Ryan & the 5th Grade Geography Bee

Ryan participated in a geography bee at school today, something he's been studying for several weeks now. It started off with about 30 students, all 5th graders from the different classes. In the end, Ryan placed 5th place, while his good friend came in 1st.

We're really proud of Ryan; he studied hard and it showed!

His good friend Isaac won overall; I don't know if they planned on wearing the same thing, but it was quite funny to see!

So proud!

Yesterday Jeff and I attended an awards assembly at Ethan's school. He and some of his classmates received the Golden Husky Award; it's an award that students receive for completing a list of goals they receive at the beginning of the school year; they have the entire year to work on the list.

I just have to say that I was surprised Ethan chose to do this (the students are encouraged, but have the option of not participating); it's well out of his realm of interests, which in the past meant he wouldn't bother with it. Not only did he participate, he accomplished all the goals on the list!

I'm so very grateful to Ms. Holly and Ms. Nancy for working so closely with Ethan. Transferring him to this school and putting him in the EXCEL program there has been the best decision we made concerning Ethan's progress. He's accomplishing so much and growing by leaps and bounds; the smile he's had on his face lately is so well-deserved!

Being congratulated by Principal Ichimura

Checking out his award with his classmates

His smile says it all!

Weekend Adventures

This weekend was a flurry of activities for us. First off, Big Poppa finally finished up our master bedroom redo, so we moved our stuff back in.

This was what a section of our carpet looked like before the redo. Now, imagine these stains  everywhere and you've got a clear picture of what our bedroom floor looks like. Yuck!

After Big Poppa ripped up the carpet and baseboards

It took Big Poppa almost a month to get the hardwood floor, mainly due to the custom cuts that he had to make some of the boards that would go around the corners near the door and window. Plus, he was laying the floor after work and the weekends. Once the custom cut pieces were laid, the rest of the room went by much faster.

Big Poppa's handiwork

We also decided that our baseboards needed to be updated, so we bought new ones after Big Poppa saw the same style in one of the Ivory Homes (the builder that built our home) model homes. These baseboards will be much easier to dust & clean.

All moved in again!

It took us almost 30 minutes to get our mattress back upstairs (we were sleeping down in the basement in our theater room) because the ceiling of the staircase is...weird, lol. We had to attempt to bend the mattress in half, then Big Poppa pulled while I pushed from the bottom. When we finally got it upstairs, we were both sweating like we'd just run on the treadmill!

Second, our neighborhood had our annual Neighborhood BBQ & Pool Opening, so we spent a couple hours with neighbors, eating and swimming. The Crack Monkeys were excited since they've been dying to go swimming for the last month or so, all thanks to the lovely, warm weather we had at the beginning of May. Besides yummy food and some activities (besides the pool) for the kids, there was also a drawing where we won a giant watermelon! The kids wanted to eat it as soon as we got home, but we saved it for Sunday dinner at Papa & Tutu's.

Checking out the kiddie pool

She was braver than last year; she actually got off the pool stairs!

Big Poppa & Ryan keeping their skin safe from the sun

Exploring the deep of the pool

Ethan is definitely my water baby

A step up from last summer; before he would refuse to let the water go past his waist. That day, The Fire Pig was jumping in, dunking his head, everything!

Getting my craft on! A.K.A I have to because of the Crack Monkeys!

I've been trying to get back to crafts/scrapbooking lately since the weather turned gloomy and decided to try this project I saw at Hobby Lobby.



It's a pincushion made out of batting stuffed into a square of material, then hot glue-gunned to the inside of a small planter I painted white. The bow is just a 1-inch wide strip of material.

I wanted to make this since my kids are always stealing/misplacing my other pincushion. This one has a bit more weight to it, so maybe it'll keep them from taking it.

Either that or I'm going to find it broken and in pieces on the floor, lol. ;-)

Pokemon, I choose you!

When Ryan was born, the Pokemon craze was starting. I didn't think much of it, considering I'd just had a baby, but my sister was living with us at the time and she fell in love with cartoon. The characters and Pokemon made for some good entertainment, so it was no wonder watching an episode was often included in Ryan's day as he grew older.

For awhile he really enjoyed the cartoon and even collected some of the trading/game cards. We bought a few plush dolls for him to wrestle, and Burger King even had a gold trading card that came in a plastic Pokeball at one point. We turned learning the Poke Rap" into a game, and found ourselves singing and dancing along whenever it came along. Heck, I think we even bought one of the soundtrack CDs and played it all the time (I think we have a video of Ryan dancing to it; I'll have to check!).

But, as children often do, he outgrew it, found another interest, and we said good-bye to the cute little Pokemon.

Fast forward to today.

Ethan's best friend (I'm so excited that he has not only a friend, but a best friend!) at school is really into Pokemon. Really into it. She collects the cards, plays the game, everything! And she's gotten Ethan into it! For the last few days, Ethan has been watching all the Pokemon episodes he can, as well as telling me all about the Pokemon that he's studied. At one point, I could probably name off all 150 Pokemon from the first generation, and maybe a few from the second, but anything after that, forget it. Plus, it's been about ten years since then, so yeah. No.

