my little girl

brynna is getting very funny as she gets older.  she talks a lot more now, and though it's very hard to understand what she's saying, when we do get it, it's a kick to see her little personality.  she's is definitely mine and dave's...angry (me) and stubborn (dave)!!! 

yesterday i took her to school with me because i didn't want her home with caleb and my mom wasn't feeling good the night before so i figured it would be good for her to come with me...we loaded up the dvd player, toys, snacks, and a towel.  i'm in the health room so i figured she could chill on the cots and she'd be fine.  by recess, she was ready to go home, though.  she said that she was tired and she "needed a squishy bed, not a hard one."  today when i got home the first thing she tells me is, "i just want hello kitty stuff."  she says things so matter-of-factly and throws her hands out...so cute.  she gets frustrated when she can't do something and will actually fling whatever she's trying to do away from her.  not so cute, but still, cute.  she's a little bossy girl and tries to boss her brother around all the time. 

she looks so different with her little glasses.  she's been a really good girl about wearing them and hasn't given us much trouble about wanting to take them off.  in fact, i've never seen her take them off by herself...she asks us to do it.  dr said that the glasses should be enough to strengthen her eyes and help them straighten so that's a good sign. 

even though i never wanted a daughter, i'm so glad to have her.  she's my little girl and i can't wait to see how our relationship develops as she gets older. 

oops, sicker than i thought!

caleb's had a cough for about two weeks now but I didn't think too much about it cuz it wasn't too bad and he didn't have a fever.  this past friday, though, he was feverish after i picked him up from school...but that night was his graduation so we decided to give him meds and take him to graduation.  poor little guy...i felt so bad for him because you could just see throughout the entire program (which was freakin' hella long) that he was in pain.  he was singing the songs (all TEN of them!) and doing his hand motions, but he just didn't have his usual spunk while doing it.  when it was done we gave him his leis and he immediately asked to take them off and he wanted me to carry him.  we quickly got out of there, got him home, changed him, gave him medicine and he fell right to sleep.  monday we took him to the doctor and it turns out he has walking pneumonia.  he's been coughing like crazy every night...luckily brynna sleeps through it but dave and i aren't as lucky.  i feel like we're up more than we're sleeping cuz he's coughing so much but dr said the coughing will help to get the mucus out.  i doubt he'll go to school this whole week...and then next week is his last week of preschool.  i guess next time he (or bryn) has a lingering cough, we should just take them in...but i also don't like to take them in for every little thing cuz i figure they just gotta build their immunity.  i wonder if bryn will get as sick as caleb has during her first year of preschool.  she just seems to be a much hardier little girl...i really believe it's cuz she sucks her dirty thumb and builds immunity to all the germs on her thumb.  heehee. 

sleepovers at the grandparent's house

for the past two weekends the kids have slept over at their grandparent's house for one of the weekend nights.  it's a nice break for dave and i...it's just nice not to have to worry about brushing teeth, reading, dealing with the excuses of not wanting to go to bed and having to get water or another book or a certain dino or a pillow or whatever other excuse they find.  now that they're older i can deal with the separation better...if they were younger, i don't think i would allow it...lol.  even though they're not in our bed, they're still in our bedroom, so without them there it is a little lonely, though i LOVE being able to sleep in.  i suppose as they get even older there will be longer sleepovers...i'm not sure when i'll be trusting enough to let them sleep over at someone other than their grandparent's house, though.  they'll be the high schoolers that were never allowed to sleep over at their friend's houses...heehee. 

how things change...

the other week we went to the 50th state fair with some friends and their two year old daughter.  last year the kids enjoyed the rides but mainly rode with us.  last year, our friends' two year old was scared on the merry go round.

this year...fearless, independent kids!  granted, our friends' baby girl rode with her daddy, but for the most part, caleb and brynna were independent riders, which made me a little bit nervous at first.  i rode the race cars with brynna the first time because i remembered how it whipped around the corners, but besides that and the slide, they rode by themselves.  they even rode the mini-roller coaster by themselves, loving every minute (okay, ever second, cuz none of the rides really last many minutes...lol) of it. 

they were most scared in the petting zoo, which doesn't surprise me cuz i'm not to keen of the great outdoors or animals, so they don't get a whole lot of exposure.  caleb didn't like the goats with horns and brynna pretty much didn't like any of them. 

i think we'll have to take them one more time before the fair is over.  it's a lot of money, but it's a lot of fun for them so it's totally worth it. 

