Maddie just turned 5 months old - so hard to believe! She is downing her veggies! I've learned that she likes her fruit to be right from the fridge cold - not warmed up or room temperature, but cold. She's also not a very "clean" eater yet - it doesn't help that if you don't get another spoonful of food in her mouth fast enough, she starts chewing on her hands. I have noticed that she sleeps in even longer now that she's getting a super full tummy the night before! It use to be that she would go to bed around 9:30-10:00 and be up by 6:00-ish, but now she's sleeping in until about 8:00! She's such a good, happy baby though (except when she's having tummy troubles, right Grandma Joanne?). Mamaw bought her a jumperoo that she just loves! She goes to town bouncing in that thing!! We've been trying to get outside, but with all of this rainy/cool weather it makes it hard. She thinks everything is funny now and just cracks up at the cats and Bruiser! I do think we need to socialize her more though - it's pretty obvious that she's with me all day/every day. I want people to see the fun Maddie not the sad Maddie!!
Both of the boys have baseball going on now. In fact, Kiegan has a 7:45 game tonight with a practice before-hand at 6:30 - YUCK! It looks like it may get rained out though. Patrick is suppose to have a game tomorrow night, but if the weather does what it says it's suppose to do then it might be cancelled too. I might actually be able to make it to his game if it doesn't get cancelled and if my one daycare mom actually picks up her girls on time!
Summer break has officially started for all 3 of the kids! Lexi's summer tutor will be starting this week and thank goodness she FINALLY cleaned her nasty bedroom b/c that's where a lot of the tutoring will be happening, especially if it's during the day when the daycare kids are here. My mom helped me to rearrange her bedroom and I think it really opened her room up more and gave her more floor space! The boy's room still needs cleaned before Kiegan's tutor starts here in a couple of weeks.
The daycare is still going strong although I will lose a few kids over the summer b/c their moms are teachers. Hopefully I can take on some drop-ins here & there to keep the checkbook happy! :o) I have a new baby starting in August (his mom is a teacher too) - he's a chunk! He'll be about 4-5 months old when he starts coming here so that will be fun. I need to get on the ball with my weekly newsletters and website - I've been slacking a bit!
What else....oh we down-sized our TV from a 55-inch console with tower speakers that took up half of our living room to a 42-inch LG flat screen. Our living room has so much more room now! Plus the picture on this flat screen is awesome - we thought the picture was great on the other one too, but there is quite a difference. We originally went into Wright's looking for a new couch - the one we have now is SUPER old. I think I bought it about 9 years ago?? The recliners on both ends are busted, the wood is poking up between the cushions and it is NOT comfortable. So we ordered one that should match the recliner and ended up walking out with a new TV too!
I've got all of my flowers planted and the garden is good to go. Although I did have to replace a couple of my tomato plants that got trampled by a certain dog (and it wasn't Bruiser!). Let's just say that this dog is lucky that I love him so much!! :o) I ended up planting some cantaloupe, watermelon, green & red peppers, banana peppers, tomatoes, lettuce, rhubarb, broccoli, cauliflower, strawberries, pickling cucumbers, regular cucumbers and I think I'm forgetting one or two other things. Hopefully it will all grow!
A big decision that we have decided on is to pull Lexi & Kiegan out of St. Mary's and send them to public schools next year. Travis was convinced that we needed to do this WAY before I was, but the final straw for me was when some faculty members told me that "Kiegan has drawn the short straw in life and will forever struggle no matter how much extra help he gets." This was their response to me pushing to get him more than just 45 min./day - 4 days a week of help next year. So I take that as them telling me that they were pretty much giving up on him which is unacceptable for a school if you ask me. There are a handful of other things about the school that we are very unhappy with, but this is one of the bigger ones. The kids & I toured the Jr. High and Washington School a couple of weeks ago and I was very impressed with both schools. The principal at Washington is also a big St. Mary's family and he said that we will see a WORLD of a difference in Kiegan next year. We learned that private schools are not required to get struggling students extra help (which explains why it's been so difficult getting that for Kiegan) and that public schools are required to do that plus keep detailed documentation of it all! The best part of it all is that Kiegan will be getting the extra help he needs every single day - all day long if need be right there in his classroom! He'll no longer have to miss class time to walk to another school for a mere 45 minutes of help. I felt so much relief and hope for him! Lexi is also super excited about the Jr. High - there's one class in particular where they learn "every day" skills and she is really looking forward to that class! They have different stations in the room where they learn different skills - laundry, cooking, electricity, money, car motors, checkbook, etc. She's also planning on trying out for softball and volleyball plus join some of the different clubs they have there. I think she will just blossom as well! As hard as this decision was for me, I feel so much relief in making it and I think it will make a world of difference in their school experiences!!
I'll get some pictures posted sometime soon - it's just a pain to do it and takes about an hour so I keep putting it off!
