Two Left Feet

Beginning to Commence

2011-06-13T09:09:00.000-07:00

There is a good reason they call these ceremonies "commencement exercises." Graduation is not the end; it's the beginning. ~Orrin Hatch

This past weekend was a mixed bag of emotions for me as I watched my first-born graduate from high school. I was excited and happy to visit my family and see Kyle embark on the next phase of his life. I was sad to realize how quickly these years have flown by, and had regrets about the choices I've made with regards to Kyle's upbringing. Mostly, I breathed a huge sigh at the end of this eventful weekend - a sigh that ended with a sense of worry and nervousness.

The weekend started with watching my family interact with my husband and two younger children. Also, I had a sense of satisfaction watching Kyle bond with his younger brother and sister. It melts my heart when Kyle holds Jane in his arms and she is a giggly wiggly ball of energy to have her big brother's undivided attention. Or to watch my dad and my aunt talk to Alex and read with him and laugh at the funny things he says and does. I even got to spend time with my niece Gabbie, who is only four days older than Jane. I love to see the new things she's learned to do since I saw her last in March.

Getting prepared for Kyle's graduation, I was a bundle of nerves. My mind kept replaying various events over the years - different milestones that Kyle has reached along the path of his life. As this is happening, I realize how old I feel, but am grateful that I have the ability to have this journey with my two younger children. At Kyle's graduation ceremony, I felt such an incredible sense of relief not unlike how I felt when I gave birth to him. My immediate thought was "thank God that's over with", followed by the realization that what just happened was the easy part when compared to what lies ahead. As I sat and listened to students speak about "putting forth your best" and "seizing every opportunity", I could not help but feel regret and sadness that Kyle has not done those things over the past four years. It made me wonder what is in store for him. I have these visions of what I would like his life to be like, but none of that really matters. What matters most is the road he chooses for himself.

In his graduation card, I wrote to Kyle that "the future is what you make of it", which I wholeheartedly believe. At his graduation party, everyone said their wish for Kyle - mostly that he lives a happy and healthy life. My wish for him was that he keeps learning new things and to challenge himself along the way. But I realize this is what I want him to do, not necessarily what he wants for himself. I have tried to come to grips with the fact that my wants for his future and what Kyle wants are not the same things. Acceptance of this is yet to come.

As we returned home from our visit, I was dead tired, and I felt like my mind could not handle even simple conversation or thoughts. It was too full with events from this past weekend mixed with sleep deprivation. But this morning is a new day - a new beginning for Kyle and for me.

Life Lessons

2009-07-30T20:08:00.000-07:00

How young is too young to teach your child about life lessons? I take Jellybean to the play area at our local mall at least once a week during the summer. It's a great place for him to play and get out some energy while I have my coffee. I've had the opportunity to observe JB and see parts of his personality play out. He's very persistent about getting what he wants, but he's not a bully. Also, he loves to play with other kids and follow what they do. He is starting to hit and kick on an inconsistent basis, so he's had to have a few time outs. Luckily, he uses "nice hands and feet" after his timeout.

This past week, while we were at the play area, there was another boy there who was about 4 years old. He had golden blond curls and the face of an angel. That's where the comparison to anything angelic ends. The boy was very rambunctious and aggressive to every child he came in contact with, including JB. JB was on the play bridge and was waiting his turn to go down the slide area, which *devil boy was splayed out on. The boy turned over on his back and used his body to push JB off of the play structure. I saw the whole thing happening and I just sat and watched. A few reasons I waited to see what would happen is because 1) the play structure is very well padded and 2) I can't bail JB out every time he encounters an aggressive kid. I never got a chance to see what would happen because another parent verbally admonished devil boy and then picked up JB and removed him from the play structure without my permission. Devil boy acted like he did not hear anything, and he chummed up with an older boy, at which point his behaviors became progressively worse. At this point, we just left.

Yes, JB is only 20 months old, but really, what would have been the harm in letting the other boy push him? If I rescue him every time, how will he ever learn how to deal with other personality types? How young is too young for these lessons? I'm not really sure what the answer is.

*I do not use the term "devil boy" lightly. I've worked with kids with very severe behaviors - blowing snot on me, kicking, hitting me in the head with a cast, biting, scratching my arms (which is how I got most of my arm scars), so my yardstick for "bad" is not the norm.

Ups and Downs

2009-07-02T20:34:00.000-07:00

Summer with Jellybean has had its ups and downs so far. On Sunday, he turns 19 months, which doesn't seem possible. One of the "ups" has been to take JB on day trips and see his reactions. We went to Santa Cruz a few weeks ago with some friends and the high point of my day was watching the little guy ride on rides like big kids do. I think I had more fun watching him than he did on the rides. He only had me to help him stay on the carousel. The rest of the attractions he rode by himself - he was so brave! I expected a few different things - that he would scream once I was outside the gate, that he would try to stand up on the ride, or that he would somehow figure out how to undo his safety belt and fall. Thankfully none of these happened. One of the downs was attempting to spend time on the beach. JB did not want to put his bare feet in the sand, so it was difficult to get all of our gear to that perfect spot where we were close to the water, but far enough away from the boardwalk. I discovered that strollers don't maneuver very well in sand, so it was just one more thing to carry. That JB would not walk in the sand should not have surprised me since he had a similar reaction to walking barefoot on grass. When I attempted to get him to do this by holding him under his armpits and dangling him over the grass, he held his body very tightly in an "L" shape so that there was no danger of the green stuff touching his feet.

Another "up" was our trip to Seattle. He did surprisingly well on the airplane ride, and was really pretty good at the places we stayed. We mostly stayed with my dad, and I thought he would get into more things, but JB did minimal damage. It was also fun to see JB interact with my dad and my friends. He's very social now and can say things like "hi", "bye", and "wuba" (which loosely translated is "love ya"). I think the most fun I had was watching him interact with my dad's friends' 6 month-old girl. I was worried at first that he would be rough with her, but he only poked her in the eye once. I instructed him to "use nice hands" and to "give her a kiss", which he did. She was so enamored that she stared at him and leaned in for kisses periodically.

The major "down" of this summer has been the lack of sleep. Jellybean has been waking up at various times of the morning several times a week for the last 3 weeks. He has this horrible cry, and when I tried to let him "cry it out", it only escalated. The bad thing is that, depending on the time he wakes up (this morning it was 4:30), he may or may not go back to sleep. If he does return to sleep, it sometimes takes quite a while to get him to that point. I've had to be a detectivce since I have no idea why he's waking up, and he cannot verbalize enough to tell me. I've tried giving him yogurt before bed because his appetite has not been that great, I've tried changing his pajamas to make sure he's comfy, we've changed the temperatures in the house to make sure he's not too hot or cold. I have to concur with what H said - that really why he's waking up may be out of our control. I am just hoping to have some semblance of normal sleep return by the time I go back to work in late August.

Ending on a positive note, it seems like Jellybean learns new things every day. He has at least 20 words that he says, and is now just starting to combine two words. He is very active and curious about everything. His whining is starting to decrease as he is able to tell me more of what he wants. He is still so loving and sweet - at random moments JB comes over to lean his head on my shoulder and give me a slobbery kiss. When I'm playing with him, he will sometimes look at me and say "wuba". So even with the trials of sleep deprivation and pre-terrible-two behaviors, there are plenty of moments that I will cherish.

Long Overdue

2009-02-16T18:27:00.001-08:00

14 months - February 2009

A lot has been happening lately on all fronts, and an update is long overdue. So much time has passed since my last post that I don't know where to begin, but I'll give it my best college effort.

We just returned today from L.A., where we visited H's sisters and had one night to ourselves. It was kind of a trial run of leaving Jellybean overnight with someone else, and he did pretty well. We have a few couples who we share babysitting with for a few hours at a time for small dates, but it's nice to know that the world won't come crashing down if we want to go away for a few days.

Jellybean is changing so much. He is finally walking, and his favorite thing is to push his stroller around. My mom also got him a shopping cart for his birthday, and he loves to throw the plastic items out of the cart and then push it all over our living room. I'm getting a good glimpse of his personality. He can be very sweet and charming, and absolutely LOVES other kids. The last time I took him to the doctor, there was this toy in the waiting room that he wanted to play with - it was a large sized cube with different activities and beads on each side. This one little girl was being a brat and would block JB from playing with any part of the cube. Finally, he went up behind her and grabbed her shirt. I thought for certain that he would pull her down in order to get to the cube. Instead, he laid his head against her back to give her a hug. She looked at him like he was crazy and ran off to her mother, at which point Jellybean finally was able to play with the cube. As sweet as he is, he has quite a temper. When he's angry, it's usually because he wants something I won't let him have, or I take something away from him that he wasn't supposed to grab in the first place. When this happens, he throws himself on the floor, stiffens his body and his fists, and screams. Then he gets even more mad that he's hurt himself, and looks at me with huge eyes and yells "OWWW!", like it was my fault he got hurt. I have to hide my laughter because I'm still trying to figure out the best way to nip this in the bud. I've tried ignoring his behavior, and that does not decrease his fits. I try to say "no temper" while looking straight into his eyes and shaking my head "no", and that doesn't work. The only thing that sort-of works is when I look at him and say "no, that's not okay" in a very serious voice, and then distract him with something else. He is very curious about things, and points at a lot of different items and looks at me expectantly. He says a handful of words, but understands a lot more than he can express. I look forward to each day to see what new thing he will learn.

On the work front, I feel fortunate to still have a job, especially with the horrendous budget deficits in California. I've been a speech therapist for 10 years and this is the first time that I am worried about my job for next year. I got a letter from HR that basically says my position is not guaranteed for next year. I have mixed feelings - I've never been laid off before, but it wouldn't be horrible. I love the school I'm at, even though my caseload his high. I see about 47 kids in 3 days, which is too high. However, the cases are not as difficult as what I've been used to in the past. Even my two "high profile" families are kittens compared to the parents I've worked with previously. A bonus is that the staff members are not as cliquish as other schools I've been at, and people seem to be genuinely grateful for the services I provide. It sounds basic, but it just doesn't always happen, especially at high SES schools.

On the personal front, I have goals of becoming more organized (I currently cannot see my kitchen table because of all the stuff piled on it), and I'd like to lose weight. I was watching Oprah and Bob Green was on there talking about the underlying reasons why people are overweight. I thought about it for a while, and I thought it was hogwash. The reason why I'm overweight is because I'm lazy and unmotivated at this particular point in my life. It doesn't need to be more complicated than that. Also, different people have either mentioned my weight directly to me, or have hinted about it, both of which piss me off. My major personality flaw is that when someone pushes me, I push back. It's almost an instinct for me. So some people go through life pushing others to do things, and it works for some. But not for me. I have to want it, and it won't happen any other way. On a positive note, I'm starting to pick up knitting and quilting again, which keeps me busy when Jellybean goes to bed. Also, I go walking with a friend on one or two weeknights, and she's actually able to keep a decent pace. Baby steps.

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas

2008-12-18T11:34:00.000-08:00

This is Jellybean's first picture with Santa. This is the moment right between "gee, your beard is awfully white - can I pull on it?" and "Mommy, this is a scary man - get me offa his lap!!". This is the only shot the elf got before he started crying. Hope this gets everyone in the holiday spirit!!

Happy Halloween from Pooh-Bee!

2008-10-31T19:42:00.001-07:00

Top 100 Songs from my year of Graduation

2008-10-14T19:18:00.000-07:00

I got this idea from TSHS. I thought that my blog could use one post not related to baby stuff.

The songs I like are in bold. I think it's sad that I only like 6 songs from 1990. But jeez, can ya blame me? What a load of crap! I guess I forgot how many truly awful songs came from that era.

1. Hold On, Wilson Phillips
2. It Must Have Been Love, Roxette
3. Nothing Compares 2 U, Sinead O'Connor
4. Poison, Bell Biv Devoe
5. Vogue, Madonna
6. Vision Of Love, Mariah Carey
7. Another Day In Paradise, Phil Collins
8. Hold On, En Vogue
9. Cradle Of Love, Billy Idol
10. Blaze Of Glory, Jon Bon Jovi
11. Do Me!, Bell Biv Devoe (very subtle)
12. How Am I Supposed To Live Without You, Michael Bolton (blech!)
13. Pump Up The Jam, Technotronic
14. Opposites Attract, Paula Abdul (I cannot STAND her voice)
15. Escapade, Janet Jackson
16. All I Wanna Do Is Make Love To You, Heart
17. Close To You, Maxi Priest
18. Black Velvet, Alannah Myles
19. Release Me, Wilson Phillips
20. Don't Know Much, Linda Ronstadt and Aaron Neville
21. All Around The World, Lisa Stansfield
22. l Wanna Be Rich, Calloway (what a song to signify the times)
23. I Remember You, Skid Row
24. Rub You The Right Way, Johnny Gill
25. She Ain't Worth It, Glenn Medeiros Featuring Bobby Brown (who the hell is Glenn Medeiros?)
26. If Wishes Came True, Sweet Sensation
27. The Power, Snap
28. (Can't Live Without Your) Love and Affection, Nelson
29. Love Will Lead You Back, Taylor Dayne
30. Don't Wanna Fall In Love, Jane Child
31. Two To Make It Right, Seduction
32. Sending All My Love, Linear
33. Unskinny Bop, Poison
34. Step By Step, New Kids On The Block
35. Dangerous, Roxette
36. We Didn't Start The Fire, Billy Joel
37. I Don't Have The Heart, James Ingram
38. Downtown Train, Rod Stewart
39. Rhythm Nation, Janet Jackson (actually, this song wasn't bad)
40. I'll Be Your Everything, Tommy Page
41. Roam, B-52's
42. Everything, Jody Watley
43. Back To Life, Soul II Soul
44. Here and Now, Luther Vandross
45. Alright, Janet Jackson
46. Ice Ice Baby, Vanilla Ice
47. Blame It On The Rain, Milli Vanilli (I forgot about these lip syncing flame outs)
48. Have You Seen Her, M.C. Hammer
49. With Every Beat Of My Heart, Taylor Dayne
50. Come Back To Me, Janet Jackson
51. No More Lies, Michel'le
52. Praying For Time, George Michael
53. How Can We Be Lovers, Michael Bolton
54. Do You Remember, Phil Collins
55. Ready Or Not, After 7
56. U Can't Touch This, M.C. Hammer (gotta love those parachute pants)
57. I Wish It Would Rain Down, Phil Collins
58. Just Between You and Me, Lou Gramm
59. Something Happened On The Way To Heaven, Phil Collins
60. Black Cat, Janet Jackson
61. Can't Stop, After 7
62. Janie's Got A Gun, Aerosmith
63. The Humpty Dance, Digital Underground
64. I'll Be Your Shelter, Taylor Dayne
65. Free Fallin', Tom Petty
66. Giving You The Benefit, Pebbles
67. Enjoy The Silence, Depeche Mode
68. Love Song, Tesla
69. Price Of Love, Bad English
70. Girls Nite Out, Tyler Collins
71. King Of Wishful Thinking, Go West
72. What Kind Of Man Would I Be?, Chicago
73. Get Up! (Before The Night Is Over), Technotroic
74. Here We Are, Gloria Estefan
75. Epic, Faith No More
76. Love Takes Time, Mariah Carey
77. Just Like Jesse James, Cher
78. Love Shack, B-52's (LOVE this song - it's still on my iPOD)
79. All Or Nothing, Milli Vanilli
80. Romeo, Dino
81. Everybody Everybody, Black Box
82. I Go To Extremes, Billy Joel
83. Whip Appeal, Babyface
84. Oh Girl, Paul Young
85. C'mon and Get My Love, D-Mob With Cathy Dennis
85. (It's Just) The Way That You Love Me, Paula Abdul
87. We Can't Go Wrong, Cover Girls
88. When I'm Back On My Feet Again, Michael Bolton
89. Make You Sweat, Keith Sweat
90. This One's For The Children, New Kids On The Block (ack! These guys were just on tour here)
91. What It Takes, Aerosmith
92. Forever, Kiss (Maybe this is a different KISS than the one I remember...)
93. Jerk Out, Time
94. Just A Friend, Biz Markie
95. Whole Wide World, A'me Lorain
96. Without You, Motley Crue
97. Swing The Mood, Jive Bunny and The Mastermixers
98. Thieves In The Temple, Prince
99. Mentirosa, Mellow Man Ace
100. Tic-Tac-Toe, Kyper

Really, other than listening to oldies and country, I am a true 80's girl. My first tape cassette was Madonna's "Like a Virgin". My first concert was Huey Lewis. My favorite concert was Steve Perry. In my graduation pictures, my hair was frickin' huge! I had leather boots with the fringy things on them. Long live black eyeliner and Aqua Net!!!

Middle of the Road

2008-09-12T13:34:00.000-07:00

That's what kind of person I am - middle of the road. With most issues in life, I don't usually think that one way is the only way, and I'm not a person who embraces the extremes. However, with the sleep deprivation I've been suffering lately, I feel extremely bitchy and extremely exhausted. But I can't let those extremes influence how I deal with Jellybean and his sleep issues of late.

In the beginning, I didn't know what to expect, so when Jellybean slept 4-5 hours at a stretch as a newborn, I was thrilled. By the time he was four months old, he was sleeping at least 10-12 hours at night. He was not like other babies, who sometimes got their days and nights confused. He also took at least two naps a day on most days, which helped me keep myself centered.

All of that came to a screeching halt in July. Several things happened at the same time - he got yet another cold, he slept in the Pack N Play in our room instead of his own crib, I tried some pajamas from the Children's Place (I think these sleepers are made for skinny alien babies and not any babies with any kind of baby fat), and we were attempting some day trips that required Jellybean to sit in the car for longer than he was used to. At that point, Jellybean started waking up at least once during the night, but often times he woke 2 or 3 times in a 10 hour period. That may not seem horrible, but when you're used to status quo, which had been no night wakings, it was a shock to the system. At first, I thought it was because he was sick, so I did whatever I needed to do to comfort Jellybean - rocking, pacing, running the shower, nursing, and various combinations of the aforementioned. My summer off of work was about to come to an abrupt halt with me getting a new job, so I was desperate to get some kind of sleep.

I have read the "No Cry Sleep Solution" and found it too difficult to follow. Plus, I'm not a "hearts and flowers" type of mom, and I don't believe in totally sacrificing my own sanity for the sake of my child. When K was a baby, I used the "cry it out" approach religiously, which did work, but left me feeling like a horrible parent. So I've tried the two extremes, neither of which fit my personality or my world views. At the advice of my pediatrician, I picked up the book "The Baby Whisperer" by Tracy Hogg. I like her "middle of the road" approach to creating better sleep habits for babies. She does not advocate letting a baby cry it out alone, but does not advocate using a ton of "props" designed to help a baby sleep. In a nutshell, the baby whisperer emphasizes the importance of routine (which is different than a schedule), and using the pick up/put down method. You watch for signs that your baby is tired and put him to bed in his own crib. If he cries, go to him and pick him up and comfort him until he stops crying. The minute he stops crying, put him back in his crib. If he starts fussing, try using gentle words and a calming hand on his back. If he still cries, pick him up and comfort him. Lather, rinse, repeat as needed.

We tried this last night for the first time and it was painful. It took an hour to get Jellybean to sleep. But, as with any behavior modification plan, the behavior you're seeking to change gets worse for a time until you see the light at the end of the tunnel. At 1 a.m., Jellybean woke again because he was too cold. Using the plan, I had him back to sleep in his own crib in less than 5 minutes, and he did not wake again until 6:30 this morning. At naptime today, it was painful again, but took half the time it did last night to get Jellybean to sleep. We'll see what happens tonight.

I'm committed to trying this approach because it seems like something both H and I can live with (which is essential). It's pointless to try to change any behavior using a method that both parents won't follow through with. Also, I feel like I'm trying to create a sleep habit that will be healthier for all of us. The cherry on top is that I don't feel like I'm abandoning Jellybean in his hour of need - that he knows I'm there to comfort him and help him in this process. Hopefully soon, Jellybean will return to sleeping a full blissfully content night on most nights of the week so I can get back to the middle of the road.

*Update: The first night I tried this approach with JB, it took at least an hour or more to get him to bed. The next night took 15 minutes, and tonight took 5 minutes. Last night I was not able because we got back late from a friend's house. We'll see what the pattern looks like this week. Of course, it doesn't help that we'll be going out of town on Friday.

Finally!

2008-09-04T21:26:00.000-07:00

Finally, I found a way to look at our presidential candidates that makes sense and asks the questions that need to be asked. I have watched only clips of some of the speeches from both conventions. I did watch all of Sarah Palin's speech on youtube. She presents very well, is a very solid public speaker, but I didn't feel like she told me anything of substance that I could grab onto.

After watching this forum at the request of my mother, who almost never engages me in political discussions, I feel like I have something of substance with which to really look at the differences between Obama and McCain. The first thing that Pastor Warren said is what I feel in my heart - that what is needed in our country right now is for people to quit attacking each other because of differing political views. Keep that in mind, each candidate was asked the same questions, which were prefaced at times with either some biblical or philosophical references. Some of the questions I didn't care much about, especially the ones about religion (faith-based institutions). The questions I liked the best were: "what do you consider your greatest moral failure, and this country's greatest moral failure?" and "was there an issue that you have changed your views on in the past 10 years?".

Each candidate did well in answering tough questions. I think McCain looked better during this forum because his speech was more fluid. Obama had too many hesitations in his speaking, which most people would perceive as being "unsure". As far as the issues, my values are more aligned with Obama's than McCain's. However, after seeing this forum, I felt like both candidates care about the direction our country is headed and both would do a decent job as president. Then again, I've had some lowered expectations as a result of the last 8 years and where I see our country right now.

Super Baby Food

2008-07-19T11:13:00.000-07:00

The other day, after some hesitation and procrastination, I finally bought the book "Super Baby Food" by Ruth Yaron. Jellybean has been eating "solid" food for a couple of months now, which I've been purchasing in jars from the local supermarket. I forgot how expensive baby food is! Plus, for the "second foods", they have additives listed on the label, some of which I'm unfamiliar with. About a month ago, I spotted a copy of this book at my friend's house, and she was saying how much she liked the book and how easy it is to make baby food. Then, she gave me some applesauce she had made for her son, and Jellybean seemed to like it. The kicker is that my friend works over 30 hours per week and still finds time to do this, so I figured that, since I'm not working this summer, now is my chance to try to make it work.

Last night, after purchasing some of the supplies I needed (I really only needed to buy ice cube trays because I had the other items required), I made nectarines. Because Jellybean is over 6 months old now, I don't need to cook all his fruits. All I did was peel the nectarines, cut them in small sections, threw them in the food processor, and hit "blend". Once that is done, I filled ice cube trays with the food, put foil over it, and let it freeze overnight. Using this method, I am able to make perfect baby size portions that will last at least a month (because I don't give JB the same fruits every day). This morning, I went to Whole Foods and purchased yams, apples, and carrots, and will use almost the same method to make these baby foods. The only difference is that I need to steam the veggies first before blending them. Next, I plan to make the "super porridge" made from brown rice. It does not sound very appetizing to me, but I figure that now is the time to get the little guy started on healthy foods so that he develops a taste for good foods that are not so processed and sugary.

