Rachel Callahan

That was NOT your happy heart.

Posted on Posted by Rachel Callahan Categories I'm a Glutton for Adventure, Toddlers: The Experience

We took Ali to the Cheesecake Factory Saturday night for appetizers and dessert.

I’m not sure what possessed us to do such a crazy thing, except that we were craving some yummy chocolatey goodness due to our high hopes for such had been dashed the night before at a banquet when we were served white birthday cake instead of the delectable chocolate cheesecake we were expecting.

So we went to The Cheesecake Factory early – we got there slightly before 5 – but the line was still already crazy.

Amanda met us there, because earlier when we told Ali that we were going to go out to eat and get cake, her first response was, “And then Amanda will come see me??”. And you know that if a Godmother hears about a request like that, she will get off the couch change all of her socialite plans to come have dinner with her Godchild.

We got extremely lucky and got a booth away from the loudest part of the restaurant, and it had a window “seat” – because you know that toddlers can make a seat out of anything.

The problem was that we had conveniently forgotten how long the meal was drawn out there. You know – The Experience – The Ambiance – The Conversation.

However, two year olds don’t exactly “get” that concept.

She did well, but she so badly wanted to get down and walk to each table and visit with all of the other patrons.

That sort of behavior is fine in Chick-Fil-A, but not so much in The Cheesecake Factory, where people are going for The Experience – The Ambiance – The Conversation.

And last time I checked, The Experience did not include an overly friendly two year old going from table to table, serenading all of the patrons with a dozen “HIIII!!” ‘s and showing off her jumping skills.

So I let her sit in my lap (this is still before the food arrived), where she continued begging me to get down.

I told her no once more, and said, “You need to find your happy heart.”

And, at that very moment, as if a little demon had control over her hand, she ever so slowly and seemingly deliberately lifted up her middle finger. Then she looked up at me and brought it right in front of my face, still slowly, and proceeded to put her middle finger up my nose. Repeatedly.

After we all finished laughing to the point of tears, all the while Ali saying “Ali’s funny. Ali’s FUNNY”, I managed to tell her with a straight face, “That was not your happy heart.”

But she sure helped us find ours.

Giveaway Jubilee: Mabel’s Labels!

Posted on Posted by Rachel Callahan Categories Giveaways and Contests

It is finally time to kick off my First Annual Giveaway Jubilee!!!

Caitlin from Mabel’s Labels was a pleasure to work with during their Blogher ’09 contest, and she generously provided a wonderful prize for my Giveaway Jubilee – a custom pack of their best-selling Sticky Labels!!

These labels are a lifesaver for all Moms. They are a great and durable way to label all of your kid’s stuff! Besides being absolutely adorable, these labels will withstand the dishwasher, microwave and UV rays for years to come. Sticky Labels are used for toys, dishes, bottles and more.

Before I discovered these labels, I was constantly labeling and relabeling Ali’s sippy cups for the nursery. No other label would make it through the dishwasher without fading or coming off. But these last forever!!

This giveaway is for a set of 45 customized Sticky Labels – an $18.50 value! You get to choose your color pattern and icon, and can put up to 20 characters on the stickers.

To enter the contest, simply comment on this post. Be sure to leave your email address if I don’t have it.

This giveaway will be open until Monday, March 16th. The winners will be randomly selected and announced by 3pm on Tuesday, March 17th.

Click here to get to a listing of the rules, to find out other ways to get entries into this contest, and a list of all of the contests for my 1st Annual Giveaway Jubilee.

Thanks, Mabel’s Labels and Caitlin, for a wonderful prize!

Normative Immutability

Posted on Posted by Rachel Callahan Categories I'm No Videographer, Quirky quirky quirkiness, Utter Silliness

After my Axiomatically Bombastic post, I’ve had several people ask me how Ali’s Sunday Word project was going, so I decided to give you an update.

Because I’m thoughtful like that.

The week after A.B., her phrase was “Liberality Equals Generosity”. I’m not sure if it wasn’t difficult enough for her to appreciate the challenge, or if one of her friends bit her right before she left Sunday School, but she gave me nuthin’ that week.

The week after that, one of our Youth Pastors, John Pond, spoke. Although his message was great, he didn’t use a single bombastically large word.

Then the week after that, we were out of town, and the week after that, Pastor Walls didn’t use any good words!! I was shocked and left to wonder what had gone wrong.

Had he not gotten a good enough breakfast? No motivating Krispy Kremes?

Did the dog eat his dictionary?

Or had he heard about my game and decided to not play along?

