School days, school days

The boys both started school last week, so I thought I'd share our first day pictures.  Ben is a big 4 year old now, which means he is going to pre-k/preschool five mornings a week. Abe is attending the toddler class (more like mother's day out) two mornings a week. Like most moms, I have conflicting emotions about this. Part of me is pumping my fist in the air and cheering for the ability to run errands without hassle, have rooms that stay clean for more than five minutes, and some time to finish all those projects I started before the summer! But I also miss them when they're gone, and feel so acutely how fast my little boys are growing up and how quickly my time at home with them is coming to an end. I feel especially melancholy about Ben, probably because he is attending every day.

My big boy on his first day of school. He's also starting to "style" his hair by himself. Can you tell?

This is the second day of school, which was also his day for show and tell. He brought a deer antler we found on Grandma and Granddad's land in Oklahoma.

Mr. A was in quite a mood and wouldn't stand still for a picture, so this is the best we've got.

The boys and some strange lady who's trying to hold Abe captive. Yes, I cut off my hair and stopped highlighting it for the first time in almost 15 years. I love it!

I'm proud to say that both boys have had an easy transition to the school year and are having a great time. Ben has always loved school, but I was worried because none of his friends from last year are in this class. When I asked if he felt a little sad about not having his friends with him, he just shrugged his shoulders and said "No. I'll just play with my new friends." Alright!

Abe just sauntered into his classroom on the first day and never looked back. Reports from his teachers are that he stays busy, has a fantastic time, and overall is a joy to have in class. I have to say, they have a lot of criers in Abe's class for some reason. Today when I went to get him from school the toddler class and two year old classes were waiting for parents together, and nearly EVERY SINGLE child was crying. Except Abe, who was smiling broadly and giving the teacher high fives.

It seems like our fall is shaping up to be a busy one. Joel is playing soccer on Tuesdays. Ben and I are both singing in church choir, which means practices on Wednesday nights (Ben) and Thursday nights (me). Ben is also starting a 6 week ukelele class at the end of this month, which I'm hoping will be worth the hassle:) He's been wanting to take guitar lessons for a while and I've heard that the ukelele is a good beginner "guitar" for kids. The teacher sounds like a lot of fun and the class description says they will incorporate a lot of movement plus learn a few songs. Ben is really excited and we've been watching lots of YouTube videos of kids playing the ukelele. I don't need him to master the instrument, but I would like for him to have fun. Fingers crossed!

We've got some house projects and trips planned as well. Ben is going to be the ring bearer for a good friend's wedding in Kansas at the beginning of October. The good news is that we get to make a trip to the midwest and see some good friends and family. The bad news is that we have to take Abe on a plane. I don't want to jinx it, but this is not good. At all. Trust me. If you hear reports about a flight from ATL to ICT where an extremely ill-behaved toddler ruined the trip for everyone while the parents seemed helpless and unable to control said child, please defend those parents for me, ok? If you have ever seen Abe in action then you know how challenging he can be. Sitting on my lap and reading stories, or singing songs, or playing games, or watching any video for longer than 10 minutes just isn't gonna work for us. I'm open for any suggestions on how to entertain high energy toddlers on a plane!

Oooh. wait....stream of consciousness thought...I just remembered Benadryl. Hmmm....

Hello friends!

Let's just pretend I didn't drop off the face of the earth for about 4 months, and try and pick up like nothing ever happened, ok? Since it's getting late here and I'm tired, I'm just going to post a few cute pictures of the boys without captions. These are just some small snapshots into our lives this past summer. Enjoy!

 

                                                  

Beach day and Abe dancin'

I still need to write about Ben's 4th birthday, plus a little post about Abe and all of his exploits, but posting these pictures from our recent trip to the beach is a lot easier.

 

 I heard Ben say, "Mommy, I have something for you!" I looked up expecting to see a sea shell, but instead had a dead crab in my face. I guess that's better than a live crab? My reaction scared him so much that he immediately dropped his surprise.

 

 

And just for fun, here's a little video of Abe showing us his dance moves.

Easter 2012

We didn't do anything big for Easter this year. We went to church in the morning, and and actually made it to the 8:30 service. I quickly realized that getting everyone out the door to the early service was a BIG MISTAKE once I looked at the program and saw that there is no children's church at that time. Ben is pretty good at sitting still, but not for an entire hour when TV isn't involved. He participated a little, and colored a little, and played with some stickers, and started to get really restless until I had an "aha" moment and hissed "There are donuts upstairs and you can have one after church, but ONLY if you are quiet." Yes, I know. I am an awesome parent. But it worked! Well, until the very end when we were standing a listening the choir sing The Hallelujah Chorus and Ben LOUDLY asked, "Can I have my donut now?" And then proceeded to ask several more times until church was over. But we won't count that.

