Happy Halloween

I'm sure kids all across the world are jazzed up about today. I know ours are! They can't wait to go trick-or-treating, and frankly neither can I. I'm ready for this anticipation to die down and for the sugar highs to level off.

We are seriously considering detox for Mr. Spencer. You know it is bad when he asked for "sugar" for breakfast this past weekend. His alternate suggestion was marshmallows! Ummm... no. Notice in all the pics that he is seriously interested in his candy.

The gang!













Our very own Tinker Bell

Sleeping Beauty had more important things to do than take pictures! There were things to do and candy to be had.

Our very own "Super Boy".
I'm particularly liking the Super Boy dance.

Annual Pumpkin Carving

Sunday afternoon was the perfect day for us to carve pumpkins. I'm so glad we had the wisdom to realize this and act on it! The girls were so excited about carving their pumpkins this year. Spencer got into it for a short while, but really - pumpkin guts? He thought we were nuts.

We started our carving adventure later in the morning and managed to get the insides, of all 3 pumpkins, cleaned out when we decided it was time to break for lunch. Spencer had long lost his interest in the activity. So we ate lunch, got the boy settled for a nap, and then continued our carving adventure with the girls.

Actually, it was me doing the majority of the carving while the girls drew out strict instructions on how exactly they wanted their pumpkins carved. I started by carving Spencer’s pumpkin to refresh their memory of how it all worked. Spencer is obsessed with all things triangles lately, so it was a no brainer for me to carve lots of triangles for him. I was incredibly impressed with their interest levels and even more impressed with their patience levels. We were all working together and it didn't seem to matter how long it took or who was first.

We then moved onto carving Abby's pumpkin. She had her instruction sheet ready to go. She reviewed the details with me, changing them a bit along the way. I grabbed a marker and we outlined her face onto the pumpkin. With her seal of approval, I began to cut away. She desperately wanted to help cut part of the pumpkin, so I reluctantly let her. I scored a few lines for her to cut and it was all good. Once all carved and cleaned we found a candle to see how it glowed. Pleased with her results it was time to move onto Ellie's pumpkin.

Ellie also had prepared detailed instructions that I was to follow. The eyes, the frowny brows, the nose was all clear. Got it! But we got to the mouth and I just couldn't seem to get what she was wanting. After a few tries of drawing it on the pumpkin I finally got it just right. Thank goodness we drew it before I started cutting! For some reason the pumpkin is a huge deal to Ellie this year. She is super excited about the specific pumpkin she chose and it had to be carved just right.

After dinner (by pumpkin light) and jammies we moved the pumpkins to the great outdoors. The kids were in heaven!

Annual Pumpkin Carving Pics

Litter Box?

Let me first start by saying that Spencer prefers to be dressed. He could care less about taking his clothes off. He actually doesn't like taking his clothes off. We've been known to negotiate with him to get him undressed by convincing him that we'll put fresh jammies on right away. He is like night and day to his sisters in this area.

So yesterday, a beautiful fall day, the kids were out playing in the back yard. They had been outside playing for a few minutes when Carie decided to go check on them.

Carie walks out onto the deck and gets to the stairs when she looks down and finds Spencer standing at the bottom of the stairs... with his pants down around his ankles... along with his diaper.

Mommy, I went potty in the sand box!

As evidence by the sand covered tushie and boy parts, he also sat in the sand box.

Fulfilling Weekend

Another great weekend in the books! The antibiotics seemed to be making a difference for some of us and the weekend went on as planned.

Friday night we met up with some friends to go trick-or-treating at the mall. Other than arriving totally late, it was a great evening. Arriving late did have its benefits as we managed to miss the enormous line of people waiting for the event to start. We enjoyed some dinner and then walked around the mall and trick-or-treated for a bit. We made it to the face painting area just in time. Abby & Ellie were thrilled to have their face painted, and the artist did an incredible job. The kids played in the play area for a bit and then we made our way out of the mall and headed home.

