When we got back from taking Owen to school, we went for a walk. Katie loved the pop can she picked up out of our yard (I had set it on the porch railing and it blew off into the grass—it was mine, not some random trash) and would not put it down.
Category Archives: Katie
Another barrette trial
I thought we’d try a barrette again since it’s been awhile…and she’s been doing great with pigtails.
But it only lasted about 30 seconds. I guess we stick with pigtails. 🙂
Sketti
She loves noodles but wasn’t overly thrilled with the meat sauce. Of course I missed the picture of the noodles hanging from her mouth. 🙂
Two new bedtimes!
So, Owen has been pretty much done with naps for awhile now, right? Right.
Until Pre-K started, apparently, when they have an hour scheduled for “rest” which can include a nap if they’re tired or just quiet time where they can draw or read.
So what do I read on his daily take-home sheet Monday? He slept. Okay, I thought, that was a fluke—maybe he was just really worn out or didn’t get a good night’s sleep. So, what did I read Tuesday? He slept. Hmmmm. Okay. And then today? HE SLEPT AGAIN! He has taken THREE naps this week!
So…I’m thinking he needs more sleep at night (even though he is already going to bed earlier and getting up at the same time—I haven’t had to wake him up for school once yet)…so I moved his bedtime to 7:30 instead of 8.
And since Katie WAS at 7:30 and I didn’t want them both going at the same time (a little rough on me), I moved her to 7—which is also likely a good thing because her daytime nap has moved back to 11 so she’s likely more tired at night.
And what might be the best bonus? More free time at night for me!
She’s enjoying wearing her pants…
On her arms. I had to help her, but it’s been a good 15 minutes so far…
Playset Daredevil
I just know she’s going to be the one headed to the ER while Tom is gone…she’s a bit more of a daredevil than Owen was.
And after baths…
Playground Observations
I love how I never know what’s going to come out of his mouth.
We have the baseball playground (the playground next to where he plays baseball, of course!) and the playground that I typically refer to as “the one by Miss Katherine’s house” to which Owen usually replies “Big’s house?” which is true (Big is Katherine’s son) or “the one with the three slides” (yes).
But today after we had the typical exchange, he says “The one with the wood chips? Not the sand?” Um, wow. Yes. The baseball playground has sand and the other one has wood chips. Impressive.
Having a little snack:
The first picture I took…with my new phone.
Of course, it’s a kid!
Tunnel Cuddle
This should be on 9/23. I’ll move it in a few days.
Practicing stepping down!
Yes, I was having just a tiny bit of heart failure, sure she was going to fall down and smash her head on the marble…but she didn’t. And she was SOOOO cute. She was doing this for a good 2-3 minutes before I started recording!
Hurrying to get her in summer outfits!
She has some 18m summer outfits that I’m trying to get her in before she outgrows them and the season changes! I can’t remember which Grandma this dress was from…but I paired it with a pair of white leggings. Cute!
She’s also becoming a bit of a PITA to get a picture of… I remember when Owen went through this stage…thankfully it only lasted about six months if I recall correctly.
One of her favorite pastimes…emptying the toy boxes.
Sibling Love
Sharing an umbrella
Or Katie’s old mobile which Owen was pretending was an umbrella…
Pre-K Open House
Amazingly, Owen was Mr. Shy when we got there…hiding behind me and literally holding onto my shirt. He had already met the teacher, he was back in his old classroom, AND his buddy Braxton was there…so I have NO idea what was going on. It took me a good five minutes to get him to look for his cubby (and I only got him to do it by proclaiming I’d found it and pointing to a picture that was obviously NOT him which got him giggling). Then he wouldn’t give me a good smile.
Then he finally came back to his normal self…he told me the reading area had moved (the classroom had been completely rearranged).
Their daily schedule:
Watching the kids play outside:
Katie stacking Play-Doh:
They had the menu sitting out for next week so I took a look. As I expected, breakfasts and snacks were okay, but there was NOT ONE SINGLE THING he would eat on any of the lunches except cheese pizza (and milk).
