Uh....OH MY GOD...Prepare for PANIC!

OH MY GOD!!!!!! Have you SEEN my list? CRIKEY! Whatever shall I do? Call in sick for the rest of the week? No, too much to do at work. OH! I know...I'll cancel all of our evening obligations this week - haircuts, basketball, work on reading with SmallBoy, driving with LargeBoy to prep for on-road driving test (GOD HELP ME!), work on reading with SmallBoy, basketball, OT, figure out if Ex is taking them at all for the weekend or just on Christmas Day proper, work on reading with SmallBoy, scouts, basketball, work on reading with SmallBoy, basketball, basketball, gig with the band. Nope, too much to do with that too. I see that my only solution to this problem is not just calling in sick - that will only delay the inevitable. I must call in DEAD. Somehow, though, I don't forsee having a problem pulling that off. I'm not sure how I'm actually even conscious right now. Must be that ethical part of me that won't allow me to sleep on the job even though there is no one here but me and I can count on less than two hands how many times the phone has rung today.

Tonight - haircuts basketball sleep. I will not stop in between. I'm on a mission. I haven't slept well, I've been snapping at the kids and at PC. My to do list is made and organized into what I need to do in the next - OH MY GOD- 6 days:

SHOP FOR:
Mom
Dad
BMD
KR
Chica
Cousin in grab bag
random adult in grab bag
1 more thing for LargeBoy
ET
something else for Princess
stocking stuffers
posterboard - MUST GET TONIGHT

Can anyone do this FOR me? I haven't anytime unless I don't see any of you for Christmas and just plain old shop on the holiday.

I feel yucky, oh so yucky. I feel yuck, and ucky, and bleh.
Eyes are burning, stomach's churning. I don't want to do much else but sleep.

Ok, I better stop there before someone hurts me.

Update: Really, this IS yesterday's post, but I was a good girl last night and went to bed as soon as we got home from basketball - without even stopping by MommyGuilt first. We got the haircuts, we got the posterboard, we even managed to get the gift for the cousin in the grab bag! (Walgreen's is a beautiful thing - no, the haircuts came from the shop across from my office).

Girl's game was a heartbreaker, but they played one of their archrivals - and they're equally as good as we are. Let's just say that for MOST of the game, it was all defense, until the other team's offense kicked it into high gear and the refs started calling jump balls instead of fouling out the other team's leading scorer (though we drove to the hoop and drew foul after foul after foul on her - she should have been fouled out at the beginning of the 4th quarter had the refs been calling).

So that's where we are. I still feel yucky, but today it's not the burning eyes and the yucky stomach so much as a sore throat. Better heed my mother's advice and take my vitamins!

Let's See If I Can Stay on Track Again

Last time I made myself an outline I stayed, relatively, on track. Think I can do it again? Hmmm...I want to tell you about so many things that have been going on, that I think I should make THE LIST again. Darn, my snowman's not moving. Well, you get the idea. Ok, let's see - what do I need to tell you about?
Scouts and the camping trip
SmallBoy & school (OY)
Christmas chaos
House...GRRRR
Cookie Day
EXHALE!!
I think that's it! Let's start at the top - and I don't know that these are in order at all:

SCOUTS & CAMPING
The first weekend of the month, PC & ET took SmallBoy on a campout with the scouts. The Boy Scout troop invited all of the boys in SmallBoy's age bracket (Weeblos I & II) to join them on a camping weekend. They planned on doing many activities to help the boys earn badges - and lots of them. From our den, only three other boys/dads went on the trip, as it was RIDICULOUSLY cold - my guys were brave! From the Weeblos II den, a few other father/son teams went along, including the man who, until last year, used to be the Scout Master of the whole pack and his son.

When my guys finally arrived up north in Woodstock, IL, they were ecstatic to be alive. The snow had hit two days before, but up in the rural country of the campgrounds, the roads were barely passable and they thought the certain death was imminent. As they exited the snuggly warmth of our little Honda, they were slapped across the face with the cold biting winter wind reminding them that, indeed, they were roughing it for the next 24hrs. My guys were prepared, dressed in layers and "toughness." They schlepped their gear to their cabin, geared up for the day, and headed out to meet the boy scouts of our troop. Their journey into the "arctic," as it seemed, came to a temporary screeching halt as a troop of boy scouts pulled up to the cabin, also to unload. These scouts had previously given up their reservations due to the weather and now, apparently, had changed their minds. Good, caring gentlemen that our troop are, offered to share the cabin, which had two separate floors, and plenty of room. The other troop was thrilled, and began to unpack their cars, from which they carried in at least 10 television sets, multiple video gaming systems, stereos and mp3 players - all contraband in the eyes of the scouts. Clearly this troop had no intention, whatsoever, of "scouting" for the weekend.

Giving it only a second thought, my guys continued on with their days. There wasn't much going on in the way of earning badges, but the boys were outside having fun. They did, however, hone their hunting/seeking/retrieval skills through a 3-Man Slingshot challenge. PC, ET, and another dad took frozen oranges and shot them out of a 3-Man slingshot into the deep deep snow. They scouts were instructed to follow the orange by sight, and then to listen for the thud when it hit the snow. Then, they were sent to retrieve it. Not an easy job in 2ft of snow out in the country, but they had fun. Sled hills, snow, boys - yeah, lots of fun, minimal badgework.

Unfortunately, SmallBoy got targeted by Former ScoutMaster (who is NOT a very nice man, thinks he's a drill seargent), AND Son of Former ScoutMaster. The son is a year or two older than SmallBoy, and they go to school together. This child has a reputation for harrassing other kids, pushing them around, and just being a general pain in the behind. This child also has an underlying learning disability, so, being the open minded person that I am, and not his parent, always turned a semi-blind eye to the behavior (shame on me). That is, I always turned one until now. The boys were down at the bottom of the sled hill when one scout came back up and told PC that SmallBoy was crying and he thought that SmallBoy was hurt. As it happened, this was the scout's way of indirectly ratting out Son of Former ScoutMaster who had SmallBoy face down on the ground grinding his face into the ground. PC didn't even hear him screaming until Son of Former ScoutMaster lifted his head up for a brief, oh so brief second, so that he could breath, and then promptly smushed him back into the snow. Where, oh where was Former ScoutMaster? In the cabin playing cards with some of the other fathers. Another lovely incident was when the boys were actually outside working on a badge project. SmallBoy told PC that he needed to use the bathroom. PC told him that he had to go to, and that he'd go with him. Well, Former ScoutMaster, abusing his former power and his "power" as the only leader there from our Pack, told my SmallBoy, "You're not going anywhere. You PISS IN YOUR PANTS!" First of all, NO. Second of all, NO. Thirdly, NO! You don't tell a child, especially one that doesn't belong to you, to PISS IN HIS PANTS. You don't tell MY child, with or without an accompanying adult, to PISS IN HIS PANTS. You don't tell YELL at a child on the spectrum, you don't SWEAR in front of all the other boys, you don't humiliate MY son, nor do you outrank my husban who is with my child and knows exactly how to take care of him.

The next incident was at dinner. The boys were all neatly lined in 2 lines waiting, believe it or not, quietly, for their food. Mr. Former ScoutMaster decided that he did not like this arrangement, made the executive decision to make it a single file line, then grabbed MY SON and another young boy by the scruff of the neck and told them that they had to go to the end of the line. Again, a child on the spectrum who is at the beginning of the line AND being patient and quiet is a very wonderful sight to behold. YOU DON'T MOVE HIM. Also, you don't GRAB a child, particularly a young one, and one who is behaving, by the scruff of the neck and yank him out of line. It's been a couple of weeks since this incident and I'm STILL FUMING. Later, Son of Former ScoutMaster told ET that he didn't like SmallBoy because he was stupid and an idiot. Honestly, I don't know HOW ET held himself together and didn't just go off on this kid - perhaps because, being a phenomenal father himself, ET is smart enough to know that know matter how much of a jerk someone is, particularly a child, you don't go off on them. I can't remember exactly how he responded to this boy, but it was completely in defense of SmallBoy along with a "don't you ever...."

