Mother Earth

I'm on a $$$ savings kick!  This weekend, our house has been turned up-side down....stuff crammed into the dining room. toys everywhere( trust me you don't want to see a picture of this!)   We had the down-stairs painted (minus the dining room) and the hall leading upstairs.  It makes the house look TOTALLY different and I'm LOVING it! While preparing for all this, no better time to get stuff cleaned out.  Man, do we ever have more stuff than we really need...I bet we ALL do. I plan on cleaning out the closets too, it's time for a little or a lot of purging.  I started thinking about all we waste and it's really bothering me. I think what's driving some of this is a book I'm reading right now called "Seven" by Jen Hatmaker.  My aunt Twyla loaned me her copy and I can't put it down...it's that good.  Any of you who really know me...know that I don't read too often ( I'm mean when do I have time other than when I'm sitting on the toilet, LOL!)  This book is so good that I take it with me everywhere and I've feel asleep the past 2 nights reading it...I'll be writing more on this book in the near future. I recommend you reading it TODAY!  OK...so where was I?!?!? Cleaning out and saving right? So..I started thinking about how we could save.  Let me tell you, we go through some paper towels.  I'm embarrassed by how many we use and I cringe to think about the amount of $$$ we spend in a year just on paper towels. So I had this bright idea..in part to the fact that my MIL gave us a stack of white shop towels ( whatever you call them...over sized washcloths?) SO, I  put them in a bin by my kitchen sink to use instead of paper towels and I have a "dirty" bucket on the other side.  We'll see how long this lasts!  My granny was super thrifty and sometimes " a little too thrifty". If she used a paper towel once to just dry her hands, she would lay it to dry on the oven rack to "re-use" again.. Sometimes she would do this if the oven were still warm after baking,  We used to say " Granny, you are going to the burn the house down trying to dry paper towels!!" She also saved every cool whip container too!!  I can see those cool whip containers now!  My how I wish she were still here!  It's kind of funny, she and Buddy share the same b-day; granny would have been 90 last Thursday.  OK so I am way off track...can you tell my mind is just wandering today?!  Back to the cloths I'm using instead of paper towels....I once saw on TV where this woman had this same idea except she did this for toilet paper...uh,gross.  This girl won't be going that "green" I can promise you!! Do you all recycle?  I'm getting better ( I know Mom, this makes you super happy!!)  Used to when my mom would come to visit, if she saw a "recycle or can" thrown in the trash, she would pull it out of my trash can, wash it and put it in the recycle bin.  For whatever reason, this drove me crazy.  I know I was being "lazy"..I just didn't "feel" like recycling....Greg and I named mom "mother earth"!  I stopped being a rebel and got smart.  I don't wanna leave all those carbon footprints! I'm a work in progress, but we have to use our "resources" wisely.  Jesus told the parable of the rich farmer who only lived for himself. Luke 12:16-21
I feel like God wants us to be good stewards of the resources he has given us and to find ways through him for problem solving, surviving, and blessing others ! That's all I have for tonight folks....  I'm off to do laundry....who am I kidding...I'm off to read some more in my book!  Till next time-Kyla

                                             - Random picture of the kids actually being nice to one another!

                                     Madi is always sweet to Will...he's just not always receptive of her love!

Buddy Baby!!

I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date...... Yesterday, we celebrated Buddy's 4th Birthday!  Ya'll, Buddy is a NUT and brings so much spice and excitement to our CRAZY life!  He truly is our Baby.....Will might say something different!  Buddy drives me absolutely crazy sometimes and his shedding hair gets on everything, but we LOVE him and have grown to love a sticky roller too :-)  Will and buddy are BFF b/c Will feeds him EVERYTHING!!  It's very cute b/c Will can't say "Buddy", so he calls him Bubba!  In order to bribe Buddy to come in from outside, we give him cheese...Will says " Bubba keys(aka cheese)"!!  The vet told us that Buddy might find his brain when he turns 5 and I'm happy to report that....he hasn't found it yet!  Just kidding...the dog is very smart and knows how to work the system ( don't all kids?!?!) He acts up when Greg is at work and tends to act like a precious angel when he's home.  Buddy has chewed up more stuff than I can recall and he is constantly wanting to play mega blocks with Will.....b/c I pull them from his mouth all the time! Buddy's favorite thing to do is play fetch with a tennis ball.  I know that all too soon he will be old and not have all this energy, so we play and chase and do all kind of crazy things....carpe diem...right!!  So here's to another healthy and happy year Buddy Boy...Thank you for bringing so much love and energy to our family, we LOVE YOU!!  Happy 4th Birthday!!  PS-He got his usual double cheeseburger from McDonald's for his B-day and we made him wait to eat it till AFTER we sang to him...he was salivating!!

