G ~ GOD (I'm a Believer!)

I believe in God, the Father Almighty,

maker of heaven and earth.

And in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,

who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,

and born of the virgin Mary,

suffered under Pontius Pilate,

was crucified, died and was buried.

He descended into hell.

On the third day He rose again from the dead.

He ascended into heaven

and sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty.

From thence He will come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,

the holy Christian church,

the communion of saints,

the forgiveness of sins,

the resurrection of the body,

and the life everlasting. Amen

One of my favorite bands does a rockin', guitar shreddin' version of this.  Third Day, live.  Happy Friday Friends!

AZ Challenge for the month of April.  Button in sidebar ! And NEW!  Navigation buttons.  I may just end up learning some HTML through this...

F ~ Fact of Fiction?

Remember that game where you say things about yourself and people have to guess which one isn't true? Can't remember the name of it, or if it even has a name, but since today is the letter F, I'm calling it Fact or Fiction. Here's how it's going to work. I'm going to tell you five (again, for the letter F) random things about me. These will be like Cliff Clavin's little known facts, as in totally useless. One will be a complete whopper of a lie. Now I know what of some of you're thinking. “I just found this blog yesterday. How am I supposed to know these things?” Well, to make it fair (because we all know that all mothers are fair all the time, and IT'S THE LETTER F TODAY) these are facts that I haven't blogged about, OK? Sheesh. Calm DOWN you competitive people! (Wait, that's me...ya'll are yawning...)

1. I had a secret boyfriend in my sophomore year in high school. A real “bad boy” my parents wouldn't have approved of (not that I was allowed to date, mind you...) He played guitar in a band, smoked, and boy could he kiss. My mother would drive me over to his house. For guitar lessons.
   
   
2. I taught myself calligraphy. I'm not half bad.  It just takes practice, and the right tools.
   
   
3. I'm a champion whistler. Can't sing worth anything, but for some reason I can whistle. Maybe all those years of clarinet, piano, and guitar lessons did me some good after all.
   
   
4. My worst fear as a child was running into Stephen Kings' Carrie, covered in blood. We were at a campground with a store and the book was on a rack, and I kept looking at the pictures from the movies every time I was in there, even though I thought she was after me. This lasted until well into adulthood, where the creep from Silence of the Lambs took her place.
   
   
5. I learned to swim in freezing lakes in Sweden, but I taught my boys to swim using crocs on their hands and in one of those quick-set pools with the inflatable ring around the rim. In the backyard.
   
   
   Tomorrow I'll let you know which one is false. Good luck!   Fame and Fortune await! Nah, just bragging rights.

AZ Challenge all month. Button in sidebar!

E ~ Expressive Language

Since we were talking about YellowBoy being a late talker yesterday ...this next story fits perfectly here. Not only did he finally start talking, he hasn't stopped. The boy talks NON-STOP. Random question. Intricate descriptions. Long movie quotes. Extensive explanations of how things work that he learned about from watching Modern Marvels. His design ideas for his latest Lego Digital Designer project. (The boy can “auto-cad” like an experienced engineer. Kinda creepy-cool in a child prodigy sort of way.) And like any good hypochondriac, he describes his symptoms. Over and over and over and over again.

I've tried various methods of curtailing the complaining. I've given him “one full minute to list all your symptoms as fast as you can”. I've had him write them out on a notecard and hand them to me for future reference, to “save him” from having to repeat himself. And I've banned whining in my pretty room. But it was the YellowBoy himself who solved the problem. Elegantly. And for school credit.

During the fifth grade, kids at my boys' former school took keyboarding and learned to type quite well by the end of the year. Well, at least Jake did. Can't actually speak for the others. So since YellowBoy is in fifth, we've casually been working with him to improve his skills, while at the same time teaching him how to organize and save files, how to make the most of the word processor's features, and how to save to a USB drive to move files to a different computer. He catches on fast and isn't afraid to poke around and try to figure it out on his own. (By the way, that's my theory of why kids are so much better at electronics and technology: They aren't afraid to try. We, on the other hand, worry about screwing something up, so we don't try anything.)

