Owen’s summer challenges: complete!
Owen just finished his “100 Books in 100 Days” and “200 Pages in 100 Days” Challenges!!
It wasn’t all easy—he fought the workbook pages a bit and got WEEKS behind but caught up at the end when he realized he might not get his surprise. 🙂 Also, to be honest, he really probably only read a total of 60-70 books, but a bunch of them were small chapter books (like 10 pages per chapter, three or four chapters per book) so he got multi-credits for those. And this was his reward!
We have a bridge in our living room.
After we got done picking up the living room, I was on the computer and Owen was watching TV—or so I thought. I came around the corner to this:
Me: Owen, what is this?
Owen: A bridge! Like if you want to go to the computer room or the dining room but not the toy room.
🙂
Mornings are always interesting.
There’s usually crying by Katie at some point, the kids playing nice, doors slamming, arguing between the kids over something/anything/nothing, sometimes yelling on my end…and then there’s this.
I had finished my shower and gotten dressed and it was quiet. Too quiet.
Owen was reading Katie the book that Tom had started the previous night.
Cue my heart melting. 🙂
You know what part I love about waking up?
Teachers on buses!
Owen’s elementary school had their teachers get on buses and visit a few neighborhoods to say hi and hand out treats!
Owen’s two kindergarten teachers are on the far right.
We were coming home from the sprayground a few minutes before the bus was to arrive at the local library, so we stopped. Owen got to say hi to his Kindergarten teacher and Aide, he met his new art teacher, and got an icee pop!
One of the last times of the season!
I wish I had discovered the sprayground before the end of the summer—it’s quite close to home and the kids LOVE it.
I didn’t take many pics because we were there with friends (she has a little one so I sat with her and didn’t want my phone near the water) but I got this great one of Owen. 🙂
Water Ninja
I love when the kids amuse themselves.
Katie’s shoe tree!
We had been shopping earlier and I bought her a coat rack for her bedroom. I hadn’t taken it upstairs yet and actually forgot about it. Awhile later she came to me while I was working in the kitchen saying “Mama! Come here! MAMA! Come look what I did!”
She was SO PROUD of herself. 🙂
Our first overnight sous vide!
Trying sous vide boneless pork ribs overnight! Tom retrofitted the top so we don’t lose water from evaporation!
P.S. They were cooking for about 20 hours and turned out amazing!
Mom! Charlie’s in my way!
Charlie just makes herself at home wherever she wants on the table. Normally Owen doesn’t care but she was right ON his placemat.
It’s Sunday so it must be swim lessons!
Katie has the jumping in down and the floating down…now she just has to get the middle part of getting into her back by herself.
Sunday morning walk!
Katie and daddy hiding from us!
Surprise!
Daddy and Katie running up the hill!
We learned the trail takes an hour if Katie is walking. If she rides most of the time on daddy’s shoulders it only takes us 47 minutes. 🙂
Our first metro ride!
We were headed into the city to have lunch with friends…and since it was semi close to a subway stop, we decided to make a fun trip out of it! We had to drive north about 15 minutes to catch the metro where it starts.
The kids were super excited about riding a train!
At the restaurant, Kabob Palace.
We wan into a bit of a snafu on the way home—long story short we weren’t paying attention and ended up on the wrong train (headed north instead of south) so we had a 20-minute wait for the next (correct) train.
And the car was a bit more crowded than our first trip so the boys had to stand for one stop.
They both loved it and wanted to do it again immediately. 🙂 I’m sure we’ll go somewhere again, but I’m also sure it won’t be a regular thing because this simple, short trip cost us about $22 in fares (it’s about $3.50pp each direction)!
If you see this, buy it!
We bought it on a lark at Marshall’s…and it’s amazing.
Kidisms 15
There are almost always geese out on/near the road when we take Owen to his activity camp in the morning—and Katie LOVES seeing them.
Katie: What are they doing?
Me: Maybe they’re looking for breakfast.
Katie: Cereal!
Me: No, I don’t think they want cereal.
Katie: Maybe they need a home.
Me: Maybe.
Katie: We should take them to our home!
Me: What would we do with geese at our house?
Katie: Put them outside!
Owen: I love red cherry snow cones. Except not much because I just ate five pieces.
Owen: Mama, I love you.
Me: I love you, too.
Owen: And I also love Sick Bricks.
We were riding home with all the windows open.
Owen: It’s 100% windy!
Katie: Mom, can I get in the box with Charlie?
Me: Sure.
Katie: But there’s not enough box!
Katie: Owen, do you love daddy?
Owen: Yes.
Katie: Owen, do you love Mommy?
Owen: Yes.
Katie: Owen, do you love me?
Owen: Yes.
Katie: Owen, do you love Cayenne?
Owen: [silence]
Katie: Owen? Do you love Cayenne?
Owen: [silence]
Katie: I love her, she’s my friend. She’s my girl.
Creeper? Creepy!
A Creeper is a Minecraft character.
