flying the friendly skies

(the sky this morning)

Well, tomorrow is the day. I am flying out to good ole VA (DC area) with my mom, my sister Heather, and niece Chelsea for my sister Melissa's wedding. We have a bunch of fun things planned to do (beach, DC Smithsonian's, Monticello, etc) - but mostly I just can't wait to soak in the beautiful green and get my fill of nostalgia for home.

Zac will be taking care of the kids while I'm gone and he's dealing with all the last week of school fun. I will miss their awards assembly, Abigail's 6th grade graduation, their running club school meet, a 5K city race that Isaac and Abigail are running, Abigail's ballet performance at the city carnival thing, and the excitement of the last days of school and first days of summer break! I'm trying to make up a list of all the places the kids need to be, what they're supposed to be wearing or bringing, and all the last minute paperwork school stuff etc that needs to be taken care of before school is out. Yikes.

Anyway, I better get back to packing and trying not to panic (have I forgotten anything?!). Just wanted to let you all know I'll be signing off for the next 10 days. Little to no Facebook, reading blogs, writing blogs, and very limited email-checking. That's the plan. ;)
See you when I get back!!

Abigail's 12th Birthday: a story in 5 parts

Part One: The Haircut

She decided to cut off her long hair and try something different for her birthday, turning 12, going into the youth program, starting middle school. So she went from this:

to this: somehow it just makes her seem even older. But it's wonderfully cute on her. (Only dilemma will be getting it pulled up into a bun for her ballet recital . . . hmm, stiff hair gel here we come)

Part Two: The Mommy-Daddy-Daughter Dinner Date

My mom and Chelsea came down the next day and gave her some cool gifts and then babysat the younger kids for us that evening. I gave her some clothes I had gotten at a Downeast Basics $5 sidewalk sale and Zac and I got dolled up and took her out for dinner!

She chose The Olive Garden. Here she is drooling over the menu when we told her she could order dessert. And eating pizza.
The weirdest part was sitting across from her and realizing that in 4 yrs it is likely that she might be sitting in a restaurant with some silly boy sitting across from her. On a date (!). yikes. hahaha. ;)

Part Three: Balloons

The next day we surprised Abigail by putting 12 helium balloons in her room while she was sleeping, along with notes attached listing 12 things we really love about her.

She told us she had woken up in the middle of the night and walked through the strings without thinking much of it. But when she got back to her room, she realized that was strange and turned on the light to see what it was. haha. :)

(I must say that this is one of my favorite things I've ever done for one of my kids' birthdays. So fun.)

Part Four: The Cake

I decided I wanted to try to make a cake like this:

(I saw this idea on Pinterest, of course. My favorite browsing time-waster of all time)

SO I borrowed some cake pans and went to it.

Some thoughts on this attempt:

1. I stink at mixing colors. I mean seriously. I used gel food coloring so at least it's not supposed to dilute the batter as you add coloring, but still. I didn't want to have more coloring than batter. And eventually I just gave up on the whole "maybe another drop of this or that would help" game.

2. I didn't get the cake layers divided into equal parts. Actually as you look at the below pic, it appears that the layers get thinner as you go down. That was completely unintentional.

3. And I hate frosting cake. Me and frosting/icing have a very hate-hate relationship. We are not kind nor patient with one another. No, we just don't get along. Period.

and 4. don't criticize the inaccuracy of my rainbow spectrum. I'm just happy to have 6 distinct colored layers. Rainbow, shmainbow.

Part Five: The Party

And finally, Abigail blew out the candles (sort of). And opened her presents. She looooved the cake. The younger kids all whined "when will weeee get such a biiiiiiig cake?!" and all in all it was a great time. ;)

The one thing she had specifically asked for was . . . . .

a wig.

hahahahah. This kid cracks us up. So along with the fake noses and teeth she got for Christmas, and hats and scarves and other various props from around the house, she has a fairly complete disguise kit, I'd say.

And that was her 12th birthday. :)

Zac was sort of surprised by all the things I wanted to do for her birthday and "going all out" - but I just felt like this was a momentous and important year for her. Kind of huge. And I wanted it to be something special she'd always remember. Sending her into her crazy teenage yrs all full of love and confidence.

That's what I hope anyway.

Love this girl. :)

Seven Years of Plenty: a cookbook review

A great friend of mine, Linda Olsson, put together and published this cookbook "Seven Years of Plenty: The Best of the World's Basics" and she was generous enough to send me a copy to review. I was so excited! :)

A lot of us understand the importance of storing basic foods to provide sustenance in the case of an emergency, but then comes the common dilemma of "what do I do with all this stuff I've stored?"

To quote from the back cover of the book:

"Inspired by the limitless variety found in international cooking, Seven Years of Plenty brings together some of the best recipes made with commonly stored ingredients.

Eat what you store.

Enjoy what you eat.

Over half the world's population eats rice daily; beans are the main source of protein for most of the world; and bread is represented in nearly every culture around the globe"

I was so impressed and excited by all the different things I could try with just basic ingredients that I haven't tried before. I have 16 pages marked with recipes I want to try next!

