So busy!

I can't believe it has been 2 months since I posted... I was trying to stick to it! Christmastime is here and we are all enjoying the season. Gregory and Kelly are here from Oregon and a couple of nights ago, we had our 2nd annual "gingerbread" house party. We made houses from graham crackers and frosting and decorated with candies and cookies. It was so much fun. Gama and I have so much work to do with Christmas and to get ready for our trip to Mexico. We are driving and we leave as early as possible on the 26th. Lots to do!

Chicken-hair, watching The Sound of Music

Last night, we needed Junior to do some extra reading at bedtime. We had him go downstairs and Gama sat with him, reading the paper. As much fault as Junior has in not doing his reading lately, part of the problem really is that our house is always so noisy. Somebody is always watching TV, running around, etc.

Anyway, I had to do something to keep Chicken-hair in his room until Junior came up. He gets scared if he is alone. Several months ago, we put an old TV/VCR in their room so we could set up the Wii upstairs while we had stuff going on downstairs. We kept putting it away and pulling it out, etc. Finally we decided a couple of months ago that Junior and Chicken-hair can have it in their room just for videos and Gamecube. Luckily they barely use it. But I figured it would come in perfectly last night and put The Sound of Music on. I told him I was going to leave him watching it but that movie has a powerful draw LOL I couldn't leave.

We were sitting there, watching the part with the nuns arguing about Maria and going into the song about "How do you solve a problem like Maria?" and Chicken-hair was getting very upset with the crankier nuns, especially when one called her a demon. He looked at me and said, "Somebody should tell the Priest on them! They are being mean!"

A few minutes later, it was the part where she in on her way to the Von Trapp home and she is singing that song "I have confidence in me" and skipping down the street and singing loudly and he got this funny smile and said, "Isn't she embarrassed to do that? Anyone can see her!" At the end of that bit, she trips and runs to the door almost screaming "... in meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!" And he said, "Yeah... she should DEFINITELY be embarrassed about that!"

He was marvelling at the size of the house and asked me why some people have such big houses and I told him that some people have a lot of money and buy bigger houses. He said, "Well... we could make one, but that would take a lot of wood!"

We stopped the movie a few minutes later, right after she finds the frog in her pocket. He can't wait to watch more today. I am so excited because I really had to talk him into it and now he is hooked!

Yikes!

I am going to start out by saying Facebook has kept me so busy, I haven't been keeping up with this blog! Since my last post, Bucket started walking, got thrush one more time, stopped nursing, and started sleeping in his crib all night... how is that for catching up? LOL Anyway, I don't think anyone else really reads this so it doesn't matter. It is just for me.

Why Kidney Boy is cute...

About three days ago, we were heading out to get dinner. We were all being a little silly, walking through the backyard to the garage. As we got to the garage door, I asked Kidney Boy, "Why are you SO CUTE??" and he turned around and threw his hands up and said, "Because I'm LITTLE!"

It was so cute. I was not expecting any answer at all... just being silly. But he had that answer ready to go as if he has known that simple truth all along!

Bucket is ONE!!

Bucket is one! I can't believe my baby is a year old. We had his big birthday party yesterday, combined with Kidney Boy's third birthday. My Bucket is such a little sweetie. I feel like it couldn't possibly have been a whole year ago that he popped his little head out before the doctor even got to the bed!

I remember that all day Friday I had contractions. Friday night, I thought about going to the hospital but my mom had offered to babysit so we went to Spaghettini for dinner instead! We even almost went from there to the hospital, but went home to see what would happen. I managed to sleep but every time I woke up to go to the bathroom, I felt the contractions still there!

Saturday morning, I called my mom. She heard me huffing and puffing through contractions and said she really thought this was it and that I should go to the hospital. I told her I'd take a shower and we should just go ahead and go to lunch and if it got much worse, we'd leave her with the kids and go. LOL After lunch, I decided to try to make it to the mall first. Chicken-hair needed new shoes for school. When we got to the mall, I went to the bathroom and saw a bit more blood than what I had been having the last few days. So I called the on-call doc and he said to go ahead in and get checked out. I hung up and said, "Let's just go to JC Penney first. They might have those Z-Strap Skechers that he wants!" We checked and they didn't have them so we left the mall, put the 3 kids in my mom's car, and went to the hospital.

