One more week until school starts.....

In one week from today, all three of my "big" kids will be in school. Levi and Calder start on Tuesday, Sept. 8th (in 5th and 2nd grades respectively), and Ansel starts kindergarten on the Wednesday, the 9th.

We have slowly been preparing for the start of school, over the past three weeks. There has been school supply shopping, going through closets and switching out too small or too old clothes, and buying new clothes/shoes to supplement their wardrobe. I started early enough that it hasn't been stressful, or rushed, so I am feeling good about that process this year. But there was one issue I wanted to resolve from past years. The issue of the daily "landing" routine.

Up until now I haven't really had a good "landing" place for the kids when they got home. Their homework stayed in their backpack until it was time to do it (the backpack sometimes staying in the hall all day), and so did the papers mom needed to read (unfortunately some not making it out of the backpack until just before they left in the morning, or not at all.) Library books would go unread in some corner of the house, sometimes not making it back to school on the next library day. We just didn't have a "place" for these things, so they floated around the house, never resting.

This year I have come up with a way that I think will really help this process, and make me feel more organized, and less stressed!

Here is my idea:

1st) I made a homework station for the boys. One that is set aside for this purpose. I used our dining room area (since we NEVER eat in there -except maybe 2 or 3 times a year) as the homework headquarters, because this is where they usually do their homework anyway. There is good lighting, plenty of seating and space for everything they need. It is in the central part of the home and is an open room (only one real wall) so that I can keep tabs on them as well.

On the cabinet, behind the glass table, you can see the work station:

It includes file boxes, homework materials, pencil sharpener, music, and school calendar:


I tried to make it fun and engaging, for the boys, so that they would utilize it.
(including using their favorite colors, personalizing the file boxes with their names, and making it easily accessible)


This is my favorite feature:
These three little Bamboo and canvas boxes are going to save my life.
Each boy has three folders in their box: A "homework" folder, a "IN papers" folder, and an "OUT papers" folder.

Here is the drill:
#1 When they get home from school each day, they empty out their backpack of everything they brought home, putting their homework in their "homework" folder, papers that mom needs to look at/sign/or read, into the "IN papers" folder. Any library books also go into their box as well. Then they hang up their backpacks, out of the way.

#2 At homework time they go get their homework folder and do everything they need to for that day. Anything that gets completed goes into the "OUT papers" folder, the rest stays in the homework folder to be completed at a later date.

#3 Mom gets into the "IN papers" folder and reads/signs/calendars the papers in this folder. Anything that needs to go back to school goes into the "OUT papers" folder as well.

#4 The next morning (or the night before) the boys go to their "OUT folder" and grab everything in there, putting it back into their backpacks to make the trek back to school. The key to this feature is that it is empty every morning when they have left for school.


Here is my SCHOOL CALENDAR:
(notice the cute pics of the boys on the left side- cool feature, huh)

This is used to calendar anything that will be happening at the school, during school hours. Not only for the kids, but for myself. Each kid gets their own colored pen. Levi=green, Calder=red, Ansel=yellow. When I get their schedules I mark down what each child needs to know for each day. For example: Calder might have PE on Wednesdays, and so he looks at the red writing and sees this, and then dresses appropriately, or he sees that he has Library day on Monday, so he puts his books into his backpack.
The key is that both myself AND the boys will be looking at this calendar every morning and night. I think it will help them become more aware of their own responsibilities and be more prepared for the day because they know what is coming.

And that is my new life saver!
YAY for organizers, they always make our lives better!!

Anyone else have some good school organization tips??

My Birthday!

Last week, on Thursday, was my 34th birthday!! Whoo hoo! Yes... I know, I am old. It was the day before we ran the Hood to Coast (post on that will be coming soon) and so my sister Lani, her husband BJ, and their baby girl (Ashlyn) were here to celebrate with me! (They ran H2C with me).

We wanted to do something fun, with everyone (kids included) so Joe planned a fun excursion into downtown Portland.

The key to visiting downtown Portland is finding a good cheap place to park. We met Joe at his office building in the Lloyd Center district of downtown portland, which is on the other side of the river from the city center (where we were going). It's not walking distance, but parking in the city center is a nightmare, so instead of just picking him up and driving into to find limited, expensive parking closer, we parked at the Lloyd Center Mall (which has free parking):

Walked a block to Joe's office building:

and then hopped on the Max and rode it to the city center:

The Max is free to ride when you are in downtown, so the price was definitely right!

Here are some pictures from the train ride:

Levi and I

Ashlyn, my adorable niece.


Kaelan (who was absolutely in 7th heaven because he LOVES trains)


This is what he did the entire train ride:

On the ride we saw The Rose Garden (where the Trailblazers play) it is 2 blocks from Joe's work:

The Portland Convention Center (which is kind of a Portland Icon), also a couple of blocks away from Joe's work:

And got to ride the train over the Steel Bridge that goes over the Willamette River. In the picture you can see that MAX is on the top level and regular trains go on the lower Level.

Right now they are in the final stages in the drawing board for putting up a new MAX bridge that will look like this:
(if you look close you can see OMSI on the right side, just behind the bridge)

Kaelan was NOT happy when we got off the train, and threw a spectacular fit for all to see.


Our first destination was Glowing Greens Miniature Golf. It is the coolest indoor miniature golf course I have ever seen. Every thing is glow in the dark, lit with black lights. It is Pirate themed. It is below the Downtown Portland Hilton.

