December 12 of 12

Here's my blog entry for December 12 of 12 - see Chad Darnell's blog for the specifics...after all, it was his idea!

12:15 PM - Got a late start to this month's pictures. I had gone to Trader Joe's for some groceries. I needed more of my favorite lavendar shampoo and conditioner.



12:16PM - Home with E who was talking about Santa and munching on an apple. She was a real trooper on our extended trip to a variety of stores over the course of the morning.



12:16PM - This is my latest obsession - the third book in the "Outlander" series by Diana Gabaldon. (Can you tell by the times on my photos that I was working hard to catch up after a late start?)


1:18PM - A view of our decorated Christmas Tree!



6:36PM - Bedtime stories. I was on my way out the door to run an errand and then go to a meeting so Rick was in charge of bedtime.


6:46PM - Quick stop at the craft store to get an item I needed to finish a Christmas gift that needs to get mailed out soon. Of course, as luck would have it they did not have the necessary item so I ended up having to go out today to a different store to find it!



7:16PM - The shopping trip took longer than expected (if you are a CMAD sufferer like me you know why a trip to Michael's is never as quick as it should be!). So, I arrived a bit late for the meeting at church.


9:08PM - Back from my meeting and in need...well want is probably a better term... of a little refreshment.


9:15PM - Checking on some blogs...including the one that had reminded me, earlier in the day, of the fact that it was a 12 of 12 day (Thanks, Tux!).



9:45PM - I finished the third book in the 'Outlander' series! On to the fourth (well, after I read the quick book I need to read for book club which meets this coming Monday). Yes, I'm obsessed. I've already admitted that, haven't I?


10:14 PM - Or as it reads on the wall oven clock - 22:14 - and time for me to go to bed.


10:23PM - Brushing my teeth in preparation for bed with some Christmas decorations for company.



BONUS picture with the theme "Believe"... I believe in Santa! Here's a cross-stitch piece that I did quite a few years ago that I hang up at Christmas time...it reads "Father Christmas bring your peace to every creature - man and beast."


Hope you enjoyed my December 12 of 12 - and again, be sure to check out Chad's blog for a list of other participants this month! It is fun to see slices of another person's day through this kind of picture blog!!

Sick and Tired...

I'm sick with a bit of a head cold - nothing major but enough to make me draggy and cranky.

And my 2-year-old has been on a sleep-deprivation torture campaign for quite a while now.

I'll be back when I'm more like my usual self. I won't bore you with the whiny-ass details.

Over and out.

November 12 of 12

My first 12 of 12! You might be asking "What is that?"

Good question!

Well, I'm no expert on the matter but I do know that 12 of 12 is the brainchild of Chad Darnell. Basically you take 12 pictures (and a bonus 13th, if you so choose) on the 12th of each month and then post them on your blog. Check it out here.


Jeanne's First "12 of 12"

8:04 am
My latest knitting project. Socks for R - one is completed this is sock #2. I had a few moments of quiet time and decided to knit a few rounds.



8:16 am
Rick made a pot of tea and delivered this cup to me while I was on the couch knitting.
He's my sweetie and he treats me right. :-)



11:05 am
I got a ton of vacuuming done with the help of my little shadow E (seen in the picture supervising to be sure I had done a good enough job behind the couch).



1:19 pm
Bags are packed and ready to go to the Y! The plan? Leave early enough so I could do a workout before I had to get the girls to their 4:15 swim class.



1:20pm
Just after dropping the bags by the back door I went to check on the two older girls and found them happily making a mess in their room.



2:11 pm
Obsessing on Catching up on Grey's Anatomy (Season 2: Disc 3) before we had to leave for the Y. I had never seen the show and decided to tune in a few weeks ago when I found the recent episodes online. I enjoyed it so much that I ended up renting the first...then the second...season from Netflix and it has become a very baaaaad habit. Help!



5:36 pm
A and E being big helpers and setting the table for dinner. Yeah, OK...A was being helpful and E was just climbing into her chair demanding to be pushed in and banging on the table with her silverware and insisting on having her dinner NOW!



5:37pm
Checking on the dinner Rick was making. It was a very thick, hot, yummy chicken stew which we ate with crusty bread. Sooooo good. And made even better by the mere fact that I didn't have to cook!



