New!

I have new scrapbook pages up if you are interested in seeing them. :) Click here!

PS. Keep reading - there are a couple new posts below this one. I know, I know...it's feast or famine around these parts. *grin*

Yesterday

Yesterday my big boy had his second playdate without me. I can't believe he is old enough to go to someone's hours for hours and hours without me. And yet, he is. He did great and had "such a great day" (which he told me about three times while I was getting things ready for bedtime).

Here is a picture that Declan's mom put up on her blog. The three boys eating corn, fresh from their garden. Isn't K adorable? :)



Thanks, M, for being brave enough to take on three boys. Wow! :)

*sigh*

My computer is acting all wonky......no clue what's wrong with it but we clearly need someone to come look at it. I love technology (and cars, for that matter) but when they don't work as they should I just want to kick them right out the dang window.

Luckily, I bought an external hard-drive earlier in the year so I sent some time earlier today transfering over the photo files and document files that haven't been transferred over since July. At least I feel good about that....you know, just incase it decides to crash and burn and take all my photos with it.

I really should get hard-copies of the photos made. I really, really should.

So that's the latest from here. Oh - and we are on Day 4 of D being in school. So far, so good. A few rocky moments but all in all, we're doing ok.

More later.

We're Home!

And we had a fabulous time!! Here is a video montage to entertain you and, if you want more or would like to skip the montage and just see pictures, you can do that here. Stories to come later. :)

Enjoy!

Edit video online at onetruemedia.com

Meeska - Mooshka - Mickey Mouse!

So - while you are all going about your regular routine this week, we'll be off in sunny (and probably far too hot for me) Southern California. It's true - we're going back to the land of the mouse. Are you envious? :) We're all so excited we can barely stand ourselves. The kids were bouncing off the walls tonight - even Baby K was yelling "POOH!" and screaming with delight when she saw pictures of Mickey. Way too cute. :)

Here are a few pictures from our last trip (in May) to entertain you. Have a good week, everyone!

New Scrapbook Pages

I finally had a few moments to work on scrapbook pages last night and tonight. I think they turned out pretty dran cute. I would have uploaded them individually but blogger doesn't seem to want to upload photos for me anymore so this format will have to do. Enjoy!



Credits:
Princess Page - Words from Brandie Valenzuela, paper from Heather Milano and frame from Shawna Clingerman

Wild Child Page - kit is Cabana Boy by Dani Mogstadt

Water Baby

Tracey was kind enough to ask for an update on Baby K and the Hand, Foot & Mouth Disease. I posted back to her in a comment but incase you missed it, I thought I would post an update.

I am happy to report that the HF&M is eradicated from our house. Thank goodness. I am all too happy to never repeat that experience again.

Baby K is back to her happy go-lucky self and I couldn't be more thrilled to have her that way.

She has one carry over from being sick though that is bound to drive me nutty; she wants to spend the day playing in the kitchen sink with the water running. LOL! We popped her into a sink full of water after she threw up the first day and then for a few days after that because it would ease her crankiness. Now, however, she feels she should be in the sink any ol' time she wants. I'm good with once a day (it's great to have her right there, happily playing, while I clean the kitchen, etc.) but she begs for it all day long. Ugh.

But still....a healthy waterloving baby is better than a sick one. I'll deal. :)

Here's a couple picture I snapped today of my little water baby in the sink.

A Mixed CD?

Tonight, while D was playing with the kids, I jumped into the new car to go run a couple of errands and there, in the cd changer, was a mixed cd. You know the kind....a mix-n-match selection of music which is usually put together for one's own enjoyment or to give as a gift to someone you like (ie: crush, affair, etc).

Call it a hunch but I knew that D did not create this cd for herself. Which left the burning question "Who the heck gave her a mixed cd????"

I skipped through the first few songs, pausing long enough only to figure out what song it was. I started feeling woozy. This is *not* the music I would expect to find in the cd player. Ugh.

So I did was any semi-reasonable woozy person would do. I finished my transaction at the post office and I called her cell phone to inquire.

K picked up. I asked for mom. He took the phone to her and after she said "Hello?" I said "Umm....who gave you a mixed cd?" She started the laugh. I was confused.

"Rick." came the answer. Apparently she told her co-worker buddy that the new car has MP3 capabilities and he gave her a cd of music to try out in the car.

Ahhhhhhhh! Ok - that explains a lot. She also went on to say "I skipped through the first 20 songs...it isn't exactly the stuff I like. He listens to some great music at work so I thought that's what would be on it but it's not. I briefly thought about you finding it in the car and what you might think." My girl knows me well.

I felt the wooziness clear. The green-eyed monster receded into the background. I felt so much better.