- Monday: Chicken parmesan over whole grain pasta, green beans, peaches, milk
- Tuesday: Beef soft tacos on tortilla, red beans, pineapple, milk
- Wednesday: Turkey & cheese on whole grain wrap, squash, peaches, milk
- Thursday: Grilled chicken breast, brown rice with gravy, cranberry sauce, green peas, milk
- Friday: Cheese pizza, corn, mandarin oranges, milk
I asked the teacher if there was ANYTHING we could do because he wouldn’t eat any of it. She said “Well, if he just eats some of it, it should be okay.” I said “No, you don’t understand, he won’t eat the chicken parmesan, the pasta, the green beans, the peaches, the soft tacos, the red beans, the pineapple, the turkey and cheese, the squash, the grilled chicken, the rice and gravy, the cranberry sauce, the peas, the corn, or the mandarin oranges.” Her response: “Oh, you really mean he won’t eat ANYTHING.” Yep. She sent me to talk to the main admin person. I went through almost the same thing with her verbatim.
Me: My son won’t eat anything on the lunch menu except the cheese pizza. Is there anything we can do?
Her: Well, as long as he eats something like the beans or the rice or the peaches…
Me: No, he won’t eat the chicken parmesan, the pasta, the green beans, the peaches, the soft tacos, the red beans, the pineapple, the turkey and cheese, the squash, the grilled chicken, the rice and gravy, the cranberry sauce, the peas, the corn, or the mandarin oranges.
Her: Oh. Wow. You really mean he won’t eat anything.
And of course I’m thinking WHY DOESN’T ANYONE EVER BELIEVE ME?!?!
And long story short, it’s tough luck. I can’t bring anything and they can’t even give him, say, that day’s breakfast or snack foods at lunch time. Each menu square is for that exact day/time only with NO exceptions. He can have a second helping at breakfast or a second helping at snack…but for lunch he’s just out of luck. They will, of course, promote trying the new foods (which I am totally a fan of) but if he doesn’t eat, he doesn’t eat. Too bad. I said “So after he hasn’t eaten anything for lunch for two weeks can we revisit this?” And she said yes, but she was sure everything would be fine. And I guess it might (hopefully peer pressure will work its magic), but it’s just VERY disconcerting to know your super picky eater who you KNOW won’t like anything and HATES to try new food won’t be eating lunch and there’s nothing you can do about it. On one hand I’m glad I don’t have to pack a lunch every day…but if it means he’s not eating lunch, then it’s kinda stupid. Damn government rules. Oh, and they never get PB&J due to allergy precautions, even though no one in his class has peanut allergies. (Okay, I’m really just guessing at that, but inwas told they do not get peanut butter, so I just extrapolated the rest from that.)
But on the positive side, I really hit it off with the teacher. She’s super nice and personable and we ended up chatting quite a bit since we were the last ones there. She’s a mom of three (5, 2, and 4mo), a military wife, and they’ve only been here a year. So I invited her to join our mom group since we’re always looking for new people!! Of course we don’t have a designated weekly group meet yet this school year (we’re still getting schedules worked out) but I told her she could come over to my house for a play date and then we’d go from there. She seems excited so that’s cool. And I figure it can’t hurt to get on the teacher’s good side… 🙂
What you can’t hear…
…is the cat screeching loudly in protest because Katie is sitting on her. 🙂 I missed the better picture when you could see Charlie’s head on the other side.
Good morning, Katie!
I usually send Owen into Katie’s room because it keeps her somewhat quiet while I grab a quick shower…so thankfully she’s happy by the time I get in there. Today I grabbed the camera.
And in a Beson outfit today!
Dinner on the deck!
Owen wanted to eat outside tonight…so we did!
I stripped Katie down since she was soaked from playing in the water table…so I figured it was a good time to let her try to eat a food pouch on her own (in the past when I’ve tried, she squeezes it ALL OVER the place). Of course, tonight she sucked it down like a pro (two, in fact) and didn’t waste one bit. I’m thinking the trick is to make sure she’s REALLY hungry. 🙂
I took 15 pictures and this is the best of the bunch.
Katie & the Water Table, Day 2
She does whatever he does…
She’s fast!
One of the few hand-me-downs from big brother.
Cart fun at Walmart
We do this with Owen and Katie so today Owen wanted to do it to Katie. She loved it.
Who do you think grabbed the worm?
