Teeth

The other night I was following Tyler on the bike trail when he stopped short.  I wasn't sure why he would do that, but he was quick to explain.  "My tongue did push out my tooth!  It is broken!"  And sure enough, he was holding the tooth that had been wiggly a few days.  He never stops playing with them until they come out, it seems.

So he told us he wanted to put it under his pillow, and we got him a little baggie once we were back at the house.  But Kaitlyn started writing something furiously right before bed, and told us it was a secret so we couldn't see it.

Apparently, she stashed this note next to Tyler's tooth.

For those who can't read Kindergartener:
"Dear Tooth Fairy
Is it all right to give
money to my sister right next
to me even though she did not lose a tooth
write back if you do or not"

Seriously, how could a Tooth Fairy ignore something that cute?

So there was some toothpaste and flossers under her pillow in the morning with that note below.  We couldn't stop laughing about it!  Kaitlyn always loves to find solutions to things in her life and do it herself.

In unrelated news, I finally made a project I saw on Pinterest a while ago.  It was actually a pretty quick little project, and the kids have really liked wearing it.  Lots of dinosaur/dragon teeth!

It's just a cape instead of a whole costume, but that makes it pretty easy to wear.  And make.

Tyler likes to run around in it, so that's a win as far as I can see.

But of course, Jasmine is pretty sure anything she sees the big kids enjoying should be hers too.  It's just a bit big for her!

Update:
Despite the fact that I took it off him at bedtime , Tyler apparently loved the cape enough that he put it back on to go to sleep.  On a hot summer night.

Now THAT's a compliment.

A new school year

This year Tyler started Second Grade.

I had him hold up two fingers for his grade, and then the rest of the morning he would whip up a peace sign every time I aimed the camera at him.  Daddy thought that was funny.

Tyler is at the same school as last year, and I have to admit I have my concerns.  (Don't I always?  Isn't that my job as a mom?)  He has an aide that had him last year, and she was near tears she was so excited to have Tyler back.  And she said that the new teacher is just wonderful, so I don't think I have many concerns there.  But the school district cut all of the hours for the aides to avoid paying them health benefits.  So instead of 4 aides there the entire day helping out, his classroom has three aides that are there 4-5 hours a day overlapping.  When Ricky was cheerfully telling us about the classroom, she said "oh, we are going to have a - " and stopped short before she said "wonderful class".  "Well, I'm not going to lie," she finished, reading the names on the board.  "It's about half and half.  Some of those kiddos are strugglers."  When the average kid in your class has trouble verbalizing and writing their own name, struggling kids most likely means prone to fleeing when they can, and acting upset to an almost violent amount when their sensory and frustrations levels rise.  So they have a rough class to tame and no help to do it with?  Awesome.  I just hope that Tyler, my wheel that never squeaks, gets the help he needs.  We're looking into what options we have in the meantime as well.  I love these public educators, and I just wish they could get paid so they could do their job.

A week later, Kaitlyn headed into her brave new world.  Kindergarten!

She was so excited.  And her teacher is fantastic!  She unfortunately doesn't have any friends in this class, since all her neighborhood friends are either at homeschool or a charter school, but I'm not too concerned.  Kaitlyn will make friends wherever she goes.

So far she has been loving it.  She is already reading books and I taught her to add and subtract, so I think she'll be just fine picking up other skills this year.  I know a lot of moms who struggle with losing their kids for so long every day, but I gotta say we were ready.  She needed some more time with friends her age, and already I have noticed that our talks when she gets home are better because she has gotten the "silly play time with little kids" need out of her system and is ready to read books and chat about her day better with me.  She's a pretty awesome little girl, I have to say!

Summer part 3

I noticed the other day that I have a lot less posts this year than previous years.  However, I think that instead of having less on the blog, that just means I am letting it pile up longer before I do long, major posts, instead of blogging one thing at a time.

This post, as with the other summer posts, probably proves that.

First off, one of our close friends hosted a Birthday party.  But not just any party: she always goes all out for First Birthday parties!  I offered to help out with taking pictures that night, so I have billions, but I have to share a few because it was just awesome.

She went with a circus theme for the evening.  Isn't that cake awesome?

There were almost a dozen carnival games around the backyard for the kids to play (once they got tired of the bounce house).  My kids loved those!

Of course, the prize tent to redeem the tickets was even better.

And Kaitlyn loved getting her hair colored.

Jasmine mostly loved splashing in the water for the yellow duck pond game, and stealing food.  In fact, that was the first time we heard her say "no"!  She tried to take a little girl's Cheetos, and when the girl took them back Jasmine looked at her very seriously and said "Nnnnn- o!"  Daddy and I would have been better at reprimanding her if it wasn't the funniest thing I have ever seen.

