Ready to go...

Yesterday was a big day at school for Evans. I got him dressed and told him it was time to leave to go see his teachers. Very surprisingly he went and stood at the back door trying to get out to the car. I think that must mean that we have finally turned the corner. There was no crying when we pulled into the school parking lot and he actually squealed with delight when I got him out of his car seat. A far cry from where we were a month ago with the wailing and nervous breakdown once we got there. He went right to his teacher and hardly looked back at me. My mom got to pick him up from school (yes, I think that it is a privilege) and she said that when she got there he was running around and throwing himself down into these big bean bag chairs that they have. In case y'all haven't noticed, the key word in that sentence was "running". I believe that at the tender age of 17.5 months my child has finally mastered walking. I don't know many children that eat their dinners with a fork and spoon but cannot walk on their own two feet. It's certainly puzzling but I think we can all move on with our lives! Now I am more concerned with him actually escaping from me on foot.Since it was Valentine's Day yesterday Evans got an extra special breakfast from Susie of heart shaped pancakes.The problem with this is that heart shaped pancakes are not actually made out of meat. Specifically sausage. So Evans did not care for it. Thankfully Susie had the foresight to add a patty of E's favorite breakfast treat.I didn't mind because I got to eat it. So. School was great, great, great. Until it was over and then the greatness wore off quickly. Apparently there was a triple birthday party and cake was served. Evans, who has never liked anything sweet in the past, supposedly LOVED the cake and devoured it. I wouldn't have believed it but he came home wearing the evidence.And acting like a maniac. The icing (which was red in case you can't see it all over Evans' pants) was also on his butt, his socks and his shoes (soles included). He refused to take a nap and was basically off the rails. It was sort of funny and cute at first until he started to come down from the high and the nap refusal caused nuclear meltdown. While I think that Evans had a great Valentine's Day it none the less ended with this scene.He may or may not have tried to knock over the flower arrangement but I decided his day had concluded. He slept for 12 hours and 45 minutes without a peep. I might consider cake and running him ragged next time I feel the need for a long sleep. I know I am a day behind but I had to share those stories. Happy Wednesday!

Valentine's Day Dance

Remember those? The dances that used to take place in middle school with a lot of awkward slow dancing? Maybe a little Def Lepard wailing about having ever needed someone so bad or Guns 'N Roses and the cold November rain? I've heard that kids these days are a lot more "advanced" than old folks like me were growing up but even I was shocked when I got a formal invitation to the Valentine's Day Dance at Evans' school. It might have been a poem with his hand print on it but, he did just learned to walk after all! All of the mom's and dad's were invited and I was impressed with the turn out. My mom met me at E's school so that we could bring the twins and I would actually be able to carry all three kids. Believe it or not, it is actually impossible to carry two infants in car seats and an 18 month old who cannot be trusted to walk himself. Even if you are super woman. When Mom and I entered the Fellowship Hall my middle school dances were immediately put to shame. THERE WAS A DJ THERE! And decorations. And lights. And balloons. And a photographer. And 492384 children! It was great. Evans' class was already in the Fellowship Hall and dancing in the middle of the room. I could only see him from the back...But I knew that the second I went around to the front and he saw me, it would be all over for him hanging out with his classmates. As I was trying to get ONE picture from the side(ish), I was spotted.Busted. The next thing I knew, this is what was clinging to my hips.Evans was clearly beat from his day at school and fighting hard to stay peppy. He was so happy to see me that he hugged my neck. We did all the things that one does at a school dance, including getting our picture taken in front of the balloon backdrop (I'll post when I get the professional pictures, ha!).Remember Henry from Thomas's birthday party? Crash car? He goes to Evans' school and we took a nice "couples" picture with Henry and Holly.While Henry would have much preferred to dance with Evans, E didn't really want to have anything to do with dancing (for once). Henry was forced to dance with an actual girl and I'm sure that his father won't mind!Even Jack and Molly had a bath and dressed up especially for the dance.Molly might have looked like a deer in the headlights but they were super cute AND well behaved. Especially since the music was blasting and there might have even been rap playing. It was a nice outing for the twins and I think that Evans and Susie had fun too. Just for the record, when I told Evans on Friday morning that it was time to go to school, he went and sat by the back door waiting to go. When I brought him into school and dropped him off in his classroom he waved to me and said bye bye. His early morning teacher was shocked and his willingness to let me go! During the dance his regular teacher came over to say hi to us and Evans lunged into her arms and didn't even regret it immediately!He might not look thrilled but he went willingly and did not seem to give a hoot about me. It is extremely satisfying to see your child enjoy something that used to make you such a nervous wreck. Whatever it takes, Tiffany necklaces included, I'm happy to do it! Wish there was a way he could go everyday but alas, there is a waiting list, I couldn't afford it and I think I might miss him too much!

