Getting back on our feet

We've had a lot going on over here.

Besides the obvious (The Silencing of Maya and the news stories generated by the silencing---which I'm updating every few days) we were also all sick with hand, foot & mouth virus (which was exactly as miserable as it sounds).  Two and a half weeks later, we're finally all back on our feet. 

Maya was feeling better last week and got to do some painting . . .

 . . . but some days she was still so tired that she needed an immediate nap (which is not her style).

 

She continues to make great progress with her talker, and so does Parker (yep, really).  First, here's Maya, showing off how she is starting to put sentences together:

Maya loves to call Parker, but she makes a tiny, breathy "Pa" sound to call him.  Sometimes he hears it, but most often not.  I made a button on the talker that says "Parker, come!" and I've been teaching him to come when he hears it.  Finally, it's working :)  Take a look:

  

If you haven't already, we would really appreciate it if you could take a minute to sign our petition to keep this app available for Maya and its other users.  As you can see, it's her voice.  We can't let it go.  (And we would be especially appreciative if you would share it---via email, to listservs, on Facebook, through Twitter, from a banner on a plane, written in fireworks, whatever.)  Thank you!

  



The weather outside was frightful*

So, we stayed inside this afternoon and frolicked in the living room, while the rain poured down outside.

First, it was time for arts and crafts . . . our first ever try at having Maya sit at her art table (a hand-me-down---many thanks!).  How adorable is she, with her little feet dangling in the air?

  

(Yes, she has bells around her ankle.  How else would we know where she is?  . . . Ok, kidding, I put them on when we were playing with her music toys and then she got mad when Dave tried to take them off.  So we had to listen to jinglejanglejinglejanglejinglejangle for longer then anyone human should have to outside of December.)

I told Maya that art means you have to put the colors on the paper.  She went with the literal interpretation, and spent most of art time putting all of the crayons onto the sheet of paper, then dumping them off, then putting them back on, etc. 

After art time, it was time to play with Parker, and the tunnel.  Parker is looking---um---rather big these days.

                                                                                   "Parker? Is that you ? When did you get
                                                                                        so big?!"


So Parker has played with & done some training with the tunnel, and Maya has played with the tunnel, but this was the first time they played with it together.  We had a fun time, especially around 1:25 :)



(Try to overlook my attire, as I was wearing an old, large t-shirt of Dave's to cook in, which just stuck around for our lazy afternoon)

I just paused while typing this when I looked up and saw:

Clearly, Parker wants more tunnel action :)

Summer, with pictures

We love having Daddy home . . .

Future career paths for Maya:

Therapist (Grief Counselor?)

Prior to Father's Day dinner, Maya breaks the news to 3 unfortunate lobsters that tonight is not their night . . .  (while Parker looks on and thinks "Oh, I just can't bear to watch!")

Artist Extraordinnaire

We did an art project for Dave's last day of school (it says "Happy Last Day of School, Daddy!").  Maya created a masterpiece, and then destroyed in, in true temperamental artist style.

Chef

We inherited a kitchen from Collin & Emerson, which works perfectly with the pots & pans that she got for her birthday and loves playing with.

A taste for me . . .                                                            And a taste for you too, Parker!

Librarian
Parker, it's story time.  Listen up! (Just noticed that the book that she's reading--The Big Red Barn, a fave here---is upside down.  Perhaps she wouldn't be the best librarian.)

(Side note: Parker loves that ramp.  Loves. That. Ramp.  Dave and I laugh every night, watching Parker's determination to nap at the top of the ramp.  He climbs up, lays down . . . slides down.  Huffs.  Lays at the bottom of the ramp and sighs.  After a few minutes, repeats the cycle.  Over and over and over.)

Weekend update

Friday:
Dave wins husband-of-the-year when he shows up from work bearing flowers, and a new Starbucks cup!  My old one (which was my 2nd) had a small crack somewhere, and coffee was trapped between the plastic layers and starting to get gross.  I have 2 big iced coffees per day, so it's hard to live without, and stupid Starbucks does not make enough of these cups to go around (the smaller ones are less tough to find---but I need venti).  He put the flowers in the cup (like a vase) and I was so psyched about the flowers that I didn't even realize I was holding a new cup.  Hee hee.  Well done, Dave :)

Saturday:

I had a great time reuniting with a bunch of girls from high school (I'm an all-girls Catholic high school survivor) back at the school for a cocktail party honoring an old friend of mine who passed away in 2008.  It was nice to actually catch up with people (vs. Facebook catching up with people) and see everyone again.  Also, it was lovely to get together and remember a wonderful friend.  I would share pictures of the event, except I didn't bring my camera.  (Actually, that's a lie, but it sounds more normal than "I brought my camera but was so busy yapping that I never took it out of the bag".)

Sunday:
Maya & I went into the city with Dave, who had a show.  We got to meet up with our friend Liz and her daughter, Leah, who we haven't seen in a while.  Leah was so cute, saying "Maya.  Maya, hi." :)  Maya was her usual self---shy and silent for 3/4 of the visit, then suddenly coming alive and wanting to play right at departure time. 

