No point in playing catch-up now

I bought a new camera last week and I've been playing with it a lot to figure out all its tricks. My kids are so annoyed with me and the constant picture-taking. I figure if I just keep it up long enough I'll eventually blend into their scenery. Here are some of my favorite shots from last week.

Making some big plans

Busting a move in his latest get-up, and ignore the laundry in the background. Our dryer was recently fixed and I had a ton of laundry to catch up on.

He was trying to explain evaporation to Will. He had to run inside to get a reference book. I love my little smarty pants.

Ahoy!

Polly Pocket was in distress. We were all a little worried.

Boys and cars.

serious art

So instead of junking up your facebook feed, I'm just going to brag about my kids here, where you can choose whether or not to stop by and see all the wonderful things my genius children are up to.

So the kids went back to school. . .

I just realized that while I was wiping up my own tears and snot over back to school, I never got around to sharing the boy's back to school fun. Here is a brief run-down:

 Luke started school a week before Will. He was really nervous to go to school with a dog bite on his nose (ouch!) because he didn't want anyone to ask about it. We practiced some responses and sent him on his way. We drove him there but he was going to ride the bus home.

 

When it was time for the bus to drop off, I dutifully went to the bus stop and waited, and waited, and waited. Finally, my cell phone rang and it was the principal of Luke's school. Apparently Luke was refusing to ride the bus because it did not have seat belts. He IS our HSO (House Safety Officer) so I would expect nothing less from the boy. I hop in the car to go pick him up and get the full story. I guess what happened is that he got on the bus and got in his seat and started looking for the seat belt. It seems that he started crying or stressing looking for it and the bus driver tried to explain to him that buses don't have seat belts. This surely sent him into tears at which point the bus driver alerted the school teacher monitoring the bus line. She couldn't convince him either so she got him off the bus and took him to the principal. The principal didn't have any luck convincing him either so that is when the phone call happened.  We talked about it and once he was reassured that it was safe and not against the rules to ride the bus without a seat belt he seemed okay with it. I'm not sure if he was more concerned for his safety or the fact that I would be upset if he was not wearing a seat belt. The next morning he climbed aboard the bus and hasn't looked back. I actually had to pick him up the other day because I was up at the school for a PTA meeting and he got mad that he didn't get to ride it home. So to that three year-old Luke who told me "When I am five I will go to Kindergarten and ride the bus without you," I say--"We did it kiddo!"

 

 

 

As for the youngster (sorry for the old fashioned word. Luke found it in a book and is a little fixated with it right now.) I never know what I am going to get with him. I mean, really, what two year-old is predictable? So I took his picture on meet the teacher day AND on the first day of school, hoping for a good one. He's fairly cooperative so I got cute ones both days.

 

Meet the teacher day, in an outfit he chose:

 

And on the first day:

 

Will with his best buddy.
These two are like peas in a pod and were so happy to see each other before class. They are just as excited to see each other every single day as they were on the first. It is really cute.

 

Kid talk

Luke: Mommy, when you and daddy got married, were you best friends?
Me: Yeah.

How I Handled the First Day of Kindergarten

Luke made some very profound statements on the morning of his third birthday. He was sitting in bed and said three things to me that have stuck with me for years. One of these was "When I am five I will go to Kindergarten and I will ride the bus without you." Well that day is here. Even though I had five and a half years to prepare for it, I still don't think I was ready.

We have been prepping for Kindergarten for a while now. Pre-K last year talked about it everyday--about going to school five days a week, homework, independence, etc. We talked about it all summer. We went clothes shopping and organized school supplies. We went shopping for things to put in his lunch box.  I started having flashbacks of Luke's first week of life. . .

