Halloween 2013

Halloween was a lot of fun this year.  Calvin had a blast going door to door begging for candy.  The first door that we went to he knocked, the lady opened the door and he walked right in thinking he was going to play at her house.  We had a great laugh.  He got the hang of it.  He wore his football uniform for a couple of days straight, until we finally hid his uniform.

 

Lindsay was a ladybug, Ashley a cat and Hailey an angel.

 

Calvin Update

My little guy is growing up so fast and I do not want to forget some of his milestones.  He is still only speaking a couple of words, but he is really trying to get through to us, somehow.  He gets frustrated a lot and screams a lot but we are trying to help him work it out with words. 

He says Mama and Dada really well and recently started calling his sisters all Nana.  We have no idea where it came from, but at least we are making progress.  Lindsay is trying to get him to call her Deedee since that is what the other two girls called her.  He has said it a couple of times but then goes right back to calling her nana.

He says balloon really funny.  He sticks out his tongue and says lalalalala but with his tongue sticking out. 

Whenever he sees an ice cream cone or drives by McDonalds he slurps his spit a couple of times.  I will have to get it on video.  It is so funny.  He loves ice cream.

Jean, our Early Intervention lady has been on vacation so we have not been able to meet with her for a couple of weeks.

He loves to dance and whenever he tries he sticks one arm in the air and points to the sky while keeping the beat.  It is so dang cute.  He also break dances, or tries to.

Every night before bed he has to kiss Dad first, then he wipes the kisses off and says Dada while wiping the kiss, then Lindsay and he says Nana then wipes the kiss, then Hailey and he says Nana then wipes it then Ashley and he does the same.  When it is my turn to kiss him he kisses me, then wipes it and says Mama.  That is his routine and we love it.  He does not like anything like a fan in his room and will point at it and make us get rid of it.  He also decided he does not like his night light anymore so we had to take that out also.  Funny kid.

He loves going outside.  Whenever he wants to go outside he points out the window and says EEEE.  Not sure if it means swing, weeeee, or what but we understand it means outside and he wants to play.

He loves to watch Dora the Explorer and calls her Doda.  He can't get enough of Doda.

Some other words he says are ball, ruff for dog, ga for cat, no, he will smile for yes or nod his head.  Water or milk are Mmmmmm......

He says um ah for thank you and he says it all of the time, so polite.  :)

He started opening doors and I am just waiting for him to open the front door, hopefully not soon. 

He is such a fun boy and I hope that when Jean comes back we can work on lots more words so his frustrations will cease.  It is so hard when he is trying to tell you something, and you have no idea what he wants.  We say, "show me" a lot and that is how we usually figure things out. 

Girls Getaway

I would always get sad when I would hear about women having girls night outs and I was never invited to them.  I thought it would be fun to start my own so I invited my friends Ruth Elison, Stacy Dowd and Heather Wynkoop to go with me to Seaside for the weekend. 

 

Ruth moved into our ward in November and Ashley realized that she was her Music teacher at West Union.  I went up to her with Ashley and she was so sweet.  I decided to sit with her in Relief Society and I sat with her for weeks, until she was called into the Primary Presidency.  Stacy was Ruth's Visiting Teacher so I knew they were already friends and Stacy is such a sweetheart I knew she would be fun to invite and I also knew that Heather, who did not know Ruth, was going to be a blast as always.  It worked out to be a great group of ladies. 

 

Stacy founds a lovely hotel about 1/4 mile from the beach in Seaside that had a kitchenette area and a balcony.  It was perfect.  It also had breakfast so that saved us some money. 

 

We were ready to go and all of us were so excited.  I was embarrassed because I packed so much for one night.  As I went around, I drove, to pick up each of the ladies it became apparent that we all packed way too much. 

 Once we got to our hotel we decided to walk around to some of the shops and get some pizza to go.   

 

After getting our pizza we went back to our room for the night and did beading, nails, TONS of talking and TONS of laughing and watched a couple of movies  It was such a fun and relaxing night.  We did not go to sleep until 1 or so.  It was so nice to have four ladies there and not a bit of gossip was said.  That is my kind of ladies night!!!!

 

Saturday morning we ate the continental breakfast then went shopping round town.  This hat store was hilarious!  It was so fun trying on hats with such crazy friends.

We then went and walked on the beach.  The weather was absolutely PERFECT!  Could not have asked for a more perfect weekend.  I am not sure that I have ever gone to an Oregon beach without any wind, and that Saturday there was none. 

