Caterpillars crawl before they fly

School started last week (sort of) for Isabelle. After hunkering down for Hurricane Irene last Saturday and Sunday, we finally got power restored on Sunday night. We were the lucky ones, some just got it back this past weekend! Schools were closed for Monday and Tuesday last week due to widespread power outages. The county reopened school on Wednesday but there were still some individual schools in the county that were closed b/c of power outages. This week, all schools are open and back to a normal schedule.
In addition to the power outages, Isabelle came home from school SICK on Thursday so she missed Friday. So last week was just all messed up. She went to school today, and we've bribed her with a big ice cream outing on Friday if she can get through all this week without any tears. She managed to choke them back this morning so we'll see how she does the rest of the week. We're hoping this adjustment period goes by quickly and she starts to love school soon!

Here is her schedule in case you grandparents want to know what she's up to each day...

I Am 3, Going on 10

Isabelle came home from daycare the other day and walked into the house with a sad, pouty face and attitude. I knew something was up. I asked her what was going on and Ed just started to chuckle.

Iz walked over and buried her head in my shoulder and was doing the fake-cry thing. She told me (very seriously)...

"Mommy, I really want to be TEN!"

(me) "Ummm, WHAT?!!?!"

"I reallllllllly want to be ten. I don't want to be three anymore."

(me) "Go to your room. I can't deal with you right now."

Talk about a pouty face and attitude, you should have seen me the rest of the night.

Preschool here she comes!

Ed & I have been researching and touring preschools in the area this month. We love the daycare where Izzi has been for three years but we feel it's time for a change. Izzi has only boys at daycare right now and she really needs to meet some girlfriends. Plus, we want to get her into a more structured "school" setting to prepare her for Kindergarten in 2013.

Today, we visited St. Andrew's Methodist Day School right here in Edgewater. They have openings in the 3-year-old program and the program is amazing. They are a green school - they have rain gardens on campus, each class has their own garden to maintain, they have chickens and goats, and they incorporate environmental lessons into their schoolday.

The preschool program includes Religion, Spanish, Art, Music, Library/Reading, Phys Ed, Science, Social Studies, and Math. They also have clubs and extra-curricular activities for the kids who attend the 'extended care' hours (which Izzi will be in since we both work full time).

We got to meet a few teachers today (the school doesn't have a summer program but the teachers were there cleaning and organizing their classrooms) as well as a few parents who were volunteering their time to get ready for the schoolyear.

We still need to review the packet of information they sent us home with and discuss our options, but as soon as we left the tour, both of us said at the same time "I LOVE IT!!!".

So, I think we've found Izzi's new preschool. And one of the best parts - UNIFORMS! No more morning battles about what the princess is going to wear. Yippeeeee!

For you grandparents who want to read more about the school, click on the logo above and it will take you to the school's website.

Down on the bayou?

I pulled out the harmonica tonight just for fun and Izzi was instantly smitten. She started to play it and finally got the hang of it after a while. She started to play a deep slow riff and I asked her if her new song was called, "Down on the Bayou"?

She said, "No, it's called 'Clean Your Feet, And Take a Shower'. Ha ha. Point taken, Iz.

My Friend Ariel

Mom-Mom SuSu snapped this photo when we were in Florida a few weeks ago. How perfect that Iz and Ariel are mirroring each other...

Overheard in the WWOI

I'm still working right now (5:20pm) and Ed is in the kitchen making dinner. Isabelle is playing princess in her room. I just overheard Ed say...

"No, Iz, we talked about this. I'm just not comfortable with you putting a leash on yourself."

I better get in there....

Mermaids of Weeki Wachee

We just got home from a fabulous vacation in Tampa, visiting Mom-Mom SuSu and Pop-Pop Bill. We had great weather every day except for one. We were able to go out on Aunt Joann and Uncle Ron's boat, to a sandbar in the Gulf of Mexico, just outside of the Cotee River near New Port Ritchie. We saw fireworks in Safety Harbor for the 4th. We got a hotel room in St. Pete Beach for 2 nights and found an authentic Maryland Seafood restaurant at the beach! And we swam, swam, swam every day we were there. I think Isabelle averaged 6 hours per day in the water.

The one rainy day we had was Friday, and boy did it downpour! They got 3-5 inches of rain on Friday depending on where you were on the gulf coast. This was the day we had planned to go to Weeki Wachee anyway, so it wasn't so bad. The live mermaid shows of Weeki Wachee are indoors. They have a huge park there, most of which was closed due to the weather, but we enjoyed 3 shows in the indoor theatre and Isabelle was in heaven.

One of the current shows is "The Little Mermaid" which was really great, even if their Ariel didn't have red hair (of course Iz picked up on that immediately). Weeki Wachee is the only live mermaid shows in the country, so if you're ever in the Tampa area, check them out, it's pretty wild!