My First Missed First

Two days ago Audra lost her first tooth:

It had been loose for about 24 hours before it fell out while she was brushing her teeth. Unfortunately, it fell down the drain in the sink and daddy couldn't find it so she had to leave a note instead of a tooth for the tooth fairy. She dictated the note to Daddy and he wrote it out:

Dear Tooth Fairy,

My tooth went down the sink when I was brushing my teeth.

 Please see my note under my pillow.

Thankfully, the Tooth Fairy found her note and replied:

Dear Audra,

I'm so proud of you for being so brave!

 I found your tooth in the sink. 

You be a good girl for your mom and dad and

 I'll come back the next time you lose a tooth!

Love,

The Tooth Fairy

Phew! Thank goodness the Tooth Fairy found Audra's note!

Sadly, the Tooth Fairy is pretty cheap around her. She left Audra 50 cents. Audra wasn't too excited. She said, "I didn't know the Tooth Fairy left money. I thought she left candy or a note."

Maybe next time that will happen. Who knows?

I actually missed all the excitement of the tooth falling out. I was at a church activity when it all went down. I think it might be the first "first" that I have missed. Oh, well- nobody's perfect.

Our Little Camille-Bug

I haven't posted pictures of our cutie for awhile, so here are some that I have taken in the past couple of weeks or so:

S'more Fun!

It's been an exciting week here in our household.

Last Saturday Ben and I came up with a plan of how to get Audra to stop crying every time we leave her at church or school.

Audra has been begging for the past year to go camping. Unfortunately, our church cancelled our yearly campout which is when we were planning on taking her camping. Of course, there are other campgrounds, but the ward campout is relatively easy- and we like that.

We decided to let her earn the right to camp in the background. If she didn't cry and was brave in going to school and her church class for a week, she could camp with dad in the backyard.

We also had to give Claire the opportunity to earn sleeping in a tent. We decided if she could fall asleep at night instead of keeping Audra up for a week she could sleep in the tent. They have done pretty well sharing a bedroom, but Claire will sometimes bug Audra and Audra will start yelling, "Claire's keeping me awake!"

Our plan worked! Lesson learned: If we ever want two little girls to do what we want, we just need to bribe them with a backyard camping trip!

Audra told everybody she could that she was going to go camping in the backyard- her teachers, her friends, perfect strangers.

She could not stop talking about sleeping in a tent. It was awesome.

Ben was about 1/100th as excited as the girls. He is so great- the girls are lucky to have him as a dad. Sleeping in a tent with a 3 and 5 year old are not high on his to-do list, but he is such a trooper. Sadly, I had to stay inside with Camille so she wouldn't get too cold out in the tent (oozing with sarcasm here- I was only too happy to have the whole house to just Camille and me!).

In this picture, I told Audra "Show me how excited you are." Can you tell she is EXCITED!

 Claire in the tent- I don't think I have ever seen her so happy:

 Or Audra, for that matter:

 Ben said we HAD to make s'mores. He was SO excited. But, we can't have a bonfire in our backyard so we used candles. It didn't work great, but it was good. Audra LOVED them.

 Claire liked "roasting" the marshmallow, but not eating it:

 Look at their excitement:

 She's such a pretty girl:

 And, this was the look on Camille's face:

She wasn't sure what she thought- as her face says. But, she's still as cute as can be!

I'll find out tomorrow how tonight went!

Tearful Day Two and Three

Audra did great for her first day of kindergarten.

Then things went downhill.

Ever since Camille was born Audra has had separation anxiety. This is new to us- we have never had to deal with it before. But Audra will refuse to go to her primary class and sob when Ben and I go on a date and leave her with Grandma and Grandpa.

But, she has to go to kindergarten, so I peel her off me and continue on my way.

These pics are from her successful first day:

 The certificate says, "Audra had a great first day of kindergarten! Glad you're here, Ms. Henley."

Then, I thought it would be fun to get a picture of what was in her Hello Kitty backpack from the first day:

A Dora lunchbox (with water and a granola bar inside- they just need a snack, not a full lunch. And I did make sure that she needed a "Christina" snack and not a "Pinterest" snack), a Belle doll (they were allowed to bring a stuffed animal on the first day), and her homework- a picture of her that will help others get to know her.

On day 2, she sobbed and sobbed. I asked her why she was so sad and she said, "because I will miss you! I just love you so much!"