 

We had fun playing in the water like children.  It was so nice to not have to worry about kids and I could just do what I wanted.  The water was absolutely FREEZING!  I never got used to it, but that didn't stop us.

 

 

  

After playing in the water we drove to Cannon Beach and ate at Mo's.  It has amazing food and I ate their fish and chips.  So good! 

After a fun filled weekend it was sad to drop everyone off at home, but we plan to go again, but next time with our husbands.  It was such a fun weekend.  I have great memories that I will cherish.  Love these women!

Spring Break and Easter 2013

This year Spring Break was very laid back and we didn't do much.  I took the girls dress shopping for their Easter dresses and we did a lot of Spring Cleaning.  On Saturday we were able to also go as a family to Oceanside and the weather could not have been more perfect.  It was amazing!!! 

 

Hailey in her gorgeous new dress.  I usually buy the girls dresses and surprise them with it on Sunday morning.  I went to Fred Meyer and would have bought this dress for her anyways, but I was glad that she was able to choose for herself.

 Buying modest dresses now a days is so hard.  In the dressing rooms my girls have to kneel down and the dresses have to be well below the knee for it to pass my inspection.  Ashley's dress goes all the day to her feet and I love it!  She looks so pretty in it. 

 Lindsay looks so grown up in her choice of dress.  She had the hardest time finding something that went below her knee but she did well.  I love this dress on her.  My little baby is so grown up.

 My beautiful princesses.  Calvin was at home asleep so I did not want to wake him up.

The girls took a picture of me in my new Easter dress.  I loved this beautiful tree next to West Union Elementary School.

 Oceanside was so fun and beautiful.  Calvin had so much fun running around and playing on his own. 

 Mitchell and I just hanging out. 

 I think this pictures shows my weight loss the best.  Down 26 lbs in a year.  Love how I feel now!

 Hailey playing in the sand.

 Calvin loved the sand and loved running in the freezing cold water.

 Beautiful Beach!

 My beautiful Ashley

 Hailey with some of her shell treasures.

 Beautiful Hailey.

 My handsome husband.

 Me.

 I LOVE this picture!!!  I love how much they look alike.  Love my guys!

Aspergers?

For the past year Jean from Early Intervention has come to our house to help with Calvin and his speech, motor skills and walking.  It has been a great experience.  She has been great and just loves Calvin. 

Since he is not really progressing in his speech, he has said some sounds but not really anything else, I have been really frustrated.  He is 27 months and I just want him to speak.  I keep thinking that there is something other then the speech apraxia that Jean thinks that Calvin has.  His social skills are a little different and I have just been worried about that.

I have spoke with quite a few people and I have always thought that he has some form of autism but nothing quite fit.  Yesterday at church Calvin was not happy.  We sat in the hall the whole time and he did not sit still and was really grumpy.  Sister Roberts was sitting next to me and we got to talking.  She is a Dr. and she asked how old Calvin is.  I told her and exclaimed that he is still not talking and I said he is in Early Intervention.  I said that I think that he has something else, just not sure what.  After speaking with her for about 15 minutes she told me that she thought that he had Aspergers. 

I have heard the word Aspergers but was unaware as to what it is.  She asked me a couple of questions like:

Does he look you in the eye?  No, we have to force him to look at you when you are talking to him.  We thought it was a hearing problem but when he passed his hearing test I knew it was something else.

Is he infatuated with one thing?  Yes, whenever he sees a ball he goes crazy.  He loves it!  In the store, on tv, on the computer, whatever, he points them out and wants to play with it.

Do his clothes bug him?  Lately he keeps taking his clothes off of him because they itch and he HATES getting dressed.  It is such a battle.

Routine changes?  He hates having his routine change.  He is very much routine oriented.

Interaction with other kids?  In nursery he just plays with himself and with a ball.  The other kids don't bother him but he loves playing alone.  (good thing he is our last or another brother or sister might drive him crazy).

Does he feel sympathy?  Not at all.  Whenever he hits his sisters and has to give them a hug he won't/can't do it. 

Anyways, I knew the second she said the word that was what our sweet boy has.  It felt so right and so good to FINALLY have an answer. 

Now I have a lot of searching to do and researching on how to help our sweet boy.  I just hope and pray that I can be the Mom that is patient and can help this dear boy.  He is amazing!  I know that Heavenly Father will help us on this quest in raising our son.