I don't know if we're going to make it.

Zack screamed and cried for a bottle for a little over an hour and a half last night.  He wailed, he was hysterical.  Mark and I took turns dealing with him and he did drink from a regular cup for a little bit, but he was out of his mind with anxiety.  Around 8:30, a full hour and a half after nighttime-medicine time, it dawns on me that I forgot to give him his Clonidine.  I just .... forgot somehow, at 7 when I gave the boys their other medications.  Zack had wanted lots of applesauce and I figured he was thirsty and applesauce is kind of watery.  And I was beginning to worry about the fact that he hadn't peed since the middle of the afternoon.  Only about 3 hours, but I was starting to think about that. 

Earlier in the day we'd been to the Harvest Party at Aliza's school and the boys didn't do well there.  Like an idiot, I marched them right into the classroom full of 2nd graders, and I tried to get them to sit in a corner with me, but within a few seconds Zack pinched someone, and I told him "no,", and he screamed, and it was one of those screams where everyone stopped what they were doing and looked over at us.....and later Aliza told me that embarrassed her, when Zack screamed like that in her classroom and I felt bad about that......and we were all so exhausted when we got home.  There was a lot going on all day, it was chaotic, and apparently I lost my mind.

I felt so bad when I realized I'd forgotten the Clonidine, the one thing that really calms him.  No wonder he was such a mess.  Within 20 minutes of having it, he relaxed and stopped wailing, finally, and went to bed.  Just about an hour later than usual for him.

But this morning he was up before 5:30, asking for a bottle, and I woke up with a jackhammer pounding in my head.  Way too little sleep for him last night.  I anticipate a rough day.  There's no school today, no therapy, he's with us all day with no breaks.  I'm not sure we're going to make it without bottles today.

Retake

The retake pictures are a million times better than the old ones.  Well, Zack's is.  AJ's picture isn't much different.  He's wearing his "somebody I don't know is talking to me and kinda freaking me out" look.

The old photos:

The retakes.  I'm not sure AJ's is actually an improvement.  But, you take what you can get, I guess.

School is going really well for the boys.  I don't get a great deal of notes from the school but there's usually a line or two about how their day went, at least.  Today, Zack's notes said this:

Looks like he might be getting desperate since we outlawed bottles around here -- hooray, progress!  Baby steps, but I'll take whatever we can get.

Earlier this week, AJ's notes were:

Um.  Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh....

Thanks?
I'm sorry?
Atta boy?
No seriously, I'll have a talk with him.  As soon as I can get him out from under the couch cushions.*

*(I don't know if anyone from the boys' school reads this, but if so, I'd like you to know we think they are doing really well there and we mean no offense by making fun of this note.  Actually, I should be thanking you for the great blog material.)

When Halloween met Winter -- Blizzard of 1991 and other Updates

Way way back in the day, when I was working nine to five (what a way to make a living!), three coworkers and I were discussing the Halloween Blizzard of 1991. 

One of us was recently married at the time, and didn't go out that night.  She remembers having a bowlful of candy and only three hardy, snow-covered trick-or-treaters.

Another of us was in college that year, and went to a Halloween party.  She remembers driving through the snowstorm to get to and from the party and it was treacherous, but it certainly didn't stop her from going.

A third of us took her two small children trick or treating that night, with warm coats and snow pants worn under their costumes.  They weren't happy about it, but there was really no choice that year.

The fourth of us was a little girl that year, and remembers going trick-or-treating with a coat and snowpants stuffed under her costume.  She wasn't happy about it either.

I won't tell which one was me, you'll have to guess.  I just thought it was neat that the four of us were not just in different places geographically, but in different places in our lives in 1991, and in our day-to-day lives we didn't really notice it at all, until we had one of those "where were you when...." moments.

Now you'll have Nine to Five going through your head the rest of the day, won't you?  Come on, sing it with me.

