Tristan and Jenny

I love our EI Therapist...in the months that Tristan has been working with her, we have seen great leaps in his development. He adores her, and she him. I love how she interacts with both him and Trinity (although, Trinity can be a bit of a pill sometimes when she is here..but, it is to be expected). We have played at Bounce U together, done numerous fun things here...she is really a great person. Tristans face lights up when she comes over, and that makes me happy. During his last session, we saw something that we haven't seen before...a true connection. He really connected with her and interacted more on a one on one level. This is huge. He has also been doing this with Trinity, whereas before, he would be happy just spinning a wheel in the corner..he actually watches her, and mimicks what he sees. He has his MRI on the 18th of January to rule out any possible precursors for the delay, I am starting to become more hopeful that they will not find anything....I am seeing so much more in him that we have only hoped to see. Thank you Jenny for all that you have done with Tristan, here's to many more sessions of wonderful therapy..for all of us, it really works.

Santa Who???

SO, this is most likely a touchy subject for some people, but, sadly, it really shouldn't be. One of the moms on myspace sent out a bulletin exclaiming that she doesn't celebrate Christmas with Santa. She said that she doesn't understand the concept of lying to our children all year and thought that it takes away from the true meaning, Christ's birth. Now....I understand the concept, yes, the true meaning has been lost in some families, but, if you are smart, if you have faith and share the meaning of the holiday with your child and family, then why would you need to axe the man in red completely? I mean, Jesus is with us always, Santa, we celebrate him one month out of the year. I think in not celebrating Santa because you feel that you are betraying
your child, you are almost robbing them of a certain innocence that comes along with the intense imaginations that our children innately posses. I think that if you decide to kill off Santa completely, when does it end? The Easter Bunny? The Tooth Fairy? What about Disneyland...does she say, "Oh honey, that is not Mickey Mouse, that is some 14 year old girl dressed up as Mickey. She works here, all the characters do, it is just made up." When do you say, enough preaching is enough? I just don't understand it. I mean, this world all on its own is not the most beautiful place...it can be scary. We already all know that our children grow up entirely too fast...why push it even more by taking away this memory? These icon? This pure and amazing wonderment that we remember as children? This mom, she goes on to say how she felt lyed to and betrayed when in 4th grade someone slipped to her that Santa is not real...that she stood up for him, and she wasn't going to do that to her children. Bullshit. I think it is absolute crap. My children have amazing imaginations, I am going to feed those little brains as much pretend, made up, dress up, imaginary things that they want...afterall, Imagination is EVERYTHING. Merry Christmas lady...I hope that Santa brings you a big ole' lump of coal.

Gingerbread Houses - LATE POST!!!

I have pictures of this..but for some reason, they are not loading! ARGH!!! BUT, here is the post until I figure that all out!

Trinity and Tristan had homeschool group on Tuesday and it was time to make Gingerbread houses! I can't even begin to tell you how much she has been waiting for this day. She loves to construct, Tristan loves to destruct, so, it worked both ways. It was so sweet to see all the kids of all different ages smashed together on 2 large tables just going at it. Tristan knocked over 2 cartons of sprinkles, apparently, he loves sprinkles...to be everywhere. Trinity caked so much frosting on her house that I got cavities just looking at it...and don't even get me started on her sprinkle bonanza. She did it all by herself, her own little creation...it is amazing to watch them do these tasks unassisted...no more "Help me momma", now its "No thank you momma, I can do it by myself", bittersweet really. I love my kiddos, and I enjoy watching them flourish into these amazing individuals that they are becoming.

Christmas, Advent Calendars and Santas Elves

As some of you know, we LOVE LOVE LOVE Christmas!!! It is such a magical time of year, yes, aside from the miserable shoppers and people so consumed with the corporate marketing aspect of it all...but the TRUE meaning of Christmas and the story of Christ. We also LOVE LOVE LOVE Christmas through the eyes of our children.

I remember being 4 and opening my stocking on Christmas morning...my mother has a picture of me peeking into my red and white fluffy polyester stocking and pulling out a magical gold coin! My heart lept when I thought of little Elves and Santa stuffing that stocking full of treasures for my little hands to enjoy. Shannon and I think it is the most important thing that this feeling of merriment be passed on to our children. SO, with that, we plan wonderful festivities for the entire month of December.

