Family Alive

Crazy stormy weather blew through here this afternoon.

We
were watching the weather coverage on TV, as they were highlighting the
6 rotating storms throughout Alabama on radar while it got darker and very windy out the
back. (We were already in the basement since that’s where Brian and the kids had been working/playing.) The tornado sirens went off,
but the weather guy assured us it was for the northern part of the
county (we’re in the south). Then the downpour started, and then the hail.  The wind was wild and swirly, and we were sure a tree was going to
come down in the backyard as we watched out the windows.  It only lasted a few minutes, and then a couple minutes after it calmed down, the weather guy says, "We’re getting
reports of a funnel cloud on Rocky Ridge Road…"  No kidding – that’s where
we are!  Like 10 minutes too late! There are tons of people without
power – not us, luckily, and lots of damage reports in our area, though they haven’t actually confirmed any tornados.  But
our porch rockers were blown over, and the double stroller – with
brakes on! – was blown all the way across the porch!

These spring/summer storms in the South can be CRAZY! (And I’m not even
talking about the hurricanes!)  Meanwhile, both my sister are in Duluth, MN getting a
certified BLIZZARD and my mom lost power last night in the "thundersnow" and had school canceled today, all this on April 11th!

**I started this post yesterday on my birthday, but it’s been so busy around here, I’m just now posting it!!!** 32 years old!  And everyone woke up healthy – woohoo! That’s the first and best birthday present!  It was a fairly good night’s sleep for everyone, and Josiah was super sweet and snuggly with me in bed.  And Analise is on best birthday behavior for me, which makes me smile!

I had a couple e-cards waiting for me.  My dad sends us lots of e-cards, and the kids always want to watch them over and over and over.  So we spent the first part of the morning enjoying all the cards he’s ever sent us. 

I got lots of emails and notes on my Facebook page, and interestingly
enough, just one card in the actual mail!  What a techy society we are
becoming!  But of course, with the little birthday reminder on
Facebook, far more people remembered it was my birthday and dropped me
a note.  I got a beautiful bouquet of pink sweetheart roses and daisies
with a balloon from my parents.  Brian got me a handheld label printer
(yes, so very romantic… it was just what I wanted!!) and some
sunflowers.  And a mom friend surprised me by dropping by mid-morning
with some flowers, a bottle of wine, and some chocolate just because
she knew the kids had been sick, and she couldn’t imagine me cooped up
with sick kids on my birthday.  AW! Analise and I the Best Birthday Cupcakes,
and they were actually VERY good, possibly even the best. 

Since everyone looked like they were going to be sick, I had planned on staying in for a birthday dinner.  But Brian and I ended up getting our favorite (well, only) babysitter and enjoying dinner at the Cheesecake Factory.  I tell ya, dinner out without kids is *heavenly*.  We really don’t go out much with the kids, except for Moe’s (fast fresh tex-mex), Roly-Poly (wraps), and Chik-Fil-A.  As unpredictable as the kids are, it’s not worth the money to go elsewhere because we never know how long we’re going to have to enjoy it, so it was a real treat to be on our own for a quiet, leisurely meal.  We had Chinese Potstickers (very very good, though still, not quite as good as Corrie’s!), Shrimp & Bacon Club (me, what I get nearly every time, it’s amazing) and Bang Bang Chicken (Brian, a peanutty-curry chicken & shrimp dish that he loves).  We shared a piece of Kahlua Coffee Cocoa Cheesecake, and of course, they wrote "Happy Birthday, Christine" on the plate and sang to me 🙂 

Honestly, I’ve been in a bit of a funk lately.  Mothering has worn me out over the last couple months…not from any particular thing, just the sum of the everyday events.  I feel like my needs have gotten lost in all the needs of my kids, Brian, the house, and other responsibilities.  That sure does sounds selfish, but I think most mothers would understand where I’m coming from. I love my kids, I love my husband, I love being MOM, but it can get wearying.  I’m not doing the greatest at taking care of myself and filling up my heart on a regular basis, so I’m sure that’s part of it. 

As I went to sleep on Sunday night after writing this post, I was just praying, "God, please don’t let anyone be sick on my birthday.  I really need a day that’s a little bit about me."  He’s such a good God…  He heard my aching heart, and poured out countless tangible blessings for my birthday.  So humbling.  He didn’t need to.  I’m sure there will be birthdays that will be overshadowed by needs, events, etc.  And yesterday could have been spent taking care of sick ones, or even being sick myself, and it wouldn’t have been the end of the world.  But in my very small corner of the world, the super sweet, flowery, sunshiney full-of-love day was so appreciated!  Thank you, Lord!! 