**another change worth noting - caleb has a little cough so last night when i was giving him cough medicine brynna asked for some.  i highly doubted she would take it, so i poured just a little bit for her and lo and behold, she drank it down like it was nothing!  remember, this is the little girl who used to make dave and i wrestle her down, hold her nose, squeeze her mouth, and force her to take any kind of medicine!  what a trip!!!! 

just don't know what to do...

I just don't know what to do with my baby girl.  Brynna is ridiculous.  She's bipolar.  She's so sweet and loveable, but when she's mad, there's no reasoning with her and no stopping her anger.  As I type this, I KNOW that she's me....and I don't know how to discipline or change her.  She doesn't respond to time-outs, spanking, yelling, etc.  Lately she's become even more aggressive than she already was.  She has put her hands around Caleb's neck in a choking motion on two occasions.  She was so pissed off this past weekend that she pinched my arms and would not stop repeating her irrational demands no matter what.  Her fit lasted a good half hour or more and there was NOTHING I could do to stop it.  I need to do some research on how to deal with her...gosh.  Payback is a bizatch and I'm going to remind Brynna of that ALL the time when she's older.  She better pray she doesn't have a daughter.  :-) 

"i don't want my kids to be teachers"...wtf?

i keep hearing people, especially teachers, say, "my kids are NOT going to be teachers...the pay sucks."  my mom even told me that when i decided i wanted to go into teaching.  that bothers, me, though...especially hearing it coming out of the mouths of teachers.  teaching is NOT about the money.  do i wish we made more money so that we could buy a house?  yes.  would i change my profession because of that?  hell no.  to me, if you don't love what you're doing as a teacher, then get the f*** out cuz you're just doing a disservice to the kids.  yea, there's lots of stuff coming down in the doe that i don't necessarily like or agree with...but bottom line is, i love working with my kids so i'm gonna keep working with my kids.  yea, i don't technically get paid beyond my work day, so does that mean i'm not going to do more just cuz i'm not getting paid?  hell no.  since i've had kids i've set certain limits for myself and leave school way earlier than i used to when i was single, and i definitely  spend less time out of school doing work for school, but if something needs to be done or if the kids/my team needs something, i'm going to find a way to do it.  i won't force my kids to be teachers, but i hope that by the example of dave and me, they'll have hearts to help, regardless of if they're going to get a fat paycheck or not.  and i hope they learn not to be excuse-making lazy asses and to do the work, even when it's hard or inconvenient, if it means helping someone else who may not have the opportunities/home-life/comforts that they are lucky to have. 

where has the time gone?

man, i'm sucking at chronicling events of caleb and brynna lately...and i haven't updated my pics blog in forever and a day!

last week was spring break so we got to spend lots of time with the kids...went to a lot of dr appointments too.  took the kids to the zoo, which is still by far my least favorite thing to do.  it was especially hellacious cuz they were repaving the parking lot so we had to find street parking, realized we only had coins for 20-something minutes, had to grab coins and feed the meter all before entering the crowded, bird-filled zoo.  and it was HOTTER than heck.  needless to say, the kids enjoyed it, me not so much.

we went to a few softball games too because grace is playing for mckinley.  i'm impressed by her skills...wish i had an athletic bone in my body but unfortunately i don't.  hope the kids get dave's athleticism and not mine.  guess going to games inspired them, though, because when i asked if they wanted to play soccer, caleb said he wants to play baseball and brynna said she wants to play softball....GREAT...i had vowed that my kids would NOT play those sports but i guess i can't control what they want.  there's a tball i9 league coming up in the summer so looks like we'll be signing up for that...yay.

i'm thinking this quarter is going to fly by cuz it's a short quarter and the last one always goes by so quickly...that and the fact that i'm going to be hella  busy with summer school stuff.  hopefully this contract gets ratified so my responsibilities with hsta will ease up cuz that's been taking choke of my time too.  then after summer, both kids will be in school...dang!!!!  kinda makes me wish i could have another baby...yea right!!!!  ;-)