10.31.2010

happy halloween

 Little Lamby Logan

 Sweet Sheep Jack

Our boys

Jack, Ferris & Logan

-

We had a low key Halloween with pizza at my mom's house along with my sister & her family.  We trick or treated around the block and took lots of pictures of our cutie pies. My mom made these fantastic costumes, and the sheep bells are authentic from Wilco (thanks, Dad!).  The boys ran down the street pronouncing, "I'm dinging! I'm dinging!" So adorable!  We were all happy to be healthy enough to enjoy this fun holiday with family.

10.30.2010

bogey & his bubba visit the ER

 To pick up where we left off... 
Monday Jack was still sick, but improving.
Then Tuesday Josh & Logan both became ill.
Like, up vomiting all.night.long.
 Josh stopped after one night.
Logan vomited all night long Wednesday as well.
Then Thursday he was super lethargic & slept a whole lot.
 By Friday he seemed all better,
and we started pushing fluids.
Then this morning he woke up
and wouldn't get out of bed.
Josh had to carry him into the living room.
 He promptly threw up and had diarrhea
{again}
so we called the advice nurse
and she said we needed to go to the ER.
Little Bogey was dehydrated.
The wait wasn't long at all,
and Logan was a real trouper.
Poor guy had to get stuck THREE times
before they could find a vein.
{It was in his foot that they finally found a decent one}
His dehydration was really severe
and it took two bags of fluid to get him better.
~
After about three hours,
we were allowed to go home.
We were so relieved to have the color 
return to Logan's cheeks.
Poor lil' guy.



10.25.2010

middle of the ocean

I am in the middle of the ocean.
My arms are tired.
I am in danger of drowning.
Or freezing to death.

And though I look, desperately, to the horizon for some kind of hope...
for some promise of a better tomorrow...
there is only darkness.


On Thursday & Friday I was home from work.
Two bonus days off, hanging with the kids.
Or so I thought.

Instead on Thursday I got the stomach flu.
Vomited all night, got dehydrated
& spent Friday night in the ER with my mom.
(Good people watching, that's for sure.)

Doctor gave me fluids and sent me home.
Said come back if I had a headache.


So of course Saturday morning I wake up with a killer headache.
Roxanne & Ferris came to hang with the boys
and Josh & I went to the ER.
The wait was remarkably shorter.

The doctor was concerned for meningitis 
or brain trauma (from all the violent puking)
so I got morphine & fluids
and a CT scan.

CT scan was clear and I was sent home with Vicodin
& advice to drink a lot of water.
 

Stayed horizontal until Sunday at noon when Jack started vomiting.
He threw up every half hour for seven hours.
Poor baby.

Then today he spiked a super-high fever
so I took him to Urgency Care
only to wait three hours, 
have his fever go down on its own,
and never be seen.

Seriously.

Just keep swimming,
just keep swimming...
What do you do?
You swim, swim, swim.

10.19.2010

roller.coaster.

I have been a roller coaster of emotions the last two weeks. The situation that was causing me so much stress has been resolved, so there has been relief. But new stressors arise everyday, so there is new tension. Things at work are still busy, although we have hired for one of our two open positions.  Of course this means training a new employee, which is not easy, but at least she's here to stay!
At home, we spent the weekend doing fun things, like attending the Cunningham family Halloween party, going to the pumpkin patch & playing at Nanny's house on Sunday afternoon... The downside to all this fun is that I started the week behind on laundry & the house.  I hate that.  It just feels like I am on a treadmill. I run and run, constantly exhausted, praying for a break, all the while making no progress.

Thank God for my family. 
My sister watched the boys for us Friday when Josh's mom wasn't able to, and while she was here, she did extra loads of laundry, and she cleaned my ceiling fan. I could have kissed her. I got home and she goes, "I cleaned your ceiling fan while you were at work. No judgment!" I cracked up. I said, "You can judge me all you want while cleaning my ceiling fan, I'm just thankful you cleaned it!" Then today she went shopping at the Rack and picked up shoes for my kids, who beg for me to take off their shoes because theirs are too small, and I am too busy and too broke to go shopping.
Then there's my mom, who agreed to not only buy and make the boys' Halloween costumes, but to go to the fabric store and pick out what they were going to be, all on her own, because I just couldn't find the time when I wanted to go by myself or bring the kids.
Then today Josh was home for a doctor appointment and he cleaned up the yard, vacuumed the house, did about five loads of laundry, paid some bills and did drop off and pick up of the boys for me.  Maybe we are finally making some headway... Maybe.

