Wait.... Was that an earthquake??

So I am sure by now everyone has heard that we had an Earthquake here on the East Coast today. What? You didn't hear? Well crawl out from under that rock and I will tell you a fun tale. Even as I type this blog my fingers cannot seem to type the right word. They keep trying to type hurricane, but noooooo, that's probably this weekend. Yes, as we are monitoring and preparing for this hurricane that we might get this weekend, we got hit with an earthquake today!

I wont give you my long drawn out "this is where I was when..." But let's just picture this...after the Earthquake hit I ran to go pick up Sydney in case there were aftershocks or who knows what. We haven't been through this before to know what happens afterwards! So I get to the daycare, and as I am there...they put the daycare on LOCKDOWN!! So I was stuck there, with Sydney until the state determined that it was safe for the schools and daycare facilities to release the children and any parents that were there when they went on lockdown. But I think that Sydney enjoyed having Mommy at "school" with her. She was so proud of herself and such a big little girl. And then I captured this perfect little picture after everything calmed down. She was such a little model. She was posing like crazy and grinning like you would not believe!!

Happy Tuesday! Good luck getting through the week and be on the lookout for Irene!!!

Back to School...

I LOVE school supplies... Simple as that. For whatever reason, the thought of purchasing new school supplies to help us become more organized for the new semesters and year is the most exciting part of the weekend. (That may be a slight exaggeration). However, I feel it almost necessary to also work in a little Public Service Announcement within my LOVE for school supplies. Although I need the few school supplies for starting my Master's in a few weeks...I don't need nearly the stuff that I am purchasing this weekend. I am purchasing a TON of great deals at our local Office Max, Office Depot, and Walmart. "Oh, you got the money like that huh Mrs Mitchell?" you might be asking me. "NOT IN THE LEAST", I would reply. However, when you see a deal for 1 cents for a tube of glue, or 50 cents for a 100 sheet composition notebook, you will see that really we all can be purchasing for our local school supply drives. There is nothing sadder than a local child missing out on any learning opportunity possible because he or she cannot afford the school supplies (or their parents cannot for whatever reason). So I highly recommend taking just a moment to check out your local deals and picking up even just a few school supplies for a child in need. It takes just a few minutes. And no child should miss out on the chance to learn this year...

Have a great rest of your weekend!

Summa, Summa, Summa Tiiiiiiiiiiiiiiime

It is so hard to believe that it is August already. It feels like just yesterday the days were starting to get longer and the kiddies were just starting to get out of school. Now all I see are "Back to School" deals and information on "Tax-Free" weekends of shopping. Huge reminder that I am about to head back to school as a graduate student. Yikes! I can't believe it. Cory and I both ordered our books today. We are both registered for all of our classes and our lines of communication are continuing to be opened so that we are both ready for the teamwork that will be needed after August 29th. We are a great team as it is (ok I am completely biased) but after we both dive into the journey of higher education (together) we will need to be great communicators. No doubt about that. I have other big news.... of course it is about this precious little face...

Sydney has her last day at her in-home daycare tomorrow. After a lot of thinking and contemplating, we are moving her from the less structured in-home care to a more structured daycare center/preschool. It was not an easy decision to make and we are very sad to leave our current provider behind. But lately, Sydney has been such a little sponge. This is the age that she is starting to learn things so often and so easily. And the mind of a child just AMAZES me! It does make me wonder how some people are such 'mediocre' parents. Maybe that is harsh to say, but to me--that is the LEAST of the harsh things that I have to say about this subject and many others. But anyways back to the point. On Monday, Sydney starts at Great Bridget Kids Academy. The facility is so clean and structured and I love the program that they use with the kids. They use the system called Zoo Phonics, which uses animals in the shapes of letters and that correspond with the sound of the first letter of the word to aid in learning. Google it, it kinda amazes me. They also teach sign language and spanish. Sydney's teacher is bilingual. After thinking so much about it, we decided that if Sydney does have to be in daycare, why not put her somewhere that will use her development to the best of our abilities? So we are excited! They also do tons of creative and artistic activities and I am soooo looking forward to seeing all of the fun things that are to come for our little explorer! We are hoping to see this... and to think she actually knows what she is doing ;)

Oh and on another note, we seem to have a walker on our hands here soon!!! The other night she stood up on her own for like a minute! Ha! oh the little things... I am totally loving my little muffin right now. I have to share something else we watched not too long ago... we actually let Sydney watch this with us and she was AMAZED at the little thing she was watching. I am sure there was absolute wonder going through her mind trying to figure out what she was watching. She was about 2 months here...

Hope everyone has a great weekend! We are thinking about going to this Arts and Crafts festival in VA Beach where we took our family pictures. Grammie read about it in the paper today and it sounds pretty fun! Be safe and stay cool everyone!

<3 Emily