Danny's 2nd Birthday and Taylor's 4 1/2-day Party!!

Busy Birthday Weekend!

Danny had his first day of "Wee Wanna Be" camp Saturday morning!! It's a 5 week class for 2-3 year olds, every Saturday, for 45 minutes. Each week they focus on a different sport so that the little kids can see what they like best and might want to take in the fall for the full season. As you can see, this week was soccer. I'm not sure this will be Danny's sport, as he would rather throw it than kick it. The instructor laughed at him and suggested that maybe he should be a goalie :)

After the class I ran to Matt's parent's house to pick up Tay and Cole. I took them home, fed them lunch and got them ready for the party, then went to my mom's to get everything ready. This year we decided to have a joint party for Dan's 2nd Birthday, and Taylor's half-birthday. Taylor's brithday is December 30, so it's a busy time of year to try and squeeze another celebration in. For the next couple of years at least, I think we will try it this way, until Taylor gets old enough to protest... :)

It's a good thing we decided on a pool party, because it ended up being 93degrees on Saturday!

We had a nice group, mostly family, and a couple of friends. Matt had a late delivery, so he got to the party about 1 hour late, and was so hot he jumped in the pool with his work uniform on!

Costco cake... Matt cut HUGE pieces for the kids, much bigger than Mommy would have!

Danny opening his present from Jon and Nicole (and Evie)

Danny pushing Taylor around in his new truck.

Wiped out after his busy day. He fell asleep in the car on the way home (my mom lives less than 1 mile away from us)

I love my kids! #1

I'm going to start listing 5 things I love about each of my kids, and try and do it every week.

Taylor
-I love how creative she is when she plays. I love listening to the conversations her toys have with eachother.
-I love how she "teaches" Danny things, like dancing and gymnastics. (mostly just spinning around in a circle or rolling around on the floor)
-I love listening to her signing to herself while she does just about everything
- I love how when she gets hurt, or when she's tired she tells me she "needs to be cuddled"
- I love how she wants to be so grown up now, even though it makes me sad at how fast she's growing.

Danny
- I love his naughty little smile
- I love how protective he is of his little brother when someone else is holding Cole. He calmly states. "mine baby" over and over and watches closely / follows them around to make sure they don't steal him.
- I love how cuddly he is when he's tired
-I love how when Tay says "Okay Danny?" and he doesn't like what she said he says "no-kay"
- I love that he still calls his Elmo toy MoMo and his blankies "Boo" even though he can say Elmo and blanket now.

Cole
-I love how he sticks his fingers up my nose while he's nursing
- I love how now that he can crawl he follows me from room to room
- I love how when I sitting on the floor he crawls into my lap
- I love how excited he gets when he's sees me getting his food. He bounced up and down and waves his arms wildly
- I love ticklish he is, and his big belly laugh

Failure to Superwoman in 24 hours

Today was a much better day than yesterday...

Yesterday was just one of those days when I felt like everything was spinning out of control and I was just trying to catch a toe hold.

Then today... I am again feeling like superwoman :)

It was one of those rare days when all three kids were cooperative, I got stuff done, and ended my day feeling really great. Dishes done, laundry done (although not folded), kitchen clean, playroom clean, caught up on all vendor invoices, did all customer invoices for tomorrow, hung 3 bookshelves all by myself, and made chocolate chip cookies (from scratch) with Tay and Dan. I also just sat and read books and played on the floor with them, something that I haven't been doing enough in the last few weeks.

I started off my day in a bit of a cranky mood (as you can see by my earlier post) It's so easy to feel overwhelmed when you rto-do list is never ending, you're doing most of your chores one handed with a baby on your hip, and everytime you finish something another3 things come up! That;s why so many of my pet peeves are things that make my job harder, like Matt leaving the laundry on the floor or 20 coffee cups out in his office. In the big picture it's nothing, but when it makes my job harder...

There are still about 50 things on my to-do list, and I'll never get to them all. But I'm trying to just step back and remember that I can't do EVERYTHING. I hope tomorrow is another good day!

My Laundry Rebellion

Good Morning!

If you would like your laundry washed and returned to you in a timely fashion please deposit soiled garments in appropriate laundry basket. I'm sure you have seen them, they are the hanging canvas bags approximately 6-12" from where you remove your clothing before walking away and leaving said garments on the floor.

Thank you for your cooperation!

Signed,
The Management



This is the note I left Matt. It was my attempt to be "playful" and not a "nag". I'm working on my nagging, one of my many self improvement goals :)

Laundry is one of my many pet peeves. I don't mind doing it, it's just the chasing it down so I can do it that bothers me. I expect to have to collect 27 kids socks from every room in the house because the take them off wherever they are, but Matt is another story. It wouldn't even bother me so much if they were left on the bathroom floor, or somewhere else....it's the fact that he takes them off INCHES from the hamper and then drops them on the floor instead of the bag. Then when I go to do the laundry I have to collects it from the floor and sometimes under the bed because it gets kicked under. If I've had a particularly bad day and Matt can't find any clean socks (because they are all on the floor) I have to resist the urge to punch him in the throat! haha ;)

I know this is petty, clearly this is just one of my "needing to vent" blogs :)

Dan Dan, Bug Bites, and Pill Bottles

Little boys are a different breed than little girls! When Danny became a toddler we had to re-childproof our house. We thought we had thought of everything... gates, child locks, door knobs, outlet covers, etc. Then came Danny came along and gave up a crash course on what "terrible 2's" is all about!

But he's so damn cute!

