My Crazy Reality

Well, that was a bit long!

2011-09-27T11:35:00.001-07:00

Um, I really don't even know how to summarize our last year.

We have been so crazy with the move, oh yeah, did I mention that? LOL, nope. Sure has been awhile. Ok, so Clint is retiring from the Army as of December this year. NO MORE DEPLOYMENTS!!!! So we moved back to Utah to be with family.

We took the kids on an amazing (ok, great, but there is such thing as too much Mickey) vacation to Disney World, for 8 DAYS!!! Abby was 8 months old at the time. So it was quite the experience flying with 3 kids. They did great, and we really did have a ton of fun. Then Christmas happened, with a trip to the ER for Abby because we all had the stomach bug, but she had it so bad she had to get IV fluids to bring her out of being dehydrated.

Then came the move across country. Yeah, I don't recommend that :P Clint "dropped us off" so to speak. He had to go back to DC for 8 months and stuck me with the 3 kids for that duration. OK, ok so it was a mutual decision. Either way, that was a LONG 8 months.

Kaiden and Kayley started preschool the last school year (they are in it again this year). They love the school, and I'm not gonna lie, I love the break.

The Winter retty much consisted of the kids and I (and my extended family) all being sick for several months. Yes, our family is GREAT at sharing!

Finally came summer, and the kids could get out of my hair, er uh, play outside! The sickness finally went away. Abby had RSV with pneumonia, so that was a pretty scary time.

Kaiden and Kayley started some new sports for the summer. Kayley did ballet and princess camp (don't ask, I have no idea where she gets the diva princess gene from, for all those who really know me, I am the opposite of all things girly).

Kaiden did karate and soccer.

Soccer and 4-6 year olds is about the funniest thing I have every seen. The girls stop to play with the dandelions and the boys pretend to be airplanes. Oh wait, nope, most of the kids actually played the game (well, cluster of kids running and kicking the ball and each other) while Kaiden did his own thing. The games were really funny to watch though. There really is no "organized" sport for that age group. It's pretty much chase the ball and don't get hurt. Ok, so maybe just chase the ball. :)

Then came the end of summer, and soccer was over. Kaiden quit karate, and Kayley quit ballet and said she wanted to play soccer instead (that's my girl!). We decided to hold off on sports for now. The kids started preschool, and finally, FINALLY Clint came home.

Clint and I were able to (thanks so very much to my family for that!) go on a vacation, just the two of us! So what do we do, why, go to Disney World of course. Because we just couldn't get enough of it in December right? LOL.

No, we actually went to Orlando. We went to Universal Studios, Universal's Islands of Adventure, Sea World, and then for one day we went to Disney World. We basically went on all of the big rides that we couldn't go on when we had the kids. We hit up 3 of the Disney Kingdoms in one day, yes, it can be done!

So we are home. All settled into a routine, comfortable, and happy. OK, well maybe not. We're happy, but not the rest. Clint goes back to DC for 2 more weeks (I think those 2 weeks will feel longer than the 8 months!). Then he will be home for good.

Nw we get to play civilians. Clint is now on the job market. He hasn't had to worry about finding a job for 20 years.

So now, there you have it, a year in review. I could go into all the details, but I don't feel like doing that, and I doubt you want to read all of that.

So have a great day, week, month, year? Who knows when I will get back on this thing again :P

5x7 Folded Card

2011-09-27T11:32:00.001-07:00

Swirl Heart 5x7 folded card

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Things are moving along...

2010-07-23T05:46:00.000-07:00

OK, so I took posted some comparison shots of the kids around the same age. They are out of order, but I am not going to redo it to put it in order :) So here are some new and older pictures.

Ok so this came way out of order. This was around the same age as Kayley is on the tummy picture below. This is Kaiden at about 6 months. Abby looks like an exact "mix" of Kayley and Kaiden together :P

As part of Kayley's princess for the day adventure, we had a little tea party after :)

Kayley got to be "princess for the day" at the mall. I got her a dress, then took her to get some jewelry, nail polish, lunch, then ice cream.

I thought these 2 pics were funny. The top one is Abby doing the same exact thing Kayley used to do (below picture is Kayley around 6 months) above is Abby at 4.5 months.

Clint took Kaiden to Dutch Wonderland for the day. Kaiden had a blast! He got to choose whatever activities he wanted all day long.

So a little bit of an update.

Abby: She is 15 lbs now. She is about ready to crawl. She can get up to the crawling position, but just rocks back and forth. She is only 4 months! She started on solids. Although the last couple of days she wants nothing to do with solids. She rolls across the floor now as well. She has been having some sleep issues, so we started sleep training. She is now sleeping in her crib for naps, rather than on me in the rocking chair. She has only been getting up once at night to eat.

Kayley: She thinks she is a princess, and frankly, she acts like one. She is a bunch of fun though. She loves all things Cinderella now. Especially the movie. We must watch that at least once a day, sometimes more.

Kaiden: Well, this little man. I tell ya. It's always something. The most recent, he's going to have to wear glasses. He is far sighted in his right eye. The doc says if he wears his glasses regularly, then his eye could "repair" itself. I guess if his eye relaxes, the damage with focusing so much can be undone. We'll see. He is also partially deaf in his right ear. He goes back to the doc to see why he has fluid behind his ears, and if tubes will help with the hearing.

Clint: Getting closer to retirement. He is headed to Utah in August to go look for houses for us. We put in an offer on one, but it looks like there are multiple offers, so we likely won't get it. It's rather frustrating. He will be going to Buffalo in Oct. to be with his brother for a few days. They are supposed to go see a Bills game together...bleh! LOL.

I am doing well. Still nursing Abby. I am slowly losing the pregnancy weight. Not as fast as I would like. I have about 15 lbs to lose to get where I feel comfortable. I had been exercising regularly, but was not losing any weight. Then it got to be 90+ degrees. I'll get back to it again in the fall :) I know, excuses excuses. But it's nearly impossible to exercise in the house with 3 kids getting under my feet. It's too hot outside. After the "instant weight loss" from birth. I have lost 11 lbs since. Just a little more to go.

Take care :)

Picture update

2010-06-05T07:10:00.001-07:00

So things are chugging along.
Where to start.
Abby is now 3 months old. Time is going by so fast! Abby slept through the night for the 1st time last night. It was amazing!!! She is smiling and "talking" now. She found her voice the other day and is definitely using it. She is trying to roll over, but it's a lot of work trying to roll all of her fat rolls :P Ok, she's not fat, but she is chunky. She is starting to laugh now as well. Mostly when I am about to feed her :P She generally gives a 6.5 hour stretch of sleep between feeds at night. Last night she went 8 hours. For me, sleeping through the night is considered 8 hours or more.

Kaiden's update. He is getting MUCH better about controlling his temper tantrums. It used to be 1 hour long tantrums. They are now down to about 5 minutes, if that. So a lot less stressful. He went to the genetic doc to look at some of the issues he has. Curved fingers, uneven ears, spots in his eyes, etc. From there he got sent to neurology for the 2 seizures he has had. That doc cleared him and said it likely wasn't seizures but a problem from prematurity. His nervous system shuts down with extreme emotion (could explain the long tantrums, trouble with transitioning between activities, etc.). Basically his system "glitches" for a few seconds before recovering. To make sure it's not a heart issue, he now has an appointment with cardiology. He also has an appt. pending for opthamology and audiology. His eye appt. is for the black spots he has been getting in his eyes. The audio is to make sure that his hearing isn't an issue due to the mismatched/uneven ears. I think it's fine, he's just a typical toddler that doesn't listen :P He did fail his first hearing test as a baby but then passed it the 2nd time. So we'll see.

Kayley update...This little girl cracks me up. One minute she is the sweetest girl, the next, she has hands on hips with a "you can't make me" attitude. She has the eye rolling, back talk thing down pretty well too. She is all set for when she becomes a teenager I guess :P She is writing a lot of letters now. She writes her name, but writes it backwards. The letters are facing the right way, but she writes from right to left instead of left to write. I guess if she lived in ancient times, she'd fit right in :) She is really starting to love being around Abby. Now that Abby interacts with her. She sings, rocks, plays with, talks to, kisses, and gives blankets to Abby. She loves playing mommy. I have to cut her off when she wants to feed Abby like mommy does though, lol.
Both kids are in summer camp for the next couple of weeks. They are loving it! I am loving the "break" too. It's not much of a break, as it is a chance for me to get things done around the house.

We're getting closer to retirement now. In one year the kids and I will be leaving DC and heading to Utah!!!! Considering how fast time is going by, this year should go by pretty quickly. The plan is still UT. but we're not entirely sure which area in UT. We still have some time to think about it.

Not really any travel plans this summer. This is the 1st summer we haven't done any major traveling since Clint and I have been married. He may head up to his family in NY for the weekend, but that's about it. We'll be doing another Great Wolf Lodge trip in the Fall. Then in Dec. we are going to Disney World :) For Christmas we will be going to Louisiana to be with my family. Clint still hasn't met my grandparents, and we've been married for over 6 years :P

I am at war with the scale. The pregnancy weight is just not coming off. I was under the impression that nursing helps you lose weight. I have talked to lots of BTDT moms and they have all said that it's not until about the 6th month that the weight comes off easier. Well lets hope so, because my body is fighting me big time on losing any weight. I have been working out a bunch, not over indulging in junk food, etc. I still don't fit in my regular clothes. But my "fat" clothes aren't as snug as they used to be. I know it's only been 3 months since Abby was born, I just have to remember that :)
We are all doing well, enjoying our kids, doing more fun things as a family and getting out more.
Take care everyone!

Sorry it's been so long....

2010-05-01T08:46:00.000-07:00

So here's a treat :)

Abby smiles in the video and rolls on both sides for the 1st time in this video. She is just about 8 weeks old now. Things are more in a routine than before. The kids seem to adore their little sister now. Anyway, busy around here, I'll give a better update as soon as I can :)

3 weeks old...

2010-03-29T16:50:00.000-07:00

Abby is now 3 weeks old. She is eating (a little too well) and growing like a weed. She is starting to be much more alert during the day now as well. She is such a good baby.

It's so much more different with her than it was with Kd and Ky. We're able to hold her more, and yes, spoil her more. With the kiddos, we were in survival mode. Not this time. Of course, Kd and Ky are jealous and are acting out now that she is here. They are acting like babies. It's getting very annoying.

Clint started back to work today. Hopefully the kids will get back to normal with the routine going back to normal. Anyway. Wanted to update real quick. Here is a picture of her at 3 weeks.

Ok, so if you want Abigail's birth story...

2010-03-16T10:53:00.000-07:00

You are going ot have to email me :) I wrote the whole thing out, but for some reason it won't let me paste it on my blog. If you are my friend on Facebook I wrote it over there. Otherwise, put in a request through my comments section and I'll give you an email with the story.

Basics: She was born March 9th at 3:35 pm weighing 8 lbs 10.5 oz and 21 inches tall.

Or not...

2010-03-05T12:01:00.000-08:00

Well we thought things were progressing and that the baby would be here sooner rather than later. But nature is a funny thing. Once she decided to flip head down, little Miss Abby decided she was comfortable afterall. I had my doc appt. this week and haven't made any progress as far as trying to deliver her naturally. So the c-section is set for the 9th.
The doc kept commenting on how big this baby is. I am sure she will look gigantic compared to Kd and Ky. Ky was 5 lb 4 oz and Kd 3 lbs 11. So yeah, this one is already guessed to be pretty huge. We're thinking close to, if not more than 9 lbs.
Clint's mom gets here tomorrow evening. Thank goodness! I love my other kids, but they are doing everything they can to drive me insane these last few days. I don't know if they are picking up on my anxiety over this baby not coming out, if they can tell something is about to change soon or what. Hopefully with Clint's mom here, it will ease that stress a bit.
Mon. morning I go in for pre-op labs and to talk to the doc. My last hope is that if I have dialated to a 3 then she may agree to rupture the amniotic sac and see if I will labor on my own. If not, then we have to go ahead with the planned c-section. I was really hoping to go natural, but Abby seems to want to come out a different way. They can't induce with medicine because I have already had a c-section, and the strong contractions from drugs could cause my uterus to rupture, which could kill the baby and myself. So natural is the only way other than the repeat c-section. The most they can really do at this point is rupture the sac if I am dialated enough. Which I am still only at a 1. So it's likely not going to happen. However, is anyone wants to offer up some "get that girl in to labor" prayers, we will accept any and all of those prayers! We have tried every home "remedy" out there that I feel safe trying. The doc said if what we have tried hasn't made a difference, then it's just not going to happen yet.
In addition to that stress, our laptop has contracted some ugly virus. It's useless for now. Which means my time on the internet is even less than before. Add a baby in to the mix, and it could be even longer between updates!
Add to that fun; we had applied for the kids to go to preschool this next school year. They were placed in the lottery, which apparently is a very fitting name since about 500 kids apply for a class that only sits 30. We live out of boundary, so we are even lower on the list for priority. Needless to say, they didn't get in. They are waitlisted at #105 and #158. I applied for 3 schools total, the other numbers they were assigned was in the 200's. So barring some CRAZY miracle, looks like preschool is out. So much for keeping my sanity going. I don't mind paying for preschool, the problem is I just don't know of any good, safe, close preschools around here. We live in the ghetto mind you. So the school they would have automatically been accepted in would have turned them in to drug dealers by the end of the school year, so yeah, no thanks.
So the next update you get from me will likely be after the baby is born. Set your dates for March 9th :)

Moving in the right direction...

2010-02-25T15:21:00.000-08:00

So after having a ton of braxton hicks contractions, I had my OB appt. today.
The doc said I am 1 cm dialated, cervix is completely soft (necessary for baby to come out), and the baby's head is really low. We scheduled the c-section for March 9th. He said he doubts I will make it that long though. My last OB appt. is the 3rd. I am hoping Abby comes before the scheduled c-section though!
I still have tons of contractions. So I'm hoping, wishing, praying, that this baby comes sooner rather than later. At most though, 12 days!!!

Jan. 2010 snowstorm and 35 week belly...

2010-02-06T14:13:00.001-08:00

So we were right in the middle of the lovely snowstorm out here in DC. Here are some pics of that fun stuff. The tree you see laying on the ground, well, that tree is normally about 12 feet tall. Also included is my 35 week belly shot...

Pictures are way out of order....

2010-01-20T12:32:00.000-08:00

But you get the point :)
I don't have the time to sort them and put them in the right order.

The following pictures are from Jan. 2nd (the kids 3rd birthday party). We had 17 kids and 12 adults at their party!

The next few pictures are from our trip to Williamsburg for Christmas. I didn't feel like playing photographer. Apparently, if I am not the one taking pictures, then pictures just don't get taken. I had to make Clint take some for Christmas, since he is in every other picture of the kids. I don't want our kids looking back asking if they had a mommy growing up because they never see my picture!

These next few pictures are from the day after the huge snowstorm we had. The kids got to build their 1st snowman :) They got some hot chocolate afterwards (I think they liked that more, lol).

On the baby front...

Abby is still kicking and dancing inside :P She makes the scene from the movie Alien look pathetic :) She has been having quite the case of the hiccups this last week. For several days she was getting them 3-4 times a day. They seemed to have calmed down some now though. I am just over 32 weeks now. I have 5 weeks to go until I am considered full term! I still have at 7 weeks before they will do a c-section though. If I decide to go that route. I m not sure at this point. I highly doubt with the amount of contractions I have been having, that I will make it to 40 weeks.

Anyway, sorry it took so long for an update. It seems as the kids get older, the crazier things get. The kiddos just started going to gymnastics here on base. They LOVE it!! They also have a small playgroup between a few friends and I that we do every week. In addition to that, we go to a HUGE playgroup on base. That playgroup easily has 30-40 kids each week. It's in a huge gym, so there is plenty of running room :)

Next month Clint and I have plans to go on a Valentines Day lunch cruise. We'll also be celebrating our anniversary at the same time :) 6 years already!!!

Abigail's first "photo shoot"

2009-12-23T06:36:00.001-08:00

So last night we went to a local place that does 3D ultrasounds of the baby. We did this with the kiddos too, but never got any good shots. Well, that's how it started last night. For 25 minutes she had her head burried in the placenta and would not give us a good shot of her face. We ticked her off enough that she even pulled her legs up over her head and covered any chance we had at a picture of her. So after 25 min., they said the time was up. While we sat in the waiting room theylooked and said there were no good shots and we were welcome to come to the back and try again. Well, it's a good thing we did, because she decided to put her legs down and move her face out from the placenta :) It was really funny, because the umbilical cord was right by her mouth and on the video you can see her using her mouth to play with it. She was also grabbing at it too. She gave us about 10 minutes of facial shots before she turned her back to us completely so we couldn't get any more shots. She sure has quite the personality already!

Snow, gingerbread houses, Christmas tree...

2009-12-19T17:40:00.000-08:00

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Decorating sugar cookies for the 1st time.

We said it was ok if they ate the gingerbread house, wasn't exactly expecting that :P

Went to an exhibit made of ice. It was COLD in there. They keep it at 9 degrees.

Now for the snow pictures. It started snowing around 11 pm Friday night. By 8 pm Saturday night this is what it looked like...

This was the 1st real snow fall of the season. We had a little snow flurries a couple of weeks ago, but it never really stuck to the ground. This storm is incredible. Everything is basically closed down. Including all the churches tomorrow.

Visit with Santa...

2009-12-05T15:31:00.000-08:00

The kiddos got to go see Santa today. They even are old enough to tell him what they want for Christmas. The picture is definitely an improvement from last year :) Still needs some work though, lol.
The kids are both over the chicken pox, hand foot and mouth disease, and the other junk. They had a good 2 weeks disease free, and now Kd is getting some kind of cough. Lovely. We're loading him with vitamins, so maybe we can catch this before it gets too out of hand.
The kids had a great Thanksgiving with Grandma and Grandpa (Clint's parents) and their uncles. Those pictures are on my other comp, and frankly I am too lazy to go up the stairs and get them. We have been going non-stop since 7:30 this morning (it's nearly 7 pm now!). I will post them when I get on that computer at some point though :)
Everyone said my 1st attempt at a turkey was amazing. Not too dry, tasted great. I'm pretty happy with myself. We had a friend of ours come over too. She made half the food, I made the other half. Worked out great!
We have quite the busy month ahead. We plan on going to the National aquarium, a new exhibit called ICE!, as well as the trip down to Williamsburg for Christmas. After that, one of my brother's is getting married. The kids 3rd birthday is Jan. 2nd, so I have some planning for that. Clint's b-day is next week. I also have 2 OB appts this month So yes, just a little crazy. I'm loving it though, sure makes the time go by MUCH faster :)
I am 26 weeks pregnant now. Things are looking great! The baby is getting nice and big, and of course, so is my belly. The kids remind me of that daily. The baby is still doing flips and kicks. She doesn't quite want to settle down for the long haul just yet.
Having to pee 6 times during the night is really getting old. 39 weeks they'll pull this baby out at the latest. I can make it 13 weeks, I can, I can, I think I can. I will be fine if she shows up anytime after 36 weeks though :)
The kiddos have been having fun with their friends. They have several now, and they go to playgroup with them each week. Well, the weeks they aren't sick anyway.
That's all I have for now. I'll update with Thanksgiving pics when I can get to it.

She's gonna be a big baby!

2009-11-08T11:49:00.000-08:00

Well, here I am at 22 weeks. This last week has been quite the adventure. This baby is crazy active! She keeps sending my uterus into contractions. I went in to my OB appt. and instead of a quick check up, I was sent to Labor and Delivery to monitor the contractions. After several hours of fluids, cervical checks, and monitoring the baby's heartbeat, they sent me home. Looks like things are trying to repeat themselves down there. We could use lots of prayers that these contractions will stop and that I don't end up back on bedrest. Good news is the baby is doing great. We have decided on a name. Abigail Ruth (leaving out the last name for privacy). We'll call her Abby for short though. Things may change once we see her face when she is born. But for now, we're going to stick with Abigail.
Kayley is over her chicken pox. She has just a few scabs left. Kaiden is now in the window of, if he's going to get the pox, the spot will show up anytime.
We have decided that we are going to go ahead and retire from the military at Clint's 20 year mark. Which is technically Jan. 2012 but we can take paid leave starting in Sept. 2011. So less than 2 years left in the military!!! As of now we are looking in to retiring in Cedar City, UT. We're hoping to buy some land within the next 6 months or so, then have our own house built. We'll see though. Location was based on price, distance to my family, distance to airports to see Clint's family, and the fact that I am SO done with city life. If I could afford my own private Island I would jump on that! Since that's obviously not an option, I am going to go for the small town feel. We'll be just 6 hours away from family in CA. 3 hours away from family in SLC. and if we want to go to the city for anything, St. George is 45 min. away and Vegas only 2 hours away. We're definitely looking forward to stability and a place to call our own.

Update and some pictures...

2009-11-01T15:30:00.000-08:00

This was taken the night before Halloween. They don't "do" Halloween on the weekends in the Airforce for some reason. So they have the kids do trick-or-treating the Fri. before. Anyway the kids were really into it and had a great time. This was also day one of Ky's chicken pox. I have a few pics of Ky's chicken pox, but because this is public I won't be posting them.

I took the kiddos to a small family farm. There is a playgroup here on base of a bunch of kids, and we all went on a field trip to the farm.

They had a fun little craft place for the kiddos, so Kd and Ky got to experience painting for the first time.

The kiddos got to dress up and do some Trick or Treating at the Lodge.

Long day for Kd at the water park down at Great Wolf Lodge. He fell asleep about 5 bites into his dinner :)

So the lodge was a ton of fun. There was an indoor waterpark, a craft place for the kids, Trick or Treating, a show in the lobby of puppets (robotic), and other fun things to do. We'll definitely be going back next year. It was also great at making the kids very tired :P

On the baby front, things are going good. She is VERY active now. If I am sitting a certain way, she lets me know she doesn't like it, and will kick at me until I move. We are still narrowing down names for her. Right now I am really liking the name Abigail. We would call her Abby for short though. That name is the top of the list now, so if we can't come up with anything else by the time she gets here, that'll be her name :) My next OB appt. is Thurs. Basic appt. They'll tell me the results of my labs and if anything showed up abnormal on the ultrasound. After that, they won't likely see me for another 3-4 weeks. SOOOO much different than being preggo with twins!

It's a.....

2009-10-26T16:48:00.000-07:00

GIRL!!!!!!

We had the ultrasound this morning. Wanted to get this put up real quick. She was very modest with her legs crossed and arms in front of her face. But we did (after an hour of measurements) finally get to see the "goods".

I have reached the halfway point in this pregnancy now :) I feel her kick quite often now. Her awake times are generally noon, 7pm, and 10pm. At least that's when I feel her the most anyway.

She's measuring about 6 days ahead of her due date. She did at the 11 week scan as well. So I am pretty sure she's going to be due a week earlier than what the docs think from the chart alone.

I have been feeling a lot better as far as morning sickness goes. Mostly just get nauseated easily.

When we came home, i told Kd he was going to have a little sister, he rubbed my belly and said "sister baby". I think he gets it. Of course, he rubs his belly and says he has a baby too :P

We went to a very neat place this last weekend, but I'll update later when I have the pictures loaded in the computer.

Meet and greet with the cast of Ace of Cakes

2009-10-08T12:16:00.000-07:00

I don't know how many are familiar with the show Ace of Cakes. Basically, these guys make the best cakes. Today they made one for the troops and their families. Some friends and I decided to go see them and we got some cute pictures. I didn't actually get any cake though. By the time I got through the line for pictures, the cake was gone. Oh well. Anyway, enjoy :)

This is my 17 week belly shot. The baby is very active at night, hopefully that will change by the time s/he is born though. We are going to find out the gender afterall. My appt. is Oct. 26th. Take care!

