281 Love Lessons

Sometimes love is a little rough around the edges.

Sometimes love turns us upside down.

Finding LOVE is always worth the search.

Remember to look for love daily, to appreciate what you love daily, and to TELL the people you love that you love them (even if it isn't in words).

Happy Love Thursday!

Visit Chookooloonks for her take on love and read through the comments for more links filled with love!

280 The rest of the 1st of 2nd

I totally forgot to mention that Katie's skirt was made by me. I think it is important to continue the tradition of wearing something Mom-made on the first day of school. My girl is much more rockin' than I ever thought of being! (Mom told me last night she was wondering why Katie's skirt looked frayed) And now you know why, too. When she picked out her shirt at Kohl's we also saw a really cute skirt with the "made from old jeans" look and black leggings underneath. Why buy it when you can make it??

I started with an old pair of Katie's jeans. These are 5Ts, but she can also put on her brothers 18month size jeans as Bermuda shorts.

You just rip the seams and realign them, stitch it up, and cut it off. A skirt is born. This is my first short skirt, but I have made full length skirts for Katie as well. In fact, she wore the full length one to her last day of school in 1st grade, I think.

And, of course I had to embellish it a little. Just some simple stitching (and you could not even see it under the shirt she wore). Sorry for the pics, it was night time when I finished the skirt.yes, she is still wearing the skirt, it just got pushed up when she sat in the bus. Good thing she is also wearing those leggings, huh!?While she was at school I made her a little purse our of one of the pants legs I cut off. Oh, and Sharpie markers :) I do love a good Sharpie marker!

We hadn't been home long from our dinner at Chili's to celebrate Katie's first day of school, when the sky went from gorgeous blue with puffy clouds to STORM ... and it went FAST!!! Needless to say, when we tucked away the floats and ran inside I cleared out the closet under the stairs. Luckily, we did not need it, but I had to have it ready. They called this "Significant Weather" in the alert on The Weather Channel site. It looks QUITE significant to me!

279 1st of Second

Yeah, I handed her the apple ... but she is the one that decided to actually bite it.

Oh, the leggings ... baggy.

The silliness in these pictures are all Katie induced.
She was VERY excited about her first day of school!

This is Katie's "Mooooooooom, can't you stop taking pictures and leave" face

.... and you know I will have to add some more when she jumps off the bus this afternoon!

278 Picture Heavy

Usually my Mom is lecturing me that I put up too many pictures of the kids or that I give out too much information, but she has changed her tune (for now) ... She has put in a request for pictures of the kidlets, so I must oblige. We have just been hanging around the house, splashing in the pool, so most of the pictures look the exact same from one day to the next. Katie rarely changes her swimsuit. It gets washed every couple days, and she puts it right back on. But, Grammy can't stand not looking at their sweet little faces, so here goes ...
The kids have perfected redneck surfing. They pull the air mattress up to the stairs and leap off. Sure, they don't go very far, but they have been having an absolute BLAST! And how many Mississippi kids can say they spent the summer surfing? One of Katie's favorite, end-of-the-season finds.... This is the THRONE, complete with drink holders. I was trying to keep Connor occupied while the big kids swam, but Nooooo, they had to horn in on his carwashing fun. And of course they completely took it over (and used up all of my dishwashing liquid) Connor got over it when I put him in his swing. He loves LOVES loves to swing! The higher he goes, the bigger he smiles. This is the one where my Mom has to catch her breath....
I finally took Katie skating. Well, I took Katie and Mia skating. Chip was at work, so I had to take Connor with us, and since I could not strap on some skates I decided a friend was the next best thing. They did SO good! I was terrified the whole time. It wasn't packed, but there were kids zooming around everywhere! Anytime I lost sight of Katie for an instant I was scanning the back corners. She fell (duh) but she kept getting back up. It amazed me that as many times as people fell no one was run over! People would just calmly skate around them, even the little kids could easily navigate around. Maybe we should have been doing this all summer....
But then again, maybe not. It did not get too expensive until the girls wanted to play games. Since it was the end of the year, and there would not be many more chances (and it meant that they were not whirling around the rink) I said yes. Katie played three games of Skee Ball. On her last game, on her very last ball, she somehow managed to hit the edge of the game and the ball went rolling off into trafffic. Luckily, there was a very alert kid who reached down and scooped it up. He came skating back around with a slightly confused look on his face, but he just laughed and handed it over.

