I realized today I've been really bad about Megan's monthly updates. It's not because she is at a standstill, it's just because I'm a slacker mom. She is still growing slowly, and at the risk of freaking myself out I looked at the growth chart on the cdc's website. Bad idea, according to that chart she is below the 3rd percentile for weight for her age. Remembering the talk of breastfed babies growing at a much different rate, I decided to look for a chart online for exclusivley breastfed babies. According to that chart here, she is right at the 15th percentile, which makes me feel much better. Lest you all think I'm one of those crazy moms that intends to breastfeed her shild until she's 8, please know that she does eat pretty much what we eat, just on a smaller scale obviously. We were doing really well with the weaning process until she got sick this last week. She did not want to eat or drink anything, so rather than let her lose weight or get really dehydrated I gave in and nursed her a lot more than usual. Now I feel like we are back at square one with the weaning. The good news is the more research they are doing about breastfeeding in the second year of life, the more they are recommending it. Here is some great info about extended breastfeeding. I know I went off a quite a tangent there about breastfeeding, but I hate that doing something so great for our babies is looked upon so poorly.
Anyway, Megan is doing great. Our parent educator from Parent's as Teachers came on Friday and said Megan is right on track with all her development. She is walking like a pro and loves chasing her brother and sister around. She is not talking a ton, but she is picking up words here and there. She still gets our attention by pointing and grunting, so I think she doesn't really have a need for words. The sign language is still working some, but she has stubborn days when she doesn't even want to use that to communicate. Her comprehension is amazing though. She understands pretty much everything we say to her, and can even respond to simple requests, like "Bring that mommy", or "Can you find your cup?". She is also learning animal sounds. You should hear her "MOO", freaking adorable!
Time with our kids seems to go by faster everyday, and I love watching them grow up together. Despite the fighting over toys they really love and care about each other and it's an amazing thing to watch as a mom.
In other family news, my sister-in-law is going to be having their second baby in just under two weeks, unless she goes into labor sooner. I'm thinking she's hoping for sooner in ways. Big jerk has only gained 2 pounds her entire pregnancy, but don't worry, the baby is perfectly healthy and is growing as he should be. I can't wait to meet our new nephew. Sean's sister and her husband and their baby came into town Good Friday and Holy Saturday. I totally forgot to post about that with Easter and then Megan being sick. Their daughter is adorable and the kids loved seeing her. They are fascinated by babies. Megan did not like mommy holding another baby at all though. Proof that she is not ready for our family to grow anymore right now. Emma and Nathan actually said they want us to have another baby. No, I don't have an anouncement to make, but we have been talking it over with Emma and Nathan. Since they are old enough to understand what having another baby means, I felt we should ask their opinion. Now that you're all caught up on the monotony that is our life I promise to try to do better in keeping up with this. I will also try to add more pictures to my posts since I know that's what people really love.
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Friday, March 28, 2008
Easter
so I've turned into quite the slacker about posting. 3 kids require a lot of work, and the pics from the new camera are such big files that it takes forever to upload them. Anyway, we had a good time on Easter, even though by Sunday afternoon Megan was running a fever and feeling crappy. Turns out she has an ear infection. No big surprise with the way our kids are, but she's finally starting to feel better.
Dying eggs
Caleb Nathan and Emma
Megan
and yes, it really snowed on Easter. What a cold and crappy day!
Dying eggs
Caleb Nathan and Emma
Megan
and yes, it really snowed on Easter. What a cold and crappy day!
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Anniversary trip
Since this November will be our 5th anniversary and we never got a real honeymoon, Sean and I are wanting to take a big vacation without the kids. We honestly can't decide what kind of trip we want. Since it wil be November, the beach or a carribean cruise sounds nice, but I've always wanted to go to a snowy mountain cabin and just hole up for the weekend, or even a bed and breakfast in Missouri would be fine. We've even talked about Vegas, or somewhere in California. I thought about New York since I've never been, but our anniversary is thanksgiving weekend, so it would be crazy busy there with the Macy's parade. I do want to go to New York for that one year, but that's something we want to take the kids to. The other half of the decision is we are talking about baby #4 sometime in the near future and how pregnant I might be in November will definitely affect where we can go. We also have to consider cost because it's not like we're made of money. A lot of the places we've looked at are similar in cost, which makes ruling some out a difficult thing. Any suggestions on a relaxing, semi-romantic, affordable anniversary trip?
