I took that list to town!

I crossed them all off, every single thing. I took the test, where, by the way, I wrote a pretty nifty essay on cell phone technology and it's effect on our society. I went to First Step Advising. Then Second Step Advising, where I met a lovely woman from the nursing department. She told me that she doesn't always see the "nurse" in the students she meets, but that she sees it in me. It was a very cool moment that I won't forget. Then I came home and registered for my first two classes. Human Growth and Development and General College Biology Lab I. Then I finished my FAFSA application. Then I took a deep breath, followed by another. I've thought and planned for this for so long and it's finally happening.

Now I just wait it out until August 24th when my first class begins. They are both night classes. Monday and Wednesday nights I'll be in class from 5:30-8:50 and Tuesdays from 7-8:50. Cason will be in school on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday from 12:30 to 3, so that will be a nice junk of study time each week.

Back to school at 32!

Cross that off the checklist

I just got back from taking my college placement test. I have a mild headache, but came through it okay. Actually I did great. Okay so I bombed the algebra section. Thankfully, algebra doesn't seem to play much of a role on my quest for a nursing degree, so I think I'm okay. Can we all just take a deep breath? There that feels better.

Next up, this afternoon I'll go to the first step in Advising. Then I'll have one on one advising, then I'll register for classes and well it's uphill from here. This test was probably the biggest hurdle for me and now I'm getting excited.

More deep breaths needed!

9 years

Gym teacher fail

I have wonderful memories of field day. It was the end of the school year and it was a day of running and being free. Usually there was water of some sort involved. And suckers. I don't know why but from my kindergarten memories the two things that stick out are tater tots and big red suckers on field day. I'd sit there eating my sucker while they announced all the summer birthdays over the loud speaker. "And last but not least...July 31st...Amy Hostetler." I can't quite figure out now why my birthday was the last one, surely there would have been other birthdays in August before the start of the school year. But that's how I remember it. The other great part of field day were the ribbons. Everyone got a ribbon. Oh sure, maybe the blue ones where better, but getting a yellow or green one still felt pretty special. The blue one's would say 1st place, but the yellow or green ones would say something equally as great like "great effort" or "most improved".

At Jonah's school field day for the 1st and 2nd graders was last Thursday. I didn't get to attend, but Jonah seemed to have really enjoyed it. Favorite part for him..Tug of War. I think times have changed and there are no sticky treats associated with field day anymore...too bad. Jonah did not come home with a ribbon. I really wish I could scan his "award". What he came home with was a piece of green card stock titled "Field Day Certificate' To the right there is a clip art picture of a heron or stork sitting in some reeds. Next to that it says "A stork brought me the good news. You did a great job today!" "Thanks for all of your hard work this year and remember that PE is important for everyone!" Signed Coach J. Umm, stork? Is it just me, aren't stork's usually associated with bringing news of a new baby?

I can just picture the stork union.

"Louie, you're headed to California, the Johnson's are having a girl!"
"Sally, off to New York, the Smith's are having a boy!"
"Clarence, you're on special assignment to Colorado, deliver the news to Coach J, his 1st graders did a great job on field day."

Early start = sleepy child

I should've made a disclaimer to yesterday's post saying that waking at 5 a.m. is not routine for our boys. Typically they wake around 6:30 and I'm hopeful that this summer they'll push that back to 7/7:30. We'll see.

Cason was groggy most of the day. Then around 4 he complained of a headache again. I gave him some tylenol and asked if he wanted to rest in my bed. He was sound asleep by 4:30. He barely woke a few times only to conk back out. We transferred him to a comfy spot on the floor when we went to bed and he didn't wake until 2 a.m. He sat up, declared he needed to go potty, went potty, and told me that he was fine and was ready to sleep in his own bed. Then he was back in our room by 5:30 again. I have a feeling he'll be ready for an early bedtime again today.

Early Start

There was a time when I used to sleep in until 11...every day. I think that ended just about six years and nine months ago. I'm not kidding, three months from today my firstborn will turn seven (but we'll save the freak out on that for another time).

This morning we were awakened by the sounds of a distressed child. At five o'clock. The child had slept on our floor for more than half the night. (I tell myself we're just getting him prepared for camping this summer) I decided to guard my last few precious minutes of sleep by transferring him back to his own bed, which promptly woke up his brother, who came in at 5:15. At this point the man of the house saw the writing on the wall and chose to get up. Jonah took his spot in the bed and was overcome by twitchiness. I'm like the princess and the pea, so it clearly was not a good sleeping condition for me. Cason came crying up the stairs fifteen minutes later. He had a headache. He flopped back on the floor where he had started. I'll admit I tried to ignore him for just a little bit longer. But one thing I'm learning is that being a parent is the greatest exercise in learning to become selfless. So I gave up on sleep. I scooped him up and snuggled him up and it was 1000 times better than sleep.

