Realizing My Capabilities

We've been through a fair bit in the past week. First, my little Brettley turned 5 years old. Where on earth has the time gone? As an extra thought on this, when Caleb was 5 he seemed so big. Because Brettley is the youngest and a little short (or a lot short) for his age, he seems super tiny to me. He wears size 5 tops, but just got into size 4 pants a couple of months ago, so he is quite short for a 5 year old. However, he made up for his lack of height by losing not 1, but 2 teeth on his birthday! Caleb and Ty were both 6 when they lost their first teeth, so Brettley is ahead of the group in that area. Some of the things Brettley got for his birthday were a truck launcher he'd been asking for, 2 Paw Patrol toys and a Paw Patrol bedding set (comforter, sheets and pillowcase). He was a VERY happy boy, and he's finally keeping a pillowcase on his pillow for once.

On Friday, the stress of everything I've been going through the past couple of weeks sort of hit me really hard. John and I decided together a couple of things. First, that because we don't actually need the money I get from doing lunch at the school and because Caleb did straight out tell me that it disrupts his home schooling too much, I will finish working for February, but won't be continuing to do lunch anymore come March. Also, we decided that 5 filling appointments in a month and a half was way too much stress on both out time and finances, so we're going to do 1 filling each month until they're done. Also, we'll get Ty's all done before we start doing any of Caleb's to give Caleb more time to develop some skills to get over his big fear of needles. I felt so much better after we reworked these things to cut down on my stress level a bit.

I think I got into this mentality that because I can handle things a lot better than I could before I started Seroquel that I need to be able to handle everything. One of the first things my doctor ever said to me was that I need to be aware of what I'm capable of and work with that. I'm going to work harder to be aware of my personal capabilities and be more willing to say no when it's necessary.

John was able to have a 4 day weekend, and yesterday we took the kids to the Telus World of Science. The past couple of years, instead of getting lots of toys for the kids, we've asked my dad to instead just fund a family fun day for us. As I've mentioned before, our kids are the only grandkids on my side, so they kind of get spoiled rotten. The boys LOVED going to the TWOS. I was worried Brettley wouldn't like it too much, but he was right in there just as much as his brothers were. After we were done there we took the boys for lunch at Red Robins (their choice). Then we took them to Toys R Us and Mastermind Toys to each get something. Well, Brettley did get a lot since he had birthday money to spend as well. Caleb bought a paratrooper with a no-tangle parachute and a little science experiment kit. Ty got a little space gun, a singing Olaf toy, a Frozen pen and Frozen skin stickers. In case you couldn't tell, he is still quite stuck on Frozen, ha ha. Brettley got himself a grabber claw stick, a red Boogie Board and 6 Paw Patrol toys with badges. He only needs 2 more now to complete his badge collection (Zuma and Marshall).

That's about it for this week. I woke up with a sore throat this morning, so I got an extra day at home with Caleb and Brettley. Now Caleb is finishing up his math for the day and I'm drinking another herbal tea with honey. I'm very much looking forward to March when I get to have days like this (minus the being sick) far more often.

3 Days In

So today is officially day 3 of home school. Monday was kind of odd. It was the first day, we were figuring what works to begin with, and then I had to leave to work at the school, so my dad was over for the tail end of Caleb's work, which was the worst example of it. The last 10 minutes or so were hard for Caleb, he was feeling a bit done.

Yesterday was AMAZING! I didn't have to work because my class was on a field trip, so I didn't have to interrupt our day. I became more conscious of when he needs breaks and snacks. I ensured that he ate a good breakfast before we started. Caleb gets really 'hangry' as of late. It was an all around awesome day and he even helped make supper as well.

Today was a hard day. The day after Cubs is ALWAYS hard. It causes him to get to bed a little bit later than normal (his normal bedtime is 8:45) and has him extremely stimulated in the evening. Looking at how thing are today, I may switch it so that on Wednesdays he does his work in the afternoon when I get home from the school, instead of in the morning. Or split it half and half. We'll see how things go next week and continue to adapt from there.

