The Wheels on the Bus Part II

Welcome, BBB!

Has it really been this long?? So, I guess I haven't updated at all during my last pregnancy - does that give any indication as to how it went for me? :) So this is my "Welcome to the Family" post for our newest addition: BBB! First, I should apologize to anyone who reads this because I cannot figure out this blogger paragraph formatting, so sorry about the paragraphs being all messed up! If you are thinking that this just looks like a newborn picture of Cee Cee, well...you are right that BBB does look exactly like Cee Cee at this age. She is now 4 weeks old (is that any indication of how crazy these past few weeks have been?). The delivery was wild - at least for me and all people involved! Long story short, I thought I would literally die if I had to give birth non-medicated. Totally serious. But, I didn't die and BBB is perfect, so I proved myself wrong! :) I hope to never have to do that again, but already the memory of the immense pain and difficulty is starting to fade, and given how quickly it all happened, I probably will not have a choice if/when I get pregnant in the future. Do you want to know how it all went down??? I wasn't going to say, given how late it is and how precious little sleep I have been getting the past 4 weeks, but I can't resist. I haven't written it down yet, and I don't want to forget. So here goes. P.S. As I am typing this I am realizing that it is serious TMI - so don't read it if you don't want to know!!!! First of all, I had a very specific timeline for this delivery. This would be VBAC number 2 for me, so I should be a pro, right? Like, even be able to choose the date, right? Anyway, after dealing with Gestational Diabetes and lots of pain throughout the pregnancy, I was seriously ready to be done. I did not feel that way with Cee Cee, but I was counting down the days for a long time with this one. It was a tough pregnancy. I had my heart set on taking my children to the temple open house when I would be 37.5 weeks. The day after that was the first BYU football game of the season - probably fun to watch while in labor, yes? It also happened to be on a 3-day weekend for S, so he wouldn't have to take any vacation time from work. Perfect time to be born! Nope, not meant to be. I thought maybe the 2nd game of the season then. Not then either. A week before BBB was born, I started getting serious contractions. Braxton Hicks, of course, but sometimes close enough together and long enough to make me wonder. I never got to the point of actually going to the hospital, but we came close. Sometime in that week, I got concerned about my water leaking and went to the OB Emergency to make sure - it wasn't. Two days later, I fell down the basement stairs (really stupid - I, for the first time in my adult life, was too lazy/pregnant/sore/tired/etc to take the dirty clothes down the stairs so I just left them ON the stairs. And then when I finally got around to doing the laundry, I slipped on them because I couldn't see over my belly.). I had to go to OB Emergency again. Everything was fine. Both times, they could tell I was having lots of contractions close together, but both times it was clear I was not in active labor, so I was sent home. On Sunday, I woke up with crampy contractions - different then the ones I had been having all week. I thought maybe it was the real thing, but I had been fooled so many times during the week that I refused to believe it. We got ready for church and went. S started timing my contractions during sacrament meeting - 7 minutes apart and painful. I thought maybe I shouldn't be at church, but decided to wait it out in case it was a false alarm again. I skipped Sunday School because there were no cushy chairs available. While in the hall, a friend sat down and we chatted for awhile and then she started timing my contractions. We sat together in Relief Society and she timed them the whole time - 5 minutes apart, almost the whole time. She was really concerned, bless her heart. I was in a lot of pain, but I figured that we could just go to the hospital after it was over, so I waited it out. After church got out, I knew we needed to go to the hospital. We called S's brother and his wife to come watch the kids and left for the hospital around 1pm. At the hospital, they sent us in to OB Emergency, where I would be checked to see if I was dilated/effaced and the decision would be made to admit me or not. I was in a ton of pain by this point, and I was not getting much time to rest between contractions - 4 minutes apart, but the ramp-up and relaxation of each contraction ate up at least another minute. Anyway, the nurse checked me at 2pm and I was a 1 and 0% effaced!!! WHAT!!??!? I told her that given the amount of pain I was in and how close my contractions were, this HAD to be the real thing, right?!?! RIGHT?!?! I told her to call my doctor, because she let me have my epidural when I was only a 1 last time and Cee Cee was born 8 hours later. And I was in a TON of pain! "I need my epidural" - repeated about ten times. She said she couldn't call my doctor, but she would talk to the midwife who was there. The midwife said I couldn't get an epidural until I was a 5, and I couldn't be admitted until I was a 4, but since I was clearly in a lot of pain, I could stay and wait and walk around for a little while and see if labor