My birthday and the last day of school

Since Sophie's birthday is in the summer, we decided to celebrate it at school on the last full day...which happened to be my birthday! It was fun to visit her class, as always. It is so hard to believe this little lady is going to be 5 and in kindergarten in less than 3 months!!

She has absolutely loved her teachers these past two years!  Mrs Solem is giving Sophie her certificate of completion in this little picture.  She also taught Weston his second year of pre-school and has interacted with Sophie on a daily basis for almost 3 years!

Mrs. Kimball has also been wonderful!

For the past couple of weeks, Jason kept asking what I wanted to do on my birthday, to which I kept responding, "see the young women!" I have missed them so much.  Luckily, I got invited to join the Laurels that night for mutual, which was so much fun! Rebecca, Emily, Makenzie, Kaitlan, Kira and Cami were all there at Jaime Wolff's house.  There was food and games, but mostly just visiting and reminiscing.

These two beauties are about to graduate from high school, so it was their last activity in Young Women's after 6 years.  I was so happy I got to be there with them.

Earlier in the day I was pleasantly surprised by a few visitors!  Curtis came by with some pasteries (gluten free) and a nice gift. After that I literally had visitors all day!  I was so spoiled.  The Crowthers brought me these beautiful lilies (and a gift card to my favorite restaurant)! 

The mini roses are from the Wolff's, and the beautiful daisy plant is from Julie!  Katie also dropped by with a lovely gift.  I am truly surrounded by wonderful friends!

The next day, June 4, was the last day of school.  Sophie's class did a water play day, so me and Brighton joined in on the fun.  Here are just a couple of Sophie's friends.  I love the sassy hands on her hips pose she's got going on in these pics.  That stance pretty much sums up her  no-nonsense attitude!

After Sophie's pre-k was dismissed, we headed over to Weston's class, which was watching Frozen and eating ice cream.  Brighton knocked over a bottle of sprinkles...but at least he was helpful and tried to sweep them all up!

Once Weston spent a moment sitting in the stroller, every kid in his class wanted to try it too...and they all wanted me to take their pictures!

This last gem was actually from my birthday, I believe, but I just had to include it...little Brighton looking like such a big boy!  He fell asleep watching Curious George, and believe me when I say that I really didn't want to move him!                                                                

And now that school is over, bring on summer!

This week

This week was reading week at school. On Monday I got to read in Sophie's class. She picked the book, which was The Giving Tree (one of my all-time favorites). After, Brighton and I got to join her class at music time. It was SO MUCH FUN! I was on a high all day from going to preschool with Sophie. Seriously!
Yesterday was character day at the kids' school. Weston and Sophie wanted to dress up as Jack and Annie from The Magic Treehouse series...which they did. I thought it was absolutely adorable, although the only thing different about Sophie is that she actually wore tennis shoes (instead of sparkly shoes or boots)! Weston loved wearing the glasses, which I thought was super funny. I don't know if anyone knew who they were supposed to be, but they didn't care.  It was fun to see all of the kids at school dressed up as different characters.

I took this picture of Brighton today.  He is seriously the most adorable baby in the world!  I adore the baby phase. I am so thankful for this precious little man that God sent to our family.  He has a huge, infectious smile that I have yet to catch on camera.  No matter how jubilant he is, the smile completely dissipates the moment he sees that camera in front of his face!  I need an invisible camera.  Is that so much to ask?

Meanwhile, my amazing 88 year old Grandma is in town visiting!  She and my Aunt Sue (who I haven't seen in 5 whole years) just arrived last night and are staying with my mom.  They met us at Weston's t-ball game this evening.  It was the most b.e.a.u.t.i.f.u.l. weather ever!  The last couple of days I have actually been leaving doors and windows open, which in my opinion is absolutely heavenly.  I am cherishing it because I know this kind of weather doesn't last forever.  I was so excited for Grandma to meet Brighton for the first time and for my Aunt Sue to meet Jason and all of the kids!

Did I mention that Jason is coaching Weston's t-ball team?  He really does a great job.  Weston is having fun, too.  He seems to understand the sport just a little bit better than he did last year.

Waiting in line with his buddy, Camden, to bat.

More Brighton.  I pretty much take pictures of him whenever the camera is handy.  Wouldn't you?

