The Little Gymnast

Isabella has been asking me for about a year if she could start gymnastics classes. Last year she had a really goofy schedule for preschool. Even though she was only there for a couple hours, it was 3 days a week, and smack in the middle of the day. I am not the type of mom who jam packs my kids in tons of activities. We need home-time with no schedule where we can just play and hang out. I made it a pretty hard rule that we would not have any other activities on school days, which left the other 2 days a week. The only gymnastics classes available on those 2 days was with a male teacher. She's a little better now, but she is not a big fan of men. (Unless they are related, of course.) I could not have gotten her to take a class with a man if my life depended on it. So, we had to wait.

This fall, I found a class at a great time in the morning, on a day off from school, and it's at a gym in an Amish town. (I have an obsession with Amish people as you may have learned from an earlier post.) And, if you're wondering, as my Dad  mockingly asked - No, Amish kids do not take gymnastics. Shockingly, there are "worldly folks" like ourselves that live and work in that town.

Isabella was so excited about gymnastics that she jumped up and down from the building all the way to our car yelling "that was awesome!!" She got to jump on a trampoline, swing from a huge rope, work on the bars, the beam and practice tumbling. There are only 3 other girls in her class, so the teacher gets to spend a lot of time on each girl. She is having so much fun and counts the days to when she gets to go back.

Great Commercial

This is by far, our family's favorite commercial. You can't help but to start dancing. The song has been our favorite for most of the summer. Even Nicholas walks around singing it. (Which I will try very hard to video, because it is hilarious.) 

First Day of Preschool

Last Tuesday was the first day of preschool. Isabella is in her 3rd year of preschool and is now considered a "big" kid at school, since she's in Pre-K. This is Nicholas' first time at preschool, and he has been looking forward to this day for a very long time. This school is very small - there is only one classroom and two teachers, so only one class goes on at a time. Nicholas is in the 3 year class and goes on Tuesdays and Thursdays for 2 hours in the morning. Isabella will go for 3 1/2 hours in the afternoon on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I won't get any time to myself while they are at school, but I'm really excited to have 2 hours with just Isabella and a couple hours with just Nicholas before he takes a nap. When I told Isabella that she and I would have some time to ourselves, she said "oh good, we are going to do only  girl things, and let's make a big stink about Nicholas while he's gone." I'm not really sure what that means, but I'm looking forward to doing just girly things.

I got to stay the entire time both days last week, so the kids don't feel so anxious with the new routine. Nicholas and I spent the entire time playing with the rescue heroes on Tuesday. He had no interest in anything else in the classroom. Thursday I got him to play with a few other toys, and at the end of class, he was mad that he couldn't play with the "guys" again. He's has been counting the days till Tuesday so he can get back to his guys.

Isabella didn't need me one bit. She walked into that school like she owned it. She played with her old friends from last year, and played with some new friends, too. She raised her hand and contributed to a discussion at "circle time". What a change from 2 years ago, and even last year. She used to be shy and meek, and would not participate in a lot of the activities. She is blossoming into a confident, outgoing kid, and I think this school and her teacher have contributed greatly to that.

Soccer

This is the second year that Shea has played soccer at the high school. Nick and I gingerly talked her into trying out last year, and she decided to go for it. When she was in kindergarten, she played on a rec league in our old neighborhood, and when she was in 3rd grade she tried out for a travel team and made it. She was on a team with a bunch of really good, and REALLY aggressive girls who constantly pushed her and told her what to do. Shea is a highly competitive kid and didn't take too kindly to not being the best anymore, and to also being yelled at by her teammates. 1 year of that business, and she hung up her cleats, swearing that she was never going to play soccer again.

When she decided to go out for the team last year, she quickly realized that she hadn't lost any of her skill in the long 5 year hiatus. She started on the JV team and played center on defense. And she was really good. Nick and I were so excited to be back in the soccer world again. It's such a fun game to watch.

This year, she really, really wanted to make the varsity team. I cautioned her that she was only a sophomore and she had only been playing for a year, but I believed that she could do it is she worked really hard and showed her coaches what she was capable of. Lo and behold, she made both the JV and the varsity teams. She starts on JV and dresses for varsity. They haven't played her yet on varsity but she is anxiously waiting. (and not so patiently).

I am really proud of this girl. She is a natural born athlete. She was born with muscular arms, and I am being totally serious. She can pick me up and throw me around like a rag doll and thinks it's wildly fun to do so. I don't know where the athleticism comes from, because it's NOT from me. I am about as coordinated as a rhinoceros. It sure is fun to watch her play, though.

