17 posts tagged “littlest brother”
(Sorry -- sacrilege not REALLY intended. Just couldn't resist. Actually that was a prayer...)
This is THE BUSIEST WEEK OF OUR LIVES (and stupid ME for signing them up for so much all in the same week -- but that's when all the programs they REALLY WANTED or NEEDED to do were happening...), and probably the most challenging aspect of it is our church's Vacation Bible School, which is held in the evenings.
We changed to from daytime to evening a few years back b/c we could get so many more volunteers in the evening. But, it is really quite hard on the little kiddoes. (and isn't it supposed to be for them? -- Eh, never mind.)
Not that they're not having a wonderful time, but they get home well after their normal bedtime, and then they take a while to wind down, and then they don't sleep in in the mornings, so by today the cumulative sleep deficit was--uh, well let's just say it was CLEARLY having an impact.
Poor Eldest Son is really struggling with his allergies too, which usually manifests itself in him as a constant post-nasal drip leading to constant hacking cough, usually leading to some form of secondary infection, this time an ear infection and probably sinus too. He's on Benedryl for the allergy-cough, and antibiotics for the infection, so don't look at me like that when I tell you that I let him continue going to his activities if he feels up to it. (And so far, he has only missed one session of Science Camp -- that's how I knew he was sick in the first place, when he said he thought he was too tired for that...) So tonight he was just absolutely beside himself, just completely, completely...
Lord. Give me strength. (I mean that. Or maybe not strength, maybe patience and flexibility. Or maybe just whatever the dickens you think I need -- that usually works...)
He fell asleep tonight within about 5 minutes of being dragged up to his room -- protesting he wasn't tired. Let's just hope he really sleeps in tomorrow -- he's not real good at that.
And Princess! Man alive, that little woman was a stinker and a half today. It was like she did not understand English.
Littlest Brother was the only one of them who was remotely normal today -- and, of course, he's the one who stayed home with me last night and went to bed at his usual time. Plus he still takes naps, although this week he's getting shorted on them a bit b/c of the schedule for Precious Princess's Safety Town class. By the time we get home from dropping her off, he doesn't REALLY have enough time for a nap before we have to go pick her up again.
Ai-yi-yi, well, over the hump, anyway. Tomorrow evening's the last day of VBS, and then on Friday we have just the two camps in the afternoon -- Safety Town and Science Camp. A nice slow Friday morning will do us all a TON of good.
Plus, I'm tired, and when my sleep deficit gets high enough, well, let's just say that an outside observer could probably tell.
So g'night!
Finally downloaded my camera, and now have shots illustrating some of my recent posts. So, what follows is a whirlwind tour of my life in May; for more details, scroll down to earlier posts! ;-)
(1) Portrait of the Artist. Mentioned Eldest Son had a first-grade artwork chosen for the all-district art show. His is the fancy letter "A".
(2) Eldest Son's Rainforest display. Only two of MANY projects related to the rainforest unit, but these are the most photogenic. (He refused to pose in front of his poster.) Note, he specified in the poster that we must save the rainforestS (plural) because, as he pointed out, there are many of them, all over the world. Little Mr. Precision, that's him...
(3) Tidy Kitchen Counters!!! Yeah!!
(Note the Macaw mask in the center of this shot -- yet another rainforest project!)
(4) Memorial Day (Today), at the parade. Clearly, I should have stayed out of this shot... But the kids are cute!! :-)
(5) Precious Princess teaching her dinosaurs about addition. Note that they have each been issued with a blank sheet of paper and a sharpened pencil. The teacher of these students is prepared!
On this day that we set aside in honor of all those who have served our country, so that scenes like these can continue to occur in peace and safety,
I dedicate this post to you.
Thank you.
Everybody's all healthy now. Just been busy lately, extremely busy.
Had a riproaring week, though not in a bad way. But enough so that Dear Husband was exceedingly relieved when he asked me what was on the agenda for tomorrow night, and I said, "Nothing. You're grilling chicken breasts for dinner, and we're hanging out at home."
And enough so that I was exceedingly relieved, nay, blissed-out, when he reminded me that he is off work tomorrow. His generous employer observes Memorial Day as a 4-day holiday instead of 3, and he gets tomorrow off as well as Monday.
