Summer Fun

These are some pictures from this weekend. We got to go swimming two days in a row, and everyone had a blast! Conor is doing great in the water and isn't scared at all. He even jumped off the diving board a few times Saturday evening! I wish I would have had the camera for that one. Ethan loves being in the water, but is still a little hesitant about getting his head wet. By Sunday afternoon though Ethan was jumping from the ledge to me. He says "you ready?" and then "jump mama, jump!"

Whiplash and Germans

Today I had to go to ASU to drop off paperwork with the VA adviser and show a friend of ours around campus since he's starting classes there this semester also. As much as I would like to once again vent about the cost of school textbooks, I'll do you all a favor and NOT. ;)

It was about 2:30 when we left campus to head back to our side of town, so of course traffic going through Phoenix was starting to get a little heavy and slowing down. Once we got into the tunnel, traffic came to a complete stop. Unfortunately the woman traveling behind me didn't see traffic stop and slammed into the back of my car. Everyone is okay, and her poor truck took the brunt of the damage I think (apparently Honda doesn't make a very sturdy truck). The front end of her truck looked like an accordion. While the Acadia doesn't look too bad, I have a feeling it's going to be a lot more expensive than it looks at first glance because the impact crushed one of the rear parking sensors and I know any of the other gadgets that have had to be replaced on the Acadia have been pretty pricey.

There weren't any serious injuries, but my neck and back are pretty sore so I'm going to make an appointment tomorrow to get checked, and I've already scheduled one for Ethan first thing tomorrow morning. He seems fine and certainly acting like his normal self, but I figured if I'M a little sore then he may be too, and despite his exceptional communication skills, may not be telling me.

On a much happier note, we finally met some neighbors! Arizona is very different from the places that Chris and I grew up. Neighbors don't talk to eachother, and for the most part everyone just keeps to themselves. I had mentioned before that Conor had a friend in his class from preschool. Well that friend rides his bus, and even happens to live in our same neighborhood about 5 houses down. We had NO idea until Conor got off the bus one day and wanted to go to his friend's house so I started talking to the little boy's mom.

They really are the nicest family, and Conor loves playing with Yosh. So yesterday Yosh came to our house to play and today Conor got to go play at Yosh's house. It's a great motivator also for both boys to behave at school because they know that if they both don't get good reports from school then they aren't allowed to play together that day. Yosh's family is from Germany, but their English is excellent and they were even nice enough to bring over some German chocolate for us! YUM! :) It's so nice to finally know another family in the neighborhood and for Conor to have a playmate.

Potty Training

Every mom looks forward to the day that they won't have to change stinky diapers anymore, or spend a small fortune on them every month. What you don't think about when you're in this diaper-free dreamland is the task itself of potty training, and how difficult it can be.

I never imagined him being absolutely terrified of going to the bathroom without a diaper on. I figured if anything he would be scared of the toilet. He doesn't mind sitting on the potty, but you can always tell if he's actually about to go because he gets this scared look on his face like he's doing something wrong and starts crying. Once he actually goes in the potty and sees how excited everyone is, then he gets excited too and can't wait to flush the toilet, but no matter how many times we go through it, he still gets scared.

I was reading online and they said that the best thing that you can do if your child is struggling is to take a break for a few weeks or even a few months. So what I think I'm going to do is wait a couple of months until after school starts and we're both settled back in our routines and give it another shot. In the meantime, I'm going to try a few other things that I read about as well that will help your child become more comfortable around the potty. Also, I was talking to my aunt and grandmother the other day and they brought up a good point about using cotton training pants rather than Pull-Ups. I think I may try that as well.

Conor's First Week of School

School started on August 3rd (apparently AZ schools start very early in the year to keep the low-income kids out of the heat), but poor Conor got sick the Sunday before his first day of school with a stomach virus. He was well enough on Wednesday for HIS first official day of school.


Like any good 5 year old, Conor used Wednesday to discover what his limits were in his new school with his new teacher. Conor's teacher, Mrs. Davis (click on her name to see her class webpage), uses the "traffic light system" to communicate daily behavior with parents and it looks something like this:

"Brilliant Blue": Spectacular day (I've never seen a blue traffic light, but I guess she had to have something for those days that green just isn't good enough).
"Grand Green": Great day
"Yucky Yellow": 3 or more warnings
"Rowdy Red": Exceptionally rough day

Conor got "yucky yellow" on Wednesday, but was "grand green" for the rest of the week! :)

He has done awesome with adjusting to his new school and all of the other changes that come with it! Conor rides the bus to and from school every day (obviously we stay at the bus stop with him and are there when he gets home), and has not had a single problem with bus riding. Once my classes start back up at ASU, Conor will go to Sunrise (his preschool) for after school care, and they have their own bus that picks them up from the elementary school.

Conor has made a lot of new friends, and even has a friend from preschool in his class. So far he loves school and can't wait to go back this week!

Hello and Welcome!

Since I have a bit of free time on my hands right now I thought I would start up a blog to keep everyone up to date on what's going on with all of us and to post new pictures. As I'm sure many of you have already discovered, I'm no longer using the website I was using before to post pictures and videos. My subscription was up and I opted to try a free website instead. I hope you all enjoy this and feel free to leave comments!