Enter at your own risk

Our house should have a big plastic bubble around it. We're still not well. The boys still have yucky noses and I have that plus a cough. Alex is still on his ear medicine and I think one of his eardrums popped or whatever it does last night. Last night Chris became officially sick. He had a fever of around 102.6 and went straight to bed when he came home from work (he knows he should have left early but didn't). He did make a doctor's appointment for today though. In addition to having the flu or whatever we had he also has bronchitis. So, he's got several meds to take now too. He did not go back to work today.

On the healthy side - the boys have their appetites back. Zach's came back first and he wanted to eat all day. A few nights ago Chris brought dinner home since I felt too puny to cook. After Zachary finished most of his dinner he kept asking Chris for his corn on the cob. Chris would cut off a few rows and Zach just gobbled them up. After repeatedly asking for more, Chris just gave up and gave the whole thing to Zachary. Zach was the last one left at the table still munching away on that corn. I just think it was fun to eat.

Catch up

So to catch everyone up on our last week......

When Alex came home from speech last Tuesday he felt feverish. Sure enough he's got fever. Then a little cough and congestion starts. Well, that makes wheezing start. Wednesday night Zachary has a fever of 103.6 right at bedtime. Thursday I take the boys to the doctor and he thinks they have the flu even though they test negative. There is nothing to do anyway but give meds for fever. I was hoping the doctor could give them something because we've been planning a house warming party for Saturday and I'd sure hate for the boys to feel bad or to make anyone else sick. Surely they'll feel better by then.

Friday Chris took off work because he wanted to help get ready for the party (or so I thought). Since the deck was done he wanted to put the skirting on 'cause you know that was the most important thing to be done before the party - not cleaning house or cooking food (insert sarcasm here). Friday afternoon my parents and cousin come over to spend the night and help us get ready. Dad gets roped into helping Chris on the deck and mom and Kelli spend most of the time in the kitchen and wrangling the boys. I seriously could not have done it without them since my husband was MIA. The boys are still sick with fever, cough, runny/congested noses.

Saturday is more of the same. Chris and dad work outside while us ladies stay mostly in the kitchen. They little boys, especially Zachary, are getting into everything. I don't know what's come over him. I didn't sleep well Friday night (I had chills) and feel kind of achy all day Saturday. The party starts in the afternoon after naptime. Alex slept very late and missed the first few guests arriving. The party was nice. We had lots of little babies - four in all that were all less than a year old. Fun! We did have less people than we expected so we had tons of food left over. After everyone left I really didn't feel well. I asked Chris for cleaning up help but didn't get it. He decided to sit on the couch while I worked in the kitchen. I bagged/boxed up all the food but didn't wash any dishes. (I found out the next day that I forgot to put some of it in the fridge and it had to be thrown out.)

Sunday I am a goner. I've definitely got the flu or whatever the boys have and it isn't pretty. Chris cleans up the whole kitchen without being asked and feeds everybody (although none of us eat much) and takes care of us all. He only comments a couple of times that he had been hoping to go outside and finish the deck skirting. I never even make it out of my pajamas or into the shower all day.

When I wake up on Monday I've still got a sore throat but otherwise feel tons better. Alex still has fever though, for the 7th day in a row. Zach's is gone. I take Alex to the doctor again and this time we've got a real diagnosis - a double ear infection! This is the first one either boy has had since we've been home. He had only started complaining about his ears the day before. At least we've got medication now. Since I'm feeling human again Chris heads to the store to get more wood for the deck but comes home with a flat screen T.V. instead. (He's been checking at the electronic store that's about to go out of business to see how far down they'd mark them and decided this was the time to buy.)

That brings us to today. Alex's speech class was cancelled which was good since I wouldn't have taken him anyway. Zachary is still being extra trying. When he woke up this morning he said he wanted to eat. I told him I would get him something as soon as I let our dog go potty outside. When I came back in Zachary was walking down the hall with a cookie in his hand - that he only could have gotten from climbing on the kitchen counter. That has been him all weekend.

Slim down Sunday

Sorry I'm a little late in posting but everyone has been under the weather here (including me). I think that is why I am down two pounds this week without doing much of anything. I was so shocked at this loss that I weighed myself again this morning and it was down yet another two pounds but then again I didn't eat much of anything yesterday (and I'm not counting it for last week anyway). So, I'm down a total of 2 1/2 pounds. Now whether or not it's real, we'll see.

I think I had three Coke's this week. We had another party on Saturday so that's where two of them came from. We had tons of yummy food, including great sweets but that was the day I started feeling bad so I didn't eat much of it. Poor yummy things went to waste without me there to gobble them up. So my snacking wasn't too bad this week either. I didn't get out to walk at all. Bad me. I hope everyone else had a good week.

