First, for the start of the school year...
On the Tuesday (September 4) after a fun Labor Day Weekend at the cottage, we woke up and got ready for the first day of school and the start of our school year routine. Once everyone was ready Asher and I documented the day with some first day of school pictures.
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Asher: Mom, why are you making me a sign for school?
Eric: Because that’s something moms do #iamthatmom #firstdayofschool#proudandsadallatonce #gonnarock1stgrade
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Avery was sad that I wasn't taking any pictures of him and wanted in on the action. I hadn't planned to take any pictures of Avery since it was just another day of daycare for him. Thus I was totally unprepared. Nonetheless, I let him hold the sign to make him quite happy and then used some Photoshop later in the day to create his own personal sign.
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| The BEFORE Photoshop Photo |
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The AFTER Photoshop Photo (Thank goodness for Photoshop!  😂 #momforthesave#itshardbeingtheyoungest) |
After the drama that went down last year on Asher's first day of school and the fact that he went to school very easily during the summer, Eric and I decided that we would just stick to our normal school routine and therefore he brought Asher to school alone, later texting me and saying that the drop-off went great.
Throughout the day I wondered how he was doing, but thankfully I found a few pictures of our happy boy on the school facebook page to reassure me that all was well.
That night, after everything seemingly going off without a hitch, Avery and I picked up Asher from school thinking that everything was still A-OK. Boy was I wrong! I picked him up and he seemed fine, but tired. Then as we were pulling out of the parking lot, I asked him if he had a good day and the floodgates opened. He said he did not have a good day and that he was sad he didn't get to do the things he wanted to do and that none of his friends played with him, and then continued to cry for a good hour+ straight afterwards. I think it was mostly exhaustion, hunger and unmet expectations for the first day but he was a total mess. We had planned to go to Culvers for dinner that night for a special treat but couldn't get him to calm down. We hesitated going but decided to push on. Apparently everyone else in Kenosha had the same idea that night though so we had to wait quite a while to get our food. In the meantime, I sat with our sobbing little boy trying to console him and cheer him up. Finally our food came and then it was like a switch was flipped. He ate his dinner, filled his belly and was once again our happy boy. It may be Avery who wants to be the Hulk someday, but there is a reason that Eric has nicknamed Asher "Asher Banner". Yikes!
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| Asher & I with our strawberry chocolate sundaes after I'd gotten him to smile again |
When we got home from Culver's, we allowed the boys to watch a quick show on Netflix before bed and thankfully Asher's spirits remained high as he watched his show and snuggled up with our pup.
One of the reasons that Asher was upset that evening was because the lace of his new shoes broke at school that day. I had just splurged and bought him a pair of Keens for school, hoping they would last better than the previous pairs I'd bought for him. Since he still isn't great at tying his own shoes, I picked a pair that had a bungee lace. Unfortunately, I now know that those type of laces are seemingly useless. He broke them that day and to help cheer him up I spent about an hour that night scouring the internet for YouTube videos to open the lock on the laces so that I could fix them. I finally got them fixed and then he wore them to school another day or two and came home with both shoes broken again!
In addition to shoe fixing, I also printed a little surprise to put in Asher's backpack that night so that hopefully he would have a better day on Wednesday.
On Thursday (September 6) Eric picked up the boys from daycare and school and I got home from work before any of them. It is rare occasions such as these when I get home with no kids in tow that I am always greeted at the door by our fur baby. As soon as she realizes that I am alone she runs off, grabs a toy and returns to me ready to play...Every.Single.Time. She is a great 'big' sister to her brothers, but I know she misses her time in the spotlight of our family.
While Emma and I played, the boys stopped at the Library to return some due books and get some new ones...making sure to get some pictures with the Star Wars characters that they found there.
Finally, it was Friday and we had survived our first week. It was chaotic and stressful but we made it. I would love to say that Asher did great from then on, but he still struggled with the transition back to school, missing our family and feeling overwhelmed by the tasks at hand. Mondays are the worst though because he gets to be with our family for two whole days and then is back to the grind.
That day as I thought of my boys I also thought that we should make some lasagna and chocolate chip cookies together. All day I couldn't wait to make some yummy foods with my boys and then gobble them up. When Eric and I got home that night though, we realized that our range (which had worked fine the night before) had somehow gotten its electronics fried during the day and now no longer worked. This meant no lasagna, no cookies and big expenses around the corner.
When Saturday came we had a new range to purchase, but we were also happy to all be home together for the day. Eric and I enjoyed getting some things done around the house while the boys played outside together and then we headed out to shop for a new range.
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| Batman and Robin. #brothers #bestfriendsforlife |
2 Videos: Batman & Robin
First we headed to Grand Appliance to check out our options. There were so many and we had never purchased a range before so we were not really sure what to get. We did end up finding one there that we liked though, which was in our price range and had a few extra features that I liked including a meat thermometer and 3 oven racks (for making MORE cookies!). Eric and I are not great at making on the spot decisions though so we continued on to Menards and Lowes to check out our options there before making a purchase. This is when the 'problem' came which brings me to part 2 of this week:
House Projects.
As we walked around Menards and Lowes I was reminded of the other projects around the house that I've been wanting to get done. I couldn't help but think of it as the adult version of "If You Give a Mouse a Cookies" or rather "If You Give a Wife a Range". The thoughts and ideas snowballed quickly and kept us busy for not just the remainder of the day but also throughout the following week and weekend...
