First day...first grade

Today is Emma's first day of first grade. Here's a picture of Emma with her friend Amy in their new clothes and maryjanes on the first day of school...


And here's my happy little girl...she's so thrilled to be a first-grader at last!


I indulged in my usual first-day-of-school ritual...I dropped Emma off in her classroom and then burst into tears on the way back to the car. Even though you go through this year after year, it's still hard to believe how fast your child is growing up. The first day of school just brings it all into focus for an intense moment.

UPDATE: Just to reply to a couple of the comments...yes, Emma does go to a French immersion school. After one year of kindergarten, she's pretty fluent...it's amazing to someone like me who struggled with through three years of high school Spanish and still never really was comfortable with it!

Summer's last blast...

Emma starts school tomorrow (finally!) I wanted to spend a little time with her before the official end of summer, so I took the afternoon off and we went to visit one of our favorite places, a local farmstead. I don't have anything spectacular to report...we had a nice time on a beautiful late summer afternoon. I did take a few pictures, of course...














This evening we went to the school's open house to see who Emma's teacher is and who is in her class this year. Much to my relief, her best friend Emme is in her class again this year. I met her teacher briefly. She is a new teacher from Belgium...I hope we end up liking her as much as Emma's kindergarten teacher.

Teething again

The older your child gets, the more you seem to forget about her baby years. For example, I know I changed Emma's diaper thousands of times, but she's been potty trained for so long, I really don't remember the dirty diapers. She sat in a high chair to eat for at least two years, but I don't have any real tangible memory of it and I don't even know what happened to her high chair (we probably sold it or it's down in the basement somewhere.)

I also have only a vague recollection of Emma cutting her baby teeth. I mean, I sort of recall the drooling and fussiness and low-grade fever. But she's had all her baby teeth for so many years, that memory has faded as well.

So when Emma complained yesterday that her mouth was hurting, I thought maybe it was a cut or a sore or something. So imagine my surprise when I looked into her mouth and saw a tooth way in the back of her mouth peeking through her gum. It was pretty inflamed and even bleeding a little. But a little ibuprofen seemed to help and she hasn't complained about it since.

It sort of slipped my mind that kids cut more molars at around age six and usually another set around 12. I do think Emma's dentist is correct when she said there just wasn't going to be enough space in Emma's mouth for those additional teeth. I can't imagine two more sets of molars fitting in that tiny mouth. Orthodontia is definitely in our future, I'm afraid.

The good thing is that Emma has become kind of obsessed with oral hygiene of late. She brushes her teeth diligently and swishes her mouth with fluoride rinse. Then she spends about five minutes flossing her teeth (just like her mom - HAHAHAHA!) I am glad she wants to take care of her new teeth...let's hope she keeps it up!

Anky's golden!

Emma and I have been completely enthralled by the Olympics...we have both thoroughly enjoyed the swimming, diving, gymnastics and beach volleyball. But the sport we have both been looking forward to the most is the equestrian competition. Unfortunately, it doesn't get a lot of coverage, but the Oxygen network has been playing the highlights every afternoon, so I've been DVR-ing it and we've been able to catch the eventing and jumping competitions.

Emma's very favorite is dressage, though, and her heroine is Anky Van Grunsven, the brilliant equestrian from the Netherlands. Emma has spent countless hours watching videos of Anky and her magnificent horse, Salinero, on You Tube.

Well, I was so thrilled that Anky came from behind to win her third consecutive Olympic gold medal in individual dressage today...I can't wait to tell Emma and watch it with her when we get home.

I'm sure this will be of interest to about zero people out there, but here is Anky and Salinero's golden performance at the Olympics today...maybe this will be Emma in 20 years? You never know!

A little housekeeping

Since she was a little girl, Emma has always been eager to help me around the house. She was always begging me to let her dust the furniture or sort the laundry. She would beam with pride when she had straightened her room and put all her toys away.

However, I am beginning to think her enthusiastic attitude toward house cleaning is waning. I came to this conclusion on Saturday morning when, as I was furiously scrubbing the bathroom floor, Emma yelled from the living room, where she was watching TV, "Mommy can you stop that long enough to get me some juice?" GGGRRR!!! You can imagine what my answer was. Instead, I snapped off the TV, ordered her upstairs to clean her room. After about three minutes, she came downstairs and said she was done. I went up to check and found that she had merely moved one pile of toy clutter from one side of the room to the other. I strongly suggested she give it a little more effort and eventually her room met my not terribly high standards. Needless to say, I know one child who will not be getting her allowance this week.