One big dip along my little roller coaster is the tears over being a working mom.  I do so well, and then I do not do so well. Tonight was one of those nights. I miss them. We were eating dinner and Logan said, "We take baths. We go night night?" And I almost cried. That's right buddy. We eat dinner, we bathe you and you go to bed. That's the extent of our time together during the week. I hate it. I loathe it. I would do anything to change it.  I hate that I am not the one home with them, I hate that I am exhausted from working all day with kids, and that it means I have no patience left for my own kids at the end of the day.  I hate that Josh feels defeated for not having found a full time job yet. I hate that we held out hope for this fall to "be the change", and that our hope don't float.

I am exhausted. And I have so much to do. So blogging is on the back burner. But I miss you.  And I will get off this ride soon. 

Hopefully.

10.09.2010

pee, poop & pancakes

 Been a while. I've been having a rough go of it lately, and unfortunately I can't go into detail (or just don't want to), but suffice to say that some stuff has been going on that has been stressing me out big time.  It's taking energy away from me that I don't have to give, and it's distracting me from things I don't want to be taken away from.

 Like these guys.
Last week going to work was rough. I have been so tired, the boys have been waking up at 5am for a while now and it's starting to wear me out.  I just want to be home, feeding them, playing with them, putting them down for naps in their cozy bed on these rainy days... Plus we've been working in our classroom with two subs and have yet to get word out that we're hiring.  So stress has been at an all time high.

 That, and Josh is still looking for work, but the search seems to only grow more bleak with each passing week.  Thankfully he is finding lots of substitute work, which is good in the meantime, but provides no hope of me staying home with the boys anytime soon.

 I have to fight everyday not to cry about it. To accept that this is where we are, that the boys are very much loved by the grandma's who take care of them, and that this is (for some reason) where God wants me.  But that doesn't mean it's easy.  It's hard.

 And today was hard even though I got to stay home. 
I woke up with the boys at 6am (they slept in AN HOUR!) and were really good until 8:30 when I wanted to take a shower so we could go run errands. BIG MISTAKE. I went into the bathroom; killed eight slugs (we have a slug infestation in the bathroom that is HORRIBLE); washed {most of} my body; heard the screaming from the boys; jumped out of the shower; yelled at said boys for fighting over daddy's shoes ("I go get pizza. You stay here," I heard Jack tell Logan, mimicking Josh from a few weeks ago); take said shoes away; jumped back in the shower, scrubbed my face furiously while yelling at the boys to play in their kitchen; lather up my hair; hear more screaming and pleas for "help me"; jump back out of the shower to find them wrestling over a HOT PAD from my kitchen drawer; put both boys in timeout for being obnoxious, not sharing and making me get out of my shower TWICE; jump back in the shower to rinse off; turn off the shower and try to breathe.

 Then I put on Signing Time so I could blowdry my hair and do my make up in peace. It worked. Got myself and the boys out the door and into the car where I realized I hadn't eaten breakfast yet. How does that happen?
Then I start driving and was two minutes from the house when Jack started in with "Elmo Song? Elmo Song?!? ELMO SONG!!!!!!" I was instantly thrown into that scene from Big Daddy with Adam Sandler where the kid he is raising wakes up from naptime and wants "Kangaroo Song!!!!!" and Adam Sandler's character gives in and screams, "Alllriiight!!!"
{"Elmo Song" is actually "Don't Know Why" by Norah Jones. There is an episode of Sesame Street where she sings it with Elmo.  The words are changed to "I Don't Know Why 'Y' Didn't Come" and when he heard me play it in the car this summer he yelled, "Elmo Song!" like he couldn't believe it was on our radio. It was so cute, and I still can't believe he remembered it!}

 We got to the mall and turned in my new reading glasses to be repaired, visited the puppies at the pet store and did a little shopping at Old Navy. (Found *adorable* blue & green vests for the boys for only $16!) By the time that was over I needed to eat, so I got a sandwhich at Subway and got the boys chocolate milk.  We ate in the food court, and (for the first time) the boys sat in the big boy chairs on either side of me.  They were so good, and so cute.  
Jack loved sitting  in the big boys chairs. Mostly he enjoys people watching. I think he gets it from his Nanny!

