Raising Cubs in a Campground

We went to the Children's Museum today because our membership expires at the end of the month. There were many reasons we should have stayed home...save gas money, spend time job searching, I could get some design work done... but getting in free (except for $9 for parking and $5 at McDonald's) was too hard to pass up when it costs $40 (with parking, admission, and a snack) for our family to go without a membership. We made the most of it by arriving at 10am and not leaving until 5:30pm. Now to make up for it, I'm saving time by posting a couple pictures from our visit the day Stellan was born instead of taking the time to upload todays images. The kids enjoyed the same things today as last time so not much has changed. Now if you'll excuse me while I take some cold medicine, get to work on editing portraits of these cuties, send off some sample book layouts, upload 500 photos from a client's Picasa Web album, and continue the final edits of a 235 page Blurb boo...

stickers Marble Works pieces Legos cardboard packaging vacuum cleaner hose Bristle Blocks flashlight toy boats books Leave your guesses in the comment section. I'll post the answer tonight. **** If you haven't read the other guesses, I highly r ecommend it**** There are some new faces and funny guesses - more creative than I could ever be! I almost labeled this post 'brotherbear' right away as a clue, but thought that might give it away. You see, our son, our sweet, gentle boy, has at some point turned each of these items into a gun . These benign items found around the house have been turned into weapons. stickers Marble Works pieces Legos cardboard packaging vacuum cleaner hose Bristle Blocks flashlight toy boats books For the most part we don't let him pretend play in that way, but he is so imaginative that a simple activity of putting stickers on a paper becomes a full fledged war between stenciled boats and the flower stickers I gave him. Anyone have some sug...

I swear I had this picture picked out before PapaBear called me a few minutes ago to tell me that he lost his job. Tomorrow is his last day. Even if they hadn't laid off all the temps, the plant is going to three days a week which wouldn't be enough hours to support our family. I'm pretty shell shocked at the moment, but when the reality sinks in, we'll be clinging to these verses from Philippians 4:6-7, 11-13: Don't worry about anything, instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. If you do this, you will experience God's peace, which is far more wonderful than the human mind can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus....Not that I was ever in need, for I have learned how to get along happily whether I have much or little. I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomac...

Thoughts are swirling in my head tonight.... Tuesdays are very busy days for us and this one didn't start off very well. I couldn't find Sam's x-rays for his dentist appointment after school. I made some calls, talked with some not very helpful people, and finally jumped in the shower 3 minutes before we were suppose to walk out the door. Miraculously we weren't late for either school. I even managed to squeeze in an important phone call. I can't tell you how much I'm loving Julia's class and the parent education portion, especially. This group of women and welcomed me into their circle, are so encouraging, uplifting, and insightful. We have to hustle back to pick up Sam by 11. It's stressful, but worth it. He was the snack leader today and so exuberant as he led his class down the ramp. We drove an hour to where Sam's dentist appointment was. We grabbed lunch at Target and then went to our 1 o'clock appointment. By this point we've s...

Not Me Monday's host, MckMama , might be off on a much deserved cruise, but Not Me Monday lives on thanks to Blogger's cool little scheduling trick. Returning visitors will probably remember my historic Not Me Post from last week . Spoiler alert: This was not one of those weeks. You can't tell from the TV screen but the kids are watching a movie with PapaBear. This is not a daily occurrence. Nope. Not in this house! We play with our kids, we encourage creativity....we do not let our two and four year olds watch bits and pieces of Jurassic Park, especially not the part where the T-Rex is trying to eat the children in the jeep . PapaBear and I agree 100% on this topic . You might be wondering who's sitting to PapaBear's left since that certainly doesn't look like my curly-locks , but it IS Julia. It was a one time occurrance. I would never let her hair get that messy every single day. Not me! See? I keep it neatly combed, conditioned, detangled, defrizz...

I celebrated my 32 nd birthday with a Big Sledding Bash at our park. It felt like -29 when we woke up but we were too busy preparing food to notice. Here's the china cabinet that we used to chill some of the beverages. The rest fit in the refrigerator (once we moved all our condiments across the street to the park refrigerator) The first round of guests that arrived included this cutie... His mom, MckMama , his aunt, Hilary , and blogging In Real Life friends, Esther and her sweet daughter, Emma. Because it was so cold we didn't have to rent skis. That meant PapaBear could join the fun. He took me for a couple rides on our vintage toboggan. Tanner went down the hill at least 20 times. Sam preferred keeping watch over the fire with Grandpa, but I did get him to go down once with Isaac and I. Thanks Gene for keeping the fire going for so long!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Bill and Trudy took a spin around the park on their skis. Talk about brave! Seventeen of our g...

