Busy Saturday

Today was a pretty busy day, especially for Garrett. He and daddy went kayaking this morning for a few hours and had a great time. Then this afternoon we went to a party for friend's daughter. We actually had TWO pool parties to hit, but we had to stop at one since poor Garrett was exhausted and could hardly function. He's had a busy week!

Both kids had a FABULOUS time in the pool. Summer started swimming ever so slightly on her own, so we'll definitely be working on that this fall. Garrett is a total fish in the water, he just swims wherever. He tends to be relatively cautious, while at the same time he is willing to test himself in little ways. Its wonderful, but a little frightening. Rather than explain, see the 2nd picture below.

Garrett and his bud Freddy
Summer playing on the stairs

Isabella, the cute little birthday girl.

Facelift!

I finally found the time to give the blog a much needed face lift. The last time I changed the header was . . . okay, I have no idea when. I have really neglected the blog in the past six months or so. I chalk this up to a couple of things: Summer became a toddler (versus an gooey little infant who does nothing); Garrett reached the point where he needed a lot more stimulation than I could give him, AND get work done AND maintain a blog; and I just do. NOT. Have. FREE. TIME!!!

So, I have to acknowledge that the only reason I have time to do this now is that work has been completely dead for the past week (as in, my boss has dropped off the face of the planet), and Garrett had his first week of school so that I had 3 hours a day where I didn't have to occupy my very high octane four year old.

In addition to being totally derelict in blogging in GENERAL, I have failed to really reflect the changes that our family has gone through since Summer's birth almost 2 years ago. The biggest change is yours truly. I finally got my weight and fitness in hand, and also became surprisingly money conscious. Two things that have never come naturally to me in the past. I'm hoping to reflect that more in the months to come. I've learned a lot about budgeting, healthy eating, fitness, and fun things in the kitchen in the past few years, and I'm hoping to share more of that here. Of course, pictures and fun tales of the kids will continue. And I REALLY hope to get back to blogging about the random things the kids do on a daily basis--I was so much better about that with Garrett than with Summer, and I feel to an extent that certain aspects of her first two years won't be remembered as clearly because of it. Another downside of being stretched too thin for entirely too long.

Creativity and Kindness

Sometimes its difficult to figure out if you are doing the right things with your kids. As a parent, you always second guess yourself. Garrett did 2 things today that made me very proud of him, and made me feel that given all the craziness in life, we're on the right track. Apparently Fridays are show and tell days, which no one (read = Garrett) bothered to tell me until we were HALF WAY TO SCHOOL! So he had nothing to show and tell, and there was NO WAY I was going home to get something and bringing it to him. Garrett was upset, at first. Then he found a rock in the parking lot and said "Oh, look mom! I can take this rock and tell about my rock collection". Problem solved, score one in the creativity column.

It just so happened that it was one of his teacher's birthdays tomorrow, so we had made a fruit basket to take her (she's on a weight loss journey, so I had lots of good ideas!!). When I picked Garrett up from school, I asked him where the rock was. He told me he had given it to his teacher as "another birthday present". Gotta love that. I worry about giving the kids too much and making them material . . . so that was a great thing.

Here's our week in pictures-its been a busy one!!

Garrett and Xander on the 2nd day of school (first day in their shirts!)

Summer being goofy!


Painting the bird feeder we made
Bubble fun with ava


Summer's monster face :-)And the cute non-monster face!
Driving in the produce box :-) More of that creativity, love it!!

I really hope to give the blog a makeover soon-its been neglected for too long!

Garrett's first day of VPK

Today was Garrett's first day of Pre-K. I've heard all these mommies say how they were going to cry, and how they hope their kids do well. I KNEW Garrett would be fine and love it. And I hardly wanted to cry, I've been looking forward to this for a while. The only thing that DID make me want to cry is that my neighbor offered to take him for his first day, and I made the mistake of asking him what he wanted to do. OF COURSE he picked riding with his buddy Xander. Although when he saw that this made me sad, he said "But you can pick me up, AND take me on my second day!" So this morning I took him over to their house, loaded him in, and sent him on his way.


He seemed to enjoy it, the teacher had a lot of wonderful things to say about him when I picked him up. He wasn't thrilled when I picked him up, but that was because A. He was starving (the kid is up at 6:30 and eats right away--we usually have lunch around 10:30-11.) and B. a boy named Chase had apparently been calling him by the wrong name and this offended him. He's so temperamental about certain things!

I managed to get him to talk about his day, after a little prodding. He said that during circle time, they introduced themselves and said the things they like about school. Garrett said he told them about Butterfly Co-op,how it was his old school and some of his friends went to his new school. He said that he played with trains and a kitchen and painted a picture.

The only thing that makes me wary is that he was VERY fried when he got home-he was tired and hasn't really been able to focus on anything. I'm hoping that's just because he was so hungry-planning on having him eat again at 8 from now on and/or snack in the car. The teacher offered to allow me to bring a snack for him, but I'd rather he get used to this. We'll have to see how it goes!

Walking down to the Shumans house.


Best buds!
The boys have the same shoes, it was too cute not to require a picture of its own.

Goodbye, Summer!

The season, not the girl, of course! We sent off summer in style today with a fun trip to the zoo with Leanne and Ava. We had a ton of fun, even though it was terribly hot.

I can't BELIEVE that Garrett is starting school on Monday. But I also don't think that there has ever been a mother or child so ready for school to start. It has been such a wonderful blessing to be able to keep him home with me for these past 4 years, but it has also been exhausting, and at times very trying. He is so social and outgoing, I KNOW he is going to love school. I honestly don't think tears will be shed on either side. I'm really looking forward to having some quality time with Summer and also to being able to work with only one noisy child rather than 2. Garrett even informed me that he would rather drive to school on his first day with his friend Xander, rather than have me take him. THAT made me more sad than anything else, and of course as soon as he realized it made me sad he told me "But you can pick me up and take me on my 2nd day!" Crazy boy.

Summer has really become her own little person this summer. She's finally started talking more. Some of it is still completely incoherent, but she has quite a bit to say on pretty much everything. Last night she implored Haylee to help her turn on the light switch ("Push . . . Haylee, HELP!") which is pretty funny since Haylee is just a tad too short, and lacks hands. :-)

So it is with a great deal of pleasure that I bid goodbye not only to the work week and to summer, but also the chapter of my life when both of my kids are home all day, every day. I am very blessed with the arrangement we have, but I am very much looking forward to not being spread quite so thin.

Miami's best kept secret!

This past weekend an article in the neighbors section of the Herald let us in on what I think may just be Miami-Dade's best kept secret--the Environmental Science Center at MDC Kendall. You can read the article HERE. It was completely free, and Garrett had a wonderful time checking out all the different rocks and fossils. All in all, a great way to spend an hour, free and in the A/C!

Sabertooth tiger . . .

Summer liked the chairs and the fish.

August so far in pictures.