Many mornings, the girls start their day by reading the newspaper.   They might glance at the headlines to see if the Brewers (or Packers) won, look at the comics,  or see how far Chris got with the crossword/sudoku.  But what they love to linger over is the weather page. You know the weather page, right?



They look to see what it will be like locally, they see which planets are visible, what time the sun rises/sets, and what the weather is in other areas.  They always look to see how hot it is in Phoenix.
This morning, Katherine and I had the following conversation.
K--"Wow, it's going to be 110 in Phoenix today!"
"I'm glad it's not that hot here today!"
(talking to herself) "I wonder if that's the hottest in the world....."
"Hey Mom! It's also going to be 110 in Baf-dad!"
"Where?"
"Baf-dad. It's usually hot there too, so I looked and it's going to be 110 just like in Arizona!They are the same today"
"What city are you talking about Katherine? Do you mean BAGHDAD?"

(confused/embarrassed look on her face)

"Yeah....but I thought it was BAF-DAD. It has a 'gh' and 'gh' says 'FFFF' like, rough and tough. I didn't think the H was a silent H!"

I just love the way her mind works.

First day of school!!!

Maggie started 4th grade today, Katherine 2nd grade. Chris started his 15th year of teaching, but he wouldn't let me take his picture.

 Couldn't take the usual picture on the deck today - had to improvise!

 4th grade

 2nd grade

After school both girls were non-stop chatter about how much fun they had. This was comforting, as Maggie had a mini-panic attack after I'd kissed her goodbye and left her with her class today. She came running back to me sobbing in tears that her head hurt and she needed to go home. She was near hysteria crying and nothing I said calmed her. I gave her ibuprofen and sent her in with a teacher's aide that she knows well.  (And then I cried)  Her classroom teacher emailed me at lunch to tell me that Maggie was fine and having a great day - I already love her teacher! It was bizarre, but I'm hopeful that it was just a fluke!

Abby goes to preschool tomorrow, here's hoping she doesn't cry. I'd be pretty surprised if she did!

After dinner, we all got to help Chris get ready for his 8th grade choir.  He will have 86 students this year. In order to take attendance quickly, he found an app that will take attendance by reading QR codes. So we set up an assembly line and got his choir folders all ready to go.

All in all, it was a successful day. And as Chris said when he got home, "1 down, 179 more to go!"