Finally! I got myself together to post these Thanksgiving pictures. It was just me and the two kids on Thanksgiving. I made a whole chicken, stuffing, squash, real home-made cranberry sauce, gravy and potatoes (sweet and regular). Rei ate the chicken, some olives and Ian ate crackers and chicken. They are both picky. >.<
You can't tell in the pictures, but Rei is wearing a cute dress. Ian, of course, is wearing a cute little suit. I even dressed up in a skirt and blouse. Whoa. :)
Yesterday we went to Licon Dairy. It's a place that makes asadero cheese, which is really good, and it has a great petting zoo. Rei loves the goats and the ducks. Ian is less sure of the animals, but he enjoyed throwing rocks in the pond. :)
The place has parrots, which dance and talk, doves, peacocks, chickens, a swan, and ducks. It has ostriches, a camel, bighorn sheep, longhorns, buffalo, goats and donkeys. :) It's totally free, too, which is also cool. ;)
Licon Dairy Links:
I've just been having a super time with my daughter and son. Something just kind of "clicked" last weekend, and while before, I felt like I was "managing" my kids, now I feel like we're being a family. I don't know how else to describe it.
Anyway, I've been teaching Rei to play dominoes using this $1.00 set I found at Target. It has animal pictures instead of numbers, so it's easier and more fun for her. She even asks me to play dominoes without any prompting. Another game she likes is Memory, which we play using a deck of "Noah's Ark" Animal cards I found at the Dollar Store. (Yeah, I'm frugal).
Rei has also started taking ballet dance lessons and jiu-jitsu. She likes both. Today, after class, I practiced some of the moves with her. She remembered them very well! I'm very proud of her.
My son likes to have me help him walk up and down and up and down the stairs. He can crawl up and down very well by himself, but he likes to hold on to me so that he can actually "walk" up the stairs like a grown up. It's cute. He has these velcro hands now that grip me all the time. I'll be walking from one room to another and suddenly velcro boy has my pant leg and won't let go. He just walks with me.
Yeah, that's all. We're all waiting for my husband to come home from Korea. I hope it will be soon, so he can see all this stuff happening. :)
Rei drew some pictures today. Just a few months ago, she couldn't even draw a circle. Now she's drawing faces with ears, noses, mouths and hair.
I am so proud of her. :D
Last weekend, on Sunday, I drove the kids up to White Sands National Monument in New Mexico. It's only about a 2 hour drive for me and quite honestly, I plan to go up there more often with the kids. I can't wait till my husband comes back from Korea and we can all go together. :)
Rei loved climbing on the dunes and Ian was just overwhelmed by all of the sand. He loves to play in the sand! Next time, I'm going to bring sleds for sliding down the dunes.
It's so beautiful there. I highly recommend to anyone that they visit White Sands if they're in the NM area. :)
Last week, we all went Trick or Treating. Ian was a little lion and Rei was a princess. They got a lot of candy, some of which I photographed here.
We went with some friends of mine from Fort Bliss, Laura and her husband, and also with my neighbor from across the street, Anna. One of the pictures shows Anna and her mom, Beatrice, when we went to their house for candy. :)
It was fun! I had a super time, and Rei loved it. Ian got tired about half-way through, but mostly, he seemed to enjoy the Halloween decorations and lights. He loved the pinwheel in one neighbor's yard.
I really like our neighborhood. People are friendly and some of them made haunted houses of their yards. Two haunted houses were really scary! One of them, Rei refused to go inside, and I went to get the candy for her. It was interesting inside the garage: they had strobe lights and used trash bags to create a really cool interior. A witch gives you candy after you walk through all of the shredded bags and strobes. Coolness.
Next Halloween, I hope that my husband can come with us. It's really fun to watch the kids running around on Halloween. :)
Yesterday totally rocked!