So there we are, I've just gone in to wake him up for the day of school and am snuggling in his queen sized water bed with him. 

 “Mom, I feel like flip.”

“Oh, what's flip?”

“Allergies as usual, but not a bad allergy day. Just an average allergy day.”

“Ok, then what about a bad allergy day?”

“Flep. Cuz I just want to flep out."

I think he's onto something. If I can condense his complaining to one or two exactly chosen words, I won't have to listen to the whole, long recital.

“That's brilliant. Why don't you go write the definitions down for me, and then print it out and we'll put it on the fridge for us all to learn.”

And off he goes. I head to the store, knowing that he won't need me for his English lesson that day. When I get back, this is on the fridge.

Not bad, eh? Pretty stinkin' clever, in fact, using suffixes to tweak the meaning. AND he figured out how to do the colors. And then put the file on the USB drive and took it to the computer that has the color printer. Not bad for a day's worth of “English”.  

I'm happy to report that so far it's working.  That's a good thing, because while I'm not needing the “y” much these days, I am most definitely flapp-ing. Going to go take a nap....

AZ Challenge for the month of April.  Button in side-bar.

P.S  If you're new, and wondering why I call him YellowBoy, you can read about him here.

D ~ Don't You Talk?

YellowBoy (now 11) has always been special. He's a prayed for boy, the survivor of a high-risk pregnancy, born three weeks early (to avoid the difficulties that resulted from his older brother being 9 pounds 10.5 ounces and his mother being 5'4”. Enough said on that topic here.  It's in "Just Call me Jake". ) He still checked in at 7 pounds 10 ounces, even though technically a preemie. Everything was fine (if you don't count that he never really slept much, and instead screamed much, as in 24/7 ) until he was a toddler. While most of his peer group had their “normal” 20 or so words, Luke could say “Mama.” That's all. Just “Mama.” This of course sent the healthcare system into an overdrive of “preventative and proactive” services.

We were referred to Child Find, which operates out of local school districts to identify kids who might benefit from intervention NOW as opposed to only dealing with their particular handicap or disability once they have begun school, when it might even be too late to accomplish as much. It's really a great program, and I don't mean to be complaining, I just feel that freaking out about a 2 year old not talking is not really helpful to the mothers who might have shared the struggles I had, from conception to delivery, only to now be told that something's really wrong.

So off we went, eye screening, hearing screening. (Just wondering, um, if he can't talk, how can you tell if he can hear you when you hold up an apple and say, “What is this?”)  Interviews. Home study. No one could find a cause for his not talking. We got a year of free speech therapy. Do you know what speech therapy looks like with a toddler? Here, I'll show you.

“YellowBoy, let's play with the train! Can you say train? TTRRAAIINN?”

Yabbadabbadooba-da! (Or like in this video...Seriously, you don't have to watch the whole thing, just take a peak to get the idea of what I mean. But if you watch to the end, know that it just gets sweeter and sweeter...if you're in need of something sweet to make you smile, spend the two minutes ;-)

Ok, so like I was saying, speech therapy is nothing different than a normal mother playing with her child. We instinctively do those language building kinds of activities all day! Narrating what we're doing, asking their preferences. We probably don't think about it, most of us. But whatever.  If you want to provide free, in-home experts twice a week for a year, be my guest.

At the end of that year, no change. He was still talking up a storm, but not English. Again, like the video. They sure look like they know what they're saying, don't they?

I would tuck him in, and pray with him. And then stand at the foot of his (now big boy bed) and wonder if I'd ever hear him say, “I love you Mommy!” I needn't have worried. We had a family, dear friends of ours from the other side of the country come visit us for a week. They had two kids at that time, same ages as my two. Second day, YellowBoy is running around speaking in full sentences. FULL SENTENCES. It was quite the shock, let me tell you.  And of course one of those precious sentences was the long awaited declaration of love.

It all goes to show that kids develop at their own speed, to their own level, and when they're ready. Wish I'd realized that when I was potty training Jake.  For a year.  But that's another story. P ~ Pee? We'll see.

