The passage of Time

                                                  Time. 

There is a lot to be said about the passage of time. Hootie and the Blowfish (the great orators of our generation) once said "Time is wasted, time is walking  you ain't no friend of mine... I think I'm going out of my mind just thinking about time."

Time is so many things to so many people. I think that time is most evident in a mother's life.The days are long but the years are short. That's what they say about motherhood. I would have to agree. Time wasted worries you, time ahead fills you with anxiety, time behind you fills you with sadness. I  think of this time in my life with my children and I feel like it is slowly slipping through my fingers. This time is precious, and valuable and quickly moving and ever changing.

It is this time, this preciousness that propels me to take snapshots of my children so that I can look back and remember.

I can remember that moment when your two front teeth were missing. It was just 3 weeks of time before that front one grew in. It was your seventh birthday with that cake that took an army of hands to put together. And it was this cake that made you smile that gloriously magnificent tooth gapped smile that I will remember forever, but that only lasted for 3 short weeks.

I can remember that moment when I first brought you to this playground and it didn't look too big for you. It was just your size. And that knowing smile told me that you were ready for a phase of life that I wasn't ready for.

But that smile also told me that while you were a big boy now, playing with the other big boys, you weren't too big to stop holding my hand or giving me a big, sloppy, wet kiss as I said goodbye to you. You were telling me that it was going to be okay, even though you weren't exactly sure that it was. That was this moment.

And then there was this innocent split second when you were sitting on your Nana's lap and looking up into my eyes with such love; such tenderness. And it took my breath away that someone could look at me that way, that someone could love me in that way. And it was in that moment that I thought to myself "There has never been a more beautiful little girl in the history of forever." And you held my hand and wiggled into my lap and you put your face against mine. For that split second, for that moment we were connected. And I was your everything.



While I'm sad at the time that is already gone and am excited about the time that I won't have to potty train, or pick up the lego that seems to congregate down the edges of my hallway, I must for now live in the present in this fast moving and changing current of happenings that is my children's childhood. How I want it to stand still. I would gladly fill up sippy cups forever if I could just hold onto this moment.

This wonderful, beautiful moment of absolute chaotic, giggling mess.

First Day of Kindergarten Milestone for my middle little

Dear Noah,

Today is your first day of kindergarten. I don't know why, but for some reason this fact blows me away much more than it did with your brother. I think it's because you have always been my little buddy. Since you were tiny, you have always been stuck like glue to my side. When brother went to school, you were incredibly happy and content to get all the attention. You've walked beside me for every therapy appointment that your brother and sister have had, you've been that faithful, constant, dependable kid. You've been an easy kid. But being the easy kid, and the middle kid is the thing I worry most about for you. You've never known a moment alone, you were born into a crowd.

Today when I held your sweaty little hands and it was the Noah show, I felt your nervousness. You had to face the world without the security blanket of your older brother, or your mama, or your protector daddy. It was just you. I watched as the gregarious, large as life personality of Noah James that I have come to adore just melted into a perfect little turtle shell.

It's not easy being the middle kid. You're always someone's brother, it sort of melds into your identity. You have that added difficulty of being the middle kid of two kids with disabilities. I recognize that sometimes we call on you to do things that we don't ask your brother to do. I wonder how unfair you must think that is sometimes?

I think about how everyone seems to remember Elijah everywhere he goes, and how they often forget your name or that Elijah even had a brother. Sometimes, being in Elijah's shadow is an incredibly dark place to be. I see that Noah. I see you.

My prayer for you is that your winning personality and charm will shine through. That you will make friends, a lot of friends. That people will be drawn to you. I pray Noah that you will grow and develop and try new things and discover who you are. That you will have different interests than your brother and that you will thrive in the world you create for yourself.

I pray, as a mother, that I will always take time to listen to you, even if your brother and sister are louder at getting my attention. I pray that I will celebrate and encourage your strengths, that I will be able to talk through things with you and get you to not hide in your shell, but to talk about your feelings.

I have to tell you, saying goodbye to you today and walking away hit me in the gut like you wouldn't believe. You are my buddy Noah. You are mama's boy and I have, perhaps selfishly, grown to love and cherish that. I hate that I have to share you with the world. Can't you just be my little piece of awesomeness who snuggles in bed beside me forever? No? I have to share you with the world?