5:41 pm
Laundry time! I went downstairs to pull this laundry out of the dryer (and put it elsewhere to be folded later) so I could put the wet clothes in the dryer and start a new load in the washer. Laundry - the chore that keeps on giving.



5:44 pm
Visiting Iris and Sadie. While I was downstairs checking on laundry and figured I'd see how the girls were doing. They were eager for treats and crowded near the door hoping I'd throw them a few cheerios or maybe a piece of apple. How could I say no to those cute little faces? Sadie is the all white one and Iris is the black and white one.



9:44 pm
I found a few moments to work on the sock here and there throughout the day. Socks are very satisfying projects because just a short amount of time and you can make significant progress!
See?



9:50 pm
In the bathroom getting ready for bed. Notice the desperate need for a haircut. I'm going to take care of that tomorrow. Seriously.




Bonus Photo: Grateful for my man. He loves me unconditionally and he is truly my soul mate. I love him more than words can say.

Fear of Change

I know that R has a hard time with transitions and with change. It has been a source of tantrums and defiance and lots of tears and frustration. She gets anxious before the start of every school year because she knows that she will be in a new situation with new kids, new teacher and new expectations. Most mornings are rough because she becomes very tense when she has to transition from home to school. She is fine once she gets on the bus and is on her way but the tension is thick here in the morning when it comes time to get ready.

I tend to think of R as more of a tomboy than a girly-girl - although she does have an attraction to sparkly things - and I think she would tend to describe herself the same way. In fact, she recently told me that she likes J and S at school because they are "not too girly." However, she also seems to have a strong dislike of being thought of as too 'boyish' and she seems to think that long hair = girl whereas shorter hair = boy. This is her perception even though we know plenty of males here in the hippy, happy valley who wear their hair long and an equally large number of females who have hair cropped very short and 'boyish' - her teacher included. So, she is very attached to her long locks, as evidenced in her 2nd grade picture:



So, the combination of her perception of self, of boyness vs. girlness, and her difficulty with change means that haircuts are to be loathed as evil and unnecessary torture the likes of which are only rivaled by early bedtimes, having to share with ones sisters, and the foolish and utterly futile concept of "clean up time."

For the last month or so I have been having battles with R about her hair. As it is has gotten longer it has become more and more a magnet for snarls, knots and wickedly clumped 'bed head'. Any suggestion of a haircut sends her into fit of screaming and wailing about injustices if life, yet trying to get her hair brushed in the morning is likely bring on tantrums of epic proportions and ear-splitting shrieks that can be heard in the next county. After a few days of this behavior and having my patience worn to a thin line, I would argue that the only way to avoid the pain of removing the snarls would be to cut it shorter. She would heed this warning for a short while and I'd have a couple of days of reprieve from the caterwauling, but inevitably it came back once the fear of actually getting her hair cut was but a distant memory.

I finally decided to stop threatening to cut her hair yesterday and told her that today was THE DAY. I was going to put a stop to the insanity and cut her hair in the hopes of making both our lives a bit easier. She would be in a lot less pain from the daily brushing and my ears could stop rupturing every time that task was undertaken. She wailed and carried on about how she hated short hair and she even pulled out her "no friend card" which is getting pretty darn old. I have a theory about this "no friend card" thing. At first I took her complaints very seriously when the issue came up last year. She would often complain that she had no friends at school and everyone ignored her. My concern was such that I think she enjoyed the attention. The teachers have not reported the same issues from their perspective and feel that R is well-liked in school. And I have found over the last while that the complaints about "no friends" seems to coincide with R's need for attention...or love...or...something. She gets my attention with this complaint and I've begun to wonder if it is a ploy...a way to shift the subject and the attention directly onto herself. So, when she was upset at the thought of having her haircut she decided to bring up the friend issue again and told me that her friends won't like her with short hair and that even now they ignore her and won't play with her. I decided not to buy into it and cut the conversation short. I had not heard this complaint for many, many weeks and the timing just seemed to reinforce my theory (not to mention the mixed-up argument she was using whereby her friends ignored her now with long hair and would surely hate her and refuse to play with her if she had short hair). I've worked hard since the beginning of school to invite her classmates over to play so that she could get to know then in a one on one situation - it seemed to be working well and she was no longer complaining about being friendless...until she felt cornered yesterday.

