Graduating Class of 2010

Last Week Lilly graduated from her preschool.  Naturally she was very excited!  She couldn't wait to get her "Pa-ploma".  Someone has since corrected her and she now calls it a diploma, thanks Jim!  I know you are supposed to correct them when they say a word wrong or use a wrong word, but it is just so cute.  Not to mention the fact that they will soon be out in the world and have their mistakes pointed out to them on a regular basis, so what is the rush!

The whole ceremony lasted about 10 minutes (mercifully) and Lucy told us there would be "freshments" served afterward.  I think she was as just as excited about the graduation as Lilly.  The six graduates walked into the room, preformed a song and dance then recited some lines about what they had learned this year then were awarded their diplomas.  Short and sweet - I like it!

Here is a picture of the girls with both their teachers.  The Montessori experience was all in all a good one, but I will admit it took us some time to warm up to the idea.  My main gripe was the girls were in the same room.  Lilly has a "tendency" to boss Lucy around - SHOCK!  It is hard to tell but I think the girls had an rewarding experience, but I am looking forward to next year when Lilly will be in Kindergarten and Lucy will finally have a chance to be the big fish in her new school.  Ben will be joining her twice a week (in different rooms of course) so that means that mommy will after 5.5 years have two days where she can do things BY HERSELF!!!  Not that she is looking forward with eager anticipation or anything.

A week or so ago I got a crazy notion in my head that it was time to start another sewing project.  Some of my fondest memories as a child was hanging out in the sewing room with Mom playing in the button box while she was sewing.  One of her favorite things to do was to get me to try and find matching buttons.  Which now that I am a mother realize that it was a fruitless mission and solely devised to shut me up and give her the 5 or 10 minutes needed to finish whatever she was working on.  I dare say the buttons largely were the "extra" button that comes with most new clothes or they were left overs from previous projects.  That being said - there was only 1 of each button!  Smart lady!!!  I am not a sewer let me go on record as saying that.  I wish I were, but I have a HUGE problem with reading patterns in that I just can't.  But that doesn't stop me from trying.  I usually torture my Mom and wait until she is coming down for a visit before I break out the scissors but sometimes I go it alone with mixed results.  But I digress.  Last year I picked up a skirt from a consignment store that I thought would be super cute as a dress.

My plan was to fold it in half and cut out a simple A-line shape and improvise from there.  The dress had a zipper in the back and I was hoping to use that so I wouldn't have to worry about doing one myself or worse - deal with buttons or buttons holes!  Well if I had made it last year it probably would have been long enough for either Lilly or Lucy so I would have to add some material around the bottom, how hard can that be right? Ha ha ha!  I can cross off my dream of being a contestant on Project runway that is for sure!!  It isn't god-awful and Lilly has agreed to wear it at least once.  She says it is beautiful but I suspect she is just being kind.  I probably need to rip the neck out and start over, but I don't see that happening.  Trust me when I say it looks better from far away.  Far far away.  Lesson learned - take a sewing class.  However, I am not easily dissuaded.  Jim has donated an old shirt to be magically transformed into a skirt and top.  Stay tuned...

We had a huge milestone occur last week!  In addition to Graduating, Lilly mastered the art of riding her bicycle without the aid of training wheels.  I bought a buddy bar a few months ago and we have been toying around with that, but it wasn't until the training wheels broke that we got serious.  I was NOT going to buy another set of wheels - according to Jim.  So last week after a particularly frustrating ride around the neighborhood where I was holding onto the bar "helping" Lilly find her balance, Jim raised her seat and in about 2 minutes this happened:

 

I can't believe it!!  She is growing up so fast!!  Any minute now her baby teeth will start falling out and then she will be driving!  Lucy has decided she needs to learn next, but I am thinking maybe by end of summer.  Right now she needs to work on figuring out how the brakes work on her bike.  Her stopping method of choice right now is slamming into whatever large object happens to be nearby, namely my car!  That is not going to end well for either Lucy or the car.

What about Ben? What crazy things did he do this past week?  I will narrow it down to the one that left a mark.  The kids were jacking around in the girls room and of course it was all fun and games until someone got hurt.  He fell onto the metal bed rail and scraped the skin off between his nose and his upper lip.  How he managed to not knock out teeth I don't know.  So he has been wandering the world with a crusty lip.  It only took a week to heal thankfully.  In typical two year old fashion he wouldn't let me get near it.  I had to wait until he was asleep to put ANYTHING on it. Hard-headed much?