Wacky Socks Wednesday

This week at my son's school is Dr Seuss week. Each day, they dress up in a certain way, kind of like Homecoming week. I have been very excited about getting him interested in school activities. Monday, he was supposed to wear green for 'Green Eggs and Ham', so I bought a new green t-shirt, and layered it over a white long-sleeved button down. Very nice! Yesterday, he had to wear black & white for 'On Beyond Zebra!', so we put a white shirt under a black one. He looked cute. Today is 'Fox in Socks', so he wore wacky or mismatched socks. I took some white socks, drew silly faces on both, as well as a couple of other wacky things, and rolled him jeans up under his knees so he can show them off. Next comes 'One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish', and he will wear Red and Blue. Friday, for 'The Cat in the Hat', he gets to wear a crazy hat.
It is these kind of things that I always looked forward to doing with my kids, even before I was a mother!

Also, Monday was Connor's first day going to the A.M. schedule kindergarten. He and Katelyn are both on the same school schedule now-phew!! It is so wonderful! It is now just Hope and me for half of the day. Very nice! And, I found out that he gets to ride the bus with Katelyn since the bus stops at both schools! How awesome is that?!? Wednesday is self-transport, because the buses don't run those days. But, all the other days, I just walk to the bus stop! I am so thrilled!

On a heavier note, Tim received orders for re-deploying to the Middle-East later this year. We were really getting into the groove of things, and now, everything is getting crazy. His training schedule will be taking him away from home for days, even weeks at a time from here on out. I understand that he will have had over 12 months between cycles, but he just returned home last June. The rumors of the early re-deployment began circulating last December. This adds such a large amount of emotional stress on everyone. Not just our family, EVERYONE. We just wanted 12 months of normal life. To me, that means no talk and planning of deploying again, no mandatory FRG meetings, no ridiculous training schedules, and certainly no talking to the kids about Daddy leaving again so soon.

I guess this is normal life here, but I can tell you, it is not easy. Just when we are OK with life circumstances, and get into a routine, things like this happen. Luckily, he was able to finish 3 accelerated college terms, and get on the Dean's List! He hopes to continue online.

I am still in school full-time. I will be taking my WEST-B this year, which is the Washington Educators Skills Test. I have to pass that so I can teach after I graduate. I was through with my coursework for the term, but, as I tend to do, added another course at the end. So, I am wrapping the last one up now, which is conducting a scientific experiment. I will then have one class left before I am ready to enter the teacher's program full time. No more liberal arts courses! Yay! I am very happy that I decided to go back. Finishing my 4 yr degree has been something I have wanted to do since I left college to have babies. Now, those babies are growing up so fast. Hope will be in Pre-school this fall. The others are going into 1st and Kindergarten. Time flies! I hope to begin teaching by fall 2012 at the latest. I do not want to push myself too hard, though, but fall 2012 is very reasonable, and I can being the year before if I work quicker. It is the student teaching and the classroom clinicals that cannot really be rushed, so I can speed through the next 2 terms if I want to finish sooner.

The kids are so busy in lessons-ballet, swimming, gymnastics, tae kwon do. They are really learning so much about themselves, and their different interests. Hope was taking ballet/tap, and Katelyn was in ballet/jazz. Hope kept telling me when I signed her up, that she didn't want to take tap, only ballet. I told her she loved tap, because she always dances in her tap shoes in the dining room, and loves them. So, when she started class, she would never do anything the teacher asked. All the other kids were listening, and Hope would literally curl up in the corner. Finally, 2 weeks ago, I talked to Hope about it again. She told me (again) that she only wanted to do ballet, and not tap. She promised me that she would like it and participate. I told her we could try it and see, but I was not going to pay or drive there every week if she kept curling up in the corner. Well, she has been doing ballet/jazz for 2 weeks now, and she actually participates!! My 3 year old knew what she wanted from day 1, it was me trying to tell her what she really wanted that messed things up for her! Children are so wise! She loves her new class, and there are even a few girls that are in the ballet/jazz class that also take her old tap class. So, she has some friends! She has even been invited to a party for one of our friends.

Speaking of parties....having 3 active kids means having a huge list of their friends, each one having birthdays...and birthday parties. Do you know, since the beginning of 2009, I think we have attended 8 bday parties (and one baby shower on my end). We have 2 this month, one of which is for triplets!! I can honestly say that we have spent more on their friends this year than we have for them! Lol.

Well, I need to get ready to pick up Connor from school. I am so glad I finally sat down to write something!