Boooohooooo more!!!

If I didn't know better, I'd think it was ME that was going back to school, because this week has just completely mentally and emotionally exhausted me! Hayley started Prekindergarten on Monday and Todd had his first day of two year old preschool today. Of course Todd handled his first independent adventure like it was no big deal. But it was absolutely bizarre for me to be walking out of the preschool completely empty handed. The entire morning I had this sick feeling in the pit of my stomach like I was forgetting something!

Hayley told me not to worry about Todd, that she'd "take care of him." I wasn't quite sure how to take that knowing Hayley! But Todd is already the cool kid since he's been hanging with the big kids for the past two years. I'm pretty sure he is convinced that he's really a PreK kid too. And I could tell he really felt like hot stuff sporting his new backpack, that only contained a change of pants for my big boy!

A summer of fun comes to an end

School starts tomorrow for Hayley and I have SO many mixed emotions about this! She'll be in VPK, which means she'll be at school EVERYday. Granted, just for a half day, but still every weekday. Little Todd will also be starting school for the first time and will attend on Tuesday and Thursday. He is THRILLED and seems to completely have his own class, his own independence, and his own backpack. So while I'm sad that I'm going to be ALONE for two mornings out of the week, I'm also pretty darn excited that I'm going to be ALONE for two mornings out of the week!! And how will I spend this ridiculous amount of child free time? Well first, I plan to go to the bathroom. BY MYSELF. Something I haven't done in four years. Then, I may just sit and enjoy the silence, the state of bliss that will be no one under the age of five questioning what we're going to have for lunch, what we're going to do the rest of the day, and whether or not I am lost. So after those initial ten minutes were I've accomplished a bathroom break and enjoyed five minutes of silence, I fully expect the sniveling to commence... I'll be ALONE! At least I've still got Chloe, who incidentally seems all too thrilled at the prospect of having 6 hours a week where there is no chance of teeny tiny fingers being stuck in her face.

We've had a fun summer though and both the kids have transformed into little water bugs. The pool has been a daily thing and Hayley is all over the big pool across the street from our house, much less our backyard pool. We again spent a lot of time in the jogging stroller, and Todd has developed his own training style with me. As I stopped for a drink of water the other morning, Hayley yelled at me to "keep running!" It was HOT out and I replied, "I'm dying." Todd said, "no, you IronMommy!" Clearly, while Hayley is still my drill sergeant, Todd takes more of a psychological approach to coaching!

And speaking of IronMommies, it certainly explains the lack of blogging. Our little group has been growing and we've spent the summer getting teams started in several different states. We even had an interview and article with our local paper. It's been a very exciting adventure and I'm looking forward to another winter of racing and yes, marathon training. After cutting back on miles this summer, I've realized that there is definite serenity that comes with marathon training. Somehow knowing you've got a 23 mile training run coming up just puts all of your other life problems into perspective. I'm looking forward to the stress relief!

California Girls...

...ain't got nothing on our Florida girl, but it was a very cute song for Hayley's 1st ballet show! We've spent the summer at a very low key ballet class and Hayley has had an absolute ball learning new moves and coming home to show them off to Daddy. While Todd and I watched on the sidelines each week, Todd picked up a couple of new moves too (much to Daddy's dismay). Next time you see Todd, just ask him to show you his tondue!

Before we left the house, Hayley told me she was not at all nervous about her performance.


Todd styled his hair in eager anticipation of seeing all the "honeys" in Hayley's dance class.


Hayley seemed completely at ease and not at all intimated by the packed house of anxious parents. She remembered all her moves and seemed to really enjoy performing in front of people.



She really enjoyed coming back out onto the dance floor at the end of the show to do her curtsey and take in all the audience applause!


And she was absolutely thrilled when Daddy presented his little ballerina with a bouquet of flowers! She told us that "this is the best night ever." A phrase she reserves for, well, pretty much every night! She's a VERY enthusiastic child!

You can watch Hayley's flower winning performance here:

Colorado Trip

We are settling back into the heat and humidity after an all too brief escape to the Mile High city. This was my first trip back during the summer months in a LONG time and I'd forgotten how wonderfully pleasant the Colorado summers are. The kids had a BLAST in Colorado! They enjoyed the mountains, some local parks, and spending time with Mimi and Grandpa!

We spent a day in Estes Park

And had to show Brian The Stanley Hotel

We enjoyed a picnic at Lake Estes...

... where the kids had a blast feeding the ducks!

Grandpapa and Little T were bossom buddies the whole trip!

We headed to Main Street where Hayley enjoyed some ice cream made just for her!

We made another trip to The White Fence Farm
The kids enjoyed the playground before heading into dinner...
... and they enjoyed using their "token" to pick out a special prize after dinner. Hayley ended up with a top, while Todd ended up with a whistle (lucky us!!)

The kids once again enjoyed feeding the animals...

We spent a morning at the fabulous Westlands Park,
where Todd spent most of the morning "gitin r done" on the big slide,

before we headed over to cool off in the fountains!

Who Would've Thought

Three weeks ago, if you would have told me that Mr. "Don't get my Hair Wet," and Miss "I NOT Gonna Pook my Face in the Water" would be doing this

or this

or this (yes, holding hands and actually being EXCITED before swim practice!!)

