bing bang choo choo train

Is it hot or what? So hot here and we are doing our best to stay cool! After I took these photos, Dennis asked why I didn't go to the other side of the pool so it seems like I might need to explain my choice of composition here. Stay with me for a minute, it will make sense, I promise!

I go to the pool typically by myself with the kids and while for the most part, they are great swimmers and love the water, I still hover like a mama owl not too far to be swift enough to scoop up one of these owlets if need be. So my angle from the pool is either in front of the slides to watch them come out or behind the diving board. And being behind the diving board, I just giggle at their adorable karate chop air moves or Alyssa's latest twist and twirl. They are so skinny and spry, I really laugh out loud and cheer them on!

Hence my viewpoint...

Love those kickin' legs of hers!

And the entire time I watch them, I have this silly camp song stuck in my head that Jaiden taught Alyssa and the two of them sing all the time...

bing, bang, choo choo train

wind me up,

and I'll do my thing

I know karate

I know kung fu

if you mess with me

I'll mess with you...

Now sing it with some serious 7 and 5 year old attitude!

return of the jaiden

This weekend was great! It was great to have this boy home again even if he was sad that he couldn't stay longer at camp. We missed him and love him so much! It was a delight to hear him talk about camp and the new things he tried, the ways in which he grew... it was incredible.

On Friday, Alyssa and I drove up to get him and we came for the closing ceremonies. The tears were rolling out of the corner of my eyes. I couldn't help it. It was so exciting to see all of these boys grow, all of these boys have their hemophilia in common and it was amazing to see them all having so much fun in a safe environment. The slide presentation was a combination of video and still images, and so well done!

Then we had lunch, Jaiden showed us a few things around camp and then to get his stuff and come home. On the drive down, he had moments of excited chatter and then stillness, absolute quiet as he soaked in his past week. A few of his highlights he told us about included

~ catching 4 fish in 1 day!

~climbing the climbing wall to the zip line, but then looking down and decided not to do the zip line

~swimming

~crafts and making stick guns and toilet paper tube eye scopes

~archery

~riding in the cart (looks a lot like a rickshaw)

~hopping right onto a horse like it was no big deal

~stood on stage during the talent show and told 4 jokes!

My highlights were hearing him tell me how a leadership boy (these are the high school boys) gave him his pokes and "... it was no big deal! Oh, and I can mix my own medicine now so you don't have to do it, Mom! It's easy!"

When I asked if he poked himself he said "no, but I did take the needle out of my arm!"

These are HUGE steps for him, and I mean really HUGE! I got all teared up hearing him talk about it like it was no big deal because let me tell you the past 7 years have been a big deal! A very big deal, and I am delighted to see him talk so casually about it... he's growing up for sure.

When we got home I took a few more photos to highlight the details of camp...

One of his leaders, Kelsey, made him this necklace. It has a frog on it with his name. She also made one for Snappy, his stuffed alligator.

The theme was Dr. Seuss' Oh the Place You'll Go and they even printed it on their camp shirts!

Jaiden showing me the dirt under his silly bandz as 1) he didn't take a shower or bath the entire week and 2) the silly bandz were gained by brushing his teeth (phew at least that worked!). I should probably also note at this point his cabin got the "dirtiest sock or cabin" award since none of the 4 boys took a bath or shower the whole week! Yuck! Good thing they are only 7 and 8 year old!

Oh, and remember how Amy wrote about this event they did where they created flags about something they dream they could do or be? Remember her mentioning one boy wanted to be a frog? Yep, that was Jaiden's dream!

Oh the places he will go!

fairies under the amur maple

The fairies were there but before I begin, I must warn you this is heavily picture loaded... I really couldn't help it. It was a photographer's delight and I had a really hard time narrowing it down to 8 photos so consider yourself lucky and maybe, just maybe, next time you should consider putting on your fairy wings and sprinkling some fairy dust to join us...

