It's Official

 I am going to be a big sister!

Fun Friday: Periodic Table of Elements

In the past year, I've noticed a lot of T shirts that use the element symbols to spell words. Here are a few:

What can you think of to spell with them?

Baby Growth

The fun part of a baby's first year is that he or she gains so many new skills. From a helpless newborn to rolling, creeping, crawling and eventually walking. From bottle/breast to food. From passively watching to playing and interacting.

River is doing so much now. And she's a much happier baby now that she is mobile and playing. And that makes all of us happy too!

Day she came home from the hospital

Learning to smile

Playing

Rolling over

Standing holding on

Sitting

 crawling

                         Eating

Just being cute

Making faces!

What a long way she has come! She will be 9 months old on the 30th.

Crazy Year

This is proving to be a challenging year, especially for Kaleb and Jasmine whose schedules are crazy!
  
We split up the school pick up to get people home faster. Jasmine is home by 3:30, Kaleb's school gets out at 3:30 and he's in another town so he's home after 4:00, and the charter school has a bus so Kayla gets home around 4:00 also. She could be home ten minutes earlier, but pokes around getting home.

Jasmine has choir Mondays from 6-8:15, band Tues, Thurs from 5:00-8:30, football games on Fridays and some Saturdays. She got in Friday night at 11:00 and had to be back at the school Saturday at 10:30 for a band assessment at two locations in AL. Home after 11:00. 

On game day mornings the band members go to school in their practice uniforms and play in the courtyard.

Kaleb has swimming every night from 6:45 - 8:00. It's about 40 minutes away, but at 6:00 the traffic is challenging. He also practices trombone every day.

Kayla only has trombone right now. I was planning to sign her up for basketball, but recent e-mails from school make me question her ability to listen to a coach and respect other players. We will see what happens. Many things are unconditional, but the things that require money and being at regular practices require trust and appropriate behavior.

Tyler is still without transportation after his accident a week ago yesterday. That was also when Jayden was injured by another animal. Jayden is doing better. She had a procedure to put in a tube, so the infection would drain. Her eye is better too. The vet called her Frankenkitty. Unfortunately, that is what she looked like!

She is looking better now. She got her tube out Saturday.

Ty's van isn't looking better though! We are waiting to hear if it can be repaired.

Ever since the amazing day we had at the springs, trampoline gym and Chuck E Cheese, the kids, including Adam, want to know what we are going to do on Saturdays. Adam has texted me the last two Saturdays to ask, but I've had to tell him "nothing" due to band. One Saturday it was band pictures, and Jasmine had to be there from 9-1:30!! This Saturday it was the assessments, and she was gone from 1:30 am -11:30 pm!!

We do have plans for next Saturday, so let's hope nothing band related comes up because the following week Adam has reserves and we are taking part in a big "yard sale." The following Saturday is Kaleb's first swim meet of the year and the next week is marching band assessment.  The 29th is our next free Saturday after the 1st.

One good thing this week is that Jasmine and Kaleb had Wednesday off of school for a teacher day. The charter school wasn't off, so Kayla wasn't. I told her if she brought me the form, I'd fill out a family leave form so she could be off, but she waited too late.

Jasmine, Jessica, River and I went to the beach for a short while. Ty and Kaleb opted to stay home. These are my favorite photos from the beach.

I think this last one is my favorite one of Jasmine.

Fun Friday: Can You Do It?

How easily can you say the color, not the word?

Are you more left brained or right brained?

Two Beautiful Girls

Today I spent most of the day with River. Then I helped Jasmine get ready for the homecoming dance.

Jessica thought she had a dental appointment today, so River went on the morning school run with me. Jessica's appointment turned out to be next week, so we met at McDonald's for breakfast.

Then we went to the library for book babies.

And we read some books. A couple of weeks ago, Jessica commented that she felt like a failure because she didn't do all the stuff with River that she should. One thing she mentioned was that she didn't even read her one book a day. Today the book babies lady was really pushing the moms to commit to reading one book a day--seven by the next book babies. It seems simple to me, but maybe it's not for everyone. I know the librarian is trying to instill a love of reading in the little ones, but she instilling guilt in some mommies without knowing it. I'm working with Jess on how she can set a routine of reading--Bible story before bed, morning book time etc.

We checked out some books with noises, and read some to River while we were still at the library. Then we went to the mall to use some coupons. Jessica started working at Old Navy and needed different clothes than she has for being a server.

We played at the house until Jess left for work, then we played some more.

We helped Jasmine get ready for the dance. 

Which photo is your favorite?