Big Changes

Well with the ending of summer comes huge changes for our family. All of a sudden last week Josh got two interviews for ITRT positions with Stafford County and Fredericksburg City schools. He interviewed with Fred City on Thursday afternoon and Monday morning they called and offered him the job. It's a 12 month position with a really good salary increase, but it means a lot of adjusting for our schedule we've been used to for 12 years. I have to get used to him not being around in the summer or over breaks. We've been lucky to both have the same schedule unlike most of our teacher friends. It also means I had to switch Juliette out of RE LEE and into my school. His school is very sad to see him go, but it's a great opportunity for him. The secretary cried about how she had watched Juliette grow up and now she wasn't coming to the school. I had to remind Josh that when she was born and we headed home from the hospital, we didn't go home. We went to RE LEE first! But now we are on to bigger and better things. Josh is thrilled and has cleaned out his room this week while Juliette was at VBS- vacation Bible school.

She's gone each day from 9-12 and has loved it. She comes home telling us about the puppet show and the lesson they learned and who they learned about that day. Now we are heading into August with one last big vacation of summer. We are going to Daytona Beach for 3 days and then a surprise trip to Disney for little miss. She knows we are going to the beach, but that's it. Yesterday Josh told her the beach was in Florida and she told him that Disney was in Florida. He told her we weren't going there and she was ok with it. I can't wait to see her face when we pull into the resort.

George Washington's Birthplace

Westmoreland County is George Washington's Birthplace. We had never been there so Kelley led the way. Here she is showing the kids in her teacher voice all around the remainder of the house.

 

 

 

 

Eddie was very excited to see Juliette and kept calling to her to play with him. She got a little over it and asked me why he kept calling her when all she wanted to do was play. I told her he loves her and missed her.

 

I'm glad I brought her bathing suit- I thought she would just put her feet into the river- nope.

Love!

Here piggy piggy!

The kindergarten teacher who was supposed to be Juliette's teacher before she retired lives out in Caroline county and has lots of animals. Her pig had babies so we went to her house to see them= summer field trip with Mallie and Annaliese, Ethan, Toby and James, and Ryan and Reagan.

 

 

What's that smell!!??!!??

 

 

 

 

The mama

Practice!

Juliette is all ready for kindergarten and has a student number. This number will identify her as part of Spotsylvania county until she graduates. Whenever kids eat in the cafeteria or log in to a computer they have to enter this number. I see so many kindergarten and first graders who don't know their number- I was not going to let Juliette be like that. She learned her number in two days and punches it in on the keyboard before meals. She's ready!! :)  

Lake Anna on the boat

One of the teachers that Josh worked with lives on Lake Anna and has a boat. We were very excited to be invited for a day on their boat with their granddaughter. We had a great time! They took us out to a sandbar where the kids swam all afternoon. I didn't realize how BIG the lake was! When we were at the state park part of the lake, it looks like it's all in front of you, but it's so much bigger. We spend about an hour just riding in the boat all around it. Some of the houses were insane!

 

Knoebels

We went to Knoebels on the only day that it looked like it wasn't going to rain which was Saturday so it was packed. It wasn't as hot as it was last year, but Juliette wasn't as interested as she was last year. She had fun, but asked to leave around 3:30. We went on the Whip about 4 times! She was able to ride the hand pedal cars all by herself this year with no help! She remembered the trip from last year and kept asking us to do the castle shooter and it took me a while to figure out what she meant.

 

 

The castle shooter- we did it 4 or 5 times!

 

Fast asleep on the drive home.

 

School time

We've been doing lots of work with letters and sounds and bending and rhyming. Juliette's awesome at rhyming and can blend sounds better than some of my first graders. She wrote a note to Captain Hook on the driveway that said Do No Come. I just had to help her with the silent e in come.

Playground

I couldn't let a trip to PA go by without a stop by the Comm's playground. She met a little girl while we were there and had fun playing with her.

And more fireworks!!!

The next night we went to a RailRiders game. I miss the Red Barons. The stadium is totally different than when we were growing up and going to games and has no "nosebleed" seats. By this night she had been up past 11 for three nights in a row. She was exhausted, but determined to make it to the fireworks.