Signs

Just about every morning that I go to take the boys to school, we get stopped at the only stoplight between our home and the school. Everytime this happens, Colin will say something out of the ordinary and I am left for a moment trying to figure out what in the world he is referring to and why all of a sudden it came out of his mouth. For example, a few weeks ago, we are stopped at the light. It is quiet in the car, MK babbling in her seat is the only noise we hear. Colin all of a sudden says "hey mom, there is an all-you-can-eat buffet from 5PM to 7PM every Wednesday night at Bojangles....I definitely want to try that, it comes with lemonade or tea to drink and it is only $3.99 per person!" Whatttttt???? I am thinking to myself, when have we ever eaten at Bojangles? So I ask him "Colin, what made you think of that?" and he points to a sign beside the stoplight. It is one of those electronic advertiser signs that flashes up specials, etc. It just so happens that Bojangles is in that particular gas station that the sign sits in front of hence the buffett advertisement. The thing is that you would think I would know by now that the sign is there and that Colin is always reading it when we are stopped. You would also think that I would know exactly why he says off the wall things at the stoplight. I haven't learned yet. Today, we were sitting and waiting at the stoplight. Colin blurts out "Mom, I really want to try that Sweet Refreshing Iced Tea, that sounds good - only $1.99 for a 24oz cup". I am again thinking, whhaaattt??? Then I look over and there it is, the sign, adverstising the famous Sweet Refreshing Iced Tea. This may not be as funny to those reading as it is to me. This is one of those posts that I am writing more for myself than anything. You see, Colin has been doing this forever. I can remember going to gas stations when he was only 4 or 5, leaving him in the car while I pumped gas only to get into the car and have him tell me, "mom, you can get two 20oz. cokes for the price of one if you pay inside" or "did you know that you can scratch and win on most Doritos labels that you purchase inside?"....he loves to read those electronic signs whether they are on a gas pump, placed in front of a gas station, etc.

Pryce-less

I got an email from Pryce's teacher today. In it, she talked about how much she is enjoying him in her class and described him as "Pryce-less"! She went on to say that during class yesterday, she noticed his hands in the air, crossed and placed behind his head. She asked Pryce if he had a question. His response was "no ma'am, just hanging out".

Mother's Day Out

Mason-Kate's first day of Mother's Day Out went really well. She did just as I expected....screamed hard and then played harder. When I called to check in on her they were taking a walk in the mega stroller, eating goldfish and drinking their drinks of choice. When I went to pick her up, she was happily playing with a little shape sorter. The teacher's first words to me were "she can really eat!".....yep, that's the one, she's mine - the amazing eater.

Brotherly love.

Weekend Update and More

As we were adjusting to being the parents of one child, I was already contemplating what we would name our next child should it be a boy (Mason was always the girl name). The summer before we would find out Pryce was going to be a part of our lives, I sat out on the beach writing different family names in the sand. It was on that day that I decided I loved the name "Pryce". Pryce is named after Ryan's grandmother. Her maiden name was "Price". We began our day on Saturday by attending the "Price Family" reunion at Shealy's Restaurant in Batesburg, SC. Shealy's is a place that I grew up going to and it is good for the tummy when you are craving southern cooking. (Nannie, the pictures are for you....notice who ate all of their food) We all agreed that Shealy's lost money on MK as they chose not to charge for her meal. Anyway, the food was great, the company was nice and Pryce thanked everyone for "his party" as we left.

Saturday night we attended the wedding of a young man that I grew up babysitting for. He is one in a family of six children. I became the seventh child every summer as we traveled across the country, hung out by their pool and fought over who was going to clean up what before the parents came home. You know you are getting old when you watch the little boy that you used to read stories to get married....incredible!

Sunday we celebrated yet another Gotcha Day anniversary with MK - 5 months. She continues to thrive and we continue to enjoy watching her little personality transpire. Today we visited the ENT for a follow-up appointment. Great day....her hearing is normal, her tubes look great and there was only a minimal amount of tears! Yay!

Quote of the day: "Mom, my stomach hurts and Colin's throat hurts so we are thinking that school isn't such a good idea today"....obviously, there had been some discussion between the two boys prior to Pryce making this comment. Needless to say, off to school they went!

Mason-Kate starts Mother's Morning Out tomorrow....pray for her. It is going to be a great thing but I know she is going to have a hard time initially.



MK will eat anything......



And I mean ANYTHING.....

Bye!