After breakfast, I got her straight into the tub and washed her hair. I let her play for a bit and then told her that it was time to get out and get dressed and to meet me in the kitchen for her haircut. She was none too pleased and refused to comply at first. Then I told her that she had a choice. I could cut her hair or I could bring her to my hairdresser and he would do the dirty deed. She decided for some reason that I was the better choice. I guess it's easier to hate your own mother for 'ruining your life' - an easier target because you live with her and can spend more time making her realize how really horrible she is. Perfect fodder for future therapy sessions.

Whenever my hairdresser, David, has cut R's hair in the past she has sat calmly and demurely without uttering a single sound and let's him do his thing. I am never so lucky. I get the complains about the chair being too hard, the task at hand taking too long, and the itchy hairs that land on her face or neck. Maybe she likes the fact that she can keep herself entertained more easily when I cut her hair because she is never too shy with me to share her pain and grief. I feel so special.

After I finished cutting I made her wait until I dried it with the blow dryer before I let her take a look in the mirror. On her way to the mirror A walked by and told R how much she like it and that R looked "cute" (which was the exact wrong thing to say according to R who equates "cute" with "babies" and she certainly was not wanting to look babyish or at all younger than her 7 and 3/4 years!). R went to look in the mirror and she was pleasantly surprised by her new 'do! And I was even more pleasantly surprised that I was not going to have to deal with an epic meltdown for ruining her life and her hair. I think she was more afraid of the change that a haircut would bring than of the haircut itself. Once all was said and done and the transition from long locks was complete she could look at it on the other side and realize that the change wasn't so bad after all. In fact, she kind of liked it and decided it maybe even made her look a little bit older!

See and decide for yourself...presenting the more mature Rebecca in her new (and hopefully less tangly) 'do!

Another Milestone...

E took another step towards 'big girlhood' this weekend!

She said good-bye to her baby jail crib...




And hello to her toddler bed!



In the first picture she is standing on the toddler bed that we had set up next to the crib for a couple of nights to be sure she was willing to give the crib the old heave-ho. Indeed she was! After two nights I asked her if it was time to put the crib away and say "bye-bye" to it and she gave a resounding "YES!" and said "tib go 'way"..."bye-bye tib!"

She had a great first few nights in her new bed and the transition is going pretty well. Last night was a bit rough because she did not take a nap until late in the afternoon and it screwed up her sleep patterns. All part and parcel of the transition process (what with the newfound freedom that means she doesn't HAVE to stay in her bed at nap time...sigh...) but we are hoping for a better night tonight. I just need to try to find a way to ensure a timely nap! Wish me luck, I think I'm going to need it.

Oh, and if you know of anyone in a market for a nice, gently used crib let us know! After nearly 8 years of having babies in the house we are more than ready to say "Bye-bye crib!" for good.

In which I finally get around to sharing some pictures I've been meaning to post...

I'm obviously not participating in NaBloPoMo this year since I haven't posted a damn thing yet this month. But there are a few participants I'm rooting for this year and will be stopping by to check on them daily (just giving them fair warning....if they happen to stop by here).

I have yet to post pictures from my October girls' birthdays! Horrors! And then of course there is Halloween. I'm slacking off around here. I guess I've been a tad busy with other things - sewing for the church fair, reading The Outlander (instead of the book I'm supposed to be reading for my book club**), failing miserably at learning to crochet (OK, so I did teach myself the basic stitch but the 'square' that was supposed to 13"x13" came out as 11"x12" and I decided to just ditch that project for now...I don't need that kind of stress! I want my projects to be fun and I use them to reduce stress, thank you very much), and just generally surviving our crazy fall schedule (I'm happy to report that this was the last week for session one of swim class - I have the girls signed up to take their swim lessons on the same day at the same time for session two - Phew!).

So, without further ado, here are a few shots from October that I wanted to share...

HALLOWEEN

R dressed as Violet from The Incredibles. Her personality changes completely when she dons this costume.

A as a Barbie...gag...cheerleader. Not my choice for a costume and I made her wear a leotard underneath for warmth and modesty. She was originally going to be a pink fairy but then found this evil lovely get up and decided to spend some birthday money on it. Her personality was not a whole lot different, just notched up a bit when she put this costume on.

Little Miss E dressed as a Ladybug - but hard to tell since all she was willing to wear was a pair of wings clipped to the back of her jacket. The cheesy grin speaks volumes about her personality.

The Thrilling Threesome ready to go get CANDY!


E's 2nd Birthday!

