A day at home

Little climber
2 little monkeys

sweet little flower girl

sweet, little tough guy

Today we stayed home and cleaned and decluttered and played and rested! I tell you, I'm not used to having to be somewhere 3 days a week. I know it doesn't seem like much, but on MWF, we get up early, eat breakfast, get dressed and take Rachel to school. On Mondays, Bradley and I have a gymnastics class that is actually quite a work-out for me! And, it's scheduled right smack in the middle of the morning, so we usually don't have time to go home before or after...we end up killing time until Rachel gets out of school. Wednesdays and Fridays, we usually come home and play or clean, but still, I'm just not quite adjusted yet. Rachel and Bradley are doing great with it and haven't complained at all about our new schedule. But, we all enjoy our day(s) at home. It's so nice to be able to lounge a little, clean a little and play a little at whatever pace we want! And, I know this is the last year for it since Rachel starts Kindergarten next year and will go EVERY day ALL day long!!! So, we had a great time today at home! The nice break in the heat was so refreshing and we had a blast outside. Bradley decided to try to climb a river birch and Rachel collected as many yellow wild flowers/weeds as she could. Fun, fun, fun!

Playdate

Raquel and Rachel
giggling as they swing "high"

The other day, after a long morning, I volunteered for Rachel's friend Raquel, to come over and play. The girls hadn't seen each other in a long time since they go to different schools and Rachel doesn't do gymnastics anymore. So, the girls had a great time playing and making a mess everywhere they went!

Crafts from School

One of my favorite things about picking Rachel up from school (aside from seeing her beautiful face and hearing her precious stories) is seeing what crafts and other info. is in her bookbag. I can hardly wait to unzip her bag and look in her folder for all the goodies. So far, she has brought home some adorable artwork. She made a cut-out picture of herself complete with a pink, flowery fabric shirt and yellow yarn for her hair and her hands. She's done a handprint with a cute poem about the first day of school, a vase with flowers and all of her family member's names on a flower and a couple of other things. But, Friday when I picked her up, she was holding a rectangular piece of orange construction paper with pink and green marshmallows glued to it. They have been working on patterns, and this was the ABAB pattern. Like, pink, green, pink, what comes next? type of pattern. Anyway, she was very proud of this craft and said not to bend it and that we couldn't eat the marshmallows because they had glue on them. She also told me a funny story about while they were making their patterns, Ms. Kim had the bag of marshmallows next to Rachel and she kept sneaking out marshmallows to eat. She said, "I try not to let her see me, but then she did and moved the bag away." I thought that was pretty funny. So, when we got home, I put the beautiful ABAB marshmallow craft on the counter. Then, I thought it might get wet or splattered, so I put it in the window in between the den and kitchen. I guess I wasn't thinking about how often Bradley stands on the couch and looks through that window. About an hour later, I saw Bradley sucking on a piece of paper and I couldn't remember where the paper had come from. I went to get it and then noticed that it was Rachel's craft and there wasn't a single marshmallow on it. There were 9 glue spots where the marshmallows had been. I grabbed the paper, but there wasn't anything else I could do. I figured the teachers had used non-toxic glue for the crafts so hopefully Bradley wouldn't get sick. (he didn't!) But, Rachel was so upset and started crying when she saw that Bradley had ruined her craft. Of course, it really wasn't Bradley's fault. He just seized the opportunity of a poorly placed craft...good job, mommy!! I tried to console Rachel and told her we would re-do the craft with new marshmallows, but ours were white. So, as we did crafts later that day, I painted some marshmallows with kid's craft paint and left them to dry on the table. We figured we would glue them in the ABAB pattern today. But, another poor plan by mommy, Bradley found them this morning and ate 6 of them. So, we gave up on the ever-tempting marshmallows and opted for colored, spiral, uncooked noodles. Rachel glued an ABAB pattern out of the green and orange noodles. She was finally satisfied that we had sort of redone her craft. And, I learned a valuable lesson: If Rachel brings home a "tasty-looking" craft, keep it WAY out of reach of Bradley!! So far, he's shown no sign of getting sick from ingesting glue or paint, so I think he's fine! Thank goodness!

