Earth Day MVP & a Crossing Guard

I am lounging tonight in a fresh smelling room, the byproduct of today's professional carpet shampooing in an attempt to eradicate evidence of recent (and not-so-recent) household events.  I won't gross you out, but let's just say that three small boys and two dogs means that our carpet perpetually looks like a splatter mat underfoot.  Okay, it's really not that bad, but about every three to six months I decide I can't stand staring at the offensive spots anymore and I pay a small fortune to a very nice and super competent guy who can make the ole' shag look almost new again.  Just kidding - we don't really have shag carpet.  But sometimes I wish we did, because it would most certainly hide some of the atrocities so much better.  Anyway, my tactile senses love the results too, because you feel this crisp crushing underfoot as you walk across newly cleaned carpet that is beginning to dry.  I know, I know - totally absurd.  Yet still satisfying.

Apparently this carpet cleaning got me in a rather proactive and productive mood, because I really shocked myself earlier by encouraging G-man that we should start on his Earth Day lunchbox project that's due this Friday.  It's only Tuesday.  This is a big deal for me - Miss Procrastinator Extraordinaire that I am. 

The instructions said to create a lunchbox out of something recyclable at home that they can tote their lunch in on Friday and parade through the other classes for all of their friends to oooh and ahhh over.  Well, this for sure demanded that I break out the fancy scrapbook supplies.  Don't worry - I didn't "girl" it up.  We found a sports paper pack and he made a baseball-themed lunchbox out of an old shoebox I had in the closet.  We cut and glued various paper to the box to camouflage the fact that it once housed a coveted pair of Arturo Chiang pumps, and then adhered some cut-outs of favorite players as well as several baseball stickers.  My husband broke out his power tool (project coolness factor: +25 points) and drilled two holes in the top and we created a handle out of a string looped through and tied underneath.  To make sure the box stayed together without the top falling off when he picked it up, we put some Velcro stickers on the underside of the box top and then on each side of the box so that the lid can be secured.  I'm guessing that Velcro isn't exactly "green", but I can't have his lunch falling out all over the hallway or who knows where else, because I know my son, and I can guarantee this thing will be put to the G-man test.  Only the strong survive.

And so voila!  We have a "green" lunchbox that is pretty cool if I say so myself.

Who's the Earth Day MVP?  G-man!

After cleaning up our mess and patting myself on the back for not only starting but also finishing this project so early, I revisited a pile of teacher notes and classroom work that B-man had brought home yesterday (he goes to an intensive pre-school three days a week).  I read more about the songs and letters they worked on, studied a very interesting abstract finger painting masterpiece, and then came across the below paper that I somehow missed in my quick flip-through yesterday.  

It seems his teacher asked him what he wanted to be when he grows up, and she wrote down his response.

It made me smile.  Totally putting this one in my pocket for a rainy day.