The girl who loves to talk...

...apparently she has a speech problem.  Actually, I knew she had a speech problem, but it was confirmed today when I took her in for a speech screening with the schools.  I'm not overly worried about it.  Reid has been receiving speech services since he was two and it has been very good for him.  I'll be glad to get her going in a program, though, as I think it will really help her with communicating with her peers at school.

In my untrained opinion, I believe her problem is that her vocabulary (and desire to talk) have grown at a faster pace than her physical ability to form words.  The kids has so much to say, so many words to say it with and she is NOT going to slow down to work on saying "remember" instead of "fremember".

Lucy's true colors (literally) came out today at the screening.  They had given her a pile of blocks, each a different color, and asked her to stack them all up (which she did just fine).  Then they asked her to give them one block, which she did (taking the block from the top).  Then they asked her for three blocks, which she did -- she gave them the top two, took the next and laid it to the side, and then handed them the next block.  I could hardly keep a straight face, as the block she had squirreled away was the pink one.  She did the same thing when she came to the purple one.  That child is just so predictable!

Lucy's Turn

Today marked the start of a new phase of life for us.  Lucy is going to school FIVE days a week this year.  I'm having very conflicted feelings over this.  The boys never went to preschool more than 3 days a week, however Lucy had a lot of separation anxiety issues last year and we decided it would be better if she had a more structured and predictable schedule.  Last year we were quite frequently greeted in the morning with the question, "do I stay home or go to school today?"  The answer was often followed with a fit on her part.  So, part of me isn't ready to let her go.  The other part of me is the part that was mentally doing a happy jig all the way home from school this morning.  

And I can't believe how much I have gotten done today...the laundry is in processing, I ran an errand (with my husband sans kids, which was a treat), the kitchen is clean and I'm even getting my blog updated.  AND I still have enough time to finish all my other cleaning tasks before I have to go get her in an hour.  

Oh, and the skirt she is wearing is the final one of the three that I have been working on.  This one is my favorite!  (Though, did have to convince Lucy this morning that it is not close enough to Halloween to wear the candy corn dress yet.)

My little sweat shop!

Over the last several years I have totally fallen in love with several sellers on Etsy for dresses & skirts for Lucy.  I've been really happy with everything that I have purchased, but last spring decided that I wanted to take a stab at making them myself.  The items I've purchased are totally worth every penny, but I can make the same things for 1/2 to 1/3 of what I buy them for and I can make EXACTLY what I want without limitations in fabric choices.

These were my first two items that I made last spring:

I've spent the last month or so scouring online fabric sellers for just the right fabrics to put together a back to school wardrobe for Lucy.  I'm pretty sure I will have spent more time fabric shopping and planning than on actual sewing. though at least most of that time was done on my iPad while Jeremy rubbed my feet and NCIS was playing.  I had a really hard time pairing down my list, but started off with fabric for three outfits -- I may be putting another fabric order in yet, though!

This is the first (and simplest outfit):

The appliqued t-shirt was a last minute addition and I'm really glad I tried it.  The stitching around the outside of the applique didn't turn out very well (I've never sewn on knits before and didn't realize it would be such a pain in the #*!).  The skirt was very simple and I think that if I make anymore items for this fall, they will be this kind of skirt -- they don't take much fabric and they are really easy!

This is the second outfit:

Hopefully you will have caught on that this dress is supposed to look like a piece of candy corn.  And, in actuality, it ended up a bit shorter than I had intended, so I think I will have to call it a top and pair it with some leggings.  I wish I had used a matching bias tape on the bodice, instead of the contrasting yellow, and  the sash could be a touch longer.  I also was reminded with this project about how much I detest gathering fabric!

The third outfit is still spread out all over my basement.  I really need to finish it, though, because the basement needs cleaned badly and the project is in the way.  Maybe I can finish it tomorrow!  

And just because she is cute, a picture from this morning of my little girly-girl!

Yahoo!!!!

I know I probably shouldn't be so excited that school started yesterday, but I am -- I really, REALLY, am!  We had reached the point in the summer where the kids had spent entirely too much time together and just needed to be apart.  And we had reached that point probably 3 weeks ago.  I swear all the three of them have done since August 1st is torment each other and bicker over everything.

I will admit to being a bit sentimental over Ross going to kindergarten, but I am not too upset about it.  He gets into trouble quickly when bored, so getting him back in the classroom is really the best thing for him.  I was a bit disgruntled to learn that he only has three days of school this week, due to our school having a staggered start for kindergartners (which I actually think is a very good idea).  It isn't so much that I want him out of the house that badly, as the fact that I had promised Lucy a girls week (since her school starts next Monday).  

Lucy & I did have a nice day out shopping for school clothes for her yesterday.  When we got home, however, she seemed lost -- she didn't seem to know what to do without the boys around.  The poor thing has never been on her own for very long!

Here are a few shots of my (very handsome) little guys on their first day of school:

How did they get so big?

Oh, and as a side note, it is apparent that Reid really does need to continue in speech therapy this year to work on enunciation.  On Sunday evening he loudly (and proudly) announced that he had eaten two boogers for dinner.  After we all started giggling (and I hung my head in shame), he corrected himself -- he had actually eaten two burgers.

