Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Conferences and Fish

So Monday night was Trevor's second and last conference for Kindergarten. Warning to all relatives who do not like to be compared to our kids. I will be going on a little brag-fest shortly.

We went to the conference and chatted with his teacher. We went over his challenges that we have been addressing in order to make sure he is at least meeting expectations according to Kindergarten standards. We have been doing a weekly sticker chart in order to focus on improving certain things and also to help Trevor understand if he is accomplishing the goals we set for him. Going over all the categories that he was working on, he has shown improvement over his report card in January. We don't get a quarterly report card, only at the halfway point and end of the year. So we still have more time to get his "grades" up on his areas in need of improvement.

Although his academic areas, we didn't need to discuss areas to improve. He really can't get any higher in terms of Kindergarten levels. We really talked about what to do for the future. I believe we got so lucky when it came to his teacher and the whole way our district handles gifted students. They have so many resources because of their own gifted classrooms. Anyway, his teacher has been so good about making sure he is challenged and not held back as a result of his abilities. He has been able to move up in reading from starting at a 1st grade plus a half year, up to a 2nd grade plus a half year. She is having him start on computerized math time tests that they do in 1st grade and beyond. Since his teacher is staying at the school, she has offered to pass on wherever he ends up in reading and math to his next teacher. She has given us suggestions and thoughts on what to do in his future grades. It is going to be an interesting decision.

And then there was a fish. Actually, it turned in to more than one fish. In the past, I haven't had the best of luck with fish. Trevor's class was studying fish and his teacher sent home a request for anyone who wanted to take one home to sign up. Well, I signed up thinking that there would be more than plenty wanting the fish. Well, of course I got a call today, the last day before spring break, that Trevor gets a fish. So I ran to get a tank, fish food, and brought it all home with the fish after school. I have no real idea why, but I started to get a bad feeling about the fish. So while the tank was being set up, we ran out to the pet store to buy some water conditioner and picked up another fish. In case anyone was wondering, they cost ten cents now. Because after buying a tank, and setting everything out, only to have the class fish die within 3 hours was not ok with me. So we have one live fish, probably get another one, and hopefully one of the 3 will last longer than a week.

To be continued!

Sunday, March 28, 2010

Who said they could grow up, anyway?

So while Trevor has been growing by leaps and bounds...literally, Gwen seems to be taking a step back. I have no problem with Gwen. She wanted to grow up too fast. All of a sudden she went from dong things like feeding herself and not having any issues sleeping at night to wanting to be fed and sung to sleep. It really was limited to spoon or fork feedings. If it was something that was finger food, she was always ok with that, but things like cereal in the mornings, she has pretty much boycotted unless someone is willing to feed her. Then going to bed, I'm still primarily the one that has to put her to sleep. That is usually how it goes. Really, I think both kids enjoy to be put to bed by me. It is a pretty heart-warming time for me. But instead of reading to Gwen at night, she has been asking me to sing to her. She picks the songs, and they usually are my playlist of songs I used to sing to her when she was an infant, with Twinkle Twinkle Little Star thrown in there.

Then we have Trevor. He has already increased his appetite threefold. Happily his milk intake has gone up too. I remember when he was younger, he would always seem to hit his growth spurt right after we had our yearly or 6 month appointment at the doctor. Yet he was already at the 90% plus for height and weight. However, recently a lot of people have remarked how much taller he seems. I can't really say I noticed, but I think that was because I was always right there every day. But we measured him the other day. At his 6 year appointment, he was 48 inches. He is now close to two inches taller than that. I double checked what the information sheet said at his appointment and it stated that for the next two years, the average growth was 2 inches a year. Although they also said that the height requirement for being out of a booster seat in a car was 4'9". Given that growth, he wouldn't be out until he was over 10 years old. Although when I expressed my shock to Trevor when he was measured, he was confused. So I had to explain that I didn't want him to grow so fast. But really, with his age, he doesn't really grasp being anything but literal. So if you ask him about his height, he'll probably tell you something like , "But mom doesn't think I should be growing anymore." or something that I didn't actually mean for him to take literally.

