Young Party of Four

As of the end of today, we will have a first grader! There is a number in her elementary school placement! No longer just a letter ("K"). That is insane. Kenzie has seriously rocked her year in kindergarten this year. She is a learning superstar, for sure. She continues to love school. From the very first day we dropped her off, she went right into her classroom and made herself at home. She still lacks any sort of social anxiety. She is also still quite a rule follower (which teachers seem to really appreciate LOL) so she gets along well in a structured setting. When she is told to do something, she does it. Now, if we could just figure out how to get her to do the same thing all the time for us... that would be great. She made a ton of new friends this year and is so looking forward to next year. She knows a lot of her friends probably won't be in her class, but she has met a ton of kids in other ways, like Girl Scouts, dance, or outside on the playground or in PE ...

I just realized that it has been almost a month since our last blog. We have been so busy in the last couple of weeks, that blogging definitely took a backseat to everything else we have going on. I can't believe we are almost to Christmas. Christmas!! Eek! Ever have one of those weeks when it seems like the week was so very long and yet flew by in the blink of an eye all at once? That was this last week for us. Monday of this week seems like it was forever ago when we think about the fact that Kenzie was in school, yet when we think that my parents were in town for 5 days, it seems like they weren't here for more than a few hours. Crazy. This last week we celebrated Thanksgiving. This is always one of my favorite holidays. I like it for many reasons. One of which is the time we get to spend together as a family. Steven usually takes off for the week of Thanksgiving. We have our families over for dinner on Thanksgiving Day. My parents usually get a timeshare for the long week...

The kids have officially been in school for a little over a month (minus a week due to Hurricane Irma and her wrath... but that is another post for another time) and they are doing great! Will is blossoming in school. The more he goes, the happier I am with our decision to put him in a "year" earlier than Kenzie. Technically he is almost the same age she was when she started but because of how his birthday falls (especially compared to her), he is in a younger class. He is the oldest in the class, I think, but he is having a blast. I remember on his second day when I made it to his school a little early and planned to sit in the parking lot waiting for time to pick him up. His class was on the playground and he was running "with" his friends (they were mostly parallel playing but every now and then would interact some and it was adorable). He went down the big slide a bunch of times and waited in line to go down the smaller slide after some of his classmates. W...

I wanted to blog this as a routine check-in for me to go back to read one day if I want. It's interesting for me to detail some of our routines to see how they morph and change through the year(s). It took us a couple of weeks, but I think we have finally settled into a new routine. This school year has been a whole new ball game for us. Kenzie starts school in the morning earlier than last year. There are two schools I have to visit two days a week. Naps are way messed up on the regular. We have to deal with car lines for drop off and pick up of Kenzie. Kenzie sometimes wants to bring lunch and sometimes wants to buy it. Will is learning to function in a classroom with a steady teacher and peers (somewhat different from an hour or so at church once a week). And I'm learning how to balance my time without children under my feet versus the times when I have one or both of them with me. We started by setting a new routine about a week before school started. Now, when the k...

The time has come. As of today, we have officially sent both kids off to school. I'm doing remarkably better than I thought I would be. Haha! Two night ago (Sunday) as we got the kids ready for bed, Kenzie requested to read Oh, The Places You'll Go. She requested it because I had been talking about taking a picture of the kids together with it and we have read it before. Especially before events like the first day of school. I admit, as I sat in Kenzie's bed with both kids reading it, I had to fight the tears. Kenzie wanted extra hugs on Sunday night. I don't think she was nervous, but I do think she wasn't 100% sure of what Monday would hold for her. Part of it was more excitement than anything else. Will was just mad that he only had Meet the Teacher on Monday and not a real day of school. This kid was so excited to get to go to school like his Sissy and wanted to start right away. I feel like I should specify that I didn't pose her. This is solid Kenzi...