progressed. Well, I was pushed up there in a wheelchair, so I wasn't going to be able to do much walking. And by this point there was about 1 minute between contractions. The midwife came in and talked to me herself (she was really wonderful, just not really grasping what was happening). She did not seem to want to call my doctor, even after I insisted several different times. Eventually the nurse came back in and said that she knew I was in a lot of pain and maybe it was time to check me again. I thought "Good luck at this point!" because there were only 30 seconds between contractions and that was not even enough for me to catch my breath, let alone be able to settle enough to get checked! She put on her gloves and then, thankfully, my water broke before she even got to my bedside! Talk about perfect timing. :) Of course, this meant that I would be admitted, so she took off the gloves and started to leave and I said "I think I have to push." She asked if I meant PUSH push, you know, like the baby. I said I didn't know for sure, I thought maybe more of a going to the bathroom kind of push, but I couldn't tell for sure I was in so much pain and struggling to catch my breath. She said I would be able to tell if it was the real deal, and then she left to go get the paperwork. As soon as she closed the door, I knew I had to push and I yelled for her to come back - "I'M PUSHING!!!!" Of course, she and the midwife ran back in and pushed the emergency button and I was rushed to Labor and Delivery. While they were wheeling me down the hall, I guess I said some funny stuff. I couldn't stop yelling, just like on TV. I wasn't doing it on purpose either, my body just made me scream the whole time. Oh well. I was yelling the whole time that I needed my epidural, and finally someone had the courage to tell me that it was too late for that. WHAT?!?!?! S tried to comfort me by telling me to think of all the money I was saving by not getting an epidural. I must have been crazy because instead of smacking him, I just repeated what he said, yelling "I'M SAVING MONEY BY NOT GETTING AN EPIDURAL!" Ha. Not much to say about the delivery room experience. It all happened so fast and was so painful, that it is a bit of a blur. BBB was born about 10 minutes after my water broke - 3:49pm. Her head is perfect. I thought that Cee Cee's head was perfect, but BBB's is REALLY perfect. They said that is because she spent so very little time in the birth canal. Go figure. My body felt better shortly after the delivery, but I didn't actually fully catch my breath and get over the anxiety and excitement of the whole thing until the next day. Oh, and I guess I should say that...she weighed 8lbs 13oz and was 21 inches long!! They actually consider all babies 8lbs 13oz and over to be "large for gestational age"! I had been worried the whole time about having a big baby and either having a traumatic birth experience or having to have a C-section (since having too big of a baby is one of the main things they worry about with gestational diabetes). And it happened! At one point, the L&D nurse asked me how I felt about everything (afterwards), and I said "it wasn't THAT bad of a nightmare." Ha. The midwife came in later and told me that now I could run a marathon or something and it wouldn't be so hard. I told her that I did run a marathon last year, and that that was WAY easier than natural birth! That's all for the birth experience. Our hospital stay was otherwise uneventful. Since I had Gestational Diabetes, they checked BBB's blood sugar a couple of times. Her first one, taken later in the night, was pretty low, but not too low, but the next few were normal, so she was fine. She breastfed like a champ from the get go, so that is a nice change from what I have been used to with the other 2. I have only used my breast pump a handful of times the past month. BBB is a wonderful baby. She is a joy to have in our house. Cee Cee adores her and talks about her all the time. Actually she talks about BBB's By-you (BYU) shirt all the time. Boo is not interested. I think the unpredictability of her movements kind of troubles him, so he stays away. But he is happy to point to her when we talk about her and he will touch her for a split second if it is mentioned that he should try it. Still, that is more than he did when Cee Cee was born, so I'll take it. BBB still wakes up three times a night, but that is OK - such is life as a newborn, right? And she is super sweet to take care of. She has the prettiest little face and big blue eyes. She has started giving smiles this week, but only to me, and only like three so far. She loves to be talked to and held. She will take a binky, but only if we can find where Cee Cee has put it (Cee Cee, who would NEVER take one as a baby, is suddenly very interested and likes to walk around sucking it). She is awake more and more in the day, which is really fun. Now I just have to figure out life enough to get her consistent tummy time and all that. She spends most of her awake time just observing the goings-on in our house. Which are many, although not very interesting at this point. 3 diapers and 3 feedings every 3 hours doesn't sound like much, but it has a little bit rocked my world. I am getting there though. And I am making a point of enjoying all of my children and putting off housework where I can get away with it. Life is good. :)

