The Tooth Fairy Has Visited...

In my post at the end of July, I mentioned JD had his first loose tooth. I though it might come out before grandmom and grandaddy came home from their trip, on August 4th. WRONG! It took almost all of August for that sucker to come out.

I picked him up from daycare last Thursday and it was really wiggley...he said it bothered him becsaue it was moving around so much. He made it through the Ravens game with daddy that night (they went to the preseaon game thanks to a friend of ours who gave us her tickets) and grandmom's on Friday. He got up Saturday morning and wiggled it a few times and it came right out. He handled it really well and was super excited about the tooth fairy! (Luckily the "tooth fairy" remembered to get some cash back at the grocery store Friday night, just in case this happened. LOL)

First Day of School 2013-14

Here's our little man, all ready to head out on his first day of 1st grade!

 

JD Gem from yesterday...

JD's been going to daycare two days a week this summer and they always have someplace to go. Yesterday, they went to the Science Center in Baltimore. So, we're getting ready to leave and we have this conversation:

Me: Do you want some money from your jar upstairs in case you want to get something at the gift shop?
JD: Yeah, cause I know we're going to the store...(pause)...and I have more money than you.
Me: *sigh* Yes, you do.

I actually had a few dollars in my wallet, which is like a teasure to me...I hardly ever have any actual cash on me. LOL

I even predicted what he'd get...a webkins, probably a cat. So last night, we welcomed BW Boots, the black and white cat to his webkins family. LOL

JD Gem - August 1st, 2013

Getting ready to leave the house that morning, my son channeling my mother:

JD: Those shoes aren't good for driving.
Me: What?
JD: They'll slide off.
Me: No they won't. (pull up pant leg to show him they have straps around my ankles)
JD: Oh, I thought they were slip on ones...that kind can come off so they're not good for driving.
Me: Can we go now?

Yup...slacker mode again...

This summer is just flying by and school starts 4 weeks from today. Yikes! Honestly, I haven't really felt much like writing, so that's why I haven't posted anything. Just feeling a little uninspired, which means I've probably missed out on sharing some funny JD gems and things like that. I also have 3 trips worth of photos to go through. Could I post them as is? Sure. Will I? Probably not. The curse of being an art major. LOL Anyway, I thought I'd try to just post the highlights starting in May.

MAY

• We helped our friend Betsy's parents celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary! That's a huge milestone. It was a crazy weekend too since Reece worked 10 hours on Saturday and 8 hours before the party on Sunday.
• The Friday before Mother's Day, JD and I went to the Mother/Son event at school. They had a DJ and games to play. He had a great time with his friends and it was fun watching them dance. A bunch of K-5 graders dancing to Gangnam Style...priceless! LOL
• We had a bunch of friends over for a Memorial Day cookout. Reece got a smoked/grill for an early Father's Day gift and smoked a brisket...delicious!

JUNE

• The Friday before school was finished, JD's class got together to celebrate the end of the year and to say goodbye to Mrs. Zanti, their teacher, who was moving to Arizona. Here's a photo of all the kids with her.

Mrs Zanti and her kindergarten class (2012-13)

• School got out on June 12 and the next morning JD and I drove to NJ to spend some time with my family. Unfortunately this trip also included a memorial service for a friend who just lost her husband to cancer...from diagnosis to his passing was only a month.
• June 21-23, we took out first camping trip of the year. Yes, I said first! Reece had been working so much and we just kind of waited too long to start making reservations, so first thing we could get was June. Anyway, JD and I did a lot of hiking with grandaddy and got to spend time with the Magees, who were also there that weekend. (Photos to come)

JULY

• We had a small 4th of July picnic at our house and then did our own fireworks display in the neighborhood. The boys have all decided to up the ante next year for a bigger show. LOL
• We left on July 6th for our week at Castaways in Ocean City. The Magees were also there. It's going to be our annual trip I think.  Had 4 great days with no rain...went to Asateague Island and saw the horses close up, spent time in the pool, and went to the boardwalk. Thursday and Friday it rained...A LOT! We found a leak in the camper and had to collect water in pans. Fun, fun! Headed into Salisbury on Thursday to see Despicable Me 2 and ran into an old college roomie and her kids. After the movie we went to Salisbury University so I could get a new alumni sticker and show Reece and JD the campus. We also made it to Frontier Town Water Park and Mini Golf again and had steamed crabs for dinner at the Shrimp Boat! Awesome! No splinter emergencies this year, I'm happy to report! Here are a few photos, but to see the rest click here.

• The weekend after we got back from the beach, we were off again, this time to Hershey Park! We had never been and stayed at the Hershey Highmeadow Campground, which I would highly recommend. The sites are pull through and really level; the staff is friendly; the pool is great; and there's a shuttle to take you to and from the park! Awesome...drops you right off near the gate and runs until and hour after the park closes. Also, having pre-purchased tickets gets you in the park 2 1/2 hours before closing the night before and staying on Hershey property gets you in an hour early the day your are going. We went on rides all morning and then had lunch and went back to camp for a break. Took JD to the pool while Reece slept and then we went back at 5 to go to the water park and on the way out, at 9:30 pm, took JD to Chocolate World, where he made his own chocolate bar.  If you've never been to Hershey Park, I really recommend it...very family friendly, lots of rides for younger kids.
• Right now, JD is spending his second full week at the daycare he goes to before school. Grandmom and Grandaddy are enjoying their vacation on a Princess cruise in the Europe...Britain, Ireland, Scotland and a stop in France. We sure hope they have a great time, but I'm sure JD will be happy to see them again next week.

