#1

Oh, my, it just seems so hard to believe that soccer season is here once again. What's even harder to believe is that Luke has been playing soccer for 4 years. Each year he improves, and each year I enjoy watching him more and more. He is by no means the fastest boy on his team, but he's pretty good in his own right. He's a good defender, and he loves playing (which really is the point, isn't it?) He has gotten pretty good at sliding to kick the ball, and even though they're not allowed to do that at this age, it's hard to discourage him from doing something he's good at (and that he'll be allowed to do next season.) He is ultra-competitive when it comes to playing the Wii or playing a board game, but that competitiveness hasn't translated to the soccer field. So when he does show a little gumption and aggressiveness on the field, I'm reluctant to squash it.

OK. The cutest soccer player. Ever. I mean, really. How can you top that?

See #7 (that super-cute #1 is throwing him the ball)? He is good. Really good. Going-to-be-snapped-up-by-a-select-team good. I love watching him play. He has amazing natural talent, and it doesn't hurt that his dad played soccer. I imagine he came out of the womb kicking a ball. Luke readily admits that Kenneth is the best player on the team. He claims the #2 spot for himself.


Here is a soccer side note. I'm not sure if I've ever shared this, but if I have, I think it's funny enough to share again. Up until four years ago, my husband called soccer a "communist sport". He is a die-hard football fan and has never been keen on soccer. Having a son who plays soccer has helped him change his tune a little bit. He even watched the World Cup this summer and got REALLY into it. Just thought I'd let y'all know.

Noah's "first" day of preschool

OK, so I know my two loyal readers have been anxiously waiting for me to post the second day of school pictures. Here they are. They aren't good. We were having a good morning until Noah got mad at me because I had to finish getting ready and couldn't play with him. So, when it was time to take pictures, he wasn't really in a picture-taking mood.

Yesterday's pictures were so much better. I got one of him playing with his friends in the classroom and another of him picking out his name tag and putting it on the wall where it goes. At least he's sort of smiling in the one in front of his cubby. I guess this will make for a funny story one day...

Oops!

So....the littlest guy in my house started preschool today. He was very excited, and, needless to say, so was I. It's not that I don't enjoy spending time with him., because I do. It's just that, as I may have mentioned at some point, I am a much better Mommy when I have the chance to miss my children. I didn't get to miss them much this summer. I enjoyed my alone time today, but I surely did miss him today.

I was a good Mommy and took pictures of him before we left this morning and then again at school. I was trying to download them and somehow ended up deleting all the pictures on my memory card, including the ones I took this morning. Waaaa! My plan is to take some tomorrow and then post them. Don't tell anyone they're not actually from today.

*Sigh*

OK, so I'm thinking blogging just may not be for me. I really have the best intentions to update more regularly, but I don't and then I get so far behind that the thought of catching up is overwhelming. So I don't, and then I get even farther behind. And more overwhlemed. I really don't want to give up my blog, but I don't have another answer. I guess for now I'll just post things when I can and will have to give myself a little grace in the mean time.

I survived the summer. And when I say survive, I really mean survive. We did have a lot of fun this summer, and in retrospect, it doesn't seem that bad, but man alive, we had some rough days. Days when no one wanted to share or get along. Days when the fighting and screaming started at 7:15. Days when we were stuck inside and almost went stir-crazy. But there were fun times mixed in.

We spent two weeks in South Carolina. It was great to see family as it always is, but I really enjoyed our week in Columbia. I got to see some of the super folks I used to teach with, and I got to spend a few hours with my friend Ellen. I'm a regular reader of her blog, and I told her that being in her house and meeting her children made me feel like I had stepped into a story I had been reading. It was a special morning.

Luke and Ellen's son Drew...they became fast friends.

The two weeks were ended with my 20th high school reunion. What a blast! Thank goodness for Facebook or I wouldn't have recognized several people I graduated with. But as a whole, I'd have to say that TL Hanna's Class of 1990 still looks pretty darn good!

A few of my fabulous classmates

There have been birthdays...Luke turned 7 and I turned...well, I graduated 20 years ago, so you do the math! Luke celebrated several times -- once with my in-laws in Columbia, on his actual birthday with my family in Greenville, and again at his party when we got home. I only celebrated once, but I had a good day on my birthday.

One of Luke's many birthday celebrations.

Decorations courtesy of Gary

Now it's September, Luke is in second grade, and Noah starts preschool on Tuesday. The college football season officially starts tonight (go Gamecocks!), soccer starts next Saturday, and before we know it Halloween, and then Thanksgiving, and then Christmas will be here. Maybe when Noah starts back to school and I have a little more quiet time around the house I'll be better about updating this silly little blog. Don't hold your breath, but I really will try.

