Oh, the anticipation waiting for the gate to drop!

So I’ve had a little over a day now to think about things and talk to some trusted people about Mikey and preschool. Time and thinking really does wonders. But if I only blogged when I feel positive or like I’ve got everything figured out, I’d blog about twice a year and none of you would read it. Anyway, I just wanted to say that I’m cool with things now. Mikey is two, almost three. And as you all know, he has been a verbally delayed toddler and two, almost three year old. He’s catching up in many ways and making lots of progress.

But in the preschool environment he’s required to do things that he’s just not capable and/or willing to do right now. By nature Mikey is a strong willed non-conformist, among other things. He is difficult, rewarding, tedious, and glorious to parent. Stick a strong willed non-conformist preschooler in a room with other preschoolers and tell him to stand and he will sit; tell him to sit and he will stand; tell him to walk and he will run. I myself have taught preschoolers bent as Mikey is bent and more often than not, you want to hand in your badge and call it a day. Mikey will and is learning to submit to authority but that is something that for whatever reason goes very strongly against his nature. And he’s got to learn to control his impulses and think through what his actions will cause. But again, he’s not quite three years old. Most children his age have similar struggles, just perhaps not to the degree that he does. They don’t call it “terrible 2’s” for nothing.

He has been getting early childhood speech therapy through our local Early Childhood Intervention program. Once he’s three, he’ll age out of that and will receive needed therapy through the school district. He’ll be evaluated on December 14th to find out what kinds of services those will be. I know for sure he’ll receive speech therapy and beyond that, I just don’t know yet.

I’ve been contemplating trying to get him back in the preschool he was going to sooner than next school year. But the more I really think about it, the more I think that’s just not the place for him right now. I wish like crazy that it were. He really loves it there but he’s got to be willing to love it on other people’s terms rather than just his own. And it is ultimately our responsibility to teach him these things, not any school. I believe that he’s got the best teachers he could have in this family. We aren’t perfect by any means and we’ve never claimed to be. But we are dedicated to molding him into the man he was created to be. We are blessed with an amazing support system of parents, extended family, and friends.

On a somewhat related positive note I have to tell you that Mikey is almost completely potty trained!! He wears underwear from morning ’till night with very few accidents. Today I didn’t even tell him when to go the potty. He just went when he needed to go. We’ve been taking him to restaurants and stores and even Chick-Fil-A in underwear and we’ve had no yucky surprises lately. We’re still working on #2 because he asks for a diaper to do that business most of the time. And occasionally he asks for a pair of underwear to put on his head.

When I was just a little girl
I asked my mother, what will I be
Will I be pretty, will I be rich
Here’s what she said to me.

Que Sera, Sera,
Whatever will be, will be
The future’s not ours, to see
Que Sera, Sera
What will be, will be.

When I was young, I fell in love
I asked my sweetheart what lies ahead
Will we have rainbows, day after day
Here’s what my sweetheart said.

Que Sera, Sera,
Whatever will be, will be
The future’s not ours, to see
Que Sera, Sera
What will be, will be.

Now I have children of my own
They ask their mother, what will I be
Will I be handsome, will I be rich
I tell them tenderly.

Que Sera, Sera,
Whatever will be, will be
The future’s not ours, to see
Que Sera, Sera
What will be, will be.

wild

wild hair

wild laugh

wild energy

wild creativity

wild beauty

wild love

wild will

wild

I’m trying to keep some perspective about Mikey and this whole preschool thing. I’m trying. I’m really really trying.

There are many worse things in the world than your kid not being able to “hang” in preschool. I know that but right now I just feel so overwhelmed with something that must be grief. I know that sounds so silly. He’s alive, he’s healthy, he’s smart, he’s mine. But I’m just so sad right now about this whole thing. I’m just brokenhearted over this entire situation. I’m not even worried about him being home more and in my hair more. That’s really not even what’s bothering me. I’m so sad that he won’t be able to participate in all the fun that goes on at that place. I hurt for him and he doesn’t even know what’s going on. Uggghhh…this really sucks and right now I’m just trying to keep it from consuming me.

