Ryan's B-day and PDK (aka KIP)

Yesterday, Ryan turned 6. 6??? 6!!!! I can hardly believe it!!!

He's had a hard time adjusting to the ups and downs and insecurity of the last few weeks. Homecoming was off to a bumpy start. His birthday gift from mom and dad was never more needed than this week.

My kids have too much stuff. I did laundry yesterday - their dressers are bursting. They have SO many toys that they don't even know what they have or where it is. Bookshelves overflow into piles on the floor. They have bins of craft supplies that don't even close. With Christmas right around the corner, the last thing we want to do is fill our house up with MORE crap that will take up space and be unappreciated. what to do?

Ryan is a hockey fan (and a hockey player!) so we took him to a Sound Tigers (Islanders) game. it happened that the closest game to his b-day was Friday night against the Wolfpack (Rangers) - always a good game. Even better? the Kids' Club (which he is a member) had an open skate before the game! He got to skate on the ice at the Arena. How cool was that? it was his first time on skates this season and he fell a lot, but he just kept getting right back up! even the security guard was impressed! Mommy was proud!



(I insisted on the helmet - the pads were his idea!)

During the game, he had a great time wearing his new jersey, eating his "fluffies" and watching the game. He really got into it!



At one point the camera man came up into our section in the stands (110 - bar stool section) and put him up on the big screen! he loved hamming it up! Then, he panned up from Ryan to the ice and caught this shot



yes.. I knit while I watch hockey! Really.. this can't surprise you.

A Weekend Full of Surprisees!

Surprise #1

• I have decided that now that it is nice out, I can ride my bike the 1.8 miles to the train station every day. I have a bike - it's in the garage in the same EXACT spot it has been in for +/- 4 years (with hte fire and all it got burried). I dug it out, wiped it down and SURPRISE!- tires are dead flat. I put some air in them and WD-40'd the chain and decided I'd take a round trip test ride to the station on Saturday. SURPRISE! I made it around the block. The tires wouldn't hold air, the brakes stuck and it was shifting like CRAP. so.. off to Tony's it went. It'll be there until next Saturday, but when I get it back, it'll have new tubes, street tires and probably at least one new shifter cable. I was SURPRISED at how relatively inexpensive the servicing is. (GREAT service BTW! I highly recomend Tony's!). I'll also need a new lock and a new helmet (those things expire, you know) then I am good to go. all in all I'm looking at about 3 weeks cab fare in cost.

Surprise #2

• The boys are on "spring break". Didn't they just have a vacation? Andy went to my parents last night for a sleepover. Colin and Ryan camped out at the other grandparents. SURPRISE! our dinner guests had an emergency and cancelled on us last minute. we had an afternoon/evening to ourselves! What do we do? we went to a hockey game, picked up take out and played with LEGOs. Wild times at our house!

Surprise #3

• At the game, Todd went out for a smoke (he knows! he's trying!) and ran into a sales guy. SURPRISE! we're getting season tickets to the Sound Tigers next season. well, actually, it is a 20 game package - half season. 2 seats in the "barstool section"! WOO HOO!

ETA: DUH! I forgot one!

Surprise #4

• long story short, Todd suggested I go to see the Yarn Harlot at WEBS with his friends wife. THEN he asked if it was OK for him to go too! uh YEAH!

weekend recap

not that my life is all that exciting...

• We are suspecting that Ryan has ADHD- not a big shock in this house... but we're waiting on a professional opinion late May. yes, that is as soon as we can get him in.




• the elder two boys were having a tough time behaving adn listening. Mommy removed ALL toys from their room. They are left with a couple of stuffies they sleep with and their books. I don't think they believed me at first. Andy damn near flipped when he saw me bring the stuff down to the toy dungon. Ryan wanted to know which bin they got to keep (NONE!) and when they'd get it back (depends on them!). I made it clear that I will not hesitate to keep taking more stuff away until they get the picture.
• Colin grabbed his RPI baby Puckman onesie out of his drawer, brought it to Mommy and said "hockey!" We went to a Sound Tigers game later that day (yes, he wore the onesie!). They lost in a 6 round shoot-out! good game though.

• Colin is picking up our love of reading. So what if the book is upside down!
  
  
• again with the Colin.. I've had ENOUGH of him pulling down the gate and headed for big kid territory upstairs. I had to buy a new gate and mounting kit so he can't pull it down. Before you even ask - the house had a slightly different configuration pre-fire (all of our gates were destroyed then anyway.) so this gate was unnecessary.

• I've been doing some stealth knitting. I can't wait to show you, but it'll have to wait until the gift is given.. totally worth the wait!

• I should have some nice LL super sport for my Pomatomus today or tomorrow YAY! I'm running out of protable projects... although my Ravlery queue isn't getting any shorter...

Puckman Lives!

Ryan participated in a hockey "jamboree" for all the kids in the clinic program. He palyed 3 games in 2 days (1-2) and had a BLAST! He got to play center a couple of times, but mostly played forward. He had some trouble figuring out which way to face during face-off. but he made contact with the puck. He and all the kids got a medal, hot dog and soda after thier last game. We also won 2 of the door prizes!

Catching up...

1. Ryan is getting REALLY good at hockey - fast. this week he did a drill where he had to dive under the coach's stick, get up and shoot a goal. He scored twice. He came home and said "Dad, I scored two girls!" oy!

this was taken toward the end of his second practice - as you can see he was getting pretty tired.

2. the shawl is off the needles and blocking.


3. Todd's socks are past the toes and maybe 1/3 the way up the instep. no new photos..

4. The epic quilt is assembled. I do have pics in it's current state, but FIL took them with his camera and I didn't get digital copies - yet. I had a stroke of creative genius. I added tabs to teh top of the quilt to hang it from. the hanger is a fishing pole... how smart am I???

I'm also crocheting "seaweed" to embelish the quilt.

Once the quilting is done I can add the hemotite beads for the fish eyes. shell beads to the sea bed. the crochet seaweed and I also have some rough peridot beads to add in somewhere in there.

5. Todd got his Blue Belt.

Christmas Chaos

Ryan got art supplies, puzzles, hot wheels, craft stuff and his favorite -his hockey equipment - and lessons

Doctor Andy got a lab coat, Dr kit (incl microscope and a human body model), hotwheel racetrack, remote control helicopter, puzzles, art supplies and- of course sparring gear!

I think Colin had more fun with the paper...

Todd got his Battlefront edition PSP. I got the Hoover Hard Floor Cleaner (aka kitchen zamboni), a bunch of DVDs, knitpicks Optiosn set, and 6 skeins of handspun alpaca.

No injuries. No trips to the Hospital.