The Kids are in School!

Despite not receiving much outright encouragement to talk about his "food baby" Patrick still brings it up whenever we talk about the baby in my tummy. We've talked with the kids a little bit about what life is going to be like once the baby is here (tired Mommy but I will still have plenty of time for big kids because babies don't talk and mostly just eat and sleep). In turn, Patrick likes to tell everyone about how they're going to want to cuddle his food baby once it's no longer in his tummy. Siblings have been quite emphatic in telling him "no!" As someone who has seen his "food baby" when it is no longer in his tummy, I can't really blame them.

I can't really believe he gets to claim to have a food baby sometimes when he is a little punk about eating any of his lunch. The cheese broke into little pieces and would zap him if he tried to eat it ...

On a different note, check out this amazing blast from the past picture I found from when I was at an OB appointment during my Patrick pregnancy. I was too distracted by the cute husband and children to notice the background of the photo ...

The kids all had their first day of school. Bradley and Eleanor started a couple weeks before Patrick. Eleanor in particular was very excited for kindergarten and Mrs. Clayton's class (she was Bradley's teacher last year).

However Bradley managed to catch some sort of stomach bug before school even started (!!!) and threw up half the night before his first day. So his first day of school became the day following the official first day. So much for a healthy start to the school year.

He didn't suffer too much though. We made sure he got plenty of dinosaur shows while he recuperated.

After being up half the night the poor boy fell asleep during quiet time.

But then he was back to good form by bedtime and ready to go!

I went on a cleaning rampage a few weeks ago and was confused why Bradley was so concerned about his missing spoons. Turns out they were used for his telekinesis powers for whichever Pokemon he mentions in the video below.

Bradley's first day of school!

1st grade with Mrs. Maddux. She has been lovely, it's going to be a good year.

And then Patrick and I were off for tennis and fun!

He has been begging for tennis on almost a daily basis.

He's quite impressive for a 3 year old and it's a lot of fun to play with him.

There's been a LOT of tennis. He even had a tennis play date with his buddy Mabel.

They have been enjoying a fair number of play dates since school started. We went to the Arboretum on chalk day.

He played at her house while I helped out in Eleanor's kindergarten class one morning.

And giving her a ride on one of the tricycle tractors at Deanna Rose.

He also gives his buddy Lauren rides. These three little kids are their own little crew these days.

This cute guy. He's really into water color painting right now, which is the most washable and least messy form of painting so I am a fan as well.

This may be my last bare buns picture of Patrick. He always waits to pull up his pants until after he has washed his hands when he goes potty and it's just such a cute little bottom but I guess he had noticed how often we were taking pictures of him like this and started to request that we take photos when we seemed to forget ... and maybe our three year old shouldn't be asking us to take bare buns pictures of him. Bummer. Don't worry, I still pinch that bum whenever I need him to go up the stairs a little faster.

Bradley anxiously checks if every child and adult washes their hands after they go potty in this house and we're trying to get him to lighten up a bit because Patrick sometimes runs around naked and he needs to chill out a little bit about bare buns sitting on the carpet while the three year old gets dressed (I don't know where he got this hygiene thing. Perhaps I need to channel it into some cleaning.) Patrick is his primary concern these days but fortunately the boy love is deep and once hands are washed there are many cuddles to be had. 

Eleanor's primary loves are kitties and Wellie Wishers right now. Here she is combining the two.

Meg was SO HAPPY. It's sweet to see the kitties starting to come around to Eleanor.

A few kitty pictures in this post! Layla literally tucked herself in under the covers when I was making the bed the other day.

This is how she prefers to sleep at night. Crammed above our heads on extra pillows. She suffers so.

Sookie is so pretty and actually looks skinny at this angle.

But she is not skinny, she is super fat and squishy and this is how she likes to snuggle when I'm reading Patrick to sleep for his nap. Yes, I often read myself to sleep as well. I'm playing the pregnancy card for this, although I took naps with him before I was pregnant as well.

