Lightning

James has a new obsession.  He is loving lightning right now.  Which would be awesome if we lived somewhere that had more thunderstorms...at least while he was awake.  We seem to get a lot of clouds but not a lot of actual rain.
We are learning a lot about lightning and he is learning how it works and constantly painting pictures of rain and lightning.

One day when it actually did rain we found him outside holding a stick to his head as a positive streamer.  I think he was hoping the lightning would come and strike him.  We are glad it didn't.  But whenever it does rain he has to be out playing in it.  Such a fun boy.

Other Happenings This Past Month

Baby Girl turned 3-months-old...about a month ago!  She is super sweet and loves to smile at everyone.

This month she has learned to roll over, both ways.  And now she moves around the house a lot.  It is no longer safe to leave her on the bed or couch, and still not safe to leave her on the floor.  So we really don't know what to do with her, so any suggestions would be welcome!

Billy is the reason we cannot leave her on the floor.  If we do he immediately goes to her and bugs her. He doesn't really understand that he has to be soft with her, and he thinks hitting, kicking and stepping on is the way we show affection in this house.  So it is pretty scary to leave her on the floor for any period of time.  

She is starting to love Daddy more and will actually sleep with him, let him hold her and play with him rather then just wanting Mommy!  

Brooke and Daddy taking a nap.  He had no clue I
even took this picture.

I completely rearranged/semi-decorated Billy's/Brooke's/The guest room.  I found a cheep crib ($50 for crib and mattress) on craigslist.  It has a bunch of bite marks but Doug was able to refinish it so it looks nice now.  Mikey was so excited he wanted it to be his room too.  I let him take a nap in there one day with Billy and when I went in to check on the them I found every stuffed animal and book in Billy's bed with him.

Billy is in there somewhere!

We finally got the crib done and set up, but I am a little afraid to actually move her in there.  Billy is super excited to have a new roommate.  I am afraid he is going to learn a little too quickly that he can climb in there with her.  

Bill is so excited to see Brooke in his room

Her first nap in her new bed

Mikey also loves Brooke.  Until recently he has pretty much left her alone.  But the past few weeks he has been such a big helper to her.  He loves to hold her and I have to get to her pretty fast when he decides he wants to because he thinks he is big enough to carry her to the chair on his own.

One day he asked if he could watch a movie with her.

Mikey has also been super helpful in other areas of the house.  One day he got the vacuum out and decided to vacuum the floors.  When he was done with that he pulled all the couch cushions off and vacuumed the couches too!  Such a great helper.  He has done this  a couple of times now.

James and Mikey have been having a ton of fun together lately too.  They really play together well...most of the time!  The best part of the day for them is bed time.  I can never get the to just go to bed, they always have to have these big elaborate adventures before bed.  Sometimes they are Mario and Luigi, sometimes Ralph and Felix or Vanellope.  One night We took everything out of their room to try and get them to just sleep.  They found their old Halloween costumes (Mike Wiscowski and James P. Sullivan) and put them on.  They were playing trick-or-treet.  It was super cute!

Halloween costumes from 3 years ago!  Although they decided
to switch them this time.

They are also very good at memorizing movies!  Mikey is so good for James because he can remember the lines almost as well as James can so they can often play with each other because Doug and I are just not that good at it!

One of James' favorite things to do lately (and he thinks it needs to happen every Friday night) is camping in the backyard.  The first time they did it Doug thought they wouldn't last that long.  It wasn't really warm and it rained a little bit, but James was insistent that they stick it out.  James and Mikey set up a camp fire this time and roasted marshmallows.  There was no actual fire, but they didn't care.

Mikey and James "roasting" marshmallows

James gets pretty creative sometimes.  One morning he woke up pretty early before school.  While I was getting ready he had found some fabric in the closet and drawn himself a "bad guy" shirt.  When I was trying to get him ready for school he was insistent that he was going to wear the shirt he made himself.  Well as you can see there is no way that was going to happen.  So I also got creative and pinned his shirt to another shirt and he was able to wear his "bad guy" shirt to school.  I was pretty impressed with how interested the other kids seemed in his shirt and they were all pretty impressed with it too.  "He made that this morning?!"