The birthday girl - see? there's that cheese-factor going full force again.

However, since we are talking about a 2-year-old, that cheese-factor can swiftly change to Major Meltdown in mere seconds.

E has never seen a single Dora episode, but thanks to the whacked-out world of preschool marketing she can certainly recognize a Dora figure 13 aisles away. So, I figured she would appreciate a little Dora-themed family celebration this year.

Happy Birthday, E! She did a great job blowing out her candles this year...even if she did try to actually eat the wax Dora candle later. Notice the wine in the foreground - I was not to be outdone by E's earlier whine, you see. Mothers have a way of getting by. Seriously!

Sisters three.


This year - as compared to last - there was no question in E's mind about what needed to be done with the brightly wrapped packages. Riiiiippppp!!!

A's 5th Birthday!

A chose a puppy theme for her party this year. I found a dog bone cookie cutter and the gingerbread doggy bones were a big hit!

Pink being A's favorite color, the pink poodle cake was a must-have for the party!

Oh yeah, and there isn't much of it left in this shot but I also made the girls pink poodle pancakes for breakfast that morning.
At five, she is a pro at blowing out the candles...

And she certainly knows how best to rip into the brightly wrapped packages. She had a total of five friends at her party and they all had a great time. She was thrilled with all her gifts and she is already thinking ahead to next year and coming up with party-theme ideas!

OK, enough is enough. I think I've got the October celebratory pictures covered now. I'll be back soon and next time I'll try not to inundate the blogosphere with so many pictures at once!

---------------

**Update on the book club comment! I'm glad I put my book club book aside because I just received this email from a fellow book club member:

At church today several of us were discussing the difficulty in getting ahold of this book/as well as not being crazy about short stories. The suggestions we came up with was to change the book to another one of Sena Jeter Naslund about Marie Antoinette . How does the group feel about that? Is it too late to change (believe next meeting is 11/19). Reply all with your thoughts,

Inger

I had only read the first short story in the chosen book so I'm glad I didn't invest too much time in it! Now I just need to get cracking on whatever book they decide on because Inger was wrong and our next meeting is actually scheduled for next Monday (the 12th)!

Got Blood?

I donated my first bag o' blood today.

In the past, I had been excluded from donating because of my time spent in Denmark in the 80s. I was told a while ago that they had changed some of their restrictions so I checked online and realized I was no longer "blacklisted".

The last time they had a blood drive in the area I was unable to attend due to childcare issues and an evening meeting. Friday I happened to drive by the sign alerting me to a blood drive being held at my church today and figured I would do my best to get there. After dinner was finished and the girls were in the midst of their bedtime routine I left Rick in charge and headed off to church.

I have actually given blood samples on numerous occasions - a large percentage of them during my traumatic experience with an ectopic pregnancy back in 2004 - but I had never before donated a large quantity of blood. I found it was not really that much different from giving blood samples except that they ask you a bazillion questions, check your vitals (I had a respectable 13.8 for my iron test, a pulse of 60 bpm, and blood pressure of 98 over 66) and the time to actually give the blood is obviously longer. I think it took about 10 minutes to get a full bag o' blood out of me.

I felt no ill effects once all was said and done. I was required to sit at the 'snack table' with the other recent donors - some of whom were fellow church-goers - for about 15 minutes before I was allowed to leave. But it went well and now I'm no longer a blood-donation virgin! It was quick and relatively painless and it feels good to know that I've given to the community in a meaningful way. If you are an eligible blood donor and have not given blood recently I urge you to do so. Let those 'vampires' suck your blood this Halloween season. They will thank you for it and you might even walk away with a cool T-shirt like the one I got tonight!

A Weekend of Celebration!

This weekend we hosted a lovely brunch for my parents 50th wedding anniversary. The night before we had a delicious time with just my siblings, their spouses (or significant other, in one case) and my parents at one of their favorite local establishments. It was a fun and festive night and a great prelude the event on Sunday afternoon. My niece, Hilary, and her boyfriend, Anthony, babysat my girls that evening and did a fabulous job! I was nervous about how E would handle being in a somewhat strange place with babysitters that were not that familiar to her but they handled it all so well and she did great! They helped the girls decorate mini pumpkins, ate cupcakes and popcorn, and watched a movie together. I think the girls had as much fun as we did!

