Thank God it’s Friday – I think everyone in our house is exhausted. 

Peyton had a LONG nap at Jen’s today and he woke up asking if he could go back to sleep.

Mommy thought about going to Target later today…for about a minute.  Once she sat down she didn’t want to get up again.

Daddy come home talking about sleep.

Peyton loves school.  As soon as we walked in the classroom on his first day he stepped out of my reach and began a chorus of “bye, Mommy”s as I signed him in and checked his cubby.  I was able to sneak out of one of my classes long enough to see his class playing on the playground…I might add a pair of binoculars to my shopping list so I can tell which kid he is   I also snuck out of my study hall long enough to pick him up with Daddy.  He didn’t want us to pick him up; he wanted to stay with teacher Melinda.  They had read a story about Spot the dog and used thumbs to put spots all over a paper, just like Spot had, and he was proud of his paper but he wanted us to take it while he stayed at school.  The only other thing he would tell us about is “criss-cross apple-sauce,” and he was very proud of me when I could sit cross-legged.

This was a good week – I’m  enjoying my students, my class load is light (though the classes themselves are large, I’d rather have 2 preps with many students than 4 preps with small classes), and I have a long break in the middle of the day.  My stomache feels really heavy by the end of each day even though I spend much of my day sitting.  I should invest in a roll-up mat and take a nap during my prep period every day

We had a mixer today, and the best part was seeing all these Washington kids have a blast as though it wasn’t raining.  Mixed groups travelled from one activity to another in a war to see which team would win.  In my station, teams of red, green, blue and yellow blew up balloons and tied them to their ankles, then attempted to pop other teams balloons in a gigantic chaotic mess.  By the end of the afternoon, everyone was soaked and smiling, ready to go back in the halls and eat their fudgesicles.   

The icing on the cake occurred when I arrived home today and found the baby gender test in my mailbox   Boy or girl?  We’ll find out with 90% accuracy in the morning…watch for an update!

Peyton was SO excited to go to school this morning that he thoroughly chewed me out when I told him the plans for the day.

You see, today was not his first actual day of school school, it was orientation day, so it didn’t start until 10:30.  Today was my first day of actual school, however, so Peyton got dropped off with Miss Jenn until Daddy picked him up for orientation, then they met me at my room at the start of my prep period and we walked over to his classroom together. 

But he was VERY angry when he found out he wasn’t getting dropped off at school.

“Mom, you SAID I was going to school today!  I don’t wanna go to Miss Jenn’s!  You’re supposed to drop me off at school!”

After several minutes of explaining and a few extra minutes dealing with his anger at being at Miss Jenn’s instead of school, he was okay with getting picked up by Daddy later.

And he was SO excited to visit his classroom and meet his teacher.  It was so cute – he reached out to shake her hand, and she said “I’d rather give hugs than handshakes” and he was so excited to give her two gigantic hugs.  They had a treasure hunt prepared for him, so he got to visit various stations in the classroom and put stickers on the map when he found each landmark.  At the end he RAN up to teacher Melinda and grabbed her hand to show her his treasure map – “I DID it teacher Melinda!  I DID it!  I found them all!”  And teacher Melinda took his hand and led him to the special treasure chest with snakes…snacks inside.  He also found his name tag, his cubby and his coat hook – the only Peyton in the class   In fact, he had so much fun that he preferred to stay a few more minutes with Daddy than walk Mommy back to her classroom in time for 4th hour.

One thing I didn’t mention yet – I had a checkup yesterday and got to hear baby’s hearbeat for the first time.  It’s at 150, which, according to wives’ tales, indicates a boy.  Peyton swears it’s a boy, too.  I found a urine test that can tell with 90% accuracy whether baby is a boy or girl, and since it wasn’t very expensive it’s on the way   It should come in the mail by Friday or Saturday, so I’ll let you know what it says!  Our next appointment is September 24th, so we should find out for sure then whether it’s a he or a she. 

I’ve been feeling it move for a couple weeks, now, and whether boy or girl it seems a lot more mellow than Peyton was

We’ve had a lot going on in the last week – and both of our computers were down over the weekend.  James’ was done for so I’m typing from his lovely new computer that he’d been drooling over for a while, but since we didn’t need it it was on the “wait” list.  Until the other one went out. 