O.M.G., I feel like me again! I've been depressed for so long (even with the medication, I now realize -- it just made me bearable, didn't make me me), and now I'm finally, finally me again!
I got so flippin' much done this week! It's unbelievable. I actually organized the kitchen counters! On top of everything else we did this week! Now, that may not seem like much, but, come on, you all saw my kitchen counter back in February when I posted about my 15th wedding anniversary, complete with photo of my roses on my kitchen counter. And it only got worse since then, believe me.
When I found myself preparing my family's meals on the 8 or 10 inches closest to the counter's edge, because the rest of the counter was entirely covered in a foot-high mound of crap (metaphorically speaking), I said, "Girl, something's got to change."
So, hah! DID that. Check!
(I love to make lists, and check them off. It is the most deliciously satisfying feeling, making that little check mark!)
Okay, Big Kid Items since last update:
- Littlest Brother has been moved to a Big Boy Bed!
His crib and dresser/changing table having been schlepped off to Aunt J's parents, who are, even as I type, schlepping off down to Tennessee (a roughly 8-hour drive from hereabouts) to deliver said furniture along with all of the baby shower gifts to J & B in anticipation of MY FIRST NIECE's arrival next month. Yippee!!
Although I must admit to a pang as I was contemplating L.B.'s "last night in the crib" and "last nap in the crib" and so on -- the crib which has seen continual hard use by my children over the past 7-1/2 years. It served us well and truly is NOT much worse for the wear! I would definitely recommend the Childcraft brand of baby furniture.
- Continuing with the Big Boy theme, L.B. has taken to sitting on the toilet and attempting to go "peedle" first thing in the morning after we take his diaper off. And this morning he actually did it! Peedled into the potty! He was absolutely bursting with pride. So, I'm thinking potty training is on the horizon. I really detest potty training, on the whole, but I think L.B. MAY be easier than the older two were. He's SO motivated to be Big Boy.
- Eldest Son got a set of Bunk Beds! His old twin bed having been handed down to Littlest Brother. He of course insists on sleeping on the top bunk, and loves it. Absolutely adores it. Couldn't be happier.
- Also, tonight was Eldest Son's class "Rainforest" event. Their entire classroom has been decorated as a rainforest, complete with paper vines and animals, for the past month, and the children have been busy learning about, you guessed it, rainforests. They each chose an animal to become an expert on, and he chose the Macaw. He did a fabulous job at tonight's presentation, telling about the Macaw.
And, I noticed several important areas of progress for him during the related projects leading up to tonight's event. He showed new capacity for accepting adult advice, for changing his plan mid-stream when the first plan didn't work out, for continuing on a project even after he got frustrated with it -- for coming back to it after a cooling-off period and solving the problem. All of these things are tremendously encouraging for me to witness, because I know only too well from past experience how much it could have gone differently (read: worse).
And finally -- I got my first rejection from my most recent bout of story-submitting! Yeah!
And know what I did? I revamped the opening a tad bit, hoping to sharpen up the "hook". And I sent it out AGAIN, to a DIFFERENT publication! Yeah!
And I'm going to KEEP submitting it until either I use up my list of pubs that I think would be a good fit for it (in which case I'll retire it temporarily, let it rest a bit and work on some other things), OR one of them buys it! YEAH!
So THERE!
AND, last week Friday I submitted what I think is maybe my best bet yet. So, we'll see how that goes.
So, I still have 5 stories out there at this point.
And I'm wallowing in the mire of this one darned story that just keeps getting worse and worse.
Six months ago, it seemed like my best story yet. Seemed like it really didn't need much polishing in order to send it out. And then, and then everything I tried just made it WORSE. And I just got SO SICK OF IT, I literally couldn't stand the sight of it. I became completely incapable of judging whether the latest changes were in any way an improvement over the previous version, or if the entire thing was just a load of crap. Gee, maybe I should change it to present tense. Gee, maybe I should rewrite it from the point-of-view of the ficus tree. Gee, maybe I should write it in second person. And finally I decided to just take a fresh approach, and start over again on a blank sheet of paper.
