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in 2 days Silas will be 4!  Thinking about that made me want to look at old pictures and what a better way to do that than through my blog 😉
A lot has happened since I last blogged. Shocking. I know.

I started nursing school last fall. Right after I started we finally sold our house. We had even debated taking it off the market while I was in school because it would be such a pain to move. So of course it would sell. We moved to the town where the boys school is and looove it! It is so nice to have their school and activities so close! So I finished my first 2 semesters of nursing school :/ and am enjoying my summer break. And hoping I don't forget everything I've learned...

Rowan just finished 5th grade! Which means he will be in junior high next year! That's hard to believe! He started playing soccer last fall and loved it. He joined band this year and is playing the clarinet. This spring he tried out for a play in our community theater. He ended up with a bigger part than he planned when someone else dropped out. He was a total natural and loved it! He even won an award for best juvenile actor! He is enjoying getting a little more freedom and every day asks to ride his bike further 🙄 ( there's a pretty main road and railroad tracks that go through the town or he'd probably have a little more freedom. He's also in scouts again and just transitioned to Boy Scouts.

Eli will be in 3rd grade next year! His 2nd grade teacher was amazing and we are so proud of how great he does at school! He decided to try out soccer this year and he did great and loved it! He really wanted to join cub scouts so he was able to do that since we moved- they meet at the church right down the road from us! He loves scouts!  He really likes getting to ride his bike around but of course gets mad that he can't go as far as Rowan.

Silas officially has a diagnosis of apraxia of speech. We started the school year off taking him to the preschool for speech but after we moved decided to enroll him in the preschool program. He rides the bus and it was too long of a ride from our old house. Since we are closer the bus ride isn't as bad. He loves going to school. It took some adjustment but he's done great. I go in once a week and do speech with him. We are seeing his speech therapist this summer for private therapy too. He's come a long way in the last year. I decided not to put him in swimming or Eco camp because of his speech. I feel bad that he's missing out on things but I didn't want others to struggle to understand him.

No more diapers!

Done!
It happened pretty gradually that I really didn't even notice but Silas has been using the potty for months.  At first he would wear a diaper when we went out since he wasn't really good at telling us he had to go. At home he was always naked and would just go sit on his potty when he had to go. But he started hated putting a diaper on since he didn't need it. The last day we used a diaper cause we were running errands he actually told me every time he had to go and was dry! So we started going out without the diaper and he has done great!

I can't believe how much quicker he potty trained then Rowan and Eli!   It's really nice yo not have to deal with diapers anymore.  He's also dry at night! He his constantly naked at home unless we have company then he has to at least wear a diaper.  So he hasn't had a lot of experience pulling down pants so he needs help with that.

We bought him a seat for the toilet. Elmo "baby" he picked out but he usually climbs on and straddles it haha

Lately...

I was thinking- the one thing Eli really has going for him- as the poor middle child- is that I actually kept up with the blog when he was little... I actually have documentation and real pictures of him doing everything.  sorry Silas...


Silas started speech in August and lately has been doing so great! When he was fist evaluated he was 24months old and scored at a 9-10month level.  He'll have another eval soon and even his speech therapist is excited to see where he is.  I've been keeping track of his words and should blog it all.  He is still mostly gibberish but is trying to say a word for so many things even if we don't understand it.  He has just started trying to say Rowan "Wowy" and Eli "wewi"  I swear they sound different ;) It's exciting! He has actually been saying Tristan "didan" for a month or so.  Tristan is our neighbor who is good friends with Rowan and ELi, he's here a lot and Silas loves him! Probably because he's nicer to him than his brothers are haha!