Alyssa's crown wand... it didn't quite look like the crown it started as but boy, was it adorable and big hit with this little fairy

the fairy picnic spread... lemonade, tea sandwiches, oranges and mango

( funny side note: when I asked earlier today if she would like blood orange fizzy drink, she replied with a scrunched up nose "No, I don't think so Mommy. It sounds like vampires might try to come and scare off the fairies")

the paper lanterns we made earlier today

"look Mommy, two butterflies"

(her sandwich and her oranges)

the dragonfly lights strung also in the amur maple

those cute toes right smack in the middle of the picnic!

it seems wrong to include this photo but I will just so you can see how we were set up. it is so hard to do the self-timer, I gave myself 3 tries and this was the best I could do...

with that said, you can see how the paper lanterns were hung above us, it wasn't dark enough yet to see the dragonflies, the flowers Alyssa picked ... it was a lovely picnic

and an artsy photo to end with... our wands on the picnic blanket while we ate... plus I really like the blur effect and opened the aperture wide... really wide to f/1.4 for any of you who really want to know... (I know a few you want to know!)

And with that, we finally had our fairy picnic... no thunderstorms, no rain, quite a bit of wind, nice hot summer night with tons of mosquitoes... it was pleasant and a fun way to end the week of girls only. We leave early to pick up Jaiden tomorrow morning (no blog updates from Amy) and after his closing ceremony and lunch at the camp (which Alyssa and I get to attend), we drive down to pick Daddy up at the airport and then well... it will be back to normal but I know Alyssa and I will be able to hear the fairies twinkling...

more spy information...

This is actually the update from Tuesday but it's all still exciting to hear a bit about what is happening at camp. I am editing a fair portion of this as some pertains to the middle school group (aka B Group) and Leadership which is high school. The only tidbit I know about Jaiden is he is in the Alpine cabin, but as far as his Olympic color I have no idea! And still no word from him or camp! I am so proud of him!!

"Tuesday started with the most gorgeous sunrise! B and Leadership got up for extra early-breakfast at 7am! Brutal! After our morning infusions were done, the two groups headed out on our white water rafting trip.

Back at camp everybody had a GREAT day! Alpine went swimming for BOTH cabin activities (lucky ones!) and we had more kids go down the zip line! Meadowbrook continued their love for the fishing pond and Rainbow played some basketball!

The Olympic Games continued with individual events. There was an obstacle course and an awesome game of dodge ball in the Hall. The Yellow team is still in the lead! All Camp was a Dr. Suess monster game using the entire camp. Very entertaining! The evening wrapped up wonderfully with very little rain and as I was walking back to my cabin to call it a night I came across Frontier who were on their way to put make up on the Leadership guys. Evidently the Leadership guys got them back by a lame attempt at T-Ping Frontier’s porch. I’m with the girls on this one…lame.

We had a wonderful day and since I’m going a backpacking trip with the Leadership guys tonight through tomorrow I’ll get back to you guys for our last blog Thursday evening. See you Friday!"

So there will be no camp update for today (Wednesday) but I am sure they were up to no good and having a blast!

As for Alyssa and I, it was a boring day around the house - she slept in until 9 am! I think she is filling in for Jaiden and lounging in her bed and room before surfacing. By the time we were ready to do something, the window washers came and we got the windows cleaned, and then had a crazy afternoon thunderstorm to make sure our windows didn't look so clean anymore! She did have a blast with Miss Rachel while I snuck off to a 1 1/2 hour Vinyasa class... phew, I am exhausted! Tomorrow, we have big plans so it should be a fun last day with no big dragon brother to scare off the fairies!

wild about you

A request for this week was to go to the zoo... she chose today where I think temps reached 97 degrees! Despite the heat, we had fun. I have never been alone with her at the zoo so it was interesting to see her lead the way.

This was the first time I saw the polar bear on this side of her habitat, and she seemed to be enjoying the heat?

 

A must stop - pink birds (go figure, right?) but what I liked about this was their reflections and the crazy feathers on the one and necks all twisted and contorted...

At lunch, she practiced making faces... I think she said it was her scary face?! However, I noticed there seems to be some resemblance to the next photo?

We spent a long time watching this hippo. In fact, I didn't see it for a long time but Alyssa said she was in her pond and so we waited until she surfaced. And then, Alyssa wanted to wait again. You really wouldn't believe how long she stayed under. And then again, we watched. Then it was off to find penguins and monkeys, roughly in that order.

