Mom's Favorite - Full Disclosure

It was brought to my attention that it seems that there is always more of Alexis in the blog than Julee. A hint of potential favoritism was even suggested.......so let me take a moment to dispel any and all rumors on either side or in favor of either girl. If you were to ask Julee who is mom's favorite, she would say Alexis. If you were to ask Alexis who is mom's favorite, she would say Julee. Typical sibling rivalry. If you were to ask Rick who is mom's favorite, he would say whichever one didn't leave their bath towel or dirty clothes scattered on their bedroom floor. He would add that if they both had clean bedroom floors, not only would it be likely that the world would certainly be coming to its end, but they would both be my favorites. Little do they know, they are both my favorites though they are likely never to see or understand that.

Having said all that, it is true that there are more appearances on this blog by Alexis than Julee. The reason for that is Alexis' attitude is 'hey mom, check this out - you can put it on the blog'. While Julee's attitude tends to lean more towards 'DO NOT put that dumb picture of me on the blog for the whole world to see'. Anyway, the other night we went to dinner at our friend's house. The 2 dads worked on computer stuff, the 2 moms chatted all night, and all the kids played Legos and Game Cube. It was lots of fun. As part of the evening, the other mom straightened Julee's hair just so we could see what it looks like. It came out really pretty and made Julee look so grown-up. Julee has never had straight in her whole life. When she was little, we wondered if her hair would ever grow in. When she was about 18 months, it started growing and out came these huge bouncy curls (lucky girl!). So here are a couple of pictures of Julee and the debut of her long, straight hair.

Bonus picture: This other picture is a framed collage that we made of Julee's trip to Arizona this summer. She brought home some postcards that she wanted to hang up in her room somehow so we ended up with this. We think it turned out awesome and adds a touch of the Southwest to Julee's otherwise upstate NY bedroom.

1st Day of School

Julee was less than thrilled to go back to school today. Being in 6th grade now, she switches classes and teachers for each subject. She is happy to have some of her friends from last year in her homebase and seems to like all of her teachers (so far). She's bummed that the classroom notes state that each child should expect 60 minutes of homework each night. "It's just wrong," she said.

Alexis on the other hand, was filled with excitement and anticipation. She is now in a "grown up" grade (2nd) and her teacher is "super nice". The highlight of her day was when they went out to play on the playground and it wasn't even lunch; and that there is no homework for the whole week. Any other questions posed about the day were met with a shoulder shrug and an "It's all good, Mom. Can I play on the computer?"

Here are some before and after photos of the big day. Looks like they both survived rather well.....

Smiles, school supplies, and all.....

Waiting for the bus

Whew - I made it through.....

So good to be home!

You Dropped A Bomb on Me!

For those of you who really know Alexis and her character, this will be hilarious. For those of you who don't know her so well, this is great insight that she is truly 7 1/2 going on 16. This morning she was in her room playing and we heard her singing. At first we couldn't figure out what she was singing. Upon further investigation, this is what we heard.......too funny! I love how she just went right along with the flow of being recorded.