Pumpkin Patch

Thursday we went to the Arboretum for the annual fall festival for the first of many trips. I love to take the photos in the pumpkins. Last year it was a challenge with a 2 month old but this year was even more of a challenge with 2 kids running around. Luckily it was not crowded. I notice that most of my pictures of Caroline are while she is walking and most of my pictures of Katherine have a cheesy smile and include her tiara (which did not match her cute fall outfit!).

Caroline looks like she is talking to the pumpkin.

Dancing in the pumpkins

The hay bale maze

With friend Eden

She always has to do her silly face.

We ran into a few friends from preschool and Sundee snapped a few cute pictures of Katherine. We wonder what she is doing in the first picture, ballet moves.

I love this one as it actually captures Katherine's real smile. I kind of wish she was not wearing her tiara but then again, that is my daughter at this phase so it perfectly captures her personality.

Cousins

Nana sent me with the assignment of getting a photo of all 4 girls. Considering we had a 5 week old, 1 year old, 2 year old and 3 year old this was a tough assignment. We have yet to capture a photo of the 3 older girls where they are all looking near the camera and smiling so adding a newborn to the mix did not have me optimistic.

Katherine wanted to hold Ally so we set them up on the couch.
Then Caroline wanted to join her big sister. 3 out of 4 is really good for us.
We then asked Sophia to join them and we started snapping away. They did not know that we were getting the coveted cousin photo.
We still don't have all 4 looking and smiling but we were close. Amazingly without planning it all of their outfits even coordinated and it wasn't just because they are girls wearing pink. They were actually in pink and blue!
And in less than 30 seconds it was over and Caroline was off.
The second attempt was planned. All of the girls were wearing matching shirts that Nana and Pops brought back from Italy. We did better than expected again. Poor Ally fell asleep in the one minute that we were taking photos.

Meeting Baby Ally

My brother and his wife, Jaime welcomed their second baby, Allyson Ellory at the end of July. We were able to go to California to meet her over Labor Day weekend. She is adorable. She has what Katherine likes to call "crazy hair". So cute!
Katherine said this is her surprised face.
I hope that Caroline and Ally, who are almost exactly a year apart, are as good of friends as Katherine and Sophia, who are also almost exactly a year apart.
I did a quick little photo shoot of the precious girl.



Jaime was trying to get a smile but Ally was just enthralled with her mommy.

Happy Birthday to Myself

Katherine loves birthdays and sings "Happy Birthday" often, even if no one is celebrating. Her newest version is "Happy Birthday to Myself". So, since this month I celebrated my birthday it seemed fitting. As the mom, your birthday is often still about the kids. We met my parents at our family's favorite Mexican food restaurant and then came back to our house.

My parents had not been to our house since we got our swing set so we spent some time in the yard. Nana even went up on the fort and came down the slide.

Katherine found a cicada shell. I love that she in not scared of bugs.

It is a family tradition to take a photo surrounded by presents. Look, you can see that I am getting a new crockpot to replace the one that broke.
Katherine picked out this frame all by herself.
Sam bought me a new fancy flash for my camera. The difference in the photo quality is amazing.

Sincere Prayer

I love hearing Katherine pray. She was shy about it for awhile but now will pray almost every night. Here is her prayer from tonight.

Dear God, Thank you for my ballet trophy. Thank you for my favorite princess. Thank you for God. Thank you for Jesus. Thank you for my parents, my baby sister and myself. Amen.

What I love is that as a 3.5 year old she is uninhibited. She does not know that most adults would consider some things silly to pray for (like princesses or ballet). But those things are her world right now. She is honest and that is what she is thankful for. At least I am glad that her family makes the list along with all of the princesses. I also love that her prayer is one of thanks, not only of asking for things. The funny thing is that when Sam or I pray with her, we do include asking for things. Somehow though, the thankfulness is what she dwells on.

I am so thankful that at a young age she is already sensitive and open to God. I pray that continues and she comes to know Him at a young age.

