New wheels!

My dear Miss Alyssa turned a whopping four years old today. Oh my, where has the time gone! Seems like only yesterday I was sitting in the hospital reminding the hospital staff that I had a GIRL* and that - No, even though we didn't already have a name picked out we were NOT naming her Katrina**.

Daddy took the day off so we could celebrate as a family and boy what a celebration it was!


According to our family tradition, she got to decorate her own birthday cake. (Minus the chocolate frosting and the writing...)

We're not big party people around our house so we generally just have the Grandmas and Grandpas from both sides come over for a little cake and ice cream. My Aunt and Uncle arrived at my parents' house just as they were leaving for the party, so they piled in car and came over to join in the festivities.


Kenna just couldn't resist trying to help Lyssa blow those candles out!


Liam certainly enjoyed his piece of cake. It was gone in a flash! I think the cake part ended up (mostly) in his stomach, but I'm pretty sure the majority of the frosting was on his face.


He was also eager to help Alyssa with the presents. He managed to snatch a bow before she could shoo him away.


Reading the fun card the Aunt Tanya sent. There was an audible gasp when she saw that there was money inside...and stickers too! What more could a girl want?


And the finale of the presents - Mom and Dad finally broke down and got the kid some wheels. For some reason we have been reluctant (or too lazy...whatever) to get the kids bikes, so we decided that a scooter might be the way to get both the parents and the kids used to some extra mobility.


Liam immediately made a grab for the scooter while Lyssa was trying on her helmet. Looks like more than one kid might be getting wheels this year since they are already fighting over it. (SIGH.) I forsee many hours of enduring his screams while watching her ride it around.

After everyone left and we ran a quick errand, we let Alyssa pick where she wanted to go for dinner. She picked Arctic Circle based on the fact that they have a playground (and the fact that McKenna kept encouraging her to go there). Mom and dad were less than thrilled with the choice, but the kids enjoyed it.

After we read her new book and got snuggled into bed for the night, she told me that she had a really fun birthday.

Here's wishing you many more my sweet girl...


*There was another baby with the same last name born on the same day as Lyssa in our hospital. The other family had a boy. Somehow they thought that OUR baby was the boy. They had a blue card in her bassinet and one of the pediatricians even showed up for a pre-circumcision check-up. (That was disturbing in and of itself since we certainly didn't request the procedure.) We had to convince every doctor and nurse that came to check on us during our stay that we actually had a girl.

**Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans the day after Alyssa was born. Way too many people suggested we should name her after the storm. Like I want my child to have that kind of a namesake...

Dancing Fool

When we got home this afternoon I went upstairs to change clothes. When I came back down, this is what I found...

Liam had pushed the chair all the way over to the girls' computer desk, climbed up and was trying to wrestle the mouse away from Lyssa.

After I took the picture, I went back upstairs to put the camera away and heard the music on the game Lyssa was playing suddenly get LOUD. I ran back downstairs to turn it down and found Liam twiddling the knob and dancing his little heart out.

That kid cracks me up.

C is for Cookie

I am ever on the quest for the perfect chocolate chip cookies. We were in the mood to make a treat for Matt today so I decided to try a new recipe. I tweaked it a little bit to suit our tastes and what I had in the pantry.

They are perfectly soft inside and just a little bit crunchy on the outside. Just the way I like them. They were good enough I think I might keep working on the recipe to get it just right.

This is the way we made them tonight:

2 1/4 c. all purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
3/4 tsp. salt
1 c. butter, softened
3/4 c. packed dark brown sugar
1/4 c. sugar
1 (3.9 oz.) package instant chocolate pudding
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 c. semi sweet chocolate chips
1 c. milk chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Mix flour, baking soda and salt. Set aside.
In a large bowl cream together the butter, brown sugar and sugar. Beat in the instant pudding mix until blended. Stir in eggs and vanilla. Blend in the flour mixture. Stir in chocolate chips.
Drop cookies by rounded spoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets. Bake 12-14 minutes.

(If you don't want the cookie itself to be chocolate, substitute vanilla pudding mix instead. That's actually what the original recipe called for, but I only had chocolate and didn't want to go to the store.)

