Loins

Bee Cool at Bee City

Some of us moms decided to take the kids to Bee City - about an hours drive - for a little field trip! Ya-ya stayed home, which was perfect because there really wasn't any place for her to crawl around, which would've resulted in a major back ache for me. Anyway, the kids learned about bees, saw some bees, made a craft with bees wax, poured honey, and saw all kinds of animals at the petting zoo. The kids really enjoyed it and it ended up being a nice outing. Here's some of the group listening to the rules. I keep looking at this picture thinking that all of these kids are coming from like 7 families or something. That's a lot of kids! And a lot of kids PER FAMILY! Wow.

Look at how attentive they are! Honestly, there were so many rules, I couldn't keep them straight. I'm glad the kids were listening in this moment, but I'm sure we broke every rule mentioned, several times...

We had fun crawling on the fake animals too!

I'm sure Noa and Evie are talking about who gets to sit on the turtle and for how long.

Evie won!

This picture was taking right after one of Ruthie's major melt-downs. She looks so content here though. They were very interested in filling up their own honey bears with honey.

Here's the bee colony that the kids got to see. Noa was pretty fascinated with the whole thing, but afterwards she pulled me aside and said, "Mom, now I'm gonna show you the real bee..."

And here it is... the real bee. :)

Precious little Eden. This is Lydie's friend - born a week later - and she was a busy little bee herself! Crawling everywhere!

Last, but certainly not least (these two wouldn't stand for that), here's Ruthie and Lulu, two middle children living up to that stereotype quite nicely. No smiles even though we asked 100 times... They are definitely kindred spirits in their approach to life: physical, passionate (you could also insert "crazy" here. "Passionate" is our positive spin on what's really going on.), influential, beautiful, my-way-or-the-highway type girls...

Thanks Rhoda, for organizing all of this! We had a fun day and look forward to when we can BEE COOL at BEE CITY again... :)

Noa's First Day of School

But first... The Lion's cheerleaders are baaaaaaaack!!!!!! (Please forgive Noa's short, short, short outfit - we are getting as much use out of last year's outfit as we can!)


Here's a little picture of a very over-tired mommy and her Ya-ya.

Beauty queen Noa and her chalk drawings below. The first is a rainbow she copied and the second is her first self portrait. Not bad!



Lydie's new face

And finally, here's Noa on her first day of Preschool! We were rushing around so much this morning, I'm glad we squeezed this shot in! She was wearing her new school tennis shoes and her new jeans. She did so well! Before we left, I told her we would probably have to leave blanky and kitty (her security things) in the car because we can't take them to school. She said, "Mom, I'll just leave them at home because that's what big kids do." Whoa! Big girl! She was a little clingy when I dropped her off. She was very nervous and shy with her teacher Miss Adelle, and the other kids, but they said she had a terrific first day. She went potty all by herself (and even told them she had to go), learned all of the rules of the classroom, and when I picked her up, she was busy on the playground and hardly noticed I was there! Afterward, we stopped at a coffee shop and she got to pick out a huge cookie because she was so brave. She kept saying, "Mom, I am soooooo brave. I went to school all by myself! And Ruthie didn't go!" I enjoyed my 3 hours of freedom, but I would be lying if I made you believe I wasn't thinking about my Noa-girl the whole time. :)

Ya-Ya

Just had a family photo shoot, so better pics are on the way. Ever since Russ got his Iphone, we've been taking a lot of pics on it and I have been lazy with my camera. Gotta get back in the groove! We've had an extremely busy September and October is looking the same. Last week Noa and Ruthie were sick with some virus, and Noa was throwing up because of it. So sad. :( Those two are back to normal this week but now the rest of us have some post-nasal drip throat thing. Blah. Anyway, Noa is going to start going to a little preschool on Thursdays, so I'll have to post pics of her first day this week. She is sooooooo excited, but I bet she'll be shy on her first day. I'm going to stay there for a little bit with her. Maybe I'M the one having a problem with it! Probably. Anwyay, to hold you over, here's a sweet little picture of our Ya. It's official. Lydie's "official" nickname is Ya-Ya, or Little Ya. And she is still the sweetest little baby ever!

Nakies!!!