Books vs. Ebooks

I posted this on facebook earlier, so sorry for the repeat. Just looking for more input before my 14 days of ability to return for a refund expire. So I got a kindle for Christmas and after a few days of using it I am considering returning it. Here are my thoughts on the matter. Am I missing something here? Aren't ebooks supposed to be better? Are they? I like it because: 1. It is kind of exciting - a whole world of books/magazines is at my fingertips and downloadable anywhere in the house or anyplace with Wifi at any time within seconds (seriously - 5 seconds or less!) 2. It is convenient to only have one "book" to carry around. 3. I can read in the dark (accomplish-able with just a reading light, of course) 4. The classics, for the most part, are free. 5. Most books are cheaper than buying retail/new. 6. I can get new books whenever I want (ie. Once we had to drive 25 minutes out of our way just to get a book we wanted to read on the road. We were lucky they had it!) 7. It holds my place in a bunch of different books without me needing to use a book mark or deface the book. 8. It will stay "open" on a treadmill, unlike hard copies of books. I don't feel like it is worth the money because: 1. I cannot see the setup of the book the way it is because all the pages are formatted for kindle. For instance, when I am reading Ivanhoe I cannot see where the footnotes go to because they are not necessarily differentiated from the rest of the text. Chapters start in the middle of the "page" and I can't necessarily tell what sections there are (ie. Introduction, Prologue, etc, which may or may not be an essential part of the text) and how they fit in or who they are written by, thus making it harder for me to determine whether or not to read them or from what point of view they are told, or if they are truthful or fiction!) 2. Suppose I just want to finish my chapter (often the case) - I have to flip through all the pages until the next chapter (which starts in the middle of a page) to see how far I have to go, and my place is not held while I do so. So I have to remember where I am in the book while I go searching around. Sometimes I like to look ahead in the book too, just to see what is coming - does anyone else do this?? If I am holding a physical copy of the book, I just hold my page with a finger. 3. There is just something about being able to flip through a book and tell how far you have read etc that is just impossible with a kindle. I mean, they have a little percentage on the bottom that will tell how far, but it is not the same as being able to feel it. Plus, they include all the pages in the book in their page count, not just the content of the book that I would actually end up reading (they include the notes and intros and everything, which does not make it a very good indicator of where you really are in your reading). 4. I would love for our kids to be in a reading mood and just go to our little home library and pick out a quality book. I am not sure how likely that is, and obviously it will be awhile before they start reading my kind of books, but in order for this to be a possibility, we have to physically have the books, not just digitally. Now, at least with the Nook I believe, you could share digital copies of the book. But that is not the same as being able to see how big a book is and read the back and see what kind of vocabulary level it is etc. 5. I am nervous about using it in the bathroom, kitchen, near the pool, etc for obvious reasons. 6. For some reason, perhaps intangible, I am finding it harder to "get into" the books I have got than I think it would be if I had a physical copy. I often read books that I think are page-turners that don't start out that way. 7. I could continue checking out books at the library or buying them used on amazon for less than the kindle copy. Please tell me what you guys think!