Friday, March 14, 2008
pictures from Florida
I'm so sorry there are so many pictures. Even after looking through the pictures several times there were still so many pictures of htings I wanted to share with everyone. It took me a couple hours just to get them all uploaded, so you better enjoy! I am so glad I had my awesome new camera or I would have missed so much. Thanks Sean!
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
home again
We're home. Our flight was delayed last night, so it was almost midnight by the time we got home. Today I'm trying to unpack and start laundry and clean up the house. I have tons of pictures and I have no idea how I'll decide which ones to share so everyone doesn't have to watch a slideshow with 500 pictures in it.
I'll start at the beginning to give you a recap of our week. Tuesday the day before we left, we got almost a foot of snow at our house. We stayed that night at a hotel by the airport which meant we had to shovel the driveway before we could leave. Then it took us 2 hours to get from our house to the hotel, which should normally be about a 45 minutre drive. We had to get up wednesday morning at 3:45 to get everyone ready and to the airport on time since the hotel was full of people who were also taking the shuttle. We made it through security easily because the lady working there took pity on us with the 3 kids and all our crap and she let us jump to the front of the line. The kids all did well on the flight and were big helpers in carrying all their stuff through the airport and to the rental car. We rented an suv that was supposed to be similar to a chevy trailblazer. We got a toyota highlander, which was smaller, but we were still able to fit all the car seats in and all our luggage, so it was ok. Not great, but ok.
Then we drove to our resort. Sean went to check-in and they had us down for 2 two bedroom units. Thankfully I had printed our trip info so they changed it to 1 unit and we actually ended up with a 3 bedroom, which mean Megan got her own room. Then we hit the grocery store and Megan and I napped while Sean took Emma and Nathan swimming. We all crashed early that night since it was such a long day.
Thursday we went to Sea World. Emma rode her first big ride with dad, "Journey to Atlantis," and Nathan cried because he was too short to go. We saw every animal there and Nathan touhed the sting rays and tried to touch the dolphins. Emma wanted no part of touching anything. We saw the Shamu show "Believe" and it was awesome. I have some great pictures from that thanks to my awesome camera. We ended the day at Shamu's happy harbor, which is the kid area with a huge playground and some rides for smaller kids. As we were leaving it started raining and we all ended up soaked by the time we got to the car.
Friday we went to Aquatica since that was going to be the hottest day while we were in Florida. The park is amazing. I took some pictures, but they just don't do the park justice. There are 5 different kinds of slides for bigger kids/adults, several slides for smaller kids, a gigantic water play area for kids with slides, two wave pools, a lazy river, and a thing called "Roa's Rapids," which is like a really fast moving lazy river. You can't use tubes to float on in the rapids, but they have life jackets to wear so you can just float along instead of swimming the whole way. They had life jackets for every size person on racks all over the park, and the kids are required to wear life jackets if under a certain height. They also have towel and locker rentals. I suggest bringing in the bare minimum of things you need and put them in a locker beecause you will be moving from place to place a lot and who really wants to lug all their crap around all day. Aquatica also did not allow outside food for lunch into the park. They are supposed to be building a picnic area so you can, it just wasn't finished yet. Even though there was a tornado watch in the area it was a great day and we all had a good time.
Saturday was much cooler and we spent the day shopping and at downtown disney. The kids enjoyed the incredibly huge disney store they have there. The kids all got "first trip to Disney" pins, and Emma got a phone call from goofy. They also got to pick out something to buy from the store. Emma and Nathan both picked cup sets. Emma's is the disney princess collection, and Nathan's is "Finding Nemo". Megan got a small set of disney princess characters.
Sunday we went to Disney World. It was an amazing day. The excitement on the kids faces was definitely the best part of the trip. We got to see all the parades and the show in from of Cinderella's castle about dreams coming true. I have to admit I got a little teary-eyed a couple of times just watching the kids and seeing how in awthey were of everything. Nathan and dad rode the teacups and the big thunder mountain railroad. Nathan and I rode barnstormers ride in the kid area. We all rode the dumbo ride, the grand prix race cars, the jungle cruise ride, and it's a small world. I really think Emma was a litle freaked out by the ride at Sea World, so she was hesitant to ride anything at disney. We also went through the Swiss Family Robinson tree house and went over to Tom Sawyer's island. The kids got to meet Alice and the Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland. It doesn't really sound like we did much but with all the walking and waiting in line the day went by waay to fast. Now I know why people have to go to Disney for more than one day. With all the lines and people it's impossible to fit everything into one. We ended the day with the spectro magic parade and the Wishes fireworks show. Emma and Nathan stayed awake the whole day, even on the ferry ride back to the car, but we didn't make it out of the parking lot before everyone was asleep.
