Joseph's Awards Ceremony

Today was Joseph's first awards ceremony of the year, and it was great! I am so proud of Joseph. He received two awards today, Perfect Attendance and Most Improved Academically. Both awards were not easy to achieve and we are very proud of Joseph's efforts. Perfect attendance has never been an award he's received because of all his doctor's appointments and he has always struggled academically because of his learning disability and receiving most improved academically shows that all his hard work studying has paid off. Did I mention how proud I am of him yet? Because I am, he tries so hard and stays up late reading and reviewing all his work and to get recognized for his efforts is absolutely amazing! When the teacher told me he was going to receive this award at our parent conference I cried, I felt like we finally conquered a piece of NF!

P.S. This morning Joseph asked if I was going to the awards ceremony and I said I didn't know because we were never told if he'd be receiving an award (I wanted him to be surprised). But in true Joseph fashion, he said he was going to dress up and comb his hair "super nice" just in case they called his name! He's grown out of suit, otherwise he would have been wearing his suit and tie for the awards!

Happy Halloween!

I know it's a little late for this post, but Manny's back home and I've been enjoying some long needed family time instead of computer time!
We had a great Halloween this year! Joe's best friend, Z and his family joined our family for the night. The evening was great, tons of pizza and sweets! As you can see, Star Wars was the major theme for the night,

and let's not forget the kitty-Cat

and the hippie!

Oh! I can't forget to add a family photo-

Joseph was Captain Rex from Star Wars, Noah was Iron-Man and Devyn was a red Samurai Power Ranger! Don't they look cute? As you can see we had a huge crowd of trick-or-treaters, I can't imagine what the neighbors thought when we rang their doorbells! 

Halloween was great, we had a blast, we laughed a lot, ate too much and had more sweets left over then we could have ever imagined! Thank you to my sister-in-laws, Crystal and Cia for the cupcakes and rice Krispies and to my great friend, Melissa for your cute witch cookies!  

Those cookies were so cute and delicious, you may lose your reputation as a bad cook! Well, maybe not yet-

I do have to say, your brownies did taste good, once we were able to chisel a piece out!

Even though I've never been a fan of Halloween, I have to admit that the night was nice. I thank God for blessing us with family, great friends and a safe Halloween!

Happy Birthday Auntie C!

I can't forget to mention another important event that took place this weekend. Auntie C's 40TH  25th Birthday!

 Happy Birthday Auntie C, we love ya!

Battle of the pumpkins!

We spent this past Friday carving our pumpkins. To prepare for the pumpkin massacre I turned on the Halloween music while Manny whipped out his painters tarp and brought out his manliest pair of rubber gloves to cover his "ouchies." Yup that's my "Manly-man" with the rubber gloves carving pumpkins!

Ok, enough with making fun of my cutie-pie hubby! But hey, he's my best friend and that's what best friends do, they don't lie! :) Now let's move on to the kiddos!

Of course Joseph had to spend about a half an hour picking out what stencil to use,

While Noah stabbed every pumpkin within reach.

Here's a photo of Joe doing the dirty work... 

I don't have any photos of Joe carving the pumpkins because he said it was too hard and it hurt his fingers. (Surprise, Surprise!)

Now, this pumpkin has the most meaning to us. Joe picked this pumpkin out at the Pumpkin Festival because of how it looked. This is Joe's pumpkin that has NF just like him. (I can't wait to show you how it turned out, it made me a little teary eyed to see it finished.) It's our NF symbol for this Halloween.

Grandma and Grandpa also stopped by for a visit. It was a nice break for the kids, they were already over the whole pumpkin carving experience.

 In the end, it took Manny and I about an hour to carve 4 pumpkins. Here they are, our masterpieces...

Now which one is the best? I'm not going to tell you who carved what, but I'm pretty sure mine is the winning pumpkin! Argh! Matey! Do you agree?

***And yes, Manny I do know  this photo of you wearing girly blue gloves will be on the internet-FOREVER!!!! But like I said, what are best friends for?

 

Noah's first Halloween Party!

Today Noah experienced his first class party, a Halloween Party! His preschool allowed the kids to attend school in their costumes and they passed out goodies and went trick or treating within their building. This Halloween Noah has been obnoxiously picky indecisive on what he'd like to be, first it was a police officer, Darth Vader, then Spiderman, then a red Power Ranger...Finally, (as in Monday evening) he decided to be Iron Man! isn't he the cutest little superhero?

Here's a picture of the little ham showing his costume off to the classroom,

And of course, it wouldn't be a party without some food, friends

laughter and games,

And let's not forget to squeeze in some learning!

Of course Mommy Dearest Mother Hubbard had to make some sweets for the class, and let's just leave out the crap fun I had making these supposedly "simple" treats.