James wearing his "bad guy" shirt

James' Kindergarden Graduation

Today James "graduated" Kindergarden.  This past year has been full of so many high points and low points that it really it bitter-sweet that it is ending.  Part of me is so relieved not to have to answer the question "Is today no school?" Every. Single. Morning.  I tried so hard to avoid saying "no, today is school." Finally I just gave in and deal with the meltdown so maybe we can get past it to getting dressed and eating breakfast.  I am really looking forward to not having to answer that question for awhile.
But a lot of me is sad to see this school year end.  James is an awesome little boy and I have not met anyone who does not end up completely loving this boy once they get to know him.  But the problem is that it takes time, a lot of time, to make that special connection.  I can always tell when the connection has been made, you can see the light in the persons eyes when they talk about James and the special smile that they have just for him.  So now that he has this connection with his teachers it is time to switch and start all over again.  I dread the looks of "I have never dealt with this kind of behavior before and am at a complete loss of what to do" or the questions to try and explain what he is thinking or doing.  It helps to know that they will get there eventually, but it is hard watching everyone struggle until they do.  Here are some of the people who have touched our lives this year.

Mrs. Leatherwood: I cannot say enough good things about his classroom teacher.  She is the sweetest, most loving, patient teacher I have ever met.  And she was perfect for James.  I know at first she really struggled with how to best help James, to teach him the rules and understand his communication.  I remember there were so many questions at first, how to deal with different behaviors, and a lot of times I just didn't know how to help because we hadn't found things that really worked either.  But she didn't give up.  She spent so much time researching, talking to other professionals and taking classes to learn how to best teach James.  At his IEP meeting in April she said "James has made me a better teacher all around." Love that she didn't write him off or give up on him.  At graduation she gave me a hug and said "Thank you for sharing James with me this year. I am a better person because of him. He has been such a blessing to me."  And I just thought, "me too, he makes me a better person too."

Ms. Eve: Ms. Eve is the classroom EA.  I am sure she has spent the bulk of her time helping James.  She has helped him to go to specials (Music, PE and Library) and when he just was unable to do it anymore she stayed with him in the classroom helping him with different activities.  James has drawn a lot of pictures for her this year, and she shows them to me whenever I am in the classroom.  

Ms. Lacey: This is James' speech therapist.  We could tell from the first parent teacher conference that she was going to be good for James.  She spoke the most positively about him and all the things she wanted to do with him.  She was excited for every bit of progress he made and loved to share them with me whenever I ran into her at the school.  She came up with some amazing ways to work with him a lot of which we have implemented at home because they are perfect for the way James thinks and learns.  She ate lunch with him every day to help him learn conversation skills, and got him to actually sit and eat.  

Mrs. Montoya: This was James' special ed teacher.  I believe that she really did love James and truly wanted what was best for him.  Unfortunately their personalities did not blend very well and James really did not enjoy going to her class.  One day he came home from school with a social story called "James' has fun learning in Mrs. Montoy's room"  They often used social stories to correct inappropriate behaviors.  I guess one time when she came to get him he pointed at her and yelled "No! You go to Montoya's room!"  However I think she got some good results from him.  When she left about a month before school got out, he really started to struggle more.  So even though he protested going to her class so much she really did have an impact on his education and behavior.  

Ms. Jessica: Ms. Jessica is the liaison from the district.  About a month after school started they realized they had about 4 kindergardeners that needed a lot of extra help.  So they created a special social skills class for them.  Ms. Jessica was the teacher.  She taught him appropriate behaviors like keeping his hands to himself, not throwing sand on the playground, they ate lunch together and played at recess.  I think the class was a success, but unfortunately it ended after Christmas.  

Mr. Vetterly: This is the school principal.  We really did not get off to a great start.  After the first few weeks James was in his office for hitting.  I could tell right away that he did not really understand James at all.  The next run in we had was after James was suspended for hitting Mrs. Montoya.  This ended in a big meeting were Doug finally just told him, "I don't feel that you even care about my kid." After that we were able to make much more progress toward figuring out exactly what was best for James and He was able to soften his attitude toward him and realize that James takes a lot longer to learn appropriate behavior and he made some extra effort to get to know James and make sure he was doing well in school.  

We are so grateful for all the people who touched James' life this year.  I am really hoping next year gets off to a better start and we have a head start to helping James progress since so many people already know and love him.

Happy Birthday Mikey

Mikey turned 4 on Saturday.  It was a really fun day for us, and we are pretty sure he enjoyed it too.  He had been begging for roller skates like "daddy's"  so he could skate really fast.  He didn't understand that his weren't fast because he doesn't really know how to do it, not because of the skates.  It was pretty exciting because it is the first time we have had a kid come up with something they really really want on their own, without us making any kind of suggestions.  First thing on Saturday morning he said "Did you buy me roller skates for my birthday?"  I told him we could open his presents as soon as Billy woke up.  The next thing I knew he was opening his roller skates without us.  We almost missed it.

