Labor Day weekend

We had a fairly busy Labor Day weekend.  We were invited to our first Bar Mitzvah for one of Addison’s classmates.  I have never attended a Jewish ceremony before and I was surprised how familiar it felt.  Other than the Hebrew, it felt very much like the liturgical service that I grew up with in the Episcopal church.  We were running late so Matt had to take over curling Addison’s hair.  I have to say that he did a good job.  I wish I hada picture of him curling her hair, but we were running late!  Matt and I shopped for furniture after the Bar Mitzvah and bought a table for our breakfast room and patio furniture that I got for half off. Very excitingz. I had almost immediate buyer’s remorse and freaked out that the breakfast room table is going to be too big for the space.  I think it is going to be fine, but I won’t really know until it is delivered.  We are all excited that we will be eating at a real table for the first time in years.  Saturday night Addison went to a 80’s rock and roll theme party for her classmate.  Judging by the pictures and from what she told us, she had a good time.  She did her own makeup and she did a fabulous job, but Matt and I were freaking out a little at just how good she is at doing makeup.  She knows so much and owns more than I will own in my lifetime.  Regan rode her bike to the bookstore on Saturday and spent most of her birthday money on books.  She carried them home in her new handy dandy feminist bag that a friend got for her.  Sunday was pretty low key.  We all slept in.  Regan slept until 1:30.  Swim practice 8 times a week can really catch up to a person.  Matt cooked a gumbo, because nothing says gumbo like 90 degree weather.  Sunday night we went out to dinner with friends and we all put on real clothes.  I wish we would have taken a picture.  It happens so seldom.  Monday was pretty low key, too.  I finally got the last of the boxes cleared out of the breakfast room in preparation for our new table (I still have the office and garage to go) and I helped Addison go through and get rid of and organize some.  All in all a good weekend, but I will always wish that we had more time.  

Carrot cake by Addison

Addison loves to bake and one of her favorite things to bake is a carrot cake.  It is a lot of work and time consuming, but it is delicious.  Most impressively, she has honed her skills to be able to bake the entire thing herself.  Aunt Bonnie recently visited, in what we hope will become an annual visit as she visited us at the same time last year, to help us get settled in our new house (thank you, Aunt Bonnie) and Addison wanted to bake something for her.  Addison also shared some with some of our new neighbors who have been very welcoming to us.  They appropriately impressed with her baking skills.  

Happy Birthday Regan!

Regan has really gotten into bike riding within the last year.  Both of my kids have.  A big factor in choosing our new house was whether or not the kids could still ride their bikes safely.  Regan loves to ride to a local coffee shop and do homework or read her book.  She has been riding my bike or Matt’s bike since she grew out of the last bike that we bought her.  We have offered to buy her a bike, but she has been resistant and content to ride our bikes.  The one problem with that is that we could never ride as a family, but time is very limited around here and it was really never a problem.  The only thing she really likes to spend money on is books.  Almost as long as she could ride a bike, she has wanted to do a triathlon.  We registered her for one last year, but she broke her wrist and couldn’t participate.  This year she was able to participate and she was the fastest swimmer in the whole event and she did really well in the run, but her bike ride was the slowest in her age group and caused her to be last in herage group (6 out of 6).  The other kids had really fancy, I don’t want to know what they cost bikes.  Or as she texted me “the kids with the fancy bikes beat me.”  This lead to her finally agreeing toa new bike that she didn’t have to share.  I asked the bike shop people for a recommendation on a bike that she could ride around town, but would also be good for one triathlon a year and they recommended a trek.  They had one on sale, but of course it wasn’t the right size.  Anyway, here is a picture of her with her new bike on the side of our new house as well as a picture of her triathlon results. I know nothing about bikes, but bike people tell me it is a good bike.  We celebrated by riding as a family to a local Mexican restaurant for dinner and I hope we are going to make riding as a family a thing.  

We’re back...

After a long hiatus, I am thinking about blogging again.  I stopped, because I got super busy with the kids and social media became a thing,  but now my kids are older.  I am still super busy with them, but they now have a lot of opinions.  I should say they have always had a lot of opinions, but now they know social media exists and they have opinions on what is posted about their lives and I have to respect those opinions.  I do not want to be put in the cheap nursing home.  I’ve seen them, it’s not pretty.   I think blogging can be a way for me to document what I want to remember and for close family to enjoy (like it was when they were little.  Before social media took over all of our lives).  I plan to start from now, but to go back and post past things, as time permits,  mostly to get pictures and videos off of my phone.  As always, I will try to use proper grammar but there are a lot of holes in my education.  I have gone back and read some of my old posts and ouch with some of the grammar. I will also blame it on baby/toddler exhaustion.  I am a work in progress (as we all are, hopefully) and I am working to improve every day.

Painting Party

Addison and her school BFF

Addison recently got invited to the cutest party. It was at the park at their school and a lady came and taught them a painting class. It was similar to painting with a twist only for kids.

Children's Museum 5k

Regan and her running partner

Regan and I ran in the Children's Museum Race. She ran the one mile fun run with Matt and I ran the 5k. She came in fourth in her age group which is not bad considering that her age group is 6 - 9 and the first and second place finishers were 9 years old. The important thing is that she likes running and I'm hoping that she will continue to.

Our Friend's Camp

Addison's First Fish

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Regan's first fish

A couple of weeks ago our friends invited us to their families "camp.". It was an extremely nice weekend. It made me want a camp. If only there really was a money tree! : ). My girls got to fish for the first time and I'm happy to report that they loved it! I'm also happy to report that casting is like riding a bike. The only downside was that Addison caught a fish almost immediately. Which made it look really easy. Which did not make Regan happy when she did not catch a fish quickly. Thankfully, she did eventually catch one. And all was right with the world again.