I shot a series of pictures of her kicking the goal kick. She does this about 50 times in any given game. She has so much power in her legs that she can kick the ball half way down the field.

  

Okay, enough bragging for one day.

Fall Sports are in Full Swing

School Started last week, but the sports started on August 1st. That is the magic date when Ohio allows teams to start officially practicing. Don't be fooled - teams practice all summer long. They just call it conditioning, and have the seniors run the practice. But on August 1st, it's hard core practice, and the fun and frolic days of summer are over.

The week before school starts, the high school puts together an evening to introduce all the fall sports teams. Every team goes on the field and each athlete gets introduced. It's a lot of fun, and it gets the kids all hyped up for the school year to begin.

This fall, Taylor is cheerleading again for the varsity football team, and Shea is in the marching band and on the soccer team.

You can easily pick Shea out of the group. She is the only one wearing a white shirt.

Shea's boyfriend, Ben is right next to her. Isn't that cute - they both play the snare drum and get to be right next to each other during their performances.

Look at the little love birds marching off the field together!! We really like this kid. He's super nice and a lot of fun.

You may wonder why Shea is the only one wearing cut off jean shorts. I wondered the same thing. Her response - "We were all going to wear jean shorts, and they changed it to their uniform shorts, and I didn't get the text." Mmmm Hmmm, but the other 36 girls got it......This is the story of this kids life.

Camping in the Wilderness

My father in law purchased a new car a few months back and as a perk was given a tent. So, bless his heart, he gave it to us. I'm not sure that anyone other than my parents, my sister, my husband and my children know this, but I hate camping. Loathe it. This has been the case for as far back as I can remember. My parents took us camping with some family friends when I was probably 8 or 9. The family friends must not have been into camping either because they stayed in a nice cabin with running water and toilets. And beds. So every day my sister and I would play with the other kids and then at nightfall when all the scary creatures came out, the "rich" kids would go to their nice cabin and we would climb into our tent. In addition to sleeping on the hard ground in a sleeping bag, there happened to be a cemetery no far from our tent. One of the older boys from the other family told me that a dead person was going to come out of his grave and get me at night. I would lie in my bag at night while the rest of my family was sound asleep and wonder when the dead guy was coming for me.

The next camping experience I can remember was with my ex-husband and his brother and Taylor. We went to a secluded island with no inhabitants somewhere off the coast of Massachusetts. There was no camp ground, it was just us in a tent on a beach with not a soul around. Taylor was 15 months old and I was 2 or 3 months pregnant with Shea. Taylor insisted on laying right on top of me and I had to go to the bathroom every hour or so, as is common with a pregnant lady. Outhouses are the most disgusting things in the world, and I would have done something similar to the rain dance if there was an outhouse there. I wasn't afraid a dead guy was going to get me this time, but I was pretty scared that a crab or some sea creature was going to jump up and grab my rumpus. NEVER AGAIN, I vowed. NEVER!!

Here we are present day, and we are the proud new owners of a tent, and a promise from my husband to the little children that we would have a camp out in our back yard. I made it clear immediately that this was a daddy thing. Mommies don't sleep in tents. It's very very bad for our health. Isabella is a relentless child and will stop at nothing to make me feel guilty. So I gave her a "maybe" and she seemed happy with that.

Nick piled about 10 blankets on top of each other to try to make it more comfortable for me to sleep on, which I greatly appreciated. We bought a little grill and used that for our camp fire. We made S'mores and played with glow sticks until it was time for bed. I brought the dog out with us so that he wasn't inside barking all night, bugging Shea. (Shea does not enjoy camping either and opted to sleep in her own cozy bed, and Taylor was in San Diego with her Dad. If she was here, she wouldn't have slept in the tent either. See I have tainted both the oldest children.)

The kids finally fell asleep around 11:00 and I was starting to think this wasn't so bad. Gio slept at the foot of my sleeping bag like a good little laddy until 2:00. I'm not sure if he woke up growling or if I woke up on my own, but I had to go to the bathroom. (I know, it seems to be a problem with me.) So I lied in the tent thinking how ridiculous it was that I had to get my shoes on and run through the back yard to go inside to use my own bathroom and then run back out. But I did it anyway. From 2:00 to 4:00, Gio was so freaked out by all the noises that he ran around the inside of our tent barking and growling viciously. At this point, my back was starting to ache and it was very damp from the night air. Gio and I went into the house, and I was never so happy in my life to get into my pillow top bed.

This time, I mean it. NEVER, EVER, LEVER, TEVER, SEVER AGAIN!!

