There's such a thing as too much fun

I've finally recuperated enough from Wednesday to blog about it. :) Blake decided to take the day off. I really can't remember the last time he took a whole day off, so we wanted to make sure we did something fun. I suggested going to the train store we'd never been to in Lexington. Then I remembered that Wednesday was also the day that parents could eat lunch with their kids in the cafeteria at school, so it was a great day for him to be off. Then ... I remembered that Nate also had PT at 8 that morning, so it would be a long day, but we would just make it work.


So we started out at PT at 8, and Nate did a good job. He was fine when I dropped him off at school and was playing trains with Justin. I came home and got Georgia ready. Didn't she look pretty?





Well, she didn't even get to go to lunch because as soon as we walked in, they said that other kids weren't allowed in the cafeteria because they wanted parents to just focus on their preschoolers. So the ladies in the office were very excited to babysit such a pretty little girl. She was good and just talked to them for a little while and fell asleep.

When Nate's class came down the hallway, he wasn't with them. We figured he had just lagged behind a little, but after a few minutes, we went down to his room where he was having a meltdown with two other little boys because they didn't want to wear their Indian costumes to the cafeteria. :) We got him to settle down, and we all went down to the cafeteria together. We had a nice lunch together, but we could tell Nate was already getting tired and was on edge.


After school (he gets out at 12:30) we headed out to Lexington, which takes about an hour. As expected, Nate fell asleep in the truck. I figured he'd be hungry when he woke up, so we talked about where we could eat, and I remembered that Gatti Town (pizza and games) is close to the train store and that would be fun for Nate ... and Blake. :) Well, Nate was in a terrible mood when he woke up, so he had fun in Gatti Town, but he was throwing fits over every little thing. He especially didn't want to leave, but we reminded him we were going to the TRAIN STORE!!

Okay, this store is like Thomas heaven. It was amazing. Nate was thrilled! He kept saying "I love here!" In the front they had all the Thomas stuff you could buy. In the middle of the store they had two rooms with a ride-on Thomas, a big screen TV playing Thomas movies, and two train tables that they use for Thomas birthday parties. Then in the back they had a big model train layout.

Very serious about trains.

They have the same mural that Nate has in his room. :)

Georgia giving me a "look." I can see her as a teenager here.

Watching brother play trains.

Shopping. :)

We let him pick out any train in the store (within reason--there was some expensive ones there) that he wanted, and he chose the cheapest plastic non-Thomas train in the whole store, haha. We've named him Teddy. We also got a Thomas sweatshirt and an "I Love Toy Trains" movie.

So then it was time to leave. We knew he wouldn't want to go, but it was getting late and we'd been there foreeeever. So I told him we had five more minutes left and to pick out what one last thing he wanted to do. He chose looking at the model train. After five minutes, we rushed him out of the store so the crying didn't start until he was in the truck. :) But then we were in rush hour traffic. And Nate does not like traffic, you know, so that just made things worse. I don't really know how to describe how bad this tantrum was. I think he said, "We need to go back to the train store" at least 400 times. I felt myself starting to twitch. :) And we could NOT get out of traffic. It was bad, bad, bad. Blake said, "Why is he acting like this?" Well, he had PT, then school, where we came for a special lunch, then we went to Gatti Town, then the train store! That is WAY too much fun packed into one day, and Nate's head was spinning. I do hope Blake will take another day off soon, and we'll learn from our mistake and have a laid back day at home.

Another decision that came out of that day was that Nate's schedule is just way too packed in general. I had concerns about this when he started school, so we rearranged it a little and decided to wait and see if he adjusted, but it's still too much. He has school 4 half days a week, plus three therapies and music class. Although he loves all of these things and I think all of them are so good for him, he's just tired all the time. So something has to go. Music class may seem like the obvious choice, but he just loves it so much, and it's the only activity that's just fun and doesn't have anything to do with therapy. It's a nice change. So I decided we should drop OT on Fridays. It's the least necessary therapy right now. Yesterday I asked his OT Katie if she would assess him to see exactly where he's delayed so we could work on those things at home. She started the assessment and we'll finish it in a couple weeks. One of the things on the assessment was stringing beads, and Nate did awesome with that--much better than a few months ago. He has that very important skill mastered. :) Another was to build a tower 10 blocks high. Well, Nate wanted to use two of the blocks at the base to make it more stable. So he didn't pass that test, but I think he was far more clever than it was asking him to be. Anyway, we'll drop Friday OT in a few weeks, and he will ride the horse on Wednesday mornings at PT. I hope the PTs schedule will open up soon so we can move that.

A couple cute stories. Nate currently loves this book his uncle Lucas got him about trucks. We've read it a lot lately, and last night he was "reading" it to me. And he was surprisingly accurate! For example, on one page, it has the word "SPLASH" written in large print, and Nate said splash. I thought, wow, he's recognizing words! So I pointed to "SPLASH" and asked Nate what that word said. He thought about it and said, "It says ... I wuv you." Hahaha! and Awww.

The kids and I are going to my parents' house today for the week, and Blake is going to join us on Wednesday after work. This morning I was telling Nate our plans, and I said, "And I bet Pop will play trains with you." He said, "And Granna will wike my new train Teddy. She'll say Wow!" :) So cute.

And now I must go get everyone bathed and pack up all the stuff we're going to need for a weeklong trip! It could take me all day.