It Went Really Well!

First day down...it went really well.  As expected, Z was a bit of the wrench in the works at some transition points, but I hope that will work itself out as he gets used to the schedule and expectations.  If anything, the girls were disappointed we didn't do more.  All in good time.

Here are my cuties on their first day of school...totally homeschooling it in their bare feet.

Ode to the Morning Nap

In the last week, my almost-two-year-old son has dropped his morning nap (without adding any additional afternoon or nighttime sleep, mind you) and learned to open doorknobs.  That effectively turns any semblance of normalcy around here on its head, thank you very much.  And so I bid farewell to our friend, the morning nap, with a heartfelt tribute....

Oh, Morning Nap, how I need you desperately and loathe you in the same breath!  That blessed hour of near-peace that always gets in the way of any possible outing.  I mourn your loss with a sigh of relief.  If only you had magically transplanted yourself next door to Afternoon Nap.  Instead you ran off for greener pastures and left me with a whiny leech completely incapable of entertaining himself for two minutes.  But I'm not bitter.  We're moving on, whole mornings available for wandering.  This is better. Right?  Oh, Mourning Nap!

100 Day

We recently celebrated 100 Day at our little homeschool.  I could not be more relieved to have reached this milestone.  We had done "number of the day" activities for every number leading up to this big culmination of the marvelous phenomenon that is 100!  If I ever have to do "number of the day" again, I think I'll move to Mars.

Making necklaces with 100 cheerios

Showing off our hats with 10 groups of 10

How far is 100 steps?  Can you see them waaayy down there?

I Don't Care Who You Are...

....that's cute!

Z has entered the Pixar phase.  He is into all things Buzz, McQueen and Nemo.  We've had these costumes in our dress-up box for a long time and he was smitten when he saw them.  He likes to stand on the ottoman with arms above his head and yell "oo 'finity 'nd 'yond!" before diving onto the couch.

You like that toddler-ese?  How is it they communicate so well without using the first letter of any word?  All the better to hypnotize us with cuteness.

Today

I confess that I cannot achieve the level of blog posts I aspire to.  Every time I want to sit down to write, my brain begs for downtime if no one else is begging for a piece of me.  But I'd still like to blog.  So I'm taking a cue from Missy over It's Almost Naptime and attempting shorter posts.  (I don't know Missy, but I'd like to.  And I'm not even going to pretend that my plate runneth over like hers does right now.)

Today, A went to her one-day enrichment co-op that we like to call "Wednesday school."  She has classes in art, Spanish, P.E., drama, character building, and music.  It's good exposure to classroom behavior and learning from someone other than mom.

While she's away, I try to have some preschool time at the house, though it is so hard to resist plugging them into a screen so I can accomplish something that appears more productive.  We compromised today.  I de-cluttered the living room while they scattered rice in my kitchen.

When A got home, we turned right around for our first return-to-gymnastics class.  The girls really enjoyed gymnastics last spring, but we chose to drop when money got tight.  When we got the wiggle room in the budget again, the girls were eager to go back.  C couldn't stop hopping through the whole class.  She stayed where she was supposed to and got nice comments about good listening, but she was so excited she could not be still.

Z's got a little tummy bug that made last night interesting.  I'm praying it's short-lived and contained to one host.

That's us.  How are you?

First Day of School

Before our house guests arrived, we had our first day of school.  I got our schoolroom all ready the night before with a fun new sign inspired by a Pinterest find.  I don't think I've ever shown you, loyal reader, our schoolroom.  Ta da...

That's my gumball sign.  We added gumballs with our ideas for making school enjoyable (i.e., being kind, waiting our turn, helping each other, listening, etc.).  I can't put much on my walls this year because Z enjoys ripping it all off too much.  Shouldn't every schoolroom have a baby gate, by the way?

These are my craigslist find cabinets.  J and my dad installed them earlier in the summer.  They are fabulous!!  J also installed our roof flashing turned magnet wall.  He's a handy guy.  I like the magnet wall because I can put independent supplies in a pencil pouch hanging from a hook on the wall.  The girls can get to them anytime.  I've also got a planning calendar up and my own notes for the week.  There's also lots of room for posting their creations and school work.

