Tube Surgery

Just wanted to update everyone, M will be having her tubes and sinus culture Monday morning. We have to be there at 7am which means we'll have to get up at like 5am(at lest hubby and I). Hopefully we can get the kids to the car and staying a sleep til we get to the hospital otherwise it's going to be a long day for me! Hubby wasn't able to take a personal day since we just found out Friday afternoon, there wasn't enough time to get one approved. On a good note it's scheduled early in the morning and the hospital is only about 20mins from his work so he'll be able to be there for most of it. Once I get home and get the kids settled I'll try and make a post, I'm going to say maybe around 2 or 3 I should be able to, since that's normally "quite" time around here for N, and I'm sure M will be sleeping most of the day since that's what N did after his tube surgery.

Another Busy Day

Early this morning M had her hearing test and then her ENT dr appointment. Her hearing test didn't come out so well, it was low moderate(not good). Her dr(which is also N's ENT dr) asked what was going on, we told him she had two ear infections and we were 99% sure she had another one right now(by the way she does). Basically she's going to have the tubes. She's also going to have a culture on her nose done, to check the sinus behind the nose(can't remember the name) since every time she has an infection her nose is also runny. The dr wants this done within the next week or two, to see if it helps with her sleeping at night. He thinks it will so then she will not have to have the sleep study though I'm not holding my breath on that one. He did give her some meds to help with the infection til we can get her for the tubes. We are just waiting for them to contact her Nero. dr to get the ok from her(even though she also wanted us to try for the tubes) then they will call back with when we can have the tubes done! The dr also checked N's (I guess he always likes to do that if the sibling is also one of his patients-nice no extra charge!!) and his were perfect!

N has now been accident free for 3 days!! He also filled up his star chart so he got to pick out a toy from Walmart today. Out of all things he picked out an Iron Man action figure. He was carrying around a bucket of Lego's for a while, then changed his mind. Worked for me it was cheaper :)!

Then there's me, for the last week or so I've been debating about something. About 2 weeks about at work I saw this lady walking out will this really cute hair cut(she also had curly hair) since then that's all I can think about. I've also been in dire need of a cut. So I looked up a bunch of pics of cuts printed out a few I liked and one I fell in love with, but just wasn't sure the last time my hair was that short.......it was a nightmare for me. I was also really young and didn't know all the neat tricks I do now. Since hubby took a personal day today I went and got it cut, even up to walking in the door I wasn't 100% sure what I was going to do. I showed the lady the cut.

She told me it wouldn't look good on me. So I ended up just telling her how I normally get it cut. After her questioning me on some of those "orders", she finally realized I knew what I was talking about. She was just about finished (I could tell she was checking all to make sure it was even), at this point it was starting to dry and she goes, it's sort of like the picture just a little longer, with that she takes my hair like she's going to layer (even though she already did that) and starts just chopping the hair away! At first I was thinking what is she doing and after she did it a few times I noticed that my hair was laying different. And the end result........

My new hair cut.....I LOVE IT!

At lest for today we'll see how it comes out tomorrow when I have to do it!

Exciting News!!

I've been holding off on blogging this week for one main reason(well, and the fact that I have been really tired this week), I was to afraid I would jinks myself. It happens all the time with kids, a parent says how great they have been sleeping through the night and that night they wake up on you. After all the praying and stress I had put on myself to get this done, I really didn't want it to backfire on me. So what is this exciting news that I'm just dragging out to tell you, N is pretty much almost potty trained!!! I am one happy, relieved, proud momma!

It all started Monday when he was dry the whole day at school from 8:30am when I changed him till well after 3pm when I picked him up from school. For months now we have tried to just get him to sit on the potty, which sometimes he does nicely, others well, it's not so pretty. So when we got home I kept sitting him on it til he wanted to get down then we would go back every 20mins or so. He also wanted to wear big boy underwear. He finally went and he got a Dinosaur.(Yes, I had gotten down to bribing, and I tried everything else; M&M's, gold fish, cars, this was the only thing that got him to at lest want to sit and try for). Tuesday he went to school with pull ups on did really good went on the potty at school once. Wednesday, the same, but told the teachers he had to go twice, though he had already gone in his pull up. Thursday, same. All these days he would come home and get on his big boy underwear. Thursday night, he wanted to wear his underwear to bed so after being dry the whole night before, we gambled and let him(after of course bringing the little potty into his room and making sure he knew it was there). We was dry the whole night!!! And it was a long night he went to bed at 8pm and didn't get up til 9:30am(we missed school cuz of this). Friday, he got to wear his underwear all day, only had 2 accidents, and was again dry the whole night. Today........we have been having him tell us when he as to go, otherwise all you hear him say is "No pee in potty!" over and over cuz he doesn't think he has to go. He made it once to the potty(just barely) and two other times where he was trying to get to the potty and started to go. Not bad if you ask me. Needless to say for the next two days we'll be "camped" out at the house, letting N get more comfortable with the whole thing, and come Tuesday he'll be going to school like a big boy!! I'm just so proud!!