No, no, no, don't worry, I didn't junk it. What, 're you kidding? I am constitutionally UNABLE to throw ANYTHING away, even when my entire house is being drowned in clutter. (Think: Tribbles. Made out of paper. Stacks and stacks of paper. And toys. Floods and floods of brightly-colored chunks of plastic, knee-deep in places.) Never mind my hard drive. My hard drive is essentially boundless for the kind of files I keep, and at least old computer files don't pile up in the meatspace, and threaten to topple over, burying small children under an avalanche of paper and Barbie-doll shoes. No, of course I changed the file name and still have ALL of the versions of this story -- all 7 of them to date, PLUS the all-new one.
So, I'm behind on my self-imposed deadline for getting this story in shape for submission, but I think it'll be worth it.
Okay, I've GOT to got to bed.
Toodle-oo!!
Feeling some better. Didn't break out in hives at Littlest Brother's swimming lesson today, so that weird skin-sensitivity thing seems to have gone away. Pretty much just dealing with stuffed-up head and a cough, which seem to be minutely better from one day to the next, so not really impacting my life any.
L.B. got the stomach-fever-gas thing, but he's better now too, and nobody else got that. Yay.
Eldest Son's Recent Accomplishments:
(Just to show you it's not all challenge and no reward...)
- Piano Recital a week and a day ago (the day of the night I got sick, so didn't blog about it)
- Had a piece of artwork chosen for the all-school-district art show that was held this past weekend over at the High School. (He had a piece chosen last year during kindergarten, too. There are things chosen from maybe 5 or so kids in each classroom at the elementary grades.) We all piled into the car and went to see that on Friday night, which was a big hit. Big Daddy got a cute Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man in front of his work, which I will post one of these days once I get the camera downloaded. The kids all really dug the quite-impressive works of the high-school art students, too.
- Is doing well at swimming lessons. Learning to dive into the deep end! "12 feet 3 inches deep," as he explained with precision later.
- Provided this completely adorable Mother's Day book which had me yelping in laughter as I read it. This book was where the children were provided with fill-in-the-blank sentences which they could complete as appropriate for their own mother, plus space where they could illustrate said fact.
My personal favorite was the page where Eldest Son had written,
My mother is very good at staying calm."
The little stick-figure-me above was smiling, and a speak-bubble impaling her head contained these enigmatic glyphs: "Huuuu. Huuuu."
"What am I saying here, honey?"
"Oh, that. You're taking deep breaths."
*giggle*
Well, I guess I OUGHTA be; goodness knows I get enough opportunities to practice!!!
;-)
Happy Belated Mother's Day to everyone to whom that applies!
What they hey, all KINDS of other Voxers are doing "Things on Tuesday," so I guess I will too.
Things I'm Loathing Today:
- Having eaten chocolates after lunch
- Having failed, ONCE AGAIN, to tidy up the house before my cleaning lady comes tomorrow (She does the cleaning -- vacuuming, mopping, and so on; I'm supposed to do the tidying that makes it possible for her to do her work...)
- Watching my poor little tykes get their shots at their check-ups today
- Having to communicate the decision I've come to -- can't really put it off much longer
- Water waste, agricultural run-off, invasive species, and loss of biodiversity (hey, it's Earth Day after all)
Things I'm Loving Today:
- Eldest Son, Precious Princess, and Littlest Brother
- Oh, Dear Husband too! :-)
- Having come to a decision
- Having tested a hypothesis regarding Eldest Son's behavioral "issues" (and deciding I was RIGHT)
- Feeling not judged, but supported, by Eldest Son's teacher and school social worker at today's meeting
- Looking forward to tomorrow's first meeting with the psychologist -- in the sense of at last maybe here is someone who can help us all (hoping this is not setting myself up for a big crashing disappointment like last year's counselor was)
- Learning that my little tykes are about as healthy as horses -- no worries there; no surprises either
- Having access to vaccinations for my kids
- Watching Disney's "Beauty and the Beast" with Precious Princess for the first time, this afternoon (I'd seen it before, when it first came out; she hadn't ever, before today)
- Aerobics Boot Camp
- Sloppy Joes for dinner
- Dear Husband taking the kids out for ice cream, so I got to eat my dinner AND take a shower in peace! Heaven!
