Happy Halloween!!!

We had a busy wonderful Halloween day! Becca woke us up bright and early at 6:15- she hopped up on the bed and yelled "Happy Halloween Day". We sent Cameron off to school and get Becca ready for school. Becca had her first ever Halloween party and she was thrilled! She got a ton of candy and loved playing the games. Then we headed off to Cameron's school and hit another party. The big kids seemed to have a good time. My friend Jean and I treated the kids (ourselves really) to Dairy Queen after school, because the best thing to get right before you go trick-or-treating is ice cream. We headed home and rested for a few minutes before heading out trick-or-treating with Dad. Our neighbors across the street went with us and we hit a couple of streets before Becca and Drew (the cute pumpkin in the picture) were wiped. David had to go to band anyway, so we came in and handed out candy. we finished the evening with pizza for dinner which has been our tradition since the first time we took Cameron trick-or-treating.

How many days until Christmas??? 

YAY Cameron!!!!

**note: full on Mommy brag** :)

I went to Cameron's Parent/Teacher conference last night. His teacher had nothing but wonderful things to say about him! This is our first year of letter grading and he got straight A's, plus his percentage breakdown was great! He had a 98% in Reading, a 96% in Language Arts, a 95% in Mathematics, and 96% in Science, and a 97% in Social Studies. He has achieved mastery on 3rd grade addition facts and is 1 test away from mastery in subtraction. Everything else he is either at or above where he needs to be. There are still ways for him to improve and we set a couple of goals last night, but overall he is in a great place after the end of the first quarter.

He still has no friends, although she mentioned that the kids seem to like him well enough. He is almost always the last to "buddy up" when they do group activities, but I don't think it is because he isn't liked. I just think that his personality is more suited to working alone and he doesn't like to choose a partner. His teacher and I are working on a plan to help him interact with the kids in his room more.

Overall it was a very positive conference. I really like his teacher and I can see the positive influence that she is having. She has really inspired him to learn and to love school. The only big disappointment to me was that the full time para in his class was not at the conference. She has been such an integral part of this school year and he has really grown attached to her.

Anyway, it was a great night and I am really proud of Cameron.

The rest of the Weekend-

On Saturday we went to see Open Season with Emma and Tommy, and then Sunday we went to BOO!! at the Zoo. It was a beautiful day and there were a ton of people there. There are stations set up throughout the zoo where you can trick-or-treat, and lots of crafts that you can do. This year we just played outside and Trick-or-treated. Becca is "Married Princess Ariel" for Halloween and Cameron is a CloneTrooper. It was almost too warm- or maybe I don't expect that kind of weather at the end of October. We had a very strange event while we were at the zoo. I heard someone say Becca Boo so I turned around- it was a mom talking to her Becca-boo who just happened to have the same costume as my Becca boo. And she had curly hair. And she was naughty. And she just happened to share the same birthday with my Becca boo, but she was born in 2004. At that point it got just a touch too creepy for me and we parted ways.

We left the zoo and went home to watch the end of the football game. I ran to the store and before we knew it, it was time for the kids to go to bed. So much for that extra hour we gained! 

Power Play and one BUSY Friday

We had a really big Friday, and to start it off we met Beth and Adam at Power Play. We went a couple of weeks ago with some of our other friends, but this time it was just the smaller kids. It was more fun for Becca that way- she got to play in the little kid area with out 2 older boys tapping their feet to get moving. I have to admit that this was not Becca's best day ever. She is starting to have issues with doing what other people (namely me) want her to do. She was unwilling to eat and ended up simply walking away in the middle of lunch. I spent most of the trip chasing her and vowing to myself that we would never leave the house again. She is just so stubborn and bull headed. Overall we had a good time though, and I really enjoyed being with Beth.

We left and headed straight to Boogey Bash- a celebration of 3rd grade writing. The 3rd grade read a book about the Boogey man and then wrote their own stories, kind of like a sequel. There were 3 featured writers (one from each class, chosen from the very fair "draw your name out of a hat" method) and then you got to go to as many 3rd graders as time would allow and ask them to read their stories to you. Cameron wrote his story about Becca fending off the Boogey man with a hamper full of dirty socks. It was a fun story. Eventually Becca is able to rid out home of the dreaded Boogey man with a mountain of dirty laundy. Maybe he is saying I need to put more emphasis on that part of housework. As hard as he tries to act like Becca is the worst thing that ever happened to him, every story he writes is dedicated to her and most of them are about her. It makes me happy to see him do those things for his little sister.

