Update on the kids

Its been too long since I’ve devoted some serious time to each of the kids on this blog.

Ethan (5.5 years) is doing wonderful with homeschooling. He gets a lot of pleasure out of doing his schoolwork and because the lessons are short and to the point, he doesn’t have any problem keeping focused and on task. Usually lessons take anywhere from 30-60 minutes and the time just flies. He’s still very much into Star Wars and Lego and my days are peppered with questions like, “Who is stronger, Yoda or Boba Fett?”. At any given moment you will see him bouncing around the house with a light saber or toy gun playing Star Wars. He’s even gotten his little sisters into it! He recently started calling us Mom and Dad, which gave a little pang in our hearts. We weren’t ready to give up Mommy and Daddy! He loves to cuddle, and he’s often very intuitive and will know when you need a hug or encouraging word. He still loves to organize and be in charge, which are traits we noticed in him since toddlerhood. He is often slow to warm up to people. Suffering from shyness (just like me!) often makes it difficult to make friends and play easily with others. We’re working on that. Physically he’s getting so tall its unbelievable! I’ve always joked that by 10 he’d be taller than me. Recently I’ve been wondering if perhaps it’ll be even earlier than that! I’ve been so proud of how he’s adapted to his diet of no dairy or eggs. I expected a lot of complaining and trouble because he had to give up basically all his favorite foods. Instead, he’s been very conscientious and checks that all his food is safe, and even last night told me that he liked being on his diet because it made him feel better. Although he’s growing up so fast, he still is happy to curl up on your lap and snuggle. I cherish this, as I can see he simply won’t fit on my lap much longer.

I remember reading that one of the definitions of the name Gwendolyn is “bright”. This sums up our Gwennie (4.5 years). She is enjoying her pre-k class and easily picks up the material they cover. She is into all the usual girl stuff… princesses, horses, flowers, anything cute! She has many dollies that she tends to and its not unusual for her to recruit big brother in the mornings to carry her babies down the stairs and set up a little home for them first thing. She is sensitive to other’s hurts. A few days ago I had to reprimand Elsa sharply for pulling Gwen’s hair. Elsa started crying, and so did Gwen! She couldn’t bear to see her little sister getting in trouble. She is a compulsive snuggler and if your lap is free, she will spot and quickly occupy it! She was my smallest baby at birth, but she’s caught up, though her frame is so light that people always think of her as smaller than she is. She’s average in both weight and height, and is surprisingly strong! She loves her dance class and is often twirling and swirling around the house. She makes friends easily and people seem drawn to her vibrant personality.

Elsa (17 months) is our little rebel baby. She’s been so unlike our other two kids in both appearance (bright blonde hair?) and personality that we sometimes feel like this is the first time we’ve taken a baby through toddlerhood! She is speaking very well… what seems to us much better than the other kids at this age. She’s full of courage and fearless. She keeps up with her sister and brother in almost every way. Once those legs grow a little longer she’ll be able to really keep up! She also loves babies and if she sees a doll lying around, she starts pointing and yelling, “Baby! Baby! Baby!”. She enjoys talking on the phone and sometimes will bring the phone to me and ask, “Nana? Jenni?” until I call up Nana or Aunt Jenni and ask them to talk to her. She is, of course, curious about everything and we are in that stage where my cupboards are emptied frequently! Elsa is now sleeping through the night and napping twice a day… a feat we didn’t think we’d EVER reach when she was an infant. She even sits patiently in her crib until you come and get her. She’s a tiny little peanut, taking after her older sister that way. Despite being my biggest baby at birth, she, like my others, grow slow at this stage. Many people think she’s around 9-12 months and are shocked that she walks! I have to admit, even to me she looks far too little to be walking :) She’s also a cuddler, but only when the timing is right. There is so much to see and do that many times she’d rather be anywhere but your lap. We can’t believe how time has flown with our little Elly-belly.

So there, an update on our three munchkins. Hopefully it won’t be so long until my next one :)

I’m getting terrible at this!

I feel bad that I’m not blogging more often. Most of you readers probably follow me on Facebook, so you’re staying informed. But I want this blog to be a chronicle for myself and the kids down the road and Facebook just isn’t gonna provide that. My current blogging rate isn’t gonna provide it either though :\

So, working backwards, I’ll tell ya what has been going on.

We went to a Mariners game with the kids and took the train from Everett to the stadium. Totally fun and the day was simply beautiful.

