Free Range Family

Its here, its finally here!  Miss Anna started her first day of dance class today. She is in the Parent/Child Creative Movement class at my old dance studio, Diversity Dance. Her teacher's name is Miss Rachel, she is so very nice. I have seriously been waiting for this day since we found out that we were having a girl, you know like two and a half years ago????? Lol, I am definitely NOT a dance mom… Wait isn't that exactly what I a dance mom is? I am just so excited for her to be starting dance! Anna in her leotard before class We started out class playing with some stuffed animals and going over the alphabet. We did "A" for Anna and for airplane, "J" for Jadelynn and Jack-in-the-box, and "I" for Isabelle and Inchworm. Each letter we did a different action, Anna loved it! Then we pulled out the musical instruments and danced to the Mouse-rcise song, a Mickey Mouse song that I have childhood memories stretching to! It was pretty cool dancing...

So my wild child son could not come up with just ONE thing for his birthday. He has a love for gymnastics and all things tumbling (just like his mama) but he also is quite  obsessed with fond of Legos, just like his crazy  creative father. :P So he was torn between the two themes. We decided to have his "school friends" party at the YMCA Kids Gym. Then we would invite anyone who wanted to join in to the local Lego store, Bricks and MiniFigs. They could play and look at the Legos with Alan. He loved the idea! It ended up just being the kids, Lon and I at the Lego store, but Alan didn't care. He was instantly in hog heaven! :) Anna went over and played with the big bricks while Alan and Lon explored the Lego creations throughout the store. We currently have a Lego exhibit at our local art museum, entitled The Art of the Brick. One of the artist's creations was at Bricks and MiniFigs, a sculpture of the inside of an eye! It was so cool and entirely made out of b...

I have had a lot of people asking me this over the summer and even more so now that Alan's birthday is coming up (4 more days). So I figured rather then repeat myself a billion and two times (like I have done thus far), I would just write about it on here. If you have been a follower of this blog for years, you probably already know why but this is for those new-comers who have just joined us! Why are we not putting Alan in Kindergarten this year?????? Well, for several reasons actually… #1- Our school district's cutoff is September 10th, just five short days before Alan's birthday. By all technicality he could attend Kindergarten this year but personally I feel that is too close for him to succeed in school. He would be four years old for the first week and a half of school, and that scares me. I feel that the district cutoff date should be on the day that school starts but I do understand that doing so would mean that the district would have to change the cutoff da...

I know, I like never write on the weekends! What has gotten into me??????? Well, for those of you who know me personally know that I only don't write most weekends, because that is my family time. It is the time where all four members of our family are available, so we spend as much time as possible together, doing fun things. I am usually too busy to post during the weekend, I just recap everything from the weekend that following Monday. In fact, the year I started this blog, that was one of my personal rules: No posting on weekends.  But today, I woke up early before the children and I thought I would go online for a bit. Started checking my FB and then my blog and I decided, hey why not post today? If I have something to write, why shouldn't I write? So here I am, typing up a post for today. It will mostly be filled with random thoughts and musings from the weekend. I still want to save my Dirty Dash post for Monday. :) But I have like a billion and two little things I ...

Our local library has recently built a new building and has remodeled. They just opened this past week. They are still under a lot of construction but can start accepting library card applications and allowing people to check books out again. Alan has wanted a library card for ages and I got my first card when I was about five, so I figured it was time to get him one. I took the kids to the new library last Friday and they just loved it! The new library is so cool! We walked all over, looking at all the new stuff. They have a wishing fountain, a tree house reading room and a toddler play area all on the first floor! We agreed that Alan was old enough to be responsible for two books. He picked those two books out while Anna played in the play area. Alan even came and played with her for a bit! However, Miss Anna wasn't too into getting any books herself this time but she really liked the play area and didn't want to leave when it was time to go lol. She put quite the show ...

I have had a busy weekend and an even busier week with birthday parties, family coming into town and a funeral. Before I begin this post, I think I am finally ready to share with you who in my family we lost this past week. It was one of my grandfathers. He had been fighting illness for years and years. He is no longer in pain or hurting anymore. For this I am very glad but as for the rest of us in the family, the "survivors"... Man, I give major kudos to anyone who has ever planned a funeral (or even helped plan one) for your deceased loved one. Its a lot of work, and still being raw with emotion from the passing, can be difficult at times. I have honestly been doing good. But I have my sad points, like when I had to tell my sisters or Alan. Or when I had to make a display with all of his pictures from my childhood. Or at the funeral when all the guests were giving my family their condolences. Thinking about him back then when we were young v.s. now, hurts me a lot still. N...