After school we ran to pick up Becca's Fall Fling costume, and then it was home for about 5 minutes until we headed out to the gymnastics place for open gym. Cameron's school was having open gym night, and since I organized it I had to be there to take the money. We ended up raising a little over $100 for the school, so I thought that was a success. Scary skate was also Friday night and Becca really wanted to go, so we left open gym a few minutes early and headed to the rink. Both of the kids dressed up in costume and skated for a couple of hours along with their dad. (his costume was "just plain dad") We had an impromtu hockey mom meeting (booze on the pool deck of the community center) and we hung out there until a couple of the guys that work at the rink started heaving snowballs at us from the Zamboni pit.

Really, although Friday was busy, we had a good time with all of our activities. I love this time of year. There are so many things to do!

 

Not a big weekend

Cameron has his last drum lesson tonight, and then in a couple of weeks he will start private lessons. They are having a party for the class, and I took it as a bad sign that the instructor asked all of the parents if the kids could have sugar after last week's class. :)

Becca has evaluation at her group skating lesson tomorrow. I don't know if we will go or not. I know how she will score and I know that we need to repeat the class- and probably will for the next few sessions of group lessons. I'm okay with that and I really need to clean the garage out, so we may just stay home. It is supposed to rain, so that may stop the garage cleaning. I have plenty of things that I could be doing anyway. In just a few weeks I will be hounding David to get the Christmas stuff out and should start preparing now.

I think we'll just hang low for a couple of days.

My craft night project

Wednesday night was my monthly craft night at my friend Beth's house. It was also her anniversary, but her husband "took one for the team" and let the girls come over anyway. Can't mess with the schedule you know! I took Becca's skating dress that needed to be rhinestoned and got to work. I got about 1/3 of it done and seem to be off to a good start. I hope to finish the rhinestoning this weekend. I guess for the first time in my life I can tell people that I spent the weekend stoned! We took the dress for a trial run yesterday at Becca's skating lesson, complete with pink sweatpants and a purple turtleneck. She is the cutest Shirley Temple ever.

All I have left to do is finish rhinestoning the dress, find a way to attach a ribbon sash and ribbon trim on the sleeves, add ruffles to her behind, come up with skate boot covers that look like mary jane shoes, finish the lollipop, buy a hairbow............... in my spare time I think I will broker World Peace. We have just under a month until the competition so I need to get a move on for sure! 

Getting back to normal....

Never in my life did I think that a full pantry would be such a wonderful sight! (well, partially full anyway) After spending the better part of my week fighting Indian Meal Moths I can finally get the food off my kitchen table and put away. My baking goods haven't been put away yet since we caulked the bottom level of the pantry, but most of it is in. I only have a few more things to replace and then I am finished. The overwhelming bleach smell seems to have gone away, or at least I have burned out what sense of smell I had with the bleach :) and all is moving back to normal!!! 

Fun Friday Activities

Friday was a day off from school, so my friend Jean and I were looking for something to entertain our kids. It seems like once school starts Cameron is really antsy if he has nothing to do on a "school" day, so we headed out to a place called Power Play. I had never been there before, but I had heard good things so Jean and I packed up for a new adventure. It was a really fun place, some strange combination between Chuck E Cheese on steriods and an amusement park. They had video games, some rides, cosmic golf, lazer tag, and go karts. There was also a very reasonably priced pizza buffet that was pretty darn good. Becca spent most of her time playing in a toddler/preschool area with a moon walk. She was thrilled! If she can bounce on somthing it quickly becomes her favorite thing to play with. The absoloute highlight of the afternoon was watching Cameron drive the go karts. There is a boy in his class that is involved in go kart racing and Cameron has been dying to try driving. He was so excited and really drove very well for his first attempt. Now he wants a go kart of his very own. I'll think about it-NO!

It was fun to spend the afternoon with friends! Cameron had his drum lesson on Friday night, and since we only have one more group class he has decided that he wants to take private lessons. I am glad that he has decided to continue on with the drums. I really think that he needs something to do.

