I Have A Kindergartener *Sniff Sniff*

Yesterday was Layla's last day of summer vacation.  It was a hot August day and so they of course spent time playing outside.  Greta loves when Layla zooms her around the driveway in this car.  It's nice for me since Greta is safe being pushed by her sister in it.  Otherwise, Greta recently likes to sit on bikes or stand on scooters or sit in cars and just let go and since our driveway is on a slant, she just flies down our driveway until she hits the gravel at the bottom.  I'm thankful now that we didn't pave the whole thing--otherwise she'd go flying into the road! 

 During the day, ZCS had an open house where you could bring your school supplies to school and check out the classroom.   This is her teacher, Zhang Laoshi (Laoshi means teacher in Mandarin--still can't get it right how you say it, it is not how it looks!) and she seems so nice so I'm sure Layla will love her.  There are also 2 teacher assistants in her room since the Mandarin Immersion class is K-2nd combined.  When the Mandarin preschoolers are there, then I believe that one of the assistants will take the kindergarteners to the preschool room. 

At night, we had the bus practice run.  The bus picks you up at your stop (unfortunately 3 country driveways down), brings you to school where  we had a parent meeting, and then drops you back off.  Layla was excited to go, but then was very apprehensive the whole night and not herself.  Before bed she said she wasn't ready for kindergarten.  After some talking through how she really was ready--she knew where her room was, had met her teacher, had all her school supplies, etc--she seemed okay with it and fell right asleep. 

 She's not on Gavin's bus (last year they would have been, but they had to change routes around this year), but when her bus goes to Adams Elementary, Gavin gets on her bus and her bus then takes the ZCS kids over to ZCS.  She is the last stop picked up in the morning which is nice and her route isn't very long, so even in the afternoon, her ride shouldn't be that long.

 Ready for the first day of school!

 Looking so grown up...

 She was fine before we left.  Then started crying in the car before she got out.  She sort of held it together for this picture.  Then started crying in bathroom (which she wanted me to go with her to the bathroom before school started--last night she went by herself while I was filling out paperwork (Em walked her to the bathroom) and was just crying by herself in the bathroom--breaks my heart!!  A lady found her and tried to console her and then Em heard her crying thankfully).  Then stopped crying and happily found her locker.  Then went to sit at her desk and when I looked at her before I was going to leave she was bawling.  So then I was about op0-0crying and decided I needed to just leave:-).

 Only the kindergarteners' names are written in English, which is good so that she can find her locker/desk/etc.  So crazy how much Mandarin the 1st and 2nd graders already know and they only started the Mandarin program last school year.  We had a hard time deciding between Mandarin and Spanish Immersion, but are feeling good about our decision.  The class size is very small, but hopefully in years to come, it increases.  I think there are around 10-12 Mandarin preschoolers which is big increase from only 4 kindergarteners!  I think it's a great opportunity for her and hope she really loves it.  I can't wait to hear about her day!

 I am curious how lost Gibs will be without his big sis.  They do everything together and love playing together.  He seemed just fine dancing by himself or with Greta and Harper:-). 

Strawberry Shortcake 5th Birthday Party

Layla chose Strawberry Shortcake for her party this year which I was excited about since I LOVED Strawberry Shortcake when I was little.  Layla's party was almost a month after her birthday, but she wanted to have her party in our new house and waited very patiently for her party.

 

Strawberry (and her pals too) sure has changed a lot over the years! 

Quick family pic before the party...(Layla made all the kids lots of pop bead necklaces/bracelets/anclets to be fancy for her party which you can see by the jewelry they're wearing:-) )

 Layla's delicious cake made by Brooke, the girl that makes cakes for most of our family parties now because we all love her cakes so much!

 Apps, drinks and cake at our desk (the bulletin board wasn't finished in time for the party)...

 We moved in a week before her party, so I was very busy that week (with the help of my sister) trying to get our house in birthday party condition!  I told guest not to look in our bedroom closets, I may or may not have shoved some extra things in our bedroom closets:-).

I love that as Layla gets older, she too thinks it's fun to think about what decorations we can use for her party.  She helped me arrange all of her SS stuff.  I have just a few dolls left from when I was little and they too were on display.

 For birthday parties, I try to serve food that the birthday kid likes, but with Layla (and Gibs too), that's pretty much anything.  We had chicken casserole, corn soufflé, cheesy potatoes, applesauce, bread and a few different yummy salads.  It was a very "yellow" meal, but very tasty and Layla said it was very appropriate for Lemon Meringue (Strawberry's friend).

 Layla asked me to sit outside by them so I did and was the only adult eating outside, but that's okay--it's what the birthday girl requested:-).

 Greta and Harper had cute matching Strawberry Shortcake outfits, but never got a picture in them since Harper went to sleep during lunch. 

