So yeah, I’m glad the importing finally worked.

Weapon X likes to tell me he’s going to keep me “porever”. He told me after the graham cracker incident above, “Mama I won’t hurt you, I just hug you and kiss you.” Before you aww too much, he also likes to take flying leaps at me unexpectedly, usually landing knees-first. This is a kid who’s going to jump out of planes someday with a Navy SEAL team, I just know it. When I was pregnant, X hid from the ultrasounds for a long time so we couldn’t see if he was a boy or a girl, so my brother nicknamed him Weapon X. Upon reflection, this was oddly prophetic.

They’re done with speech therapy for the summer now, though I still do the constant pronunciation and grammar reinforcements of course. We’re leaving on Tuesday for three weeks in San Diego with the Hubby, then we’ll be back home  for like a week before school starts. They’re doing speech therapy at school, it’s supposed to be twice a week for half an hour each time. School speech therapists don’t get as good results as private therapists in our experience – they don’t always work with the kids according to their specific diagnosis, even when they’re told to in an IEP. So we’re in the pool for the local university clinic, which is the only private therapy we can afford. We did therapy there during July and saw some improvement since they used apraxic specific techniques. I’ll be pushing the school more, as usual, to do what’s best for the boys rather than what’s expedient for them.

It’s hard sometimes, but they are making improvements, and the neurologist was positive about their future, which apparently he’s not normally very positive. I quite liked him, but the school STs told me they usually get parents complaining. I get along with doctors, even though I don’t trust them. The boys’ dentist told me he was glad I wasn’t one of those moms who freak out, that I kept it together and was calm, when Weapon X whacked his mouth and impacted a tooth (he was doing a flying leap at a friend’s house and landed on her coffee table. He makes me tired).

So that’s where we’re at. Hopefully we’ll continue to see leaps of improvement through their kindergarten year.

Alpha: You can’t go to Washington with me, doggy. You have to stay here.

X: There no dog food in Washington?

Alpha: I have to go to Washington. Good-bye.

Me: That’s because I locked it. You don’t need to be playing around in my car.

Him: We not playing around, just reading a book.

Me: Uh-huh.

Him: Where your keys?

Me: Forget it, dude, I’m not giving you my keys.

Him: I need you keys, Mama.

Me: No. You’ll never find them!

Him: How bout I check in you pocket.

Me: *laughing* How about not. You don’t need to play in my car.

Him: We not playing, just reading a book.

Me: Yeah right. Go read a book somewhere else. Not in my car.

Him: Where you keys? I can’t find you keys.

Me: *sigh*

PA came stomping out and glared at WX, who said, “C********, you’re my best friend forever” and tried to hug him. WX pushed him away and said, “You keep being too many noise, I can’t sleep.” Then he went stomping back to bed, saying “I going back to sleep!” PA looked at me and said, “Why C******** can’t sleep in noise?” After a few minutes WX came back out and now they’re happily building train tracks together. Guess PA was still being too many noise.

Weapon X was bugging me for a popsicle today (after he’d already had 4) and I told him no. He started begging “peese Mama” until I told him to stop bugging me, then he hid under the table and after a minute I heard, “Mama, yeh ou no?” lol. That’s what I say to them when they’re not paying attention and I ask a question – “Hey! Yes or no?” They’ve started saying that a lot now.

Their enunciation has not improved yet, but they’re talking so much now and in real sentences, even Weapon X. He said a 10-word sentence to me yesterday, his longest yet.

The “y” sound gives both of them trouble, though D’s favorite word lately is “why?” He asks me why constantly, about everything, and will keep asking until I give in and say I don’t know. We just had a conversation today that went:

Me: We need to wash the car while we’re out, it’s covered in bird poop again.
D: Why, Mama?
Me: Because there’s a tree over the driveway, and the birds like to sit up there, so they poop on the car.
D: Why?
Me: Because birds don’t go on the potty like people.
D: Why?
Me: Because they’re birds.
D: Why Mama?
Me: Um. Because Heavenly Father made them that way.
D: Why Mama?
Me: I guess he thought it was a good idea at the time.
D: Why?
Me: I don’t know. You’ll have to ask him later.

Their other big discovery lately is the Ultimate Boy Realization that the world is their urinal. C will be playing outside and suddenly drop his drawers and pee on the yard/sidewalk/tree/etc. D’s done it a few times too. I suppose I ought to have seen this coming, after all, my brother was only about 5 when he had me judging his peeing contests with his buddy from next door. So now I’m convincing them that peepee needs to go only in the potty.

