So, our Iep and transition to kindergarten meeting went well. We got to see the school a little bit, find out about how they plan to structure the day and the schedule for her to get pull out services (adaptive PE) and address her strengths (perfectionist, knows her skills, shapes, colors, abc's) and her weaknesses (perfectionist, leans on the classroom Para too often, avoids classmates to engage Para and teacher in classroom, etc) and we got to take a tour of the special education room where she would get pull out services for speech and OT if we need to amend that into the IEP, but the goal for now is to keep her in the classroom as much as possible so she can get the socialization she needs and learn from her peers as much as possible.
We left our IEP meeting last week and drove back home to participate in the "World's Largest Trivia Contest". It was much fun and a tradition that I've participated since my birthday. (which is in April, as is trivia, so it usually lands close to my birthday). Our team came in 11th place. 3rd or 4th 11th place finish in 5 years. 54 hours of trivia, 8 questions an hour, the length of 2 songs is all you have to call in your answer.
We also celebrated my Nana's 90th birthday with a party! Family came from all over and celebrated her and the amazing life she's lived and the strong family she has built. She's an amazing woman that I admire deeply. What woman doesn't admire a gal who can birth 9 kids without drugs? That takes some guts!
I also got to visit with my dad! It is always nice to catch up. First time we've seen him since Christmas. I traded in some genealogy stuff my dad loaned me for some family pictures. its awesome. I'll have to scan some in and post a few. I love how beautiful they are!
OH! and Kaelyn and I shared the most DELICIOUS Dairy Queen cake and had some family over to my in-laws house for our first ever joint birthday! I think its pretty neat that I have a kiddo born so close to MY birthday and Jeremy has Aria, who was born 3 days after his birthday. Groovy, right?
We're home and safe and sound and after a crazy morning/afternoon (i'll blog more about that later, when I've had time to process it a little more) we're ready to snuggle in for the night and just enjoy our little family!
Thanks for Reading my little blog!
Lara
We are just beginning our lives with a beautiful daughter who was recently diagnosed with Partial Trisomy 21. Its not common, infact its pretty rare from what we were told, so we have NO Idea what the future holds for us. Hang on for the ride of our lives!
Tuesday, April 19, 2016
Thursday, April 7, 2016
New laptop!
With two active kiddos and a hubby who loves his computer, it's hard to find a time or place to sit down and update! But alas, with tax money comes the great idea to buy an acer chromebook and it arrived all neatly wrapped yesterday. I am sure after the purchase of our EXTREMELY heavy kitchenaid mixer that our mail man was very happy to have a lighter package to deliver. That poor man must have hated us a few weeks back!
Life in the house is crazy as usual. Kaelyn and Aria are over spring cold/allergy issues and I no longer find kleenex in the strangest of places. We've gotten a taste of warm weather and we are NOT happy about the sudden chill the weather has given us! But we'll manage, I suppose. Just more board games and netflix and time with the tablets.
Kaelyn just celebrated her 6th birthday and is happy with her new outfits (she's wearing her sparkle jeans and star wars shirt to school) and her favorite so far is the kids kindle. She had outgrown the apps on her Nabi tablet and it was so hard to get learning apps from the amazon app store or google play so we gave the old one to Aria and she has a Kids kindle. She's got phonics and math apps and also a few fun ones, but honestly, she plays the learning ones more! We do limit their time on the tablets so that they get artsy time and free play time where they can do what they want. Hot Wheels or puzzles or dolls or playing with their kitchen toys. But it's hard to say "no screen time" when that is a great way to engage her and let her study/practice in a way that engages her. She's a little techy and there is NO denying it!
Kaelyn was also super pleased to spend the morning of her birthday voting in our states primary with me, we did lunch and then dropped her off at school. Even though she rides the little bus and is belted in, I didn't trust a bus full of kids as the best way to transport her cupcakes for her class. So she got to have a purely fun morning and show off her classroom to her sister, and show her sister off to her teachers! I think if Aria had her way, she would have stayed with Kaelyn all day and been happy as a clam.
We had friends and family over for pizza and cupcakes after school and it was just family and friends. Well, it's the family we've made for ourselves here away from our family back home. Our friends are "aunt" and "uncle" to the girls and likewise, we are "aunt" and "uncle" to their kid. If you can't have family where you are, you make your own. I can honestly say that though i'm often homesick and sad to think about the cousins my girls aren't seeing as often as we'd like and the milestones that we are missing in our nieces and nephews lives, the "family" here in town is amazing at bringing me back to reality and that someday we will move back home and my family in town will be the family I miss and want to see. So thank you to my "made" family, you all know who you are. And thank you to my bio family who skype and call and email the girls and keep us all in the loop. It makes being away from you all that much easier.
Next week is a pretty big week. Kaelyn has her IEP/transition to kindergarten meeting next Wednesday. We get to meet her kindergarten teacher and put together our game plan for ....eek...KINDERGARTEN!! I have enough of a hard time saying i have a 6 year old. let alone have her gone the WHOLE day. I have so many worries where that is concerned. Will she do well all day? can we keep her constipation under control? minimize accidents? How will she do with lunch? Hot or cold lunch? Will we drop off at the front door or walk her to her class everyday? We dont qualify for bussing since we live to close to school so that is just another logistic. Trusting Kaelyn's education to my trusty rocket. (The girls watch "Little Einsteins" and since my car is red, we call it "Rocket" and they try to tell me to go "adagio" or other such music terms that I have long since forgotten from 10th grade band!
Oh lordy. More rambling! How did we get from IEP to little Einsteins? Who knows.