I would have said you were crazy. But fortunately, I'm the proud mother of two fish and I couldn't be more excited! Todd still has about two weeks left of lessons. He's doing a great job swimming and is still working on mastering the transition to a float so he can take some breaths and rest before turning back over to swim. I fully anticipate that by the end of next week he will be swim/float/swimming and completely independent in the pool.

ABCs

Schools out for the summer and I'm already completely pruned up from the amount of time we've spent in the pool. The kids have pretty much been in the pool everyday for the last 3 weeks. Add that to the time I've spent in the pool (don't laugh) learning to swim, and I'm pretty sure I'm becoming part amphibian. The kids both started back with their daily ISR swim lessons this morning and I'm fairly optimistic about this season! I'm pretty comfortable with Hayley in the water at this point as she's been swimming and floating around the deep end on her own for over a week now. Her biggest issue was that she REFUSED to put her face in, so her swim was more or less a doggy paddle. I've negotiated, bribed, and pleaded with Hayley for the past two months to put her face in the water to no avail. Her swim teacher convinced her in the first 5 minutes today. Fabulous. Little T has been much more of a spoil sport when it came to the water, and quite frankly I'm a big softy when it comes to him fussing at me, so I haven't been pushing him to swim. He seems to remember what he learned last year though and Ms. Amy seems to think he'll be swimming like a fish in no time. I'll be relieved to feel confident in his ability to float and get himself out of a body of water on his own. This time of year it's like a daily occurrence to hear about a local toddler drowning... AWFUL!

When we're not in the water, we've been hitting the books. I just wrapped up my studies to become a certified Nutrition and Wellness Consultant and spent a grueling weekend in a classroom at UCF completing the USATF Level 1 certification course. Hayley has been studying up on learning to tell time, and Todd has been going through ABC's bootcamp with Drill Sargeant Hayley. She seems to have taught him well! We gave him a (post spaghetti dinner) quiz last night!

Happy Birthday, Hayley!

Today, we have a FOUR year old!! Hard to believe that it was just four years ago our adventures in parenting began. We've learned A LOT, thanks in part to our very thorough teacher, Hayley! She definitely kept us on our toes as a newborn and toddler, but has grown into SUCH a sweet, loving, little girl. She's still a VERY intense little girl. There is no in between for Hayley and her enthusiasm can only be rivaled by her frustrations. She's incredibly curious and can (and does) talk nonstop!

We took Hayley and Todd to Disney a week ago to celebrate her birthday a bit early. We'll celebrate a little more thoroughly this upcoming weekend and Hayley will celebrate with a party at school on Wednesday. Here are a few pics from our trip to Disney!

We spent our first day at Typhoon Lagoon where Hayley had a swell time until the very last wave of the day. Typhoon Lagoon has a huge wave pool which shoots out 6 foot waves. Even in the most shallow end of the pool, it's enough to knock you off your feet. Hayley LOVED the waves and by the end of the day I thought Hayley and I both had enough courage for her to try one wave without me clinging to her. Sure enough, the wave knocked my little light weight over and she scraped her knee, which, if you know Hayley, you know that boo boos are the absolute END of the world. Two weeks later and she still hasn't let me forget that the healing boo boo on her knee is because I didn't hold on tight enough to her. How's that for mommy guilt??!! We did make major progress this trip however because Brian and I were finally able to convince Hayley to wear a band-aid. Hayley has had a HUGE phobia of band-aids for her entire life. Just opening the wrapper was the enough to induce screams of pure terror. Yes, this is definitely a sign my little band-aid wearer is growing up!

The next day we headed to Magic Kingdom where Hayley met Alice in Wonderland and told her all about her mermaid Silly Band. She then did a pirouette which thoroughly impressed Alice.
Next we hit the race track, the merry-go-round, and It's a Small World. Todd was a big fan of the hula dancers in Hawaii.

After an afternoon nap at the condo, we headed back to Magic Kingdom to explore the Swiss Family Robinson tree house and take a ride on the Jungle Cruise. We ended the night watching the Wishes fireworks show which Hayley said was "AMAZING!" She ooed and awwwwed the entire show!


The next morning we headed off to Hollywood Studios.

There wasn't a whole lot to amuse the kids at Hollywood Studios, but the main purpose of our visit was so Hayley could get a picture with every little girl's favorite Disney character... Lightning McQueen. For those of you thinking she'd eventually grow into the princess preference stage... it certainly hasn't happened yet!


Hayley was happy to meet Goofy and Pluto... Todd seemed a bit suspicious of them.


And then we spent some time playing in the Honey I Shrunk the Kids playground before heading back to the condo to rest and cool off in the pool.


We spent our final evening at Downtown Disney, dining at Hayley's favorite restaurant, T-Rex.



She let everyone know she was turning FOUR!


She was overjoyed when the servers at T-Rex brought her a sundae and sang to her! And Todd was thrilled that his sister was willing to share her special treat!




We spent the last day of our trip at Blizzard Beach. It was a busy, but great trip to Disney!




Here's some video of Todd and Hayley rockin' out to the Disney Playhouse Show we went to at Hollywood Studios. They both LOVED this!