Friday, August 28, 2015

First Day - Fourth and Second

The end of summer is a weird thing. I am fully ready to return to a normal schedule where we all go to bed at decent times and get up around 7am. The kids are ready for school again, they need to see their friends regularly and to stimulate brain cells. Heck, I want to see all of my mama school friends again. 

That said, our family struggles with change and adapting to new situations. Vera has a great class and a male teacher for the first time! She was bummed that her best friend wasn't in her class and that has dominated the year so far. Give her a month and I think she will adjust and adapt. 4th grade brings a whole new set of rules...not just education, but social. She is navigating well, but I am nervous. This is the first year that she cares what she wears and wants a say in what clothes I buy. 

Keller's situation is a first for us this year too. He is in a job share class. One teacher teaches Monday and Tuesday, another teaches Thursday and Friday. They teach every other Wednesday to share the week. I can't get much out of him...details are slow in coming. My plan is to talk with my friend whose talkative daughter is in his class. I know she is getting all of the good information. 

Had to get at least one picture of the four together. 

2nd Grade:

4th Grade:

Thursday, August 13, 2015

Mars and Nix

Meet the newest addition to our family! Mars and Nix (or Nixie)! They are a super sweet brother and sister that we adopted from Resqcats. Now, if everyone could just wish us luck that Pearl's puffy eyes are due to her cold and not an allergy, that would be much appreciated. 

We seriously can't tell if his nose is dirty or brown. I think we just have a sloppy eater on our hands.

Gus is 4!

4 is going to hold good things for our boy!!

One thing the boy wanted, a pinata!

Thank you Opa for the super cool water balloons. Coolest thing ever. A "device" attaches to the a hose and hanging off of the device are 25+ water balloons that fill, get tied off with little rubber bands, and then fall off of the device. It is ingenious! Thank you to Kate for great advice to fill the balloons in a bucket full of water, when they pop off the device they float along nicely.

Family of 6!

It takes a lot of air to blow out 4 candles.

Earlier in the day, Aunt Stephanie, Gus was uber excited about all of his money. He hasn't spent it yet, but like a true banker in the making, stacks it over and over. 

Saturday, August 1, 2015

Flower Girl 2015

This is Vera's second year as a flower girl and she was excited to get all fancy again. Flower girls attend different Santa Barbara Fiesta Events. They visit a rest home to hand out flowers, act as greeters during the Fiesta Opening Ceremony, and toss flowers during two parades. Fun to do with friends!

That moment when you realize that your child is almost as tall as they two adults on stage and they are wearing heels.

Vera and Tay-Tay. So much fun.

They were cracking themselves up.