IEPs, Monkey Boy, Toddler Bed and Tantrums Galore

Let me start with Sunday. We had quite an adventurous Sunday at church. Aaron made me take Noah to nursery. When I handed him off to the nursery leader he was NOT happy. We hurried and left because by us being where Noah could see us it wasn't helping him. He did calm down eventually, but he wouldn't let the nursery worker put him down. He finally fell asleep in her arms. She made a soft bed and tried to lay him down, but that woke him up and he was quite angry. They had to finally bring him to me during Sunday school because he wouldn't stop crying. It also happened to be Fast and Testimony meeting which is Matthew's favorite week since he can go up and bear his testimony in the microphone during Sacrament meeting. Without fail as soon as it was time for bearing testimonies Matthew ran up to the pulpit to bear his testimony. He HAS to be the first person every month. Another lady in the ward stood up to bear her testimony when he finished. During her testimony Josh and Daniel decided they wanted to go up as well. Aaron, who was sitting on the end of the bench, let them both go up at the same time--BIG MISTAKE!! When Matthew finished his testimony he came running down the aisle to come and sit back down with us and asked, "Did I do a good job?" rather loudly like he does every time. Matthew gets so excited about it! What a funny boy! Meantime the lady was bearing her testimony while Josh and Daniel were sitting behind her in the front row of the stand. She took awhile so Josh and Daniel got restless and started switching chairs and goofing off. Daniel then started waving at me. About this time Noah started wandering out in the aisle and wouldn't be contained without screaming so Aaron took him out to the foyer. That left me sitting on the bench with just Sarah. While I was watching Josh and Daniel goof off on the stand I was trying to send dagger looks to let them know what they were doing was not ok. Of course the didn't stop. Sarah followed my gaze and saw Josh and Daniel up on the stand and wanted to go join them. She kept telling me, "I need go get Daniel." while pointing at him. I kept telling her no, but she doesn't take no for answer EVER. She forced her way out into the aisle and I grabbed the back of her dress so she couldn't run up to the stand. She got mad and threw herself to the ground and started screaming until I let go. She stood up again and I grabbed the back of her dress again and she, again, threw herself to the ground and started screaming. About this time I decided I needed to take her out. I stood up and she figured out what I was doing so she threw herself to the ground and started really screaming because she didn't want to be taken out. I tried to grab her to pick her up, but she started rolling around so I couldn't get a grip on her. I finally grabbed her and picked her up to take her out. She SCREAMED the whole way out. Meanwhile while I took Sarah out to the foyer, I left Matthew on the bench sitting by himself and Josh and Daniel goofing off on the stand while this lady was still bearing her testimony. I handed Sarah off to Aaron who was also holding Noah and went back inside to sit with Matthew and send dagger looks at Josh and Daniel to try and tell them through my stern gaze to KNOCK IT OFF and to sit still. They, of course, didn't stop and continued to goof off. When I sat back down with Matthew I could hear Sarah just screaming from the foyer. She was pretty ticked off. Finally Josh and Daniel got their turn to bear their testimonies and came to sit back down. By the time they sat down I could hear Sarah screaming in the foyer even louder than before. I took the cue and gathered up our stuff so we could make a hasty exit. I made it to the chapel doors to see Aaron had to take Sarah all the way outside because she was screaming so loud. I was trying to figure out where Noah had gone to when our old neighbor came and brought him to me. They saw Aaron had his hands full with both Sarah and Noah so they grabbed Noah to help him out--which was very much appreciated!! I scooped up Noah and we all headed out to the car. Sarah was kicking, fighting and screaming and continued doing that the whole ride home. She was fighting so bad we couldn't even get her in her seat belt--good thing we live close to the church!! She was still kicking, screaming and fighting when we got home so we just sent her straight to her room and closed the door. She continued for a few more minutes when she finally fell asleep. What a Sunday!! It's Sundays like this that make us truly appreciate the ones that all the kids behave!

Last week Josh had his annual IEP (Individualized Education Plan) meeting where we meet with his Speech Therapist, teacher, and principal to discuss his goals. Josh is doing well with his speech, however, he has back slid a bit. He was just working on the "g" sound, but the speech teacher did some testing to find even though he had previously passed off the "k" sound, he couldn't really make that sound consistently. So he is now working on both sounds, but that isn't too bad. However, before the meeting started Josh's 3rd grade teacher started talking to me about Josh's handwriting. It is very difficult to read. Now let me give some back story about this. Ever since Josh started having seizures (about 7 years ago) he has been slightly delayed in all skills especially his motor skills. He has been on the border of needing therapy, but not quite bad enough to require it. I think this has finally caught up to him. As other kids handwriting improves, Josh's hasn't. The teacher and I came to an agreement to get him tested with a school occupational therapist to see if his hand muscles need extra strengthening so he can write better. In order to do this they had to send home a permission slip. The Speech teacher called me Thursday to let me know the sealed envelope was coming home with Josh. When Josh got home from school that afternoon I asked to see the envelope. Josh asked, "What envelope?" Josh then handed me a bunch of papers. They were the papers that were supposed to have been sealed up in the envelope that Josh decided to open up at school to see what it was. I signed the papers I could see, but I don't know if they were all there. Hopefully, they were, but you never know...no wonder I am getting so many gray hairs!!