I think instead I’ll just focus on this sweet face. I’ll focus on what I know to be true of my son. And I will just try to let everything else go. Because when I wake up in the morning this is what I’ll see. He’ll melt me all over again. Yeah, I think I’ll just focus on this.

I haven’t written a real entry in a long time.  It’s not because things haven’t been happening – November was quite the eventful month – I just haven’t felt very eloquent or insightful lately.  And that’s not a very good reason not to write.  So, to catch you up on our November:

November 6th-7th – Rochester, NY

mikey and I went to Rochester the first weekend in November.  There we saw a fantastic production of Dracula by Push Physical Theater, explored, tried all sorts of new food at the Public Market, and generally fell in love with the city.

November 20-22: ALIVE conference

I spent this weekend in Ocean City, Maryland, with some of the craziest middle school students and leaders in the entire world.  The numbers:
- 3 days
- 2 nights away from my husband
- 9 students
- 5 adults
- 2 vehicles (1 van named moby and 1 car named griffin)
- 3.5 hours there (and then back)
- 4 main sessions
- 5 members of the worship band
- 2 small groups
- 2 main speakers
- 1 discipline issue (only 1!!)
- 3 decisions to follow Christ for the first time
- 2 decisions to follow Christ again
- $1000 spent on junk food by the kids (approximate… or exaggerated.)

November 24-28: Thanksgiving
And for Thanksgiving weekend, mikey and I drove up to Boston to spend it with my side of the family.

Highlights include (but are not limited to): turkey dinner on Thursday, playing whist with my parents, playing rockband with my siblings, black friday shopping (and doing it ALL wrong), “I hate that pie because it smells funny,” Apples to Apples, “How I Met Your Mother” season 2, Star Trek, and the puggle at the pet store (too bad our apt. doesn’t allow pets).

December 2nd – Target

Yes, November was an eventful month.  And then last night, we got our first Christmas tree!  Pictures are on facebook, but as you can see, we’re pretty excited, even if it’s only a 3′ fake tree from Target.

WOW so what do you think hmm?

So I don’t really know what to write here or how much. To get right to the point, I had to pick up Mikey early from preschool today and he won’t be going back, at least not this school year. I don’t want to get into specifics on the blog. Just know that his teacher is amazing and has done everything in her power to teach him and love him. I love St. Mark Lutheran Preschool and have nothing but good to say about the school and entire staff. I hope that maybe Mikey can go back there next school year. But right now we’ve got some things that we’ve got to work on with him to get him to the point where he can be in a classroom environment.

If you’re the praying type I would love to ask you to please pray for Mikey and this family. We want him to succeed in every way in this life and we’re doing the best we know how to make that happen. But sometimes we’re at a loss. Right now we’re at a loss.

But we know that God is bigger than this. He created Mikey and He placed him very intentionally in our home. We will not let Mikey down and we will not let God down. We will do everything we can to be good stewards of the gift we’ve been given in Mikey.

I thought maybe I would try to get a picture of the boys sitting in front of the Christmas tree this evening. Nothing fancy at all, just something in front of the tree so I can say I did. They were both in their pajamas so I thought I would give it a try. I got a somewhat decent one right off the bat. Not too bad, right?

But maybe I can do better. Maybe I can get one that’s a *little* better. I’ll keep trying…

Nope, that’s not it. Let’s keep trying. This is bound to work.

Hmmm…it seems things might be going downhill.

and fast…

Yep. Looks like we’re all done here.

Here’s one of Jack, the congenial child.

And here’s Mikey, the…. well, the one with the cute hair. It might appear that he’s being cooperative in this next picture but don’t be fooled. The only reason he’s looking at the camera is because I gave him strict orders not to. Reverse psychology still works on him for now.

And this one I told him that I was just taking a picture of the monkey on his sleeper so he thought he was off the hook. I lie to children. Did you know that?

My favorite is definitely this one. It’s so awful.