Monday we slept in and then headed to clearwater beach. It was warm enough outside to enjoy playing at the beach for a couple of hours, but the water was waaaaay to cold to go swimming at all. The kids had a good time away playing in the sand and running around.
Tuesday we had to be out of the resort by 10am, so we packed up and headed back to downtown disney since we didn't get to see everything the first day we went. We ended up having lunch there that day and that ended up being Wetzel's Pretzels and Haagen Daas ice cream. What good parent I am, huh? All well, the kids had a good time. Then we drove down international drive to kill some more time. Finally it was time to head to the airport to drop off the car. We loaded up the car seats in the bag and loaded down everyone with all our stuff. Obviuosly we looked like we need lots of help because we got lots of offers on the way in, but we really did have everything under control. The plane arriving from New York was slightly delayed, and then once we got on the plane the outside lights stopped working, so they couldn't finish loading our bags. We ened up delayed almost an hour. Thankfully Nathan and Megan both fell asleep on the plane after about an hour, which made being delayed not so bad.
We mde it home with some really crabby kids, but everyone had a great trip. I definitely was not ready to come home at all. The kids were incredibly well behaved in Florida. Of course we had a couple of incidents, but I'm happy to report we were not that family with the kids throwing themselves on the ground and screaming about things. Emma and Nathan can't wait to go back, and honestly, neither can I.
I'll start at the beginning to give you a recap of our week. Tuesday the day before we left, we got almost a foot of snow at our house. We stayed that night at a hotel by the airport which meant we had to shovel the driveway before we could leave. Then it took us 2 hours to get from our house to the hotel, which should normally be about a 45 minutre drive. We had to get up wednesday morning at 3:45 to get everyone ready and to the airport on time since the hotel was full of people who were also taking the shuttle. We made it through security easily because the lady working there took pity on us with the 3 kids and all our crap and she let us jump to the front of the line. The kids all did well on the flight and were big helpers in carrying all their stuff through the airport and to the rental car. We rented an suv that was supposed to be similar to a chevy trailblazer. We got a toyota highlander, which was smaller, but we were still able to fit all the car seats in and all our luggage, so it was ok. Not great, but ok.
Then we drove to our resort. Sean went to check-in and they had us down for 2 two bedroom units. Thankfully I had printed our trip info so they changed it to 1 unit and we actually ended up with a 3 bedroom, which mean Megan got her own room. Then we hit the grocery store and Megan and I napped while Sean took Emma and Nathan swimming. We all crashed early that night since it was such a long day.
Thursday we went to Sea World. Emma rode her first big ride with dad, "Journey to Atlantis," and Nathan cried because he was too short to go. We saw every animal there and Nathan touhed the sting rays and tried to touch the dolphins. Emma wanted no part of touching anything. We saw the Shamu show "Believe" and it was awesome. I have some great pictures from that thanks to my awesome camera. We ended the day at Shamu's happy harbor, which is the kid area with a huge playground and some rides for smaller kids. As we were leaving it started raining and we all ended up soaked by the time we got to the car.
Friday we went to Aquatica since that was going to be the hottest day while we were in Florida. The park is amazing. I took some pictures, but they just don't do the park justice. There are 5 different kinds of slides for bigger kids/adults, several slides for smaller kids, a gigantic water play area for kids with slides, two wave pools, a lazy river, and a thing called "Roa's Rapids," which is like a really fast moving lazy river. You can't use tubes to float on in the rapids, but they have life jackets to wear so you can just float along instead of swimming the whole way. They had life jackets for every size person on racks all over the park, and the kids are required to wear life jackets if under a certain height. They also have towel and locker rentals. I suggest bringing in the bare minimum of things you need and put them in a locker beecause you will be moving from place to place a lot and who really wants to lug all their crap around all day. Aquatica also did not allow outside food for lunch into the park. They are supposed to be building a picnic area so you can, it just wasn't finished yet. Even though there was a tornado watch in the area it was a great day and we all had a good time.
