Bubble Run and Bad Teeth.

Tomorrow is Halloween, so in the usual case of brilliant planning, the kids had Monday off for a teacher inservice. Why they don't schedule it for November 1 is beyond me, but last year they had actual Halloween off, based on how the week fell.

I made the most of our random holiday Monday by scheduling the kids dental check ups. Poor Ellie had once again grown a set of shark teeth. She already had her front middle bottom ones pulled back in May, and then the two teeth on either side of the middle had also grown up through her gumline without pushing the baby teeth out. That however, turned out to be the least of our problems, as due to bad luck, Ellie's teeth have awful, weak enamel. The dentist said her teeth are almost chalky, and showed us how one of her six year molars has already experienced a significant break. The poor little thing needs teeth pulled, her palate expanded, and is going to eventually end up with crowns on a number of her teeth. I guess the upside to living in Orange County is no one will bat an eye if we get her ridiculous chicklet teeth veneers for her 12th birthday (KIDDING.) So the dentist filled the chip to fix her tooth and pulled the two baby teeth. Ellie happily took another snootful of laughing gas and pronounced it the best dental visit ever! If she's going to end up with a lot of dental work, at least may she be happy during the procedure. One of the baby teeth was clearly never going to come out on its own - the root was three times the length of the tooth! The poor kitten was numb across her entire lower jaw when all was said and done, so we went and got a milkshake for lunch and stopped by Grizz and Gigi's to eat. I poured it into a bowl and got a spoon for her (no straws when you have teeth pulled) and asked her if I could make her a bib, since her face was numb. She initially said no, then said "wait, a bib like Grandpa Howie? Okay." At one point Grizz wiped her numb chin for her, and assured her he'd done the same for Grandpa back in the day. I also thought of Grandpa Howie as I ransacked my house in search of gold dollars for the tooth fairy to deliver (the tooth fairy left the stash in a bag in my glove box. OBVIOUSLY.)

Adam meanwhile, no cavities, no problems. His teeth are great even despite his thumb sucking (which has lessened significantly since we began leaving banishing Lamby to our house during the day since kinder started. Sometimes we will bring him in the car, and he's allowed to go with Adam to his grandparents, but I no longer make sure to have Lamby in my purse every time I walk out the door.) He got to eat a burger and fries, actually said he didn't want a shake!

This morning was the kids' jogathon at school. They've been hyping it for weeks and Adam in particular has been driven insane by the prospect of winning prizes and running the most laps. He has been asking me every day if I texted people to tell them (since the kids get crabby prizes if you send out emails on their behalf, even if no one donates) and also told me looks forward to winning the grand prize of the iPhone X. He was very dismayed when I said we don't need one, and even if I won it, I'd give it back to the school.

The kids ran at the same time, which was nice because I got to cheer them both on. Ellie's class raised the most money and sent out the most emails/texts (their class sent over 1,000, of which I sent 5, way to go other parents!) Her teacher also got to do a money grab thing at the end in one of those booths where they put in a bunch of bills and turn on a fan and all the kids that wanted to ran in superhero costumes. BEHOLD:

SUPER ELLIE!

SUPER FAST ADAM

Thank you to all of our family who donated - the kids will also get a bunch of additional garbage prizes for having met certain goals. The best part by far has been Adam winning a sequined snake, which he named Saver and carries around a la Britney Spears wearing a snake at the MTV music awards back in the day.

He's a slaaaaave, for you. Not gonna to deny it, he's not trying to hide it. On the plus side though, Saver is better quality than the bucket of slime I already hid and then threw away, and the two squishy balls that he squeezed to death within three days of receiving them.

My favorite donor is Uncle Jake, who thought the kids were running quarter mile laps and pledged $3 and $4 per lap per kid accordingly. I emailed him and called him a big spender, and let him know that Ellie ran 29 laps last year, so if she repeats that times three bucks a lap, he may be the lead donor in the family! Good thing he also appreciates running, so it enables him to support many people and activities he loves.

Ellie had her final soccer game this past Saturday. She said she loved it and would play again next fall, which is funny to me, as she was most often seen strolling slowly through the back field during games. Definitely not willing to run full out or go steal the ball and make a play, but willing to be on the field, that kid. We had a little picnic with the team afterwards, and it was a nice way to celebrate a good group of girls and coaches and a great season. They all had a blast and I can't argue with that, though I'm glad to be spending less time sitting on the sidelines!

Birthday And More.

I know, I know, I am the worst. Things have been fairly routine, which is always a little nutty. A couple hours of soccer a week, gymnastics, birthday parties, piano lessons, home work, school projects, plus trying to eat and sleep and read Harry Potter.