Rei, Ian and I all woke up early and went to Therapeutic Horsemanship in Anthony, TX. Rei had a super time. She made some art while she was waiting for her turn to ride the horses. Then, she got to ride for 45 minutes. She even participated in the equestrian events which she's never done before while riding.
Then, she got to hold a baby chick. Ian was conquered by a baby chick, as you can see in the photo. The chick wins!
Then we drove back towards El Paso and had lunch in the Franklin Mountains. We hiked around a bit until Ian got too tired to walk and fell asleep in my arms. We saw a ton of butterflies, two large beetles (genus Eleodes?) and two large hemiptera bugs (they were huge) and a funny little toad.
We drove home and then later on, went to the Día de los Muertos festival downtown. Rei danced and we saw a lot of great altars and heard traditional music from Michoacàn.
Totally awesome! The Día de los Muertos festival is going on all week. Tomorrow, there's a workshop to make candy skulls. I am hoping we can go. ;)
I've been on an emotional roller coaster! Whee!
The up! I've gotten some great feedback on my writing. The thing about my stories, is that while I know they're not perfect, they really have a lot of 'me' in them. I use a lot of my own experiences and write about things that bother me so that I can work them out. Like, I'm bothered by death. I'm bothered by cruelty. I think about morality and how people relate to one another. Stories help me make sense of my thoughts.
I think that people think in different ways. I tend to think in stories. It goes back to how I was as a kid. I remember driving in the car, a story in my head as I'd stare out the window. The best times I had sometimes were sitting in the car, working a story through my head. I can't say they were good stories. They were crap! But all the same, that's how I think.
And I'm an observer, too. Honestly, my observations have gotten better since I got onto anti-depression medication. I find that I'm able to pay more attention to details and that's helped with my art and, in a more practical way, fixing things around the house. *grins*
The down! :(
My daughter is making me crazy!
I don't know what's up with her recently, but the past week or so she's been just awful at home. The thing that gets me, is that when I talk to her teachers, I find out that she's a perfect angel at school. She listens, cheerfully works and enjoys herself very much. At home, she seems angry all the time.
It has made me wonder what I'm doing wrong. I have tried to come at this from many different angles. I figured, maybe she's tired. My daughter is 3 1/2 and she goes to school 8 hours a day! She's in a special autism program. I changed her bedtime to an hour early. No dice. She just woke up in the middle of the night instead and ended up sleeping in my room, which is what she does when she wakes up. I don't even know she's crawled into bed until the alarm goes off in the morning. That's how sleepy I am. :P
Then, after that didn't work, I figured, maybe she needs to go to bed later. At first that seemed like it was working OK. This Saturday morning started off great! Then the badness started... every time I said no, there was a meltdown. Then my son hops on the bandwagon and when Rei cries, he cries. Soon I had 2 crying, screaming children.
I'm having trouble getting her to eat anything besides Quaker Rice Quakes, cereal and chicken nuggets. She doesn't want to use the potty anymore and so that's a battle. Bleh.
One extra cool thing happened though: Rei can now put on her own socks. She bitches about doing it, but she can do it. Finally! I'm really proud of her.
I know that she tries hard and I think, in the final analysis of the situation, that she's just tired and stressed out. Today, taking that perspective, I let Rei watch a ton of her favorite movies (Baby Einsteins and Shrek). I also taught her how to play Dead or Alive on the X-Box. That was pretty cool, too actually. She has always liked karate and stuff. She liked the background with the underwater glass building the best and always picked the same character. I can't remember her name, but the chick wears denim. I put the game into sparring mode so she didn't have to compete. She just had to figure out what the buttons do. By the end of it, she was able to do a tag-team match and was showing me what buttons to press. Pretty cool.
Yep. But I didn't draw all weekend. I thought my brain was going to explode most of the time. But it didn't. Cool school. :D
I got sick over the past week or so. I lost my voice and my nose was like a faucet. My daughter was on fall break, too, so it was kind of hard getting any rest.
But I feel a lot better today. Still have some sniffles, but doing better.
