Random Pictures

Here are some random pictures of the kids that I have on my computer at work. I need to download the ones from my camera and post them. I haven't done that in a while. I really am starting to stink with the picture taking! :(

This picture cracks me up. Tab sent it to me. It was taken during Mallory's birthday party. Not sure what the expression was about, but he looks a hot mess!

This is a better representation of my little man. This sums him up perfectly! He is always happy! :) Love it!

See? Another day, another great smile!

Here is my sassy little girl. Sarah - in this picture, I think she resembles Joseph a little!

Daddy and his little girl. She is going to give him way more gray hair as she grows up!

Here she was coloring at the Children's Museum. I am pretty sure we have a lefty on our hands!

Whew! Time for a Breather

So my monster project finally went out the door. It is now in the hands of Massachusetts and we now wait to find out what happens next. I am keeping my fingers, toes, legs, arms….everything crossed in hopes we win. I think we definitely have a high chance of winning and retaining this piece of business, but we never know what is going to happen. I will be on pins and needles until they announce the winner.

I took off a couple of days this week to catch up on things. My intention was to clean the house and do stuff that I have neglected over the past 2 months….but guess what? It didn’t happen! I ended up being pretty lazy and sleeping. I told Ted that I can’t believe how tired I have been the last week or so. He told me to just relax and it was probably my body trying to catch up from all the late work nights, the travel and the stress. I am definitely feeling a bit better now that I had a few days to rest up.

The kids are all doing great. Ethan went back to his Mom’s this past weekend and will be there for the remainder of the summer. Loved having him at home! Like I said in a previous post, it feels like we are complete when he is there. The kids have been asking about him a lot because he was with us for over a month. I love that they do that! :)

Brody and Molly both moved up in their classes at school. I had a brief meeting with Brody’s new teacher last week, since I didn’t know who she was and wanted to introduce myself to her. I LOVE HER! She is awesome and we had a great meeting. She said that she is a pretty strict disciplinarian (yay!) and that whatever Ted and I have done with Brody, we need to keep it up because he is so well behaved. That made this Momma smile! It totally warms my heart to hear that. It makes me realize that when we have to get on him for things and punish, the results are paying off! In his new class, they go on a field trip to the movies down the street every Tuesday. She said she was impressed with Brody considering it was his first time. I have always been hesitant about taking him because I am not sure how he will act. He watches movies at home, but normally he gets ¼ or ½ through and then wants to do something else. The only time he will watch the whole thing is when he is in his room. But, she said he did great and Brody loves going!

As for Molly, she has the same main teacher that Brody did when he was in her class so I know her pretty well. A couple weeks ago, I asked them how she was in the class with the other kids. The reason I asked is because my little girl has a TUDE! Yes, a big fat attitude! She is the sweetest thing one minute and then the next, she is throwing a look at you and if looks could kill you would be dead. She definitely bosses Brody around when we are at home. (He will be my sensitive one….she will be the more strong-willed one!) They said she is the leader of the pack, but not in an aggressive way. They said she gets along great with all the other kids. They love her there! All the teachers love to love up on her. I am thinking that she is holding it all inside until she gets home at night. Don’t get me wrong….she is a sweet little girl, but she can be mean. And like I said, when she doesn’t want to eat something, or she doesn’t want to do something, she lets you know! Sometimes, we laugh because it is pretty funny and other times, we aren’t sure what to do with her. She is too cute to get mad at, that’s for sure.

She has started to say love you (although it comes out “low-you”) and it makes me melt. Last night, after we read our books before bed, I asked her if I could rock her before I put her to bed. Initially, she said no, but when I get her paci, she came right up and just laid on me. I rocked her for a little bit. I could have stayed like that forever. I told her “Molly – don’t grow up…..just stay this small forever!” She said “Yes!” If only that could happen!

