Will's big news....

Will lost his first tooth on Monday!! It had been hanging by a thread for several days. Everytime he'd try and pull it, it would bleed and he would lose his nerve. Finally when they were at my parents house on Monday night, my dad just pulled it out! He was very excited for the tooth fairy to visit, he also got 8 quarters! The next night, Brian read them a book about the tooth fairy and he touched his gap the entire time! He keeps asking when the tooth fairy will come back and I keep telling him he has to lose another tooth first! Grace's comment on the whole situation went something like this "Everybody is losing teeth and I don't even have one loose one!" Poor girl. It really will be a while until she loses a tooth!

Some fun with family!

 Xander and Grandma Pam.

 Will and Grandpa Mike.

 Grandma Pam, Grace and Aunt Meagan.

 Grace and I.

These pictures are from 2 weeks ago when we went out to Kara and Wes' house to celebrate Sebastian's 2nd birthday. It was also a football game, so we watched football, ate and did all the birthday things at once! The kids always have fun playing out there and it was a nice night!

We're still plugging away, trying to keep our heads above water! It hasn't been easy for the last 2 weeks, especially since all three of the kids have been sick. And you know us, when we get sick, we get all sorts of lasting problems. Xander had been sick the longest (almost 3 weeks) and started getting worse on Friday. I broke down and took him to the doctor on Saturday morning. He had a sinus infection that was exacerbating his mild asthma. So, antibiotics for him. We've been pumping Will full of steroids and gotten back out the nebulizer and his asthma seems to be under control and his cold is getting better. Unfortunately, last week was a string of bad nights of sleep, for all of us, because of coughing and such. But, after a weekend of some good nights of sleep, I am happy to say, they are all on the mend. I anticipate a better week!

When not in school, we've been keeping up with all our activities. 3 weeks of soccer down, 3 weeks to go. Grace started dance last week on Saturday mornings and loves it. She'll have a recital in December, then I think we'll take a break from dance for the spring (she said she wants to do gymnastics, so we'll see about that). They are doing well in piano. I will tape them playing some songs, so you can hear their progress. They love singing in choir at church. When we're not doing all that, you can find us outside enjoying this fantastic fall weather we're having. Brian and the kids went on a long bike ride yesterday, 3+ miles total. We've got to soak it up while we can. Winter will be here toooooo soon!! That's about all for now!

Soccer

Here are some action shots of the kids playing soccer. They're doing a great job this fall. Grace has even scored two goals! Both the boys have had break-out runs with the ball, but both times their kicks missed the goal. Will had a couple of great saves last week. He blocked a couple of goals and kicked the ball to a teammate twice who kicked it in and scored. Two assists for Will! They are really getting the hang of it. It's nice because they're playing on Cavett teams now, so all the kids on their teams are in their classes. I think they will be able to keep these teams for a while and become friends with those kids.

In other news, they sang in church for the first time with Cherub choir on Sunday. It was really cute to listen to, and according to reports from their director, they ARE singing (and listening, which is a plus!) Grace had her first dance class on Saturday morning. She had fun. Brian took her and watched towards the end. He said they were doing some hard things coordination-wise and all the girls were having trouble. I think she enjoys it, though.

School is still going well. They are starting to read, write and recognize words more. I enjoy looking at the "invented" spellings they come up with for words. They're encouraged to do this, as it helps increase their phonemic awareness. Grace wrote yesterday "My pecsr book". I asked her what it said and she said "my picture book". Pretty good!

I started school last week, so that is a change to our schedule. Brian has to walk the kids to school on Mondays and Wednesdays, and more when I start subbing. I've been volunteering in their rooms every week. It's fun to see what they're working on and get to know their teachers a little. So far, I really like everything I see. So, all is good! That's about all our updates for now. Thanks for checking!

Busy, busy, busy!!

Sorry it's been so long since I posted! School is sucking the life out of us these days. I'll post a quick update now, then try to do more details and pictures next week.

The kids are still plodding along every day, trying hard to adjust to the new schedule. Some days are really good and we think "Yay! They're finally adjusting!" and other days (like yesterday) are bad and we take 2 steps backwards. Mornings are the biggest problem. We decided, after the first week of screaming our heads off at them in the morning to get going, that we would tell them once they need to get up, make beds, get dressed, brush teeth then they can eat breakfast. And if they didn't do that, they wouldn't have time to eat breakfast and they would go to school hungry. Well, several times, Xander has pushed it to the wire, getting his work done with 5 minutes to spare and scarfing down his breakfast as we were walking out the door. But, he's never gone to school without eating breakfast. Yesterday, Grace refused to get out of bed. She got her one warning and we left her alone. At 7:50 (we walk out the door at 8:00) we physically got her up, put everything on her, ran a brush through her hair, slapped her backpack on her back and shoved her out the door. She did not eat breakfast. She was pretty upset and skulked all the way to school. I asked her how her morning was and she didn't say much, though I gather she ate lunch pretty well. The afternoons are still challenging, with tired strung out kids. Xander pretty much cried all afternoon yesterday, over one thing or another. At one point, he was just sobbing and saying "I can't stop crying! I can't stop crying!" I would have him take a nap, if we had time for that and I thought he would sleep. He probably won't. The 7:30 bedtime is sticking around for now.

They have been bringing home huge amounts of homework. That is relative, I guess. Huge amounts of homework for 5 year old kindergarteners. Last Thursday, Xander had 3 pages (front/back/front) of math homework, he had to write a "story" about this bear he brought home, and had to cut something out of a magazine to bring back the next day. That, combined with practicing the piano, took us an hour and a half. It was insane! These poor kids' brains are fried. Thanks GOD the weather has been nice so they can go run off some steam outside.

One last piece of fun news. We think Xander has a crush on the neighbor girl, Nyah. She's in his class, and they live about 4 houses up on the other side of the road. He talked about her constantly. Always wants to go outside and play with her in the afternoon (which they've done several times). They invited us over last week for ice cream one night and he begs daily for us to invite them over (which we just haven't had time to do, since we've been so busy!) If she's already walking to school when we leave, he runs to catch up with her. And the other day, we started to walk home from school before her and he wouldn't leave until she caught up with him. Crazy kid! They really are a nice family. It's been nice getting to know her mom, Mindi, walking to and from school. I think we've found some new friends! Overall, it's been nice to hear the kids talking about playing with other kids from school, and talking about them. They've all made several new friends. The first (of many, I'm sure) birthday party they're invited to is next weekend.

Ok, I'll get pictures this weekend of Sebastian's 2nd birthday party and soccer. My days are filling up too, as now I have started school and I'm doing some volunteering in the kids' room. I've also jumped head-first into my duties as one of the coordinators of the multiples club. Keeping busy!!! More later!