Five and a half years ago my sweet Luke was born. They told me he had a broken clavicle. I didn't cry. They told me he was breathing funny. I called them idiots and I didn't cry. He didn't latch on to eat for days. I was frustrated but I didn't cry.  I gave him a bottle and he was eating so fast he forgot to breathe and turned blue. I scolded him, told him he would get himself in trouble acting like that. I didn't cry. When the pediatrician called me at home to tell me his bilirubin was too high and he needed to be admitted to the intensive care unit immediately, I started crying. The flood gates had finally opened. I had been sitting in the nursery rocker, trying to coax Luke to eat when the phone rang. After the pediatrician said "26" the tears started coming and there were no more words. Gene came in and took the phone out of my hands, reassured the doctor we were on our way, and started gathering our things. I just cried. We put Luke in the car seat and I sat in the back next to him and cried. It was raining like a monsoon and the roads were flooded.  I remember not being able to even see where we were going. Gene was trying to be calm and strong and I was falling apart. I cried at the hospital when they took our information and walked us up to the NICU. I handed him over to the nurse and stepped back out of her way. When they shot his chest x-ray the nurse held his arms up over his head and a sob caught in my throat hearing the way he screamed when they manipulated that broken collar bone. Another nurse, trying to be kind, put her hand on my shoulder and said, "its okay honey. It's just an x-ray. It doesn't hurt him." I wanted to slap her because she didn't know MY baby and it DID hurt him. I cried off and on for days. We would go home from the hospital and I would start planning when to go back. It was still raining. Our street was flooded. We tried to go to him and had to turn around because the water in the road was too high. So I would cry.

That is how I felt the weekend before the first day of Kindergarten. Crying off an on over anything. We had some stressful events happen at meet the teacher night and I thought to myself "this is why people homeschool."

Over the weekend, our dog nipped at Luke. He is partially blind and completely high strung and he got spooked. It was the third time he has nipped to draw blood, but we weren't hanging around for a fourth. On Monday, he moved in with my parents. We've had him since he was a puppy and since before we were married. He is a good dog, a faithful dog. I miss him.

I took Luke to school Monday morning and walked him to his class. When the teacher dismissed the parents I gave him a hug and a kiss and left before he saw my tears. I didn't go to the kiss and cry breakfast because that would only make things worse. I went home. Will was at Grammy's house. The house was so quiet. No children, no dog, and I didn't have anything scheduled to do. I ended up aimlessly driving around town. I went to stores where I didn't need anything and didn't buy anything. I would go to two or three stores and then come home. The quiet would get to me again so I would find another few stores to go to. I think I came home and left at least three times that day.

I will address Luke's experience of Kindergarten in the next post, this one is about me.

I guess I am having Kindergarten grief. I am done with the constant crying and have moved on to anger and jealousy.  This week without him has seemed so terribly long. Even with Will around, we both look at each other and think about Luke. I am starting to think, "Why do they get him for so many hours? They get him FORTY hours a week! EIGHT hours a day! I only see him awake for FOUR hours a day. This is unfair. He's MY baby. This is why people homeschool." I miss him so much. I didn't expect this feeling. If it weren't for Will, I might just stand at the bus stop all day waiting for him to come home. He won't even let me make his lunch anymore--he has bought cafeteria every day.

On the flip side--Will and I are having fun with one-on-one time. He is so sweet and giggly, it is what gets me through my day.

I know that in another week or so I won't feel this way about Luke going off to school. It was an emotion that took me unexpectedly. I thought I was SOOO ready for school to start. Going from the three day week to the five day week makes for a long week. Bottom line though, Luke is having the time of his life. He loves it. He smiles when he gets on the bus and smiles when he gets off the bus. Oh, the bus. . . that's for the next post.

And the party. . .

This was the biggest birthday party we have ever given Luke either of our kids, yet surprisingly it required the least amount of preparation and was probably one of the smoothest. We have always had parties either at our home or at a local park because that is what he wanted. This year he wanted a roller skating party. I was down with that except that there was only one rink he wanted it at and it was not in our city. It required driving through a ridiculous construction zone freeway. The last party we went to there we were met with a line wrapped halfway around the building just to get in. But it was awesome because he got out there and did that roller skating thing all by himself.

