Free ($0) Entertainment At Work/Fire

So this past Sunday I was just on my first table, finishing cheese when we got a word we need to evacuate because there was a fire. WHAAAAAT??? 

Apparently, one of the vacant units of the building that Melting Pot is attached to, got on fire. 

Everybody, guest, employees, had to leave the building immediately. We, employees, stood outside for 1 hour 40 minutes until it was clear for us to come in. 

 There were TEN total fire trucks. Can see the fire on the above picture.

The policemen on the scene said it was 10th electrical fire for the month of March. How crazy is it? It MUST be the weather related as the yuckiest weather we had this season!

In the end we all got in, with firefighters giving us their huge flashlights so we could see the hallways and in the kitchen because it was pitch dark, no power, so we had to clean all the tables and kitchen from any food that is not in the fridge or freezer. Standing outside for so long in only our thin uniforms in 40F, was not fun. But using flashlights and phones in the dark...That WAS the fun part.
$0 money brought home. Will hope for the best for the next weekend!

Vitamins

Non was telling kids she is going to get B12 vitamin shots to get her to the level they should be in her body. Kyra was not sure what all those vitamins were, so Non was telling her what she could get from the sun, etc. Right in the middle of the conversation Brandon jumped in:
- You can get vitamin K from spinach :)

Just to you know!

Bibbs As 7 Dwarfs

I asked Brandon who we look to him like from 7 Dwarfs. Seriously??? Here is his answer:

Kyra is Poopy, Mom is Happy, Dad is Slouchy. I should have ask him what he thought himself to be. 

S-P-R-I-N-G!

I do not care how cold it still is. When my little man brings me the first flower of the year that he found, I consider it is spring! (happy dancing)!

Teenage Is In A Progress

Ummm... She is only 7 but already.. She stands at the mirror forever trying to find something that is not right with her hair... She runs to change her clothes because it does not match, she goes in another room if she wants to make a phone call, she closes the door of they bathroom when she is in and of course, she is covering herself up when she changes.
On another side.. Brandon does not care for any of this and does the exact opposite. I wonder if it will last.

Lazer Dome

I never thought I would have so much fun myself! This even was organized for cub scouts and even though siblings were welcome, Kyra got invitation to Lauren King's house literally at the last minute so she bailed on us :)

We were broken into two groups and I did not realize that we could have given ourselves some funky names, I gave myself old plain Kate. Not like Dax's Dad who named himself Zoro :) Brandon was Bear :)

We were blue group. They give you a vest with so called lazer gun and there are a few places on your vest where you can be tagged and you can tag others from red team. The whole place was dark with yellow neon lights on. So we were running, hiding and trying to shoot another team.

We won 4 times. I had to leave earlier for work but oh boy, I want to come again. So much fun!

Crossword Puzzle

So... Kyra is in 1st grade, right? So how come when she was solving crossword puzzle which had her doing math and writing answers instead of words, she did MENTAL math 472-210=262?  This girl is a math killer!

Chinise Foods

Kyra:
- Mom, so what else do they eat in China?
Brandon:
- I know, I know! They eat rice, fish and fortune cookies! :)

Another Milestone

My little 7,5 year old girl can cut her nail on her left hand. Clumsy but on her own. So growing up!

GPS

I know, it is funny how simple device like GPS can bring more joy than no headache from not knowing the directions :) I got this one from my friend and I was able to set it up in Russian. Even funnier that I set it up for telling me direction home from work (which, obviously, I knew years ago). Interesting how this famine voice talks in a different way than in English.
English says: "Turn right here"
Russian says "Now we are turning right", I feel like this person is sitting in the seat next to me while giving me those directions. Love the technology!

Hair Or Fit In Issue?

I know it sure will happen at some point but I was not ready for "right now". Lately Kyra has been spending quite some time at the mirror fixing her hair. No big deal, right? It was not until one day she came down crying that she did not like her hair. She wants them straight like mine and it is it! (and I want mine wavy like hers but it is besides the point).

