Hat n' Snip Off Party

Bald women sexy?

Has she lost her mind?

What brought this on?

My dear mother in law had to go bald because of an illness.

So after some spur of the moment, she decided to have her hair shaved off at her "Hat n' Snip Off" Party. That was a brilliant idea. My husband, David and Cousin Becky went along with the idea by going bald with her as a show their compassion for her. They wanted to let her know there was nothing to fear.

Before they snipped their heads off, we had many luscious Mexican potluck for our lunch from many gracious friends and family of Cathy's. The food was too good to fill our stomach because we were anxious to witness the exciting show, "Snip It Off."

We started off gradually my gallant husband gets his thin hair snipped it off in a front of thirty people. He did not realize that he would end up getting a Mohawk hairstyle just like his cousin, Becky. I thought it was pretty cool for him to show his spirit because he probably thought his own biological daring mother would end up having the new fad hairstyle. She indeed did it in a front of us. Oh what a positive spirit she had!
However, this was only temporary before the three of them decided to act like if they were "Kojack, the detective." Each of them had a lollipop.

Despite how far they had come, I discovered that the beauty and sexuality remain tied to a woman's hair. Little did Cathy know about her beauty when she received so many hats from her friends and relatives, including me. She got all kinds of hats and scarfs from sophisticated to fun hats. Once she realized she got so many beautiful and cute hats, she stated, "Bald is sexy!" Who would argue with her?

She is very fortunate to have all kinds of hats and scarfs, so she could wake up in the morning and reveal the mood she is in! When she is in a mischievous mood, then I would be more alert and get "tit for tat." Even today she had showed her excellent spirit at the party, she did share the dark side of her; mischievous when we exchanged a good bye hug.

Personally, I admire her for having a good spirit. I could see why she is so popular with her family and friends who love her dearly.

Marlee Matlin

Have you ever watch a deaf actress, Marlee Matlin took a trip the light fantastic on Dancing with the Stars?

If you had missed the recent show, don't worry. She and other famous actresses and actors will be on a National TV show on Monday and Tuesday night. Right now, she and her partner are in a third place. Let's wish her the best of luck.

Easter Eggs Hunting

Easter seemed odd this year. It came early. It snuck up on us. Instead of buying so many sweet candies and plastic Easter Eggs, we took our boys to visit the Easter Activities nearby our home school site.
Ryan was brave enough to stand in a front of Easter Bunny. Dylan was terrified of the Bunny.

Dylan asked for my assistance to put the glitter on his Easter Egg Foam.

After finishing their short activities, the boys headed for their Easter Eggs hunting. There were age groups. Ryan and Dylan were in a different group this time. They started at younger age groups.

David was standing next to Ryan. He was giving him the signal until it was his turn. When it was time for Ryan, he rushed out to get all of his plastic eggs as much as he could. He indeed have the fun. He was also so proud to get all of the Easter Eggs though there were no candies inside of any eggs. At the end of his hunting, he was very generous to give one of his Easter eggs to a really sad little girl, who only had one egg. I was pleased to see that he did have an empathy at that moment.

Dylan was in the older group. While he was standing patiently, he decided to fool it around with his Easter Basket. By the time it was his turn, I was pleased to see that he had learned his lesson from last year. Last year, he only preferred to have Orange Eggs! This year, he got all colored eggs.

After they finally collected their Easter Hunting, they were so proud to have many eggs than they did a year before. They both had returned their eggs at the counter in exchange for the prizes. The prize included pencils, mini notebook, and one plastic egg with few candies inside of an egg. I considered it is a win-win for both of us: less sweet for the boys from us and the boys had a blast time for them.

Physical Descriptions

Have you heard "Handwriting without Tears? " This is really working for my younger son who really needs to work on his cursive writing and drawing pictures appropriately. I love this assignments.

Over the Spring Break, Ryan has homework practices more on his cursives and drawing pictures. One of the assignments is "How many people are in your family? Write the number below and draw a picture of your family."