Saturday was our big day to go see Miss Bindergarten. The kids have been so excited about this day and they were glad it was finally here. The girls' actually had a chance to see the show recently through a school field trip. They were still quite excited to go to see it with us. While it was most definitely a kid production (not big time theatre), it was awesome. It was so exciting to see all three of our kids on the edge of their seats soaking in all that was going on on stage. While I enjoyed the show, watching our kids enjoy the show was the absolute best part for me. I'm so glad we decided to get season tickets and I can't wait until we get to go to our next performance.

After the show we got home and got settled. Mr. Spencer was ready so incredibly ready for his nap. Later that afternoon Grandpa, Yia Yia, Aunt Betsie & Uncle Mark arrived. We all just chilled out and watched some great football. It was nice that Carie's folks were able to come up and spend part of their last weekend with us. The kids especially enjoyed spending time with them.

Sunday was a stay at home day, a much needed stay at home day. We started the day off slow and relaxed. We processed an amazing amount of laundry, gutted pumpkins, ate lunch, carved pumpkins, and went to choir rehearsal where the kids had a little Halloween party. After all the partying we stopped at the store for some essential items and then picked up dinner before going home for the evening.

That Would Be A No

My doctor was so kind to call in a new prescription for me and I have to say that the rash is lessening. I no longer feel all itchy around my neck, like I just got a haircut. The good news!

The not so good news is that I'm either experiencing a side effect of the new drug or now I've got Carie's intestinal problem. I'm not sure which is worse, the rash or this. If my reaction continued to develop, I could have ended up with other problems. But man, this other problem stinks!

Thank goodness Abby loves her bubble gum tasting medicine, that it agrees with her, and that she seems to be doing a lot better.

Catch A Break?

We are so ready for a break, so so ready. We are physically and emotionally tapped out, the well feels empty.

The kids are all going through something. Every night at least one of them is up and often it has been all three and multiple times. Add to that Carie's difficulty in sleeping, even if the kiddos are sleeping, and some sort of intestinal thing going on... that just won't end. My coughing and hacking has progressed from mildly annoying to down right irritating and painful. I gave in yesterday and called it a day. I was feeling extremely guilty because I knew that Carie hasn't felt great herself. But the cough, the sore throat, the chills & ache feeling got the better of me. I don’t get sick often, but when I do I’m a baby!

As I was driving home I decided it might be best to call the doctor. It was meant to be! They had an opening if I could get there in 5 minutes. Since I was already driving, all I needed to do was take a left instead of going straight. I made it and he gave me the usual rundown of meds. Usual, as in what I get every 2 - 2 1/2 years that I go in. At least this time my chart wasn't in storage!

I just got the result of my strep test, and I'm so lucky that it is positive. I'm also pleased as punch that I'm either having a reaction to the antibiotics (amoxicillin) or I've got something else going on. This rash just isn't normal! Guess I should have had the Allergy doctor test for this when I was in, but I've never before had a problem. We are now waiting to hear back from the doc’s office.

In light of my strep results we've now got an appointment for Abby this afternoon. She's had a mild complaint of a sore throat, which has always been caused by drainage. I guess we'll see!

Last night everyone had a decent night in the sleep department. We could use a few more of those, like now.

Someday I'll get around to sharing pumpkin patch pics and the story of the girls' first ever paintball gun experience.

******

Edited to add... Abby has strep. The test results were quick, clear & decisively strep throat. We've got antibiotics for her, a new antibiotic for me, and we are on the lookout for symptoms in the rest of the members of this household. Toothbrushes will be added to the shopping list!

In Black & White

The girls are really into journaling and I absolutely love it.

I love their excitement over it.
I love their dedication to it.
I love watching them work together.
I love witnessing their joy.
I love hearing them talk about how important it is to them.
I love hearing them talk about how proud they are.

But with all the joy comes reality. They now have another avenue to express themselves and it absolutely breaks my heart to read about how sad they are.