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| Sooooo many options... |
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| Asher at Menards |
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| Range option at Lowes |
In addition to purchasing a new range at Menards (the same one we picked out at Grand Appliance but with same-day pick-up and and 11% off rebate), we also bought 4 large metal shelving units to reorganize the workroom and thereby the attic, basement closet and upstairs closets along with it and medicine cabinet for the upstairs bathroom to give us some much-needed additional storage.
When we got home early that afternoon, the boys (thankfully) played together fairly well for the remainder of the
The Kitchen (Pre-Install)
The Kitchen (Post-Install)
The Workroom (Before)
The Workroom (After).
It may not look like much changed but we needed a bulk pick-up on trash day for everything we threw away and also took two or three car-loads of donations to the local thrift store. Additionally, I was able to clear out half of the attic, reorganize the closet upstairs and the closet in Asher's bedroom, and clear out half of the basement closet so that we could move toys, games and puzzles that were in Asher's bedroom closet to that closet instead.
Even though we did work for much of the weekend, we did take a little time off to spend together as a family. After church on Sunday we all headed to Sam's Club for lunch and some shopping and then Eric did a little work outside with the boys and made dinner while I tested out my new oven with a batch of chocolate chip cookies for everyone to enjoy!
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Finally got my chocolate chip cookies & took the new range for a test drive! 🤣🍪 |
When Monday came we were completely exhausted but happy with how much we were able to accomplish over the weekend. We pressed on through the week with our every day activities and the start of the Awana program at our church for the boys.
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| You know you're a #boymom when you find this in your car! |
Sword fighting in the backyard.
Video: Sword Fighting
All set for Awana! Well, not really but they were both surprisingly excited to go on Wednesday (considering they had previously both insisted that they didn't want to go). To show them what it would be like, I dug out my old Awana vest for them. They both took a turn wearing it happily around the house on Tuesday.
On Wednesday night I wasn't sure how the boys would do with Awana (I'd tried with Asher two years ago and it didn't work out), but they both had a great time and couldn't want to get back. The only down side of the evening was that they were both excited to get their own vests but when we arrived they didn't have enough vests for all of the Cubbies, so Asher (a Spark) got his vest when I dropped him off but Avery (a Cubbie) did not. During Awana this wasn't an issue because they were not together. When Eric picked the boys up that night though Avery quickly realized that Asher had gotten a vest and he did not and although Eric said he was trying to play it tough it was obvious that he was quite devastated Eric said it was one of the saddest faces he's ever seen on our boy and would have pretty much given him anything in that moment. Thankfully, the Cubbie leader also saw the very sad little face and gave Avery one of the vests she did have even though the other kids that needed them did not get them that evening.
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| Avery so happy to show off his new vest that night! :) |
In addition to house projects at home, I also got to head out to a house project for work on Thursday (a gorgeous end-of-summer day) to see the final result of a project I'd worked on.
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| Emma caught taking a nap on the *clean & folded* laundry Thursday night. |
On Friday, Avery and I were able to have a nice, quiet morning home together while Eric went to work and Asher went to school. Earlier in the week Asher had taken advantage of his freshly cleaned closet to make an 'office' for Avery (since they will be sharing a room in the near future and Asher isn't so keen on the idea of sharing the desk we got this past summer). Avery spent quite a while that morning playing in his 'office'. :)
Avery's Quote of the day: "Mom can we listen to Alexa sing music? I won’t make you listen to ‘peed (speed) metal. I will let you listen to girl music."
That afternoon, after picking Asher up from school, I took a nap and let the boys play on their own for a while. When I woke up the house was eerily quiet. I went from room to room in the house and could not find either of them anywhere. All of the rooms in the house were dark and empty and no sound could be heard. Just as I started to panic, I remembered the 'office' and headed toward Asher's bedroom. Then I opened his closet door and sure enough both Asher and Avery were in there sitting at Avery's 'desk' watching a cartoon on his tablet!
😂
As we made it through week 208, I couldn't help but think of the new medicine cabinet we'd purchased the weekend before. The organizer in me could not wait to get it up, clean out the old one downstairs and fill up and organize the new one upstairs! (Yes, I am a dork!) The more I thought of it though the more the house project list grew. My thought process went a little something like this: If we are going to put up a new cabinet and take down the existing mirror, then I should paint the walls first (something I've been wanting to do for a long time)...AND if we are going to put up a new medicine cabinet I am going to find a new light fixture to replace the hideous one that is existing that I have hated for SO LONG!...AND if I'm going to paint the walls, should we also replace the vanity cabinet to give us a new look and even more storage?...YES! (It just so happens I'd seen one I liked at Menards the weekend before when we were shopping for everything else). So yeah, as I mentioned above it was a bit of a "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie" syndrome, but I was thrilled to finally get to upgrade our bathroom to something cleaner, more organized and more our style! And so...we got to work...again!
Upstairs Bathroom (Before)
The vanity I'd found at Menards last weekend.
Upstairs Bathroom (Painting Progress)
Upstairs Bathroom (After)
The only things left to do are add a few wall decorations and I want Eric to build a small shelf above the toilet from the wall to the vanity to give us a little more "counter space".
Since there wasn't much that I could do in the bathroom once the painting was finished I promised the boys (who hadn't had much time with mom or dad in the past couple of weeks) that we would make a robot craft that we had seen in one of the boys' magazines. Together we had a fun time creating a robot for each of them. They directed me with the colors and decorations and I did all of the gluing with my hot glue gun.
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| Asher's Robot |
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| Avery's Robot |
In closing of two VERY busy weeks, some words to live by: “A balanced diet is an ice cream cone in each hand or hoof!” #wordstoliveby
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