This book also has some helpful hints about what to have in your kitchen to make your life easier, stresses having an uncluttered kitchen (which is a challenge for me), and has some home-made recipes for other things besides just baby food. There are a few things that I don't agree with. For one, the author makes it a point that parents always need to have a happy face, especially when changing diapers, so that JB doesn't have sexual repression issues later in life. Huh?!? However, I like how she advises to check with the pediatrician about ages at which certain foods should be introduced, and encourages parents to follow the pediatrician's advice first and foremost since different sources give conflicting information.

I've read most of the book except for the recipe section, which I am using piecemeal so that I don't get overwhelmed. Overall, I'd recommend this book to parents of babies who really want to make home-made baby food, but thought it was too hard.

Happy Six Month Birthday, Jellybean!

2008-06-05T20:50:00.001-07:00

Hey big guy! You're half of year old now. You sit up, but you're a bit wobbly yet. The silliest things make you laugh, like Dada's snoring, Grandma clapping her hands, and when Mama says "saucy" to you in a whisper voice. You have learned to roll over both ways, but you don't like to because you get stuck on your tummy. Your hair was coming in weird, so we've already had to give you a haircut. Mama remembered to save a lock of it for when I finally get around to getting a baby book for you. You love it when Mama sings "Itsy Bitsy Spider" and does the hand movements. You continue to hate having your boogers sucked out of your nose with the syringe. It will be nice when you learn to blow your nose. You're grabbing everything - Dada's glasses, Mama's hair, and now you're eyeing our remote controls. Time to start baby-proofing! You love to smile at everyone, and people love you for that. Your Dada and I can't wait to see what the next 6 months brings!

Product Review: Wii Fit

2008-05-30T21:52:00.000-07:00

Because of H's sister, we were able to get our hands on a Wii Fit. As expected, you can't find them anywhere in our area, and the store personnel do not have much information on how to get one. I hope it's not going to be like the Wii console and take over a year-and-a-half to actually have them available.

Okay, enough griping. Before we even got the game, we had heard that it's not very forgiving with respect to weight and BMI, and that the exercises are difficult. Those things are true, but I don't really care. I just got finished with 20 minutes of exercising for the evening, which is time I might have normally spent sitting on my ass either watching TV or surfing the web. No, I cannot do the exercises perfectly, but I don't think that's the expectation. The exercises are split up into four different categories: yoga, strength, aerobics, and balance. Before beginning, you step on the balance board and get weighed and such, and your Mii profile changes accordingly. Sadly, now my Mii has a belly. Hey, I'm just glad they didn't make my Mii butt huge. After getting weighed, you can develop some fitness goals for yourself, then you begin exercising. Even if you're out of shape, like myself, there is at least a few exercises that a person can do. The Wii keeps track of your performance on tasks and graphs progress over time, which is nice to see. Also, as you put in more time, then you unlock more activities in each category so that you don't become bored with the few that you start out with.

My initial impression is that I like this game. At least it's a game that you do while not being sedentary. I think that, in order to reach my personal fitness goals, I still need to do more walking outdoors, and then use Wii Fit in addition to that. If you're already fit, then this is something you can do to change up your workout routine a bit. Also, because more than one Mii's information gets stored, if you're competitive, you can see where your scores rank as compared to other Miis. The downsides are, as mentioned before, it's not very forgiving on weight/BMI, some exercises are difficult, you start out with only a few exercises before unlocking more, and the availability of the Wii Fit is not great yet.

Overall, I'd give Wii Fit 8 out of 10 dancing feet. It's a fun and motivating way to get off your rump!

What I Like Best About My Mom

2008-05-05T15:09:00.001-07:00

From when I was born, and even still, she gives me hugs and kisses.
She wants me to be happy.
She accepts me for who I am, despite my flaws, and loves me anyway.
She is fun to hang out with.
I can tell her anything and not worry about being judged.
She keeps her mind active.
She taught me some of my best swear words.
She's funny.
I can always count on her to help me when I need it.
She doesn't tell me how to live my life, but lets me find things out for myself.
She still fixes me macaroni and cheese.

I love you, Mom! Happy Mother's Day!!

Raggedy Andy

2008-04-24T20:23:00.000-07:00

I will preface this post by saying that everywhere I take Jellybean, he seems to win friends and influence people. When I brought him to my workplace, this was no exception, especially since I work with mostly women. Jellybean flirts with the school secretary and cuddles when my principal holds him. He usually kicks with excitement and smiles when anyone pays him even a modest amount of attention.

Today I was minding my own business at work when the nurse called me to her office. She had a gift for Jellybean that she'd been meaning to give me the past couple of weeks. I sat down to open it and found this:

Call me a total sap, but it brought tears to my eyes. First of all, this is a very extravagant gift. The nurse hand-made this Andy doll for me from a Mc Call's pattern she found in her mother-in-law's old things. She called Mc Call's and found out that the pattern came from somewhere in the 1920's, which was not long after the birth of Raggedy Andy. Once Nurse Virginia realized that I knew the value of Andy, she began showing me all the things she had done in the process of making him, right down to her initials and date sewn in on his keester. She only charges $50 for these dolls, which is a huge underestimation of the time and care she puts into these dolls. For that reason, she usually just ends up making them as gifts.

Secondly, only a certain generation can appreciate the history of a Raggedy Ann and Andy doll. I told Virginia about my Raggedy Ann doll that was dirty and worn from me dragging her all over the place when I was a little girl. To go along with my doll, my mother had made ceramic plaques of Ann and Andy for my brother's and my room when we were little. Unfortunately, both the doll and the plaques are long gone.

Jellybean now has a historical timepiece that I can share with him to accompany my tales from my own childhood - a gift that is precious and invaluable.

Filoli

2008-04-13T20:26:00.000-07:00

Today was our first visit to Filoli. It's a historical mansion and gardens halfway between San Jose and San Francisco. Since there are 16 acres of gardens and a huge mansion, I should not feel at all bad that I couldn't see it all in 2 hours. The name of the place is quite unique and is a combination of letters from the estate owner's favorite quote: "Fight for a just cause; Love your fellow man; Live a good life".

My goal was to visit Filoli before the tulips died because I had always wanted to go to Marysville, WA for the tulip festival when I lived in the Seattle area, and I never made it there. Luckily, the roses will be in bloom by the time of my next visit in early June, when I will bring my mom.

The admission is $12 per adult (babies are free), which seemed a bit steep until you set foot on the place. I can only imagine the staff it takes to maintain the grounds and keep the displays in the mansion clean and in order.

I was very glad I went, and I'd recommend it for a nice Sunday outing. I give it a rating of 8 out of 10 dancing feet.

I Have a Grandma Purse, and Other Happenings

2008-03-07T18:26:00.000-08:00

This is a picture of my purse. I don't think it's a horrible purse - it's pretty functional. I hate big purses, ones with lots of shit on them, like glitter, sequins, or feathers, or ones that are so tiny that I might as well not have a purse at all. Last week, I was working with a group of third grade girls who made this observation when they saw my bag: "Your purse looks just like my grandma's!" Out of the mouth of young girls who are way more hip than me. I really didn't think I was THAT out of style, but apparently I've been neglecting my appearance in more ways than just continuing to wear my maternity shirts (hey, they're comfortable!), not bothering to mask the dark circles under my eyes, or putting off that haircut that I needed 6 weeks ago.

It does not help that I've reached a certain milestone that was a harsh reminder that I'm aging - I got my first gray hair! At first, I thought it may have just been leftover highlights, but when I yanked it out, it was definitely whitish-gray and wiry. Decision time - do I just accept defeat and wait for more gray or do I start coloring my hair? Not sure what I want to do yet.

In other news, work is crazy. Conferences are coming up and teachers and parents are freaking out about their students. Most of the time I'm pretty understanding, but I have a hard time with the teachers and parents who insist that if their child does not do x, y, and z by a certain point in the year, they must have either a speech/language delay or a learning disability. Never mind the fact that some of our students who are "at risk for retention" have only been speaking English for a year, or at home they receive no stimulation besides the tv or video games, or their attendance has been spotty and they've missed important instruction. It's the same thing each year, which leaves me shaking my head at times and wondering what in the hell happened to parents taking some personal responsibility for the education of their children. Granted, there are many children out there who need more help than what they're getting, but when I rant, I'm not talking about the kids who attend school on a regular basis, have involved parents, and who still are not making progress in school. There's a big difference. All in all, working in the schools again, even just as a private contractor, is a big reminder of why I like early intervention so much.

Jellybean is now three months old and is growing and learning new things daily, it seems. Everywhere I go, people come up to me and want to touch Jellybean. It probably doesn't hurt that he's entering the most enjoyable phase, where he's not old enough to say inappropriate things or run off, and he smiles and flirts with almost everyone. At the end of the month, he'll take his first plane trip to Spokane to see my family, which is exciting and daunting at the same time. I'm going to have to get myself more organized if I'm going to pull this off with as little pain as possible.

Lastly, I may have a long-standing dream of mine fulfilled at some point in the not-so-distant future. I've always wanted to be on The Price Is Right, and my sister-in-law says she may be able to snag some tickets. I didn't think I'd like the transition from Bob Barker to Drew Carey, but I have to say that I've been pretty impressed with what I've seen so far. Drew is not cranky with the contestants, he inserts amusing anecdotes, and generally keeps the show moving at a pretty good pace. Since I've decided that Drew is an acceptable host, my desire to be on the show has not waned. My challenge is going to be working up enthusiasm outwardly so that if I go to the show, they will pick me to be in the audience. I better start practicing now!

Organization

2008-02-10T07:45:00.000-08:00

That is a word I thought would not be back in my vocabulary for a long time, at least until Jellybean enters kindergarten. However, because my mom is here visiting and helping out, H and I were able to go to OSH and get some storage bins and racks for our garage and one of our closets. This may not seem exciting to anyone else, but you must remember that this is the first time we've been out as a couple (w/o baby) since Jellybean came onto the scene. Now, H and I need to just dig in and get rid of that "where to we start??" feeling and tackle it one pile at a time. Here's to organization!!!

Coming Up For Air

2008-01-30T06:39:00.000-08:00

After what seems like an eternity of one day melting into the other with diaper changes, nursing, spitting up, cleaning up, burping, and playing with the baby, I've come up for a deep breath of air. Jellybean is 8 weeks old now and, either he's becoming more predictable and following somewhat of a routine, or I'm adapting to him. Probably a little of both. His initial disposition does not seem to be changing much. He's a very easy baby, except at dinner time. At least when he does fuss, he is calmed by us holding him under the bright kitchen lights (he loves to tilt his head back and look up at them) and running a slow stream of water in the kitchen sink. During the day, he has been listening to the music his Auntie Alice bought for him. His favorite is "Free to Be You and Me". While I play him the music, I hook my hands underneath his armpits so he can practice standing, which he loves to do. He has recently started to say things like "gahhh" and "aaahhh". If I talk to him in a funny voice and kiss his cheek near his ear, I am usually rewarded with a big toothless grin. The other day, I was lamenting the fact that Jellybean had simultaneously spit up AND filled his diaper, and his response was a small laugh. I think this is a sign of things to come.

This is my third week after returning back to work for the school district. I'm working one day per week until February, at which point I'll increase to two days. It's nice to have the flexibility to work part-time. I don't want to be away from Jellybean for more than that. It's hard enough to have him start daycare in March even two days per week. Luckily, I have family support until then. I thought it would be harder to return to work, but I'm finding myself looking forward to one day a week when I'm not just a pair of breasts. Also, the teachers are so excited to have me back, and the kids I work with have asked how Alex is doing and have a renewed energy for speech therapy sessions. On the private business front, I've gotten some calls, but nothing that's panned out for certain yet. One man wanted us to prescribe drugs for his ADD. Another woman wants speech therapy for her son, but doesn't want to pay for it. Two other women are checking around first before starting therapy for their children. At least the advertising is working - I'm glad that's not been a waste of money. What I'm hoping is that by summer time, the school job will be winding down, and by that time I should have more clients through my private practice. If not, I can always go back to contracting with the birth-3 population.

As I'm sitting here, I'm amazed at being able to even write a blog entry. Jellybean is sleeping quietly in his bassinet, and I've managed to eat breakfast, have some decaf coffee, get myself showered, and start a load of laundry. Hopefully this is a sign of things to come!

One-Month-Old Jellybean

2008-01-05T09:42:00.001-08:00

Likes to sleep, take baths, wave his hands wildly, and receive calf massages. Has skills in grunting, pooping, and farting. Also can track objects of interest with his eyes, when placed on stomach, can lift his head and turn it from one side to the other, and can grasp a finger that's within his reach. Special project - creating the next Wonder of the World, "The Fountain of Pee". Dislikes cold air and diaper changes. Can assess surroundings with one eye open, and then decide if his attention is required before falling back to sleep. Loves to cuddle on mommy's chest and loves to "do the bicycle" with daddy.

Birth Story

2008-01-03T10:23:00.000-08:00

It feels like forever since I've given birth to Jellybean, so it's hard for me to know where to begin. I just know I have to write it out so that I won't forget.

December 4th: Had my last prenatal checkup, at which point my blood pressure was the highest it's ever been (I've never had blood pressure issues and didn't until the last month of my pregnancy). My OB was concerned, so he had the nurse check the status of Labor and Delivery to get me in that day. I freaked out and insisted I could not have Jellybean that day - we didn't have the right car, my bag was at home, my mom was flying in the next day, H's sister was driving up from LA to be there. After manually dislodging my mucus plug, he sent me home and agreed to induce labor the next day. Upon coming home, several calls were made, mom got on a flight that evening, and H's sister was able to drive up. I had mild, but frequent contractions that day and into the next, but never went into labor naturally. I spent my time relaxing, making sure my bag had all the necessities, and then mentally reviewing all the things that I meant to do that I didn't get done with the realization they may never get done at this point. I had a hard time sleeping, but managed to get some rest.

December 5th: Arrived at the hospital at 1:30 p.m., as instructed. I had completed pre-registration at Kaiser, but the admittance process was still long and involved. When I finally got set up in a room, I was told the nurse would be with me shortly. I guess at Kaiser, "shortly" means an hour or so. It appeared to be training week at the hospital, as every nurse had a student nurse with her. They took my history, which involved some routine questions about allergies, weight gain, etc., but also had some rather odd questions. "Do you know why you're here?", the nurse asked me. I looked at her with a frown and looked at my belly and said something like, "I guess I'm here to have a baby". They also gave explicit instructions on who was able to have access to our baby, and for us to only let staff with a green background on their badge take our baby for certain procedures. As a precaution, the baby would also be fitted with a sort of alarm that would sound if the baby was taken out of the appropriate area. I was also informed about how they would induce labor - that I was to be given Pitocin through IV. I was a bit nervous about this and would have preferred to start with the suppository (which is all that was required to induce labor for my firstborn). The student nurse started the IV process on me and was successful the first time, which is usually a painful process. Apparently, my veins are deep and difficult to access, and it usually takes at least 3 or 4 tries to get a good IV set up, at which point I'm cranky.

Somewhere between 3 and 4 p.m., they start me on Pitocin in a small amount, which doesn't produce much results. They have levels of this drug, which I never knew, that range from 1-20. My final Pitocin level that actually had me in active labor was 10. After I started having regular contractions, my recall of the events and happenings was a bit hazy, and I've relied on my mother, H, and H's sister for specific details. Because of my blood pressure, I had to give urine samples, which tested positive for protein (a bad thing). Consequently, I was given magnesium sulfate intravenously. I've never had anything so nasty - I thought my arm would burn right off from my elbow to my fingertips, and my whole body felt feverish. My blood pressure did stabilize for a while. Somewhere in that time frame, my Pitocin level was gradually increased, which produced stronger contractions. The nurse was watching my face and offered me pain medication (I can't remember what it's called) through my IV, which really doesn't take away the pain, but makes a person not care as much about the pain. She instructed me that, if I wanted an epidural, the correct time to ask for one is about an hour before you think you really need one. I was thinking that I could go a while on this nice IV cocktail, but only lasted about 30 minutes before I was thinking an epidural might be nice. By that time, I was already in heavy labor, and H told me that if I'd asked for it even a few minutes later, they would not have been able to give me one. Once I got the epidural, it only took effect on my right side, so I had to get the line repositioned and also lay on my left side to see if it would travel over.

At that point, I was in pain and H said my body was shaking pretty much uncontrollably. My blood pressure was yo-yo-ing, as was the baby's heart rate. Apparently, Jellybean's heart rate would jump between 60 and 120 beats per minute (120 is normal). H told me that nurses kept running in and out of the room. I kept asking for "the lady", who, in my altered state, meant the anesthesiologist. Just about the time I was told it was time to push was when my left side finally got some of the effects of the epidural. I pushed three times, and then Jellybean was born. When his body was coming out, the nurse told me to look down, which I had been afraid to do. Oddly enough, I can handle some pretty gross things, but the idea of watching a person come out of me freaked me out. She asked me if I wanted to hold my little guy, and I was able to while they cleaned him up a little and completed his Apgar scale, which was 9. I had some minor tearing, which they repaired with stitches. Jellybean appeared to know what he was doing and found my breast rather quickly. I was nervous that it might not come that easily for him, but my fears were quickly put to rest.

All in all, if you use the nurse's definition of labor, which is when contractions produce effacement and dilation, I was in labor for around 6 hours. About two hours after labor, we were both cleaned up and sent to a recovery room. I had to stay in the hospital an extra day because of my blood pressure, so I was anxious to finally be sent home. My experience was pretty good and Jellybean and I received good care from the nurses and doctors. My only frustration was that I was having difficulty nursing the little guy and had to ask 5 times to see the lactation specialist, at which point I was almost in tears from frustration and pain. Each nurse seemed to have different advice about how to get Jellybean to latch properly, and one even told me that it was okay that it hurt me (which is a lie). After I finally got a visit from the specialist, I felt better about feeding, and I thought I could actually make a go of it.

Unlike when I had K, there has been plenty of follow-up support through the Newborn Club at Kaiser. We go in there at least once or twice a week, Jellybean is weighed, the nurse watches me feed him, and gives me instructions based on what is happening at the time. If I'd had not had this kind of support available, I think I would have thrown in the towel and ended up bottle-feeding Jellybean. As it is, I'm now in my fifth week and feeling more and more confident about nursing him. My goal is to make it a year, and then wean him, especially since I have to return to work and he needs my immunities.

All in all, things are going well at this point. Jellybean has gained two pounds since birth and has grown over an inch in length. He is almost too tall for his newborn outfits, and he's getting a bit of a double chin. He's still very mellow, for the most part. H went back to work, and I was afraid to be alone with Jellybean during the day, but it's gone very well so far. I'm starting to see more of his personality, which is nice. His temperament is a lot like K's, which is good and bad. It makes Jellybean easy to take care of now, but I wonder if I'll need to light a fire under him when he's a teenager. Only time will tell. Bottom line: I'll never regret having Jellybean and am looking forward to watching him learn and grow.

New Pics

2007-12-13T18:08:00.001-08:00

These pics don't need much introduction:

Jellybean after a bath and a massage

Jellybean's face while he's working on a ..... you know

Jellybean was not completely satisfied with his baby lotion massage

Jellybean's little fist

Jellybean Update!

2007-12-09T19:27:00.000-08:00

Jellybean was born on Wednesday night at 10:39 p.m. after about 6 hours of labor (more details later, not for the faint at heart). He weighed in at 6 pounds, 4 ounces, and his length was 19 and a half inches. He is a very healthy little guy. Right now, he sleeps most of the time, mixed with some nursing, pooping, and a small amount of crying. I thought he would be fussier, but I'll cross my fingers that he stays this easy-going. Only time will tell. Not sure when I'll have another update - I'm pretty much concerning myself with our little guy and enjoying time with him. Thank you to everyone for the well-wishes!

I'm ready, but Jellybean is apparently not

2007-12-03T15:48:00.000-08:00

Okay, I'm ready to have this baby. I'm officially 39 weeks and I'm frickin' huge. I don't sleep because of BH contractions that are supposed to be painless - mine aren't, especially when paired with back and lower abdominal cramps. I've had them regularly (sometimes not so regularly) for the past two weeks and it's getting old. I'm running out of things that I can either disinfect or put in our washing machine, unless I want to start washing things a second time. On the plus side, I've had time to thoroughly clean my house, get my hair cut, and buy a couple of pairs of stretchy cozy pants which I intend to live in for the next month or so. Also, I'm glad that it looks like my mom will be able to be here for the birth, which we both really wanted. At least this is not like when I was pregnant with K and stuck inside the house for the last month or so because of the worst snowstorm in Spokane since the 1960's - I can still get out of the house.

Tomorrow, I will go to (hopefully) my last doctor appointment and see if all these contractions have done any good. It's nice to know that I have an endpoint - the doc will induce if Jellybean doesn't appear by the 20th of this month. In the meantime, I'm inventing things now that need to be done around our house, and will be soon making up my own recipes to freeze. Heaven help us all!

** Update: I went to the doc today and my blood pressure is high (it's been up and down the last few weeks). Looks like I'll be induced tomorrow.

Remind Me

2007-11-27T07:25:00.000-08:00

Our Thanksgiving was very quiet, but good. I was able to have a good visit with K, who seems to be changing each time I see him, not so much physically, but in maturity. Not only did we have some good talks, but his patience level for certain things has increased just a little bit.

On Sunday, we got up early and drove up to the Oakland airport in order to get him a non-stop flight home and to get him home early to try to avoid the rush. As I expected, the lines were quite long, but moved along at a decent pace. I think I only heard K grumble once, but then I reminded him "what better do we have to do here but wait?". Once we finally got to his gate, we sat down and tried to wake up. After a short time, an elderly woman with white curls sat down next to us. She asked me if I could see the numbers on top of the new Southwest poles, and then proceeded to explain twice about the new boarding procedure. I already felt my patience waning and was trying to figure out a polite way to discontinue the conversation. Then, I happened to glance over at her boarding pass and saw her first name was "Frances", which was my grandmother's first name. Suddenly, I imagined my grandmother sitting next to someone in an airport and I thought to myself, "if this woman was my grandma, I'd want the person sitting next to her to be nice to her". My heart softened a bit as grandma seemed to be reminding me about the patience and kindness that was so much a part of the way she treated those around her. We talked a bit longer and she mentioned that she was also from Spokane and anxious to get back home. She asked K a few questions, which he answered very politely. K even asked her a few questions and told her about the upcoming cold front, especially where he lived in the mountains. As we sat there talking, and I listened to her repeat herself , I smiled and remembered some of the last conversations I had with my own grandmother.

When she got up to stand in line, K and I looked at each other and we both commented on her name, which surprisingly, K had noticed also. When I told him that I miss grandma, K said what had already been on my mind - "the holidays are not the same this year without grandma".

Happy Thanksgiving!

2007-11-22T08:25:00.000-08:00

HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO EVERYONE!!!