I tried tie-dying some stuff and it turned out OK. I wanted to learn to dye since my daughter is constantly ruining her clothes by getting paint and markers on them. Sometimes, I can get the paint out, sometimes I can't. I figured, that if I could dye over the paint and hide it, then her clothes would still be good for school. :)
It's cheaper to buy some RIT dye than to buy a new wardrobe. LOL
Rei is talking much more! It's in a sort of stereotypical way, in the sense of autistic kids... she has a set of phrases that she uses to communicate. She says, "I want ____" or "I need ____." She can also say, "I can't." or "Not right now." She has conversations with me and other people with more garbled words. A few I catch now and again. It's interesting how she thinks about things--I think the way she uses language is a clue to how she thinks about things. In some ways, she is a very rigid person: certain things should be done certain ways. In other ways, she is flexible and creative.
She loves to dance and we rented the movie: Barbie and the 12 Dancing Princesses. It's a good movie for kids. I am actually a big fan of the Barbie movies. They all show women in a good way. Barbie's characters are strong, determined and in some movies, rescue the prince! She uses her brain a lot in the movies. And of course she dances a lot. The dancing is based on real ballet, though, and I'd like to have Rei take lessons. I think she might be ready for it.
Maybe you know, maybe you don't. But the truth is, that when I seem to drop off the "online" radar, it's because I'm dealing with depression.
I have a serious depression disorder and take medication for it. Most of the time, I do OK. Last week, however, I screwed up pretty bad. I forgot to take my medication all week! I got off track since my schedule was messed up. I need to do things in order every day to remember to take my medicine. I didn't realize I'd forgotten to take it until I was shopping at Wal-Mart and wanted to cry (OK, Wal-Mart usually makes me want to cry, but this was different!) When I finally took my medicine, everything came back into focus. I was able to organize the house, finish up some sketches... it's almost like magic. The medicine really makes a difference with me.
So, I just wanted to explain that this is a big reason why I get behind with work and art. It's tough being here alone, with my husband far away. I have no family in town and only a few acquaintances. Some weeks, I don't talk to another adult (even by phone) except for maybe one or two times.
I spend a lot of my energy on my kids. When I run out, art gets pushed aside. My daughter isn't easy to work with, but I try. I do love them both. I hope I am able to do enough for them. I am glad that my husband believes in me. :)
So that's what happens. Lots of people have depression and everyone handles it a different way. I'm glad that I got treatment for it. I'm glad I have the Internet. It makes me feel less alone sometimes.
Yesterday, I had a great day. We didn't really do anything special, but it was great anyway. I took my kids up to the highschool and since it was Sunday, the soccer fields and baseball fields were empty. They ran around, even Ian, who is getting to be a great little walker.
Rei likes to play "dinosaur," which is a variation of tag. She says, "You're the dinosaur!" and runs away. I catch her and say it back. She likes to be chased more than being It.
I recently bought Rei 2 rats as pets. She's doing a good job handling them gently and feeding them. I don't know what to name them. Rei calls them both "Mouse."
Heh, now you can see the roof of my house. This is before I lanscaped the front yard.
Here it is, in all its El Paso glory. ^-^
Today, the police cars finally left my street and they took down the crime tape. I don't know too much more about what happened. There's not too much information going around.
As my husband can tell anyone: I'm a huge Law and Order fan. I watch anything that starts with "Law and Order." Although, I do miss Lenny Briscoe from the original show. He was a really interesting character, sympathetic and tragic in a lot of ways.
I would often wonder what it would be like to be questioned by police about a murder. I thought it would be exciting: like I could help crack something open.
Instead, when I was questioned yesterday, I remembered that I felt that way, and I was ashamed. It wasn't exciting. I had nothing to say that was very useful, I think. A very stupid, sad thing happened to a woman who lived a few houses down from me. That's it.
