The Culprit

The reason I am not a good blogger anymore:

Facebook.

It is so much easier to just type out one or two sentences and let people know what's going on in your life. Easier than typing out a narrative. So to catch you up (all 4 of you that read this) I have compiled a random sampling of my facebook statuses since my last post. It pretty much sums up what has been going on in our lives.

June 20

10 years ago today, Matt and I were about to embark on a terrifying 106 day journey. We had no idea just how amazing that journey would be!

June 21

I have one very excited little girl reading a new book on her new Kindle.

I can't complain about all this rain...saves me from having to keep moving the sprinkler on the new sod!

June 22

A remake of Footloose??? Really!!!

Clean house. Full belly. Good Will Hunting on tv. Breeze coming through the windows. Me lounging on the couch. I love summer break.

June 24

Getting everything ready for the sleepover!!

June 25

‎*YAWN*

June 26

12 years ago I married the greatest guy in the world. Happy anniversary Matt! I love you!

June 27

Caitlyn has her first black eye. That's what happens when you run through a sprinkler and hit your friends head with your face.

June 29

I hate you insomnia. That is all.

While packing for the lake, Caitlyn says:
"Sometimes I think we take moms for granted."
From the mouths of babes!!

June 30

Waupaca bound...

July 7

Making our way home from the lake. I have one worn out little girl on my hands. That's what happens when you swim from sun up till sun down I guess!

July 9

Getting my girl ready for her Girl Scout camping trip! I think I'm going to miss her more than she will miss me!

July 10

Driving my girl to camp :/

July 12

Having a "mole" (by the name of Michelle Tatela aka Nurse) has eased my separation anxiety tremendously!! I am the lucky mom getting updates on activities, photos, and even a video of my kid doing the Macarena periodically.

July 14

Oy Vey!!! I certainly have my work cut out for me here :/

July 15

Had a wonderful sleep last night. Now, work for the day and then....I get to see my girl!!!!!

July 19

It's DynaVox, not DynaBox. It's the little things that have a tendency to push me right over the edge!

July 20

It's gonna be a hot one today folks!!

July 24

Was going to cook dinner, then decided against it. Going to Chipotle instead.....mmmmmmmm

July 25

After watching the news this morning, it doesn't look like I'll be turning my AC off this week either :/

July 26

Listening to Cait talk to the dentist cracks me up!! The conversations she has when she doesn't know I'm listening LOL

No cavities for Caitlyn! Love hearing that from the dentist (mainly cause it just saves me money). Aaaaaand....she may not need braces afterall; maybe just a tray or a retainer. Will know for sure after the next visit in January!

July 27

Caitlyn just asked me if we could watch a Lifetime movie and take a nap in my bed. Man I love my kid!

July29

Think I have an ear infection :/

July 30

I love that Caitlyn still asks me to read to her before she goes to bed. Tonight's book of choice was 'Don't Let the Pigeon Stay Up Late' by Mo Willems.

I Have Returned

And I am going to try and stay returned. That is, unless life happens to get in the way....again!

Lots going on around our house these days. So I won't go into all of the gory details, rather I will just do a small recap.

1. There was a few weeks in March where we ended up with loads of rain. Lots of that rain somehow ended up in my basement. This has never happened to us before so we just assumed it was the catch basin in the back that needed to be cleaned. That turned out to be fine. However, the pipes under our lawn were not so fine and needed to be replaced. To the tune of $6700. And of course, they don't replace the lawn they damage in the process. Feels like the front porch drama all over again.




2. Caitlyn had her spring concert. It was very cute. They sang a song called Take me Out of the Bathtub to the tune of Take Me Out to the Ballgame. I am going to attempt to put a video up here. So please be patient with me while I demonstrate my lack of technology skills.


3. Matt and I flew to Oregon for Carla's wedding. We had a great time. I forget just how green everything is out there. Just so pretty.

