Bertha

I stated yesterday that I hurt my foot. We were FaceTiming with Poppy and Grandma when I decided to put them in charge of babysitting Kit-Kat so I could run upstairs and grab something.  As I was running (literally) back down the stairs I slipped, skipped a couple, and face planted on the floor. The diet mt. dew I was carrying happened to not spill, thankfully, but in turn I hurt my foot.  I hobbled around on it that night and the next morning until Poppy convinced me to head to urgent care. Poppy isn't really a promoter of going to the doctor as he seems to have some remedy to fix your ailment. I figured this might be serious if he thinks I should go to the doctor.

I had the new babysitter I hired come over and went to pick up Miss M and her friend and took them to her friends house to play while I hit up urgent care. They were fast/kind enough.  I had an x-ray taken of my foot and the doctor informed me that my foot was in fact broken and I needed to be fitted to a boot that I would need to wear as much as possible including to bed.  

And thus the coming of Bertha (the boot).  I hate her. Although she does make it easier to walk on my foot than if I didn't have her. I am angry mostly bc I had a few races planned in the upcoming months and now those are off the table.  I am trying to refrain from eating sleeves of Ritz crackers to drown my sorrows.  

Big Will doesn't like the boot. He keeps telling me to take it off or wants to know where the 'nother one is.  Miss M keeps asking me when it's coming off and explaining to a four year old who has no time concept that it's going to be a long time isn't going so well.  I was able to get an appt with a surgeon for next week so hopefully they tell me it isn't as bad as it feels and I will be on the mend sooner than later. 

I was saving all my pharmacy receipts to submit to our flex spending plan but based on larger/significant medical expenses for the first half of the year I don't think we'll have any trouble spending it all without messing around with $7.00 prescriptions.  

Due to limited mobility and difficulty walking up and down the stairs we are going to watch a lot of shows and do a lot of snuggling.

Jill picked up my medicine from the pharmacy and while I was answering the door and talking to her Miss M snatched my phone and took a bunch of selfies.

No idea where she gets the eyebrow raise - I don't even have visible eyebrows.

 The eyebrow and head tilt. Yikes.

St. Patrick's Day

We're lucky to have generally happy and generally healthy little munchkins.  

Everyone cooperated for the most part for one pictures.  Kit-Kat isn't all that impressed but no one is screaming. I call it a win especially considering Big Willie woke up at 5am.

I hurt my foot and I am fortunate enough to have great friends. One of my friends brought us McDonalds for lunch. Kit-Kat grabs at everything these days. It's rather annoying so I gave her a french fry. She didn't really eat it but it distracted her long enough for me to eat.

Big Willie sat across from Kit-Kat and laughed hysterically in her face for the duration of lunch.

Random pictures

We ate ice cream in honor of Jack's birthday. We weren't able to go to celebrate so we celebrated at home Sunday. She doesn't eat baby food all that well but she couldn't get enough ice cream.  

Big Willie enjoyed his ice cream too.

Miss M had her four year old check up.  She got her blood pressure checked. It makes me laugh that they check her blood pressure.  Her blood pressure was 82/50 which apparently is good.  Her height was 39.5 inches which lands her in the 47%. She weighed in around 37 lbs which is the 42 percentile.

Playing outside makes everything wonderful and everyone happy.

Big Willie hit the lottery when our friends dropped off some of their hand me downs. Included in the loot was three train hats and a train raincoat. His heart skipped a beat.

Fun with Mimi

The weather was lovely and so we packed up and headed to the zoo Saturday.  Kit-Kat just bounced around in the bjorn. 

Miss M got a hex fish thing as a present. Big Willie is obsessed with it. It's a good thing we don't have a real fish b/c all he wants to do is reach in and grab the fish and throw him back in.

When Miss M doesn't pay attention to her plate her food disappears.  She should jack around less and eat more and food theft would not be an issue.

Mimi and Miss M.

Mimi and the girls. Big Willie wasn't having any of it.

The birthday party

Beginning at 10:30 am we had 17 kids and 8 adults descend upon our house.  I had secured all toys in the house with more than five pieces in a locked room/cabinet. It was a genius move on my part. It meant a lot less clean up than usual when there's half the number of kids here. I am contemplating leaving them locked away for a very very long time. 

Ta-da

The lovely thing about a four year old birthday party is that they generally play by themselves and the adults can socialize.  It's possible we never thought the day would come and then one day it happened. Glorious.

Miss M was set on having a piñata. I am a sucker for all stupid ideas so we had a piñata.  I filled it with lots of candy and hung it on the shepard's hook. We let Miss M hit first and made the boys go last.  In hindsight, we could have let the boys go first b/c the piñata was really hard to break. Sinead finally took it upon herself to beat the piñata to death. It took her approximately 15 serious swings before the thing finally cracked. And once it cracked the kids swarmed.

Big Willie got a shot too.