Liam really was enjoying his cookie, despite the face he's making in the photo. He's decided giving people angry looks is a fun game. As soon as you give the look back to him, he breaks out in the giggles.

Boys are weird.

Finally!

Liam is walking!

My back is loving not having to carry a 25 pound baby all around the house!

(Also...note the pot and lid - these are his new favorite toys. He carries them all around the house and has been known to cry if he is put down to sleep without them.)

Easter Bunny

Apparently my family has a tradition of doing the Easter Bunny part of Easter on the Saturday before the actual Easter holiday. Somehow I did not remember this and was reminded of it by my mother on Thursday night.

After she told me about it I thought, Wow! My parents are so smart! That makes it so much easier to "enjoy" the whole Easter basket-egg finding-gorging on candy thing and still reserve Sunday for the celebration of the religious type Easter (and not have hyper kids during Church!).

So...this year we picked up an (apparently forgotten!) Easter tradition from my family and celebrated the Easter Bunny on Saturday morning. I am now a big advocate of this approach. It was much more relaxed and fun for every one.



Some Easter basket treasures....


The Easter Bunny was cheap this year. $1 bubbles were a big hit though.


We had a little egg hunt in the backyard since I have not been able to bring myself to brave one of the city sponsored ones. I have nightmares of my children getting trampled and then coming home empty handed to boot.


Intense concentration is required when peeling an egg you are going to complain about eating about 10 minutes later.


Liam attempted to eat the egg before we had taken the shell off and managed to give himself a good schmear of blue lipstick for the rest of the day.

It was a wee tad cold outside, but so nice to have a relaxing morning to enjoy the time with the kids.

Pre-Easter Preparations

Decorating Easter eggs is one of those things that strikes fear into my heart. Multi-colored dye with the potential of staining anything it touches, hanging around in liquid form, and actually meant for child participation. Scary! I feel the need to go break out the spot remover just thinking about it.

Apparently it scares Liam too.

We took precautions (note the large field of while in the photo – hooray for white plastic garbage bags!) and managed to escape without incident.

Matt got involved and made a very interesting rainbow spotted egg using the wax from a candle and soaking the egg in increasingly darker colors. Apparently the process required intense concentration…

We've been busy...

We ran to the park.

While we were there, we were treated to a new 5 year old phenomenon - POUTING. Kenna is using this new tool at every opportunity.

I am not amused.

Lyssa played while Kenna sulked.

She finally cheered up long enough to chase a remote control airplane around with about 500 other neighborhood kids that were taking advantage of the weather.

Lyssa ran her little heart out. She really wanted to catch the plane.

We had sandwiches...big ones. Lyssa showed proper etiquette by raising that dainty pinky finger every time she took a bite.

Liam played with Mom while Dad tried to get the external flash on the camera up and running. (He finally found it after several years of being hidden in a box.)

We tried out a yummy new donut place. I fell in love with the green one. I think Key Lime is one of my new favorite flavors.

We raced paper airplanes. (Bad picture of me. Yuck. But you can see the shorter hair. I was having a hard time getting the remote picture taking timed just right. Also note the amount of sincere effort the girls put into throwing those planes.) We got a chance to try out our new tripod with this picture. Yay for more camera equipment!

And we got girly. Liam escaped sans curlers, but only because his hair isn't long enough for the girls to put one in it.

St. Patrick would be proud...

Oh boy did we celebrate! I was feeling bad that the girls didn't get to go to school and partake of all the activities today...so we decided to liven things up a little at home.

We made green pancakes for dinner (I couldn't think of anything Irish and that was the best bet for food coloring).

To be followed by green cupcakes with green frosting and green sprinkles.

I'm sure we had waaaaaay too much food coloring.

But, it had the great side effect of making Kenna forget about being sick for a couple of hours. Which means, I think she's feeling better, she's just stringing it out in order to get more "green drink". ("green drink" = Sprite - since it comes in the green bottles they think it's green, even though we've pointed out it is not green once you pour it out.)

