First day of school approaches

Tomorrow will be the first day of school for Kaeli, Paige, and Ryan. Kaeli is going into 3rd grade, Paige will be in 1st and Ryan will be starting his first full year of preschool. I'm very excited--looking forward to things being a little quieter during the day. I'm guessing AJ will be lost for a while.

Kaeli is very apprehensive. She's heard many stories about 3rd grade and is very concerned that it will be too difficult. I do believe she'll have to work harder, but I doubt it'll be too much for her. Fortunately there will be plenty of familiar faces in her class this year. There are 4 kids in our neighborhood (within 2 blocks of us) that will be in her class--2 girls and 2 boys. The 2 boys are twins and were in her class last year. A few times this summer she rode her bike down to their house to play. As a side note, I forgot about the one time last weekend that was so cute. She walked into the door for the day and I saw only one of the boys walking down the driveway away from our house. He had walked her home and I thought that was so sweet! It's also funny because they get into alot of friendly competitions at school--it's a good, healthy academic rivalry that keeps them both motivated to do their best.

Paige is incredibly excited about starting school! In fact, she came downstairs this morning fully dressed and ready for her 1st day! Steve asked her if she was practicing for her 1st day of school tomorrow and she said "that's TOMORROW?!" So, she turned around with her head hung low and proceeded to change into something else. I sure hope her day goes well. She seems to have a very nice teacher. At this point we don't know any of the other kids in her class. I did just find out that our future girl scouts leader's daughter is in the class. So, while they don't know each other yet, I know they'll probably becomes friends since they'll be seeing each other outside of school as well. I'm looking forward to her becoming even more competent in reading. She's doing well, but I know she'll do even better with some direct teaching of more advanced decoding skills.

I know Ryan is going to dazzle his speech therapist with his new skills! I tried to warn her that she's going to be completley amazed by him, but I don't think she has any idea just how amazed she will be. I just wrote her a long note explaining where he is right now and what areas she might want to address. I'm certain that he will make progress in even bigger leaps and bounds once she starts working with him. At this rate, I wouldn't be surprised if he doesn't qualify for services at the end of this year.

I will post their "first day of school" pictures when I get a chance tomorrow.

Excited to need deodorant?

YIKES! Strangely enough, Kaeli has been asking to wear deodorant for the past few months. I always told her she didn't need it yet and not to rush things. Well, a few minutes ago she put her arm around me and much to my huge surprise--she does indeed need deodorant now. I verified that it was her armpits I was smelling and not my own...lol. Then I informed her that she does indeed need to start wearing deodorant. She proceeded to jump up and down and celebrate. Then ran into the next room where our two neighbors were (they are over playing) and announced the news to them. Sarah said "you're GLAD to need deodorant?" When she's a teenager I'm sure she'll enjoy hearing all about her initial reaction to having stinky armpits. ;)

I yub you, mommy

Last night as I was taking Ryan upstairs for bed I told him to tell daddy "goodnight, I love you". He did exactly that. At that moment I realized how amazing it was for him to be able to repeat that phrase with such ease. I remembered not too long ago (maybe 6 mos ago) sitting next to his bed as I tucked him in saying "I love you" several times hoping he might try to repeat the phrase. But, all I ever got was a big grin. I waited so long for him to be able to say "I love you" back to me. I mentioned this memory out loud...... so Steve said "tell mommy you love her". With absolute ease Ryan said "I yub you, mommy" and gave me a gigantic hug!! You can better believe my eyes were full of water as the tears welled up.

Everything is looking good for school!!

I have been eagerly waiting to find out what Ryan's schedule would look like this year and I finally got the letter today. For the 3 yr old program there were lots of options--2 days/wk, 3 days/wk, morning, afternoon. I really, really wanted 3 days/wk in the morning and guess what???? That's what he got!!! YAY!! I could only put in my request, but space and other kids' needs were the first consideration before requests. I was a little concerned that they would cut him back to only 2 days a week since he's made so much progress in his speech. So, now I know he'll still get 3 days a week of speech therapy and that is awesome! While he's come a LONG way I know the more help he gets the more quickly we'll see MORE improvement. At this rate he just may be completely caught up by Kindergarten--that would be awesome!!

The other reason this schedule is so perfect is because Kaeli, Paige, and Ryan will all be dropped off at exactly the same time. They are all in the same building, so the girls can go in with me and just keep walking to their classroom when I stop to drop off Ryan. Then I just go back to get Ryan at 11:15. I'm so excited that I will have a FULL 3 hour window of time to do whatever needs to be done. Last year I dropped the girls off at 8:15 and then Ryan got dropped off at 8:45 (in another building) and then I had to be back to pick him up at 11:15.

Everything's looking good......all 3 have orientation on Aug 22 and then classes start Aug 25.

