Two weeks in Review...

Ok, so it has been a couple of weeks and it seems like a lot has been going on. On Friday, August 29th, I picked the kids up early for school, picked up Terry from MTC and drove for about 9 hours over to Huntsville, Alabama. WOW, that was a very long trip. I think when we got to GA traffic pretty much came to a stand still for an accident that happened. We had to wait for about 5-10 minutes and finally got going then about 2 miles later there was construction. I believe we drove about 15 mph for about 1 hour on I-26. It was no fun. Thank goodness for a DVD player in the car. I don't think we got to Huntsville until about 9:30 their time. We did have a great time. The kids had so much fun. I believe it had been about a year since we had seen them so it was nice seeing them again. Tom (their boxer) has gotten pretty big. I was very proud of Riley because she really is not fond of big dogs but she did great with him. And Josiah loved him too but I don't know if Tom was too fond of him. I think Tom was not used to having somebody around that was actually smaller then him so he kept nipping at his face. But they had fun:)

Here are some pictures of the weekend.

We came back Monday night from Huntsville. And Tuesday was a BIG day for my Jester. It was his first day of school. He was so excited! He was amazing. He walked right into his class like he had been doing it for year:) I guess he had seen Riley do it for the entire year last year so he knew what it was like. Today was another big day for him (or should I say, me). While we were waiting in the car before school started, I asked him if he wanted to walk to his class by himself. At first he said no he didn't want to. I told him that was fine but to just let me know when he wanted to do that. So when his teacher came outside to "wave everybody in" I got out of the van to open the door for him so I could walk him to class. He said, "No, Mommy I am going to go all by myself". So he walked off. He kept looking back saying, "don't watch me mommy. Get back in the car and go home". I have to say, that made me sad. I did make sure he made it all the way to the door. WOW, my boy is getting big:( He loves it. He has such a good time at school. I asked him the other day who is friends are and if he remembered any of their names and he told me, "Mommy, my friend's name is (long pause)...Mrs. McMurphy (which is one of his teachers). I thought that was very cute;)

So, we are about 3 weeks into the school year with the other kids are enjoying it. Riley came home yesterday and was practicing writing sentenses on the white board. I did help her some spelling but other then that she did great:) Here is what she wrote:
I don't know if you can read it but is says:
Hi!

It is sunny.

It is cloudy.

We went home.

I went to art.

My baby girl is writing sentences. I can't believe it. I know she is so proud of herself. I also just introduced her to the "American Girls" book series and she seems to really like that. We are reading "Meet Kaya". It is about a "girl named Kaya, who is an adventurous Nez Perce girl whose deep love for horses and respect for nature nourish her spirit".I think she really likes it. I can't wait to get the other books for her. I think we are going to have fun reading these books. Some of it might be a little too much for her. But I try to explain to her and also ask her questions about what is going on. And she does really well. I know what Riley is getting for Christmas this year.

Joel finished reading ALL the Harry Potter books this summer so now he started reading "The Hobbit". He was not really interested in it at first. I think he just didn't know anything about it and he had no idea what a Hobbit was. But he sat down and started reading and they actually explained what a Hobbit was and then started getting excited about it. So now he is reading it. I believe he is enjoying it.