Yeah, we have bus transportation!

Shawn is finally riding the bus! Last Thursday, I decided to just go ahead and register him for the regular bus online. It told me that I needed a e-mail confirmation before he could ride the bus. Well, I never got one so yesterday I stopped by the office after dropping Shawn off and explained my situation to the secretary. She had me fill out a form and told me that as long as they provided the bus driver with that form, she couldn't refuse him. So she gave me a pink armband to attach to his backpack (the buses are color coded) and asked if I wanted him to ride the bus home that day. At first I was getting ready to say yes but decided to wait until today. I didn't want Shawn freaking out since he didn't know he would be riding the bus. Plus, this is the "real" bus and he wouldn't have any idea where to get off at. This morning when I took Shawn to school, I showed him where the bus stop was and told him that's where he needs to get off of the bus and that I would be waiting for him there. I just crossed my fingers this afternoon that he was on that bus, lol. I took my cell phone to the bus stop just in case. Everything was ok; Shawn was on the bus. The bus driver even stopped him before he got off the bus and asked him where his mom was so I felt good about that. So no more car lines for me!!!

Bob the Builder Vs. Handy Manny

Who would win?

Shawn LOVED Bob the Builder when he was 2 and 3. He couldn't get enough of Bob. I saved all the Bob the Builder toys (not like we had a lot of them) for Joshua but every time Joshua plays with Bob, he calls him Handy Manny, lol. Joshua doesn't really care too much to watch Handy Manny right now or Bob the Builder for that matter, but he does watch Handy Manny enough to know who he is. Let's compare:

They are both builders/repair guys. They both have helpers - Manny has the tools and Bob has his crew. They both have girls in their lives that help them out - Manny has Kelly and Bob has Wendy. They're both bachelors. Personally, I like the old Bob the Builder cartoons with the old Spud (I don't like the new Spud's voice). Who do you vote for?

More bus drama...

Well, Shawn is still a car rider :-(

I've decided to just try to get him switched to the regular bus so I don't have to waste any more gas. I registered online yesterday but it said that I need an e-mail confirmation before he can ride the bus and I haven't gotten it yet.

Update #2

Well, I ended up picking up Shawn anyway. Around 3pm, Mrs. Barber (the EELP teacher) called me to ask me if I was wondering where Shawn was. Then she told me he was in the office because the bus driver has a different list then the school has and since he wasn't on her list, she wasn't taking him. He wasn't the only one who didn't make it on that bus. She also said that they were trying to get him removed from the ESE bus and put on the regular ed bus. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that that doesn't happen. It's so convenient to walk out in front of the house to get him from the bus. I don't even have to wake up Joshua if he's still sleeping. So for now I guess Shawn is going to be a car rider until further notice. Should I charge the transportation department my gas money?

The wheels on the bus go round and round...

If we had a bus that is. We never got a call this weekend from the ESE bus driver so I took Shawn into school this morning. Can you say mass confusion!!! It took me an hour to get Shawn to school. Class is supposed to start at 8am or 8:05 I can't remember. Anyway, we got to class at about 8:30am.

I stopped by the office to pick up a car rider sign since it looks like I'll be driving Shawn to school for a while until I can get this straightened out. The secretary asked me if I registered Shawn for bus transportation. What??? That's the first I heard of that. After a small discussion, it comes down to whether or not Shawn is supposed to be on the ESE bus or not. If he isn't then I can register him online for the regular bus. That's the stupidest thing I've heard. I don't ever remember having to do that as a kid. I think if you are registered for school and you are eligible for bus transportation then you should have it but here you have to register for it. This is Shawn's 4th year at this school and we've never had a problem with bus transportation.

I'm not looking forward to pick up time. If this morning was a mess, I can't imagine what this afternoon is going to look like! I keep going back and forth on what time I should leave. Should I leave early to get in the front of the line but have to wait 30 minutes before they dismiss school or should I leave later and get in the back of the line that will take forever to get to the front? Either way sucks IMO.

Update: the ESE specialist at Shawn's school just called. She said that Shawn is on her ESE transportation list but they only had him listed for the afternoons. I still should have gotten a call from the bus driver though to let me know what time they were going to drop him off at the house. She told me that she would let Shawn's teacher know what's going on so he can ride the bus home today. Yippee!!!!!!!! I don't have to wait in the pick up line!!!

I knew I was forgetting something...

Today was the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary which means we have to go to church. Our church had mass times at 8am; 5:30pm; and 7pm. I was planning on going to the 8am mass because I felt it would work out best for the kids. Anyway, I totally forgot this morning! We ended up going to the 5:30pm mass which meant an early dinner. We barely made it to church on time. I kept telling God to help us get there on time since we left the house later than we should have and waited about 10 minutes at the intersection of Lithia Pinecrest and Lumsden. When we pulled up to the church there was a fire engine out front. Someone got hurt coming into the church and the paramedics were working on her inside. So mass didn't actually start until 5:40pm. The kids were horrible. Shawn could not sit still for the life of him and Joshua kept humming and I couldn't get him to stop. The more I tried to hush Joshua the louder he started humming. I could only take comfort in knowing the Blessed Mother knew what I was going through, lol.

