I just knew that Joslin was not ready for her bed! Last night at 2AM, we heard a loud THUD, with wailing immediately following. From a dead sleep, both Juli and I jumped up and rushed to Joslin’s room. She had fallen out of bed and was crying like a baby. She was pretty scared and slept in our room the rest of the night. Tonight, I moved the bed to a less than aesthetically pleasing arrangement and Juli padded the side of the bed that is exposed. Hopefully she gets used to the bed and doesn’t go bump in the night.
This picture is from the archives. Was too lazy to take a new one.
So I am in a pickle. Noah questioned me last night as I was putting him to bed about the Easter Bunny. In his most innocent voice, he asked, “The Easter Bunny is real, right dad? I mean, you saw the Tooth Fairy and took a picture of her so the Easter Bunny must be real too, right?” Oh goodness. Fortunately, he is easily distracted with my iPhone games so I quickly asked if he wanted to play Fruit Memory and like the dog in the movie UP, he went on point and said “GAME!” That was a close one. I think it might be time to come clean. I’m really regreting the picture I ‘took’ of the Tooth Fairy.
A few weeks ago, Joslin turned 4. It’s unbelievable really. Well, we have had her still sleeping in a crib. For the past few months before her b-day she has been asking for a big girl bed. I have steadfastly refused under the guise that “it’s too much money”. Secretly, I haven’t wanted to get her a bed because that means she is no longer a baby. My baby is all growed up. ;( Juli kept pressing me and I kept ignoring. Well, she finally got fed up with me and decided to save her babysitting money. She did the research and found the bed she wanted and went and got it. So this weekend we got a mattress and put it all together. Joslin was so excited. I don’t see why, who doesn’t want to sleep in a small confined space with bars? I mean really!
Speaking of Easter, we had a great day. We decided to take a drive after church up Butterfield Canyon. It was a little chilly but the kids had fun. Here are some pictures from our Easter Sunday:
Well yes this is Juliette writing and not Brandon. Surprise surprise. So, I’m thinking this is going to be my therapy as we go through yet another hard spring with Hailey. I probably should just write this all in my journal so any one that might possibly read this won’t think the worst of me but I’m going to save my mom hours of phone time by just letting her read it instead. P.S. Just to warn you I believe in run on sentences no time for periods.
A few weeks ago the thought hit me that it was time to start doing things a little different. Sometimes I’m like a robot feeding, dressing and keeping my kids alive but sometimes not really living or being in the moment. After a not so normal (but typical for my life) shopping trip at Walmart, I decided enough is enough, whatever that means. I had just made it to the checkout and was about half way through buying my 2 weeks worth of grocery’s, when Hailey starts shouting she has to go potty. I tell her to hang on we’re almost done but of course she doesn’t listen and took off for the bathroom. There was a long line of people waiting behind me and the bathrooms are almost directly across from the checkout so I as patiently as I could waited for the cashier to finish scanning the rest of my groceries. Well Hailey apparently needed to go the big number 2 (yippee for me). Any normal person is thinking big deal she’s almost 11 Well as most of you know she has Autism and this type of stuff is really hard for her. For quite a few years we as well as her Occupational Therapist have been trying to teach her to wipe when she goes the BIG 2! Just haven’t mastered that one. So anyway she starts screaming for everyone behind me, in front of me, pretty much the whole store to hear ” MOM WIPE ME”!!!! You know I’ve pretty much learned to have tunnel vision put on a smile and everything and everyone else around me just goes blury. (If I can’t see them they can’t see me, That’s my motto)!!! I turned to the cashier and said hang on I’ll be right back. I ran in there wiped her and you can imagine what everyone was thinking as I escort a 10 year old out of the bathroom and back to gathering my groceries. You know I pretty much have no problem with the whole “pride goeth before the fall” thing. Really I have NO PRIDE. I don’t even get a chance of thinkin I’m (somethen else) I’m tripping before I even get a chance to feel prideful.
I’m happy to report that one week from Hailey’s 11th birthday I am wipe free. I still hear “MOM WIPE ME” at 4:00-5:00 A.M. but now I just yell right back “wipe yourself remember, you know how now” without so much as getting out of bed. Awwwww pure bliss what more could a gal want.
Wow! this really is theraputic I’m feeling much better thank you very much. Now let’s see if I actually publish this.
In our home NORMAL Is just a setting on the dryer.
Noah and I recently took a trip to Arizona to pickup my Dad’s jeep. I decided the best way was to fly and take Noah with me. He has never been on an airplane and so I wanted to make sure that I recorded his reactions, even under penalty of law to turn off all electronic devices. Yeah, I’m a rebel.
