A Christmas Post...

I am trying something a bit different this year. Instead of posting about all the goodies we got and gave this year, I am gonna post a little something more.

Something I learned this Christmas:

That spending money and a lot of gifts under the tree is not necessary to make your children happy. Due to our after-Christmas-trip, we didn't have a bunch to spend on gifts. We let the kids go to the dollar store and buy each other (and us parents) a gift each. Joe and I bought them a couple board games (it's about time we got our kids Chutes and Ladders and Candyland). And Santa brought them a few new movies... It was pretty sparse Christmas Morning, and I honestly don't think the kids noticed, or cared. It was surprisingly pleasant.

Something I will do again next Christmas:

Though it was all sorts of chaotic, it was so much fun (and very cute) taking the kids shopping for the first time at the dollar store! This was the first year I let the girls get each other gifts. I helped Matthew choose their gifts, and Grandma helped them buy gifts for me and Joe. It was pretty funny trying to keep Lacey from telling her sister what she was getting. I do love these little munchkins!

The Worst and Best parts of this Christmas:

Worst: Matthew burning his hand on Christmas Eve. Poor little man!

Best: Spending one night with Joe's Dad's family, the next night with his mom, and then the next with my mom. Family really does make the holidays wonderful!

Sick and tired...

A favorite saying of mine at this time of the year. "I am sick and tired of being sick... and tired. "

Boy how this fits this year! My house has been a teeming pool of illness for the last 2 1/2 weeks. It's been quite the event. Luckily, it seems there may be an end in sight (knock on wood).

Between Matthew and Lacey I have had my hands full. The short version:

Lilia got the flu. Matthew got Rotavirus. They both gave their bugs to Lacey. At. The. Same. Time. Poor Lacey was so sick for so long. She was throwing up every morning around 2am, followed by her first trip to the bathroom. She would then spend most of the morning, and into the early afternoon making frequent trips to the bathroom. Her evenings would be mostly fine, she would be tired, and lethargic, but hungry. She would go to bed then start the cycle over again. This went on for about 10 days. Not fun. About a week into it, Lacey woke up around 11pm complaining of pain in the right lower quadrant of her abdomen. After talking to the on call doctor, I decided to play it safe and get her to the ER. We were afraid it was appendicitis. Luckily, it turned out to just be dehydration. After a very traumatic IV incident, they rehydrated her and sent her home. Thank goodness for my dear friend for coming with me and keeping me awake and sane at the hospital.

During Lacey's craptastic week (pun intended) Matthew was also suffering from Rotavirus. He eventually got over it with little trouble, and was feeling better. Just as Lacey got over her bugs Matthew woke up with croup. My experience with croup is pretty vast. Lacey has had it MANY times in her short life. In fact, for the first 2 years, every time she got a cold, it would turn into croup. It seems Matthew is taking after her. This case was different though.

Typically, croup is bad at night. The child will wheeze when breathing, sound like a barking seal when coughing, and will only be relieved by cold, moist air. Once morning comes, the croupiness goes away. Most parents who haven't dealt with it before would think it's over, but it comes back the second night- usually worse than the first night. It's usually over after that second night, and the third night is pretty well back to normal. But those first two nights can be very very scary. WELL- this time was different.

Matthew woke up at 6 am with a huge gasp and then instantly started wheezing. By 10 am I realized his croup wasn't gonna clear during the day like usual. I called the doctor to get him in for a decadron shot (a long term steroid) and a epinephrine breathing treatment (immediate relief). The appointment was set for 3pm. I kept taking trips outside with Matthew all bundled up to spend some time in the cold air to help him breathe. Around 1:30 he fell asleep on me, and I sat holding him watching TV. He woke up with a gasp half an hour later in a panic. He was really struggling to breathe, and his lips were turning blue. So I instantly got in the car and headed for his appointment early. They couldn't get him in at the clinic closest to me, so I drove to the next closest one (still closer than the ER) and they got his treatment underway. The epinephrine worked well, but after it wore off the croup came back. The decadron didn't seem to have any effect on him at all. That night, Joe and I took it in turns wrapping Matthew up and taking him outside. We sat on the porch swing watching the snow fall and listening to our poor little man struggle to breathe. The next morning, I set up another appointment with the after hours pediatric clinic (it was Saturday) and got him back in because his breathing and coughing was still awful. They gave him another breathing treatment, and put him on an oral steroid (Prednisone) to see if that would work. Luckily, this time, the steroid worked. He was kept under observation for an hour, and they told me they would feel comfortable admitting him into the hospital, but since Joe and I are croup pro's, they were fine with us taking Matthew home under strict instructions to get him to the hospital if at any point his stridor and blue lips come back into play.