In other updates:

Not much progress to report on Operation no more Nipples.  Other than the fact that he cried and fought it a little less last night than he did the night before.  This morning he tried to climb the dishwasher again to get into the cabinet and make his own bottle.  Hoping to make some good headway this afternoon when his therapists are here to help him through it.  He's so pitiful lately, and even kind of angry.  The other day he got up at 6, his usual time, and came into our bedroom, padding along in his footy jammies in the dark.  He not only closed but then locked the door behind him as he came in and Mark says "uh oh, he's going to beat us up."  He's so funny when he's insanely tired!

All the Screaming

Zack's a tough guy.  He's not giving in easily.  AJ is worried about all the screaming.  He had his bottle of chocolate milk this morning and hasn't really drank anything the rest of the day.  He keeps picking up the sippy cups and saying "no?" and handing it over to one of us.  With his wide, tear-filled brown eyes.

{Pictured slightly smaller than usual and cropped to minimize view of cluttered kitchen.}

He tried to climb the dishwasher to reach the cabinet where he knows the bottles are kept.  When he had trouble keeping his footing on the edge of the dishwasher he put a hand on either side of it and tried his mightiest to yank it out from under the counter.  I worried for a few seconds he'd succeed; he is after all, the strongest 5-year-old alive (I proclaimed him that when I put a 40-pound sandbag in the toybox, along with 2 8-pound weights, to keep him from moving it, and he still maneuvered it across the room somehow.  That was back when he was 3, but I'm pretty sure the award would still stand.).  I started to take a picture of him trying to scale the countertop and he came over and screamed at me.

A little later Lily had the nerve to sit on the couch next to him.  He pulled her tail.  She swatted him right back.  He screamed as if he'd been mauled by a lion, rather than merely patted by a 5-pound declawed housecat.  He's a little sensitive right now.

Lily, by the way, has had her own problems this week.

She's better now.  She's mostly back to herself after her brawl with the neighbor cat.  I'll spare you the really gross picture of her oozing, gunky, leeching wound.  I won't spare you the adjectives, but I'll spare you the picture.  *smile*

It's Going to Happen This Week

1.  Zack is quitting bottles.  We're going to break him of the habit.  I've had it with washing bottle nipples and spending $5 on a set of new ones when he bites them apart.  AJ has been drinking from sippy cups for a few months now, it's time Zack caught up.  I'm making zero progress getting the kid potty trained, but I know I can help him break the bottle habit.  History:  Here's where the bottles-to-sippies transition began.  It continued here.  And yet again, here.  Here's where I talked about the potty training debacle.

2.  I'm going to sort through and file this pile of documents and papers on a shelf in the kitchen that needs to be filed.  It's all things from different doctors, teachers, therapists, counselors, etc. from the past few years.  I started out really organized with a filing cabinet with color-coded files, and a three-ring binder, everything.   Then one day I started piling things next to the filing cabinet, saying to myself I'll file this later....

Now that pile is about as high as your average kindergartener.

This week I'm going to sort through it.  What spurred on this need to reconcile my filing cabinet with the pile of papers?  Well, the Waisman Center in Madison, WI wants my boys to participate in a study about how kids with Fragile X learn language and gain speech skills.  And they need copies of the lab results showing the boys' diagnosis of Fragile X.  And I know they are somewhere in that pile of stuff.

Holland Schmolland

One of my favorite Fragile X mom bloggers, Kristin, recently posted this awesome story.  I read it and thought how in the world have I never seen this before?  I have mentioned here before how much I dislike the sing-songy Welcome to Holland.  I do like Welcome to Beirut, but I admit it's a little rough.  Holland Schmolland really says it all!

Holland Schmolland

by Laura Kreuger Crawford

If you have a special needs child, which I do, and if you troll the Internet for information, which I have done, you will come across a certain inspirational analogy. It goes like this:

Imagine that you are planning a trip to Italy. You read all the latest travel books, you consult with friends about what to pack, and you develop an elaborate itinerary for your glorious trip. The day arrives.