And then there was LOST. 

Monday:

I'm suffering from a LOST hangover.  I got way too excited (and confused) this morning when I saw an email from LOST in my inbox . . .  which I then realized was from LOFT (as in, Ann Taylor LOFT).  Talk about being deflated.  And I thought I pretty much wrapped my head around everything until a conversation with a friend left me wondering if I had misunderstood the whole deal.  Sigh.

In an effort to distract ourselves, Maya & I did some art projects after this morning's busy-ness (PT, walk, dog park, OT).

She thinks finger paint is fun (and tasty, if you noticed the spots on her lip) . . .

I'm not sure, but I think she may have rubbed her eye while I wasn't looking . . .

After finger painting, we tried walking with the stroller, which worked out pretty well!  Maya, walking solo, for the first time ever on tape:   (At the end I ask her to say "Hi, Daddy!" and she actually does sign it---a quick wave for "hi" and then the sign for "Dad".)





And Parker is growing like a weed.  Here is the picture from the day after we got him, and one from 1 month later.  Ignore the fact that Maya looks drunk in the second picture, it was the end of a long day :)

Other projects

Besides the paintings and new couches, we started a bunch of other projects over break:

-Dave made a fantastic shadowbox using old Scrabble tiles (we got a new set for Christmas):

-We uploaded, cleaned out, organized and ordered 1,320 pictures from Kodak.com. Yes, one thousand three hundred twenty. (That's typed out for emphasis). Some of these are fairly recent:

(fingerpainting this fall)

Some are older:

(first haircut in August)

Some are really old:

(first day home from the hospital, June 2008)

Some are super duper old (like my baby shower, April 2008). That's about as far back as we go. Who wants to come slap these things into albums?

For perspective's sake

So the back story to the painting is that Dave and I wanted to find some art for the apartment. Someone in his family joked over brunch "Oh, why don't you just paint it?" Ha ha ha. Good one. We went browsing for art here and there and found nada.

That same night, we watched the movie "My kid could paint that" (fantastic movie, btw). I had never seen anyone really paint before and kept thinking "Hmm, maybe we could do that". The idea was something big and abstract, to go over the couch.

Somehow that idea evolved into 4 paintings: 1. Something big and abstract. 2-4 Smaller paintings that were more still-life-ish (but not realistic) for the kitchen. I found something I liked for the first canvas, drew a grid on it, drew a grid on the canvas, sketched the design, and painted. Just basically created my own paint-by-numbers.

And now it's inished, for real. We debated on whether to leave the backgroun blank or paint it, I compromised by doing both----a white mini-border, a purple-ish frame. The picture is from my cell phone, so it's not ideal but I'll put nice ones up when they're all done. We picked the next painting to copy last night :)

(more info to come soon, but I've got to stick this here for now)

Recent Happenings

Lots of exciting stuff going on with us. Maya outgrew her bathtub:

Guys? Really? This is ridiculous.

I've been gardening. These pics were taken 2ish weeks ago, the plants are way bigger now and yesterday we got our first red tomato!!!

Oodles of basil plants, inside & outside:

Habanero & Jalapeno peppers---they're being attacked by aphids, so I don't know if we'll get any peppers:

Lettuces & Spinach:

Windowsill herb garden:

Tomato plant:

First basil harvest:


Mommy & Maya went to KIPP's 8th grade advancement ceremony:

Maya did a Father's Day craft:

We read books:

And go back to doctor's appointments:

(Maya is having a genetic test called a microarray done. The geneticists still feel like some genetic issue has caused Maya's delays and the test will search for microdeletions or duplications which could have caused a syndrome. Results due in 2ish months.)

We celebrated the 4th of July with a yummy cookout in NJ:

Where Maya enjoyed watermelon and chocolate:

We are getting ready to have a big change in September. For the first time in 8 years, I'm not going to be returning to the classroom. I have super mixed feelings about it, but we've decided that it would be best if I'm home with Maya. It will make it easier to schedule appointments and therapies, and give me more hands-on time to work with her. At the same time, I'm going to miss my KIPP family, and hopefully Maya and I will visit all the time.

I'm not going to take the year off entirely, instead I'm going to be working from home with a grad school that's affiliated with KIPP and TFA, among other schools. I'll be helping to evaluate first year teachers via videos, which is web-based and can be done any time, day or night. So I needed to create a home office, and Dave and I bought a desk at IKEA. Now, I love putting crap together (Really. It's very satisfying to build stuff.) . . . but this was intense! It came in 2 boxes that looked like this:

It had this many parts:

After a few hours of work it looked like this:


Finally, all done:



It's normal to have left over parts, right?




We're rearranging our 3rd bedroom to make it more workable with the new desk, and we're back to work (for summer school, which I'm working at but not teaching) tomorrow!