The Watershed, and Parent Teacher Conferences!

Nico didn't have any school on Friday, so him and I and my mom ventured out to a market in Caldwell that we'd never been to before - Cliff's Country Market. They had so much gluten free stuff! We will go back there before Thanksgiving to buy a gluten free apple pie, and rolls, and stuffing cubes. While we were there we bought some gluten free bread and snacks, and a few new flavors of Zevia (the most common soda brand in our house these days!)

Friday night we made hamburgers again (Crabby Patties). Nico has decided that he wants to open a burger joint when he gets older. He's working on the menu right now, coming up with all kinds of different names for burgers. It will be called the Diamond ... uh... forgot the last word. Oh yes! Diamond Dominion. There will be the Diamond Patty, and Hot Diamond, and a bunch of other types of burgers. There will even be one with 4 patties on it. And one with a patty on top of the top bun.

On Saturday, Guy took Nico to the Watershed. They learned about what happens to toilet water once it gets flushed. Ew! He also got to hold a snake? This is a python!

Then Saturday evening was the Halloween Chess Tournament. Evelyn joined him. Evelyn was a dinosaur in an egg! Everyone was really impressed with her costume :)

Coach Vellotti handing out trophies. Nico got 1st place in his division. He played 4 games and won 2 of them. Evelyn was in a different division.

All the chess kids from Adams Elementary!

On Tuesday we had our friend Brianna come over for dinner. Wednesday was Nico's Parent Teacher Conference. We took him with us and he played on the playground while Guy and I went in to talk to his teacher. She said that Nico is great, of course! He is excelling in Science and Math. She says he can see problems and understands them quickly. He is struggling with paying attention and getting distracted easily. We've noticed this being more of a problem recently, as well. His teacher was also concerned about him during his recent stretch of tummy aches. She said we could bring in an essential oil roller bottle and can bring in any kind of gluten free snacks that he can eat when the other kids might be having a snack he can't eat. She intuitively didn't let him have any of the gluten free cookies I provided her, ever since that week that he was struggling with his tummy. She said without prompting that she knows that the wrong foods can play a big role in tummy aches. She emphasized that Nico is a very kind and smart boy but is having trouble being all that he could be because of his trouble with being distracted. I sure love his teacher! She is so kind and seemed genuinely interested in working with us to do everything we can to help him! Guy and I will sit down this weekend to talk over some things. It will likely include: less sweets (oh no Halloween!), less iPad, more activity, and more of a commitment to essential oils and supplements (we've been lax...) And, more prayer. His next doctor appointment is in 2 weeks so I'll bring this up to her then.

This morning I took him over to my parents' house for Grandma Camp! He has no school today and tomorrow. Guy picked him up from their house tonight to take Nico to the Corn Maze at the Farmstead farm. Our church was meeting there to do the corn maze tonight. Unfortunately they have been there since 6:30 and have not seen anyone from the church! Sure hope we got the day right! Hehe.

Guy sent me these pictures just now:

I think Nico is playing "9 Square" in this photo.

That's it for this past week!

Birthday and a Boo Bash!

Friday after school Nico and I went on an hour long bike ride on the greenbelt. Nico brought home an activity calendar from school and you can color in a star every time you spend 30 minutes exercising. If you fill in all the stars you get a free pass to Wahooz.

For dinner that night we made "Crabby Patties", Spongebob style. Nico even put onion and tomato on his burger because that's how you actually make one on the Spongebob show! Eating Crabby Patties while watching Spongebob, we thought it was appropriate :)

While we were over at Grandma and Papa's house last Tuesday, while Nico was home from school sick, he discovered a drawing book in their living room that Rory must have left there. He practiced drawing from it, and when we got home that afternoon he gave me cash so that I could purchase him a similar drawing book from Amazon. It arrived on Friday! Here he is drawing.

Saturday was Guy's birthday! We went to Touch-A-Truck in the morning. Nico got to sit in a lot of different kinds of trucks.

After that we went for a little walk on the greenbelt, we hit the post office and the library.

Nico wanted to catch a leaf that was falling from a tree. We found some trees that were dropping lots of leaves, and he caught one!

That evening we made pizza and watched Matilda downstairs in the basement because Jeff and Allicia and the kiddos were out of town. Then we cut Guy's birthday cake and ate a few pieces of that! If you remember, we were trying to get to the bottom of Nico's tummy aches. We went a few days without one, we pulled all sugar out of his diet. On Saturday night we let him have a piece of Guy's cake, and the tummy ache came back! So we know sugar is involved somehow!

On Tuesday we went to visit GG and Aunt Pat. Melody was there and Nico brought out the US map that he had brought with him and they looked at that together for a while.

After leaving GG's house, we stopped at the Farmstead. We met Guy there, and Jeff and Allicia and the kiddos. First stop was the huge inflatable monster maze. 

Then tonight was the Boo Bash at Nico's school. He is going to be a ninja again this year for Halloween. Yes this is the THIRD year Nico is wearing his ninja costume! That was quite a good investment! Not that it cost much.. he he.  Here he is walking with Ivy.

Nico won the cake walk on his first time. Apparently Evelyn won the cake walk on her first time, too. It was a strange coincidence. Nico picked out these purple spider web gluten free cupcakes. Evelyn picked out a spider cake! Evelyn was standing on #1, Nico was standing on #2. Not at the same time, they had to be in different rooms because the 3rd - 6th graders were separate.

It's tradition... eat some of the cake you won at the cake walk this very night!

That's it for this week!

Persistent Tummy Ache!

