Holy health-related craziness

Sooo, I guess we can count on February being a banner month for our family. Last year it meant whooping cough for James and both twins, leading to an ambulance ride for Macey and several hospital stays. The twins also both had RSV last Feb. Which leads me to THIS Feb...

All 5 kids have been sick with one thing or another. First it was strep, which made its way through the ranks. Now it's the tummy flu, which started with Madelyn on Wednesday, then moved to Macey Thursday and also to Declan Thursday night. This morning (Friday) Macey has thrown up a few more times but Madelyn and Declan seem to be doing ok...though Declan hasn't had a thing to eat or drink. I'm being cautious, especially considering the fact that he's laying on our bed watching cartoons right now. Here's a picture of Madelyn from earlier in the week. All she wanted to do was lay down and sleep, wherever she was:


Which leads me back to Monday (still in Feb, noted). Avery fell off the monkey bars at school, hurting her wrist. Her teacher called me when Avery was on the bus and told me about it, so I watched her when she got home - I could tell there was a problem. Off to the ER we went and she has a buckle fracture to both bones in her wrist! She got a splint in the ER, and she wore it proudly. We had to amputate one of the sleeves of a pair of winter jammies but I'm ready to amputate winter anyway:


She was ready to go to school the very next morning! All smiles, what a trooper:


And on Wednesday she had a regular cast put on. She wanted RED (daddy's favorite color) and she is so proud of it. I finally talked her into letting me write on it and I wrote "mommy loves you!" with a little heart. She loved it and is taking the Sharpie to school today to let her classmates have at it! We'll see what it looks like after school. Here's yesterday, after I wrote my message:

As of this morning...

I now weigh what I did when I got pregnant for the very first time (found out 9 years ago on Valentine's Day)! It's good to see that number on the scale and know that I am so close to the 100s. Down over 55 pounds and still going. I still am reaching for ONEderland by my 33rd birthday (Mar 7) - best gift I think I could give to myself. That feeling will be amazing!

A time for everything...

and apparently it's finally my time to be sick. I went to the doctor yesterday and I have a sinus infection and more than likely I also have pneumonia. I started on an antibiotics yesterday and today I am honestly feeling better. Thankful for that!

What makes me feel bad is that Caden is also sick, Avery is sick and they are both feeling pretty miserable. Caden has a fever more than anything else and Avery is struggling with the same awful runny nose/head cold that I have. Today we finally had school after after the blizzard and everyone is here at home with me. We just put the twins down for a nap and the big kids are upstairs watching iCarly with me. Ok, so they're watching and I'm blogging.

I have a feeling no one will be going to school tomorrow, either. It's a time to recover. If you recall our whooping cough episodes of last year at this time, we'll take what's going on now over that for sure! If that doesn't put things in perspective, I don't know what will. (It was Feb. 5 last year I had to call the ambulance to come get little Macey because she coughed SO hard I was worried she wouldn't breathe!)

James got an unexpected day off yesterday due to the weather so he was home to help me and allow me to get to the doctor. Rumor has it he now might be working on Saturday all day...cooooooooooooooooool. You'll have to forgive me, I just feel like complaining today.

Connecting with your spouse

I still have questions about this arena, and we've been married a while. Right now, James and I would love nothing more than to go away overnight for two nights: eat when we want, sleep when we want, talk without interruption and just basically do a whole lot of NOTHING. Because let's face it, when we'd come home (if we decided to) there'd be a whole lot of EVERYTHING to do.

We feel weekends away are crucial but it is just not a reality for us at this point in our lives. I mean I'm not blind, we've "done it to ourselves" by having more kids than is really necessary. (Yes, I did just say that I will will NEVER say who the unnecessary one/s is/are/mightbe.) The burden of asking someone to take 5 kids for a weekend is just, well, it's a lot. And we take it very seriously. That being said, we can't help but long for it because this is a season of our lives where it's not happening. We always want what we can't have. Just ask Declan (who turned 3 on Monday, had a "monkey cake!", and always, alllllways wants what he can't have).

Which brings me back to the title subject. How do you reconnect with your spouse when you have lots of children or when you maybe only have a few children but don't have reliable babysitting? And I want your feedback on this, because I want to know, too!

All too often after our kids are in bed (they are good about bedtime, everyone's down and out by 7:30 and no one makes surprise visits out to the living areas, bless them, I've scared them well) James and I just want to catch up on our favorite things and enjoy the silence. We've joked that our ears ring and almost hurt from the silence after our kids are in bed and that's really not too far from the truth. I tend to gravitate toward the computer (I know, you're shocked) and James grabs his iPod and crashes in front of the tv. We don't MAKE time to just be together, and this gets to be a problem. We miss each other, but we don't work at spending quality time together. So maybe, connecting with your spouse has a lot more to do with behaviors than it does with the knowledge of what to do to reconnect.

