A Year Ago......

So now that I'm behind
on keeping this thing updated
by an entire year,
I thought I'd take the time
to finally get caught up.
Plus I'm home alone all day
on a kind of bed rest thing
(more on that later).
So let's take a journey back
over the last year.
Well, I won't do the entire year
in one post.
I'm not that motivated.

So this summer was the
Great Eclipse Event.
It was this huge deal.
People were going nuts for it.
Of course, it was too cloudy
for us to see it here.
So we watched the live stream of it:

One day the kids were playing

and Kale started yelling,

"Mom! Hurry and come take a picture

of what I'm doing to Ellory!"

Although I was happy with how

they were happy to play

with each other,

I'll admit I was a little apprehensive

of what I was going to find.

But I had nothing to worry about,

this time:

Ellory figured out she could
do this with her fingers,
and she thinks it's super cool:

To get Kale ready for school,
we went and got his hairs cut.
Before:




After:



I'm obsessed.


Well, summer has to come to and end
some time.
And with our last day before Kale
started school,
we built a blanket fort,
and watched a movie inside of it:



 And then it was time to send Kale
off to his first day of Kindergarten!



I'll admit, that was a hard day for me,
for many reasons.
For one, Kale is my pal.
He and I like to do the same things
together.
And I missed having my pal to play with.
For another thing,
I hate that he is growing up.
I mean, I love getting to share in
new experiences with him,
but at the same time,
I want to keep him little forever.
It's also hard going from knowing
what he sees, hears, encounters every
minute of every day,
to having only a vague idea of
what he is experiencing,
and trying to get him to tell me
everything after school is
practically impossible becasue
he says he doesn't really remember.
Letting go is hard.
I can admit, too, that sometimes
I am fearful that some horrifying tragedy
will happen at his school and I won't
be there to protect him.
It's sad, but true.
But, despite all these things,
I am happy for him.
He LOVES school.
He loves learning and getting to help his teacher
and spending time with friends.
All year long, he would NEVER let
me get him out of school early,
for fear he might miss out on
something.
But that first day,
Ellory and I missed him terribly:



Like, A LOT:




But then it was time to
bring him home and we
couldn't have been happier!!!!



And then later that week,
I got to take him to the
End of Summer Party
at the Ames Public Library.
Just the two of us.
We danced.
We played all the games.
And I let him eat as much
pizza as he could handle.





 And now, Ellory and I
had to get better at playing
just the two of us.
This really was an adjustment for me.
I had to be very aware of when
I was trying to treat her
the same as Kale.
Her interests are different,
and sometimes her attitude is WAY different.
Although missing Kale was hard,
having an opportunity
to spend time with Ellory just the two of us
has been a great blessing.

One day she wanted to do some sort
of dress up AND have a surprise
for Kale for when we picked him up from school.
She picked pirates.
No complaints here!
So we made spy glasses and swords,
enough for all 3 of us,
and had a blast hunting for
treasure and beating that sneaky snook,
Captain Hook!

Ellory really really likes taking pictures of herself.

Like a lot.

Like, I'm pretty sure we will NEVER

give her a smart phone because

she would spend all her time

taking selfies.

But every once in a while,

I indulge her:

This was Kale's 3rd day of school.

I took a picture because this

is my favorite shirt he got

when we went school shopping:

Ellory the picky eater

actually asked for a piece of toast

one day,

so I had to document it:

Sometimes, if I catch her in the right mood,

she likes to play Go Fish:

And then, one time, 

tried something new!

Fruitloops.

I don't remember the context of this next picture.

But she's cute, isn't she?

I'm sure I've mentioned this before,

but just to remind you all,

Tyler is a genius. 

I told him I really wanted to get 

the kids a book shelf,

but that I wanted it to be short

so that they could reach everything themselves.

We were at Wal-mart and he showed me

a bookshelf that I loved but I told him

it was way way way too tall.

His response?

"So we will lay it on it's side."

GENIUS.

Plus we got it for a steal.

It was the last one in the store,

and it was already on sale,

but since it was the display one it was 

a tiny bit banged up,

so they gave it to us for and extra 50% off.

Win!

And then one Sunday, 

Ellory decided to dip her french toast in

KETCHUP.

So. Gross.

So that was last August.
Lots of changes and
new experiences.
And still stunned that we live in Iowa!