Today was an eventful day for the kids. First off everyone is fine. Just fine.
Caleb came running off of the bus yelling "Mom something awful happened on the bus today."
"What?" Immediately I thought of throw up. Really what could be ickier than throw up on the school bus you are on. Uggh!
Beth and Caleb together: "We were in accident on the bus."
Me: "What?"
Beth: "A car ran a red light and hit us."
Caleb: "This morning before school."
Me: "Was anybody hurt? Are you telling me the truth?" (I'm wondering why the school didn't call me--to the point that I am calling the school tomorrow--even if no one is hurt I should be informed so I can make an educated decision about the situation.)
Apparently the police came and the other car was very smashed up on one side. No ambulance came. The kids had to wait for a police report to be filled out before they went on to school.
Rob got home from work and checked on the fish. One had been looking quite sickly, and Rob almost put it down before he left for work. It passed away today. So the kids had a funeral for Zippy.
The gravestone said: "Here Lies Zippy R.I.P"
The kids said a few words
Jacob: Fish go live with Heavenly Father and let him take care of you.
Caleb: Go have a nice day with Heavenly Father
Beth: Zippy I hope you have a great life in heaven.
This is the first fish we've had die in the two years we've had fish. We had five zebra danios as a gift from Santa. When we got them we figured we would have a bunch of fishy funerals in the first few months as Rob acclimated the tank, but he managed to keep them alive. A zebra danio's life expectancy is about two years. So Rob has done an excellent job on the care of the fish. The other four look healthy, but they are nearing their life expectancy, so we are expecting a few more fishy funerals in the next months.
Everyone is doing okay so far. Have a good week!
Monday, December 13, 2010
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Catching Up--Big Time!
Wow! It's been a really, really long time since I've posted about the family. No excuses from me. But I'm going to try really, really hard to get back to posting once a week again. We'll see how it goes. The blog's been similar to my journal writing, really consistent for a bit, and then not so consistent for a long time.
Elisabeth is turning 9 this week. Blows me away to consider the fact that I've been a mom for that long, but that aside it's been a great nine years. She wanted and got a bike for her birthday. She also had a half slumber with ten girls over. There were some moments when I really wondered why we had invited all of them. Noisy, screaming, giggling girls. So far this year Beth has enjoyed school muchly. She's taking violin and her first concert is this week as well. I'm looking forward to it. She is growing up and can be quite helpful around the house when she wants to be. it's always a pleasant surprise to see what she has done next.
Caleb is adjusting to kindergarten. He's had his ups and downs friends wise with school, but I think he is making progress. Caleb has always been one to look out for other people's feelings and make sure that everyone else is happy and taken care of. He still does that. He'll make sure things are divided fairly or even give up some of his prize without me asking to make sure his brother and sister are happy. He's very energetic and loves to make people laugh. His biggest accomplishment off the week is armpit farting. He can go on with it for hours. This week we went to a work party with Rob, and he asked if he could do it there. (he really is proud of it) and I told him no. He asked me what if there was a grown up band of armpit farters. I said if you see such a thing you can join in. Today he was saying the opening prayer in primary and going along great, but then he suddenly said "blah, blah, blah" and then ended the prayer properly. I almost laughed out loud.
Jacob is doing good. He was pretty sick along with Rob for about two weeks, but he is over it now. Sadly his speech therapist moved on to a new position, and we will be getting a new one. This really made me sad. I don't know that Jacob quite realizes yet, but the last session the speech therapist and I were both in tears. She really helped Jacob move from not making any sounds to talking almost nonstop now. He's doing well overall, and lately I've got myself looking at him and thinking that my baby is just so big. He is missing having Caleb home with him, but preschool is helping with that, and his playdates with Miles. He is going to move up to Primary next month, and they had his class join sharing time today. Jacob sat so still with the biggest grin on his face. He was so proud of himself, and it was adorable.
Rob is recovering from pneumonia. It's been a very long three weeks, and I think he has at least another really tired one to go. But he did manage to kick his Dr. Pepper habit during that time. He told me that he hasn't had any caffeine at work or at home since. I didn't think it would actually happen. But he seems determined not to start back up since he got through the worst of it.