We are now on the third night of croup, and I was an hour late getting him his prednisone and could hear the stridor coming back. He is currently asleep, and his breathing, though labored, is not too awful. Hopefully he will continue to improve and we won't need to take him to the hospital. We aren't out of the woods yet, but we do hope he continues to get better...

Now... if we can just get all of us better in time for our trip to Disneyland next week... :) I hope you all have a fantastic Christmas! For that matter, I hope we do too.

Halloween

This year has been a bit of a doozy... first off, Lilia was sick on Friday. Poor kid. She missed her Halloween party at school. The interesting part? She missed it last year for the same reason. And she got sick the year before that right after she did the trunk or treat but before we could take her around the neighborhood... Quite the odd coincidence, doncha think?

Luckily she was feeling fine by Friday night so we decided she would be fine to go trick or treating over the weekend.

Second, this was Matthew's first Halloween. YAY! But due to him being sick with an ear infection and a cold he sat out most of the night... BOO! I took him trunk or treating (where he slept in the car almost the entire time). But decided to not take him around the neighborhood. Mostly due to all the RAIN.

Lilia was Cinderella. She is so darn cute! She loved the dress I got her. Lacey was a vampire bat. The costume had wings, a headband with ears, a tutu, tights, and little fingerless gloves. She looked super cute, but refused to say she was a bat. If you ask her she was "a black Tinkerbell!" Matthew was a vampire. I was gonna paint his head to have the classic widows peak black hair, but decided against it when we saw the rain and chose to keep him home.

The picture of the kids for trunk or treating...

The trunk or treat was quite the ordeal with the weather being so bleak. There were a lot of people there, yet many neighbors I didn't see. So we went home and I made some totally delicious stew for dinner. WHILE I was making the stew, Lacey realized she needed to go potty- NOW. Unfortunately, she couldn't get her tights and tutu off in time and had an accident on the bathroom floor. All over her costume. :S Not two minutes later, while I was attending to Lacey, Matthew crawled into the kitchen and decided to go for a swim (or sit) in the dog's water dish. He was SOAKED from the waist down. Good grief! So Matthew was stripped down to nothing but his shoes and a diaper, and was dubbed "the modest streaker." (Or maybe I was too lazy to re-dress him- you may never know...) For Lacey, we decided to just pull out one of the dress up dresses, and sent her as "Sleeping Beauty." She wore a pull up this time. :) I did get a picture of my two youngest miscreants, but my camera is dead. I'll update this with pictures once it's charged.

I took the girls for the first half of the neighborhood. Lilia had a great time, except for the need to stop for a potty break... Lacey was not faring so well. When we finished the "top loop" of our neighborhood, I took the girls home so Lil could go potty, and then I convinced a frozen wet Lacey to stay with me and Matthew while Joe took Lil back out to finish the "bottom half" of the 'hood. All in all, a crazy hectic night. We didn't quite give out all our candy this year, but I totally blame the weather and the fact that Halloween is really on Sunday so we may get a few stragglers tomorrow night.

To give you an idea of how much candy we go through in this neighborhood...

For the trunk or treat I gave out a REALLY large bag of Smarties, and about 3 large bags of Livesavers.

For trick or treating we gave out:

1 bag of Twix

1 bag of Snickers

1 bag of Almond Joys

1 bag of M&M's and Skittles

1 bag of Baby Ruths

1 bag of Crunch Bars

1 bag of Starbursts AND

1 bag of Dove milk chocolates

I would say of all of that we have about 1 bag of candy total left... (we always save the best candy to be handed out last, can you tell?)

How was YOUR Halloween?

Talent comes in MANY forms...

I read a blog a few days back that made me smile...

For those not in the mood to check out the link it was all about talents. Lemme sum up for ya! Everyone is blessed with talents. Some of these talents are musical (be it piano, vocal, or some other instrument). Some are physical (like sports). Others are blessed with talents for teaching, or learning, or speaking, etc.

