All 4 of our kids have loved every opportunity to go to Grandma and Grandpa’s. They live on the Oregon coast exactly 4 hours from us. We used to get to go there a lot until the kids got older and were scattering every direction all the time. It would be nice if that would be something we could do more often now that it is pretty much just the 3 of us.
In these years, Rhianna didn’t get to go often with us any more so there aren’t any pictures today of her. Grandma and Grandpa live in the country and the kids loved running and playing there. These disks didn’t have any of the swing but our kids have all spent hours and hours swinging under the big tree.
This is probably going to be long just because I haven’t posted any current pictures.
I got a visit last week from a little black kitty.
Can’t get any cuter than that!
The next afternoon, got a visit from two cuties. Uncle Tyler was helping guard little miss Sweet Pea in her new Bumbo chair. She has on a onsie that belonged to her mommy.
That night, she and mom went on a date night with us since her daddy was out of town.
That was fun!
Yesterday at church, we had a little handknit girl. The first picture I took was really better but silly me had it on video rather than still so we have to settle for the lesser of the two pictures.
The sweater came from Hasbu, isn’t it cute! The leggings were knit by a blogless knitting friend, Amber. I LOVED them both on her! She was so snuggy warm and was quite the hit!
However, I digress. Are you wondering about the title? Well, I have mentioned several times about the current obsession of collecting song sheets of the worship songs.
This morning, we had to get up early to head up to Olympia for therapy. I was not fully awake and I was trying to step over a pile of hot wheels surrounded by song sheets. I have no idea what happened but the next thing I knew, I was on the floor with my leg twisted behind me. I’m thinking my foot must have slipped out from under me, but honestly…I could not even figure it out.
Now, I know it could have been a lot worse, but let me tell you..this HURT! My knee is also skinned and I spent the rest of the day hobbling around. Stairs are not fun and I found out I cannot lead down the stairs with my right foot, the injury was on my left.
Hubby was waking up Tyler and thought the dog fell off the bed until he was coming down the stairs and heard me crying. lol
We had two appointments today and got to go for lunch in between.
That’s Red Robin up there behind the trees. It was a beautiful day today.
It was a fun lunch!
The drive to therapy was so beautiful.
We haven’t been to therapy since early summer so it was all fun and new again.
We went outside a little bit, too.
Tonight I had a meeting at the church and I just thought it was so beautiful outside I needed to take a picture. The tree in the lower right is really meaningful to us, it was planted in honor of a pastor who passed away about 10 years ago.
It was a horribly busy day, so much for a day off! I got to leave my meeting early or this would have been a very short post.
Another look at the past. This is a month after the visit to the police station.
A big thing in our household is birthday breakfast. Tyler has always looked forward to it with eager anticipation. We’ve always tried to catch him coming down the stairs half asleep.
He was so tiny.
He had to stand on his chair to look at his gifts.
I think that year we were pretty in to gross motor skills (actually, I wonder if that will ever end) but not only had he gotten his bike but we also bought him a scooter. Yes, he always wore the helmet on that one, too.
Before I do the 31 for 21…I wanted to show you what a nut big brother is. You read his post yesterday about his brother, but I can’t miss the opportunity to show you what a nut he is in his own rite.
He was on a mission trip to Mexico when he did this….he totally adlibs as he goes.
(video courtesy of his good friend)
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and now we visit the police station in June 2000.
After we got the new bike, we needed a helmet. Someone must have told us to take him to the police station to get him fitted for a helmet. What a fun time he had!
Rhianna took him.
Oh wow, this is fun!
It fits!
Thanks, guys, it was fun!
A few years later when he started wandering from home, he got a ride in a police car when he let the dog out and decided to catch him by himself. We were on the run within 5-8 min. as near as we can tell, but he managed to get 8 blocks away… downtown…had crossed 2 very busy streets as well as many others, someone noticed something didn’t look right and followed him the last block and got him into a pizza parlor and called the police. Hubby had gotten in the car and every person he saw and asked if they’d seen him casually said…yes, saw him headed that way .. and continued working in their yards. We were one step from falling apart! I will forever be grateful to that anonymous person who stepped in to help out.