I knew they were sad. I knew Abby was really struggling with the upcoming move. I didn't need a journal to tell me that. But now we have it in black and white.

Yarn

Last Friday night we had our traditional family get together at Grandpa & Yia Yia's house. We often gather together with the family on Friday evenings. This Friday we were there for additional reasons, we were to celebrate a couple of birthdays, anniversaries, and Carie's Mom had some things to distribute amongst the group.

We enjoyed a delicious dinner and good conversation. We then shared our gifts with those who were being celebrated. Then Carie's mom began to hand out her "parting gifts", as I like to call them. In these enormous gift bags were items that she had been collecting with the intent to give them to us at some point, and now seemed to be the time to do so. Then she had a large bag for each of the 4 grandkids. As the kids began immersing themselves into the bags she comments on the bulky item found in the bottom of each bag. She had made these blankets for each of the kids "to remember Grandpa & Yia Yia". This is the point where I can't get my emotions in check and exit the room. Heck, I can't even write this without crying.

The blankets are way, way cool. The kids loved them. We loved them. The girls have kept them close since Friday night and love to cover up with them at bedtime. Spencer though refers to his blanket as yarn. He's seen Yia Yia, Mommy, and Abby & Ellie crocheting with yarn. He's most familiar with the yarn in its unfinished state. So to him, this blanket is still yarn and he doesn't want anything to do with yarn being on top of him. He thinks it is cool. He loves to touch it, he's just unsure about covering up with it.

The Process

Going through the "potty training phase" with Spencer brings back memories of our experiences with the girls. Were all pretty laid back about it and I wouldn't exactly say that we are "potty training" in the true sense. But he seems to be in the mood at the moment so we won't be discouraging that! Though, I still believe that this candy addicted boy has figured out an avenue to score some candy, thus the real motivation.

So Sunday evening I was working with him to get ready for bed. He was laying there ready to get his fresh diaper on – tushie up - and the light bulb went off.

The Boy: Potty - I go potty!!!
Me: You need to go potty?
The Boy: Yes - I go potty!
Me: Okay, let's go to the bathroom! We need to potty in the bathroom, not on Momma's bed.
The Boy: Why?
Me: Because potty belongs in the potty!

We get into the bathroom but this time though he wasn't interested in his seat. He's been silly with it lately, putting it on backwards, sideways, or on his head and getting it stuck around his neck.

But this time, no interest in his seat. He's clearly been watching Ben do his thing in the bathroom. I know he'll eventually stand to go potty, but I'm just not ready for it! I'm about as much not ready for it as he was pleased with himself. He called for Mommy to come and check it out. He was so cute, so proud, and it was so gross watching it dribble everywhere. But he did it and it was all his idea. There was mucho excitement and praises followed by supervised hand washing.

So I guess we go from here.

Negotiations

The boy can use the potty.

The boy doesn't care to use the potty.

Unless candy is involved.

Go potty - 2 candies?!?!?!?

If you don't verbally confirm the 2 candies part, the go potty part is stalled until it is confirmed. This morning he initiated the "go potty - 2 candies?" Then he proceeded to lay there until Carie confirmed that he could have 2 candies if he went potty. He didn't really want to go potty, he just wanted the candies since I had already thwarted his pleads several times.

He's also working the system. Go potty, 2 candies, go potty, 2 candies until the well runs dry.

Thank goodness 2 candies = 2 jelly beans.

Sick Day Saved The Weekend

While several of us seem to be battling this that and the other, last Friday I woke up and decided that I'd take a "sick day". I could have gone to work. I probably should have gone to work. But staying home for a mental health day was so incredibly appealing and it turned out to be exactly what I needed.

It is amazing how that one stolen day changed the outlook and the course of the weekend. It felt so good to feel more on top of things instead of drowning in things.