Take my sweet husband for example. He is overly blessed (in my opinion). Not only is he a computer WHIZ. But he is smart. As in straight A's with no effort, smart. He can play almost any sport well (not golf- he sucks at golf). He can look at an item, de-construct it in his head, and know how to fix it (like garbage disposals and the likes). He is quite the handy man (he has framed our basement, laid all the electrical, and put up all the sheet rock with only a few hints and tips from professionals), and he can play a musical instrument! The man is AMAZING!

When asked about my talents I usually draw a blank. I don't necessarily feel like I am all that talented when it comes to music. I mean, I can sing, but not solo. I used to play an instrument, but not anymore. I have absolutely NO talent in sports. I guess I am marginally blessed in the area of learning. I have a pretty good memory, and did well in school without too much effort. But still- no common talent really stuck out for me. But here's the truth of it... no one said talents had to be so cut and dry? I have talents! For example:

1. I can pick things up with my toes. Now some don't see this as a talent. I beg to differ... ever have a fussy baby in your arms, you are on the phone trying to take a message and you drop the pen? TOTALLY easier to use your toes to get the pen than to bend over with the phone on your shoulder and a 20 pound child on your hip.

2. I can read in the car. I am the family entertainer because on long car trips I will pull out a book and read to the fam. (Ask me what book I am gonna read for our drive to Disneyland in December... go on, ask! It's fantastic!) I have this insane ability to not get car sick. I lose my voice before I lose my cookies! :) (And yet- a shaky camera scene in a movie makes me motion sick- go figure!)

3. I can wake up seconds before my children. This one is odd but I swear to it! I am RARELY woken up by my kids. I almost always find myself wide awake just a mere minute or so before they start getting up. When my kids are sick, it's nice to be alert when that first child makes a mad dash for the bathroom...

4. Along those same lines I have this insane ability to wake my kids from their naps by announcing publicly that they are still asleep. Yup- every time I comment to someone that my kids are all asleep, they slowly trickle from their beds all bleary eyed and confused... :) (Okay- maybe this one isn't a talent so much as a curse, but whatev!)

5. I make good chili. Just ask Joe. He says its better than his mom's... (shh- don't tell her!) It's the ONLY dish he says that about. And I will take claim to it! YAY! I make SOMETHING better than my awesome cook of a mother in law! :)

6. I can quote movie lines like nobody's business! Problem is, I don't always remember what movie it is I am quoting... That's when it's nice to have Joe around. He can usually supply me with the movie title. Unless it's Disney. Though I KNOW when I am quoting Disney...

7. I have this THING with numbers... I remember my first phone number. I remember my bank account from when I was 14 and opened my first account. Heck I remember all of my phone numbers. And most of my friends phone numbers from my childhood... If I do struggle with the number all I need is the first two or three digits and then it floods right back.

8. I make cute kids. Yup- takes a BUNCH of talent to create the cuteness that has come outta me in the form of three adorable children. Now if only I made cute, PERFECTLY-OBEDIENT-AND-WELL-BEHAVED-AT-ALL-TIMES kids... THAT would be a true talent!

9. I can pack the car for a camping trip. This is a killer skill when you have as little trunk space as I do. Seriously! I am proud of my puzzle piecing abilities!

How about you?! Feel free to post a blog with your awesome talents, I would LOVE to read it!

Random Goodness (and maybe a touch of naughtiness)

Oh how I love my children! I love them when they are cute- when they are silly, when they are sleeping, and especially when they are naughty. Heaven knows they keep me busy!

Lil-isms:

Her latest favorite sayings:

"What the heck?!" Always used properly- if not a little too often. Last night she was reading a school book about silkworms and it mentioned that when silkworms become silk moths they don't eat, and eventually die (odd fact, but true) and she said, "They don't EAT?! What the HECK!?"

"That's LAME" Don't you just love all the wonderful sayings children bring home from school?

Lilia is loving 1st Grade. She is also a natural at gymnastics. She is kicking some royal booty in her gymnastics class! She loves her teacher and loves being in the same class as one of her best friends (Kyle). In gymnastics she says her favorite thing is the bars (the uneven bars) and the vault. Unfortunately she practices the vault flips at home on our couch... Not good. :S

Lace-isms:

Favorite sayings: "I nuh-no" (I don't know). Anytime I catch her doing something she probably ought not be doing I will ask, "What are you doing?" and she will look at me, ring her hands and say "I nuh-no..." with a very sad kind of lilt in her voice. It's pretty cute.

"Maffew" and "she" she is quick to call her baby brother a she. "Mom- Maffew is awake! She is awake!"