But alas, the third week of no vocab challenge came to pass.

Then came this week. Oh, this week was full of awesome words. So many that I had to narrow it down from all of the choices that Amanda, Chris and I caught. But I landed on the phrase “Normative Immutibility”. I liked the sound of it, and I thought that Ali might approve as well, and boy did she.

When we got to lunch, however, my Economics-degreed brother told me that those two words didn’t go together AT ALL and it made NO SENSE.

Obviously, he is missing the point of this exercise. Who ever said anything about making sense???

But, since I knew you would want to know, here are the definitions:

Normative: of or pertaining to a norm, esp. an assumed norm regarded as the standard of correctness in behavior, speech, writing, etc.

Immutability: unchangeable; changeless; Not subject or susceptible to change.

So Normative Immutability would be something that was unsusceptible to change in a normal sort of way.

Makes sense to me, don’t you think? Maybe God is the only one who actually has N.I., but I still think it works.

So, without further ado, our training session:

And, of course, it wouldn’t be complete without the outtakes:

Mommy Scouts

Posted on Posted by Rachel Callahan Categories "Deep" Thoughts by Rachel, Rachel's "Brilliant" Marketing Ideas, Utter Silliness

I think that we should have Mommy Scouts.

You know, where we get to earn Merit Badges as we experience facets or overcome obstacles of Mommyhood. Because admit it – we’re all proud of what we’ve overcome in this crazy job, and we like wearing them like honors on our sleeves anyway, so we might as well have the pretty stitched badges.

Maybe we could sew them on our diaper bags.

Or sew them over the baby puke spots on our shirts.

When you first have a baby, you start out as a Brownie. Which is quite aptly named, as brownies are crucial in making it through those first sleepless weeks.

Then, as you earn your Mommy Merit Badges, you get to graduate to Mommy Scouts.

You finally achieve greatness and get to be an Eagle Scout when you are a Grandmother.

Some of the merit badges that I personally have earned would include:

I survived selling our house and moving with a baby Merit Badge:

My toddler ate a ladybug and lived through it Merit Badge:
I made it through an Emergency Room visit (or two) with my toddler in tow:
I let my toddler fingerpaint and I actually enjoyed it Merit Badge:

I make fresh veggie juice for my toddler and have conned her into liking it taught her to like it Merit Badge:

And yes, I know that I earned this one while I was still pregnant (would that be Daisy Scouts?), but I claim it anyway!! I survived a squirrel eating through the wall of my shower and the ceiling of my bedroom Merit Badge:
Some of the badges my friends have earned:

Jennifer actually earned the I successfully performed the Heimlich maneuver on my baby Merit Badge:

Deidre earned the I adopted internationally Merit Badge:

Ashley just earned her My Toddler Got a Weeklong Stomach Virus Merit Badge:
I really hope I never get that one.

My friend Barkley is currently working toward getting her Let him cry it out so that he will sleep through the night Merit Badge:
I think all of us Mommies shiver in remembrance of earning that one.

Some other Merit Badges to be earned:

I taught my child to read and write without losing my mind Merit Badge:
I taught my child to say “Please” and “Thank You” Merit Badge:
My child is the one in the nursery that every one always talks about – and not in a good way – Merit Badge:

I survived my child being in the band Merit Badge:

Homeschooling Merit Badge:

I lost all my baby weight and fit back into my little black dress Merit Badge:

I can understand what my toddler is saying Merit Badge:Which, by the way, you get another one of these if you ever get to the point of understanding what your teenager is saying.

Surviving a Blended Family Merit Badge:

I have a drama queen daughter (or son, as Scouts are always politically correct) Merit Badge:
Tent Camping with kids Merit Badge (which only applies in a one room tent):

I took my child to big church Merit Badge:

I endured the glares of all other passengers and took a baby on a plane Merit Badge:


I survived organized sports Merit Badge:
(You get a golden one if you survived organized sports with more than one child at a time.)

And one no one looks forward to getting,

I didn’t kill my daughter’s first boyfriend Merit Badge:So how about you? What Merit Badges have you earned? What Merit Badges would you add to Mommy Scouts?

Caution: Jubilant Anniversary Celebrations Ahead!

Posted on Posted by Rachel Callahan Categories Giveaways and Contests, Newsflash

Current Giveaways:
1. Mabel’s Labels – $18.50 Value
2. Ted Dekker’s Circle Trilogy (novels) – $50 Value
3. Doodlebug Designs Custom Blog Design – over $100 Value
4. Handmade, Designer Pottery – $130 Value
5. Six Week Pottery Lessons – $175 Value
6. Gorgeous and Stylish Handmade Bracelet – $20 Value
7. Gorgeous and Unique Handmade Earrings – $16 Value
Next Saturday, February 28th, is my One Year Bloggy Anniversary!!!

