Jenni's Diary Entries Diary Navigation: Choose A Diary Entry -------------------- Latest Entry: 12/21/04 -------------------- 10/14/04 9/11/04 7/22/04 6/13/04 5/13/04 5/9/04 2/3/04 1/19/04 12/31/03 12/12/03 12/2/03 11/24/03 11/11/03 11/6/03 10/20/03 10/12/03 10/5/03 9/24/03 9/5/03 8/28/03 8/24/03 -------------------- Jenni's Introduction

January 19, 2004

January 19, 2004

He did it, HOORAY!!!

As I mentioned in my last diary entry, Kevin was very close to finishing level 1 of Hooked on Phonics. Not to long afterward he finished it! I was SOOO proud of him. He actually read a whole bunch in one afternoon so he could get his promised reward- a trip to Toy R’ Us to pick out anything he wanted. He picked a back pack full of plastic bugs and the Rescue Heroes fire truck. Actually, he picked out a Bratz doll but I managed to talk him into the fire truck. I don’t know if this Barbie thing is something to be worried about or not, other than that he is ALL boy and knows that Barbie’s are girl toys. I know this because he talks about hiding the few girl toys we do have when his friends come over. Anyway, we were really proud of his accomplishment. Starting the second level has been a challenge because first we have to listen to a cassette tape and look at flash cards so he can learn blends i.e. “sl”, “ch”, “dr”, etc. Once we move to the workbook and the books it will be much easier.

Every time I look at Kevin I am amazed at how much he has grown and changed in the last 2 years. I guess it is because I have Maxx to compare him with. Kevin is definitely a “boy” now not a little boy. I can’t believe that next year he will be attending all day kindergarten. I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately and can’t believe how much my life is going to change next year. We are going to have to become much more schedule oriented because we are going to have to get Kevin up early and to school on time. As hard as I try every night Kevin does not go to sleep before 10 p.m. I could have him bathed, read to and tucked in by 7 and he would still be screwing around at 10! Right now it doesn’t matter because he goes to afternoon preschool and he can sleep in. The other thing we really need to change is Kevin ending up in our bed almost every night. He always falls asleep in his own bed but at some point during the night he sneaks into our bed, half the time we don’t even know when he’s come in. Sometimes if I wake up and he’s there I try to take him back to his own bed but he’s so heavy that I can barely lift him. Kevin weighs about 65 lbs. and he’s 49 ½ in. tall! He’s not fat but was looking a little chubby so I’ve tried to cut back on his snacking a little bit and he’s looking a little slimmer.

Kevin got to go to his first birthday party for someone other than a family member or neighbor. A little girl from his preschool class invited him to her party and it was held at a place called Dinorex. Dinorex is a lot like Chuck-E cheese only a lot more spread out and they even have a few rides for the kids. Kevin had a great time and I was glad I took him. I almost didn’t go but it was for his “girlfriend” and he was so excited about it that I couldn’t not take him. It was so cute to watch him and this little girl play together they were almost like a little married couple. They did almost everything together until her mother came and told her to go a play with some of her other guests. I realize that it wasn’t fair for them to be spending so much time together but at a place like that the kids don’t stay together anyway. Kevin was very well behaved and only fell apart at the end when he cashed in his tickets and only had enough for a few really crappy prizes and couldn’t get the prize he wanted. At that point I just wanted to leave because it was already past the end of the designated time and Maxx was falling apart because he hadn’t had a nap. Kevin finally decided on a prize and we were able to leave without any major meltdowns. I am mentally and physically exhausted from the whole thing.

Maxx is a hefty 24.5 lbs. No, I still haven’t taken him for his 1 year check up (my goal is to do that next week!) but Maxx likes to stand on the scale in our bathroom so we at least know how much he weighs. I don’t think Maxx is going to be as tall as Kevin he’s always measured a little smaller than Kevin at all the milestone marks. Maxx seems stockier too. Maxx has two new teeth on top they seem to be the cuspids. He has a grand total of 6 on top and two on the bottom. I think he’s getting molars on the bottom also but they haven’t broken thru yet. Tom keeps saying he’s waiting to teethe until we’re on vacation, LOL! I hope not, I can’t imagine staying in a bed and breakfast with a teething, crying toddler!