Sunday was the day of the big brunch and we had a total of 58 guests in attendance. I have not seen a lot of the people there in quite a while so it was nice to see them all. It was wonderful to have them all there to celebrate and honor my parents on such a momentous occasion! Everyone was very festive and happy and the day was such a bright, crisp, beautiful fall day. My sister, Diane, (my partner in crime event coordination) had put together some beautiful scrapbooks to commemorate the day and everyone had a great time looking through the pictures and signing the book. My parents renewed their vows and reaffirmed their love for one another with my oldest brother, Jim, as "officiant" and my brother, Bob, provided us with a heart-felt and comical toast.

It was special and inspiring to celebrate with my parents and realize that they have been together for fifty years! They have had their joys and their sorrows during the course of their marriage. Their love has stood the test of time and they have been through all those years together, side by side. They are an inspiration and a testament to true love and devotion.

Happy 50th Anniversary, Mom and Dad! We love you very much and hope that we created a day full of love and memories that you will cherish! Here are a few choice photos from the day of the brunch!

Mom and Dad arriving at the restaurant

The scrapbooks and photos.



The toast!



The bride and groom surrounded by Jim the officiant
(far left), and their best man and matron
of honor for the day!



Cutting the cake!

Random Blogging

Catching up on happenings in the land of Elastic Waistland. Be prepared for random thoughts, scenic detours, and general meanderings. If any of that sort of thing offends your blogger's sense of style feel free to click along to someplace more palatable.

Where to begin.

Well, the school year is off to a good start. I have my handy-dandy planner and we have all settled in with the fall schedule fairly well. I have days where it just seems like I spend all my time in the car shuttling kids between various activities and engagements with barely a moment to catch my breath, but there are also days that are more laid back and I can actually sneak a few pages of my current read before running off to the next pick-up, drop-off or errand. Alas, the house could be cleaner, the dishes sometimes sit in the sink until dinnertime, and there is still a pile of mulch in the driveway that needs to be dealt with at some point (hopefully before the snow flies!) but, all in all, life is chugging along fairly smoothly. And I'm not one to worry my little head over a layer of dust, toys strewn hither and yon, or those aforementioned dishes that sit in the sink for a while. Life is much too short.

R just started her art classes and she is enjoying the subject of "Fairies" that all the projects will be centered around. This past week they worked with real leaves as templates and colored their creations with pastel crayons. I'll post a picture when she brings home that project - she is off to a very nice start. Swim classes are going very well and she is getting much better at her standing dive. After her classes on Saturday mornings I've been trying to get in a workout at the Y. I drop her in the childcare area and head to the gym for a while before we head home in time for lunch. The two younger girls are home that morning with Rick. It's the only time I get to workout at the Y right now because the issue with little Miss Cling-E is still going strong. In fact, the last visit to the Y all I had to do to elicit screams of terror was to walk into the childcare area with her by my side. She wanted NOTHING to do with the place. She also has a screaming fit whenever we approach the showers for some unknown reason. My best guess on that one is that she is afraid she will get wet but this even happens when she is wearing a swimsuit so it might just be the noise and confusion. Good times. (not really)

A is enjoying swim classes and her weekly gymnastics as well. She recently decided she wants to be on the gymnastics team. I told her to keep working hard on her skills and maybe in a few years she'll be invited to join the team. She wasn't too pleased with that answer and we'll see how much longer she actually stays interested in the sport! For a while now she has been angling for horse-back riding lessons but I've explained that they are very expensive and that she needs to be a bit older before she can start. She has also mentioned more than once that she wants to be a horse-back rider when she grows up (although today she added the possibility of being a tie-dye maker/mom...we have a friend in mommy group who has a home-based tie-dye business). So, who knows what her plans will be tomorrow...or the day after that.

I've been spending Tuesday mornings at R's school helping out in any way I can with the classroom teacher or the librarian. This past week I spent time trying to do some copying (but the machine was getting jammed so I took the project with me and decided to get it done at the copy shop and donate the cost of the copies to the classroom) and processing library books that were headed for the shelves. I also spent time there on Friday last week helping with the hearing screenings. I served as hall monitor and kept the noise to a dull roar and ushered kids in and out as necessary. The audiologist in charge of the hearing screenings was my grad school supervisor so we got a chance to catch up on life in general and on goings-on in the department.

