many fun things today

Very exciting day for Rachel today... she got to take her new bear, Sparkles, to school.  She earned enough  "Panther Bucks" to bring a stuffed animal to school for the day.  This is the new bear she made last weekend with the Build-a-Bear gift card she got from Shawna & Josh for her birthday.  Sparkles is also wearing Kate's old dress... loved that dress!  What was confirmed during the process of her making this bear is that she makes decisions like me... it takes awhile!!!

This morning was also a big one for Eli, Kate and Olivia... Grandpa's Daycare was in the house!  Grandpa was kind enough to come here and watch the kids while I went to my monthly PTO Meeting.  I went to a meeting last year knowing they needed help this school year or PTO would be eliminated and walked out of the meeting as Vice President... why does that happen to me!  I actually don't mind helping out and the events planned/supported by PTO are fun for the kids and something I'd hate to see disappear.

Grandpa did great and seemed to enjoy it!  He even said this could possibly be a monthly thing... that would be very nice!  It's much easier to pay attention at the meeting without worrying about trying to keep the kids quiet and content.  They have been great in the past, but as Kate gets older... she's getting louder.  I think we have another Rachel in the house!

We were also lucky enough to have Olivia here all day and had a blast!  She is so much fun to have around and Kate just loves looking at her!  Kate has always been very gentle with Olivia, but after today I think that might be changing.  She is gentle most of the time, but then all of a sudden she will tug really hard on her bib ~ or her new thing is to throw blocks... that could get to be dangerous!  We've been working with her on throwing a ball and looks like she's now practicing with blocks!  Yikes!

Today was a big day for Kate as well for two reasons...

1) She had a grilled cheese sandwich and loved it!

2) No she's not walking, or even crawling.  And, no, not bending down to pick up toys or pulling herself up on furniture... drum roll please... she's FINALLY holding her own bottle!!!!  She's our over-achiever!  [and we LOVE her for it!]  She's actually just very content and could care less about getting around or doing fancy tricks!  The tricks she can do are using her fine motor skills: such as... clapping on command, which is "Go Pack Go," pointing at the light when asked, throwing a ball and a few others.  The gross motor skills are what we've been trying to get her interested in... she's just lazy!

That was a summary of my day... and what a GREAT day it was! : )