Well, since I last posted, we haven’t been back to the doctors.  J has bumped his lumpy discolored forehead a couple times and banged his front teeth, which I think may warrant a visit to the dentist this week.   And Thursday, Friday and Saturday were relatively uneventful.  We went to the Day Out with Thomas the Train event at the Heart of Dixie Railroad museum on Friday with our friends.  SUPER FUN!  I’ve just resized the pics, and I hope to upload them tomorrow.

But last night, J got sick with a stomach bug and he was up sick nearly all night.  Up til this point, Brian and I have been spared the all-night stomach bug experience with our kids.  But last night was ROUGH.  Piles of laundry, 3 changes of PJs for him, 2 for me, 2 sheet changes (hugely awkward on the heavy crib mattress) before I started laying down a beach towel.  And I used 3 beach towels, before he ended up sleeping on his mattress pad cover.  Poor little boy.  He was a bit better this morning, but ran a fever all day, and got sick again midafternoon. 

Analise, thankfully, got rescued from the sickhouse by Brian’s mom mid morning.  That left J and I to snuggle on the couch with a sippy cup and a movie, and then take long naps to make up for our restless night.  She came home bubbling with energy, but soon started complaining about her stomach.  I thought she was just trying to get the attention that J was getting, since she’s been like that lately.  But after J went to bed, she got sick, too.  Both of them are sleeping soundly, though, and I hope/pray/cross my fingers that tomorrow will be a better, healthier day and that this bug is short lived… and that it skips me and Brian!

But Brian says he’s not feeling so well.  He helped some last night, but he had to leave at 6am for a bike race.  He felt really good early in the race, but when he made a move to follow an attack at the front of the group, he caught one of his teammate’s wheels, taking them both down, along with 10-12 other people.  What a mess!  His teammate is scraped up pretty badly, and Brian’s got some road rash and a sore knee.  But his bike – a top of the line 2008 Trek Madone – took the brunt of the crash.  It looks like the frame may be cracked.  UG.  I’m just thankful he wasn’t hurt. 

We’ll check in tomorrow, but for now, here was a snuggly moment before bedtime, though it’s pretty much what J and I did all day 🙂

Ok, you are not going to believe poor Josiah’s luck.

I took both kids to
the dentist this morning (amazingly easy, except for the whiney Miss Analise,
of course. Josiah was so laid-back about the whole thing.), and then we went to the playground as a reward. Not 5 minutes into
playing, J is running and trips, falling headfirst into the bottom step

I was across the playground, and another mom picked him up. It was not
even 10 seconds until I was over there, and he already had a MASSIVE egg
sized purple lump on his forehead.
I pulled them both to the car to run him to the pediatrician’s just to check it
out. (I thought maybe it wasn’t such a big deal, but every mom there looked aghast and several said they’d go, if it was them. It was so ugly). Analise was crying harder than Josiah because she couldn’t
play. I was like, "Sweetie, LOOK at his head! We need to go…"
Thankfully, I was able to drop her at a friend’s house to play on our way to the doctor’s.

He was fine – not even crying – all the way there. But then he was mad as a hornet when they gave me ice to put on it. With 4 doctor’s visits for him in 10
days, $100 in copays from an already over-stretched budget, and too many
heartbreaking, "Maaamaaaaaaaaa…." cries…I had a mommy meltdown in
the exam room. Luckily for me, we had to wait half an hour, so I wasn’t
too much of a mess. We saw the sweetest doctor in the practice (and in 4
visits, we’ve yet to see our ped!), and of course, all’s well. I KNEW
it was going to be another $25 for my priceless peace of mind. He said it was definitely smart to get it checked out, and he agreed it looked way worse than it was. We do
have an order for a skull x-ray, if he’s fussy tomorrow to rule out a fracture, but I’m sure
it’s fine. It’s so ugly, though, and his eyes will probably be black
& blue tomorrow. (Here’s what he looks like now. I think the swelling has gone down some, because it was sticking nearly an inch off his forehead within 30 seconds of it happening. Honestly. I think I’m a pretty level-headed mom -bc I almost didn’t go in – but it was so scary looking! I’d better get used to the rough and tumble-ness of boys!)