Not much to report

2009-09-25T05:23:00.000-07:00

Haven't posted in awhile, because there is nothing really tp post about.
Same stuff, different day.
The kids are putting words together a lot better now than before. Kd has learned how to tell on every little thing someone does (or doesn't do) to him.
We will be moving to a different house, same area, next month. Apparently this house is unsafe to live in due to crappy construction, possible black mold, etc. etc. We will be moving to a bigger house at least. Right now we are in a 3 story 3 bedroom house. We will be moving to a 2 story 4 bedroom house instead. It has a very nice backyard with the back right next to a playground.
The baby seems to be doing fine. I feel the little one move every day. My bladder is apparently a fun toy because the baby likes to kick it whenever it gets full. I still have some morning sickness, but not nearly as bad as it used to be. I have an OB appt. on the 2nd of Oct. It's just a quick check up and they'll give a referral for an ultrasound. It's supposed to be the "big" ultrasound for gender. I have been wanting it to be a surprise so bad, I just don't know if I can hold out! As of Sept. 27th I will be 16 weeks along (about 4 months).
That's about all I have for now. Sorry it wasn't much!

This could get long...

2009-09-04T07:54:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I am going to backtrack a bit in this entry...

On Aug. 4th the kids and I headed out to UT. That was the LONGEST 4.5 hours of my life. I would take Baghdad over that any day of the week! The kids screamed the entire time. Thankfully there was a couple of ladies on the plane that helped out. We got to UT. and I was feeling extremely sick. Morning sickness had hit me hard. It just so happened (I don't believe in coincidences, there is a reason for everything) that a family friend was visiting my parents from out of town. The one friend just so happened to be an OB/GYN. He could see how miserable I was and he was able to call in an Rx for the best medicine in the world...Zofran! I had taken that with the kiddos and it kept me from having to be hospitilized from the extreme morning sickness. I was concerned because each pill can run about $45-60 depending where you go. My insurance won't cover it. He had said they came out with a generic form, but I still wasn't sure insurance would cover it. I was willing to spend several hundred dollars for it anyway though. I brought my insurance card, and to my great relief I was able to get 2.5 month supply for only $6!!! It is the difference between night and day. Even with the zofran, I still have food aversions. Primarily meat. Just looking at meet makes me sick.

Anyway, so I spent the week with my family in UT. then we got on the plane, again, to CA. That flight was only 1 hr 45 minutes. The kids did AMAZING! No crying at all, they were happy and playing the whole time. While in CA. we stayed with Jody.

The kids had their pictures taken (the pics in the prior post), they got to see the B-2 bomber take off as they ate doughnuts (very rare treat), they got to go to the local fire station and even got to ride in the fire truck with lights and sirens going. The firefighters even gave the kiddos each a teddy bear. Then they got to tour the fire house. Kd talked about that trip for a week. He had so much fun with it. We got to hang out with my dear friend Donna and her cute little girl. She took over as "big sister" and was very helpful with the kiddos.

We also got to see my brother Chad, his wife, and their 6 month old daughter. The kids got to play in the little kiddie pool together at his house.

2 days after we got to CA. Kd started getting a runny nose. There was lots of wildfire smoke in the air, so I firgured that must have been the issue. I was wrong. 2 days after his runny nose, Ky and I got sick. 5 days in to the trip all of us had fevers, coughs, sore throats, the works. The last 2 days in CA. we were miserable and tried to relax as much as possible. Then we had to get on the plane (still sick). I had tried rescheduling the flight, but they wanted $150 per ticket transfer fee, each ticket only cost $167, so I was not about to pay that much money to transfer the dates.

We got back to UT. and surprisingly, the kids did extremely well on the flight.

We got to see our good friends that we met out in CO. when I was pregnant on bedrest with the kiddos. They have totally been adopted in to our family.

The kids and I, my dad, my brother and his kids, and 2 of my sisters all went on a hike up to a waterfall not far from my Dad's house. The kids loved it (well, until we had to leave and they didn't want to walk anymore).

We got to see my grandma, my cousin's wedding, went to several parks, etc.

We had a great time, but we were ready to go home. The trip was long and exhausting. Vacations are no longer vacations when kids are involved. Then add a pregnancy and hormones to the mix, and it can get ugly.

We all survived and Wed. we all got on the flight to head back home. The kiddos did great up until the last hour. They were tired and cranky. So was I! Clint met us at the airport and he had some flowers for me. Pregnancy hormones, fatigue, hunger, all of it caught up to me and I was in tears.

We got home later that night.

Now for the baby update:

While in UT. Cassie (sister-in-law) and I went to an ultrasound place and had them do a quick one on the baby. I was concerned with all of the traveling and cold medicine that something was wrong with the baby. We went in, and immediately saw that the baby was bouncing and kicking all over the place. The heart rate was nice and strong.

Yesterday I had my 12 week OB appt. They did a quick ultrasound and the baby was moving. Had a nice heart beat and looked great. They then listened for the heart rate with the doppler. We could hear it just fine, as well as the baby had hiccups. A little unusual this early according to the doc, but she said it's nothing to be concerned about. When babies are still in the uterus, they have practice breathing and actual hiccups, basically the diaphragm is just practicing for after birth. So it was a little odd that the baby had them this soon.

The doctor didn't seem concerned, so I'm not. They did the genetic screen (drew a bunch of my blood) and the good old papsmear (any guy that wants to complain that they have to turn their head and cough while being touched down there, may very well get punched in the face by me). My next appt. is Oct. 2nd, they'll just listen to the heartbeat and check my blood pressure and weight, nothing special. Then they will schedule me for the "BIG" ultrasound. Well, sorry to dissapoint, but we are not finding out the gender of this one. We have a boy and a girl and everything we need for the new baby. So there is no reason we have to find out the gender :)

Professional Pics...

2009-08-12T19:59:00.001-07:00

So today we went and had some pictures taken with Ella (my niece born in Feb.) and the pics came out pretty cute! I'll update on my trip when I get home. But wanted to get some of the pics up for everyone.

7 week ultrasound!

2009-07-28T09:27:00.000-07:00

So we went to the doc again today. The baby looks great. In the 1st picture you can see the heartbeat at the bottom of the picture. The 2nd picture you can see a close up of the little blob :P

The thin line is the cord and the leftover yolk sac.

The baby is measuring right on with dates and has a healthy heartrate of 140 beats a minute.

My official due date is March 16th.

I have been released to regular OB care now and don't have to follow up as often from the ER visit I had a few weeks ago. So more than likely my next ultrasound won't be until I am around 18-20 weeks along. Unless of course we go to a fetal ultrasound place they have in the mall.

So it's still just one baby :)

Some other updates:

Clint and I went with the kiddos to NY. to go see his family. The kids and Clint had a great time. Iwas feeling too sickly to enjoy myself.

Clint took Kd to the amusement park out there along with his sister and other family members. They had a great time. While they were gone, Roe (Clint's sister-in-law) and I took Ky to the mall and did some girly stuff.

I ended up coming home early with the kiddos because I wasn't feeling so good. Clint drove back with the kids and I, then flew back to NY. so he could spend some more time with family.

After a few days to relax, I drove down with my family (they came out from UT.) and we went down to Myrtle beach.

My dad has a timeshare, and so we stayed in a nice condo right on the beach. It was really fun and the kids and I had a great time. Sorry, I have been horrible with picture taking. I brought the camera, but just didn't feel like taking a ton of pictures.

Then we got back from Myrtle and I spent all day Sun. going to and from the airport dropping and picking people up.

Yesterday I spent the day feeling crappy and having tons of cramping. I was worried I overdid it at the beach. I talked to the doc, and she said it's likely just growing pains from my uterus just stretching.

So we are home a few days. On the 4th I have to go to the OB orientation class. It's 3.5 hour class. Then that evening the kids and I fly to UT. and Clint stays here. He has school in August so we're just going to go be with family and friends while he is gone.

Ok, I think I got all of the updates in :)

Just one!!!

2009-07-10T08:36:00.001-07:00

Everything looks great with the pregnancy! I just had the ultrasound this morning. You can see the black spot and a little white inside the black circle. That's not the actual baby, baby is too small to see right now. If you look above my finger you can see the black spot. But the HCG numbers came back at 3500! So a very potent baby :P I go back in 2 weeks for the ultrasound to see the heartbeat.

So to all those thinking I was having twins (or triplets), it's just one baby!!!

Or is it???

2009-07-08T11:40:00.000-07:00

So I went to the doc again this morning. The HCG level is now at 1590!!! That's more than double! A VERY good thing! They did a quick ultrasound and saw the very beginning of a gestational sac forming. The doc is having me come back on Fri. for another lab to make sure the numbers are still climbing. She'll also do another quick ultrasound. If everything shows up normal, I will be released to regular OB care :) Except that she wants another ultrasound in 2 weeks from this Fri. Keep the prayers and positive thoughts coming!!!

Most likely over...again.

2009-07-07T05:43:00.000-07:00

So here we go again. Just like last time. The cramping spread to my whole uterus, not just the side. My breasts aren't really tender anymore, the nausea is gone, I'm not peeing all the time now. This is exactly what happened last time.
I should know something by tomorrow or the latest on Thursday. I go in tomorrow morning for another blood draw. I would not be surprised if the numbers have gone down.
If this is another miscarriage, I'm getting my tubes tied. If I can't sustain a pregnancy, then I don't want to have another "oops" just to have another miscarriage. This is rediculous.

What is going on?!?

2009-07-06T17:36:00.000-07:00

So yes, I'm pregnant. For now?
Yesterday I started having the same cramping that I did the last miscarriage. In the same exact spot.
The cramping eased up quite a bit after a blessing from the elders in my church in the afternoon. Last night it started up again. Then continued in to today.
I had to go to the clinic and get a pregnancy confirmation. One of the questions asked if I had any pain. Well, I had to put yes. That's when things got crazy.
You see, last time, I just decided to drive on over to the ER on my own, and got reprimanded for it.
So today, the nurse said she wanted the doc to see me for a different kind of pregnancy test. Not the normal pee in a cup one. So they drew a bunch of blood.
Then the doc called me back. She explained that because of where the pain was, she wanted to rule out an ectopic pregnancy. She also said she wanted to send me to the ER. She wouldn't let me drive. The ER won't let children in the rooms unless they are the patient. So protocol said that I had to be transported to the hospital, from the clinic, by ambulance. Oh so much fun. Considering I already get car sick if I sit in the back. Now I had to face backwards. I almost lost the little bit of food I did manage to eat that morning which would have been bad, because the next time I got anything to eat wasn't until 3pm!.
So I get to the hospital. Labs confirmed I was pregnant...duh.
Then they draw a whole bunch more blood. They ask me for my blood type, I told them A+. then why did they screen for it anyway? Waste of time and money. They drew the other stuff to determine any other things that could be wrong.
Then the lovely pelvic exam. About flew off the back of the bed with that one. I never want to hear about how bad a guy has it when they have to have their prostate checked!!!
Anyway, all the action, then nothing. I was sitting there for 2 hours, no one came in, no updates. Nothing. I was beginning to think they forgot about me. Through the boredom I got to take in the very disgusting nonsanitized hospital. No wonder they call it Malpractice Growe medical center. Finally a nurse comes in, says "we're gonna set the monitor to just record every hour in case we forget"...ok, not exactly something you want to tell a patient.
There was one guy that was in training, I knew more than him. I tried giving him a couple of tries on why he couldn't figure out why the BP cuff wasn't working. Finally I told him he had it inside out, and to try it the way I showed him. Amazing, it worked. I felt bad for him though. I wasn't mean to him, I promise!
Anyway, now in the beginning, I told the original doc, there is no point sending me up to ultrasound. It is way too early to see anything. She didn't listen. Lo and behold, I get to radiology, and the tech said it's too early to see anything. Duh. I told the tech, good luck finding my right ovary, no one else seems to find it. She got all "I'll find it" Um, she never found it. She found what she "thinks" is it. At least she had good bedside manner and wasn't very aggressive with the probe. Unlike the last person I saw back in January.
So they take me downstairs, where I am dropped off. No one comes in for 2 hours. The monitor had been beeping for almost that whole time.
Finally the doc comes in and tells me they didn't see any signs of a miscarriage or ectopic pregnancy. She couldn't rule it out, because there was no visualization of anything in the uterus. She then said my HCG level was at 706!!!!! Ok, so at this gestation with twins mine was at 433. This time it's at 706!!! She said the cramping could just be from early pregnancy and should go away on it's own, but to come back if things get worse. Um, I think I'll go to a different ER thanks.
I am to go back on Wed. for more labs. The HCG level should have almost doubled at that point. So Wed. I will either have good news, or bad.

OOPS!!

2009-07-04T05:23:00.000-07:00

Well then!
So as you all know I had a miscarriage back in Feb. After that, we decided we were done. We were just going to enjoy our children and move on. We were both happy in that decision.
Now, it took 2 years to get pregnant with perfect timing the first time, we still couldn't. Had to get help.
Then we got pregnant again. After 3 cycles of perfect timing. Of course, that ended up in a miscarriage. It sucked, but I had come to terms with it and was fine.
Then we had an "oops" moment. I was NO WHERE near my "fertile" perfect timing window. By all accounts, I shouldn't have had to worry.
Then I realized I was late. Add a whole bunch of other symptoms in the mix, and I knew I needed to test. Sure enough, I got a positive. I'm pregnant.
I'd like to ask how it happened. But we all know "how" it happened. LOL.
We are both in shock. We've never experienced an "oops" before.
God has bigger plans, and like Jody says, "you wanna hear God laugh, just tell him your plans" I have a feeling he's laughing pretty hard right now!
We had just cleaned the garage out and were ready to have a huge garage sale on all the baby stuff we had. I guess we'll be holding on to that just a little bit longer :P
Now, I have had an early miscarriage before, so chances are greater that I could have another one. But as of right now, I'm pregnant. My due date is around March 11th I am 4 weeks along. Very early. The miscarriage before was at 5 weeks and 4 days.
I find it funny that my brother's that are twins were born in Jan. My twins were born in Jan. Then I was born in March. This baby is due in March. Too funny.
The last pregnancy, we didn't want to tell anyone until we were past the miscarriage point. Well, we have a ton of traveling with family this summer, so I think me puking all day from morning sickness might just give it away. Plus, I've gone through a miscarriage. I know what to expect. Having to apologize to everyone last time because they were upset that we never told them we were pregnant was hard. So this time, everyone knows.
The question, "are we excited?" Well, yes. Right now it's more of a complete shock. I don't really want to get my hopes up too much, last time it was just so hard.

A day in the life...

2009-07-02T06:39:00.000-07:00

Oh my goodness. Let's start at 3 am, the crying from our 2 year old twins begin. From something as simple as a foot not being under a blanket, having to potty, laying sideways in the bed and not coherent enough to turn themselves around. We get them resettled in to bed. Then husband gets up for work around 7. Which means the kids are up, and unfortunately, so am I. I go in to their room, which has a baby gate on it, otherwise NO ONE gets sleep. We don't have the regular door on, because the kids use it as a weapon against each other. We keep little potties in their room, because for the most part, they are potty trained.
One is screaming because she wants her underwear, the other is screaming because he doesn't want to get out of bed. Even though he is the one that woke up first. Then there is a struggle getting him out of bed, because I can't just bring my daughter down, they have an invisible rubber band attatching them. Where one goes, the other follows. If I take her down, she screams for him. So we have to wait until he decides he wants to come down. Then there is the potty fight. "My potty, no my potty" ensues. I'm already wondering why I even got out of bed. They sit down for 5 minutes or so. Just long enough for me to settle in to my chair and look online. Then 2 screaming kids come running up, "breakfast breakfast", no please, no thank you, nothing. Just screaming. After a pointless lesson in manners, they get their breakfast. I put towels on the floor to keep the mess contained, except somehow the cereal falls everywhere BUT the towel. Figures.
After breakfast they tune in to Noggin or Disney. Which keeps them calm for maybe 30 minutes. Then they see the toys. Oh boy. The fun begins. "My toy, no mine, MOMMY!!!!" then a blood curdling scream. My son has bitten the crud out of his sister. Enough that draws blood. I'm yelling at him to go to time out, but she thinks I'm yelling at her. Next thing I know, all 3 of us are yelling.
After a couple of minutes, my son is out of timeout, hugs and kisses his sister and apologizes.
All of this, and it's not even 9 am yet!
Things settle down when I show the kids, "look, your grandparents got 2 of the same toy, you don't have to fight over it" which seems to work. For a little while.
More fighting. "I want dinner!!!!" What? It's only 10 in the morning. Although I wish it were dinner time, that much closer to bed! But it's not. Snack time it is.
My boy, the savage beast, devours his snack, but my girl hasn't even eaten half of hers yet. He doesn't understand that she had the same amount as him. She is just slower. So he starts screaming at me because she has "more". It's impossible to explain logic to a 2 year old. I give up.
I have tuned them out. The TV has become their babysitter for the time being. Have I showered, brushed my teeth, had any time for me, nope. I have learned that my hygiene has become the lowest priority. Do I care anymore, I don't have TIME to care.
Just for fun, let's throw in a trip to the store...with 2 year olds. We head out, as a good friend said, we're out the shooting gate, like a herd of turtles.
I get one dressed, meanwhile the other screams. I get the 2nd one dressed, but now the 1st one is screaming to use the potty. They don't just pull pants down, they want nothing, no socks, pants, shoes, etc. on their legs when they potty. So, we start over.
Finally we are out the door.
I get them in to the shopping cart (hopefully, if we're lucky, we can find the little car or spaceship gorcery carts) if not, we are doomed from the start. For the sake of time, lets assume I have found a car grocery cart.
Things go well, I was lucky enough to find a cart that the seatbelt straps actually still work!
There are 2 steering wheels (occasional fighting when they want the same one).
Check out. See, I never learn. To help appease the children during shopping, I give them some item I am going to purchase anyway. Except, when I get to the cashier, I have to take the item away. Which leads to more screaming. The cashier has pitty on me, and gives the item back.
Now, at this store, you aren't allowed to bring the car carts out. So I have to pull the kids out, screaming. They still want to play.
So now I am having to drag 2 screaming toddlers out of the store. Yes drag. They refuse to walk on their own, and I can't pick them both up anymore.
We get home. I start unloading groceries. During the many trips up and downstairs, I can see the kids getting in to the groceries. Bread is getting smashed, the watermelon has become a bowling ball, and the grapes are being consumed. Good thing I stocked up on them.
It's finally noon. Lunch time. They see I am preparing lunch. I tell them I am making lunch. Yet they scream "I want lunch, LUNCH MOMMY!!!" Another pointless lesson in manners begins.
I get them settled in to eat. Wow, silence! It's a miracle! I get online again. My only real escape.
After 20 minutes, the kids run up...they both have to use the potty at the same exact time. This twin thing has gone way too far. I get one on the potty, and hope the other one can hold it long enough for me to race them up the stairs for the other bathroom.
Pee is dribbling down the legs. Figures.
After potty, it's nap time!!!
My absolute favorite time of the day for me to be alone. Assuming they actually take a nap that is. So we begin the process. We have to seperate them for naps during the day, otherwise it's a sure thing they won't sleep.
I get them settled down, and thanfully they fall asleep.
Now, it's ME time. I could take the time to shower, shave, maybe even brush my hair for the first time today. I am too tired to do any of it. Only, I don't have time to relax. The house is a disaster.
The cleaning begins. How the heck did a cheerio get stuck to the ceiling?
After a couple of hours of cleaning and finally eating my own lunch, I get to use the bathroom, without children congratulating me for going potty.
I then make the biggest mistake in the world. Why did I do that, I knew the outcome. Why couldn't I have waited??? Why on earth...WHY did I flush the toilet?!? The screaming begins and kids are awake.
It's around 3 pm. Husband should be home soon.
The same routine from when they wake up in the morning. One refusing to get up, but screams if I leave the room, etc.
I get them downstairs. They have become leaches. I take the time to just sit on the couch and cuddle. I do love my children afterall. Things are peacefull. Each one is snuggled up next to me, and I am doomed to watch the same crazed childrens show on Noggin. You know, the kind where they sing the same song, over and over. So instead of having some cool grown up song in my head, I have "keep trying, keep trying, don't give up, never give up" maybe it's a subtle reminder for ME to keep trying.
Daddy comes home...FINALLY! Some days they run to Daddy and I can get some stuff done, like, oh, maybe make some dinner. Other times, they want nothing to do with him, so he's stuck making dinner, good thing the kids love Mac'n'cheese!
We all sit down to dinner together. I actually love that time. We can all sit together, sing, talk about our day. All while the kids are munching away. For the most part, the kids are really good about eating. There are those days, where I work on dinner for 2 hours, and they won't even touch it though. Days like that I don't know why I even bother. Kids can survive off of PB&J sandwiches and Mac'n'Cheese can't they?
After dinner my husband and I trade off. One of us gives the kids a bath, while the other cleans the dishes.
Bath time involves the one giving the bath getting just as wet as the ones in the bath. Too bad it doesn't clean the clothes, that could save me time on laundry!
After their bath and the kitchen is clean, the kids come down stairs and play. By this time, they are usually very happy.
You see, I get the kids when they are at their worst. By the time my husband gets home, they have calmed down. Making it seem like things couldn't have been that bad while he was at work...OY!
Finally bed time, for the kids anyway. It's now 8 pm. I have survived another 13 hours with the kids.
My husband and I lay in bed with the kiddos and sing their favorite nursery songs. The ones that inevitably get stuck in your head. The children are calm, and exhausted. We kiss them good night.
We head downstairs, where I am able to catch up on the message boards, facebook, and blogs.
Then hubby and I spend some time cuddling on the couch. That's our only time together. We watch some of our favorite shows on TV, and then head to bed.
We're too tired for anything else.
Next thing we know, it's 3 am and kids are screaming...

I promised more pics...

2009-06-25T04:59:00.000-07:00

Ok, here are some more pictures of the SH meetup...

These cupcakes were so cute. They had elmo's face done in icing. VERY messy!

This was the funniest thing. This ride shoots you up in the air and then free falls down. Kd was LOVING it! Just to clarify, this ride is designed for little kids. It doesn't shoot up fast like the big 50' rides. It only goes up about 4-5 feet. A friend was concerned about Kd going on that. So yes, this ride was safe :)

The little boy there is Cade, Ky's boyfriend :)

Ky looks like she's thinking, um, excuse me, we were talking...

All of us waiting in line for the balloon ride.

Sesame place...

2009-06-23T05:57:00.000-07:00

So this last weekend a bunch of friends I have online through iVillage met up at the amusement park Sesame Place. These are people I have been chatting with online since I was just over 6 weeks preggo with the kiddos. We finally all got to meet up. You all know my good friend TJ, the one with the twin boys, well I met her on the same iVillage website. This group of ladies all have kids that were all due in Feb. 2007, some were born in Jan. or in TJs case, Dec. and some were born in March. The majority were born in Feb.

Anyway, there were 6 families that met up, with a total of 7 two year olds. The group of children are in the playgroup called Feb. 07 Sweethearts or SH for short :)

With 7 SH running around, it was very crazy, but they all had a great time. the weather couldn't have been crappier for an amusement park. The rides were mostly shut down, except for about an hour or so when the rain let up. Kd LOVED the rides, and kept going on them with Clint. I don't care for rides anymore, and Ky doesn't really like them either. So we just played with the other SHs. There was one little boy that Ky fell in love with. Now, Ky is not the type to be very affectionate towards strangers. She is very shy when meeting new people. But for some reason, thei little boy she loved! She ran up to him and threw her arms around him and was hugging and trying to kiss him. It was the cutest thing ever.

We got to see Elmo's World Live. The kids all had crazed eyes with the joy of seeing a real life version of Elmo. They weren't so happy with poor Bert and Ernie though :P As seen in the picture.