This photo is just because she is so darn cute. She is actually trying to talk to the monkeys across the pond and I decided I wasn't too inspired taking photos of animals in a zoo. After all, being experienced rainforest trotters in Costa Rica, what can I say? So I switched my camera setting and took this photo in RAW which is a format that is more similar to true film. I am not sure what I am doing yet but I figure now was as good as any to play, and I love this photo of her. I love that I can see those cute freckles, beautiful blue eyes and for once, her hair isn't blinding the photo!

Today was a good day with this sweet pea! She really is something else...

PS. Our dinner with the fairies got rained out tonight, we hope to catch up with them later this week!

camp update...

This is the post from the camp spy about Monday... I have no idea what color Jaiden is so we can only wonder what mischief he is up to but I am thinking Jaiden still isn't missing us!

Amy writes: "We rocked Monday everybody. What a fun day!

We started out with cabin activities in the morning. Most of the cabins rotated around music, art & crafts, outdoor living skills and sports & recreation. Right before lunch there was cabin choice—the swimming pool was packed. It’s a VERY popular choice and we had many wet heads at lunch. I also heard several campers went down the zip line for the first time today! Whoo-hoo!

Morning infusions went great! Everybody got a good poke and some of the Leadership guys were brave enough to let the younger campers poke them! We have an infusion mentoring program that we started several years ago with the Leadership guys. We pair a Leadership mentor up with a younger camper who is learning self-infusion for the week. Each time the camper infuses, the Leadership mentor is right there along with our HTC nurses. He’ll infuse himself for the camper and guide him along the process that you guys know so well! All of the Leadership guys feel a certain pride about letting the campers poke them. Brave…and wonderful souls. It’s a truly beautiful thing to watch these teenagers give back in this small but powerful way.

After lunch several cabins had education sessions with the clinic staff. Two cabins go to education during rest a day. By the end of the week every cabin will have had some education!

Then it was on to the start of our Olympic Games! We had two events today, a Three-ball game and a swimming relay. Three-ball was AWESOME! Three fields going at once and everyone was participating. We have such wonderful runners here at camp! Of course, the swimming relay was hilarious and full of competition. By the end of the day the Yellow team was ahead of the Blue team by just a few. But tomorrow’s another day for the Purple, Orange, Green and Red teams.

We finished up the evening with a really cool All Camp. We encouraged the campers to paint their dreams for the world. Everybody got a piece of cloth and we went to work on painting our dreams. We got up by cabin and each camper shared his or her dream with the entire camp. Some included were world peace, a green planet, a cure for Hemophilia and lastly we had a camper who would like to become a frog. I’m really hopin’ that last one works out. We have a possible opportunity to use these dreams in a really cool way so we’ll keep you posted.

We had some thunderstorms tonight ,but everybody was tucked in bed and I guess that means I need to get myself tucked in bed! We had a great day, parents!

PS. Rainbow made Frontier eat dinner blindfolded. The two cabins have made their peace and become allies…the other cabins better look OUT."

fairy godmother

"Mommy, you can be the fairy godmother!"

 as Alyssa helped me slip on my tooth fairy costume wings.

"And I will be a princess fairy..."

as she placed the crown on her head.

And then we gathered the supplies to make our fairy wands.

 Tulle, jewels, pink yarn, pink sheer ribbons, and cookie cutters... I saw this project quite a long time ago and thought it would be fun to make our own fairy wands. It seemed quite simple until we made the mess...

The trick is to create a glue made of cornstarch and water, and then dip the yarn in the mixture. Alyssa really did not like this part! Funny enough, she found it gggrrroooossss {really sound it out like a teenager might say but from the mouth of a 5 year old}. I mean, what's up with that? The child eats sand and makes mud pies but a little cornstarch and water? Too ggrooosss!

Then you press the yarn in the cookie cutters. Alyssa wanted hers shaped like a crown, fitting for a princess fairy. Mine is a heart, perfect for a fairy godmother.

Right now, our wands are drying but tomorrow, we will decorate them and get ready for the fairy dinner under the Amur maple tomorrow with the other woodland fairies, you are welcome to join if you like but be sure to have wings, or a crown or be dressed in pink!

mommy has spies...

