An Ear of Corn

Kai is in the throes of the terrible two's.  He has it down...the silliness, the sassiness, and the dirty looks.  He is still pretty little so we're lucky that he cannot yet open the doors or climb up to reach the games (unlike his older brother!), so I can leave him to play alone for a few minutes. 

Tonight Eric took Cade to run a couple of errands, so it was just Kai and me at home.  His bath done and his pj's on, I left him to play while I cleaned up and got the boys' rooms ready for bed.  I was so engrossed in what I was doing, probably because it was so quiet around the house and I was able to get so much done.  That should have been my first clue that something was up.

I finished what I was doing and walked down the hallway to check on Kai.  He met me with an ear of corn.  Now considering the fact that we did not have corn for supper last night, or lunch or supper today (and although I wasn't there for breakfast this morning I'm pretty sure Eric did not serve them corn...), it was a curious thing.  And then I realized that the corn was cold.  A cold ear of corn could only come from....you guessed it...

Kai had hit the refrigerator!!!

Yes, friends, my youngest male child had been having a grand ole time removing the contents of the refrigerator in my absence.  He is always fascinated by the mustard (I have no idea why!), and managed to not only get the carton of eggs out and break all of them, but also to get the top of the carton completely off.

Kai was quite proud of himself.  He showed me all that he had done and proudly exclaimed, "Cheese!!" when I grabbed my camera to take a picture (I'm pretty sure my kids are probably getting the wrong idea by the fact that I take their picture each time they do something nutty before we clean it up...but I cannot resist!).

As I promptly grabbed the Lysol wipes to clean up this Salmonella mess, I thought back to that ear of corn.  Had Kai not found that cold veggie in the fridge his plundering would most likely have continued well into the next half hour, probably clearing out the remaining contents of our refrigerator.  I laughed to myself as I quietly thanked God for sending that ear of corn (I honestly have no idea where that corn came from!!) and saving the remaining items of my latest grocery trip.  God uses the strangest things sometimes to keep us from creating even bigger messes for ourselves.  And, I suppose, to teach us lessons...like don't leave your quiet two-year-old alone for longer than a minute!

Lessons from "Max and Ruby"

So today while Kai was down for a nap Cade and I curled up n the couch to watch a show.  "Max and Ruby" is one of his favs, so we tuned in to watch.  Now I have to be honest, I wonder about this show.  I mean, I do like it...the lessons are good and the story line is always pleasant, (and I do especially love how Max is especially mischievous and usually the one with the great idea in the end!), but I can't quite figure it out.  There is Ruby, who seems to be about 10 or 12.  Then there is Max, who appears to be about 3 or 4.  And other than Grandma, who doesn't even live with them, it appears as if these 2 kids live alone in a house.  Does anyone else find this weird?!  Anyway...

The show had already started by the time Cade and I tuned in, and today's show was apparently all about fairy tales.  On the screen we saw Grandma Bunny dressed as a queen and Max dressed as a prince.  In waltzed Ruby who claimed to be Grandma Bunny's long-lost princess, who had apparently been lost in the Enchanted Forest when she was "just a wee bunny." 

Max and Grandma were skeptical.  How would they find out if this bunny who claimed to be the long-lost princess was for real?  Grandma Bunny came up with the great idea of using one of Max's marbles.  "Princesses are special and feel things that other people don't feel, so we'll put this marble under her mattresses.  If she is a real princess then we will know in the morning."  (Yes, I know this is from "The Princess and the Pea," but I think I enjoyed it more coming from those silly bunnies...).  So they put the tiny marble under Ruby's 25 or so mattresses, and of course she has a terrible night's sleep because her mattresses are "lumpy."

I think God was using this episode to remind me how special Cade is.  He feels everything, and more times than not it results in huge problems!  But is does make him special.  I told him how since Ruby could feel everything that others could not and that made her a princess that God must have made him a prince.  "Yeah," was his reaction...not too impressed.  :)  But one day I hope our little prince is able to share just how special he is with the world!

Now I also have to add that the next episode was based on "The Emperor's New Clothes," and Max pranced around completely naked except for a crown.  This, too, would be Cade's suit of choice...I HAVE to find this episode of "Max and Ruby" for our personal collection! :)

To our oldest little superhero...

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Staying in the lines

Sometimes when I get the chance to really stop and think about where we have been over the past year through the journey with Cade I am truly able to realize just how far we've come.  Each day is a new experience, mind you...I walk on eggshells each day waiting to see what is in store.  But in the rare moments when I am able to look at the whole picture, that is where I am able to celebrate the "small stuff".

