A Blessing in Disguise

Andy is very similar to my brother, David.  He's a complete antagonist, knows how to push everybody's buttons and gets pure entertainment out of pissing people off.  He's smart, and he knows it, extremely confident, and convinced that he is always right and knows everything.  I love them both, of course, but growing up as Dave's little sister who often got the brunt of his obnoxious behavior makes it pretty hard to parent someone just like that.

Last week Andy got grounded.  When he gets grounded, it's always from electronics.  I don't know that this punishment makes him rethink his actions and prevents him from doing the same exact thing in the future, but it's the only thing we know to do that is painful for him.  He was grounded for a week and then got a few days tacked on for bad behavior, so it has been quite awhile since he's gotten to touch the computer (other than to do homework), his DS, his PlayStation or the iPad.  He has gotten to watch tv, because we can't make the girls stop watching tv as well, but he's been forced to watch all their princess and Disney Jr. shows (that don't appeal to him but he secretly likes).  Andy is like me and can pretty much get sucked into anything that's on tv, so it hasn't been too bad in that respect, but I'm sure he would like to be watching something else.

Generally when he gets grounded I moan and groan inside, because him getting punished is almost like me getting punished.  He follows me around and asks me what he can do and he pesters me and he picks on the girls.  A lot.  When Andy is grounded the complaint level from Sarah and Amanda goes way up because he pays more attention to them, which is usually not a good thing.  This time it was a little different.

I'm not going to lie, there definitely were some moments in the last week when the fighting and teasing was a little out of hand, but overall it was pretty enjoyable.  He read several books this week which made us both happy.  One afternoon we played a game of chess and another he and Amanda played Indiana Jones (Amanda was Kentucky Amanda).  They played outside a little bit, when it wasn't snowing, and we even did a little shopping.  All in all, a pretty good week.

Tomorrow he gets his electronics back.  We may not see him for a few days.  Or, he may put the joystick down and do some reading or adventuring or game playing.  I hope it's the latter, there's so much fun to be had.

Say What?

My friend, April from New Jersey, recently wrote a blog post about how she loves the fact that, although sometimes it takes a few minutes of hard thinking, she can pretty much understand everything her three-yr-old (who is two months younger than Amanda) says.  Even when he gets his context mixed up or says things in a way that doesn't normally make sense, she can figure it out.

I definitely have days when I am spot on with Amanda and we have wonderful, funny conversations about roller coasters and cows and whether or not she will be a Daddy when she grows up or if she will be tall enough to touch the ceiling (I still say no on the last two, she thinks she can beat the odds).  There are other days, however, when I don't have a clue what the hell she is saying.  I'll ask her to repeat herself, say it another way, show me, draw a picture, act it out like charades (no, just kidding there), anything to try to figure out what she's saying.  I either get it eventually or I give up and she is so annoyed with me.

The main reason we have this communication problem is because she says all her letters wrong.  She still says Nes instead of Yes, but for some reason can say Yep just fine, and drops a lot of letters at the beginning of words like H and C and S.  If it's a word she uses a lot you just know what it is, but if she's talking about something new I'm lost.  She probably needs to go to speech therapy to get it all worked out, and I've mentioned it to her a few times, but I'm going to wait a little and see if she figures it out for herself.  We're not in any hurry, especially since she's has two years of preschool left before she starts kindergarten, and there are a few words that she had fixed already and things she has gotten better about so it may just be a matter of time.

No matter how hard it is for me to understand her, it is equally that easy for Sarah to understand.  Still.  So this morning we're in the car driving to swimming and Amanda says something to Sarah.  To me it's like the teacher from the Peanuts is talking, "wha wha wha wha wha whaaaa".  But of course Sarah responds with, "yeah, that would be so awesome.  Or if...." and they go into this whole long conversation about whatever it was Amanda brought up in the first place.  It's almost like you're hearing one side of a phone conversation or a friend who's parent is talking to them in a foreign language but they are answering back in English.

I'll get it eventually, but it sure would be nice if it was sooner than later.

Back on Track

I went away for the weekend, back to Dallas to visit some friends.  I didn't get to see everybody I want to see, but I did get to see four very special people, so I'm good.  It was so nice to go out with my friends and just laugh and laugh, something I don't feel like I've done too much in the last nine months.

I got home Sunday night and the kids filled me in on their wonderful weekend with Charlie.  Amanda informed me that she liked Daddy more than me because he was a lot more fun.  I'm okay with that, she is not the first of my kids to tell me that and she is right.  He is more fun.  That's why I like him too.  I'm just happy that I can go away and come home to happy kids and a clean house.  It allows me to do it again sometime.

