Emma got invited to Zia’s birthday party after all. Last night I got a phone call from Zia’s mom. She said that she wasn’t sure if Emma had been invited or not, but that Zia really wanted Emma to come to her party. I’m not really sure what exactly happened, but Emma was thrilled to be invited.

It turned out to be a Star Wars party, and they wanted everyone to come in costume. How perfect! Emma has been really loving Star Wars lately, and she was Princess Leia for Halloween. She couldn’t wait to wear her costume again.

She had a great time, and I was happy for her that she got to attend afterall.

It was a busy party day. As soon as that party was over, we all headed over to Vicky’s house for the twins birthday get together. I can’t believe they are 3 already! It was a lot of fun. It was fun to see Tiffany and Laurel there. I haven’t seen them in a while, and it was nice to catch up. The kids all had a great time, and got along really well. They decorated cupcakes and it was a huge hit. Hopefully Vicky’s house didn’t get too trashed

Vicky had the most delicious cup cakes for the adults. I don’t even like cake, and I ate way more than my share Her neighbor makes them and sells them. I’ll have to keep them in mind in case we ever need yummy desserts for our parties.

It was a busy party day, but it was a lot of fun!

Ian started Karate at Bobby Lawrence Karate this fall.

I thought it would be perfect for him. He loved karate even before he knew anything about it. He was always doing his “karate moves” and yelling ai-ya.

I have been so impressed with Ian’s instructor, Cole Klekas. He has an amazing way with the kids. He does such a good job of getting the kids to listen to him and respect him.

Ian has been going once a week since school started. Earlier this week they had a “tip test” where they test the kids, and find out if the kids are ready to move up a level or a belt. I didn’t expect Ian to be ready to move up, since he has only been going once a week. Most of the other kids attend twice a week. I was pleasantly surprised to see that he got a red tip, indicating that he was ready to attend promotion and get a new belt.

Ian has been anxiously awaiting the promotion. It was last night, and he wasn’t disappointed.

It was so cute and so serious. Each group of kids had to perform a certain set of skills. After each group was done, the instructors had a little meeting and determined who would earn their new belts.

Ian was thrilled to earn his white belt with a yellow stripe. It was fun to see how much he has learned. He was really proud of himself and it was neat to see.

I have been thinking about having Lasik surgery for the last few years.

I wondered if I would be a candidate for the surgery. My dad went for an evaluation a few years ago and he wasn’t able to have the surgery. His corneas were too thin to qualify. Apparently corneal thickness is genetic. I also wondered if my Ankylosing Spondylitis would disqualify me.

This week we had to decide how much money we will contribute to our cafeteria plan. I decided I would have the evaluation as soon as possible, so that we could max out our cafeteria plan to pay for the surgery.

I went for the evaluation today at Hoopes Vision. I was very impressed with the facility and the staff. They have the newest laser, the Allegretto Wave, which looks fantastic. They did a very thorough 3 hour exam. They did tests to measure my prescription, check my intra-corneal pressure, measure the thickness of my cornea, map my eye to check for astigmatism, and a bunch of other things.

I was happy to learn that I am a candidate for the surgery.

I still had a few questions, but I am really thinking that I will have the surgery next year. One of the things I wondered about was my future vision and what will happen when I start to develop presbyopia–or old eyes Right now there is a Lasik surgery where they adjust one eye for close vision and one for far vision. I asked if I would still be able to do that in the future, if I choose to have Lasik now. They said there is no guarantee, but with the thickness of my corneas, if the healing process goes as they expect it will, I should have plenty of cornea thickness left to have future surgeries.

I feel very confident about using Hoopes Vision for my Lasik surgery. I know they will take good care of me and do everything in their power to get me the best vision they can. Now I just need to decided when to schedule the surgery.

A while ago I posted about a new camera strap I ordered from My Funky Camera. Gabi, who owns the store, is so nice and has fantastic customer service. I got it and thought it was adorable. The only problem was that it was a bit scratchy on my neck.

I ordered a different style from an Etsy store, but I didn’t like it as much. It was more of a sleeve to go over your existing camera strap. It moved around a lot and got bunched up on my neck.

I wanted to get a birthday present for my friend Vicky. She just got a new DSLR, so I thought I’d get her a new strap for it. (Thanks for the good idea Vicky ) Again, Gabi was awesome. I had the strap within 2 days and it was adorable! I noticed that the new ones had this super soft fleece lining sewn to the inside. It looked like just what my sensitive neck needed.

I emailed Gabi to see if she could sew some onto mine. Again, she went out of her way to be nice and helpful. I mailed it off to her to add the fleece. She sewed it within one day of receiving it, FOR FREE, and then sent it back to me.

I just wanted to tell all my photog friends to go check out the adorable prints on her site. Order something from her. You won’t be disapointed!

Emma came home from school today talking about her “best friend” Zia. She has had a new best friend almost every week since school started. I have taken that as a good sign. I am glad that she can be friends with all different kids.

She started talking about Zia’s birthday. She is having a birthday party. Emma said that she wasn’t invited. She said “Zia can only invite 17 people, and there is no room for me.” She seemed sad about it, but said that she would still want to invite Zia to her birthday. Emma has been talking about her party for months I have been trying to explain to her that she should tell people about her party, because we aren’t sure who we will invite 3 months from now. I keep trying to tell her that she could hurt some people’s feelings if she talks about it now and doesn’t invite them later. This was a perfect example of that happening. I tried to explain to her that how she was feeling now, was how other kids would feel if they didn’t get invited to her party later.

