Happy Easter Y'All

We were a bit late on the uptake, only buying our dyeable eggs last night, but the kids had fun anyway. We picked up a few very cute helpers from the neighborhood. That's (L-R) Samantha, Jordan, Jack, Julia and Ryker. Ryker and the Fragility of Eggs didn't get along so well. His first one turned out cracked all over and covered in pizza sauce instead of dye. The rest turned out well though.

This morning the kids wandered around and found all of the eggs. It took them MAYBE 4 minutes. And so far this morning they have eaten no breakfast, one hardboiled egg each, and a bunch of Jelly Beans. And we're watching Despicable Me. Not the traditional Easter morning, I know. We're having fun though.

The Rest

I forget sometimes that you all aren't in my head all day long. (And for that, you should all be very, very thankful.)

Here are the major points:

1. Chuck has been renewed at Best Buy, and is on a 3 month rolling contract. He has to wait every 3 months to see if he's asked back. Not ideal, but all indications look good that he will continue to be asked back. He likes the location and his coworkers, and the work is right up his alley. Keep your fingers crossed.

2. My job got turned upside down two weeks ago. We had another round of layoffs. I was spared, luckily. Two of my colleagues in our department were laid off, and several others throughout the museum. The shock of the layoffs and losing our friends, coupled with the task of trying to absorb the work, has made the last two weeks very tiring. Our department is set up to take on the responsibilities of the two that were let go, but it will take a LOT of work. Most of it falls on my team and one other team. It's going to be a challenge.

3. Jack will go to kindergarten this fall, but we're still not sure where. He is 42nd on the wait list at the school we want him to go to. It's a free public charter that is a block away from our house. We do know a #33 from last year that got in, so it's not out of the realm of possibility, but it doesn't look good. Otherwise he'll go to Indian Mounds - which is a good school, despite having the world's creepiest name.

4. Ryker thinks he's Santa. I'm not sure why. But every once in awhile he starts asking "what YOU want?" and then pretending to write it down. I wish for Peace and Love for All Mankind, and then new clothes and shoes. Chuck wishes for No Tantrums. Jack wishes for "a million of every kind of dollar." Brilliant.

5. A couple of stories:

One morning Tugboat came into the bedroom and shook off. She was wet. It was not raining. Ryker came in and goes "I keening up da waa-der." I said "what water?" and he got nervous, looked around, then goes "no waa-der. You want dis door cwosed? Okay" and BOLTED out. Ha.

Another morning he took it upon himself to make a carb-buffet. He brought out chips, a sleeve of Saltines, and a bag of bread crumbs.

Jack has been writing a lot. Mostly random words listed out, or simple sentences. Sometimes he puts sheets together and staples them, then deems them a "book." He's been adding pages recently that look like scribbling. My mom asked him what it said and he goes "I don't know. I can't read CURSIVE, Grandmommy!"

I was talking to Jack the other day about ways to make people happy. I was asking him what he thought he could do. His answers:
--"I could color them a picture."
--"I could give them a hug."
--"I could say nice things to them."
--"I could give them a kidney." (This one comes courtesy of Magic Neighbor Nicki, who actually DID donate a kidney to someone. Jack knows the story.)
--"I could give them some blood if they needed it and they were sad."
--"I could donate money to them."
How sweet is he?

Okay, that's most of the action you've missed. There you go.

Jack Update

I've neglected this blog a bit and for that, I apologize.

I'll write two posts tonight - this one, catching you up on Jack's behavior, and a second that will update you all on our family in general.

So...there appears to have been a misunderstanding with regards to Jack's behavior. I can't really explain what happened except to say that there were some words used, like "aggressive," that got misconstrued, and then it all snowballed. We starting getting told every little thing, and we really were on him about not being nice to his friends. We thought that was what was going on. Today I cornered one of the lead teachers and made her clarify the situation. I asked if he was being malicious towards the other children. She said no, not at all, that it was all about him being bigger than the other kids and that he would accidentally run into them. That's normal. She said he was NOT mean at all and that the kids all love him.

He has things to work on. For sure. Chuck and I will own that, and we'll stay on him about it. But he is NOT being mean to other kids or doing stuff that's abnormal. We've been pestering him about doing something that he has NOT been doing, and for that I have tremendous Mommy Guilt.

After talking to Miss Christy, I went over to Jack. He was sitting on the rug waiting for their morning routine to start. I leaned down and hugged him and told him that I had a really good talk with Christy and I would tell him about it later. He goes "what did she say?" and I said "she said you were a good boy, Bud." He looked up at me and BEAMED. I almost cried.

Tonight I talked to him about it. I tried to explain what happened. It's hard enough for me to explain it to ADULTS, try a five year old. I told him that we thought this whole time that he was being mean to the children, and that's what we kept talking to him about. I said that I talked to Christy and she told me that he wasn't being mean, he was just being too rough with kids that aren't big like him.

I told him that I owed him an apology. He goes "that's okay Momma." Then he goes "why didn't you just talk to Christy before saying those things to me?" Oh my God.

So there you go. He is totally age appropriate.

It's Not Working

Okay for real people - Jack is just not behaving well. He's throwing major tantrums at home and misbehaving at school. Someone PLEASE tell me this is a phase that 5 year olds go through.

At school I think it's that he's bored. When he's being challenged, like during work time, he is perfectly fine. But at playtime he's a terror. We've taken things away from him (privileges) and now we're going to go back to a sticker chart to reward the good days.

He's lucky that he's perfectly adorable.

Maybe it'll all be better when school starts?

The Shore

Holy Moly Chuck and I needed a vacation. We haven't been on a trip without the kids EVER. For those of you doing the math, that makes it over five years. It was time.

We got a really swanky room in this newish resort on the North Shore (of Lake Superior). This is the unit we stayed in - the bottom floor was ours.

It isn't really skiing time, or hiking time, so we got a great deal. And because of that, we were virtually the only people there. We hiked around, played on the rocks, enjoyed the pool and hot tub - all without a single other person being around us. There were no waits at restaurants, and no other tourists wandering around the quaint little towns. It was wonderful. The food, I should mention, was outstanding. We ate SO MUCH FOOD and pretty much everything was great. That includes the Goober Burger in Grand Marais. It was a hamburger with peanut butter and mayo. Sounds nasty, I agree, but it was delicious.

Chuck spent the time taking pictures of nature. That's his happy place.

I spent my time crawling over the rocks like a little kid, then sitting down next to the lake, closing my eyes and listening to the waves. That's MY happy place.

We didn't really have an agenda, but on our way back from Grand Marais one day we spotted Cascade Falls, and decided to go back and hike it the next day. When we got there a family was coming back to their car and saying how dangerously icy it was. "Whatever" we thought, and entered the park. It was REALLY icy. We should have paid attention. We skidded past lots of these signs.

This was the sunrise out our window the final morning.

I rolled over and opened my eyes long enough to take it in, then promptly fell back asleep. Chuck was sitting next to the window watching it, then stayed up long enough to watch a deer walk straight up to our window. Not sure how I missed that. Anyway, it was a GREAT weekend. Big ups to my mom for watching the kiddos!