Summer Lovin'

I don't know about your house, but in the summer, our house gets a little boring. I hear the whining of my children about how it's so boring, there's nothing to do, blah, blah blah...

To complicate matters, I have kids I babysit that fall into the "whine-ese" category. Mix them up with MY kids, and you get explosions of all kinds: "That's MINE!"...."Don't touch me!"...."So-and-so kicked me!"..."Moooooooom!!...."and then "mean mom" comes out and it's a big mess.

SO.....

I decided that this summer, we needed to have some things to keep everyone busy. Several years ago, my aunt Shelly gave me some really awesome books called, "Kid Concoctions". It has all kinds of cool kid friendly projects. The kids and I went through the books and found some things that sounded fun.

Today was our first attempt at staying busy. We made "Peanutty Clay" and it turned out great! Kaleb & Cameron are at Scout Camp this week, so it was Liam and Taylor who gave it a try. They loved it!! They were able to make groovy things, like you would with play dough, and then EAT it. As Taylor said, it was an activity and a snack all in one!

If anyone is interested, I'll post about our activites as we do 'em. I think we're gonna do 1 or 2 a week. I'll give you the recipe as well as tell you if it was successful or not. For our first try, this was a hit and I'm sure we'll do it again!

"Peanutty Clay"

1/2 c. peanut butter

1/2 c. powdered milk

1 Tbs. honey

Put the above ingredients into a sandwich size Ziploc bag. "Squish" it around until mixed. Remove from bag and continue squishing for a few minutes to mix thoroughly. Then, create away and eat! Yum!

Our Little Guy

Today was our long awaited appointment with Kaleb's NEW endocrinologist. I was getting rather frustrated with our old one, so I took it upon my little self to find a new one. Today we finally saw her and I'm grateful that we found her!

At the appt, they took some blood, did an x-ray of his hand and a complete physical. Kaleb didn't really like that part (he wanted to know WHY it was SO important they know about his privates and how far along he is in puberty!) The Dr said that she is fairly confident that Kaleb is growing and it's not a lack of growth hormone that is keeping him small. She said most likely it is that he is just delayed in his growth, and there is medication to help speed that up.

So, for now, we know he is growing slow. He is a full foot shorter than he should be and nearly 30 lbs less than an average 12 yr old. Now, this part made me giggle...the Dr said that Kaleb is burning calories faster than he can use them, so we are supposed to start him on a HIGH CALORIE diet. Excuse me? Here I am trying to CUT calories, and I'm supposed to start shoving calories into Kaleb? I thought that was kinda funny!

He'll probably start on some medication soon, but until then, he remains our little guy. We'll see how long that lasts. Hopefully not too much longer!!