Giant Lemon Sugar Cookies

Yum! That's all I have to say about that.

Our park

No school today...it's a teacher work day. We just got back from the park. Our park.

This is the park that is attached to our neighborhood. It's one of my favorites. Not because it's fancy and has all the latest and greatest playground equipment, but just because it's small, but not too small and quiet and pretty.

Our neighborhood sits on a hill, that's the view of the park from the hill.


The boys were excited!

They ran...


and ran...


and ran.


We're really working hard one when it's okay to totally leave Mommy behind. Every time we go to the park and they run ahead like this I pray over and over "please let there be no snakes, please let there be no snakes..."

Parts of the park are a little old. Like these guys...




and these...




I think that may be the last working merry-go-round in this city. That's some dangerous stuff you know. Can't have the kids spinning themselves sick these days. We'll have to see if I find another one on our quest to visit all the parks this summer. I've made my list. There are 22 parks to visit. That means during the 11 weeks of summer vacation we'll hit two per week. Wheee!

I'm that much closer to being a college student again. My petition for residency status was approved today. I've been working on that little piece of the puzzle for a while and now that it's worked out, I can move on to the next step. Which is really just a bunch of steps that I need to take at the same time...financial aid, assessment testing, advising, registering...yikes. I still haven't decided how many classes I want to take, but I think it'd be best to start small.

It's Wednesday already. Jonah is off school on Friday so we only have one more day until the weekend! This week has been pretty nice and quiet. Yesterday Cason and I went to a planned Mom's club activity, but it turned out that whoever had done the planning hadn't planned very well. It was supposed to be something organized by the city parks and recreation department, but was an activity they only have during the winter months. We got a smoothie to share and headed to the park instead. I've decided to set a goal of taking the boys to every park in the city this summer. (Credit goes to Jessie Crow for the idea) We've been to quite a few already, but it will be fun to make a list and check them off as we go. An added bonus, is that it will give me something to blog about and pictures to post.

We signed Jonah up for an Intro to Karate class for the month of June. He's pretty excited about it since he's been on a Kung Fu Panda kick lately. I'm hopeful that it will be something that will click with his personality and needs. I'm also hoping to find some sort of class for Cason. One of the things that I was so excited about when we decided to move to Fort Collins was the parks and recreation offerings. I'm a little surprised at myself that it took this long to finally jump into something. Better now then never though.

I never know where to start when it's been a couple weeks since my last post.

April 24th-25th
Josh and I had a much needed overnight date in Denver. We went to see a favorite female artist named Jonatha Brooke. Life has been so consuming lately that it's been hard for us to make time for ourselves. We were very thankful to Mark and Lorrie for taking care of Jonah and Cason. The concert was great. It was at the Soiled Dove. Just her and her guitar and keyboard ten feet away from where we were sitting. She was awesome, incredible voice, just enough funny. One of the best parts of the night was that I got to dress up. I guess my need to escape from my SAHM persona was high. In the morning we went to breakfast at the the best breakfast place in Denver. The Snooze A.M. Eatery Oh man, that was the best breakfast we've ever had. My mouth is watering just thinking about it.

Not a great picture, but here we are getting ready to leave.


May 1st, 2nd, 3rd
It's crunch time for Josh's job at Della Terra. Since they were really wanting Josh to keep working, they offered our family a cabin for the weekend. This cabin is almost starting to feel like our own personal vacation cabin, since this is the third time we've stayed there since the job started. I wish I could say that it was a wonderful weekend, but the truth is we came home feeling a bit fried. The weather had been cold and rainy, so we were mostly stuck inside while Josh was working. And the cable had been knocked out by a cut line, so we watched Meet the Robinsons three times, Kung Fu Panda twice, Thomas and Friends once and Honey I Shrunk the Kids once. There were some nice moments though. Jonah had a very wiggly tooth, so on Saturday while Josh was taking a lunch break they worked together to pull it. Jonah did not want us to touch the tooth but he was willing to hold on to and let Josh yank on his arm. It popped out after about twenty tries and a lot of laughing. He was very excited that the tooth fairy was able to find him even though he wasn't at home and she left two dollars. The boys and I did get out twice, first to watch the annual Estes Park duck race. They release 1000 rubber ducky's down the Fall River. People "adopt" them and the money goes to charity and there's a ton of prizes. It was pretty fun and we capped it off with a trip to one of the many fudge/candy shops in town. After the kids were in bed, Josh and I tried our hand at some of the games provided. We found that we were terrible at "Friends" trivia, but had fun asking each other personal questions from another game that I can't remember the name.