THINGS I'M THANKFUL FOR: my family and friends

TRADITIONS I LOVE: getting together with family, mashed potatoes and gravy

FAVORITE FAMILY RECIPE: scalloped corn

RECIPE:

2 cans of corn, mostly drained, but with a little juice left
~3/4 cup crushed saltines
~3/4 cup of shredded cheddar cheese
~3/4 cup of milk
1 egg, beaten
salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix ingredients together and place in 8x8 pan. Garnish with paprika, if desired. Bake for around 60 minutes or until completely "set" in the middle.

Disclaimer: This recipe has approximations since my grandmother made this from her memory.

Greater Good

2007-11-20T09:28:00.001-08:00

So I was home yesterday watching some sort of local news program and caught a quick blurb about a researcher out of UC Berkeley who is the director of the Greater Good Science Center. Her website is devoted to how to teach our children to be happy and emotionally literate, and is based on research from the Greater Good Science Center and is collected from other studies completed outside the UC Berkeley system.

What I like: First off, the website grabs my attention, but also has good content, both in the form of writing and video clips. I like that the information she provides about teaching "happiness" has to do with things that I would consider "outward focused" instead of "inward focused", like how to be grateful or how to teach our kids about failure and how to deal with it. I also have asserted, like the author, that it really doesn't matter how smart academically a child is. If they can't make it socially, they have a tough time not just in school, but in life. Looking through the video clips, the author's advice makes sense - nothing really radical is being proposed. Sometimes, even if we know the right thing to do for our children, it still helps to hear it or read it again.

What I don't like: Studying "happiness" is subjective. Also, there is no easy way to access even a list of the research (not just links to articles) that the author alludes to on the website. I don't like to have things watered down or summarized for me. If someone mentions research, then I like to see the actual study to see the particulars and formulate my own questions and opinions.

What it made me think: It's hard to teach my child happiness because, even though I don't view myself as a sad person, I also am not overly joyful or bubbly. Kids learn how to cope not as much by what their parents talk to them about, but how they see their parents react to different situations. K has picked up some bad habits about how to react in stressful situations and I cringe when I realize how I have taught him these bad habits. It makes me realize the need to be hyper-vigilant in the area of my own emotional literacy if Jellybean is going to learn how to be a well adjusted person in this world.

You Look..... Okay

2007-11-11T11:30:00.000-08:00

Be still my heart. I was shopping in OSH today for an extra paintbrush and a mask to use while sanding down baseboards that will be painted this week. The lady who helped me looked at my belly and asked me, "When are you due?". I desperately wanted to say, "Oh, I'm not pregnant, I'm just fat." Instead, realizing that I'm too far along to get away with that explanation, I sighed and told her "December 11". She looked me up and down once more and said, "You look.... (pause)... okay". Grrrr!

The Home Stretch

2007-11-07T21:51:00.000-08:00

I'm 35 weeks along in my pregnancy and I feel like I'm on the home stretch. This time is a bit different, though. Unlike my first pregnancy, I'm not anxious to have the baby out ASAP. Of course, that could have something to do with the fact that I can still get out and do things, and because I still have projects to complete. With K, we had the worst winter in Spokane since the 1960's - the snow was piled so high in the middle of the streets that you could not see oncoming traffic. I was pretty much confined to the house, which drove me mad. Add to that that I'd pretty much gotten everything set up early on, so I didn't have a lot to do the last month.

Physically, I'm tired a lot, but then I have trouble sleeping. I can no longer put on my own socks, and I have to wear shoes that slip on pretty easily. My belly button (previously a deep innie) is now halfway an outie. I cry during television shows that don't normally stir up emotion for me, like Good Morning America. This is in stark contrast to episodes where I become extremely pissed off and curse a blue streak because of something really minor, like when Safeway gave me a bag with a rip in it and my olive oil dropped out of the sack and broke in my garage.

It's a good thing work has slowed down. My patience has become a bit thin dealing with my more difficult students. My goal is to work until the end of November, which would give me about a week and a half before my due date to relax. We'll see how long I last. We just finished our last night of childbirth preparation classes, which is a relief. Neither H nor I do well with paying attention for learning after the dinner hour, but the class was helpful. Now we have to complete the birth plan, tour the hospital, and pre-register. In the meantime, I've been trying to find recipes that I can double so that I can freeze part of it so we won't have to cook so much right after Jellybean arrives.

More later....

Autism Screening

2007-10-29T17:34:00.000-07:00

I have mixed feelings about the new Autism Screening that is to be done on every child under the age of 2. I just learned about this on the news this morning, then watched a clip of it on the news tonight.

In a way, the new screening procedure is good. I've seen way too many children come into the school system and they could be the poster child for Autism, but have gone undiagnosed and, as a result, without services. I believe wholeheartedly in early intervention, especially for this group of children. On the flip side, I have seen more and more children lately who have been diagnosed with "high-functioning" Autism where the diagnosis is in doubt. Why does this happen? With increased awareness of the disorder comes more concern from professionals and parents. Now there are checklists on the internet of behaviors to watch for in your children. I think it's a normal thing to see something in your child that may not be there if your senses are heightened about it.

Another aspect to the over-diagnosis or mis-diagnosis of Autism is that savvy parents know that a diagnosis will get them the Cadillac of services. If you know this from the start, what's to keep you from seeking second and third opinions in order to obtain a diagnosis for your child? You're bound to run into at least one professional who caters to the parent, especially since there is big money involved in both assessment and treatment of children with Autism. I hate to be so jaded, but no where in the news are these trends mentioned, and they happen regularly.

How many behaviors need to be present for a child to fail a screening, and how objective is this screening? How are therapeutic services going to be funded? How will this screening trend affect the multitude of lawsuits that already happen in school districts over "appropriate" services? Who determines what appropriate services look like? These are just a few questions and concerns that I find myself asking about the new screening procedure.

Be Nice

2007-10-20T12:05:00.000-07:00

This little video clip is from when I visited my mom and my son in September. I forgot that we had taught Zoe to "be nice". I am making progress in my videoing skills, but I've not completely figured out editing and how to get music onto the video. But just give me time. In the meantime, enjoy. :-)

Sometimes It's Difficult....

2007-10-08T16:56:00.000-07:00

... to know what to say. At times, there simply is not much to say, and other times there is plenty but I don't always know where to start. I guess a lot has been happening. My business partnership officially started up, but we're still waiting for our business card so we can order the testing supplies we need. We even have our first client, who needs a full evaluation (yay!) and doesn't mind waiting for us to get set up fully. My business partner and I went last Friday and networked (isn't there a better word than "networked"?) with private schools in the area so they would know our name is out there and hopefully refer people to us. Kinda funny how things happen, because on Sunday, I got a call from a fellow SLP who is looking for people who want extra work. She runs a company similar to the one I contract with. I told her that I didn't need extra work and mentioned that I've started a general partnership. She was eager to know the details, so I began explaining what we'll be doing - mostly focusing on psycho-educational evaluations and recommendations. Her response was totally opposite of some of the responses I've gotten from other SLP's - mainly that she'd be happy to refer clients our way (obviously she is overloaded). One other SLP I told my plans to warned me that I would be sorry if I "went up against her". Oh please! Because there aren't enough people out there with communication delays looking for services?!? Either way, it was a breath of fresh air to actually have some support from a colleague, which is really how it should be.

H and I put Jellybean's crib together. We had both dreaded doing it because we figured it would be a pain in the ass. Luckily, the crib took about 45 minutes from unpacking to finish it, which is the easiest thing H and I have ever assembled. Hooray for directions that make sense and quality craftsmanship - what a concept!

Speaking of things related to Jellybean, I'm getting to the point of getting nervous. Not all the time, but enough. There are things I don't remember about my first pregnancy, but I do remember the pain. I remember yelling things that I never thought I would say, like barking at the doctor "don't push him back in!!!" and "get IT out!!!". At least we're getting prepared as far as getting things set up. Next week, I'll attend a breastfeeding class, and our childbirth preparedness classes will start. I think I need more resources for what happens after the kiddo is born. Some friends of ours came over for dinner last night and mentioned the "No Cry Sleep Solution", which made me think of some other friends of ours who are struggling with their own issues. It makes me wonder what kinds of things we'll be dealing with....

On a personal front, I've been dealing with some resentment issues with someone in my life who likes to keep a scoresheet. For those unfamiliar with the concept, scorekeeping in any relationship or friendship is when one or both sides try to keep things even. I must confess, scorekeeping is ingrained in me, and has been a very hard habit to let go of, even though I know it doesn't do any good and mostly ends up doing harm. Recently, I've been on the receiving end of it, and I've had a hard time disengaging from it. I had no idea, until now, how much resentment this "keeping even" produces. The problem is that I have this compelling urge to inform this person of all the wrongs that have been done to me in the past and how that means that the scorecard will never be even in my mind, no matter what happens from here on out. This takes my focus off of just sucking it up and doing the right thing. In the end, especially with H's support, I'm choosing to do the right thing, but it's so hard for me not to say "yeah, but....". I think only time will help with this issue. The one thing I'm learning is that I'm on the receiving end for a reason, if only to give me a small taste of my own medicine.

This post is brought to you by a fellow blogger, whose link never works when I try to use it, but his simple "hello" was a reminder that I need to get off my ass and keep blogging. Hope everyone is having a good start of the week!

Pregnancy Dreams

2007-09-16T07:11:00.000-07:00

I'm officially 27 weeks along in my pregnancy, according to my LMP (last menstrual period) and the ultrasounds I've had that measure the baby. Even though this is my second child, a few things have taken me by surprise - either things I forgot or things that just didn't happen the first time around. I think pregnancy dreams happened the first time, it's just that I don't remember. Well, I've been having a lot of them lately. They are all bizarre in their own way. Contrary to what the baby books tell me, I've not had any sex dreams, sadly. Those would be much more enjoyable than what I've been dreaming about. So far, I've dreamed about Alec Baldwin trying to kill me. If you doubt his ability in this area, just refer to the movie "The Cooler". He was a badass in that. But that's not as disturbing as the dreams I've had this week. They all involve me messing up with caring for my baby. The other night, I dreamed that I had the baby and we brought him home. For the first week, I forgot to feed him. I couldn't figure out why he wasn't gaining weight and why he was fussy all the time. In last night's dream, I was just generally inept as a mother. I could not figure out how to nurse my baby, I couldn't put a diaper on the right way, his bedding and clothing were filthy because I didn't do laundry.

All of these dreams must mean something, except for the one with Alec Baldwin. The thing is, I've been reading so many resources with this baby than I did with K. I never read anything with him and he turned out okay. That's not to say that I wouldn't do some things differently if I could. Maybe I have a certain amount of guilt about that - that I was not as prepared as I should have been when I had K. The books I've been reading I've actually learned things from - things I never knew before. Things I should have known before. So I guess I'll keep having these dreams until I let go of the things I can't go back and change.

Why I Do What I Do

2007-09-12T12:34:00.001-07:00

Yesterday was one of those days that reminded me why I do the work I do. I was working with my first little kiddo, who's almost 2 years old. A little history on him is that I've been working for the better part of a year on just getting him to initiate intentional communication - ANYTHING intentional. He has been diagnosed with Autism, which is the youngest child I've ever worked with to have been diagnosed with it. During therapy, I have modeled the sign for "more" (requesting is usually a good place to start) and given this little boy hand-over-hand assistance for signing more about a gazillion times. I've taught him other things as well, which he has been learning. In the beginning, he wouldn't even tolerate me touching his hands, then he slowly would let me help him, then, within the past couple of months, he got to the point where he would reach for my hands so that I could help him. At that point, I figured he knew what I expected out of him, but just was being over-reliant on my help. Around that time, another parent of a child I work with gave me an excerpt from the book "Overcoming Autism". The authors are very knowledgeable and work with children on the spectrum. They give very practical advice on how to teach a child to communicate. One of the things they mentioned was that a nonverbal child will go through a routine of behaviors to indicate that they want something. If they get it, fine... no need to verbalize. If they don't get their needs met, they keep going down their list of behaviors to try to get a desired item or activity. So, in order to encourage a child to either vocalize or verbalize, you have the desired item, model the verbalization that you want to teach the child, and let him/her go through the repertoire of behaviors, never giving in until they produce the modeled verbalization. This approach, while it seems mean to some, made sense to me. After all, what child is going to expend more effort than necessary in order to get what they want? For that matter, what logical and reasonable adult will?

I was having such a hard time with this one boy that I thought "what the hell, I'll give it a shot". This was three weeks ago. His repertoire of behavior was to reach for the item he wanted. When I held it just out of his reach and modeled what I wanted him to say, he would sit back. Then he'd reach for it again. When I wouldn't give it to him, he'd begin to whine. He reached for the item again, and his whines turned into full out crying (with real tears and everything). Still, I did not give him what he wanted, but continued to provide models of what I wanted him to say. At times, the crying episodes would last as long as a half hour, at which point it was difficult to calm him. Each week, we went through this routine. Sometimes, I was not prepared and he would simply walk away from me to avoid the pain. Most of the times, I either blockaded him in a corner or put him in his high chair so that he could not escape. I was just beginning to question my decision to keep up with this approach when we had a breakthrough yesterday. I read a book to him and was having him point to pictures in the book. When we got all done with the book, I took it away from him, but held it in front of him to see what he would do, then asked "what do you want?". He reached for the front of the book and tapped it with his fingers, and I still held onto it. I repeated my question - "what do you want?". He looked straight at me, made the sign for "more" and said "mmm" (which is what I had modeled for him). I looked around as if to check if anyone else saw this miracle! Then my heart proceeded to do flip-flops in my chest, and I had to choke back the urge to cry. We've been working on this so long and I've tortured this poor boy for 3 weeks! Finally.... intentional communication AND a vocalization! This was a huge reminder for me of why I do what I do.

A Major Milestone

2007-09-04T17:00:00.001-07:00

It was my son's first day of high school today. I had to work today, but I thought about him and found myself distracted. Yesterday, he was less than enthusiastic to be returning to school. It about killed me to wait for him to get home today to call him. Our phone conversation a bit ago went something like this:

Me: Well......?
K: Yeah?
Me: How did it go today?
K: Pretty easy (upbeat tone to his voice)
Me: You realize it's not going to stay easy (ever the realist)
K: Yeah (voice slightly less upbeat)
Me: Did you get your locker open? Do you have to share a locker or do you get your own?
K: We get our own, but I didn't open it today. I'll open it tomorrow.
Me: What did you have for lunch?
K: I didn't eat lunch - I didn't feel hungry.
Me: WHAT?!? You need to eat lunch - it's not good for you to skip meals. Promise me that you'll eat lunch tomorrow.
K: Don't worry mom. (notice the lack of a promise...)
Me: How about your teachers?
K: My health teacher must lift weights. I should stay on her good side.
Me: I don't think teachers are allowed to rough students up, so you should be okay. What about your other teachers? How was Spanish? Did you learn any words today?
K: No, but I picked out my fake name - Jesus. I picked Jesus because of Taladega Nights. You know, where he says "or as our neighbors to the south call you "Jesus"". My friend picked Fabio.
Me: (finally remembering the prayer scene in Taladega Nights) I like Jesus better than Fabio - good choice.
K: I'm pretty lucky because I sit by my friends in all my classes.
Me: Did you see any cute girls?
K: No.
Me: You mean you're at high school and there are no cute girls? There should be plenty!
K: Well, yeah....
Me: Anything else on your mind?
K: Nope.
Me: If you need any help with homework, you'll call me, right?
K: Yeah
Me: Love you
K: Yeah, I love you too.

/sigh

Jellybean's Baby Quilt

2007-09-02T13:56:00.000-07:00

This is the first baby project I've actually made for our little guy. I found myself quite motivated to get this done in a timely manner, and I realized how cute it would be once I started piecing it all together.

This closeup shot gives you some idea of all the clipping that's involved in making this quilt. At first, I thought the time-consuming part was cutting all the squares, but after I finished sewing it all together, I realized the clipping is the time consuming (and very messy!) part. There are 11 squares in each row, and 11 rows in the blanket. You clip each seam on each square at 1/4" intervals so that they will look "raggy" after going through the washer and dryer.

This is the finished product. I have learned to go to the laundromat to wash the quilt for the first time because there is fuzz everywhere. Also, we have a front-loader at home and it doesn't do the same job that a regular washing machine does with regards to making the fabric edges fray.

Today at the laundromat was especially interesting. I was acutely aware that, out of 20 people in the place, I was the only white girl - the rest were actually Hispanic men. I could understand bits and pieces of what people were saying, but not enough to pay much attention. When I was waiting for the quilt in the dryer, this Asian lady stormed in through the front door, proceeded towards the back door, threw her keys on the ground and began stomping up and down and yelling her head off. Then, she stopped and headed back out the front door. You could have heard a pin drop in that room if not for the laundry machines. Everyone looked at each other, and, as soon as the woman left the building, the men smirked and began talking rapidly in Spanish. I don't have to know the language to figure out what they must have been saying.

Now that my baby quilt adventure is over, I'm quite tired and will go take my nap while I still have the luxury of sleeping.

Our New Toy

2007-08-26T10:55:00.000-07:00

In anticipation of our new little guy, my mom and her husband were kind enough to buy us this camcorder. Mom had me do my own research and pick something that H and I wanted. After reading reviews from Consumer Reports and Cnet, we chose the Panasonic SDR-H18. I haven't gotten a chance to use it much, but we charged the battery yesterday, and I was able to work the camera while reading through the instruction manual. I'm amazed at how lightweight it is. Also, the features are pretty simple, so it's not difficult to use. The zoom on it is much better than my digital camera, and you can use it to take pictures as well as video. Best of all, the camera records either straight to its 30GB hard drive or a San disk. I really had wanted to avoid the kind of camcorder that records to a tape cassette or even DVD.

This is the first video camera I've ever owned. When K was a baby, I had a hand-me-down Pentax camera, which I loved and used religiously. But it's so much nicer to have both a digital camera and camcorder so that our family can see the little guy, especially since none of our family lives close to us. Now, it's off to practice so that I'm a pro at this thing before the baby comes!

10 Things

2007-08-19T07:05:00.000-07:00

I was tagged by SME over at Blue Apples. I've done something similar, so I've been trying to think of some different things to share. To add a different flair, I will tell 10 things about me from the past.

I love chocolate, but I hate hot fudge. When I was in second grade, I went to a friend's birthday party. We had pizza, juice, and munchies. Later that evening, my friend's dad took us to DQ for Peanut Buster Parfaits. That sent me right over the edge, and I don't remember ever throwing up as much as I did that night. In reality, it was probably the pizza and juice combination that did it, but the last thing I ate was hot fudge. To this day, I cannot touch the stuff.
When I was little, I tortured my younger brother. I forced him to eat mud pies, I would convince him to touch things on the ground, and then stomp on his fingers. The worst was when Grandma fixed us mashed potatoes, I decided to mix sand in his. He got me back, though, by peeing on me in the bathtub (grandma used to make us take baths together when we were little). After that, I was nicer to my bro.
When I was a young girl, I hated blowing my nose. My grandmother was always after me to blow my nose, which seemed to constantly be stuffed or runny. To avoid the Kleenex, I would go hide under my bed and then sniff hard repeatedly. Luckily, I have no aversion to blowing my nose present day.
My friend and I went to the mall when we were about 12 or so. I had this favorite clothing shop that I liked, so we went in to take a look. I found this little black tank top that I had to have and it was on sale for a few dollars. I had the money, but I stole the tank top anyway. I never got caught, but when I got home, it was the wrong size and I never could wear it. Plus, I felt horrible, so the tank top was the first and last thing I ever stole.
When I was around 16 or 17, my friends convinced me I should skip school with them to go have lunch off campus. Our school was closed-campus at the time. It was the only time I'd ever done anything like that and, of course, I got caught. After that, I reverted to what I'd always done - play by the rules and be a good girl. Getting in trouble just wasn't worth it.
My first car was a '77 White Datsun Pickup that I bought from a family friend for $800. I paid for it all by myself with babysitting money. To this day, I still have fond memories of that truck - it got me everywhere and it was 100% mine.
From the time I was in fourth grade on, I planned on being a psychologist for a living. My current job is not so different from what I had planned when I was a young girl.
I used to work as a house-cleaner in my late teens and early twenties. Two of my clients had old houses with amazing staircases. When I cleaned, I imagined that I was the "lady of the house" and dressed in those fancy poofy dresses with my hair piled high on my head. I would regally descend the main staircase to greet my guests for the party. It made the job more fun.
Other than one real boyfriend in junior high, I did not date through school until I got to college. I guess you could call me a late bloomer.
My first "real job" was a hostess at a place in Spokane called Perkins, one of those family breakfast resaurants. I didn't much care for the job and I wasn't very good at it. I was not quick and I spilled a lot of things. That was probably my shortest-lived job. I've never worked in a restaurant since.

I'm supposed to tag 10 other people, but I will encourage anyone to complete this who wants to.

Just Call Me Miss Domestic

2007-08-17T17:32:00.000-07:00

I usually get so stuck in my cooking rut that I don't branch out as much as I should. However, a couple of weeks ago, I got a wild hair and made my first Yakisoba dish ever. I had to hunt a bit to find soba noodles, and I never did find the chile paste that the recipe called for, but all-in-all, it was pretty good.
This is the peach cobbler that I make when I can actually find decent peaches. This time, I used white peaches, which still turned out well. This particular recipe I got off the allrecipes.com website.
And finally, I got enough fabric to make a flannel and chenille "raggy" quilt for Jellybean's crib. Tomorrow, we will go pick out his crib and hopefully a bumper and sheet set. I'm finally feeling the desire to get things in order for the little guy.

In Loving Tribute

2007-08-08T14:00:00.001-07:00

I have not been ready to speak of this until now, but it's time. On July 15, 2007, my Grandma Fran passed away. She had been sick since last October. After she was diagnosed with cancer, Grandma decided to forgo treatment and enjoy the time she had left, which I believe she did. She was amazingly brave and continued to be strong in her faith. Around the holidays, she asked me to speak at her service, which I was honored to do. She made this request after reading my blog entry about "Strong Women", so it seemed only fitting to honor her in this way.

My Memories

"I have so many fond memories of my Grandma Fran. From the time I was a very young girl to my adulthood, Grandma has always been closeby and there for me. No matter the season, she was always there with either home made sun tea and a chat on the porch swing or a cup of hot cocoa and a good game of cribbage in her kitchen. When I was a young girl, Grandma always sang to me. On hot summer nights, she would sit on the front porch with me and sing my favorite song, "The Man in the Moon". During August days that sweltered, she would fill a small metal tub in the backyard with water and let Chad and I splash around. When we were sick, Grandma insisted that the best remedy was plenty of rest and her famous mustard plasters, which I detested. But she took her responsibilities seriously and helped my brother and me get well. Grandma was never too busy to spend time with me. Time was her currency and she spent a ton of it giving us individual attention. She had an infinite amount of patience when teaching me to cook, sew, knit, and crochet. Grandma never refused my offer of help in the kitchen, even though I probably made more of a mess than anything. I learned a lot from my Grandma. She was one of the strongest and most beautiful women I have known. Her strength was in her ability to make the best of every situation. I don't think I ever remember hearing her complain about anything. Grandma's beauty was in her faith and spirituality, which helped her get through tough times with grace and dignity. Grandma was from the generation that knew what it was like to do without and to get by the best you could on limited resources. I've never seen her waste anything - everything had its use, which is evidenced by one full cupboard in her kitchen filled to the brim with old Tupperware and plastic containers, some of them at least as old as I am. Grandma always had a generous spirit. When I had a child of my own, she was always there to help out. Especially in the beginning, she was there to take care of Kyle so that I could rest, later helping out so that I could return to college. Her support is something I'll never forget. I could not have gotten to where I am without it. Grandma Fran is who I like to refer to as my "sugar cookie grandma" because of her sweetness. Throughout my life, I can count the times she has been visibly upset with me on a few fingers, even though I've made countless mistakes. She has always shown me patience and kindness and I have never doubted her love for me. All of these things are what a grandmother should be. All of these things are what Grandma Fran has been and will be to me, always."