Patrick and Eleanor are an amazing duo these days and I can't get enough of Eleanor geared up in her rollerblading attire.

She's a great teacher and I hope Patrick starts listening to her and doesn't have to go to prison.

This video is worthwhile largely to view Eleanor's very cautious rollerblading. Exactly how I would have done it. No need to fall is one is careful enough.

We've been tired with all the fun stuff going on lately.

Literally how Eleanor fell asleep a few nights ago. Nathan went in to check on her as we do every night before going to bed and this is what he found.

We went to a cub scout fishing derby right before school started and each child caught a fish before they called it quits and ran around wildly with friends instead. 

We're really excited about Cub Scouts this year, Bradley has thoroughly enjoyed each event so far and Nathan is going to be the den leader for the 1st grade group. It's a good group of kids.

Eleanor with her fish.

Patrick and Mabel fishing together, of course. Mabel's older brothers are all in scouts.

Cute pictures of me and Nathan at a wedding.

Still at the wedding. This is my one nice summer maternity dress so it's going to be in any date picture for the next month or so.

Like this one. Nathan and I have been getting a reasonable number of dates since my parents moved here! We got to go out for fancy gelato on The Plaza after dinner.

Meanwhile, my parents sent us this picture of our very excited children who had talked themselves into a similar dessert.

Having grandparents living here has provided many perks. For instance, I never allow Patrick to spray me with a squirt gun at the pool but Patrick has turned it into a fun game with his Grandma Kathy who is far too nice to him.

More Patrick swimming. The kid got good really fast.

Eleanor loves her new dance class so much and has been getting private lessons so far because she's currently the only kid signed up for Monday evening class.

Fortunately she doesn't mind the one on one attention. She adores her teacher and made her a card to thank her for being her teacher.

It's amazing how much she has been picking up while getting private lessons. I'm sure she'll be excited when there are more girls in the class but she's doing just fine in the meantime!

Patrick's current favorite two activities are tennis and playing near/in the creek.

He's only a little scary when he jumps from jagged rocks over a couple foot drop to get to the path.

We have a rule that you can't throw rocks in the creek (because we would dam it up with the quantity we like to throw) so Patrick gathers nuts to throw in.

Fun Patrick story: Patrick was at a science class where they were very cutely teaching children about tectonic plates and they got to practice figuring out of a substance was brittle or bendy just like different kinds of tectonic plates. Unfortunately for me, they chose to use food items as most of their examples. Somewhat ironically, the one food item they passed out was the first thing Patrick popped into his mouth. Play doh. The teacher and I both gasped as she handed him a small slice of play doh and he instantly put it in his mouth. There was instant regret, I laughed a bit hysterically because the other teacher was passing out chips at the same time and of all the things to put in your mouth I couldn't believe he had selected the play doh. But the joke was on me, because ultimately Patrick isn't a fool and the grimy marshmallow he had been handed at the beginning that had been on an unwashed tray and a number of unwashed hands was ultimately eaten by the child despite my fervent efforts to get him to hand it back. It was a MARSHMALLOW. You have to eat it. He didn't get sick and he is going to be a super healthy kid once he gets to school because he's taken all the necessary steps to ensure he has already been exposed to everything.

Speaking of which, here he is trying to tell me I have to eat his mud ball he made.

If his face looks naughty in this picture, it's because he's telling me how Bradley is going to be naughty later and throw rocks in the creek and he's demonstrating on repeat what that will look like. He was really proud of finding a way in which to throw rocks in the creek while we talked about how much trouble Bradley would be in when he did this.

I took the full crew of kids to the park one morning (I'm a bit of a fiend when it comes to getting a little outside time in each day, especially on the weekends). Everyone was hot and whiny and fighting with each other at the playground so we walked back to the creek and I let everyone get in because it was warm enough and the water was moving so it wasn't scummy. Great joy.

Of course, Patrick did try to do some actual swimming and submerged himself entirely a few times (against my wishes) so once again he's been exposed to everything and continues to survive.

