Kids Rock Nashville!

Psyched to be co-hosting and guesting on the groovy radio show Kids Rock Nashville 107.1 live from Music City 3:00-5:00 tomorrow, Thursday, September 30th. Please give a listen if ya can. I will try to post it here later, too! Thanks to DJ Jacie for having me on-I think it will be a hoot. She is going to tell a little about my parenting memoir and play a few songs from the accompanying album and we will talk mom stuff including dental health tips for kiddos. (And ya know the missing tooth story of last week will be blurted out for sure)Looking forward to it.
And in the words of my little boy who loves all things having to do with radios/microphones or walkie-talkies ... "Over"!

A week of smileys--minus one tooth!

Celebrating my 12 year wedding anni this weekend and the fact that our little guy kept his smiley faces in kindergarten ALL WEEK LONG. A VERY big deal and the best anniversary gift I could have asked for for the weekend! AND he lost his first tooth this week!
The school secretary has worked there for 25 years and has pulled 9000 teeth! It is rumored that she may be the real tooth fairy! She "tested" his tooth Wednesday to see how loose it was and voila! It was out in a flash. She sent him home with the tooth in a little plastic treasure chest. The stuff magic childhood memories are made of.

No kidding

Gotta share this weird story. So, on our way back from our summer vacation we were at a large North Eastern airport. I decided to go get a panini from a sandwich shop to have on the plane later. Little Man was in tow. The large guy with glasses at the counter said "would your little one like something?" "No, thanks, he has eaten". Then the guys says "I am required by state law to let you know that I am a registered sex offender in twenty-three states". Dumbfounded I asked "Are you serious?!" "Dead serious" he replied. I stood there kind of shocked and then he said "that will be $12.00, or free if you give me your little one." Oh. my. God. I was so freaked. I had given him my debit card before I thought about it which made me even more paranoid that he had my name. My husband and I went back and forth on whether or not that could possibly be true, but if it wasn't ...why joke about such a thing?! Was it a warning or cry for help??
Jim immediately reported it to the head of the corporation who responded promptly. They called the young man in (turns out he was only a teenager!) with a policeman present. They confronted him and he said he was just joking around and had no idea the seriousness of it. They dismissed him from his job and he is never allowed to work at the airport anymore. Sorry he lost his gig, but I guess that was a life lesson for him that some things are just NOT okay to kid about.
Oh yeah, the sandwich shop corporation sent us a nice goodie basket of sweets with a nice apology which was appreciated.
Strange-huh?!

My dad's birthday "flocking"

My dad had a birthday last month and to help him celebrate we ordered a "flocking" as a gag and to help support the Nashville Zoo and their new flamingo exhibit. Little Man considers himself a zoo man and was very into this idea. My dad woke up to about 15 plastic flamingos on his lawn this morning with a sign that reads "you've been flocked" and tells about the new exhibit. The flamingos will roost there for 24 hours and they will leave one behind for him being a good sport. Fun!

Stalker Mommy

It's true. I have surpassed the helicopter hovering mom and gone right to the slaker-mom status! This is my little boy's first week in kindergarten (all day, five days a week) in a big school. He is doing pretty good with the transition. Me? Not so well!
True, he is a very impulsive kid and a "runner" so safety has been a big concern. The school has been great to work with me on safety precautions and I am starting to feel a little bit better about it. But still, I can't imagine dropping him off in the drop off line, so I walk him up. I have been there at lunch the past two days to "help" (and make sure that he doesn't escape the cafeteria!) and I come early to make sure that he is close to the first one out so I can nab him. Yesterday, I admit, I drove around the school a couple of times when they were on the playground to make sure that he wasn't running off. Oh yeah, I have an ID tag on him too, like a puppy! He will hopefully stop being as impulsive ... he is way better than he used to be about running off and has actually been following the rules pretty good this week. (Though I do have an all points bullitin alert on him!) And hopefully I will learn to trust more. And we both will grow!

My baby is in kindergarten!

What can I say except that we survived! Mama was a hot (nervous) mess, but Little Man did really good!

Summertime Fun!

We just got back from an action-packed trip to the East Coast. We went to the boardwalk at Seaside Heights, NJ (now infamous from MTV's Jeresey Shore show) Little Man rode tons of rides.

I had a blast riding with him until I met my match with the Octapus or Spider or whatever hateful contraption it was conspired to try to make me heave. I kept my eyes closed the whole time to try to keep from losing my lunch, an overindulgence of greasy delicious authentic pizza
, Little Man, however, love it!
We went to New York City for 24 hours to get to spend some extra quality time witCousin Gracie. They played in her condos way-cool playground, had take-out Chinese and Little Man hailed his first NY taxi cab!

Then back to NJ for another amusement park, Blackbeards Cove for more fun with his sweet cousin and they also went to Popcorn Park. A great, humane society owned, safe haven for mistreated or abandoned exotic/farm animals (that also houses a regular humane society as well. As you can guess from the name, you can purchase popcorn there to feed to the animals.
We spent the last three days of our vacation on Long Beach Island, NJ, a quaint, lovely, relaxing family vacation spot. My BFF from college was vacationing there with her whole family (5 older brothers and their big, great families) and invited us to stay with her. She has a 6 and 9 year old and so the kids had a blast together! The big kids did too! We spent our time on the bay beach, big beach, visiting the lighthouse there, going to get ice cream and going to the best Water Park ever! Little Man was afraid to go on the BIG water slide at first with me and his dad, but was finally convinced and loved it so much he ended up riding it by himself! Dad walked him up and I was planted at the bottom, a nervous wreck until I saw him pop out the bottom of the slide with the biggest look of eletion on his face!
Great summertime memories that will last forever!
We got back just in time for me to put together a dinner for my dad's 70th bday! Just a little family affair, but nice!
After two weeks of absolute decadence, this Mam is ready for a cleansing diet of sorts!
And now we have to gear up for KINDERGARTEN starting next week! Shew! I'm not ready!!!!