Our second outing was for a teeny hike on Sunday around the property. Rocky Mountain National Park starts right behind the building. I think we will have more fun hiking this year. Cason still has some stamina issues, but they do love "adventuring".

Jonah with his brand new holey mouth.


Some of the ducks on the river.


Climbing on rocks on our mini hike.




(Mom, in case you are wondering, the boys got haircuts this week. : ))

After working through the weekend, there was a ton of stuff for Josh to take care of at home so he was home Monday and Wednesday. Let's just say it was a rough week. I'm thankful that it's behind us and we're moving forward from it.

May 9th-10th
He worked Saturday (did I mention it's crunch time?). The building had it's first event last week...first wedding, we hear, is the last weekend in May. There is still so much to be done, it's crazy. The boys and I actually had a decent day and Jonah surprised me at one point by announcing that he had lost another tooth! This time the tooth fairy didn't have change, so since it was the fifth tooth lost, he got FIVE whole dollars for this one. I just realized how funny it is that teeth that come out are called "lost". How else would you describe it though? It's just that technically they are not lost, they're just not in his mouth anymore. Hmm...

The hole in his mouth got bigger!


When Josh got home we talked about what I wanted/wanted to do for Mother's Day. The weather wasn't looking to be great so being out wasn't an option. In the end, we all ran out to pick out my Mother's Day present...a new gas grill! We haven't had a grill since we moved here and I have missed it so much. I consider myself to be a bit of a grill master, so I'm really looking forward to how this will open up our menu options this summer. We also ran to the store for some breakfast provisions as Josh wanted to make breakfast for me. Then we ordered chinese for Josh and I to eat after the kids were in bed. My parents had sent a package including the movie P.S. I love you which we watched while we ate. (We loved the movie, Mom and Dad!)

Sunday morning came rainy and cloudy, which was wonderful because it meant the boys slept in until 7. Josh started breakfast and I got to sleep in even more. There was a little waffle crisis, but in the end it was a great breakfast and I really appreciated the break. We spent the rest of the day just really enjoying being together and it was the best mother's day for me. We assembled the grill. It was christened by hot dogs for the boys, followed by some chicken that I grilled to make chicken salad and then by a big fat juicy ribeye that Josh and I shared for our dinner. Oh boy, we are definitely going to be eating more protein now. Yum!

Just like Daddy

Cason is going through an identity crisis. In the last month his whole world has turned topsy turvy. First it was deciding to wear underwear and learning to become successful on the toilet. He is still having fairly frequent accidents, but there is clearly no going back. Learning to potty awakened the big boy in him. So soon after that naps went out the window. I am sad to see the naps go. It was a guaranteed time of quiet for me and we usually got to cuddle a little too. Plus I got to sneak in his room and admire his sleeping form before waking him up each afternoon. It's hard to let go. Then over the weekend after a few days of extreme hyperactivity, it dawned on my that I hadn't seen him suck his thumb for a while. You know like this...



or this...



Nope no more ear holding and thumb sucking. Soothing him was so easy by rubbing his ears, or letting him hold onto my ears. I wish I had gotten paid for all the hours the child spent holding onto one of my ears. For a while he had us stumped every time he would tell us that he had a closed ear and an open ear. Then he would examine our ears and determine which of ours were closed and open. The mystery was solved by Josh one day. We each have one ear with softer cartilige at the top, one that would fold open and one that wouldn't. A closed ear and an open ear. That child loved ears. But no more.

We asked him why he had stopped sucking his thumb. He said "Because I'm big. My toes are getting bigger and my head is getting bigger." It's really amazing that he came to that all on his own.

He talks daily about going to school. He can't wait. For now I'm mourning truly being past the baby stage. Yes he is almost four years old, but for the first time he's pulling away, expressing independence. "No, I can do it!" No, please let me do it for you one more time. It's heartbreaking and exciting at the same time.

Thank you.

We've felt the prayers. These kind of behavior issues don't resolve quickly, but we do feel encouraged. We know we've got two special little men depending on us and we won't let them down.

There's an old saying, or maybe it's not an old saying, or maybe it's not even a saying at all...anyway somewhere along this parenting journey I've heard more than once that once you get to the point where you are crying out for help that it means the problem is already on its way out.

There have been some things to be thankful for lately too.