I had really been bemoaning the fact that we don't have a Fazoli's close to us, but I think Friday night we found a better alternative. Drum lessons fall exactly at the dinner hour, and usually I am prepared, but Friday night I just didn't have a plan. There is a little hole in the wall Italian restaurant that is right by the music center, and we decided to stop by after drums. It was FABULOUS!!! Way better than Fazoli's, and about the same price. Best of all it is only 15 minutes away, not 35.

All in all, Friday was a pretty long day. 

Becca's interesting personality traits

My daughter is a very complex little girl, sometimes to the point that it surprises me. She is naturally very driven, very friendly, and very resourceful. I am not sure how she came by these traits, but I hope that she carries them with her for the rest of her life. Tuesday at school she didn't have anything to show for the show and tell portion of the day (I was not the only parent who didn't send something for show and tell for what it's worth :))and I was worried that she would be upset. Nope, since she didn't have a toy she quick grabbed the spare pants in her bag and described them to the class. She didn't miss a beat.

She is so friendly with the other kids in her activities, always saying hello and good bye to her friends. Usually she calls people by name, but if she can't remember she just calls you "friend". She is so genuine and sweet. There was a brief stage of shyness this summer, but that has pretty much evaporated.

I feel really lucky to have such a wonderful girl.

All are feeling better!

Becca and David are well already! David's teeth are gone and he is in very little pain, and Becca looks like the sweet girl we know and love. Things are going well for now!

Not much this weekend

I got the results of my CT scan- my sinuses are normal, so I am going to start a course of steriods and I will probably end up with an MRI in a couple of weeks.

David is having his wisdom teeth removed tomorrow, so I think he will be pretty out of it for the weekend. The kids are going to spend the night at Gma and Gpas so that David can have some peace and quiet for at least on evening. We have a few activities to run to this weekend, but otherwise we will be hanging out at home.

I think after today I am looking forward to an uneventful weekend!

Yes, that really was my daughter!

Becca got a few bug bites on her face the other day, and I thought they looked a little strange so I took her to the doctor. They looked at her and said "bug bites", charged me $92 and sent me on my way with instructions to double her zyrtec dose. The doctor told me to expect it to get worse before it got better, but I wasn't ready at all for what I saw this morning. Her right eye was swollen completely shut and her left eye had begun to swell, plus her cheek was swollen. This afternoon I ran her back to the doctor and she was dianosed with pre-orbital cellulosis. She has an infection in her eyelid, and as long as it stays there she is all right. The real danger comes if it gets out of the eyelid into the orbit of her eye. So, she is on mega antibiotics and I am under strict instructions to take her to the ER if she gets any worse or has eye pain/light sensitivity. She will then need a CT scan to pinpoint exactly where the infection is and IV antibiotics to kill it.

Made for a long day at my house for sure!

Becca's very scary day...

 
 
  

It's not a toomer- for now :)

So I went off for my CT scan today. I've never had one of those and it was definitely an interesting experience! They had me lay face down on the table and lined me up with the machine- and then the nurse left the room! She didn't tell me she was going, I just heard the door open and then a click when it shut again. You really should tell a girl when you are going to leave the room!

Of course I have no information yet, hopefully this is just a sinus thing. My next stop is an MRI if this comes back clear. Hopefully I will be more prepared the next time! :)

On a side note, (hee hee) I think I am going to try a chorus tonight. It has been so long since I sang regularly and they are opening a new chapter of the Sweet Adelines here. They have to have 15 members to be a full chapter and they are up to 10 right now. The Sweet Adelines sing 4 part female babershop so I think it will be fun. I can remember them coming to my school and singing when I was a little girl. I thought then that it seemed so fun and now I have a chance to try it myself. I am pretty excited.

Becca had a good day at gymnastics today and Cameron had a good day at school- 100% on his spelling pretest! It's been pretty good around here lately.

The Week in Review

I jsut can't seem to keep up with getting the blog done, and now I am having problems getting Picasa to post to the blog, so there will be no pictures for a while. Hopefully I will get that solved this weekend. So now (drum roll.....) our week in review!!!!!