Mixed cd's (or mixed tapes as my generation called them) set off alarms in my head. It takes me back to high school and slightly beyond. Do people even make mixed cd's for other people anymore? It's just so darn cheesy.

I mean - I'd gladly be on the receiving end of one from D (and only her) but then, I am a product of my generation. I know what they mean; "Here. Listen to these songs. They make me think of you (or of our illicit affair)."

It's probably what they still mean. I just don't want anyone giving D a mixed cd. Well - Rick can. But no one else better.

:)

My Little Robots

The Halloween costume catalogs are already out and K has been going nuts looking through them every day trying to decide what he will be for Halloween. During bath the other night he decided that he wanted to make a robot costume before bed. So what are a couple of over-indulgent moms to do? Put off bedtime for about an hour and create silly costumes to make the kids happy. And happy they were!

Here are a couple of photos as well as two short movies. These two little guys had a blast! And yes, it appears that we do indeed let our son run with scissors. Ok - not *run* but he definitely has his safety scissors in his hands. How else did we expect him to be able to cut that tape he is also carrying around? :)

And I bet you will wonder why they are hanging out in Miss K's room while they sing and dance. Easy enough to answer: that's the only room with a full length mirror in it so they can see themselves. :)

Enjoy!





Video Hosting - Upload Video - Video Sharing



Video Hosting - Upload Video - Video Sharing

Some of the fun we had this weekend.....

Eighteen Month Well Visit

Ok - it was *supposed* to be a well visit but as it turned out, it was a sick visit with shots. *sigh*

As you have read, Baby K came down with a whopping case of Hand, Foot and Mouth disease on Tuesday. The poor girl is miserable and, as a result, so is everyone in the house. K is feeling the pain of getting much less attention and the moms are feeling the pain of having a very sick little girl who is clingy and in tears much of the day and night. It's a stress that wears on a person, that's for sure. What I wouldn't do for 2 hours of solid sleep.

Anyway - the doctor gave her the once over today and concurred with my diagnosis (having gone through this in January with K, I was quick to figure it out this time around). And since the girl is already miserable, we talked it over and decided to give her the two vaccinations due today. This way, we won't have to go back in a week or two and go through a couple more miserable days. I felt a bit evil at giving them to her but also relieved that I didn't have to lug the kids back to the doctors office in a week or so.

But- other than the HFMD, Miss K is looking good. She weighed in at 25.4lbs, is 32.5 inches tall and her head is 18.75 inches. That puts her in the 60th percentile for weight and 75th for the others. Her weight percent has dropped but everything else is holding steady. All in all, a good report for that.

We talked about her never ending saga in the stop breathing department but since it doesn't sound like seizures and since the heart tests all came out ok it appears to be something she just needs to outgrow. She only does it after trauma (falling, sudden fright, etc) which means it doesn't sound like a seizure disorder (thank God!). We had gone an entire 4 months without an episode but that streak came to a crashing end Monday after she lost her balance and fell while crawling through the bath water to get to D. (I guess that would have scared me as well) I had *almost* forgotten that terror when she stops breathing. D had her in her arms this time - I'm not sure if it was easier or more difficult not to have physical control in the situation. It terrified D, that's for sure.

So anyway - long story short: even though she is sick right now, Miss K looks healthy and is doing well. I, however, am in complete disbelief that my baby turned 18 months old today. Unbelievable. Just a year and a half ago today we were watching our baby, attached to tubes and machines in the NICU. How far she has come! :)

-Casey

Here We Go Again

My house has once again been invaded by Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease. If you remember back to this past January, K contracted it pretty severely. At the time, baby K had a couple sores and was pretty miserable. She never had the mouth sores as bad as K but enough that we were pretty sure whe would now be immune.

So not the case.

*sigh*

She is sick, sick, sick. It started Monday with her just being off her game. I figured she just needed to rest after our wirlwind weekend. Goodness knows both K and I did, too. Monday night she was a nursing machine and then Tuesday AM she hurled after eating breakfast. D thought she saw something on her tongue but from the not-so-great look we got, we chalked it up to left over hurling. Since she didn't throw up again, we assumed she over-ate (which she tends to do during a growth spurt). By yesterday afternoon we had an extremely cranky girl on our hands. We finally got a good look in her mouth and yep.....bunches of little sores.

Last night was hell. She was miserable and cried in pain.

Today has been a nightmare as well.

I finally plopped her in her carseat tonight and drove her around until she fell asleep. She's sleeping now.