Ryan is lost.....

without his sisters! Every single day this week he has asked when Kaeli and Paige will be home. He doesn't understand days yet, so it's been hard to explain to him that it's going to be quite a while yet. But, it's been kind of neat to watch Ryan and AJ learn to play together without the girls running the show. Boys sure are different than girls. I'm SURE to find trouble any time these boys are on their own for a few minutes. Let's see....today I discovered toothpaste ALL over the bathroom. It's obviously pretty cool to paint the bathroom with toothpaste. Another time I was putting away clothes.....I hear Ryan saying "drop it, AJ". I heard this phrase a few more times before deciding to intervene. Ryan was downstairs in the family room encouraging AJ to drop anything he could find down from the balcony. At one point, AJ crawled into a chair with a book and proceeded to flip through the pages acting like he's reading. You know you're in trouble when the older of the two says "what is AJ doing?" The sad truth of the matter is that AJ is the one that gets "shafted" when it comes to having a book read to him at night. Being the bottom of the'food chain' means sometimes mom and dad just don't have the energy left to read another book at the end of the day. Besides, he doesn't complain.....YET!!

I talked to the girls today. Sounds like they are having a great time. Grampa signed Paige up for 2-- 1 hour private swimming lessons. She had her first lesson yesterday and is already diving into the deep end of the pool. This morning she said to me "I can swim in 9ft of water now, mom!" I'm so happy for her. She often gets left behind by the older kids in our neighbor's pool. Kaeli learned to swim this year, so she hangs with the bigger kids in the deep end. Paige usually just occupies herself in the shallow end. And, just like Paige--she never makes a single complaint about it, although I think it bothers her deep down. So, now she won't be left behind anymore.

Just us and the boys this week

Kaeli and Paige are staying the whole week with their grampa and grammy in North Carolina. I met my dad halfway (about 3 hrs) between his house and my house. The girls are incredibly excited because my brother's family will also be there. I think it's been 4 yrs since the girls got to spend time with their cousins. This is also a big milestone because they have NEVER been away from us for more than a day or two at most. I even found myself tearing up as I walked back to my car without them. Of course, I didn't let them see my tears. They were all smiles and weren't the least bit upset. I know they'll have a great time.

Steve and I didn't waste any time taking advantage of having only 2 kids. We already had a babysitter lined up for tonight. Normally, I have the babysitter come over after Ryan and AJ go to bed. But, since it was just the two of them we decided to have her come earlier. I was so proud of Ryan!! About an hour before Kailyn came over I told him what would happen. His only response was "how long you take?" When it was time for us to leave Ryan just waved and went back to playing with Kailyn. Even Kailyn was surprised because he normally screams and tantrums when we leave. Steve and I had a nice dinner all alone.

It should be an interesting week. I'm guessing it'll be a lot quieter!

Refrigerator is back in action

But, I don't think I'll ever call GE service again. They are EXPENSIVE! It only took the guy 30 min and it cost me 150.00 in labor alone. The part was 110.00. That's because they don't charge by the hour, it's by the job. Evidently our "mainboard" was bad and needed to be replaced. It basically looked like the "brains" of the fridge. So, I'm a little miffed that the brain died after only 4 years and cost so much to replace. I'm pretty sure I'm done with GE appliances. Our GE dishwasher is also only 4 years old and all the little plastic pieces are falling apart. Based on my experience it appears that you can only expect 4 good years from a GE appliance. Personally, I believe that major appliances are expensive enough to last longer than 4 years!

I did email their corporate customer service but didn't get anything more than "sorry". Oh well, live and learn.

This is off the subject, but has anyone else know a dog to CRAVE tomatoes? Our dog is insane! He has now stolen 6 tomatoes from my countertop! He got 4 on Sunday and then he got 2 more yesterday. I really need to learn to put them high enough that he can't reach. When he gets them he devours them--not a piece is left behind. It's just the weirdest thing ever! If I don't get more careful about where I leave the tomatoes he just might eat our entire crop. Thank goodness we have the fence around the garden or else I'm positive we'd have no tomatoes at all.

Room-temp refrigerator

Well, it appears that our refrigerator has decided to quit working. There is a digital thermostat that is very visible when you open the door to the fridge. When I opened it this morning, the freezer was -4 and the fridge was 52. We tried unplugging it to reset the computer, but it hasn't helped. The refrigerator part is now at 68 (perfect room temperature). Something about the whole thing is working because the freezer went from 12 degrees back to 0 degrees. But, the fridget just seem to stay at room temp. Fortunately, we have an extra refrigerator that only has drinks in it. We cleared out all the drinks today and filled the extra fridge with all the food. WHEW! Thank God we have the extra refrigerator.

