Nathan's 1st Day of VPK

Nathan has always been our politician-in-training.  As a toddler, he would walk around the restaurant waving and blowing kisses to the strangers in booths next to us.  I can definitely see shaking hands and kissing babies in his future, so it was no surprise that he was ECSTATIC to be starting school.  St. Paul's, within walking distance, was his alma mater from last year, so going back meant he got to be big dog on the campus.

He ended up having 2 beautiful and sweet teachers that did a great job preparing him for Kindergarten.

12th Anniversary

My husband.  Also known as The Rock or The Oak or Mr. Sturdy, comes up with some off the wall stuff every now and then that will blow you away.  And for our 12th anniversary, he did just that.

You see, him and our precious little girl, came up with the bright idea of recreating our wedding.  In our kitchen.  With a bride that had 30-ish pounds more to love.  But that's neither here nor there.  I kept fixating on that, but tried to enjoy the moment for what it truly was: blessings galore and being surrounded by people who adore me and each other.

Nathan, all of 4 years old, was the official photographer.

Jim got dressed up for the re-creation.

He. Convinced. Me. To. Put. My. Wedding. Dress. On.

I'll spare you all the shots showing my backside and the 8-inch gap in the zipper being held together by a 63 ft. piece of ribbon.  Well, maybe not a FULL 63 feet.  But trust me, it was close to that.

Brandon was my escort and the ring bearer, carrying the rings on his buffalo pillow CowPapa got him in Montana.

Katherine knew where to find some spare silk flowers in my sewing cabinet for my bouquet.

The ceremony consisted of me walking through the kitchen, escorted by Brandon, while the laptop played "Here Comes the Bride" and Katherine reading a script tucked neatly away in her baptism bible.  Her script being the usual, "We are gathered here..." along with some prompts neatly written out by Daddy.

Jim even found the actual unity candle from our wedding.

And afterwards, we had a toast with sparkling, iced water in plastic cups.

 
As uncomfortable as I was to be wearing that size 4 wedding dress again (and I use the term "wearing" lightly.  "Strapping on" might be closer to reality), it was a beautiful reminder of what that day signified.  Our love for each other.  Through thick and thin.  And the beautiful family we created through all that.

Happy Anniversary Jim.  Thank you for the loving and thoughtful way you show me how much you love me.  I love you to the moon and back and thank God for you everyday.

Homeshooling retry

Jim and I made the difficult decision to not send to Katherine to Redeemer this year for 2nd grade.  It just wasn't the right fit for her and us.  After weighing our options, we decided to keep her at home this year and have me homeschool her.  Can I just be honest here?  I am so stinking excited and nervous about this venture, I just might jump out of my skin.

I attempted homeschooling Katherine for her K-4 year while I had a 2-year-old, was pregnant, leading the MOPS group of 70 women and was suffering from a horrible case of insomnia.  She was so excited for me to teach her.  Each day after Nathan laid down for his nap, she would come running to me holding one of her school books for the day and say, "Mommy, mommy, can we do school?"

She was so precious and eager and excited and willing and compliant and beautiful and I was a mess.  MOPS ended up taking up much more of my time than I expected, my multiple attempts at potty-training Nathan were destroying any relationship I could potentially have had with him and 2-3 hours of sleep each night led me to crave nap time when Nathan finally laid down.  Prime teaching time for her = opportune sleeping time for me.

I remember feeling so defeated when reality hit me.  Her desire was there.  My desire was there.  But life's circumstances didn't allow the desires to perform their intricate dance.

My feeble, yet well-intended, attempts lasted through Christmas when I was forced to face the reality that I was not in the position to school her, now.  I disappointingly admitted that my circumstances were not allowing me to be the teacher she deserved.  So we enrolled her in her former alma mater and I resumed beating myself up.  Wishing and praying I could have another chance.

Well, here it is.  A second chance.  I hope and pray it works this year.  Nathan will be in a 5 day/week K-4 class right down the road at St. Paul's and Brandon will hang with the big girls.  His personality is a little more agreeable to schooling, so I'm hoping it is a successful year for us all.

Katherine seems to be completely on board also.  I've asked her numerous times if she's going to miss her friends, her new classroom, having a different activity every day, or does she think she'll be bored here.  She faithfully replies with a resounding NO, and says, "Mom, I want you to be my teacher."

We started schooling over the summer because I ordered curriculum right after school ended.  It's been a challenge to juggle 3 personalities and 3 different educational levels, but I see progress already.  We actually have 3 other families, with 2nd grade girls, scheduled to come to our house once a week for Science, History and Art lessons.  Myself and another mom will lead the lessons.

One recent success story: Two weeks ago, I made the last-minute decision for us to go to the Butterfly Museum in Gainesville.  It ended up being the perfect trip to discuss the Intro chapter for our History book and I felt like I'd had a little pep talk with myself in addition to receiving a pat on the back.  A real life, tangible, "You can do it, Kel!"

I've also been surrounded with encouraging and uplifting comments from friends whom I respect in the education community.  Some negative ones also, but I'm learning to appreciate them.  They're just concerned with what "could" happen if not done correctly or taken seriously.  I respect their expertise and am grateful their comfort level allows them to be so honest with us.