Interestingly, when I went around to get mail yesterday, I saw one of my neighbors who lives on the other side of the block. He asked me about what was happening. Said news crews wanted to shoot footage from his yard since the street had been blocked off. He told me that some neighbors said they'd heard "gun shots."
I thought this was ridiculous and told him that I didn't think a gun was involved. I think this because A: I didn't hear any and I live really close to the house. B: At first, from what I could gather from news stories, the case wasn't immediately ruled a homicide. I would imagine that if a gun had been involved, the case would have been considered a homicide or at the very least, an accidental homicide immediately.
This made me think that my neighbors, once they knew something terrible had happened began to make up ideas about what that something was. They even began to tell stories about imagined gun shots.
I think it's a fabrication, but an interesting one.
Someone was murdered across the street from me. I didn't know her, but I remember seeing her from time to time. I was questioned by police, but didn't have any information I would consider useful.
I am shaken up by it in a strange way. I didn't know her, but as I'm writing, there's crime tape around the house, a CSI-mobile, lots of cops, detectives, people asking me for water that I don't know who look very lost.
Here is a clip of the news article I found about it:El Paso Police investigate possible homicide. Although, from the detective that questioned me, I learned that they are fairly certain that it was a murder.
First of all, he told me someone was murdered. He asked me if I had seen the people who live there fighting. I had not. I had seen them often outdoors, talking on the cell, but nothing that would indicate they had problems. He asked about a Blue Ford. I couldn't say if I had seen one or not because my next-door neighbor fixes cars and there's always different cars nearby. I think I had, but to be honest, I don't trust my memory of it.
So there you have it.
This quote will have me smiling all day: Militant Secular Pagan!
My son has been a little sick...just a head cold with some sniffles and coughing. He's been sleeping a lot and when he's not sleeping, wants me to hold him. So all I've been able to work on is computer stuff, since I can work on that and hold him at the same time.
I think that painting, sketching fan art and re-designing blog templates is what keeps me sane. I don't watch a lot of TV, so that's what I do for fun. Sometimes I write stories, too.
Hm. Stupid day, really. But I did get some painting done. I have about 4 murals going on right now in my house. I work on them when I can't do my "real" work: commissions. I can't draw commissions when my kids are being hyper, but they like to "help" paint, so it's an activity we can all "enjoy" (I use the term loosely) together.
My daughter loves music. Today, we sang "Head Shoulders Knees and Toes," "Old MacDonald" and danced to Rapper's Delight. I am a terrible dancer. Oh well. Rei loves "Who let the Dogs Out." She can listen to it over and over and over and over... forever.
Den de la Iniquidad is my Spanglish for "Den of Iniquity." ;)
Still never found my stupid keys. Well, that's all good. It forced me to fix the other car, which I did with the help of some of my neighbors. I live in a really nice neighborhood. In fact, I'd say in general that El Paso is a friendly city. Texas is a friendly state, too.
The most friendly state I ever went to is Arkansas. My husband and I were married in Arkansas and we could not believe how incredibly nice everyone was. It was almost twilight zone-ish, they were so nice. I grew up in Ohio and people are less friendly there, so it was a shock to me.
I've been listening to podcasts while I'm drawing. I really like AudioMartini and Geek Nights with Rym and Scott. They're fun to listen to.
My son hasn't been feeling too hot. I think he's getting some back teeth in. He's really picky: he only likes peanut butter, crackers, yogurt and assorted fruits. That's it. Sometimes he'll eat chicken. Of course he loves milk. ;) He can feed himself with a spoon now and climb onto the furniture.
My daughter is saying more "stock phrases," like thank you, you're welcome, I can't... stuff like that. But it's a good step. :)
Still can't find my keys. I have 2 cars here. One is mine, the other is my husband's. One car has a dead battery, the other has no keys. So I had to get keys made.
