In an Effort

to keep this blog as current as possible I'm putting up a couple new pics. I downloaded tonight. Enjoy :)

Joe waiting for the bus on picture day

Ready for Little Gym

My Little Ballerina

A busy Wed. night for Mom

Joe's first homework assignment, a poster about his life

It's Gonna Be a Long One...

I hope your comfortable I have ALOT to report on! I guess first thing is first. Hurricane Ike. I apologize for not updating faster we have been trying to get back in the swing of things and luckily Tuesday our daily routine was back to normal. I should go back to the "beginning". Hurricane Ike hit us Friday the 12th at about 3AM and honestly it wasn't as bad initially as I thought it would be. We slept through most of it...we did wake up to hurricane force winds and a tree sitting in the middle of our boat! The high winds and massive amounts of rain lasted most of the day. A side note, our power went out BEFORE the hurricane even hit! We had a generator so we were able to set up one TV, a light, a fan, the frig. and a microwave. So in all honesty we never really had to "ruff" it. However, any loss of power is hard on a house of 8 people (Cindy moved to Texas...that story is coming later in the post, and had arrived the day before the storm hit). We did pretty good the first 24 hours, we watched the storm which lasted most the day, went out in the afternoon to look at our yard and our neighbors and watched lots of news. By day 2...the business of no power was old! The biggest problem was the heat (we were hot!) the fan just wasn't cutting it and the kids were miserable! Problem #2 the inability to take a shower! So by the morning of the 3rd day we had enough. With no power in sight (we got a date of October 4th for power returning!) we called up family in Kansas and got the okay to head North! We left the afternoon of the 15th for Galena Kansas (it's right on the border of Kansas/Missouri). It's about an 11 hour trip but it was a LONG trip we were willing to take in order to find civilization! Once we got on the road we were shocked by the magnitude of people the storm had effected! It took us 2 hours PAST Houston to find an operating gas station! And in all honesty most of our area looked like a war zone! We ended up staying that night right outside of Dallas. We ended up getting to Galena the 16th around 12. I've always loved my family in Kansas. My Aunt Lola is a Drama teacher and one of the coolest people I have ever met, my Uncle Dennis is an avid sports lover, my other uncle Jim has a son Jake who is a year older than Joey so he was great entertainment for my kids and...My great Aunt Madge and Uncle James (Mamoo's Brother). They have been married 50 plus years and are hilarious! They fight all the time (not really fight more like argue) and it's sooo funny! They kept us laughing and in good spirits! If you guys are reading THANK YOU for your generosity! Not many people would take in 3 women, 2 toddlers and a baby! We stayed in Galena until the 20th. By that point Ron had lost Cindy's dog (he found it the next morning), the sewage was leaking and Ron was just in general "sounding bad" so...we went on a hunt to find a bigger generator (3 stores later we found one) a window unit air conditioner and more non-perishable foods. Having gathered up the said belongings we were on our way home. We got home the night of the 20th. The 21st was an "easy" day, we had 2 generators so we had more outlets and the extra power enabled us to use the shower (it was cold but it was running water so that's all we cared about) And just as we were getting used to our new "pioneering" lifestyle the afternoon of the 22nd our lights came one! Shocked we were beyond shocked our lights came on that early! We got lights before Kingwood and Houston which I hear NEVER happens! Post-storm has been hard "swallowing". Most of our family "fun" spots are no longer there. If you know me, my favorite spot in the Houston area is Kemah...it is GONE! It's just not there anymore. Galveston another family favorite is destroyed. It's just amazing how insignificant you are to the forces of nature. The Houston area has vowed to rebuild which I'm sure they will, we are just going to really miss those places in the mean time. Before I move on from this topic I'll leave you with some pics.


Julianna watching on the car TV, we were able to charge it in the van and bring it in for her to watch Movies (life saver until we got the 2nd TV set up)

Our family room set up. 1 Adult TV, 1 Kid TV and fans

Our boat

The baby with her personal fan (she was so hot...but surprisingly still smiling)

That's not a river it's our road!

