A weekend of Thanks

~I AM THANKFUL AND SERIOUSLY BLESSED~

~ First and foremost: FAMILY... the ones that live in this house and mom and dad and brothers and grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins and nephews and in laws too~

~ Friends: love my small group of friends in my life~

~ Health: as i feel myself aging quicker than i wish, really it could be so much worse~

~ Opportunities: i am not speaking of any specific opportunities.. just that they are there every day masked or unmasked~

~ Materials: not in a shallow way... but i am lucky to have a home and clothing and food and even a few nice things and the best is providing for the kids~

~ Nature: she's a beauty~
~ The Small Things: i really try to cherish them each day and not just today~
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Kienan had a Kindergarten Thanksgiving Performance

He recited a memorized line with another little girl:

"A is for Americans. The earliest Americans were Pilgrims. They sailed to American to be free from their religion."

Long, huh?

and then all 3 classes sang Thanksgiving songs.

How cute is he as a pilgrim!! **************************************

We spent the holiday in Fremont, San Francisco and Monterrey. We visited Kyle's aunt jeannette and uncle vince. Aunt marilyn, uncle matt, ( i didn't get a picture of you 2!!!) ashley, trevor, and vincent were there too. The food was awesome the company awesomer.

kyle, ashley, vincent, and trevor

i have no idea what is on kienan's pants!!!

the fabulous cooks~

We spent Friday at the San Francisco Bay being tourists :)

Kienan was excited to eat Clam Chowder right on Fisherman's Wharf.

Josh had the clam chowder also while the rest of us ate chili.

We walked, shopped, and saw the sea lions on Pier 39.



The kids learned about Alcatraz and i hope i scared them into never going to jail.


~some of my favorites~

We crossed the Bay Bridge going into the city....



... and the Golden Gate Bridge heading outta the city~

We spent the next day in Monterrey and at the Aquarium. The aquarium was AMAZING and well worth the money, but waaaayy too over crowded.

~Monterrey Bay~

There was a baby and toddler section.

I was so impressed with how well it was set-up.

This was "Walking on Waves." It was just like a water bed.

~Sitting in the clam~

~Curious Learners~

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We ended the trip with dinner at Bubba Gumps which is a restaurant based on the movie Forest Gump.

The food was great, but even better was the atmosphere and dining on the beach.

AND.... the newest little person to be thankful for is our new nephew born November 29th:

Conner Liam Bain

(Kyle's sister Heather & her husband Keith & their son Donovan)

Photography is a creative outlet

Patience

There is not a whole lot to this story. It is pretty simple....

My patience ran out the other day. I saw her. She ran right out the front door around 5:30pm. I am pretty sure the whole thing was premeditated. Earlier in the day I kinda had noticed a suitcase by the front door, but i didn't really pay that much attention.

It was her suitcase, Patience that is. She was packed and ready to go.

Can't blame her.

I had been working her 24/7 with no smoke breaks or lunch breaks. She had asked several times to just let the kids go hog wild and take a breather.

I demanded that she stay on top of things.

Funny thing is... after she bailed on me i was faced with 2 choices:

Yell and have a meltdown or let the kids go hog wild.

Yep. Hog wild and Butt Naked.

I sent her an email today begging for forgiveness and offered a her new and improved contract.

Baths each night, glass of wine every now and then, and Hog wild parties.

She responded.

Apparently, Tolerance was hiding in her getaway suitcase.

I hadn't even noticed that i had lost Tolerance.

They were enjoying "The Life" and weren't sure if they wanted to come back to our home.

i reminded her and Tolerance of how sometimes the giggles filled our house and what a baby kiss felt like and a monkey hug too and how the smell of peanut butter meant there was a kid near by and innocence is most pure in a child and how they strive to please sometimes and all the creative. messy, imaginative things we accomplished each day.

She listened.

She cried.

She wanted to come back.

I guess they made it all the way to Canada. It's gunna take a few days before they're back.

So..... I'm eagerly waiting by my front door with three little ones all in my lap.

My Lil Monkey

i love when my camera works :)

Feelings

Just thought that i would put some books out there to consider when dealing with the 546 emotions that children experience from birth to well, teenagers and adults. Obviously i took the pictures from Amazon. :) Visual props always work better for me.

