All Four Stars

All Four Stars was written by Tara Dairman and revolves around the life and love for cooking found within an adorable sixth grader named Gladys. 

This book was unexpectedly spectacular.  I had no idea how much I was going to love this book.  The writing was brilliant and entertaining.  I read that it took Tara many years to actually get this published, with it almost not happening, and I am so happy that she took the leap into being a published author because the world would have been missing too much cuteness in Gladys, and a wonderful light-hearted story with All Four Stars. 

Gladys lives with parents who walk a line of constant crap food and microwaveable “healthy alternatives”.  They are not big on utilizing anything past the microwave by way of cooking.  It isn’t until a visit from her aunt at the age of eight that Gladys even realizes that there is a whole world of food that she has been missing out on.  Thus begins her double life of secret cooking. 

I felt pain at thinking how many households may live off of fast food and cheap restaurants instead of exploring their palette.  As a mother I cringed to think of the lack of anything actually good going into Gladys’ diet at the hands of her parents.  I rejoiced in Gladys’ rebellion against constant manufactured food in her quest to reproduce recipes from scratch.

Overall I give this book 5/5 stars.  This was an easy love in a book for me.  I do not often read books such as middle grade, but this book was so much more than a specific age book.  As someone who also loves to cook, it would be awesome to see some of Gladys’ recipes into a possible future recipe book.  Gladys could inspire anyone to find their own “flavor” and if you already have a love of food or cooking, than I am sure you can easily relate to this book.  This book is great for pretty much anyone.  I am happy to see that The Stars of Summer will be coming out this summer as the sequel to this delightful read!

*I received a copy of this book for free in exchange for a fair and honest review.

Boxes, Grandma and Train Tracks: The Mind of a Toddler

July was filled with having fun with boxes, grandma coming to visit, SeaWorld, trains, and things that movie lead Liam to say.  I love my hilarious little character of a toddler, these are some of the moments I was able to record from the past month.  Enjoy!

Liam and I decided we wanted to start out Friday night off playing with trains, so I took him to Hastings to buy a new train since he had been so good, and they are the only place that sells wooden trains.  Liam immediately decided that he wanted a Play-Doh dentist kit and wouldn't not settle for a train.  I told him we would think about it but he had to carry it.  He carried that set for over an hour while we looked at books and various other things and he told me how much he wanted it, so after carrying it around for that long, I figured that he deserved it haha.

Liam found a candy heart on the floor of the car and stuck it in his mouth
I said "Eww, don't eat that."
He replied defensively "I didn't eat it mom, I licked it."
Then he kept explaining to me repeatedly how he only licked it and he wasn't going to eat it.
I said "Liam, it was on the floor of the car, licking it is still gross."
His response was "I just licked it mom."
Boys....

I was loading the dishwasher while Liam was getting out of the bath; upon completion I found he had dried off with 3 separate towels and changed around all the night lights in the house haha.

Liam found a lizard at bedtime, he kept hugging it and telling it her loved it and goodnight.  I finally got him to put it down gently with only a broken off tail.  He went in to use the bathroom and was in there for too long so I went to check on him and he was sitting on the floor with the lizard hugging it goodnight.  He was concerned about the lizard and asking me if it was ok.  I told him the lizard had to go outside to go home and put it outside, pretending not to notice the poor gecko's 3 smashed feet.  I hope it got away.  We talked about being gentle and I didn't have the heart to tell him the gecko was hurt.  

I think it just hit Liam at bedtime that grandma wasn't here anymore. He cried for a good while and wandered around aimlessly wanting grandma to play and read him a story... Wish we lived closer. 

Liam only wants to eat the frosting and the fudge/crunchy middle of his DQ ice cream cake.... he is definitely my child haha 

Liam swam on his own for the first time at the hotel pool in San Antonio!  So proud of my little man.


Liam and I are watching the Croods, and Liam says to me
"No mom, we don't hit people with rocks ok"
I agreed with him haha.