We did have some fun this weekend, however. On Friday, we went to see Momma Mia! Emma absolutely loves Abba, but I was hesitant to take her because it was a PG-13 movie. But I checked on one of those movie sites that reviews films for parents and they said with the exception of a few "Oh my God's" and a shot of a man's bare behind, it was pretty tame. Needless to say, Emma loved every minute of it - she had a big smile on her face the whole time. I'm so glad we went. I downloaded the soundtrack on ITunes when we got home and we've been listening to it all weekend.

On Saturday, Emma went to her friend Macie's 6th birthday party. Their good friend Pacey, who moved away a couple months ago, came to the party too and it was so wonderful to see the girls together again - they've known each other since they were 1-year-olds in preschool...they seem like such young ladies now!


And we squeezed in a trip to the pool this afternoon - I suspect our last of the summer. The water was really too cool for me, but Emma had fun perfecting her cannonball jump into the pool.

Hope everyone had a great weekend as well - enjoy your week!

Notice anything different about me?

Need a hint? Look a little closer. See those tiny golden balls on my ears? Yeah, my mommy let me get my ears pierced this weekend! Can you believe it?! I never wanted to get my ears pierced before, even though a lot of my friends have pierced ears already. But last week, I decided I DID want pierced ears and asked my mommy. She said I really needed to think about it for a week because it's a big decision and that I would have to use my own money to do it. So I thought about it some more and still really wanted to do it. So on Saturday, we went to Libby Lu (my favorite place in the world!) and these two nice girls pierced my ears (they do both ears at once.) I didn't even wince a little! The girls said I looked 10 times cuter than when I came in (I think they have to say that!)

So I love my pierced ears and I'm always looking in the mirror at them. I can't wait til I get some new earrings in six weeks!

Between my mommy letting me do this and her actually considering letting me do some modeling, I pretty much think she's lost her mind - but I like it!

My dilemma

Sorry I haven't posted anything in awhile. Like so many of you, I have the late-summer blogging blahs! Sometimes you just need to take a break.

Anyway, I am really struggling with something right now. First, a little background...

I am a magazine editor and work with a lot of very talented professional photographers. One of my favorite guys to work with is Gabe. He's a great guy and a super-talented photographer. Last week, Gabe and I were hanging in my office before we went out to do some location scouting and I showed him a photo I had taken of Emma. He really praised the photo, which made me feel so wonderful...I really respect his opinion. Then he said "You should really think about letting Emma do some modeling." I just kind of laughed and said "Yeah, right!" I mean, I know Emma is cute, but modeling...come on! Gabe said there are thousands of adorable kids in the world, but you can be cute and not necessarily photogenic. He thought Emma was extremely photogenic. But I just kind of laughed it off.

So a few days later after we wrapped up a shoot, Gabe asked if I had thought any more about the modeling thing for Emma. I said I really didn't think it was for us, that I didn't want to put Emma in the position of going to cattle calls and being judged by a bunch of strangers for her looks. Plus, I thought modeling agencies were just scams to make people pay for modeling classes and expensive portfolios. He said he understood that completely and there certainly are a lot of scammers out there. But he said he works with a couple of agencies in town that he would totally vouch for and they never ask for any money from their clients. He suggested when it gets a bit cooler that he could take some photos of Emma and I could submit them to these reputable agencies and see what they thought. I told him I would think about it.

So now I'm starting to think...is this a totally insane idea or would it be a good experience for Emma? I made the mistake of asking her what she thought about it and, of course, she's thrilled about the idea (I guess I shouldn't let her watch Project Runway with me!) I don't know...I mean one of the things I can never fathom is mothers entering their kids in those idiotic child beauty pageants. Is this all that different? Am I being a total hypocrite? Would I be exploiting my child? Is this communicating to her that looks are more important than anything else?

Plus, there's the money. Gabe says some of the kids he has worked with get $500 or more a day for print modeling. The idea of stashing more $$ away in Emma's paltry college fund is appealing. I'm never going to be able to afford Stanford at the rate I'm saving now!

And I have to be perfectly honest...the idea of her being rejected is devastating. I would be so distraught if I did decide to pursue this and had Gabe take some photos and submit them and then have the agency turned her down.

So I'm not sure what I'm going to do...any advice is welcome. I'll probably have Gabe go ahead and take the photos...at the very least, I'll get some really cute photos of Emma from a great photographer for free.

Anyway, here's a photo of America's Next Top Model...maybe!