Maxx has developed an affection for hats. We have one knit hat that Tom wore out one day to get coffee and Kevin put it on and pretended he was a basketball player and then Maxx discovered it and wants to wear it everywhere! He looks mighty cute too! If it’s not the knit hat it’s the Bob the Builder construction helmet or one of Tom’s old Police hats, both of which are too big and fall down over his eyes causing him to walk into things. Maxx also really loves books and wants us to read the same ones over and over and over and over…. Until we are ready to scream! We have to hide some of them just so he’ll find new ones to like. Maxx’s favorite toy is still the tool box shape sorter. He loves to put things into other things. I thought he might be ready for some simple puzzles but after showing him a few I think he’s still a little young for them. So he does his shape sorter and then he empties a metal vase I have in our bedroom of the silk flowers and then puts them all back in. He also likes to empty the cabinet that has all the pots and pans in it. Kevin loves to help him with this and then march around the house banging pan lids together.

Maxx is still going through a stubborn phase, it is nearly impossible for me to change his diaper. If I try to change it anywhere other than the changing table I am in for a 15-30 min. battle of wills. Yesterday I tried changing his diaper and his clothes in the family room and it took forever. He struggled so much and was so upset that I had to nurse him to get him settled down and he ended up taking a thirty minute nap on my lap. He’s still not talking much either which is starting to worry me. His only clear word is Dada. Sometimes he will say a few other things but not on a regular basis. Kevin was almost talking in sentences by eighteen months so this is new to me. I have also started giving Maxx time-outs, he kept climbing up on our train table and I kept telling him not to. He knew he was disobeying me but kept doing it and was actually smiling and laughing when I was telling him no so every time he did it I’d pick him up and put him in his crib for a few minutes. After a while he stopped climbing. Oh, and he still has that nasty habit of sticking his thumb in his eye. I’ve noticed that he starts to do this when he thinks he’s not getting enough attention. Gross!

My house is finally devoid of all things Christmas, Yeah! I can’t tell you how glad I am to have it all back to normal. Everything is packed up and back in the crawl space and I have made notes of new things to do for next Christmas. I even managed to get a jump start on “spring cleaning”; I tried rearranging some of our furniture so I got all the floors and furniture vacuumed. I wanted to do a more thorough job in some of the rooms but it was talking so long to get all the Christmas stuff down that I had to settle for a regular cleaning in most of the house. Now Tom has a bug to paint the family room in a couple of weeks, this is the last room in the house to be painted so if he has the energy to do it I will be thrilled! I also need to decide on a theme to use in the family room but it also has to be something that we can use in the kitchen too since the kitchen and family room open up into one another. Most of our house is traditional furniture with a lot of “English/Scottish” decorative items.

Has anyone else noticed that this time of year is a great time to shop at Target? Target re-does all their departments this time of year and they have fabulous markdowns. I originally went there to find a calendar for 2004 and a few groceries (we have a Super Target) and came home with a whole bunch of great deals but no calendar! I got Kevin a new winter coat, hat and gloves all for less than $20 and I got the Leap frog cash register and slumber time soother both a ½ price. I went back later in the week to get a couple of birthday gifts only to discover that everything was marked down again. I got both my nieces birthday gifts at 80% off. I got one a Bratz disco and the other the mega bocks play house both of them were less than $20 each! I remember that at this time last year I got a lot of great deals there also.

Last we got together with Tom’s sister for the first time since Maxx’s party. We met a Lonestar for lunch to celebrate his sister’s birthday. It was just the four of us, Tom’s sister and three of her girls, luckily her husband was out of town on business. We also brought the birthday gifts for two of the girls that have birthday’s coming up. We received an invitation for one of the parties that was to be held at some play place. Tom and I had decided before hand (or so I thought) that I was not going to go. We were only going to get together with his sister and the girls from now on and that his sister’s husband would not be welcome in our home and that we did not want his sister’s husband around our children. So we’re sitting there eating and chatting and she keeps bringing up the party and Tom never once tells her that we are not coming. When she took the girls to the restroom I asked him about it and he told me I had to tell her since he was working that day and I had made the decision not to go. (????) I felt that since it’s his sister and we had talked about it before hand he should be the one to tell her. When we were walking out I had Kevin tell her that we had gifts for the girls and then I told her we would not be coming because it was late in the evening and past Maxx’s bed time. On the way home I let Tom have it and that he totally wimped out, it seems that he could not remember our discussion! It’s funny though, when we went to Tom’s parents for dinner he told them that he was going to tell his sister that he was willing to get together with her and her daughters and if she couldn’t accept that we didn’t want to be around her husband then he would have to not have a relationship with her. We’ll see! So far my MIL in really sticking to her guns in this whole situation but my FIL wants it all to just be over with and has actually gotten together with them all. Over all the getting together with his sister went okay, she kept bringing up her husband. She kept telling us all the things they’ve done and are going to do. We didn’t react much to it and just kept the conversation moving a long. Tom’s oldest niece, the one who is having all the problems with her parents didn’t come for the get together she was at home studying. I hope she’s doing okay we haven’t talked to her in awhile and the last conversation Tom had with her was very vague. He said later that it was probably because she thought he mom was listening in on the conversation.