I asked if I could help her ("No"), then I asked her what would she want me to do ("Nothing, because no matter what you do it will look terrible!"). At this point I sent her up to come down.

After a while I realized that she was not trying to get attention, she was legitimately upset. I came up to her and found her laying on her bed, under her blanket, wailing. At this point I knew that I could not do anything until she was able to think straight so I was just laying with her, hugging and rubbing her back with saying nothing. After long 5 minutes she was not crying anymore and I gave her the shpeel.

First, I looked at myself and wondered if she ever heard me saying anything like that and the answer is no. Neither me nor Jimmy ever say that we are not happy with how we look or our clothes/hair/eyes etc look terrible. We always make compliments to the kids if they look good or the way Kyra did her hair or if they matched their outfits well. So, I knew it was not us.

May be she was trying to fit in at age 7? I do not know but she mentioned how no one but her family tells her how nice she looks. Brandon never does where I had to explain that boys are different and they express their opinion and notice stuff differently from girls.

I told her that she was smart and funny and thoughtful and and really... it does not matter how beautiful you are if you are poisonous, mean and jealous inside. I reminded her that her friend Emma does not like her for her hair or her clothes. She likes her for her personality and that is that what she needs to concentrate on.

My Mom told me that I had that stage too but I was much older, she things about 12. God help us when Kyra is teenager. I will have to think through every single word I will need to say to encourage, again, good deeds and personality vs. appearance when she will be trying to fit it. I do not want clothes/hair issue to change the way she is, sweet, funny, determined and smart girl!
My heart was tearing apart while I was laying there with her rubbing her back. I love her so much

Cold Or No Cold?

Kyra got a cold. She is laying in her bed trying to fall asleep. I am snuggling with Brandon in his bed per his request (which later turned into going downstairs to ask me to sit with him in my room while he is falling asleeP :)
All of a sudden Kyra yells:
- Only one side of my nose is breathing.
Me:
- Yes, you can not breath because your nose is stuffed up because you got a cold.
- No, I do not have one.
- Oh.. Then why can't you breath?
Silence..then..
- If I could not breath, I would be dead....

Another 30 seconds, another yell:
- Mommy... It's empty!
- What is empty?
- My nose!! It is empty! It is not stuffed up, there is nothing inside of it and I can not breath.

For love of God, she would not take medicine,  put vaseline on her nose so it is not sore and would not put Wicks on her chest. At the same time she would not stop complaining she can't breath out of her nose and.. by the way.. she does not have a cold.

Spent Day

How nice for me was not to work on Saturday! :) In the morning we went to Play it Again store in Lancaster and got kids skating stuff - two pairs of skates, guards, gloves and helmet for Brandon. He even got orange laces :) After his playdate with Corey we went to Outlets to get them both 3 pairs of shoes.
"Only" $500 dollars later we were home, relaxing. I had the first run of the year, it felt so great! Yay for spring!

Ice Skating

Because of Lauren inviting Kyra to her skating party in a couple weeks, we decided to expose her to skating first. I took her to Hersheypark Arena to try it. First, of course, she was holding to the sides to hold on. Literally in a few minutes she was pushing off herself telling me "I got it, Mom, I got it". At that time she had fun and wanted to come for more.

Next weekend all four of us went. Brandon got hockey skates and it was unbelievable to watch both of the kids to pick up and go. By no means I see Olympics in their future but how quickly they got an idea how to do that, that was impressive! Both of them go with no holding to the sides now.

All by himself!

Then this past Thursday Lauren King invited Kyra to her end of the year skating party for her Learn to Skate program. I was able to skate to, being Carla's guest. So fun! We played games and had freestyle skating. I am not joking when I am saying, it was Kyra's 3rd time on the ice ever and after watching Lauren, who competes, Kyra was able to make awkward and clumsy but spinning. I was very proud of her!