I am in such a baby mood lately and can’t believe my babies are growing up. I could have 4 more, but unfortunately, I need a man to do that and Ted said he is done. I definitely respect his decision….we do have 3, but I could have many more Brody’s and Molly’s. Knowing our luck, we would hope for good babies like they were and getting the holy terror!! We thought that would happen with Molly but she turned out better than Brody. But, I am not complaining. I have the 3 best kids in the world and could never ask for anything more! :)

Not funny....but I had to post

Okay...the parent in me does not think this is funny, but the other part of me is in disbelief and had to post this. Brody is a very precocious child. I think the child has been cursed with my smart mouth and it really scares the crap out of me. Here are two conversations we had this weekend: 1 on Friday after school, and 1 on Saturday.

Friday
I picked up Brody and Molly from school. Brody had a note in his cubby from his teacher that said that he had a rough day on Friday. He wasn't listening and she asked that we speak to him about hitting his friends. Brody never hits his friends so I was definitely taken a back.

Me: Brody - what happened today? Ms. Kendra said you weren't listening and you hit your friends.
Brody: Well, Alex pinched me.
Me: You know you aren't supposed to hit your friends. You know better than that. Why did you get in trouble for not listening?
Brody: I did listen to my teachers.
Me: Well, apparently you weren't listening or else I wouldn't have gotten this note.
Brody: Well, apparently I was!

Yesterday
We took the kids to my girlfriend's daughters party at the local children's museum. When we passed the park at the front of our neighborhood, Brody asked if we could got to the park.

Brody: Mommy, can we go play at the park?
Me: Not right now, we need to get home and start dinner. Maybe another day.
Brody: Why Mommy?
Ted: Because we said not right now.....
Brody: Daddy, I wasn't talking to you....I was talking to Mommy. Mommy why?

Both Ted and I sat there with our mouths wide open. We were in shock that he actually said that. I am not sure what we are going to do with him..........He has been so good for so long, but this week, he has had a hard time listening at both school and home. I am hoping this is a short-term thing and he straightens up soon.

It has been too long....

I can't believe I haven't posted anything in over 2 months! Crazy. Life is crazy. Work is crazy.....


I would say that in the last 2 months, I have been on the road traveling more than I have been home. I am working on a very large project at work right now (a $500 million contract in MA) and have been traveling back and forth to Boston alot. I also had to travel to Connecticut a couple of times. Luckily, I don't mind traveling to either one of those places, so it hasn't been too bad. And Ted has been doing really good with the kids. I just find it funny that when I have to travel, sooooo many people come up to me and ask "Since you are traveling, who is taking care of the kids?" I look at them like they are stupid, I am sure, and say "Uh......their Dad!" It is almost like it is totally not expected that their dad would be taking care of them while I am gone. What is wrong with that picture. I actually get offended by the question because it almost makes me feel like people think I shouldn't be traveling when I have small children. I am a very career-driven person and I don't think that having small children should hold me back from opportunities at work. UGH! Sorry for the ranting, but sometimes it really frustrates me. My good friend, who is much higher up in the company as me, said the next time someone asks that, I should respond with "Would you ask a man that question?" Of course, I am not that quick on the draw like that, but still. I can have both, right? A career and family? I think it is possible and I think I am doing a pretty darn good job at it. I am not saying it is easy all the time, but luckily I have an extremely supportive husband who never complains when I have to stay late or when I have to travel and I have a supportive family who can help. Anyway, I don't know who I am trying to convince....maybe myself, but I intend to stay at it so I can have both.


On the kiddie front, I posted new pictures of the kids on the right of the blog. Ethan is growing up way to fast. He turned 13 last month and has sprouted a moustache and is now my height! His voice is deeper than his Dad's and I would like to know where the little, blonde headed boy went..........oh, that's right. That is now Brody! The other day, I was looking at Brody sitting in his car seat on the way home from school and had flash backs to Ethan at that age. I think Brody resembles Ethan at that age so much sometimes. Of course, Ethan doesn't agree, but what does he know? :) We have Ethan for the summer, or atleast a good part of it, so it makes me happy when he is here. I feel like we are one complete unit and all the pieces are finally all together when he is here!


