Coming off a Christmas high

All I wanted for Christmas was for the tree and decorations to disappear. I wanted everything cleaned up after the kids opened their presents. I refrained. But it killed me. I never understood my own mother's desire to get Christmas put away as soon as it was over. I do now. I have become my mother. AHHHHHHHHHH. I guess it could be worse. Right?!?!

I let Miss M watch shows all day Thursday after Andrew left for work and Mr. Man slept and I took the decorations and lights off the tree and shoved them in a rubbermaid container (who knows how bad it will be when I open the containers next year - I don't care right now). Then I just stared at an empty tree and wondered how I was going to get this tree out of my house. I couldn't not handle the idea of waiting for Andrew to get home so I took matters into my own hands. I couldn't lift the tree myself since it is a 7-8' real tree but I could slide/scoot the tree myself. I wrapped a sheet around as much as I could and then shoved it through two door ways and tossed it outside. It was a freeing feeling. I didn't even mind cleaning up the fallen needles. And right now I am not sure I care that I am going to find needles in random places for the next 12 months.  Next year we will have a beautiful pre-lit tree gracing our house which I can take down myself without risking throwing out my back. 

Then we went to dinner. I couldn't handle eating left overs or another home cooked meal. Or maybe I was just too lazy to cook. Mr. Man isn't miserable to take to dinner. He can eat finger foods which keeps him entertained enough.

Saturday we cleaned/purged/reorganized most of the main floor and the basement. It felt so great. And then it felt so wrong. I missed all our friends so I called the troops over for a PJ party.  We ordered pizza and destroyed the house and then everything felt right in the world.  Miss M was so excited for a PJ party picture. I don't know where Mr. Man's clothes are - maybe Miss M's lack of clothing isn't really her fault?!?! They are so grown up and adorable. I just can't handle it.

Next up - New Years - there will be more chaos with more kiddos over and we can't wait!!!

She's got a live patient

Miss M has decided her brother is a great live patient. And her favorite tool is the reflex hammer. She knows it's a hammer which means she gets to whack things. She whacks his head, his stomach, his legs and she thinks it's hilarious.

He just looks at her with his standard look.  

First - his blood pressure - it came back normal.

Next - his heart rate - it was normal too

I don't have any pictures of her with the reflex hammer because I was trying to save his life. Here she's using her hands to physically open his mouth to give him some medicine.

We put him on the changing pad so he couldn't get hurt (or get away).  

We'll be home for Christmas

We did it. We were able to have Christmas at home this year as a family. It was wonderful. It was most wonderful that our kids don't really know exactly what's going on and they both slept until 8am!!!

We locked the baby gate at the top of the stairs just in case Miss M remembered Santa had come the night before. I am glad we did because once she got up she was ready to go downstairs. She had 800 reasons why she needed to go downstairs. I wanted to wait for Mr. Man to wake up but I wasn't really in a hurry to wake him since he hadn't been feeling well.

We came downstairs and all Miss M could focus on was the easel that Mimi got her for Christmas. She's already seen it. She's already played with it. We told her Santa had visited but she didn't really care. Andrew is trying to cattle prod her to show toward the tree but she was uninterested.

Until she was interested...

This is what the Christmas tree looked like when the kids came downstairs. 

All Miss M saw was the little tiny purple (Doc McStuffins) race car beneath the Doc McStuffins clinic. There's a huge clinic and she didn't even notice it. We had to ask her over and over what it was. In her defense, she did tell us (repeatedly) that Santa was bringing her a race car. Good thing Santa is such a good listener to such good girls. 

She loves her Doc clinic. She loves to give her babies check-ups and diagnoses. 

She's cheesing her brains out because I told her she could open the Christmas presents from Andrew and I if she would let me take her picture in front of the tree.

I hope we can spend our future Christmas' at home. It really was wonderful and magical to be together as a family with minimal chaos!

Christmas at Grandma D's

All of the children and grandchildren were able to travel to Grandma D's for Christmas this year. There were some who ran into car troubles on the way home but thankfully they made it safely to Iowa.

There are a lot of people in one room when we all get together. It can be kind of exhausting. I am more of a small group of people kind of gal but once a year it's fun to watch all the cousins get together and interact (interpret - entertain each other).

