My boys are learning to spell

I am glad to report that school is teaching my boys to spell. The other day I was asking the husband what a phrase meant that just happened to include the word b*tch. I finished spelling the word and EE quickly said the word out loud. Although we thought it was pretty funny we knew we couldn't let on. We explained the definition of the word and that it was not a nice word.
Yeah for school.

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In other funny news, the baby every once in a while will take a shower instead of a bath. The other night as the water was warming up in the shower, we were all in my room. All of the sudden the baby disappears. The husband runs into the bathroom and he is standing in the shower fully clothed playing with the squeegee.

Let's play

Last weekend was fairly busy for us but we managed to get some things done around the house. On Friday and part of Saturday the boys moved the sand from the driveway to the new sandbox in the backyard. I looked around on-line and found a 7X8X12 Hexagon shape sandbox. The husband thought about building one but in the end decided it would be faster, easier and maybe cheaper to just buy one. It is one awesome sandbox.


The boys helped their dad load sand into the wheel barrel.


This is what is looks like.

I keep forgetting to take my camera out when the boys are actually playing in the box. They LOVE having the sandbox. I have to admit it makes more work on me trying to keep sand out of the house but so worth it. They will play for hours in the box.

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I have enrolled the baby in a My Gym class on Wednesdays. He has a great time when we go there. He loves to climb, jump and run. Here are a few pictures of him from this past week.


He has finally started to figure out the trampoline. There is another larger one in the room that he likes to jump on also.


Always climbing up on things. He sees something underneath the landing and decides to come back down to investigate.


His most favorite thing is the ball pit. This week they had it set up where they had to climb up the ladder and had to slide down the slide to get in. He had a ton of fun.

I have met a few ladies in the class. It seems like most of the people I know are local, it almost seems odd to find a transplant here. This week I met this one lady who moved from Texas about 3 years ago. She thought the same thing I did regarding the people not being as nice here. But she has learned to not let that get to her. I guess I have started to as well. Class will run through the first part of November. I think we will take a break and then start back up after the new year.

2 head traumas in a matter of 4 days

I knew the title would get your attention. But first the funniest thing happened this weekend. We were at our neighbors on Sunday evening. There were 3 other families there with us. The kids were swimming and the adults were indulging in a drink and a little conversation. All of the sudden my husband gets up from his chair walks by me and says I think a bird just pooped on my head. While he is talking he is lowering his head, my husband is a lot taller than I am. And sure enough he had bird poop on his head. When he comes back all of us could not help but laugh. Just in case you were wondering, he said if felt like someone cracked an egg on his head. It hit his head and then oozed down.

I know you are wanting to know what head traumas and who. Friday, Jay was in our bathroom getting ready for a shower. The boys have to alternate who is in the bath and who is in the shower every night. I am in the bathroom with him. I opened a drawer and left it open as I was going to put something back. He reached down to grab a ball and stood back (actually jerked up as hard as he could) up under the drawer. He screamed bloody murder. I took a look at his head and the blood started gushing out. At this point I am thinking that this may be an ER run. I stuck him in the shower to get the blood off of the wound. It was actually a very small cut and not deep. No one ever wants to go to the ER but I think Friday would be a really bad night to visit.

Last night, the baby was playing on the metal bleachers at baseball practice. He somehow fell on the bleachers and hit is mouth. I picked him up and blood started accumulating in his mouth. A lot of blood. I only had wipes and I was sticking them in his mouth to soak up the blood. He cried a good bit. I took him home and was able to get a good look at his mouth. He cut his gum on top of his two front teeth. He also cut his Frenulum. I took him to the Dentist this morning because it didn't look much better than last night. She concurred that his split his Frenulum and did damage to his gums. But the mouth heals quickly. She also suspects the trauma may affect his two front teeth, which may turn black at some point. Luckily, these are baby teeth so no harm done. The baby was so good today and let the dentist look inside his mouth without so much as a fuss.

I know that our days rushing a child to the ER are just beginning. We have kids who are active and play sports. I tend to be a little more lax about injuries than my husband. He tends to think everything needs to be looked at by an MD. I know he will shake his head when he reads this. But it is the truth. He tends to get a little more anxious whenever we have a bad injury. It is good that I am able to offset him a little.