Of course, Brody is growing like a weed too. He is start to get skinny too. I know that when others look at him, they don't see that, but I definitely do. A couple of weeks ago, I was getting him dressed and had the hardest time finding him some shorts to wear.....all of his shorts were too big in the waste. Pretty crazy. He has changed sooooo much over the last couple of months it is hard for me to believe that is still just 3 years old. He is definitely becoming more of a lovebug with Molly too, which makes me soo happy. For the most part, he is so sweet with her, calling her sweet names and hugging her alot. Of course, she is not always digging it which I will get to later. But, I have to share this moment I had with him the other day because I never want to forget the feeling I had.


Last week, I left on Tuesday to go to Connecticut for work for a couple of days. I ended up getting home really late Thursday night and Ted ended up taking Brody to school Friday morning since Molly had a doctor's appointment that I was taking her to. So, I didn't really get a chance to see Brody since before I left so I definitely wanted to peek in and see him when I dropped Molly off at school after her doctor's appointment. Ted told me that they were having a little parade at school right around the time that I would be dropping her off so I figured I would see him anyway. I walked into the school and all the kids were in the main area singing and chanting. There were other parents standing around and when Brody looked around, I could tell he was looking for me. I peeked around from the parent standing in front of me and the look on Brody's face when he spotted me literally took my breath away. He broke out in a huge smile that lit up his entire face and as he was running to me, he started to tear up! I am actually tearing up right now as I type this because it was a moment I will NEVER forget. I could just tell how excited he was to see me and I was only gone for a few days. I swear.......these kids are the best thing I have ever done and they make me so proud to be their Mom every day!!!


Anyway, now that that sappy moment is over, let me get to little, miss attitude. Yes, attitude. Whew....Ted and I are going to have our hands full. Brody is going to be our sensitive one, "momma's boy" is what Ted calls him sometimes, but we are definitely going to have our hands full with lil' miss Molly. The looks she gives sometimes are to die for and like the saying "if looks could kill" we would have been dead more times than I can count. In saying that, she is also the most laidback, funny, cuddly girl I have ever met. That sounds so weird to say, but it is true. When Ted and I went on our vacation, which was the best time EVER, my Dad said it was so strange because Molly could be running around one minute, playing, and then when it was time to go to bed, you tell her it is "night-night" time and she is up the stairs and asleep in 5 minutes. I can't remember when Brody started climbing out of his crib, but she is now 19 months old and I don't think she has ever stood up in her crib when we weren't in there. At this point, I might keep her in her crib until she is 5! HA! She loves her sleep and her crib....I have never seen another child like that. And funny......man she is funny. The faces she makes, the way she imitates us, she is pretty hilarious! But when she has a 'tude, you better watch out. My parents keep saying she gets that from me. I guess they got their wish. They used to tell me that they can't wait until I have a kid just like me. I think it finally came true.

She had her 18 month check up the other day (she was actually closer to 19 months) and here are her stats:


Height - 31.1 inches (25%)
Head - 18.1 inches (25%)
Weight - 27.1 lbs. (75%)


So, she is short and stocky, just like her Dad and brother. But, she of course, looks more petite to me.


She had to back to the ENT after our last appointment for a check-up, but she ended up going back earlier because she got a double ear infection. They checked her out a couple weeks after she stopped the antibiotic and said that they would go ahead and do the tubes. They said I did have some time to decide because we are going into the summer months when ear infections are supposed to be rare. But they said if she continues to have issues, we need to go ahead and do it. It has been almost 3 weeks since she was seen and the other day at her check-up, her regular doctor said her ears look fine so I think we will wait. I really don't want her to have to have tubes, but of course, if she does need them, I won't wait. But I think right now, we will see what happens.


I will post some recent pictures I have taken of the kiddies later this evening. Sometimes, it takes a long time to post them and I am not a very patient person when it comes to that. :)

Molly Info - 16 1/2 months

This is more for my benefit later one when I look back and wonder what Molly was doing at 16 1/2 months!

