Coloring Easter Eggs 101

We colored our Easter eggs today. I decided to go with traditional food coloring this year. Old school.

1/2 cup boiling water

1 tsp. vinegar

20 drops of color

Make your own mixtures.

36 hard boiled eggs

Fun times!

Draw faces and designs with colored sharpies when coloring complete.

Creative, cheap, good times.

Easter Bunny Hop

Easter in Michigan. 60 degrees and sunny yesterday. 40 degrees, cloudy, windy with intermitent sprinkles.

I wanted the kids to get their picture taken with the Easter Bunny. The bunny I wanted was at a very nicely dressed gazebo at an outdoor mall. The bunny only works weekends and Good Friday. Best of all it's FREE pictures. I get the kids dressed today and we head over to the Village Mall. The line is long, the day is cold.

We wait in line for 40 minutes. It's almost our turn. Our noses are red, it looks like Christmas instead of Easter. 2 groups ahead of us...45 minutes.

Our turn. The bunny helper exits the gazebo and announces...sorry, the bunny will be taking a 10 minutes break. The lady that finished up before me is still inside the empty gazebo. She's taking 5 minutes to use the background for pictures.

She leaves and we're cold. We go inside the gazebo and I let the kids take different poses and I take about 16 pictures to kill time before the bunny comes back. Isabella had mentioned last week that this might be her last year in the Easter picture.

The bunny comes back in, places everyone. 4 pictures later, we're out of there. Isabella has decided that the bunny is cuddly and she wants to continue the Easter picture tradition (for Quentin's sake at least).

Happy Easter.

The Overlap

This weekend was the classic overlap weekend. It happens every season. That weekend that ends one league and starts another.

Ava and Quentin both ended their indoor soccer seasons and started their outdoor soccer seasons this weekend. Isabella also had a game scheduled that was cancelled just as she was leaving the house for the hour long drive north.

2 of the Ubaydi kids scored a combined total of 13 soccer goals over 4 games! They both displayed skills and drive that were wonderful to watch.

I am so proud of both of them in everything they have learned this winter during their WAZA Little Dragon training. Hats off to Coach Angela and her team for an outstanding training and mini season.

Outdoor soccer is going to be a shock to our family. Ava cried when we told her she had to not only wear an under armor shirt under her jersey but that she would also be required to wear a t-shirt, a sweatshirt, gloves a fleece earband and pants under her uniform for the first outdoor season. It was 40 degrees with 50 mph winds and a wintry mix of snow pellets. Not only did she run against the wind but she scored 4 goals within the first 13 minutes of the game. After the game, she thanked us for her warm layers.

Quentin didn't complain much about his attire, other than having to wear a hat. Even on the coldest days he doesn't like to wear beanies. But, he too was required to wear layers, that even included his winter jacket under his t-shirt. Looking a little like the abominable snowman he scored 7 goals. I figure that all this gear will just make them stronger runners when they shed the layers and can actually move....

Personally, I was sitting on the sideline wearing ear muffs, my winter jacket and hood and had 3 snuggies on. Hoping it gets a little warmer before June.

Happy soccer season.

School

Today is Kindergarten Registration day. The last of the wee ones is going off to school. Unbelievable. Q is nervous and excited. I am as well. Thank goodness we both have a bit of an adjustment being that Kindergarten is half day and we'll still get to spend our mornings together.

The next week will be full of new school surprises. next week I am attending Middle School Orientation for Isabella. ACK! Middle School already.

This Fall will be full of excitement. New house. A middle schooler, a kindergartner and I know it sounds weird, but, my baby Ava will be a 3rd Grader...3rd Grade is such a big transition year and she's still my baby girl.

Hard to believe how fast time is zipping by.

Return to Reality

Well, it's the middle of April. Spring break was a week ago and I'm recovering from post vacation bliss.

We spent 7 days in Tampa and Sarasota. The first vacation where we didn't have a full schedule of plans. No theme parks, no plans. Just a hotel with a pool on the beach. We instructed the kids not to bother us and be prepared for much sunscreen to be applied. We planned on spending 7 hours a day on the beach in the sand without moving.

We did decide to spend the first full day in Tampa. We ate breakfast and visited one of those tourist racks in the lobby of the local Bob Evans. That is how we picked our adventures of the day. We managed to culture the kids by going to the Salvador Dali museum and then the Chilhuly Collection. After getting some visual stimulation from all the wonderful styles of art we headed for Sarasota to spend some time on the beach.

Saturday morning we did have one plan. We got up early and drove down to Siesta Key Beach and we participated in an early morning 5K run on the beach, benefiting the Mote Aquariums Sea Turtle program. This race was tons of fun, very scenic and enjoyable. Everyone ran, including Quentin.

