Frustration

Sometimes Lauren's memory issues are more frustrating then Brandon's language issues. Case in point. Last Monday, Lauren had "Chapter 2 Test" written in her agenda book. I asked (like any mother would) what subject the test was in. It seemed a logical question. She couldn't remember. Go Figure. She had just copied it from the board and didn't pay any attention to what it said. I asked her to find out. The next day I saw that she had again written "Chapter 2 Test" in her agenda book, so I asked if she had figured out what subject yet. The answer was of course "I forgot". So I wrote a note in her agenda book asking the teacher (who initials the book every day) what subject it was. No response. The next morning I e-mailed both teachers, even though I knew only one teacher would know what I was talking about. I received an e-mail from the one teacher that the subject was Social Studies. GREAT. So I ask Lauren that night "What are you studying in Social Studies". You guessed it. "I can't remember". So I ask her to bring it home so we can study over the weekend. You see by this time we have lost a week in study time and the test is on Tuesday. So, of course, she brought home Science. So I e-mailed the teacher to remind Lauren to put the Social Studies in her book bag and let me know what to study. The teacher e-mailed me that she had to know the words highlighted in the book and she had already had Lauren put the book in her bag. So tonight we have to study and hope it's enough for her to get a good grade.

Lauren's Eye

When I got home on Wednesday, Lauren told that her eye was hurting her. She told me she had been at the nurses office and that the nurse had taken some pencil shavings out of her eye. It was red and swollen. After supper I tried to flush her eye, just in case they didn't get it all out. When that didn't seem to work and I couldn't see anything else, I tried a cold compress. Finally I sent her to bed, thinking that it would work it's way out while she slept. No such luck. When she woke up, her eye was even more red and swollen. She said it hurt more when she blinked. To keep her from rubbing it I finally put a patch over it. That seemed to help. Then, instead of taking her to school right away, I took her to the place where she got her glasses. I THOUGHT the woman who checked her eyes was an eye doctor. There were initials after her name. I was informed that she was not qualified to check her eye and was referred to a REAL doctor. Guess where I WON'T be going back to. I called the real doctor and asked if I could bring her in and was told that I would have to make an appointment. GREAT. I made on for 2:15 pm and then took her to school. WHY, I DON'T KNOW. She said her eye was feeling better. I left her there at 9:14 am. They called at 10:10 am to tell me to come and get her. I left work and picked her up and then took her to Jim's Mom. Oh, by the way. That patch I worked so hard to put on, yeah, they took it off. Then back to work, which was one bad thing after another. Just not my day. Then at 1:40 pm I left and took her to the REAL doctor. He was really nice. He ended up numbing her eye and flipping her lid to find another piece of shavings. So now we have eye drops for the next 3 days. She has small scratches on her eye and we need to keep them from getting infected. The funny part was the e-mail from one of Lauren's friends asking if she was alright and if she had to go to the hospital for the CUT on her eye. The lesson is not to blow into a pencil sharpener. Lesson Learned.

New Picture for Lauren

We got Lauren's school pictures yesterday. Not too bad. She is very happy. Boy is she growing so fast.

And Then It Was Gone In A Flash

This weekend started off pretty good. Lauren and I decided to start working on her camera shots badge. We went to the mall and visited a camera store. Then we stopped and got some new shirts for both her and Brandon. When we got home we started going over the stuff she needed to learn. How to clean, maintain, load and take pictures. She needed to learn about three different types of cameras, so I got out my old 35 mm camera for her to use. She needed to take some pictures so after walking around the neighborhood, we headed over to the park. It seemed like a great place to get pictures of nature. Brandon loved it because while she was taking pictures, he played in the large sand box they have. We came home and Lauren only needed about 4 more shots to finish out the roll. Sunday was good too. Went to church, then my sisters. Watched a movie, harassed my niece, GOOD TIMES. When we got home I started cooking. I planned to make bread, apple butter and turkey tet. This is when things started going a little crazy. Jim's mom came over and the kids went out to play. The bread was giving me a hard time till I moved it closer to the stove. While I was milling the apples, Lauren came into the kitchen carrying the camera. She then opened it and pulled the film out and asked "Mommy, how was I supposed to take this film out?" Yes, the memory was not working again. She had forgotten what we had discussed on Saturday morning. I ran over, but it was too late. The entire roll had been exposed. The only thing to do is to trash it and start over. Here are some pictures I took while she was using the 35mm. She now loves this camera, if she can only remember the differences.

