The 3 Boy Update

Obviously my New Years Resolution had nothing to do with blogging... lol. I have been busy with Eli in school, Seth at home learning, Jacob recently potty training, and being tired. Eli finally lost his first tooth!!! Congrats Elijah! He has been wanting to lose a tooth since the beginning of Kindergarten. He has been very upset since the day his cousin Teancum lost his first two teeth in one hour over a month ago. January 21st, 2010 Here is his story:

So, I came out of my room after going to bed because something was on my mouth. My mom said, "Look in the mirror." and I looked and saw blood. It wouldn't stop bleeding so I started wiggling it a lot. My mom tried to yank it twice but she is not good at getting the floss tied around my tooth and the floss just like slid right off. My mom got me a paper towel and I was wiggling it more and then it just came off. I went to tell my mom and it was like 9:30 at night. Jacob got to see my tooth, but Seth was sleeping so I put it in my tooth box and hid it from the tooth fairy. I showed Seth in the morning and put my tooth box out that night and got $2.00.

Elijah has been having such a rough time recognizing and expressing his emotions. Every week that follows Shane leaving is usually a tough week. The problem is Shane left on Jan 3rd, Eli had a rough Jan. 4th - 8th. Then Shane was home for a week and he left on Jan. 17th, Eli had a rough Jan. 18th - 22nd. I started to get worried so I started reading Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child by John Gottman. So far it is such a great book. It is teaching me what to say and do to help him work out his emotions in a positive way. It has worked wonders using the techniques in just the past week. Elijah is now at a 4th to 5th grade reading level, excelling in math learning difficult addition and subtraction and learning his multiplication tables, and just loves all the academics in school. He is also anxious for the baby to come, so I can sign him up for sports again.

As you may notice, Elijah got his hair cut. After being referenced as a she three times in a week, he said he's ready for spiky hair. So, here he is with his new doo. You look adorable with long hair Eli, but soo handsome with short hair.


Jacob boy! He has been so good and not so good lately. The not so good: He is taking up every bad habit of talking back, getting mad, hitting, biting, yelling, and temper tantrums. The good: He is so polite always saying please and, "Oh, thank you!" He always tries to give loves to say sorry, hello, and good bye. He has been very protective and he chooses sides. This is not really a good thing, but its super funny. If I am scolding Eli or Seth, then he his scolding me. He says, "Time out mommy! I'll spank your butt!" Now, I have been doing what I shouldn't do lately and that's giving empty threats. I am not a spanker, but for some reason I keep threatening. They just go to time out and we resolve the issues, so I don't know why I'm just not saying, "You are going to time out!" instead. Weird, I know. Thank you Jacob for teaching me what I'm doing wrong. One really stressful and great thing that Jacob is doing is potty training. He does really well when he has no underwear or pants on. He likes the little potty instead of the big boy potty with a little seat on top. Eli and Seth always went with the big boy potty, so that's new for me. We started with jelly beans and now we are on to marshmallows for going pee. If he goes number 2, then he gets a lolly pop. He has been doing fairly well for peeing in the potty as long as he stays in my sight and we stay home. He went number 2 on his own for the first time yesterday. We were all excited! He usually waits until I put a diaper on him then he goes in there. That's either when he first wakes up, before nap, after nap, or before bed. I am hoping the hard work will pay off and we'll have this done before the new baby comes.

Seth is just the greatest kid. He has been just devastated about being pulled from preschool, but has learned a ton in just a month with me. We work on writing, numbers and math, grouping, science, social studies, art, health, and reading. We cover all the subjects throughout the week on a rotation with reading and writing daily. His school time is one hour and some times less, but he's already learning sight words, counting to 60, all sorts of science and social studies info, and has read a few tiny Bob Books. They seem to be very helpful as beginning reader books. Since he is never gone during the day he is having to come with me for a lot of things like shopping, errands, and going to Eli's school to talk about emotional disruptions. One day Eli was accused and punished for something he says he did not do at school. After a few hours of discussion Shane and I felt that Elijah was telling the truth, so I set up an appointment with the principal and teacher and handled the situation. The principal apologized to Elijah and I and agreed to handle things a little differently with subjects regarding Eli. It was a stressful week that ending well. What does all of this have to do with Seth? He has a very good memory! One day Eli's school called to say he had gotten wet in a puddle and needed a change of clothes. I packed in Jacob and Seth and came to the rescue. The principal walks up very nicely and says, "Hey, you guys are Eli's brothers right? Seth.... and... Jacob? Good to see you guys." Jacob smiled and got really happy. Seth looks at him and says, "Hey! You're that guy that doesn't believe my brother!" I told him that's something he didn't need to worry about and I would handle that discussion. Talk about the funniest thing ever! I was trying so hard not to laugh and succeeded luckily. We really need to watch what we say around him!