Our deck is done

Well, mostly done. It is completely built but we still have to stain it. We're also going to put a skirt around the bottom. Since it's so high off the ground we're going to use the underneath as a storage shed so we'll want it closed up. As you can see from the pictures we made a fun new addition to the deck - a slide for the boys! We tested it out last night when the workers were done and it's a pretty fast slide. We plan to add a box at the bottom filled with "kiddie mulch" or whatever it's called to make a soft place to land. The deck extends about 12 feet off the existing back porch. On one corner is an octagon shapped seating area where we plan to put a table. There is storage in those benches too. Then the back middle has a long bench. With a gate to the stairs on the far end.

I think we're going to have lots of fun out here.

At last.....

our house has sold! Well, it won't close until March 30th but I can't help being excited. We got the offer late last night but countered back (they wanted us to basically knock of $10k - not happening) and got the news today that they're accepting it. The funny this is that this morning we also heard that someone had put in an application to lease it and we had just listed it for lease last week. We (I) much preferred to sell it and be done but it was good to know that we had a back up in case the buyers fell through. I guess there still is a possibility that it can fall through but I'm crossing my fingers!

Elmo and Big Bird and Cookie Monster - oh my!

Sunday we went with some friends to see Elmo Live. The boys were excited all the way there. We had a good time even though it was 1 1/2 hours long. We had really good seats in the third row so we were close enough to see and pay attention. There was an intermission and that made the boys a little bit antsy. The 2nd half was a little bit squirmier than the first but still very good over all. There was lots of singing and dancing. At one point Grover came to the end of our row and touched our friend Luke's hand. Oh boy was that exciting! After the initial fun of seeing Elmo Zachary kept asking where Cookie Monster went. We (well me anyway) knew all of the characters except for the one that doesn't talk & honks his nose like a horn. Who is that guy?

Goofing around during the break. I have no idea why Alex is making such a silly face.

Here we are meeting the famous Grover.

Afterwards we all went to a pizza place to grab some dinner before heading home.

Slim down Sunday

I'll be honest here. My first week didn't go as well as I had planned. I didn't get out and walk at all. Partially because of the weather and partially because of laziness. I did do really well about snacking. Although I wanted to I didn't really snack at all. We did have a little party Friday night and I served only finger food. I don't know if that counts as snacking or a meal - probably both because I did eat a cookie too. I was able to cut back my soda drinking but not completely. I had three I think. That's still better than 7+ so I'm O.K. with that for now. The scale said I had lost a half pound this week. I'm not putting to much excitement in that because I think I can fluctuate up and down a pound anyway so I'm not counting it as a real loss unless it sticks through next week too.

So for those of you joining me - how did you do? You can post your progress as a comment or leave a link to your blog and post your progress there.

Zachary's mischief

Last night we had some friends over to play poker. We had a pretty good group of us with ten adults and four kids. The boys generally behave themselves while we play. At one point during the game one of my friends motioned to me that I needed to come in the other room. What I found was Zachary sitting on the sink in the guest bathroom with the water on wearing only his shirt! What a goober! While I did fuss him for climbing up on the sink I think he went to the bathroom all by himself and was washing his hands. He had a dry diaper and his pants on the bathroom floor. Twice before he's gone to the bathroom alone but he's never crawled up on the counters like that. Later last night Chris said that he found Zachary in the kitchen holding the tub of butter (he's just gotten strong enough to open the fridge door). He had the lid off and was just turning it round and round looking at it. Luckily he didn't have his hands in it although that was probably coming if daddy didn't catch him. Zach's got quite a little personality and boy did he show it last night.

And by the way - I so almost won the game. I technically came in second but was put out at the same time as third place (I had more chips though).

Growing up and hand me downs

I know I recently posted about the boys getting bigger but I had another one of those moments last night when it hit me hard. Chris got the boys changed into pj's without me and sent Zachary back to the living room first. When he came out he was wearing some pj's that he'd never worn before. They were Alex's old ones that he's outgrown and they're still a little big on Zachary. Now Zachary's worn some of Alex's outgrown shirts before but it didn't hit me the same. These jammies were ones we bought for Alex when he first got home and for some reason it made me cry to see Zach in them. Zachary really likes them though and keeps saying "dinosaurs everywhere!".


This was Zachary last night.


Here is Alex in December 07.I'm such a sap. (I inherited that from my mom.)

We're getting a deck!

