Becca's first school program

You know, going to your child's school programs really is fun. You get to ooh and aah and truly marvel at how great your child is...or maybe sometimes how embarrassing your child can be at times. In kindergarten, they are supposed to learn so many nursery rhymes so they've been learning and doing art projects as well. A few weeks ago, they had the kindergarten classes (all 4) sing the songs and a few children act each out. Becca was a horse in Humpty Dumpty. There were probably 12-14 songs and the kids did a great job. My child is very comfortable at church because she is there all the time and knows a lot of people. So, when she's in front of the church, she doesn't mind raising her hand and talking or doing anything else. I guess she hasn't reached that level of comfort at school just yet. I think she's pretty comfortable in her classroom but with all the classes, in front of a lot of parents she doesn't know I guess was intimidating to her. At the end of the program, all the kids took turns walking by the microphone and saying their names. There are about 100-125 kids and only 3 or 4 didn't say their name...my child being one of them. She walked up close, paused and then kept walking with her finger in her mouth. You never really know what she's going to do; I guess she's more shy than I realized.

Becca has had a loose tooth but I never felt it was ready to pull. Last week, she came home with something around her neck; I thought a dentist had come visit her school. She then gave me a great big smile and showed me her tooth was missing! She told her teacher her tooth was really loose and she pulled it. Becca said it didn't even hurt. It's funny how excited I get for little milestones. I think I was almost as excited as she was and wanted to tell everyone. Darren and I were discussing the whole tooth fairy thing and trying to decide if we should give her $5 since it was her first tooth. However, he felt like she would expect that with every tooth and I agreed, so she got $2.

Rest of October

Darren's parents came the week after fall break. Becca was in school all day but that gave grandma a chance to spend some time with just Barrett. Unlike Becca who took a little time to warm up, Barrett warmed up instantly to them. He went right into grandma's arms without hesitation and spent to rest of the week getting her attention...of which he loves to be the center of. We had a nice visit; it was nice having another set of hands around the house and Darren's dad helped us do a few small projects that needed to be done around the house: light fixture in living room, Becca's toybox, kids bathroom sink all needed fixing...I think there were a few more but I don't remember. They finished the week at Becca's school at her fall festival. I had to work at Becca's class at the lollipop tree the first half hour but they enjoyed walking around playing games, etc. The guys went home after a little bit to do the cooking and we continued to play games. Barrett was getting fussy so we decided to go get them a bite to eat. They were supposed to have hot dogs and chili but when we got there...about an hour to hour and a half into it, they were out of hot dogs. After some convincing, Barrett decided the chili wasn't half bad.

The next week was final preparation for trunk or treat at our church. I was mainly in charge of putting it together. I spent the week running around gathering items, getting help, etc. Our pastor was making calls trying to generate more trunks as well. A couple of sweet ladies offered to come and help on Friday morning. They were helping me separate candy into buckets, make welcome bags for visitors, etc. My friend called me about an hour after I dropped Barrett off to tell me he had thrown up. Now tell me, why do kids get sick in the middle of the night or at the most inopportune times?? My husband was the only one at work so he couldn't leave. My wonderful, wonderful, friend called back and said in case it was one of those fluke things, she'd throw his clothes in the wash, give him one her son's shirts to wear and let me know if it happened again. Okay, that was on thing off my mind for the moment. Luckily, Barrett didn't throw up again who know why but I'm glad my friend was willing to keep him. I started around 9 or 9:30 and didn't stop until 7:30 that evening, except to go home, get Becca off the bus, get all the kids costumes, the brownies I made and everything else I needed to get things prepped. On the way to pick up Barrett, I remembered I hadn't put down numbers for the cake walk, so I stopped by Dollar General on my way and picked up some masking tape. I had a little over an hour to get the rest of the games set up and ready; we were working right up to the time people were standing around waiting for us but we did it. We had ours on Friday night to coincide with the downtown businesses who pass out candy on Halloween or the last business day before Halloweeen, so we catch a lot of foot traffic. There were some things that went smoothly and some things we could have done differently but the kids had fun and didn't really know the difference so I saw all in all it was a success.

Saturday, it was nice to sleep in, relax and not do much. Our town did Halloween on Saturday, so we invited some friends over to come and trick or treat with us. I didn't realize I didn't have a picture with just Becca and Barrett...maybe I should have them get dressed up again to take their pictures. I got Barrett's costume at the kids consignment sale. It was homemade and the tail really made the costume...there were several strangers who asked if they could take a picture and people were commenting on it all night. It was pretty cute with the tail dragging on the ground. I definitely got my $7 worth, plus it was warm which was a bonus. Becca was Jessie from Toy Story. I had already gotten Barrett's costume by the time Becca figured out what she was going to be. Next year, I need to find out what Becca wants and try and coordinate Barrett's costume. Lightning's Pit Crew, Mario, Jessie and my little stinker I know it's a little blurry but you get the effect

October

October went fast! We celebrated my husband's 40th birthday a week late as he was out of town on his actual birthday. I had planned an event with our nursery kids at Christian Way Farm that morning but figured I would have all afternoon to finish prepping and cleaning for the party that evening. The farm was fun as usual; I really enjoyed the lady's pumpkin presentation of the gospel. Wandering through the corn maze Which pumpkin should I pick? We brought a sack lunch to enjoy and Becca was tired of waiting for Barrett and I to catch up so I handed her the keys...mind you I could see her so I wasn't sending my 5-year-old off by herself. We got all our stuff out and locked up the car. We enjoyed our lunch and visiting with friends when I decided it was time to go home, get the kids naps and finish up for the party. I can't find my keys...I'm beginning to remember giving Becca the keys and not getting them back. Sure enough, she had laid them in the back seat when she got her lunch. I spent awhile trying to figure out what to do. A sweet friend packed our 4 kids in her minivan illegally as her oldest and my oldest didn't have car seats and drove the 25-30 minutes back into town to get the keys from my husband, go to Sonic to get shakes for the kids and the most delicious cherry limeade chiller (I'm trying to lose weight but I thought this was a well-deserved treat after the day I was having), driving back 25-30 minutes to the farm and then 25-30 minutes back home.

I got the kids down and I'm rushing around trying to finish cleaning, finish the game we were playing, etc, etc. Luckily, we were grilling burgers and brats so I didn't have to cook too. All I had to do in the kitchen was make the frosting for the cake I had made the day before...turtle cake as always. The guests started arriving before my husband did and I was trying to finish things. Even though I felt very harried, we had a good time. Because it was his 40th, I had to do something different and found a game online. You make posters of various events that happened over the last 40 years and have people guess what year it happened. I had things like when Pac-Man was created, when Disneyland opened, when ESPN first aired, Columbine, Michael Jackson's hair catching fire, end of Vietnam War -- some serious, some fun. I would have been horrible at this game but I was running it so I didn't have to guess. It was fun to walk down memory lane. I had pictures cut out of whatever they were supposed to guess and write down the year. At the end, whoever had the most right won a prize of some of Darren's favorite things: Milk Duds, Fruit Loops, Caddyshack (now I can't even remember everything that was in it). The best thing was, we only had about a quarter of the cake left so it didn't ruin my diet too much.

It's a good thing fall break was the following week. We stayed fairly busy with doctor appointments and playdates with friends but we had fun. We ended the week with a day trip to Nashville to spend the day with my dear friend and her 2 boys.