4 Men and a Mommy: Inspiration From Everywhere...

I came home last night in an absolute frenzy. Too much going on around me and in my head.

Today, new perspective. I am inspired to be inspired. {and who wouldn't be inspired by this little scrapbook? Heaven} I've said it before and I'll say it again...I love me some spray paint! Two trips in two days to Hunt's. {expensive paint} I am also loving Fusion paint, the kind that bonds to plastic. Woot! Let's see...I'm going all over the place today. Must be my mood. Keep up. Tuesday I bought a can because our 50/50 buckets needed some TLC. I was planning on recovering them but decided to spruce 'em up in a different way. Red does not cover print. I can also count on black. My first trip. I also made a balloon arch for the players to run through on Saturday. It looks pretty nifty. I also mentioned to a new friend that I was toying around with the idea of pop cans. Sound familiar? I dropped the ball on that one once our pop can drive was finished. She reminded me of it Sunday. {thanks, friend} Today I need a barrel at the home game and as of last night I still had a blue one. Not so matchy-matchy for our red and black theme. I purchased 2 more cans of spray paint yesterday during lunch. {second trip} Last night, about 9pm, Keith hauled the barrel from the back corner of our yard to the garage and cleaned it up. This morning, before I took Caleb to the bus, {6:22} I sprayed on the first coat. The second coat came before taking Andrew to the bus. Funny thing happened there...we watched the bus pull away. Dang. We flew home to finish morning tasks so we'd be able to leave for school. In 20 minutes. We made it. The barrel made it too. We'll see as the day goes by if I'll make it til tonight.

I originally thought this single barrel would collect cans at our home football games for Lil' Vikes. I have since come up with another idea. A bigger idea. Something that'll allow me to carry this into the future. Beyond my time with Lil' Vikes. I'm naming it The Viking Project. I intend to do this to raise $ for the golf outing. The Whitehall football golf outing. {see where I'm going?} I haven't broken this news yet, so you know who you are...you're reading it here first!!

Okay, so I've been busy this morning. Since being at work, I've also been busy. After doing part of my job, I took a moment to blog hop. I think I prefer this over blog stalking. I don't want to be a stalker. Inspiration everywhere. I WANT TO WORK ON MY SCRAPBOOKS!!! I will plan for it soon. I found a great little idea using bubble wrap to stamp and it is so cute. Love the texture it'll add to a page. Also found a grungy flower idea using a script stamp for a lovely finished embellishment. I have been getting so many emails from my favorite supply companies and, instead of opening them up, I have tucked them away in a neat little folder on my computer. The temptation is getting to me. I want the new Cosmo Cricket Boy Collection. YUM! Oh, and I want to doodle a bit on some pages. Hold the phone...if I don't stop dreamin' I may end up missing the games on Saturday. {I'll be in my basement}

Can you sense the caffeine overload? Can you? Believe it or not, I haven't had a sip. Or a bite for that matter. This is natural, baby. My natural high. {and nobody is in the office to appreciate it. ;)}

I was looking forward to preschool this year for some structure for Kyle. One week in and I rip him right out of his schedule. An option was presented to me last week, but I chose to overlook it. Kristin re-presented it to me Monday morning, right before school. I panicked, took a bit of time, talked to Tami, talked to Kristin, talked to Keith and went for it. Talk about jumping in with both feet first. Kyle is now in afternoon preschool. He moved with Ashley. He really needs to have her schedule for our work schedule to work. The transition was great. What I didn't know was that the transition worked so well because it was my day off. The next day was another story. We're having a tough time going to daycare first. Another struggle this morning. Kyle wants to go to school in the morning. Every day. I think he would go every day if he could. It's nice to see him so excited to go somewhere. I really think he likes it. I really like that I get to slow down enough for preschool. Kyle came at a point in our lives when there was no choice for him but to keep up with everyone else. He enjoys keeping up with the big boys but preschool will allow him to be 3...or 4. He'll be 4 in 4 days. Imagine! I like the nostalgia of preschool. It reminds me of the boys in preschool. I also like that I am forced to slow down and enjoy everything Kyle will experience this year. I am really super excited.

Caleb had a timeline project due the other day. I, like other moms, helped him put it together simply because of the lack of time in every single day. I was able to sit and look through pictures for awhile. Pictures I haven't looked at in quite a while. My sweet babies are getting so big. All 3 of them. One picture we used, one of Caleb on his first day of preschool, is so precious. Caleb, Keith, and a few random others thought it was a picture of Andrew. It's funny to me because I don't think he locks like Andrew at all in the picture. The pictures of Andrew on his first day of school are totally different. Sadly, I forget how gorgeous his eyes are, hidden behind his glasses all day. He has striking eyes. Long, pretty lashes. Very prominent at 3 to 5 years. Maybe I'll surprise you and post past pics soon so you can see for yourself.

Quote for the day...{author Keith Stratton} "You better get your boy a crown because he's the story problem solver King..." {after helping Andrew with his homework}

THE BEST STORY THIS WEEK...Okay, so I think I explained the whole Star Spangled Banner story during our vacation, yes? How before we could start any ball game, we had to sing the National Anthem with hands {mitts} over hearts. No exceptions. Well, the other day Andrew came home from school and handed me a small stack of papers for me to look over. One had the sheet music for the Star Spangled Banner on it. I handed it back to Andrew. I thought it was just messed up with the other papers. he told me his homework assignment was to sing it with his parents and have a parent sign the sheet. I was in the middle of 10 things but there was no reason to put it off so instead of getting ready for it, I just started right in. I think it startled Andrew a bit, because there was no warning and I just belted the song out. No hesitation. He then joined in. Seconds later, Kyle and Ashley come running into the dining room{where we were singing} with, get this, their hands over their hearts!!! Kyle was beaming ear to ear. Andrew and I glanced at each other and promptly placed our hands over our hearts as well. It was totally the best! I was asked if I took a pic...I was in the middle of singing. I easily could have reset the scene by singing again, but I didn't. It was awesome. I loved it. Silly kid.

Sleeping yet? Hmm, what else is new? Ah, Halloween costumes. Here are the 3 current choices...

Andrew as the Joker...