abc ME READ

I am so happy to announce that one of my best friends has started her own business. She is a wonderful mother and outstanding teacher! I have been working with Kim for 6 years, and she has done some amazing things with my struggling students. I have seen this reading program in action, and have taken many things from it to use in my own classroom! Kim has been put her heart into this program! Please take the time to visit her website and check it out! You can click on the button on the side bar of the blog and go directly to their website.

At abc ME READ, their passion is teaching children to read. They have designed programs to reach children at various age levels that will spark their natural curiosity and love for learning. As parents themselves, they understand the importance of parental involvement in a child’s learning and created abc ME READ and Book Clubs to bring that participation to a new level. As children begin to learn how to read and master these skills, they will also begin to lay the foundation to become lifelong learners.

Book Clubs

Book Clubs target children ages 3-7 years old. During book clubs, children will enjoy story-time and socializing while learning letter shapes and sounds, crafting, and snacking. Currently, they have an alphabet book club that has 24 alphabetically appropriate themed snack and craft ideas. Book Clubs are great for starting your own business, party planning ideas, and for parents, teachers, and tutors. The craft kit is available for purchase and can be used to create multiple crafts for multiple children.

Letter Program

The letter program targets children ages 3-5 years old. It includes 26 interactive, multi-sensory lessons that focus on recognizing, reading, and writing all the letters of the alphabet. Picture flash cards accompany the letter program for additional visual recognition of the 26 letters. The letter program provides a head start for preschoolers and is great for parents, teachers, and tutors.

Sound Program


The sound program targets children ages 6-9 years old. It includes 122 fun, multi-sensory lessons that focus on reading and producing sounds, as well as decoding, spelling, and comprehension skills. This program is beneficial for children with dyslexia and other reading difficulties. It is easy and great for parents, teachers, and tutors to use.

All of their programs and book clubs are available for purchase through their website in downloadable version, on a CD, or in a bound book. Please feel free to contact them with any comments or questions.

Please check them out!

Case of the Mondays!

Okay, so somebody had a case of the Mondays today....I know.....it's Wednesday. Well, with congestion, an ear infection, and possibly pink eye in both eyes.....you would too! Macy headed to our doctor on Monday for a diagnosis, antibiotic, and pink eye medicine. She is feeling much better, although still congested, and is finally catching up on her sleep.

That is the explanation for her delightful "case of the Mondays" this morning!

Grandma Kelli dropped everything to head down on Monday afternoon to help out! We are truly blessed having her as a mother and grandmother!!! Not only did she care for our little Macy for the past few days, but she managed to cure her "case of the Mondays" today!!!

Nothing cures a "case of the Mondays" like a maniCURE and pediCURE!

I love you Mom! I just hope I can step up and fill that mother/grandmother role like you do someday! Can't hurt that I am getting lessons from the BEST!

Clunkers

So with all this "cash for clunkers" talk going on, it made Jeremy and I start reminiscing about our old clunkers i.e. our first cars.


Kristen's First Car- 1993 Chevy Beretta

I was anticipating the day I finally got my driver's license, because this car had been staring at me from the garage for 6 months. Honestly, I can't remember exactly why we ended up taking it into the auto shop a week before I got my driver's license, but I do know that it wasn't finished on my first night at a 16 year old driver. So my best friend Nicole and I headed out in my brother's 1992 Dodge Shadow. Definitely not as cool as my car, but hey, I could finally drive!

The day after I got my driver's license, the shop called to say they were finished and that I could pick up my car. Mom was working that day about 45 minutes from home, Dick was in Mexico for work, so Corey drove me over to pick the car up. Sure enough, there was my beautiful car sitting in front of the shop, with the keys waiting under the mat. I jumped in and headed to the gas station.....I was notorious for filling it up with $2-3 at a time. I got a few dollars worth of gas and started to head home. Pulled out on the road, got the car up to about 45 miles an hour, and WHAM, CRASH......oh crap....I can't see.......my hood......it's blown up and smashed into my windshield!!!!! Luckily I had my window down, so I suck my head out the window, pulled the car into the median, and sat in shock for a few minutes.

The front fender was bent due to the impact of the hood flying up and hitting the windshield, it was insane. It looked like I had been in a horrible car accident....yet I hadn't......my car kicked its own butt! Funniest part about it all was that while I was waiting for someone to stop and help, I see a moped coming down the road. The guy pulls up.....driving the moped......and asks me if I need to use his phone to call someone. Yes, he has a cell!!! I didn't even have a cell back then, it wasn't common. Well, to make a long story short(er), the auto shop paid to fix everything! They failed to put the latch back in the car that your hood latches into. Crazy!!

I loved that car....drove through my first year of college! At that point, the heat and air didn't even work anymore. Therefore, I had to let "Larry" go. Yes, his name was Larry!

Jeremy's First Car- 1984 Ford LTD

I just laugh every time I picture Jeremy driving around in this car. All I have to say is, "HOT!"

Leave us a comment at the bottom of this post and let us know about your clunkers, and any stories you have to go along with them!

Trach Baby: A Mother's Journey with her Child of Special Needs

Here is an excerpt from my book, "Trach Baby: A Mother’s Journey with her Child of Special Needs". I have been working on it for about 20 months....or not really working on it. I must admit that I really concentrated on putting this book together at first, and then I just got too busy. Great excuse, huh?!?! More like....I fizzled out. Okay, so I need to get it together and start focusing on getting this book finished and figuring out what to do with it next. Here is a sneak peek:

I had a funny feeling. It was the same feeling I’d had in my stomach all morning long. It was this nervous, “something just isn’t right” feeling. Fifteen minutes had gone by so we started thinking that things must have been fine. I reminded myself that this was a simple hernia surgery. Many newborns go through this same procedure. That is when I saw them. Two men in white coats, they were coming toward me carrying pamphlets and papers. That feeling in my stomach got heavier when I realized that one of them was Macy’s surgeon. This was the second time in 2 weeks, that I’ve had doctors come at me carrying pamphlets. I learned quickly this was not a good thing!

