Yes, it has been a VERY long time since we last posted, but we have been VERY busy. I think Patrick and I could sleep for a weekend straight if we were able to. Unfortunately we don't have that sort of leisure time. Sarah has been finishing up her last semester of school. Yup, 3.5 years later and she will finally have her MSW. It is crazy thinking that we she started the MSW program Elle was just 16 months old and Jay wasn't even born. Now Elle is almost 5 and Jay will soon turn 3. Sarah can't wait to read books (other than school books) again and do some crafts. Speaking of crafts, she couldn't wait to get her feet wet and made a crochet cowl.
What else is new? Well, Sarah will be ending her part-time GRA job and will begin full-time work again on December 1st. She will be working for the Lawrence-Douglas County Health Department providing care management to older adults. One of her practicum placements was there, so it will be nice returning to an agency with which she is familiar. It is also nice that she was able to find a social work and aging job in Lawrence as they don't open up every day.
Patrick's team is doing really well. He has ~70 (yup!) swimmers on his team only after about 6 months of the team existing! Pretty amazing. His swimmers are in Columbia this weekend and have been doing really well. Patrick has also been juggling a few design projects.
Elle has been attending two preschools this year and loves them both. She is really coming out of her shell this year. Last year she was quiet and didn't do a lot of talking. Now when I pick her up she willingly says by to her teachers and her classmates. For Elle's snack the other day we made a fun turkey (see below). After putting on the "feathers" we realized that this was not going to be able to fit back into our fridge as we had just gone to the grocery store. So, Patrick had to make an extra run to Elle's preschool to drop off the snack because she doesn't attend that preschool until the afternoon. The week before we also made a snack of homemade cinnamon rolls for Elle's preschool. When Sarah printed the instructions the second page didn't print so she thought the recipe would be easy. It wasn't until after starting that she realized how time consuming the recipe was. They turned out great, though!
Jay is also attending "school" two mornings a week. It is like a pre-preschool program. He loves going and playing! Most of the other kids had separation issues at first, but not Jay, who's Mr. Happy. Every day when Patrick would pick him up his teachers would say, "Jay had another good day today." Jay also has a big boy bed, which he calls his dinosaur bed because he has a dinosaur quilt. There is storage space underneath the bed, but right now we have it set up so the kids can play under there.