I walked 5 1/2 miles to the dealership yesterday. I made a key, but the catch is, it might not work because my car *might* have an anti theft chip. In which case, I would have to tow the car to the dealership and have the key made that way... grrrr.... So, I get the key made and on the way back, it starts to rain. I have Ian with me and thankfully, an umbrella. I decide to take the bus back.
It takes an hour for the bus to show up! We get rained on. Then we have to transfer buses. The bus never shows up. Turns out, it got stuck in some flash flooding. It's nearly time for my daughter to come home from school... she takes a bus. I'm about an hour away, walking... and there's lightning and thunder now, and some flash flooding... Fortunately a nice fireman gave us a ride home. I got Rei off her bus OK and try the new key. It's a no-go. But at least I can lock my car now.
I can't belive all of this has happened. Maybe I can get my other car jumped now that I can at least turn my one car on, even if I can't drive it.
Aaaaaargh!
:P
I think I have lost my keys. On Friday, I took Rei and Ian to the video store and we rented some movies. Then we got pizza. Getting home, I was juggling pizza, movies, Ian and Rei, just trying to get them into the house without dropping the pizza. I think I lost my keys somewhere at this time. I've turned my house upside down and I can't find them. I have a terrible feeling I may have thrown them away. I've tried to remain positive about this, but really, it sucks. This is the second set of keys I've lost in 5 months. I do think I've lost my mind. >.<
bleh
Great quote I found: "I prayed for twenty years but received no answer until I prayed with my legs. " Frederick Douglass
I like that quote a lot, especially right now. It's about prayer and how it doesn't work. But to me, it also shows how anything that has to be done just must be done.
All day, I've been trying to get motivated to do.... anything. The most I've accomplished is making a pot of coffee, fooling around with CSS templates and trying not to fall asleep. I'm soooooo tired!
Yesterday was really hard after my daughter, Rei, came home. Some days, her autism affects us more than other days. It's so hard for me to get her to listen and do as she is supposed to. When she got home, I was thinking we would have a good afternoon. I had been painting and she liked my painting of fish. She was really excited. Then I told her we had to go shopping. She likes to shop and ride in the car. But when we got to the store, she broke down. She didn't want to hold my hand, she wanted to run around and when she saw a zebra statuette, freaked out because I wouldn't buy it for her. Typical kid stuff, huh? I guess the difference with an autistic kid is that everything is jacked up several levels. She was on the floor screaming or in the cart screaming and this made my son, Ian, scream, too. He loves Rei and does what she does.
At home, I tried to get her to sit down and color, do something constructive. This was a battle, too. All she wanted to do was watch TV. By this time, my nerves were hell-a frayed. I was so upset: with Rei and even more, with myself. I don't blame Rei for the trouble that we have. She's a little girl and no matter what, it's my job to help her grow into an adult. If she's having behavior problems, then I am not doing something right.
I'm not sure how to handle things sometimes. All she wants to do is watch TV and have her way. Explaining things, reward systems, time-outs.... these have little effect at home.
At school, I know that she listens, works quietly at her desk, follows instructions... ect. But at home, it's a battle. It's hard to have this kind of pressure. It's really, really hard.
Then, last night, my son couldn't sleep. So I was up and down all night with him. So I'm tired.
But I need to get my legs moving. I can't spin my wheels. There are answers and I must find them.
Time keeps on a-keepin' on. Everything moves so fast! It's been a very long time since I updated. I'm doing OK. I'm pretty busy with my kids since I'm the only one here taking care of them. My husband is in Korea and our nearest family is 12 hours away by car. So it's just me, myself and I.
But I guess I'm doing pretty well. I'm keeping the house clean, keeping my daughter on a schedule, and Ian has learned to walk! My daughter, Rei, is showing more signs of speaking, not just one or two words, but sentences. This is very good! Yesterday, very clearly, she said to me "I want more." We were having cereal for breakfast. It was so clearly spoken that I almost didn't believe it. I've had dreams where she's talked to me for real, in a clear voice. This was just like that. I thought I was dreaming. I'm glad I wasn't.