Friday evening the girls had their final soccer game of the season followed by a pizza party to celebrate. My oh my was the pizza party crazy. There were 3 soccer teams that descended upon the pizza joint... the place that generally has no in restaurant traffic. Three teams of kids, their siblings and parents. Three teems of kids all jazzed up about soccer, their friends, the party, and sugar! Carie made the cake for the party and it was a huge hit. It turned out awesome in every aspect. Another parent handed out all sorts of goodies, also a huge hit. Then I handed out the pictures of the players I've taken over the season, which the parents seemed to enjoy. When it was all said and done, we were ready to get out of there and find some quietness. We got loaded up in the van and I suggested that we run an errand, any errand, just to have some quietness and space. The kids finally ate their pizza and watched a show. We enjoyed the peace.

Saturday morning we headed down to Lincoln to take bed stuff to my parent’s house. We arrived and fairly quickly setup the beds for a couple of our nieces. They were super jazzed to have "new" (to them) beds to call their own. After lunch mom gave Carie and I our flu shots and then we packed up and headed home. Poor Spencer fell asleep on the way but transferred nicely to finish his nap in his bed. Later that afternoon Carie's folks arrived to spend some time with the kids while Carie and I headed out for an evening on the town. We ended up choosing to go to The Cheesecake Factory, which is semi new to the area, and enjoyed an incredible adult dinner. As we enjoyed the meal we decided that 1) this would be our celebration for our upcoming anniversary and 2) as we were enjoying the Fried Mac-n-Cheese we committed to getting back on track with our eating. Loved the timing! But it was nice to have adult conversation where we were actually able to complete our thoughts. Then we headed to mall to pick up some more pants for the girls'. We've done well at scoring great deals and bargains, but finding/fitting pants for them just isn't easy to do. So we go with what works and it was high time we owned more than 3 pairs between them. LOL!

Sunday morning was our lazy morning. A much needed get going at our own pace kinda morning. That afternoon it was time to tackle the garage. We've had some critters thinking they'd like to take up residence in the garage until Carie evicted them. They were so kind to leave an incredible smelly mess behind and it so needed our attention. Thankfully the garage cleaned up relatively quickly and easily. I love Clorox! While we were doing our cleaning the girls', along with B&B, were out playing in the rain and loving it. Then it was time to get ready to head to choir and since we were all wet anyways it only made sense to toss everyone in the bath and get that out of the way. I took the kids to choir, a first this season, and I really enjoyed watching them do their thing. Carie stayed back for some quietness and she rocked at picking up the house in our absence. We enjoyed dinner and then moved into our normal evening routine. The bonus was that after the kids were in bed we got to enjoy our dessert, which we ordered to go, from The Cheesecake Factory. Oh my was that delicious!

Thanks to the incredible mental health day that provided better opportunities to enjoy the weekend, I feel ready to tackle another week.

"Big Boy"

We've now heard it from the boy. He's told us that he isn't a baby anymore, he is a big boy.

Oh man! The reality of that is so true.

We've collected a pile of stuff that is no longer needed. Quite a fair amount of it is baby gear. Why it is strictly baby gear I'm not sure as I'm positive it is giving the kids (ages 2 1/2 - 5 1/2) plenty of entertainment.

So the pile of gear is back in our house and totally accessible to the children. It has drawn them in like magnets. They are like new toys to them!

As Spencer was spinning the various things on the exersaucer last night I talked about how he loved to play with that when he was a baby. He looked at me like he had a revelation. Like it was at that moment that he realized he wasn't a baby anymore. He piped up and informed me that he wasn't a baby anymore, he was a big boy.

He's still doing great in his big bed and we are loving his new thing of wandering into our room after he's woken up for the day. He quietly goes to the edge of the bed, climbs up and finds a spot between us. He then cuddles for a bit with Mommy before rolling over to say "wake up Momma!" followed quickly by a request to watch a show and more cuddling with me.

Halloween

Halloween is approaching and the kids are getting antsy. They are all very excited about the upcoming celebrations.