1st day of Chapel

Rachel's 1st day of chapel was yesterday. It's now going to be every Wednesday at 9:30. Families are invited, so Bradley and I went. I wasn't sure how Bradley would like it, so we sat away from the students, in the back. It was so cute watching the preschoolers march in to "Father Abraham" and sit together in a big pew. Rachel spotted us and waved and then told her teacher we were there. Surprisingly, there weren't that many parents there. It was a short program...just 15 minutes long, but just the right amount for those little wigglers. The preacher of the church and the music minister led the chapel and the kids really enjoyed it. They sang: "Jesus Loves Me," "Jesus is my friend," "Jesus loves the little children" and one more that I can't think of. The music minister taught them some sign language to go with it. The preacher had a short lesson (about 2 minutes) on God's love, since this week's Bible verse is "God is Love." from 1John, but I forgot the chapter and verse! Anyway, the whole experience was sweet and fun and I was a little tearful at times, just watching the precious little kids be excited about singing songs about Jesus. Bradley behaved superbly!! He sat in my lap or walked along our empty aisle and even listened and watched what was going on from time to time. We'll probably make this part of our Wednesday morning routine. I felt very blessed to be apart of this sincere, heartfelt children's worship.

Bradley's 1st Haircut

I forgot to take a "before" picture, but here's a glimpse of his hair...

it was a thin scraggle about 2 inches long.

the new look!

who knew Bradley had such a cute neck??

I'm a big boy now!!

It's an unofficial cut, but still a cut. I have been thinking about it for a few weeks now and decided that rat-tails on any child really aren't cute. I think Bradley's a doll, and I didn't want some scraggly hair taking away from his boyish good looks. So, today I snipped the tail off the back of his hair and it looks adorable!! He didn't care that I was doing it. He sat on my bathroom counter and "brushed his teeth" with my toothbrush and I just cut away a few snips of hair. It's definitely not blended or faded or anything, but good enough for now! I love looking at the back of his little neck now. Rachel loved that I was cutting Bradley's hair and wanted me to cut hers. But, hers looks long and lovely and I'm not going to touch it!

Nappin'

snoozin'
wakin' up...don't talk to me!

still wakin' up...still don't talk to me!
(he gets his dislike for waking up honestly from both mommy and daddy!)

Naps are still negotiable around here. Some days we take 'em and some days we don't. On the days when we do, it usually is a small battle prior to the nap happening and then a small battle to wake up. Frankly, I'm not sure they're all that great! But, I try to enforce them if I think Bradley is really tired and acting cranky. Anyway, Bradley's still been doing GREAT in his bed. Lately he has decided to stockpile as many things as he can in his bed to make himself feel "safe". At first it was every dinosaur he owned...big and small. Lately, it's been all his large, metal, tonka trucks. I think he had about 15 trucks in there one day. It didn't look very comfy to me, but he seemed fine in his tiny corner, so we let him do it. I know he's still getting adjusted to the freedom of his big boy bed and feels a little less secure than he did in his crib. I'm very proud of him for doing so well, though! He usually meets whatever challenge he faces and succeeds...what a smart boy!

Labor Day Weekend

Enjoying one of her homemade cookies!
Playing with moonsand...the moldable sand that never dries out.
(pretty cool!)

Our Labor Day weekend was extremely uneventful, but very nice! We didn't "do" anything or go anywhere, but we had fun around the house. Nick got alot of projects completed and I didn't really do anything! Sometimes I'm just not in the mood to "accomplish" anything! :)

We had our dearest friends, Jen and Micah over on Saturday night. That's always fun just hanging out and chatting.

Sunday we ate lunch with Gege and Papa at Sonny's BBQ, which was good and lots of fun! Then, Bradley and I came home to take a nap (which didn't happen) and Nick took Rachel swimming with Papa. She loved it! Nick and I are kinda tired of swimming, but thankfully Papa is still enjoying it. Rachel will never get tired of swimming!

Monday, Rachel and I made chocolate chip cookies, which really didn't turn out very good. I have no idea why. We followed the diretions to the "t" and didn't overmix, I don't think. I was disappointed, but Rachel loved them! While we baked, Nick took Bradley to Home Depot for some guy time and they had a great time. The rest of the day was spent playing and doing things around the house.

I haven't taken many pictures lately, so those are a few from the past week and weekend. :)