Does your bookcase look like this?

The case of the nasty bookcase. I don't know about anyone else but keeping a decent bookcase is a lost cause in our home. I organize, organize and organize and well its still ends up looking like this......

 

I try to ignore it knowing that if I organize it again it will just end up this way. I've tried everything from designating an area for school library books to where to put their daily readers and no luck. They have to read daily so instead of putting books back correctly they just shove, sigh.... I'm guilty of it as well. So for now I shall cover it up with Ashton's tent castle and pretend its pretty and neat. Yeah that'll work!

 

 

~ Liza

Never let them see you cry....Don't buy that boys don't cry BS!

Yesterday Little E had a rough end of school day. He's been having spats with one of his best friends, they play on opposite teams at recess and when Little E's team wins his buddy gets upset and refuses to talk to E. Sometimes name calling occurs and Little E gets extremely heart broken. I've always told them that they can totally cry and let their feelings out but never to let them see him cry at school. So he climbs into the SUV at pick up and I can immediately tell he's upset. I continue with my usual "How was school today?", he spits out "Terrible!" and starts to let his recess drama unfold. I can tell he wants to cry. We pull up to Z's school, park and wait for Z to be released for the day. I tell E if he would like me to hold him so he can cry it out. He nods yes and he starts to bawl, he's so upset my heart breaks. He pulls away and tells me "Boys shouldn't cry right?" I respond with "Who told you that?" He says no one that it's just known. Well I reassure him that his been horribly misinformed, boys can most definitely cry and whoever tells him otherwise is on crack! He giggles at my response and looks to ease up and smiles at me, crisis for now is averted. My point is telling our boys that they "Shouldn't cry", "Be a man", "Man up" is a bunch of BS. As a mother of 3 boys I want strong and independent boys who can most definitely show their emotions. I don't want emotionless, meatballs who can't show how they feel. Sadly, society pushes us on what women and men should be and we all have to fit in societies perfect little box. Well lucky for us we don't play by the rules we dance to the beat of our own drums and in our house boys can most definitely cry!

These boys here....

 

Having had my baby days behind me there was one thing I missed and that was the absorbing, curiosity, the learning. I am so happy to be able to start this phase in my life all over again. There is just something magical when they discover leaves, planes in the air or like this, sidewalk chalk. I LOVE toddler years they are a hot mess but oh so cute in the process.

 

 

Today after school I caught Little E just sitting there playing with some little objects entertaining himself as we waited for Z to get out of school. I suddenly didn't see my 5th grader but a toddler pretending and using his imagination. Wasn't long ago that he was Ash's age, time is cruel, it goes by way too fast.

 

Couldn't leave my biggest baby out! Here he is practicing his trumpet for us. And not because he's my boy but for only having been at this for a month he is pretty darn good! He played me Mary Had a Little lamb. And YES that is a picture of a video, I record him regularly so he can see his mistakes but most importantly to send the videos to his grandma Lupe. Because you know grandmas love watching videos of their grandbabies!