The kids are mostly having a good school year. There are some wild children who make Ellie's class a little unruly, and nothing bothers her like being punished because the rest of the class was acting up. Adam meanwhile, will get frustrated when something is anything other than totally easy for him (see: scissors work) and the other day I got a report that he'd crawled under a desk and refused to talk to the parent volunteer while they were trying to cut out squares and make a little math hat. So we've had discussions about doing our best, thinking of school work as exercise practice to make our brains stronger (like soccer practice!) and trying to go with the flow. But, they are kind friends, smart kids, and we'll help them deal with being perfectionists.

Soccer continues to be funny. Ellie is all out in practice, strolls casually during the game and might kick the ball if it comes her way, ready to do a cartwheel whenever. Adam is all out in practice (though sometimes all out crying) and then puts about half power into the game. Either way, they're both having a good time and like their teams - Adam in particular has a lot of kinder classmates from school on his team.

Still, not amused.

They could be twins!

On Tuesdays when Adam is at piano, if Auntie Sara isn't at our house, Ellie and I go and get a coffee and a cookie and do her homework.

Lots of good mathing ahoy.

On Friday she officially turned eight, which seems unbelievable. It's also interesting to me because this is the first year where it doesn't feel like a total seismic shift. A one year old is totally different than a newborn. A three year old is a different creature than their two year old self. But while yes, she's grown and matured a lot over the year, it's not as though she's completely unrecognizable compared to when she turned seven.

Though, now going strong on her fourth year of cowboy boots as her main pair of shoes.

At eight, she still loves math, but is getting to be a better reader. She still loves Nerdy Nummies and baking, and while she doesn't seem on fire for soccer, she LOVES gymnastics and busting out her moves where ever possible. Everything else is Harry Potter all the time - she's a few pages away from finding out that Dumbledore dies, and I dread the tears to come. She's delightfully exuberant and radiates attitude and sass, which has it's minuses when you're her mom and have to deal with the back sass, but I love her strength and hope she takes it forward with her forever.

For her birthday, we had a fun day at school, followed by the usual running around between gymnastics and soccer. Mimi and Poppy came to watch her play, and we made cookies for the team. Then back to our house for pizza and a lemon cake that she decorated with Harry Potter symbols (she wanted me to frost Hermoine's face onto the cake, but I steered her away from that.) Lexi and Judd came too, adding to the fun of family birthday party.

We also had a real great dance party.

For her friend party, she wanted to go to the indoor gym to pretend to be the American Ninja Warrior. I personally find the place to be a suburban hellscape, so I decided we could go with a couple of kids for 90 minutes, but we'd do dinner and the party back at our house. We've been having a really fun time this year with a bunch of her second grade girlfriends who live in the neighborhood and also have a younger sibling (two in Adam's kindergarten class!) I mean, isn't that the suburban dream, a bunch of great kids the same age as your kids who live within walking distance and also have fun parents? Truly, they are very sweet girls, and I love how funny they are hanging out for a little bit on the play ground after school pick up (while us moms catch up about how the day is going, what's new at school, etc.)

Our friends Julian and Felix came as well - we love them and wish they weren't moving out of state in a month. Please also enjoy crabby Adam refusing to sit with the girls, but still in the picture.

(plus in the back ground, our favorite kid, Auntie Sara.)

Tim was able to leave the party 15 minutes early and pick up catering from the Mexican place we love, and so when the tired and wild animals arrived at home, we were ready to feed them all. I invited all of the parents and siblings to come back to the party at our house. We ate, we drank, we had Costco cake and ice cream, and then ended with another dance party.

Conga Line!

I know this is super blurry, but I love the disco colors, and the little boys as monkeys in the middle.

Tomorrow Ellie is star student for her class, and she got to take the pet (stuffed animal) crocodile home for the weekend and will return the journal with updates of their activities. She also got to spend last weekend having a special time with Mimi and Poppy, going up to the American Girl Store for their wonderful traditional lunch and shopping for Bitty and Sammy. She's a lucky bunny to have such great friends and family to love on her, and I'm the luckiest that I get to be her mom.

Worm Time.

Right now the kids, especially Adam, are obsessed with this online game called Slither IO. You're a worm, you're trying to kill other worms and then eat their sparkly guts. When Adam really gets into it, he likes to have his jams going as well.

Sometimes Ellie, Tim and Adam will all play and then collude with each other to take out other worms. They did it on Sunday and at one point it got so loud that I got my coffee, got my cat, and escaped to my room, where I turned the music up real loud to drown out the music and the yelling. Tim is living his best life.