Liam turned my new laptop box into a toddler fun house haha.

Liam just brought me a box of birthday candles and told me "it's Liam's birthday."
I told him that his birthday wasn't until December.
He Said "Mom, sing Happy Birthday ok."
So I did and then he grabbed the candles again and said
"Go get my fire mom.."
Life with a toddler is never boring haha.

 Liam out of nowhere just screamed
"Mom! I Love You!"
So I yelled back
"I love you too"
He thought it was most hilarious things ever haha

I set Liam's lunch down in front of him and he asked
"You made this mom?"
I said "Yes I made it just for you Liam"
He said "Oh, good job mom, yummy in my tummy"
Motherhood has its perks 

Liam and I are cleaning out the fridge, and he disappears at some point. I don't think much of it, until I hear him knocking on my bathroom door and yelling "Mom"
So I go see what he is up to and he has taken 6 slices of cheese and has them rolled up in a ball and is flattening them out with his play-doh rolling pin.
Liam then got to have (what I previously would have thought of as an unnecessary) explanation of the difference between cheese and play-doh...
Oh the joys of motherhood.

Liam just found a "little bunny FooFoo" video on youtube. Nothing makes it seem more ridiculous than to see it depicted. Haha I never realized just how silly that song was. When I was little it seemed so serious haha.

This morning when I woke Liam up for school he said
"Mom, I'm tired, I want to take a nap."
Maybe this means he will start sleeping in later....  
*No, it did not mean that at all yet this month     

 While reading bedtime stories,
Liam: "P is for Plane! Airplane"
Auntie Savannah: "Are you sure it's a plane? It looks like a pig"
Never a dull moment hahaha

 Liam's allergies are acting up and I just tried to give him a quarter dose of allergy medicine to help with his nose and he refused to take it saying
"I don't want to get better"
Bribing was effective in this instance...

I just went to check on Liam since he went back into his playroom and I caught him looking over lego building plans very intently like he was a foreman. He would take little sips from his cup without his eyes leaving the plans haha.

Tonight during hockey before bedtime Liam kept giving me "thumbs up mom" and then he would put an imaginary sticker on my hand, and I had to do the same for him haha.

Liam's new bedtime stalling technique is taking a really long poop with the door closed..... If you try to interrupt him he giggles and runs back to the toilet and says he needs to poop more... The only reason I can't get mad is that he actually does poop more....

Liam just told me "No bubbles in the eye mom, bubbles are for eating"
Oh the joys of bath time haha

   

If you would like to check out previous editions of The Mind of Toddler click the links:

*Bonus Link: Grandma's Visit & SeaWorld

Mommy's Best Friend: June 2014

Character Antics: May 2014

The Exciting Why Stage: April 2014

Strange Bedtime Requests: March 2014

Timeouts Reign Supreme: February 2014

Random Toddler Moments: January 2014

Random Toddler Moments: December 2013

Taking Credit Where Credit is Due

Mommy's Best Friend: The Mind of a Toddler

This month was all about best friends and inanimate object friends.  I love to track some of the crazy things that Liam (my 3 year old toddler boy) does and says for the hilarity of revisiting it in the future.  What kind of crazy things do you kids do and say?  Comment below.  Enjoy!


Liam found a pink hair tie which he has appropriately named Pink.
Pink was taking a nap and now Liam is showing Pink around the house. During Pink's nap time, everyone had to be quiet including the dog. Pink is afraid of loud noises and the dog apparently... Liam is also quite distraught when he hides Pink and can't remember where she is and starts frantically looking and shouting "Pink, where are you?"
Why do we buy kids toys again? 

Liam was playing with his interactive monkey toy and he would try to sit her up and she would fall, he would pick her up hug her, kiss her head and say "I'm sorry." 
Then the process would start all over again haha, what a sweet boy I have.


Out of nowhere Liam just started giving me double thumbs up...
Now he is saying "Thumbs up means it's time to eat..."
Grandpa Bubba would be proud... and probably instigated this...

