Wednesday, July 29, 2009

The First Day of School

savannah's new styling shoes!

and so our day begins....cassandra is in 4th, savannah 2nd.

the very popular "wizards of waverly place" backpack featuring selena gomez



ditto for savannah


lookin' good! cassandra is disappointed because she decided her new shoes were "too slippy" so she had to wear old shoes for the first day. imagine the horror! savannah has on her new echo red hightops



my lil rocker girl


"ok take the flipping picture, my shoes are old"



this is griffin at 7:15 am...a time he hasn't seen willingly in 9 weeks



ok they are starting to loosen up a bit :-)


now THERE is my group!


well we ended up with a fantastic first day! the girls sprung out of bed w/ their 6:45 alarm. i went down at 7:00 am and they were dressed, teeth brushed, hair done and beds made. i was impressed to say the least! i only had to physically wake up griffin. he had a slow start but he perked up by 7:30.


i walked the kids in this morning. usually they get dropped off and shuffled to the playground to wait for their teachers to pick them up. cassandra went to her class on her own. i walked griffin to his. there was a note telling us to go to the playground so i reluctantly took him out there, saw his teacher and let him go. i went back with savannah to her class. i adore her teacher so far. he always has a smile and just so upbeat. i got her dropped off and headed back to griffin's room because i saw his class coming in from outside. he looked so little and somewhat lost. there were about 15 parents tagging along for his class. i went ahead and hugged him and told him to find his seat. he go in there and got to his table. he looked a little nervous. i remembered the girls' kinder teacher telling the sooner you leave the better so i went. i made it 1/2 way down the hall before the tears hit and i let it roll the whole way home. time goes so fast. everyone tells you when you are little how fast it goes and you don't see it because you are waiting to be older i guess. but man, the moment those kids are in your life it is like someone is hitting the fast forward button and you're scrambling to find the "pause" button so you can take a breath.


so i picked up griffin, he said he had a great day! he made 2 new friends and his table was the quietest so they got stickers. he was pretty pleased. they made cute booklets about the 1st day of school. they read "the kissing hand" and his teacher sent home a beautiful note to go along with it. very nice!


cassandra had a kick-butt day! her teacher (she had him last year too) dressed up as capt. barbossa (from pirates of the caribbean) and the whole day's theme was pirates. pirate math, pirate reading, pirate geography, pirate social studies.....she loved it! he's a fantastic teacher and i love how he gets them involved and challenges them. getting to have him again was such a blessing. he kept telling me last year he wished he could be cassandra's teacher again and since he moved up a grade he got his wish ;-)


savannah also had a great day! she has some of her best buddies in her class so that is nice! she couldn't tell me many specifics except it was great and everyone LOVED her new shoes. she had a good lunch and they stayed in at recess. it was 110 today. that is actually 7 degrees cooler than yesterday!
so that's it..we survived it! and only 179 more days to go!




Thursday, July 23, 2009

The End is Near.....

Some brain bag years ago coined the phrase "all good things must come to an end" and so here we go again with the end of summer break.

Yes, I know I am the freak who enjoys having everyone home for the summer and I am the freak who cries when they go back to school. I do love having everyone home for many reasons. I want them home for me (selfish, I know) and I want them home for each other. Despite the minor disagreements, they get along very well. They like to do things together. I love to watch them build forts in the playroom or play family or pirates. Maybe part of it is the fascination because I didn't have that as a kid. Who knows but I am sad to see it be done already. 9 weeks of summer break isn't nearly long enough!

So it's still hot as hell and we've got school supplies to get and new shoes. Oh and the ever important backpacks also. This is Griffin's first year at school. He has 1/2 day kinder. I found out from the girls' kinder teacher/Griffin's preschool teacher that his new teacher is a cowgirl with horses so hopefully that will be something Griffin feels comfortable with. Cassandra is giong into 4th and has the same teacher she had last year. He is teaching a 3rd/4th combo class. Savannah got a male teacher as well but she seems totally fine with it so that's good.