The police were searching for frantic parents and when hubby saw a police car, he threw down his cell phone (I was talking to him) and hollered to ask him if he’d seen a boy and a dog. The policeman turned to the passenger seat and said, “Have I seen a boy and a dog?” Hubby heard this little voice say, “Yes!” I heard him yell, they’ve got him and I fell apart on the street bawling my head off.
It was after this that we discovered that we could get him a bracelet like they put on alzheimer patients from the agency on aging and it has numbers on it. Wherever we go, they can call the number on it and find out exactly who he is and who to contact. The kids all ended up with cell phones after that (a perk for having a brother like theirs) and the police have all of the numbers.
Another thing we tried for awhile was a $400 watch that had a tracking device in it. We were supposed to be able to track him but unfortunately the phone service they used was not a good option for us here.
At least the police knew him and so do many, many people in a huge radius from our house. Everyone knows that he should never be seen alone and we continue to be vigilant about that.
I was about 6 when Tyler was born. I remember Dad explaining to Becca and me that he had Down Syndrome. At the time I didn’t really know anything about that sort of thing, or how different it was from someone who did not have Down’ Syndrome. I think that if I ever had the choice to change it I probably would not. Tyler has been a great joy throughout the years. More recently he has started really enjoying a lot of the same sorts of movies that I like, so it gives us something in common. He likes to go to the theatre with Brittany and me whenever there is one of “our” kind of movies out… things like Spider-Man, Incredible Hulk, or Narnia. Basically if it is anything nerdy, we will both like it. Luckily Brittany likes that stuff too, because she has to come with us! He likes to sit in between us if he can, a few times he has succeeded in being in the middle seat. He has even given himself and me alter egos of his favorite characters. He is Spider-Man, Iron Man, and The Incredible Hulk.. while I get to be Superman, Batman, Wolverine, and The Punisher. Brittany is always just “the girl”. In fact, when I made this picture below he didn’t care for it because I am Superman, not him: This is us last year when we went to go see Spider-Man 3: Here he is pretending to be Optimus Prime in Transformers:
When he first met Brittany he liked her a lot… he thought she was his girlfriend! He also didn’t know what her last name was C****, so he always just called her Brittany H****. It went in line with the rest of the family: Mom H***, Dad H****, Ben H**** etc., then Brittany would say, “What about me?” and he would shrug and say, “Brittany H****”. As you have seen in one of my mom’s previous posts with Tyler getting his haircut, Brittany and him have become good friends. Now that Brittany and I are getting married Brittany really will be Brittany H****. This is strange to him, because when Rhianna and Rebecca both got married to their husbands they had their names change. Now that I am getting married, naturally, my name should change too! He didn’t quite understand it at first that because I am the guy my name stays the same and Brittany’s changes to ours. He’s figured it out by now though! He, and Brittany and I as well, are all excited for when the two of us have a house so he can come visit and do all the things we all three have in common. A few days ago Rebecca had a post that had pictures of Tyler that he had taken of himself one time on her camera. One time he did the same thing on my camera: One of my favorite things about him is all the phrases that he has and that all of us in the family can quote it and the rest of us know what we’re talking about. “Sure is,” “I knew that,” “You’re fired!” “1, 2, 3 Tickle!” and of course… “Dad’s bottom!” The last one has been an inside joke in the family for a very long time, and probably won’t be forgotten for a while. It’s funny how some things stick. Brittany always tells me that she thinks it’s great to have him around all the time because he keeps the family young. He really does too! Everyday he does goofy things that we all laugh at; he has such a great sense of humor and it’s always a blessing! God really picked the right family for him, we love him a lot and he loves us and we mesh perfectly!