Out front of the entrance:

The entrance (the golf course is down the stairs- or the elevator):

Some pictures of the golf course:

Cool, huh!! The boys LOVED it, even Kaelan. He had his own club and ball (which also glow in the dark) and would hit the ball once, then pick it up place it in front of the hole and whack it in! It was SO cute. Also, he was wearing underwear this whole time and didn't have an accident!! The best birthday present of all! ;-)

When we were done golfing we hopped back on the MAX (much to Kaelan's delight) and rode it to E-SAN Thai restaurant. It was rated 4.5 out of 5 stars, so we thought we would see what all the hub-bub was about.

The exterior was really neat. I really liked the architecture

The interior was really neat too. I really liked the windows. We sat on the first floor, but the boys loved going up and exploring the second floor balcony.

The food was DELISH!! My kids love ethnic foods, so they consumed it all, with much gusto.
Here is a sampling of some of the foods we ate:
(sadly the accident free trip came to an end at E-Sans. KK got stuck under the table somehow, and we couldn't hear him yelling Pee-Pee at first, so he peed under the table and was very sad. Luckily I brought a second pair of underwear and a new outfit just in case)


KK's sadness was mollified when we got back on the train to go home.


When we got home, Joe made Lemon bars for my birthday "cake":


They were SO yummy. The only downside was that Joe put the candles in when it was still hot and it melted the candles down to the string, so we had little puddles of wax in the four candle holes!! It was really funny pulling out those candles to see nothing but string!! It didn't ruin the lemon bars though.... phew!

Joe got me some perfume (Lancome Hypnose) and some Lancome makeup. That's a first! I loved it. Lani gave me some awesome (well needed) sunglasses, Levi gave me an awesome pencil sketch of the Golden Gate Bridge, and Joe's parents gave me a gift card to Borders books! It was a Great day.

But the best gift of all was family time!!

New Blog backgrounds

I would like some advice. I just learned how to make my own blog background and I wanted to make a few and try it out on you guys, see what you think. I gave one a test run as the new background to see if it would work successfully and it did!! YES! But just because it is on my blog doesn't mean it is my favorite. I made several that I like, Levi got in on it and requested one himself. Can you tell which is Levi's?

I will change my header a bit to fit with the new blog background, so don't worry about a clashing header.

What I want to know is what style do you like best, and why.

Here they are:

What the.....????!!

What do you think when you see these pictures??

And what relationship does it have to a trampoline???

No guesses??


Well, I am sure you have guesses, but I am too impatient to wait for them. So here's the scoop....

This was the state of Calder's face when I first saw him this morning. I nearly swallowed my gum! Did he wake up with chicken pox??? Was it some weird rash related to the chlorine in the pool we swam in last night? Some reaction to a food? Grass??? It couldn't be mosquitoes because I have never seen them EVER in our yard.....What could it be???

When I saw Levi and Michael also walk inside from their night on the tramp, it was confirmed. They all three had red spots ALL over their exposed body parts. No where else. Levi had a lot also on his arms because he was wearing shorts sleeved pajamas. They had all gone out after dark, when the stars were shining. There have been many a nights, over the years, spent sleeping on the tramp, without incidence. And yet.....

It was Mosquitoes.... DEFINITELY mosquitoes!! Apparently my little Camelot has a darker side. The mosquitoes only come out at night on hot days, and it has been VERY hot for the past 2 weeks, and not cooling down until 4am. The mosquitoes were only out at night and the mosquitoes were HUNGRY!!! The poor boys! I left them out there unprotected, and they were attacked while they slept!! Levi and Michael paled in comparison to Calder's monstrous collection, but they each had around 20-40 even still. Calder was so covered that it deserved closer inspection and a count. I laid him down and carefully counted his bites.........
You might want to sit down for this.......

214 bites in total!!

That poor kid had literally been eaten alive!!

An Amazing photo shoot! (or three)

 

There is a great story to go with these awesome photos.  Our Primary School has an auction every other year to help with funding. (just like dozens of other schools)  They always hold it at a fancy golf club, and I always feel WAY out of my league when I attend, but that is a side note.

This year a professional photographer, Nina Beilby, who owns Eminent Images, donated her services to photograph EVERY child in the school, so the parents could purchase them with 100% of the proceeds going to our school.  It was an amazing undertaking.

She photographed all of them  successfully.  When she was done, I started hearing multiple comments about Calder's photo ( I hadn't seen it yet).  Then I got an e-mail from a friend (who organized the auction) asking if they could use Calder's photo for display in the school - to advertise the photo auction.  I said sure, and was told that I had to come and see it at the school on Monday.  So I did.  It was AMAZING!  She had blown it up to be 3 feet by 5 feet and it was right inside the front door!!  Calder felt like a celebrity for 2 months straight!!  It was really cute.

Anyway, we got the photos that we had purchased, the last week of school.  Nina's son, Patrick, was in Levi's class and on the last day of school (at the school party) she came up to me and asked if she could use Calder's photo on her website and business cards.  She said that she would compensate me by either more prints of Calder and Levi, or with a photo shoot of my other two little guys.  Nina is from Australia, and so she said all of this in a very cool Aussie accent.  I chose a shoot with the little guys.

The photo shoot just happened last week.  We did it at a local park.  She was amazing.  When Nina saw Ansel and Kaelan, she exclaimed over how cute they were and then asked if she could use all of the kids on her website.  I signed the waivers, she got the rights and I got the photos!  What a deal!!!

So, without further ado.... Here they are!

Which, of Ansel and Kaelan’s, do you like best???