Very sweet.

What Love means to a 4-8 year old. Slow down for three minutes to read this. It is so worth it. Touching words from the mouth of babes. A group of professional people posed this question to a group of 4 to 8 year-olds, 'What does love mean?'

The answers they got were broader and deeper than anyone could have imagined. See what you think:
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'When my grandmother got arthritis, she couldn't bend over and paint her toenails anymore..So my grandfather does it for her all the time, even when his hands got arthritis too. That's love.'
Rebecca- age 8
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'When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You just know that your name is safe in their mouth.'
Billy - age 4
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'Love is when a girl puts on perfume and a boy puts on shaving cologne and they go out and smell each other.'
Karl - age 5
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'Love is when you go out to eat and give somebody most of your French fries without making them give you any of theirs.'
Chrissy - age 6
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'Love is what makes you smile when you're tired.'
Terri - age 4
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'Love is when my mommy makes coffee for my daddy and she takes a sip before giving it to him, to make sure the taste is OK.'
Danny - age 7
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'Love is when you kiss all the time. Then when you get tired of kissing, you still want to be together and you talk more...My Mommy and Daddy are like that. They look gross when they kiss'
Emily - age 8
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'Love is what's in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents and listen.'
Bobby - age 7
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'If you want to learn to love better, you should start with a friend who you hate,'
Nikka - age 6 (we need a few million more Nikka's on this planet)
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'Love is when you tell a guy you like his shirt, then he wears it everyday.'
Noelle - age 7
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'Love is like a little old woman and a little old man who are still friends even after they know each other so well.'
Tommy - age 6
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'During my piano recital, I was on a stage and I was scared. I looked at all the people watching me and saw my daddy waving and smiling.
He was the only one doing that. I wasn't scared anymore.'
Cindy - age 8
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'My mommy loves me more than anybody. You don't see anyone else kissing me to sleep at night.'
Clare - age 6
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'Love is when Mommy gives Daddy the best piece of chicken.'
Elaine-age 5
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'Love is when Mommy sees Daddy smelly and sweaty and still says he is handsomer than Brad Pitt.'
Chris - age 7
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'Love is when your puppy licks your face even after you left him alone all day.'
Mary Ann - age 4
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'I know my older sister loves me because she gives me all her old clothes and has to go out and buy new ones.'
Lauren - age 4
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'When you love somebody, your eyelashes go up and down and little stars come out of you.'
Karen - age 7
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'Love is when Mommy sees Daddy on the toilet and she doesn't think it's gross.'
Mark - age 6
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'You really shouldn't say 'I love you' unless you mean it. But if you mean it, you should say it a lot. People forget.'
Jessica - age 8
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And the final one
The winner was a four year old child whose next door neighbor was an elderly gentleman who had recently lost his wife.
Upon seeing the man cry, the little boy went into the old gentleman's yard, climbed onto his lap, and just sat there.
When his Mother asked what he had said to the neighbor, the little boy said,
'Nothing, I just helped him cry'

Beach

I don't typically call the Oregon Coast the beach. If simply for the fact that I think of the beach as really warm and sunny and when your feet touch the sand...well the sand is hot.

But...yesterday we went to the beach and it was sunny, reasonably warm and the sand was hot on your feet. It was beautiful and we didn't even need jackets. The kids wore jackets, however, because I made them.

Andrea and James tagged along, they even agreed to ride with Austin and Alex...and I'm told they talked constantly. We lucked out on the ride home because everyone was so exhausted and didn't have much energy to move around or talk or anything else.

We ended up getting like $35.00 worth of candy, which at this one shop meant that we got 5 pieces of taffy. Just kidding...about only getting 5 pieces. We got fudge, taffy, chocolate and just a ton of candy. Then...if that wasn't bad enough, we got ice cream afterwords. However, I'm happy to report that since we paid an arm and leg to get the candy first, we were able to save .25cents/cone we bought. Black Licorice ice cream is the absolute best.

It was busy, long day and we walked miles, but we shared time together, had fun and made memories. More importantly we got to share love with each other by holding hands, playing sand castles and being us.

We need more days like that. :)

The pinkie sneaky.

I went for a run tonight, did 2 1/2 miles. It felt really, really good. While I was running I was thinking about my day and specifically my children because, well, they sort of hang around a lot and it's hard not to notice them. Not to mention that they need to be fed and watered, like, all the time. So, chances are, during the day I'm spending time with them...constantly. LOL

Anyway, what I'm about to tell you us fail proof. Well, mostly. I don't think I've shared this with you before, and while running I thought of that and felt it just completely selfish of me not to. Thus, I will explain to you the pinkie trick. It's a little sneaky, but it works. Seriously.

As a parent, I want to believe I've raised honest to goodness kids. They don't lie to me...often. When they do, I can tell they are lying by using their pinkie...and that same pinkie tells me with 99.9% accuracy whether or not they are telling the truth, or lying. It's very simple really. I should also note that I did not come up with this on my own, but my sweet Vondie Blondie passed it on to me years ago. It's darn near fail safe. In fact, when you use pinkie and said pinkie produces and tells you your child has lied...95% of the time you get a confession and, "I'm sorry". So...it's highly effective.