As a side note, I gave her that haircut just hours before the party.  The baby mullet was ready to go.

Anyway, there was so much fun to do that by the end of the night, even the birthday boy was tuckered out.  "Hmm?  Oh, cake?  Um, sure, if you say so."

Kaitlyn and the other little girls loved the photo booth with all of the props.

And even Jasmine struck a pose for me.  I don't know if she was saying "shoooes" or trying to kiss me, but she was in silly mode for sure.

A few days later, however, she caught a fever and was down for the count.

Poor thing.  She barely left my bed for about two days, and the rest of the week was still a bit slow.  Thankfully she perked up by the weekend so we could make it to the swim parties and cabin trip with friends we had planned.  Not only did our ward have a swim party, but a local Autism school had a party at a nearby water park we hadn't tried before, and that was really fun.  And then Christopher's work had their swim party as well.

Luau!

A group came with this cute set up, some dress ups for pictures, and a dance routine to show us.

Of course, Kaitlyn's favorite part was going up and learning a dance with them.

And Daddy's favorite part was the FlowRider.

And Jasmine and Tyler loved the shaved ice.

One of my favorite "not pictured" events from this month was that I spent the rest of that weekend up in Salt Lake.  My sister-in-law is a psychologist, and she let me know about an Autism conference up there so we could attend together.  It was really great to spend time with her and learn more about the way other people see life!  Oddly, the more I learn about Autism, the more I see that is truly isn't the perfect diagnosis for Tyler.  One of the big things that was said over and over again that weekend was that "with any disability, there will  always be uneven skills".  And everyone seemed to agree with that - most Autistic children have an ability or at least a strong interest somewhere, along with areas they just can't comprehend.  But Tyler doesn't.  Tyler has a lot of similarities with these kiddos, and he truly thrives on the type of instruction developed for them.  But we've recognized that Tyler is gaining ground evenly . . . at a much slower pace than most kiddos.  It is as though other kids like Kaitlyn are running a race at a nice jog and Tyler is wandering behind at a slow saunter.  He's moving forward, but it takes a few extra hundred repetitions for everything to sink in, and the gap between where he is and where he "should" be just widens every year.  And while it is frustrating to see more and more Autistic children from his class catching up and "mainstreaming" every year with him getting further and further behind, the main problem I have with this analogy is that the system isn't designed to handle it.  Our school system places people by age, whereas he would probably be at a Kindergarten level next year, and take 3 years to grasp that content, etc.  I have a feeling we'll be shifting to a private school soon because of that.  We'll see.

Anyway, the Autism conference was great.  And just as I got home, my parents pulled into town!

We always have lots of fun when they drive out.  We got to go to a car show, which is something my parents love to do.  In fact, I was a bit amazed at how much my parents knew about all the cars.  My dad would tell me something about every car without even looking at the sheets first - this one is really rare, or they made this for only a couple of years, this one was originally a different color, down to knowing what engine they swapped out into the vehicle.  I was really impressed, and it made it a lot more interesting than what I would have done on my own (which would have been looking at cool paint jobs).

We have our list of usual places to visit while they are in town by now, like the bulk isle at Winco, a meal at Chubby's, and a trip or two to the cabin.  This time I decided to show them what Ikea is like, and we randomly picked a Tuesday.  That is a mistake I will never make again.  The line was about an hour or two long so every mom in two valleys could come for free kid's meal Tuesday.  Don't get me wrong, I like saving money too, but seriously?  That was a room piled full of distressed and hungry kiddos who don't like standing in lines.  I'd rather pay $3 and have a nice, quiet and calm meal another day.  Or better yet, feed them at home for less and not drag kids through all of that just for a meal (we saw them all parading in straight to the restaurant without shopping).

But I digress.  Again.  Sheesh.  I guess I just have PTSD from dragging my own angry baby through that store.  Teething stinks sometimes, as does trying to make a baby skip her nap.

She liked craft day though.

Well, Kaitlyn liked painting her salt dough creations.  Jasmine liked eating the paint brush (don't worry, I only gave her water) and trying to drink from the bowl (really glad I only gave her water).

The highlight of the week was our weekend at the cabin where my mom's sisters came to spend the day with us.  Everyone had a busy Saturday, but we were really glad that they made time to come.

We love going for walks up there.

I just can't believe the colors were out already!

And my mom enjoyed opening up boxes of old pictures to sort through from their parent's home.

Jasmine, as usual, loved to climb in the Argo.

As a funny side story, earlier that week we got my mom and dad took the Argo for a spin.

And they came right back.  My mom did not care for that thing at all!  She said it was too bumpy and jerky, and she was done.