Tipping

When we moved in we were receiving the weekend paper. We figured the previous owner forgot to change it over and eventually she would figure it out. Well, it came for a good while and at this point I thought it would be embarrassing to do anything. Then what looked like a bill came in the mail addressed to the previous owner so I sent it back to let them know she had moved. Soon after we stopped receiving any newspapers.



We signed up to receive the Washington Post just a few weeks ago. Sunday morning the husband brought in the newspaper as he does most weekends. He takes the newspaper out of the plastic wrap. This week an envelope fell out. Curiously we looked at it and it was addressed to the newspaper person. The husband looks at me and says I guess she wants a tip.



I really didn't want to get started on this topic but I have to get it off my mind. Keep in mind that we moved almost a year ago and we have had a lot of work done on our house. We have had movers on both sides of the move, the inside of the house painted, landscaping, furniture delivered, the outside painted, an irrigation system put in and other things I am probably forgetting. Then there are the normal places we frequent that requires tipping. The servers in restaurants, hairdressers/barbers, the coat check in areas at museums and such and even the people who show you to your seat at a baseball game. My hair shop have people who wash your hair who require a tip. When did this happen? Every shop I went to in the past the beautician who cut your hair also washed it. When I went to pay for the class I signed the baby up for at My Gym...had a tip line also (which by the way I left blank). I don't even want to think about how much I have actually paid out in tips in the last year.



It is almost expected that tips be paid. I had sand delivered for the sand box we purchased (more on that later). The guy had me sign a delivery paper and then made casual conversation with me (maybe waiting for his tip). I didn't have a tip for him. Isn't he doing his job and I paid enough for the sand. Did you know you should tip if you receive a flower delivery?



If you Google "how much to tip" you will get many results back. I looked at The Original Tipping Page and it gives you a list on how much to tip. According to this site I am probably under tipping in certain respects. Another site I looked at was a Gentleman's guide . A bit sexist but I looked at it anyways. This site provides several reason on why to tip.



We are done with the work that needs to be done to our house. I can not bear to pay another tip out in the near future. Is it just me?

Dueling lawn mowers

Yesterday as the husband was mowing the lawn the baby was following him with his lawn mower for a very long time.


I could never catch the baby with his finger pointing up at his Dad as he was giving him pointers on how to mow the lawn.


Sometimes he followed.




And sometimes he didn't.

Back to school night

The boys have been in school for 3 weeks now. So far all is going well. Back to school was held on Monday night. There was a presentations made by the administration and then you had an opportunity to go into your child(ren)'s classroom to talk to the teacher and look around.

This year the school has a new principal. This itself is not a bad thing in my opinion. The old principal had a pretty big social network at school. She lives in this district and was neighbors to many whose kids go to our school. We moved here in November of last year, so I only experienced part of the year under her leadership. She seemed to do a good job but probably had too many friends around. The new principal is certainly not looking at making friends and it is very apparent. She is not a warm and friendly person. Our school has a very active PTA and many Moms like to volunteer their time in the classroom. The new principal has made it almost uncomfortable if you step foot in the school. Now I do feel like she is having the staff enforce visitor rules for the safety of our children (and who wouldn't want that). Most of my neighbors have been at the school for many years now. It is a newer school and has had the same principal since it opened. I hear my friends talk about how different it seems around there. I really want the teachers to be happy, if not it will probably affect our children in some way. I will wait until I form my opinion on the new principal.

I spoke a bit with Jay's teacher. This is her second year teaching but she seems very organized and put together. I understand last year she had a few hyperactive boys that she could not handle (it was her first year) who were subsequently taken out of her room. She raved about how Jay was doing in class. He is very well behaved and when he finishes his work he gets a book to read while he waits for others to finish. She also said how glad she was that EE was back at school. I thought it was nice of her to mention that.

I didn't get a chance to actually speak to EE's teacher about him. Both boys wrote a note to us in their journal and we left them one back. EE left us a paper with his number one goal for first grade. You ready for this one? His goal is to not talk in line. He is not much of a talker so I am sure this one will come easy for him. The class also answered questions and you had to guess which child was yours. The questions were: how many brothers, sisters, I like to play (EE wrote yes) and I love my (EE wrote my Mom). I picked his out right away.

