Tunbridge World's Fair

At work this week, Ryan had heard some good things about the Tunbridge Fair so we decided to go check it out this Saturday. It wasn't far from where we live and it ended up being really fun. As soon as we got there, all the kids wanted to do was ride the rides. So we let them choose a few.

They also had this really fun little sand box sitting in the middle of the kid's area but instead of being filled with sand it was filled with corn feed. The kids loved it!

Kate was even making corn angels in it

The rest of the time we spent walking around and seeing the giant vegetables and the fun animals (including some HUGE oxen)

And, of course, we ate some fair food. It was a fun day to enjoy the crisp autumn air that has come to Vermont.

a Saturday hike

On Kate's first Saturday home from school we decided we needed to do something fun as a family. It was very pretty weather so Ryan found a hike near Stowe, VT and we headed out. On the way I stopped for a Joann's visit in Montpelier to get my halloween costume supplies...I still have no idea when my Joann's is opening! The hike was very short down to this big waterfall. There were lots of college age kids jumping off the top of the waterfall into the freezing water below. After a little talk with my children about how important it is to be smart about protecting our heads and necks to keep us safe, we headed down a little ways from the waterfall to where the water was a little more calm and played. The water was freezing and the weather was in the 70's so it wasn't great swimming conditions, but they loved throwing rocks in the water.

After we hiked out we explored the area a little bit. We had passed a cider press and doughnut making shop AND the Ben and Jerry's ice cream factory on the way to our hike and suddenly our healthy family outing turned into a not so healthy one! But it was all very yummy!

(In case you are wondering, that is what Kate looks like when she has ice cream for dinner!)

I want to learn!!

Saturday!! Its amazing the new meaning a Saturday has when you have a school girl. So we're going to try and make the most of it and go on a hike today. But this morning I was talking to Ryan about his vacation time he has at the end of the month and Kate overheard me.

K: "Vacation? What vacation?"
me: "Daddy has a week where he doesn't have to go to work. You'll still have school but I think some days we'll let you stay home with us."
K: "NOOO!! I don't want to miss Kindergarten! I want to learn!!"

She sure loves school! And I love my school girl!

I miss her!

This morning Kate walked into my room by herself and we started talking. I was excited because my kids had slept in 15 minutes longer than they had the rest of the week. I know Sawyer is the early riser and now that they are sharing a room he wakes up Kate every morning. We then had this little conversation.
me: "So where is Sawyer?"
K: "He's laying in my bed."
me: "Oh. When did he get in your bed?"
K: "Recently."
I laughed and then I hugged her and then a thought about how much I miss her and our funny conversations all day long!
Yesterday after school we got home and I sat on the couch sewing a little baby project and listening to Kate and Sawyer run around and play. I love that sound.

Kate-less

Today, despite the rain, we met some friends at a local farm that grows apples, raspberries, blueberries and pumpkins. It was so fun to tromp around in the rain with the pretty scenery all around us and pick our own raspberries. Unfortunately we have had a lot of rain recently so a lot of the berries were moldy, but we found some good ones! They had red raspberries and some yellow Kiwi Golds, which were quite yummy. The blueberries were very picked over and the ones left weren't very ripe so we didn't get any. Sawyer was disappointed about that! But we did buy some apples and he ate one completely down to the core on the way home. Yum! We can't wait to go back and take Kate and Daddy with us and enjoy their corn maze, apple cider and pick some pumpkins! Sawyer is excited to show Kate our raspberries when she gets home but I'm wondering if I shouldn't let her know we do fun things while she's gone for a while...it might be hard to hear after your second day!
I only took pictures with my phone because I didn't want to have to try bring my camera in the rain

After the farm I took Sawyer out to lunch for a little date. He is just such a funny boy and it is so fun to have him all alone. I don't know if this makes sense, but I feel like I SEE him more. At lunch he was jabbering on and on about something and I was just sitting there and looking at him and feeling like I hadn't SEEN him like that before. I don't know if it is because he would always jabber to Kate instead of me or if he kind of just let Kate be the jabberer and he was in the background or if having 2 I just was splitting my eyeball time and I actually just saw him less. Whatever it was, it is fun to see him now.

After we got home we sat down on the floor together and played some board games, just counting down the time until we go pick up Kate. Will we always be so anxious to go get her from school that we are counting down the minutes or is that just because its new? At any rate, 1 hour left to go....

