The Worm and The Pear: What We've Been Up To

You know when I title a post as such that I've been a bad blogger lately. I went from stellar August blogger to MIA. We've been busy!

Taylor is fully buying into the whole full-day kindergarten thing. Every single day, I ask her how school was, and every single day, her reply is an enthusiastic, "GREAT!" Her teacher emailed me the other day to tell me how she is a great role model and student.

The Worm on picture day.

She still loves arts and crafts!

She's also spending about six hours a week with soccer. She practices about two hours twice a week and then has games every Tuesday night. Like I mentioned before, she's the youngest on her team (and I'd guess in the league), but she's a tough little nut. At her age level, they set up with three forwards up front, one midfielder, two fullbacks and a goalie. Her coaches play her almost exclusively at midfielder because she'll work her butt off to get the ball no matter where it is! She's absolutely spent after games because as midfielder, she's responsible for covering front, back and the entire width of the field. She loves every minute of it!

Now that Taylor is in school full-time, the Pear and I get lots of quality Mommy/son time. We are both loving it! We almost always hit the park right after dropping Taylor off, play lots of shootball (basketball) in the basement, play board games, color, read and pretty much whatever he wants. He gets bossed around by Tay Tay a lot, so I pretty much let him call the shots when it's just us. He's a good boy, too. He's making great progress with potty training, "helps" me clean and is really a sweety most of the time. He's smart as a whip, knows lots of numbers, letters and all of his colors. His memory is as impressive as his sister's.

Is there any wonder that he has me completely wrapped?

The Pear helping me water my tomato plants. I don't think it's rained since way before the last time I blogged and we KNOW how long that's been. My poor, poor lawn.

Mike is enjoying his new eighth grade math classes. He's already holding open gyms for his players and says that though they will be very young, this season should be an exciting one. Of course, Mike is thrilled that the NFL season has started. As a Steelers season ticket holder, he's already been to one Pittsburgh win.

Mike with some of his best buds (and, no surprise, they are all Steelers fans). Mike, Erik, Lloyd and Jason.

I'm been running around like crazy, but loving life. I never realized how exhausting school is for parents! Lunches, homework, outfits, fundraisers, class parties - there's always something going on. I just celebrated my 5-year anniversary at School Outfitters. It really is a great place to work. Lots of smart, GOOD people who really care about each and every employee. The biweekly chair massages don't hurt, either. :) In addition to work and kids' activities, I've been trying to keep up with my workouts and other stuff like harvesting my insane tomato plants. I bought two tiny tomato plants for a total of $4 back in May. They are HUGE! I've been getting yummy tomatoes off them almost daily for the last month. I probably have 100 green ones on the vines right now!