You board the plane and settle in with your in-flight magazine, dreaming of trattorias, gondola rides, and gelato. However when the plane lands you discover, much to your surprise, you are not in Italy -- you are in Holland. You are greatly dismayed at this abrupt and unexpected change in plans.

You rant and rave to the travel agency, but it does no good. You are stuck. After awhile, you tire of fighting and begin to look at what Holland has to offer. You notice the beautiful tulips, the kindly people in the wooden shoes, the french fries with mayonnaise, and you think, "This isn't exactly what I had planned, but it's not so bad. It's just different."

Having a child with special needs is supposed to be like this -- not any worse than having a typical child -- just different. When I read this my son was almost 3, completely non-verbal and was hitting me over 100 times a day. While I appreciated the intention of the story, I couldn't help but think, "Are they kidding? We're not in some peaceful country dotted with windmills. We are in a country under siege -- dodging bombs, boarding overloaded helicopters, bribing officials -- all the while thinking, "What happened to our beautiful life?"

That was five years ago.

My son is now 8 and though we have come to accept that he will always have autism, we no longer feel like citizens of a battle-torn nation. With the help of countless dedicated therapists and teachers, biological interventions, and an enormously supportive family, my son has become a fun-loving, affectionate boy with many endearing qualities and skills. In the process we've created . . . well . . . our own country, with its own unique traditions and customs.

It's not a war zone, but it's still not Holland. Let's call it Schmolland. In Schmolland, it's perfectly customary to lick walls, rub cold pieces of metal across your mouth and line up all your toys end-to-end. You can show affection by giving a "pointy chin." A "pointy chin" is when you act like you are going to hug someone and just when you are really close, you jam your chin into the other person's shoulder. For the person giving the "pointy chin" this feels really good, for the receiver, not so much -- but you get used to it.

For citizens of Schmolland, it is quite normal to repeat lines from videos to express emotion. If you are sad, you can look downcast and say, "Oh, Pongo." When mad or anxious, you might shout, "Snow can't stop me!" or "Duchess, kittens, come on!" Sometimes, "And now our feature presentation" says it all.

In Schmolland, there's not a lot to do, so our citizens find amusement wherever they can. Bouncing on the couch for hours, methodically pulling feathers out of down pillows, and laughing hysterically in bed at 4:00 a.m. are all traditional Schmutch pastimes.

The hard part of living in our country is dealing with people from other countries. We try to assimilate ourselves and mimic their customs, but we aren't always successful. It's perfectly understandable that an 8 year-old from Schmolland would steal a train from a toddler at the Thomas the Tank Engine Train Table at Barnes and Noble. But this is clearly not understandable or acceptable in other countries, and so we must drag our 8 year-old out of the store kicking and screaming, all the customers looking on with stark, pitying stares. But we ignore these looks and focus on the exit sign because we are a proud people.

Where we live it is not surprising when an 8 year-old boy reaches for the fleshy part of a woman's upper torso and says, "Do we touch boodoo?" We simply say, "No, we do not touch boodoo," and go on about our business. It's a bit more startling in other countries, however, and can cause all sorts of cross-cultural misunderstandings.

And, though most foreigners can get a drop of water on their pants and still carry on, this is intolerable to certain citizens in Schmolland, who insist that the pants must come off no matter where they are and regardless of whether another pair of pants is present.

Other families who have special needs children are familiar and comforting to us, yet are still separate entities. Together we make up a federation of countries, kind of like Scandinavia. Like a person from Denmark talking to a person from Norway (or in our case, someone from Schmenmark talking to someone from Schmorway.), we share enough similarities in our language and customs to understand each other, but conversations inevitably highlight the diversity of our traditions. "My child eats paper. Yesterday he ate a whole video box." "My daughter only eats four foods, all of them white." "We finally had to lock up the VCR because my child was obsessed with the rewind button." "My son wants to blow on everyone."

