Monday, January 28, 2008

mmmm.. cake

Megan didn't quite know what to think about her cake. She really didn't care for the icing because it was sticky and messy and she couldn't get it off her fingers. She did enjoy the cake if I gave her bites from a fork. I think she still had a good time making a mess regardless.





"I think I need a bath"

Megan got an elephant from mommy and daddy that she still isn't quite sure about

a little people car that she loves to play with from Uncle Matt, Aunt Heather and Caleb

some books from Grandma that she likes to hear

and here is proof that even if it isn't your birthday and you don't get a present, you can still have a good time!

Wednesday, January 23, 2008

one year old

Here are the latest round of pictures of Megan. I love some of the faces she is making. I took her to the doctor today for her checkup and some more shots, boo! Anyway she is 29 inches long and weighs 17 pounds. She is in the 50th percentile for height and the 3rd percentile for weight. Maybe she'll get lucky and stay skinny forever. Enjoy the pictures. Is there a more beautiful baby anywhere in the world? I think not! :)

Monday, January 21, 2008

Happy First Birthday Megan

I can't believe this day has already arrived. I'm honestly sad that Megan is already one. I can't belive I actually miss those first couple weeks of her life when I got almost no sleep and was exhausted constantly. She is always doing something new and funny, so I'm trying to enjoy the days as they come and not long for the past. She is getting into everything, which really makes me miss the days of being able to leave her on the floor and know when I return, she'll still be there. She is now a walking babbling toddler who is curious about everything. And if you don't let her see what she wants you are going to hear about it. Emma and Nathan are definitely her favorite playmates. She loves it when they play with her or let her chase them around. She also loves the time of day when daddy gets home. I guess by then she is bored with me and happy to have someone new pay attention to her. I am sad Megan is no longer our baby, but I know there are so many fun things in store as we venture into toddler world. Happy First Birthday Megan!

Here is the post from pictures when Megan was born just to reminisce a little more.

Saturday, January 19, 2008

germaphobe

I'm a germaphobe. Not so bad that I spend hours a day washing my hands or showering to keep clean. Come on, I'm a mom of three, I'm lucky to get 15 minutes a day to clean myself, but I definitely worry about picking up germs from public places, and I'm pretty anal about everyone washing their hands the instant we get home from anywhere, and I frequently change my shirt, if not my entire outfit upon returning from a store or other similar public place. It has gotten worse with each kid I've had. Which sounds silly because most parents get more lax about things the more children they have, but not me. I know that the more people in the house, means the more potential for carrying around germs and spreading illness and that means more sick people for me to take care of, and more chances of me catching said illness and not being able to take care of anything. Plus now when we go to stores the older two like to touch everything. Then I start thinking about how many other people have touched that thing, and where their hands were before they touched that thing. And then there are the people that are really sick, or their kids are sick and they go do whatever anyway and infect everyone else. Seriously if you're sick, stay home. I don't want what you have. See, I'm a germaphobe. Luckily it hasn't reached the point of me not going places ever, but during cold and flu season I am definitely more likely to keep my kids home as much as possible than to drag everyone to the store. I know a lot of people say you should just expose everyone to the germs and let our immune systems build up defenses to things, but I'd rather just keep everyone as healthy as possible. This means there is lots of handwashing going on in our house, and everyone takes their vitamin everyday. I feel kind of bad because I do make the kids wash their hands a lot, and because of it they both have ended up with the driest skin on their hands. Poor Nathan's hands are chapped and peeling and cracking. He was crying the other night because he said washing them hurt. So everynight we've been slathering the kids's hands with lotion and Nathan even sleeps with socks on his to keep the moisture in and help them heal faster. It seems to be working, which makes me happy since I'm not about to let up on the amount of handwashing they do. Germaphobes unite!

Happy Birthday Matt

Happy Birthday today to my big brother Matt, and to my cousin Tom. They were both hoping Megan would be joining them on their birthday last year, but she held out for two more days just to have her own special day. Anyway, I hope you both have a great day, and don't freeze your butts off since it is freezing cold, as usual, today.

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

and all hell breaks loose

Do you ever have those days that you think, man the kids have been really good lately? You haven't had to really get onto them about a lot and you're feeling like things are finally getting easier, and then, dum dum dum; the damn breaks. Well today is the damn breaking day in our house. I'm not saying the kids have been angels because come on, they are kids, but I haven't felt like they've been awful either. They have been fighting a lot, but I just send them to find something else to do so I don't have to listen to the fighting. But this afternoon after picking Emma up from school it's like they couldn't control themselves. And I wanted to punch them in the face! Ok not really, that's just a family joke we have. Paul, are you reading this? Anyway, it really was like someone flipped a switch on Emma and turned her into her evil twin. Usually when this happens it means they are in desperate need of a nap, so they are in bed now, hopefully sleeping off whatever issues they have today. I'm hoping dinner will be nice once everyone is refreshed. GEEZ!