Our camera isn't water proof, so I only got a few pics with it. More were taken from other members of the group and they will post pictures to me when they get the chance.

The night before we drove up. It was a 5.5 hours drive, but that was just because of traffic. We stayed at a very nice hotel and the kids were loving it. Anyway, we tried doing the water stuff at the amusement park, but it was so cold. All the SHs lips were blue and all of them were shaking. Clint and I decided we would head back to the hotel where they have an indoor heated pool. The kids loved it!

That night those of us in the SH group that were still there, decided to go to Outback Steakhouse for dinner. We had a great time. We didn't even get back to the hotel until around 10:30 pm. The kiddos were exhausted. They hadn't really slept much the night before, and they didn't get a nap that day. Even with that, overall, they were in good moods. Despite the rain and cold.

They were so tired, when we got back, they were pottying in their sleep, we changed their clothes in their sleep, and then put them to bed.

They slept in the next morning until nearly 9! That was very nice. Then we had breakfast and drove home.

For Father's Day, we got Clint a collectors Buffalo Bills helmit so when he is in NY him and his brother can go get autographs on it at the training camp the Bills have.

Bonita is back at her new well, kind of new home. The horse haulers picked her up Friday and she is back in CO. where she started. My good friends wanted her back. At some point they want the horse trailer too.

So that just leaves the camper and truck we need to sell.

Through the whole weekend the kiddos didn't have one potty accident! We are so excited! We have so many more trips this summer, hopefully they will continue to do as good as they are.

In a couple of weeks we are headed to Buffalo and we'll be there about 8 days, then from there we drive all the way down to Myrtle beach with my Dad, Karen, and other siblings. Then we'll get back, and a week later the kids and I fly to UT. After a week or so in UT. we fly down to CA. where Jody and I will head to Disneyland with the kiddos. Plus I'll get to see my darling niece Ella! She was the one just born in Feb. She'll be 6 months old then. I loved that stage with the kiddos!

Then we'll fly back to UT. and stay there another 2 weeks, then fly home.

Busy summer, don't ya think :P

Some updated pictures...

2009-06-14T09:37:00.000-07:00

The above pictures are what happens when kids go swimming and skip their scheduled naps...

Ready for church :)

There's a whole lot going on. We're still working on Kaiden and Kayley's potty training. So that takes up most the time.

Some other things going on.

Kaiden has a new girlfriend. Her name is Jewel and he talks about her ALL the time! He always asks when she's coming over. Funny thing is, when she is here, Kaiden and her fight over everything. LOL....Young love.

Kayley is still cutting teeth. She still has 2 more of her 2 year molars that need to come in. She just got 2 of them over the last couple of weeks.

Today I attempted to bring both kids to church with me so that Clint could take some time to himself. The stress of twin toddlers is really difficult, and even the best of marriages find couples bickering and snapping at each other and the kids. Clint and I are no exception neither are our kids! I wouldn't wish twins on my worst enemy. Don't get me wrong, we love them dearly, but we still ask ourselves, are they too old to drop off at the firestation???

So church basically turned in to me playing with the kids in nursery while I attempted to hear the speakers. Well that didn't happen. The kids were loud and other parents kids were loud. At least we all looked miserable together!

We have sold my horse. I haven't had hardly any time to go out to see her. Plus, we added everything up, and there is no way we can get out at Clints 20 year mark for retirement. That's in 2 years. So Bonita would have to keep traveling with us and I would have less and less time with her.

My good friends in CO. decided they wanted to buy her. Since we won't have a horse, we don't exactly need a horse trailer. So they are buying that as well.

We also have our camper. We never use it. So we don't need it, and it just sits in storage for $55 a month.

So we will be trying to sell that as well.

Then it comes down to the truck. We don't have huge stuff to haul, so we don't need the truck. So we will be selling the truck.

Between what we'll save on board for Bonita, camper, and insurance that covers all that, lets just say that's close to $800 a month in savings. Which will go to savings so when we do get out, we can actually afford to live!

Anyway, sorry that was pretty winded. We have some more fun activities scheduled so I'll update as those things happen!

Some potty talk...

2009-06-02T06:36:00.001-07:00

I know my Dad doesn't care for all the potty training talk, so Dad, if you want, you can skip this post...LOL.

2 weeks ago Clint and I were talking about how we are seriously not looking forward to training Kaiden. Kayley is basically done now though. She has accidents very rarely and initiates going on her own now. So we knew it was time for Kaiden. I was chatting with a friend of mine on Facebook. She told me she trained all 4 of her children in a day. I thought, uh, sure. Tell me how, and we'll try it.
She came over a few minutes later with a book. I was willing to try anything. I did not want to spend 7 months training Kaiden like we did with Kayley! The title of the book Toilet Leraning in less than a day. The cover looked very old, and I looked at the copyright, haha, 1974!!! I was like, uh sure. So I read the book. Now, I have tried several times in the past to get Kd started with training, and it only ended up in both of us in tears and frustrated to no end. In the book it said that if one parent has already tried other methods and failed, that the other parent should try this method. It also said that there should be NO distractions. That siblings and the other parent should not be home, all toys removed, no tv, phones, etc. I told Clint all of that, and I thought I saw a hint of "yeah right dear" but he said he would try.
He read the book and wasn't very convinced. We said it was worth a shot, what did we have to lose???
So we planned a weekend (just in case the 1 day thing didn't work) and decided to give it a go.
On my end, I took all of the toys and anything that could be a distraction out of the room where the training would be. Then 7:30 Sat. morning Ky and I headed out for the day.
We went to out to breakfast at IHOP, then to Target where I got her some skates, then we went to a movie. She was amazing during the movie, she was thoroughly enjoying this one on one time. After that we went to get some ice cream for her. At that point I got a call from my very discouraged husband.
Part of the training said no more diapers, from now on underwear during the day and pullups at night.
So I get the call after 4 hours of training. Now, before, Kd would never even acknowledge if he was wet or poopy. He would sit in it all day if we let him. So I asked Clint to tell me about it. He said Kd was having a bunch of accidents, but that he was saying "oh no, wet!!!!" I told Clint, that in itself is quite the accomplishment. At least if nothing else, he would know if he was wet or dry. Clint said he was frustrated and put Kd down for a nap.
I explained that from the reviews online, that the kids would kind of need their brain to take a break, and things would click. In the mean time for him not to be discouraged and to watch a movie on tv while Kd was napping. Later I get a call saying how Kd woke up after just a few minutes in the nap and said he needed to go potty. He was already a little wet, but Clint gave it a shot, and he went! I told Clint that when he got up from his nap to continue what he was going.
Clint knew all of the steps, don't get me wrong. I was just doing what I could to encourage him to not give up. He didn't either!
So Kayley and I went to the National Aquarium for an hour or so and then came back on post and she got to practice with her new skates at the park. I got a call from Clint saying that Kd was initiating going to the potty on his own and wasn't having any accidents. I said we'd give them another hour while Ky and I picked up some dinner. Then we headed home to Kd very proudly showing off his potty training success!
Clint did an amazing job with Kaiden! In 3 days time Kd has surpassed what took 7 months for Kayley! He has been diaper free and going mostly on his own. We have to help with pulling up the pants and stuff. But he mostly takes care of buisness on his own. Since Sat. we have only had one pee accident. All the credit goes to Clint...he's the man! We were talking last night, and he told me he knew he couldn't cut corners or cheat because it would be obvious. LOL.
So now the kids are no longer babies. They sleep in big beds, drink out of regular cups (no more sippy cups), no diapers, are potty trained (mostly), they can feed and dress themselves, they communicate with full sentences. Now they are children, not babies.
Do I feel sad about it...NO WAY!
You know how nice it is not to have to worry about finding a place that will heat bottles, making sure there is a changing table, making sure we bring a diaper bag full of sippy cups, diapers, and wipes.
Now we just throw in a change of clothes in the van and head out.

On a little sad note, today I would have been 23 weeks pregnant. The age of viability. I remember in my 1st pregnancy how I was so relieved to make it to 23 weeks, because there was at least a chance that the babies would survive. So it's a little saddening today. I am just so blessed to have my beautiful healthy children. The more I look at it though, the more relieved I feel. I am done with all the baby stuff. Now we can just have fun! We were at ChuckECheese the other night, and I saw a mom with a toddler as well as a baby that couldn't have been more than 2 weeks old. Just watching her having to stop every few minutes to change, or feed, or soothe the newborn. I can definately say we are done having any more children.
That doesn't mean adoption is out though. As the kids get older, we may consider adopting a (definately potty trained) child. For now though, I am happy with my family and love the stage where we can focus on the fun stuff.
In no way is it all fun though. They still have those lovely temper tantrums, but from my understanding, these will be hanging around for quite some time :P

Hello all

2009-05-18T05:17:00.000-07:00

Sorry it has been awhile since I updated.
Let's see, the last I posted was 3 weeks ago, so here goes. On the 2nd we took the kiddos to the train station in Baltimore. Thomas the tank engine was there. The kids had a great time! If I remember I will post some pictures later. We got to ride the train just like we did at Christmas at Clint's parents house. They had all kinds of fun activities for the kids.
The following weekend, demons possessed my children. Ok, well only when we go out. I don't know what happened! My kids used to be great when going to the store, then this thing called the terrible two's showed it's ugly head, and now taking kids in public is a death sentence to my sanity! We went to one store and I was so very close to wanting to just leave my kids in the store and run! I never would have, but the thought sure crossed my mind. But then we get home and they are as cute as can be. What gives?!?
Then Sat., as if the torture of Fri. night screaming from the kids at the store wasn't enough, we decided to make a full day of shopping. WHAT WERE WE THINKING?!?! We went to Target and the kids screamed because they couldn't have everything they wanted in the store. We were on a mission, we needed to get bedding for the big kid beds. Yes, that night we were switching from cribs to twin size matresses, and like any normal parent, we wanted to use bribary to get them to stay in bed. So spending a few dollars more for princess and Thomas the tank engine blankets, in my book, was WELL worth the money! We had so many other small things we needed though, and the longer we were out the worse the kids got. I have learned a valuable lesson, don't tell the kids that you plan on doing something that day unless you know without a doubt, nothing will stop it from happening.
So we got the beds and the kids were amazing! We decided to get the bed rails because our kids toss and turn all night. I think that is the biggest reason our kids are great sleeping in their new beds. It still has the "enclosed" feeling of a crib, except they have a lot more room and they can get in and out of bed when they want. The first night, within 40 minutes of putting them to bed, they slept in their own beds. They are very proud of the big kid beds :) The bribary worked wonders. We told them if they didn't stay in bed, that we would take Thomas and Princess away, they ran back to bed!
Let's see, oh, Mother's day. Clint made me breakfast in bed :) That was very nice. We all had a "picnic" in bed and got to just relax. He also got me a necklace and a musical figurine. We got to know a few more of our neighbors that day too. There were a bunch of kids playing while we all ate. I think I counted 8 kids, maybe 9. There were 7 of them under 3 years old.
I went to UT. on Mon. to see my family and to go through the temple with my brother. He leaves to go on a mission in Brazil in July, so it was the last opportunity to see him for 2 years. I also have 2 other brothers that will likely be headed out on missions soon, so I may not get to see them for 2 years either. I came home Sat. morning.
We have some wonderful friends in my church that helped with the kiddos while I was away. Clint did an amazing job juggling work and the kids.
Kayley is doing great with potty training. We have yet to really start Kaiden.
They are both growing like crazy! I measured them and they were 34 inches, about 1.5 weeks later, it seemed some of their clothes weren't fitting, so I measured them again, and they had grown nearly half an inch! Talk about growth spurts.
Their language is expanding like crazy. They talk in full sentences. If somethig falls, they cry out "Are you ok?" They are interacting with each other a lot more now. They grab each other's hands when they want to play. Sometimes they just hold hands and go everywhere together. They dance with each other and they still fight each other. I don't know how life would be with a singleton, but they are missing out with how fun twins can be at this stage. They are each other's best friend and their bond is closer than ever. They comfort each other when sad, they scheme together, they are so amazing to watch!
Not much is going on this week. Just relaxing. Sat. I need to go ride my horse. It'll have been more than 2 weeks since I rode last.
Take care everyone!

Sprinkler time fun!

2009-04-28T14:25:00.001-07:00

We got a new sprinkler toy for the kiddos. They had a great time, and it was definately hot enough outside for it! Here are some pictures I was able to get :)

2009-04-23T12:36:00.000-07:00

Things have been kind of crazy here. The last week the kiddos and I have been sick :( So those that have called and we haven't returned the calls, it's because we aren't feeling well and we are in survival mode right now.

These pics are from Easter. Sorry I didn't get them on here any sooner.

This weekend we are planning a trip to the zoo so we'll have more pics then. Then next weekend we are planning on going to B&O railroad and riding on Thomas the train. I know the kiddos will love it.

I'll update more as I get the time, one of the sickly babies are up now. Hope you enjoyed the pics!

Promotion and Easter Egg Hunt pictures

2009-04-05T11:11:00.001-07:00

The base we live on had an Easter Egg hunt for all the kids. We took them not thinking they would get more than one egg. They each racked in 7 eggs! We were very surprised!!! The pictures you see Kaiden crying are when they weren't allowed to go after the eggs yet and he wanted to get them. Then when he realized there were no more eggs left he started crying again :P We will be having another hunt this weekend with some friends of ours.

There are also some pictures of Clint's promotion ceremony too. We had a good time there as well :)

So weird...

2009-03-29T11:15:00.000-07:00

So I thought I gained a bunch of weight on my trip. Guess not :) I just ate too much right before bed :P
I weighed myself today and I have lost 5 lbs...lol. Although, I don't quite remember eating 5 lbs worth of food before bed. HAHA!

I'm HOME!

2009-03-27T17:23:00.000-07:00

I got in last night :)
So I left off at coming back from Vegas.
That Thurs. I got to go on a very nice trail ride with my good friend Donna and her horses. Her daughter was in school, so it was nice to catch up on some adult conversation. I got to hang out with her daughter too, which was really fun. We went out to eat that night. Then I spent the night with her. Then the next day I went with Donna to her daughter's open house at school and was able to see all the fun stuff she has been learning this year. We went out to eat again (and the scale is showing it). Then Sat. the weather turned awful. So Jody and I went and saw the movie Knowing with Nicholas Cage. I really liked it, he thought it was ok. LOL.
That night we just relaxed a bit.
Then Sunday (the day it snowed in southern CA. in MARCH!!!) I went to go see Chad and their sweet little girl. I'll have to upload some pics later (I know I keep promising that). I actually didn't really take any pictures almost the whole time other than with my cell phone. I have a few of Ella and that's it.
On Monday, Jody and I met up with Donna and rode the horses some more up in the mountain area by her house. There was an incredible view. The next night I got to hang out with Jody's girlfriend (Traci) and her sweet little girls! We went to a pizza place similar to Chuck-E-Cheese.
On Wed. I met up one last time with Chad, Jen, and Ella and got to say goodbye. Then afterwords I met up with Traci, her girls, and Jody at Red Lobster. It was Jody's birthday :)
Then Thurs. I got on the plane and headed home.
So all the great fun and food and I have gained 5 lbs!!!! I had to work my butt off (literally) last summer to lose the weight and now I have gained that 5 lbs from this trip and the 4 lbs from the Holidays. I had lost a total of 17 lbs in 3 months. Now I have gained 9 of it back....AAAARRRGGGGG!!!!! This morning vacation is over and I am now back to exercising until this weight comes off...again.

Las Vegas....

2009-03-18T08:51:00.000-07:00

Ok so here is a quick photo while Jody and I were in Vegas. But I want to back track a little bit.
I got here to CA. on Friday the 13th (hehe). We got to Jody's house around 9pm and met up with Brad, Cassie and their 2 children, as well as My dad and 3 of my other brother's from UT. in addition to my brother, Chad his wife and their new baby Ella. it was a f ull house for sure! We all caught up with each other and visited until 2:30 in the morning! Which really felt like 5:30 for me since I am 3 hours ahead of them. Then we all got up around 7 and ate some GREAT breakfast Chad and Jen made everyone.
From there we visited some more then went to a local park and had a HUGE picnic again provided by Chad and Jen. We played frisbee and football and just had a great time hanging out with each other. Then we came back to the ranch and while the little ones (and some of the big ones) took some naps, Alex, Daniel, Jason, and I went to Jody's studio and got to have a great time singing with each other. Jody's studio is AMAZING! he has it all finished and it's open for buisness. He brings in artists from all over to record their songs in his studio. If anyone is interested having their songs done they can contact Jody at djjody@rpmwin.com and he can set you up! He also DJs parties, weddings, etc. So if anyone in CA. needs a DJ, he's your man!
After the hilarious time in the studio we went to the bowling ally here. We had some air hockey tournaments while we waited for our lanes to open up. After bowling we all went and got some dinner then came back to Jody's place and some people crashed out while some of us soaked in the hot tub while others watched a movie.
Then next morning Brad and his family as well as my dad and my younger brothers had to go back to UT. The house was VERY quiet after they left! The rest of the day Jody and I just relaxed and fixed my lap top that was extremely slow. Now it's up and running again! Did I mention that Jody also fixes computers :P The man can do anything! From fixing cars, B2 Bombers, DJing, fixing computers, and running a studio at the same time. He can fix just about anything too!
So Mon. morning we headed to Vegas! It was only about a 4 hour drive. When we got there we went to the hotel and checked in. Then hopped on the new monorail (no having to drive in Vegas anymore!!!) and took the rail down to MGM grand and checked out the lion habitat (which was really awesome!!!) then headed over to Excalibur hotel and walked around for a bit until our dinner show started. I had been there a LONG time ago (18 years) and remembered a lot of it. They have changed a bunch and now it is even more amazing. We got to watch the Tournament of Kings where the horses and knights jousted and held the midieval times games. Well, they acted it out, but it was a blast!
After the show we went to New York, New York hotel and got to ride on the roller coaster there. Now that was fun!!!!!! We have pics from the time we were there, but they need to be scanned into the comp, so I'll post those later on.
After the ride we headed over to the M&M store. OMGOSH! I have never seen so much M&M stuff in one place!!! There was 4 floors filled with M&M figurines, gifts, candy, etc. It was crazy! After that we headed back to the hotel.
The next morning we got up and had some breakfast then went and relaxed in the hotel's hot tub. After an hour or so we headed to the rides on top of the Stratosphere hotel. Talk about insane rides!!! The Big Shot ride (shoots you strait up in the air) was the craziest ride I have ever been on. I can't believe I actually went on it...twice! Jody and I are nuts :P Then we went on the ride x-treme and that was just nuts! Basically it's a teeter totter type ride and it throws you over the edge of the hotel. Crazy! Then we went on the ride Insanity, and let me tell you, that was definately one insane ride! Here is the link to the hotel so you can see the rides I am talking about http://www.stratospherehotel.com/thrills/
After that ride we were done with rides. Jody and I felt queezy and too dizzy to ride anymore. So we headed over to Circus Circus and walked around Adventuredome. They have all kinds of games and stuff there. We played some miniature golf and and another circus game. As we were walking around we saw the most morbid and disrespectful game. I couldn't believe it. It was one of those games where you insert a coin and try to get it to land on a certain point. Well the game was called Titanic and the ship was sinking and you had to try and land your coin in one of the life boats. Talk about sick. They even had it in the area where all the kids are. OY!!!!
After walking around some more we decided we were beat and ready to head home. No we didn't gamble in case anyone was wondering. I don't believe in gambling and neither one of us have the money to gamble with. We would rather spend the money we have on something we know we get a return on. LOL. It sure was fun in Vegas though!
We got back to Jody's around 7:30 last night and today we just plan on relaxing and washing all the smoke smell out of our clothes! YUCK!!!!
Anyway, as soon as i get some more pics I will update again. I still have another week here and have a few more activities planned. Stay tuned....

Headed West...

2009-03-12T11:54:00.000-07:00

I'll be MIA for 2 weeks. Going to CA. to see my family. I'll have plenty of updates when I get back!

UGHHHHHHH!

2009-03-02T05:37:00.000-08:00

There should be a rule that moms shouldn't be able to be sick!
I am sick, and so are Kd, Ky, and Clint. This sucks, and it hit us quick! One day we were fine, then 2 in the morning it got me. Stupid cold.
On top of the cold, ever since I was pregnant the first time, my kidneys are ULTRA sensitive. If you remember, I had almost gone in to kidney failure with the kids. So now, whenever I get sick with a cold or anything, my kidneys get all irritated. They start hurting really bad and I just have to wait it out. So now I have this stupid cold, and sore kidneys.
I think the weather is to blame for this cold. It was nice and sunny in the 70s for several days, now we have had winter storms and snow like crazy. As soon as the weather did the dramatic change, we all got sick. What gives?!?!

Let the Good Times Roll...

2009-02-25T05:07:00.000-08:00

Things have been pretty busy around here.
My niece Ella was born on the 15th! She is the first born to my brother Chad and his wife Jen. We are very excited for them!!!
Clint and I celebrated our 5th anniversary on the 20th. We had a great time, some friends came and watched the kiddos and we were able to take off for the evening.

I just wanted to post some fun time goofy pics I took of the kiddos. They were acting really silly so I used that opportunity as a photo shoot:

Hope you enjoyed the pics!

So THESE are what temper tantrums look like...

2009-02-19T04:53:00.000-08:00

So last night we had Burger King for dinner. The kids got those wondeful cheap toys with their dinner. Well, the last couple of times we got toys for them from there, Kaiden has a meltdown because they don't do what he wants them to do. One time the toy was a monster truck that the top would pop off if it bumped something. Kaiden would get SOOO mad because he couldn't...no...wouldn't put the top back on. The boy has less patience than I do, and we all know that's BAD!

Well this time the toys were these car things that the outside wheels don't move, just the inside. Well, Kaiden wanted the wheels on the outside to move, and because they woudn't, he through a FIT for over 20 minutes. Which we caught some samples of on video of course :P

During this video, Kayley kept trying to take the spotlight. It's hilarious! Anyway, thought you might get a good laugh at this. BTW for those thinking how sad to just let the boy cry like that, let me tell ya, NOTHING we did stopped him from crying. We tried ignoring, we tried explaining, we tried holding him, we tried distracting, none of it worked. So I figured, might as well get it on video for his girlfriends some day :P

Each video is only about 2 minutes long, but there is some funny stuff in all 3 of them. Make sure to turn your volume up nice and loud to get the full effect :)

Disney on Ice...and the meltdown

2009-02-14T13:40:00.000-08:00

Today we went to Disney on Ice. The show was great. But, well, they really shouldn't have had intermission. I think the kids would have been fine if they wouldn't have stopped. The kids got bored and were driving us nuts the rest of the show. They were really loving the first half though. Let's just say that we won't be taking them to anything like that again for AT LEAST a year. That was rediculous! They got some great toys we got suckered in to buying though :P

My fellow MoM Heather and her Hubby with their twins that are just a few days younger than ours were there as well. Seems like the halfway point did it in for them too. We probably should have left at intermission because we may have left in good moods then. Oh well, maybe next year.

We were all going to go meet for lunch after, but that got cancelled due to the kiddos meltdowns during the show. I'm sure lunch would have been a disaster! We came home and the meltdowns were even worse. So we fed them lunch and put their butts to bed. Kd slept for 2 hours and we're having to wake Ky up now because she's been asleep for 3 hours. It's getting late and we kind of want them to sleep tonight ;)

We got a couple of pics, sure wish Clint hadn't chopped my head off in the one with me and Kd. That was the best smile he had all day!

Hopefully next time the kiddos will enjoy the whole show. Overall we had a good time though.

Moving on...