I’ve been pondering for over a month on how to appropriately celebrate my anniversary. I wanted it to be meaningful, memorable, funny, and fun.

So here’s what the plan is:

A giveaway jubilee, with a fun ending!

(by the way, if you were wondering, The word “Jubilee” means “the celebration of an anniversary” – nice, huh?)

Starting this coming up Monday, besides my normal blogging (if I have time!!), I will be having daily giveaways that total over $500 worth of some of my favorite products in the whole world, provided from some truly awesome companies and individuals. These will include giveaways for:

  • Personalized indestructible kid’s labels,
  • Novels from one of my favorite authors,
  • A free custom blog design,
  • A set of gorgeous high end, handmade Pottery,
  • Six weeks of Pottery Lessons, and
  • Two pieces of beautiful, handmade jewelry.

There are multiple ways to enter these contests:

  1. First of all, You MUST enter each giveaway separately by commenting on each post as they are published. Be sure and read the posts carefully, because there will be instructions on some of them as to WHAT to post to be entered into the contest.
  2. Then, on Saturday the 28th, in celebration of my anniversary, I will be posting Toddler Tips – this year’s sequel to Baby Tips. Just because I didn’t learn ENOUGH that first year.

    I will have a Mr. Linky on the post so that everyone can participate and write their own Baby, Toddler, Kid or even Teenager tips, using pictures and the basic idea of Baby Tips.

    Don’t worry – you can still play even if you don’t have a blog – you can email them to me and I will post them on B-Sides and link them in to Mr. Linky for you. For each photo “tip” that you write, you get an extra entry into every contest you entered over this week. So get started on writing your baby/toddler/teenager tips now!!! You can do as many or as few as you want!

  3. I’ll also be throwing around a lot of extra entries for things like if you’re a subscriber, follower, or regular reader of my blog (comment on this post and tell me and I’ll take care of your extra entries), if you write about my giveaway jubilee on your blog (feel free to steal my button at the top of this post) or twitter about it (again, comment on this post and let me know to collect your extra entries), or if you comment on my actual anniversary post on Saturday.

    Why all these extra entries? Because although all of these contests will be publicized nationally, I want to give my loyal readers as many chances as possible to win.

    Plus, I will get to put together one heck of an excel spreadsheet to keep up with all the entries. And that, my friends, is, in itself, a happy anniversary present to me.

You can go ahead and comment here to get your extra entries, But please note that you must enter each giveaway individually – your extra entries will go into all of the giveaways that you enter eventually, but not the ones you didn’t. that way if you aren’t interested in a prize or can’t use a particular prize (such as if you’re not a blogger and couldn’t really display a custom blog design on your mantle or anything), you won’t end up with that prize.

You can come back to this post anytime to see the current listing of the giveaways – I will add them at the top of this post each time I post a new giveaway, as well as put links on the sidebar of my blog.

Please let me know if I have completely muddied the water and you have questions as to how this will work.

You will have until Monday, March 16th to take advantage of all of these ways to enter. The winners will be randomly selected and announced by 3pm on Tuesday, March 17th.

I’m so excited!! It’s going to be a FUN week!!!

I’m Afraid There’s Been a Mixup. . .

Posted on Posted by Rachel Callahan Categories Toddlers: The Experience

This morning while I was getting ready, Ali was snooping through my makeup and jewelry drawers as usual. She found a jewelry box, opened it, and let out an excited gasp.

“Ali found a pretty pretty ring!!!”

I looked over, and it was the ring that my Dad had given me when I was about 8.

I told her that it WAS a pretty pretty ring, and that Pop had given it to me.

She said in dreamy wonderment, “POP gave Mommy a pretty pretty ring.”

I decided that this was a good time to try and introduce the concept of family ties again, as it had never been successful before.

So I started really slowly.

“Did you know that GRAMAMMA is MY Mommy?”

She replied back thoughtfully, “Gramamma is my Mommy. . . “

“No, honey, Gramamma is MOMMY’S Mommy.”

“Oh. Gramamma is MOMMY’S Mommy.”

So to make sure she got the idea, I told her a couple more times, and she repeated it back to me. Then, right before I was about to go on to Pop, she decided to make the logical leap herself.

“So POP is DADDY’S Mommy!!!”

We’ll keep working on that concept.

Oh, This Generation. . .