OH, I almost forgot about the other troop with the televisions and video games. Loud boys upstairs. They stayed up, well after our troops had lights out, and played video games, loud music, furniture rearranging, jumping, you name it, until 3am. When the guys arrived home the next day and relayed the goings on to me, I was LIVID. I am not one to put up a stink to a higher-up, but this time it involved my child. That's going over the line. I got on the phone with the current fantastic ScoutMaster who has a son in SmallBoy's class, has different issues, but uses the same OT as SmallBoy, ScoutMaster who understands SmallBoy and treats him with equality, but with the little differences - and respect, that he deserves. He was livid. ET wrote an email to the Boy Scouts of America who assured us that this would be looke into. Boy do I feel like I opened a nasty can of worms. We get to spend two of the nights this week at scout outings with Former ScoutMaster and Son. Should be interesting.

SmallBoy & School
Meltdown city. Oh LORD! School's been incredibly trying these last couple of weeks. I have spoken more in the last two weeks to SmallBoy's teachers than I did all of last year. My poor guy has just been having such a difficult time. He's not been wanting to do the work, he's been complaining that it's either too easy or too hard, he's not been wanting to do the assignment as given, but his own way. He's been exploding in class and the kids, who have been SO incredible with him, are now all afraid to even speak to him for fear that he may blow up again for reasons unclear to them - and even to SmallBoy.

We all know that with a spectrum child, meltdowns can come on out of the blue, or over the smallest little thing. We also know that, odds are, it isn't the smallest little thing that causes the melt down, it just happens to be the spark on the powder keg that's been waiting to go off, filling more and more with powder - enough to fuel a HUGE explosion. I've been at my wits end, trying to hold it together and not burst into tears at the office after talking to Mrs. M. I've broken at home, only for a bit, to let a little bit out, whild trying to remain "SUPERMOM". I've lost it at home, melting on my own - venting at everyone in my house for stupid stupid things - things like, "Mom, I need posterboard tomorrow," (oh crap, she really does), things like, "Geez, will you look at the calendar?! How are we supposed to be in all of these places that require us to be there all at the same time? And HOW, if we're supposed to be in those places, are we supposed to get our holiday shopping done? Our laundry done? Our house clean? My flat tire changed? Homework done? Lunches made? Spend time as a family?" Oh my head hurts.

My poor guy has been having his own struggles and meltdowns and, without realizing what I was doing, he's been stressing out worrying about ME. My Not-So-SmallBoy has been worrying about ME. Love him to pieces. He's worrying about himself, about making friends - he's feeling the "excommunication" from the group, he's associating that with what Ex is doing to him, he's struggling with reading comprehension at school, and now he's worrying about me. What a schmuck I am. Totally unthinking sometimes, but I am so grateful to have a family that will help me see what I'm doing and where I'm going.

SmallBoy and I increased our intensity on our reading program that we're doing at home. I'm not sure if I posted on exactly what we're doing, but we're using one of the programs that we do at our center at work, and helping him learn to visualize and make pictures for everything that he's reading. This will help him to build comprehension skills in order to understand what he's reading, and to build an even greater vocabulary. We were doing it just a little bit, which, I should know better, isn't nearly enough. Now we're working on our own little deal: He works really hard and gets x amount of stars. If, by the end of the week he has earned 50stars, he gets to teach me one of his video games. This works out well for both of us because I'm teaching him, and then he'll get to teach me. It's just really really been breaking my heart to see him hurting like this.

Christmas Chaos
This should be a little shorter of a blurb. Are YOU done yet? Religious affiliation aside, everyone celebrates SOMETHING this time of year - Solstice, Hannukah, Christmas, Kwaanza - all of which involve preparation of something, joining with loved ones, sharing of something, usually, some kinds of formal ceremonies - be they at church, temple, home, etc....This year, we have Christmas parties, Christmas baking, elongated Christmas celebration, transportation of the children ON Christmas, deciding who will have them when and how they will get where on Christmas when we're not even certain what time we'll be where on Christmas. And that's just Christmas DAY! Christmas Eve, SmallBoy will sing with the youth choir at mass and I'll be the cantor, so we'll be singing together. Then we'll be having some family over and beginning a new tradition. Christmas Day, we'll do our thing in the morning, Meem & FIL's for food and gifts, then to my aunt's for more food & gifts, then home to collapse. Day AFTER Christmas, we'll spend at Dad's with KR and then bring KR home with us for 2days!!! WHOOT WHOOT!

If I live that long, I have a feeling I'll enjoy it. I haven't finished my shopping, and I still haven't shopped for my mother, my sisters, my father, my father's wife, ET - and I think I still have some stuffers to get for the stockings - OH GOD! I haven't found the stockings yet! And I have NO time this week. Tonight - Scouts/Basketball Game/Reading with SmallBoy/Passing out. Tomorrow night - basketball/Reading with SmallBoy/promoting Code West's gig for Saturday night/passing out. Wed night - Basketball, something else...you get the idea. Somewhere in the spare moments between all of these activities and the important things like sleeping, eating, bathing, and just plain dropping dead, I can find time to do all of the rest of the stuff that still has to get done - oh yeah! And I have to color my hair and find time for haircuts too! EGADS!

Dear Santa:
All I want for Christmas are a few more hours in the day and an extra day on the weekend that are reserved soley for me, that cannot be taken up by obligations for OTHER PEOPLE, other things, work, or anything that I do not care to do. I have been a very good girl this year. This gift does not involve spending any money or creating a brand new toy or video game. I would say this is a relatively simple request. Thank you for taking the time to carefully consider my Christmas wish.
Yours truly,
Me

HOUSE...GRRRRR
Saturday, in the mail, I get a letter from my mortgage company telling me that because I had a nasty little spell with paying for my house, that my escrow is so far down, they are now DOUBLING my mortgage payment, effective Feb. 1. First of all, this house is so NOT worth that amount of money each month. Secondly, if I really and truly could afford to spend that much money on my house each month, I'd live on the richy rich side of town...or at least in a larger house in the comfortable side of town. Can you say REFI????? Seriously, do mortgage companies actually think people will settle for this and just pay it? No. But I've got to do it fast, cuz Feb 1 will come up soon. I don't make that much money in a month. Seriously, I need to sell my house, but it's not ready to be sold, plus stupid Ex will put up such a stink that it would be unbearable if I tried to leave this town of "wide lawns and narrow minds," (E. Hemingway on this town in which I live).

Electrician is coming tomorrow to see what he can do to fix this awful thing. Our house is still on the original fuses and is totally stupid. Our house is sinking on one side, my stairs are falling apart, my garage is falling apart, my insurance company changed my policy and now, get this, they no longer cover any damages to the house caused by the weather - so if a tree falls on my house - nope, if we have a tornado and my house blows to Oz - nope, if we get so much snow that my roof collapses -nope. Can they DO that?????????

Cookie Day
We made scads and scads of cookies, I took scads of pictures. We baked from 10:45 until 6, propped the TV up so that we could roll and decorate cookies while watching the Bears almost blow it against Tampa. We made Grandma Rosie cookies (secret family recipe, roll out dough), butter cookies, gingerbread cookies, butternut snowballs, peanut butter kiss cookies, apricot delights, almond crescents. There were about 21-25 of us (and we were missing several people), and we rolled and decorated and spritzed and baked. I tried desperately to post a slide show of the pics, but they moved my entire blog around.

Cookie day was at my mother's house this year, we rotate every year. My mother lives across the street from a forest preserve. As we were walking up to her house, we noticed a few deer at the edge of the forest. Surprisingly, they stuck around all day. We all walked down there at one point or another over the course of the day and looked at and admired them. I believe there were five total - 2 bucks, 2 does, and a fawn. Amazingly, the bucks were not fighting. (I know, could have cropped a little better, but forgot). We arrived at around 11:15 and the last time we saw the deer outside - you could see them just by looking out of the window, was just before it got dark. I'm impressed, and surprised that they hung out that long.

