11/3/09 - Jim is off from work this week (yeah!) Photo: Burying (finally) my placenta from Kanoa's birth. We kept forgetting to do it, but the changing weather motivated us to remember. An anise plant was put on top. Li has a forsynthia plant on top of his and Kana had a rose bush (but it died this past winter).Thursday 11/5/09 - Was going to go to Augusta for vaccine support of the No Mandatory Vaccine bill appealed. However, we stayed up very late last night and slept in and I had plans to get together with Amy, Lily, Will and Olivia. Called Amy to check in and see if we were still on, but couldn't get in touch with her. So we hung out at home a bit and then decided to go to Target in Augusta so Katie could get jeans. Of course we ended up spending more than we wished, but that's how it goes. The coolest thing was that it was snowing inland and the ground actually had a layer of snow. We watched the Honda's "outside temperature" reading go from 35 (or around there) down to 31 on the way there. On the way back it went from 31 to 33. Amazing! When we got home, I made cheesy rice and cleaned the bathrooms. The kids preferred leftovers. Li and I made brownies and Katie and I packaged them up so they could be sold. Yes, Li created a baking business where he sells brownies and Katie made business cards and Katie, Li and Kana all decorated the cards. Very cool!
Kanoa really doesn't like car rides. He manages not to cry because Jim sits next to him and talks and plays with him. When Jim's not there, Katie does the best she can. Usually we get by and luckily he does fall asleep much of the time.
He is 10 months old now (as of 10/28/09) and is beginning to take his first steps (as of last week...or was it now the week before??) He can take between 1 and 4 steps at a time. Usually 1. (As of 11-6 he took 8 steps once this day!!)
Li and Katie call Kanoa "Bub" frequently. Love that!
Kana seems jealous of him much of the time. I am trying to spend more time with her and that is helping somewhat.
Daddy loves playing horsie with Kanoa and observing everything Kanoa takes in. He is always amazed at how much Kanoa does and learns and watches. Kids are like sponges!
Li is still very interested in earning money. He was going to rake the leaves outside today, but the leaves were wet, so another day maybe. Hard to find things for him to earn money for when we are short on cash and we don't pay our kids for chores. But I had to come up with something where he could earn money, so we spoke about the leaves and thought that would work. He came up with the sale of brownies in the neighborhood on his own. Good for him!
Jim is off this week, so it has been good for everyone to be together lots. Li and Jim bonded the other day going to the dump (believe it or not! Had a nice experience of Li getting out of the car and asking Jim about how to sort the garbage and learning about the types of plastic and how to tell them apart and sort them, etc) and then went to the barbers for haircuts together. Li had brought goodie bags for each of the Jones Brothers (Roger and Lowell) that had a couple sweeties in them and a piece of paper that said "Good Luck." Nice. Oh...a while ago (like last year or two yrs ago) Pat McLean came into the barbers to take photos for a book she was making as she wanted to include the two barbers who are known characters and have been cutting hair in Camden for ages! Li and Jim were there when she had come in to photograph and Li's reflection and maybe Jim's too are included in the book! Neat! The book is called "Maine Street."
11/5 - Being goofy and having fun!
11/5 - The photo on the business cards. Li's bakery! He decided to make a business baking sweeties and will hand out business cards. If you have a party to go to, but no time to bake, call Li! Or email him at LisBakery@gmail.com! (Katie set him up with that gmail address too!)
11/5 - Here are Li's business cards, brownies (all wrapped up individually and in tupperwear ready for tomorrow) and a box for money.
11/5 - Katie helped Li make business cards. Li, Kana and Katie decorated them together. So nice to see them all working on something that means so much to Li and them.
11/6 - Me and Kate on the ice.
11/6 - Great Katie photo! She enjoys skating very much!
11/6 - Daddy and Kanoa at the ice rink.
11/6 -Kana shows off her feet on the wall trick. She is so proud of herself! We call her spider girl as she can walk on the wall with her feet too!11-8-09 Sunday (And what a warm beautiful day it was!!)
Kt, Li and Kana built towers for Kanoa to knock down.
Here's Kanoa's scrunched up grin that he has been making (btw, he loved knocking down the towers).Charlesbridge, a publisher in MA, has several math adventure books that my kids love. We already knew about the Sir Cumference books and enjoyed them over and over. But now, we found out about a whole bunch of other books. Li really enjoys math and so loves the books for that reason as well as that they're interesting stories. Kana enjoys them too, so does Katie, and so do I. Very clever books!!