All in all, today was a great day! Noah had a blast at his class party and is now demanding candy everytime he says, "trick or treat" and Joseph is upstairs with a stomach ache from eating all the chocolates Noah didn't want. Happy early Halloween Everyone!

Sous Chef

I love cooking, I love cooking for two reasons, I love food and I love the quiet time I receive while I'm cooking. In a house full of boys, my 2X2 kitchen is the only place that's off limits to everyone! Well, almost everyone. This is my Sous Chef, Noah.

He pours, pinches, stirs and makes the biggest mess I have ever seen! Today my little Italian helped me make lasagna with french bread. He looked so cute pouring the ingredients and stirring the sauce. He's going to make such a good husband one day!

Of course I couldn't finish this post without a picture of my taste-testers. These two guys worked up a serious appetite at work and at school today and from the moaning and groaning coming from their end of the table tonight, I think Noah and I did a job well done! Oh, and look at how much these two look alike, it's almost creepy! I feel like I was just the surrogate when I see pictures like this!

And another thing before I leave, look at this bad boy!

Yup, I finally bought my springform pan! Most of you already know that I've been bugging for this pan for awhile and I finally bought one yesterday! So there you have it, my first cheesecake I've ever made, Cheese Cake Factory better watch out! 

CSA

I have had several people ask me about my CSA, so today I thought I'd talk about it. CSA stands for community shared agriculture and in my never ending quest to feed my family healthier and organically I thought a CSA would be the best choice for my family. I am a member of Farm Fresh to You and I love it! They send me a box of organic produce a week for around $30 a shipment. The kids get so excited and can't wait to see what fruits and veggies will be on our doorstep every Friday morning. I love knowing the boys are eating healthy, and are excited about fruits and vegetable and I LOVE not going to the grocer every week. Because of the CSA I now only go to the store about twice a month for milk and other staples. Not going to the grocer every week saves us a lot of money and with organic milk costing $6-$7 a gallon I need to pinch those pennies anyway I can! Now if only I could raise my own milking cow? Hmmm? I'll save that idea for another day, but if you'd like more information or would like to join a CSA you can click here and read more about it and be sure to mention I sent you along with promo code 6164  and you'll receive $5 off your first order! Woo-hoo to that!
*I must mention that a few fruits are missing because Noah snatched the green grapes and Joe took 2 kiwis to school for snacks. Like I said above, the kids act like it's Christmas when the box arrives!

P is for pumpkin

This month Noah and I have been working on letters that coincide with halloween. Pis for pumpkin, S is for spider, C is candy, you get the picture!  I personally am not a fan of Halloween but it is something that we celebrate for the kids, but they're not allowed to be anything scary...Only happy costumes in our house!
 So in my search for today's lesson, I came across another one of Carissa's amazing ideas. I love the idea of turning Halloween into a lesson about Jesus! So today Noah made a Christian Pumpkin.

 First, he colored his pumpkin orange. Orange symbolizes the bright sun that rose on Easter Day.

Next Noah cut and glued on the stars for the eyes, like the star that shone bright on the day Jesus was born.  Then the nose, which was the cross our savior died on and finally the mouth, like a fish to show that this pumpkin is a Christian just like us!

 Ta-Da! Here's my lil' Picasso's masterpiece! I also glued the symbols and their meanings on the back so Noah can share his project with Joe tonight. 

Now it's time for lunch, crockpot baked potatoes and brussel sprouts! Yum-o!

Wild Wednesday

Ugh! In our house we have Manic Monday's and Wild Wednesdays. Everyone close to us knows that these two days are when we get 'er done! Between soccer, preschool, chess and our other obligations we are pretty busy! Today wasn't any different except our crazy day didn't exactly start this morning. It started last night at urgent care, Or "injured care" as Joe likes to call it. Joseph and I spent yet another night at urgent care for a bad stomache ache that wouldn't go away. After a prescription and some rest he was able to go back to school today. As for Noah and I, we took a break from our Wednesday grocery trips and went to a friend's house to work on a poster for Joe's school. We had a blast and came home covered in paint! Now fast forward with me past shampooing carpets and taking Noah to preschool and let's stop at my niece's birthday party. Yup, we squeezed a birthday party in before soccer practice! The boys had a blast until I, "Mother of the Year" gave Joseph pizza for dinner. I gave Joseph, my lactose intolerant child whose been suffering from stomach aches, cheese pizza!! Poor kid, sometimes I really wonder how he's made it this long. As if that wasn't enough, we had another party we were supposed to attend tonight, that didn't happen!

With all that being said and done, tonight I'm going to sleep early. I'm going to climb in my bed that my boys have also decided to call their own and thank God for another Wild Wednesday! We may not have accomplished everything on our Wednesday itinerary and Joe's stomach may hurt more than it did last night but at least we were blessed with another day!