These are just a smattering of our end result. We baked. A lot. Of Cookies. Somewhere in my spare time, I will bake some more, when, though, I'm not certain. To more pics from cookie day, either peek over at the sidebar, or, to see them larger, head over to my myspace blog, where the slide show is considerable larger in both height & width. I think I'm finally done with this post now. I stopped in the middle of the Christmas Chaos part, went home from work, snarfed down some food, did some reading work with SmallBoy, went to scouts, came home. It's now 10:00. I think that I may just go crack a beer (another beer) and go color my hair. Of course that means, no sleep until at least midnight, but then at least I will have THAT done! EEEEEK. Ta Ta my Friends. Sleep tight.

New Band & Stuff

Last night we met, again, with JG and another gentleman to work on forming ANOTHER band, to supplement what we're doing with Code West. We're looking to play a LOT and a similar, yet different form of music. Hoping a lot of good will come out of this. Tonight, we're going to start recording one or two things and get them sent out and ready to be put up on North Country's myspace. We'll be doing some bluesy rock, a little bit of jazz-ish kinda stuff, and, well, having a grand old time doing it. What I really like is that everyone is willing to do what we have to in order to get moving and start out from the gate running! It seems that everyone has the same ideas on how and what we want to do, and three of our 5 already have some originals written!!!

Oh, I should plug: If you're around on December 23, Code West will be playing at the Pioneer Tap in Forest Park. Click on our myspace for more info. I know, I know, it's the night before The Night Before Christmas. Hopefully by then, you'll have everything done and will be ready to go out and relax before the holiday chaos. Or, if you're like me, you'll need a break from the fact that you're STILL not done. SO, if you're around, come on out! It'll be a blast.

Kids - yes, kids! I'm feeling particularly old today. Girl went to school with LargeBoy today for a shadow day. For those of you not familiar (and I certainly wasn't until very recently), the shadowing day is a day when 8th graders can visit the high school and follow a student around to get a feel for the school, the classes, the structure, the enormity of the school compared to the school they came from. She is shadowing her step-sister, not LargeBoy, because neither of them thought that would be "cool."

I think this is a wonderful process. I have no idea if this was around when I was going into high school, oh so many years ago. If it was, it certainly wasn't something that was brought to everyone's attention as it is now. So, this morning, on our runs, we dropped of TWO children at the high school. THAT was our "shadowing" - getting a feel for how it's going to be with two high school children. EEEEEK!

SmallBoy will be the last one at his school - from our family, that is. I thought he might be worried about not having his sister there anymore, but he was totally gung-ho about the idea. I believe he said something along the lines of, "Yes! Girl won't be there anymore!" It was kind of funny.

What's nice about that, though, is that it's giving us a good feel for how HE feels about his independence. This year began the walking home alone in preparation for next year. I didn't think he's be ready to be on his own next year, but apparently, that's not going to be an issue.

He IS having difficulty, though, with the revelation about Santa. I got a note yesterday in his communication book from his teacher saying that he had had a great day overall, but that he's having a very hard time not sharing his "Santa Secret," and could we please discuss this with him. I was surprised, yet not surprised. I thought that, being in 4th grade, he would be one of the last kids to know. I found out in 1st grade. So I was very surprised when the teacher's note came in. I'm not nearly as surprised, however, that he feels this need to share his new found knowledge with everyone he can. It gives him a feeling of confidence that he knows something that not necessarily everyone else does.

We expressed to him how incredibly important it was to keep this secret to himself, because there are many kids older, his age, and younger, who don't know yet. We told him that it was up to their parents to determine when was the right time to let them in on the secret. To help remind him, and deter him from blurting it out, we gave him a little something from our dishwasher project (something else he's fascinated with) to keep in his pocket during the school day. We told him that whenever he felt like telling someone about Santa, that he could reach in his pocket and hold this bolt-y thing or that he could take out the bolt-y thing and talk to the kids about THAT instead of about Santa. He laughed. He thought we were totally silly, but at least this way, he won't be perseverating on the fact that, "I can't tell I can't tell I can't...oh I GOTTA TELL!"

If anyone has any other wonderful ideas on how to dissuade the sharing of the secret identity of the Jolly Red One, I'd LOVE to hear them!

Sunday Sunday Sunday

I've made the switch over to beta, figured out what I'm doing and am finding this new format to be pretty cool so far. I discovered the "label" feature and am in the process of going back and labeling all 409 posts. As I went through the month of November, to mark them all as NaBloPoMo, I discovered that somehow or other, I MISSED November 4th - two posts on 11/3, but nothing on the 4th. I was SOOOOOOOOOO diligent about getting them in. I threw my children off of the computer, "GET OFF! I NEED TO POST!" I can blame it on I thought I was posting after midnight and apparently didn't. I can blame it on a different time zone (but I wasn't in one), or I could just suck it up and say I didn't get the post in for some reason, and just never realized it. AAAAAAARRRGGHHH!!!!! Well, next year. Unless you guys, Laura & Kyra, really want to try and get a NaBloJanMo going - even if it is only the three of us.

This weekend went by entirely to quickly. Anyone agree? Ex had Girl and LargeBoy, of course NOT SmallBoy, for the weekend. Friday night we stayed in and made some music. We are in the process of forming another band (in addition to, not instead of Code West). So, ET came over, as did JG, who will be our other guitar player. We hung out, made music (and merry), and had a blast. SmallBoy hung out with me while the guys did their thing with their guitars and bongos. He taught me a couple more games and played just with me for a while. It was very nice for both of us, I think, especially since it was a weekend when he had been, once again, excluded from visiting his father.

Saturday was a very busy day from start to finish, yet it didn't seem overly crazy, like it usually does on the weekends. We had promised LargeBoy that we would take him out driving to log in some more behind-the-wheel time. Ex refuses to do this with him (Why? I'll never know.), so PC took him out for a couple of hours first thing in the morning, when traffic was relatively light. He's really doing a wonderful job. I'm still terrified, and I'm sure I will be for the rest of my life when I know he's behind the will (right, Mom?), but I'm much more comfortable with him driving than I was in September. New element in the equation now, the snow, but he's got to learn somehow.

GR had called and asked if SmallBoy would like to spend the night. She likes to have GR and SmallBoy nights when she knows that Ex has the other two. SmallBoy was THRILLED and had his bag packed within seconds. I told him that it would probably be mid to late afternoon before GR picked him up, because she had things to do, and we had Girl's play to attend. He was quite fine with that, as he was ecstatic that he was going to GR's and that he was going to see his sister's play.

The play was fantastic. The drama club performed a play based on children's books including Courduroy, The Grouchy LadyBug, Horton Hatches an Egg, Lon Po Po, Pierre, The Rough Faced Girl, and a couple others that I can't remember. The play began with a group of kids in the library talking about just how TOTALLY LAME it is to read. "Boring!" "Reading? Um, no." With that, one of the girls knocked over the table where the books are displayed and out rolled the Grouchy Ladybug. The librarian told the girls that to make up for losing the ladybug, they would have to read all of the stories until they found the one in which she belonged, and returned her to her story. The performances were wonderful. The play was written to have a narrator reading the story and then the story book character reciting their "lines." Girl was in 3 or 4 of the stories. In this pic, she was the wolf in Lon Po Po - a story similar to the mother goat and her three kids. Mother goes to visit grandma and tells the kids not to let anyone in no matter what. Big Bad Wolf (Girl) poses as Grandma and enters into the house, the kids finally discover her identity and then set about getting rid of the wolf. In Horton Hatches the Egg, she was the Ringmaster at the circus. Now, the costumes are never too elaborate, it's junior high play in a Catholic School, so you know that it's all volunteers, but the kids always manage to pull them off. She came out in a "ringmaster" jacket and a hat and looked fantastic. She already had her nose and eyebrows on for her Lon Po Po character, so she looked extra adorable. She came out and with all of the confidence in the world, like she owned this role, like she was meant to be a ringmaster. She was graceful, elegant, and Seuss-ian. PC and I were terribly proud of her. I really want to put more pics in this post, but I'll add them to the slide show in the sidebar instead. In the Grouchy LadyBug, Snood played the ladybug and Girl played one of the animals that the ladybug kept challenging to fight, in Girl's case, the rhinoceros. I tried to get a good pic of the two of them on the stage together, but when I finally got into position, Girl was the one and only character that came out stage left. Go figure.

