It's Been 4 Years & He's Still a Nut!

Today is Austyn's 4th birthday! Can you believe that 4 long years have passed us by? It definitely doesn't seem like it. Not long ago, Austyn was a little baby that drove me bonkers with his crazy antics, so not a whole lot has changed since then! Austyn has been my 'problem' child in every way, and I mean that in a loving mom kind of way, not an OMG kind of way. lol. He was born early, always seemed to have a cold or be sick and he started walking at 9 months old! Ever since then, I have been trying to keep up with that boy. He is literally a ball of everlasting energy. He rarely tires out, but I guess it sort of keeps me on my toes. These days he is a lot more energetic and a lot more crazy! He also has something to say what seems like every moment of the day. He's constantly asking questions and is always curious about things. He is the kid who will poke you in your eye and ask you if it hurt, and why, and how, and then apologize. He's been in preschool since September and that has been going good. Unfortunately, I think his run with part day, part week school has come to a screeching halt. There was mention of psychologists, therapists and social workers having to come in and intervene with several of his classmates. After witnessing some of the shocking behavior for myself, I have decided that he will no longer attend school there. The teacher mentioned that several of the students have psychological, emotional and behavioral issues that need serious help. I just don't want Austyn thinking those behaviors are okay, he acts out sometimes and I think I may have found the source of the problem. The school he goes to isn't public school and they won't just 'kick' students out due to these problems. If it were the school Taylor goes too, they would have already gotten rid of those preschool kids and sent them to get help. This school is more along the lines of, well if we lose those kids we need to find 2 more to fit the bill....literally. Don't worry, I won't be yanking my kids out of school and sheltering them and homeschooling them. Austyn will go to an alternative class the same days and times and still have social and educational interaction with kids.
Okay, so back to Austyn...my fruitcake. He makes me laugh a million times a day. He can be such a monster and a cuddle bug all at the same time. He gives Mark 'knuckles' over the phone, and insists upon it. He opts for air hugs, air kisses and air high fives when you are too far away for the real thing. He loves music, loves to dance and sing. He has quite the imagination. He loves playing rough with Taylor and likes taking out the boxing gloves and beating up on him. Boys. I tell you. He also loves sitting down and having tea with Ryleigh in her house. He loves to draw and paint. We spent an hour painting yesterday. It calms him down. It doesn't quiet him down, just calms him. lol. He spent the night at a friend's house one night and I said, he talks ALL the time, and you will probably get annoyed. Her response was, oh, no, J does the same thing, so I'm used to it. Well, the next morning when we picked him up, she gave me this look, like...holy crap! She said...you weren't kidding! He kept asking question after question and asked why to every response I gave him. All I could say was I told you so. Our plans for today are just to hang out and play, and have birthday cake, of course! He's excited that he's four today and not three. He's not little anymore! He's big. Its hard to believe that this time last year Taylor was the three year old. How time flies.

My Run-in With an F-18

We all know how our kids just love to leave things lying around the house and how we always seem to be asking them to pick up their toys. Well, there was an accident yesterday that involved an F-18 that I really hope will teach my kids a valuable lesson in listening to their mother. Usually its the kids that end up injured when they don't listen. And it has nothing to do with something I did. haha. Last night was a little different. I was injured by an F-18. Obviously not by an actual life-size jet. Taylor had 2 friends over for a sleepover and I was walking down the hallway to use the bathroom when I tripped . . . over the toys that the kids had been asked to pick up. =o) Do you see where this is headed? I really don't like wearing shoes or socks. I hate things on my feet, so naturally, I was barefoot. And, the nose of a metal F-18 toy jet stabbed my foot! I wish I was exaggerating and just had a scratch, but I'm not. It hurt like hell and I think it starting hurting even more after I saw it. lol. I was bleeding, and just for fun, I'll give details. The wound itself was about a quarter of the size of a nickel. Did you catch that? I know it may sound a little confusing, but bear with me. The nose of the jet stabbed my foot and then proceeded to go in deeper while pulling my skin from my foot and essentially stuffing my skin under my skin. Lovely. I cleaned it up to the best of my ability, slapped a band-aid on it and called it a night. Well, it was throbbing and hurting awfully bad, and the band-aid was blood soaked. The most painful part was the area where ripped skin was shoved under intact skin. Being the genius mom I am, I decided that I would try to cut the skin away with some nail scissors. It didn't really seem like a bad idea, but the pain wouldn't allow me to actually do it. Ryleigh was cringing and covering her mouth and saying, "OOOOWW!" the entire time. She's such a girl. And just to be funny, all of the boys were covering their ears waiting for a scream. lol. I didn't go through with it and sucked it up until this morning when I finally went in to the doctor. They asked me a million times what I did, and kind of laughed when I told them. Jerks. =o) A tetanus shot, lydacaine, and some skin short, I was okay. The lydacaine is what hurt the most, and I uttered a few profane words at the doctor, but once it was numb, I was okay. They removed the skin over the rest of the wound, cleaned it some more and put a dressing on it and sent me home. Now my wound is about half the size of a nickel. They didn't give me any pain meds, but then again I don't really blame them. The last time I was at the hospital they prescribed vicodin and Motrin. I have a laundry list of narcotics, muscle relaxers and pain medications that just sit in my cabinet. I have a very low tolerance for anything that might do me some good, so in the end it doesn't really do anything for me but make me worse. I'll stick with my Motrin. I can't walk on my foot which is really fun. =o) I told Mark they should have just given me a wheelchair. I was just kidding, but it was a funny thought. So, let that be a lesson moms, dads and children! Pickyour toys up off of the floor. Speaking of floors, I should go now because my poor daughter has fallen asleep on the floor due the lack of a nap.

