Mommathon

Colm went to the dentist for the first time today. If you have ever tried to give a cat a bath, that is about how well it went. I tried everything, but it boiled down to me leaving and letting the dental people do their job while he screamed his head off. I thought about just whisking him out of there and just forgetting the whole thing, but this is one of those times that you have to just do it. Shots hurt, but I don't let him skip those. Taking naps isn't a favorite activity either, but I don't let him skip those either. I had to blink the tears away in the waiting room while I listened to him scream, but no one said being a mother was easy.

UPDATE: I noticed tonight while we were at preschool open house that he has broken blood vessels in his face from all of the screaming. Yep, that's how bad it was.

We have a date...Friday, September 28 is the official day. We are so excited about the new house and can't believe how quickly it has taken shape.

I LOVED the lights we picked out for our kitchen. Yes, LOVed...past tense. I loved them when they were hanging in the display room. Now that they are in our kitchen I don't like them at all. They're awful! They don't go with our kitchen AT ALL! So, we went to the lighting store this weekend and picked out some different ones. The paint color in our bedroom and master bath is going to have to be redone as well. It is so hard to tell from those darn swatches! I was thinking we were getting kind of a warm sage green color. That's not what we got. It's more the color of a green apple. What makes it even worse is that our bathroom countertop is kind of a tan speckled color. The green apple and the tan speckled looks awful! We went to the Sherwin Williams store this weekend and are leaning towards more a warm mocha color now. I hope that is what it looks like when they actually put it on the walls.

I went to look at our house today and they tiled a bathroom that was supposed to have carpet in it! That's a good mistake. :)

My kids aren't huge dino fans, they like them as much as the next kid. They do, however, like this book. It is a cute and short story that rhymes about a T-Rex who busts into a dino cafe and stirs up some trouble. One of the other dinos uses her cell phone to call Terry Triceratops who shows up and saves the day. It also has a funny punchline which I won't give away.

We went to back to school night tonight. We got to listen to Liam's teacher talk about what their school year will look like. I am so excited. They are going to have so much fun this year and learn a lot while they are at it.

Don't start negotiating move-in dates and have us get a bid from a contractor so he can do some painting if you have not even been approved for a loan that is large enough to purchase our house! We waited for a phone call all weekend saying there was a contract to sign when it turns out that the loan they had been approved for was $30,000 less than the asking price of our house. GRRRRR!

This is a quick read and a fun look back at growing up in the 80's only with a twist. The twist is that the writer grew up in the 80's and lived through Madonna, Cyndi Lauper and Martha Quinn, but she was a Vietnamese refugee who had been plunked down in Michigan with her father, her sister, her grandmother and not long after, her Mexican-American mother and step-sister.

I love that school starts at 8:35. That gives us plenty of time in the morning to get out the door. I hate feeling rushed, especially in the morning. It is just not a good way to start the day. The kids have time to eat breakfast, get dressed, etc. without me harping on them every five minutes to hurry up. Liam even has time to do his chores in the morning. It will be even better after we move because we will live even closer and won't have to drive as far to get to school.

You have to make a lot of decisions as a parent. I think we made a great one this week. Colm is SO excited about going to school now that he is going to be in Ms. Jan's class. He absolutely did not want to go to school a week ago. Now he is mad that he has to wait until September for school to start. Ms. Jan let us come take a sneak peek at her class today in an attempt to get Colm excited about school...it worked! What three year old doesn't love Ms. Jan? I think she puts a spell on them. While eating his lunch today Colm told me he loved her. Already? Whatever, as long as you want to go to school. I think this has also had a positive effect on his potty issues. He wore his big boy pants all afternoon and evening and is sleeping in them right now. He did not have an accident the entire time! He knew he had to be potty trained for Montessori. So, he solved that problem by not doing it. If I don't use the potty then I can't go to Montessori. Now that that problem is solved, he can use the potty. It may be a coincidence, but I don't think so. Smartypants!

All of the sudden Liam gives a hoot about what he is wearing. When did this happen? He is especially picky about his shoes. He has completely grown out of his tennies that we bought last spring. I took him shopping and we found a pair that he likes. No problem. I decided he might need another pair. The kid only has a pair of sandals and a pair of tennies. One more wouldn't hurt. Okay, maybe it could. He doesn't like any pair of shoes anywhere on the planet Earth. He just turns up his nose...until tonight. God bless Zappos.com. We found a pair that is passable and, not that we need it, they have free overnight delivery and free returns. How cool is that?