My Kindergarten Kate

I have been very emotional all summer leading up to Kate's first day of Kindergarten. I can probably blame the crying myself to sleep most nights just thinking about it on pregnancy hormones, but I think the feelings are the same that most mothers feel when they see their little one go off to school. It helped that she was just so gosh darn excited to go to help me get a little excited about it. And the day finally arrived! The night before we had a Family Home Evening about David and Goliath and being brave and then Kate and Sawyer both got Father's blessings from Ryan. It is such a special tradition. After it was over I gave her a surprise I had been working on, a new quilt. She has to have "rest time" in the afternoon and the only school supply she had to take with her was a blanket to lay on during it. I wanted to make her something special that she could remember and I think she liked it. After that it was bedtime and then I started to get things ready. I made lists to make sure I didn't forget anything, and then slept horribly because of the anxiety. Kate wasn't nervous or anxious. She woke me up at 6:30 ready to go. I decided to make cinnamon rolls a first day of school tradition for us so I had pre made them and frozen them before and was able to just pull them out last night and they rose perfectly. It was an experiment and I'm glad it worked! So we had cinnamon rolls, primped, packed her lunch, took lots of pictures, and then headed off to school. We had made her teacher a tissue paper flower with a note that said, "Happy First Day of School, Love, Kate" on it and she was so excited to give it to her. The morning was cool and rainy so we didn't have great light for pictures and she had to wear her rain boots and rain jacket over her cute first day of school clothes. But it definitely felt like fall, just like the first day of school should! When we got to the front door of the school her awesome principal was outside greeting all the kids and the office staff was holding a big sign welcoming everyone back. I walked her in and her teacher explained how to organize all her things on her hook and in her cubby, where to put her lunch, etc. Then I took a picture of her and Mrs Bradley and Sawyer and I left. Zero hesitation from Kate, she was off and playing at one of the stations. As we walked towards the car and suppressed the tears because I just kept thinking what a sight it would have been to see a huge pregnant lady bawling like a baby as she walked away from the school. I held it together well! And then Sawyer and I were home. I let him watch his favorite show, Jake and the Neverland Pirates, and it wasn't halfway over before he asked when Kate was coming back. I told him it wasn't until after lunch. He played well by himself while I was laying down on the couch, exhausted. My lack of sleep the night before had caught up with me! Sawyer and I read some books and played some games and he asked about Kate at least every half hour. In the afternoon we went to the gym and his teacher in the gym daycare said the first thing he said when he walked in was, "My sister isn't here." After my workout we got home, ate lunch and I took a shower. It was the first time in a long time that I had a buddy bugging me while I was in the shower, Kate and Sawyer can occupy themselves pretty well. But with just Sawyer he peeked his head in wearing one of Kate's headbands and said, "look at me!" When I told him how pretty he was and laughed he made it a game and he would run and get a new headband and say the same thing. That lasted for the duration of my shower. It was so funny having him need the attention from me when he was Kateless! Before we knew it, it was 2:45 and time to pick up Kate. She ran to us with a big smile and we walked hand in hand to the car. At first I asked her what she did that day and she told me she was too tired to talk about it, but once I started asking her specific questions she perked right up. Here is her recap: When she first got to school she chose the coloring station. She sat by her friend Casey (that she met on the bus at orientation) at lunch. She made a real gingerbread boy after reading the story together in circle time but he ran away and hid and they are trying to find him. During rest time she closed her eyes and rested but didn't fall asleep. She went to PE after rest time and had a different teacher. She went outside for recess twice but it was too wet to go on the slide. She had to stand in a line to go anywhere else besides her classroom. And she loved it.
After a quick snack and wardrobe change, we headed to her first day of dance class which she also loved. It is ballet and tap, which is a first for her. We have had hand me down tap shoes for a while but this is her first time using them in a class and she loved it. After class it was home and I was pooped! I can only imagine how tired Kate was! But she happily told Daddy everything that she had told me, adding in some of her new dance moves. And then her and Sawyer chased each other around and played until dinner.
It was a fun, exhausting and successful day and I'm glad she had so much fun! Now....we do it all again tomorrow!

Phone Pics

I always have my phone with me so it is the most reliable way to get pictures of our every day stuff. Here are some things we have been doing:

Quechee Library Summer reading program....not quite as nice as our Houston summer reading program prizes but we did get to go mini golfing for free. The kids were a little clueless about form but they were determined to do it on their own.

yummy cupcakes for an Activity Days activity

We bought a new mattress and took it home the white trash way! We were shopping for a mattress for Kate's queen but decided to get ourselves a new bed and give her ours. (That's what is so great about being the parents, right?) Commercial time....have you ever tried a Tempur-Pedic bed? I had tried the pillows and thought I didn't like them but after trying the bed I was totally hooked! ESPECIALLY being pregnant! I wake up several times during the night with my hips aching on a normal mattress and I could feel the difference in support the minute I tried out this bed. So go try it. Or better yet, don't until you are ready to buy one. We tried it, went home and "slept on it" before making the decision and our bed just felt awful. Now that we have it home we are still in love. The other day I was in my kickboxing class with my huge belly, standing next to the lady who had just asked me if I was having twins when she heard when my due date was, and all I could think about was how I wanted to take a bath and then lay down in my new bed. It is that comfy!

Hurricane Irene came for a visit. There was a whole bunch of hype leading up to it but mainly for NYC and other areas close to water. I was fairly confident that it would only be a big bad storm by the time it hit us. We did prepare with some water and food but we weren't thinking it was a going to be a big deal. And it wasn't. At our house we lost power Sunday night for about 15 minutes (right around bed time) and other than that, it was just rainy. We didn't really have much wind to go with it at all!

It wasn't until the next morning when Ryan texted me from work to tell me to look up "Quechee bridge Hurricane Irene" to see the damage that we knew exactly what happened around us. We may not have gotten a hurricane but we got too much water and the rivers were flooded. Poor downtown Quechee is on the edge of the Ottauquechee river and it saw a lot of damage.
This is the playground off the Quechee Green, next to the post office

The post office remained open but was still drying out when I got there on Tuesday. Everyone with PO Boxes behind the tape had to ask for their mail through the window. It has since been cleaned out.

The Quechee Green gazebo. It is still standing but had a lot of damage to the ground around it

Then we drove into West Lebanon where all our shopping is and we couldn't believe it! It sits on the Connecticut River, which divides Vermont from New Hampshire. The river is actually pretty far from these stores, they don't sit on river front property.
This whole complex was, and still is, closed! I heard that there was water 8 ft high against these buildings and that JCPenny had 4 ft of water inside. I'm sure the rest of the shops were the same.


Across the road from there, even further from the river, Walmart was shut down and this is what the parking lot looked like from the grocery store next door (which was open). All the muddy sludge had dried up and turned to dirt and all of West Lebanon was swimming in it! My town doesn't have a lot of shopping so it is pretty devastating to have all these shops closed. Especially Joanns!!

Kate's Kindergarten open house

Lunch with Daddy at the hospital after a midwife appointment