It's the First Day of School!

I have to say it's a lot more confusing on the other side of preschool -- where the "general population" are. Preschool was such a nice, protected little bubble. They have their own playground. They start the morning with songs before heading out to their classrooms. They have their own lunch area. It was so nice, so protected.

Come the first day of school for Kael... and it was mass chaos. OK, so it really wasn't chaos, chaos. It just seemed that way because of all the kids and parents milling about. Kael was a little more comfortable than some of his classmates and immediately ran towards the big slide. Unfortunately, the bell rang just then so he didn't get a chance to really play.

Ah, yes. The Bell. You all remember the bell. It's what tells you to line up and come back to class. Kael was not used to being rung and continued playing. I had to go get him and do the whole "Did you hear the bell? You have to line up when you hear it" drill. He did not hear it so hopefully like Pavlov and his dogs, my kid will be as easily trained to come on command.

That's another thing we have to work on: lining up. Don't get me wrong: he knows how to line up. The real question is where does he line up? There were so many people milling around I had no idea where to take him. Luckily they had signs posted for each teacher. I asked a faculty if this was where the kids lined up every morning and she said... No. But they do line up in this area.

WTH? What does that mean? My kid can read certain things. But he can't read "Junior Kindergarten, Ms. Romo's Class." Alright, alright. Nervous Nelly Mom. He can handle it. No one's ever lost their kid at school, right?

We line up and the school does the whole song and dance of introducing the teachers then we head into class. At that point, we (the parents) were kind of kicked out so I only managed to get one picture of Kael sitting at his huge, ginormous desk. You'll see what I mean.


Mr. GQ. He's totally goofing around. This was the only picture I got of him where he's not doing something completely wacky. This was only mildly wacky.


Mr. GQ's photo spread continues. He's posing with his friend Lauren.


The big kid's slide. Notice how the area is deserted? That's because the bell rang and he didn't hear it!


The Line Up. But not where you line up every day. No. It's just for today, to confuse all you youngsters.


Doing the Pledge of Allegience. I love the looks of total and utter confusion on their faces. We'll need to work on this too.


Kael and his buddy Cole. I would have thought they'd have smaller desks for Jr. Kindergarteners, after all most are 4 years old, going on 5.
Or maybe these are the smaller desks... hmm.

All in all, the first day of school went well. Kael said he enjoyed it and likes his new teacher. I'm looking forward to another great year.

And to all of you who made the same comment on pictures from Orientation Day: I did pull his pants down! That's his natural waist line, people! Kael is like a horse: he's all leg. That's why buying pants are such a pain the a$$. He's got a 3T/4T waist and a 5T length. So either his pants fit around his waist but fall about 2 inches too short or they hit the heels just right but he's having to hike them up every 2 minutes.

Sheesh.

School Orientation

Sorry for the short post but it's getting late and I wanted to get this in before I post Kael's 1st day of school pics from tomorrow.

Today was school orientation for new parents and while we aren't new parents/students to the school, I took this opportunity to introduce Kael to his new teacher and to get a lay of the land. Junior Kindergarten is completely different from Preschool. They play in a different area and eat in a different area so I wanted to make sure Kael at least was aware of that. He freaks out when he gets disoriented so I wanted to be sure the transition was a smooth one.

I also wanted to check out his new teacher, Ms. Romo, since we were expecting Ms. Thompson. Ms. Romo seems very nice, and the way she set up her classroom was very cozy and engaging. Kael is sitting with his friends from preschool so that will help ease him into the new school year.

We were told that he had to wear his uniform today, hence the pictures. Just for the record, I'm not a complete dork -- I was not the only parent taking pictures on Orientation Day! He looks so handsome, like such a big boy. He was so proud to wear them, as evidenced by his mile wide smile. And being a school uniform, it's very durable. Meaning: it's thick as heck and most likely as comfortable as wearing cardboard. I bought some gently used uniforms and even "gently used" they feel like they were freshly starched. I can't imagine what the brand new ones feel like! Needless to say, the second we got home, he asked to take them off and spent the rest of the day in his tank and boxer briefs.

So, here's my handsome boy:

Check out his belt. We went to 2 stores before finding a pretty kid friendly belt that didn't have holes to line up and braids to punch through.


Upon entering the campus, Malia stated that she wanted to go to school too. Sure... she says that now. I'll bet money she'll be the loudest one when it comes time for me to actually leave her there!


Dad took some time off work to come to Orientation with us. And still keeping up with being a super Dad, he's coming to the first day of school tomorrow too!


Kael at his new desk. He's sitting next to his buddy Cole. I hope he and Cole pay attention to Mrs. Romo otherwise those boys are going to get into a lot of trouble.

I'll post First Day of School pictures tomorrow.

Fact... or Fiction?

You remember how when we were growing up our parents would tell us all kinds of things to get us to not do something?

Like:
Don't cross your eyes otherwise you'll go blind.
Don't make that face -- one day you will wake up that way.
Don't swallow watermelon seeds otherwise it will grow out of your tummy.

As we get older, we obviously know better and that sort of stuff rolls off our backs. However, for me, as much as I know... as much education I have under my belt... as much life experience I have accumulated over 3.. thirty-something odd years... there's still some stuff that my mom's drilled into my head that I can't shake loose.

This morning I was upstairs getting ready for the day and the kids were downstairs watching TV. My typical routine is to feed them first then let them watch a show so I can have at least 25 minutes of uninterrupted Mommy Time to wash up, do my hair, get dressed, whatever. It's a treasured time, believe me. Anyway, I usually hear them talking or making some comments about the show. Especially Malia. But this morning, she was pretty quiet. I should have picked up on it, but I was pretty tired from a late night out with Linda, Katelyn and Shirley. I finish and walk (OK, OK -- it's more like waddle) downstairs.

