Time marches on....

It's hard to believe that it has been almost three years since I last posted a blog. I was working on something and a memory was triggered about a blog I wrote a while ago and I thought I'd stop by this site and see what was here.

He's an update:

Pete is doing much better. He has some residual memory issues, but if you weren't living with him or worked as a speech therapist you would barely notice. He can get stuck on a thought or idea and its a struggle to get him off of it.... and when he tries to argue his point of view he can get easily turned around. But, he is so much better. His face is healed and his body is what it was before. The only way to tell that he had any eye damage is when he tries to roll his eyes like a teenager- since he will turn 20 in a few months I hope that completely goes away.

Dori has finished her degree at MSU. She entered the political arena and became a campaign manager in a local election. Everything was going great- until the candidate lost. I think it really broke her spirit. Dori gave up politics. It really isn't the time for Democrats and Dori just didn't want to get on the Republican bandwagon. She's done several other jobs, like waitressing, working for the Girl Scouts, selling Mary Kay and lately insurance. I don't think Dori has found her niche yet.... but she keeps looking- she will find it.

Dill is now 15. He is super bright but his social skills are a bit lacking. For example, last summer Pepper and I took him with us on a cruise. He completely refused to go to the teen center and only wanted to hang out with us or his dads. One day, he was sitting on a deck chair and a teenage girl about his age came up to him and asked his name. Dill, dropped his Sudoku book and looking at the ground stammered "yeah" and went back to his room. Later he said, there were 20 deck chairs to his right and 10 to his left.... why did she have to come to the one right beside him? - He said really it messed up his concentration for Sudoku!

Macy has made the most changes. In fact, I am changing Macy's Blog name. It is now Mack. Mack decided (or always knew) that being a female wasn't working. Mack has been taking testosterone for over a year and recently had a double mastectomy to help his outside look more like he feels it should. This was a hard change for Pepper and I to deal with, but we love Mack and want him to be happy- so we did. Mack seems happier and has big plans in restaurant management... maybe even a move to a bigger town.

Pepper and I are still plugging along. Pepper left the job she had for 20+ years to try something a little different. She is still doing speech, just in a hospital setting now. It means a little more money and different hours (she loves Fridays off!). Today I have a snow day and she doesn't..... she's not really a fan of that change!

Not sure I have a lot more to say, but maybe I'll get into blogging again. I'll try not to take 3 years to post something new....

Thanks for reading.

ilene

The Weather Boy

I remember the "My First Weather Station" thermometer we had in the kitchen when the kids were little. It had an image of a boy in the display that dressed according to the temperature. So when we first plugged it in and it was 80° the little fellow was wearing a bathing suit and a smile ready to dive in a swimming pool. As summer turned to fall the little guy moved from shorts into long pants. In late fall the temperature in Michigan dropped to 45° our little display was wearing a long coat, boots, scarf and wool cap.

At that point we lost all respect for our weather boy. In Michigan we don’t pull out the hat and gloves until it is at least freezing. And the long coat… at 45 degrees? The kids immediately changed his name to “wimp boy” instead of weather boy and every morning they all got up to check to see if he was overdressed. Poor kid, he just wasn’t used to our Michigan weather.

Working in a Consolidating School District

Each day I enter the school with confidence and determination.  I have done this job for 17 years. I know what to do.

Each day I step into my office ready to take on the pile of work I left yesterday and I am ready for the new challenges that will reach me on the phone… in a report… from a parent… from a teacher or a co-worker….from a small, distorted voice in the hall. I look forward to working with my students.

Each day I have a plan- Each day I am ready to teach

Each day I pray that I will make a difference

Lately, each day is harder than the one before…

I feel less confident that I will finish yesterday’s tasks

I feel less determination to take on new challenges

I feel over-whelmed by the phone

Reports

Parents

Teachers

Coworkers

Giant's lunch

As a group of kindergartners went into the lunch room I noticed the tray included chicken patties without a bun.

One of the kids also noticed what was on the tray and said to me, "Wow! We are having a giant people's chicken nugget!"

:)

Out of the mouth's of babes

At work my new student teacher has started working with a group of 1st graders. She brought in a Batman and Robin matching game that she found on the internet. The kids loved playing it and it was fun to listen to the conversations they had together, but this one is my favorite....

Student: I'm looking for Robin. He's Batman's wife.

Student teacher: You mean Robin is Batman's friend?

