Staycation

Sydney didn't have school yesterday or today because of some Catholic Teacher training event.  Had I taken a close look at her school calendar when she started this year and noticed this 4-day weekend, I would have planned a vacation for us, but in my baby haze I did not look closely at the calendar, so we are having a bit of a staycation.  I love that word - who came up with that?  Yesterday was lots of fun, mainly because I didn't have to drive anyone anywhere!  Here's what we were up to:

A quick visit to a local pumpkin patch yielded several hours of fun.  We spent $20 on these beauties and came home to paint them.  The kids had a blast and the weather was perfect for sitting on the back porch and making a mess with paint.  I let the kids just do whatever they wanted with their pumpkins instead of trying to direct them to some cute finished product.  It was pretty stress-free this way and everyone was happy!  Pierce added layer after layer of color to his pumpkin and his last and final layer being gray meant that he ended up with a solid gray pumpkin.  But I kind of like it that way!

We made strawberry tarts for snack and had an impromptu tea party to properly enjoy those cute little tarts.  They were so cute: why didn't I snap a picture?  Here's our secret to making them: buy pre-made tarts, spread strawberry jam on them, bake for 5 minutes at any temperature and serve!  Next we hit the neighborhood park for some soccer fun. Then we made home-made pizza for dinner.  I let the kids have a "toppings bar" and put what they wanted on their pizzas.  Sydney chose mushrooms and olives, Pierce heaped on olives and sausage (both of which he later declared he did not like and picked off, the olives being to "sour").  But what a yummy and easy dinner for a laid back night with no strict bedtimes.  We usually don't have dessert during the week, but since we were technically on "staycation," I served chocolate ice cream, with copious amounts of sprinkles for the kids, none for me.  What is it with those sprinkles?  Yuck!

While I cleaned up the pizza bar mess, the kids decided to make cards for daddy (who was coming back from New York last night).  Cute idea, but major mess.  Major messes are the story of my life at this point.  I feel that I am in a constant battle with clutter and disorder, and that I am generally losing that battle.  But I got some help with little resistance from the kids to clean it up and all was well.

It's so nice to have lazy days like these.  Makes you realize how hectic our normal daily lives are.

Grant Michael

Our precious Grant Michael arrived three days later and two pounds heavier than expected on June 20, 2012, weighing 9 lbs 10.5 ounces.  He was born at 10:50 am, one year and one minute after his adorable cousin Addison.  Maybe the clock was fast and he was actually born at the exact same time?  It’s funny because we thought he’d come on Father’s Day (his due date), and he didn’t, but he still managed to pick a special day to share with Addison.  Sydney chose her birthday to share with Aunt Susan.  And Pierce decided to come on Mother’s Day.  Funny how all that works out.

According to those surveyed thus far (including family, friends, preschool teachers, grocery store cashiers, and random strangers), Grant looks just like Pierce.  Well, he’s a little chunkier, but otherwise, they must strongly resemble each other.  A friend of mine saw him for the first time recently and said, “Claire, you’ve created the same child twice!”  Ha!

Grant is a sweet and relatively happy baby (unless you catch him hungry or tired!), and we are so happy he decided to join our little family.  What a blessing he's been!  His favorite activities include: practicing his vowel and consonant sounds, cooing, grabbing his left foot, eating, sleeping and snoring.  His siblings adore him and are so good to him, giving him kisses, holding him, helping him with his pacifier and blankets.  They are very attentive!

It’s a shame it’s taken me 3 months to get some pictures and a quick post up about him, but I’ve been busy, as you can imagine.  My daily to-do list is long, and blogging is way down around number 89, right after #88 - flossing my teeth (checked that one off today!) and just before # 90 - cleaning out the guest bedroom closets.  Maybe I can get back on here more regularly soon.  We are still not sleeping through the night (that seems to be everyone’s favorite question to ask me!), so I can’t say I’m all that rested.  But, when I catch a spare moment or two, and the bills are paid, laundry is folded and teeth are flossed, I’ll post again!

Summer fun with weekly themes for the kids

Summer is here!  I love this time of year, but with young ones the summer can get LONG and you can run out of ways to keep those little bundles of energy busy and happy.  So, last summer we picked a theme for each week and did art, crafts, stories and little outings that went along with our weekly theme.  Our themed learning and playing worked really well last summer and we all had a good time exploring different worlds together.  Sydney stayed engaged and pretty well-behaved and she looked forward to the new adventures each week would bring.  So, I’ve planned the same sort of thing for this summer and I thought I’d share some of our plans in case there are other moms out there with young ones home looking to add a little fun and a little structure to an otherwise long and open-ended summer.

We will be exploring the following themes this summer:  under the sea, on the farm, building and construction, fantasy land, on safari, Dr. Seuss, sports, food and cooking, and nature.