Monday- Our first trip to the Orthodontist. We decided that we need to wait 3 motnhs and then re-access. Cameron has quite an overbite and his front teeth aren't lined up correctly, plus he has a larget gap between them. Eventually this will cost us the big bucks, but not right now!

Tuesday- You and Me and No TV. We had the first of our monthly family reading nights at school. It was a baseball themed event complete with hot dogs and chips for dinner. Our school got a grant from Sprint and this is the way they decided to spend it. 30 mintues reading on the floor in the gym, then a cute skit from the teachers. Afterwords we went with Nick and his family to Sonic for ice cream. Lots of fun!

Thursday- A way busy day!! I have been having headaches on a daily basis for 4-6 weeks so I headed to the doctor. We think that the source of the headaches is my sinuses and I am headed for a CAT scan next week. If that doesn't bring an answer to my problem, then we will move on to other fun tests. Cameron had an appointment to see his doctor and that went fairly well. He still is playing alone at recess on a regular basis, but we are going to work on that a bit. She was in agreement with me that it is important that he learn to swim so we are in lessons until he is able to swim. Becca skated like crazy yesterday and we ended up almost being late to swimming lessons becuase I couldn't get her off the ice. Cameron did all right at swimming lessons, but he is still so afraid to be in water without floaties that it is a tough 30 minutes for him.

Last night we had huge excitement in the 'hood. Someone parked a huge propane filled semi outside my house and then disappeared. One of my neighbors walked by and noticed that it was hissing and leaking propane, so he called 911. We got to spend the evening with 3 fire trucks, hazmat, and the police. After a while almost everyone who lives on my street was congregated in my driveway checking things out. It took about an hour, but eventually they found the driver. After giving him a hefty ticket he moved the truck and life returned to normal. It was an interseting way to spend a couple of hours though!

Not much going on this weekend- Cameron has another birthday party to go to and Becca has skating lessons.

A small school crisis for Becca

As soon as I picked Becca up from school I knew something was not right. We had to run home to get her skates and I figured it would come out sooner or later. We had been driving a few minutes and she said- Momma, this boy drawed on me at school! He drawed on my sweatshirt, my paper and the centers table. I looked and the boy had done a real number on her. He colored all over the sleeve of her sweatshirt, behind her ear, and on her hand. She was so upset that it was all she could talk about for an hour. She seemed to get over it, but I bet it's a long time before she will sit next to that boy again!

She brought home a paper from school yesterday that she had written her name on. B and E are looking very good, but when she writes her name it comes out looking more like Benny than Becca. I am still impressed. She seems to be behaving well at school and adjusting nicely.

Cameron has had SAT-10 testing all week at school. Makes for not a very exciting week, but he feels like he is doing well. The students got to vote on a mascot and it was announced Wednesday that Wildcats won. The school colors are green and black. Not my first pick, but at least it is an okay color combination.

I think the final decision has been made on Becca's spotlight program has been made. She is skating to Good Ship Lollipop. She has made some good progress and I have seen a lot of improvement in the past couple of weeks. The competition is the weekend before Thanksgiving for anyone who is interested. Cameron didn't freak out at swimming lessons last night so that went well.

Not much going on this weekend- drum lessons, skating lessons, and a birthday party- I get to go scrapbooking with Beth all day on Saturday though. I am really looking forward to getting to spend some time working on my handmade Christmas presents. I would like to get all of those finished by halloween so that I don't have to worry about it anymore.

skating, swimming, school

Yesterday was a big day- Becca got her first skating cd. The song that is on it can't be cut short enough so I think we are going to change songs, but for the first time yesterday Becca was on the ice with her very own music. I wish I could say that she skated, but in true 3 year old form the music scared her and she wouldn't skate. Hopefully that won't last long!

Last night was Cameron's first swimming lesson. I thought that we had come so far with his fear of water, but last night I realized that was not true. He screamed and cried until they finally moved him down to the class that still wore floaties. We are at a point now where he *has* to learn to swim, I have let this go far too long. I don't care if he ever becomes a competitive swimmer, but he has to know basic floating and stuff.