I just wanted you to know, to have documented proof that you are loved and you are treasured...highly and that I will miss you terribly as you cross the threshold into the school years.

Don't ever grow up Noah, stay Peter Pan forever okay?

Love,
Mama

Jurassic Park Birthday Party on a budget

Today I wanted to share with you a birthday party for my son that was a total hit, but didn't break the bank. Let me introduce you to my son. This is Noah, he loves dinosaurs and has an incredible imagination. For his fifth birthday, I wanted to do something special for him. I had great plans to take him to a dinosaur museum, but after months of searching for an exhibit near us, I came up empty-handed. Noah's favorite movie right now is Jurassic Park. He just loves the idea of dinosaurs, so I thought it would be a great way to throw a birthday party.

     A feast for Carnivores and Herbivores alike
Little disclaimer: If you are searching for a beautiful tablescape to present gourmet food, you have to come to wrong place. I believe that Pinterest somewhat clouds our perception of what a "great party" should look like. You see, while pretty tables are nice, a five-year-old boy could really care less about that. With that being said, I'll go straight to what a five-year-old boy cares all about: the food.

We went simple with food, and tried serving kid basics. Chicken nuggets, pretzels, chocolates, bugles. Just mainly munchies. The key was to create fun "dino" language for them. They were a real hit with the kids and the adults got a kick out of the names.

The real crowd pleaser, however were the dino bones. These I made out of pretzels, marshmallows and hardened chocolate. While Pinterest made it look "easy" I had to figure out a method to it before it looked good. At first, they just looked like dumbells because the marshmallows were too big. I cut them into 4's and they seemed to be big enough to resemble the ends of bones. Also, don't let the chocolate harden too much, keep it hot, or else it will be a hot mess.

  

 Here is the end result. Noah was super excited to eat these dinosaur bones!

 

 Below are the signs I used, along with a blank one for you to write what you will. Feel free to use them.

                      Adults Can Have Fun Too!

Because our family likes to do birthday parties right, they all agreed to dress as characters from the movies. Noah had such fun guessing which character we were. We also had fun creating movie memes that we put throughout the house. It's a fun way to incorporate the movie and entertaining kids and adults. Because let's face it, being an adult at a kid birthday party isn't always fun, making memes and dressing up allowed for adults to participate too. 

                      Here are some of my favorite memes:

 

 

                              

  One thing I love to do is incorporate kids in getting ready for the party. They're so excited, but it can take hours before it's time to celebrate, so what can they do? I sent the kids out with sidewalk chalk to make dinosaur footprints to further decorate for the party. It was entertaining AND helpful. Also, some of the dino drawings they came up with were hilarious!






 Let The Games Begin!

For boys, it's all about the games. You've got to have good ones to keep the party hopping. So the first game we played was a small remake of the original game we played for Elijah's Star Wars Party called "Don't fall into the tarpits!" The children had to hop, skip and jump onto the rocks (created with sidewalk chalk) and make sure not to fall in the tarpits, or they would become extinct! Kids of all ages love this game and it's one we like to come back to.

                                             I Really DIG this party!

The main dino-event at our party was the dino-dig. I've seen many variations of this, but it was important to find realistic dinosaur bones for our very enthusiastic little boy. We got two giant packing containers (from the garage) and bought sand from the local hardware store. We decided to seperate the diggers into two teams: Carnivores and Herbivores, so that they wouldn't be chucking dirt in each other's faces and so as to not create giant arguments. We settled on a model we found on Amazon that had several different pieces to find and buried them in various depths in the sand. Then we had the teams use little paint brushes, just like regular paleontologists, so as to not hurt the bones.
 
This took up a large portion of the time and it was fun to see their excited giggles as they found a new bone each time. It really tapped into their imagination.

 Once they had found all of the bones, they had to put it together. This was a little more challenging than we anticipated, but even with the dads helping out it was still fun to see their dinosaurs come to life.


As you can see, the finished product put a smile on his face, and I could see that this was exactly the kind of "dinosaur birthday" he had been dreaming about.

                                           Let Them Eat Cake!
Of course, I could have gone all out on the fancy cakes that I saw all over google. In the end, our Noah was so specific about what kind of dinosaurs he wanted on the cake that we ended up just making one and letting him choose out of his personal collection what kinds got to go on his cake. It may not be pinterest pretty, but he loved it. He also loved being able to be a part of the process. After all, it is HIS birthday, why not let him choose what was on the cake?

