Good-bye 2009

What a great year!!!!!

Happenings of December

1- Decorated for Christmas-
It's a tradtion in our home to start decorating for Christmas with Jessica- she is the daughter of a classmate of Todd's from Athens and is living in Northern Ohio for college. One of the first things we put up is this climbing the ladder Santa. The boys LOVE this, or should I say LOVED this... after being up for 2 days, it broke, not sure why, but it was sad for all the boys.
We have 2 trees, one is a tree my mom had gotten from a Festival of Trees years ago. When we moved to Northern Ohio, she brought it to us (as well as a dining set and a king-sized bed, which has SAVED our marriage). Well, in the move and whatnot, the bottom of the tree has broken right off. In some ways, we're fortunate about that, because there is no way the tree would fit in our house, it's just too tall. The unfortunate thing is that it is not the most stable thing in the world. The kids definitely know not to touch the tree. This tree we keep decorated and just store it in our basement. The other tree we take the decorations on and off each year, so it's what the kids get to do to experience decorating a tree. It's much smaller, and really, by the end of decorating the small one, I'm grateful we don't have to decorate the big one. Grant liked decorating the tree, he didn't pay attention to the hooks or branches, he just stuck the ornaments into the tree as if were a table.

2- Was able to take a picture of me and some friends while we look good, because this woman got married

3- Had Four little boys dressed in Footy-Jammies all month long4- Hosted a Christmas Party -
I may be a little crazy, but I had a party with over 30 kids here...but the mothers stayed and were involved also. (I guess it was just an excuse for us to hang out)
We did crafts, ate lunch,and of course, performed The Nativity
5- Todd and I went on TWO dates!!! and have another one planned this week! I think that's a record for us. (No, we're not trying for another baby)
6- Made a Gingerbread House
Todd actually was in charge of this activity. I some-what supervised while I was making dinner.
Things were looking hopefulThe boys started getting skepticalTodd didn't read the directions, and something went terribly wrong. But don't worry, Mom stepped in to save the day
7- Spent a lot of snuggle time reading books

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas!!!

Today and yesterday we did nothing but family time, cooking, playing, and reading stories. The boys decorated some cookies for Santa, we had cheese fondue for dinner - the boys LOVED that.

After dinner we read "The Polar Express" to the boys. At the end, we presented to the boys the first gift of Christmas from the story, a bell. We then went on to ask them what the real first gift of Christmas was...of course the Christ child.
We performed the Nativity. I was Mary (2nd time my entire life I got to play that role, Lyndee always got it while growing up), Roger was Joseph, Mikey was an angel, William was a "ylepper" (sheperd), Todd was a wise man, and Grant was a terrorist. I have been reading Christmas stories to the boys since Thanksgiving, and we have a book with some illustrations that quotes the story of Christ's birth from Luke and Mathew. I have been reading that almost everyday so that the boys could know and understand the story of Christ's birth, so when we performed the Nativity, the boys really knew their roles. Then as we were ending the boys were distressed because they wanted the scene with Herod in it, so they insisted that Todd be Herod, Roger took me and "baby Jesus" into Egypt, William gave "Baby Jesus" a sword to fight King Herod ...and Satan, then Mikey, Roger, and William fought "Herod". I now wish I would have video recorded it.
We finished with reading some stories and putting out some cookies and milk for Santa, and some carrots for the reindeer. Then we went to bed.
This morning was really nice. We all went downstairs together, Mikey was so anxious to go down. The boys were so excited to see their toys, they had asked for believe it or not, Dinosaurs. They played with the toys Santa had left them and emptied their stockings. Grant got a "little red car", he noticed it immediately and sat in it, waving to me all the while.
After awhile we had them exchange their presents with one another. Almost a month ago there was a "Secret Santa" shop at a local church. We took the boys there and let them go and get everyone in the family one thing. They loved doing this and I had no clue as to what they had gotten. As they were giving eachother their gifts William was so confused as to why he had to give other people the gifts. So when he gave Todd a transformer, Todd let him have it back.
After they were playing with all that for awhile I made some breakfast. Todd's family usually has Bagels and Locs for breakfast, so in keeping with tradition but compromising because I don't really LOVE this meal, we are creating our own tradition of having Eggs Benedict with Locs instead of ham.
After breakfast we went back to the living room and had each of the boys grab one of the presents for them. After opening, they played with each present for awhile, then when they were ready for the next, we had them open another one. This really prolonged the opening time to several hours, but that was better because they got to have a little time to play with each gift, and we got to cherish the time for a little bit longer. The boys reaction to each gift was awesome. True, there were some that they were more excited about than others, but every gift was a pleasant surprise, the reactions were priceless, I can totally see why giving gifts to little kids is a lot more fun than giving gifts to adults or teenagers.
My mom had gotten the boys light-sabers. they LOVED these. They immediately starting fighting with them. Mikey and Roger were actually playing pretty rough with them and did show some good skills, William gets the cutest fierce face on when he goes into attack, and Grant is surprisingly very good and aggressive.
When we were younger my mom never bought any "good" cereal... they just were too expensive. Because of this, every year for Christmas we each got our own box of "good" sugary cereal. I remember how much I loved getting this, so the boys each got a box of cereal. They were just as excited to unwrap those boxes as they were any other toys. So of course, they requested that we have cereal for lunch. It was a happy chorus that went on around the table as they ate their sugary cereal. All of them happily humming while shoveling their sweet cereal into their mouths with milk dripping off their chins.
For dinner we had the traditional turkey dinner. The boys weren't really into the dinner, and Roger actually threw up during dinner (he was having a coughing fit), but he did make it to the bathroom!
All-in-all, a really great Christmas. Hope yours was great too!