Walking

It is only fitting that the day after I finished my "running" post, Boo would...LEARN HOW TO WALK!!!!!!! I can't even believe I am typing this. I have dreamed of this day for so long, both literally and figuratively speaking (for those who know my kinds of dreams!). I have so much to do right now, since I have spent the bulk of my day either helping him to start walking (he needs help starting out and then he takes it from there) or announcing the good news, so I do not have time to tell the whole story. We will just say this - THANK YOU to our Shriner's hospital physical therapist, for now our little speed-crawler who, prior to this day had never in his life taken an independent step, has taken a record of 28 consecutive independent steps without stopping. Even our PT didn't expect this! (Today was the first day we saw him). That's all for now. Hopefully I can capture this on video soon.

Running

So this year was a big one for me, exercise-ically speaking. I have taken up running! Again. Ever since my mission (2004) I have run off and on and enjoyed it. I started running again in Feb of this year for the first time since CeeCee was born. My goal was to run a half marathon by the end of the summer. Luckily, I have a great neighbor down the street who also happens to be a personal trainer and who also happened to be in need of a running partner. We ran together, starting short and slow, in the mornings in February, March, and most of April. Then we had to part ways as things began coming up in our lives such that we could not consistently run together. Sometime between February and April, I somehow was convinced, albeit not wholeheartedly, that I could actually run a FULL marathon. Crazy? Yes, I think so. I mean, I was always the last person to finish the mile run in middle and high school, walking most of the way because I could not breathe, with 20 minutes being a good time for me. I have struggled with sports-induced asthma basically my whole life, and I have sometimes needed an inhaler, or struggled big time without one. I always thought there must be something wrong with people who run. What is chasing them? Plus, I didn't really know any runners growing up - running wasn't a big activity in my hometown.On my mission, out of necessity (due to my companion being an avid runner who, of course, needed me to be with her while she ran every morning), I came up with breathing exercises that made running for more than a minute or two possible for me. They still work for me now, even though I don't usually need to use them anymore. Long story short, I started training for, not a half marathon as I had originally planned, but a full - 26.2 miles. After my personal trainer friend and I stopped running together, I found a marathon training plan on the internet and decided to go for it, but without my whole heart and soul. At one point, after an extremely exhausting 14 mile Saturday run, S asked if I really thought I could run 26.2 miles, since I had so much trouble with 14. I told him, no, at that point I did not think I could run 26.2 miles - that is why I was training. Silly S. Essentially, I just stuck to the plan like glue until I got within about 5-6 weeks of finishing, and then I figured that I needed to sign up for one - of course, by then I had to pay a late registration fee, but I didn't want to pay at all until I knew I could do it! The week before my marathon, I decided to take the kids to the finish line of another marathon nearby and cheer for the runners (even though we didn't know any). All runners know how nice it is to have even strangers cheering for them. Anyway, it's way silly I know, but it was definitely an emotional experience watching all the people cross the finish line and accomplish such a lofty goal. I was there at around the time I figured it would take me to finish, and I was pleased to discover there were still many people finishing at that time. I knew I would finish, but I had been worried about possibly being the last. Of course, finishing last was still a possibility, since the marathon I signed up for had about 1/10 of the runners that the marathon I watched did. But I didn't mind finishing last anyway, I just wanted to finish, and preferably within my time goal.Can I tell you that my first marathon was one of the greatest experiences of my life? I chose seriously one of the most beautiful marathons I could have chosen (email me if you are interested) and at the end of July, I ran it! I felt totally great for the first half, and I even ran faster than the pace I expected (I had not been accurately timing myself during training, but my trainer/friend lent me her Garmin watch for the marathon). In fact, I felt great for the first 20 miles. Then I started to slow down a little, about 1 min/mile slower. I still felt great though. At mile 23, the farthest I had run during training, I felt pretty good, but about a half a mile later I really started slowing down. Like 1-2 min/miles slower. I was able to pick up the pace a little bit around mile 25, and a little bit more around mile 26, but I definitely crossed the finish line quite a bit slower than I was running at mile 20. But I finished! 42nd out of 65! S was volunteering at the finish line and my trainer/friend, who had run most of the last half along with me, ran ahead and took some pictures of me crossing the finish line. Ultimately, I have only two pictures of the whole thing, but I am glad to have even those because we had a lost camera scare which I am glad to forget. :) It is a beautiful thing to discover that my body is capable of doing so much more than I ever imagined! The marathon recovery period lasted from Saturday to the following Tuesday, after which I would never have known that I ran a marathon by the way I felt. In fact, just hours after running a marathon, I found myself at home with my husband, children, brother, and sister, with all of the adults sleeping but me, leaving me with my sore little body to chase the babies around. That night, we went to a tourist site about an hour away and walked around. I was pretty tired, but, again, surprised and thrilled that my body was handling all of this. Now, nearly 5 months later, it all seems like a dream. Isn't life just like that? I still look at people who have run marathons and think they must be crazy - only now I am one of them! Ha.

