August Update

Things have finally started settling down for us. Chuck has started school and is trying to get into the groove of being in class and studying again. Most people say your 3rd year of law school is the easiest, but he has a lot of commitments. He is working in a legal clinic, editor for the ABA Student Lawyer magazine, president of Law Families (with me), VP of J Reuben Clark Society, Managing Editor of the Journal of Energy, Climate, and the Environment, driving for Traveller (the schools transit system), and his regular classes (plus a husband and father). I know he will do great.

A great thing is that he has no classes on Fridays this semester, so hopefully we can take some weekend trips. Most of our trips will hopefully be to look for jobs for next year. We are planning to go with him to his ABA meeting in Chicago in October. I am really excited. Our best friends Adam and Shana live there and we didn't get our summer visit with them like we have in the past.

Leland starts preschool next week. She is so excited she can't stand it. I didn't really want to mention it to her till it got a little closer but it slipped when I opened a packet of info from the school a few weeks ago. Every day since then she asks if she can go to preschool. It's pretty much every time we leave the house, she says "Are you taking me to preschool where I can go all by myself?" I have such an independent child. She wants to do everything by herself. We finally made a paper countdown chain to help her visualize how long till it starts. I had to do this for her birthday too.

She is full of questions and it is making me pull out my hair. Here's a sample of our conversation this morning at the gas station:
LJ : What's that? (pointing to the gas pump)
Me: the gas pump
LJ: What's a gas pump?
Me: It's what I use to put gas in the car
LJ: Why you put gas in the car?
Me: So we can drive the car.
LJ: Why do you want to drive the car?
Me: So we can go places like Wal-Mart (that's where we were headed)
LJ: Why do we go to Wal-Mart?

Seriously?!?! I thought I was going to loose my mind! I'm glad she's so inquisitive and wants to learn, but I just can't handle it some days.

Lucy is cute as ever. She can really get around great and is more steady on her feet. She loves to be chased and laughs so hard when you catch her. Leland loves to play hide-n-seek and Lucy is great at the seeking. It's like she has x-ray vision or something and always knows where to look. She hasn't really learned the art of hiding yet.

She has learned a few signs like eat and please. It's very cute. She is still a big eater but picky about what she eats. We are trying to break her of the binky. She is now only allowed to have it in her crib. Church is the only exception because we are there in the middle of nap time and usually trying to get her to fall asleep. She is also attached to blankets, she loves dragging them around. After our 10 day vacation with the same baby blanket she was attached to it. The first night we were home that blanket was in the wash. She threw every blanket I put in her crib out and cried herself to sleep. That blanket is now hidden in my closet for a few weeks.

Lucy likes to put things inside things. For example it's fun for her to drop things in buckets, boxes, or trash cans. I'm not so fond of the trash can thing. One morning I found her PJs stuffed inside a blocks sorter toy. She has also discovered how to open our doors. They are not knobs but handles so it's really easy for her. Yesterday I found her standing at the front door that was wide open. The food pantry door is also a fun one for to get into. She likes to help herself to Cherrios or Rice Krispy cereal shaking the boxes upside down till some comes out. So far we haven't had any major disasters.

As for me (Ashley) I am staying busy with work and trying to entertain my girls. I am trying to be more productive and waste less time on the computer. I recently read an article in Real Simple magazine called "More Free Time" (I tried to find a link but couldn't). It motivated me to make daily to-do lists of only 3 things per day. I tend to waste time on the computer a lot so I have decided to only check my email and look at blogs at scheduled times of the day. It's hard to do, but I feel more productive.

I'm excited to have the few hours a day with just Lucy, while Leland is at preschool. The new school year brings lots of new friends to the area. It has been fun making new friends for me and my kids.

Congrats if you read this long post with no pictures. I like to write once a month as a journal. Posting this checked off one item on my to-do list today . Yay!