Prayers for a Friend

Last week a high school friend (actually high school couple) of mine published a new blog to follow the medical adventures that they are going to be on with their son Andrew. At the end of March, Caryn and Shawn found out that their oldest son, Andrew, has Perthes Disease. Caryn has put a great website on their blog that describes Perthes so I won't even try to explain all of it, but in short, Perthes is a condition in which there is a temporary loss of blood supply to the hip. This loss of blood supply causes the rounded head of the femur (the " ball " of the " ball and socket " joint of the hip) to die. It is reversible, but it will take time to get there... and as with any injury or therapy, it's going to feel worse before it starts to get better. That statement just does not resonate well with parents when it's referring to their children, so my heart goes out to them during this struggle with Andrew.

I have put a link to their blog in the list on the left. It's called Andrew's Journey. If you don't check in on them periodically, please just keep them and Andrew in your prayers for a speedy and full recovery with limited "roller coaster rides" throughout the process!

Sweetest Thing

As I was walking out of Trevor's room tonight he quietly said, "I love you, Mama."

Now, normally by the time a child is 3 1/2 you get to hear that from them all the time; however, Trevor typically needs to be prompted to say it back. And lately, he's been in the mind-frame that he can only love or be friends with one person at a time. After I say, " I love you, Trev" he'll respond with, "but I love Daddy." So, to hear him say it on his own tonight just melted my heart.

Happy Secretary's Day

At Ethan's school they decided to "surprise" their secretary and shower her with gifts from those that she helps each and every day. She is a wonderful woman and Ethan decided he wanted to take her flowers. Along with the flowers, he wroter her a special note all by himself. He felt so proud carrying these into school the morning of Secretary's Day.

Why Have It??

Why, if it continually fails, are we all so caught up on technology that is in our world today? Why? Wouldn't it just be simpler to forego using the technology, but know that what you do use, whether it be a paper and pencil, or old school cameras, or a rotary dial telephone, will work when you go to pick it up and use it? I am so frustrated with things not working and when you go to figure out what's wrong, there is seemingly no solution available to the "Plain Jane" that is trying to figure it out herself. You have to call this number or that number, then sit on hold for 30 minutes while some computer generated "person" tries to direct your call by asking a series of "Yes", "No", or "I don't know" questions. Seriously, some days I wish we could just go back to the days when things were not so technology driven!!!


Whew.... there's my rant. And what brings it on this particular Sunday? Well, did you read my previous post about "Catching Up". Well, I am doing just that. I have all my 2008 photos renamed and backed up onto a CD. Then, today, I was going to continue on and get them onto the external hard drive that, oh, by the way, only works on our laptop because it is newer than our old desktop computer. Yes, another technology blunder. So, I have to put the pictures on CD and then use the CD in our laptop to transfer the pictures to the hard drive. I bought the hard drive just before leaving Utah and used it just as I explained for some of the photos... so I know it worked with the laptop. Notice I said WORKED! I went to plug it in today and it says that the driver of the device need to be formatted! WHAT????? I've already used it, already have files on it. So why must it be reformatted?  If I have to reformat the driver, all will be lost. Now, if we had put the hard drive on the moving truck and it was bounced around, heated and cooled, I might understand that something went astray. However, we hand packed it into one of our bins in the van and it was never moved the whole trip and it's been sitting in my bedroom ever since we arrived in Missouri.

So, answer me this.... how can something that was working prior, was hand packed (in its original box with all the "packaging" pieces so it didn't get knocked around), and hasn't been used since the last time it was used less than 1 ago be broken? These are the type of questions we never had to answer when things were simple. There was less technology, but things just worked...
 
(ok - so maybe I'm exaggerating a bit.   I do remember things just "not working" when I was a kid too, but not nearly as much as now.  Not nearly as much.)

Rainy Day Fun

It's another rainy day. Rick left for quick trip to WI. Those two statements together mean that I need to find activities for the boys to do so they don't get on each others' nerves as the day goes on. So, off to the cupboard to reference my handy dandy book entitled, "The Toddler's Busy Book" by Trish Kuffner. I have come to LOVE this book.

Today's finds in the book included "Tape City" and "Mini Olympics".

Tape City was so very simple and all you needed to be willing to do was waste a bit of masking tape. The boys made me go above and beyond just the masking tape when they asked for a bridge that could jump over water. Hmmm... added a couple books and some blue construction paper and viola - we had a jump over water. That sparked the creativity and we then made a tunnel (an empty granola bar box), an off road section (tape that went over a folded up towel), and a parking lot for the vehicles that needed a rest. Simple, yet fun for the car enthusiasts in the house.