The plan for the day was to run a few errands, then go to my grandmother's house for lunch. While I was getting Danny ready to go I noticed that he had 3 red bumps on his right leg by the ankle. They were about quarter sized and a little raised off the skin. I figured he had just gotten a couple of mosquito bites while we were outside last night. We continued getting out the door and when I went to buckle Dan in his car seat I looked again at his leg... this time the "bites" had doubled in size, had a white center that were oozing a clear liquid, and I could actually see them pulsating. I panicked a little. I grabbed the Benedryl and gave him a dose. We were already in the car, so I called my mom, drove to her house, dropped off Tay and Cole, and drove Danny to the doctor. I turns out that he is just VERY sensitive to insect bites. Matt is deathly allergic to bees, and has bad reactions to all bug bites. So I guess now we know that Danny does too. We had been wondering when one of our kids would get bitten and if it would result in a trip to the ER...

So anyway, crisis #1 averted! We continued on to my grandparents house for lunch. We had pizza and then a cake for Danny's birthday because my grandparents are going to be out of town this weekend. After lunch the kids were playing in the living room and Danny took off down the hall and ran into the library. I got up and followed after him (he had MAYBE a 10 second head start) and as I turned into the room I saw him wiping his tongue with the back of his hand. I looked down and there were pills all over the floor in front of him. PANIC. Only for a second though and then my mommy brain kicked in! :) I called to my grandmother to ask her what the pills were because I couldn't see a bottle. Danny had what looked like 2 pills stuck to his chin like he had tried to spit them out. There was also some white mush on his hands. I wiped him off and then got down on the floor and collected the pills. I found the bottle under the cabinet and then I relaxed just a little. It was Zofran, the anti-nausea meds that I took during all 3 pregnancies, still not something you want to give an almost 2 year old, but my grandmother had just had surgery and I had been worried that he had gotten some kind of narcotic pain med or something. Finding the bottle also told me how many pills there had been originally, and my grandmother said she had taken 1 or 2 from the bottle. I accounted for 16 others including the 2 on his chin, so at MOST, he had eaten 2-3. I'm guessing that the white mush on his hands was the missing 2-3, that he had put in his mouth, tasted the horrible taste of them, and tried to get them out of his mouth with his hand. I called poison control, and they said that there shouldn't be any problem, just to watch him.

Had a 2 year old Taylor gone into a room and seen a pill bottle on an end table she would have brought it to me and asked to have the "candy" inside... but not my Dan Dan. I'm pretty sure he ran into the room, saw the bottle, heard me walking down the hall and tried to shove as many into his mouth as he could before I caught him and took the "candy" away. Danny's reaction is probably more normal for a 2 year old, we were just spoiled with Tay.

I got home and all three kiddos were asleep, so I put the car in park, reclined the seat and just sat for 10 minutes.

And I let Danny fall asleep in my bed tonight.

Father's Day

What a busy day yesterday was!

When we got home from Scott's graduation party Saturday evening Taylor decided (on her own) that she wanted to make a ballet show for Matt. She got out costumes for herself and Danny, and "taught" him how to dance. So when she woke up on Sunday she got herself dressed and ready for her Father's day present.

Sundays are usually Matt's only morning with the kids, so he usually makes a big breakfast. We skipped making him breakfast in bed since he would have had to cook it!

Tay and Dan put on their show, which of course I got on video... it mostly consisted of running in a circle and waving ribbons over their head, but they were very proud of themselves.

We went to the cemetery and brought my dad lilies, Danny loves to put the flowers in the vase. Then we went to my grandparents house to wish Dungie a happy Father's day, and then to my mother's to go swimming.

Matt hasn't been with us the last few weeks when we went swimming, so the kids were very eager to show him all of the new things that they could do.

We ended our busy day at Matt's parents house for dinner with the family.

Bambi

Taylor and I watched Bambi for the first time the other night. We've had it in the movie cabinet for 3 or 4 years, but I've avoided it. I remember watching it when I was little and being so sad when Bambi's mother got shot. Taylor watched intently, crawled up in my lap with watery eyes, and snuggled. She asked me questions, and I did my best to answer them. She's such a thoughtful child, always thinking and studying and trying to figure everything out. Having that conversation with her and her acceptance of the movie made me sad. I feel like she's lost a little of her childhood innocence.

The more I think about it, the more angry I get at Disney. Why do they have to include the death of a parent in so many of their movies? Isn't real life hard enough? Can't a fairy tale be just that? What's wrong with giving a four year old the illusion that everyone will live happily ever after?

Is it supposed to prepare children for an imperfect world where bad things happen to good people(animals)? Do they think that watching Bambi, Simba, etc. loose someone they love will somehow prepare them for loss in real life?

I can tell you that it doesn't. Nothing can.

I guess I'm a little overly sensitive. Having children makes you think about your own mortality. Even more so when you've lost a parent yourself. Since the moment I first knew I was pregnant with Taylor I've had the fear that something would happen to me before she was done "growing up"... as if there was some magic age when you're all grown up and don't need your parents anymore (I talk to my mom at least twice a day still)

I know I can't protect my kids from everything. They will know pain, and heartache, and hopefully lots and lots of happiness. I just want them to stay innocent and pain-free for as long a humanly possible.

So on this eve of my 15th Father's Day without my Dad I guess I'm just a little sad that Taylor's world is just a little less innocent.

My First Blog

Hello world!

I feel like I'm the last person to start one of these. I've been thinking about it for awhile, but with three small children and a new business I just never felt like I had the time. I still don't, not really, so this may be my last blog entry too. :)

I titled it "Mary;s Mommy Outlet" because that's kinda what I'm hoping it will be. Staying home with my children the last 4 years has been a wonderful, but also a very isolating experience. I'm hoping this will give me a place to vent, to unload, and at times shamelessly brag about my children!

I won't be proofreading, and I have never been much of a writer, so my apologies in advance...