On the upside, Cameron has not brought home a paper from school yet this year that wasn't graded A+. His timed tests do not count towards his grades, but even with those he is much closer to passing them that I had ever expected he would be. He actually scored 48/50 on one last week. His teacher feels that he will be able to reach proficiency this year and we are excited about that.

The boys are headed to the air show this weekend and we have the second drum lesson tonight, but it should be a pretty slow weekend.

Drums, group lessons, who could ask for more?

Cameron finally made the decision that he wasn't going to play hockey anymore. (although he is quite angry at me for removing the "my kid is a saint" window decal off of the van) I understand why he made that decision, and it really doesn't surprise me, but all the same I am a little sad because it was a fun social time for me and I really enjoyed the friends that I made at the ice rink. Many of them I still see because of Becca, but it just isn't the same when you aren't at some ridiculously early game in a city that is an hour away. I felt that Cameron needed to do something, so we made him choose an activity- and he chose drum lessons. I was skeptical at first, and I really wish that he had picked something else, but his first lesson was last Friday and he loved it. You could hear his laughter through the store, even over the *4* kids in his class playing drums. He has practiced every night without nagging since. He is also starting swimming lessons this week. The two things that he can't do that really concern me are bike riding and swimming. This was the first summer that he wasn't afraid of the water, so we are off to swimming lessons. I think I am going to put him in a class level higher than I think he can do (with the swimming directors approval) because of his age. That and the fact that if I decide to put Becca into swimming lessons they won't be in the same class. We had taken the training wheels off of his bike at the beginning of the summer and David finally gave up and put them back on. He really wants to ride the bike, but he just doesn't get it. It is a struggle for him to keep the bike upright even with the training wheels on- maybe he just isn't cut out to be a bike rider. We will try again next summer with no training wheels.

I was really enjoying my group lesson hiatus at the rink, but it has ended. Becca was really wanting to go back to group lessons, and I told her she couldn't because she already knew everything in Beginner 1 and she wouldn't do her Beginner 2 requirements so I wasn't willing to go. The next thing I know she was out there doing the best 1 foot glides she has ever done, and she even did 1 crossover by herself. I am going to fix dinner soon, and then we are off to the rink for the second time today. At least we aren't there for hockey practices anymore! Preschool is going well for Becca, she seems to really enjoy herself. Today was "blue" day. She wore blue clothes and they talked about blue things. Thursday is "black and white" day. It will intersting to see what I pull out of the closet for that one!!

Things are going well here. Not too much exciting, but I think that is a good thing. The quick change to cooler weather brought out my jeans and yet another commitment to my "PUT DOWN THE FORK!!" diet. We'll have to see how that goes! Dinner (and the ice rink) are calling me......

First Skating Party

My first skating party was last night. I didn't really know what to expect, but we had 103 skaters that raised a whole whopping $77.25. When I called to set up the parties I was appalled at how little the skating rink gives back to the school for the amount of money we bring in to them. If we had less than 100 skaters we would have only gotten .50 per skater and if we have less than 50 skaters we get nothing. I feel like it is a pretty poor return for my $4 entry fee. There was a line almost the entire night at the snack bar, so that alone brought in a ton of money for the rink.

I am allotted a $25 budget from the school PTA, so I made that up and then some. I was definitely pleased with that! I have 3 more parties to go and if I make a similar amount I will really be worth that $25! :)

Becca's first day of school!

Yesterday was Becca's very first day of school. We sent her to PDO last spring, but this was her first day of "real" school. She did really well. Some of the other kids were sobbing and wanting to go home, but not B. She was so excited to be there and just sat right down and got to work. When I went back to pick her up she seemed a little shell shocked, but by the time we got to the van she was chatting up every detail of her day. I think she really had a good time.

After school I took her for a special lunch at Pizza Shoppe. We have an hour to kill between school and skating and Pizza Shoppe is on the way. Becca seemed so happy the rest of the afternoon. We will see how she feels about school tomorrow!

I didn't actually cry, but I was a little sad. It is quite the change of life from having kids and raising kids. All of a sudden they both seem so big! A friend and I went and did a little retail therapy and all was well! I got a 2ft tall paper mache letter D that I am going to paint so that it looks like metal and hang it on my wall. Trust me, that was a necessary purchase!
I vow that tomorrow I will come home and clean during preschool and not waste my time!