To say I have been negligent with this blog is being exceedingly kind (especially since THIS post was actually written way back in early May!). In truth, there are parts of writing in the blog that while enjoyable, actually make me even more sad that the boys are growing up so darn fast! Once again I am up with some form of insomnia. This one is prompted by illness that just won't go away and is making it hard to sleep. So annoying.
Let's see, what have we been up to lately? Well, fall saw the end of soccer which Aidan and Brady LOVED to pieces. While I think they were bummed to see it end, I also think they liked going back to only one "thing" per week by doing gymnastics with Gavin. Gavin's gymnastics coach is really great with all of the boys. They all listen to him really dutifully, but they love when he breaks out his fun side in the foam pit and tosses them in and lets them all go a little crazy. It's fun to hear all of the parents of the boys laughing watching this while all of the girls teams are busy doing their individual skills all hour.
For Thanksgiving we spent time with Ruth's family. It was our first snow storm in NH and it was the crazy heavy wet kind. Luckily Ruth was able to get power back on in time to cook food for the dinner, but it was touch and go there for a bit.
Christmas was spent in TX and then we took a week long trip to Iowa as well to see the Ks. It was great fun spending time with Aunt Pam, Uncle Tony and Grandma and Grandpa V. Santa was particularly generous with a fart gun, army tank and legos. We also had fun just being in the milder weather. Our trip to Iowa was bittersweet. We had intended to do a day trip to Iowa City, but there just didn't feel like there was enough time to do that and spend the time with family we had wanted to. Another time. (sigh) The CHOICES you have to make when you live away from both sides of family! Curt and I had a great new year's eve with the Carroll's and the boys loved every minute they could be with their cousins. It really does break my heart a little bit every time they ask if they can go to Noah and Gabe's house, or go visit Grandma and Grandpa K when we have a short break (Like this week during their vacation week). I know they don't mean to, they are just referring to what they used to know we would do for short visits when we were in IC. If only we were independently wealthy and didn't have to work or go to school!
The boys had their first set of ski lessons beginning in January through the school. While they now love skiing, it took us a little while to get there. The first night of lessons at Gunstock was pure chaos. They had told us to be prepared for that, but it really did seem to be a little over the top. Oh, and it was FREEZING cold. Like miserably, freezing cold. The second week was just as bad if not worse. Finally by week 3, it seemed like they had their act together. How did each of the boys take to skiing? Well, differently, as you might expect. Gavin likes to go FAST. "Like a bullet, mommy!" and man was he good at doing that. He said he preferred to be caught at the bottom of the bunny hill, as opposed to actually doing his snowplow to bring himself to a stop. Aidan was a bit more cautious, but seemed to also enjoy going downhill and was getting turning down pretty good on the bunny hill. His biggest problem was how heavy the skis and boots are in proportion with his body vs. his brothers! Brady on the other hand was the MOST cautious. After the first lesson, he said he had fun. After the second he decided he felt too uncomfortable with not knowing quite how to stop and he did NOT want to ski again. He sang that tune the entire week leading up to the 3rd lesson. We literally arrived at the mountain and I had no idea if he would even take the lesson. As we are getting out of the car he says "Look at all of those people skiing. They look like they are having a lot of fun." and that was it. He then was having fun! The boys ended up doing one more lesson through the program (two were canceled due to cold/snowy road conditions), a full day lesson at Cranmore over their February vacation week (which was a DELIGHTFUL day on the mountain for Curt and I) and a couple of other family ski days to use our free tickets to Gunstock. Curt and I both think they got WAY more out of the full day of skiing at Cranmore, as well as then just getting to ski with us. By our last day in late March they could all do blues without a problem and we had accidentally skied one black (we won't do that again for awhile!). I joked with Gavin he is like a robot skier, on his last day he would ski in front of me and I would just say, "Turn! Turn! Turn!" and he would just turn every time he heard it. He has some strong legs, that kid! Brady was also feeling more daring and more comfortable on skis and didn't get very tired. Aidan was feeling less comfortable on skis and was not as willing to come out of the snowplow, which was making him more tired more quickly. He is a good little skier, he just needs to up his confidence some more!