I didn't get a lot of pictures because we didn't take our camera. I am not sure there was room for it by the time we loaded everything.  It was ridiculous. There were some pictures taken by others that I just don't have. Miss M played with everyone really well.  She played with Dallin (3) which was interesting watching their interactions but overall they did really well together.

We had craft time.

 Mr. Man tested mashed potatoes

He liked them. He ate (or smeared all over everything) more than his share. There wasn't enough mashed potatoes to go around and it's probably because Mr. Man is HUGE.

 And look how huge he is. Ashleigh picked him up to bring him to me. He's essentially as big as she is (she's so skinny but still - she's 10). She's such a good big sister. She is always so aware of the younger ones. It's heartwarming to see.

 Mr. Man was hanging out with Miss Audrey (Jo-Jo).  The green shirt and blond hair laying on the ground is Miss M throwing a fit because she doesn't want to be in the picture.

Until next year when we're all together again...

Christmas at the Greats

We were able to make it to Great Grandma and Great Grandpa's house for Christmas. The snow wasn't as bad as predicted.  It was mighty cold though. Brrr. My car does not appreciate -12 degrees.

There were a lot of presents and Miss M was excited to open all of them. Jack on the other hand could have cared less about any of the presents after he opened his broom from Mimi.  Mimi wasn't there but she had more presents shipped to the kids to open.

Great Aunt Lynne was a busy woman this year. She made three blankets. One for each kid.  And she made a beautiful scarf for Miss M.  Miss M loves wrapping her blanket around her neck and walking around the house telling me she needs to stay warm with her scarf. So a scarf was the most perfect present.

She even wears it on the potty.  She makes me wrap it around her neck and tie it so it doesn't come off. She chose not to wear it at one point last week because per her "it wasn't snowing". Apparently snow is a determining factor when Miss M determines if it's cold outside. She's in for a rude awakening. 

 We got Mr. Man dressed up for a photo with his namesake.

He looks so happy. He was so sick. We spent most of our Christmas travels with at least one person sick. It keeps hanging around and is taking awhile to kick. 

 We made a shirt for Great Grandpa that said Big Bill.

 I think they like each other.

Mr. Man is one squirmy worm. Seriously the guy doesn't sit still. He's not happy just hanging out. He's got to be moving. It's kinda exhausting.

Great Aunt Lynne tried to keep him occupied but she found him to be too squirmy. He wants to stand all the time. I like to sit.

We are going to Great Grandma and Great Grandpa's this summer to collect their lovely and perfect fake Christmas tree. I am excited for a fake tree again.

Pictures from the week

Jack loaned one of his favorite toys to Mr. Man. Mr. Man sits in it and opens and closes the door.  I predict he'll enjoy more aspects of it soon. 

He has started to lift his chest off the floor. I think he wants to crawl. He seems motived and ticked off that he can't do it. Maybe he's just ticked off about the teeth that are coming in. I don't know which is making him more mad but it was a rough day today.

Mr. Man and I dropped Miss M off at school and then went shopping to finished the last of Christmas the presents to be purchased. We are officially done. All presents have arrived, been purchased, and are wrapped.  We got done shopping about 30 minutes before school ended so we went to her classroom and watched through the two-way mirror (where she couldn't see us). It was entertaining. The teachers were trying to corral and get eight toddlers dressed in their snow gear to go outside. I can't imagine dressing eight toddlers in snow gear.  Then they went outside and played on the playground. Miss M pulled her friends around on a sled in circles. The snow has been packed down a bit and is a little slick so she would be pulling with all her might and lose her footing.  She just got back up and kept pulling.

We had our dining room and entry way painted this week.  I don't know that I have a before picture but trust me when I say it's so much better! The dining room is now a blue-gray where it was a terrible terrible brown. It looked like poop.

The entry way was red and now it's an eggshell-ish color.  Do you like the cheeta print on the stairs? Andrew comments about it to everyone who walks in the door because he hates it. It doesn't bother me especially considering the cost to replace it.

We also painted the fireplace. It's a creamy light gray where it was green.  Things are coming together. Maybe I will take real pictures of our house to show the next time the cleaning lady comes.  We all know the only time the house isn't a disaster is in the first five minutes after the cleaning lady leaves.