- Looking forward to this weekend's Women's Retreat for my church.
*****
Cheers, all!
- C
...and I'm fwee!
Thus spake Littlest Brother.
(Yes, that is a third finger being held up -- hard to do, hold it up separately from the pinkie -- he did his best!) (actual birthday this past Wednesday, but party was today -- joint party with Big Sis.)
Precious Princess & Friend reading her NEW book (one of her faves), "Alice the Fairy" by David Shannon.
(Highly recommend this book by the way, especially if you have or are expecting a girl. When she is between the ages of say, three and six, this will be your life!) (Precious Princess actually has a pair of the over-the-shoulder fairy wings, and SEVERAL magic wands!)
TOTALLY lowered my standards this year! TOTALLY.
Took them all to Jungle Java; I didn't have to clean up my house before or after, or prepare any food whatsoever!
BOUGHT cakes from Meijers! (Can you believe it????)
Well, Precious Princess wanted a Disney Princess on her cake, plus roses, and I knew my artistic skills with frosting did not meet this standard, so rather than stressing about it, figured, what the heck. Bought a cake with roses already on it, and then went to Party America and bought some Disney Princess cake toppers, and voila! Princess cake with roses. She loved it.
And then I thought, well, gee. Seems silly to make Littlest Brother's cake when I'm buying Princess's cake. What the heck, buy 'em both! Bought cake toppers with "Cars" theme for L.B.'s cake. He loved it.
Figured, the kids will eat it anyway, store-bought or not. What do you know, I was right!!
Of course they all love Jungle Java, so the kids had a blast. Dear Husband and I were totally NOT stressed since we had utterly no work to do other than show up with cakes, so we had a blast.
Everyone had a blast! What's not to love???
What a day!
Ahhhh.
(they're all asleep now...)
(nighty-night)
Yesterday evening -- Littlest Brother, just waking up from a nap, woke up cranky and couldn't stop crying. Sometimes he wakes up hard and there's nothing really wrong with him, you just have to wait for him to stop crying -- it can be a long wait at times.
I came back from aerobics and was trying to eat my dinner. He was sitting at the table beside me and chewing his dinner and crying.
Precious Princess came up and hugged him and tried to make him happier. Didn't work, but she tried.
I said, "Thanks for trying, hon. You're such a good big sister!"
She said, "Yeah, I am. -- I'm your sidekick."
I laughed. "Yeah, you are my sidekick -- a good one!"
She said, "So I'm your sidekick, and you're SuperMom!"
:-)
Nice to get a vote of confidence, and I needed one yesterday.
2008 Edition of White Easter in Michigan,
brought to you by Carole
In Michigan, we don't have Spring. We've never had it, as far as I know. *shrugs*
I've lived here all my life; I'm used to it. But somehow, by Easter, I'm always hoping it wouldn't quite be THIS snowy:
The 2 pix above are from Friday evening, in the midst of the storm.
Here, shots of the aftermath:
(don't worry, he has a tractor with a plow on the front -- he didn't do all that by hand!)
(somebody else tried to, though! :-) )
Thus spake Littlest Brother the other day.
"No, I'm NOT cute! I don't wanna be cute!"
"Oh, well, what are you, then?"
"I wanna be pwecious."
As in,
I wanna listen to Peanut Butter and the Wolf."
- Littlest Brother, after we dropped off Precious Princess at preschool and began the 20-min. drive back home.
So we did.
We've got a great version of it on a CD called "Leonard Bernstein's Children's Classics," which I highly recommend. It also has Saint-Saens' "Carnival of the Animals" and Benjamin Britten's "Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra."
All the kids used to adore "Peanut Butter and the Wolf," but lately Eldest Son has taken to announcing it is "for babies" and refusing to listen to it. They all still like the "Carnival of the Animals," though. But Littlest Brother seized his moment as the only kid in the car to assert his preference: Peanut Butter and the Wolf!
Good old Peanut Butter, he got that wolf in the end, just like he always does!