2009-02-09T05:08:00.000-08:00

Things are getting better around here. We have several things lined up to get our minds off of our loss.
Sat. we are going to see Disney on Ice. I think I may enjoy that more than the kids though :) We will be meeting a fellow multiples mom and her kiddos and then afterwords go to lunch.
In March I am going to CA. from the 13th until the 26th. Clint's mom will be coming out here to help Clint with the kiddos. That way Clint won't have to take time off of work.
While in CA. I am going to get to see my brother Chad's new baby. She is due to be born any day now! Also while I am there my step-dad and I are going to go to Las Vegas. We've decided to be kids again while I'm down there. I wanted to treat him to a little bit, so we'll be going on the rides at the top of the Stratosphere hotel. I have always wanted to go there but the opportunity never came. Well, it's here now :) We will also go see a couple of shows.
My dad and some of my family from Utah will be driving down for one weekend I am out there, so it will be nice to see them! The other weekend I would like to go to Disneyland. My friend's dad helped build part of the new area there, so it will be nice to see his work.
In April, Thomas the Tank Engine will be here in Baltimore. The kids are obsessed with trains, so we figure they'd love to do that.
In between those main activities, the weather is starting to get warmer, so we can start venturing out more. We'll be going to the zoo, and other things around here. This summer the kiddos are going to start horseback riding lessons. Not much to teach them at this stage other than balance, which is kind of mandatory :P
We also want to go to NY. as well. We want to take the kiddos up to see Clint's family again. We haven't pinned down a time on that quite yet, but we're thinking around July.
The 20th of this month is our anniversary! We'll have been married for 5 years already!!!
We took the kids to the car show here on Sat. What a joke, we won't be doing that again! WAY too many people and the cost to get in and parking...no thanks! There were supposed to be characters like Dora and Diego as well as spiderman, etc. I didn't see any of them. Clint said he saw the ninja turtles, but I didn't. Which means the kids didn't. $12 for per ticket for Clint and I to get in as well as $15 for parking....that's not gonna happen again! I'm glad we got out of the house though. We went out to dinner after and had an ok time. The kids loved climbing in the cars, but when it came time to get out, they would freak out. Well, Kaiden would more than Kayley. Oh well, now we know.
Hope everyone is well.

A moment in time...

2009-02-02T09:54:00.001-08:00

Dear sweet Angel,
You were only with us for a brief moment. I only saw a glimpse of you on ultrasound. You would have been due in September, only you were taken away before that time came. I dreamt of you. I saw you and I held you. You were sweet and warm and you were mine. But that dream has come to an end and instead there is an emptiness inside where you would have continued to grow. You were special and couldn't stay. It was all taken away too soon. I will be strong and I can move on, but I will not forget you. You gave us hope, we know that we can get pregnant without the use of fertility treatments. We will try again, but for now we will be remembering and thinking of you. I love you, and miss you.
Mommy

It's over

2009-02-01T04:37:00.000-08:00

So I started bleeding really bad this morning. It's over, I've had a miscarriage.

Prayers please...

2009-01-30T16:08:00.001-08:00

Ok, we were waiting to announce the news until we got to have the first ultrasound with a heartbeat. Well, unfortunately, that may not happen. Instead I am asking for prayers and lots of them. Clint and I tried to get preggo off and on for 2 years and eventually had to get fertility help. So imagine our surprise when we got preggo this time after trying just 3 cycles. However....

I was in the ER all day today. I am supposed to be 5 weeks and 3 days pregnant. I started getting horrible cramps on my right side yesterday and it has progressively gotten worse. After no sleep I decided to go to the ER this morning.
They drew several vials of blood and urine sample. No bladder infection. Great, but I was not prepared for what followed. No one gave me the result of the lab, but I was sent upstairs for an ultrasound. The tech did her measurements and I asked if she saw the pregnancy. She said no, but she wasn't surprised with how low my numbers were. I had no idea my numbers were low. She said they were just over 300.
According to charts, at 24 days past ovulation (which I am), I should be over 540 and even averaging at 1000 right now. But I'm not. I'm just over 300. After several hours the doc comes in and says that they saw two "cyst" type things in my uterus. The doc said that it looks like it could be a molar pregnancy. I didn't think to question it because I was in shock. She said she couldn't see a gestational sac, just the cyst things. Ok. She said my numbers were really low and were what someone only a week to 2 weeks after conception should be, not someone that is 3 weeks after. She said I could also be experiencing an ectopic pregancy and that it's just too small to see on u/s.
She said to come back in Mon. for another blood draw and then had me set up an appt. for 11 am Mon. with the OB.
So I come home after 7 hours in the ER and lay down. Then the phone rings and it's a different doc from the ER. He's the one that actually put the order in for the u/s. Well he was calling to see if I had set up my appt. with the OB and asked what the other doc told me in the ER. Uh...wouldn't he know that??? So I told him about the cyst things and the numbers, etc. He then said that it is extremely unlikely that it is a molar pregnancy because usually HCG levels would be extremely high, not low. I asked about the cysts, and he said at 5 weeks you wouldn't really be able to see anything on u/s and that I would need to have numbers closer to 1000 to get an image. He said that the 2 "cysts" could very well be...TWINS!!!! UM, what the heck people, really??? I asked why the low numbers if it were to be twins, he said that's what concerns him. Arggg. He said HCG levels are meaningless unless there is something to compare it to. I would need another set drawn to see if the numbers double, or if they go down. I explained that I had my first + home pregnancy test last Mon. He said that worries him more, that I would get an HPT that soon and still have numbers this low. I asked about the likelihood of an ectopic. He said that would be more likely due to my number being that low in addition to the right sided cramping. But he said there was nothing visible in the tubes so we have to wait and see what happens.
So the waiting game is on, I go back Mon. to see if I am miscarrying or to see if the numbers have doubled like they should have.
Any prayers you can offer would be great.

Fun with photos

2009-01-27T07:28:00.000-08:00

The kiddos were being extremely cute this morning, so I thought I'd grab some photos of them.

They had their 2 year check up last week. Kaiden weighs 24.2 lbs and is 34 inches tall, and Kayley weighs 23.8 lbs and is 34 inches tall as well. For some reason she looks bigger than Kaiden, but according to weights and measurments she's smaller. Go figure.

We're all doing well. We have had yet another cold. Which is really bad when mommy, daddy, and kids are sick!

I have been out to ride Bonita again. She decided she wanted to rip her horse blanket to shreds, so she's going to have to do without until next winter. At least she has an inside stall so it's not as cold for her. The blanket was for when she gets turned out, but now I'll have to invest in a blanket that doesn't rip so easily. This one was a cheapo blanket at least :P

Again, not much going on here. Same stuff, different day.

Nothing new to report....

2009-01-16T17:35:00.000-08:00

Same stuff different day. Nothing major has come up, sorry for not posting. I just didn't have anything to post about.
I get to go on a vacation by myself with no kids! My brother Chad and his wife are having a baby! The baby is due in Feb. So in March I will be going out to California to go see the new baby. I'll also get to see some other family and friends. I am definately looking forward to it. Clint's mom will be coming up here to help Clint with the kids so that he doesn't have to take a ton of time off from work. We'll be needing those vacation days for this summer. We want to make another trip to NY. to see Clint's family again. The kids will be 2 years older than they were the last time they went out. So it'll be fun to see how they interact with everyone.
I was finally able to ride my horse last weekend. Bonita has come so far and is doing great. She was trained by the best! Thanks Joe and Cathi!
Clint's up for promotion again this year, so if you could all send lot's of prayers that he gets promoted, we could definately use them!
Update for Kaiden: That boy talks a lot! I think by the time he is 4 he will have mastered all the words in the dictionary. Ok, ok, maybe not all the words. He is doing amazingly well with them though. His latest phrase is "bix it" which is actually fix it. He is starting to use 3 and sometimes even 4 words sentences now. He is big in to hugs. Every hour or so he comes running up saying "hug hug" and just wants a quick hug and then he runs off playing. He says I love you mommy and Daddy now too. When Kayley does something she shouldn't Kaiden yells at her and says "top it Kayee" it's pretty funny. He looks just like mommy when he says it too.
Kayley update: She is basically done potty training. We just have to fine tune some areas. Overall though, she doesn't have many accidents, and if she does it's usually because we forgot to take her or she drank way too much. She is starting to copy everything I say now. She'll stand there and mimic my facial and hand gestures. Instead of yelling Kaiden when she is mad at him, she actually yells her own name. She is very much a drama queen. If something upsets her the whole neighborhood knows, I have no idea where she gets that from :P

Anyway, that's about all that's going on here. Boring stuff to report. Nope, I can't give you back the last 2 minutes of your life you used up reading this :)

Happy Birthday Kaiden and Kayley!

2009-01-02T15:09:00.000-08:00

I can't believe the kiddos are 2 years old!!! We didn't go all out this year. Just a quiet evening at home. Well, almost quiet. While we were trying to get the stuff ready, Kaiden got a glimpse of his cake and FREAKED out. He wanted it so bad. He couldn't have it just yet though, so he had to go throw a fit in his room. Once he calmed down we brought him out. We got a couple of cute pics. They were better this year than last year. Just like last year though, Kayley wanted nothing to do with her cake. Oh well. Enjoy the pics :)

Christmas Vacation

2008-12-29T11:00:00.000-08:00

There is a video at the end of this post :)

Our Christmas trip was MUCH better as far as driving goes. Both ways it only took 6 hours each way. Unlike Thanksgiving where it took 9.5 hours. The kids were much better this time too. When it got to the point where they were extremely bored, we put a movie on the laptop and had it positioned to where they could still be rear facing in their car seats. I was very happy we didn't have to turn them around.

We left on Tuesday the 23rd. Thankfully Clint got off work really early so we could get ahead of traffic. We got to our destination around 6:30.

Christmas Eve we spent with his parents and just relaxed. Up until dinner time anyway. Yeah, so those of you that followed my blog last Christmas, you'll remember that Kayley ended up in the ER for several problems and it turned out to be Roseola. Well, this year she decided she wanted to visit the ER again. Oy. Most kids can safely play with cardboard boxes, the world cheapest toys for toddlers. Not my kids, nope. Instead, Kayley went to reach in the box and fell into it. The flap on the box then sliced the inside of her mouth and lacerated the upper frenulum. The flap of skin between the to front teeth that connects to the lip. Well, she cut that all the way back to her gum line. I was worried about infection and her teeth. There was blood all over, which is to be expected with a mouth injury. I wasn't worried about the blood.

So we got to spend 4 hours at the hospital only for them to tell us that we jus needed to keep her mouth clean. Um, anyone that has kids knows that they put everything in their mouths. So keep it clean, uh...yeah right.

The next morning we had Christmas gifts and the kids got a ton of toys. Then we went to some other relatives for dinner and then went to another one for pie.

The best part though...Clint's brother Bob came home from his deployment. He was supposed to be at Ft. Bragg for inprocessing stuff, and could only get the day off. So we all told Clint's mom that Clint wasn't feeling well and that he would go back to the hotel to get some rest. He was really making the 2 hour drive to go get Bob and bring him back to surprise her. All the while we were convincing Sharon that we would go see Bob the next day. She had no clue. When Clint came back and she saw Bob, she was in tears and so happy to have him home safely. Unfortunately Bob couldn't spend Christmas with his wife and son, since they are in New York, but at least he was able to spend it with us.

Friday we didn't do much. More family came over that we visited with.

Sat. was the big day for the kiddos. We got to go to the Transportation museum. The kids had a BLAST!!! They were running around saying "Train train" "All Aboard!" "Car" "Truck" "Plane". We even got to ride a train for a little bit and the kiddos were so excited.

We came home Sunday. We expected a ton of traffic, and were surprised when we were home by 4:30! I'm glad we didn't spend money on plane tickets. By the time we would have had to be at the airport, parking, waiting for flights, the actual flight, etc. We would have already been to our destination. Now we know that Thankgivings are the worst with traffic because everyone gets off the same day. Unlike Christmas where people travel on different days throughout the break.

The kiddos birthday is coming up! They'll be 2 years old!!!! We don't have anything planned though. Last year they were screaming for both of their parties. So this year, we'll just keep it simple.

Kayley regressed with her potty training while on vacation this time. She would pee a tiny bit in her potty, but within a minute of putting the pull up back on, she would soak it. She is doing better now, I think she got used to going in the pull up as though it was a diaper, so she is back in undies again.

Wed. we will be starting Kaiden on the potty! Clint has several days off in a row, so we figure we should take advantage of that to get Kaiden used to the concept of a potty.

So here is the video of Kaiden sleeping while eating his pickle on thanksgiving. Sorry it took awhile to get around to it.

My fellow M.O.M. tagged me...so here goes...

2008-12-21T05:02:00.000-08:00

Ok Heather, here are the answers to the questions:

1.How long have you been together? We have been married for almost 5 years come Feb. We have been together for 7.

2.How long did we date? We "dated" for 4 months prior to getting engaged. Then we were engaged for 11 months prior to getting married. When we started dating, we really only dated for about a month, then we got orders to both deploy to Iraq in 2003. We were both in Germany at the time. So the remaining dating period we would go to work at 4 am and not get off until around 11 pm. Then we would go grab a bite to eat and head to his barracks room where we would fall asleep on the couch watching a movie. We never did get to do fancy dating. Prior to getting engaged in Kuwait, our version of dating would be to get our wonderful MREs (Military food rations) and go sit in his tent watching a movie on his laptop.

3. How old is he? 38, he just had his birthday on the 9th.

4. Who eats more? LOL, it depends. Sometimes I have a huge appetite, but for the most part he eats more.

5. Who said, "I love you," first? He did.

6. Who is taller? He is, by 8 inches :P

7. Who does the laundry? I do. But he helps me fold.

8. Who does the dishes? He does the evening dishes. I do the morning and lunch dishes if there is a bunch. But there usually isn't. I cook dinner, so Clint does the dinner dishes.

9. Who sleeps on the right side of the bed? He does in this house. It really depends on where the bathroom is. I don't like him tripping over me when he gets up for work in the morning. So whichever side of the bed is closer to the bathroom he gets.

10. Who pays the bills? I pay them. The last couple of times I let him, we were almost overdue.

11. Who mows the lawn? Clint does the backyard, the military has a lawn company that does the front.

12. Who cooks dinner? Mostly I do. There are some days where I don't feel up to it, and Clint makes mac'n'cheese or something that doesn't require a whole lot of effort :P

13. Who is more stubborn? I had to laugh at this one, no comparison really. I am by far way more stubborn than Clint.

14. Who kissed who first? He kissed me first I'm sure. I am very shy in that department, so I am pretty sure that he always had to make the first move.

15. Who asked who out? Well, it kind of played out like this. We had some mutual couple friends. Apparently Clint had asked about me to them, but seeing that he was an NCO (an enlisted army officer) and I was merely a PFC (um, very low on the totem pole), he was worried that he would get in trouble for approaching me. I had no idea he was interested in me. I saw his picture on our friends fridge and asked about him. Then they went on about how he really wanted to ask me out etc. Through them we both agreed on going to a mini Oktoberfest in Germany and that was our first date.

16. Who proposed? OMGOSH! He did, but he left a lot to be desired :P See, we were on the border of Kuwait and Iraq the day the war started. Him being all studly like, came up to my ambulance I was working in, and he leaned up against the vehicle, not even on his knees, and his exact words were "So, you wanna get married?" As though he were asking if I'd like a soda or something. I have never let him live it down :P I gave him 7 days to think about it. Then I walked up to him and simply said "Yes" he looked at me funny and said "Yes...what?" I explained "If you don't remember the question, then I can't help you" well, he about died from excitement.

17. Who is more sensitive? It depends. I swear he has as many mood swings as I do. I love you babe :) He holds a grudge longer. He'll let me do about 10 things that tick him off, and I'll have no idea what. Until he starts snapping at me. Then I'll realize, oh boy, I must have done something about 6 months ago that I never apologized for. Like I could even remember what it was. We have tried to get him to work on this :P I explained that it's a whole lot easier to just talk to me if I have done one thing wrong, because by the time he finally spits something out, he can't even give me an example of what I did. He just feels angry still. I'm on the other end of that spectrum. I get ticked off easily, but within a couple of hours, it's no big deal. Even if he owes me an apology, I don't care. I figure getting an apology is just going to make us both more mad. So the majority of the time i just drop it. I get more angry over one thing and Clint holds a grudge. So I think we're about even though :)

18. Who has more siblings? Again, no comparison. He has 2 bio, 3 adopted. I have 6 step, 2 adopted, and 4 biological.

19. What were you doing ten years ago? Dec. 1998. Uh... Well, let's see. I was a senior in High school. I was working at PetsMart. That's about all I remember :P I was pretty busy.

20. Five things on my to-do list: Oh goodness, I have no idea.

21.Things I would do if I was suddenly made a billionaire. Well, I would pay tithing on that. Then, I would get a huge ranch with some seriously nice facilities. We would also have an 18 hole golf course for Clint. A small lake for boating, you know, all kinds of fun stuff. I can dream can't I? :P

22. Three of my bad habits: Yelling at the kids when I'm mad at them. Horrible lack of patience. I don't clean the bathrooms as often as I should :P

23. Five places I have lived: ROFL, is it limited to just 5? OK, I'm going to go with more. CA., AZ., UT., LA., TX., MO., CO., DC., Germany, Kuwait (for 3 months), Iraq (for 6 months).

24. Five jobs I have had: Only 5? Too bad, I'm listing more. Dog/horse groomer, Video store worker, PetsMart, Natural Wonders (kind of like the Discovery store), Rescue Services International (EMT), I was even a rent-a-cop, and an Army Medic.

25. Things people don't know about me: Well, I guess that I was an artist at some point. I sold a couple of my watercolor paintings. Never continued the hobby though. I used to work on movie and TV production sets as a medic too. I met a lot of actors and actresses.

Clint's Birthday

2008-12-12T11:51:00.000-08:00

Things have been going well lately. Not much to report. Still having good and bad days with potty training. The kiddos got pics taken with Santa at the mall a week ago and I was able to send out some cards of them. They aren't great pics though. The kids refused to smile, they preferred the deer caught in headlights look.

Clint had his Birthday on the 9th. We had plans to do stuff, but we were waiting on his gift to arrive by UPS but they didn't even get here until after 7:30 at night! So our plans were pretty much shot by then. We did spend the day relaxing (Clint was off work early). We had pizza and I baked Clint a cake. No worries, I don't plan to become a cake decorator. It was yummy either way though :)

The flights to go down to NC are crazy expensive, so looks like we're driving again. UGGGGHHH!! I don't mind being there, I love being with Clint's family. But the drive, wow.

So here are a few pics. Enjoy.

Thanksgiving...

2008-12-01T11:27:00.000-08:00

Well we survived Thanksgiving! I was really worried how Kayley would do with the potty training while we were away from home, but I was worried for nothing. Kayley did even better on the potty there than she does at home! She had a few accidents, but that was because she drank a TON! She pooped several times in the potty. What was the most impressive was on the way home. She said poopoo and stinky a couple of times. So we pulled in to a gas station parking lot and put her on her little potty in the back of the van...door closed of course so no one could see. She pooped all on her own without us trying to push her. She just sat down, pooped then stood up with arms raised yelling "I POOPOO, I POOPOO!!!"
She has become a modest pottier (not that that's even a word). She will go much faster when we leave her in the bathroom to do her business. So we have been doing that. We no longer have to use warm water to get her going. She'll hold her pee a lot longer now too. We have been potty training for about 3 months now. But we took 10 days off in the beginning. So I guess only 2.5 months or so. I definately think by Christmas she'll be done. Sure she'll have accidents every now and then, all kids do.

The drive to and from North Carolina was HORRIBLE!!! Apparently every person in VA. goes to North Carolina for the Holidays, and they all go at the same freaking time! It is technically only supposed to be a 6 hour drive, 7 with stops. Oh no, turned out to be 9.5 hours. For only 3 days to actually visit. I guess the one good thing of having gas at $5 a gallon is that there isn't as much traffic. Now that gas prices are down, so are the IQ points of drivers. Apparently 90% of drivers slept through drivers training when they talked about how to MERGE in traffic. It's not complicated people, 2 lanes go to one, every other car...MERGE! Not "get as many people over as possible before the person takes a break from texting on his cell phone and realizes he should go forward now." I mean seriously, we moved 3 miles in one hour. Construction on a holiday weekend, alright dumbies. Seriously, the spot of construction was all of 100 feet. Yet it caused an hour worth of delays. If we were in our F-350 dually truck, our butts would have driven on the side of the road all the way. 4 wheel drive is awesome!

The kids had a great time, and the grandparents did too. I was so stressed, I could have been in Hawaii and been grumpy. I am a control freak, duh. I am not used to my kids having free reign of the house. Not that it was a big deal, there were 4 adults and 2 teenagers that kept an eye on the kids, but I still felt like I was constantly trying to make sure which kid was where. Hard to relax like that :P

The grandparents were amazing with the kids. The kiddos had no problem being left with them so Clint and I could go out on a much needed date. I got to go to my fav restaurant and watch a movie I really wanted to see (Twilight). Clint was a good sport :) We then got to walk through Walmart. As bad as that sounds, I really enjoyed it. You see, out here, the Walmarts are BEYOND ghetto. So being able to walk through a nice walmart was really fun. Out here I have to stick to Target. Not as much variety as Walmart has. Oh well.

We also took the kids to see the new movie Bolt. The kids did amazing! They watched the whole movie and Ky only had to get up once to pee. But that's the night she had tons of pee accidents. In order to bribe her to stay seated she got to drink as much juice as she wanted. Boy did that backfire!

I didn't take any pics because I just wanted to relax and enjoy the moment. Not like that happened, but still. I did get a great video of Kaiden eating a pickle in his sleep. I'll find a way to post that somehow. It is hilarious!

On the way home I really felt like jumping in to a meat grinder would have been more tolerable. Traffic was backed up for over 120 miles. Again, the idiot drivers not knowing how to merge. For 3 hours we were in rush hour stop and barely go traffic. Almost 10 hours of driving total. Kayley screamed for most of that. Kaiden did good, he didn't start screaming until near the end of the drive. By the time we got home I was so angry and tired. I am so glad the trip is over. I loved being at Clint's parents house. Next time we are flying down. I'll gladly pay $250 per person to fly. I don't think my nerves could take any more traffic!

We're going down again for Christmas. At least now we have all the kinks worked out. I know what to expect so I won't be as stressed this time.

Thank you Sharon and Rick for having us! We really did have a good time. Plan on picking us up at the airport next time :)

Kaiden is a natural....

2008-11-22T13:29:00.000-08:00

Today Kaiden went with Mommy to the ranch. It was COLD! Kaiden had so much fun though. The ranch is a rescue that also has boarders like me there. I put Kaiden on Bonita and he did great! He was holding the reigns like a pro. He stayed very balanced and was smiling and laughing. Bonita didn't seem bothered by him at all. She was very relaxed. I decided to get up on Bonita with him and we rode around the arena for about 45 minutes. He was pointing at the birds, cats, dogs, and the other horses. Bonita did great! She didn't try to test me or get nervous that Kaiden was up there with me. Debbie (the owner of the ranch and rescue) said that she hasn't seen a child as young as Kaiden do so good on a horse. She wants to start giving him lessons next summer. They have a couple of small ponies at the ranch that she wants to work with him on. I think he would absolutely love it. The next time I go out, I'll be bringing Kayley so she can get a turn on Bonita. I had a wonderful time bonding with Kaiden on our little ride. Here is a picture, it's not great, it's from my cell phone. Bonita was half asleep she was so relaxed.

I'm STUCK!!!

