The case of the missing tooth!

The Boy lost his first tooth this summer. Literally lost it.

We were spending the day in Washington, DC before taking my sister-in-law to the airport. The entire time we are walking around he is working that tooth. A few minutes later we looked over and the tooth was gone. We looked down at the ground and laughed. We were on a sidewalk covered with little pebbles about the size of a baby tooth! After attempting to look for a few minutes we gave up and decided the tooth fairy would come anyway!

A few days later he practically pulled a second loose tooth out of his head! That one he was able to hang on to.

All was quiet on the tooth front for a while until a few days ago. When I picked him up from school I noticed right away something was missing! And, of course, it really is missing. It was lost on the bus, never to be found! Nothing a note to the tooth fairy couldn't fix...."Dear tooth fairy, I lost my tooth on the bus". Literally.

Oh, and you'd think by now the tooth fairy would realize this is going to be a common occurance at our house and have some funds at the ready.

New Year's Resolution

I did not make any resolutions this year.

Actually, I take that back. I made one. To use the auto feature on my coffee pot every day so that I wake up and the coffee is ready. I am 1 for 16.

That is part of the reason I did not make any resolutions. I can not keep them.

The other reason is that I know this year is going to be challenging enough as it is. My main resolution is going to be to make it through the year.

In '08 I know that we are moving half way across the country.

Which entails:
2. selling a house
3. searching for and buying a new house
4. packing
5. unpacking
6. finding new doctors, dentists, hairdressers, libraries, parks, kids places, stores, dry cleaners, babysitters, friends
7. saying goodbye to good friends
8. living within 45 minutes of most of our family for the first time ever

This year we will also send my youngest off to kindergarten and my oldest to a new school, again.

We have done this before. By the time we move we will have been in our house and in this community for just under 2 years. Prior to that we had a wonderful yet challenging opportunity to live overseas for two years.

Packing, unpacking, starting new schools and making new friends, we have become experts at that.

Hopefully this will be our last move for a long time. But you never know. That is why they say that life is full of surprises.

I know that once we are settled we will love living closer to our families. It is just that the road to that contentment that will be very bumpy.

Ahh, the weekend!

I am so glad it is here!

It is amazing to me how a couple weeks of holidays, school breaks, ect. can throw my entire family off track for so long.

The Boy's antics continued all week. Wednesday, I gave in. I figured a day at home wouldn't hurt him and I just did not have it in me to fight him. I was afraid by giving in that I would create a monster but what was done, was done. Well, by 8:45 a.m. (still time to be on time for school) he decides he wants to go (because he learned that by staying at home he would not be playing outside or doing anything else that resembled fun)! And things got a bit better after that.

Whew!

School Struggles

The Boy has been fighting practially every morning going to school. Last week I chalked it up to end of vacation blues but his stubborness was back this morning. It is about to wear me out. It has happened off and on throughout the year and I am at my wits end. He doesn't eat breakfast. I have to brush his teeth and put his shoes and coat on him. And even then he will kick me or kick his shoes off. I literally have to pull him down the driveway and then he will fight me when getting on the bus.

I am sure he is worn out....it is a long day for him. And, he struggles with most everything they do so I am sure he doesn't like that. But, if this is what life is going to be like for the next 12 years, I'm not sure I can handle it.

Uuuggggg!

Happy New Year!

It's all over! All of the parities and presents and food.

We had a very nice Christmas. My parents arrived the Saturday before Christmas (after a 4 hour delay) and were here to celebrate with us. We went to Hershey, PA to the hotel for dessert and through their amazing light display. We went out for a lovely lunch on Christmas eve and then to a children's church service where the kids joined in as an angel and a sheep.

The kids were so excited on Christmas eve. They put out their reindeer food and left cookies out for Santa. Grandpa read "Twas the Night Before Christmas". When I put the girl to bed she said "Mommy, I can't sleep, I'm too excited" and 5 minutes later she was out. At 7:30 a.m. she woke me up and said, "Can I got knock on every one's doors and wake them up now?" We told them they couldn't go downstairs without all of us!

Oh, and their faces when they walked in and saw the tree and presents! Priceless!

After a marathon present opening session, we had breakfast and lingered in our pjs for a while before cleaning up and going to our friend's house for appetizers. We then came back for a nice dinner.

Friday we headed out of town to Williamsburg, Virginia. It was nice but the weather was awful...rain off and on all day Saturday and it poured on Sunday. The kids were a bit young for Colonial Williamsburg but they had some neat kids activities going on that they enjoyed.

After dropping my parents off in Baltimore on Sunday night we headed home. They had a flight out on the 31st but we decided we didn't need to stay - we wouldn't have done much if we had stayed.

Now, everyone is back to school and work. I have today to get myself in gear and then it's back to work for me too!