Silas has been using the potty for several months now too! I totally credit the little bit of elimination communication I did with him as a baby.  He spends his days naked and can say "peepee" and "poop" he loves to be naked but unfortunately because of his speech isn't that great at telling us when he needs to go so if he has clothes on he has lots of accidents.  Because of this when we go somewhere he wears diapers and is not usually happy about it.  Slowly we'll get there... He has been sleeping and napping without a diaper and is usually dry- I usually try to sneak a diaper on at night once hes a sleep. I just bought him a seat that fits on the toilet so he doesn't need to use his little potty anymore.  Every time he had to go he would go get his potty and move it to where people were and then go haha yeah I was getting sick of that so decided the little potty needed to go.  He loves sitting on the big potty and picked out an Elmo"baby" seat.
He has finally been sleeping in his toddler bed and falls asleep really quickly if Mike takes him to bed.  He's horrible with me and spends forever laying there in Eli's bed with me He won't even lay in his bed if I take him.  SO Mike gets to put him to bed most of the time@!

Eli is doing great in 1st grade and reading really great! He is still crazy at home and does things every day to make Rowan and Silas mad :/
He has been planning his birthday party for months! He has very big plans and almost every night wants to talk about it haha So we will def. have to have a friend party for him this year, lets just hope what he wants gets a little less expensive as we get closer! He generally gets along with everyone at school, although he has had some issues with a few boys he desperately wants to fit in with.  He always wants to keep up with everyone and hates to miss out on anything.  He is excited to play coach pitch baseball this summer!!

Rowan is doing pretty good in 4th grade.  He likes to hurry on things so has gotten some not good grades from that. but hopefully he will be more careful.  He wants to play Minecraft all day everyday and if he's not then he's playing lego's.  He wants to play soccer this spring!

I am taking 2 classes this semester- yet another online Chemistry class :/ and microbiology, that will be it for my prereqs and then I can apply for nursing program for next fall.  Our lives will get insane but it will be good in the long run.  Of course I can't actually make any plans- childcare, money.... until I am accepted into the program so I just wait.  I'll be mailing my application soon but the deadline isn't till April so I won't know till March :/
The kids and Mike are all doing great helping out on the nights I have class.  The kids have a checklist for morning and evening.  In the evening they have to make sure they complete it all then they show it to Mike and he double checks them.  It's just stuff like- picking out clothes for the next day, make sure homework is done, signed and put back in bookbag... they also help clean up after dinner and pick up the living room.  It helps the next morning run a little smoother if everything is done the night before and I hate coming home to a messy living room.
Mike rearranged his schedule so that the 2 nights I have class he can get off at 4.  This puts him home by 5 so I can leave and get to class by 6.  Last year the kids got home from school and basicsally had time go to to the bathroom before we loaded up to head in town.  They ate their snack and started homework in the van.  We'd meet Mike at work and I'd take his car and he'd go home with the kids.  They like it better now a lot! It's a lot better on all of us to not have to rush like that!

I'm still hoping to blog pics of our trip last summer... one of these days!

....hello??

Eek. I'm really failing at this blog. I really want to remember stuff about silas st this age and keep forgetting to write it down. :/ 
Mike brought home the movie Pippi Longstocking a month or so ago. The old horribly dubbed one from Sweden I think. The boys did not want to watch it but I made them. They LOVED it! But what was most surprising was how much Silas loved it. He became obsessed!  This is especially funny b he had never even sat to watch a 20 mins PBS cartoon before and all the sudden he wanted to watch Pippi. And all the time! He'd go to the projector and say "Piiiipi" pretty cute. It was nice to have him watch .it on days he didn't nap so I could still get stuff done. But I saw it becoming too much of a crutch do had Mike return it. Silas still asks but not as often. I'm thinking of getting a Pippi doll for him for Christmas :) 

Silas started getting speech a few months ago. Last week I got his original evaluation in the mail - from this summer- his speech was at 11.5months at tge time. I doubt he's much higher now. I think he's even behind where Eli was at this age. He doesn't really have words for anything. He says no and shakes his head yes and no. There are things he can say - mama Dada baby ba (ball) but he doesn't regularly use them. He did just start saying Me and points at himself. Rowan gets really annoyed with him cause he's always trying to pull him somewhere to show him stuff. It's cute but definitely stressful to try and figure out what he wants.