The first thing I notice is what I don't see: Malia. Kael's sitting on the couch and usually Malia is next to him or jumping from the ottoman to the couch and back. But she's nowhere to be found. I call her and there's no response. I start to feel the first pricklings of panic -- then I see her: she's climbed up the bar stool to sit at the kitchen counter.

The past week she's discovered that the kitchen counter is a virtual treasure trove of forbidden fruits: pens, coins, Kael's art work, Daddy's glasses, car keys, the plate of brownies. So she's climbing up those bar stools every hour or so to see what's up there. As mentioned earlier, I went out last night. I emptied out my "going out" purse of stuff to put back into my "everyday" shoulder bag: driver's license, credit card, chapstick, a pack of gum.

A pack of GUM.

GUM. Or at least what used to be an almost full pack of gum. What was left was a pile of wrappers and 4 gobs of partially chewed Spearmint Trident gum. There were probably 8-10 empty wrappers and only 4 chewed gobs that I collected. The obvious question would be what happened to the rest of the gum? Well, it wasn't stuck on her anywhere (not her body, not her hair, not her clothes). I pulled one out of her mouth (under protest) and the rest were either on the counter or on the ground. The only logical conclusion is that she ate said missing gum. That's a lot of fricking gum! (On a side note, I did take a moment to be duly impressed at her fine motor skills to be able to unwrap those tiny pieces of gum.)

So to tie everything in and finish this post, I know intellectually that gum doesn't really make your intestines stick together. I know that. But at that moment (and I will admit many moments throughout the day as the scent of spearmint floated about her), I could hear my mom's words coming back to haunt me: Don't ever swallow gum -- it will glue your insides shut.

That's not true. Malia's fine. Her intestines won't be blocked or anything. Right?

RIGHT?!

Necessity is the mother of all invention.

We had a really fun (and tiring) day at Wild Rivers with the Di Dodo's and Kendall's. The park is closing for the season end of September so we wanted to get the most use out of our season passes as possible. Realistically, I don't know how much more I can handle it. Even with Truong helping today I was pretty beat. I can't imagine going at it alone like I did earlier in the season.

Anyway, Malia took a nap, while Kael played quietly as Truong and I tried to recover from a day in the sun. When Malia woke up, he got her to play a game of basketball. She of course had no clue what he wanted her to do and ended up just chasing him around the house. This suited him just fine since he kept yelling out "Come on Malia -- try to get the ball away from me!" Poor Malia. I can just read the big "SUCKER" sign on her forehead.

Kael kept asking me to set up a basketball net for them with his bug net. I was trying to get dinner ready so I couldn't help him. Dad was BBQ'ing ribs outside so he couldn't help him. Finally I told Kael: "Honey, just stick it anywhere! You have to figure it out or play a different game. I'm trying to get dinner on the table."

After a few minutes I heard a "YEAH! I did it! This is cool! I made a basketball net!" And the kids continued to play. It never occurred to me to check it out. Until I started cleaning up the house as Truong took the kids for a walk.


There's his bug net, stuck in a pool noodle.


The weight of the ball must have caused the pool noodle to sag so he took the couch pillows to prop it up. I tested it out and "dunked" a basket -- it stood up!


Here's a close-up of the basket, secured inside the pool noodle.

What a smart kid I have! I would have not thought of this set-up. I would have just stuck the net in between a toy basket and the cabinet, or something equally as lazy just to get the job done. This is pretty ingenious.

Seeing is believing.

The countdown is 4 weeks.

4 weeks to get my act together.
4 weeks to get things for Blub ready.
4 weeks to... well, come to the realization that we're going to have another baby!

So far, I've accomplished -- nothing. Well, not "nothing" really. Since we don't know what we're having, it's kind of hard to prepare. I've got Malia's old preemie and newborn clothes out of storage. I just have to wash and organize them. I have some clothes from my many nephews sort of sorted, just waiting to be washed. I have diapers -- preemie and newborns.

Really, what else do I need?

Oh yeah -- the co-sleeper and car seat. Yeesh, only the 2 big ticket items. Technically I have the co-sleeper; it's in the garage. I think. I just need to, uh, find it (!!), air it out and then set it up. Thao has the car seat in Santa Cruz which will be given to me August 31.

So while I don't actually have anything ready to use if Blub decides to make an appearance tomorrow, everything is RIGHT HERE.

Speaking of getting things ready, I packed my hospital bag tonight. I suffer from major pregnancy induced amnesia and couldn't remember what actually goes in a hospital bag. Luckily Shana still remembers and we went over the list last night. If not for her, I would not have remembered to pack a going home outfit for Blub (*mental slap*). So after some digging around, I found a blue and pink preemie outfit which I am happy to say is being washed as I type. Going through Malia's old stuff brings back so many memories. Mostly disbelief that she was so darn tiny.



In the middle is one of her outfits.
Yes, she actually wore that.
No, it's not a toy doll outfit. It's an actual preemie outfit made and sold for real babies.
On the left is her doll. It's a regular sized doll. Nothing fancy.
On the right is a ruler. A regular 12 inch ruler.

I can't believe how much she's grown and yet she's not that big, compared to kids her age. I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that in 4 weeks I'll be coming home with another little bundle.

Yikes. 4 weeks! And we still don't have a name.