Basketball

Basketball has become a big deal at our house.

Jude is interested in all sports, and very competitive. Owen likes the social aspect of sports, but that is about as far as his interest goes. 

Jude is a smack-talker. Points his finger at the competition, then gestures them closer, implying they can come closer if they want a whoopin'....:)

Owen declined to play basketball in his own league this year. However, Jude's team has needed an extra player every practice so far, in order for them to scrimmage, and Owen gets out there, in a wheelchair, and gives Jude a run for his money, even though he knows he won't be allowed to play in the real games. Owen is so shy that he barely speaks on the court, and is hesitant to pass or catch the ball...unless he is guarding Jude! Then he is all business and hustles, playing excellent defense.

Jude more than makes up for Owen's reticence, hollering for the ball, taking shots.....notice in the pic below that Jude has learned how to keep the ball in his lap, now that they have started enforcing the rules of "legs must be strapped down".

The team has special chairs that go very fast, have no brakes, and turn on a dime.

Owen is in a chair that is for a much bigger person, so struggles to keep himself in the chair.

Jude is having to learn to do more with his upper body, which is a struggle for him, as he is VERY mobile in his lower body, and he uses his legs a great deal for balance and power. He is mobile in his upper body as well, he is just used to being able to do as much as he can, with a he has, an being constrained irks him.

Learning to shoot from a seated position has ticked him off, but he is coming along. :)

Learning to roll the ball up the side of the chair is coming along too!

Below is an example of Owen and Jude head to head.

To close, today I over heard Owen say to Jude, while they played a video game, "Get him, bro'!!! Get him!" And I heard him call Jude "bro" twice more , later! No idea where that has come from but cracks me up!

A very good thing....

This is a list of good changes that have occurred as a direct result of Jude joining our family through adoption, in no particular order. I am unclear, in each scenario, if the change was fascilitated by adoption in general, Jude specifically, Owen specifically , or the unique elixir created by those factors.

- Owen sleeps in his own bed a LOT more often now, than he did before Jude came home.

- Owen whines "I can't do it" almost NEVER anymore...as a matter I fact I can't remember the last time he has said that. He tries to figure things out on his own, with his own initiative a lot more. THEN he says, "Hey, Jude! Can you do this?" I find both a nice change.

- Owen plays a lot more, in general. For starters, he has a built in playmate now. Who happens to be a boy. Who is for all intents and purposes developmentally about the same as Owen. Who is usually game for anything. Whom Owen thinks is a laugh a minute, and vice versa.

- Owen has someone with which to engage in imaginative play with, constantly, now, and as a result, kingdoms are built and empires are crushed underfoot daily at our house, as opposed to my poor attempts to remember that this pretend enemy has this fighting capability but tHAT one can fly, etc...it was an exercise in frustration for both of us. Jude and Owen have some kind of  twin-speak going on, that enables them to play for HOURS, in relative accord.

- Owen is a great deal more adventurous, as long as "Jude does it,too". This does not always end well for them, but in general, Owen is getting to experience a lot more of life than he used to, bc he was just too shy.

- Owen has shown a generosity of spirit, and some leadership that may have always been there, but how do you know, if you are never in the crucible?

Are things perfect? Is Owen perfect? Of course not. But what he is, is MORE. He's louder,more often. He tells jokes and laughs, in this totally hokey, all-boy way, that only another boy (or 45 year old man who used to be a goofy 6 year old boy) can find funny, more often.

He has IDEAS. BIG ONES, that have only come as there has been this sounding board, in the form of another person with BIG IDEAS to bounce them off of. Listening to them construct and reconstruct their tent-city is a joy-filled hour of enthusiastic brainstorming that continues to amaze me. There was just a switch that was NOT on, before May. It's on now.

I would go so far as to say that whatever trajectory Owen's life was on prior to May, it has taken at least a 90 degree turn. He was always a good kid. He just seems so VIBRANT to me now. It's a beautiful thing. :)

Art

Jude and Owen took an art class with a few classmates. This was their first completed painting.

This is the class

This is the canvas after they prepared the background for their second painting. I was impressed with even this!