Our neighbors roof across the street in the woods

The baby in her swing in our hotel in Dallas...notice that swing had to evacuate too! We haven't figured yet how to live without it!

Driving through Oklahoma

Allie in Missouri! We had to buy her some winter clothes! There was a noticeable temperature difference!


In more recent news...Joe started back to school on Tuesday! He was so happy to be back to his "normal" routine! Dance and The Little Gym opened back up as well so the kids were able to attend Wed. Julianna still loves dance...asking me everyday when can she go to dance class! Joe is warming up to The Little Gym, we kinda have to force him to go in the door but by the end of class he is enjoying himself. As I said earlier Cindy has moved here! We are so happy to have some more family around!!! She moves into her apartment tomorrow (that's what we will be doing all weekend, helping her move). She starts mortuary school (yep you read that right!) on Monday and is in her last week of bartending school (she is going to bartend after school and on weekends to pay her rent). The baby has had a pretty bad cough/cold I think from the temperature difference up North. I took her to the dr. on Tuesday and she got an antibiotic. She now weighs 19 pounds! She's a healthy girl! My sister Kristy and her husband and daughter (who I've never even gotten to meet yet) were supposed to visit last week but because of the storm had to reschedule :( The airport wasn't even open the day they were supposed to fly in. The good news is they are now coming the 7th of November! So we are definitely looking forward to that! I believe that's it for now. I'll leave you with some pics. of our bon fire we had on Monday and a promise to post pics. of Cindy's new apartment this weekend!

Julianna and I

Cindy helping the kids roast marshmellows to make smores

Joe putting out the fire just like Grandpa!

Take a hike Ike!

We are preparing to get pounded by Hurricane Ike! It is heading straight for Galveston (about 60 miles south of us). We are definately in the hurricane zone and expected to be on the "dirty side" of the storm. We are expected to get winds in the upper 80 to 115 MPH with 5-8 inches of rain starting around 3AM Saturday morning. However, tropical storm force winds are supposed to start tomorrow afternoon.

We are prepared the best we can be. We were not mandatory evacuated and honestly we don't have anywhere to go even if we were to evacuate. I am scared to death. I am worried about the kids (it's going to be a scarey experience for us all but more so for them). We do have a generator so that will be a help (the last time a hurricane like this hit our area was 3 years ago and we hear the power was out 10 days). We are trying to mentally prepare ourselves for that possibility.

For those that want to check up on our area we live in Liberty County (just north of Houston)and www.click2houston.com is our local news sight. The map at the top of the post shows our area in case you are looking at maps on your local news stations and wanted to know where we are on the Texas map. Galveston is part of those thin little islands in green toward the bottom of the map. I probably will be without internet access for a long time so I might not be able to update for a while.

I'm asking for your prayers. As you can see we are right in the "line of fire" and they are expecting 30-60 percent of the houses in our county to have damage. We live in a brick house so that is a plus for us but it's still an uneasy feeling. Tornados are another thing our county is worried about. It's going to be an uneasy couple of days.

Joey watching cars evacuate from Galveston (we live right on the emergency evacuation route)

Random Updates...

I took Julianna to the eye dr. on Monday and found out that her vision is still 20/1000 (20/20 being perfect). We found out her vision was 20/1000 when she was about 6 months old and we have been hoping that it has improved...it hasn't and won't ever improve until she is old enough to have corrective surgery (at age 21) so...we ordered her a new pair of glasses. We are really hoping she wears them this time. She got her first pair at 6 months and we could never get her to successfully wear them. She is older now and is very active so we are hoping that once she gets her new glasses she will realize how much better she can see and WANT to wear them! I asked the eye dr. if 20/1000 was "horrible" vision and he said "Well I see blind patients so I wouldn't say horrible...I'd say really bad!" It is what it is. There is nothing at this point we can do but try our hardest to get her to wear the glasses. Personally I don't know how she functions when vision that bad. Her eye dr. explained that she doesn't know what's it's like to see well so she's adjusted her life to fit her vision. He says that once she starts wearing her glasses regularly she will NOT be able to function without them. Plus she as an astigmatism so that's something else working against her.