The cotton candy might have been the highlight for them :)

The kids love Ichiro and every player *was* Ichiro. If someone got a hit, “Yay Ichiro!”. If someone caught a ball, “Good play Ichiro!”. It was pretty funny,.

Mmm, peanuts.

 

Gwen goofing off

The lovely Safeco Field.

 

We had a good time. Gwen is definitely more interested in the game than Ethan, though he’s the one that is interested in playing it. Maybe once he starts baseball watching the game will hold more appeal.

Earlier this week we attempted to go apple picking. We went to South 47 Farms in Redmond and found the trees bare. I wasn't too happy about that as I’d called a few times, mentioning that we were coming to pick, and when we arrived and got our gear for picking, no one said a thing. They let us tromp down there with 6 little kids to find 6 edible (edible, but beat up and ugly) apples . We did find some organic heirloom tomatoes and picked some of those. They were delicious, I have to say. Overall it was quite disappointing though. Luckily, Aunt Daralyn, who lives in an apple growing area, is bringing me a box of apples next weekend so we’ll still get our fix.

Yesterday we did something very unlike us and took off at a moments notice to BrickCon (i.e. Lego Convention). I had heard about it from a friend on Facebook and thought Ethan would just love it. So down to Seattle we went.

Waiting in line. It was a very long line and it was a good thing we let Daddy hope out early and wait for us while we parked.

Smith Tower, in Lego.

Random Lego pieces that people submitted for showing.

 

Yes… that is a bra and underwear constructed of Lego!

Jason says this is Voltron (I have no idea…)

I thought this was very clever.

Gwen playing in the Build Center.

Elly spent her time playing and/or trying to escape.

You might wonder, hey, you went for Ethan… where is Ethan? Well, something about the convention did not mesh well with him. It was extremely crowded and noisy. Hard to move. He kinda had a meltdown and despite lots of distractions, he never really relaxed enough to enjoy himself so we left after an hour and played outside in the Seattle Center for a little bit. Next year we want to go again, though we will be there when the doors open so we can beat the crowds.

We’ve been pretty busy running Gwen to  pre-k 3x a week, doing lessons, and dealing with the everyday stuff. We’re getting into a groove now, which, if not making things easier, does make it more familiar. One thing I’m VERY happy to start up next week is sewing classes. The only thing I’ve sewn at all this summer is Jenni’s Sith robe. I don’t think I ever posted a picture of that… She looks very appropriately evil in it. It was both simple and complicated and I will never ever make another one again!

Anyway, I’m anxious to make Gwen some dresses, finish up that quilt I promised Shelly & Peter and maybe even make a few things for myself! I’ve determined not to buy myself any new clothes until I reach my goal weight, but I can make myself some new things to fit the new and improved body :)

Ten pounds, triumphs, and trials

That sums up our week!

I hit the 10lbs lost mark this week. It only took me 4 months :| But I’m not going to complain because 10lbs is 10lbs. I’m now working out 6 days a week, doing a mix of high-intensity cardio and sculpting. If I was more strict about my calories, I’m sure I could have lost 2x as much, but I like cooking and eating and that’s not going to change, so I wasn’t interested in going low-fat, low-carb, low-cal when I have no intention of keeping that up long term. Most workouts are 40-60 min and I’m doing them in the mornings at 5am. Not my preferred time, but its very hard to get them in during the days now with school and extra-curriculars and just LIFE. If anyone wants recommendations on good workout DVD’s, let me know. I feel like I’ve tried every single one on Netflix!

Speaking of school, everything started this week and went very well.

Gwen’s first day of pre-k. She was so excited, she even wanted me to curl her hair to look extra-fancy.

This picture is a little bittersweet to me! Last year, Ethan had to talk Gwen out of the car so she’d go in for pre-school because she was so nervous. This year, she didn’t need her big brother to tell her it was ok. She strode in, full of confidence.

Gwen getting her nametag from Ms. Paula

An old friend from last year, Katie!

Sitting next to another friend, Blake.

 

After leaving the church, Ethan and I stopped and got a coffee (hot chocolate for him) to celebrate our first day of school. We came home and took our “opening day” picture

 

He worked very hard every day at his assignments. Love the tongue!

Everything went smashing. In fact, as Ethan already knows all his numbers and letters he found the introductory lessons rather boring (they start with the assumption that you don’t know any letters or numbers). After the first day, we doubled up and will do that until we’re done with the introduction lessons.