Student: No, actually we call them partners.... that is what they are. :)

Ned's Head

One of the games we played this week at school was “Ned’s Head” which is a game where the kids have to feel and identify all sorts of gross disgusting things in Ned’s head and match the card they pick out of a pile. These are things like a giant ant, a dirty old Q-tip, and the favorite of the boys in my group…. Ned’s used lunch. (A big plastic slab of vomit)

One item is a huge, decaying tooth. One of my students pulled this out and I said, “Wow! That is a big tooth! I bet the tooth fairy would give a lot of money for that!” The student considered this for a minute and said, “No, she wouldn’t”

I was surprised, so I asked why not. He said, “The Easter Bunny will give anything cuz he’s got lots of stuff he needs to get rid of, Santa only comes if you are good, but the Tooth Fairy is the smartest…. Fake tooth, fake money.” I love kindergartener logic. J

swim blonde

Pete is on the high school swim team..... and that means goin' blonde! At the beginning of the season all the boys dye their hair blonde then just before the last big meet they shave their whole head and possibly other body parts too..... since Pete is a freshmen we aren't exactly sure how involved that gets, but we will find out soon! Its hard to believe how fast this guy is growing up. It seems like just yesterday we were waiting for the kindergarten bus and taking off the training wheels-- now my boy and I can share a L'Oreal Excellence superior grey coverage hair color bottle. Dang, time sure does fly!!  :)

Conversation from School 2

Kindergartener crying outside of the lunch room. 

Substitute: "Why are you crying?"

"I forgot my lunch"

Substitute: "Oh no! How did you do that?"

"I wasn't hungry when I left this morning."

Conversations from School

"My Dad went to the Barbie Shop over the weekend but said I couldn't go.... I didn't even know my Dad liked Barbie's"

Kindergartener crying outside of the lunch room. 

Substitute: "Why are you crying?"

"I forgot my lunch"

Substitute: "Oh no! How did you do that?"

"I wasn't hungry when I left this morning."

Overheard...

Dill: (Just returning from swim practice and finding out all his siblings are busy and doing things he can’t do): I am grumpy. There is nothing to do.  

Pepper: Well, I am running to Target. Want to come with me?

Dill: But I don’t have any money to take to the store.

Pepper: Me either!!  :)

Overheard while standing in a Target line: "I'm not criticizing you, I'm telling you how to do it."

The Pantry Cleaning

The boys decided to clean the kitchen pantry and were very cute as they worked together. I let them do it the way they wanted with no input about how things went in. First they took everything out of the cupboard and wiped off all the shelves. They discussed how everything should be put back in (since everything was now spread all over the kitchen) The conversation went something like this:

Pete: "The top shelf is for water soluble things."

Dill: "Ok, here is some coffee, oh, and sugar that's water soluble"

Pete: "The next shelf is for pasta and noodle-type stuff"

Dill: "Where does onion dip powder go? Is it water soluble, Should it go on the top shelf?"

Pete: "No, its sour cream soluble.... it should go on the third shelf."

Dill: "What goes on the third shelf?"

Pete: "Miscellaneous"

When they came upon the tea selections, they decided that they were "water soluble".... except for English Breakfast Tea- that one went on the 4th shelf--- 'breakfast foods'. I may never find my flour or tea bags again.... but it was worth the entertainment!

Chips and dip

I am not sure when Pepper’s family started serving Chips and dip…. But I have no recollection of family events at Pepper’s parents house without them. I have been going over to their house since around 1986… and I can’t remember a single time. Pepper’s Mom has a special Chip and dip set that I believe had been a wedding gift. They always use that. My friend Sal has been searching second hand stores for years trying to find me one, but they are harder to find than you would think.

The dip is not a hard recipe… but there is a trick at the end that is important for optimal taste and flavor. It is basically a 16 oz container of sour cream (we use light… and 32 oz because we make a double batch) and 1 dry package of French onion soup mix. You carefully make a hole in the sour cream, pour in the envelope of onion powder and stir. To make this easy, you could pour both into a medium size container and mix, but we like to spare the dirty dish and love the challenge of not spilling the powder everywhere. The ‘trick’ I mentioned earlier is that this must be done the day before you are going to eat it. For the onions to actually un-dehydrate, they need time to soak. The pre-planning will be worth it. I’d like to note here that Pepper was in a play awhile ago where they talked about this recipe and added a “squirt” of lemon juice…. This is not needed and Pepper’s family likes it the way they have always made it.

