Christmas...and a new year....

I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas! As you can see by the pics above...our kids were terribly disappointed in their gifts. I must say it was a very nice Christmas this year. Hubs and I made a pact to only attend one or two parties and the rest skip and stay home. We want the kids to be able to enjoy their new stuff and not have stress with running to and fro with different get togethers. Christmas Eve I had one of my daycare families and then when they left Hubs and the kids and I all piled in the car to deliver cookies to the fire stations (especially the one who responded to our house earlier this year when Trix had his huge seizure)and we also delivered to a policeman we know from church. Then we came home and lounged around after dinner. We read stories with the kids, watched a christmas movie and then attempted to put the kids to bed. It was my fault...Trix fell asleep on the couch and when I put him in bed he sleepily asked me if it was Christmas yet. I told him no but santa would be here soon...boing..his little eyes popped wide open! He was awake till 10:30 and up at 4:30...oh well I told the kids (he woke up the other two) that we would not be investigating what Santa brought until at least 6am. So Dawn if you read this nope your not the only one who was up before it was light out! lol We opened gifts, and I made homemade cinnamon rolls and hot chocolate for breakfast (ok so it was homemade from a pop open can, and instant hot cocoa...remember I was up till almost 11 the night before and awake since 4:30) but nevertheless it was a cozy fun day. I did make a prime rib dinner with mashed potatoes, corn, fruit salad etc.and afterwards we played games with the kids. In the picture above Trix beat Daddy at the fishing game which is funny since my husband is such and awesome fisher usually but apparently not at fisher price lol. :)
Now onto my New Year...I normally don't make resolutions because I never stick to them but this time I am going to stick to one...my biggest resolution is to get healthy again!

Nice people....

While reading the news online this morning I about dropped my hot chocolate cup (ok that is a mouthful but I dont like coffee...there I said it...I am a Washingtonian and I hate coffee forgive me.) Anyway as I was reading I was shocked to see a ..dare I say it? N-I-C-E story in the news! It was part of that "pay it forward" trend that is starting to catch on. Especially with the hustle and bustle of the holiday season upon us, and after watching shoppers beat each other up...errr I mean search for the must have toy of the season or whatever else they need it was nice to see this story. A woman at a starbucks bought her morning coffee and then decided she was in the Christmas spirit so she paid for the lady behind her, and started a chain of events that went through 490 customes as of 8 am today...I am not kidding. This woman did this yesterday morning at 8am and it has been going strong even into today. Here is a link to the article http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2004084452_webstarbucks20m.html

As for us...our hoiday season so far is going beautifully. I am done shopping for the kids, just gotta finish up for my mom and hubs. The cookies, peanut brittle, and fudge are almost all baked. I am so excited I have been working on a tradition with my kids since they were little and they actually came up and asked me about it this year in a very excited manner. The tradition is that each season we bake and bake and bake. Then on Christmas Eve the kids and hubs and I all pile into the car with tins of cookies, and candy and homemade cards that the kids made...and we deliver them to our local fire stations and police stations as a thankyou for giving up time with their family to protect us. My little ones LOVE this tradition. I am glad because I want them to look back on their holidays as stress free and remembering the true spirit and not just the rush of shoppers, and fussy parties. Although we have been to a couple parties this year...we have tried to keep everything low key.

anyway if I don't post till after Christmas...well I am just enjoying my family.
Merry Christmas to all my blogging friends and hope your holiday is fun, memorable, and stress free. :)

The Cheerio Queen

Hello again....

I am sorry it has been so long since I posted. I always have big dreams of posting every day or even every other day but I just have not been able too. When I do have time I often am tired or just have not had anything to blog about. Most o fmy blogs update you on my family although my goal was to use my blog to talk about topics...especially homeschooling. I do spend time reading quite a few blogs for inspiration on homeschooling ideas, along with inspiration on family life, christian living etc. I want to highlight a few blogs that i normally read becuase I think they are ust really good blogs. No I am not part of any blogging awards committe or anything like that but these are blogs I really like to read for a chuckle, inspiration, ideas etc.