Afterwards we had quiche and strawberries, and hunted for Easter eggs. This was Ben's fourth egg hunt this year, and he was totally OVER IT. Totally. Since he is such a pro at this point, he found all of the eggs in about 5 minutes flat, immediately dumped them on the patio and started tearing them apart looking for treats. The real eggs that he had had so much fun dyeing were NOT as much fun when he realized they didn't magically turn into chocolate eggs overnight. Abe found 2 eggs, and then spent the rest of the time playing.

 

  

After the egg hunt I tried to get some pictures of the boys in their Easter outfits. Even now, as I enter my fourth year of parenthood, I forget that if you want pictures of your kids in their dress clothes you'd better do it immediately. If you look closely you can see dirt stains on their pants and sweaters. In fact, right after these pictures were taken Ben decided to make a mud puddle and have he and Abe stomp in it while my back was turned. Hello Oxyclean!

 

 

 

Tomorrow there is a little boy in my house who is turning 4!! I would like to just sit and cry meditate on that fact for a while, but I still have a cake to bake and a present to wrap.  While I'm busy with that, you might be entertained by seeing what happens when I ask Joel to take a nice picture of me and the boys.

 

 

Park City 2012

It seems strange to be writing about snow and skiing while I'm wearing shorts and thinking about what plants I'm going to buy at the nursery tomorrow, but here it goes! 

We visited Mimi and Poppy in Park City at the beginning of March. We stayed a week, and had a great time relaxing and finally getting to see some snow. You can tell that Mr. B was ready for takeoff in his camo pants, and with TWO Lightening McQueen water bottles in his backpack :)

 I tried my best to corral both boys at the airport, but it was tough. And that was just the first hour of our trip! The details have gotten pretty fuzzy at this point, but I can assure you that the actual traveling portion of our trip was miserable. Not only did Abe scream, throw multiple tantrums, and refuse to sleep through both flights, but he also projectile vomited during our car ride up to Park City. This picture was taken before the madness.

But once we arrived everyone had fun! We went for a little hike on the trail behind Mimi and Poppy's house. Ben looks super serious with his walking sticks.

And Ben went to ski school for a day and LOVED it. I think he mostly loved being able to pelt the instructors with snowballs whenever he wanted. During ski school he learned how to make a pizza wedge with his skis, rode on the "magic carpet" and, um....ate chicken strips for lunch. Then the next couple of days Uncle Aaron took over the lessons.

And here's Ben chillin' on the mountain.

 

Joe, Ben, Aaron and Joel

And if you're interested, (GRANDPARENTS) here is video of Ben skiing. That little speck in the middle is Ben. Joel is on the left and Aaron is on the right. This was his last run of our vacation and I think he was starting to feel pretty comfortable on his skis. 

 

 Daddy and Abe got to do some sledding. Fun fact: Mimi bought Able some super adorable Elmo snow boots in his (correct) size. When we got to Park City we had him try them on. We must have pushed and pulled those boots in every direction but it was no use. Abe has the fattest widest feet known to toddlers.

This picture was taken a day after we arrived. You can tell that Abe was definitely feeling the effects of a cold plus traveling plus the time change.

And Joel and I got to eat dinner in a YURT! One night we took a 30 minute sleigh ride to the top of the mountain, and waiting for us was this cozy little restaurant. We had a wonderful five course meal. Since there was group seating, we were placed at a large table with 4 other couples. We met people from Texas, NYC and what a coincidence...Chapel Hill, NC! I thought that having conversations with everyone was the best part. My more reserved husband might disagree :)

Here we are during our sleigh ride. I just realized that we are looking in two different directions. What is Joel looking at?

And since I don't ski, what did I do? Well, I did some shopping at the outlet mall down the road from Joe and Cathy's house. I ran a couple of times to keep in shape for the 5K I had the weekend after we got back (more on that later.) I finally read the Hunger Games series...it was pretty good! I got to see a good friend of mine from college that I hadn't seen in about 5 years, and I spent some kid-free time with my husband. I call that a successful vacation!

Guess who just learned to ride without training wheels?

Ben has really been all about this no training wheels business ever since he got his bike from Santa. Almost immediately after Christmas he got to the point where we had raised his training wheels up as high as they could go, so he was pretty much balancing on two wheels. And then he plateaued a little bit and rode around like that for a few months. He didn't show much interest in going beyond that level so we didn't pressure him. But the other day we went for a ride down the street, and I just casually asked him if he might be ready to take off his training wheels. "No! Not until I'm a big kid." Ok. No problem. I waited a few minutes, and then said "Well, it's up to you. But I think that you are doing a really great job, and I think that you can take the wheels off any time you want. But if you want to wait that's ok." It's like something just clicked, and he immediately said "Ok, I want them off now." I think he honestly hadn't realized that he didn't have to be a big kid in order to ride on two wheels. So, we went and knocked on the door to Joel's shop/office, and he came out and took off the wheels. Then Joel got on his bike and they went for a ride together.

I'm really proud of Ben for taking this leap and not being afraid. He even wiped out a couple of times on his first ride sans training wheels, and it didn't phase him at all. I can't believe that he got a trike for his 3rd birthday last year, and now we're a week away from his 4th birthday and he's riding a bike!