Oy.

If I am no longer here after today, you'll know why.

I thought yesterday was quite a surprise. Yesterday was when I called for a brief appointment at the dentist's for them to look at the hole I discovered in Keziah's tooth. Her tooth that has stubbornly refused to come in was finally coming in and I was showing it to our friends when I discovered that the tooth behind it had a cavity in the outer wall of it. I was quite surprised! When I first called, they didn't have room to see her and were rather suspicious that she even had a cavity. ("So you can actually see a cavity in her tooth?" "Yes, there is actually a visible hole in her tooth." "How old did you say she was again?" "Three." "Well that is certainly unusual." "Yes.") I was relieved to find that they could fit her in after all, at 3 o'clock.

David, Abby, Kez & I left a bit late to get there. In the process, David released from the house the dog that we've been taking care of. I did not have time to chase Elof down, so I mentally said, "Adios" to him as I took my 3 youngest down the road to the dentist.

When I got there and the dental hygienist looked at her tooth, it was indeed deemed a cavity. (Yeah, I'm the mother of five but I'm totally stupid, right?) She also asked if I wanted her to clean Keziah's teeth today and since she had the time, I gave her the ok. Apparently Keziah has very soft enamel and that, plus a possible problem with her in utero was what caused the cavity on her tooth. Keziah was an amazing patient. She sat there, did as Miss Linney told her, and wasn't at all afraid. The dentist came in, told her what would happen when she came back for her filling, then left. At that, Miss Linney said that she'd had a cancellation, if I wanted to get David's teeth cleaned, I could. Seeing as I like to keep us on as close a schedule as possible, I said yes and Dave climbed up into the chair to get his teeth cleaned as well.

As Kez and I were settling in, the dental assistant came in and said that they had time to fill Keziah's tooth, if we had time to do it now. What else were we going to do? Fortunately, Abby was there, so she stayed with David while I took Keziah over to have her tooth filled.

Keziah, being the tiny girl that she is, found that the chair the dentist put her in made a great slide. She couldn't figure out why it was that I couldn't get in on the fun with her. Yeah, Mommy's too big for that, Zi. She did the exact same thing in the filling chair as in the cleaning chair and everyone in the office was quite impressed with how well she did, especially for the first time.

When Friend Husband calls me on his way home, I generally don't have anything to tell him about my day. Yesterday I told him all about our adventures at the dentist. Sometimes the days are just packed, as that intrepid philosopher Calvin once said.

Today has been yet another ball of wax. Perhaps those of you who have hyperactive little boys can tell me what to do here. David has been into everything. Today he has 1) opened some poster paint and festooned his bed, room, and person with it; 2) thrown cardboard down the downstairs toilet; 3) smacked his twin upside the head with a piece of trim; 4) led her on a merry chase around the house after stealing some possession of hers; 5) urinated in an unauthorized place; and 6) stolen candy from our Valentine's stash.


It's a good thing that we have times like this to make up for those other times, huh?

The day's young yet.

Spanking him does not slow him down. Taking away privileges doesn't seem to make a dent. Putting him in time-out only stops him for as long as he is in time-out (and, tempting though it may be, I cannot leave him in time-out all day). So what do you do to keep him (and his twin sister) occupied and still be able to teach their older sisters? Looking for advice here, bring it on.

I've been thinking a lot about what my duties as a parent are and how to reconcile those with what my heart tells me I should be doing. This is generally in relation to my child(ren) with Asperger's but it also plays out with the others. This job is never one that you can cruise on, or at least I've never been able to. There's always something coming up to make you think, challenge you, or give you the opportunity to crash or to fly. Some days it makes me too tired to even entertain thoughts about it. This is turning out to be one of those days.