First day of school 2010

We now have two Lincoln Lions! The girls could not be more excited to be back to school and Mom and Dad (and Judy) are all thrilled as well. I'm pretty sure Jani is the only one who loves the lack of structure in our circle ;-).





The big "get ready" item this year was the book bag. This year Ashton was insistent that she did not want a backpack but a more age-appropriate messenger bag. She found the perfect one at her new favorite store Justice

The day started by dropping off Ashton at 8:30am. She was thrilled to find friends in her class that she knew and everyone was looking ready and happy taking their obligatory photo for mom.


Next we went back home to get Jacqueline ready for her "late bird" drop off. She had to wear her fancy "cherry dress" and could not have been more excited. The teacher let the parents come into the classroom and get settled and she had spots on the floor marked out for each of the kids. Jacqueline put her bookbag away as requested and found her spot on the floor.

The rule is that each child is to stay in their own square which is harder than it sounds when you are wearing a cherry dress!



After an hour and a half it was time for early pickup. Jacqueline's teacher helped the kids find their parents. We are all thrilled as can be with her teacher. She is smart and sweet but very much in charge of the class. I have no idea how you do that, especially while having a very quiet and measured voice. I'm not going to suggest there is pharmaceutical help or anything, I'm just going to say I could never do that myself.
Next, we picked up Ashton and went to lunch to recap the day which all agreed was a great success.

Girls being cute

This is a post of a couple recent strike a pose moments. This is Jacqueline practicing for their statue pose.
Here is the statue pose -- John and Charlie's back yard just seemed to be missing something with that statue all by itself, the girls were there to lend a helping hand to that situation.
This is how I found Jacqueline after I stopped by the house to check on something. It seems the driver seat is more usable when you put a booster up front.
Here is a typical Saturday afternoon -- getting out of the swimsuit is a challenge. In fact, often Jacqueline wears swimwear around the house with or without any hope of swimming. Today she decided to add a pair of boots and to lay on mom's pillow while using dads iPod touch to play games. You will notice that the shoes are still often on the wrong feet. I figure if she doesn't complain who am I to switch them.

Dentist

In the last couple years it's worked out that Bob (and Judy) have done the dentist trips. This year both girls were excited to go. I guess it helps that their dentist has mastered all the tricks, toys, movies, purple chairs.
Jacqueline, of course, had to wear a dance outfit (thanks again Gabriella!) and strike a pose in her pink chair. I'm not entirely sure if this was before of after we discovered a cavity (ugh!)
As you might expect Ashton has the whole thing figured out -- notice Jacqueline in the background using the chair as a jungle gym.. ?
Thankfully, Ashton's teeth all checked out -- Jacqueline is going to need to get used to dentists as her mouth seems a bit small for all her teeth so I'm guessing that's going to be a fun time as she grows.

Uncle Bill and Christina Visit

It's always a treat when we get to see the Chicago relatives. We just don't do that enough. Bill had a conference in the city and came to visit us -- and yes I think they are even better when there is no long flight with the kids to make it happen ;-).

What was especially nice this year is that Christina and her girlfriend Ashley came out too. The girls were thrilled to see cousins. In our household cousins are celebrity material for sure.
We didn't do much, had a few nice meals, walked around the downtown art fair and just caught up. Christina and Ashley are off to college next year -- how the heck did *that* happen so quickly?

Swimming in the Summertime

Summer 2010 was a big swim summer. Not that we did more swimming this summer than other summers but this was the year of two big breakthroughs.
The first was that with one notable exception where Bob almost killed Jacqueline, this was the summer that taking the girls to the pool was not at all stressful and it only required one parent.

This made for a more flexible weekend where we managed to get some workouts and some relaxation too. Well, now that I think about it the relaxation option only really seemed to be for me since sometimes Bob would take the girls himself and I would relax (to be fair, I also paid bills and blogged some...).
This is Jacqueline demonstrating how mom thinks about relaxation.
The pool was also a place for the girls to socialize with other kids taking lessons at similar times. This worked out very nicely.

The second big breakthrough was even more important (for mom). This was the swim season where mom was not required to wear swimwear! You got it -- I could safely watch the girls from the side of the pool staying fully clothed! While I was not yet ready to leave them to the lifeguard to watch them, it is a lot more relaxing to attend to swim lessons when you are not actually in the pool. No water in your eyes, no kids kicking you in the gut -- really big.

I now love swim lessons. That hasn't been true since I was a kid myself -- yay!

Legoland 2010

After hearing about Legoland for years we finally got ourselves a trip. It was a nice cool summer day and all the rides were well suited for ages 4 and 7.

There were too many photos to count of cool Lego statues and objects but Harry Potter certainly had to make the cut.


Ashton had to demonstrate not only how to captain the boats but also how to strike a pose.
A very little bit of sisterly love. This was mixed in with a huge amount of sisterly strife, I somehow chose not to snap photos of that!
Jacqueline checking out her future home for size.
Ashton and Dante conspiring on how to get rid of her annoying sister. This was a big theme of the weekend for sure.

Life's a Beach

For my birthday weekend we took a quick trip to San Diego to see Dante's new digs. Living just blocks from the beach is a pretty good life we discovered.

Shockingly the weather was not too great, a bit overcast and cool for July but the kids certainly didn't mind.

The adults also managed to relax -- here is Bob watching the kids.
and Caren watching the waves


and Max reading a book...

Little did we know that this relaxing day would end with a stressful finale as Max and Caren found themselves with a huge hassle in Menlo Park waiting for them including fire trucks and lots and lots of smoke and fire damage. Luckily no one was hurt but certainly not the relaxing weekend we were intending to have!