They had picture day very early this year. Check out these adorable children.

We ran into a friend of Bradley's when we were leaving school and they ended up climbing trees. Can you find Bradley in this photo? Hint, Eleanor is on the bottom right and she is looking at him.

Then we went home and Bradley complained about the boring pictures they took for picture day so I had him demonstrate. This is what the school demanded of him.

And this is what he tried to do before being told to conform to boring standards. I'm with Bradley on this one, I greatly prefer the pose on the bottom. Check out Patrick being Bradley's little mimic.

Sweet Bradley. Nathan called me over when he was having Bradley look at something on his phone because of the cheek to cheek action he was getting.

Boys playing on the platform swing together. Still such an amazing thing to have in our backyard.

Superman riding his motorcyle. Patrick zooms on this thing now, he wiped out going as fast as he could around a corner and hopped up and hollered that he wasn't hurt. This boy feels no pain unless he has a chigger bite that is itching him in the middle of the night. That is an abomination and he requires 1AM soothing lotion each and every time he has a bite for the duration of the bite.

Latest fort. They were contortionists for this one, I was told the official point of entry was under the barstools.

I got an amazing video of Bradley and Patrick the other day and proved that at least in play, Patrick would literally rather die than be separated from Bradley.

It was kind of like a Titanic movie, but brother style.

I wasn't worried about Patrick going to preschool until the walk through day where he pushed any kid that got close to him or Mabel (she's in his class) and he refused to take a picture with or even acknowledge the existence of the main teacher. Luckily he liked Mrs. Davis, the assistant teacher. 

I dropped him off today and was only a little worried. But he was very excited and the teachers are very nice and certainly knew what they were getting into.

I got a good report at the end of the day and he even allowed me to take a picture with him and his teacher, Mrs. Bieker. Great success!

Pokemon is the obsession of all children in the Scott house. Bradley has been saving up his allowance and was ecstatic when he had enough to get a Charizard lego.

Playing some sort of Pokemon princess game as a group.

Eleanor also has an allowance and was proud to save up enough for Eevee and Rowlet (I unwillingly know much more about Pokemon than I wish to.)

Points to Eleanor for continuing to smile for the camera while simultaneously trying to push her little brother out of the picture.

Watching them play together though. It's just one of my favorite things.

The crew playing with the new Pokemon toys together.

In shocking news, Patrick is a stinker and delights in being an imp.

This is his cute face.

However the video of me asking for his cute face is even better.

Nathan and Bradley went to a scouts night in full uniform and I demanded lots of pictures. Many points to Nathan for delivering said photos.

And for the first and last time this year I went to school to surprise Bradley and Eleanor for lunch. They were both so cute when they saw me and Patrick in the lunch room, they were SO excited.

However, they do not have lunch at the same time and Patrick got very squirrely by the time second lunch rolled around which is understandable because we ended up being there for about an hour and fifteen minutes. Cute but I'd rather volunteer in their classrooms.

Eleanor has come home with quite the impressive Spanish skills since school started. She has taught me so much.

And then we discovered she knows French as well! I mean, Srench.

End of summer is okay. I don't know what I'm going to do with Patrick in the winter. He's covered in dirt (look at his face) and he's playing baseball and he's so happy.

Ice cream on our way over to Gracie and Natalie's house to play with their dog. A real invite we got one evening that we eagerly took advantage of.

We almost didn't make it because we found the neighborhood cat Chewie on the way.

Ivy had been left outside because she was naughty and wouldn't go inside for her family before they left for dinner. We hope she does this on a regular basis.

Although this wasn't my favorite activity. As soon as Patrick climbed on top of this thing I knew the other two would follow. Sigh.

Lucky Ivy getting so many loves.

And then the next morning at Natalie's bat mitzvah! This is Eleanor with Gracie. The only picture I got at the ceremony. We love these sweet girls. Gracie has lunch at the same time as Eleanor at school and apparently she comes by and gives her a hug every day. Major cool points for the kindergarten girl to get hugs from a fifth grader. Gracie gave Eleanor a mechanical pencil the other day and Eleanor was beyond delighted.