So we searched for Ryan's old cards (still don't know why they were under Vanessa's bed) and neatly arranged them in protectors in a binder. They're mostly 1st generation, so I guess we're going to be updating the pile soon. And while we were at the library today, Jeff grabbed the first two movies, saying, "Ethan will like this!" :-)

I really don't mind the rewind of interest in Pokemon; Ethan's really excited about it, and he's thrown himself into learning all of the different Pokemon with such intensity, it's a bit surprising (I've read that it's a trait of kids with autism/Aspergers). I'm always amazed at his ability to recall info and facts, no matter how long ago he read it; he'll recall it perfectly and with the same enthusiasm as when he first learned it. It's one of his qualities that really impresses his teachers at school.

And so begins a new era of Pokemon for our family. I have a slew of reading/studying to do if I'm to have an inkling as to what Ethan will be talking about in the coming days. Hmm, I think that Pokedex app for my iPhone is looking pretty tempting right about now...

Why do I feel like something's missing?

So 5 days of potty-training has passed and I'm a bit....bewildered. It seems like Jeff caught on a bit quicker than I remember any of the Crack Monkeys did, and he's going by himself. It feels like there should've been more work/encouragement on my part.

Don't get me wrong; I LOVE that he's totally out of diapers and that he's able to recognize when his body needs to go. I just feel like I did something....wrong?

I dunno.

Anyway, there have been a few accidents at night, but for the most part, Jeff is on his way to becoming diaper-free! He even commented to me that he's now like his best friend Addie from across the street: "We both wear underwear, Mom-Moms!"

Gotta love this kid! ^_^

Day 2 of Potty-Training

Today was much better with the potty-training.

With the exception of not getting Jeff to use the potty as soon as he woke up (which resulted in both of us needing to change, thanks to me holding him at the time!), I pretty much just sat back and let Jeff free reign. He actually went to the potty by himself, which really surprised me! I didn't have to ask or prompt him, he just went when he needed to.

YAY!

We did hit a snag at bedtime. Jeff is afraid to poop in the potty, so he tried holding it. Didn't work for too long and we found a surprise on the floor, right outside our bedroom door. We didn't make a big deal about it, but tried to encourage Jeff to go in the potty next time.

He just cried and screamed, "I don't wanna poop in the potty!"

I can't remember if I had this problem with the other Crack Monkeys, but this will take some time. He seems to have the peeing part down, but the poop aspect is a different story.

Oh, well! We'll have to work on it, I guess.

Today's the day!

We decided to start potty-training Jeff today and after hyping it up and getting him excited, we got off to a grumpy start. Jeff, unfortunately, is like me in the morning: grumpy and not "all there" yet, so he resisted even considering putting on the brand new underwear he was so excited to wear last night. I did convince him to eat something for breakfast, which led to him agreeing to change his underwear.

Afterwards, we just hung out and watched cartoons while we played with his Hot Wheels, and just waited. And, waited. And, waited.

Wouldn't you know it, his bladder decided it needed relief the moment I went upstairs to check on the laundry? When I came back downstairs, Jeff greeted me with a scowl and and indignant, "My pants are wet, Mom!"

Let him pick his underwear, changed him and went back to the waiting game and the constant, "Let's go to the potty!" which was also declined. An hour later, he stops playing with his cars, looks at me and says, "I gotta go to the potty!" We run to the bathroom, he pulls down his pants....only to realize the bowl is higher than we anticipated, so the toilet gets wet.

At least it was the toilet that needed a wipe down and not Jeff. ;-)

Afterwards, Jeff tells me, "The potty is a jerk!"

The day wears on and as I'm trying to clean up a little, I hear the toilet seat being raised and then....tinkling?! I run to the bathroom and Jeff is standing on his stool, peeing into the toilet!

I couldn't help it; I jumped up and down and cheered excitedly for him. I must've looked stupid, but the giant grin on Jeff's face told me otherwise. He was so proud he finally got to put a sticker on his chart. Which, by the end of the day, looked like this:

He needs to fill the entire row before he can get a prize, but I think he's off to a great start! ^_^

For my next magic trick....

Since the time Mr. Ryan has been old enough to tell me what he prefers to drink, I've always, always, ALWAYS had a problem getting my Crack Monkeys to drink something other than Kool-Aid. It's been torture for them to have milk other than in their cereal and I could usually forget about orange juice!

Until now.

The way to get the Crack Monkeys to want to drink milk and/ or orange juice now?

Make them believe it's disappearing fast!

Ta-dah!


See these containers? I found them at Bed, Bath & Beyond. They're called Juice Jars and they hold about 32 oz. of liquid. I stumbled upon these wonderful things, thinking they'd be a cute way to store our milk, but they turned out to be something even better!

I fill the Juice Jars up (the one on the right has apple juice, my favorite), then hide the milk jug in the back of the fridge. For the OJ, one mixed can of frozen concentrate fits perfectly in the jar, so there's no carton to hide; same for the apple juice.

Then I sit back as I watch the older Crack Monkeys scramble for the jars every morning, hoping to get some milk or OJ before it's gone.

Very entertaining. ^_^

The only one that doesn't freak out is the Fire Pig. And I think it's because he's seen the milk jug in the back while foraging for food. ;-)