4. I am currently in 2 classes again this term. One of which is Assistive Technology. This is the class that I tried my damnedest to get an exempt from. All to no avail. I could probably teach the class, so I think it's so silly that I have to take it. I don't mind being in the class. But I do mind paying the close to $2000 that it costs to do so. I am also in a research class. This is an online class (which I am not a fan of to begin with) and the research paper is to be completed as a group (another thing which I am not so big on). I am convinced this class is going to completely wipe me out this term. I am am just thanking God that I am taking it now right before summer break. So I will have some good down time after it's over.

5. Work is absolutely insane. I constantly feel like I am behind on everything and can't seem to catch up. No matter how hard I try. I am convinced it is because of the person that I am working with. No matter though. She will be gone at the end of this year. So I just try to keep telling myself that I am almost through it.

6. I managed to pass the Learning Behavior Specialist I test. My paper work is now sitting at ISBE waiting for them to approve everything and include that endorsement on my certificate. Hopefully it will happen soon as I have once again been riffed. Same situation as last year. Only this time, there is light at the end of the tunnel and this process is almost over. At least I hope. If not, I will in fact be a greeter at a Wal**Mart near you. So keep your eyes open for me.

7. Caitlyn is making her communion in 2 weeks on May 2nd! The dress and shoes and tights have been purchased. We are going for the veil/headpiece this weekend, and hopefully the banner will be made by Friday night. We have not yet started the banner, because I am a bad mom. But it will be made by it's due date of Friday.

8. Report cards came out and Caitlyn went from A's to B's in a few subjects. So she is beside herself about this. She can't even tolerate that she got a B. No matter how I try to explain to her that it still means she did incredibly well, this child is bound and determined to get straight A's!

9. Hip Hop is finishing up and we have the recital coming up at the end of May. So we are gearing up and practicing like crazy in the living room.

I think that's about all. I can't even believe how busy we feel these days. There just don't seem to be enough hours in the day to get everything done that needs to be accomplished. Hopefully once I am done with school, things will settle down some and we can all relax for a bit.

Progress Reports

Progress reports came home from school on Friday. Caitlyn has amazed me once again. She has all A's right now in her subjects which is fantastic. But that's not the part that amazed me. They are doing DIBLES testing again, it was done earlier in September. They don't look at as many categories as they did last year; this year they only look at nonsense word fluency and oral reading fluency.

Benchmark for nonsense word fluency is 50 words per minute. Caitlyn is reading 54. So she is meeting the benchmark.

Benchmark for oral reading fluency is 44 words per minute. Caitlyn is reading 98. 98!!!!!! The benchmark for June is 90. The average words per minute read by a third grader is between 100-110. To say I am stunned is an understatement. This kid is cruising along in the area of reading. And what's even more amazing is not that she reads at this level. Cause we all know decoding words isn't the most important part of reading. What's important is whether or not you can comprehend what you have read. And lo and behold, she is.

On Thursday last week, she read her first chapter book completely on her own. She was so very proud of herself for reading a book that had close to 100 pages. And I think her mom is pretty stinkin proud of her too. Then over the weekend, she read another chapter book. So now she is all gung ho to go through her bookshelf and clean out the books that are just too easy for her. And I am all about that seeing as we have books crammed in every nook and cranny of that shelf and 2 tubs full of them as well. Now I need to figure out what to do with all of them.

In other news, Matt's football team is tied for first place in his conference. He is playing the team he is tied with on Friday. So any good vibes you can send on over to Chicago would be spectacular. I would love for him to win his conference.

My school district has signed a new contract. So there will be no striking for us. Thank goodness. Things are crazy there as usual. Though it seems to be a much calmer year than it was last year. We had a couple "high profile" kids leave at the end of last year, so I think that's the reason.

