Beads of Courage

When Eve was on treatment, she was given a beautiful glass bead for every cancer-related procedure she had through Beads of Courage. We tried making necklaces with them, only to have them break apart and fly across the room after many games of tug-of-war gone awry. Of the ones I have been able to recover, and the ones that have not broken, we were still left with a long strand.

Carma

I believe in signs. I do. Like when my mom and I went out to dinner and a thunderstorm knocked the power out, my mother calmly said, "Well, I guess this is God's way of saying I've maxed out my Weight Watchers Points today."

I just took it as a sign that we needed to go out for ice cream instead.

No. 250

This is the 250th post on the blog. Taco Bell should be paying me for advertising at this point.  (Truth be told, this wasn't actually the 250th I've published, as there are many gems waiting for you in draft form.  Most of these will never see the light of day because my children will probably grow up and never talk to me again if I tell all their secrets.)

Banana Guac

August 1st marked the first day of first grade for Natalie. She smiled for a pic before running away from me toward the school bus.

Not even a goodbye. What am I...chopped liver?

Actually, I like liver. What am I...sauteed leeks?

Moon over Kill Devil Hills

Because July ain't over, we are still on vacation. We packed up the circus and headed to my mother-in-law's house for a week of commercial-filled programming and infinite requests to buy everything as seen on TV. You gotta admire their tenacity, though. No matter how many times they get shot down, there's still a glimmer of hope in their eyes when the next high-fructose corn syrup spot comes on. The only thing I relent to is the purchase of Kidz Bop 20, which I've been dying to get for a while.

Cancer-kicking cupcakes

Ahoy there, sugar lovers, another bake sale is on the books to raise money for the Ultimate Hike.

Messy Chef cupcakes for a cure!

$15/half-dozen, $26/dozen

Strawberry-lemonade cupcakes with lemon buttercream

Piña colada cupcakes with pineapple rum buttercream

French vanilla cupcakes with blueberry buttercream

Chocolate cupcakes with raspberry buttercream

Have circus, will travel

After we were refueled with pizza and Slurpees, we took the kids to Gilbert Run Park on Friday. I used to go to this park as a kid and it was just as I had remembered, sans the elementary school pillow sack races.