Same Same

Baby Blues

I think Mary has earned herself a hot fudge sundae - these eyes look blue to me.

Oh Yes, There WILL be Snacks!

I have still been meeting Matt and the kids for lunch so I can feed Penelope. One day when they picked me up, Miles was very inquisitive about what mom does at work all day. He doesn't see the point of going, and frankly, sometimes I feel the same way. But most days, I do like my job. I would have to like it just a bit to be able to leave the three cutest kids in the world at home.

Anyway, Miles said, "Mom, what you do at work?" I said I write stories (blog posts), teach lessons (training meetings), create pictures (websites), and make up commercials (radio ads). He said, "Hmm... do you have snacks?" You can tell his priorities. I said of course I have snacks! I have string cheese and a chocolate shake (Special K protein drink) waiting for me after lunch. Miles was suitably impressed.

The Bumbo

Why do baby products have such funny names? ;) Penelope did well in her first try with the Bumbo - this one was at Mema's house. We need to find ours in storage. I have a feeling a lot of our baby stuff is in there still...

In the Nursery, With a Slide

Mr. Miles had a tough Sunday - he fell off the top of a small plastic slide during nursery class at church and broke his arm. The nursery workers came to get me and seemed very urgent - Miles fell really hard, they said... come quick! Well, how bad could it be?

Bad. His forearm was dented in at an unnatural angle that made me want to cry. But I didn't, and just scooped up Miles and went to get Matt from the primary class that we teach. Miles was crying, but not hard. He was surprisingly calm on the drive to the hospital. We got right into the Children's ER at UMC - I was hoping for a short visit, but knew it could be a long day. Betty came to pick up me and the girls so we didn't have to stay in triage, and to keep Penelope away from all the germs. Almost 8 hours later, Matt brought Miles home.

He broke both the bones in forearm - radius and ulna. They had to heavily sedate him to align the bones, and Matt wasn't allowed to be in there with him because I guess it looks pretty bad when they pull on the arm to put the bones back in the right spot.

The nurse gave Miles a Spider Man sticker - he just held on to it the whole time. He loves Spider Man right now, so it was the perfect choice!

Miles has a splint and sling on now, and then next week he will get a cast. I heard they make water proof casts that kids can swim in. That would be awesome! He is just taking over the counter meds and seems ok - just hard to sleep, and he gets cranky sometimes. Just look at this face!

First Week Lessons

Well, we made it through week one of work - and we are all still alive. A lot of this working with three kiddos will be trial and error until we get some sort of schedule down. Last week, I learned:

1. Penelope is stubborn. She did not suck on a bottle once! She just plays with it and she gets a few drops of milk in her mouth at a time. Matt said she maybe takes 1-2 ounces per feeding - way less than I think she takes when nursing. I met Matt over lunch to nurse her - I am thinking that might not have been the best idea, but it meant I didn't have to pump as many times, and I got to see her. But maybe now Penelope is figuring out she will get fed at lunch if she holds out long enough.

2. I have to do as much as I can the night before, or I forget it. That means, laptop, pump, snacks, lunch, purse, clothes for the next day, kids clothes (if they are going somewhere), and getting milk out to defrost.  And then anything that doesn't need to be refrigerated is put right at the front door so I would literally trip over it if I tried to leave without them.

3. Healthy dinners require planning - if I don't want to eat fast food for dinner, then I need to have something ready before I get home. This weekend I went to Weight Watchers and the leader said she has multiple crock pots going at a time on Sundays so she can get several meals prepped for the week. I got inspired and got my two crock pots out. As long as I have some different proteins made already, I think meals will be easy. This week we are going for a Mexican theme.

• Crock pot 1:  One cup of salsa, one can of black beans, 2 TB taco seasoning, and 4 chicken breasts on low for 8 hours. This makes a spicy chicken that is good for tacos, rice bowls or nachos. 
• Crock pot 2: Taco soup/Chili - ground turkey can go in uncooked - even partially frozen, and broken up later. It's an easy meal - mostly cans. Refried beans, diced tomatoes, green chilis, pinto beans, chili beans, taco seasoning and ground turkey. I am going to freeze half for another day. The taco soup can also be served over baked potatoes or rice with cheese and sour cream. 

4. I have finally trained my hair to go 3 days between washings - I am SO happy about that! When I am pregnant I really have to wash my hair every day because it is so greasy. But when not pregnant, I can usually go 2 days - add in some dry shampoo and now I am at 3 days. I think it's easier with my new haircut too. I have saved so much time on blow drying already. 