I am a room parent for both teachers. One of my responsibilities is to handle the volunteer calendar for both teachers. I am looking forward to getting a little more involved in the classroom. I always like to experience the class dynamics. It should be a fun year!

TROUBLE (note all caps)

Here are a few pictures of the baby. I am a little biased but I think he is a cutey.

I stepped out to get the grocery bags out of the car. I walk in to find the

baby at the counter drinking out of a water bottle.

Here he is drinking.

And of course, he puts the cap back on. He did this maybe 6 or 7 times.

And although I think he is a cutey he is also very mischievous. I picked him up from the gym child watch area after my workout today and was told he hit a child on the head (not provoked). So I had to explain that I am working on trying to get him to stop hitting. I told the worker that I put him in time out and I would like for them to do the same. She said they normally wait until the child is 2, but that she would put a note in the file. Great! A note in the file and he is only 18 months. That is going to be one gigantic file.

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Ok, so we have some behavioral issues to take care of but he is doing and saying so much. He favorite (and first) phrase is "Is that Mommy?" or "Is that mine?". He says this over and over and over. Today he pointed to a picture of a man in my magazine and said "Is that Daddy?". Speaking of firsts, his first animal sound was that of a donkey. He loves to say "hee haw". No, we don't live on a farm but we have a really cute book with farm animals (from Grandma) and I guess he liked the donkey. He does try to say a lot of what we are saying. He just picked up yuck from me. I admit that I am constantly telling him that what he is putting in his mouth is yuck. He likes to eat chalk, mulch and pretty much anything else in sight.

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It is amazing that in the last month or so he started understanding what we are saying. It seems like for so long I would ask him a question and I would get the blank look. Now when I ask him a question he will shake his head yes or no. It is very cute when I tell him we are going outside, he will go find his shoes.

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His most favorite things to do: go up and down the stairs on his own, turn light switches on and off, climb on things (up to the table, into his high chair) and when we are outside throw balls into the street.

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I have to say he is a Mommy's boy. He does not like to be out of sight from Mom. If I leave the room he starts to cry and then will try to find me. He will say "mommy" and repeat it a few hundred times. So I have started saying his name back to him when he says mine. It is a cute little game.

B-Ball, both of them

The boys started basketball on Saturday. Well, Jay started basketball and EE chickened out. EE tends to have a hard time on the first get together. He went in fine and then all of the sudden when they started doing the warm up exercises the look came my way. I pointed and told him to join in and then the tears came. I ignored him and the coach told him to go sit with his Mom. I digress for a minute. I was sitting next to the Mom of a child that is in Jay's class. She has one child and made it very clear that he is spoiled. I have heard he is a little rambunctious in class. As EE is walking towards me the conversation with the other Mom went something like this:

Other Mom: Does he know about Power Rangers

Me: Yes (thinking why is this important)

Other Mom: Tell him to use his magic powers from within

Me: What, oh no they don't watch power rangers

Other Mom: Why don't you go join in with him and that will make him feel better and stay in

Me: No. He tends to be shy in the first class and then he will be fine.

Other Mom: Let's go join him....I will go with you.

Me: No.

A bit bizarre if you ask me. My boys are too old to be coddled. So EE sat out and both the husband and I were so upset with him. Rest assured this will not happen next Saturday.
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On Sunday the boys had their 2nd baseball game. They are the Aberdeen Iron Birds. Here are a few pictures of them.


EE, the baby and Jay. The baby has to be in the middle of everything.


EE at bat.

Jay at bat

EE and Jay.

The both did well. The each had two hits at bat and one out at bat. It unfortunately is blazing hot here today. The baby and I only stayed for the top of one inning.

I am no Martha Stewart

Mascarpone cheesecake with an almond crust

I do love to bake, but the recipes need to be simple. I made this cheesecake (crust and all) yesterday. It doesn't take long to make and it is absolutely delicious. If you decide you want to give it a try the recipe is here. It is a Giada recipe. I really love watching her show. She seems to make really good dishes that are fairly easy to make. Her show used to come on Sunday mornings at 7:00 and all of us would pile on the bed to watch her show. I really need to find out when her show is on so that I can DVR it.