Just like when my Aunt Betty tried to hold Jasmine.  Miss Baby was done with that pretty quickly.  In Betty's defense, Jasmine does the same thing to us.

"I like you, but not hugs."

Their trip was a great end to our summer!

Summer part 2.5

The show the kids put on at school was really cute!  They all picked what character they wanted to be, and then worked as a group to decide what story would happen with all of those characters.

They made a poster in art class that showed the beginning, middle, and end of their story in comic strip style.

First, Ruffy dog was guarding the princesses at their tower while the train came along the tracks.  The train broke down, but Mario fixed it and they kept going.

Once they found the princesses, Indiana Jones used the Crystal Skull to scare Ruffy dog away so they could rescue the princesses.  Ruffy was supposed to run away, but he came back a time or two before he truly ran away. :)

And then they had a party to celebrate the rescue - and bowed at the end of their play.

Needless to say, Kaitlyn loved every second of the spotlight.  Tyler seemed mostly excited to pretend to be Ruffy and play with his costume and dog.

The song they sang from their music class was one of Tyler's favorites.  He loves pointing out things that are silly, and this song was about fishes that woke up from their nap and then took a shower ("washing their fishy beards") or rode their bikes all over town . . . until they said "wait a minute, we're fish!  Let's go swimming!"

But during the actual performance, Tyler just sat.  All of his class was "swimming" in circles around him, or sleeping on the ground, and our little guy just sat and watched the world go by.  Sigh.  His teacher tried to get him involved, but he was content.  Unfortunately, that is one of the biggest issues with Tyler's learning progress.  When he is engaged, he moves forward, and when he just "checks out", he doesn't have a care in the world.

Of course, Jasmine wasn't all that interested in the show.  But the PEZ in my camera bag kept her happy for a while.  And then she decided that opening and closing it in Daddy's mouth was quite hilarious.  The things we do to keep babies happy!

From there, Grandma took over and Daddy and I headed off to freedom!  It was our 10th Anniversary that day, and we had a grand weekend getaway.  We shopped the outlet malls (which is glorious without kids in tow), checked in at Little America (where we stayed on our wedding night), and had dinner at The Roof (an amazing buffet at Temple Square that is worth every penny and calorie).

The picture isn't the best, but the view from the restaurant is wonderful.

And at the risk of sounding sappy, I have to say that I'm grateful I got to spend a weekend just celebrating how awesome my marriage is.  The kids might drive me crazy some days, and my house might look like a tornado hit it, but I have never for one second wanted a life without this guy in it.  That part of my life is always awesome.  He knows all of my flaws and faults (and I've found a few of his, over the years), but we make a fantastic team.

He cracks me up, though.  One of his running jokes this weekend was bringing every conversation back to the Argo somehow.  He is pretty excited about his newest purchase.

This . . . vehicle . . . is hilarious.  Somewhere between a tank and a four-wheeler, it is a loud and slow machine that can power up anything.  Eventually.  The coolest feature about it is actually one we don't intend to use, unfortunately, since we don't have any water nearby.  Because this crazy thing actually floats on water.  If you look on youtube, you can find videos of people not only driving these into lakes, but even running them down ramps and jumping into the lake.

We bought it because it came with snow treds.  While things went rather smooth last winter trying to bring all the kids up by snowmobile to the cabin, it was not ideal.  We used to all fit on one snowmobile, but we just can't anymore.  And I can't hold a baby and drive a snowmobile at the same time.  So we had to either leave the kids at one end or the other and hope we would be back soon to get them (they are usually pretty good kids, but leaving them alone while you drive a mile away is not a good plan at this age), or put them bouncing in a sled behind the snowmobile, eating the exhaust and snow we kicked up.

This thing, however, fits all of us just fine.  And by all accounts, it should take us up the hill through some decent powder.  Here's hoping!

And while I am posting, I figure I should toss in some pictures from last night.  Our neighbors let us come swimming, and we are always game to take them up on that offer.

"Please!"  She wanted to go swimming, even if their pool only has stairs that are shallow enough for her to play on.  And even if Mommy grabbed a swim suit that was too small for her.  The bottom fit, but that top was a bit small for her and I have to admit we ditched it.

Tyler and Daddy had a lot of fun, since Tyler takes everything as hilarious.  Even if you take his noodle away and make him sink, or chuck him to the other side of the pool.

And of course, they loved the diving board.

So then Jasmine decided she needed in on the action.  (Sorry, half naked baby alert!)

She was so determined.  Too bad she is too young to even know how to jump.

Eventually, I lowered her down to Daddy.  But she decided it was still so much fun that she asked to go again a few more times that night.

Silly girls!