My parents have been gone for the past couple weeks visiting Boston family and had us come by to check on their house while they were gone. Wise decision? I think we left things in once piece. 

It's nice to have all three kids in school and get settled into our fall routine. Everyone is doing really well and they love their teachers and Eleanor has only had one major nose bleed at school so far. On the second day, poor thing. We'll probably know baby gender by the time I do another blog post, very exciting!

Nathan Hip Surgery and Bradley Belt Assessment

Sometimes a girl falls asleep during quiet time in her room and then the boys still want to be near her so they play in her room until she wakes up.

Eleanor story: I told her that she had to stay in the backyard to play and stop trying to run up to the front and she said she didn't have to listen to me because Jesus had set her free.

We then had a three minute debate on the role of boundaries within that freedom and the responsibility of honoring your parent who Eleanor was pretty sure shouldn't ask her to do anything anymore.

Bradley's fort game has remained strong this summer.

Sometimes you don't want to take apart the whole fort so that you can eat dinner in regular chairs and it's hugely exciting to get to eat on the bar stools instead (causing minimal damage to the fort and adding a lot of cool points to dinner).

Eleanor sang to an admiring audience. And it was beautiful.

We did this for a couple meals while Nathan was gone on a work trip. Here is the conversation we had when he returned.

Nathan: I just got back from Seattle.
Bradley: I was born in Seattle!
Eleanor: I was in Mommy's tummy there!
Patrick: I was in Daddy's tummy!
Eleanor. No! Only girls have babies. Daddies just help make the babies.
Bradley: And that's why boys die first!

Bradley was also desperate to play his Pokemon game after Nathan got home from this trip and was asking about it basically every two minutes while we were at the pool. So I told him to stop asking if he wanted to play it or he wouldn't get to play it at all. He was desperate though, and when we pulled into the garage from the pool he shoved a Pokemon fruit snack wrapper in front of my face and said "I want to play this." I guess it counted as not asking about playing if he didn't actually say the word Pokemon. He got his game time in shortly after this.

There have been a number of school playground play dates in anticipation of school starting. I don't know that Eleanor has really made any new friends but she's good at climbing all the things.

Cute kids with Bradley's friend Charlie who was excited to hop into a family picture. Good thing we like her bunches!

These play dates have been ridiculously hot for the most part so hiding in the shade is a frequent part of playground time.

And here is our three year old doing the monkey bars. It's terrifying to watch, but he somehow makes it across.

Bradley got a blister while doing monkey bars and then it popped right before he was supposed to go to taekwondo. He was worried about his hand hurting while making fists so we set him up with a cool bandage, which of course required a matching bandage on his other hand. We got to taekwondo and the instructors made a fuss over him, especially when he told them he had bandages because he had gotten a big owie on one of his hands. Their "ooohs" of concern turned to chuckles when I said it was actually a blister that had popped. It's a big owie for a 6 year old I guess!

He's so ridiculously cute. My parents put the kids to bed while we went to a friend's house for a game night and we came home to find that Bradley had read himself to sleep.

He also can use the microwave on his own now! I was bustling around getting breakfast ready one morning when I realized Bradley could jolly well microwave his own breakfast sausage. He was delighted and very proud of himself and has been helping all of his family members have a hearty and delicious breakfast every day. Our consumption of breakfast sausage has gone up considerably but there have been no fires or explosions so we're calling it a great success!

We've had a fair number of swim birthday parties to attend this summer, which has been a lot of fun. All three kids have become swimming champs this summer, we're very proud of all three of them. Eleanor went from using a floatie at the beginning of the summer to diving for toys in the bottom of the pool and doing cannon balls to jump in.

And Patrick ... my 3 year old swims. And also dives down to retrieve objects at the bottom of the pool. It's impressive what a little determination will do for you.