Posted on Posted by Rachel Callahan Categories Anal Retentivity to a Fault, Toddlers: The Experience

I’ve been in a teaching funk.

We did shapes, colors, animals, animal sounds, letters, and counting (to 15), but after that, I didn’t know where to go next.

She wasn’t interested in learning how to write, so I was stumped. I really haven’t taught her anything new of importance since before Christmas, and I so I was starting to feel like a homeschool Mom failure before I even began.

And every time I read one of Mozi Esme’s letter craft projects, I felt even more behind.

So I mentioned to Chris the other night that I needed inspiration on what to teach Ali next.

He suggested that I teach her how to type.

Aha! Why haven’t I thought of that?! I am constantly trying to keep her overly excited little paws off of my computer (as shown in my B-Sides Wordless Wednesday post), so she would LOVE that!

Of course I felt a sneaking bit of guilt in teaching her how to type before she could write, but I justified it away with “The world is a changing place!! Kids need to know how to type these days!”

So the next morning, I put her in my lap and asked if she would like to type some words.

Her eyes lit up with excitement as if I had just told her she was getting a pet baby elephant.

So I opened Word, set the font size to 22 and caps locked it, and asked her what she wanted to write.

Of course she wanted to write Ali, then Pop, then Daddy.

I had her attention span for much longer than I expected. I would tell her that she needed to type an “L” next, and she would get out her little pointy finger and scan the keyboard back and forth while saying to herself, “where’s the L. . .where’s the L. . .where’s the L. . .where’s the L. . . THERE’S THE L!!!”.

Then she lost interest and just wanted to type random letters.

So after that practice round, I later asked her if she would like to email Daddy.

Again, I got the baby elephant reaction.

I used this opportunity to teach her about the benefits of the space bar. She again, did much better than I expected.

So here was her first email to Daddy:

DEAR DADDY

I LOVE JYOOU

ALLKi

I think “AllKi” might be slang from her nickname, Ali Qaeda, that our small group bestowed on her during her terror-of-an-infant stage.

After that, she miraculously was interested in learning how to write as well. So we’ve been “playing” at writing letters, and she’s been mildly successful with writing V’s and A’s.

So, the moral of this post is, technology is not the evil monster coming to turn our kid’s minds into mush and make them never learn the basics.

It might just excite them enough to make them want to learn after all.

Even if their name is Ali Qaeda.

Deep Thoughts, Valance Hair, and Not Another Blog about American Idol.

Posted on Posted by Rachel Callahan Categories "Deep" Thoughts by Rachel

I had an epiphany during American Idol last night.

It’s probably something that everyone else in the world already knows, but I can be a bit slow with my deep thoughts sometimes.

However, at the risk of you giving me a big fat “DUH” in the comments, I thought I’d share.

I was thinking about the fact that they were doing the Billboard top 100 songs from all time, and I found myself hoping that someone would do one of the awesome songs that I loved from the 90’s (which, by the way, Danny made me so happy by just doing so).

I mean, they were just so emotional and intense.

Then I thought, wait a minute. What makes the 90’s music more engaging than any other time’s music? I mean, come on – it wasn’t like that was necessarily a period of musical genius..

Then I realized what it is.

I was a teenager in the 90’s.

As a general rule, there is no greater time of intensity of emotions and wallowing in the angst of those emotions than the teenage years. Hopefully, anyway – most of us mature out of that by the time we get to our 20’s.

Except Tatiana Del Toro, of course, but we’re not talking about the contestants yet.

Anyway, my point is that I now understand why my parents get all sentimental when they hear music from the 60’s that I think is pretty silly, why my Grandmother still had 8-tracks of music from the 40’s that really was silly (I mean, who ever heard of a song about a purple people eater that was written for ADULTS?!), and why I think that the 90’s music is the most gripping music ever written.

We bond with music the most when we are the most emotional and needy for something to express those emotions better than we can, and music is perfect for that. We use music as teenagers to medicate our emotional ups and downs. Music makes us feel like someone else just might understand the depths of emotions that we are experiencing.

I mean, have you ever met a teenager that didn’t think that their own emotional burden was unique to the world? That they are the only ones in the world that have ever or will ever feel exactly like that? I certainly felt that way as a teenager.

Music helps teenagers cope.

You know, when they feel like a purple people eater.

Or feel like they are riding on a yellow submarine.

Or, to pick on my own generation, when they just feel like their life is full of millions of peaches, peaches for me.

Which is why music is so important to teenagers (I’ve been wondering why I don’t care about music nearly as much as I used to), and why everyone thinks that the best period of music ever was whatever was out when they were teenagers.

