Tooth Fairy

Saturday, Brady pulled his loose tooth out. He then dropped it in the pantry and lost it. I am pretty sure I later sucked it up in the vacuum. Anyway, Brady left a note under his pillow telling the tooth fairy the situation and hoped she understood. Scott and I are very bad at the whole tooth fairy thing. VERY BAD. We often have to throw money under the bed after the kids wake up disappointed that nothing was left under their pillow...we tell them that they probably rolled around so much it fell under the bed :) So, this morning at 7am when Scott remembered the tooth, he was reaching under Brady's pillow when Brady's eyes popped open and he asked what he was doing. Scott told him he was looking for the remote and Brady closed his eyes and went back to sleep. Good save Scott...or so we thought ;) At lunch, Brady told Grammy, Fran, and Bau Bau his version....."I woke up and dad was checking under my pillow. When I asked what he was doing he told me he was looking for the remote. But, we both know the remote is on top of the dresser like it always is. I knew he was really looking to see how much money the tooth fairy left me, but he's not getting any of my money!"

I find it hilarious that Brady thought Scott was going to take some of the money from him and it never once crossed his mind that maybe Scott was the one leaving the money. He's at the perfect age to truly believe and never question tooth fairies, Santa, Easter Bunny, etc. And even though keeping up with the secrets and all that comes with it (hiding presents w/special paper, writing letters to the North Pole, keeping the other boys quiet), it really is all worth it when they do find that special treat tossed under the bed and the gifts under the tree Christmas morning. It's magic :) And I'm glad we have many more years to come of these special surprises.

In other news, Brady had his second league game yesterday and his team rocked it!! They are so good. Brady played awesome and they won 2-1. These little guys are so much fun to watch!

HAPPY MONDAY!

New Park

This week, Carter's freshman team played in a soccer tournament in O'Fallon and had games every night (they lost the championship game tonight in sudden death penalty kicks!) The park that they played at is amazing. Bennett also plays his fall baseball league there. On Monday, the city dedicated a new playground/sprinkler park and we were lucky to be some of the first to break it in. May be the coolest park we've ever been to.

Cate was in charge of game time action shots. This is her one and only...Carter's not even in the picture. It's not even our team!

But, she did love taking pictures of her shadow :)

The playground had AstroTurf over rubber flooring...super bouncy/soft and looked like real grass! I wish we could have it in our yard.

The waterpark is activated by waving your hand in front of the sensor (as Brady demonstrates below)

I was talking to another mom when I turned around to find Cate walking through the sprinklers...The kids love finding new places to play!

Another Cate-ism

Bennett: "I can't wait til I'm 16 so I can drive"

Cate: "I can't wait til I'm 15 so I can drink cold water out of a beer cup!"

We had a garage sale on Saturday and Cate insisted on wearing this snow suit (size 18-24 mos) with nothing on under it and her rain boots...so ridiculous!

Fancy

Catie Bug got herself a haircut last weekend! It was so long overdue (mine too...I hadn't had a cut since November!). Goodbye ratty chlorine/sun crisp hair....hello supercute bob! Of course it wasn't easy. She cried for thirty minutes straight before we even left the house. She hates haircuts, or so she says. But I didn't care, she was going no matter what. Scott was like "you are seriously going to take her to get a haircut kicking and screaming, but you will keep her out of school over a few tears???" Um, duh. Haircuts are important. She sucked it up though and got in the car. By the time we got there, the tears were gone and she was fine. She sat perfectly through my haircut...seriously, 40 minutes she sat on a couch and played with her baby and never got up. Tasha and I were both shocked! By the time I was done, she was so excited for her turn. She jumped right up on the seat and listened to all of Tasha's instructions..head up, head down, lean to the left, lean to the right, stand up sit down fight fight fight. Well, something like that (obviously my Ambien has kicked in!). Cate told Tasha she hates ponytails so we decided it was time to cut it all off. Glad we did...looks so much thicker and healthier now. Miss Cate is very proud of her new 'do and couldn't wait to show it off to Mau Mau and Papa :)

And that my friends is the story of Cate's haircut. Thank you and goodnight ;)

Labor Day

We had a fabulous Labor Day Weekend...very few things on the calendar and plenty of down time. Friday night we went to the highschool football game where we watched the Warriors win 30-0...amazing (for real)...2 and 0 baby! We spent most of Saturday at the pool. The water was cool and it was the perfect day to soak up the rays. I can't remember a single thing we did on Sunday...maybe grocery shopping? On Monday, we attended the annual Labor Day Parade...the kids love parades :)

Cate is proud of her new shoes....I think they're the cutest things ever :) Scott will chance getting run over by a firetruck for candy!
After the parade, we went to Bau Bau's for lunch. Thankfully we packed the kids swimsuits because even though it was only 73 degrees they decided to swim. The pool water was still in the 80's so it was actually really nice. Cate spent her time diving in and swimming to Carter. She's getting really good at swimming far...she can take 2-3 breaths with her strokes.
Uncle Josh played fetch frisbee with Carter

At 4:00, Carter had a highschool soccer game. On Labor Day...can you believe that?! The good thing about the holiday game was that our entire family was able to go. His team won 4-0 and he had a beautiful assist.

This is not an optical illusion....Carter really is this much smaller than most of his teammates and opponents!
Scott and Uncle Josh watching a Warrior victory!



I love three day weekends :)

Carter For President?