Still getting caught up with work. I enjoy drawing, but I was really burned out. Now I'm doing a lot better and getting back into the swing of things. Unfortunately, I work very slowly sometimes, especially when things are disorganzed as my work load is right now. But I will finish, eventually!
Tchuss!
Ayame
Pretty good week! Last week, there was a sale at Toys R Us and my husband and I bought Rei a bike. We got a $80 bike for $40 on sale! It's a Schwinn and very girly! I'll have to take photos of Rei riding it. :)
Ian is trying really hard to learn to walk and crawl. It's funny, he doesn't crawl, but he's great at scooting all over the place on his butt! He has 2 little bottom teeth now. :)
My husband is leaving for Korea in a couple of weeks. I'm really going to miss him. I am so bad at facing reality sometimes. I know he's leaving, but I can't bring myself to believe it. He's going to be gone a whole year.
Well, life is never really how you want it... but sometimes I know it can be pleasantly surprising. I am hoping for good surprises!
Well, it's been a long couple of months. I want to talk about something that I think I need to... talk about. I have depression. I take medication for it and the medication helps a lot. It doesn't completely take away all of my depression... if things get too stressfull for me, I end up becoming very disorganized and have a hard time focusing. Recently, in the past few months, a lot has happened.
My daughter started school in January. In January also, I was recovering (with the help of my parents) from a very bad financial situation. My husband and I have finally got things working on that end (again with help from my parents).
I'm glad my daughter started school, but at first, it made me feel like I hadn't been a very good mother! Why? Well, at school, she started to make real progress! My daughter, who at this point has been diagnosed with "moderate autism" by the school shrink, didn't speak except to say a few words. She was impossible to work with. All of my efforts towards her resulted in temper tantrums. But I could tell the teachers were working wonders with her! It made me feel inadequate. Now I realize that it's foolish that I felt that way! Rei's teachers are trained to work with autistic children. I wasn't even trained to raise a "normal" child. It's a learning process. I have adapted many of the things they do at school to home. It has really worked! Now I can have Rei sit at the table and eat dinner with us. She can take her own empty plate to the sink. She can ask for what she wants by name. She goes to bed and stays in bed at bedtime (previously, I had to sit in her room until she fell asleep!). She is finally being potty trained. So much good has come from Rei going to school. I am very proud of her.
Eh... I wanted to write more today, but I guess I'll write more later. It is good to write about the things that are on my mind. I really want to do it more often.
Last Saturday, I took Rei and Ian to Therapeutic Horsemanship of El Paso. Rei loves horses. Here she is riding Cheif. :)
...and it's only Thursday! Aargh!
On Monday, my husband and I went to my daughter's school to talk to her school psychologist. It's just part of the process of making sure Rei's special education is on track. She is learning a lot at school and it was great that my husband could come and finally see the school! All of the other opportunities he may have had to see it happened when he was away with Army stuff.
But that interview with the school shrink was tiring! Tuesday was another day full of errands and such. Bleh.
Yesterday I had to clean a very un-tidy house. It gets so cluttered so quickly!
Today, I get caught up with my artwork and emails. Yeah. Whew!
For fun? I watched House and Boston Legal.
It's been a very long time since I wrote anything here. It's been a long few months for me.
My daughter, Rei, started school in January. I was very stressed out worrying about her school and such, but it has actually turned out OK. There are still some issues that need to be settled with the school district about customizing her educational experience, but those will be taken care of soon. I'm pretty firm about making sure that my daughter's educational needs are taken care of. She really needs the early intervention. That's the best way to work with autism... there is no cure, but you can teach autistic individuals how to adapt to "our world."
My son is doing pretty well, but he does have a bad cold, and maybe asthma. Even though he's not feeling super, you wouldn't really know it! He's still playful and happy. He has the best attitude. :)
My husband is home from field manuevers. I'm glad. It's nice to have some company.
