Mother's Day Out

Bethany started Mother's Day Out last week, and so far she is loving it! She is going to the same program Brooke went to last year, and has been so excited to start going to school. The first day, she was dressed and ready at 7:35 when we took Brooke to school, and was annoyed that she had to wait until 9:00 for her school to start.

I was worried that she might be shy or nervous the first day, but she had no problems at all. In fact, she put on her nametag, hung up her backpack and lunchbox, and then kicked me out! I had to talk her into giving me a hug before I left, she was ready to start making friends to play with.

She said her favorite part so far is having puppet shows and playing outside on the playground...fun stuff for a 3 year old! She also really likes lunch, and insists on packing her own lunchbox...today I found it filled with peanut butter crackers, vanilla pudding, a juice box, and she set pears out on the counter for me to cut up for her. I'm so glad she is enjoying her new school, and can't quite figure out when she turned into such a big girl!

Oh BOY!

We had our ultrasound last week, and found out that Baby Bennett #3 is a BOY! Honestly, we weren't too surprised, I've been saying it's a boy all along, but it is nice to have confirmation. We are very excited to have a brother in the house, and the girls have been so funny talking about him. Brooke is ready to share her Handy Manny and Diego toys, and said she hopes he gets a lot of new boy toys to share with her. Bethany isn't sure what to think, she just keeps asking, 'but what do you DO with a brother?'. She has been carrying our ultrasound pictures around the house since last week, and loves looking at her 'bruder' as she calls him.

As for me, I am 20 weeks along and finally feeling somewhat normal again. This pregnancy has been so different than with the girls, and it seems like it has flown by. I am hoping the next 19 weeks go by just as quickly...we can't wait to meet our little boy!

Beautiful Ballerina

Bethany has been asking to take dance classes for at least a year, and now that she is 3 she is finally old enough! She has been so excited, and insisted we call her 'Ballerina Bethany' all day Monday and Tuesday. Her first class was last Tuesday evening, and she LOVED it. The class is actually a creative movement class, and she said they hopped around like frogs, danced in circles, and did ballerina spins. The class is closed to parents, so I was a little worried she wouldn't want to go in by herself, but she walked in grinning without ever looking back. She was so proud of the sticker she earned, and can't wait to go back! What a beautiful ballerina!

What a Busy Week!

We have survived the first week of school, but it has been exhausting! Not only was it the first week of school, but we also started ballet and soccer this week. Next week we add church back in on Wednesday nights, and I don't think we will be slowing down anytime soon.

Brooke had a fabulous week at school. She is very much a 'rules and routines' girl, so she has done really well with the structure of kindergarten. When I picked her up the first day, she said her favorite part of school was when it was over and she was able to see me. The second day, her favorite part was recess, and she hasn't changed her answer since. Here are a few pics of her leaving for her first day...

She was really excited to see that she has homework every night...we'll see how long she stays excited about that!

Bethany has been a bit lost without her playmate. She almost drove me crazy the first day, I don't think she left my side for more than a second. She helped me with laundry, dishes, sweeping, cooking...pretty much everything I did all day long. We also played baby A LOT...I don't think I realized how many baby dolls we have in our house until this week.

Needless to say, she was very excited to see Brooke come home!

Bethany's Prized Posessions

Over the last few weeks we have done a lot of back to school shopping for Brooke, and Bethany has been feeling left out. She is going to be in a Mother's Day Out program twice a week, and is excited to be going to Brooke's old school. Even though she doesn't really need anything new to start MDO with, I felt bad dragging her along on our shopping trips, so I did give in one day and let her pick out a new lunchbox. Apparently the lunch box wasn't enough, and she started asking on Friday for new school shoes. I asked her what she wanted, and she was very specific-princesses, flowers and sparkley glitter.

I took her shopping this afternoon, and tried to steer her towards more conservative shoes, but she was not interested. As we entered the third store, she started squealing when she saw these shoes, and I knew it was all over...here is what she fell in love with:

Once she had them in her hand there was no reasoning with her, she was absolutely thrilled to find princess shoes, with flowers on the straps and glitter around the edges...and when she dropped one and saw it light up she was over the moon! Normally, I don't buy character clothing for the girls, and I'm not a big fan of all the sparkle, glitz and lights, but Bethany lives for anything 'fancy', so I really didn't have a chance of changing her mind. She wore them out of the store and grinned the whole way home.

Back to School Breakfast

A friend of ours suggested we have 'Back to School Breakfasts' for the kids in preparation of school starting next week. It is a chance for the kids (and moms) to get used to waking up, getting dressed, and leaving the house early in the morning. It was our turn to host today, and the kids had a lot of fun eating and playing.

I cheated a little, and set the table last night before going to bed. When Bethany walked into the kitchen this morning, she asked if it was her birthday...I guess plastic tablecloths and dishes mean party time to her!

We had lots of food to eat...several types of cereal... ...different muffins and cinnamon rolls... ...and tons of fruit, applesauce and drinks. The kids did a little eating... ...and a lot of laughing!

After two days of waking up by 6am, I confess that I am tired this afternoon!

Bethany's New Haircut

After a long summer of sun and swimming, the girls were in need of a haircut to trim up the ends and reshape their hair. I took them in last week, and wasn't too thrilled with the results. After looking at Brooke's crooked hair for a day, I decided to dig out my scissors and even it up. They didn't realize I know how to cut hair, and thought it was so exciting to get a haircut at home.

Instead of just evening up Bethany's hair, we gave her a whole new style, and it is super cute!Bethany has always liked her hair long, but I've been thinking lately that it would look better shorter. Her daddy also thinks little girls should have long hair, so he was speechless when he walked in to find us halfway into her new haircut! Her hair is really fine, and when it is long it just looks stringy and has to constantly be pulled up. I love how thick and healthy her hair looks now...I should have chopped it off a long time ago! She spent most of last night talking about her 'adorable hair' as Brooke calls it, and just grins everytime she looks in the mirror. Now that it's done, Rob agrees that her hair is super cute, but he did ask me to please not cut Brooke's hair any shorter-ha ha! And if you are wondering why she has on a swimsuit and mis-matched hair bow, we were headed to the pool and I wanted to snap a picture really quickly before we left.