My little truckers

Meet the boys new best friend, The Chevy Silverado. They both ALWAYS wanted a power wheels, but with them costing well over $300, we could never afford it, nor could I justify that amount of money either. So our neighbors, who boys are 8 and 10 now, asked us last weekend if we were interested in theirs. I said sure, thinking I'll pay no more then $100 ~ Well they gave it to them for FREE! I SO need to get them a gift card to repay them or something. We couldn't even afford $100 right now, but I didn't want to pass up the opportunity either, so this was so great! The boys love riding in it together, as long as no one but Caden is driving (per Caden of course) They even enjoy being little mechanics.

There they are traveling down Bory Drive!

And checking under the hood to make sure the engine is OK

Gas stop mommy. I've even caught him laying UNDER it checking the under carriage. I think he watches Dave too much. LOL 

Wants

Everyone has wants and needs right?? I WANT (not need) one of these 2 pieces of equipment! I think they would really help me achieve my goals. Just sayin......

The Garmin Forerunner

The Body Bugg (which also comes with a GPS watch such as the garmin)

A girl can dream can't she??

From Early Intervention to Preschool and back we go

Round & round we go. Only this ride isn’t fun ANYMORE!! *sigh* Poor Colin. We are having the hardest time getting this little guy the services that he needs, no wonder he’s a mess!

Colin transitioned from Early Intervention (EI) to Preschool (CPSE) on April 13th. Which made him eligible for MUCH more services, if you can remember that post. So for the past 3 weeks we’ve all been working HARD on finding him a center based program. That was a no go. So then we’ve been working even harder on finding him the correct therapists to work this out. As of right now,  only OT and speech was to start this week. Even Special Ed. Had to end because they weren’t CPSE certified (ugh) so I get a call yesterday from the school district (special Ed dept) that according to Erie County Colin can’t transition early, because he is 10 days after the cut off date! WHAT????? Are you kidding me?? Everyone was so thrilled that he was going to get the services and programs he much needed, no one bothered to look at the county calendar.

Apparently if I child is born from 1/1 through 06/30 they can transition starting 1/1 and on. From 7/1 to 12/31 then can’t transition until 07/1. When is Col’s birthday? Yep, you got it. It’s 7/10. 10 days too LATE. So what does that mean?? That EI has to REOPEN our now closed case and take him back on. We will ALSO have to fight for the additional services that were approved by CPSE because EI doesn’t qualify for as many as preschool does. *sigh* Are you following this?? I was SO lost yesterday. So on July 1st, he will then be a preschoolwe with a disability (CPSE) not EI and can have his full range of therapies. This ALSO means that if I program is found for him between now and then, he CAN NOT go. Yep, we are shit out of luck until July 1st. In which case you have to HOPE that they will  hold his spot and NOT move onto the next child in line, thus putting us back on waiting lists until FALL. Yikes!

I am bummed to say the least. So we are going to add the speech in for him through EI (**If EI approves it**) but hold off on the PT until he transitions(since this is the LEAST of my worries). Please keep your fingers crossed and pray a program doesn’t open until July. I will just be heartbroken if he misses out.

Update on the Bribery Post

Yeah ~ I guess it only works for 2 days, because we are DONE with that. Back to not sleeping during the night. Back to taking 2+ hours to get to sleep at night. Back to major meltdowns and tantrums at 1am and on. *sigh* Someday I'll sleep. I figure I have 11 years until he's a teenager and they always sleep for days on end then RIGHT????

No amount of suckers, stickers, candy, gum or anything is getting me out of this this time.

Caden has been working hard!

Caden's Name!

caden's squares!

 

Caden has been working so hard at school that he has started to write his name!! I am so happy for him. He really works hard when he's doing this and I enjoy watching him do it.  the second picture is of some squares, that I also knew he wasn't able to do, I was so proud he kept drawing them, I said I didn't know you could do that, he says "My OT teach me Mom" LOL I was cracking up! The bottom right one, I said, oh you made a rectangle, he said No, Mom ~ It's a door!! Silly me!

Great Work Caden ~ Keep it up buddy!

Sponsor Me?

I have registered to run my 2nd 5K on May 8th! I am even more excited about this one then I was for my first one I think. First off, I have a goal to beat my first time of 39:19. Secondly it's supporting a great cause! It's to support the Heritage Center Foundation which is an advocate group for children & Adults with disabilites. Obvioulsy you all know this a cause Mike & I will support until for the rest of our lives. Having 2 speical needs children, I couldn't think of a better cause to run for and raise money for. Although we currently don't use the Heritage center programing or advocacy, you never know what the future might hold. Colin may end up in one of their programs or we may need them to advocate for Caden as he gets older. The possibilites are endless. You can click HERE to go to my race page and donate any dollar amount to help me get to my goal. Any amount is welcome. Even $1.00 is worth a TON to this cause! Won't  you please consider helping to sponsor me? And please remember to cheer me on Saturday May 8th as I run my 2nd Race and strive to beat my original set time!

