St. Patrick's Day Boys

Cole and his leprechaun hats and Mr. Carter and his favorite toy Rafe' (short for Giraffe)

Carter thinks he is a Yoga master and Cole is a SUPER genius

Here is Carter with a 'hot mess' (as my friend Brandi would say) on the top of his head.

Carter's new trick...he likes to do yoga with me in the mornings....

Here is Carter's version of the Downward Dog Sequence

Oh....let's try again....

Got it. Perfect....

Cole had a special Parent Workshop night...so Cole took me around the classroom and showed me his favorite 'works'. Here he is with the sun from the solar system work.

Rolling up the galaxy....

Counting with the blue cord.

And the skeleton work. He LOVES this one.

Then we treated ourselves to some Baskin Robbins. Cole loves Cookies N Cream.

So much to talk about today

Ah...hello. It's Monday and the 2nd day of "Spring Forward" I love the spring and summer months. I just love them so I was glad to wakeup Sunday morning one hour earlier and start the day. Before I get into everything here are some cute photos of the kids sleeping. Chris thinks I'm a little crazy because I absolutely LOVE taking photos of the boys when they are sleeping. They are so peaceful and so sweet. I can promise you that when they are both awake there isn't a moment that they are not running around or talking like little chatter boxes. Carter loves to play with Cole and he will chase him around the house and tackle him. So much for my quiet baby. 

Both of the boys have had an absolute fascination and love for Ragedy Ann dolls. Here is Carter sleeping with Cole's "Big Ann" and he just loves here. Cole has a Andy doll that we have taken all over the country with us. Andy has flown from Virginia to California and all the stops along the way 

with Cole. 

Cole is a bit of a wild sleeper....and he kicks the covers off....the lady bug next to him is his nightlight. Carter has a turtle nightlight that is exactly the same (the shells light up and cast shadows of stars and a moon on the ceiling). (Thanks Grandpa Coke and Tamara for the turtle night light. Carter loves it!)

Sooooo what I want to blog about today is my last trip to the grocery strore. I made a fast dash into 

Fred Meyer's on Friday night to pick up some basics for the weekend and as I walked by the meat section a package of bologna caught my eye. It's been YEARS since I've had a bologna sandwich and being extremely hungry as I was I picked up the yellow package and put it in my carrier. I remembered the summers eating bologna sandwiches with ketchup and cheese and thought of how great summer was. This was a perfect memory to share with Cole. In my optimism I was hoping it would be nice enough for us to have a picnic outside on Saturday (it snowed in reality) so I checked out and paid with these wonderful ideas floating around in my head.

Zoom to Saturday afternoon. We were getting ready to have some lunch and then we were heading to the Museum of Idaho to spend the afternoon there. They have a great exhibit about wolves and their connections to dogs and of course Cole and Carter both love the children's room.

I took the yellow package of bologna out of the fridge and turned it over. I was curious. What was bologna made out of? I vaguely knew it was a combination of meat but I figured it was a simple mixture. Oh....how I was wrong. This is how the package reads: 

(my comments are in the parenthesis....sarcasm included) 

INGREDIENTS:

Mechanically separated chicken, (not capitalized) Pork (why is it capitalized) Water (again, why?) Corn syrup, Contains less than 2% of Salt (?) Sodium lactatee, Flavor, Sodium phosphates, Autolyzeded yeast, Sodium diacetate, Sodium ascorbate, Sodium nitriteDextrosese, Extractives of paprika, Potassium phosphate, Sugar (because lunch meat needs sugar) Potassium chloride.  

I stood in the kitchen for a few minutes #1 trying to read all the ingredients and #2 in shock. 

Asking myself, "Have you lost your mind---why in the world did you buy this?"

I had NO idea this is what was in bologna. 

One word for you: APPALLING 

Another word: FRIGHTENING

This is cheap meat. What that translates into is this is easily produced and produced in mass. I'm sure many parents are feeding this meat to their children and by all means I understand that all parents are doing the best they can but after all the processing it has undergone....is it even considered meat let alone a source of protein? 

The most unsettling part of the ingredients (besides I have no idea what all the different 'Sodium' ingredients are and why. so. many?) is the MECHANICALLY SEPARATED (lowercase) chicken. That is insane. Apparently Water can be capitalized on the ingredient label but 

chicken=no capital letter C. 

The yellow package of whatever it is bologna so-called-meat was put back into the fridge and the kids had peanut butter and jelly for lunch. I am not sure what I'm going to do with the yellow package of whatever it is bologna so-called-meat. 

I think I may drop it off at my office. My kids are absolutely not eating anything that contains those ingredients. I understand there is an entire industry that is fueling parts of the economy and making bologna is the key to that successful engine....however....my opinion on this matter is that this is not food we should be feeding out kids. Our rule of thumb at the house is if we can't pronounce the ingredients we don't eat it. If we aren't sure of where the food came from or how the animals were treated to produce the food-we don't eat it and it certainly doesn't find a place in our fridge. 

Me: Food snob, maybe. However, it's only responsible to consider where our food is coming from before we put it into our bodies....and growing little bodies of the Smith boys.

Watching Sesame Street....

Saturday Night 11:30 pm....

Let me set the scene for you: 

Chris and I are in the kitchen and he's looking in the pantry...he stumbles upon the boxes 

(and I mean BOXES) of Girl Scout cookies I purchased this year. 

Chris: Whoa! Where did these come from? And you didn't TELL ME! Holy Jesus Christ. How could you not tell me we have a Girl Scout Cookie Factory operating out of our pantry. 

Catherine: Oh...yea...I brought those home yesterday. Sorry. Forgot to tell you....

Chris: So how many boxes did you order? I want an exact number. 

Catherine: um....12.....

Chris: OK, and they are like what 4 bucks each....

Catherine: Yes, I think $4.50...

Chris: OK, so you ordered 12 boxes...OK, that's good....

Catherine: Yep....12 from one girl scout, Julianna....the other 3 orders will be in next week.....

(I can't say "NO" to my cute art class students.....)

Morris J2 Pick Ups

Recently Cole discovered Chris' collection of old match box cars in our closet. Chris has a few boxes filled with match box cars that date back to the 1950's. Upon Cole's discovery of the cars every night Cole has requested that after dinner and Carter is in bed he and Chris look at them. So Chris brings the three boxes out and carefully unwraps each car from it's respected bubble wrap. The boys then look each car over and Cole asks Chris many questions about each car. Chris had explained to Cole that these special cars were not to be played with because they are collectibles and very special and rare. Sunday night after Cole was in bed Chris turned to E-bay to find Cole his own special collectible car. We didn't tell Cole that Chris had ordered him one but Chris put this note in Cole's lunchbox for Monday. (We send Cole a note everyday in his lunch. Chris draws pictures and I use stickers...which is ironic but Chris can draw well...) Here's the note: 

So today when we went to the Post Office it had arrived. Cole patiently waited for Chris to come home and right after dinner Chris opened the package for Cole. All along I was teasing Cole that Dad had ordered a golden egg for me....

*disclaimers #1 Cole is covered in tattoo's. Santa Clause brought Cole 500 dinosaur tattoo's and Cole enjoys putting them on and he also puts them on Carter. 

#2 You will notice that Cole is wearing pajama pants in these pictures. 

For tonight he is NOT Peter Pantless

Pretty Excited

The boys with both of their Morris J2 Pick Ups

During all of this...Carter was crawling around the house panting and pretending to be a dog. 

Another wonderful day in Smithville. 

Wheely Bug