JD:
JD has entered yet a new annoying stage: WHY? This is MUCH worse than the 3 "why" stage, because at nearly-6 he actually expects a reasonable answer, and will ask follow-up questions to things that don't make sense. So I hear this steady stream of "whys" from my little darling's mouth. It was much easier to eventually end the conversation by saying "I told you so," which I can't do anymore! Of course, it is wonderful that his mind is growing, but difficult too.

Of course, he remains, as always, my argumentative Curious George. When he gets an idea in his mind, or doesn't want to believe something, by golly there is no swaying him. He remains very interested in numbers - so his new thing is "a million" he wants to know what one looks like. So we were talking about the zoo and the new elephant and tigers - so he says, "there are a million animals in the world." And I said, yes, there are at least a million of all animals, but some animals don't have a million. Like Pandas - there are only about 1500 Pandas. (aside, which is horrifying since you think there are like some 3000 people in my building.) But anyway, he didn't want to believe this, so that was that. I don't think he truly understands what a small number 1,500 is for an animal, only that it is much smaller than his current dream number of one million. But it did lead to a neat conversation about what endangered means, and about how people affect their environment.

Oh yes, the "I love you more" game worked so well with the numbers that I am now using it to teach him all the planets. This would be great except I don't know the order of all the planets - so I'm constantly singing this silly "Blue's Clues" song in my head in order to teach him (oh the sun is a hot star, Mercury's hot too, Venus is the next one, Earth's home to me and you, Mars is the red one, and Jupiter's most wide, Saturn's got those icy rings and Uranus spins on it's side.. Neptune hmm hmmm Pluto hmmm hmm we wanted to name the planets and now we've named them all.) So I'm an idiot desperately trying to help my little boy be all he can be.

JD continues to have these semi random screaming fits. Ok, they aren't random. First, the occur when he is tired. This leads us to the true problem - getting him to sleep enough. He's really too old for naps. When I try (hell, the last time I told him to 'just stay in here and be quiet' he cut all his hair off!) he nearly vibrates in bed in his desire to stay away, and 15 or even 30 minutes later comes slowly walking out of the bedroom. So, it doesn't seem to do him any good to try to get him to nap - but it is SO obvious that he's tired. Tonight I laid down the law for John - I said, Katie and JD are to be in bed by 7pm! (Mike fell asleep at 5!! More about that later!!) Of course John doesn't see JD freaking out, and instead sees this hyper little boy -- and doesn't fully seem to get it that JD gets too wired when he is tired and then can't calm down. So I got JD in bed by 7:10 and (this is true) we could hear him snoring by 7:15. Yes Santa Claus, he was really THAT tired.

He used to have a fit every Thursday when I'd pick him up at school. Remember, Craig and his kids come over on Thursday, so JD would be in the car with me pissed off that Katie and Mike saw Craig without him. (I swear, some times I want to shriek at JD, "You're one of 3! Get used to it!") Anyway, I finally saw the carpool light and got permission from Little Lambs for Craig to go and pick him up. Needless to say JD is the happiest kid around. The other day Craig needed to go shopping - so I handed him my list, and I stayed home with the 4 babies and Craig took JD grocery shopping, which worked out really well for all involved. Second, they occur when he somehow feels that he isn't getting is rightful amount of attention. I'm really working with him to recognize that it would be much more effective to say something like "I need a hug" as compared to begin to shriek at the top of your lungs as I attempt to get you out of the car. Sigh. I wish I knew what I was doing. (so much for super mom.)

Kindergarten is . . . interesting. JD's class is on this huge Martian Luther King kick at the moment. So he's always coming home singing songs like "there was a woman had a boy who wanted to be a leader. . Dr. Martian Luther King, Dr. Martian Luther King, Dr. Martian Luther King. . . He grew up to be a leader" and repeating parts of the "I have a dream speech." (which I also had to memorize in order to help HIM learn it!) Now, I know the schools are now expected to pick up a lot of social slack, and teaching AGAINST hate and racism should be of paramount importance -- but is this the best way to do this? I guess I have the extra problem in that, as a Christian, I keep saying -- Jesus got nailed to a tree for demanding that we love our neighbors and forgive people, so it actually annoys me (a lot) that the school seems to be teaching that MLK was the first person on the planet to come up with this idea, much less die for it.