As for my master's program, I have 2 really intense classes this term. One of the classes is online and I swear it is more work than the classes I sit in class for. The class that I have on Thursday is a huge amount of work. And I am convinced the instructor doesn't like me. Which is fine with me, so long as I can manage to get through until December and get the credit for the class. I currently have a 4.0 going and I would like to keep it that way. Let's just hope that the fact that this woman doesn't like me doesn't interfere with that ;)

Caitlyn is leaving for Atlanta on Saturday for a couple of days. She is going there with Rita to visit Jimmy. She is ecstatic about it and has been counting down the days for weeks. I am a little nervous though. Not because she will be away for 2 days in a different state. That happens all the time in the summer when she heads up to Wisconsin with Matt or Rita. What I am nervous about is not being on the plane with her. She isn't afraid of flying, she enjoys it actually. I just worry that if something were to happen, that I wouldn't be there to comfort her. I am sure it will all be fine and she will have a wonderful flight, but it scares me a bit.

Really?!?!?!?

Has it been over a month? Ok, so the reason that I haven't posted any updates is because......yeah, I have no excuse whatsoever. Other than the fact that the girl and I were enjoying all of our summer days together. It was fabulous. Splendid. Exhausting. We went on vacation to the lake a couple more times. Slept in a bunch of days. Swam at mom's in the pool. Went to the park. Pulled weeds in the yard. And just had an overall fantastic time.

And now we are back to the real world of school and homework and work and dance classes and brownies and team meetings and IEP meetings and football practice and football games. It's never ending and I remember why I love summer months so much every August/September when we arrive in this place once again. So here is a recap of the last week as it has been probably the most eventful of the summer (how is that even possible?).

I returned to work last Monday. All was going wonderful until 2:00 when I received an email from the admin office saying I had to stop by there to pick up a letter that was delivered for me. It came certified mail and was from a law office. Yeah. Fun. Turns out it is a subpeona for a deposition. I will not (and can not) go into details here about what it involves, but needless to say, it completely sucks. So happy first day of school for me. We are now done with the first week, and things are in full swing. Almost to the point that it seems I never left for 2 1/2 months.

Matt's team has been furiously practicing and managed to win their first game on Saturday. It was a really good game and his team looks great this year. So hopefully he will have a good season. Because we all know that Matt having a good season also equates to a happy husband, wife, and household.

Caitlyn is fantastic. She is wearing her glasses like a champ and loves wearing them. The most exciting thing that happened to her this summer is that she had a tooth knocked out. Yes, you read that right. My little lady who is always the girliest girl on the block, managed to get her tooth knocked right out of her mouth. She was swimming in the pool on Sunday and she and all the kids were splashing around like crazy and she got hit in the mouth. We didn't know right away that her tooth was missing until she started laughing and had blood all over her teeth. Gross, I know. The funniest part of the story is that one of the other little girls there said she was going to find the tooth. I shrugged it off, because it was a baby tooth in a big pool that had a blue and white speckled liner. Lo and behold that child came up about 47 seconds later with the damn tooth in her hand. Caitlyn was a trooper about the whole thing and was thrilled to learn that the tooth fairy leaves more money for teeth that are knocked out as opposed to those that fall out naturally. Thanks Mom.

Today was the first day of second grade. Holy smoke.....did you read that right??? SECOND GRADE!!!! How in the hell did that happen? She is excited and yet very nervous. She knows that things pick up in second grade and that more is required of her. I am sure she will be just fine cause she is the smartest little second grader that I have ever met (not that I am biased or anything). She looked so mature to me when I took the picture. We have let her bangs grow out this summer and they have gotten quite long. And a few weeks ago we went and got her hair cut much shorter than we usually keep it. And now she just looks like a "kid." Not a little kid anymore, a full blown kid.

And finally, for your viewing pleasure, first day of school pics with her glasses:

Playing Catch Up

Sorry for the absence. Once Caitlyn's birthday hit, we were busy busy busy. We had her party with her friends at a place in the mall that is similar to Build A Bear, only way cheaper and just as good. The following day we had family at the house for a BBQ. Once we were settled from the parties, we went to the cottage in Wisconsin with Grandma and Auntie Mary and her boys. Caitlyn had a ball tubing once again this year and swimming was a bit hit again.