As for me, I'm still juggling everything that comes my way, and hopefully not dropping too many balls at once. I just telling myself that I've got the most important ones up in the air and everything else will work out. Take care!
Elisabeth is turning 9 this week. Blows me away to consider the fact that I've been a mom for that long, but that aside it's been a great nine years. She wanted and got a bike for her birthday. She also had a half slumber with ten girls over. There were some moments when I really wondered why we had invited all of them. Noisy, screaming, giggling girls. So far this year Beth has enjoyed school muchly. She's taking violin and her first concert is this week as well. I'm looking forward to it. She is growing up and can be quite helpful around the house when she wants to be. it's always a pleasant surprise to see what she has done next.
Caleb is adjusting to kindergarten. He's had his ups and downs friends wise with school, but I think he is making progress. Caleb has always been one to look out for other people's feelings and make sure that everyone else is happy and taken care of. He still does that. He'll make sure things are divided fairly or even give up some of his prize without me asking to make sure his brother and sister are happy. He's very energetic and loves to make people laugh. His biggest accomplishment off the week is armpit farting. He can go on with it for hours. This week we went to a work party with Rob, and he asked if he could do it there. (he really is proud of it) and I told him no. He asked me what if there was a grown up band of armpit farters. I said if you see such a thing you can join in. Today he was saying the opening prayer in primary and going along great, but then he suddenly said "blah, blah, blah" and then ended the prayer properly. I almost laughed out loud.
Jacob is doing good. He was pretty sick along with Rob for about two weeks, but he is over it now. Sadly his speech therapist moved on to a new position, and we will be getting a new one. This really made me sad. I don't know that Jacob quite realizes yet, but the last session the speech therapist and I were both in tears. She really helped Jacob move from not making any sounds to talking almost nonstop now. He's doing well overall, and lately I've got myself looking at him and thinking that my baby is just so big. He is missing having Caleb home with him, but preschool is helping with that, and his playdates with Miles. He is going to move up to Primary next month, and they had his class join sharing time today. Jacob sat so still with the biggest grin on his face. He was so proud of himself, and it was adorable.
Rob is recovering from pneumonia. It's been a very long three weeks, and I think he has at least another really tired one to go. But he did manage to kick his Dr. Pepper habit during that time. He told me that he hasn't had any caffeine at work or at home since. I didn't think it would actually happen. But he seems determined not to start back up since he got through the worst of it.
As for me, I'm still juggling everything that comes my way, and hopefully not dropping too many balls at once. I just telling myself that I've got the most important ones up in the air and everything else will work out. Take care!
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Things from a Kid's Point of View
Caleb:
"Mom are you going to be gone five grown up minutes or five kid minutes? Because they are different."
(When I got back)
"Mom you were gone six kid minutes"
Jacob:
(He wants a Batman birthday party at Myrtle Beach with friends)
"Mom I love you as much as Myrtle Beach"
"Mom are you going to be gone five grown up minutes or five kid minutes? Because they are different."
(When I got back)
"Mom you were gone six kid minutes"
Jacob:
(He wants a Batman birthday party at Myrtle Beach with friends)
"Mom I love you as much as Myrtle Beach"
Monday, October 4, 2010
Caleb's First Video
Now, it's time for Caleb to get featured in his first video I ever shot of him. I hope you enjoy all of Beth's silly dancing.
Caleb's First Video from Robert Caldwell on Vimeo.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Myrtle Beach
We had a great time visiting Myrtle Beach with family, thanks to Karen and my mom for letting us mooch off them for a few days. They had a nice hotel reserved for Chloe's birthday, and it turned out there was plenty of room for some freeloaders, and we don't need to be asked twice, especially when there's free food and a beach involved.
We stayed at the Dunes Village resort, a great place for young kids. They had an indoor watermark that the kids loved. Caleb especially enjoyed the watersides, showing absolutely no fear. He even went down the scariest slide there, one that goes pretty much straight down, then causes you to go airborne for a split second, all inside a dark tunnel. You're supposed to be four feet or taller to ride, so I didn't really expect him to go down it, since he's not that tall. But I look away for one second and he's already at the bottom. He screamed all the way down--not screams of fear mind you, more gleeful than anyone. I guess when he's finally tall enough for roller coasters, I'll have another partner to ride the crazy ones with. He rode the slide five times in a row. Then, all of a sudden he told me he didn't like it, that it was just too scary. I said, "but you've been laughing all the way down. Why the heck did you ride it so many times if you didn't like it?" He told me he just wanted to keep riding it to see if it ever changed.
