Our Kids

Well the Roseola that plagued Lela last week will be visiting Piper this week. The good news is that her fever is not quite so high and the other good news is that Piper is way stubborn. LOL! She is insisting that she does not have a fever that it is the sun that is making her warm, ha! I tell them that the sun is making them hot in the summer so that is where she got that from. She is so cute though, she will fall asleep and then wake up and just chatter away non stop and then back to sleep she goes. She is a bit more bearable than Lela when she is sick. Lela is so dependent and very sad when she is sick, kind of breaks your heart to leave her side. Piper is fighting it every step of the way but getting in her rest anyway in spite of herself. Hopefully Landis’ antibodies will keep going strong and she won’t get it again. Hope, hope, hope…..

ps. It is kind of nice to have to stay at home and just be together though:) We did lots of crafts and had some good together time last week so I suppose that is the gift that Roseola gave us (see there is always something be to thankful for).

This morning I was watching some football and I apparently I was watching for too long. Piper came over to me and said, “Dad, you can’t spend all day watching TV.” Hah! I thanked her and said, “you’re right”, and I moved away from the TV (but left it on — it was a good game).

Just now, about 4 hours later, I was catching up on another game. Piper came out of the office, had he hands on her hips, and said “Dad, do you remember what I said?” At first I didn’t catch on… I thought I forgot that I told her I’d go to the playground or something. And then I realized it. After she asked again, “Do you? Remember what I said?” I asked, “You mean when you told me I can’t spend all day watching TV?” She gave me the cutest little nod of her head with a great facial expression and said “yep.” And she turned around and walked back into the office.

I turned off the TV and we’re off to the park.

Jason

Well it is Thanksgiving morning, I am up early to go on my 10 mile run but was greeted with a deluge of rain. I am thankful for the rain, I wonder how my garden will react to such silly stuff as water from the sky, LOL! I just wanted to say that I am thankful for my family and friends and I don’t think I stop often enough to just appreciate how lucky I am. The economy is in the crapper, the future looks murky but I am blessed with so many good things too. My hope for 2009 is that I can stop more often to realize just how fortunate we all are to be together, to be a family and to have each other for support.

The whole fam (mostly the girls) have been fighting a cold for over a week, our first cold of the season. Most recently Lela had a 104 temperature for 5 days, nothing like a high fever to take the zest out of a gal. She is wilted and has lost about 5 lbs which she could not afford to lose (but I could:). Her fever has broken and the tell tale rash has appeared, yep it was Roseola! Dag nabit! It is highly contagious so we will see if it turns up in the wee one again. Good thing we did not have anything planned this week, I am guessing we will be hangin’ at the house and recovering. Well the wee one is calling so I better jet.

Well Thursday marked the end of our first session of Apples to Zebras, our community recreation class for preschoolers. We had our end of the session get together and it was so cute and sweet. The kids performed some of their songs and got their certificates and then we all went in to the courtyard for a sugar feast. At least I know the cupcakes were vegan and healthier and the pumpkin cookies that Grammy brought were delish and healthy too:) I think the girls ate a Devil’s Food cookie, store bought ones. They did not rave about them so I am guessing they will just stick with our homemade vittles.

Lela has been fighting a cold like the rest of us this week so at first she did not want to participate but she soon changed her mind when she saw that we were going to stay to watch. The girls had so much fun in that class that we are definitely going to do it again, I wonder if I could sneak in Landis, LOL. Lela really enjoyed the singing and signing and Piper did it all but without the enthusiasm that Lela showed. Piper is very enthusiastic when it comes to reading letters and books where Lela is only mildly enthusiastic about the written word. It is so fun to see how they are changing and becoming their individual selves.

Landis was of course an angel during the whole thing, sitting in her chair kicking her legs and being quiet as a church mouse.

I was looking forward to taking Piper to the symphony. Lela had a great time with Mystique when they went, and Piper was pretty excited for it to be her turn. Plus, I always love the one on one time… you get some great conversations out of the girls when you just let them be.

