8/21 - School is in session!!

Aiden has been obsessed with lizards since we have moved back to Florida. He keeps saying he wants one as a pet. We went to our friends beach house a few days before school started and much to Aiden's delight, his friend, Carter, catches lizards. We just pull up after a 1.5 hr drive and I open the van door and Carter runs up and puts a lizard on Aiden's arm (see upper left picture). I thought Aiden was going to flip out. He didn't. Not at all. He stayed pretty calm. Aiden eventually holds the lizard, pets it, picks it up, and lets it crawl all over him!!! It was so awesome. With the help of Sue and Carter, they caught a lizard that we took home and kept for 1.5 days. It was a beautiful nice little lizard (never thought I would say that about a lizard). It a little chameleon one too. I was too scared it was going to die on us because I have no idea how to catch the bugs it needs to eat so we let it go. Come to find out later, the lizards that have kinda taken over North Florida are the mean lizards and actually eat these small lizards that are actually from the area so it makes me sad to think of this little guys fate. We did give him a habitat for a few days though and then Aiden caught another lizard at our friends house and we kept that for a few days too. We are currently lizard-free for the moment. 

I forgot that it had been over a year since the boys have been to a beach. They both were hesitant to walk on the sand at the beginning and complaining that sand was getting in their crocs.  Eli tried digging holes for a bit. He just enjoyed himself running away from the water and running in the water a bit and then just digging holes.


Aiden was brave enough to try and ride on the boogie board on his stomach. Carter did a great job of not pulling/yanking him to fast around to make him fall off ... after he did it once and we asked him not to do it :) Aiden had a good time.



Some of the best times for the boys were just hanging out at Sue's after we ate some dinner. Eli had a blast playing on the tire swing and Aiden got to fly frisbee with Riley for a while. We got home super late and the boys were totally worn out but we all had a good time.

After realizing that all of Aiden's pencils for school had to be sharpened, I got an electric sharper because I have better things to do than sharpen 40 pencils by hand. The boys had a blast sharpening all the pencils for Aiden's class so it worked out perfect.

Aiden had orientation at his school on Monday. We got to meet his teacher (who is fabulous). There are 3 pods of tables in Aiden's room of 4 students each but she's got more students than that so 2 students sit at this big table in the back corner. That's Aiden table. I actually think he likes because it's less people to 'bother' him and he's on the left side so no one to bump elbows with (he's a lefty). His 'First day of kindergarten' pictures crack me up because it was just starting to sprinkle and he just wouldn't let it go (hence the hand being held out to 'see if it was raining still'). After meeting his teaching, seeing where he was going to sit, and having some questions answered, he was all ready to start the next day.

Tuesday was the first day of school. Both boys were so excited. Eli and I walked Aiden to his classroom (after parking up over a curb on the grass and making it through the mobs of people) and Aiden got to look at a book while we waited for his classroom to be open. Mrs. McEachen had play-doh waiting at the tables for them. Exciting news: Aiden sorta played with it!! Eli was so encouraging to him and giving him ideas for the play-doh. I finally told Eli it was time to go and he gave his brother a huge hug. So cute. I eventually found out he asked two questions throughout the day: Is it time to go home yet?

I then dropped Eli off at his new daycare. Eli was so sad. He didn't know anybody and his big brother was not there for the first time ever (they've almost always gone to the same daycare). Eli was crying and it broke my heart. I was fine with Aiden but Eli made me get a little tear in my eye hearing him cry like that when I left. I called a few hours later to check on him and he did great. 

As a "great job" reward for their first days, we wen to see Planes. They loved it and had a blast. The motorcycles on the way out were too enticing not to stop by and try out though. I am fine with that as long as they don't expect me to give them money for those crazy things. :) 

All this excitement was just too much for Aiden. He crashed on the way home from the movies. Little stinker Eli won't nap for me at home but he slept for 2 hrs at daycare. (He's been sleeping about 2 hrs almost everyday since he started now)

I've been working a little project: A menu for Aiden. I am determined to not let Aiden eat yogurt and some carb for every lunch so here is my attempt at a balanced lunch and letting him choose things but still having variety. Thus we have Aiden's lunch menu. I google imaged a bunch of things that I know Aiden will eat (lots of carby snacks and fruit) and then researched some ideas that other parents had for lunches. His only rules are that once he uses a card (a food), he can't use it anymore. This forces variety and for him to try new things. He's made up a banana burrito so far (1 half of a sandwich thin with peanut butter and a banana half wrapped inside) and has chosen things for his menu that normally are an issue for him to eat at home (salad, cucumber, peppers, etc). I was so excited that he chose this for his menu but here is the real kicker: I'm not telling him anything regarding how much of his lunch he is supposed to eat and he's still eating a great portion of the items he normally won't even eat for me at home!!!! AWESOME! 