Lunch

Pryce asked me on the first day of school if I would come eat lunch with him. In fact, he said it in more of a command way than a question way. I told him that I thought Friday would be a good day for us to do lunch. So, today being Friday, I went to visit the boys at school for lunch. Now, my first experience having lunch with a kindergarten class was three years ago with Colin. I will never forget the little girl who purchased a hot dog and then piled THREE packages of mayonaise (yuck!) on top of the meat....what is worse, is that then she carefully took baked (not fried) Cheetos and placed them very ornately on top of the mayo....what is worse than that is that she actually ate the entire creation.....aggghhhh, it really still makes my whole body cringe! So, today was a much different yet new experience. Today there was not a child to gross me out with their food sitting in front of me. Instead, I talked with Pryce about his day. It was quite a nice experience. The one thing I realized, though, is that the kindergartners have a LONG way to go. They are like little newborns who have just entered the world. They need someone to sit them in their seats, they need help with their food and they need some guidance in the rule department. I took note of all of the children getting out of their seats to talk to each other but what really got my attention was when Pryce proceeded to yell over two tables to his friend Matthew. I quickly said "Pryce, you can't do that". His response was "sure we can, we don't get in trouble, it is ok." I told the parapro on my way out that the word on the street was that yelling was more than ok in the lunchroom. Her response was a long sigh. Then I joined Colin for lunch. He, as well as his friends, welcomed MK and me with open arms. I had a good time chatting with all of them. I dread the day that Colin says no to me having lunch with him at school. Even then, I will most likely still go, sit at another table and just wave kindly to him as he ignores me.

On another note, I went to orientation at Mason-Kate's preschool last night. On Tuesday of next week she will begin a Mother's Day Out program. She will go two days a week. Among other things, I was informed that she would need to bring a lunchbox. Man, we don't have any pink ones just lying around our house so MK and I went to find just the right one for her. I had a little cute monogrammed one in mind but as we went down an aisle looking for other school supplies, she started saying "mama, mama, mama"....I looked down at her and she was pointing to a Disney princess lunchbox. I gave it to her. She immediately started naming all of the body parts on each princess, the "eye" being her favorite one to point out. She was hugging it and holding on tightly to it as we continued to shop. So, wouldn't you know, the princess lunchbox is the one that made it to our house.


My favorite quotes this week:

* After telling me that this one child had brought several toys to class, Colin says "You know mom, that kid just doesn't have a brain. It IS third grade, yuh know, and we don't have time for toys"....his tone was set to the "duh" style.

* Pryce's response to my asking him to eat his breakfast "well, mom, we do get a snack at 10:00 and if I eat my breakfast I probably won't be hungry for my snack".....hmmmmm.

Halfway There

Today is hump day, halfway through our first week of school. Mason-Kate and I are halfway through our first week home alone! When she is not opening every drawer in my house to see what she can find to throw away, she is very lovingly pushing her baby doll around (albeit upside down) in the stroller. Her speech is so much fun to watch develop. I love to hear her say "Yeah!"...she has a lot of expression and excitement in her voice. Of course, the expression and non excitement come out when she says "no"....her little head sways violently back and forth, occasionally she will shout "no" but more often we still get the standard and very loud "aghhh". Mason-Kate decided yesterday that since the boys were not around to take Finley out, she would do the job. She walked around holding Finley's leash saying "outside" over and over and over. Finally, Finley gave in, walked over to the door and laid down on his back. I guess he figured that was his only chance to go outside. We have also been spending some time blowing bubbles and playing our little musical recorder. Of course, it is all a process....with the bubbles, she blows some and then spends a lot of time putting the top back on the container, then we repeat. With the recorder, she will play a sound, clap for herself then yell "hey, MA!" which is my command to clap and then usually we have to repeat this as well. If she plays more than one note, then she pauses to dance for a moment. Always entertaining!

Back to School

MK's thoughts on the boys going back to school...

School began yesterday for the boys. Colin and Pryce did not miss a beat when they walked into the school to begin their third grade and kindergarten year. Fortunately, we were all smiles! Pryce's only concern was about naptime. He kept asking me if I was sure he was going to have to rest at school. I said yes. He said "awe, man, it is supposed to be a special day." I had to take a picture of Pryce this morning as he got ready for school. Yesterday he came into our bathroom to do the whole morning routine of brushing teeth, brushing hair, etc. He came in, grabbed a brush, brushed all of his hair straight down and then proceeded to place a "part" in his bangs. After he finished, he looked at himself in the mirror, smiled at his "do", said "perfect" and proceeded to get his shoes on. I thought it was just a one time thing. It wasn't. Apparently, he has decided that the "part" is cool and he spent quite sometime in front of the mirror once again styling his hair this morning. Colin, too, is into this whole "looking cool" thing. I pulled out some new shorts for his first day of school, he put them on and announced that "these are what the cool guys wear....now I look cool". I said "don't you think you dress cool all the time?"...."no" was his reply. Sigh. I am truly missing the boys. They were very entertaining to me this summer as I watched them create the most fantastic stories and games out of nothing. The best part was that they worked together and enjoyed their time being brothers. To see them want to be together is very rewarding to me. For the record, though, I must state that they do have their moments of madness, those moments where you just throw your hands up and wonder what in the world has gotten into them.

As for Mason-Kate, she will begin a Mother's Day Out program next week. We are just hoping that she behaves and doesn't knock someone out :) She has quite the throw coupled with very little aim when toys are in her hand! She has recently begun playing the "recorder" musical instrument, her latest word that we understand is "boom", she is blowing bubbles in the pool and we are teaching her how to go down the stairs in our home. She continues to be such a cutie!

Pryce and his new teacher



MK doing her best belly jiggle



Pryce's "cool" do



Are we done yet?

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