Unfortunately, this week had more than a few stressful moments as well. Ethan has been having some constipation issues (in truth, going off and on for a year now) and this week it became clear that home remedies and waiting it out weren’t gonna cut it. We went to see our pediatrician, had an x-ray done, and found it was no wonder that the little guy was suffering so. He was backed up all the way. So we are on an intensive round of laxatives and other helps to clear things out and hopefully retrain his body to respond appropriately. Its been extremely uncomfortable for him the last few days and very hard for me to be pretty much helpless.

On a brighter note, tomorrow we are taking Ethan and Gwen to a Mariners game and taking the Sounder from the Everett train station down to the stadium. We are all SO excited to do this! Elly is going to stay with Mom overnight so she’ll have a blast too. I’m hoping the kids will be able to stay entertained through most the game, as they are playing the Yankees and I really want to be able to watch and cheer and boo and all the other fun stuff you do with the M’s play the Yankees :)

Just life.

Not too much going on as of late. Just life. Just taking each day as it comes and trying to handle it the best way.

We've made some changes in our TV and video game usage. We severely restricted the time the kids are allowed to watch and play and, of course, this means that there needs to be something else to fill that time. Its been amazing to see how cutting the TV has immediately resulted in more positive behavior and play. I've started reading them a chapter from the Little House On The Prairie series. We're in the first book, but Ethan wanted to read about boys, so I'm also doing a chapter here and there from Farmer Boy too. Just a few months ago I tried this with them and they were not interested in sitting and listening for that long. But now they eagerly sit and listen. It was funny, at first they were really bummed by the lack of pictures. We had to kind of walk them through how to use their imaginations to "see" what we're reading to them. They're very imaginative kids, but they hadn't thought to use it quite in that way. Now you can see the little wheels turning when I read something... they really are making those pictures in their minds.

Today was supposed to be our first day of homeschooling. However, all the kids and J came down with colds last night and they were not in shape to do school. I had also forgotten about some preliminary work I needed to do and so I scratched the whole thing and decided to start tomorrow, while Gwen is at pre-k.

I should get some video of Elsa and put it up here. She’s been amazing us daily it seems. She talks very well. She understands so much more than she can say. She is, as my Mom put it, quite precocious. The other day she laid down on a stool, put her hands and legs out (think Superman) and started saying, “Whee! Whee!'”. Never before had I seen her do that or say that word. How I wish I’d gotten the camera in time! Last week I was distracted during dinner so she kept chanting, “Momma, Momma, Momma, Momma”. Finally I turned and said, “Yes honey” and she showed me her food and said, “Icky!” and threw it on the floor and looked quite pleased with herself. Oh my, so hard not to laugh.

Ethan and Gwen are doing well, though both are growing up so fast mentally that its hard for us to keep up sometime. They will say something and we’ll do a double take… “They said what?”.

We make little chore charts for them and after they’ve done their work for a set amount of time with no fuss, they get a reward. Gwen wanted a tutu very badly, and we’d been looking for awhile because the kind she wanted we couldn’t find in stores. We finally ordered one online from that wonderful site of handmade things, Etsy.

Its a little big, but that’s GOOD! Its very thick and wonderful. She loves it!

Ethan’s reward was a box of Legos, which him and Daddy assembled one evening. Unfortunately, things don’t stay assembled long, because Ethan likes to play very imaginative and rough games with the figures. But that is ok. The nice thing about Lego is that you can always put them back together again :)

Gwen started dance classes at Martha La Valley School of Dance last week. You may remember that we tried her in ballroom dancing at the beginning of the summer and hated how terribly intense and involved it was. This one is just right. We got a surprise when one of the little girls in Gwen’s class was also in Ethan's preschool class last year. Its just 4 little girls and the teacher. While she was serious and kept them on track, there was lots of joy and fun in that room. Good times.

Ethan started swimming lessons on Saturday and those did not go as smooth. He got freaked out when he realized he was in a class with no one he knew and not even his sister was there. He would only put his feet in. We’re hoping that next week goes better…

I'm a year older

That's the biggest thing that has happened since I last blogged... My 31st birthday was on the 31st and I feel no older. Though it is rather weird to say I'm in my thirties now as opposed to just being thirty. I found 30 kinda hard to deal with. 31 is easy in comparison!

J and I went with my friend April and her husband Gregg to El Gaucho in Seattle for my birthday (and April's too, which was on the 2nd). Whoa, it was a high-falutin' place. We had a caesar salad made table-side (a first for us), then J and I had a New York steak carved table-side, while April and Greg had rib steak and baby back ribs, respectively. For dessert we ordered 5 things! The boys each got a chocolate ganache, April and I got table-side bananas foster (cool) and then we had to get a creme brulee to try, since its our favorite dessert. Oh we ate like pigs and had a great time doing so.