It's July already?!?

Well once again I'm so far behind on my blog that I don't have any idea how I can catch up. April seems like a long time ago, and I can't believe it's been that long since I posted anything. I wish I could find a personal assistant who would blog for me...any takers?

I'm sitting here on a rainy Saturday afternoon listening to my boys play together...nicely. This rarely happens. I try to enjoy these quiet moments when they do happen because all too quickly there will be noise and fighting and mischief and chaos. We have survived 5 weeks of summer. Some days are fun and good and enjoyable. Others are not. I've tried to structure our days a bit so there's time for all of us to play together, time for the boys to play by themselves, and a little bit of rest time sprinkled in for good measure. We have done some crafts, run lots of errands, been to the pool quite a bit, enjoyed our week at VBC, been to the splash pad, wrestled, played the Wii, made forts, played in the sprinkler, been to the library almost weekly, been to a waterpark and a hotel, laughed, cried, and relaxed.

What else? Luke lost another bottom tooth and his other front tooth and is an official snaggle-tooth now. Noah is completely potty-trained, even at night. Luke finished first grade with flying colors. I am planning Luke's 7th birthday party and beginning to think about packing for our trip to South Carolina. My camera broke and I got a BRIGHT PINK one to replace it. We bought brand new, real-live adult bedroom furniture. Our refrigerator is on its last legs. *Sigh*
I guess that's all for now. Hopefully I'll post something again before the end of the summer, but don't be surprised if I don't.

Bluebonnets

Bluebonnets are one of my favorite things about Texas.Here are my two absolute favorite things about Texas.

Scattered

Despite the title of my last post, I'm not a big fan of change. It doesn't really matter, though, because change, it it a-comin'. Since I was pregnant with Noah, Gary and I have planned to have the boys eventually share a room (that was assuming Noah was a boy which, in fact, he is.) Now that Noah is in his toddler bed, the next step is to move Noah into Luke's room and to turn Noah's room into a play/scrap room. Sounds easy, right? Not so much. I spent several days last week going through the 10+ boxes of teacher stuff I brought with us when we moved here. They were in the closet in Noah's room, and it was essential to pare them down if we are to use that room in a different way. It was a blast to look at all the things I saved, but I now have enough distance from teaching that I was also able to see that much of what I kept I didn't need. So I whittled the 10 boxes down to 5. Hooray for me!

After we got Noah in the toddler bed, I put his crib and changing table on Craig's List. Last night a couple expecting their first baby came and bought them. I have no dresser to put Noah's clothes in, so they're on the floor in his room, and all the toys that were previously under the crib and, therefore, mostly unnoticeable, are in a pile in his room. I knew I couldn't live like this for long. Luke happens to be home sick from school today. He's running a low-grade fever, so he's not so sick that he needs my constant care and attention which freed me up to do something else. So I decided to use this forced stay-at-home day to be productive. I went through the toys in Noah's room and got rid of a lot and put the others in the toy chest in Luke's room (after cleaning it out first.) I sorted through most of Luke's closet and some bins with miscellaneous toys. I have a large pile of toys and books to take to the church for the nursery there, and I threw a lot of other stuff away. I love throwing stuff away!

I guess I'm just rambling now. The point is that I feel like it is now possible to turn Noah's room into a play room. The best part, for me anyway, is that I'm going to get a desk to put in there that I can scrapbook on. Any time I want. Without having all my stuff scattered all over the dining room. My very own little spot in this house dominated by boys and boy stuff. I will post pictures when the transformation is complete. Stay tuned!

Ch-ch-changes

My wee one is growing up. Fast. OK, so I know this is just a toddler bed, but it's not a crib! For some unknown reason, I was anxious to get Luke out of the crib and into this bed before he even turned 3. With Noah, I decided to wait at long as possible. I thought he would eventually try to crawl out of the crib and that would be what forced me to make the switch, but amazingly enough, he never tried to climb out. But now that he's basically potty trained (hallelujah and thank the Lord!!), he needs to be able to get up to go potty. So last Thursday we put this bed together and put him in it. He was very excited about sleeping in his new big boy bed. It took him a while to get to sleep the first night, and there have been a few times he has gotten up when he wasn't really supposed to, but over all it's going well. I'm pretty sure he'll never take a nap again, but he is still resting for an hour or so each afternoon in his room.