If this is really day three then we either have four or seven days left of this. Ugh. Tomorrow just happens to be her pre-scheduled well baby visit (now there's a joke!) so at least I'll be taking her to the doctor to have her checked out. I know there is nothing they can do for HFMD except wait it out but still...always nice to have a sick child looked at. She won't be getting her 18 month shots though, that's for sure.

*sigh* My poor baby girl. :(

Thank you, Cristin!!

The mail carrier brought me a great surprise today from Cristin. Clothes for Baby K! Lots and lots of adorable outfits that her daughter has outgrown (Avery is 3 now). I swear to you these clothes are in the most amazing shape. If I didn't know better (which come to think of it, I don't *grin*) I'd say these items have never, ever been worn. What an amazing gift. Thank you, Cristin. Thank you SO much. What an amazing thing to do for someone you only know via the internet. I am overwhelmed by your generosity.


The box immediately after I retrieved it from the mail carrier:

Look how tightly packed it is!


Just look at all these great clothes!



PS..Keep reading. There are more posts from today. I've been busy. :)

P-U!

A dog stinks a few hours after it gets thrown up on. Really, really, really stinks. Like it rolled in something very dead.

I'm just saying......

Brain Dump

So - this past weekend we went up to Seattle to help (though I'm not convinced we were of any help whatsoever what with the kids and all) settle my parents into an adult family home. As some of you may remember from earlier postings, my parents had been living in an assisted living situation for the past 2.5 years. My mom has a neuro-muscular disease called Primary Lateral Sclerosis which is akin to, and often mistaken for or mis-diagnosed as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis or ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease). Conversely, I'd assume, the mis-diagnosis could also go the other way. But whatever the disease actually is (the doctor's say PLS, my sister seems convinced it is actually ALS (my great aunt and grandfather on my moms side had ALS though genetic testing on my mom says she does not have genetic ALS. More on that later.) it is not something you would wish on someone.

My mom's care needs have gone beyond assisted living so the next step was to move her to the adult family home (which is basically nursing home level care in a family type setting. The number of adults needing care in the homes vary based on the home itself. This home is set up for three care-needing residence.). This sucks on many levels. The first being the obvious: Mom is getting worse. The second reason this sucks is my dad doesn't need this level of care (he had a stroke 13 plus years ago which left him impaired but he is still a fine candidate for assisted living) however my parents don't' want to be split up. So - dad has moved into the house as a tenant (as opposed to a care-needing resident).

So - as hard as that all is to take in and deal with, I find that I am really bogged down by the weight of "what if this happens to me?" or.....the much worse and a hundred times more terrifying "What if this is something genetic that I have passed onto my beautiful children??" It scares me. Both things scare me.

My mom turns 68 years old this month. When I am the age where her symptoms started being noticeable (though not diagnosed. That wasn't done until 2.5 years ago) my son will only be 17 and my daughter will be 14. That is waaaaaaaaaaay too young to saddle them with something this enormous. And even if it weren't to strike me until I am 65.5, my kids would still only be 28 and 25. Still too damn young. I have four siblings. Does that better the odds or worsen them? I don't know. I wouldn't want any of them to have something like this either. Like I said, I wouldn't wish this on anyone.

And what about my kids? What about it happening to them? I can't even handle the thought.

Genetic testing was done. Mom does not have the genetic markers for ALS. But isn't it odd that my mom's father and aunt both had ALS and now my mom has either PLS or ALS? What are the chances? The average person has a 10% chance of developing ALS in their lifetime. That odds that two people in the same family (and a third with another similar disease) must be astronomical.

I feel awful for my mom (though I personally think she could have slowed the progression somewhat by actively fighting instead of basically rolling over and giving in) but on a whole different level, I am scared for myself and terrified for my kids.

Yeah yeah - we could all get hit by a bus tomorrow or develop some other disease....but that isn't the point. This is a "known" scenario....and it scares me.

The home, though, is a really nice place with really nice people. That part is good. Really good. The house has a great view of Puget Sound and from it you can hear both the trains and the ferry boats. Both of those things make my dad very happy. Like I said - it's a nice place. I just wish it wasn't someplace my parents needed to be.

Name That Baby

Does this baby look familiar? :)

Are You Kidding??? She Has MORE Photos??

Ok - I know you are thinking it but yes, it's true. I have MORE photos to show off. These are the photos I had taken the week of Baby K's adoption - she is all dressed up in her Adoption Day dress (Thank You, Cristin!) and I think she is beautiful.

Enjoy!

I love this one! Her eyes just sparkle!

But in this one you can see her pretty little dress.

She was supposed to play with the necklaces but she opted to remove the teddy from its place inthe water pitcher and love on it instead.

I love this picture because it captures her "Yeah, don't even bother trying to amuse me." look perfectly.There is just something about black and white.