A public service announcement.

Melissa

I’ve noticed that a lot of people in the last few days are finding the blog by searching “what does 2 to 3 inches of snow look like?”

I’m thinking this may be a lot of my southern neighbors who are looking at just such a weather forecast.  Please rest assured that this is not what 2 to 3 inches of snow looks like!  That was 18 inches so there is no need for you to panic. 

Of course, the forecast that day was for 2 to 3 inches…so maybe go buy some snacks and such just in case 🙂  Don’t forget the hot chocolate!

PTSD much?

Melissa

This afternoon Duhdee and I will be attending an IEP meeting.  Well, actually, it’s what everyone else would call a parent/teacher conference but we live in a special world where everything is governed by our IEP and federal law.  Awesome. 

So, a parent/teacher conference, no big deal!  Right?  Right.  So why do I have a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach?  We haven’t even started kindergarten and I’m already shell-shocked by the entire IEP experience/process. 

This should be fine.  We’ve read the progress notes, he’s doing GREAT!  He’s a magic little being who charms (and manipulates, in a charming fashion, of course) everyone he works with.   Even knowing what we should hear at the meeting still leaves me flashing back to that meeting two years ago when we heard all the same things only to be told 3 months later that none of it was exactly true and whatever was true didn’t matter…no one could handle him or be expected to handle him. 

*Sigh*  I’m going to go buy some cookies and show up with a smile…hopefully I manage to get there without throwing up.  It’s all going to be fine, I wish I could convince myself of that though.

Grammy has good timing!

Melissa

I spent 4 hours yesterday doing photo editing.  

Christmas fun!

Music to my ears…

Melissa

Every word I hear from Monkey is music to my ears…but you know how annoying ear worms are?  🙂  But, no, I’m still not complaining, right?

Monkey has been in the “Mama” phase for a while.  He will chant “Umma, Umma, Ummai, Ummai, Ummy, Ummy, Umma, Umma, Umma” on a regular basis to get my attention.  Umma’s response, eventually, is “WHAT?”  Sometimes he has a legitimate reason, he’ll ask for help or something.  Sometimes he has either no reason to attract my attention other than just wanting my attention (which I guess, for a 5 year old, is a reason) or he has forgotten by the time I respond, it’s hard telling.

Anyway, he has recently started to skip the whole “Umma, Umma, Umma” bit and skip to “What! What! WHAT!” until I respond “What??”  His response varies according to the same pattern above.  I feel like I’ve said this all before but I can’t find the post…maybe I’ve just been telling too many people… Anyway.

On Christmas day I got a chance to get even without even trying to do so.  We were visiting at my parents house and after all the presents were unwrapped I pulled out the camera (yes, I pulled it out AFTER we opened presents…brilliant) to show my Mom and Sister the photos from earlier in the day.   As we were going through them I got to a bunch of photos that looked like they were taken by a 5 year old because, well, they were.  Monkey loves the digital camera and has begun taking tons of photos any time we leave the camera within reach.  So, I start saying “Monkey, Monkey, Monkey, Monkey, Monkey…” approximately 40 times.  Suddenly I hear, from the living room “WHAT??”  We look over and see a very annoyed looking Monkey glaring at us.   He was not impressed when I had no good reason for saying his name so many times.  Haha!  Revenge is sweet!

Back to work :-(

Melissa

I made my post-Christmas return to the office this morning.  Other things got in the way yesterday. 

While I was home yesterday I played over 2 HOURS on the Wii Fit.  Oh my goodness is Monkey ever persistant.  “Again!”  “Pens! (penguins)” “Bird!” “Again!” “Again!” “Again!” “Again!” “Again!”  Until Umma nearly collapsed.  After watching us play we even convinced Monkey to take a turn with the “Pens” and he did pretty good considering he was mostly just flapping his arms in excitement, lol.  I guess maybe we should try to get him to play the “Bird” game since the whole point is to flap your arms.  Taking negatives and turning them into positives is a way of life around here 😉

I want to do it again!

Melissa

I know most people are glad to see the crazy season end but I really wish we could do Christmas morning again!  Monkey had so much fun.  He loved opening his presents.  We heard several “Wow!”s.  He loves his toys, he even enjoyed opening the clothing.  Watching him have so much fun was totally worth the 2:30 and then 5:30 wake-up calls.

We’ve spent a lot of time with family over the last few days as well and watching him interact with everyone was a ton of fun.  He seemed to enjoy being the center of attention whenever possible and more than once went out of his way to get his share of the glory.  He was amazingly social and vocal.

There are a million funny things I kept telling myself to blog about but my brain is so fried from all the excitement that I can’t think of anything at the moment, lol.   Let’s see…He was a huge fan of presents but had no interest in gifts until we explained that gifts were presents, then he was down with both and used the words interchangeably.  Not bad for two totally new vocabulary words.  He let his Grampy pick him up, dangle him upside down and tickle him…when he was done he told Grampy “Put me down!”  lol.   He sat on the couch with his Great Grampy and shared a movie on his DVD player.  He would look at the gift tags and yell “Me!” every time he read his name.   Santa left a Wii Fit under the Christmas tree and Monkey has already decided on his favorite games for Umma and Duhdee to play…he’s a slave driver…we don’t need a personal trainer!

I’m sure I’ll think of more once my brain recharges 🙂  I hope everyone has enjoyed the holidays!