Family Christmas 2013

Well.  The family descended upon us this weekend for a surprise 40th birthday party for Bryan (my brother in law) and subsequently a family Christmas. Someone figured it had been eight years since we had our last Christmas all together. I remember that Christmas. I would prefer to forget parts of it. Dad and Nan had told us we had to be to their house by a certain time b/c they had a big surprise for us. Andrew and I racked our brains trying to figure out what the surprise was that we all needed to be there. In my head I made it out to be the biggest surprise I could think of. I was convinced (and terrified) they were going to tell us they were having a baby.  Oh my.  I couldn't even imagine.  

Thankfully everyone arrived on time and the surprise was they hired a limo to take us around and look at the lights in the city.  They were not impressed that I thought they were having a baby. Here's some pictures I happened upon when I was cleaning off camera memory cards this afternoon.

Yikes. Those two needed to go on a diet. Why didn't anyone tell them? Aren't real friends/family supposed to tell you those things. 

 Here we are in the limo. I look unimpressed. It's normal.

Classy.  Thankfully there was no one drinking out of pitchers this year at the family Christmas events or the surprise birthday party.

This year Andrew arranged for us to all go on a limo ride again and drive around the city.  We piled into the car and went and saw the sights. We are missing Bryan and Stacey b/c they had other commitments but we gained Uncle Dave (or other grandpa per Miss M) and Aunt Sandi. 

 These two will probably always need to go on a diet.  But aren't they cute!!

Mr. Man was generous enough to share his new toys with Jack and Miss M.

We were able to capture a picture of almost everyone.  Sadly, Mr. Man was sleeping and everyone else was in the living room and cooperating so we took the picture without him.  

Everyone left Sunday afternoon/evening.  Our house was a disaster mainly due to presents that needed to find a home and laundry spilling out of every room.  We have a babysitter come over on Mondays after school and I usually go run errands but this week I was so overwhelmed with the state of our house that I decided to stay and pick up.  I walked into our bedroom and it looked like a tornado went through and so I organized my new wallet instead of dealing with the disaster. I felt better after my new wallet was organized and then tackled all the stuff that was everywhere. 

Mr. Man is 7 months old

Mr. Man turned 7 months old on the 8th of December.

On the 8th of December I decided I wanted cable in my bedroom.

On the 8th of December I called the cable company and set up a service person to come hook up cable for the next day.

On the 8th of December I conned Andrew into carrying the downstairs TV upstairs.

On the 8th of December Andrew realized that there was a dilemma and we had no TV downstairs so we had to go to Costco to buy a new one.

So. On the 8th of December Mr. Man turned 7 months old and there aren't very many pictures b/c we were more concerned about remedying the situation of no television in the basement.  Priorities people.

When we were at Costco we discovered that Mr. Man is capable of sitting in the cart.  This is grand news for 2 reasons. 1) there's more room for goods in our cart 2) I don't have to strap him on or carry his car seat into and out of each store. There are so many great things about Costco. I could go on. And on. I seriously love it. The place just makes me giddy.  We were able to optimize the dual seats in the cart which just adds to the joys.

We got the TV all set up and ready to watch.  It fits the space quite well. It's like Matt and Al are actually in the living room delivering the news.

Since the little fella was neglected on his 7 month birthday I will give you some other random pictures from the days/weeks following.  

Some say we look a like. He loves looking in the mirror at himself. If he's fussy and you put him in front of a mirror he usually perks right up.  Thus the picture below was while he was fussy and I was waiting for his bath to fill up to wash all the food off of him. Or to calm him down and have something to do for a half hour before he was allowed to go to bed.  

He was a night owl on this day. He's usually in bed before Miss M gets ready for bed. It was not necessarily fun to have him up b/c she wants to read books and he wants to eat them. It doesn't work out well for anyone. Miss M doesn't know what she's in for when he can actually move. She's ticked off at him most of the time for swinging his arms around and accidentally touching her. I don't exactly know how to toughen her up. I guess it's a life lesson she will get to learn with time.

He likes to chew on everything but there's no teeth yet. I don't even think one is really budding through.

