Fun and Christmasy Things

Tomorrow is Christmas Eve! 

Last week, the third graders had their poetry recital.  They each had to select a poem, memorize, and recite it in front of their families on Wednesday morning for a grade.  Casey was nervous and thought if she picked a short poem she'd have an easier time remembering it.  Her teacher was on to her and knows her potential should aim a little higher, so she made Casey pick 2 short poems to recite.  She did very well and we were proud of her :)

Thursday was both girls' holiday class parties.  I was smart this time and signed up to bring and run the same game at both parties.  I learned my lesson at Emily's Halloween party - I do not like crafts; I'm much happier doing games.  I made this one up and it was a hit at both parties.  Even better - it couldn't have been easier.  It's loosely based on corn hole and all I needed was to wrap an empty box, add ribbon across the top to make it a little harder and more fun and to buy plastic ornaments from the Target dollar bin.  Easy, fun, not much of a time commitment, no clean-up.  For a day, I considered myself a genius.

 

 

Friday was supposed to be the girls' last day of school, but we played hooky to go downtown with friends to see The Nutcracker and have lunch.  I think there were over 20 of us moms and daughters and was a fun, Christmasy thing to do.  Casey seemed to enjoy the performance, but it did not catch Emily's attention for very long, so she and I hung out outside the auditorium and walked around.  I was prepared for this and spent too much time worrying about this before hand.  Casey was fine and Emily and I were fine entertaining ourselves with counting city Metro buses and looking at the Christmas trees around the Aronoff Center.  A friendly usher did offer us the private VIP corporate viewing suite to watch the second act since it was not in use.  So we were able to watch some of the show in the comfort of big leather chairs and the freedom for Emily to move around and talk without us bothering anyone else.  Sweet hookup :)

My iphone camera really let me down.  Just a few of the kids who were part of our group.

By this time, Emily was done with the pictures I was taking.  I think Casey is eating her 8th candy cane.

Only part of our group (we never did get an entire group picture)

Today, we took the girls to EnterTRAINment Junction here in West Chester.  We used to go downtown to see the Duke Energy holiday trains until the exhibit was moved to the Cincinnati Museum Center.  We followed them there one year and hated the experience.  It just isn't fun and Christmasy anymore at it's new location.  Although we miss the festiveness of downtown, now our tradition is to stay close to home and enjoy finding all the miniature Santas scattered about the world's largest indoor train exhibit (I think I read that in a brochure today).



 Not only are there trains there, but Mrs. & Mr. Claus is there as well, so it really becomes a one-stop fun, Christmasy thing for us.  On the record, in the year 2013 at the age of 5-1/2, for the very first time on her own, Emily sat on Santa's lap.  And little sister was actually excited for it!  Last year she wouldn't go within 20 feet of Santa.  When we got in (the very long) line, she wanted to back out, but by the time we got to Mrs. Claus and her sugar cookies, Emily was gearing up to go toe-to-toe with the big guy. 

Emily greeted Mrs. Claus by saying Merry Christmas :)

I couldn't resist Mrs. Claus' spices in her (adorable) kitchen

Casey on the other hand, said she was opting out of it this year but she wouldn't come clean on why.  After some coaxing, with her arms crossed across her chest, she finally said, and I quote, "Fine, mom.  I just feel like I'm a little too old to sit on his lap.  I'm just probably having a mid-life crisis or something."  Tom and I were dying laughing.  The cool thing about seeing Santa here is, when it's your turn, you have a private audience with him.  No screaming, whining kids and exhausted parents escalating the chaos of the scene.  It was Santa, the 4 of us and a helper behind a camera.  Santa addressed Emily first and she answered with a big hug.  Then he told Casey to have a seat on his knee and it turns out she couldn't say no to him :)  When they were done telling him what they wanted, Santa asked Emily to stand right by him as he was looking for something in his pocket.  Then he gave her her very own sleigh bell from his sleigh.  And she was over the moon. 

She greeted him by saying, "Nice to meet you."

First time on Santa's lap

Casey overcame her mid-life crisis!  ;)

Genuine smiles
 

Personally, I think Santa is thinking, "You want WHAT?" here.

Santa is giving Emily a special sleigh bell.  (I'm not sure every kid got one of these :)

I later asked Casey if she was upset that Emily got a jingle bell and she didn't and she said, "No, that's okay.  Emily got a special bell because she has a special syndrome."  I wasn't sure what to do with that statement.  Should I probe deeper to find out if Casey has some buried resentment or encourage her to open up to me about why it's okay for Emily to get special treatment, but I decided to just let it go.  Casey seemed to be happy for Emily and her special jingle bell and, instead, I told her I was proud of her that she was glad her sister got something special for her first time sitting on Santa's lap.   
 

