Proof

Remember how I said Lila loves Jensen and loves to kiss and hug him?

Jersey Shore

Too bad I didn't have huge poofy hair and loads of makeup for this trip. Instead, just frizzy hair and mostly al naturale. I was worried about having up to 19 people (including babies) in a 3-bed 1-bath beach house, but the largest number of people we ever had overnight was only 16 (wohoo!) and it was way fun anyway. We basically spent every day at the beach, came home and ate dinner with the families upstairs (Todd's parent's friends that are kind enough to let us come with them and take over the entire downstairs apartment), and then play a game or 2. Then usually chat a bit when the kids finally went down. Not too bad. 

Maybe later if I feel like it I will post more pictures or some of our videos. All in all, a great week!

Brian's Dance Moves

The first week I came out to Philly Todd's Parents were out of town. So we were lucky enough to take care of my brother-in-law, Brian who is down syndrome. He goes to this great school for adults with disabilities and he lovingly refers to it as his "college" since all his brothers graduated high school and went to college. Todd's mom wrote everything out that I needed to know and went over it with me, and also wrote important events on their calendar to help as well. On Tuesday night Brian's school was putting on a dinner event where all the classes had put together a program of singing and dancing. He was way excited to go, and had been talking about it for weeks. We got out the door a little late, I was a little frazzled about getting there, and of course hit monumental traffic on the way. When we finally pulled into his school a few minutes late, there was a whole car in the parking lot. Yup. Just one. I was so confused. It hadn't even crossed my mind that this event would be anywhere besides the school. So I poked around, and finally found someone who worked there-I think a janitor. But he didn't know anything about it. He called his supervisor, and he also had heard nothing about it, and mentioned that if it was to be held at the school he probably would have been notified to help out with it.

So I am beyond confused and frustrated and scared. I don't want to ruin Brian's special night. Not knowing what else to do, I offer to take Brian out to eat as consolation. He says he would like to go out to eat, and we just need to go back to his school at night instead of morning. That the program is at 10:00 at night. He says it over and over, that we have to go back at night, at 10:00. I feel so bad. So we get him chicken nuggets and and a JBC at Wendy's (he loves both bacon and chicken nuggets), and I pick him up a chocolate donut on the way home. Still feeling awful.

When we get back, I look at the paper Margie had written for me, and see there, plain as day "Tuesday night, CADES program 6:00 p.m. at Springfield Country Club." HELLO. I realize that instead of trying to make it up to Brian by taking him out to eat, maybe I should have come home and actually CHECKED THE PAPER. That is how confused I was. I literally had not considered that this could have been anywhere else and must have just missed that when Margie mentioned it as she went over the paper with me. Later I realized she had also written Springfield Country Club on the calendar as well. I never checked to see where this was because I had assumed! A lady had left a message on the phone to remind us of the time the day before, so I knew I had the date and time- I didn't think I needed to check the paper for anything. Yeah well I learned my lesson!

It is almost 8:00. It has to be over, right? I called Todd and asked if he thought I should try to make it there for the end. He didn't seem to think there would be much to catch. So I looked up the phone number for the country club and asked if they were still there. The lady said it looked like they had just literally finished up the singing/dancing program. So I crammed Lila back into her carseat, chased Brian into the car, and manically drove to the club.

Well, Brian of course had missed the dancing, but we hung around for a good 45 minutes of visiting with the people he knows from his school. And he got a free shirt! But he kept saying that he "missed it." Yes, now I am feeling even worse. So I asked one of the program directors if they were going to do their dances for anything else, maybe at school? And she said that she thought that would be a great idea, and she would talk to some other people about maybe putting the program on for the actual school they have for disabled children still school-aged. I think she knew that I was upset and Brian was disappointed.

So, yesterday we went to Brian's school at 10 a.m. They were having a talent show. And Brian got a solo. Instead of doing the whole program, Brian got to do the dance all by himself for the other kids in the adult program as part of the talent show. I promised him that I would video record it for him so he could see it, and he got excited about the idea of having it posted on the internet too. How could I say no after all the stupidness I had done? Of course I can do that for him. Love ya Brian! I'm sorry! Hope you like your video!

Lila Meets Her Cousins!

There were only two left for her to meet. We flew all the way out to the east coast to do it, too! Reagan was very excited to meet Lila, and immediately played with her and was excited to have her around. Lila isn't used to having other kids around, so she was a little confused at first. But now I think she loves to see Reagan and Jensen and wants to play with them. It's funny because Reagan gets excited and wants to play with Lila, but Lila gets excited and wants to play with Jensen. Although Jensen is only 5 months younger than Lila, their young age still puts them at pretty different developmental levels. So Jensen isn't as excited to play with Lila as she is to play with him. Once he was standing, walking a little (has has been learning since we got out here), and she walked behind him and just gave him about 4 hugs in a row. With a big smile on her face. It was so cute! I'm so glad she will have some time with them this summer. We have already done some really fun things!

Here are some pictures from when they all first met. Todd and I came over to Rob and Stephanie's place the day after I got in to Philly. 

For memorial day, we all went swimming at the G-parent's Itri pool. Lila loves to swim! Even with her 50 spf sunscreen, she is still already MUCH tanner than her mommy who only wore 15 spf. Unfair, I know, but I am sure glad my little baby doesn't BURN like her mama! We all had a good time outside, it was really warm so the pool felt nice and we had a lot of good food. And later, we got so Skype with the rest of the Itri Cousins. It was a great day!

Stephanie has also taken us to a couple of fun parks, one with some animals you can look at (Lila LOVES live animals), and we went with a playgroup to "pick your own strawberries" at a local farm, complete with a hay ride. Lila actually did pretty well with that, I was surprised and impressed. If I showed her a strawberry and helped her reach it, she would pick it and (with prodding), drop it in our bucket. If I left out the prodding she would eat it instead of put it in the bucket, most of the time spitting it out after, and if I didn't help her pull it off the vine she would squish it in her fingers. But for a 16 month old? Pretty good! We have also spent some time with Reagan, Jensen and Stephanie at the library, but I don't think I have any pictures of that. Anyway, we sure have had a ton of fun with them so far and look forward to many more weeks of fun!