I really hope no one else comes down with this one. I can do colds, but Sunday night was a LONG one and I have no desire to do more throw up laundry. Yuck. Plus Kenna insisting that she has to carry a bowl around everywhere is embarrassing. It's awkward to explain that at the grocery store.

Also, did I mention that Liam is tall enough to get an open yogurt container off the kitchen table?


Awesome. I love cleaning up after these munchkins.

See, this is why I don't do well with journals...

So I guess I've proven that, once again, I cannot be trusted to write on a regular basis.

When I get busy, writing goes out the window.

Boo.

I suck.

It turns out that when you leave on a week long vacation with only three days notice,

things pile up while you're gone and the kids seem to want extra attention when you get home.

Who'd 'a thunk?

A recap of the vacation (with photos!) is coming. In the meantime,

here's a little of what we have been up to this week.

On Sunday morning, Liam and McKenna woke up with colds.

Blast.

Matt wasn't feeling all that hot either so he stayed home with the sickly ones

while Alyssa and I went to Church.

Monday was better. McKenna magically got over the cold in a day just in time for her best neighborhood pal Rachel, to come over and play.

They disappeared into the toy room for an hour.

It was heavenly. I actually got to cook dinner in relative peace.

Bless you Heidi for letting her stay.

Tuesday ended up being doctor day. Liam had cried all night.

(I have no idea how the girls slept through it because Matt and I sure didn't.)

He was wheezing and rattling and generally sounding terrible that morning.

Since I was going in to work late because of my own appointment anyway,

I ended up just calling in sick and then taking Liam to the doctor.

Double ear infections and RSV do not make for a happy baby.

The nebulizer treatment at the doctors office worked wonders

(WONDERS I tell you!)

though and we are now the proud owners of this fancy set up to help at home:

Albuterol inhaler and children's mask

Liam HATES it but we are finally getting sleep and wondering how we have managed so far without this. Someone finally decided that when the kid is constantly getting bad colds that go straight to his chest, he might have some asthma issues like his older sister.
Hallelujah!

Wednesday was haircut day for most of us. My sweet niece Shannon got her license a week or two ago and we were privileged to be the first in line for family haircut night.

McKenna (surprisingly) volunteered to go first.
Her request was that her hair stay long enough to still be considered princess hair (even though she knows it probably won't get as long as Rapunzel's).

Then Alyssa (not a fan of the spray bottle).

I went next, leaving about 5-6 inches on the floor, in the hopes that shorter hair would induce the beginning of spring. (No pictures until my cold sore goes away.) I'll let you know how that spring thing works out.

And Liam was last.
It took three people and a dog to get him finished.
Shannon did a phenomenal job in spite of the fact that he wouldn't hold still for more than 5 seconds at a time. (Not exaggerating.)

Thursday was date night. We actually went out to a MOVIE. And then dinner, with FRIENDS.
I wasn't sure either of those activities could still be done!

So we are sick again, but on the mend, no doubt thanks to the new fabu haircuts from Shannon. I'm getting spring fever so I hope the magic haircut works!

Birthday Boy!

My baby is turning ONE today.

How did this happen so fast?

One minute he was a teeny tiny baby(okay, 9 1/2 pounds wasn't that small, but still...)

Now he's a big kid that can clap and put up his dukes on command.

He stands up (no walking yet!) and crawls like lightning (just ask Aunt Lori's dog).

I'm sad that the baby stage is so rapidly being replaced by toddlerhood!

But I love seeing how his cute little personality is coming out.

Happy Birthday Little Moose!

I know you're tired of hearing about this...

This is what we've been doing the past few days. How pitiful is that face?

We ended up taking Liam back to the doctor Friday night since he couldn't keep down the antibiotic the doctor prescribed. There was a different doctor in the clinic and she told us there was no ear infection. She also said to stop taking the medicine.

I was so confused.

So was the nurse,

since she had been there the night before when we brought him in.

She suggested that we continue trying to give him the medicine.

Oooo boy.

I was even more confused.

It was a LONG weekend. And not in a good way.

His fever didn't break until late Monday. Up until then, we had to pack him around constantly. (That gets tiring when he weighs almost 26 pounds.)

