The finale- Summer, week 8!

The FINAL WEEK OF SUMMER... sigh...

Monday & Tuesday:  The beach!

Wednesday: Our babysitter came over this morning, and I went to my school for a couple of hours to scope out the room, work on my bulletin boards, etc.  3/5 of my teammates were there, so it was fun to catch up.  I got a good bit done, and since I don't have that much bulletin board space to fill, I can do the rest next week during pre-planning.  I ran some errands and came home during naptime for the kids.  Once they got up, we hung out and played at home until it was time to go to church dinner/bible study.  Stephen flew out this morning for work, so it was just me and the kids.  Nothing too exciting- we had fun, the kids behaved, and they went to bed.  I then worked on some things for my classroom until midnight.  I have got to start going to bed earlier!  Next week is going to be rough.

It MONSOONED on us when we left church to go to the car.  Don't know if you can tell how wet Taylor is.  It was unreal.  Our car was only about 25 feet from the door.

After we got dried off and in PJs, Parker accessorized himself.  Can you tell he has older sisters??

Thursday: Babysitter came, and I went to the park, to Kohl's, Bath and Body Works, Walmart, and Publix.  All within 3 hours.  I have to admit that I'm in my annual stress mode- I get this weird anxiety right before summer is ending and I go back to work.  My brain races- did I get everything accomplished that I needed to??  I keep acting like, once I go back to work, I will have NO time to get anything done.  Ever.  I know that's not the truth, though my time definitely will be limited.  Anyways, running these errands helped me accomplish some things.  After naps, I took the kids to Chuck E. Cheese for a bit.  They had fun- Parker ran straight for all the cars.  Their fave was probably the little merry-go-round, which could fit all 3 of them perfectly.  Then, we met my parents to eat dinner by the Mall of GA.  It was a good day!

Friday: The babysitter came a little later this morning, and I went to the park, got a speedy mani/pedi, and went to my doctor's appointment.  I came home for about an hour, and then went to my annual mammogram appointment (nothing to worry about- I hope- just preventative).  When I got home, the babysitter came back, and Stephen and I went to dinner and then to see a cute little play in downtown Conyers.  They were filming a movie right outside the theater- it was wild.  It was supposed to be from the 1920s (or so), so they'd covered the streets with dirt, had old-timey cars, people were dressed in ther '20s gear.  Queen Latifah was the star of the movie, but we unfortunately didn't get a glimpse of her.  The movie is called Bessie and is supposed to be on HBO eventually.  Anyways, the play was fun- a great date night for us.

Saturday: This morning, I went back to school and worked more on my room.  I got most of my bulletin boards done, and I got my desks arranged.  We did some yard work, which lasted most of the afternoon. The kiddos got to run around and play.  It was a beautiful day... just HOT! We went to a BBQ that evening for a church friend who just retired from the Army.  It was in an awesome loft building in downtown Monroe.  Good times!

My room, so far.

At the BBQ.

Sunday: Ahh, my last day of summer.  I have to admit I got a little emotional in front of the girls tonight before bed.  But, backing up... we went to church this morning, Sydney and I ran some errands, and we literally hung out in the house all day.  Today was the hottest day of the year so far, so despite the beautiful sunshine, I didn't feel so bad about not playing outside.  I got so much stuff done around the house- laundry, ironing, putting up toys, etc.  I made a new casserole for dinner, straightened my hair, and played with the kiddos.  A great last day of summer with the coolest kids (and hubby) I know.  It's been a wonderful summer... I know I'll be more excited about work once I get in the swing of it.  I'll just miss seeing those sweet faces all day long!  

Parker completely crashed on Miss Nicole at church today!  And the other little girl wouldn't let her put her down.  :)

22 months!

Parker is 22 months old!

Accomplishments this month include:

• New words: Golf Cart, drink, "Gooo Dawgs, sic 'em, hoo hoo hoo!", broom, bike, bite, "tickle tickle!".
• He's starting to put words together, like "Hi Daddy" and "here you go".
• Probably his biggest accomplishment: moving into his big boy bed!  He was starting to jump in his bed, and his waist would jump higher than the top of the crib.  We had wanted to keep him in the crib longer than this, but we made a split minute decision to go ahead and convert his crib to a toddler bed.
• Jumping (see note above)!
• He picked berries for the first time.
• He took his first trip to Florida.
• When leaving our neighborhood, we drive by a little horse farm and then a golf course.  He'll say "a woof woof" for the horses, and "GA KA!!!!" for the golf course, every time we drive by.
• He also does the above for water ("Hey a-woo!") and cows ("Mooooo!")
• He now reciprocates hugs by putting his arms around your neck.  It is so sweet.
• He seems to be enjoying swinging a little better now.
• He visited Athens for the first time!
• Celebrated his 3rd 4th of July.
• He does the funniest thing- when someone he doesn't know talks to him, he looks straight up.  Kind of like an "I don't see you so you can't see me" look.  It's hilarious!
• He got another haircut this month.
• He loves to dip his food into dips- ketchup, ranch, honey mustard... you name it!
• He wants to be Mr. Independent and won't let us feed him with a fork/spoon anymore- he takes it from us to do it himself.
• He's still working on drinking out of a cup.
• He can turn round doorknobs now.  We have to actually lock his door when we put him down for the night, because he constantly comes out of his room by opening the door.  He is so darn cute about it, too.  He'll shyly look around a corner at you and smile.  It's hard to be stern!
• If someone asks a question, like, "Who loves cookies?" he'll say, "meeeeee!"  It gets funny, when the questions are like, "Who is a pretty girl?" and he says, "meeee!".
• He can climb on beds, tall chairs, couches, etc.
• He can "sing" Wheels on the Bus, Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star, and even the tune to Caillou.  It's nothing intelligible, but you can hear the tune (and sometimes see the motions).

