5 Maddening, and 5 Awesome things about a 5 (almost) year old.

I read an article on "Parent Dish" where the blogger listed 5 maddening and 5 awesome things about her 2.5 year old. I decided to steal her idea and use it here. In less than 3 weeks The Boy will be 5 years old so it seems appropriate at this time to think about 5 Maddening and 5 Awesome things about him.

5 Maddening Things About a 5 (almost) Year Old.

1. He can be very single minded when he has focused on something. (For example: He will say that he wants to watch PBS Kids, no other kids programming will do, not even Sprout which has all the PBS Kids shows. He won't even accept that the shows are over until next time.)

2. He is learning aggression from other kids his age. (I know that some aggression is good, it will help him not to be a door mat. But right now it's a little extreme at times.)

3. He STILL thinks that yelling about what he wants will get it for him.

4. Except for when he goes to school, he thinks he needs to be where ever I am all the time. Not attached or even in the same room, but if I go out he thinks he needs to go with me.

5. He can pick the exactly worst moment to want attention, like when I'm on the phone, or washing dishes or in the middle of a row of knitting that can't be put down until the end.

5 Awesome Things About a 5 (almost) Year Old.

1. He has a wonderful memory for stories.

2. He is starting to learn how to read. He has several sight words and is learning more.

3. He can play by himself for hours with his trains, cars, or blocks.

4. He often remembers to say "Thank you", "You are Welcome", "May I be excused", and "Excuse me" (when he burps or farts), less often he remembers to say "Please".

5. He will still climb up in my lap for a hug and kiss, or just to snuggle for a little while.

Quick Post with photos.

We've been a little busy lately, and I've been a little tired out. On Friday the Eleventh, we met with the EI teacher, a speech therapist, The Boy's teacher, and the "home educator" to discuss any assistance The Boy might need at school to help him work through and learn ways to handle school and it's stresses. The Speech therapist will see him three Thursdays a month, and the EI Teacher will see him for half an hour twice a month. An occupational therapist will come in and observe him while in normal class room activities and do whatever tests he/she feels are needed to determine if The Boy has a Sensory Processing Disorder or anything else that might be behind some of the problems he is having in class.

The week end was normal, which means that not much happened around here. Monday after The Boy got home from school we discovered that he had lost a tooth while in class. No one knows when it happened or what happened to the tooth. There wasn't any blood or a fight or any kind of bump to the mouth that might have hurried it along. It looks normal for a naturally lost tooth. It probably came out while he was eating lunch or snack and he probably swallowed it. Here's a picture of his now slightly toothless grin.

And another one that you can see the empty spot better, but I caught him with his eyes closed and looking kind of silly.

I can't believe that he's lost a tooth already! he isn't even five years old yet! Isn't it more normal for a child to loose his first tooth around six years old? Oh well, I guess we are just lucky.

We did some shopping after school yesterday, because we filed our taxes the day before and got an anticipation loan for our return. We looked at lots of things we were thinking of getting, but decided to wait until next week to make a decision. I did get a sifter and a set of nice knives, not to good professional ones Howard wants but they will do until we can afford the others. And we had a nice dinner out, with a taxi ride home.

Today it's been kind of cold, and foggy. I'm not sure it was freezing fog when we were out waiting for The Boy's school bus to come pick him up but I got these interesting pictures of what appears to be frozen droplets on spider webs.

So that's what's been going on with us for the last few days. I hope that you all are doing good.

Happy New Year!

I know, I'm a bit late. I've been going through some weird illness since the 21st. It started in the afternoon with a sore spot on the left side of my throat. When that got better I got so congested that I felt like I couldn't breath. Then the middle and back of my throat started to really bug me. After that went away I started coughing almost non stop for a couple of days. It got so bad one night that I threw up. Two days of that and then the cough stopped but the right side of my throat started to hurt. Off and on through all of this I had a fever, but there were hours, even days when I felt almost normal. Now I have a little bit of a cough left but other wise I'm feeling normal again.

The Boy was sick on Christmas Eve, and Howard developed some kind of stomach thing that sent him to the bathroom regularly. Both of them got better quickly and were their bright active selves. However, neither of them did on bit of clean up through all of it.

We had a nice Christmas, just the three of us. Howard got a new job and was able to be home for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

New Years Eve was quiet, just The Boy and I. He tried to stay up to give me my first kiss of the year but crashed in his bed (He went in and covered himself up) around 11:30. I waited the last 30 minutes and sent out text messages to people I knew were okay with getting text messages. Then I went to bed.

New Years Day The Boy and I made cookies with a mix that my "step" sister Jessica gave us for Christmas. They were good, a bit on the thin side because they spread out all over the pan, but they crisped up nice and we just finished them today.

The Boy is back in school. He wasn't sure he wanted to go back after being home for so long, but decided that the bus ride was worth it and is now happy to be back with his class.

I don't have any resolutions this year, I don't have a good track record of keeping them anyway. I'm way behind on my picture taking for one of my Flickr groups, but that's okay. I've got most of the house cleaned up, just dishes left to get done. Now we can plan for The Boy's birthday, hoping that we will get our tax return in time to get him a few nice bigger tag items, but I've heard that tax returns may be late this year so we will just have to wait and see.

I want to wish all of you who are reading this good things for 2008. Thanks for coming by and checking in on my family.