Mikey putting on his skates

After breakfast a couple of boys came over (one James' age and one Mikey's) while their parents went to a high school graduation.  So we had a small birthday party for Mikey.  We did water balloons, and played outside, had popsicles, and lunch.  After his friends went home Mikey had a short nap then Doug took him to the skating rink to try out his new skates.  He loved it.

Once they got home from Skating we took the boys to the store to pick out a swimming pool with their birthday money.  We seem to buy a new pool every year, and always debate for a long time what kind to get.  We don't want a big one because we want to be able to take it down every time so they boys don't have access to it constantly, it has to be shallow enough for Billy, blow up ones pop, the "Snap side" pools always crack and break, and the hard plastic pools blow away.  So we went with a blow up one and I guess we will see how it goes.  Once we got home we tried to have dinner.  Mikey choose pepperoni pizza, but the boys were too excited to get the pool set up.  They swam for a few minutes, then we did cake.  Mikey insisted on having a "roller skate cake"  I tried to talk him into a Batman one, but he insisted.  I am kind of glad because it was much easier, and after James' cake I needed to do an easy one.

Overall I think he had a really fun day, and I love that there is an activity that he can go do with his Dad for some fun one-on-one time.  We love our tiny little 4-year-old!

Mikey is 4!

Recently I decided I wanted to interview the kids on their birthdays to see the change from year to year.  I started asking Mikey the questions last night while we were eating cookies and he was being so stinkin cute that Doug suggested we do video interviews.  My camera card was full right at the end so we missed just a few of the questions but he is still a really cute 4-year-old with lots to say.  Also if I did the same interview today I believe the answers would be completely different.

It's Like Living With a Six-Year-Old

Doug used to always say "It's like living with a six-year-old" whenever someone would do something "childish".  Now I am excited that we get to say it all the time since we actually do now live with a six-year-old.  I love the idea of interviewing your child on their birthday each year, but it wouldn't really work with James since he wouldn't actually answer any questions.  So as I was thinking back on the past year with James I realized we have had a TON of obsessions.  The thing with James' obsessions is they come and go fairly quickly but while they are there they are EXTREMELY intense.  Everything he does is somehow related to whatever his current obsession is.  Some are fun, some are annoying and some we try so hard to get him to move on from.  So I thought it would be fun to go back and remember all the things we had to put up with this past year.

Scout

Scout was the obsession right around the time of his birthday last year.  I think it was actually on it's way out. He did everything with Scout.  Then one day Scout was gone.  We couldn't find him anywhere.  Oddly enough James didn't seem super upset about it.  His uncles gave him a new scout for his birthday.  Then a short time later James was playing in the car, got in the back and opened a little door in the side of the car and pulled Scout out like he knew he was there the entire time.  

Balloons

Balloons was also around the time of James' birthday.  He had a balloon themed birthday party.  His balloon obsession included buying huge packages of balloons at the dollar store every time we went, filling each one up with water and popping them in the backyard.  Also buying the big punch balloons and hooking them to the hose and filling them up to jump on them and pop them.  We filled up balloons with air too.  Also he loved to get the plastic balloons that you put the goo on the straw and blow it up.  And every other kind of balloon available. 

Water Scooters

All summer it was everything water.  It started with some blow up water scooters Mikey got for their little pool out back.  Then he NEEDED a row boat, which he earned by pooping on the toilet.   Then water skiing so Grandpa's boat was a big hit last summer.  We did force him to actually try water skiing while we were visiting last summer, he was not a big fan.  He mostly liked to pretend. 

Water Marbles

This may be one of my least favorite obsessions yet.  If you don't know what a water marble is, look on youtube, there are tons of videos.  Basically you have to drop nail polish into water then dip your fingernail in the water and the polish sticks to your nail.  Some of them look really cool.  The reason I hated this one so much is because first of all we could never get it to work.  And second he was constantly getting into nail polish, and getting it everywhere.  Every time we went in public and he saw someone with painted nails he had to stop and look.  The lady in the grocery store we go to has probably 2 inch nails and he loved to stop and look at them.  The first time he met his teacher she had some polish on her nails and that is all he would talk about the entire time.  The nail polish lead to makeup so that had to go away also because he started getting my mascara all over everything.  We were really glad to see this one go.  