For the purposes of this review though, I started with just a couple recipes.

First, French Bread. yummm. We have fallen prey to the temptation of picking up loaves of french bread from the grocery store bakery to have with dinner occasionally. Now, I think we have a recipe to replace that temptation! Homemade! Fresh! Easy! Delicious! What could be better? I have to admit I did cheat slightly and I used my bread machine on the manual setting to mix and knead the dough but then I shaped the loaves and followed her directions on rising, etc.

The bread was sooo good. mmmm, I loooove bread.

Next, I tried Baked Oatmeal. I've never made baked oatmeal before, but it sounded really good one morning, so I gave it a try.

I have to say, I've gotten used to eating my normal morning oatmeal without any sugar or sweetening (just fruit) so this seemed really sweet to me when I ate it for breakfast. But then my husband tried some and thought it was perfect as it was, so it must just be me. I still think it'd be delicious as a dessert with some vanilla ice cream! yummy.

Anyway - this is a terrific resource if you're looking to add variety to use some of the basic ingredients in your house. She also includes an "In A Pinch" section after each chapter for even simpler recipes for those situations when you're out of even basic basics (like eggs, for example).
So helpful!

Be sure to go check out more about it here!

{Bonus! Some samples of her recipes, including these, can be found here.}

And take a visit to her food storage blog by clicking on this cute button:

Stop by and say hello, she's friendly I promise!

(and as a side note, we think it's funny that Linda is from UT and now lives in VA. And I'm from VA and now live in UT. Who would have thought?! ;))

The End of Preschool Forevermore

It's true. Elisabeth had her preschool graduation on Friday. My baby! Done with preschool! Such craziness going on in these parts.

Before Mother's Day, though, her class put on a little picnic and program in the park for the moms. They sat on the playground and sang some cute songs and that was fun.

Then at the preschool graduation program it was so cute seeing them on stage and showing off some of the fun things they've learned.

They had the option of dressing up as something they wanted to be when they grew up, but after she chose a princess, a mermaid or a witch, I ended up talking her into just being her cute little self instead.

Anyway, Congrats to our little graduate! She can't wait for kindergarten to start! yay!:)

Samuel School Update #2

So as Zac and I read over the research, researched online, thought long and hard and prayed about our decision about Samuel, these are the things we thought (let me see if I can summarize somehow):

1. "the research" basically shows higher correlations between being held back a grade and incidences of drug use later on, dropping out of high school, low self-esteem and other risks, regardless of the reasons for holding them back.

2. what it doesn't tell us exactly is if these kids might have been at risk for these behaviors regardless of them being held back or not. In other words, there is no way to know what might have happened otherwise. It shows a correlation, but not cause and effect.

3. the research also clearly indicates that one shouldn't retain a child with the hope that this alone will be the intervention to help them succeed. This, I think, is where it fails. The argument is that they may struggle anyhow, being held back won't change that, so keeping them with their same age peers is more beneficial. But, in our case, Samuel already has support in place with his IEP so we are not looking to retention as the "end-all-be-all" solution.

4. So. Our rationale for wanting to hold him back goes something like this: he is behind academically, this will give him a chance to catch up. He's been in a self-contained classroom for 2 yrs where they don't cover some of the core curriculum that the reg ed classroom gets, such as science and social studies. So he's missed a lot of that completely. This will give him a chance to be exposed to all of it and be on track again. He is small for his age. Even compared to kids a yr younger, his pediatrician assured me he will never be a "big" kid. He is socially immature and might stand out less in this regard with younger kids. He struggles A LOT with his speech. Kids don't understand him. Teachers and other adults have a hard time understanding him. This gives him another year to perhaps concentrate on his speech and social skills without the stress of being behind academically and lost in the curriculum. He also struggles with anxiety. We have felt like giving him perhaps a little edge in being even ahead academically could help him reduce his anxiety to where he can function better and participate more fully before being challenged with all new material. Also since he is small, I am hoping that as time goes on he will have less chance of being teased and bullied, or just frustrated, for his speech and social skills if he's with younger kids, rather than being a small one in the grade. Anyway.

5. He'll be going to a new school anyway. None of his classmates will be at this new school. No one will know he was held back. It's a new start. As we talked to Samuel about the possibility, his only real concern was that he wanted to have a real desk and he was afraid that if he did 1st grade again he wouldn't get one (they sit at tables right now). So, if that truly is his only concern, I think we'll be ok there.

6. As I read online somewhere, the bottom line for us really, is that a child hardly ever struggles very much for being slightly ahead. But struggling by being behind can be a much tougher struggle. Little Samuel has enough challenges, we think. He is going to have a hard time either way. So we figure it can only be beneficial to give him this time to maybe hopefully help things be a little easier in some ways.

When we met again on Tues. the school psychologist said the principal had seen things work both ways. Sometimes it really works in the child's benefit to be held back. Other times it would have been better not to. The school team and the principal both said they could see the argument for wanting to hold him back. Really, it just came down to our decision. So, we decided to do it. (They also kind of waived the rest of the required "process" for this decision since he kind of has a unique situation of already being in Special Ed. phew!!) So right now, he'll be going to the public school in the mainstream class and going to "resource" for part of the day. He is now on the list at the charter school to get a spot in 1st grade if anyone drops out (which we are hoping for with all our might).

