2019 First Day Of School

The first day of school for 2019 really snuck up on me. We were barely back from vacation and had to scramble to get ready. I was glad I ordered school supply kits through the schools so we didn't have to go shopping for those. We were gone for the middle school back to school day, so Kara and Kiersten missed the picture day. Luckily they were able to get in for retake day a few weeks later. Kiersten was super excited to start the 6th grade. 

By 8th grade, Kara felt that she knew the ropes, but was still excited to start a new year. I was just able to get a picture of her as she was dashing off to the bus stop, because she kept remembering things she needed to grab or run upstairs to brush her hair more. 

Evie was a little sad to be alone on the porch last year. But she soaked up the spotlight while she could get it. 

We were at the bus stop bright and early. 

Once the kids were off to school, Jingles was able to emerge from her clever hiding spot. 

These are from a few days before the start of school. Since we missed the orientation day, we were able to go into the school on a make up day to get schedules, find lockers, drop off school stuff, and goof around. Kiersten, like Kara, was not terribly interested in decorating her locker. Maybe Evie will be my fun locker decorating diva. 

The eighth graders get full lockers, so that's kind of a big deal. 

They are smiling so big to hide the fact that neither of them wanted to sit next to the other. Too much quality bonding time on vacation, I guess. 

Leave it to Evie to break the ice. 

We were back in time to attend meet the teacher night at Evie's school. She was pretty excited for that, and happy to have lots of buddies in her 4th grade class. She was also eager to show off her braids to everyone. 

She wouldn't take out the braids until the night before school started. She really wanted this crimpy hair for the first day. Sleeping on it, did not hurt the curls one little bit. She only had about an hour and a half between her sisters leaving, and her turn to head out, but it felt like an eternity to her, and SHE WAS SO BORED. 

 It was a pretty great school year for all of them, while it lasted. 

Flower Story

I always take tons of pictures of flowers and plants, and they almost never make the cut for the blog, because I try to include pictures of the kids and what they were doing on vacation. But, the plant pictures are some of my favorites to look back on and remember what made the place we visited so pretty. So here are a few pictures of the flowers we saw last year in D.R. 

I snuck an Evie picture in because I'm pretty sure I was trying to take a picture of the foliage, and she jumped in there. 

There is actually a crabbie hiding in this one if you can see him. 

I take pictures of the room too, and don't usually share those either. But here ya go. I took this one because I thought it was funny I could spot Mr. Scooty in the mirror. 

 

Dominican Republic 2019: Part 2

The second half of the week was just as fun filled as the first. 

We had some really perfect beach days. 

Of course these lizards were everywhere, but the girls got equally excited about each one. 

I'm not kidding, it was like having a private beach. So perfect. 

Evie collected all the coconuts she could find, and then Ben threw them into the ocean. 

One morning she was served a cappuccino by mistake, so she carefully checked her hot chocolate after that. 

Because of his broken foot, we had to get motorcycle rides into Cabarete and to Kara's kite surfing lessons. It was terrifying. I caught myself figuring out the best direction to push Kiersten away from traffic in the inevitable event of our crashing. 

Fun nights on the beach. We kept hearing drumming every night, and eventually walked down and met some very nice people at a bonfire. They didn't speak any English, so we didn't outstay our welcome. 

Evie spent a whole day digging holes and creating sand art. It was pretty fun, and she was exhausted. 

Just a small sampling of her work.