September

After the first day of school, Nick experienced his first day of Sunday School. The three-year-old class consists largely of Nick and identical triplet boys born just a couple of days before him. He was quite shy the first weeks, but he was very fond of a couple of the understanding older girls and the capable teachers and helpers quickly took him in hand so I was able to leave. We tried to have Dennis sit with us in our Bible class, but he was loud and disruptive, especially after an hour being quiet in church, so our practice became to drop Nick off and then Dennis and I would go for coffee and a walk while John sat in on Bible class.

So – the weekly routine to persist throughout the school year:
Sunday: 8:00 Worship service, 9:00 Sunday School/Bible class/walk, soup for lunch, nap and then whatever the day brought – sometimes visits from grandparents
Monday: (John worked) 9:30 leave for music class, stopping to share an order of waffle sticks at Taco Johns across the street first, 10:10 class, soup for lunch, nap and some activity burn off energy in the afternoon
Tuesday: Drop Nick off at school, then Dennis at daycare; I am on call beginning at 7 AM nearly every Tuesday, so John does drop-off and pick-up (at 5:15) duty
Wednesday: Our unscheduled day. In the early weeks and months I would have a hard time figuring out how to keep the boys productively occupied for the whole day. Nick wouldn’t listen well enough to take both boys to the park alone. When they took off in different directions I would panic. They learned to play well together in the basement playroom. We frequented the play area at the mall in Appleton and had yogurt parfaits with play-time at McDonald’s on other days. I would count the hours and minutes until John would be done working and would be able to take a turn with our very active sons.
Thursday: Just like Tuesday, except I wasn’t on call, so I would drop the boys off before coming home to trade the van for the car and head to work. It enabled me to stay in touch with his teacher and the daycare providers.
Friday: Drop both boys off at daycare and head to work. John always picked them up from daycare since I was never able to leave right at 5 PM.
Saturday: Whenever we are all up and dressed we head over to Two Brothers restaurant for breakfast. (It is my weekly reprieve from the every day oatmeal routine!) John usually takes the boys for the rest of the morning and gives me time to exercise, shop and have some solitude. He’s wonderful! Then it is (yes!): soup, nap and whatever.


September 16th we gathered for the Thur family September birthdays: Aunt Becky, (cousin) Matthew and Grandpa. It is always wonderful (and a little bit noisy, especially now) to get together with John’s entire family. What a blessing that everyone lives within drive distance, even if we represent five cities in three states. It was a chance to get a picture of the four of us together, too.

September 29th we ventured onto an airplane again to go to the annual Gogolin Family Reunion. This year it was hosted by Uncle Jim and Aunt Lin in the Black Hills. We flew in and arrived late on Friday, renting a van and following excellent directions out to their home. They allowed us to stay in the guest trailer and made us feel most welcome with pictures of the boys printed and posted on the doors and walls and with beds made up for every one. The next two days we soaked up family time, and “allowed” relatives to entertain our boys from time to time. In fact, Uncle Jim was able to make arrangements for us to join a hike up to the top of George Washington’s head! It was fun to have Nick and Dennis meet all the people they had been seeing in photographs. Nick especially enjoyed the company of (second, third?) cousins Jake and Zane. He always looks up to the older boys, and Jake was great about continuing a game of tag in the park on Sunday, even when it was clear Nick was no match in strategy, agility or speed. He gamely offered to let him win if we wanted.
It was a quick weekend in South Dakota and we had to leave early on Monday:
10/01/2007 - We got off just fine shortly after 5 AM. The orange and white cat gave us a friendly farewell. We arrived just in time for our flight, but as we were ready to board at 6:30, they announced that due to a minor mechanical problem, we would be delayed, but the mechanic would be in at 7:15 and it wouldn’t take long after that to make the repair.

We had time for some breakfast, but missed our connecting flight in Minneapolis. Instead of a 1-hour layover, they put us on stand-by for a flight 2 ½ hours later. Fortunately, enough other people gave up their seats that all four of us were able to make that flight. Dennis had a bit of a hard time. The second to last squalling episode was due to head-butting me hard enough to really hurt him, and the last was because he really, really didn’t want to leave the tray table in the upright and locked position as we landed! They fell asleep on the way home in the van, I ran into a grocery store for a couple of necessities while John continued to drive in circles just to prolong this nap. Now it is 4:20 and time to wake them up in hopes they might sleep on time tonight!