Mom and Dad had taken the kids overnight, and I got all day Monday (my actual birthday) to myself. It was good. Every now and then its very refreshing to have a span of hours to oneself.

This last week has been fairly calm and quiet. I've been having a lot of headaches for some reason. On Friday we had a whirlwind of a day. Rather unexpectedly I ran out to Aunt Margaret's house to help set up her computer, then we rushed off to Grammy's house, grabbing lunch on the way, where I dropped off the kids and hit Walmart for some schooling supplies. I got most everything I needed, except clothes. I was hoping to buy some plain t shirts for Gwen... just solid, long sleeved shirts. Instead all I could find were shirts splashed with logos, music stars and sassy sayings. I was not happy! I did end up buying two shirts (one with Disney Princess, one with Tinkerbell) that I knew I'd have trouble finding elsewhere and that she would love, but no jeans or plain t's. I've noticed that since Gwen has moved into Girl's sizing that the style is much more mature and I'm just not ok with that!

Today, the boys and girls split up. Jas took Ethan to get the oil changed in the car, haircuts, errands at Target and lunch. I took Gwen and Elly and we searched for a tutu (no acceptable ones found, thank goodness for the internet), lunch, then we went and signed Gwen up for dance classes. We've tried a few different places but didn't like them for various reasons (too intense, too much commitment, financial and otherwise). This one looks to be perfect. The teacher/owner is an older woman (probably in her late 70's) and makes everyone come in and meet her in person to register. I wondered at this, until we showed up and she wrote down, complete with old style cursive handwriting, all of our information on an index card and then put it in a file box. That is her student database! My goodness. She was a very nice lady and her love of children was shining through. From the start she couldn't stop interacting and talking with Gwen and she apologized a few times for ignoring me. She commented on Gwendolyn's name, saying it sounded like a fairytale and that she would refer to her as the "fairytale" girl. This is gonna sound like a Mommy brag (and it is), but she said that Gwen was beautiful and light and joy shined through her face. Well, I couldn't help but be pleased at such a comment :)

Full plate

A few days ago Ethan's curriculum for kindergarten showed up. At first I wasn't going to use any curriculum (or organized curriculum rather) and just continue working on his reading and reinforcing basic concepts of counting and and such. But as the time drew nearer for Gwen to start pre-k, I got more and more stressed about making sure he'd have what he should need. Its strange. I feel two completely opposite ways on this issue.

1. I feel that kids these days are pushed WAY too young and WAY too fast academically. In theory, I have no problem with delaying all "official" schooling until 7.

2. On the other hand, I see the natural desire my kids have to read and the love they have of worksheets and other typical school-like tasks. I want to take advantage of that natural desire to do those things.

So I ordered the Kindergarten curriculum from My Fathers World. Its pretty cheap (total cost is just slightly more than 1 month of Gwen's pre-k class!) and seems to be a low-key and fun paced curriculum.

My plan is to work with him while Gwen attends the church pre-k that Ethan attended last year. Both kids have gotten so much from the pre-school and pre-k classes and we wanted her to finish that out before going full time into homeschooling. Next year, I think we'll be using Sonlight and have both kids in the same "grade". I say "grade" because they won't be in grades per se but just working at their own speed through the curriculum.

Although both these curriculum that we plan on using are extremely user-friendly and require little prep-work for me, I'm still scared. Really scared. I'm scared I can't do this. No, I know I can do this... I'm scared at how overwhelmed I'm going to feel when I do this. I can't even keep on top of housework and other things I want to do (sewing, how I miss you), and now I'm adding more to the plate.

Another thing pending is changing our diet completely to help Ethan get off dairy, eggs and gluten for at least six weeks. Ideally we should be doing 3 months, but 3 months from now runs us through Thanksgiving and Christmas and I can't do that! So I'm going to aim for 6 weeks to start and that should give us a good idea of how his body is doing. That means I really need to start planning and getting an idea of what we can and can't have NOW. But the very thought makes me quiver in my boots and want to take to my bed.

In short, I'm a ball o' stress. I've not felt this consistently low and overwhelmed since I was on therapy and anti-depressants 2 years ago. I don't feel like I need to go there again, but I need to figure out a way to handle this all. My current method is not to handle it at all and push everything off to the last minute. Hence our last two camping trips in which I forgot lots of things and was mostly unprepared and waited until the day before to get anything together. I keep waiting for the morning when I wake up and feel energized and ready to take on projects again. Usually it does happen that way. One day I just wake up and feel about 1000% better.