There is one thing we all agree on. We are a growing population. Ten years ago, 1 in 10,000 children had autism. Today the rate is approximately 1 in 250. Something is dreadfully wrong. Though the causes of the increase are still being hotly debated, a number of parents and professionals believe genetic predisposition has collided with too many environmental insults -- toxins, chemicals, antibiotics, vaccines -- to create immunological chaos in the nervous system of developing children. One medical journalist speculated these children are the proverbial "canary in the coal mine", here to alert us to the growing dangers in our environment.

While this is certainly not a view shared by all in the autism community, it feels true to me.

I hope that researchers discover the magic bullet we all so desperately crave. And I will never stop investigating new treatments and therapies that might help my son. But more and more my priorities are shifting from what "could be" to "what is." I look around this country my family has created, with all its unique customs, and it feels like home. For us, any time spent "nation building" is time well spent.

-- The End --

Temple Grandin - Living Proof of Early Intervention!

I overuse the word amazing.  I should save that word, I should check thesaurus.com for alternate choices.  Because the word amazing should be saved for experiences like I had last night.

Temple Grandin was speaking at Century College in White Bear Lake last night.  It was free.  My friend Christina and I decided we'd better go early in case it was mobbed, and was it ever!  Almost an hour before she was scheduled to speak, the place was packed with people.  The place was buzzing with anticipation.  About a half hour before the lecture they started filling rooms with people to watch it on closed circuit monitors.  They weren't even letting folks into the main room anymore, it was beyond standing room only.

She was selling and signing her books both before and after her lecture, and Christina and I were first in line to get ours' autographed.  When she signed my book, she asked me if I was a parent or educator, and I said I was a parent.  She asked me how old my children were and how they were doing, and of course I didn't have the wherewithall or nerve to talk about Fragile X, like perhaps I should have.  Like other mothers of Fragile X kids would have.  I wonder if she's heard of it.  I just said my boys were 5, and they were doing well, starting to talk more and more.  Then that was it, the line moved on.

She was so motivating.  It's so uplifting to see someone who had all the earmarks of severe autism as a child grow and blossom into a public speaker, writer, and just a hugely successful, honored, and loved person.  She is living proof of early intervention.  She is living proof that, with enough gentle encouragement even the most nonsocial, fixating, stimming autistic kid can grow to be a productive person!  Possibly one beyond our wildest dreams.

She's a success story in the autism world.  I'm in awe of her. 

You can still see a tiny bit of the autism characteristics in her.  You can see that socializing and mingling doesn't come naturally to her.  She's still working hard to fit into society.

After her lecture there was a question and answer period.  I didn't even try to ask a question, I guess I'm not all that social and outgoing either.  Besides, what I wanted to ask would have been way too personal for her, I think, and I would have been too embarrassed to ask it.

What I want to know is, is she happy?  Does she like her life?  Does she have family and friends?  Is she surrounded and cared for by people who love her, who she loves back?

I wonder how she would have answered.

The Last Hurrah

This past weekend I made Mark help me chase the kids around Minnehaha Falls to get some last-minute great fall pictures.  I think it's hopeless to expect to get a good shot by a professional, and I figure I can make them smile and look in the right direction as well as anyone else.  With my dear husband's help, of course.  Every honest photog knows they would be nothing without their assistants.  Unless of course, their subjects are willing and cooperative.

I'd never been to Minnehaha Falls, I've only seen other people's pictures from there, and it was exactly what I'd hoped it would be -- a place where, no matter where the kids run off to or which direction they turn, the background of the picture is gorgeous.  Some photographers don't like what the sun does to outdoor photos, but I don't agree.  I love the way the sun shines in their hair.

All the kids were very cooperative, but I bribe Aliza to guarantee her cooperation.  These pictures cost me $3.  And all I could think was, I bet Kelle at Enjoying the Small Things doesn't have to pay her daughter for cute pictures.  Maybe when her daughters get older she will have to, and she'll change her blog to Paying Off the Small Things (except she wouldn't, because she's not really sarcastic like that).  I've been bribing Aliza since she was 2.  Back then it only cost me a couple of candy corns.  But it was totally worth it.