After the play, GR came and picked up SmallBoy. PC and I were home alone with nothing to do - at least for an hour or so before we headed out to Girl's basketball game. It was against the rich snooty kids from the next village over. They had all been "myspace-ing" each other all week and trash talking each other. Our girls were pumped. It was the other school's Pack-the-Place, the school spirit game - the BIG rivalry. Sadly, our girls did NOT win, but their record for the season, so far is 15-3, so we're not complaining. Between the coaching, the shots just NOT falling, bad defense, bad calls & non-calls, it was not a pretty game, but they fought hard. They've got a great record and we're all proud of them. After the game, PC and I had SUCH a craving for sub sandwiches that we stopped at one of the best joints in town, SubTender (or SubT, for short), grabbed some subs and headed home - to our empty house. Gee, what should an exhausted couple that hardly ever gets alone time do with a house to themselves - no kids, no obligations - do for the evening? What any couple would do in this situation; we plopped ourselves on the sofa with our sandwiches and popped in the first disc of the second season of The Office. I nodded off by about episode 4, PC was out by episode 6. We were in bed, asleep by midnight.

That actually served me well, as I had to sing 7:30 mass at church this morning. I so had hopes to go back to bed when I got home, but by 8:45, I was awake. PC got out of bed, we made some coffee, and discussed our game plan. We both had a craving for biscuits and gravy for breakfast, so we headed to our favorite breakfast restaurant - Page's, in Hinsdale (GO THERE!!!!). We pigged out. Out to GR's we went to pick up SmallBoy and go to Cub Scouts. We were doing an outdoor 3 mile hike today, so we knew we'd walk off breakfast. The weather was relatively decent (for Chicago in December), especially compared to the great freeze we had last week. PC ad SmallBoy, fresh from the frozen camp out last weekend, were well prepared with their layers of clothing. I did pretty ok, too, but by about 5 minutes into the walk I was wearing both my hat and PC's hat (which technically IS mine anyway). The boys goofed around, explored, got off task, on task, followed, passed, lagged behind, but had a great time. Every so often our den leader, Mr. G, would stop the guys and have them massage their feet to warm them, take a hydration break and, believe it or not, cool off. We got pretty cozy warm while hiking. SmallBoy got so warm that he wanted to take off his hat (especially since some of the other scouts had). I, not thinking in ASD mode, ended up arguing with him about keeping his hat on. DUH - after going back an forth for about 45 seconds, I told him that he could take it off for 2minutes but then had to put it back on. After 2 minutes, he put it back on - no arguements, whatsoever. LIGHT BULB! I told him then that, absolutely, when he got too hot, he could take his hat off for 2 minutes to cool down. Bam! He put it back on each time!

The boys hiked along doing 1.5miles out and 1.5 miles back. They were fortunate enough, on the way back to spot a fawn - then an 8-point buck and the doe (can you find him in here?). We were considerably closer than this picture represents. It was really fun watching the boys saying, "COOL! Deer!" and knowing that the deer were probably thinking, "COOL! People!" We stood and stared at each other for about 2 or 3 minutes before we moved on. The deer, surprisingly, never bolted - I expected them to take off at the noise and sudden movements that the boys made, but they stayed, and we moved on.

Our long, cold afternoon came to an end as we dropped SmallBoy off for a whole whopping hour at his father's. He insisted on having SmallBoy for a little bit of time this weekend, even after I explained his incredibly busy schedule for the day. Had I known HOW little time he would have him, I would have just said no. Literally, it was an hour, and then he came bounding through my door again. I asked him if he had a good time at his father's and he told me about what he and LargeBoy did for the hour - worked on a Lego toy he has there.

Now, we're all home - except Girl, she's at a softball tournament (don't worry, it's indoors). Snat and a friend are over trying get our dishwasher to work, the boys are watching a combination of The Simpsons and football. LargeBoy is DESPERATELY waiting for his turn on the computer. He's got some CDs to burn into iTunes, so I should be a nice mama and let him have it. Perhaps later I'll get the rest of the pics from the play and the scout outing loaded into the slide show for your entertainment.

Cookies and Code West

The only reason that I'm awake and posting right now, after a very late night playing with the band, is that I had to get up and sing at 9:00 mass this morning. Take the "outside voice" that I use for the band, use it to it's fullest potential inside of a smokey bar, while consuming only water, and the product the next morning is pretty scary. Of course drinking the water made it recover much more quickly. I think after the opening hymn I was ok, the psalm was a little shaky, but after that...BAM! I was ok.

Girl's class had a bake sale after all of the masses today to raise funds for all of the fun stuff they do this year. Each family was required to bake 5 items, or 5 plates of items, for the sale. We made my grandmother's chocolate chips, toffee bars, and lemon bars. We had plenty! We spent our Friday night of nothing to run to in the kitchen. LargeBoy was out, so PC ordered a pizza. He and Girl went to the grocery store to get our baking supplies, SmallBoy and I did some quick OT, and then we hit the mixers. Would my post be complete without pics? No way! So here are a few for your enjoyment:





What I really enjoy about THIS pic is the cookie dropper he's using. In theory, his motor skills should make this incredible difficult, yet he did it with ease, while I struggled doing it the way my mom always does with a spoon & knife. Here's a pic of Girl. She was bummed that I didn't take any pics of her baking, since this was for HER bake sale, so I took one of her licking the spoon.



...and one of her getting groomed by our OTHER OCF, Charley - she does this when you have wet hair or when she's feeling particularly lovey - which isn't very often because she's more of your typical aloof cat.



Sometimes she'll even hold your head while she chews your hair. It's quite hysterical.

Our band played last night at a bar that gives us a mixed feeling. We played our very first gigs there for minimal pay and were absolutely elated about it. Since then our relationship with this bar has changed tremendously, but they called and asked us to play, so we did. When we first started there, we weren't very good at all, but we worked our butts off and, after a while, we picked it up. This is also the same place where PC & I met, and where we fired our first guitar player to hire PC. We rocked. I stood on chairs, PC and I totally played off of one another, I played with the band..we had a blast and were a far cry from the first time we ever played there.







Now, I'm going to go wake up PC - which means I'm probably going to crawl back into bed and go back to sleep for an hour or so. Then, our modified schedule for the day is minor league hockey game outing with the scouts at 4, Girl's basketball game at 7 (if we get back in time). Have a wonderful Sunday everyone.

Crazy Thursday's Aftermath - and the iPod

Ahhhhh...Thursday is over! Yes, yes, it is finally Friday. SmallBoy and Girl are off today, LargeBoy is at school, and here I sit at work preparing for a busy day at the office and a quiet night at home. Isn't THAT backwards?!?! Yes, as it turns out, Girl is not squaded for tonight's game. She is going anyway to support the team, but we do not have to go and watch because she won't be playing. WOO HOO! And yes! I DID say a busy day at work! Our CEO, and the co-author of many of our programs, is having a video conference tomorrow with every center that we have nationwide (about 40) to explain how one school system in Pueblo, CO took our program, implemented it in their school and had tremendous success. Today, we set up the office for that. LOTS of work involved. MUCH coolness! And so, I post now while I can because tonight, I'm not going near my computer.