It's worse than it looks.

What Good Times...

So, today was Taylor's very first day of basketball season! He has been wanting to play since he was six, and unfortunately, I just kept missing the sign-up dates. They are in the middle of the soccer season, and are usually the last thing I am thinking of with soccer, Thanksgiving and Christmas coming. However, this year I managed to make the sign-ups. Well, okay, so I made the late sign-ups and had to pay an additional $10 for it, but hey, I made it! I took him to the mall yesterday afternoon so that he could get some basketball shoes. He picked a pair of Jordan's that actually have a photograph of "the man" himself on the sole of the shoe. He was pretty excited about them and he wore them to school today to help break them in. Anyway, so his practice was at 4 today and I could tell he was really excited about it. This was something fresh, something new and he couldn't wait to jump right into it. The coach is a guy who has played softball with Mark, so Mark and Taylor know him. They started off practice by doing suicides! Yes, that's right! I said suicides. Can you believe it?!?! 7 & 8 year old kids running suicides, but I guess you have to have endurance in basketball, so run away. The kids actually thought it was fun. I would probably fall over and die if I attempted to run suicides right now. hahaha. Okay, I'll give myself some credit, I could probably make it through a round of them and then fall over and die. Then it was off to stations where they learned all about passing, dribbling and shooting before they scrimmaged each other. Taylor is amazing! He is very athletic and he surprises me a lot. He is really hard on himself and always says that he stinks at basketball and he should practice more, but I think he is doing great. He made at the very least half of all the shots he went for. He even stole the ball and almost scored in their scrimmage! WOOHOO! Go Taylor! I had a great time watching him play. He had a big cheesy grin pasted to his face all practice. It made me really happy to see him so excited and happy to be playing. I'm glad I remembered to sign him up this time around and I'm going to try to remember in the future as well. I took a few pictures, I'll have to post them later because I don't really feel like loading them onto the computer.
Off to some, "I told you so" news. While I was cooking dinner tonight, Austyn decided to do what I ask him NOT to do on a daily basis, and that is to not jump/climb/wrestle or horse around on the furniture because someone could fall and hit their head on the table. Well, it was definitely an "I told you so" moment tonight when he was screaming bloody murder. I had to hang up on Mark and tend to Austyn. He managed to get a big goose egg and cut his head in two places. Not to worry, it isn't anything major, just a nick that bled a little. I watched his behavior and his energy. He's fine, thank goodness! After a couple of hours I gave him some Motrin for his pain. I think he has finally learned that he should probably listen to what I say.

A Little Catch-up and a Snow Day!