The girls love going places in my car. It’s not because of me or the car, of course… it’s just that it’s different and they get to do different things. They can open and close the doors by themselves, let themselves out of their booster seats, etc… Fun times. And Saturday was no exception… Piper loved driving in the car to the symphony. She was reaching for me and I’d reach back and grab her hand which would cause quite the giggle. She told me about the billboards as we drove by… counted some cars… it was fun.

We got to the symphony and because my wife rocks, parked in the garage where all we had to do was climb one set of stairs and go up an escalator and boom, we were in symphony hall. Nice!

We got there early enough to let Piper wander around a bit and check out some of the instruments. She played with some hollow tubes that you bang together to make a note… an instructor put some folks together and gave each of them a beat to do with their sticks. She attempted to make some sort of melody, but really… with a room full of kids she had no chance. I like the effort, though.

We got to our seats (which were great) and settled in. The real Phoenix Symphony came out, then the first chair violin, then the conductor. Piper noticed a harp and pointed it out to me, she was pretty excited to see one. One of the violinists has an aid dog which is a golden retriever and I pointed that out to Piper, which triggered a “why does she have a dog up there?” question. I thought it was cool seeing the golden up there… I love those aid dogs, he just lay down right next to the violinist and settled in for some relaxing music.

Once things started it seemed to go well for the first 40 minutes… we listened to some music, then the conductor explained some things to us, played some sample music, etc… By about 40 minutes in, though… Piper started to get restless. 45 minutes in and she was ready to go. I know that because she told me so… multiple times.

I didn’t want to be rude and stand up as the dude was talking, so I whispered to Piper that we’d leave after the next song. She was semi-ok with that… and got down in the aisle to stand up, try hang on the (empty) chair in front of us, etc…

Finally the next song started and it turned out it was going to be the last song. By this time Piper was back in my lap (she couldn’t see over the person in front of her), and about three minutes into the music… she was fast asleep on my lap. It was kind of sweet, so I just held her through the song, enjoyed the music, and gently woke her up when it was over to tell her I had a great time and I loved her.

The girls first school program is tomorrow! I think they will just be singing songs but for all I know they will be picking their noses on stage, either way we will be sure to get it on video so stay tuned. This is for their two day a week recreation class where they learn to take direction from someone other than me, learn to sit quietly etc. Of course I don’t think the girls have had any trouble doing that and they have really enjoyed the classes, it is the most social they have ever been. There is another set of twins in the class and that is cool, fraternal girls too. The parents bring snacks, which makes me cringe at what they bring, and on that day the girls get to be special helpers (they so love that). We signed up to do it again starting in January and we are also going to be taking Spanish and Ready to Read which should be fun. Piper is really ready to read and like everything else I suspect that Lela is right along with her but just less vocal.

PS. Jason took Piper to the symphony, I am sure he will post all about that experience soon:)

I never thought I would have one, why would I, my previous experience was so tame but it is official….I have a daredevil! She climbs everything she shouldn’t, puts everything she shouldn’t in her mouth, throws her head at your face in quick catlike motions, throws rocks, runs with scissors, eats fire….well you get the idea.

Landis is a crack up. I see her and just laugh, she is so different (and she should be) from the girls. The girls were so tame and they stayed so clean most of the time. Now I have to check Landis before I go out because she is bound to have dirt dripping from her mouth, a ring of some sort of food around her mouth, sand in her hair and maybe even crayons stuck on her teeth.

The other day I was letting them play in the petroleum crusted driveway (hey I wasn’t letting them lick it) and I was shadowing her because she would run in front of a truck and try to stop it I am sure. Anyway, I was shadowing her so I was RIGHT there and she fell right on to the scooter that I was holding! She banged her forehead and got a gash which proceeded to drip blood into her eye and on her shirt before I could herd the rest of the cats indoors. She is fine of course but I was not sure if we should go for stiches or not. I decided not so if you are reading this Landis 20 years from now and wondering how you got that scar above your left eye, it was me, or you I should say but everyone blames everything on mother so go ahead.

Well I better jet I am sure while I have been typing this you have climbed up on to the stove and gotten the knives to throw at your sister that you have tied down to a spinning wheel just because you can:) Oh and BTW I wouldn’t change a thing, this little baby is exciting!