5. And finally, I learned that my co-workers, even women, don't really want to know about breast milk. Or see it. I forgot my little cooler one day and had to put the bags of milk in the office fridge. Awkward. I had to wrap them in paper towels so they were sort of hidden.

So, on to next week. It will get easier, and more like a habit to remember everything. Now to add in some time to exercise someday... I can hope, can't I?

2 Months

Penelope had her two month check up last week - she is growing so much and is still up in the higher percentiles for height and weight. She gained almost 2 lbs in one month!

Weight - 12.6 lbs - 90th percentile

Height - 23 inches - 75-90th percentile

Head - 39.5 cm - 50-75th percentile

She still won't take a pacifier or a bottle - and she even held out yesterday, going on strike and barely eating when I went back to work. I really, really hope she does better tomorrow.

Curls

Claire is very excited that her hair is longer than mine for the first time. So, I dug out the sponge curler to take advantage of her long locks. I used to sleep in these all the time, even as an adult. Claire surprised me by leaving them in all night. She had cute curly hair for Sunday.

Flashback

Look at those two young kids. We had just started dating maybe a month before this was taken at a friend's graduation party.  I think I miss my hair... Matt probably misses his too. :)

Blowouts

I got my hair cut this week - I felt like I was ready for a change. I didn't cut my hair after Claire or Miles, and I didn't want to do the typical "mom cuts all her hair off after baby" routine. But this time I did. I feel like I basically have my same hair cut, only now it's above my shoulders. I think I had about 8 inches cut off.

I took Penelope with me since I knew it would be a long appointment. She did so well! I fed her while I sat under the dryer, and then she just hung out. That is until I was getting my hair dried - and then she started fussing. I picked her up and she had a huge blow out in her diaper. So, we took a timeout for me to change her. I just threw away her onesie along with the diaper. I am beyond trying to save poopy clothes when I am away from home.

I have never had my hair cut this short - I am not sure how to do it. But, it still fits into a ponytail, my number one hair style criteria. I have simple needs. :)

Prayers Answered

Well, I guess I was mocking the weather in my previous post and mother nature decided to test me. On the hottest day of the year thus far, our air conditioning went out. It was about 8 pm and I felt the hot air coming out of the vent and knew we were in trouble. Luckily we could go stay at the Hiller's house so we packed up our suitcase and headed up to North Las Vegas. By the time we left the house, it was up to about 80 degrees in the house. When we came back a day and a half later to meet with the repairman (all the AC repair companies were swamped with customers this week), the house was around 92 degrees, and it was 110 outside.

Matt had called  a guy in our ward who used to do AC repair and he said if our whole unit was out, that it could be $3,000 to replace it. Well, this would be the absolute worse time for us to get a big expense like that - what with the no paycheck for many weeks and all.  Luckily the problem was the fan, not the whole unit. And it cost $350 to repair. Who knew I'd be so happy to spend $350! The best part was that we had $375 in our cash budget for home repair (we use a cash envelope system for many expenses that are for both weekly costs and for a rainy day). So, I think that was an answer to our prayers - we had just enough to get our house nice and cool again (i.e. liveable).

Recent Artwork

Claire loves to draw pictures and every time I ask her what she wants to do she says, how 'bout arts and crafts? Someday we will have a craft room, Claire.

This is a picture of me and Claire -we love our long hair ;) Claire's hair is finally getting longer after she cut it almost a year ago:

Here is our family portrait during a trip to the snow. Claire said the circles are snow balls, and we have on snow hats, not party hats (as I originally thought). :) 

Some modern finger paint art:

Miles Man

Miles, Miles. He is quite a character. He is into something every minute of every day and keeps us on our toes. He is also my little man who wants to do everything... "by myself!!"

I was putting Miles to bed the other night and asked him what song he wanted for bedtime. He said "Storm Trooper." Hmm - I have actually sung the Star Wars theme but I wasn't familiar with a special storm trooper song... I could go for the Imperial March (can you believe my repertoire?), but I said, what about Spiderman? I have made up a Spiderman song, by the way, since he asks for it every night and I have no idea how it actually goes... sheesh.  I used to get to sing Claire songs from the Sound of Music or Wizard of Oz - actual, well,... songs.

 About that time, I smelled something unpleasant so as any good mother would do, I sniffed Miles' bum. It was stinky. I said - are you poopy?! What is that smell?! He has been doing pretty good with potty training so I was disappointed to think he had gone in his bedtime diaper. I said again - what is that smell? He looked at me for a few seconds and said, "Flowers??" It was only a toot, so I just laughed.