Time for the next events of our lives!

Thursday, March 25, 2010

Last leg of the trip

So we were able to get to the airport without incident. The kids were obviously exhausted from their days of sun and swimming and not enough sleep. Not that I thought that it was a bad thing. I knew they enjoyed the trip tremendously. I was hoping to be able to keep Gwen awake through at least the point of being in the air so that the plane trip for her would go by quickly.

Earlier in the week, Kevin and Kelsey took their trip back on Monday, which was pushed to Tuesday. They were on the plane, pushed back from the gate, then heard that they had a repair issue, and it wasn't going to be fixed until late that night. They opted to have my dad come back and pick them up for the night so they could try again next morning. I had thought that would be the bad travel luck for our family for that trip. Unfortunately I was wrong.

When we got to the gate, the gate next to us was already having issues, and again I thought, ok...it's not us, so our luck should be great. Our arriving plane was late, but not extremely late. Probably an extra 15-20 minutes onto the trip. No big deal. The kids seemed to be ok. I had packed extra snacks for Gwen to keep her occupied. So they tried to rush everyone on the plane as best they could before the pilot came on to say that they were waiting for some paperwork before they could leave the gate. The paperwork should be in "momentarily". Never a good word to use. 15 minutes later, they said they were waiting for the maintenance check guy to finish his check, then he would sign off on the paperwork, and then we could get going. 30 minutes later, the pilot came on again and said his hands were tied, we could not leave without proper paperwork, which somehow, headquarters was not giving him. Or at least he said they did not give him the complete numbers he needed. Everyone around us was puzzled.

Let me note that since we were leaving from Florida, there was a big percentage of kids on the plane. But a lot of the people that were crazy were adults, like the kids. When we finally had the gate doors closed, it was an hour and forty-five minutes later than our departure time. Trevor got to play his DS, and Gwen and I played princesses, and ate snacks, and somehow neither kid threw a fit. I have no idea how. Gwen wanted to watch the princess and the frog movie, but I didn't want to run the battery down.

So we push away from the gate, the flight attendants are running through the safety routine, and the power cuts out. In mid sentence. Everyone groans. About 3 minutes later, the plane moves, the power resumes, and the safety routine continues. The flight attendant was nice enough to explain that they took off the auxiliary power which was what caused the power to go down. It was nothing to worry about. She was more concerned about the thunderstorm we were flying into. Thanks for the vote of confidence.

Before taking off, the pilot warned us that the flight attendants were not going to be able to come around for a bit because there was going to be heavy turbulence when we took off. He was right. The kids of course, were screaming joyfully at the bumps in the flight. A few of the passengers took it upon themselves to get out of their seats to use the restroom. The flight attendants were not happy about this.

After the turbulence, they brought out the snacks and drinks. Shortly after, Gwen was watching Princess and the Frog, and fell asleep. She slept through the entire rest of the flight. We landed, and found out that they didn't have a gate for us. But that one would be available in 5 minutes (which our pilot translated to at least 10 minutes). 15 minutes later, they sent us to another gate.

Gwen finally woke up when we were parked and ready to get off the plane. While we were all hungry, we decided to get back home before eating dinner. We just wanted to be home. We thought the quickest way to do so was to grab a cab.

Gwen was in true form as as soon as we were in the cab, and ready to head out, she started asking me who was driving us. I said he was the driver. Next is Gwen: "Hi Driver, my name is Gwendolyn, what is your name?" Once she got his name, she just kept talking. I guess I'll have to defer to Russ on this. He always seems to remember the exact conversation. I believe she mentioned her age, the fact that we were just in Florida, that she went swimming there, and anything a caring cab driver would love to know about her.

Getting home was very nice. Russ ran out right away, and got dinner. I started cleaning, unpacking, and doing laundry for his trip the next day.

Since that day, both kids have destroyed the house. And I have no motivation to clean it. I guess I'll have to do that now, since I finished my homework. It will be nice to have Russ home for the next week. We have Trevor's school conference in Monday. Good luck Trev!

