Love Note

I know things will change as my kids age. However, today, if this is payment for:

- Sleepless nights

-Whining

- Disobedience

- Illness

- Endless worry

I'll gladly accept!! :-)

Everything about this job is completely worth it.

Princess 2.0

We have observed an interesting evolution in #1's personal development lately.

She has always loved princesses (they all do), but recently she's been telling us she's "grown out of them". I knew there was something deeper going on - As her parents, we can read her in a way no one else can and we knew she still liked princesses despite her protests to the contrary.

In the background, she began developing an intense interest in Star Wars. We own all six DVDs, so she's been asking to watch those. She's also been checking out Star Wars books at the library, pretending her cheese stick is a laser gun and commanding invisible armies from the perch on her swing set.

After discussing all of this with Micah, we think we finally figured it out. She appears to have outgrown the simple princesses and grown into the princesses that exhibit more of the characteristics she finds admirable. The princesses of Star Wars still have beautiful hair, makeup and clothes which she loves. They still have their love stories and get their man. But in Star Wars they also command armies, fight the bad guys themselves, shoot guns, fly ships, are in strong leadership roles, triumph over evil etc. etc.

Personally, I'm loving this! I laugh when people call me a girly girl because while I love clothes, shoes, hair and makeup, that's about where it ends. I'm far from demure and reserved. I've never been afraid to get dirty (see earlier posts about hiking, camping and fishing). My lack of constraint in standing up for my beliefs has ruffled feathers and I've never backed down in fighting for the Good.

Today, she was invited to a "Glama Jama" party (ie-she had her hair, nails and makeup done), but the whole way there, she discussed the details of Star Wars IV with her father. If you want to call her a girly girl, you'd be accurate to some extent, but that hardly encapsulates her and certainly pigeonholes her. She is every bit our daughter and we couldn't be more proud.

Norwex

My friend Julie got me on the Norwex bandwagon and I have been using their microfiber antibacterial cleaning cloths for a few weeks now. Such a cool cleaning tool! The cloths contain silver particles making them effective germ killers without the use of any cleaners or chemicals - just water. This video demonstrates how the cloth kills all of the germs from wiping chicken on the kitchen counter through the use of a test.

The microfiber also makes the cleaning much easier. The grime wipes up without a lot of work which is really nice.

I bought the travel pack which comes with four small cloths. I keep one in the kitchen and one in each of my three bathrooms. I wipe my bathroom sinks down daily with the cloth and I wipe the toilets down every Monday. That's when I wash the cloths (no bleach or fabric softener). I must say things look very clean and it goes so quickly. I'm also no longer running through vinegar at an alarming rate. I'm thinking about getting some more to have on hand for some of my other cleaning tasks.

Thanks Julie!