Body of Christ. . .

Bread of Heaven.  Blood of Christ, the Cup of Salvation.

Mama, did we just drink Jesus' blood?????   Note to self:  Must schedule Aidan for an Instructed Eucharist as soon as it is offered. . .

I promised Aidan that if our warm weather holds, he could begin wearing shorts to school in April.  Well, it's not only holding but has begun to feel a bit like early Summer.  I think we're skiiping winter and Spring and heading straight from Fall to Summer!  The lowest high temperature predicted for the next 10 days is 72 degrees on Sunday.  So, Aidan is wearing shorts to school today.  Crazy because just a week ago it was long sleeve shirt and long pants and a coat.  Now we're already going for shorts and short sleeves!  I may even wear some sandles today. 

We're getting ready for a big home improvement project.  We finally bought the wood for our flooring in the family room and extended hallway.  We also bought paint for the family room.  And then this last Sunday we went to the Tile Shop and bought some really nice tile for the foyer and some slate to go around the hearth of the fireplace.  The wood flooring will be installed professionally this time--all we have to do is move the furniture--and is scheduled to be done April 2nd and 3rd.  I'm really excited because it is one step closer to getting rid of the carpet in this house!!  We'll just have three of the four bedrooms, the upper hall and both sets of stairs left.  We're hoping to do our bedroom next year.

I also want to shorten the valances I had already made so I took them down to start that process and then we're thinking we'll replace the shutters we have with some nicer Plantation Shutters.  Should be a nice room when we're done.

Aidan has been complaining of headaches lately.  It's been a bit concerning.  At first we were thinking it was because of the pollen. . .which it may still be in part.  But, Pat comented last night that Aidan hasn't been wearing his glasses at all lately but has been doing a LOT of reading.  He's only supposed to wear them for reading or when he is on the computer for 15 minutes or more.  So, they are getting cleaned up and will go to school with him today.  I'll also be making an appointment to have those beautiful eyes checked out, probably around his birthday.

I do have some great pictures and promise to upload them by the weekend.  We're a bit exhausted around here with the time change and with the Caps continuing to win!  It's exciting stuff this later sunlight, warmer weather, cherry blossoms and flowers blooming and the Caps winnng, but boy are we tired!! 

Enjoy your Spring!!

Napkin Notes, Stick & Shoot and the Russian Embassy

After the Holidays, I started sending Aidan's snack to school with him.  It was his request and he emphatically insisted that he no longer wanted to buy the school snack.  Although this added to my schedule, I agreed.  The school snack wasn't much and I knew I could send better: sliced strawberries, apple slices, cheese sticks, etc.  But, what I hadn't planned on was adding even more stress because of a little note I wrote on his napkin.

It started simple and innocent:  a heart with an I Love You in the middle, which went on to Mama loves Aidan, and then Mama and Daddy loves you.  On Monday as I was drawing the Cat in the Hat, I thought, How did I get here???  I have now drawn Mario, Luigi, Aidan as a hockey player, the Caps logo, The Lorax, Sam I Am, and so on.  What happened????

I am in need of some inspiration of what to draw next on Aidan's napkin.  Hurry please, we leave in a couple of hours and his snack bag will need to be in his backpack!!

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About a year ago, Pat and Aidan converted Aidan's soccer goal into a hockey goal and fixed in so it could be easily moved out onto the pipestem by our house.  We bought some inexpensive adjustable sticks and some outdoor hockey pucks.  Aidan can spend hours out there practicing his shots.  He will run up and down the pipestem controlling the puck and then he shoots and scores!!!  He even does it really good while wearing his inline skates. 

His favorite past time is to have one of us, preferably daddy, out there with him to work on passing the puck and to create "traffic" in front of the net.  He's only five and you should see him!  And I do have to say that this has really helped him a lot on the ice.  He typically scores anywhere from 5-7 goals during his Mini Mites games and he has gotten really good at stealing the puck away from other players.  I am sure it is from this practice on the pipestem.

