Kindergarten, scrapbooked already

Journaling: The big first day has come and gone! We biked the first morning while Jeff stayed home with
Michael. Christopher looked sad, but didn't cry, when I left him off. Christopher thought school seemed long and wouldn’t tell many stories. Two days later at the mini-conference his teacher said he’s doing very well, participates, and seems happy. He has brought his lunch every day so far: The first day he had a turkey sandwich, grapes, cottage cheese, baby carrots, and a tiny bag of Lego fruit snacks for a treat. It’s hard to believe he is really old enough for kindergarten!
Supplies:
Scraplifted from Vivian Masket's layout in 9/08 CK magazine
Robin Carlton Bears 'n Blossoms 'n Blooms kraft paper (bottom layer)
Shalae Tippetts Freedom special (stripes)
Angie Briggs Beloved red paper for apple
Erica Hite Fabric Buttons apple
Angelica E. Almost Solids ledger paper
Thao Cosgrove Typography Scrap Simple Paper Template (words overlay)
E-lena calendar
Ursula Schneider Mini Calendars Emb Templates
Shabby Miss Jenn pencil
Impact and Candara fonts
Jan Hicks Coin Folder Chip style on "off"
Katie Pertiet Defining Moments -Love (circle brush at bottom)

Phew, the first week of school is done!:) C actually admitted school was "good" today, though still said it was too long. Y'all should have seen me getting to school to pick him up today. A bit of background first: Jeff drove the van to work this morning and left M's carseat here, and at 4:00 we are riding with our friends in their big van down to Des Moines to have dinner with them. Then we will ride back with Jeff in our van:) Anyway, the boys don't fit in the bike trailer together anymore, and fight when they try, so C would have to ride his own bike home. M and I didn't want to have to run any errands today, so we didn't have a chance to drop off C's bike at school. So M rode in the stroller, I pushed it, and pushed C's bike off to the side, the whole 1/2 mile to school this afternoon. :) I'm sure I was quite the spectacle. And C did just fine riding his bike home with us. He isn't super fast yet, so didn't seem to mind waiting for us to catch up on foot. M slept most of the way there and back, but of course woke up when we got home. Guess he'll be a bit sleepy tonight at Grandma & Grandpa's, oh well!

You have GOT to see...

Ok, everyone who thought the last post was funny...you HAVE to go see Jeff's latest title idea!!!! ROTFL!

This is What I Deal with...

Disclaimer: I will freely admit that when I saw this picture that Jeff took while we were on vacation in the Twin Cities a couple weeks ago, I came closer to PIMPing than ever before, I was laughing so hard.

Description: The Children's Museum in St. Paul is wonderful! This was one of the last areas we visited, and is set up as a town with post office, grocery store, restaurant, bus station, etc...oh, and a doctor's office. Well the crutches were taken by a girl and her mother, who proceeded to parade around on them (nostalgia here...I acquired somebody's old crutches as a child and had ENDLESS fun walking around with them. In the days before PC, I wrapped my arms and a leg with ACE wraps and went around on crutches for Halloween. I knew even then I wanted to be something medical when I grew up.) So the only enticing thing left in the doctor's office were 2 dolls. Christopher proceeded to disrobe them and was absolutely delighted to poke at their "bottoms" (Miss Delphine at preschool says we say bottom, not butt...he took that one good message to absolute heart and NEVER says butt unless he's with a certain friend...who just happens to be the reason why Miss Delphine had to say this to begin with two years ago!) LOOK, look at the baby's bottom....LOOK, LOOK! This is the most fabulous grin he's had on his face in a photo for at least 2-3 YEARS!!!! (What is it with a scrapbooker's child not liking to have his picture taken? Is this some special curse?)

Request: If I'm going to scrapbook this one, I need ideas from those way more creative than me...bring it on! Oh, and I'm thinking this pic DEFINITELY makes an appearance at his high school graduation and wedding *evil laughter*

Kindergarten

The big first day has come and gone!:) We biked this morning while Jeff stayed home with Michael. Christopher looked sad, but didn't cry, when I left him off. I was quite impressed that he smiled for a (yes, a) picture...he's on a 2-3 year kick of not liking to have his picture taken (must be a scrapper's curse or something, lol). Michael and I biked to pick him up at 1:45 (shortened days this whole week for mini-conferences with the teachers). M fell asleep on the way there:) Christopher seemed a bit too proud of himself for not saying anything at school. Later it came out that he talked with a couple children he knew from other classes at recess, but apparently didn't say anything in his own class. I think within a couple-three days he'll be talking TOO much in class;)

He was adamant that he bring his lunch and liked that, but unfortunately I'm not sure how many turkey sandwiches a kid can really eat! (Or how many lunches a mom can make). He brought: turkey sandwich, grapes, cottage cheese, baby carrots, and a tiny bag of Lego fruit snacks for a treat. He knew he could buy milk there but drank the water in his lunch box. Now that I know it stays cold enough, I think I'll just send milk with him. It sounds like we're going to keep up the bringing the lunch thing! And speaking of, he just fell asleep so I better get downstairs and make his lunch!