David Beckham, a 4th grade paper & NF

The other day Joseph told me about a paper he's working on in class. The topic for the assignment was, "if you could change something in your life, what would it be?" So all these crazy ideas went through my mind on what my goofy kid picked. But he didn't pick anything goofy, he didn't wish he had super powers or wanted to change his Dad for Kobe Bryant. He chose to change his NF. If Joe had one thing he could change, he would change being born with NF. As I sat at the table fighting back the lump in my throat and the urge to grab him and say I was so sorry and wish I could take this all away, I instead asked how the paper was going. He said he had to write a few reasons to support his topic and he wrote that he doesn't want tumors on his spine and he doesn't want his leg to hurt anymore. That’s a powerful paper for a 4th grader, but it's something he has to deal with on a daily basis. While his friends were probably writing about how they'd change their houses to mansions or have basketball stars and Hannah Montana as their parents, Joseph was writing about not wanting NF.

So what does this have to do with David Beckham? Well not much, but the only soccer player I know is David Beckham and soccer is Joseph's favorite sport. And watching him at practice tonight, I thought about his 4th grade paper. On the soccer field Joseph's not the tallest player, he doesn't make a goal every game, or bend it like Beckham, but watching him on the field and knowing what he goes through and knowing that he was so close to that spinal fusion 6 months ago that wouldn't have let him play soccer this season at all- That makes me so proud of him and his "sick" soccer skills!

He was so happy on the field tonight, not a care in the world and he was so excited kicking the ball around like a mad man. We are Blessed everyday for the fact that we have him, and at the moment we can't change NF in his life but I believe someday we can. Someday we will re-read his 4th grade paper and say, remember when you wrote this? Remember when you thought of this as just a wish and now it's true? Tonight that's what I'm praying for, I'm praying for Joseph's 4 grade paper to come true. And who knows? Maybe we do have the next David Beckham in our hands?

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The Pumpkin Festival

It‘s a tradition in our family to go to the Cal Poly Pomona Pumpkin Festival.

This year we had a few guests join us. This bad boy was one of them!

Isn’t it awesome? Our cousin had it in her backyard and gave it to us to refinish and oh boy! Did we refinish it! Talk about Pimp My Wagon! Ok, that was never a show, but if it was it would have wagons like this! Most of the credit has to go to Manny for his hard work and long hours googling chrome wagon accessories, but I did sew the cushion and did ALL the supervising! Phew, I’m exhausted just thinking about how many times I cracked the whip!

 Ok, the wagon wasn't the only one joining us, we also had Ephrim and Devyn too. They may not be covered in chrome like the wagon but the boys were just as excited to have them with us. Watching the three of them enter the patch and soak in all the fields of pumpkins was heart warming. The boys were so overwhelmed with all the pumpkins, Noah and Devyn couldn’t decide which pumpkins to pick!!!

After three hours of carefully hand-picking 5 monstrous pumpkins and shopping at the farmer's market we were finally done and ready to take our annual family photo? I love comparing our photos over the past years, the boys are getting so darn big!



Now for some pumkin' carving and some homemade pumkin' pies, breads, pancakes and...uh-oh it's begining to sound like the holidays are coming! ~God is Good, can't thank him enough for such a blessed day!

Noah's Preschool Orientation

Noah started preschool back in August. He was so excited to go and be just like big brother, and then we got there, and umm?? Let's just say we had a bit of a rough start...

(Please note: Although I may be smiling in this picture of child torture I can promise you that I was all for pulling him out of preschool and letting him stay with me until Kindergarten, BUT Manny a "friend" I know felt that if I did that he'd eventually turn into a highschool drop-out. )

Fast forward to present day and he now loves school, he loves his teachers, his friends and is on track for eventually completing high school! So tonight as I walked into the preschool parent orientation feeling like a success story for potential preschool drop outs, I was so excited to see all his artwork and extremely thankful that I didn't receive a complaint from the teacher that he's a bully or only draws headless people. Instead I heard he was a good little boy and a cutie and I saw this:

Isn't it the cutest little spider you've ever seen? I'm so glad I made him stay and never pulled him out for crying. I must say it was a wise decision on my part! (wink-wink!)

I did it!

So I've been talking about blogging for awhile now and finally did it! I'm going to have some extra time for the next couple weeks so I figured, why not start blogging? Now, about the name of my blog? Considering how my life is, I thought RX Needed would be a great blog name. What do you think? Those of you that know me know it's condescending since I hate medications but for those of you that do know me know that I very well should be taking something! But I guess that goes with the Mommy territory? Right? Feel free to chime in at anytime letting me know that you've experienced the same things! Ok, so I may be alone on this one, but hey it's my crazy life with a house full of boys and I love it!