In between the events we had a couple really hot days where we didn't go to Grandma Linda's to swim so we played in the sprinkler in the back. Well, Caitlyn played in the sprinkler while I pulled weeds. Then we had Matt's graduation ceremony for his Master's. Which he had no intention of attending until I pretty much forced him to.

Caitlyn picked out the song for the montage. It is currently one of her favorites :)

Rather than posting all of the pictures individually, here they are in a montage. Enjoy :)

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Another Tooth is Gone

Number 6. And of those 6, only 2 have actually grown back.

Caitlyn came into my room on Monday morning at 3:30 hollering for me. I truly thought she was bleeding profusely, she was so hysterical. Turns out she woke up to go to the bathroom. While on the toilet, she tried to wiggle her loose tooth with her tongue, and the tooth popped off and got stuck on her tongue. Sounds funny, I know. But what else should she be doing when she is on the potty at 3:30 in the morning but wiggling her loose tooth? When she finally got it unstuck, that's when she hollered for me.

I told her that it was too late for the tooth fairy to come now and that we would put the tooth under her pillow that night. Mainly because my lazy ass wasn't looking for the tooth fairy pillow and waiting for her to go back to sleep so that I could put money in it.

About these teeth that haven't grown in, it's the oddest thing really. The dentist tells me that as long as they are under the gums there is no need to worry. He said that they could possibly take a year or more to come in. She lost one front tooth in June and the other in August. So we are approaching that year mark soon. But the interesting thing is that they are breaking through her gums, just not where you would expect them too. They are coming through on the top. It's kind of hard to explain, I will try to get a picture up here soon. Needless to say, I am almost certain that this kid is going to need braces. Her mouth just looks way too jacked up not to need them. Time will tell. We have our 6 month visit to Dr. Mike coming soon, and Caitlyn has to have xrays done. So that will be helpful in telling us what in the world is going on.

Matt is healing nicely. He is very itch from his brazilian because it is starting to grow back in now. Hopefully he will be back t normal in a few days.

And finally.....the countdown begins.....22 days of school left for me. WOOT!!!! I may do about 5 or 6 days of summer school, but that is it. This will be one of the first summers that I actually have the entire summer off. It really makes the countdown that much more meaningful for me :)

Long Weekend

It's weird looking at your husband knowing that in a few months he will be completely sterile. Very weird. I think it's certainly going to take some time to get used to it.

I stayed home with Matt on Thursday (obviously) and I took Friday off as well. Last week, Matt had said that he was probably going to go golfing on Friday since he had already taken the day off. I told him he was crazy. That there was no way he was going to be able to golf. That he would be far too sore for that. He basically told me that I didn't know what I was talking about. Guess what? He was far too sore to do much of anything on Friday, let alone golf. He even admitted that I was right. I love those moments.

I was able to get a load of work done for school while he was sleeping most of the day and Caitlyn was at school. I have done all the research and written an outline (with the exception of 2 small parts) for the entire project. It isn't due until the 21st, but I wanted to get the bulk of it done because I have 2 other projects due around that same time. So I am trying to stay on top of things here. Now all I have to do is type the information out and administer the test/evaluation that I was critiquing. Both of those things re relatively simple.

That means I can start one of the other projects this week. The one I am planning on starting is just a reflections journal on some observations that I had to do. So it's pretty simple. Which is why I did the test critique first as that one is more difficult.

I also was able to complete my financial aid forms. (Like they're really going to give me any damn money?) I know I won't be getting financial assistance based on our income. But you have to apply for it in order to apply for student loans. Which is how we are going to have to pay for this whole thing. My district does have tuition reimbursement. However, you have to pay up front, complete the class, turn in your grades, and then they will reimburse you. In OCTOBER! They only reimburse in October. That's the craziest thing I have ever heard of. But whatever, I will try to get the loans and then it will be nice treat for me come October when I do get the money back. The shitty thing about it is, we have paid off all of our student loans from undergrad. Long ago we managed to pay them off. And now we will be swimming in them again. Such is life, I suppose it will pay off in the long run.