I guess I'm also concerned with the PC side of this. Of all America's past and present leaders, this is who they are teaching you about in kindergarten? And, (this is the somewhat amusing part) while JD realized that MLK was important, and that MLK was shot - he doesn't really understand why. So we get into these AWESOME conversations about loving your neighbor, and that Jesus wants you to love everyone, and sometimes people can be hurt for doing the right thing -- just like Jesus was, but you still have to do what is right anyway. I also mention that MLK was "black" (JD is so color blind, I don't think it even occurs to him about colors) and that's why some people didn't like him -- and since some of his friends are black, that without MLK's fighting for blacks and whites to be friends, he wouldn't be able to talk to half his friends. So our personal conversations at home are satisfying, but I wonder what is the agenda at school. I guess I worry that if this is what they consider important for kindergarten - my heavens, what nonsense is next? God only knows what crap they'll be tested on (which I am so totally against, what BS.)

Other than this slightly disturbing trend (which maybe will end after they have a big MLK celebration and sing songs and stuff. .. oh yes, so John and I are going to go to this- Katie and Mike in tow, of course, and JD is SO excited because he gets to wear a suit! I'm going to go tomorrow and get his hair cut nicer so that he looks super suave.) kindergarten seems to be going well. He's learning to read somewhat, and recognizes a fair number of words. His writing is pretty horrible, and to say he cares about how his letters look even a little bit would be a gross exaggeration. He also seems to be following in his mother's footsteps when it comes to reading and writing. He will see the word "On" and say "No." He will also occasionally write backwards. Not like a few letters, but starting the sentence on the wrong side of the page and write perfectly backwards. I mean, most people can't do that if they tried --- alas, I can too (I can write cursive backward too.) and this is a sign he is dyslexic, as I am (slightly). It's very scary when he confuses the very same letters that I do -- b, p, d, and q. Now, what normal people have to think about writing those letters? Typing is much easier -- I rarely screw up with typing, although some words I always put p's in for b's. But with writing those letters come out wrong all the time. So I am going to a teacher conference in Feb where I'm going to ask if maybe he needs extra assignments or special worksheets to help with this. Although, I never got special worksheets and more or less survived. :+)

Mike:
Mike is slightly less wonderful than he was the last time I wrote. :+) I swear I left a darling little boy at daycare one day and picked up this awful terrible two! So he's all "Hear me roar" and as fearsome as a little 22 month old can be! Lord is he cute. Remember how hard the 2s were when I had JD? When you worried why they were so fussy and demanding and unhappy all the time? Now I laugh and smile as my littlest man asserts himself (or thinks he is, anyway.) Off to bed with you if you are that unhappy! Nooo! Nooo! Gooo! (this is how he tells me to "go away" or want me to go somewhere else)

That said, Mike remains about the nicest guy you are going to meet. Man, he'll give you his juice cup, offer his hand to help, whatever. He is just such a SWEET kid. Like the other day, I was going insane (Mike and Katie have had the Flu since last Thursday - and by Sunday I am about out of my mind being stuck in the house. It is now Wed and Katie is still under the weather) So we went to McDs to let the kids run a bit and play on the equipment. So Mike is just on the verge of being able to climb the tower by himself, but often needs to be either pulled or pushed up some of the stages by JD. So this 4 or 5 year old girl - who could of course do it herself - anyway, she is pretending that she can't get up and is just kind of hanging there. And Mike rushed over and grabbed her hands and tried to "help" her up the way JD helps him. Oh it was so precious.