And that's where things stand. One of the hardest decisions I've ever made and I can only hope it ends up being the best thing for him and that he won't feel bad about it somewhere along the line. That's our only concern really. Anyway. Onward we go . . . it's all we can do.

Pics from Easter 2011

(better late than never) it was too hard to get the kids to stand still and all look at the camera and smile, so I gave up and told them to be silly.

that wasn't hard at all. a pic of me in this dress that I bought myself as a reward. some of you requested seeing a picture. here it is. ;)

hunting easter eggs

some of which were almost too high to reach

it was very chilly and raining

but Elisabeth wouldn't take off her dress and change into something warmer. she really liked her dress.

we had a lot going on Easter weekend, with Isaac's birthday and stuff, and things didn't all go exactly how I would normally have liked, but it was still nice. I remind myself often that not every year (for any holiday) is going to outdo the last. They won't all be memorable or exceptional. Sometimes everything will flop and feel disastrous, and that's ok. That's what I tell myself anyway. I hope it's true. ;)

Samuel School Update #1

So, to make everything about as clear as mud:

This is the post I wrote about Samuel's annual IEP update, wherein I was once again frustrated that the teachers don't seem to be seeing the same things I'm seeing and what ends up on the paper doesn't really seem to be capturing the essence of the issues.

This is the post I wrote to sort of explain why my kids go to a charter school and why it would be really nice to have Samuel go there. If Samuel did not get into the charter school and was mainstreamed it would mean I'd be driving to 2 different schools at essentially the same times, twice a day. Plus one more time to pick up Elisabeth from half-day Kindergarten (just one of the reasons I really dislike half-day kindergarten -but that's a rant for another day). So I'd be driving back and forth to schools essentially 5 times a day. Now doesn't that sound fun?!?

And this is the post I wrote in Feb but just got around to posting today that explains the confusion that went into putting Samuel into the charter school lottery and then finding out he didn't get in anyway. We are currently still fervently hoping that someone else drops out and that we will get a spot.

Ok, oh one more thing. Sometime awhile ago the school sent home a notice asking all the parents of the small group LD group kids to come for an important meeting. With the school district special education supervisor. That's never a good sign. Turns out they are not continuing a small group class at this school and they are working on phasing out small group Learning Disabled classes period for grades 4-6 (or something. It's been awhile and I don't remember the details). But what that means for us is that no matter what we chose for placement, keeping him in small group, mainstreaming him to his local neighborhood school, or putting him in the charter school, he would be going to a new school. There would be no continuity of teachers, location, speech therapist or anything, no matter what. Ugh!


So. What I understood was that some time around May-ish, we would meet as an IEP team to determine Samuel's placement for next year, since that is something that is reviewed annually and wasn't really discussed at his IEP. Then we would meet in a transition meeting with his new school (wherever that ended up being). But before all that I wanted to meet one-on-one with his teachers to find out how they feel he is really doing.


So I wrote an email. I got a response from the regular ed teacher that he has been joining for science class. She said he does what is asked, but doesn't participate voluntarily. He doesn't speak to his peers, or raise his hand. When I probed for more info such as how he doing compared to the other kids in his class and whether she thought he could learn effectively in a reg ed classroom, she told me she hasn't seen him enough to give me that kind of information and that his Special Ed teacher would be more qualified to discuss that with me. Problem being, of course, the Sp Ed teacher does not have the opportunity to observe him in comparison with his reg ed peers and so cannot really give me that info either. So that wasn't helpful.

Then I met with his Sp Ed teacher. She said he is only about a half year behind academically and that he is doing so much better than his sp ed peers, she just doesn't think he should stay in the self-contained small group class next year. I brought up the possibility of holding him back and she said that the research doesn't support that as an effective option. We then brought over his speech therapist to get her opinion. She said he has had a really hard time concentrating and wanting to work in speech therapy lately and that she really worries about him being in a mainstream class. He would be overwhelmed and lost. Not that he would be lost as in clueless. But that they would lose him in the shuffle.

This was on Friday.

She recommended I get in touch with the school psychologist on Mon and try to meet with her and get her opinion.

And so I did.

Turns out it usually takes a few months to go through this process of evaluating whether or not to hold a child back. She gave me a whole flow chart of all the steps they would normally take. uh-huh. And she basically said "the research" does not support holding kids back. For any reason, really. She gave me an article from The American Society of School Psychologists (or something) giving a summary of this research. And she gave me a form with a bunch of questions on what we felt the benefits of holding him back would be, what our concerns are, what's already been done to try to help him, etc. And his sp ed teacher was given a similar form to fill out.l The school psych also said she didn't have a lot of personal experience (being fairly young) and so she would consult with the school principal, and they would bring it up in the special ed team meeting that afternoon and then we would meet again the following morning.

(to be continued . . .)