Finger Knitting!

Aden has now mastered finger knitting. Where he goes to school, they have a "subject" called Hand Work, and they are learning how to finger knit which prepares them for knitting with needles. He will now move on to making his needles and then will start knitting.

The Protected Path

Aden's school does the most wonderful thing the Saturday before Halloween. It is called the Protected Path and there are 2 routes you can take, one for 5 and under and one for 6 and older. There are stations along "the luminated path" with skits acted out (fairytales etc). Alexia and I were on the younger path and we were Tree Fairies. We sang Twinkle Twinkle Little Star (did you know there are acutally 3 parts to that song):

twinkle twinkle little star
how I wonder what you are
up above the world so high
like a diamond in the sky
twinkle twinkle little star
how I wonder what you are
are you an angels twinkling eye
are you a gateway in the sky
so you guide me near and far twinkle twinkle little star
stars in apples seed pods pears
stars in berries every where
so you guard me near and far twinkle twinkle little star

That was a feat to learn in 2 days! At the end we gave out shink red "magical" apples, the children were mesmorized! The night was so entirely magical.

The First picture is of my wizard Aden and his friend Juliette the Queen!

Pumpkin Patch

Today some of Aden's friends and me (and my friends) all went to the pumpkin patch after school. We took a train ride around the patch and climbed a hay bale pyramid. It was quite warm out but had a great time! My "farmer" son found a persimmon tree and the group found a pomegranate tree and we spent lots of time picking and eating.

Lego's, the cost and the guns!

Being the pacifist that I am, I vowed I would never buy my children anything with guns. So about 5 months ago Aden received a basic lego set that he has been playing happily with since. He decided that he wanted to spend some of his money (holiday's last year) and could I please take him to Toys R Us to get some more Lego stuff. OK, first of all I don't like Toys R Us and second I couldn't believe how much they charge for these Lego sets!!! Aden bought two small sets, Star Wars (yes, the SW's has guns in it) and Castle, to the tune of $36.00! Yikes!! But, as far as the gun thing goes, I figure it is part of him and his desire to "play" with toy guns and he will make them out of whatever he can anyways, he has shaped his toast into one before. I figure if I let him play with them, maybe he will get tired of them eventually. Oh well, he is happily playing as we speak. Any other moms have any thoughts on gun play?

Good Stuff

Life has been so good! I recently helped organize a Parent Evening called: An Evening With Your Child's Heart Team. The photo below is of me and about 1/3 of the other mom's that showed up. We had about 100 people come. There was a panel of experts from Child Life, PC, Peds Anesthesiologist, Peds Intensivist to the PCV Surgeon. We rolled in a heart lung machine and the perfusionist was there to demonstrate! We had the Child Life therapy dog, Greta, giveaways, dinner etc. It was wonderful. We had about 5 adults with CHD throughout the audience and they had a lot to offer. One mom wrote to me and said: "I left the Hilton feeling emotional, enlightened, supported, and hopeful!"