The Search for Miss Direction: Movie Theatre Floor

Be honest - did you cringe a little bit when you read the title of my post tonight? Honestly, it makes me do more than cringe, I'll give a full body shudder at the thought of what exactly resides on the floor of the average movie theatre. So when I was searching out a way to celebrate National White Chocolate Day today and came across a recipe with exactly that name, I shuddered and then was admittedly more than a little intrigued.

Mikayla and I whipped up a batch of movie theatre floor this afternoon (she told us at dinner that it was her favorite part of her day) and it's a lot like it sounds - a combination of all the things you might find on the floor of a movie theatre all covered in white chocolate. When we went grocery shopping Kayla and I had lots of fun picking some of the extras to go along with the obvious popcorn. What made our batch even more fun was that I had leftover homemade kettle corn from when we were watching the Michigan game the other night and movie theatre style popcorn from the festival on Saturday to use as the 'base' of our creation. To it, we added fritos for salt, some peanuts, s'mores flavored candy corn (which we of course had to try first. If you like flavored candy corn I highly recommend checking it out - it's a Brach's offering this year), raisinets, and some skittles. All this was stirred up then topped with white chocolate, stirred again very well and then spread out to cool. Everyone here loved it! And what I thought was great was similar to chex mix, you could make it with whatever suits your own personal fancy. Too much fun around here on white chocolate day.

In other news, Grant pulled Mikayla aside tonight and told her he thought she was looking a little gray. He then elaborated on that thought to say it was because she was apparently now Mommy's shadow. The Bean has not left my side all day. OK, not completely true. She did hold a karaoke contest with her stuffed animal for about 10 minutes in her bedroom this morning after we decorated the house for fall. I'm cleaning up the kitchen post-breakfast when I suddenly hear: "Okay everyone, we're going to have a contest. And for this contest you need a microphone. Lydia, Pink Gumdrop, Selena, do you have a microphone? Why not? Go get one! Okay everyone, sing with me" Oh how I love her. But I'll be glad when she gets used to not having Noah around all the time and cuts me a little slack, too. Even once Grant got home tonight, there was no one but Mama as she proceeded to help me make banana muffins, pack lunches for tomorrow, clean the kitchen, pick out her clothes and then mine for tomorrow (ever tried being dressed by a three year old?) and then insisted that Mama do her shower tonight, too. I'm trying to remember it's nice to be so loved.

Noah is still struggling. And Grant and I are struggling to figure out how to help him adjust. I've done the super positive thing. I've done the giving him some space thing. I've done the ask endless questions to try to pull him out thing. I've done the very patient through crabiness, temper tantrum and snotty attitude thing. I've done the "I'm the boss and what I say goes" thing. I'm running out of things here! He seems to be doing well in school but my usually cheerful, wanting nothing more than to please little boy does not get off the bus in the afternoon. He's been replaced by a crabby, know it all, brooding, refusing to listen, bad attitude stinker. I finally just went in and held him for about 15 minutes after he ended up having to go to bed half an hour early for the attitude he was coping with Grant and reassured him over and over that I loved him and that we were proud of him. Thoughts? Prayers? Positive vibes? I'll take 'em all at this point!

Kayla's back to school tomorrow, Noah starts an hour late (stupid district policies, grumble grumble grumble) and the Kennedy's are joining us for dinner tomorrow night. Oh, plus I get to set things on fire! It's Cherries Jubilee tomorrow :) Until then...