Here's what you do. It's very simple. Takes little time. The first time you use this trick, you may need to explain it a little to the party involved in suspicious activity or whatever. For example:

Me: "I'm going to ask you a question and I will know if you are lying or not. Austin, did you poke your brother in the eye on purpose?" <---Something simple, to the point, they can answer yes or no.

Austin: "No"

Me: "Let me see your pinkie." <---simple simple simple. (Note, it doesn't matter if it's left or right pinkie...they both tell the truth.)

Austin: Shows me his pinkie while sort of hiding it and glancing at it.

Me: "You've just lied to me. Your pinkie told me the truth. You did poke your brother in the eye on purpose."

Austin: "Well he was bugging me!" <---confession and angrily shoves pinkie into pocket. Will probably teach that pinkie thing or two later.


SO...now we have an example out of the way let me explain. When you ask your child to show you their pinkie, if they are lying they will become uncomfortable, will look at their pinkie, maybe try to hide it from your complete view, wiggle it around a little bit like they think it'll sport a mouth and start talking to you...maybe even all of these things simultaneously. When they do this, you know they are lying. They are looking at their pinkie to see what on earth you can see that tells you they're lying.

When you ask your child to show you their pinkie and they show you their pinkie straight away, hold it up bold, do not look at it and look at you instead, they are telling the truth. Everytime. (Unless they figure out the trick, in which case...good luck with that now.) They don't have any fear or hesitation because they know they are telling the truth. They don't need to see what their pinkie looks like because there's no way it would betray them. Then you can praise them for being truthful. (They might, after you're done, reflect on their pinkie to determine how in the heck you know this...I think I clocked Austin sitting his bed one night pinching it, moving it all around and just overall baffled on how it could possibly tell me the truth everytime for like 15 minutes.)

So there you have it. Vonda said that this trick worked for her son until he was almost 15. So, that's really saying something. LOL

LOL

Seriously. I spoke too soon. Alex and Sam have the flu, again. I knew it was too good to be true. I hope it's only a 24 hour thing this time.

Last night and tonight I got so many deals at the store using the Living Well deal at Safeway. It's ridiculous. :)

Here's what I got with $47.12:

6 80 count Hefty Large Kitchen bags
12 12pack cans coke products (caffiene free, of course)
3 24pack bottled water
8 packs gum
32 boxes of capri suns
2 packages 1lb ground turkey
2 packages Tyson chicken nuggets (large bag)
4 packages American singles cheese
6 pkgs of 4 count Smart Balance butter
6 tubs Smart Balance butter
1 6 pack Dove bar soap
1 large Lawry's seasoning salt
2 12 count pop tarts
1 bag Fritos
1 bag Tostitos chips
2 gallons milk
4 12rolls of Cottenelle toilet paper
10 pkgs Electrosol gel tabs
1 bottle Life Water
1 tin foil
1 Lysol disinfectant


That's it. I should have spent without coupons: $405.79...not a bad haul. Average savings of about 88%....or so. I'll take it.

Betcha ya thought I'd dropped off the face of the earth!!

So, I've not been good at all at updating lately. My bad. I've not kept up on anyone else's blogs either, so I've got a bit of catching up to do.

Special shout out to Kristina for checking on me to see if I was still kicking. I saw your comment yesterday and feel blessed to have such a sweet and exceptionally funny blogging friend. Thanks. :)

I've been bummed because I did injury myself the last time I wrote and it's still not 100% healed. And, just like this last summer when I'm certain I broke my foot, I've not gone to the doctor. I'm really stubborn.

But tonight I did run 2 1/2 miles, record time. My leg hurts, but it's not unbearable. Which means, to prevent further injury, I'll work out on the elliptical tomorrow instead of run again. I look forward to it.

Everyone's healthy. Jon finally got over whatever the heck he had, it took antibiotics, but he's finally a lot better. I still get woken up in the middle of the night by his cough, but it's much better. The kids, expect for Austin, are well. He's still got that same crap. Jon and Austin are going on what...8-9 weeks of being sick straight? Crazy.

Work is going good. I'm working extra this week because a co-worker is on vacation, and I teach preschool...it'll be a busy week.

I've got about 50% of my coupons sorted, which is saying a whole heck of a lot. Andrea and Vickie, bless their little hearts and fingers, helped me clip coupons yesterday. I don't know that they really realize how much they've helped me out, but they did. I'm grateful to them. A lot.

I had a little bit of a break through today and didn't even realize it until my run tonight - that's why I love running...I get to think about things and sort through things and pound it out. Anyway, I don't really know how to say it other than I saw him today and I didn't get upset. Or, frightened or worried or frantic or anything. I actually thought he looked like he was having fun...and what's more is that I hoped he was! There was no other emotion other than that. Hope. It's awesome.

Sam cut her hair again today. I didn't freak out as badly as last time. It's just hair right? At least it wasn't a finger...

I'll update again later this week. I just had to sit down and rest for a bit and let everyone know something.