Ft. Stevens & Blueberries!

We vacationed Thurs-Sun with April and her family, Su and her family, Kelly & Tim and Mom and Jenni at Ft. Stevens, just outside Astoria (one of my favorite places btw!). The weather was cool, as it often is there, but that didn’t dampen our fun!

There were 7 children and Ethan was the oldest, so they kept us hopping. The oldest 4 are close in age and everyone played nicely.

Group hug! (Gibson, Heather, Gwen and Ethan)

Our campsites. Mom’s tent was the blue, we were behind and to the right slightly (can’t see our tent), then April’s family. Sue was right behind where I took this picture. It worked very well for our group!

Waiting to go on the Battery Mischler tour.

Entering the Battery. It was damp, cold, totally dark and FREAKY. But really really interesting. I’d like to go again, without little ones who tired quickly of walking in a concrete maze and listening to a guy talk on and on.

Later that day, we went down to Seaside and had lunch. This is how we entertain our children until their food arrives ;)

Gwen and Elly did the annual ride on the dinky little train

Ethan preferred the self-propelled car

We had ice cream at Zingers again... can't recommend them enough. Delicious! A real treat and worth the 18% butterfat :)

Our campsite was mostly sand with a little bit of dirt and keeping the kids clean was a huge problem! I pretty much gave up by the second day. Elsa also hated her shoes so I just let her do what she wanted. She had such a hard time walking in the sand, but the shoes made it worse!

The kids roasting marshmallows

Backtracking a bit… about an hour after we arrived at the campground, Elsa tripped (those shoes!) and smashed her face on the picnic bench. She bit her lip and scratched her chin. She also bonked her nose and under-eye area, but luckily it didn’t bruise. Here she re-enacts how she felt about the incident.

Gwennie posing. First princess, then MONSTER!

Saturday we visited the Peter Iredale shipwreck (which seems much decayed over the past couple years in particular). It was a gloriously sunny day!

Elsa didn’t want to sit. She wanted to stand while Nana pushed her, thank you very much.

The kids were super brave and loved splashing in the icy waters!

Even Elly liked it!

Soaked head to toe

A self-portrait

She touched the sand this time!

My kids enjoy getting as sandy as possible. Its like a challenge to them… how much sand can we carry on our person?

Elsa took off by herself and we watched to see how far she’d go. We got nervous and sent Jenni after her, but she walked all the way to the waters edge without even LOOKING for us. She scares me!

After changing, we headed into Astoria to take the trolley. It was great fun and super cheap too!

We met up with Grandpa Les and Grandma Karen for some ice cream at Custard King. For whatever reason, Elsa HATED this flower. It was so funny! She’d be fine, but put that flower near her and she would get away as fast as possible.

On Sunday we were packing up when a scary thing happened. Jenni had the kids and was playing hide-and-seek with them in the bushes around the campsite. I was on top of the car loading the carrier and I heard Gwen scream. I thought at first she’d tripped or something, but then she kept screaming and screaming and I told Jason that he needed to check that out ASAP because that was her “really hurt” cry. Suddenly Jenni starts yelling, “RUN! RUN! RUN BACK TO CAMP”. Well as you can imagine, this gets the parents attention. Here come 4 screaming and crying children. Gwen is thrashing and out of control and we realize its bees! I jump off the car and rip off her shirt and pants. There are bees all over her and caught in her hair. Mom and Jason are trying to get them out while poor Gwen is just beside herself.

Finally we get them all out and I’m holding her and we start to count the injuries. 17 stings my little girl had :( Ethan had one (which he almost wore with pride… informing us that he was crying because he was scared, NOT because it hurt) and Gibson had 2. We immediately dosed her with Benadryl and people from all over the campground who’d heard what happened (from the screams and from the other little kids in the campground) came with various remedies. We laid her down in the front seat of the car and she napped while we finished packing up.

She recovered very quickly and by the time we’d stopped for lunch you couldn’t even see most of the stings.

All in all, a very fine trip even with our unfortunate ending :)

We haven’t done much this week beside catch up with laundry and recoup! So today I took the kids out to Mountainview Blueberry Farm and we picked berries for about an hour. We did pretty good, picking 8 lbs!

I made a white chocolate-blueberry mousse tart with some of them, then froze the rest. I got 2 gallon-sized ziploc bags of frozen blueberries plus the 4 cups I used for the tart for only 14 dollars. A steal!