Sleigh bell in hand.

Writer's Block

December 17th and an entire month has again passed by without a blog post.  We've had a busy November and December and I've nothing to show for it.  And, sadly, I am forcing myself to sit at my computer right now.  See this picture?  I just took it as I'm typing this. 

That would be my beer sitting on top of Casey's OAA reading test scores.  Ironic that I haven't even written about how well she's doing in school this year.  Third grade is the first year our district gives letter grades and girlfriend has straight A's so far.  Nice work, babe!!  She still has a lot (I mean a lot) to learn in the personal responsibility department, but seems to be keeping her head pretty far above water in spite of it.  Daddy has dangled a pretty big carrot in front of her if she maintains straight A's the entire school year, so stay tuned to how that goes.  (*chuckle*) No, really.  I swear I'm going to be better at writing memories.  I am determined to get over the writer's block that has consumed me this fall. 

Emily's dance team requested parents write about how dance has meant to the dancers.  And I was like, of course.  Who can do reflective and sentimental introspection better than me?  Okay, a lot of people.  But who can do it better about my kids?  And I like writing that way.  And I like to think that Casey and Emily will enjoy reading 'Deep Thoughts from Mom' one day.  And I find writing actually therapeutic (or cathartic - am I using that word in the right context?  I have a hilariously terrible habit of mis-using words).  The fact that I haven't written much at all the last few months has been a bit of a burden.  I have even not allowed myself to read any book (something I truly love to do) because I know I should be writing.  Anyhow, about sometime in October it occurred to me that maybe what I am writing in my blog might be read and judged by people who know my kids through school - like parents of their peers.  When Emily was invited to her very first play date (you know, the legit kind where I wasn't invited along to?), I cried the proverbial tears of joy.  Yes, Emily was invited to play at a typical friend's house and I did not write about that.  If I look back at my blog, that does not follow my style.  My style is to celebrate these kind of things and to reflect on how meaningful such an ordinary event is to us, me.  But as soon as I started to put pen to paper (that sounds so much cooler than fingertips to keyboard), I put the brakes on.  And I started to think, maybe I am seeing her too much for her special needs.  And drawing too much attention to her special needs by writing about her and life and struggles and victories.  So I stopped writing.  Because I don't want to hinder what people think about my girls.  Even the fact that Casey got straight A's made me think if I wrote about it, someone might construe (did I use that word right?) it as shameless bragging.  So I continued my boycott of writing.  And I've hated it. 

I feel a bit sad that I never wrote about celebrating my parent's 40th wedding anniversary.

I feel wistful about not writing about how beautiful fall was and how we played outside in the leaves, or how we've had 2 snowfalls already and have had snowball fights and went sledding.

 

 

And I feel almost negligent about not writing about Emily fell down the stairs and fractured her wrist.  Just after Tom had surgery on his elbow.  And how Casey rallied the neighbors to write messages to Emily in the cul de sac so she would see them when we got home from the hospital.

Hear that?  That is the sound of Tom finding out I put this picture on the internet.  If you can't tell by that sound, Tom is pissed.  :)

Pink with purple stripes.  And glitter.

This was a lot of fun.  Not.

 

Best big sister ever, right?  (Tom said Casey actually cried when he told her Emily broke her wrist because she didn't want Emily to be in pain.) 

And I regret having not captured the fun of the Christmas season so far.  From putting up and decorating the trees to making cookies and goodies to the arrival of our magical elf to helping out with festivities at our church.

 

This might be the all time funniest picture.  I'm playing in the snow with Casey (mostly taking pictures) and I turn around and see Emily lying like a blob on the front porch.  What a goof.

She's completely comfortable.  Go about your business.

As I wrote the requested letter about what dance has meant to Emily, I realized what writing has mean to me.  And, hopefully, what it will one day mean to my girls.  I will try to not let what people may or may not think about this blog decide the direction of it.  And I will not try to hide the fact that Emily has special needs and we deal with a lot of special needs stuff.  And I certainly will not be ashamed of either of my daughter's accomplishments.  So here's to getting back on the horse of writing and documenting memories for my family!  Although I just realized I've just made a toast and my beer is empty.  I'm going to go get another one now and I think I will enjoy it a bit more now that I think I've shaken my writer's block.