Digital Detox

April 29, 2013April 29, 2013Leave a comment

After a full week of a nasty little virus that left Baylor feeling well enough to get out of bed but not good enough to go to school, she is FINALLY feeling better. Fever gone and ear infection cleared up, she was back to school on Thursday. But after a week of constant cartoons, I was left with a little girl who felt better and yet was acting like a beast. She was constantly asking for cartoons and throwing tantrums when she wasn’t getting her way. Cut to me standing outside of church Saturday evening with a soon to be four year old screaming her head off because she didn’t want to sit quietly and I was threatening to leave her on the bench outside so I could go to mass inside. I decided that it was time for a digital detox.

I told PW my plan and he was on board; no cartoons (except on runs…I get to be a little selfish). Sunday was rough. The harsh reality of “when you don’t listen and you act like a lunatic, you loose privileges and cartoons are privileges” set in. We had friends over for brunch and Baylor was EVERYWHERE. It would have been so easy to turn on Sophia the First and get some less-interrupted time with our friends, but we stayed strong. By Sunday night, it was a game. She would ask half heartedly just to see what we would say. And this morning, it was a non event. She asked, I said no and we moved on. We did get a run in but even then, she easily handed over the Ipad and found something to entertain herself. I found her playing in her playhouse in the backyard and having a great time. I realized we were long over due for a cleanse. As the temperatures begin to really heat up, our outside time is going to be less and less. So giving her a reason to go outside, get bored and use her imagination is the best reason to turn off Disney Junior. Not to mention she’s a way nicer kid when she’s not hopped up on Doc McStuffins.

Pancake Update

April 16, 2013Leave a comment

The Dad’s Pancake Breakfast couldn’t have turned out better! All the hard work and stress paid off 10 fold; we raised nearly $1000 for the school and the dads, grandpas, uncles and kiddos had a really fun morning together. Here are the highlights:

Stephanie’s ADORABLE centerpieces

Pin the Tie on the Daddy game

Make Your Own Tie

A happy recipient of Make Your Own Tie

These two were like a well oiled machine. They found every flat surface that could go on the stove and were flipping cakes at a rate of 20 every 2 minutes!

PW working hard manning the serving table. Please note that Auggie is eating a paper napkin.

Happy customers

For being at the school at 630 am and flipping pancakes, refilling toppings and doing whatever else needed to be done – we didn’t look too shabby!

A HUGE thank you to Ms. Stephanie D. I would work with you on any project, any time lady 🙂

Spring Breaking

March 15, 20131 Comment

This past week was spring break for Bay (why preschoolers need a break, I’ll never know) and it happen to coincide with one of the busiest weeks I’ve ever had with the water company. To say that I am exhausted is an understatment. The good news is that with a little sleep training, the big guy has been sleeping amazingly. So while mentally falling apart, at least I’m getting more consecutive hours of sleep than I’ve seen in almost six months.

I recap our week in pictures:

Train Park fun – could someone tell me where those legs came from??!

Not totally sure about the sand

90 degree heat never looked so cute

Perfection.

Fun with the sprinklers in the backyard. Please disregard the dead plants – I’ve decided if it’s going to be 94 degrees today, it’s probably not going to freeze again – so I’m trimming this weekend. Fingers crossed. Focus on how lovely the grass looks! Oh and the cute kids!

This is what happens when you’re too small to fight off your sister…

It’s really too bad that we don’t have enough Little People to make AN ENTIRE CITY WITH TWO SCHOOL BUSES AND SAFARI CARS

Auggie patiently listening to his singer songwriter sister

The Happiest of Hours

February 22, 20131 Comment

We live in a one of those weird neighborhoods where we know (and like) almost everyone on our street. Not only that, but there are a ton of kids and they have a blast playing together. Another benefit is when you get a text from a neighbor at 8am that says “Does 345 work for wine/bikes?”. The answer is yes. Yes it does.

And this is what 4 moms and 9 kids having happy hour looks like:

Riding down the street

Controlled chaos

Bay giving J a ride

The girls and the babies

Happy mommas

Berkley keeping watch

Auggie and H baby wrestling

We stayed out until Peter pulled up – it was like your mom calling you home for dinner since he arrived with Julio G’s Mexican food!

Happy Valentine’s Day

February 14, 2013Leave a comment

Or as Baylor says “Balentimes” Day.

When you’re 3 1/2, nothing says love and Balentimes like barnyard animals. I sent her to school today with 22 handmade valentines – almost all of them containing pig, horse and cow stickers. I didn’t realize what she was doing until she was a few in and then I thought they were cute! Only she could get away with putting pigs on valentines.

This is the one she made for me 🙂

Auggie – 4 Months

February 13, 20131 Comment

The wild man has continued his growth spurt – 3 lbs and 3 inches these last two months! He’s now 19 lbs 26 inches – 75th and 95th respectively. I knew my shoulders hurt for a reason… He is now grabbing, holding and examining anything he can get his hands on and of course, get into his mouth. He’s getting close to sitting up without help and is desperately trying to get his swimming arms and legs coordinated enough to crawl and keep up with his cousin, Mason. Who he currently out weighs despite Mason being 6 months older.

You can really start to see the difference from his two month pictures. Those legs are stretching out!

Photography is serious,Mom

This is how he spends most of his time not in the jumper

Always angling for a better view.

Ta da!

Those wrist rolls don’t even compare to his thigh rolls – hard to decide which I love more…

Snow Day

February 8, 20131 Comment

When Peter and I lived in DC, we had no idea what we were doing when it came to freezing weather and snow. Having both grown up in AZ, we had never cleaned gutters (our desert homes didn’t even have gutters), removed hoses from the bibs before a freeze and we had no idea when you were supposed to put out salt (we actually thought you just threw it on top of the snow. That is not the case). Thankfully our landlords caught on and would let us know what to do. We also had a very nice neighbor that actually cleaned our gutters for us one fall. There was a language barrier so when we pantomimed asking to borrow his ladder, he just brought it over and got to work. We were never sure if he was being nice or if he thought we were too stupid to do the job ourselves. Our money was on the latter.