Joey started Sports Development at the Little Gym. He did really well. Once of the traits of Asperger's Patients is "poor or clumsy" athletic ability. I signed him up for this class just to get an early introduction to the idea of sports. I am a firm believer in extra ciricular activities and I am prepaired for that fact that Joey's "thing" will not be sports but I think it's important for him to be involved in activities with other children. That's another weakness in Asperger's kids is poor communication skills with peers so this class will also help with that. He is to young for cub scouts (which I think he will really enjoy) so... this was more or less our only option for him. When he first entered the class he sat on the mat by himself in the corner. He slowly got the courage to join the other classmates and by the end of class seemed to be having fun. He wasn't as advanced as the other kids, I knew that was going to be the case. But our goals for him are different then the goals of the other kids and that's okay. I've excepted the idea that he's not going to be the standout athlet and won't always be the best in his class. It's painful to see him struggle, almost everything he does is going to be harder for him than most kids. He did manage to do a forward roll by the end of class and he was very excited about that! With Joe that idea is to celebrate the little things, successes that most parents would overlook are a really big deal to us. We "play up" everything he does. I am really worried about him lacking self confidence so I also try to make him feel extra special about his accomplishments.

Allie is sitting up on her own!!! It's neat to see her and Julianna and Joey all sitting together and playing. Joey and Julie are sooo great with her! I'm looking forward to really seeing them interact with each other now! And trust me Allie want to be right in the middle of everything!!!

Some pics. from this week...

Julianna at her dance class this week

Joey sleeping with his skeleton and notice his halloween P.J.'s Halloween is Joe's favortie holiday and yes we start getting in the "spirit" early!

Our little ham! Sitting up all by herself and mighty proud!

It's the end of the 1st week

of school for Joe and when I got him off the bus today he had a weekly report in his hand. On that report it lists what kind of mood he was in Mon-Fri, what he liked that week, how well he ate and slept and just some school news. So...on Joe's report is said he was in a Happy mood each day (except for Tues. the first day) ate all his food (except for Tues. again) and enjoyed playing outside and listening to stories! There was also a hand written note from the teacher that said:

"Joey is really starting to interact more with peers and teachers! We are proud of him! :)"

I would say that's a pretty good start for the first week!

A Star is Born!

Giving the thumbs up!

Our little ballerina!

Million dollar smile

Let me tell you our little Julianna is a STAR in the making! I have to give you a little history before I talk about today. For those that don't know Julianna has been in occupational therapy since she was 6 months old for torticollis/plagio and for some sensory problems. Now 24 months into therapy she is ready to be discharged! I walked into Active Development Therapies with a baby with a crocked neck, lop sided head and the worst case of separation anxiety they had ever seen! Today my little girl walked into Texas Academy of Dance took the hand of her new instructor and walked into the dance studio all by herself! That's huge for her! Active Development Therapies is ready to finally discharge Julianna under the stipulation that she be enrolled in an extra curricular activity (they wanted her to be around other children so she wouldn't regress). She is too young for pre-school and I don't trust day care (a whole nother blog!) So I signed her up for dance. I, myself danced for 13 years so it was only natural for that to be my activity of choice for her since she can't make up her own mind and really there are only so many options for a 2 year old. My niece Madison also started dance for the first time this week! Okay, back to my story. So her dance studio http://www.txacademy.com/ has cameras in each of the lesson rooms and while you wait you can watch what's going on in the class on a TV they have in the waiting room. Cool concept, it's neat to watch her without her knowing I'm watching! My little Julianna did EVERYTHING they asked her to do! She danced up a storm! Meanwhile all of the other little kids stood there or cried or a combination of both. Trust me I know how they feel, Julianna used to be an avid screamer too! But Julianna didn't let the other kids get her down (she used to have a big problem with mood stablization) and watched her teacher and did her steps perfectly, I really was impressed! She LOVED dance! I swear the kid is a natural! She cut a rug for the whole 1/2 hour! Then at the end of class she came running up to me "Mommy I love dance"! I was so proud I almost cried. She has come so far, she really has! I am thrilled at the fact she enjoyed it so much! And it was thrilling to see Julianna as a leader! She is the leader of our kids (Joe gladly takes back seat to her, he doesn't like being in the spotlight) and she was definitely the leader in class today as well! Oh and I was picked as room mother...not to sure if that's a good or bad thing but I jump at the opportunity to be involved with my kids "doings" (I'm also on policy council at Joe's school) so I accepted without second thought! More to come on that when I find out myself.