A word about the chips. Since I mentioned that they like things the way they like them I will mention the potato chips here. I once thought that “wavy” type chips would be a great improvement because they could hold more dip and be stronger (to avoid breakage into the dip). This did not really go over well. Pepper’s mother and both brother’s commented negatively on the change. All implying that they had liked things the way they were. Did I mention they needed to be Lay’s potato chips? They do. And do not even think about skimping on this with store brand… they would know. As a side note- I have noticed that Pepper’s Mom moved to lightly salted Lay’s… this adjustment went pretty well.

My children have never known a trip to Nana and Grandpa’s house without chips and dip. That would never fly…. To them it would be like shoes without socks or television without sound- just unheard of! The adults are allowed to gather around the bowl and in a turn taking fashion, select a chip, dip then move slightly out of the way for someone else… it works well. (We’ve all had lots of practice) We had some issues with the kids dipping too heavily which either broke the chip in the dip, breaking everyone’s rhythm- or deep dipping, which meant the chip AND their fingers were covered in dip. This problem was solved by Nana providing individual cups of chip and dip for each of the kids. This solved the kid issues. Dori has graduated back to the chip and dip bowl, but Macy still likes hers separate- probably to avoid the whole turn taking situation. The boys do not seem to care…. as long as they can get refills!

Dinner with Dori

I went to spend the afternoon with Dori and saw all these bikes outside her dorm. There were more along the other side of the walkway too! We actually drove around town (rather than ride the bikes) and had a nice dinner. We passed a huge playground and park at one point and I asked her if she wanted me to pull over so we could try it out. She laughed... but 10 years ago she would have been thrilled. They grow up so fast!

Today's smile...

Student teacher reading "If You Give a Moose a Muffin" to kindergardeners....

Child (looking at a picture): Wow! That moose is so HORNY!!

Student Teacher (after the briefest of pauses): Maybe, but those are called antlers. :)

A Little Nudge

I think sometimes God knows when we need a little nudge. I was feeling a bit sorry for myself for a couple reasons yesterday and I think God wanted me to realize that I needed to get over it.

Every morning, when Pete heads out for the bus, I am awake but still laying in bed. As he walks by the bedroom to the front door he yells out “bye”. Then I hear the front door open, he shuffles out and then the door closes (although on a couple extra cold mornings it will blow back open and I have to get out of my warm bed to close it behind him!). He can see the bus coming down the road behind us so he does not even head out the door until its almost here. He does not wait outside long.

This morning was just like any other morning. I heard him yell “bye” then the door closed. About 90 seconds later I heard the loud screech of brakes and a sickening “thud!” I jumped out of bed faster than that guy in the stocking cap in that Christmas story when Santa lands on his roof. (I was kind of dressed like him too…. With bed head rather than the cap) Pepper, who was in the bathroom at that moment was half a second behind me.

It was completely dark outside. I ripped open the front door and called out Pete’s name. There were cars backed up around the bus in both directions and nothing was moving.  We both yelled out for Pete again. I couldn’t see anything and the silence was deafening. After about a minute, the bus driver yelled that Pete was on the bus and was fine. The car three cars behind the bus had run into the back of the one in front of it.  No one was hurt, thank God.

In those moments and the moments since I have realized that I have no reason to feel sorry for myself. I need to focus on the have and not the have not, the needs met and not the things I just wish for. I need to focus on what is really important and forget what isn’t. I have fantastic, healthy kids and for a few very harried minutes this morning I thought I lost one…. Thank you God for keeping them safe and for putting my thoughts back into perspective, I guess I needed the nudge.

Consequences

Today I went to the funeral of a co-workers daughter. I’ve been thinking about her a lot since I heard her 20 year-old daughter died in a car accident Saturday. For instance, just over a year ago, Dori was in a motorcycle accident that could have ended much worse than it did. Last weekend, Macy and Pete drove to a church event and sent a text when they arrived safely as we agreed. Dill went with friends this weekend climbing trees to set up a hunting stand 15 feet up a tree.

Last Sunday, while we were enjoying a family dinner with B&D then Skyping with Dori…. this co-worker was planning her daughter’s funeral. It’s hard to let children grow up and become more independent and make their own mistakes. Some consequences are just too huge…. Too permanent.

Macy had some friends at her swim meet tonight. They are a young couple from our church with three young children. I watched the Mom hold one of the kids hand as they walked up the stairs to keep him from falling and the Dad put his hand on the back of another one’s head when he almost bumped a railing. After they left, Macy asked Pepper and I if we missed having young kids. I thought about how much easier it is to keep them safe when they are always in sight. I thought about a commercial for toilet tissue I once saw on TV where a Mom wraps her child in toilet paper before allowing him to get on a bike. At the time, I thought the commercial was ridiculous…. But now, I can see the desire to keep growing kids safe. 