Hmmm. 

My computer is also done for.  I’m waiting for Circuit City to call about the damages.

The weekend without computers was kind of nice – James power-washed the whole driveway and you can actually see the cement now.  Not so in the gutters…the city ought to have those cleaned out now and then!  Sheesh!

While he was power-washing I pulled the dead plants out of the garden.  No, I didn’t kill them off.  They’re bulbs – they’ll resurrect next summer.  After that Peyton and I cleaned out and organized all the junk in our garage.  In the middle of doing that I came across a storage tub containing a few adorable baby girl outfits that I bought when Peyton was going to be a girl (that’s before we found out he was a he).  The Chinese birth calendar says it’s a girl, but with Peyton it was only as accurate as our doctor’s first guess.  If it’s consistently inconsisten, then, this baby is a boy.

When we picked up the new computer we decided we might as well move the computer out of the office and into the hallway to make room for our boy or girl baby, so we moved the junk-covered cardboard box out of the hallway and actually starting throwing some of it away!  James still has a lot of cleaning out to do in baby’s closet, but with school starting (next week!!!) I won’t have time to work in there for a while anyway.  We’ll probably do some painting in October since we find out Sept. 26th whether it’s a boy or a girl, but I have the feeling we’re going to paint it a neutral light green anyway.  There are some really cute pink bedsets with green as an accent, and if it’s a boy he’ll be using Peyton’s blue and green transportation set, so we won’t have to worry about gender mixups or changing rooms later.  

Yesterday I got our room and bathroom cleaned up and decluttered enough that I should be able to locate matching shoes and clothes for work since it starts TOMORROW.  We’ve also been encouraging Peyton to dress himself – he does a great job but he wants me to sit and watch.  Strange – when I tried to dress him he wanted to do it by himself, but now that I want him to do it on his own he wants me to dress him.  Kids don’t make any sense (or do they?).

He also had a major blow-up at the grocery store yesterday.  It makes me think he’s nervous or stressed about something…what could it possibly be?  His growing up reminds me of my ed classes when we learned about brain development – from ages 3 to 8 and then again from 13 to 18 the brain is developing so fast that parts of it don’t keep up…the last part to develop is the frontal lobe, which is in charge of emotions and also of linking actions with consequences.  Like this morning, when, for the first time ever, Peyton used a marker to color on something other than paper…the floor under my desk at school.  I could just imagine his thoughts – I wonder what will happen if I touch this open marker to the shiny floor?  The same exact thought patterns in a teenager – huh, I wonder what will happen if I stick my pen in an electric pencil sharpener?

My son is becoming a teenager?

I’m trying to get a hold of the book Bringing up Boys by Dr. Dobson.  I should have a copy by next week, but maybe I need it sooner than that.

This is our super-fast update since I haven’t blogged in a week!  I have 22% battery before I have to get off my butt and plug this laptop in, so here’s the summary:

Our vacation was fun – it was great seeing so many of our friends and family even though we were only there for a short time.

Driving was long but it worked.  Peyton watched the first two seasons of the Rescue Rangers – season one on the way down, season two on the way back up.  He was a good traveler, though he’d start getting ancy after about 3 hours of sitting still, but Mom and Dad felt the same and were ready to stop for gas or food or driver switch after about that much time, so it worked out.  We stopped mid-way in Weed, CA on the way home at 7:00 for dinner and a good night’s sleep.  With minimal traffic through Seattle, we made it home by 7:00 on Saturday night.

