The FAAvourite Fun

Where has James continuously asked to go visit, ever since he started preschool, over 5 years ago?

That's right, the Sonoma County airport, officially known as the Charles M. Schultz Airport.

He loves to watch the planes take off, their spinning propellers, and the observation posts around the field. He likes visiting in December, to catch the tree of lights atop the air control tower ... and visit Santa, who lands from a Sikorsky helicopter.

 At least once a year we visit the adjoining air museum. Their Wings Over Sonoma County air show makes going back to school exciting.

And he loves, for some reason, the red REACH helicopters. By golly, we have sat parked for up to 15 minutes, just observing those babies parked on the tarmac. And if we get lucky and see a take-off or landing? Oh my -- such the ecstasies of delight!

So yes, we went there too, over Spring Break. Several times.

SOOC Saturday: New Year at the Beach

A group of friends from our UCSC college days decided to get together and head to the beach in Santa Cruz to ring in 2010. We could not get away for the overnighter part, but we did enjoy meeting up with them on the second day of the New Year.


Can I just say that I still love to drive HWY 17 when it's not choked up with traffic? It's beautiful and interesting, always. Then there's the thrill of leaving behind a huge metropolis and dropping from the forest in the mountains down to the ocean. Ahhhhhh! The flashback to our glory days is a bonus.

The kids are really good car travelers, although James is showing a tendency to get carsick on long (over 5 hours) or twisty rides. It only took us ~2 hours to get there and I kept a most sedate pace over the mountain. Therefore, we arrived just after 11:00 AM, refreshed and eager to get out there and walk.

The kids were super good as we walked from West Cliff to Saturn (Cafe) downtown. They liked the old pinball machine in the restaurant. We chatted with our friends while the kids fidgeted (James) and amused themselves (his sister, drawing). James ate the french fries and had some milk. He was totally not interested in their organic PB&J sandwich. He did eat the apple slices that I'd packed in a baggie.

We progressed down to Logos books. There, the kids started to melt a bit. So after a look at the kids' books in the basement, we walked back to the Boardwalk, where the kids had a good hour or so in the sun and wind, playing near the surf. The was much running, jumping, leaping and frolicking.

We let the kids take off their shoes & socks and run barefoot. James loved feeling the dry and wet sand on his feet and toes. Practically the whole time walking was spent with his hands in the "high guard" position and on his toes, springing along with a loping stride. His foot prints were a mixture of ten tiny toes and the balls of his feet and regular footprints where the sand got swampy.

Of course, a great deal of the time was also spent *on* the sand, making sand angels and drawing. Had to clamp down on the throwing.


It was a great start to the New Year.

Time to Breathe

It's Friday! It's been a crazy, whirlwind week! Big sister started school and I am juggling five organizations to organize James' new school schedule, which starts next week.

I snapped this shot of James this morning, and I am happy that he is having a few moments of Zen-like tranquility:



He is 3' 9" and is loving trains and planes right now. This morning he asked for "popcorn," which puzzled me mightily. James is not a big popcorn person. Then a light went on: He was watching a Laurie Berkner special last night. So I started it up again ... and voila -- there was a picture of a bucket of popcorn at the start of the show. I had totally missed it. Again, he surprised me; in the nicest way!

More in SHAPE

James has started working with his new SHAPE person! So now he also gets some special one-on-one time Tuesday, Wednesdays, and Fridays, instead of just Mondays and Thursdays.

I stayed out of James' line of sight in the next room, reading a book. Just to check in that they didn't need me. They certainly didn't. So after about 20 minutes I moved down the hall to my office. It's dusty! Kidding! Kind of!

James' speech is getting much clearer and he is now saying 3-syllable words that others can easily recognize. Um, I think 3 weeks ago he could not do this. He is working on letter recognition and has a pretty good grip on the alphabet. Listening in today made me smile. There is so much more give & take in the verbal process now in his SHAPE sessions. It used to be almost a monologue for his first SHAPE assistant. He has better focus and can stay with a task much longer than before.

Except if he is cranky. Cranky=all bets off. Cranky prompted throwing of puzzle pieces into the sink (nice arc on your throws, James, BTW) when alone with Mommy and got him another Time Out. Cranky wipes out speech and brings on the screeches and screams. The tears. Cries of "A-Daddy! A-Nana!" And many many tears. James gets tropical storms of emotional outbursts -- fierce, loud, wet, and mercifully brief.

James likes to work with his word cards and can actually talk about what he sees on them. Not a lot, but he's talking!

Sometimes lately, I catch him sizing me up thoughtfully while I am busy at something. His sister does this all the time. I am seeing him do it more and more. It reminds me that I need to watch out for bad habits -- like swearing. A few weeks ago, he repeated a word I'd really rather he forget I said. Yikes! How about a popsickle, James? A red one? Yes, talk about *that* all you like!!!