The whole potty thing has finally clicked with him, and he will even go by himself most of the time. I am no longer obsessed with if he's had an accident or if he will even get on the potty, and it's such a relief. He even used a public bathroom this weekend. He has been terrified of public bathrooms for about a year, so I knew this would be a difficult hurdle, but he told me on Saturday that he had to go to the bathroom, and he used the potty in Ikea of all places. Hopefully that means if we're out and he has to go he will. Whew! I wasn't sure I'd survive this round of potty training, but it looks like I just might make it after all!

Whew!

What a month it's been! Here are the highlights (and lowlights):

-Say hello to my little snaggle-tooth!
-Luke & Gary are in a group called Adventure Guides through the YMCA. They go camping a couple of times a year and do other activities including a derby car race.

This year they built a shark car. Pretty cool, huh?

Luke was so intense when he was lining his car up to race. It paid off!
Luke place 6th out of about 40 cars!

-Our spring break was March 15-19, and my plan was to do some hardcore potty training. Noah's been going on the potty for well over a year, but he was still in pull-ups and only used the potty when he felt like it. I bought underwear, a treat for the end of each day that he stayed dry, and steeled my nerves. Then he started throwing up on Friday evening. Amazingly he was better on Saturday and actually stayed dry all weekend. That changed on Monday when he had several accidents. Each day was a struggle, especially since I felt pretty yucky most of the week. He had accidents most every day, and by Saturday, I was at the end of my rope. I felt like after a week we had made no progress. Eloise, one of Noah's very special friends had her 3rd birthday party on Saturday, and I told him if he had an accident we'd have to leave (he had already had one that morning.) Sure enough, 30 minutes after we got there, he had an accident. I hated to make him leave, and we both cried the whole way home, but I felt like I had to backup what I said. Without getting too graphic, I finally realized the reason he was having pee-pee accidents is because he was extremely backed up on the other end. So after much coaxing, a bunch of Miralax, and one suppository, we got over that hurdle. Things aren't perfect, but they're going pretty well. My next hurdle will be getting him to go potty in a public restroom. Wish me luck!

-It snowed. On the first day of spring. We got 5 more inches. On the first day of spring. Did I mention it snowed on the first day of spring?

-I guess that's about all. It's finally starting to warm up this week so hopefully I'll be able to post some outside pictures that don't involve snow. Happy spring!

Noah-speak

A couple of weeks ago Noah came home from school and told me his friend Nick had "hody mody" in his lunch box. I asked him what he meant, and he told me the same thing again. I tried to figure out what "hody mody" was and asked yet again. Then Noah started talking to me like I was either deaf or foreign. He said very loudly and very slowly, "NICK'S LUNCHBOX." This went on for a while, and then I just gave up. Later that evening when Nick's mom Laurie, Nick, and his brother Ethan were over for dinner, I asked Laurie what Nick had in his lunch that day. She rattled off a list of things, and Nick exclaimed, "Holy moly!" Noah heard him say that at lunch when he opened his lunch box, and he thought "holy moly" was what he was eating. We all got a good chuckle out of it and have talked about it several times. Hody mody!

Happy heart day

(This is a side note and not in keeping with a post about Valentine's Day, but I'm quite frustrated with this blog right now because it won't let me change the order of my pictures. So, this doesn't look how I want it to look, but I'm just going with it.)

My two boys (plus one extra) enjoying heart-shaped pancakes.

Noah didn't take a nap on Sunday and was very crabby by the time dinner rolled around. I think that's pretty evident in this picture.

Happier times during the afternoon.

Notice Gary's unbridled enthusiasm for all things Valentine's. The pink Snuggie is nice, too, isn't it?

Boy stuff

Luke had his first sleep-over Saturday night. Clayson is a friend from church and school and also is on Luke's basketball team. This will not surprise anyone who has a boy, but they spent most of the evening wrestling. And wrestling. And wrestling. Good times!

Winter wonderland

We got 7 inches of snow last week. In Texas. The weathermen were predicting about an inch. They were kinda wrong. Even though I'm really ready for spring, I have to admit it was beautiful. I've never seen that much snow at once! The boys had a great time playing with all the neighborhood kids.

Having Canadian neighbors is a great thing because they let us borrow their real live snow shovel.
We also got to use their real live sled (instead of a swim ring or a piece of cardboard!)

Hoop dreams

Luke is playing basketball through the Y again this year, and Gary is coaching. What a difference a year makes! Most of the boys are able to actually dribble this year, and they score at least 20 points a game. We scored that many last year, but it was only because they got one point for hitting the rim. It's so much fun to watch!

Happy New Year!

I read this in my devotional this morning and thought it was a great way to start the new year:

"We want you to be blessed with joys deeper than any sadness, gratitude happier than any regrets, hopes brighter than the shadows of any discouragement, and the vitality to make of every day what God on Christmas Day made for all days."

Happy New Year!