Giveaway!!!

Heather at Sweet Baby Cheeks Diaper Cakes, has a great giveway going on for a Spa Towel Cake! I would SO love to win this, and I know alot of my family and friends would love it as well. Heather has just started up her business and has some super cute diaper cakes for the new baby and towel cakes for the newlyweds or new homeowners!! Go support her HERE and enter to win this great cake as well!!

Update from Meetings

Last week was Caden's Anual CPSE meeting to determine summer/ CSE referal services. He was obviously approved for summer services due to severity of need. So he'll stay in the same school, same class and recieve the same therapies through the end of August. Good News. Becuase of the severity of need, he also qualifies as a child needing CSE services as well (school age) Becuase he is only in a 6:1:1 class currently and still requires much needed adult direction, our local elementary school doesn't offer a class that would suit his needs. He can't stay in his current school becuase he ages out of the preschool program and the school age program is based more on behavior based issues, which caden does not demonstrate unless he is not adult directed. So, as of right now, The district will either look for a boces program or private school for him to attend until he can mainstream into our school district. I am so happy to hear this, since him starting school has been a huge concern of mine for months and months. We got back in June for the CSE transistioni meeting and will have final answers then. I am looking forward to it. I know I've said this before and I'll say it forever. I am SO thankfull for the school distric that we live in and the Special Ed. director that we have. She is ALL for what the child needs and deserves and so many disticts AREN'T like that.

We also briefly discussed Colin. There are NO programs available for him right now. There is a class opening up at Childpro, which has an amazing facility in Lackawanna, NY (about 30 min. away) but they still don't have the funding. It's an 8:1:1 program and very bahvaior based, which is exactly what Colin needs! So in the meantime, he is going to get his services at Home {well Stacy's actually} I hate that this has to happen like this, only becuase it really is goign to be chatoic and even more chaotic for Stacy. She has her children, my children, and 1 or 2 others on any given day. Not to mention the animals, puppys, daily schedule, kids going to school etc. I have NO idea how to make 4 in home therpies work in a certain amoutn of hours per day. it will, but It won't be easy.

My fingers are crossed that a program opens up very soon for him. He is on the waiting list at Caden's school for Summer and on the waiting list again at Caden's school and Buffalo Hearning & Speech for the fall. HOpefully between the 2 of them, something good will happen, unless of course Childpro gets funding and we can start there before.

*whew* it will all work out, it always does. But geez, can it get much more crazy?? LOL

Bribery DOES work!

Last night Stacy bribed Colin into sleeping through the night. She told him if he stays in bed all night long that she would give him a sucker in the morning. Well ~ we finally got him asleep about 9:30 and he slept until 7am! Can you say Mommy is THRILLED??!! LOL I am so proud of him. So much that I think I am going to go and buy Stacy a years worth of suckers!  Seriously though. When he did wake up, I was just coming to get him into the car anyway, so he was standing in his doorway ½ asleep still and said “mom?” I said Hi Col Col, you slept really good huh?! He replied “Stacy give me sucker?” I said, yep, she sure will, Mommy is so proud!

And I am. And I hope he does it again tonight. And tomorrow. And the next night. And the next night.

Fingers crossed.

Quick Easter Recap, almost 3 weeks late. here are kids baskets. They all found them, however Caden and Courtney had a pretty hard time. We gave Caden alot of clues, since he was getting pretty upset! We had a nice day though. Went to Meema's house, got to ride the tractor and had a delicious ham dinner! The weather was WAY perfect as well!!

April Fools Day

Yea, yea, I know I am 17 days late posting this. I am behind on TONS of stuff. Colin does't settle until after 10 typically and by then the last thing I want to do is post blog posts. So for April fools, I got Mike pretty good. I shaving creamed his truck. And he had NO idea it was me. He figured it was Dave, of course, so we went along with it for awhile. Eventually I asked him, are you SURE it was Dave?? He said why, was it YOU?? LOL I was cracking up. In a million years he never thought me. We got all sides of the truck and I thought we did pretty good!

Can you see the eggs??

This is why we love our friends ~ who else is going to go to all the trouble of putting easter eggs on your roof?? Yep, only your true best friends. LOL 

You guys know I HAVE to keep posted baby pictures. God they are so cute! 

My First ever race ~ Official Time 39:19!

