Lay off the 'hos Daddy

Yes words I never thought would be spoken....as I was dressing Anna for school I noticed she had grown and those jeans were just a wee bit tight..so as I was loosening them up I told her jokingly (what kind of Mom do you think I am....) "Lay off the ho ho's anna" Who started laughing hysterically and ran to tell Daddy...but you know those telephone games of yore? Well it went something like this...

Anna running to Daddy in office...

A: Daddy, daddy.....lay off those 'hos.

K: What?

F: Laughing too hard to answer and holding myself up in the doorway...tears streaming down my face

K: Did she just say what I thought she said...???!

F: Wait wait...she meant..lay off the HO HO's.

K: Well Anna honey I like my 'hos.

A: Lay off the hos dad, lay off the hos...

F: This might not have been such a great idea (as visions of preschool carpet time float through my head.

This is the kid who looked at me the other day pointing out our tonic water (flat as can be btw- to which my good friend Luce would be horrified ;) And said: This is for Daddy- he's a drunk....and me quickly saying...no honey- he drinks..he's not a drunk....and anna saying..that's what I said mommy. Oh boy! :) I tried to explain he has a drink once in a while but she's sure she's saying it right!

ParTAY time!

I agree with Catherine- I should have played the Hallelujah chorus because the kids were going back to school. But this year was a bit surreal with me trying to squeeze in getting to the store. Katie was first out. What an adult now...when did she start closing her door at night to sleep? It's already begun with her. SOB But anyway she gets up at the ungodly hour of 6am to get ready for the bus. It arrives at 6:58am. I managed to straighten her hair for her and then follow her out with the camera...she wasn't that thrilled with me. :)

I took a bunch of pics and then started to get the "look". All moms of preteens know the "look". Mikey got up and was more agreeable to photos except the sun was shining bright and he squinted in almost all of them. Need to get that boy a pair of sunglasses LOL

Mikey's new school is at the end of our block..well like 2 blocks down.....you walk to the end of our street and then cross and then walk around the lake to the school. I can see it from our house but my trepidation comes from it being MIKEY who is walking himself to school with no Katie to watch him. She's my 40 yr old and Mikey is my 2 yr old kwim? Anyway we walked with him and sure enough the dude did NOT look when crossing the street. We have an added danger of a stupid traffic circle right in front of the school so if he walks safely without crossing to the crossing guard he actually has to cross TWICE over this circle (think mass confusion from vehicles) by himself. So we trained him -sort of on walking. Kev thinks I am a worrywart but even he was annoyed w/the way they placed the crossing guard. And then the next am Mikey and his friend were totally on their way and forgot to cross at all.....and had to backtrack. No I am not following him anymore. LOL Only once in a while.

So the older two went earlier than Anna..who started last week Fri for one hour (more on her in a minute). Mikey LOVED it. I had to go with him prior to his first day (full day too..no half day here this year) and meet his teacher....young and newly married...seemed nice. He came home and said his teacher is VERY nice and he loves her. YAY. Katie got home before him that day and was all angst. The school was horrible, she missed the other school, the passing period is shorter, her locker was jammed with others and hard to get to, you name it she had a complaint for it.

We told her to suck it up..that teachers will appear to be hard butts the first day and then will ease up....we mentioned making the best of it and then you'll have a good day and we talked about fixing some of the issues (I called and got her locker reassigned and let her sign up for chorus and also student council). So needless to say she loves it there now and is so happy. The girl we had issues with the last year in grade school is now her friend again...which makes me happy as that was horrific (remember I was going to school because Katie was getting threats?) Anyway school is going great for them.

That leaves the little one. My angst one for other reasons :wink: She went on Fri for one hour...we were told we'd be with her the whole time but some brainiac decided that the parents would go into the other room for a meeting...and Anna was none too thrilled with this development. We had a LONG meeting there while I worried about Anna and then it was over and I was talking with the head person and thought Kev went to get Anna (idiot ;) And he hadn't so they brought her to us since all the other kids were picked up already- WTG Parents of the year. She did ok. She didn't really talk to other kids, etc but was ok.

This week she did one hour alone and I waited in the parking lot...today is her first OFFICIAL full day where we do a drive up - drop off. Heaven help us. Getting her out of the car should be fun :)

I'll post more about her first day and our apple picking tomorrow. I'm doing better...aren't I???