I feel very domestic all of the sudden. I have been stuck at home since last week because of sick children. I really can't wait to get back to my routine of getting to the gym and running all my errands during the week. I do have to say, I have gotten so much done with this time. I have continued my quest to clean out drawers and toys and whatever else I happen to stumble across. I also got my 500 pictures ordered and they should be here next week. My first project with the pictures will be to get the baby's first year album done. I am doing separate albums for all my boys. They will each have several albums that will be there to take with them (at the right age). For the most part all their albums will be the same.

We are going to a friends house for dinner tonight. I will call her Babs. She is such an incredibly sweet person (a little over the top sometimes). She was one of the first people to befriend me when we moved in. She has a son that was in the same class as Jay last year. She does understand that it is a little harder to be out with the baby and always makes accommodations when we get together. She has an older daughter that will help watch the baby while we are there. We look forward to a nice evening.

An EE update. He is doing much better today. No fever, however, he is really congested. We heard him cry out in his sleep a few times last night.

A plate full of yack!

I remind myself that I must listen to my children and get tuned in with what they tell me. EE had a great evening last night. He ate dinner and then went to bed with no fever. I knew I wouldn't send him to school. The rules state that your child must be fever free for 24 hours. He ate breakfast fine and played outside for a little while. Then mid-morning he spiked another fever, as high as 102.8. At lunch time he said he was hungry so I warmed up some pizza, gave him chocolate milk and he asked for a banana with a little bit of peanut butter. He took a few bites of banana and drank his milk. I requested he take just a few bites more of peanut butter, he needs some protein. All of the sudden I see him choke up. Before I could ask him if he was going to throw up I see it coming. I reach over and pull his head down on his lunch plate. Not so appetizing for me.

If he continues to run a fever I will call the doc. in the morning. It will be 6 days tomorrow. This brings back memories from last year around the same time. He was in the hospital for a week because he was running a fever and he had pain in his lower abdomen. He had every test you could imagine while he was in the hospital. All test came back negative or clear. I remember one of the docs telling me that you always don't get answers to the cause of pain. She told me when she was young that she was hospitalized several times with no diagnosis. I did not like that explanation but we didn't have any choice to accept it. At least this go around he doesn't have excruciating pain.

Another day at home

The baby is all clear. We will only keep him on medication for the next week and then he will come off. I guess she didn't read his chart regarding the other nurse practitioners telling me to keep him on Pulmicort (steroid) for the remainder of the season. I really would just like to be able to see my Doc all the time. It is hard to get in with her on same day sick visits. But the positive side is that you rarely have to wait too long before the Doc/NP is in the room with you.

EE was running another fever today. I took him to the Doc since this is the 4th day. They did a strep test on him, which I don't know why. He has had strep before and I remember his throat hurt so bad and he had no appetite. The Doc had to get his mouth open with a tongue depressor. He ended up losing WII privileges for the rest of the week. How incredibly silly.

On the way home Jay ended up giving me attitude in the car. I so wanted to jump in the back of the car and get into his face. He has a lot of attitude that will not get him very far in this household. He has lost his WII privilege also.

So EE will stay home yet another day. I am hoping that he has no fever tomorrow and will be at school on Friday. He needs to get out of the house and I need my quiet time during the day.

Glad to have gotten through the day

EE was home sick again today. He was fine today but he was running a fever last night and I felt like it would not be right to send him to school today. He spiked a temp this evening but I think it was just a normal fluctuation in body temp. I have not been getting him to drink enough fluids. He had a bath and he was in bed very early. He really needs a good nights sleep. I hope he gets that tonight and will be ready to go to school in the morning. School pictures are being taken tomorrow. You got to love this, I have an order form that must be sent in tomorrow. Yes, I have to buy pictures that I have not seen. Is that not crazy.

I got notes home from school the other day that both Jay and EE will be going to different classrooms for Math. We think that Josh will be going into a more advanced class and that EE will be going into a class where they offer a little more assistance. Math is not EE's thing. He loves to read, so we hope his strong point will be English.