N's Daddy Day!

I wrote this yesterday, but got interrupted when M wake up in the middle of the night, so I didn't get to post it. Here it is a day late!

Today N and Daddy went to a movie. This was N's second movie in a theater, the first time it was all of us and we also went with T and her family so N had his best friend with him. When I first told him-first thing this morning-he didn't seem so interested he said "No!", but then when I got him changed and his shoes on he didn't put up a fight and was ready to go, as long as his Lego truck could come. He was aloud to take it, but it had to stay in the car. He also was very vocal on the fact that he wanted to go in my car not the truck. He kept saying "NO truck, car! I want car!" It was really cute.
Off they went to see Iron Man!! Daddy said N was great, he didn't complain till the end when they where just about to run the credits. Then after wards N didn't want to go home yet so they ended up walking around the mall(the theater is in the mall if you didn't guess). Since daddy apparently told him in the car if he was good he would get something, N ended up getting a dart bow and arrow set from the Disney store! N really enjoyed his Daddy Day! I asked N if he wanted to take Mommy on a date next week and he said Yes so maybe in a few weeks N can have a Mommy day too!

Once Upond a Child

Yesterday M had her check-up to see if the ear infections have gone away. They have, but there is still fluid in her ears. So I told the dr what her neurologist said about the fluids maybe causing the off balance, and if I could bring her next week to have it looked at again. I love our dr's office they are so upfront with us there is never any beating around the bush. She told me that the fluid would still be there it usually takes at lest 3 weeks for it to go away, and her ear drums do look a little abnormal. She told us to go ahead and meet w/the ENT(ear, nose and throat) dr, but to wait 3 weeks before we go, cuz she wanted us to put M on this other Medicine that hopefully will help the fluid to go away faster. She doesn't really think that the fluid in her ears is the problem and she knows that if we tell the ENT dr about the balancing and there is fluid the only thing they can do is the tubes in the ears. Basically she doesn't want M to go through the surgery to find out it's not the problem when she already doesn't feel it's the problem. Which I thought was very sweet of her. Right now I think we will still go ahead with the tubes if the ENT dr suggests it cuz of the fact that both our families have had ear issues(ie having to have tubes put in) and also with N having to have them it may not be such a bad thing. That's where we are right now that M is on another medication and I made her ENT appointment for in 2 weeks(the dr only comes to this office once a month and next month is already booked). They did make her hearing test appointment for me which was nice, it will be 15mins before her dr appointment(it's in the same building).

After M's appointment we went to T's house, so the kids could go play in the kiddie pool she has. Her hubby got off work early and offered to watch the boys so that T and I could go with the girls to this consignment store that just opened up. Once we got there I got N all settled in, and made sure he was ok with me leaving(he was with his best friend he could care less) S ended up falling asleep right before we got there so it was just M, T and me. It was a really nice store, Once Upond a Child it's called, I know they are a chain and they are all over the place, but I've never been in one. It's nice cuz they buy the items off you(fyi for me later). Some of the stuff was bran new items(ie sippy cups, and car seats). I wasn't planing on getting anything, but I had gotten N the Leap frog Leappad on clearance for $7 a few months ago, but the books are like $14, so he only has one(and I found that one on sale). They had all different ones for $4.50 so I picked him up 4 of them, and got M some strawberry hair bows. M had a fun she got to play with toys and was even a model! Since S couldn't come and M is the same size and height as her(even though S's 4 months older go figure), she was perfect. Mostly we just held dresses up to her to see how long they would be, but she did try on 2 different swim suit tops, and one bottom, don't worry she kept her diaper on :). Then we went back to the boys having a blast in the pool. We ended up eating over there, and I had my first Chinese take-out since we have been in Florida. It was pretty good. I do have to say the Sweet and sour chicken was better than Rising Sun, but Rising Sun still has the best egg rolls and fried rice!

Mother's Day and Lego's

Before I start with today I need to go back to yesterday, really Friday night. Friday night after we got home from a play date at Chuck E. Cheese with one of my online friends, I started making one of grandma's Mother's day presents. I had it all done and it looked great! Can you guess what I made:)-Yes it was a cake with raspberry jam-seedless cuz she can't have seeds. In the directions it said it could sit out for up to 2 days, which was great since there was barely any room in the fridge.

It was so pretty see....