A Little Beach Vacay..

Just to warn you before you start reading, I almost labeled this post the"Griswold/Fisher Family Vacay" b/c things didn't get off to a good start!  Usually ( being the key word) Greg and I are good about getting things packed and getting out the door by our "targeted' time.  We had planned to leave at noon on Friday b/c Madi only had a 1/2 day of school. We left at 1:30 the first time and headed into Butner to get Gas before we hit the road.  I realized that I had no sippy cups for Will and had left our Meds that we needed.  When we stopped at the Gas station Greg asked me to get him a ginger ale and tums?!?!  He said he was fine!  I bought a cheese stick for myself and after the first bite, I'm thinking  "Do they sell spicy cheese sticks?" I look at the sell by date and it was out a month ago!! Disgusting! We head back home AGAIN to pick up our stuff and finally hit the road around 2:10.  We dropped the dog off in Wallace and kept right on...till we hit Wilmington!

This is the traffic we encountered! Everybody was hungry so after sitting in traffic for about 30 minutes we finally made it to a place where we could cut off and find a restaurant. No worries, we had entertainment for those 30 minutes b/c my sweet mother aka Mimi decided to hand the kids  "mini" recorders that she purchased at target..she said she couldn't resist b/c they were so cute!! Let me just say that 30 minutes felt like and ETERNITY and I seriously contemplated walking on the side of the road for a bit!

   Greg spotted this cute restaurant called the "Shuckin Shack" and it did not disappoint! We were seated in this cool booth seat next to a huge window where the kids could look out...it was great! The food was awesome!  I would highly recommend! Will was waving at some police officers walking by and they came back by to bring him a badge and some stickers...I thought that was so nice! Things got better after we ate....got back on the road and made in to the beach in a whopping 7 hours.  What should have taken 3 hours at most!  We did make a 1-2 hour pit stop at walmart too...cause you know we don't have any of those around here!!!

This child LOVES some crab legs! She ate a whole pound by herself!

 According to my husband, no trip to Myrtle Beach is complete without a visit to Bass Pro Shops...I have to admit that I've grown to love it too! Here is how you spend 2 hours in the store with kids.  First, you let Mimi and Will nap for the first hour in the car.  Mimi then calls cell phone to tell us they're awake.  We go and get them from the car and immediately head to the fish tank.  We watch fish for 30 minutes.  The last 30 minutes you give them some candy and quickly look at whatever else you want!

Another one of our favorites

KRISPY KREME!!

                                                      and another favorite......           

All in all, we had a great weekend.  I have to say it was the coldest it's ever been when we have visited the beach! We shopped, ate, relaxed and just had a some good ole' family time!  I thought we had packed light, but the looks of the van tells a different story..this was packing up to come back home!  Oh yeah..I forgot to mention that we woke up to SNOW Sunday morning!  I was the first one up and I thought I was seeing stuff!  I immediately went and told everybody...they all jumped out of bed to come and take a look.  I think Greg forgot my mom was with us b/c he walked to the porch with his Boxers on...Mom was like "you think Greg forgot he just has underwear on?!?!" We all had a good laugh!  Love my husband!!



                                             

I'll be back tomorrow for a special-FUR post!

Hugs-Kyla

For the love of CUPCAKES.....

