Goofing off on a lazy Saturday morning

Disclaimer: The following stunts are done by a rambuctious, fearless toddler. Do not attempt at home! I'm pretty sure this isn't what Fisher Price had in my mind when they created this little bounce n spin pony, but AJ sure does love practicing his stuntman routine on it. Enjoy the next series of pictures. We sure had fun snapping the pictures. We were all just sitting around watching TV--kids were doing various things. Out of nowhere AJ started trying to balance himself on the pony. Like the good parents we are, we went and grabbed the camera and told him to do it again instead of telling him "get down before you hurt yourself". That's what we probably would have said with Kaeli, but on the 4th one we just consider it entertainment and enjoy the break from kids arguing.

And, here he is....the masked hero of our story.

And, now he's thrown his mask aside and is attempting his daring ride balancing on the horse's back as it gallops at full speed!!

Oh wait.....will our hero fall??

Alas, he regains his balance and is back in control as his horse gallops off.

Did he just jump off??? What was he thinking? I see now, he's off to rescue his damsel in distress as she lays face down on the ground. Hurry, fearless hero....save her!!!

Now our hero watches over his TWO ladies after his daring rescues. He must be exhausted. (actually these pictures were taken later in the day--he just looked so cute laying there watching over his babies)

Of course, our hero has received so much attention that there are bound to be copycats that follow in his footsteps.

THE END.....

Birthday Cake

We also had a little party--it was really the Fisher Price Playdate house party, but we did buy him a cake and sang happy birthday. Here he is showing off his cake and saying "cheese"! As soon as we let him get the train he proceeded to use it to "dip" into the cake for taste-testing.

AJ turned 2!

I'm definitely running a little behind!! AJ's 2nd birthday was Sept 19. These pictures are from the actual night of his birthday. We had chicken nuggets for dinner, followed by cupcakes, and then let him open his presents.

As you can see from this picture, he's certainly enjoying his cupcake!

And, now it's time to open presents.

He was very excited about his cars.....and also the Thomas the Train stuff he got. He loves, loves, love Thomas and cars!! The cars he's showing off in this picture are Darda cars he got from Mom-Mom and Pop-Pop. I didn't know what they were until Mom-Mom bought him some last Christmas. Now we all love them! They come with little flexible tracks and the cars go by themselves after you "wind" the car up by pulling it backwards and pushing it forward really fast. It's very easy to get them wound--easy enough for AJ to do it by himself. We are constantly losing these cars because they often going flying through the house and, of course, under furniture. One of these days when we move out of this house we are going to find a ton of the Darda cars hidden all over the house.

Yes, I'm really adding a new entry!

I actually have so many pictures and at least 2 videos I'd love to get on here eventually....but it's coming along. I have too many "irons in the fire" I think.

Let's see, where should I start?

I'll start with Kaeli since she's the oldest. She joined the 3rd and 4th grade chorus this year. She came home today and told me that the teacher chose her as the announcer for the chorus recitals. I find this completely shocking and I can't help but wonder what the teacher was thinking--especially when Kaeli described how it happened. Kaeli signed up to audition for a particular part. When it came time for her audition she was just too shy to do it in front of all the other kids. So, she auditioned for the teacher in private. Kaeli did not get the part she auditioned for, but the teacher told her she has a wonderful voice and assigned her to be the announcer. Now, I'm wondering....if Kaeli couldn't get up and audition in front of a bunch of kids she KNOWS, how is she going to get up in front of an audience of unfamiliar faces and announce anything? This should be interesting and I can't wait to see how it plays out. Kaeli definitely is feeling quite proud of her teacher's comment about her "wonderful voice". WE are in trouble! She already walks around singing constantly. Unfortunately, I think her teacher meant that she's good at projecting her voice--not that she has a good singing voice. But, what do I know? Maybe she'll surprise me. Other than the star in training, she's handling 3rd grade superbly. She was very concerned because she had heard how much harder 3rd grade is...but she's rising to the challenge. She's so self-motivated that I'm finally beginning to relax a little and realize that she will always do well because of a drive from within. I actually felt apprehensive at the beginning of this year for a variety of reasons-it's nice to realize that apprehension was completely unfounded. WHEW...one down, 3 to go (and something tells me they won't be so easy).