We spent the next few days with Grandma at our hotel. The kids had a sleepover in grandma's room while Rami and I had date night. We visited St. Armand's Circle. We spent one morning touring the Ringling Brother's Museum, house and circus artifacts.

Grandma left during the morning of our one rainy day. We spent the rainy morning at the local movie theater, followed by a cloudy afternoon on the putt putt course that included live alligators to view and feed.

We returned home tanned, relaxed and wanting to stay in Florida.

The Pot of Gold

Written by: Ava (2nd grade)

If I could find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, I would spend all of it on...rings, necklaces, 4 yo yos, 29 wind up toys, 100 finger paints, 20 houses, 200 books, 900 computers, 1,280 plants, 24 cookies, 2,100 carrots of gold and many other fun things like...3,990 soccer balls, 1,000 baseball bats (to hit my brother), 100 dogs, cats, hamsters, gerbils, snakes and many other pets.

After that I will be tired. I would take a nap. I just forgot one more thing....a leprechaun.

I would wear all the jewelry. I would share all the yo yos. I would wind up all the wind up toys. I would splatter all the finger paints. I would give away all my houses. I would read all the books. I would play on all the computers. I would water the plants. I would eat all the treats. I would spend all the gold. I would play every sport. I would play with all the pets. Oh no! What happened to the leprechaun?!

Wait he left a pot of gold behind! I know just what I would do with it!!

The End.

***um, I'm a little concerned as a mother about her idea for the baseball bats but overall I think this gives us a pretty good idea of the kind of sweetheart Ava is and the things she enjoys. Fantastic writing!***

Dear Oakland County Road Commission

I know that it is Spring in Michigan. How do I know this? Well, I don't subscribe to the notion of Spring on a calendar, I don't believe in the traditions of the groundhog predicting our season of forthcoming flowers. I merely wait for the time when the salt trucks start to disappear after a long Winter. I wait for the freezing rain that is worse than snow. And, then....I wait for the pot holes.

I have never understood Michigan roads. With their crazy Michigan turn arounds instead of traditional left hand turns. But the other day while I was driving I saw a snow plow/salt truck being followed by a pot hole filling gravel truck. Don't get me started on how in the world the gravel you pour into potholes and let the poor souls driving their cars behind you smash down questions. How does that work...isn't that method of filling pot holes how we get pot holes in the first place?

I have a bill I want to submit to you. You see the other day I was picking my kids up at school. Now, some parts of Rochester, as you may know, are still unpaved roads. I find this odd that such a wonderful town doesn't have paved roads but I understand that this was originally a farming community and some folks want to preserve that past. However, I think that the entrance into a school where 450 student attend probably should be paved. Especially if the road leading into the school is paved. But, that's just my opinion. I figured you all have been doing this longer than me. 20 buses a day go in and out of that school twice a day.

So, let me get back to why I think you should pay my bill I received. I pulled into the school parking lot and encountered pot holes the size of small lakes. I probably would have classified these as sink holes. I also encountered other parents trying to leave through the same entrance/exit and of course everyone is trying to avoid the largest pot holes by swerving left and right for 100 yards. Looks a little like the pot hole version of Frogger.

Upon exiting the parking lot with my minivan full of passengers I to have to negotiate the landmines of holes in the ground for fear I will be sucked in by the behemoth sink hole. I make jokes to the kids of my minivan being an old lady and creaking with every bone snapping divot it encounters.

I get to the main paved road, turn out of the school and happily head home. Less than a quarter mile into my travels I hear what sounds like a rock pinging under my car and seemingly flying out the back. I didn't see anything in the road so I carried on.

Turning left 1 mile later seemed like a feat of endurance. I knew something was wrong. I no longer had any power steering control and yet had a car full of passengers under 11.

That night I had to have my minivan towed to a mechanic. The next morning the mechanic delivered the good news (well, it's his good news and my bad). You see...my mechanic makes a lot of money during Michigan Pot Hole Season, errr...I mean Spring. He informed me that my van was in dire circumstances. She had succumbed to the pressures of the pot holes. The noise I heard while driving? Well, that was the rack and pinion system blowing. Thus rendering my steering capabilities useless. And, well...just as an added bonus when the rack and pinion blew it damaged the power steering pump and power steering fluid began leaking. To repair these two things will cost me $1200. It cost me 2 days worth of rental cars and it cost me a lot of precious time.

Also, I guess I'm pretty lucky that I was able to muscle the turn and exit the roadways safely without steering capabilities because had I been hit by another car power steering fluid is flammable and who knows what would have happened to me and my precious passengers.

So, here is my bill for $1200 (plus $60/day for a rental car). I'm sure you won't pay it and I'm sure you don't care. I won't even bother billing you for my time.

Sincerely,

Disgusted by pot holes but thankful to be alive.