Monday, March 22, 2010

The rest of the trip

Whew....that went by to fast. Although by the last day, both kids were exhausted, yet not ready to "give up". They both adjusted to the two hour time difference (one hour daylight savings time) right away and never slept past 7:15 EST. On Wednesday, the kids watched the Princess and the Frog, which was a big hit for the rest of the trip. On Wednesday afternoon Trevor got to play his 9 holes of golf. He is very ready to advance to the 3 hole league for his golf school. There was a very short par 3 that he was putting for par for. He is slowly coming along with putting, and as soon as someone can convince him to switch his hands while holding his golf clubs, he will be all set. He does the same thing when he bats. He has a really strong swing, just not holding the club or the bat the correct way. And if you try to get him to swing right handed, he doesn't like it at all.

There was a hole that he had to hit over a small water patch where he hit it into the water. After which he slammed the club into the ground 3-4 times, but did not yell or scream or anything. My dad looked at me and said, "I wonder where he gets that from?" I don't doubt that Russ has corrected his own similar behavior, but I do think it is something that is hereditary. I have never been competitive. I just enjoy the event that I'm taking part in. I have my good days and bad, but I never seem to get frustrated. Must be my genes.

Anyway, Trevor wanted to keep playing after 9 holes, and probably could have but it was time to be done. He loves to golf.

It was unfortunate that Trevor seemed to get another mild cold while we were on the trip. His cough from his first cold seemed to get better, but then he got worse and more congested before having his cough lighten up by the end. So he has been coughing now for 3 weeks. Strangely, it never really seemed to bother him. It would keep him awake, but not awake enough to be upset. And definitely not enough to keep him from doing anything.

Friday morning we all went to the beach. It was within a 15 minute drive of the house, but it was still pretty chilly in the morning so the kids still kept their jackets on while we were there. That helped with the sun protection because it was a bright sunny day that morning. Trevor and Gwen both put their toes in the water and felt the waves on their feet. Gwen was sort of puzzled by the fact that the waves weren't coming up to the same place every time. She often had to run out of the way of them because she wasn't sure what they were doing. One time, she was brave enough to go out to Trevor, but when she saw a bigger wave coming, she tried to run back to me but tripped and got her pants and jacket wet. She wasn't upset, but the gulf water was really chilly. Trevor got some sand and shells to bring back to Minnesota and we were off. It was a really good idea to get out there early before the rest of the crowd started to come.

Although I could have gotten more golfing in, I decided to get more sun than anything. The kids would have swam any chance they got, and by the end I think they had enough swimming. Trevor would get out of the pool when he was done without having to be asked (not like in the beginning of the week, we had to give them 5 minute warnings) and Gwen didn't really mind if we offered her a snack or something, she was ok getting out as well. The pool water was kept really warm for me so I was ok swimming the last few days.

I also attended the golf dinners that Russ and his dad was playing in that week. The food was wonderful. The golfers finished first in their group and second overall. So it was a good week for them as well.

I will be posting pictures soon. The trip home and the kids is another story. Not one I particularly want to remember, but one I want to document so if I ever need proof, I will have it.

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Halfway there

Well yesterday marked the midway point in our vacation. So far we have been very lucky. Today doesn't look like such a nice day, but perhaps we will take a trip out to Target and pick up The Princess and the Frog for the kids to watch. Contrary to my parents take on it, I don't think the place we are staying at could be more perfect. They love the pool, we are really close to a nice variety of restaurants, grocery stores, and other shopping things. The neighborhood is quiet and walks are pretty easy to come by. The golf course is very nearby, and a pretty challenging course. Hopefully we will get out to visit the gulf soon, but in the mean time, the pool is always the main attraction.

Yesterday we went to watch the Twins Spring Training game. We got really good seats, but didn't get a chance for Joe's autograph. Trevor was very excited to see him bat, and I didn't know how lucky we got because he hadn't played since last Thursday. Morneau didn't play that game, but Cuddyer did and so did a few other notables. The temperature wasn't too warm, and the sun wasn't out the entire time, so the boys enjoyed that. We were lucky enough to be sitting by a few nice people. They gave us their winning ticket to get a bobblehead.

