Life Lately

Life lately has been filled with lots of waiting for repairs {waiting for repairs to be approved by our property management company, waiting for the repair company to call us to schedule said repair, waiting for the repair person to show up, then waiting for the right part to come in, then starting the whole process back over again when the appliance breaks again--waaaah!}. We're just thankful we live in a super dry climate, so all of our clothes can be air dried in a jiffy & that we have a trusty little toaster oven that can get the job done!!!

Other than that, it's just been business as usual around here as we've been trying to get back into the swing of things after our Disneyland trip! It was a rude awakening to come back to some suuuper cold temps in Las Vegas! We also celebrated the 100th day of first grade & Shelby's first school awards ceremony.

 

I was thoroughly impressed with the girls' imaginations for the 100th day! Because we were out of town right before, we didn't really have much time to prepare. The first graders had to do a 100th day project as well as dress like a one year old person. We have a ton of dress-up stuff, but nothing that could really work to be an old lady. Hadley suggested Shelby wear our apron & go as the little old lady from The Gingerbread Story..I thought that was genius! So she just wore an apron, put her hair in a bun, & we stuck a little gingerbread man in her pocket that we printed out, and boom! Done!

For her 100th day project, Shelby decided to make a rainbow out of 100 fingerprints. She had her heart set on a catchy phrase to go with her project {we'd seen googly eye projects with the saying "Eye Survived the first 100 days" or popcorn projects that said "Popping through the first 100 days}, but unfortunately Google & Pinterest had nothing I could find with rainbow sayings! And my creative juices were NOT flowing, so I was no help. But Shelby all on her own and came up with: "I'm 100 days more colorful!" How perfect is that?!

And of course we have our obligatory library pictures...

The girls got Zoobs for Christmas from us, and they have really been enjoying playing with them since we got back from our trip.

 

And take a look at this guy! The other day he took a cup from our little play kitchen in the playroom and brought it into the kitchen to fill up with water. I guess he's seen us do this a time or two ;)

Over the weekend while Brady was napping, Shelby played a game of Checkers with Derek. Then the girls decided to play each other in Checkers for the first time, and this was also Hadley's first time ever playing. We did NOT think this would end well since Shelby is pretty good at Checkers now & Hadley is not the best sport yet {ahem, most games end in tears}, but we were BLOWN AWAY by how well they played together. Shelby kept teaching her what to do and what to avoid and was the most patient and encouraging big sister. It was one of those moments where we had hope that we've done something right along the way!!! And Hadley won the game! :)

I got to see Shelby receive an award for All A Honor Roll & the Principal's Award for academic achievement yesterday. It was fun to see her recognized, but awards or no awards we're always proud of this girl! Our school's motto is "Be Kind and Work Hard," and "Be Kind" bracelets are awarded when kids are "caught" being kind. Shelby has been disappointed she hasn't received any bracelets yet this year, but we're trying to make sure she and Hadley both know it doesn't matter if other people "catch" your kindness or if your accomplishments are recognized. I love that our school recognizes their achievements and promotes kindness in such a big way, but we want them to know that you do the right thing just because it's the right thing and not so you'll get an award. This girl definitely lives up to her school's motto--she's always kind & working hard, and we're so, so proud of her!

This guy loves to "sweep" the floors and carry around our little handheld vacuum keeping our floors clean. And yep, we're still wearing Christmas jammies over here!!

Here's to hoping your week is off to a great start & that the next time I pop in on the blog we'll have a functioning dryer & oven again!