Some little things we do, in case you're looking for a little morsel of something from all this rambling:
1. We serve the kids supper first. Yes, they all sit down and eat around 4:50-5:00 while we run around like crazy getting refills and seconds and MORE APPLESAUCE PLEASE! Sometimes James will sit down with them and I'll do what James has named "The Negative Calorie Meal" - if I've eaten too many calories already during the day I won't eat and will just do all the running for supper. I actually burn calories during a meal and don't take a single one in. ANYWAY! We serve the kids first so that when they are done, WE can sit down together as two and eat food that's actually still hot and have a semi-decent conversation. We are able to chat entirely about the kids' days while they eat and we don't feel POed that we can't talk to each other. Win-win-win-winner on dinner!
2. We put a tv in our bedroom, and got an electric blanket for Christmas. It works for us. We're drawn to the bed because it's allllll cozy and warm, plus there's the added benefit of tv viewing, connected to our DVR so we can catch up on all the important shows. Lordie, we sound so pampered!

So there's some ideas to get the ball rolling. What do YOU do?

Two babies and a banana.

You'd swear I've never given my kids fruit. Ok, so I am terrible about it and I'm just now incorporating them into the twins' diet regularly. Sue me, they're 18 months old but I've been sorta busy - they had them as infants but I've gotten out of habit. My older kids eat them fine so I'm doing something right. Annnnnyway yeah, just now giving them to the twins.

Madelyn has this *precious* habit of taking whatever she doesn't like and throwing it straight to the floor. To be more correct, she actually takes whatever she doesn't THINK she'll like (without sampling) and throws it straight to the floor. Macey will usually just politely ignore it and eat all around it. I'm appreciative of Macey at mealtimes.

So a few days ago I introduced banana at a snacktime. They both sampled - Macey put it back on the tray without sampling again and Madelyn's taste buds can apparently decide in .05 seconds that she doesn't like banana. Down to the floor it went. I ignored. I tried again yesterday morning at breakfast. To my amazement, Macey sampled again - and she liked it! She is eating banana with no problem! Which leads us to Madelyn...

She tosses. And tosses. And honestly if you put it on her tray before anything else, she will become angry with you. Downright honked off, thank you very much. I tried that this morning at breakfast and she.was.mad. I guess I just keep trying!

We go to their 18 month well-child checkups this morning! I'll update with how they're doing later. Ta-ta!

A teacher who believes in your SN child...

is worth more than any gift I've ever been given. Caden's 1st grade teacher this year is nothing short of phenomenal. I literally just hung up the phone from her calling me to tell me about some big successes Caden has had in the classroom. They (the students) were going around in a circle, telling her what sound each letter group made - ir, or, etc. It came to Caden's turn and he had "er". He nailed it. They went around again and he nailed it a second time. No fluke. Came around again and she challenged him with a new one - qu. "Qwah," said my boy!!!! I literally have tears running down my face. She just believes in him so much! She said she just feels so confident he is going to read. I'm so excited about that, too!! I just feel so blessed, so very blessed that God has given us this amazing woman to spend the year with him. He's doing so very well!!

Happy 2011!

I just can hardly believe it. 2010 was a great year really, aside from whooping cough, multiple hospitalizations, job changes, money uncertainty...ok so it really wasn't that awesome.

However! I did lose 50 pounds in 2010 so that's awesome!

I'm excited about 2011. I plan to lose as much weight as possible (another 75 is my goal) to reach my goal weight. I want to see the twins (finally) start walking! I want to see sir Declan potty train. I want so many things and we'll see how God sorts it all out!

I am not the kind to make New Year's Resolutions. Mostly that's because I never want to be disappointed! But I can promise you this much - I am determined to make 2011 a year that I remember...for lots of good things!

Bragging on my Caden!

Today Cay came home from school early - fever. Didn't surprise me as one of the twins has strep throat (I know, don't ask - how does a 17mo old get strep before any of the other kids??). I brought him to the dr after calling for an appt because he's also had a lot of peeing accidents as of lately. He's *mostly* trained but we still have some accidents, but it's been a LOT of accidents lately and I wanted to be sure everything was ok.

Anyway. I brought urine along, it was clear. We battled through a throat swab (he actually essentially punched our awesome dr in the face, gotta love kids who don't understand and have oral defensiveness) which was negative for strep. We started antibiotics as he DID have an ear infection.

ANYWAY! He's been out of sorts all day, but I asked him to get ready for bed. I always ask him to get ready for bed, and I always help him all the way. Tonight...he put his own pullup on and pulled it up. He put on his pants. He put on his shirt. He came to me FULLY DRESSED for bed and I didn't have to do ANYTHING!!!!!!!!!!! I have waited 8 years for this with him! I am just so proud I could burst!!!

