creative little daisy

Sweet little blog of mine, why do I neglect you so?

I have have so many fascinating things I would love to talk about. Like...

• My cat's hyperactive thyroid
• Making pompoms out of yarn
• Spring (did you hear that NC? enough with the cold, it's SPRING!)
• Bayleigh. I Never run out of Bayleigh stories, like the time I said son of a gun, and she asked if I meant son of a #@$&*. Yes she did.
• I can't remember if I introduced you to Lola. Did I? A chihuahua mix I found abandoned beside the road.
• Early menopause. Oh joy!
• Trying to learn new makeup strategies for a face that isn't as young as it once was. 
• Pillowcase dresses. So sweet aren't they?
• Our pending induction into the club of jobless folks. The plant where Mitch has worked for the past 26 years is closing in a couple of months. Oh my!
• Some of my new favorite things.

See,  just that quick I came up with ten potential blog posts. I have absolutely no excuse. Where shall I start, the starving cat or menopause? Job loss or stray dog? Foul mouthed four-year-old? You tell me, what are you just dying to hear about?

Ducks and sand and shells... the stuff memories are made of.

As soon as Irene blew through our neck of the woods, we loaded the camper and truck and headed south.

Bayliegh, Mitch the dogs and I.

I know Bayleigh is still young when it comes to life long memories. She may not remember a bit of this trip, but it is etched in my heart forever.

To be able to enjoy life alongside a three-year-old is a wonderful thing, a gift.

We had a great site, right across from the duck pond. Let's just say, it's a good thing it was only for a few days. Many more days with us as neighbors, those poor duckies would be so fat they wouldn't be able to swim.

We fed them.

And watched them.

Some of us shared their food.

Some of us weren't all that impressed with all the quacking and waddling about.

We loved feeding the ducks, and they loved being fed.

They would literally eat right out of your hand.

When we weren't feeding the ducks, we were likely splashing around in the kiddie pool.

And although she preferred the pool, we did manage to get in some fun beach time too.

We crammed a lot of fun into those four days. Not planned out or scheduled fun. Cheese fries by the pool fun, evening golf cart rides fun,

 
Just hanging out at the camper fun. (photo taken by Bayleigh)

I know you're wondering about the camper. Have I painted and recovered every inch of it?

Nope! It's ug-leeee. Who designs these things anyway? My theory is they make them so ugly you can only stand to look at them for a few years then have to trade up.  I'd love to get in there and paint and recover, but that would be one big undertaking and would likely not be good for resale value. Ugly as it is, I have to admit, it is durable and doesn't show dirt.  We really just sleep in there anyway. We don't go to the beach to sit inside a camper.

We go to play in the sand, splash in the pool, feed the ducks, ride the golf cart, eats lots of ice cream and make happy memories. I'd say this was one successful trip.

 

 

 

I hope it works

I'm not a spanker. I'm not firmly against a swat on the bottom to get attention when nothing else is working, but how can you expect a child to understand hitting is wrong if you use hitting as discipline. We use time out with Bayleigh. Or I should say we try to use time out. She's a very strong willed child. Very strong willed and if it isn't her will to sit down, you are going to have to sit on her to keep her in the chair.

The terrible twos seem to have waited to attack full on at three. We definitely notice a strong correlation between food and her behavior and are trying to greatly limit artificial coloring, especially brightly colored candies and fruit punch. Fruit punch + Bayleigh = wildfire out of control. Out. Of. Control. And just you try putting her in time out. She had one of these episodes this past weekend. We tried everything to reign her in. Alyssa put her in the tub and it worked for a few minutes, until she decided to sling with both hands water out of the tub and onto the floor. Bath time over. Fit throwing resumes.

We finally got her to settle down by getting her to use my peak flow meter.  It was really just a distraction, but taking deep breaths helped her to calm down to a reasonable level and wind down for bedtime.

Boy, that was a wordy bunch jibber-jabber to get to the meat of this post. I had this pinned on pinterest. Yes, again with the pinterest. I'm a junkie folks,. but in a good way. She calls it a mind jar and made hers with glitter glue, water, food coloring and glitter.

I made one for Bayleigh today. I didn't have any glitter glue on hand so I just used some gel tacky glue.

 
I filled a jar with water. I think this jar holds about 2 cups.

Then I added a few drops of food dye,

about 2/3 of the container of glue,

and several shakes of glitter.

I started out with a large flake glitter, but it sank too quickly.

This very fine Martha Stewart glitter floated slowly to the bottom.

The idea is you give it a good shake and let the child hold the jar while in time out, watching the glitter fall to the bottom is soothing and calming and also a timer of sorts.

I kept adding glue and glitter until it took about 2 minutes for the glitter to settle to the bottom.

Long enough for a screaming banshee to settle back into a sweet toddler. I hope. We shall see.