The Overall Track

The Parking Lot

The Off-Road Towel

The Tunnel

The Over-the-Water Jump

Mini Olympics was even simpler than the Tape City. A bulls-eye drawn on a piece of newspaper or construction paper. Put it on the floor and then find discs (small paper plates) to throw at it in hopes of landing on the bulls-eye. Also, can use javelins (straws) to spice things up a bit. Again, nothing too hard to put together, but Ethan and Trevor thought it was fun to be able to throw things that don't normally get thrown - especially in the house!

The last thing they decided to play (for quite some time, I might add) was titled by them, "Bunk Bed". The time between dinner and bedtime was quite blissful due to this little game they made up. Ethan decided to get all Trevor's blankets and pillow from the bed and brought them into his room. They then set up Trevor's "bed" under Ethan's bed. So, in reality Trevor was sleeping on the floor, but he thought it was the greatest thing EVER. They had wake-up morning time, bed time, reading time, etc.... all dictated by Ethan. Big brother Ethan was the master of this game. Telling little brother what to do (in a fun voice) was his idea of a great time! And Trevor loved it, too. Bless his heart for taking direction from Ethan for over an hour.

Catching Up...

Now, those of you that have been reading my blog in the past, might think I am going to be posting a bunch of things from the past right now.  And I'd have to admit, that would be a great guess, as my "catching up" title may suggest just that.  However, I am being sneaky this time and it is in no way related to my blog catching up (although, I do need to do that one of these days).  I, my friends, am catching up on backing up all my old pictures. And when I say "old", I mean OLD!!!   I download pictures to our computer in order to free up space on my camera disc, but then forget or just don't have the time to back them up onto CD or the external hard drive.  So, the pictures get off my camera, but get stuck on the computer. 

They get so stuck that I am just now, in April 2010 - yes, 2010 - backing up pictures from as far back as 2007!  2007.  Can you believe it?  I am terrible!  But our computer is running a bit slower lately (I can't imagine why....) and I have this fear that with the nasty storms that come through this part of the country our computer is going to get wiped out somehow this summer! 

So, I am on a mission.  First, back up onto CD and then onto the external hard drive!  And if I can open both of those media then it will be DELETE, DELETE, DELETE off the computer.  I can only imagine how quickly the computer will run after it has 75% of the current files taken off of it! 

I just finished 2007 and have part of 2008 completed on the CDs.  Just a couple more years to go.  HA!

Trevor's One-Liners

Trevor has been a man of few, no MANY, words lately.  And not just the normal 3 year old words.  He's been coming up with some doozy responses lately.  Here are just a few of them...

We were in Aldi's one day, waiting in the checkout line.  Trevor was looking at the stuff in the aisle, as he normally does, and asked for a candy bar.  Of course, being the mean mom that I am, I said, "No, you can't have one."  His response, without even looking at me (but getting up and not asking for one again) was "OK, whatever."   My mom and I (and the lady in the next aisle) could not help but laugh.

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I took one of Trevor's toys or something away that made him say, "That's not fair, Mama!"  I, being the mature mom on this particular day, responded like any good, frustrated mom would and said, "Well, that's too bad."  Trevor decided to one-up me by responding, "Yep, too bad so sad."  And then he giggled.

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When grandma asked him to pick up a paper that was on the floor in the path that they were walking, he very matter-of-factly said, "It's ok Grandma, you can just walk around it."

This is What Boys Do

On a sunny Sunday afternoon, this is what you can find the boys in our family doing.  May be some variations from day to day, but there will be 2 main components.  1 - it will be something outside and 2 - it will, at some point in time, involve some type of sport.

On this particular Sunday we had some activities that were a little bit more unusual than the normal basketball, tennis, soccer, golf activities.  This Sunday included the following:

Riding the "scooters"

backwards across the driveway

and going fast enough so they could it the edge of the grass and end up like this...

Bike Riding

(this was Trevor's first day riding the bike we received from our neighbors all by himself.  He was so proud to be doing it on his own!!!)

And finally,

Fishing

with the new fishing poles from the Easter Bunny

trying to get the weighted line into this "fishing hole" (aka top of the sand turtle)...

So, when you live with boys, this is what you come to expect of nice, sunny days outside.

A Couple New Favorites

Trevor - Age 3 years 7 months

Our Self Portrait Family Style

Our Silly Faces

(ok - maybe this isn't a favorite, but I couldn't not post such a gem of a picture)

I Can Read, Too

Lately, Ethan has been addicted to reading. He loves to read and will read any label, book, or sign to us that he can. We are obviously very excited about that and so continually praise Ethan for a job well done with his reading. Trevor has caught on to this praise and so wanted to read something of his own to us....

(pause the music playing to hear Trevor's "reading")

A Conversation with Trevor

7:30am Sunday morning.

T: Mama, I want a sucker.  Can I have one?

