Catch-up

Well, either I have not been in the blogging mood recently, or I have been too busy to think about it - maybe a little bit of both.  To catch you all up on what has been going on recently...

Jake:
 - Has been back in school since the 8th, he's having a little harder time letting me leave in the mornings when I drop him off, but otherwise, is doing fantastic as always - still has the same girlfriends, so at least he can commit!
 - Has really made tremendous headway in the potty-training since Christmas, he has been almost always dry through the day, and is now going without diapers at night as well - and we haven't yet had to wash the sheets!
 - Unfortunately he has been having a more difficult time with accepting that he needs to sleep when we tell him to - ie: nap time and bedtime, and has been coming out of his room during both for about the first 45 minutes to 1 hour, 5 and 6 times during that amount of time.  This is really very frustrating for us because we don't know what to do to keep him in his room.  So willing to accept any advice veteran parents can offer!

Taking the recycling to the curb for Pops!

Travis:
 - Crawls at speeds as fast and sometimes faster than I can walk - yikes!
 - Now has 7 teeth
 - Got his first hair-cut (on the 16th), and now doesn't look like a baby anymore (tear)
 - Took his first step a week ago (on the 17th), we kind of felt initially like we pushed him into it since we stood him up at the sofa and backed away, but a couple days later he took 5 steps over to a toy, so I guess he is ready.  He isn't actually walking yet, but he is attempting at times to take a few steps.  Once we can actually get this on video, we will share.  He is so excited about walking, that once he takes a few steps, he is too excited to do it again and waves his arms about in the air which causes him to loose balance and sit down.  Oh well.

Before the haircut

                      After the haircut





Sarah:
 - Trying to cut some of the sweets out of my diet - I have a serious sweet tooth, which I know is not contributing to me getting rid of the remnants of baby weight, so I am just going to cut them out entirely for a time, and see if that helps.  This is really hard though, and I miss chocolate - so everyone out there, eat a chocolate for me!
 - In additional effort to remove baby weight remnants, I have started a crazy fitness routine (Moms into Fitness Fierce program, with running mixed in for the days that I just can't do the training videos - Immediate goal is to do 60 days of workouts everyday) with the end goal of being happy with how I look and feel by the time I turn 30 - so I have 5 months (minus a couple days) - wish me luck.  I am NOT going to post photos of this progress, but maybe an end result one if I am actually happy with it.
 - Working on early spring cleaning and de-cluttering around the house, wanting to get things into an organized, and seriously purged mode to start off the year happy.

Other goings on:
 - Blake and I went to Houston overnight without the boys at the beginning of the month to attend a gender reveal party for some of our really good friends who are having a baby this spring.  Travis has only spent one other night away from us since he was born, and that was less than 24 hours.  This was nearing 36 hours, and may I say it was very difficult for me, but I think I did very well.  The boys of course both had a blast, and slept like champs for their Mimi and Pops!  They did not however continue the champion sleeping upon coming back home to us.  Pooh.
 - Mom and Dad took me, Jake and Travis to see the Architects of Air Extopolis exhibit yesterday.  I must say, that it was very fun.  Dad bought tickets while Travis was napping, and we met him over there with lunch, and had a picnic before going in.  No line!!  A little warm with all that filtered sunlight and no air conditioning, but it was so cool to walk through the giant blow up tent with all that colored sunlight playing with your emotions.  Jake of course wanted to run through the whole thing, and after an initial fear of walking into a colored space, Travis was happy and oohing at everything he saw.

So that is most of what has been going on recently.  It has been unseasonably warm this last week, which has afforded us more significant outdoor time than we normally get this time of year, and I think it is doing wonderful things for the boys.

Merry Christmas

To put you in the holiday spirit!

 

 

Merry Christmas to all!

Travis's First ER Visit

For me, Thursday should have been Friday because it definitely went down the way you would expect a Friday the 13th to occur...