The baby was a big cranky mess today. He is continually hitting me and his brothers, his punishment is to sit in his time out chair (I am out of site). He was throwing my groceries out of the cart at the grocery store and then trying to hit my hands. To top it all off he decided he did not need a nap today. He spent 1 hour and 15 minutes in his bed playing. Needless to say, he was in bed tonight at 7pm.

I am hoping that tomorrow will be a back to normal day. I have to take the baby to the Doc for a check up on his wheezing. We then will be going to his My Gym class. I will try to remember my camera.

A Saturday washout/One a fever, two a fever, three a fever

Tropical storm Hanna made her way through here on Saturday and brought us some much needed rain. I decided to tackle a few more projects that I had not been able to complete on my projects weekend. I also started working on organizing my pictures for printing so that I can work on photo albums. The boys had a lazy day watching movies and playing WII.

The rain brought us another house headache. The bedroom in the master bedroom has leaked from time to time when it rains. When the rain comes in at a certain angle it somehow gets into the framing and wets the drywall and then trickles down to the carpet. My husband caught the leaking early enough and decided to cut the drywall around the window off. Our window looks fabulous with pieces of drywall missing. Although he couldn't exactly tell where the leak was coming from we do know for certain that it is NOT coming from the roof. Our contractor neighbor feels like we should have the window taken out and resealed and then have all the drywall replaced. We are going to first make some calls to the builder.

It was a lazy weekend. Jay ended up coming home from school on Thursday with a fever. He was out on Friday and still was running a fever yesterday. Today he woke up and was fine. Today it is EE's turn as he was running a fever. The baby is doing fine. He is still wheezing but his congestion is clearing up. I am hoping that with EE it will just be a quick fever and be done, not a prolonged 3 day ordeal.

The boys had their first baseball game today. They have moved up to the machine pitch league. They both had one hit off the machine, I think they were at bat 3 or 4 times. It is now a little more like baseball. They play 6 innings and outs are called (3 outs and you switch). EE ended up sitting out because he was not feeling well. He kept telling us he was hot and we were getting really mad at him. I felt him and he did not feel hot to me. When we got home the thermometer read 103 degrees. Next time I will listen to him when he says he is not feeling well.

This year the boys are required to wear a cup for baseball. We started getting ready for the game while the husband was out. I put the cup into the special underwear. As soon as they put the underwear on they both started complaining. I guess it helps if you put the cup in the underwear the correct way, I put it in upside down. My disclaimer is that I don't have a penis so how am I supposed to know how it all works.

What a big jerk

I was told a story last week about a couple who lived across the street from our old house. She was mid thirties and he was late forties. This was his second marriage. From what they said, he was really sick when they met and she stayed with him until he got better. They got married and then moved across the street from me. She ended up being diagnosed with breast cancer. He supported her through her double mastectomy and reconstruction. They both became avid runners and started training for a marathon. That is a summary in a nutshell.

In June, they were having marital problems and he told her that he needed to move out but still wanted to work on it. One day she decided to drive by the hotel he was staying in and low and behold she sees her running partner's car parked in the lot. She called and confronted him and after much denial came clean. Yes, bad enough that he cheated on her with HER running partner. The part I really find horrifying is that he is now running in the old neighborhood with his new cheater girlfriend. Let's just put more salt in the wound. What is he thinking. Us ladies in the neighborhood new something didn't seem right about him, I guess we were correct. She is so nice and deserved much better than him.

No time for mid-life crisis in this home. My husband has told me that his mid-life crisis can involve getting a motorcycle. Sorry babe, not thinking that will happen. You need to start thinking about something else you may want to buy instead.

Baby is still sick but I need a break

The baby was looking so bad yesterday that I ended up taking him back to see the Doc. (actually a nurse practitioner). She really didn't like the way he looked or sounded. He is wheezing which was not determined the day prior when I had him checked. She prescribed an antibiotic to hopefully prevent pneumonia. We will also continue his breathing treatments and have him checked in a week.

I took my scripts the Doc wrote me the other day with the medications I have been administering to the baby. All last winter, I used the same script from our old Doc. in NC. One of the meds I have been giving him is an adult dosage. I am a little concerned about why I would have been prescribed this dosage. It could have been a mistake or intentional. I don't know but I will talk to his current Doc about it next week.

