Tuesday Again...

Joshua has enjoyed his first week of school. His favorite part of the school day - RECESS, of course! Why does that not surprise me! And it only took him 4 days to figure that out. He complains though that he doesn't have enough time to play at the recess during schooltime...because he takes so long to eat his snack. It's not like I'm sending him with a whole meal...apples slices, baby carrots or Teddy Grahams...but he's such a slow eater! I told his teacher that yesterday...and that he eats slowly at home, too. Maybe recess will motivate him to take more than one bite per minute.

On Saturday we went to the Yolo County Fair. Last year, when I was 9 months pregnant and melting in the heat, I took a bunch of pictures. This year, for some reason, I didn't take very many. Well, one reason was that I took Nathaniel and we went and looked at the buildings with all the fair entries (next year I'll get stuff entered. Yolo County Fair's enteries are pathetic (the amount) compared to the Siskiyou County Fair when I was growing up) while Brian and Joshua did the rides. Theresa let us use a VIP pass that they had, so Joshua could go on whatever he wanted and not worry about running out of tickets. That was so nice...we thanked her very much for that. At the Kid drawing for Toys, Nathaniel's number got drawn for a battery-operated monster truck. He was thrilled. Joshua's number didn't get pulled for anything...but he was okay with it...last year he won a TV and a baseball & bat. I didn't get any pictures of Nathaniel at all at the fair...oh well. There's always next year.

Two weeks ago I interviewed for a job through the local Friends of the Library...it was for a Family Reading Program Coordinator. They were looking for someone with experience with children, bilingual and computer savvy. I figured as a computer literate, bilingual former teacher I might have a shot at it. It seemed like the perfect job - about 10 hours a week, $25 an hour and the hours were pretty flexible. They're wanting to use a grant that they got to generate more outreach programs for the Hispanic community here. I've been researching different programs that incorporate that and coming up with ideas....just in case. Yeah, well, I got TWO rejections in one day. I asked Brian how fun is that - getting rejected twice in the same day for one job. My day started with a phone call informing me that I hadn't gotten the job...and then in the mail this afternoon there was a nice typewritten letter thanking me for my interest my strong interview and qualifications, but they'd gone with someone else. Being as I hadn't heard anything in two weeks, I'd kind of figured I hadn't gotten the job, but I still had a little hope. I guess I'd been holding out with more than a little hope, because when I got the phone call I was pretty upset. I don't know who they did hire...I only know of one person that interviewed - but I think they interviewed 7 in all. Oh well, hopefully I can get some kids to tutor this year. I haven't done that for a couple of years...haven't advertised or anything like that either for a few years. I'll work at getting an ad in the paper for next week and see if I can have any luck there.

Here are a couple of pictures of Nathaniel in the yard last week - he's so funny. He loves the camera (just like his big brother did at this age) and it is sometimes hard to take a picture of him since he walks right at the camera!

Today was the Day!!!!!!!!!!!!

Today was the big day...the first day of kindergarten! My how the years have flown. It was almost exactly 10 years ago that I had my first day of school (as a teacher) at the very same school. Joshua was so nonchalant about the whole thing, "Bye, Mom, see ya'." I sure hope he's having fun right now. He got to play for a few minutes on the playground before it was time to line up and follow Sra. Gonzalez to class.

Nathaniel wasn't too sure about leaving him there, though. He kept looking over to Joshua's seat as I buckled him into his carseat as if to say, "Where's my big brother? Mommy, you're forgetting something!" He fell asleep on the way home (such a long drive - I think it's half a mile...I need to clock it because once it cools off, Nathaniel and I will walk over and pick him up at the end of the day.), poor baby. He was sniffly and had a runny nose yesterday evening...and woke up at 2 am with a fever. Finally got him in bed after 4 - in time for me to take my medication - and he woke back up at 6 when Brian's alarm went off. Yes, it's been a long day. But he's been sleeping for over an hour now. At least his fever is gone. Some friend dropped off a little gift for Joshua on our doorstep this morning...he was so excited! If you read this blog and you are the wonderful friend - THANK YOU!!! We have several ideas, but no real idea who it was.

Yesterday was kindergarten orientation...the parents' portion was a waste of time...the stuff that was reviewed was stuff that we'd heard at several meetings in the spring as well as read in at least two newsletters that were sent home. Luckily, Joshua enjoyed himself more and met some of his classmates, his teacher and explored his classroom a little bit. We took a couple of pictures of him with his class list at the front of the school (we'd been going to go look at it on Friday, but since Mommy was out of commission, that didn't happen until yesterday.)

