KINDERGARTEN!!

Today was the big day! So last night Henry opened the bag of "Ready Confetti" that his kindergarten teacher had given him. He sweetly shared some with his sister.
He placed it under each of their pillows.
And then he did a funky dance.




The boy's got moves. Here he is this morning, not wanting to give me a straight picture.
I did get a couple of nice ones.


Here he goes, off on his way! Of course he had a whole parade following him: me, Grammie, Dad, Clara in the wagon...
Hooray!!
The kids did a little milling about, trying to size each other up, I suppose. Henry looks like he's going into his Sue The Dinosaur impersonation here.
Then they lined them up for our Kodak moment. This is while we were all still holding it together. As soon as that kindergarten door opened, Henry ran back to me and said "Actually! I do feel a little sad!!!!" and then burst into tears. Oy!! Of course that put me in tears too...and Grammie. I think Pete stayed in control.
Mrs. K swooped in for a quick rescue. She took Henry by the hand, promised him (and me) a great day and then they were off.
I was told all tears ended before he even entered the classroom. I'm pretty sure I believe that. All reports at pick-up time were positive! I'm sure there will be lots more stories to come!!

Beach Day

Today was my last real day of summer break. I don't have to go in to work tomorrow, but I really kind of do...
So we decided to head over to Glencoe Beach to take things out with a bang.
Clara took a sneak peek as we headed down the hill.
There are a lot of steps down.
We got there early and it was already a lovely day.
The waves were high and there was a rip-tide warning, but we did take several chances to dip our toes in.
And we spent lots of time digging in the sand. This may explain all of the sand Grammie washed out of Clara's hair this afternoon.
Henry wasn't scared off by the cold water or the big waves.
Sharon and Rhiannon joined us for a bit and Rhiannon jumped right into the hole digging.
The kids got sandy chins.
When Clara brought Baby Two back for another dip in the water she seemed to think she might like to go face down in the sand.
And she dipped her head in as well.
Henry, Rhiannon and Clara liked to play a game of "run away from the waves!!!"
We were SO happy to put our umbrella to use. We needed the small bit of shade.
And Henry made the most of the sand.
We got a bit of color after about 6 hours there.
Mom took this shot for us. Pete thinks it should go on our Christmas card.
Check out the umbrella in Pete's glasses. He was pretty relaxed.
Happy summer! Look for more frequent updates in September....Samantha has thrown down the gauntlet for daily posts of at least one photo.

Put the lime in the coconut

The kids and I went to Iowa for a few days last week for the sole purpose of helping my mom with some things at her house. We did find a little bit of time for fun though, too. The kids enjoyed the mini beach out at the lake.
Henry tried, earnestly, to figure out how he could catch a fish with a bucket. Later Mom got him a net, but that wasn't much more successful.
We made one quick stop downtown before heading home. We had to buy the new cousin (Liz and Van's baby-on-the-way) a Hawkeye onesie. I had the kids pose in front of the Old Capitol for a few pictures.
Henry was a little more enthused than Clara. She's still trying to figure out where she's going to apply.
Finally, before leaving town, Mom talked Rob into cutting open a coconut for the kids to enjoy. She had just bought it at the Co-op earlier in the week and hadn't thought about the whole opening-it-up thing. Rob was very enthused about the whole endeavor.
I think here he's saying "would you just let me do it?" and Mom's saying "I'm the Coconut Queen!" Maybe you had to be there.
The kids were pretty interested!
Here's Rob pouring out the coconut water while Carrie gives me the "what's with these two?" look.
Rob also enjoyed some special time with a giant fly. This is right before he tried to suck it up with the shop-vac.
When we went inside Eleanor drew a coconut face for me on her doodle pad, and then proceeded to make the same face herself.

Braids

Clara is kind of a fashion plate. She's not afraid to mix and match patterns!
I tried real braids in her hair today. Next time I"ll have to try while it's still wet. We'll see how long these last. The good news is that she's very patient with me!

Northbrook Days!

Clara's old enough to do some rides this year!
Henry actually really liked this dragon roller-coaster. I think it was just the right amount of scary and fun.
The Ferris wheel was the right amount of scary and fun for me. I had a death grip on both kids the whole time.
We had some ice cream too.
When it was time for the merry-go-round Henry chose the monkey with pants on.