August 2016

Sorry this has turned into a month to month post. I think I FINALLY have all this picture downloading stuff figured out for now on our new computer. It doesn't help when I only get about 10 minutes of free time a week to work on it. That 10 minutes NOT being consecutive.

August has been busy, busy, busy. We've started school, visited Washington D.C., celebrated Mack's 3rd birthday, and earned a wrist cast over the past month.

I will try to update more often now that I know how to work my new computer (hopefully?) I'm just not sure why you can't take a picture, download it on your computer, and put it on your blog. They have to make everything so hard!!

August 4, 2016 brought the first day of school for Ellie and Emma. 2nd grade for Ellie, and Kindergarten for Emma. It was an emotional day for me because I had not properly prepared myself for Emma being gone. It hit me when I left her in her classroom and got back into the car. I worried about both girls on their first day this year. Ellie was entering a class that she knew no one. She was nervous, which made me nervous for her.

They both did awesome though and have had a great start to the school year so far.

Ellie was one of the few 2nd graders allowing their mothers to walk them to class the first day. She never asked me not to, but I heard from several other mothers that their kids wouldn't allow it this year. Thankfully, it never even crossed Ellie's mind...this year. 

Sorry this is blurry, I couldn't enlarge the thumbnails to see which picture I was clicking on. This is Elle escorting Emma to the car in pick up line after their first day. It brought a smile to my face to see Ellie looking out for Emma so sweetly.

Annual after the first day of school froyo trip. Mack was allowed even though it wasn't his first day of school yet. 

Mack finally got his turn at his preschool open house. He gets to repeat 2 year old pre-K this year. With an August 21st birthday and a September 1st cut off, we felt he might benefit from being held back.  We did a 2 year old class at the Episcopal church last year and we will be at the Methodist church this year. 

Worth's grandfather, Gramps, died last November. The family had a memorial service in Albany after his death, but his burial was at Arlington National Cemetery this August. We decided the girls needed to be there and took them out of school for 2 days to tour D.C. and to attend the funeral. They both knew and loved Gramps very much.

The plane rides went smoothly with them. We made sure our connections were spread out enough so we could take our time getting through the airport with these two silly girls. We crammed in a lot of touring for a 5 and 7 year old, but they handled it great. They loved D.C. and Ellie has asked me several times when we get to go back.

This is their first cab ride. They were thrilled that they didn't have to have boosters

They are standing in front of the Washington monument at the Jefferson memorial in this picture

Ellie insisted on a picture with this memorial for the nurses and  women who served in Vietnam. 

They found the dollhouse at our first Smithsonian stop. 

Dorothy's slippers

This was very exciting for them - The White House

A picture of the Capitol building from our trolley tour

Spirit of St. Louis. They took this picture for me to send to Papa. 

D.C. was unusually hot. It called for ice cream consumption

While we were gone, Mack had his first day of 2 y.o. pre K. Mama took him and sent me this picture. It made my morning!

Soon after our return from D.C. Mack had his 3rd birthday. He was thrilled and thought that his birthday was supposed to be all week long instead of just one day. HIs 3 year old stats: Weight: 25 and 3/4 lbs - 2%, and height 35 and 3/4 - 12%. He's little, no surprise there.

Waking up the birthday boy

His sweet sisters made him cards. They read them to him that morning. 

He finally got a transformer. He lifted one from the church nursery several months ago, and I made him take it back. He was so upset and didn't understand why he couldn't just keep it. I told him if he potty trained, I would buy him his own transformer. Since we are finally potty trained - that was one of his birthday gifts. 

The big gift was a bike!

We celebrated that night with hamburgers, hot dogs and cake with Grandma, Papa, E.W., and Mia. 

He handled being sung to much better this year. 

cake face

His birthday was on a Sunday, so the following Monday, I took doughnuts to his class for snack and had another small "party." No wonder he thought his birthday should last all week:)

To round out August, Ellie decided to sprain her wrist pretty bad. She had a different coach in gymnastics who was really working them. I was glad because their normal coaches are more interested in picking at their nails than working with the kids. Anyway, Ellie had done about 350 back walk overs, front walkovers, and back handsprings. I had seen Ellie shaking her wrist, but I didn't think anything of it until we got into the car and she started telling me she couldn't move it. I did a few provocative tests and realized that it might be worse than just a sore wrist. I thought she might have actually torn her TFCC. I splinted her and long story short, we ended up at a hand surgeon"s office the following Monday.

The only way to see if the TFCC is truly torn is through MRI or scope. The hand surgeon felt at Ellie's age, these would not be her first approach. The doctor opted for a cast for 4 weeks, then Ellie can go back into my splint for 2 weeks after that.

I believe this will not be our first gymnastics battle wound.

She just thought the splint was fun

Although she looks happy in this picture, reality set in of how long it has to be worn and there were lots of tears. We talked the surgeon into letting us try to remove it on Ellie's birthday. (1 week early) If everything looks good, she can just wear the splint at that point. 

Out of order picture from the post 1st day of school froyo

Hot stuff on his new bike.