{more love} We're getting the hang of it

IT meaning school. I just realized the kids started school over a month ago, and I never posted pics. Lulu started first grade:
Quotes from the first day:

"I LOVE first grade. It is nothing like Kindergarten. I didn't want to come home."
"I already made three new friends."
"Did you miss me? I feel special being gone all day and eating lunch and school. I'm kind of like Dad."

Quotes from week two:

"I HATE first grade. Why do I have to go ALL DAY? It is so long."
"Do I have to go to school today?"
"I don't like eating lunch at school."

Currently she loves school, except when she hates it and tries to fake a tummy-ache so she can stay home. Too bad I'm onto her evil plan and just dump her off at school everyday--then breathe a sigh of relief. At the end of the day, she is always happy--and healthy.

Buddy is A LOT more easy-going (something he inherited from his dad) and still enjoys Kindergarten day after day, week after week. He never complains about going and seems happy when I pick him up at the end of the day. He has learned a lot during his first month. Here he is on the first day of Kindergarten--one L-O-N-G week after Lulu started:
And what do Squiggle and I do with so much (ha, ha) time on our hands? Well, she sleeps and I clean up whatever mess she created right before taking Buddy to school and try and catch up on other 'stuff'--like this blog. She is turning into quite a character and is getting more and more into pretend play. Here she is helping Rob and I hang a picture rod:

And here she orchestrated her own tea party, even found some chips in the pantry for the event. I let her have the tea party before bed--isn't she adorable? Here are some other LOs I completed of our trip to Colorado with Rob's family:

hiking to Lily Lake

hiking with Cousin A and teaching her to make silly faces
one of my favorite pics of the summer--Squiggle and Mom ready for the train ride

{more photos} Day 2

Okay, here we are for Day 2, Squiggle swinging gleefully:

Squiggle and I visited the park TWICE today.  Let me back up a bit and explain our schedule on Tues/Wed/Thurs:

9:30 Buddy starts preschool

11:20 Lunch--Phase 1 (Lulu)

12:00 Preschool ends

12:15 Lunch--Phase 2 (Lulu finishes, Squiggle begins, Buddy begins)

12:38 Kindergarten begins--Lulu

12:45 Lunch--Phase 3 (Buddy & Squiggle finish; I eat--hopefully)

3:30 Kindergarten ends

4:00 Lulu must play with a friend, or her world will utterly crumble

Back to our story...Lulu & Buddy wanted to go to the park Tues, but they are not really home at the same time, so they came up with this plan that I would take each to the park while the other was at school.  Great plan for them, great plan for Squiggle, do-able plan for me.  Since our days of playing at the park in the warm sunshine are numbered, I figured we might as well enjoy each opportunity.  Squiggle couldn't have been happier, especially since #1 she got to swing A LOT & #2 there were two pairs of random shoes left at the park--Squiggle loves shoes.

{more joy} Two in School

Here is my little guy going to preschool, his teacher said he must have grown 2 feet over the summer.  Well, not quite that much, but he has really grown and he closing in on Lulu pretty quickly.

{more Joy, more chaos} Our lives will never be the same

Yes, this is our Kindergarten Diva.  Lulu started kindergarten this week, and although she is probably the oldest in her class as she will be six in a couple of weeks, it still just seems weird that she is old enough to go to the "Big School".  But she is so excited, and so ready to be in kindergarten, we are all excited for her to start on this new adventure.

Her second day of school she came home with two fundraisers for the school.  For some reason this just hit Rob & I--we are now back in school with semesters, back-and-forth every day, school holidays, parent-teacher conferences, etc, etc, etc--including fundraisers!  Some things never change--they are still selling the same wrapping paper I sold when I was in elementary school!  So, we are all ready to embark on this new adventure, realizing our lives will never be the same again...