Today, another person at the funeral shook her head and whispered to me when she saw the co-worker barely holding it together: “There but for the grace of God go I” she said. Pepper mentioned later that I always seem to know what to say to people in these situations (like funerals and hospital visits) and it surprised me, because I always just say what I feel. When the co-worker hugged me and thanked me for coming I simply said, “No one should ever have to bury their child. I am so sorry you have to do this.”

“If you were my child, I would staple you to your bedroom wall.”

 ~Myra McEntire, Hourglass

We The People...

My new student teacher today had a little boy say to her, "My Dad said today is Prostitution Day!"

She was speechless and just stared at him a minute when I broke in and said, "You're right! It is Constitution Day!!"

She seemed very relieved that I jumped in to translate!!  :)

The Clean House

Following a Saturday morning of full tilt cleaning by everyone.....

Dill: Wow.... Our house is so clean!

Pepper: Yes, wouldn't it be nice if we all kept the house clean all the time?!!

Pete: Naw, then we'd have nothing to do the day before Nana came over.

:)

The Baby Dream

Last night I dreamed that we had a baby. This is a surprise to me on a couple different levels. First, I never remember my dreams and this one was vivid. My whole family was there waiting to meet my new baby. We were at my Uncle Jerry and Aunt Sue’s house. Everyone from our old annual family clambake was there. My grandmother who recently died and my grandfather who died 20 years ago were there with matching blue and white striped shirts on that said “Mexican Hotel” .  I have no idea why their shirts would say that but in the dream I did not think to ask. Aunts and uncles and cousins I haven’t seen in years were all hanging out at the house and looked happy ~none of them aged a bit.

The baby itself was quite a surprise. Besides the fact that I wasn’t trying to have a baby and am at this point to old take on such a huge endeavor....she talked to me on the way out of the hospital! I am holding her as we were going down in the elevator, she was quiet so only I seemed to hear her but she said the numbers that lit up as we headed down. “Seven, six, five, four, three, two, one…. Bye, bye”  Then as we walked to the car she was telling me that she was very excited to meet the rest of the family. When we got to the car I sat down in the backseat and explained to her that I was a speech therapist so I knew that she should not be talking yet. She was just too young. She rolled her eyes at me like the most skilled teenager and told me the car seat I was putting her into was just too ‘strappy’. Yeah…. we’re so done having kids.

Staycation- Part 1

Our plan at Christmas had been to head out east and spend time on the coast this July. We had discussed Maine, and Boston and New York. But, due to finances and schedules, by June we decided to change it into a “staycation”. We planned quick day trips and things to do from home.

The staycation got off to a bit of a rocky start.... The kids had differing schedules and places they had to be, the guys were waiting for a fence to be installed and I had to work 2 mornings that no one else did. 

Monday, Dill had a stomach flu and the local news said the temps would be in the high 90’s- low 100’s all week. 

Tuesday started with me getting whacked in the face with a block by a student at work and then dropping a bocce ball on my foot. Had a great dinner cooked by Dad B&D tho.... things started looking up.

Wednesday was better with a trip to a water park (although it was hot and we accidentally brought our whiny kids… rather than the fun ones!) followed by a picnic and movies. (Amazing Spiderman…. Pretty good, biggest complaint was everyone had slight sunburns).

Thursday we went to Put in Bay. No one but me had been there before. The last time I was there was 1984. I was a little stressed that it would not be the way I remembered it…. Or would just be really lame! No worries though, everyone had fun. There was something for all of us. Caves to explore, wineries, golf carts to drive, free fishing, ice cream, cute shops, flush toilets, a boat ride and a fantastic breeze off the lake that made it feel cooler than it really was.

Today is Friday, the plan today is hanging around the house watching cartoons and movies, playing games and enjoying the A/C (temp was 92 by 10 AM… high expected to reach 102 degrees). For dinner we are doing a mystery meal. Each of the kids has teamed up with a parent to make a portion of tonight's family meal. Pete and I- appetizer, Dill and Dad D- Main dish, Macy and Dad B- side dishes, Dori and Pepper- Dessert/beverage. The rules- no one can tell any other team what they are making and it has to be something no one on the team has made before. The biggest feat will be sharing the kitchen! 

J