Jacob loved floating around the lazy river and pretending to be a pirate. We looked at other kids as we passed them by and yelled out at them, "Arrr! Avast!"
Beth loved getting her face painted and spending the night in Chloe's room with Chloe and Tori, a friend. Karen let them all jump on the hotel beds, a highlight of the trip, I'm sure. She also liked talking with the lifeguard at the top of the watersides, though I'm sure she would tell you she wasn't flirting--she was just being friendly.
We played mini-golf at a small course at the hotel. Jacob held his club backwards and awkwardly struck at the ball as if he was trying to club a small woodland animal. And what do you know, he got a hole in one. Pretty amazing stuff.
I climbed in a hammock to take a break from the grueling round of golf and Caleb promptly tried to tip the hammock over and dump me on the ground.
The kids loved the beach. It was perfect weather--not too hot and with a nice breeze. Jacob loved jumping waves. Beth and Caleb loved using their new boogie boards to surf waves. At night, there was an amazing full moon over the water. I really wish I had taken a tripod; I could have gotten some amazing shots of the harvest moon over the water with some fishermen's silhouettes in the foreground.
I did take some video. My apologies to everyone that is not in it. I was a slacker and never had the camera with me. The kids also kept me in the pool most of the time. Everything you see on the video was shot in about 15 minutes on the second day we were there.
I love the beach. I rarely want to leave. I think if I could live near the ocean I certainly would. I need to start checking want ads for Wilmington =)
We stayed at the Dunes Village resort, a great place for young kids. They had an indoor watermark that the kids loved. Caleb especially enjoyed the watersides, showing absolutely no fear. He even went down the scariest slide there, one that goes pretty much straight down, then causes you to go airborne for a split second, all inside a dark tunnel. You're supposed to be four feet or taller to ride, so I didn't really expect him to go down it, since he's not that tall. But I look away for one second and he's already at the bottom. He screamed all the way down--not screams of fear mind you, more gleeful than anyone. I guess when he's finally tall enough for roller coasters, I'll have another partner to ride the crazy ones with. He rode the slide five times in a row. Then, all of a sudden he told me he didn't like it, that it was just too scary. I said, "but you've been laughing all the way down. Why the heck did you ride it so many times if you didn't like it?" He told me he just wanted to keep riding it to see if it ever changed.
Jacob loved floating around the lazy river and pretending to be a pirate. We looked at other kids as we passed them by and yelled out at them, "Arrr! Avast!"
Beth loved getting her face painted and spending the night in Chloe's room with Chloe and Tori, a friend. Karen let them all jump on the hotel beds, a highlight of the trip, I'm sure. She also liked talking with the lifeguard at the top of the watersides, though I'm sure she would tell you she wasn't flirting--she was just being friendly.
We played mini-golf at a small course at the hotel. Jacob held his club backwards and awkwardly struck at the ball as if he was trying to club a small woodland animal. And what do you know, he got a hole in one. Pretty amazing stuff.
I climbed in a hammock to take a break from the grueling round of golf and Caleb promptly tried to tip the hammock over and dump me on the ground.
The kids loved the beach. It was perfect weather--not too hot and with a nice breeze. Jacob loved jumping waves. Beth and Caleb loved using their new boogie boards to surf waves. At night, there was an amazing full moon over the water. I really wish I had taken a tripod; I could have gotten some amazing shots of the harvest moon over the water with some fishermen's silhouettes in the foreground.
I did take some video. My apologies to everyone that is not in it. I was a slacker and never had the camera with me. The kids also kept me in the pool most of the time. Everything you see on the video was shot in about 15 minutes on the second day we were there.
I love the beach. I rarely want to leave. I think if I could live near the ocean I certainly would. I need to start checking want ads for Wilmington =)
Myrtle Beach and Fort Fisher 2010 from Robert Caldwell on Vimeo.
Friday, September 17, 2010
Canoeing the New River
I had a great time with friends canoeing the New River. Hope you enjoy the video.