We went with my parents to Dinosaurs Revealed at Union Station. I think we had fun, although we made it through the entire exhibit in 28 minutes (this includes the 3 minute video they show you before entering). Grandpa had some sort of strange desire to read some of the info they had posted by exhibits. This was not tolerated by the children.

We could barely get the kids out of the gift shop where someone had placed in a very touchable location a giant geode with a $3,000 price tag. Ah museums, we're awesome at them.

The roaring boys were adorable. Strangely, Eleanor was not interested in being involved in any roaring pictures.

But she's game for playing Pokemon while getting ready to wash hands for dinner ...

Nathan got hip resurfacing surgery a couple weeks ago which was a rather big deal. Luckily, he got some good visitors to make him feel better soon after his surgery.

The surgery went well and Nathan really wanted me to include a picture of his hip post surgery and the 30 staples he got but I refused because gross. I like cuddly hospital pictures much better.

There was a tv in his room and the kids watched Mulan. Are they cuddly enough? Hard to tell.

His recovery went really well once he got over a nasty case of thrush in his throat (another picture I choose not to post) and couldn't eat for about 5 days straight. It was rough but he was a champ. Now he is doing well and just has a cane to get around. The kids are big fans of his temporary handicapped parking pass.

He played a bunch of games with Eleanor the other day (we've really enjoyed having him home for his recovery) and he sent me texts about the smack talk he was on the receiving end of while playing Eleanor's current favorite game, Go Fish.

Eleanor: Of all the people you are the slowest poke ... because you don't have as many cards.

Later -
Eleanor: It was embarrassing because I almost finished with a mountain of cards.


Bradley and Patrick are adorable together. Patrick is not going to be happy when Bradley and Eleanor start school next week. I don't holler "I want to play Pokemon ballerina!" like Bradley and then jump off the couch.

Sometimes the kids compete for Bradley's leftover desserts by doing ballet.

I was expected to split a life saver candy in half after this.

Eleanor's roller skating gear has added another level to ballet as well.

I don't know what to call this exactly but I like it!

We've been trying to make the most of our last bit of summer and went to Deanna Rose with our friends the Rutherfords last week. This is our best try at a group photo of the kids. As always, Bradley is obsessed with cute baby Charlie.

Patrick managed to lose his snack holder near the beginning of our time there and realized it towards the end of our time and flipped out and yelled repeatedly that it was at "the up high place." Magically, he actually remembered where it was and we got to hike back to the fence he had climbed and then placed his snack on the fence post before leaving it for a solid 45 minutes. He's lucky he's cute.

And he's lucky he shares my love of the kitties. Sookie is so appreciative of his devotion. 

Eleanor hauled a yowling Meg into her room for quiet time the other day and when I came in to check on them Meg was blissed out purring as Eleanor rubbed her belly.

I have a fancy art museum picture of my younger two on our way out of the Nerman Museum after dropping Bradley and a friend off for an art class. Can you tell my children are art aficionados? We're just happy we didn't break anything.

This is how Bradley reads in the morning. Fan club must drape themselves over him. Lucky for everyone he is the cuddliest of them all!

Bradley is such a miniature copy of his father. In so many ways. It's sweet but tough for him sometimes. Eleanor was a little upset about her dinner options the other night and was quite visibly annoyed when she sat down at the table. Bradley was upset to see her sadness and asked me if he could go hug her and I said "Sure, but you have to ask Eleanor if you can." He did and she said no and it was just beyond his comprehension that a sad person wouldn't want a hug. Nathan often tries to do the same thing to me so I told him about this and he said "sounds familiar." Um, why would you want a hug when you're busy being annoyed with everything? I'm firmly with Eleanor on this one.

Bradley had his belt assessment at taekwondo last weekend and was a champ!

He remembered his complicated and long sequence perfectly! (This is from a class prior to the actual assessment. Other children got in the way of my video at the belt assessment.)

And he broke his board on the first try.

It now has a volcano drawn on it. I even let him use sharpie. He was very excited.