2008-11-20T07:16:00.000-08:00

So Kaiden decided he wanted to try and climb over the fence. What he wasn't counting on was how to get down the other side of the fence. He screamed and screamed. Because he got stuck. He was afraid to get down the way he got up, and was afraid to climb down the other side because he had nowhere to put his feet. I let him sit there and scream for about 10 minutes before I put him back down on the fenced in side. He was not happy being stuck and hasn't tried to climb back over since, lol. I think I "tortured" him by letting him be stuck that he doesn't want to try it again. Hopefully that plan works. Kayley tried but didn't get her leg over the top. Which is FINE by me!

The 2 pics above show what the kiddos look like when they eat a banana. It doesn't matter how small I cut the banana, they still stuff their face :P

On the potty training, Kayley is doing AMAZING! She hasn't had really any accidents for over 5 days now. She has been pooping and peeing in the potty. She is starting to let us know when she has to pee instead of us always taking her every hour. She had somewhat of an accident last night. But that was because I was making her laugh so hard she couldn't hold it...my bad :)

We are all getting better now, the sickly bug is going away. Clint and I have some sinus stuff lingering, but we're all MUCH better now.

Next week we will all be going to Clint's parents house for Thanksgiving. It's only about 7 hours drive to get there, so not too bad. It may be a little longer since we'll have to stop and take Kayley potty. Something I didn't have to do on any other drives. We'll see how it goes. I hope that the trip doesn't set Kayley back with her potty training.

We have put Kaiden on the potty a few times and he pees for us, but I'm not going to go extreme training on him until after their birthday. It's going to be hard enough keeping Kayley on track while away from home, let alone both of them.

I have jumped on the Twilight bandwagon, thanks a lot to my sisters Kaci, Jessica, and Ashley. As well as my step-mom Karen. Hehe. they tried for months to get me to read the Twilight books, but I kept saying I didn't care to read about vampires. Well, they got there wish. I saw the previews to the movie and decided that I would give the books a try. I have finished the first and second books, and now waiting on the 3rd and 4th ones in the mail. Clint and I are going to see the movie when we go to his parents house so they can watch the kiddos.

That's about it I guess. Hope everyone is well! Take care :)

Sickly

2008-11-14T12:47:00.000-08:00

Sorry I haven't posted much. All of us are sick. Ky had a fever of 103.6 and we took her in. They put her on antibiotics for an ear infection.
Kd is doing fine. Hopefully it was just a fluke and won't happen again. My concern now is that my brother was Kd's age when he started having seizures regularly until he had brain surgery at 19 years old, and he is a twin too. So it's a little unsettling if it was a seizure.
So the kids are getting better, but neither Clint or I have slept really the last week. Now Clint and I are sick, so we're up coughing all night. At least we can take cold medicine to ease our symptoms. Not many options for the kiddos. Mucinex didn't do anything. Benedryl helps them sleep a little but doesn't help the symptoms. They don't need motrin/tylenol because their throats don't hurt anymore. We just have to ride it out. Although I gotta say, I don't think the antibiotics really make that much of a difference. Ky and Kd have the same thing, and they have been sick just as much as the other. They are both healing at the same pace. Makes me wonder if the antibiotics are even doing anthing, since Kd isn't taking them and he is healing just as fast Ky and she is taking them.
Overall, we're hanging in there.

Concussion, ambulance, and ER for Kaiden

2008-11-09T06:42:00.000-08:00

SO, last night was quite the adventure.
I went to put the kids down to bed. Ky had a fever of 102. So we had her on motrin. Kd didn't have a fever but he was getting motrin because they both are sick. Full blown nasty coughs and noses.
Their bedroom is completely child proof. Or so I thought. That didn't stop them from not being child proof from each other. We had taken out the toddler beds and just put the mattresses on the floor. Since Kd had fallen out of his crib we went to toddler beds. Ky fell out of her toddler bed, and hit her head and woke up with bruises. So that's when we decided to put the mattresses on the floor.
Anyway, so they were running around the room and ran right in to each other. No biggie I thought, they do it all the time. But then Kd went to step up onto his mattress and slipped. The thing is only 5 inches high. I noticed right away something was wrong. Usually when he falls, he either cries or get's back up. He didn't do either.
I called his name, and his body flopped over. I ran in the room and called his name. He didn't respond. He was face down, so I did the best spine protecting roll over for him as I could. But I was worried that he wasn't making any noise. As soon as I turned him over he went completely stiff. His whole right side of his body contorted behind him. He turned the deepest purple and blue I have ever seen. He completely stopped breathing. His eyes rolled back in his head and was getting even more blue. DH was already on the phone with 911 by that point and they were sending an ambulance out right away.
I started giving him mouth to mouth for about 10-15 seconds and his color returned. Then his body went limp and he still wouldn't respond. He finally would open his eyes, but then he would black out again. The whole ordeal lasted about 1 minute. That was the scariest minute of my entire life. The ambulance arrived within 5 minutes of the call, thankfully we live on a military post with an ambulance on standby.
By the time they got here, he was mostly awake. Still kind of lethargic. He wouldn't talk or anything. He didn't make a sound.
I was in the back of the ambulance. There was an ambulance, fire engine, and military police on scene. Then more firetrucks came in addition to another ambulance. Apparently the call we put through to 911 got confused because instead of just the military emergency response team coming, the Washington DC response team came.
The DC team was called off and we headed lights and sirens to childrens hospital. We were put through triage quickly and sent to the back. They did all the neuro tests on him and by then he was back to acting like his usual self again.
The docs were confused as to how exactly he ended up unconconscious and not breathing. We think it was the way he fell that maybe gave him a concussion. They also said it could have been a febrile seizure, but I explained to him that I used to be a medic and my brother used to have seizures, and that was definately not a febrile seizure. I also explained that I had just taken both of their temps about 15 min. before the episode happened because I knew Ky was running a high fever. But Kd didn't have one.
So around midnight we got home. Ky was still having a fever of 102 and she was shaking like crazy. They were both coughing horribly. DH and I have been up all night with both of them.
That was the absolute scariest night of my life.

I'm a dork...

2008-11-06T05:34:00.000-08:00

I feel like I should be writing with a lisp, because that's how I am talking right now. Last night, oh so graceful me decided to do what humans do, eat dinner. I put a pepperoni in my mouth, bit down and tried to bite the tip of my tongue off. Ever heard of the expression "Bite your tongue" who knew that it was a figure of speech. I took it literally. So uh yeah, I couldn't sleep last night because it hurts THAT bad. If you look at the picture, you can see where there is a red circle, yeah, that part hurts bad. The white part, well, that part is dead, it has no feeling in it anymore. It's numb. Maybe with time new taste buds will grow and I'll get feeling again there again. Oy.

Kayley is doing GREAT with potty training. We haven't had any pee accidents in almost 3 days now. Only 1 poop accident too. She has pooped twice in the potty. I think we're actually getting somewhere now!

It's come to this...

2008-11-02T15:55:00.000-08:00

Ok, so the reason for my caption...

We have been racking our brains coming up with a cheap solution to child proofing the window in the kids bedroom. By looking at the pics, you may be saying that's a little extreme. But when you have 2 toddlers scheming together, it is a necessity. Anyway, they kept destroying the blinds, we tried stapling and nailing a blanket on the wall, but they just kept pulling it off. They can unlock the windows, which is definately unsafe. The other problem...they take after me, it has to be pitch black in the room in order to sleep at night. They come by it honestly :P

So we finally brainstormed and figured it out. The result works perfectly. The other problem was fire safety. We couldn't just nail up some boards, otherwise in a fire, we couldn't get out. So we came up with a sliding mechanism with wood flooring. It's easy enough to just slide it up. It's hard enough that the kiddos can't lift it up, but easy enough for a teenager/adult.

In order to get the idea across better I added some pics. Clint did the handy man work.

So a little extreme? Maybe, worth getting a full night's rest over...priceless. Ok, it cost a little bit of money, I think the supplies cost under $20 for the whole thing.

Potty training is going great! Kayley has pooped and peed in the potty with no accidents in her underwear for 2 days. She only had 1 poop accident and that was in her pull up while we were out. She is peeing right away on big potties when we are out and about. We were at church and had a dinner at the church after, and Kayley did great. She only had the one accident, and that was the poop one. Last night and earlier today she has pooped in the potty right away!

Halloween continued...

2008-10-31T16:40:00.000-07:00

So today was pretty fun. We went to the playground across the street to play before the trick or treater's came. That's where that picture came from.

Then after dinner, I took Kaiden out to trick or treat. He was having SO much fun. He would run up to the house and say "teeotee" then grab the candy and put it in his bag. He was laughing and trying to keep up with the big kids that kept running past. I didn't take Kayley because Clint stayed here to pass out candy, and I didn't want to stress with both of them. It worked out well though. Kayley was the one putting the candy in the bags of the kids. She would laugh, then the next one would come and she eagerly put it in the next bag. Of course, she kept trying to steal some for herself. Turns out it was a good thing I took Kaiden, because we wouldn't have had enough candy to pass out otherwise. We basically just recycled the candy. I don't need the extra calories anyway :)

Potty training and Halloween don't mix by the way. Kayley had 2 pee accidents while we were busy with the trick or treater's, and I was gone with Kaiden. Oh well, tomorrow's another day.

Halloween fun...

2008-10-25T18:23:00.001-07:00

We had a church Halloween function tonight. We dressed the kiddos up in pirate costumes. The kids had a BLAST running around and even got to do some TOTing. They were absolutely adorable with their bags. They would hold them out and say "Tee o Tee". I told people we were collecting candy for potty training bribes :P Anyway, here are their pics...

On the potty training front...

Kayley did amazing tonight!!! We kept her in a pull up just in case. But she held her pee and poop the ENTIRE time we were gone. Which was over 3 hours. When we got back I put her on the potty and she peed right away! Then I waited a few more minutes in the bathroom and she started saying "ew" with that uh oh face. So I put her on the big potty and she pooped a ton...sorry if that was a little TMI ;) I am so proud of her. She did such a good job on the potty today...NO ACCIDENTS!!!

At a loss...

2008-10-24T14:12:00.000-07:00

Here is the problem. I don't really think the whole wait until they're ready thing applies here. I know she is "young" by many people's standards. But Kayley has shown signs that she is "ready" to potty train. I know several people cringe at the word "ready". Sorry about that. I have played with the whole EC thing since they were about 6 months, but was never consistent. It was more just to show what the potty is and get them used to the sounds of a flushing toilet.
We aren't working with Kaiden right now. 1 at a time thanks ;)
Well 3 weeks ago we started full time potty training with Kayley. We did 2 weeks and she was doing well, but she she started getting stubborn and throwing a fit just to sit on the potty. We were having days in a row with no accidents with pee and just poop accidents. We put her in underwear all day except when napping and night time, which we'll put her in pull ups for. So at the end of 2 weeks, the rebellion started, and we took a few 5 days off. But she started saying "I pee pee" "I stinky" and "ew" everytime she had to go. So we started back up with the training again.
What we do is take her to the little potty, because she won't stay on the big one. With some help with warm water on her feet she'll go right away. Several times, she's go without any help, and she'll fill up the potty with all her pee. So I know she has bladder control. Sometimes I just have to say is go pee pee and she'll go right then and there. Then we take the pee and put it in the big potty, flush it, and wave bye bye.
She has accidents every once in a while with the pee, but over all I think she is doing great for just 3 weeks of it.
Now my concern is the poop. She has NO problem pooping in her undies. She knows what she's done, because when she's done she would walk up and say "stinky". Well after the break we took, she doesn't say it after she goes anymore. Only if we find out what she's done. Then she starts crying saying "stinky". She refuses to go on the potty with the poop. We can sit there for 20 min. and nothing. As soon as we let her out, she poops right away. I thought, well maybe it's the whole comfort of something on the waist. Well, not so. She has no problem pooping without undies on, with undies on, in pull ups, no pull ups. It doesn't matter. This girl poops fast! By the time we get to her when we see her trying to go, she's already done. I have tried showing her where poop goes, either big potty, little potty. Doesn't seem to matter.
This isn't a matter of her getting constipated either. Kayley poops like 3 times a day, at least. So giving her something to help her go, would do more damage than good.
I am really at a loss on what to do next. I have a potty in the play area, and she'll sit on it without me "making" her for 30 min. Then go walk away and poop. We have a potty in the bathroom, and a couple times DH has just let her run around in there, and she'll squat and start to go and he'll rush her to the potty and she'll finish it off. But for some reason, she won't do it for me. Heck, she'll even sit on the big potty to finish off her poops with him, but won't for me.
So what do I do now? DH can't be home, he works, but when he is here, he will usually take over. I tried going in with him while we wait for her to poop, but she won't. As soon as I walk out she will.

Back in the saddle again...

2008-10-22T15:18:00.001-07:00

Ok, not the horse one either :)
We started back up with the Potty Training on Sun. so far so good! She actually pooped in the potty!!! Hopefully we can keep this up. Things are going a lot better than before. I think the break did some good. Kayley even says "I pee pee" and "stinky" when she goes.
On the other hand, the kiddos are both sick. Last night Kayley was up every 15-20 minutes. We are all dragging today because of it. We took the door off from their room. Kaiden can get his body up on the side of his rail on the crib. Which means within this week he will be getting out on his own. So we didn't want him smashing his fingers in the door. We put a baby gate in the doorway though so he can't go wandering off in the middle of the night. We also put lots of pillows on the floor for the "thud" when he falls out of the crib.
Kayley can totally get out by now if she wanted to. She doesn't seem to care. Although, she is a lot more tempted in the playpen. She can get her whole leg over the side of that. And that's taller than the crib rail. So who knows. There are pillows under her crib rail for when she gets out too.
There isn't anything in their room they can get into trouble with. The only things that fit in there are the 2 cribs. And the closet has a door knob that we can lock. Their dresser is in the guest room.
So whenever they choose to get out, the room is ready.

HAHAHAHA! Edited to add:
Kaiden got out of his crib. Well, fell out, and bruised his face. So the crib rails are off and they are officially in toddler beds now. The cribs grow into stages. They turn into toddler beds, then full size beds. They were having a party up there. We had to take Kayley's off because she was screaming that Kaiden could get out and she couldn't. So, should be an interesting night.

Cox Farms :)

2008-10-18T15:23:00.000-07:00

Today we went to Cox farms and had a blast! The kids had so much fun. They went in a corn maze, hay ride, pony rides, huge slides, a train playground, a petting zoo, and a pumpkin patch. They were running in all directions and giving Clint and I the exercise we needed to burn off all the calories from the yummy food they had there!

Not much to report...

2008-10-17T07:48:00.000-07:00

Things are calming down here. Not much is really going on. We have made a decision for where we are going for the Holiday's this year. We'll be going to Clint's parents in NC. for Christmas and Thanksgiving. We were going to go to NY. But Clint's brother Bob, won't be back until after Christmas. So we are thinking of going to NY. after he gets back, so maybe not until Spring Break. That's several months away, so we haven't really planned for that.
Clint also can't really take any days off since we just got here. So he'll get the normal federal holidays. Since Clint's parents only live about 7 hours away, that will be where we end up going for both. Less travel time taken away from the vacation days.
We have both already voted for who we would "rather" be president this year. Not necessarily who we "want" to be president. The lesser of the evils I guess. At least we are on the same page as far as who we voted for. His vote won't really make that much of a difference in the state he is registered for.
My vote is in one of the battleground states. Colorado. So hopefully, we get the one we voted for there.
LOL, like I said, nothing really going on :P
This weekend we are going to go (weather permitting) to Cox farms. It's a fall festival type thing. Hay rides, pumpkins, petting zoo. Basically a place where the kids don't have to be contained to a stroller! A friend of mine that has twins posted on her blog about it, and I thought it sounded fun. The kids need to get out and play.
As far as the potty training front, we'll get to it eventually. I'll likely start it up again on Monday. That will be a week off, we'll see how she does. Take care all!

The step back...

2008-10-14T06:26:00.000-07:00

So the whole 2 steps forwards, one step back. Yeah, that's us right now. Kayley has gone on potty strike. We don't know what else to do with her, and I am losing my 1 ounce of patience I do have. So we are going to take a break from this until Fri. then try approaching the issue again.
The hardest part, is knowing she has to go, but she absolutely refuses. So much for hopes she'd be done by Halloween. At this rate, we'll be lucky if she's done by Christmas. It's so frustrating when it becomes a power struggle to get her to stay on the potty.
We went to giving in to her "demands" just to get her to stay seated on the potty. Well all that has done is created a spoiled little girl. She whines over every little thing now when she doesn't get her way. So in order to preserve mommy's sanity. We are holding off for a few days.
Some may be thinking, "she's not ready". Sorry, but I have read horror stories of those who have waited until the kids are "ready" and the kid is over 4 years old. She's already showing signs of "waiting too long". Especially in the poop department. That little bugger will have poop starting to come out, and yet she refuses to sit on the potty. As soon as underwear goes on, she poops. She'll just scream and scream until she gets the underwear on. Then happily poop away.
I am at a loss.

Short but sweet...

2008-10-11T17:31:00.000-07:00

For me anyway.

The last 2 nights I have been out riding my horse. She has been doing amazingly well! I absolutely love her :) I got to ride for over 2 hours today.

Her leg is healing nicely too! She is getting much better about respecting boundaries now. I go out again in a couple of days for another ride. I am trying to get as much time on her since we are all going to go on a trail ride in a couple of weeks. Maybe even as soon as this coming Sat. So far things look optimistic. She has never been on a trail ride away from home, with me anyway. We will actually be loading the horses up in trailers to go to some nice trails not far from here. So I need her to be as ready as possible before then.

Ok, off the subject of potty, pee, and poo :P

2008-10-10T07:19:00.001-07:00

How about a more pleasant topic!

Although it seems all my thoughts only consist of the above mentioned items these days. Other stuff is going on.

As you may have read, my horse really messed up her leg. It's healing very well. I actually got to go out and ride her a couple of nights ago. Just inside the arena. It went well considering her cut leg. Great training for her and for me. There were some other horses in there, and she didn't know them. Yet she did very nicely and paid attention to me...and the gate :) Something about horses and gates. It's bad practice to let the horse stop at the gate going in and out of the arena. So that's my biggest task I am working on with her. Getting her to only stop when I tell her to stop. Not when she wants to stop!

Clint is doing well. He is settling in at work. They kept saying they would be moving his office here on base this month, turns out it's not going to happen until sometime after the New Year. Am I surprised, not at all! He is heavy into this Fantasy Football thing they have online. I guess they pick several players they want as a "dream team" and when they play in real life, they can stack up points for his "dream team". The winner gets a prize. I think that's the true love of his life during football season!

Kayley is doing well in other areas beside the potty. The last couple of days she has been able to count to 10! Ok, not every number. But she'll fill in the blanks when I count to 10. She knows 1,2, 5, 6, 7, and 9. Very impressive I think for a 21 month old. She doesn't know as many words as Kaiden, but that doesn't mean she isn't just as smart! The fear that she may have autism is gone. She has definately caught up to her peers.

Kaiden is a riot! He has mastered the skill of jumping with both feet in the air. He had been working on that for a couple of months now. He is getting very good at puzzles. We have a wooden puzzle with 9 pieces, and he can get the thing put together in about 20 seconds. When we put them to bed at night, he'll say "night night" and blow us kisses and wave bye bye. When ever he notices a car, he yells "car...beep beep". Same with when he sees a cow, "cow...moo moo". Horse is still "sueie...neigh neigh". They love throwing a ball to each other, ok, more at each other.

For me, I am trying to master the skill of patience. I think my kids will have the entire dictionary memorized before that happens though ;) I am trying to get back to becoming me, not just mommy. There are times where I find myself asking, "what about me???" Of course, those thoughts always get interrupted by a screaming child or a child trying to capture my attention by playing peek-a-boo around the corner. I complained of how I had no life when I was a teenager. I was always bored. Not anymore! These 2 keep me going all day, and sometimes all night :)

So what exactly do we do to get her to go?

2008-10-09T07:37:00.001-07:00

So several people have been asking what the process is that I have been using, so here it is:
The first day I started off just having her nakey bottom. I would keep track of how often she would pee. Then show her the potty and tell her that's where pee goes.
I then put underwear on her with a baby washcloth as a pad inside the underwear. For Kayley, she pees every 60-70 minutes. So I take her around that time. To start her I used warm water and would pour it on her private parts. She wasn't comfortable with that. So I decided to just try letting her play with warm water. I got a tupperwear container and put warm water in it on the floor. Then I would put her foot in, and instantly she would pee. I then rewarded her with an M&M, at first it was every time, but now she get's an M&M every other time.
I also let her play with toys in the warm water, so it keeps her entertained. Today I was able to just run the water in the bathroom and she would start peeing. For her, the reward for peeing is now getting to actually play in the water. She gets mad because she wants to play in the water, but she's already peed. So I just let her play for a minute or so.
Then I take the little potty and put the pee in the big potty. She doesn't like the big potty at all, even with a sizer in there to make the seat smaller. But she loves saying bye bye to the pee as it flushes down the potty. She waves to it and everything, it's hilarious.
Tomorrow I am going to try and put the water container that is usually on the floor, on top of the step to the potty. That way it's as though she is on the little one.
As far as timing her. Some people use a timer, and that's great. I am afraid of that. Not sure if you know of Pavlov and his experiments. He is the one with the dog and saliva at the sound of a bell. Anyway, I am afraid that if I use a timer, then she'll associate that with peeing, and start peeing at the sound of a timer wherever she is. So I just log down everytime she pees and poops. Then use that log to get an idea of when the next pee will be at. I keep a tally of how many accidents she has, and how many times she used the potty correctly. It's very encouraging to see the numbers add up in the right direction.
Believe me, this isn't easy. I am the worlds most impatient person. I want things done immediately. So this has been very hard in that area. I am also a control freak, so I am working VERY hard to not yell and get mad when she does have an accident. So far I think I am doing ok. It also helps that when DH comes home from work, he takes over for the evening. I think that helps her to know she doesn't just have to use the potty for me.
Sorry if I rambled. I hope I gave you some ideas to work with. Give yourself a goal. TJ made me :P She said give it 1 week. If I didn't see improvement, then I could stop and go back to it at a later date. Well, I have seen a ton of improvement, so I really can't stop at this point.

A little review and an update too...

2008-10-09T07:33:00.001-07:00

So a week ago DH and I started working with Kayley full time on the potty. We introduced her off and on for several months (same with Kaiden) but we started officially training her last Wed. Here it is a week later and she is WELL on her way!
She will pee 8-9 times a day in the potty. Very rarely does she have pee accidents now. She does have poop accidents. I'm still trying figure out how to get her poops in the potty.
Day before yesterday she had no accidents at all, but then again she didn't poop that day.
She is no longer in diapers during the day now :) She wears pull ups at night and for naps, but other than that, she stays in underwear.
Today she started vocalizing when she needs to pee. She'll run up to the gate and say "pees pees" which I think is please and pee combined. She says please all the time too, and she'll say pee pee when she's actually on the potty peeing. Today she said potty for the first time. She peed 11 times in the potty today, and only 1 accident, but that was poop.
Anyway, I am so proud of her. I think by Halloween she may be potty trained during the day completely. Maybe ;) No later than Thanksgiving I'm sure.
I took her out today for the 1st time since we started training, and she was overdue to pee by 30 min. but she held it until we got home and she went in the potty!!!
Definate progress :)
As far as Kaiden, well, I'm waiting on him and just working with Ky for now. When I am sure she'll tell me when she has to go the majority of the time, then I'll start with Kaiden.
Kaiden is fully diaper trained. He FREAKS out if he goes to the bathroom without a diaper on. So I think he'll be a lot more work :(
I know in PT 2 steps forwards 1 step back. So I am mentally preparing myself for a "relapse".

When the going gets tough...