 

Great Book

I found a really good book at the library the other day and decided if I'm going to read something like this it had better be plenty in advance from the time that the events will be taking place. It's about a woman and her teenage daughter and the trek they take across the country to drop the daughter off at college. I must forwarn you, if you are about to embark on this adventure, the book isn't going to leave you feeling all warm and fuzzy inside. In the end it all works out, and the mother realizes that, yes, life does go on and she makes it just fine with an empty nest.

The author had so many great quotes that I just had to write them down, and will share some of them with you.

"It's been marked on the kitchen calendar for weeks - the expiration date on her childhood"

Are you kidding me??? The expiration date on her childhood?? I never thought about it that way, but so, so true. Once they leave, that's it. Hopefully, if everything goes right, they won't be back. At least not to live there full time.

".....when a child leaves for college, it is the end of something. Other than birth or death, leaving home for any reason is the most extreme of life transitions. One moment we are a family of three. The next, we've lost a vital member. It's a true loss, only people don't understand your grief. They don't send you sympathy cards or invite you to join a support group. They don't flock to comfort you. They don't come to your door bearing tuna casseroles and bottles of Cold Duck and platters of cookies on theur good chintz china. Instead, the journey to college is a rite of passage we mark as a joyous occasion, one we celebrate by buying luggage and books on how to build a fulfilling life. But really, if you ask any mother, she'll tell you that deep down, we want to mark it as a loss, a funeral of sorts. We never show our sorrow though. Our sadness stays in the shadows like something slightly shameful."

When I read that, my chest became tight. I had to talk myself down. I have a whole year. I don't even have a 2012 calendar yet, so in my world, next August doesn't even exist yet.

In this last quote, the author is talking about a woman and her toddler in a restaurant that the character has noticed.

"It's easy to recognize a little of myself in the weary, distracted mother. I used to be like her - preoccupied with matters of no importance, never seeing the secretive, invisible passage of time slip by until it was gone. Yet if someone had deigned to point this out, I would have been baffled, maybe even indignant. Disregard my child? What do you take me for?
However, when you're with a toddler who takes 45 minutes to eat a chicken nugget, the moments drag. Or when your baby has the croup at 3:00 a.m. and you're sitting in the bathroom with the steam on full blast, crying along with her because you're both so tired and miserable - those nights seem to have no end. 
From my perspective at the other end of childhood, I want to tell the young mother what I know now - that when a child is little, the days roll by at a leaden pace, blurring together. You're like a cartoon character, blithely oblivious while crossing a precarious wooden bridge, never knowing it's on fire behind you, buring away while you go. Sure, everybody says to enjoy your kids while they're little, because they'll be grown before you know it, but nobody ever really believes it. The woman at the next table simply wouldn't see the bridge, see time eatning up the moments like a fire-breathing dragon."  

I love this, because I do have the chance to do it again with the little kids. I try so hard not to take the time for granted. I know very well how fast those childhood years go by, and you're left wondering if you filled those days with enough memories to last a lifetime.

I'm so happy that I came across this book this summer rather than next. I highly recomend it to mom's who are close to this stage in life. 

First Day

Today was the first day of school for Taylor and Shea. Today is also the last first day of High School that Taylor will have. The countdown has begun to Graduation - 9 months to go.........

Isabella's BIrthday

Isabella turned 5 two weeks ago. Crazy, crazy, crazy that she is already 5. Time really needs to SLOW DOWN! I still have some of her teeny baby shoes and dresses hanging in her closet, because they were just too special to sell or give away, so I just left them there. They really need to go in a bin before I see them on Baby Alive with fake green beans crusted down the front. I just can't bring myself to put them away yet, though. I just put all the receiving blankets and crib bedding away last year and got a little sad doing so. It's horrible to say goodbye to all those baby things. She's so grown up and says all kinds of things that a 5 year old shouldn't say. Nothing inappropriate, but very teenager-ish. She calls me "Mom" more than the older kids do. (They still say Mommy.) She'll be going off to Kindergarten in a year, which will be the same time that Taylor leaves for college. I am going to need to be severely medicated to get through the 3rd week of August.

We had the family over for a party the weekend before her birthday, and for the second year in a row, were rained in, so instead of enjoying a beautiful summer day on the deck and in the yard, we were stuck in the house.

I think the highlight of the party to Isabella was that she got to feed her cousin, Natalee. She was bubbling over with excitement. And look at Natty's so, so proud big brother instructing and encouraging Isabella the whole time.

Even Nicholas got to hold Natalee for the very first time. I have been telling him no for all these weeks because I was too afraid that he might move suddenly and hurt her head or neck. I finally gave in when my sister in law assured me that he would be fine. That smile says it all. He was so happy and proud of himself, for about 60 seconds. Then he said, "Here Mommy, I'm all done." And that was that. He probably won't ask again.