On the negative side, he still doesn't talk much. It's heartbreaking, because much of the time he really seems to think that he is communicating. He'll take my face in his hands and look me in the eye and say something unintelligible. It's like he tries to talk without ever moving his jaw. So he's looking me straight in the eye, searching for a sign of comprehension - and I have no idea what he wants. And then he falls to pieces, since here he is TELLING me what he wants and absolutely NO ONE ever does what he asks and GOD is it HARD to be two!! So he says ma ma, da da, ball, bye, baby, up, opn (open), no, oww (ouch), go, shues (shoes), marr (more), down, and two 'sounds' that mean thirsty and hungry but sound nothing like those words. He also says something reasonably close to bed. PS - how many 2 year olds do you know that simply demand to be put to bed? He absolutely demanded to go to bed today at 5pm. So tomorrow morning is going to suck. On Sat he wanted to go to bed at 7, but I was still folding laundry in there so I wouldn't let him in the crib and he actually stood there holding onto the crib rail until I was done and would put him to bed. Dammit, it's time NOW!

Anyway, I finally given up hope for nature to take it's course. He's supposed to be saying something like 200 words and talking in sentences. This is a LONG way off - he just doesn't seem to get it. And the scary thing is, I KNOW he can hear! He LOVES music! This child dances to car commercials. (Who else besides my dad dances to "Like a Rock?") So there is Mike - and he bounces up and down while only moving one arm, so he looks somewhat like a retarded bird attempting to take off.. . .and he dancing to totally random things. And then the car commercial ends and Mike gets offended and yells at me, because he just knows that somehow I had something to do with the music ending. He's like this in the car too - heaven forbid you try to get the news, or a traffic report!

So, I finally caved in and called the special needs services offered by our community. We are going to get an in-home evaluation on Feb. 15 - which is more the therapist talking about what they can offer and slightly watching Mike in a home setting. We have a formal evaluation in Manassaus on Feb 27 (hmmm, I think I better check the time, but it would stink if it was in the middle of Mike's nap and then he was fussy and miserable with everyone.) Anyway, it may be that he doesn't need any help at all, but that seems too good to be true. At least Mike seems to want to learn, but that he truly can't say sounds. For the longest time it seemed he didn't care at all about communication.

In conclusion, Mike continues to greatly enjoy terrorizing Katie. He's quite jealous of my space. If Katie wants to cuddle - which she most certainly does right now since she's sick, but she's always a lap baby and wanting to touch me. So Mike comes rushing over and wanting to shove her off my lap or whatever. More Fun! And - but of course - he goes nuts if JD and Katie are doing something that he can't do. This makes things like craft time difficult! But he really want to be in the thick of things.

In the hopes of sending this out soon I'm going to Skip Katie (who is a doll, and lord does she have a CUTE haircut right now) and start with her next time and also talk about "craft time" and the "puzzle board".

Some Final Christmas Notes:
Christmas was a huge success this year. I figured I baked something like 400 cookies. You think I jest? I do not! I take the kids Christmas Caroling to 10 of our neighbors, and they each get 25 cookies (which is not a hell of a lot per house, I know, but that's 250 cookies right there!) They get 5 of the sugar cookies with sprinkles; 5 sugar cookies with icing (I use icing, food coloring and paint brushes, and let the kids "paint" them) - which I really shouldn't give away because Lord knows the kids love icing and are sticking those brushes in their mouth every time I turn around; 5 of the peanut butter with Hershey's kiss cookies; 5 chocolate with white chocolate kisses; and the grand finale - 5 or 6 of my famous (and now award-winning! They were voted best tasting desert at the OEUS office party) chocolate-mint sandwich cookies! Oh yeah, so I also had to bake 100 of those sandwich cookies for the office party -- (which is actually 200 cookies plus 100 york peppermint thin mints cut in half!)

But, this is like the high of my life! I love Christmas, I love baking cookies, I love scrubbing my new tile floor by hand as I attempt to get red icing out of the grout (ha!) We have the new neighbors that moved into Kenny's house. Wow have then done wonders - but anyway, I took them over a nice plate that I got for like 5 bucks on sale full of cookies plus our Christmas letter and had the 3 kids sing to them. The woman about had tears in her eyes. All the neighbors always give us such a warm reception, and I (but of course) love giving off that impression that I am supermom (as compared to reality which is: supermom has been known to lock herself in the bathroom to get a single moment alone.) God should probably strike me down any day now, given my vanity! The house was great, the lights were great, and no one got sick over Christmas. Praise God.