Well, when we got up yesterday I looked at it and all the raspberries ran. When I opened the lid and it smelled terrible. So in the garbage it went! Hubby had to do the lawn so I ran out to the store with the kids as soon as we woke up to picked up everything I needed to remake the cake. Once we got home I washed the pans and cooling racks, mixed the batter, poured the batter in and baked. 33mins later the cakes were baked I took them out and while I was trying to make them flatter(a trick I learned at cake class) I burnt my wrist, then when I was trying to get one of the cakes out it broke in half! I figured great, I'll just try and work with it. As I'm doing all this daddy and N went to get our laundry and grandpa gave N some juice so he was carrying it home, he puts it in the fridge. I just started to do the filling on the cake when N tells me he wants the juice, he gives me his sippy and gets the juice like he always does for me, he gets to me and turns toward the living room he most have tripped or something cuz all I saw was the bottle go flying. It was plastic so at first I didn't think much of it. But when N moved a little I saw juice just flowing out of the bottle! It was ALL over the place, we are talking over half the bottle! Poor N was so upset cuz he thought he did something wrong. At this point, daddy had just gone back outside(for about 1min if that) to close the garage door and came back to the mess. Hubby was like I think we should just meet my mom at the mall, swimming may be pressing our luck! So that's what we ended up doing, I did make the second cake though it's not as pretty as the first, and it is in the fridge!

Here's the second one

It is slanted though you can't tell from the picture
Here is what N made Grandma all done by him(except the from Nathan 2008)

On to today. We didn't do anything or at lest I was trying not to! Hubby had to work and well I just didn't feel like doing much. I played with the kids. When M was down for her nap N and I rebuild a Lego house I had gotten.

A little background through Pampers you get these codes and you put them into their website and get points. Points lead to prizes/toys. I've been doing it since N was a few months old. I was trying to get this cool tricycle that had a handle so a parent could push(always loved those things) so I FINALLY got enough points and they stopped having that toy(of course!). So the next thing I liked was so Lego Gift Cards I ended up being able to get $100 worth so I got N the largest Lego box I could and then this house kit and some shower gifts for my brother (shh don't tell:) ) The box set is for Xmas, but the house was more for me, but figured N would get a kick out of helping me build it. Which the first time he wanted to help, but wasn't real sure what was going on they are a LOT smaller then his Mega Blocks. So on to the story.

Well today we broke down the house and build another one of the 3 house you can build with the kit. This time he had a lot more fun and keep trying to build a car(I mean truck) with the extra pieces. Which wasn't working well since the only "tire" were these really really small ones. So when we were out today I picked him up Lego car that said 7-12, but didn't really thing much of it.(M got some baby doll bottles, which she thinks is the greatest thing in the world!) After we had dinner(McDonald's since I decided I didn't want to cook-Yeah it's mother's day I'm allowed to be a little lazy!!) I put the car together it was a little over his age limit as far as trying to build it, but he loved it, cuz you just pull it back and it goes. But the whole reason for the LONG story was this.......

N's FIRST Lego Plane!!!

He was very proud of it he kept wanting me to take pictures of it!

Here is N with the car kit

He's also trying to build more things with the little "parts" he has at the moment. I can't wait for Christmas! Now little brother of mine this does not mean you can send all your old Lego's our way-at lest not yet ;)!

Neurology Appointment

Today was M's third neurology appointment, it was suppose to be last week right down the street at the All Children's clinic, but like last time they had to reschedule it due to the dr having something come up. So needless to say I had to drive all the way down to All Children's Hospital for the appointment an hr ride. I love the dr and hospital, but it's so stinking far!!! Anyways, on to the appointment. We were in and out pretty quick, we only had to wait a about 10 mins which was nice, cuz there was a lady there w/her two kids(I'm pretty sure they were twins) they had to be about 4 or 5. BOTH of them still had binkies!!! Now I was ashamed that N had one at 2.5yrs old, but it was very rare that he would go out of the house w/it at that age, and talking w/it in was a big no no, now these too, they were talking w/them hanging out of their mouths and the swearing. All I have to say is I'm glad my kids are well behaved(thank you mom for telling me to start early w/the behavior!!) Ok, I'm back on track!! So the appointment......

I'll give you the run down cuz it's a lot.

M's falling-She is still, just falling sometimes when she's walking, not tripping, she'll just be walking and she'll go down, or even sometimes when she's just standing there. It's like she just losses her balance it's really bad if she gets all excited, like daddy comes home. Now there is two things that could going on......
First what we are hoping is that she has fluids in her ears that is not going away, so it's causing her sensory(center of gravity) to be off, in turn making her fall. So, next week she has an appointment w/her regular dr to check on her ear infection if it's clear and there is still fluid(like there was after her last ear infection) then she'll go back a week after that to check it again, if it's still there then we will have to take her to an Ear, Nose, and Throat Specialist about getting the tubes put in.
Second, so, if the fluid is gone and the sensory room isn't helping then there is something going on in her brain. Which means M will be going back and have another brain MRI done to make sure there is nothing going on.

