Boo!

Another Halloween is in the books. We had a skeleton and Toad in the house this year and thanks to Grandma, Toad’s hat was a mega hit with the second grade crowd. As tends to be the way with Halloween, we stretched the festivities out over a couple of days by carving pumpkins, attending a Halloween carnival at the boys’ preschool, enjoying parties at their elementary school and trick-or-treating with friends tonight. 

Andrew hit the ‘hood tonight with friends from school and a few of their parents. He was delivered home with a bulging bag of candy, which he had already ensured was nut free by making strategic trades with a buddy. I thought that was forward thinking. What might NOT have been forward thinking was the fact that I found all of these empty wrappers in his bag. These were just the ones he didn’t think to dispose of before I found them. I shudder to think what else he ate in addition.

Happy Halloween!

A bunch of pictures hopefully worth a bunch of words

I'm falling further behind in this blogging quest. Pictures sit in folders, unedited, waiting to be posted and stories float around in my head, waiting to be told. It becomes kind of like putting off a phone call that you're dreading, where the longer you put it off the more difficult it is to make yourself pick up that phone.

So. I'm about to post a photo dump with captions; no stories to speak of and no weaving of tales, just a visual attempt to dig out of the pile. What follows sums up last weekend, though our Friday night excursion to see the National Acrobats of China, went undocumented. The irony of this is, of course, that it's the weekend again so I'm still behind but it will somehow feel like a small step in the right direction.

Thomas' last soccer game of the fall was last Saturday. He's sad. He loved playing and he loved practicing and I'm a little concerned that he's going to ask once a week until April how many more weeks until he gets to play again. We probably should have signed him up for basketball as a distraction.

 

He's going in for the offensive assist.

 

If you pretend that I can hold a camera still, you'll see that he has just kicked it straight into a horde of defenders.

Never fear, though. This culminated in a goal. He was a tiny bit proud of himself.

 

The Thunderbolts RULE! This was one aggressive group of little boys and once again, we totally lucked out with the coaching staff.

This is Coach Natalie and we're very glad her son is in Thomas' grade because she was a great, positive, laid back coach. The fact that she's a former KU soccer player was also a bonus.



After Thomas' game we headed home just long enough to give away our KU vs. K-State football tickets - a move for which we would later congratulate ourselves - and headed back for Andrew's game. It wasn't his last but his coach decided to take advantage of a warm sunny day for photos.



I took about 10 shots of this and another mom distributed hers as well. This is as good as it got for Team Xtreme that day. While they're not all looking at the camera,

I think we can agree that they're all adorable. This is a NICE bunch of kids and a really great coach.

Team huddle to revamp the game plan.

Andrew's on the far right in blue, wrestling over the ball with #10.

 

It's moving the right direction.

 

This is the closest I'm going to get to a good action shot with my photography skills. I believe both of his feet are off the ground

right here which brings back concussion nightmares but it all worked out in the end.

 

On Sunday we ventured to the pumpkin patch with the cousins. The crop is a little thin this year because apparently pumpkins like rain and we've been a little short on that. We had a good time anyway.

 

 

Mark loves the pumpkin patch.  OK. I can’t even type that with a straight face. This is him enduring having Andrew take our picture and then, guarding our pile out in the field. Thomas is a good pumpkin picker and that pile was larger at one point but the pile guard made him make some tough choices.

 

We’ve just tackled a rousing Friday night of soccer practice, basketball practice and a birthday party and tomorrow we’ve got a soccer game and family time on tap with the Rocks. That probably means you can either look forward to another post like this one next week or that I should leave the camera at home. Stay tuned.

Apology accepted

Mark thinks I should be pleased that he doesn't know how to spell snuck. I think I should be pleased that he does know the way to my heart is the written word.

Isn't it ironic

You know how you have those days where you just feel "off" or like things aren't clicking, but you're not entirely sure why that is? Thomas had one of those evenings.

After school it was a meltdown over his brother not wanting to play what he wanted to play and at dinner, the meltdown was over yogurt; after showers it was over my nerve to ask him to please follow directions.

Except? It was probably actually all about being physically tired, or hungry, or just mentally exhausted from having what was, ironically, a very good day at school.  And? Truth be told, I'm probably having one of those weeks as well. It's probably not a coincidence that my mood would rub off on him. 

At bedtime things were a little rocky around here and I looked him square in the eye and said, "Thomas, I need you to talk in a normal voice to me and get your act together." He paused for a second and said, quite clearly, "Mom, that's the problem.  I'm trying to get an act, but I just can't find one and it's just not working."

Ugh.

Note to self: Get your own act together before you ask these sweet boys to do the same.

Miscellany

Andrew received a book for his birthday called "Children's Miscellany." He hasn't yet written a thank you note for that gift because I keep forgetting. In my defense, he didn't get the book until three weeks after his birthday, which means that rather than seven weeks late, it's only four...

While the gifter hasn't been appropriately thanked, I love the title and have decided to begin working that word, miscellany, into conversation.

+++++++++

Andrew is feeling much better. His teacher told me this afternoon that he thought Andrew seemed much more energetic and himself today than even yesterday. THAT was what I have been waiting to hear. Every adult who has encountered me in the last week is probably WAY sick of hearing how concerned I am about him, but I've felt strongly that he just hasn't been himself.

A few hours later I know that "more energetic" means loud and even a little bit annoyingly himself, but we'll take it.

++++++++

Now that he's feeling better I think I'm allowed to tell a story of our drive to the hospital last week. Andrew was so upset and confused and also nauseous that I rode in the backseat with him holding a garbage bag. We were 2/3 of the way to the ER when he began moaning and saying he didn't feel well and it just suddenly really felt like it would be good if were there already.

Mark pulled the car through a left hand turn on a busy street and then ducked his head down and announced that he too wasn't feeling well... and was going to blackout. 

That's when I began yelling at him to PULLOVERRIGHTTHISINSTANT, because I was doing the math and I felt like if we could just keep driving we would get there faster than if he wrecked the car and we ended up waiting on an ambulance. We did a little Chinese firedrill right in the middle of a street so I could finish up the drive.

Someday we'll tell Andrew about the time he knocked himself silly and his dad was so worried about him that he was having sympathy nausea and dizziness.  That's love.

+++++++++

In the last week Andrew has received books, legos, balloons, candy, cupcakes and cards from his buddies as get well wishes. The most priceless one I've saved.

I told this friend's mom that Andrew really appreciated the visit from his classmate and I really appreciated the card because it simply made my day last Thursday!

+++++++++

Speaking of all those get well gifts. We haven't written any thank you notes for those either. Do we need to? I'm not sure. Probably? Thoughts? Opinions?

+++++++++

Since Andrew's been a little out of commission, Thomas has been a little bored. He's accustomed to his brother providing most of his entertainment, much of his direction and nearly all of his thoughts. I have taken him out to ride his bike a couple of times just to get him out of the house and engaged in an activity. Lately, we've been riding to a church up the street because they have a huge, empty parking lot that gives the boys a place to cruise more freely than the sidewalk or our driveway.

Last night he asked me when we could go to Honey Mustard again. I didn't understand the question so I asked him to repeat it. He did. "When can we go to Honey Mustard again?" I couldn't figure out whether he was asking a serious question or just being silly then he said, "You know, to ride our bikes. When can we take our bikes to that Honey Mustard place again?"

It's the church. It's called The Mustard Seed.