Trip to the Mothership

So a few weeks back, I took a trip to San Jose for some training for work. Apple is located near San Jose, so one day we decided to zip down and give Steve Jobs a visit ! I stopped in, went to the official "Apple Store", picked up some apple shirts and a case for my iPhone.

For those of you who don't know, the Apple campus is considered the mother ship for computer folks and a must visit if your in town. After spending about an hour in the store, I asked if we could go on campus and walk around. The person at the store apologized, and said "Sorry, we are VERY paranoid, no unauthorized persons are allowed anywhere other than the store and parking log :-(. I was hoping that since we had iPhones, and were software engineers, they would understand and make a special case. Unfortunately, well, that just didn't matter.

It was fun though

Sarah Has Her First Swimming Lesson.

So for those of you who know our children, you know Sam is our cautious, sensitive first born. One thing I have learned raising Sam for the past 6 years is not to push too hard and when to give him a little nudge. With Sam, if you push too hard, he tends to get scared and shut down, making my job that much harder to convince him he can do something that might be a bit scary.

Enter little Sarah, who's personality is equal and opposite for the most part. She is aggressive, willing to try just about anything she thinks others are doing, and not willing to miss out on what she feels she is owed ! Well, for the first time we enrolled our little three year old dare devil princess into swim lessons at the YMCA. At first, I decided to put her in the Pike with Parent class, which I figured was the best place to start. In this class, I get to go in wither her and practice with her while she learns about swimming. Well, it would be safe to say she was quite bored the first lesson, as it seemed we spent more time singing in a circle in the pool and less time jumping in (Something she loves to do and has no fear doing it). As we took our class together, I found Sarah watching the Pike class (Without parent), and rolling her eyes each time we had to stop swimming/jumping in the pool to go sing songs. After class I spoke to a YMCA teacher, and she encouraged me to move her into the Pike w/out parent class since she was so far ahead of the other kids in her class. So the next week, I decided to push her a bit, and moved her into the Pike class. In this class, I get to watch from a bench next to the pool while she sits with the other kids, hanging on to the side of the pool while the teacher takes each one and works on skills.
So there we were, I brought her over, and the teacher asked her to touch her ears into the water and blow bubbles. She did both with confidence and a smile. The teacher then smiled and said "Yeah, your ready!". Sarah smiled at me as she hung on the side of the pool, and I glowed with pride, patting myself on the back for pushing my child when I was supposed to, and it working out. I watched with pride as the teacher took Sarah, put her on her back and guided her around the pool as she tried to kick and make "ice cream scoops" with her hand, learning some basics. Then it happened........ I looked up to see Sarah in crisis!!! She had lost her grip on the side of the pool, and was struggling to keep above water. I jumped up, and dashed over to the side of the pool to pull her up and out of the pool. She was shocked and started to cry. screaming "I want to go home!". She had had a scare, and in my opinion, knowing Sarah's tendency to be on the wild side, taught her to respect the water. Now entered my critical moment as a parent on this occasion. If this was Sam, the day would be done, and we would go home and try another day. That is what you do with him, as he needs to take some time to think about what happened, and approach a challenge on his own, well thought out terms. But this wasn't Sam, it was Sarah, and we are still working on when to push and when not. After she stopped crying a bit, I asked her is she wanted to try again or go home. I assured her that she was OK and wasn't going to drowned. She replied "I want to go back in the Pool and be a Pike!". So she did, but this time sitting on the side of the pool, going in when it was her turn. She is still afraid to stay by herself in the pool hanging on the side, but happily sits with her feet in the water, going in with her teacher and learning her strokes.

In the end, I think I was more afraid that she was. When I saw her struggling, I went into a complete panic, wondering if I had pushed her too hard !!! I even spoke to her teacher after, asking if she was comfortable with Sarah in the class to which she assured me Sarah was fine and would do fine in this class.

Sarah talks about the incident all the time, and is very cautious around the pool (This is a good thing!).

Anyway - My little Sarah is a Pike, and learning how to swim!

Lets not forget Sarah !

So, I have gotten quite a bit of flack over the fact that we have not included any pictures or stories about our little princess Sarah. Well, the little future movie star has been quite active in our humble abode, keeping us on our toes and always helping out with Thomas. Sarah is her own person, someone who like to point that out whenever she can. She is our only girl, and very happy to keep it that way.

With Sam starting Kindergarten this year, Sarah has taken over as the oldest member of the family to attend Storybook. She has been waiting patiently for Thomas to get ready to start out in the infant room so she can keep an eye on her little brother, and make sure he is OK. She has talked non stop to her friends and teachers in the three year old room about her baby brother, and can't wait to bring him in to school tomorrow and show him around :-).

Hanging with my little Buddy

So here I sit, watching the end of "Dante's Peak" for probably to 20th time in my life (Don't ask, its not a very good movie, but Laurie has it on). I have my little partner next to me on the couch taking a snooze. I gaze down at him, and am just floored by the fact that he is here and part of our lives. I know this is the third time for us, but this whole baby thing never gets old. I think this time around, we are more relaxed than ever before. With Sam we were terrified, nervous new parents. Sarah, well Laurie was a full time Nursing student, so we were pretty much constantly on the brink of insanity, running around, working, Laurie studying etc. This time, we are actually relaxed enjoying our time with our new little person.

