There has been so much and yet so little going on. We've taken a while to settle into a daily routine here in Kansas (this hasn't been helped by multiple snow days - more on that later) but hit the ground running in regards to catching up with family and friends. We've had at least one 'something' every weekend, including having both sides of the family here for dinner. It's so great to be able to have them all over, finally. We need to find a time to lure all of our friends here, too, so it doesn't look to slow down anytime soon.
Wyatt is getting adjusted to his new school and I'm getting adjusted to the much earlier start time. There are a lot of days I have to wake up Natalie so we have time to get dressed, eat and get him there, but we're making it work. I really, really miss the carpool drop-off system! Natalie likes taking Wyatt in and has to tell him goodbye before we go. Since school's so early, we usually just come home and hang out. I'm not sure Wyatt's new school gives me (or him, for that matter) the same warm fuzzies that the one in Virginia did, but I felt good about it on the first day when he came home and told me "another name for an oval is an ellipse!" He's also recently exited the building with a homemade, Wyatt-sized sunflower and stick pony, so I think he's having fun. And I'm not going to lie, I like that he was all jazzed for Kansas Day this year.
I've had a few chances to meet the other AF Element wives who are, of course, pretty cool. It's interesting to start an assignment where everyone is new; that never happens. A few other families live in our neighborhood and a lot of us have kids similar ages, so once all this crazy weather stops, our playdates will start in earnest. Jeff is equally settling into his routine, and I think he likes it. He just met some of the foreign students last week and in his group alone there is a Georgian ("not from Atlanta"), a Hungarian, a Singaporean, a Zambian, and a Mongolian. The Army (Big Green, as he keeps calling it) started this week but then they've been snow cancelled for two days, so I think the jury's still out on how it will be in the coming weeks. We're told we'll see more of the Army folks and less of the AF group once his final group gets set.
So, when we're not doing all of that stuff, we're just being us and enjoying life. Some of which includes:
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| Natalie's daily playtime with the kokeshi dolls. She helped me put them away, so I should have known she'd go back to get them out. While it's not how I envisioned them being used in our house, I happen to think it's really great. |
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| Sledding down our neighborhood hill. It's ridiculously steep and Wyatt's a wild man on it. This picture was taken before I ruined it for Natalie by sledding through a pile of snow and making it go all over our faces. She's pretty much refused to sled since then which makes me an award-winning mom, right? |
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| Natalie has been waking up with some amazing hairstyles lately. This one was particularly stellar. There's not an ounce of product in there, just good old fashioned sleeping on her face and essentially backcombing her hair all night long. |
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| Yesterday's snow day activity was chocolate chip cookies. This was the first time I had both kids helping and it was, wow, really helpful! |
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| Natalie added all the dry ingredients, one scoop at a time and wanted no help. She managed to get about 80% of it in the bowl, so that was pretty good. And, since Natalie had to wear one of my aprons that was WAY too big for her... |
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| I spent my afternoon making her a perfectly girly apron that's very similar to one of mine. I'm not sure whether to be proud or ashamed that I had this much fabric on hand! |
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| Snow day #2, the one during which we actually ventured outside. This is Wyatt telling me it's too bright to look at the camera. |
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| Gotta love my pink popsicle of a girl. She likes it until she loses her footing and can't get up. That actually happens a lot, so her tolerance is a touch lower than Wyatt's. |
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| This is the reaction I got when I told her we couldn't ride bikes in the snow. I am so unreasonable. |
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| And then I looked up to see Wyatt rolling down the driveway. I thought he was just being silly, which is how this started, but then after a minute we realized he was stuck. Don't worry, Jeff rescued him and he's now cozy in his flannel sheets. |
3 comments:
Ok I laughed out loud about Natalie's bed head....and am so jealous of your sewing skills to be able to make an apron in an afternoon!
A fellow kokeshi loving girl! You're right, not at all what I envisioned when I bought my dolls, but I love that Katelyn loves them...I just hope they survive her love.
Great bed head. Seriously.
Adorable cookie making pictures. Fabulously ruffled apron. You can never have too much fabric. (Don't tell Stoner.)
Sledding...ahhh, childhood memories. We haven't had enough stay on the ground here to take Michael out yet. Maybe next year... Snow in the face? A childhood (and Mommyhood) rite of passage.
Glad to see you survived the move and had a great January :)
Love the bedhead. Basically love Natalie's hair in general! And, I love Wyatt's sledding and Kansas enthusiasm.
For whatever it's worth, Thomas got a face full of snow on his first and only run down a hill last year. This year he started out full of trepidation and by the time we left was flinging himself down all alone on a coaster, face first. She'll come around!
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