Before going to church this evening, I spent all afternoon trying to get a hold of bus transportation. They obviously screwed up this year because several parents were concerned that they haven't gotten anything in the mail from them. The school office just received the list yesterday so there were a lot of parents checking the list to make sure their kid had bus transportation. Of course Shawn's name wasn't on the list. I'm thinking he'll be riding the ESE bus again but they didn't have that list. So, I tried and tried to get a hold of bus transportation all afternoon. I would either get a busy signal, a sound that I never heard before (kind of a cross between a ring and a busy signal), a disconnect sound (like someone picked up and then hung up), or a message from the operator telling me "I'm sorry but your call did not go through. Please try again". I guess everyone in the county was trying to call them today. We'll be waiting for a call this weekend from his bus driver telling us when they are going to pick Shawn up on Monday morning and if we don't hear anything, we'll just drive him to school and try to figure it out on Monday.

1st grade here we come

So tonight was orientation at Shawn's school. We already knew that he had the same teacher. When we pulled into the parking lot, we ended up parking next to Sophia, someone in Shawn's class from last year. I asked who her teacher was this year and her mom said Mrs. Errity. Great, Shawn already knew someone in his class. Then we walked up to the classroom and the door was closed. She had all the students first names on her door and everyone was in his class last year. He has the exact same class, teacher and all (well except for a different classroom). He's so excited. I thought maybe all the kindergarten classes stayed together but I ran into Nolan (who was in EELP with Shawn) and his mom said that he doesn't have anyone that he knows in his new class. I'm not sure how we got to be so lucky but I'm not complaining. Shawn can't wait to start school on Monday...music to a mothers ears, lol.

Good ole back yard fun

Don set up the slip n slide in the back yard for the kids to play with. Don even joined in on the fun.

This and That...

I got my car washed today. I think it was the first time in like 2 yrs., lol! All Joshua wanted to do was squirt the hose.





I have mixed feelings about school starting. On one hand, I'll be glad when Shawn goes back to school because it is good for him and he'll be busy all day. On the other hand, it's so much more work for me trying to pack his lunch (because of the fact that most of what we eat is not finger food and it's warm). I have to call or drop by the school to see if I can make an appointment with the school nurse. Shawn is going to have to take a digestive enzyme with his lunch and I know I can't just pack it in his lunch box. Plus, I need to have it documented somewhere that he's allergic to peanuts and he can't eat any food unless it's from home.

I've been preparing Shawn all summer about starting first grade. I've been telling him when he goes back to school, he'll have a different teacher. I wanted it to sink in because he had Mrs. Barber for 2 years and I wanted to make sure he knew that Mrs. Errity wasn't going to be his teacher this year. We got the packet from the school on Friday and guess who his teacher is? That's right...Mrs. Errity! She's now a first grade teacher. Shawn is super excited! In a way, I'm a little disappointed but at least I know he has a good teacher. She's easy to get along with and she already knows Shawn. This will be the third year he's been in her class. Shawn used to go to her class for 2 hrs. twice a week during his last year in EELP to help transition him into kindergarten. We are already for school. No new clothes since they all fit from last year. I may have to buy him some jeans when it starts to get cold and I'll probably have to buy him shoes before the end of the school year but for now he's all set.

I made some roasted kale this afternoon. Check out my other blog to read about it.

The unveiling...

Ok, so here I am with my new "lighter" hair. I really like it. The cut isn't really anything new; it's very similar to what it was before I let it grow out. Can you imagine that there was an extra 6" added to the length before the cut?

Out with the old and in with the new

I could not take it anymore; my long hair that is. It was just too long to do anything with, it was heavy, it took too long to clean, etc. I was going to try and wait until I had 10" to donate to Locks of Love but I just couldn't stand it anymore. We had an appointment on Tuesday to get our portraits done for our church directory. So when I came home from church on Sunday I made an appointment for that day to get my haircut. I feel so free!!! My head is much lighter now. She took off 6". I'm glad I didn't wait now. I'm not sure if I would have wanted to get a shorter cut but even if I did, I would have had to wait a few more months to have 10".

I found a picture of the haircut I wanted and the girl in the picture had her hair highlighted. When I showed Don the cut I was going to get, I mentioned that I would like to get my hair highlighted like that some day. He said I should do it now. I told him that the reason I've never highlighted my hair before is because it's so expensive and you have to keep doing it. Then he told me that some times a woman needs to pamper herself and that I should just have it done. That was the sweetest thing. I always do without because of our finances. It's the main reason I was letting my hair grow out; to save money. So when I took the boys to get their haircuts on Tuesday, I made an appointment for me to get my hair highlighted today. You'll have to wait for a picture though. As soon as I got home, Don rushed off to work at Lowe's so I'll have him take a picture tonight when he comes home.

Ugh, tired!!!

I'm so tired. I didn't get much sleep last night because for some reason, Shawn woke up at 2 am. He tried not waking Joshua by whispering into the monitor but it didn't work; Joshua woke up too. Oh, and let me tell you...when you whisper right into the monitor, it's very loud and scary sounding, lol. Don got up with them (the first time). Shawn went right back to sleep but not Joshua. I decided I was going to lay down in his bed with him for a little while to see if I could get him to relax and fall back to sleep. It wasn't happening so I left and came back to bed. A few minutes later he starts calling my name and telling me he pooped. I knew he didn't poop but I decided to go ahead and change his diaper thinking maybe he would fall back to sleep. So when I go in there, he's soaking wet! His diaper leaked in the 5 minutes I left him. So then I had to change his diaper and his pjs and his sheets. The whole time Shawn is sleeping like a baby. Part of me wanted to go over and wake him up since he started the whole thing.

So then today I was thinking there was a good chance I could catch a nap since Joshua didn't get much sleep last night and we spent the morning at the pool. He slept 1 hour!!! Of course, I didn't hop into bed as soon as he took his nap so he woke up about 10 minutes after I got into bed. He's in bed right now and Shawn will be following soon. I'm not staying up late tonight! I need some sleep!!!