And, since I hate to make a post without a photo, here is a recent cute picture of Katherine talking on the phone. We can pretend she is talking to God for the sake of relevance to the post but actually she was pretending to call Nana.

Still here

I am still here. I promise I have not given up on the blog. It has just been 10 days since I posted. That is a lot for me. The main problems have been going on vacation and a computer that is just so frustrating. My computer crashed in June. I thought it was fixed but it keeps crashing. All info is now on an external hard drive but that is my blogging computer with all the photo programs that I use. So, I am now in the market for a new computer, possible a "net book".

When I get my technology back the way I want it, I do have a lot to blog about - my birthday, a trp to Sacramento and the usual cute kid stuff. I hope that I still have readers when that happens.

First Day of School

Last week was full of back to school events. It is kind of funny that for preschool I would have something every day for a week. Monday was a room parent meeting. Of course I am the room mother for Katherine's class. Tuesday was a play date for the 3 year old classes. Wednesday there was a parent meeting. Thursday I had set up a play date for the girls in our class and then Friday was a play date for the 1 year old class. Whew! It was tiring but fun to meet some of the families at our new preschool.

Tuesday was "Meet the Teacher". Sam was going to work late because he was going to come home late so he was able to go with us. That was a lot of fun. We went to Katherine's class first. She immediately went to the beads and started playing. She talked to a few of the other girls but kept pretty busy.

Next we went to Caroline's class. Here she is with her teachers. The one on the right is Melissa who lives a few doors down from us. Her son takes care of Hooligan when we go out of town. I know Caroline will have a harder adjustment so it was reassuring to already know her teacher.
Caroline played in Katherine's room but somehow knew that we had moved to her room and she cried when we tried to put her down. Eventually she started playing.
When we got home, we practiced the new skills she would need for school. This year they moved the cribs out of the Toddler 1 room to make more room. So, the kids are sleeping in nap mats on little cots that are about 6 inches off the ground. Caroline was not sure what to think about her nap mat. They also eat sitting at a regular table and regular chairs, not high chairs and not a feeding table. The table and chairs are really low but I do not envy the teachers at nap and meal time when they are trying to keep 8 kids, ages 12-18 months where they are supposed to be.
Today was the first day of school. We had to take photos for our annual tradition. Aren't they so cute? I think both girls look so grown up.


Katherine got a new backpack that has the Disney Princesses on it of course. It is small enough for her to carry but large enough for her lunch box to fit. It also has wheels so she can pull it if she wants. I really needed her to carry some of her own stuff because I will be carrying Caroline, Caroline's bag and 2 nap mats.

We talked about school and what to expect of the routine. We reviewed the kids names in her class. We said a long prayer driving to school. I was amazed and we got there on time. In fact, both classrooms still had the doors shut with the teachers getting ready.
Katherine found her nap and put her things where they belonged.
Then she walked right in like she owned the place. I guess all of our play dates and meetings last week really payed of because she did not even look back. She went right to the table and started playing.
Here is her teacher Mrs. C. She is so sweet and will be a great teacher. There is also an assistant, Mrs. G.

I was really nervous about dropping Caroline off. She typically does not like to be left at Mother's Day Out or the church nursery. Amazingly, she did fine. I handed her to Melissa and walked out of sight. I snapped one quick photo of her (blurry). I hung around a little and peeked in through the hole in the closed door and she was fine.

We had great reports for the day. They said Caroline did great. She dropped her paci at one point and they put it away. She also took a one hour nap. I was surprised but I bet she was pretty tired.

Katherine had a great day. She said she played with all of her best friends - only the girls of course. The only name she can remember on her own is Phoebe who lives in our neighborhood. She said they played with the kitchen and building things. She said they went outside and saw baby Caroline out there and they played together too. Some of the boys were playing Batman and being rough so she told them to not be rough around her baby sister. Katherine did not take a nap. I would have been shocked if she had.

Katherine loved school and can't wait to go back. She loved having girls in her class to play with. Even though we really liked where we went to school last year, I think that this will be a good move for us.