Cade still cannot really hold a pencil very well.  We are still working on his grip, and which hand he is going to use for that matter, and by the time he gets that much figured out his grip is either so hard that he breaks the point or so soft that it just falls right out of his hand.  And of course he is so frustrated and tired by then that he doesn't even want to write or draw or even color.  This has been a huge struggle for me...of course the teacher part of me wants him to be able to soar academically.  But I know that in the big scheme of things this isn't really a big deal.  This will come, I know...just another thing that I need to be patient about.

This morning I picked Cade up from his class at church.  When I finally got him to acknowledge I was there and stop circling the classroom, and then find his shoes - which he had apparently deposited somewhere in the climbing wall - I began to herd him out of the door.  One of his teachers stopped me to hand me the picture that Cade had colored during the lesson.  I thanked him and managed to get Cade into the hallway to lean against the wall so I could put his shoes back on (much to his dismay, I might add...), then wrestle them onto his feet while he was jumping around because he discovered that he had to go the bathroom right at that moment.  Luckily we were able to fly around the corner and he made it into the one-stall men's room, and I said a silent prayer it was unoccupied (because don't you know he would have just pushed himself right on in if he could...).

As I was waiting for Cade to finish I opened the picture that I had folded on the way out of the classroom.  To most people it would seem so insignificant.  The circular scribbles covered the little lamb peeking out from behind the bold color choices my little boy had decided to use.  But the scribbled circles and lines warmed my heart.  You see, I knew just how hard this must have been for him - to sit down in a little chair long enough to make this masterpiece. 

As I stood in the hall looking at his work I overheard another mom picking up her little girl from Cade's room.  The little girl proudly held her picture up to her mom, to which her mom praised, "You even stayed in the lines, honey!"  I glanced over to see a picture with bright colors and an obvious effort to keep her coloring actually in the picture.  Of course, an excellent 4-year-old piece of work.  The mom was so proud, and the two of them moved on down the hall. 

As my little boy finally made his way out of the door of the men's room and took off sprinting down the hall, I had to chuckle to myself.  Sometimes I wonder if we will ever be "in the lines."  It seems we are always just a little outside, never truly on the picture.  But hey, I just celebrate the days that we are even on the paper!

And I had to laugh out loud at God's ironic sense of humor.  The title of Cade's little lamb picture?  "Cecil, The Lost Sheep."  Thanks, Cecil, for helping me to put things in perspective today...

Are these on the right foots?

Ever pray that you can just make it to your car before you cry?  That happens to me more times than I wish to admit, especially over the last several months since Cade's issues and diagnosis.  And it continues to happen as we progress through this crazy world we have been thrust into called SPD.  I'm beginning to think I have either become a big sap or my life has somehow fast-forwarded to the age where everything makes you cry (or maybe rewinded back to the age where everything makes you cry -- that's where Kai is right now...).

Anyway, today didn't start as one of those mornings.  In spite of the fact that our a/c is messed up and it was 87 hot, sticky degrees outside yesterday, we managed to get a good night's sleep last night.  There's just something about nature at night that is a natural sleep aid.  Cade woke up early, but I was able to get him to go back to sleep for another hour and a half before he was up for good.  Kai slept waaay in, but I was able to get him up and ready - we made it to preschool on time...all was well.  I was praising that fact after the weekend we've had -- Cade was on a downward spiral all weekend and I am just "slap wore out" -- but today was good.  Cade even found shoes that he was agreeable to (Crocs are about it these days) and was thrilled that I let him wear them without socks.  And with his "Mom, are these on the right foots?" we were off!

Not sure what happened from the house to the van trip to walking into preschool...maybe the anticipation of the day or just simply being overwhelmed with all of the activity going on around him before we even got to the classroom.  But that's where the cooperation ended.  As I'm explaining to his teacher about the sour Starburst I have stuffed into a paper bag in an attempt to thwart his new oral issues, Cade is laying in the hallway.  And I'm not talking about simply laying down resting (which, I grant you, would STILL be inappropriate!).  No, his position of choice this morning was stretching his entire body across the hallway so that people had to literally step over him as they came down the stairs.

Now I must stop to say that I should have seen this coming.  As we dropped Kai off and headed down the stairs to his room Cade began to slow down and drag himself down the stairs.  It is hard for people (even me!) to understand just what assaults his little body when we come to school in the morning.  The visual craziness -- kids everywhere, brightly-colored bulletin boards all around, parents milling; the auditory craziness -- does that even NEED an explanation?!); all to be topped off with the anticipation of what will happen today sometimes sends him over the edge.  So, yes, the "dragging himself down the stairs" part should have tipped me off...

