Lost his first tooth

 Last night I was able to pull out the loosest of the two teeth.  He was so excited, and even more excited to get money from the tooth fairy!

 We also went to the pool yesterday with Uncle Daniele to cool off a bit.  The boys loved the special attention.  Isabel spent all 4 hours in the water and screamed when I tried to convince her to climb out for a break.  So we stayed in the water.

Loose teeth

 Aaron's front two bottom teeth are loose.  He doesn't tolerate pain well, and won't let us touch those teeth or work on getting them out himself.  One tooth is growing in behind and I can see it (even though the picture really doesn't show it).  I feel like my boy is officially turning into a big kid now that he's about to lose two teeth.

Does anyone have good suggestions on how to pull out those teeth?  We're not sure how to help them along.

 Even though it's hot, and we feel like we're constantly melting away, there are lots of good things about summer.  Watermelon for instance! Yummy!

And here's Aaron making a funny face with his watermelon.  Aaron likes to be silly and make others laugh.  What a fun kid to have in our family!

On a side note.  Still haven't gotten Isabel to sit down to pee.  She'll squat where she's going, but won't sit on a toilet or potty chair.  A few gross things she's done lately:

While unloading kids and things from the car she climbed into the driver's seat and had a very big accident all over the driver's seat.

At the park had an accident while climbing on one of the playground structures.  She was kind of high up and not where I could immediately grab her.  She formed a good sized puddle.  She then laid down on her stomach and started lapping it up like a dog.  I couldn't stop her.  So I quickly told Aaron to give her a swat on the bottom to try and make her stop.  He had a plastic sword in his hand, and gave her a little pat.  It worked and she stopped drinking up her own pee.  Gross!!!!  I didn't give or accept any kisses the rest of the day from her.

Givers

Yesterday we went to a lake near our house.  It was beautiful, and we fed old bread to the fish and the ducks.  While the kids were playing at a little playground, I watched an older gentleman shuffling along.  I'm pretty sure that he had Parkinson's disease, he had the Parkinson's shuffle and the thumb bobbing that you usually see in people who suffer from this disease.  It's a terrible disease to have because it takes away your mobility and you have to put in a LOT more effort to take steps, to move, than a regular person would have to.  Eventually that loss of control goes up towards your face making it hard to swallow, and even hard to smile.

I remember taking care of an elderly woman in an assisted living center when I was in college, and when I got a smile from her, I felt like I was being given a big treat!

This gentleman that I saw by the lake, despite the difficulty in moving around had one of those pincher/grabber sticks in his hand.  He labored to walk and pick up some trash with his special stick, and then labored to walk and put it into a trash can a little ways away.  As I watched him, I thought, "there is a man with character!"  It cost him a great deal to do a very small amount of good, like cleaning up the park that he was in.  But he is a giver.  He gives to those around him, and the things that surround him.  He could very well feel sorry for himself and about his lot in life (kind of like I had been doing that day because I was so tired from not sleeping).  But no.  Instead he was giving and lifting around him.  What a man!  I thought of the story in the New Testament and about the widow giving her mite.  It was so little, but it was all that she had.

I felt like I want to be a giver like this gentleman that I saw.  Not just when I'm old, but now.  When I'm young and sleep deprived, and I feel like my brain is on screen saver all the time, and I feel like my brain my short circuit when I hear the kids screaming.  But I can still give kisses, and hugs, and reassurance, and patience when I want to lose it.  I can be a giver!  I just hope that I don't fail to keep trying.  I feel like I need divine assistance to live this way, and everytime I seek for it, I feel filled up and given what I need.

Maybe that's part of the gift of giving... when you haven't got what you need anymore, but you keep trying, love and patience and faith and kindness is given to you in abundance.  Grateful for that.

potty training

Our computer is out of service and therefore I don't have any pictures to show.  But we are full-fledged potty training.  Isabel refuses to let me put a diaper back on her in the mornings and so we're going at it full guns.  Unfortunately with one little problem.  She won't pee sitting down.  She goes in front of the toilet, pulls up her shirt like her brothers do when the go to the bathroom and she wets her pants.

The good news is that she's figured out when she does have to go and usually tells me, or has a face where I know that she knows she's got to go.

So in the mean time it's cleaning up lots of urine off of the floor!  And off the oven door when she decides to climb on top of it, and before I can scold her and get her down, she has an accident on it!  Oh my.

bad fabric experience

not grey fabric!

One nice thing about having my mom come visit is that she was able to bring us things from the states, including what I dream about most- fabric!  I had made an order from fabric.com because I really wanted some grey fabric.  When I opened the small package, I was horrified to find this ugly piece of fabric instead of grey fabric.  The tag on it says Kona Grey, but um, it's most obviously not grey.

I emailed fabric.com with how upset I was about the mistake.  They emailed me back saying that there is a 30 day return policy and I was at 35 days and so sorry, too bad.

I wrote an email back explaining again how unsatisfied I was, that I didn't have a chance to check the package within that 30 days to please reconsider.

They did decide to a one-time only refund.  So I was grateful to have not lost my money on some really, really ugly fabric.  I will think twice about orders in the future, but likely will purchase from them again because they have good prices.

Stabbing the fly

The other day we were eating dinner when a fly started flying around Jordan.  He had a fork in his hand to eat his pasta when he started eyeing that fly in a sneaky sort of way.  That fly decided to land on his left arm. Unfortunately for the fly, it landed on Jordan's left arm, and his right hand was wielding a dangerous fork.  Jordan had a curious look on his face for a few seconds and then quick as lightning stabbed the fly- or better TRIED to stab the fly.

Unfortunately for Jordan the fly was faster than him and he ended up stabbing himself in the arm.  Paolo and I both had to choke down our laughs and fake cough to pretend to not be laughing our heads off.  Surprisingly Jordan didn't cry.  He managed to shrug it off as something funny and we finished our meal. Jordan, Jordan.

ninja Jordan

Nonni

Grandma Copple and Papa Jim arrived on Wednesday!!!  It's so good to have my mom for a few days, and even more excited are the kids to have real live grandparents.  In Italian culture and society grandparents have a HUGE role in helping raise the kids, especially while the parents work.  It's almost more normal for kids to go to school and get picked up by a grandparent.

Jordan's life long dream is to have a grandpa.  He makes up stories all the time about things he does with his grandpa, and even more he dreams about having a grandpa picking him up from school.  So Wednesday he got his wish.  Grandpa Papa Jim came and picked him up from summer school.  I've never seen such a big smile on his face!

sand balls

 Thursday we went to Ravenna, and while the grandparents were sight seeing, I hung out at the beach with the kids.  Fortunately it was a weekday and there weren't many people there.  And the water was really shallow for quite a ways out so it was easy for the kids to play safely in the water.  Jordan figured out that you can make sand/mud ball and throw it just like you would a snow ball.  Worse effects though.  Trust me!

 They played 3-4 hours in the water and we all got burnt except for Isabel.

 We had fun burrying the kids in the sand.  Unfortunately Jordan got a huge mouthful of sand when Isabel came up and threw some sand in his face while he was lying there.  He took it pretty well though.  Happy 4th of July!