I ♥ my home!

And when I say I love my home, I don't mean my house (though I love that, too).  I mean I love my new city, my new place to be.  We've been in our new home for just over a year now and I am really really happy here.  A lot of my happiness comes from all the great people we've met since we moved here.

I don't make new friends easily.  I was terribly worried when we moved here because I was moving away from my dear friend "E" and was worried I wouldn't click with anyone.  E was the first friend-you-can-call-tears-at-any-hour friend I had had since high school.  And I do miss E a lot (always will -- she is a gem), but I've also made a lot of really great friends here.  I feel a lot like I've come home, even though I moved some place totally new to me.  This place feels like the place God intended for me, which is a really great place to be.

I'm relishing having a great group of women around me and don't for a minute take that for granted.  So, maybe I should say that "I ♥ my peeps", as that is more accurately what I've been thinking about this evening.

Hiking and crying and whining, oh my!

On Sunday, we headed out for an unplanned hiking expedition.  We went back to the same spot that we visited last August.  Ironically, when I got home and started digging through pictures I realized that Jeremy & I are wearing the exact same clothes we wore on our last trip to this location, so all our pictures look very similar!

The trip started out rather well.  There were two directions to hike from our van -- a long one leading to several sets of falls, including the biggest ones and a short one leading to a smaller set of falls, which included a nice little area to swim in.  We decided to start out on the long hike, so that we could end the trip with swimming.  This part of the hike went well...there were no major incidents, no crying and no whining to speak of, really.  Lucy was a rockstar of a little hiker -- she did so well and walked most of the way.  

 Someone was nice enough to snap a picture of all of us in front of "High Falls".

Then we headed down the path to the smaller falls with the swimming area and that is where things went terribly astray.  Lucy pretty much refused to get in the water because it was too cold (but she did stand on a rock with her feet in the water and pee everywhere so that all the spectators around could see -- I swear I've taught my children not to pee in the pool).

The boys had fund splashing around and would have gladly stayed all afternoon, if we would have let them.  However, shortly after we arrived dark rain clouds started gathering over head and we decided that we should head back to the van -- I had no desire to hike through the mud to get back home!  Ross had an absolute melt down over this.  He yelled, screamed and pulled us in the wrong direction the entire trip back to the van.  He has been belligerent about the incident ever since, insisting that his behavior was our fault because:  1) we made him get out of the water and 2) it didn't even end up raining and it was our fault for mis-predicting the weather.  Needless to say, I was quite grumpy by the time I got in the van.

This was my attempt at a group picture...looks like they were cooperating, doesn't it?

On the way home, we stopped and tried out a local German eatery in Hendersonville.  It was pretty good, fairly authentic from what I can tell, and was a fun place to stop.  We got a German beer sampler for Jeremy & I to share, which helped immensely with resetting our patience with Ross.  All in all, it was a good day, though it is too bad that Ross's rowdy antics had to spoil part of the afternoon.

Nooooooooooo!!!!

When Jeremy was deployed, I got quite attached to watching old NCIS re-runs on USA.  Wednesday nights were actually something I looked forward to, because it was NCIS marathon night and I could watch NCIS for something like 4 or 5 hours straight (maybe longer, but I usually turned the TV off to talk to Jeremy at 11:00).  When he got home, we started watching the series together from the beginning (using Netflix to get the DVDs).  When we moved here, we dropped Netflix (because of their crazy price increase) and started using the DVR (which I LOVE LOVE LOVE, by the way).

Last night we finally got caught up.  And I am so sad about it!  Now we have to wait until September just like everyone else to see what happens.  Plus, we have nothing else to watch if we want to crash on the couch after the kids go to bed.  And, seriously, did they have to kill of Ducky?!?!?!?

I'm really tempted to start over at the beginning....again.  Jeremy wants to watch NCIS:  LA.  But, uh, really, Chris O'Donnell just can't compete with Mark Harmon!

Swirlies!

On Sunday evening, Grandma & Grandpa M. treated the kids to a trip to the dairy bar in McClure.  The kids were all told that they needed to use the facilities and wash their hands before we left for our excursion.  I went in to check on them, because the task was taking so long, and Lucy got quite flippant and defiant with me.  I calmly told her that I could stay at the house with her if she didn't want to do what she was told.  At that point, Ross finished washing his hands, took off for the door and yelled over his shoulder, "I'll tell them we can leave without you and that you want a swirly."  A swirly?  I think he meant twist, which has become my cone flavor of choice lately.  Thanks for the offer, Ross, but I'll pass on that swirly.

And it was a very deja vu-ish (so not a word, but I think you know what I mean) feeling getting a treat at the dairy bar...reminded me of some very long gone summers.

16!!!

Yes, so it has been a long while since I have posted.  I have my reasons, which I will try to get into soon, but for now I wanted to share some pictures.


Hannah turns SIXTEEN this week.  Isn't that crazy?  The kids and I spent the weekend in Ohio and I gladly snapped some photos to commemorate the occasion.  You know what?  It was REALLY nice to take pictures of a willing subject for a change.

This one is my favorite!

I did manage to get one of all four kids.  They are at least all looking at the camera, which is about the best I can hope for at this point in life.

More from me later...I promise!