School days are here again!

This week Morgan started in her new junior kindergarten class and they have already been doing so much! She switched school in July and for the most part the summer was filled with lots of playtime. She would bring home the occasional colored page, or painting, but it was all pretty non-structured, so I was surprised to see that this week they started their "curriculum".

(Note- for some reason the colors are slightly messed up so use your imagination!)

Well maybe this picture isn't really a learning activity, but you can see that she is trying to write her name. The letters on the bottom of the page are her first attempts!

The started out with the letter 'A'. (See her name in the upper right corner!)

And I promise this apple is really red in the original. But this is one of the first pictures that she actually stayed in the lines!

And they are learning the #3. She got incredibly upset when she was telling me about it because she pointed to the ones on the bottom and said "But I didn't do it correctly!" I tried to assure her that she did great, but she wasn't having it. It sounds like she is going to be a perfectionist....not sure where she gets that! (said with a hint of sarcasm- I know right where she gets that...me!)

This picture is much better in person but I had to include it. I think it is a family picture. There is the sun, and Elizabeth is the smaller person in the left corner, and Morgan is the one in the middle. They are wearing stripped shirts. I can only assume that the other two figures are me and Greg, but she wouldn't go into that much descriptive detail. Only, "this is Lizzy, this is me and there's the sun!"

I can't wait to see how much Morgan learns this year. It should be pretty exciting!

And since Elizabeth is going to be 2, and is the second oldest at her daycare she gets to start the pre-preschool program. It's the same thing Morgan did when she was there. Her school program won't start until September, but they are trying to let her and Riley (the oldest at daycare) do a few projects to keep them occupied. Elizabeth gets pretty proud of her crafts when she brings them home.

This is one of Elizabeth's first pictures. You can see she was pretty into it!

One day when I brought one of Elizabeth's pictures home I showed Morgan and said "Morgan, look what your sister did today." Morgan replied "She didn't do a good job Mom." Apparently since Elizabeth didn't stay in the lines on the coloring page Morgan was not impressed. Poor Elizabeth.

It should be an exciting year at the Clark house!

Let me tell you about it....

So for awhile I was wondering if Miss Elizabeth would ever talk. Don't get me wrong, there was lots of jabbering on but no real words. It wasn't until our stay-cation in June that she really started to put sentences together- and she hasn't stopped since!

She started with small sentences:

"I want Mommy."

"I want mo (which really means milk)."

"Where's Mommy?"

And since then she has mastered many more. Here is just a sampling of Elizabeth's conversation skills.

"Mommy....Get me out!" She says this in the morning. So nearly everyday this is what I wake up to.

"Mommy...I want yo-yos." Which means I want those crackers that are on the table.

"Where's Kathy?" Kathy is our neighbor who is incredibly friendly to both Morgan and Elizabeth.

"No Belle- out pool!" This weekend she came up with this while Belle was swimming in her pool.

"I want waffle." Again I hear this nearly everyday. Elizabeth loves waffles!

"I want Sissy." We haven't mastered Morgan's name yet, but she definitely knows who her sister is. And she loves her.

"I wanna Wiiiii!" No she doesn't love playing the Wii, she loves the slide. And instead of calling it a slide- she calls it a wiii. Probably because that is the large shrieking sound she makes while going down the slide.

There are so many more but they have become a part of my normal day that I can't think of them. But next time you see Elizabeth be prepared- she might just talk your ear off.

Introducing.....Abby Clark!

Some may know this already- but there is a new Clark in town. Her name is Abby and she is an eight week old Golden Retriever. We were able to bring her home this past Tuesday.

A few months ago Greg decided we should add to our clan and found a wonderful breeder here in Carmel- and to our surprise her dog Lizzy was due shortly after Greg found her. Once Lizzy had the puppies (9 total!) we found out that we did indeed get the female we wanted. The litter had 7 boys and 2 girls. At about 3-4 weeks old we were invited over to see the puppies- Morgan and Elizabeth loved it. Not only did we get to visit once, but we went twice! And the entire time we waited to bring our puppy home, the breeder provided us with pictures of our puppy and her brothers and sister.

The puppies taking advantage of the nice weather we have had recently.

The nine puppies trying to drink from the same water bowl.

Sleepy time (Turns out that one with the red mark on her hip is our Abby!)

All piled on top of each other.

Once the puppies were born, we still didn't know which puppy was ours. We were second on the list for a female so we had to wait until the first person chose her puppy. So this was the first official picture of Abby Clark. Otherwise she was know as right- hip female.

Since she has been home we have been acclimating her to the Clark household. We've been spending a lot of time outside with her and the girls because the weather has been so nice! Here are a couple of peaks into life with Abby.

We showed her the deck and she got to splash in the water that Elizabeth spilled from the hose.

She has been investigating (and tasting) the flower pots on the deck.

She followed the flower tasting up with a little drink from a puddle.

And she has been enjoying chewing on the many sticks found in our back yard.

Now for those familiar with the Clark house you knew we already had a wonderful yellow Labrador retriever named Belle. After several weeks of worrying how Belle would take to a new puppy- she surprised us all and did wonderfully! For the most part Belle leaves Abby alone, but is getting better about interacting with Abby. Today I saw the two of them touch noses! I think the two of them will become friends in a matter of a week or two.

I think for the most part Abby is adjusting well to life with two kids, two adults, a dog and a cat. And the rest of us are adjusting to our new addition. I'm sure there will be many more posts to come on life with the newest Clark.