All of a sudden she burst out crying. She said that Zia is her best friend but there are 2 girls that are very mean to her. Apparently one of them told her she wasn’t her best friend, that she couldn’t come to her birthday, and that she couldn’t play with them. Another girl who has been one of Emma’s good friends, apparently went along with the mean girl.

I felt so sad for her when I heard her crying. I just wanted to hug her and make it all go away. I felt so bad to see my little girl hurting, and not really have any control over it. I remember all of these issues so well, but I wasn’t thinking they started in first grade.

I gave her a hug and tried to comfort her. I told her that there will always be some kids that aren’t nice. The important thing is for her to keep being nice, and to try to be friends with everyone. I know that Emma is a sweet and sensitive little girl. It just breaks my heart to hear that everyone is not that way to her.

The last few days we did so many little projects, I kind of feel like I am nesting I think I am–I am getting ready for the long winter. LOL.

It was another beautiful day here yesterday, so we got the rest of the garage done. We made a quick trip to Home Depot to get a few more hooks and hangers. I have been wanting to hang up our wheelbarrow for quite some time. I finally found the perfect thing for it. This hanger was a close out at Home Depot and it worked great. Having it up off the floor sure cleared out a lot of space. Our 3rd garage bay actually looks like we could park a car it it now.

While we were cleaning out the garage I found an extra shelf for one of my bathroom cabinets. I had wanted Scott to cut it to fit after we first moved in. So while we were doing projects I had him cut that too. I put it in my cabinet this morning and it is great. Just one more shelf gave me so much room, and it looks much more organized. The next thing I need to do when I am feeling motivated is to go through all the random bottles of things I have in my bathroom cabinets. I am sure half of it could be thrown away.

Last, I cleaned out Emma and Ian’ pjs. Ian kept getting dressed for bed in pajamas that were floods. He still had some in his drawer that were size 24 months! No wonder they were so short.

It was a nice weekend. I always feel good when I get projects done. Going into the garage this morning was a treat. I’ll see what other projects I can come up with in the next few days. I’m sure I can think of something

I took a ton of photos of Sue and Scarlett and then pretty much put my camera away for the week. I even got a new lens for my birthday that I haven’t used at all. Next week I should have more time to experiment with it. Here are a few more photos from my photo shoot.

Please visit Lotus at Sarcastic Mom to view all the Weekly Winners participants.

Today was such a nice day. After our snow and cold snap, today warmed up and felt a bit like Indian Summer. It made me feel like doing some spring cleaning in the fall.

I have been wanting to clean out our garage this whole summer. Scott and I finally spent a couple of hours today and made a big dent in it. One of the main things we needed to do was organize our bikes. We bought some pulley type bike hangers about a year ago. Scott hung them up today and they worked out great. I got a lot of things organized and hung up on our Rubbermaid FastTrac system. It really made a big difference.

Hopefully tomorrow it will be nice again. I still want to sweep the floor and possibly wash it down.

We also took the kids out for a movie today. It has been a while since we have all gone to the theater together. We went to see Madagascar 2. I thought it was really cute, and the whole family enjoyed it. Nora did great for most of the movie. She sat in her own seat eating her popcorn. About 20 minutes before the movie ended she started getting antsy. But it was still a lot of fun to all be there together.

So that is our Saturday wrap up. It was nice to all hang out together with no real agenda. I am looking forward to more of the same tomorrow.

One of the other presents that Scott got me for my birthday was a Gorillapod. It is basically a mini tripod that you can carry with you in a purse or backpack or camera bag. You can set it on a table or wrap it around a pole.

I have been wanting one for a while, and just haven’t ever ordered one. I am excited to try it out and see what it can do for my photography. Maybe now I can work on setting it up with my timer and actually getting some photos of myself. I was working on my scrapbook photos yesterday and I was reminded that I need to do better at that. There are almost no pictures of me in the scrapbooks or anywhere else. The only ones I have are ones from Peekaboo Photos or that my mom took. (By the way, if you click on the Peekaboo Photos link, you will see that Ian is their poster child )

I haven’t had a chance to use it yet, but I am looking forward to seeing what I can do with it.

I found a new website called Parentography. They are giving away a Gorillapod to one lucky winner. All you have to do to win it is to link to their site on your blog. The contest ends on November 15 at midnight. Hurry and check it out!

Well, I decided to start working on potty training Nora after all. I wasn’t sure I was ready, but she was showing clear signs of being ready. I decided to just start and see how it went.

I started just letting her wear dresses with no diaper or underwear underneath. With Emma and Ian I found that this was the best method. If they had an accident they got immediate feedback and pee running down their legs. It usually sent them running for the bathroom in mid stream.

The first few days Nora did great. She peed in the potty many times and pooped every day for about 3 days. I started trying to have her wear underwear, but that didn’t go as well. She had more accidents, but I decided to keep trying. One day I had her wear underwear when we left the house. She had about 5 accidents and her pants were completely wet

The last week or so has been harder. We have been gone a lot and it just doesn’t go as well when we are away from home. She is distracted and she just isn’t able to hold it until we can get to a bathroom.

So, it isn’t perfect, but I am still encouraged. I am still having her go naked as much as I can when I am home with her. When we are out in public, she is wearing pull ups. I think she is making progress, but slowly. Which is fine, because she is still really young, and we have lots of time.