Sadie Counting

Usually when you ask Sadie to count you get, "1, 2, 3." Or some random numbers, so when Matt asked her to count, we never expected her to count to 12.

Preschool

Lily had preschool orientation on Tuesday. Her and I went to her school for about an hour so she could see the classroom, her teacher and some of her classmates. She was very excited to see everything and hear about some of the things she would be doing this year. Here she is ready to get going at 8:30 even though we didn't have to be there until 10:30.
Lily and Sadie posed outside for some pictures to waste some time before we had to leave. Sadie also had to be wearing a backpack and tennis shoes like Lily. She keeps saying, "Sadie school." Mommy is not ready for that yet :)

Today was Lily's first day of school! She was so excited. She once again hurried to eat breakfast and get ready. She was waiting at the back door, shoes and backpack on, about an hour before we had to leave. Lily told me once that she didn't want me to stay with her, then she wanted me there, then she couldn't wait to get there, and so on. I think she was nervous because she kept telling me her tummy hurt a little. We took more pictures and again Sadie had to be like her big sister.She looks so grown up yet so little at the same time :)

Here she is at school getting ready to walk in.....she kept doing this pose, I think because she was nervous and excited.

Once we got inside, it was very chaotic so we didn't get pictures. I had to sign Lily in, help her hang up her backpack and coat, and wipe her face and hands with a wipe...there is a child in another class that has very severe allergies, so every preschool class has to take extreme precaution. Once we had that all settled we waited by the door to the room until her teacher opened it and that was it. I barely got a hug and Lily walked into the classroom and didn't look back.

When Sadie and I went to pick Lily up she was very excited to see us, yay! She had a great time and said her favorite part was snack because she got to eat Mickey Mouse fruit snacks with milk. Some other things she did today are, playing outside....there were some monkey bars she liked that were not too high up (her words), she also liked playing with the play dough, and dancing crazy to music and then freezing. It was great to hear her talk about all the fun things she did. She even told me that one girl was sad, so she went and put her hand on her back to make her feel better, then she asked the girl to sit by her. That was my favorite part :)

Feeding Ducks

Lily has been asking to go feed ducks for awhile now. We aren't exactly sure where she got the idea from but she has been pretty persistant. So yesterday we set out to find a park with ducks to feed. We found a park in Grandville that had a lot of ducks so we stopped and got out our bread. We were swarmmed by the ducks who were not shy about getting close to people. It was a little overwhelming for Sadie, but Lily thought it was so cool. Here are some pictures.

Lily loved being surrounded by ducks....Sadie ran away after this picture, they were too close.

The sign we ignored.....oops!

Lily was very happy to have fed the ducks :)

ArtPrize

ArtPrize is descending on Grand Rapids and voting begins next week. If you are totally confused by this, I'll explain what ArtPrize is. ArtPrize is an art competition in Grand Rapids that is open to any artisit. Artwork will be displayed all over downtown Grand Rapids, at different venues. The judges in this competition are anyone who registers and visits the exhibits. And the grand prize is $250,000.

The reason I'm writing about this is that my mom has entered. If any of you has been to my house, you've seen many examples of her work :) Her painting is going to be at Peaches Bed & Breakfast. Each artist has a little profile written up on the ArtPrize website, here is a link to my mom's. You can see some examples of her paintings on her profile.

If you have the time and want to see some spectacular art, go visit some of the venues for ArtPrize. The competition runs from September 23 through October 10. All the info about voting, venues, and artisits can be found at artprize.org.

This is one of the pieces my mom has done (with chalk) and if you've been to my house, you've seen it in my dining room :)

Sadie

I've recently realized that I have not been taking very many videos of Sadie at this age. I have a lot of Lily, which I guess is to be expected because she is the oldest, but I love this age and so I have been trying to get some more videos of Sadie. This one is Sadie spending some quality time with the baby :) Both girls insist on having my tummy showing to talk to the baby so you will see a bare pregnant belly. And the angle isn't great but I just grabbed the camera and turned it on so I would catch it.

Here is the song Sadie sings.....it can be hard to make out the words :)

"A B C, next time won't you sing with me"

Room Sharing

We have been slowly preparing for baby #3. We have everything we need for his/her arrival but we knew that Lily and Sadie would have to be in the same room. First we worked on getting Sadie to sleep in a toddler bed. It didn't take too long and she was sleeping in it all the time. So, we moved on to the next phase, painting Sadie's room. We wanted to make it feel like a whole new room so Lily would feel like it was hers too. Finally, we took the crib out and set up a twin bed. The transition has gone surprisingly well. We put Sadie to bed about 1/2 hour before Lily's bedtime so she has time to fall asleep and then once she is sleeping we put Lily to bed. I think this has been nice for Lily too because she gets Matt and I to herself for a little while before bed each night.
I feel a little more prepared now and Lily asks almost everyday if the baby can be born. Only 8 more weeks to go!

Camping

For the second, and last, time this year we packed up the camper and headed to VanBuren State Park for a weekend of camping with family. We were joined by my parents, Kyle & Corey, and Yvonne. It was very hot and there was not much we could do to get away from it. Lake Michigan was the perfect temperature and a great relief, especially for me. The girls enjoyed the beach, the water was a different story. Lily surprised us all and was terrified of the water. We had to be out pretty deep because there are rocks from the shore to the buoys, beyond that is the sand bar, so it was too deep for Lily to stand and she was afraid of going under the water. Sadie LOVED the water. She was splashing and laughing and stayed in until her lips were turning purple. She also surprised us and wanted to go under water. It was great to spend time together but we all missed Kurt & Laura, who are in Hati, and Mary, who was working at a camp in Minnesota.

Our home for the weekend
We set up the back of the van as a playroom for Lily while Sadie took
a nap. It was a good way for Lily to get some quiet time and stay out of the sun.

Ready to go to the beach

(I didn't get many beach pictures because I was in the water most of the time)

Trying to catch the sunset

goofing around

The sunset