MelissaStuff

I confess the details of some things have slipped by me as of late. So, literally up until the week of the screening, I thought Mary Poppins returns was a remake of the original Mary Poppins movie. My boys were quick to inform me that it was actually a sequel…and, boy, were they right! The movie starts with a grown-up Michael and Jane with their own set of grown-up problems and three little kids stuck in the middle. I also have to confess I wasn’t prepared for the beginning of the movie to center around the death of Michael’s wife and the children’s mother. There are several very poignant moments, and I found myself crying… Yes! Crying at Mary Poppins.  BUT the joy of the movie far outshines any solemn storylines. One of my favorite things was to look to each side of me throughout the movie and see my boys' faces beaming as they watched all of the silliness and shenanigans that we associate with Mary Poppins.  You will see many of the same things you remember from ...

My middle son, Colt, told me not too long ago that he wanted to wrestle. We are a sports family, but wrestling has never been one of those sports. AND this child is on the spectrum . . . now, all that really means for him is that he's not going to pick up on any social hints you drop, he's incredibly literal, and he's finicky about sensations. Yes, the child who is finicky about sensations told me he wanted to wrestle - where people are constantly touching you and holding you down and forcing your body into positions you don't want it to be in. But I have always determined that I would not hold my children back by forcing artificial boundaries on them that they don't have for themselves - so if the boy wanted to wrestle, we were going to let him try it out. A couple of weekends ago, we went to his first wrestling tournament. I was so naive. We were supposed to be there at 9 am, and, in all seriousness, I made plans for 11 am. I thought we would walk in, he wou...