Well, you haven’t heard from me in a couple days… it’s been busy around here!  Here’s some random numbers that will explain Sunday through today (though there might be a little more info than you want to know)…

Sunday:
Time we left for Brian’s bike race (with just Josiah): 6:30
Miles in Brian’s bike race: 68.9
Number of times we saw him during the race: 9
Number of movies Josiah watched during the 3+ hour race: 4 (?)
Brian’s finish place:  Looked like 3rd, he thought 2nd bc the first guy had supposedly been DQ’d, but final result was 3rd.  Still, not bad!
J’s fever when we got home (he’d been running one off and on since Friday): 102.1
Hours spent at the Urgent Care clinic: 4
Time waiting for a urine sample using a bag: 2.5 hours
Number of tries to get a catheter in for a urine sample: 3 (!!!!!  my poor, poor boy!!!)
Result of evening:  No infection, thankfully
$$ paid in co-pays for doctor’s visits this week: $50

Monday:
Fever: None, thankfully
Bouts of crying and holding his diaper area: 10? 
Time of his nap due to crying and pain: 30 minutes
Time & $ spent at doctor’s: 1 hour and $25 (result: everything’s ok, treat the pain, followup in 3 days if still having problems)
Time spent screaming at 11:15pm: 40 minutes, inconsolable.  Finally collapsing asleep on me while we debated going to the ER.  Decided not to, given that they might likely do another catheter…
Number of times he was awake crying last night: 4
Hours spent sleeping on the couch with him crying/sleeping on me: 4

Tuesday:
Ok, enough of this.  He’s somewhat better today.  The doctor (again) said treat the pain (alternating motrin & tylenol every 3 hours), and as long as he is urinating, give it another day or 2 to heal before we follow-up with the ped. urologist.  He fussed going down for a nap (though he slept 3 hours) and bed, but I’m crossing my fingers and praying he’ll sleep ok tonight. 

By the way, J’s got urinary reflux (too tired to find my links), so we have to get EVERY fever over 101 checked out to make sure it’s not a urinary tract infection.  He’s never had one, thankfully, but if he were to get one, the urine backs up to his kidneys, and it can cause permanent kidney damage, so we have to be really vigilant.   We did just see the pediatric urologist in February, and it’s looking from his kidney ultrasounds that he may be outgrowing the condition, which is just what we’re hoping.  Now, if we can just stay infection-free until then!

Josiah has become quite the talker! It’s so cute. I just love hearing his little phrases. All this is since December, when we saw my family at Christmas and he only had a small handful of words.  Here are a few notable ones:

"Wha choo doin’?"

"Whassat?" (He asks this about EVERYTHING.)

"Wha matter?" (I came into the living room to find Analise engaged in
an intricate play set up with all her people and a little drama going
on. Right next to her, Josiah had 2 little Care Bears, playing on his
own, making one say this to another. So sweet! These parallel play
moments between the two of them have been rare, but they are becoming a
little more frequent.) Just tonight, Analise is spending the night at her grandparents, and I overheard Josiah playing with the little bears and people all lined up on the bookshelf. He said, "Wha matter, Do-a? Wha matter?" And then later, "Where’s Do-a?" When I brought Dora up to the party, he said, "There you are!" Which is so comical, because he says, "There you are!" to any where question. For example, Where’s Josiah? "There you are!" Maybe because we say, "There you are!" Or Where’s my belly button? "There you are!"

When a movie ends, like tonight in the car as we were picking up Brian, he’ll say, "Staht it!" I’m working on adding "please" to this phrase.

Tonight he came up to me with a stem from the grapes that had been on the counter. "Eh-ty!" (Empty! Who’d have thought to call it empty?0

"Yeaaah!" and "Oooooo yeaaahhh!" He’s so responsive with these, too.
Like, "Josiah, do you want some cheese!" "Yeah!" and he gets all
excited, and when he gets the cheese, he’ll say, "Oooooo yeahhhh".

"Oh, maaan" So funny.

And "Where going?"

Analise is doing a lot of letter recognition, so we’re often spelling things, talking about letters, pointing letters out. Josiah loves to spout out his letters, "S-T-M-A-A-A" (We hear a lot of A’s because that’s Analise’s favorite letter, of course because it’s the most important in her name.) He can very nearly spell her name, too, which goes something like this: "A-S-E-L-A!"