Gymnastics started up again after skiing was done and Aidan and Brady just started spring soccer last week. Everyone is happy and healthy! Curt is coaching their team again and in their first game Brady and Aidan scored the first goals for each of their teams. Gavin and I were on the sidelines and Gavin says to me "I can't believe it's brother versus brother!" Too funny.
School is going well for everyone. Gavin still loves it the most, while it has taken Brady and Aidan a little longer to feel like they "love" it. In the fall Aidan and Brady would get upset because they felt the days were so long. I still remember one particularly emotional morning getting ready for school when they were feeding off of each other and Aidan says "School is too long! You have to sit so much your legs hurt and you have to write so much my hand gets tickly!" So I taught him some hand stretches which Ms. Traynor told me she has seen him do, she just didn't know why he did them! :)
Brady's class has been a little more challenging in that even his teacher has told us he is the best behaved kid in the class and she sometimes feels bad for him that the whole class doesn't get to do things some times because of a few kids behaviors. Well, it all came to a head right before the February break. Even though Brady said he didn't want me to tell Ms. Simpson, he had become so angry about school I didn't want to see him begin to actively dislike school, so I went in to talk with her. Ms. Simpson was VERY open to hearing about Brady's experience and I could tell she genuinely felt bad about how things were going for him. Some simple changes have been made (like the Good Deed Jar, putting smiley faces and stickers at the top of his work, and her using language that doesn't make it seem like they are missing something when kids are slow to do what they need to do) and about 2 or 3 weeks ago he says to me, "Mom, I really like school now! I didn't for awhile, but i like it a lot now!" And yes, I was sure to pass that on to her - gotta reward good behavior! There is also a boy who is in Brady's class named Angel. He has profound disabilities - is unable to speak, use his hands and has limited walking ability. I had found out that Brady had been sitting at Angel's table all year. That didn't concern me until I was able to spend time in Brady's class and I see not only is Brady TOTALLY distracted by this boy, but when he talks about him at home, it's out of genuine concern for how he is feeling in class. He would ask me if he could bring an orange silicone handle cover for Angel to play with because he knew he would love it. He would ask what Angel must be feeling when he can't talk with the other kids in the class, etc. I also brought that up with his teacher, not wanting to be THAT parent, but also understanding that Brady clearly is distracted by his concern for the boy. She offered to move him and see how that went, and I think that also contributed to it being a better environment for Brady.
Gavin, on the other hand, is absolutely in 7th heaven at school. He and Mrs. DuBois LOVE each other. Just LOVE each other. Gavin loves feeling challenged in school, he has asked for more work from his teacher, and before the end of the fall he had memorized ALL of the birthdays for all of the kids in his class. He had written them all out for his teacher before we left for TX, and she was so surprised she emailed him through me to ask how he had done that. She is a wonderful teacher and I think she sees that Gavin is exceptional in a lot of ways. He also had a calendar obsession for awhile where he was making calendars constantly. He loves understanding what day of the week each month begins on and had made a calendar on our white board all the way out to 2017.
Aidan and Ms. Traynor also love each other! He loves reaching "star fish" on nearly a daily basis (some behavior tracking thing where you move your clip up or down) and in his parent-teacher meeting she indicated she always knew she could count on Aidan when she had a sub to let them know what was OK in the class and what wasn't. I do think Aidan has experienced some kids being less than nice. This fall he ended up in tears at the breakfast table when he told us that the day before two girls in his class told him to beat up his brother (Brady) or they wouldn't be his friend. Well, you can guess I wanted to MURDER someone when I heard that. Luckily it was Brady they had sicked him on because 1) he and Brady play well together so Brady would know this was an aberration and not to take it personally and 2) Brady would stiff arm him in no time. Turns out Aidan was so upset it had happened in the first recess he asked his teacher if he could NOT go to second recess because he was worried he would "make a bad choice". How adorable is that? You can bet we had some good family conversations around this and his teacher indicated they would be having some good conversations about friends at school as well.
The boys are doing well, I can just hardly believe how much they have grown in just the last 6 months or so! I was looking at our last family picture and while I thought they were grown up them, they now look like gangly BOYS now. With that comes sassiness that at times is just too much. I'm trying to do my best to take it in stride, but sometimes i do wonder what happened to my sweet compliant kids? And then I remember they aren't always compliant . . . we just had a little more time and space to be more patient than we do with schedules and work now. It's a good reminder about me checking myself when they are doing what kids do. . .