Some Cute Things

To preface: I have misplaced my USB cords, so no pictures this time. Sorry!

CeeCee and Boo have been so cute lately. Not that they haven't always been cute, of course. They never cease to amaze me with their latest and greatest accomplishments of magnitudes great and small. Here is a list, in no particular order:

1. CeeCee's place - Lately I have noticed CeeCee's frequent appearances in a special place in our house. Right next to the sliding glass door, which is on the south end of our house, is a vent. Being that we have a little one (Boo) who, historically, has not expressed discomfort with extremes in temperature, we have our air conditioner set at a comfortable 70 degrees all summer long. Therefore, our vents have cool air blowing through them more often than not, or so it would seem. CeeCee has found one of the unique spots in our house where she can sit on a vent, having the wind blowing through her hair, and get blasted by the sun next to a window that spans the height of floor to ceiling. It is quite the spot. The only thing I can ascertain from this is that she must share my love for the sensation of being hot and cold simultaneously. One time I was standing there, inadvertently of course, and she became quite distraught until I left "her place" so she could go there.

2. Boo and ice cream - This is a long story. I will try to be brief. Boo has made extremely slow progress in feeding therapy ever since we restarted towards the end of last year. Don't get me wrong - progress is progress! But it has been very slow. Most recently (prior to the last month or so), the most progress we have made toward our final (quite distant) goal of Boo being an oral feeder, is having him play with food at the table while we eat. Not much, but more than what he has done in the past! Anyway, the therapist and I recently decided, thanks to his success in coming to enjoy horseback riding as well as dance class, that we can push a little harder. So we decided to start bringing things to his mouth. This was upsetting to him at first, but as with so many other things recently, he got over it after a few times. He still resists by fighting with his arms, but he knows he is expected to "kiss" each piece of his food after every meal and he will even do it himself sometimes. The best part is that the last few days I have been able to give him miniscule amounts of ice cream and pudding in his mouth and he didn't cry, in fact he was laughing - it has been a fun game for him! I think things are looking up, even though we still have an extremely long feeding battle ahead of us. :)

3. Climbing the stairs together - Often if Boo notices that CeeCee is following him he will wait for her so they can climb the stairs together. I love to see their little heads pop up at the same time. She is getting pretty fast at crawling, but is still no match for our speedy man Boo!