Very busy, but very fun weekend in New Orleans

This past weekend was so busy I was worried it wouldn't be fun. But it ended up being one of the best weekends we have had in a long time. The girls were at Matt's sister's house all weekend. By all accounts they had fun (thanks Camille!). Matt and I (along with Philip and Meredith) met up with an old friend for dinner and then went to a surprisingly hilarious show, Adam's Family. On Sunday Matt had tickets to the Saints game through work. Which was awesome! I've been wanting to go to a game and these were much better seats than we would have ever payed for. Very Fun!

My Apologies

I'm sorry I've been MIA again. I've been very busy being Super Friend for some very good friends of ours that moved to Africa. We were their "family" here and we are very sad that they have gone.

IPad

Mermaid Lagoon

It has been raining all day due to Tropical Storm Lee. The girls watched Peter Pan which inspired Regan to draw Mermaid Lagoon.

Conversation

Addison: so and so stole so and so's boyfriend.

Regan: y'all are way to young for boyfriends.

Me: that's right. How old is old enough for a boyfriend?

Regan: (thinking)

Me: 16?

Regan: 24

Matt likes the way that Regan thinks. : )

Conversation

Regan: Mommy, Ascension is the best school in the world! Do you want to know why?

Me: Why?

Regan: because everyone that comes to Ascension loves it and everyone that has already been there loves it. Do you think it's the best school in the world?

Me: I think it's the best school in Lafayette.

Regan: Well, I think it's the best school in the world.

Addison: me, too!

Busy, Busy Weekend!

When it rains, it pours. We were invited to 2 birthday parties, a barbecue, and my kid's school had a family picnic. We made it to all except one birthday party, but we were exhausted!

Regan's Birthday

Our little princess wanted a rock climbing party for her birthday this year. You could have knocked me over with a feather! I think she's tired of swim parties. : ). It was a very successful, popular party. All of the kids seemed to have fun. I found a uniform that matches her school uniform for her American Girl Doll. She was very excited about that!

School

I, once again, will not be in the running for mother of the year. A mom of grown children once told me that being mom of the year is overrated, so that's my story and I'm sticking to it. : ). With that said, I did not take first day of school pictures this year. My only excuse with Regan is that she leaves really early and my brain doesn't function that early. I don't know what my excuse with Addison is.

Regan is loving school, of course. Her teacher seems nice and she has a really sweet class. And for the first time since we've been at the school her class is balanced with boys and girls. Up until now the classes have been boy heavy, which has been hard at times.

I'm room mom for Regan's class this year, which came as a shock to me. Unlike most schools, who are begging for volunteers, there are an inordinate amount of super moms who volunteer for everything and are room moms every year at my children's school. Up until now, I've been content to let them be super moms and I've sent the juice boxes. My motto has been I'm a good Indian and it's hard to find good Indians. Everyone can't be a chief. So imagine my surprise when I got the call to be chief. So far it hasn't been bad. Seeing as I am nosy by nature, I like being in the know on things. We'll see how it goes. I have three assistant room moms, so I think it will be okay. To put it all in perspective, Addison's class has five room moms.

For the first time ever Addison is loving school, too. She never liked school when she was at her last school. She would tell me every morning that she didn't like school and didn't want to go. I just thought that you don't get lucky enough to have two children who love school. Now I think she got unlucky with her teachers and was bored. There is a lot of commotion at her new school and I think she likes that. She tells us that her favorite is the sensory table. There is also another little girl in her class who has glasses and she and Addison have become fast friends.

Addison is most excited that there is an after school class for cooking. The after school classes start next week and she asks me every day when her class starts. Regan is taking the pottery class, of course.

Weekend Fun

Ever since Addison got glasses Regan has been dying for a pair. She thinks the cutest thing is glasses, freckles and braces. It has been somewhat helpful, because anytime Addison complains about her glasses Regan tells her how cute she is. So imagine her delight when she found fake glasses at Gymboree this weekend! She has been wearing them ever since.

We had a nice weekend in New Orleans. Matt has been working a lot lately and wanted to get away for the weekend. We went to the Northshore on Saturday afternoon and spent the afternoon with his brother's family. We took the kids to the children's museum in Hammond which is about the size of our children's museum. The kids had fun playing with their cousins, as always. I wanted to get a picture of all of the kids, but forgot.

Regan is Reading!!

Regan has been reading for a while now, but mostly only when it was required of her by me or school. But she recently checked out her American Girl Doll, Kit's, books on tape and was reading along with the recording. She then decided to read a Junie B. Jones book that Aunt Carla had given us a long time ago. I'm not a huge fan of Junie B. Jones. She's very Sassy. But I decided that as long as Regan knows that she's not aloud to talk like that and as long as I don't have to read them, it's okay with me. My mom bought her some and I got some from the library and she has read seven, so far. Today she read her first book all in one sitting. I'm so proud! I've always wanted my children to love reading!

Play Dates

One thing that we've done differently this summer is have lots of play dates. A definite downside of private school is that you don't necessarily go to school with the kids in your neighborhood. So you have to schedule play time for your kids. This is a stark contrast to how I grew up. I always played with whoever lived closest to me and they also went to school with me. It started with play group, which I was fine with because I was with my kids. But then it turned into drop your kid off, which I was less okay with because I didn't know the parents very well. But then I realized it's good for kids to get to know each other outside of the school setting. No one tells you how hard this parenting business is. The kids have fun playing with their friends. Addison thinks that she is seven, so we mostly had play dates with Regan's friends. They were kind enough to let her play. I don't know what Addison's going to do when she gets to pre-k4. She definitely doesn't think of herself as a four year old.