Wednesday was Blake's company Christmas party, and we didn't get home until 11pm - which means the kids weren't actually in bed until 11:30pm, and we weren't in bed until midnight.  Not terribly out of the ordinary for us, but it was for the kids.  At 1:45am, we were woken up to a crying baby, but this was not just any crying baby - it was our baby for one - and he was crying more than ordinary and with slightly labored breathing and he was burning up.  Normally he will cry for a little bit, and go back to sleep, but he didn't do that this time, and since he sounded so bad, I went in to get him.  A little bit of snuggling got him back to sleep for a bit by around 2:15am, and then it was more difficulty and up again at 3.  I turned on the humidifier, and held him by it for a little bit, and then let him fall asleep on top of me.  Unfortunately, he just started sounding worse and worse.  At 4:30 I decided that we needed to do more than just comfort him, and we got dressed and called the hospital.

The hospital next to us is a full emergency room, and hospital, but does not specialize in anything so far as I can tell, so I called to make sure that they were equipped to handle a baby who was coming in with breathing problems which sounded Croupy to me.  When Jake sounded this way at about a year old, I took him directly to Dell Children's, but I know the local hospital is WAY faster to get into, and they have been able to handle everything else we have thrown at them over the years, so I was hoping they could handle this too.  I called because I didn't want to go in just to have to transfer to another hospital...  They told me to come on in.

We arrived at the hospital a little after 5am (I have been basically awake since 1:45 - because who can go back to sleep when their baby is having a hard time).  I walked into the ER, which was empty, and the lady behind the window took one look at us, came through the door and escorted us back to a room without making us fill out any paperwork.  I guess when you come in with a baby who can't breathe well, that they take you more seriously.

What we looked like - Travis has bloody boogers all over his face because he jammed his nose into the boogy sucker in his struggles to get away from it earlier - my shirt has bloody boogers on it from him snuggling.  He is sweaty from the fever, and from crying.  He is making a high-pitched wheezing/whistling sound every time that he breathes (strider breathing), and his chest is caving in on breathing in (retractions) because he can't get enough air.  So, it makes sense that they rushed us back.

Travis was hooked up to the little thing they wrap around your toe to tell your pulse-oxygen level, or something, he got a blood pressure cuff, and his temperature taken - 102.6.  They immediately got one of those smoky-breathing things, and had him inhale that for about 15 minutes.  Travis was so miserable that he basically just laid on my chest and let them do what they wanted to him.  The breathing treatment didn't really help much, he still was wheezing horribly, and having the retractions.  They gave him an oral steroid to help open up his airways, and ibuprofen for his fever.  Then they told me that they were going to transfer us to Children's across town because he wasn't improving enough, and they didn't have the specialized care which we could receive at Children's.  (Oh joy, just what I was trying to avoid).

While we were there, I swear that every person who was on duty in the ER was in our room.  There may have been one other person in the ER, but we certainly received all the attention - about 12 people in and out of the room in all with 3 or more present at all times!

It is 6:30 at this point, and Travis is still awake, been awake most of the night, but is so miserable he is just laying on me not moving very much.  While waiting to be transferred, they do chest X-rays to check for pneumonia, and they take snot samples to check for RSV and for the Flu.  He was not particularly happy about either of those because it meant not being able to lay on me with his head on my chest for a couple minutes each.  By 7am, the paramedics arrived to take us by ambulance across town.

The paramedics were very nice, and they loosely strapped me to the gurney, and I continued to hold on to my sick little boy.  Of course, going across town, we hit ALL the morning traffic, and what is about a 20 minute drive took an hour.  Travis was stable though, and sound asleep finally, so the emergency lights and sirens were not used - probably would have freaked him out if they were used, which would have set him back into breathing difficulties.

We arrived at Children's a little before 8 am, and were put into a room in the emergency department there.  They hooked up a bunch of monitors to Travis - another foot pulse monitor, and three chest monitors which did different things.  Basically then they just monitored us.  While Travis slept, he would just wheeze lightly, but if he started crying, he would go back into full retractions and strider.  Around 10am, the Dr. told me that it was kind of a 50/50 toss up for her on whether to admit him, or to send him home.  She said they would monitor him for a little longer and then make a decision.