Just some random news here in our world.

Mikey is talking like crazy!! It’s so awesome to FINALLY hear his thoughts come out in a somewhat rational and intelligible way! I’m so excited to finally have to watch my mouth in front of him. It’s so great!

I got my main camera back a few days ago. There was indeed something wrong with it and it is now fixed. I’m very glad they didn’t tell me that it was user error and tell me just to read the manual. I might have been peeved.

Jackson has lost some teeth lately and has another one that will be ready to come out soon. He holds onto teeth forever. It’s almost impossible to get him to pull those things. Jack won’t put his teeth under his pillow at our house. He waits until he spends the night with his grandparents. The tooth fairy pays double over there. We’re fine with that.

I’m gratefully bombarded with lots of sessions, editing, and orders to process. This is a very busy time of the year which is why I don’t have much time to blog. In fact, I really shouldn’t be blogging now but photoshop is batch editing for me right now so it’s cool.

We got Mikey some precious footed sleepers on sale the other day. They are size 4 and we probably could have gotten a size 5. He’s not even 3 yet. He’s huge.

I will be launching a new wedding/engagement/bridal website by the end of the year or early next year. I’ve had a hard time finding time to get that done and ready to go.

Phillip and I are seriously thinking about selling our house and buying another one in a year or so. A few things would have to fall into place for that to happen. We’ve really outgrown this house. Mikey can easily use 1300 square feet all by himself. And 4 people living with one bathroom kind of sucks. I know that lots of families have grown up with one bathroom but if we can have two, that would be so awesome!

We got all our Christmas decorations out and up today. Phillip didn’t complain too much. We didn’t listen to Christmas music while we decorated. We listened to Wilco. I put some decorations in Mikey’s reach this year. We’ll see how that goes.

Santa Claus might bring Jackson a bike but Jackson doesn’t want a bike. He has zero interest in ever riding a bike. I don’t know what to do about it.

I started to get kind of sick a day or two before Thanksgiving but Seagate throat and nose spray saved me again. I haven’t been on an antibiotic in years.

I’m talking a little bit tomorrow in church. I spoke briefly a couple of weeks ago about our pregnancy losses. This week I’ll be focusing more on Mikey. The pastor wanted us to bring Mikey up to the front. I think that’s a BAD idea. We’ll show a picture.

Michael Iinuma, who I call Mikey, is a friend I’ve known since elementary school but have been out of touch with for a while. Luckily, he needed new headshots and we got to meet up for a little bit to do the shoot. It’s always great working with old friends! Mikey is currently located in Los Angeles and is an aspiring actor. I have seen some of his acting work throughout college and he is definitely a very, very talented individual. I’m sure he will do amazingly and go far!

We’re drawing nearer and nearer towards the end of the Tales series as issue 70 quickly comes up.  Nevertheless, Jim Lawson and Tristan Jones deliver a good comic involving Chinese mysticism and a round about of villains.

This issue represents the first and last comic Tristan Jones and Jim Lawson have done and will do together.  Unfortunately, it’s also the last Turtles comic Tristan Jones will do.  It’s a shame because Tristan has become a relatively new writer at Mirage with about 5 (I believe) turtles comics under his belt.  All of them have rejuvinated new life into the comics and brought them back to their grimmer, darker days.

However, this comic takes a different approach by being narrated by Mikey in events of circumstance.

I enjoyed the story, but I didn’t necessarily find it as one of Tristan’s best Turtles stories.  It may just be that it’s strange for me to have the mix between Lawson and Jones because their two styles don’t completely mesh.  On top of that, I really did not like the inks by Steve Lavigne in this issue.  They appeared to be some type of water-like brush that caused the lines to be undefined and a little unclear.  I believe that the inks could also have used a lot more black – negative space – to get Lawson’s artwork to match Tristan’s writing a bit more.

The tale was rather humorous and it was nice to see some of the characters tie back into the new-ish villains Jones begun sculpting for the TMNT universe.