We're getting ready to enter the "birthday rush" season starting in September. I don't know what we're doing yet for Griffin's 6th bday because he is a little wishy-washy when we talk about it. So we have my dad and Griffin in September, Savannah in October, Shane and Cassandra in November.

My friend Dee is coming from Australia for another visit in early October! I guess we've rubbed off on her :-) Since it should be cooler a little ("should" being the key word here) I am hoping to get her to the Phoenix Zoo and maybe some other outdoor places. We are going to San Antonio in November the week of Cassandra's birthday. I am excited! It looks like there are a lot of things to do. Nighttime Ghost Tours, Ripley's Believe it or Not museum, Wax Museum, 6 Flags, downtown has a little mini-amusement park for kids, the Riverwalk...Then we have Disneyland for the week of Christmas. We are counting down the days to that! The plan is to take a couple of years off from going to Disneyland so we can save up for Disney World. That is going to be soooooooooooooo hard! But worth it, I'm sure.

So we're just hanging low, trying to keep cool and survive the beginning of school. I hope everyone is doing great!

xo

Thursday, July 16, 2009

More Greer Pictures

Griffin being "Griffin"

Alyssa didn't mind the C-O-L-D water at all

River Ninja Cassandra trying to attract fish with her sucker


Shane and Savannah cozy by the creek



oh ya, need I say more? Griffin decided to cool his bits in the water!


Double trouble!

my little wood sprite :-) She loved hiking
all of these pictures (except Alyssa in the hiking pic) were taken at the ponds near our cabin. they have free fly fishing, free kayak lessons, free mountain bike rentals, free telescopes, etc. they have a lot to do if you want to stay that busy!


Wednesday, July 15, 2009

We're home from Greer

this is the beautiful forest we hiked around in near Big Lake
more pretty forest

ok, maybe we're a lil intrigued with the greenery LOL




this was the hike that Shane and I took the kids plus our niece, Allison, on. It was called the Butler trail. it was about a mile or more and took us an hour. it started raining, we heard thunder and the wind in the trees. absolutely gorgeous! Alyssa loved hiking!


My little woodsey girl
Near Big Lake and rainy again
Woodland creatures :-)

Me and the 5 Dwarfs!

Ok, odd posing but they all look happy don't they?
Well I have more to add but Blogger isn't letting me add more pics so :-( I'll try to finish tomorrow!

Friday, July 10, 2009

Headed to Greer!

hello everyone!

well it's been busy around here! hot as hell too. we are supposed to reach 117 on saturday. i am not looking forward to that at all!

other than avoiding the heat by being house hermits....all is well. the kids are doing great, enjoying their lazy, carefree days :-) cassandra is sleeping in until 10 or 11 every morning so i cringe at the idea of school starting in 3 weeks, resuming a 6:45 wake up! we are going to the library weekly still, having playdates, movie marathons, building indoor forts, playing on the computer, writing stories, etc. swimming too but some days it's even too hot to do that.

so this sunday we are going to greer. we found an awesome cabin at http://www.greerlodgeaz.com/ we stayed in a "cozy" cabin last year. this year we are staying in a luxury cabin ;-) more space but more bodies too. my brother in law and sister in law are going with us. it should be fun! there is a loft with 3 queen beds and a sitting area! cassanda, savannah, griffin and my niece allison will sleep up there. they are too excited! the weather has been in the 70's up there. i see they are calling for 80's while we are there but that's still 30 degrees cooler than here. they have fishing, mountain bikes to use, telescopes, hiking, etc. we should keep busy with no problem!

shane has an update, he had his leg ultrasound on thursday. he still has the clots in his leg but they are not concerned as his coumadin levels are perfect. the best news is it appears that from his lung scan, his lungs are clear. he doesn't have the formal report from the doc but the person that did his scan said "you look all clear" which i take as great news. thank you again to everyone for your thoughts and prayers throughout all this!

well that is about it. we are going to get moving. i plan to get the suburban washed today. take care and keep cool!

Saturday, July 4, 2009

Happy 4th of July!

Happy 4th everyone!

I hope you're spending the day having fun, enjoying your family and friends :-)

keep cool, be safe and thank God for our many blessings in the USA.

xo
Susan