Changes

Well, our oldest is officially an elementary school student.  Despite having to wake up much earlier than usual the past four days, she's still very excited and raring to go each day.  I'm sure once the excitement wears off she's going to be very tired (I am) but so far she's handling it like a champ. She's already making friends and getting stickers for good behavior. Ezra also started a new class but at the same preschool.  He is doing great in Ms. Katherine's class.  Ms. Katherine has 30 years of experience with two year olds and Ez is already super comfortable.  Having his best friend Jamey there helps and so does feeding his new class pet, GG the guinea pig.

 

I'll admit that these changes have been a lot harder on me than they have been on her.  Even though we chose the school she's attending because we loved it, public school is a big adjustment. We've spent over 3 years at a tiny co-op preschool that truly is a community.  We know the parents, kids and teachers very well.  We pick the kids up whenever we want. We stop by school whenever we want (i.e. every 3 hours when I was pumping).  It's next door to my office.  I spend 4 hours each week co-oping and know the dynamics between my kids and their classmates very well.  There are just a handful of kids in each class, plus a full time teacher, a parent helper and sometimes a part time college student teacher.  Now we've got a class of 22 kindergartners and a teacher who seems friendly enough but who has done very little communicating thus far.  Even though Eliza is having a great time, I'm not used to not really knowing what her day is like.  I'm used to calling up Ms. Madelynn (the preschool director) and her answering her phone immediately and having the answer to my question without even having to go ask a teacher.  So, adjusting will take some time, at least on my end.  In the meantime, take a look at these cuties. :)

 

 

Flying L

I totally meant to post this about a week ago, complete with lots of cute pics of the kids on horses, etc. but the pics are not on my phone and the post just didn't happen.  So, we capped off summer with our annual trip to Flying L Ranch.  This was our 3rd year.  It was our first year with just the four of us, usually it's a company sponsored trip but we went to a different ranch for that this year.  Eliza talks about Flying L all year so when we found out the company retreat wasn't there this year, we knew we wanted to go as a family instead.  I actually liked it better this way!  It was much more relaxing!  Eliza was super excited to see Mr. Buck, the guy at the ranch who leads the wagon rides, sings and plays guitar around the campfire during s'mores each night, etc.  I pulled Mr. Buck aside and told him that Eliza thought the two of them were super close so he went right up to her and said, "Eliza! Good to see you!" and she thought that was way cool.  Both kids got to ride the ponies this year (Brownie and Jelly Bean) and both kids were very into the water park.  Since we didn't have to go to the fancy company dinner on Saturday night, we got to go to "Ghost Town" and see a sheep dog in action, live music, face painting, archery and some pretty cool rope tricks. On the way home we stopped at Firehouse Subs and the kids traded in their cowboy hats for fire fighter hats instead. 

Take a chance, Zombie!

In the car on the way to school this morning, that song, "Honey I'm still free; take a chance on me!" came on the radio.  Eliza said it was weird there was a song about zombies (Dylan talks about zombies constantly).  I asked her why she thought it was about zombies.  "Because, Mom, it keeps saying 'take a chance, Zombie!'"  After I listened again, I realized she was totally right.  And now I'll probably never hear the song with its original lyrics. :)