I already scheduled a service call. The guy will be here sometime between 8 and 3 on Monday. Would you believe the first time given was 8-5.....why don't they just say ALL day? I was worried that the deal was over when I said I had to leave the house by 4. But, she changed it to reflect that necessity. But, seriously, sometimes I wonder how people do it when they have jobs. I mean really, is someone supposed to take an entire day off work to sit at home and wait for an appliance repair man? That's bordering on being completely ridiculous. Let's see, you can choose between having a broken fridge forever or taking an entire day of work. This is GE, by the way. And, believe it or not, they no longer have a "troubleshooting" dept. That also seems pretty ridiculous to me. Oh well, you do what you have to do, right?

You have to take a look at this!

I just got the link to the blog my sister set up for her new hand-made frame business. All I can say is WOW!! Click here to see the site Also, it's linked on the right hand-side under "favorite sites". These are beautiful frames and she DOES ship. Keep in mind Shana and Jeff make these frames completely from scratch. If her designs inspire you to come up with your own ideas she would also be willing to work with you to design your own custom frame. The ones with sayings are just beautiful and make me think of scrapbook pages made for hanging on the wall.

So, if you get a chance, take a look and don't hesitate to contact her if you are interested in one of her custom frames.

Back from the family reunion

Kaeli, Paige, Ryan and I all left for NY at 8 AM on Thursday morning. I kept in contact with my dad by phone the first 2 hours, then followed him the rest of the way. Before I go any further, I have to tell how we met up because it was pretty amazing! Keep in mind I only knew what town he was staying in (he stayed in a hotel Wed night). When I was about 15 miles from the town he was in, I called to let him know he could leave and we'd find each other on the highway somewhere. When they got on the highway Jeanne called and asked where I was. I told her we had just passed the Allentown exit. She said "that's the exit we just came off of". We discussed a couple of landmarks we were passing and I suddenly realized I was right behind them!! They obviously merged onto the highway right in front of me and I didn't even realize it. Talk about perfect timing!

After many stops--the kids seem to have to pee every hour--we made it to Delhi, NY around 3:30 or so. We spent the rest of the afternoon setting up the tent and preparing ourselves for night fall. The kids headed down to the creek and played there most of the afternoon/evening. The creek was just beautiful and very shallow. An absolutely perfect place for kids to play and explore endlessly. Over the course of 3 days they found crayfish, minnows, small fish, tadpoles, baby frogs, salamanders, and toads. I did hear about the discovery of one snake, but did not see it personally.

The field where we set up camp was in a valley and had no cell phone coverage. I have to admit that was hard! I wasn't expecting it and I felt a little cut off from Steve and AJ back at home. I was able to call and touch base when I went back into town about once a day.

So, I'll do my best to write a quick summary of our 3 days in the mountains.....

This event was a famly reunion/80th birthday party for my gramma. My Gramma has 13 children and each of them now has children and many of those children are having children. So, there were 4 generations at the party and when you start with 13 kids that makes for a lot of people! Also, my grandmother's siblings always attend with their extended family. I was certainly born into the right family because these reunions are the only time I ever feel so content, comfortable, and "right at home" with a LARGE group of people. Everyone is so down-to-earth and fun-loving. I loved watching my kids play with their "cousins". Before I go any further I will explain that in this family "cousin" is used loosely. As you can imagine, when one has 13 kids, there is a huge spacing of ages. I'm the oldest grandchild (36) and the youngest grandchild is 3. So, obviously alot of the "cousins" my kids played with were actually MY cousins. And, they were also playing with my cousin's kids and I have no idea what my cousin's kids would be to me, much less what it would the relation would be between them and my kids. But, regardless, it was so great seeing the kids enjoy nature and exploration with their "cousins" like I did as a child at these events. In fact, I can't help but wonder if, just a little, it helped shape my desire to major in life sciences. At one point Ryan told my gramma (his great-gramma) "look! a frog". She took him by the hand and walked him over to look, then went on to gently and patiently explain that he had actually found a toad. She explained all the differences between and toad and a frog. Soon after they were discussing snails.

So, I was explaining our weekend. The kids seemed to enjoy camping in a tent and so did I. Besides all the fun the kids had, I enjoyed having three kids that were old enough to go off and play while I sat and talked. I missed AJ, but it was nice not having to worry about him every 2 minutes. I belong to a family of beer drinkers, so we spent lots of time talking around a campfire and drinking beer each night before retiring to our tents.

There are at least a million more things I could write about our weekend. But, I'm tired of typing and I'm sure everyone is tired of reading. Here are some pics:

bathing in the creek

Muddy hands

These are my gramma's grandkids! This is definitely not all of us. I am kneeling ot the right of gramma.

These are the great-grandchildren that were there.

Here is a pic of Ryan roasting a marshmallow with one of my cousins.