First Day of PreSchool

Well many of you probably know that our kids have been going to daycare full time pretty much their whole lives.  As the oldest, Sawyer went the longest, starting when she was 3.5 months and continuing till this past May when Margot was born.  While she's had a good summer off at home and we've done lots of fun stuff as a family, this girl was really excited to get back to school. Real school this time.  Since we knew with three kids daycare was no longer the right choice for us, we signed Sawyer up for Pre-K through our school district.  At first I was slightly overwhelmed with all my options - Catholic schools, a gifted school, the school district program, and even whether to request special approval from the superintendent to go to Kindergarten early since our cutoff is Sept 1, which she misses by 25 days.

I went for the district since that's where we intend for her to do elementary school and the path of least resistance to not skip Pre-K, and after our visit day yesterday feel great about our choice.  There are several kids in Sawyer's class who have September birthdays, and for a 15-16 kid class there is one teacher and two full time assistants who all seemed wonderful.  So, the whole family went over to Sawyer's school yesterday for a little visit.  Her classroom itself is super nice, she has a friend from daycare in her class, and her teachers were wonderful...one of them even grabbed Margot for a bit to get some baby love in.  Poor Isla loved it so much too that I feel bad she's not yet old enough for 3 year old preschool.  When the teacher took Sawyer off to get a picture Isla yelled after her, "Do you want my picture too?"  We will definitely be signing her up to do two years of preschool starting next year.

At any rate, today was the big start day.  Sawyer goes Tuesday thru Friday in the afternoons.  Last night she picked our her outfit, and got herself all ready today.  Mark said she was asking all morning whether it was time to go to school.  She did allow me to take two quick pictures before they left.

I stayed home with Isla and Margot while Mark drove her over.  He said that she didn't even really say goodbye, just walked right on into the school when they opened the doors (parents don't walk them inside). No hug or anything.  I'm so proud of her because on Monday she was a bit shy meeting her teacher, but I'm guessing that was because we were around.  It's crazy because despite taking my kids to daycare all these years, I've been excited for her all day myself.  I know she's going to love it and I can't wait till we have dinner tonight to hear all about it.

I hope it will be good for Isla to get some one on one time as well.  She's grown up a lot lately though as our most emotional child (so far) she will probably benefit from some focused attention, and a chance to think a bit more independently from Sawyer.  Lately we hear a lot of "I need to talk" from her, but she often doesn't know what to say after that so maybe this time apart from Sawyer will let her find her voice a bit more.

 Here she is riding her bike in the garage while Mark was out taking Sawyer.

And just because I love this girl so, I found this picture on my phone from this weekend and thought I'd post it.  I was reorganizing Margot's clothes for Fall and came across this little winter hat that I bought for Isla when I went to Dublin.  Her head needs to grow a bit more but I just love how happy she is.

Three Months and Counting

Well the inevitable happened - my maternity leave is over and I've gone back to work.  I have to say, first week kind of sucked.  I didn't really want to be there, though I'm hoping that this week is better.  I have more things I need to do this week so the busier I am, probably the better.  In the meantime the girls have had trips to the park with Mark and have been enjoying the last of summer.  Sawyer starts up school this week which is exciting.  We will go to meet her teacher tomorrow, and then on Tuesday it begins.  I think she's ridiculously excited and it will be nice for Mark to break up the day for all of them.

This weekend Mark took Sawyer and Isla to Manchester and saw Grandma and Grandpa and Uncle Ted.  I got some updates and calls through the weekend and it seems they had an amazing time.  Mark will have to update in detail if he wants, but I think there were trips to the park, pizza, and even more flying.  Isla made her first two trips up in the plane with Grandpa as well.  Last time I was there she didn't want to get in the plane at all, and now she went up once with Sawyer, and once with Mark and seemed quite excited by it.

That left Margot and I home by ourselves, which was really nice.  This was the first time that we had spent a good amount of time alone, and I was happy to have it - kind of like I did with the previous two kids.  We didn't do much of anything - took some walks, hung out and "talked" to each other, and god lots of cuddling time in.  Turns out that even though we can't get her to take a nap longer than 30 min anymore, she takes great naps if I hold her the whole time, or let her sleep on me.  Not practical in the long run, but it was nice for this weekend.  Besides...we were celebrating her 3 month birthday on Saturday so she deserved it.