Today Thomas went with me to Wegmans, and then to Target. I wanted to get him out of the house to give Laurie a break, figured those were pretty loud places so if he cries, well so what. Little did I realize that he LOVED Wegmans. As I pushed him around the store, he just gazed up at the lights in amazement. Its so much fun to watch babies at this age develop. Their little brains are complete sponges, absorbing everything they hear/see/feel etc. Very cool.

Anyway, not much more to tell. Oh, and I do realize I have left out one VERY special person in the blog. That would be Sarah ! No worries, she is definitely not forgotten, and is a major source of excitement in our life (Sometimes too much :-) ).

Anyway - Stay tuned for some Sarah updates in the days to come !

Sams first day

Well, what a day we had. Sam got up early and got ready to go to his first class. He made sure all his supplies were in his backpack, and was ready to go 1 hour before we needed to leave (The school is about a 4 min drive from our house :-) ). When we arrived, he practically jumped out of the van, and ran over to the front of the school. We walked in, and Mrs Swanson was right there and shook his hand. Sam turned red, smiled and said "hi". As we walked around his room, he led me to the place to put his supplies and then hang his bag. Sam and I made a special place mat that he will use for snack time this year. Sam drew a race car that his Uncle Scott showed him how to draw. He also added a freight train and a bunch of other vehicles. Next we moved on to story time, and then they sang us a song.

After our 1/2 day at Harris Hill elementary school, we went to visit the YMCA wrap around program Sam will be attending. That was fun too, Sam finally got to play with a train! He will also be getting swimming lessons, and lots of fun healthy YMCA activities to occupy his time while Laurie and I are still at work. Sam is also very excited about the YMCA because he will get to ride a bus from the YMCA to Harris Hill in the early morning, then get to take another bus back to the YMCA at lunch time!

After our visit to the YMCA, Laurie, Thomas and I took Sam out to lunch and let him pick where wanted to go. He smiled, and said "I want to go to Wendys!". This was humorous for use, because we never go to Wendys! I guess some of the teachers at his old school would occasionally get Wendys take-out for lunch, and he wanted to check it out. So off we went to Wendys, and let Sam order whatever he wanted. He stepped up to the counter, and got the chicken nuggets, fries and a milk. He proceeded to consume his entire plate. While he was finishing up, Thomas informed us that he too was hungery and would apreciate some lunch so Laurie went to our van to feed Thomas. I assured her I would wait for Sam to finish, and bring him out to the car to go home. As sam finished hoovering his last piece of chicken I noticed a look on his face that all parents dread! Its the look that make you realize your child is about to throw up in a public place ! Right then, Sam told me he ate too much and was sick to his stomach ! I jumped up, cleaned the table and rushed him out the door. As we rushed out the door, Sam got sick! (We JUST made it out the door !). Right in front of a car doing take-out and one of the windows to the restaurant (For all to see). I stood there, trying to figure out what to do. I mean, when you inside and this happens, you try to clean it up, hope that someone will come by with a mop. But we were outside, so I immediately started to look for an exit strategy. I realized our van was about 10 feet away, so I decided to make a fast dash to the Van and escape. My plan was to get Sam in the van, start the van and speed away ! I had forgotten that Laurie was busy feeding Thomas in the Van so when we got in, we had the wait 10 min for her to finish ! So we sat in our van, and watched as some poor girl came out with a Mop/bucket and started to wash down the sidewalk. She glanced over at us in our van (Thank god for tinted windows !) and went back inside. Did I mention we don't ever to Wendys for lunch/dinner (And won't start anytime soon ;-))

As we pulled away, Sam announced that he was feeling much better and would like to have some ice cream when we got home. I groaned, kept quite and decided to let Laurie manage that one. I dropped everyone off at home and proceeded to drive to work as fast as I could! :-).

The arrival of Thomas

Well, I finally got some time to post, and share some more Thomas news. Thomas, my third was born on August 18, 2008 weighing in at 7lbs 3oz. We are very excited (And lucky) to have our third child. So far, he is a great little baby, very cute and cooperative (As long as you feed him, and hold him :-) ). What I am finding is the most fun is watching Sam and Sarah react to his arrival. Sarah is VERY excited, and constantly wants to touch and play with Thomas. The other day she asked if she could take him into the basement for a little while to play. I can see it now, Sarah dragging Thomas by the leg down the stairs! She is cute with him though, the other day she started to sing to him !

Sam is also so much fun to watch. As most of you know, Sam is a very sensitive little boy. And he is so in love with his little brother. Watching him with Thomas is so sweet. He is very loving and tender with Thomas. Constantly touching his head gently, giving him little kisses !

Check back for more photos/stories.

Sam starts Kindergarten tomorrow

Big day tomorrow ! Our oldest, Sam is starting Kindergarten. This is a big deal for him. He has come so far and is growing so fast ! It seems like yesterday Sam was struggling to go to daycare, feeling very afraid and shy. I can still remember coming to Storybook child care, into the 18 month room (aka "Miss Taras Class" - Miss Tara came to his Storybook Graduation and is pictured here) and staying with him for a little bit so he wouldn't freak out too bad when we left him. Then watching him grow up into my little, confident son who loves to play, build, create. I am just as excited as he is to take him to his first day tomorrow !