Here's the website if you want to check them out: http://www.charlesbridge.com/showproducts.cfm?FullCat=144
Here are some that we enjoyed recently:
A Very Improbable Story
Multiplying Menace The Revenge of Rumpelstiltskin
Equal Shmequal
This is the pattern I made - lw 11/11/09
Katie began painting this sleigh for the holiday season. 11/11/09 
11/14/09 - Kanoa was enjoying walking around following the balloons which were hard to grasp, esp when he tried to get more than one at once! Then, the vacuum cleaner handle seemed attractive and he was investigating it. 
11/14/09 - Ahhh....Balloons!!! 
Li made this for Jim a long while ago (not sure how old it is). It is very special to Jim and we see it often in the kitchen - it brings a smile to our faces! It's the simple things that mean so much! 
11/15/09 - Awwww! Two cute fellows!! I love this picture!! 
11/15/09 - Kanoa smiling - 
We recently read this mystery book where part of a puzzle was solved by holding the page in front of a mirror to read the words correctly. Li wanted to see if he could write like that. It took him a couple of tries, but he learned how to write so he could only read CAT in the mirror! Love how he loves to investigate things! 
I went shopping in Kana's store and wrote up the amount for each item I purchased. Li and I were showing each other how we added up the numbers. Me by carrying over. Li by adding up the cents first and then adding that amount to the dollar amount. The bottom was another game we were playing involving letters. 
Here we were playing a game where the letters had to be unscrambled to spell words. Li and I took turns doing the scrambling. 
Li wrote down some numbers and added them. 
More addition. He likes to write and solve math problems and does this of his own accord. 
More words that Li learned how to spell...he likes to makes lists of some words he knows or just learned. And another math problem..fractions this time. 
Oh, I can't remember what this was...it was something Li was asking me to do and wanted to know *when* I'd be ready to do it. The W was for when. I wrote back that I'd be ready when Daddy was ready. 
The tick that bit Kana. She got bit on the 15th (a Sunday). She said her ear hurt her (behind her ear she said) and I checked and was surprised. We had just hiked in the woods by Seabright Park along the Megunticook River. The next day (the 16th), I took pics of the tick and sent it to Igenex in CA to see if the tick carried lyme disease and two other co-infections. It turned out that the tick was positive for lyme!! Yikes! I did get it out fairly easily, although I crushed the body which killed the tick. So I do wonder if the lyme transmitted or not. The only possible symptom Kana might have is swollen toe joints (see pics below). I noticed the swollen toe joints (one big toe on one foot and one pinkie toe on the other foot...sort of the side of the pinkie toe where it sticks out). Today is 12/12/09 and she still has the swollen areas. They don't hurt her at all and she runs fine. She had a Western Blot (so did I) and the test showed neg for lyme. I have the PCR test from Igenex which is more sensitive...so if we feel we should do that at some point, we can. 
Kana named five of her favorite doggies these names on this paper. So cute! Love the names she calls them! Bony (because of the bones on the scarf around his neck), Little Black Dog (because it is a little black dog!), Brownie (the brown dog), Pug (her fav pug dog), and Huggy Puppy (the soft, floppy dog that is very hugable - think she got that name from Ben who named his dog something like that or even maybe it was the same name and she just liked it). 
11/17/09 - There's Li! 
11/20/09 - Love the way baby Kanoa greets Daddy! And Daddy loves it too! It lifts our hearts! 
11/21/09 - Kana's Right toe joint and Kana's left pinkie joint are swollen. These are the pics I was talking about. 
Close-up pic of Kana's right toe joint.
Kana's right toe joint again. See..it is swollen! The pinkie area (where an older person might get a bunion) is reddish and swollen too....harder to notice I think.
11/22/09 - Sunday - Writing down some things that have happenned recently.