I’m back into my exercise routine. I got a Lateral Thigh Trainer (they are advertised on late night infomercials) and have been doing that a couple days a week. I usually work out after I get the kids in bed and the house put back in order. I do the Lateral Thigh Trainer or a yoga or Pilates video. I’ve been trying to watch what I eat during the day and have my dessert after dinner and not later in the evening and I don’t feel as bloated. I actually did a free trial of weight watchers on line and got a lot of good information so now I just need to put that information into action. I don’t feel like I’m totally back on track as to what I was doing before Christmas but at least I feel like I’m moving in the right direction.

I am also trying to decide if I should work toward keeping my group exercise instructor license current. Right now it is expired but I have a couple of months to finish at home continuing education credits before I would actually have to take the whole exam over again. The only problem is the courses cost about $39 per 3 credits and I need to have 15 credits. I have one course at home that I haven’t sent in yet so I would need an additional 12 credits and then get my CPR certification renewed. Tom has never suggested that I go back to teaching aerobics and every time I would go to a seminar or order a CEC he would complain about the money we had to put out towards it. I have a feeling that if I don’t renew my certification I’ll regret it in the future. Right now I have no desire to go back to teaching but who knows how I’ll feel in a few years. A couple of years break may refresh me.

I guess another reason I’m not sure about keeping it up is lack of self esteem. When I first started teaching the class (1993) I took over a very successful dance aerobics class which I had been a participant of for nine years. Things went great for a while but then the park district hired an aerobics co-coordinator and even though she was not an existing teacher she was good friends with one of the instructors. To make a long story short this new coordinator tried to give her friend my prime time spot and this caused a MAJOR problem for the park district which led to several high ranking people within the park district to loose their jobs. I finally got my class back and time slot but not without damaging my reputation some. Things were fine until I got pregnant with Kevin and then they didn’t have anyone to do my class format so the previous teacher agreed to sub for me until someone new could be trained. It ended up that the old instructor could only do my 7 p.m. class and not the 8 p.m. so they had a new instructor do that one. When I came back to train the person to sub for me the 8 p.m. sub had not been told about the change and was very angry about the way she was told. It ended up that the 8 p.m. sub eventually became the aerobic coordinator for the park district and apparently held a grudge for the way things had been handled when she was abruptly told she would not have my 8 p.m. spot anymore. After she became coordinator she went out of her way to make my life and my subs life miserable so by the time I got pregnant with Maxx I was so sick of teaching and the only reason I kept up the class was out of loyalty to my participants. So I am so afraid of all the politics that go along with the classes that I hesitate to even try someplace new, that and the fact that I will only teach a “dance” aerobics class which somewhat limits me.

I also went back to the chiropractor after a 3 month absence. Everyday I would think I need to make and appointment but then something would come up and I would never get to it. Well, they called me! So I went back in and I feel so much better. My left hip was so numb at night sometimes I could barely sleep. I also told him about the pain in my hands and he diagnosed it as tendonitis and he said he would treat it the next time I came in. He wanted to see if adjusting my neck would help it before he did my actual hands. But they still hurt so I’m anxious to see how they feel after he adjusts them. My carpel tunnel was really bothering me a few months ago and after he treated my wrists the instantly felt better.

Is anyone watching The Bachelorette or The Mole? Let me know!

Until next time,
Jenni, Kevin and Maxx

What we are reading:
Jenni- Royal Duty by Paul Burrell (I haven’t had much time to read)

Kevin- The Magicians Nephew by C.S Lewis (I bought a compilation of the Chronicles of Narnia and the cover intrigued Kevin so he asked me to read it to him)

Maxx- Piggies by Audrey Wood, Elmo’s Mother Goose by Constance Allen, and What Does Violet See; Birds and nests by Julie Aigner Clark over and over and over ……….