TWO

Even though I am late, I couldn't let the month of August go by without posting about Charlie's birthday. He had a great birthday week, and we celebrated with a family dinner to All Aboard on Monday, and we had his party the following weekend. He had a Bubble Guppie themed party complete with a bubble machine, jumpy house, water slide, and our family and friends. It was kind of weird that I felt like I barely saw either of the kids most of the party, but I knew they were running around somewhere in the backyard having a great time. It was a busy day, but a lot of fun, and it was our fist big party in the new house.

*Please disregard the frog onesie Kenley decided to put on before cake.  She was cold after going on the waterslide, even though it was almost 90 degrees!  HA!

 

 

Charlie seems to have gone from baby to big-boy overnight. He is very outgoing, brave, funny, and sweet. He is always on the go, and he is already fighting naps.  I'm lucky if I get him to nap every other day or so. He is so talkative, and communicates really well. I love his voice, and I love hearing the way he puts words and sentences together, and he loves to copy everything his sister says. His favorite word is "no", he loves playing outside and running around, and he's really getting into all the typical little boy toys like cars, trains, etc. (Although, a moment later you may find him wearing Elsa high heels and rocking Kenley's dolls.  He's tough and sweet!) Charlie gets soooo much attention from strangers! People constantly comment on his light blonde hair and bright blue eyes. Pair that with his personality, and it's kind of hard to miss this kid!

It's fun now that Charlie is old enough to play with Kenley,and they are usually very good with one another. It's really sweet how she is protective and tries really hard to teach him things, and how he really tries to do everything she is doing. They both started school last week, and it went really well.(He was crying in the pictures because he wanted to play with his outdoor toys instead of take a picture and get in the car.) We took Charlie into his classroom first, and he started crying when I left, but I know it was only for a minute or two.  He was happy both days I picked him up, and gave me a full report of the highlights of his day. "Ate applesauce and mac n cheese!  I play outside!" and repeated his teacher's name many times throughout the day.

 Kenley walked in her first day like a rock star.  All of her friends were calling her name, and she was waving to everyone.  She gave me a quick kiss and ran off with her friends.  She has a new teacher this year, and is in the "Big Kid" 4 year old pre-school.  I know they are both in for a fun year, and will learn so much.  I thought a lot about how next year Kenley will be in school full time, 5 days a week for kindergarten, and it made me kind of happy that she missed the cut-off for kindergarten this year.  I'm so glad I get another year to be with her the majority of the time to be her main "teacher" before she is away from home most of the day, and I really want to cherish this time.

I also started work 2 weeks ago, and it going really well.  There was a last minute change in my work schedule, so my classes aren't back-to-back anymore, but now I have about an hour and 20 minute break in-between.  I think it will work out ok because I would usually go in early and stay a little bit late to get most of my planning and grading done, so now I'm just using that time for that.  Because of that, I also switched the kid's school days so that I could have one of the days they are in school to get things done.  Last Monday was my first 3-hour time period alone, and it was so nice!  I worked out and went to Target as planned, but I leisurely browsed the aisles, and I was actually able to plan ahead and shop for some specific ingredients to make dinner that night.  Normally, I throw random food into the cart when I'm trying to rush out with the kids.  Then, when I get home I feel like I didn't buy much to make an actual "meal."  So, I think our new schedule is going to work out very nice.  Once again, I am so thankful that my mom and mother-in law are able to watch the kids while I am working.

We had such a great summer, and in my mind it's not over until the last 75+ degree day.  I am looking forward to a lot of fun things coming up this Fall, but I hope it stays nice out during that time.  We will be wearing our summer clothes and sandals until then!







 

Busy Bees

We have had so much going on!  Every week, I think to myself, "next week we won't be so busy." But, then I find myself signing us up for events, making playdates with friends, making appointments, so it is busy in a good way!  The past few weeks have been very full.  I'm trying to cram as much in as I can these last few weeks of summer.  This month we celebrated the 4th of July, the kids finished swimming lessons, We celebrated Ray's birthday, I got to see a lot of my friends, and the kids got to see a lot of their friends, and Ray and I went on little trip with Katie and Greg to Put-In Bay.

We had a great little trip, and we were lucky we had the perfect weather!  It was Katie and Greg's anniversary weekend, so we were able to celebrate kind of a combination of Ray's birthday and both of our anniversaries.  We soaked up the sun and got in lots of interesting people watching at the pool parties.  We had some nice meals, and overall just enjoyed our little get-away.

We have more celebrations coming up in August, which started with our 7th anniversary this weekend.  Since we were away the weekend before, we celebrated with the kids, and we took them to Great America. It was fun to celebrate as a family, and we took (snuck) Charlie on his first roller coaster, even though he was technically about 2 inches too short! 

Kenley finished sportscamp this week, and she learned a lot of different things through playing soccer, t-ball, and basketball.  She will be finishing up the summer with dance camp next week.

We are only 1 week away from Charlie's 2nd birthday!  His party is the weekend after, so we will be getting ready to celebrate with the whole family.  Last night, he graduated from a crib to a "big boy" bed.  I wanted to delay this as much as possible because all I could envision was him coming into our room multiple times a night.  But, the last two weeks, he has become a master at climbing out of his crib.  So, I gave in because I guess it's time.  He did great last night, and he only got out of bed once!  He is even napping in there now.  Hopefully, he continues doing well and keeps napping because I am not ready for him to give those up yet!

Last week, we had our 2nd annual BIG playdate.  I invited pretty much all of my friends with young kids over to our house.  We had so much fun, and total ended up with about 16adults and 27 kids ranging from about 3 months-8years old.  (Not everyone was there for the picture)  It actually went very well, the kids all behaved, played nice, and the mom's got to socialize!  It was a lot of fun, and I am definitely planning on having one again next year!

I know it will be just a matter of time until school starts again. I'm gong to be teaching 2 classes again, both 2 days a week.  It is going to be very weird dropping both kids off a school two mornings a week also.  They will go to school in the mornings on the same days that I will be working in the afternoon.  It will be very weird and nice to have those 3 hours to myself.  I plan on napping, getting manicures/pedicures, shopping, etc.....Oh, who am I kidding?  Ha,ha, I will be going to the gym, maybe getting a little bit of cleaning done, and grading/preparing for my classes!  Maybe, every now in then I will try to sneak in some of those fun, relaxing things, but I already know that those 3 hours between drop-off and pick-up time go fast!

For now, I will enjoy these last 2 weeks of summer!!