week ending nov 30, 2008

Week ending Nov 30, 2008: This week the kids didn’t have any school or any gymnastics because of parent-teacher conferences and Thanksgiving. Even though I had lots of entertainment planned, we all got on each other’s nerves a bit. In addition to celebrating Thanksgiving, the kids and I made cookies, went to the play area at the mall, went to the playground, watched “High School Musical”, got some craft items at the dollar store, decorated the Christmas tree, and went to the National Air and Space Museum near Dulles. Most of the details about Thanksgiving are best summed up in our pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/Thanksgiving2008# One part of Thanksgiving that didn’t come through on the pictures but still worth mentioning is the “trash talk” that Alex did while he was playing Wii. He was SOOO excited about the games. He tried boxing, tennis, bowling, a shooting game, and a racing game. Whenever he decided he was doing well he’d shout “Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!” or “you didn’t think I was that tough did you?!” or “I am AWESOME!”. Casey said he can’t think of many other times when Alex, our usually reserved child, has been so outgoing.

Alex’s phrase of the week is “ohmigosh!” (as in “oh my gosh” all run together). That was another popular phrase while playing Wii, and we heard it about a hundred times at the Air & Space museum. Chloe, on the other hand, wasn’t thrilled with the museum. She said it was too much “boy stuff”.

The kids are starting to try to tell jokes, but they don’t understand double entendre at all. They’ll say “Mom, wanna hear a joke?” I’ll say, “Sure!” Then one of them will say, “Why is cantaloupe easy to swallow? Because it is made of chocolate!” Or some other non-sequitur, at which point both of them will collapse in laughter. Luckily they aren’t offended if I don’t follow suit.

Alex got really angry with me this week when I put one of his toys in “time out” on top of the refrigerator. His response was to tell me he didn’t love me anymore. I tried to explain that it is hurtful to say that you don’t love someone and that what he really means is that he is angry. He insisted that he didn’t love me. I asked him if that meant if I went away he wouldn’t miss me. He said that is what he meant. About 15 minutes later after a short quiet car ride he opened his arms to me and his face crumpled and tears sprang to his eyes. I got down on one knee in the parking lot and gave him a big hug and told him I loved him. He said “I’m sorry I didn’t love you”. I explained again that he was just angry. He said “No, I meant it”. There was just no winning that one. I guess if I’d thought more quickly I could have explained that the reason he was feeling so sad and worried is because he knew it was wrong to say that he didn’t love me. Oh well, I’m almost certain we’ll repeat this episode and I’ll get another chance to try to get my point through.

week ending nov 23, 2008:

Week ending November 23, 2008: This week we took our holiday photo. I dressed the kids up in their new Christmas outfits and took them to the mall to see Santa and take their picture in front of the holiday decorations. This was the first year that Alex agreed to sit on Santa’s lap instead of insisting on standing next to Santa. Both kids ran right up to Santa and told him about what they wanted for Christmas without being at all shy. As I do every year I bought the picture that the mall folks took. Unfortunately I didn’t like any of the pictures that I took myself, so the next day I asked the kids to dress up in their Christmas clothes again, and this time I took them to a local home-and-garden store that sells lots of Christmas decorations and has a HUGE train garden set up. All told I took 50 pictures between the two days. I think I’m never really happy with the formal portraits that I do, but I got one that was close enough. I won’t post it until after the cards have been delivered, shortly after Thanksgiving, but I did post 3 old xmas card pics above.
Alex’s coughing had me worried this week. For years it seemed that every time he got a cough it just kept getting worse and worse until his throat got so irritated and swollen that it interfered with his breathing and we had to go to the doctor and get a prescription for an oral steroid. We’d tried all sorts of medicines and nothing else seemed to help until this spring when the doctor suggested that we give Alex an acid-reflux drug every time he gets a persistent cough because his stomach acid might be causing further irritation to his throat. Since then we’ve had 3 colds each with a cough, and none of them got bad enough to warrant a trip to the doctor for steroids. Well, this week we got coughing-cold number 4 and I thought our luck had run out because the coughing was starting to get really bad, but after 24 hours on the acid-reflux medicine Alex suddenly started to get better! I’m so glad to not have to watch him suffer through struggling to breathe and to not be giving him steroids.
Alex and Chloe are really enthusiastic about doing craft projects these last few weeks. I think the success they’ve had working on craft projects at school has had a good influence on them. Chloe really likes to draw, color, and paint. Alex likes to cut and glue. He cuts construction paper into tiny shaped pieces and then glues them together mosaic-style to form a new shape (usually a rocket or a jet).

week ending nov 16, 2008:

To anyone who hasn’t heard, Casey’s doing much better. He started physical therapy and went back to work for one day so far. The pictures is of Alex trying on Daddy's sling.

On Monday the twins got very curious about the mysterious place called “hospital” where Daddy went to have his surgery and where they were born, so I decided to take them on a field trip. Our hospital has a street-level corridor that connects the waiting rooms for surgery, pediatrics, women’s health, and emergency, so we walked the corridor and I pointed out the doors behind which various life-events occurred for our family. They were underwhelmed. I guess they thought they’d get to see people on gurneys or something more exciting than hallways, doors, and chairs.

This week I noticed the constant presence of the question “why?” is giving way to the statement “I know”. The twins are getting more confident about their understanding of everyday events and are letting me know. For instance they LOVE to correct me. Like when I burp and forget to excuse myself they say “Mom, what do you say?”. And they’ve started to question whether I really know more than them, for instance when we were driving home from the hospital Alex questioned me, “Mom, is this the way home?” “Are you sure?” “Is this the SHORTEST way home?” And they like to remind me what they do know, like when Chloe asked me which books in her catalog cost less than $5 and I started reading off the titles she kept saying “I know that one! You already told me that one!”

