Fifth Grade, here we come!

I can't believe that Ian is in fifth grade this year! He's moving right on up! And literally too, he's now on the third floor of the school : )

He is adjusting well to the bigger homework work load, and the older kid activity classes like shop class, and home ec. The only complaint he's had so far are the much, much, much shorter recesses. Ha. I love it!

9-4-11 The day I saved a bee

The day I saved a bee. . .

Oh yes, for those who don't know me, I am a lover of all (99.9% anyway) things. Snakes are the only exception. The idea of hunting sickens me, road kill makes me get all teary-eyed, dont get me started on fur coats.

Every day, many times a day even, the pool had to be cleaned, skimmed off at the very least. There were always tons of leaves, a thin layer of pollen on windy days, the occasional caterpillar and some sticks.

On this particular day, I saw something struggling in the water, being a lover of all (99.9% anyway) things, I swooped it up with my pool net and let it crawl onto my arm. It looked like a beautiful, harmless bumble bee, who had taken a tumble into the water.

The poor thing couldn't fly because its wings were so saturated, so I let it hang out on me for a little while until it got it's barrings.

It felt really funny having it crawl over my arm and hand, I guess I had never really looked at a bee very close up before. They have little barbs all over their legs and feet, which kept sticking to my skin. I was like tiny bits of Velcro scratching me.

I felt good that I could save it's life, but it didn't occur to me that my bee allergy would make me have this strange reaction to it even touching me. I broke out in teeny tiny blisters, everywhere it's little feet touched me. Bizarre.

But I was happy to save that little guys day! Next time I'll be sure to wear long sleeves though.

Birthday Prep Begins

I knew pretty early on in the planning process that I wanted his party to be a prince/princess party. He loves playing dress up, and I think that's great! Plus he is the only boy in his little circle of friends, all the girls get to have princess parties and dress up really pretty, and he doesn't know that society thinks he shouldn't. So I said the heck with it! Let him be a prince(ess) if he wants to!

I took advantage of that faux hurricane day to hand make the invitations, I went with the more glitter the better theory. And then I spent a few sleepless nights putting together custom, jeweled crowns for all the tots. I also made all the goodie tote bags, with my favorite medium, felt and hot glue, with a few touches of jewels, buttons, and fabric paint for good measure.

Alexander was very paws on with all the preparations, I think because he knew they were all for his boy.

And the baby showers continue!

My good friend Claire just actually welcomed her second baby girl into the world last week, but since I'm so far behind on my blog, I needed to post her baby shower!

She has a two and a half year old named Maddie who is simply precious, and great friends with Isaac. (she's the blonde beauty in the first photo, with Isaac)

Claire is the fourth mom in our mothers group to have her second baby, so we've become quite good at throwing these baby showers, not to toot my own horn or anything. She was just radiant, and we were blessed with a very beautiful day. Things couldn't have gone better : )

(and yes, I made that Sweet Baby banner!)

They call this a hurricane?!

It way so long ago, and so uneventful I forget the name that they even gave the "hurricane" that was supposed to practically wipe us off the map. Thankfully it turned out to just be a very, very windy day.

Isaac and I drove to a couple of the beaches to look at the surf, which was not as rough as I was expecting to see. I wasn't about to go diving into it by any means, but I thought it would have been much worse.

When Michael came home from work, the rain had mostly stopped and the wind had died down quite a bit. Since obviously nobody was playing golf in our backyard, he thought it would be a great opportunity to try and fly a kite out there!

Unfortunately he didn't have very much success. The ground was too wet, and the winds were too strong. . . Isaac and Alex had a wicked fun time though, chasing leaves that looked like birds, and running much faster with the wind pushing him along!

It was a fun time had by all, well except for maybe the kite : )

A day at the pond

We were supposed to get smacked by a big hurricane at the end of August, turns out it was nothing more than a very windy day. Because of the storm that was headed our way, Ronda and fam decided to leave a day early. Sad for us, safe for them.

My mother has a pair of kayaks stored at a boat landing in town, and we really enjoyed being able to use them each week. I thought it would be fun to ask Ronda and the kids to join us. We all had so much fun!

I have to admit, with those storm winds coming in, it sure did give me an upper body work out, that's for sure! Isaac and Brooklyn loved it, even though they were both getting quite wet. We decided to make it a short adventure, and headed back to shore, where they had even more fun splashing and swimming at the waters edge. Spencer had a great time sampling handfuls of sand when nobody was looking at him, clever little guy that one is!!

Even Ronda's husband got in on the fun, which was nice to see, he had never used a kayak before, and I was happy to have been able to help him out!

The Ag Fair with Friends

I was very lucky to have my BFF visit the island for the whole, I repeat the WHOLE summer this year! Unfortunately we both worked so much we didn't get to spend a ton of time together. We did however get to bring our kids to our annual agricultural fair, which was of course, a BLAST!!

Isaac and Brooklyn were finally big enough this year to go on some rides, not by themselves, which made it quite comical I'm sure for the people watching, to see Ronda and I squeeze ourselves into toddler sized car rides.

They both had so much fun roaming through the barns, and seeing the baby sheep, pigs, cows, chickens, ducks, goats, and horses. There were a few horses that were bigger than any Ive ever seen! I'm pretty tall (5'9") and these things ad tails that were taller than me! They were magnificent to say the least!

We enjoyed some super overpriced, flat-bread pizza, and watched some tractor pulling, went on the carousel a few times, watched a very disturbing jumping frog race thing, and looked at the amazing exhibits that people had entered hoping for the blue ribbon.

I grew up looking forward to that fair every summer, but it has always been bitter sweet. It seems that it's always the last hooray of the summer, it's a sure sign that fall is on it's way. At any rate, I sure had fun, and I was happy to be able to spend the day with my bestie, my husband, and our adorable tiny tots.