They love playing pretend right now too. D will tell me “I be Mama, you be baby, C be Dada.” (C  says “Me Dada, buh Mama, you baby.”) They’re really into Max and Ruby, D sings along to the theme song every time it comes on. Yesterday D planted some jelly beans in the backyard, and told me they were going to grow into a beanstalk, and then went on chattering about the beanstalk while he played in the mud for a good hour. I asked him what would happen when the beanstalk grew, and he said he would climb and climb, and C (kiss-in, it sounds like) would climb. I said, what do you think will be at the top? and he said, “Candy. And toys. And a red elephant toy.” and I realized that was the Easter Max & Ruby DVD that my mom had sent them. C liked the “mon-ter” version better. “Biiiiiiig mon-ter, eat me!” I think he’d like to be a monster. My mom pointed out to me that most of the animals they pretend to be are carnivorous: alligators, T-rexes, lions, etc.

We still can’t afford private therapy for them. They’ll be going to the in-between kindergarten next year. Academically they are ready for kindy, but their speech is not ready yet. Their cognitive skills test 3 years ahead, and they’re caught up on fine and gross motor skills and their social skills. D’s still kind of shy when he’s away from C, but I think that’s just his personality. So they won’t be in regular kindergarten, but in the one that’s basically a continuation of the developmental delay preschool, but they also won’t be in the handicapped kindergarten (I have no idea what it’s called, but I’m grateful) and they expect them to be mainstreamed in first grade.

We had another hearing eval (first one was at 18 months), and they said their hearing was fine, though they had suspected from D’s speech that he had some “standing” fluid somewhere. Turned out not. Maybe he used to and it drained and that’s why he suddenly is repeating everything I say? I don’t know. The audiologists were much nicer after I told them I thought the last eval was bullshit, and showed me actual number results and graphs and things this time.

We have an eval scheduled with a developmental pediatrician next month. We’ll see how that goes. I thought the pedi had made an appointment with an ENT to discuss C’s continued stridor from his laryngomalacia, which the ENT assured me he would outgrow by age 2. D was diagnosed with laryngomalacia as well based on that he is identical twin to C (thus I suppose the ENT thinks they are physiologically identical in every respect, which only goes to show that he doesn’t understand twins), C has it, and D makes the same noise. He didn’t bother to scope D and look at his vocal cords. I was very unimpressed by that particular ENT, though. At our follow-up evaluation in 2006, he did not get within 5 feet of C, merely said “oh he’s fine, he’ll outgrow it” and walked off. After making us wait for almost 2 hours to see him. So I make sure I give him bad word of mouth whenever someone mentions anything ENT-related.

So, I’m thinking about switching our pedi. I do still like her, but she’s very much not proactive about getting a diagnosis for my boys, and often acts like I’m just being a pushy mom who’s overreacting. I liked her much better when the boys were babies, and we didn’t know anything was wrong. She’s a great pedi for “normal” kids, I guess, but I need someone to be an advocate with me, not be another person I have to fight in order to get help for my boys. I have to shop around for a new one though. I need to find a local special needs parents group and see who they all like for a coordinating pediatrician.

Anyway, there it is. They’re doing well but we still don’t have a diagnosis for their speech delay. It doesn’t sound like we’ll ever have one. Their therapists don’t think they have verbal apraxia, and everyone agrees that they’re not autistic, so at least we can rule those out. I suppose I just have to keep pushing. And get a new pediatrician.

School’s out for me too, well until the end of the month. Must check on when fall classes start up. This is my final semester of grad school. I take the comprehensive exams in November, and graduate in December (assuming I pass comps, of course). My GPA is a 3.96, disappointing. I have one B+ out of all my A’s and it just shot my GPA. What really kills me is that it was the professor’s mistake on a quiz which she refused to give full credit to those that answered correctly that brought me below an A. So I’m a little bitter. I will still graduate magna cum laude, although I have no idea if they do that for master’s degrees. My next decision is whether to get a second master’s degree in something different, or to continue to a PhD in the same, or scrap it and go back to work. Tough one. I have about 6 months to decide though, since apps would be due around early March for acceptance into a fall program.

My mom comes to visit in about 2 weeks with my nephew, to stay for 2 weeks. My sister is picking her up since she flies in to BWI, and then driving down to stay a few days, then I’ll drive up at the end of Mom’s trip since her return flight is also out of BWI. It’ll give us a nice visit to Baltimore, probably hit the aquarium there so my nephew can see the sharks.

The husband is recovering well from his surgery, he returns to work on August 13th. He’s putting up a new shed since we are once again overcrowded in our house but can’t yet afford to move. He also is supposed to finish the bathroom remodel this week. I want him to repair the screens on the front porch too.

That’s it for now, will post pics soon.