Last night was supposed to be one of our harriest nights of the week. We were prepared for much chaos, but had a plan: go to OT, haul ass over to cub scouts, and then book down the block to Girl's game. I truly believe, that because I stepped back and looked at the big picture (and got us somewhat organized this week), the Schedule Gods had mercy (or pity) on me. SmallBoy's OT was cancelled and, though it was MUCH needed, it helped ease our life just enough to breathe. SmallBoy was able to make it to his scout meeting in time to join in the flag ceremony. Not only did he get to join, but he got to be a line leader in the ceremony. Unfortunately, the picture of that didn't flash too well, but here you can see SmallBoy in his spiffy new Weblos uniform, complete with neckerchief & hat. Believe it or not, he's happy. Can't tell by the look on his face, though.

The flag ceremony was wonderful. He led the boys in, directed them where to go and was SO proud. Then it came time for badges. We missed a meeting about 3 or 4wks ago. Guess which badges were handed out and who didn't get one. Guess who melted. He was sobbing SO hard that I had to take him outside of the meeting to get him to pull out of it, which he did, eventually. Things got going again and the boys broke into groups to play "machine charades". Each den had to choose a machine to act out - not what the machine does, but the actual machine. It was really fun. Our boys were a bulldozer. When the boys were assembling on the floor in front of the stage, SmallBoy got his hand stepped on. Yeah, total meltdown. You'd have thought that someone was cutting his fingers off one at a time. I pulled him aside, calmed him and he pulled out of it and went back to the group, enjoying the rest of the meeting.

I hope that this is truly just the result of the chaos of the last couple of weeks. He's been much more on edge and much easier to break and crumble than is usual for him. I'm going to call J, the fabulous OT and see if we can't get in a makeup session next week, since we'll miss due to Thanksgiving - that would then be 2wks in a row with chaos and no OT.

After that, we boogied over to Girl's game. Thankfully, this one started on time. We were only about 15minutes late. When we arrived, our girls were up 20-1 almost at the half. 20 - 1! HOLY COW! The team we played was not the best, by any stretch of the imagination; it wasn't just a team having an off night, we've played these girls before and experienced the same sort of scoring. It was nice for our girls though, because the starters didn't have to work as hard and the bench got a great deal of playing time. Girl, who LIVES to be on the court or on the diamond or on the field, was actually kind of relieved, too. With as many games as she's played this week, it was nice for her to have some time to just sit. I'm not sure what's up with my camera, all of my pics are dark when I take them out and put them on the computer, and they're pretty decent in the camera...but I regress.

SmallBoy was THRILLED to be able to go to one of her games. Like I said earlier, he and Girl have no school today, so even if the game ran long, it wasn't a big deal, because bedtime was no longer such a key to the night, we could fudge a little if we had to. He took off to go run around the gym and play in the lobby with some of the other kids because, well, that's what they do. As I sat and enjoyed Girl's team crushing the other girls, I heard a yelp coming from the lobby. I was 99.99999% positive that it was SmallBoy, but didn't go rushing out because I want him to handle his own. About 30seconds later, I hear the screaming and the sobbing again, as only a mother can while inside of a noisy gymnasium. When I got to the lobby, I found SmallBoy lying on the floor with another, younger boy, standing over him. SmallBoy was in hysterics, so I calmly asked him what happened and he couldn't calm down enough to tell me. The other boy, said to me, "I can tell you what happened, I slapped him."

My ears not being able to clearly hear over the din of the crowd, I thought this boy said he had "slugged" him. I also know that this young man has some issues of his own and when you put two boys, both with social issues, together, who knows what could happen. I asked, "P, why did this happen?" He replied with a stone face, "I don't know." I let it rest and chose not to talk to P's father about it right then, that I would call his mom today (still don't know how to put this so that she doesn't break - she's right where we all were prior to diagnosis, pulling her hair out trying to understand "what" & "why." Remember that phase?). The final score, btw, was 43-7 - us.

When I was tucking SmallBoy in, brushing him (do any of you do that? SmallBoy LOVES it), and he was nice and calmed, I questioned him about it again. He told me that it was, in fact, a slap, not a slug. I asked him to tell me what was going on prior to the "incident". He said they were running around, but had no clue why P hit him. Well, Duh, MG...of course SOMETHING precipitated this. I wasn't about to call P's mother and say, "your son hit my son for no good reason," that would just be wrong. I'm not certain of all of the details, but Girl and P's sister are both in the drama club after school. Last year, SmallBoy would stay after with her, do his homework and play with P, who also stayed after with his sister. This year, SmallBoy walks home by himself on those days. Apparently, P angrily confronted SmallBoy about this and was resentful that SmallBoy was no longer there for him to play with. I'm clueless as to the happenings prior to the slug, or what words may have been exchanged, but I guess P has been harrassing SmallBoy about this for quite some time and now, finally, had his opportunity to express his misplaced anger by slapping SmallBoy.

My poor little bug. What a night. Tonight, we do nothing. Tonight we hang out as a family - watch movies, play dominoes, eat pizza or something. Nothing else. I'm looking forward to doing nothing, because Saturday and Sunday are both filled with doing lots of stuff, again.

Ahh, the iPod list. So far I have about 70 songs loaded. Here's just a smattering of them, brought to you by Maizey, one of the OCFs, doing her prairie dog stance (isn't this hysterical?!):


Carry On My Wayward Son - Kansas
Bad Moon Rising - CCR
(I need "Back in Black" to complete my Supernatural playlist)
Black Crowes
The Ramones
Sugarland
Dixie Chicks
some Janis - what work out would be complete without Janis Joplin?
Cream
Allman Brothers
"SuperModel" (Taylor Dane?)
The Gorillaz
The Offspring
Pearl Jam
Zeppelin
Grateful Dead
Taj Mahal
Jimmy Eat World
Corrine Bailey Rae (or Rae Bailey - "Girl, Put Your Records On")
Code West ("Blue Star Highway" - written and sung by PC - you can hear it here)
and much much more. I really wanted to cut and paste the list out of iTunes for you, but I couldn't. Thanks for your suggestions. Oh yes, "Redneck Woman" IS going in there, but the only recording I have loaded into iTunes right now is with me on vocals and THAT is definitely NOT going in myPod.

Well, kiddos, work is insane today (Wheeeeeee!), so I'd best get back to doing my job. Tonight I will enjoy the lack of something to do, be at, drive to, make, etc. Tomorrow: workout, take LargeBoy Driving, freeze outside with the Scouts and then a gig with the band. Hey if you can make it, click here to find out the details on our myspace.

Duckwings - and Grown-Up Time (what is THAT?)

Duckwings: What SmallBoy used to call dumplings. My favoritest dish in the entire world is my grandmother's pot roast and dumplings. I am, personally, more a fan of the dumplings than the pot roast, but it just doesn't work without both components. For my birthday dinner every year, I always ask for Ps & Ds (as they're affectionately called now). This year, as my birthday will fall on Turkey Day, I had to move my birthday dinner to a different date. As fate would have it, PC bought THE most ENORMOUS pot roast I've ever seen - a 6pounder (of course, my gram probably cooked bigger cuz she had a house full of hungry girls to feed). He had a grand scheme to make his own pot roast recipe and to try something new. I begged, pleaded, and made sad puppy eyes at him to make dumplings. Who could resist? Not PC. So we reached a happy compromise that he could make his pot roast his way, as long as I got to have dumplings.