Should I get his head checked?

Backfire

We've had a problem with Roger lately.
He is becoming very defiant.

If I ask him to do something, or not to do something he answers me in a very defiant tone saying something like, "Then I'll just kick your wall" or something of the sort. Of course he gets his punishment, which is usually standing in a corner, but because he will punch the wall while standing there he will be moved to the backdoor step, which can be very cold.

After he cools down, I discuss the problem with him, and he is aware that his behavior is unacceptable, but just isn't sure of how to cure it. He once told me this, "I just get worst."

The other evening Todd was working and I, having taken care of my children all day, had the task of putting them to bed. Roger hadn't wanted to go to bed and posed a challenge with each step. I finally sent him to sleep in "Nae's bed" while I finished story time with the other children. To this there was much screaming, throwing himself to the floor, banging on the walls, and kicking the floor.

I was livid. He was pushing the boundaries just a little too much. I went into the room and threw open the door. I wasn't sure of what I was going to do until I remembered that just that morning, my friend's tactic of putting some hot sauce on her children's tongue had been brought up.

I carried Roger into the kitchen, grabbed Tabasco sauce from the fridge and in a very firm voice instructed Roger to open his mouth. He did obediently and I shook some of the Tabasco sauce into his mouth. It had been awhile since I myself had used Tabasco sauce, and in that moment I couldn't remember if it was very hot or not, so ya, I put in quite a few drops because his face hadn't changed from when I dropped the first of it in. When I turned to return the Tabasco sauce into the fridge, I whipped a drop off of the top and placed it on my tongue to inspect the hotness. Oh, man, ya, it was definitely hot enough.

I sent Roger to the corner before I was going to allow him a drink to relieve the hotness. He started coughing, but I was too upset to care. Then all of the sudden Roger puked all of his dinner, and some of lunch, onto my walls.

I was shocked. but then I remembered that when I was about his age I had thrown up (due to illness) on the living room floor and my mom was so upset that I didn't make it into the toilet (I didn't know it was expected) that she gave me a coffee mug and a tablespoon to clean i up. So of course since this has left such an impression on my little kid mind I did the mature thing and gave Roger a mug, a spoon, and a rag.

Let's just say he wasn't very effective in his cleaning. I ended up cleaning it all because he lied around asking me questions. "Mom.... I want to tell you a question. Why...." and on and on he went. I tried to stay firm but soon he kept saying, "I love you so much"

Wow! Not only had I caused him to loose all his dinner, but was also making him clean it up, yet he was so forgiving and loving.

Well, Roger still has the problem of being very defiant and throwing tantrums (threw one at the eye doctor's today....so badly that another patient started yelling at him to do it somewhere else - but all I could think was that at least Roger had the excuse of being a 4 year-old for his acting like one). I'm trying to curb this behavior without breaking his spirit. I'm not totally sure of what to do, and I haven't thrown the Tabasco sauce out the window. Now it's a good threat and when I do deliver on my threat, it's just a small, small drop that is placed on his tongue.

Bad News

Uh-ohwhat is this?Could it be?Oh, no! Roger's Anna is being noticed by some other guy...his own BROTHER!!!! This has bad news written all over it.I don't see this being good for their relationship. Let the fighting begin (maybe that's why they've been fighting more lately?)

Swimming Lessons

Guess what!
Somebody's moving up in their swimming class! Okay, actually two people are!Mikey and Roger are the only ones in their class that passed for advancement in their lessons. They are super excited, but are sad to say goodbye to Miss Ruth and a little nervous to start having their lessons in the big lap pool. But we think they'll do great. And William gets to start swim lessons with Miss Ruth.