 Logan was signing "chocolate milk" over and over. He was so excited. He kept saying, "Mommy has sandwich.  I eat chocolate milk. It's yummy. I like it."  Then out of the blue he said, "I love Mommy," and he stood up and hugged me so tight. Then he said, "I love Jack, too."

 Then Jack said, "I love mommy, too." And he hugged me.

 Our little outing was worth all the headache this morning because of three things: One, their spontaneous hugs, kisses and declarations of love in the food court; Two, they both stayed dry while we were out (!!!); and Three, Logan went potty in a public restroom, which is a huge step for him!

 This afternoon I got a much needed break and headed to a family baby shower.  It was nice to visit with other mommas, and remember the excitement of my pregnancy. It is easy to forget the joy when I am so bogged down.

 Again when I got home this afternoon I was thrust into the trenches of parenthood. Jack had pooped his underwear (diarrhea actually... and what a mess), and I didn't know it until I was taking off his jeans to have him go potty, so it got all over my fingers, his fingers, his legs & his pants.  What a mess.  Then when we got home from picking up my glasses tonight he  peed his pants as I was having Logan go potty. Ugh! It was so frustrating! Two more minutes and he would have been on the potty.
After that we ate dinner "together", pancakes & bacon, and the boys made such a sticky disaster of the table, their booster chairs, and their hair- I just had to laugh.  Then I spent the twenty minutes Josh had them in the tub scrubbing down the entire dining room, which was smeared with peanut butter & syrup.

No one tells you about this part of parenting. No one really sits down and says, "So you wanna have kids? How do you feel about waking up four times a night for the first year, twice a night for the second year and up for the day at 5am everyday for the third year?  How do you feel about never going to the bathroom alone again?  What about showering? Do you really like to do that everyday? And how about your furniture? Do you care if there are goldfish under your couch cushions?  Do you mind if your kitchen table has a residual stickiness about it?  If any of this bothers you, then maybe parenting isn't for you. "

Today was just one of those days... And I know these days will come, but whew... I was ready for bedtime tonight!

10.06.2010

{mommy lullaby}

KEEP YOU SAFE
{by jj heller}


 Quiet your heart
it's just a dream
go back to sleep


I'll be right here
I'll stay awake
as long as you need me
to slay all the dragons
and keep out the monsters
I'm watching over you


My love is a light
driving away
all of your fear
~
So don't be afraid
Remember I made
a promise to keep you safe


You'll have your own
battles to fight
when you are older
~
You'll find yourself
frozen inside
But always remember
if you feel alone
facing the giants
and you don't know what to do


My love is a light
driving away
all of your fear
~
So don't be afraid
Remember I made
a promise to keep you safe


Here is a video of the song I found on YouTube.
I just am {in love} with this song right now!

10.01.2010

autumn...

 Autumn has always been a special time to me.  When I was younger it meant heading back to school and my birthday was coming.  Now that I am grown up with children of my own, it holds all kinds of {wonders}.

 It reminds me of when I was pregnant with the boys (I found out I was pregnant on October 16th, and every orange leaf I saw was a sign of change.)  I remember listening to "Dream" by Michael Buble a lot that fall. I had so much hope for the future... That song still makes me tear up!

I love the fall for the chilly Sundays spent {cozy} at home with my boys, candles lit, making chili and watching football...

I love fall for the {family} togetherness...

I love fall for delicious things made with apples like my mom's {amazing} Apple Cake...

I love fall for the pumpkin patch, where Sunflowers grow among the orange orbs...

I love fall for the boys' joy as we explore said patch, climbing the hay pyramid, visiting the animals in the petting zoo, and picking out just the right pumpkin...

I love fall for Halloween with its jack-o-lanterns, its ghostly treats & its clever costumes...

 I love fall for my birthday. For the opportunity to look back on my life thus far, and blow out the candles on my cake, making {wishes} for what the future holds...

 I love fall for Thanksgiving.  For being surrounded by loved ones, expressing our gratitude for one another and for God's bounty...

 And lastly I love fall for the anticipation of the holiday season. Shopping, baking, decorating, and surprising...
There is such {joy} on its way.
So much to look forward to.
I can't wait!