Last Friday while I was in Moscow, Nico and Guy went to Red Robin for dinner. I knew what they ordered because I got an email receipt from Red Robin. That was neat. Saturday they went to the library and watched the Little Prince with pizza. They wanted to watch Matilda but I am making them wait until this coming Saturday so I can watch it with them!

Aunt Mary Anne and Me!

Facetiming Guy and Nico. They were working on making a small video game.

My mom and I returned from Moscow on Sunday.

Monday morning Nico complained of a tummy ache all of a sudden, but I sent him to school anyway. The nurse called me a little bit later saying Nico was in her office saying he felt sick. He had asked her if she had oils to help him feel better.. he he. I talked to him for a minute on the phone and he told me the nurse had given him a hot water bottle to put on his tummy and it had made it worse. I asked him if he wanted me to bring him some oils or if he wanted me to come pick him up. He said he wanted me to come pick him up, so I did!

After picking him up, I did a Zyto scan on him, slathered him in oils, and brought him with me to my parents' house! I had some work to do over there. 

So the strange thing about Nico's tummy ache that started on Monday is that it comes and goes, and even when he has it, he still eats normally. He has no fever or lethargy, but the tummy ache has been persistent in its return. It went away that afternoon, but returned in force during his baseball game that night and so we left early. He was still feeling sick the next morning, he told me he wanted to go to school because he didn't want to miss PE, but I decided to keep him home. I took him with me again to Grandma's house, and the tummy ache went away that afternoon. He woke up the next morning (Wednesday) telling me he felt GREAT! So off to school he went. 

Another call from the nurse around 12:30, saying that he had been in her office three times already telling her he felt like he was going to throw up. She had the "wait and see" mentality, so they brought some schoolwork in to the nurse's office for him and he worked on it a bit in there. The nurse called me, not to come pick Nico up, but to tell me what had transpired and to ask if anything might be going on with him. She recommended keeping a food journal, so I started one. He does not seem to be avoiding school just for the heck of it, when I try to probe with questions his response is just as always. The only part of school he doesn't like is the free-write time.

The tummy ache was gone when he came home from school Wednesday, but returned shortly after eating Blue Cow Frozen yogurt that night. 

This morning I realized that the tummy ache on Wednesday morning started shortly after Chess class, where they are always given a sweet treat. So, I was thinking I had narrowed it down to SUGAR.

Tonight, Evelyn came over for an early dinner right after school, so we could head to Nico's baseball game. It was cold! But it was his last game this season. 

At one point he was standing on first as the first baseman, totally oblivious to the game, instead he was watching a bird in the sky. The pitcher threw a ball to him to make an out and he didn't see it. Everyone was screaming "NICO!!!" and the coach asks Nico, "What kind of bird to you see?" and he said "It's a red tailed hawk!" then he heard everyone yelling at him for his attention and he kept yelling, "IT'S A RED TAILED HAWK!"

It was a good last game. He had a great coach and a great team. Excited to see what next Spring brings!

Tonight while reading in bed, his tummy ache came back all of a sudden. Poor boy. Still moving forward...

That's it for this week!

Sleepover, GeekCraft, Stem Night!

Friday after school, Grandma Salisbury came by and picked Nico up for an overnight with the cousins! This was him BEFORE school that day. He was all ready!

We picked him up Saturday morning and then went to the GeekCraft Expo downtown. I thought it would be bigger than it was, but it was actually easy to find parking, and the setup was a quaint room with about 20 GeekCraft vendors selling all kinds of hand made geeky stuff. Lots of zelda, Dr. Who, Harry Potter stuff, made from wood, plastic, cloth, cookies! All kinds of interesting things to look at.

We saw Jeff and Evelyn there, which was expected, and when we were all done we went outside and had some fun on these stationary bicycles that made music when you cycle on them. It was very cool! Video at the end of the blog so you can see what I mean!

Saturday pizza night was fun, and it was Guy's turn to choose the movie. He chose an animated series called Revolting Rhymes, stories from Roald Dahl. There were just 2 thirty minute episodes. It was very good.

Monday night was another baseball game. It was treat day for me, so I brought the treats for the team. Tuesday night was Stem night at his school. Guy got home a bit early so he could take him. Allicia and I, and Avery and Ivy hunkered down in the basement while Guy, Nico, Jeff, and Evelyn went to Stem Night. We watched Mulan! By the time the movie was over, the big kids were home. Nico made a brush robot: a tiny robot that has toothbrush-like attachments that moves along by vibrating. You can see a video of it at the end of the blog!

Readathon ended yesterday, Nico read a total of 20 hours in 2 1/2 weeks! Guy finished reading Matilda to him and now we plan to watch the movie.

This morning my mom and I left for Moscow. We are up here to help one of my Aunts out for a few days. We'll be home on Sunday! I know this afternoon Nico was able to go swimming in a geothermal backyard swimming pool belonging to Jeff's sister. They took him over there while Guy had band practice tonight. I just got a text from Allicia saying they were done and home. I bet he had a BLAST! The original plan was for them to go the Farmstead today (hay rides, pumpkin patch, games, that sort of thing), but the weather was too rainy earlier for that, meaning it would be a bunch of sogg and mud!

Today I got to see my Grandma, we all ate dinner at our hotel and I heard many stories about her and my Grandpa. It was so neat.

Nico won a prize at Sunday School on Sunday, a mini game of chutes and ladders, a Christmas version. We've been playing it nonstop the last few days.

We played a version of the bird matching game where the cards were put all over the clubhouse, not just in one area. So we had to get up to get the cards. It made it a little easier remembering where some of the birds were, though!

That's it for this past week!