We started this week with “Under the Sea” and it has been fun.  It doesn’t really take much work at all to set up a theme for the week and follow it through.  Here’s what we did this week to give you an idea of how simple it can be:

1. Did under the sea artwork (coloring, stickers, stamps)
2. Pulled out all our ocean-related books and picked up a few extra at the library for our weekly reading
3. Pulled out any ocean-related toys and puzzles and put them in a special basket for the kids to use this week
4. We did a sea creature hunt (like an egg hunt but with Pierce’s sea creature bath toys) in the back yard.  This was a big hit.  We probably did it 10 or more times over two days, taking turns hiding them and so on.  The kids really enjoyed it.
5. Sydney did some work with a few ocean-related vocabulary words.  She had three words to look up in the dictionary, use in a sentence and illustrate.
6. At the end of the week I reward the kids with a themed movie afternoon if they have had good behavior.  This week we watched “Finding Nemo” and had popcorn (thanks to a neighbor who loaned us the movie!).

So, none of this really took much time or forethought on my part, but it gave the kids something new and interesting to look forward to.  I’m keeping their art and “work” in 3-ring binders so they can see all they’ve done throughout the summer.  Other things you could do for a theme week include: printing off word searches or coloring pages from free websites, doing some themed cooking or snacks, and of course, field trips are fun.  Some of the field trips we did last year were: visiting the aviation park at RDU to watch planes take off and land, visiting the NC Zoo, and visiting the aquarium at Fort Fisher.

I didn't really spend much money to plan our summer adventures.  I did pick up some sticker books at the craft stores to go with our themes and bought one or two small items (like a new puzzle for Pierce for our construction week).  Otherwise, it's just a matter of sorting through what you already have, visiting the library and making sure you have plenty of basic craft supplies on hand.

We certainly don't spend all day on our weekly theme, but for those few hours when you are inside and need a little structure and interest, the theme is a big help.  And switching out the books, puzzles, toys and games each week makes everything seem new and interesting for the kids.

I know we have a baby coming soon, but having a little bit of a plan and some ideas for fun activities already lined up has helped me to envision a summer with less whining and hopefully happier kids.

Sydney finished kindergarten!

Sydney on her last day of school - no uniforms that day!

Sydney finished kindergarten on Thursday of last week.  She really had a great year at St. Mary Magdalene, and we are so fortunate to be able to send her to such a wonderful school.  She loved her teachers and made some good friends.  With only two classes per grade, she’ll be sure to have some familiar faces in her first grade class next year.  Sydney was so sad to have her kindergarten year come to an end.  She cried for her last day of school, and I know she’ll miss her teachers and friends this summer.  

There were so many great things about St. Mary Magdalene, but one little thing in particular illustrates the type of environment she was in this year: every morning (every single morning), Sydney’s teacher assistant Mrs. Bishop would greet her as she walked in the room by saying, “Good morning, Sydney.  You are a gift from God.”  I loved this way of starting the day.  Imagine if all children were uplifted like that on a daily basis at school.  In fact, I remember when she was in public school it used to really annoy me how she was ignored or greeted in a harsh manner by her assistant when she walked in the room.  No eye contact, no smile, not using Sydney’s name.  That really bothered me.

As for the academics, Sydney learned SO much this year!  Before starting school, she could read simple books and now she can read just about any book you hand her (and will if you let her).  She could write all the letters back in August, although her penmanship was not great and most of her letters were written upper case.  She could spell a few simple words like “I,” “love,” “was,” and so on.  I scanned two samples of her writing from this year because the difference is so amazing.  Both were written independently with no spelling help (obviously!).  The first is from her first few weeks of school back in August and the last is something she wrote this weekend.  She LOVES to write and is enthusiastically embracing the idea of keeping a daily summer journal.

Funny true story!  Translation: "It was my nap time.  I saw a spider.  It was under my bean bag.  I told my mom.  My mom she killed the spider."  Yay, for mom the superhero!

This is Sydney's journal entry about her sleep over this weekend with Aunt Zia and Uncle Thomas.  Love the liberal use of exclamations and question marks!

We are looking forward to a fun summer at home with the new baby.  I have lots of little activities planned for Sydney and Pierce and we will hit the pool as often as we can.  I think she’ll be glad to be on summer vacation and will soon forget about missing all the fun in kindergarten.  I know mommy is THRILLED not to be making school lunches any more and to have a break from the driving and paperwork involved in school!  Yay for summer break!

Pierce is turning 3!

We celebrated Pierce's birthday this weekend and embraced the fact that it was Cinco de Mayo for his party!  It was a lot of fun for him.  The party was intended to be an outdoor party, but we only enjoyed about 20 minutes of outdoor fun before some serious storms rolled in!  Oh well!  The kids were happy with their brief pool time, and then we enjoyed a Mexican dinner: pulled pork tacos, mexican cole slaw, guacamole, chips, salsa, fresh-picked strawberries, and cerveza.  Yum!

