First Day of Preschool

Ava was so excited for her first day of preschool. Her new school is a pre-K curriculum. Very structured. She could actually start kindergarten here next year. Not sure I'm ready for that! Her birthday is 10 days before the cut off, so she'd be the "baby" in the class.

She goes three days a week, in the afternoon. Here is her daily schedule:

12:45-1:00 Opening, Religion

1:00-1:15 Language Arts

1:15-1:30 Playground (Mondays) Gym (W, F)

1:30-2:20 Art, Free Choice, Centers

2:20-2:35 Bathroom Break and Snack

2:35-2:55 Math, Music, Science, Social Studies ( I assume that they don't do all 4, every day in the allotted time period)

2:55-3:10 Show and Tell. Ava's day for show and tell is every Monday.

3:10-3:15 Closing Prayer, Dismissal

She also will go to library every Wednesday and gets to check out a book (big stuff)! Every child has a turn at the classroom jobs (ex. line leader, weather helper, napkin passer). She will go to chapel once a month and the class does a monthly cooking project in the cafeteria too. Today she came home with the alphabet bag. I guess being at the front of the alphabet qualifies her for first spot. We have to fill it with things that begin with "A" by Friday.

I'm excited to see all that she's going to learn this year!

Here is a clip of her right before we left for school:

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M.I.A.

From this blog, that is.
So here's where I've been: 2 weeks ago, I took the girls for a visit back home. My sister-in-law was due with their 2nd baby so I scheduled a visit around my beautiful, new nephew's arrival. We spent the first few days visiting my parents. Ava had a blast playing with cousins and catching butterflies on the farm. I got to catch up with my sisters, got a little pampering (a day at the salon and then a spa pedicure) and my dad's side of the family came over for a dinner. Some of my family on that side had not yet met Emily. It was so nice to see everyone. On my sister-in-law's due date, we headed down to Mike's parents and I got to meet baby Tyler. I also got to go out a couple of nights and catch up with some good friends while Grandma Pammy babysat. Ava and Emily were loving their visit as well. Ava had play dates with cousin Nicholas and Emily had a play date too! The girls got to enjoy playing on the lake and in the sand and Emily took her first boat ride in Papa Nick's boat.

We made it back here just in time to spend Labor Day as a family. We took the girls to a kiddie park and then had a cookout at Mike's office. Monday night, I fell into bed exhausted from our travels and a big day of family fun. Ahhh, I thought. My bed. Home sweet home. I'm gonna sleep soooo good tonight. And I did...for the first 2 hours. Then, Ava developed her most painful ear infection ever. I've never seen a kid in so much pain. I've heard the term "writhing with pain" but I'd never actually watched anyone do it. Now I know. It was awful. Also on Monday night, Emily's other front tooth decided to pop through. It was one of those nights that you know you will eventually encounter as a parent...both kids screaming....the night that seems to go on forever.

On Tuesday I spent part of the day at the pediatrician's office and the other part keeping the kids happy and trying to unpack our bags. On Wednesday I had to start cleaning and laundry because company was on their way for the weekend. 2 couples and my in-laws were coming to stay with us for a wedding. Here is also where I would have updated the blog, had I not left my camera cord back in Indiana. I hoped to post pictures of our trip, now there are 200 pictures to sort through. On Thursday my mother in law arrived to help with the girls so that Mike and I could attend a dinner for our a friend that got married over the weekend. Friday was crazy with an attempted trip to the mall and grocery shopping for our company. My father in law and our good friends from Lexington, KY arrived in time for dinner. Our friends from Chicago got in later. We had fun sitting around the fire and telling old stories and hearing new ones. Saturday, the ladies went hiking while the men shopped for the wedding gift. Love that! Then we all reconvened to get spiffy and put on our dancin' shoes before the wedding. Saturday night we hit the town in our mini van and had a fantastic time tearin' up the dance floor at a Yacht Club wedding reception. Sunday morning came early. This mamma's not used to 3 late nights in a row! We went downtown for lunch with our friends and said goodbye to everyone. Last night as I served up a quiet mac n cheese dinner, Ava said, "It's nice that everything is back to normal now." I agree. We had so much fun, but it's been a whirlwind couple of weeks.

Of course, today was Ava's first day of preschool, so my feet hit the floor running again as we were in charge of snack and it was her day for show and tell. But I did manage to get her and everything required into the car and then into her classroom. I even put the house back together a little bit while Emily napped this afternoon. The forecast might hold "normal" in it for our family...at least for a week or two.