Habitat Fair

One of my favorite things about Kinkaid is coming up and seeing the kids present their work.  There aren't many opportunities, so I relish the ones we do get.  This year, the Second Graders participated in a Habitat Fair.  Each class had an assigned habitat -- Olivia's was the ocean.  And each child got assigned an animal to research.  Then they had to write a non-fiction story about their animal and create a diorama of their habitat/animal. 

Olivia got the blue whale and she -- as well as all the other kids -- did such a great job! 

After you see your child's presentation, the parents and other teachers/administrators walk around to see the projects the other kids did.  We loved being able to hear her story and see her work, as well a walking around and seeing her friends' projects.  Here Olivia is reading her story to Mrs. Lemon, the Vice Principal. 

It was a great afternoon and we loved seeing Olivia bursting with pride at her work!

This and That

We had a busy weekend recently with what is hopefully (knock on wood!) the last traveling weekend for Matt for a while.

Olivia had a few birthday parties on her social calendar.  I just adore the themes that these creative mammas come up with -- what little girl wouldn't love a Unicorn Dance Party.  And, of course this is what you would wear!

She has a sweet little group of friends that I'm happy she can celebrate

And while Olivia was with her friends, I planned a little park play-date for Eric and one of his friends, Hannah.  Its the first time he has ever had a playdate with one of his school friends and he LOVED it!

Another first for Eric was his first time getting caught climbing.  I am pretty lax on letting Eric be alone in a room because I think of him as compliant and cautious.  So I was SHOCKED to walk in and see him like this.

We have been enjoying these little traveling pop-up experiences that have been coming to town.  We went to Candytopia last summer and we hit up Color Factory recently with our friend Sadie.  It was strikingly similar to Candytopia but the kids both loved it.  

 

 

We were very happy to have Olivia to ourselves on Sunday and we took advantage of the nice weather and played outside

My parents came over for dinner and by 7:30, this little one was DONE!

 And, I wanted to quickly document this mainly so we would remember later on.  As I’ve mentioned, we have really been struggling with Eric’s eating—specifically his refusal to eat.  He is still gaining weight based on his consumption of a half gallon of milk/day, but some recent bloodwork confirmed that he’s lacking some pretty basic nutritional requirements.

So, we went to an appointment with the specialists at Texas Children’s.  It was an interesting appointment because it was a very clear visual representation of how deeply uncomfortable and anxious this child is with food.  When we walked in, we were introduced to 2 therapists who would be doing the evaluation.  There were several puzzles set out on the table and the therapists greeted Eric and asked him if he wanted to come sit and do a puzzle.  He immediately agreed and happily sat down and began doing the puzzles.  I quickly realized this was designed to occupy Eric so I could talk to the therapists.  After I walked them through Eric’s history, the therapists sat down and tried to engage with Eric to develop a rapport with him.  It worked and he easily warmed up to them and began telling him about the puzzle he was working on.  Then they asked me what food I brought (I received instructions ahead of time re: bringing foods Eric will/will not eat.).  As soon as I pulled out the lunchbox, Eric’s mood visibly changed.  He pushed his chair out and came around the table, climbed on my lap and laid his head on my shoulder.  He initially wouldn’t look at the therapists when they asked him to try the food.  But, these ladies definitely showed off their professional knowledge by patiently convincing Eric to “crunch his cracker like a dinosaur.”  He ate 2 small saltines.  Then they wanted to see him use a spoon so they asked him if he could teach them to take a bite of yogurt.  Eric was not falling for any of this.  He opened the lid of the yogurt and then came right back to my lap.  The therapists were asking him to smell or touch the yogurt, to which he politely responded “No thank you.  No thank you.”

Then, one of the therapists took the spoon and smeared the yogurt on the table making the letter “E.”  Eric’s eyes got big as saucers and he looked at me and said “Do we put yogurt on the table?” in the same voice I use when I ask him things like “Do we throw balls in the house?” or “Do we climb on the table?”  She told him it was okay and then ask him to touch it.  Another no thank you.  She asked him to smear it with his spoon.  He reluctantly put his spoon on it for a minute and then was right back in my lap.

So, they saw first hand his attitude towards food.  The good news is, they assured me they successfully treat 100s of kids a year with these issues.  We will start weekly occupational where Eric will join up with a group of 2 other kids with similar issues.  While he’s working with that therapist, apparently the parents are in a room with a double-sided mirror watching the kids and being coached by our own therapist on do’s/don’ts and tips/tricks.  So a simultaneous parent-child therapy if you will.  I think this will be good for him and my expectation is that these therapists can figure out what’s going on and help us.  I have some pretty serious nerves about the logistics of getting to these weekly appointments with our already full schedules, but hopefully we can make it work. 