 The other really cool thing is that he makes most of his own lunch the night before. Here he is putting peanut butter on his crackers. It's great because he's learning how to use butter knives and sharper knives for fruit and vegetables (yes I am supervising him). He puts on exactly how much peanut butter he wants so I don't have to hear complaints of how I put too much on and it came out the sides or that there wasn't enough. He actually gets excited to make his lunch!! I never thought that would happen. He's also finding ways for little brother to help. Tonight he let Eli scoop in the Chex mix in the container while Aiden was putting nuts in his other container. I'm loving this. He makes the menu on Saturday so I can make sure I have the stuff and if I don't have something then I take the card out so he can't choose it. This week we had to shuffle a few things around (switching fruits for a day and a vegetable another day) but he's just fine with it. 

Even though he hasn't napped in weeks, the fact that he doesn't have a rest period anymore is just wearing this kid down. I wake Aiden up to take him potty before I go to bed and I flushed the toilet for him and walked into his room and he wasn't there. After a slight panic I found him in my room (across the house) on the floor on the crash pads under the swing. Poor kid.

My mom and I went to Aiden's school last week to have lunch with him. It was fun and he enjoyed (see picture to left) but then cried once it was time to go back to his class.












Aiden has been adapting really well. He got his first V (very good) for conduct last Friday and was super excited. He LOVES taking the bus to and from school and just got assigned seats today and is really excited about that. He loves his seat right by the driver :)

I wanted to include this picture for Brad. While we have had a few horrendous bath times, we've had 1-2 good ones too. Here is one where Aiden is laughing because they were drinking shower water and then spitting it back out.

My little man getting on the bus to go to school. Eli goes with me sometimes to wait with Aiden for his bus but then Eli gets sad once Aiden gets on and starts crying. We are all still adjusting. 

On Saturday we wanted to go have some fun down by the amenity center. He are Nana and Aiden up in the treehouse. We all played putt putt and the boys had fun. Aiden played the course about 3 times I think although he never waited for us to finish hole together. I think Eli and I were on  Hole 4 and Aiden had finished all 9 and was starting over again. 

Eli ended up just preferring to watch other people play because he just found it too hard. 

I thought we still needed some exercise so we became race cars and raced around the putt putt golf holes. That was actually a lot of fun. I wanted to take a cute picture of the boys and I before we left but I tired them out so much that Eli (green shirt) wouldn't do anything that I asked him to do and Aiden (white shirt) just wanted to tell us each letter written on his shirt.

I start school on Monday!!! I will be teaching at Jacksonville University as well as the College of Southern Maryland. I'm so so so excited to be back in the classroom this semester although this fall semester is going to stink pretty much because I have to commute there (about 1 hr each way) on MWF and fight morning traffic and drop Eli off crazy early at daycare. After 2 weeks of getting adjusted to school, things are going to get even crazier as I go back to work and my schedule will impact all of us. We miss you so much Brad!!! As Aiden prays every night, "Please let daddy do well on his school work so that he can hurry and come home."

3/27 - Nana is here!

Last Tuesday the boys found a mater costume that someone gave me last year at the consignment sale. They got it out and "towed" each other around for a while. 

Because of the timeline I was dealing with on Tuesday, Eli was forced to come to Aiden's therapy (OT and Speech) for the first time. Eli did a good job playing by himself for the majority of Aiden's speech therapy appt.  

Ms. Lisa was nice enough to let Eli do some stuff with Aiden. Aiden had a blast on the swing as you can see.

Eli thought the scooter board and did pretty well on it.

He tried to do some of the same things that Aiden was doing but he struggled a bit more with a beading activity and got a little frustrated.

Aiden is doing better with his writing. He is trying more but I almost always have to correct his grip but at least he's not completely breaking down and crying every time I try and fix his grip. Here he in OT with a weighted sleeve on his arm so that he has to work his muscles a little more and it provides some stability.

I went down and got my mom last week and brought her back up with me. Here are the boys eating a popsicle that I just bought them. It was Eli's first one and he wasn't really sure what to do with it.

