Show and Tell: T for Tiger

I had something else in mind for this week's Show and Tell, and then I learned last night that Kate's class is doing Show and Tell for the first time today! How appropriate!

Kate knows all her letters already, but her class focuses on a letter every week to practice writing, talking about things that start with that letter, etc. So it makes perfect sense to add a Show and Tell component—bring in anything that starts with that letter!

So with this week's focus being on the letter T, Kate decided to take in her tiger puppet, Bartholomew P. Tiger, who we bought four years ago on Kate's first trip to the zoo. She's memorized his full name and is prepared to tell all her friends about when and where she got him. And, of course, to demonstrate his RAWR!

You just can't hold him without saying, "RAWR!" Claire looked quite alarmed and backed out of the room when Bartholomew rawred at her this morning :0)

Kate and Bartholomew's first meeting, April 2009

Show and Tell: Thirty-One Bags

This week, I want to "show and tell" you about my Thirty-One bags. My friend Nancy has been a fan for years, and she finally rubbed off on me. In the last year, these things have become some of the most useful and used items in our house.

If you're not familiar with Thirty-One, you might call it the Mary Kay or Pampered Chef of lugging and organizing. My consultant (that's another fun thing about companies like this—you have your consultant :0) Allison got married this month (yay!) and since she wouldn't be able to do as many parties as usual, with all that vowing and honeymooning, I thought a virtual party might be in order!

So let me tell you about some of my favorite things (and a few special bonuses at the very end!) They're all pretty, but more importantly in my mind, very practical. So I don't feel too indulgent spending money on them, and they make great gifts! (Mother's Day will be here before you know it!)

I use my Large Utility Tote for groceries and other random stuff I might need to take somewhere (Christmas presents to the in-laws' house, a huge pack of diapers and other baby gear when going out of town...).

I actually got the black damask one last fall because I loved our pool bag so much and wanted one for everyday use. I got my first LUT (Large Utility Tote) two years ago when we moved into our new house and would be going to the neighborhood pool a lot. This thing holds everything! We took it on our beach trip and saw so many other families with the same bag (in different fabrics, of course, since there are a bunch of options). I put the bunch of bananas next to it just to give a sense of scale. It's huge!

Here's my black one holding all the groceries for our food pantry challenge a few weeks ago. That's a lot of food!

My other most-used bag is this Keep-It Caddy, which I use as our family lunch box to take leftovers, utensils, and paper products to church every Tuesday so we can eat dinner as a family before taking Kate to her gymnastics class. It's not too big to carry around when you've also got a purse, gym bag, and other stuff to lug, and yet you can fit a lot of stuff in it. For a pot luck at church, I once fit a tupperware of veggies, a container of dip, a large jar of spiced pineapple, and the dishes/platters in which to serve all that. This year's version also has pen pockets on the side that would be great for spoons as well.

Note: I see a lot of people using the above caddy as a small diaper bag, which feels very small for a diaper bag, and yet there is plenty of room for diapers, wipes, a spare outfit, and a sippy cup on the side, which is really all you need and doesn't require the digging through a bottomless bag! For a bigger diaper bag, a lot of people are using the new Super Organizing Tote, with its seven pockets and zipper top.

These Littles Carry-All Caddies were gifts from my mom to each of the girls for Christmas, filled with stocking-stuffer type things. I know the girls would love to tote them around with treasures, as kids tend to do, but I've made them our "upstairs-downstairs bags." They sit on the steps to collect items that need to go up to the girls' rooms, and then I load them up with downstairs stuff that has somehow found its way upstairs.  (As you see, shoes seem to end up where they should not quite a bit.)

The Littles caddies are only $12 and so useful. I've seen people use them for remotes in the living room, office supplies on the desk, and creams and such on changing tables. Kate actually mentioned out of the blue how they would be great as trick-or-treat bags, so I'm thinking about getting some in the "black happy dot" pattern and orange monogramming for the girls to use at Halloween!

My treat for myself in December was the Timeless Beauty Bag, for travel, and there are smaller accessory pouches that I'm thinking of getting for the kids to hold her toiletries when we travel.

I hope you'll come to my virtual party! There are also thermal lunch bags, office organizers, duffel bags, purses, and more. And here are two added bonuses:

1. For every $31 you spend, you can get a tote (one of five options) for 50% off! (click "Monthly Specials" on the site for details)
2. My dear Allison—I mean my dear Mrs. Kennedy*—is going to draw one of my virtual guests to get free shipping! 

So come to my party and get some fun, useful stuff for yourself and your loved ones, and maybe get free shipping too! The party will close Monday at noon, so take a look and at the very least get your Mother's Day gifts out of the way! :0)

*Anybody get the Gone With the Wind reference there?

Show and Tell

I'm starting another new series here on The Parsonage Family, basically designed to showcase random stuff worth sharing. Like the name indicates, Show and Tell is reminiscent of that classic kindergarten activity where you bring in something from home to show your classmates and tell them all about it.

Blogging in general is more or less just a giant exercise in show and tell, so I guess you could say this series is basically an excuse to share more random things than I usually would! Maybe a recipe I've tried or a new craft project, or some other fun thing. I'll invite you to tell about any random thing you want in the comments too!

First off, allow me to introduce our Show and Tell mascot, Sunny. Sunny is a yellow Kennel Kuddlee (a knock off of Pound Puppies, I guess) from the 1980s. I loved Sunny and even wrote his name on our deck in black crayon when I was five, and held him by the ear with my teeth when climbing on the playground monkey bars. I took Sunny for Show and Tell every week in kindergarten. We had weekly themes, like "something blue" or "something green," so I would tie a different colored ribbon around Sunny's neck each week so he would fit the rules. Mrs. Cruickshank finally sent a note home saying I needed to bring something other than Sunny for Show and Tell.

Justice for Sunny! He can appear every week here on The Parsonage Family with no teacher to tell him otherwise :0)

But just in case Mrs. Cruikshank is looking down on us (we were her last class before she died of breast cancer) and wishing we'd share something else, I will point you over to Ministry Matters to see a series of collages I made in 2006 for a Stations of the Cross worship experience at Vanderbilt Divinity School. Matt and I have used these for Holy Week in various churches every year since then, and I finally photographed them so they could be shared more widely and projected during worship.

Here's a sampling of my favorite stations, and you can download all of them, with corresponding scriptures, at Ministry Matters.

Have a blessed Holy Week!