Grandma, everyone should be so lucky to have a person like you in their lives. I am a richer woman for having had you in my life. I love you.

This 'n That

2007-08-06T19:50:00.000-07:00

I feel like a lot has happened lately, but not all of it I've been compelled to blog about. Here are a few things that have been going on:

On Sunday, we took K to Big Sur and to Pfeiffer Beach. We ate at the Nepenthe Inn and had steakburgers that K is still talking about today.

I have successfully fixed our refrigerator that was leaking water on the inside. Turns out, all I needed to do was defrost the freezer (which I've never done before), which looked like it has not been done in the 5 years since the fridge was made.

I've had the HOA blues because of a compliance request for violations from the previous owners. I'm trying to figure out why in the hell we pay dues (and an additional inspection fee) if we have to follow the rules, but the HOA does not bother following the rules to inspect each unit before transfer of ownership.

My last OB-GYN appointment turned out well. My AFP screening came out all negative, which is a good thing. My chances of having a baby with Down Syndrome is about 1 in 1500. I didn't catch the odds for neural tube defects or other chromosomal abnormalities, but they also came up "negative". According to the ultrasound, the baby is right on target with respect to size, and I've lost another pound. I'm starting to show and now have to get up multiple times at night to pee.

I am reading a portion of "Overcoming Autism" given to me by the parent of one of my little kiddos. She wants to know my impressions of the advice given in the book.

I have recently started to work with my first adult client in 8 years, which is a bit intimidating and challenging. It's pretty nice to not have to haul in a bunch of toys and crawl around on the floor in order to do therapy with her.

At night, after going swimming with K at the pool, I am reading fluff books by Janet Evanovich about a female Jersey bounty hunter with a penchant for big hair and a bad boy named Morelli.

I am kicking ass and taking names on the Sims 2 in my spare time (with K's help).

My mom is coming to visit for a week beginning next Monday, which I'm very excited about. I miss her.

Movies watched: 300 (on Blue Ray DVD), Zodiac, Live Free or Die Hard, Ocean's 13, American Graffiti. Looking forward to seeing Knocked Up when it comes out on DVD.

Have been helping K with algebra and we are getting to the point where I can no longer do some of the activities that he is supposed to be working on. How do I motivate my son to do math and explain the usefulness of algebra when I cannot remember how to do the things he's working on?

I've been putting off buying maternity clothes, which I can no longer postpone.

Tomorrow, I will embark on my search for soba noodles so that I can make Yakisoba for the first time. I need to "branch out" in the kitchen, so decided to try one new recipe a week.

I Forgot That They Come This Small....

2007-07-25T11:26:00.001-07:00

My good friend has a little boy who turned 1 in May, and has graciously offered to lend H and me a ton of baby items and clothes. So I was picking through the clothing and found this little newborn shirt. I put it next to the remote to show how tiny it is (our remote isn't huge - it's a normal sized remote). I had forgotten that little babies come this size, although the new sensations in my belly have reminded me that he's growing. Pretty true to the sources I've read, it feels like popcorn popping in my tummy (and on my bladder). Luckily, Jellybean doesn't kick me all the time - he's pretty quiet during the day, but starts getting active the minute I lie down to go to sleep.

In other news, my business partner and I found and reserved "virtual office" space to start in September. That means we have a lot of work to do between now and then. We filed to protect the business name we want to use and are waiting on approval before we apply for state and city business licenses. After that, we're pretty much a go. I'm scared, but excited. This will be quite the learning process.

It's a Boy!

2007-07-14T13:47:00.000-07:00

I went to my ultrasound appointment this morning and got a piece of good news - we're having a boy! This was just what I needed in order to bounce me out of my funk. It was pretty funny because the radiology tech had to spend about an hour trying to get decent pictures. She kept saying "he won't cooperate" and "I guess he's shy". Every time she would get in a good position to get a good picture, he would move away from the ultrasound wand. It was pretty amazing to see him moving around - he moved his hand towards his face and moved his head from side to side as if in silent protest. H wondered aloud if you can tell a baby's personality from what they are like in-utero, something I was curious about myself. Time will tell....

Don't Know Just What To Do With Myself

2007-07-10T16:57:00.001-07:00

I have not been in a funk, but I've not been exactly happy. Not the kind of happy I'd expect. Things are fine with Jellybean - I've had my blood test screener (AFP, I think it's called). As far as I know, nothing out of the ordinary showed up. This coming Saturday, we have the ultrasound in which we can figure out the sex of the baby. I should be excited about that too. I'm done with morning sickness and heartburn, and I don't even need the Prilosec anymore. It's hard for me not to compare this pregnancy with my first one. I was so much younger and less informed, but infinitely less worried (and happier). School is out for the summer and I do not have to go back in the fall, which hasn't truly hit me yet. Work now is going well - I'm basically working part time and loving it. My kiddos are very cute and they are at the age where it's still okay to be excited about things. One little boy runs out of his house and stands in his driveway jumping up-and-down and clapping when he sees me drive up. He remains there until I walk in with my huge cart of toys. How can you not smile at that kind of enthusiasm? My business partner and I are starting to finalize plans so that we're ready to start in September, which will be good timing. Most of the kiddos I currently see will be off of my caseload in September/October because they will become part of the public school system. K is here for the summer and we're having a good time. We just got back from Toys R Us where we bought Monopoly (his favorite board game). I can't believe I didn't have it already. H has been helping K with Algebra, although I help out a little bit. Our goal for him is basically for him to maintain skills over the summer and not suffer from rotting brain. Our new townhome is fine for the moment - there are only minor annoyances that need to be taken care of. We just had our first house guest last weekend, which went well. It's nice when you first move in because you can get a little bit of slack for things being not the most "put together". Also, I put our stove to the test, and nothing blew up, so that's a plus. We have no big trips planned, which is fine. I'm not sure I have the energy for one anyway. Okay, okay.. maybe I am in a bit of a funk. Like Cameron Diaz sang (in the most horrid singing voice ever), I don't know just what to do with myself.

Our New Home

2007-07-02T08:30:00.001-07:00

We are officially moved in as of June 30th. My "everywhere" hurts, and I didn't even move the big stuff! I am painfully reminded of what home ownership means - we already are unable to use our washing machine because the bolt leaks when we turn the water on. Also, our fridge has taken to dripping water on the inside so that I have to put a huge wad of paper towels in there until we can get the handy man to visit. Not to be outdone, our automatic garage door appears to be possessed. Most of the time it will close when I push the little button, but sometimes, just to mock me, it will act as if it will close, then come up again. Usually this happens when I'm in a hurry or I'm late for an appointment.

Before moving in, we replaced most of the flooring, most of the baseboards, and had all of the walls painted. We decided to keep the colors neutral so that we would not have trouble selling it when the time comes.

before pic: old dirty wall, old baseboards, and filthy carpet

after pics: carpet, baseboards, and clean wall

before pic: icky carpet in bathroom

new pic: nice clean linoleum

There are a ton of things that we have on our "to do" list. The light fixtures, bathroom fixtures/sinktop, and kitchen tile are all original. But I can clean those and not have any fear of catching some disease from them.

Okay, no more dilly-dallying for me. There are a ton of boxes just waiting to be unpacked.

This Reminds Me....

2007-06-18T10:45:00.000-07:00

...of why I don't miss living in Seattle. I've been in Seattle since Thursday evening to visit friends and spend time with my dad for Father's Day. Pretty much the whole time I've been here, the skies have looked like this and the temperature has been a balmy mid-50's to low-60's. The fog and grayness outside have seeped inside my body to create a haziness in my brain and in my limbs, and I've fought off chills from my body's attempt to acclimate itself from the 100 degree heat of San Jose. Funnily enough, when you live in this climate for a few years, you almost fool yourself into thinking that it's not that bad - that it's normal for you to move in slow motion and have constantly bad hair. Tonight, I return to what I once hated, but now have come to call my home - the almost consistenly sunny, congested, and plastic Silicon Valley.

General Update

2007-06-06T17:47:00.000-07:00

Today was my second monthly visit to my doctor to check the baby. I am 12 weeks or so along at this point. Like usual, I had to pee in a cup, during which time the fire alarm went off. Since it was not a false alarm, the building had to be evacuated. I was about to carry my little yellow cup with me when a nurse took pity on me and gave me a brown paper bag. Still, kind of embarrassing. Finally, when things calmed down, I was able to finish my appointment. I heard the baby's heartbeat for the first time today - so steady and fast. It reminded me instantly of when I heard my son's first heartbeat almost 15 years ago. Not surprisingly, I've lost another couple of pounds (which I can add to the 5 pounds lost at my last visit). I'm sure it's just because of not being able to handle Starbucks, not eating much fast food because of my heartburn, and because I have to walk in the evenings to be comfortable at night. All my blood tests so far are fine, but next time I get the blood tests that tell you the probability for different conditions like Down Syndrome and the like. From that, we can decide if an amniocentesis is needed. I am really hoping to avoid that measure.

On the house front, I am meeting the flooring guy tomorrow at the townhome for an estimate. Our place was built in 1985, and the flooring looks original. I have no idea what kind of cooties are in the carpet, and we definitely have to rip out the carpet in the bathrooms. Seriously... who the hell puts carpet in the bathroom? Sheesh! Friday morning, the paint guy will come give an estimate, so we'll see how much we need to shell out before even moving into our place. The good news is that there doesn't appear to be any other problems that need our attention right away, and everything is set to close on June 22.

At work, my last day is June 21, which can't come soon enough for me. I'm pretty much mentally drained and going through the motions at this point. Good thing that I'm not doing much therapy since this is the time of year for all the field trips. I will still work at my contracting job until the baby comes, but it's such a relief to know that I will not be returning to the schools. Just as I prepare to make my exit, I get an email from our union president regarding the government finally taking notice of the SLP shortage in the public schools and the explosion of our Autistic population (who all need intensive speech/language support). They're just now pulling their heads out of their asses to notice this problem? It's been happening for a while. The thing that makes me shake my head is the structure of the communique - basically listing all of the statistics on attrition rate of qualified professionals, incidence and prevalence of Autism, and the increase in litigation as a result of reduced services, but only briefly mentioning that "something must be done about this". I know what that means - it will be several years before they agree on what the "something" is that must be done. Blech.

On a happier note, besides the horrible heartburn, I am finally feeling better. My energy and motivation returning. What perfect timing since I need to pack, move, get ready for my son to visit for the summer, increase my private client caseload, and finish the final stages of opening my partner's and my private practice.

A Place to Call Home

2007-05-22T19:05:00.000-07:00

Well, if anything could bring me out of my slump, I guess it's buying our first home. Above are pictures of the outside of the place that we intend to buy. Our offer was made last night and accepted this morning. I won't disclose the price because I'm still suffering from sticker shock. I will, however, share that I'm actually excited about this place. For one thing, it's literally down the street from where we live now - we can walk there in two minutes. That means we already know the neighborhood and I don't have to learn a bunch of new streets and find new places to shop. No, it's not a conventional house, but we have to start somewhere. The inside is pretty original, so we'll be replacing flooring and getting walls painted before moving in. We have plenty of space - almost 2000 square feet, which is bigger than any of the houses we'd been looking at. There are three bedrooms, two and a half baths, and plenty of room. This sounds really silly and petty, but I'll be so excited to park in a garage - no more fighting for decent parking. It's not that I'm lazy, but I'm always lugging a bunch of crap back and forth, and it's harder to do from further away. K will be happy because he will continue to have his own room, and the complex has a pool. Directly across the street from us is a small park and playground, which we will definitely be using since we have no yard. Best of all, we can quit pissing our money away on rent, even though we will definitely hurt for the first year or so. Guess this is just the kick I needed to boost my motivation. Whether I'm ready or not, there's plenty to get done in just a month!

Movie Review: 10 Items Or Less

2007-05-06T16:54:00.000-07:00

A few weekends ago, H came home with this movie from Blockbuster. It is a small independent film with only one actor you'd recognize - Morgan Freeman. Freeman is one of those actors who can do no wrong in my eyes. His role in this film was no exception. The other actors and actresses were pretty much "unknowns".

In the movie, Freeman plays himself, an aging actor who is considering doing an independent film to stay in the game. He gets a ride to do some research at this small market, where he meets Scarlet, the cashier in the "10 items or less" lane. He needs to get back home after his "research", but the kid who dropped him off is nowhere to be found, and he can't get anyone to pick him up. So, he bums a ride from Scarlet, who has a few things to do before she can drop Freeman back at home. In the course of things, they learn about each other, and Freeman helps Scarlet get ready for a job interview so that she doesn't have to work as a cashier at the store her ex-who-is-screwing-another-checkout girl is manager.

I won't give away much more of the movie than I already have. I do have a few favorite parts, but to describe them would ruin it for others. I will describe one scene that is my absolute favorite. Freeman and Scarlet are sitting on the top of her crappy little Gremlin, eating Arby's, and just killing time before her interview. Freeman and Scarlet share with each other their "10 items or less" - the things you can't do without and the things you could do without in life.

Bottom line: The movie is very sweet and sentimental, but funny too. It's really not like anything else I've seen, and the actors did a great job and played well off of each other. I would give this 9 out of 10 dancing feet.

My "10 Items or Less"

Things I can't live without: family, friends, chocolate, sun, water, laughing, a good nap, hugging, a nice hot bubble bath, and my car.

Things I could definitely do without: inconsiderate drivers, olives, judgement from others, *being bloated and gassy, beestings, spiders, commercials, sensitive skin, pushup bras, and empty ice cube trays.

*bloated and gassy are not my normal modes, but have gone hand-in-hand with the appearance of Jellybean.

A Jellybean in an Eggplant

2007-04-30T20:14:00.000-07:00

That is what our baby looks like right now at my 7th week of pregnancy. The only difference is that the jellybean has a heartbeat that is visible, and the eggplant is Jellybean's home until December.

So far, so good. My hCG levels (hormone levels) are high, which would account for my morning sickness and my general bitchiness. My body definitely thinks I'm eating for two, but I'm trying to be careful. Apparently, there are new things to avoid that I didn't know about the first time around. For example, I'm not supposed to eat lunch meat that's not cooked because of nitrates, and I can't have too much tuna because of mercury, so finding things that actually sound decent for lunch has been difficult. I'm drinking water like it's going out of style because nothing else sounds good, but I have to be careful of plastics. I never thought I'd lose the taste for coffee, but it has happened. Just the thought of it makes me queasy. Then again, the thought of most things in the morning makes me ill.

It will be an interesting journey having a baby at my age, especially when my son will be almost 15 when this little person is born. One the one hand, diapers and feedings, and on the other, teenage hormones and helping with algebra homework. I better find something to grab onto because I'm in for a ride!

I Was a Whole Foods Virgin

2007-04-22T12:05:00.000-07:00

Until yesterday. Recently, I've been on a fitness kick in order to take better care of myself. You know - eating right, exercising, getting enough rest, taking time to relax. The whole shabang. For exercising, it's been my goal to exercise at least 4 to 5 times per week (this week has included 4 days), to completely cut out coffee - even decaf, to rest when I need it, and to try to buy more organic food. So H and I drove to the nearest Whole Foods, which is about 5 miles away in Mountain View. I have to say that I was pretty impressed. The store was very clean and well laid out. Even the prices weren't as bad as I had prepared myself for. The only gripe I had is that I could not go down the frozen aisle because the stock clerks were refilling the freezers. I never will understand why some stores refuse to either stock very early or very late. Not that tough of a concept. H and I weren't there very long because H had control of the cart and I could not keep up. But, along our random journey, I was able to get some whole wheat bread, cottage cheese, Yogi tea, and organic gingersnaps, all of which are pretty good. Next visit, I will be in charge of the cart!

Hodge Podge

2007-04-20T07:50:00.000-07:00

I've been in sort of a writing funk lately. When many things creep up on me from all sides, instead of expressing myself, I tend to hole up, keep my dukes up and try to protect myself. Where to start? H and I have been looking at houses, which has been exciting, depressing, and overwhelming all at the same time. It's been exciting because I do not do apartment living very well - I hate dealing with noise from neighbors, I detest fighting for a decent parking spot because of all the crap I have to carry each day, and I just don't feel like the place is truly mine. I have no pictures hung on the walls because I just can't get motivated to and because I don't want to be charged extra for that when we move out. House hunting has been a bit depressing because I can't get past how expensive it is here for something decent. For our down payment, we could buy a place almost outright in my hometown. Yet, here in the Bay area, it's only 20% of the total cost of many of the houses we're looking at. I get scared and overwhelmed because of the thought of the finality of mortgage payments.

Last week was very nice - I was on my spring break. However, this week returning to work has been a harsh slap of reality. I can't go into too much detail, but two of my 40 cases are going through probable mediation/lawsuits. On the bright side, I gave my notice that I will not be back at the school district next year, and we're almost to the end of this year (I say almost because the time period after spring break always flies). Honestly, I've had my fill. The two difficult cases have been draining my energy and sucking the life force right out of me, not to mention taking away from therapy time for my other students. I'm so frickin' done with schools. Luckily, my consulting job is going well. I've only had to deal with one pushy parent, who I refused to deal with. They will have to find another therapist for that family - I'm past my capacity for that type of parent. Now that I have the power to say "no", I find that it's very liberating.

The month of May is one of the busiest and I'm trying to brace myself. First off, there are tons of end-of-the-year meetings for my students, most of which will go fine. It's just that they take more time and preparation. Almost every weekend in May, H and/or I will not be in town. The first weekend we will be staying right on the cliffs over the ocean in Carmel at the Tickle Pink Inn, which is a gift from my mother and her husband. I'm very much looking forward to that trip. For Mother's Day, I will be in Spokane to spend time with K, my mother, and grandmother. The next weekend is our friend's son's 1st birthday, which we'll be attending. Memorial Day we're off to San Diego to visit H's family. Whew!!

Oh, and what to get for my dad and H's upcoming birthdays? I'm still at a loss....

Book Review, Part 1: Women & Money

2007-04-03T09:00:00.000-07:00

My good friend, B, in the Seattle area, has been sending me all sorts of interesting information lately. The latest find is a book called "Women & Money" by Suze Orman. I figured it couldn't hurt to be a little more informed about finances and how to make the most of mine, since I'll be starting a business of my own soon. I have read about a third of it so far, right up to the "action plan" part. I must preface what I'm about to say by mentioning that the concepts in this book, while mostly focused on finances, is also about other aspects of our lives. That is why I almost burst out crying while reading the Acknowledgements while waiting to pick up K in the middle of the San Jose airport. In this part, Suze describes a situation where a friend of hers has made the leap from being someone else's employee to working for herself. Leaps like this are never easy and it's one of the most difficult things to go from being safe and comfortable to the unknown. It reminded me of all the things women are expected to be and take care of in this world, but that we are usually last on our "to do list".

The first part of the book talks about women and how they view money, especially focusing on the fact that women make more money now than ever before, but we don't know what to do with it. We do things like let our spouses make financial decision for us, volunteer ourselves without realizing the true value of what we do (no, Suze is not advocating giving up volunteering), barter services where the trade is either not fair or not what we truly want, and refusing to negotiate higher salaries for what we do. Orman also points out one thing I hate - the importance of money in our lives. The reason why I hate this is because I don't ever want to be seen as "money grubbing" or a "money lover". But, she is right to an extent. If you don't have money to be comfortable, you can't afford things like decent health care, house payments, groceries, and the like. Certainly, my experiences in life give support to Orman's claim. I remember when I first graduated from college and had my first "real job". I was so excited - K and I moved into a little duplex (which was a crappy little place in BFE), we got all settled in, and started work. By the time I got my first paycheck, though, I was in tears because I realized I could not possibly pay for all our living expenses and daycare, plus my student loan payment, with what I was making. I started charging gas and groceries, but could not pay off the credit card each month. How crazy is it that I'd have to charge our necessities?? At the time, I put on my blinders, learned to ignore the pit of dread that was constantly in my stomach, and plow ahead. Fast forward to present-day, where I feel financially secure for the first time in eight years. I do not have to charge our necessities or put off going to the dentist because of a lack of funds. If K needs shoes because his big toe is (again!!) poking out of the end of his sneaker, I can go get him a new pair without worrying. I no longer have the "pit of dread" in my tummy. The fear is gone, even though I've not totally taken charge and made good decisions with the money I have. Even though I see how different things are now, it still feels icky to admit money's importance. Besides the importance of money, Orman discusses the importance of halting our tendency to feel shame for our current state of finances and to blame others for where we are in life (two things I KNOW I have done). She also talks about the concept of "you are not on sale" - the idea that women undervalue themselves and their role in society, in the workplace, and in the home. The last part before the action plan, Orman discusses the traits of a wealthy woman: harmony, balance, courage, generosity, happiness, wisdom, cleanliness (which is really organization), and beauty. She lists these things in this order because the very last trait is dependent on having your shit together - that beauty is not in the strictest sense, but comes when a woman is confident because she has the other traits, and that harmony and balance are stepping stones to the other traits.

The rest of this book will be reviewed when I finish. So far, I would recommend this book to most women I know. If you're like me, I never take a book as gospel, but I take the parts I need and use what I can, and the rest I discard. However, so far, I can't find much to argue with what Orman is saying. It's sad that I can't argue with it - it means that I have a lot of work to do in the area of my finances.

Weekend Getaway Review: Lake Tahoe

2007-03-25T16:58:00.000-07:00

Yes, yes, the picture I took is lovely, but picture aside, there is one word to sum up a weekend getaway at Tahoe: OVERRATED. H and I got a wild hair and decided to be spontaneous and go away for the weekend. Lake Tahoe was our destination, primarily because we've lived in the Bay area almost 2 years and have never been, and we knew it would not be difficult to get to this time of year. So on Friday we booked a room at the Horizon Resort Casino in South Lake Tahoe. We had an okay time - mostly it was just nice to get away and be in a place where all there was to do was spend time with each other. Took us about 3 and a half hours to drive there from San Jose area. When we got there, they tried the infamous "room switch", in which we were offered a room with a "pool view" instead of the lake view I had requested. We walked around the "Village" area, which was overcrowded, then promptly hiked down to the beach and sat and talked. When we got back to the hotel, we did play the penny slots, which was my first time ever operating a slot machine. I do have to admit, they're pretty addicting, but I can't get the $8 we lost off my mind. After that came a nice dinner at Josh's, which is the restaurant on the first floor of our hotel, followed by the "TV Magic Show". This morning, we got up early and took the scenic drive around the lake, which was my favorite part of our stay. Here's a quick review of pros and cons of Tahoe area:

Pros

1. Not a horrendous drive from San Francisco or San Jose.
2. Plenty to do if you're a skier, drinker, or gambler.
3. Pretty scenery.
4. The Magic show was decent.
5. At our hotel, we could park and walk to everything - dinner and casino and even a Starbucks was inside the hotel.
6. Tahoe City - nicest area we saw on our drive around the lake.

