Consequences

We are trying the "Love and Logic" thing around the house again. I really like the concept, but in practical application, when someone has just pushed the last button left, I wish Charles and Jim Fay were in my living room to tell me what to say exactly! Well - experiment #1 this morning. Joshua had found some balloons in some old craft things upstairs. He had blown some up for his siblings. As always, things started out nice, and then turned to chaos...

Well, this morning, he put the bag in his pocket. I told him not to take the balloons to school. He said "I'll keep them in my locker all day". OK - well, just so you know there will be consequences if you make a bad decision.

Guess what - as we are sitting at the hospital, Rocky gets the call...Josh has after school detention for taking balloons to lunch, and then arguing with the teacher about where he was sitting.

After school - I asked him what my last words were to him before we left the house. He said - I love you and have a good day - I said nope - that was in the car.

Again - what were the last words I said to you at home - he repeated MOST of the conversation - got the part right about consequences. So he then proceeded to tell me that all teachers are the devil, their heads spin around all day and spit green pea soup. (well, that's not entirely all, but close). Everyone hates him, they run school like a prison, etc.

I asked him why when he said he would keep them in his locker all day, did he not do that - and he said he did. And clarified that to mean that lunch didn't count. He didn't KNOW he would get in trouble for taking balloons to lunch, but he knew he would in class. We didn't even go into the fact that he argued with the teacher about it instead of just taking his punishment. He always HAS to be right.

After dinner, we went upstairs to talk about consequences...the natural ones, such as he has detention, and the imposed ones - he will write an apology and apologize in person to the teacher he argued with. He said that was redundant - we explained that sometimes redundancy is a good thing.

The next thing to tackle is his relationships with his siblings. I might need a nap!

How long has it been?

Well, it would seem that it has been some time since I updated this blog. Things have been rather busy here in the land of chaos. I'll start by giving you a brief synopsis of the happenings for the last few months:

September: My office mate, coworker and friend's husband was diagnosed with Colon cancer. He had surgery, and nearly died SEVERAL times. School started. I went to weekend camp at John Marc with the teenagers from work.

October: I had another Birthday, enough said!

November: Thanksgiving, 4 birthdays in 3 days, trying to get some Christmas shopping done.

December: Christmas. Attended a New Years Eve wedding that my husband performed. It was so nice!

January: My office mate, coworker and friend's husband passed away. They were fortunate to have one more Christmas with their Husband, Father, Grandfather, and friend.

February: One of the physicians I work with gave his wife a kidney. Kidney is working wonderfully. Had the start of some family drama.

March: Emily turned 12. The wife who received a kidney died unexpectedly. Mema was hospitalized, diagnosed with pneumonia and has been asking to die for 4 days now. She has uncontrollable pain. We don't think it is pneumonia. My father in law is having quadruple bypass monday. My uncle is coming in town from Hawaii to help my dad care for my grandmother. I have spent all weekend at the hospital to give my dad a break.

I'm really tired! It has been a busy year already. I promise I will get some pictures up soon!

Reunion

This weekend we drove to Houston with all the kids to attend a "Family" Reunion at Texas Children's with the fetal specialists that cared for the girls while I was pregnant. It was good to see all the walking miracles! We also got to spend some fun time with Melissa and her family. We hadn't seen everyone together for a few years! We also made a quick pit-stop to visit The "other" Rudds. A good time was had by all - and a special thank you to our host family for the weekend for allowing us to invade their space!

Eye update

I took both girls to the eye doctor yesterday (Thanks Shay). It was a whippin'! A total work-out. The results...Abby - the left eye is still deviating. He asked how the patch was going and I explained what life is like trying to keep a patch on a almost 2 year old. If she isn't pulling it off, Izzy is. We are now going to try drops. She gets one drop of Atropine on Monday and Thursday. This should keep the right eye dilated so that she will have to work to strengthen the left one. We will do this until October. The good news, her vision is still good, so no glasses. Izzy - we've discover that the "cute" way she looks at you out of the corner of her eye is due to strabismus. By looking off to the side, she can stop the movement of her eye to better see. If it worsens, they can do a surgical procedure to tighten up the muscle. She will follow up in April. Also, her vision is good, so no glasses for her either.

It will be a busy week as we prepare to go to Vegas for a combination "I have a conference, hey why don't you come with me and we'll call it our Anniversary" trip. The kids have all been farmed out, and if you are one of the recipients of my "bundles of joy" THANK YOU! If you are not, you don't know what you are missing!

My watermelon kids

We gave the kids watermelon for dessert tonight. Emily is away at camp, but everyone else enjoyed it. 

The girls are really starting to talk. Abby just said "Rocky" for whatever reason. Isabelle says more than Abby, and can say "Abby".  I guess Izzy is a little harder.

We are headed to the eye doctor next week. Hopefully we will get an all clear, but I fear that we will have to continue to patch Abby (or head to surgery), and start patching Izzy.

I hope everyone has a good evening!

Happy 4th of July!

Want some?

This is what happened in the bath tub tonight. Isabelle was feeding Abby bath water with a ladle from the play kitchen. Team work, right?