The baby once again kicked Dad out of bed so that he could sleep with me. He slept fairly well, but every once in a while he would want to climb back up on me to go back to sleep. I am hoping the baby will sleep in his own bed for the night, he really needs a good night sleep as do I.

Now to my break. I called my babysitter yesterday to see if she could come sit while I get away for a while. You have to remember the baby has literally been on me or carried by me for the last 3 days. I really just needed a few hours to call my own. It worked out and I had 3 whole hours to myself. I missed being in the gym so I went to my barbell workout class and then I went to Target. How nice was it to stroll the aisles not having to entertain someone in the cart. It was heaven and what I needed. The baby even ended up going down for a nap in the afternoon for 2 1/2 hours.

Hopefully, back to a somewhat normal house tomorrow.

Me and my shadow

The baby is still really sick. He didn't sleep much last night and as you can probably guess I didn't either. I think the congestion is starting to break up but he still can't breathe very well. He also has not eaten much for the last three days. He is really pathetic. I put him in his crib to see if he could sleep for a little bit and this is my opportunity to get some things done around the house. I have not been able to do much because where ever I am the baby is right there with me in my arms.

Baby sickness update

The baby woke up from his nap with 103 degree temp and having a hard time breathing. I decided to take him in to the Dr. I didn't get to see my normal Doc. He just has a normal cold but since he has compromised lungs the sickness tends to be harder on his body. We are back to his neubulizer treatments and she wants me to keep him on a once a day dose throughout the rest of the season. I need to confer with my normal doc on this. I really would like to wait and see how it goes the next time he gets sick. I would just like to make sure that the benefits of keeping his lungs clear outweigh the negative effects the medication can have on his body. I need to do my research on the medications.

A sick baby

We had a nice long weekend. We didn't get to go to any of the places I wanted to because I was so focused on the house. But I think the boys had a good time hanging out. Yesterday, we went to my neighbors for a cookout. They seem to have people over to their house all the time. It is nice that they include us. Our boys get along with all of the other kids that typically hang out at their house.

The baby is sick. He started with a runny nose and now he is just completely stuffed. I know that I must have jinxed my luck the other day at the Dr's office when I said he has not been sick and nor have we had a wheezing episode. He did not sleep well last night and I ended up bringing him into bed with me around 4:30 am. He was having a hard time staying asleep. He would fall asleep and then be startled awake because he couldn't breathe. So I ended up giving him some medicine and tried to clean up his nose a bit. Then I sat up in my bed and held him a little upright so that his nose would drain. He ended up falling asleep for a little while. Me, well you can just say that I am pretty tired. I didn't sleep well because I was listening to him cough most of the night. I don't like it when my boys are sick.

Lots of progress

First of all, here are pictures of the landscape work we had done last week.

This is what we did around the pool equipment. There used to be a big ugly white fence around it.

Directly behind our house. I mentioned that we would need to wait a few years for the plants to mature. We initially did not like the weeping willow but it has started to grow on us. It is especially nice because it provides a little bit of privacy. I understand that weeping willows are no longer on the approved list of plants for the neighborhood.

This is on the side of the house.

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We managed to clean out our storage area this weekend. Here is a picture of the before. The picture doesn't really do it justice, it was jammed pack and barely able to walk in the room.

After! It is nice to have a husband who is good at organizing in confined spaces. We got rid of a lot of stuff.

The other major project was to get my office organized. I was way too embarrassed to take a picture of the before and after but let's just say I can actually see my desk top. I still have more to do but I am definitely making progress.

Always thinking about the three letter word

We were in the car the other day and I pointed out a lady that I had met recently. I told my husband that she was another Suzy Q(a lady from NC we knew). And he said oh did she have sex in a bathroom at a special event. Suzy Q was not very talkative and it wasn't easy having a conversation with her. I would ask questions and hope to get along response but usually just a yes or no from her. Every time I was with her I would make a comment to my husband on how difficult it was to talk with her. I told him the story about her having sex with her husband in the bathroom at a wedding one time. See what I mean.