Happy Fall Y'all

 Adrian

I must be my mom's daughter! I was given the nickname 'Little Miss' by my mom when I was younger and I've been using 'Little Man' for Adrian a lot. I also call him 'My Happy Boy' when he giggles and smiles after sleepy time and is happy to see me, or when I'm trying to convince him to stay happy through diaper changes before bedtime! If I let him get too tired he gets grumpy while getting ready for sleeping, he has also been more grumpy the last two days, and drooly so I'm thinking we will see another tooth soon! His cousin who is only 3 weeks older than him came to visit and has two teeth too, but is starting to move to the crawling position! I've got to be ready for that in the next month with him now so good thing I have a better vacuum downstairs and keep the ground as clean as I can. I don't think he will be allowed in my room since my hair seems to be everywhere no matter how many times I vacuum.

Claire

We had a day off of school on Wednesday and they have been really good at playing together instead of wanting to watch shows. We went for a walk around the neighborhood since I felt bad that Buttercup didn't get the morning walk she usually gets when we take them to the bus. When we came back the neighbors were packing up to go ride 4-wheelers and invited them! I stayed home with Adrian, but they had a blast from what I was told. I love being close to some of our neighbors and having kids the girls can play with and not have to travel far. She loved being the biggest cousin around and creating games for everyone, she read them books, showed them all our toys, picked movies they would like, and was very protective when Buttercup was too excited to know how to stay away. 

Shay

They had a picture day on Thursday, and I forgot to get a picture of them before they went to school, and the fundraiser fun run was on Friday. Claire did 39 laps and Shay did 30, not at the same time because each grade went at a different time. I could have gone to watch but Shay was first in the morning and Claire was after lunch both times are right when Adrian likes to nap. I don't think they minded that we weren't there, but I know the Halloween Costume Parade next month will be a bigger deal and I will make sure we go. There was only one day that she came home with bad news about her and I haven't got a call about her behavior in a couple weeks so she has adjusted quickly! She still has a pretty angry voice when she gets mad at us teasing her, but I'm trying to remind her gently to use a nice voice to ask for what she wants. 

Pumpkin Palooza

First pumpkin patch of the season for us because we plan on going to another one in October, but the kids were all excited to go to this one. It was a little weird to have one in what seemed to be the middle of town instead of out in the fields, but it was a cute little lot with huge inflatables. We didn't do everything there because they have a ticket system that gets expensive with how many tickets everything was, but it was a good lesson for the girls that if you don't budget and spend your tickets wisely, you can't do everything you want. We liked where we went last year more and have learned our lesson about seeing a cheap 'entry fee' on social media. It is more about giving the kids happy memories and fun times, and convincing them we don't need to buy a pumpkin yet because we don't want it to go bad before we carve it!

Enjoying Autumn

 Adrian

He is using his two sharp teeth more and more to eat and find things not so edible to taste. My list of projects isn't getting much shorter because I only get to work on them in very short time frames when he is content to sit and nap. Usually, he likes it when someone is actively spending time with him and giving him toys, looking at him, or holding him. I'm enjoying it, but I wish he was more cuddly when wanting to go to sleep and didn't fight it so much still. To everyone else, he is so happy all the time and asks if he is always so content. He came out to eat with Chris and me last night with friends and was the best baby because I had just fed him and he napped on the way to the restaurant. The time I went to get my nails done he was a little tired and was not happy about just sitting next to me instead of going to sleep happily he was a menace! 

Claire

I love it when she wants to read and loves books because I was worried about her in Kindergarten when it was so hard to get her to try. We got test scores back this week for both girls and one was a lot better for Claire than last year which makes me very happy. She is having a lot of fun being a big sister and playing with Adrian, especially when I put her in charge and she gets to be the one to keep him happy. She sets up his little play area with every single one of his toys out and moves him from one to the next when he is bored. She says he is getting heavy though and I agree! Claire also has fun practicing her gymnastics all the time and got excited when she was able to do a handstand pretty well. 

Shay

She earned all her stars for good behavior two times this week! They started a fundraiser at their school and got some fun days in her class like hat day, PJ day, and no shoe day. I wish they were old enough to go ask the neighbors around for donations, but all I've done is share the link for them and they've earned some small rewards so far. I don't know why they've changed how they do fundraisers so much and why there isn't a 'buy this and the proceeds will go to the school' like when I was growing up. Obviously, things are just very different now and that's not a bad thing necessarily, but they get the kids excited by offering them prizes. I feel bad I didn't get any pictures with Shay in them so here is one of the pictures from our photoshoot that shows how goofy she is!

Date

Chris and I drove all the way into town near the capital for the first time because we had friends in town who wanted to go to the melting pot. It's been a while since I've been and this was Chris's first time, and we brought Adrian! The girls went over to the neighbor's house, which they asked to do almost every after school anyway. We had the full experience and Chris said it wasn't enough food, but it was really tasty and he didn't want to see the price. He is funny wanting to still pinch pennies even though he is making plenty of money for us to budget date nights! Oh yes, and I also picked a ton of grapes from a new friend who isn't able to get them all picked and wanted to share with neighbors! We froze a lot of them and they taste really good, now Chris wants to start growing a grapevine.

Goodbye August, Hello September!

Adrian

The last two weeks have been good with more regular naps and overnight so I can work on the yard and get longer sleep at night. The only problem recently was at church today when he was tired and wouldn’t just cuddle and fall asleep on me. He is too interested in the world to want to put his head down on my shoulder. Sitting up and playing is his new favorite thing to do with toys to play with and a view of whatever I’m doing. If he has to play too far away from his sisters or me he doesn’t stay as happy, but I can look at him from the kitchen usually and he is fine. The baby-led weaning is getting fun too now that he is understanding how to hold the food instead of trying to bite my hand. 

Claire

She lost one of her front top teeth the night before we took family pictures! Daddy asked if she wanted him to pull it out while I was putting Adrian to sleep so I couldn’t tell them to stop it and wait one more day. The tooth fairy did a fun scavenger hunt around the house too and the girls worked together to find the treasure which was all they talked about all day. I think her confidence with reading has grown so much within the last year and even though I know she guesses what word it is wrong, she still now tries new words. She even had her first spelling test on Friday and could spell them for me on Thursday night when we did homework. 

Shay

This week was a lot better and I wasn’t called by the school or bus driver for her attitude so I know she is adjusting.  This week at school she was featured and brought a poster and items to share about her. It was called “Incredible Me” and she told her whole class all about herself. I took her on a date when Chris had a movie night with Claire so I got to ask her how it went. One of the questions was what her family thinks of her so we each had a word to describe her. I think she is creative, Claire said she is cute, and Daddy said she is brave. She does have a very goofy side and created a tongue smile that she enjoyed sharing during half of our photo session. After photos, we had a pizza date as a family and this time, I remembered quarters for them to use with the arcade games. 

Me

Doing the lawn has been fun since I get to work only a few hours a day and I don’t hurt myself too much. I feel sore usually, but I’ve been learning and meeting neighbors as they walk by throughout the day. Luckily the weather is mostly bearable in the mornings and evenings and I can handle the smokiness. Since this project was my idea and I did the research, Chris doesn’t know how to help and gets to play with Adrian while I work. I also did a project for Buttercup's sleeping cage that has been on my list for a long time. It needs a few more tweaks, but so far it works really well to make it a comfortable place for her. I get more time each day to do training sessions and she now knows to lie down and stay pretty well. I'm starting to roll over and constantly working on not jumping up on the kids at the bus stop.