DJ survived his first day at the new job. The rest of us managed to muddle through without him at home. It helped that we had company all day. We babysat for a 3 year old girl in the morning. She left and a half an hour later cousin Kathleen came over for the afternoon, so Joey could have his physical therapy session in peace. Sami was in heaven entertaining the girls. She is a great hostess, showing off her room, toys and teaching everyone how to jump on her brother's bed.

DJ's day was spent in orientation, learning the company policies, what he would be doing, getting all sorts of fun electronic toys and the endless paperwork. He was well compensated with a steak lunch. Later this week he will be going with another consultant to clients and get real hands on experience.

School ended about 2 1/2 weeks ago. We are trying to keep up with reading. If Sami keeps going she will be doing 1st grade reading next year and the rest of her curriculum will be kindergarten. She is a strong visual learning and has always been ahead of her age in language development. The two skills make her a natural reader. Chris took longer to catch on to reading. About a month ago he went to bed one night, stuggling to understand the concept of reading and woke up the next day, a reading machine. Sami has little interest in math, while Chris has been able to do multiplication in his head for almost a year now.

We've been keeping busy since school ended. We've been to Brookfield zoo a few times and hope to get back soon for their new ray exhbit. We've gone to the Morton Arboreteum quite a bit. Chris, though is really liking Cantigny. He is tall enough now to climb the tanks without any help. Good for him, bad for mom, because dear Sami is very determined to get herself up with him. She doesn't like getting help. Plus when she decides to get down, she slides on off with reckless abandon.

Chris is riding his bike without training wheels. Like reading, he went to bed one night barely able to get around the cul de sac with lots of help and the next day he rode to the park only needing help to get started. So now, he can race his sister again. Sami is thrilled to be able to climb the top of the tunnel slide just like her big brother. If we survive this summer without broken bones it will be a miracle.

Sami is looking forward to her first kid birthday party. We are having a Cars theme ( the Disney movie). Ironically, she has never seen the movie. She is enamoured with Cars, ever since we convinced her that it is a girl movie, because the lead car is Lightening McQueen. We did this out of desperation while trying to get her to buy shoes. THe only pair she deemed comfortable had Lightening McQueen on it and she figured they were boy shoes. We told her they were girl shoes because it said Queen. So we are having a Cars birthday party for friends on June 23 and a family party the beginning of August. She agreed that we could celebrate her birthday close to the anniversary of her baptism since she would have a party close to her birthday. Less stress on mom, if they aren't right on top of each other.

Not much else going on here. Take care.