  Layla loved her birthday balloon and I can't believe how many weeks after the party it lasted!

 I took the traditional pic of her with her presents before opening, but forgot to take one after with her gifts!! Oops!

 This Minnie dress for her American Girl sized dolls I actually crammed into my suitcase on the way home from Disney in January.  Greta LOVES shoes (and 'shoes' is one of her favorite words to say) and has loved playing with the cute little Minnie shoes from this set:-).

 A new bigger princess bike from Grampy and Gigi!!  She loves riding now with no training wheels.

 A new big wheels from Grandpa and Grandma and they also got her a big girl Razor scooter.

 With her cake and FIVE candles!

 I had such issues with her birthday outfit.  There is pretty much no Strawberry Shortcake stuff in stores.  She happened to see this Lemon Meringue skirt at TJ Maxx awhile back and really wanted it for her party. I then got her a white shirt and ordered a sheet of Strawberry and friends iron on decals to put on it.  She was so excited to choose which girls would go on her shirt and in what order and was excited for us to make her short a couple of days before her party.  I've done iron ons for many birthday parties in the past and have never had problems with them before, but could not get them to work this time.  I ended up putting this one Strawberry Shortcake on this tank top she had and had to call it good even though it was such a faded Strawberry on it.  When I first started having issues not getting the iron ons to stick (they would just partially stick--like very faded and then I tried to fix it and made it smear and it was just a mess) she cried that her birthday party was ruined.  Thankfully she was happy with the end result of this tank top! 

 She cut all the pieces of cake for everyone...

 Stick the strawberry on Strawberry...

 My little Gibbers...

 Em woke Harper up from her nap to get a picture of her with Greta, not realizing that I had stuck Greta in bed already.  Harper was not so thrilled by that decision.

 Harper happier...

 Movie time after the party...

 Trying out her new bike...

 Family pic infront of the new house...

 Apparently Gibs was tired out from the party...

Just A Typical Day In Our Castle

My two little princesses and my pirate prince had fun dressing up tonight.  So funny to hear what their minds think of.  Layla and Gibs love pretending to be a princess and a prince.  They tend to their babies.  Run away from danger.  And attend many balls.  Quite the aventures they have.  And Greta follows behind.  :-)

Country Livin'

The kids have been enjoying the country life.  After church we went to Grandpa and Grandma's for lunch followed by some time playing by the pond. We then came home and played some more outdoors.  The kids had fun walking in the back and side yards (we just planted grass last week so for the most part, they play on the deck or the driveway) to pick wildflowers and blackberries.  We felt pretty country tromping around our yard in rainboots:-).

 I'm not a bug lover myself, so I don't get too close to tall grass :-)...

 The kids were so excited about all the berries we found but had a lot of them gone before we even came inside:-).

 Layla LOVES helping out in the kitchen.  She really is very helpful.  She's great at getting things I need, putting dishes (that she can reach) away and cutting food up.  Unfortunately we didn't move in on time to have a garden this year, so all of these veggies are just from Meijer.  She had fun Saturday night helping us cut up the veggies for dinner.

 The other night, I had no idea that Gibson wasn't in  his bed until we went upstairs to go to bed...

Movie Time

We don't have a tv in our living room yet, so when the kids need some down time, they've been watching movies in the play room.  I thought it was cute last week that the little girls wanted to join right in for movie time...for about a minute:-).

5 Year Stats

Layla had her five year appointment today.  When we went in last month for Greta's 18 month check up, I asked the nurse for Layla if she had to have shots at her 5 year appointment.  I figured it'd be better to warn her ahead of time if she did:-).  She did not need any, so that was a relief.  She was nervous at her appointment and therefore gripped my hand pretty tight walking in, wanted me to keep Dolly in my purse for her during the appointment, and gave VERY short answers to their questions.  Here are her stats.

Weight: 34.25 (20th%)
Height: 42.5 (50th%)
BMI: 10th%

So she is petite, but we already knew that:-).  I think that's about the same %s as last year.  Pretty sure Gibs has passed her in weight:-).  On our scale at home he's about a pound more. 

I'm so proud of our little five year old.  She's such a sweet, caring, nurturing little girl and it has been so much fun to get to see more and more of her personality develop over the past five years.  I love her infectious giggles and her determined personality.  I love how she is so naturally respectful of her things and how much she treasures little trinkets.  I love how she makes her bed every morning (and sometimes mine while I'm in the shower!) without me ever telling her to.  She is such a wonderful big sister--a good influence (for the most part of course) and good at keeping her brother and sister in line:-).  I will truly miss her while she's at school every day next year!!  Love you Lulu!!

Girlies

Harper happened to have the shorts that matched my girls' tops that they wore today, so I thought it was a good opportunity to take a pic of the girls:-).

 When I watched Haper last week, these two thought it was pretty fun to sit on the bench together:-).