This is the other end of our schoolroom, but it's really more of a play area.  But I wanted to show off my map wall.  Strictly decorative purposes because the maps are from old National Geographics.  Again, I'll go lower with more maps when I know Z won't tear them off.

I told the girls we would be taking first day photos and I loved the results!  A asked to stay her in pj's all day, including for photos.  Then she took one photo and was done.  So very A.

C asked to put on her fanciest dress, wanted a headband and a bow, then wanted a portrait session for the next 20 minutes with silly faces, serious faces, good smiles, bad smiles.  Every bit C right now.

Getting lice the first week of school has definitely put a damper on things, but I'm so glad we homeschool!  We'll keep going, keep practicing our nice attitudes, getting down routines and figuring out realistic expectations.  Hope your year gets off to a smooth, sweet start!

House Guests

So it's always fun when a blog post generates comments, but when a post generates phone calls....!!  Wow!  The announcement of a foreign exchange student actually ranked a few phone calls!  Sweet!

When we decided to buy this big ol' house, one of the things we looked forward to doing was hosting an exchange student.  Because what better way to share the world with our kids than bringing it to our dinner table?  Sure beats traveling internationally with small children.  We have the space to share and just hope we are good representatives of our culture--both temporal and eternal.

We have been complete novices through this process and are learning as we go (like all parenting).  We chose an exchange agency because we had a friend of a friend who was a local advocate.  We chose our student because she is the oldest of several children in her home and we thought she would be comfortable in our chaos.  Other than that, it was a stab in the dark, and we couldn't be more pleased.

You'll be hearing more about H, our exchange student.  She'll be part of our family through the end of January-ish.  She's from northern Germany and is doing great with her English.  We are really impressed!  She'll turn 16 while she's here.  She arrived Thursday night after more than 24-hours en route.  We had great plans for the weekend, including taking a pic of her to introduce her to my huge readership, as well to show her around and maybe take in a local festival, but....

Friday morning we realized we had even more house guests than we thought.  I made the gruesome discovery that A and C had lice!  I wanted to crawl into the fetal position and deny my own existence for the next 48 hours.  Alas, that was not an option.  Our plans went down the drain and I began the overwhelming task ahead of me.

I started with a trip to the pharmacy for requisite tools.  Then, I made my first-ever trip through the Starbucks drive-thru for my own self-medication.  Chai latte has become my drug of choice and it helped me through the morning.  When I got home, I took each girl to the backyard and lopped off as much hair as I was comfortable with.  They both have decent little bobs now.  Then, I used that tiny little comb to go through A's thick, thick hair.  It took over an hour and a half.  C's was not so bad because her hair is so fine.

Then I gave the Cetaphil solution a try.  It was mid-afternoon by the time they were both "treated."  Next we bagged up all the stuffed animals, extra pillows and blankets.  I vacuumed, sterilized, and laundered for the rest of the day.  J came to the rescue by working from home and keeping Z out of the way.  So far, Z, J and I have been spared.  But just thinking about it makes my head light up with imaginary itches.

I'm going to say the Cetaphil trick was not particularly effective for A.  C seemed clear this morning, but A was still just as bad.  My own particular brand of torture is a contagious condition that keeps your children quarantined but at perfectly good energy levels, then re-occurs at weekly intervals for up to a month.  Yippy skippy.  Add to the equation one six-year-old with incredibly thick hair, a sensitive scalp, and a tendency to make mountains out of mole hills.  SuperMommy kryptonite trifecta!

J wanted to nail down where we had picked it up, but I knew that was futile.  Our best guess is the headphones at the library computer station.  A spent about 15 minutes trying the computer game in the kids' section.  C tried it too, but the headphones kept slipping off her head, so she didn't stay as long.  It could have been anywhere, honestly; we just don't know.  But you can rest assured, we will not ever use those headphones again.

I am so indebted to my sis-in-law, CA, who came to the rescue and whisked H away for a teenage girl shopping trip, dinner, and youth group study on Friday.  Then she came again tonight to take H to her first-ever baseball game.  Thank you, CA and R!!  You salvaged this weekend with flying colors!