Tests

Mrs. Weimer recommended to have Brandon tested for gift program. He was and that was what Ms. Smith, his guidance counselor said:

"I screened him yesterday and he was delightful.  He did a great job and I spoke with Mr. Markham, our district psychologist about his screening.  His verbal score was a 132 which is in the “upper extreme”, and his nonverbal score was a 121, which is “above average”, and his total IQ Composite is 129, also in the “above average” range"

So at this point I will need to sign a paper for the school to have him testes further and we will go from there. 

Eye Check Up

Kyra was complaining that her eyes burned and her vision was blurry. I remember my mom and me, both got our vision worsen around Kyra's age, so we called for an appt right away with a Dr whose sister used to be Jimmy and his brothers' ophthalmologist.

As they were checking her, they ruled out certain possibilities like lazy eyes, crossed eyes, bad vision. She sees as a hawk as of now. Nothing but a case of allergies. Thank goodness!

Sort of out of the way - it is great to have friends, right? Although.. Sometimes friends really do not help like in a situation that Kyra knew she would be getting eye drops and they all told her how much they would hurt.   So after Dr figured out what was going with her, they wanted to give her allergy drops to make her eyes feel better and oh my gosh! She had an ocean full of tears because her friends told her it would hurt so she was crying before she could get any drops. Two nurses were all over her calming her down and Dr was very patient too. That is what you want in the Dr office you choose. So they really care.

As much pain in the neck allergies can be, I am still happy that it is all that is wrong. Could have been times worse.

Compliments And Such

Jimmy told Kyra he would say something nice to her and she would need to say something nice back. Here how it went:
- Kyra, you look so cute tonight.
- I like your shirt, Dad.

- I like how straight your hair is.
- I like how soft your hair is.

- I like your pretty smile, Kyra.
- I like your crowns.

I could not help it, I laughed, laughed and laughed... She is sure something!

Future Boyfriend Wish

Next morning after Melting Pot I was driving kids to school when Kyra said:
- I would like to have a boyfriend like Brett.
Me:
- What do you mean:
Kyra:
- Well, I would like for him to give me chocolate and bring me flowers at 4am. I just do not understand how can someone dump him, he is so nice!

Every time we talk when something comes up, we talk about having a boy who would treat her right and well. She remembers that I told her about Brett bringing flowers, coffee and donuts to Renee at 4am before her very last final. I really, really hope she will get "one of this kind" as much as Brandon will be one like that to the girl who will be very special for him.

Melting Pot With Ruchi

Me and Ruchi finally made it to Melting Pot to celebrate her birthday, her 1st year work anniversary and moving out. We were treated so well there. I guess knowing someone sometimes helps :) They gave us extra "brown" bread and loooooots of chocolate instead of for 1. It was nice to be served for a change :) Loved it.

Kyra's Humor

So my friend Monique, who lives in Finland just got back from her Red Cross trip to Laos. As always, she sent me something from her trip. I brought a package home  and Kyra got all excited! She kept asking while giggling:
- Where did she send it from? From Finland? From Greenland? From Iceland? From Farawayland? :)

What He Did For Me

What could my 8-year old boy give me that would be a value to me? Besides his art/craft things.... It is baked Doritos! He saved them from his lunch to bring the entire bag home for me!
I love him to pieces!

Letter To Mom

We recently talked about lake Baikal which is in Russia. We looked at the photos of its bottom, noticing how clean and transparent it is. We read about ice marathon, obviously, on the ice.
Then one day that is what Brandon came home with:

I love my boy so so so much!

Sweet Frog

Seriously. It is freezing outside and only the Bibb family would go to ice cream place instead of having hot chocolate!

Languages

I saw the new programs in Hershey library offering Italian and French languages classes. I WISHED I was in time to sign up for them. Only $15 for all ten classes. I would take just about any language that I could learn a little about. I will be keeping an eye on those programs from now on!