Here she gives us a little ham.

Mark got our boys to smile and smile that day.

He is an excellent performer of Wiggles toons, and he knows a wide variety of Dora the Explorer songs and Wonder Pets.  He might be willing to do parties.  Let us know if you're interested in an audition and a quote.

Blogger is a little freaked out by either the number or size of these pictures, so I better conclude here before it crashes my laptop.  But there will be more, many many more....

Talking Zack

AJ is the superstar of speech advancement, lately.  My Zachary is a man of few words.

But the words he does say are meaningful, from the heart, and even show the little comedian blossoming in him.

Yesterday he came upstairs from the basement where he was having ABA therapy, and he outran his therapist by about a mile, shooting past the kitchen where he was supposed to be headed, darting up another flight of stairs and pounding down the hall to AJ's bedroom where he was having ABA therapy.  He slammed AJ's door shut.  Just call him Captain Subtle.

His therapist went upstairs after him, opened AJ's door, and Zack looked over at her, smiled, and said "heh-woh."

It strikes me that this might be one of those "you had to be there" instances.  Maybe you did have to be there to see the cute "you got me" smile and to hear his game show host tone of voice.  I actually wasn't there.  But I've seen the smile, and I've heard the tone of voice, so I can readily imagine how cute it was.

Yesterday Lily got into a cat fight in the backyard -- a neighbor's cat was back there and the two of them yowled and wrestled it out for a few minutes before we spotted them and I broke it up.  Lily seemed fine but she ran downstairs to hide, mostly, I think, just to nurse her wounded pride.  I let her be most of the afternoon but then decided I needed to make certain she was okay, so I ducked around the furnace and laundry area with a flashlight, calling her.  She's a cat that thinks she's a dog -- she usually comes when I call her.  So when she didn't come out and I couldn't even spot her...

anyway I digress.

Zack was back in his little orange chair learning how to "wait" 20 seconds (you can't imagine how hard it is for him to sit there and do absolutely nothing for 20 seconds), when I walked through the room.  I waved at him and he said "buh-bye, mom."  Crystal clearly.

I get so used to hearing babbley-chittery-mumblety-nonsense from these boys, and it's just a thrill to hear real, meaningful, appropriate, clear words come out of their mouths.  Words and phrases you'd hear from a typical boy.  Words that show that they are understanding what they hear, and know the right thing to say in the right situation.  Phrases that show they are getting more social and interactive with people.  All things I took for granted that kids learned, before I knew these boys.

And my AJ -- well he doesn't just watch Wiggles videos on You Tube anymore.  Today he played a Moose and Zee game on http://www.nickjr.com/ where he had to match up the lower case letter with the upper case letter.  And he could do it.  And he liked it.

Well he liked it, because after he played one round of the game, I let him go back to You Tube.  But only a few times did I have to point out to him which upper case letter went with which lower case one.  And he came back to play the game again, on his own accord.  I figure, if he's going to use the computer, might as well get him to play an interactive game with it so it's at least a little bit educational.

And now I have to go back downstairs and continue the search for Lily.  Haven't seen her in about 22 hours now.  Starting to worry about what I'll find when I do find her.

Autumn in our backyard

Sorry I'm late. It's my mom's fault.

Aliza was tardy today.  I hate that word.  It sounds so much more obscene than just saying "late."

She forgot her homework at school yesterday so I thought there was nothing for her to do last night.  But I forgot about the weekly spelling.

She is supposed to work on her spelling words every night.  I knew it, but I didn't realize that is actually homework she is required to turn in.  I thought it was just a friendly, helpful suggestion.  If she doesn't do her spelling homework, she has to stay in during recess and do it.  She enlightened me with this information this morning.