It's AZ challenge all of April. Button is side-bar!

C ~ Contentment

What does contentment mean to you? It's a fairly common term, but I've found that we don't all define it in the same way. In my view, contentment has nothing to do with WHAT you have, or don't have. Contentment is an attitude we can choose to have, or not to have. I choose to be content.

Maybe you're thinking, “Wait a minute. This whiny girl with all her chronic pain is saying she's content? I don't buy it. She writes all this poetry about pain and heartache. Complains about homeschooling. That is NOT what I call content.” And you're right. But that happens to be exactly my point. I HAVEN'T been choosing contentment. I HAVE been wallowing in self-pity. I'm done now. Going to try to be done now.

In my A post, A New Beginning, I mentioned that the past year or so has been rough. The slide began with me being canned from my dream job,  and as I sit here writing, I have the flu.  In between, I had whooping cough (with almost a month, total, of bedrest). I had complications from whooping cough. I tore the labrum in my hip. I found out that I need that arthritic hip replaced, not scoped. My grandmother died. My dad was diagnosed with Parkinson's.

But in 2010, I also went on a cruise. My relationship with my sons changed dramatically (that would be the result homeschooling.) I was able to be there for a friend during her major life-changing crisis. I went on a road trip to my favorite vacation spot, Annapolis, MD. I went to the beach, the same beach where we honeymooned. I became a blogger. I am able to knit again. I got to go on three separate snowboarding trips with my boys, and my Best got to join us for one of those. The Engineer and I established a REAL date night, where we LEAVE THE HOUSE once a week. Even got two weekends in a row without the boys, so as a result, a trip to Glenwood Springs. And we finally, finally, finally, paid off our last credit card.

Those two different descriptions of this past year make for a sharp contrast. Seems painfully obvious which description is more pleasant. Yet they both are an accurate depiction of the events. So this day I am choosing contentment, and when someone asks me, “So how was your 2010?” I'm going to say, I got to go on a cruise...

How about you? Are you content?

By now, you're probably catching on. A ~ Z for the month of April.   1200+ participants and counting! Climb aboard, it's going to be a great ride!

B ~ Brother

I've written a lot about my family, both my immediate family, as well as the wonderful extended family I'm blessed with. But I've never written about my brother more than in passing. It's his turn, and long overdue. I'd like you to meet DataBoy.

I was seven when he was born, and it was very hard being patient, waiting for him to be born. Not only was I excited to have another sibling, but I was more than ready for my mother to quit barfing everywhere. You might recall that I'm vomit-phobic (V ~ Vomit? Hmm...will have to consider that...) so I didn't really want to be anywhere near her. For nine months.

My parents had two girls, and were praying for a boy. I remember my mother (who does NOT subscribe to there being any such thing asTMI, EVER) explaining in great detail about how to stack the odds in the male direction. I was SEVEN. I didn't need that information. Then.

The night he was born I awoke to the sounds of my mother barfing (of course) and then taking a shower. Hmm. I went to investigate. She was getting dressed! In the middle of the night! “The baby is coming soon!” I didn't get any more sleep after that, and it was with open arms and happy heart that I got to hold him a few days later when they brought him home. My very own, living doll.

As a toddler, he had to put up with a lot. Imagine two sisters whose favorite game is playing house, who own numerous dolls, and who spend a LOT of time building the house set-up, and THEN playing for hours and hours. Now we had a real doll! Who moved and talked and hugged! But he didn't lie down. He would NOT lie down for his “nap”. Or for bed. We hadn't really expected that. A doll that resisted our directing was something new. So the challenge became getting him to lie down. We built an amazing assortment of “cribs” for him, hoping that something would cause him to want to REALLY play with us. I think he may have consented once or twice. But no worries, by then we'd found something far more interesting to do with (to?) him.