I had a heck of a time getting pictures off the old floppy disks to my old laptop (I really used to think that thing was so cool and I thought the old Sony Mavica was, too.) I managed to get a few pictures before the old laptop crashed. I can see this may be a lifetime job of getting our old pictures recovered, maybe I’ll teach Tyler to do it. lol
Anyway….let’s go back (no comments, please, on the picture quality, this camera was really happening in those days!)
For his birthday one year, we bought him a real drum set, his size! He entertained us with that for years until he started dismantling it on his own and moving it from room to room or using it for his cars or whatever..
This picture was evidently taken at Christmas the same year.
I had the dates when I was on the old laptop but they didn’t come along for the ride when I got them onto a flash drive, onto my computer, into Picasa and then over to Flickr. I think these were in 2001.
Then I think these were in March of 2000. We went bike shopping with his therapist and then got some huge training wheels to make the bike like a 4 wheeler. You can imagine his delight when we walked in the bike shop!
This wasn’t the one he ended up with but evidently he really liked this one!
I really like this one, guys!
We spent hours at the store….it is like walking back into time. Next door was a “department store” that just went out of business last year. You would never believe what could be found in there. We walked over there after the bike shopping and in the women’s department, we found those old satin robes that were quilted and brought back visions of big curlers and those net things we’d put in our hair to cover them. The robes were covered in plastic bags. We were dying of laughter. You would never believe the ancient stock in there…the community was pretty sad when they went out of business. I know a lot of young people who loved to go there for vintage clothes. The businesses were owned by two brothers.
Moving along…I also found some vacation pictures.
I can’t remember where this is but I thought it was cute.
Must have been something really interesting down there.
This vacation was around the time he was wandering away. Every single day before we did anything, we’d take his picture so we would remember exactly what he was wearing. It’s funny now, but it wasn’t funny at all then. One of the mornings, he did escape and our family was frantically covering the RV park. The park owner and I headed directly for the water and we saw this little fellow sitting at water’s edge, throwing rocks in. I was about to fall apart, but really…he’d never get in water without a LOT of coaxing. That period of time was incredibly stressful for us all and we had no idea how he managed to get out but let me tell you, it didn’t happen again. It’s a wonder we all didn’t end up on meds during that time. lol
I’ll try to find a few more pictures before this is all over. I also know that the big brother is going to do a guest post, too, so stay tuned.
I was 4 years old when Tyler was born. So I haven’t really ever known what life was like without him. I don’t have anything to compare it to and I don’t even remember when I actually understood what down syndrome is and that Tyler has it. But I do know that he has changed my life and the way I see things. It has been so fun watching him grow up to become such a gentleman. Whenever we go to the grocery store he always carries as many bags as he can for me. When we get home from the store I usually I grab a bag or two and go to unlock the door, and by the time I get back outside he’ll have everything in his hands with the trunk shut and everything. And he loves doing little jobs like getting the mail and helping me vacuum. Usually he’s willing to help whenever he can! Today we were at UPX and Jim asked him if he could go to the UPS truck and get a box full of peanut’s for him and he was thrilled to help! (sorry the picture quality isn’t the best, it’s from my phone)
This is his favorite place in my house. He could (and sometimes does) spend hours sitting here with a whiteboard writing things or just listening to music. And when he listens to music he sings along very loudly.
I spend at least three afternoons a week with him and we have a lot of fun together. I can’t say that I haven’t ever had my bad days with him, but I’ve had many more good days than I have had bad. Tyler has been such a joy to grow up with, he never fails to make me laugh. Sometimes it makes me upset when people talk about special needs as a negative thing, because Tyler has only ever been a blessing to me. I’m proud to have him as my little brother and I’m very thankful for him.
ps from me….Rebecca wanted a picture of her and Chase and Tyler together, this one is a few years old.
I’ve now been tagged 3 times for the same meme so I guess I had better get with it. The tags came from daughters Rebecca, Rhianna, and Joan. Joan is a knitting friend whose blog has been really fun for me, especially since these days she is showing beautiful “leaf peeping” pictures, she’s from Vermont.