In other Pilkerton news Allie has been an absolute monster lately. I took her to the dr. today and they said her throat was red and she has a sinus infection. They gave her some meds. and also said she was heavily teething (she has 2 teeth with more on the way). She weighed 18lbs 12oz which is almost a pound jump from last month's weight! The poor baby screamed herself to sleep tonight, I tried to console her but she wasn't having it, she is just miserable :(

A happier thought...Joe had a good day today! He got on a off the bus without crying and I called his teacher just to see how he was doing in class. She said he was doing good. He doesn't cry all day (a relief!) and that the only time he gets "sentimental" was the word she used...hmm...wonder where he gets that from? Is right after they come in from playing outside. The next thing on the agenda is lunch and nap both of which he doesn't like. So once recess is over he tells the teacher "I just want my mommy to come" but she says she goes over the schedule and that after lunch and nap he can get on the bus and go home and that comforts him. I'm so pleased to hear he is doing good. It's been a big concern of mine for so long. And she said he was playing well with the other children....WONDERFUL! I'm leaving you with a picture of Joe getting on the bus for the first time this morning:)

1st Day of Pre-School

So today was Joe's first day of pre-school. It's actually his second year of pre-school but since he was home schooled last year it's his first year actually going to the school. I had a hard time letting him go...literally. The bus' gas was stolen this morning so instead of putting him on the bus I had to take him myself. The bus would have been an easier transition for him because he loves the bus. Me taking him into school was much harder on him and me. I classify this as one of those many parenting milestones yet to come where you don't want to let go and let them grow up but you know you have to. I have been reminiscing a lot about him as a baby and the last 5 years, I can't believe it's time for me to let him go and start school. Where and the hell does the time go? Then with Joe being diagnosed with Asperger's there is a whole new set of worries. I have done nothing but think about him all day and 2:00 seems so far away! So here was our morning, I'll let the pictures tell it (you can also click on the pics. to make them bigger)!

Joe outside the house...ready to go (he thought he was getting on the bus)

My little big man, the book bag is almost bigger than he is!
Ready for the 1st day of pre-school
Yawning at the bus stop (it's gonna take a min. to get used to early mornings)
Excited about school (I got a call a couple seconds later saying the bus couldn't come)
After I dropped him off in the classroom, this picture breaks my heart :(
So after a couple rounds of "Mommy don't leave me in this place" and "Mommy please stay with me" I pulled him away from me and left. I did manage to get to the end of the long hallway only to run back and sneak a peek through the window, he had stopped crying and was sitting at the table waiting for his breakfast with a somber look on his face. I'll update once we get home and let you know how he did through out the day. I haven't gotten any phone calls so that's a good thing!

In the face of a Meltdown!

I know I'm such a bad parent, lol but I couldn't help but take some pictures of her melting down. She has the cutest meltdowns, her faces are priceless!

"Noooooo"

"But Why"

"Pretty Please"...the girl has perfected this look! At this point I had to stop and pick her up!
She has us figured out in 6 months, I can't imagine what she'll be like at 16!