When he got hurt, he'd allow himself to be cuddled and swaddled, and rocked and comforted. So we made sure he got hurt. I'm NOT kidding, unfortunately, and I don't know why my mother didn't stop us, but we'd take turns being the one to hurt him, and then the other got to comfort him. I'm sad to say that we did this, but here at Life is Good, you do get the truth. (I try to respect the privacy of shy family members, but in this one I'm the bad guy, so I figure I'm safe...)(Sorry Swissie, but I'm here under the bus with you...) I don't know why he continued to play with us, but he did. Despite the pinching and indian burns and um, light punches.

He did grow up to be a perfectly normal man. Well, not normal. He's incredibly brilliant, has basically a photographic memory, and excels at whatever sport he chooses. He's generous, and forgiving, and fair. He works in the computer world, and does very, very well.  (And would KILL me if I published the picture of the three of us siblings getting our very first computer.  This was 1983, and it was the Atari 800.  Tape drive.  It's a very prophetic picture because he's grinning like a kid in a, well, computer store and so excited.)  That excitement has taken him far.  He now works for one of the giants.  Pretty sure you have some of their software on you laptop.  He's a security expert.  

I guess you can tell how much I love him. He lives way too far away from Colorado, but he flies me out for “chill weekends” to enjoy his hospitality in Virginia. An added bonus is that he married one of my dearest friends, who is now my sister-in-law! Has made for an interesting dynamic at times...and we'll leave that one there. Ok, one story.

When they first met (I set them up. Ok, I gave him her email...) it was Thanksgiving. She was still a Colorado girl at the time, so when Christmas rolled around, he came to visit her (and me, and our parents). YogaGirl and I have very similar physical features, in height, body type, and hair color. Well, imagine a group of relatives, all hanging out in the same, small house (that was our Old Town bungalow, a whopping 760 square feet.) Imagine lots of frivolity, lots of libations, and lots of good night hugs. So DataBoy wraps me up in a big hug, and plants one on me. We both kinda freaked. “Oh, sorry. You're Tina. Oops.” Yeah, I love you and all, but keep your lips on your girlfriend!

I wish we could spend more time together. But for now it's nice to know he's there, and he loves me, and it won't be too long before we're chillin' again.

More A-Z posts found here.  Hop on and join the challenge!  1190 participants, and counting!

P.S  Doing what I promised, even though I'm sitting here thinking, "There's so much more you could say about him!  This isn't nearly enough!"  JUST.  PUSH.  PUBLISH POST.  Sigh.  It's a learning curve.

A ~ A New Beginning

Let's re-boot.

Hello my friends, fellow bloggers, family members who don't know WHAT a blog is but are curious, and other wonderful writers I've met across the blogosphere in the last year. It's been a... different year than what I'd planned. That's pretty much the understatement of my life. And as a girl who learned at the feet of her amazingly talented story-telling Aunt Risky, I will be sharing tales of that, as well as what I predict will be an unpredictable stream of random posts. I'm taking the A-Z challenge with the wonderful folks over at Tossing It Out.

This challenge comes at a very good time in my life. I've been at a cross-roads of playing around with writing and writing for real and swimming in the big kids pool. I will admit I've gotten quite intimidated by the immense talent out there. But I've also learned a lot from those writers. I'll be writing about that journey, too.

It's rather a relief to have this post where I can just say all that's been on my mind for the last little while. I'd gotten to the point where I was part-way through a writing challenge and ran out of time. After that, I didn't really feel like I “should” write anything else until I finished that story. So there I sat, paralyzed. Haven't posted at even a 1/10 of my previous pace. Been paranoid about losing readers. And followers. Which led me to take a good look again at WHY I started this blog.

My tag line (as above) is: Wanna be writer seeks place to vent, practice, and share. I did that quite comfortably for a while. But the more I wrote, the more positive feedback I got, the more hesitant I became. I think it's the classic perfectionist sneaking out: wow, they think I'm OK. Better not do anything NOT OK. Sigh.

So on this first day of the challenge, I (in front of God and cyberspace) pledge to write all 26 posts in April, come hell or high water or all you get is my grocery list. I will write. Because I love to write. I want to write. And I lost that in seeking approval. But I'm back. Criticize at will.