A and C will stay home from church with me tomorrow and we will attempt to salvage Friday's schoolwork without Z in the mix.  Monday is a big day as we register H for high school and get a crash course in the public high school education system.

Enough rambling.  Stay tuned.  Our family motto really is "never a dull moment" and we strive to deliver.

Look Who's Walking!

It's been about ten days now since the video above.  He likes to do new tricks for daddy more than mommy, so of course he started walking the night I had bunko.  It only took him a few more days to start trying to stand up by himself.  But again, he still only does that when daddy is around.  After all, who needs to do it yourself, if your mom's around?

For anyone keeping track (namely myself), that will be A and Z who both started walking at 14 months; C at 15 months.  It's a whole new world!

This is the Face of a Six-Year-Old

You can tell she's six by that stinkin' cute gap in her smile.  Oh, and the fact that I can't get a non-silly-face picture.

It's also difficult to get a picture of one cutie-pie without the other.

 They do enjoy hamming it up for the camera.

 Not to be outdone by his sisters, ladies and gentleman, the show-stealer...

Summer is Slippin' Away

We made a bucket list of the beginning of summer and I thought it was pretty relaxed.  No problem, I thought, we can do those.  Yikes!  There are three and a half weeks before school starts and we'll be cramming a few things in.

Our summer has been such a welcome break from the last year.  I desperately needed the break from homeschool.  With a new curriculum for a new year, I'm looking forward to it again and getting excited.

I had a whole slew of DIY projects to tackle over the summer, too, but I'm afraid I won't get many of those crammed in before school.  Something about being a ping-pong mom between small children makes it nearly impossible if not unenjoyable to try to get any projects done.

What have we been doing this summer?  The reading club at two libraries, getting more comfortable in the swimming pool, sleepovers with cousins, library story times, dinners with neighbors and friends, birthday parties, watching fireworks, and more screen time than I care to admit.

Early in the summer, J camped in the backyard with the girls.

They zipped up the tent early to keep the mosquitos out and played lots of go fish and read a big stack of books.  We were quite impressed that they made it through the night.  Of course, I took one for the team, and stayed inside with Z.

A has been to VBS and two day camps with a neighborhood church--one week of active, outside rough and tumble camp and another week of inside, creative choir camp.  It's been very interesting to see how differently each child behaves when one is taken out of the mix.  Good practice for fall when A will go once a week to co-op classes.

While A was at camp, I took C and Z to a kids' event downtown to see The Biscuit Brothers perform.  C gets really excited about The Biscuit Brothers.  I really think they are so special to her because she saw them perform at a street concert just after we moved and they were heavy on the crowd participation.  Very real, very fun and then she saw them on tv.  So when we had the chance to go see them again, I stretched out of my comfort zone (with the help of my sister) and made her day.

I know she looks a little creeped out, but she was elated.  She even mustered the courage to ask them a question and tell them her name clearly enough to be understood.  When we walked away, she looked up at me and exclaimed, "Mom!  They know my name!"  It was pretty cute.

We have a road trip planned to visit friends and family yet.  Plus a trip to the children's museum and a little party with the girls in A's class at church.  I have a few more items on the get-ready-for-school list.  All in all, it's been a sweet summer.  I know time is going to scream by once school gets going and Christmas will be here before we know it.  Going to make the most of these next few weeks and then grab school by the horns and relish that ride.

Picture Day

I've been wanting to get some professional pictures of the kids.  Unfortunately, I was a bit spoiled by the friends I made who were taking up professional photography and offered me reduced rates.  Sticker shock for big city photographers encouraged me to give it a go myself.

After an hour and a half and about 150 pics taken, here are half of the keepers.  (There were a total of 12 keepers--yes, 12 out of 150.)

Tell you what...those photographers work hard for the money, so hard for ya honey!  I know I earned the few smiles I got!  And I won't have the benefit of all the mad editing skillz to make them look any better than they are right now.  But, I captured this moment and we all left happy (thanks to Grandma's help). That's huge--HUGE, I tell ya.

Related

The girls and I were scrolling down memory lane recently and I wanted to do a side-by-side comparison.