2008-10-09T07:32:00.003-07:00

BLEH!
Ok OK, Kayley is doing well as far as no accidents today! Yup, all 8 times she went to the bathroom, she did so in the potty.
However, keeping her ON the potty is a WHOLE other story. I had to resort to a popsicle today just to keep her seated. At least she peed with that one!
I'm preparing myself for that step back, you see, today...she didn't poop. Which means tomorrow, we may not be so blessed as we were today.
I was not at my proudest moment today. I had a mommy breakdown. With all the stress, I finally lost it. I had my pitty party and now I am up on my feet again...we'll see what happens tomorrow.
Clint, he is my biggest sanity saver. I really don't know what I'd do without him. When he comes home from work, he does't skip a beat. He jumped right in to the potty training. I don't think that's what he really wanted to do. But I had had it. I couldn't take anymore. Maybe he sensed that and went with it.
My other problem, is when I take Ky in to the potty. Kd gets EXTREMELY jealous. He wants that attention. So today I decided I would try just having him in with us while I tried to get Ky to pee. That did absolutely no good. All that did was get Ky distracted and want to play. Ky is doing so well with not having so many accidents. I think it's more that we're trained, but not her. I don't care, I am saving a bunch of money on diapers! She hasn't been in a diaper in 4 days. She wears the pull ups at night and naps.
If nothing else, I am learning my daughter's cue's on when she needs to go. The problem is getting to her fast enough. I am not wanting to use timers to get her to go because the fear that we'll be out and about, and someone's timer will go off, and she'll just start peeing. I don't want a Pavlov experiment on my hands. He was the scientist that got the dog to salivate with a ringing of a bell. I don't want her peeing with the ringing of a bell!
Although I do have to use one from time to time if we are busy with something and can't see a clock.
So instead I have a log of all the times she pees and poops, and I try to guess when she needs to go again. My theory is that I can push her between times, by distracting her or whatever, so that the number of times she has to go get's less, but more comes out each time. So instead of every 45-60 min. I would love for 1.5-2 hrs. on a regular basis.
I guess right now, my main focus just needs to be getting all potties in the potty though

Great Job Daddy!!!

2008-10-09T07:32:00.001-07:00

If any of you are going to talk to Clint, give him kuddos! He has been taking Kayley to the bathroom for the last 3 days. He has been the one to really get her going. So great job Clint!!!
The totals for today: 8 in the potty and only 1 in her undies!!! She wouldn't have had that one, but I was a little too late running to get her. I saw her look down when she started to pee, but by the time I could get to her, it was too late.
She really is doing well though. She managed to get 2 poops in the potty today!

Things are looking good, but....

2008-10-09T07:31:00.001-07:00

Kayley is getting really good about peeing in the potty. The poops are harder to get in the potty though. She shows no signs that she is pooping. So I have no idea how to get her to go poop in the potty and not just pee. Her totals for today, 8 in the potty and 4 in her undies.
On another note,
The kids are progressing very well. They have TONS of new words now. Kaiden knows more than Kayley, well, he can say more than her anyway. They really are such fun to be around. They have very different personalities. I wish they would both have their Dad's but sadly they don't.
Kaiden has mine. I have the worst temper. I am not always very good at hiding anger outbursts from the kids either. Kaiden sees that and now I am getting bit in the butt by it. They are copying words very quickly, so we have to be very careful what they are exposed to now. Especially TV. I can't believe the words they are allowing on there now. At all hours of the day too. Thankfully Disney and PBS are very good about it. Those 2 channels are my sanity saver!
So developmentally, the kids are doing great. They are mastering all kinds of skills, from throwing, climbing, and actually walking up stairs now, instead of crawling.
Kayley's favorite game is good old "Pat a cake, pat a cake"
Kaiden loves "Head shoulders knees and toes"
They actually sing along with it as I sing it to them.
By far, Kaiden's favorite word is sui. Sounds like sue ee. Daddy taught Kaiden Horsie instead of horse. So now he sounds like he is speaking chinese or something. Especially with how he fluctuates his voice when he says it. I try and correct him and say "no horse" to which his reply is "no sui". LOL, it really is cute.
Kayley has been doing this really cute thing with her arms. She'll throw them out to her side and say "what" which sounds like "whaaaaaat?" It really is adorable. She and Kaiden will both put their hands to their face and say "oh no" and have a pouty lip as they say it with sad little voices.
When Kaiden sees Kayley cry he will run up to her and give her a hug. When Kaiden cries Kayley looks at him with disgust. Mostly because he is crying because he can't have her toy. Which inevitably, he always gets.
If Kayley falls down and starts crying, Kaiden will get jealous and purposefully fall down and pretend to cry. It's quite hilarious.
They have both mastered utensils. Well, mostly. They can actually get the food in their mouths now, instead of their eyes, ears, hair, etc. They are also using plates and bowls now too. Instead of eating directly off the table or high chair tray.
Kayley can undress herself. Kaiden can't. Kadien can put shoes on, Ky can't. Basically, they are both at the same stage developmentally right now, but just better at different things than the other one. They are interacting a lot more now than they used to. They actually "talk" to each other and play with each other. Before, they just played next to each other.
I am so blessed to have these two. I know I complain about the stress a lot, but they really are very good kids and a whole lot of fun. Thanks for reading!

Potty Training (PT) continued...

2008-10-09T07:30:00.001-07:00

Oct. 2nd

So today we had a step forward in potty training Kayley.
She woke up and went potty right away.
The totals for today are:
In her underwear 2 in the actual potty...8!!! So A LOT better than before! She is doing great today. We have been warned for the 2 steps forward 1 step back in potty training. We'll see what happens.
Kaiden was so cute watching her today. I had her on the potty and he would sit in front of her making the "psssss" sound. Kayley was laughing at him.
Not much else to report. Bonita is healing well. She doesn't even act like her leg bothers her. Good thing, it looks really painful.

The potty training chronicles...

2008-10-09T07:29:00.000-07:00

OK, this is it. Potty training has OFFICIALLY begun. We have been "playing" with the potty idea, and have had hits and misses (mostly miss). But Tanja left yesterday, and we are officially "housebound" well, the kids are anyway.
So far...AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH! Ok well, it's just a lot more stress than I bargained for :) We are moving forward with the plan anyway ;) Even if I just end up working with one at a time.
The beginning of this process is crazy. If I had a singleton it wouldn't be so bad. But I don't, I have 2, making work twice as hard, if not more. Why is it that when you have one on the potty, the other one decides they will go potty, and not in the toilet?
This morning started off with Clint taking Kd to the potty right before work. He didn't go. Duh. So after about 20 min. I decide to take him to the toilet. Ummmm, nothing. Ky wakes up and I bring her to the potty, again, nothing.
So naked bottom they went. Within 5 min, Ky peed all over the floor. Great.
I fed them breakfast, and then within a few min. Kd sarts grunting. So I take him to the potty. He SCREAMED like he was dieing. I figured, what the heck. Forget it. Then decided to work with Ky. She sat on the toilet for a couple of min. Then decided she was done. I took her back to the play area, and she pees in the corner. Wonderful. I look over and Kd had peed all over the floor and couch. Uggghh. This is going to be one VERY messy process.
So I decided, maybe nakey bottom is a bit much. I put underwear with washcloths in them on Ky and left Kd in his diaper. It was only a matter of time for him to poop anyway. I look over and Ky has peed in the underwear. YIPPY!
So I went on the big potty to show them how to potty. They thought it was hilarious. I put Ky on the potty with chocolate chips and M&Ms to keep her motivated to stay there. She hadn't pooped yet.
Kd started grunting so I took off his diaper and put him on the potty. He didn't want the chocolate. I couldn't leave to find more bribary, since Ky was still on the toilet.
Kd on the other hand started screaming and freaking out like he was terrified. I looked over and poop was coming out his bum. I knew it didn't hurt, the poop wasn't hard. He was terrified to go without a diaper. Well, his butt is going to be in underwear when not sleeping now. I do not want him being terrified to go without a diaper on. I want him potty trained, not diaper trained.
After reassuring him that it was ok to poop, and showing him where the poop goes, he finally calmed down. But that was after the enitire bathroom floor was covered in poop smears. OY!
Ky never did go in the potty. I took her and Kd out of the bathroom. Ky went to a different corner and peed on the floor. Uggghh. Well, at least she isn't afraid to go without a diaper. She thinks it's funny. She was pointing at it like "look Mom...I peed!!!"
And that is just 3 hrs from this morning. They are napping peacefully in their diapers.
EDITED TO ADD:
So after their naps I decided I am just going to work with Ky for now. She was only in diapers for her nap and bedtime. The rest of the day she was nakey bottom or in her undies. She did manage to poop on the potty (not in the potty) But we'll count that! So the grand total for today: Floor 2, Undies 4, potty 2. Hopefully tomorrow the potty can get a higher score!
I just need to keep repeating this quote:
“Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.” Dale Carnegi

July through Sept. 2008 review...

2008-10-09T07:24:00.000-07:00

Hope you don't mind that I c/p an email I sent to friends and family. Some of it is a little repetitive from my other post. But there are pics at the end.:
So DH will be home from his deployment On Aug. XX!!!! We have orders to be stationed in Washington, D.C. and we will be living on Bolling AFB.
We have quite the trip ahead of us, and I won't bore you all with the insane details of our move. For some reason jumping off a cliff looks a lot more pleasant than a 4 day drive with 19 month old twins, a horse, 2 cats, a camper, horse trailer, truck, van, myself, DH's mom, DH, and myself.
Anyway, we have been assigned a house at Bolling. Which was a huge fear because we have been pretty high up on the waiting list. We started at 59 a few months ago. A few days ago we were at XX, but we got a call, and we have a house now! The move in date isn't until the XX of Aug. We are definately looking forward to just getting there and settled in!
We have a horse stable lined up for Bonita, which thankfully is only a 25 min. drive. Everything else was about 45 min.
We are only going to be about 6 hrs from DHs parents. We'll be about 7 hrs from every other family member he has out in Buffalo, NY.
I'm also excited about how close we'll be to major tourist spots. I have never been to NYC, and we're only going to be about 4 hrs away!!!! I can't wait!

Physically: Kayley is 22 lbs 4 oz. which puts her in the 16th % for weight. She is 31.25 inches tall which puts her in the 32nd % for height. Kaiden is 22 lbs and is in the 4th % for weight. He is 31.75 inches tall and that puts him in the 25th % for height. Remember, boy and girl growth curves are different.
They are both going to need to have surgery on their upper lip when their baby teeth come out, before the permanent come in. The flap of skin is too short and thick, which could cause problems for their permanent teeth.
Kaiden is overall advanced for his age develomentally. He is catching up physically though. He may need to go back to the neurologist for an eval on his head since the sutures of the skull closed prematurely. He is starting to get a very prominent ridge on top of his head. His ears are also getting very uneven. If it gets really bad, then they would have to go in and break the bones in his skull and reallign them.
Kayley, wow. Something is always going on with her. The doctor is suspecting mild autism. If she has it. The doc wants to wait until Ky is 2, to give her a chance to catch up to her actual age. She is still having to go by adjusted age since she was a preemie. Even though Kaiden isn't having that problem. There are a couple of signs that the doctor noticed and wants to keep an eye on it. In addition to that, Kayley may have to get leg braces. She has been doing a lot of tip toe walking. Almost the entire time we were there she was walking on her toes. So she has a refferral put in for physical therapy.
So, once we get settled in the D.C. area, we have a lot of doctor appointments we'll be going to.

Sorry things have been REALLY crazy around here. We are in DC now. After a VERY long drive with some very crazy adventures on the drive. Anyway, we're safe, and in our new house. We finally have internet and cable. But we still don't have our household goods yet. So we have been using folding chairs and the floor as our "furniture". The kids, Clint, and I are really stressed out, and just can't wait until our goods are here, and unpacked.

So yesterday our exchange student Tanja (she used to be our exchange student a few years ago), got to experience the "grand entrance" of the president and VP. Some huge motorcade of like 5 busses with 10 police escorts came by to the white house. Then a secret service motorcade came by with even more escorts. Then the helicopters came by with the president. We were standing at the Washington Monument when the motorcades came. Then we were at the white house when the president landed. That was pretty neat to experience that with Tanja.

OK, I have tried and tried, and tried some more, to be patient and optimistic about this place. It's just not working. EVERY time I feel like "hey, it can't be that bad" I am only kidding myself, no, torturing myself. At every turn something goes wrong... here's a little bit of what I am talking about....
We moved to DC in Aug. We got to temp lodging where we stayed for a couple of weeks. The people upstairs had 6 kids, yes, 6 and they all figured that the floors were a trampoline. Yet there was no where else for us or them to go. So we had to wait there for our house. Now usually, they give you your address as soon as the house opens up. Well, they refused because this and that. Finally they gave it to us. We should have been all moved in by the 27th of Aug. Household goods and all. Well, because we didn't have the address, we couldn't even get household goods here until the 5th of Sept.
Well, let me back track. While we waited for the house, we decided to buy a TV so that we could "do" something while we waited for our stuff. We went to Target, which is normally a nice store. Well, not here. Target is the "walmart" out here. I don't know what happened. I think it's worse than walmart. And I actually liked Walmart. We waited for the guy to get done talking to his girlfriend, who also works at Target. He finally decided to go get the TV for us. After about 30 minutes, he finally comes back with the TV. The end result, we have a TV that skips on the DVDs. In otherwords, broken. We went back again to get a couple of car seats. Different Target mind you, and waited for over 45 min. for the seats to be brought out.
Well, we then got our house. So we had to wait for our household goods sleeping on air mattresses and only had a couple folding chairs for a couple weeks.
We decided we needed a new mattress anyway so off to the furniture store we went. We got a really nice mattress. Hmmmm. Supposed to be anyway. We had them set up for a Tues. delivery. I called midday that Tues. They said that they weren't supposed to come out until Wed. Which meant another night on an airmattress that deflated throughout the night. Trying to reason with the guy was useless. The next day the mattress got here. The thing had dirt all over the bottom of it. They said they could take it back. LIKE HECK!!! I was more than happy to deal with some dirt than another few days on an airmattress. They gave us a promise of a $75 check to pay for cleaning costs. Yeah, great. When I was at the store, I told the lady, I didn't care for a bed frame, that it will just end up moving all over when we get on and off the bed. She talked me into it.
The thing is sitting in our closet.
We had to do a walk through of the house to write a list of broken things. The carpets had burn marks on it, the back porch light didn't work, one of the stove burners didn't work, the fridge was leaking, the smoke detectors didn't work, outlets didn't work, the ice maker didn't work, and the garage smelled like cat urine.
So Service (contractors) came out. They fixed the smoke detectors. Attempted to fix the light switch, didn't touch the carpet, said they didn't see the obvious leaking in the fridge, they fixed the stove, and they fixed the outlets. They also fixed the icemaker.
Well, apparently "fixed" is a relative term out here.
We called them back, because the fridge was definately leaking, all over the floor. Let's just stick to the fridge a sec. He came back, fiddled with it, and says "I promise it won't leak anymore" uh huh...So the third time he comes out, and said, "I guess this fridge is done, we'll bring a new one out". Well after a few days, I called service and asked where the fridge was. The lady had no record of them saying they would replace the fridge. WTHECK??? Instead, we'll send yet another tech out to come take a look. So he'll be here tomorrow.
Well, then there's the light on the deck. Apparently, by fixed, it means that the light is no longer working, and the fixture is hanging upside down. OY!!! We'll be calling on that again. By the way, they came out 4 times to fix that thing.
Then there's the stove/oven. Yup, they fixed the stove. But after several nights of cooking and nothing seemed to be cooked all the way through in the oven. I got an oven thermometer. Well, the oven is about 75-100 degrees off what it says it's at. No wonder my food isn't cooking all the way through. We'll be calling on that tomorrow.
Ah yes, the cable and internet. Let me tell you first, there is this thing on post called a monopoly. Only one internet provider, one phone provider, etc. Lucky us.
We had them come out to set everything up. We have a desk top comp and a laptop. One is wirless, one isn't. We have a wired/wireless modem. Provided by the company. Well they came out to set everything up, but the internet only worked for about an hour before we kept getting bumped off. So we called in. After being on hold for about 30 min., we finally got someone. They said they'd send a tech out. YAY! The tech comes out, pushes a couple buttons. Internet works...for about 45 min. COME ON PEOPLE!!! I told the guys, it's got to be the modem. Just replace the modem. When the thing plugs in, the "power" button should light up. It didn't for a minute or so after. They said, nope, we did this this and this. Your internet works. OK, no biggie. Thanks. I am not kidding you, about an hour later, it no longer worked. Now, those guys came out 4 times. Each time we called we were on hold for 30 min. then it would be 3-4 days before someone could come out. Then they would be out here for a couple hours...each time. The end result, they replaced the modem...and the internet has been working just fine for several days now. GRRRRRRRRRRR, I told them that's all they needed to do.
Well, then the cable. Oh yeah, internet and cable are the the same company....WOOHOO!!! We had it set up. Then it would work for awhile, then not. We were supposed to get the DVR (records live TV), instead, they gave us a stupid HD box. In addition, it only had us getting 20 channels, when we had ordered a lot more than that. So after being on hold, they said that we could either wait a couple weeks for someone to come out to replace the box, or we could take it in ourselves at any time. Wonderful. We took it in. We got back, turned it on, and they didn't give us all the channels we already paid for. After another 30 min. hold, they finally fixed it. Oh yeah, and a tech was still supposed to come out, but he was a no show, at least we got a $20 credit to our account for that.
Well, now the cable and internet are good to go... for now.
Then the movers came to drop off our stuff. They had broken several sentimental figurines. It looks like they drop kicked our kitchen island down a flight of stairs. They literally broke the legs off the thing. What's worse, they had left crystal glasses inside the cabinet portion of it, unpacked. Those weren't broken. Yet the "packed" figurines I have were. Go figure. They ripped the bottom of a king size mattress we have, and broke the fronts off of 3 different dressers. They lost a bike seat that was attatched to a bike...how does that happen??? They ripped the backs of our couches too. I can't believe how much stuff was broken and ripped. So we're still waiting on the claim adjuster to come look at everything.
Let me add to the mix, I have fibromyalgia and a messed up back. All aquired from a serious injury in the Army. Stress and humidity levels make mine worse. Uh...lets see. Not stressed, yeah right. Washington DC...yeah, definately humid.
So then I tried to get a medical appt. Because the fibro has gotten so bad that I can't stay in one position for long, because my legs and arms start tingling and get very sore. Well, I can't make an appt. because even though we are in the military, and use tricare/triwest, we are only registered in the west region, not the north. It's all the same exact insurance. And it's on a military post. I shouldn't even have to register to be seen on post. But according to them, we have to wait up to 10 business days before I can make an appt. Because it takes that long just to push "enter" on the computer.
So, I think I am done ranting now. If you have read this far, thank you! I know things could always be worse. In fact, I feel bad complaining about this stuff. I just needed to let it all out.

So today Heather (theholleranfamily) and I with all of our kids met up today at a local park. She's a friend of mine I met off www.iVillage.com She has twins that are just 6 days younger than mine. We had a great time. Although, I think the squirrel had a better time. Word of advice, never take pumpkin chocolate chip cookies to a park where squirrels live!!!That little bugger took off with a huge bag of them and left them up in the tree so we couldn't get them...Punk!

"Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong"
Murphy's law is kicking our trash. We are officially in a funk. I posted in the rants of how bad things have been going. But now this isn't a rant. I am two steps away from locking myself in a padded room...
The plan... I was going to take the kids out to see our horse at a ranch we board her at. It was a very nice day, and we hadn't been to see the horse "Bonita" for a week due to weather. I was going to get some great pics of the kids sitting in the saddle enjoying being with her. What ACTUALLY happened... That is a horse panel. Supposed to hold horses IN a contained area. My horse didn't want to be in that area. She wanted to be near the hay on the other side of it. So like a typical "toddler" which she is still considered to be. She threw a FIT!
TMI TMI TMI if you get sick at the thought of blood. I won't show pics of the actual wound. It is bandaged.
I pulled up, no one else was at the ranch. I saw Bonita on the far end of the barn. As I got closer I could see that her leg was red. The whole leg. I didn't even notice the panel. I got on the phone with the emergency vet and the lady that owns the barn. While I waited I got a closer look at the leg. I shoul have taken a picture, but I think even TOS violations would kick it off for being too gross. There was a 6-7 inch flab of skin hanging off of her, just dangling there. She was bleeding really bad. The ranch owner got out and helped me calm Bonita down, and calmed me down. The vet came out. Took one look and decided we needed to sedate her. She was messed up bad. She basically tore off all the skin down to the muscle. About 7 inches long and 1.5 inches across. She was still bleeding too. After sedating her she gave a tetanus shot. Then she had to cut the skin off.
It was still bleeding nearly 2 hours later. So she had to "explore" the site to make sure there were no major arteries involved. Thankfully there wasn't. She did have pockets under where the skin was ripped off that were pretty deep.
So now she has to have 2 forms of antibiotics, Butte (pain reliever/swelling reducer), bandaged changed daily, and on stall rest for 2 weeks. Here are pics of her after the bandage:
She looks kind of silly because she was still somewhat sedated. So what was supposed to have been a peaceful couple of hours, turned into having the vet come out and care for my horse.
Then they showed me the panel. I couldn't believe it. The panel was older, but sheesh! The vet said Bonita is very lucky that she didn't rip her tendons and break any bones. I very well could have been faced with thousands of dollars in surgery, or having to put my horse down.
Add that to all the other crap we have been dealing with...I don't know how much more stress I can take!!!!

Apr. through June 2008 review...

2008-10-09T07:22:00.000-07:00

OK everyone, sorry it has been a while for posts. Things have been going very well. The kid are doing great. They definately keep me on my toes! They both say several words, can climb mountains (ok, well it seems like they can), and follow several commands. They play and fight with each other a lot more now.
Clint is coming back Aug. 8th, and we will be moving to Washington D.C. on the 1oth of Aug. We have a place to board my hourse, now we just have to find a place for us, otherwise we will be living in the stall with Bonita.

Ky was admitted to the hospital. We are home now but here is what happened...
She had been throwing up and having horrible diarrhea. She was at the doc on Thur. getting IV fluids. But after a couple days, she was getting more sick. Saturday night, she started throwing up dark red blood. Bright red blood would not have been as much of a concern because it would just mean her throat and esophagus were irritated. Dark red blood means that somewhere her stomach is bleeding, or the valve going into her stomach was bleeding. I won't use all the medical terms they used on me...luckily I have a medical background, otherwise I would have been clueless.
So around 11 on Saturday night, I called her on call ped and he said to get her to the ER right away. After being in the ER for 4 hours they had her started on more IV fluids and different medications to help ease the nausea and coat her stomach. Then they admitted her to the RTU (rapid treatment unit). Where she was put on more medication and given D5W (dextrose...sugar solution). This helped flush her system, while giving her some necessary nutrients. She didn't sleep at all during the night. She didn't finally get to sleep until about 5:30 am Sunday morning. But she kept getting awakened when they would come take her vitals.
Around noon they said to try giving her oral fluids (she was put on bowel rest, where no fluids or food were allowed orally). So after a couple hours with no throwing up, they said to give her some crackers, still no throwing up. Around 5:30 she had a normal BM (bowel movement). Well, normal texture, the color was like chalk. We then gave her more food, and she still had no issues. They discharged her at 6 pm.
She was exhausted. Given the sugar IV though, she was loopy. She would laugh weird, and just seemed drunk. So that's why she seems "normal" in the picture I posted below. You can see that she was still pretty pale. She was doing a little better at the time I took the pics.
Today she is doing A LOT better. She has been eating a little more, hasn't thrown up and hasn't had the diarrhea she had been having. The doc said that at some point today she could get bad again, but unless she just isn't drinking, then she should be ok now. So far so good. Thank you everyone for your prayers!!!

