so glad I took to Grandma and Grandpa's house! They were:

1. Books

Isaak's not super into reading right now. He likes to create more. Mica on the other hand loves to read. Before our trip he was talking about Flat Stanley. I was familiar to the series. It's about a kid that is just like it says, flat. Aunt Terra told me about how Cousin Evan's school had them mail out a Flat Stanley to others far away. They took pictures of Flat Stanley and mailed him back in a self address envelope. Most of our family and friends live by us. On FB Terra posted about needing someone to take pictures of Flat Stanley. More than one family volunteered to take him in. She has pictures of Evan's Flat Stanley all over the place now. It's pretty cool! I got Mica the first book and a ninja book of Flat Stanley. Here Aunt Laura is reading it to Mica and Cousin Payton.

2. EverEarth Table Top Easel.

Daddy thought I was nuts when I wanted to take an easel. It was one of Isaak's favorite things. Then Cousin Payton drew on it as well. I reviewed it awhile back. Then I set it in Isaak's closet to get out if we went out of town. It's so great because it's small, it has a chalkboard and a dry eraser board.

Isaak drawing a robot.

Isaak drawing a turtle.

3. Nintendo DS

Maybe this was or wasn't a good idea. We spent too much time playing it and it we fought over it. I say [we] because Mica insisted that I wasn't any good and couldn't play. Hello! I've never played their little game system, but I could play back in the day. I proved to him I could in fact kick some booty. It still was fun. Daddy's phone was just as bad because he downloaded a game on it.

4. Legos

Legos with my kids are fun just about anytime. We brought a bin and they played with them making all sorts of things.

They Rode a Camel

First off, I wanted to pre-post some stuff for the weekend. Like my "Sing, Sing a Song Saturday" post. It just didn't happen. It was a busy week last week!

Do you ever say, "Man I wish I had my camera?" That was me once this weekend.

This weekend we drove 5 hours to Moberly, Missouri to see Grandma and Grandpa Apel. It's near Columbia, Missouri.

I registered the boys and their cousin on that side to go to the Lowes Clinic. I thougth Grandpa would like to build a little something with them. The problem is, is that he can't stand in one spot for long. He's had back and knee problems. We didn't know if we should go, or not. We decided to go because the boys were stir crazy; meaning they needed something to do. Grandpa's answer, "No." turned into a, "Yes I'll join you."

It was rush, rush getting out of the house, so I neglected to grab my camera.

On our way back to their house. We stopped to give the boys a camel ride at a petting zoo.

We got crappy pictures from Daddy's cell phone. I wish I would have gotten good pictures of Grandpa helping the boys with their Lowes Clinic project and the camel ride.

I did happen to get the boys with Grandpa Apel later on. Grandma Apel was hiding in the kitchen.

 Daddy had to close his eyes. When I went to take a 2nd shot, Isaak ran off.