Cons

1. Expensive - our room was especially overpriced for what it was .
2. Built-up, especially around the south side of the lake.
3. Casino inside hotel + lousy insulation = loud at night.
4. If you've lived in a place with lakes and mountains, like I have, it's nothing new.
5. Not much to do that's not horribly expensive if you're not a drinker, skier, or gambler.

Bottom line: If you live in the Bay area and really want a weekend getaway, there are plenty of other places. Look elsewhere.

What Happened To The Old Standbys?

2007-03-18T08:28:00.000-07:00

In my never-ending quest for appropriate therapy materials for my birth-3 population, I have been frequenting Toys R Us and Target way too often lately. This is because therapy with the little ones is not structured, but more play based. You'd be surprised how much language and communication you can get out of a child with the old standbys like a shape sorter, Mr. Potato Head, Play Doh, and building blocks.

I can use the shape sorter for receptive language and requesting by giving the child the box and keeping the shapes. I can either set a few shapes/colors in front of them and have them "put the ____ one in", or I can withhold the shapes and model requesting "I want the ____". With Mr. Potato Head, children can learn body parts, can start to learn singular versus plural nouns, and can also learn requesting and following directions. It's also interesting to see their problem solving skills when they want to put Potato Head's glasses on without having the eyes and the ears in the correct places. Play Doh is great for creating almost anything and encouraging imaginative play. Blocks are great for number concepts and teaching things like "shorter" and "taller" (when you stack them).

The frustrating thing I'm running into lately is that, while I have been able to get my hands on some old standbys, a lot of the toys simply have too many bells and whistles. They help children be entertained rather than educated. What happened to the old Playskool barn that had animals, a farmer, and a tractor? It is now replaced with the "new and improved" barn that makes animal noises and sings songs. This makes it a totally inappropriate toy for my kiddos who are Asperger's or Autistic, as the only thing they're interested in doing is pushing the damn "cluck cluck" button a gazillion times. There are many other toys that have gone through this "evolution". Even reading has taken on a different look with the invention of Leap Pad. I was sitting at one meeting where a teacher actually encouraged a parent to buy a Leap Pad to get her daughter interested in reading. She was explaining that a child could just press the wand to the written word to get the Leap Pad to produce the correct pronunciation. Inwardly, I was shaking my head and thinking "what happened to parents sitting down each night and actually reading with their child?". You don't need a Leap Pad to get kids interested in reading - you need parent involvement.

So, the old standbys have fallen to the wayside because the focus for children is different now. It's really too bad because all the bells and whistles in the world are not a substitute for simple human interaction.

At A Snail's Pace

2007-03-13T17:33:00.000-07:00

Time sometimes flies like a bird, sometimes crawls like a snail; but man is happiest when he does not even notice whether it passes swiftly or slowly.

Ivan Turgenev - Russian Novelist

Repetitive

2007-03-07T19:31:00.000-08:00

Like usual, I find that issues in my work life mirror those in my own life. Issues I've had for a long time. Last week brought it home for me. Let me preface my story by saying that I wasn't born a patient person - I've had to work hard at it and I willingly admit that I have a "patience bank". Only so much patience can be "withdrawn" before there's a deficiency, then there's no more to go around.

Not much drains my patience (and empathy) more than listening to someone state the same thing over and over again. In the same way my autistic students hate doing tasks over again, I hate hearing things over again when I've already been told. In a parent meeting last week, I had the opportunity to let a parent know some pretty good things about her son. Mostly because, even though he's autistic, he's quite bright. He can read and take visual cues like no one's business, which is wonderful since I can encourage appropriate behavior using that channel. This year has been a difficult one, though, because of the shortage of special education teachers available. As a result, this little guy's class has had a sub with very limited experience, which led to Tommy being mainstreamed less, going on less outings with general ed, and certain lack of variety of subjects covered in class. All of these concerns are valid. I would be disappointed also if Tommy was my son and he was not being challenged enough or didn't have enough opportunities to be with his general ed peers. What I do take issue with is listening to the same complaint five or six times after the new teacher has apologized and explained what has been done to rectify the situation. Here is my breakdown for repetitions of complaints:

First time you say something, I will listen and remember, even if it looks like it hasn't registered.

Second time, I know it's important to you and I'm thinking of solutions to the problem, while getting slightly annoyed.

Third time, I'm annoyed.

Fourth time, I'm rolling my eyes inside my head, and I've quit paying attention to the other things you're saying, even if it's something new and important.

Fifth time, I'm pissed now, have tuned you out completely, and am planning my exit strategy.

Everyone deals with repetitions differently. This woman's husband was dealing with the complaints by being what I like to call a "silent lump", the teacher continued to apologize (which only seemed to feed the woman's complaints), a few team members looked at the clock, stood up, and excused themselves, and the rest of us sat there.

On my way home, I got to thinking about how upset I got about this woman's nagging (I'll call a spade a spade at this point). Then it got me thinking about how many other times that people in my personal life have mentioned things more than once, and I have to admit that my reactions are similar. I think it's because I assume that, if people are telling me things more than once, they think I can't remember or that I didn't get it the first time. Either way, I find it insulting. The one exception is when I have listened to my grandparents retell stories, events, or something they're concerned about.

Since this issue keeps popping up, I obviously need to find a different outlook and ways of dealing with it.

Baby Steps

2007-03-02T17:27:00.000-08:00

I've recently made my first transition away from schools and into private practice. I just reduced my school workload to three days per week so that I could catch my breath and save my sanity. After a few weeks of having two extra days off, I decided that I needed to do something to help transition into private practice and to make up for the drop in income. So, after a few interviews with different places, I decided to sign up with a place who hires contractors to provide intervention for the birth-3 population. The nice thing is that I get to say how busy I am, and when I'm full, I'm full. Also, I still have one weekday to myself, which I'm guarding very carefully. As far as helping step into private practice, since I'm an independent contractor, I'm not technically an "employee" of anyone, and this will be a good way to network with parents who will have friends with small children possibly needing services.

This past week was my first week of travelling to homes after trying to buy appropriate toys and activites, cram client information into my head, and remember what it's like to work with the wee ones. It went better than I expected, and I didn't get worn out too much. I'm amazed sometimes at how permissive people are with their homes and their children. My families are across the spectrum as far as their involvement - at one place I'm led to the child's room by the nanny (who I communicate with by using gestures and facial expressions since she speaks no English) and the door is promptly closed behind me. Then I have other families who have me work with their toddler in one room while they are in the next room listening. And then there's the mother who watches every move I make and stays within 10 feet of me and her child. Truly, I prefer the parents who are a bit more involved - it makes carryover so much easier. Also, I feel weird being alone unsupervised with a child, for liability sake. At school, I'm very careful to have a room that is observable by people passing by so that there are witnesses to what is happening. This may seem paranoid, but I have known a few people who've been accused of certain things. The only way they haven't lost their job is because they've had peers who can vouch for them.

I'm learning to take on some different roles than I'm used to. In schools, I don't have as many opportunities as I'd like for parent education, which is very different from my new position. I have to become more educated on things like weaning, use of binkies, picky eaters, oral hygiene and the like, which delves more into feeding and swallowing than what I'm used to. I've had parents ask me questions, and for the first time in several years, I've had to say "I'm really not sure - let me get back to you on that".

Even though there's a learning curve that makes it a bit stressful, the best part is that I get to work with the little guys. Yep, all the kids on my caseload are boys. Some of them are truly delayed, and I have a feeling the others are just "late bloomers" as many boys tend to be. I have the quiet ones who I have to practically stand on my head to get anything out of them, the cuddly ones who like to sit on me, the ones who are happy go lucky one minute and screaming bloody murder the next, and the ones who are quietly oblivious to me unless they want something. Each is a little puzzle.

This new venture of mine is a bit scary, as I'm leaving the "safe, but stressful" environment I've known for so long, but it's the only way to move forward.

Big Island Adventure

2007-02-25T08:24:00.000-08:00

We just returned yesterday from our vacation on the Big Island of Hawaii. When it was getting towards the end of our stay, I thought I would not want to come back, but I found that, by Friday, I was ready to come home. This is partly because we were on an island for a week and beginning to feel cooped up, but mostly because we were able to see most, if not all, the sights we wanted to see. Before we left, our friends gave us "Hawaii: The Big Island Revealed, Ultimate Guidebook" by Wizard Publications. I have to say that we'd have been lost without this book. It is written by people who actually go to all the attractions, restaurants, sights, and hotels, so it takes them one to two years to complete an edition. A book on each island is written, and I would highly recommend purchasing this if you are planning a visit. We happened to get lucky with our hotel - we reserved our room at Sheraton Keauhou Bay Resort and Spa in Kona, which was given a "gem" by the guidebook, before really knowing what was out there. After seeing the other hotels and condos in different areas, we were pretty happy with our choice because it was a quieter location (just south of Kona), within our price range, and not too remote.

The best part of our trip was just being able to relax. There truly was no agenda - we did not go to Hawaii with a "plan of action" and we didn't sign up for tours each day. Instead, we went on a Circle Island Tour during the first part of our stay so we would know what to see and do, but the rest of the time we explored on our own. Let me just say that it would have been difficult to do this without a rental car. The island really is huge - the circle tour was 12 hours long and covered much of what you'd want to see in general.

We were able to visit a coffee farm, which wasn't hard to find since the west and southwest parts of the island are peppered with coffee and macadamia nut trees and farms. On our tour, it was mentioned that most of the coffee grown within the United States comes from Kona.

The next stop on our tour was the Black Sand Beach, which was very windy and a bit cooler than Kona area. It was beautiful, though, and the drive was well worth it. Because the winds are so strong, the waves crash along the shore and I had to be careful to keep my balance and not get knocked over.
Following the road northeast, we were able to visit the Kilauea Volcano. I was surprised at the sheer amount of lava that's visible on the island until I found out that Kilauea is still active. We could not see any lava, but only sulfur coming out of the crater. The only way to see the active part of the volcano is to take a helicopter tour, which is quite expensive.

Near the crater of the volcano, we walked through lava tubes, which were hidden in dense rainforests. I was pretty amazed at how much plant life was able to grow despite the lava flows. On different parts of the island, the "pancake batter" type rock is visible, with these lone plants and trees sprouting from underneath and in between the crevices.
After visiting the volcano, we went towards Hilo on the east part of the island and stopped to see Rainbow Falls. This part of the island is so different from where we were staying - very lush and green due to the humidity and rainfall.

From there, we travelled west towards Wimea and Parker Ranch. According to the guide book, Captain Vancouver brought cattle to the island in the late 1700's, and they were multiplying and getting out of hand by ruining crops and driving people out of their homes. John Parker was hired by King Kamehameha to "fix" the horned cattle problem and ended up starting a ranch, which now spans over 200,000 acres.

One night we went to a luau in Kona, which was entertaining. The two best things about it were the baked pig and the show. Even though the dancers are entertaining, they are supposed to be telling different stories through their dance, but to me, it's hard to tell what they are saying. The costumes are different, though, and some of their dance is more peaceful and other parts are quite lively.
And then there's the fire guy who eats flames - that's always a big hit in my book. H was pretty impressed, too. I was disappointed, though, because most of his performance was behind a net. They didn't used to do that. I bet someone in the front row had fire accidentally tossed at them. Now, because of the legalities, there are nets. I'm not trying to be flip, but there is a section in the guidebook that explains things like this - that certain attractions and sights are considered "at your own risk", and in danger of closing down to the public if there are complaints or lawsuits.

Second to the ocean, the most beautiful thing about Hawaii are the flowers. Everywhere I looked, there were flowers. I'm not a fancy gal, but flowers are girly thing I do appreciate.

One of our last places we visited was the Place of Refuge, which was a sacred place that people could go for asylum. If they had broken a law, they would be immune from death if they could reach this place before they were captured.

Hawaii leaves quite an impression on a person. It is a very relaxing place, not just because there's nothing better to do than relax, but because of the whole atmosphere. However, there were a few things that left us longing for home. Firstly, people of Hawaii are not exactly the pinnacle of health that shows like "Baywatch", "Magnum P.I." and "Hawaii-Five-0" would have you believe. It's not hard to see why. I've never seen so much greasy and fried food. H and I both commented on how much we looked forward to our own food again, cooked in our own kitchen, and not a bit of it fried. Also, it's hard not to wince when everything is so expensive and when literally every place "quarter and dollar's" you to death. I don't say "nickel and dimed" because the incidental charges, tips, and such hurt your wallet far more than losing a few nickels and dimes. H and I just about fell over from shock when we visited the Place of Refuge and parking and admittance was free (I think that was the only free thing on our trip besides the shell necklaces at Hilo Hatties). Even so, there were experiences on our vacation that were priceless that I wasn't able to capture on film. At the luau, couples were asked to get up and dance together to a Hawaiian song of love (please don't gag - it was actually sweet). Also, just like the guidebook promised, the geckos at the Aloha Angel Cafe really were friendly and licked small pieces of strawberry from my fingers during our breakfast. Most importantly, H and I had nothing better to do than to enjoy each other's company.

Aloha and Mahalo!

2007-02-16T12:17:00.000-08:00

We're flying the coop for the week - I might come back.

1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die

2007-02-05T20:00:00.000-08:00

After much deliberation and trials and tribulations with finding this book, I finally broke down and bought it. Originally, I wanted to get this book for my brother for Christmas, but do you think I could find it anywhere? Of course not. Now I have the excuse to peruse the book before I buy it for anyone else, since it's not cheap. I can say right now that it's well worth the $34.95 I spent. I like how the book is laid out - there is a preface by Michael Lydon, Founding Editor of Rolling Stone, followed by a list of contributors (there were 91!), and an album index. The "meat" of the book is laid out in decades starting with the 1950's and going up through 2003. In each decade, the albums are sorted by release date, with most pages having a picture or album cover, a track listing, and a 3-4 paragraph writeup of why the album deserved to be in the book. I have learned many interesting facts which I had not known before, like the fact that Eddy Van Halen did the guitar in Michael Jackson's "Billy Jean". Most impressive, since Eddy is now relegated to doing the music for porn videos. Most of the albums listed are not a big surprise, like Elvis Presley's self titled ablum (1956), the Beatles' "Hard Day's Night" (1964), Simon and Garfunkel's "Bridge Over Troubled Water" (1970), The Boss' "Born In The USA" (1984), Nirvana's "Nevermind" (1991), and Johnny Cash's "American IV: The Man Comes Around" (2002).

Some highlights from "1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die" by Leading International Critics:

1950's - Frank Sinatra's "In the Wee Small Hours", Fats Domino's "This Is Fats", and Ray Charles' "The Genius of Ray Charles"

1960's - Joan Baez' "Joan Baez", BB King "Live at the Regal", and Bob Dylan's "Blonde on Blonde"

1970's - Black Sabbath's "Paranoid", Elton John's "Madman Across the Water", and The Ramones' "Ramones"

1980's - Michael Jackson's "Thriller", Cyndi Lauper's "She's So Unusual", and Dire Straits' "Brothers In Arms"

1990's - Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Blood Sugar Sex Magik", U2's "Achtung Baby", and Green Day's "Dookie"

2000's - Madonna's "Music", Coldplay's "A Rush of Blood To The Head", and 50 Cent's "Get Rich or Die Tryin"

Even though there were several albums I expected, there were some listed that made me say "Whaaaa?!?", like the White Stripes, Justin Timberlake, and Bjork, who are all artists in the decade labeled "2000's". I really can't find much wrong with the recommendations from the other decades, even if I have heard a certain album and don't particularly like it. I think the problem is that current music isn't that compelling, so our expectations for what constitutes "good music" are lowered. I'm not saying all music from our current decade is crap, but not much of it is anything I'd care to listen to. Maybe I was just born in the wrong time period.

A few albums I am curious about checking out as a result of this book are: Royskopp's "Melody A.M." because I heard the song "Remind Me" on the Geico caveman commercial and couldn't get the damn thing out of my head, Miles Davis' "The Birth of Cool" because I've never been into jazz but would like to try, Rod Stewart's "Gasoline Alley" because I want to remember when Rod had some balls and didn't sing stuff that's already been sung, and The Flaming Lips' "Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots" because I'd desperately like to believe that there's something that Justin Timberlake can do right, cuz it sure ain't singing (Lips recruited him to play bass on this album).

For any music lover, this is a great book. It's not just a "coffee table" book, but it's one that can help you expand your musical horizons. I give "1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die" 8 out of 10 dancing feet.

Who would've thought.....

2007-01-30T20:29:00.000-08:00

...that this little bundle would eventually have bigger feet than his mother? Happy 14th Birthday to my son, K!

Book Review: Devil in the White City

2007-01-19T17:07:00.000-08:00

I picked up this book after hearing my dad describe it, hoping that it would not become part of the pile of half-read books in my nightstand drawer. Luckily, it didn't - it now has a permanent place on my bookshelf with the other books I've read cover to cover.

"Devil in the White City" is a historical novel about the first American World's Fair (dubbed "The White City") in Chicago and the madness that happened to coincide with it. The "devil" refers to the charming man who used his skills and the excitement of the fair to befriend and murder up to 200 people - mostly young women looking for adventure in the big city. I say "up to" because authorities apparently never did determine how many murders "H.H. Holmes" or Henry Mudgett committed.

The books is very readable, even for me. I can't handle a book with a lot of details without having some story to go along with it. I liked how the author alternated chapters about the development of the World's Fair with intriguing tidbits of the beginnings of Holmes' schemes. The history of the fair itself was quite interesting, and it was surprising to me how many of our current day started with the fair. For instance, Shredded Wheat was introduced at the Chicago World's Fair and still remains a breakfast staple today. Also, the Ferris Wheel, which is one of my favorite rides at carnivals, was one of the reasons the fair did so well and brought in so much revenue. In order to prepare for the fair, though, Chicago had to ready itself and make plans that would best the World's Fair recently held in Paris, for which the Eiffel Tower had been constructed.
I was amazed by the sheer expense of the fair. It had to be elaborate to not only best the Paris exhibition, but to bring pride to the people of Chicago. Still, even by today's standards, I'm amazed the fair happened at all, not just because of the expense, but because of the short timelines with which to complete the buildings and the fact that labor unions were just beginning to start up and the fact that the world was really in an economic crisis. Not to mention that the planners were not all on the same page as to which type of architecture was best, which only pushed back the beginning of the construction.

This book made me wish I had been around to see the fair, but also makes me want to visit Chicago just to see Jackson Park and see if I could imagine what it might have looked like, since most of the buildings are not there today. The Chicago World's Fair was quite an inspiration and an amazing event to have happened at the time. Others inspired by the World's Fair went on to create wonderful things, which is why we have Disneyland and the movie Wizard of Oz and Coney Island.

If you're looking for a very entertaining read about the events surrounding the 1893 Chicago World's Fair, you won't be disappointed. I give this book 9 out of 10 dancing feet.

My Adventure Window Is Closing (and no one told me until now)

2007-01-15T15:49:00.001-08:00

Let me just first say that I love my iPod. I recently upgraded to the 30G Video and have been pretty impressed with the things I can do with it. However, like most of my other tech gadgets, I don't use it to it's fullest capacity. So, because of this awareness and also wanting to get the most bang for my buck, I've recently discovered Podcasts. H has gotten me hooked on NPR casts, which I can download and listen to at my leisure. Today's cast was titled "NPR's Most Memorable Moments of 2006" and dealt with the almost inevitable loss of adventure in our lives that happens as we approach 40. One professor at Stanford noticed this and did a little bit of "research" after being extremely irritated by his TA, who was never stuck in a rut as evidenced by his enjoyment of different genres of music on a daily basis. He decided to call around to about 50 radio stations nationwide and found that there was a concept of "breakthrough minus 20", in which you take an artist's "breakthrough" year and subtract 20 from it, and that's the year of birth for that particular artist's fan base. So, artists we identify with and listen to in our high school and early college years tend to stick with us. We then keep listening to this artist well past their prime because of the happenings and associations we make to the music of our time. Professor Zupolsky (sp) also inquired about food trends and body piercing trends and found similar veins - that once an "adventure window" closes, that a person is less likely to try something new if they haven't been exposed to it yet. In the case of new types of foods, if you've not experienced a new type of food by your mid to late 20's, you're not very likely to try it after that point. The window closes sooner for body piercings - especially tongue piercings. Apparently, according to one body piercer who was interviewed, if you don't have a tongue piercing by age 23, it most likely will not happen.

This got me to thinking about my own adventure window, especially since I'll be turning 35 soon. I'd like to believe that I'm not stuck in a rut, but admittedly, I'm not as likely to try new things now compared to when I was in my 20's. Some of it is good and actually is protective in nature - the fact that I no longer skydive means that I'll most likely have significantly less broken bones or sprained ankles, and gee, I might live longer. Some of it is bad and makes me feel old and crotchety, like when I hear some songs on the radio and gripe about the crap they try to pass off as music. Now, I'm not about to go out and get my tongue pierced, but I'd like to think I'm open minded enough to try a new food, visit a new place, or listen to music I've not heard before. Maybe my adventure window doesn't have to close all the way - maybe I can put up a screen to let little wafts of adventure into my life so that I don't get stuck in a rut and miss out on something fun.

Christmas Tag

2007-01-13T07:23:00.000-08:00

TSHS tagged me to do a Christmas me-me, which at least gets me writing (I've been in a slump lately).

Three things I got for Christmas: a very nice soft cotton bath towel set, a sushi and soup serving set with some funky and cool-looking chopsticks, and a personalized scrapbooked picture frame.

Three things I never want to get for Christmas: a subscription to the "x" of the month club (where "x" equals any kind of weird shit that people come up with), anything domestic like a vacuum or dish towels, and weird things like the clapper or a Chia pet.

Three people to tag: I think most people have done this, so anyone who'd like to can complete this.

The most fun gifts I received were actually from my students. One of my severely autistic students, I'll call him Tommy, got me a candy dish and home-made peppermint bark. When he saw me coming to get him for therapy, he insisted that I "OPEN IT, JEN, OPEN IT!!!", and helped me to unwrap his gift because I was taking too long. Another girl was so excited to get me something, she kept dropping hints and rubbing her hands together and saying "ooo-la-la". Another boy made me his own Christmas card, which is still hanging on my cork-board at work. So, I think my best gift was getting to see how excited my students get around Christmas-time, not just because they are getting gifts, but to give them also.