Just the other night the girls' were talking about how much longer it would be. Since it is now October, Halloween must be coming soon. Abby had the notion that we could just go to Halloween instead of waiting for the day to come to us.

Spencer is so enthralled with Halloween. He talks about it all the time. He doesn't seem to care about the dressing up part. He's of course more interested in the candy! I hope a little bit of trick-or-treating and a little bit of candy will be sufficient for this little boy with the enormous candy craving.

Of course spiders and pumpkins are in great supply this time of year. I love listening to Spencer talk about the "fider webs" and "fooky pumpkins".

The Girls Know

The girls now know about Grandpa & Yia Yia's impending move. We haven't talked to Spencer, yet! We'll have to tell him what is going on, but for now he can be oblivious.

The girls' are so not happy with the news, which is the understatement of the year. I totally concur!

I really wish it would have been possible to delay that news. There is no benefit to them knowing this far in advance. To them a month is a very long time. It is going to be a long month and I have no idea how to make this any better.

We hear... "visit often". What does that mean? I suspect to each person it means something different.

Me being the logical realist, I look at the potential of visiting. While the emotional side says we'd love to make the trip to visit at least a few times a year. The logical side questions that possibility.

There are a couple prominent ways to make the journey with neither one making it feasible to "visit often". Either we drop $1500-$2000 to fly for a single round trip experience, plus any necessary lodging expenses, car rentals, and all the other daily necessities. Or we drive the 1500 miles, which sounds incredibly painful but actually isn't that much more painful than the hours and all the stops required to fly. But taking the trip by land adds travel days and surely you'd want to spend more time there than on the road.

Hypothetically say we saved back a $100/month to make these trips. Realistically, even if we could save this much monthly, it would take a good 2 1/2 years to have the funds. This isn't "visit often" to me. Well, and since we can’t just pull $100/month out of some black hole, the likelihood of that frequency is even in question. Thank goodness there is always credit, eh!?!?

Say we cut expenses, drove the miles and used more time. Carie can take off a chunk of time if necessary, but it is completely unpaid. I'm more limited (than Carie) with my vacation hours, but I can carry a small amount from one year to the next. So I save up my vacation hours and blow the large chunk every other year. We are still back to a 2 year cycle. This isn't "visit often" to me… but hey, we’ve cut it down from 2 ½ years to 2 years. Look at the bright side, right?

I have no idea what financial shape Carie's parents are in. They are in their early 60's. He is starting a new job, she is unemployed, they have a house to sell in 30 days, this is their 2nd house that they've "owned" in oh I’d guess 10 years, they've only lived in this house for 2 years, the market continues to suck, they are moving 1500 miles and who knows who is covering that tab, the list goes on and on.

Time wise, I'm making an assumption (maybe inappropriately so) that they won't have a bank of vacation hours at their disposal. Generally speaking it takes time to build up those vacation hours when you are starting a new career path.

Nothing is pointing to the possibility of "visit often" to me! It completely breaks my heart to see my kids hurt. It completely breaks my heart to know that my kids, the kids who think Grandpa & Yia Yia are the WORLD to them, won't be able to run to them and hug them with all their might.

It breaks my heart into a million pieces when I hear my girls say “I’ll miss Grandpa & Yia Yia” as we’ve heard randomly and they’ve only known since Friday afternoon.

While I'm grateful that they have one more month to be with them, it is extremely painful for me to watch my kids be with them. They were in Church with us yesterday I had to leave Church no less than 3 times to get control of myself.

I may be happy "for" them, but I'm also so damn pissed at them.

Damn I hate being a logical person, I really hate it!

Pondering The Eye Appointment

I was totally shocked by some of the tests performed during the girls' eye appointment yesterday.

The depth perception test was pretty cool. That was on of the girls' favorite tests! They got to wear fun glasses and look at butterflies, etc... Her directions were a bit lacking, but the actual test felt age appropriate.