Wipeout

We have had this one before, and it is always a fun one.  This includes, taking all the couch cushions off the couch so they can be the "big red balls", having Dad swing a pool noodle around for the sweeper arm, and being overly dangerous every time we are in the bathtub.  I think it was during this obsession that he really started drawing.  Here he was drawing the wipeout course, and now all of his work comes home from school with very elaborate drawings of his favorite things on the back.  This is pretty neat because writing has always been somewhat of a struggle for James, and he never really liked to color.  So this is a major improvement. 

Apple Trees/Seasons

This one started around the beginning of the school year.  They had a unit on seasons and used trees to show the different seasons.  Since then everything was about apple trees.  He constantly drew apple trees, talked about apple trees, and made apple trees with whatever he could.  One day he came home with a picture he had drawn of the trees and their seasons.  I asked him about it and he told me it was "Leaving up (Spring/Summer), Falling down (Fall), and winter."

Cooking

Cooking is another repeat obsession, however this time around it was much less controllable, and way more intense. He wanted to cook constantly, and pretend cooking was not enough this time, he wanted the real stuff.  Which was fine if I was able to help him, but if I was busy with something else he would often just help himself.  We had a lot of messes.  In this picture he was making a cake.  I think there was some water, flour, salt, cream of tartar, some other spices and probably an egg in the bowl.  One time Doug was putting up Christmas lights and I got stuck outside talking to the neighbor for probably 15-30 minutes.  When I came back in there was spaghetti sauce all over the floor (which he had tried to clean up but mostly used about 10 towels to spread it all over the kitchen), a frozen pizza in the oven and a smiling boy telling me happily that he was making Pizza.  Another time I was shopping and Doug texted me that we needed more eggs.  I replied that there were a dozen in the fridge already, to which he responded, "not anymore."  Another time there were 6 or 7 eggs cracked all over the floor.  This was a pretty messy obsession.  Also for Christmas he bought himself a cake pop pan.  He was so excited.  During one primary activity we were cooking breakfast for all the kids.  James came in the kitchen to help (we cooked 10 dozen eggs that day).  He was cracking eggs and cooking them and just talking and talking.  The primary president commented to me that it was so neat to see James like this, "It was like getting to see just James without his Autism."
Cooking also led to a bunch of fun one-liners from James"
"Oh, I break it so bad" This you say when you crack an egg and get some shell into the bowl
"Don't let the yolk fall in the bowl." this you say when you are trying to get egg whites only and he is pretty good at it.
"Now it's time for cooking with Chef James."
"I make it rain, I make it rain" This is said when you sprinkle sprinkles on cupcakes 

Restrooms 

 This is probably the oddest obsession he has ever had, and we can't really link it to anything like the other ones, but at the same time one of the best since he essentially became potty trained as a result of it.  For some reason he became very obsessed with restrooms.  Every single time we went to a store he had to use the restroom.  If the store had multiple restrooms he had to use them all.  If we went to multiple stores in one trip we still had to use all the restrooms.  When he came to visit me in the hospital he had to go look at all the restrooms.  Every day when I picked him up from school I had to wait while he used the restroom.  He drew bathrooms, he drew signs for our bathrooms.  Everyday.  We constantly had a new sign on the bathroom.  One day he decided our restrooms were now handicap accessible and drew the handicap signs to go on the doors.    One day he drew this lovely picture of a boy using the urinal.

 Pacman

This is probably my least favorite obsession.  He learned a lot of bad things from this one, and I was kind of sad to see the cooking go.  Pacman included lots and lots of drawing.  Running away from his class in school, building guns at school so he could shoot his classmates who were the ghosts, telling me and his teacher to "shut-up", and my personal favorite (sarcasm) saying "What the @#$!".  There were a few fun things.  He found this bag that the "jump" goes in and decided it was the perfect ghost costume.  He even wore it to the store several times.  Dad made this awesome pacman board on the kitchen floor and he often asked us to play with him.  Also I started making him Pacman sandwiches to take to school everyday.  I really wish I could have been there the first time he opened that lunch box.