Next weeks is the "Worlds Largest Trivia Contest" back home and we participate each year. It also means lot of family time for the girls. They get to see the grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles, and see the Trivia Parade. See www.90fm.org for more information. It's really a great time for all and a super way to fund raise for the local college radio station and keep this program around for the students who wish to pursue a media degree that might otherwise be unavailable as anything with music and the arts seem to be cut lately.
We are having a cupcakes and family party next week so Kaelyn's grandmas and grandpas can sing to her. (that is her favorite part) and hubby is pretty psyched that he ordered me and Kaelyn an ice cream cake from DQ! I'm just ready for 5 1/2 days away from work (retail sucks lately as our department is short on people and long on work) and put my feet up and relax. I also need to track down time to visit my grandmothers and get a birth certificate from one for my DAR application. I only need my mom and grandmothers birth certificates and my application will be complete. Following in my great grandma Ruth's footsteps. Although I will admit, it seems to be something more common among an older demographic and I feel REALLY young to be in DAR but someone has to keep tradition and they do so much good!
well, i'll be off for now. For someone who hasn't updated in over a month, this sure seems long winded! lol. I hope you all have a good day and enjoy any warm weather you may get! We didn't' send it as we can't seem to get rid of it!. hahaha. Well take care. I'm off to go snuggle toddles. she seems to need a good amount of snuggles lately. I'm chalking it up to a growth spurt and being happy with whatever snuggles i get!
More next time!
Mom and the girls!
Life in the house is crazy as usual. Kaelyn and Aria are over spring cold/allergy issues and I no longer find kleenex in the strangest of places. We've gotten a taste of warm weather and we are NOT happy about the sudden chill the weather has given us! But we'll manage, I suppose. Just more board games and netflix and time with the tablets.
Kaelyn just celebrated her 6th birthday and is happy with her new outfits (she's wearing her sparkle jeans and star wars shirt to school) and her favorite so far is the kids kindle. She had outgrown the apps on her Nabi tablet and it was so hard to get learning apps from the amazon app store or google play so we gave the old one to Aria and she has a Kids kindle. She's got phonics and math apps and also a few fun ones, but honestly, she plays the learning ones more! We do limit their time on the tablets so that they get artsy time and free play time where they can do what they want. Hot Wheels or puzzles or dolls or playing with their kitchen toys. But it's hard to say "no screen time" when that is a great way to engage her and let her study/practice in a way that engages her. She's a little techy and there is NO denying it!
Kaelyn was also super pleased to spend the morning of her birthday voting in our states primary with me, we did lunch and then dropped her off at school. Even though she rides the little bus and is belted in, I didn't trust a bus full of kids as the best way to transport her cupcakes for her class. So she got to have a purely fun morning and show off her classroom to her sister, and show her sister off to her teachers! I think if Aria had her way, she would have stayed with Kaelyn all day and been happy as a clam.
We had friends and family over for pizza and cupcakes after school and it was just family and friends. Well, it's the family we've made for ourselves here away from our family back home. Our friends are "aunt" and "uncle" to the girls and likewise, we are "aunt" and "uncle" to their kid. If you can't have family where you are, you make your own. I can honestly say that though i'm often homesick and sad to think about the cousins my girls aren't seeing as often as we'd like and the milestones that we are missing in our nieces and nephews lives, the "family" here in town is amazing at bringing me back to reality and that someday we will move back home and my family in town will be the family I miss and want to see. So thank you to my "made" family, you all know who you are. And thank you to my bio family who skype and call and email the girls and keep us all in the loop. It makes being away from you all that much easier.
Next week is a pretty big week. Kaelyn has her IEP/transition to kindergarten meeting next Wednesday. We get to meet her kindergarten teacher and put together our game plan for ....eek...KINDERGARTEN!! I have enough of a hard time saying i have a 6 year old. let alone have her gone the WHOLE day. I have so many worries where that is concerned. Will she do well all day? can we keep her constipation under control? minimize accidents? How will she do with lunch? Hot or cold lunch? Will we drop off at the front door or walk her to her class everyday? We dont qualify for bussing since we live to close to school so that is just another logistic. Trusting Kaelyn's education to my trusty rocket. (The girls watch "Little Einsteins" and since my car is red, we call it "Rocket" and they try to tell me to go "adagio" or other such music terms that I have long since forgotten from 10th grade band!
Oh lordy. More rambling! How did we get from IEP to little Einsteins? Who knows.
Next weeks is the "Worlds Largest Trivia Contest" back home and we participate each year. It also means lot of family time for the girls. They get to see the grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles, and see the Trivia Parade. See www.90fm.org for more information. It's really a great time for all and a super way to fund raise for the local college radio station and keep this program around for the students who wish to pursue a media degree that might otherwise be unavailable as anything with music and the arts seem to be cut lately.
We are having a cupcakes and family party next week so Kaelyn's grandmas and grandpas can sing to her. (that is her favorite part) and hubby is pretty psyched that he ordered me and Kaelyn an ice cream cake from DQ! I'm just ready for 5 1/2 days away from work (retail sucks lately as our department is short on people and long on work) and put my feet up and relax. I also need to track down time to visit my grandmothers and get a birth certificate from one for my DAR application. I only need my mom and grandmothers birth certificates and my application will be complete. Following in my great grandma Ruth's footsteps. Although I will admit, it seems to be something more common among an older demographic and I feel REALLY young to be in DAR but someone has to keep tradition and they do so much good!
well, i'll be off for now. For someone who hasn't updated in over a month, this sure seems long winded! lol. I hope you all have a good day and enjoy any warm weather you may get! We didn't' send it as we can't seem to get rid of it!. hahaha. Well take care. I'm off to go snuggle toddles. she seems to need a good amount of snuggles lately. I'm chalking it up to a growth spurt and being happy with whatever snuggles i get!
More next time!
Mom and the girls!
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