My Best Shot Monday

Not the most artistic photo, but pretty funny, none-the-less. Pink dress and ruffled socks riding on a tractor? Couldn't resist.

There is another photo, but it's of a friend's little guy. Don't have permission to post, so you'll have to look at M!

More tomorrow.

I missed it and OTHER IMPORTANT STUFF

I'm sad that I missed My Best Shot Monday w/ http://picturethis.clubmom.com/ . That's one of the biggest reasons I started this blog. But check it out. Those people are TALENTED. Oh, if only I had that talent!

However, there is something more important on my mind tonight. I played Bunco w/ my friends S and E tonight. What a fun time!

When I got home, I had a prayer chain message from my church. That's the more important thing on my mind tonight. This morning a young man (26 years old) was out jogging before he went to work. He thought a car had stopped to let him pass, she didn't see him and there was a terrible accident. She ran over him with both front and back tires. Then he was drug (dragged?) for almost 200 feet. He's alive and there is not a life threatening injury, but he's going to need major reconstructive surgery on his left hand, possibly both. He lost a finger on the left hand and the doctors are using his left thigh to graft skin for his hand. He is going to have a long recovery road ahead. He's not from this town, so his three single roommates (all young men) are rallying around him at the hospital until his mother can arrive from VA.

My heart is breaking for everyone involved. He's an Ivy League graduate with an awesome job. The woman who hit him is young--only 29. I can't imagine what she's going through. His mother--oh, to be so far away when your child needs you! And to have to make travel arrangements! The roommates, one is the son of a dear friend of mine, who are learning at a young age that no one is invincible. The injured young man is a believer. For those of you who are, PLEASE pray for everyone whose world was altered today. They all are going to need our prayers for a long while to come.

Natalie

Update on Valentine's Day Bear

This is just a quick update to the whole screaming banshee/sweet Valentine's Day Bear from Dad. I don't know how H did it (he's the Daddy Magician in our family), but he got M to sleep with her bear last night. When I got her up this morning, the bear was in her bed and she was playing with it while she waited on me to come get her. I could see her on the monitor, so I was armed with the camera when I went in her room. She usually stands up as soon as I open the door, so I had the flash ready to go as soon as I opened the door. I was able to get these two sweet shots of her holding that precious bear. Please note the snugglies in her other hand and the pacifier safely stuck in her mouth.

Isn't she just the sweetest thing!?

I'm so glad it's Friday and we have a long weekend together. My parents are coming to visit us this weekend. M loves her grandparents and I love seeing them together. I hope I get some great pictures of them together. I'll post later this weekend.

HVD part III

The mean mama in me kept putting the bear in the bed with her...oh, at least 3 or 4 times. Maybe more. You can see the left end of her crib here. At the other end there is a cow and a pink bunny that sleep with M. After my failure to get the snuggling picture I wanted, I put the bear in between the bunny and the cow. I swear if M was older and stronger, she would have thrown the bear at me! She finally had enough of my antics and just put her face in her snugglies and quit looking at me. The best photo I got was the one on the left which was taken about one second before she sat up and started the screeching again. Needless to say, the pink teddy bear is not in her crib. We'll try again tomorrow to snuggle with it for Daddy's sake.

I hope you all have had as humorous Valentine's Day as I have. I've laughed to hard my sides hurt.

H gets lots of husband points for bringing me a BEA-U-TI-FUL bouquet of roses and tulips at school.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Natalie

HVD part II

This is M in bed with the dreaded new pink teddy bear. The tears started about 1 nanosecond later. She was holding the bear above her head screeching "MAMAMAMAMA." I took it out and held it myself kissing it and hugging it close. I tried to guilt her into loving it by saying "Dada gave this to you. He wants you to love it." Note to all mothers of toddlers: 16 month olds don't fall for guilt yet. After holding it and kissing it myself and giving M a minute to calm down, I put it back in her crib. The banshee screeching started again. All I wanted was one picture of her snuggling with the bear!!

Happy Valentine's Day

These are not the pictures I thought I'd be posting today. But then, I didn't realize H was getting M something for Valentine's Day. After I bathed M and was getting her ready for bed, I glanced over at her crib and noticed something, but thought nothing of it. When I went to put her in the crib, I realized she had a new pink animal that was TOUCHING HER SNUGGLIES AND HER PACIFIER! The nerve!!!! No one. NO. ONE. messes with the snuggles and pacifier. I didn't realize it would be a huge deal, so I grabbed the camera to take a picture for H. He's never home when I put M to bed, so I wanted him to see how much she loved her new animal (you should start laughing now....)

I handed M her pacifier, which she immediately stuffed in her mouth, and handed her the snugglies. Then I made the fatal mistake of trying to get her to hold the innocent little pink bear that says I love you on the heart. That's when the neighbors probably wanted to call 911 because they thought I was beating my little girl!! (More in the next post...these might be in opposite order)

Remembering

I was just over at slurpinglife.typepad.com reading about the adoption of a son.

It reminded me of two years ago...the feeling that my body wasn't quite right. That maybe I was growing a little baby. I took pregnancy test after pregnancy test after pregnancy test. H finally said NO MORE PREGNANCY TESTS! I was dizzy and hungry in a funny way. My parents came to visit for the weekend and I took a pregnancy test Friday morning just in case that was what was wrong with me. I wanted to be able to tell my parents they were going to be grandparents, but yet another test was negative. Over the weekend, I decided I was going to the doctor Monday to find out why I was late and to make some decisions about starting a family.

