Progress

Tori has had some ups and downs at school this year, but finally, she is getting into the swing of things. It is only Tuesday, and she has most of her spelling words down pat. She is also starting to catch on to more of her math.

Tori has been reading more, too, chapter books now. Right now she is reading a book about dogs. She is all into Buddy and his pals.

Hot Hot Hot

The heat index is 100 today, and with some schools not having air conditioning, a heat schedule has been implemented for the rest of this week. That means the kids are getting off school an hour and a half early. Christian is lucky. He rides the bus. The other two have to go to latchkey, but not today. Annie picked them up so they could swim for a couple of hours before they have to go to soccer practice. Tori likes to play in the park and walk the trail while Eli practices. Meanwhile, Christian and I are going to be baking cookies for Back to School Night at the school. Yep, we are baking cookies in a hot school. Lucky us. Then, drenched in sweat, we get to walk around the school and meet his teachers. Fun, fun!

Tori Girl

Tori had a decent first week of school. She had no problems lining up on the first day and she went willingly most of the week. She did well on her first spelling and math tests. She is trying to get into the groove, but it is not easy. It usually takes her a month or so for everything to really start clicking, hence her teary episodes doing homework. We’ve had a few of those this week and last.

Tori got really upset the second day of school when she realized that Ms. Lynn had been moved to latchkey at another school. She was really hoping to see her and had a complete meltdown. Fortunately, she has been better about everything this week and has learned the new staff’s names. Of course, they are starting to change already. There was a new woman there this morning, so who knows, Ms. Lynn may come back.

Last Dance

Tori has her last dance class tonight. My friend is coming to watch. She stuck it out, tears here and there when the focus was on her, but she made it. Now whether she chooses to take another class is up to her. She seems torn between taking Ballet II again or trying something else. For now, she says she wants to focus on school and seeing what is going on there She is going to be upstairs this year in Ms. Roach’s class. She wanted a male teacher, and I thought she would cry when she didn’t get one, but she took it in stride. She is all set for a good year with Ms. Roach, even if her friends are in other classrooms.

Hairspray Girl

Tori decided to let her bangs grow a bit so she can sweep them to the side. In the meantime, she has been training them with hairspray—loads of it. She puts on a headband, pushes her bangs over and sprays and sprays and sprays some more. She smells lovely and her bangs are extra crunchy, which causes her to play with them until they fall back into place on her forehead, I don’t know that we’ll ever get to the side swept bangs at this rate.

It's Official

Tori can swim. Saturday was her last swim class, and she swam, freestyle, on her own for several feet. She also passed everything else on the list. Now, all we need to do is get her some time to practice.

Tori also learned how to tie her shoe and ride her bike this summer. She is timid, but she can do it. And, she can now change her own earrings. Hooray, Tori!

Side Bangs

Tori is changing her hairstyle to sideswept bangs. I am supposed to get some hairspray and help her start pulling them over. I wonder how long this will last—as long as the nail polish on her fingers? That comes off pretty quickly.

Tori has grown up a lot this summer, doing more for herself and making her opinions better known. She can pretty much ride her bike and tie her shoes. She can change her earrings too. She can also make her bed and clean up her room when she feels like it. And, there is no need to help her in the bathroom anymore. She can care for her hair all on her own now.

My little girl is little no more!

Shocking! She's Ready

After a weekend of boys, Tori announced she was ready to go back to school. She can’t wait to see her friends and find out who her teacher will be. She is the only one of our three who is a returning student, so she does not have to attend registration. We are hoping they have the classroom assignments posted then anyway so we can see who will be her teacher. She has a two-in-three chance of getting a male teacher again. I think she is ready for that; in fact, she even mentioned she was hoping for Mr. Hagan, whom Christian had. We’ll see.