The last winter we were there, a HUGE storm was predicted – not unlike the one that is supposed to hit the Northeast today. We went to Target to stock up on supplies: salt, shovels, etc. except our cart also contained a lot of wine and a new sled. The storm hit over night and we woke up to a foot of snow. It was beautiful! We made coffee and snuggled back into bed to watch the news…only to have the power go out exactly 1 minute later. After waiting for a bit, we decided to go sledding. When we returned, still no power. We made breakfast on the grill off the deck and threw a bottle of champagne into the snow (see? our supplies were super important). We then bundled up, grabbed a dog to warm us up and read books. By 6pm there was still no power. And no heat. And no fireplace. We were woken up at 5am the next day to everything in our house coming back to life when the power came back on – we were bundled up like homeless people with both dogs under the covers.

So let this be a lesson to all you east coasters getting ready for the blizzard. Salt is all well and good, but make sure your sleds and wine supplies are stock piled too.

5pm Saturday

8am Sunday

There were steps under there somewhere

We were told icicles were bad news…I enjoyed every drop of them!

Abominable snow Travis!

We learned the hard way that the SUV should be the last one in. Trying to get the Audi over the ice berm created by the snow plow was challenging.

We couldn’t figure out where all the kids were…turns out they were waiting for the big dummies to shelp up and down the hill a few times and tamp down the snow.

Jumping Bean

January 31, 20131 Comment

Auggie got a new jumper for Christmas and Grandma and Grandpa were kind enough to deliver it a few weeks early and I swear the kid hasn’t left it since! He loves to bounce and spin and grab the toys. So much so that he’s worn through not one but TWO pairs of jammies. He’s literally jumping out of them!

Loving on his favorite Lamb

First casualty

And the latest…

Sick of Being Sick

January 24, 2013Leave a comment

Last Thursday everyone started feeling crummy…lots of sneezing, sore throats, stuffy noses all around. And of course, Baylor’s mystery cough was still present. Auggie’s tear ducts seemed to be infected (again) so we did a family trip to the doctor. An ear infection, a possible sinus infection, low oxygen levels and an eye infection were the diagnosis (and that was just the kids!). Four prescriptions later, we were out the door and on a first name basis with the lovely pharmacist at CVS.

Medicating the team is literally a full time gig. Antibiotics can’t be taken with reflux medicine. Probiotics needed to keep the antibiotics from killing off even the good bacteria…it’s a process to say the least. Also, see the white thing in the top of the big bottle? This is the greatest invention ever – it has a tiny hole that the measuring thing fits into so you can get every last drop of medicine without spilling!

Auggie has been sleeping in his car seat in our room for a week – it’s the only way he can sleep because if he is laying down, he gets stuffed up and wakes up. Last night I found him like this:

Which I took to mean he was ready to get back to his crib. I elevated the mattress and he slept the entire night in there – although he didn’t sleep the entire night. I don’t know if he’s having a growth spurt or catching up from not eating much last week – man that kid can really pack it away. He’s had two long naps today so fingers crossed, if it’s a growth spurt, we’ve entered the sleepy phase. 5 hour sleep stretches please come back!!

I broke down on Tuesday and called in reinforcements so I could go to the doctor. I took whichever doctor was available and got the guy who was going to solve all my problems. After 5 minutes of scrolling through my history he deduced that I go to the doctor approximately 4 times a year with a sinus infection. It took all my strength not to say “yeah. I know because I’M THE ONE WITH THE SINUS INFECTION”. He decided (after looking at what kind of health insurance I have – i.e. the kind that would pay for a lot of crap) that I needed an x-ray of my head. I did explain that I would do pretty much whatever he wanted as long as he promised me right now that I could have antibiotics and whatever else would make my teeth stop feeling like they were going to pop out of my mouth. 4 x-rays later he proclaimed “see that little, tiny, sliver of black right there? That’s your nasal airway. You really cannot breathe!!”. If I had had slept in increments longer than 90 minutes the night before, I very well might have punched him. He made good on his promise and loaded me up with the good stuff and 48 hours later, I’m feeling much improved. I still can’t smell, but I can breathe so I’ve got that going for me. And around here, sometimes it’s not a bad thing not to be able to smell anything…I go back in 2 weeks to have my head re x-rayed to look for an underlying cause of reoccurring sinus infections. I know Peter is dying to let out all the “you need your head examend jokes he can think of.

Oh. And Auggie’s eye infection? Totally pink eye. And we all got it (except Peter, damn him). Talk about insult to injury. The smell of Vick’s Vapo Rub and bleach is almost visible around our house.

So Very Thankful

November 28, 2012Leave a comment

Phew. After a full round of antibiotics for the team and a very busy yet fun Thanksgiving, I have some time to A. Breathe and B. post pics from Thanksgiving!

This was our 6th year of hosting and probably the least stressful yet. I think PW and I finally have a system that we have honed over the last years that starts weeks ahead of time but means the day of Thanksgiving is actually fun and not so crazy. Also I have slowly been accumulating the things we need for the day of so that I don’t have to raid my mom’s house for table cloths, silverware, serving spoons, plates…the list goes on.

This year PW built me a table that I have always wanted; it’s the same height and length of our outdoor furniture so when you smoosh the two tables together, it makes one large square with enough room to seat up to 20 (more on Peter’s craftsmanship soon…). It was awesome. No more people at one end of a very long table with no one across from them!

Fun paper table runners