It's been a little while since I have blogged, so we'll play catch-up before we get to our snow day. Since Christmas, we have just been 'hanging around.' Not literally, of course. lol. The boys got haircuts from Mark. He's a funny guy when it comes to the boys and their hair. He always gives them these awesome doos and takes pictures before he gives them a real haircut. Taylor got a mullet this year. Sweet! Austyn lucked out on the blackmail pictures this year. Mark went back to work for half of the week and had the rest off due to the New Year. Our New Year's plans were to hang out with our old neighbors, the Villasenors, but that didn't really happen. The night before I had a really bad pain in my side and couldn't sleep. I tossed and turned all night long, only to wake up tired and still in pain. I did a little bit of housework and decided I really should go in to the hospital. I went in at about 11 am and finally came home by about 6:30 pm. It was a very long day, by myself. Mark and the kids stayed home, which was fine. I didn't want them sitting there, bored out of their minds for that entire day. I wasn't allowed to eat or drink anything the entire day and needless to say, I was starving! The did a urine analysis and blood work before they did anything else. Those all came back normal, so they decided that a pelvic exam was necessary. That didn't really reveal much else, other than that my pain wasn't exactly where my ovaries are, so that meant a CT scan. I had to drink this chunky, chalky, really thick berry tasting drink. Not just a little bit either. I had to drink TWO QUARTS of the stuff! It was awful and I had to wait 2 hours before I could get the scan. I finally was able to get the scan and just so happened to know the guy who was doing it. I coached his son in soccer. So, when the scan was done he actually let me look at it. It was really cool to be able to see my internal organs like that. Mark finally decided to come to my aid after the scan. They said it wasn't appendicitis and I wouldn't need surgery! WHEW! And it wasn't an ectopic pregnancy, another whew! So, in the end after a full day's worth of hospital gossip, being poked and prodded, they still don't know what was causing the pain. Lovely. Oh, and did I mention that they poked me once and broke the needle, poked me again and then poked me a 3rd time for an IV! Man! My arms were hurting for a few days. They think it may have been ovarian cysts but it was too soon to know! SSHEESH! The pain finally has subsided, but I still get an ache every so often. I spent the night at home with the kids and was knocked out before 9pm! Mark spent a few hours at our friend's house and then came home, only to fall asleep on the sofa before midnight! I woke up and told Mark to get up, we had 9 minutes to the New Year. Well, we turned on the TV, and we only had 10 seconds left! I guess our clock is a little slow. We caught the ball dropping, said happy new year and went to bed. We are such a lively bunch!
Okay, so our snow day! We had a blast. We drove up to the Sequoias on Saturday. Our friends, the Quintanas had invited us to go along, so we did. We brought snow boogies and our snow gear. We played in the snow for a couple of hours or so before we headed for food and shelter. The kids had a blast. I think Austyn had the most fun. He didn't show an ounce of fear and was taking off down those hills so fast! He scares me. Our lunch was okay. Our server wasn't the most pleasant, and she definitely didn't work for her $11 gratuity that was included. She never asked us if we needed anything else, or if everything was okay. My sandwich was supposed to have mozzarella cheese, but looked as though they threw a few shreds of cheese on it and called it a day. She brought us our check without even asking if we wanted any more food. We were all on E with our beverages and practically had to beg for a refill. She could have been better to us, but maybe its because we were young, and had 6 kids. The kids were actually great and were quiet and ate most of their food. Once the older crowds came in she suddenly perked up! Damn those old people. Just kidding.
After lunch we headed over to see the General Grant Tree which is amazing. Sure its JUST a really big tree. But its a REALLY BIG tree! Massive actually. It made me feel like a tiny speck of sand. The kids didn't really grasp the magnitude of the situation, but they'll appreciate it in their later years. The trail leading up to the General was steep and slick in some places and the kids took full advantage of that, sliding down on the snow sled boogie things. After we oohed and aahed over the beautiful trees, we headed to a campsite with a pretty steep incline. Austyn almost gave me a heart attack. He got out of the car, grabbed a sled, hopped on and zoomed down that hill so fast. It wasn't that bad until we realized that he was headed straight for a tree!!! Next to that tree was a steel, bear proof food storage locker! We screamed and yelled for him to stop, but he wasn't about to. It could have been a disastrous moment in time, but thank God, it ended well. I ran as fast as I could down the hill, only to trip about 3 feet away from him. I face-planted in the snow. (Laugh it up, I'm sure it was a sight to be seen!) He just missed the tree and the locker. He managed to go in between the two. The space was only a few feet wide. Jesse decided that he should stand at the bottom of the hill and stop all speeding children. That was okay with all of us! I must say, it was a great hill. The bigger kids took turns going down the hill, while Ryleigh and Kyle (the babies) took one spin and they were spent. The adults took a few turns down the hill as well. Austyn almost had a second disastrous moment when he just kept on sliding and Jesse tackled him a few feet short of a creek! That boy is going to be trouble when he's older, I just know it. All in all, it was a great day and I think its safe to say that we all had a blast! Enjoy the slide show of pictures.