Here's a funny. I am 5 weeks into the term, and I just got my acceptance letter to the school yesterday. Bizarre.

No new Caitlyn news this weekend. She has another loose tooth. When this one decides to fall out, she will have already lost 6 teeth. Mind you, only 2 of those have grown in. The poor kid has gaping holes all over her damn mouth. Matt and I are going to start saving for the braces now. Cause we know they are in our future. No doubt.

Beginning to plan the birthday party. 7 folks! 7!!! It's weird to me when people ask me how old my daughter is and I have to tell them that she will be 7 next month. It's very strange to hear me say that to other people. Good lord the kid is making her way to double digits quickly.

It's Done

And I'm not really sure I how feel about it. Obviously, I have to be okay with it, because there is no going back now. But once the doctor came in and they started to wheel Matt's gurney out of the room, I left the hospital to go outside. Once in the car, I cried. I didn't realize until the moment they were taking him away just how much I would be effected by it. In the midst of my crying, I cursed my body for crapping out on us 3 times. 3!! Granted, I got an amazing kid out of one of those times. But it crapped out that time none the less.

I called my best friend and told her how sad I was. Amazingly, she was wide awake at 8:30 in the morning. Which is unheard of. And she listened to me and made me feel better. Hearing myself tell her the reasons why this was the best decision for my family helped me to know for sure that it was.

But damn it, it really sucks. And it hurts.

Enough of the pity party. Matt is doing great. He is in quite a bit of pain. And he is pretty swollen. But overall, he feels really good.

Caitlyn thinks he has a stomach ache and that we went to the hospital for blood work. She is none the wiser, and doesn't need to be. She would never be able to understand this at her age.

On that note....here are some pictures of my amazingly beautiful daughter. Could she be any more gorgeous??

Tomorrow is the big day

Matt is going in for surgery at 6:30 tomorrow morning.

I am so torn with this decision. I guess I just hate the finality of it. While I know that it is in the best interest of my little family to have this done, it's just such a hard thing to let go of completely. I would probably be more comfortable with the decision if we had 2 or 3 children and those pregnancies were all well and good. But when you have a life threatening condition that forces you to give birth to a 25 weeker, and then go on to have 2 more miscarriages, I think it's safe to assume that the odds are just stacked up against us.

What I keep telling myself is that I can't tempt fate. We are so incredibly lucky with Caitlyn's developmental outcome that I often fear if we were to have another preemie, our luck wouldn't be the same. One of the biggest reasons that I believe this is the right decision for us though is because of Caitlyn. If we were to have another pregnancy and I became as ill as I was with Caitlyn, I don't want to even imagine the pain and suffering that would cause my baby girl. And if for some reason I were to die because of that pregnancy, I don't know what it would do to her. Her whole life would be turned upside down and inside out. Because of that, I know this is absolutely the right thing to do for our family.

Caitlyn has no idea what I am taking Matt to the hospital for. I have told her that it is because he has to have some blood work done. And because of that, he can't eat or take his insulin. So to make sure that he doesn't go low on the way there, I am driving him. While she is accepting this explanation, I don't know how much she is buying it. She has always been quite the intuitive little girl, and when I give her these reasons, she looks at me almost as if she is thinking, "I'll pretend like I believe you, but I know there is something much bigger going on here."

In recent months, Cate has started saying that she doesn't want a brother or sister. That she is perfectly content being an only child. I think the fact that she has begun to formulate relationships outside of school and she spends time on the phone with her friends and she goes to their houses, etc, she has learned that she doesn't need a sibling in order to have a playmate. Which is what I think her logic has been in the past. Not to mention the fact that this kid can clearly see how much more spoiled she is by being the only child and the only grandchild on my side of he family ;) She is a quick study that kid! So I don't worry about her not having siblings. She has plenty of cousins and extended family through close family friends that I think they can fill that void for her; as much as it can be filled.

