The Weekend is Over

Don't you just love this hat?

Sorry I've been AWOL for the last couple of days. Calvin has not been sleeping at night and we have been moderately busy which leads to me being mummy-like, stumbling through the days trying to accomplish even the most simple of tasks.

On Saturday we went to visit Nick's sister, the Bean, and her husband Mark. She is pictured above with Baby Calvin. On the way there Em puked her guts out which was gross but helped us figure out that she must be getting car sick. This only seems to happen when we have been in the car for more than a couple of hours. There always seems to be something, doesn't there? So if you have any suggestions as to help a two year old conquer motion sickness let me know. Anywho at the Bean's we had quesadilla's and banana splits, both of which were amazing! It was nice to get away and just relax and not be worried about all of the cleaning I need to do or anything else.

Today we went to church with Nick's mom and Al Denson was there performing...just amazing! He sang some of his songs which were great of course but then he also led us in a few medleys of old hymns. The hymns you grow up with that make your skin tingle because you can just feel the spirit of the Lord is in this place. I was awestruck and so grateful...I needed that. Of course God always knows what we need right? Can I get an amen?

And now we are back home and just trying to enjoy one another. I am going back to work this week and tomorrow is my first day. I am kind of nervous about going back but also very sad. I wish I could stay home with my children permanently. But what Nick said is right: I tend to thrive when I have structure and a reason to get out of my sweats, which is what work gives me. Plus it is only a few hours a day, a few days a week and I can handle that. I know that, I just need to keep convincing my heart of that as it feels crushed. Please be praying for me and I will let you know how it goes!

First Trip to the ER

Today started off like any other, until Emma tripped on the living room rug and hit her face on the coffee table. At first I thought she bumped her head so I was holding her up against me. When I pulled her away and saw all of the blood on her eye, I knew it was serious. So I called Nick and he immediately was on his way. Praise God he only works .7 miles from home! So off to the ER we went. I thought I was just being panicky but when Nick saw her he thought we should take her too.
This is Emma waiting for the nurse. She held Whiskers the whole time. Occasionally she would put her hello kitty ice pack on the kitty's eye because it was hurt too. She refused to go to the scale to get weighed without her cat and then she dragged him down the hall behind her...too cute (and now it needs washed!)
This is Emma checked in and waiting for the doctor. She kept holding up the remote like a phone and saying "hello Grandma?" She called the nurse twice before we caught on.
She is just growing up too fast. Here she is being a big girl. She didn't want me to sit by her...she was too busy watching Higglytown Heroes.
Here she is back home. We figured having to have stitches warrented McDonald's so Emma enjoyed French Fries and Shamrock shake. I was afraid she wouldn't be feeling good, but Nick called me "Lindsay Ann" so she was following me around all afternoon saying "Winsy Ann, Winsy Ann"and laughing...I think she is okay.
Here's the damage. Three stitches with no anesthesia. To do it they wrapped her in a sheet like a straight jacket and the nurse and I held her down. She is such a trooper. The whole time while having stitches she cried "Mommy, mommy." Enough to break your heart. But she is okay. The doctor said the stitches can be taken out in about a week and there won't be a scar. We are just so thankful to God that it wasn't more serious. I mean, look how close it is to her eyeball...it could have popped out or something! Nick said she looks like Rocky when they cut the skin to get rid off all of the blood pooling. She is supposed to be pretty bruised tomorrow from this but we are just going to tell people that they should see the other guy! Please just be praying for our little trooper...I am so proud of her.

Aunt Jan?

Today was a wonderful day. Although it had snowed TONS over the last 24 hours, Jaime and Gram battled the storm and headed over to our house to visit, bringing Panera with them...yummy! I explained to Emma that Grandma Jean and Aunt Jaime were coming over to see her. "Jan?" she asked immediately. She still thinks the three should always go together like during the summer time I guess which is just so cute.
Jaime played with Emma tons which I know both Emma and Jaime love which is always nice. Plus then I don't have that nagging guilt that Emma wasn't played with enough. Gram treated us to lunch and then got plenty of time in holding Calvin.
Speaking of Grandma Jean I must tell you this story as it is just too, too cute. The other day we were asking Emma if she wanted to take off her pants and diaper and sit on the big girl potty. Well of course no was the response, like always. But she started grabbing her pants and she said "Jeans, jeans, Grandma Jeans"! Isn't that the cutest? She apparently thinks my Grandma is Grandma Denim or something adorable. But in hindsight I was pretty proud of her for putting those things together...way to use your noggin' Em!