The roast was seasoned and browned well before PC loaded it into the giant roasting pan accomanied by big ol chunks of carrots, onion slices and mushrooms for extra seasoning. He added some beef bullion to the water, and some carribean jerk seasons for a little extra kick. He's desperately trying to change our very bland palettes to appreciate some "flavor." The really funny thing about this is that LargeBoy, Girl, & I all notice the extra seasonings when he adds them to things, and the last couple times, we've just kept our mouths closed and chugged our milk to put out the flames so that we wouldn't draw SmallBoy's attention to the "heat" - cuz he dislikes it tremendously. The last two times we've eaten something with a bit of zest (my BIL made some mashed potatoes with some of that green habanero sauce in them), SmallBoy was completely oblivious. Very very interesting. And so it went with our pot roast. Now the duckwings - dumplings - are cooked in the juice from the meat, so obviously, they picked up quite a bit of the jerk seasoning. Not only did SmallBoy eat a ton of it for the meal, but he also ate quite a large portion of the leftovers yesterday. I was shocked. Perhaps it had something to do with him helping to prepare the dumplings:



He helped make the dough for the dumplings, too. It's just eggs, flour and salt, but you have to keep adding flour until you absolutely cannot stir any longer, or, until someone with fresh arms who hasn't been stirring can't stir it any more. Nice and thick. It was good OT for SmallBoy to be stirring the mixture. He loves it, "More FLOUR!"



The actual cooking of the "duckwings," however, is the most fun. Dip the fork in the juice, dip the fork in the batter and get a HUGE mess of it (if you're like me and like giganto sized dumplings), and....



...put the fork full of the flour-y goodness into the juice, gently shake the fork to encourage the batter into the juice, and cook covered and enjoy the aroma until they float. Lord, I'm salivating. Good thing I'm going back to working out tonight (even my fat pants are too tight, and they're 2 sizes too big for me normally).

I think I said something in the title about grown-up time. What the hell is THAT? I don't recall. With the zanieness of the last week or two, we're not getting any downtime, really, until the kids are in bed. We used to complain because we got nothing done around the house because we felt guilty about sitting and enjoying a movie before bed. Now, we don't even have time to do that. Our "free time" has consisted of sitting on the computer, helping each other build our myspaces (band's, mine, his) to help further promote autism awareness and network with more parents who need support and to reach those who don't realize what a VAST support group the internet is, (oh yeah, and the band), oh yeah, and loading my iPod (I'll post on what's going in it tomorrow). We're getting to bed at about 12:30 or 1, and that nasty alarm gets earlier everyday. Tonight won't be any different except that, perhaps, we'll go right to bed instead.

Last night I did as I said, and stayed home while PC went to Girl's game. SmallBoy and I worked with his weighted ball doing some balance and spatial awareness and tone building exercises. The deal was for every 10 he did, I had to do 20. Yeah, tummy's a bit sore today. When we had finished, I had him make his lunch and brush his teeth right away with the promise that he, LargeBoy, and I would sit down and play dominoes IF he agreed that AT 9:30 we would stop whether or not someone had won. He did! It was wonderful!

Tonight - are you ready for this? I'm off work at 4:30 and going to work out. I'll get home around 5:30 and have just enough time to change and "deodorize" before running out the door to get to our 6:15 OT appointment. When we leave there between 7:15 & 7:20, we'll already be late for Cub Scouts which starts at 7. SmallBoy's Den is doing the flag ceremony tonight. He will miss it. He was upset, but came to realize that OT is SO much more important and that it's OK if he misses the flag ceremony, he won't miss the whole meeting. From there, whenever that ends between 8 and 8:30, we'll haul booty down the block (or perhaps cut through the school building) to the gym where, HOPEFULLY, Girl's game will already be underway - not like the other night when they started 40minutes late. Out of the gym by 9:30/:45 (optimistically), and home. Fortunately, Girl and SmallBoy don't have school tomorrow, so bedtime isn't necessarily a priority tonight, just some key SmallBoy time. He's excited, more than anything, because he'll get to go to his sister's game. IF I remember, I'll bring the camera and take some pics tonight!

Well, that was a nice long post. Can that count for two so I can skip one, oh, say, on Thanksgiving? LOL!

50 Ways to Ease the Chaos

Ok, ok, so it's not 50. It's not even 5...just one. If you've been following the posts the last few days, you've seen what total insanity my week has been and is going to continue to be. You've read about how this absolute lack of structure is making my poor Not-So-SmallBoy melt, how my Girl is so overextended that she's forgetting committments, how LargeBoy is, well, LargeBoy, but a stressed LargeBoy, and how PC & I are just pulling our hair out trying to make the schedule work and keep everyone happy.

Last night was a basketball game for Girl and a meeting for me. Thankfully, both were at school. The timing, of course overlapped and it seemed like there was no way on earth that we could pull all of this off effectively. As it turned out, I left work at 4 because I had to make the bank deposit. Despite the long line at the bank, I was still home before 4:45. PC had been cooking the most divine pot roast since 1:30. SmallBoy and I made my grandmother's dumplings (I'll have pics for you tomorrow). Girl went early to her basketball game with some friends because they wanted to watch all the games prior to hers. One problem solved - we didn't have to get her to the gym 1/2 hr before game time which happened to be in the middle of my meeting. I didn't have to be at school until 7, so we still had time to sit down and eat sort of as a family.

To further maximize our time, since Girl's game was at 8:00, PC drove me to the meeting and went to do some errands. SmallBoy stayed home with LargeBoy and did the post-dinner routine. After the meeting, I walked over to the gym hoping to be on time for tip-off and to meet PC. Things seemed to be going well and running about as well as could be expected. Yeah. You know what THAT means. At 8:00, the scheduled start time, the 7th grade game had just begun the 3rd quarter. Lovely. Our Girls finally tipped off at 8:40. They fought hard, kicked some butt in the 2nd half to come behind, but just didn't have the defense (nor the offensive boards) to pull this one off. Finally, after post-game conferences and clean up, we piled back into the car at 10:00.

When we arrived home, LargeBoy informed me that his brother had gone to bed on time. We were glad to hear that, but surpised, since we could see his bedroom light on through his window when we came in from the garage. I went up to kiss him goodnight, and he was still awake, waiting for me to tuck him in and perseverating on where his Christmas list could have gone (he has to have this to his Grandma Pooh-Bear - Ex's mom by Saturday). I assured him that it was somewhere in the house and that we'd find it the next day. He finally consented to let me leave the room after tons of hugs and squeezes and squishes. I tucked him back into his sensory tunnel (something I've gone back to for his sleep since his being "off track" returned), zipped his bed tent and went back downstairs. Ahhhhhh, finally time to relax with my husband.

We hung out for a while and then headed up to bed, shortly after 12:30. Morning came entirely too quickly and it came in just the same way that the day went out - chaotic. I woke 10minutes before my alarm to Girl trying to rouse the dog. She was afraid that the dog had beaten us to the punch and decided to "go" before we could take her in for the "last doggy walk." Finally, she got up, but our hearts were all racing. Morning routine went as usual, start doing hair, stop doing hair to go wake up LargeBoy, come back upstairs to start waking SmallBoy, finish hair, get dressed, make up at work....I was on track. Then the phone rang as I was down to crunch time. It was my drummer, who is unbelievably difficult to get ahold of, calling to discuss our gig this Saturday. Yep. Schedule thrown. Rush rush rush, SmallBoy wanted no part of getting up because he was cold and, despite the darkness outside, it was still too bright. LargeBoy was running behind because he overslept AND hadn't made his lunch yet. We were now, officially running late. I still, miraculously made it to work on time, however.

Girl has a basketball game tonight. I have cantor rehearsal tonight. Of course the times that everyone has to be where they need to be overlap. I had already asked Girl to get a ride to the game and told her we would meet her there. My rehearsal is once a month and, as we're entering the Christmas season, there are a whole slew of things that get added into the mass, so missing it would not be very beneficial. After this morning, however, I called PC and told him that something had to give and that I would not be going to the game tonight. I am going to stay home and spend some time with SmallBoy. We'll do some OT work with his body sock and his pilates ball and his weighted ball and I'll let LargeBoy hog the computer and figure out my iPod (hooray, it just arrived! - I'm still taking song suggestions, btw). PC totally agreed. Instead of sending Girl off to her game, though with no one to watch her fabulousness (cuz Ex never goes if it's not at the home gym), he's going to go and watch her while I stay with SmallBoy.

