Lexi and her friends

Lexi had a class assembly today - what us "normal" people would call a 'class play.' Instead of taking pictures DURING the performance - and ending up having to delete half of them because they didn't turn out - I just waited until afterward and got some pics of her with some of her friends.




That's Lexi with Anna. I can't even put into words how proud I am of Lexi for being friends with this girl. As you can see from the picture, Anna has Down's Syndrome. Because of this, she gets bullied a lot at school. But Lexi doesn't care that Anna's different. She sees what Anna actually IS - a good natured, sweet little girl. Hell, Lexi's even tried to stand up to the "big kids" in the playground when they start bullying Anna. One of the kids down the block from us was bullying her, and Lexi tried to tell him to leave her alone. He didn't listen, but that didn't matter. What matters is that she tried.

Obviously, having a sister like Syrina is what sets Lexi apart from most kids in understanding kids with special needs. She knows to look past the disabilities to see the person, because she's had to do that her entire life.




And THAT is Lexi with her friend Melissa and Melissa's little brother Robert. Melissa and Lexi have been friends since Nursery. I'm pretty friendly with their mother, as well. And Robert gets all excited whenever he sees any of us. If he sees me, he comes running to me. I find it funny. He'll be starting Reception at their school in September, so I wouldn't be surprised if Lexi, Chloe, Melissa AND Robert started hanging out together in the playground next year.

I had to admit, I liked the little play they put on. They called it "An African Story." It was about a zebra who didn't have any stripes (the poor boy who played the zebra was SO uncomfortable - he was wearing a t-shirt and a pair of tights, and you could see how uncomfortable he was!). He goes on a quest to find himself some stripes, and in the process he learns to accept himself the way he is. I liked that little message. :)

Happy Birthday, Caitlin!!!!

I can't believe it... she's TEN today!!!!

We had a relatively quiet day. I spent the day cleaning and baking (her birthday cake, of course!!!). She had a friend over, and spent much of the day upstairs with her radio blasting.

Hubby and I just can't get over how much she's grown up. I happened to come across our wedding photos today (while wrapping Caitlin's birthday presents) and there was one of her and I together. She was so TINY then! Granted, she was only 2 and a half, but STILL! She barely came up to my knees, and now... well, just look at her!!! She's turning into a young lady. I don't know if I can handle this. *lol*

She got spoiled this year, too. But then again, it's not every year that we literally have thousands in the bank. And it's not every year that a girl turns 10. That's double digits, man!!!

She got a quilt cover set, a messenger-style bag, a backpack, a pair of fuzzy slipper socks, an alarm clock, a watch, a gold necklace, an XBOX, 4 games, and an extra controller for the XBOX. That's just from us. Her Aunt Vicci got her a pair of hair straighteners.

I'll tell y'all a secret, though. The XBOX was a used one. And the games came with it. But still... she got one. Heck... *I* never had anything like that. I had to go spend the weekend with my cousins to even get my hands on a Nintendo! *lol*

If you'd like to see more pics, click here. I uploaded them all already. :)

Big Kids' Toys

Momma got a new toy!!!! *Happy Dancin' Here!!*






It's a 15" widescreen, with 512 MB DDRII, 533 RAM, 40 GB hard drive, DVD RW, and it's completely wireless, too. Has the built-in wireless modem and everything. So I don't even need my little wireless card that I had in my old one.

Why did I get a new laptop, you might ask? There really wasn't much wrong with my old one, except for the fact that you could only see about 2" of the screen. I was unplugging my camera from the computer one night, and my screen just went NUTS. I was still using it, but I had to plug it into a VERY old-school monitor, which made every freaking thing very blurry and it gave me a headache just looking at it for 10 minutes!

And unfortunately the screen is one of the most expensive parts to replace on a laptop. So rather than spend all that money on just a screen, I just got a whole new toy!!!! I'm giving my old laptop - as well as the old-school monitor - to my SIL. She doesn't have a computer at all, and I'd much rather have it go to her than just let it sit gathering dust - which is what would happen. Hubby can't throw anything computer-related away. If she feels like spending the money on it, she can always get the screen replaced.

And the whole family got a new toy as well. A Polaroid LCD HD TV!!!!





I swear, Hubby has got to be one of the luckiest men on the face of this earth. Not only is he married to me *angelic grin*, but he's always finding the best deals or even just finding MONEY. Last week, we got the couch that he managed to find and get a great deal on. This week it's the TV.

He wanted a LCD tv, period. So he went shopping around for it, and managed to find the same size as the one he'd seen on the website - but a different brand - for £100 less than what he thought he was going to pay. And AGAIN, it was the last one in the store!!! So now the kids have "their" tv back.

A while back, we had gotten a pretty big widescreen tv from my neighbor. She thought it was broken and basically said that if we could figure out how to fix it, we could keep it. Well, it workedn for a while, and while it was working we'd given the kids the tv we'd already had. But then it went on the fritz permanently, so we had to turn into "Indian Givers" and take the TV back. Now that we've got our new toy, the kids can have THEIR tv back. We're also giving them one of the many DVD players we have (Hubby has a thing with DVD players... *lol*). So they can go in their own room and watch tv and we can have some peace and quiet!!!

How are we getting all this stuff? Well... things have finally started to go the way they should have in the first place. Not only did Syrina finally GET her DLA (Disability Living Allowance), but after granting the claim, they went back and changed their decision on the first application (from July '04), and we just got £5,900 today!!!! So yeah.... we're having some fun over here!!

But we're not JUST doing fun stuff. Hubby's going to pay off his bills (credit cards and one bank account) as well.

But it sure is nice to be ABLE to do some fun stuff for once!!!!