"The branches were dipped in frosting this morn" and the sun cast a fairyland spell; Each fragile twig looked feathered and white and beckoned a heart to swell. A winter treasure - a sight to behold - while silence augmented the scene; I wanted to walk through an open gate to find the artist, supreme. No gate could I see, the artist unseen, awe captured my soul; The canvas would change, as nature intended, but I'd witnessed her morning's goal. (By Joan Adams Burchell) If this poem sounds familiar it's because I used it last year with a different series of frost pictures that I took at our old house. You can see them here .

In two days my house will be filled with 17 children and about 25 adults. I'm so excited! For the second time we are inviting our friends and family over for a big sledding bash. The weather doesn't look like it's going to cooperate (high on Saturday of zero), but I'm not letting that get me down. Instead, I'm coming up with indoor winter games and activities for adults and children. I've got a few things up my sleeve, but am putting out a request to all you creative types for more ideas. Does anyone know of any games or activities with a snow, ice, or winter theme you'd be willing to share? (Most kids are 2-5 years old) Thanks in advance!

Houston , YOU are the problem!

Except for one post at the end of 2007, I haven't kept up with recording the words SisterBear is learning. Her vocab is too big and constantly growing. She's one of the only kids who sings all the words to the songs at school. It's not obvious to everyone what she's saying all the time, but for the most part she can get her point across. When we can't understand what she's saying BrotherBear is our go-to guy for a translation. 90% of the time he can tell us right away what she's saying. 5% of the time she has to repeat herself a few times and then he gets it. Her latest phrase is "don't worry" which comes out clear as whistle with a touch of toddler cuteness that always makes me smile. "Don't worry Mama. I'll get that." or "Don't worry Mama. I kiss that." A couple days ago she started answering with "sure" instead of yes. It comes out more like "show" or "shoe" but it'...

I've been blogging about not blogging, and then blogging via Twitter about how not blogging is going for me. Did you follow that? It's ok if you didn't. The whole point of me logging on to post right now is to record the words BrotherBear just said to me out of the blue. "You're a really nice mommy." And that folks, is what makes it all worth it. Thanks to those who have continued to follow our story! I appreciate your friendship and understanding as I refocus my priorities.

It's the start of a new work week, a clean slate so-to-speak. The things that happened this past week are ancient history (unless of course they were blogged about, and then someday when I'm not making blogs into books for other people , I'll forever memorialize my shortcomings in my own hardcover masterpiece book. To join the Not Me fun head over to My Charming Kids . My friend MckMama has been hosting this carnival for about four months now. Has it really been that long? I cringe when I think about the things I could have accomplished if I had been as committed to losing weight, exercising, service projects, eating healthy, saving money, etc... as I have been to Not Me Monday. BUT that's the beauty of this carnival! I can let go of the guilt, wipe that grungy slate clean, and because I am a child of God, His forgiveness makes all things new. A new week. Ah!!!! Almost makes me want to skip over the things I didn't do last week. Wait. That's NOT a b...

The following was originally meant to be posted last week when it was still super cold out. We've made it to the 20's now and people are coming out in droves to ski now. I rented over 40 pairs of skis yesterday compared to the typical 15. The mercury appears to be taking up permanent residence in the bottom of the thermometer so I thought it would be fun to remind myself why exactly I love living here even when we're stuck in an 80+ hour stretch of sub zero temps. Winters are long here so even with the sun setting we have to take advantage of the 'warm' days that we get from time to time. Eventually Spring will take hold and the fruit trees will distract us from any lingering memory of Winter. Next comes my least favorite season of all - Summer. Why don't I like Summer? Because I melt whenever it gets above 70. Just ask my college roommate, Sarah, who had to huddle under her blankets while I had my window open to cool off (and that was in the Fall and Spri...

SisterBear and I had a tea party this morning. We invited a lamb and puppy to join us. We drank tea (with sprinkles) and ate cupcakes. Then it was time to go grocery shopping (in the hallway). I lined the walls with food and the kids put the items in their shopping cart. I mentioned to PapaBear that I hadn't played like this for a long time. I havn't used my imagination or been creative. I havn't engaged with the kids. I have been a lump. Existing. "Why do you put up with me?" I asked. "I've been a lump on a log." He laughed and said, "No, you've been a lump on a blog ." Not any more!

I just did an About Me post a couple weeks back, but it's always fun to do the random things memes that come along from time to time. (This one came from Brittany .) I had a fear of my house burning down when I was a kid. Not when I was in it, but that we'd come home one day and instead of seeing our house, there would only be ashes. That house burned down 2 years after we moved out. I am named after two of my great grandmothers. I consider myself lucky to not have an 'old' sounding name. I was picked on my freshman year of high school by a group of boys who were friends before and after that year. I was thrown in the boys locker room shower, squirted with pickle juice, and made to sit all by myself in Advance Biology while the rest of the students moved their desks to the other side of the room. I could go on and on..... Their nickname for me was " paja muchacha " loosely translated to "Prairie Girl" I don't wear my wedding or engagemen...

