First Day of Preschool

 Chase and Owen started preschool on Monday August 27th!  They were soooooo excited and couldn't wait to go, which made it easier for Jeff and I.  It's always difficult to end the summer and go back to work.  This year, since they were going to preschool, it was a little easier-or hmmm, maybe not easier, but "different".  Knowing they will be in a structured learning area, also learning about God makes me feel good.  Here they are! Chase is on the left and Owen the right, holding their "I am a Preschooler" sign.

At 4, when asked, Chase's Favorites are . . . .
Color:  Green
Movie:  "The Dragon Show" which is really called, "How to Train Your Dragon"
TV Show: Dora
Candy:  Suckers
Food:  Pears, apples, bananas
Toy: All my trains
Dessert:  Cake
Book:  Whatever book we are reading that night
Song:  Mommy Loves Me or You are My Sunshine
He wears size 9.5 shoes, 2T-4T shirts and 2T-3T pants

At age 4, when asked, Owen's Favorites are . . . .
Color:  Turquoise
Movie:  "The Dragon Show" which is really called, "How to Train Your Dragon"
TV Show: Dora
Candy:  Suckers
Food:  Grapes
Toy:  Finn the car from Cars 2
Dessert:  Suckers
Book:  Whatever we are reading that night
Song: Mommy Loves Me or You are My Sunshine
He wears size 9.5 shoes, 2T-4T shirts and 2T-3T pants

 Chase and Owen with their new lunch bags, which they could not wait to use!

 They will be attending a Christian preschool, which Jeff and I are very happy about.  They ran up the stairs and couldn't wait to go in. 

 Here they are wearing their too big backpacks with their lunch bags attached (which is what they wanted).

 Their lockers!  At open house their names were not on the lockers yet, so this was a big wonderful surprise. Owen really wanted to take his home at the end of the day.

Their first teacher, Mrs. Hoffer

 One proud Mommy with her beautiful little boys! 

When we got there, they ran into the room and were off to play.  Of course they kissed and hugged me, but they were too excited to linger.

When I picked them up Chase wanted me to see his 3 new friends, one of which was a boy wearing a princess dress and crown.  I had to laugh.  Later that night Owen told me that some of the Mommies were weird.  I asked what he meant and he said "God made them like that."  I probed further and he said they say things like, "Hello Baby," and he used a baby talk voice.  How funny.

Thursday

Thursday was a beautiful day as usual.  We hit the beach, soaking up as much sun as we possibly could.  We took the "secret passage" as usual.

Walking through the yard . . .

Up the path . . .

down the path . . . boys running ahead . . .

the ocean is just over the ridge . . .

private walk ways to get to the beach

Daddy heading through the sand dune to get to the ocean-isn't it beautiful!

Owen is heading for the ocean . . . 

going . . .

going . . .

gone!  with Chase running along too!

"Come on brother, let's go!"

Looking down the dune

and up from the dunes before getting to the beach

Owen begins digging right away.

Chase heads to the water to collect treasures.

Jeff gets ready to swim!

I was trying to simulate a picture of Jeff and his brother when they were about this age.  Chase was cooperating, Owen was not.

Cooperation and big muscles!

Chase, Owen, Mom and I made a big sand castle this day and used sticks to make flags.

Chase digs

Owen digs in the sand to help make a big pile.

Chase all sandy, wet and salty

same goes for me!

Snacks with Papa

The gathering room

Aunty Kate reads a book this night

Nana cuddles with Anderson

A Big Owie

Back near the end of July Owen had a big fall at a neighbor's house.  He was running down their driveway pushing a car, much like he does at our house.  The difference was that their driveway is a pretty big hill.  As he was running down he must have lost his balance, fell on his knees and then didn't let go of the handles of the car.  His fingers must have smashed directly into the asphalt driveway. He started screaming and I ran to him.  He was holding his hands and I could see blood dripping already.  I was pretty worried. I picked him up and went into the house to look.  When I looked I saw that on one of his hands the middle and ring finger were missing 1/2 the fingernails and they were bleeding.  When I looked at his other hand I saw that the skin was gone on his fingers and there were holes in the middle of his nails and the nails were all black from asphalt. It was so sad to see.  Owen really did handle it pretty well, despite the fact I had to clean out the wounds, which he didn't like.  We wrapped them up good and he slept ok that night.  It took awhile for them to heal and he loved to show them off to people.  Poor guy.

Wednesday

Wednesday in S.C. brought rain rain and more rain in the morning and it was down right depressing.  It's hard to know what to do on vacation when it rains.  The boys were up early and we had nothing to do so by 11:00 I was pretty restless.  The men were supposed to go out fishing but it was cancelled due to rain.  So, that left us with nothing to do.  Jeff and I went and grabbed a bite to eat at Rita's and I had the best nachos I've ever had in my life.  They were amazing with tuna, watermellon salsa, brie cheese, etc.  mmmm.  When we got home we packed up the families and headed to Charleston to take a boat tour of the harbor.  This was so much fun!  The boys loved being on the boat and looking at the water.  After a few minutes they had fun racing their new cars and I was able to listen to a bit of the tour and take in the sites.  We saw Fort Sumter, beautiful homes, heard about the history of Charleston, industry, etc.

When we got home from the tour, Chase, Mom and I headed to the beach to have "lots of fun", which is what Chase kept calling it.  Chase and I did just that!  First off, I found two huge conch shells that I had been wanting to find.  The surf was just going down and the water was great. Chase ran and splashed and ran some more and keep saying, "this is really fun, I'm having a lot of fun Mommy!'  We made a fort with sand, shells and weeds.

Large navy ship

On board the boat

Fort Sumter

The boys played cars most of the boat ride

It was a bit sunny in this picture