TGIF?

Some Fridays are easier than others. Yesterday was not one of those days. It wasn't a bad day, persay, but the kids were definitely in "challenge Mommy" mode. Collin's school day included crawling under a table rather than sitting in either of the places his teacher had designated, scratching another student, and getting into a full dust-up with yet another student. I think there may have been more, but it's all gotten tangled up in my head. I'm going to cling to the bright spot in all of that: He went back to his teacher and asked what you should do when you've hurt someone, and then he went and said he was sorry to the boy he scratched. He has never once initiated an apology in that sort of situation before yesterday, and I was delighted to hear about it. I'm not ignoring everything else - of course we're dealing with that. It can get exhausting, though, to be the one who always gets 'that' phone call - the one that says "Your son had a tough day today" and goes from there.

Collin's current tics have been there for a while now. He has a sort of peep or whine he makes a lot, including in the middle of a statement or even a word, and a complex facial tic that moves from one eye to the other and down to his mouth. They're the most noticeable combination he's ever had.

Willow wasn't quite as cantankerous, but she was determined to do everything her way, which, among other things, resulted in one of those shrieking tantrums when she learned she had to ride with Mommy instead of Daddy from the soccer game to the pizza parlor last night. You know the ones - I'm pretty sure just half a pitch higher and a couple decibels louder would have seen windows shattering.

On the bright side, I made my first soccer cake, and it didn't turn out too badly. I already have ideas on how to improve it. One of these days I really have to take a decorating class. (And I'm dreaming of having an oven that actually maintains a temperature - evenly, even! - all over and for as long as I ask it to.)

New kitten

This is Skyfire. He was born on May 30, and this photo was taken when he was about ten weeks old. As you can see, he is quite a beautiful little fellow. He is now almost five months, and has grown enormously - he's a Maine Coon, and a fairly large one at that. We expect that he will eventually top out at somewhere between eighteen and twenty pounds, and that's an 'in shape' weight. He's supposed to be a puppy - this is what my daughter was pushing for, but as my son is afraid of dogs - to the point of being phobic - we opted for a cat who would grow up to be dog-sized. Needless to say, our two adult cats are just *thrilled*.

He was a fairly skittish little guy when we got him, but my husband sat in the back of the van with him on the way home, and by the time we reached the ferry, the kitten was happily curled up on his lap and purring. I swear my husband has cat pheromones. He loves to tease them, and they don't seem to care - they adore him. The kids have named him after the autobot (as in the Transformers) Skyfire. We usually shorten it to Sky. He's into absolutely everything. He got pretty sick for a while after we brought him home (didn't eat, drink, lost weight, had ringworm!) but our vet is an ace, and he's doing fabulously now. The kids love him - our daughter is particularly relentless, but fortunately she does understand the need to be gentle, and generally does her best to follow the 'kitten rules' we've set out. Much to her annoyance, the kitten prefers her older brother, who is wise enough to wait for Sky to come to him.

He dips his paws constantly into the water bowl, and he loves to 'prairie dog' to get a better look at things. He also likes to try to sleep on our heads, and purrs like a buzzsaw. We have a gerbil, who may be doomed, because the kitten is much more determined than our adult cats. I'm doing my best, but this is an overly bright feline, and unlike my two black marshmallows (really, mellowest cats I have ever seen) he has definite predatory instincts.

My sister made me do it!

My sister has been after me to start a blog for quite some time. She's lived between one and two thousand miles away at any given time for almost fourteen years now, and she wants to keep up with children, new kittens, and life in general. It's only taken her about two years of nagging to get me to this point.

Bear with me while I get all of this set up. My hope is to give my sister a chance to see regular pictures, and hopefully the rest of my family and friends will enjoy responding as well. If you've stumbled your way across this and are not a member of the group above, feel free to look around. At the moment I intend to include two basic topics: my family, and information about Tourette's Syndrom and Pervasive Developmental Delay (autism spectrum).