Eli is such a little cuddle monster after his night/nap time and here we are cuddling after he woke up from a nap.

We had an afternoon park date last week. We met up with Sydney, Allison, & Jordyn. It was beautiful outside and the kids had a blast.

We got a group photo of the boys and I with Nana and Bronco. Bronco enjoyed going down the slides for the first time in a while.

I also got a picture of all the kids. They all get along so well. 

Aiden really wanted Nana to watch him play on the iPad last week and she happily ablated him. Eli tries really hard to use the letter program that Aiden likes so much but he's just not ready for the fine motor control that is needed.

 

On Friday afternoon, we went to beach at Amelia Island and met our friend Sue and her boys. It's been a while since we've had Aiden at the beach and trying to get wet at the same time.

It was a great time to go because it was low tide and there was like a small narrow river all along the beach. It was perfect because Aiden was much more relaxed because he knew the waves wouldn't get him and that the water wasn't too deep.

Here is Aiden posing with Nana.

Of course Eli didn't mind getting wet and sandy real quick. The water was quite cold but that didn't keep Eli from standing and sitting in it. Here he is showing me his sand castle mold that he filled up with the shovel.

I was so proud of Aiden. Sue told me beforehand that I should bring a big dump truck or something so we did. Aiden pushed it all over the beach after he got comfortable. Some places were deeper than others and he got a little panicked at times but did a great job. He must have done 20 laps back and forth with the dump truck before I finally convinced him to give it up and let one of Sue's boys borrow it.

It was a good trade in Aiden's mind to give up the dump truck. He then got to take the bogey board all over the place and he thought that was pretty fun. He carried that thing around for a long time.

Eli finally stopped playing with the bucket and shovel and got a bogey board too and thought he was pretty special.

Eli hopped on Aiden's board when he was in the sand but Aiden couldn't really pull him on the sand.

We told Eli that was a bad idea because he was going to fall over/off the board and into the cold water (and even though it's shallow, it's definitely deep enough for Eli to drown. The boys each got a board and walked around for a while towards the end of our stay and they had a great time. We ate dinner at Sue's house and then headed home about 6:30pm.

On Saturday morning, we went to Lowe's for the Build and Grow workshop. The activity this week was mini chalkboards. I pretty much helped Eli and my mom helped Aiden. They both did a good job of hitting the nails with the hammer.

I'm not so sure why Aiden is hitting his head with the wrong side of the hammer. I asked them to say "cheese" for daddy and this is what they gave me.

Eli really liked his chalkboard and continued to write all over it.

Aiden earned his Fish game on Saturday too. He had to go two nights in a row with no wet pull-up and then he could try a night in his regular undies and stay dry. He finally made it and his reward is this fish game. He gets it taken away  if he wakes up wet and can earn it back when he can stay dry (hopefully the next night). I've only had to take it away for a night and that's just because he wanted to wear a pull-up (it was even dry) but I need him in real undies. Regardless, here are the boys playing the game.

Here is Aiden working on the iPad again with Nana watching.

The boys do a pretty good job of sharing the iPad and taking turns although sometimes Eli is a little stubborn and wants to play the higher level/coordination games that Aiden can play. 

On Saturday night, my mom watched the boys so I could go to dinner with some girls from church and then we went to see the Peking Acrobats which was a lot of fun.

I had to include the pictures below to show that my kitties love the iPad too. Here are Pouncer and Twix playing with the Friskies free app. They love to chase the fish on the screen.

We've had a great time with Nana here so far. The boys love seeing her and it's great for me to have my mom around too. Here is Eli towing Nana.

On Sunday night, it was pajama night at AWANA's. Eli found the tricycle in the kitchen because my mom was going to clean it while we were at church. Well, as you can see, Eli decided to ride it around the house and found some sunglasses too. This kid is full of personality.

We had to go to church early to help setup my computer so they kids played around with the microphone for a bit for the first time. They loved hearing their own voices. Eli was cracking me up. He kept stealing the microphone and wouldn't share with Aiden and he was dancing around as he was singing. I have a cute video I'll have to post soon.

I've been so impressed with Aiden lately. He know a few songs and doesn't mind singing them out loud. It makes my heart smile. He sang "Jesus loves me" when he had the microphone and then he busted into a melody of the ABC's.

We have a few more days left with Nana and plan to enjoy them. I've put a lot of work into get stuff ready for a consignment sale tonight. I'll update about that next time.