Paige learned to ride her bicycle without training wheels last week! We tried early in the summer, but she just wasn't ready. This time we decided to try on a whim and she took off without a problem. She was off riding like a pro with the first push. I've been working on editing that video to share it so hopefully it'll be up soon. She was so proud of herself! At school she's really excelling as well. We do still struggle with the motivation and daydreaming issues, but it's obviously not affecting her grades. She got her mid-term progress report on Friday and so far her averages are 100, 100, 100, and 98. The 98 was in math. She was sitting at the table when I was looking over her progress report. I went through each one and called out the grade. When I got to the 98 she very incredulously, with a definite questioning tone, asked "98?!" We all got a good laugh out of that for a moment. Ok, but this is only 1st grade, so I won't be letting my guard down anytime soon. Still have to keep an eye on this one. One more thing about Paige-I'm beginning to wonder if she has allergies. She's been coughing like crazy every night. It's been pretty terrible and she wakes up looking exhausted. This happens EVERY single year and the Dr has never been able to give any explanations. I called and talked to the nurse today. She asked about allergies and suggested that maybe I could give some OTC allergy meds a try to see if that helps. So, tonight I gave her Claritin (non-drowsy allergy meds) about an hour before bedtime. I could not believe it when Kaeli came down to tell us that Paige had fallen asleep while they were reading. Not a single cough! I went up to actually get her in bed and she was completely out and never once coughed. A couple of hours later and I still haven't heard a cough! This would be sooooooo awesome if a dose of allergy meds every night fixes this coughing problem!

Ryan-quite honestly, there's not a whole heck of a lot going on with him. He's loving school now. Last year he would ask if he had to go to school and start crying if I said yes. This year he says "I not mind". Then when we get to the school his teacher is usually waiting at the door. He will literally run all the way up the sidewalk until he gets to her. We have to keep reminding him not to run. The first day he did that I actually teared-up a little. There was just something very sentimental about watching my BIG boy run off to greet his teacher without so much as a glance back at me. Natalie, his speech therapist, is just amazed by him. She can't believe how well he's doing now! It's pretty amazing to see how far we've come in only 6-8 months. These days he's just working on adding more words to his sentences and how to say multisyllable words more fluently. But, there's probably not a day that goes by when he doesn't surprise in some way or another. In fact, his memory has been shocking me lately. He's been workng on memorizing bible verses for AWANA. I cannot believe how quickly he learns the verses!! And, he actually LOVES to practicing them! He's one sweet, adorable little boy!

AJ--what do I say about him? AJ is just about the most lovable 2 yr old in the whole entire world.....and just about the most frustrating 2 yr old in the whole entire world. There are some moments that I want him to freeze at this stage and never grow older. Then there are, of course, days that I keep wishing he'd grow up faster. He's so affectionate and loves to give hugs and kisses. Sometimes he'll give me a tight hug completely unprompted. His signing vocabulary grows daily! He has really caught on to signing so much more quickly that the other kids ever did. Of course, I have been using it more regularly with him. But, it's still amazing how quickly he picks up new signs and starts using them for real communication. I can't even describe how thrilled I am that we can use signing for communicating. He does try to use words, but they are so off most of the time that I'd have no idea what he was saying without the accompanying signs. He's taking a huge interest in the potty and will often ask to sit on the potty. He knows exactly what he's doing and will usually produce a little bit of peepee when he does sit on the potty. We just might start considering real potty training within the next few months!! Could it be?.......might I actually get to a point where I won't have to buy diapers????? Of course, I will continue having to buy pull-ups for a while, but no diapers would be amazing!

Other than the kids, I just got a call from my mom today!! She's coming to visit for a long weekend Oct 16-19!! My mom lives too far for it to be considered driving distance so we rarely get to see each other. I'm very excited to see her again! It has been so long! I told the girls about it today and they were very excited as well.

I'm sure I could write tons more since it's been so long, but I will stop there. I really have to get myself in bed! I will make it a priority to get at least one of the videos on here within the next week.