While I was sitting next to him, he was counting the number of people living in the same house and then he drew a picture of us before coloring the pictures. From that point, I questioned him about the coloring the hair and eyes.

This was not problem for him knowing the coloring of our eyes. However, it was somewhat difficult for Ryan to determine what color his older brother, Dylan's hair. So I told him that he is mixed with brown and blond. He mixed with two colors on Dylan's hair. When it came to coloring his dad 's hair, he was thinking carefully and said, "Well, he has no hair!" In fact, he does not have any hair on the top, but told him that he does have hair on the side. He then finished coloring his dad's hair.

Once he finished one of his homework assignments, I had tried videoing him about the family picture. He declared, "Mom, I'm very busy" concentrating back on his Hot Wheels.

Grandma's Hugs and Kisses

"Where are we going," my younger son always asked me the typical question before leaving the house. My reply for this time was, "We're going to Grandma's house." I could see Ryan beaming his smile when he heard my comment. Then, Dylan would say, "Which Grandma?" He has three Grandmas! "Grandma Cathy, the ones with Zack," I answered.

"Oh boy, I need to bring my toys to her house!" They hurriedly gathered their new toys to show off to Grandma.

So, we left for a short afternoon to visit Grandma Cathy. While we were on the road, Ryan said, "Grandma lives far away." It was interesting to see from the child's perspectives though we only lived less than forty minutes. As soon we arrived to her home, they chased up to her front door from the driveway, wanting to be the first person to ring her doorbell. The fun part of watching them was peeking through the beveled glass side window until she greeted us at the front door.

The first and foremost important thing was exchanging lots of hugs and kisses. It had been a long while we last saw each other. Not only getting hugs and kisses from Cathy, we did give Zack, the dog, our hugs because he was so anxious to see us. While exchanging our hugs and kisses, the boys were too anxious to share their update news: from stuffed animals to Hot Wheels Magazine even we were only at the front entry. We got ourselves moved to another room to catch our news up.

There were times we, as adults, were anxious to share each other news up, but knowing the boys wanted to shared the news with her first. Letting the kids shared their exciting news to one of their important people in the family, Grandma Cathy, had always made me feel good.

As soon as the excitement settled it down, Cathy, my wonderful mother in law, and I had a little opportunity to catch our news up. The chance between us was slimmed due to that I have two youngsters. It was a really decent feeling to catch each other news up because I knew we had missed each other so much. Literally speaking of missing her so much, I could tell you that she is one of the few people I admired. She does indicate her strong-willed thoughts, yet she does have soft heart to others.

I also missed her senses of humors when we didn't see each other for a while. That's how Dylan also felt about his Grandma. He later told me that he enjoyed visiting her because " Grandma makes me happy. Laughing is in my heart." I could not disagree with Dylan. She does have a good humor along with her mischievous thoughts. That's why I loved her so much because she and I are alike: enjoyed being mischievous on the part of our "inner" personality.

Sharing the laughter was a great way of spending each other over our kids' lunch meal: the macaroni. While we were eating our meal, we exchanged the conversation about our coloring eyes. Ryan approached to his Grandma's eyes closely carefully, " You have green and brown eyes." He was right despite of the looking from the distance. Truthfully, it was a really good feeling to watch them having on-going conversations over the table.

Out of blue after we had a lunch, Dylan announced he missed his Aunt Ginger and Cousin Danae. Calling to Aunt Ginger was another thing we did at Grandma Cathy's. They spoke over the phone for a few minutes. Ryan did have the opportunity to speak with her over the phone. This was a good practice for the boys to practice using the phone. (Of course, we will get a new wireless phone soon. Be aware, for the family who read my blog, you soon will get a call from the boys.)

Another thing we shared our moment was watching a Disney's movie, " Snow Buddies." Zack even joined with us. I was definitely surprised that Zack was not interested in listening or watching the talking dogs movie. Instead, he would rather to sit and relax next to us. While he was laying next to us, he was sleeping on the top of one of his stuffed animals. His other stuffed animals, the huskies dog was somewhere near us because he knew Dylan had his smaller huskies stuffed animals with him.