I am no longer allowed to tell Liam good job for anything without a double thumbs up...  
If I forget I get a long lecture about how I am doing it wrong haha. 

Liam told me that Aubrey isn't his best friend anymore (they have been friends for a year and a half at daycare).  
I asked him why not he told me: "You are my best friend mom"
*Gushing with love*

Liam just said "I want the daddy'
I hesitantly asked "You want the daddy?"
He said "Yeah you are the daddy"
Unsure where this was going I just said "Yes that is true"
He just grinned and went on his way.
And that was the end of that conversation for now....

It has begun, my son is already trying to mooch his way to a taste of my alcohol.
I have a glass of wine out while I am working on homework and he was out of bed and came over and hugged me and told me he loved me and then he was sniffing my wine glass.
I asked him "Are you just trying to use me to taste my wine?"
He answered "No mom, I don't want to whine, I am not crying."
Gotta love the English language haha.

 Liam keeps telling me that grandma is coming and he's not sleeping because of it.... considering that this is about 25 days away I keep coming up with ways to try to equate to him just how long that is. Today I told him how many Show and tell days away that was since he counts down to show and tell every week.
His response was angerly "No show and tell I want grandma"
If the standing at the door whining for grandma doesn't stop soon I can't take 25 days of this, I may have to tell him she changed her mind haha. How can you equate that it's not soon to a toddler so that they will understand?

I told Liam he had to take a bath and start winding down for bedtime, his response was:
"I don't want it to be goodnight mom, wait until tomorrow."
If only sometimes we could push off sleep....

Liam and I just put together a new ABC puzzle and we were going through the letters and picture, we got to Y for Yarn and Liam says "Kitty Toy"
I said "well it can be, but it's also called Yarn"
Liam said "No mom, it's kitty toy."
I have no idea where he learned that since our cat has never played with yarn before haha, but technically he's not wrong...

Liam had my phone and all of a sudden I heard ringing.
I asked "Liam, who are you calling"
He said "I'm calling grandma."
He has set the phone on speaker to talk to her and then when she answered and I tried to talk to her he pushed me away saying
"No mom, I'm talking to grandma. You don't Talk." this came with a glare.
*I have lost control of my phone....
On another note I love how when Liam says bye on the phone, he also waves 

I won a flashlight with a book that I got in the mail and Liam is now using it to showcase his "spiderman" and "batman" fighting styles.... pantless....

You know you have perfected multi-tasking, when you can sing "If You're Happy And You Know It" while doing the actions, typing and looking up father's day recipes for a blog....
*Obviously Liam is not asleep yet haha

Liam just grabbed a bunch of grapes and shoved them into his mouth. Now he is rubbing his tummy singing "It's yummy yummy in my tummy.... my tummy..... it's yummy."


I think Liam may have watched Lion King too many times lately..
Twice now, I have caught him playing with his toys and saying "Somebody... anybody.... help."

Liam measured himself haha. He is 39in tall now. 9 more inches and he can ride on bigger rides

Liam is very excited about going to his first baseball game, I had him put pants back on and he asked
"Are we getting ready mom?"
I said "yes Liam"
He squealed "oh my goodness! Get my shoes mom"

Liam had my Kindle and read me all of the letters for the DDay book advertisement then we talked about what each word meant. Except that apparently triumph doesn't mean win it means H for hunter haha.

 Liam told me to "put the kitty away mom"

Liam keeps telling me that I am his best friend Life as a mommy is awesome

Liam put a long feathery cat toy in his pants and is walking around with a front "tail"  if he was older I would totally think that he was trying to be perverted haha
 

If you would like to check out previous editions of The Mind of Toddler click the links:

Character Antics: May 2014

The Exciting Why Stage: April 2014

Strange Bedtime Requests: March 2014

Timeouts Reign Supreme: February 2014

Random Toddler Moments: January 2014

Random Toddler Moments: December 2013

Taking Credit Where Credit is Due