Could they be any more different?

All 6 of us attended open house at the kids' school tonight. It went well....considering that we have 4 kids with one in the terrible twos. They only had 2 sessions so we went to Kaeli's and Paige's classes for the whole speech and just dropped in look to at Ryan's class really quick.

Ryan's teachers said he's a pleasure. While he's mostly quiet, he does participate in class and even raises his hand to get called on.....how sweet!

The thing that is so interesting to me is how night and day different Kaeli and Paige are as far as schoolwork goes. I didn't get a chance to talk to Kaeli's teacher tonight but I have talked to her recently-last week, I think. Paige's teacher was the one I was so glad to talk to. Her teacher hasn't been exactly stellar in the communication department. I feel like she could be giving more information since we are dealing with 1st graders. So, I got a few questions answered about the weekly vocab list and about when I should expect homework. I knew Paige was getting vocab words every week, but I didn't know what she was expected to do with them. Fortunately, she just needs to be able to read then on sight. She's a pretty good reader already so that hasn't been a problem. But, I did find out that she's supposed to have homework every weeknight--according to Paige she doesn't. I know last night she didn't bring any home. I also found 4 half-finished papers in her desk. I showed them to her teacher and found out it's morning work that Paige isn't completing (even though I know she has plenty of time). Paige's attitude toward all of it? A shrug of the shoulders and a little, sweet "oops". This is so incredibly different than Kaelil that I don't quite know how to handle it. Kaeli is obviously a type A personality. It drives her crazy to forget to do something. Not only does she does what's excpected, but she often goes beyond the expectations. She's soooo self-motivated that his made my job al ittle too easy, I think. Now, here I'm dealing with Paige who is absolutely opposite. I realize that I will just have to be in CONSTANT contact with Paige's teacher in order to keep her motivated. Her teacher is also going to stay on Paige a little more and have her stay in for recess and complete any work she doesn't turn in. I told her to do whatever it takes to get her in gear with taking more responsibility for herself. I taught way too many 7th graders with this problem. I think it'll be alot easier for us to correct this problem now than when she's in the older grades when this behavior can heavily impact a grade. But, I have to say, I wish I could have her "oh well" attitude a little more. She puts no stress on herself and rarely does she allow anything to really bother her....doesn't really sound like a bad way to go through life, though, does it?

At least I can let myself off the hook and stop blaming myself for Kaeli's almost neurotic approach to schoolwork. I can't imagine any stronger evidence for the theory that kids just come into the world with a certain amount of persoanlity already set. I wonder which one Ryan and AJ will be most like?

At least I can recharge a car battery now

The DVD player in my car has created a very bad habit for me. First of all, it automatically comes back on and starts up in exactly the spot it left off when I restart the car. The kids have now watched "The Lion King" a gazillion times--and they still can't get enough of it. When we get home from a quick trip AJ always wants to stay in the car to keep watching the movie. The bad habit is that I actually let him. I pull into the garage, close the garage door, and just leave the car ignition in the "on" position (so the car isn't running). I take off his seatbelt and leave the house door open so he can come in when he's ready. He ALWAYS comes in within 5-10 min and I USUALLY go out and turn the car off then--except today. I just completely forgot to go turn the car off when he came in. So, from 11:15-2:00 the car was running a DVD player. You guessed it--my car battery was dead! I called Steve and he walked me through the steps to putting the battery charger on it. Now, I have to say, I'm terrified of dealing with anything like that. But, Steve was very patient with me throughout the whole process. I didn't even hear laughing when I told him I had to put the phone down to connect the little recharger clips--although I'm sure he was laughing quietly to himself. I had to put the phone down so that if something bad happened I could react quickly without worrying about the phone. I know, my mind goes crazy with all the things that could go wrong. I'm very pleased to report that nothing bad happened and I got everything connected just right with no injuries.