It starts with us putting the tree up on my birthday (November 22nd) and then lighting the house. The fun comes when we wrap a couple of gifts, put them under the tree, and have NO tags on them. The next day, Trinity gets a note from Santa's Elves. The notes tell her that they left the gifts for her, they are from Santa, but obviously he is oh so busy in the North Pole, he has sent them to check in on her from time to time until he can come on Christmas. The following days are spread apart, the Elves leave little things, hang up the stockings, and this year, left her a MAGICAL ADVENT CALENDAR *oooohhhh, aaaaahhhh* [Hey, it's cool alright] Shannon bought all these nifty things at Walgreens, the dollar store etc. and packs them into the tiny boxes that adorn this wooden treasure. I am excited about tomorrow...tomorrow is CHRISTMAS SCAVENGER HUNT DAY!!!! We, umm, I mean, THE ELVES, *phew* leave her the details, and they read as follows:

CHRISTMAS SCAVENGER HUNT
Today’s special gift will not be so quick,
We have set up a path to which you must stick!The payoff will be more exciting for you, and
also your little brother Tristan too! Santa
has put together a set of clues and
different paths that you must choose.
You will need to follow these special rules
That will lead to you your treasure and jewels!!!

1) To find your special gift for today
follow the steps with lights that guide your way.

2) Once at the top you need to look
and find a special Christmas book

3) Open the book and you will see
another hint to step number 3!

4) Follow the stickers down the hall
on the floor and on the wall

5) We’re in your room, you’ve followed the rules
look under your tree, uncover your jewels!!!

Great job Trinity!!! We knew you could do it!
Did you have fun working through it?
We still have our watchful eyes on you,
Keep doing the best that you can do!

Love,
Santa & Santa’s Elves

We are going to place post it notes down the hallway with arrows and little notes that say things like "RIGHT THIS WAY" "YOURE ALMOST THERE" "GETTING WARMER" etc. It will lead to her Christmas Tree in her room...I can't wait to see her little face...I think we will record it. Maybe I will finally try and upload to You Tube and share it with all of you!!!!

Enjoy this magical time of year, remember what it is truly about, abandon the feelings of monetary guilt and share the meaning of Christmas with your family!!

Newsletter for little t : Month 17

So, you are growing up on me little man....little big man I mean. Why do you have to grow so fast? I remember feeling you in my tummy...moving around so much, kicking and squirming, you felt amazing in there, but nothing compared to holding you for the first time...all 10 lbs of you! You are so sweet Tristan, I love it when you touch my face when you nurse, and on that note...what is up with the nursing lately?? I don't mind it, but geesh, you have been eating enough to feed a small country. I don't think you understand this Christmas thing, aside from trying to eat the "balls" off of the tree, you could care less about the shiny objects. I am really liking the new hugging thing that you have been doing when I pick you up. You stretch your arms out really wide, wrap them around me, and just hold on for about 10-15 seconds, being really still...I love it. I love you bub bub, you are amazing.

Love Momma.

Newsletter for Big T : Month 50

You turned 50 months on the 4th, you are so much more mature than most children your age, both refreshing and frightening all in the same breath. This month is a fun one for everyone, it's Christmastime again. I have a mixed feeling when talking to you about Santa and such...you are incredibly smart, and honestly, I have this feeling you know that we are lying to you about the man in red and you are just going along with it to appease us...which, I do appreciate. All in the same, I do sometimes feel a tiny bit bad that we have resorted to a type of bribery by means of "Be a good girl because Santa is coming..." but hey, your 4 and sometimes if that is what it is going to take to make you stop asking me the same question OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER....well, you get the picture. You asked me where he gets in the house since we don't have a chimeny...I at first said the attic, then you had this sort of startled look on your face and looked up to the ceiling in this way as if thinking "So, there is someone in the attic???" in retrospect, that was probably a really stupid thing to say to a recently scared of the dark 4 year old...so, I quickly backpedled and said that we gave him a key. PHEW, averted disaster, again..this parenting thing is not as easy as it looks my dear. You will see, you are going to have a smarty pants little girl too, and coming up with cleverly witty things to trick her will be hard! I love you boo boo bean, thanks for keeping me on my toes.

Love Momma.

It's time to get organized

I need it...organization of this blog! I need to have a way to post my ramblings and musings...my updates and such and I am going to start this week. The boy is going to be 17 months old...YES, 17 months, so, I am going to start a new way of updating by means of "Newsletters"...keep your eyes peeled, whenever you hit a title "Newsletter...such and such months" this will update you on either Big T (Trinity) or Little t (Tristan).

