Legible

Some belated first day of school pictures. As I mentioned in an earlier post, all of my photos are on our dead computer. As soon as we get a new one up and running I should have them back. Luckily I sent a bunch of recent photos out to my family via email and was able to retrieve these there. I've also included a note that Talia wrote the other day when she answered the phone (which is a miracle in and of itself). It says, "Dear Mommy and Daddy. Cory kld! He wtid to tok to you." So cute.

What a difference 9 months can make...

My almost first grader! Talia has grown up so much this year. Well, in most ways...! Today is a very special day for her class. Not only is it the last day of school, it is also her teacher's last day. Everyone seemed to be weepy-- especially the teacher-- when I dropped her off. I'm so proud of Talia and all her accomplishments this year. The skill I was most excited for her to acquire was learning to read and she totally did. I love reading with her each night and watching her brain work it all out. Congratulations Talia!

My first laptop lunch

I've made a few laptop lunches for the kids this week but their lunches are rather boring and certainly not worth sharing! This one is for Ron. All he wants is for me to make him lunch every day and I refuse. It's that last thing that makes me feel like housewife (you're standing right next to me-- make your own lunch!). Now that I'm making Talia lunch everyday and Alex lunch three times a week I'm trying to be a little more prepared. Plus I often made lunches in the morning but obviously I have to do it at night now. With all of this going on, I decided to make Ron a lunch last night.

I bought these laptop lunchboxes online and they are super cute. Besides helping reduce waste by providing easy-to-clean reusable containers and real silverware, they also force you to rethink portion control and focus on healthy eating. I stumbled upon a laptop lunch flickr group and was stunned at the effort people put into their lunches. I could look at those pictures for hours!

So, as I said, I finally gave in and decided to make Ron's lunch for today. The conditions were right-- we had the right amount of leftovers, the house was all cleaned up and the kids were at the park. I have to say it took me way longer than it should have but it was kind of fun. There isn't, in my opinion, room enough in the laptop lunch for a real adult size main course so I added an extra tupperware. I filled that with leftover spinach mozzarella ravioli with herbs, parmesan and slightly cooked cherry tomatoes from my garden. Israeli salad with feta and zataar filled one big container and pita crisps and purple carrots filled the other. Hummus went into a small container and homemade zucchini bread went into the last one. Only one of the larger containers has a lid, which is kind of weird. I had to cover the hummus with tin foil. The outer plastic container of the laptop lunchbox fits snugly to the tops of the containers but I wouldn't trust it with wet ingredients. I threw a cloth napkin in with the silverware. A balanced, healthy meal with portion control and almost nothing to throw away.

When I have made Ron lunch in the past he complained that I gave him too much food. I used to work 12 hour nursing shifts where I really looked forward to my 20 minute lunch. I used to bring lots of little snacks to sneak in during the day for energy. I think that's why I would give Ron lots of different things. In this case, I gave him lots of things but the portions are soooo small (that's three small carrots!) that I think he'll eat it all. Now he'll complain that I don't make him lunch every day. He'll say, "You did it once so now I know you can do it again!"

First Day of Kindergarten!

I was definitely stressed about getting the kids up, clean, fed and all of us out the door. I guess I'm going to get a lot of practice. Talia has a "staggered start" meaning she only goes Tues and Thurs this week and then starts full time after Labor Day. I think that's good for us! Today I'm still going to wake her up but at 7:30 instead of 7. Mostly just so she will go to bed early. Interestingly enough it was Alex who was melting down yesterday morning. A fly was in the kitchen and he was in tears! He was so offended-- it landed on his placemat! He really doesn't like bugs-- I wonder who he gets that from?! (me!)

I couldn't predict if Talia was going to come home from Kindergarten happy or crying. The first thing she said was "I love Kindergarten!" so we'll see how it goes tomorrow!

Alex's first week of school

So my baby goes to school now. After two years of dropping off and picking up his sissy at school it was finally his turn. The first morning went well. He seemed to understand that I was going to actually drop him off and leave. He went right in and played with the cars. I said goodbye and told him I was leaving and he nodded and I left. Easy. I called at about 1pm to check on him and they said he was doing great. After his nap, however, he woke up hysterical and cried, with heaving, for a long long time. I picked him up and he was desperate to get out of there.

The next day he cried and cried at drop off and they called an hour later saying he was totally fine and having a great day. He woke up from his nap and cried but wasn't as bad as the previous day.

The third day of school he started crying at breakfast and cried in the car. It was heart wrenching. I had to pry him off of me. They called after 10 minutes and said he was doing great. He woke up from his nap in the afternoon and was even better than the first two days.

All this weekend every time we got in the car he would say "No school!" He started crying when he saw pictures of himself at school on the computer and also when we passed the road that would take him to school. At least he's smart...

So, we're giving it some more time. He's only 2 so he certainly doesn't have to go school right now. He loves playing with other children and to tell you the truth-- I really need a break! 24/7 parenting with no break is not healthy for anyone. We rarely have babysitters here and the truth is that those three days he was in school I barely left the house. The things I want to do are at HOME. I unpacked from our last trip and got some things done from my summer list (like weeding out the kids' clothing drawers- finally!) and transitioning our mudroom from winter (there were still hats and scarves in there!) to summer. I took a little time for myself and got a much enjoyed pedicure. I weeded the garden; I went to a store BY MYSELF! I made a bunch of "business calls" that had been on my list forever-- like updating our credit card for our newspaper and Tivo service.

This deal is good for all of us because when my children were home this weekend I actually sat and read library books to them. Not just one book, but many books. For an hour at least. Just me sitting on the couch and them tucked in beside me. I played a game with Talia. I went outside with them and didn't spend every moment wishing I could go back inside and finish up whatever needed to be done.

