If you haven’t heard the “Mom Song” yet, you must listen to it.  It was written by a mom, Anita Renfroe, for moms.    It’s everything a lot of moms might say to their kids in 24 hours …. only it’s said in less than 3 minutes to the tune of the William Tell Overture.

Our poor little dachshund has terrible grass allergies.  We give her Benadryl and that’s always helped in the past.  She has such bad allergies this year, though, that she chews on herself to the point of bleeding.  She has to wear a cone a lot of the time so she can’t chew on herself when we’re gone or at night when we can’t watch her.  I read online where one vet recommended putting flaxseed on the dogfood and that would eventually eliminate the need for Benedryl.  Well….let me warn you!  I gave it to our dog for two days.  We noticed that everytime she would go outside to go potty, she would stink so badly when she came in.  It was almost a fishy smell.  And I’m not talking about smelling it when you were close to her.  I’m talking about a horrible smell that you noticed when you were several feet away from her.  It was really bad!  I finally made the connection and realized that the flaxseed affected the smell of her urine.  So, NO MORE flaxseed.  She’ll just have to be a “conehead” for a while longer until the grass pollen gets better.

In a study of families, these are a few of the qualities that help to make families strong:

1.) Spend time together as a family. This might be a family outing, playing a favorite game together, or whatever the family enjoys.

2.) Have good communication patterns with lots of talking & listening. Listening and trying to understand are really important.

3.) Express appreciation to one another. Don’t take one another for granted.

4.) Have a sense of commitment to one another. Work as a team.

5.)  Support each other’s efforts.  If someone in the family has a game, concert, or some special event, then go and support that person. 

Our son put down a deposit on the Wii as soon as the store was accepting pre-orders for them, and we and some other relatives were fortunate enough to be some of the first to get a Wii when they came out.   We would look at “Wii” articles on the Internet during the weeks before its release.  I thought it looked cool, but I had no idea how fun it would be to play until we actually brought it home.   It is so much fun to play!   A lot of  people think that, too….so many, in fact, that sales for the Wii have surpassed the XBox360.  The Wii is the world’s best-selling game console.   It’s less than half the price of the PS3 and is less than the XBox which makes it more affordable than the other consoles.   Another plus is that Game Cube games can be played on it.  

The Wii is great for teenages and young adults but also for little brothers and sisters who might want to play too.  It’s great for parents and grandparents to play as well.  One of my favorite games is the interactive bowling game.  Another favorite of mine is “Brain Age” which helps to sharpen the brain.   There’s such a variety of games, and it’s truly fun for any age.

When our son was younger, he loved to play with remote control cars and helicopters. And I enjoyed watching him play with them. There’s something fascinating about the way they give the appearance of moving all by themselves. His dad enjoyed actually playing with him. One time we went out to the park to fly his helicopter. I must admit it did have one or two crash landings, but it was a lot of fun to fly. If you’ve never flown RC helicopters then you might want to check them out. It’s a lot of fun for every family member, no matter what their age.

Recently I was talking to my daughter and her sister-in-law who is college age.   So they use this word “kitschy” and I didn’t know what it meant.  They said it meant retro or vintage.  We looked online and it can also mean bad art.  But most people probably use it to mean vintage.  We looked at some “kitschy” pictures of things which were definitely retro or vintage.  And the funny thing is that I can remember seeing things like that when I was a little girl.  Only they weren’t old…they were the new things back then.  🙂

Our first “grandpet” was a “grandpuppy,” the cutest miniature dachshund named Josie who was bought by our daughter and son-in-law.  Talk about full of personality.  She knew just what look to give you or what trick to do and knew that it was so irresistable.  Then two kittens were added to the family and Josie must have thought she was their mother.  She licked their faces and tried to take care of them.   So at this point we had “grandkittens” too.  They all got a little older and learned how to work together.  Our daughter called them “partners in crime” because the cats would knock things off on the floor such as the mail or magazines and then Josie would tear them up.  Of course, Josie could make a big mess all by herself.  Now that they’re older, they don’t make messes very often.  And that’s a good thing because now we have a real “grandbaby” (Baby J) on the way soon and I’m sure there will be plenty of messes once again!!  🙂  LOL