Um, most likely NO. However, he was elected to his highschool Student Council this week. WOO to the HOO! I'm incredibly proud of him for even running...it's intimidating throwing yourself out there like that the first week of highschool! But YAY he won :)
Friday was the highschools welcome back rally. Each year they put on a kick-ass school spirit rally...I'm going to try and upload a few videos of some of the highlights. Each class is a different color and this year the overall theme was fruit. Freshman are green...pears....pear up get a buddy. Sophomores are blue...blueberries....berry glad to not be freshman (or something like that). Juniors are orange...oranges...orange ya glad we're upperclassman (I think). Seniors are yellow....bananas...time to split. Teachers were apples...not a bad apple in the bunch ;) Everyone goes all out dressing in their colors...flags, jewelry, socks, tutu's....fun fun fun!!!

Each year they choose 8 kids from each grade to perform in a rally relay race. The obstacles are taken from "Minute to Win-It". Carter was excited to find out he was one of the students chosen to represent the freshman. The video I have of his race is blurry, but I'm trying to get my hands on a different one..when I do, I'll post it. His first obstacle was to throw ping pong balls into cups. He had zero problems with this....future beer pong champ? yeah, probably. Then he ran to the next station and had to unroll a roll of toilet paper as fast as he could. Next, he had to put pantyhose over his head...they had an orange in the foot...and he had to swing it around and knock cans over. The final station was balloon popping..this was his hardest challenge. He was too little to pop the balloon when he sat on it :) He gave it a good jump and destroyed it on his second try. Overall, I'm told, he rocked his portion and had an awesome time doing it.
I'm so glad Carter is taking advantage of all of the fun things to do in highschool. Yes, we're going to struggle with his grades, but damn he's going to have a great time and create a ton of forever memories :)
Freshman Student Council! So happy Alina, Abbie, and Rachel made it...I know they'll keep him focused and in line (and me on speed dial to let me know what's going on!)

back to school=even more chaos

Saying goodbye to summer is really hard for us....and it's more than just because the pool is closing and the kids fading tans makes me sad, but the end of summer means fall is here and that is our busiest time of year. I'll give you an idea of what a typical week is like....

We'll start with Carter. Entering his first year of highschool. As the mother of a freshman, this is my best way to describe his schooling thus far.....

Carter:"Mom, I need $12 for team shorts. Mom, I need $10 for food after the soccer game. Mom I need $15 for a welcome back rally tshirt. Mom, fill up my lunch account...$100 should get me through October. Mom, I need $5 to help pay for rental of SFF." You get the idea.

His school starts at 8am. Scott has to be at work at 7:55, so they ride together and get there at 7:30. Makes things very easy for everyone. Scotts school doesn't start til 9, so he has 90 minutes to grade papers, read the newspaper, play bball with his fav. teachers in the gym...all fun things while I'm slaving away trying to get three kids up and out the door for school. No hard feelings :) Carter then has soccer practice everyday after school til 5ish. The coaches are very unorganized and no one ever knows what's going on. It's so frustrating. Away games bring him home around 7-7:30...which means he hasn't eaten and not even close to starting his homework. Oh and the homework.....at least three subjects a night. I hate highschool homework!!!!!

Now we'll move on to Bennett-big 4th grader :) Ben and Brady's school doesn't start until 8:30 so they roll out of bed around 8, get dressed, eat, brush their teeth and they're out the door. If Tyler is over (more on him later), they walk to school...if he's not, then I drive them the 500 yards to the parking lot. ugh. On Wednesday nights, Bennett has baseball practice from 6 til I call and tell Scott its too damn late and to get his ass home. Seriously, 9pm is NOT the time to start homework...what are we teaching him about priorities????

Next up, Brady. 1st grade. He loves his teacher but he has homework EVERYNIGHT of the week all year long. Its good for him, but I'm tired of hearing him read...I've done this already with two other kids and it's so boring. We're getting to 100 books quickly to meet his year reading goal and then we're backing off. Brady is so competitive that he wants to read 10 books a night so his certificate gets filled the fastest. *Sigh* I give it a few more weeks before we're done and can bring the pace down a bit!

And what kind of teacher gives out whistles as prizes for good behavior? Grrrrrr

Brady has soccer practice on Monday and Tuesday nights at SIUE. Then his games will start next week and they play Saturday or Sundays...throw in a few tournaments and we're good to go. Brady's team is really good and very fun to watch...Scott and I are very excited about this season. The above picture was taken during his two practice games last week...he scored four goals!!

And then there's MISS CATE. She has pre-k 2.5 hours everyday of the week! As of today, she has officially gone to school more than not! Woohoo! She doesn't whine about going, gets herself dressed, but gives me a sad/shy face when she walks into the room. I sneak out and when I come back 2.5 hours later, she's happy as can be. Uncle Mike did mention that he can't wait to hear what she has to say about finding out that the universe does not actually revolve around her! Well, today she came home and said "I had to wait in a line. Why would I have to wait? I should go first all the time" HAHAHA! Big wake up call for Catie Bug!

Her weekly activity is Thursday night dance class from 6:30-7:30. We had our 3rd session last night and she's doing great. She likes playing with all of the girls and the instructors are really awesome.

Scott's middle school girls basketball started this week which means he won't get home before 5:30 on practice days and then just whenever on game days. Fun for me...I'm left having to take all of the kids to Ben/Brady/Carter/Cate's activities by myself. blah.

And speaking of me....what am I doing with all of my free time now that my kids are in school? Babysitting Baby Hadley of course!

Miss Hadley comes to me at 7:30am and stays until about 3:45. Her big brother Tyler also comes over in the morning and walks to school with the boys and then after school too. I am so thankful Hadley is such a laid-back super baby :) We run errands all morning and play all afternoon. Cate loves reading books to her and teaching her to crawl :)

So there ya have it...our wild fall weekly schedule. No rest for the weary :)