Movie Review: Little Miss Sunshine

2006-12-29T08:06:00.000-08:00

If you have a chance to rent one movie this year, get "Little Miss Sunshine". This film has some very real characters who most people could relate to. Also, by watching this film, one can feel slightly better about the dysfunction in one's own family because this family is painfully bad. The basic story involves a family with a "9 Steps to Success" father (Kinnear) who is so annoying you want to slap him, a mom who's trying to hold everything together (Collette), a suicidal uncle (Carrell), a perverted grandpa, a selectively mute teenager, and a sweet little girl named Olive. They need to make it from Albuquerque to California so that Olive, a runner up in the Little Miss Sunshine contest, can try to win the coveted crown. They have some obstacles to face along the way, like juggling schedules, driving a dilapidated old Volkswagen van, figuring out what to do with the grandpa who dies along the way, and dealing with teenage angst. Despite these obstacles, the family does make it to the pageant.

Lessons learned from this film: Letting a suicidal relative befriend your angry teenager could possibly have a good outcome, never trust a perverted grandpa to train a young girl for a beauty pageant, and most importantly, keep a stash of porn in your vehicle for the purpose of bribing a police officer in order to get out of a traffic ticket and to distract him from the dead body in your trunk. In all seriousness, the film spoke to the fact that people need to be allowed to be who they are, that sometimes silence is better than words, and that people who can be themselves in a world of fake beauty should be applauded and celebrated.

On a side note, the beauty pageant was disturbing to watch, and I could not get the image of JonBenet Ramsey out of my head as I watched these little doll-like girls prance around on the stage. I don't know if that's how these pageants really are, but if so, then I wonder what is to be gained from parading these little girls on stage. Is it to give them a twisted sense of what beauty is? Or to make them overly aware of watching their figures at such a young age? Or just maybe it's so that adults have something pretty to look at that's unattainable for them.

Overall, I'd give "Little Miss Sunshine" 9 out of 10 dancing feet.

Hug the Potholder

2006-12-23T17:01:00.000-08:00

While I've been visiting my mom in Spokane, we have been working on making these cute heart-shaped potholders. These are the ones with the fabric I selected, and mom has some cute ladybug and teapot ones.

On a side note, making this project made me think of a time when I had a bunch of friends over to my house for a party. We always played group games like Pictionary and the like. One of my friends was a high school counselor and suggested we play a game called "Hug the Potholder". So he took one person aside and explained the game and the "hugger" waited in a separate area. Then the lucky hugger was brought back in and given a set of parameters and then was instructed to "hug the potholder". There was a potholder on the center of the floor with everyone else in a circle surrounding the confused "hugger". So, you hug the potholder every which way you can think of until your actions are deemed worthy by the judge. Only after humiliating yourself in a variety of positions with the potholder do you see one of your friends in the circle holding a cast-iron pot. Moral of this story? If someone asks you to play "Hug the Potholder", be afraid. Also, beware of anyone with a camera, as they might get some interesting butt-shots that can be used at a later time in some kind of bribery or blackmail situation.

Kickin' Caffeine is Kickin' My Butt.... and Other Happenings

2006-12-13T18:23:00.001-08:00

No, I'm not crazy. I'm just cutting WAY back on my caffeine intake, much to my chagrin. Yes, I know that I will probably feel much better once I'm off the stuff, but I took a certain pride in being able to say "Hey, if caffeiene is my worst vice, then I'm not doing half bad". I'm on day three and my body doesn't like going without - I'm having headaches, my body is sluggish, I'm cranky, and I generally feel like crap.

What prompted this insane idea to give up coffee? Well, on the advice of a close friend, I picked up the book "Taking Charge of Your Fertility". Let me just say that cutting out caffeine is one of the less icky things this book would have me do in order to take charge of things. I won't go into all the gory details, but if you want to read up on it, just do a search on Fertility Awareness Method on Google and you'll read more than you probably wanted to know. Just don't say I didn't warn you.

Since H and I have Blockbuster online, we've been catching up on the old classics. We have watched some truly good movies, like Casablanca and Guess Who's Coming to Dinner. Also in our queue have been some odd movies like Clockwork Orange, which disturbed me. Why on earth would a guy wear freakishly long fake eyelashes on one eye and not the other? Some other movies have been complete duds. I couldn't even make it through Funny Face. I'm not sure that some movies translate well over time.

Work has been filled with moments that are either extremely funny or very touching or painfully difficult. There doesn't seem to be much "in between". Kids who are usually not close to me have asked me for hugs. Some of my students are learning to make jokes that are actually funny, which has been very amusing and refreshing to see. But we've also had an influx of kids who are drug and alcohol affected. No matter how many other things I can become accustomed to and hardened to, this is something I can't. When I sit across the table from these kids and work with them, I have a hard time not thinking "this kiddo could be normal if his parents hadn't done drugs/alcohol". Some of them are already having anger issues because of the choices their parents made. I'm not quite sure if the parents don't realize the global issues they are causing their kids to have, or if they are so caught up in their addictions that they don't have the wherewithall to think of anything else. Either way, it makes me sad and angry.

On Saturday, I'll be leaving for Spokane, which I'm really looking forward to. I need a change of scenery, to be away from work, and to just be around my family. When my students asked me what I plan to do, I said "sleep in, spend time with my family, and possibly go sledding". Winter break, here I come!

A Little Perspective

2006-12-01T17:27:00.000-08:00

Today, much to the surprise and horror of some of my students, I demonstrated what unexpected behavior looks like, so they can begin to gain some perspective of what it looks like to others. I was inspired to do this after a workshop I went to yesterday, which was amazing, that was taught by an SLP who works with mostly Aspergers and Autistic folks on social reasoning and cognition. Her approach with this population is very direct and her aim is to try to teach them how to take others' perspectives and think outside of their own little bubble. It got me thinking about how many behaviors that I excuse because "oh, they're autistic - it's just the way they are". So, even though it upsets me, I put up with not being greeted when I greet my students, being yawned at as I'm starting to teach a lesson, being told "I'm bored", grabbed at, yelled at, and insulted. Today, though, I tried a different approach, with mixed results. I was working with a group of three 3rd graders, one of whom is autistic - the other two are severely language impaired. The autistic boy explicitly expressed his displeasure with my lesson by yawning loudly several times, slumping in his chair, then allowed his body to slide off his chair and onto the floor. Something inside of me railed, and once I got the student back into his seat, I decided to stop mid-stream and do a lesson from the workshop I went to yesterday. The lesson was unexpected versus expected behaviors. After a brief introduction to the students on what I meant, I proceeded to demonstrate unexpected behaviors that the austistic student does in my room on a regular basis. The sad thing is that the other two students gaped and laughed nervously, but the autistic student had no reaction. This was not what I had planned, but not being one to give up easily, I decided to reproduce his behaviors again, but this time right in his face. Success! He physically backed away from me in horror and crossed both of his index fingers in front of his body. When I asked him why he did that, he told me that he didn't like the things I was doing. "You mean it upset you?", I queried further. "Well, that's how I feel when you do unexpected things". I saw a glimmer of light. I reproduced this lesson in a more structured format for my mixed classroom of 10 4-6 grade students - some with Autism, some with other significant cognitive impairments. Again, like in the first group, my students who are lower cognitively were able to understand and express feelings related to my unexpected behaviors. Frustratingly, my autistic students, for whom this lesson is most applicable, showed very little reaction to my rantings and ravings. However, both groups of students were able to identify what I should have done and what expected behaviors look like in the classroom, but application and carryover are difficult. Clearly, this will be an ongoing process, but I felt some comfort in being able to use some terminology and phrasing to express to my students how they come across to others. I used phrasing like "I'm getting weird thoughts when you do that". What a freeing experience to be able to express to my students in an honest way about how they come across to others and what they need to do about it.

The whole idea of teaching these kids perspective taking comes from the fact that most kids just learn it, but some kids don't. Those of us with neurotypical kids take it for granted that we don't have to teach each little skill discreetly. If our kids don't learn some of the finer social lessons at home, they are in tune and motivated by the feedback they get from teachers and peers. They know that a furrowed brow means displeasure, even if it's not paired with any verbal reprimand. So out of this realization that some kids need to be taught how to take others' perspectives comes this approach of teaching social cognition and recognizing how pervasive the effects are when we do this. This fits right into my belief that it really doesn't matter if a student is doing well academically - if he can't "make it" socially, then he can't make it. I know it's a bit extreme of a statement, but I've seen way too many people who are "book smart", and are successful by most people's standards, but cannot relate to others because of social ineptness. So then, how successful are they? You can only get so far in life without being able to network appropriately. I love the terminology that Michelle Garcia Winner uses, like "social software" and "social algebra", which really really are pretty accurate depictions of what some of us are born with and what others of us have to work so diligently to achieve.

How I Spent My Thanksgiving

2006-11-25T20:33:00.000-08:00

I am finally home from my Thanksgiving weekend in San Diego. We went to visit H's family, which went pretty well. The parts that didn't go so well were the drive there and the drive back - both rounding on 9 hours. The only good thing was that H drove, and I got to look at sagebrush and knit.

We had a very good Thanksgiving dinner which was preceded by a drive to Oceanside to walk along the pier in the sun and watch the surfers. The only blemish on the day was that I really missed my family.

On Friday, we went to the Wild Animal Park in Escondido and the Meditation Garden in Encinitas. I have to say that I was pretty impressed with the Wild Animal Park (pictures below). We went on a 45 minute tram ride through the different parts of the park where I was able to get some good photos of elephants, giraffes, and rhinos. For those who are so inclined, you can book a truck tour to go right up to the animals and feed the giraffes or watch the cheetahs. Both of those had sold out, but I'd like to do one of those next time. After that, you can walk to the other exhibits like the lions and tigers, and also the bird sanctuary where you buy nectar so that the birds land on you. While no birds landed on me, they did leave me some gifts in my hair.

I'm rather proud of this picture - I just happened to catch him yawning.

A baby elephant with its mother - sooo cute!

This big fella was resting after chasing a younger gorilla that had taken his bananas.

Apparently, a giraffe's tongue is proportionate to his heighth - one inch per one foot!

This dad rhino was on "time out" for trying to impregnate a female rhino right after she had given birth to another offspring. Apparently the park is quite successful in breeding certain animals.

Bonsai tree in the garden of the Animal Park

Flowers and cactus in the Baja Garden in the Animal Park

Flower in the meditation garden in Encinitas

This picture does not do the meditation garden justice. First of all, it's on an elongated plot of land that is set high on a cliff overlooking the ocean. There are beautiful trees, flowers, shrubs, benches, and ponds with huge goldfish. The garden was very peaceful, even with as many visitors as were there. These are two places I'd recommend visiting if you're ever in the San Diego area.

Babysitting

2006-11-19T07:58:00.000-08:00

I work with a gal who is on maternity leave for the year so that she can be with her little guy. I saw her a few weeks ago with C, her little 5 month old bundle, and was talking with her a little bit about how things were going. She was describing things that took me right back to when K was little - about having to plan to go to the bathroom, shower, etc. These are simple things I do now without much thought, but looking back, I did have to plan for those simple things. I also happened to find out that, because C had been a fussy baby, they had been reluctant to leave him with anyone, even for a few hours. I promptly signed H and I up for keeping C company.

Our first time babysitting C was last night. First of all, I had forgotten how much effort it takes to get a sitter - S had typed out two pages of info that we should know for C and showed us his two different bags with all the supplies we would need. Do you know that there are scented baggies for diapers? Where were these when I needed them?!? I was relieved to see a few of the "old" toys like the plastic keys on the ring that are different colors and have numbers on them and the teething rings. Oddly enough, C seemed to prefer chewing on the little board books, his fist, and my arm over the teething rings. In fact, anything he got his hands on went straight to his mouth.

Can I just say that I'm physically wiped out this morning from having babysat last night? He was a little bundle of energy - he loved to "jump", which consisted of me holding him under his armpits and him bouncing up and down on my leg. My shoulders and arms withstood all 17 pounds of him for a total of at least an hour of bouncing. He also, amazingly, had the attention span to look at books when H read him the "Maisy" books from his stash. I just figured that a baby so active would not settle down for anything. I was pleasantly surprised. C's favorite things were to look at himself in our slider, to watch the ceiling fan go round and round, and to giggle uncontrollably while H did raspberries while shaking his head back and forth.

My favorite time was when I was feeding him, then went to burp him. I sat him on my leg facing sideways so that his chest and neck were draped over my forearm. Pretty soon, there was no motion from C as his head lolled on my forearm. I leaned back and had him cradled on me facing outward with his blankie and listened to him while he breathed and let out the occasional sigh.

Ohh... in the words of Lea Thompson on one episode of "Friends"... "I think my uterus just skipped a beat".

Blech

2006-11-16T18:19:00.000-08:00

That is pretty much how I feel right now. I have been having a writing slump, simply because nothing noteworthy has been happening. Also, if anything exciting did happen, it would have to whack me over the head in order to get my attention.

More things have been going on in my mind than anything else, partly because it's conference time and my mental energy has been focused on parent meetings, testing my students (which they hate), and writing almost 70 progress reports. Gone are the days when teachers could write ambiguous statements about their students' progress like "approaching standard" or "gets along well with others" or "overly talkative in class". Yes, I'm glad those days are gone, because now there is increased accountability. I actually have to prove that my students are making progress towards goals by giving accuracy levels and percent correct in certain tasks. Johnny can tell me 8 out of 10 times what the proper solution is to common problems, but in carry-over tasks, his accuracy drops to below 50%. No, I cannot pull numbers and percents out of my ass - I actually have to collect data, which takes a lot of time. Some of my conferences have gone well - better than I'd expected. Some parents are actually grateful to me for the services I provide. A few of my parents actually take their kids to private therapy and/or work with them at home. It's quite refreshing. Others blame "school personnel" for their child's behaviors. "Timmy would not have the problems he has if the school would quit labeling him". Personally, I've no more patience left for parents playing the "race" card. Your kid has problems because he does not make wise decisions, he hurts others, and ends up alienating his peers because of his actions. Plain and simple. And, just in case you wondered, "no, I cannot fix it so that other kids will want to interact with your child". One thing that's very frustrating about what I do is that I can teach a child just about any kind of social interaction... and they can actually show carryover. But I cannot make others not have preconceived ideas about the kids I serve. The kids I work with are different, and it shows. Above a certain grade level (about third grade and above), kids get less accepting of differences as each year passes. I agree that it's a problem, and it makes me sad. I don't have a good answer about how to make it different because I'm not in control of others' ideas, expressions, and actions.

On the home front, I'm not particularly motivated to do too much. The place is a mess, and usually I would care enough to do something about it. But I don't care. When work "takes over", then everything else sort of suffers because I use all my energy to channel into work, mostly to keep a level head and not spout off, even when there's nothing I'd like better. To make things worse, I have something in my personality that prevents any kind of change when I am pushed by external forces. It has to come from me. Hopefully I will be back to normal soon, whatever that is.

Strong Women

2006-11-06T16:23:00.000-08:00

Some points in my life are tougher than others. Right now, I have a mix - my personal life is settling down, but my work life is acting up. When stress piles up, I try desperately to think through my actions and reactions, but sometimes, try as I might, I act out of instinct or habit. I'd like to think that I make conscious decisions about how to conduct myself through thick and thin, but how much of what we do or how we behave is choice, and how much is handed to us?

Throughout my life, I have been lucky enough to have strong women in my life, each of them with different kinds of "muscle". From my mother, I definitely learned how to be affectionate and loving, as well as the "buck up" attitude. From very early on, even when mom was upset with me, I never went one day without a hug, a kiss, and an "I love you". I think that's where I get my affection for my own family and for the kids I work with. It's very hard for me not to find something endearing about the people I'm surrounded by. Because of the pragmatic approach taken by my mother, I can (and am still learning to) stop and think about tough situations or tough people I run across in my life and think of them as "preparations" for what lies ahead. However, I have enough "me" in me to want to throw a pity party first. It always amazed me that, even when I was in my teen years, mom trusted me to do things that most other kids my age were not trusted with. Because of this trust, I learned to be independent and not always rely on an adult. From driving in a snowstorm, to having my first job, to helping out with the family groceries, I learned how to do things early so that I'd know how to do them when I was out of the nest.

From my Grandma Fran, I learned how to be domestic. Because of her patient teaching, I know how to sew, crochet, knit, and cook/bake. Don't scoff - it's a valuable thing, especially when considering how expensive it is to eat out. Even when I was very young, Grandma never refused my offer of "help", even though I probably made more of a mess than actually helped. She was from the generation that taught their children how to be self-reliant around the house. How else would you raise a big family if people don't pitch in and do their share? This is my grandma who I refer to as "my sugar cookie grandma" when I first introduced H to my family. This is because she has the sweetest and kindest heart. In all these years, I can count on one hand the times she has become visibly upset with me, even through all my mistakes. Grandma's strength, though, is her spirituality. Whatever life brings her, I've never seen her "lose it" or become despaired. The only time I can muster the kind of strength she has is when I made a full-fledged effort, and even then sometimes it doesn't happen for me. It's still something I strive for.

Grandma Jane, out of all the women in my life, had what anyone would think of as "strength". If anyone wore the pants in the family, it was her. She definitely taught me to stick up for myself and not to take any shit. She also was very generous (sometimes too much so), and tried to impart that, if I don't share what I have with others, I will end up with nothing. Like Grandma Fran, Grandma Jane also showed me the ways of the domestics. I truly believe that it's not just because of family necessity, but because both of my grandmas grew up in a time when they didn't have much. You had to find ways to make do - to tough it out. So, even in times of good, you'd better be prepared for what may lie ahead.

I'm lucky to have such strong role models in my life. Practically speaking, I see their effects on me each day, especially dealing with tough situations. Because of their love and acceptance for me, I continue to try to be the strongest and best woman that I can be. When I fall or stray off-course, I have the desire to get back on track. I have a backbone and speak my mind, but try to temper it with some self-restraint and composure. I cannot go through a day without expressing my affection, in some form or another, for those who are closest to me. Yet, I value the time when I have to myself to get re-centered and prepare myself for what lies ahead for me the next day.

What an Ass!

2006-10-26T16:09:00.000-07:00

Unless you've been living in a cave the past few months, you've undoubtedly seen some of the political ads floating around. They haven't been very nice, for the most part. Some of the criticisms of the ads have been even less kind. But no one has shown himself more of an asshole than Rush Limbaugh, for his criticism of Michael J. Fox's endorsement of a particular Senator in Missouri for her support of stem cell research. Specifically, Limbaugh had the nerve to insinuate that Fox was "exaggerating" his tremors just for effect.

According to Fox's website, he was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease in 1991, which means he's been living with the disease for around 15 years. Anyone who either lives with or knows someone who is living with Parkinson's Disease knows that, like other diseases such as cancer, Parkinson's has several "stages".

Stage 1: Mild tremors, loss of balance/posture, facial grimaces
Stage 2: Symptoms are bilateral, difficulties walking, maintaining balance, everyday tasks are
more difficult
Stage 3: Symptoms of stages 1 and 2 are more severe, with difficulties walking or even
standing, and noticably slower physical movements
Stage 4: Rigid movements, bradykinesia (extreme slowness of movement) , inability to live on
their own, sometimes tremors lessen during this stage
Stage 5: The disease takes over all physical movement, may not be able to walk or stand alone,
may be unable to take care of self
*description of stages from webmd.com

Depending on the stage, the day of the week, the amount of sleep a person has gotten, what time of day it is, if they are "in between" meds, if their current meds aren't working, their stress level, and how the stars are aligned in the night sky, a person's symptoms can worsen or get better from one day to the next. To have your mind intact and be able to watch your body deteriorate is a horrible thing to deal with, especially because your dependence on a caregiver is inevitable, which means a loss of independence. Can anyone honestly blame Michael J. Fox for endorsing a senator who is interested in finding a cure for this disease? Wouldn't you?

I'm Gonna Wash That Blond Right Outta My Hair

2006-10-17T17:39:00.000-07:00

So last Saturday, I took the plunge and went to a brand-spankin'-new salon in San Jose called 5 Color Cowboy. I found this place off of yelp.com, which has been very helpful. True, it's all based on customer reviews, which need to be taken with a grain of salt, but I figured that not much harm could come out of keeping an open mind. The salon itself was very nicely decorated in a trendy Asian theme and the place was hopping with business, which I took as a good sign. What was most important was that all the stylists had "good hair", which boded well for even my head of hair.

So, no more blonde highlights for me - they were eating up my hair and making it generally look like crap (especially on the ends). Not only did the my stylist do a great job coloring my hair, she also colored my eyebrows so they'd match. At first, I was a bit worried because, after putting the goup on my eyebrows, I looked strikingly similar to Groucho Marx, but without the mustache. My stylist, Angel, assured me that it was just a temporary effect, which made me feel slightly better. After about an hour and a half of being pampered, I left the salon with considerably better hair than when I went in, which is what Angel had promised. I have achieved what I thought was the impossible - I found a stylist who has proven herself a worthy "tamer of the tresses".

What I get for $100 a month

2006-10-09T17:55:00.000-07:00

Usually I do not look at my paystub because I shit bricks at all the money that gets taken out. But for this post, I actually had to look, and under my "voluntary contributions" (cough, sputter), are my union dues. The term "voluntary" supposedly means that I have a choice about whether or not I'd like to belong to the CTA, but it's never explained that way by union reps. It's more like "fill out these papers, turn them in on time, then watch your paycheck shrink". It wouldn't burn so much, but then I get told by "higher ups" that people who go to the union with issues are "troublemakers" and we should all go through "proper channels" with any grievances. Translation: Go to the union with caseload/workload issues, and I can make your life hell. To make matters worse, at voting time, I get the CTA "Voter Guide". Maybe some union members like this perk - a nifty little packet that tells educators what to think and how to vote. I don't like it. This packet recommends that I not vote for Arnold Schwarzenegger for Governor, that I instead choose Angelides, who came off as a major slime-ball in the televised governor debate last week, and whose policies I don't agree with any more than I agree with the Governator's. The proposition that I'm to vote "yes" for (bonds for schools) is labeled in bold green lettering, and includes only information aimed at supporting the measure. The props that I'm to vote "no" for (parental notification of abortion, public campaign financing, and eminent domain) are labeled in bold red lettering and only state the the negatives of the measure. No information is given on opposing viewpoints for each measure. To top it off, on the back of the ballot, CTA has kindly included an absentee ballot so they can monitor my voting habits and be forewarned of any kind of independent thought on my part. How's that for getting what I pay for?

I Watch Too Much TV

2006-10-01T18:59:00.000-07:00

I readily admit that I should not watch as much television as I do, but I do have my favorite shows. When I'm home sick, I love watching "The Price Is Right" - I've watched it ever since I was a young girl. At night, I watch reruns of shows, plus "Lost" and "Grey's Anatomy". One thing I noticed is that there is a stark difference between "daytime ads" and "nighttime ads". The ones during the day are noticably worse than the ones at night. Here are some doozies I've seen during daytime programming:

Just For Men - Because you know a man can't be a real man without a beard. Not only does a real man need a beard, but there must be no gray. What ever happened to men getting away with gray as "distinguished"? Now we have to suffer through watching women revere and marvel at their very-noticably-dye-job-bearded-real man. Gag!