My little guppy

I have been worried for some time now that Emma could not or would not learn to swim. She loves going to the pool and splashing around, but has steadfastly refused to put her head under water. We took swimming lessons last summer and they were a near-disaster, and Emma has gotten hysterical when I've even broached the idea of taking more lessons. Truthfully speaking, a little bit of my concern is that all of her friends know how to swim and it's a little embarrassing when you see all these two-year-olds fearlessly leaping in the pool, while your six-year-old can barely dog paddle. But I was more freaked out about the safety aspect. Your kid needs to know how to swim so they don't drown - HELLO!

Anyway, I had pretty much given up - at least for this summer. So on this beautiful and very hot weekend, we headed to the pool yesterday. Imagine my shock when Emma told me she was ready to try to put her head under water...and she just did it. Even more amazing was that after dunking her head under a few times, she starting swimming all over the pool. I had to stop her from going into the deep end by herself! We were both so excited! Sorry I don't have any photos, but I'm not inclined to take my expensive camera to the public pool...too risky, I'm afraid.

It probably would have served me well to remember that children do things when they're ready to and not one minute before. That goes for walking, talking, potty-training and now swimming.

The other big excitement today was that our caterpillar cocoons hatched and we have these four beautiful butterflies in our butterfly house. Emma was so excited and I have to admit, it was really cool. One other member of our household has taken a keen interest in the new butterflies as well...


I had to hang the butterfly house on a hook from the ceiling so Sami, Queen of the Jungle, wouldn't maul them. We are going to free the butterflies tomorrow so they can enjoy the remainder of their 3-week life span in the great outdoors.

Words of wisdom...

Generally speaking, Emma is a fairly quiet child. But for some reason, she turns into a little chatterbox on our evening walks after dinner. She keeps a running stream-of-consciousness commentary on life going the entire 20-25 minutes that we walk. Here are some of Emma's observations from tonight's amble:

"The reason I use so many band-aids is that I need my blood to survive."

"I don't think I would like to wear a straw hat because I'm worried a bird might think it's a nest."

"If A-Rock (Barack) Obama becomes President, the first thing he should do is get rid of all the mosquitos."

"We need smoke detectors because our noses don't work at night."

"Cars don't get bigger like other living things."

"Don't worry, Mommy, I can hold it til we get home." (uh-oh!)

I could go on and on...she says the most hilarious things while walking. I need to start bringing a tape recorder or something.

Anyway, here's a pic of Emma on our walk tonight...in a rare moment of silence!

Flashback...

During the long wait for Emma, I used to play the song "Waitin' for a Sunny Day" by Bruce Springsteen over and over and over again (I'm a major Boss fan.) I probably played that song at least 20 times a week during that long 13 months. It just made me feel better to know that better days were coming.

I hadn't heard the track for years and I was in the car this morning when it unexpectedly came on the radio. Tears immediately came to my eyes and I just starting bawling. It just brought back all the memories of that wait and made me think about how it had all been worth it because I now have this amazing little girl.

Anyway, Bruce, thanks for getting me through the rough spots...

Holy cow...

...for the first time in two years, my daughter is taking a nap! She went to friends house for a sleepover and apparently they stayed up late and then got up at 6 am (WAAAYYYY earlier than my sleeping beauty usually gets up on the weekend!) I was making her some lunch and when I went in the living room to get her, this is what I saw!


She's been snoozing for more than an hour now. Aahhh, this brings back fond memories of the afternoon nap, when I got so much done. I know it's a one-time thing, but it's sure sweet.

Coolest toy ever...

We've had a pretty quiet week. The big excitement is that I got Emma this really cool toy.

Well, it's not really a toy...it's a Live Butterfly Garden.


We had seen a commercial for it on tv a little while ago and it looked so neat. Well, it totally is! It was on sale at Amazon so we ordered it. It comes with this expandable butterfly house and a certificate which we mailed back in. Two days later, we got a plastic jar with five little teeny tiny caterpillars in it. The jar already has the food in it and everything.

Every morning when we get up and every afternoon after school, we rush in to see how much our caterpillars have grown. They've gotten like 10 times bigger in just five days. They're already attaching themselves to the top of the jar to build their chrysalis (sic?) When they become cocoons, you transfer them to the butterfly house and wait for them to turn into butterflies. It's really a lot more fun than playing with Polly Pockets, let me tell you, and more educational!

Emma had a sleepover at her friend Emme's house last night and she had to call me before she went to sleep to see how the caterpillars were doing (me, she didn't care so much about!)