"kuh-zurt" as in my favorite kuh-zurt is ice cream. She doesn't get to eat kuh-zurt until her dinner is finished. She is too cute!

Lacey has lately gotten herself in all sorts of trouble due to her artistic tendencies. She was supposed to be taking a nap at my mothers house a few weeks ago. When Grandma went to check on her she found a tube of hydrocortizone cream spread across her carpet (finger painting) and Lace had taken a ball point pen to Grandma's newly painted dresser... we never did get all the ink off and now we have to sand and repaint the drawers. And then there is last night... She was supposed to be sleeping (again). And eventually she really did sleep... but when I went in to check on her and her sister, this is what I found.

And then I found MORE this morning in the daylight... though I think this is the work of the older sister... the letters are too neat to be the writing of a 3 year old. And besides, the equasion is not something Lacey would know how to put in order...

Ugh children... It's a good thing they are so darn cute!

Matt-isms:

Favorite sayings: "uh daa!" or "uh daa?" Like the other day when I was nursing him and he tooted. He stopped nursing, sat up said, "uh daa?" and then went back to eating... it was pretty cute!

I commented to someone the other day how I was amazed that Matthew had yet to fall asleep in odd places. I have many pictures of Lil and Lace asleep in high chairs and bouncers, but Matthew only ever sleeps in his crib. Sure enough, the next day he fell asleep in the bouncer, then the day after that he fell asleep in his high chair... I guess I spoke too soon!

Randomness...

It blows my mind that I can give Lacey a fruit roll up, or an ice cream and then put cheerios in front of Matthew and she will STILL ignore her treat to eat his cheerios.

Nectarines are likely the best fruit ever created and I wish I could live in a place that grew them year round... Anyone know of a place that does?

Joe and I are taking our kids to DISNEYLAND for our 10 year anniversary and I am SO EXCITED!

Lilia has an insane fear of automatic toilets. Seriously petrified.

When I read in a fantastically cool book about Disneyland that ALL the DL toilets are automatic (yes, there is actually a book so detailed about DL that it talks about their toilets) I told Lilia and she said, "What the HECK?! That is LAME!" and then pouted about it. I asked if we should cancel the trip and not go because the toilets were automatic and she actually seemed to WANT to do that! Ca-RAZY!

My son has this amazingly cute outfit on today and I can't stop looking at him and thinking that he has GOT to be the worlds cutest little boy ever. And I really do believe that. He is so stinkin' handsome. And he has such a cute little smile, and such a funny little crawl. I could watch him all day and not get tired of him.

Lilia was playing with her daddy's tennis racket last night and totally biffed Lacey in the FACE with it! Poor Lacey has this monster goose egg on her head now. It's bright blue. I took a picture.

My mom and my aunt got in trouble as children for playing with some blue eggs they found in their chicken coops as children. It still makes my grandpa mad to think about it.

Over the last 6 years or so, my cousins send my mom random blue eggs (like marble eggs or easter eggs) as a joke. I think I will give my mom or my aunt the picture of the blue goose egg on Lacey's head...

Lilia is such a smart kid. She is amazingly cool! Tonight she was rattling off all of our birthdays and whose birthday comes first in the year and whose is last, etc. Joe looked at her and said, "I am glad you know the dates, then I don't have to remember- I can ask you!" Lilia looked at Joe and said, "Dad- you aren't so smart!" (I seriously didn't expect to hear THAT until she was in high school!)

Lacey's Latest Adventure

Yesterday was a quite the adventurous day for Lacey...

To preface the incident, I gotta tell you a couple things...

First off, Joe and I only have one car. In our nearly 10 years of marriage that has always been the case. We are too cheap to get a second car, though we are finding that it is quickly becoming a necessity. All in good time, I guess... ANYWAY- We only have the one car, and yesterday was Joe's day to have it. So I was home with the kiddo's and no vehicle. Not too big a deal, I am used to it.