Tomorrow I go back to working at the school, so our days will be messed up again. I'm REALLY glad that I won't be doing lunch supervision next year, it just isn't working well for us now. I agreed to finish the year out though, so I'm trying really hard to keep that commitment.

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In other news, my baby boy turns 5 tomorrow! His cake is currently in the oven. He LOVES homemade German chocolate cake with coconut pecan icing. He's my only boy who still prefers for me to make his cake instead of buy it, so I'm going to enjoy that while it lasts :)

I would also like to say that I was super impressed with myself on Monday, that I was able to home school and work at all. The night before was really bad. I have struggled with major back pain since I was a teenager. It's been a lot worse lately since I injured my back at Christmas a few years back. However, that being said, the pain I had on Sunday night was hands down THE WORST back pain I've ever had. If it wasn't for several layers of Tiger Balm, an amazing husband rubbing my back and keeping me as calm as possible, I definitely would have ended up in the ER.

Next week we're doing our family fun day. John is taking Tuesday off and Ty is being excused from school. We're taking the kids to the Telus World of Science, going out for lunch to Red Robin (as the kids insisted) and then taking them to Toys R Us so they can each pick out a toy. This day is my Dad's Christmas present to the kids. They are super excited for it and so are we!

Or Not...

So our plan was to wait until September for Caleb to start home education. Then things started going downhill really fast. Before, Caleb came home from school about 2/5 days each week and was either distraught in tears as he walked through the door, or he'd explode in anger. I eventually figured out that the problem was that he'd tried to stay in control all day long and bottled up 'everything' and it would explode when he got home. Well, it started happening every.single.day. Caleb couldn't handle things. I couldn't handle things. The status quo was clearly not working anymore. So we made a big change, and decided to start home schooling ASAP instead. I found a board that was willing to accept him mid-year. I quickly figured out some curriculum, pieced together an Education Program Plan and sent in his registration information last Friday. On Wednesday this week, I heard from Caleb's facilitator. He was very nice and let me know that he's happy to be involved as much or as little as we're comfortable with. Then yesterday morning the official acceptance letter came. So today is Caleb's last day at the school. Monday he starts doing home school. It's a little bit sad. He'll miss seeing his friends so much. It's sad for him to leave the school he's been at since the first day of Kindergarten. But all 3 of us (John, Caleb and I) know with a deep surety that this was the right decision for Caleb and his specific needs.

For inquiring minds, we are only doing 5 subjects for the rest of grade 4. English Language Arts, Math, Science, Social Studies and Health. He was planning on dropping art and music next year anyway, so I wasn't even going to bother with that. He's doing level 1 French in grade 5 as is, so continuing FSL this year wasn't at all necessary. As for Phys Ed, we will still have opportunities for him to be physically active, it's just not an official subject for him for the rest of the year. We may put him in swimming lessons a couple of months down the road, but we'll see how things go.

So that's kind of everything that's been going on, for the most part. Most of my time went into dealing with this and getting everything ready as quickly as possible. I'm sure there are people who think I'm crazy for making this choice, but we got an incredibly strong answer from Heavenly Father and continue to get them, so we feel very confident going into this that we have made the best choice that we could for Caleb. I feel so blessed to be in a position to be able to do this for him, and to do it within a province that (in my opinion) is one of the best places in Canada to home educate.

In the way of other news, Caleb and Tyrell went to the dentist this week. They were both awesome, but they both need fillings, so we'll be doing that next month. Mostly nervous about Caleb, because he has a fear of needles, but we will be bribing him to tough through it. Also, my doctor referred me for a sleep study for sleep apnea, which I have do to at the end of the month. I'm really not looking forward to it, mostly because I have a hard time falling asleep as it is and I'm pretty sure that having a mask strapped to my face isn't going to help much in that area. Oh well, better safe than sorry. Sleep apnea causes a truck load of problems if not treated correctly.

And as a final note, I can't believe that the baby of the family turns 5 next week. In some ways it feels like he's still 2, but in other ways it feels like he's been with us for so much longer than 5 years. Two things are for sure though. 1) We love him so very much and 2) He is still the best surprise I've ever had in my life.