On Monday it was back to normal except on Monday afternoon it started to snow.  It was coming down hard and fast and we wondered whether or not school was going to get cancelled, but we decided no because everyone had been snookered the week before.  In the end they did not cancel school but there was more snow on the ground than last week.  Of course typical Denver weather, all of the snow melted today and it's like it never happened.

Today Amanda and I dropped of two big storage totes worth of clothes at the Denver consignment sale.  Yes, I'm back to trying to clear out my house, get rid of my mess, minimize.  I doubt I will every truly get to where I want to be, but I can try.   At least the office looks better, and I'll have a little cash in my pocket when it's all over.

So that's it.  Nothing hilarious to report, just that we're finally back in the groove.  Eight more weeks of school and then hopefully an amazing summer.

Kid Quote of the Day

"The first one up [the stairs] is a...a...a person!"

-Amanda, I guess rotten egg wasn't coming to mind.

Snow Day

Once again, the weather guys got it wrong.  It snowed on Tuesday, but not more than a few inches and definitely not enough to close school.  Of course because they were predicting the spring blizzard of 2013 school was closed the night before, a little prematurely.  All I know is they've walked to school in way more snow than we got on Tuesday.

Don't get me wrong, we enjoyed the day at home.  Even though the kids had just been off for two weeks, we had a pretty full spring break.  We had company for a week and the day after they left we went to Phoenix.  The day after we got home from Phoenix they went back to school.  So they didn't really have any down time.

Andy spent the entire day in his pajamas and mostly in front of the computer.  I did much the same.  It's kind of weird when you go to bed and you still have your pajamas on.  What do you change into?  You don't change, but it feels weird and wrong to skip that step.  The girls kept busy playing all day and never once told me they were bored or asked me what they could do.  I wish I could have an entire summer like that, but more than one day is too good to be true.

The kids went back on Wednesday and it's been a pretty uneventful week after that.  Unless you count the fact that I'm still hobbling around and I went to a D.O. today that stretched me like a pretzel.  In a good way of course.  This weekend I am taking some much needed time away from home with a few of my friends in Dallas.  We got a hotel for the night and hopefully everybody can stay away from their family's and just have fun hanging out.  I really need it.  I miss my friends and can't wait to see them.

Andy's Random Word of the Day

Andy asked me if I could start a new segment on my blog called Andy's Random Word of the Day.  He thinks it's genius, so I'll go with it.  Today's word is:

BRAINWASHED

Fascinating, huh?

Back to School, Or So I Thought

So, we spent the last five days or so in Phoenix.  The weather was gorgeous, the water at the pool was warm for once (or at least not cold) and the kids were so happy to just play in the water all day.  The resort had a lazy river, a kiddie pool that was nothing spectacular but that Amanda still spend two whole days in, and several other pools that had volleyball and basketball and waterfalls and swimming in general.

The kids were exhausted by the end of each day, and the only night we went out for dinner was the night we went to visit my friend Mark, who moved to Phoenix around the same time we moved to Denver.  Otherwise, the kids vegged on the Food Network and we sent Charlie out to get food for us.  One night Amanda fell asleep at 5:30p and didn't wake up until the next morning.

Overall a fantastic family vacation except for one minor detail.  On Friday I pinched a nerve or did something so that my back and my left thigh were in horrible pain any time that I was standing up.  That's right, standing up.  I didn't even have to put pressure on the leg, just had to be vertical and it hurt.  This went on for three days until we got back last night and this morning I was able to get in to see the doctor.  She thinks it's a bulging disk, which compresses when you stand up and therefore pinches a nerve or something and causes pain or spreads out when you sit which is why it doesn't hurt if I'm lying down or sitting.  She prescribed me some muscle relaxers, awesome, which have the potential to make me totally loopy so I can only take them at night and can't even take them tonight because Charlie is out of town and she doesn't want me responsible for the kids by myself when on this medication.  Strong stuff.

So it's ibuprofen for the pain and swelling and a hope that everything will work itself out and go back in place.  If not I have an appointment with one of her colleagues on Thursday for some special stretching and also have a chiropractor appointment on Monday if all else fails.

On top of that, although it was 65 degrees and sunny this afternoon, it is now snowing and we are supposed to have such a bad snow storm tonight and into tomorrow that they have already cancelled school.  Are you kidding me?  The kids had two weeks off from school for spring break and now a snow day?  I'm all for a day off here and there, but already?  The only good thing about this is tomorrow is the day I'm supposed to volunteer with the first graders so I get a break this week.  I'm not sure the tradeoff is worth it.

I guess it will give me an excuse to stay in my pajamas all day.  Yay snow!