First Day of 1st Grade

New Do

Yesterday Abigail and I had a mommy-daughter date. I'm hoping to make it a new Back-to-School tradition. First we went to the salon to have our hairs cut by our cute friend, Kristin, who used to be our neighbor and Abigail's Primary teacher, and whom Abigail adores. I think having Kristin do our hair aided in the confidence level remaining high for Abigail to cut her hair short. She had been saying for a week or so that she wanted to do something different and have it "short for once." I was pleased, since she doesn't like to have her hair brushed and it was getting rather nasty with the chlorine and summer sun build up. So she didn't chicken out! And look how cute she looks! (For Alec: you must act surprised when you get home, because she wants to see if you recognize her or if you think she is a neighbor or something.)For lunch after our haircuts Abigail picked "Subway: Eat Fresh" (this is what Abigail calls it, and she was so offended once when her cousin Matthew called it "Subway: Eat Gross"). As another side note, she always orders the Seafood Sensation (imitation crab meat) sandwich. They never know how to ring it up at the register because she gets it in a kids pack, and they don't have a button for that combination apparently. As we walked to the car after lunch, we decided that we had never actually been to lunch just the two of us.

To round out our little date, we went to the mall to find some new sneakers and an outfit for her first day of first grade. She picked out an adorable little knit dress with apples on it and a watch to match. I'm sure we'll have photos of it next week.

As we pulled into the garage after our date, I said the usual date things. "That was so much fun, we should definitely do it again." To which she replied, somewhat unenthusiastically, "Yeah, next year."

Poof!

I'm sick of the computer. It seems as though every time I sit down in front of it, time suddenly vanishes. The Internet has this mesmerizing mind control over me where I can't seem to remember why I sat down to look something up in the first place. How is it that I sat down at least 45 minutes ago to shop for socks for Abigail, and yet none of my open tabs would indicate this? I have my Gmail inbox up and Google Reader of course. But I also have tabs open for overstock.com (not to find socks, but a leather ottoman I've been desiring) and HGTV's website is open to an article on staging your home for sale (not that I'm moving, just for decorating info from a show I saw). Anyway, my question is this...does this happen to anyone else, or am I just simply absent-minded and hypnotized by the inviting glow of the computer screen?

Newport Beach with the Walker Fam

Spending the week at Newport Beach with Alec's family last week was wonderful! Here are some highlights....

Alec's brother, Peter.

Alec's sister, Sarah.

The boys (Alec's Dad, brother-in-law Tyler, and Alec) staking out a prime spot in between the pool and kiddie pool for cribbage and other card games.

Abigail demonstrating the starfish.

Pops taking photos.

Owen hard at work.

Like father like son.

Flying kites.

Searching for shells with Grammy.

The Mud-Slinger.

We tried to get the kids out the wet sand for a photo, but Nate just kept crawling back to the water.

We had so much fun. Can't wait until next time! Thanks, Grammy and Pops!!

Ode to Abigail

This post will require some participation from you. Okay, pretend with me that it is not August, and that it is still July, and I am still within the month of Abigail's birthday.

Alright, now that we are all in denial I would like to wish Abigail a happy 6th birthday!!

I can't believe it has been six years since I became a mother! Abigail really is a joy to have around. I may be slightly biased....but she is smart (just today she told me that too much salt is bad for your heart), funny (this afternoon she was walking around the driveway lifting my weights--not to try and be funny, but it was funny to me...wait, maybe she is just health conscious), considerate (tonight before bed she asked what job she could do first thing tomorrow to help me), obedient (most of the time she will say, "Yes, Mom!" when I ask her to do something), and many other things that you hope your children will be. I feel lucky to have her in my life and hope that the next year will be just as great as the last. We love you, Abigail!

These are her cute Fancy Nancy glasses and purse our regular babysitter gave her.

Alec's mom took her to Build-a-Bear for her birthday. She was thrilled, and picked out this bunny that she loves. The best part is, that before she went, she got on the Build-a-Bear website to do some pre-browsing. She had loaded up her cart with all the cute outfits she wanted. Then Grammy kindly explained that she could probably only pick one outfit and that she had a budget of $40. So Abigail busted out the calculator (which I didn't know she knew how to use), found outfits on sale, and maximized her spending power enabling her to get two outfits and some underpants for her bunny.

We had a "luncheon" on her birthday. I had to call it this and not a party, because I didn't want to do the whole party thing. But she was just as happy, and never would have known the difference. She got to pick two of her friends to invite over for lunch and to play. Beforehand we went to the dollar store and I let her pick out whatever plates and napkins, etc. she liked. I didn't care if they matched or not. It was so nice not to have the pressure of it being a party, that I think she and I both had more fun. We made English muffin pizzas for lunch and decorated cupcakes. Then I painted all their nails. Such cuties!

Later in the month we had the monthly birthday party at my Dad's house, celebrating all the July birthdays: Uncle Peter, and cousins Spencer and Lauren.

And finally, to round out her birthday month, she lost her first tooth!

Swim lessons

The excitement of the week is that the kids have been doing swimming lessons this week that will continue next week as well. We did a 2 week session earlier in the summer, and they both loved it so much that we had to sign up for another session. Both Abigail and Owen have shown improvements even just from earlier in the summer. Abigail is quite the little fish and Owen is quite the little guppy. They can't wait to spend everyday in the pool in about a week, when we go with Alec's family to Newport Beach, California. Yeah!

Look what Abigail can do!

One of my goals for the summer was to teach Abigail how to ride her bike without training wheels. Well, I haven't gotten around to it yet. But no worries, her sweet friend Kate (who has been riding without training wheels since we met her two years ago when she was 4) took care of it yesterday. Abigail is quite thrilled about her new found skill. By 7:30 this morning she was dressed, had her bed made, and her cereal ready so that she could get outside and practice.