Second, our good friends went out of town for a few days and I was watching their two sons all day yesterday. Their boys are the same age as my girls, and they get along really well so it was really not a problem to have the extra kids. If anything, it keeps my two girls occupied and keeps them from getting into trouble. Now- on to the story:

After the older two kids got home from school yesterday afternoon, I had them help the younger kids clean up the front room. With the promise of a snack after the room was clean. Lacey asked if the snack could be peaches (Really- they were nectarines, but Lacey doesn't know the difference). I told her sure- we could have peaches AFTER the room was clean. I then handed her a spoon that had migrated to the front room and told her to take it to the kitchen. I doled out a task to each of the other kids as well, and was changing Matthew's diaper when I heard Lacey start to scream... She came running into the front room with her hand COVERED in blood! Now- I am pretty proud of myself for not TOTALLY FREAKING OUT at that point. I grabbed a diaper wipe (not likely to stick to a cut, and cleaner than a towel) and cleaned her hand off. Problem was that I couldn't keep it clean. It was bleeding too much to uncover the wound. So I got a second diaper wipe (cause the first was already soaked through) and held it over her palm with some significant pressure. I then called Joe and told him that I was pretty sure Lacey needed stitches. I then went to the kitchen (with Lacey's hand firmly pressed in mine) and found a nectarine and a STEAK KNIFE sitting on the table. Seems she didn't want to wait for a clean front room before getting herself a "peach."

So, I called my next door neighbor (who happens to have a son Lilia's age as well) and asked if she could watch Lilia and the two boys while I took Lacey to get stitches. Matthew would come with me and Lacey. I then looked around and realized two very BAD things. One: Matthew's car seat was in my car. With Joe. CRAP. And two: So was my purse (including my insurance card). CRAP CRAP CRAP! My next phone call was to the boy's parents. They had left their car at home and I wanted to ask if I could borrow it to drive Lacey to Instacare. Well- I couldn't get them on the phone, but I DID have their house key so I went for a short walk to their house (with Matthew on my hip, a phone on my ear, and Lacey's hand still firmly grasped in mine). Once there I realized that THEIR baby car seat wasn't in the car (duh- they took it with them for their baby girl). Well, never mind that idea- besides, I can't drive while holding Lacey's hand, and if I let go of her hand, it would bleed profusely. UGH!

So my next phone call was to another good friend whose husband works odd shifts and he MIGHT be home. Sure enough, her husband was home and so I BEGGED her to come drive me and Lacey to the doctor, AND bring her baby seat for Matthew. She was quick to respond and was sitting in her car in front of my house 10 minutes later. (Have I ever mentioned that I have fantastic neighbors and friends? Cause I do...) While waiting for this friend to show up I got all the kids in their shoes and herded them off to the neighbor's house, managed to get shoes on myself AND Lacey (all one handed since I was still putting pressure on Lacey's hand).

We made it to the Instacare, and had to wait about 20 minutes for another poor kid who needed stitches on his head. Luckily, I had taken the kids here before so they already had my insurance info on hand and because of Lacey's previous stitches incident (the day Matthew was born), my insurance out of pocket premium was completely maxed out so I didn't have to pay anything. I guess you could call that the silver lining... Throughout the wait, Lacey kept insisting that she felt fine and wanted to take the diaper wipe off her hand. Um, nope... Once we got in to the procedure room, the nurse cleaned her hand up as much as possible, and put some numbing cream over the wound. As soon as the doctor appeared he got to work numbing her hand (which was by far the worst part- Lacey was screaming and trying to move her hand, but between the nurse and me she was pinned down pretty well). Once her hand was numb it was easy going. She needed three stitches, and will be able to get them removed in 10 days. The cut was really deep, but I guess kids heal pretty fast! The whole time they were stitching her up she was whimpering to me that she wanted a peach. Poor kid never did get one!

All in all, she is quite the trouper. It turns out that the doctor who stitched up her hand was the same doctor who stitched up her head back in January! He looked at her forehead (he had forgotten where the wound was) and was not thrilled with how badly it had healed, until I told him that the scar he was looking at was from her incident a few weeks ago with a boy and his hot wheels car, NOT from her stitches back in January. When I showed him that scar he was much happier with it's healing. Poor kid has mom's accident prone tendencies...

(You can see the beginning of her cut, but the stitches are covered up to keep them clean...)

Milestones

This last week has been chalk full of new milestones.

Last Wednesday was Lilia's first day of first grade. Her first FULL day of school. She loves it so far, and she loves her teacher.

Then on Saturday, Matthew turned 7 months old AND got his first tooth! I have yet to get a picture of it, but here is a cute one of him chewing on this mesh baggie of apricots...

Then Yesterday was Lilia's 6th Birthday. :) She is such a big girl!

Today is Lacey's first day of preschool. She chose her own outfit and asked me to give her pig tails. :) She is pretty excited!

I sure love my kids- it blows my mind how quickly they are growing up!