Family Portrait

My sister Emily drew this wonderful family portrait for us in honor of Michael's brave battle with cancer.  The portrait of Michael is based off of one of the last pictures we have of his charming smile.  The rest of the portrait is based off a family picture we took last summer shortly after Michael completed his cancer treatments.  We are so grateful he's still with us and thriving!

Sarah, Whitney and Spencer finished school last week, so summer vacation has officially begun!  We're enjoying our Memorial Day weekend with Liz's parents here in town.  They were originally planning to come last month for Liz's birthday but at the last minute they had to change their plans.  They've been a tremendous help around the house and with a couple of home projects.

My brother ate my homework!

This is the last week of school for our kids.  Sarah has a big report due on Monday about sea turtles and we've been trying to encourage her to get it done early so she doesn't have to worry about it.  She managed to get it done a week ago, but the other day Michael found it on the floor.  In a blink of an eye he managed to rip it to shreds and start eating it!

It's a hand written report, so it's not a matter of simply printing off a new copy of it.  What's Sarah going to say to her teacher on Monday?  That her brother ate her homework?  We managed to gather together all the pieces Mikey hadn't digested and taped the report back together as best we could.  We emailed the teacher to let her know what happened.  If Sarah was in high school or college she'd probably want to rewrite it, but for a first grade report we're calling it good enough.

Sarah's repaired report...almost as good as new!

Mikey's funny that way when it comes to eating.  He still mostly eats bread, cheese, and milk.  Even in nursery at church they give him all kinds of crackers and raisins and he'll barely touch them.  But when it's coloring time and they bring out the paper and crayons, he quickly starts shredding the paper and stuffs the pieces in his mouth.  Oh well, at least he's getting fiber in his diet.

Spencer turned four on Tuesday.  He loves balls and playing with his indoor basketball hoop, but the indoor hoop was getting to small for him.  We found a great deal on an adjustable outdoor hoop, so he was thrilled to receive it for his birthday. 

Spencer testing out his new hoop

Spencer's gumball cake

"I wish for...more gumballs!"

Happy Birthday Spencer!

 Spencer's been going through a bit of an identity crisis lately.  Whenever we call him Spencer he always corrects us by saying, "I'm not Spencer, I'm Peter Pan."  Or "I'm daddy".  Or "I'm baby".  Or someone else.  Sarah went through the same phase when she was Spencer's age with Disney princesses.  The other day when we asked him to clean up a mess he'd made Spencer told us "I'm not Spencer, I'm a grown up".  When we asked him why he was a grown up he said, "Because grown ups don't have to clean up!"  We got a good laugh about that one!  I wonder what he thinks we do all day and especially at night after he's in bed.

At school last week Whitney got to say the pledge of allegiance over the school's PA system with a few of her classmates.  One of them, a boy who hasn't been very nice to her, showed up late.  The other kids didn't want to make room for him, but Whitney invited him to come stand by her. 

Later that day there was an awards assembly at school.  Sarah won the academic achievement award.  We're so proud of her for working hard in school!  Whitney didn't win any awards and was feeling a little sad about it.  But after witnessing what she had done for that boy in her class, when Whitney got home from school Liz presented her with the "Kindest Kindergartener" award, complete with a certificate and flowers.

Whitney and her classmates reciting the pledge of allegiance

Sarah wins the academic achievement award

During Michael's vision therapy appointment last week the therapist acknowledged that Michael's vision is doing so well that there isn't much left that she can do for him.  Such a tremendous blessing after being mostly blind a year ago!  His vision isn't perfect and never will be, but especially after his eye surgery last December it's doing very well.

We also found a new speech therapist for him down in Denver.  There aren't any speech therapists close to us that have any experience with facial paralysis.  A typical speech therapist gets their face close to Michael's face and repeats syllables over and over (such as as "ba-ba-ba-ba-ba") until he gets the hint and starts repeating them as well.  Well, in Michael's case, that's like a physical therapist walking around and around a paraplegic in a wheelchair until he gets the hint and starts walking.  Michael's facial paralysis renders him physically unable to do certain things, so merely demonstrating those things to him is completely useless.  This therapist in Denver has specific training and tools for facial paralysis, so we're hoping it will make a difference.  It's expensive and it means going to Denver on a regular basis, but if it helps him with his eating, drinking, and speaking, it will be worth it. His first evaluation is in June.

Let's Play Music

Three years ago Sarah started taking music lessons from "Let's Play Music".  It's a great three year program introducing young children to music in fun ways.  Sarah's done very well in it, but there have been times we wondered if she'd ever complete the program.  For example, there's been a lot of driving across town to Miss Emily's house for lessons, so we're grateful to friends who have gone out of their way to take her to lessons when we weren't able to.  Parents have an active role in the program and have to be there for some of the lessons, so we're grateful for babysitters who have watched our other children on days when Liz had to be there with Sarah.  Not to mention the numerous times Sarah got frustrated when she couldn't learn the songs right away and didn't want to practice anymore.  She's such a perfectionist (takes after her parents) and we debated whether it was worth all the backtalk and tears to keep her in music lessons while she's so young and with everything else going on in our lives.

But Sarah stuck with it (as did we), and on Friday night she wrapped up her three years with a recital where she played a song she composed herself to a large gathering of parents and fellow students.  We were so proud of her!

Sarah's recital

Sarah's song is called "Snowflakes".  Sarah's teacher emailed us an mp3 of it a while back so we could hear what it's supposed to sound like.  When Liz played the mp3 for me I didn't know what it was at first and said, "That's a pretty song, who wrote it?"  She gave me this incredulous look and replied, "Sarah did."  "What?! Let me hear that song again!"

Watch Sarah's performance of "Snowflakes"

After the recital we gave Sarah a bouquet of purple flowers--that made her beam!  She also received a song book with all of her fellow classmate's original compositions.  She's trying to learn some of them and is already starting to write more of her own.  Upon seeing the purple flowers Whitney asked Sarah to teach her how to play her song so she can get flowers too!  Unfortunately we don't feel like we have the bandwidth to put Whitney in Let's Play Music, but she is definitely showing an interest in learning to play music and we hope to put her in piano lessons before too long.

Our kids had another snow day on Wednesday, the first day of May.  In the course of one week they went from playing in the snow, to playing in the sprinklers, to playing in the snow again.  That's Colorado for you.