Finally, a layout...and a funny story

Kristin Aagard (Plain Digital Wrapper): Bubble Bath, Bubble Bubble, and Just a Boy collections
Ariadna Wiczling (Scrapgirls) Date Seals Embellishment Templates
Mandy Steward (SG) Acrylic Bubble Buttons Emb Templates (acrylic bubble over date seal)
Becky Fleck Aug 08 round page map

I am LOVING Kristin Aagard's style! She is a new-ish designer and can be seen HERE and also HERE.

Anyway, on to the family info: This is Michael playing in the tub with their all-time fav bath toy. We purchased a brand new pirate ship bath toy with Elmo and Ernie for a friend's son in 2001, then of course wanted one for our own son in 2003. And of course by then it wasn't manufactured anymore, but behold the lovely Ebay had it!:)

And a funny story from today, in Jeff's words:
When I got up this morning, I noticed that Michael's door was still
mostly closed, like it was when we put him to bed last night.

After my shower, I went downstairs and was surprised to see Michael
already down there with a large serving spoon and an opened box of cake
mix, which he was helping himself to as his breakfast!

He had gotten out of bed, closed his door so it looked like he was still
in bed, gone downstairs, used a chair to get into the pantry and get the
cake mix (and maybe opened the plastic wrapper by himself), got a spoon,
and was eating the cake mix like it was no big deal.

Back to Cheri's own words: It's not unusual for him to go downstairs in the morning without telling anyone...it is highly unusual that he took it upon himself to find breakfast! If this becomes a habit we might have to put a toddler lock thingie on the doorknob to the pantry...

History Repeats Itself (again)

Remember THIS? Well smile, b/c history just repeated itself again! DH acquired all the 2006 images from his parents' digital files well after I scrapbooked that year, so I made a list of the ones I wanted to print, but never scrapbooked any of them. Jeff was looking through them the other day and asked me if I'd ever seen this one. He noticed Michael's smile looked just like Lucy's and Grandpa Borg's, so of course I had to make Michael his own scrapbook page:) Hm, now wonder if we can find one of Christopher smiling that way? Check out the journaling on Michael's page, b/c I can see a resemblance around the chin and ears too.

SB credits: Luke, Benjamin, and Nate papers from Jen Wilson's laundry line, plus all except the girls' items from the credits on Lucy's page (in other words, if you need to know where I got something, just ask me, K?;)

A very sad end to a long weekend...

(layout from 2003)

I was busier than I ever have been at Fast Track on Saturday. There was no lull
from the moment I got there at 11:00am until the time I finally finished my last
chart at midnight (FT closes at 9pm or whenever we finish the last patient, then
I have to finish charts). We had more patients in FT, at least per provider,
than they did in the ER almost all day long. I had 10 people waiting for me at
one point, and there are only 6 rooms.

Sunday was a quieter day in the beginning, but of course that meant the evening
was busier than ever, so I got home around 11:20pm that night. The garage door
opener wouldn't work so I got out to manually open the door, and found a note on
the inside door that said to go through the FRONT, not garage door, and come
talk to Jeff RIGHT away.

Our 12 year old beagle, Reuben, had died in the early afternoon. He has
had some liver failure issues in the last 2-3 months, but had treatment, was
never jaundiced, or anything, but was obviously not feeling as well as he had.
He didn't eat well on Saturday, but Jeff said he ate his lunch with gusto on Sunday and
acted normal for awhile after that as well, but then started panting slowly and
just lying around. 15 minutes after that began, he died quietly lying down on
the laundry room rug (right in front of the garage door).

Jeff and the kids dug a deep grave in our backyard flower garden (don't tell the
authorities, I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to bury animals in town...),
and at 11:30 Sunday night Jeff and I buried Reuben. I didn't get to sleep until
after 1:30am with all my reminiscing and crying and then of course the danged
storm we had kept me up half the rest of the night. Our sump pump alarm went off while
the power was out for an hour or two, and anyway, I took a TWO hour nap at the
same time as Michael Monday afternoon. TG for afternoon summer camp this week as
Christopher was having a bunch of fun while we slept away. Then there was
another brief storm and I had to wake Michael up to go get C early from camp b/c
it's outdoors.

I love pets, but today of all days I wish they lived longer than they do b/c
it's hard to lose them...