Well, the lab results came back and Kayley had Salmonella poisoning as well as campylobacter. I was in CA. at the time she was exposed, and so we can't really pin down where she got it from. Maybe when we had gone to a public pool and someone had pooped in the pool. Either way, she is doing great. She is happy and healthy and back to her old self again.

Jan. to March 2008 review from other blog site...

2008-10-09T07:20:00.000-07:00

Hey all. Not much going on right now. Clint comes home on Fri. for 2 weeks. When he gets here, we will be going on vacation. We will be staying at a ski resort for 2 nights without kids :) Our anniversary is while Clint is home, so we are going all out. We will be snowmobiling, tubing, a roller coaster in the snow, and a 2 hour horse drawn dinner sleigh ride. We are so excited!

Clint got home for his 2 weeks leave from deployment on Valentines Day, which was a surprise because he wasn't supposed to be home until the 15th. We were very excited about him being home sooner :) Over that weekend we spent some much need time alone as a family. We went to my Dad's on Sunday and Monday, where we had family come over to see Clint. We had a great time. I have 12 siblings. The ones that were there were my triplet sisters, and 4 of my brothers. Then cousins, etc. It was a lot of people, and a lot of fun.
Our anniversary was on the 20th, but we didn't do anything to celebrate, because we would be celebrating the following weekend. We did however spend 5 hours at the mall. We are having our pics professionally done on Tues. so we had to get some outfits put together. The kids didn't get too bored. They were entertained by all the people and things to see.
The 21st we went to the Ped. to get the kids weighed. Last time we were there, the doc was concerned that the babies weren't gaining any weight. Well, they are doing great now. Kayley is 20.08 lbs and 29.92 inches. Kaiden is 20.22 lbs and 29.53 inches. For the 1st time Kaiden weighs more than Kayley. Awhile back he weighed more, but that was because she was very sick. So that doesn't really count. The Ped said the kiddos are doing great now, and to keep feeding them the way we are.
That night we stayed at my Parent's house. Some of my siblings watched the kiddos while Clint and I took my brother Alex (the one that lives with me) and his girlfriend out to dinner. We went to the Cheesecake Factory. I had never been before. I hate cheesecake, but I found out they don't just serve cheesecake...lol. The retaurant is amazing, and the food is awsome!
Friday, the 22nd, we dropped the kiddos off, and we started our weekend trip away from the kiddos.
We started off by going to see the movie "Jumper", the movie was really good, although we could have seen a flop and thought it was good, neither one of us have been to a movie in a long time. From there we headed up to Park City, UT. We checked into the condo, and we were very disgusted by the room. It was a disaster. The drywall was falling apart, the beds were stiff, the place smelled of dirty feet and mildew. We decided to make the best of things and left to go walk down historic Main Street. There were lot's of cute shops. We strolled up and down with hot Cocoa and chocolates. It started snowing really bad so we decided to head back to the condo. Oy, our van sucks in the snow! We were were slipping and sliding all over. We even slid onto a one way street, and we were headed the wrong way. We were laughing in a scared laugh kind of way. We managed to get back to the condo and went to see if we could switch rooms. They said they had no availability for that night, but could switch us the next night. I explained that the room they gave us looks nothing like the one on the web, and they claimed they didn't know what the one on the web looked like. Grrr. So we decided to head next door to the Marriott.
We asked for availability, and they said they didn't have anything available in the "lower" pricerange. I explained how Clint was home from a deployment, and asked if there was anything they could do. The lady at the front desk went and talked to her manager and explained what was going on, and they came back and said they can't go down anymore on the price, but for $266 we could stay in a corner suite. We jumped on it. Especially since the going rate on that room is $999 a night! The room was amazing. I only got pics of the bed area, forgot to get them of the Living room, and spa bathtub. We had huge windows. The bed was sooooo soft, and down feather blankets and pillows. It was beautiful! Unfortunately, they only had it available the one night though.
Saturday we woke up and headed to our snowmobile tour. When we got there, the guy told us that we couldn't do our 1 hour tour because they didn't have enough tourguides, but we could do the 2 hour and he'd take 10% off the 2 hour tour. They had 2 huge groups doing the 2 hour, so we went with them. We had a BLAST!!!!!! Neither one of us had ever been snowmobiling. I guarentee this won't be the last. They took us up into the mountain, and we stopped at a cabin where we had cider and hot cocoa. Then headed out again. It was an amaing adventure! We hit a couple jumps, and on one of them we got a good 4 foot of air under us. We couldn't stop laughing all the way back to the lodge.
From there we went on an Alpine Coaster. Which was so much fun. The thing goes all the way to the top of the lift and you can control the speed of your cart all the way down.
From there we went Ice skating. It was so cute watching Clint fall off balance. We skated for about an hour. Then went to the photo place and asked if we could get pics taken for later. They said they closed at 5. Our event was at 5:30. I pulled out the deployment card, and a photographer was willing to stay behind and take pics for us.
We had a dinner sleigh ride reserved. The horses came down, and we took a wonderfull sleigh ride up to a cabin where they served us dinner cowboy style. The whole thing was fantastic. The food was great, and the service was wonderful. We enjoyed dinner next to a fireplace with a musician singing and playing his guitar and harmonica. He played a huge variety of music other than country. We were very impressed! From there we took the sleigh back down and headed back to the old condo. They had changed our rooms, and the room looked good. But it was awful. We could hear conversations in the rooms next to us, we could hear people walking on the next floor above us. The bed was harder than a rock. We got up earlier than normal, and decided to head back down the mountain and go home.
Yesterday we went to Dad's and hung out with family and watched some TV shows that Clint missed while being away.
We don't have anything exciting planned for today. Tues. we get pics taken, nothing planned the rest of the week though.

So if you all remember my good friend TJ, she is the one that had twins 4 days before I did. We went to CO. to spend time with them.
We arrived at TJ's on the 18th and stayed until the 28th. Things were hectic but very fun at the same time. Let's just say TJ and I have a new found respect for Jon and Kate (the ones that are on TLC with twins and then sextuplets). We finally got them all on a schedule after about a week :) Yes...all 4 babies were STTN!!!!
We took the kiddos shopping, and figured we should put them all in one cart, so we could fill the other cart with groceries and supplies.

Oct. through Dec. 2007 from prior blog site...

2008-10-09T07:12:00.000-07:00

Kaiden and Kayley: Starting to stand unassisted. Walks along furniture. Has developed the pincer grasp (can pick up tiny things like food). Walks with support. Crawls up stairs as well as all over the house. Says "dada" and "baba". They are also able to eat table foods now, but just no citrus, peanut butter, or honey.
Kaiden: 17lbs 3oz. and 27.5 inches in the 5th % for weight, and 20th% for height. His head is in the 19th % (very tiny head) He has 2 bottom teeth and 1 top tooth.
Kayley: 17lbs 7oz. and 27.6 inches in the 25th % for weight, 47th % for height. Her head is int the 85% (big head!) She has 2 bottom teeth, and 4 top teeth.
The kiddos are now caught up in height and weight as each other, even though Kayley still looks bigger. Kaiden has grown almost an entire foot since he was born. Kayley has grown about 8 inches. She has gained about 12 lbs since birth. Kaiden has gaind about 14 lbs.

So we had Kayley's surgery today. We got there about 10:15 for check in, then had to wait in pre-op for 2 hours. The surgery started at 12:20. They took her to the back and intubated her (breathing tube). The surgery took about an hour. She woke up pretty quickly after the surgery, long enough for a bottle of glucose water. Then they transfered her over from PACU to the recovery area. She took about 2 hours to wake up, but I just rocked her until then. At first she was grumpy, but then within just a couple minutes she became the silliest little goofball. She was all smiles and laughs. Of course the drugs had their influence. I swear the 2 hours of deep sleep must have given her a muscle boost because it was all I could do to get her into her car seat! She was strong! So after we finally got home at about 5pm she was doing fine. Right now she is starting to get fussy, the drugs are probably wearing off. The doc did about 12 internal stitches and "glued" the outer layer of skin together. Because of the angle and shape of the cut, she will have a little bump of tissue on the ends of the cut. When she is a couple years old, if she hasn't outgrown the little bits of tissue, they will just remove it. The doc is pretty sure she will outgrow it though. The nevus (the mark on her leg) was removed and sent to pathology, we should hear back in about 4 days whether or not it was melanoma. I am just glad the thing is gone. To have a "ticking timebomb" on my daughters leg was not what I wanted. Now it is gone, and we just have to keep an eye on her so that any other marks don't seem to grow at a rapid pace. Thank you so much for everyones prayers and support!!!

Our kiddos are in a Gym class where they have all kinds of free play, as well as structured activities (ok, ok, as structured as you can get with 10 month olds). Anyway, they have been in the class for about a month now, and they love it..er uh..well they love it, but they moved the time of the class to the same time the kids are supposed to take naps. So Kaiden gets really upset and doesn't want to do the activities. He loves the ball pit and the swings the best. Kayley enjoys all of it.

Bonita, my horse. This is my other baby! Ok so she is a little hairy She has been in great hands with my good friends Joe, Cathi, and Diane out in CO. Since I have my hands full out here, I didn't think it would be fair to bring Bonita out here. I wouldn't have had much time to ride. Plus, she is still young and is getting great training and playtime in with my friends. They ride her for me frequently, so that when the year is up, she will be ready for me to get on her. I "had" her before I had the kiddos. When I was on bedrest, we would park our camper right outside her stall so that I could be next to her.

Kayley has been sick for a couple days. So I took her to the doctor today. It started off as just a little cough but then she got to the point that she was throwing up every meal, and was sleeping all day. She wouldn't even wake up when Kaiden would poke her. I was going to take her to urgent care last night, but decided to wait until this morning. Well, the doc said that Kayley has bronchiolitis that turned into asthma, so now I have to give her breathing treatments every 4 hours. She was so tired yesterday cause she was having to use her stomach muscles to breath instead of just relying on the diaphragm. On top of that her throat looks awful, and she is snotting up something awful too. Her doc also said that if she won't keep any liquids down that tomorrow they will draw more labs and give IV therapy for a couple hours. The vomitting is caused by her coughing/ stomach breathing/ and sore throat. The ped said that this could all be RSV related or flu virus. Even though they just had their flu vaccine a month ago. The problem now is that since it looks like asthma, she is now more likely to get more sick than the average child. This could have all been the result of them being preemies. She may grow out of it, or she could have it the rest of her life. It may just come to the surface when she is sick. All Kaiden has is a runny nose. That could just be because of genetic factors. Hopefully she will get better quickly. I have been sick as well, which makes for a very chaotic household.

Oh my goodness, my little man can walk now! He isn't that great, but he can take 3 steps without falling. He has to get in his starting position 1st. Which is standing and leaning his booty against something, and then he puts his arms up and can take 3 steps I will try to get pictures as soon as I can. He usually falls by the time I can get the image though. It is way cute. He is so proud of himself. After the 3rd step he gets so excited that he forgets to step again, and he just falls. Wow, my little infant is not so much an infant anymore!

Earlier in the blog I had talked about my good friend TJ and her twins. A refresher:
TJ and I met online, found out we lived just a couple miles from each other, that we were preggo with twins together, we were on hospital bedrest together, our babies were born 4 days apart, the babies all spent 3 weeks in the NICU together, they all came home on oxygen together, and both of our husbands deployed together. That's just the tip of the iceburg of the amount of things we have in common.
HAHA, do you think we have a lot in common?
Anyway, so she came out here for a couple days so that we could see each other (she is still living in CO).

WOW! I have had such a great time on vacation. Jody flew up to UT. and then we all drove down to AZ. to visit with Jody's parents and his sisters Nancy and Sandy. We had such a fun time and I am sad to have to go back to just me and the kiddos again.
Anyway, we stayed at a really neat inn down in Camp Verde, and the scenary was so nice. The kids had a lot of fun too. They were just eating up all of the attention. So now I have to unspoil them again. It was well worth it. We then headed out to CA. and got to see more family and friends. The kids also got to ride a horse for the first time too. Jody and I put the kiddos up on his horse Rio. Ok, so they didn't actually ride, but they had fun sitting on Rio. They were smiling from ear to ear. Here are some of the pics. The ranch is where Jody lives. It looks amazing!

This year has gone by so fast in some ways, but very slow in others. The kids are developing quickly now. Kaiden can walk about 6 steps and Kayley is able to take 2 steps. They both have 8 teeth. They are LOVING solid foods. They are able to have just about anything now, and they can't seem to get enough.
They are back to a regular schedule from our last vacation. LOL, now we will be going to Louisiana and they will be even more messed up on their schedules! They are a lot of fun, and Kaiden...he definately has the Revere genes!!! He is one tempermental little boy. If he wants something, he will scream...for an hour over the same thing! If you don't do what he wants, he arches his back, falls on the floor, and freaks out. Kayley is so opposite of him! She really could care less. She will get mad when her limits get pushed, but overall, she is really one of those "go with the flow" kind of people. Just like her Dad. I can tell that I am going to have to deal with another me as Kaiden gets older. I am in SO much trouble!!!
Clint is doing well. Bored out of his mind, but hanging in there. They have him doing so much PT (physical training) that he is always dealing with sore muscles. For Thanksgiving he was able to go to the house of one of the higher up people, and they had a dinner for some of the soldiers. He said he had a good time, and they gave the soldiers tons of movies to watch. He is going to come home for 2 weeks at the end of Feb., which is great because that is our anniversary. Perfect timing for the kids cause they will be walking and a lot of fun to play with.
I am doing well. Taking it day bay day...like I have a choice. The vacation was great, but now we are back into a routine again. We will be leaving the 21st and coming home th 3rd of Jan. We will be celebrating the babies' birthday while in LA. then when we come back we will have a small get together for them in which case my Dad will be making a cake for each of them. He makes the best cakes! He got the recipe from my stepmother who passed away a few years ago (Jamela). She was such a great cook, and left behind the legacy of the "Strawberry Dream Cake".
Other then that, not much to report. The kids had the 2nd part of their flu shots yesterday, and Kaiden didn't even cry, it didn't phase him at all. Kayley only cried for a minute or so, but was fine. I don't have weights or anything on them. They are still very tiny for their age group. The way they are eating now, it won't take long to catch up.

So the last week or so Kayley had a fever that was around 102 degrees. I kept her on motrin to keep the fever down. A couple nights ago, she started bleeding out of her urethra. I took her to he ER and they said it could be some kind of viral issue. She didn't have a rash then. Well she started getting it yesterday, and now it is all over her body. It is roseola, so the worst is over. But she looks so sad. She is cutting a molar right now too. we are on vacation in LA. with family and friends right now. The kiddos birthday party is today, and she has a rash all over her face. I can't believe it. I never thought my babies would get the measles. Uggg. Anyway, I don't have my camera cords to post pics, but I will be home on the 3rd, and can post them then. Anyway, just thought I'd share.
Kaiden doesn't have the measles, and hopefully he won't get it. This last week has been a nightmare. Colic has nothing on the measles. So much for a good vacation :(

Well, we had a good time in LA. The kids met my goal last year of meeting all of their great grandparents in 2007. I don't have many pics yet. Still working on that. First we went to Papa and Ruths, and had Christmas there. The kids had a great time, they were opening gifts and playing in the wrapping paper. Ruth made a fantastic dinner, and we were chowing down. The kids favorite dishes were the sweet potatos and pumpkin pie. What can I say, they take after me :) We had a very relaxing time. Kaiden mastered walking while we were there, and is really good at it now.
Then we went to Aunt Sherri's and that's when Kayley got really sick. Turns out it wasn't the measles. I got confused on the info. Roseola is not the measles, it used to be grouped in the measle category. She was very sick though. She is better now, but that was a rough week!!! They celebrated their 1st birthday out there. Aunt Sherri threw them a birthday party. Kayley screamed the whole time, and Kaiden just kind of stared. It was not the birthday I had imagined at all.
We came home, and had a "redo" of their birthday at my dads. HAHA!!! That wasn't any better. My camera sucks, and I didn't get any good pictures at all. I am hoping I can get some from my cousins that took the kids pictures while we were there. We'll see. Let's just say thet the song that says "It's my party, and I'll cry if I want to" definately applied!
The kiddos are doing well now. Kaiden is copying just about any sound I make, Kayley just watches. No, Kayley is not walking yet :( She'll get there, but she can't take more than 3 steps by herself. They have been off of bottles for 3 weeks now. They are on soft tip sippy cups. I am hoping to switch them to hard tipped within the next couple weeks.
The kids have their 12 month check up on Friday. They are due for more shots :( I'll update on percentiles then. Kaiden got his 1st molar on Friday, and his 2nd one on Monday. Kayley hasn't had one pop through yet. Kaiden has 10 teeth now, and Kayley has 8.
Next week I am going to have my 1st overnighter away from the kids since Clint left. I am going with my family up to a condo, and we are going to go skiing. Well, they are anyway, we'll see if I can. It depends on my hips. Anyway, my friends are going to take the kiddos overnight :) I am definately looking forward to that. I got a break from them twice when we were in LA. My Papa and Ruth watched them for several hours, while I got to go in a boat up and down the river, and then again when we got to go into town to look at some small shops and had lunch. It was nice to be "free" for a little while. It makes coming home to the kids that much more enjoyable. I am happy to see them when I come in the door and they smile and hold their arms up for me to hold them.
Other than that, not much else going on. We are waiting to see if Clint gets promoted this year. We should find out in about a month and a half. We should also find out where we will get stationed next. KY. didn't fall through (thank goodness!), so we are looking at different slots that are opening up. We have a couple more months to see what opens up, then we'll have to sign up for one, otherwise, we could get stuck with whatever the Army wants to give us. I like the idea of us having at least some control over where we go. They usually have about 5-6 slots open at any given time. So far, we haven't seen anything we like.

July through Sept. 2007

2008-10-09T07:06:00.000-07:00

Ok, so we live in military housing, but we live in the newer homes. Well, for some reason, the newer homes have bad mouse problems, whereas the older ones don’t. Well, we have lived here for a year, and have not had one rodent problem. At least not until 5 days ago.
We have 2 cats, both are declawed in the front, but hunt all the bugs and eat them, so we thought they would be good mouse hunters. We didn’t even know we had a mouse until my cat came out from around the corner with it in her mouth. We thought “YES! Go Ginger” What does the cat do??? She drops it and lets it get away. Apparently it is a toy. So we watch our cats the next day, they kept eyeing different areas of the house where this little stinker kept running. I figured we needed to pull mouse detail and find and clean where this mouse has been. HOLY CRAP!!! This little guy has been all over. Tore open bags of rice, baby cereal, and yes, even hot chocolate packets. Luckily I hadn’t been feeding the baby cereal to my kiddos. Anyway, so then we saw the cats looking under the oven in the broiler. Sure enough, mouse droppings. We then saw them eyeing down the laundry closet. Yup, droppings. So we decided to pull out the washer and dryer. Well sure enough there was a little mouse hiding in the corner. SO we called our cat over thinking she would catch it. NOPE! The mouse jumped at her, and she bolted, the other way. She was more afraid of that mouse than he was of my cat! So, the mouse bolts into the hot water heater closet. There is no way in the world we could even begin to try to scare it out. Sure enough there are days worth of droppings back there. Plus a nice size whole in the wall where the stupid gov’t. contractors didn’t seal it. So now we know where the mouse is coming from. The problem is that there is no way to get back behind the heater to close it off. So we sealed the door instead.
I am against killing an animal if there is a possibility of catching and releasing it. So we got some humane live mouse traps, where it has a ramp they can go in, but can’t get out. We got three of them. So last night we put the traps out, one in the broiler, laundry, and pantry. This morning we had caught the mouse!!! I was so happy that we didn’t have to kill him. I took the trap drove about a mile from here, and opened it for the little guy to get out.
That darn mouse ran straight for the van and ran up the tire, and is now somewhere under the hood. So now, the stupid, or smart (depending on how you look at it) mouse hitched a ride back to our house. So either I have brought him back into the house, therefore the whole catch and release effort was pointless; or I have killed the mouse because of him hiding in the engine, therefore completely destroying my whole effort of not wanting to kill an animal if it can be released. Uggghh. I guess we’ll see what that mouse decides to do tonight. So far, the mouse is winning.

Today the kiddos turned 6 months old. We went to their well baby exam. Here are the current height and weight:
Kayley: 14lbs 15 oz. and 26 inches
Kaiden: 14 lbs 6 oz. 25.5 inches
The doc said thatthey have both hit a growth spurt. They are right on target in every area of development.
A couple of disturbing things were mentioned.
Since Kaiden's head is really shifting (he has a flat spot), and his soft spot is closing, which could be causing the shifting problems. The doc put in a referral in for the neurosurgeon. There could be some deformities that may get worse due to the way the skull plates are moving into. He will most likely have to wear a helmit to put pressure in the spots that will make his head go back to normal. Or worst case scenario, he may need surgery on his skull to shift the plates to their normal positions.
Kayley has a birthmark on her leg that is supposed to stay the same size, as she gets bigger, it's supposed to appear as though the birthmark is getting smaller. Unfortunately it has almost doubled in size. So now we have to take her to a specialist so that they can make sure that it isn't some type of skin cancer. That's worse case scenario. More than likely it isn't. Hopefully.
They had their shots today too, so they are so sleepy and have slept since their appt. at 11. It is now 5:30. Poor babies.

Kaiden has made several accomplishments the last couple days. He gets on all 4's and bounces back and forth. He is trying so hard to crawl.

Kayley sticks out her tongue at everyone now. It's cute now, but maybe not later :)

Well we just got back from Denver. It took 1.5 hours there, waiting for 2 hours for the doc cause he was way behind and the secretary had overbooked several patients. Anyway:
When the doc saw him he said his case is so mild that he wouldn't recommend any treatment, and that by 9 months it should correct itself. He said it won't be 100% though. As far as his soft spot, he said for some babies the soft spot is really small, but that the sutures are still there and aren't overlapping.
IN OTHER WORDS GREAT NEWS!

Well, we just had Kayley's dermatology appt. and the doc thinks that it is safest to have it removed. He said it isn't actually a birthmark, it just happened to be there at birth. He said instead of staying the same size like birthmarks do, this one will keep growing as she grows. It could get as big as a credit card. He also said these things are like a ticking timb bomb, you never know if and when they will become something to really be worried about. Also, due to scarring it is better to remove it at a younger age when the thing is smaller. He said he couldn't absulutely rule out that it could be a type of cancer, especially since it has an abnormal shape and is already bigger than the size of an eraser. So when we get to UT. we will have to find a surgeon so that he can keep a close eye on it to make sure it is removed if it starts to look really bad. Anyway, thanks for all of your prayers. Take care :)

Hey all! We are very busy with the move but got to spend several hours relaxing at a picnic for all the babies that graduated out of the NICU. The 2 twin boys with our kids are a friend of mine's. Her and I were pregnant together with twins, ended up in the hospital on bedrest together for 3 weeks, and our kids were in the NICU with ours for 3 weeks (her's were in a lot longer though). Anyway, these kiddos have been going through every developmental milestone together, and this is the first time we were able to get pictures of them. The baby playing with Kayley is her first "boyfriend" lol, but she isn't his first girlfriend ;)

Well, everything is packed and on it's way to a storage facility in UT. When we find a place, the military will move it in for us. We will be heading out midmorning today (Wed.) instead of the planned Thurs. We had to stay in the worst hotel, worse than the Bates Motel from Psycho. The sad part, is this "inn" as the Army calls it, is for out of town guests. We have been here since Mon. afternoon. We should be at our destination tonight, and hopefully in the next week, we will find a place to live. My Dad has offered up his home for us to stay in until we find a place. The kids are stressed out, they cry more and fight sleep more. They aren't happy about being cooped up in an unfamiliar place. Neither are we. That's all I have for now, I will update when we get more settled in.