Sarah's attitude hasn't much improved this week from Sunday. She has been Miss Attitude Girl all week long! Yesterday was one of the bigger tantrums. It was time for her to go to dance. Since it is just across the street I put Noah in his high chair with some food while I ran Sarah over. Sarah saw Noah get some food and she decided she needed some food, too. However, we were running late as it was so I told her no. Seeing as she does not ever take no for an answer she started into a major tantrum. I had to pick her up and carry her over to dance while she was kicking and screaming the whole time. I finally laid her on the middle of the dance room floor and told the teacher, "I think she will stop once I leave." I hurried up and left all the while she was continuing her tantrum on the floor all the while thinking to myself, "Good luck with that!!" When I went to pick her up after dance, I asked the dance teacher how Sarah did. The dance teacher told me once Sarah stopped crying she mostly pouted the rest of the way through class and didn't do much. When I brought her home she was happy because she had gotten a treat at dance. This child is going to be the death of me!! I have never had a kid quite as strong willed as her over everything!! Hey at least she knows what she wants and very determined to get it! That might help her later on in life...I am hoping. Sarah has a dance recital in a few weeks so we got to pick up her costume. When we got home I made her try it on and she, of course, was not happy about that either. Her hair had been combed earlier, but with her floor tantrum she messed up her hair. Even with her crazy hair and sour look she is giving me I still think she looks cute in her dance costume:

Her attitude changed by this morning because she changed into by herself and came downstairs wanting to wear it for clothes today.  **sigh** good thing I love this girl!!

Noah has turned into monkey boy! Monday afternoon I laid him down for a nap in the pack-n-play in my bedroom. I thought he was asleep until I heard him pushing buttons on the phone. I go upstairs to find that he had climbed out of the pack-n-play and was getting into all kinds of stuff. I thought it was just a fluke thing until I laid him down for bed that night. I laid him down and next thing I know he is climbing back down the stairs to come to see me. I went and laid him back down in his crib again only to have the same thing happen again. I went upstairs and put him back in his crib and watched what he was doing. Which was this:

Aaron and I decided that we better change his crib into a toddler bed before he hurt himself by climbing/falling out of it. However, Sarah liked his toddler bed more than he did and took it over. When they both finally fell asleep we put Sarah in her bed and Noah in his. In case Noah rolled of his bed in the middle of the night out I laid some blankets on the floor so he could have somewhat of a softer landing. Good thing I did because I heard a big thud and screaming about 3 am. Noah did roll out of bed hitting the floor. He needed loves until 4 am. Last night I put him to bed in his toddler bed and went to the gym. Aaron told me that while I was gone he kept hearing Noah cry and cry. He finally went up to check things out to find Noah had crawled up on Sarah's chest of drawers and couldn't get down. Aaron picked him up and put him back in his toddler bed, but he doesn't ever stay put. Every night since Monday I put him to bed in the toddler bed, but when I come to get him out in the mornings he is asleep on the floor somewhere. Here's what I found this morning--Sarah's in her bed asleep and Noah is asleep on the floor. What a crazy boy!

Since Noah is at that age where he just can't stay away from the Christmas tree we only put up non breakable ornaments this year. Good thing we did because he pulled the whole tree over on him the second day after we put it up. It scared him pretty badly and he hasn't done it since, but you never know with him if it will happen again.

Tonight is my friend's annual cookie exchange party. Everyone brings 6 dozen treats to trade so everyone goes home with quite a variety of yummy things. This year I decided to do something other than cookies. I made some vegan cake balls and they are yummy if I do say so myself. The nice thing is, that Daniel can eat them, too. I made about 10 dozen so my family could eat some extras. Hopefully they will still leave me the 6 dozen I need to take tonight to the party! They are chocolate dipped cake balls that are dairy, egg and nut free and delicious! I am not the best at dipping things in chocolate so they don't look the best, though, but here's how they turned out:

I think Daniel liked them.  The chocolate all around his mouth gives it away--what do you think?!

Tuesday afternoon Sarah spiked a fever. She had no other symptoms, but lethargy and a 103 degree fever. She didn't have much of an appetite so I tried to get her to drink. We got some Gatorade so she would be more willing to drink that than just plain water. I did medicate her with some ibuprofen and her fever came down and stayed down. The next morning she was fine, but she kept asking me for alligator juice. I had no idea what she meant until I saw the Gatorade bottle and then it clicked. She didn't have any other problem the rest of the day. What a random thing, but I am glad it wasn't anything else than a random high fever!

Josh and Daniel's school started a Christmas Choir for any student to attend. It is every morning up until the Christmas break. The choir meets and sings Christmas songs before school starts. When Josh and Daniel brought the flier home I asked them if they wanted to do it. They both said yes and I sighed a big sigh because that meant I had to get everyone up and ready to go (including myself) by 8 am which is a big fete!! It started yesterday so everyone was up and ready to go and I was only a few minutes late in dropping off Daniel and Josh. When Daniel got home from kindergarten I asked him how the choir was. Daniel told me they didn't have it that morning. I double checked the flier and it did say it started December 7th. I waited until Josh got home from school and I asked him if he had choir. Josh told me he did have the choir. I asked him why Daniel didn't go to choir with him. Josh told me that Daniel insisted he needed to go to his classroom instead of following Josh because he thought the choir was going to be in his classroom. Josh let him go and went to choir by himself. Good thing Josh looks out for his brother--NOT!! Poor Daniel ended up sitting outside his classroom for about 30 minutes until someone else showed up to open his classroom for him. This morning I talked to Daniel and told him he needed to follow Josh to choir and not go to his classroom. It seemed to work because Daniel just got home from school and told me he really liked choir this morning. What crazy kids!!