He’s also picking up counting very quickly. He prefers the even numbers, though. When I start counting something for Analise, like bites of food she’s to take until she’s done, I’ll say, "One…" and he’ll chime in, "Toooo". When we say 3, he’ll say, "Fo. Five, "Si", Seven, "Eh", Nine, "Te!"

I know there are more, but I’ve had this blog open all day, so I’d better post it before it gets saved and forgotten 🙂 I’ll have to come back with some more.

Analise is such a chatterbox.  She’s always got something to say, and sometimes I just wonder where it all comes from! 

This morning, she hurt her finger playing and came crying to me.  I washed it off and suggested a band-aid.  The last time she had a band-aid was after 3-days of antibiotic shots for an ear infection last January.  It was traumatizing.  I think band-aids remind her of that, and to top it off, taking the band-aids off was painful enough that she doesn’t associate band-aids with any kind of feeling better.  So of course, when I suggested that a band-aid would keep her cut clean and make it feel better, she didn’t believe me and cried even harder.  She just preferred to hold her wound, keeping it covered with her hand.

As I put her in the car to take her to school, she told me she didn’t think she could play because she needed to hold her boo-boo.  I told her, "Miss Brenda is going to ask why your Mommy didn’t put a band-aid on it.  What are you going to tell her?"

"I’ll tell her the boo-boo didn’t want a band-aid." 

"But wait… I just heard the boo-boo say it needed a band-aid to keep it covered."

Analise in a high squeaky voice, making her hand talk, "No, no!  I don’t want a band-aid!  I’m fine!" 

Then when we got to school, the school "principal", Miss June, opened the door to get Analise out and said, "Good morning!"  Analise didn’t say anything.  Miss June said, "You’re not going to talk to me this morning?"  Analise said, "Shhh… my boo-boo is sleeping!" 

Miss June got her out of the car and said, "I hope your boo-boo feels better."  And as Analise sauntered in to school, I heard her say, "It’ll feel better when I grow up." 

You get an evening like tonight…

I had dinner all planned out.  Brian was going to be gone for a weekly training ride.  But as I was cleaning up the kitchen to start dinner, the drain started backing up on one side of the sink, and when I rain the disposal, it came up the other side.  ARG.  I tried to plunge it but splattered junk all over.  Brian came rushing in bc he’d had a bike problem he needed to fix and wanted to fill his water bottle.  I was looking for something in the cupboards under the bar area of the kitchen, and came up to CRACK my head really hard on the corner of the counter.  OUCH.  It was the final straw and I broke into tears.  Analise HATES to see me cry. 

I scrapped dinner plans, loaded A& J into the car for a $5 Little Caesar’s Hot & Ready Pizza and breadsticks.  We spread out a blanket in the driveway and had a picnic.   The kids played outside for an hour and a half until it got too chilly as the sun was setting, and I cleaned out the car.  Whew… am I glad the evening turned around! 

The house is still a mess as we’re unpacking from a whirlwind trip to Indiana for Easter with my family.  It was a nice visit, but way too short with family (um, 36 hours including sleeping) and way too long in the car (24 hours!!!).  Brian is amazing for driving nearly the whole trip, largely at night, and the kids were troopers to be tied into their seats for so long.  We’re so lucky to have such good travelers! 

I’ve made 2 more loaves of bread!  This is becoming a delicious, healthy new habit!  The current recipe of choice is a yummy honey wheat oatmeal bread.  Brian’s eating lots of PB&J sandwiches 🙂

Ok, enough rambling.  I’ve got to get the kitchen cleaned up so it’s ready for all that tomorrow has to offer. 

Courtesy of Martha Stewart… these cookies live up to their name!!

Humor me, as I watch my baby boy grow up 🙂  He’s so cute… I love his new haircut and all the soft neck I have to snuggle when we’re reading and I’m carrying him to bed. 

Analise and I colored eggs this afternoon, while Josiah played with a couple bowls of water and some plastic eggs.  Oh, and a granola bar.  That’s what he had the most fun with in the water.  He dissolved it into little grain pieces, and called, "Mo water!" 
We started out with a pretty swirly coloring kit, but it didn’t work well.  Analise was more than happy to use her watercolors and paint away.  So glad she doesn’t need much crafting extravagance to keep her happy!  She was so serious, she spared me one tiny smile as I tried to duly document the memories…  Oh, and you can see that her hair is quite a bit shorter (maybe 3 inches), but it’s kind of scraggly because this was right after naptime.