Prom, Prom, Prom. . . And did I Mention the Prom. . .

Photo parade of the Prom.  I guess I over did my share on Facebook with my Prom pictures but I am sure when others children did Prom they did the same.  This was my sweet Big T's first Prom and there will not be another like it.  So pardon the parade of photos. 

These are my favorite pictures that I took.  These two are very photogenic and we had a great day.  They also had a wonderful time at the Prom.  Everywhere we went that day everyone said how wonderful they looked.   I know because the hubbs and I drove them everywhere.  We did not chaperone the Prom though.

Lax Season is Upon Us. . . .

So sad that Sprat will not have a Spring lacrosse season this year but, Big T's lacrosse season is in full swing with three games this week.  The first one was a bad loss, the other team was very good and had been playing together for several years.  Big T's team has not been playing together more than a few weeks.  The second game also a loss but they fought hard, they stayed close through half time and unfortunately lost in the second half.  Big T was so excited when he came home, I had to work that night so I did not get to see the game.  He was bursting with excitement when he came through the door that night.  I love seeing him that excited and beaming with confidence.  I have not seen him this way since last lax season.  Looking forward to watching him play this year.
Sprat is getting ready to come home for Spring break, I cannot wait to see him.  He said they got a lot of snow this past week.  For a kid that did not want to go to school where it snowed a lot and was very cold he sure has enjoyed his time in Boston and is looking forward to and hoping to go back in the Spring.  He cannot wait to watch his little brother play lacrosse while he is home on break. 
Big T is getting ready to go to his first Prom.  We have the tux and his date has her dress now we have to get flowers and the hubbs and I will be chauffeur since Big T has no drivers license. 
Stay tuned for lots of Prom and Lax pictures. . .

I am the Slacker Mom. . . But, I do Love my Kids. . .

I am a slacker mom, I have one good picture of Sprat in his cap and gown and not one good one of he and I together.  I must say, I am a little jealous when I see these moms with these great pictures of their boys and their tux at prom and their cap and gown at graduation.  I am just never able to capture those moments, I have other moments but never these perfect moments.
I have this one halfway decent picture of Sprat:

As you can tell, this was a quick snap as he was coming off the stage after receiving his diploma.  He hates having his picture made and that does not help when trying to capture these precious moments. When he was little I could hold him hostage and snap away but, now that he is grown up he is harder to hold on to to grab those special moments.

This is one of my favorites, I love those chubby little cheeks and that smile is contagious.  He has always had such a great smile and was always such a happy little fella. Not many things upset him.

I challenge you to look at these pictures without smiling.  He is just so darn cute!!

So many adventures ahead for this guy, I cannot wait to see what happens.  Stay tuned as Boston is getting closer and closer.  Who knew there was so much paperwork involved in going to College?  I do not remember this much.

New Schedules to Adjust. . .

Took a remake of their picture from Sprat ' s first day of kindergarten.  You have seen these folks that go back and take the same picture after so many years well, this is my attempt at that.  I am not sure how good I did but here ya go.  Took this last night before we went out to eat to celebrate the last day of Summer since the Big T starts back to school today and Sprat will start next week at the community college.  This is going to be one crazy year with so may different schedules to coordinate.  Sprat working a high school and college schedule and Big T working his modified high school schedule.  Throw in mine and the hubbs schedules and this year can only be more interesting.  Ha ha ha ha!!  

Looking at these pictures together you can really see how much these two have grown up and yet how absolutely silly they still are.   They drive me crazy and many days I question whether I am a good mother or not and there are some people that question whether I am a good mother at all.  Looking at these pictures tells me I am a good mom and that my boys are happy, healthy, and grounded in who they are.  I love em to the moon and back, the loves of my life.  

Then August 2005

Kindergarten Sprat (5)/pre school Big T (2)

Now August 2017

Senior Sprat (17)/Freshman Big T (14)

First Day of School

Yippeee!!!!  First day of school.  I am so excited!  The hubbs and I have a tradition, that on the first day of school he takes the day off.  This way there are no distractions and we double team the kids to get them ready on time and out the door.   After the kids are gone we go out for a nice quiet breakfast, just the two of us.   There are always errands to run too, and we tackle those together.  Today we made trips to Goodwill and Sunnyside Ministries.  We also dropped by the shooting range for a little target practice.  Nothing like a little couples therapy at the range. 
The hubby and I have been doing this for several years now and we look forward to it every year.  I have been trying to take the kids pictures each year too on their first day.  Sprat hates having his picture taken so this took some effort.  I told him that some day he will have kids and they are going to ask; dad, why are you not in any of these pictures?   Or, they might ask; dad why are your eyes closed to tightly?  Here is our picture today.  Sophomore and 7 th grader, my goofy boys.

February 2015 Snow

Such a peaceful sight.   We got a good bit of snow this time and it was beautiful.  I am renewed this morning, my kids are at school and I have been able to get back into my routine.  It is amazing how we all need structure in our lives.  We think we run around by the seat of our pants but really there is structure and routine in all of the chaos.   I lost my structure and routine these last two weeks, I hope I have it back and will be able to keep it.   We are after all, animals that need routine.   I am blissfully at peace today sitting here thinking about everything I have to do this week.   My ducks are in their rows as they should be.   Thank you for listening while I had my nervous break down this last week.   I will try to stay on track this week with my posts but, you never know what might happen so, hang on.

Fall Break. . . For Me

I have been of Fall break this week.  I have still been working though, Mothers never get a true break.  Sprat had to go to the doctor yesterday, he has a sinus infection.  Ughhhh!!!  Today since I have had a few hours to my self I have been trying to clean my computer up.  This is my monster desktop that we have had since 2006.  It has not been turned on since 2012, because it was having such issues.
Today I decided I would put what I have learned to good use.  I laid out my static mat and set my tower on it, I put on my static bracelet and began vacuuming the outside of the case.  I then laid the case down and took off the side panel, and wow mama, there was a lot of dust in there.  It is any wonder how this thing has not caught fire before now.  I had BIG dust bunnies in this case.  You would not think that a computer could accumulate such dust.  EEEEEkkkkk!
Everything in the case looked good, no blown up capacitors like I have seen in other computers I worked on at school. I vacuumed the inside of the case gently.  Once I was satisfied with the cleaning I closed it back up.   I powered the old girl up and she started right up.  No smoke, no fire.
I began with a basic virus scan since I had not had updated virus protection on it for a while now.  I had one threat and I got rid of that.  Then I did a malware scan too.  Not all virus protection will scan or catch malware so it is good to have both on your system.  Clean scan there too.  I was surprised.  I decided to do a system defragmenting program too.  The newer systems that have solid state drives do not require defragmenting.  My system is older and has a platter type hard drive (HDD).   I must say that was a mess.  It needed defragmenting badly.
Now that I am sure I don't have any viruses or malware on my system I am going to pull my many, many, many picture files off the hard drive.  I bought an external hard drive to back up my pictures almost a year ago.  I am in the process of doing that now.  So far so good.  I highly recommend if you have a lot of pictures on your system that you back them up periodically.  If something happens to that hard drive it is hard to get those pictures back.   If you are like me, once everything went digital, I stopped printing pictures.  My kids whole life was on this system and that is why I am so excited about retrieving those pictures.  These are pictures I have not even looked at for over a year.  
I feel like I have actually accomplished something today.  yayyy me!!!