What's the deal with Handy Manny?

photo courtesy of tvfortots.com

So Emma has taken a liking to Handy Manny. We try not to let her watch too much television, but when Calvin is screaming and I haven't had time to get a cup of coffee in the morning, I find myself turning on the Disney Channel to let her watch him. As I sat watching it with her this morning, I couldn't help but ask myself what the heck is up with that guy? Have you ever watched this show? He's a mexican fellow who has a weird obsession with his tools...he talks to them and he polishes them every night before work the next morning. He never has what he needs to do a project...ever. He could say "well all you need it a screw but I will have to go to the hardware store for that." Clearly this guy has some inventory issues. Maybe it is because he is secretly stalking the hardware store owner...there seems to be some definite tension and flirting going on there. Also he tends to not be very good at his job. Today he was supposed to be mending a fence, but instead took the fence section out and replaced it with a gate without asking the owner...if I were the owner I think I would be mad. Last but not least I cannot understand why you would hire this guy. No power tools, so if he needs something cut he pulls out the saw...its like hiring amish people. Hello to inefficiency. Thats all I'm saying.

Snowman PJ's

I may find that this is going to come back and bite me but I thought I would post a picture of myself in my snowman pajama's so you can all get a laugh. No laughing outloud if you're at work or are involved in sometype of hostage situation (besides work). My Aunt Jan gave me these PJ's when I was a freshman in college and everytime I wear them Nick makes fun of me. They must be a "no sex tonight" beacon or something. Or maybe you just don't want to get it on with someone wearing purple pajamas made out of long underwear material with snowmen printed on them. Regardless, I love them as they are the most comfortable things own. That and it gets so wicked cold around here that you need something warm you can depend on. So these are my snowman pj's...have yourselves a good laugh at my expense. Oh yes and that is Roscoe in the picture...I know she's small and can often be confused with the dust balls in our home!

The Consignment Finds

These are the items I got at the new consignment shop on Saturday. I only spent $10.00! Some of the clothes are from Coldwater Creek, Abercrombie, and Talbots! As the little kid on Little Einsteins would say (which is now stuck in my head on a perpetual basis) "I can not believe it!" I think in total I got four sweaters, a button down shirt, a leotard for Emma when she is in ballet, an embarrassing sweater with reindeer on it for Calvin, a pair of jeans for myself, and a homemade baby blanket. A good deal? I think so my friend! If you live in our area and want to know what place I am talking about just comment me and I will give you the 411!

Stuck In This Room

The perfect afternoon environment for blogging and browsing for online coupons...Nick is downstairs taking a nap with Emma and I am upstairs with an adorable sleeping little boy named Calvin. It would have been perfect had I had everything I needed. But now I am up at the computer and am stuck...if I go downstairs it will definitely wake up Emma which would probably cause Nick to scowl at me. First I realized I forgot my sales flier for the grocery store downstairs, meaning I can't see what coupons I need; no problem I will look it up online. Next I realized I left my coupon organizer out in the car so I can't see if I already have a coupon that I may be thinking of printing off for an item. Next I was going to take a picture of all of my loot from the consignment store and realized the camera is downstairs...shoot! Last and shamedly least, the camera card is even with the camera (which is almost unheard of around here) so I can't even post the goofy pictures of myself that Nick took last night. Rats! So I thought I would blog about my blogging misadventures and how I have been sitting at the computer getting caught up on all the neat websites I find in magazines and tear out the pages to look up later, which ultimately results in millions of papers lying around the office. Sigh...sorry there's nothing exciting yet but hopefully I will be able to post some things tonight!

A Sensational Saturday

Ready for shopping...here we go!
Outside Restore...this is what the sign looks like in case you are bored out of your mind and have nothing else to care about!
Emma enjoying shopping (and apparently not being able to see!)

What a gloriously busy day we had! Today we leisurely woke up and got ourselves around for the weekend. We then went shopping at the two Restore's in our area. If you have never been to one of these stores, I highly recommend that you look into them to see if they are in your area. Restore is a resale shop for items for your home. It is run by Habitat for Humanity. The items are either used from homes and saved from landfills or are donated by chain stores to get a tax write off. Think of it as a goodwill for building supplies. The proceeds go to help fund Habitat for Humanity which makes you feel good about buying items. Although we didn't find what we were looking for (lighting for our foyer and morning rooms, cabinets for our laundry room, and tile for our foyer) we did find a new flood light for outside (have been needing) and new brass house numbers to replace the outdated ones we have now. In total for those items we spent 12.46...awesome deal as the numbers would have set us back at least $10.00 a piece.