I had a mixed report from the teacher yesterday, but, considering his last week or two, it was better than I had expected. Kyra, you're hitting it right on the nose about just the craziness being enough to set him running for cover and decompression with no where to turn, and there's another messed up no structure kind of week right around the corner. We'll be starting the communication notebook at school next week and PC and I will be going in to school the first week of December to present SmallBoy's book to the other 4th grade class and the teachers are inviting the parents and staff to attend (I'm SO excited! Again, Marti - God Bless YOU and Child for that!).

So here I sit blogging - at work. This is the one place, lately, where I stay put for 8hrs. The most running I do is going to the salad bar next door to get lunch. Here I will stay and enjoy my calm before returning to the chaos. At least it seems like today, though, and last night - generally, there has been some easing of the insanity. Btw, I'm still taking workout song suggestions for my iPod. Thanks a million to the ones that have come in. Smoochies!

GO! Check THIS Out!

See that cool slide show down there...I did one for the band and replaced the old boring one that we had. Go to our myspace and check it out. And no, this is NOT today's post. Read yesterday's - It's heavy-ish, and I've got another one already in the works for today (yes, I'm VERY bored at work).

Please Allow Me To Introduce Myself...

...to steal from the Rolling Stones. Now that I'm participating in NaBloPoMo, I'm finding that - surprise! - there are more people out there that I DON'T KNOW...nor do they know me. Not only that, but MOST of you haven't seen the REST of my family. I have come across this fabulous site, thanks to Blogorrhea, that is a slide show generator. I'm going to make one for the band's myspace site too, cuz myspace only gives you 2 slideshow options, and only lets you upload 16pics. This one has, well, more than 16!

Scroll down a bit to the sidebar and meet my family...and then scroll down and read today's other post about Princess and her intense relationship with creamed corn.

Stay-at -Home-Mom For a Day

It's been a LONG time since I've been a stay-at-home mom. I much preferred it to the working world. Some people prefer it the other way around. Me, no. I was born to be a stay-at-home mom. Since I divorced Ex, though, the only way I have the opportunity to stay home during the week is if my office is closed on a holiday (though not 7/4) or if one of the kids is sick - not if I'm sick, you know the mom rule of sick hours, we use them all for our kids but when we're sick, we go to work and get everyone else sick cuz we've used up all of our hours for our kids.

Long story short, I left work in the early afternoon because SmallBoy was sick. PC didn't work til later in the afternoon, so he picked him up at school when the call came in,

"Mrs. MommyGuilt, we have your SmallBoy here in the office and he's wheezing, coughing, and has some major congestion."

I wanted to drop everything and come home from work right then and there, but I knew that PC could handle it until he had to leave for work - he's such a good daddy. So at 1:00 I came home and we traded. We hung out on the couch and watched Star Wars, then decided we both really wanted to sleep since we had been up a lot the night before with the cough. It was decided that my bed was the best place to partake of our snooze. We popped in a disc of West Wing, I slimed him up with menthol rub, snuggled in, and he was soon asleep for a a short nap.

SmallBoy felt a little better after his snooze, but it was a deceitful kind of better, as we all know the witching hour for fevers and yuckiness to return is between 4:30 and 6pm. He slowed down, but ate his dinner. I thought that perhaps we were going to work our way out of this - the wheezing had stopped, the coughing had slowed significantly, especially since we finally found the inhaler, and there was no temperature in sight. I let him hang out and play on the computer for a while, since he'd been very good with staying away from it during the day. He made his lunch and was in bed 10minutes before bedtime. Cool! Success! We're all going to work/school again!

...at least that's what I thought until about 20minutes after I crawled into bed. I had gotten the call from PC that he was off of work and on his way home. I was so tired from the night before that I just couldn't wait up for him. I did my bedtime routine, put in another disc of West Wing and hunkered in for the night, sharing the bed only with the Obnoxiously Cute Furballs (OCFs). Within minutes my eyes were closed, and somewhere in the state of consciousness between deep sleep and awake, I could hear the voices of Jed Bartlett (Martin Sheen) & Josh Lyman (Bradley Whitford - HUGE Cure Autism Now supporter, btw). My contentedness was harshly interrupted by a sound that I knew did not belong in my little sleepyland - the hacking and wheezing of one Not-So-SmallBoy. Inhaler, menthol, back rub, nose blowing, back to sleep and me back to bed. Twenty minutes later, as I approached the entrance way to my West Wing sleepyland, the sound echoed in my ears once again. This routine continued for 2hours at 20minute intervals...take care of cough, snuggle back to bed, start to doze, cough cough cough.

Thankfully there was another 2hr time period that he slept, but then about 2 or 2:30, it started again. We stayed home today. He needed the rest. PC is off today. I could have (read "should have") gone to work, but I'm really damn tired myself and about 2 days behind SmallBoy in the chain of the sickness - and my band plays on Saturday night...talk about timing, plus, my stomach's all messed up from all of the extra iron the doc is giving me. So, I stayed home.

I had the privilege of taking the kids to school today. I take LargeBoy everyday, but that's 45minutes before he has to be there so that I can get to work on time. Girl and SmallBoy ride with PC. I let PC sleep this morning...he's been working so hard, and I was up anyway, so what the hell, right? It was kind of fun. The hustle and bustle of everyone trying to be where the needed to be, the fight for the perfect parking place (it felt a little like the scene in Mr. Mom - "North to drop off, South to pick up.").

I pulled back up to the house, turned to lock the car and saw Girl's viola still in the back seat. She had called shotgun when I took her and her brother to school, and she put the viola in the back. Obviously, she had forgotten. I toyed, only momentarily, about teaching her a lesson in responsibility, and then the I-miss-being-a-stay-at-home-mom instinct kicked in. School officially started in 5 minutes. I could make it! Back into the car and then off I raced (no more than 25mph in a school zone, though) and got to the school just in time. As I walked into the office, they said to me,

"Oh, Girl was JUST in here calling you."

With that, she walked past and all was well. I was met with a bright and truly thankful,

"Thank you, Mommy!" (I love when my almost 14 y/o calls me 'mommy', makes me forget that she's almost 14).

She has auditions for her music festival coming up and every lesson now is a must.

Now I'm stuck with the dilemma: I'm already up, but I'm really freaking tired from no sleep last night. Everyone else is sleeping still. Should I do the mom thing and start cleaning and doing laundry or should I give in to my body to avoid getting sick and GO TO SLEEP? Sleep sounds good, but I'm not sure I can do that after 2 cups of coffee. Oh well, we'll see! Nope, decision made. My Not-So-SmallBoy is up. I'm up. We'll hang out together. I'll make bacon and eggs - oh, no eggs....oh well. Maybe we'll bake again today! GOD I wish I could stay at home again. Too bad stay at home mothers don't get paid, they would command THE single highest salaries! To SAHMs EVERYWHERE!! CHEERS!

Pics from the Big 1-0 (and I'm Home Alone & SO Bad)

This is how I found my Not-So-SmallBoy yesterday morning - extremely excited about turning 10, you see....well, he WAS still asleep. He LOVES to sleep in his sensory tunnel with his covers pulled over his head. I have MANY more pictures to share with you from his big day, but I saw what a giant bite (or byte, if you will) the last monster picture post took out of my blog, so I'll only post a few. At the moment, I am HOME ALONE!!!!!! I don't think this has happened in, wow, well over a year. PC is working tonight and the kids are with Ex for a birthday dinner for SmallBoy - yeah, I know - shocked? I think he's trying to put up a front. He picked them up at 4:30 and it's almost 6, so they should be home soon. Anyway, while I have time alone, I'm being incredibly bad and eating terribly: Overly buttered noodles, lightly dusted with garlic & parmesan. Oh, who am I kidding, there's enough garlic in there to kill every vampire in Transylvania! Wait...it gets better...I'm eating while using the computer AND I'm eating it out of the pan I cooked it in!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm going to have one hell of a stomach ache later, though. Ok, more pics!