I mean, I don't think there's anything we wouldn't do for this snuggle-bug!

Toddler 2

Just a quick little note on Eric's transition to his new class at school.  He has been in Toddler 1 since this summer and he LOVES it.  His favorite thing about the class are the teachers - he loves each of them so much and will tell me every single day which teacher sat next to him, talked to him, helped him with his work, etc.  He has also grown a lot in this class -- his speech is crazy -- complex sentences with lots of new words and phrases.  His imaginative play has really expanded and we are forever pretending to be pirates or animals going on an adventure.  Academically, he seems to be excelling as well.  I've mentioned before that he's not as open as Olivia telling us what he knows, but we have been working with him at home on a few workbooks or Brain Quest and he definitely is mastering the concepts/letters/numbers that he should.

He is also starting to get a little more interested in friends.  I think because he hears Olivia talking about "best friends" so often, he has started using that phrase too.  Lately he will come home and tell us about a kid that he played with on the playground, or sat next to at lunch and label that kid as his "best friend." 

We knew he was going to transition the week after Valentine's Day, so we had been talking about it for a few weeks.  He is old enough now that he was able to plainly and clearly tell us he was scared about it. So we talked about being brave, how it was normal to feel that way, and he went to school that morning with his puppies (appropriately named Blue Puppy and Other Blue Puppy).  We also watched a Daniel Tiger episode about finding something familiar when you're in a new situation and we talked about what might be familiar in his new class.  And finally on the big day we both walked into school a little nervous.   

When I went to pick him up that evening, he ran to me and said "I liked it! I didn't cry and I didn't run away!"  Matt and I were laughing that we didn't even know he knew what running away was or that it was on the table, but we were thrilled he liked his new class.  He apparently listened to a story, learned about traffic lights, got reunited with his old pal Amelia and they played pretend together.  Then he got to go on the playground with his new class.  His teacher, Kayla - who Olivia had as well - told me that she was working with him and kept trying to get him to say her name.  He refused.  But when it was time to go line up to go outside, she felt a little hand in hers and realized Eric had come next to her and held her hand.  I guess he was feeling a little nervous about going outside with his new class so they walked together and then he apparently gave her a smile, let go of her hand and ran off.

I think this new class will be a good adjustment for our little guy.

LOVEly days..

We have had a fun few weeks.  First up was International Fair at Kinkaid.  I don't think I will ever get over the amazing experience the school/parents create for these kiddos.  This year's countries were Brazil and Austria.  She visited Austria on the first day and had fun learning about the country and building a snowman.

The second day, I took a shift manning the Mercado in Brazil and loved teaching the kids about the fruits and coffee at this beautiful market.

With Matt's busy travel schedule, I have taken over a few Waffle Wednesday mornings at Kinkaid, including one with just Olivia after we dropped baby brother off at school early one morning.

One recent development in the story of Eric and Olivia is that the hitting seems to have stopped and been replaced by a love for Olivia that conveniently comes when I want Eric to do something he doesn't want to do (go to bed, go to school, take a nap, etc.).  In these moments, he will run to Olivia and yell "Olivia, get on my back!! Lets run away!"  And, she will gladly oblige.  They usually go hide in my room with the iPad or under the dining room table. It's not ideal but both Matt and I are usually willing to let them get away with it for a little while all in the name of fostering this sibling relationship.

(In this particular picture, Eric was scared to walk outside because Olivia brought an earthworm home from school that was living under the covered patio by the back door.  Eric was pretty grossed out by the whole thing (who can blame him??!!) so he made Olivia carry him and he closed his eyes so he didn't have to see it!)

Every once in a while, I can convince them to read a bedtime story..

We also had a week of Yazzie in Houston!  She was involved in some litigation that THANKFULLY settled, but while she was in town, she ended up staying literally across the street from Cathedral House.  So I made her come over in the mornings to walk Eric to class with me.  And we were able to reinstate our sushi/crepe tradition one night.

Olivia has been having fun at Girl Scouts and enjoyed a painting class with her troop.

And we had a sweet LOVE day.  Olivia took popcorn for her friends, and Eric took little animal masks.  Plus they both took some cookies for their teachers.

They woke up to a few sweet surprises from mommy/daddy and their aunts.

They both were festive for the day and had class parties at school (unfortunately, Olivia's teacher didn't send any pics)

And they both came home with a big bag of loot (and some presents from their grandparents) which they promptly dumped all over my floor

And just for the memory book, I can't even with Eric in a matching button down with daddy one night before dinner