We then went to a consignment shop in the Miami Village district of our city. I have been driving by this consignment shop for probably a year and a half now and have never had time to go in. To be honest too I have been scared to go in...I am always so scared that people are going to be mean when you go in a new store. So we decided to go there, and the ladies that worked there were sooooo nice! I couldn't believe the warmth that radiated from them as we looked around. We got a lot of deals which I will write about tomorrow. I love consignment shops! Having children has definitely made me appreciate these types of stores. With how quickly they outgrow everything, there is just no reason to buy everthing new.

After that it was back home for lunch and naptime. Nick put Emma to bed and I went out shopping. I FINALLY grasped how to take advantage of the sales at CVS; I have been trying to figure out the concept for quite some time but to no avail. Finally today I jumped in with both feet. They were having a deal where you could buy $30.00 of certain products and get $15.00 in their extra care bucks for next time. So I bought diapers (of course, my lifeline it seems) and ziploc containers, and freezer bags. Then I bought a toothbrush with coupon for $.39 and a toothpaste that got me another $2.00 in extra care rewards. So after my coupons on all of this crap I spent only $23.00...not bad considering I got three packages of diapers! If you factor in all of the extra care bucks I got ($17.00 if you have been paying attention) then it is really like I got everything for $6.00 which I think is pretty freaking sweet. If you want to try to figure out all of this CVS stuff for yourself, I found an awesome article over at Money Saving Mom...I'm too tired to explain it all myself.

After CVS and the shopping trip of the year I jetted over to the library for some alone time. I borrowed the IT Girl's Guide to Blogging, so hopefully in the near future I won't suck entirely at this whole thing...you all can only hope.

After that, it was back home to get ready for our big night out. We went out to eat with Nick's parents, pizza at one of our favorite haunts, and then to Philadelphia for dessert...yummy!

When we got home Calvin was being a cheeseball so I couldn't help but take pictures of him in his I Love Mommy teeshirt...thanks again Barb for the gift! I know the picture doesn't do it justice, but he was smiling in this one, I promise!

So all in all we had a fantastic Saturday. Hope you all had as much fun as we did!

Britax? More like Ripoffax!

Okay, I may be the biggest idiot in the world, but can someone explain to me the point of paying $300.00 for a car seat? A couple of my friends have Britax carseats and more have registered for them, which has left me sitting here wondering why on earth you would need to pay that much for a carseat? Please do not be alarmeed, I do not have Emma strapped in with a handkerchief or anything in the back seat sitting on phone books. We have a very respectable Eddie Bauer Carseat that we bought on sale at Target for around $80.00. It works great. The $300.00 price tag is something that just floors me. Does the carseat automatically fasten the child in so you don't have to hunch down to do this, all the while getting your backside rained on while it sticks out of the car? Does it feed your child vitamins so you don't have to cooerse them into this yourself? Does it come with some type of tracking device so if your child is kidnapped by someone prudent enough to take the carseat as well, you will be able to find them like dogs with chips in their heads? I know people say that you can't put a pricetag on your child's safety but I think that is a bunch of crap. Unless you are driving like a Nascar racer (which by the way I do pronounce Nas-car-A) a carseat that is supposedly that safe is simply unnecessary. All of the tests and precautions have been taken to ensure safety on my moderately priced seat; there weren't any stickers on the box that proclaimed my seat perfect for moms hopped up on Meth that just don't care. And how would you know if your seat is really that safe? Are you going to go and play chicken on the tollroad to ensure that the side panels on your child restraint seat really are sound? But seriously I do want to know what all the hype is, I am not just being cynical (well maybe just a little). So if you know why you should buy a car seat for the cost of a large Coach tote bag, please comment and tell me so I may decide if I should run out and get two...one for the princess and one for the Noble Hunchman who is sitting next to me (hunched, I'm not just mean).

I hate this!