And no party would be complete without a T-Rex pinata. The kids had a grand old time whacking that T-Rex. 

  And there you have it: our Jurassic Park Party on a budget. Full of imagination and fun!

How to be genuine or, what I did this summer

I've struggled for a while with what to write about on my blogs. How many times can my readers really listen to an emotional spill about my children with special needs? How many craft projects are really that interesting? I worry about what strangers will think of my blogs, or what magazines and publishers will think as they stop by based on proposals I send out. Do I talk less about my kids and life as a mom? Isn't that unprofessional?

These questions are dizzying and quite frankly, keep me from writing anything at all. Here is one fact you need to know about me that's more important than any other fact you will ever know and that is: I'm GENUINE. I can't stand fake. Fake smiles, pretending, trying to be something I'm not. I really despise it and am quite bad at it. So, I've decided to make a decision to go with the one thing that I really know about myself and to be genuine. That being said, here is my summer so far:

*Went to Disneyland which was awesome. My boys loved Carsland (ok so did I) and ended I up buying a season's pass (that was so cheap after our stay there I couldn't say no). Now I'm just a girl, saving up for her next adventure. I love being able to have adventures to look forward to. So on really bad days, I can close my eyes and think about what ride I'm going to ride next, or what Disneyland looks like at Christmastime. It gets me through those really hard days. And is somewhat of an escape for me when the challenges of motherhood can get the best of me.

 

*Discovered the library again. After a pretty scary threat that I received from a homeless man last 

 summer, I've been nervous to take my kids near the library. But they just love to read and play so I developed a systematic approach. I circle the place first and make sure there's no violence or scary people and then I take my ducklings in. They love it!

*Did our best to stay cool in the scorching 116 degree temps Redding gets. This was a challenge since my kids don't understand how to NOT play outside.

Enjoyed a wonderful fourth of July with our cousins in Sacramento. We decided to do a cool art project for flag shirts this year which was really awesome. Only problem is, it led to Elijah's first meltdown about his hands. He asked me for the first time "Why did God make me look different than everyone else?" It broke my heart as it was the question I had been dreading him asking me since the moment he was born. Fortunately I was ready, and I am proud to say I got through my little schpeel without shedding one single tear. That takes effort folks. Fortunately, I got to tell him that the very next day we were off to handcamp where he could meet other kids just like him.

*Which brings me to handcamp. No way am I gonna give a tiny blurb on the lifechanging affects it had on Elijah. It will have to be a seperate blog post. But for now, let me just say it was amazing and we are blessed to have this community of parents and kids and people who take time out of their lives to play with, nurture and love on kids with hand differences. Just looking at this picture makes me tear up.

We also got a lot of swimming in so far. And even tried our hand at kayaking. Which, with three small
children isn't easy. Noah has been especially brave
this year, trying new things. He's getting to be so big standing next to his big brother.

I also got some not great news about Olivia's therapy. Her Sensory Processing Disorder continues to be a challenge. We're working everyday and she's getting better and better but, there is still a lot to go. Last year, we discovered that she had a connection with water. She would go under for a while and never be scared or cry. She would try to swim with little effort and not mind a bit floating on her back. Her therapy is coming to an end, though she still needs a lot of help. I've been trying to brainstorm ways I could help this little water baby and heard of a really cool thing called swim therapy.

 For sensory kids, swimming feels good on their skin. The pressure makes them feel great, and because she often has trouble controlling her muscles, the weightlessness of water allows her to be a graceful little fish. When there's not sun beating down on her face, she is quite content to be in the water for... well forever.

Because we live in Redding, there aren't a lot of options out there for sensory kids. In fact, there aren't any past age 3. So I applied for some funding at our local YMCA and researched how to do swim therapy on my own. Between Elijah and Olivia I've been doing kid therapy for 6 years. I was pretty sure I could hack it in the water and was determined not to let my baby girl slip through the cracks. Problem is.... we didn't qualify for funding. I have been pretty discouraged about it. Still not giving up, but feeling like I'm tired of fighting and nothing happening. It feels like punching underwater.

But still we press on. I'm considering several next steps. Possible fundraiser? Oh I hate asking for money. Maybe haggling with the manager? I'm not sure. The point is, it's been a summer full of happy times and also obstacles.