There is a new source of stress in our house...getting the kids to bed on time, actually Liam. He has always gone to bed at a reasonable time, but now I feel like he has to be in bed by 8, at the lastest 8:15. He has got to get his rest for school the next day. If we have absolutely nowhere to go after school, we don't get home until after 4. If we have violin or something else to do, then it really cuts our night short. We have to eat dinner in there somewhere. There's also baths to take, violin to practice and stories to be read. There is no time to do anything else. We wanted to go look at the house tonight after dinner because they painted the inside today. It was this big decision. Do we have time? Will we be back in time to get everyone to bed on time?

On a related note... Colm is now sleeping with his light on. It all started a couple of nights ago when we had a big thunder/windstorm. Colm DOES NOT like thunder. He doesn't cry, but it does scare him. That was the first night the lights went on. He doesn't fret if you turn them off, either. He will just get out of bed and turn them back on after you leave. I turned them off last night before I went to bed at about 11. When I woke up this morning they were on. Sometime in the middle of the night he got up and turned them back on. Stinker.

Well, he's not potty trained, even remotely, and after a lengthy discussion with his teacher, he will not be attending Montessori...and you know what, I am so happy about it. He will get to go to Liam's old preschool now and have the teacher Liam had when he was three. She is the best teacher EVER! We can also go to Kindermusik, playgroup and storytime at the library now and do other fun things together that we would not have been able to do otherwise. I realize now how close I was to shipping him off to school too early. He would have been gone every day. I am so happy. Every time I look at his little dimpled smile it makes me smile even more now. I find myself hugging and squeezing him more, too. He's my baby and I get to hold onto him a little bit longer now.

School starts in four days and Colm is not potty trained. I told him if he doesn't go in the potty then he can't go to school. He doesn't care.

Rule #1. If school gets out at 3:40 and you show up at 3:40, your kid will be the last one to get picked up. (The line was so long I thought it was for the junior high next door. So I went around all of those cars to find out that I had been in the correct line. So then I had to turn around and go back to the end. Hopefully the length of the line will get shorter as the school year wears on.)
Rule #2 When you get out of your car to buckle your kid in, shut the driver side door. (I was in such a hurry to get out of the car to help Liam that I left my door open which meant no one could go around me. I think there might be a few parents who have me targeted now.)
Rule #3 Don't get out of your car to buckle your kid in. It holds up the line. Pull forward and buckle them in. (Okay, no one told me this rule and truly it is not stated anywhere, but I think you have to do it that way or no one would ever get through the line.)

I know the drill now. I will do better tomorrow.

He has his Star Wars backpack with his Star Wars lunchsack with his Star Wars sunglassess.


Wiggling his loose tooth.


At his seat and ready to learn!

Liam starts school tomorrow! Holy cow! How did that happen? Preschool just got out! Where did our summer go? We went to Whole Foods today and loaded up on all of his lunch goodies so he can take his lunch. He has made it very clear, after viewing the lunch menu, that he is NOT going to eat the school lunch. Okay, fine by me. I have a feeling the novelty of packing his lunch every day is going to wear off quickly though. Everyone was in bed by 8pm tonight and we have the backpack by the door. Wow! Here we go!

I hope I didn't sign my life away tonight. We had school events for both the boys tonight, both of which involved sign-ups. At Liam's school I signed up to help the music teacher with misc stuff. I signed up to help with teacher appreciation lunches and one other thing I think. At Colm's school I signed up to bring flowers twice during the year for the flower arranging lesson. I signed up to bring crickets twice during the year to feed the class tarantula and toad. I also signed up to help with the Halloween party, teacher appreciation lunches and community service projects. I may have signed up for something else, too. I can't remember, but I am sure I will get an e-mail within the next few weeks reminding me of the commitments I have made.

I would like to take a few moments to toot my own horn. I got my grade back from my big pain in the hiney project I did this summer and I got a 100%. But wait, I'm not done. My instructor also wants to use one of my lessons I did with my student to use in her class to teach student teachers. Toot, toot.