Ben is worried she will be made fun of. Audra said the teacher makes her sit at her desk until she can calm down before she can come down to the carpet and participate in class.

On Friday my mom, sister, and her daughters were visiting. We went to the park in the morning. Before we left, I told Audra that she would have to leave early from the park to go to school. She made an angry face and said, "But when do I get a break?!?"

(Cute story interjection here: My mom gave her some fruit snacks and I told Audra to save them for the car. Audra got a very confused look on her face and said, "But why does the car want to eat fruit snacks?")

She cried and cried when Ben dropped her off- again.

So this week we came up with a plan. If she can be brave all week and not cry at all, then we will set the tent up in our backyard and go "camping" in it. She is REALLY excited about this idea as she has been begging all summer to go camping, so hopefully it will work.

Three Months

On Wednesday Camille turned 3 months old. The newborn stage is over! She is the first of our three kiddos to go into 3-6 months clothes when they actually turn 3 months old.

Camille continues to get BIGGER and BIGGER. And I LOVE LOVE LOVE it!

She is 13 lbs. 4 oz. and she has lots of chubby rolls all over. It's the cutest thing.

She continues to win "Best Baby" awards all over town. She is very happy (except when hungry!) and is cooing and smiling all over the place.

Sleep continues to go pretty well for the most part. Every once in awhile she has a bad night, but for the most part she wakes up around 4 and 6 to eat, but sleeps perfectly from 10 to 9 or 10 otherwise. At one point she only woke up once at 6 to nurse for three nights in a row. It was WONDERFUL- but didn't last. Bummer. She is not a very good napper- only taking 30 minute naps a few times a day- but that may be more my fault than hers. With two active older sisters we are often on the go so she doesn't get a chance to nap nice and snug very often. She still sleeps in the swing next to my bed or in my bed. We have the crib set up, but she has never used it yet. Admittedly, I LOVE having her next to me- I don't want to give that up quite yet.

She eats about every 3 hours during the day. It only takes her about 8-10 minutes to eat which is super nice. She is a great sucker!

She loves to suck on her hand, but will take the pacifier as well.

She has kind-of started playing with toys. She at least notices the toys that dangle down from her floor play mat thing. She likes the TV and always tries to turn her head to watch it, so we watch her closely and try to not let her see the TV.

The older girls continue to love on her- perhaps too much. Especially Claire. Claire always wants to touch and hug and smother the baby. Luckily, Camille puts up with it for the most part.

Her eyes are still blue and she still has quite a bit of hair.

This newborn experience has been so completely different than my other two. Camille is such a dream baby! I have said that before, but seriously- if you have never had a colicky baby, you can not possibly understand what a difference it makes to have a nice, happy baby! We all just love this little baby to pieces!

First Day

Today was a big day- Audra's first day of kindergarten!

It's actually kind-of been 3 days of first days of kindergarten. Monday was the open house, where we got to go and see her classroom and meet her teacher. We went and found her cubby and table and Audra turned to me and said, "This is NOT fun!!!!"

Then yesterday they did some testing to see what ability group the kids would start in.

Then today was her first full day.

Here are some pictures our big girl.

I think I will count this picture as her "first day of kindergarten" photo. It was taken Monday for Open House day and I think it is the cutest, so here you go:

 This was taken today before lunch- notice her outfit. Notice Claire as well. She insisted in being in all photos, which made it hard to get a good "first day"shot. But, Claire is also super cute:

 Here is Audra walking up to get in line at school. Notice her new outfit- post lunch. Today is also school picture day and I wanted her to look cute. I wanted a solid color shirt because I think that makes for better pictures. Low and behold, she had one- the pink shirt above. I made her wear a huge bib while she ate her pbj. It did not work- somehow she got a huge glob of jam on the one part of her that was not covered. So, this dress was our second best option and I am sure it will be fine.

 She should be a backpack model as she waits here in line:

 At her new desk- which is really a table:

 The teacher had all the kids sit on the rug. Thankfully, she wasn't too upset that Claire insisted on being a big kid, too:

 Here is Audra's teacher reading The Kissing Hand to the kids. Then we got our good-bye kisses and off we went:

I wasn't sad about any of this until everybody kept telling me that I should be sad about all of this. Stop telling me how much my kid is growing up so I won't cry!

What I am sad about is losing the freedom to do whatever we want whenever we want. For the next 23 years we will be tied to the school schedule. There's a lot of freedom that we lost today, and I will miss that. But, I am excited for Audra- she will do great in school and I know she will love it!

