Oh Geez

It's been a bit Kels and I am sorry that the kids and I haven't written anything in a bit. Here's a brief run down of what has happened since Brenna turned 2 whole hands :

• Dr Doom had to go meet his Nirvana. He developed Hemoganic (?SP) Cancer. A tumor developed on his liver and in addition to going into liver failure, it ruptured so he was bleeding internally. He was a good dog and we have learned a few things since his passing.
• He ate a lot of left overs
• I can't eat 2 French Bread Pizzas...he inevitably always got the second.
• Gunnar doesn't understand the permanence of death
• Odin not phased by it
• The house is a lot quieter without his jingling
• Spazz was apparently his biggest fan and still rolls on his old collar that is by the couch where he used to lay.
• Gunnar lost another tooth, so he's 5 bucks richer. He even took it out by himself like a big dude. He was terrified to tell Justin, just like he doesn't want to tell him about another wiggly jiggly.
• Odin has his first loose tooth. My BABY is growing up...must be time for another.
• Jaxom went to All District Band. The 6th grade band received a 4. So not great, but atleast it wasn't a 5, because at that point that score indicates that you should have just stayed home. True to band fashion, they were over an hour late arriving back at the school. This has resulted in the decision that on all future band trips, Jaxom will take his cell phone.
• Brenna is old enough to stay home by herself for short periods of time and loving it. I don't think that she will ever go anywhere with us again if she has the choice.
• Gunnar was denied an IEP, so our advocate is seeking and IEE.
• Brenna has scoliosis. Woot, like all great women do. She has started core exercises and is hating it!
• Jaxom's life has been pretty unremarkable, just wish that he would hurry up and start growing again, he and Brenna are almost the same height.
• Gunnar has been in the ER for the past 2 Thursdays running.
• Last Thursday he had an allergic reaction to something, we still don't know what...there will be another story about this later.
• Yesterday he passed out in gym, so that took about 20 years off my life with worry, we are still waiting on diagnosis from that one.

Ok deary, that's all I have for you today! I miss you super duper muchos!

Love you,

Sae

Mommy's First Day of Vacation

Dear Aunt Kelsey,

I don't think that Mom knows how to relax. It's day 1 and she has rearranged the entire living room, taken me and Odin for haircuts, done all the laundry in the house and cleaned out the upstairs closet. Here are some pictures of us learning how to make the wet cheek sound that Dad hates so much, that, yep, you guessed it! Mom taught us!!

 Brenna has the wettest squishy sound.

 I am still getting down the pull your cheeks part. It's hard when you're all muscles like me and Uncle Rickey!

 Odin wants to pull his cheeks in the same direction. He'll never learn.\















Jaxom hates doing anything that we do. Mom says "he's too cool for school."















We miss you Aunt Kelsey. Wish you were here with all this snow...we had more last night and went to school late this morning!

It Snowed...and Snowed...and Yep...Still Snowing

Dear Aunt Kelsey,

It's an earlier post today because...yep. No School. Mommy didn't have work today either! Woot. Mom got my report card. Apparently my band teacher is pretty hard core...I think I'm pretty good and I go to all the extra practices and I still got a C, but all my other grades were A's and B's so Mom is pretty proud about that.

We have 13 inches of snow outside. We went out earlier to help Dad shovel, all while Mom watched. Rude. There is a giant mound of snow at the end of the court, when I stand on top of it, I am taller than the fence at the end of the street. Mom just stood around taking video's of everyone working and laughing when we fell over, she said that it looked like a turtle on it's back every time we fell because of all the flailing around. I think that I did a better job shoveling than Daddy because I got all the way down to the concrete...he kinda just pushed it around. Now that I look at it maybe that was the plan all along.

Brenna couldn't find her hat so she wore her helmet outside, which amazingly enough turned out not be that bad of an idea with all the falling she did. She kept complaining that her hands were cold because she didn't pull her mitten flaps down on top of her fingers. And she is GT. Mom was a little upset that Brenna doesn't qualify for services at school, something about her having appropriate coping skills. I think she's over it though...she doesn't go on and on about it like she does Gunnar's stuff. Brenna doesn't care though she still gets to keep her action plan and get extra time on her assignments and to talk out loud when she is reading.