Hearing-I've been worried about her not listening-hearing me so I asked the dr what she thought and she wants her to have a hearing test again just to make sure it's cuz of her ears hurting that she's not listening and that the infections haven't caused any damage.

Sleeping-I didn't bring this one up. The dr asked how she was sleeping, if she was sleeping through the night? M hasn't, she did for about one month at about 5 months old. Other than that she still wakes up every night usually around 1-2am. Most of the time she either goes right back to sleep and wakes up again 30mins later doing this for at lest 2hrs. Or she'll just be up for the 2hrs. She's always really tired, we've given her gas meds, sometimes we end up feeding her again, but I'm still not sure what it was, I figured it was just cuz she's always getting teeth(she has all but 4). Due to her waking up and being up for so long, M will be going for a sleep study in the next 2 weeks. I'm not really sure what we are looking for, but I know she said something about maybe that's why she's having these problems.

On a very good note, her high muscle tone is pretty normal now!! I think she's considered to still have Hypertonia since she still gets stiff when she's upset or mad. But that just means she's growing out of it for the most part which I'm very excited about!!

Caughting Up

On Saturday we went to hubby's work picnic which was at this really nice resort in St. Pete. It's right one the beach and it was a beautiful day out. The only bad part was it's a long drive to get there so it made it a very long day. They had a tent right on the sand which was interesting, my chair would sink in the sand and if I needed to move I had to try and stand up, then pull the chair out of the sand and move it so I could move or just reposition the chair.

They had a ton of stuff to do, face painting, snow cones(which you will see later), a bounce house, dunk tank, and then you also had the ocean you could go swim in and of course the sand. They gave everyone these nice beach bags that are mesh and then you got a visor, beach ball, and Frisbee. The kids got a sand bucket and shovel. All blue and which w/the company name on it of course :)! I thought it was great since I forgot the kids sand toys and that kept them entertained most of the time. I didn't bring the swim suits since we were all just getting off our colds, I didn't think it would be a good idea, but then kicked myself once we got there, cuz the water was nice not cold like is was a few weeks ago. We had a great time. I meant one of hubby's co-workers and we hit it off really well. She also had a little girl that was just a month older than M. Ok I meet a lot of hubby's co-workers, but the rest I had nothing in common w/:). By the time we left and got home we were all tired. N took a nap in the car and then continued it for another hr after we got home which is not like him. I was so tired, and had to try and get the kids(and me) a bath in once we got home-we had sand everywhere-that hubby was nice and picked up a pizza so I didn't have to cook!

N enjoying his snow cone(which he had 3 thanks to Daddy!)

M waiting for hers

She didn't get one...If you saw N's shirt you would know why

N playing in the sand....

Notice the red face and new shirt-that's what snow cones will do to you!M playing w/the little girl.

The other girl is a month older and M looks so much older than her crazy!

I just have a really cute picture of N from yesterday. He kept asking "Where Daddy?" I would tell him, he's at work and will not be home til you're in bed. He asked a few times through out the day, and the answer would hold him for a few hours. Around 6:30 we were in the middle of watching a movie and this is what happened....

"Where Daddy?" "There Daddy?"

"I wait Daddy!"

He stood there for a good 15mins and every time he saw a truck it was "Daddy!" Then he got down and finished his movie. It was the cutest thing.

And that brings us to today. If you don't know this week is Teacher Appreciation Week. Last Tuesday I had a customer looking for an apple cookie cutter so she could make her famous lemon cookies in an apple shape for her kids teachers for this week. Then I had my cake class which gave me a great idea. I decided to make each of N's teachers a mini cake that looked like a basket and had flowers on it. My idea had a bunch of different roses in different colors, but after spending most of the morning baking the cakes it got cut to one color of roses. The cakes took forever to cook I had to do each one separate since I only have one baby pan, and it took about 20 mins per cake, times that by 4 than add in the time to fill the pan...yeah I needed more pans. I did end up using a different pan for the left over mix, which worked out since 2 of the small pan cakes came out really small and I couldn't use them. After they were baked and the frosting was all made and colored it didn't take to long. So here is the finished product. The cake is Red Velvet(N picked it out) and then butter cream frosting. They came out really cute.

Here are two of the four I made.

The top one is made w/the small pan and the bottom is made w/the doll pan flipped upside down and cut to make it sit better.