 Such a happy little fella.

Mr. Man is generally a happy baby. Generally. As I mentioned before, he loves is bottle, his momma, his sister (when she's paying attention to him and being silly), and himself.  He sits up pretty well with minimal falls. He isn't really inching around yet but he will with time. I need the time b/c I haven't thought about nor do I want to deal with baby proofing the house. I didn't really have to do anything with Miss M.  It was partly b/c we didn't have much to baby proof since we lived in an apartment with no stairs and it was partly due to her just being chill about stuff.  I have a feeling this little guy isn't gonna be chill about much when it comes to stairs, toilets, ovens, and light sockets.  I bet they have a service to do baby proofing for you :) (that's for you Craig).

Update - So I put my finger in Mr. Man's mouth (not sure why) and noticed there are budding teeth. I swear they weren't there a couple days ago. 

Preparing for Christmas & life lessons for Miss M

I have been excited to get everything set up for Christmas. I bought new stockings for everyone this year. Miss M thinks they are socks and wears them around the house thinking she's hilarious. 

Miss M loves to do 'projects'. She asks to do projects all day every day. She loves any kind of project you give her.  Today we used a glue stick to glue cupcake holders to paper bag. It doesn't need to be extravagant she just likes to do something. We bought a pre-made gingerbread house and so I put on the frosting and she got to decorate it with candies. She loved it.  She was so excited about this project she woke up at 6:30am (which is early for her) begging to go downstairs and get her project out.

 Our finished product.

We bought a real tree this year. We found a company who delivers trees for a reasonable fee. We are getting a big artificial tree next year (thanks Grandma and Grandpa - we look forward to picking it up this summer!!!) so it seemed like a good idea to do a real tree this year. I knew it was going to be a big tree as they promise to deliver a 7-8 foot tree but this tree is significantly bigger than I expected. It takes up most of the living room space where the kids (used to) play.

Preparing the tree. Miss M hung 80% of the ornaments thus 80% of the ornaments are on the bottom of the tree within reaching distance of her little arms.

 Andrew hung lights outside.

I had to bake cookies for Miss M's school fundraiser. I made 12 dozen cookies in a day. It was a lot of cookies. I probably ate a dozen too.

We have an advent box that has an ornament to be hung on a little tree every day. Miss M and I get to do it every day.  I added one pieces of candy to each box in hopes of offering her one piece of candy and letting her eat it rather than fighting with her to get her hands out of the candy jar all day.

On Sunday when we were preparing the tree I was eating a piece of chewy chocolate candy and bit down on something hard. I assumed it was just a clump of sugar but instead of just swallowing it I spit it out. Upon spitting it out I realized it was part of my tooth. I used my tongue to feel which tooth was now gone and noticed a gaping hole in my back molar. It didn't hurt thankfully but it was sharp. I was so upset. It almost ruined the Christmas spirit we just worked so hard to create.

I called a random dentist who had received a lot of good reviews on Yelp and left a message. He's only open three days a week and thankfully one of those days is Monday. He called me back and told me he could squeeze me in. Thankfully, one of Miss M's preschool classmates lives around the corner and they were able to come over and stay while I went into the dentist.

I was prepared for the dentist to take a look at it, sigh, and tell me there was nothing he could do but sand it down and make another appointment. Well he had good news. He could fix it right then. He threw out phrases like 'it might get bad', 'you might need a root canal', 'there's a lot of decay', 'I will pray for your tooth', and other things that didn't make me too excited.  He fixed the tooth with a filling and told me my tooth was 70% filling and would eventually need capped but that day wouldn't come for awhile.

I have spent a fair share of time in a dentist chair and I imagine as the years go on I will spend more time there as my 15 year old fillings start falling out b/c that's what they do.  Therefore I have decided that I am going to make an example of myself to Miss M (and eventually Mr. Man if he likes sweets as much as I do). I try to scare Miss M into brushing her teeth really good. She knows if you don't brush your teeth when you eat candy your teeth will fall out. So while most people are worried about where they are going to hide an Elf I am worried about my kids teeth rotting and falling out.  I hope making an example out of myself helps but considering genetics my kids are screwed.