2017

Soooo much fun.  This was our best costume idea ever!  Oh, Disney, we miss you.  Facebook memories again.  

School Halloween

Most years there is a whole school parade and it's a ton of fun.  This year there is a play and each cohort will get to go see it while wearing their costumes.  Kids are all hyped.  Jia is a character from a game.  She made her own costume this year and did her makeup.  Luk is a pirate and Kai a fireman, they're taking their costumes to school to put on there.  

Cowkids from Yesteryear.

Oh Facebook memories you're killing me.

Four years ago...Boys are 5, Jia is 6.  Sob.

He didn't love trying out the glow in the dark vampire teeth. Forced Halloween fun. Edit...not forced...cajoled...lest anyone think we held him down to wear vampire teeth.  Every time I hear the word force it reminds me of our first homestudy with our first social worker.  She laid out a scenario (amongst many). You're late for work and your toddler doesn't want to get in the car, what do you do?  I said pick her up and put her in the car seat.  Wrong answer.  Apparently you can't force a child into the car or to do anything really.  Haha.  Many years and many kids later.  I have put lots of crying kids into the car.  Some in the middle of tantrums and total melt downs.  Hopefully it always looked like less than a kidnapping to onlookers. In these overly sensitive days of pandemic my attempts at funny aren't as funny.  

They had to gut their school pumpkins.  Kai has been with Michelle all day every day and he's starting to follow her lead and example, we noticed he gutted the bulk of his pumpkin by feel, he was largely staring off at the ceiling.  ;)  Love it.  

More forced Halloween fun.  She didn't want to do it at all, and especially didn't want to join the boys.  Then declared the whole event at school lame.  Sigh.  Pre-teen has arrived.  Edit...school event...so this was actual homework...phone taken away was our 'forced' method. 

Cookie decorating.  Not quite as forced because - cookie :)

Yum.

We had the boys iep meetings this week.  I think they went well overall.  I like a lot of what is happening for Kai this year.  Loved meeting Michelle.  They're a good match.  The new principal seemed open to hearing me.  

Lili has decided to come home for term 2 that is officially all online again.  So sad what her University experience has become. 

Fei remains swamped in homework.  

Dr. Bonnie has changed rules again on house gatherings.  Allowing a safe 6 in people's homes.  That's pretty limiting for sure.  Never thought a day would come that I'd be anxious for a vaccine.  Days coming are bleak. 

My first love passed away a few weeks ago.  Much sadness has swamped me.  I haven't talked to him in 25 years but I liked knowing he was here.  RIP Paul.  An old friend with psychic abilities called me out of the blue with messages to me from him a couple nights ago.  Which just started the tears up all over again. Her message from him was close to what I would have expected but not quite right and from someone who didn't know any details or him very well so that was super freaky.  

Strangely the government stopped sending our child tax credit funds.  It took me all day yesterday to sort it out.  In the end I needed to confirm our address.  We didn't move. Nothing changed.  And the money is directly deposited anyways.  So that was weird and frustrating. So we didn't see Sept or Oct. Problem not fixed in time to get Nov. So all four months will arrive in Dec.  Which is fine.  But what about families that desperately need it right away?!  

I stopped in at Joanie's yesterday, she was going to sort out the exact birthdate for my pups.  We have approximate dates. She had company so we didn't get our planned visit.  The lady there is another breeder who has Joanie's Zuzu.  So I got to cuddle Zuzu yesterday.  What a total doll.  I had promised Eric I wouldn't bring home another dog but honestly if I could have snagged Zuzu I might have.  They have a tiny silver Yorkie there that they are trying to breed her with.  When I got home Eric rushed outside to meet our new dog.  Haha.  He seemed a bit disappointed that I was alone.  He knows how much I adore Zuzu and he said I should offer to swap Coco for her.  Like that would be possible for me.  Coco and I are forging a hard won tight bond.  I wanted a picture of my Zuzu cuddles but I wasn't completely comfortable with Joanie knowing what a total geek I am.  Haha. It's sometimes hard making new friends.  The kids always talk about being socially awkward themselves and they tell me often how cringy I am.  Messes with confidence.  

Work is busy.  My desk is loaded.  The flare is mostly under control. Have had a good week.  Last night was rough, took myself up for a bath at 7 and went to bed with extreme nausea.  The boys tucked me in.  I did get up around 10 feeling better and ate a snack.  Feeling great.  No pain, no nausea, no issues yet today. 