I'm pretty sure that most of you know that I LOVE baking cupcakes.  They are just so stinkin cute and little and just the right serving size.  Don't get me wrong, I've made my fair share of cakes...but my preference is cupcakes.  Let's face it, they're easier!  It's funny how cupcakes seem to be "all the rage" now...just about every town now has a cupcake shop or two or three or four....  Madi and I love to go and check these places out. I recently had lunch with my mom at Daisy Cakes in Durham...I was impressed.  Madi on the other hand was not...she's a hard critic ( I think she might be a food critic one day).  I bought her a red velvet cupcake to try, which is her favorite.  My mom and I tried a maple bacon cupcake and it was great!  Madi said the cupcakes tasted like muffins and I have to agree that after she made that comment, it did taste somewhat like a muffin.  I appreciated the fact that they were not overly sweet.  Trust me, the icing had plenty of sugar to make up for the muffin/cupcake.  It was obvious that they use fresh/wholesome ingredients.  A big issue that we have is dryness...who wants a dry cupcake, yuck!  DaisyCakes had the moist factor..I'd go back!  They also serve sandwiches and some breakfast stuff...you should try it!  Here's the website if you want to check it out:
www.eatdaisycakes.com   OK...back to my cupcakes..
Because I have this obsession love of baking cupcakes, I take joy in rushing to sign up to bring these for parties at Madi's school! I know, I'm a tad bit CRAZY!  Madi's at a new school this year and when we were at open house, they had a sign up sheet for all the holiday parties for the year. I was thinking " this is great, I'll get to bake LOTS of cupcakes"!  I thought I was signing up to attend the party and you know..bring my cupcakes. Because I'm over zealous and me being me...I signed my name and/or Greg's name by every party! I quickly found out why not many parents were signed up! You're not really signing up to "attend" the party, but rather you are coordinating and planning the party with the other parents that might of signed up for that day. The days are over where the teacher would send home a little sign up sheet for cupcakes, chips, drink, and paper products.   Let's just say they go ALL out and for Thanksgiving we had a full blown meal! I took green beans, butter beans, corn, and corn muffins...NO CUPCAKES! The joke was totally on me!  I think the party was for the staff and not the students!  Luckily at Christmas we ordered pizza!

 Valentine's Day has arrived and guess what...I made CUPCAKES!!  Madi wanted to help and I told her to get out the kitchen, that was my "therapy" time! Maybe that's why I like baking cupcakes, it's therapeutic! OK..don't feel sorry for Madi, I let her help with the sprinkles! Even though I'm a little OCD about the way I think they should look!  I really should have baked cupcakes AFTER the kids went to bed, but there was a very IMPORTANT ball game coming on at 9pm and we had to "get er done".  NO COMMENTS ALLOWED ABOUT THE GAME.....if you want to talk about that, start your own blog! Love ya, mean it! Now to the good stuff!  My niece Katie is in town visiting, so she got to enjoy Madi's Valentine party at school today...fun times!!







Just a little taste!!







My two sweet girls that were fine till...



this one came along!







Will couldn't understand why Katie was so upset...maybe because he was JUMPING and BOUNCING on her!! Mother Hen Madi saved the day!  After all this excitement, it was time for a bath!

He is so mischievous...I could eat him....a few sprinkles on top and he'd be GONE!

The Party at school was fun, but you could tell that the kids had been eating sugar all day! Madi's class had a fun day. They watched movies, played games and snacked!  Double fun watching them devour the cupcakes!

YUMMMM!!

 



what shall I eat first??



And then there was the sugar CRASH...minus Katie b/c she keeps on going...

Off to chase the little one's b/c I just heard Katie say " Will, you wanna play dog?" I hear the dog leash and I'm sure Will is hooked up by now!

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!

Off to the beach for a little R & R, I'll be back on Tuesday for a Big ol' weekend post!

Till next Time... Kyla

So I figured I would jump on the band wagon and start a blog.....only because I have all this extra free time lying around and well we just don't want anything going to waste around here!! Let me start by apologizing for all my grammatical errors....bless my mother's heart, this will drive her NUTS! I love you mom!  We're all busy with LIFE and sometimes I don't always get to "keep up" with friends and family so I thought this would be a good way for ya'll to peek in on what's happening in the Fisher world! I LOVE looking at other peoples blogs!  I guess I could wear the title blog stalker b/c most of the people I don't even know!  For whatever reason it's just interesting to see what other people do in their spare time...you know, what kind of cupcakes they baked or neat projects they did with their kids, that their child won superstar of the month...you know all that good stuff!!  I think I have a problem with run-on sentences...anywho!  I'll try and work on that!  So sit back, enjoy, leave a comment only if it's nice   (and remember what your mother said.. If you don't have anything nice...yeah, you know the rest!) OK..so off to work I go..more to come soon!  Hugs-Kyla