Brenton's 1st Day of School

1st Day of School!!!

Brenton had his 1st Day of Kindergarten today!
He has to be at school at 7:45am!! And doesnt get out until 2pm!! There are 5 Kindergarten Classes & each class has about 30 kids! (for a town with under 10k that's Impressive!!) The School Mascot is A Moon Cub. Brenton has asked for Mommy & Savannah to pick him up everyday rather than taking the Bus. Brent is the only kid in class with a name that starts with the letter B. (And hes pretty excited about that) Brenton has to take a Lunch everyday. He loves a Cheese & Meat Sandwiches cut into triangles. Cars Fruit Snacks, Applesauce, Spider man Cheez-It, & Apple Juice.

It seems pretty surreal we are finally at this point. The thought of both kids in School next year makes me so sad... I try not to think about that though. :/

Brenton before we left Grandpa & Grandma's House...

Savannah was so Excited for her Brother.

Brenton & Mommy walking into School.

It looks like I'm on my phone... but in reality I was going back & forth between my Iphone Camera & Normal Camera.

Almost Time!!

Mommy & Brenton before he went in his Classroom!

I would have been crying...but I had to hold my tears in. Brenton was already sobbing when he realized we weren't coming too.The teacher had to literally pull him off me and take him into Class. :( My Poor Little Guy!

Savannah was probably the Most Excited!! She missed her Big Brother & Best Friend.

Brenton was so happy to see us waiting! I knew it was going to be rough. New School, New House, New State, No Dad (yet). Too much change, way too fast for him to process. I know most Mom's can't wait for kids to be off to school, but I'm already counting down the months until School is out!

Our 1st Tornado Siren

Every Evening we have the same routine...
We check the weather.
Our clothing is laid out.
Shoes are placed by the basement steps.
Our laptop Case packed with our external hard drives and chargers.
And the dog leashes on top of the kennels.

We do all of this in case Tornado Sirens go off in the middle of the night.

So with all of that said. It was no different last night.

Last night before bed, I checked the weather. I saw a Big Storm way up north on the Minnesota/Canada border. Normally, the storm, would proceed east thru Northern Wisconsin and toward Michigan. Since I thought we had nothing to worry about. I told Alan, "Don't worry about getting things ready. I'm really tired, lets just go to bed".

BIG MISTAKE

Fast Forward... I'm asleep. Dreaming. Because its 4:45am...
All of the sudden in my dream I hear this faint noise... and it just doesn't quit.

I wake up.
I lay there for a few minutes. I can still hear a faint noise.
I think to myself "Huh.. that's really weird."
I get up. Walk over to our bedroom window.

The Sky is Green. A Minty Green. The clouds are low. It is EXTREMELY Windy. (as in 65mph)
I open the window.

(This is not my video but it shows you exactly what we hear when it goes off and how fast these storms move in)


I realize what is happening!! I am completely dumbfounded!!
I just stood there, almost as if I was in a trance! I couldn't take my eyes off the window!!

So many thoughts went thru my head...
Oh My Gosh this is the REAL thing!!!
I can't believe how Green the sky is!!
What time is it??
I shouldn't be standing here!
The Clouds look so weird!!!
Most importantly, how long have the sirens been going off?!
And how much time do we have??!

I stood there for only a minute, but I felt like I was standing there for at least 5 mins.
As quickly as I realized what was happening my adrenalin kicked in.

I yelled to Alan.. "AL WAKE UP!!!! ALAN ITS A TORNADO SIREN!!! GET UP!!!!".
Alan jumps up. He immediately asks... "HOW LONG HAS IT BEEN GOING OFF?!"

I am scrambling to put my sweat pants on. At this point I'm shaking. I am so caught off guard, I literally put 2 of my legs in the same pant hole twice!!! We are throwing our laptops and cells into our computer bag. I slip on my shoes and put the bag over my shoulder.