I even managed to dress him coordinating colors with the paper they used - what are the odds :)

Catch-up

Well, I never did get back to adding more beach pictures. Last week got crazy. I had an interview for a part-time "independent contracting" job through the Friends of the Library - main focus to get outreach programs to the Hispanic community. I should hear this week if I made it to the final cut. I so hope so. It would be the perfect job and I'm qualified for it. Wednesday I ended up going to the dr. for a "girl thing" and got some medication and it was better by Thursday. Which was good because as I was tying Joshua's shoes to go to the bounce house place with his friend Bradlely, I bumped myself and said, "Oh great, a blocked duct again!" Nathaniel is trying to wean himself somedays and other days he doesn't so the whole milk production thing is getting messed up. Well, by the time we got home from the bounce house and errands I was really hurting. Then we went over to Sacramento to see Brian's niece's new baby and by that time I was feeling really bad...achy and chilled. By the time we made it back to Davis it was past dinner time, we stopped at Applebees and Brian took the boys in and I tried to get something out, because Nathaniel had refused to nurse on the sore side two or three times. What I got out was thick and yellow...gross! So it was more than a blocked duct, it was an infection. I called our bishop who is also Brian's doctor and kind of my back-up doctor. He called in an antibiotic for me which we picked up on the way home. Thank goodness Carrie didn't have to work until Friday evening. She came out Thursday night, got Nathaniel to sleep and then took care of the boys until she had to go to work Friday afternoon. I was able to sleep and rest which helped a lot - especially since I was running a fever over 102 for awhile that day. I'm feeling much better now. Fever is gone. Aches and pains (except for the infected area) are gone. Appetite is starting to come back and energy level is kind of coming back. Actually a lot of the redness and stuff is going away too. I'm hoping to get in to see my doctor tomorrow morning or late afternoon (Joshua has kindergarten orientation in the early afternoon) just to make sure everything is getting better as it should be. I had one of these with Joshua, but he was only about 6 weeks old when it happened, not two weeks shy of his first birthday.

As I mentioned above, Brian is now a great-uncle. Which he thinks is weird at 32. But it's even weirder for him to think of his brother as a grandfather and his dad as a great-grandfather. Zachary Blair was born on August 9th and weighed 6 lbs 13 oz and is 18" long. He's cute...and so tiny!! I haven't held a baby that small since Carrie was born and that was over 22 years ago. My two "giants" (in comparison) were 9lbs and 9lbs 6 oz. BIG difference (also 22.5 and 21 inches long).

Here are some pictures of Nathaniel eating spaghetti. This is from last week - after we got home from the beach. He'd never really had spaghetti before and boy did he enjoy it!

End of Swimming Lessons and the Beach

Friday was Joshua's last day of swimming lessons. He swam all the way from the steps of the shallow end to the "candy cane" rope thingie that separated it from the deeper main section of the pool...and then swam all the way back to the steps with no help or anything. It was wonderful to see! He was so happy with himself and what he's learned. He even swam with no aid in the deep end - not very far, but it counted. Here is a picture of him jumping into the deep end and a picture of Nathaniel watching from the stroller:

Yesterday we drove over to the coast. It's only about a 90 minute drive or so - depending on how much traffic there is. A small accident held us up a bit at one point, and then a bike race on the narrow windy road to the beach slowed us down quite a bit for the last stretch. Nathaniel did not approve of this and let us know quite vocally that he was tired of the carseat and wanted out and wanted a dry diaper and he wanted it NOW! We hadn't told Joshua where we were going - just that it was a surprise. He was quite surprised and enjoyed himself. The "marine layer" never burned off. It was actually a little thicker when we left after 2 pm than it had been when we arrived around 11 am. The boys played in the sand and surf and we build sand castles and dug a moat. Nathaniel, of course, tasted the sand (he kept licking/chewing on the little shovels!) and crawled all over in it. In fact, we had to keep grabbing him because he wanted to crawl right down to the water. After and hour or so, the tide was starting to come in, so we cleaned up stuff as best as we could (I hate sand...it's just so dang...sandy!) and had lunch. Then we took everything back up to the car. (*Just a hint, I read this in some magazine or something, a sled is an AWESOME way to lug all your paraphenalia down to the beach...it slides right over the sand. Brian thought I was kind of crazy when I told him to bring the sled, but we but our ice chest, bag of sand toys, towels, blanket, etc. on to the sled. What would've been at least two trips was only one. Awesome!! That's the most use we've gotten out of our sled being as we bought it to go up to the snow in the Sierras and then found that none of the ski resorts/snow parks let you use your own stuff.) After we ate, and before we headed back up to the car, we went back down and watched the tide destroy the sand castle and moat...after just a few waves, you couldn't even really see our creation...it was just a slight depression in the sand.