Craft Day...let's make something for Daddy!

Trinity's FAVORITE thing to do in school is crafts...and guess what Thursday was!!! She had this heart shaped potato that we found in a bag getting ready to be boiled, she selflessly spared it and said she HAD TO SAVE IT...so, this was the best time to use it! We made potato stamps and with finger paints, created a peice of art. I rolled out her butcher paper, broke out the paintbrushes, and she went to town. The 3 feet long peice of paper was magically transformed into something only a Daddy could love...well, I love it too! She wrote, "SMILE" "HAPPY" and "I LOVE YOU DADDY" along with her heart potato stamps, and a bevvy of smiling faces. Immediately after she says "Momma, I miss Daddy...I wish he could come home so I can give him this" So, with that, I loaded the kids up in the car, wet paper art and all....we drove to Shannon's work and visited him. He hung the creation in his office, and boy, did that make one little girl SO proud! She told him that she wanted him to have it so he can always think of her and be happy at work. Now, if that doesn't help you have a better day at work, I am not sure what will!

Yumm, Corn on the Cob!!!

Tonight was the first time that Tristan has had corn ON THE COB. He has has plenty of corn in his lifetime, it is one of his favorite veggies, but tonight, he went to TOWN on some corn on the cob! It was really fun to watch how much joy he got out of eating this corn...at one point, he stole a second cob from the plate and was double fisting them...that's my boy, loves his vegetables!!

Words, words and more words

Trinity has really been building upon her vocabulary lately...just within the past couple of days we have noticed some AMAZING use of words on her part. Here is just a little blurb of some of the occasions that she has used them.

Talking to me about Target store versus PetsMart (her FAVORITE store, I think she likes going there more than Disneyland!)

T: "Momma, we don't need to go here [referring to Target] "
Me: "Why sweety, remember we need to pick up [such and such] then we can go to PetsMart"
T: "See momma, in here [pointing to Target] the aisles are so tiny and well, PetsMarts aisles are wide"
Me: "Oh really? [impressed that she used the word aisles and picked up on the sizes...my little shopper!!!]"
T: "Yeah, and Target, they just sell a whole bunch of junk.....PetsMart has a good variety of things..."


During a class session

T: "Momma, please remove these from the board..."

During breakfast one morning

Me: [giving Trinity and Tristan strawberries]
T: "Good job Momma, you gave both of us equal portions."

While we were looking at what size batteries to put into a new toy

Me: "Geeze, why do they make this so hard!"
Trinity: "I know, we just want to know which batteries it requires!"

Watching a little boy climb a rock wall

T: "Now that was impressive!"

Homeschool Show and Tell

Today we met up with our Homeschool group and it was Trinity's first "Show and Tell". She brought her Hermit Crab named "Flower". It was sooo cute to see her explain to all the kids and moms about her little pet. The entire thing starts something like this :

TRINITY : "Hi, this is my hermit crab, her name is fowler (loosely translated to FLOWER)"

BOY: "AHHH, make it go back in!!!!"

TRINITY: "Oh, don't worry, she doesn't nip..."

KIDS: "Oooooh, coool!"

TRINITY: [HUGE SMILE ON HER FACE]

She was so happy to share with her friends something near and dear to her. I love that we have a support system of other homeschoolers and moms in our neighborhood...Next week she will start PE, it is organized by an outside agency so the kids have an actual coach and they do ACTUAL PE activities for an hour. She loves homeschool, so do I!

Vomit vomit everywhere...anyone have an extra towel to spare??

OMG...I was always wondering when it would happen...when BOTH my children would be sick at the EXACT SAME TIME! Well, it happened..yuck. First Tristan is coughing, but it wasn't like any "normal" cough, it was followed with a "swallowing" sound, come to find out later that he is holding back being sick. Then, it happens....he starts erupting EVERYWHERE. Now, both kiddos were in our bed, so, he throws up, finally gets settled and asleep. Then Trin wakes up "Momma, I don't feel so good" followed by "BLAAAAAAHHHH" all over me, the bed, Shannon.....she starts crying because she HATES to vomit (who can blame her) and then that wakes up Tristan, and he starts crying, and the crying leads to more vomit. This was our routine until about 4 AM....YUCK. So, I say, anyone have a spare towel or extra set of sheets that they wouldn't mind GIVING me...trust me, you won't want them back.