A while back I was sitting at a stoplight and I looked over and there was one of my former students...driving! The last time I had seen her she was nine years old! All of my former students are at least in high school now. I can't believe it! The first group I ever had are all at least 22 years old. I have run into former students a couple of times while they were working. One worked at Noodles and Co., one worked at Turtle Wax and then I ran into him again and he was doing cement work in a subdivision we were looking at, one worked at Hy-Vee and one is a firefighter who I saw when we were at an event for kids. I have also run into a couple of them out and about shopping. The funny thing is that they always remember me, but they forget that I haven't seen them since they were nine years old or so and they don't usually look the same. Usually I can figure out who they are, but sometimes it takes me a second. And today I saw one of my former students at church. That is not unusual since I taught at the school at church. What really struck me is how grown up she looked. Now what she is closer to adulthood and looks less like a child, I could really see how much she resembles her mom. It is funny the relationship you have with your students. They aren't yours, but they are in a way. They aren't your biological children, but they are still your kids and you want the same things for them. You want them to to do well and to succeed and to grow up and be good people. Now when I start seeing my former students getting married and I see them out and about with their own children, I will really start feeling old. ;)

It didn't start out so good, but things got better. We started our day with Sean taking Liam to the emergency room. He fell out of a chair and smacked his head on something and it was bleeding pretty badly. He's fine though-no stitches needed. We then went to church, went to Panera's and then to Liam's kindergarten pool party at our new subdivision. There were about seven or eight other kinders there-all boys except one. I don't think Liam really met anyone because he was too busy going down the slide, but Sean and I met some of the parents. While we were gone doing all of that, we had an open house. We had seven people come and they all had great things to say about our house. :)

I HIGHLY recommend having your car detailed. My car has not been really truly super cleaned in five years and my gracious in-laws paid for me to have my car detailed as a birthday present. With kids and crackers and pretzels and raisins along with just the everyday stuff that trashes a car, if was nice to have it cleaned. It is like having a new car and it is SO shiny both inside and out!

Highly overrated

We got LOTS of chocolate at the Hershey store. If you want some please come and get it. The boys filled a bucket FULL.

We have been to several children's museums and this one was the best by far! It was three stories of fun, fun, fun!



Family Art Class

This is where we had lunch. When kids order a pizza, they get to make it.



Navy Pier

We had dinner here. It was super yummy. I think they are owned by the Cheesecake Factory people. The menu was very similar and the inside of the restaurant seemed very similar, too.

We couldn't take a lot of pictures of the animals here, so I had to take pictures of the signs instead. The neatest thing we saw here was a dolphin show. Colm about fell out of his seat when all five of the dolphins jumped out of the water at the same time. It was fun watching Colm watch the dolphins.

The boys got snakes painted on their arms.


Dinner...I loved it...they had cups with lids!


We took a carriage ride around the city. This was one of Colm's favorite activities. It was a nice tour and we even got to see where Oprah lives.

We had this yummy place right across from our hotel. The first time we ate there, I had scrambled eggs with bacon, tomatoes, fresh spinach and blue cheese mixed in. Yummers!

We then headed off to the zoo.



This bear cracked me up! Look at its tongue. I don't know if it was just really hot or what! The sign said she had just had jaw surgery, so maybe she just couldn't keep her mouth shut.

This place was not originally on our agenda. I didn't even know it existed, but my aunt, who used to live in Chicago, told me about it. Luckily, it is right next to the zoo. The boys liked this place better than the zoo, so I am glad we went.

Liam in a beaver dam
They were having a special exhibit about robots which was the hit of the day for all THREE of the boys in our family.


On the way to dinner, the boys posed next to this cool mailbox.


We had dinner here. It was a DISASTER! It was a really nice restaurant, both of the boys spilled their drinks, Liam was crying...ugh! I will say, however, that it was probably the best Italian food I have had in a long time...too bad I didn't get to enjoy it.

We're back! Chicago was quite an adventure...from a cranky, sleep-deprived three year old to busses breaking down because of the heat...but we made it and managed to enjoy ourselves at the same time. Here are some pics from our first day...

We dropped off our stuff at our hoteland headed off to the Sears Tower. We must have looked like lost tourists because as we were standing outside our hotel trying to figure out where to go, a very nice man who was headed out of town gave us his bus passes that were still good for another four days. We found the bus stop and we were on our way. We were still a little unsure about where we needed to get off though. We must have looked lost again, because this very nice woman sitting next to me on the bus told us exactly what we needed to do. I asked her another question about the busses. She didn't know so she asked the stranger sitting next to her who was also very helpful. Very nice people, those Chicagoans.

View from Sears Tower

Going on the elevator makes your ears pop

We had a yummy dinner here. One complaint I have about eating with children in Chicago. Very few places we went had cups for kids with lids. I can't even tell you how many drinks we spilled.

After dinner, we headed over to Michigan Avenue to see Garmin's only retail store. It opened last fall and we heard a lot about it from those who went to the grand opening, so it was fun to see it in person.