Angry at the Weather

It's 114 degrees outside (hottest day in 5 years in Las Vegas) and I guess I'm keeping the house too cold for these two. I wondered why Matt bought these Angry Bird blankets in the first place, but then again, I am never, ever cold.

Dear Diary

Yesterday Claire showed me her journal entry, written all by herself. She told me what she was trying to write on the first few lines:

I do the right thing for a mom and a dad.

Not bad for a four and a half year old. :)

4th of July Festivities

We spent the Fourth of July with our friends the Jensens - Emily and I both have newborns: her little Brooke was just shy of two weeks old and Penelope is almost two months. The girls took their first of many photos together, this time with matching shirts. So cute and girly - good job Emily! We had a BBQ and fireworks and fun! By the look on everyone's faces, the fireworks were a success!

Here is Claire's drawing of us watching the fireworks:

My Day

1:00 AM: Claire wakes me up crying hysterically saying her stomach hurts. I had gone to bed at 11 pm so I was pretty groggy and cranky. I make her go to the bathroom - she feels a bit better and goes back to bed.

5:00 AM: Penelope wakes up and I nurse her. Back to sleep.

8:00 AM: I wake up - Matt let me sleep in, bless him. He is sick too though, and had slept downstairs. I will have him take a nap later.

8:45 AM: Claire still feels sick so I cancel her and Miles' 9 am play date with her preschool teacher. Bummer, I was really looking forward to a quiet house.

9:30 AM: Claire throws up right after I tell her I am tired of hearing that her stomach hurts and she probably just needs to go poop for goodness sake! Mother of the year, right here.

10:00 AM: My kids need attention, I think. And Miles is getting a lot of negative attention lately. I remind myself to be more positive and loving so I take Miles for a walk around the neighborhood to stretch our legs. He has to go to the bathroom so I let him go on the grass near our playground. He loves peeing standing up.

10:45 AM: Back from walk - too hot to stay out very long. It was good to have some alone time with Miles, even if only for 45 minutes.

11:00 AM: Both Claire and Miles want to take a shower, so I set them up in both bathrooms. Miles says he has to go potty, so I get him on the toilet. Then Claire calls for me - the water is too cold. I run in to fix it. Then I go back to check on Miles - he has unwound all of the dental floss. Penelope cries - I go get her. I come back, Miles has poured his capri sun juice into the paintbrush holder on the play easel. I leave it. Penelope is poopy - I am changing her diaper when Miles comes up behind me and pulls down my pants. He laughed so hard! I pull up my pants and get Claire out of the shower. I think about birth control.

11:07 AM: Just kidding, it was probably more time than that but it feels like every minute is filled with kids misbehaving and getting into trouble - the days are long, but nap times feel short.

I know I am supposed to sleep when the baby sleeps, but it's not really an option most days. During naps, I work on my PR projects and Matt studies for the GMAT (when he doesn't have the flu). I have stayed current on all my work email and then also done some work for my law firm client while on maternity leave. It has helped to pay the bills as more than half of my maternity leave is unpaid. I wish I could take the full 12 weeks off available to me by law, but we will just make it with our savings for my 9 weeks off as it is.

I know I will look back on these days and miss them - everyone says so. It must be true. :)

Mom, Can We Have a Backyard?

Yep, it's waiting for you at your Aunt Becky's house. :)

My kids ask me for a backyard often, as we don't have one, or even a door to the back of the house. Matt thinks they wouldn't play out there even if we had one, but I say otherwise. We went up to Salt Lake to visit my sister and these kids played and played in the backyard. It didn't hurt to have an awesome water slide bounce house set up for McKinley's birthday party. It was definitely a hit!

Miles and Gabe liked to have screaming matches followed by arguments over Miles wanting to hold Gabe's hand. I think that means they do like each other in between being typical two-year-old boys.

We also got to visit with my cousin Jenny - we haven't seen each other since Claire was about 18 months old.  She loved holding Penelope and spoiled the other kids with candy. Thanks for the sugar high, Jenny :)

We also took a trip to the Hogle Zoo, which was crowded but fun. I hear rumor of a zoo here in Las Vegas, but I am afraid to see what animals look like after living so long in this desert heat. At the Hogle Zoo, we saw elephants, seals, sea lions, a polar bear, brown bears, giraffes, monkeys, gorillas, lemurs, and more. It was hot and humid so we didn't last too long, but the train was a fun way to end the visit.