So these are the medicines that we have been giving Calvin. He has been diagnosed with Acid Reflux so we were given two medicines: one to help the acids stay down and another to help repair his esophagus. The only problem with these medicines is that they have not been working. You know that there is something wrong with your three week old baby when they are projectile vommiting everywhere and constantly screaming and moaning...something was just not right. So after several doctors visits and an emergency upper GI scan we acertained that he had Acid Reflux. We have been giving him these medicines now for about three weeks and nothing has improved. So they prescribed another medicine, however it is going to cost $80.00 every two weeks and it is so complicated only one pharmacy can make it and it takes three days! Unbelievable! So while waiting on the medicine we stopped giving him Zantac, which is the medicine that the new medicine will be replacing. Lo and behold, he is happy and smiling, and not screaming! Nick called the doctor today only to find out that in fact Zantac can cause pain if it isn't helping? Why didn't someone tell us that in the first place? Here we knew it wasn't working but have been continuing to give it to him on the off chance that it is helping at least a little bit. I feel so bad that we've been causing this child to be in pain. So now we are just giving Calvin reglan (the one medicine he had and will continue on) and he seems great. We are going to wait through the weekend to see how being off Zantac affects him but so far I think he is doing splendidly. And if we don't need to drop $150.00 a month on a new medicine, well, that would just be icing on our acid reflux cake.

Hi Aunt Jan

So this is my Aunt Jan...she lives almost across the pond in England, but not quite so far. I know she reads this thing sometimes so I thought I would post a note on here saying that I love you, I miss you, and I am thinking and praying for you often. I have been so swamped with kids and mopping, and laundry, and getting puked on (I think that one goes under the kids category) that I haven't had time to call to check in. And I miss you woman! This lady and I are a lot alike...maybe she's my mom! Nick devised this plot that maybe my cousin Chris and I are secretly twins and my mom couldn't have any kids so my Aunt Jan gave her me. When I asked about why Chris and I look nothing alike, Nick kind of came to a stand still with the theory. But this woman, my Aunt Jan, is one of those people that brings fun with her (my uncle Bill would probably say she brings a lot of shopping bags with her! teehee!). She loves planning and shopping and talking...see, sad epic movie about giving your daughter away written all over this. Anyway, hello Aunt Jan! I love and miss you and am thinking of you!

Cute Shirt

So this is one of Emma's cute shirts. I bought this when she was about a year old thinking that it was the cutest shirt ever and one day she would be able to fit into it. Now the darn thing is almost too small and I discovered it in her closet unworn...yikes! So we wore it today. Isn't it just the cutest thing you've ever seen? I had to put a little cardigan over it because it was so chilly today, and the beads, well let's just say I let the child do her own accessorizing!

Its Too Small Now

I just ran across this picture Nick had taken and I think it is just precious. This is one of Emma's hats from about a year ago. She was just too cute in it...it was one of the one's from Nick's mom and it was just adorable. Whenever Emma outgrew something I would always get very sentimental. My baby was growing up! Lately when she outgrows something there has also been a sense of excitement...yes! Now that we are getting into big girl fashions, outgrowing something means there is the potential to wear something different. Soon gone will be the days of snapping her shirts at the crotch.

Yesterday however, I went to put a sleep and play on Calvin and I couldn't even get it up to his shoulders...the boy isn't even two months old and we are already in 3-6 month clothes...can we say he's going to be tall like Daddy? I think we can! Anyway, when dealing with the too-small-of-outfit situation, two emotions came to me. One was fear...holy crap, I'm still unpaid being on maternity leave and this kid has nothing to wear! Hmmm...maybe Goodwill is half offing it this Saturday? The other emotion was sadness; it hit me that this is our last child, this is the last one I will experience the little babyness with. And to be honest I have been diligent in praying that he would get out of this stage as quickly as I somehow managed to get pregnant with him. And now I find myself trying to pull back the fog of sleepless nights, postpardumness, and hormones to try to remember his babyness...to remember his smell, or the way his skin was the softest thing I had ever touched, or how his little buttser fir perfectly in my hand when I held him. I have to somehow find a way to encapsulate all of those things into my memory...my little boy is growing up already far faster than I ever could have anticipated. If I don't have clothes for him that fit how am I ever going to be prepared for him leaving the house or going to college? How will I manage to wrap my head around those things?

Anyway, take two things from this: one, if you want to buy cute baby clothes, now would be the time, and two, I am nuts, but I think it may turn out to be for the best.

Sleep My Precious Baby

Thought I'd show you this adorable picture of Calvin sleeping. I propped him up for pictures, he doesn't normally sleep uncomfortably hunched in a chair...promise! Isn't he handsome? I have to remember to say handsome. Handsome, handsome, he is handsome. Nick overheard me tell Calvin the other day that he is such a pretty boy and he hit the roof. And I don't blame him, who wants their boy called a pretty boy? Anyway, I can't believe Cal is going to be two months old in a couple of week; where does the time go? Pretty soon my baby will be knocking teeth out in hockey games, taking girls on dates, and getting drafted by NFL teams. And I will look at this picture and remember the good old days when I could scrunch him in a chair and there was nothing he could do about it!