October 10, 2006

Hey Everyone,
We took the boys to the dollar store tonight because they earned enough stars doing their responsibilities. It is so funny to see the things they choose. Joseph chose a bat kite, and Brigham chose a combination lock. Yes, a combination lock. Ben spent about 15 minutes once we got back home trying to teach him to open it, but it is kind of tricky for those little fingers. I'm not sure exactly what Brigham wants to lock up, but I'm sure I will find out eventually.
Yesterday the boys and I put up Halloween decorations. I remember last year we just barely got them up, and a couple days later we had to take all the outside ones down because of Hurricane Wilma. Amazing it's already been a year. So we are pretty much ready for Halloween around here. Brigham has been drawing pictures of jack-o-lanterns and vampires and ghosts, so I'll have to find a place for him to hang those up. Probably on the sliding glass door. I remember so well as a child drawing pictures of witches and jack-o-lanterns and other halloween images and taping them up to the sliding glass door in the living room. It is startling sometimes to see how much your child resembles you in ways that seem completely non-genetically founded!
Here is a way in which Joseph is just like me. All of last week he had a substitute teacher in his class. Last Friday he brought home a drawing he had made at school. I guess the assignment was for them to complete this sentence: "I take a ____ to town," and then draw a picture illustrating this in crayon. Joseph filled in his blank with bike, (spelled phonetically as biec which I thought was pretty good!), and then drew a very good picture of him on a bike, riding on a road around a bunch of buildings. However, he drew the picture in pencil. The sub had written in red ink (hey, I thought red ink was banned in public schools these days!), "Did not follow instructions. Picture was supposed to be in crayon." Joseph had actually torn off the part of the picture where this note was written, but I found it at the bottom of his backpack. So anyway, it seemed clear that he was upset by this, and I thought he was embarassed that his teacher had corrected him and so he tore off the note so I wouldn't see it. So anyway, Monday morning as we were riding bikes to school I tried to talk to him about it, telling him that it's ok if sometimes he forgets the directions and the teacher corrects him. It doesn't mean the teacher is mad, and I'm certainly not mad either. This is why he's going to school, to practice listening and following directions. Well, as I'm talking Joseph starts pedalling faster and faster, apparently not very interested in continuing the discussion. I just couldn't shake the feeling that there was more to this story. Anyway, right about when we reached the school, Joseph said in this gruff, mad little voice, "Miss Vitale lets us draw with pencils or pens!!" Ah HA!! The window opened in my mind and I figured out what had happened. I had forgotten there was a sub in the class. So what happened was that the sub told the children to draw the picture in crayon, but since Mrs. Vitale always lets them choose crayons, pens, or pencils, Joseph wanted to choose a pencil. I'm sure the sub probably approached Joseph and told him to use crayons, and Joseph probably refused, hence she wrote the note on the drawing. I doubt she would have written the note unless she had already talked to Joseph and he continued to use the pencil anyway.

Poor little Joseph. He gets attached to whoever is the authority figure in whatever situation he is in, and is VERY loyal to that person, and has a REALLY hard time accepting the authority of someone he probably perceives as a usurper-- someone like the poor unsuspecting substitute. I've seen this element of his personality in other circumstances, and it is one I remember in myself as a child. Grandma tells me stories of when she would come stay with us when Mama was having a baby, and I would get so upset when she would do things differently than mama. To the point of refusing cookies in my lunch because it's not what Mama would have put in it!
So I guess Joseph gets it from me. After school I did have a talk with him about the importance of obeying whoever is in charge, even if they change the rules from what they usually are. I think 5 year olds in general are not known for their flexibiilty, and definitely not *this* particular 5 year old. So it's something we will have to continue to work on, I suppose.
So Joseph has been invited to another birthday party in his class, this time a "Pump-it-up" party. I'm just getting familiar with all these cool party things kids have these days. I guess this is kind of like a kids gym place where they can play on all sorts of fun equipment. So poor Brigham will be left out again. I'm sure he will be totally fine about it, that's just his nature, and I'll definitely plan something special for him that day, but I'm hoping he'll get invited to a birthday party soon!
I worry about Brigham a little. He has wet his pants a few times at school-- I think maybe 3 or 4 times. This is certainly not typical of him, in that he never, EVER wets his pants at home. But also somewhat typical of him because he definitely does wait until the LAST second before running to the bathroom. He gets so involved in whatever he is doing, he just can't take the time to go to the bathroom. And so at school when he finds himself somewhere where he doesn't know exactly where the bathroom is, he is in a pickle. After the 1st time, I wrote a note to his teacher and asked her to remind him to go during centers (sort of like free play), and I think she did for a while, but I don't think she has been doing that recently. And so yesterday I walked with him around the school a little bit, showing him exactly where some of the restrooms are. I also told him to look around for a grownup if he ever is not sure where the bathroom is, and to make sure when he raises his hand to go to the bathroom, to tell the teacher "it's an emergency," so I hope it doesn't happen again. Brigham doesn't seem to care, honestly he's totally oblivious to what other people think, and hopefully the situations in which this has happened have been discreet, because I would be so sad for Brigham to get the reputation at school as the boy who wets his pants, you know? Ugh. Sometimes I just wish I could be there with them all the time to help them through these tough social situations.

Ok, I'll close with a quick question for those doctor's spouses on my email list. Maybe you can ask your husbands about this for me. About a week and a half ago I banged my lower leg really hard. Actually I was on my bike trying to ride and carry Brigham's bike at the same time. I just couldn't do it, and the bike started to tip over. Moses was in the back of the bike, so I was trying to stop the bike from crashing to the ground, and unfortunately my lower leg, a few inches above my inner ankle bone bore the brunt of the fall. It immediately swelled up quite a bit, and was very sore. But it never really bruised. Anyway, there continues to be a very tender knot-- a visible swelling, right on the bone there, and just yesterday I noticed that there must have been some internal bruising because I can see black and blue extending all the way around to the back of my calf, and also down to the arch of my foot. But it must have been internal because I never did get a surface bruise.
So anyway, is this anything to worry about? I think I probably bruised the bone? Can you bruise the bone? Am I going to develop a blood clot and die? Is it normal for it to be still very sore (even when I just walk on it) this many days after? I think it's been like 11 or 12 days. I hate being a hypochondriac and so I don't want to go to the doctor because it's probably nothing. But I also dont' want to get a blood clot and die!
Anyway, I hope everyone has a great Wednesday.