Sophie is such a good helper when it comes to the baby (as is Weston).  She was sitting with the baby so I could get some laundry done this evening while daddy was out doing visits.  Weston didn't want to miss out so he had to jump in too (of course)...I think it is so funny how Sophie holds both of her brothers in such a motherly way, gathering them close to her. 

Brighton just looks shell-shocked from the camera flash!

A little while later the kids passed out on the couch (now if the baby would just go to sleep at a decent hour)!

Tonight while reading scriptures, Weston had some really deep questions.  I am so proud of him for actually thinking about the things we read and discuss.  Tonight he asked how Jesus could feel the sins and pains of the world if he was perfect and never had any of those problems himself?  How could a perfect person feel all that?  I was blown away.  He also asked some insightful questions about the resurrection.  I'll never forget him asking me how Jesus could love people that do bad things.  He asked me that when he was three!  I am glad that he's a deep thinker.  It was a great day!

First Day of School

This year Weston started Kindergarten and Sophie (after barely turning 3) started pre-school! Both kids love school...especially Sophie.  Their classrooms are in the same hallway, and they begin and end at the same time.  This makes my life easier!  They even play on the same playground in the morning when we get there. These are pictures from their first day. Here is Sophie showing off her new dress (courtesy of Grandma Laurie).

And the cute hair clip (a blue butterfly) that Auntie Shae-Leigh gave her for her birthday...

Weston was pretty excited too, as you can see!  His teacher this year is Ms. McBreen, who is a WONDERFUL kindergarten teacher!!  We couldn't be happier with her.  Weston likes her too, but was rather disappointed when he realized that he only gets 5 minutes on the playground every morning ...he was used to the 30 minutes of playing that he got in preschool.  He also kept telling us that he had no friends in class, which I found out wasn't true at all!  In fact, he is so friendly and chatty that the teacher had to kept moving kids around until she found the only two students in the entire class that he doesn't care to talk with (one because he's super shy and one because she's the "smelly kid")!  He seems to finally be settling into his new routine and is pretty content with it.

 

How can I not love this?  On the first day, I kept telling Weston to look after Sophie on the playground and take care of her - you know, since she's the youngest in her class and had never been to school before. 

 

 He dutifully (and lovingly) held her hand...until they got inside the playground area!  He immediately found a friend from last year and ran off in utter glee.  Meanwhile, Sophie ran off and started making her own friends...and I think she hardly even noticed that Weston wasn't there any more!

 Jason and I stayed a while, watching them play.  At some point, Sophie noticed that we were there and came over for one last pic... 

I felt a twinge of sadness leaving them both, but was pleased to see this note from Sophie's teachers after picking them up:

 Sophie was thrilled to show me her first picture!

 

Weston was much less excited about his, but I loved it and thought it was adorable.  It is still hanging on my fridge!

One of the highlights of my day is picking the kids up from school.  Every day, the kids are so excited to see each other!  They always give each other a big hug, and often times one or the other will yell, "Yay, Weston (or Sophie)! You are my best friend!" They may spend the entire car ride home fighting, but in that moment, they are always pretty thrilled with each other.  I am happy they have such great teachers and are learning so many new things...and that Summer is FINALLY over!  How I love the Fall!!

Finally, a school visit!

Weston's preschool at Duncan has a bunch of rules that I wasn't used to, because they didn't exist in his preschool last year (at Tartan). At the beginning of the year I asked Mrs. Solem about possibly visiting or helping out in the class sometime, to which she responded that she would have to look into it because they are supposed to have some kind of special forms for that, yada, yada, yada. Apparently parents haven't even been let in the classroom to bring treats on their kid's birthday! At our parent/teacher conference before Christmas break I brought it up again, and this time (obviously exasperated by all the red tape) Mrs. Solem said that she has tried for months to get permission the proper way, and that she was just going to start allowing it. So, Sophie and I got to spend the entire two and a half hours of preschool with Weston's class today! It was so much fun, and both kids were rather excited this morning (as you can imagine)!
Sophie had a blast... and even though she is only 2, she fit right in with the other kids! She got to sit next to Weston during circle time, and he was so sweet to her. I would have loved to snap some shots there at school, but I guess that would have been a *little* distracting to the other students (understatement)! Here is a video of the two of them before we left in the morning:


