Busy week

Our family at the beach.

Our dear friends, Rae Ann & Dan (with their four kids) have been here, explored and will be departing the state tomorrow. So I have a LOT to write about! So put on your reading glasses and let's begin this story of our great week together. For those of you who don't know about Rae Ann let me give you a little background. We've been friends since the first day of our freshman year in high school. We have one of those amazing friendships where months will go by and we'll call and it is like we just talked the day before (which lately is the case since she's a stay-at-home mom and one of my favorite people to talk to). The best thing is our kids - we each have four, she has one son (8 years old) and three daughters (6, 2 and 9 months). So as you can imagine my kids love having them around too, because they each have a playmate.
Dan's Clan arrived on Tuesday and we had lots planned for their visit. Wednesday we awoke and realized that our air conditioner was not working (again!) -we thought it might be the addition of six bodies into our little house but it turned out we had not actually changed the filter in several months (note to fellow homeowners don't forget to change your filter - that was an expensive lesson for us). Dan's and I took our kids to Sea World (Jason had to work). We drove through a LOT of rain and I was beginning to regret the on-line purchase of Sea World tickets when we arrived and the sun came out. We had an almost perfect day to go, it began raining on us again as the end of the day came, but it was actually pretty nice while we were there. Not too hot and not too humid. Rae Ann & I enjoyed watching Shamu while nursing in unison, what a sight to behold. I took the big kids on the Journey to Atlantis - let's call it a glorified log flume - it was a blast! We had such a good time that the kids begged Dan & Rae Ann to let us go again, I didn't have anything to do with it. :) While we were on our second ride down there was 2 year old meltdown so we had to get going. A waited to have her meltdown when we were about 20 minutes from home, we stopped but she didn't want to hear about the time factor. Thursday we prepared for our trip to Port Aransas and played at our local pool. Oh yea and Jason blew up the microwave. He was trying to change the light bulb but didn't realize that the light was on and when he tried to take it out it went zap. Here's a funny side note, Friday as Jason was getting out his microwave oatmeal and getting it ready to put in the microwave I asked in my most innocent voice, "whatcha doing with that?"... hee hee. After that fun we got an early start so that Jason and B could go on a fishing trip. They went deep sea fishing and caught nothing! Poor guys - the worst part was that B got sea sick twice. Jason didn't get a picture of that. While we were in Port A we rented a beach house and had a great time playing on the beach and in the pool.
Everybody in our family had a great time and we want to say thank you to Rae Ann & Dan and their crew for a terrific vacation - let's do it again soon!
Here's some pictures.

2 year olds learning to share.

Lesson #1 - Don't take a two year old to the beach without putting on his sipsuit (as he calls it) because they don't understand the concept of just going to see the ocean.


Lesson #2 - Two year olds find PURE JOY in running in water and mud.

Lesson #3 - Seven year olds don't get it either!

There's a little Baywatch in all of us.

I LOVE this picture!

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Triathalon

Today B participated in a kid's and family triathlon. He did a great job and had a lot of fun. He swam 100 meters, rode his bike 2.5 miles and ran 0.6 of a mile. He was one of 59 kids between the ages of 7 and 10 and the unofficial results had him as coming in 16th - which we thought was really great. I video taped the swimming so we don't have pictures of that, but we have some great pictures of him riding his bike and running.

Pajamas & Rock climbing...

As many of you know I have begun an exercise program and I've been trying to eat healthy. Here is the way my plan works, A wakes me up sometime between 4am and 6am and after I feed her I go ahead and get dressed and exercise right then. (Yes, I can fall back to sleep after this.) Well this morning Jason commented on how he thinks I'm doing a great job. I said, "yes I got up this morning at 4am." He responded, "yea, I can tell - your nightgown is inside out." Hee hee... I looked down and sure enough I may be able to fall back to sleep after I exercise, but I cannot dress myself. FYI - I have lost 11 lbs. (I know it is baby weight but I won't complain) and I appreciate people keeping me accountable to this exercise program. My next goal is to compete with B in the local family triathlon - I have a year to prepare, since this years is this Saturday and I'm not ready for that yet.
Yesterday was a good day for Z. I have decided to implement quiet time for Z. I called it that yesterday and he fell asleep after about an hour of sitting in there and I woke him up at the time that I told him I would and he was in good spirits that evening. Yea!

We also went and took pictures of #1 hanging on the walls.

#3 is ready to go too as you can see.

Be careful the next picture is scary!!

K after a late night of girlie movies with Mommy.

Why fight it?

So Z has been in his "dark" room for about an hour now... not asleep! Here's what I am thinking, why fight it? I've told him that he can't come out until he takes a nap and he's not allowed to get out of his bed, so I suppose I should just think of this as extended quiet time, right? What I know is that he does need a nap so I won't back down on naps for a two year old. Advice on how to get him to actually nap when I put him down is appreciated.
Here is a funny story about my dear sweet Z:
Yesterday & today as we were driving B to and from rock climbing I have been pointing out the red traffic lights and telling Z that red means, "Stop!" and green means "Go!" I was encouraging him to tell me when the light turned green and told him I would nap (because I could really use one every once in a while) until he told me green means go. So today as we are waiting at a red light and I heard this noise, "honk-shoe, honk-shoe"... I turned around and realized that he was pretending to nap too during the red lights. Silly boy! Perhaps this isn't the greatest thing to teach but I'm sure I can unteach that by the time he turns 16 - right?!