I have received a few emails from friends who are asking "what camp?". I thought I better post a few more specifics as it is so hard to know who knows what.

Jaiden was invited to a special week long camp for kids with bleeding disorders. The majority of the kids have either hemophilia A or B, however, there are some with rare bleeding disorders or vonWilldebrand, etc. He was dropped off on Sunday, and we left by 2 pm. All of the clinic nurses are there at camp so for the first time ever, I feel 100% secure knowing his medical needs will be handled by no other than the wonderful clinic staff that has helped us for the past 7 years, even his doctors will be there!

The camp is a special camp designed for children with disabilities so literally everything they do and can do has been taken into account for those with no signs of disabilities to those with severe disabilities. This special camp is about an hour and a half drive from home, and really is incredible. It's beautiful up there!

Jaiden will be at camp through this Friday when Alyssa and I can come up for a closing ceremony and lunch. We really have no idea what he will do but it has now been well over 24 hours from being separated, and no word whatsoever... which is good and sad ... for me!

As for my spy, well she's not my personal spy, but our camp director said she will try to blog to our hemophilia communities blog/web site this week, so I just checked and here is a few highlights (btw, Jaiden's cabin is Alpine)...

"Camp is off and running! It already has that awesome ‘camp hum’ as I call it. Our theme this year is ‘ Oh, The Places You’ll Go’ by Dr. Seuss AND we’re having Olympic Games! Every afternoon after rest break we’ll play games with the entire camp.

Every camper was placed into a team to compete in the games. Every team has different age groups so the kids will get a chance to be separate from their cabins and meet new kids! The Leadership guys will serve as referees. We’re excited to watch the entire camp be involved in one activity! We had the Opening Ceremonies Sunday night before bedtime and the games officially start at 3:30pm Monday-high competition around here.

Our cabin introduction skits got rained on Sunday night so we moved to the pavilion for each cabin to introduce themselves and each camper to say their name in front of the entire camp! Everybody did great and were so creative coming up with their skits! Aspen had a pajama party, Alpine took a hike and were eaten by ‘bears’-aka campers in bear costumes, and everybody had a good time painting their counselor face!

We also had a wild night, Leadership joined the B group for a campfire & smores, Meadowbrook started off the morning with a pillow fight and Frontier pranked Rainbow at 7 o’clock in the morning! Counselor Sam came dressed in false eyelashes, a wig and a lovely evening gown to breakfast courtesy of Frontier. It was awesome. I’m sure Rainbow has something up their sleeves to get them back.

It’s been a great start to our camp and let me assure you—the dining hall has never been more rambunctious. I’ll keep everyone posted…enjoy your week—we sure are enjoying ours here!"

Clearly, we won't be missed...

camp

Today was the big day... the day we have have been waiting for all summer... CAMP!

We arrived, checked in and got a short tour of all the exciting things (and I mean, exciting like fishing, zip line, camp out under the stars, catching frogs, tennis, horseback riding, baseball, crafts, drum circle, karaoke, ghost stories ... the list went on!... oh, I almost forgot about the mud pit?! Yuck!) that Jaiden would get to do this week. The entire time, Jaiden was bouncing up and down with excitement. He was ear to ear grinning and bubbling over in his enthusiasm. He high-fived his nurses as he checked in, thrilled to be there. 

When we drove off, I took a quick photo (not a good one) but we paused for just a moment and in time to hear him telling the camp counselors a joke...

"So I bought a new guitar but I had to return it. {pause}

Why? {another pause}

Because it had a hole in it!"

And we heard them all start laughing...

hippo birdies yaya

Last year we spent Yaya's birthday hiking and picnicing. I captured this moment... however, this year, we get to post the photo and sing happy birthday to her over the phone.

We did celebrate for you by visiting the local water park and being very water logged at the end of the day. We hope you didn't have too much water on your birthday (i.e. dousing your cake because you got winded trying to blow out all those candles!)

Happy Birthday Mom!

medicine woman

This morning, we had our windows and doors open to enjoy the cooler morning air, when suddenly Alyssa looked out the door in time to say "Mommy, the medicine woman is here!"