Jump Up Jump Up Jump Down

I know it's some song...which one- I'm not totally sure on....this child has been the one hardest hit by my being gone all the time. I had no idea and didn't see it coming. Anna sure- she's the one who has attachment issues- ie me leaving her...but this dude flies under the radar...I've been trying to make sure he has special attention from us. Sigh....being a parent is hard!

Here he is at the park near Aunt 'Cole's and Uncle Tom's jumping....we passed this same park a few weeks later on the way to eat dinner with Tom and Nic and man there were SO many trees uprooted at the roots from the storm..these were big trees. We lucked out because while the "mircoburst/tornado" went through here - we are too new and don't have the trees and stuff like other areas.

Anyway.....I love the look on his face here....just pure joy! My action boy!

Look Ma,

This phrase always worries me...but it's one that AG uttered the other day to me...come and look Ma...she was SO proud of herself....turns out that she can actually PUMP her legs on the swing. :) I was able to get some cute action shots of her (notice I don't post the blurry ones in between). Did I mention I love my camera? I do! Even if the flash doesn't pop up on it's own and even if the external flash never worked on my camera ;) I was worried so much about the kids with opening the LSS but I needn't have worried. First I am blessed with the *best* employees around. They work for me when I am sick (Thanks Marge!) and come in so I can get the baby to school (Thanks Joy!). I couldn't survive without them all to help me succeed (Thanks Cheryl, Julie, Karle, Beska and Elizabeth). This doesn't even include our great dt (local and online) and everyone else! Back to Anna....she has been coming out of her shell more with people..not kids...which worries me...she still clams up with them but has started talking to adults in our store!!!! She will walk around with them and bend over to look at product with them---giving her opinion, etc. It's cute to watch. But she also has a boyfriend now. Poor Sandy has lost her husband Mark to Anna. Who thinks she's marrying him someday but then realized that Sandy is already his wife...does that explain the death glares Sandy gets from her?

I'm not sure who is more in love either. Now I can't even email Sandy about anything without mentioning Anna for Mark..and when they last met...they ran across the store like they hadn't seen each other in ages....had fun playing in the kid area and I don't mean to alarm ya Sandy but when we left he was STILL in there playing :) Thanks Mark for helping my shy kid break out of her shell a bit!

Our summer vacation

It's school time now but we are behind....with the store opening we haven't had too much of a summer but I'm proud to say that we've made sure the kids have had sleepovers- numerous ones---fun swimming and fun outings. We've been down to see Uncle Tom and Aunt Nicole for lunch...I loved taking the kids to the local park there...we got some great shots of them in the water area. Mikey showed us what eating a whole box of lemonheads looked like ;) BOYS...and we have just hung around here mainly enjoying each other's company.

I'm glad it's fall though...hard to reconcile the 90 degree days with the September date.

One of my fave summer shots was one of Mikey proving what a good influence Aunt Bonni was when she was in. The kids got to spend one on one time with her and Anna loved goofing around with her but I'm pretty sure that Mikey was her buddy the whole time. Don't tell him I said so though. I can't wait to have more time to mess around with the camera....I love it..it takes such crisp clear shots....I'm gonna be so sad when I upgrade it. The flash already doesn't pop up anymore and I don't want to send it in. :(

Scrap Addict after hours

I have never..ever laughed SO hard as when we went out for Mexican food that first night. I'm pretty sure that the staff hated us ;)

Talk about NEGLECT

My poor blog...I'm so sorry..I've saved tons of pics now to get caught up. I'll try and work on it some each night!





We caught up with Austin Powers at CHA who was thrilled to have an Austin sandwich and if I recall totally propositioned JEN :) Who kindly let the poor dude down. He was perfect to his accent and those teeth!!!!










CHA recap....man was it FUN.....it's work too spending all that money ;) But the laughter...I have some pics I'll post here. I was so very lucky to have old friends and meet new ones (jen) and just have a great time. And this time was extra special because I had Bonni here for an extra week....and yes you'll get a glimpse of what that looks like..aka when Bonni Runs Scrap Addict ;)



Ah yes.....Bonni...my love...when we leave Bonni to run Scrap Addict...this is what happens. We have her with a myriad of eye colors too. SIGH and yet i still adore her! Miss you loads babe!






And we had to invoke the what happens with ScrapAddict at CHA stays at SA but I'll share some photos next which will explain to all.






The SA Angels..as dubbed by Bonnaroo....aka SF :) Mom had to be goofy but that's what makes this so lovable! :)
More to come in a bit!