The twins are really changing their tune about school. Last year they’d moan and groan and bargain in an attempt to getting out of going to school, and this year they’ve started to be downright positive about going to school. On Friday Alex asked which day of the week it was. When he found out it was Friday he asked if Friday was a school day. When I told him it was he said “oh good, then I’ll get to see Mrs. Peirce”. He really likes her! I’m so relieved to have them liking school before they have to face the scary transition to kindergarten.

My last story of the week is about raking leaves. The twins raked up a pile of leaves so they could jump and play in it, and then they named the pile Phil. Whenever the wind would blow the leaves around they’d yell “No! Phil, come back!” As I sucked up the rest of the leaves in the yard they pleaded that I not “throw away Phil”. When I asked Chloe how the pile of leaves got its name, she said simply, “I named it Phil”. Apparently naming a pile of leaves and becoming emotionally attached to it is perfectly normal from her point of view.

casey's surgery - day 1

Casey’s surgery – day 1: The day isn’t over yet, so perhaps my title is premature, but… The surgery was at 7:30a which met check-in at 6:30, which meant our babysitter had to show up at 6a.m.! Things went very smoothly and at almost exactly 9:30 the doctor came and told me that the surgery was over and had been a success with nothing unexpected. I’d been told beforehand that Casey would be a ½ hour to an hour “waking up” enough that they could get him dressed and in a chair, and then I’d be allowed to see him. It was almost an hour and a half later when a nurse came and told me that Casey had an asthma attack (he hasn’t had one since he was 3!) and seemed to be doing better after a nebulizer treatment and some oxygen, but that he was still going to be a while. I forget the timing of events from there, but Casey’s oxygen saturation wouldn’t stay up without oxygen assistance, so they took him for a chest x-ray. They found fluid in his lungs and a lot of air in his belly, both of which made it hard for him to breathe. Instead of getting to see him at 10:30, it was nearly 3pm before I was allowed back. I stayed with him for an hour watching his O2 saturation go up and down until finally it stayed up and he was released to go home. It seems there were a number of factors at play. 1) The pain killers are also central nervous system depressants and other patients in the recovery also had short-term O2 sat problems. 2) The anesthesiologist and the nurses believe that Casey’s snoring is because of sleep-apnea and the anesthesiologist heard Casey make a snoring/gurgling sound as he was coming out of the anesthesia. She thinks the apnea of a (I forget what words she used, but it meant “relaxed”) throat caused him to aspirate some fluid. 3) The air in his belly put pressure on his diaphragm making it harder for his lungs to expand.
Since he’s been home Casey has been doing very well. He ate a good dinner, took a pain killer, and was comfortable enough to get a little sleep in his recliner.

week ending nov 2, 2008:

Week ending Nov 2, 2008: This week was Halloween, a nature walk in Patapsco Valley State park, the twins’ first gymnastics class of the season, and a bowling birthday party. The twins had a Halloween party at school and I volunteered to help run a game for the kids to play, but when I showed up, there were so many volunteers there wasn’t anything left for me to do so I just got to enjoy the party and take tons of pictures. When we first arrived in the classroom Alex brought his friend Matthew over to meet me and after the introductions Alex was holding Matthew’s hand and Matthew reached over and grabbed my hand and wiggled it. At first I was confused and then I realized Matthew was shaking my hand! How grown-up these kids are introducing their friends to their parents (without prompting!) and shaking hands.
On Halloween night we went to Natalie’s house and did our trick-or-treating in her neighborhood. We told the kids that they could only go the houses that had the porch lights on. After a few houses they caught on and they’d run down the sidewalk yelling “Light! Light! Light!” each time they saw the next house with the porch light on. Alex’s costume was the Transformer character called Optimus Prime, and Chloe’s costume was an angel. The package said “Darling Angel”, so Chloe told everyone who asked about her costume that she was “Darling Angel”. http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/Halloween2008#
On our nature walk we walked 3 miles in 3 hours with 3 preschoolers (Cousin Natalie went to that also). The twins didn’t have any trouble with the distance and they had a great time reveling in the joys of nature (as evidenced by the pictures). http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/PatapsacoStatePark2008#
Since Chloe picked ballet over the summer, and Alex picked soccer in the early fall, it was Chloe’s turn to pick what activity the twins were signed up for next. She picked gymnastics. They gym they used to go to had closed, but a different local gym seems to have a very similar program. When I asked Alex if he wanted to do gymnastics he said “no”. I guessed that he’d change his mind if he got to watch a class so I drove over one evening when a class of kids their age was in session. I was right! Alex hadn’t been in the building but a few minutes before he was asking when he’d get to “do that”. They had their next class the next day and Alex loved it so much that he sulked when it was over. The bowling birthday party was for their friend Moni who is in their preschool class and also lives in our neighborhood. I hadn’t considered bowling as an option for 5 year olds, but the kids loved it. The bumpers were set up in the gutters so all the kids had to do was get the ball moving just a little bit down the lane and they’d knock over at least a few pins. I couldn’t believe how slowly a ball could roll down the lane and still manage to knock over 3 or 4 pins. The kids would get really excited when it was their turn to roll the ball, but sometimes they lost interest before the ball actually reached the pins. http://picasaweb.google.com/constance.phelps/BowlingBirthday#