Gunnar doesn't like how it feels when he comes in from playing in the snow. You know that feeling you get when things that are really cold start to warm up. Yeah. He doesn't like it and starts to scream, not with words just literally screaming at the top of his lungs. Mom put all his clothes in the dryer so that maybe he can go out again later when it all stops, but I think he might just want to stay inside because of how he acts when he comes inside.

Odin was too short for all the snow. He was lucky though because he was the only one that had snow pants that still fit, and they were mine from the last time it snowed like this when he was still a baby. I stayed with him after we finished digging out and I dug out some rest areas for him, you know, where he didn't have to try really hard to stand up  or that he could roll to to get back up. When Mom started to strip him down when we came inside we knew why he didn't complain that it was cold. He had on Snow pants. He had on 2 pairs of pants. He had on 4 socks on each foot. He had on boots. He had on a jacket. He had on gloves. And. He had on 2 shirts. Why didn't I think of that?

We miss you Aunt Kelsey and Uncle Rickie with the Big Muscles! Wish we could have a snow ball fight with you!

So the kids...they want to mail you everyday...but the POSTAGE!

Dear Aunt Kelsey,

Mommy can't keep up with our demands to mail things to you...by the time she get's things boxed up to go...the holiday has passed. By the time she gets the box in the mail...well let's just say that the baked goods are no longer fresh. She also complains a lot about the cost of postage...something about robbery and customs...oh she can go on about customs.

We got our report cards...well Jaxom's...Jaxom's is coming in the mail. We're really not sure why he didn't just bring it home. Gunnar is struggling more than he did in first quarter. Despite all the therapy and notecards and things velcro-ed to the wall some of his grades went down, but Mommy is working on it. I still have a B in Social Studies...it's not my favorite, but I'm working on it. I got a B in Language arts too, but we're working on it. I got pulled from class a lot for some extra help so we're going to get a hang of it here soon.

Gunnar has a new therapist. She came to the house today. While things are a lot better, he still has a ways to go in the anger management department. He doesn't get mad as often, but when he does we all scatter, but Mommy is right there in the thick of it. She hasn't backed off one bit, she is on top of him the second he looses his temper trying to make him count...sometimes they race to see how high they can count in one breath. Sometimes it makes Gunnar giggle, and then we know that things are going to get better. Sometimes that doesn't work though and they have to see who can take the deepest breath. I wish that he could do that on his own though. We always remind him to cool down. We always try to stand back when he gets angry, but we get angry to and we don't get to work things out the same way with him that we do with each other, and that is confusing sometimes.

Odin's foot seems to be better. He says that it still hurts when he runs a lot at the park, so as soon as he gets cleared to have a MRI, I think that Mommy is going to take him for one just to make sure. He is getting big...he outgrew almost all of his clothes and he comes up to Gunnar's chin now. Mommy was talking to Daddy the other night on when they can start to take him to get tested for Autism. Ms. Judy at the doctors office is worried that he might be autistic too. We try not to laugh, but when he gets angry, it's really hard not to because he screams and talks loud...Mommy laughs and says, "Odin, calm down you sound like a cracked out Elmo." Then we all laugh a little and stop what we are doing to listen to him. But oh yeah, Mommy and Daddy aren't sure where to start with Odin...the foot thing or the autism thing...because no one can give them a really good reason to go one way or the other first, but everyone does agree that they should take one before the other.

Jaxom is having what Mommy calls some irrational attachment to electronics. His interim grades were pretty bad...I don't know how bad...but he lost everything...so don't bother texting him because he isn't going to answer for a while. Tonight he got sent to bed early because he threw a fit because my computer time was up and since he was watching over my shoulder he freaked out. Mommy is going to talk to the pediatrician at our check up to see what they suggest. She not sure if it's the horomones that the guidance counselor warned her about at orientation or something else...guess we will have to wait and see.

I am going through a Child Find Study at school right now. I have had some one on one time with a specialist at school to help me complete my assignments to see if that would help with the letter reversals, some of them are better I think, but a lot of them are the same. I am having trouble keeping up with the rest of my class, even though I understand what is going on it takes me longer to complete the assignments. On Wednesday, Mommy has a meeting at the school to talk about where we go next to see if I need extra help or if I can try to get myself on track. Either way, I'll be ok.