It's all fun and games...

The kids were messing around at dinner the other night. I said, "It's all fun and games"

As in the phrase "It's all fun and games until someone gets their eye poked out." I just didn't finish the phrase.

Deklan immediately piped up with, "Yeah - it's all fun and games when you tell someone they lost an eye!"

Special Boy

Deklan decided to be in the talent show - telling jokes. He's telling the banana joke: "Knock, Knock. Who's there? Banana. Banana who? Knock, Knock. Who's there? Banana. Banana who? Knock, Knock. Who's there? Banana. Banana who? Knock, Knock. Who's there? Orange. Orange who? Orange you glad I didn't say banana?" and a skeleton joke: "Why don't skeletons watch horror movies? They don't have the guts!"
We had "dress" rehearsal on Friday afternoon. When it was Deklan's turn, the teacher in charge seemed a little irritated. I assumed it was because she was trying to get all these students up and practice within a short time. However, when we left, Hayleigh said, "I don't think she liked Deklan very much." I thought I was the only one reading into that - but like I said she was busy. So I just asked Deklan if he liked her. He said yes he likes her just fine. Then I asked if she likes him.
He said, "Yes. I'm special to the school though."
O..K.. "Why do you say that?"
"Because everyone knows who I am - even kids that aren't in my grade. I think the teachers must tell everyone my name or something. But I know I'm special to the school."
"Why do you say that?"
"Because they treat me different than the other students."
"How?"
"They just do."
"So how do they treat you different than they treat Dillon?"
"Not just Dillon - ALL THE OTHER STUDENTS."
"OK - how do they treat you different?"
"Nevermind - you don't understand. I just know I'm special to the school."
Ok - I know I want him to have the special advantages that he needs to function normally in his gen ed class but have I made such a big deal that now they treat him differently. Nope - I think he just has such a great personality that everyone knows who he is. The teachers don't talk about him except to say what a great kid he is. That's what I'm going to believe - it works for Deklan, why not me?!
Back to the talent show... He did a great job. Everyone laughed and did the "Who's There?" part of the knock, knock joke back to him. It was great.
Here's a picture - taken from my phone so it isn't the best but you get the idea of how cute he looked on stage.

A joke

Why did Tigger look in the toilet?
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He was looking for Pooh!

Don't want to go to school

So, Deklan is in his "I don't want to go to school" mode again. I think I'm one of the few that actually may dread the 3-day weekend. It's always tough to get him back into his school routine. Yesterday was bad. He almost wouldn't let me get him dressed - it was a struggle. He wouldn't let me put his shoes on him. He wouldn't put on his coat. He wouldn't get his back pack. And he wouldn't go out to the bus. I finally gave in and told him that if he would just get on the bus I would pick him up after school. I know - bribery is NOT a good thing. Sometimes it's the only way for me. In the meantime, while trying to pull him out the door while he's kicking and screaming, the dog gets out. She's a rat terrior and LOVES to run! We live in an apartment so we have no back fence. I thought I was going to be scraping dog off the road way. If I hadn't been so mad that Deklan was throwing a fit and even angrier that the dog got out, I probably would have been extremely scared. She nearly got hit 3 times - with the kids watching too. After the bus left, I got the dog into the house - again with bribery! - with a hot dog. I left the door open, broke up a hot dog, threw a piece to her, put the rest on the floor where she could see them and then I sat and waited. She sat at the open doorway and whined. Finally the pull of the food brought her in and I closed the door. Then I gave her a whipping and sent her to bed. She pretty much slumped around all morning because she knew I was mad. But back to not wanting to go to school. Deklan was literally in tears. I asked him what was going on that he didn't want to go. He said that his friends disappear when they're playing. I said you mean they don't want to play with you and leave? No, they play with me. But when we're playing we run and when they turn they disappear. So they run away from you? NO! They run but when I get to where they turned at then they've disappeared. Mommy's translation: 1. Deklan can't run as fast as his friends. Already aware of that. 2. His "friends" decide they don't want to play with Deklan and run away. Since he can't keep up, they go play with someone else. Mommy couldn't really say a whole lot - I just held him while he cried. But my heart was breaking for sure.

The psychologist met with Deklan's teacher on Friday last. I'm meeting with the psychologist this Friday to get a run down of what was discussed and any ideas she may have for us. One thing we've been working on is the potty training issue. We've worked really hard and he's doing better - not perfect, but better. Anyway, the teacher emailed me yesterday and said that the potty training was discussed with her. She and the nurse are going to work together to implement an incentive program with Deklan. For every day that there are no accidents Deklan will get a sticker on his chart. For a week's worth of stickers he'll get extra/special time at the end of the week. I think it sounds pretty good. Hopefully Deklan will continue to do well with the training.

It's Cookie Time Again!

