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- The Kid starts school next week, entering the first grade. His teacher sent him the cutest postcard welcoming him to her class. I’m so hoping that this year goes more smoothly. The Kid’s behavior has improved this summer, but it’s just him and his brother most of the time, not an entire class of kids. So we’ll see how things go with the new teacher. He is sleeping better since his tonsils and adenoids came out, so there’s that, too. He’s also been working with Hubby on his writing and getting better all the time.

- The Kid is really into cartoons right now and starting to venture into territory I’d rather he didn’t go. I don’t mind Code Name Kids Next Door or Fanboy & Chum Chum, but when he starts getting into the more violent cartoons, I have a problem. I’m one of those weird Americans who would rather my kid see people get naked than people getting hurt/killed (not that we sit around with nudie movies on either, but you get my point). So we’ve told him that anything over a TV-Y rating, he has to ask mom or dad if he can watch. We try to keep an eye on what he’s watching, but it helps that he’s such an incredibly honest kid.

- Boo moved up to a big boy bed! Hubby’s folks had the head/foot boards that match the Kid’s, so we bought them a new frame for their mattresses and set up the matching bed for Boo (his mattress is nicer than ours!). He seems to be doing well with it. There was one rough night where he was up every hour or so, but he seems to have gotten over it. The worst part is that he’s a total wiggle worm at night and moves ALL OVER the bed. He’s already cracked his head on the headboard a time or two and somehow ended up on the floor this morning (if he fell out, he didn’t cry). It’s a happy and sad thought to think that we don’t have a use for the crib anymore, but our little Boo is 2 and a half.

- My job has been sucking lately. Only because I haven’t had much to do. Finally today I got to start a big project creating computer-based training for another girl in our greater department. I was SO happy to be doing CBTs again! Our boss has pigeon-holed us to the point that all I do is system administration for our training tracking system (when I’m not traveling) and my coworker was doing all the eLearning stuff. Lucky, for me, said coworker is busy with other project right now so he was more than happy to pass this one to me! I’m hoping this will help people see there is more to me than just being a system administrator.

- Went to a weekend crop last weekend and finished 22 pages. Not bad for me. Especially since I missed half of the first day when I was trapped in an airport trying to get back home. I’m about a year and a half behind on my scrapbooking right now so I was glad I got any time at all to get a few pages done and catch up with my Scrap Mafia girls. They are about the coolest bunch of ladies I’ve ever known. Even when we don’t talk for months, it’s like we were never apart.

- Speaking of women friends, apparently I need to remember who reads my blog and not be so rude to them on here. I would hope that folks would realize when I’m venting and just doing an emotional dump here, but I also realize that I use some strong words sometimes. So I’m sorry if I offended or angered anyone reading this.

- Speaking of reading, I am slowly but surely making my way through “The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest”. This book is very hard for me to get into. I really liked the first two, but this one is slow going and not really keeping my attention. Hopefully, I’ll finish it soon so I can start the new Patricia Briggs werewolf book.

I haven’t moved the betta over to the new 2 gallon tank yet. I’m letting it run for a few days before I toss him in. I was worried that it might get too cold (Bettas are tropical fish, you know) so I bought a heater for it, but the thermometer I also picked up has read a steady 79 degrees all morning. I think it’s the air vent on my laptop heating it up. I also considered getting a filter, but the tank comes with one (sort of) and the girls at Petco talked me out of it. And no piddly fish flakes for my boy, he only eats freeze-dried bloodworms. Mmm mmm good!

Yes, I know I’m spoiling him.

The snail is annoying me. When I had him at home, he was very active and crawling all over the tank. Since I brought it to work, he’s hardly moved. I don’t know if the betta has been annoying him, if the water conditions are bad for him, or if all the moving around freaked him out, but he’s been hibernating for about a week now. If he’s moving around at night, I can’t tell. He’s not dead, according to Dr. Google, because he’s still in his shell with his “trapdoor” closed and he doesn’t smell bad. But he is an incredibly boring pet and an ineffective algae eater, if he just stays in his shell all the time. I moved him over to the new tank today, so he’ll be in there for about 24 hours by himself. If the betta was bugging him (which I never saw him do), maybe this will give him an opportunity to explore before the betta joins him. I’m also thinking about adding one or two other snails to hang out with him.

Isn’t this just the most exciting post EVER?!! Well, half the women I know are pregnant right now, and since I won’t be joining them any time soon (or ever again), I have to get my “new thing to take care of” fix somewhere.

Sooooo, the whole weight loss thing… um, yeah… That’s not going so well. I pretty much gave up once I started traveling for work about a month and a half ago. It’s pretty hard to say no when the company you’re visiting is offering free meals (and entire pints of gourmet ice cream)that are not diet friendly. I promised myself I’d get back on track this week, but I haven’t been 100% faithful to the diet and I haven’t exercised at all (other than walking down to see the fireworks on Saturday). I’m not mentally in the game right now and I need to be.

It doesn’t help that I am absolutely addicted to the Mcdonalds Caramel Frappe and have a buttload of coupons for a free small. There is not much I like to eat at Mcdonalds (aside from their tasty fries!), but those frappes are some good stuff.

The subject he’s definitely at or below level in is writing. He writes in all capitol letters with no spaces between words and no punctuation. When asked to write a descriptive story about a special event in his life, with pages and pages to write on, he basically wrote “MYCLASSWENTTOTHEMAGICHOUSE”. So writing is definitely an area he needs more work in. But he couldn’t write at all before Kindergarten so we’re on the right track. He’s just one of those kids who expects things to master things easily and when it doesn’t, he either gets overly emotional or just shuts down. We’ve got to work on that.

In the end, we decided that he should go to 1st grade next year, with enriching activities in reading and math. Luckily, the teacher who tested him will be his teacher next year. She had a really good rapport with the Kid and seems to be on top of her game. She said it would be no problem to give him more advanced work and had worked with kids with his talent previously. I let her know that I’m not trying to be the helicopter parent from Hell, I just want my kid to not hate school and to be challenged in his work. I made sure to let the principal know how disappointed and upset I am with his Kindergarten teacher. She promised us enriching activities too and it never happened. She continued to teach to the lowest common denominator. I was also upset by her demeaner towards my son. The Kid came hom on more than one occasion saying that she had called him a “bad kid” and then the other kids started calling him bad. I know my kid isn’t the most well behaved child, but he is NOT a bad kid.

So we’ll see how it goes next year. The prinicipal is awesome and very open to reconsidering the plan if it’s not working out. If the 1st grade teacher can’t provide what he needs, they could pull him up to 2nd grade just for the reading activities. Or re-assess bumping him up a grade. I just hope next year is better for my boy. Of course I want my kids to only have the best of everything!