Of course, my baby girl is the one who grabbed the worm from me. Owen wanted NO part of it.
Confined to the porch!
I didn’t feel like chasing her with my bum leg, so I confined her to the porch while Owen ran around. She made do and had fun.
She was sleeping hard!
I rarely have to wake her up, but it was time… Normally she wakes up just as you open the door, but today, she was OUT. Enough so I could actually snap a picture!
Little Sister Outfit
I don’t buy many clothes for Katie, but when I saw this on the clearance rack at Kohl’s, I couldn’t pass it up.
I’m feeling disenchanted this morning.
I am a bit disenchanted with Owen’s school this morning. I know it’s all a little last-minute and that’s fine, but it’s stupid little things like no coat hooks and bins, but just bins (which backpacks don’t really even fit in) and a boring outdoor play area (no playset area like he had before—just an open space and a volleyball net—really?). Not that that’s why they’re there or they need an awesome play area…it was just a bit disappointing.
But the biggest thing is that they have no room for Katie in the drop-in care. Why? Because oh, they don’t have drop-in care for 1-year-olds (which no one ever told me) but technically they could take her but because of all this room- and building-switching, they had to move kids and now the 1 year room is at capacity. I asked “So you really never offered actual drop-in care, it’s mostly for scheduled care?” Yep. Well, thanks for wasting my time and having me fill out all the paperwork for no reason. She said I could still call in the mornings and ask if there was a space, but the chances wouldn’t be good unless someone called in sick. Great. There are other locations around town but the point was to DROP THEM BOTH OFF AT THE SAME TIME AT THE SAME PLACE—not drop Owen off then drive 10 minutes across town to drop her off, only to reverse the process at 11:30.
I still have the other drop-in care, but they don’t open until 9am which means I’d have to waste an hour in town if I want to drop her off after Owen (or drive home 15 minutes, waste 30 minutes, then drive 15 minutes back to town). Annoying, first world problems…but stuff that makes my life more difficult.
Edited after pickup to add: Okay, I jumped to conclusions. The area outside their classroom is for the bigger kids. They do take them out front to the nice, cool, new play area. 🙂
Second day of baseball
Here you can see how many people are on the field at one time! (If you click on this panoramic pic, it will pop up a bigger version.)
His first at-bat. Of course, since I was taking pictures, he actually hit the ball on his own! (The next time when I was taking a video (below), he ended up having to use the T—and someone obviously didn’t notice that I was recording and kept talking to me!)
This time, I let Katie out of the stroller when Owen was in the outfield. She stayed pretty close…
Except she kept wandering into the dugout (it wasn’t even Owen’s dugout—it was just the one we were closest to)!
Mid-game post-potty water break:
Here, you can see the announcer with Owen and his volunteer running in the background.
Heading for home!
A different church was helping out today so they didn’t have the full lunch truck, but they did have hot dogs and chips! Then it was off to the playground for a quick visit!
Katie disagrees with me
This was her response after I took away an empty granola bar wrapper:
Also known as “didn’t take a long enough nap.”
A new sprinkler for the kids!
You gotta love end-of-the-season 50% off sales at the dollar store! Without further ado—Katie’s first sprinkler!
Morning at the playground
I told Owen we could go to the playground this morning, thinking he would pick the one we’ve gone to a few times (the one we stopped at on the way back from seeing Tom off) that’s closest to us…but no…he requested the “baseball playground” (obviously, the one next to the ball fields we went to after playing baseball).
He also requested “socks like grannie’s at the hotel” so he could slide down the slides better. So I gave him some of mine (no pics, unfortunately)…and they stayed on pretty long, until he saw a girl in bare feet and then he wanted bare feet, too!
It was a nice, cool, fall-ish morning so we were all in long pants and long sleeves (which felt like heaven!)…but Katie just couldn’t quite understand the long sleeves and kept trying to pull them off.
This is how she sometimes goes down stairs.
Unlike Owen, she doesn’t mind sand at all.
Owen with Connor, one of the kids from my mommy group.
Katie had her first skinned-lip/chin fall on the sidewalk moments before this (she just stumbled). She cried for about 15 seconds while I brushed the sand off her face…and then she was fine.
Her first two-fer tails!
