Time and Drama

The girls are already most of the way through their third week of school. I just don't remember time going by so fast when I was young!! Someone has told me that when we are young, a year seems longer simply because it is a more significant amount of our lives, and as we get older it just seems faster because a year is just a smaller percentage of the time we have lived. Sounds plausible, but it truly seems that someone has sped up time and the years are just whizzing by now. I swear sometimes, that if I close my eyes and concentrate, I can actually feel the wind on my face as time literally flies by. As proof of how fast time is going, here is a picture of Allison's eleventh birthday cake!!! I remember her first couple of birthdays around the pool in Texas......that couldn't be ten years ago, could it?!

Sunday, we went to Orlando to Seaworld's waterpark, Aquatica. Rachel stayed with the neighbor across the street, because she is too little to go on any of the waterslides. The neighbor's youngest daughter went with us. She is nine and is Leah's and Allison's best friend. We were worried we were going to get rained on, but got lucky and just had a few clouds and a little rain, but no thunder and actually, for the most part it was sunny. It was a lot of fun. It has been many years since I have done anything like that, and both Mike and I were sore the next day. We had to laugh at our old selves on the rides that had short lines, because we would actually get a little winded walking up all those flights of stairs quickly! Below are some before and after pictures.

Notice the sheer joy on Allison's face at the end of the day? After all the fun, the day was apparently ruined entirely, because she did not get to ride one more ride before we had to go. We had already ridden the ride at least four times, but it seems that was not enough. Oh, the joy of raising drama queens!!! Below are pictures of the girls on the ride home. Leah was TIRED and Allison was MAD!

I think we are just about back into our school routine. The schools are certainly back into theirs .....they have already sent home the first fundraiser. So far, the girls and I have all struggled with getting to bed on time and getting up early in the mornings, but I am staring to feel a little more normal now and not quite so tired. The girls seem to be getting used to it too. Allison and Leah seem to like their new teachers. Allison says her teacher is nice, and Leah is not complaining too much about being bored. That is a good sign and must mean the teacher is doing something interesting some of the time. Rachel seems to be liking her new teacher and classroom. She goes into the room without complaint, although she does not go directly to the table like she is supposed to do. She first has to go sit in the teacher's rocking chair and argue about having to go sit at the table.

Rachel's school had open house on Tuesday, and the teacher says that Rachel is doing great in the classroom. She says that she is participating in the activities and is following directions. Speaking of directions.......I took Rachel to a gymnastics class last Saturday. It is a class for children ages 6-12 with disabilities. It is a small class of seven little girls, five of which have Down syndrome. When we first went into the gym, I was holding Rachel's hand and trying to walk her through all the things the instructor was getting them to do. Rachel kept pulling on my hand and saying, "No, Jump!" over and over. When the class took a water break, the teacher asked me to let Rachel go back out to the gym alone. I figured that there was no way that was going to work, because Rachel would just run around everywhere, but I let her try it. To my surprise, Rachel marched out there and sat down with the rest of the girls and never once got up unless the teacher told her too! I was amazed! My little girl is growing up!