Monday, January 14, 2008

more on disney

Since this is our first major vacation with all three kids, my brain has been consumed with worry, excitement, and planning for this trip since we booked it. In ways I think it's good that I'm trying to plan ahead and I hope that means we will end up in Florida with everything we need, but i have a feeling I'm just overthinking everything and will be freaking out about everything by the time the day of departure arrives. After watching Jon & Kate plus 8 last night on their trip to Disney I got a couple more ideas of things to look into to make our trip easier.
I have never really watched their show before, but I'm totally sucked in now. As insane as my days are some times, they don't even come close to how crazy their life is. One of her quotes from last night stuck with me, though. She said, "Each day is painfully the same, yet vastly different." Oh my god how true that is. Anyway, I am so impressed with their family and that they have let cameras into their lives on an almost daily basis. It must be a hard enough job caring for 8 kids, but to have all the ups and downs documented on national television is pretty crazy.
Emma is still stressing about Sea World, but each day it's getting better. I am kind of sad that in one week Megan will be one. This year has flown by and she is growing so fast. She is walking like crazy now, which I love, but it means we no longer have an infant and are dealing with a tempermental toddler instead.

Thursday, January 10, 2008

nothing to say

Believe it or not I have nothing new to say really. I feel kind of bad that I've been on total blogging hiatus, but it's not like anyone is dying out there from not knowing what's going on with our 3 crazy kids. We finally told the kids about our trip to disney and the ywer really excited, until we told them about Sea World. Emma started freaking out and screaming and crying and saying, "I don't want to go there. I'm scared." This from the kids who begs to go to the zoo when there is snow on the ground and it is 5 degrees outside. I kind of think it was partially due to her being extremely tired that night and since then we've talked about it a little and she is less freaked out. I've also told her that her cousin's Mitchell and Madelyn have been there and they weren't scared at all, so hopefully after hearing how fun it is directly from those two Emma will calm down. Nathan is busy making fun of Emma. He keeps saying, "Emma is really scared, but I'm not." And all day long he will make comments about Sea World just to get a rise out of Emma. It's actually kind of funny that at 3 he already gets it. I'm spending a lot of my time during the day trying to strategize our packing so we don't have 8 bags and 3 kids to lug around the airport.
Finally here are the pictures of Nathan's room. I haven't put his curtain back up because the holes the brackets were in are not very secure anymore, so we need to drill new one's and put drywall anchors in, and honestly I've just been lazy. The other thing I've been lazy about is decorating his room. I bought some scrapbooking stuff to make things for his room, I just haven't done it yet. Here is the set I bought.

and here is his blue room before:



and here is his green room after:




I love the way the green turned out. Sean is ok with it. He waited until after I already had one coat of green finished to tell me he was sad I was painting over Nathan's blue walls. I asked why he didn't tell me before I even bought the paint that he didn't want me to do it, and he said he really doesn't mind and he thinks it looks good, he's just a little sad. Way to make me feel bad Sean! All well, I think it looks good, and it will look even better when I get his frames finished and some other boy decor in there.

Thursday, January 3, 2008

catching up

I've been a horrible blogger lately, huh? Mainly it's because Sean was off work for two weeks, and I spent most of my time with him and the kids. Now that Sean is back to work and Nathan went back to school today, I guess it's time for me to play catch up on our holiday.
One of the presents I ordered for Megan did arrive late, but I just wrapped it up in the same Santa paper and stuck it under the tree and pretended we missed it Christmas morning. Emma and Nathan barely noticed, and Megan won't remember, so that ended better than expected. The kids got all kinds of great presents, and now our house needs another major toy overhaul. I am bad because I have a hard time parting with toys that the kids really enjoyed playing with, but we are getting overrun and something has to give.
Anyway, Christmas Eve we went to Aunt Sandy's as usual and had a very yummy dinner. The kids got some presents and the adults had a white elephant gift exchange, which was a lot of fun. Then Christmas day we stayed home and sat around in our pajamas all day long. That was nice! My mom and grandma came by to see what Santa had brought everyone, and then I made a ham for dinner. The day after Christmas we went to my mom's to have Christmas with her and my grandma. She made Chicken and Dumplings, which is quite possibly my favorite food ever. The kids received even more presents there and we had a good time just eating and hanging out. Christmas was really fun this year, and it was pretty relaxing since we stayed home instead of traveling. Normally we make a trip to Ohio while Sean is off work to see all his family up there, but I really wasn't feeling up to it this year. Instead, Sean's dad and his wife, and Sean's sister came to see us last weekend. The kids were so excited to see their papa and grandma and Aunt Nikki, and of course they got more presents. We spent the weekend eating and playing games and just lounging around. Sean's sister stayed to ring in the new year with us. We didn't do anything exciting this year, which was just fine with me. Obviuosly our holiday was filled with lots of gift giving and eating, but the best part was definitely spending time with everyone we love.
Sean and I had originally agreed not to do gifts since he just bought me my camera and we are taking that trip to Disney in March, but I couldn't resist getting him something. He was mad because he listened and didn't get me anything and felt bad that I had gotten him a gift, but I honestly didn't care. I knew I wasn't getting anything and his present made him happy, so I was happy. I got him this:

It's a 12 inch compound miter saw. He's been wanting one lately and we've been talking about all kinds of projects around the house we want to do, so it was a pretty good present. He was so funny and as soon as the kids's present were out of their boxes and assembled, he took his new toy into the kitchen and put it together on the island. If it hadn't been so cold and if we'd had some wood, I'm sure he'd have been using it that morning.
I hope everyone else had a great holiday season and got to spend time with their loved one's.
Christmas morning

the aftermath

Sean with his new toy

Christmas at Grandma's

and a picture of Megan, just because she is cute!