Shortly after the movie, Grandma Cathy wanted to get a kiss from the boys due to not seeing each other for a while. Give me a kiss!" when Grandma Cathy requested. Not only getting the kisses from each other, they also played hugging and teasing each other. The smiles in them melt my heart.

So typically I thought it was time for us to go home. The boys wanted something more to give back in a return. They drew pictures and gave pictures to her. Dylan drew pictures of the family, including Zack. Grandma asked him, "What happened to our stomach?" because he was drawing a stick body while a picture of Zack had a stomach. She ended up teaching him how to draw a simple picture of human such as making polka pants! Ryan drew his colorful pictures, a picture of him and his name. That was a good free gift to her before we headed for home.

Shortly before we walked out of the door, Grandma Cathy insisted to get, "Give me one more Kiss!" Dylan did without an obligation. Ryan said to her sharply, "I already did!" I burst into laughter. Still, she wanted to get ONE MORE kiss from him. The last reply was from him, "Alright (sighing exasperatedly), I will kiss you." They did! Of course, she and I exchanged our hugs and kisses before we headed for home.But, even as I'm lamenting the time that is gone, I am beginning to realize how fortunately we had a chance to spend each other during our Spring Break. I honesty can say that we do look forward to the time with her and the family.

Thoughtful

Some of you know Dylan can be very arrogant young little kid. But he does have the other side of personality: being so thoughtful of others when someone is in need.

It happened this evening after I put both boys in their bed. Ryan showed his terrified eyes and said, "I'm scared. I'm afraid to sleep alone." Dylan offered him to sleep with him. They made a verbal negotiate agreement.

Finally, they agreed that Ryan's bed would be in Dylan's room. Ryan took all of his blankets and his stuffed animal: Jaguar while Dylan helped me to take Ryan's mattress out to Dylan's room. Once everything settled it down in Dylan's room, he offered Ryan one of his stuffed dog animals because he felt that it was not fair for him having three small stuffed dog animals while Ryan had only one stuffed animal. Isn't he thoughtful?

Let's keep our fingers crossed that Ryan would sleep through the night with Dylan being in presence.

Self-Reliant

Once we learned Ryan has a mild autism, we promise ourselves that we give him an Early Intervention by becoming independent. It is not an easy task for both of us, but he has been showing tremendous progresses since he looks up his older brother, Dylan. Not only looking up at his older brother, interacting with the typical students at his school site help a lot.

For weeks, he has learned to brush his own teeth, doing mouth washing and brushing his hair before he hits the sack. He especially likes to give me the number to count before he spits his mouth wash. While doing his mouth washing, he likes to sway his head as if he is dancing.

Brushing his "Spike" Hair

Swaying his head with his Mouth
Wash while I was counting

Brushing his own teeth

Not only focusing on his grooming, he has recognized and counts the basic coins. He even learns to color inside of the pictures. As I have said it is not an easy task for us, I also have to work with him on his sentences in and outside of home. Lately, he has been putting more descriptive words together. Few examples he has used the last few days are:

Adverbs: Sometimes, Fluffy shakes. Every time, a girl name Sonia gets a time-out. Mom, it's raining very hard outside.

Preposition Phrases: Dylan is in the bathroom. At the playground, I rode a bike in a circle. I won. I'm hiding under the blanket.

Pronouns: (Since Ryan already uses some of the pronouns, except for we and they. So, I have been working on we first before using they. It seems to be working. This week, he has used more of "we" without my help ) We have 20 Hot Wheels. We are hiding from daddy. We the three of us are in the room (speech therapist told me.)

Evidentially, it is a matter of his own pace despite of numerous of hours I have been working with him in and outside of home. All I can say is that I am a proud mom to see him becoming more independently gradually.

Hailstorm !