I did consider sending Alex to school for mornings only; maybe that would be better for him. In my research I determined that once Kindergarten starts for Talia there would be no way to pick him up from school and give him a good nap before I would have to wake him up to get his sister from school. I guess I could have put him in mornings for the summer but Talia is there full days so it wouldn't make sense. Besides-- full day now or full day in three months doesn't seem to make much of a difference.

When T started school in Philadelphia she had the same issue-- crying with separation. It killed me but I stuck with it. In Philly, once you got a spot in daycare you TOOK that spot or got pushed to the bottom of the list so it was an easier decision. Talia *still* gives me crap about going to school so I guess that's just my family. I'll keep you all posted...

Happy Valentine's Day!

I felt really rushed to get Talia's valentines done for school. I wanted to have Talia help me with everything but there just wasn't time after our vacation. Plus, there wasn't really any moment I had with just Talia and not Alex, who would not have done well with a big package of birdseed or the oven. I baked up little heart shaped birdseed feeders using the recipe from Family Fun magazine (3/4 c birdseed, 2 tbl flour, 2 tbl water mixed and pressed into cookie cutters or muffin tins and baked at 175 degrees for an hour. Insert a straw for the hole and leave it in during baking). I found these cute bird valentines online and printed them. Talia is still working on signing each one-- she can only do about 8 before going bonkers. There are 22 kids in the class plus 3 teachers. I packaged them up into ziploc bags that have hearts printed on them. They are quite cute but were definitely a pain in the ass to make. Plus I'm afraid the kids will think they are cookies or granola bars. I'm sure someone will try to eat them.

100 days of school

Of course, considering that Talia only goes to school 3 days a week it's really the 70th day of school, minus about 10 days of vacation and sickness so it's really the 60th day of school but... who's counting? And seriously, why do we need a "holiday" that falls *literally* the day before the Valentine's Day party? To celebrate this wonderful holiday the children are asked to bring in 100 of something. In order to represent who Talia is we thought maybe 100 crayons or markers or stickers. To make it a little more creative and waste more of my time we decided to make 100 heart crayons, reminiscent of our valentines from last year. Talia was able to help more this time around-- she was an expert at getting the papers off the crayons that had been soaked in water. This project took too much of my time, as usual, but the payoff is nice. I'm sure her class will enjoy using them for a long time. On a side note, I had to count them about 8 times to make sure I have exactly 100. I'm still not sure I have exactly 100. And if I couldn't count them, how are the kids going to count them?

What we've been missing

What a nice weekend! We seemed to have the perfect balance of work (completely organized the garage, did a bunch of laundry, gardening, kept the house mostly clean, cooked some meals) and play (a birthday party, family bike ride, outing to the Terrace with friends, new friends over for fun in the kiddie pool). Great weather, mostly good behavior from the kids. Both kids asleep by 8:30 and a movie (The Diving Bell and the Butterfly-- excellent!) for the adults. I may have to take Talia out of school completely. This no nap/ early bedtime thing is fantastic. I feel rejuvenated.

Surviving

I survived a week of no school for Talia. While it's really difficult to satisfy the needs of a 1 year old and a 4 year old at the same time, I think we did really well. Factors that helped:

1. Alex has been taking really great (2 hours+) naps.
2. I've just hired my cleaning people to come every week instead of every other week.
3. I also hired a babysitter to come once a week.
4. Ron was off of work on Memorial Day.
5. Since Talia wasn't in school she did not nap and went to sleep relatively easily at 8:30 (ok, 9) pm instead of kicking and screaming at 10:30pm. That gave Ron and me some time together each night.
6. Nice weather hasn't hurt either.

Now that I'm less stressed about the house-- and able to keep it more manageable on a daily basis I feel like I have more energy to give to the kids. During Alex's nap I am really sitting down with Talia and playing board games, doing puzzles, having tea parties etc. It's hard because she wants to have a tea party for about 10 hours but she seems mostly satisfied with what I can give her.

I still have grand plans for things I want to do together, like the garden for example. It's disappointing that I have to drag her out there (she still wants to stay inside and chill in pj's all day) but of course she has fun when we do go. I also realize that I'm a bit of a control freak and it's hard for me to let her dig the holes and drop the seeds in. What I really want is for her to do some parallel play while I'm doing the gardening. We did make a fairy garden in a big flower pot and she picked out all the flowers and design. She likes to bring some little dolls or fairies to play there but there isn't more digging to be done for it. What I need to do is give her a pot and dirt and let her do her own thing and not freak out if she gets dirty and not worry that she's wasting seeds or dirt or whatever. It just sucks that I get frustrated when whatever silly fantasy I had about tilling the earth with my children comes up short. Ok, I paid someone to till my soil and build my garden bed but hey, it probably wouldn't have gotten done otherwise.

We now have 12 days with no school coming up. Yes, TWELVE. Ron has two days off so he will be around for 6 of the 12 days. We have some scheduled activities (swimming, gymnastics, a playdate or two) and at least one day with the babysitter. I'm ok with not being able to get any sewing done (I've been on a roll!). Hopefully everyone will stay healthy and we can have a really nice time slipping into our summer lives. Well, there was a frost warning last night...

Talia's Puppet

I was wondering what was taking so long in that Art Studio! Every week at school she was working on the same project. I like quick and easy projects with fast results so I was a little impatient to see this masterpiece. Finally, the puppets were revealed! Very cute, definitely worth waiting for.

Talia's first ballet class

Talia liked it. I was reminded why I don't like Ballet and everything it stands for (anorexic girls, rigid and old fashioned teaching methods. If she didn't like it so much I would consider not taking her. I'm going to give it another chance and then consider maybe switching to another class. I did NOT like the teacher.