Bouncing Joy

Last weekend my little cousin, Thomas, turned three years old. People often times mistake me for his aunt or his mother, my aunt Jennifer, for my cousin. I know that aunts and cousins are a really hard concept to grasp but I do actually know the difference. When I introduce someone to Jennifer and say, "this is my Aunt Jennifer" there is really no reason for that someone to respond with "Oh, you mean your cousin Jennifer"? This exact scenario has played out multiple times in my 31 year life span. So, just be clear, Jennifer is my mother's youngest sister and while she and my mom are 18 years apart, we are only 11 years apart. The combination of our relatively small age difference and Jennifer waiting until later to have children means that I have a 3 year old first cousin and 6 month old twin cousins. Evans has three first cousins once removed (I really do NOT understand all that once removed hocus pocus) who are close to his age, there is a 31 year difference between my first cousins and me and Jennifer is a Great Aunt at a pretty young age. Bet you didn't think you would get a lesson in genealogy, did ya? I just didn't want anyone to feel the need to point out to me that I might be referring to my family members with the wrong title. So, in the picture above I was attempting to get a cute shot of Evans and Thomas in their monkey shirts. Believe me or not, but Jennifer and I did not buy the shirts together or plan them. Evans is way more concerned with the little boy that was sitting on Thomas' other side that he clearly didn't want sitting there.In this picture I sort of feel like Evans was trying to use telepathy to communicate with me his plan to get rid of this other child. Scary. Thankfully, he let it go and there was no major incident. Deaner and I have taken Evans to several of these bouncy places in the past and I have to say that he really could not have cared less about them. I think it might have had something to do with the not being able to walk issue we were having a few short months ago. When we arrived at the birthday party I was not particularly surprised to see this amount of enthusiasm from E. Like perhaps he might just sit angelically and watch the other children tearing the place to shreds. Thankfully after a bit of observation he threw caution to the wind and let loose.He attempted to walk in the bounce house using only his tongue for balance.He watched in awe as his friend Henry showed off his fancy moves (not the same kind of fancy that the girl in the red dress on The Bachelor displayed last week).However he did not try and imitate them considering he witnessed Henry's ultimate fate.Since this was the other shot that I happened to capture of Henry, I can sort of understand where Evans' hesitation came from.Henry was not afraid to take a nose dive (or two). Eventually, in the end, the bounce house got the best of Evans as well and brought out some maniacal and hysterical behavior.You could argue that this last one borders on psychotic. All and all I think that I can safely say that Evans had a great time at Thomas's birthday party and that he can finally enjoy places like Monkey Joe's.I'm afraid that if he and Henry played any harder Evans' cheeks would have caught fire and Henry would have become dehydrated due to profuse sweating from the head. I'd just like to say happy 3rd birthday COUSIN Thomas and thanks for inviting us, AUNT Jennifer! :)

Belly Laughing

I could listen to this laugh all day long. The fun didn't wear off for about 45 minutes. Round two will be after the afternoon nap!

Realistic Lesson Plans

I know that yesterday I shared a bit of Evans' school curriculum with y'all. I have to say that every week I look forward to reading about all the lessons that my son is learning at school. It sure makes it easier to part with the tuition money. While Evans' teachers are putting an emphasis on the advancement of his vocabulary and cognitive skills I figured that I might set some more realistic goals that we can work on at home. Let's save the hard stuff for the qualified professionals, right? It's hard being mostly perfect but after really digging I have found a few flaws that Evans could stand to polish. I also managed to find pictures to demonstrate several of his bad habits. First off, I would appreciate it if E would stop scratching his nose. In this picture you can see a cut on the right side of his nose. This has since healed but now he has one on the other side. I am not really digging the ruffian look as I don't feel it photographs well. Since I'm not exactly sure how he does it, I am at a loss as to how to stop it. Next up is something that I could probably stand to help him with.It might just be me but I feel like this outfit might look a little bit better if it included pants. I REALLY like that he has on shoes and socks without pants. I'm just not sure it is his best look and in the future I might have to be more strict about it. The next issue could actually be a bit of a hazard.We are going to have to work on sitting down in the bathtub. I should have made a bigger deal out of it when he first started standing up but since he was trying to kiss me, what could I possibly do? Now he wants to stand to open and close the glass doors, stick his finger up the faucet to turn the shower on my head, knock the $5 bottles of baby wash into the tub while they are open and therefore ruined and to get the squeegee off the ledge so he can lick it. This sort of needs to be dealt with soon. Maybe tomorrow. Lately Evans has been wanting to do everything that the twins do. The problem? The twins are 6 months old and Evans will be 18 months at the end of the month.Which brings us to age appropriate toys. Not really a lot to say here except that my MOM indulged this and put him in the jumper. I'm not sure what the weight limit is but my guess is that it isn't not for 24 pound giants who SHOULD be walking. A good rule of thumb would be that if the child's knees drag on the ground, he is probably too big for the toy. Now every time Jack or Molly wants to play in the bouncer, Evans wants to physically remove them for his turn. While I'm busy not letting Evans play with baby toys we should probably go ahead and work on this.We are getting MUCH better at walking these days, sometimes even choosing to do it on our own accord. Something about being nekkid and being in the hallway leads Evans to transport himself from one place to the next like this. Cracks me up, yes, but normal? I'm not sure about that. Last, but certainly not least on our lesson plan list has something to do with this.We have somehow forgotten (because I know that at some point he did know) that it is not appropriate to crawl on the kitchen table. Even if we are on vacation at the lake house. No matter how much joy it is bringing you.