Yesterday, during Molly’s ENT appointment, they asked me how we felt her hearing and speech development was. I said “everything seems to be going well!” He said “does she say about 6-10 words?” I said “Oh yeah!” Ted looked at me shocked. He didn’t think so but I started to rattle off everything she is saying now and I started to realize that she is saying a lot:

Mommy
Daddy
Bobo (for Brody)
E-tan (for Ethan)
Book
Apple
Eat-eat
Night-night
Pop-Pop
Mamee (instead of MeeMaw)
Go
Shoe
Juice
Papi (for paci)
Baby
Elmo
Fishy

In addition to her expansive vocabulary :) she now has 7 teeth! Four on the top (including the two middle ones with a big gap in between) and three on the bottom. Unfortunately, her teeth look a little jacked up right now, but it just adds to her beauty! :)

A little more about her right now. She was fully clothed yesterday (including shoes and jeans) and she was 26 lbs. and 30 inches tall. She is growing up too fast!! She climbs on everything, including stairs, and her Grandma taught her to go down the stairs on her behind rather than try and walk down. She still loves her bath and gets really excited about brushing her teeth. Of course, she is still an amazing sleeper (even now when she is sick!) I am so thankful for her every day!

Cooties!

Okay…it has been almost a month since my last post and there is lots going on.

First, the good news. Ted and I are going on vacation! We are heading to Cancun for about a week at the end of this month for our anniversary and I can not wait! We will be celebrating our 6th wedding anniversary on May 28th! It seems like we have been married longer than that! My parents are going to watch the kids that week for us. Ted and I have both said we are not planning anything except relaxing, beaching and pooling it, drinking, and sleeping! Ahhh………sounds so nice. I know I will miss the kiddies though, but they will be in good hands. In 18 days, we will be here!!


Now on to the bad news. We are all sick! That is everyone except Ted. Not sure how he escaped that one. Last week, Brody was coughing, mostly at night, and I thought it was just his allergies acting up. He is like his Daddy in that respect. When the pollen gets bad around here, which it has been the last month, their allergies are real bad. On Saturday morning, he was laying with me and I could hear him wheezing so I decided to take him to the doctor. Unfortunately, we couldn’t get in with my doctor’s office so they told me considering his symptoms to take him the urgent care. We got there, they did a chest x-ray, said that looked good and gave him an overall check up. They said they couldn’t see anything that would be causing it so they said he might have just picked up a virus and it would have to run its course. Then Sunday morning, I got a call from them and they said the radiologist ended up looking at his chest x-ray and said he had the beginnings of pneumonia. I couldn’t believe it. I couldn’t believe that the doctor at the urgent care missed it. I thought something else might have been wrong and should have trusted my “Mommy instinct” They told me they were going to call in an antibiotic and that he needed to start using his inhaler again. So we did that and he seemed to be better on Monday morning.

I got the kids ready on Monday morning for school, dropped them off and headed to work. Got to work around 8:00 and sure enough, at 9:02, I got a call from the kids’ school. It was Molly’s teacher asking me to give her a call. I wasn’t sure what was up…figured she had just gotten hurt or fell or something. Nope! When I called, they said Molly was running a 101 fever and she was fussy ever since I left. I thought that was strange because she was absolutely fine that morning! She didn’t give me any inclination that she wasn’t feeling good. My mom went and picked her up and kept her for the day. When I headed home from work, I left a little late and told Ted to keep her up because I wanted to see her. My mom said she was fine in the morning, but in the afternoon, she was running a fever again and was real clingy. When I got home, I almost cried. She looked horrible. When my little girl doesn’t feel good, it is written all over her face. She gets dark circles under her eyes and she just looks beat down. I swooped her up and she was burning up. I took her temp and sure enough…it was 102. She was breathing real funky and I was worried about her getting pneumonia since the last time, she got it right after Brody. So I decided to take her to the doc. Since I was still pissed with our urgent care, I took her to the ER at Children’s Hospital for them to check her out. When we got there, she was running a 104 fever and they immediately gave her a Tylenol suppository. Poor thing! When we got back to the room, all she did was lay on me, sweating up a storm. The doc checked her out and said her lungs sounded fine and that she was probably just fighting a virus. Luckily we were in and out of there by 8:00. On the way home, I was joking with my Mom, who was so gracious to come with me, that Molly has never been in the car and not home in her bed after 7:00-7:30 in her life! Crazy! Anyway, she ended up staying home all week and today was her first day back at school. Considering it is now 3:00 and I haven’t gotten a call, I consider it a success.