We got on the computer one night and looked around the internet for fun places to party that were local and easy to access. We chose a place called Leapin' Lizards which was awesome. It had 8 or 9 inflatable play things, a big playground/climbing/slide thing and the party packages included absolutely everything from napkins to party favors. We had a party bouncer that was amazing. He took one look at the party and then knew who belonged and who didn't. Luke kept calling him his coach, as in, "Where is my coach? I need a drink of water." I just can't rave enough about this place and I would recommend it to anyone. When you consider all the things included, the price was reasonable to me--what we would have spent on birthday decor, plates, food, favors.

Will jumping with the big kids

 Will was in absolute heaven. He talked about that yellow castle for days, literally. The kid never stops jumping around on dry, flat, solid land. Putting him in a bounce house was like sending him back to his home planet.

Group shot with Izzy(?) the lizard.

I did my best attempt at a spiderman cake.  Thank you for action figures.

A cute bunch of kiddos.

 This picture below was one of the best features of the party. The kid-mob riot that happens at present-opening time drives me bananas. They had this giant inflatable chair that they plopped Luke in for presents and it totally gave me the space I needed. I didn't get a good shot of it though because I was standing to the back/side.

 When we got home, this is the first present he ripped from the package.

Look out. This kid is five and he means business.

And just for fun. . .

4 years old

Three years old

Two years old

One year old

Minutes old

Luke turns 5!!

So I haven't posted in nearly three months, but I have a really good excuse this time.  I've been posting over on my new project www.lizspinspiration.blogspot.com and keeping myself really busy with that. But now that its up and running I am going to try to work on this one a bit. And of course I can't miss a birthday! First things first--the birthday photo shoot, which I did myself and I am surprisingly pleased with! I kinda wish I had some photo editing software to polish it up a little.

This is Luke's favorite shot. I told him he looked like a cranky pirate so he loved it even more. Boys.

Feeling alive at five!!

Gosh, with a kid that cute how could the pictures turn out awful?

Best of Fall

I think I crashed Blogger three times trying to upload all these pictures.

Since I was a big fat slacker and didn't post much this fall I thought I'd just lump 'em all together here in a greatest hits post. Otherwise, I'd never get around to posting about everything I want to share.

Fall school pictures:

 I love the hand-on-hand action in this one. They are going to love it when they are older. The photographer was probably just trying to pin Will down.

Peek-a-boo! The cutest bug I've ever found behind the blinds!

 Getting silly for Halloween

 Darth Vader had some work to catch up on before trick-or-treating.

My sweet little penguin and darth vader before the trick-or-treating begins. Will loved Halloween this year--except for wearing a piece of costume on his head--but loved everything else. The candy, the kids, going door-to-door. We weren't sure he would last long with the walking, but he proved us wrong (as always) and lasted as long as Luke.

 I guess he could have been a pirate but the costume looks a little painful. Gotta be tough to be a pirate.

 Will & I feeling green.

Cute little indian all ready for a Thanksgiving feast!

Thanksgiving we continued our annual tradition of doing the Fort Worth Turkey Trot. The weather was beautiful and all the hats and jackets had been shed by the end. Will was much happier this year--he cried the entire 5k last year. We declared this year the last for Luke to participate in the stroller. Against his will he will be walking it on his own two feet next year. When you add the boys weight and the weight of the stroller it is nearly 100 lbs. This summer we walked to the park a lot and I started having low back pain from it. Training starts Jan 1 for Luke. He's not pleased.

A big grin before he found out he is walking it next year.

We headed over to Grammy & Pops for Thanksgiving lunch. My cousin Sarah took some sweet pictures of the boys while we were there.

A moment of sweet brother-ness. Sitting close watching Toy Story. I assure you it was only a moment.

Luke striking a rock star pose before heading out to school one morning. Must have been a good day!