On Tuesdays E spends time with my in-laws and although she is otherwise super clingy and in hyper stranger anxiety mode she is more than pleased to go to grandma and grandad's house for the morning. She barely gives me a second glance, let alone a kiss goodbye, on those mornings. So, there is hope! She even allowed our neighbor (who also has a home daycare) to babysit her here at home with her sisters while Rick and I went to the 1.5 hour curriculum night at school last week. Baby steps... Some day I will get to utilize my Y membership to its fullest potential!

In other news, I'm trying to get back on the wagon and reign in my eating and increase my exercise once again. I've done pretty well with the walking regime (3.5 or so miles in the morning) but I've slacked off a lot in the high intensity cardio and the strength training sessions that I was doing last spring. So, the reduction in exercise and the increase in food intake - which seems to happen whenever I don't keep a food diary - has caused a 7# gain since early May. I started using my LifeForm program again to keep myself accountable and I even recently managed a couple of hikes to a beautiful overlook here in the southern part of our little New England town. The view from up there is so beautiful. The leaves are just beginning to turn so it was not quite the colorful spectacle that will appear in a week or two, but it is still a great place for a hike. The first hike was a solo one during the scant couple of hours I had between dropping off and picking up A from a friend's birthday party. It was a good hike for the soul to sweat it out on the way up the mountain and then relax and enjoy the views from the top in solitude. I needed that time to regroup and refresh. Last Friday, Rick and I took advantage of some gorgeous and unseasonably warm October weather and hiked the mountain again. My in-laws babysat for us and we had ourselves a very nice date night - hiking the mountain followed by dinner at a local brewery and then a movie at the small theater in town. Good times! (really!)

This past weekend was A's 5th birthday party. I plan to post some pictures of that soon. She had a dog party with a slight emphasis on pink poodles and she and her preschool friends had a very nice time together on Saturday afternoon. Next weekend we are heading to the Cape and spending some time with my family (both immediate and extended) for a big celebration and the following weekend is Miss E's 2nd birthday which will be a much smaller and more relaxed event.

That about wraps up the events of late in the E.W. and the busy life of yours truly.

Which way did she go? Which way did she go?

Things have been busy, you could say.

The last few years I have not felt the need to keep a schedule book handy at all times. I've been able to keep tabs on our schedules by sporadically writing things down on a wall calendar in the kitchen, but mainly just keeping track of who needs to be where -- and when-- in my head. I've kept the few numbers I've needed handy in my cell phone. And although I've been caught unawares by a phone call or two reminding me of a dentist appointment that I'd completely forgotten to write down when it was scheduled six months prior, on the whole been I've able to get by just fine.

Now? Not so much.

The two older girls are involved in two extracurricular activities this fall (gymnastics and swimming for A and art class and swimming for R). Not too hectic, you might say, but I am also dropping off and picking up A from preschool four days a week, doing a childcare swap on alternating Thursdays with a friend, and my in-laws are taking the girl at various times to spend some quality time with them individually. To help R with some social issues (real or imagined) that seem to be bothering her (she can be painfully shy and feels like she has no friends right now) I am also working on scheduling semi-regular play dates with a few choice classmates in the hopes of nudging along a friendship or two. And A refuses to be left in the dust - she's the social butterfly of the family with a social calendar to match!

Oh yeah, and I've decided to spend Tuesday mornings at R's school volunteering in the library and as needed in her classroom. It's a worthwhile investment of my time as I like to be aware of what is happening at school, and recent budget cuts have reduced the support in the library and classrooms to nil or almost nil. Luckily, R is still of an age where parental visits to the classroom are encouraged (by her and by her teacher). I'm sure there will come a time when mom's arrival at school will be a complete embarrassment so I'm getting my time in while I still can!

And then there are the evening meetings - preschool board meetings (not very often, but still can't forget!), book club (a monthly "me time" that I hate to miss), school events like curriculum night and the welcome back picnic that happened last night (the kids had a ball!), helping with fund raisers like bake sales, and so on and so forth.

To add to the mix, there is also church, choir practice for the girls, teaching Sunday school (luckily I just have to show up and teach - the lesson is all organized and prepared for me ahead of time), and a host of fall birthday parties on the horizon (including the party planning and prep for my two October girls).