Can you tell we love our booster seat?  Three first birthdays, three different houses, three very different kids.  Can you tell they're related?  

First Haircut

He was overdue.  Just like C on her first birthday, Z was a mop-top cutie.

I summoned up my courage and decided to tackle the first cut myself.  After a good nap to recover from his birthday party, I put him in his chair to contain at least two limbs and gave him a snack, hoping it would occupy the other two.

That worked for half of his head.  Then he started grabbing for the scissors, flailing and arching his back, and generally protesting in every possible way.  I was really hoping to get it all done at once so we only had one mess to clean up, but we called it "part one" success.

I tried again at bath time, thinking I could finish up in a dry bathtub while he played with a trickle of water.  Even better, he climbed up the step stool to C's sink and played with the water there.  (And figured out how to turn the faucets on.)  His head was bent down so I could even out his neck line and he was fully captivated by the water, so I could trim up the remaining stranglers.

Ta da...

 Isn't he handsome?

Such a silly cutie!

We call this move, "using the force."  He likes to do this at mealtimes and giggles when we copy him.  He's using the force here to get mommy to put down her camera and hand over the food.  I think his Jedi skills improved with the haircut.

Birthday Boy

This little birthday boy had a great party, especially considering he was one week into missing his morning nap.  We started with cake; that always helps.

 He wasn't quite sure how to attack the cake, but it didn't take him long to figure it out.

Then we moved on to presents.  Hooray for trucks, tractors, cars, and planes!

Happy 1st Birthday, Z!  You keep us on our toes, keep us guessing, and keep us smiling.

Eleven Months

One more month and I officially have a toddler on my hands.  Though I think Z's been toddling for at least two months already.  Today is the last of his "month" birthdays.  I want to remember that right now he is...

• funny.  He loves to smile at people, belly laugh when he's tickled, and squeal when he's chased.
• sneaky.  Quiet Z means trouble, and if I go investigating, he'll take off with whatever contraband he's found and squeal as I chase him.

caught in the act

trying to get away

• smart.  His only consistent word so far is "Da," but I can hold long conversations with him and have him follow my instructions (like playing ball, putting toys in/out of the basket, finding a toy across the room, etc.)  
• busy!  He knows how to open doors left unlatched, open cabinets, oven doors, go up the stairs, etc. He knows all the places that are off-limits and makes a bee-line for them if given the chance.  I think his bumper sticker would read, "Don't fence me in, buckle me up, or hold me down!"  (This explains the general lack of photos and the poor quality of any photos I do post.)

the one cabinet he's allowed to pillage

• badly in need of a hair cut.  I trimmed it once around Easter, just two little snips.  I'm trying to hold out for the one year birthday before his first full cut.  It either needs a good cut or some serious product.
• hot-tempered.  Boy, does he wail when he gets stuck behind a gate or has a door closed in his face, knowing something better is happening on the other side.
• pitiful.  That anger quickly turns to pitiful pouting. Good thing he's my third and those theatrics don't work on me any more (much).
• easy-going.  Keep him fed and rested, and he goes with the flow.  Thank you, God!  He's also very tolerant of his sisters' attempts to love and protect him.
• all boy.  The sound of a lawn mower, the vacuum, or any engine makes him stop in his tracks and listen.  Baby dolls are for gnawing on.  You and anything else in his path are tools to be used or climbed.  And he's already chewed more bugs than I care to admit.  Oh, and electronics?  He might have a little bit of a preference for any toy with batteries or buttons.  And daddy's already letting him play xbox.
• affectionate.  He's still a good snuggler, when you can get him to be still.
• big.  He weighed 21 lbs. at a doctor's visit this morning (no ear infection; so what's up with the broken sleep?!) and he's outgrowing his 12-month clothes.
• over-the-moon for his daddy.  This boy loves to wrestle with his dad!  And there's no better mountain to climb.  His face lights up when he hears "Da" come in the door and he hurries to get to him.
• a picky, but hearty eater.  Just because he liked it yesterday doesn't mean he'll eat it today.  But if today's the day he likes it, you better have a lot of it.
• all that I imagined a son would be so far, but so much better in person.