"E" Day

While Jack is a preschool superstar with two green weeks in a row, our more outgoing, talkative and squirmy oldest has a bit more difficulty having good days. Especially putting together a run of them.

This week Josh had 4 "E" days! E stands for excellent. This is a really big deal for him. We wanted to make sure he knew how big a deal this was and to go above and beyond in praising him. So the boys got to have a weekend of fun.

Saturday Josh had a game in the morning, in the afternoon we headed over to Suwanee Days where they got fair food and lots of inflatable fun. Then we took them out to Panera (one of their favorites) and they got chocolate chip cookies. Sunday we took them to see their first ever 3D movie, The Lion King along with popcorn, coke and m&m's. Josh also got to rent a video game for Wii for the weekend.

Hopefully it inspires him to be extra diligent about his behavior. And if not, at least our bank account will get a break next weekend :)

7 months

Seven Months as of Thursday. I was in an accident last week so we are still trying to get back on schedule after that day of fun and now adding almost daily chiropractor visits to the schedule, so we're a bit behind again.

No doctor check ups so I'm not sure about height and weight, although I know she seems long and tiny to me. I'm also very pleased that she is FINALLY fitting into all the cute shoes we bought her before she was born. We bought her size 1 shoes, because it's practically impossible to find size 0 shoes, and the boys always had bigger feet. Well at 7 months (and thankfully when the weather is cooling down a bit) all her cute boots and flats are fitting. The girl is just petite all around. Her 3-6 month pants are a bit big on her.

Although she is in such a fun age (all be it the squirmy it's like holding a monkey phase) with her jabbering and interacting, and I cannot wait to see more of her personality come out part of me wants to keep her a tiny baby forever.

She is just so sweet. She smiles at everyone and is always happy. Even though she likes to move she will still lay her head on me and snuggle up, often times even falling asleep on me. I wish I could freeze the look she give me as well. She just looks up at me with those beautiful dark eyes with such adoration. She seems to think I'm it. Even though she adores her daddy and loves hanging with him, if I walk away she's looking around for me.

I know someday we will hit a difficult phase. Chris thinks I'm being dramatic, but I know it's just part of mother-daughter relationships. I know I'll have a door slammed on me at some point and our relationship will be strained. I'm trying to freeze the sweet look of adoration she gives me in my head for that moment. Remembering that even then when she's proclaiming her dislike for me, she needs me, and even if she won't say it, in some way she still adores me and needs me to be her mom. Someone to guide her and protect her and love her despite the yelling and moodiness.

On to the milestones.

• We have two teeth that should be busting out at any point. Come on teeth!
• We jabber. And squeal with excitement. Particularly at her three favorite boys (brothers and dad)
• She has now said "mama" and "dada" in solicited form instead of a string of jabbering. Very close to calling for us.
• She's started to get very ticklish
• We do a slight army crawl when we get desperate
• She really likes food, and is constantly trying to grab mine whenever I am holding her
• She's learned to drink from a sippy, but just the big kid kind she sees brother drinking from
• The closest she gets to throwing a fit occurs when she is put into her car seat. She just kind of whines for a minute. I think this is mainly because we practically live in the car. I kind of resent it as well.
• The girl loves cords. She loves to roll to them. Speaker cords, lamp cords, Wii cords...anything she can get to.

I think that's the gist of the new stuff. Snuggly and sweet EvaKate.

School Drama

He survived the week. Not only did he survive, he did great.

I'm learning to not put expectations or assumptions on my children. I totally thought Jack was going to have a rough week and it was going to be a traumatic transition for him. I couldn't have been more wrong. He was SO ready.

He had a green week all three days. While some families may think "yeah, of course, what else is there?" We haven't gotten to see too many of those with our oldest (whose kinesthetic learning tendencies and very strong verbal skills aren't always recognized as that by the school system), and we think those green stickers are a pretty big deal.

This has however made for some interesting dynamics between the boys. Jack always asks Josh what he got when he gets in the car, and enjoys telling Josh he got a green day and "it's not that hard, you just have to try your best." Needless to say my oldest does not take very well to having his little brother out do him, let alone telling him it's "easy."

While Jack has been doing wonderfully it's been a really hard week for me. I keep going back and forth between being upset I'm one step closer to an empty house and feeling overwhelmed wondering how the heck I'm going to survive until they are out of the house.

As much as I had hoped having Jack in preschool would make me have a ton of time, so far it's done the opposite. I have to drop Josh off at 8, come home and get Jack and myself ready, drop him off at 9:20, feed EvaKate, run any errands, or go to bible study or exercise, get myself and EvaKate fed again, pick Jack up at 1:20 come home and try to let my sleep deprived daughter get about 40 minutes of sleep before throwing her in the car to go pick up my oldest. So far my daughter is not getting enough sleep and I feel like I have less time. We'll see how the next week or so progresses, but we may have to make some changes.

We've also been really struggling with what to do about Josh. The kid is a talker. Shocking I know. He also is very smart and very active, all of which combined together doesn't thrive so well in the public school system.

Getting "E" days are a rarity, and more often we are getting notes sent home about how he's talking, reading books during social studies, not sitting still, etc. Often he'll even get in trouble for talking at lunch. Seriously? As a mom I need to support the school and it's rules and for the most part I understand them. But it's really hard when I don't feel like what Josh did was bad or wrong but simply them enforcing crowd control. There are no easy options. Homeschool isn't a perfect fix by any means and honestly is not an area where I'm very gifted in. Chris knows the downsides to homeschooling and I know the downsides to public school. And we don't even see the point in paying thousands upon thousands of dollars for our kid to go to a private school and have the same issues.

We've literally tried every disciplinary and reward tactic we know, we've talked to professionals (I love having a childhood counselor as a friend!) and taken their advice, all without much luck. The common theme: consistency and perseverance. But that is really hard, and defeating. We are doing the best we know how and trying to balance encouragement and praise in with the discipline. I feel inadequate and am having my first experience of really having to fully trust Christ with my children and their hearts. I can't make Josh obey, or want to obey. He has to want to and the Holy Spirit will have to help him.

Parenthood sure increases your prayer life!

Day In Review

He survived. I survived. My daughter is too quiet.

He did wonderfully. His teacher said he was great and she is really looking forward to having him in class.

Of course he did. He is the epitome of kindness.

We called daddy to tell him how we did. Jack said "I tried my best". He did too, he even told us he told the teacher yes ma'am.

I'm pretty sure my kid just aged a year in one day.

My heart feels worn down by all the letting go I'm having to do that I'm not ready for.

First day of Preschool

My baby boy just headed out the door for preschool. My shy, reserved (unless his brother is around) little man just walked straight into preschool like such a big boy. What a champ.

I'm so proud of him, I know it's such a big step for him, doing something on his own.

Me on the other hand, I'm a bit of a mess.

I thought after the first one leaving for school it would get easier. However each one that leaves is a reminder of how much closer I am to having an empty house and how quickly parenthood and these precious years are slipping by.

Homeschooling seems like a really good option today.

Hope he has a better day than I am!