Saturday was much cooler and we spent the day shopping and at downtown disney. The kids enjoyed the incredibly huge disney store they have there. The kids all got "first trip to Disney" pins, and Emma got a phone call from goofy. They also got to pick out something to buy from the store. Emma and Nathan both picked cup sets. Emma's is the disney princess collection, and Nathan's is "Finding Nemo". Megan got a small set of disney princess characters.
Sunday we went to Disney World. It was an amazing day. The excitement on the kids faces was definitely the best part of the trip. We got to see all the parades and the show in from of Cinderella's castle about dreams coming true. I have to admit I got a little teary-eyed a couple of times just watching the kids and seeing how in awthey were of everything. Nathan and dad rode the teacups and the big thunder mountain railroad. Nathan and I rode barnstormers ride in the kid area. We all rode the dumbo ride, the grand prix race cars, the jungle cruise ride, and it's a small world. I really think Emma was a litle freaked out by the ride at Sea World, so she was hesitant to ride anything at disney. We also went through the Swiss Family Robinson tree house and went over to Tom Sawyer's island. The kids got to meet Alice and the Mad Hatter from Alice in Wonderland. It doesn't really sound like we did much but with all the walking and waiting in line the day went by waay to fast. Now I know why people have to go to Disney for more than one day. With all the lines and people it's impossible to fit everything into one. We ended the day with the spectro magic parade and the Wishes fireworks show. Emma and Nathan stayed awake the whole day, even on the ferry ride back to the car, but we didn't make it out of the parking lot before everyone was asleep.
Monday we slept in and then headed to clearwater beach. It was warm enough outside to enjoy playing at the beach for a couple of hours, but the water was waaaaay to cold to go swimming at all. The kids had a good time away playing in the sand and running around.
Tuesday we had to be out of the resort by 10am, so we packed up and headed back to downtown disney since we didn't get to see everything the first day we went. We ended up having lunch there that day and that ended up being Wetzel's Pretzels and Haagen Daas ice cream. What good parent I am, huh? All well, the kids had a good time. Then we drove down international drive to kill some more time. Finally it was time to head to the airport to drop off the car. We loaded up the car seats in the bag and loaded down everyone with all our stuff. Obviuosly we looked like we need lots of help because we got lots of offers on the way in, but we really did have everything under control. The plane arriving from New York was slightly delayed, and then once we got on the plane the outside lights stopped working, so they couldn't finish loading our bags. We ened up delayed almost an hour. Thankfully Nathan and Megan both fell asleep on the plane after about an hour, which made being delayed not so bad.
We mde it home with some really crabby kids, but everyone had a great trip. I definitely was not ready to come home at all. The kids were incredibly well behaved in Florida. Of course we had a couple of incidents, but I'm happy to report we were not that family with the kids throwing themselves on the ground and screaming about things. Emma and Nathan can't wait to go back, and honestly, neither can I.
Saturday, March 8, 2008
in Florida
Just wanted to say we are havinga great time in Florida and the weather here is gorgeous. I have tons of pictures and stories to share. We are hitting Disney tomorrow and I can't wait!
Saturday, March 1, 2008
stroller dilemna
I really thought I was going to just take our single stroller with us, but now I'm thinking about not taking it and instead renting a double stroller at disney and sea world. They cost $18.00 a day so it would cost us $36, plus tax probably, to avoid the hassle of another piece of equipment we have to haul through the airport and then to the rental car. I think $18.00 a day is expensive for a stroller rental, but I've heard that the strollers are great, and since it might be more convenient than taking ours I'm leaning toward doing it. What does everyone else think? Should we take ours and add to our ever increasing pile of things to take, or just spend the $36.00 and rent a stroller at the parks when we need them? Please help me decide!
aquatica pictures
I finally found a website with actual pictures of Sea World's Aquatica. Go here then click on the arrows at the top to scroll through the pictures. I am so excited to go.
The site I found the pictures on is really cool. They have news and pictures from theme parks all over the world. Sean has recently been talking about a new AB project in dubai, and we found pictures of the plans for that. They are building a sea world, aquatica, discovery cove, and busch gardens all on a man mad island in dubai. The island is in the shape of a killer whale. I would love to be able to go there someday. World's of Discovery-dubai.
The site I found the pictures on is really cool. They have news and pictures from theme parks all over the world. Sean has recently been talking about a new AB project in dubai, and we found pictures of the plans for that. They are building a sea world, aquatica, discovery cove, and busch gardens all on a man mad island in dubai. The island is in the shape of a killer whale. I would love to be able to go there someday. World's of Discovery-dubai.
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