As we were driving home I asked Weston the usual question, "how was school!?" He told me that it was good, but he just wishes that I could have stayed with him in his class today (he often says he wishes that I could be one of his teachers in his class). Then he burst out into laughter! Silly boy. I'm just glad he is still young enough to want his mom around! :)

The New School

Some firsts are better than others. Last year, when Weston was 3, because of a speech delay, he qualified for the school district's awesome pre-school program. I was so nervous to send my little "baby" off into the big wide world of public school, but the instant I met his teacher my fears melted away. Mrs. Shelly is the single most awesome teacher in the whole universe! Seriously, I think she has super powers. She is one of those people that just oozes warmth and goodness... and I knew she loved my Weston. She genuinely loved each of the kids in her class, seemingly from the moment she met them! She had a system for everything, and always seemed to know the right thing to do.

Jason and I thought Weston would cry his first day of school but he didn't. He loved it from day one which was something of a small miracle! The whole year was incredible. Weston learned to talk, made great friends, and thrived with his awesome teachers.

The last day of school after saying good-bye to everyone, I came home and opened Weston's Spider Man backpack. To my shock there was a letter from Mrs. Shelly saying that she was taking a different position in the school district and wouldn't be returning to run the preschool program at Tartan Elementary. I was overcome with a wave of intense sadness! I had just assumed Weston would be fortunate enough to be with Mrs. Shelly another year... and that I would be lucky enough to volunteer in her class, which was run so perfectly! I thought about Mrs. Shelly a lot this last Summer and how much we were going to miss her.

Then, another unexpected thing happened. Sometime at the end of July or beginning of August we received a letter saying that Weston had been reassigned to a different school - Duncan Elementary. Duncan has only been open for a year, and this is its first year with the preschool. It is supposed to be a great school, and is only 10 minutes down the road... but when you compare that with Tartan, which is only a couple of blocks away, the change seemed a little ridiculous!

We had the opportunity to meet Weston's teacher before school started, and she was (is) really nice. Jason says she looks like she's 10 years old. To be fair, she looks closer to 20. The classroom wasn't decorated yet, and there was barely anything in the room at all when I took Weston to our "meet the teacher" deal... and no refreshments! I don't particularly care about the food, but when we went to the school, we just weren't feeling the love. Everything was cold and awkward. I was pretty sad about the whole thing, but trying to keep a positive attitude for Weston.

The first day of school was MADNESS. There was no parking on any street going in any direction around the school. Jason and I literally spent 20 minutes looking for ONE spot to open up. So even though we went with plenty of time to spare, we ended up being late after hiking up to the school from our parking spot, which left no time for first day of school pictures in front of the school! I was bummed. That entire day I found myself constantly comparing everything less desirable about this new preschool to everything that was so great about the last one. It's a long list, trust me!

When Weston got home the first day, he wasn't too happy. He said he didn't play with anyone, because he missed his "best friends." He told us he didn't want to play with any of the toys in the room because he missed his old (school) room with his old toys! Poor kid.

It was then that I realized how good for him this experience was going to be. Life is ever changing! You can't spend your life longing for the "good old days!" I figure now is as good a time is any for Weston to learn that awkward and unsettled beginnings can sometimes turn into the best experiences of our lives! To be honest, this situation reminds me a lot of how I felt when our ward was first formed a little over a year ago. There wasn't a sense of cohesion at all those first weeks. Most people felt torn about leaving their old wards that they had come from and just didn't know where they fit in. Looking back, I am astounded at how far we have come! I don't know a soul that would go back to their old ward now, because we have truly become a ward family.

I look forward to seeing what this school year will bring. Weston will undoubtedly make new friends and love his new teacher as he gets to know her. Not everything is magic at the beginning... but that doesn't mean it won't turn into something wonderful with a little bit of time and effort!

Weston got to eat anything he wanted for breakfast on the first day of school. What did he choose? A turkey sandwhich and chips. Here he is pretending to have a grumpy face, but he loved it (along with all the extra special attention)!
I tried to take a nice, smiley picture of him before leaving for school, but he did his goofy, over dramatic "I'm smiling so big that I throw my head back in glee" grin. So here is a nice picture of Weston's neck! For the record, his back pack this year is Iron Man.