Travis woke up and started to play a little bit, and one of the nurses brought in a few toys for him to try to keep him entertained.  He of course threw them off the bed several times, but at least he was starting to act more like his normal self.  At 11, they told us we would be able to go home - albeit they warned us of the MANY things we would have to come back in for: strider and retractions when he was not worked up, inability to swallow, paleness or blueness, and excessive drooling (really,drooling in a teething infant?).

Since we had arrived by ambulance, I had no car to get home, so I had to call Blake (who had stayed home with Jake who was still asleep), and have him drive to the first hospital, get into my car, and then come and rescue us at Children's.  At 11:30 we checked out.

The rest of the day, I worked on keeping Travis calm, and allowing him to sleep on me as he had been doing at the hospital.  He fell asleep at night Thursday pretty easily (who wouldn't after being up all night the night before) - but woke up scared, and ended up sleeping on me for the remainder of the night after 10pm.  He is doing better, but I am still not letting him get worked up about anything since his breathing is still labored, and sounds so scary when he cries (think small kitten gasping for breath).

Friday he slept through until 6:20 am - yeah!  Hopefully he'll be long over this by Christmas!

Looking at lights

Mostly in an attempt to keep Jake good through the evening, I told him that if he was good, ate all his dinner, and didn't whine, that he would get a special surprise at bedtime.  Seems like it worked, he was an angel all night!  So after bath time, we made hot chocolate, and got dressed for bed - kissed Daddy and Travis goodnight, and we hopped in the car to go look at Christmas lights in the neighborhood.

Apparently he is exactly the right age for doing this, because we drove around for 20 minutes, and he kept asking to see more lights, and he oohed and ahhed at all the lights that we drove past, and we called the long stretches of houses without any lights scrooges.  His favorites are the color changing lights, and the blinking ones, but the blow-up Mater Car was pretty cool that we saw too!

We got home after, and he said "thank you Mom for my surprise", I told him Thank you for coming with me to look at lights, and he said "you're welcome" - aww, sweet little boy!

Happy Monday!

How to un-light your pre-lit tree

When we moved into the house, at our first Christmas, we bought a pre-lit Christmas tree.  Pre-lit = easy, right??

Year 1 - tree was perfect!
Year 2 - tree had 2 branches which were no longer lit, turn tree toward wall, still almost perfect!
Year 3 - still just the 2 branches out, still almost perfect!
Year 4 - closer to 4 or 5 branches out, mostly on one side of the tree, decent enough.
Year 5 - still close to 4 or 5 out, maybe a few more, decent.
Year 6 - OVER HALF THE LIGHTS ARE OUT - no longer okay at all! 

So, cue figuring out how to un-light a pre-lit tree, because there is no way that I am going through the season with that much of the tree not working!  And before you judge, yes I tried replacing fuses, didn't do anything, and adding enough additional strings of lights to get it to look decent seemed like it would be a fire-hazard so I wasn't going to do that.

First off, what is not the best way to go about un-lighting a tree:  Start on the top section of tree at the end of the plug, and unwind from the back of the branches to the tips until you get so frustrated that you get out the wire clippers to make it go faster.  Did you know that they actually loop the wires around EVERY SINGLE piece of green sticking out on the tree!!  (and apparently starting at the plug end is doing it backwards - which you will see in the "better way to go about it)

Better way to go about it:  Go to the end of one of the branches, find the single light which is attached with a clip instead of wrapped around the entire branch.  Pull off the clip, and then you can unwind the light string back to the base of the branch (yes it wraps around EVERY single little branchy thing on there).  When you get back to the end of the branch, that string will connect up to the next string along a much shorter wire which - thank goodness - is not wrapped additionally around the tree.  Do this about 100 times, and the tree is finally done.