Yaz Birth Control - First of all, when I'm with my girlfriends, contrary to what commercials would have you believe, I don't talk about birth control or feminine hygiene products. Secondly, all the girls (not women) in this commercial are too young to be doctors, so I would not take a bit of advice from them regarding best methods of birth control. Usually I just try to bear through bad commercials, but when this doozie comes on, I actually change the damn channel. It's just that annoying.

Cingular Go Phone - You know, the one with the mom and the teen girl arguing. Supposedly, this is supposed to make me think about getting a cell phone for my teenage son, because jeez, every kid needs a cell phone right? Unfortunately, the whole argument scene is so excruciating that I cannot even focus on what they are trying to sell me.

Life Alert - Remember the commercials that used to be on during shows like "The Price Is Right"? The one with the elderly person on the floor, with the caption "Help, I've fallen and I can't get up!". Not only do they still have these on tv, but I get them in my ValPak mailer. These commercials are not very flattering to elderly people. I know what they are trying to sell, and the idea is not a bad one, but there has to be a better way to sell a safety device.

Burger King - Some of my favorite nighttime commercials include the ones with "The King" to advertise Burger King. I gotta tell ya, it's just funny to see a guy dressed as a king with the big happy king-head on doing everyday things like making touchdowns and popping up to say "hello" outside of someone's window and scaring the shit outta them. Cracks me up every time.
Career Builder - Everyone knows that anything with monkeys is just better. Besides, who can't relate to ineptness of some co-workers? Sometimes it really does feel like we're just working besides monkeys.

GEICO - Some of these ads are hit-or-miss, but I love two of them - the one with Little Richard and Burt Bacharach. These are the ads that have a real GEICO customer paired with a celebrity who tells their story. MMM... mashed potatoes and graaaaavvvyyyy!!

I think that daytime target audiences need to campaign for better commercials, since they have to suffer through them just like the nighttime target audience!

My Papa

2006-09-24T19:22:00.000-07:00

Today I got an email from my dad about this website, called Boot Liquor Radio, based in San Jose that plays very eclectic country music. He mentioned that he heard a song called "Down Mexico Way" by the Sons of the Pioneers. It brought him back to a time when he was a young boy and his father (my papa) was just getting home from work, the radio would be on playing Sons of the Pioneers and various other oldies, and he would soon be on Papa's lap, despite the fact that he probably just wanted to relax after a long day at work.

It surprised me to read this because I never thought of Papa as the "cuddly type" - in fact, he was quite the opposite. Even when my brother and I came along, he still had an edge to him, though he was somewhat softer with us than with his own children. I was looking through my old pictures and found a few with my Papa and me. They were surprisingly tender moments where he is either holding me or playing or joking with me. I remember, when I was very young, having a difficult time approaching him because he was a very quiet and very tall man. As I got older, he opened up more, and even taught me to play cribbage. He was cut-throat about it - I didn't get any slack just because I was his granddaughter. I can't remember a time when we visited our grandparents that he wasn't watching or playing golf, going square-dancing with grandma, or getting together with their gang (the S.O.B's). No matter what the setting, you could count on Papa to tell an off-color Norwegian joke that left some people scratching their heads.

Despite his gruff exterior, Papa would surprise me every so often. When I became pregnant at a rather young age, he was the only one in my family who wasn't upset with me. Instead, he jabbed me in the ribs with his elbow and, with a straight face, said "You know, Jen, you should never take something serious that was poked at you in fun", then winked at me. When I was in grad school, and Papa was sick, I would sometimes come over to the house to help out - sometimes just for company, or to shovel the driveway. He would get teary eyed, something I never thought I'd see from him, and would thank me for helping, even though I know he was upset that he couldn't do it himself.

Even though Papa was gruff and stoic, he still meant a great deal to me. It brought a tear to my eye to read my dad's email about his wanting to be close to his father. It made me think of my relationship with Papa, as well as the relationship with my own father. I'm glad things have changed a little - that it's okay for a father to be tender and say "I love you". It's what every kid needs from a father.

Mixed Feelings

2006-09-18T17:55:00.000-07:00

So now that I'm in the work groove, I'm in the middle of doing something that I like best - getting to know my students. At one school, I have most of the same students I worked with last year, which is very nice. At my other school, I have a whole new group of students, most of them are somewhere on the autistic spectrum. Only one of those students is so severe as to require augmentative communication, which is a device to help them communicate. Technically, according to how things run in California, he should be in what's called a "county program". The county programs are reserved for the most severely disabled children, as general education classrooms are not always appropriate for them (mostly because of a lack of resources and/or staffing). This is what brings me to the point of my post - mixed feelings.

Most of my professional career, I have worked in Washington state in the public schools. There, county programs do not exist, so kids are in the public school system regardless of the severity of their disability(ies). The only exception is if a parent pushes for a private placement that specializes in working with children with particular difficulties, like schools for children with emotional disorders. This way of running programs is vastly different than here, where the most severe children are in county programs that are run independently of the public school systems. When I first got here a little over a year ago and started working in various classrooms, I kept wondering "where are the kids with severe disabilities - they have to be out there somewhere". All I knew is that they weren't on my caseload. This has been a mixed blessing. I was able to end last year without a single incidence of being bit, kicked, scratched, spit on, snotted on, etc. For once, I didn't have scars on my arms from restraining my students. For the first time in a long time, I felt productive because all of my students were able to benefit from the program that I offered them. There was not a single child on my caseload last year where I doubted that my efforts were in vain. Sadly, I cannot make this statement for a few students I've worked with during my years in Washington schools.

But I still feel wrong not having the "county" students in our schools. They can still learn, even if they need a more restrictive environment than most students. Also, I've noticed that general education teachers here are, for the most part, less accepting of students with disabilities than those teachers who are used to an "inclusion" model of education. If a student doesn't fit a "certain mold" some teachers do not want those children in their classes and make no effort to make those students feel welcome. Additionally, students who are exposed to other children with a variety of disabilities and severities are able to serve in a helping role and to learn to have empathy for their peers. If I was a parent of a child with a severe disability, it would be very hard to make the decision as to which educational placement would be best, but I would not want them in a place where they did not feel welcomed. Even though my students are not my children, I get upset when they are not made to feel like part of the community they belong to, not just by their peers, but by adults. I don't know what the answer is, but I don't think exclusion is the answer.

Advanced Global Personality Test

2006-09-17T16:12:00.000-07:00

Advanced Global Personality Test Results

Extraversion	63%
Stability	30%
Orderliness	76%
Accommodation	50%
Interdependence	63%
Intellectual	30%
Mystical	10%
Artistic	16%
Religious	30%
Hedonism	16%
Materialism	70%
Narcissism	36%
Adventurousness	43%
Work ethic	36%
Self absorbed	30%
Conflict seeking	23%
Need to dominate	63%

Romantic	23%
Avoidant	16%
Anti-authority	83%
Wealth	23%
Dependency	23%
Change averse	36%
Cautiousness	43%
Individuality	43%
Sexuality	43%
Peter pan complex	10%
Physical security	90%
Physical Fitness	10%
Histrionic	43%
Paranoia	43%
Vanity	16%
Hypersensitivity	76%
Female cliche	23%

Take Free Advanced Global Personality Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

Here is my snapshot:

self revealing, neat, craves attention, prefers organized to unpredictable, needs things to be extremely clean, worrying, perfectionist, emotionally sensitive, respects authority, social, vain, does not like to be alone, likes large parties, controlling, social chameleon, not a thrill seeker, enjoys leadership, takes precautions, puts the needs of others ahead of their own, assertive, rule conscious, makes friends easily, always busy, heart over mind, phobic, aggressive, clingy, compassionate, dominant, outgoing, suspicious, hard working, strong

I got this from Laura's post. It's pretty interesting. I would agree with it for the most part, except for the "vain" and "craves attention" parts. I'm definitely way more self conscious than vain. Other than that, it's all pretty true. Not very flattering, but then, usually the truth is not very flattering.

Keeping Score

2006-09-15T18:00:00.000-07:00

As always, my life seems to follow themes. This week, the theme has been "keeping score" especially with respect to workplace issues and people's needs to have everything be "equal". In my own life, I have struggled (and continue to) with the issue of equality. My issues with this topic go back a long ways. When I was a kid, if one person in our household was working, we pretty much all were. It was the idea that since we all shared the privilege of having a house, then we all share the responsibilities for the upkeep of it. I liked that - there was some comfort in knowing that, if I was the one to cook dinner, then it would be someone else's job to clean up the dishes. Now that I'm on my own, things around the house aren't always "equal", and I'm learning to deal with it. For me, it was being asked the question "how is that working for you?" when I explained my need to keep a mental checklist of who does what. The short answer is that it doesn't work very well for me because it only serves to piss me off when I see that I'm the one doing more chores. But do I keep track as closely when I'm not the one doing the majority of the manual labor? Admittedly, no.

Funnily enough, the issue of "equality" is now popping up at work, with certain teachers comparing their workload to those of specialists (which is what I'm considered) and complaining that we have it "easy". Of course, since the roles were reversed, and I was on the receiving end of the "scorekeeper", it was easy for me to see how ridiculous "keeping score" is. It only served to make me feel undervalued and unappreciated for all the things I do and no one sees. It also made me realize that, no matter how hard you try, things cannot be made completely equal. Someone always gets what they view as "the short end of the stick". Also, why is someone else keeping track of what I'm doing in my work? Do they not have enough to do to keep track of themselves? Do they not realize that not only can I keep track of myself, but so can my supervisors? Oddly enough, my supervisors never have issues with my decisions or activities on any given day. What if everyone did their fair share, without anyone keeping score? That would work if everyone had the same work ethic. But we are only responsible for our own work ethic and don't have any control over another person's sense of responsibility. Shouldn't it be enough that, at the end of the day, we've done the best we can according to our own personal score sheet without worrying about someone else's tallies?

Best Radio Commercial Out There... Hands Down

2006-09-08T06:45:00.000-07:00

Since I've gone back to work, I've been spending way too much time in my car trying to get to and fro. Usually it's a drag, but on several of the stations I flip between, they play the best damn commercial I've heard in a long time. The commercials are for Bud Light beer and are introducted with inspirational music and the lead in "Real Men of Genius" and are hilarious - I cannot listen to one without laughing. The latest one is "Mr. Hair Gel Overgeller", which talks about the guy who forms stalagmites (or is it stalagtites?) with his Dippity DOOOO. From this website, you may also enjoy such treasures as "Mr. Push Up Bra Inventor" and "Mr. Way Too Proud of Texas Guy". Maybe I'm easily amused, but hearing a commercial saluting silly men and the crazy things they do always puts a smile on my face.

License Plate Holders That I'd Never Have

2006-09-06T18:48:00.000-07:00

I was driving down the road today and, while sitting behind and orangish BMW or some such car, I read the license plate holder, which said "YOU CAN NEVER BE TOO RICH OR TOO THIN". Of all the messages to have on a license plate holder, that's one of the last ones I'd choose. Other license plate holders I'd never have include:

anything with sequins or bling on it (too flashy)
any saying with the word "PRINCESS" in it (gag!)
wording similar to the "NURSES DO IT WITH CARE" line - mostly because I can't figure out how speech therapist would "do it"
anything starting with "I'D RATHER BE....", especially if it ends with "shopping" or "golfing"
anything with the phrase "HAPPINESS IS...", because even when I'm at my happiest, I don't want it defined by one single moment or activity
"I _____ THEREFORE I AM" (insert favorite hobby into the blank) - again, I don't want to be defined by just one thing
"YOU SHOULD SEE ME WITH MY TOP OFF" - Do I really need to call that much attention to myself?
"I BRAKE FOR ________" (insert favorite mundane activity or noun)
"JESUS LOVES YOU" - save it for church - not everyone on the road believes in Jesus
"MY OTHER CAR IS A ______" - Why would anyone care which type of car I drive?
"WORLD'S GREATEST MOTHER" - (putting pinky to mouth in Dr. Evil style) No, not really, I can't back that up

Movie Review: Match Point

2006-09-05T17:15:00.000-07:00

We Netflixed "Match Point" last night, which is the second Woody Allen movie I've seen. I must preface my review by saying that this movie disturbed me to the point where I could not stop talking to H about it last night, even past the point of sleep deprivation. I guess that's the sign of a good film, but I'm still upset about it.

Without giving too much away, the story is a classic entanglement of boy-meets-boy, gets invited into the family, first boy-meets-sister, sister falls head over heels, first boy also meets second boy's fiance and he falls for her. You know - the typical love story. Right from the beginning, I could tell that things would go south quickly, but leave it to Woody Allen to throw in enough twists and turns to keep your attention until the bitter end. It was kind of like a scary show - you don't want to watch because you know that awful things will happen, but yet you can't help yourself. The characters were well written and they were just ordinary people who were easy to identify with. You've either been like one of them or knew someone like them at some point in your life. Yet, I was not able to fully sympathize with any of the characters because none of them were either "strictly protagonist" or "strictly antagonist". At the end of the show, I was most upset by the universal truth in life - many people get away with atrocities against their fellow man and never suffer any external consequences. The only thing that made me feel better in the end was knowing that this character would have to live with himself and look in a mirror every day - something that I wish brought him an inordinate amount of misery.

Normally I would not be so vindictive, but I think that when an innocent human life is taken in order for someone to escape the awkward situation of having to be honest, there is no excuse for that. This is only one of the issues that "Match Point" raised. It also had to do with knowing the difference between love and lust, and not acting on every hard-on you get. After all, what good can come out of diddling your newly found friend's fiance in a field of wheat in the pouring rain? A bigger issue that I think most people would be able to relate to is that you never know the side effects of pressuring someone into doing things that they were only luke-warm about in the first place. Some people will suck it up and try to make the best of it. Others will try to keep their chins up, but have silent resentment that runs like poison through their entire body, and others will do the unthinkable. You could argue that the person was weak to begin with in order to agree to a life that they weren't sure they wanted in the first place, but money and comfort seem to make people complacent when it comes to decisions like that. In the end, each person is ultimately responsible for their own decisions and courses of action, despite the tendency to blame someone else.

If you like a movie with a message, believable characters, and a convoluted story that could only have a bad outcome, then you will like this movie. Even though it will take me a few more days to get over my intense feelings about this movie and remind myself that it is just that - a movie - I would still give it 8 out of 10 dancing feet. This is a good flick, and according to H, not in the typical Woody Allen style, which might encourage Woody-haters to give it a shot.

Stuff Portrait Friday

2006-08-30T17:09:00.000-07:00

I've been keeping up with Julia's blog, and she is a pretty regular participant of Stuff Portrait Friday. It's pretty simple - there are three categories per week that you get a picture of, then post it on your blog. I like challenges, so here is my first shot at Stuff Portrait Friday:

SHOW MY SUPPORT

Because my job gets me up early, and exercising before work means I have to drag my ass outta bed around 4:45 a.m., I am in full support of my caffiene addiction. I know that supposedly, I'd have more energy without it, but I'm just not buying it. I think the fact that I don't have addictions that are worse is the reason I keep justifying my dependence on the brown grit.

SHOW MY SACRIFICE

I have two main sacrifices during most of the year - time and sleep. I've always been a person who needs at least 8 hours of sleep a night just to function the next day. Time is something I seem to never have enough of. The workdays are filled with "have to's" and my time on weekends, even when spent doing enjoyable activities, is too short. It seems like I'm never ready for work when Monday morning rolls around.

SHOW SOMETHING RED

This is the second baby blanket that I've been knitting. I have about 1/3 of it done, so there is still a lot to get done on it. It's nice though, because it's done in a simple seed stitch, which does not require me to count stitches, and then subsequently lose my place and mess up the pattern. I think a simpler pattern works with this blanket, since the color is vibrant.

I Want My Mommy!!!!

2006-08-29T16:41:00.000-07:00

Today was the first day of school for our district. It started out so promising - I got to work in one piece and without being stressed from the drive, people had smiles on their faces, and it wasn't too cold, despite the layer of fog. Then, the children arrived. The start of school can be such a harrowing time, not just for the students, but for their parents. I anticipated having to calm down students who are "high needs", so I tended to rotate between those classrooms, but they were just fine. Suddenly, I was summoned to the kindergarten classroom. Apparently, "Johnny" would not separate from mom, and she needed to return to work. When I got there, he was sitting on his square of the classroom carpet while the teacher was informing the class about the rules. Johnny was not listening to a word she said, but instead had his gaze fixed upon his mother, who was crying silently, while he whispered commands for her "not to leave" and to "stay right there". When the children were allowed to stand and move around, Johnny went straight to his mother and attached himself firmly to her thigh, and it all went downhill from there. I thought I won him over at one point when I had him in the middle of the room doing puzzles with other kids, but mother did not take my cue to leave, but began moving towards her son and snapping pictures with her digital camera. But alas, he became aware of her continued presence, and resumed his post as her "leg tumor" (which is my term of endearment for a child who can't separate from his mother). I thought I had a second chance to integrate him into the classroom when it was time for snack and recess, but mother remained by his side asking him questions like "do you want to go play with your friends?". At one point, mother did break away to use the restroom, at which point I had to grab Johnny so he would not run after her. I think I finally have my hearing back after the temporary impairment from Johnny's wails of despair yelled into my right ear. After mother came back, there was no way in hell Johnny would let her out of his sight. Finally, accepting defeat, I mentioned to her that it was her choice to either take him home, or for me to hold him while she made her exit. She opted to take him home. Before they left, I told Johnny that I looked forward to seeing him the next day, that he would come to kindergarten like a big boy, and that mommy would not be staying with him.

It's difficult for me to deal with situations like this. At first, I was sympathetic with the mother, but that quickly faded as it became clear that she would not leave Johnny. When my son was young, he pulled the same thing in preschool. The difference is that I actually left him, and he was fine after five minutes. It didn't take even a week for the behavior to stop. I also could not understand why she would ask the child what he wanted to do - it's obvious what he wanted. How hard is it to say "you need to do this"? When do kids begin learning that there are just certain things that have to happen in this world? The icing on the cake was when he would shoot her glances that clearly said "I have you right where I want you". That was the point I quit trying and asked her to either let me take him and help him join his class or take him home. I hope that I will see him tomorrow sans mother.

I Will Survive

2006-08-26T06:59:00.000-07:00

As of yesterday at 3:30 p.m., I officially completed my first week (although it was just a half of a week) at work. It went fine, for the most part, and I made it to Friday virtually unscathed. There are a lot of changes this year. First off, I have a new "main boss", whose title is Director of Special Education. I think I will really like her - I've already been in a few meetings with her and she handles herself quite well and has a nice manner. A bigger selling point is that she has a very extensive knowledge and appreciation for speech therapists from personal experience. Already I've given her a head's up on a few things I have coming up in my personal life, and she has assured me not to worry and that everything at work will be taken care of. The second big change is that, at my main school, I'll be working with a new principal. She is not brand-spankin' new, but just new to our building. I was not sure what she'd be like, but so far, so good. I take it as a good sign that she didn't freak out when I couldn't attend every staff meeting, and when I approached her about it, her response was "Don't worry - you just do what you need to do. I trust you."

A few things worried me ab0ut the start of this year. First of all, I started back for a few hours on Tuesday, and already I had calls requiring me to put out some fires. Even worse is that our only two program specialists, who are psychologists that handle the "tough" cases, are in the hospital due to undisclosed illnesses. I know that they are stress related, which sets the tone for what's coming. These are the gals I turn to when I have a parent come to me with a 10 page list of demands. These are the gals I call when I've handled things as diplomatically as I can and the parents are still not appeased. At my other school, I have a lot of these cases. Usually the kids are wonderful, it's their parents who are the problem. More often than not, they are coming into meetings with advocates - people who are trained (and untrained) to push for certain things.

I am realizing quickly that, in order to make it through this year with my sanity, I have to ask myself a couple of questions when I start getting stressed out - "Is this worth my energy?" and "Is my stressing-out going to change the outcome?". This is another way of relinquishing control over the happenings of the impending school year. Giving up control is hard for me to do, but there are so many things that happen that I never had a handle on in the first place.

If made it through my first week, and hold on to those important questions that I'll need to ask myself on a regular basis, then I just might survive this year.

Mr. Burn's Award in Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Excellence

2006-08-24T18:00:00.000-07:00

So today I am one of the several recipients of our district's Exemplary Staff awards. It's not quite as ambiguous and hokey as my blog title suggests - I actually had to meet some criteria and be nominated. And, today I found out that the nomination process is not just simply putting a person's name in a hat and saying, "Oh, hey, this person is exemplary". The person who nominates a staff member has to write a detailed and lengthy essay that covers several topics. This made me feel slightly better about the meaningfulness of the award, but I had to go back and read the "District Core Values" - quality performance, focus on student learning, respect, positive interdependence, and integrity - to get a clear idea of what qualified people for the award. It was interesting to see the reactions of the nominees as they marched across the stage to receive their golden apple. There was everything to clear embarrassment to excitement and princess-like waves directed to the throng of people in the audience. My feelings about the award are mixed - I think it's nice to be recognized, but it's not going to change what I'm doing or how I operate at work. I don't need an award or recognition to do my best. I've been doing this job in the schools for several years and have never been at a school district that gives any kind of award or recognition to Speech Language Pathologists. This is not because we're lazy, and last year was definitely not the first time I've worked my tail off. It's just that, because we're autonomous (which is one of the things I like best about my line of work) means that not many people realize all the things that we're responsible for. Then again, not many of us go into this profession seeking awards. My best rewards have been when a parent comes and tells me how much I've made a difference in their child's life or when they thank me for the help I've given. But, I will keep my golden apple in my office as a reminder that recognition is not a horrible thing every seven or eight years.

Mental Preparation

2006-08-21T07:29:00.000-07:00

Today and tomorrow I will be in a state of "mental preparation" for my return to work on Wednesday. Going back to work should be a good thing, and for the most part, it is. After all, what would I do at home all day besides sit on my bum and be lazy? I've noticed that I don't always use my free time in useful pursuits. However, I'm not quite ready to return to the source of much of my stress.

Yesterday, I was able to process it a little bit with a third person so that hopefully I can build some helpful routines into my schedule so that I don't get stressed out. 'Cuz when I'm stressed out, everyone suffers. First of all, I have to get back into the mode of evaluating my day (especially when I've had a bad one) and looking for the good things that happened. But even more important than that, it was suggested that I take 15 minutes at the beginning of the day to think about and plan what I'd like to have happen, do some pleasurable reading, or listen to inspirational music. It's not just the idea of positive thinking, but it's also the concept that my day starts out with an activity of my choosing instead of getting up and rushing off to work. Work should not "be" my day - it is only a part of my day. Also, when I explained my feelings about work, I was given three choices - either accept that my workload is crazy and unmanageable and make allowances, work with administration and/or union to change workload size, or change what I'm doing. It's funny because I had never thought of it in such simple terms. I started going through my options and realized that I will not just accept a high workload, because my quality of service suffers, and so does my sanity. If I would have been able to accept it, I would not still be complaining about it after 7 years. I'm not willing to try to "change the system" because I realize it would take a united front (meaning all the SLP's in agreement), which I don't think will happen. Also, to be honest, my heart is not in the fight - maybe it would have been if I'd started younger. Why do I stay in the jobs I do? Because it's a safe place - I'm guaranteed a yearly salary that doesn't change, it allowed me to spend more time with my son when he was younger and not have to find daycare, I've always had decent health care benefits (although I've seen them steadily decline over the years), and a lot of vacation days. But all of these things which I thought were good are not giving me what I want and need, so I'm left with my third option - change.