So, on to lighter observations from American Idol, poor Paula’s hair was worse than usual. I mean – did you notice that her real hair ran out around the tops of her ears, and the rest was extensions? It looked like she had hair valances and curtains.

And Jackie’s pants (or, as Simon called them, “trousas”,) reminded me of a certain shopping trip I had in Atlanta. . .except that she didn’t go for the gold.

Wuss.

Our favorites of the night were Danny Gokey and Alexis Grace. Although Chris has a major bitterness issue with Alexis because she has a one year old that she was willing to leave to do this show “to make a better life for her”.

Because we all know that celebrity’s children have a better life than children of normal, well-adjusted, hard-working families.

Personally, I just like Alexis because she has pink hair.

How about you? Any deep thoughts about the night? Or shallow observations?

Recipes and Winners and Speeches, Oh My!!

Posted on Posted by Rachel Callahan Categories Can I get a copy of that recipe?, Giveaways and Contests, Homeschooling: Not just for the socially awkward anymore., Newsflash, Shamelessly Plugging Away

First of all, for the exciting news: The winners of February’s Reader Appreciation Giveaway!!

The winner of the Top Commenter’s $10 Target Card was: Leanna!
The winner of the other $10 Target Card was: Christie!

Congratulations, Ladies!! Please email me your addresses so I can get your cards out in the mail.

And – I will be having a VERY EXCITING giveaway announcement at the beginning of next week. So stay tuned!!

Secondly, a few of you requested my Vegetable Soup recipe from Mom’s Birthday Dinner. There’s no magic formula – it’s quite delicious, but it’s pretty simple and without exact measurements, but here you go (and by the way, I doubled this recipe to feed our whole family, but we had a lot of leftovers also):

1 – 1.5 lbs Beef Tips (same thing as Stew Beef except it’s cut smaller)
2-3 large cans of whole tomatoes
1-2 Yellow Onions, Chopped
2-3 lbs. Potatoes, chopped into squares with peels left on
2 Beef Buillon Cubes
1 large bag of frozen mixed veggies (corn, peas, butterbeans, green beans, carrots, etc.)
1 large bag of frozen Okra
Salt and Pepper

Put the beef in the stock pot and cover with water. Cook the beef on medium while chopping veggies.

Chop onions and potatoes and cut the whole tomatoes into quarters. Put all into stock pot, including tomato juice.

Add buillon cubes, salt, pepper, frozen veggies and HALF of the frozen okra.

Simmer for a long time, stirring every now and then, until the meat and the potatoes are tender (it helps to steam with a lid on). Be sure and taste it every now and then for good health and to know whether you need more salt and pepper.

About 20 minutes before serving, add the rest of the okra.

Serve with cornbread.

MMM.

Oh – and cornbread. Let me tell you. I consider myself a pretty decent cook – I follow directions well, so I have confidence in myself that I can make most things. However, I have made my great-grandmother’s cornbread recipe out of the family cookbook a million times and it always crumbles into a big pile. And is as dry as dirt, no matter how many sticks of butter I slather on it.

So on a weak whim one day, I bought a bag mix (GASP) at the store of sweet cornbread – just add milk and an egg. I made it and it was the most delicious, perfectest cornbread that I ever had.

And I’ve never gone back. Sorry, Great-Grandmother.

I would tell you the brand name of this wonderful cornbread, but I threw away the bag before the family arrived yesterday so they wouldn’t know of my terrible storebought sins.

Last note of the day:

Have you spent most of your life judging homeschoolers?

Then I have an event for you!!

Last year I blogged about my adventures of judging at the National Speech and Debate Tournament, and this year, the National Opens are here! It is being held in Trussville from March 16-19.

It is very interesting and quite fun (depending on what type you get – I recommend SPEECHES, because debates can be quite overwhelming unless you’re up for a big challenge), and is also a great way to view firsthand the homeschool culture if you’re considering homeschooling.

Oh – and if you’re a blogger, I PROMISE that you’ll get a good blog out of it.

They need over a thousand community judges. They explain everything that you have to do quite clearly and are very helpful with any questions. You only have to be there for a couple of hours, and you can pick your time slot from many available options.

And you might get a free notepad and pen out of it. Oh – and snacks in the judges hospitality room.

If you’re interested in more information, click here to go to the NCFCA Website. I’m judging on March 19th. Come join me!

Let me know if you’re interested or have any other questions about my experience. And be sure and go back to my post from last year for a better idea of what it is.