1. We're all healthy (well besides Rio, but that's another point). After dealing with some form or another of sickness in most of February and some of March, we are all finally completely healthy.

2. In between fits of anger, Jonah is very loving. This past weekend he and Josh made a run to the grocery store and surprised me with flowers when they came back. Lilies. My favorite. They are blooming one by one and our living room is filled with their heady scent.

3. Cason is 85% potty trained. We knew he would eventually get excited about it and in the end his timing is nearly identical to his brothers. While on our trip to Colorado Springs, he discovered he could go standing up. He was so delighted by his success that it continued when we came home. He still has an accident or two each day but he is taking charge and cleaning himself up. After six years and seven months, I think we are finally done buying diapers!!

4. Today I got to use the gift certificate that Josh gave me for Christmas. It was for an hour massage and spa treatment. I choice the sea nutrients hydrator. Basically she painted green stuff on me. Not sure I would pay for that treatment on it's own, but altogether it was so very relaxing.

5. Rio's not dead. I mentioned that Rio was sick. He seemed to have caught something from one of the puppies we had here. There was much vomiting and diarrhea. We took him to the vet and were reassured it wasn't a blockage. He was prescribed antibiotics and we were given instructions to watch for worsening lethargy. This morning he woke up and couldn't walk right. His hind legs were clearly weak and he was arching his back and really just looked bad, he just kept wanting to lay back down any time we got him moving. The worst started going through our heads and we had to discuss how far we would go for him. Thankfully, the vet was able to see right away that his leg problem was a different problem of its own. One steroid shot later and he is well on his way to being his normal self. I'm thankful that he will be living a long and full life with us.

Enough already!

We all have limits, right? But what happens if you are stretched past your limit? Doesn't your limit just stretch a little farther? It has to, right? The alternative is just too scary.

I'm just putting this out there because I think we're just about at our limit and I am on my knees trying to survive. It's been a rough couple months. Lots of fighting between the boys and from them to us and all our best efforts to hold the peace are not really working. I wake up every day feeling like I'm going into battle.

Both boys have taken to being physically rough with me when they are angry. Jonah adds verbally abusive language to his anger. Cason just screams, hits me and sometimes tries to bite me. We even had a phase of hearing "I hate you" daily. From a six year old. What in the world am I doing wrong that deserves that? Thankfully he seems to have realized how truly horrible it is to tell someone you hate them, but I still get called names daily, told that I'm mean, that I'm bad. Sometimes it falls into the funny...yesterday Jonah tried to insult Josh by telling him that he was young and ridiculous. We're not perfect, but we do not talk to the boys or each other like that. I'm waving the white flag. We do automatic time outs for physical anger, but it's not changing the behavior.

If you're wondering what's setting this off, here's an example. I was in the kitchen a moment ago, putting some dishes away. Jonah asked me what was for dinner. I said lasagna. He started yelling at me that he wouldn't eat that. Lasagna is in his "foods i like" book. Something we tried to get him to engage in the idea of eating more than just pizza, chicken nuggets, tacos, Pb & J, and hot dogs. By some miracle a few months back we actually got him to try lasagna and surprise...he liked it. But today he's yelling at me, "Lasagna is already in my foods I like book!" "I don't have to eat it again!" Pizza is also in the foods I like book, so it's not like once something goes in he never has to eat it again. So he's yelling and I'm still at the sink, so he comes over and starts head butting me on my lower back, it hurts. I took him to the time out chair and then started crying out of frustration. He asked me why I was crying and I said it was because he had hurt me on my back and his response was to tell me I was hurting his feelings by crying.

This was last night. This morning is no better. From the moment they woke up the boys were fighting. Jonah decided he was too tired to get dressed...it goes on. To add to that Rio is sick. Josh is on the phone with the vet now. We sent Tina back to the rescue people. She was overwhelming me anyway, but I thought it was safest if she went back so she didn't end up getting sick too.

We need your prayers.

Tina! Eat your dinner!

Freckles found his forever home yesterday during the adoption event. Last night Tina joined us for the week. We assume she's a Jack Russel/Beagle mix. She will keep us on our toes. She's lively, but so far has done okay with our correction.

Buddy of the Week....Tina.



Bonus points if you get the movie reference in the title.

Buddy of the Week

As I mentioned in an earlier post, we have decided to be a foster family for a local puppy rescue. It's a nice way to get Rio comfortable with another dog and we don't have the long term commitment. So I'm starting this series called the Buddy of the Week highlighting the adventures we and Rio have with our canine visitors.

We got our first pup yesterday.