Monday came and I headed to the dr's office right after school. I did the urine sample and was waiting when the dr came around the corner. The conversation went something like this:

Dr: What are you doing here?
Me: Taking a pregnancy test.
Dr: Why? Did you have a positive test at home?
Me: No.
Nurse: It's positive.
Me: No, at home, it's negative.
Dr: Then why are you here?
Nurse: It's positive.
Me (more insistent): No, at home, it's negative.
Nurse (handing me a white thing with pink lines in the window): It's positive here.
Me: SOB
Dr (rubbing my shoulder): Are you okay with this?
Me (at my finest hour, as you can tell): SOB. I think so. SOB. GULP. SOB. What am I supposed to be doing? SOB. What do other women do when they find out they're pregnant? SOB.
Dr (beginning to sound concerned): Do you want the nurse to call your husband?
Me: Oh, no. SOB. I'll call him when I get back to the car. LAUGHING. SOBBING. LAUGHING.

I sure didn't expect to be pregnant. I thought maybe I was, hoping I was, but never expecting to be. I'd spent the past year waiting for those little pink lines. And I wasn't ready for them when I saw them.

My Best Shot

MUST. FEED. MYSELF.

And then she doesn't like having a dirty face! She eats big people food most of the time. Every few nights we have baby food just to make sure she's eating enough veggies, and to have prunes when necessary. She loves to use her own spoon, so baby food night always ends up being VERY messy!

I'll post Valentine pictures later this week.

Something New at the Benson Household

Sometimes inheriting something can lead to the INTENSE desire to have a newer version of that very thing. Here's a perfect example (yeah, I know...you're shocked that I have an example): My dear friend E taught me how to sew. She helped me make M's birthday dress and Christmas outfit. That lit a desire to sew more, so over Christmas break, my mom helped me with a few more things. That led to inheriting my mother-in-laws sewing machine. It hasn't been used in ATLEAST 22 years, if not longer. It seemed like a great machine. It certainly had some really cool accessories, especially if you consider it's age. But the darn thing wouldn't work half the time! The first time I used it, perfect. The second time, not so perfect. I knew I wanted a new machine, but thought I could live with the older model. Today it worked for about, oh, 10 minutes. Even H worked on it, and trust me, he's very mechanical. I thought surely he could fix it. To no avail. Desire for that new machine flooded my body. M woke up from her nap, we all got dressed again and headed out to Target to check out new machines. H was so sweet--he actually took the old, heavy machine out of the cabinet to take with us to Hancock. We thought, even though the employees at Hancock don't fix machines, perhaps they could tell us what was wrong. The very nice (that's as sarcastic as I could make it) lady suggested the tension was off. As little as I know, that was one of the first adjustments I made and it. did. not. work. So, we went to Target, went to Hancocks, went back to Target and now I am the proud owner of a new sewing machine! And it is AMAZING. I would shout that from the rooftop. I am so pleased with the machine H helped me pick out. He was so patient as we looked at each machine and debated the merits of each one.

I'm going to post pictures of the new machine tomorrow and the pants I finished tonight without help from anyone! That's a great feeling. I'll also post my Best Shot for the little photo sharing at Picture This.

Finally!

Well, after 6 hard weeks of sewing class, I've FINALLY finished an outfit. Now this might sound like some accomplishment, and it is--no doubt, but this is not the first outfit I've made. Oh, no...it's like the 6th! So, I'm trying to figure out what took so long. I'll post pictures tomorrow. I have to admit...it is a cute outfit! I got several yards of precious fabric tonight, so more sewing is in my future. And M is going to look so darn cute all summer long! But not as cute as Susie's tiny girl will be. Susie finished not one, but two dresses AND started a diaper bag for the newest member of their family! We met some new friends, including two hospice nurses, a precious 14 year old, and a 70 year old grandmother from Africa.

Other news in the "and other stuff" catagory: We've started our annual play at school this year. It's going great, I'm surprised to say. We waited until the last minute to start rehearsing...we perform 3 weeks from today. My co-teachers and I have written a musical honoring Dr. Seuss, so the kids are familiar with the stories we're using. That's a major help to us. We're only using four songs, so that's another major advantage.

The other interesting factor in this year's performance is the inclusion of the special ed students. Since we've gone to almost total inclusion, I feel it's paramount that these guys be included. It's important for my regular ed kids to know that the students who come in are truly part of our class and this is one more way to build that community. My newest little guy even has a "starring" role in one of the dances. I'll be darned if he doesn't already know every single thing he's supposed to do! My other kids are so proud of him.

One of my other autistic boys has been totally unconnected during the rehearsals...he's silly, flopping around on the floor, touching his classmates, laughing inappropriately, etc. But today--he was singing the songs like a champ! He still had a hard time during dialog scenes, but he's getting the music. He might need someone to sit right near him during the play, but, by golly...I think he's gonna make it! A few of my kids even noticed how well he did today. The parents of both of these boys are so excited that their children are being included in such a "normal" thing as a class play! I can not begin to tell you how rewarding that is for me as the teacher. Sometimes I wonder if I wouldn't prefer to be the resource teacher for the sp ed kids.

It's been interesting to watch how the other kids react to the autistic kids. They don't know my boys as well as my class does. Some of the other kids are so kind to them. Some of them ignore them. But none of them have been unkind. As I watch the kids rehearse, I'm able to think about next year and the class make-up that will most support the autistic kids. I don't want to shelter them too much, but I don't want to put them in a class where they will be bullied. I want them to find school to be a safe place...the same thing I want for all my students.

During sewing class, one of my parents happened to be there. I had made a huge mess of M's shirt and the teacher was helping me correct my mistake. Well, if truth be told, she was basically redoing the shoulders in it. The grandmother of my student, who is from Indonesia, said, "When we are learning something new, it is important to make mistakes. The next time, we'll know how to do it right." An important lesson for me AND my students.

My Best Shot Monday

There is a strange love affair between a 22 lb little girl and a 95 lb lab at our house.