Back to School

The kids have all been back to school for two weeks now and are all settling back into our school year routine really well. AND I remembered to get back-to-school pictures for all of them.

Rabbit started SIXTH GRADE! This means she is now at the middle school - and is one of the lucky students who gets to attend the brand new middle school in our district. The school is beautiful and modern. They have all these funky tables and chairs instead of desks, most classrooms have a wall that can be completely opened up into the common area, and there is all kinds of technology for the students to use. Rabbit even gets her own Chromebook! She has started Spanish, band, and a class devoted to using technology. It's pretty cool. She's enjoying having different teachers throughout the day and has adapted to the middle school environment easily. She's growing up so fast! I hate to admit it, but I think she might be taller than me! Did I mention she's only eleven?!

Tigger is now in THIRD GRADE! He's our only child in elementary school this year. He is having a great time so far, and has a fabulous teacher. He comes home excited about what he's been learning, and I'm amazed at what a great reader he has become. He's still a bundle of enthusiastic energy, and I hope that never changes. To me, that's a defining feature of Tigger's personality.

Kellin started his second year of PRESCHOOL! I'll be honest and say this picture wasn't actually taken on the first day of school, because he was not happy that day, but I managed to get this picture a few days later. Doesn't he look handsome?? Kellin is five years old and would have been eligible for kindergarten this year, but we felt that the obvious decision was for him to attend another year of preschool. He has so much catching up to do. His transition back to school has been much smoother than last year. He still fusses when I walk him into his classroom, and he has his little meltdowns when his teachers and therapists want him to do something, but overall, he's reasonably happy, and he's not coming home cranky and exhausted like he did last fall. That's about as good as I could have hoped for. I'm excited to see what he will achieve this year!

Pooh started PRESCHOOL! This is particularly special to me, since he is my youngest and I now have all four children in school. He LOVES preschool. He attends preschool in the same building where I work and I drive him to daycare on my lunch break, so we have 10 minutes in the car together and he usually talks the whole way about what he did that day at school. I love it! Rabbit and Tigger don't tell me all the details of their day anymore, and Kellin doesn't talk, so I truly appreciate listening to Pooh chatter away about his morning. As an added bonus, Kellin also attends preschool in my building, so when I drop Pooh off at daycare, I also pick up Kellin and bring him back for his afternoon class. So far, it's working well.

Working full-time and having four children in three different schools and various activities requires a lot of organization and planning to make sure that everyone is accounted for and gets where they need to be when they need to be there (with the supplies they need), but I love it and wouldn't change it for anything! I am one blessed mom!

What We've Been Up To

It's been too long since I posted an update! In the past few weeks, we finished up our summer and all headed back to school. I finally managed to get new pictures of the kids up on our living room wall. Every summer, we try to get a good picture of each child to display for the coming year. Usually I get to it in June; this year, it was the end of August. But here are our beautiful and handsome kids!

Rabbit, age 11

Tigger, age 8

Pooh, age 4

Kellin, age 5

On August 29th (Kellin's birthday!), we started our school year routine - the kids off to daycare for a couple weeks until school started, Daddy and I off to prepare for our students this new school year. I was worried about this transition for Kellin, as last fall it was very traumatic and stressful for all of us. I'm happy to report that so far, he seems to be settling in pretty well. He has his fussy moments - at home, daycare, and preschool - but he gets over it.

We are continuing our approach to his eating, although I feel that we are "pushing" him to eat just a little more than we were for a while. I have learned that it doesn't seem to decrease his eating if he is coaxed or praised for eating, unless he gets upset, so I do offer food and put food into his mouth (as long as he is willing). He is tolerating chunks of food much better than he was (soup with small noodles, spaghettios, creamed corn) and swallows bigger mouthfuls than he used to, without gagging. A few weeks back, we were at a restaurant and he was eating crackers or cereal (can't quite remember), but he must have swallowed wrong or gotten something caught in his throat, like we all do occasionally. He started to cough and he spit out the food that was in his mouth - BUT HE DIDN'T THROW UP. I was amazed. Before we changed our approach, he would NEVER have gotten through this without throwing up. So we're still moving forward, but although I haven't dared to actually have him weighed, I'm still pretty sure his weight is down. He has an appointment in a week and we'll see what he really weighs. Gulp. He must be taller though because the pants that fit him last spring are now looking a little short. I'm still on the hunt for a high-calorie, high-nutrient juice for him. Something like Pediasure, but not Pediasure because it's milk-based and he won't drink it. There are juice drinks out there for adults but I can't find anything for kids that seems to be what we need. So we continue to give him regular juice - but the most nutritious, high-calorie stuff I can find (orange juice, green fruit/veggie juice, etc.).

I'll leave you with a few pictures of our last trip of the summer "up North" (if you're from Minnesota, you know what that means!) Most of these are from the bear center we visited, but we also visited a wolf center (remember Tigger LOVES wolves) and went to a music festival. It was a great way to end the summer!

We had an awesome hotel room, which was actually two rooms with beds like this. This was the back bedroom and the front had a bed plus a table and chairs. It was perfect for us!

I'm planning to do another blog post soon about the kids getting back to school. Stay tuned!

Why

In case anyone ever wonders why raising awareness of the forgotten orphans in this world is so important, please go read this family's blog post. This is the reality. And this is not an isolated case. There are many, many other children out there just like the little boy in this story.

http://thesometimes8irons.blogspot.com/2015/09/the-new-8-in-semi-long-nutshell.html