Owen loves Minecraft. Hence him wanting to try it on. If it wasn’t really thin and $20, I probably would have gotten it for him. 🙂
Helping Katie play Uno
The great closet clean out!
Tom and I have been sorting through all the clothes that no longer fit. This is my first bunch—I still have to go through the long-sleeved shirts, summer stuff I’m making last through the end of summer, and more jeans:
- 18 shirts
- 11 pair comfy pants
- 10 dressier shirts
- 3 dresses
- 3 shorts/2 Capri/2 jeans/6 dress pants
- 3 PJ sets
- 1 swimsuit
- 4 bras
- 2 sweaters
I look forward to having fewer clothes in my closet, that’s for sure. (Honestly, it doesn’t look like I took anything out—it looks like a normal closet now. That’s what you get when you keep clothes in four sizes!)
I pulled out a fall jacket that I’ve only worn once and it’s been too tight for years—and now it’s too big (which I could say about a lot of my stuff).
I know it’s a great thing to be losing weight, but I’m having a hard time putting some of my favorite pieces in the donate pile. I keep wondering if maybe I shouldn’t try to get them altered so I can keep wearing them…but then I realize I will just buy cuter clothes that actually fit. But it’s still hard. 🙂
Every time I get dressed now I just shake my head in awe because I was literally thisclose to getting rid of all my clothes that were too small that I hadn’t worn in years and were just pissing me off seeing them there. And those are the clothes I’m wearing now!!
Morning playground time
I was on my walk when I noticed Owen had started pushing Katie! And she was loving it!
Katie came up and asked if she could run. Sure! So off she went!
I can’t wait until these days are over.
Welcome to a typical Katie tantrum—she wanted to put her socks on herself but the first one got stuck within seconds. She started this as I walked forward to help her—and it went on for a good 15 seconds before I started recording and continued for at least 15 seconds after I stopped.
Things that make you go hmmm.
Owen was doing his summer [school] pages tonight when he came across this. We all thought it was funny. (The object was to pick the word from the sentence that should be capitalized—learning that the first word of the sentence is always capitalized.)
Back at the sprayground!
I had promised Owen we would take him so today was the day! Both kids had a blast! (I remembered to take cups!)
Owen was very proud of this:
Genetics Revisit
Owen’s pediatrician wanted to revisit his genetics results to see if any new information has been discovered in the past 2.5 years…so it was off to Bethesda to see a specialist.
In the waiting room, Owen made a beeline for the one kid he saw who was also using a tablet. 🙂
The short story is that there is nothing new regarding his previous test results and we don’t have to worry about revisiting them for another two years unless something changes drastically with his health or behavior. We also don’t have to worry about getting Katie tested.
I fully believe it’s something that could’ve been handled over the phone without actually seeing Owen in person but I obviously that would make things too easy. (Fortunately the drive there did not give me an anxiety attack as it has in the past—the traffic was fairly light and I left plenty of time.)
Gooses!
This hasn’t been her best response yet but of course I didn’t have the video running on those. 🙂
It’s just about perfect.
We bought a string of big lights from Costco and Tom hung them from the tree! I love it! I can’t wait to have people over to enjoy it!
Me and Owen got treats!
To celebrate my weight loss, I went shopping. 🙂 I was hoping to find a pair or two of capris on sale that would last me the rest of this season (and most likely through the spring when I will hopefully need another new size—the way my body apparently fits into pants, I may be wearing these for 3-4 months (if I keep losing at the same rate)). This was me trying on new jeans—and kind of liking how they looked and feeling good! I sent the pic to Tom saying I wasn’t sure—they were a little tight but they were stretchy—and he said GET THEM. Smart man, I know! 🙂
And then we got Owen a future treat at the Lego store (we’re changing his chore chart reward system), and he was giddy about the Minecraft displays. 🙂
Owen and Tom were in a hurricane!
Owen saw this Hurricane machine while he was at his activity camp last week…and begged me to go in it…so I told him we could do it after a swim lesson when daddy was there. So today was the day!
Sunday Swim Lessons
Playing before her lesson:
She has reverted back a little from that one day of awesome jumps and floating…she still does well enough, though, and has fun.
Normally she plays after her lesson (while Owen does his lesson) but today she wanted to get dressed. We didn’t bring anything for her to do (since she normally plays in the pool the whole time) so we gave her the camera to take pictures—which she LOVED. These were the best two. 🙂
50#!
I DID IT! I lost 30# in 10 weeks on Naturally Slim (my goal was 25!)…and 50# overall in just 14 weeks! Hopefully I can lose the next 50 in another 14 weeks!
I debated posting my official “before and after” pics because they’re actually not all that impressive—plus me in yoga pants/tank tops isn’t very flattering!—but decided to go ahead because I’m still damn proud of myself!
I owe all this to Tivo friends Brad and Bryan who brought NatSlim to my attention, Tom for being amazingly supportive (he lost about 25!), and all my TCF friends for the daily online support!
And my Fitbit app congratulated me as well!