This is the finished product. Owen's is on the left and Jude is on the right. Jude said Owen helped him with some if the outlines for the houses. (Without the rubber grips we use on pencils, Jude's grip is a little loose.) So, call me crazy, but I was impressed! The woman who runs the studio had 6 kiddos aged 4-8 sit still long enough to crank out a painting from blank canvas to a recognizable facsimile of a master's work. ALL the kiddos' paintings were this good! Is that not nuts?! Now I have to paint the boys room so they can hang up their art work....:)

Been awhile

I have been re-reading my blog posts from China, as we have approached and passed the 6 month mark as a family of 4. Jude seems so little in those pictures, now. And that seems so long ago. He told me that "China told him" that we were coming for him, and showed him our picture, one day before we got there. They told him "you like-a me, and take me home."

We have fallen into a routine here, that is pretty much working for us. Home school in the mornings and some physical activity in the afternoon, most days. The boys started art classes on Thursdays, for the month of November

Somewhere in the process of getting out of the tub and getting into their pjs, a game of tug of war ensued, in which Jude had the towel in his teeth, while Owen pulled on the other end. Not surprisingly, given the mouthful of loose teeth Jude has, he lost the tug of war and just about yanked another baby tooth out of his head, to boot. He is already anticipating another visit from the Tooth Fairy. :)

We are going to see a speech therapist for Jude. Now that he has hearing aids, and they have been set at their appropriate volume, I feel like his speech sounds less like an accent and more like he can not hear the last Half of words. We will see what the therapist says.

Sometimes our Saxon math requires geometric shapes to do the work. Jude is normally very good in math, at least when it entails numbers. But when it involves geometric shapes, especially in the assignment pictured, which was to use shapes to fill in a pre-printed pattern, you can really see the  lack of pre-school type skills.

On another front, we have seen a lot more emotion out of Jude. He has pretty consistently shown us a lot of energy and enthusiasm when he was in a good mood, and a flat, aphasic demeanor when he was upset or angry. Well, that is changing, let me tell you.  I don't know if this is progress or not, but it's different. The changes we are seeing don't feel like good change, but only time will tell, I guess. 

The boys raked leaves, in an attempt to make a pile to jump in. Just as it assumed enough mass to be called a pile, Zeke came over and hiked a leg, peeing all over it. 

The same pile, after Abby decided pee didn't bother her. It made a good bed, regardless. :)

Halloween

Just some shots of the goings on here. I took the boys down a local street that goes all out on Halloween, a couple of nights before Halloween. The street in question is full of pedestrian and automotive sight seers for an entire week before Halloween. We were just one of dozens of people walking down it Tuesday night.

The boys posing with their jack-o-lanterns. This was a near miss! I was waiting to get the pumpkins until closer to Halloween. I was eying some enormous pumpkins that S@m's had, but when Jude and I went in on Tuesday they had sold them ALL. They had apparently marked them down to half-price over the weekend, and one person bought all they had....there were hundreds, and they bought every one! So, Jude and I headed to Kr@ger, and do you know Kr@ger didn't have ANY either???? I started to freak out, and fear that my children would end up on a psychiatrist's couch at some point because their mother failed to provide pumpkins on Halloween when they were kids, when Jude and I finally found some at W@lmart. Whew! 

Pumpkin carving fell to me this year, as Jim was working over. While carving Owen's pumpkin, I stabbed myself, and bled profusely, all over the pumpkin. Jude immediately went to get me a band-aid, while Owen said, "Cool! Real blood! Can you bleed on Jude's, too?"

For the record, I was careful to pick out pumpkins that were the same size, but Jude was quick to show Owen that his, Jude's, pumpkin was shinier. (Sigh.)

We went to a Trubk-or-treat, at a church across the street from our house on Sunday. The boys had a great time.

Note Jude's mismatched socks. I told you people that the sock situation was desperate. :) so, if you see Jude and notice that his socks don't match, I know. At the end of the day, I just throw the one with a hole in it in the trash, and throw the good one in the laundry. Laundry is somewhat simplified in that I don't spend unnecessary time trying to find the mates to Jude's socks. I just find two "singles" and fold them together, calling it a day. :)

The witch below was a riot! She was in full character mode, and scared the kids with her maniacal cackling.