I think we will start all these lessons tomorrow since the little mister is still running a fever. I hate that he feels bad but I do not mind all the lap sitting/cuddle time I have gotten today. I do mind the 3am wake up. Time to start feeling better! Happy Wednesday!

I Should Have Listened

On Tuesdays and Fridays I have to set my alarm clock for 15 minutes earlier than usual. Typically having to wake up earlier would really annoy me but since these days of the week are school days for Evans, I don't mind. Instead of lounging around and eating breakfast and getting dressed at our leisure, we have to get ourselves out the door to be on time. Evans has been going through a really bad sleeping stage and has wanted to be up at the crack of dawn (I consider this a real problem) so he was awake in plenty of time this morning for all of our pre-school activities. I didn't realize anything was amiss with him besides clearly not wanting to have his picture taken with me. He had his normal crying spell when we got to school but I left and knew he would be fine. Until I got a call from school to come pick him up because he had a 101.5 degree fever. Seriously? Can we catch anymore illnesses in one month? First the stomach bug, than the cough from hell (which might as well have been the stomach bug) and now a fever. When I got to school to pick him up 15 minutes later, he was asleep on his teachers shoulder waiting for me in the director's office. Pitiful. I could tell he didn't feel good and was like a rag doll when I picked him up. Fast forward 1 hour, a dose of tylenol and a 30 minute nap. Temperature at 97.8, chowing down on everything in sight and playing happily. Huh. I really don't get it but as long as he feels better, I'm happy. Something tells me that I probably haven't dealt with the end of this but at least he was responsive to the tylenol. Could he be psyching me out? I forgot to mention he ate two sausages, an entire hash brown patty and a banana for breakfast. I'm a little suspicious.A wasted outfit for sure! I've been pretty lazy lately about school postings. E has been having a great time and his teacher's love him. I think it was the Tiffany necklaces personally. I had to laugh several weeks ago when I got an email from our class mom regarding the end of the year teacher's presents. Is it really necessary to plan for something taking place at the end of May, in the second week of January? I'm just saying. I can't let it pass without saying either that the gifts are completely over the top again. I can't stress enough how happy we are with school and how much we are enjoying E's teachers so I'm happy to do it.........but I've done the math. With everyone participating in the donation, we are spending $450 on an "Our Favorite Things" basket. The teachers have filled out a questionnaire of all their favorite things and apparently, we are buying every single item on the lists (well, not really but almost). I'm just wondering who is going to be in charge of the hand stitched table linens that have been requested. All kidding aside, I feel happy when I drop Evans off to school there twice a week and know that he is going to have a great time. THAT makes it worth it. The four hour break is just the icing on the cake! I do think I'll pass on being a room mom anytime soon. :)This week in school, according to the curriculum sent out by our room mom, Evans will be working on new vocabulary, his math skills, experiencing "Dada art" (??), and his development of language and cognitive skills. Tomorrow I'll be back with a list of more appropriate personal goals for the week that we have set on our own. Happy Tuesday.

2011 Book List

I always love reading everyone else's "what I am reading now" lists and yet I have never done one myself. I love to read and I'm always on the lookout for a good recommendation. I got a Kindle last February so that makes it fairly easy to keep up with what I have read and I have kept a list the past few years on my computer as well. There is no way that I can give a summary of everything I have read in 2011 but I thought I would share my list starting with the most recent and maybe point out the books I really hated or really loved. I can tell y'all ahead of the list that it practically took me ALL of April to read Fall of the Giants by Ken Follet and I really hated it. So, without further ado, my 2011 book list:

The Submission by Amy Waldman
Rules of Civility by Amor Towles
Room by Emma Donnahoe
Maine by J. Courtney Sullivan
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
The Gatehouse by Nelson DeMille
The Gold Coast by Nelson DeMille
The Irresistible Henry House by Lisa Grunwald
Dead Reckoning by Charlaine Harris
Summer Rental by Mary Kay Andrews
The Summer Garden by Paullina Simon
Tatiana and Alexander by Paullina Simon
The Bronze Horseman by Paullina Simon
Half Broke Horses by Jeannette Walls
Lies Chelsea Handler Told Me by Chelsea Handler
Chelsea Chelsea Bang Bang by Chelsea Handler
Are You There Vodka, It’s Me Chelsea by Chelsea Handler
My Horizontal Life by Chelsea Handler
This Is Where I Leave You by Jonathon Troller
A Visit From The Good Squad by Jennifer Egan (hated)
The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
Fall of the Giants by Ken Follett (hated and should have quit)
The Weird Sisters by Eleanor Brown
Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese
Swamplandia! by Karen Russell
Little Bee by Chris Cleave
Mennonite in a Little Black Dress by Rhoda Janzen
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
The Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo by Steig Larsson
The Girl Who Played With Fire by Steig Larsson
The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest by Steig Larsson
Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger
Eat, Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

By far, my favorite book of the year was Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese. I would love to hear if anyone else has any must reads for me to add to my 2012 book list.