Yesterday was my FIL's birthday also, so we went by Meem's & Poppy's to celebrate. We had pizza for dinner, since it is one of SmallBoy's absolute favorites and red velvet cake for dessert...Sal, I couldn't help but think of you! The red velvet cupcakes he took to school gave me quite a scare that night, though, when in the middle of dinner at Meem's, SmallBoy was screaming in the bathroom. He had gone in with a stomache ache, so I tore off like a bat out of hell to see what was wrong. He was complaining about the pain, said he made LOTS of #2, so I did the mom thing and took a peek to check the consistency (I know, TMI). My heart dropped to my stomach when I looked into the toilet to see blood red water staring right back at me. I returned to my senses (slightly) when I realized, DUH, that it was the dye from the cupcakes. Here's my Not-S0-SmallBoy showing off his rollerblades. He really was excited, though he moved them so fast through my attempt at capturing the moment, that when I asked him to do it again, he got a little pissed off. Oh well. He LOVES rollerblading! Thanks, GR!

OOOEEEWWWHHH - tummy's starting to hurt, perhaps I should stop eating these noodles. I think I will, but, I think I'll grab a beer to wash them down - I'm AWFUL, aren't I? And no, I haven't washed the pan yet! Hmm!

Here are SmallBoy & Poppy sharing the fun of blowing out their candles. My NSSB came home with some GREAT presents - a HUGE dinosaur puzzle, his roller blades, some really cool books, including one about wolves (he LOVES wolves), a fishing game (recommended by the fabulous OT, J), some clothes, a calendar that he can change & personalize each month with stickers and a dry erase marker (because things DO change), and a whole bunch of other great stuff - INCLUDING the still-to-be-delivered body sock that Meem & Poppy got for him. He was SO excited! What was really cool, though was his reaction to the gift from PC & me. After all of this cool stuff, I wasn't expecting much more than an "oh, gee, thanks," for our gift. We all know how HUGE it is for a child on the spectrum to make, and maintain, friendships. SmallBoy has some really key friends and a couple of them happened to be at the concert in the park that Code West put on last month. Girl and S got all the boys to line up on the stairs to the stage and took a pic. So, we had it framed and gave that to him (another ordeal, if I haven't already written about it, perhaps I'll tell you another time). His face LIT up. What I read in that face and the gigantic thank you and hug that followed, was that THIS was a gift that he would value and treasure forever. It wasn't something he would outgrow like clothes or outgrow and not want to play with like toys and games. It was a memory and a reminder that he has good friends. It will always be there for him when he's having a "nobody likes me" moment. It will make him happy. When I got home from work, the bag of gifts that we brought home was still sitting on the landing, waiting to be taken upstairs. LargeBoy said to me, "Mom, you should be very happy - yours is the only gift that made it out of the bag and into his room," and it's sitting on his desk, next to his bed, right next to the pic of him and our first dog. That made me feel so good.

I really wanted to show you a GREAT poster that Girl made for him, but it's got his name on it - something I'd rather didn't go on the blog (not like it matters, his pic is all over the place, but it would TOTALLY throw the whole pseudonym stuff for a loop. Before we left to go home, SmallBoy put together his fishing game. In OT, J used it to help with eye hand coordination and fine motor skills. I gotta tell ya...it's not an easy game. The object is to catch as many of your color fish (if your playing with more than one player). The game is motorized, going around in a circle. The fish, in turn, open their mouths for about 1 second. In that second, you have to try and "hook" the with this plastic fishing pole. It ain't easy. I found myself trying to time the opening of the mouths...LOL Here are SmallBoy and Meem's cat, Meatball...who do you think wants to catch the most fish?

Well...it's almost 6:30 and Ex hasn't brought the kids home yet. My tummy is very happy and full from my noodley badness, and my beer is still cold, and relatively full, since I've been typing away. I should probably go and wash my dishes so I feel like I accomplished SOMETHING in my time alone.

Ladies & Gentlemen, Not-So-Smallboy (or NSSB)!

Playing the battery game this morning, I don't have the pic posted yet, but I will this evening.

My baby, my youngest, my last little one has now hit double digits. Such milestones this year. LargeBoy is learning to drive, Girl is in 8th grade, and my SmallBoy has become a Not-So-SmallBoy. I'm teetering on the emotional fence somewhere between elation and sadness, not knowing whether to let out a big "WOO-HOO!" because I'm closer to my "freedom," or a big "BOO-HOO!" because my babies are all growing up.

Not-So-SmallBoy was elated when he woke up this morning, but letting go of 9 was not easy for him. He was afraid that there would be too many changes, that as soon as he woke up in the morning he would be different from when he went to bed. There were frets & worries, sadness, anxiety, and just general sniffles.

"Of course", I assured him, "you will be the same boy when you wake up, the ONLY thing that will be different is that you can now proudly hold up two whole hands when people ask how old you are."

I think he's excited again, and ready to take on the world. He's eating up this independence thing and I see that it's beginning to do a world of good for him. I know that he'll enjoy being 10 just as much as he enjoyed being 9. There will be a lot of changes this year, but nothing more than any other year. Things WILL change with the way he feels about himself. Things WILL change with the amount of responsibility & independence he receives. Things WILL change with the way he interacts with those around him. Things WILL change with his father - I will see to that. Things WILL change with the way he feels towards others. Yes, my Love, things will change, but the change isn't a bad thing or anything to be feared.

My SmallBoy is now a Not-So-SmallBoy. He took red velvet cake cupcakes to school today, and we're having pizza and red velvet birthday cake tonight at Meem's & Poppy's (it's Poppy's bday also). He will be surrounded by those who love him. Girl made him THE birthday sign for this morning (I'll post a pic when I do the battery juggle tonight). When we lived in our old house, we would always take a big sheet of paper or wrapping paper and make birthday signs for the kids, decorate them, sign them, and post them on the back door. When we moved into the new house, we stopped doing this...not for any particular reason. We decided that THIS was definitely the time to resurrect this tradition, especially for such a big birthday for such a wonderful kid.

I don't have a birthday present for him. In my moment of dorkness, I made a HUGE error. Here's what happened. When our band played at one of the local parks, Not-S0-SmallBoy's (NSSB's) friends were there, and we got a GREAT pic of them together. I uploaded it to kodak gallery, ordered it in a great boy-ish frame and had it 2day shipped so I'd definitely have it in time. I should have had it Thursday, but was so wrapped up the week's craziness that I didn't realize I was missing it. I checked the FedEx site on Friday and it said it had been delivered at 11:09am, left on the porch (because I had waived the signature requirement since I KNEW I wouldn't be home, and didn't have it sent to work for some reason). I scoured the house, asked the kids if they had brought it in. Nope. Nothing. Checked FedEx's site again. After looking a little more closely I discovered it had been delivered at 11:09 the day before! At this point I was getting upset. So I looked at my confirmation from the kodak site....THIS is when I noticed my error. I ordered it from work and was having it shipped home. Yep. You guessed it. I had it shipped to my house number on the street that my office is on. JUMPED in the car and went to that house. Of course no one had seen it. WHY would someone want it? For the frame, maybe? Anyway, I called FedEx and left them a mssg that if someone should return it to please deliver it to a different address. I ordered a new pic from Walgreen's, had LargeBoy & PC pick it up, and Mom found a frame at Target. It will be fine, but ...UGH... it's not what I had done. Oh well, all is not lost. Now I just have to find time (and some cash) to get a bday present for my FIL (yeah, we sort of slacked on that). PC has to work late and has the bank card, and I have to use the cash in my wallet to get gas! YIKES. It'll all work out, though...always does.

I'll get pics posted ASAP. In the meantime, wish my Not-So-SmallBoy a VERY VERY VERY Happy 10th Birthday!!!!!!!!!!!!