First Day of Preschool!

It finally came, Cole started preschool today. After 6 months of waiting, visiting, enrolling, paying, talking about it, visiting again, and waiting some more, it is here! Our little baby made his very public entrance today!

I have to admit I was a little nervous last night. I spent a couple of hours cleaning and organizing the house, aka, nesting!

So here are some pics to enjoy...

Cole walking into his school.

This may be my favorite picture of him ever... doesn't he look like a big boy!

Family pic.

Getting ready to go into his classroom.

Daddy kissing Cole goodbye

Mommy kissin' Cole goodbye... at this point his good friend "J" had discovered Cole's presence.

The line of mommies and daddies eagerly awaiting to hear about the first day... Carter was SCREAMING in the back.

Cole waiting on mommy for pickup, Mrs. Brennan (his teacher) is the one in black and white.

Here's my boy after his big day... his first words, "Good morning mommy, we had snack with JOOCE (juice)!!!!!"

We are looking forward to a fun year at preschool!

One Year Ago Today

One year ago today...

• I decided I was going to change for myself and my family.
• I put two feet on the ARC trainer and lasted ten minutes before wanting to DIE!
• I ate 2547 calories.
• I HATED Diet drinks, diet foods (well, I call them diet... AKA, healthy) ;)
• I weighed 259 pounds.
• I wore a size 24-26... Online shopping and Lane Bryant were the only choice.
• My kids had never heard the word exercise, much less understood it.
• I was not sure this would last, I just had to hope.
• I was not proud of my body.

Here are the embarrassing pics of the OLD ME:

Today...

• I am still changing each day... I have a long way to go.
• I work out 5-6 days a week for at least an hour.
• I have run a 4 and a 5 mile race. (And I didn't come in last!)
• I usually eat about 1500- 1600 calories.
• I ONLY drink diet pop, I also love vegetables, fiber bars, and many other things I used to loathe!
• I have lost 67 pounds! (48 pounds left)
• I just bought a pair of jeans from the GAP, size 14! (Had to return the 16's, they kept falling down!!!)
• When my kids see the sneakers, they know it's time to go to the Y. Cole says the East Y is his favorite.
• I know this will last, but the battle faces me each day as I chose to eat well and go to the gym. Getting there is the hardest part.
• I am proud of my still very imperfect body that can do more than I ever dreamed it could. I thank God for legs that can run, arm that can lift weights, a flabby tummy that has carried two babies, stretch marks, and lovely curves.

So lift your Diet Coke with me, and lets say "Cheers to a year of change!"

New Floors

So I know I have been out of commission for a couple of weeks, but I do have lots of fun things that I need to update everyone on.

I am going to start with the kitchen/laundry room/entryway re-tiling project.

Since I have kiddos that I keep during the school year, the time had come to get the project done, or we were going to have to wait for another time when kiddos wouldn't be in the way
in danger.

We started by tearing the floor up... this didn't take much since most of the tiles were coming up on their own. I think we finished that part of the project in less than an hour.

The next step was to lay new sub floor. Uncle Don came over to help Brian with that project. In the mean time, our friend Ed came over to tear out the cork floor in the entryway, and I sorted through each tile to make sure there were no imperfections or broken tiles. I had to go and exchange 7 out of 27 boxes of tile... (pretty bad stats if you ask me)... or I'm really picky.







Saturday morning our friend Larry came over to start laying the tile. He would lay tile while I stood behind him handing him the next one I wanted put down (I'm not a control freak... stop thinking that!)




Sunday was finishing the edges and small cuts of tile... then the real fun began... GROUTING! WHAT A MESS...

After the grout dried, we had to put a coat of seal on the tiles. As I was doing this, I realized that the grout color was not evening out, and it was drying about 10 shades lighter than I expected, so I ended up hand staining the grout.... each and every line of it... ugh!

FYI... after this was complete someone mentioned to us that this is not the first time that Lowe's has had trouble with their dry mix colored grout... AVOID IT ALL COSTS.

Here is a pic of the tile before the sealant, and after the sealant. Big difference.


One last coat of seal, and voila, new floors! What a joy to be homeowners.

Here is a pic of the new entryway.

These are the new curtains that I made for the kitchen windows. I have been looking for a pattern that I like for about a year now.