Luk at 3.

The Facebook memory of the day.  Luk had just turned 3.  Our sweet little monkey.  Awe.  It's all going too fast!!  I want my little smoochie monkey back.  

Halloween Decorations

We had a mess to deal with today. We brought it all down and dumped it on the tables last week.  The boys and I sorted it and decorated this morning.  Kai was super excited.  Luk was artfully placing things and rearranging here and there.  I love how helpful and involved they are.  

Kai's section of things he can touch and rearrange.

Luk did the coffee table.  We had fold the tablecloth so it wasn't hanging.  Coco was throwing her whole body up against the table to bite and nash at the hanging part.  

We removed the Coco gate in the living room today so we could clean and get to the mantle.  She was running around the open space.  So far so good.  Fingers crossed.  

Luk has to do a passion project or talent to share tomorrow at school.  He had zero ideas.  He's not one to have BIG passions.  I said today he's great at decorating shame he can't do that as his passion share.  He liked the idea so we pushed this picture to the printer :) 

Magical Words

Fei and I took food and supplies to Lili yesterday.  We ate a late lunch out at Montanas.  There is an apple, spiced pecan salad there that I dream about. Nice time out with my girls. Lots of talk about what's next. 2nd term at VIU is all online again.  Online sucks hard.  Lili said she will think about coming home for term 2.  She had really hoped there would be in class learning by term 2. She likes her place and feels it will be perfect for campus life.  Waste of funds for online.  However, the new routine is starting to feel more comfortable. She says it's much quieter there.  Too funny.  Fei and I feel it's MUCH quieter at home with Lili gone.  She keeps weird hours. Showers at midnight.  Wakes me regularily with the front door opening and closing and lights off and on.  She agrees it's quiet down stairs. We'll see.  For Fei she is interested in practical nursing and we are muddling through the application process. Lili was helping us try to understand which courses Fei needs to take.

Lili needed something silicone for a lab. We hit the dollarstore after lunch in search.  Found a silicone dog toy that will hold water.  Fei choose a unicorn horn to wear to work on Halloween.  She hates Halloween.  Lili laughed when Fei showed her which made Fei question her decision all over again.  Haha.  She wants understated.  Meanwhile Lili still hasn't decided what to dress as.  

Eric sent me this. Coco cuddling with Isabel.  They do ok together but Coco feels very threatened when Isabel tries to lay near me and growls and barks at her.  So this was nice to see.  

Meili looking adorable.  

It's been pointed out to me that the previous post about not being sure about white pumpkins marks me as a pumpkin racist.  Ok.  Clearly I need to own that.  Lili needed a pumpkin for a party so Fei and I picked one out for her.  In my defense, there were no white ones at the market.  Haha.

More dollarstore fun. They had tiny butterfly outfits.  We just had to.  Both Chihuahuas are 3.4lbs now.  Fei found them tiny sweaters too.  Score.

Beyond adorable. It's super tough to get a picture of Coco.  She is constant movement. Fei got this one.

Oh Walter...we'll get you costumed too.  

Love it.  Kai is pretty fond of Walter so he was pretty excited about his costume.

He seemed quite comfortable to just hang out in the jacket.  It's warm. I was a tad concerned he'd scoot out the cat door with it on.  The neighbor cats might make fun of him.  He's sporting a wound on his face right now so someone is already picking on him.

This popped up on my Facebook feed memory today from 5 years ago.  Would be worth our limbs to get Esmei in a costume today ;)  I think Lacie's pumpkin sweater (the one on Walter kitten) would fit her though.  

Ballerina Isabel was the BEST!! Again, Fei's idea. I thought she would hate it. I was wrong. No dog ever was happier about clothing!  She was grinning.  Running around the house totally showing off.  She went straight to Eric and actually turned a circle to show him.  So sweet.  Getting her to pose wasn't easy.  

Her old costume. Devil horns.  She was a good sport for Fei last night.

Isabel still smiling.  The only way to get them all together was for Fei to hold the littles and quickly scoot in and crouch near Isabel demanding "take it now!".

Fei wasn't thrilled with me posting that there was possibly neuro problems with Coco. She wants me to correct my terminology. She points out that Coco could just be developmentally delayed. Possibly needing 4 or 5 years to catch up and that's ok.  So, I've been corrected.  