It was difficult to corral 17 kids away from a four year old swinging a bat. We luckily didn't have any serious accidents.

We catered Chick-Fil-A for lunch. It was amazing. They did a great job with catering and the kids actually ate. There are many days when we present the kids with food and no one eats much of anything.

The birthday girl picnicked in the living room with some of her friends.

The cookie cake. Singing to the birthday girl.  The patio was filled with sprinkles and cookie crumbs and icing so doing it outside was perfect.

After majority of the party left, we played pin the tail on the horse b/c that was Miss M's other request.  The game came with a cardboard mask. The kids cheated and all pinned the tail pretty close so we wrapped their eyes up with a scarf and made them play fair. Miss M was so close while the others ended up putting the tail on the curtain.

Miss M got a super hero cape. One side of the cape has a star burst with a letter M and the other side has a cat. It's amazing.  

She received a soft and cozy blanket with her name on it. After all our party guests left she just curled up on the couch and relaxed with some shows. I think she had a fun day.  It was minimally stressful all around. Mimi was here to help me with all the preparation and cleaning up which made it minimally stressful. 

Birthday/party preparations

I took Miss M to get her hair trimmed up before her birthday party. I was just trying to get it a little under control. The hairdresser cuts it pretty short. I realize she doesn't have much hair but it's so short when it's done.  I didn't take any pictures of her getting her haircut b/c I was distracted by entertaining Big Will and toting Kit-Kat around. It was a busy Wednesday.  

Big Will was so excited about his Hawkeye Choo-Choo. 

We shoveled the snow/ice into the sun so it would/could melt.  We did the same thing with the patio where the table and chairs sit. It was a fun task for the kids.  It was supposed to be 50 degrees for her birthday party and I wanted the snow be gone.

In keeping with tradition, we had McDonalds for lunch.  

She did a very nice job waiting until after dinner to open presents. I was trying to get her to hold off opening her presents until Andrew got home but he ended up being late so I didn't want her to have to wait any longer! She got so many great gifts.

And while Miss M opened presents Big Will ran around and played with trains.

After the children went to bed Mimi and I completed final preparations to make Friday go as smooth as possible. It was a success. Instead of making a cake or cupcakes for the party I made a skillet cookie and gave each kid a dixie cup of sprinkles and icing. It was perfect. As predicted, the kids ate all the sprinkles and icing and minimal cookie. The cookie was easier and I feel like I won.

Addict

I see trouble in my further.  I have been drinking Diet Mt. Dew for a long time.  There are always cans sitting around the house throughout the day.  Friday night Miss M decided she needed to try my pop.  She put her finger around the rim and licked the drop off and told me it was good. I didn't think much of it b/c she tries a lot of things and tells me they are good and never drinks them again.  

Then I caught her out of the corner of my eye sucking down as much pop as she could consume before getting caught.  She barely put the can down and swallowed the first drink before she was taking another drink.  

 The next day it was the same thing. She found one sitting on the floor and went to down. I now have to be more aware of where I leave my pops as to try and not create an addict.  Based on her genes she could easily become a pop addict.

Big W. He's on the mend.

We've been battling ear infections with Big Willie for a long time now.  Probably since he turned 1.  Finally after having an ear infection in Oct, Nov, Dec, Jan, and two in February the doctors said it was time to talk to the ENT to discuss tubes.  

He doesn't even know what it feels like to feel good b/c he seems to always feel bad. 

His tube procedure was scheduled for 8:30am on Monday morning. Andrew took him to the appointment.  He was in and out in 15 minutes.  He downed some apple juice and gold fish crackers while he waited to be released to come home. They were home by 9:30am.

And now he's back in action. He loves riding the rocking horse now that I have pulled it back out from the closet.

And trains. Lord. The trains. He's obsessed.  He wants to watch them, color them, wear train clothes and underwear, play with them, hold them, take them everywhere. Miss M makes such a fuss about when he wants to watch Thomas b/c she's supposedly scared of Thomas now that her infatuation is over.  She's scared of Cranky - that tall green thing in the picture below behind Big W's arm.  She's so full of nonsense it's ridiculous.

Line 'em up. 

 A portable train operation.

 I end up with a significant number of these coloring pictures saved to my phone every day.

He's obsessed with his Thomas underwear. I am not looking to potty train him any time soon or at least not let him run around without a diaper until it's summer and he can pee in the yard.  He does love sitting on the potty but I think it's because he likes to get the toilet paper and put it in the toilet.  When he sits on the potty he feels the need to get naked. He doesn't get that from me. I hardly have time to go to the bathroom let alone take the time to get naked first. He's tried to put on M's panties more times than I care to admit so I bought him his own.  He wears them over his diaper all day everyday. He seeks them out and demands they be on. We had to bring him home from a birthday party without his pants on b/c he couldn't see his Thomas underwear.  He does not lack for persistence.  

 And he's working on his selfie skills with all the practice he's getting using the phone.