the first one I want to talk about I actually just found and it is really neat. Her blog is "Large Family Mothering" This woman homeschools 14 children! I am not kidding she really does. She also recently wrote a really neat post on coming back to family life. I found it so inspiring. I am the type of person she was describing in this article she wrote and posted recently. Check out this article and then explore her blog...http://ladyofvirtue.blogspot.com/2007/12/return-of-family.html
the second one I want to highlight is : It coulda been worse! All I can say is if you want to laugh then this is definitely a blog for you to read! Deedee is hilarious and humble about raising and homeschooling her "three quirky children" as stated in her bio on her blog. I don't think I have ever read her blog where I have not laughed at what she writes and i mean that in a good way. :) check her out at: http://fiddledeedee.net/
the third blog I read every day mostly for inspiration is one I have talked about before. "By Sun and Candelight" is a very inspirational blog and one that as a homeschooler myself I check every day because she always has such cool crafts and ideas for celebrating seasons. Oh and I always check to see what her kids are reading for books because so often I get stuck in a rut of one kind of books for the kids...she has awesome ideas. She makes you feel as if your a guest in her home just through her writing and it is obvious her kids are very blessed. She is also a nature lover so you should check into some of her awesome posts on nature. Dawn is one of those people that writes so well you feel like she is a friend of yours even if you have not met her in person lol. Check out her blog at: http://www.dawnathome.typepad.com/
The last one I want to highlight is "Getting Ahead" if you are looking at ways to be frugal then you should visit Jennifer over there. :) She has some GREAT ideas! She is a homeschooling mom of 4 who recently went through a period where she wanted to pay a dental bill and so she actually made it on $25 dollars a week for a family of SIX for groceries..also using what she had stockpile in the house. I am impressed she also payed off her dental bill. She has some of the neatest ideas and seeing as how my goal for this year is to "be healthy, and more frugal" I will be visiting her blog a lot. :) Go visit Jennifer and her adorable kids at :http://getting-ahead.blogspot.com/

Well those are some of the blogs I like to read...how about you? If there is a blog you love to read that you want to share then leave me a comment. :)

I hope everyone has an awesome holiday season. :)

Take Care,
The Cheerio Queen

Happy Thanksgiving!

yes a post today! Mainly it is just a bragging post lol. It is mostly going to be showing pictures of the kids that we just had done for the year. Hubs and I have not had any done yet lol. I decided to wait until I see if Santa brings me the gym membership I asked for. then I will do some before and after pics in a few months...maybe. lol.

Until then I will leave you with the pictures of the kids. I hope everyone is having a wonderful turkey day and is finally in a triptophan coma with loved ones lol. :)

In the mean time...Here is what I am truly thankful for on this Thanksgiving.

Update on the neurology appt yesterday.

Hello and thanks to those who emailed me asking about how Trix's appt went with the new neurologist yesterday. So I figured rather than email everyone seperately I would come up with a blog on it.

Hubs really likes the new Neurologist. He just felt like he was a better fit for our family and did not brush off our concerns. the last one had a little bit although he was good. Anyway Hubs came back with a mixed bag of results. I saw mixed bag because really it is a big mixed bag of emotions for me.
Trix has had more seizures recently then even Hubs and I realized and let me tell you I am always watching him like a hawk to the point Hubs keeps telling me to relax I am not doing him any favors. I know he is right but to be honest it is hard to just turn your emotions or sixth sense off with a switch. Anyway when describing how Trix has been lately especially over the weekend the neurologist said more then likely he had at least 2 seizures on each day. The issue with Trix is most of his seizures are not the "tonic clonic" like most people think of where one is shaking, and falling to the floor etc. His are more what they call "partial seizures" where he zones out, sometimes he gets really whiny and says he does not feel good but cannot tell me what does not feel good etc., this weekend it came out that he was just plain out of it...almost like he was in a funk. He did not want to eat dinner which is very out of character for Trix...he is ALWAYS hungry. lol But in any case he basically had 2 back to back seizures both Sat and Sun in the afternoon and it took a long time for his brain and body to reset. As I looked back to all the days I kept record of how strange he was acting I realize he has had a LOT of seizures lately. The mixed bag of emotions comes in where I am in one sense somewhat relieved to have my concerns validated, but frustrated and disappointed that he has been doing worse and not better. I know I should be grateful that he is not having 10-20 tonic clonic shaking seizures every day like some people have to go through but ...well I am just a mom who does not want to see my child like this at all.
So we got Trix some new medicine which the main side effect is it will make him sleepy, the second "possible" side effect is gall stones. Sheesh that is only a possiblity i need to make sure he stays hydrated and he should be ok. However he will be taking both the medicine he is currently taking plus the new one for awhile as I am supposed to wean him off the first medicine. Apparently you cannot just stop the medicine. For the next two weeks he will probably be very sleepy. I have to take him back to the neurologist in two months. If after a couple weeks the new medicine does not work, then we have to try one more medicine. Truthfully I am praying that one of them works because if the 3rd medicine does not work then we are looking at Brain Surgery for it. YIKES. I am not prepared for that. I of course will be getting 2nd and 3rd opinions before it comes to that and I know they can do some great things with surgery these days but the thought of my baby on the table having his (in my opinion brilliant) brain being operated on is not the greatest thought in the world. However I always as a mom go to the worst scenario lol. I am working on just focusing on trying new medicine instead and hoping beyond all hope that one of them works for him. He is getting to the stage now where he is really frustrated with all his seizures, and keeps asking me "mommy can we stop these seizures so I can feel better?" That tugs at my heart. I went to an awesome ladies thanksgiving night out last night for our church ladies, and was talking to a friend of mine who is also one of Trix's helpers and she told me that when he was in church on Sunday he asked her on his own if they could pray to God for his seizures to stop. See he is such a bright boy. I think what bugs me most is that he is more and more aware of his seizures and is partially conscious during them so he is remembering them and the fact that i have no control to stop it or fix it is the real issue with me. Oh well on a brighter note this new neurologist is really good and I did get some validation of my concerns and I at least have a few more answers then I did before which is nice. Ok on that "uplifting" note lol. I need to go make lunch for the kids who are all staring at me wanting to know when they are going to eat haha. I promise from here on out that I am going to try and post more happier posts.