Finally, a special thanks to: Larry, Don, Ed, Karen, Melissa, Nick, Jenn, Jeff, Nana, and Bradley. (and if I forgot someone I am so sorry, I have been inhaling fumes to get this job done, ha!) You all helped us so much to finish this task whether it was giving us the emergency spot at Lowes, feeding us, watching our kids, moving furniture, or getting in there to actually get dirty. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for being such a wonderful support system to our family. We love you all.

Spa Day

So I was in line at Jason's Deli yesterday when an older lady in front of me brought my attention to 7 children (yes, I counted) sitting at a table together. She specifically pointed out one little girl who was tipping her chair back on 2 legs. She said to me, "Look at that little girl, she is going to fall, where are their mothers?"

I already knew where the 3 mamas were, they were pushing strollers through the line to get food. It just really rubbed me the wrong way... I wanted to respond "I'm sure they're at the spa."

So when you see kids sitting at a table alone, or being out-of-hand, or running ahead, it's not because I'm under a table chasing after another kid, or carrying a pool bag, diaper bag, gym bag, and a toddler. It's not because my hands are full with 4 lunches and 3 drinks. It's not because I'm changing a dirty diaper for the 15th time that day, or better yet running to the potty every 15 minutes so we don't soil our Elmo underwear, therefore causing me to have to clean out crappy pants at a restaurant or anywhere for that matter. It's because I have decided to let the children fend for themselves while I have a spa day, so there.

Serious

So this is a very serious topic for me, but it's laying heavy on my heart to put it out there, so here it goes.

Drowning is silent.

I mean this quite literally. When your kiddos are in the pool, and they are drowning, it cannot be heard. You must always keep your eyes on your kids when they are swimming.

Here is what happened:

Case in point #1:
Last week I was at the pool with 2 other mommies and their kiddos. We were all enjoying ourselves just swimming around in a neighborhood pool. The kids were in an area that was approximately 3 feet deep (a little past their belly buttons), but then the pool makes a quick slope to the deep end. To stay safe, we posted ourselves at the slope, and faced the kiddos swimming in the shallow end. Carter and another little boy were playing out of the pool, so I exited to help them for a minute (leaving 2 mommies still in the pool near the kids) as I am getting back into the pool my friends turns around slightly, and says "Who is that?", to discover Cole has snuck past her (we still don't know how), and is bobbing nose in and out of the water trying to stay afloat. We heard nothing, it was a mother's instinct that she turned around to notice him.

#2:
Tonight we were at a friends pool, once again swimming with the kids. Carter was sitting on the pool steps playing as he always does. Brian is literally less than 2 feet away from him (in the water) talking to another parent. There were 10 adults swimming in this pool. I look at Carter playing, look over at Cole in another area (with another adult), look back, and Carter is under water except for his eyes. No one heard him fall off the steps. He was silent.

This is the point that I am trying to make. Please don't take swimming for granted (I'm sure you're thinking at this point, sure, she has room to talk, she almost had 2 drownings in a week), but what I'm trying to say is we had very capable aware adults within arms reach of both of these kids, and things turned out OK. Praise God. I guess up until this week I've been a bit naive to believe that if my kids were ever in trouble at the pool I would hear it. They would cry, splash, scream, get my attention... IT DOES NOT HAPPEN THAT WAY... DROWNING IS SILENT. They will most likely not splash (maybe not even when they fall in), their arms and legs are underwater swimming as hard as possible. They will not scream or cry, their faces are underwater. Please don't trust sticking your nose in a book, or laying on a floaty with your eyes closed that you will hear if your children are in distress... most likely it will not happen. Constantly scan the pool, do head counts, swim with your kids, be aware. For this reason, both of my kids were seen and pulled out instantly.

I hope it does not seem like I am on a soap box, but what I saw was the scariest thing I have ever seen, I don't want it to happen to anyone else. If this makes one person aware, it was beyond worth it.

Oh Crap, what have I gotten myself into?

So we're just getting home from seeing our family in Amarillo (more on that later), but I believe that while I was there I roped myself? into running a half marathon with Josh, Kenna, and Allie on December 13th in Dallas. 13.1 miles on December 13th... just kind of sounds unlucky... ha! Better get it in gear so I can keep up!

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