A day in the life

Today was crazy! There is no other way to explain it, as you will see. I was up at 6:30 (A slept until 4:40 - but I went back to bed for a few more zzz's since I was expecting a hectic day). I fixed Jason & B lunches, took a shower and got breakfast ready for BKZ. B had his first day of rock climbing camp today, we left at 8am to make sure we got there by 9am - I was afraid of traffic driving toward the city. Luckily I didn't encounter any and we actually got there too early, so we drove around and found me a good way to get back to the highway. After we signed B in and left him to hang on "rocks" sticking out of topsy-turvy walls (no stress there!) we headed back home for A's 2 month check-up. Here are the stats, she weighs in at 13.9 lbs (95th percentile), 23 inches long (75th percentile) and her head circumference is in the 80th percentile (I don't remember the exact measure on that one). We've got a big, healthy baby with a funky belly button. For those of you who have not been tortured with my obsession with her belly button - here it is... it took forever for her umbilical cord to fall off and then when it did it kept oozing and getting gunky (not the technical terminology there)... but nothing to write in the blog about, just annoying. So I mentioned it to the dr. today and she said that she didn't know if it was this or that (I don't remember what she called it), one she could deal with the other she'd need us to see a surgeon - huh!!! This freaked me out a little, except that she said it was nothing to be alarmed about. Oh yea, then K reminds me that her ear hurts and the dr. (taking pity on me) takes a look - swimmers ear, no swimming for 1 week, poor K. So we left there with two prescriptions (one for K and one for A) and went on our merry way, getting home at about 11:15. I called Jason and gave him the scoop on the dr. appt. and fixed a quick snack for K & Z. This is when the dr. calls me and ask me to come back saying that she would rather go ahead and put some silver nitrate on A's belly button and try that before I cart my whole clan to the city for a surgical consultation. So we zip over there again on our way to pick up #1 (more commonly referred to as B on this blog).

**Tiny side note, due to Jason's & my increasing senility we have determined it might just be easier to call our kids 1,2,3 & 4, maybe even get them t-shirts.**

We get back home and I attempt to put my 2 year old down for a nap - no go without lots of frustration on both of our parts until about 3pm! Ugh! The bug guys call and wants to re-investigate my ant issues, another long story that is too frustrating to share right this minute. Jason calls to say he's going to be late, I still need to go get the girls prescriptions and I haven't even thought about dinner (thank heavens for leftovers). So I load the van, we get the prescriptions, come home and Jason is home (yippee)! I put him to work putting curtains up in K&Z's room - a last ditch effort on my part to coax Z into taking naps. Right now everyone is asleep and I'm sitting here contemplating this stay-at-home mom thing! All I can say is I am so glad that I don't have a job outside of the house because this one is keeping me plenty busy! I am so appreciative that I have the opportunity to spend this time with my kids. I told my father-in-law the other day that I think this is the closest thing to heaven on earth that you can get, here's why I think that. Where else do you get countless hugs from your own personal angels, coos, ahhs, giggles and numerous "I wuv you" or "Mom, I love you"? Okay, mom friends out there, I know I didn't mention laundry, cooking, cleaning, dishes, laundry, children's TV (over and over and over), spit-up, dirty diapers, laundry, mysterious spills that appear out of nowhere, making beds, tripping over toys, laundry - don't worry I'm not delusional I know there are other perks that go with this job. But I can look past those "perks" every time Z and I get into a giggle fest and it ends with his little arms clasped around my neck!
On a final note this is a picture of Z sleeping in his new dark room tonight. Am I the only one that sees an "I surrender" written in his body language?

Just a cute picture of the gunky belly button girl. Is it me or does she look like a cross between the Gerber baby and the grinch?

Love you all!
Don't forget it is my prerogative to have grammatical errors, spelling errors and run-on sentences whenever I want to! :)

Just random pictures

B with his legos

A smiles

K and A have matching outfits... aww isn't that sweet!

Alamo

Saturday we went to see the Alamo - we've been saying for a while that we needed to visit so we made a day of it and drove to San Antonio saw the Alamo, walked on the Riverwalk and ate at the Alamo Cafe. Here are some pictures of our trip.

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Once upon a time...

there was an adorable little girl named Sherry who made one small mistake and colored her mother's banister with several brightly colored crayons. She was punished for this bad behavior and has since repented and has had no more breaches in good behavior. So why, you may ask, is she sharing this story? Well it is simple, that little girl grew up and had four beautiful children... one of which (who will remain a nameless 2 year old) has decided to show her what it feels like to have someone color all over her belongings, dishwasher, walls, doors, rocking chair, the list goes on! This nameless child has been been reprimanded however continues to slip up and forget that crayon goes on paper not furniture and walls. Ugh! I am convinced that this is belated punishment for my poor behavior - so I have one thing to say, "Mom, I'm really sorry I colored your banister, I really did believe that your room needed a little color but I now see that I shouldn't have added my own flair to your stuff." Okay, now this will end! Right?!

See he looks innocent enough - don't let him fool you he's a crayon bandit who can't be stopped!!!

Busy, busy

Hi All
We have the great pleasure this week of having Jason's parents here visiting. I love having Bonnie & John come to visit, B&K love staying with them in their trailer and Z&A have been enjoying getting to know them better. We've been busy too... I asked John to build some shelves in our garage so that I can get the van in so he and B have been working hard on that. Bonnie and I took K to get a pedicure - a special treat for us! Here's A getting to know G'ma Bonnie & G'pa better (I think she has them both wrapped around her teeny tiny finger already).



Yesterday we enjoyed the neighborhood 4th of July parade (that is a bunch of kids and parents parading down the main street all decked out in red, white & blue). Here's a couple of pictures of our celebration.