No Pictures Today!

Dominic is doing great in school.  He had another week with earning a Tiger Stamp every day (this is a reward for being good) so he was able to choose another prize.  He picked the same orange bracelet he did last week and gave it to Luke.  Dominic "can" be so thoughtful at times.  He also earned 2 "caught in the act" tickets from other teachers.  These are tickets handed out by teachers that see a child doing a great job of being respectful, thoughtful, or caring.  At the end of the month, some one's ticket is drawn for a prize.

Dominic asked for a piece of paper and pen yesterday.  Next thing I knew, he had written the alphabet in capital letters.  I was impressed.....

Luke starts pre-school this week.  I can hardly believe that starting Wed, I will have 3 hours in the mornings all to myself!  I won't hardly know what to do because the house will be so quiet.  But Luke is definitely ready and excited for school.

A Luke Only Day

Luke and I have joined a play group for toddlers/preschoolers.  While Luke enjoys his time at the park, I can tell he misses his brother on outings like this.  Luke is a rough and tumble kiddo and the kids that are his age in this gorup are girls that like to sit and "talk" already!

I could also tell that I'm a mom of 2 boys.  My boys are "allowed" to challenge themselves on the play equipment.  My boys hang from monkey bars, ride the zip line, hang upside down, and slide down the fireman's pole.  My philosophy is "it's not a matter of IF we have to go to the emergency room, but WHEN."  I don't hover over my boys at the park telling them to be careful or not to do something.  Maybe I would be different if I had a daughter.

Brothers....Wordless

Brothers

I love watching the boys relationship change and grow.  They can already be best friends or tearing each other's eyes out!  This has become apparent this past week with Dominic in school.  On the first day, Luke gave Dominic a big hug and said, "Bye Dominic.  Have fun at school.  Remember to kiss your brain if you do something smart!"  That phrase is from my sister - a teacher.

Dominic doesn't share much about his day with us - except Luke - when he thinks we are not listening.  He "teaches" Luke about things he has learned in school.  Dominic even thought of his brother when getting a prize from the prize box since he earned a tiger stamp every day.  He asked his teacher if he could get one for his brother too - how sweet - but Dominic learned that Luke is not in school right now so the prizes are just for the students.

But not 5 minutes into being home and the fighting begins!  That's when I realized how quiet the house had been all day.

Then today at the lake, Luke was feeling nervous about jumping in the water.  I saw Dominic take him by the hand and walk him to the edge of the dock.  He whispered, "I know you can do it buddy.  Jump with me, ok?" 

Some people ask me if I will miss not having a girl.  No - I'm glad I have 2 children of the same gender.  My sister and I are best friends and I really don't know if we would have that relationship if we were not the same gender.  While Dominic and Luke fight now, I have a feeling that they will be the best of friends 10 years from now.

First Day of Kindergarten...Wordless

Hannibal Day

Dominic wanted to see a cave before school started.  We decided to have a "day before school" adventure and went to Hannibal.  Here the boys are outside the Mark Twain Cave.

Here they are inside the cave.  We took the first tour of the day so we were privledged to see several bats.  By the end of the tour, the boys thought the cave was a little too cold.

 We also took a river boat tour.  I thought this was great - the boys thought the boat went too slow!  Here is Luke covering his ears as the pilot blew the whistle signaling us to leave the dock. 

Once back in the historic district, we took a tour on the "clopper".  This is a horse drawn buggy ride.  We all liked this.

After our ride, the boys were able to feed "Barney" corn and apples.  Barney even posed for this picture!

MUD!!!!

 Boys will be boys!  They found a very nasty, deep, and stinky mud hole at the edge of the sand and grass at Baring Lake.  They called it "quick sand" because they would literally sink into it past their knees. 

Dominic thought it would be a great idea to take a "mud bath".  He smeared the mud everywhere - including his hair. 

Bath time later that night required getting hosed off first!

What a Week!

Dominic came down with the stomach flu on Monday evening.  He was a total champ with the whole thing - I'm very proud of how he handled it.  After running to the bathroom every 20 mins from 9pm-12am we both decided it was time to camp out in the bathroom instead.  Once the diarrhea hit, Dominic decided that his underwear were only "one more step" that we needed to avoid.  We sat on the step stool in the bathroom for over 2hrs until we both thought it was safe to try to sleep in the bed again.  Yesterday evening I announced to the family I had officially cloroxed all the bathrooms so it was now time for someone else to get ill!  So far so good .....

It is so hot and humid here.  We have been going to the pool in the evenings just to cool off. 

Dominic starts K next week.  He seems somewhat excited and I'm getting nervous!

Dentist

Dominic had his first cleaning last week.  He did very well and received a clean bill of health.  His bottom tooth is loose (which we knew) but he doesn't work on it much so it will be there for a while longer.  He does have a long frenulum (the piece of tissue between your upper lip and gum).  This may cause him issues with his adult teeth in the future.  So we will keep an eye on it and it may need to be sniped later on.  Ironically I have since read this long frenulum could be a contributing factor to poor breast feeding - which Dominic had.

Luke let the dentist look in his mouth too because we believed he was missing a baby tooth on the bottom.  After looking at it, she thinks the 2 teeth are actually fused together (instead of one missing) because the tooth is 2X larger than it should be and compared to the one next to it.  This is good news because we are keeping our fingers and toes crossed that Luke will also have all his permnament teeth.