Russ is off to his golfing portion of the vacation for the rest of the week. It looks like the weather is going to get warmer the end of the trip which I will be really happy with. I guess it has been a very cold winter for Florida, but I will not complain about the sun. I think we could stay until Trevor's spring break in April....anyone else want to?

Friday, March 12, 2010

Growing up

While having kids is an experience in watching them grow up, there are always things I'm going to notice about the parents needing to grow up. I will admit, getting this new clothes washer has really made me realize how I am growing up. For those of you that don't know, many years ago, I used to LOVE going to the laundro-mat so much that I talked about how some day I wanted to own my own. I can't explain why exactly. Part of it is how cool it is to be able to do like 5 loads of laundry at once. Part of it is watching the clothes spin around and how mesmerizing that is (peaceful even). Part of it is all the cool compartments in a washer that you have to put the detergent and such in.

I still enjoy finding a nearby laundro-mat in order to do industrial sized washes such as big sleeping bags or down comforters and such. And when we got our washer last weekend, I have been very excited to use it. I find myself wondering why they didn't put an internal light on it because I feel like I really could sit in there and watch our laundry. Instead, I have resulted to giving the kids a flashlight to watch it with because I think that they have a bit of my love of the laundry with them.

I did want to mention a few things that I have noticed about it that I thought differently. First off, the time needed to do laundry has either stayed the same, or increased slightly. The washer spins the clothes dry a lot more than previously, however it takes longer...about 20-25 minutes longer. That causes the dryer to use less time, but overall, not less than 20-25 minutes. It requires the use of HE laundry soap. I found and am very happy with rear controls, yet a front loading washer. This saved money on having to buy pedestals. They can run about $200 each. We did not buy a new dryer. Our dryer was fine, and like I said the drying time has decreased. No we don't have a matching set anymore, but I don't plan on letting go of these anytime soon, and you can have a retailer take them for little to no cost anyway. Who wants to deal with trying to haul out a huge laundry appliance? Because of the tight seal on the washer, it can lead to mold or mildew from the water that stays in the tub. My kids want to shut the door whenever they see it open, so I'm trying to remember to leave it open at night.

Moving on to Gwen. Both kids are still recovering from their colds this week, but they seem almost well again. They both have a bad sounding cough, but they don't cough much. The humidity in Florida will do them well. Anyway, Gwen has been enjoying her bed and talking about what is going on the next day. This week, I took her to our local grocery store. This is the one we don't usually go to but is closer. I just needed to pick up a few things. I decided to let her push the child sized cart around. I could not believe how well she did. She is my much more independent child, wanting to do everything herself. But I think once she knows I will leave her alone to do what she wants to do, she really is a good listener. She walked around with me following me, and not putting up a fight. She unloaded the groceries for the check-out without a fuss. It was remarkably pleasant. I am much less nervous about her traveling on the airplane today than I felt about Trevor at her age. I do know I need to pull some of the usual parent tricks...new toys and snacks...but she doesn't feel the need to run around like he did.

On the Trevor front, he has had a really good week. Or maybe I had a better week than the first week Russ was traveling. But school has gone well, home has gone well, we signed up for baseball this week, and a lot of the snow has melted! There isn't much to say when all is good, other than looking back over the past year, to even before Kindergarten, Trevor has really come around in his personality. I feel like just as he is starting to back off, Gwen is asserting her independence more and wanting to not respond to our requests. Hopefully, this vacation will be a good way to get some Vitamin D and recharge. Only another month and a half and we'll be almost to summer! (That's what I keep telling myself anyway.)

Monday, March 8, 2010

Time for a break

Well, this weekend, it was time to end hockey. Trevor had his "tournament" for the end of the year where they were supposed to actually play in two games over the weekend. They had one player on the team that wanted to be goalie, although he looked pretty upset any time the other team scored. Even after that game, Trevor said that he wanted to try to play goalie. Lucky for him, in his last game, he got to try to play. They gave the kids goalie gloves and a stick. Also that game, Trevor scored a goal. It was the first one I got to see. Having a young child that doesn't want to sit still in an area that is not exactly child-friendly is hard to put your eyes in two places. They also got a participation trophy for the end of the tournament.