Ni ni little man. I hope you feel better in the morning.

Ave's thoughts on singing for the old folks.

Today Avery's class is going with the other K class to sing for the "grandpas and grandmas" at the old folks' home. I'm not sure if there was a rather rousing conversation that went on at school or what, but both James and I have heard these exact words out of her mouth about the whole situation (on many, separate occasions):

We're going to sing for the grandpas and grandmas. They're deaF, not deaD. Do you hear that F at the end? Yeah, they're deaF. We have to sing really loud so they can hear us.

Holy mother of hilarious.

Bye-bye ba-bas!

No more bottles! Quite frankly, the twins did it for us. One day they refused the naptime bottles. The next they refused the nighttime bottles. And they BOTH refused on the SAME days/times! I really thought they needed the formula to make it through the night but I was totally wrong. It's been well over a week since they've had a bottle. It's bittersweet, because I loved watching them take that bottle with both hands and suck it down, but I'm so glad we're done with it as well.

The twins are 17 months now and pretty good about getting where they need to be. They still motate via army crawl for the most part, but they are doing more up on hands and knees crawling every day. Macey pulls to stand a LOT - you often find her standing next to something, even transferring back and forth to things next to her. Madelyn will pull up as well, though not as often. Both girls like to climb - they go all the way up our stairs and will get on top of boxes or on the bottoms of tables if they have an extra shelf at the bottom. Madelyn has also figured out how to go down stairs - she spins herself around on her tummy and goes back, one at a time. Macey followed suit just today and went down, too!

And now, for something to lighten the mood...

There's always hope. And I find an immense amount of hope in humor. Enjoy this!

TRUTH for mature humans:

1. I think part of a best friend's job should be to immediately clear your computer history if you die.

2. Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you're wrong.

3. I totally take back all those times I didn't want to nap when I was younger.

4. There is great need for a sarcasm font

5. How the hell are you supposed to fold a fitted sheet?

6. Was learning cursive really necessary?

7. Map Quest really needs to start their directions on # 5. I'm pretty sure I know how to get out of my neighborhood.

8. Obituaries would be a lot more interesting if they told you how the person died.

9. I can't remember the last time I wasn't at least kind of tired.

10. Bad decisions make good stories.

11. You never know when it will strike, but there comes a moment at work when you know that you just aren't going to do anything productive for the rest of the day.

12. Can we all just agree to ignore whatever comes after Blue Ray? I don't want to have to restart my collection...again.

13. I'm always slightly terrified when I exit out of Word and it asks me if I want to save any changes to my ten-page technical report that I swear I did not make any changes to.

14. I keep some people's phone numbers in my phone just so I know not to answer when they call.

15. I think the freezer deserves a light as well.

16. I disagree with Kay Jewelers. I would bet on any given Friday or Saturday night more kisses begin with Budweiser than Kay.

17. I wish Google Maps had an "Avoid Ghetto" routing option.

18. I have a hard time deciphering the fine line between boredom and hunger.

19. How many times is it appropriate to say "What?" before you just nod and smile because you still didn't hear or understand a word they said?

20. I love the sense of camaraderie when an entire line of cars team up to prevent a jerk from cutting in at the front. Stay strong, brothers and sisters!

21. Shirts get dirty. Underwear gets dirty. Pants? Pants never get dirty, and you can wear them forever.

22. Sometimes I'll look down at my watch 3 consecutive times and still not know what time it is.

23. Even under ideal conditions people have trouble locating their car keys in a pocket, finding their cell phone, and Pinning the Tail on the Donkey - but I'd bet everyone can find and push the snooze button from 3 feet away, in about 1.7 seconds, eyes closed, first time, every time!

24. The first testicular guard, the "Cup," was used in Hockey in 1874 and the first helmet was used in 1974. That means it only took 100 years for men to realize that their brain is also important. (Ladies.....Quit Laughing.)

Merry Christmas?

It should be merry, but things are stressful for us. While money has always been tight, we've never before been worried. Now, James would tell you that I am worried more than I should be, but isn't that what women are supposed to do? :) It is a very good time for us to learn to trust in God. A trusted friend told me this week that God isn't going to let us fall. That made me feel so much better because I know it's the truth. There's something to be learned in every situation, something that God needs you to hear or know. The hardest part is the patience through the journey - we want to know what life holds for us on the other end.

James worked for years in a job that didn't fulfill him. He was miserable, unhappy and lost. We finally found a job (albeit on a part-time basis, but would still provide for our family) that seemed like the perfect fit. And the job itself IS a perfect fit. The problem lies in the fact that this job currently doesn't have enough hours available, and no one saw that caveat coming...least of all, us. Initially they had to work hard to keep his hours low enough because there was so much work. Now...well now that isn't the case. At all.