A big thank you to all the family that drove a long way to celebrate with sweet Pierce.  He was thrilled to see you all!

Happy (almost) Birthday, Pierce!

 Pierce and Sydney enjoying the pool with their new squirt bottles!

Nana and Pierce's cousin Addison.

Papa John and Pierce having fun!

Yay, we are happy to break in our new patio with a party!

Pool time.

Pierce jumping from the slide!

Pierce was so proud to blow out his three candles on his dump truck cake!

Pinata time!  So much fun!  Thanks to brave Uncle Ian for volunteering to hold it.

Scramble for the candy - even the adults were going for it!

Enjoying his loot.

Pierce had an awesome weekend.  Thanks to everyone who came!

Sydney lost a tooth!

Sydney lost her first tooth last night!  Well, "lost" is not exactly the best word to describe how it happened.  Her tooth was REALLY loose (hanging out of her mouth) after dinner.  She actually had two loose teeth, but after being hit in the mouth by Pierce (indirectly and accidentally) twice this week, one was really hanging on by a string.  So, last night after dinner (which she almost couldn't eat because of her tooth), things started to get dramatic.  After about 45 minutes of drama and crying (over the imaginary pain and the fear of the unknown, I suppose), I finally had to pull it out for her.  Her tooth was literally dangling out of her mouth after dinner, and I had to tell her that I was not going to let her go to bed with that thing hanging out of her mouth - it was a serious choking hazard!  Once I pulled it out, the tears stopped, a proud smile appeared, and she asked for her popcicle and moved on with her evening.  When she got into bed, she asked me to leave the window cracked so that the tooth fairy could get in her room, so I obliged.  She was thrilled with the dollar she got the next morning.

Easter

Wow.  I haven't posted anything on here in a month and a half.  No, I haven't been sick or disabled or anything.  The pregnancy is going well, and baby and I are doing great.  My doctor told me this week that I have a textbook pregnancy.  For that I am quite grateful.  It's been the same for all three.  I don't really know why I haven't written on my blog except that I've been busy (isn't everyone?) and also pregnant enough to not want to do anything after 9pm!

We have been on the move a lot, and also have been busy bees around the house in a frantic combination of spring cleaning and nesting!  We are currently or recently have been working on: getting the house clean inside and out, refinancing our house, selling one car, purchasing a new car (3 car seats don't fit in either of our cars!), finishing our backyard project, visiting family, working some serious over time (Brett), getting ready for baby boy, and raising two fabulous but demanding little ones!

We went to Wilmington for Easter and Hilton Head later that week.  We saw lots of family that week and got to attend baby Addison's baptism.  It was a great week.  Lots of sun, sand, ocean, and family time.  Here are a select few pictures of some of the fun we had.

Can anything top the pure joy of a child on the beach on a perfectly warm, not too hot, not too cool spring day?  I really can't think of anything...

The kids had a blast at on the beach at Hilton Head while visiting Grandma.  They could have played all day every day with no breaks.  Watching your children run wild and free on the beach with the wind whipping their hair and the sand squeezing between their toes elicits memories of your own childhood in the sun, sand and breeze; and all the joy you felt as a child comes washing back over you as you see your own children experience the same sensations.  Its another one of those unexpected joys of parenting.  Like playing Santa.  Which is almost more fun than being visited by Santa.

In Wilmington, we were so happy to participate in the baptism of my sweet niece, Addison.  My dad performed the baptism, and it was short and beautiful.  We don't have any photos (forgot the camera in a rushed packing effort!).  I'll get some from Ian and repost!

The kids had a great Easter in Wilmington - a little too much candy, but otherwise it was great!  We had several egg hunts (one with filled eggs, the others with empty eggs, and interestingly equally fun for the kids!).  Again, we had no camera, so these photos (taken with a phone) are pretty bad!  Sorry!

While in Wilmington, we got to visit with Nana and Papa John as well as Grandpa Knox and Grandma Julie.  Knox and Julie were "in town" (all the way from Australia) for their annual visit.  They had all sorts of handmade treasures for the kids and we enjoyed a fun morning on the beach with them as well.  Then, in Hilton Head, we got to see Grandma (Brett's mom).  So, in one week, the kids saw three sets of grandparents and played on three beaches!  Three times the love and three times the fun.

And baby boy is coming right along.  I have been asked three times in the last few days if I am due "any day now," which is only slightly disconcerting since I have 7 1/2 weeks left!  So, with hesitation I post a picture of me and my apparently LARGE belly. :)

Baby #3 is due on Father's Day, and Pierce was born on Mother's Day.  How about that? :)