Ah, the lazy days of summer are done. Good bye, do nothing days....
We spent our last two free days before school started just taking it easy as a family. On Monday, Kenny worked part of the day from home and then we snuck away with James to go see Wall-E at the cheap theather. It was a cute little Pixar indictment of consumerism, but we liked it. I snuck in my own popcorn too, not because I'm cheap (although it's not a bad guess) but because I can pop the healthy stuff at home. I love me some movie theather popcorn, but MAN! is it bad for you. Sheesh.
On Tuesday I let James have a totally chill out day, being as lazy as he wanted. He watched cartoons, played Fantastic Contraption on the computer, and made lots of new Lego inventions. After Kenny got home from work, we rode our bikes to James's school to find out which class he would have the next day and found out that his best friend Raven would be in his class, which was exciting. Then that night we went to get his school stuff ready and realized in horror at about 8:30 that his back pack was still up in San Francisco. It was Kenny and the internet to the rescue. Kenny jumped in the car and headed to Target, then called to report on the backpack selection. James and I looked up the choices on the computer and he was able to select a super cool black and gray camouflage backpack to replace his green camouflage backpack. Sigh.
Wednesday was the first day of school. We walked over as a family. I was kind of nervous because his teacher is new to Smith this year and I didn't know anything about her. Also, last year the first day of school was rough. James was new at the school and had no friends at first so we brought him and watched him sit at the front of the line, too shy to talk to any of the other kids and looking totally forlorn. I fought tears that fell like crazy as soon as his class shuffled off to start third grade.
What a difference a year makes. As soon as he walked up to his new line up spot, his best friend greeted him with a huge hug and one of his old classmates immediately invited him to help him expolode imaginary bombs. They were off and running without looking back. Sure enough, he reported in the afternoon that his teacher was kind of strict but all right and he had lots of friends in his class. It was a load off of my heart and an answer to Kenny's father's blessing the night before.
Thursday and Friday were more of the same. I spent the day doing major story edits (I'm really happy with how it's going) and waiting to hear about James's day and the new friends he was making. Wait, that's not true. Friday I went with my brother to my old middle school where I used to teach and helped him do teambuilding activities with the AVID classes all day. It was a long, hot day but a ton of fun. It made me realize that I am absolutely doing the right thing by being home with my children now, but it was good to switch the routine up for a little while. Kenny played stay-at-home dad for a day and did a spectacular job. That night, Jamie and Nadine came over and watched the boys so Kenny and I could have a date night. We kept it low key and went and saw a movie called Traitor which was really good. When we came home, we discovered that Jamie and Nadine had invited some old friends of the family over to visit, so we sat around talking for a while. But then I got to sleepy to stay up any more so I excused myself to go to sleep since I had been wide awake since 4:30 in the a.m. Yikes!
Kenny spent Saturday morning walking in support of Proposition 8 (an amendment to the California constitution stating that marriage is between a man and a woman). I did a ton of writing and editing while Grant slept and James played at his friend's house. When Kenny and I got home, we debated a little bit about Prop 8 so that I could work out my own thoughts and feelings on the subject (I'm for it) and then we spent the afternoon and evening cooking and getting the condo clean for movie night. Several of my friends came over to watch the movie Emma in advance of our book club on Tuesday. I made crock pot meatballs, brownies, toffee cheesecake bars, and also had chips and salsa and edamame for everyone. We have a sectional and so once we brought in another chair, we could comfortably fit everyone and we had a good time watching the film and laughing.
Today as my first day fasting since I got pregnant with Grant and it was hard! But I survivved and next month will be better. After church we had our home teacher and his wife, James's primary teacher, come over for dinner and enjoyed a nice crock pot roast and corn from the grill (again). It was a relaxing Sunday and I'm thankful that the Sabbath feels so different from the rest of the week. James entertained us by setting up and knocking down all kinds of domino configurations. He has a creative mind and it's a pleasure to watch him use it.
Stay posted for next week's report which will include highlights from Kenny's band's performance and my beginning tennis class. Whee!