Gideon's 4th Birth Day

This was the invitation that we handed out to the people who live around us and a few people from church. The super-hero theme was the major theme for the entire day.

Gideon woke up early (6:30 instead of 8) and his first words to me were: "I put my Iron Man clothes on!"

I convinced him to lay low for another hour, but by 7:30 I was making his requested cinnamon twists with chocolate glaze. (Pillsbury... don't think I'm super-woman or anything.)

After breakfast, he got to open his first present of the day. It was from Ryan and Claudia.








It made him look like this:


He wore it all day.

He ran outside to show Ana.


Aunt Kelli, Rachel, and Simon called to sing to him. Rachel sang in English, and then sang the Polish birthday song. And Simon mooo-ed for us. The cousins are getting pretty excited about seeing each other.


We web-cammed with Gigi and Papa Dan who are in Greece. The kids asked what was in Greece, to which I said, "A lot of old rocks." But it confused Gideon and Naomi, b/c all they could see was the office in which my parents were web-camming. :)

While we were on the computer with my parents, JR's mom called.

We spent a busy 45 min. chatting with people all over the world. (Just in case you aren't keeping up, that is Poland, Greece, and Florida.)

Then Gideon and I got ready to go out for our birthday date.


He chose Burger King. It is currently his favorite restaurant. And he was hoping to get an Iron Man toy. (He got a Marmaduke toy instead.) We laughed throughout our meal remembering funny things that happened last year on his birthday.

When I asked him what he wanted to do for dessert, he said he wanted to pick out some candy. So we went to Fresh Market and I let him pick out whatever candy he wanted. He chose (surprise, surprise) 2 different shades of blue jelly bellies.

After coming back home, the kids requested taking a nap on the couch.

I snapped this picture really close to the minute of his birth 4 years ago. He's so much bigger now! :)

The rest of the afternoon, we spent getting ready for his small get-together. I was blowing up balloons, which we didn't even include in the party. But G and I love this picture b/c we think he looks like a Muppet.


At around 4 we got to web-cam with the Mosiers.

Can you see Madison and Hudson?

For dinner, G has requested BBQ Chicken pizza with pineapple and black olives.

Here is G waiting for JR to finish up with the dishes so he can open his gifts:



The cards...

Naomi's gift to Gideon is a figurine of J'onn J'onzz the Martian Manhunter. This is a great gift SHE picked out for him. We read the Justice League books aloud and Naomi is always asking who J'onn J'onzz is. Gideon thinks it's pretty funny. Here's how the gift-giving went down:


Gideon got a lot of other great gifts. He is super excited about all of them. And if you know Gideon, you know that I'm not exaggerating about that.

Since I already posted the link to the photos of the party on the last post, I'll just type out about the rest of the day.

We had a good turn out at his party. Even some people from church made the trek out to celebrate Gideon. Gideon picked out s'mores cupcakes and assorted super-hero plates and napkins. And for our purposes, Transformers count as super-heroes. We even had Optimus Prime masks for those guests who showed up without costumes.



Fun was had by all while we were visiting outside. And by 7:30 we brought the kids in for bath time. During our cuddle time, Claudia and Ryan web-cammed. When Uncle Ryan lowered the camera to Claudia's belly, Gideon (unprompted) began talking to Kaden. He called him his special nick-name (Keathan) and talked to him about how he was going to teach Kaden to play with Transformers and that he was going to love on him when he comes out of Claudia's belly. (SO SWEET!)

It took G a long time to settle down after such a full day. But by 10 he finally stopped trekking down the stairs to make up questions to ask us.

He's such a big kid now.

Within the week I hope to get an interview with him to post here on the blog.

Our Big 4 Year Old

We've had a big day. I took lots of photos. I'm beat.

But, since so many of you are out and about and use this as a way to be a part of our lives, I'll go ahead and link you to the flickr set. But I'll do a big post tomorrow.

Turn back the clock...

This was originally posted on the evening of May 25, 2006 with the anticipation of most people reading it on May 26, 2006. Let's all turn back the clock 4 years, and remember what was going on with the Sheets family then...

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I sat on my couch all day drinking water. JR went to Stafford to deliver his Grandpa and Judy to Debby's house and do some yardwork.

Around 8 pm I started monitoring my blood-pressure. It fell in the range that the nurse told me to watch for.

So when JR got home, we paged the dr. Apparently the first time we did, the number was scrambled. But then at 11, we got to talk to Dr. Hodges.

He moved up my apt. from 10:15 tomorrow morning to 8:30. He also told me that he and Dr. Meinig had discussed that they should probably not allow this pregnancy to go past week 37 (according to them, that's Monday). In addition to this information, I was told to pack a bag to bring to the apt. tomorrow.

Here's the problem: X-Men III. I have been looking forward to this movie since before I knew JR. But the good news is that there is a showing at 10 am right around the corner from the hospital. If they say that we need to head to the hospital, I'm seriously going to ask if we can post-pone it for a few hours so that I can see the movie. I mean, let's face it... once I have the baby, I won't be seeing movies in the theater for a while. (don't worry, I do have my priorities straight. I won't do anything that would endanger Gideon or me.)

So... that's the update for now. Keep us in your prayers.

I should go to bed. I might have a baby tomorrow.
Daisha
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Birthday Celebration 4.2

Gideon has been celebrating his birthday in phases this year. Before my parents flew off to Greece for the summer, we met in Wynne for a b-day get-together/pick up children from their weekend visit, and now, we've celebrated with Grandma as well.



