Fall Firsts!

 

Fall is an exciting time around here...the weather is cooling down and school is starting!  Here is Peanut on his first day of his second year of preschool.  He is in morning preschool this year and has Ms. Anne and Ms. Jenny as his teachers. 

He was so excited and ready to go!  I miss him when he's gone but I'm glad he is still half day for 3 days for one more year. 

This is Ms. Anne.  She is so kind and has a lot of experience under her belt.  Excited for lots of learning again this year!

And what an exciting Wednesday:  First day of preschool and the first day of Little Wild hockey!

This program is so great not only because of the great instructors and ice time, but look at that cool uniform!

He works so hard on the ice and has quickly surpassed my skating skills! 

I love these impromptu shows of affection.  She is so proud of her big brother and he loves an audience watching him skate!

Sister had a big day recently as well.  The first day of her ECFE Terrific Two's class.  She has Ms. Jodi again and we were so happy to see her and lots of familiar friends from the One's class.

I guess we should've taken an apple for the teacher but Sister loves them so much she gobbles them up as soon as we pick them.  Yes, we got 2 apple trees and one already has fruit!  We are getting another and I'm looking forward to pies and apple crisp each Fall.

More love.  Another reason I'm glad Peanut isn't full time yet.  They have lots of time together and their relationship is so sweet.  Sister's class is on Mondays at the same time as preschool and right in the same building.  Today after her class she told me, "I'm going to look if Hayden is good in school."  Smile.  So stay on your best behavior Peanut, she's watching your every move!

Hope your Fall is cool and crisp and full of deliciousness!  Have a great week friends and family!

Summer Wind Down

 

I really enjoyed Peanut's soccer games this year.  The weather was nice and it was so relaxing to be outside watching him have fun and also there were so many friends for Sister too!  Here she is with my very good friend Heather's daughter Zoey.

And here is our soccer star.  It was his first year and he loved it.  And I think he was pretty good too!

And of course he looked super cute doing it!

Tough I mean...smile.

I loved the way they ran the practices.  My friend Suzanne was one of Peanut's coaches and she is so great with the kids.  They spent part of the time on skills but always left enough time for a "game."  And with no goalie there was plenty of scoring!  They loved that part!

And plenty of summer days were spent like this...

And this...

And this might be one of my favorite pictures of all time, ha!  he was asking me to take a picture of him but she said "I will be in it too" and ran right in front of him.  He is not pleased.

Another fun thing that happened was that a friend shared a new bed with Sister.  We had the princess sheet set so now we have the matching bed.  Thanks Melanie!

 

I love that sometimes after breakfast she will just say "I'm going to rest in my bed with the door open" and snuggle up and read.  Peanut does this too but usually on the floor and when it gets really quiet I sometimes find them in the same room both looking at books.  Makes me so happy.

Another summer activity (although we love this place at Christmas time too) is the Landing.  This particular weekend  the houses were open and the residents of the town were celebrating the Eagle Creek town fair!

The school house is always a favorite and the kids like to sit in the desks and write on the slates with soapstone. 

It's so much easier now without the stroller!  Sister and I wore our fanny packs and Peanut was kind enough to carry our snacks in his back pack.  No more trying to fold up the stroller and get it onto the trolley!

Some of the townspeople really stay in character and that makes it so fun!  Lots of times the women are in the kitchen cooking and at this house the lady needed more wood for her fire.  She said to Peanut, "Now if you were my son I'd have you out hauling wood in for the fire."  Well, say no more he was on the job with Sister to help.  He felt so proud to contribute.

And this gentleman was so kind and after playing a little Johnny Cash at our request, he gave each kid a fiddle lesson! 

Sister doesn't have a shy bone in her body and her go to line is "I will do that too"...and she does!

We had such a full, fun summer.  It seems like a million years ago that it started with our big trip to South Dakota.  I'm excited for Fall now and that's one of my favorite things about Minnesota.  Each season brings new weather, activities and adventure.  Hope you're ready for your next adventure!  Have a great week friends and family.

Inspired

 

I came back from Chicago rested and inspired to share more culture with my children.  So the week after we returned I took them for their first trip to the Art Institute downtown.  I wasn't sure how it would go since we have really just gone to the Children's and Science museums so far, but it was a win!

Just the size of the place was impressive to them and we had fun walking around and chasing squirrels between touring the buildings.

The museum staff greeted us so warmly and made me so comfortable to have the kids there.  They gave us a scavenger hunt to complete that included tasks such as looking for animals in the artwork...

The kids immediately found a "bison" in this triptych and Sis had to stop right then and there to draw it on her paper.

After we ate lunch we found this neat little spot with some hands on activities.  I just kept thinking how happy I was we'd made the trip.  The kids had so many great experiences and it was such a beautiful peaceful place to spend the day.

Sister's words to me on this statue were "Mom, that is a boy and he is naked.  And he has a butt."  Smile.

This one had them speechless for a moment...and then a million questions and comments!  Their brains were working overtime and I loved it!

We got to ride in this old fashioned elevator.

See some asteroids on the ceiling...

And one of my favorite things is when instead of asking me they talk about things together.  Their excitement to share a discovery with the other is so sweet.  The other day out of the blue Peanut told me he thought she was "so so cute."  He is right about that! 

 

The Art Institute was a great experience.  When we completed our scavenger hunt we got to go into the gift shop and each kid got to pick out 3 free postcards from a wall of about 500 choices!  So much fun.  The weather was nice so later on in the week we went to a familiar place to enjoy some outside fun. 

 

I'm glad we went when we did because the butterfly house is only open for a bit during the summer and we almost missed it this year!

But we didn't...and the kids love finding what they see on the charts and we see lots at home now too!

So then to wrap up our week of fun...The Children's Museum of Southern Minnesota!  We aren't members of this one but we got in for half price due to our other children's museum membership...I love reciprocity!  Sis really loved the indoor sandbox. 

And one of the more interesting parts of our visit was watching this snake being fed his lunch of a live mouse!

Peanut LOVES this indoor treehouse.  I went up in it and my favorite part was that the steps are each made out of a different type of wood and labeled.  There were probably 30 of them at least!

We enjoyed the outdoor garden area and Peanut really had fun with these boys on some sort of water project.  I'm not sure what they were doing but they were very serious about it.  So cute!

And speaking of cute:  Sis and this little friend really had fun feeding the goats hay. 

Back inside we loaded up our shopping carts, tended the garden, dressed up in costumes..

Peanut is literally in the middle of the action!  I don't know if he'll ever be too old for a train table.

And he soon made another friend at the lego table and they were playing castle and I overheard them talking about meeting up the next time they came to finish the project.  Peanut always starts a big project when he is given access to any type of building material and he eagerly recruits help from his peers.  He really enjoys working with others and it's such a good way to learn compromise.

Sis just painted for a long long time.  It made me happy.  I'm not the first one to pull out the paint at home because, well, it's just messy.  But that's why we come to these places.  To do things we don't do at home and have new experiences with new friends.

So coming off my weekend away back to the kids I didn't feel one bit of vacation let down.  I had a blast in Chicago but this is really where my heart resides.  I'll take lego buildings over skyscrapers and lunchables over foie gras any day as long as I get to spend my days with these two.