No doubt, the best part of this issue was Mikey’s drawings/interpretations of events.  I felt that Jones definitely pushed Lawson to try some new things and it came out with some stellar results.

Overall, this Tale was bittersweet.  Good compared to most comics, but only decent for the standard that TMNT comics set.

Billy loves boxes and is often found with his head inside one or just a paw peaking out when the flaps trap him inside.  Mikey favours curling up on top of items of clothing abandoned in new places around the house.  Occasionally they both try to assert their claim on a new curiosity which on this occasion was a Freecycled blanket box in the hallway waiting to be moved upstairs (thanks Jenny, it’s fab).  Down on the allotment there’s been quite a bit of bed hopping and moving round over the last month!

1.  cabbages now in the early pumpkin patch

2.  broad beans in the late pumpkin patch

3.  onion sets where the second sowing of beetroot and carrots were

4.  first sowing of spring bulbs where the dwarf beans were, second sowing of bulbs and wallflowers in the early potatoes patch The grazing rye cover crop sown in the blighted tomato bed grew rapidly in the first 2 weeks but has slowed down now.  On the home front we’ve been moving things round in the kitchen replacing an overburdened shelf with a cupboard.  Hoping the new cupboard would house all my jars of chutney as well was a bit optimistic (and hasn’t happened!)I’d envisaged a clearer worktop than this but every vegetable that sits here waiting to be pureed, pickled or creamed is immediately replaced with something else.  The punnets of crab apples have now been pickled and apples, carrots and sprouts are currently filling every square inch of worktop space. 

tired of pretending. tired of trying. tired of being myself. tired of being someone else. tired of expectations. tired of failure.

I officially won the title of “Best Wife Ever” last night.

Yesterday was a friend’s birthday, so we went over to their place for a small party, which was definitely my kind of party – there was cheesecake (lots of cheesecake) and a chick flick.  (Mmmmm cheesecake.)  mikey was planning to go see the Pacquiao – Cotto fight at a bar with another friend.  I was going to stay at the party and stuff my face with cheesecake.  Sounds like the perfect night for both of us, right?

Well, said friend canceled on mikey at the last minute.  The poor boy started trying to figure out how else he could see the fight and had more or less sadly resigned himself to watching it at home online… and in a flash of uncharacteristic selflessness, I said to mikey, “Well, what if I go to the bar with you?”

And so, after several moments of convincing him that I was indeed serious and not just toying with his emotions, we set off for the fight.  I left cheesecake and a chick flick and good friends to go watch a boxing fight in a bar.

And that, my friends, is how I won the “Best Wife Ever” award.  Ta-da!  (applause, applause.)

**Note** In all fairness, it was not as selfless as it may seem, for the following reasons:
1. At the party, they were watching “the Proposal,” and as I am neither a Sandra Bullock nor Ryan Reynolds fan, I was not terribly interested in the movie.
2. I had already had 2 slices of cheesecake.  Thus, the stuffing-of-the-face had already occurred.
3. We spent two fun-filled hours at the party before going to the fight.  And the wonderful friends at said party?  We will see all of them tonight at church.
4. I am not entirely opposed to the bar scene (in fact, I find it kind of entertaining).
5. We had pretzels at the bar.  Resume face-stuffing!
6. I got really into the fight, cheering and gasping in all the right places, and rejoicing as Pacquiao completely dominated.  I enjoyed myself.
7. I was spending time with my wonderful husband.  Not even the friends-and-cheesecake combination can compare with that.

So today is new lens day. I’ve gone through a few wide angle lenses that just didn’t seem right for whatever reason and I think maybe I’ve landed on one that I’ll use for a while. Maury suggested this lens probably a year or more ago but I didn’t go with it then. I wanted to go with Canon and I didn’t think this lens would work on a full frame camera. I finally got the lens I should have gotten in the beginning and that’s a Tamron 28-75 f/2.8. It’s a great and rather inexpensive lens for the quality. Sometimes you get what you pay for and other times more expensive doesn’t necessarily mean better.