List six details about myself;
Tag six fellow bloggers;
Leave them a comment so they know they’ve been tagged.
Ok….these are always really hard for me to figure out.
1. The first thing that comes to mind is that on August 25, 1966 I got to see the Beatles in Seattle. Look what I found!
I was looking for the year of the concert and found copies of the tickets. I had a $6 ticket which was a HUGE amount of money in those days for a concert. What’s funny is that we couldn’t hear them at all…everyone screamed through the whole concert. I can still remember what I wore to the concert!
2. I am a chocoholic. The darker the chocolate, the better.
3. My dream vacation is New England in the Fall. Just this year, I learned that “leaf peeping” is what you do when you go there.
4. I am thrilled that Rhianna wants Mayah to be left-handed as she and I are left-handed and she wants to keep up the “tradition”.
5. I am terrified of heights.
6. I ended up on the cutting room floor of the John Wayne movie McQ, and hubby actually made it onto a small clip when he was playing in his band. This scene was actually filmed in the very building that we met and then my family ended up buying this building for a retail store.
The end.
31 for 21…..
Today was all about “selective hearing”. On those days that he is really doing it, you can talk until you are blue in the face, he will not acknowledge you. Enough said, I was frustrated and it wasn’t until I said I was leaving that he perked up, hugged me and said he loved me. Of course he shoves me to the edge before he hits that point. lol
I did get him to pose for a picture, though.
This is the tree and the house across the street. Soon it will be bare but it is always the last tree in the neighborhood to lose it’s leaves.
And now to tag someone else…I honestly can’t think of anyone that I haven’t seen do this or didn’t just get tagged. If I do…I will add it here.
ps…yea! I thought of someone! My good friend Marlene! She is a brand new blogger…go say hi!
In July 2006, a friend of mine gave Tyler a pirate hat that provided him weeks of entertainment. From an old blog of mine, I copied the pictures.
This is exactly what he was saying when he came in the room.
The next morning he jumped in front of me ready to go again.
He was seriously concerned that I wouldn’t recognize him….
We repeated this performance for many weeks. It’s so funny, he hasn’t really outgrown this yet. If you recall the picture of him sitting under the blanket sometime this month or dressing up, he still thinks we won’t know who he is or be able to see him.
Sorry for the poor quality of the pictures…I copied and pasted them in here.
I am so wiped out today, sometimes it just all catches up. I am too lazy to get pictures on here.
We all had to be at church early today for various reasons. One of the ministries I am involved in was supposed to be doing all the greeting, ushering, etc. I woke up feeling rotten. I knew I wasn’t actually sick, but it was hard getting going. Hubby took the little guy and left me to just worry about myself. I managed to get there on time but I felt like it was a miracle.
We had a potluck followed by a (too long) meeting. I lost count of how many times we lost Tyler. This has been a real problem over the years and not so bad now. The highlight was when we were sitting around tables and we suddenly see this adorable young girl of 15 run by the windows followed by Tyler…we have 2 sets of big windows and to our family it was a comical sight. I am sad I didn’t get a picture of them…every time we went looking for him, he was with her. Funny, he is older than her, I wonder if she even knows that.
We came home and I slept away the afternoon. I had asked hubby if there was any way we could go to Olympia to see the movie “Fireproof” and he asked the show times, we thought we might head up there, the 3 of us, and next thing I knew it was hours later.
I want to thank everyone who has left me comments about following the 31 for 21 posts. So far it hasn’t been a huge burden but days like today it’s just a get-it-done kind of thing.
Maybe I’ll go see if I can find some kind of picture to slip in here.
Oh yes..this is when we won the Baby Legs from RK’s blog. That was the day I found her blog and have visited regularly since then. I had told her if I won them, I would let Tyler give them to baby since it was a link regarding down syndrome that helped me find her. This was last spring sometime.
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