The Girl Scouts are selling cookies. Saturday was our first day of selling cookies here in our region. That means Friday night was our Cookie Kick-off. That's where we pack as many Girl Scouts, ages kindergarten through seniors, into a room and see who survives. Ok, not really. But we do get all the troops, as many as we can, from our region and have a cookie party, in essence. There are craft booths, choose your favorite cookie booth, sample our new cookie booth (Daisy Go Rounds this year), and practice your cookie pitch with pretend house doors booth. We also have a "Celebrity Chef" event. The local celebrities team with a local girl - usually a top seller from some of the troops - and they build a cookie cake with ingredients provided. Each celebrity has a different cookie that they build with. The girls' screams determine the winner. The kids get a lot of fun out of this event every year. I'm sure some adults do too. I don't think I'm one of them. Probably because I have Deklan with me. We spent nearly an hour just at the coloring page table so he could use every marker in the bucket on his picture. Ok, it wasn't really EVERY marker, but it sure felt like it. I also had to change him once and take him to the bathroom twice. By the time I got back to the chair, I was ready to sit. Hubby was there with me but he wasn't really much help until I told him it was his turn. Somehow his turn never lasts as long as mine. Oh well. On the plus side, I had the girls out before noon selling cookies. They already have over a 100 sold. Both girls are selling - separate sides of the road, so we're going to split the cookies this year so they each get a good chance of meeting their goals. They'll earn more credits when they do the booth sales. The credits can go either towards camp or the council shop - that's how they got their uniforms for this year was from their credits from last year.

Oldest daughter

Youngest daughter

Deklan and Daddy

Oldest and our troop - hers and mine as co-leader

Crowd pictures

So... did I mention Deklan had the flu? Well, now that it's over Deklan is having major potty training issues. It's not like he wasn't having some issues anyway. Now - it's near impossible to get him to go to the toilet. I took him to the psychologist again - have I mentioned that I love her? Her first suggestion was NO PULL-UPS except at bedtime. Uh-Oh. Deklan would prefer pull-ups every day if it were up to him. Especially if he has one accident then he likes to change into pull-ups. I'm just as guilty. I prefer the pull-ups too, anticipating an accident. He has had an accident every day since Christmas break. Her next suggestion - which will be more difficult - is to have a Potty Party. You heard me, a Potty Party. Spending a whole weekend putting him on the toilet every hour on the hour and having him sit there for at least 5 minutes. Let him eat and drink whatever he wants - that way he'll need to go to the bathroom anyway. Then let him know that if he goes potty in the toilet that he can have more of his favorite snack/drink. And when he goes potty we celebrate - a Potty Party - in essence. We were going to do it this weekend but I just found out that Deklan has a Boy Scout meeting Saturday and the girls start Cookie sales too. There's no way that we'll be home long enough to celebrate. I may be able to start it Sunday afternoon and continue into Monday - no school Monday so it may work.

The psychologist is interested in doing in-class observation and also meeting with the teacher - which she'll do on Friday. I'm anxious to see what happens there. I know the teacher doesn't really think that Deklan has a disability. She believes in tough love - her words exactly. I'll back up to Friday. We had a meeting with the psychologist, Shani. I was very concerned with the potty training issue especially since Deklan had at least one accident at school and came home wet - no one even noticed apparently. Also because he was having accidents - sometimes 2 or 3 - every day at home. I don't always take Deklan back to school after appointments, depending on what time we get finished. In this case we were finished before 10 so I felt guilty keeping him home. I took him to school - we made it in the door ok, down the hall alright, to the classroom no problem. THEN it was meltdown mode. "Don't leave me" - "I want to go home" - "stay". I convinced him to let me talk to the teacher for a minute in the hall but then he came out too and leached onto me. He grabbed my shirt and wouldn't let go. I got him to his desk but he still wouldn't let me go. I was thinking about just taking him home and not leaving him, although I had plans for later that morning and an afternoon appointment. Her comment was to the effect of you're not going to take him are you. When I said I wasn't sure but maybe. She said she believed in tough love and didn't go for the manipulation from the kids. That rather irritated me. I finally left - Deklan was crying and it killed me. But I know that once I leave he's usually fine within a few minutes. USUALLY. About 45 minutes later I get a call from the school. It's the OT. She's had to get Deklan because he was standing in the hall screaming and refused to quiet and do his work. She had taken him to her room, given him the spelling test he was supposed to be doing, and then agreed to let him call me if he would quit screaming. He asked me to come back. I couldn't - plans and appointments, but told him if my appointment finished in time I would. That sufficed - he calmed down and I didn't get anymore calls. I made it back to the school as the busses were leaving so I didn't get to pick him up. I did meet him at the bus when he got home though. I let Shani know what had happened so she's even more interested in meeting the teacher and observing Deklan in the classroom. So I get an email from the Special Ed teacher saying that next time we come in late that she should come down and get him from the office. Maybe they'll go to her room for a few minutes before going to class. OK with me - wait, I think I tried that once and she didn't do anything but come to the office, walk me to the classroom and then just stand there while Regular Ed teacher unhooked him from me. Yeah - we'll see how that goes.