But, while the battery was recharging I had to walk to the school to pick up the girls. Fortunately, we are less than a mile from the school. The problem was that before naptime Ryan scraped the back of his heel. I had forgotten about the scrape, but he certainly had not. When I tried to put his shoe on that foot he SCREAMED and wouldn't allow me to come anywhere near him with the shoe because he was afraid it would hurt his booboo. The problem was that we only have a single stroller now. AJ had to ride in the stroller and Ryan couldn't wear his shoe so he couldn't walk or ride his bike. Just as I was about to throw my hands in the air and cry, I saw the wagon. WHEW! It wasn't fun dragging a wagon all the way to the school, but at least we did all get there and in time.

As soon as I got home, the car started right up. Many lessons were learned today. I hope I never have to use the skill again, but at least I do know how to recharge a car battery now.

Update to the guinea pig bite

The bite looked better this morning so I decided AJ didn't need to see the Dr. Also, I did a little online research--I know, shocking!! haha--and found that infection from guinea pig bites are uncommon. That doesn't mean I won't keep my eye on it, but it's comforting to know the odds are on our side.

Other than that, nothing interesting going on arond here. Paige is having significantly less problems with sleep. She's only complained of a few stomach aches. Kaeli loves her teacher and her class. Ryan is even going to school without any crying. All in all, life is good.

Guinea pig bite

Wouldn't you know that a biting guinea pig is very rare and we seem to have one! To give the guinea pig the benefit of the doubt, I don't think he really meant to BITE. I think he was planning to have a nice juicy sausage for snack. Yesterday, AJ was sitting on the floor without shoes on while the guinea pig was running around on the floor. Completely unprovoked (or so I hear-I wasn't in the room) the guinea pig came up and took a bit out of AJ's big toe. There was a good bit of blood and the cut seems to be fairly deep. But, we cleaned it up as best we could, put some neosporin on it, and covered it with a band-aid. I just took the band-aid of a little while ago. It's not TOO terrible looking, but doesn't look great, either. Right around the bite area it's kind of a purplish, whitish color and then there is a big red ring around that. I'm thinking the purplish area may just be bruising, but I don't know for sure. But, the fact that it looks a little bad now has me thinking about how much bacteria was probably introduced into that bite area. Just the thought of a deep-ish bite wound from a hairy little rodent now has me a little weirded out. I've decided, to be on the safe side, I'll take him to the Dr tomorrow. At least I'll feel better if he tells me there's nothing to worry about.

What have I been up to?

I've been creating a new blog! I enjoy writing and I enjoy sharing with others. In a nutshell? I love blogging! But, with all the very personal info on this site, it wasn't exactly conducive to sharing with the whole world. Well, now I've created a new blog that is completely separate from this one. I will continue to update this blog on a personal basis so not much will change for my family and close friends. Just keep reading here for the mundane details of our everyday life.

Because I do have a category of posts on my new blog about some of the anecdotal situations with the kids I am creating a link from this blog to the new one that will take you specifically to those posts. The link will be just before the posts themselves on this blog. At this point, I don't know how often I will be adding to that section. Just check periodically to see if I've added anything new.

AJ's first two word sentence-kind of

AJ just came up to me and did the signs for "eat" and "more" back to back to ask for more crackers!! That is his first official two word sentence--even if it is in sign language instead of actual speech. The reason this is significant is because it means his level of understanding speech is right on target for an almost 2 yr old. I'm also impressed because he took two signs that he knows and formulated a plan in his head for how to use those to get what he wanted. I'm not exactly surprised he was able to do this because he's always seemed fairly intelligent. But, it is definitive proof that he's where he needs to be and that as soon as his ability to form words catches up with his understanding his speech will take off at lightning speed. Not unlike his older sister and brother, of course.

I must say, this late speech development becomes easier and easier to deal with the more you go through it. Kaeli started talking right at 2, Ryan at 3......chances are I wouldn't get too concerned about AJ until age 4. But, I'm confident it won't take him that long. He already has several words and will try to say lots more words--they just sound nothing like the target word. But, the important thing is that he's trying and he IS communicating! One thing I find funny is that AJ's word for train is exactly the same as Ryan's first word for train. The word he uses is "eee". We never understood why Ryan chose such an unusual substitution for the word. But, even more strange to me is that AJ has chosen the exact same substitution. (Ryan does say it correctly now, so it didn't come from hearing Ryan-I don't think). Interesting!