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Friday, December 17, 2010

For Proprietary Reasons

For Proprietary reasons, I cannot go into detail about what we did today but it involved this:



 And this:



These two hoodlums came along for the ride.  They only had to pee once the entire 5 hours we were outside.  Not too shabby.




There were a lot of people standing around.  (Seemed like an awful lot of people doing nothing if you ask me).



And these hoodlums found joy in rolling down the hill.  By hill, I mean slight grade to the park road.  I'd be lying if the crew didn't find those kids entertaining.  And I got the best birthday present ever when several of the crew told me that I had the most well behaved children.  I did have to look around a few times to see if the person was addressing me.  No, I did not drug them or bribe them either.  I may have threatened to phone Santa and tell him to give their presents to some other little kids if they didn't put forth their best behavior, but I didn't drug or bribe them.  Psychological intimidation is a lost art.

One of the girls that paid me that compliment talked to me for a while about what we did on the farm, our animals, etc.  Then she asked if we farmed exclusively and I told her that we had a landscaping business as well.  She then asked what I did so I said, "I'm a stay at home mom," and I don't know if it was based on the conversation we had and the impression she got from it or if it has just become so popular, it was just a natural question, but she then asks, "Oh, do you homeschool then?"  I told her that I envy folks who can, but I don't feel called to or equipped to home school so Walker goes to public school which we took him out of for the day to have this unique experience.

The guy in the black coat is a big -time director.  At least to us.   He was super nice and talked to Erik the whole day.  I kind of got the feeling that all the while he was asking us about the farm and what we do, he was kind of panicking in the back of his mind that we were crazy FARM people and he wondered what we were truly capable of.  The guy in the tan coat - owned the production company, I think.  He's totally bald under that hat.  I don't know why I pictured him as having a head of dark brown, curly hair that has been cut so that it doesn't look curly, but you can tell by the texture it's curly.  Totally surprised when we got to lunch and saw him take off his hat.  He has four kids too and is expecting a grandchild in January.  His youngest is 21.  I swear the guy didn't look old enough to have kids much older than ours.  He was super nice and so pleasant about us hanging around and the hoodlums rolling all over the place.

These hoodlums continue to goof off . . .
 While their big brother (kid in the orange hat in the middle) works.  He didn't have to work, no one told him to work, his parents didn't even say, "Go to work!"  He just CHOSE to work.   When he left the set today, he got a standing ovation from the cast and crew.  The AD (assistant director - yeah, I know the lingo now) said she'd hire him now.  I hope he didn't overhear her because my argument of "You have to go to school or else you won't be able to grow up and get a job" will be completely shot.
 So the hoodlum in pink finally realized her working brother was getting a little more attention, so she decided to help out.
 Standing behind her is the AD's PA (Production Assistant), Maggie.  Talk about confusing to my Maggie.  I finally told her that she should just assume that NO ONE on set was talking to her.  Two seconds later, the AD addressed her.  Then she looked like an idiot child because an adult was speaking to her directly and she was ignoring her.  

"Maggie."  (she looks up in the sky)  "Maggie May" (she looks across the lawn at the playground) . . . .  "MARGARET MAY!  THEY ARE TALKING TO YOU!"  (Turns and looks at me with a DUH face)

"What Momma?"

Another fine parenting moment.


 Eventually even the little one got in on the action.  Notice both boys sitting next to one of the space heaters.  Smart boys - it was only 19 degrees today.
When I can, I'll release all of the proprietary details of what all happened today and hopefully we'll be able to share the final product with all of you.  It was such a fun day and I hope the kids will remember it forever.  It will be our one claim to fame.

 In the meantime, my disclaimer:  No children or animals were harmed in the writing of this blog post . . .  Yet.

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Making A List, Checking It Twice . . .

No, I'm not talking about Santa.

I'm talking about me.  Yes, I confess, (because you probably hadn't already guessed) I am a list maker.  My lists even have lists.  Seriously, I have lists with sublists.  My lists look more like the outline to a doctoral thesis with all the bullets, Roman numerals and footnotes!

I've been spending a lot of my time at my computer making lists to prepare for a Christmas Open House.  I've got my household to do lists, food lists, and my to do "wish" items - those things I really want to have done, but probably won't because other items on my lists are a priority.

Another list that is in constant progress is my "gift" list - where I'm tracking items I've thought of buying for people as gifts, crossing off items I've purchased, and the homemade gift list which includes the directions for making the homemade items, the materials list, and to whom the item will be given!

Are you as crazy as me yet??

Tonight, one of the homemade gifts I'm working on is my annual year in review photo slideshow DVD.  Not only am I sorting photos (so thankful for the digital age and the ease of sorting through photos in my folders on the computer) and then searching my itunes database for songs to go with the slideshow.  My song choices usually include songs the children have loved from the radio or church and songs I think will evoke emotion from the viewers.  For instance, I spent a few minutes tonight searching for this song which the kids are singing with the choir at church Sunday.  They had their first practice with the grown up choir today and it really stirred me so this will be the song that ends the slideshow.


The year in review slideshow is one of my favorite projects to do.  I love going back through my photo files to see how much the children have changed and grown.  I also hate seeing how much the children have changed and grown.

This week has been filled with a lot of nostalgia for me.  Remembering what we did last year at this time.  It really is amazing how fast this year went.  

So, a few pics of where we were last year at this time.






Maggie

 Will
 Me and my babies.

 Walker, Taylor, Chet, Maggie, Will






Now back to my lists.