Yesterday, she had her ENT appointment scheduled because her pediatrician said she needed to be seen since she was having recurring ear infections and persistent fluid in her ear. When we were at the ER the other night, the doctor did say something to me about her right ER and when I mentioned that we had the ENT appointment this week, he decided not to do anything about it. The first part of her appointment was a hearing test. The first thing they do is a tympanogram, which I wrote about in a previous blog. This test assesses the movement of her ear drum. She failed both ears at her pediatrician’s office, but luckily, this time she only failed on the right side. The next thing they did was the actual hearing test. They had her sit on my lap and made noises in speakers to her left and right. She did really good with that, but they said that they think she is hearing more out of her left than her right. She might have minor hearing loss in her right ear, which is caused from the fluid sitting behind her ear drum. Once we got called back to see the doctor, a resident came in first to assess her situation. He took a peek at her ears and then decided he needed to clean them out. My poor baby was screaming her little heart out the entire time. I felt so bad for her. I finally had to have Ted hold her because I couldn’t do it anymore. Not only was I emotional, but she was making me sweat! The doc came in and said that considering we are going into the summer months, which means it is not ear infection “season” he wanted to give her a little bit of time to see if the fluid goes away on its own. He said it generally happens in 9 out of 10 children. She has a follow-up appointment on June 30th to see what has gone on and if the fluid hasn’t gone away, she will probably need tubes. UGH! We avoided this bullet with Brody and I was hoping the same thing would happen with Molly, but not sure. Hopefully the fluid will disappear and all will be good. We shall see.

Now, I am not feeling so hot. I stayed home with Molly on Tuesday and on Wednesday, I started to have a sore throat and a cough. It has stayed around and while it doesn’t seem to be getting worse, it isn’t getting better. If it is not gone by next week, I will be heading to the doctor to get some meds so I can be good and healthy for our trip.

I really need to blog more......

Yet again, I totally suck at blogging. I swear…I say I am going to be better about it and I totally cherish the fact that I blogged so often the last couple of years because I look back on what I posted all the time. Especially looking to see what Brody did at certain ages and (dare I say) compare him to Molly. There definitely is no comparison. Other then the fact that they were both easy, they are 2 totally different children!

The biggest news right now is that Ted will possibly not be working next week if the Government shuts down, which according to what I have been reading, is inevitable. As of right now, they have about 12 hours to come to some agreement or Ted will be getting on Monday, heading to work to get his furlough papers, and then heading back home! UGH! We were planning to go on a vacation at the end of May for our anniversary, but of course, that has been put on hold because we don’t know what will happen. I am hoping some miracle happens in the next 12 hours and he will still get paid next week.

Other news….Molly has another ear infection. When I took her for her 15 month check-up when I took Brody for his 3 year check up, unbeknownst to me, she had an ear infection in her left ear. Of course, like Brody, she gave me no indication that she was having issues so I had no clue. Well, when the doctor looked back at her other appointments, she has either had an infection or fluid in her ear since January. She prescribed an antibiotic to try and knock it out and said we needed to come back in 2 weeks for a re-check. Well, her re-check was on Tuesday and guess what – the ear that had an infection still had yellow fluid and her right ear was the same way. The other issue is that when we first went back, the nurse did a tympanogram test on her. I don’t remember Brody ever having that done, at least not in the pediatrician’s office, so I was surprised when they did it. The tympanogram tests the middle ear the mobility of the eardrum. It doesn’t assess her hearing, but it measures the eardrum’s response to sound at different pressures. Well, both of her ears came back abnormal which means we are headed to the ENT. I was able to schedule an appointment with the same practice Brody went to on May 5th so we will wait to see what happens. I am hoping that they are able to solve the issue without having to do tubes, which is what happened with Brody. I know that I shouldn’t be freaked out, but anytime someone says a test came back abnormal with my kids, I get a little scared. Then of course, I thought back and remembered that in the hospital, she failed her first hearing test, but passed the second. Of course, in my warped brain, I am already associating the 2 and they probably have nothing to do with each other. So, now we wait. Of course, you take one look at her and have no clue that anything is wrong. She is still her happy go lucky self. Such a lovebug. The following list is just for me because I want to document some of the funny things the kids are doing now:

Brody

• The other night, I was getting Brody ready for his bath. I told him to take his clothes off and he looked at me and said, “Okay little girl…..little girl named Mommy!” Of course, it is not as funny as I am typing it because the funniest part was the look on his face and the way he said it! It cracked me up.


• Brody is doing so awesome at school. I definitely think he was more than ready to move up to the next class. When my parents picked him up from school the other day, my Mom asked how he was and his teacher said “Brody is always good!” Makes this Mommy smile. He has been so good the last couple of weeks with listening and doing what he is told. His time-outs have been few and far between and he just seems to have matured so much recently. Crazy to think of him as mature at 3, but I don’t know another way to describe it.


• I have started to relax a little about his schedule. Anyone that knows me well might be falling out of their chair right now as they are reading this, but yes, it is true. The nap times are limited on the weekend and he is able to fully function with no nap so if he misses it, I am not that worried. We still send him upstairs in his room at his normal nap time, but we let him watch tv and have now referred to it as “rest time.” At night, same thing, but he has been hanging out with us a little more at night and the other night, I actually let him stay downstairs and we watched cartoons and it was 8:00 pm! I know…..sometimes I shock myself. But he is a well-adjusted kid and I have learned that we can modify the schedule a little bit and guess what? The world doesn’t fall apart like I thought! Of course, I can’t say the same thing about Molly’s schedule. She is still too young.

Molly

• Similar to Brody, Molly is doing really well at school. She has definitely adjusted to going there every morning and I can’t honestly remember the last time she cried when I dropped her off. That used to just be a staple in our morning routine, but not now. I can’t tell that she is picking up more and more language. She can pretty much imitate most words we say to her and has come to call Brody bo-bo. It is pretty cute.


• At night, for a while, we would bathe her, put her jammies on, and then I would rock her for a few minutes before I put her down at night. She would just lay on me with her head on my chest and those were one of my favorite moments of the day. Well now, or atleast for the past couple of nights, we do the same thing and I will go to sit in the rocker and she will fight to get off of me. Once she is down, she will walk right over to her crib, grab the railing, look at me and say something in her Chinese, and hike a leg up like she wants to get in the crib. The first time it happened, I couldn’t believe it. It was like she was trying to tell me that she was ready for bed. Well, she has started doing it more and more. I guess our rocker time has slowly faded away! That is like a knife to the heart for me because it is yet another sign my little baby girl is growing up! :(


• Molly definitely loves her brothers. She and Brody play together pretty well, but of course there are those times where they fight. It is crazy to think about a 16 month old and a 3 year old fighting, but trust me it happens. Molly started this new thing last week where she would break out in a high-pitch scream when Brody would take something from her. She is a little feisty……….I think it is pre-cursor of what is to come. She is definitely my more laid back baby, but she has a mean streak in her and as she gets older, I am sure we would find it as cute as we do now at this age.


• Last weekend, Molly was out in the kitchen while Ethan was emptying the dishwasher. She fell and started crying and I was getting ready to get up and go in there, but Ethan had scooped her up and she immediately stopped crying. It was probably one of the sweetest things ever. She was just staring up at him, with this look on her face that said “Thank you so much for saving my life!” It was adorable! I love those moments….they definitely can not be re-created!

I think that is it for now. I am going to get back to work. I just wanted to take a little brain break and post something since I haven’t posted in a while! Ciao for now! :)