And here we are, back where we started. This is me, vowing to be more transperant about my life. My boring, mundane life. This is what life looks like with 3 kids, 2 of them struggling through disabilities. But we manage to make memories, and laugh and have good times together. This is my life.

Noah James turns 4!

Dear Noah:

Today you turn 4 years old. It's hard to believe that it has been that long since you have entered the world, and yet it feels like you've always been a part of my life; the moon that I have orbited. Before you existed, I like to say that there was a Noah shaped hole in my heart. God knew I needed laughter and giggles and someone to break the mold and get very muddy doing so. Your name means "Rest and comfort" and I have to say that's exactly what you brought to our family.

You love to laugh, and can be heard most days from the other side of the house squealing (some would say MUCH too loudly) and laughing. You are always saying something funny and joking around with someone. Right now you like to tell funny jokes that are one-liners like "Why did the monkey climb the tree?" and then you bust up laughing. You don't quite understand the timing of jokes, but you're so funny when you laugh at the ones you make up that everyone ends up laughing anyway.

You can't say your r's or l's properly, and it's still adorably cute. Especially when you talk about Legos (which, by the way, you have become quite fond of). "Mama, I weewy, weewy, wov wegos" is what you tell me, and I hope as long as I live I don't forget how you said it.

You love to be active, you ride a scooter like you're in the pro championships, and whip around corners and jump off of steps with it. It gives me a heart attack, but you do it with ease. You also love to play any kind of passing or kicking game, anything that involves a ball. But you haven't quite mastered the art of sharing, and you quite often end up taking the ball and running away from the other kids, or a ball of screaming rage when others won't pass the ball to you. But you are unmatched when it comes to wrestling, and while your brother has 2 years on you, he cannot beat you in a wrestling match. The two of you break out into wrestling matches all the livelong day. I have to say, it's a lot like watching the Discovery Channel and little baby bear cubs.

You are absolutely ruled by your tummy. As soon as you wake up you want to know what's for "bweckdast" and while you're eating that, you're asking what's for lunch. You're also entirely too pre-occupied with what I'm making for dinner which is both frustrating and comical. If you're ever mad or upset you can be easily persuaded at the mere mention of a snack or treat, it's incredibly cute and I'm wondering what my grocery bill will look like when you're a teenager!

But mostly, Noah James, you are a very thoughtful little boy. You and I spend our mornings together, alone, which suits you just fine. You love to ask me questions, and sing songs and you HATE being alone  (which I can totally relate to). I guess that's why you're a perfect fit as the middle child, because you always have someone to play with. You are a caring older brother to your sister, always helping her down, or bringing her a toy or washing her hands for me. And you're a very kind younger brother, always willing to help your big bro and you don't care one iota that he is different from you, you shrug it off immediately which just makes my heart melt. You and I understand each other in a way no one else does, and I am so blessed by our tight bond. I don't mind giving you the "Mama's Boy" title for a little while longer.

You are laughter, you are light, and you are comfort and love to this family; we would be so terribly boring without you stirring up trouble! I love you Noahboy, to the moon and back.

Love, your mama

Raising Prince Charming

Noah James Age 2: 

"Okay Mama, you be de pwincess and I be de pwince. You go to sweep and I kiss you but first I fight de dwagon and save you. Den you wake up and dance and we sing:I know you I walk wif you once pon a dweam. I know you de gweam in you eyes is so famiwar a gweam"

Noah, you are prince charming. You are my knight in shining armor, who protects me from dragons and sweeps me off my feet as we dance the night away at the ball. I don't know how you got in the habit of playing this game, but it's very real to you and you desire to be my prince charming all the time. My prayer is that you will not lose this desire. I pray that though girls will break your heart, or ignore you, or not even give you the time of day that you will never lose this charm. I pray that your father and I will be able to direct you on the path of righteousness and that with every year you will grow more and more gallant. I promise to teach you how to eat properly at a table and how to always put the toilet seat down so that your girlfriend can take you home to her parents and you can charm them too. Noah, the world (including the christian world) puts so much focus and emphasis in raising princesses. And I'm sorry for that because it's just as important to raise a prince and that's exactly what you are. I pray that when you grow up you will be a Godly man, full of integrity, wisdom and self control and that you will be just as delightful as the 2 year old prince charming I spend my days with now.

One day you will rescue a fair maiden and make her your princess, but until then I don't mind one bit keeping this title and all the kisses that come with it.

I love you so very much my prince charming. Love, your mama.