1st day of school

Back to school... Raelin's in second grade and Ryker's in kindergarten. I had mixed feelings about it this year. We'd been making SO much progress on all sorts of things that we've been struggling with. The kids had been getting SO much better about doing chores and we were working on routines and habits. We were doing lots of sensory stuff with Ryker and working on teaching Raelin about having a better attitude. Raelin's just like I was--always feels like she's the victim and takes things WAY personally. It makes for a pretty sad childhood and I really want to teach her about agency and how to choose to be happy so that she doesn't have to learn it in her 20's like I did and waste all that time worrying so much about what people think of her. Through all of these efforts, I was enjoying my kids more because I was spending more time with them instead of only interacting with them when they needed something or were fighting. They were also fighting less because I was present to intervene and redirect sooner and they never got to the fighting stage. Well, I shouldn't say never; but a lot less often!

Raelin has a really loose tooth and she likes to poke it out between her lips--it makes her look like she has buck teeth!

And my handsome Ryker. He is just the cutest guy! Always full of smiles. Ryker loves life and you can see it in his face. I admire his ability to just be happy.

I couldn't decide between these two pictures because I like Ryker's little head tilt in the first one and Raelin's smile better in the second one, so I had to put them both up.

By the way, Ryker (in kindergarten) started a week after the rest of the school. That's why Raelin is in a different outfit in the pictures of both kids than in her first day of school pics.

You know what else I was thinking about that kind of strange? (Musings of a sleep-deprived, postpartum mother with rapidly depleting brain cells... Don't mind me) It's going to be FOUR YEARS until I send another kid into the school world! That's a long time. I mean, Raelin started school last year and Ryker, this year and I won't send another one off until 2014! I wonder what will happen with the babies in the meantime. It's like starting over kind of. I have 4 years where I'll spend substantially more time with the littles than with the bigger kids. And then I'll send the littles off boom, boom in a row too. It will be interesting to see how the two "sets" of kids turn out; I'm a much different mom than I was when I started out. Okay, I should stop rambling. Sorry! The end.