Anyway, here's a photo of Emma watching over her caterpillars, which she has named Fluffy, Muffy, Buffy, Scruffy and Tuffy.

My little barn rat

Emma continues to improve her equestrian skills every week. I'm so proud of her and so happy she has found something she loves so much (even if it is bankrupting me!)

Emma's lesson is from 3-4 pm every Sunday. But lately, we've been spending a lot more time at the stables. She wants to go early to watch whoever's lesson is going on and then she wants to stay after to help tack up the next horse and to tag along with the girls doing barn chores (watering and feeding the horses, cooling the horses down, etc.) So far, no mucking out the stalls, but I have a feeling she might not even mind that!

So we are spending more like 2.5 hours at the stables instead of just the one hour for her lesson. She just wants to hang out there all the time. The stable is too far out in the country for me to go anywhere else, so I've just been bringing a book and sitting in the lounge reading while she helps out. I can think of worse ways to spend an afternoon.

Anyway, here's a (sort of blurry) photo of Emma riding this afternoon...she is so totally comfortable on her horse, it amazes me!

Vacation completion

We just got back from the family vacation...exhausted and poorer...but we had a great time.

First of all, a belated happy 4th of July from us!


We spent the 4th with my parents, who live south of Chicago. My sister and her family were there as well and we had a really good time swimming, shopping and eating. Emma loves hanging with her cousins!

Emma and I then headed to St. Louis for several days, where the temperature rocketed from the low 80s to high 90s on the day we arrived (naturally!) Fortunately, our first day there was spent at a water park, so we stayed fairly cool...


Here's Emma, post-water park, rockin' in her ultra cool mode...


The following day, we headed to the world-famous St. Louis Zoo. Now I love the St. Louis Zoo, but I have to say, I have never been there when the temperature hasn't been at least 95 degrees. It's a huge zoo and the trudging around in the heat can be pretty brutal. That said, we lasted about 3 hours and had a nice - and very sweaty - time.

Here's Emma at the zoo entrance, just a few moments before I noticed the huge "DO NOT CLIMB ON THE SCULPTURE" sign!


Here she is on the carousel...


And last but not least, an almost perfect photo of my girl, if a man hadn't wandered into the frame at the last second (sigh!)


We also hit a couple of museums in St. Louis, some of which were hits with Emma (City Museum) and some of which were not (Art Museum).

Anyway, back to reality. I have ton of things waiting for me at work and a broken toilet to deal with at home (trust me, you don't want to put that off!) Oh well, it was fun while it lasted!

And we're off!

Emma and I are leaving today for our summer vacation. We're not going to Disney World or the Grand Canyon or anything fancy...just heading back east to visit family and maybe hitting a couple theme parks or zoos. The important thing is getting away for awhile (yes!) and spending time together.

Have a happy 4th and we'll be back soon!

The big gap

Last night, Emma lost her other bottom front tooth. It's been loose for a few weeks but I didn't think it was going to come out for a while longer. But Emma's friend Emme told her she should start twisting the tooth and it would come out sooner. Anyway, so we're getting ready for bed and Emma says "Mommy, my other tooth just came out!" After the initial excitement, I suddenly panicked - I didn't know if I had any tooth fairy money! After we put her tooth in an envelope and put it under her pillow, I went downstairs to see if I had a couple of one's in my wallet. But of course not! All I had was a $50 bill that I keep tucked away in my wallet in case of an emergency (I've had it in there for at least five years.) As much as I love my child, there was no way the tooth fairy was leaving her $50. I thought about leaving her an IOU from the tooth fairy or maybe telling her that the tooth fairy has Friday nights off or something. But what I ended up doing was calling my next door neighbor and she lent me a couple dollars for the tooth fairy.

The lesson here is, when you kid is in the "losing their baby teeth" stage, it is probably wise to keep an envelope tucked away somewhere with a few ones in it, just in case. Please learn from my shortcomings as a parent!

Anyway, here's my girl with her really big gap now...I'm kind a freaked because it's so big, but my mom says that's good so her permanent teeth won't be too crowded coming in (at least for now.)


And just a couple more photos I took this morning...




Have a nice weekend!

Our great wall photos

During my year-long wait to get a referral, I met three other single gals who were waiting as well and our DTC dates were very close together. We got together every month and really became close friends and a wonderful support system for each other. After we all got our referrals, we tried to get our girls together every month for a play date and, even though it seems harder and harder to coordinate these get togethers as our kids get older, we have all remained very close for the past six years.