I think Taylor might have the baby bug. She walked around with Natty for an hour while she slept, and then talked about how good she smelled all night. Hmmm, sounds a little like me.....

We passed this little doll around all day. Thank goodness my sister in law, Heidi, is so laid back because we sure had fun with this little cookie.

On the day of Isabella's birthday, Nick took the day off, as is his tradition, and we took the little kids to a cute place called Memphis Kiddie Park. They have only little kid rides, and every ride takes only 1 ticket. We had so much fun!

Nick and I took turns jamming our legs into this little roller coaster, and my back bone was bruised from banging into the back of the seat over every little hill and turn. This was Isabella's favorite ride at the park. Nicholas rode it once, and decided it was not for him. He's not what you would call a thrill seeker, where the rest of the 5 of us are. He doesn't like fast rides, or spinny things or even going high in the swing. We are hoping that it changes so that we can all ride the roller coasters together in a couple years.

Afterward, we came home and opened presents. Isabella has been asking for a Barbie Head that she could do hair and make-up on for months. She was so excited when she opened that box!

After presents, we went to Guido's for dinner by the birthday girl's request. When we came home, we had dessert and sang Happy Birthday.

Nice necklace, my little darling son. I didn't notice that he had it on until I was looking at the pictures later.

Taylor had just as much fun doing Barbie's hair as Isabella did.

What a perfect day. When I put her to bed that night, she thanked me and said it was the best day ever. That is what it's all about. We are so blessed to have this beautiful creature in our lives. I love you so much, Isabella Grace!

Hilton Head - 2011

I am somewhat behind on the goings-on at our house for the last month. School starts in a couple days and I still need to talk about our vacation that we took 4 weeks ago.

Since Taylor was about 5 months old, we have been going to Hilton Head, South Carolina every other year with my parents, and my sister and her family. About 4 years ago, we invited my cousin and his wife to join us, and they have been coming ever since. We rented a huge house within a short walk to the beach. Our agenda was pretty much the same thing every day. Eat, beach, pool, eat, nap, bike ride, eat, laugh, shop, eat. You get the idea. What's not to enjoy about a vacation like that? Aparently a lot when you're my teenage daughters, whose only job was to have fun and get along with everyone. They definitely failed the second task, and I'm not really sure the first one was met either....It's so hard to be my kids! You must go on vacation where you will spend none of your own hard earned money, you will stay in a mansion for an entire week where there will be every accomodation you could possibly think of at your fingertips. (Including a private elevator) You will spend your days at the beach or pool, whichever you shall choose, and you will be provided with any type food and beverage your little beating heart desires. Yes, I know, it is utter misery, which clearly bled from their pores. This is the story of my life these days. Let's all have a pity party for me. Awwww.......Poor, poor me.

Anyway, I had fun and the little kids had a blast with their cousins. The 4 little kids were inseperable, which also meant that much of their time was spent ransacking Nick's and my room, since that's where all the toys were. But man oh man, did they have fun!

The car ride down was not too bad. We drove for about 8 hours the first day and stayed overnight in Cornelius, North Carolina. Every one was pretty happy. The little kids had their movies and the big kids had their Ipods. We had tons of snacks and candy.

The drive home was horrendous. We drove the whole way in one day so that we would have all day Sunday to be home and get settled. Nicholas started whining around the 2 hour mark and didn't stop until we got home. We got stuck in a 2 1/2 hour traffic jam, saw a car completely engulfed in flames and Nicholas threw up at 10:30 at night, 3 hours from home. The memories still haunt me.

Every morning we went to the beach and the kids played in the sand and water for hours with not one complaint. They all shared their toys and got along so well.

My cousin was such a good sport and let the kids bury him in the sand. His own children tried to bury his head too, so we had to move them to the bottom of his body. We all had a great laugh at his expense though!

My cousin's daughter and Isabella could easily pass for sisters. When they both had their sunglasses on and hair in a ponytail, it was hard to tell them apart from a distance. Both also have some serious sassy pants issues.

This year, my sister brought the Wii and we brought some games and extra controllers. What a great idea! The kids had their own little living area upstairs and all the kids could hang out there and watch TV or play the Wii. The four little ones had so much fun playing Just Dance. A first for all of them.

We went out 2 nights for dinner and the rest of the evenings, we stayed home and took turns cooking a meal. We always go to our two favorite places - The Salty Dog at South Beach and Harbor Town.

I'm not sure, but if December roles around and I don't get a good picture of my children, this one might make the Christmas card cut.