So, about 6 hours of unlighting later, and some seriously scratched up arms (I recommend gloves and long sleeves to anyone else stupid enough wanting to undertake this challenge), the tree was back to the state it would have been in had we originally bought a not-pre-lit tree (which it now is).

We wrapped the lights, hung the ornaments, and now it is beautiful, and all the lights work - so yeah!! 

Maybe I'll be able to just fold it up with all the lights on and can consider it pre-lit again next year....

Thankful for...

This year I am thankful for (in no particular order):

1. My loving, and seriously understanding husband without whom I would be a total disaster.
2. Two wonderful children who daily remind me how lucky I am to get to be their mother.
3. My mother who comes over and distracts Jake 2 days a week so that I don't go crazy when he is acting like a little $#!& displaying his less than perfect child behavior.
4. Daycare which distracts Jake 2 more days a week - and is turning him into a very well rounded little boy.
5. The ability to stay home with my 2 little boys while they are little, and be around for all the firsts, seconds, and more.
6. A 3 year old who out of the blue frequently tells me that I look pretty (think his daddy is coaching him?)
7. Nap-time which finally lasts longer than 30-45 minutes!!
8. My health, and that of my family.
9. My parents - who helped me survive my childhood, and are helping me survive my adulthood too; who offer love all the time, and who don't criticize my parenting techniques (even when I have a bad day).
10. My sister - who I survived my childhood in-spite of, who is the best sister in the world, not kidding, all the rest of them fall sub-par to her!
11. My in-laws - who I can count on for anything that I need.
12. Our family dynamic - who else has Easter and Thanksgiving with both their sets of parents, and siblings, and there is nothing but happiness the entire time!!
13. A 3 year old who apparently occasionally wakes up at night and turns on his sleep sheep to go back to sleep without coming out to get us! (discovered this last night).
14. A love of, and talent for cooking, which most of the time keeps my family eating more healthy than I think we otherwise could be.
15. Shoes on my feet, a shirt on my back, a roof over my head, and a big comfy bed.
16. Coffee (which my 3 year old prefers to assist in making each morning).
17. Chocolate.
18. Being a daughter, a sister, a wife, a mother, and a friend (and all at the same time).
19. Friends who see when I am having a rough week, and initiate a girls night to lift my spirits.
20. My 3 boys who always keep me laughing and smiling.
21. A baby who can not yet crawl (even though that will change probably by next week).
22. Children who like to play with each other.
23. Having had a boss who told me recently that he was totally spoiled having me as an employee (talk about make me feel awesome about myself, nothing like positive feedback about how well I had been doing).
24. Being able to understand everything that Jake wants, needs, and otherwise talks about - even when he thinks that there are fish in his bed for no rational reason (a story for later).  Not sure if he is advanced in the language department or not, but I am going with yes because the Dr. asked if he could put together 3-4 word sentences at his 3 year old appointment... well, yes he can, or he can tell you a detailed story for 5 minutes...

And finally...

25. Being Mama to the smartest baby in the world - pretty sure Travis read my blog post, figured out I was complaining about him, and decided that he would sleep from 8 to 7 without a peep, just to prove me wrong!  I am enrolling him in kindergarten tomorrow because clearly we are not challenging him enough.  :)

The Gripe List

I figure it is easier to be thankful for all that we have after getting the griping out of the way first - so here is my gripe list - thankful list to follow:

1. Potty training a toddler

2. Regression in  a potty training toddler

3. An almost 8 month old who has gone back to NOT sleeping through the night

4. An almost 8 month old who when he does wake up in the middle of the night will easily fall back asleep, ONLY as long as I am holding him, and wakes back up the SECOND his head is laid back down on the crib mattress

5. An almost 8 month old with 5 teeth who feels the need to use them on Mama while nursing


Okay, so that list is really short, (I guess it just feels longer between the lack of sleep and the mounting load of wet underpants), but it is really all I can complain about - the thankful list should be awesome since I have so few gripes!