Barn Entrance

So, my whole before-and-after-finale plan got bundied over when my hard drive recently fried.  Right.  So the before, you'll have to trust me, was boring.  The after -- fabulous!  The wood is from a barn at my dad's farm. Barn wood is just so gorgeous.  You can't buy anything like it, and the fact that it's from the family farm gives it a sentimental note.  We love the new entry.  Now if I could just convince the kids to not pile all their junk right there.

Back to School 2012

Whew -- the Hamby peas are now covering two schools.  Yikes!  Can you believe P and C are in Middle School.  I and A are super,big,third graders.  This means the homework meter will be in the red for this year.  The bus comes a bit later, thank God -- ten extra minutes is huge around here.

This is my bus tribe.  Each morning, we have these two cuties for about a half hour before we get on the bus.  They make it a fun wait for the bus.

Hope everyone has a great start to the school year!

Middle School Lockers

 Claire and Paige start Middle School this year.  I still forget to call it Middle School; my entire life it has been Junior High.  We have gone every day this week and ran through class schedules, mapped out the routes, investigated bathrooms, timed walking from class to class.  This is all new and ever so nerve-racking.  The biggest bother is the locker combination.  Jeez -- I think keys would be easier.  They are getting the hang of it, but it's a new skill that needs some practice.

Of course, with girls, comes the locker decor  We had to decorate it shmancy for the first day.  Thank God for the Dollar Tree.  A few bucks later we were loaded with all the goods we needed to hot glue together and awesome, unique locker.   

I still can't believe we're hitting this phase.  I'm not old enough to have middle schoolers (right?).  The girls still remain late bloomers in the boy department.  It's all about softball and friends currently, but I feel that future storm brewing and am bracing for the impact.