Maybe tomorrow I will post more about the awesome Thanksgiving ladies night out at church! The guest speaker was wonderful and it was really great to just have fellowship and of course food. :)

Been awhile I know...

As usual life just gets crazy busy sometimes. :) Hubs and I had a great time in Ocean Shores it was so nice to get away for a couple days...of course we are complete nerds...we were ready to go see our kids by the next morning so we left a little earlier haha. What can we say we love our munchkins! In any case things around here have been as usual busy. I have honestly not taken anytime to blog because I am working on that other biz I told you about to build since I am closing the daycare in June. On top of that I have been pretty uneasy lately because Trix has been having more seizures, behavior issues which we think is caused by his seizure meds (every time we up the dosage he gets more impulsive, and has more behavior problems), he has been acting really strange for the last week complaining of sudden headaches etc. So we are taking him to the neurologist today. Actually Hubs is I have daycare kids so I am sending hubs with a big list of questions. He has a new neurologist as his other one retired to write a book. Personally I am ok with that because it will be a second opinion. I just cannot help the feeling that something more is going on with him but yet I cannot figure out what it is. It bugs me because I am a fixer and want to fix whatever is going on but I can't and that is frustrating for me...plus I am a Mom and my heart and instinct tells me more is going on that meets the eye. Well in any case I am going to keep praying I know God has a reason for this I just wish I knew what it was.
Otherwise everything else is going well. We are gearing up for Turkey Day this week! I am really looking foward to that! The kids are doing well. Honey Nut is doing really well in her school work and has been coming along well with the k12 curriculum we are using. Lucky Charms is doing well also but is trying to be stubborn and is very frustrated to find out Mommy and Daddy are even more stubborn then he is. lol.

This weekend we went to the Pacific Science Center. Yes again, we are really getting a lot of use out of that membership we got as a gift last year! This weekend when we went we used the free passes for an imax movie there. We saw Monsters under the Sea which is not as gruesome as it sounds it was talking about prehistoric fish, shark, and water dinosaurs that lived many many years ago. The cool part about it was that it was 3D so the kids got to wear the cool glasses. They LOVED it! Especially Trix..he kept reaching out to touch the fish. Of course in all my wisdom I forgot the camera so I have no pictures for this post sorry. I did take it with us to Ocean Shores but we spent the first day at the Casino, and the second day on the beach but it was so cloudy because of the time of year that I did not take any pics. Although it was still beautiful. I love the Ocean and Ocean Shores is one of my most favorite places in the whole world.

Oh yeah we have been doing some Xmas shopping online this year. It is just easier. One of the pitfalls of homeschooling is that I have all the kids with me all day so it is not as easy to get the shopping done lol. That is ok I still love having them with me all the time. They really are awesome kids.

I have been reading a really great book called: "The Mom your Meant to Be" by Cheri Fuller. It is a Focus on the family book. One of the things it told me to do in the first chapter is write down all the things I love about each one of my children, and then also write down what frustrates me most about my children. Then pray about it and thank God for both of those lists of traits! I will show you one of the things I wrote that I liked about each of my children but that is it. :)

Honey Nut~ Compassion...This little girl is the most compassionate child I know. She has such a huge heart and is always wanting to do something nice for someone, or help someone who is blue.
Trix~ Humor...Although he has had some communication issues...when he is on a good communication day Trix is really very funny! He has a great sense of humor and is always able to make you laugh no matter what situation your in.
Lucky Charms...loving...This is a child who loves with everything he has in him. He will not just hug you he will hug you with every ounce of love, and strength he has (and he is a strong little guy so watch out if he hugs you around the neck)he has such a trust in everyone and everything and has no fear at all.

Tonight I am attending the Women's Thanksgiving night out with the church gals. I am really looking foward to some girl time, and great prayer and learning.

Well anyway that is what I am doing up to now. :)

If I don't write again for awhile it is because I am up to my eyeballs in schoolwork,holidays etc.

Happy Holidays!
The Cheerio Queen

quick post

Hi all,

Just a quick post with a pic from Halloween of my little trick or treaters. Aren't they cute? Actually I had a couple more pics but they did not turn out because Trix was so frustrated waiting to go by the time I took the pic that all he did was cry. lol yes he has a mask on but you can see in most of the pics through his eyes that he was crying lol.

It has been another busy week but hey that is life with the Cheerio family. :) I am off for the weekend with hubs! We are going away (ok one night but hey it is something) to Ocean Shores! I will try and take some pics while we are there. We are excited I think it has been since before Honey Nut was born that we just took off for a weekend just the two of us. Gee I hope we have something to talk about after an hour or so...you know to get through a real conversation. In kiddieland an hour conversation between two adults takes a day and a half usually. lol No seriously we are looking forward to it!