Well, we found a home and it is very comfortable. The kids love it, they have a huge room that is just for baby toys and the babies. It is a 4 bed 3 bath, living room, family room, house. Very nice looking too. So we are now unpacking and getting settled in. We will be heading to NY next week to see Clint's friends and family. We will be gone a week and then Clint leaves the 29th.

WOW! Kaiden crawls...fast! He is all over the place and we are very fortunate that we found a place when we did. The camper bunk no longer contains him anymore. They are starting to mutter "da-da" and "mama" But it doesn't come close to sounding distinct. It sounds more like "ehdededede" and "ahmememema" and Kaiden does it more than Kayley. She however makes some very cute babble and cooing noises as she is learning to combine different vocal sounds together. Kayley isn't crawling, yet, but she is very close. Kaiden will crawl to a stair and stand up, but his legs are so far apart that he starts shaking, he then gets mad because he doesn't have the strength to bring his legs together while standing. Other than that, things are going well, and we are a lot less stressed since we have found a place. We don't have internet right now, and won't for several days, so I am using my Dad's internet for updates.

Well, have you ever tried to stop a mac truck...because that's what Kaiden has become. He learned to crawl not 2 weeks ago, could pull himself to a standing position a couple days after that, and now...he can climb stairs. We were so not ready for that. We figured a couple more weeks. Yeah right. He climbed 4 stairs in just a couple minutes. The 1st 2 we didn't even realize it. We had gone to the kitchen to make some bottles, and we looked down to see what they were up to and by that point he had already climbed 3 and did the 4th one while we were watching. This is crazy, this boy is going to be walking before 10 months old, and I am not looking forward to that just yet.

LOL, the first time I went to NY I was 23, my kids get to go at 7 months :) We had a great time. Clint's brother Bob hosted us while we "made the rounds" with all the family and friends. The kiddos grandparents from NC drove all the way up too. The flights out there weren't too bad. We had 3 of them! The 1st one, the kiddos were a little fussy, but the next 2 they slept the rest of the way there. The first day, all the boys went to a place called Lasertron. They got to play war with each other. Apparently the little kids were taking out the "big kids" (though they would never admit it). The next day we just hung out and the guys played X-box games. Sunday Bob's family hosted a farewell for Clint and a lot of his friends that he grew up with were there as well as a ton of family! Grandparents and other family took the kiddos so we could visit. I still think that was mine and Clint's chance to get away for a few days and ditch the kids ;) The kids also got to meet there Great Grandma Ivy. She was so happy to see them, and the kids were having a great time with her. The kids also went swimming for the 1st time. Bob has a very nice salt water heated pool, so it was really easy on their skin. They had a blast!
The flight home was awful. The delays, not the kids. They were really good considering we had 2 hours worth of delays. We didn't even get home until 2 am!

Wow, so things have been crazy lately. Very busy. Clint left 2 weeks ago for Kuwait. He calls every couple days. Everything is fine on his end. He is still waiting for his own room. While he is still settling in, and doing his briefings, he is on a waiting list to get a room. So our phone calls haven't exactly been private, since he has to use the one in the hall.
The kids are doing well. Kayley is finally crawling on all 4's and not doing the army crawl. They are on solids now, they couldn't for awhile because they had problems digesting it. The doc gave them some medicine to get things moving along, and now they aren't having problems. Well, except that even after stopping the medicine Kaiden is still pooping around 5-7 times a day!!!!!! Ugggh. They are bored with the stage one foods that are like liquid, so now they are getting stage 2 with more texture. They love it. They are eating finger foods now too. Kayley got her 3rd and 4th tooth a couple days ago. It the top middle front teeth. Kaiden is about to get one of those. They are best buddies, lol and some sibling rivalry. They laugh and play with each other, mimic each other...which is not so fun when they mimic crying! They play together, and steal each others toys, which results in temper tantrums. Kayley hit a growth spurt and is quite a bit bigger than Kaiden now.
We have been referred to a surgeon for Kayley's mark on her leg. So we'll see what the plan is from there. The appt. isn't until the 28th. They are crawling and climbing over everything. Kayley can stand unsupported for a few seconds now. Kaiden is walking along furniture and transfers from couch to table without sitting down to do so. I give him maybe a month before he is walking!

So we went to Kayley's surgical appointment today. The doctor is worried about the mark on her leg. She fears it is melanoma, and wants to remove it immediately. Kayley is set for surgery on Monday Oct. 8th where she will undergo general anesthesia. The Doc doesn't want to biopsy it, she wants to get it off of her as soon as possible, which would be the 8th. The Doc also said that even if the thing isn't Melanoma now, that they almost always turn into it. So please say lots of prayers for Kayley and her surgery.

Review of March to June 2007 from other blog

2008-10-09T06:55:00.000-07:00

March to June 2007

Well, we have reached the 3 month milestone.
Babies are now:
Able to lift head and chest up while laying on their tummies.
Starting to see their hands.
Sleeping minimum 6 hours at night but mostly 7.
Laughing and talking to people and toys.
Cry when they get bored (not so happy about that one)
Kayley can sit for a little bit without support.
They turn to familiar voices.
They don't startle as much.
They don't scream over a minor amount of stress (Very happy about that one)
They make noises to get my attention.
They bring their hands together.
They grasp objects if given to them.
They have more alert periods and want to play.
When on their tummies they can roll from side to side, but not all the way over yet.
That's all I can think of for now. As for Clint and I, we're doing well. We aren't nearly as stressed as we used to be, and are taking everything in stride now. The babies are on a great routine which makes thing a lot easier. This next week we are going to lengthen their feeding schedule by about 15 minutes. Our hope is to get them to a 4 hour schedule instead of 3. This may take a week to get them there, but with us adding small amounts of time every feeding, we should be able to accomplish this rather quickly. I get out to see my horse more frequently now, and Clint gets to go out and enjoy golfing again.
I am already planing my next trip, I am hoping to go to Utah at the end of May. The babies will be nearly 5 months old by then, I can't believe how time is starting to fly by. I tell ya, the "early" days with the NICU and hom O2 seemed to last forever, each day seemed like a week. Now it's the opposite.
Thank you to everyone who has sent us gifts for the babies and for us as well. It is so crazy how busy we get, that by the time we get some kind of a break, we have forgotten who sent what. I had a system in the beginning, but the kiddos decided to do away with that. So I apologize if you have not recieved a thank you card by now, please be patient, we'll get this thing down soon (maybe 18 years from now???)

Clint's brother Bob and his wife Rosanne came to visit us over Easter. They brought her mom, and their son Bobby. The weather was really bad, so we were house bound for a couple days. The guys had fun playing X-box the majority of the time. Luckily the weather is better today, so they will get to go out and get to see how nice the area is around here. Oy, the kiddo's have been extremely fussy. I think they are in a growth spurt because they are both eating full bottles now; they wer leaving about 1.5 oz. in every bottle. Well, as of yesterday, that has changed. Hey, no more wasted formula for a while now :)

Well, it was bound to happen at some point, we are just happy it didn't happen when they were smaller, otherwise they probably would have to be in the NICU again. They have a really bad cold, and as long as they are eating, we'll be ok. It's the wonderful stuffy nose, sore throats, coughing, and fatigue. I am not feeling nearly as bad as them, but I have the same symptoms, so I can know how to treat how they're feeling. We actually had to take them to the ER because the pediatric clinic had no openings yesterday, and since our kiddos are preemies, they suggested we bring them in to make sure they can be treated as soon as possible. I feel so bad for them, but this is life, and they are getting to build up their immunities that much faster. They are on a couple medications to treat their symptoms, so hopefully this won't last too long.

Last night we had a very big scare. I had just fed Kayley, and was working on feeding Kaiden, when out of nowhere, Kayley started gagging, and then this thick mucous mixed with formula came bubbling out of her mouth like a mini volcano. I put Kaiden down, by this point Kayely wasn't able to breath. I had one of the bulb syringe things the hospital gave us, and I had to use that to clear her airway. She had turned purple for over a minute, the bulb couldn't keep up with the stuff coming out of her. So I went to the hosipital in my car, cause it would have taken to long for an ambulance. By the time I get there, she was fine, smiling and everything. so the stupid triage guy looked at me like I was insane. They finally brought us in the back after 30 minutes. Then had me sit there another 15. When the doc came in all she did was listen to her lungs and say that it was just throw up, and sent me home. No labs, nothing. Nor did they take a sample of her stomach juices to see what could be going on. They didn't do crap. It was clear thick mucous, very thick, like the consitancy of gel, just stickier and slimier. She said there was nothing they can do. She set me up with an appointment in peds this morning, I didn't even bother going, they'll just tell me the same thing. They didn't even document everything the way I told them. They said it was green mucous, nope, they said that it was because of her cold. She's been over her cold for a couple days now, then they said, oh she is just throwing up and she'll be fine. Well the next time it happens, I am taking her to Memorial, the hospital they were born at.
If she does this again, I will definately go to memorial, I don't care if all she has is a cold, and it's Friday, so I can't go to Evans, she is not going back there. The worst part though, I can't just take her off post, I have to go to a military treatment facility first. Unless it's an emergency, in which case we go to the nearest ER. Well, if we just "happen" to be closer to Memorial, we'll go there. Ugg, I am quickly losing respect for any military doctor. The worst part, I used to work with them when I was in the military.

I have had it! These babies have been crying all day, through the night, so I caved. This is the thing I told everyone I wouldn't do, and I really meant it. With twins, I think all rules go out the window, and you just have to do what you can just to get by day to day. So here it is I confess, and if you want to bash my choices, take your opinions elsewhere, those that understand, thanks for not judging me.
After an ER trip, nonstop crying, throw-up, fussy eating, and more crying, I couldn't take it anymore. I have these Baby Einstein DVD's and I brought the TV and put it right in front of their swings, and hit play. They have their toys to play with too. I needed a break, and nothing, and I mean nothing, would calm them down. Well, it worked!! They love it, it's great that it is stimulating and they are learning from it, rather than mindless cartoons. I look at it this way, either I have to let them CIO or I give them stimulating DVD's. Unlike mom's with singletons, I have no choice to let one baby CIO if I am tending to another baby. It hurts, because you're always feeling like you're leaving one baby out when you're giving attention to the other. At least this way, they can "do" something instead of CIO. It's great, it's not going to be an all day thing, just long enough for me to pull it together, and get some chores done. It's already helped my girl to calm down and go to sleep.
They have only watched it for about 10 minutes, and the crying stopped after just 1-2 minutes of it playing. They are also sound asleep.

Well, we have been here for 3 years, and that's when families come up on orders to move to a different duty station. Clint's unit is overstrength in soldiers with his rank, and since we've been here the longest, we're up for the move. We have no idea where we'll be going, but it will likely be within the next 6 months. Good grief, moving with 6-10 month old twins is not what I had in mind...

We did the Walk America march yesterday. It was incredible. It was a beautiful day, about 74 degrees, and sunny skies. There was a pretty big turn out too. The walk took place in America the Beautiful park. This was the area that Katharine Lee Bates composed the famous patriotic song, "America the Beautiful."
The kiddos looked so cute in our new jogging stroller. They had on their cute little hats that Grandma and Grandpa (Clint's parents) gave them. Sorry, I didn't get pictures, but they looked like babies you would see in a commercial celebrating Spring. Ok, Ok, so I am a little baised there. They were absolutely adorable, and they had a great time. They got to see the world from a whole new perspective. They can sit forward facing in the stroller and they were talking and smiling the whole time. Unlike the rear facing car seat stroller.
I guess now that I have an all terrain stroller, I actually have to start exercing :)
Thank you everyone who donated. Your donations are helping to save babies lives.

Just wanted to share everything we've learned today. We had their Occupational and Physical therapist evaluations today, as well as their Well Baby.
Neuro: They did about 30 tests to determine where they are on the develomental curve for actual and adjusted age. Their actual age is 4 months, adjusted is 2 months 3 weeks. Adjusted for those that don't know is going by the date they were due to be born, and actual is going by the date they were born.
Kayley: Is at 96th percentile if using corrected age for motor skills, and 50th percentile for actual age. So she is right on target. Height, weight, and head size: 12lbs 11oz. and 23.82 in. Head (big head!) 42.1 cm. Her H &W is in the 25th percentile for actual age, and doing great on her growth curve, actually is gaining a little bit ahead of her curve. My little chunky monkey :P Her head is in the 75th percentile. She was the same while I was preggo.
Kaiden: My little genious boy. Is at at 98th for motor skills at corrected age and 75th for actual age. He is way ahead of the curve on that. Height, weight, and head size: 12lbs 2oz. 22.6 inches head 40.9 cm. They actually didn't have him able to show up on the curve. He is lower than the 5th percentile in H & W. His head is in the 25th. However he is still on the same growth curve with his H & W and is gaining like he is supposed to.
Their Doc said to start Kaiden on cereal because he has some reflux, but by spoon, not bottle. He said if that doesn't calm it down, then to do a trial on Soy to see if that helps. He said I could with Kayley, but only if she wants it. Right now she wants nothing to do with it, but Kaiden sure does. He opens his mouth for the next bite. So we'll do cereal now with him. He said just not to start other solids until they are 6 months though.
Kaiden also has mild torticollis. The therapist saide that it really isn't much to worry about. He just prefers to lay with his head one way over the other, but he looks in both directions. With some basic stretches, she said he'll be fine. We go back in 4 months.
They also had their shots today :(

This was my first Mothers Day :) Clint has been so amazing this weekend. We have been having some really hard times trying to get the kiddos to eat. The docs had us switch formula to soy, but that didn't fix the problem. They have really really bad stomach gas, that it hurts them so bad to eat. We tried the gas drops. Those didn't work. So the doc wanted us to come back in. He said to try Zantac for reflux. I know it isn't reflux, but we tried all we could think of so we tried it. That just made matters worse. The flavor is so horrible, I tried a taste of it, just a drop and I was gagging. I had to give an mL of it to them, not only did they gag and swallow more air in the process, but they started throwing it up. So much for that. We switched bottles and nipples. We are now using platex drop ins with the collapsable bags so that no air is swallowed. That seems to have helped a lot. Clint took over this weekend, I needed a break from fighting them the last 2 weeks. Well, of course they would do better with him feeding them. Come tomorrow, I am sure it will go back to fighting them to eat. The next step, if this doesn't work, is going to be a fomula that is partially digested so it's easier on their tummies. Well, the really bad part about that is that for a container that we normally buy would be about $10 per, well, this formula is $24!!! The don't even sell a bigger one. This container would only last 2 days. You can do the math...There is no way we could afford that! So please pray that the formula isn't the problem, that it's just gas that will go away in time.
Anyway, about Mothers Day. Clint took care of all the feeds this weekend, which allowed me to catch up on a lot of sleep. This morning he made a really big breakfast. Then the kiddos gave me a necklace, and Clint gave me two really pretty porcelin (no idea how to spell that) sculptures of a mothers hand holding a baby, one hand holds Kaiden, the other Kayley. Their names are engraved in the sculpture. I had a very good Mothers Day, take care everyone :)
Happy Mothers Day!!

We have word,
I am officially moving to Utah in Aug. Clint will have to report to Kuwait in Sept. We are so happy that he is going there, and not Korea. There is alot more to do in Kuwait, and he can travel around more. He will be going to a nice post, they have golf, swimming, etc. Best of all, there is no hostile activity where he will be. So, the fun of moving the 5th time in three years begins...
Here is a picture of Kaiden...just before he rolled over for the very first time yesterday. He was so cute. He has been trying to do it again, and gets mad at himself when he can't get over.

It has been awhile since I have updated. Like I mentioned, our comp crashed. I have the worst luck with computers.
Just before they turned 5 months Kaiden started to roll. He started to grab at objects, and he began to have full body giggles. The babies and I went to Utah to visit family and friends. My brothers Jason and Daniel were the best babysitters, and the kids love them! I got to go and do stuff by myself several times. They had their baby blessings at church by my Dad. Kaiden was quiet during his and I actually got to hear it. My dad did so good :) They baught him a cute outfit to wear too.
The last couple weeks he has developed sooo much! He rolls, and rolls, and rolls. I can't leave him alone for a minute because he will be across the living room floor. He grabs at everything; toys, my hair, the dogs hair. Our dog, Charlie, is very good about it. Instead of snipping at them he bites his own hair and pulls it out of the baby's hands. Kaiden is also eating baby food. As seen in the pictures, no bib in the world would have stopped that mess. He loves toys. He steals them from Kayley. He smiles at Kayley a lot, and will giggle at her every once in awhile. He scoots all over now too. He can lift his whole back end up, he can lift his whole front end up. Just not at the same time ;) He can stand up supported. He can also sit up with very little support now. We took the kids to see Shrek the 3rd and he watched the whole movie.
Ok I'll post more pics (they come out before this post).

Here is her update. We have figured out the differances in their schedules. Kaiden is develomentally about 4 weeks ahead of her.
Just last week she mastered the roll. LOL, she doesn't roll across the floor, she rolls in circles. She can lift up her back and front end. Like Kaiden, not at the same time. She laughs louder than Kaiden, and laughs more. She grabs at everything, but not really coordinated. She drools a lot, but no sign of teeth yet. She is always trying to get anyone's attention. She makes so many funny sounds, and sings along to the hymns in church. She is very vocal now. She isn't very fond of baby food either. Lately she has been fighting her bottles again. She puts her hands on her bottle and tries to hold it.
More pictures to come (seen before this entry).

Hi everyone!! Sorry it has been soooo long. After the computer crashed, we had to order a new one and it took 3 weeks to get here.
The updates on the babies are below. But here is the update on Clint and I.
Clint reports to Kuwait on August 29th. So since he gets 30 days leave prior to him leaving, we will be moving all our stuff to Utah on the 30th of July. Thankfully the Army will be paying and coming to pack up all our stuff. All we have to do is not let them pack stuff we will be needing right away when we get to Ut. Our stuff will most likely get there before we do. We leave Aug. 2nd to head west. My horse and trailer will be staying here so that my friend Joe can ride her for the year. While Clint is gone, I know I will have very little time to ride, that it could actually be unsafe to get on her if I can only ride every couple weeks or so. She has only been trained for a year, and is only 3 years old. So she needs more steady time on her. Then there's me. Because I had so many issues during the pregnancy, my pelvis split in half. So I am in physical therapy to repair the damage. As a result of the pelvic fracture, my "seat" has changed in the saddle. I have poor muscle tone to stay seated while she trots. So the year I am away from her, I will continue physical therapy.
Last week was my real practice for time without Clint. He was in the field doing military training and they don't come home during that time. So, without help, I managed my way through and got along well. At least in UT., I will have a lot of help. Lots of family and friends. I figure, if I can make it a week without help at all, then I will do fine for the year since I will have help. Ok OK, at least I keep telling myself that.
Clint is getting things ready at work to get us cleared from Fort Carson. We have to clear housing, medical records, phone, cable, bla bla bla. So there is a lot of stuff we have to do to get out of here.
We will be taking the truck and our camper. My step dad will be taking care of our truck and camper while Clint's gone. Since he is a mechanic, and a very good one at thet, he will make sure the truck stays up to date on fluids and such. A diesal truck sitting idle during the winter can be harsh on it when starting it up again, if it even starts.

A review of 2007 from prior blog site Jan. to March

2008-10-09T06:39:00.000-07:00

2007 Footnotes...

Jan. to March...

My twins are here after 35 weeks of pregnancy. They were born by c-section after problems associated with preecclampsia, twin discordancy, and kidney infections. They were born Jan. 2, 2007 at 4:33 pm. The babies go to the NICU due to prematurity. Kayley had fluid in her lungs and had to be suctioned out after birth. She also had to have TPN (total parental nutrition) which is a special IV mixture made specifically for her in Denver, then flown down to where we live. She also had to have sugar IV's because of low blood sugar. Kaiden had low blood sugar, but did not have the same complications as Kayley.

The babies came home after 20 days in the NICU. They are off everything, except their oxygen. They will come off oxygen as soon as their oxygen levels in their blood stay above 92% Right now they are at about 86%.

Clint's parents come from North Carolina to see and help with the babies. They have been great! They help with every feeding, and spend lots of time with the babies. It's going to be fun unspoiling them now ;)

After a day of nothing but screaming by both babies, we tried everything to calm them. Nothing worked. Finally we decided to let them yell at each other, since we were too exhausted to tend to their cries. Well, the opposite happened, the second we laid them next to each other, they calmed down, and started talking to each other. We couldn't believe it, that was the most quiet they had been all day.

Wow, Kayley has hit quite the growth spurt! For the last few days she has been fussing, screaming, and always hungry. Well, one day she was wearing newborn clothes, the very next day, she outgrew them all!! She is now over 9 lbs (remember she started at 5 lbs 4 oz. after the normal newborn weight loss). She is starting to interact by kicking her legs when she is excited, when she is with her brother, and when she knows she is about to eat. She is also starting to "coo" a little. She is doing great, and went from eating 3 oz. every 3 hours, and in one day went up to 4 oz. ever 3.5 hours. Last night they both slept for 5 hours! It was great to get more than a 2 hour stretch between meals.

Well, the very next day, our little man decided Kayley will not outdo him, and he hit the same growth spurt. He went from wearing newborn diapers one day, to wearing size 1's the next! Good thing I had extra's while I was out running errands, otherwise it could have been pretty ugly! He still fits the newborns clothes, because he is just over 8 lbs. now. He started out at 3lbs. 11 oz. after the normal weight loss. He, like his sister, interacts with people. He is actually more talkative. When the 2 are together, he does all the talking, and she just watches him. When they cry, she'll stop and let him do all the crying. It's so funny watching them start to interact with their environment. They have started "seeing" toys now. Before they didn't even look at them too much. Now, they'll stare at black and white toys, and those with bright primary colors.

Wow, after the night we had last night with "teething behavior" this morning I was rewarded with a very cute smile. I thought, no way, that's just a coincidence. Nope, she smiled again when I smiled at her. LOL, I still thought, it's just me. Nope, After her bath and being fed, she was in her swing, and I started smiling and talking to her again, and she smiled, again!! I am so thrilled, at least I got my reward for the bad teething behavior last night ;)

Grandy (my mom) came out to visit from California for a few days. We had a great time, even got to see a movie with the babies. They were great, and she was lots of help.

Oh man, I can't remember the last time Clint and I slept so well. They gave a good 6 hour stretch of sleep last night. So Clint taking the last feed, and me taking the 1st feed, we both got about 9 hours of sleep, man did that feel good!!! We went from getting about maybe 2 hour stretches, to 6 hours between meals. Life is good!

Well, I made the trek (long drive!!) from CO. to CA. for my brothers wedding. I left Wed. and got here Thursday afternoon. The babies were so good the entire trip! I was all by myself the whole time. I had to keep checking to make sure the kiddos were really back there, they were so quiet. OMGoodness, they made up for it big time when they got here though! They both cried inconsolably for 6 hours strait. I finally just had to shut the door and let them cry it out. Hehe, I had just told everyone how good my kiddos are, and then we get here, and they made me look like a liar! Surprise, surprise. Used to be we would tell everyone how they cried all the time, but when they would come over to see the babies, they didn't cry at all. Oy, guess that's life.

The kiddo's got to see their Grandpa Jody and he was so helpful with them. Especially since Clint didn't fly down for a couple days later. We had a good time with Jody.

Wanted to share my little cuties all dressed up for photo's. I will be sending out this and a couple other photo's to our family and friends. Take care.
ETA: The babies had a weigh in before their shots. Here are the weights:
Kayley: lowest weight 5 lbs 4 oz. Currently 10 lbs 5 oz.
Kaiden: lowest weight 3 lbs 11 oz. Currently 9 lbs 13 oz.