Subject change - let's talk about me. :) I was VP of the Parent Brigade (PTO) at my daughter's middle school. Was is the operative word here. Before Christmas the President became overwhelmed with life in general and resigned. I didn't know that until after the fact. She and I are friends so she had called me, said, "I think I'm going to resign but I'm going to talk to the principal, I don't know what I'll do." That was the beginning of December. The middle of December I get a call from the Treasurer saying the President "has resigned are you going to be able to do the job?" Uh, WHAT?! Calming down, calming down... "Yeah, it's my job, I'll take over - what needs to be done?" Needless to say, it's been a busy month. I guess things just weren't getting done the way they were supposed to. No committees had been formed for the different activities and upcoming events, concessions for the games was a mess, no one knows what our inventory is supposed to be. We had a meeting - me, the principal, treasurer, and two other Parent Brigade members plus the old president who moved on to the high school this year. She's been a big help actually. It's been interesting, fun actually. The first thing we did was decide what we needed to do. Then I went home and sent out a mass email to all the parents that I have contact information for. Then I became the person in charge of concessions inventory so, after every game I go to the school and take inventory count - about 45 minutes to an hour if I do an accurate count. That's ok because I have the time. Last night was our monthly parent meeting. It lasted over an hour. This was the first one since I took over as president and we had a lot of new business to discuss. Anyway, that's one big thing that has been taking up my time. The second being that I am now also assistant cookie manager for the Girl Scout service unit. Yep, it's that time of year again - Cookies! So, I've had a couple of training sessions and lots of communication with the troop leaders. It really takes up more time than one would think. But it's worth it for the girls.

Last week was when the kids started back to school. My friend took her vacation from Christmas until January 11. We got together every day. We had so much fun. Monday we didn't because that was her birthday and she had plans. Tuesday we scrapbooked. Wednesday we worked on Girl Scout troop plans. Thursday we scrapbooked. Friday we just hung out and she went to my appointment with me in the afternoon. And, mostly, we just laughed and had a really good time. She's nearly 17 years older than me but we get along extremely well - there is no age difference to us. It's really nice to just be able to hang out with someone and have so much fun. We actually see each other a lot. And our daughters are best friends so that makes it really good too. Well, I think that's about a full update. Hope everyone has a great day - or week, if I don't blog again until next week.

Holiday Catch Up

Let's start with Christmas break. It was good - didn't go ANYWHERE! Although the break didn't start out so well. 2 days before break Deklan got the flu. It took him over a week to get over it. Things got better though... The girls actually convinced us to open the "big" presents a week before Christmas. The kids went Christmas shopping and couldn't wait to hand them out. We figured since it was OUR Christmas we could celebrate it any day we wanted. So, we had two Christmases - opened presents that day and then gave the smaller presents on Christmas day. It was fun. The girls each got a cell phone for Christmas. No, the younger one really doesn't need it, nor does she really use it - except to tattle on big sis. We got them because they're affordable on my existing plan and I was tired of them using my phone to text their friends. That's mainly what they do, TEXT. I also have a family allowance option for minutes and can block any calls from evening until morning. That means they can't sneak the phone and still talk to their friends all night. Smart, huh?



Deklan got a "Kid's Tough Digital Camera" which he loved. Check out some of his excellent photography.




What did mommy get? I got socks from middle daughter, a beautiful Mom locket from oldest, and... ready? kisses and a Sonic Vanilla Coke from Deklan. I loved it all. From Hubby, you ask. A portable GPS Tom-Tom. I love it, love it, love it! I am the worst person in the world when it comes to directions. I cannot get the north/south thing down for the life of me. We live right between two interstates - 135 & 235. I get mixed up on which interstate to take just going to appointments. This Tom-Tom is excellent - it even gives directions in left/right talk, not north/south. Anyway, love it! Hubby got a memory card for his XBox 360 - it was expensive so all went in together for it. I got him a digital measuring device - which he'll probably never use because that requires work outside of work. Just kidding :) We still haven't had Christmas with my brother yet so there's still more to come. Yea!

Next came birthday parties. December 27th was the evening we celebrated both girls' birthdays. Unfortunately, it snowed like crazy that day so there weren't as many girls as we'd expected. BUT the girls had lots of fun. Oldest got her skull cake and Middle got her Tinkerbell cake.

The New Year was nothing special either... at least for me. Oldest might have a different point of view. She had her first kiss! WAAA! She's way too young for any kissing. I guess it was pretty innocent but she was still kind of excited. She went to a New Year's party at one of her best friend's. The friend's step brother decided he liked Oldest. At midnight he leaned over and kissed her for a Happy New Year. Innocent enough, I guess.

That's the quick holiday update. Hope everyone is having a great beginning to a new year.