Riley and Avery

Riley literally taught Avery to read.  Seriously.  They were upstairs and Riley was going over letter sounds with Avery.  She then got out the BOB books and Avery actually read them!  Riley is so well-versed on the Montessori method, she taught Avery in the exact Montessori way :)

We went to the South Portland Rec Center last night to swim.  The admission was $3/adult and $2/child.  Not too shabby.  The pool is warmest on Sunday night, the lifeguard said (and it was very warm! Yay!), because they ramp up the heat on the weekends for the swimming lessons.  I think we'll make it our regular Sunday night activity.  The pool is not cosmetically nice, the pool bottom was worn through to the concrete in many places, but it was clean and not too busy.  No fancy-shmancy stuff, no slides, spray things, just a rectangular pool.  But it was nice and quiet.  Riley took a while to get back into the swing of things, but she eventually was up to her old antics.  Avery hung onto the wall, as usual, for about the first 45 minutes, then let go and started swimming around in her life jacket, which is something she's NEVER done.  She was so funny, she moves her arms and legs in slow motion, with exaggerated grace.  I couldn't control my laughing a couple times.

We took an afternoon trip to Crescent Beach State Park and spend a few hours there.  It was beautiful!  The weather was about 60 and Riley brought a bathing suit and lobbied her hardest to get us to let her put it on.  Rudi said absolutely not.  I am seriously considering getting her a full wet suit.  If the girl wants to go into Maine water in October, then let her have a wet suit so she can do it safely and comfortably!  I really don't like to put limits on their explorations, so a wet suit would be nice.  I think LL Bean has some...

Riley's school pictures turned out FABULOUSLY this year!  Oh, my goodness, just awesome!  Her hair even looks brushed!  That was the longest 2.5 weeks ever.  Without further ado:

Lately, on MDC, I've been embroiled in debates over schools.  Even those with children in public schools are strangely critical of teachers.  One woman, with a second grader, announced at meet-the-teacher night (ie, before school even started) that her family "doesn't do" homework.  Before ever seeing the homework, or knowing how much will be assigned.  She then told the teacher that under no circumstances is her child to be punished, either by taking away recess time or by lowered grades, for not doing homework.  Excuse me?  So the teacher has to come up with a whole new system for your special little prince?

First, there's tons of local and organic products available.  Like, a ton.  Plus, they don't shaft you on the prices like they seem to do everywhere else.  Of course, there are some exceptions, but for the most part they are competitively priced, and often even cheaper.  We got local handmade butter for a lower price than factory butter.  Potatoes are the same.  Even local mustard, honey, jams, just everything under the sun.  And when I say "local," I mean just down the street.  Our milk is from Scarbourough, which is about 3 miles down the road :)

While I was busy examining the hermit crabs in the girls' room, I hear Riley reading to Avery and talking about stuff.  It was cute to see them interacting that way, so I videotaped it!

I'm such a nerd.  Riley's big hermit crab is my favorite, because it is colorful and beautiful, and very very active, and not shy at all (doesn't pop back into her shell when you look at her).  She buried herself about two weeks after we came back from Maryland.  So, beginning of August-ish?  She had been buried ever since.  I knew that hermit crabs molted, and that they stayed buried for about a month, but it was terrible waiting for her to re-emerge, wondering if she was dead, etc.  Hermit crabs frequently die from "bad molts."  She was so much my favorite!

Just a quick one.  The girls slept in their own beds last night, on their own floor of the house.  All night.  They didn't wake up once.  Which kind of confirms my suspicion that bed sharing with a nearly-5yo and a nearly-7yo upsets everyone's sleep!  None of us were sleeping well in that situation! 

We finally made it to Old Port, and couldn't have picked a better way, weather-wise.  A cool, foggy, and rainy morning gave way to sunny mid-eighties weather.

I was impressed with Old Port.  There's a really nice toy store there, and plenty of places to eat seafood and sushi.  However, a cruise ship had docked and Old Port was filled with cruise-shoppers.  The cruise ship was amazing to look at, though!  No.way.in.hell I'd get on it, though.  No way!  If I have to get on a boat, it needs to be a smallish one.  Just saying that a boat bigger than the state of Rhode Island is not my cup of tea.  Rudi said that he wanted to go on one really bad, but there have been many times that I've wanted him to go on an airplane really bad, so he'll just have to suck it :)  I'm definitely in for a whale-watching trip, and they have sailboat trips that look fun.  But cruise ship?  Um, no.