So of course I pull him up from the floor, him kicking and screaming, mind you, and manage to get him outside so at least we can hopefully have a conversation without everyone looking at us.  And that's where it happened -- a very profound, and heartbreaking, moment for the both of us.  As he has sprawled himself out on the grass I say, "Cade, what's wrong?" to which he answers, "I'm scared."  And of course I say, "What are you scared of?" to which he answers, "Of the things that are going to hurt me."  WHAM!  And there it was...his first attempt at describing what the ugliness of Sensory Processing Disorder is like for his little 4-year-old self.  How does a mom even respond to that??  Yes, I know that even the slightest touch from a friend or the loud voices of a rousing group of preschoolers or an offensive smell can certainly send him over the edge.  But what I wish we could all understand and remember is that those things literally cause him physical pain.  And it was the anticipation of that physical pain that now had him laying flat on the grass outside.

Now of course I HAD to try to talk him down off the ledge while still validating his very real fears, all the while trying very hard to keep myself together.  So I helped him up and dusted him off, then squeezed him really tight in hopes of helping his body get even a little regulated, and led him back inside.  Thank God for Julia and Amber who, unbeknownst to them, distracted me from my near-mommy-meltdown as Cade clung to my leg.  I kissed him and walked away, just praying that God would give him the strength he needed to make it through this day with his friends without a meltdown.

Walking back to the van I thought back to Cade's question as we were getting ready to walk out of the door..."Mom, are these on the right foots?"  Well, Cade - most days we probably aren't on the "right foots" - at least not to everyone else's standards, anyway.  But who cares, right?  And what real damage has ever been done from not being on the "right foots" now and then?

Fussing, Fishing, Flushing, and Laughing

So our potty fiasco has continued into this week...the infamous Pull-Up has remained.  In a moment of meltdown (I promise not all about the potty...it was just one thing that came out in my tirade...) I began to tick through the list of things that were driving me crazy around here.  The list is long sometimes, ok often, but this has been one of those weeks where I have been drowning.  Thus that potty tirade...

So I look down the hall to see my darling husband, the object of my tirade, with his hands on the said potty and his eyes closed.  Many things went through my mind...as our 2 darling children were racing down the hallway, the dinner I was cooking going crazy on the stove, and I'm pretty sure at least two phones ringing...and I need to say that most of those things were not sweet.  I mean, come on people, what in the WORLD was he doing?!  So of course I stroll (and I use that term very loosely...) down the hall, past the Daytona 500 that has now developed in our hallway, to the man I married to say..."What ARE you doing??!!"  And his answer?  "Praying over the toilet."

Now at this point you are either laughing or rolling your eyes.  I was doing neither.  Ok, maybe rolling my eyes a little.  But I certainly did not find it funny that the water that should have been already in the bathtub for our racing stars in the hallway had yet to find its way into the bathtub.  It was at about that time that Eric picked up the plunger and put it into the potty.  Now just so you know, that HAD been done -- probably 20 times or more.  Each of us had also attempted to reach INTO the potty to find the intrusion and remove it (man, what I would give for pictures of that...).  All of this was to no avail. 

You can imagine my fall on the floor surprise when he pulls the plunger up and out pops the Pull-Up.  That's right, folks...stuck for at least a week and suddenly it makes an appearance.  Most of you know I am never speechless (well, almost never...), but the shock that I experienced at seeing that thing come up was momentous.  Of course it didn't take long for both of us to begin loudly expressing our gratitude, and for both of the once-occupied young racers to make their way into the bathroom to see what in the world their parents were up to. 

As Cade looks into the potty to see the Pull-Up, which by the way he has completely forgotten about, I nudge him and say, "Cade, tell Jesus thank you for bringing up the Pull-Up!"   Without hesitating he says, "Thank you, Jesus," and runs off to find another "creative outlet" to tackle.  I, of course, immediately put Eric on task to lay hands on everything in our house with issues (no comments from the peanut gallery, please).

Meanwhile, I fished the sopping Pull-Up from the potty to encase it in it's final resting place of a plastic bag.  I must tell you, though, that it was in remarkable condition.  The pictures and colors were not even faded!!  Not sure what they make those things out of, but I'm pretty sure they are about as far from biodegradable as you can get.  But I can attest to their functionality -- they definitely do what they say they'll do.  I couldn't help but laugh with God...after all of that fussing, fishing, and flushing all we really had to do was to simply ask -- and He delivered.