Been to Portland for a dental chkup for Li and Makana with Dr. Susan. All went well and the kids had fine check ups. (No cavities!!) Katie and I had checkups with our local dentist Dr. Pier. I said no xrays for Kt or me this time. Funny how the hygienist talks..as if I had no say of whether or not I wanted to radiate my head. She went on to say that she'd check my record to see if we were watching any spots and talk to me about how I was taking care of my mouth and then she'd talk this over with Dr. Pier to see if it would be "acceptable" to not take the xrays. As if it would be up to the dentist as to whether or not radiating my head would be "acceptable" to him or not. What?! Another instance where our society thinks that the "professionals" and "experts" know best and we should just follow their advice. This is just one example of people just going along with what is easiest and what is typically done without questioning anything. Do people really believe that humans are that unintelligent that they can't do research and ask questions and consider decisions and make the best decision for themselves? I guess so. Sad. But I do feel empowered as I feel I am capable of researching most subjects to my satisfaction and I feel okay about leaving any practice that can not meet my wants and needs as a customer.
It truly would behoove our doctor offices if they would follow the footsteps of Dr. Hafner in NJ. You'd walk into his practice and he'd say, "What can I do for you today?" At first I was taken aback by his questions. I wanted him to check out my mouth to make sure that there were no cavities and I wanted to know about any spots he saw that I might take better care of and I wanted to know if there were any special things I could do to take good care of myself and my dental health. I also enjoyed listening to him discuss holistic care as well. I enjoyed the health related books in his office and how he suggested using homeopathy and products from the health food store to maintain dental hygiene and overall care of our bodies. I liked learning about the different chemicals to use to fill the teeth or to buy time until the kids were older. He told me about them and asked me which I preferred. I always had questions. He provided more information and he used the product I chose. If he knew one was best for whatever reason, he told me about it and I typically agreed. He was a one in a million doctor. I totally respected him and his opinion and wished we lived closer as now this is what I want from any doctor or health professional. What a way to empower people! By treating people like they are intelligent and capable of making choices, people will know they have the responsibility of taking care of themselves and they will want to know more details and ask questions and research and make the best decision for themselves. This is very different from how society works though. In schools, we are told that people know what is best for us to learn. Our elders know best too, for they have more experience. Oh, and therefore they deserve our respect. Wow. If only people released that everyone is deserving of respect, especially our little people. And if only people treated each other as if they were capable of making decisions for themselves. How different could our lives and our society be?
During Katie's exam, the dentist noticed her last baby tooth. (Her second to last tooth had come out Monday night, the night before our Tuesday afternoon appointment. And she was sad that she was almost grown up...she thought of losing her teeth as a sign of losing her childhood. I reasurred her that she'd always be my child...even an adult child is still a child. And I told her my Dad still calls me Mouse sometimes and that I'm always going to be his child no matter my age. But that yes, she is getting older and I understood what she meant. And I still loved her so much and will always!) The dentist said quietly to me that he thought the tooth should come out. That sometimes parents have to make choices that their children don't like for their own good. That he'd use numbing stickers for ten minutes and she would hardly feel the prick of the needle. That this would be necessary in his opinion because sometimes when part of the children's tooth's roots are out and one piece of children's tooth's root is still in the gum, waiting might cause problems with the adult tooth. He said that she'd need the novacaine because the root was still attached/far enough in the gum to cause pain if it were pulled out. It would be like pulling a piece of dead skin off that has live skin attached to it. It would hurt. We talked about Katie feeling pain MORE than most people. He said he already gathered that from his interactions with her. He said that she was 12 now and was ready to begin making decisions about her dental care/treatment. He said that he "didn't want to play games." (Was he referring to the time when I supported Li when he was five and couldn't sit for the filling of the cavity. Maybe he felt I should have made Li get that cavity filled?? Did he think that was a game? Or does he just simply not want Katie to bring a Nintendo DS to play if she chooses to get her tooth pulled? (yes, I am being sarcastic - because he is not supportive of young people being able to make choices for themselves if they differ from his expert opinion and he thinks parents should make their kids do things they don't want to do for dental treatment rather than work with their child..maybe in a different practice ...to find a solution that is agreeable and comfortable for the child. It is aggravating.)
Anyway, I do like that office. I don't like or respect what Dr. Pier said this time about Katie. I like that they now are touting the benefits of xylitol...finally! (Hopefully we won't find in the future that it was "bad" in some way. The jury will be out for decades!! But I am glad it is offerred now to customers as a way to help teeth.) I wonder (and will re-research) the sugar gum chewing as he said sugar gum was really bad for teeth. I said I heard any gum chewing was good as it stimulated saliva flow. I said that I thought raising were harmful as they are sticky on the teeth. He said but at least they are good for you. (I disagree on this, but let it go as they are what gave Katie her cavities I think. She used to have them as snacks frequently.) I like that they offer MI Paste. But the flouride-free one has saccharin in it. I bought it, along with xylitol mints, but will return it as I don't want to ingest saccharin and will show him the remineralization power (ecodent) that my health book suggested. Well, I did speak to Katie and she says her body tells her that the tooth is getting looser everyday and will shortly come out. She says she feels comfortable waiting. I asked her if she wanted to investigate with me what possible could happen to her adult tooth if the baby one hangs on for some time more. I said that it might be a good idea to just look into the possibility that Dr. Pier was right when he said it could be troublesome or cause problems later. She agreed. But for the moment, she is comfortable waiting and trusting her body to get rid of the baby roots in its own time.