She's getting to be such a big girl.  Her thighs are getting so big it's sometimes hard to get her out of this chair.

 Isla on the other hand has no trouble getting in and out of it, and wanted her picture taken with Margot

 I caught one of her smiling, but really she isn't always so keen of the attention her big sisters throw her way.  They often grab too tightly and smother her a bit so this is a bit more realistic.

 A few snaps from last week - girls were doing movie and a picnic and let Margot hang out on the blanket with them

 They even tolerated a picture when I put her in between...

And finally, since I'm not really in a writing kind of mood, I'll share a few pictures I took this weekend of Margot.  She's quickly growing out of her three month clothes so I wanted to snap her in one of my favorite dresses.

She did pretty well sitting out there, though when I tried to get a few of her on her belly she would flip herself onto her back within seconds.  I never had a chance to pick up the camera she was so fast.  Girl likes to be able to look around so she's spending a lot more time propped up.  She has also found her hands so she spends a lot of time grabbing her head, her hands, and starting to reach for things.  Regardless, she's a very happy, wonderfully squeezable kid.

And now, before I head off to bed, there's one last thing on my mind.  I've been thinking about the names of our girls, and I want to remember some of the other names we considered for each.  So far, no regrets - I think all three names fit the kids perfectly.  But for Sawyer, we also went to the hospital with Willa which I still think is really pretty.  For Isla, we were also considering Ivy and Winnie.  Some of my family may find Winnie funny as when I was growing up I was sometimes compared to that character on the Wonder Years show, but I just liked the name at that time for some reason.  And finally for Margot - her name was hard because we wanted something that worked with the other two.  At one point Hazel was a front runner and I liked Evelyn and Evie for awhile, but it really came down to either Margot or Wesley.  I love the name Wesley for a girl, but since Sawyer's name is also somewhat masculine we didn't want people to think we had two boys and a girl, instead of three girls. So Margot the little pearl it is.  Now let's just cross our fingers and hope when they're older they think we made the right choice.

We Are Rolling

So just a quick update here.  Not much to report from the previous week - it was pretty quiet all around on our end, though I did start up with some yoga classes which was fun.  Long story short is I'm starting to try and get my fitness level back and so have tried Vinyasa yoga, which I'm digging.  It's in 90 degree heat which I like, but man it's quite possibly the hardest exercise I have ever done.  I am absolutely the worst in class and leave looking like a sweaty mess but I leave feeling refreshed and with a much quieter head than before.  I did a one week trial but my plan is to continue to try and go to 1-2 classes a week when I return to work.

This weekend we actually had some things planned though and headed about 30 miles away to hit up a waterpark hotel with Ann, Ted, and the boys and the Draheims as well.  Was a really fun little getaway with time spent at the waterpark on Saturday and Sunday, some time at a giant arcade, and just generally some fun time spent with family and friends.  Sawyer and Isla both seemed to enjoy themselves though I'd say we're maybe a few years early from really getting full use of the facilities.

There were three different areas of water slides - the smallest we spent time in on Sunday, and was the area I think both girls enjoyed the most.  Sawyer would go on all three water slides there, while Isla stayed on the small two and would only go if I was directly at the bottom waiting to catch her...even though she was only landing in about 1/2 foot or 1.5 feet of water and could stand/sit, though she did figure it out by the end that she could do it herself.  We never made it on any of the really big water slides as one of us had Margot, and the other was with Sawyer and Isla, though we did spend time in the middle size.  Sawyer went on the smallest of those water slides twice but ultimately wasn't loving the thrill.  Instead she would have Mark or I go down and wait at the bottom.

We got home Sunday and were surprisingly tired from our mini vaca.  I think we were both thankful that we didn't have "work" on Monday.  Now if we can just get our kids to cut us a break so we can catch up on sleep life would be good.

But the real reason I wanted to make sure I posted was so I didn't forget to update on Margot.  Our girl continues to have such a sunny little disposition and I just love when she gives me a big grin because she catches me in her sights.  Her smile lights up her eyes the exact same way that Sawyer's do, which I have always loved about Sawyer.  She had me smiling earlier this week as she did her first full night of sleep - huge shout out to you Margot because I woke up that morning loving life.  Initially she slept 7p till 4:30a which felt nice, but then she rocked out 7p till 6:30a the very next night.  She's regressed a little with earlier wake-ups and a couple where she's needed her binky a few times a night until she put herself back to sleep, but overall we're done with middle of the night feedings which feels nice.  Neither Sawyer or Isla was sleeping through the night when I went back to work, and this will be my shortest of the three maternity leaves, but I'm thinking I'm better at figuring out what her schedule is/should be so that helped it all come together faster.  Now we just need Isla to stop waking up in the middle of the night!