4. Monkey bars at dance class - Boo attends a little dance class on Saturdays called "Dancers with Disabilities". He is not the only boy, in case you wondered. I would never have thought of or considered putting him in a dance class, except that his personality is BEGGING for structure, which leaves me to seek diligently after any kind of class he can join which will meet his structural needs. (Did I mention that we/Boo can't wait for school to start again?) And so we have dance class, which has actually been quite fun. Except for the "Monkey Bars" part (really a ballet barre). He cries and cries when the children, all aged 3-6 years, must pretend to be monkeys and sit on the bar and fall asleep and wake up to the music. It is really horrible, I assure you. Anyway, this past Saturday I had to bring CeeCee along, which is usually not a good thing when I have to focus on Boo. But such is life, and along she came. One of the students there was willing to hold her for me and she got to somewhat participate in the class, which was so much fun for her. When we got to the Monkey Bars part, Boo started in and had already cried a few elephant tears by the time he got seated. Then CeeCee (brought by the student) came to sit by him and suddenly everything was OK! He leaned over to give CeeCee a forehead kiss (which she does now too, by the way!) and then they were both happy for the rest of the Monkey Bar part.

As a side note: I don't think anyone around me at the time could have witnessed this miracle, but I call it a miracle because that is totally how I would describe their relationship right now - miraculous. CeeCee seems to have a stabilizing effect on Boo that S and I don't necessarily have. I am so glad we decided to have her because she has been such an influence for good in Boo's life - things are happier, particularly for Boo, when she is near. All I can say is, far from being an extra burden (as I once feared another baby would be), CeeCee has HELPED Boo in ways I could not have foreseen and she is a huge blessing in all of our lives. It is a pleasure to raise her.

5. Boo and his blankets - Boo is so funny when he goes to bed. I "sneeze" his blankets onto him to make him laugh, and he proceeds to wiggle his body back and forth and use his arms to tuck his blankets underneath him on both sides. Maybe you can picture this? It is super cute, and it is a nightly occurrence.

6. CeeCee's feeding antics - My sister, H, recently put together and into words something I have long noticed about CeeCee when we give her her bottle. She LOVES to play with hair - even short hair like S's - and if you turn your head or lift it up so she cannot reach it, she will push your head, not so gently, back into her preferred position so she can play with your hair. Such a funny little girl.

7. Falling into the laundry basket - CeeCee LOVES laundry. Which is good, since it frequently appears in our family room, waiting for me to get around to it! More than once, CeeCee has fallen into the laundry basket headfirst, while trying to pick up some desirable item of clothing. It is too funny to see that little bum in the air, body folded almost completely in half, all to acquire some piece of laundry. I have not yet taken a picture of this, as my camera has always been too far away for me to justify leaving her like that long enough to go get it. One of these times though!

8. Sitting and laying on the coffee table - We recently made a trip to my parents' house and Boo quickly discovered the height of their coffee table to be optimal for scaling. He climbed right on top! Now mind you, he has never climbed on top of anything. I have always assumed he lacks the upper body strength, which I still think he does, but now I know that the height of all our furniture is also a factor in the equation. He got really fast at it too, so we would turn around for a second while he was laying on the floor and turn back to discover him sitting on top of the table "rolling a ball in his fingers". This was a particularly enjoyable aspect of the vacation for him, and he did it often while we were there.

9. Sleep training - It is, perhaps, too early to call CeeCee "sleep-trained". It has now been five days - 10 minutes of crying the first night, 3 the second, 1 the third, less than 1 the fourth, and now 3 on the fifth. Trained? I don't know. But I am really happy with how it has been going, compared with how it HAD been going! She has always slept through the night though (except on vacation...) since she was only a few weeks old. I think I am blessed. :)

10. Bathtub imitation - Recently, Boo has learned some tricks from CeeCee. Notably, crawling in the bathtub and standing up in the bathtub. Not that he couldn't have done these things before, he just hadn't considered it. Now that the idea has been introduced to him, he does it too. I enjoy seeing those two learn from each other.