Here I am getting ready to go. a  We'll start with the weather, It was 37 when we woke up, and cloudy. I can deal with cloudy. Then I went outside. Holy WIND! :-) I think I could have done even better if it wasn't for that wind! So by the time we were leaving for the race, it was getting sunny out and i was feeling MUCH better about the day. I wasn't nervous or anything which was pretty suprising for me! We got there, got a drink and waited inside where it was {much} warmer! Here I am with my mom and Courtney (like the teenage attitude?Ugh) And here I am with hubby before. bad picture. "Just before they called us to head out the starting line, it began a rain/snow mix! yuck. I was freaking out. We grabbed hubby's windbreaker to wear over my jacket so I didn't get too wet, however the Zipper broke off, LOL so we had to pin it closed! we are such dorks!! Well guess what??? Just as they were saying the prayer to send us off, it stopped! What a blessing!! 
 
So off we went! 

I ran the first 1.5 miles without stopping. Just after 1.5 I had a to stop for a couple mintues. The best part about the first mile was getting cheered on!! I've mentioned before that my very best friend passed away suddenly 2 years ago April 4th. Well her sister lives along the race route and I still keep in touch with the family. So Amy and her daughter were out there cheering me on and had a HUGE sign that said GO KYM!! I was cracking up. It made me feel SO good and I know Jen is up there smiling down and as proud of me as she could possibly be. 

Hubby, My mom and Courtney drove along the route and suprised me at 3 different spots to cheer me on as well! It was great to get so much support. When I hit the 2 mile mark they had volunteers giving us our time. I was at 24:16! I couldn't believe it. that's the fastest I have run yet!! 

The mile was by far the hardest. there were 2 pretty decent size hills that we had to go up, so I just paced myself and walked a bunch of times. Once i got in the home stretch thought I kicked it up in high gear. It's so great to have all those people that you don't even know at the finish line cheering you on!! 

My official end time??!! 39:19! I couldn't be more happy or proud of that at all. My goal was 53:47, and I blew that way out , so I am happy. I was suprised that I wasn't even sore after or tired either. I did take 2 motrin before we left this morning, since I KNOW how my legs react afterwards, and I am glad I did to avoid how uncomfortable I know I get. We then had hot dogs and baked good and TONS of water. I was parched!! What I couldn't get over was the amount of beer!! Geez, doesn't that defeat the purpose of running over 3 miles?? not to mention that it was only 11:45 in the morning!! LOL 

So here is my offical time stamp. so super proud of it. I did come home and take a 1.5 hour nap and woke up super sore. Took more motrin and headed to my dads for a quick dinner! (and the boys wanted to use grandpas vacuum of course!)  

all in all though, I had a ton of fun. I am running my 2nd one on May 8th and 3rd on June 6th. I never would have though 2 months ago that I could ever run 10 minutes let alone a 5K! I never could have done this without the support of all you wonderful spark friends of mine. Especially Trish & Becky. You both have pushed me and got me to where I am today. Thank you for that girls!! You are ALL the reason why I've got to where I am! Thank you Spark!

How cute are these babies???

These are Stacy's new puppies, who are now 2 weeks and 1 day old. Mike and I were lucky enough to be able to be there for the birth of one of them. They are so adorbale. It really makes you want one! (but don't worry, Iam NOT ready for another dog yet)

Cocca's been a really good momma to them and it's so great to get to see them everyday and watch how fast they grow and change. The boys love to see them too and always point out new things to me, like their eyes opening and the tail sticking up. What a learning experience for them too!

Happy Birthday Courtney

Courtney turned 13 last week {argh!!} She had a sleepover with 5 of her best friends and as a gift to her, we let her have a jewelery party, so each of the girls got to design their own bracelet. It was pretty neat to see what they each come up with. Some of them really suprised me by their choices, so adult like, but they all looked great! It was a fun time!

Happy 13th Birthday Courtney!

Caden likes to be right in there with the girls

All the bracelets! 

Caden & the Dentist

In order to get Caden registered for school next year,we had to take him to our reg. doctor for a cleaning. I was SO SO very proud of how well he did. I guess it helps to lose 2 teeth in a freak accident at 3 years old huh? And 2 of his bottom teeth are loose due to that accident now as well.

Printable Coupons

I just stumbled across this great blog this monring. Coupons for many of the places most of us shop! Check it out HERE

Caden got in trouble!!

Well not really in trouble. BUT he did get told at school, during nap time that he had to be quiet, because he wouldn't stop TALKING to a friend! That is WONDERFUL news!! :-) So while we don't encourage him to not follow directions at school, we encourage the talking to friends, since he has NEVER done it before!

 Bring on the peer interaction! Yippie!!