Give Thanks

Don't you love the days when you used to eat olives off your fingers. I still do sometimes :-)

Howard, David, my brother-in-law Phil and his son Matt enjoying some games. Thanksgiving wouldn't be complete without game time!

We enjoyed Thanksgiving with Howard's side of the family this year. It was a big group, probably 18 people, but not all were in attendance so it wasn't as big as it can be. Wow, I can't imagine how we are all going to fit into my sister-in-law Laura's house when we celebrate Christmas!!! If I'm doing my math right there will probably be 28 people when we get together next time. It will be good.

Things I'm thankful for:

My husband and best friend Howard

My boys David and Daniel

Our family's good health

Our extended family

Howard's good job at Xerox

This shouldn't be last but my Friendship with God

Daniel

Daniel is David's apprentice in the field of lego building.


Daniel looking quite pleased with his accomplishments.

Daniel is very three and a half. Gone are the days of Daniel's sweet whatever goes attitude. He is now exerting his assertiveness in full force. I would say he is going through a sweet and sour phase. The other morning he woke up quite nicely with a few I love you mommy's only to arrive downstairs and loudly proclaim "I don't like you mommy because you got my blue dogs warm." All this because I carried his blue dogs down the stairs for him and apparently transferred some of my body heat to them. What was I thinking. He's also a boy of extremes. The other day I made him bread and butter for a snack and when he finished he decided he wanted more. I let him know that he could have something else but no more bread and butter. He wailed that I was never going to let him have bread and butter and he never gets bread and butter. I'm such a mean mommy. I share all this just to give you a small glimpse of what daily life is like these days at our house. It's all good! lol.

A few tidbits about Daniel:
He weighs about 2lbs less than his brother and is about 40" tall
He loves to laugh
He'll often say his favorite part of the day is eating
He loves to play pretend especially anything Star wars related
He can sing his ABC's and is learning to recognize them

Hannah's Birthday Celebration

I had a wonderful birthday yesterday despite my boys waking up around 5 a.m. ARgh! Howard got up with them and I slept in until 6:30 :-) David has been so excited to give me a present and keep it a surprise. As I was coming down the stairs though Daniel came up and said, "come see your candy and Ipod." David was not pleased as you can imagine. Poor guy.
My neighbor watched my boys for me while I went to lunch at PF Changs with a girlfriend. Then when Howard got home from work we went as a family to Red Robin. Yum. It was so nice having a day off from cooking. It doesn't quite feel like my birthday is over yet since my mom, grandma and Howard all pitched in to give me a spa package on Friday this week!!!! I can't wait. Thank you guys.

David

I just had to share this photo. I love seeing the joy simple things bring. I want to reflect on things like this right now because I'm feeling a little stressed since we met with the principal, David's teacher and the school psychologist this afternoon. We aren't getting the daily phone calls home anymore but at conference last week and today at our meeting David's teacher sounds very tired of all the work David requires. She cares very much for David and is somewhat emotional about how hard it is for him to be in the classroom environment. I/We are feeling the school is really pushing us in the direction of medication. It's a very hard decision to make and one we want to be very sure about. On a positive note, the school psychologist is going to be partnering with David's teacher to make some changes in the classroom i.e., visual cues for David to help him follow the routines each day. They are going to help him build up to the 20 minute carpet time in 5 minute increments. Basically he needs help to follow routines and stay on task. We are going to try to help at home by firming up our routines and adding the visual cues as well. We will meet back with everyone we met with today in mid December. If you would pray for us to have wisdom about the next step should these interventions not help enough we would appreciate that.

Leaves and more leaves

I didn't exactly have my hearts desire set on yardwork today but having three large trees, two maples and one sweet gum tree, kind of necessitates the job. I'm not completely complaining here because fall is my favorite season and I kind of like seeing the leaves on the ground. I'm just not as fond of the raking up part.

sixteen 30 gallon yard debris bags later!!!!

After it all hot cocoa and games.

Happy Halloween!!!

Daniel is Bumblebee the transformer and David is Captain Rex a clone trooper. The boys had lots of fun. We carved pumpkins in the morning and went trick or treating starting at the Clackamas promenade stores and then to the mall ending with our neighborhood. Boy was I tired after it all.