This is just the big stuff. There's always something going on. JD has been spending 3 days a week this summer with Grandmom and 2 days a week at daycare. They take the kids on all kinds of field trips, including swimming, which is great because we really wanted him to have more time in the pool. He's still using swimmies, but at Hershey, he let me take them off and tried swimming without them and he even jumped in without them on. Yippie! They've been to a dairy farm, local parks, the science center, mini-golf, the movies, and cascade lake too. I joined the new Gold's Gym up the street from the house and have started going again...my goal, to see a difference by the holidays. Hoping using the weight machines will help me out. Reece has been working alot, as I said, and he worked again this past Saturday.

We've still got the month of August to go and hope to get together with some of his old classmates and head to NJ to see mom-mom and pop-pop one weekend, and we have a birthday party to go to and back-to-school night for our 1st grader. Hopefully soon we'll find out what soccer team JD is on and when practices are. Oh yeah, Rennfest starts the last weekend in August too. Ooh, and last but not least....JD has his first loose tooth, so we'll soon have a visit from the tooth fairy. My niece asked me how I do everything I do. I told her I just do it and sometimes I don't really know how. LOL

April, At-a-Glance...

The first weekend in April, was my birthday. We went out with a bunch of friends to Cancun Cantina. Hadn't been in a long time and wanted to dance. Pretty sure I did more drinking than dancing. LOL Had so much fun that night, but man, Sunday was a total wasted day. I did find out later that it wasn't just a hangover that kept me sick all day. The stomach bug was going around and Reece had it the next day. Thank god JD didn't get it. My neighbor's son had it too. Yuck!

On April 11th, I had an IEP meeting at the school to go over the results of the reassessment tests they did with JD. He's still going to get speech therapy and he's been in a "social club" that the speech therapist runs, so they will keep him in that. They play games and learn to work through furstrations and express how they feel and ask for help. I still need to talk to his pediatrician about his anxiety, which seems to be causing most of his touble in the classroom. He did show improved in his reading and math and he's been participating more in class since the previous meeting. On April 12th, I took the day off and went on the kindergarten field trip to the local fire department. They have a brand new building because they had a fire that destryed most of the old one in 2010. We'd had 2 reall heavy snows and it was just too heavy for the roof...the roof collapsed and broke a gas line and there was a huge fire. I remember walking down from our house, through the snoww, and getting some pictures. The new facility is beautiful and up to date with everything they need. The kids had a great time and hopefully learned something while they were there. JD asked me to come to school for luch, so I did that too (no lost teeth and no puking...yay!) and then went for a massage I put some birthday money away for.

On April 20th, my brother's girlfriend threw a party for his 40th birthday. I think Dave had a really good time even though he kept saying he didn't want a big party or anything. I got to see friends I haven't seen in years and all Dave's friend's got to meet his nephew (that he talks about all the time, apparently). He didn't want a cake, which I think only disapponted JD, since he was they only one who asked for a piece of cake. It was a quick trip, since we drove up Saturday morning and left at noon on Sunday. I did get a chance to clean at mom and dad's, which the house desparately needed. .Will have to make it a point to do that every time we go up there.

Oh boy, my slacker side is showing again...

Wow! I haven't posted anything since the beginning of March?! Yikes. That means I have a lot to go through. Maybe several posts. We'll see.

First of all, St. Paddy's Day was pretty quiet this year. We did go out the night before for a few drinks at a local bar, Cobblestone. They had a great DJ that night too. On St. Paddy's, we had dinner with my in-laws and Norm and Michelle. Usually I'll make corned beef and cabbage, but went for Irish Stew instead and it was great. Got the recipe from Pinterest and it used Guinness, of course. Oh, btw, don't ever make marshmallow treats from Lucky Charms. So. Not. Good. I should have just made rice kispy treats and used green food coloring.

The following weekend, Reece and I went to St. Michaels, MD for the weekend to celebrate our 10 anniversary. We stayed at the Tillghman Island Inn. Wasn't too sure about it when we first pulled up, but it was great. The food was fantastic and we met some interesting people. Spent some time walking around St. Michaels on Saturday; had lunch; sampled some local beer, and went to the maratime museum. Pretty quiet weekend, but it was perfect. We got hom on Sunday just in time to take JD to a classmate's birthday party at the bowling alley just up the road. A great weekend!

We went to my mom and dad's for Easter weekend. My brother and his girlfriend, Amy, had an Easter egg hunt for JD again this year and then we had dinner there with my parents and Amy's parents. JD just loves this kind of stuff. The Easter bunny brought him a bunch of yummy scented markers and candy and the Wreck It Ralph movie.

Here are a few pictures from that weekend. Thikning I'll put April in a separate post...more photos from my brother's birthday party to share there.