This can’t be happening. This is not happening. They are not coming for me. Those were the thoughts running through my head, but I was wrong. They were coming for me. They sat down and literally laid it on the table. I could not decipher the pictures. They sent a scope down to see why it had been so difficult to get the breathing tube down. That is when they saw that Macy had a narrowed trachea (airway). It was the size of a pinhole. The ENT, Dr. Miyamoto, stated that he thought about performing corrective surgery to make it larger today, but all the doctors in the room were against it. He said she was just too tiny, and had a heart defect that wasn’t repaired yet.

The next moment is one that I would like to say was a blur, but it wasn’t. I can remember every second of it. I can remember the feelings that were overwhelming my body. Dr. Miyamoto said, “We feel at this time that the best thing for Macy would be to perform a tracheotomy and put a trach in.”
“No, no, no.” I was not going to have that for my daughter. This was not happening. They directed us once again to the pictures they had taken. They pulled out information and diagrams. They must have thought this stuff would help, it just made matters worse.
I started sobbing. I told them that there must be another way. We were not letting her have a trach. I had experience with trachs. They were horrible. When I was in second grade, I became a buddy to a classmate who had one. I remembered all the things that came along with it, the noise, the suctioning, the constant coughing due to mucus, and the loss of ability to talk. Also, I associated it with someone who had severe defects and deformities. My baby didn’t, she was perfect, she was beautiful!

I cried and sobbed telling them that they needed to "fix" her, they had to do something else. I was in one of the best hospitals in the world! Do something! They kept insisting that this was the only way. They said she was stable at the moment, but they wanted us to sign the papers so they could put the trach in. I refused. I crossed my arms like a child and said they must do something else.

With tears in his eyes, knowing it was against my wishes, Jeremy signed those papers. I didn’t know what he was feeling, but my whole world, my life, my dream was gone. At that moment, I didn’t know if I could take anymore. I could feel my heart breaking; my body felt that it was shutting down. As those doctors walked away, I felt as if I wanted to chase them down, hit them, and hurt them. They had torn apart my life. I couldn’t look at Jeremy, nor did I want to. I was in my own world. I was done.

Look What Macy Can Do Now!!!

The video says it all!



In following tradition, it is Grandma's job to take all the grandkids on their first tube ride. While watching all of the other grandkids, I was excited, happpy, and little scared. While watching Macy, I wanted to start crying out of pure joy just watching my daughter do something we weren't sure she would ever do! God sure does amazing things!

Ahhh....The Joys of Pregnancy!

You know you're pregnant when.......


You ditch your wedding rings for a $10.50 wedding band set from Claire's. You figure if these rings get stuck on your fingers and you have to eventually get them cut off, oh well!!!

You have a pile of "pregnancy panties", and "pre-pregnancy panties". Then when you are taking the time to sort them out you find a few pairs of thongs from back in the day. You finally toss them, coming to the realization that you are probably never going to where those again!

You lock the bathroom door when you do your nightly lotion ritual so no one else can view your deformed pregnant body. Everyone says pregnant is beautiful...I beg to differ!

You buy new bras, one size bigger, with flaps that unstrap in the front to feed your baby at a later date. In the meantime, you cringe thinking of the day they unstrap accidentally exposing your breasts to the world!

Shaving has a whole new meaning. Boy does that belly get in the way sometimes!!!!

You sit on the toilet, talking to your belly. Enough said!!!

Well, that about sums up my life lately! Have a great week!

Ha, ha, ha!

I know you should never laugh at someone else's pain....but this is just downright hilarious!!! Okay....it also hurts just watching it!!!

You may want to go down to the bottom of our blog and mute the music first.

No Beer!

I totally love a beer at a cookout, I love a margarita at the lake, and I love a strawberry daiquiri at a Mexican restaurant! Haven't had a drink since February 2.....won't have another for a long time! Does my husband care?? No way! He's still holding a brat in one hand and a beer in the other at all the cookouts, at the lake, and at the Mexican restaurants (maybe a burrito in place of the brat). I've tried to pull the "I can't drink for 9 months...this is your baby too", line, but it just doesn't work! Honestly, no one has taken pity on the pregnant woman this summer and substituted their tasty looking drink with a water or soda....until yesterday!!!

We spent the afternoon swimming and cooking out at my in-laws. Yes I said swimming.....Macy finally got to swim! Anyway, my sweet mother-in-law and adorable sister-in-law gave me that pity yesterday. No drinks for them! Girl power!!! I loved the support!

When my husband ordered a beer from his mother yesterday, I vetoed it! "VETO"! Was it honestly going to work....hasn't worked all summer long! You wouldn't believe it, but he didn't drink it! Awwww......my sweetie, my hero.....awwww!!! It was so sweet! For the first time at a cook-out, my husband sported a brat in one hand a Pepsi in the other! Thanks Stud! Okay......don't usually call him "stud", but I thought maybe he'd like it! He also liked the time I wrote "Love Dawg" on his sandwich and he discovered it at lunchtime with all his work buddies.....okay.....maybe he didn't like it so much!

Well, here are some pictures from our day of fun!

My Squirt squirting everyone!


Yeah! Swimming!!!


Papaw taking Macy for a swim!


Check out those pigtails!


My adorable husband cozied up to his blue whale! He's going to love me for this pic!