So this morning at the moment we are putting on shoes and jackets, she discovers we (and I say "we", because it's my job to help her remember to do homework, right?) forgot to do her spelling work.   Today it's word pyramids.  You know, like this:

"Dang nabbit!" I say in my continuing effort not to curse in front of the children.  Aliza looks soap-opera tragic; the tears begin to well up.  "All right, calm down, we'll sit and do them quick right now."

She whips out 10 word pyramids.  Then we look for shoes when suddenly she looks up and says "I can't wear jeans today.  We have gym and I can't run in jeans."  Which makes very little sense when I've seen her run in jeans plenty of times, I know it is possible....but arguing will take more time than changing.  So I find her some decent stretchy pants.

Do you think after this we could put on a pair of nice and easy slip-on crocs?  Of course not!  Tennis shoes, whose laces have to be loosened, then tightened again, then tied in double knots.  Easily a 4-minute effort.

We drive to school and I warn her I'm going to have to walk her in to the office because we are running late.  I avoid using the word "tardy."  It upsets us both.  I'm keenly aware that I haven't done my hair or makeup yet today and now I'm going to walk into the school office and see real people, but it can't be helped.

When we park and start to walk in to the school I quit worrying about my lack of neatened hair or made-up face, because I'm pretty sure my neon-green house shoes are going to draw more attention than anything else I might have going on.

It can only get better from here, right?

(This whole post is just an excuse to use these cool sticky notes I found at http://wigflip.com/superstickies/.)

An early morning at our house

It's 3:20 AM.

"Car.  Car.  Moo-sha. GREAT WALL!"  shouts AJ from his bedroom.

"AJ, quiet down!  You'll wake up the whole house."  I shout-whisper.  You know what I'm talking about.

"HI.  MOM."  Two separate words; AJ calls back as if I'm in a different wing of the house. As if our house has wings.

"Come in here and lay down with me."  I do that shout-whisper again.  AJ comes round the corner and into our room.

"Hi.  Hi.  Hmm.  Moo goo gai pan. Yeah.  HA!"  He comes over to the edge of the bed.  "Hi.  Mom.  Hi."  He's such a morning person.

Down the hall, Zack begins to whack his head on the wall.  Bang, bang, bang, bang......his way of saying, "you guys are waking me up!"  He's okay with that though.  Really he is, because he's a morning person too.

AJ hears his brother.  "Zack?  Zack.  Hi.  I, myna bah.  Tuna.  Juice?!"

"AJ, come on up here and lay down."

"Lay down.  High, Zeek!  Zeeeeeek!"  He shouts as he digs his elbow into my neck, climbing over me to lay down.

A few minutes later Mark gets up to give the boys their early morning dose of Clonidine.  Just a few drops keeps them asleep until 7 AM.  Sometimes.

He turns on the hall light and opens Zack's door just enough to squeeze through.  Zack squints, sits up, and says "All done?"  in his oh-so-cute falsetto.

"No, no.  No, no, no, no, no, not all done.  More sleeping."  Mark gives him his few drops of Clonidine and Zack lays back down.  Good boy.

Mark comes back to bed and gives AJ his few drops of miracle sleep agent.  AJ sits up.  "Zack?"

"No, Zack is sleeping."  I tell him.  "Lay down and go to sleep."

He repeats "lay down."  AJ lays his head down on mine.  Wiggles, squirms, and turns until his feet are on my head.  Then he's still.  I start to doze off.

SLAM!  Zack's come out of his room, slamming his door shut behind him.  He stomps down the hall.

AJ sits up.  "Zack?"

Zack pokes his head into our room.  "Pop?" (Zack-speak for, "I'd like to go to the basement and watch the intro to "Three Little Kittens" on my Pop Go The Wiggles DVD over and over and over.")

"No Zack, it's still nighttime."