Misplaced Baby

2006-08-17T09:14:00.000-07:00

Last night was a doozie of a nightmare. H and I finally had a baby, who we named "Alex". It was difficult to tell whether it was a boy or a girl since we never changed its diaper. In fact, he or she remained tightly swaddled in a receiving blanket so that we were just only able to see a head full of dark hair and intense blue eyes. We finally took Alex to the doctor for a well-baby check, and while we were on the bus, there were a few couples who I'd gone to high school with. I asked one of them for a fresh diaper because I figured it would be awful to take our baby to the doctor without having changed the diaper. He would certainly realize at that point that H and I were neglecting our baby. We signed in and sat in a large waiting room with several different sections. I carefully placed Alex on the floor underneath my chair. Pretty soon, our names were called and we wandered off to a parenting class. While we were in the class, I realized that I left Alex under the chair in the waiting room and became panicked. I yelled at H to go find our baby, meanwhile I cried to anyone who would listen and insisted that "I'm really not a bad parent - I've never lost a baby before". People nodded their heads sagely, but gave me "the look" - the look that said they didn't believe a word I said. I became more and more hysterical, and went to look for our baby because H was taking a really long time. I went back in the waiting room, and it had changed - not only the layout, but all the people were different. I started looking under chairs, and I found several babies, but not one of them was Alex. I started wailing and accusing other mothers of stealing my baby. Just as I was about to call the authorities, I woke up.

Road Trip: Big Sur

2006-08-16T18:29:00.000-07:00

Bixby Bridge - Highway 1

Coastline - Highway 1

Cliff - Highway 1

My mom has been visiting since Monday to celebrate my last full week off before my return to work. It's been a busy time so far, but today, we took a little bit of time out to take a road trip to Nepenthe Restaurant in Big Sur. We had a great lunch, topped off with a delicious berry cobbler-pie. The only blemish was the unbelievably loud woman at the next table who thought it was necessary to talk on her cell phone....loudly. After lunch, we drove down the road to the River Inn at Big Sur to view the Art Show - mostly photographs of nekkid women by the ocean and nekkid women in fields of flowers. In fact, the whole shop had pictures of nekkid women - it's the only time I've seen that much boobage in a place not labled "Adult". The drive was cut a little bit short by my bum arm, otherwise we'd have gone on the 17 mile drive and possibly shopped till we dropped in Monterey. Still, a very nice day on Highway 1.

I Must Have "Sucker" Tattooed on My Forehead

2006-08-08T07:12:00.000-07:00

I've been struggling with a theme this week, and it seems to be popping up on a daily basis - helping others less fortunate than myself. I know we are supposed to do this, but after my experiences, I can see why most people don't. I was walking to our apartment complex mailboxes on Saturday to get my mail, when I am stopped by one of the residents, an elderly African American gentleman - we'll call him Bob - with his dog. Bob informed me that the mailman was not done delivering our mail yet, but that he would wait because he is waiting for a grocery gift card which he needs because he has no food in the house. He also let me know that at least a neighbor had been kind enough to hook him up with a beer and a cigarrette. He went on to explain that once he gets his card, he would have to walk all the way down to Albertson's, then push the shopping cart all the way back (which is about 1/2 mile away). Well, like an idiot, I felt sorry for him and offered him a ride to the store. He gratefully and immediately accepted, and told me he'd let me know when the mail gets done. So I walk back to my apartment and begin knitting, and in a few minutes, he knocks on my door. I take him down to Albertson's and, when we get there, he asks me if he can leave the rest of his mail in my car. I put on my best "dumbfounded" face, since my intention was to drop him off at the store, then go home. He then asks me, "are you going to wait here for me or are you going to come in?". I mumble that I will come in with him. All throughout our shopping trip, he is mumbling about "now, I can't go over $70" and "I need this to last me for two or three weeks". I am silent and irritated throughout our shopping excursion. We finally get to the checkout counter and the clerk rings up his items, but it is soon apparent that all of the groceries will cost more than the $70 he has on his card, and he instructs the checker to stop when the total is close to $70. When she does, he still has quite a few groceries left on the stand, and I stand still and quiet as he assures himself that "I've done pretty good". The checker looks annoyed at the amount of "go-backs", and he gives a silent pause, but I remain quiet. I know that the expectation of his is that I will have a heart and help him out by buying the rest of his groceries, which I refuse to do. Finally, he asks the checker to ring the rest of the items, and that he will just pay for them with cash. We get the groceries out to my car, I drive him to his apartment, and set the groceries on his outside step for him to deal with, then leave. A little while later, I feel guilty for not helping out a little more, and bring him some of the fish I caught. All seems to be well - I don't hear from Bob on Sunday. Then Monday, I am stepping out the door, and he is there asking me for a ride to the closest military base to buy some things. Even if I didn't have a good excuse, I'd have refused. I am now past being irritated with him - and now irritated with myself. I felt no danger in offering this man help, but it's clear that no matter how much I help, he will need more. What I find even more exasperating is that he has rambled on and on about trying to afford groceries, but also has a dog and a smoking habit, both of which are expensive. I also don't understand why this man is living in one of the most expensive places to live if he's on a very fixed income. The other thing that complicates matters is that Bob is a disabled veteran - he served in the Vietnam War. I have very strong feelings about the treatment of our veterans, since my son's grandpa (on his dad's side) also served in Vietnam. He was in a submarine and became exposed to a harmful substance (I'm not sure which substance), and as a result, became sick with cancer. I saw first-hand how much assistance he needed, and I also heard some of his stories. I was there to witness how he would weep openly when he saw those advertisements about sending money to less fortunate children. Something happened to that man, but no one really cared that his life was forever changed. He ended up passing away from cancer when he was 47 years old - K barely got to know his grandpa. Like Bob explained to me, there's not a day that goes by that he doesn't think about the war and not a day goes by that he isn't affected by it in some way. But he's one of the lucky ones.

This is a big dilemma for me. I feel cold and heartless when I refuse someone help, especially if I have the means. However, when I do help someone of my own accord, I end up regretting it. Then I think about how that person lives and I start thinking that I'd probably smoke and drink if I had to deal with some of the things that people deal with. So, it's really not my place to judge. But I need to find my own way to help on my own terms, otherwise I will just end up feeling like a sucker and not help at all. I know that's not how it's supposed to be.

I Am Woman... Hear Me Roar!

2006-08-02T18:27:00.000-07:00

More like, "I am fisherwoman.... hear me barf!".

fishing boats

my first wee fishy

Half Moon Bay

One of the things K really wanted to do this trip was to go fishing. He had never been ocean fishing, so I booked us a trip out of Half Moon Bay, which we went on today. This morning was full of promise as we got lost, stopped in Safeway in Half Moon Bay for directions, and finally arrived at the docks. As we were picking up our necessary supplies and paying for the trip, the lady remarked three times that "You are a cool mom for taking your son fishing - I never see that happen". I took that as a compliment, not a warning.

We were directed to our boat, which already had at least 20 men with their poles and tackle ready to go. I was the only woman on the boat, besides the first mate, Heather, who smoked a cigarette while getting us organized and reviewing the procedures. As we headed out of the bay, I had "butterfly" feeling in my tummy, which quickly turned to nausea as soon as we headed out to the wonderfully choppy ocean. I hung my head in shame as I tried to figure out why this would be the first time I've been weak enough to get motion sickness, while trying hide my sickness in the bathroom of the boat. Soon, all was well enough to attempt to fish over the side, which K and I did for a little bit - I even caught my first little bitty fish, and K caught two! Pretty soon, it was clear that we were not going to be the steadfast seafaring fishermen that I had envisioned on our early drive to the bay. K informed me that he felt sick right about the time my stomach was telling me again that I was sick. We both experimented with what to do to make things a little better. I learned a few lessons - first, never go into the cabin of the boat if you're feeling nauseous; second, try to crouch down low to keep your center of gravity as low as possible and to minimize what you're able to see; and third, don't watch the other people hurling (of which there were plenty) so as not to set off a chain of barfing, the likes of which you haven't seen since the infamous pie-eating contest scene in "Stand By Me".

I recovered enough to catch 11 fish that were "keep-able", but K was not able to fish after his first bout of sea-sickness, instead preferring to curl into a ball by my feet and occasionally hold the fish sack open for my catch. The people were very nice and tried to accomodate us and gave us extra praise when I caught fish. The lunch that I so painstakingly planned the night before went untouched, as food was viewed by us as "evil". All in all, K and I were never so happy to see land. We are safely at home now, with fresh fish fillets in our fridge, and our sea legs still a bit wobbly. I think next time, fishing from the pier would be a better idea.

Movie Review: Lady in the Water

2006-07-28T08:29:00.000-07:00

We went to see "Lady in the Water" last night and left feeling lukewarm about it. I didn't dislike it, but didn't love it. Shyamalan's movies are usually "hit or miss" for me - the only one I really enjoyed was "Sixth Sense". I did not care very much for "Signs", and I never saw "The Village". To be honest, the reason I wanted to see it is that I really enjoy watching Paul Giamatti, especially in "American Splendor" and "Sideways". Even when he plays smaller roles, like in "Private Parts", he does a good job.

The one thing this movie does well is provide interesting and amusing characters. For instance, there is the young guy who is doing a "science experiment" by only working out the right side of his body (gee, I wonder why), the very large Hispanic family with five very loud and verbal daughters, and the young Asian woman going to college while living with her mother. Watching the dialogue between those two makes me alternate between cringing and laughing. Then, there is Cleveland Heep (Giamatti) who is the superintendent of The Cove apartments. I must say that Giamatti does very well portraying him, and I had not realized from the trailers that this character is a stutterer. He must have done his homework, because he was very convincing. Bryce Dallas Howard plays "Story", the water nymph from the "Blue Place". She does an okay job - nothing ever jumps out at me as spectacular.

The movie is based on a bedtime story that Shyamalan tells his little girls. I feel sorry for them, because parts of this were scary, especially the scrunt (wolf-like creature who hide in the grass) who prowl around the property while trying to thwart Story's return to her Blue World. Basically, Heep discovers Story, the nymph at the apartment's pool. While trying to get her to come out of the water, he slips and falls, knocking himself unconscious. After falling in the pool, he is rescued by Story, who now thinks of him as her protector. After trying to return to her Blue World unsuccessfully, Story receives the aid of Heep as he tries to enlist the tenants' help. The story of the nymphs and scrunts is told by the older Asian woman through her daughter, since the mother does not speak English. As parts of the story are told, Heep is given clues in order to assemble a group of people to help Story. The part that is difficult for me to buy is that all of the people he assembles readily believe about nymphs and scrunts. Even the ones who are somewhat skeptical still end up going along with his plan. There are parts in the movie that are meant to be emotional, but they fell flat. Without giving away any more of the story, the ending is pretty typical - Story gets back to her Blue Place, but only after a scare with the scrunt because of a bungled attempt by the "guild" at protecting her return.

Because of the convoluted plot and the holes in the story, my rating is 5 out of 10 dancing feet. If you read other reviews about this movie, my rating is quite generous. This is because I'm giving points for the likability of the characters and the fact that I still maintain that Paul Giamatti can do no wrong as an actor.

5 Things

2006-07-26T07:02:00.000-07:00

I took this from TSHS. It's a little fluff because my brain is fried from all the heat:

5 THINGS ALWAYS IN MY PURSE:

wallet
ball point pen
Neutrogena lip balm
work badge (which looks like a prison mug shot)
Eclipse Winterfrost mints

5 THINGS ALWAYS IN MY WALLET:

driver's license
medical insurance cards
Border's discount card
debit/credit card
at least one receipt

5 THINGS ALWAYS IN MY REFRIDGERATOR

coffee creamer
parmesan cheese
milk
tortillas
spray can of whip cream

5 THINGS ALWAYS IN MY CLOSET

clothes
shoes
my suitcase
extra pillows
a chair

5 THINGS ALWAYS IN MY CAR

a hand towel and my 24 Hour Fitness card
large warm blanket
CD's
a ball point pen
Thomas Guides for San Jose and San Francisco

5 THINGS ALWAYS ON MY DESK

a cup from my last school full of pens and other junk
a refridgerator magnet that says "Jennifer" in rainbow shiny colors (in case I forget who I am)
"Thank You" notes
a ceramic flowery drink coaster
blank CD's for burning

The Almighty Dollar

2006-07-24T18:42:00.000-07:00

So we are having a major heat wave here in California, which has shoved us into voluntary (for now) power conservation and prompted tips and warnings about how to avoid heat exhaustion and heat stroke. This past weekend, the temperatures were record-breaking, but people attempted to continue their activities as much as they could. One such activity was an outdoor concert in the San Jose area. Now, I would not have attended such an event, but many people chose to. That's fine - more power to them if they are prepared to handle the heat. The problem was that the concert promoters only allowed people to bring in one bottle of water per person, then charged $7 for each bottle of water once in the concert. People were dropping of heat exhaustion and heat stroke - extra medical emergency teams were hired to be "on hand" to treat any heat related injuries. The ambulances had to alternate hospitals that they took people to so as not to overwhelm any one emergency room. I'm having trouble seeing why, if the concert promoters were so concerned about the almightly dollar and "did the best they could at the time" for the people, why they didn't either cancel/postpone the concert until we have sane weather or allow people to bring in more water or at least charge a reasonable price for water they sold. Only after many people were being treated for heat illnesses did they lower the price of water to $1 per bottle. It never ceases to amaze me what some assholes will do for a dollar.

Baby Blanket

2006-07-20T12:06:00.001-07:00

I am extremely proud that I have finished my first knitted baby blanket. This is the biggest project I've ever knitted - mostly I work on scarves or dish cloths. I've been afraid to try such a big project because, up until now, I didn't know how to fix my mistakes. So, every time I made a mistake, I'd rip all the stitches out and start from beginning.

However, based on a recommendation from a friend, I bought the book pictured below - Maran's Illustrated Knitting and Crocheting. It gives very specific and easy-to-understand instructions on just about everything you need to know about knitting, even fixing mistakes! The pictures that accompany the instructions are very easy to see and really help to figure out for those of us who are visual learners (like myself).

I used this simple basketweave pattern (pictured below) along with a garter stitch border. The blanket came out to be 30" x 30", which is the perfect size for a little one. I learned a couple of things, though, with this project. First of all, all yarn is not created equally. I used an acrylic yarn of pale yellow, which is nice because it's a neutral color and the yarn can be machine-washed and dried. However, it doesn't feel as good against my fingers as a soft cotton yarn (like a yarn made out of Egyptian cotton or cotton blends).

Also, in looking at the finished product, I realized that I keep making the mistake of casting on too tightly - the corners of my beginning row curl up a little instead of laying flat. I made a few other mistakes along the way, but was able to fix them, thanks to the book.

I have no idea how I did this, but I managed to mess up a stitch along the border (pictured above).
Also, I have learned an important lesson that I will complete each row before setting it down to do something else. In the picture above, my pattern is messed up because I sat my work down in the middle of a row, and when I came back to it, forgot which stitch I was on. So I knitted the rest of the row, instead of following the pattern. When I ripped it out, it took me several tries to correct the row, and in the end, I ended up with one extra stitch on the needle. The next row, I decreased by one, which threw off the pattern.

This blanket was to be a gift for friends of ours who are expecting, but I will donate the blanket instead to a local hospital for parents who need a blanket for their little one. In the end, it is a good "first blanket" and I've learned several good lessons. My next attempt will be a pattern that I create - stay tuned....

It's Like Google Can Read My Mind

2006-07-18T07:33:00.000-07:00

So H sent me an invite some time back to try "gmail" by Google. After having the benefits explained to me about this new fangled email system, I decided to give it a go. I've had no complaints so far because very few people have this email, so I don't receive junk mail on it. However, it has an interesting feature that seems to be based on words or phrases in my emails - both sent and received. Along the right side of the page are advertisements similar to Amazon's "if you liked this book, you might also like...." ads. Normally, I don't pay too much attention and have never clicked on the ads... until recently (out of sheer curiosity). According to Google, I may be interested in this:

This is a "pink slip voodoo doll" that is apparently in cubicles everywhere in order to avoid pink slip layoffs. They are unique and infused with high energy, and I can be the proud owner of one for only $24.95.

I am also encouraged to participate in a vote to see who is more talented - Radiohead versus The Flaming Lips. I could win this!!! After I get done voting, I can check out the membership to the CWA, which is a "working families" Union. This is because I don't pay enough frickin' dues through the National Education Association and affiliated California Teacher's Association, only to receive so little in return. To make sure that I laugh, instead of cry, when getting screwed by union dues, Google made sure to recommend this site, which I've never heard of before. I did see one thing on the website that captured my interest, because now that I'm an adult, I have all the free time in the world to make crank calls along the order of the Jerky Boys. What ever happened to them?

All of this leads me to wonder if Google really CAN read my mind...

Too Much Power

2006-07-12T11:47:00.000-07:00

So I go to Costco today to pick up digital prints I ordered from our visit to Disneyland. I am just a plain 'ole Goldstar Member, so on weekdays, I am not allowed into Costco before 11 a.m. Usually, when I show up a few minutes early, the customer service person at the front door lets me in. Today, I arrived at 10:57 and there was a huge line of people with their carts, presumably Goldstar members like myself, waiting to enter the store. Holding them back was a little Hispanic woman who was fastidiously checking her watch to be sure not to let us in to the store even a second or two early. So I watch in amusement as people have sour looks on their faces and the Costco lady's jaw juts even further out. A battle of wills. I am immediatly transported to the infamous airplane scene from "Meet the Parents" where Ben Stillar's character is the only one waiting in the terminal to board the plane, but because the ditzy attendant has not called his row, he must wait until she finally calls his row. The absence of logic and reasoning struck me as I waited to get into Costco, watching the growing throng of people block the entrance and exit to the place. So it makes more sense to let the entryway and exit get clogged with people rather than to let them in a minute or two early? Clearly, the Costco-Check-Your-Badge-At-The-Door people have way too much power.

The Happiest Place on Earth

2006-07-09T08:20:00.000-07:00

When K first arrived for the summer, we asked him what he'd like to do during his stay. He wanted to go swimming, go on a fishing trip, and go to Disneyland. The swimming is easy since our apartment complex has a pool, and the fishing trip is scheduled for the end of July out of Half Moon Bay. This past Friday, we visited Disneyland. K had been a few years ago with my mom, but I had not visited since I was 14. Let's just say that it's a bit different than what I remember.

I don't remember them doing a fireworks show behind the palace, but they probably did. I was impressed by this year's fireworks - they topped the ones we saw at Great America on the 4th. In honor of Disneyland's 50th anniversary, they went all out - they had Julie Andrews narrate and had voice clips and music from various movies and attractions to accompany each set of fireworks. This was probably my favorite part of the day - I cannot get enough of fireworks.

We also went to the "Innovation" exhibit where new technology is showcased. In here, they did a presentation of Honda's robot, Asimo. Right away, I realized that this was where South Park probably got their idea about the "Awesom-O" episode, which is one of my favorites. The presentation was cheesy, but at least we were able to see what this robot can do. K was worried about Asimo becoming smart enough to realize that he was being dominated by humans and possibly planning a revolt. I said, "Oh honey, they'll never make robots THAT smart", while inside my head I was envisioning a scene from I-Robot.

Throughout the park, there were Photomosaic pictures of different Disney characters. This was my favorite. There were newer characters like Nemo and Buzz, but I prefer the "old-school" characters.
My favorite pictures were of things like this - odds and ends that you find tucked away while waiting for a ride or while trying to find a quiet spot in order to gather my wits.

We caught part of the parade, and the thing I couldn't get out of my head was how incredibly awful it would be to have the job of wearing a costume in 95 degree heat.

The best parts of Disneyland were the rides. My top three rides were Space Mountain, Pirates of the Caribbean, and It's A Small World. We rode most of the popular new rides and I got incredibly soaked on Splash Mountain, but nothing can hold a candle to the rides from the days of old.
K had difficulty appreciating "It's a Small World", especially because the ride is pretty long and the song plays the entire time. But when you think of the intent of Disney in creating the ride, it's hard not to recognize the value behind the sentiment.

All in all, we had a very good time. It was very crowded, though, and I was amazed by the number of people riding those mechanized wheelchairs. It's not my place to judge, but some of them looked healthy enough to walk around. Being bumped and jostled while getting from ride to ride is all part of the experience, after all. I was proud of K - he tried every ride we went to, even Space Mountain. This was even after our particular car suffered from a "malfunction", and we had to get out and be loaded into a different car while the ride was halted. He does not usually like roller coasters and balks at anything that turns upside down (which nothing at Disneyland did), but he was quite a trooper. I know people who have mixed feelings about Disneyland, but I think everyone should get to experience the "happiest place on earth" at least once in their lifetime.

Father Figure

2006-07-03T22:40:00.000-07:00

So, in order to do a very important printing job, I went and splurged on the Canon Pixma M500 All-In-One printer. It was very easy to set up, but I had been looking forward to just having a scanner because of the plethora of old photos I would like to edit. You can guess that it wasn't long before I got distracted from the original reason I purchased this machine and started rifling through old photos. I came across several that my grandma had given me from when I was a very young girl.

Recently, I've been asked to complete an exercise that addresses "old baggage" and how it still influences me today. Because of this activity, I have been hyperfocused on the men who were not healthy influences throughout my life - mainly my stepfather. But my heart softened a bit when I saw all the pictures of me with my Grandpa. If there was a steady male in my life, he was it. Grandpa was the person I knew I could go to whenever I needed anything, even a good "straightening out".

This special relationship I had with him started at a very young age. I remember being very excited any time I knew that Grandpa was going to come get me. I waited by the window of our place and watched for his truck. My grandma told me about one time when Grandpa passed by and didn't pick me up, but I had seen him. My mother called my grandmother to ask what happened because I was inconsolable and she couldn't figure out why. That was the last time he passed by our place without picking me up.

For a few short years, my brother and I lived with our grandparents, which was a very good time for me. It was our ritual during hot summer evenings to lie on the living room floor with our pillows, watch TV, and eat green grapes.

Grandma and Grandpa lived on a farm, and I spent most of the days when I was not in school following grandpa around as he fed the animals and worked on the farm. He took me everywhere with him and was especially kind and loving with me. When I got older and even into young adulthood, I knew he though of me as his daughter, especially because he had not been close to his own daughters. Even when he was angry with me and chewed me out, I knew he would never stop loving me or accepting me.

It's funny that, when I get in the "pity party" mode, I come across something that makes me happy and grateful for what I did have.