Making Progress

Some might call it bribery.....



1 marble for not crying during school time.
2 stickers for not crying BOTH morning & night about not wanting to go to school.

But I call it incentive:



For the 1st time in more than 100 days of school, Ryan has made it for two consecutive weeks without crying before, during & after school about not wanting to go back. We are happy about this progress!

Haircuts...

are always such a happy time at our house.



Cody never wants one...Ryan cries because he doesn't want me to cut his ears off, Casey doesn't want a missionary haircut, and so I try to make everyone happy!

Cody seems to pose the biggest challenge, as he wants it styled & not too short. "Too short" according to mom & "too short" according to Cody seems to be a bit of a different standard, as I've found out in the past. We try each time to reach a compromise on the haircut length:



Cody instructing me on how to cut his bangs!



Total Haircut Time:

Casey = 15 min.
Ryan = 10 min.
Cody = 40 min.

...Success...we can see Cody's beautiful(I mean handsome) blue eyes again!



...and Thank You for your patience!

Love, MOM

100 Days

Today marked the 100th day of school for the kids. This is a week long celebration for the elementary schools. They bring in collections of 100 things of their choosing (Ryan brought legos), they made necklaces of 100 Froot Loops & vests with 100 things on them.(see picture below, although 1/2 of the Froot Loops have been eaten) They read books about 100 and did 100 exercises today, they had a 100 day parade, put together 100 piece puzzles, and prepared a snack of 100 pieces of food.



This also marks the 100th day of having the same conversation in the morning with Ryan:

Ryan: I don't want to go to school today.
Me: why?
Ryan: My stomach hurts.
Me: You'll be fine.
Ryan: I don't want to go.
Me: You'll have fun.
Ryan: My leg hurts.
Me: Ryan, your teachers will miss you if you're not there.
Ryan: It takes too long.
Me: I'll be waiting for you when you get off the bus.
Ryan: I wish it was only 1/2 day.
Me: Here comes the bus.
Ryan: I don't want to go!(1/2 whining & 1/2 crying)
Me: Have a good day.

His bus driver must think we are doing something terrible to him every morning to make him cry.

When he comes home he is fine & transforms into his favorite superhero...



If only he could be this happy in the morning....Here's to the next 100 days of school!(actually, I don't think they have that many left, but who's counting?!)

Squirrel Overpopulation

When we first moved into our house we were entertained by all of the wildlife that seemed to be inhabiting our neighborhood. We've seen a family of deer, an armadillo, raccoons, cardinals, red tailed hawks, and even a coyote in our yard, but we were really amazed at the amount of squirrels that would be in our yard at any given time. We'd watch them run from tree to tree, jump, climb up to our back porch, & attempt to eat the bird food out of the bird feeder.

It was all good until this year....



When they decided to dig holes in our lawn & make a mess out of our flowerpots.

Today I caught him....her...whatever it be....in the act, so I kicked the door to scare it away. It ran down the steps & stopped on our sidewalk & looked up to see if it the coast was clear for it's safe return.



So, it proceeds back up the steps & looks at me inside the door to let me know how unhappy it was I interrupted it's mealtime madness in my flowerpots!



I kicked the door again & this time it knew I wasn't going away, so it scurried back down the steps & away...until tomorrow when, if I'm lucky, I'll catch it again before it dumps the dirt back onto my porch.

Green Eggs & Ham

Each time we read Dr. Seuss's Green Eggs & Ham Ryan wants me to make them for breakfast, so with left over Christmas ham I decided I'd give it a try...



O.k.....so it didn't look as neat as I thought it should(I think I put a little too many green drops of food coloring on the egg), and Ryan didn't think it looked all that appetizing....so the green egg didn't get eaten, but it's still a fun book to read!

Christmas Favorites

It started early (3:00a.m. to be exact!), with the kids going to check their stockings. They managed to stay quiet for another 4 1/2 hours until everyone else in the house woke up.

Some Christmas Favorites:


Cody's Sam size box of Hot Cheetos, which he was expecting to be his Guitar Hero drums...sorry Cody!



Ryan's Nintendo DS



Heather's Pasta Salad!



We are enjoying our Christmas vacation & love spending time with family!



Casey's favorite Christmas tradition - burning of the boxes!

Eli the elf

I have talked before about Ryan's unwillingness to go to school each morning, and after the Thanksgiving break it was even more intensified. He stayed home an extra day, because he had been sick over the break, so when it finally came time for him to get up & get ready to go back to school, he was not very happy. I felt really bad sending him to school with him being so upset. I thought about him all day & even, after much contemplation, e-mailed his teacher about his severe distress that morning.

She e-mailed back letting me know that he had a hard time in the morning but was doing better & had a surprise in his backpack. He came off the bus with a big smile, telling me he wanted me to read something in his backpack:



I was choking back tears as I read the letter, thinking I am so grateful(again) for such good kindergarten teachers. He was so much better after that, waiting each day to see who in his class would receive the next elf hat.

We will gear up these next couple weeks for the return after Christmas break!