AJ scrambles out of bed and there's no stopping them now.  Four little feet pound down the stairs.  They are up.  Mark and I do a quick round of Rock, Paper, Scissors to see who is getting up with the gruesome twosome.  I am the lucky winner.  Which is only fair, since Mark is the one who got up to get their medicine.

Time for some back-to-back Diegos.

 

School Pictures, and What Would You Do?

We are in the midst of an Indian Summer, so I've been forcing the kids to play outside as much as possible, before being outside requires lots of winter equipment.

Yesterday at the park, a kid came up to Zack & AJ and said "hey, you guys want to play tag?"  They just glanced at the kid and continued on their way up the jungle gym.  I watched from below, wondering whether I should say something.

What do you do when this happens?  Because it does, occasionally -- they look like ordinary little boys.  Climbing up the jungle gym, they move like ordinary boys.  But they won't answer strangers.  Most of the time they won't answer me.

Should I have intervened and explained them to this kid?  When they didn't acknowledge him, he continued on his way.  He didn't seem put out.  So I didn't do anything.  Actually I was thinking thank goodness Zack didn't bite him....

A few minutes later Zack did bite a little girl in the arm.  I hollered to get him to stop and he ran over to me, screaming a little, looking distressed.  I picked him up and held him.  We stayed for just a few minutes too long, I guess.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So the boys had their school pictures taken a couple of weeks ago, and I got them early this week.

You know how you can usually tell that a kid is "special needs" by their school picture?

Well, you can definitely tell in their pictures.  And I hate it.

I was going to scan them in to show you, but I am afraid Lifetouch will hunt me down and sue me.

I just don't know why this has to be so hard, though.  I mean look at all the pictures I take of them -- they are great smilers, aren't they?  Maybe this is why I don't go to professional photographers though.  Maybe this is why I spend money on a great camera for myself and don't let other people take pictures of my boys.  I want them protrayed as attractive and "normal" as possible.

But doesn't everybody throw away the bad pictures of their kids?  We all do it, don't we -- just keep the good pictures?  I'm not the only one who wants good pictures of my kids....

I could just refuse to buy any of them, but these pictures will be the ones in the yearbook.  These are the pictures that will represent my boys forever in the 2010-2011 yearbook.  I want people to see cute little blonde twins, and not wonder if something is not quite right with them, by the expressions on their faces.

I think I'll go to the school on picture retake day, and try to help the boys to smile and cooperate.  I don't know if it'll help, but I have to try.



Gratuitous nature shot, taken in our own backyard



I challenge you not to smile when you see this~








Hello Fall, You Gorgeous Thing You

After driving along and gasping at the beauty of all the trees, fall flowers, and brush for a couple of weeks, I finally stopped the car and took some pictures the past few days.  This is absolutely the most wonderful time of the year.  Christmas ain't got nothing on fall!

This weekend we spent a little time at my parent's house, a very rural setting where I can let the kids roam pretty freely and bask in the freshness of the crisp air.  And I use the term "bask" loosely, where the boys are concerned.  Aliza and our cousin Jocelyn are more than happy to run around outside and explore.  They definitely bask; but the boys take some coercing.  Once they are outside though, they follow Grandpa, Aliza, and each other around like little puppies.

I really hope these days of sunshine and brisk breezes and red, yellow, and orange trees and football and bonfires and dried corn husks and pumpkins and cozy sweatshirts lasts awhile.

The flooding this time of year is odd (why does flood rhyme with mud and not with mood, by the way?).  Isn't that only supposed to happen in the spring, when all the snow mounds melt?  We had a torrent of rain a few days ago, and rivers all over the place have gushed out of their banks.  Including the one behind my parent's house.

You might remember how I feel about August.  Well, September and October are my prize for surviving it.  I am energized by this weather.  This is my time.

I'm pretty sure my love of fall doesn't come from my mom.  She's a native Texan who gets the same energizing euphoria from temps in the mid-90's.  In other ways we are so alike though.  I wonder whether my kids will be lovers of the summer heat and humidity, or cool-blooded, like me?