The Linda Family

We’ve been talking about it for months, finally settled on a school 2 months ago, planned to start her May 1 and yet here we are in late June.  It’s finally time.  All of our ducks are in a row and Ashleigh is officially a student in the Rain Forest Cottage at the Young School.  She’ll be attending school 2 days a week, Tuesday & Thursday.  We can drop her off any time after 7 AM and pick her up any time before 6 PM.  If she gets there before 8 (NOT likely) they have a “breakfast club” so the kids can enjoy breakfast together.

Her day will most likely start at 9 AM most days.  During the summer session her group will be doing water play from 9:30 – 10:30, so she will get plenty of outdoor time!  She is even excited about her “nap time” at school!  They do naps from 1 – 3, but if the kids are up at 1:30 they go to another activity, so they are not forced to lay there for 2 hours if they don’t sleep.

I’ve spent the past week getting everything ready for her to go to school.  She needed 2 extra outfits to keep in her backpack at school, 2 bathing suits, 2 beach towels, a lunch box, water shoes, and bedding for her cot.  We finally found water shoes last night on our trip out to find Sunbutter so I can make her a sunbutter and jelly sandwich for lunch.  I tried making a cream cheese and jelly sandwich, which is a trick I learned from other moms with kids in schools where all nut products are off limits, but Wes told her it was strange, so while she liked it at first, she decided it was yucky when Daddy told her it was weird.

Ashleigh woke up bright and early this morning to get ready for school.  She had her new bunny cereal, got dressed in her bathing suit, let Daddy put her sun screen on her, put on her clothes over her bathing suit, and let me put her hair in a pony tail.  I even surprised her with a Princess Lunch box, despite the fact that I still think it’s ugly.  It does hold more food than the other one I had found…

I had a knot in the pit of my stomach the whole way to school, but she did great.  We met her teacher, Ms. Crystal, and chose her activity station for the day.  This week’s theme is Camping & Fishing, and she chose the Arts & Crafts activity station.  Some other options were construction, dramatic play, & Science.  She came home with 4 cool crafts.  Two paintings, a pair of toilet paper roll binoculars, and a fish on a fishing pole.  She is thinking about which activity station she wants to do on Thursday.

She had a blast at school, she did make a friend, but she can’t remember the girl’s name.  She said she couldn’t sleep during nap time because it was too noisy, and she didn’t want to get really wet in the sprinkler, so she just got her hands wet.  What a kid.  We do have a few cute photos, and I’m hoping to get a first day of school recap video from her, but there wasn’t time.

We asked her this morning what she wanted to have for dinner to celebrate her first day of school.  She said she wanted Rita’s.  When we pryed for food to eat BEFORE Rita’s she decided she wanted mac & cheese, so instead of going out, I went to the food store for some cows milk on the way to get her so that I could make her some mac & cheese.  After I picked her up, we went to get Wes, came home and made dinner, and headed to Rita’s.  Came home and played a quick game of Mario Kart and off to bed she went.

I’ll get some pictures up tomorrow.  Hopefully a video from her as well.  I didn’t want to keep everyone waiting!

This morning I grabbed my phone to get a photo of Bekah staring at the picture Ashleigh drew on the easel before she left for Grandma and Grandpa’s, but by the time I got to her she was turning around to see me. She had a blast chatting and jumping up and down, so I got some video…

Bekah,

This month has been so much fun!  You are a real little person now, with real emotions.  You love to laugh at your sister and the world around you.  You also freak out and cry when you are scared.  I now know, you do NOT like being tossed in the air.  Your big sister loved to “fly”.  You?  Notsomuch.  I get it.  We’ll try again another day and see if you change your mind.

This month you have become more entertainable.  You love to sit at your toys and watch the lights and balls go.  You are even enjoying time in the Exersaucer.  The Bumbo seat is still used all the time, and the swing and bouncer are being used less and less.  You do an awesome job of sitting in my lap, and you are even learning to sit all by yourself!  Today you sat for quite a few seconds before loosing your balance and leaning to the side.  What a big girl!  You finally decided TODAY that rolling from your tummy to your back might be an ok thing to do.  Up until today you would roll side to side and spin in circles, but that dreaded rolling from your tummy to your back eluded you.  I finally decided that you would probably figure out how to roll from your tummy to your back before you got married and I didn’t need to be concerned, and all of a sudden you bust out the new skill.  Way to make Mamma sweat it out a bit…

As far as your sizing goes, the scale here says you weight 16lbs.  I haven’t gotten out the measuring tape to see how tall you are.  I know you are growing, but you are still quite capable of fitting in 0-3 month clothes.  You can wear 3-6 months too, but a lot of it is still really baggy.  I’m a little surprised by your clothing size considering you are bigger than your sister was, I expected you to be in 3-6 months clothes by now, if not 6-9.  Your size 0 diapers still fit, but they’re not designed for a kid as big as you, so we’ve got a few new diapers on order to see what we like to replace those newborn diapers with!

This week you have found your toes.  You LOVE to suck and chew on those toes.  It’s become a common occurance to find you laying down sucking your toes.  SO adorable!  You also learned how to grab things and pull them to your mouth.  If people don’t believe how strong you are, we let them hold you.  And then have them offer you their finger to hold.  It is usually a split second before you have grabbed that finger and shoved it in your mouth.  You even grabbed my Chick-fil-a cup and tried to lick the condensation off the outside.  If it’s not tied down, it is in your mouth.  Speaking of your mouth….

You love to make noises.  If you are not talking you are blowing raspberries.  Your mouth is NEVER quiet.  I think you come by that honestly, and at this point, it’s still cute.  Well, cute when it’s not in the middle of a wedding.  Just sayin’… That tongue!  It is ALWAYS doing something.   One day someone is going to grab it, and you are NOT going to like it.  Just so you’re warned. 

This month you also celebrated your first Mother’s Day, and my first Mother’s Day with more than 1 kid.  I had a blast taking some really cute photos of you and your sister.  I just haven’t gotten them edited yet.  I need to work on that.

We took our first long walk last weekend.  You slept in the sling through much of it, but Ashleigh did pick you some flowers and she checked on you a few times.  Daddy even carried you on his shoulders for the last 1/8 of a mile.  You spend the first 2 7/8 miles in the sling.  It may have been hot, but you were still happy and cozy!

I captured a video of you and your sister today.  She was playing princess and you were loving it.  You love any attention, but you really love it when your sister plays with you.  I love hearing the laughter from the two of you together.  I hope that you two contine to enjoy playing together.  You are very lucky to have a big sister who loves you so much!  I’m so excited to see the two of you interacting and I hope that this video is just one of many to come!

I love you little girl, and I can’t wait to see what the next month has in store for us.  You’re only 1 month from being half a year old.  That scares me a bit, I’m not sure how that happened SO fast, but we’re loving watching you grow!

Love,

Mommy