Would you believe we indeed did have a hailstorm in our home area? It happened just right before I tucked the boys in bed. While Ryan and I were in his room getting ready for his bed, Ryan suddenly made a puzzle-looking comment as he heard something unusual, "Mom, it is raining very hard outside. " At the very last minute, I let them to go up in our front door to take a look at the rain.

Little know what to expect when I opened the front door. The moment I opened the front door, I was really SHOCKED to see the hailstorm. I then hurriedly grabbed for the camera because it was the first time I saw the hailstorm since 1982. It was the first for the boys to experience the real life: hailstorm.

The hailstorm was everywhere in our area. We could see all over our front yard, cars, street and backyard. Thank goodness, it did not damage our cars' windows, but knowing it would kill some of our plants, especially my all-time favorite plant, Bird- of- Paraside Flowers. While watching David shoveling some of the hails in a large plastic bag, Dylan and Ryan had the taste of hails from the sky before falling it to the ground. Ryan was too excited to watch the hails from our opened garage, yet he understood that he had to stay under the shelter.

While we were taking pictures for our life time experience, Dylan decided to write so-called song,

"Look Out for Hailstorms."

Look Out for Hailstorms
Look Out for Hailstorms
Look look out for hailstorms
Hailstorms are very hard
so look out for them.
Be sure to look out
for hailstorms they
will hurt your head.
So don't let your head
get cracked up by hail.
Stay in your home and
don't open your windows
or else you'll get your head
broken.

Botanical Garden

On the News, it said,"Everyone wanted to be an Irish for one day." Frankly, we were supposed to watch the Saint Patrick's Parade at Balboa Park. We unfortunately missed the chance. Instead of being doomed, we explored to find a way to substitute the fun for the boys.

In order to cheer the boys up, we started taking them out to the Miniature Railroad. They were delighted to be upfront of the train. While riding on a train, we could feel the cold air. After the short ride, the sprinkle appeared for a few seconds.

As we were walking around the Balboa Park, we decided to continue our exploration at Botanical Garden. I especially was astounded to see the words from both of my sons telling me that they were having fun exploring around Botanical Garden. Most kids don't ! (Well, I felt bad because I recall I used to complain when my mother, who still is a Green Thumb, often would take me to any garden place such as Huntington Park.) They even took their chance to feel and smell the plants and flowers. Actually, we were awed to see how big and beautiful plants in a green house.

Shortly after we left from Botanical Garden, we were heading south of Balboa Park. The boys had eyes for the art of Dinosaur. They played and climbed on the top of the Dinosaur along with few other kids for at least twenty minutes. While we were there, we saw an entire family spraying their hair green for showing their true spirit for Saint Patrick's. I must confessed that I was feeling guilty for not be a part of this spirit. We indeed will do it next year. As the weather got colder, we decided to head for home. It was a perfect timing to leave because the shower was heading in our way. It rained lightly on our way home. Yet, we were grateful that the rain was put on hold for the day, and let us enjoyed our experience at Botanical Garden in Balboa Park.

Journal

Today is the boys' first day of a two week of Spring Break. I was cleaning the boys' paperwork out of their backpacks.



I found one of Dylan's journals in his backpack.

Dear Mr. Leprechaun,

Are you rich or its just pretend gold that s made out of plastic? How little are you? Can your friend come, in my trap, I won t hurt your friend, I will call it "The Leprechaun, and his friends place. If you let me do it I'll be nice for real. Please please please?

From, Dylan

(That's his exact words he wrote for St. Patrick's. Isn't that cute? )

Destined for Greatness

GREAT NEWS! I received the positive progress reports for Dylan and Ryan.

This is a second progress report for my older son, Dylan. Believe it or not, he received all OUTSTANDING in all of his academic classes. That even included telling me that he had improved one grade higher in his reading-- the beginning of 3rd grade reading for the first grader. That means he jumped from second grade to third grade within 18 weeks ! His teacher even made a positive comment about him, "What an avid reader!" I would agree with her because he has read over 32 books since December. I thought it was pretty good considering he is a full time first grader. He is a cheater because his mom (me) is a teacher. Isn't he lucky?

