Report Cards

Hello friends and family,

Today I attended my first parent/teacher conference to discuss Easton and Layla's progress report cards.  Seeing the list of measurable skills along with the twins' relative success brought back stressful memories from my schooling.  I still have some of my report cards and even though I made good grades there was still a certain anxiety related to scanning down through the list of grades each semester. 

In some ways I felt like my ability to parent was on trial.  Not because of anything the teacher said or did but because I feel very responible for their success or failure at this age.  when they are 21 years old...  probably not so much, but until then I am my own best accountability partner when it comes to parenting. 

Our house was joyfully busy over the past week.  Ouma's best friend, Christy, added an extra special flare or element of interest while she was here.  I was sad for her to go after only spending a few short days with us.  I was very excited we had room in the house for everyone to sleep and also throughout the day to have space and separation when needed.  Layla slept on Easton's trundle bed, Christy slept on Layla's bed, and Ouma and Oupa had their own room.   

Here's Ouma and Christy waiting patiently for the parade.

What parade?  Easton and Layla's preschool patriotic parade!

The whole school marched up and down the campus donning red, white, and blue attire to celebrate the USA.  They say the pledge of allegiance every day (thank God that is still legal).  Every time Layla sees an American flag waving atop a business or out front of government buildings she energetically points it out.  I am a very proud father knowing they are patriotic and love the country. 

The triangle hats are a mystery to me, but as 4-year-olds i'm sure they could care less whether the make-shift hat looks cool or not.  It's all about what it represents and as long as they have the concepts down I'm thrilled to see them celebrating patriotism. 

Easton decided to try on Kendra's Ugg boots because they happened to be laying around in the living room where we were hanging out.  He was a little shaky at first, but before long he was walking around the house proficiently.  I know somewhere there's a picture of me at this age wearing cowboy boots...  naked.  As if that one would ever make its way to the blog.  I'm interested to see how much he looks like me when I was 4.

Easton loves race cars.  Over the course of the past several months we managed to get him every single character from the Cars 2 movie except one:  Shu Todoroki.  Kmart made a deal with Disney saying it can only be purchased individually from a Kmart.  The problem is that we don't have a Kmart close to us and the one within driving distance was out of stock.  Thanks to eBay Easton now has every single race car from the world grand prix.  This is as genuine of a smile as you'll ever see on his face.

Ouma and Oupa flew out this morning.  booo...  We were all sad to see them go.  Layla cried for the first time because she realizes the concept of time and knows it will be a few months before we see them again.  Easton is sad too, but his emotions come through in his words more than his tears.

Luckily, we are preparing to have my Mom and Dad visit starting on Friday!  We are busy cleaning and planning already.  7 days is plenty to prep for their visit and we are counting down the days.

SEVEN!