The more you read...

Parent teacher conferences for Aaron today! He is progressing amazingly well. He is right on track for everything he should be doing. Just needs to work on letter recognition and cutting appropriately, but these are both skills that need to develop still at this age anyways.

I have been trying to figure out if I am doing enough to help them all at school, and I have decided that I am going to be purposeful about reading to them, so, tonight, we shall read three books, each boy will choose one, and I will make this a daily routine! Here's hoping I can make this work!
Update tonight to follow!

Here I am!

So, it has been a long time, but here I am. A lot has changed.
The boys are all doing really well. Aaron has been discharged from most of his specialists, and Caleb and Logan are doing really well in school. Someone else is doing really well in school....ME! I started back last spring, and I have really enjoyed it! I am going to community college for special education, and I plan to transfer to the University of Rhode Island to earn my Bachelor's in communicative disorders, and then my Master's in Speech and Language Pathology.
The boys have grown a lot. They are learning to play chess, and loving. To build with their Lego's.

Steve has been super supportive and accommodating while I am doing my school work, and I could not be happier about that. He also has joined the church choir. I know, shocker right?

All in all things are good, and I plan to post more.

Here are some pictures of the past few months. Disneyland, legoland, school, Halloween, and Christmas included

Sometimes you just need to go...

I have to say, today, today my kids are behaving wonderfully, and I am loving having time with them!

wow!

school is awesome!
After 3 days of second grade for Caleb he is adjusting awesome, and loving it!, and today being Logan's first day of Kindergarten (he was so excited to be dropped off!), I am so excited that I have this opportunity to spend time alone with Aaron. We took a shopping trip to Whole Foods to get some of his "special Milk" and while we were there, we went to the produce section, and Aaron picked out some peppers, Orange, Red, Yellow and Green...and so I grabbed an onion, some garlic, we grabbed some roast, and what do you know, dinner! and Aaron picked it out!

Now, you might say, so what? but what you don't know is that getting any of my kids to behave in a store is like herding cats, they scream, they run, they fight, so this was a wonderful chance for me to spend some time with Aaron, and teach him that shopping trips can be fun, and not full of chaos!

when we got home, he helped me prepare dinner, and then he got all excited as I cooked, and I hope when I pull it out of the crock pot tonight that he will be just as excited to eat it.

Medically, he seems to be doing better, except for the fits, but we see the pediatrician tomorrow to discuss what it could be. right now, I am just happy to have the time to work with him. He is making huge strides, he is talking more, and going to the bathroom on the potty (yay) and all in all, improving little by little every day!

a trip and a half...in more ways than one!

well, we took the kids to Disney, surprised them, got in the car, they were surprised, it was fun, and it was HOT!!! heat index of 110 or more every day, and in the back of my mind every day was "what if" what if he has a seizure, what is he has a stroke, what if he isn't ok....well, he was, for the most part ok. only a few small things stuck out to me. he refused to eat almost anything. he drank a lot ( I will take that in the heat!) his sweat smells like vinegar (not sure what this means) and he is aggressive in the heat. He punches, he kicks, he screams, he pinches, he stomps his feet...sigh...so we shall see what all this means, but what it does mean, is that we can go places, for now, he is a "normal" healthy child who can travel with very few meds, and as long as we keep Milk out of his body, and put Culturelle in every few days the bloating has been down.
We have an appointment with Pediatrics in September to talk about the fits, they are not normal two year old temper tantrums, and he is not easily distracted or easily redirected, so we will work on it.
in time.
I am, on the other hand, applying for jobs. I need to work, he needs time away from me, and I need to feel important. I know taking care of him is a lot, taking care of all of the boys is a lot, but i need something that is mine...so that is where the Johnson family is at right now. one day at a time...

some pictures of our boys!

10 days later

and it is amazing the progress he has made!
I can not believe that one medication could have this much of a difference in a child. He is "talking" and walking better and trying to communicate and he is happy, and less aggressive and just a beautiful little child!!!!
He says mommy and momma again (it has been months) and he says dada and is trying to say his brothers names, and just this last weekend, he has been trying to but sentences together "hi Caleb" "bye pa" and he even this morning signed Milk while standing at the refrigerator and knocking on it's door!

I can not believe the difference and I am just awesomely amazed.

Caleb and Logan have been awesome at helping with this transition too, they are helping him sign and encouraging him to talk with them, and they are helping me keep him away from the stairs. It has been a crazy few weeks transition, but I am so glad that he is better! there is still more testing to be done, and reality is there will probably be a lot more yet to learn about Aaron, but for now, I am happy he is progressing! Early intervention is going to be coming out every other week again, just to make sure I am up to date with my signing, and that he continues to improve his vocabulary, and we will also have a SLP come out to evaluate him and make sure we are on the right path.