I'm excited.  Yes, I'm really excited.  I've done hours of research on curriculum choices, made dozens of phone calls to other homeschooling moms asking "How do you do it?", have set up a system of checks and balances to help keep me and our family accountable and even converted our 4th bedroom to the school room.

I just hope and pray this year is a success and we can continue.  No, let me rephrase that: I pray for 2nd grade to be a successful year.  We'll take it year by year and for now, I'm so thankful I get this year.

A visit with the cousins

Here, Ruby and Katherine are working real hard to convince me that they were sooooo hot outside and all that was sweat.

Some sweet fort action built around the new bed.

 

Katherine got a hold of the camera and is giving us a bird's eye view of her room.

Behold, a brother is attacking the fort!

 

Nathan jumping, like usual and me washing dishes and loading the dishwasher, like usual.  I now know what my mother-in-law meant when she would talk about when her boys were young: If anybody ever needs to find my body, just come look for it in front of the washing machine or the kitchen sink.

En motion.

 

Sweet bent over shot loading that little dish washing machine.  Oh yeah, and Nathan jumping, again.

I think he's going to enjoy gymnastics also.

 

Daddy being doctored

 Pics of some good ol' fashioned doctoring performed by a toddler.

Movin' the beds around

We've known that Nathan needed to move to a twin size bed for a while now.  His little feet were hanging off the toddler bed and he ended up in our bed every night because he didn't like the feel of his bed.  "It's not soft like yours, mom."  He was lying on a crib mattress.  They're meant to prevent SIDS in infants.  Nathan is almost 5.

It was time.

The bedroom situation is going to drastically change eventually.  I'm planning on moving K to the smaller room and letting the boys share the larger room.  But for now, Nathan and Katherine are sharing the new beds we got them - bunk beds - and Brandon has moved to the toddler bed.

 

Side story: Brandon was doing wonderful in his crib.  When it was time to sleep, most of the time he would wave goodbye with his right hand and his left thumb propped half-way in his mouth and word, "Goodnight mommy, I wuv you.  Sweet dreams."  So I didn't feel the pressure to move him to the toddler bed like I did for Nathan.

I digressed.

Bunk beds are so cool.  I remember loving them myself.  We have a daughter that is content with waiting on the move into her own room for now, because of the coolness of the bunk beds.  And, to make it even cooler, she's sleeping on top.

The plan is to have the boys eventually share the bunk beds, with Nathan moving to the top and little guy moving to the bottom when he's outgrown the toddler bed.

I love changing our home's interior.  Stagnant layouts, dated decorations and old setups cause me to feel like we're stuck with what we have.  Repurposing, redesigning and reusing is my answer to not feeling stuck.  And our children have picked up on it.  Katherine has begun asking about once a week if we can re-arrange someone's room. :)

No more sweet little girl's girly room.  It's sharing with the bro for now.

Shredded paper heaven

Our lone trip to Busch Gardens without daddy must have sent my brain into convulsions because I had a terrible lapse of judgment the day after.  Either that, or I was really starting to feel the pinch of school starting and wanted to give our kids another I-can't-believe-we-got-to-do-that event.

I thought it would be a good idea to have Nathan help put the shredder paper in the recycle bin outside.  You know, chores type stuff.

I thought it would be a good idea.

Nathan didn't make it much further than about 6 inches with the can before little pieces started littering the office floor.  With many warnings from me, some pretty effective pleading from him, more you-betters and pleading that he understand me and a stellar set of puppy dog eyes, I conceded.

 

Nathan was requesting to play with the shredded paper.  I felt the intense internal battle between letting him be crazy and spontaneous and a beautiful, messy child fighting with my need for control through orderliness.

Good heavens, why can't stuff like this be easier for me?

Oh whatever!  It can always be cleaned up, right?  I'll be sure to help him and not do it for him.  It'll be a lesson in "minutes of pleasure" can sometime lead to hours of "cleaning it up."

So I ended up letting ALL of them play with the shredder paper.  They were fully aware, in their 4 and 7 year old brains, that cleaning up had to happen (with my help) after all the festivities and before they did anything else.  Like go visit their friends for supper.

I got to safely sit behind the door and take pictures.

Behold, the shredded mess my children so magically and beautifully created.

In the hair.

 

In the air.

 

Everywhere.

 

Watching them throw it at me, safely sitting behind the glass.

 

Even little guy got in on it.  His favorite nickname for me is Boppy, so here, he's slapping shredded paper on the glass saying, "Boppy!"

 

There was a good 30 minutes of pure, unadulterated, wild and crazy mess-making.  Then it was time for the real world.

It wasn't as fun getting your picture taken while cleaning up, though.

 

And some people take a little longer convincing themselves of their self-induced reality.

 

But they eventually come around.

 

They did great cleaning up.  So good they overheated the vacuum cleaner and were left to sweeping it with a broom that repulsed the little pieces scattered everywhere.  The vacuum had to sit for half an hour to cool off then they were back at it again.  Overall, the cleaning process took almost an hour, for the 30 minutes of fun.

I think they learned a lesson.

I know I did.  I'll stick with enjoying it in the dry bathtub for easier clean up next time.