Even though he did earn many outstanding reports in his academic classes, I did see that he got few "Good" on his elective classes such as Art, Music and P.E. For his P.E. class, he nearly got "Need Improvement" because he got "Good minus." Clear and loud, he would rather to use his brain along with the books! Who wouldn't argue with him for his motivation for education more than Physical Education???

As for Ryan, he did not get his first progress report because he was in a full-time special education class. He just joined his mainstream classes for Language Arts and Math. His Reading class is his BEST subject! Almost all Outstanding on his reading part, except for reading comprehension. I thought it was pretty good for a start. Not only reporting to this good news, he, who is in Kindergarten, is now reading at a first grade level.

Both of his Language Arts and Math showed that he got many "Good" reports. I considered it pretty good for a special education student. Since he is an exceptional student, he still needs to work more on patterns and sorting. From the mainstream teacher 's report, she said, "Ryan is able to make great patterns. When I started adding three parts of patterns, it threw him off." I would not blame him because I am not very good at logic either. Guess it had something to do with traits!

Another thing from his mainstream teacher mentioned he needed to improve on "Staying on Task." Do you know why? His teacher commented, " He tries hard on all his work and is making lots of friends. He does need prompting to go on to another step in a project, to get back on task, or what to do when he is finished. He gets excited to talk to other students and other adults in the room." OH MAN, he got another traits from me-- being a chatterbox! I could see my mother in law saying in signing, "See it runs in your "crazy" family."

In Ryan's progress report, it also included the first part of his Individual Education Plan (I.E.P.) benchmark. Ryan had his I.E.P two months ago. Believe it or not, he met six out of seven goals within two months! One of the benchmark is substantial progress when given letters,words, and sentences from a written model/dictation. The goal is to make 90 % accuracy. So far from the special education teacher's report, "Ryan has made such great growth in his area. His average is 71 % overall accuracy." Not bad because he just started learning to use cursive a few months ago.

Without a doubt, my husband, David and I were VERY PROUD of our sons, Dylan and Ryan. We also hoped they would continue enjoy learning many new things. But let's hope they would not become Nuclear Scientists.

Drawing a Picture

For months, he usually scribble the pictures. This time, I worked with him on drawing basic pictures. I instructed him with shapes such as making : two circles for the bodies, two circle eyes, two triangles for the ears, etc. It turned out that he did a really good job on following the directions despite of having too many legs.

Not only following the instruction, he is able to spell simple words on his own. Spelling "cat" is one of the simple words he can spell without my help. His cursive writing has improved for the last few months because I had requested his special education and general education teacher to focus on his fine motor, especially in writing.

The next day, he started picking up the appropriate drawing picture such as rainbow. Let's see how he does with other simple pictures. So, look out for the future pictures! What do you think of his drawing a picture of a cat?

Sunny Sunday

Finally, the sunshine came out! The weather in Southern California had been like living in El Nino weather. It was a perfect way to get out for a short while after we all had been cabin fever, got over with the ear infections, and fevers.

The three of us, except my husband who had his own errands, went out to our neighbor park which it was a block away from our home. Ryan decided to ride on his training wheels bike. Dylan decided to walk with me because he did not want to try out on his bike without training wheels. Like I said on the previous post, he is a really stubborn to try something new.

By the time we got to the park, they played all over the playground. Frankly, I felt that this park was a little bit too small for the boys. Next weekend, we will take them out to a bigger park where they could explore something different and new.

They were being in a good sportsmanship despite of a small park.

After the park, Ryan wanted to paint all over his new toy, "Hot Wheels" car.

While he was busy painting his Hot Wheel Cars, he mentioned to me, " I painted Hot Wheels yellow. After the car is dried up, it will go to car wash."

You probably noticed he took his top off, it was because he had his shirt painted! Another load to wash the clothes. Yet, I don't mind because I am glad the boys finally got a chance to go outside in the sun!