I'm really excited. We've talked about wanting/needing a deck since before the house was finished. Our back porch is probably 4-5 feet off the ground making it more like a balcony than a porch. The builder put a temporary rail around it to keep the boys from falling off but there are no stairs so you can't walk out to the back yard. We picked a company and signed a contract. The materials should be delivered this afternoon or tomorrow and the work will start tomorrow. The best part? The whole thing should take less than a week to finish. Yea! I can't wait to sit out on our beautiful deck watching the boys play (on the deck too of course since we don't have a yard yet!).

Slim Down Sunday

O.K. so I'm starting something new. I am a little heavier than I would like to be. I'm not a big exerciser and I pretty much eat what I want (not too, too bad). I am not going on a diet. I've done it before and although I did lose weight it was hard and that was before I had kids. I want to be able to eat with my family and not munch on lettuce leaves while they eat a lasagna or something. I'm starting on a smaller scale (no pun intended). Here are my three main goals for now.

1) Cut out sodas - I drink one or two every single day. I love Coke but I know it's not good for me. I'm going to cut out as much as I can but I'm not going to sweat it if I have one every once in awhile.

2) To get moving - Remember the not exercising thing? I'm not saying I'm going to hit the gym or anything but I'm going to try to get out and take a couple of walks during the week. I think all my yard work is good for me too but I need cardio.

3) Cut back on snacks - I honestly don't snack all the time but I do think I snack more than I should. So, when I have to have a snack I'm going to try a cup of coffee or a piece of fruit instead.

That's it. Again, I'm not going on a diet and I'm not going to say that I'm never going to eat a cookie again but I am going to try to make some small changes and I'm going to chronicle it here. I weighed myself today and I will every Sunday. I'm not going to tell you how much I weigh (did you really think I would?) but I will post if I lose any weight, how that week went, and how I feel. Feel free to join me if you'd like.

Unfinished projects

While unpacking I've run across several projects that I've started over the years and not finished. This one is probably the oldest. It's quilted Christmas place mats that I made in a quilting class I took somewhere around 2002-2003 while we were stationed in Ft. Rucker, Alabama. It only needs the edges. Although I didn't find it for a picture there is also a crib sized quilt I made in this class that still needs the edges too.

This was a baby quilt I started for my now 4 year old niece. Since this was the 2nd girl in the family they were already overwhelmed with pink so I chose other colors. The blue print has little flowers on it so I probably can't use it for my boys. I love it though and really want to finish it.

I let my sister pick this needle point out and told her I would do it for her. Now that I think about it this could have been before the baby quilt. What I didn't realize when I bought this needle point was this huge size of it. It's very detailed and while it has not seen the light of day for at least a year it takes a long time to make any progress.

This is another project for that same sister. It will eventually be a t-shirt quilt from all of her many many college t-shirts. The shirts are all cut apart but only 6 of them are made into prepared & backed quilt squares.

This last one could stay the way it is and nobody would have to know. I'm guess that maybe two years ago I started this one. This was an ugly old dresser that I painted white and changed the hardware on. It looks so much cuter now. The unfinished part is that I never bothered to paint and hang the mirror on top.

I don't know when I'll ever find time again for any of these. I've got so much house stuff, especially yard work to do. Not to mention certain little boys running around the house. Am I the only one with this many started & stopped projects?

Growing like weeds

The boys are growing so fast that I can hardly keep up. I bought Alex 4-5 new pairs of size 3 pants in the fall and they are now too short. All but maybe one are high waters. Couldn't he have at least made it through the winter without changing sizes? He now owns one pair of size 4 pants and needs more.

*I have a little complaint here.* Why is there such a big length difference from a size 3 to a 4? While the 3's are too short the 4's have to be rolled up. I guess we'll get a little more use out of them at least.

Zachary is a hard one. He's outgrown (in length at least) his 12 month pants finally. But....although the 18 months fit him in length they are still, mostly, too big in the waist. Sigh.

I decided to measure the boys and sure enough Alex has grown 2 inches since September and Zachary has grown 1 1/2 inches. Alex is almost 42 inches tall at 3 years old and Zach is 34 1/2 inches at 2 1/2. Where did my babies go?

Fun at the river park

Chris got home from work a little early today so we decided to finally go to our neighborhood park. Our subdivision is large and spans two sides of a "big" road. The opposite side from us backs up to a river and we have a nice park there for residents. The water is really low right now but in the summer this river will be filled with people on inner tubes! We got to walk on all the rocks that are probably covered with water in the summer (or at least partially covered). The boys had fun throwing rocks in and just looking at the neat stuff.

Superbowl watching

Chris decided that we needed to eat finger foods for dinner and forget about the dining room table. He wanted optimum T.V. watching seating for the Superbowl. The boys thought it was pretty fun to not be at the table. They also enjoyed watching football for a little bit and would bring in a stuffed football pillow to throw back and forth with us.