Now A Family of *gulp* Six.

We have been taking Roman to OT now for a month. Three times a week, we jump in the car at 4pm, drive 50 min. to the office, do 50 min. of therapy, and then drive the 50 min. home again. It makes for some long days! However, his confidence has already grown, his core & upper arm strength is increasing, and best of all - his encopresis is already improving. They have an OT named Sandy that we had been told about, who apparently has a "magic touch" when it comes to this problem. She has done 3 half-hour sessions with Ro and the problem has gone from 3-4 times a week to 2x a week. She does something called "visceral manipulation." Basically, as she explains it, his internal organs and nerves in the private area are bound, restricted, and confused. She applies different techniques to his low back & upper buttocks. Ro doesn't mind it - he gets to watch a video while he lays on a massage table. Sandy told me she currently has five clients with encopres...

Kindergarten is hard. That's Charlie's summary of his school year so far. He has a teacher who has high expectations! It was a good/bad start - he likes school, but some things are too easy and boring (alphabet, he already knows it). On the other hand, some things have been challenging to him - cutting, sitting quietly. We have gotten 2 calls from his teacher so far about his behavior. We all agree his behavior is worse in the afternoon and it's because he is so darn tired! That doesn't excuse his hitting, of course, or refusing to follow directions - but it does explain it. He's on a special behavior plan now, where his teacher notifies us what "color" he is (green, yellow, blue, red). If he gets 2 green in a row, we will give him a reward. Since starting it 4 weeks ago, he has earned 3 rewards. It clearly helps. He likes gym the best, and loves before & after-school care. Playtime! He is definitely ready to read - he's always spelling out words ...

Roman finished 4th grade and as he described it, it was "bittersweet." in our district students switch schools to an upper elementary for 5/6 grade, and while he is excited to move on, he really doesn't do well with transitions & changes. He likes Social Studies, art, gym, & computer lab. Math & Language Arts is where he struggles. We had some interventions in place and his teacher continued to grant us extra time if needed for work.  His class traveled to Lansing to tour the state Supreme Court & the Capitol building, which he liked very much. It's great to see him understanding parts of our government and how the state/country works. This summer I've allowed him to be lazy. He has 3 friends in the neighborhood (all younger than him) that he plays with - they are all into Minecraft, a computer game. 2 of the 3 really like Legos too. His bestest friend who moved away, Nick, we try to see a couple times a month. He attended a laser tag birthday pa...

Family members not on Facebook, this is for you!  I'll get to my family in a future post, but today - projects. We've attacked many. Over winter break back in January, we had the wood floors refinished. Over spring break in April, we finally decided to act on our daydreams and redid the living room. I can't say remodeled, because we didn't change much.... but gutted? Definitely. We were excited for this project, but you know how one thing just snowballs into something else? Well, we pulled the old insulation down and besides a mouse nest (complete with baby), we found rotted deck boards. A lot of them.  After a couple of estimates and some discussion, we also got - a new roof! All in all, we had 13 deck boards replaced, a new roof, and new soffets & downspouts too. On the upside - we've noticed a temperature difference in our house already. Anyway... after our budget was surpassed (thanks, roof) and our couple-week timeline turned into a month, it...

My dislike of snow days started when Roman was probably 3 or 4. They were no longer fun, carefree days - they were a lot of work!  Having a lack of imagination, Roman needed constant "entertainment." He was always asking for me to play with him, create with him, watch TV with him... and if I tried to do tasks around the house, or heaven forbid - something fun for me - he would cry, yell, complain, you name it.  It makes sense to us now - an abandonment feeling, a need he had to be close to someone - but at the time, just the most frustrating, annoying behavior. It hasn't gotten much better with the addition of little brother. There are days that the boys play well together, and days where all they do is pick, poke, and yell at each other. Snow days, sadly, seem to be days they do not get along.  I actually dread the phone call, because all it means is a long day of playing referee, sending them to separate locations, and listening to them whine either about each other o...

Christmas: check. New Year's: check. Charlie's birthday: check. Semester break: check. Practically February: oh my gosh! 2013 arrived with a whoosh and it's been nonstop since we all returned to work/school. We had a great Christmas break, probably the best yet - spent time with family & friends, visited the Institute of Art for some fun, had a couple lazy pajama-days here at home. As usual, Charlie's birthday snuck up on us but he turned 5 with much fanfare. It seems the older he gets, the less he wants to follow directions - there is a large learning curve going on in his life right now. Of course, he reminds me of... well, of me. And I turned out just fine! Roman is finding 4th grade to be really fun and really tough all at the same time. Homework is taking longer & is much more involved. He's done a couple projects & the great thing is, he tells me he doesn't get nervous before he has to do a speech or presentation. What a grea...