Tori has also started talking about middle school. We’ve told her that she is going to Mark Bills, and she is ok with that. She may even be looking forward to being at a different school than Christian. Anyway, she is already talking about walking home. I am not real keen on that idea, as it is about a mile away from our house and there could be bullies. We’ll see what happens. She still has two years to go!

Party Time

Last weekend was Tori’s party, and this weekend was her friend Dakota’s. They played together for three hours, doing crafts and swimming in the pool. Tori came home happy but exhausted and hungry. The snacks were good, but after all of that swimming, she needed more. We got her McDonalds and a yellow Minion and she scarfed most of it down. She was really tired this morning and stayed home too.

School is less than a month away. Only Tori can fit into her clothes from last year. We got her a few new shirts and are looking for shorts this weekend. She needs something she can fasten and unfasten with ease. They get short bathroom breaks, and the buttons on her short are just too tough for her little fingers to undo—mine too. Wish us luck shopping!

Birthday Party

Next weekend on our anniversary is Tori’s birthday party. Yes, we are late, way late. We had so much going on in June that we had to push her party to July. She is having three or four girls over, and most of them are staying the night. She asked us to plan the actually party—pizza, cake, gifts, water fun and shirts (decorating T-shirts), and then she is taking over. She has got lots of things in mind for the sleepover. Whether she will get to do any of them is another matter. She had things in mind last year, and the party took on a mind of its own that night. One little girl that is coming adores our cats, so watch out, Squeaker and Junior. Shaylee and Tori are coming for you!

Anyway, we are prepping for the party this weekend. We have to get the shirts and the decorating supplies. We also have to get some water guns. We already have bubbles, and the sprinkler, and the water balloons. We also have to get a cake next week. Lucky for us, Tori has had a cake already and is looking for anything special. We’ll pick up a sheet cake from Walmart or Kroger, and that will be that.

Uh-Oh

Tori got her ears pierced in May, and she finally got to change out her earrings this week. We started off fine, but now we may have a bit of a problem. She has been wearing larger earrings, in her sleep, and they appear to have irritated her ears. There was a bit of pus and blood this morning when we changed them. So, tonight, she is going to pull out her earrings before she showers and then douse them with peroxide. Then, we are going to pick out some smaller, flatter earrings that she can wear overnight. Hopefully we can get this irritation under control and avoid a trip to the doctor.

Tori still loves her earrings and she has mentioned getting her American Girl doll, Cory, earrings. I don’t know if the store pierces doll’s ears, but Tori seems to think so. At least we won’t have to worry about an infection with Cory’s ears.

Happy Birthday Tori!

Tori is 8 today. She had a celebration last week at Grandma and Grandpa’s house and came home with loads of goodies. She opened her presents from us last night. She already knew what they were. She has money to spend two weeks from now in St. Louis, and she is having a party on our wedding anniversary, July 12. She is psyched. She took donuts this morning for all the babysitting kids and she is eating at McDonalds—ugh—tonight. It's the birthday that never ends!

Too Busy To Care

Tori has been at her grandparents’ house in Kansas City all week long. While her brothers have taken the time to skype with us, she has generally been too busy, at least the first few nights. Huts saw her for a second on Monday night, a few minutes on Tuesday night and finally, a lot on Wednesday night. I am wondering if she is starting to feel a little homesick. She is having a great time with her cousins, but I bet she is starting to miss her room and friends here. She may even be missing her parents. She turns 8 on Monday, so that should give her something to look forward to.

Shopping For Clothes

We started packing for the kids’ visit to Grandma’s next week, and it became clear that Tori could use a few more clothes. She wears her clothes out faster than the boys—probably due to all of the changes. She has several shirts for hot days, but few for warm days. Tonight we are headed to Penney’s to see what we can find for her. We are also going to pick a few things for the boys, but they are not into the shopping, so it is up to us to choose for them.

Tori loves to shop but gets distracted easily. She likes to weave in and out of the clothes racks, picking out little. I will have to keep zeroing in her focus, else we will never get out of the store.