Webelos

Last night at dinner we were discussing the things that Brandon needs to learn to earn his first cub scout badge. The first badge is not so hard. He has to know the handshake, the motto, the solute, what Webelos stands for, etc. So Jim and I are asking him "do you remember the sign?". Then Jim asked his he remembered what Webelos stands for. Brandon thought for a minute and then said "We Blow". After Jim and I stopped laughing we reminded him that it meant; We be loyal scouts. Still makes me smile to think about it.

Grave Hunting with Grandpop


On Monday I had my long awaited trip to New Jersey to work on the family tree some more. Me and Dad do this about once a year are usually around my birthday. This year I asked to do it a little early so we could check out a cemetery or too. We started at the Trenton Archive. I was hoping to find more information on the old death certificates, but the ones before 1900 do not have any information like parents or where they are buried. Very disappointing. So I had to change gears and only really found 2 new pieces of information. At about 12:00 we headed to the cemetery I wanted to check out. After eating a great lunch at a cafe across the street we headed into the Church office to see what they had to say. They handed me a list of the old section to look over and low and behold, I found a name that I didn't expect to see. You see I knew they had one surname there. I knew my great grandparents were there. I knew my gg grandparents were there. I knew my ggg grandmother (Mary) was there and hoped that her husband (Stephen) was there. This name on the list was a gggg grandparent. VERY COOL. Thank God I had printed out some pedigree charts before I went. Dad and I went out to find the grave and after about 10 minutes of looking find it. I started taking pictures and then we wondered into what they said was the newer section. In my view, this was still a very old section. After a little while we were able to find Mary and Stephen. I then almost had a heart attack when I noticed that his parents were right next to them. As we walked around I started seeing names that I recognized. LOTS OF NAMES. It will take me quite a while to figure out how many were actually related, but I did find another set of gg grandparents from another surname. I guess they all lived very close back then and that's how they all met to marry. I might have to ask the church is I can review their old records. Here are some of the old stones I found. You might think I'm nuts, but I had the BEST time.

Update on Lauren

New things have been happening for Lauren. First, she has decided to play the clarinet. I bought one on e-bay which turned out to be much cheaper than renting. The instrument even turned out to be pretty good. Secondly, the school sent home a letter stating that she now qualifies for an after school tutoring program. They will bus her home when she is done, but we will need to see how long that takes. She gets done at 5:30 pm. If it takes very long to get home, Jim or I will just have to pick her up. Right now it's two days a week, but they are trying to get funding to expand to four days. For once it seems that they are stepping up and giving her more without me have to do anything.

Horse Camp

Last weekend (I know it's Thursday, very busy week) Andi and I took the Girl Scouts to Camp Wood Haven to earn their Horse Fan Badge. OK, imagine this. 2 Leaders, 12 girls, no beds. Well they had very thin mattresses to lay on the floor. After the first night Andi and I doubled up to help our backs. It rained almost the whole weekend. We really don't have very good luck. Last time it was 98 degrees and this time rained. Anyway, the girls had a good time and although they didn't get to ride, because of the wet conditions, they did get to groom them.

Jim is supposed to have an overnight this weekend with the Boy Scouts. Brandon is very excited. It might be a little chilly, but there is no rain forcasted.

Here are the girls in all their rain gear.



Here are our sleeping conditions.



Here is Andi with her pony. The leaders had to lead in the horses.



Not my best picture, but me with my horse - Duce.



Here's Lauren in the dining hall. And no, the food was not that great.