The Mundy Family: September 2007

Wyatt is the 'special person' this week in his class. His class' name is the Grizzly Bears, therefore, he is the Grizzly Bear of the Week. We put together his poster which is used as a visual aide while he shares about himself to his class. As Wyatt worked on his poster, Annabelle worked on her own (not for school, just for fun). They had glue and glitter and little pom poms, colored sticks, etc.

Tuesday was Wyatt's day for sharing. He was VERY excited to be GBOTW, and happy to go to school (if you have read previously, you know this isn't normal for him!). He was the first person to start off the new school year. When I got to school to pick him up, two of the teachers told me how well Wyatt did sharing his poster. They said he stood up in front of the whole class and told them about each picture. They were very impressed with how "well spoken" he was! (Well, of course he is - is what I'm thinking in my head, but you know...you can't say that out loud!!!)

So we get in the car and I begin with my normal "how was your day" routine, and all of a sudden Wyatt says very loudly, "School was GREAT today!" What a shock! When I asked him what made it so great, he had a hard time with specifics. So, all we can surmise is that if you put the boy at the center of attention and give him a good tool from which to speak, he loves what's going on? Hmmm....sounds a bit like his papa?! I don't know...you be the judge!

A part of the poster was a list of favorites. Here is his list:

FAVORITES
Food: bacon and French toast
Color: red, blue, and green
Thing to do at school: play knights and armor with Chloe
Movie: Star Wars

And, he said he wants to be an astronaut when he grows up.
This is new...it used to be that he wanted to be a construction worker.

It was a great experience, and fun to finally get some positive feedback from his teachers, too! (Last year they never said anything about anything! Kind of annoying! This is a new classroom with different teachers. I like them better already, and not just because of the nice comments!)

Working on her poster.

Get these off my fingers!!! (As you would expect w/her, she put both of her entire hands in the glue bowl!)

Working hard on this 3-D creation.

He was very intent on having this structure. It actually stayed on!

The finished product!

It sure has been fall-type weather around here. This has been the most mild summers here in Northern California since I have lived here. This August marks 11 years of living in the Bay Area. Pretty crazy!

We've been busy as ever...Matthew took a great vacation with his dad, brother John, Michael Ageno and another friend. They went up to a remote place in Canada to fish for a week. They had a great time...caught lots of fish, ate lots of fish, talked a lot of whatever they talk about for days on end, etc. On the home front, I kept everyone busy here while they were gone. Lots of the normal stuff, but I somehow kept the kids going and going and going.

We had two different countdowns going on during Matthew's vacation: one was a countdown to when Grandma and Grandpa would arrive; and the other was to when Papa was coming home. Grandma and Grandpa came in on Thursday 8/30/07. The kids were beyond excited (I KNOW they were tired of my tired face and voice!), and are by now well conditioned to expect some presents. Grandma pulled through like she always does and brought some fun new books, bug vacuums and new dress-up clothes. The kids showed Grandma and Grandpa how well they swim at Del Amigo Pool, they decorated a birthday cake for Grandma, went to the French Fry store (another grandparent staple) so I could have a night out with the girls, and just had a ton of fun.

Eating strawberries from the garden

The princess in her PINK! dress.

Matthew came home on Saturday happy and tired. We had a big family dinner with my mom and dad, and Pat and Fred that Susie prepared. She made a dinner that could have come right out of a restaurant. It was delicious and a lot of fun to have everyone together!

The Tuesday following Labor Day was the first day back to pre school. Annabelle was as excited as ever to be going and had no problem saying good bye. Wyatt hung in there (how could he not with Annabelle leading off with such a show of strength???!!!) and I think he was excited to see some old friends. They are only going Tues./Thurs. right now...hopefully in the next couple of months they will be switched to the M/W/F schedule. Either way, I am sure Wyatt will be ready for Kindergarten next year - both intellectually and socially. Having both kids in school for me was kind of difficult...it still is. Anybody in their right mind would be jumping for joy! I'm slowly getting used to having a huge chunk of time to myself, but it hasn't been easy. I really thought we'd have another baby by now, so it has been an adjustment - emotionally - for sure. I have not doubt that I will adjust and really enjoy the time that I have!

I finally decided to take Annabelle to an Ear, Nose and Throat specialist after this last ear infection came on the heals of the one in Tahoe just three weeks ago. When we went to our regular pediatrician I had her write down all of the times we'd been in for ear infections in the last 12 months...poor Annabelle has been on antibiotics at least 8 different time in the past year! That was all it took to convince us that she needed to see a specialist. So, the ENT said, yep, she's got big tonsils and big adenoids...she's a perfect candidate for having both removed and tubes put in her ears. After a tiny bit of consideration, I booked the appt. for October 16. I know it's the right thing for her...I want to be rid of all this misery due to the infections. It's still tough, though, to imagine my little baby going into surgery.

On a different note...this weekend we had the pleasure of babysitting our neice and nephew Jackson (5 1/2) and Maile (4 1/2) while John and Chieko had a couple of days away. The kids have had sooooooo much fun together, and Matthew and I have had fun keeping it all under control. We've always said 4 was a magic number for us, and this experience has given us some confidence, for sure!

A few words about Wyatt and Annabelle:

Wyatt

he's gonna be that kid that never really wants to go to school...I guess I just make it too much fun for him!
he's growing faster than you could imagine - he truly looks like he could be 6 years old!
he continues to be sweet and thoughtful...just ask his Oma or Grandma...he says the nices things!
he's going to be Grizzly Bear of the Week in his class at preschool this week...I may have more to write about him as we work on his poster. Usually good things come up while working on it!

Annabelle

her signature color is now PINK! anything in PINK! she would like
she changes in and out of her dress-up clothes about 5 times a day
when she puts on any one of the ballerina/princess dresses, she holds her arms out in a flowy way and dances around
when you ask her a question that she's not sure about, she starts with "Well..."
she absolutely repeats 100% of what Wyatt says
when she's ready to get out of her crib she says, "Mamaaaaaaaaaaaaa, where are youuuuuuuuuu?" over and over!