The standard eye chart test was questionable. How do they know if the child passed or failed the test based on their vision? It could have easily been their lack of skills and abilities with the alphabet. Sure, I know a lot of kids who have known their whole alphabet, by sight and sound, for quite a period of time. But I’m also positive that there are kids this age that do not.

Then there was some test she did out of a book, more of a nearsighted test it seemed. While I didn't have a good view of the inside of the book, I heard her questions and Ellie's answers as she flipped pages. As the Dr. flipped the pages she quizzed Ellie on what number was on each page. Again, many kids this age probably don't know their numbers. Especially double digit numbers like 96, by sight. Counting them and recognizing them are two entirely different things.

We've recently seen the test results for all the Kindergartener's in our district. The large range of abilities was astonishing. There are absolutely many kids who wouldn't be able to complete this eye exam, and not for lack of vision.

Fortunately the girls were able to successfully complete the entire eye exam. We left knowing that their eyes are healthy and developing as they should. But I left feeling like the tests at this "family" eye care place was lacking and not appropriate for their younger patients.

What A Day!

It all started out weird and continued to be a day full of surprises.

Carie took the girls' to the bus stop this morning. I'm hanging out at home with the other 3 kids and realizing that Carie hasn't returned from the bus stop well after she should have. I of course got quite curious. I was about to go look for her just as soon as she came in the door. Carie and the girls were "on time" per their usual time. Except the bus driver is now arriving later, after the posted pick up time because he was told he was arriving at school too early. This has been a big gripe of mine from the get go. It didn't seem right that the bus passed by our house a solid 8 minutes before he was even supposed to be at the bus stop. Now the question is... will this trend continue? When should they go to the bus stop... their old time, the posted time, or the new time? On nice days it doesn't matter all that much. On rainy or upcoming freezing days it certainly does. I wish the girls weren't so adamant about riding the bus!

The rest of the morning went fine. I then took the afternoon off to take the girls to their eye appointment. The eye appointment that never ended. It all turned out great, but it seemed to take forever. I'm sure it didn't help that they were doing 2 appointments at a time, but the girls' and I were way ready to go well before it was over.

But then near the end of the appointment Ellie starts acting off and proceeds to tell me that her ear hurts. The upside is that we happened to be just around the corner from the Peds office. The downside is that it was almost 4:00. So I quickly call the office on the off chance we could slide in yet today. Thankfully we got in!

Except there was now more waiting and we still weren't headed home, which is where we all wanted to be. Ellie was pretty miserable by this point and fell asleep on my shoulder as we were cuddling and waiting. Our Ped didn't have to look twice to see how miserable she was. She took one look in her ear and it was definitely infected.

They were wonderful and called a prescription in for us. On our way to get it we stopped to get a much needed snack. Boy did that help! Between the snack and the Motrin at the Peds office, she was definitely perking up. Then we waited a solid 20 minutes in the drive through at the pharmacy before we were finally on our way home.

We finally made it home 4 hours after I had left to get the girls from school. We arrived home to a wonderful dinner Mommy had made. She pulled out all the stops and made quite the kid friendly meal! Everyone was pleased! But quick, don't get comfy yet...

Then it was time to go get (or rescue, IMO) my brother from the airport. After checking his flight status we found that the flight was nearly 15 minute early. Since I hadn't been home all that long I knew Spencer wouldn't be happy staying home while I went to the airport, so we all hopped in the van and went. The kids loved going to the airport and it didn't take long before we were headed home.

Carie walks in the door to the phone ringing. Timing was bad, very very bad. We were just getting home and the kids were begging for a snack. It was most certainly bedtime! We should have let it go to voicemail, but didn't. It was her parents calling to give her the devastating news that they are moving... across country... in a matter of weeks. That wasn't on our radar and clearly should have been.

Time to pull it together and get the kids through the rest of their bedtime routine and tucked in. We didn't say anything to the kids tonight. They will most certainly be devastated. Grandpa and Yia Yia are the world to them!

I'm personally ready to call it a day!