I run over to Brenton's room. "BRENT WAKE UP! WE GOTTA GO! THERE IS A TORNADO COMING". Brenton starts crying and says "My tummy hurts! I don't want it to come today." He wasn't moving. So I picked him up in his blanket and put him in the hallway. I told him to run to the basement!

I run into Savannahs room. I literally just scooped her up and ran toward the stairs. Mean while Alan runs to the other side of the house to grab the dogs and there leashes. We all meet on the stairs.

We all get into our tornado room in the basement. Which consists of a room with all 4 walls in-cased in cement. We had camping chairs already set up, our emergency bags which consisted of changes of clothing for each person, shoes for the kids, and our toiletry's. We also had our 72 hour kits, along with snacks for the kids, a few toys, and sippy cups.

We sat in the basement for 35 minutes.

We watched the doppler radar go over Dubuque.
The kids were quiet and just held onto the dogs.
While sitting there I did discover my bra was on inside out. My shirt was backwards. And I had 2 different socks on.

The rest of the day has been pleasent. Sunny and no signs of a cloud in site. The Storm had winds over 100 mph to the east and west of us. Tornado's in Minnesota and damage all the way to Chicago.

Later on I didn't hear the kids playing anymore. This is how I found them...

Looking back I think it would have made a really great 1920's silent film! You know with the old pianos playing? With Captions in between scenes. :)

Hopefully these occurrences will be few and far between.

The Garden & The Lawn

The Garden & The Lawn

We finally got the Garden planted! We waited because up until last week were were experiencing random nights of Frost!! We had to rent a Rototiller and weed like crazy! It has definitely been a Family effort! I love that the kids are seeing how much work goes into it. I know it doesn't look like much but we actually planted more seeds on top of the others we started last month. :) Hopefully we will have several Harvests out of it!



Also it seems odd, that Iowa is where we would finally end up buying our First Lawnmower! We borrowed the landlords for a month until we decided on one. We picked out a Craftsman Self Propelled. It does a great Job and there's nothing like freshly cut grass!!



Thank Goodness we had a nice day to get all of this work done!! :)

Sea World

The Malson's took us to Sea World for Brenton's Birthday. This was the kids first time ever going & what a treat it was!! We are hoping to come back one more time before the end of the year with Alan.

We went and saw Shamu! Savannah got so excited, she minorly peed her pants... literally. When I noticed she was lightly damp. I asked her if she had to go to the bathroom. Her reply was "Shhhhh!!!! Not now!!!! Theres a WHALE!!!" Good grief. lol.

The kids loved the starfish... Brenton was doing really well up until he thought it was a Frisbee... Sorry Starfish!!! As you can guess we were done after that.

HUGE Highlight was petting and feeding the Dolphins!!!! I have always LOVED sea life. In fact as a kid I wanted to grow up to be a Marine Biologist. Which became a shattered dream once I realized I swim like a rock... :/ The last time I did this was a day before my brother was born! I was thrilled to see the kids loving it! Savannah a true girly girl would absolutely not touch the dead fish. Brenton showed no fear... perhaps he will accomplish one of my dreams for me. lol.

We also saw Elmo in 3D... Doesn't Brenton remind you of my little brother?! hahaha. I am pretty sure it somewhat scared Savannah. Only because all I have heard is how Elmo's friends are gross and how she doesn't like them. haha.

We headed to Sesame Street land for rides. We did this last because I knew we would never get them out of there if it wasn't before the park closed.

Brenton's 1st Day of Preschool

Brenton has been begging us to let him go to school!! He cant wait to ride a school bus or to make new friends! Well the School Bus will have to wait a few years... Brent's preschool is just a few blocks away. Most days we will walk but if its snowing he will get to go in Dad's BIG Yellow Truck!! Brenton got to pick out his backpack and was so excited for his 1st Day! (He had to bring beans to school in the exact weight of when he was born... he kept telling us it was his school work) Brent had a great 1st Day... Savannah on the other hand cried for the entire 2 1/2 hours. haha. Hopefully that will get better with time.