The good news is, he has three new teeth to show for it. Maybe now he can chew all that real people food he's been drooling for.

This next little bit is for Aunt Tanya. It's a long time coming, but I think I finally figured out how to post this.

Kenna's Directing Debut:

p.s. thank you for all the well wishes.

the baby-sitter is coming over for a repeat tomorrow.

hopefully no one gets sick between now and then.

Ranting and Rambling...(might want to skip this post)

Yesterday was not my favorite day.

My morning prayers started out asking for help to understand and complete some things I had for a big deadline at work. Let's just say, I wasn't specific enough when I asked for understanding.

I meant "please give me a light bulb moment in which everything becomes clear and I magically get all this really hard stuff done."

I got "here, let me show you how you have been doing this wrong all along and you will understand how you need to do this in the future because you will be redoing everything from the whole last year."

So my prayer was answered, but totally not what I meant.

I was tired.

The inversion made me grumpy.

And I was really mad at myself for not seeing the problem sooner.

But, at least I had a date with my hubby to look forward to.

When I got home, Liam seemed like he was breathing kind of shallow and fast. I didn't think too much of it, but I thought I ought to call the doctor anyway, just to make sure. The nurse was busy, so I made an appointment for the next day and asked that she call me back when she could.

Matt and I got ready to go out. He picked up my niece to baby-sit for us and we left.

Halfway to the restaurant, I got a call from the doctor's office. I briefly explained what was going on with Liam and they told me I had to get him checked out that night.

We ended up in the doctor's office at 7:45. (Who knew they were open so late?) Turns out the poor kid had an ear infection and fever of 102.5 by the time we got him all checked out.

Next stop - Walgreens for the prescription. I've never been to a Walgreens before. I don't know that I'll go back. They kind of scare me.

Matt took my niece home while I got the kids medicated and in bed. (Lyssa still has a cough and Liam needed to take his prescription for the ear.)

Little did we know, the night was just starting. Between Alyssa and Liam, we were making trips upstairs about every 10 minutes. Liam was fussing and coughing. At one point, he threw up all over everything, completely covering himself and me. Lyssa was whimpering and crying all night. How is that not supposed to break your heart? I hate it when they are sick.

After another doctor's visit this morning, we found out Alyssa's ears are both infected.

We have so much medication in our fridge.

I have had enough. SERIOUSLY.

Also, I want a do-over on the date night. Doctor's offices are not fun places for dates.

Weekend projects and picture blow-out

Whew! It was so nice to have a good long weekend at home to work on some projects. I could have used a few more days, but it's amazing how much of a difference even one extra day at home can make with my motivation to undertake a project.

I bought some letters for the kids rooms waaaaay back in October and they have been sitting in the basement bugging me to finish them ever since. Saturday morning I gave in and hauled them out of their hiding place.

Here is what the girls' names look like all finished and hanging on the wall:

Detail on the letters.
Here are the planets we made a while back, hung up on the ceiling.

I did get Liam's done as well, but it was late in the evening and the sick kiddies wanted snuggles instead of pictures.

Yes...sick again. Seriously. My mom even commented the other day that it seems like we have been sick for the last 6 months straight. I am on a campaign to rid the house of whatever germs are at the root of it. I have been busting out the bleach at every opportunity. I will win eventually!

The weekend also brought a new tooth for Liam (FINALLY!). He's up to 3, all on the bottom, and only two weeks shy of his first birthday. He almost did as well as I did...I didn't get my first tooth until 13 months.

Here he is showing off some of his amazing new skills:

(Check out the very sick sister in the background.

Asthma + bad chest cold = miserable Lyssa)

And since I finally found my camera cable, here a few more pictures from happier and less sick days.

Matt's Birthday

Playing with the dress-ups they got for Christmas. Check out the pirate hook on Lyssa's hand.

The tutus I made them for Christmas are a big hit.

Happy Lyssa

Liam making faces.

Kenna being a ballerina.

Goofing off with the camera, making faces.

Liam attacked us while we were playing.

Tired McKenna, still snuggling with Hippo.

(Hippo has been her best friend and constant companion since she could hold on to her.)