It's one of those things that I'm sure thousands of people have been through, are going through, are fearing. You just don't assume things will work out that way for you. And let me say this - you do NOT understand what it is like to be in the situation until you are in it. I thought I was so compassionate, so understanding, so able to put myself in the place of someone going through this. And I was not. At all.

We covet your prayers. We are positive God is rowing our little boat with us, but we are learning to let him take the oars more. And we fully agree with this quote: We may not have it all together, but together we have it all.

When your 2 year old asks you...

"Where's your bra?" you know it's time to:

a) put one back on
b) stop using adult language in front of your tot
c) get your jammie shirt on MUCH quicker
d) all of the above

I'll let you decide.

Hello, daddy? 'Dis Macey!

Sometimes, a picture says it all:



and sometimes, Tena still needs to say stuff. No, Macey doesn't talk that well yet (she doesn't talk at all yet actually, and neither does her baby sister) but that was a cute title, no? Yes. Love my babies!

Food battles ala Declan

This boy is something else. He would survive on Pop-Tarts alone if we would allow it. We fight him to eat. Period. It's not about battling for fruits and veggies (forget those), we have battles of will just for taking one bite of something. I decided to capture one of our usual mealtimes with him in pictures. It's me, sitting across the table from him, asking him to eat one half of a chef boyardee ravioli. NOT HEALTHY. Super kid friendly. You'd think we were asking him to eat asparagus. Raw. His motivation? An early piece of Caden's birthday cake (this was the day before C's 8th birthday on Sunday).

"Take a bite and then you can have the cake!"


The cake was pushed right up in front of him as motivation...he took the bait!


Now I can use the fork for cake! (Note the leftover ravilolis - he didn't have many to begin with and only ate that one half.)


I believe he thinks he has won.


It's baby steps with this boy. We are working HARD to make sure he's hungry at mealtimes. limiting snacks, etc. He's a buggar.

Mischief is brewing

It's so cute with two. Like today, they were both scooting forward, army-crawl style, and they bumped their heads together. They looked at each other and laughed. It was priceless. And when one takes off across the room the other follows behind. I'm also now catching them sitting up when they had been scooting around. Most of the time that's because they pull up on something low and then can't get back down, but still, they're figuring it out! Here's a few pictures of them getting around lately:


Madelyn left, Macey right. Should we or shouldn't we...try the stairs...


Macey tries, but thinks better of it.


Madelyn left, Macey right. Macey was here first, and Madelyn thought it looked like fun...


until Macey started pushing her away.


And another of Madelyn, because I think it's absolutely adorable!!

Do I need to post with more pictures?

I do, don't I. You can say it. I know it's true. It's like one of those things that I know is true but I don't want to do anything about. It sort of like someone walking out of a bathroom stall with toilet paper hanging from their pants. You know you should say something but you really don't want to. Or it's like when you *toot* silently in a large group of people and you know you should say something but you just simply cannot admit that you did it. Not that that's ever happened to me or anything.

More pictures. Ok, working on it....

More milestones for Macey and Madelyn

Now they're pulling up on things like steps and fireplace hearths and stepstools. They don't get up on their feet but up on their knees to whack at what's above. It is TOO cute!! (If I do say so myself.)

Wanna see some pics of my crew?

My friend (and talented photographer) came over Saturday morning to get some pictures of the kids. I decided to get in on the action a bit, too - you know those awesome pictures you see of a mom all in play with her kids? Yeah, we didn't get a lot like that but we both had some good ideas! Caden and Declan were seriously SERIOUSLY uncooperative. You can see that in a lot of shots. I'm sporting myself down 40 pounds from January (go, me!) and am determined to love me and the mommy I am to my beautiful children! They light up my life. Let me know what your favorites are - I'm going to have a hard time choosing!

http://www.photoreflect.com/pr3/store.aspx?p=235481

password: fall

Up on our knees...

not in prayer, but UP on their knees! The twins, that is. Macey has been getting up on all 4s for quite a few weeks now. Madelyn has just started today. Macey is even lifting one hand up off the floor to reach for things while she's up on all 4s! It should be soon that we see the moving forward with "real crawling"! Right on time for our kiddos - they'll be 15 months on Friday! Go little ladies!

In other news, the school called me around 1:30 - had to go pick Avery up from school. Her fever was only 99.9 (which isn't really a fever for my kids) but she was coughing a ton as well. Thankfully Heather happened to be out here so she stayed with my 3 littles who were sleeping while I ran and got Ave from school. It was picture day for her but she told me she did have her picture taken so we've got that out of the way!