We switched around the kids bedrooms!  I expected mike to not be happy when I suggested it but he actually went for it! Because if how much rowan and eli were fighting eli had been sleeping on the floor in Silas's room. But most of the toys were in Rowans room and that just caused more issues. So we moved the bunk bed into silas's room and Rowans room became the playroom. I love having a room just for toys and I think they are doing great being in one room. Rowan actually falls asleep a lot quicker!  He wouldn't admit it but I think he'd get scared a lot in his own room.
Of course the bad part is we moved Silas to the toddler bed since he was trying to get out of the crib. It's been awful. He went to bed do good in the crib snd now it's a nightmare. I don't know what to do. Usually he ends up laying in our bed and falling asleep. I wish he'd lay with Eli but he won't. Nap time isn't quite as bad but still takes way longer. Today I let him lay in my bed to fall asleep and he was out pretty quickly. Hopefully we figure something out soon cause I'm kinda going crazy with bedtime!

School! !

Wow! Didn't I just blog that school was out?? This summer flew by, I think even faster than usual! 

I can not believe Rowan is already in 4th grade! I don't even want to think about how he's almost in jr. High! ! And 1st grade for Eli! I'm definitely curious to see how he'll adjust to having homework this year!

This year the night before school started they had an open house so we could meet there teachers and bring in supplies. I really liked it and it was nice to not be as rushed for the first day. I even made them ride the bus the first day since their stuff was there already ;)

Eli is really excited to have several friends in his class. His teacher seems great and I've heard really good things about her so I'm excited for him! Every day he comes home telling me that 1st grade is the best! I met with his speech therapist today and she's going to informally work on the "r" sound with him in a group ( of 2nd graders he'll be excited cause he loves the older kids!) She usually doesn't address that sound in 1st but thinks it'll be good to work on since he's had lots of speech issues. Last year he started with an IEP because of all the speech issues he needed to work on and this year he's not even formally getting services!  He's done so great we are so proud of him!

Rowan doesn't have any close friends in his class ( Like last year :/) but he likes several of the kids so I think it'll be fine. His teacher seems nice too. Of course he's already finding things to complain about - the other class has Legos.... hopefully he can have a good year in spite of that ;)

They have a new bus stop that's a few blocks away. Mike takes them in the morning cause he leaves for work but in the afternoon they will usually walk. So far it's been fine there's a group of kids so that makes me feel better.

Silas has been obsessed with his bookbag since school started. It's pretty cute. He wore it both times we went to the school and he wears it at home a lot. I thought he'd be really upset when they'd leave but he's been fine. He is really excited when they get home though.

Home Sweet Home

We got back from our 20 days of vacation Monday evening. The last day is always the longest....

It was so fun - I'll post more details and pictures later. I think we went to 9 states!

Definitely makes us want to travel more or just move somewhere prettier ;)

Here's a few of my favorite shots from my phone.

SUMMER

Why does it have to go so fast?! Last summer I took Chemistry online and I barely remember anything because I was so busy.  I decided not to take a class this summer, I was hoping to remember this summer but it's going so fast already.  I think the fact that the kids didn't get out until June didn't help with that either!

Baseball and t-ball ended last week and now we have our evenings back so that's nice. Of course soon we leave on our trip...
The boys are doing swim lessons again and to try and make up the 3 weeks we'll miss we are going 4 days a week instead of 2.  It's been kind of a pain.  On Wednesday's they do Eco-camp at Homer Lake- they love that and are sad that they'll miss the last few camps.  Silas and I have either gone for walks during camp or go to the library and then on walks.  Silas mostly wants to go in the building and get water in the cone cups from the water cooler....

We've only had one fire this year so far! That's kinda hard to believe but for the most part we've had pretty nice weather.  The boys have to earn minutes to be able to play games on the ipod so they've been more willing to help out with chores- mostly Rowan, Eli is pretty much happy to only earn 5 minutes here and there lol Rowan wants to get tons and save them up!

For the most part we've had nice lazy days, not quite doing all that I hoped we would but having to go places every day really messed us up.