Wreck It Ralph

Wreck it Ralph is our current obsession and it is a fun one.  About a week before his birthday he switched from a pacman cake to a Wreck It Ralph cake.  I really had a lot o fun doing this for him because he gets so much joy out of it.  I like Wreck It Ralph because it includes a lot of pretend play and playing with his brothers.  So for his birthday Mikey picked out this action figure (he actually picked the one in the Medal of Heros suit and we go this one to go on his cake, then he got another from his uncle so he had a total of 3 Ralphs.  We told him we could take one back, but he wanted them all and spent all night playing with his Ralphs and his cake.  He also got a battery for his Power Wheels he got for Christmas 3 years ago and has not cared about until recently when he discovered it would be the perfect racing car to pretend he was in the movie.  

It has been a pretty fun year with this kid.  We love him so much and cant wait to see what the next year has in store for us!  I know one day he will settle on one thing and know everything there is to know about that one thing, but for now we are really enjoying his creativity and excitement over each new thing.

Birthday/Easter Weekend

Easter weekend was a big one for us.  My birthday was on Friday and Saturday and Sunday we celebrated Easter.  I have to say my family SPOILED me for my birthday.  But you do only turn 30 once right!  On Thursday night when I got home from a Relief Society activity Doug got the two older boys out of bed (they were nowhere close to asleep) to go to the store to (as Michael put it) "buy Mom a present.  Mom likes candy!"  So that is what I was expecting from my guys.  On Friday morning I woke up to Michael climbing in bed with us.  Doug asked him what the day was and he excitedly said "Easter!" when Doug asked what else it was he said "Mom's birthday!"  I was impressed he remembered.  Once James and Billy joined us they decided to give me the presents they picked out, and wrapped for me.  

I opened James' first, it was a little package of orange beads.  Then Michael give me his.  He had picked out these awesome (fake) yellow roses. He even had me smell them.

I look terrible in this picture but Michael's face is priceless!

Doug told me when he took the boys to the store they were allowed to pick anything out as long as they thought Mom would like it.  The first thing Michael picked was a sprinkler.  When Doug asked if it was something Mom would like he said no and put it back without a fight.  There were no more selfish choices after that.  I have to say this was the best part of the entire day.  How excited the boys were to make me happy!

Birthday kiss for Mom!

After a lazy morning we packed everyone up and ran some errands. Lastly stopping at my favorite sandwich place for lunch.  Once we got home my present from Doug (also using the money his parents and Granny and Grandpa sent) was waiting on the door step.  I was so excited I opened it right away.  A new sewing machine.  I didn't realize how much I really did need a new machine.  My old one worked, but didn't have any fancy options.  I can't even describe how much better this one works.  

I spent the rest of the afternoon figuring out my new machine and having fun with it.  After naps we had cake, the boys made a delicious cake for me, and I love listening to them sing to me.  Once they had dinner and went to bed Doug fixed me some dinner and we tried (unsuccessfully) to watch Lincoln.  Doug went and picked up Sushi from our favorite restaurant. And we had some crab legs which are my favorite.  Overall it was a great birthday!

Notice my nice necklace.  Thanks James!

On Saturday we woke up early and headed over to the city's Easter egg hunt.  James was so excited.  They had it at some baseball fields so each field was a different age group.  Billy got to go first.  He really gets this kind of stuff.  James and Michael never have until this year, they would always just pick up one egg and eat the candy then find another, but they would be just fine if they only got one or two.  Billy went and picked up eggs as fast as he could putting them in his basket.  He ended up with 17 eggs.  James and Michael were in the next group.  Parents were not supposed to go, but parents never follow the rules, it always ruins stuff like this for me.  Just let the kids do it.  James ran out so fast picking up eggs as fast as he could he ended up with over 20 I never got to count because Michael only got 4 (which he was really excited for) and James happily shared his with him.  

On Sunday morning the Easter Bunny came.  James and Michael were really excited to find their Easter Baskets, but Billy was still into the whole egg hunt thing.  He looked at his basket but was much more excited about finding the eggs. 

Brooke got all dressed up for Easter.  She looked so pretty in her new dress.  We were going to have a nice Easter dinner too but our stove decided we didn't really need it.  Part way through cooking the ham and just when we were going to put the potatoes in the oven one of the elements on the stove broke, blowing the breaker and burning up the switch and wires on the stove.  Every time we tried to turn the breaker back on there were sparks and a loud pop and the breaker was blown again.  So we decided the only possible solution would be to finish the dinner on the grill.  Never baked on a grill before so it was kind of interesting.  Turned out OK but the potatoes were a little crunchy.  

Happy Easter from Brooke!

Dad and Brooke enjoying a Sunday nap!