School's Out!

Jillian just finished up her first year of school, well really MDO, but we called it school.  She went once a week and LOVED it!  When she started last fall, she would cry when I'd drop her off, which would break my heart.  But when I'd come pick her up, the teacher would always tell me she calmed down within a few minutes and then had so much fun.  As the year progressed, she would get SO excited to go to school. The night before we'd tell her she has school the next day and she'd get a BIG grin on her face and do sign-language for school.  She'd wake up the next morning and starting saying 'school?' over and over again and get really giddy when we'd tell her 'yes today is a school day'!  

Truly, we have had the best experience at this school (which I wont say the name of since this is not a private blog), and I'm excited that Jillian is going there for the summer and next fall.  We're bumping her up to 2 days/week and she's ready for it!  I'm excited also to have 2 days to concentrate on our little man (who comes in 4 weeks!!!).  I have spent so much one-on-one time with Jillian I'm excited I'll have a few uninterrupted days with our little guy too.

Two of my favorite school stories from this past year:
1)  Jillian is well known for being a HORRIBLE napper at school.  Nap time is from 12-2, and most days on her informational sheet the teacher makes, her nap is from 1:15ish (sometimes 1:30) to 2.  The teachers always tell me she and another girl (I'm assuming Skye) stand up in their cribs the whole time and chatter back and forth non stop.  I'm sure that irritates the teachers, and the other kids trying to sleep, but it makes me laugh.  She's having too much fun to sleep!  Can't blame her :)

2)  Whenever we'd talk about school, Jillian would start listing off all the friends in her class.  She would ALWAYS start with her BFF Skye.  Always.  Then work down the list of friends.   The entire drive over on most days she would say "Skye?" like a question and look at me.  I'd tell her, "I'm sure Skye will be there" and she'd smile and do a little happy dance.  So precious.  I'm hoping Skye will be in her class again this summer and fall.

Last night Jillian's favorite teacher, Ms Courtnee, send me a SmileBox full of pictures she took from school.  I loved it!  Here are a few of those pictures....

Ring Around the Rosie was always a favorite!

This picture was used in an Easter craft they sent home along with the bunny ears.  

I busted out laughing when I saw the craft; this looks like a mug shot of Jillian.  

Her teacher said she really liked the ears, just not a big smiler for the camera.

To celebrate her last day at school, we got frozen yogart on the way home.  Yum!

I can't believe this school year is already gone - it has literally flown by!!!  

Easter 2011!

We had such a fun Easter weekend!  I was hoping to get this post up sooner, but when I hit week 31 of being prego, I hit the wall.  I am SO tired again!  It's a totally different kind of tired than the 1st trimester or how tired I was carrying Jillian.  I am physically exhausted because I'm chasing after Jill all day.   When she takes her afternoon nap, it's a guarantee that I am on the couch for most of that time. 

So back to our fun Easter weekend!  We spent Saturday night at my parents house since church was at 9 am the next morning.   The ONLY sad part was Jaden, Shelby and Matt were out of town in Colorado.  We missed them so much!!  

The Easter bunny came 2x!! 

After church Jill dug into her Easter baskets. 

Jillian got lots of fun toys, but her favorite for the day was her own set of keys.

Kisses for Bama!!  I loved all my Easter toys!!!!

After a long nap, Jillian was ready for an Easter Egg hunt!  We hid 25 eggs, most being inside.  Jill had a blast finding them!  I learned from our Easter egg hunt a few weeks ago to keep what's inside the eggs to a minimum.  No chocolate or the hunt is over.  So we put either 2-3 jelly beans in each egg, a couple raisins, a couple goldfish or a couple stickers.  It was perfect!  After she found each egg she'd run up to someone and ask them to open it.  She'd go crazy for whatever was inside and eat it.

She loved putting the stickers all over her legs.  

(And I was relieved we had a break from sugary jelly beans!)

Outside we went to hunt for more eggs....

We hid confetti-filled eggs outside.  She had fun smashing them!

Her last egg.  She had concentrated on this Easter Egg hunt for probably 40 mins, so her attention span when we got outside was done.  She just wanted to run and play.  

Jillian actually had 3 Easter Bunny visits!  Nana and Popa made sure the Bunny visited all the way from El Paso.  There were so many cute things inside the box, but Jill's favorite by far is her bowl, spoon and roller (shown in the last picture).  Jillian LOVES to pretend cook.  Earlier this week, she dumped all her cheerios into the mixing bowl and mixed them around with the spoon.