Some Things Never Change.

Some Sweet Soccer Mom Action.

When I signed the kids up for their first round of "real" soccer, I did not expect that it could be upwards of six hours a week between practices and games, but here we are. I am now someone with a folding chair in my car so I can sit on various sidelines. The pluses are that the kids have their practices and games at the same field every time, so me and my lousy sense of direction only have to make it to two locations a week, and each soccer field is next to a park, so one kid can play while their sibling practices. Game days, Tim and I divide and conquer, and Mimi and Poppy have been trying to make it to both games.

The other, biggest plus, is that the kids are having a blast. Adam loves that his "best fwiend" Nico is on his team, and while he spends a lot of his practice time just ding-donging around the field, he's got some decent focus on game day. In his age group they break each team in half and they play on a half field, so that it's not all eight kids trying to kick each other in the shins at once. Ellie's team has slightly more skill and focus, though on Fridays she comes to practice from gymnastics, so some of her focus is broken by her desire to do front and back walkovers on the field, and she's distracted by the sheer exhaustion of it all (this Friday night she went to bed crying, and then we heard her crying at 7am because of an aquabead emergency - we had hoped she'd sleep at least an hour longer!) They have good, encouraging coaches and they're having a blast, even sweating to death.

Hopefully their beautiful, smiling faces give you the full picture of how nice and sunny and warm it is out on the pitch, yikes!

Settling in to School Times

Week three (is it three?) of the school year and we seem to be getting into a good routine, between the early mornings, the various pick ups, soccer practices and piano lessons. By that I mean, things are busy but good. Eight years later it has finally come to pass that the children have activities that prevent us from lounging around Gigi and Grizz's house every afternoon, eating their granola bars and using up their art supplies.

Ellie had back to school night last night - her teacher seems great, and I loved this "Taco Bout Me" work sheet they did.

As you can see, her hobbies are drawing, gardening and baking, like a middle aged lady, and please enjoy the suck up move about her amazing teacher.

Adam also brought home a nice work sheet. Please enjoy that he wrote his first name on the top half of the space provided, and his last name underneath, going backwards. I'm pretty sure he knows garbage truck doesn't begin with A, but I also suspect it's the only thing he can draw.

Walking to school has been a nice way to start the mornings, except for when Adam doesn't listen to me about not running down hill and ends up with a case of road rash. When I pick him up from school, Ellie's class is just walking over to the picnic tables for lunch, so the kids get to see each other for a brief minute, which they cherish, as though they had been separated for years.

Coming up next year, they'll be on the same play ground schedule and she'll pretend she doesn't even KNOW him.

Back to School.

Look at how cute this little knuckleheads are, in their matching outfits! Ellie was so excited that they could wear the same shirt, and go to the same school. Adam was so excited that his friend Nico from the YMCA Kidzone was at his school and in his kindergarten class that he walked into the room without even turning back to say goodbye to me. Which is better than having him physically pulled off of me, as has sometimes happened in preschool.

Ellie has a few good buddies in her class. Her former "boyfriend" Preston (of the "we're going to get married, we don't care HOW LONG we have to wait!" fame) is now just a friend to her allegedly, but I have seen them do a lot of strolling the play ground together before and after school. Her teacher suggested she do more reading by herself, so even though Tim and I have said all summer she should start rereading Harry Potter book one on her own, she didn't start until Monday afternoon when the teacher told her. Adam is happy to head into class and happy to see me at the end - I'm sure he's being his usual social butterfly self - I just hope he's sitting his bottom down and using his listening ears. The bigger transition for him is not napping anymore (though he did lay down for an hour today after getting up early this morning) and not being able to take Lamby with him - we are trying to transition to Lamby being a friend who only stays inside of our house

Also this week, we started AYSO soccer practice, which is quite a step up from them ding-donging around the turf at the Y with a variety of kids. This is divided by gender and ages, so Ellie won't get the chance to beat some four year old like a drum on the pitch. Thus far, the coaches are really nice, and the schedule is okay-ish. Ellie has two practices a week, including one one Friday about an hour after gymnastics, so I look forward to seeing if she's able to stay awake through dinner.

As you can see, Adam is running outside the boundaries of the field. Was not able to get a picture of him with the siglet over his head like Cornholio. Good news, BEST FWIEND NICO is also on his soccer team.

For me, the three hours between drop off and pick up are going too fast, especially since mom and dad are out of town and I'm in charge of getting Sara to work. But the good news is that since Adam is an early bird, I don't have to miss out on my favorite work out classes at the Y, but before I work out, I have coffee and cat time in my quiet, empty house.