Peyton is still adjusting to being home again – he’s had a lot of attitude the last few days.  We almost didn’t make it to the fair yesterday because he was whining so much, but when I told him it was his last chance to show me he could be a big boy or I wouldn’t take him to the fair, he was suddenly able to control himself.  The fair was fun – just he and I went because James was at work, but we still had a good time.  He rode two kiddie rides all by himself, he visited all the different animals, he learned how to spin wool into yarn into clothes, he saw Ben the 3,300 lb. bull and a brand new calf that had been born that very morning.  We saw names of my students next to their animals, but we only saw one of my students in person.  We ate at the LC food booth and saw a few elementary teachers who know teacher Melinda, Peyton’s teacher next year (in two weeks!  ack!).  We had ice cream, cotton candy and lemonade; we milked a cow, dug for potatos and made a river suitable for fish.  And we won a free Adventures in Odyssey CD for knowing the secret word of the day at the Praise 106.5 radio booth…I happened to be listening while we got dressed in the morning

Anyway, we’ve had a great summer, but we’ve only got a week left!  And the red x appears over my battery…ttyl!

We made it – after two days of driving, we’re finally enjoying our vacation in Southern California.  Peyton did very well in the car (for a 3 year old).  He watched the first season of the Rescue Rangers most of the time, listened to CDs with us, and begged to get out for the other few minutes.  I don’t think we had any tantrums, but when he wanted to get out, he really wanted to get out.  In the last hour especially, sitting in LA traffic, he was done sitting in the car. 

Needless to say he was very excited to get here, which has meant a few behavior problems.  Also, my uncle, aunt and their four boys and one girl are also staying with my parents, so having friends to play with is way too much fun for him to use his listening ears.  I’m sure he’ll calm down and start paying attention to Mom and Dad once he gets used to the excitement levels.

But that’s not going to happen today – today is Daddy’s 30th birthday, but we’ve been to a 1 yo’s party with friends, now it’s naptime, and later we’re going out to eat with Daddy’s side of the family. 

Our ultrasound on Friday went well – the doctor said the baby is definitely a boy or a girl.  I suppose that’s a good thing to know, but I was hoping for something a little more specific   We have some really good ultrasound pics that I’ll post when I get a chance.  Right now, I think we’re just glad to be out of the car. 

This comes from Ashley who found the link at Everydaychapter.  I’m not sure whether it’s a hilariously funny ad or a frightening display of how low people will sink to make some money, and I’m definitely confused over what “refreshed” means.  Be warned – there is some nudity at the beginning (FYI you can view a smaller example of the nudity if you place your mouse over the link), but it’s not gratuitous and I’m sure we’ve all seen it before. To view a fabulous new “oasis” that is available for your home, click here.   Make sure you check out the “happiness” link and the “Washlet 101″ link.

This week’s Works for me Wednesday is dedicated to parental advice.   

Quit buying kid’s videos.  They cost too much money, they take up too much time (because you get how many hours for that money?), and I KNOW I’m not the only one who’s tired of hearing Dora’s special rainbow song after the second playback.  Before I list a few cheap options, I thought I’d mention that no I do not let my dear 3 year old watch TV non-stop – the TV is off as soon as I’m done in the shower and if he gets to turn it on again it’s only for 30 minutes before lunch or dinner time (this system has worked well for us this summer – he’s very good about asking before turning it on and turning it off on his own without argument). 

-Go to the library!  We just borrowed the new Curious George DVD for free!  If he’s not tired of it when it’s due back in 2 weeks, I know I’ll be ready to get rid of it and I won’t even need to hide it in the back of the cupboard to keep him from playing it again.

-Go online!  While playing the Dora game on www.nickjr.com my son clicked a link that brought him to 8 30-minute Dora cartoons!  Of course, my crap laptop is too slow to play them well, but he didn’t care that it paused every minute to load (I did – it turned a 25 minute commitment into nearly 40 minutes).  Playhouse Disney might also have a few short clips, but seek and I’ll bet you’ll find!

-Make use of Tivo or DVR!  If you don’t already have this it’s something to think about – instead of watching shows that happen to be on when it’s TV time, record the shows you want to watch and enjoy them during TV time.  It’s also helpful in turning OFF the TV because when the show’s over, the DVR pauses for several minutes waiting for you to choose save or delete rather than continuing on to the next show.  It makes it easy to watch JUST ONE Diego rather than Diego and the 10 shows that come after him. 

I can’t believe I just bought a $12 Dora video when we could be watching fresh episodes for free!  Free always works for me – for more ideas visit Shannon at Rocks in My Dryer.