Don't you just love how cooperative Katie is when I want to take her picture? Off to OPEN HOUSE! Daddy looks super manly with Katie's new backpack :) Could be worse, could have been Hannah like last year. You know Daddy did not care though. Friday morning I was up bright and early, and you know what happens when you are up bright and early? You actually get to see the morning glories blooming :) I brought some inside and put them in a tiny vase. I actually LOVE the way they wilt into little circles. Too Cute! Saturday, we finally made it to the local library to get Katie her library card!! Chip and I got our cards, too. Katie had fun building this poor guy. She must, she did it a couple times.Tomorrow is the first day of Second Grade!! It is going to be hard to turn Katie loose! We have to break in a new teacher, and get to where we can totally trust her to take care of our little girl while we aren't there. It is very hard to let go! Wish us luck!!

277 SOOC Saturday

A beautiful sunset, enjoyed the best way. On the deck, pushing Connor in his swing and listening to Katie splash in the pool. A perfect end to a summer day! ...too bad everyone has satellite dishes on the backs of their houses these days. Can't they switch to cable to improve my pics?? Insensitive!!!

Check out SOOC Saturday at Slurping Life, and don't forget to say hello to Melody and all the other SOOChearts out there :) yeah, I said it. Don't shoot me. I get to be silly sometimes!!

276 Love Thursday

Happy Love Thursday!

Check out other testaments to the power of love at Chookooloonks!

Hope you don't get "tricked with love" :) You will have to follow the link and watch the video to get Alex's take on love. Hope you always experience the "nice" love.

275 Back to School

We spent all day yesterday shopping for back-to-school supplies. We bought the requisite first day of school outfit (which Katie wanted to wear today - we said no). We bought the MASSIVE amount of things on the school list. And I do mean massive. You have to think, there are approximately 25 kids in each class. The supply list asks for 5 boxes of tissues! 125 boxes per classroom. There are three grades in this school, about 8 classes per grade. WHERE ARE THEY STORING ALL THE BOXES OF TISSUES!!!??? And each kid has to bring in FOUR bottles of hand sanitizer, one container of Lysol wipes, and a container of baby wipes. How dirty are our children? Their hands are going to dry up and crumble. Not to mention all the packs of paper, dry erase markers, and permanent markers. Oh, and they had to bring in a box each of ziploc bags in snack, quart, and gallon sizes. Does the school budget not cover anything anymore?? Why can't they just buy what they need IN BULK and then divide by the number of kids? I would much rather pay a fee than search multiple stores to fill a list. Yeah yeah, there are kids who can't afford to pay the fees. Fine, maybe one of the almost weekly fundraiser events could be to cover their supplies. One of my friends went to eight different stores searching for a pack of construction paper. And while they are at it, can they just put on the list NO LICENSED CHARACTERS. We had to find cool notebooks. Couldn't make do with the $.15 notebooks.

Gone are the days when you bought a pack of pencils and a new Trapper Keeper each year. And I can almost promise you that we did not have to bring FIVE boxes of Kleenex to school.

I am pretty proud of Katie for picking out a backpack and a lunchbox WITHOUT Hannah Montana (or any other character) on it!

It wasn't so very long ago that I was dreading Katie's first day of kindergarten. Sure, we had a good reason to worry about her going to school. She is diabetic, and other than a babysitter with medical training, she had never been away from us for any period of time. We caught a break when we found out she has monogenic diabetes and she went on pills. Once the blood sugar was under control, and she was settled in I started to enjoy having a few hours of peace every day ... well, for two months I did. Then I was glad that I did not have to worry about her being jealous of Connor receiving the bulk of the attention. I had guilt free baby time during the day, and lots of family snuggles at night. The first summer vacation passed quickly, and she was off to the 1st grade.

This summer vacation has not passed as quickly. I am totally looking forward to a little downtime! I feel horrible for saying that, but I can't wait!!! I have had enough attitude to last me through the school year. I think she is ready to go back, too. She wants to see someone other than her family and her little circle of friends. I can't blame her. I bet the tune will change when they take their first test.

Just a few more days to hold on to my sanity. I can't wait to get her back on a schedule, and then Connor back on a schedule. I think I can make it that long ... I hope I can!

And I get to add another first day of school picture to the group :) now to decide whether to let her ride the bus ......