Kenna is 5 weeks old and the kids are in school now.

Well Kenna is now 5 weeks old. Ahhhhh the days are going by so fast! She is growing so much and changing every day. When she was born I swore she was a spitting image of Chad, now that she is filing out a little and has more awake time I really think she is looking like Kinsey. It sure will be interesting to watch her grow and continuously change. After our house had the awful stomach flu, she definitely changed, much more needy than she originally was, but she finally seems to be coming around a little and it's getting easier again. But with 3 kids in a house, there is never much sleep to be had. Kenna slept really good last night, 4 hour stretches, well, Cole then had us up all night with an ear ache. Go figure!!! He finally went to sleep about the time we were getting up for the day. Kinsey has decided she is an early riser, so she is up around 7am every day. But he woke up in a good mood and says his ear doesn't hurt anymore, so I'm just hoping it doesn't flare up again tonight.

Cole and Kinsey started preschool yesterday. Although Cole turned "5" August 31st, we decided giving him another year before he starts Kindergarten would be beneficial for him. To be one of the older kids in the class instead of the youngest, cutoff is September 1st here and since he isn't the biggest kids 25th percentile in size, we figure another year will be great. And this way I get another year with him before he is gone 7 hours out of the day :o) Kinsey and Cole are in the same class so I can drop them both off at the same time and they both love love love their teachers (same teacher's they had last year). Cole was excited to have one of his favorite friends in his class again from last year and Kinsey, well, Kinsey just floats to her own tune, she doesn't much care about anything, she just smiles and goes about her business :o)

After I picked the kids up from school yesterday we headed to a local hotel pool for a couple hours so the kids could swim! Kinsey LOVES to swim, she is destined to be on the swim team, you seriously can't get this girl out of the water and that is ALL she talks about! As soon as I got her swimmies on, she was in a full sprint for the pool and launched off the side. Tomorrow I will take my camera with me so you all can see her in action. It's priceless! Cole and Kinsey both worked on their swimming in the shallow end and Cole can now swim the width of the pool no problem without touching the bottom, he can also swim down and touch the bottom and swim back to the surface. Kinsey can easily swim 6-7' without touching the bottom when she remembers to keep her butt up and face in the water. :o) I plan on taking the kids to the pool at least 2x's a week after I pick them up from school since we are already out and about, it just makes it easier and the kids love it and it wears them out. Seems crazy to take em to the pool when we live on a lake, but with 3 kids, it's nice to be isolated inside.

Chad drew a bear tag this year, so he has been baiting at a couple different properties around here. Well they have been hitting the bait stations all summer and now have tapered off because the acorns have fallen. But he is still hunting and crossing his fingers. So most nights he comes home, walks in the door, changes into his hunting gear and is back out the door. I don't blame him though, he's only waited 7 years to get a bear tag! Bears will get sick of the acorns eventually and they'll start coming back in, so it's just a waiting process now! Every night we cross our fingers that tonight will be his night. But so far, he hasn't seen a bear. Though we do have the on camera, they are just hitting it at night right now when they do hit, which I can understand too, it's so friggin' warm here for this time of year.

As for me, I started back with photoshoots two weekends ago. So now I am booked every weekend until November, so Chad gets time with the kids when I am working and so far it has worked out great. The kids have also spent a couple hours with Chad's mom and dad, which went so smooth, thank goodness. I'm actually hoping to have his mom watch the kids on Friday afternoon so I can get out in the woods and do some bow hunting! Friday afternoons will be the best chance for me to get out with my weekends booked.

Here's one of the kids down at our farm.
Here's Kenna's 1 month photo I captured the other day.

Here's one of Kinsey from this summer. Chad was throwing her up in the air when we were out on the lake up at the sandbar. She couldn't get enough of it.