TAG

Tony was pretty excited yesterday. He came home from school and said he was chosen to be in TAG (talented and gifted) for Math. I knew he was doing well in Math but I didn't know he was do SO well! I am not sure where he gets his Math skills because I surely never would have been asked to be in TAG. Anyway, he is totally excited. He will get to go to another classroom for 1/2 of his Math class to learn additional stuff.

Both of the boys got excellent report cards. The each got all A's and B's. I was extremely happy about that. It's a relief to know that things are well in that department.

Congratulations Will!

Will got a pleasant surprise at work on Friday. He was pulled into his bosses office and given a promotion! He is now a Senior Systems Analyst. Before there was no Senior on his title. We are so excited and I am so proud of him. So, to celebrate his accomplishment (and his pay increase) we treated ourselves to a family gift. Rock Band. The boys (including Will) have wanted this since it came out. For those of you who don't know, this is a game that you hook up to your XBOX. It comes with drums, a guitar and a microphone. We have a guitar already so now we have 2 and the whole family can play. It is AWESOME and we definately broke it in this weekend. I played with Jacob and his 2 friends and found myself beaming and feeling very proud of myself because Jake and both his buddies were saying "Good job Mom, you are awesome at this game!" Even his friends were calling me Mom. Apparently I am a very cool parent, for now at least. I am sure that will change soon...

Update on Drew Bug and Jake

I had Drew's ENT apt. yesterday. We had this scheduled because as most of you know, Brodie shoved a plastic toy into his ear 2 days before Christmas and punctured his ear drum. The Dr. thought everything looked great and he passed his hearing test! So all is well and there is no need to follow up. Thank goodness. Jake's hand is recovering nicely. He can make his hand into a fist again and his pain is much improved. Hangin' in there and waiting to see what life throws at me next.

Comments...

It seems that many of you have said that you have tried to leave comments and it wouldn't let you. Well, I think I have fixed that. Let me know if you still have problems. Thanks!

Week In Review

Well, TGIF!! What a week this has been for us. Starting on Sunday Drew ran a fever and was very clingy. He fell asleep twice while Will was holding him. Something he rarely does. Monday he still ran a fever so I took him to the Dr. I wanted to make sure he didn't have ear infection again since he just got over that and with his other ear being ruptured from when Brodie poked it I wanted to lean on the side of caution. Nothing serious thankfully, just viral but they drew his blood anyway to make sure. Tuesday came around and there wasn't too much drama. Just the usual hustle and bustle of getting Tony to his piano lesson and then home for dinner and then off to basketball practice for both him and Jake. Wednesday Tony was home sick with a stomach ache. I had a eye Dr apt that morning. Everything Ok there, just confirmed that I will probably always have problems with my left eye that was burned over the summer, so that was sort of a bummer. Tony pretty much laid around all day. He perked up a little that evening. Thursday...Going ok, sent Tony to school because he was a little better. I went and did a little shopping when Will came home from work. I called to check in and he said that he thought he might have broke Jakes finger. I was like WHAT? I said you have got to be joking with me and he said no that it looked pretty bad. He and Jake were messing around playing Nerf guns and he went to shut the basement door and Jake stuck his hand in at the last moment and got crushed. So I quickly checked out and went home. Jakes fingers were pretty swollen and starting to turn a little purple. It was already 4:45pm and I knew he has basketball pictures at 6 and practice at 6:30. I figured he should have an x-ray because the last 2 times he has had an injury I waited and he ended up breaking his finger and his arm. Sooo, after some phone calls I took him to my old clinic for an x-ray. Of course also with me was Brodie and Drew because Will had to go to basketball practice with Tony because he is the coach. That was FUN!! Thankfully none of his fingers were broken, they saw one spot but thought that it looked like a growth plate so they are going to have the x-ray over read to make sure. He does have a lot of soft tissure damage so they said it could take awhile to heal. They were quick we were there about 25 minutes and made it to Jakes pictures on time. Whew! It was close though and it had started snowing so the roads were getting a little slick. I hate driving in snow! Now it's Friday and it was suppose to be calm, but Tonys stomach started hurting again so I took him into the doctor this morning. He thinks it is just acid hopefully, and put him on Prevacid for a week. He said if it got worse to call. I am hoping now, things will be peaceful for the remainder of the day and weekend. For now, I can sit back and catch my breath because it is quiet for the moment.

Pretend Play

I had to smile to myself this morning as I sat at the kitchen table with Brodie coloring. I was coloring Elmo remembering how much I used to love coloring when I was little. I remember sitting at my Grandma and Grandpa Fleischacker's desk scribbling all over a piece of paper and then coloring each section a different color. I took these pictures of Brodie who was pretending to go to school. He always likes to watch Tony get on the bus in the mornings. So yesterday he found his backpack and filled it up with cars and then wore it around the house for the majority of the morning. Then of course there is the "cooking stuff". For Christmas we got Brodie and Drew a play kitchen. They LOVE it. I had also found a chefs hat, apron and oven mit set. Brodie loves to wear it when he is playing with the kitchen. We cooked everything today. Hotdogs, noodles, "mitch" (sandwhich), mana (banana), cookies you name it. If fact, he even pushed Drew down this morning for touching a pan that he pulled out of his oven. He was yelling "No,No, Drew, Hot!"

Men of the House

Just liked this picture and thought I would share. It was taken at the Pumpkin Patch back in October. Nothing too exciting is going on for us right now. Drew has been sick the last couple days. I took him to the doctor today and they said it is just viral. Will and I are still struggling with a cough and cold that we have had now for almost 8 weeks. All the other kids seem healthy right now. We will keep out fingers crossed that 2008 doesn't dish out the medical expenses we had in 2007.

This is what I mean by five boys...

This is what Jacob woke up to this morning. 30 bright pink post-it notes hanging all over the kitchen to remind him that today was trash day. It was late and cold last night when we remembered that he needed to take the trash to the end of the driveway, so I told him he could take it down this morning but to write himself a note. He did, and hung it on the cupboard. Will of course saw an opportunity to be obnoxious so he decided to hang the post-its. Sometimes I can't figure out which one is the child...

Happy New Year!

Well, it is a New Year and it gives me time to reflect on the things I would like to be better at in the year to come. I guess as always I would like to try and be a little more PATIENT! I find that my patience wears pretty thin these days. I would like to RELAX a little more. I always feel like there is something that needs to be done and if I sit to long I am wasting valuable time. Of course like most people I would like to SHED A FEW POUNDS. Having 2 babies 13 months apart turns your body into something even your own self doesn't recognize. I would really like to join the Ankeny YMCA. I think that would be good for my whole family. Apparently they have part time childcare so even I could enjoy some free time while getting healthy and it would be fun to spend some time with the older kids shooting hoops or swimming. And the most important thing I think I need to work on is being a BETTER LISTENER and take the time to sit down and actually listen to my boys and husband. Right now everything is so rushed with school, homework, practices and lessons that I feel like no one is ever heard. We all just move around at our own speeds and just sail along in life not paying attention. I am hoping that we can all slow down and actually spend more time together as a family. I have designated Wednesday nights as our family nights. I started this in 2007 but for some reason we never kept up on it. Well, no more. From now on every Wednesday we all have dinner together and do some type of activity as a family. No one is skipping out. I can see everyones reaction...Jake will roll his eyes, Tony will be thrilled, Brodie and Drew won't know any different and Will and I will just hope we make it through till bedtime.