First Day of School

Okay, the first day was a couple weeks ago but now that "B" has finally settled into his school and not having a nervous breakdown every morning...I feel more like writing about it.  

"B" had a VERY hard time on his first day.  Actually the entire first week was rough.  He would wake up at 5:00 A.M. crying about not wanting to go to school.  He wouldn't eat breakfast because he felt sick, told me there were "too many recesses" and he just wanted to stay in the classroom and finish his work so he could come home faster.  Even going so far as to tell me, "I wish you didn't push me out of your tummy first so I wouldn't have to go to school first."  All things that pretty much just want to break a mother's heart.  

The morning started off fine.  New outfit, new shoes, little bit of nervousness but mostly just excitement.  Observe:

Once we got to the school and the bell rang...it was all downhill from there:

It was just very hard for him to adjust to being gone all day long.  That combined with eating lunch away from home, riding the bus to and from school...all big changes for a kid who DOESN'T like change.  (poor thing, I'm the same way)  

On a more positive note, I'm surprised at how fast they are moving along for Kindergarten!  He is learning so much and I feel confident that I picked the right school for him.  

Now switching over to "T"'s first day of school.   He is the COMPLETE opposite of "B", in every way.  This kid could not wait to get there.  He literally ran into the classroom without a second look back at mom.  I had to hunt him down for a good-bye kiss.  He then told me, "Mommy, I will miss you.  But I'm going to have fun."  And that was that!  

Now for "S"'s first day of school.  Yes, you read that right.  See for yourself:

No noisy, loud, obnoxious brothers to take toys away, scream during his favorite movie, sit on his favorite chair, take away all the toys, or knock him down on accident (or sometimes on purpose).  I think he's going to like school the most out of all of them!  

It's SO weird to just have one child home 4 mornings a week.  Easy.  It's funny how your perspective changes over time with the more kids you have.  When it was just "B" at home, I used to think how hard it was, and it WAS hard at that time!  But now with 3 boys, I'm really enjoying this one-on-one time with just me and my baby.  And I can tell he loves it too!

It's almost over...

(**NOTE**  I wrote this a couple days ago and thought blogger screwed up and erased it.  Duh...it auto saved.  Anyway, here is it for your viewing pleasure.  First day of school was today, hopefully a post on that will be coming soon.)

Summer vacation that is!  School starts Wednesday and I have to admit, I have mixed feelings about it.  On the one hand, WOOHOO!!  "B" is starting Kindergarten full day, and "T" is starting a new preschool where he will be gone 4 mornings a week!  This means I'll only have one child at home 4 mornings a week.  I am looking forward to that.  I laugh when I look back on the days of having only one child, and how hard I thought it was.  If I only knew what was in store for me...  I guess that's why I never had twins, I needed a slow adjustment to "crazy".  

I am also nervous about school starting because I'm going to miss the little stinkers.  As hard as it is keeping them entertained and behaving, they are fun and pretty dang cute and I love them.  I guess that's why I had kids in the first place right?  haha...  Anyway, I just hope they behave at school ("T" mostly) and that they don't get picked on or don't pick on other kids ("T" again).  

Can you believe that I have ALL of "B"'s school clothes for this year, and didn't have to go shopping at all?  Yes, thanks to my obsession with clearance rack shopping all year long, I had his ENTIRE school wardrobe completely taken care of.  This includes 5 pairs of jeans, and about 10 shirts, which I probably spent under $50 for total.  I must say, I am very proud of myself.  Especially considering the fact that he seriously skipped an entire size this summer alone.  That kid is huge!!  Not even 6 years old and already wearing a size 7?!  Yikes.

I am doing a lot of reorganizing around my house, which has been fun and stressful.  Can I just say that I HATE clutter?  Yeah.  I do.  If I wasn't married and didn't have kids, my house would be perfectly clean and clutter-free.  But...instead I'll just buy lots of plastic storage bins and cabinet shelves.  Out of sight, out of mind right?  

We also are putting "B" and "T" into the same room.  It is not going well.  In fact, I'm off to enforce the law right now.  GO TO SLEEP ALREADY!!!  

Grrr...

I'm melting...

In this AZ heat!  Okay so swimming lessons ended yesterday, and I am so happy.  6 weeks was a whole lot of public pool.  Every year I think, "I'm never signing them up for this many swim lessons again..."  But every year I do it.  Mostly because I REALLY want them to learn to swim, it gets them out of the house once a day, and because we get the lessons half price.  Thanks City of Mesa!  

We went and visited Josh's family last weekend in 29Palms, CA, and took a day trip to Del Mar Beach, on the Camp Pendleton Marine Base near Oceanside, CA.  It was SO nice.  I wish I could move there.  The weather was beautiful and I do love the beach.  I hate how the sand ends up everywhere though.   

S wasn't sure about the beach.  First he wouldn't walk on the sand, then he was throwing the sand.  First he hated the water, then he loved it.  It was all very confusing.  One thing he DID love was his cute cousin K, who is 2 months older.  He couldn't get enough of that girl!  Kissing cousins!  (Notice my new hat?  Wore the ugly straw one for awhile and then saw this beauty at Wal-Mart for $7.  B told me he liked this one better.)  