The other exciting thing that happened is that Margot rolled over from front to back today!  It was totally random as I had just gotten off the phone and brought Margot down stairs.  For whatever reason I put her on her stomach so she could watch Isla and Sawyer playing and within about 10 seconds she flipped herself. I swear she has not been remotely close before so it came as a big surprise.  Of course I quick turned my phone on and caught the second time on camera.  She's getting to be such a big girl!

Anyway, we have taken no pictures lately so nothing much to share but planning to take advantage of the nice weather this week before work starts, and then school starts for Sawyer the week after.  Tick tick tick...reality is setting in.

Home Sweet Home

It took a little bit of time to get ourselves back into our routine post vacation.  First up on importance was catching up on sleep and then getting the kids back to a normal sleep schedule.  I think we're close to where we need to be for when Sawyer starts school but maybe 30 minutes more earlier to go.  Isla has been a little big of a bugger - she keeps falling out of bed at night and waking up around 4am which then requires me to either lay with her or for her to come in bed with us, though last night she slept 12 hours straight so maybe we've turned a corner.

Also on tap right when we got home was Margot's 2 month doctor appointment.  Our girl is 12 lbs 3 oz and grew to 23 inches.  They were very happy with her growth, though she was not at all impressed with the 5 shots she was given.  The other kids would cry briefly when they got shots and then take their pacifier.  Margot was deeply upset and cried a good 5 minutes after her shots.  She has a good disposition normally but this seemed to set her off, and she was not herself the rest of the day either.

 Not so happy that Dad left her in this uncomfortable chair, but still cute as a button.

As for the girls, they also seem happy to be home and with their toys.  We are hoping to get out for some bike riding shortly in the hopes of expending some energy.  Their big downfall is they do not nap.  Isla is more stubborn than Sawyer and has also refused lately.  You would think this would make them fall into bed each night but it doesn't.  If we tire Sawyer out she's the easiest, but Isla is deep in the throes of terrible two-ness.  She usually comes down stairs at least once a night after we put her to bed - she covers her eyes as if we can't see her.  It's pretty funny to watch but oh so annoying when she won't sleep.

Playing well together...

Posing...

 Big Time

This all happened when I was out getting groceries.  These girls behave so well for Mark when I'm not around but become much whinier when I am around.  Drives me nuts.

They seem so sweet sometimes...

 But really they just like to gang up on us...I like to call this "children unite"

 A big part of this week was also a bit of Buffalo detox.  When in Buffalo our eating habits are very abnormal, with a whole lot of pizza, chicken wings, cheeseburgers, and fries in the diet.  Needless to say we were in need of some normal eating so we've been doing fish and vegetarian dishes all week, and I've been testing out a bunch of my pinterest recipes which have been seriously good.

It's been a very quiet week as Isla and myself seem to be fighting something off, and same goes for the weekend till we're 100%, however we did get out of the house on Thursday to keep our sanity and because it was such a nice day.  We headed over to the arboretum that is pretty close to our house.  I think Mark and I were both envisioning the day when we could go minus kids and do the walking/hiking trails or bring bikes.  But I digress, as we had all three kids and as a result stayed relatively close to the visitor center. Lucky for us they put some very nice things nearby.

After running all the way up the hill, both girls came back and posed for a few pics on the stairs.

 Not quite twirling...

Next we headed over to the hedge maze.   

We played follow the leader as Isla and Sawyer took us around.  Luckily it's not too complicated of a maze and it was easy to get out.

Finally we headed into the Children's garden which had a bunch of different climbing areas, lookout areas and ponds, playgrounds, etc.  Probably their favorite area though was the Slow Moving Stream that you could walk through and climb on rocks.

 Walking the rocks...

And picking up big rocks.  

 And posing...

Margot didn't get to walk the stream, and we kept her toes out because it was a little chilly, but she and I hung out in the shade together.  This summer off has been fun because we've actually taken the time to explore so many of the places near us that we'll definitely be going back to.

Two more weeks of maternity leave left and three until Sawyer starts at Pre-K so time to start getting organized.