Of course, as soon as we got there, the contractions slowed way down. For the next 5 hours, they were fewer and further between. But when I was checked again, I had dilated another centimeter, to six! So stuff WAS happening. And he had moved down to -1 station. So the doctor broke my water, and the next contraction had me hollering for the epidural already! I guess it was because he moved down so quickly... I have never gone from being OK to needing an epidural that fast LOL About 30 minutes after getting numb, I started feeling pressure. The doctor checked me and I was ready! He told the nurse to let me "labor down" for about 20-30 minutes, until my own nurse got back. Basically that just means you let the baby move down into position before you push, if you can manage it.

I was feeling a lot of pressure so after about 10 minutes, the nurses that were in with me told me to go ahead and give a few pushes to see what was happening. A couple of pushes and she said, "OK! Stop for a minute. I think I better get the doctor." She left the room and suddenly, I felt his head moving. I was watching in the mirror and said, "I think his head is going to come out RIGHT NOW!" The nurse came back in the door saying, "It's OK! Go ahead!" and as she came towards me, the other nurse on the other side of the room came towards me, and his head just POPPED right out LOL The doctor came running into the room and I said, "I can't stop him! He is coming!" and he said, "It's OK! You're fine!" and as he came up and grabbed his head, his body came out in one more pop! Just like that, he was on the bed in front of me. The doctor was still getting his gown and mask on. The bed wasn't broken down. There was no catching him. He just plopped out in front of me LOL They suctioned his mouth and nose, Gama cut the cord, and they put him right on my chest. It was heavenly.

And now he is a whole year old... unbelievable how fast it all goes!

Kidney Boy is THREE!

Kidney Boy is three years old. May 26 was his birthday but I didn't get to my blog. Anyway, I made him a chocolate cake with lots of FRINKLES on top. We ate dinner outside, BBQ, and afterwards, my parents came over and we gave him his presents and had cake. His big party was combined with Bucket's. It was yesterday, May 31. I will probably get around to blogging about that sometime in the next month I hope hahaha...

My Mother's Day =)

This morning, we went to Church. Junior sings with the choir and today they did a beautiful Ave Maria song (not the Ave Maria) for Mother's Day. It was so nice. After church, we went to eat with my parents and gave my mom 2 of her presents. One didn't get here in time! Darn shipping! After that, Gama and the boys took me to Roger's Gardens. It is a great nursery not too far from where we live. I haven't been there in a few years. Here is a picture of what we got...

Afterwards, we stopped at a Starbucks and then went into Costco. That is not normally the place I want to be on any weekend day, let alone Mother's Day, but I was looking for grapes that come in little snack cups, all ready to pop into school lunches. We didn't find them. But we put Kidney Boy and Bucket together in the cart and it was so cute. Here is a cute shot... Bucket realized he could reach Kidney Boy's drink!

We came home and Gama went to work in the backyard, making space in our planter for some of the plants we bought. After a couple of hours of playing around back there (LOL) he finished. The potted plant is not actually potted, but just sitting in this pot for now. He will probably do that tomorrow. But the planter has 4 new plants.


There is one more plant too... it is a big vine-y plant with pink flowers. Gama needs to put it in a different section of the planter, where we have big things for the vines to grow up and around. But right now, we have these big scary pumpkin plants. Gama planted a few seeds about a month ago and THE NEXT MORNING there were 7 little sprouts poking through the dirt. Later that afternoon, there were 14! And the next day, 25! Within a couple of weeks, they were getting tall. Here is a shot of them. They are really pretty... big, green, heart-shaped leaves. But we need to move some of them over so we can put the new plant in there. Check this out... seriously, there was nothing there just a month ago! hahahaha...