Hot-lanta

Last week I went to Atlanta for school. I looked out my hotel room to see this:I was sent to visit this man:Who co-founded this school:The school visit started in the library with stuff like this painted on the ceiling:
...and this jumpy thing as a permanent fixture in the middle (yes, of the library):
The classrooms all had fun stuff like this in them:
We learned (and sang and danced and laughed) a lot and at the end of the day, the only way out was to go down this slide:
What an amazing place! You can go here and read more about him/his school.

The house was even still standing when I got home.

Happy (early) Valentine's

Valentine's Day was always my favorite holiday as a kid.

Not for the romance aspect. Bleh! No, I love Valentine's Day because of the crafting possibilities. There's just something about heart shaped doilies that makes me pause and think, "what could a grown woman do with these?"

The answer, is nothing.

This is why I had kids.

As I said in an earlier post, I made the kids' Valentines this year. I ran into a post on the blog I Am Momma Hear Me Roar. This also introduced me to the photo editing website called Picnik. I see many more projects like this in my future.

Here is Iwa's:
For the treat, I upcycled a bunch of broken crayons (I'm an art teacher who can't throw anything away in a school of 900+ kids. I have plenty of these) into heart-shaped crayons. I put them in a snack-sized ziploc bag and stapled the picture on top.

For Kawika's, I stuck more closely to the idea I saw on the blog:
...mostly because he has THE BEST kissy face in the world. I filled a snack-sized ziploc with Hershey's Kisses.

I still couldn't find a way to incorporate doilies. Maybe next year.

Spoiler alert

This year, I made the kids' class Valentines. I'll post them when I'm done but here's a sneak peek of Kawika's:


...just makes me smile every time!

Happy birthday, daddy!

...John warming his hands by the fire.

We know you've only spent the last 8 1/2 years with us, but we love you forever.

Here's to many, many more.

Show and tell

For those of you who were curious, here's what Kawika took for show and tell at school today:
Of course, at school, he was wearing pants.

Ever since Aunt Krissy sent him and his sisters glow in the dark "bone jammies" for Halloween and we explained what bones were, this kid has been obsessed.

This incident has just put fuel on the fire.

He now sleeps with his x-rays and an issue of the American Journal of Orthopedics which is complete with more x-rays and candid photos from various surgeries.

I just hope that football scholarship can take him all the way through med school.

3 for 3 makes a Turkey!!

I can't see it, my family can't see it, but medical professionals tell me that somewhere in there is a hairline fracture.

In my baby boy's foot.

Let me rewind:

Lots of times, Kawika walks into his room for awhile. Minutes later he comes running full speed into the living room. Sometimes he is running right for you and you hope that someday all this abuse you take will pay off in the form of a football scholarship. Sometimes he falls down and plays dead and you have to perform a fake autopsy or CSI investigation (yeah, mommy has an odd sense of humor. uh, have you met me?). This time, however, he fell down, landed with his left knee on top of his right foot, and laid there and cried.

He broke his own foot and now he's sporting a knee-high blue weapon of mass destruction. Heaven help his sisters if he finds out how useful that thing could be.

He is very excited about the x-rays we got to take home on a CD, and the American Journal of Orthopedics he also took as a souvenir.

First we had the stitches, then, two days later, Leilea dislocated her elbow (again). Not even a week after that, Kawika breaks his foot.

That- in bowling- is what we call a Turkey. (3 strikes in a row)

At home we call it a hell of a week.

I think the Department of Child Services might have a name for it, too, but from now on the kids are going to be wrapped in packing foam and bubble wrap so we never have to find out.

You should see the other guy...

In the blue corner, wearing the pink princess footie jammies, weighing in at a squishy 34lbs, with a record of 3 and 0, hailing from Millington, TN, we have Leilea "The Berserker" Frisky.

Don't let her rosy cheeks fool you, ladies and gentlemen. This one takes no prisoners.

This one is going to give me a heart attack.

Saturday night, we took Leilea to get the Frisky Five's first set of stitches.

(in the words of the kids at school) You see, what had happen was... I put up a big girl bed in her room. I was putting stuff away not more than two feet away from her when she rolled off the bed. Her fall was broken by her face and the corner of the armrest of the glider.

Seeing it all in slow motion, I was almost able to catch her. She cried for just a little bit but when I got a chance to look at it, my insides flinched. I'm sure if I had had the stomach to look closer I might have seen skull.

I got toilet paper on it and, speechless, I showed it to John. Sometimes we can't decide whether or not things are bad enough to go to the ER. This was not one of those times. Without question or hesitation, John got the other kids dressed and we were off to drop them off and go see what the damage was.

She never cried or fussed after that initial minute or two right after the fall but I knew what lay ahead. The little girl before us had her chin stitched up and I cried for her in the waiting room while we heard her cries (blood curdling screams) from the procedure room. She had to be bound to the table. My tears were for her but also in fear of what I knew was coming for Leilea. I don't think I could handle that. I planned on bailing.

She was checked for concussion, we were asked probing questions about how the fall happened, and then after a few hours (near 9pm) it was our turn to be sewn up.

She recognized the nurse from when he came and poked at her wound to see what kind of treatment it would need. When she saw him she kind of whimpered and hesitated and clung to me. He told her, "Don't worry, baby. Mommy's not going anywhere, I promise." Thanks, cause mommy fully intended to ask, plead, beg the nurses to hold her down so that John and I wouldn't have to.

We laid her on the table, gave her the usual set of comforts that go with bedtime and she fell asleep... he put on the topical numbing stuff... still sleeping... he prodded with a syringe of lidocaine in the wound to numb her a little deeper... sleeping... Finally he sewed her up with four stitches. Thank God for little miracles because she slept through the whole thing. It was bedtime and she'd had a big weekend, not to mention how tired she probably was from the incident itself.

Bless her crazy little heart.