Now, while I would prefer we didn't have monthly medicine shipments, I did have that momentary thought of how cool that sounded... we have a medicine man! I said something to that effect and Alyssa immediately corrected me "medicine woman... and I need to document this!" and off she went to fetch her camera, and seconds later I found her doing this!

The other exciting part of our day was today was Alyssa's last baseball game...

... batting in action! She played right field, center field and pitcher this game ... she also tried to play 1st base, 2nd base and short stop. She really gets excited to get the ball and throw it ... well, throw it somewhere regardless of where she should throw it!

After the game, each team mate was given a trophy with their name on it and a baseball cupcake! She couldn't have been more delighted and as we drove to Red Robin, she sang... "i got a trophy, trophy, trophy". What could be cuter than that? When Jaiden said, "mommy, you should see this, Alyssa is really cute. She's holding her trophy in the air and singing she has a trophy!" What a sweet big brother! His last game is tomorrow night...

a fleeting moment

Today, Alyssa said something about the liberry and at that particular moment, I scrambled to write down a few of my favorite words she uses such as:

liberry = library
blanklet = blanket
packpack = backpack
comedian = chameleon
puter = computer
bampire = vampire

Dennis chimed in and offered to take her to the liberry this morning and she could pack her comedian and blanklet in her packpack. Oblivious to the teasing, Alyssa readily agreed!

It was then that I fully understood in a very short period of time, she would stop using these versions and start pronouncing them correctly. It was then I realized with the second child, you recognize what a fleeting moment is because you watched your oldest grow and change quickly without fully knowing how quickly it would go. I am sure I thought about capturing the cute words Jaiden used but did I? I don't think so because I can't find them written down anywhere and what I wouldn't give to remember all the cute things he said. With the second child, it happens just as quick but I now know better and make a better attempt to capture these snippets of time.

Since I realize 5 years is a fleeting moment, can the more experienced moms and dads step forward and give me advice on what to capture for the next 10 years? Because in that short time, I will be absorbed in living with the growth and change these two go through and I do not have the wisdom or the 20/20 hindsight vision each of you have to know what I will miss about these years, but I do have the wisdom to realize they will be gone in the blink of an eye and a blur in my memory of the beautiful experience they have provided me with.

hamburger... cupcake... what will it be?

Seriously, is that not the cutest cupcake you have ever seen?

I had to share this because while we were in Arizona, we got the pleasure of seeing Susan's family and spending time on the 4th of July together. It is always fun and easy, but I swear the best part is when Brandi brings the dessert. Remember those cute Turkey cake pops at Thanksgiving? Same creative person created these adorable hamburger cupcakes. The amazing part is that these are really simple to make but the impact of the cuteness especially for a 4th of July BBQ is unreal! She even made some plain burgers with just "ketchup and mustard, no lettuce". The lettuce was shredded coconut... so clever!

simple things...

While we try to teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about.

~Angela Schwindt

I discovered this quote earlier today and it struck a chord with me and how true it is. Both of these kids amaze me. I could not be any luckier to have them in my life to slow me down, to throw my cares aside (at least momentarily), to enjoy the present moment and to delight in the simple things. In the photo above, I watched her play with the pea pods from the Palo Verde trees that filled Papi's pool, annoying most of us when we stepped on them yet for her, it was pure delight opening each pod, sorting out the seeds. She even safely placed them in a little baggy to take home which unfortunately, I think I left behind. To her, this was important and to me, it was pure delight watching her.

the 4th...

Happy 4th of July!

testing a new iPad app

One thing is for sure, this new iPad is an amazing tool but it's a bit of a challenge to figure out what I am doing most of the time. Today I am playing with a new app that will hopefully allow me to post blog journals while traveling. Today, we have spent several hours in the pool until some storm rolled in. This is Alyssa's infamous unique gasping for breath swimming style, but boy, can she dive for toys at the bottom!

hello july

One way to start July with a sizzling bang is not with fireworks but ...108 degee weather! And we did.

We decided to visit Arizona... crazy? Maybe but it makes swimming all the more fun to cool off and then get out of the pool, only to find that 100 degrees now feels cold!

We are looking forward to more sizzling hot days where we can spend time in the pool: floating, jumping, playing and cooling off!