Brian wanted to go check out some tide pools that he remembered from a field trip when he was a kid and he says we checked them out when we took Joshua to this same beach 4 years ago...I don't remember that...but the tide was too high so we didn't get to find any sea anenomes or anything like that. We did find a large jellyfish on the beach, but didn't mess with it too much. Looked like a big silicon implant.

Joshua wants to go back, but we told him we didn't think we'd make it back over there until next summer. Both boys were pretty tired and slept most of the way back. I dozed off too...luckily Brian didn't!

Well, I'll post more pictures of the beach tomorrow. It's too late tonight to do more...especially since I have to rotate them. buenas noches

Swimming Lessons and More

Joshua is nearing the end of his two week swimming lesson session. Tomorrow is his last day. He has made so much improvement! Last Friday, Carrie was over and she stayed at the house with Nathaniel so Joshua and I could have some Mommy & Joshua time.

So, since I wasn't trying to keep the water fanatic away from the pool during lesson time, I was able to take some pictures and video clips of Joshua. He was starting to swim! He didn't seem to realize that was what he was doing at first. He'd step away from the steps and then swim (thrash) back to the top step. Techincally he wasn't supposed to be off the steps when the teacher was working with another student, but none of the kids do very well with that rule. Then he started having the teacher pull the "noodle" away as he neared the steps and come in under his own power. It was so great to watch him...finally I think we've managed to pry his fingers off of the kickboard or any other help! Yesterday in his lesson he swam almost the entire length (width?) of the shallow end of the pool under his own steam without holding on to the teacher or anything. We went back during public swim time for an hour and a half or so and he kept jumping in and swimming to wherever Nathaniel and I were. Today the teacher wanted to start them in the deep end, but Joshua would have none of that. Somehow she managed to get him to go in towards the end of the lesson because all of the sudden I heard him holler "Mommy" and he was waving from the deep end (hanging on to the lifeguard's flotation thingie that the teacher was using today instead of the noodles) instead of the shallow where he'd been earlier. Tomorrow I'll have to juggle Nathaniel and the camera and see what else I can get. These videos are from last week.


Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Share Photos - Free Video Hosting



Photo Sharing -
Video Sharing - Share Photos - Free Video Hosting

Nathaniel is now 11 months old...hard to believe how fast time is flying! He's into everything and is loving being mobile! Last weekend while Carrie was here, Brian and I went and rearranged things in the storage unit (we were getting the bunk beds out). We got the shoes and 18 month size clothing for Nathaniel (among other things). Well, his feet must be bigger than Joshua's were at this age because the shoes Joshua was wearing at 11 months don't seem to go on Nathaniel's feet! So this weekend we'll have to go get the next size up that we have in the boxes. We rearranged their room and Nathaniel is now sleeping on the crib mattress on the floor and Joshua is on the bottom bunk. I'm not quite ready for Joshua on the top bunk full-time yet. He hangs out up there and looks at books, etc. But I knew he wasn't quite ready for it either, when his second time climbing up there he looks over the side and repeated warnings notwithstanding informs me that he thinks he could jump down. Yeah, we'll wait a few months. Nathaniel still isnt' sleeping that great, but he had a little tummy bug or something earlier this week and finally seems to be feeling a little better. He did sleep all night last night (yay!!) and Joshua told me when he came into our room at 6 this morning that he was lying in the middle of the floor, so he just covered him up with a blanket and let him sleep (thank you, big brother!)

Here are a few pictures of him from the past week or so.

Other than that not much happening...Joshua is getting more and more excited about school starting in less than two weeks. It doesn't seem real to me that he's going to be going to school so soon. Brian & I finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows late Tuesday night (or early Wednesday morning, depends on how you want to look at it). It was so fun reading it together (he read & I listened and took care of kids or crocheted). Hard to believe that the series is finished. I started reading it when I had students that were not much into reading suddenly become addicted to the books. I knew that there had to be something to it if kids who hated to open a book suddenly wouldn't close one! Eventually I think I'll reread the entire series in order, but not right now. Probably this winter.

Well, it's time to fix dinner and calm the howling from the living room. Brian set Joshua's geotrax trains up in the garage over the weekend and he's been playing out there in the morning. It's about 100 outside and even with a fan on in the garage it's too hot out there for him right now but he still wants to go out. Time to get him helping me fix dinner!