I think Mackenzie likes this one, "The Way I Feel" best. It's simple yet has a variety of emotions. I'm all about the illustrations too.

Kienan has really gravitated towards "Feelings" and it's my favorite right now. There are a few flaws in the book, but i just choose to see past them and absorb the good stuff. Kienan gets that "pondering stare" when we read it (he has had that look since birth). I can tell he is absorbing. I think that this one is actually making a difference!

I used "My Many Colored Days" as a poetry activity when i taught 7th grade. It's a bit easier for a kid to say I'm having a red day or a mixed up color day than I feel frusterated or unemotionally stable. Today I started with a yellow day cuz i felt busy all day. (I cleaned out and wiped down the pantry and reorganized it, cleaned out the medicine cupboard and cleaned and wiped down the inside of the fridge. Huh? Ya, don't know what got into me. Now i feel kinda purple, mellow. Gunna go take a very hot bath while sipping a glass of zin.)

Another way we address feelings is through drawing. I walked outside the other day and saw a whole bunch of sad faces in sidewalk chalk. I realized it was kienan emotionally throwing-up all over the concrete. Makes me sad to see his sad faces, but at least i know what he's feeling which presents an opportunity to TALK!

Whatever you choose just make sure that the door of communication is always open even if it's not what you want to hear cuz it's not always about you.

Family News

Here is our newest edition, Tommy hanging with his brother, Toby. Toby was hanging with us until the kittens were 8 weeks old. He is off to his new home, my brothers' house :) Kienan came up with the name Tommy. Since we have a mice problem in our backyard he figured we already have the "Jerrys" so now we have "Tom" like Tom and Jerry :)

Can you tell that Kyle insisted "No CATS!" for the first week before we convinced him to let us keep Tommy?

tough guy cuddled on the couch with the kittens~

We mustn't forget the first born children of the family. They are very curious about the kitties, still love their treats, and attempt to escape every now and then.

Josh earned Student of the Month in his school!!!! The program through is Character Counts. His Video teacher nominated him and he was chosen amongst 10 other students. We celebrated with a family dinner at Islands. He also had a 4.0 on his last report card. He had all A's and 1 B, but the B was in an Honors class so it counts extra. Check out his video website as he is adding new ones all the time.

Kiera is busy as ever keeping up with her older brother and sister. It is amazing how much she understands what we say. Her words are still "mama" and "dada". She's a dancer, an entertainer, and still a snuggle bug :) She mimics all of us in everything we do. No room for error i tell ya.

Kienan brought home 3 papers this week with 100%. He is doing so well in school academically! We are signing him up for flag football starting in January. He has more energy than the energizer bunny times 10. He is an avid skateboarder, reader, and loves to antagonize his sister :)

This series of picture really warms my heart. He recently told kyle and i that he has a hard time making friends during recess. Broke my heart and of course brought me to tears. I just can't understand how the whole world wouldn't want to be his friend. He has so mush to offer and i'm praying that everyone can see it too so he doesn't feel so sad at school, but rather shares this smile.

Mackenzie seems to have grown up so quickly all of the sudden. I hate that. She went from toddler to big girl way too fast. My parents gave her ballet lessons for her birthday so we will be starting those soon. She is very fond of being fancy these days. I believe she has worn more make-up in the past month than i have in the past 5 years.

Good to have a girl in the house :)The picture below was such a proud mommy moment. it just seemed that the girls room was getting out of control with their clothes and i was trying to weed out the summer clothes and their room look like a tornado, hurricane, and earthquake hit all in 2 seconds.

Poor daughter of mine just wanted to rest her tired self. So she found the only cleared spot in probably the house that day and curled up as tight as she could. i found her fast asleep not even covered up with one of the million blankets we have. Nope. A pillow times three. She stacked them to make her half naked body warm. This is proof of how crazy our world gets sometimes. i feel bad that she didn't have a nice cozy bed to lay her head down, but at the same time i feel like this picture captures the unspoken truth of parenting at times.and here i am. UGH! done with the whole knee-in-brace look. Yep. Just Done.