A few points about this video.
Apparently, the only question I really knew how to ask was, “Are you excited?”
I apologize for the orientation of the beginning of the video. Rookie mistake.
Sorry for the length, but it was so stink’n adorable that I added pretty much every video I had taken.
Other than those items, enjoy!
More is coming regarding our adventure on the way home. Let’s just say the flight was the only good traveling part of the trip…
It’s a little known fact that back in 1973, the office of Secret Creatures And Myths (S.C.A.M for short) was being investigated for misappropriation and mismanagement of funds. At the same time O.P.E.C. began it’s worldwide oil embargo causing significant interruptions in travel. These two significant events created a perfect storm in which the S.C.A.M. would take years to recover from. Some departments never did fully recover. Santa and his elves were the least affected but the Toothfairy, well she still hasn’t recovered. It’s all political. Some threats were made and resignation letters turned in but in the end, the Toothfairy negotiated with the Managing Director to hire regional representatives to collect teeth at the appropriate time. Unfortunately these new regional “Toothfairies” decided to unionize. Last night, after filing several grievances with the S.C.A.M., the regional toothfairies walked out on the job leaving many little kids with dashed dreams of big bucks this morning.
Our Noah was one such kid.
To his dismay, the “regional” Toothfairy didn’t come last night as expected and leave some money for his first lost tooth. Noah was so distraught; shaking his very faith in Secret Creatures And Myths. Juli and I assured him that some mistake was made but now we know that they went on strike. I mean really! Who strikes against making kids happy?! I think I will file a complaint with the United Toothfairy Association Local 4327 about this egregious and outrageous behavior. This Toothfairy should be fired.
** UPDATE
After Noah had gone to school this morning and when I was getting ready for work upstairs, I heard a loud sound coming from Noah’s room. I quickly grabbed my camera (cause that’s what you would grab when you think there is an intruder in the house) and rushed downstairs. It was dark down there but I was able to quickly fire off a shot of this:
Calling into Local 4327, I learned that the strike has been resolved and normal service will be returning. Apparently our regional rep is going to be putting in some overtime and delivering money for teeth while kids are at school. Whew! Noah will be so happy…
Hey all. Just a quick post. Juli and I are in New York City this week and getting ready to go to Washington D.C. today. We are having a lot of fun (without kids … thx mom and tia!)
The picture is from yesterday in Central Park. I will write about this trip when we get home. Just wanted to say hi and that we are still alive. We’ve only been mugged twice so far.
Well maybe not damnation. That would be bad. But definitely hellfire. A few weeks ago, Noah, Josh and myself went to Utah Rocket Clubs annual rocket launching event called Hellfire 15.
They hold the event on the Bonneville Salt Flats in western Utah. The salt flats are an amazing place. It’s, well flat and full of salt. As we drove to the event, Josh dared me to see how fast I could go. Under severe peer pressure, I raced the car to almost 80 MPH! Whoa nelly. Try not to be such a rebel. If Noah hadn’t of been with us, I would have tried to push it to 90. I know, I know, crazy talk.
The ground was wet from the monsoon rains the night before and so the salt was wet and sticky. Just walking on the stuff caused a buildup and made it hard to walk. We picked a great spot on the safety line and setup a small shade to watch the launches.
All the people we met were really friendly and talked at great length about how the got into rocketeering and the costs involved. Some of those motors can run upwards of $800! Once I started calculating the costs I realized, I probably wouldn’t be getting into this. We did see a lot of families and dads and sons working together building rockets. Maybe one day when I’m rich.
Some pictures of the rocket launches. As you can see, these aren’t your run of the mill hobby store rockets. Some of these were as tall as 10ft. Walking down the safety line looking at all the setups, there was one that had to be at least 20ft tall. I don’t think they were launching it though. The last picture in this set, they had to call the FAA to get clearance to launch it. It went about 10,000 ft in the air!
Every once and a while the announcer would come over the intercom and say, “ok folks, time to apply the sunscreen.” We had put sunscreen on and were pretty much sitting under a shade all day and so we disregarded the announcement. I wish I hadn’t. Sitting on that white salt, the reflection totally burned us. I had a sunburn all the way up to where my hat line was. Next year we will pay attention to those instructions!
It was a great day and a lot of fun. Once I got home I had to immediately wash the car. We had salt built up on all of the wheel wells and all over the car. When I pulled in to drop Josh off, the car next to us thought we had snow on the car.