Our Week In Snapshots

Here's some pictures from our week...

This is Audra with a Raggedy- Ann doll my Aunt Janet made for me when I was a kid. The clothes are long gone, but Audra dressed her in Build-A-Bear clothes which seem to work just fine:

 This is from our favorite park- they have a petting zoo and Claire decided to hug the sheep:

 Claire drew this- it is the first time she has drawn a person- can you see the eyes on the left? She says the person has 2 arms, but as you can see she has more like 20:

 The other night I put Camille on the floor. She lay quietly for several minutes just sucking her binky:

 Then a couple of minutes later she had fallen asleep all by herself:

 I never put bands or bows in the other girls hair because I worry it will hurt their head. But, I caved and bought some for Camille because they are so cute. But, this one caused indentations into her head so we will be taking this one back:

 This one is plenty big and she looks so adorable:

Shedding A Little Tear

Camille keeps getting bigger and bigger. What does that mean? It was time to change out her newborn clothes for her 3-6 month clothes.

I almost cried putting away her newborn clothes. Luckily, we are giving them away to friends and family so I will see them again on some other baby hopefully.

What made me the most distraught, however, was that I FINALLY found the newborn box that I was missing- the newborn box that had the beautiful hand crocheted dress that Ben's Grandma gave to us when Audra was born. She didn't crochet it herself, but it still has a lot of meaning to us. I searched EVERYWHERE for the box, and made Ben go up into the attic TWICE to look for it. And where was it? On the storage closet on the middle shelf right in front of my face. I can't believe it!

Needless to say, I am thrilled that I at least found the box. I really, really, really just wish I had found it 15 weeks earlier.

Nevertheless I decided I HAD to get a picture of Camille in the dress.

She is way too huge for it.

It was torture trying to put it on and take it off.

I don't care- I had to get the picture!

So here it is- tears, screams, and all:

 And here is Audra:

 And here is Claire:

Can you see why I am so sad that I didn't find the dress until today?!?

My babies are growing up. Even though Camille is not even 3 months old, I can feel her baby-hood slipping away. When we were at the doctor the doctor said, "Look at how strong she is!" I said, "No- we want a fat and lazy baby!" She looked at me and said, "Then you should of had a boy."

Camille doesn't even look like a newborn anymore. Putting away her old clothes and pulling out her new ones was so sad. It's hard to believe that I can have such an emotional attachment to clothes. But these clothes tell a story- the outfit Audra wore home from the hospital, or the favorite that their aunt gave Claire, or whatever. I am saving some of their clothes for when they have kids, but so many of the clothes I can't save because they stained them or they have elastic bands that will get destroyed.

Well, I better get over it. These girls aren't getting any smaller!

School Shopping

It's hard to believe I have a child who will be starting kindergarten- next Monday! Only 8 days away!

In honor of the special occasion, I took Audra on a special mommy/daughter date yesterday to get her some new school clothes. Now, if there is one thing the girls do not need it is clothes (except maybe dresses- they can never have enough of those!). All three girls have so many clothes they are overflowing their dressers. And, as you all know, spending money on things that are completely unnecessary is not exactly high on my priority list.

But, I have very fond memories of school shopping growing up. Every August, my mom would head off to the mall with all five of us kiddos in tow and we would get to choose two new outfits for school. This was always a BIG and EXCITING deal. We even got to eat lunch at the mall! It was an all day affair. Sometimes more than one day. I want my girls to have those same fun memories.

Plus, HELLO! Who doesn't get new school clothes every year? So off we went.

Audra was very excited to get to actually try on clothes. She kept telling me, "and remember, I have to try the clothes on." It's the first time in her life that she has ever gotten to pick out her own outfits, outside of a random dress here and there. 99% of her clothes are hand me downs which is AWESOME, but as all of us girls know- it's nice to pick your own clothes sometimes.

We went to Ross because it was the store closest to us.

This was a very serious process for her. She was very matter-of-fact about what she liked and didn't like.She ended up choosing a lot of PINK- not a surprise there.

Here she is in the dressing room with two of the outftits she picked out:

 For this picture she said "I want to make a silly face."

 She was also intrigued by the security tags. She was very curious as to how they take them off.

Afterwards, we went to Jamba Juice.

We went home and Audra put on a fashion show for Dad and Claire. Claire was very jealous that she didn't get any clothes, but her time will come. I am realizing that time really does fly with young kids!