At Christmas, a good friend of ours gave Aidan a pass to Stick & Shoot at the Ice House.  It has 10 sessions pre-paid.  We never know for sure when the Stick & Shoot is going to be offered, so we have been waiting.  And our wait ended. 

All during March Stick & Shoot is being offered at differing times so we decided to take Aidan up there last Tuesday.  In preparation, Pat bought a helmet, gloves and a stick so he could go out on the ice with him.  They only allow 30 people on the ice, which is nice because there are so many more during Aidan's Skills Class.

When we got there on Tuesday, we were too late.  It was full.  So, we decided to watch for a bit to see how it all went and it is exactly like what Pat and Aidan do out on the pipestem.  Aidan stood there watchng and he said with that sad little sound, "I want to be out there too."  Oh.....Okay, we'll try again on Wednesday.

So, on Wednesday, Pat and Aidan went, without me because I get off work too late, and headed up to the Ice House and got signed in (the sign in starts 90 minues before) and then went to have dinner.  When they got home, Aidan was just glowing!  He LOVED it!!!  So, we're going again on Sunday. . .and I think we have some other dates on the March schedule we will try to go. 

What a great gift!!!

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On April 14th, we will be heading over to the Russian Embassy for the annual Easter Party.  It will be our third year.  Interesting that it will be the day after our 4 year anniversary of being home!!

Dr. Seuss, Curious George and the White Stuff

As most people with small children know, Friday was Dr. Suess' birthday.  All of our area Elementary and PreSchools were participating in a week long celebration that culminated in a party like atmosphere by Friday.  On Friday, the children were invited to dress up as their favorite character from their favorite book.  Aidan didn't really have a favorite character, so he wore my Dr. Suess sweatshirt that has the Grinch, Thing 1 and Thing 2, the Lorax and a Sneech on the front.  I thought he looked incredibly cute, even if the sweatshirt was much too big!

I do love the way Aidan's school really focuses on literature.  They make it fun which helps the children stay focused and have fun.  Aidan's class has been working on a Curious George project.  Each child take Curious George home and involved him in whatever activities that the child does.  If the child's turn comes up on a Friday, you have an entire weekend of fun.  At the end, you need to write a sentence for each day about what you did with Curious George. 

Aidan's turn came this past Friday.  And he immediately took Curious George to bed with him along with Tigger and Simba. . .we'll set aside the squeemish, you don't know where that thing has been, thought that kept going through my mind and just say that Aidan was excited beyond belief!  Curious George went with us to the Ice House on Saturday and "watched" Aidan play hockey.



I've never really heard of Curious George plays hockey, but maybe it's time!!  : )  Sunday was closed and blustery.  We had planned on playing outside and riding bikes with C. G., but because it was so cold, we palyed Yatzee, watched a movie and then played Super Mario Brothers.  This morning we will write our Day 2 sentence and then back to school Curious George will go to move on to some other lucky young child. 

The other excitement around here is that Aidan has learned how to blow bubbles.  Yes, this is big stuff for a 5 year old kid!  And with each passing day, his bubbles get bigger and better and I worry more about when I will have to cut it out of his hair. . .

And finally, we celebrated Grandpa's birthday on Saturday with a delicious dinner out followed by cake.  Happy Birthday Grandpa!!!

And finally, yes, we moved on to the White Stuff on Thursday due to the continued sore throat. We had the pharmacist add bubble gum flavor and so it is now bubble gum favored white chalky stuff that Aidan still hates. But, we are now four days into taking the Augmentin and he is much much better. In fact, he was better by Friday. We are scheduled to see an ENT April 23rd, due to the persistent asymetry and enlargement of the tonsils, who I imagine will say something about taking the tonsils out. We'll cross that bridge at that time.

And that's it from us!  Hope you all have a great week!

Four. . .

. . .years. . .

Since I came back from lunch to find that I had a message from the travel agent our In Country agency uses and she wanted me to call back because she had our dates and we need to get on the visas and plane tickets and Moscow hotel reservations right away. . .

Since I called our agency, with shaking hands and numb lips, and confirmed that, yes, we did in fact have travel dates and a Court Date and that yes, we were going back to Russia to get Aidan!