He did point out things other children were doing wrong during the belt assessment and at one point got bored while watching another belt class and hollered that he was ready to break a board. Oh well.

And we discovered during the group photo that we had somehow missed the giant sparkly heart ring he had borrowed from Eleanor that morning and that he had worn it for the entire assessment.

If you look closely in the photo below you can see it on his right hand. Oops. Maybe it was his good luck ring.

We're very proud of sweet Bradley and it was a lot of fun to see him demonstrate his taekwondo skills!

And Nathan and I even got a lunch and ice cream date in after the belt assessment! Having grandparents nearby has had quite the positive effect on the frequency of our date nights and afternoons!

Eleanor was gifted free roller skates from our cute neighbor - which then necessitated me going out and purchasing pads and a helmet. She loves all of it and has been rollerskating frequently, so it was all well worth it!

And have you ever seen a cuter roller skater? Good thing there's enough pink in this picture.

She has some cool new clothes as well, we went back to school shopping at Target together. She called me "Mother" out of nowhere for our entire shopping trip, which was rather unexpected. At one point she hollered "Mother, I want to show you something!" and I hollered back "Daughter, I want to see it!" and a woman I hadn't noticed who was standing nearby starting laughing at us.

We ordered Bradley a pair of new glasses and while we were at the shop I talked Eleanor into trying on a pink pair. She looks rather adorable, although she was surprisingly embarrassed about the whole idea of her wearing glasses.

Princess butterfly fairy ballerinas though - that she's cool with. Costco has Halloween costumes already and Eleanor assured me she would still love this in two months. I can see why - what is not to love?

Bradley got to try out a big kid class at the Museum of Prairiefire and it was a moderate success. It was great that Nathan got to be there with him but the kids basically just made pinwheels and Bradley cared far more about a tiny Pokemon creation that he made out of scraps than the actual pinwheel project once he got home.

Oh well. At least he had a good time with his cute daddy.

Patrick is cute but naughty. Can you believe it? We're trying to get rid of Eleanor's old dresser so I took all the clothes out of it and most of them ended up in Patrick's room. This is the face you make when you find your sister's heart tights and quite impressively manage to get them on by yourself (over shorts!) and then try to wear them barefoot outside on a 90 degree day. Sighhhh.

Patrick is also quite the champ with band aids these days! He's been doing a lot of stall tactics at bedtime and his favorite one is demanding all new band aids on owies real or imagined after we've put him to bed. The only assistance I provide is taking off the old bandaids (usually there are four) and then he gets the band aid box, selects the band aids he wants, and opens them up and applies them all on his own. One of his "owies" is on a pointer finger and he manages even that band aid with no problem. So I mean, he's still naughty for getting out of bed. But such band aid skill at a young age! Neither of the older two do this yet, although they probably could, they just don't make up fake owies at the same rate as Patrick.

We went to a new donut place on our way to dropping Nathan off at work in celebration of him feeling better and in celebration of new baby news (Nathan brings donuts to coworkers whenever we're pregnant. I guess it's only been two times, we don't need to make it much more of a tradition than that!)

And at the end of the day my dad and Bradley picked Nathan up and they all went to the boy scout store together and got Bradley his gear for this year. He's just a bit excited and tried to wear his cub scout hat to taekwondo today.

And this is the picture we used to share pregnancy news with the world at large (aka Facebook). Comparing babies: baby baby vs food baby. Mine is due in February, Patrick's is ever present and he reeeeally likes to talk about it.

I said I was fine with having either gender for this baby but Patrick was pretending to shoot me with a fossil at the museum the other day and then that same evening he discovered he could throw his Pluto stuffed toy against the master bedroom door in order to close it so he did it on repeat and then he started to throw himself against the wall and the bed in order to fall over (all while laughing hysterically) and I think I want a girl now. Or I need to do a better job of running the child. There was rain that morning and he was cooped up all morning instead of getting his rampaging in.

Okay, I guess this face is pretty darn cute. I'll take either, both genders are rather adorable around here.

But I really don't understand boys sometimes.