Look at this little boy...he is irresistable.  He had lots of fun running away from the waves.  Back and forth...back and forth.  And of course he loved playing in the sand!  Do you like his hat?  He bought it with his very own dollar at the Dollar Tree.  He was very proud of himself.

Then there's B, I could not get this kid OUT of the water.  He played by himself (with supervision of course) in the waves for hours.  Threw a fit when we had him come up to re-apply sunblock or to eat even!  Told us, "I want to go back in the water, that's the reason we're here!!!"  

Anyway, it was a nice trip.  We got to meet my BIL's fiance, spend time with family relaxing, and of course eat good food!  I am lucky to have such great in-laws.  

Here I Am!

I know I know...it's been over a month!  Summer is DEFINITELY here.  We had a little tease of 90 degree weather for a couple weeks in June, but not to worry, we're back up to the 100+ degree AZ summer, otherwise known as hell on earth.  And the fun don't stop till October.

Swimming lessons are in full swing, the end of this week we'll be halfway through.  I started a class with S yesterday.  S could care less about blowing bubbles or kicking or floating on his back.  But he does like to jump in and have me catch him!  I'm so glad I'm doing this class because it was SO HOT sitting on the side watching B and T do their lessons.  

So I bought a giant straw hat in the dollar section of Target (my favorite place on earth) to keep the sun off my face.  I am ANTI-tanning.  I wear at least SPF 50, and try to cover my face as much as possible.  No skin cancer or premature aging for me, thank you.  Anyway, I got this giant hat and this morning before we left for swimming lessons, B asks me,

B - "Mommy, are you going to wear that hat?"

Me - "Yes, why?"

B - "I think people are going to laugh."

HAHA!  My 5 yr. old son is worried people are going to make fun of me!  Too cute.  It is a pretty ugly hat.  Maybe I should spring for the extra $10 and get a more attractive giant hat?  Hmmm...

Summer Summer Summertime!

Since it is now officially Summer here...well, not "officially" since that's not till June 20 something...but still it's over 100 degrees outside and we live in the desert so I think that qualifies it as Summer in these parts.  Anyway, I have decided to try to be positive and come up with things I like about Summer.  Because really, I hate Summer.  I hate the heat, I hate the clothes that don't hide my fat, I hate the kids being out of school and bored, I hate dragging all 3 boys to the store with me, I hate my obsession with covering every square inch of me and my boys with sunblock, I hate the air conditioning bill...  

Wait, was this supposed to be a positive post?  Oh yeah...

So anyway, I have thought of ONE thing I like about Summer today, and that is NOT taking the kids to school!  I know right?  Sounds contradictory to my earlier complaining.  But seriously.  For the last 10 months, I have been driving B to school 5 days a week and picking him up after school.  For T, I have been doing the same 3 days a week.  This involved lots of rushing, yelling, planning, crying, migraines, etc.  

So.

This week I have come to the realization I like having NOWHERE TO GO all day long!  No one to get ready, no one to rush, nowhere to be.  My boys have worn their PJ's or swimsuits all day long all week long, and I don't care.  

Yay for Summertime!  

Autopilot?

The other day, I drove my son to school, and have no idea how I got there.  Seriously.

Has anybody ever noticed this phenomenon?  You're driving along, the radio is on, the traffic is normal, etc.  Then suddenly, you're like, "Wait, how did I get here?!"  Now I know this sounds scary, but hear me out.  At least once a week, I will drive on autopilot.  In other words, I will drive to my destination, and have no idea how I got there.  I don't know if I hit any red lights, if I changed lanes, if I followed the speed limit, nothing!  It's like, I drifted off into la-la land for the last 5-10 minutes.  But yet, there I am, my car is intact, I didn't get in an accident, no cops are chasing me.  

I doubt I am the only one.  Please validate me.

Reminiscing and Such

Wow.  I am just not doing so hot at keeping up with my blog!  

School is out next week.  Yikes.  Things have been crazy as usual.  I had a TON of extra work this last month, which I am very grateful for, but which kept me stressed out pretty much non-stop!  I'm glad it's over but now...school is letting out.  Augh!

Last night I went to my sister's chorus concert for high school.  My old high school.  I haven't stepped foot on that campus since I graduated 12 years ago.  (yikes, 12 years!)  But really, why would you go back once you've graduated right?  Anyway...  Being back there was TOTALLY weird for me.  Brought back lots of memories, not all of them good.  High school was not a good time for me.  And I just felt so old!  The lockers are all gone, replaced by picnic tables since they stopped having open lunch.  There are new sidewalks where there used to be grass, new buildings even!  Gates EVERYWHERE.  The school is practically a prison.  I was surprised I didn't see barbed wire and a crow's nest with an armed guard.  Even the trees were all bigger!  Anyway, it's just strange to think that so much time has passed.  I saw the place where I got a flower for Valentine's Day from this guy I didn't feel the same way for.  The place where all my friends and I used to gather in between classes.  The place where I argued with an ex-boyfriend and he screamed obscenities at me and then punched a door...  The memories were everywhere, good and bad.  I'm glad that time in my life is over, but at the same time, I wish I could go back, relive it and do things differently.  

I always think of blog topics at random times, just never get around to actually writing about them.  Let's hope I can get my act together and entertain everybody with my random daily musings this summer.