He loves golf carts.  

His big boy bed!

This is what he was doing when those girls were talking to him.

Summertime park visits

One thing we did for fun this summer was to visit as many different parks as we could.  I made a list to keep track of all the different ones we went to.  Here's our list:

• 1.  Destination Park (Loganville):

• 2.  Bay Creek Park (Grayson):

• 3.  Loganville Toddler Park (Loganville):

• 4.  High Park (Toronto):

• 5.  Dufferin Grove Park (Toronto):

• 6.  Morgan Falls Park (Sandy Springs):

• 7.  Rabbit Farm Park (Loganville):

• 8.  Meridian Park (Loganville):

• 9.  Town Center Park (Suwanee):

• 10.  Table Rock State Park (Cleveland, SC):

• 11.  Tribble Mill Park (Lawrenceville):

• 12.  Lenora Park (Snellville): 

• 13. Laura Walker State Park (Waycross):

• 14.  Jarboe Park (Atlantic Beach, FL):

This was so much fun to do!  We usually hit up the same couple of parks, and this helped us go out of our way to try something new.  There were some I had hoped to go to before I went back to work that we just didn't make it to.  Those include Fort Yargo, The International Horse Park, and Stone Mountain Park.  Maybe next year. :)

Summer 2014 Bucket List

We did it again this summer... made a poster of things we wanted to accomplish.  This time, we upped the ante to 60.  Brave, huh?  This is what our poster looked like:

And this is how it went!

1.  Pick flowers:

2.  Go to the zoo:

Toronto Zoo

3.  Write to a pen pal:

I had tried to get someone we didn't know, preferably in another state/country.  I had registered on a couple of websites to try to find another person willing to write to Sydney.  I think most kids registered were older, like 8-12.  So, she wrote to her cousin in Tennessee. :)

4.  Gymnastics:

5.  Slip n' Slide:

6.  Go to Canada:

7.  VBC:

8.  Make cookies:

9.  Go bowling

10.  Hopscotch:

11.  Chuck E. Cheese:

12.  Feed the ducks:

13.  Nature scavenger hunt:

The girls had to find about 20 things on a list out in nature.

14.  Mountain House:

15.  Play with bubbles:

16.  Learn to braid:

17.  Eat frozen yogurt:

18.  Do a puzzle:

19.  Make homemade pizza:

20.  Make necklaces:

21.  Ride bikes:

22.  Go to the Dollar Store:

23.  Have a water gun fight:

24.  Go on a hike:

Table Rock State Park in South Carolina.

25.  Pick berries:

Watkinsville, GA

26.  Play Go Fish:

Playing with the babysitter.

27.  Number Egg Hunt:

They had to search for and match the top of the egg (# of dots) to the bottom of the egg (actual #).

28.  Rainy day PJ/movie day:

29.  Go see a movie in the theater

30. Home Depot workshop:

31.  Visit a garden:

32.  Play in the sprinkler:

33.  Finger paint:

34.  Visit Niagara Falls:

35.  Backwards Day:

36.  Play with the water table:

37.  Plant a garden:

38.  Visit as many different parks that we can:

39.  Make cupcakes:

40.  Go get ice cream:

41.  Paint on canvas:

42.  Stone Mountain

43.  Go to the library:

44.  Have a sleepover:

45.  Swim lessons:

46.  Wash the car

47.  Go to the arcade:

48.  Build a fort:

49.  Make trail mix:

50.  Go fishing: Go to the beach:

51.  Play the piano:

52.  Go on a picnic:

53.  Go to a mall:

54.  Make homemade popsicles:

55. Make paper airplanes:

56.  Letter egg hunt:

They had to match the uppercase letter to the lowercase letter.

57.  Go to a concert:

58.  Play with sidewalk chalk:

59.  Manner School:

My kids are getting to the age where we really need to stress the importance of manners (saying excuse me if you need to talk, not chewing with your mouth open, not talking with food in your mouth, no elbows on the table, etc., etc., etc.)  No pictures could really be taken, but to update you on our progress: I'd say our students at manner school would all get Cs.  The positive thing that came out of it is that now, they (esp. Sydney) recognize when others are doing something wrong.

60.  White Water:

We were 56/60.  Oh my, this has been the best summer yet!  I'm so sad it's over!!