Unfortunately, both kids' colds have really turned it up over the past two days. It sounds like the same type of hacking coughs that Trevor had when we were in Disney World last January. Fortunately, they have been sleeping better than when he was there. This morning though, Gwen was up at 5:30am. And now she is complaining that she is tired (it is about 7:30am).

Baseball sign-ups are this Wednesday, and I am already starting to get more and more golf information through our club. The weather has turned for the better here, so coupling all these things together, it really feels like we are through the worst of the winter. If it gets bright enough, I might just bring the kids outside for a walk or something.

We got our washing machine. And it works nicely. I'm excited to be doing our laundry again. So it's a Monday morning, and if I can make it through the next 5 days, I'll have a nice reward at the end of it. Come on sickies! Leave my kids alone now!

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

How could I forget

So as most of you know, there was a gold medal hockey game on Sunday. But did any of you know that there was a Nascar race at the same time? Trevor saw that and didn't want to leave the channel. He got out his usual toy Nascars and was racing them around similar to the TV. I could hear Russ downstairs as he was watching hockey, and occasionally he would let out a scream if something happened. At one point, Russ came upstairs to try to convince Trevor to watch the hockey game. Saying that it was a lot like the movie Miracle, which Trevor has seen and enjoys.

So Russ changes the channel to the hockey game upstairs and Trevor does not appreciate it. I believe his words were similar to: "NO, Dad! I DO NOT want to watch hockey. I WANT to watch Nascar." Oh boy. I don't recall if I mentioned when the first week of Nascar started, Trevor asked when we could go and watch a race. I wonder if he really will continue to enjoy Nascar that long. I wonder how out of place I will feel if I go with him. Oh well...it is a long time from now anyway. No sense in worrying about it.

On a different note, both kids have come down with small colds. I'm happy they are now, not a week from now. By our trip, they should be gone. Poor Gwen is not wanting to nap, as she is so excited to be in her new bed (we got the princess sheets yesterday). In our ECFE class last week, our teacher was recommending that we not give up on naps until at least age 4. That there are a lot of ups and downs. It gives me hope that she will be a napper longer than age 2.

Back to the weekly grind for us!

Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Crib be gone!

Last night was the big transition from crib to bed and boxspring on the floor. Unfortunately, I had ordered a new sheet set (princess of course) and it has gotten lost in shipment. I hate feeling like I keep putting things off after the I talk to it with the kids, and that was what I had been doing. Gwen kept asking to sleep in the big bed, and I kept saying we were waiting for the princess sheets. I thought for sure they would arrive by Monday so that is what I told her on Sunday. I know she has no concept of time in terms of "tomorrow" but I figured as long as Trevor was willing to share his Lightning McQueen bed sheets, we'd be fine.

He was, and did. So last night we rearranged her bed, took down the crib, put her light on the opposite wall, and everything was set. She had missed her nap that day, but as is the usual case with kids (at least mine, anyway) she was still able to read herself some books after I said good-night and talk about sleeping in the lightning Mcqueen bed. She was up earlier than normal, but as I suspected she hasn't tried to get out of bed. The rails on the sides of the bed must make her think she is still in a crib, yet she gets herself in and out of the bed no problem.

So that is done. I can still hope that potty training will be this easy, right? I did buy another chair and seat. The seat is princess, so she is already putting that one on the floor to sit on it and "go potty". And then when she is done playing with it that way, she thinks it is a backpack to wear on her back.

Yesterday was the big MN rebate program for energy saving appliances. Their sign-up was to start at 8am either via the website or a 1-866 number. The system was down until at least after noon. I think it was more like 1 o'clock. I finally got in through the website after 1:30. The funds were already 1/3 gone. I then went to Sears and got a new washer to be delivered on Saturday.

It is becoming a very productive week! Oh, and for the record: LET'S GO MARCH!!! COME ON SUMMER! LAST MONTH OF WINTER! And we are going to be gone for part of it as well.