School Days...

Gracie is enjoying 3rd grade so much already! She would live there if she could. I've never seen a kid so excited to go to school. Mornings have been a breeze with her getting up & ready on time. I love it! :)

This is a picture of her in her classroom holding a book of her new love...rocks & minerals. She absolutely loves reading and seeing all kinds of rocks, etc. She has always enjoyed getting those small bags of rocks when we go to certain stores but lately it's really become exciting to her to learn all about them. We went into a really awesome store called Earthbound Arts this past week, and there was a huge rock that was beautiful inside. While we were admiring it..the gentleman informed us that it was petrified dinosaur poop! Eeeek! Haha..if only I had my camera to capture a picture of it and Gracie's face once she heard that. :)

This is the latest art installment at her school, "the clock lady". She greets us each morning as we are entering the school. She is lovely! :)

Comedic Husband...

Paul says that I spend as much time doing this blog, as it takes to do the things that I post in the blog. Haha...So true! :)

Park Play...

We wanted to go to the zoo so badly on Wednesday...but Gracie had school. :( The weather was so perfect for it! Then we thought we would pick her up at 2:45 and then head straight there, but we were bummed once we realized they close at 5:00. So sad!

So, we opted for the park instead. Haha. We had a good time. Hopefully soon though, we will be able to make it to the zoo. Jai has never been and I think the last time we went was when Gracie was 4. Maybe a zoo trip will be in a (near) future blog post...so stay tuned! :)

Hospital Visits & Car Accidents...

We've had a rough week! :( On Sunday, we had to take Paul's mom to the emergency room because she was having trouble with her ammonia levels from her liver. I stayed with her at the hospital until 3 a.m and they transferred her to Chapel Hill thinking that her liver was doing badly. She had a liver transplant about 5 years ago. Thankfully, once the Chapel Hill Dr's were able to run tests on her, they determined that her liver was working properly and that her ammonia levels were up due to her not taking her meds properly! (Bad Rita!) :)

She came to our house to stay with us for a few days and I think she is finally getting back to feeling normal. We are so happy that she is ok! She gave us quite a scare and hopefully she will get back on track of taking her meds more regularly!

Yesterday, I went to her house to pick up some meds that she needed. I had left my cell phone with Paul (running errands) and we left HIS cell phone with her at our house. I hardly EVER go without my cell phone, so it was a perfect day for this to happen. I was on my way back home, driving on a 2 lane road. The car on the other side coming towards me veered far into my lane. I jerked the car (big mistake) to the right to avoid them hitting us head on...and then jerked back onto the road and I lost control of the car! It was the scariest thing I think I've ever been through, and to make it worse...Jai was with me! The car was is crash mode and I thought we were going to flip. We ran off the road to the right, hit a ditch and the front of the car came off the ground. We slid sideways for about 20 feet or so and crashed sideways against a bush. It was a very strong bush to stop my car! I immediately checked Jai and he was terrified but ok. Oh my gosh..if anything would have happened to him, I would have just died. He was on the verge of tears saying he didn't want to do that anymore. I had to get out of the passenger side since my side was rested against the bush. I got him out and checked to make sure he was ok. The car that caused all of this didn't even stop! No one did! (except for a body shop guy checking to see that we were ok and then to give me his card). I couldn't even describe the car if I wanted to other than the color. I sat with a lady that owned the property that I crashed on. I felt so bad for tearing up her yard. It has been rainy the past couple of days...so the tire tracks were all muddy and the grass was pretty torn up. I have felt terrible about it. Every time that I closed my eyes to rest yesterday...it would re-play in my head. And to make it worse, Jai keeps saying the following phrases. "I bumped my head", "that was a bad car", "i don't want to do that again", "we tore up that yard", etc. I am so thankful that he is ok, but it upsets me that he is reliving it in his head. :( I wished I wouldn't have panicked, and jerked the car so hard. Oh well, I can't go back so I'll try to cope. Our car was mostly if not all cosmetic damage. The crash was pretty hard...so I'm surprised that it didn't do more damage.

We took our car to the shop today. We went to the Enterprise to get our rental...and we got a Prius. It's really nice, except for the fact that someone has been smoking in it (ewwww!)...and it smells disgusting. I want to trade it out for another one but I'm not sure if one will be available. It's pretty crazy that it gets twice the gas mileage (50 mpg) as our Element though. Maybe one day we can afford to buy one! Anyways, onto the pictures...

1st day of 3rd Grade...

We're looking at the pictures backwards of course. Keep this in mind until I wrap my mind around how to upload all of these pictures. :)

Here is Gracie in her 3rd Grade Class. She was SO excited to go back! I have never seen a kid so excited about school! It's crazy! She came home from school on her last day of 2nd grade stating that she wanted to be in Mrs. Deal's Class. She said that Mrs. Deal was so nice and had a class gerbil. So, when I got the class lists and saw that she was in Mrs. Deal's class, I knew she would be so happy! :)

Gracie's best friend, Aida is also in Mrs. Deal's class. :)

Walking to her classroom with her class...

This is where 3rd-5th grade meet each day. They sit quietly and read until their class is called back.

My pretty little lady.

Jai was a little jealous of all of the pictures that I was taking of Gracie. He wanted me to take his picture...

I can't believe that she is in 3rd grade already. It makes me sad but I am so proud of how she has grown. She is so compassionate, sweet, friendly, shy, loving, funny, and everything I have always wanted her to be. Ok, I'm going to stop before I cry...

Thanks for looking guys! <3

Last days of summer...

Last week was Gracie's last week before school started. We tried to do fun things all week...and the pool was one of them.

She was pretty bored the entire time because none of the other families that we invited could come along with us. :( She was pretty bored the entire time. She had wanted to get in the "big pool", instead of the "baby pool". I tried to explain that I couldn't manage both of them in the "big pool" because neither can swim properly and that was pretty intimidating to take on my myself. And I'm sure I don't have to remind you guys about how nervous I am with my kids in the water (over ankle deep). Haha..so that added to my stress. LUCKILY, our friend Jim & his son Ian were there, and he kindly offered to help Gracie out if we wanted to join them in the big pool. That was such a relief and Gracie was able to enjoy the day a little more. I wasnt able to get a good shot of them all swimming because we were all in the water..but we had a great time.

At all of our pools this year, the kiddos (who can't swim) have to wear a life jacket. Gracie was NOT happy about this! I was completely content with it. :)

Jai loved it! He didn't want to take it off when we were leaving. I'm happy that they take this precaution though! There were a couple of really sad stories last summer involving little ones drowning in the public pools. Hopefully this will prevent any further tragedies.

Haha...

Birthday Party...

On August 8th, we had a birthday party for my stepdad. We had a great time. Very low-key! We had planned to go outside and take pictures with everyone...but we didn't get around to it. :( My mom asked me to make the cake, and I ended up making carob whoopie pies. Gracie and the kiddos kept asking for "whoopie cushions". It was pretty funny.

I made a mega-sized one for him. :)

All of them blowing out the candle. :)

My brother and his lovely family. <3

This is how Paul spent his time while we were celebrating! Party Pooper!

I love that he always make crazy faces when I ask him to smile. There will plenty of time for posed smiles down the road I suppose. :)

Happy Birthday Paw-Paw! :)