A couple of weeks ago I started to feel the weight of the scheduling nightmare -- and a bit old and addled at the thought of trying to keep everyone's schedule straight in my head -- so, I went out and found a nearly perfect planner. If I could tweak its contents a bit I would, but it serves me well enough and it is certainly helping to keep me sane (relative term indeed...it is keeping me from jumping off the cliffs of insanity anyway). I also purchased a new bag ("Hi. My name is Jeanne and I'm a bag-aholic.") which has a handy outside pocket into which my bright and shiny new planner fits perfectly! (Thank you, mom, for the birthday money that financed the new bag purchase!). The bag also has end pockets with mesh bottoms that are perfect for a bottle or sippy cup of milk or water for the wee lassie as well as what should be my ever-present bottle of H2O (working on that daily goal). And the main compartment is big enough for my wallet, a diaper or two, a travel wipes container, and I bet I could even fit my latest book in there in a pinch if it is paperback and not too thick.

So, armed with my life in a book and a bag (and all neatly labeled with a few different colored pens and highlighters), I'm as prepared as I am ever going to be for the crazies of the season! If you are the praying type, just pray that I don't lose my portable brain planner or I'll be sunk!

Tagged yet again...

Tag : Three Things About Me
This is another simple tag "3 things about me".

Three things that scare me
1. The thought of losing a loved one
2. Driving in Boston
3. Snakes

Three people who make me laugh
1. Karyn
2. Suzanne
3. Sharon

Three things I love
1. Family
2. Sleep
3. A good book

Three things I hate
1. Mean people
2. Fake people
3. Being ignored

Three things I don't understand
1. Algebra
2. Drinking to the point of vomiting
3. Keeping up with the Joneses

Three things on my desk
1. Camera
2. Cordless phone
3. Unpaid bills

Three things I am doing right now
1. Answering these questions
2. Fretting
3. Listening to 10,000 Maniacs (and the sounds of a couple of maniacs who are supposed to be cleaning the playroom)

Three things I want to do before I die
1. Travel more
2. Enjoy grandmotherhood
3. Celebrate my Golden Wedding Anniversary

Three things I can do
1. Speak Danish
2. Lots of crafts - knitting, sewing, cross-stitch, hardanger...
3. Bake

Three things I can’t do
1. Pee standing up
2. Drive a tractor
3. Wink with my right eye

Three things I think you should listen to
1. Music that makes you feel happy
2. People who support you
3. The sounds of nature

Three things you should never listen to
1. VERY LOUD music - you'll damage your hearing (consider that a public service announcement from your friendly SLP)
2. Obnoxious people (drunk or not)
3. Whining children

Three shows I watched as a kid
1. Little House on the Prairie
2. Mighty Mouse
3. Creature Double Feature

Three people I tag
1. Consider
2. Yourself
3. Tagged

First Day of School, Part II

A's first day back at preschool was yesterday. She's been a bit difficult to live with over the course of the last week as she was chomping at the bit to get back into the swing of things. She was very jealous that R got to start school so much earlier than she did (and of course, as things usually go with sibling rivalry, R was upset that summer had to end so much sooner for her than for A...).

With her first day of school outfit already decided upon she got dressed right after waking up and was eager to get going as soon as R had one foot on the bus. I made sure the camera batteries were charged last night and that her backpack was by the door. Once R was safely off to school I loaded A and E into the car and we headed off to school. Before we left the driveway, however, A reminded me that she had not yet picked flowers! Heavens to Betsey! I ran inside and grabbed scissors and she happily found the perfect one for each of her beloved teachers.

Once at school, with backpack flung on her back and flowers in hand she headed to the little red brick schoolhouse. She was greeted at the door by one of her teachers and after finding her new cubby space she settled right down to the business of playing.

There are only a handful of kids who are returning from last year (the rest are off to Kindergarten this year), but some of the "new" kids were still familiar faces. Many of the new students are actually siblings of kids who attended preschool with R so we know the families well even if A doesn't! One new student, however, is a great friend of A's who we have been having playdates with frequently over the last few years. A was so happy to finally welcome N to preschool this year and N was pleased as punch to finally be old enough to attend with A!

Yesterday was only 1/2 the class in attendance - the other 1/2 of the kids will have their first day of school today and then the whole class will come together on Monday for the first time. Since A and N were both off from school today we arranged a playdate and the girls are right now playing happily in the playroom. I need to get going and make them some lunch and then it's naptime for little Miss E.

I have a meme that I need to fill out since I've been tagged. I'll try and get to it at some point today!