Her Growing Vocabulary

This morning when Grace got out of bed, Wookiee was excited to see her. As he jumped on her legs (he does have sharp nails and is definitely in need, as Christianne says, of a paw-dicure), she said,

"Help! Help! Wookiee is 'tacking me! He's 'tacking me!"

But even better was shortly after, when she tattled to me about her brother,

"Mom! Joshua's 'tagonizing me! He won't stop 'tagonizing!"

I sure know what it's like to be 'tagonized by a sibling, Grace. Hang in there!

Well, Shucks

This weekend was the annual Corn Roast Festival. I love this yearly event and look forward to it for quite awhile. It was one of the first things that we did when we moved here and one of the things that really endeared me to this community.

This year it was moved to another location - a nice new park on the site of the old fairgrounds. It seemed much bigger and a lot nicer than the last two years we attended. Good times.

You should see these kids eat corn. Even Grace! I think I might enter Grace, Josh, and Ro into the corn eating contests next year. Not Chris, though... she's a pokey eater!

I wish I had pictures but of course we left the camera in the car.

On Sunday we* moved our bedroom furniture into the basement to make way for Pop. Tomorrow (hopefully), we'll paint his room (our former room) and then work on getting the carpets shampooed before he arrives in a couple of weeks. I'm excited!

*I did say we, didn't I? Truth be told, I didn't do anything. Ro did most of it and our friend Jeff helped with the moving stuff. Ro even washed our bedding! Don't ask me what I did; I probably couldn't tell you!

Pop's new room - ready for painting and cleaning:

Our new room in the basement. Gosh our bed is big!

They Say...

... that after awhile a dog and his owner begin to look alike. Although we've only had Wookiee about three months, I'm seeing that it's true:



But we took care of it:

Hoping Memaw brings her scissors when she comes 'cuz Wookifers needs a trim!

BKOCs

So school began this week and I think I'm the most excited. ;) It's been a fairly quiet couple of days around here. Although I miss having the kids around and the freedom to do fun things whenever we want, I definitely don't miss the fighting and the messes!

Both kids are the Big Kids on Campus - Chris is in her last year of middle school (yikes!) and Josh is in his last year of elementary. Doesn't seem like long ago that I walked Chris into her kindergarten classroom and helped her make a new friend. (Josh wasn't that shy - he didn't even look back as he walked away with his teacher.) Josh rode his bike on the first day - the first time ever I didn't see him to the door.

Sixth and ninth graders started on Monday, seventh and eighth graders on Tuesday, and everyone else today. I'm not sure why some kids need a couple more days than the others!

So Grace and I went to Storytime at the library today. She is doing really well with that. She isn't too shy to participate or too exuberant to be irritating. She loves making the 22-second-long crafts at the end, too. My only complaint is that it's too short. It takes me as long to drive over there, get her out of the car, and get situated in the room as it does for the storytime - and the craft included. (And if you ever went to Storytime at the Palmdale City Children's Library - it was sooo much better there. At least I'm the only one who knows the difference, I guess.)

And on the way home, I did something completely spontaneous and out of my comfort zone that I only ended up regretting a little bit. Kids are in school and it was a beautiful day, and as we drove by the lake I looked across to see only a couple of people on the beach! So even though I didn't plan on going and despite the fact that I DESPISE sand, we stopped by and played for a bit. Kudos to me, I must say, although I cut the trip short since I didn't bring anything to sit on or play with. Grace was fine just playing with her imagination in the sand and water, but I wasn't going to sit my backside on that gritty mess. ;) I did promise her that if the weather was just as beautiful we'd return tomorrow. I don't like crowds more than I don't like sand, so the emptiness and quiet of the beach was a big, big draw for me. I think I'm actually looking forward to it tomorrow!

:: Sigh :: This time next year, my oldest will be starting high school, and my middle one middle school. I'll have one year left with Grace before she starts. Goes by way too fast...