Time of Discovery

The latter part of March and beginning of April have been dubbed by the preschool teachers, "The Time of Discovery". They mentioned this to the husband one day and it's really true.

Suddenly, all the children in Fellan's class "get it". They get everything. They're totally comfortable at school and with the friendships they've made throughout the year. They're just amazing little creatures and I feel so lucky to be able to be a part of this school and see such growth of character from 4-year-olds.

One of the things that Fellan has suddenly "gotten" is the ability to swing. By himself. He no longer requires pushes from us.

This is a huge, huge thing for him. Swinging is, by far, his most favoritist thing ever to do. If given the opportunity, he would swing for over an hour and not play on any other equipment at any given park.

And so, in an attempt to save our sore arms, we have tried ever since he started using the "big kid swings" to teach him how to pump his legs. "Straighten! Pull 'Em Back! Straighten! Pull 'Em Back!"

Apparently, one of these teaching episodes must have been quite memorable (I'm hoping it was due to the loving supportiveness of my instruction) and now if you ask him who taught him to swing by himself, his answer is always, "Mommy!" Poor Daddy never gets any credit... :)

Runnin' Back Shoes

For those of you who don't know me, I'm not much of a girly-girl. However, it seems that despite her mother, somehow Marxo is learning some of the finer aspects of being a girl.

She loves all kinds of pretty, frilly outfits, and if I ever let her choose the bow for her hair, she will always choose the biggest pink bow that we have (which are all hand-me-downs from one of the neighbor girls - I definitely didn't buy them!).

She loves it when you tell her that she looks pretty (and I must admit I use that to my advantage fairly frequently in order to try to make her wear whatever it is I want her to wear so that I don't have to try to pick out something else! - "But you'll look so pretty in this shirt...")

And she especially loves the multitude of shoes that the neighbor girl has handed down to her. Every day she chooses different shoes to wear. Here lately, however, her favorite shoes are a pair of hot pink tennis shoes that she calls her "runnin' back shoes". Apparently she did pick up something a little "non-girly" from the football season. :)

Farthead

I overheard a conversation between my husband and the boy the other night:

Fellan: Look at my farthead!
Husband: Your what?
Fellan: My farthead!
(at this point, I was thinking that little-boy humor must have finally seeped into Fellan's class from the older kids' class)
Husband: What's on your head?
Fellan: No, look here! (pointing to his forehead)
Husband: Oh! That's your forehead!
Fellan: (thinking a couple seconds) It's my fivehead!!!
(much laughter all around...)

TMI?

Remember how I said that we were all sick for a couple of weeks? Here's an actual e-mail I sent to my mom on Monday after the first weekend of being sick: (she asked me how I was doing)

Better today than last night.

After watching the kids dry-heaving all night long for two nights, I was really afraid I was going to do it, too. But even after trying to will it all to come out the hind end, I ended up throwing up anyway. I hate throwing up.

After I threw up, I took the anti-naseau medicine that the doctor had prescribed for Marxo. It worked like a charm! I was able to sleep from about 10:30 until 5:00 when a big thunderstorm and hail came through.

Of course, that woke up the kids, so I went down the hallway, thinking that I would climb into bed with one of them and they might go back to sleep. But, when I was telling Marxo to move over, I touched her sheets and discovered that she had thrown up.

She threw up while she was laying on her back, so it got all in her hair. I ended up having to give her a bath. Then I changed her sheets and finally, I got them both to lay back down for a few minutes. I was just hoping I could make it through the next few hours until the nanny would get there and I would finally have a break from the gawd-awful weekend.

But then I heard the phone ringing and so did Fellan.
So we all came downstairs at around 7:10 and I checked the messages. It was the nanny - her daughter had been up most of the night crying with an ear infection, so she needed to take her daughter to the doctor. She would not be coming in afterall.

Oh - and when we came downstairs, I tried to turn on the lights in the dining room and one of the lightbulbs burned out (quite fantastically) and tripped one of the breakers, so the lights in the dining room and kitchen wouldn't work.

I eventually made my way downstairs to the garage to try to trip the breakers and get the lights back on, but after I messed around with them, even more lights wouldn't come on.

At this point, I was still not feeling very well, so I just laid on the couch and gave the kids some saltines and animal crackers to eat. The husband was still sleeping, so I left him up there until 9:30. At that point, I decided he had slept enought and he'd better come and help me figure out how to get the lights back on.

He's finally feeling better today after having a fever since sometime on Saturday afternoon. He claims he didn't get any good sleep from Friday until this morning from around 2:00 until 9:30.

I just can't wait to go back to work tomorrow so I can have a break. :)