Other that that, the office was clean and besides me having a root exposed at the gumline, all was well with me and Katie.
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Kanoa - This morning we went by a pot of boiling water and Kanoa stuck out his hand and said HOT (sounded like Haaaa).
He goes "Vroooom, Vrooom" when he plays with cars.
He played Peek-a-boo with Jim in the car yesterday on our way back from Shaws. He put a blanket over his head and Jim said "Where's Kanoa?" and he pulled the blanket away and showed his face as Jim said "There he is!"
Kanoa progressed to walking 4, then 8, then 10, then 15, then 18, then 20 steps in the matter of a couple days. He now walks all over the place and is hard to keep an eye on if I am trying to do something and make sure he is safe!
Li helps out watching Kanoa sometimes and plays calm, interesting things with him. Katie watches him frequently if I'm trying to get dinner made or clean up dishes. I love her helping and appreciate it so much, but she plays loud games with him and sometimes I feel guilty asking her to help as sometimes I think she would rather be doing something else and is helping me out of kindness. Now there are many times when the kids just do play with Kanoa for the joy of playing with him. I usually hold him when I do things with the other kids. So he gets to see what is going on most of the time like babes in arms do.
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What do we do late at night?
Read, go on the internet (to play games, write stories, read stories, write science books, look stuff up), watch a favorite show, play ball (games where you keep score and earn points depending on which pillow you hit), practice volleyball serving and hitting, play with Kanoa, put legos together, experiment with electronics kit, draw, paint, color, all the typical stuff we do during the day. Anything pretty much goes depending on how much energy we have. We eat late, so add in cleaning up and general tidying up the house. Also, there is likely a late night snack, known as "second dinner" in our house. Right now this works for us. In time I expect the baby's schedule to change and us to get to sleep earlier. But as long as we are healthy and happy, who cares! But...one glitch...a big one...I think Jim needs to get more sleep so he can better function during the day. We are still tweaking and figuring this one out! If he could just get an hour or two more sleep, that would be better for him. Luckly he goes into work later and works later. (Not as late as when he is doing tons of overtime, but later to make up for going in late...and sometimes a little more as well.)
11/29/09 - Patricia Coombs writes these great books like "Dorrie and the Blue Witch" which I read as a child and remembered loving so much. I shared them with Katie and we loved reading them together. Now I am sharing them with Makana...er...um...Katie really is the one sharing them! She reads them to Kana more than any of us, although Kan and Jim read several one morning while baby and I slept. Here Kana is dressed up as Dorrie and has her little black cat Gink! Love it! So clever! (Again, Katie is the one who helped Kana get dressed up...what a creative person Katie is!) And by the way, I only suggested Kana might like to read the Dorrie books and next thing I know is that Katie got out ALL the Dorrie books that our lending library had and they were on their way to us! Yikes! Think we had over 25 at once of just Dorrie books! And we still have about 8 or so and I'm writing this on 12/13/09!
11/29/09 - "Dorrie" playing golf on the Wii. Jim playing golf on the Wii. Check out his Mii!
11/29/09 - Click on the pic to make it larger so you can read what it's all about. Li cracked up at how to spell assassin (ass ass in) - ha! Like the skit from the Odd Couple about 'when you assume, you make an ass out of u and me!" Funny!
11/29/09 - Katie was trying to encourage the others to go to bed and made a conga line. Baby joined in as it looked like fun!
11/30/09 - Just after midnight...Kanoa brushing teeth! He loves to do what the rest of us do!
11/30/09 - Lots of various photos of Kana in her psychedelic outfit!! Katie dressed her up and she's livin' life large! There is one close-up of Li and then back to Kana again!
Li and Kana sell Krabby Patty's at the little kitchen! Yummmmm!
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