Meet Freckles or Speckles (as Cason calls him).



Isn't he cute?! He's a pretty good pup. We'll have him until Saturday when the rescue is having an adoption event. I suppose there is a chance he could come back to us, but I don't think he'll have any problems being adopted.

Rio's loving having a buddy. What's not to love about having a smaller pup around that he can steal toys from?

And take naps with...



Ahhh, puppy love.

Spring Break

Spring break week felt really long and wasn't at all relaxing, but we did end it with a fun weekend. We forgot to bring our camera, so you'll just have to use your imagination. During our trip to Colorado Springs we....

1. Stayed in the Holiday Inn Express, which Jonah has been wanting to do since we moved out here. You can't beat the HIE continental breakfast.

2. Had dinner with an old friend and her daughter. Famous Dave's. It was messy, it was loud. The kids were a little crazy, Jonah was grouchy with Ellette (our friends 2 1/2 yr old), Cason and Ellette made up a song "Diesel 10 is destructing, Wooo". With we could've had more time to catch up, but it was still great to see Steph.

3. Went swimming twice. Cason was tentative but enjoyed it. Jonah didn't want to get in at all, until Josh coaxed him in and he learned that he could stand on his own in the shallow end. It was a big breakthrough for him.

4. Went to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. We got up close and personal with the giraffes feeding them crackers (the zoo sells them). Cason was grossed out by their very long gray/blue tongues. We left the area just in time to avoid a mating in nature lesson. Cason's favorite was the little turtle that he got to pet. Jonah and I really liked the baby tigers. Their trainer was feeding them when we came by so we saw them being really active.

5. We also had dinner with Ed and Amber. Josh met Ed at his job at Della Terra. They graciously had us over for dinner and stuffed us with flank steak and baked mashed potatoes and the most moist carrot cake I've ever had. We enjoyed chatting with them while the boys entertained themselves in a toyless house. Honestly, I think not having toys around was good for them, they were a little crazy, but no fighting at all! Hmm??

6. We also made a couple stops at the parks in the area and let the boys romp. And as we do every time we go to Colorado Springs we drove around reminiscing at all of our old spots.

Distracted

This has been an off week, for several reasons which I don't feel like going into. One of the reasons has been completely resolved which feels great and I love being able to move forward. The other is still present and though I hope it's on it's way out of my realm, it's still keeping me from really being present in my life. That's my subtle way of asking you to pray for me, even though I myself find it completely annoying when asked to pray for an "unspoken" request. I'm just too curious. Sorry, though, that's all I can offer.

It's spring break around here. Jonah seems to have a little cold and Josh is working extra this weekend so we're not doing much. The boys are watching Cars for the second time in two days. We have a couple things to look forward to next week though. Some playdates and we're capping off the week with a trip to Colorado Springs. We're all excited about staying in a hotel, going swimming, a trip to zoo, and seeing some old and new friends.

Why I liked this weekend...

Yesterday Josh and I had a date for the first time since October. It's appalling. We will not let so much time pass again before we take some time for us. But it did make the three hours we had to ourselves yesterday very nice. It was a midday date so we didn't do anything all that special. We did stop by a puppy adoption drive and volunteer to be a foster home for dogs waiting to be adopted. It's crazy, but that's not all that far off from everything else we do. We've been dreaming about getting another dog, a buddy for Rio, but know it's not really the right time for adding another canine companion. Being a foster home means we'll have another dog around without much commitment. It's a week to week thing, so we can have an extra dog around for as long or short as we'd like. We think it'll be great for Rio. Fun stuff. In the coming weeks...lots of puppy pictures.

We also had a delicious lunch at a tiny little Thai place. Our first time trying Thai food and we really enjoyed it.

Today we're using the Daylight Savings excuse to be lazy. I took Rio for a walk. The guys are playing a game on the other computer. It's one of those mornings where just being together is cause for contentment. I love these kind of days.

For Mom

While my parents were visiting this past Sunday, my mom casually asked if I was thinking about getting the boys haircuts. The conversation went something like this:

Mom: Soo....are you thinking about haircuts? (While gesturing towards Jonah's near mullet.)

Me: Well yeah, I've been thinking about it for a while, it's the doing it that is stopping me.

Neither of the boys are very keen on having their hair cut. Last time it took a ton of post-Halloween candy to keep them sitting still. But last night Josh and I decided to take the plunge. We prepped the boys as well as we could and headed to Great Clips.

Surprisingly they both did exceptionally well.








Jonah....Before and After









Cason...Before and After

Thanks for the nudge, Mom!