Last week, our local FCC group had its annual charity walk and all of us have always made it to that. When the girls were two, we sat them together on this wall (don't ask me how!) and took their picture. And every year at the walk since then, we sit them on the same wall and take their photo to see how they have grown.

Here is the photo we took when they were two (from l-r, that's Emma, Jenna, Kimmie and Christina)


And here they are in 2008, all of them age six now...


It is so incredible to see how the girls grow and change from year to year. I so appreciate the friendship of these three women and their (not so little anymore) girls. As I said, it's become more of a challenge to get together with everyone's social calendars (or more accurately, our kids' social calendars!) But I'm hoping we'll be taking our great wall photos for many years to come.

My little Paris

For some time, Emma has been bugging me about lip gloss. Or I guess I should say "nip gloss" because that's what she calls it. She has about 155 tubes of chapstick, but I've never allowed her to wear the shiny stuff. Well, the other day we were scouring the dollar bins at Target and they had some "glearmy nip gloss" - "glearmy" being Emma's term for glittery shiny shimmering lip product. She BEGGED me for some glearmy nip gloss and, in a moment of weakness, I caved. I mean, she's six now...I guess it's okay if she has a little tube of shiny lip gloss.

Oh, how wrong one can be! On the way home, Emma smeared the lip gloss on her lips (and a bit on her face too.) Then I heard a little high-pitched voice ask "Mommy, does this nip gloss make me look hot?"

Are you kidding me?! Where is she picking up things like this? Has she been reading Paris Hilton's blog when I haven't been looking? GRRRR!!!

I told her very calmly, but in no uncertain terms, that she didn't look hot, that she was too young to look hot, and she wouldn't be looking hot for many years to come. When we got home, I confiscated her new nip gloss when she was distracted and it went into an inaccessible drawer. I would have thrown it away, but you never know when I might need some watermelon-flavored glearmy nip gloss.

Anyway, here are a couple of photos of my definitely un-hot daughter taken last week..




May she be in a school uniform and pigtails forever...

The Defiant One

Now it's common knowledge that I happen to be the mother of the sweetest little girl on the entire planet. But that doesn't mean we don't have the occasional behavioral challenges. For example, we are going through a phase now where Emma pretty much argues with everything I say. Here is a typical exchange:

Mommy: Come on, Emma. You need to brush your teeth and get ready for bed.

Emma: In a minute

Mommy: No, now!

Mommy waits in the bathroom for obedient daughter to bend to her iron will. And waits and waits and waits.

Mommy: Emma, I mean it. Get in here now.

Emma: Just a minute

Mommy: (loudly this time) If I have to come in there, there's no story tonight.

No response

Mommy: EMMA!

Emma: OKAY...I'M COMING!

We do this nearly every night and it's wearing me out.

Tonight, after the inevitable struggle to get her ready for bed, she decided to do somersaults on the bed before I turned out the light. She did one and I applauded and said she could do one more. So she flipped over one more time and I said "Okay, that's enough." And she looked me right in the eye and somersaulted one more time and then started to do it AGAIN! I just flipped off the light and walked out of her room (I always like ending the evening on such a warm note!)

Blah! I know it's just a stage (please let it be a stage!) but it's really getting old.

Anyway, here's a photo of my great debater with her friend Kimmie. I took this at a splash park last weekend and I love this photo of them. It's hard to stay cross with someone so adorable!

Au Revoir, Maternelle

WAH! Yesterday was Emma's last day of kindergarten...I can't believe I have a first-grader now. It's just one year older, but the gap between kindergarten and first grade seems much more than that.

Anyway, the room parents organized a little party for the last day of school. I was so sorry to say au revoir to Emma's kindergarten (maternelle) teacher. M. Thomas has been such a wonderful teacher for Emma. He is so sweet and loves his kids so much. Plus, he's such a great instructor - I mean my child is fluent in French already, for crying out loud! And as a single mom, I'm thrilled whenever Emma has the chance to have a positive male influence on her life - and M. Thomas has definitely been that.

Here's M. Thomas giving Emma her "diploma" yesterday...


And here's Emma with her ex, Ocea (they used to be boyfriend and girlfriend but Emma tells me they are just friends now (whew!)


So now it's summertime for us, the time of year I'm insanely jealous of my friends who are teachers and get to spend a couple months with their kids. Emma's going to zoo camp for a couple weeks, then summer school and then we'll take some vacation time. I know it will be over before we know it!