So wish us luck. Actually, just Matt since he is the one who will be having the procedure done. I just need the luck to deal with him for the next few days. He needs much of the luck because he is still going on about this Brazilian thing and is none too pleased about it.

The Winter Break is Over

And we are all back at school and work this morning. It was hell getting up at 6:00am considering that we have all been sleeping until about 10ish everyday. It was also hell trying to fall asleep before midnight last night. Not only for Matt and I, but for the girl as well. But we all managed to make it to our destinations on time this morning.

Over the break, here is what was accomplished:

1. Bssement furniture moved to make space more functional.
Despite this being Matt's "domain" I had decided that the space was just not being used very effectively. With Matt grumbling the entire time, the furniture was moved and the space is now much more effective for everyone to use. (With Matt's permission of course.)

2. Closets in basement cleaned out as well as some of the utility space in the basement.
It would appear that this time spent cleaning was all about the basement! But that's because it needed it. We have a huge storage bin that is built into the basement that spans the width of the house. Perfect for storing things like Christmas decorations and Halloween decor. Which also makes it perfect for storing nothing but crap. Which is what has happened in the last 4 years. So that storage bin was cleaned out.
We also have a row of closets down there that is perfect for hanging extra coats and storing things like wrapping paper and such. While we had those things in there, we also had a load of other crap that needed to be purged.

3. I managed to read 3 novels (they were all parts of a trilogy).
I forget how much I love reading until I am able to just sit down and completely devour a book. Which is precisely what I did after New Year's. The books I read were Uglies, Pretties, and Specials. They were written by Scott Westerfeld. The genre is sooo not what I normally read. But I was intrigued by the first one and found myself back at the bookstore to buy the second and third in the series. There is a fourth, and I read the blurb for it, but I am not so sure that I woudl enjoy it as much as I did the first 3. So I haven't decided if I am going to purchase it or not.

4. Portion of the garage cleaned out.
Our garage is a dumping ground. Literally. We put anything and everything in that stupid garage. And the garage itself is a piece of shit. We had a really bad wind storm over break and the shingles were actually flying off of the roof into our yard and into the alley. So Matt was up on the roof on Christmas Eve replacing the stupid thing.
Because the garage is such a piece of shit, we have to try and salvage what we can of it, even if that means patch up after patch up. We just don't have the money right now to replace an entire garage.
So as we were putting away the Christmas decor, some of which is stored in the rafters of the garage, I got the bug to start throwing a bunch of things away in there. I tossed the baby swing, a few bags of clothes, and some random stuff that I found in corners coverd with things I can not identify, nor do I want to.

5. Purchased and set up wireless internet and set up Caitlyn to have access to the internet.
Matt and I often want to be online at the same time when we are home. When you have to have the computer plugged in, it can't work. So we bought ourselves wireless for Christmas and set it up. Which was surprisingly easy. So now, Matt can sit in the basement and do his homework and such and I can sit upstairs and play backgammon.
Caitlyn is also wanting to be on the internet quite a lot lately. She has her Webkinz World subscription and she loves going to her school's website as they have links to other websites that she can go to. I have been letting her use my log in, but I wanted to be able to restrict certain things for her so I had to set up her own email account. Which she is head over heels thrilled about. She is terribly excited that she may actually get email from someone! So I have to send her an email this afternoon so that she will feel all special when she gets home from school. If anyone else (that I know of course) would like to send her an email let me know and I will pass along her email address to you.

6. Purchased the new car that we have been waiting for!
The van was paid in full last month, so we went out and bought the Dodge Charger that we have been wanting for over a year now. Matt is way too excited about this car. I have the feeling that he may be recieving a few speeding tickets this summer ;)

And now we are all back to our normal routines. Which I am kind of glad for.