Blah, blah, blah….anyway, when I get a new lens that means the boys must be photographed. Jackson already knows this rule and Mikey will soon enough. Enjoy!

It was more than two weeks ago that my parents drove down here to DC to bring mikey and me a bookcase.  For those two weeks, the only books that were on that bookcase were the Harry Potter books mikey bought me for my birthday.  Our excuse was that all our books wouldn’t fit on the one bookcase, so obviously we should wait until we get a second one, so we can get it all done at once.

Last night, we finally went to Ikea and bought another bookcase.  I was pretty excited.  On our way home, I kept saying things like, “we have a bookcase!” and “can we put books on it tonight?” and “yay!”   Yeah, cool, I know.

Look, there it is, in the box.

For the record, this thing was heavy!  I had a very hard time helping carry it up 3 flights of stairs.

There’s my cute husband, hard at work putting this thing together.

I helped, too!  A little.

It took about 30 minutes to build the bookcase, which isn’t too bad (much better than the stupid pantry-shelf thing we bought back in July).

And there it is, built and standing upright!

It’s taller than the other one, but it works.

We readjusted the shelves after this picture, since apparently I can’t measure anything, even with the help of a tape measure.

Once we had the shelves finished, we had to unpack our books and put them on the shelves.  And by ‘we’, I mean ‘I’.  But of course, I made mikey help.

There was some strategic organization involved, such as:
“do you have more fiction or Christian books?”;
“where should textbooks go?”;
and, my favorite, “does Bernie Mac go under fiction, or Christian?  or do we need a new category?”
(We decided a non-fiction category was neccessary in such a case.)

As you can see, it’s still a work in progress; maybe someday it won’t look so messy.  We have less books than I thought we did (to be fair, all mikey’s comic books are on their own bookcase in our bedroom) so the second bookcase looks pretty bare.  But that’s okay, just means there’s plenty of room for expansion.

Mikey’s secure enough in his masculinity to feel comfortable wearing purple. He’s okay with being called pretty. He knows that his eyelashes are gorgeous. He knows he’s the apple of our eye.

more on my photoblog.

I say, the Worthington household is all abuzz with the fabulous work of the groundbreaking Washington DC Chancellor.  Michelle Rhee is most certainly a model for Mikey and Joel.

No seniority nonsense for her.  Dump hundreds of teachers on the street, and leave them there.  This is what needs to happen to the bootless and unhorsed when they get uppity.  Now all we need is for Mikey and Joel to get on the bandwagon.  In three days they’ll have another four years, and I see no reason why we couldn’t get a fourth term.

It’s about time the great unwashed learn that we do what we want, when we want, and how we want.  Thanks to our valiant Mayor for demonstrating this, and don’t forget the great work of this Rhee woman.

She’s a model for us all.

I got called into the office the other day.  They wanted to warn me that I was getting a new student, and his mom or dad was requesting testing and for him to be put into a Special Day Class.  Looking at his records, they didn’t see any glaring needs, and he scored high enough on one test to indicate that he wasn’t autistic.  They though his parents might have thought he had ADHD.

Later that morning the boy came to class.  We’ll call him Mikey.  Mikey did not seem ADHD, although he did seem to be a little odd, and he did have a rough morning.  He was crying in class, and students saw him hitting his forehead numerous times.  I had him go to the office with another boy to run and errand for me, and while they were out, I was able to talk with the class about the new boy, and how he was asking.  They all knew he was having a rough day, so they all agreed to be extra nice to him.

By the afternoon he perked up a bit.  While talking to him, he continued to be a bit odd, but nothing too radical.

That night, while chatting on line with our school psych, I mentioned that I did not think Mikey was ADHD, but that he did seem to be a bit on the spectrum of Autism.  She tentively agreed.

It’s been about 10 days now.  I think Mikey definately seems on the spectrum.  There is something familiarly odd about him.  He’s a really nice boy.  The way he talks, and some of the things he says, and they way he acts at time, make me think he’s spectrummy.  But I’m no expert.