Me: No, Trevor.  No suckers this morning.

T: But I want just one. (in that nice whiny voice that a 3 year old can have)

Me: No, Trevor.  We're not having a sucker this early in the day.  I think we need to go through Candy Detox this week.

T:  (As we're walking away from the suckers to get dressed for church.)  Is that a city we have to go to, Mama? 

Me:  Is what a city?

T: That "tox" place. 

I couldn't help but laugh out loud at him.....

Beauty is All Around

While I am still catching up on some past items that need to be written about, I wanted to give you these pictures to show some of the beauty around and near our house. Everything is in bloom here and it's just beautiful. Enjoy.....

And what house would be complete without a picture of this precious little gold "flower"??

Easter 2010

For Easter we stayed in Missouri. It's never fun being away from family at the holidays, but in Utah a group of us, misfits (aka - those of us that didn't have family around), started celebrating the holidays together. Our family away from family. Since there are several families here in Missouri that are "misfits" right along with us we decided to start the tradition of the holidays with them as well. Easter at our house included 8 adults and 8 children this year. Thankfully, it was a beautiful day outside. Breezy, no WINDY day, but still nice enough that we could all be outside rather than stuck in the house.

Everyone arrived around 3pm and we had munchies and snacks until dinner was ready. All the food that everyone brought was delicious - kinda makes me want Easter Dinner all over again just thinking about it! We had an egg hunt around the house before dinner, the kids (and adults) played basketball, the itty-bitty sandbox was utilized and everyone had a good time (as far as I know). We haven't known everyone all that long since we're here less than a year, but it was so nice to celebrate the holiday with friends. Hopefully we can continue these friendships and celebrations and this will be our Missouri family away from family. Thank you all for sharing the afternoon with us!

I Have Failed

Remember my post about making my 2009 blog book by March 22nd. That time has come and gone and I still do not have it done. Not only do I not have it done, I have not worked on it but for 1 hour since the day I wrote my first post about it. UGH. Thankfully shipping is not all that expensive, so I'll just go ahead and finish it when I have time and then order it. So much for hoping that writing a goal down so everyone could see it would be motivation for myself. Obviously didn't make one iota of difference....

Random Tip #8

One day a couple weeks ago, I was standing at the counter cutting up onions and Trevor was standing right next to me. Now, I don't know about you, but I not been able to find a full proof way to cut onions without crying. I've tried many things and I thought the whole chewing gum while cutting them was going to work for me. It had worked in the past, but this time, it failed me. And it failed miserably!! My eyes were dripping with tears. Dripping. Literally. Dripping. Trevor, who was very concerned as to why I was "crying" (bless his heart) was standing right next to me. Did he have a tear in his eye? Was his nose dripping because of the onion? No. No, nothing. He was not affected at all. I was standing there, eyes dripping, trying to open my eyes as wide as possible so I could actually see what I was cutting. And he was standing there looking as if I was cutting strawberries or a block of cheese. No tears, no nothing! So that brings me to....

Random Tip #8

If you are sly at convincing your children to do some "not-so-desirable" jobs, get them to cut onions for you.

C - C - S

H. E. L. P.

Please HELP!

I need HELP immediately!

I have a child that has CCS (aka Crabby Child Syndrome)!

And I don't know what to do about it.

Not just the normal crabby because they're tired or sick.

All out crabby.

Throwing fits because his slice of cheese ripped.

Screaming because he doesn't have ENOUGH toothpaste on his toothbrush.

Thrashing on the floor because he wouldn't pick out one of the 3 shirts he had a choice of so Mom decides to just put one of them on. Thrashing, screaming, tantrum.

H. E. L. P.

Any suggestions with how to deal with this type of behavior would be much appreciated because as I've mentioned, I have a child with CCS. And honestly, I don't think that screaming back at him, putching his hand/leg, or making him sit in his room all day are appropriate things to do on a daily basis.

Did I mention I need

H. E. L. P.

?????

My Helpers

We had a beautiful day yesterday and I took advantage of it by washing some of the windows that had finger prints, doggy nose prints, and whatever else might have been on them. Much to my surprise Trevor asked if he could help wash the windows. It probably had less to do with actually helping and more to do with the fact that I was outside on the deck with a bowl of water (and he didn't seem to mind the vinegar that was in it too)!

Once Trevor wanted to help, Ethan thought it would be fun too so he grabbed a rag and joined in. Pretty soon I was standing back and the boys were doing the work (or at the work for as high as they could reach - I didn't make them stand on stools to reach the top of the windows. I'm not that much of a slave driver.)   They washed.  I dried.  And we were left with streak free, slobber free, and hand print free windows.

It was great because they had fun, I accomplished my goal of getting some windows cleaned and everyone was happy! Perfect.