Debby got into town for her visit on Thursday evening and left this morning a little after 9. We had a great visit full of cuddles, laughs, shopping, Rendevous, Blue Coast Burrito, Build-a-Bear, JR's preaching/my singing, and G's 2nd 4th b-day celebration.

Here's the slide-show: (these photos are SOOC--straight out of camera)



And I took one of the photos of G as Iron Man and did this with it:

Bathroom Etiquette

I took Gideon to the women's bathroom at a bookstore during our adventures today. (Naomi was still reading books with G'ma.)

G carefully talked me through his locking of the stall and his preparations to use the facility. (The kid NEVER stops talking.)

All of a sudden G says:

"Momma! Who's that peeing?"

Me: "It's a public bathroom, Bud. Lots of people use this bathroom."

G: "Ask her her name!"

Lady-in-Stall: (a giggle)

Me: "Um... no. Bud, you don't do that in public restrooms."

Lady-in-Stall: (full out laughter)

G: "Why?"

Me: "We give people their privacy."

G: "Oh." (to the Lady-in-Stall) "Sorry!"

Lady-in-Stall: (through her laughter) It's OK!

G: "Momma! Did you just change your voice!?!"

Me: "No, Bud."

Lady-in-Stall: (guffawing)

*****
I did notice, however, that she did not make eye-contact with me as she went to wash her hands. There is such a thing as bathroom etiquette after-all. :P

Gideon's Batman Face

Muddy's

So we have been hearing about Muddy's since we moved to Memphis.

Well, the other day, when the kids got up from their quiet time, I told them to get ready to go.

I didn't tell them where we were going, but I did tell them that their snack was going to be part of my surprise.

We headed out to Muddy's to see what the hype was all about.



Gideon chose the "Plain Jane" because of the blue icing. Blue IS his favorite color after all. :)

Naomi chose the "Vanilla-Berry" because of the pink icing. Pink IS her favorite color after all. :)

I had the "Pucker Up" because I like lemon. :)

It was wonderful. We had fun. And Naomi let me know in no uncertain terms that she was NOT finished with her tup-tate.

Unfortunately, the other day I didn't have my camera. So we HAD to go back.

Today I brought my camera. (And I was trying to get part of my home-work assignment finished for my workshop which explains why the kid's faces are in shadow while their backs are in the sunshine.)







Gideon is getting to be such a big kid! He ran our trash into the restaurant while Naomi and I were finishing up. He also brought us more napkins. He loves getting new responsibilities like this.



All in all... we give Muddy's a icing-covered "thumbs up". (oh, shoot... I should've gotten a picture of that!)

I've been playing around with new editing techniques. (not a part of my class) JR doesn't like this edit. I'm wanting to get more feedback on it.

Reading

This week we are reading

as a family.

"Stuart Little" is the only book JR remembers enjoying as a boy. :)

The entire family is enjoying the cuddle-time on the couch with this short, imaginative book. Gideon and Naomi like to giggle at the voices JR has for the different characters.

Today, as part of school, the kids and I drew pictures of "Stuart". This is the beginning process to get them to start processing the information they are learning. As their drawing skills improve, I'll expect more details from the story. Right now, their verbal responses indicate that they are engaged in the story and are remembering it from chapter to chapter.



These drawings are the beginning stages of what will one day be book reports. (It's nice to see it in the simple beginning stages, isn't it?)



What books have you enjoyed reading aloud as a family?

I thought I was going to all-out deck the boy. All I wanted was for him to PICK UP THE CRAYON!!! I wasn't asking much. I wasn't asking for perfection. I wasn't asking for good penmanship. I wasn't asking for letters even. I was asking him to pick up his crayon. And he refused. We were both at our wits end.

It was then that I seriously questioned this whole home-school thing.

That was back in February.

I laid low when it came to G and writing. He doesn't really like to draw or color. His confidence isn't high when it comes to those types of fine motor skills.

However, we'd do something light and fun dealing with coloring about once a week.

Last week, I found a little dry erase board with writing guides on one side and blank on the other. So I picked it up thinking that it might be something to tempt him to write.



And I was RIGHT!!

Last week he started, on his own, writing "on". Today, while I was getting lunch ready, after asking me to write his name as an example, and helping him with the letter "G", he wrote the rest of his name!

As I finished up lunch, he had me spell "ice cream" from the kitchen and he wrote down the letters I told him. "Ice" was in the right order, but the other letters were scattered around. :)

He's gaining confidence in his writing and JR and I are praising him for his perseverance.

Mat sat on Sam.

Mat sat on Sam.
Sam had a cat.
Mat sat on Sam's cat.

These are the sentences that I wrote with a crayon while coloring with Naomi today. When Gideon returned with JR from the grocery store, I asked if G could read it to me.

We have been working this past week on words with the short a sound. When he starts guessing at words, we back up, slow down and sound them out.

With very little prompting from me (partly because I have been unable to speak for the last 3 days), Gideon read all three sentences. He has also read the first book in the "Bob book" series to Papa Dan and Gigi this weekend.

We are really proud of him.

We are not pushing the reading thing. He is. He loves it when he knows what the written word is. So instead of continuing to allow him to just memorize all the words he sees, we are starting to work on phonics.

He'll be 4 at the end of the month, and like always, seems so much older than he actually is. I can't believe how fast he's growing up.

Oh, and he also asked his Sunday school teacher today if he could make me a "get well soon" card. She helped him a little, but he was quick to point out that he wrote "on" inside the card. (actually, he wrote "no", but the letters were there) And since he usually refuses to pick up a writing instrument when I want him to write, we are making HUGE progress. :)

I'm one proud Momma!