I tweeted late last night about a new blog I'm reading. It's written by a mom and dad of twins. I have the privilege of reading each and every word they wrote about their children's first year because Jenny and Joel of Our Story have hired me to make their blog into a book for Sam and Amelia's birthday. I'm 60 pages into the project and wanted to share a couple of my favorite entries with you. This one about a Daddy's First Kiss will make you feel like you were there to witness the special moments Joel had with his preemies a week after they were born. Then there's this one written by Jenny. Her children are in the NICU, her husband had a bike accident - yet she still finds the silver lining! The twins are going to turn two in April, but I'm starting at the beginning of the story. If you can find the time, I suggest you do too!

Once we got past the "car vs. snow plow" scene on Tuesday it was smooth sailing to SisterBear's new school. "My YOU-to-to" she calls it. I have no idea why. Most everything else she says is understandable, but "new school" always comes out with a few extra syllables. It's a huge class - 14 kids. We're used to 6. 10 max. There were familiar faces (BrotherBear's old teacher and an aide SisterBear knows from last year) and toys she loves, so the separation was a cinch. The mom's had an hour with a parent educator and while I'm normally an active participant, I for the most part, settled back in my seat and soaked up the experience of being surrounded by other moms. I'm very isolated out here in the country and really missed my ECFE moms. I don't even know this new group yet, but already they are bringing sunshine to my life and when schools are closing left and right the night before , we could all use a little sunshine ...

If you scroll down to the "Breaking Bear Country New's sign on my blog you'll see that I started twittering recently. It's a great way to update my blog without spending too much time online. If you'd like to follow along I'm 4MamaBear . If not, that's ok too. Nothing that exciting happens around here anyway unless you consider $10,000 worth of camping reservations taken in less than four hours newsworthy. Yes folks, that's right. Almost 400 nights of camping were reserved this morning before I had time to eat a decent meal. Makes me appreciate the long, cold winter months a little more.

I've always been very cautious about what I let the kids watch on TV. Now that they are exclusively watching movies, I don't have to worry about commercials, but simply the content. Violence, guns, bad language, etc... are found in just about everything these days. One of the reasons I don't like kids TV shows and movies is all the products that are associated with them. We avoid the whining and begging for clothes, shoes, food, and more toys that always come along with the latest movie or cartoon. Until very recently we only had two Disney movies in the house. Sam was 4 before he watched Finding Nemo. Of course this means, Julia is watching stuff at 2, that Sam never, ever did. The perk of being the second child I suppose. Tonight, (I mean yesterday. ..I'm scheduling this to post in the morning so I can stick to my new routine), Sharon brought us 15 movies that she didn't need anymore. Don't tell the kids, but she also shared a bunch of brownies too. Mo...

It's time for my free therapy session, otherwise known as Not Me Monday . My friend, MckMama hosts this blog carnival over at My Charming Kids . We get things off our chests and in the process remind each other that we are only one person, we're human, and our kids will forgive us (if not now - in their own future therapy sessions). This might be the second week of the new year, but I've made more changes this week than last. My new layout for example - Emily , at her design site, The Blog Necessities , designed it for me. I did not bug her with over 20 emails filled with questions about what was and wasn't possible in my layout. I'm not html and digital scrap booking illiterate and therefore a clueless in that area. She was kind and considerate of my shortcomings and in less than four days had my new blog up and running. Thanks Emily! My other change will be in the frequency of my posts. It is not because I've become a blogging fool - a fool who...

It's been a few months since I've changed up my template so I thought it would be fun to mix things up again. My Bear header was new right before Christmas so I didn't get to decorate my blog for the holidays. I 'met' a sweet gal last week named Emily who has a second blog where she posts FREE backgrounds. She has been working tirelessly to create my new look ever since. Didn't she do a terrific job? Valentine's Day is just around the corner so now is the perfect time to check out The Blog Necessities ! Thank you Emily!!!!!!!

Esther did this little meme which she got from Minnesota Mom and I couldn't help but join in. The things I have done in my life are in bold, the things in italics are things that I could have done in Europe, but because of long lines or cost, chose not to. Edited to add: I'm having trouble telling the difference between bold and not bold so I'm going to add an * to the ones I've done. UPDATE: Ask and ye shall receive! I share the stories behind my crazy life under each activity. I have a tendency to get long winded so I'm holding back from telling the story of each item in bold, but maybe I'll go back and edit this sometime. My kids might get a laugh out of hearing how my friends and I almost drove right past the Grand Canyon because we didn't see it at first. Who misses a gigantic hole in the ground?! Or the time my friend Rhonda and I went to a drive-in movie and fell asleep (it was a double feature). We woke up at 2am in a deserted drive-in. 1. Started...

It's Gwyneth Rose's 1st birthday today ! SisterBear is wearing pink and brown in her honor. This incredible family has gone through so much in the past year and they continue to inspire me to stop and smell the roses . Hats off to YOU, Gwyneth! Happy First Birthday!