11. Dishwasher and piano - would you believe that the babies come running (crawl-running) the second the dishwasher is opened or the piano is played? They do. CeeCee loves to climb into the dishwasher and Boo loves to throw things inside of it. As far as the piano goes, they both love to play (Boo plays individual keys and CeeCee bangs), and they also both want me to surrender the bench, the books, and the keyboard. So if ever I start, I soon have to stop. And, as always, they hate the flute. So we don't even go there except on extremely rare occasions during which I must be willing to tolerate my babies in hysterics.

So glad to be the Mama to such super cute and fun kids!

First and Last Day of Preschool

For some reason, when I post pictures lately, I don't see them on my draft, I see the html version. And since I have no idea where one "picture" ends and the next begins, I will just have them all at the beginning in a big clump. Anyone know how to fix this?

Contrary to what the title of this post suggests, Boo's first and last day of preschool were not on the same day. The pictures from his first day are the ones with his short sleeved shirt. The red sweatshirt is from his last day (yesterday). He was in preschool for a total of three weeks, one of which he was out sick.

Boo loved preschool. I don't know what I am going to do this summer to keep him entertained! He loves structure, and so do I for that matter, but I am not good at providing it. Especially now that I have two children, and CeeCee is entirely unpredictable.

Boo attended preschool (and will attend in the fall also) at our local elementary school in a special needs classroom. It so happens that all the children in his class had genetic syndromes, as he also likely has. Some of the children could walk, some were in wheelchairs. I don't think any of them talked, but they all seemed to have a few signs. Super cute kids. They attended from 12:30-3pm Monday through Thursday. In class, Boo loved to play with two little girls, A and I. They were the two who walked. Boo, of course, walked in his walker or crawled or back-scooted.

On the last day, his teacher threw a little party for family members. We congratulated the graduates (most of the kids in his class were 5 and heading to kindergarten in the fall) and everyone got an award. Boo got the award for "Best Ball Player". He loves balls. Apparently he was never happier for them than when he was in the ball pit. He and the little girls would throw balls at each other and laugh. His teacher also talked about how one day they had a school assembly to watch the dancers from a nearby university. Boo walked all the way to the auditorium, amongst all the other children in the hallway no less. And he paid attention for the entire 45 minute assembly, after which he walked back to his classroom (on the other end of the school). No wonder he gets so excited when I tell him he's going to school!

Admittedly, the pictures are nothing to brag about. It is hard to take pictures with a grabby baby in your arms. Speaking of grabby, CeeCee was not very attentive during the end-of-the-year party slideshow. She kept grabbing a balloon from the girl standing next to us (a little sister of a boy in Boo's class). Then she started grabbing her hair! CeeCee! All the students had to sit in the front row in their special seats for the entire party, which most of them were not thrilled with, since their parents were sitting right behind them and they wanted to sit on laps! Boo did pretty good, but he kept reaching back to me and signing "all done". He did not cry though. CeeCee did that for him. :) Boo did a good job of clapping at appropriate times and then he was very excited to leave at the end of it all. Of course, neither of my children are into snacks, and I am still trying to lose/maintain weight, so we skipped the snacks, thanked the teachers, and were the first ones out of there.

It has been sure wild to send our baby boy to school! I never cried, and neither did he, but we sure missed him at home. He was mainly happy all day every day at school, just like at home. It is especially strange to not see what he is doing and not get much by way of a report at the end of the day. I mean, I would pick him up (all the other kids are bussed, since they live far away) and the teacher would say a few things, but not much. Just "He had a good day. He sure loves balls." - that sort of report. Much different from Early Intervention and private therapy and all the medical reports I get. Oh well. I suppose this is the same for every parent. I mean, I don't remember my mom talking to my teachers at the end of every day. Mainly just Parent-Teacher Conferences I think. It is an interesting transition for us. Now we get the whole summer to have fun - riding horses, swimming lessons (maybe...), and dance class. And some trips and walks and maybe even camping this year, since Boo is off oxygen! And hopefully a little structure in there too, so Boo and I do not go crazy. :)