Ending this post with my little heart dog.

Stuck on the island.

Once again, reminded that we're on an island and getting off isn't always easy.  Luk had an issue that required possible attention.  It's 1st thing in the morning, Kai is attempting to alert us, which just made things super confusing but we clearly got the message that Timmy was in the well.  Then the special needs hiarchy comes into play.  When kids are complex they get shuffled to specialists.  So we knew walk in wouldn't work, or E.R. thought maybe calling his pediatrician but knew she would send us on.  Possibly Victoria but what if there isn't a pediatric urologist on call.  Ok.  Likely needing to just head to Children's.  But...reduced sailings, reduced numbers on the boats.  No reservations available.  They took the ability to assure load away from disabled kids.  As we are sitting and trying to calmly rearrange our world and the biggest issue of the day is once again getting off this damn island.  Yes it's one of the most beautiful places on earth to live but we can't quantify how much I dislike these damn ferries and the whole system in place.  And covid...hating covid.  In the end we just dealt on our own, muddled through and calmed Luk.  Luk is fine.  Nothing to worry about.  Resolving on it's own.

Luk was stressed.  Any mention of Dr's stresses him.  He was scared.  Wasn't sure about going to school.  So I let him take his phone to school.  It's in his iep that he can utilize his phone.  But...he left it in the bathroom.  His EA found it.  It was confiscated.  Luk was again upset.  Sigh.  The story concocted was that he was taking more time in the bathroom because he was obviously playing games.  Uh. No.  He was taking more care and texting me updates.  And honestly, if he wanted to play games in there I wouldn't have personally cared after the day he was having.  

I do realize we can always park and walk on and take a taxi to Children's so we're not really stuck.  Unless there is wind and boats aren't moving.  It's super covid weird on the boats right now so that isn't a fun option.  I hate, hate, hate sitting in a ferry line to "see" if we'll get on.  Massive pet peeve.  Too many years on an island ;) 

Kai doesn't love Halloween.  He does like the candy.  He also loves his fireman hat.  He agreed to put the coat on.  We'll see if he'll agree to put it on at school.  Eric is planning to do some trick or treating in our house so Kai can have the experience at home, inside.  Have told the others they have to join him going door to door.  They weren't too sure until I reminded them that the candy they get out in the public has to sit for days before they can touch it.  So a clean available candy source swayed their decision to play along with Kai.  Eric has bought tons of chocolate already and he's also into it already, uh oh.  He also got pumpkins. 6 white ones.  Not sure how I feel about them yet.  I mean they're just pumpkins, who really cares, but, orange, tradition.  

We haven't decorated much for a couple years. Planning to put it all out this year.  We need cheering up.  Mary and family are coming for the weekend.  No clue what the actual plans for the day are but we'll find some fun. We had some fun sorting through costumes. Luk didn't have any ideas of what he wanted to dress as.  He kind of likes the pirate gear.  Really he just wants a beard and mustache drawn on.  Kai thinks he does too.  Love it.

While digging in Halloween boxes I found these mini backpacks that match the chi's costumes. Because, of course they need candy bags!

Pretty darn cold in the mornings.  Time for sweaters.  Isabel wonders where hers is.  Haha.  She would HATE it if we tried dressing her.  

Picture day at school.  Jia's wearing her new favorite outfit.  In this moment she's begging me for a 3rd Chihuahua because apparently two isn't enough. Yikes.  Could you imagine?!  What if it was like Coco?!  We'd never survive.  As Coco nears her 1st Birthday we're starting to realize that possibly some of her issues aren't all about being a puppy...possibly something just not quite right about her.  Neurologically.  

Pretty cold in the office in the mornings.  I let them keep their sweaters on.  Just turned around to take them off and found them cuddled.  Awe.  

International White Cane Day

Kai has previously declared the cane too heavy.  However, now that there is a day about the cane at school he was pretty happy to see it again.  The kids in the class get to ask Michelle questions today.

Facebook sent me this memory from 3 years ago.  I laugh every time I see this photo.  Usually at Eric but this time at Luk.  Zoom in on his face.  He's totally speeding down the road.  Boys are 6 in this picture.  

Jia has a new friend at school and he made her these claws.  Pretty big deal.

Eric sent me this one...a line up to the food bowls.  

I'm doing much better. Not ready to resume a normal schedule just yet but definitely coming out of this flare.  Man I miss remission.