Since I began the excited/happy/freaked out mad dash to get the forms filled out and sent with our passports to get said visas processed and plane tickets purchased and reservations made and emails sent to our In Country coordinator and thousands and thousands of dollars in clean unmarked bills from the bank. . .

Since we began making lists of what we wanted to bring followed shortly by lists of what we knew we needed to bring, closely followed by lists of what we knew we could bring weight wise. . .

Since we started to allow ourselves to imagine what it might be really like to hold our son, to rock our son to sleep, to watch him sleep in his crib, to play with our son, to dress him in the cute outfits that people had bought for him. . .

Since we began the process of putting our private lives on hold for a month and my professional life on hold for three months. . .

Since the last February 29th--a day that I used to not like at all because it was just one more day added on to the winter that I am usually ready to end at this point but which is now one of my all time favorite days!

But, wait!!!!  Hasn't Aidan always been a part of our lives???? 

Happy Leap Day! 

The Pink Stuff

Over the past four years, I have had to school my self on the signs that Aidan is sick.  He doesn't complain.  Ever.  And to complicate matters, he has had maybe four fevers in the past four years, two of which went away within six hours.  So, that is never a sign of sickness for me.

Aidan spent so much time during the first two years of his life being sick, that he still doesn't recognize when things are not normal.  Being sick was normal for him!  And he already knows he will be okay and can just go on.  Breaks my heart.

A couple of weeks ago, I had taken Aidan to the pediatrician because his tonsils looked huge--one side was so big it was practically touching that thing that hangs down in the back of the throat.  They weren't red, just huge.  And he was snoring at night.  Nothing was wrong that the doctor could see.

About a week ago, I noticed that the ever present cold (since October) was back again.  However, it seemed to clear up during the day with Triaminic Cold medicine.

A few days ago, I saw a notice at the door to Aidan's daycare class room saying that there were 2 children with Strep.  That sign was changed to 4 children the next day.  Trouble is brewing.

Thursday afternoon, being a nice day, Pat picked Aidan up a little early and they came home to play.  Aidan even went over to one of the neighbor kids houses to play for a bit.  But, he came home early saying his throat hurt and his tummy didn't feel good.  Uh oh. 

Dinner time, Aidan ate, sort of, but was very tired.  Knowing something was probably up, I put him to bed early where he fell asleep almost immediately.  He sleep nearly 12 hours.  When he woke up, he seemed much better and even said so.  He wanted to go to school.  No fever and he said he was feeling better.  The throat was a little red, but not horrendously so, so off he went to school.

But.

The nagging feeling that things were not all good stayed with me.  When I got to work, I called the pediatrician and made the appointment for early afternoon.  When I picked Aidan up, he seemed totally fine and even said his throat hurt a little, but not very much and he could swallow fine.  Hmmmm......

When we got to the doctors office, the nurse listened to the symptoms I had noticed over the past few days and took a swab of his throat.  In came the pediatrician, who saw an amazingly healthy looking Aidan bouncing off the walls and an exasperated Mommy trying to get him to sit down and sit still.  "Well, you don't look sick!"  She said with a quick look at me. . .he never does!!!!  She then asked what made me think to bring him in so I again went through the symptoms.  She typed everything in to her little computer and then said we should get a strep test and I told her the nurse had already done one. . .and ping!!  The doctor said, "oh!  It's back. . .and it's positive.  Mommy's intuition."  And smiled at me. 

So, we're on the pink stuff for the next 10 to 14 days.  Hopefully, it will work.  Last time we had to go on to the gross white stuff shortly afterward.  Oh, and I called Winwood to change the sign to 5 children with Strep.

Fortunately, so far, I have been able to figure it out if Aidan needs to go in.  But, I worry I might miss one!!  So, I sometimes seem to badger Aidan: how's your throat/head/tummy?  Whereby Aidan has gotten used to telling me, "Mama, nothing hurts on my body.  Okay?"  sigh.

He's one tough little dude.  And I love him dearly.  I don't want him to be sick and me not know it!!